| Re: "Humans 'very likely' making earth warmer" is wrong
Joe Fischer <joe@westpointracing.com> writes:
>On Sat, 03 Feb 2007 10:34:02 +0900, Bernd Felsche
><bernie@innovative.iinet.net.au> wrote:
>>Sequence is not proof of causality.
>Right logic, wrong words, "causality" in science only means the
>proper sequence, the cause must precede the effect.
Causality in physical sciences doesn't require sequence. e.g.
gravity of the Moon and Sun cause tides on Earth. The "events" are
simultaneous and appear concurrent to observers in the same frame.
Causality requires that things are linked by a physical
relationship, according to the laws of nature.
>My reasoning on global warming is that it is very likely going on,
>but since there was ice a mile thick across all of Ohio and Indiana
>18,000 years ago, there must be a general warming trend that hasn't
>stopped yet.
There have been at least 5 "coolings" since the last glacial ended,
approximately 10,000 years ago. These were between the Holocene
optim,a at about 5000 year before present (ybp), 3000 ybp, 2200 ybp
just prior to the Medieval Warm Period and then the "Little Ice
Age"; starting about 700 ybp and having its last plunge about 150 ybp.
>CO2 in the atmosphere must surely be increasing because man burns
>coal and oil, unless there is an unknown process where carbon is
>disassociated from the oxygen or combined with something else and
>it falls to Earth.
CO2 is released from the oceans as they warm. That's the main reason
why a rise in CO2 is observed to _follow_ temperature increases.
Such releases follow because the surface area being warmed is finite
and most of the CO2 is stored a long way down; needing to travel to
the surface via convection to re-establish the surface equilibrium
of dissolved CO2.
That CO2 flux is about 50 times greater than that from the burning
of fossil fuels by human activity.
>But most climatologists say that water vapor has 20 times the
>shielding, absorbing, and reflecting effect as CO2.
There is no global "greenhouse". Real greenhouses work by preventing
free convection. The "greenhouse gases" do no such thing. They
simply absorb part of the available radiation depending on the
molecular arrangement; its resultant "tuning" to the wavelength of
the radiation; and warm themselves. The molecules can't get a
"second bite" of radiation already absorbed by other molecules;
either of the same gas or others. The resulting temperature increase
is logarithmic; not linear.
Water is *the* major "greenhouse gas", responsible for the bulk of
the 30 degrees C or so of greenhouse that make this planet habitable
(in places) for humans.
The most important driver of climate is solar radiation. Sunspot
activity is a typical indicator of that and such activity has been
recorded for longer than temperatures; since the 1600's. Sunspot
activity was, until quite recently (<10 years) at a maximum similar
to that estimated (from C-14 presence) for the Medieval Warm Period.
Note also that sunspot activity also indicated how much cosmic
radiation impinges on our upper atmosphere; which has demonstrated
experimentally by researchers in the past year, increases the
likelihood of cloud formation. At high altitudes, such clouds
increase the reflectivity of the Earth (albedo) and there is less
heat available to be transmitted to the lower atmosphere.
Albedo is also variable in the actual surface presented to the sun.
That, in combination with the variable orbit of the Earth around
the sun provide a significant challenge to predict how much sunlight
reaches the lower atmosphere were one to ignore the highly-variable
cloud cover and the variability of the sun itself.
Not only are there too many equations; there are too many *unknown*
equations to be able to produce a computer model with any credible
chance of providing predictions of climate. They try to do
computational fluid dynamics without knowledge of boundary
conditions... and adjust the fudge-factors until the output looks
right.
Yet the IPCC is obsessed with computer models and CO2 to the costs
of thousands of millions of dollars every year; both directly and
indirectly.
If Kyoto really worked, it'd at best cool the "greenhouse" by one
thirtieth of a degree Celsius. The costs of implementing Kyoto far
outweigh the benefit of that one-thirtieth of a degree. Not that
it's actually possible to measure such a thing.
We are after all dealing with The Church of Climatology where the
high priests propagandize and collect their extorted moneys from
governments and officials, lest their ignorance and incompetence be
(more) exposed to the public that funds the Quixotic enterprise.
--
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