how much warming from adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere is what we

[itfitzme]

Quick, run and hide or the truth is gonna get cha and eat you all up!

Ignorance is hard to defend because you got no facts. Your best option is to slam your mind closed and never, no, never open it again!

I am afraid that it is you who is short on facts. *I keep asking for facts and you keep giving me opinion. *Lets see the hard data that proves that AGW exists....following that, state how much warming is due to man's CO2 emissions.

You keep talking about facts but remain incapable of producing any. *The models are based on the AGW hypothesis and they are failing spectacularly. * *Look at this. *It is a graph of the output of 73 climate models compared to the satellite record and actual measurements made with balloons.

All of these models claim to be based on the same set of actual atmospheric physics but look at their output. *None of them produce the same result....in fact, they are all over the place and diverged completely from the observed temperature. *If I build a model, or 50 models based on the Stefan-Boltzman law, or the ideal gas law and run them, the results could not help but be the same because if any number of models were based on a physical law, by definition, their output would have to be the same and the output, if it were in fact based on the physical law, would match observation very closely. *That isn't what is happening with the models...they not only do not match each other even though they claim to be based on physical laws, they do not match observation.

If you are unable to see the uncertainty, flaws, and spectacular failure of the claims made by climate science, then I am afraid it is you who suffers from the closed mind.

Here is the appropriate image if actual mean global temperatures vs IPCC models from the last IPCC assessment report.

Errata FAQ 8.1, Figure 1. Global mean near-surface temperatures over the 20th century from observations (black) and as obtained from 58 simulations produced by 14 different climate models driven by both natural and human-caused factors that influence climate (yellow). The mean of all these runs is also shown (thick red line). Temperature anomalies are shown relative to the 1901 to 1950 mean. Vertical grey lines indicate the timing of major volcanic eruptions. (Figure adapted from Chapter 9, Figure 9.5. Refer to corresponding caption for further details.)

Posting a comparison of troposhperic temperature models with the statement "It is a graph of the output of 73 climate models compared to the satellite record and actual measurements made with balloons." is, at best, disengenuous.

This is why I can't take anything these guys say as credible. *Everytime I look beneath the surface of something that seems poignant, it end up being competely misleading.

It strikes me as an extension of cherry picking.*

 

[itfitzme]

Oh, straight from the IPCC on CMIP tropospheric models.


" These models cannot yet simulate all aspects of climate (e.g., they still cannot account fully for the observed trend in the surface-troposphere temperature differences since 1979).*Clouds and humidity also remain sources of significant uncertainty, but there have been incremental improvements in simulations of these quantities."

And their own published graph is

So**Dr Roy Spencer doesn't add anything new.


IPCC Third Assessment Report - Climate Change 2001 - Complete online versions | GRID-Arendal - Publications - Other

---

A related example is out of Sacramento, Ca. *The local new station runs investgative reporting stories about some problem that has been discovered with a department of the California State Government. The funny thing, that they never mention, is they got their info from the State Auditors Department, that regularly looks for inefficiency in govt departments. The station didn't uncover anything. The state did, regularly.

 

[itfitzme]

Postma and analysis

I concur that Trenberth's energy budget diagram is seriously flawed. do you have a better one? post it up and I will start using it. until then I have to use what is available to make simple points.

Seriously, what's wrong with this one? *It is certainly better than trenberth's if for no other reason than it portrays the earth as it actually is. *I have read all of the critique of it that I could find and the complaints seem to be nit picky at best and I didn't see anyone prove that it was more flawed than trenberth's cartoon. *You tell me where you think he has left the rails and produced a model that is more deeply flawed than trenberth's cartoon.

So seriously. *What is wrong with this alternative model?

http://principia-scientific.org/publications/The_Model_Atmosphere.pdf

The short of the rubutal is

"Joseph Postma published an article criticizing a very simple model that nonetheless produces useful results. *He made several very simple errors along the way, none of which are very technical in nature. *In no way does Postma undermine the existence or necessity of the greenhouse effect."

An earlier comment, in this thread, about Postma's model using night and day, stuck out. It seemed obvious that averaging the two would be the*thing to do. *So the following addresses this;

"Postma then goes on to describe fictitious “boundary conditions.” *In particular, he seems to have serious objections to the averaging of the solar radiative flux over the Earth. *In essence, he would prefer we had one sun delivering 1370 W/m2 of energy to the planet, with a day side and a night side, noon and twilight, etc. instead of the simple model where we average 1370/4=342.5 W/m2 over the planet (so that the whole Earth is receiving the appropriate "average" solar radiation). *The number becomes ~240 W/m2 when you account for the planetary albedo (or reflectivity). "

Yada yada yada, more technical stuff.

To summarize so far, Joseph E. Postma did not like a simple model of Earth’s radiative balance where we approximate the Earth as a sphere with uniform solar absorption....

**Of course, this is never done in climate modeling or in more detailed analyses appropriate for scholarly literature, so*it is more an exercise in complaining about undergraduate education than an attempt to correct what he calls a “paradigm” in climatology. *

Yada yada yada...more technical stuff...

Postma stretches a simplified model to areas that it was never designed to go to, and then declares that its failure to work means the whole paradigm of the greenhouse effect is wrong. *The incompetence is overwhelming. Postma is not done though, and decides to dig in further. *His next argument is amusing, but perhaps a bit strange to follow, so I will try to explain.

yada yada yada...

In summary, Joseph Postma published an article criticizing a very simple model that nonetheless produces useful results. *He made several very simple errors along the way, none of which are very technical in nature. *More sophisticated models are obviously designed to handle the uneven distribution of solar heating (which is why we have weather!); nonetheless, the educational tools are useful for their purpose, and in no way does Postma undermine the existence or necessity of the greenhouse effect

Which was my sense of it from the start. The "cartoon" is just a basic presentation. *The argument seems to be that it doesn't work as a good model. I am sure that the IPCC doesn't use it as a model. *So the argument is foolish, at best.

I continue to be unconvinced by coollies arguments which seem to be, basically, "Your not a scientist, therefor the IPCC is wrong." or "No fair posting from one of those biased warmy websites".

http://principia-scientific.org/publications/The_Model_Atmosphere.pdf

Joseph Postma and the greenhouse effect

 

[PMZ]

People who post here should realize that deniers are very good at sidestepping science and denying. They are well trained by extreme conservative media and they can always find denier web sites that repeat the same thing that they heard on Fox News.

It just no longer matters. The country has moved on. We, the people, and business and our government just don't sit around doing nothing until there is 100% agreement on anything, much less everything. We're acting. The deniers are antiquities.

The relevant discussions now are about the fossil fuel replacement technologies. The sustainable technologies that are our future, not the unsustainable ones from the past.

While there can't be any question that our energy future will come from a mix of solar, wind, water, and perhaps tidal, my current favorite is concentrated solar with molten salt storage. We have so much empty land with nearly perfect solar conditions and concentrating solar requires zero new technology.

There are some big projects underway now, and the technology scales so well, that it's future seems nearly unlimited.

While our obsolete energy plants get replaced by sustainable sources they must also prepare for the transition of automobiles to electric, trucks to CNG and planes, well, planes will be the last bastion of fossil fuels.

There are only finite supplies of oil left. Using what's left for applications that we alternatives for is incredibly stupid.

Time to move on.

 

[westwall]

Once again, for the learning impaired...warmth does not lead to more bugs.


[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=PxtWEW2nKRI]The Distortion of the Malaria Issue by the UN and Al Gore - from The Great Global Warming Swindle - YouTube[/ame]

 

[flacaltenn]

Oh, straight from the IPCC on CMIP tropospheric models.


" These models cannot yet simulate all aspects of climate (e.g., they still cannot account fully for the observed trend in the surface-troposphere temperature differences since 1979).*Clouds and humidity also remain sources of significant uncertainty, but there have been incremental improvements in simulations of these quantities."

And their own published graph is

So**Dr Roy Spencer doesn't add anything new.

IPCC Third Assessment Report - Climate Change 2001 - Complete online versions | GRID-Arendal - Publications - Other

---

A related example is out of Sacramento, Ca. *The local new station runs investgative reporting stories about some problem that has been discovered with a department of the California State Government. The funny thing, that they never mention, is they got their info from the State Auditors Department, that regularly looks for inefficiency in govt departments. The station didn't uncover anything. The state did, regularly.

Actually he did since your graph is over 10 years old and doesn't seem to have ANY temperature curve superimposed. Especially not the satellite record which is starting to depart significantly from the butchered GISS station data..

 

[PMZ]

The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Environmental Decision Making, Science, and Technology

 

[itfitzme]

I like this;

"This message is hidden because flacaltenn is on your ignore list."

If only I could do that in real life.

And what's really funny is I keep reading it as;

"FLATULANCE has been ignored."

Which would be even greater in real life.

It just makes me laugh, every time.

 

[itfitzme]

I was trying to compare that stomata graph, above, to the one that the IPCC has, but couldn't match up things.

Here are CO2 atmospheric concentrations, based on numerous proxy measures, from IPCC and geocraft.

Geocraft

IPCC

I just can't get a marker where I can put them together.

But, still, not like stomata is something new. Why do these guys act like they've discovered something new. *You'd think they'd have read the IPCC report, right? *Or are they afraid they will come under it's hypnotic spell and they might start believing it?

http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/figure-6-1.html

http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/stomata.html

 

[Saigon]

Now tell me what plagues infest and devastate the state of Florida

I don't know about Florida, but bark beetles have wiped out western forests. Why? Lack of winter kill, longer breeding season, drought-stressed trees.

Higher temps mean more bugs. Do you classify that as one of your benefits of warming?

New thing or same old same old? History says same old same old.

Not at all - ask any epidemeologist about this and they will tell you that many of the bugs and diseases that the US is not at risk from have never occured in the US in the past.

There is more than one reason for this - changing agricultural patterns, immigration, urbanisation and the overuse of pesticides all being obvious ones - but climate change will bring challenges that US farmers have never faced before.

I've mentioned leshmaniasis and schisctomiasis on this thread already, but it's worth checking them out.

Of course you will poo-poo the ideas here, but off-line I suspect you also realise that many of these things are not theoretical - they have actually already happened.

 

[itfitzme]

Obama Moving on Climate Change

"The White House released a video today saying Obama will address the threat of climate change in a speech at Georgetown University on Tuesday. "I'll lay out my vision for where I believe we need to go - a national plan to reduce carbon pollution, prepare our country for the impacts of climate change and lead global efforts to fight it," he said. "


Obama Moving on Climate Change - The Daily Beast

 

[jon_berzerk]

Obama Moving on Climate Change

"The White House released a video today saying Obama will address the threat of climate change in a speech at Georgetown University on Tuesday. "I'll lay out my vision for where I believe we need to go - a national plan to reduce carbon pollution, prepare our country for the impacts of climate change and lead global efforts to fight it," he said. "


Obama Moving on Climate Change - The Daily Beast

good for him

 

[IanC]

I asked for a replacement diagram for Trenberth's cartoon. you gave me a multipage pdf with no useable diagrams. what is the actual number that the slayer's come up with for the average solar input? is it demonstably different than Trenberth's?

Realistic Terrestrial System Model...beginning on page 34. Now once again, why believe in trenberth's cartoon that you acknowledge is terribly flawed when a more realistic model is available? Do you not like it because it isn't "cartoony" enough or because it doesn't require an ad hoc greenhouse effect to explain the temperature here on earth?

does this mean that you don't have a replacement diagram?

and you dont have a figure for average solar input?

if you have the answers just post them up, dont send me on wild goose chases.

 

[itfitzme]

I asked for a replacement diagram for Trenberth's cartoon. you gave me a multipage pdf with no useable diagrams. what is the actual number that the slayer's come up with for the average solar input? is it demonstably different than Trenberth's?

Realistic Terrestrial System Model...beginning on page 34. *Now once again, why believe in trenberth's cartoon that you acknowledge is terribly flawed when a more realistic model is available? *Do you not like it because it isn't "cartoony" enough or because it doesn't require an ad hoc greenhouse effect to explain the temperature here on earth?

does this mean that you don't have a replacement diagram?

and you dont have a figure for average solar input?

if you have the answers just post them up, dont send me on wild goose chases.

Nothin'

Realistic Terrestrial System Model - Google Search

Here is the one that was all the ruckus;

Apparently, they think that is THE MODEL.

Principia Scientific Intl | UN Climate Report Fundamentally Wrong in Greenhouse Gas Gaffe

 

[SSDD]

Quick, run and hide or the truth is gonna get cha and eat you all up!

Ignorance is hard to defend because you got no facts. Your best option is to slam your mind closed and never, no, never open it again!

I am afraid that it is you who is short on facts. *I keep asking for facts and you keep giving me opinion. *Lets see the hard data that proves that AGW exists....following that, state how much warming is due to man's CO2 emissions.

You keep talking about facts but remain incapable of producing any. *The models are based on the AGW hypothesis and they are failing spectacularly. * *Look at this. *It is a graph of the output of 73 climate models compared to the satellite record and actual measurements made with balloons.

All of these models claim to be based on the same set of actual atmospheric physics but look at their output. *None of them produce the same result....in fact, they are all over the place and diverged completely from the observed temperature. *If I build a model, or 50 models based on the Stefan-Boltzman law, or the ideal gas law and run them, the results could not help but be the same because if any number of models were based on a physical law, by definition, their output would have to be the same and the output, if it were in fact based on the physical law, would match observation very closely. *That isn't what is happening with the models...they not only do not match each other even though they claim to be based on physical laws, they do not match observation.

If you are unable to see the uncertainty, flaws, and spectacular failure of the claims made by climate science, then I am afraid it is you who suffers from the closed mind.

Who is Dr Roy Spencer? *How do*CMIP-5 models of*Tropical Tropospheric Temperature fit into the discussion of mean global temperature changes and IPPC models?

I don't know, but I'm getting this sneaky suspicion that the presented graph is out of context.

It was the balloon measurments that seemed odd. If the discussion is about global average means, balloon readings have nothing to do with it.

You are a full fare paying passenger in the first class section of the AGW crazy train, aren't you? Those models are the basis for all AGW claims and now you say that they are irrelavent to the conversation. I agree. They have always been irrelavent to anything resembling actual science as have the wild claims of catastrophic anthropogenic global warming and all of the horrors that go with it that have been made based upon them. The have always been based on unjustified, unproven assumptions and flawed physics and for that reason, have failed miserably. If you want to agree that the models are irrelavent then you must also believe that the claims of AGW are also irrelavent as those models are the sole piece of (cough cough) "evidence" supporting the claims.

 

[Saigon]

Those models are the basis for all AGW claims

Very obviously they aren't.

What we know about climate change is based upon at least a dozen different areas of study - from CO2 readings to glacial melt, from energy budgets to arctic ice, from deep ocean temperatures to storm patterns, from local temperature readings to desertification patterns.

I am sure you would love to believe that finding a kink in the scientific armour would somehow mean the climate ceased changing, but no one believes that will happen - least of all you, I'm sure.

 

[SSDD]

Not at all - ask any epidemeologist about this and they will tell you that many of the bugs and diseases that the US is not at risk from have never occured in the US in the past.

Name them. State specifically how much the temperature must rise, where the pests will come from, and into what specific region.

There is more than one reason for this - changing agricultural patterns, immigration, urbanisation and the overuse of pesticides all being obvious ones - but climate change will bring challenges that US farmers have never faced before.

Describe them. How much temperature rise. Describe specifically the changes you are suggesting. What change in immigration and how do you tie it to rising temperature...and how much of a rise? Describe the changes you expect to see in "agricultural patterns".

I've mentioned leshmaniasis and schisctomiasis on this thread already, but it's worth checking them out.

Already did. There is no reason they can't be eliminated as thourougly as malaria.

Of course you will poo-poo the ideas here, but off-line I suspect you also realise that many of these things are not theoretical - they have actually already happened.

I am not poo pooing anything. I am asking for specific descriptions. You claim that they are not theoretical and are already happening but don't seem to be able to name a single thing that hasn't already happened multiple times before. No one disuptes that the climate is changing and that conditions change along with them. The issue is whether the change is man made. If it were, then one should reasonably expect to see things happening that have never happened in the past and so far, you haven't pointed out a single thing that is not already part of the historical record.

 

[Saigon]

SSDD -

Let's try and keep this to a reasonably adult level of discussion, shall we? I don't see how naming the epidemeologist I was talking to a few weeks back is going to help you out.

. State specifically how much the temperature must rise, where the pests will come from, and into what specific region.

In your case, the infection zones for illnesses like, say, Cholera are moving northwards through Central America. It makes sense that areas like Florida, California and New Mexico are most at risk.

This might help you understand the point here:

The density and habitats of Aedes aegypti have expanded both in urban and rural areas. This mosquito is once again infesting regions from which it was previously eradicated. The disease was originally imported into the Americas from Africa, but became widely established there. Yellow fever has never been reported from Asia, but, should it be accidentally imported, the potential for outbreaks exists because the appropriate mosquito vector is present.

WHO | Yellow fever : a current threat

I'm constantly amazed that you are unable to figure these things out for yourself.

As for the extent of the temperature rise needed, I doubt even experts can say precisely. Breeding conditions for insects depend a lot on humidity and local conditions, obviously. Mosquitos are difficult little bastards to control.

If you had read the article I linked yesterday, it did explain this quite clearly. You poo-poohed it, of course, as you usually do.

I don't see this as a national crisis and I don't think there is any reason to panic, but when you claim US farmers have nothing to fear from climate change, then clearly you have not thought things like this through at all. How much would a single Yellow Fever outbreak in an urban area cost?

 

[IanC]

First, hopefully you realized that I understand the GHGs absorb and re-radiate, I was using the half silvered mirror as a metaphor. If you find it confusing, it's not a necessary part of the explanation.

From my perspective you are inclined to confuse things with frequency domain stuff that is both confusing and unnecessary. The only relevant commodity is energy, no matter it's form.

Also, you intoduced Trenbarth's energy budget, so I assumed that you bought into his portrayal of reality.

Considering the energy budget and simple physics, I don't see how anybody can, and certainly nobody has, come up with any rational that denies AGW.

GHGs make it harder, considering outgoing longwave radiation, to achieve energy balance. The force that overcomes that additional resistance is the long term average temperature of the earth and atmosphere. With the incoming solar energy the same, and a reduction of outgoing longwave energy, the earth components will warm. There simply is no other possibility to achieve eventual equilibrium.

The dynamics of the transition are very complex, made more so by the reality of daily massive additions to our atmospheric GHGs, but the stable end can only be achieved by a warmer planet and atmosphere.

your half silvered mirror being replaced with a 3/4 silvered mirror is just wrong. a better analogy is a deck of cards. it takes seven shuffles to randomize a deck, shuffling 70 times doesnt make it more random. 10 metres of atmosphere randomizes (disperses) the wavelengths preferential to CO2, the next 10, 100, 1000 metres dont make any significant differences.

the theoretical 1C temp increase per 2xCO2 is based on no change to other parts of the system. but that extra energy (actually decreased loss of energy) will go into other pathways rather than simply only get used to warm the surface. GCMs (general circulation models) are unable to handle water vapour, thermals, clouds, and a host of other local small scale factors. the assumptions made in 5x5 degree, or even 1x1 degree grids make for uncertainties that are far larger than the actual CO2 effect being looked for. there is a slim chance that one of the models may be correct, but that would be more of a lucky guess than an accurate physical description of the climate system.

as an interesting side question.....I wonder how much IR radiation from the Sun gets 'blocked' from entering the lower atmosphere and surface by CO2?

No matter what happens within system earth, energy balance remains the necessary long term equilibrium big picture end point.

It is very entertaining to consider all of the various thermodynamics of earth, oceans, atmospheres, ice caps, natural and man made sources and sinks, frequency domain details, as long as they are regarded as actors on a stage who play their parts and interact and then retire to the wings. But the play is Conservation of Energy and at the end of the performance that's the plot that the audiance carries home.

Energy in = energy out. Incoming solar radiation is constant enough to be considered so over the long term. Outgoing long wave is presented obstacles on the way out. Unles you dispute that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the higher the concentration of it in the atmosphere, the more incoming energy temporarily exceeds outgoing, and that energy will have its way with earth until the net effect of warming drives it through the obstacles.

How long that play takes, and how much forcing is required as a function of GHG concentration, can be debated endlessly, and has been, and the majority of scientists are now converging on some more reliable estimates.

Let me say that I have been no part of that but have researched and followed it objectively and am the reporter here.

While you've been consumed with proving denial, a professed skeptic is not an objective perspective, the mainstream science community has considered all possibilities in an open minded way, and discovered, as often happens, the big picture is pretty simple. The details endlessly fascinating.

There is a time and place for skepticism, but it's long over. The problem has moved from a science problem to a business, political, and engineering one.

Technology, economics, risk, profit making, jobs, organizations, laws, etc are the stars of the next act and are already on stage playing their roles.

"you've been consumed with proving denial"

that funny! the warmers call me a denier and the deniers call me a warmer, hahahahaha.

I am not consumed with anything. I try to point out the weakness in the logic and data that the catastrophic AGW side puts up as evidence, thats all.

by coincidence the 90's appeared to support the CO2 theory. the idea got locked in but since then they have been trying to jam square pegs into round holes to make things fit.

there is no 3x feedback. nature abhors positive feedbacks because they are unstable.

there is no 'hotspot', which is an obligatory condition for all climate models. not from lack of looking for it, I might add.

if there were no GHGs in the atmosphere then more than 90% of the heat would escape by direct radiation from the surface and less than 10% would be carried even part way up by conduction and convection. as GHGs are added the ratio changes, especially at lower elevations because heat is stored, temps go up, and energy is available to drive convective and latent heat pathways. the ratio has already gone from 90:10 to 66 (40 through the window, 26 pinballing through GHGs) : 97 (17 thermal, 80 latent heat). nature has already found a way past the blockage in the near-surface atmosphere, any diminishment of that 26W by CO2 is mostly going into the already primed other pathways, not being completely transformed into extra surface temperature.

it has been this warm, or warmer, for much of the interglacial with no catastrophes. proxy reconstructions wipe out the variance so we cannot see the peaks and valleys of past temperature records, if you looked at the modern thermometer era at the same resolution as proxy records it would hardly be an upturn. that is why it is so dishonest to splice on high definition data to proxy reconstructions like the MBH98,99 Hockey Stick abominations. they are pure propaganda, and the authors knew it.

I could care less whether you understand the points I am trying to make but the one thing I know that you are wrong about is my politics. I am a socialist Swedish-Canadian, although I must admit I am old enough to have been forced by reality to give up some of my youthful exuberance about the intelligence and character of mankind. global warming alarmism isnt the stupidest thing I have seen from group think herd mentality, but it has been the longest lasting and most expensive.

 

[PMZ]

your half silvered mirror being replaced with a 3/4 silvered mirror is just wrong. a better analogy is a deck of cards. it takes seven shuffles to randomize a deck, shuffling 70 times doesnt make it more random. 10 metres of atmosphere randomizes (disperses) the wavelengths preferential to CO2, the next 10, 100, 1000 metres dont make any significant differences.

the theoretical 1C temp increase per 2xCO2 is based on no change to other parts of the system. but that extra energy (actually decreased loss of energy) will go into other pathways rather than simply only get used to warm the surface. GCMs (general circulation models) are unable to handle water vapour, thermals, clouds, and a host of other local small scale factors. the assumptions made in 5x5 degree, or even 1x1 degree grids make for uncertainties that are far larger than the actual CO2 effect being looked for. there is a slim chance that one of the models may be correct, but that would be more of a lucky guess than an accurate physical description of the climate system.

as an interesting side question.....I wonder how much IR radiation from the Sun gets 'blocked' from entering the lower atmosphere and surface by CO2?

No matter what happens within system earth, energy balance remains the necessary long term equilibrium big picture end point.

It is very entertaining to consider all of the various thermodynamics of earth, oceans, atmospheres, ice caps, natural and man made sources and sinks, frequency domain details, as long as they are regarded as actors on a stage who play their parts and interact and then retire to the wings. But the play is Conservation of Energy and at the end of the performance that's the plot that the audiance carries home.

Energy in = energy out. Incoming solar radiation is constant enough to be considered so over the long term. Outgoing long wave is presented obstacles on the way out. Unles you dispute that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the higher the concentration of it in the atmosphere, the more incoming energy temporarily exceeds outgoing, and that energy will have its way with earth until the net effect of warming drives it through the obstacles.

How long that play takes, and how much forcing is required as a function of GHG concentration, can be debated endlessly, and has been, and the majority of scientists are now converging on some more reliable estimates.

Let me say that I have been no part of that but have researched and followed it objectively and am the reporter here.

While you've been consumed with proving denial, a professed skeptic is not an objective perspective, the mainstream science community has considered all possibilities in an open minded way, and discovered, as often happens, the big picture is pretty simple. The details endlessly fascinating.

There is a time and place for skepticism, but it's long over. The problem has moved from a science problem to a business, political, and engineering one.

Technology, economics, risk, profit making, jobs, organizations, laws, etc are the stars of the next act and are already on stage playing their roles.

"you've been consumed with proving denial"

that funny! the warmers call me a denier and the deniers call me a warmer, hahahahaha.

I am not consumed with anything. I try to point out the weakness in the logic and data that the catastrophic AGW side puts up as evidence, thats all.

by coincidence the 90's appeared to support the CO2 theory. the idea got locked in but since then they have been trying to jam square pegs into round holes to make things fit.

there is no 3x feedback. nature abhors positive feedbacks because they are unstable.

there is no 'hotspot', which is an obligatory condition for all climate models. not from lack of looking for it, I might add.

if there were no GHGs in the atmosphere then more than 90% of the heat would escape by direct radiation from the surface and less than 10% would be carried even part way up by conduction and convection. as GHGs are added the ratio changes, especially at lower elevations because heat is stored, temps go up, and energy is available to drive convective and latent heat pathways. the ratio has already gone from 90:10 to 66 (40 through the window, 26 pinballing through GHGs) : 97 (17 thermal, 80 latent heat). nature has already found a way past the blockage in the near-surface atmosphere, any diminishment of that 26W by CO2 is mostly going into the already primed other pathways, not being completely transformed into extra surface temperature.

it has been this warm, or warmer, for much of the interglacial with no catastrophes. proxy reconstructions wipe out the variance so we cannot see the peaks and valleys of past temperature records, if you looked at the modern thermometer era at the same resolution as proxy records it would hardly be an upturn. that is why it is so dishonest to splice on high definition data to proxy reconstructions like the MBH98,99 Hockey Stick abominations. they are pure propaganda, and the authors knew it.

I could care less whether you understand the points I am trying to make but the one thing I know that you are wrong about is my politics. I am a socialist Swedish-Canadian, although I must admit I am old enough to have been forced by reality to give up some of my youthful exuberance about the intelligence and character of mankind. global warming alarmism isnt the stupidest thing I have seen from group think herd mentality, but it has been the longest lasting and most expensive.

I think that your science is strong on the thermodynamics of the earth adjusting to energy imbalance, but you seem to think that energy only sometimes needs to be conserved.

But there is a more important point that you tend to underplay by an order of magnitude. The resulting warming of AGW is not the problem at all. The fact that we have built a civilization capable of feeding and housing 7B people assuming a stable climate which has now become unstable from this energy imbalance is the problem. We have just experienced only the tip of the iceberg in terms of what it will require to rebuild civilization to accomodate the new climate. But it's something for which there is no choice. That's why the current discussion is mostly outside of the scientific community. It's among engineers and business people and politicians and meteorologists and public safety people and agriculturalists.

Denialists assume that do nothing is a choice. They present zero evidence to support that which they'd like to be true. For that reason they are no longer relevant to the future. Cultural Natural Selection is at work on the problem and denialism will go extinct.

Doers have taken over and will save at least some of us from the delay in action that the Denialist culture has imposed on our fate.