Comments by "PM" (@pm71241) on "Dave Rubin on the Climate Change Debate | DIRECT MESSAGE | Rubin Report" video.

Nobody claimed Science was a democracy. Science doesn't advance by consensus, but unless you're an expert in the field doing your own research you'd damn well better listen to the consensus. JUST AS when you go to the hospital medical science doesn't advance by a group of doctors having a consensus opinion on your diagnose and treatment - but you'd damn well better listen to them. More specifically: The 97% didn't reach their opinion by voting.
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Eric Duprey So when 97% of scientists tell you we need to diverge an near earth asteroid, you'd prefer to sit on your hands pointing to someone who once told you sugar was healthy?
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+Samuel Bayliss ... I have to agree with you, Daylan and TheNakedAtheist too. As someone on Twitter said: "@alexepstein expertise is to exploit this sense of fairness, but that's not how science works" Dave is entering the territory of science-journalism and it sets a higher bar for good journalism. He should be very careful not to be exploited to create a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_balance . If these interviews with science deniers (he has just invited Mark Steyn on) are just to make a larger point about "Freedom of Speech" for people playing the victim card that someone tries to "silence" their "alternative" viewpoint, then he should be careful not to sacrifice the stated goal of his project to (quote) "apply reason to the big questions".
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aCycloneSteve ... they will probably also add the one doesn't "prove" things in natural sciences. You support hypothesis' with evidence. And the evidence that the consequences of continuing our CO2 emissions at the current rate have a high chance of being catastrophic IS actually very solid. Science never deals in black and white and you trying to make it seem that way and exploit it to insinuate that if it's not "proven", then we know nothing is disingenuous.
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aCycloneSteve So .. .given that all the real scientists are sounding alarm - who do you think the "alarmists" are? Please base your claims in facts. Every relevant scientific society of international standing is telling us we've got a problem: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change#Statements_by_scientific_organizations_of_national_or_international_standing
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aCycloneSteve "These are all political organizations." ... I just don't have patience for such arguments, sorry.
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aCycloneSteve "I don't believe it's true and I don't trust the "scientists"" Well, that basically leaves you with only 2 options: * Sign up for college and take an education in the field your self * Find someone you do trust and let a scientist explain it to them. ... if you realize that your criteria for trusting someone else is that they also don't trust the scientists, then you have truly painted yourself into a corner. "to produce a model that both predicts the temperature forward and matches the historical temperatures." Which the scientists have already done. However, - they haven't done that to "prove" the theory. The theory doesn't rest on the models. It rests on physics. The models are created as a tool to understand the system. I could link you to resources about that, but it would require you listening to actual scientists (which you said you don't trust) explaining the stuff... "then after 10 years of seeing the accuracy of it's projections" 10 years is way to short a time to do such an evaluation. (you'd need more like 30). Fortunately we can do better than that. Btw... Thank you for taking this approach. In the 8 years I've been following this topic it's very rare that someone doubting the climate problem has done like you and taking a deep breath and thought about what it would take ... unless of course they ended up making absurd requirements for proofs which the science doesn't really predict anyway. "On the flip side, what would it take for you to change you mind?" That's a good question. Now... first I will remind you of what Carl Sagan said: "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" ... and given the level of support for the theory in the scientific community, I'd say the extraordinarey claim is that they are all wrong. So it'll take something like JBS Haldanes "Fossil rabbits in the pre-cambrian" That's to say that not only must it be observations which cannot be reconciled with the theory... there would probably also have to be presented an alternative consistent theory which explained not only this new evidence, but also all the rest we already have. "Twenty years of inaccurate projections?" Depends on the conclusion about the explanation for this which the science reaches. If it turns out that there's a reason which doesn't contradict the theory - like the Sun measureably just got weaker for 20 years, then no. "Corruption in science programs?" It would have to be truly monumental at scale... and there would still be lacking an alternative explanation. Try imagine what kind of relelations about corruption in biology it would take for you to reject the theory of evolution. "Profiteering by advocates?" ??? what? ... While the science is still solid? ... no. It would be pretty predictable that people standing to gain on the science being true would not be stupid enough to work against it... but what difference would that make if the scientific evidence still overwhelmingly support it being true? "I get the impression that the only way you will change your mind is if most of the scientific community publicly denounces global warming/climate change/weather change." That would surely help ... I'll like to see the reason too though. And btw.... again... If most of the community of biology changed their mind about evolution, I would also still like to see the actual fossils for rabbits in the Precambrian. "If you are right that scientist's are incorruptible then eventually either you will be proven right or I will be proven right." I didn't say scientists are incorruptible ... However... to explain the current state of science with corruption you'd have to have so many scientists all over the worlds in on the plot that it resembles the moon landing conspiracy. Now ... to give you an example of something which would change my mind if observed, we'd have to look at what it specically was I was supposed to change my mind on. Are we taking the correctness of the keeling curve? Are we speaking of the correctness of the temperature record? Are we speaking about the causal explanation of the temperature record? ... Assuming the latter, you'd have to make an observation which contradicted the greenhouse effect explanation AND have an actual alternative explanation which wasn't even more in conflict with observations. It's not enough to - say - observe that volcanos at the bottom of the sea has been contributing mcuh more to warming than we thought (as some suggest). You'd also have to explain why the stratosphere is then cooling. (which is a prediction by the current theory). ... and you'd have to go through geological time and see that there are alternative explantions for all the stuff that we currently only can explain with CO2 - like the PETM. It's not simple to overturn well established theories like evolution and antropogenic global warming. It's a whole web of evidence which ties together. But if you could do that - and make it all work together again in a different theory - then yes. That would convince me.
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Nirvan Sengupta Are you doubting that 15 of the 16 hottest years have all happened in this century? ... and that it very likely in a few months will be 16 of 17 with 2016 being the hottest ever recorded?
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Nirvan Sengupta "Is the increased radiative forcing from that increase in CO2 enough to cause significant temperature changes?" yes "Due to changes in earth's orbital eccentricity, there are ice ages and subsequent warming periods. We are in a warming period right now." Actually no. We are in an Interglacial - but there's not reason to think it would have become hotter without our "help". Show me the evidence for that. "Is there data showing that the current rise in temperatures is faster than previous temperature rises from previous post-ice age warming periods?" Actually - there has been periods with very abrupt climate change. - like: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Younger_Dryas But there's a difference: We have ways to explain that without CO2. We don't have ways to explain the current warming without CO2.
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Except - in terms of topology, the truth is not somewhere the middle. The earth is neither flat, nor a donut ... it's topological equivalent to a sphere.
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SuperAwesomeVidya ... "Not sure it's comparable, climate change denial isn't a fringe belief in the US. A huge percentage of Americans doesn't believe in it. I think it's worth debating." Sorry ... explain this to me... is physics somehow different in the US than in Europe?
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Cameron Llewellyn It hasn't ... and it's also not what the current investigation is about... though Alex (and those who put it under the headline of "free speech") would like you to believe that.
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insidetrip101 "Sure, he wasn't the one actually being prosecuted" Exactly ... it's perfectly reasonable that the AG subpoenas others to collect evidence during an investigation. Whether it's logical to subpoena specifically Alex, - I don't know - since Alex wasn't really active at the time Exxon was doing the stuff they are investigated for. ... but don't go out calling this a free speech issue. That's nonsense.
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insidetrip101 "I agree, but not even Alex was saying that his free speech hasn't been violated." I was actually hinting about that Dave might have gone over-the-top putting this under the free speech headline. "He did say his privacy had been invaded, ..." Yeah... He can tell that to all the Climate Scientists who have been harassed by FOIA request ... lately be Lamar Schmit. "he is saying that his privacy was invaded was because the original investigation against exxon mobil is violating the free speech of exxon." Was the RICO investigations against the Tobacco Industry a violation of Phillip Morris' free speech?
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insidetrip101 "But, second, these people are receiving public funding, and have a duty to be held accountable" And Exxon has laws to abide by as well. "I don't like to comment on actual judicial opinions without having actually read the case;" But you are obviously doing it in the case of Exxon "And then you accuse him of "anti-science" wrong-think because he wants to bring up an issue about fundamental rights--simply because you disagree with the politics of the speaker." That's a blatant strawman. I've never accused Dave of being anti-science. I've accused Alex of being a science denier ... and I've been very explicit of why - and that was not the reason. You are not coming through as honest here. Exxon is being investigate on two accounts: * Failure to meet its obligations to inform its shareholders and the financial markets. * RICO violations, just like the Tobacco industry. You'll have to argue that the Tobacco case was wrong to argue against investigating Exxon at all.
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insidetrip101 "There has been no judicial opinion written about this..." How on earth would you ever be able to reach a judicial opinion on a case if you were not allowed to investigate it because people thought it was a "free speech" issue if you did? And please don't play the victim card. You brought forward a blatant strawman about what I had said ... I have the right to point that out.
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Daylan Hammer Let me inject here that as much as one would have wished there in general was a way to hold those spreading misinformation accountable, we have to realize that (unless you are religious) the only ones who can hold them accountable is their grand children, when they once ask them: "What were you doing when all this played out?" Since this is how free speech works. Companies like Exxon, how provably knew better, and deliberately misinformed of their product is maybe another issue. If this can be shown to be like the Tobacco situation there probably is a way to hold them accountable. But that is not a free speech issue.
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aCycloneSteve ... it's kinda of a premise isn't it... if you are going to start out by fertilizing a conspiracy theory by calling institutions like NAS ond Royal Society for "political organizations", then the rest of the discussion about what they say is rather pointless isn't it? Abraham Lincoln could just as well have not created the NAS... they would tell him any objective information anyway.
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aCycloneSteve ... tell me how that not just become an excuse to reject any message from the scientific community which you don't like
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Daylan Hammer As a (geo)libertarian, I will have to object. The "don't force me at gunpoint" is an anarcho-capitalist talking-point. ... though admittedly, many who call themselves "libertarians" seem to be flirting with anarcho-capitalism. Anyway ... it's a basic tenet of classical liberalism that your freedom extends only so far that it does not interfere with the equal freedom of others. Denying science to hide that CO2 emissions is actually interfering with everybodys lives also goes totally against the spirit of classical liberalism of basing policy on reason.
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Daylan Hammer ... which reminds me of something Trump said yesterday.
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Daylan Hammer If you have followed US politics the last few years you would know that what's "moral" is highly contented.
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Nirvan Sengupta yeah ... I had the impression you were trying to pull off the "this-looks-like-a-very-small-number-it-must-be-insignificant" stunt. It's a 40% increase in the concentration to 400ppmv. Let me remind you that given the right physics and/or chemistry even small concentrations can be significant. Try walk into a room with 200ppm Hydrogen Cyanide.
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Nirvan Sengupta " What is the per unit of CO2..." It's not linear. It's logarithmic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svante_Arrhenius#Greenhouse_effect "What is the rate of temperature change over time in previous interglacial periods ( dT/dt in previous IG periods) and what is the dT/dt currently? Can you show me that it's different now than in previous IG periods?" No - and what's the point? Many different things influence climate in general. But they are not happening now. Are you seeing any signs for a glacial-interglacial transition?
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Nirvan Sengupta "I think NOAA started recording sometime in the 1800s." Yeah... and? "If we're in the middle of an inter-glacial warming period, you would expect temperatures to rise regardless of human activity." Only if you didn't know anything about interglacials and really believe that they were "warming" periods and not just "warm periods". I honestly thought it was a typo, but you seem to believe it's a rule temperature should go up all the way through an interglacial. "I'm basically asking the scientists and Anthropogenic climate change supporters to explain why interglacial warming doesn't explain the current rise in temperatures" First of all because the warming which brought us the interglacial ended ~8000 years ago. Secondly - we know of no mechanism related to the glacial cycle which explains it and can be observed. The onus is actually on you to demonstrate one. "And if possible give some quantitative measures of heat capture increases due to 0.01 % increase in historic CO2 concentrations." ... which (as I said above) is meaningless. It's a logarithmic effect. Even Alex knows this well enough to make an argument out of it.
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Nirvan Sengupta Yes - Milankovitch cycles does appear to be the triggering factor for the glacial cycles. However... whether you can call them "clockwork" depends on whether you actually understand how they work and what that then would mean. The orbital forcing is pretty predictable. ... but that doesn't mean the resulting glacials and interglacials will have the same duration. The current accumulative effect of all orbital parameters indicate that this specific interglacial (The Holocene) would last at least 16.000 more years... and probably 50.000. ... so let's cross that bridge when we get to it.
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Nirvan Sengupta "When I say clockwork I mean you can model them with sins and cosines pretty well." Ok... fair enough ... Wikipedia has a nice overview graph over the clockwork then: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/53/MilankovitchCyclesOrbitandCores.png Notice than, that the next 50.000 years will have remarkable stable forcing.
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Nirvan Sengupta "earlier you said the last interglacial ended 8000 years ago" No. I said: * We are in an interglacial (the Holocene) * The warming leading into it ended 8000 years ago. * It will probably last 50.000 years (under no human interference)
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aCycloneSteve "If there was a model published 10 years ago that matched up with historical the record and in the 10 years after being published correctly projected temperature measurements the debate is over you win. Just give me a link to the paper or article published 10 years ago and the temperature data that shows it was correct and I can go all in on CO2 restrictions." Before we discuss the evidence for the models actually doing pretty good predictions - both in hindcast and 10 years forecast, I would like to be sure that you understand that for a model to do a good prediction of the general trend on a 10, 20, 30 years timeframe it does not mean that it can also capture every little detail of internal variability on the system on smaller scales. It's like doing a model of a bath tub being filled with water while someone has started a wave in it. You can predict the general trend of rising water level, but you cannot predict the exact height of the water at a given place at any time. We agree, - Right? And given that the climate system does have large internal variablity (El-Nino as a prime example) and there are unknown changes in forcing from other places there well be small stretches of years where the models only match within the error bars and are not directly spot on. You agree with that - right?
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Nirvan Sengupta "Any links you can provide?" I would regard it as rather uncontroversial. The term "Holocene Climatic Optimum" does not exist for no reason. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_climatic_optimum Just to be sure about what we are discussing here. You repeatedly spoke about an interglacial as a (quote) "warming" period as if it consisted of a warming trend throughout its duration - as opposed to just being a "warm" period. That's not the case. I just objected to your claim that the default during an interglacial is a warming trend.
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aCycloneSteve No ... that wasn't what I said. I asked you two simple questions in order to ensure that we was on the same page wrt. what a meaningful question wrt. to the models were. I'm sad to now get the impression that you were actually not interested in a serious discussion about this, but rather would take the first opportunity to find a cop out. Btw...Just to be sure you understand (I've already said it) Even though I'll gladly provide you the answer to the question you raise about the models, you are IMHO approaching the the wrong way. It's fine if the models is what convinces you, but that really a misunderstanding of the science. The science isn't founded on the models. The models are a tool in the understanding. The science is founded in physics. The models are only as good as the skills of those who programmed them and the complexity they can manage to include in the software. If a model is wrong it can mean that the theory is wrong... but it can also just mean that the software quality, the development complexity and maybe the hardware available to run it is not sufficient to represent the theory fully.
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aCycloneSteve You are changing the subject and running from your promise to enter a serious dialog about it ... please just answer the two questions I posed... it's not that difficult if you are actually interested in know what the models tell us.
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Nirvan Sengupta ... waiting for aCycloneSteve to reply to the above questions - then we'll look at the actual situation wrt. models vs. measurements.
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Nirvan Sengupta "It doesn't matter to me as a downstream user of the models as to why the models are wrong. I am only interested in whether or not they are accurate." I didn't say the models were "wrong" ... (anyway, that 's a subjective measure which you kinda have to know what the models are intended for to judge) But given that there seem to be a general misconception of what the relationship between the models and the theory is, then it's important to know a bit about what's included in the models and what's not. You cannot just ignore this. Example: You can make even the best model, but it it doesn't include the exact time of a super-volcano exploding it can have everything about the theory correct and still be "wrong" - for a given subjective definition of "wrong". I have to say, that - if you can't see that point, then you are really not a "downstream user" of the models but just someone using a tool for something it wasn't intended for and out of context.
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aCycloneSteve "I would have more faith in a model if it showed a 10-15 year pause somewhere in the neighborhood of this time so you can say look, we predicted a 10 year pause" But if the "pause" is not actually a "pause", but rather the effect of some super-imposed internal variation, then such 10-15 years would not change the overall trend - having in mind that 10-15 years is still way too short a timespan to evaluate the general climate trend. "El nino & things like that are weather events. They should be in the model." Not really - depending on that the intent of the model was. If it was to simulate the effect of El-Nino - yes. If it was to simulate the long term (100 years) general trend of the climate, then no. ... Since one must realize that the El-Nino/La-Nina cycle doesn't really add or remove any energy from earth. In the long run that cycle should be zero-sum. That being said... You asked for (quote): "a model published 10 years ago that matched up with historical the record and in the 10 years after being published correctly projected temperature measurements" Since the last modeling project CMIP5 did not end more than 2-3 years ago, it obviously doesn't meet your criteria. So we'll have to look at the CMIP3 project: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CoYiOVQWYAA3K0d.jpg
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Nirvan Sengupta ehh.... no. One has to understand the concept of "anomaly" ... which is basically "deviation from reference". And the reference in this graph is clearly stated as the 1980-1999 average. ... so clearly - if the temperature has been rising throughout, then the anomaly from the 1980-1999 average would be expected to be negative before 1980. The reference really doesn't matter. Whether my body temperature is 37 C or 310 K - I'm still the same temperature.
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aCycloneSteve > "could be convinced that man made global warming is a problem. I don't believe it's true and I don't trust the "scientists" so I think the way to put me in a box is to produce a model that both predicts the temperature forward and matches the historical temperatures. (And also predicted dangerous rising temps in the future) If that model was made public, then after 10 years of seeing the accuracy of it's projections I would need to be either be a fool or be corrupt to not take the situation seriously." ... I guess this went nowhere ? https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CoYiOVQWYAA3K0d.jpg
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Nirvan Sengupta "How about 50-100 years?" For obvious reasons we cannot evaluate that question the same way. Not only have not not known the severity of the problem for 100 year, nor had computers to do the models. We don't even have sufficient direct temperature data to do the comparison. ... and due to the nature of the problem, if we sit down and wait 100 years to do that, it'll be too late to act anyway. But we know a great deal from the paleo-climatic record about what happened under earlier similar situations in earths history and we have no reason to believe physics has changed. "And then the next question is, how do we know that the catastrophic climatic consequences results some claim are predicted by temperature rises are reliable?" Depends on which consequence you are thinking of. But one of the most simple ones is that it's simply not possible for the planet to maintain polar ice under the predicted temperatures. There might be uncertainty about whether it'll take 300, 400 or 800 years to melt most of the ice ... but it's very obvious that we will see double digit meters of sea level rise within few centuries. "I've heard environmentalists swear to me that if the temperature rises by 2 degrees C the we're in for trouble." How do you define "trouble" ? ... would you think it would be troublesome if we returned to the state of the Pliocene within 200 years?
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Nirvan Sengupta Sure ... But I have yet to meet any of the "doubters" who will be convinced by that ... or anything at all (in most cases).
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Nirvan Sengupta "Well I'm to be your first reasonable and open minded climate skeptic" ... Which is kind of an oxymoron ;-) Actual "Skeptics" are supposed to be reasonable and open to evidence.
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Nirvan Sengupta "I think you mean "open minded skeptic" is redundant? Since skeptics are supposed to be open to evidence?" Yes. That's my point. ... and the observation that many others who call them selves "skeptics" are really not open to evidence. I've actually once had a guy directly admitting that yeah, - maybe the science was solid, but that didn't matter. The only thing which mattered to him was to protect his liberties from the "red".. ... explicitly admitting that dogmatism was his strategy. And experience shows that many who call them selves "skeptics" have in fact a dogmatic approach (though not wanting to admit it like this guy). ... so it's nice to meet an actual skeptic - open to evidence.
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aCycloneSteve cop out. No topic has been changed. And your straight forward question has been answered.
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aCycloneSteve "That makes you an activist." That's nonsense... If the question has a wrong premise I should be allowed to point it out. ... anything else and you are an activist.
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> The Progressive Atheist ... or as Einstein once said: "Next to me, Churchill is probably the most misquoted guy on the Internet" ;-)
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Yes, - please ask him how it goes with the miracle cure for everything from HIV and Malaria to the common cold.
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... and so is science literacy. The worst of both worlds would be to have a science illiterate public elect an authoritarian leader. But of course... that would never happen outside of theocracy... * tumbleweed *
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Jack Allen ... except that what you just said is completely bullshit. First of all... the models were not "completely" wrong. Secondly... it was not at all ignored, but intensively investigated and the conclusion has been available for anyone interested (not you, I kmow) for some time now... so if you really wanted to you could have familiarized you self with the fact that there has been identified a number of causes and none of them implies that there's anything wrong with the overall theory or that the problem is less than predicted and when the reasons have been taken into account in the models, they replicate the historic temperatures just fine.
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***** Well ... at least one of them (Roy Spencer) is.
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