On 29/11/2011 11:41, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

snip

But sea levels are NOT rising.

Or not by anything like what the model says they should be.

http://arxiv.org/ftp/physics/papers/0703/0703220.pdf

Makes interesting reading.

Well no..once again its a set of arguments based on an unproven
assertion: Namely that the IPCC predictions on temperature rise are
accurate, and likewise that the modelling being used includes all
relevant data. and the correct weightings..and probably that the
relationship is broadly linear.

Well that is your opinion but I didn't make that quote just to give
you a chance to vent your prejudices. You claim sea levels are not
rising, or at least not as much as the models predict but provide
nothing to support you claim. So where are the models you dispute and
the evidence that you are correct?

Hansen refers to evidence on melting of both Greenland and Antarctic
icecaps and suggests why this might be non linear which, after all, is
only to be expected with positive feedback.

Er no. Non linearity and positive feedback are entire distinct concepts.

I am sure you can come up with some situation where positive feedback
doesn't magnify whatever imbalance it is acting on but I am not going to
even try.

Though I doubt Hansen understands that.

Given the choice of believing you or some published and peer reviewed
scientist I will take the sane choice of believing the scientist.

Even te simplest of thongs - a loaded column - can be shown to have
instability failure modes..that completely negate in certain scenarios
the actual compressive stress failure modes. Fail to appreciate that and
your church or cathedral falls down. That was noted years before Euler
finally used calculus to nail the problem in a correct mathematical form

Climate change models for sure LOOK impressive, but in reality they are
crude as ****.

So you keep on saying but the proof of the pudding is in the eating
and the latest models at least fit quite well what has happened in the
recent past which is the only period we have accurate primary data for.

Of course they do, the data a little and the coefficients a LOT have
been adjusted to ensure that they do.

But a curve fitting excercise with the wrong number of elements in the
wrong relation is not a truth. It remains a curve fitting exercise -
mere mathematical sleight of hand.

If you know anything, you know that you can make a polynomial
approximation as close ass you lie to any data set. That doesn't mean
that the terms of that equation have any significance whatsoever, nor
that their predictions will in any way be accurate.

How else do you build a model but by including all the fields believed
to have an effect and given each factor some weight. You build a model
to predict the future but to do so convincingly it must also account for
what has happened in the past.

Those who claim that they are inaccurate have prejudices rather than
more accurate models to support their assertions.

Not inaccurate, just meaningless.

Mere prejudice.

About as meaningless as Gordon brown, noting year on year GDP growth of
whatever, announcing 'no more boom and bust'. Of course he was correct.
It's been a case of 'bust and more bust' ever since.

I cannot believe how you can be fooled by this sleight of hand.

Gordon Brown never got my vote.

A curve fit is not a theory, and a correlation is not a cause.

It has been noted in Wisden, going back many years, that the cost of
corn followed the incidence of drawn cricket matches in any given year*.

A Nu Laber solution to that would be to change the rules of cricket to
eliminate drawn matches.

A Hansen theory would be that psychic players anticipating hunger play
with no verve or something.

Strawman.

*wet summers give drawn matches and poor crops

So there is a connection between drawn matches and the cost of corn so
the number of drawn matches could be used to predict the cost of corn or
vice versa. Much the same way as tree ring and ice core data is used to
predict prehistoric temperatures. not perfectly but better than nothing

Positive feedback of the order that Hansen has had to use, would make
the climate now, and historically, really unstable. It simply hasn't
been that unstable.

ISTM that there have been a number of occasions in the past when a
tipping point has been reached and rapid changes have ensued.

--
Roger Chapman
Attempting to master a new computer
and failing to master a new gps