On 19/01/18 09:51, Nightjar wrote:
On 18-Jan-18 8:05 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 18/01/18 18:19, Nightjar wrote:
On 18-Jan-18 4:22 PM, harry wrote:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...t-El-Nino.html

I 'spect there's still some nitwits here who still don't believe it.


I will believe that the scientists know what is causing climate
change when they can make accurate predictions based upon their claims.


Unfortunately one of the problems of science is that certain classes
of equations, called chaotic, won't give meaningful predictions *even
if they are 100% accurate in representing the reality*.

For example, a pencil balanced on end is perfectly described by the
law of gravity: however that won't tell you which way that it will
fall. Brownian motion at the molecular level will determine that.

That's before we start on Schrödingers much maligned moggy...

Climate is chaotic, and that means within a very broad range of
possibilities, its totally unpredictable.

The IPCC seems to think that they can predict what will happen to the
climate. I have yet to be convinced they can.

No one is entirely clear what 'caused' the ice ages, their ends, the
mediaeval warm period, the little ice age, the Holocene optimum etc.

There are theories, but none of them seem to work well, and none of
course involve CO2 which has been remarkable stable (unlike the climate
for the last 10,000 years...

--
"If you dont read the news paper, you are un-informed. If you read the
news paper, you are mis-informed."

Mark Twain