Update: The Notch has passed away, peacefully, in the presence of family and close friends, with little fanfare. RIP. [Sou 1 August 2014]
Someone suggested I preserve this for the record. It shows how some deniers will waste an inordinate amount of time and energy in the fruitless pursuit of ABCD (anything but carbon dioxide). From Joanne Nova (Codling) and her partner David "not a rocket scientist" Evans, (h/t John Mashey) - Deniers in Residence, Australia.
This is a record of all their blog posts on the subject so far. I've already written about their Part VIII. In this complete set (so far), they set out why they reckon it's not really CO2 that's causing global warming, it's Force X from the sun. Force X, by a strange coincidence, has about the same radiative forcing as greenhouse gases.
Update: The WUWT article by David "funny sunny" Archibald on this subject has earned 533 comments so far, so here's the archive - latest here, with 638 comments. More than any article for years, I'd say. But it's not listed in as one of the "top four active stories". Wonder why (not)! Watch for the match between Christopher Monckton and Leif Svalgaard and comments by Wondering Willis Eschenbach. Sou 2 July 2014
The mechanism for Force X is not known at this time, we're told. Which they agree is a shame. It could be anything from UV light to puppy dog tails. All they know is that it can't be CO2 and, to prove it, the world is about to get very cold, any day now. David's very meticulous 18-month modeling effort allows him to make this extremely precise, extremely falsifiable prediction: it will cool by 0.8°C, or maybe 0.6°C, or maybe 0.1°C - next year, or maybe in ten or even twenty years.
Or, if you are David "funny sunny" Archibald, by two degrees:
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| Data source: Marcott13 and WUWT |
If you're on the home page and you want to read about all their zany articles to date, click "read more". If you click on the title to their blog articles, it'll take you to the archived versions complete with comments.
BIG NEWS Part I: Historic development — New Solar climate model coming 14 June 14
For the last 18 months David pursued an idea, and developed something the climate debate has needed, but failed to do achieve after 30 years, despite billions of dollars in funding. He’s taken sophisticated silicon-chip maths and applied it to the climate system — analyzing the system as a black box to discover the filters and parts. He has built a working O-D model with 15,000 lines of code. In order to develop the model he had to produce a more advanced method of Fourier analysis (which on its own is an achievement and will be useful in many other fields). ...
...Over the last six months we’ve been quietly circulating this work amongst scientists we admire and seeking feedback. We want more, and open science is the only way to go. I will boldly predict that many papers will spring from this work and its implications, but for the moment we see no reason to wait for two unpaid reviewers and an editor (with little knowledge of the details) to delay or prevaricate on its release.
...The fans of the CO2 dominant models are not going to be happy. It seems the climate is an 80-20 sort of thing, where there is a dominant influence responsible for 80% of climate change and a tail of 20% of other factors. It turns out that the CO2 concentration is not the 80% factor, but in the 20% tail. An indirect solar influence seems to be the main factor....
...There is a big paper with all of the above in rigorous detail. It runs to about 170 pages. There is some groundwork to discuss before it is all released. This should produce a more productive discussion.Sou: 170 pages. It must be right. It passes the weight test :) (I hope he's not trying to get it published in Nature.)
...Let this be the last nail in the coffin of climate extremism... Christopher Monckton, Viscount of Brenchley.Sou: We can but hope.
BIG NEWS Part II: For the first time – a mysterious notch filter found in the climate 15 June 14
To put some numbers on it: TSI typically varies from the trough to the peak of a sunspot cycle by about 0.8 W/m2. If this was a long term change, the Stefan-Boltzmann equation would imply a change in radiating temperature of about 0.26°C, which would result in a change in surface temperature of about 0.5°C. Even allowing for some attenuation by a low pass filter, there ought to be a detectable temperature peaks.
Sou: No, not really. David "not a rocket scientist" Evans' estimate is a bit off.
...Short-term variations of a few tenths of a percent are common during the approximately 11-year sunspot solar cycle (1.2.2 Key Concepts in Climate Science)
...Typical changes measured over an 11-year solar cycle are 0.1% for TSI and up to several percent for the ultra-violet (UV) part of SSI (see Section 8.4). Changes in TSI directly impact the Earth’s surface (see solar Box 10.2), whereas changes in UV primarily affect the stratosphere, but can influence the tropospheric circulation through dynamical coupling (Haigh, 1996). (5.2.1.2 Solar Forcing)
...Based on concentration changes, the RF [radiative forcing] of all WMGHG [well-mixed greenhouse gases] in 2011 is 2.83 [2.54 to 3.12] Wm-2 (very high confidence). (TS.3.2 Radiative Forcing from Greenhouse Gases)
BIG NEWS Part III: The notch means a delay 17 June 14
Later, when we fit the notch-delay solar model being developed here to the measured temperatures, we find that the delay is mostly likely around 11 years (but definitely between 10 and 20 years).Sou: Oh my. Such precision! (David should become a rocket scientist.)
BIG NEWS part IV: A huge leap understanding the mysterious 11 year solar delay 17 June 14
The big mystery is what could cause such a long delay in the correlation of solar radiation with temperatures on Earth?
David and I spent months wondering “what on Earth” could drive it.
In the end, the answer was so prosaic, so beautiful – of course, the only possibility for a delay so perfectly timed with solar cycles was within the sun itself. Have we been fooled by a language slip? “Peak” solar activity doesn’t mean a “peak” in magnetic activity, actually it’s the other way around.
Think about the timing: At the peak of the sunspot cycle, while the sun is producing its maximum solar irradiation, it turns out that the Sun’s magnetic field is collapsing through its weakest moment. (Marvel at Figure 1 below.) The solar radiation only varies a little through the cycle, but the dynamo of the solar magnetic field is undergoing profound changes — flipping in polarity from North to South or back again. This causes the notch.
We don’t know exactly how this collapsing magnetic field reduces the effect of solar radiation on Earth. One obvious candidate is Svensmark’s cosmic ray hypothesis. He theorized that during the months of the weakest magnetic field the Earth loses its shield against cosmic rays, seeding clouds. But the mystery force might be electrical, or work through UV, or be something else entirely. Nonetheless, it was a leap to finally connect so many studies.Sou: Lol!
BIG NEWS Part V: Escaping heat. The Three pipes theory and the RATS multiplier 19 June 14
The problem then is to work out their order and to fill in any other bits needed by the model.Sou: Yes, that is an insurmountable problem, if you reject the greenhouse effect.
Lubos and a few misconceptions 19 June 14
Hey Lubos, no hard feelings, but next time let us save you from posting unnecessary innuendo, irrelevant criticisms, and not-so-informed commentary. It only takes an email.
We explained in this public post, the big paper, the FAQ, the small summary, and David wrote in personal email answers to him (April 11th), that we don’t think the delay and notching occurs on Earth. It doesn’t seem at all likely that the actual solar rays would take 8 minutes to arrive on Earth, then wait 11 years to warm the planet. The 11 year delayed effect is very odd – dare I say “mysterious?” (Perhaps I better not, lest it’s seen as “demagogy”, eh?)
Obviously the place to look for the notch and delay is on the Sun,Sou: Obviously! Now why hasn't anyone else thought of that? I expect David is writing his next 170-page paper on how Force X affects the other planets. And in the interim, he'll be trying to figure out why his Force X only came into being at the exact same time as CO2 increased.
BIG NEWS part VI: Building a new solar climate model with the notch filter 21 June 14
The discovery of the notch filter means some other force (yet to be specified) from the sun acts with a delay of probably 11 years. This delayed force turns out to cause a lot of the variation in temperature.
BIG NEWS Part VII — Hindcasting with the Solar Model 24 June 14
Solar TSI appears to be a leading indicator for some other (probably solar) effect, that we are calling “force X” for now. If that factor, quantified by TSI, was fed into current climate models, then those models would work with less forcing from CO2.In other words, Force X by strange coincidence, has the same radiative forcing as CO2!
BIG NEWS VIII: New solar theory predicts imminent global cooling 27 June 14
The flickers in sunlight run a whole sunspot cycle ahead of some other force from the sun. ...Sou: Watch out for those sunny flicks!
The delay could be as much as 20 years, in which case the drop could be as late as 2024. Or it could occur as soon as 2014.Sou: Best to cover all bases!
Force X works by modulating the albedo of the Earth, or the amount of solar radiation reflected straight back out to space without changing the heat of the planet, by clouds and ice and so on.Sou: Clouds? Wait a minute, below David says it affects how much radiation comes into earth, not how much is radiated out.
Force X turns the tap that controls how much sunlight pours into the Earth’s climate system. This could be through UV, magnetic field effects, solar wind, or some form of electrical field.Sou: Puppy dog tails? Leprechauns? Hang on. I thought he just said it affected outgoing radiation, not incoming. I do wish he'd get his story straight. It's been 18 months after all.
Are transfer functions meaningless (the “white noise” point)? Beware your assumptions! 29 June 14
Some people are claiming that the transfer function is meaningless because you could use white noise instead of temperature data and get the same notch. It’s true, you could.
...It would be better if there was a known mechanism. Of course, but Rome wasn’t built in a day, steady on.
Sou: Hmmm....I guess you can't have everything. Oh, wait. In climate science the mechanism is well known, proven beyond a shadow of doubt. It's called the greenhouse effect!
Thanks for the run-down on the bizarre world of 'Force X', Sou.
ReplyDeleteTruly, I don't think I've ever seen so many people talk themselves into something so completely on the basis of such ethereal 'evidence'. Outside of religion, of course. Indeed, the po-faced solemnity of the discussion thread below each post seems more suited to some sober conclave's determination of how many angels might dance upon the head of a pin...
It's fascinating - and not a little disturbing - to watch.
And this is, um, "Skepticism"? Every irony meter in the country is now kaput...
Ahh, Sou, you need a correction.
ReplyDeleteEvans is about right when he says "To put some numbers on it: TSI typically varies from the trough to the peak of a sunspot cycle by about 0.8 W/m2"
From wikipedia.
"Total solar output is now measured to vary (over the last three 11-year sunspot cycles) by approximately 0.1%,[3][4][5] or about 1.3 Watts per square meter (W/m2) peak-to-trough from solar maximum to solar minimum during the 11-year sunspot cycle. "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_variation
But he is wrong when he says
"If this was a long term change, the Stefan-Boltzmann equation would imply a change in radiating temperature of about 0.26°C, which would result in a change in surface temperature of about 0.5°C. "
The peak to peak is not a long term change, but a cycle of 0.4-0.6W/m2 warming followed by a 0.4-0.6W/m2 cooling, so they will tend to cancel themselves out.
What you quoted with the IPCC report is the long term TREND in the solar constant over about 100 years, which excludes the 11-year cyclic variation. Yes, this is 0.05 [0.00 to 0.10] Wm. You have confused the long term term trend with the cyclic variation.
Hope that helps.
Thanks, Dave. You're right. I'll make a correction.
DeleteHmm, but there should be an extra factor of 4, shouldn't there? Because TSI is measured in a plane perpendicular to the sun direction, so a square meter of TSI gets spread among 4 square meters of earths surface (pi r^2 vs 4 pi r^2).
DeleteI found this in a 2009 AGU poster by Ka--Kit Tung and co., does it sound about right?
Delete...the 11-year solar cycle variation has been measured by satellites since November 1978 (Frohlich and Lean, 2004) and shown to vary by about 0.08% from solar min to solar max, or about 1.0 Wm-2 in total solar irradiance (TSI). When divided by 4 and multiplied by 0.7 to account for the portion reflected back to space, it yields a radiative forcing (RF) of 0.18 Wm-2 (see footnote 11 in Chapter 2 of AR4) for the 5.5 years from solar min to solar max....
...We compare their model temperature variations with the recent observational result of Camp and Tung (2007), who found a globally averaged warming of almost 0.2°C from solar min to solar max
http://yly-mac.gps.caltech.edu/AGU/AGU_2007/TungSolar/Li_AGU07_KKTung_IPCC_2009Jul_revised.pdf
"it yields a radiative forcing (RF) of 0.18 Wm-2 "
DeleteAhh, well done guys. For the forcing at the earth's surface, you need to account that the earth is a sphere. Someone better let Nova and Evans know that their calculations are off by a factor of 4.
It's probably why you should leave the climate science to the experts. If they actually read any of JoNova's posts, they would have to install a waterproof screen protector !!!
That 0.2 degrees would be over 5.5 years, on average less than 0.04°C degrees a year, and is plus/minus the same amount over the whole eleven year cycle.
DeleteI reckon that it would be difficult to detect.
At SkS they describe a paper where the same authors say they've detected it (a later paper than the poster), at 0.18 °C minimum to max.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/solar-cycles-global-warming.htm
If you can scale it as you like, shift the time axis without any justification, and add anything else you want to the mix to get the desired result, then any data that has a rough increase over time could be used to give this result. Of course, to give a fossil fuel industry friendly conclusion, you'd want a sudden drop at the end that can be used to 'predict' future cooling.
ReplyDeleteI suspect that if you accept this basic method you could prove that PC desktop sales are responsible for global warming. Must be the heat output from all those Intel chips.
The comments at Watts on all of this are pretty amazing. Some people recognise how dodgy the analysis and "data" are, but many are falling for it hook, line and sinker.
ReplyDeleteThis comment from Willis Eschenbach is pretty interesting:
Now, I’ve used the word “invented” for that data. The graph itself uses the word “assumed” for that data. And Leif used the word “fabricated” for that data.
I see little difference between the three terms. We could just as well call it “made up” data, or “imaginary” data, what’s the difference? What they themselves say that have done is to add arbitrary numbers to real data, no matter what word you use
So I fear that you claiming that there is “no advantage to Dr Evans” from using “assumed” data makes no sense at all. Absolutely, there must be some advantage, or he wouldn’t have done it, would he?
To those three terms could be added "fictional", "fantastical", and plain old "dodgy".
DeleteAh, the joys of the "missing variable".
ReplyDeleteIf you try to correlate a phenomena (like temperature changes) while leaving out critical independent variables (like GHGs, aerosols, etc.), you can and will get a fit to the variable(s) you do include.
That fit may be terrible, requiring absurd scaling (Force X at an order of magnitude higher strength than TSI), ad hoc fixes (11-year time delay, ridiculous 'nuclear winter'), etc. But if you torture the data enough you can claim a fit.
Of course, if you actually pay attention to that darn physics, and include independent factors known to have an influence, the anthropogenic contribution is clear. As is the negative contribution of solar from the last 50 years or so. But being sensible like that is just no fun if you're invested in ABC (Anything But Carbon)...
in one of his papers Svensmark had an even better way of getting the earth's temperature evolution to fit with his GCR hypothesis: he subtracted a 0.12 degree/decade trend...
DeleteAnd Scafetta added a rising quadratic to his cyclorama to account for even his hand-selected astronomical cycles (mis)fitting temperature changes from GHGs. And then ignored that little bit of adjustment to claim that all climate change is a set of natural cycles.
DeleteAmazing skills in self-deception - demonstrated. Basic skills in math - not so much...
Eli Rabett points out Maybe There Is Something You Don't Know, including
ReplyDelete"Simply put it is well known why surface temperature records show no dependence on the solar cycle, the answer being ozone and oxygen and other scattering. It turns out that almost all of the variability in the solar spectrum is below 300 nm, and none of that makes it below the ozone layer. Let Guy Brasseur tell you why"
David Evans has made a clear, short-term prediction, based on non-science followed by non-math.
Perhaps the Sylvia Browne of climate nonsense.
"
I thought he'd gotten over the rocket scientist silliness, but no...currently Rocket Scientist for Hire.
ReplyDeleteH/T j bowers
Is that for real, John, or is it a sendup? Someone making fun? Joanne has a gaping mouth and David Evans is speaking at Luna Park!
DeleteRummage around the Science Speak website. Looks real.
DeleteThe Whois entry shows Admin: David Evans, with an address in W.A.
It's all quite consistent and if it's a fake, it's exceptional.
Really, a thorough look around may offer insight, as in Attacks and Smears.
Yes. It's most likely real and goes a long way to explaining why Jo was forced to cyber-begging for more than pocket money :(
DeleteLuna Park seemed a fine venue to me. Why not?
DeleteSo they really call it ForceX? I thought you had invented that name for mocking purposes. :-)
ReplyDeleteYep! I can see the paper now - Force X invades planet Earth, by David Evans, Rocket Scientist from Luna Park :)
DeleteIt's worth keeping up with the thread. The latest has locals grilling Lord M on his authorless graph in the Tele.
ReplyDeleteHad a look - Monckton given the chance to give a straight answer, er, can't. I am not sure he knows what one is. Perhaps comes from being an advisor (sic) to Mrs Thatcher and a colleague of Nigel Farage.
DeleteMonckton was not an advisor to Thatcher, he was a Downing Street advisor, which is to say an advisor to his brother-in-law and Chancellor Nigel Lawson, who lived at No 11.
DeleteSee how that works? It's almost elegant.
Update: The WUWT article by David "funny sunny" Archibald on this subject has earned 533 comments so far
DeleteAnd now over 600+ comments. But for some reason the article does not make it into the shortcut list of the 4 most active articles that is displayed at the start of the WUWT blog.
Jammy, I noticed that too. I'm surprised that Anthony hasn't cut his losses and closed the thread. Then again, maybe he'd get all his allies offside - Willis, Leif and Christopher in particular.
DeleteHe did close it in the end. I think even 25 Watts worked out that Monckton was taking a real beating on lots of sides - throwing around libel threats, misunderstanding consensus, being on the wrong side in a scientific dispute, being very evasive over simple questions on who drew a graph... I know Monckton comes across as a silly cartoon of a real character but even he must know he is on the losing side on virtually every scientific debate he raises.
DeleteNone of Anthony's biggest allies spoke up for Christopher. I think it's the first time many of them have seen that side of him. He went absolutely nuts. He must have threatened half of them with libel, getting worse and more verbose and more threatening as the thread lengthened. He was variously treated as either seriously and got as good as he dished out, or treated as the joke that he is.
DeleteA lot of the WUWT-ers might not be aware that threatening to sue people or threatening to get them sacked is part of the potty peer's normal repertoire. He does that sort of thing often though I don't think he's threatened his "allies" before. While he writes letters to employers he's never taken legal action to my knowledge. His crazed letters probably get stored with other hate mail from deniers, at various universities around the world.
He also made some classic comments that can be thrown back at him, about his fudged "charts", disowning some and declaring others to be "schematic" or "simple mistakes". That's a big step, too. He's basically admitting to fudgery and misrepresentation.
I hope that more of the regular WUWT readers are starting to see that Christopher Monckton is not all there. Many of them already see him as the pompous ass, the clown, the blustering nincompoop that he is. There are a few people at WUWT who manage to string a sentence together in a coherent fashion. And this isn't the first time they've complained about his appearances at WUWT.
Anthony Watts thinks Christopher is royalty though and I don't think he's about to let him go. He is easily impressed.
" Anthony Watts says:
DeleteJuly 2, 2014 at 5:12 pm
...I’m closing this thread, There will be a followup thread related to my findings on the charges that Monckton botched a graph. I have not decided if I will allow comments or not."
No comments allowed eh? Sounds like he wants to reprint the hymn sheet.
Love the pseudo-legal language. A judge and jury all wrapped up in Anthony Watts. Will he hang him out to dry or will he defend him against his other allies - Leif Svalgaard, Willis Eschenbach and Pamela Grey in particular? Who is more important to Anthony? Where will that leave Anthony's arch-rival Jo Nova and her Rocket Scientists hubby from Luna Park?
DeleteQuestions, questions.
Is the second law of Monckton about to come into force?
(He'll probably try to get them to kiss and make up. Which will be a big ask, given Christopher's behaviour.)
Given that Christopher said that he would break with convention and not add the media that published the alleged libel (WUWT) to his long list of parties to be sued (he was just threatening lot of people whose comments Anthony published), I wonder what the outcome will be?
One ironic comment in that thread was when Christopher claimed that his "IPCC hockey stick" graphic was just a "schematic". This after all the denier nonsense alleging the temperature graphic on the cover of some WMO annual report was "fraudulent".
Deniers can be remarkably inconsistent.
Monckton will be available for kiss and make up at the Heartland conference next week, but let's face it, nobody'd want to kiss him and you couldn't make him up.
DeleteWell, one question has been answered. Christopher Monckton - one and, presumably, Willis Eschenbach and Leif Svalgaard and Pamela Gray and co - nil.
DeleteAnthony's posted another article by the potty peer. In spite of his crazed voluminous comments and overt threats of legal action etc, forelock-tugging Anthony still bows and scrapes to his lordship.
Some lovely graphs there. Since we know his Lordsnip can't draw, someone else must have done them.
DeleteJr. Rocket Scientist David Evans
ReplyDeleteI think I have found a geocentrist at WTFUWT. In the mega-thread (disaster) about Force X, bushbunny wrote this:
ReplyDeleteBut the orbit of the sun, constantly spinning in space with its satellites, ie. planets and asteroids, have influenced our climate and weather, between interstadials and seasons.
The "orbit of the sun", my friends ... I present to you a geocentrist, alive and kicking in the internet era!
The first half of that cite is totally reasonable: the sun orbits around the galaxy, and the planets are satellites of the sun.
DeleteI'm not aware of any credible research about this having an effect on the climate. There's the Nemesis hypothesis, but it wasn't ever very popular.
Stoat's Battle of the Graphs is related, and informative, including a high densit yof real information in the comments.
ReplyDelete