(06-16-2012, 02:11 PM)Mavfin Wrote: There are time blocks (100s of thousands of years) from some geological eras where the carbon dioxide levels are much higher than anything we have now, but evidence points to temperatures in general being lower than now. However, the climate experts who push the climate change don't bring those up, because they don't fit the model that they're pushing on everyone.
Right, the entire field of climate science just ignores entire geological eras?
No serious climate modeler is pushing a theory that says atmospheric CO2 content is the sole determinant of climate. Climate is determined by the interaction hundreds of variables, of which CO2 is only one. Nevertheless, this does not stop us from modelling what would happen were we to increase CO2 dramatically over a short time frame. One can question the efficacy of the models, but the greenhouse effect is real, and increasing CO2 warms the planet. This is not in any meaningful doubt.
Quote:Some of this came out when some emails between researchers were leaked several years ago, talking about data they were going to ignore, because it didn't fit their pet theories. No, I don't have links, but it's not hard to find.
Climateaudit has everything, along with great reams of suggestive commentary. I believe what you are referring to is "hide the decline," which (even in its least charitable interpretation) refers to leaving out part of a data set which was known to be a poor indicator - there was a "decline" in tree ring growth in the data they were using for exogenous reasons, rather than climate. From what I've read, they should have just tossed that entire tree ring dataset, but regardless, the "hockey stick" pattern produced by Mann et al. is well-replicated from a variety of independent sources of evidence.
Quote:Fact is, it's become a political thing more than a scientific one, and, those researchers basically buried the data that didn't fit so they could keep their funding. If the experts on this were more united, I'd give them more credence, but, there's lots of climate experts out there that disagree with the one the news media likes to push.
This is not a "fact". There are very few climatologists who do not subscribe to the mainstream view of climate change - they may not agree on the details, but the general concepts are consensus. For exceptions, one might look at Judith Curry, or Richard Lindzen, but these are few and far between. Most "big name" climate skeptics are not climatologists, and most have no formal training in any meaningful related fields. Some still manage to make interesting contributions (McKitrick and McIntyre), but they are in a very small minority.
Or, in other words, if you think there isn't much consensus among climate experts, then I don't think you've looked hard enough. Or perhaps, looked too hard in the wrong places.
-Jester