Climate Knowledge vs. Computer Game Predictions

all quotes below are from:

                   “Heaven and Earth”   
        an excellent  book by Professor Ian Plimer

http://www.amazon.com/Heaven-Earth-Warming-Missing-Science/dp/1589794729

(from the back cover of the book):

“Climate, sea level, and ice sheets have always changed, and the changes observed today are less than in the past.

Climate changes are cyclical and driven by Earth’s position in the galaxy, the Sun, wobbles in Earth’s orbit, ocean currents, and plate tectonics.

In previous times, atmospheric carbon dioxide was far higher than at present but did not drive climate change.”

(from pages 98 and 99):

“ … the UK’s Meteorological Office has now confirmed a fall in average global temperatures since 1998, despite a 25% increase in the burning of coal, oil and natural gas which produced voluminous CO2 additions to the atmosphere.”

.
(from page 99):

“Declarations that a particular year was the warmest ever are nothing more than calculating an average value of temperatures recorded at measuring stations.

Such calculations can be misleading since the distribution of observation points over land and ocean is uneven and there are large areas of the Earth that have few measurements.”

.

(from page 125)

“… there is a scientific opinion from astronomers at the Pulkovo Observatory in Russia that the Earth will be facing a slow decrease in temperatures in 2012-2015.

The gradually falling amounts of solar energy will be expected to reach their minimum level by 2040, inevitably leading to a deep freeze around 2055-2060.

This is a view supported by other astronomers.”

.

(from page 130)

 “Mars, Triton, Pluto and Jupiter all show global warming.

(from pages 144 and 145)

“The 20^th Century shows an overall warming of some 0.7 degrees C., almost half of which was before 1945 when the Sun was more active, and when there was far less emission of CO2 into the atmosphere by humans.

… The pronounced cooling from 1945 until the mid-1970’s was at the time of a weakening of the Sun’s magnetic activity and, after 1975, the upward trend in solar activity resumed. 

As a result, warming resumed.”

.

(from page 165)

“The Ordovician-Silurian (450 to 420 million years ago) and Jurassic-Cretaceous (151 to 132 million years ago) glaciations occurred when the atmospheric CO2 content was more than 4,000 ppmv and about 2,000 parts per million by volume (ppmv) respectively.

The Carboniferous-Permian glaciation (360 to 260 million years ago) had a CO2 content of about 400ppmv, at least 15 ppmv higher than the present figure.

If the popular catastrophist view is accepted, then there should have been a runaway greenhouse (warming) when CO2 was more than 4,000 ppmv.

Instead there was glaciation."

 (from page 175)

“A sobering thought is that 99.99% of all species that have ever existed in planet Earth are now extinct.”

.

(from pages 198 and 199)

“The U.S. Fisheries and Wildlife Service showed that there are some 22,000 polar bears in about 20 distinct populations worldwide.

Only two bear populations, accounting for 16.4% of the total, are decreasing, and they are in areas where air temperatures have actually fallen, such as the Baffin Bay region.

By contrast, another two populations, about 13.6% of the total number, are growing and they live in areas where air temperatures have risen, near the Bering Strait and the Chukchi Sea.

As for the rest, 10 populations, comprising about 45.4% of the total, are stable and the status of the remaining six is unknown.

.

(from page 228)

“Since the last glaciation ended 14,000 years ago, sea level has risen some 130 metres. 

… Some two-thirds of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet has already melted over the last 14,000 years since the last Ice Age and the remaining ice will melt, detach and cause a 7-meter sea level rise.

… The process is not the result of the Late 20^th Century Warming, it is the end result of the 130-meter increase in sea level since the last Ice Age.”

.

(from pages 251 and 252)

“The Northern Hemisphere has had ice sheets for 2.5 million years, whereas Antarctica has had ice sheets for 37 million years.  Glaciers grow, flow and melt continuously. … However, a calving iceberg makes good television for a catastrophic message.”

.

(from page 262)

“Monthly readings over the last 70 years from 37 Arctic and seven sub-Arctic stations show that the highest temperatures occurred in the 1930’s."

(from page  271 and 272)

“Al Gore exaggerated the impact of global warming on Antarctica about 50-fold.”

.

.

(from page 276)

“The … Vostok ice core … detailed measurements on the scale of decades over a 250,000-year ice core record and a correlation of a 35,000-year ice core record from Taylor Dome, it was shown that high air temperatures are followed some 400 to 1,000 years later by a high atmospheric CO2 content.

… During the last 420,000 years there have been massive temperature changes, and a rise in CO2 concentration follows an air temperature increase by about 800 years and it is only after a cooling event that CO2 decreases.

This is no surprise, as CO2 is more soluble in cold (ocean) water than in warm (ocean) water.”

.

(from page 344)

“Sea surface temperature used to be measured in the major sea lanes of the world by passing ships.

This was voluntary and only covered maritime ship routes.

Almost all the surface of the oceans went unmeasured, especially in the Southern Hemisphere where about 80% is ocean and these oceans have far less shipping than the Northern Hemisphere.

Until recently, the sea surface temperature was measured with a thermometer in a bucketful of seawater.

These measurements had an accuracy of no better than +/- 0.5 degrees C., which is highly inaccurate.

The change from wooden to canvas buckets led to a “discontinuity” of temperature measurements and significant errors.

Currents were also measured by similarly crude methods.”

.

(from page 366):

“All the CO2 does is slow down heat loss.  Atmospheric CO2 does not trap heat, as insulation does.

If the current atmospheric CO2 content of 380 ppmv were doubled to 760 ppmv, there would be a miniscule impact on the radiation balance and the temperature.

(from page 377):

“One can argue that it is human vanity to imagine that our relatively small inhabited percentage of global surface has the ability to alter the climate of the whole planet, as some 98.6% of the surface of the planet is essentially uninhabited.

… It has now been shown that about half of the U.S. weather measuring stations are incorrectly positioned, do not fulfill the siting requirements of the U.S. government and introduce a warming bias.”

.

(from page 392):

“The last 30 years of weather are not in accord with what greenhouse models predict and can be far better explained by natural processes, such as solar variability.

Furthermore, the satellite and balloon data show that atmospheric warming trends do not exceed surface warming trends, whereas greenhouse models demand that the atmospheric trend be 2-3 times greater."

(from page 393):

“On a scale of 500 years, the planet is warming.  But warming compared to what?    We were in the grip of the Little Ice Age 500 years ago, so thankfully it is now warmer.”

.

(from page 416):

“There is a 180-year record of atmospheric CO2 measurement by the same method. It has been measured with an accuracy of 1 - 3% from 1812 until 1961 by a chemical method.

Between 1812 and 1961, there have been more than 90,000 measurements of atmospheric CO2 by the Pettenkofer method.

These showed peaks in atmospheric CO2 in 1825, 1857 and 1942.

In 1942, the atmospheric CO2 content (400 ppmv) was higher than now.

A plot of the CO2 measured by these methods shows that for much of the 19th Century, and from 1935 to 1950, the atmospheric CO2 was higher than at present and varied considerably.

… In 1959, the measurement method was changed to infra-red spectroscopy with the establishment of the Mauna Loa (Hawaii) station, and measurements were compared to a reference gas sample. 

… The infra-red technique has never been validated against the Pettenkofer method.

The raw data from Mauna Loa is “edited” by an operator who deletes what may be considered poor data.

Some 82% of the raw infra-red CO2 measurement data is “edited” leaving just 18% of the raw data measurements for statistical analysis.”   

.

(from page 419):

“The IPCC chose to ignore the 90,000 precise CO2 measurements compiled despite the fact that there is an overlap in time between the Pettenkofer method and the infra-red method measurements at Mauna Loa. 

If a large body of validated historical data is to be ignored, then a well reasoned argument needs to be given.

There was no explanation.

Just silence.”

.

(from page 424):

“The release of CO2 from cooling molten rocks is unmeasured (e.g.; Kamchatka), the release of CO2 from bacteria in the first 4 kilometers of the Earth’s crust is unknown, the release of CO2 from uplift of mountain ranges and alps is unknown and the release of CO2 from submarine volcanoes is unknown.

Most of this CO2 has a biological signature and hence cannot be differentiated from CO2 derived from a burning of fossil fuels.” 

.

(from page 425):

“ … CO2 derived from human activity produces 0.1% of global warming and there is a maximum threshold for CO2, after which an increase in CO2 has very little effect on atmospheric warming.

The current CO2 content of the atmosphere is the lowest it has been for thousands of millions of years, and life (including human life) has thrived at times when CO2 has been significantly higher.”

.

(from page 435):

"We are facing the greatest global threat in my three score and two years.

It is not global warming.

It is the threat from policy responses to perceived global warming and the demonizing of dissent.

(from pages 436 and 437):

“When the facts change, extreme green ideology, politics and pressure do not change.

Green ideology and political pressure take place in a science-free zone.

… The founder of Greenpeace, Dr. Patrick Moore, has stated that the green movements have been taken over by neo-Marxists promoting anti-trade, anti-globalization and anti-civilization.”

.

(from page 438):

 “The (climate) models suggested constant warming until the end of time.

However, neither the post-1998 cooling nor El Nino events were predicted.

Climate predictions are not evidence and certainly not suitable for environmental or political planning.

The refusal of climate to follow the IPCC computer models is the grim reality of Nature."

.

(from page 440):

“Climate computer models amount to a religious statement by the modeler stating his belief to how his small part of the world should operate.

Global climate models deal with atmosphere-ocean-land interactions, while variables such as the Sun, the cosmos, bacteria, history and the geological processes that take place beneath our feet are ignored.”

(from page 446):

“Human-induced global warming is a popular belief because it offers the satisfaction of righteousness without actually having to do anything.

Subscribing costs nothing, it provides the immediate reward of moral superiority, and there is the bonus of seeing “polluters” having to pay for their sins.”

.

(from page 448):

“Almost every time a global warming story is featured on television, there is a background image of a cooling tower on a coal-fired power station.

The visible plume is not CO2, it is H2O.”
.

(from page 462):

“There is no use for an honest scientist who says “I don’t know”.

Yet uncertainty is the crux of science whereas certainty underpins religious beliefs.

The politicians and the public prefer to hear scientists give confident black-and-white answers and make confident predictions.

Uncertainty and predictions that all is well are far less likely to attract attention than those that say we’re doomed.”

.

(from page 463 and 464):

“Environmentalism is an urban religion disconnected from Nature, or rural life, or the realities of food and mineral production.

This environmental religion is terrified of doubt, skepticism and uncertainty yet claims to be underpinned by science.

… Like many fundamentalist religions, it attracts believers by announcing apocalyptic calamities unless we change our ways.

… Logic, questioning or contrary data are not permitted.”

.

(from page 482):

“It took nearly eight years and direct action from the U.S. House of Representatives before the data and computer programs for the 1998 Mann et al. “hockey stick” were released. These showed a lack of robustness, statistical flaws and fraud.”

.

(from page 486):

 “The late Dr. Roger Revelle, Al Gore’s scientific adviser, must be turning in his grave. Before he died, he co-authored a popular paper stating:

“We know too little to take any action based on global warming. If we take any action, it should be an action that we can justify completely without global warming.”  Gore’s staffers tried to have his name posthumously removed from the paper by claiming Revelle was senile.”

.

(from page 490):

“Even if today’s warming was unprecedented, the Sun is the probable cause.

It was more active in the past 70 years than in the previous 11,400 years.

… CO2 occupies only one-ten-thousandth more of the atmosphere today than it did in 1750 AD.

Even if CO2 were to blame, no runaway greenhouse catastrophe occurred in the Cambrian Period 500 million years ago when there was more than 20 times today’s atmospheric CO2.”

(from page 492):

“How many examples of failed predictions, discredited assumptions, evidence of incorrect data and evidence of malpractice are required before the idea of human-induced climate change