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michaelj

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The fact that you replied and completely understand the point of my post says it all. No one knows what the climate will bring tomorrow much less in a month or a year. Al Gore is famous for having said around 2005 that the oceans would all dry up by 2015 and now won't respond to questions about his statement. And further a few months after making that statement he bought a $7 million ocean front house in California.

As a person who would claim that Al Gore said the oceans would all dry up by 2015, certainly you must be able to know a sensationalist when you see one. The fact that there are sensationalists does not change the undeniable fact that human beings are causing long term noticeable climate change.

Better be careful about saying that kind of thing. They are liable to show up at your residence in black jump suits, ski masks, clubs and fire.

Really, Vance?

You wrote the above, Weather is unpredictable Climate is a lot more predictable. Not meaning to be condescending but it is necessary to state the following: prove it!

Not to be condescending, but dude, it's been proven beyond any reasonable doubt. You sound like Alex Jones. There is a 97% consensus, backed by an ever more reliable set of data. If your only support for your skepticism it is a tinfoil hat conpiracy fantasy in which 97% of the world's scientists are in it just to promote a lie to make money for other people, THAT is the claim that requires some proof.

We don't think CO2 causes warming. We know it. We don't think that humans are adding large quantities of CO2 to the atmosphere. We know it. We don't think that sea level has risen in the last 30 years and 100 years, we know it. We don't think that glaciers are retreating. We know it. We don't think air temperatures around the world have been increasing consistently. We know it. We don't think solar activity hasn't corresponded with the warming. We know it.

We don't know exactly how the future changes are going to come. We don't know exactly how much more water will be released into the oceans in the next 20 years. We don't know exactly how and when this will change the number, intensity and range of tropical cyclones, droughts and permafrost melt. The models keep getting the trend right, but not all of the details.

I get that predictions will be unreliable. I get that the wildest alarmists, who are seeking attention by claiming the most outrageous parade of horribles are coming, will be wrong. But you are ignoring the fact that very smart sensible and unbiased scientists are all coming to the same conclusion, which is this. We are in a profound warming trend. It is substantially caused by human activity. There will be numerous and profound adverse effects from it, and many of those will be difficult or impossible to reverse. If you believe otherwise, without some fantastic proof of this conspiracy you cling to, you are fostering ignorance.
 

milehigh_7

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There is a 97% consensus,

97% of the world's scientists

Not to sound condescending... (using your phrase) as any self-respecting academic would do I'll ask for your sources listing what all world's scientists believe on this issue so that we can do some statistical analysis on your data just to check. No academic who makes such wild claims would mind. Surely you have evidence for your 97% claim right?

Or...

Was your post wild alarmist, attention seeking, (I just moved a few of your words around) hyperbole?

First, it is physically impossible for you to make a claim about what 97% of scientists believe ... How would you verify this claim? Has there been some poll of every living scientist in every field? What exactly qualifies someone as a "scientist" by your definition anyhow?

Next, and I have stated this before, a scientist knows that science DOES NOT WORK VIA CONSENSUS!!! If you are going to start parroting CNN talking points at least do some reading or something... Science is not a democracy where they hold a vote to see what everyone thinks. A good scientist assumes the null hypothesis which states that the stated variable has no effect on the observed object. The reason for this is so that they do not introduce bias to the research.

Next, they gather data from at least two populations (the larger the better) one in which the variable has been introduced and one in which is free from the variable. This second group is called the control. Then they statistically analyze the data using something called math not consensus. If the statistics show a 95% or greater increase (or decrease) in what is being measured in the experimental group then we can establish this magical thing called causality. Otherwise, you say that the variable does not have a statistically significant impact on the observed object.

Even then, the work must be repeated with the same results. Because real science is observable, measurable and repeatable or it is not science. It is speculation.

Now please stop fostering ignorance.
 
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michaelj

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"Not be be condescending" was actually Vance's phrase. It's one he uses when he is about to say something incorrect or unsupported, but in a very condescending way.

I'm not parroting CNN, I'm parroting CalTech professor Yuk L. Yung (http://www.gps.caltech.edu/content/yuk-l-yung) and NASA (https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus). Back when Time magazine was still publishing speculation about how an ice age could be upon us in mere decades, Dr. Yung's research was bringing us this sort of thing: W.C. Wang, Y.L. Yung, A.A. Lacis, T. Mo, and J.E. Hansen, 1976, Greenhouse effects due to man-made perturbations of trace gases. Science, 194, 685-690.

And yes, I do have evidence for the 97% figure. It can be found here: J. Cook, et al, "Consensus on consensus: a synthesis of consensus estimates on human-caused global warming," Environmental Research Letters Vol. 11 No. 4, (13 April 2016); DOI:10.1088/1748-9326/11/4/048002

It is not physically impossible to know what the percentages are. The fact that you cannot fathom such a thing explains a lot of your other opinions. In this case, the 97% figure comes from viewing the published work of scientists who are sufficiently qualified to publish their research findings after successfully navigating peer review. If you are a scientist, or know someone who is one, you know that this is a meaningful thing, and not just the result of having declared oneself to know things, or paid money or received money to say things. It is statistically legitimate to extrapolate that the findings in these peer-reviewed publications are representative of the scientific community as a whole. If you have difficulty understanding how this can be true, take a statistics class. It's an advanced form of that "something called math" you alluded to. If you do take such a class, or ever did, you'll quickly understand why you'll have to excuse me for not explaining the concept in a single forum post in a bonsai forum. The fact that you assumed a 95% confidence interval is necessary to ever ascertain causality suggests to me that you've never taken a statistics class and are simply cutting an pasting stuff you don't actually understand from an unreliable source.

And yes, we all know science does not "work" by consensus, and a scientist's conclusion should not be based upon a consensus, but when scientists, using state of the art scientific methods, are coming to consistent conclusions 97% of the time, that's a consensus that the public can generally rely upon when forming their own world views, and when making decisions individually and in groups. Those who side with the outliers under these circumstances are usually making the wrong decisions.

As to the merits, there has been an abundance of scientific study that shows causation between CO2 (and other gases which we now call greenhouse gases) and warming. This is a pretty good starting point to provide an explanation for someone who is not familiar with the underlying science: https://www.nature.com/articles/srep21691

So tell, me, if you're so much smarter than these guys, or the scientists who run NASA (probably the most sophisticated and accomplished group of scientists the world has ever known), perhaps you can explain for the rest of us unwashed dumbasses where people like Dr. Yung and Dr. Stips and his team got it so wrong.
 

Vance Wood

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"Not be be condescending" was actually Vance's phrase. It's one he uses when he is about to say something incorrect or unsupported, but in a very condescending way.

I'm not parroting CNN, I'm parroting CalTech professor Yuk L. Yung (http://www.gps.caltech.edu/content/yuk-l-yung) and NASA (https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus). Back when Time magazine was still publishing speculation about how an ice age could be upon us in mere decades, Dr. Yung's research was bringing us this sort of thing: W.C. Wang, Y.L. Yung, A.A. Lacis, T. Mo, and J.E. Hansen, 1976, Greenhouse effects due to man-made perturbations of trace gases. Science, 194, 685-690.

And yes, I do have evidence for the 97% figure. It can be found here: J. Cook, et al, "Consensus on consensus: a synthesis of consensus estimates on human-caused global warming," Environmental Research Letters Vol. 11 No. 4, (13 April 2016); DOI:10.1088/1748-9326/11/4/048002

It is not physically impossible to know what the percentages are. The fact that you cannot fathom such a thing explains a lot of your other opinions. In this case, the 97% figure comes from viewing the published work of scientists who are sufficiently qualified to publish their research findings after successfully navigating peer review. If you are a scientist, or know someone who is one, you know that this is a meaningful thing, and not just the result of having declared oneself to know things, or paid money or received money to say things. It is statistically legitimate to extrapolate that the findings in these peer-reviewed publications are representative of the scientific community as a whole. If you have difficulty understanding how this can be true, take a statistics class. It's an advanced form of that "something called math" you alluded to. If you do take such a class, or ever did, you'll quickly understand why you'll have to excuse me for not explaining the concept in a single forum post in a bonsai forum. The fact that you assumed a 95% confidence interval is necessary to ever ascertain causality suggests to me that you've never taken a statistics class and are simply cutting an pasting stuff you don't actually understand from an unreliable source.

And yes, we all know science does not "work" by consensus, and a scientist's conclusion should not be based upon a consensus, but when scientists, using state of the art scientific methods, are coming to consistent conclusions 97% of the time, that's a consensus that the public can generally rely upon when forming their own world views, and when making decisions individually and in groups. Those who side with the outliers under these circumstances are usually making the wrong decisions.

As to the merits, there has been an abundance of scientific study that shows causation between CO2 (and other gases which we now call greenhouse gases) and warming. This is a pretty good starting point to provide an explanation for someone who is not familiar with the underlying science: https://www.nature.com/articles/srep21691

So tell, me, if you're so much smarter than these guys, or the scientists who run NASA (probably the most sophisticated and accomplished group of scientists the world has ever known), perhaps you can explain for the rest of us unwashed dumbasses where people like Dr. Yung and Dr. Stips and his team got it so wrong.
I'm not smarter than these guys but I am right, and I am convinced that most of them have sold out to sell an idea that is full of flaws, but the forwarding of this idea is full of profit. The last two days here in Michigan the highest temperature has been 68*, that is global warming. Incedentally they have stoped calling it Global Warming and now call it climate change. See; I know what is going on, I just disagree with the so called science.

I am not going to convince you and you are not going to convince me so why try?????
 

milehigh_7

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"Not be be condescending" was actually Vance's phrase. It's one he uses when he is about to say something incorrect or unsupported, but in a very condescending way.

I'm not parroting CNN, I'm parroting CalTech professor Yuk L. Yung (http://www.gps.caltech.edu/content/yuk-l-yung) and NASA (https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus). Back when Time magazine was still publishing speculation about how an ice age could be upon us in mere decades, Dr. Yung's research was bringing us this sort of thing: W.C. Wang, Y.L. Yung, A.A. Lacis, T. Mo, and J.E. Hansen, 1976, Greenhouse effects due to man-made perturbations of trace gases. Science, 194, 685-690.

And yes, I do have evidence for the 97% figure. It can be found here: J. Cook, et al, "Consensus on consensus: a synthesis of consensus estimates on human-caused global warming," Environmental Research Letters Vol. 11 No. 4, (13 April 2016); DOI:10.1088/1748-9326/11/4/048002

It is not physically impossible to know what the percentages are. The fact that you cannot fathom such a thing explains a lot of your other opinions. In this case, the 97% figure comes from viewing the published work of scientists who are sufficiently qualified to publish their research findings after successfully navigating peer review. If you are a scientist, or know someone who is one, you know that this is a meaningful thing, and not just the result of having declared oneself to know things, or paid money or received money to say things. It is statistically legitimate to extrapolate that the findings in these peer-reviewed publications are representative of the scientific community as a whole. If you have difficulty understanding how this can be true, take a statistics class. It's an advanced form of that "something called math" you alluded to. If you do take such a class, or ever did, you'll quickly understand why you'll have to excuse me for not explaining the concept in a single forum post in a bonsai forum. The fact that you assumed a 95% confidence interval is necessary to ever ascertain causality suggests to me that you've never taken a statistics class and are simply cutting an pasting stuff you don't actually understand from an unreliable source.

And yes, we all know science does not "work" by consensus, and a scientist's conclusion should not be based upon a consensus, but when scientists, using state of the art scientific methods, are coming to consistent conclusions 97% of the time, that's a consensus that the public can generally rely upon when forming their own world views, and when making decisions individually and in groups. Those who side with the outliers under these circumstances are usually making the wrong decisions.

As to the merits, there has been an abundance of scientific study that shows causation between CO2 (and other gases which we now call greenhouse gases) and warming. This is a pretty good starting point to provide an explanation for someone who is not familiar with the underlying science: https://www.nature.com/articles/srep21691

So tell, me, if you're so much smarter than these guys, or the scientists who run NASA (probably the most sophisticated and accomplished group of scientists the world has ever known), perhaps you can explain for the rest of us unwashed dumbasses where people like Dr. Yung and Dr. Stips and his team got it so wrong.


LOL, it only took you 4 days to Google enough things that you think rebut my background knowledge lol... I will read your sources and get back to you. Do be advised it's pretty well known that NASA is the very organization actively engaged in faking the data. So while they may be smart, they are also dishonest and agenda driven.
 

milehigh_7

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Oh yeah, @michaelj one more quick thing if you don't mind. While I am reviewing your sources if you would be so kind as to correct me regarding my understanding of confidence intervals and statistics in general. Yes I am aware you can tighten the precision but please do give guidance to where I was actually "wrong". You say, "you'll have to excuse me for not explaining the concept in a single forum post in a bonsai forum." No, I'll not excuse you as you were quick to point out my ignorance. Given that, I would like to be taught so I don't make such blunders in the future.

Thanks!
 

michaelj

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Oh yeah, @michaelj one more quick thing if you don't mind. While I am reviewing your sources if you would be so kind as to correct me regarding my understanding of confidence intervals and statistics in general. Yes I am aware you can tighten the precision but please do give guidance to where I was actually "wrong".

You do not need to have a 95% confidence interval to know that there is causation. If fact, you can have far less, and still have causation, or you can have far more, and not have causation.

You say, "you'll have to excuse me for not explaining the concept in a single forum post in a bonsai forum." No, I'll not excuse you as you were quick to point out my ignorance. Given that, I would like to be taught so I don't make such blunders in the future.

No, I will not teach you a semester's worth of statistics for free. That would be a lot of work, and you're not paying for it.

LOL, it only took you 4 days to Google enough things that you think rebut my background knowledge lol... I will read your sources and get back to you. Do be advised it's pretty well known that NASA is the very organization actively engaged in faking the data. So while they may be smart, they are also dishonest and agenda driven.

It took me ten minutes. What do you think people do? Live on this forum, read your posts and then embark on a 4 day quest to refute you?

And no, it is not well know that NASA is endeavoring to fake the data. But now that I know that this is the world view from which you come, I don't see much point in furthering my discussions with you on this point. If you think NASA is just an organization of smart hoaxers, it is doubtful that you will accept any data that conflicts with your opinions, no matter how ironclad.

I am not going to convince you and you are not going to convince me so why try?????

Convincing you is far from the only reason why someone should speak out when you peddle erroneous information.
 

Vance Wood

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I am flattered that you think what I say is important enough to enough people that you think you have to invest time in rebutting what I say. I guess we are going to have a confrontational future.
 

michaelj

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I am flattered that you think what I say is important enough to enough people that you think you have to invest time in rebutting what I say. I guess we are going to have a confrontational future.

Only when you try to propagate dangerous falsehoods. Or when you're being particularly cantankerous.
 

Vance Wood

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Only when you try to propagate dangerous falsehoods. Or when you're being particularly cantankerous.
Falsehoods according to you. I'm not cantankerous I am just aggressive when I defend myself. For some reason, over the years people have found it necessary to make their disagreements with me personal.
 
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@Vance Wood Do you have data that shows support for another hypothesis besides climate change, rather than just your recent localized weather? If you don't that's not science.

The main problem is that people who don't know any better fixate on what is presented by Al Gore and Bill Nye. Neither one is a scientist.
 

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Falsehoods according to you.

Not just me, Vance.

I'm not cantankerous I am just aggressive when I defend myself. For some reason, over the years people have found it necessary to make their disagreements with me personal.

Yes, for some reason(s)...

@Vance WoodThe main problem is that people who don't know any better fixate on what is presented by Al Gore and Bill Nye. Neither one is a scientist.

For what it's worth, Bill Nye has a degree in mechanical engineering from an Ivy League school, he's earned a bunch of patents, and he's taken more high level science classes than most "non-scientists." Engineering is a close companion to science, and you cannot be a mechanical engineer without having an aptitude for science. While Nye may not be a scientist, he is a talented communicator of science. And frankly, extraordinary scientists are not always the clearest and best communicators. So while technically, it may be true that Nye isn't a working scientist, it doesn't in any way reflect on his bona fides as a speaker on matters of science.

I like the guy. Having been a double major in a science and in communications, he has a job I'd have loved to have gotten for myself.
 
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Oh yeah, @michaelj one more quick thing if you don't mind. While I am reviewing your sources if you would be so kind as to correct me regarding my understanding of confidence intervals and statistics in general. Yes I am aware you can tighten the precision but please do give guidance to where I was actually "wrong". You say, "you'll have to excuse me for not explaining the concept in a single forum post in a bonsai forum." No, I'll not excuse you as you were quick to point out my ignorance. Given that, I would like to be taught so I don't make such blunders in the future.

Thanks!

The way you described science is not the only one way to do science. There's descriptive and experimental science. There's modelling and there are a number of other statistics that are used. For instance, Bayesian statistics are a whole different world. etc. etc. etc... What you described is the scientific method taught to kids... :)
 
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I'm not smarter than these guys but I am right, and I am convinced that most of them have sold out to sell an idea that is full of flaws, but the forwarding of this idea is full of profit.

I am not going to convince you and you are not going to convince me so why try?????

Well. If you're right and you're not smarter than these guys, who must be wrong according to you... So most scientists around the world have sold out to the idea of climate change...

The last two days here in Michigan the highest temperature has been 68*, that is global warming. Incedentally they have stoped calling it Global Warming and now call it climate change. See; I know what is going on, I just disagree with the so called science.

The last two days there in Michigan was weather not climate...

People have not stopped calling global warming and now call it climate change. It's just that global warming is only one of the many faces of climate change. There's also ocean acidification, sea-level rise, droughts, changes in pluviosity and so on. Global warming refers to the effects on, guess what, temperature. Climate change refers to all the effects.
 

Vance Wood

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Not just me, Vance.



Yes, for some reason(s)...



For what it's worth, Bill Nye has a degree in mechanical engineering from an Ivy League school, he's earned a bunch of patents, and he's taken more high level science classes than most "non-scientists." Engineering is a close companion to science, and you cannot be a mechanical engineer without having an aptitude for science. While Nye may not be a scientist, he is a talented communicator of science. And frankly, extraordinary scientists are not always the clearest and best communicators. So while technically, it may be true that Nye isn't a working scientist, it doesn't in any way reflect on his bona fides as a speaker on matters of science.

I like the guy. Having been a double major in a science and in communications, he has a job I'd have loved to have gotten for myself.
I almost have a degree, just a couple of credits short from a major University and I have a patant and you think I couldn't find by ass with both hands tied behind my back. While we are at it I do not deny the possibiity of climate change. The climate on the planet has always been dynamic and changing. We went from a mini-Ice-age at the beginning of our Country's history to what ever you choose to call it now. Also it must be pointed out that man had nothing to do with that climate change. What I do disagree with is the accusation that the change is due to human activity. I also do not accept the assertion that if we give up all our technology and pay reparations for out past deed we can change it. BULL SHIT.
 
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