6″-10″ of Global Warming for Chicago, Detroit

November 20th, 2015 by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.

Up to 20 million midwest U.S. residents are about to get some significant pre-Thanksgiving snowfall.

Portions of five Midwest states are now under winter storm warnings as 6 to 10 inches of snow are expected across Iowa, northern Illinois, and southern Lower Michigan. Portions of Chicago could see a foot of snow.

Here are the expected snowfall totals by mid-day Sunday (GFS model output courtesy of Weatherbell.com):

Total forecast snowfall by midday Sunday, 22 November 2015 (NWS GFS model).

Total forecast snowfall by midday Sunday, 22 November 2015 (NWS GFS model).

After the snowstorm passes, temperatures could reach the single digits in northern Illinois on Sunday morning.


211 Responses to “6″-10″ of Global Warming for Chicago, Detroit”

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  1. Gordon Robertson says:

    Here on the west coast of Canada, in a rain forest that normally has very moderate winters, we are sitting under a blanket of Arctic air, which has driven temperatures below freezing. Local ski hills have opened early.

    It’s supposed to be melting in the Arctic from all alarmist accounts, yet sub-zero Arctic air has flowed down and frozen us out.

    Environment Canada predicted a very mild winter due to El Nino conditions. Someone in a blog suggested El Ninos would bring more rain. In this rain forest, we are having a fall drought compared to the norm.

    • rah says:

      Joe Bastardi has been saying the NW is getting the worst of their winter early. We may get a little of the white stuff here in Central Indiana tomorrow evening while Chicago is forecast to get a record snow for November. All I can say is I’m glad I’m no longer doing hauls along I-80 across Wyoming anymore. It can get pretty brutal along that road with the winds. There’s a reason they have gates at every ramp to close them off all along that stretch of I-80. Elk mountain can be particularly bad. Dealing with the lake effect along I-90 and the record snows in the NE US is quite enough for this truck driver thank you.

      Seems that I remember people warning us a few years ago that the US Ski industry would be hurt badly because of climate change. Same thing for the Scottish Highlands. Where are those prognosticators of doom these days anyways?

      • geran says:

        rah, I once counted 26 semi-trailers flipped or jack-knifed between Laramie and Evanston, on I-80. This was April 2006. There was about an inch of ice on the interstate, topped with about 3 inches of snow.

        I think the highway patrol closed the interstate the next day, or so….

        • rah says:

          Yep! The wind pushed my rig from the right lane and across the left lane. Not a thing I could do about it. The plowed hard crested snow berm that was at the edge of the shoulder was the only thing that kept it from going off completely so I could keep it rolling and drive out of it. It wasn’t even snowing and it was a sunny day. But the wind was blowing loose snow across the pavement right at the surface and in the glare of the sun it really made it like one was driving in white out conditions as far as seeing the lines. I’ve been driving a big truck for a decade now and mother nature never ceases to amaze me with her bottomless bag of tricks.

          • Gordon Robertson says:

            @rah…” The wind pushed my rig from the right lane and across the left lane. Not a thing I could do about it”.

            Glad I wasn’t driving beside you. 🙂

            As I told my buddy, who drives a rig, and who likes to lean into corners on dry pavement, all you have between you and being off the road are the small patches of rubber at the bottom of your tires. Once that friction is overcome, you’re in trouble.

            I have experienced similar conditions driving a van on the Canadian prairies in winter. It can get pretty scary.

            I was in Saskatoon and advised to stay the night since there was a wind advisory. Being a dumb west coaster (or wet coaster) all I saw was clear skies and could see no problem. It was about -30C.

            About 30 miles south of Saskatoon, on a freeway, I began to see wisps of powder snow blowing across the road. In another half hour they were covering the road to about a foot thickness. Next thing I knew, they were above my windshield and it was like driving in fog.

            There’s nowhere to go. You can’t pull off for fear of being sideswiped or stuck in a snowbank. You can’t slow down too much or you’ll get rear ended. While I was white-knuckling it from clear spot to clear spot, some idiot passed me going about 60 mph.

            As if that wasn’t bad enough, about 15 miles short of my destination, the accelerator pedal froze. It was one of those kinds with a drive wire inside a sheath. My engine was revving fast and I got out on a strong wind to free it. It was so cold with the windchill that I could not stay out more than 30 seconds.

            I managed to pry the cable off the carb and turned the idle high enough so I could idle into town. Thankfully, by then there was no powder blowing across the highway. Soon as I got into town, the accelerator freed itself. There’s global warming for you, Urban Heat Island effect.

            On another occasion, on the freeway a couple of hundred miles west out of Edmonton, going through a higher altitude pass, the highway was covered in black ice. There were cars and rigs off both sides of the highway. I could not keep my van on the road and slowly angled it off the side to avoid being rear-ended.

            When I was well off the highway, a woman rear-ended me and blamed me for stopping. She claimed you should never stop in such conditions. I asked her how to stay on the highway when my van would not respond to steering and how she had managed to rear-end me while I was well off the highway.

            That was in the day just as ice tires were becoming popular. I had ordinary M&S tires on the back. Next time I was up that way in winter I had Nordic Trak ice tires all around and 200 pounds of sand bags over the back wheels. Makes quite a difference.

    • steve says:

      Dr. Spencer,
      Would you please comment on the validity of Vaqlentina Zharkova’s work on solar activity and climate change?

  2. mpainter says:

    Just in time for Thanksgiving so that folks can remember to give thanks for all those windmills and solar panels that will keep them from FREEZING inside their homes this winter.

    Poor global warmers, Ma Nature just won’t cooperate with the cause. Tsk,tsk.

  3. Mick says:

    Bbbbbbut…that’s just weather. Right Gordon, I’m In the same area. I remember back in the 80s, plenty of my friends were complaining about the lousy winter ski conditions. Back in those days, it WAS just the weather. Now its unprecedented
    I wish these goofballs would just shut up, and stick to their 5 day forecasts.

    • Gordon Robertson says:

      @Mick…”…friends were complaining about the lousy winter ski conditions. Back in those days, it WAS just the weather. Now its unprecedented…”

      As far back as I can remember, skiing on the Vancouver mountains was variable. Down on the lowlands, I played soccer for over 30 years and seldom missed a game during the winter. You could still ski up on the mountains depending on how warm it got and how much it rained.

      I don’t see much of a difference in Vancouver’s climate. I’m sure it too has been variable to a degree. This summer/autumn has been drier than normal but that’s no different than summers I remember as a kid. Sometimes we’d go right through July and August without a drop of rain.

      What I go on is the tidal marks on the seawall. AFAIAC, they are in pretty well the same spot they have been for several decades. Same with the Fraser River dikes on the Middle Arm, across from the airport. The dike was built for the best of floods and to allow for floods combined with tides. I don’t see anyone rushing to increase the height of the dikes.

      • Mick says:

        Im from the south arm. The main problem with flooding is the fact the the river needs a good dredging. Richmond historically has great land for farming. Every spring we get the meltwater rushing down from the mountains bringing the payload of silt that has always supplemented the Fraser Delta with minerals. The silt builds up and accumulation on the river bed will evetually cause the dyke to be breached. This of course will be blamed on the new unprecedented rate of climate change.

        • Massimo PORZIO says:

          Hi Mick,
          so as we say here in Italy “all the world is a country village”, meaning that everywhere you go the things are the same.
          Our administrations did the same with our rivers, they stopped dredging and now they spend their time watching the rivers’ level until the water floods off… And finally blame the global warming
          🙁

          Have a great day.

          Massimo

  4. Jim Dean says:

    You’re right Mick. I guess depends on “Weather” or not you have an agenda. 😉

    To the Weather Channel – Oooops, your bias is showing.

  5. Rick Adkison says:

    Winter is Coming!

  6. LukesAreWrongToo says:

    The calculations by Lukes and Warmists are WRONG because they do NOT explain the required energy flows. The direct solar radiation cannot and does not account for the observed surface temperatures on Earth, let alone Venus. Back radiation has nothing to do with such temperatures. It could only slow the rate of cooling by radiation, but the solar radiation is not what gets the surfaces of such planets up to the observed temperatures. How does the surface actually warm each morning? How does the required new thermal energy get into the surface? YOU GUYS HAVE NO UNDERSTANDING AT ALL IN REGARD TO THE THERMODYNAMICS OF PLANETARY TROPOSPHERES. You need to think in a wholly different paradigm one which has been explained correctly by only one writer in all of world literature. When you understand the maximization of entropy it will blow your mind as to just HOW WRONG all Lukes and Warmists are. The biggest single problem is that they dont understand thermodynamics and radiation, and they are not prepared to try to learn and understand such. They just scoff at the author of that breakthrough science (already endorsed by other physicists) and think they know better. But water vapor does not raise surface temperatures and they cannot prove it does with any valid study of temperature/precipitation records. THAT SINGLE FACT DEMOLISHES THE GREENHOUSE.

  7. Aaron S says:

    Opposite response of an average El Nino warming pattern expected for the mid west. Austrailia was 40 deg C last week as anticipated. This is interesting weather.

    • Doug~Cotton says:

      Yep – Sydney CBD nearly 41C yesterday, Friday – hottest November day for about 3 decades – but it was hotter back then. And it was 20 degrees cooler today, Saturday.

      Weather proves nothing about carbon dioxide.

      Global warming proves nothing about carbon dioxide.

      Only correct physics can tell us what causes what, and what doesn’t. Sadly the “sciences” of meteorology and climatology “learn” their physics from inventions of the minds of people like James Hansen.

    • rah says:

      To this layman this does not appear to be an “average” El Nino. While stronger than most the warmest SSTs in the equatorial Pacific are a pretty good distance west of the coast of S. America this time as compared to the very strong 1997 El Nino and others in more recent times. SSTs in many other locations in the Pacific are quite different from what they were in 97 so our the weather patterns in N. America will naturally be different. This current El Nino looks like it may have peaked already which would also be a significant difference.

      I really am not sure but I suspect that the only reason this one is not classified as a Modoki El Nino is because the SSTs to the east are not anomalously cool.

      • mpainter says:

        You can expect the spike in January/February. It would be very unusual if there were no El Nino at this time, with the present conditions obtaining. However, it is always possible that the ever-hopeful global warmers will be disappointed. Ma Nature seems to take a special delight in toying with them.:-)

        If there is an El Nino, it will of course be followed by a La Nina and we could see the global temperature anomaly at the lowest for this century. Ma Nature, again.

        • rah says:

          Joe Bastardi at Weatherbell just happens to discuss the atypical pattern for the current El Nino and it’s effects on the weather of N. America to come in this weeks Saturday summary. Excellent through and through this time I think. Having watched every one of them for about a year now I have started to notice a pattern. The later in the day he posts his Saturday Summary the better it is.
          http://www.weatherbell.com/saturday-summary-november-21-2015

          • AaronS says:

            Wow I finally had time to watch that video. Very impressive ideas and a great share. So many oscillations impacting weather… Very cool.

  8. mpainter says:

    The NWS has issued a number of urgent advisories concerning this storm. Winds to 30 mph are forecast. This storm will be particularly damaging to vegetation. Record cold expected.
    I wonder how many Chicagoans are fretting about global warming?

  9. rah says:

    accuweather is forecasting a “near record” low of 15 deg. F for my area in central Indiana near Anderson tonight. As I look out my west facing Bay window the wind is picking up and the sky has that gray storm cast to it across the west and north. Radar shows us right on the snow-rain line so it looks like a mix turning to snow for us here but turning into snow much sooner than they forecast just last night before I went to bed.

  10. Thanks, Dr. Spencer.
    Yes, this unstoppable global warming is being felt, globally, in the minds of alarmists getting ready to impose socialism by UN mandate in Paris.
    See http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/021015-738779-climate-change-scare-tool-to-destroy-capitalism.htm

    • Gordon Robertson says:

      @Andres Valencia…”…in the minds of alarmists getting ready to impose socialism by UN mandate…”

      It’s not socialism they are imposing, it’s some kind of quasi-religious dogma.

      Let’s not confuse socialism with that Draconian Bolshevik system imposed in Russia. The Bolsheviks hated socialists and even real communists yet they stole the name socialism to give the impression their totalitarian state was about workers.

      Socialism is a workers movement and the only places it has thrived is in democracies like the UK, Sweden, New Zealand, Australia, Canada and so on. That had to be the case since any workers’ uprising in Russia or China would have been quickly put down.

      It was the unions in the aforementioned countries that formed the backbone of socialism. They put their bodies and their lives on the line to fight for better wages and conditions, pensions, unemployment insurance, workers’ compensation, Medicare, and womens’rights.

      What the UN is trying to impose in Paris has nothing to do with that. Since the 60s, the UN has been trying to form a world government with the right to tax nations. They plan to redistribute that money to poorer nations.

      I can almost see that as being a decent idea in principle but not through lies about climate change based on scientific misconduct. If we go that route to help poorer nations it should be through a vote. By that I mean a vote in each participating country, not a vote at the UN.

      I am totally opposed to the UN telling Canada what it should do. In fact, I’d like to see the UN abandoned. It has been a dismal failure.

      • Mick says:

        Right and then plenty of these workers in private industry lost jobs due to outsourcing. The only good jobs are “created” by the gov. Funded by the private sector workers, or government borrowing money to pay for the new jobs created. Like the new department of environment and climate change. That is socialism isnt it? Eventually everyone will have a healthy bias due to the fact that they are pretty much all government employees. Eventually the government eats itself alive creating jobs.

        • Gordon Robertson says:

          @Mick…”Like the new department of environment and climate change. That is socialism isnt it?”

          Not to me it’s not. The NDP in Canada wont even call themselves socialist, they have become social democrats, whatever that is?

          The Liberals are wannabee socialists in certain ways but they have always supported corporations unabashedly. The union form of socialism has never been about government job creation. Unions in the old days defied governments and in that respect they were no different than those who wanted no government interference.

          Marx refused to use the term socialism. He related it to wealthy Germans who gave handouts to the poor. That’s describes the Canadian Federal Liberals with the exception that they would rather hand out 2.6 billion to Third World countries rather than help the poor in Canada.

  11. Doug~Cotton says:

    Is there any reason why I should not point out errors that are promulgated by hoaxers and serve no purpose other than to support themselves financially and promote the killing of thousands of innocent persons in developing countries?

    • jimc says:

      Yes. You’re confused, wrong, obnoxious, and ridiculously repetitive.

      • Doug~Cotton says:

        Yes well there’s no substance in your response because you obviously are gullible enough to believe the IPCC garbage and arrogant enough not to deign to discuss any alternative explanation which, unlike the IPCC nonsense, can be confirmed empirically. So you won’t qualify for the $10,000 reward for proving me wrong, but silent readers will note that you will be unable to write any correct scientific response to this comment below.

        • wert says:

          Please get some professional help.

          Please. You have an obsession.

          No-one requires you to change your opinion, just stop pestering blogs where you are no longer welcome. You have your own website. Use it.

  12. Global warming, regardless what primarily causes it, comes also with a positive trend in the water vapor mass in the atmosphere (which leads to a positive feedback between warming and water vapor mass through its radiative effect, since water vapor is a greenhouse gas). More moisture in the atmosphere can lead to more precipitation, and also to more snow fall, as long as it is cold enough for the precipitation to reach the ground as snow.

    But this is only one snow storm, a single weather event. No conclusion can be drawn about the presence (or absence) of a trend from a single event.

    • mpainter says:

      You ignore the role of phase changes and the effects of these processes on climate.

      The AGW GHE is wholly erroneous in attributing warming to water vapor. Observations and theoretical considerations both instruct us that the phase changes of water have an overall cooling effect. Water vapor has only a moderating effect on temperatures as shown in the comparison of the humid tropics with arid locales such as the Sahara. This moderating effect is reflected in the diurnal temperature range:
      Sahara- 80F or more; humid tropics- 10F or less.

      The claim that global warming is the cause of severe winters is illustrative of the scientific perversions of the AGW zealots.

      • mpainter,

        I see you that are recycling previous assertions by your to which I already had replied in a past thread.

        You assert here:

        “The AGW GHE is wholly erroneous in attributing warming to water vapor.”

        But previously, you had said following:
        “IR astronomers, who certainly are intimately familiar with the DWLWIR of our atmosphere, tell us that atmospheric CO2 generates only 3% of that. The rest is from water vapor. It appears that our modeling friends have vastly overstated the role of CO2 in our atmosphere. .. tsk, tsk.”
        (mpainter on May 2, 2015 at 11:48 PM, http://www.drroyspencer.com/2015/05/uah-v6-0-global-temperature-update-for-april-2015-0-07-deg-c/#comment-190960)

        You cannot have it both. One one hand saying that water vapor was such an important greenhouse gas in the atmosphere (much more important than CO2), and on the other hand asserting that the radiation effect of water vapor in the thermal range doesn’t warm the atmosphere, without you being logically inconsistent between your statements.

        The greenhouse effect of water vapor can be quite accurately calculated with line-by-line radiative transfer models. These models have been very well tested against measurements.
        (e.g., http://rtweb.aer.com/lblrtm_description.html

        That mainstream climate science was neglecting water vapor as greenhouse gas is actually one of the many (false) assertions made by the ones, including you in previous statement, who claim global warming caused by anthropogenic greenhouse gases was a “hoax” or similar, when it comes to downplaying the role of CO2 (and other greenhouse gases that are increased by human activity).

        Btw: I do not recall that you have ever backup up your number with any scientific reference, according to which only “3%” of the downward longwave radiation comes from CO2, although you had been asked for it. (http://www.drroyspencer.com/2015/05/uah-v6-0-global-temperature-update-for-april-2015-0-07-deg-c/#comment-191080)

        “Observations and theoretical considerations both instruct us that the phase changes of water have an overall cooling effect.”

        I doubt that. What observations and “theoretical considerations” are these supposed to be? What about you provide some scientific references to back up your assertion?

        “Water vapor has only a moderating effect on temperatures as shown in the comparison of the humid tropics with arid locales such as the Sahara. This moderating effect is reflected in the diurnal temperature range:
        Sahara- 80F or more; humid tropics- 10F or less.”

        That is not evidence against the warming effect of water vapor. On the contrary. The smaller diurnal cycle in the tropics, compared to deserts, results also from atmospheric warming by water vapor due to its greenhouse effect. Because the greenhouse effect (both due to water vapor and clouds) is stronger in the humid tropics, the minimum temperatures are higher at night in the tropics compared to the dry deserts, and, in turn, the amplitude of the diurnal cycle is smaller in the tropics compared to the desert.

        “The claim that global warming is the cause of severe winters is illustrative of the scientific perversions of the AGW zealots.”

        I’m not going to further comment on any assertion by you about alleged specific claims made by alleged “AGW zealots”, whomever you exactly mean with that, which are not referenced by you with exact quote and exact proof of source for it.

        However, a general comment on that: Principally, there isn’t any fundamental law of nature that would forbid an increase in the frequency of severe winter events in specific regions that could come together with global warming. Thus, I don’t see why you would outright dismiss such a possibility as “scientific perversion”. There aren’t any scientific grounds for such a dismissal by you. Thus, there must be others for it. Whether such an increase of the frequency of severe winter events was actually happening is something that has to be studied. The answer will depend on the evidence.

      • Doug~Cotton says:

        Real world temperature data proves water vapor causes the surface temperature to be lower, and just as well because the mean surface temperature would be over 300K without water vapor and the resulting clouds that increase albedo from about 10% to about 30%.

        No one has produced a study showing water vapor warms, so the greenhouse conjecture is smashed.

        My study is in the Appendix of this peer-reviewed paper …

        http://www.climate-change-theory.com/Planetary_Core_and_Surface_Temperatures.pdf

        and the results were …

        Means of Adjusted Daily Maximum and Daily Minimum Temperatures

        Wet (01-05): 30.8C 20.1C

        Medium (06-10): 33.0C 21.2C

        Dry (11-15): 35.7C 21.9C

        The reasons why water vapor cools can only be explained with CORRECT physics – also in the above paper.

        Radiation (solar or back radiation) reaching a planet’s surface is NOT the primary determinant of the mean surface temperature.

        • Your text to which you link in your comment is not a peer-reviewed paper. Through what peer-review process has it allegedly gone?

          I take only the first three sentences of the Introduction in the text. They state:

          “Historical records indicate that the world has experienced long-term periods of about 500 years of alternating warming and cooling. The last two thousand years have seen the Roman Warming Period, the Dark Ages Cooling, the Medieval Warming Period, the Little Ice Age and the current warming period. So we have a long-term cycle which appears to cause variations of about 2C up and down over each 500 year period of alternate warming and cooling.”

          In a proper scientific publication, the assertions made in these three sentences would already have to be backed up with references from the scientific peer-reviewed literature (i.e., real scientific literature, not links to wikipedia entries or links to some blog posts in the Internet). In a real peer-review process, reviewers very likely would already have started complaining about your assertions not being backed up by anything.

          There is no scientific evidence that Earth’s climate over the last two thousands years was governed by 500-years cycles with an amplitude of 2 deg. Celcius for the globally averaged temperature.

    • Mick says:

      But my nearly fifty years of observation reveals no obvious trend of unprecedented climate changing.
      In my lifetime the mid eighties had milder winters than what i have experienced in the last decade.
      My 90 year old grandmother says that the 30s had unbearably hot summers. And she grew up at English bay right at the beach. So….. What is so different now. Besides the new narrative?

  13. mpainter says:

    Jan Perlwitz,
    Thank you for your reply.
    But once again, you ignore the phase changes of water and the profound role that these transitions play in determining climate. You adhere to the AGW meme that the radiative properties of water vapor are the only aspects of water that count in determining its effect on the atmosphere.
    The overall effect of water, in its evaporation, convection, and condensation aloft is cooling, the radiative properties of water vapor notwithstanding.

    You continue to ignore observations, in the habit that has become reflexive with AGW zealots. It is clear from observations that adding more water vapor to the atmosphere reduces tmax. This is not to say that there is no GHE, but that the zealots have mischaracterized it. Obviously there is no panic value in screeching “Temperatures will be moderated! The diurnal temperature range will be reduced!”
    Now this is not to say that water vapor is not a radiative gas. But the predominant effect of water, in its evaporation at the surface

    • mpainter says:

      To continue,
      From its evaporation at the surface, to its enabling of convection as a vapor and transference of latent heat aloft, condensation, freezing, all this is a cooling process.

      You say “On the contrary. The smaller diurnal cycle in the tropics, compared to deserts, results also from atmospheric warming by water vapor due to its greenhouse effect.”

      Here your AGW knee-jerk shows. You confess the humid tropics has a lower diurnal range (the moderating effect of increased water vapor), yet you insist that this is due to warming! A higher tmin, true, but a lower tmax. This moderating you reflexively ignore, in the typical rigid, doctrinaire fashion of the zealots, and you say
      Moderating of diurnal temperatures = warming. You are hopeless, but I thank you for the opportunity to demonstrate the doctrinaire zealotry found amongst the global warmers.

    • mpainter,

      “Thank you for your reply.

      But once again,…”

      Well, unfortunately, it is not reciprocated by you. You are just repeating the same assertions, and you add some name calling. You are making the exchange recursive over and over again, but you are not engaging with the arguments by your opponent. You are being asked to back up your claims with scientific evidence and references, but nothing is coming from you.

      “you ignore the phase changes of water and the profound role that these transitions play in determining climate. You adhere to the AGW meme that the radiative properties of water vapor are the only aspects of water that count in determining its effect on the atmosphere.”

      You are fantasizing. Neither is there such an “AGW meme” that the radiative effect of water vapor was the “only aspect of water that count”, nor did I say anything like that or adhere to such a belief. And a couple of threads ago you accused me of believing that CO2 was the only factor that influenced the Earth system. One of the problems when talking with people like you who reject mainstream science for non-scientific reasons is that you make up absurd assertions and accusations all the time. Which, in addition, are changing from one time to the other, and even logically contradicting each other.

      All I said is that the larger diurnal cycle in deserts compared to the tropics is not in contradiction to the warming effect of water vapor, because the greenhouse effect contributes to the smaller diurnal cycle in the tropics. There are, to be sure, other effects to be considered, if you want to fully understand the physics of the tropics or the deserts. Like more clouds in the tropics due to convection, which reflect more solar radiation back to space, so that less of it reaches the surface (this is not the first time here that I mention this). Also, the tropics are not isolated from the subtropics. There is atmospheric circulation which advects energy away from the topics to higher latitudes. However, you compare the states of the tropics and deserts as if the two climatic zones were isolated from each other. That makes your approach fundamentally flawed from the beginning. If you want to properly asses the overall role of water in all its phases in the Earth system you must consider the planet as a whole. You cannot simply pick some regions and neglect that the states of different climatic zone are interconnected by energy and mass flow.

      “The overall effect of water, in its evaporation, convection, and condensation aloft is cooling, the radiative properties of water vapor notwithstanding.”

      And your “evidence” is what? Stomping on the ground, while you are repeating your faith-based assertion over and over again? Because that’s all what you do here.

      Freezing and condensation aloft have a warming effect, because of the release of the latent heat that has been used for evaporation. Basic thermodynamics.

      The overall effect of the whole hydrological cycle itself, including the phase changes of water, of evaporation, convection, freezing/condensation, precipitation, but without considering radiative effects of water in its different phases, is neither cooling, nor warming. Instead, it is redistributing energy from the surface to higher layers in the atmosphere. It’s cooling the surface, but warming the troposphere. This is why you get strong warming of the overall troposphere (with a time lag of about 4 to 6 month) with El Nino events. Evaporation is strongly increased during these events. Convection transfers the latent heat of evaporation to higher layers. The latent heat is then released again by freezing/condensation in the upper tropospheric layers, warming these layers, and advected around via Hadley/Walker circulation.

      • mpainter says:

        Thank you for your reply and your further demonstration of AGW zealotry.
        Wading through the floodtide of ad hominems, I believe that I detect a slight shift in your position.
        Above, in your original response, you said:

        “The smaller diurnal cycle in the tropics, compared to deserts, results also from atmospheric warming by water vapor due to its greenhouse effect.”

        But in your next comment you state
        “…because the greenhouse effect contributes to the smaller diurnal cycle in the tropics.”

        The second quote substantially agrees with my position that the greenhouse effect, i.e., atmospheric water vapor, moderates temperatures through reducing the diurnal range.

        • “Wading through the floodtide of ad hominems.

          My comment was supposedly a “floodtide of ad hominem” through which you had to wade? What a ridiculous accusation. Even more from someone like you who regularly makes unsubstantiated claims/accusations about/against your opponent and resorts to name calling as a substitute for arguments. You apparently also don’t know what “ad hominem” means, or when it is a logical fallacy.

          “The second quote substantially agrees with my position that the greenhouse effect, i.e., atmospheric water vapor, moderates temperatures through reducing the diurnal range.”

          No, it doesn’t. It says the same as the first quote, only differently phrased. Read again and try to understand.

          • mpainter says:

            Then you claim that increasing atmospheric humidity warms without moderating temperatures. You can’t have it both ways Jan: you cannot warm the atmosphere and moderate the diurnal temperature range simultaneously. Either you go with the AGW zealots or you go with observations.
            My guess is that if forced to choose, you will go with the zealots.

          • “You cant have it both ways Jan: you cannot warm the atmosphere and moderate the diurnal temperature range simultaneously.”

            Wrong. You are stating a false dilemma. And why are you talking about “moderating the diurnal temperature range” now? Before you had claimed a moderation of the temperature, for which the smaller diurnal cycle in the tropics, compared to deserts, was allegedly the evidence. These are not the same things. A higher minimum temperature at night with higher humidity isn’t a moderation, but an elevation of the night time temperature. It contributes to the moderation of the amplitude of the diurnal cycle in the tropics, though. Thus, warming by the greenhouse effect of water vapor can very well come together with a moderation of the diurnal cycle in the tropics compared to the deserts. There is no contradiction. This was my argument.

          • mpainter says:

            Hard to say whether it is sophistry or confusion in your pretense that the moderation of the diurnal range does not mean moderation of temperature extremes, i.e., tmin and tmax.

          • mpainter says:

            But, as I predicted, you embrace AGW zealotry and thus you once again shift your position, claiming as before that diurnal temperature moderation means warming, ignoring the fact that tmax is much lower in the tropics.
            And no, Jan, you cannot ignore observations and invent your own pseudo-nature to substitute for the actual. Do you deny that the tropical “hotspot” is missing?

          • mpainter on November 23, 2015 at 1:08 PM,

            “Hard to say whether it is sophistry or confusion in your pretense that the moderation of the diurnal range does not mean moderation of temperature extremes, i.e., tmin and tmax.”

            Your claim has been that the presence of water vapor in the atmosphere has a cooling effect, compared to the temperature with a dry atmosphere, everything else equal, hasn’t it? You have called this cooling effect a “moderation” of the temperature, haven’t you? You have used “moderation” as a term for lowering the temperature.

            So how would an increase in the night time temperatures with higher humidity be also a “moderation” of the temperature then, given the meaning of how you had used the term “moderation” in your previous comments?

            Why are the temperatures higher at night, when the atmosphere is humid, compared to dry conditions, everything else equal, if humidity in the atmosphere allegedly has a cooling effect?

            mpainter on November 23, 2015 at 1:17 PM,

            [snip name calling] …you once again shift your position, claiming as before that diurnal temperature moderation means warming, ignoring the fact that tmax is much lower in the tropics.

            I didn’t say anything like that. Neither before, nor now. You are deliberately making things up, or you don’t understand what I say. A reduced diurnal cycle can mean different things. I said something different from what you claim here. I said the reduced diurnal cycle wasn’t in contradiction to the warming effect of water vapor, because the warming effect is also a factor for the reduction of the diurnal cycle. It follows that the reduced diurnal cycle in the tropics compared to the deserts is not evidence for the alleged cooling effect of water vapor in the atmosphere, which you asserted.

            As for the maximum temperatures in the tropics. There are other factors in play, besides the water vapor, which you are ignoring. I already have addressed this in previous comment. You prefer to ignore what I have said previously, though. Instead, you are just repeating the same to which I already have replied. I’m not going to repeat my answers. It’s tiring.

            “Do you deny that the tropical hotspot is missing?”

            What is the source of your information? It’s not missing.

            http://www.ipcc.ch/report/graphics/images/Assessment%20Reports/AR5%20-%20WG1/Chapter%2002/Fig2-26.jpg

          • mpainter says:

            UAH data tells a different story: there is no hotspot. What do you think about that?

          • I’m not going to comment on mere assertion by you about what data allegedly show or not show.

            Scientific reference, please.

          • mpainter says:

            You are very tiresome.Go look. It was posted this year by Roy, as I recall. Or dig up the data yourself.

            Or don’t look, I really don’t give a hoot.But no hotspot on UAH.

          • Once again. You are asked for a scientific reference, but nothing.

            So, you say Roy Spencer posted it here. If he posted it here it’s not a scientific reference.

            If the UAH data don’t show it, but radiosonde data do, what do you conclude? That those radiosonde data must be false data?

            Here is a new paper, analyzing radiosonde data. According to this paper, the warming trend in the upper tropical troposphere is about 0.25 Kelvin per decade, compared to the surface with a trend of 0.14 Kelvin per decade.
            http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/10/5/054007

            Following study comes to the conclusion that data derived from measurements with satellites agree with the one simulated with GCMs, with respect to the ratio between the tropical TMT trend to surface trend. The study also finds a large difference between its own results and the work by Christy, Spencer and others using UAH TMT v5.6.
            http://journals.ametsoc.org.ezproxy.cul.columbia.edu/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-13-00767.1

          • mpainter says:

            Jan Perlwitz says: “So, you say Roy Spencer posted it here. If he posted it here its not a scientific reference.”
            ###
            Thus Jan Perlwitz, and what more need be Sid?

          • mpainter says:

            What more need be SAID.

          • It looks like we finally agree on something. That Roy Spencer’s blog articles are not scientific references. Unlike, e.g., the peer-reviewed research studies to which I linked.

          • Ooops, I just have seen that I still had the proxy in the link to the study by Po-Chedley et al. in the one comment by me above. Sorry about that.

            Here is the proper link:
            http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-13-00767.1

        • mpainter says:

          I have concluded that you seek to confuse the issue through semantic entanglement. My position restated:

          AGW mischaracterizes the GHE by claiming increasing atmospheric water vapor raises temperatures. This is incorrect, for in fact it moderates temperatures by reducing the diurnal temperature range. Thus compare the Sahara with the humid tropics.
          For example, we find that summer temperatures in the driest Sahara typically range diurnally from circa 40F to over 125F, a diurnal range of 85. Compare the humid tropics where the diurnal range is 10F or less, typically with a tmax under 92F.
          This is observation, and it trumps hypothetical dogma, like it or not.
          You cannot show increase in temperature from dry climate to humid, but only a reduction in the diurnal range i.e., lower tmax and higher tmin. Thus the claim that increasing water vapor means increasing temperature is false.
          Despite the data to the contrary, however, you insist that the observed temperature moderation from dry climate to humid constitutes warming.

          In my experience, this is what can be expected from AGW zealots, whose zealotry forbids them to assimilate data contrary to their AGW dogma.

          • mpainter,

            “AGW mischaracterizes the GHE by claiming increasing atmospheric water vapor raises temperatures. This is incorrect, for in fact it moderates temperatures by reducing the diurnal temperature range.”

            You can’t logically refute something by mere asserting that the opposite was true.

            “For example, we find that summer temperatures in the driest Sahara typically range diurnally from circa 40F to over 125F, a diurnal range of 85. Compare the humid tropics where the diurnal range is 10F or less, typically with a tmax under 92F.”

            Just using your own numbers, that means that the average temperature is higher in the tropics than in the driest Sahara. Which illustrates my point even more, that the larger diurnal cycle in the deserts than in the tropics is not in contradiction to the additional warming effect due to the greenhouse effect of water vapor.

            “You cannot show increase in temperature from dry climate to humid, but only a reduction in the diurnal range i.e., lower tmax and higher tmin. Thus the claim that increasing water vapor means increasing temperature is false.

            Even if the first sentence was true (although you contradict your claim with your own numbers above) the conclusion in the second sentence would still be a non-sequitur, because 1.) the amount of water vapor is not the only factor that distinguishes the tropics from the deserts, i.e, everything else is not equal, and 2.) comparing the two climatic regimes as if they were isolated from each other, instead of interconnected through energy and mass flow is the false approach from the beginning. I already have said all of this before. You have not addressed that.

            “Despite the data to the contrary, however, you insist that the observed temperature moderation from dry climate to humid constitutes warming.”

            Why do you keep inventing statements that I haven’t made? And what “observed temperature moderation”? According to your own numbers above, the average temperature in the tropics was higher than in the driest Sahara in summertime.

            “In my experience, this is what can be expected from AGW zealots, whose zealotry forbids them to assimilate data contrary to their AGW dogma.”

            You are obviously projecting your own approach to reality onto me and others. I have addressed your “data” with arguments. Even your own “data”, when you finally provide numbers, like above, contradict your assertions. But you don’t seem to be able to come up with any meaningful reply. Instead, your response consists of just repeating the same initial assertions over and over again, or you invent things I didn’t say. You behave more like the members of a religious cult, whose faith-based beliefs are being questioned. I have the science on my side. You don’t. Which can be seen from that you almost never back up any of your assertions with any scientific references.

          • mpainter says:

            How can one tell that the zealot is losing the argument?
            Answer: When he segments comments to set up strawmen, which he then pretends to knock over.
            Not so clever, Jan. In fact, all too obvious.

            It is the observations that refute you and you repeatedly show that you are incapable of taking cognizance of observations contrary to your cherished AGW meme
            ###=
            You say:
            “Just using your own numbers, that means that the average temperature is higher in the tropics than in the driest Sahara. Which illustrates my point even more, that the larger diurnal cycle in the deserts than in the tropics is not in contradiction to the additional warming effect due to the greenhouse effect of water vapor.”

            Another strawmen by Jan. The tropics receive a great deal more insolation than the subtropics, and a winter comparison of average temperature would show an even greater difference. My comparison was of diurnal temperature ranges and you are trying to pull a switcheroo. My claim stands: an increased GHE moderates the diurnal temperature range.

            The rest of your response is non-sequiturs or bald assertions based on the above strawman

          • mpainter says:

            In fact, the ultimate greenhouse effect is found over tropical oceans. There the ambient humidities are the highest, the greenhouse effect most intense, and the diurnal temperature range only one or two degrees. The ambient temperature?.. circa 86F. Add whatever quantity of water vapor you might, you will not achieve a higher temperature.
            So, Jan Perlwitz, what is this “boil the oceans” of your mentor James Hansen, aka “boil the oceans” Hansen. Do you subscribe to such panic-mongering?

          • Do you know what the phrase “everything else is equal” means in science when you make a statement about a relationship between A and B?

            Do you seriously want to claim that the water vapor in the atmosphere was the only factor that controlled the amplitude of the diurnal (or annual, for the matter of fact) temperature cycle near the ocean surface?

            The diurnal cycle of the air temperature near the ocean surface is mostly controlled by the diurnal cycle of the ocean surface temperature, because of the coupling between the two via heat flux. It’s the diurnal cycle of the ocean temperature, which mostly controls the one of the air temperature, because of the much larger specific heat capacity of water than the one of air. The heat capacity of about 2 meters of water column equals the heat capacity of the column mass of the entire atmosphere above it.

            “The ambient temperature?.. circa 86F. Add whatever quantity of water vapor you might, you will not achieve a higher temperature.”

            The air temperature near the ocean surface stays close to the temperature of the surface water. And there is nothing magical about the 86F. Where the oceans are warmer, the atmosphere near the surface is warmer too, accordingly. Nothing follows from this fact with respect to your assertions about water vapor.

            As for Hansen. I already have told you that I don’t comment on statements by others, which you allege, without you bringing the exact quote and proof of the original source first.

            I also replied to your other comment, but the other reply is hanging in the moderation. If Roy Spencer doesn’t release it I may put the screenshots of it on my own blog.

          • mpainter says:

            The point, which you obtusely ignore, is nature shows the upper bound to the GHE: the atmosphere above tropical oceans, where the earth’s GHE is at its a maximum.

            As far as your characterization of my positions, my comments were clear enough and I feel assured your twisting of my meaning will not fool many.

            Regarding your mentor James “boil the ocean” Hansen, he formally retracted that statement in 2013, I believe. You must be aware of that. He was your boss then, right? Jan “me no boil ocean” Perlwitz cannot pretend his way past this notorious alarmism.

          • “The point, which you obtusely ignore, is nature shows the upper bound to the GHE: the atmosphere above tropical oceans, where the earths GHE is at its a maximum.”

            So now it’s suddenly about the upper physical bound of greenhouse warming because of the oceans, but not about the alleged cooling effect on climate of water vapor anymore?

            As for the “upper bound”. Surely, given the current ocean heat content and that the oceans are the most important component of Earth’s global energy budget, whereas the atmosphere is only an energetic appendix of it, there is an upper bound for current atmospheric warming. What it is that makes you think I would ignore this, I don’t know. This is just another claim about me where you make something up.

            But the current upper bound is not forever. Perhaps, in your parallel world, oceans can’t warm up. In the real world, they can. And they have been warming. They continue to warm, and there is no indication that the ongoing ocean warming is currently leveling out or even reversing. There have been times in the geological past of Earth, when it was much warmer than today, even much warmer than what is likely to realize at the end of this century. Just think of the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. There isn’t any law of nature according to which Earth’s climate couldn’t go there again, given a high enough greenhouse gases concentration in the atmosphere.

            “Regarding your mentor James boil the ocean Hansen, he formally retracted that statement in 2013, I believe. You must be aware of that. He was your boss then, right? Jan me no boil ocean Perlwitz cannot pretend his way past this notorious alarmism.”

            So, still no quotes and proof of the original sources. What does it matter here anyway what James Hansen allegedly said at some point? How is this relevant regarding my person? It looks like you are trying to accuse me of something. Or why are you bringing this up? Do I have to defend myself for what James Hansen allegedly said at some time? On what grounds? Because he supposedly was my boss? And because of that I was guilty by association? Is this how it would be working when the Republican anti-science nutcases a la Smith, Cruz, Inhofe and the freedom fraud caucus where to have all the power in Washington, unchecked, and maybe with the proto-fascist agitator Donald Trump as president?

          • mpainter says:

            Jan Perlwitz says : “So, still no quotes and proof of the original sources. What does it matter here anyway what James Hansen allegedly said at some point? How is this relevant regarding my person? It looks like you are trying to accuse me of something. Or why are you bringing this up? Do I have to defend myself for what James Hansen allegedly said at some time? On what grounds? Because he supposedly was my boss? And because of that I was guilty by association? Is this how it would be working when the Republican anti-science nutcases a la Smith, Cruz, Inhofe and the freedom fraud caucus where to have all the power in Washington, unchecked, and maybe with the proto-fascist agitator Donald Trump as president?”
            ####
            mpainter says: !

      • mpainter says:

        To continue,
        The observation that increasing atmospheric water vapor moderates, rather than increases temperature, is not to say that water vapor is not a radiative gas or that it does not thermalize the atmosphere.

        But this observation indeed tells us that the thermalizing property of atmospheric water vapor is subsumed in the overall processes associated with water’s phase transitions: evaporative cooling at the surface, convection that transports energy aloft, the formation of clouds and cloud albedo, etc., and that these transitions and resultant processes wax accordingly with increasing water vapor. The failed AGW hypothesis distorts the processes that determine climate by discounting those which are most important.
        Thus the tropical “hotspot” that has failed to materialize, which failure AGW zealots refuse to acknowledge.

  14. mpainter says:

    Concerning the claim that CO2 increases the severity of winter, this is so preposterous that it is a self-refuting claim.
    We now have that increasing atmospheric CO2 1) causes warming but causes cooling 2) makes Greenland melt but makes Anarctica grow 3) increases droughts but increases floods 4) is bad for plants and reduces yield, and many more preposterous assertions.
    Now you come and try to peddle the notion that it increases the severity of winter.
    This is rank alarmism.

    Concerning the 3% of total back radiation is from CO2, does Columbia have an Astronomy Department? Why not see if there is an IR Astronomer there? Ask him, he should know.

    • lewis says:

      Dear Mr. (I presume) MPainter:

      Typically I take exception to those who denigrate others religious beliefs. Unfortunately, in this case, I must agree with you as the purpose of the AGW zealots is no different than ISIS, it is takeover and control of the world polity and economy and finally religious beliefs.

      So keep on exposing the hypocrisy of the AGW zealots. But count your time, the leftist students the liberal education establishment has produced may well come after you next.

  15. Svend Ferdinandsen says:

    Also Danmark got some global warming, 20cm of wet snow.
    It is not unusual to have some snow in late november, but 20cm and more is unusual.
    I have not yet heard any one connecting it with global warming or climate change.

  16. Doug~Cotton says:

    You people rave on about small differences in temperatures due to water vapor without realizing that, if the IPCC garbage science were correct, then they imply that average levels of water vapor (say roughly 1.5%) do most of “33 DEGREES of warming” and so, sensitivity for each 1% is implied by IPCC et al to be about 20 degrees. Hence a rain forest with 4% WV would supposedly be 60 degrees warmer than a dry region with only 1% WV.

    Why are you all so gullible as to believe that the most prolific so-called GH gas (water vapor) does all that warming?

    Empirical evidence shows it cools anyway, and the reasons are in my paper that is based on the entropy maximization process which the Second Law of Thermodynamics says will always happen.

    There is no “33 degrees of warming” that needs to be done.

    The effect of gravity would lead to over 40 degrees of warming in dry conditions but, fortunately for all of us, water vapor then lowers the magnitude of the temperature gradient so that the temperature profile becomes cooler at the surface end.

    It’s not hard to understand once you get it into your heads that force fields like gravity and centrifugal force autonomously create radial temperature gradients as they act of molecules in motion between collisions.

    Every planetary troposphere displays such temperature gradients and they can all be calculated in the same way. The reason James Hansen thought it was radiation raising the surface temperature was simply that he was unaware of this gravitationally-induced temperature gradient which we can now confirm with experiments with centrifugal force. As BigWaveDave said here

    “I have been earning a living as an engineer specializing in cutting edge technology for very large scale thermal energy transfer processes and power systems for close to 40 years. My credentials include BS, JD and PE, and I have four patents.

    “As for my qualifications to engage in argument with PhDs, I have many times been part of and have led teams with PhD team mates. I was also married to a PhD for 20 years.

    “Because the import of the consequence of the radial temperature gradient created by pressurizing a spherical body of gas by gravity, from the inside only, is that it obviates the need for concern over GHGs. And, because this is based on long established fundamental principles that were apparently forgotten or never learned by many PhDs, it is not something that can be left as an acceptable disagreement.”

  17. Doug~Cotton says:

    (continued)

    If you are interested in learning where it all went wrong with Hansen and his followers (including Pierrehumbert’s “gold standard” book) what must have happened is that Hansen et al realized that the direct solar radiation reaching the surface (about 168W/m^2) was nowhere near sufficient to explain the estimated mean surface temperature. Yes, you may sometimes actually get warmed by the Sun, and, yes, thermometers do sometimes read higher temperatures in the Sun than in the shade, but that’s not a 24 hour mean flux. In fact, because solar radiation varies so much over the course of a year, the mean surface temperature would be far less than the temperature of about -40C that a steady flux of 168W/m^2 would attain.

    So Hansen thought “What else?” – Bingo! It must be back radiation helping the Sun to raise the surface temperature. Given that the surface loses about 102W/m^2 due to conduction and evaporation, he gets out his trusty Stefan-Boltzmann calculator and works out that we need a net mean of 390W/m^2 to “explain” a 288K mean temperature. In fact, that’s not right by a long shot, because the flux that contributes to that mean varies considerably and would need to have a mean above 800W/m^2. Anyway, ignoring that horrific oversight on Hansen’s part, he figured out that we need about 324W/m^2 of back radiation, thus tripling the effect achieved by the Sun alone.

    That meant he had to produce some fictitious, fiddled physics. You see, all the (two-way) radiation between the surface and the atmosphere does is cool the warmer surface. Back radiation slows the rate of cooling that is by radiation (not the evaporation and conduction, however) but, unless you had a much stronger Sun, the surface would never get up to a mean of 288K in the first place, so the rate of cooling is irrelevant.

    And, as I have said in other comments, if you still think you can add back radiation, remember that you need another 400W/m^2 or so on top of that 324W/m^2, but in fact you have NONE entering the oceans (as even Roy knows) and so that 70% or so of the Earth’s surface only gets the Solar radiation, which is rather like that from a nearby iceberg at about -40C.

    • Dr No says:

      Doug,
      Explain this.

      Ever tried lying on an electric blanket?
      You feel warm.

      Now add a blanket on top.
      You feel warmer.

      Now add, another blanket,
      You feel very warm.

      Now add another blanket.
      You begin to feel hot.

      Now add another blanket, and another, and another…
      Eventually, you can catch fire.

      But there has been no change in the energy delivered by the electric blanket !!!
      How can this be so ????

      • Gordon Robertson says:

        @Dr No…”But there has been no change in the energy delivered by the electric blanket !!!
        How can this be so ????”

        If you are inferring that lying on an electric blanket and progressively adding blankets on top of you has a parallel to the effect of anthropogenic gases in the atmosphere, then you are caught in a thought experiment. It’s obvious that adding more blankets slows the escape of thermal energy but there is no blanket effect in the atmosphere or anything near it.

        Glass in a real greenhouse acts as a blanket in a way in that it traps molecules of gas. If you compare the atmosphere to a real greenhouse with 100 panes of glass, you would need to remove 99 panes to get the equivalent of the effect of GHGs in the atmosphere. That’s because all GHGs make up less than 1% of atmospheric gases and all CO2 makes up 4/100 of 1%.

        Anthropogenic CO2 makes up only 4% of all atmospheric CO2 based on an atmospheric concentration of 390 ppmv, as admitted by the IPCC. There is no way in anyone’s imagination that a gas making up 1/1000nds of 1% of atmospheric gases could act as a blanket.

        In his book on atmospheric radiation, physicist/meteorlogist Craig Bohren referred to the blanket hypothesis as a metaphor at best, and at worst, plain silly.

      • DJC says:

        Dr No

        Try this: wrap a large block of ice* in a blanket, read my paper, watch my videos and try to understand the relevant physics pertaining to maximum entropy production.

        * preferably ice at -40C which emits as much radiation as the mean solar radiation of 168W/m^2 reaching Earth’s surface.

  18. Aaron S says:

    I think the lesson for me is how little reliable data we have. I believe paleo data indicates ENSO extends back millions of years but we have roughly a dozen events on the satellite data and only a several significant ones. Every major event still defines the scope of change for the phenomenon… and i have little doubt in 100 yrs humanity will look back and say they knew nothing. This is the perspective i think its laughable that there is so much certainty assigned to climate models by the IPCC. Its pseudoscience… not science bc ENSO is a small part of the bigger more complicated system.

    • Doug~Cotton says:

      Yes Aaron, and, you know, not a single hoaxer I’ve ever seen writing blog comments is actually able to explain with valid physics why the mean surface temperature of the Earth is what it is. They completely overlook the T^4 relationship in Stefan-Boltzmann calculations just for starters.

      Yet, even though they obviously don’t understand or even know about the mechanism which does determine that surface temperature, they presume to understand what the mechanism is which they claim will lead to a warming of that surface temperature supposedly all caused by one molecule of you-know-what in each 2,500 other molecules in our atmosphere.

      Oh well, if anyone happens to be interested in finding out what the real mechanism is that has been confirmed as correctly explaining all planetary temperature data, they could spend a couple of hours studying what I have spent many thousands of hours working out here and confirming with studies and experiments.

    • Aaron S says:

      1. What is this data set? It looks so different from either satellite data set or hadcrut.

      2. Why are they releasing it early?

      3. Where is 97 98 el nino, if removed then why is 15 16 el nino not corrected?

      http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-11-25/world-halfway-to-dangerous-warming-as-temperatures-hit-record

  19. Walt Allensworth says:

    “Schoolchildren just won’t know what snow is!”
    -Dr. David Viner, March 2000

    • lewis says:

      Who likes snow other than school children? Ah, the skiers and snowmobile buffs. No one else.

    • “‘Schoolchildren just wont know what snow is!’
      -Dr. David Viner, March 2000

      Where? In midwest U.S.? All over the world, including the Arctic? And over what time frame? In 2015? In 2050? In 3000? Proof of source for the quote?

      • MarkB says:

        Jan, the quote comes from here: https://web.archive.org/web/20091230061832/http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/snowfalls-are-now-just-a-thing-of-the-past-724017.html

        It’s pretty clear the context is Britain with specific references to southern UK locations, which donn’t get all that much snow anyway. It’s probably also the case that Dr Viner overstated the rapidity with which snowfall in that region might diminish with global warming.

        I don’t know if this is the latest, but this UK Met document shows snowfall trends up to 2005 (figure 13) and there is a clear downward trend in all districts over the period considered: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/q/h/UK_climate_trends.pdf

        • MarkB,

          Thank you much for the source of David Viner’s quote. So, he didn’t talk about midwest U.S. The quote referred to UK, especially lowland Britain. And according to the UK Met Office document, the snow cover trend had been downward indeed, at least up to 2005.

          Here is the State of the Climate report for UK from 2014.:
          http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/0/a/State_of_the_UK_climate_2014.pdf

          Figure 29 shows a snow related time series for the UK. There has been one year with exceptional large snow cover, the year 2010. The other years have apparently continued to be pretty low. This single year is probably the one that is always picked by the “skeptics”.

          I notice in the newspaper article with David Viner’s quote that this is not the only quote attributed to him. According to the article, he supposedly (I state this as carefully, because I generally don’t trust journalists to report correctly what scientists say, especially, when it’s just single sentences and the full context of the question that were addressed by the scientists is not known) also said:

          “Heavy snow will return occasionally, says Dr Viner, but when it does we will be unprepared. “We’re really going to get caught out. Snow will probably cause chaos in 20 years time,” he said.”

          Now, this one is regularly omitted by the “skeptics”. Only the one above is being cited. I wonder why that is?

          I actually see the possibility that a mere extrapolation of the downward snow cover trend for future snow in UK may will turn out to be incorrect. If meridional overturning circulation in the Atlantic slows down due to freshwater influx from melting glaciers, it could lead to a cooling in northwestern Europe and to more snowfall again. And that regional cooling would be indeed due to global warming, then.

        • mpainter says:

          Were really going to get caught out. Snow will probably cause chaos in 20 years time, he said.

          ###
          Did Viner actually say that in 2000? So, in five years snow will cause chaos in GB, tsk, tsk. Such awful stuff, that CO2!

          Interesting that Jan Perlwitz posts here rank alarmism from Viner as proof that Viner is no alarmist. Very telling.

          • “Did Viner actually say that in 2000? So, in five years snow will cause chaos in GB, tsk, tsk. Such awful stuff, that CO2!”

            Now you are just trying to misrepresent the content of the other statement that was attributed to David Vilner in the newspaper article. The one that is regularly omitted by “skeptics”.

            “Interesting that Jan Perlwitz posts here rank alarmism from Viner as proof that Viner is no alarmist. Very telling.”

            What makes you think this is what I wanted to prove? Did I say this? Where? I don’t share your presumptions about what were correctly derogating labels for drawers into which you put people in your parallel universe of science rejection. Thus, there is no reason for me to prove that the labels used by you didn’t apply to specific people.

            Instead, I wanted to expose the lies by “skeptics” about the quote attributed to David Viner. Lies such as

            1.) that David Viner’s statement was made with respect to winters in midwest U.S.

            2.) or that the statement was made with respect to any other region in the world, except for lowland Britain.

            3.) or that David Viner had stated that it will never ever snow again. Or that there never every will be any snow storms again.

            You think that was “telling”? For what? Please elaborate your innuendo. Don’t hold back.

          • mpainter says:

            Five more years and snow will cause chaos in GB sez the good Dr. Viner. But only if the authorities have no better sense than to listen to such alarmism and screw up, as in the example given above by An Inquired.

          • mpainter says:

            Of course, for alarmism, David Viner is pretty pale stuff when compared to James “boil the oceans” Hansen, who now appears as an f-word if the latest report is true. Imagine! Cooking the temperature record!

        • An Inquirer says:

          I always understood Dr. Viner’s comments to be about England, and still the comments are quite embarrassing. Some of England’s harshest winters in the last 50 years have come after 2005. In fact, snow at Easter used to be rare; it has become less rare after 2005. 2010 was not the only harsh winter.
          Many municipalities relied on the forecast of decreased snow and put up less grit to handle winter road conditions, but they ran out of grit and went over budget on winter road expenses.
          Snow is not becoming a thing of the past. Snow extent in the Northern Hemisphere is on an upward trend.

          • “I always understood Dr. Viners comments to be about England, and still the comments are quite embarrassing. Some of Englands harshest winters in the last 50 years have come after 2005.”

            From the State of Climate report 2014 for the UK, to which I linked in the other comment:

            Days of frost in UK:
            1961-1990 average: 61
            1981-2010 average: 55
            2005-2014 average: 52
            Year 2014: 29

            Days of ground frost in UK:
            1961-1990 average: 116
            1981-2010 average: 111
            2005-2014 average: 102
            Year 2014: 76

            The time series can be seen in Figure 10 on page 15.

            Somehow, the numbers and even the graphic, where you don’t see only averages, don’t agree with what you claim about some of the harshest winters in UK in the last 50 years after 2005. I only see one winter that would fall under this. The one of 2010. Except for this one, it looks like that the “harshest” ones after 2005 were more like the average winters from the 1960s up to the 1980s. Perhaps, your perception has changed. That you perceive as “harsh” winter today, which was an average winter 50 years ago.

            “Snow is not becoming a thing of the past. Snow extent in the Northern Hemisphere is on an upward trend.”

            True for fall and winter which show some upward trend. I don’t know whether it is statistically significant. Here it is for winter:
            http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/chart_seasonal.php?ui_set=nhland&ui_season=4

            But then again, spring shows a strong downward trend of the snow extend in the Northern Hemisphere:
            http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/chart_seasonal.php?ui_set=nhland&ui_season=2

          • mpainter says:

            An Inquirer says “Snow extent in the Northern Hemisphere is on an upward trend.”
            ###
            Interesting. Must cause the alarmists fits to hear such things.

  20. Toneb says:

    Jan,

    I applaud your efforts with this particular “sceptic”.
    I have experience too in another thread, and know that he even “upset” Anthony Watts with “his” posting “style”. Which takes some doing from the “sceptical” side. Much easier from the science side – which I am of course.
    This “sceptic” has nothing but hand-waving and dragon-slayer “physics” to “his” argument. Which of course is no argument at all.
    He is contemptuous of your expertise, as he was/is of mine.
    He oozes Dunning-Kruger syndrome coupled with arrogance, hubris and conceit that is beyond nauseating.
    Someone said in this thread he really is “a prat”.
    http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/prat

    At least DC can be seen to be potty.
    There is no winning against this type who drag you down the rabbit hole to their alternative universe.
    ……………………………………………………………

    Mr Dunning-Kruger.
    Again;
    Deserts: (essentially) NO HYDROLOGICAL CYCLE: Have descending air from aloft (most notably around 30 deg N/S beneath the convergence within the sub-tropic jets). The air dries (rel hum). Subsidence inversion essentially at the surface.
    No cloud. max Insolation. Soils bone dry/sandy. High insulation to/from heat flux in deeper ground. Insolation is added to subsidence heating and > v high Tmax.
    High radiative transfer to space at night. Calm winds and insulating ground = deep shallow surface layer cooling > low Tmin. This shallow surface cool layer lies under much warmer air and that layer is rapidly “burnt out” by the sun with a few hours of sunrise.

    Tropics: HAVE A HYDROLOGICAL CYCLE: Latent heat uptake from evap. of H2O takes extra heat from boundary layer, convection soon reaches the condensation level at a relatively low altitude. Cu/CB form > it rains > cools/moistens surface > reduces Tmax due transfer of heat aloft. Cloud cover also reduces Tmax.
    Night: Moist air traps more LWIR. Moist air releases LH as it condenses onto hygroscopic nuclei in the atmosphere and onto surfaces (dew). This has a braking effect for Tmin.

    http://www.geologycafe.com/images/california_water_cycle.jpg
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_thermodynamics

    “The ClausiusClapeyron relation shows how the water-holding capacity of the atmosphere increases by about 8% per Celsius increase in temperature. (It does not directly depend on other parameters like the pressure or density.) This water-holding capacity, or “equilibrium vapor pressure”, can be approximated using the August-Roche-Magnus formula ………
    This shows that when atmospheric temperature increases (e.g., due to greenhouse gases) the absolute humidity should also increase exponentially (assuming a constant relative humidity)”

    If that blows your mind then think of it this way…
    Why do clouds form?

    It is simply moist air from/near the surface that is lifted aloft until it reaches it’s dew point – the WV condenses onto hygroscopic nuclei. All BECAUSE the temperature fell. And don’t say it’s because the pressure fell – the two are interrelated – which is why vapour forms on the top (LP) side of an aerofoil in humid air.
    Loss of internal energy via reducing pressure is exhibited by a fall of temp (adiabatic process).
    So obviously colder air cannot hold as much water.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adiabatic_process#Adiabatic_heating_and_cooling

    It’s just empirical science my friend … and NOT up for discussion.
    I’m afraid the way the universe works will not change just because you want it to, and only the ignorant will take any notice of you.
    Shame.

    Have a nice day my friend.

    Oh, how about providing the science that Jan asks for?
    Because there is none.
    As I said – a Dragon-slayer and a hand-waver – oh and a waste of breath.
    Yours and mine.
    As I said, I prefer to stay above ground, where the rational people play.
    And no Mr D-K – I shall not read any reply you may make to me, so you waste your time.

    Second thoughts – it’s all about “bigging” yourself isn’t it? – the need to get a cheer from the rest inhabiting the rabbit-hole.
    In that case be my guest.

    Oh, PS: No irony in there this time.

    • mpainter says:

      The heartbreak of substance abuse.

    • LukesAreWrongToo says:

      If you think DC is wrong then PROVE IT and claim the AU $10,000 reward. I bet you can’t. You can spell out your fault-finding efforts on his blog … https://itsnotco2.wordpress.com

      No one else has proved him wrong, so the $10,000 reward is still on offer – as it has been for a year or so. Put up or shut up. Hundreds of silent readers will be watching you.

      • Let me guess who the jury is for judging whether Doug~Cotton’s “theory” has been successfully refuted, so that the “reward” can be claimed.

        Hmm.

        Doug~Cotton?

        • Doug~Cotton says:

          Submit what you think is wrong with the hypothesis right here. Your errors will then be addressed here in full view of perhaps over 100 silent readers. So let’s not have any waffle from you Jan. Present real physics and real arguments pertaining to issues in the hypothesis such as maximum entropy production. Put up or shut up!

          • You already have failed to respond to what I had to say about the first three sentences of your not peer-reviewed “paper”.

          • “Submit what you think is wrong with the hypothesis right here. Your errors will then be addressed here.”

            Yeah, right. Exactly what I have thought. Thanks for the confirmation. ROTFL

          • DJC says:

            Submissions pertaining to flaws in the Second Law of Thermodynamics or the physics I have explained based on such should be submitted to my blog where all can see my replies (which won’t be deleted) to those who dare to take me on.

            I have no intention of submitting critical papers to pal-reviewed rags that would be unlikely to publish anything that correctly faults papers they have mistakenly approved. I have summarized faults in Pierrehumbert’s writings in another comment on this blog, just as an example. Most climatology suffers from the same errors. It’s up to the promoters of the hoax to support their claims with correct physics, which they can’t and never will be able to do. Neither can you.

            Back radiation, DA, has about twice the flux of solar radiation reaching the Earth’s surface. The energy balance at the surface takes this into account, deducting back radiation (324) from outward radiation (390) to get the thermal energy flow out of the surface by radiation as 66W/m^2. To that we add 102W/m^2 of energy transfers out of the surface by evaporative cooling, conduction etc. to get a total of 168W/m^2 out, which balances the incident solar radiation of 168W/m^2 reaching the surface. The latter is equivalent to that of an iceberg at about -40C.

  21. LukesAreWrongToo says:

    HUGE NASA FRAUD EXPOSED

    “Ederer reports not long ago retired geologist and data computation expert Professor Dr. Friedrich Karl Ewert began looking at the data behind the global warming claims, and especially the datasets of NASAs Goddard Institute of Space Studies (GISS).

    Ewert painstakingly examined and tabulated the reams of archived data from 1153 stations that go back to 1881 which NASA has publicly available data that the UN IPCC uses to base its conclusion that man is heating the Earths atmosphere through the burning of fossil fuels. According to Ederer, what Professor Ewert found is unbelievable:

    From the publicly available data, Ewert made an unbelievable discovery: Between the years 2010 and 2012 the data measured since 1881 were altered so that they showed a significant warming, especially after 1950. [] A comparison of the data from 2010 with the data of 2012 shows that NASA-GISS had altered its own datasets so that especially after WWII a clear warming appears although it never existed.

    Ederer writes that Ewert particularly found alterations at stations in the Arctic. Professor Ewert randomly selected 120 stations from all over the world and compared the 2010 archived data to the 2012 data and found that they had been tampered to produce warming.

    The old data showed regular cycles of warming and cooling over the period, even as atmospheric CO2 concentration rose from 0.03% to 0.04%. According to the original NASA datasets, Ederer writes, the mean global temperature cooled from 13.8C in 1881 to 12.9C in 1895. Then it rose to 14.3C by 1905 and fell back under 12.9C by 1920, rose to 13.9C by 1930, fell to 13 by 1975 before rising to 14C by 2000. By 2010 the temperature fell back to 13.2C.

    But then came the massive altering of data, which also altered the entire overall trend for the period. According to journalist Ederer, Ewert uncovered 10 different methods NASA used to alter the data. The 6 most often used methods were:

    Reducing the annual mean in the early phase.
    Reducing the high values in the first warming phase.
    Increasing individual values during the second warming phase.
    Suppression of the second cooling phase starting in 1995.
    Shortening the early decades of the datasets.
    With the long-term datasets, even the first century was shortened.

    The methods were employed for stations such as Darwin, Australia and Palma de Mallorca, for example, where cooling trends were suddenly transformed into warming.

    Ewert (pictured) then discovered that NASA having altered the datasets once in March 2012 was not enough. EWERT Alterations were made again in August 2012, and yet again in December 2012. For Palma de Majorca: Now because of the new datasets it has gotten even warmer. Now they show a warming of +0.01202C per year.

    Using earlier NASA data, globe is in fact cooling”

    • JohnKl says:

      Hi LukesAreWrongToo,

      Great post, but not surprising! Nasa’s apparent pseudo science has some history to it. Remember the Space Shuttle Tiles that were supposed to protect the atmosphere and the ensuing shuttle disaster?

      Have a great day!

      P.S. – Harsh as it may seem. It seems a very good thing that Alan Bond and the Brits will sport Skylon. Nasa has a great deal of explaining to do!

      • Yeah, great post! It has been posted in the Internet, so it must be true!

        How gullible are you?

        • Doug~Cotton says:

          Not as gullible as yourself.

          The Second Law of Thermodynamics tells us that, in an isolated system, entropy will never decrease in any independent process. The combination of two or more inter-dependent processes may be considered to be a single independent process. For example, in a siphon the two sides may be considered to host inter-dependent processes, so water will flow upwards on one side provided that it must flow further downwards on the other side because of the inter-dependence. But water will not flow up a creek to a lake on top of a mountain just because it will subsequently flow further down the other side. Hence, a one-way pencil of radiation must obey the second law because there is no inter-dependence with any reverse pencil of radiation. For example, radiation may heat some water, but some of the energy may exit the water via evaporation or conduction into the surrounding air. Nothing compells it to exit via radiation. Once the electro-magnetic energy in the radiation is converted to thermal energy (as only happens in a cooler target) then the new thermal energy can escape by any heat transfer process, and such a process is totally independent of the first process. Entropy will not decrease in either process. So radiation from the colder atmosphere cannot warm the surface by supplying new thermal energy to the surface. The radiation is pseudo-scattered – a process which (energy-wise) is similar to diffuse reflection.

          Now, in the fictitious fiddled physics of climatology the incorrect assumption is made that pencils of radiation from the colder atmosphere can transfer thermal energy into a warmer surface, thus creating an independent process that would decrease entropy. Nature does not permit this, and the way that it prevents it happening is absolutely fascinating. It was the subject of extensive research I did before writing my paper on radiated energy that is linked at the foot of this page.

          You can prove what I say is correct with a simple experiment in your backyard. Suspend a mercury bulb thermometer horizontally in a sunny spot. Let’s say that, early one morning it reads 15C – the assumed global mean surface temperature which climatologists want you to be gullible enough to believe is brought about by the combination of direct solar radiation and about twice as much radiation from the atmosphere. But your thermometer is also receiving radiation from the ground beneath so why is it not much hotter? Suppose you now block most of the ground radiation with a large tray filled with ice and placed just under your suspended thermometer. Try it and see if you can explain the temperature readings by adding all the radiation to get a net effect. You can’t, because radiation does not compound like that, and radiation from the colder atmosphere cannot be added to solar radiation in Stefan Boltzmann calculations because the Second Law cannot be violated.

          Fortunately there’s more to the Second Law than you realize, and this has now been known since the 1980’s in more recent work by physicists including myself. That’s what you can learn about in my second paper (linked on the same page) that explains the process which accounts for all planetary temperatures and the necessary heat transfers that support such temperatures. It’s a whole new paradigm – a totally different ball park. And of course it proves the greenhouse conjecture to be false, whilst also explaining the observed fact that water vapor does not warm the surface by about 20 degrees for each 1% of WV in the atmosphere – another piece of garbage the IPCC would like you to be gullible enough to believe.

      • mpainter says:

        John says “Nasa has a great deal of explaining to do!”
        ###

        Is this not the work of the infamous James “boil the oceans” Hansen and his understudy Gavin “38% chance” Schmidt? Of the notorious GISS? Hardly seems right to blame NASA for the work of that crew, which has for years been reported as emanating a foul odor. I hope that this report is noticed in the right places.

        • What “report”? Have you seen it? You haven’t, have you?

          You obviously believe the claims at face value, simply because someone makes these claims about the alleged report and its content, and it is what you want to believe. You don’t need any evidence. Or why is it? Do you see and call yourself a “skeptic”?

          You are one of those most gullible ones among the “skeptics”, which I meant.

          At what places will the claims be noticed? At those places where people like you assemble.

          I register your vile insults against the scientists working at GISS. Insults spewed by a nitwit living in conspiracy fantasy land.

          • mpainter says:

            You should examine the credentials of Professor Emeritus Friedrich Karl Ewert, Jan. They look pretty impressive. I don’t believe that his expertise in this issue will be easily dismissed by your sneering. I would say that the GISS crowd could find itself in hot water, given the present political complexion of Congress.

          • If Congress has the same approach to science as you do, where hearsay, rumors, mere assertions w/o evidence, and (quasi-)religious beliefs trump evidence, scientific rigor, and reality, and the same people were able to get ahold of all the power in the country, United States would be heading into dark times, a return to the Middle Ages. Okay, maybe not “return”, because U.S. hadn’t existed yet during the Middle Ages. So that would be actually something new for U.S. Maybe not the Middle Ages, but the 1950s. This time not with a witch hunt and tribunals against alleged “communists”, but with tribunals for scientists who have published results from their work, which are in agreement with the results from science all over the world, but which aren’t liked by the ones in power in U.S. Scientists will be persecuted then, using made-up allegations in the tradition of Stalin, Beria, Lysenko. And science will only be funded and allowed to be published, when it confirms the political, ideological, and religious beliefs of the ones in power. It may not come as dystopian as described here, but this seems to be the form of government and approach to science about which you dream.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            You’re still not able to “explain” the Earth’s surface temperature with radiation calculations, now are you Jan? Let’s see your personal explanation using Stefan Boltzmann calculations. (Just search for the on-line S-B calculator at tutorvista.com.) Then go back to this comment and by all means write a submission for the AU $10,000 reward, whether or not you believe I can pay the money via PayPal to anyone in the world.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            And you Jan are clearly not qualified in physics, yet the study of heat transfer mechanisms in planetary tropospheres is totally within the realm of physics – quite advanced physics in fact at the forefront of 21st century research – something I have been involved with for years.

            Real physics is a far cry from the fictitious, fiddled physics taught by climatologists to up-and-coming climatologists preparing to carry on the process of claiming funds from governments for their research.

            I’m not the slightest bit interested in this garbage science promoted by popes and politicians who haven’t a clue about the relevant physics – like yourself. I have challenged you personally to explain the Earth’s surface temperature. You can’t, whereas I can.

            Real physics is supported by empirical evidence. My hypothesis is real physics supported by copious evidence and experiments with centrifugal force. You wouldn’t even know why such experiments are relevant because you haven’t read what’s at http://climate-change-theory.com – probably because “it’s on the internet” – well there’s plenty on the internet that’s real physics – far more so than the fictitious, fiddled physics of climatology.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            And Jan, the world is indeed warming due to natural causes, just as it did between the Dark Ages and the Medieval Warming Period. But, by using long-term moving averages, I have shown in my paper published nearly four years ago that the rate of warming is decreasing. That is because we are approaching a long-term maximum before about 500 years of long term cooling starts later this century.

            The issue is whether carbon dioxide does anything. In fact I have proved beyond a shadow of doubt (using correct physics) that it and water vapor both cool, and I have backed up the claim about water vapor with empirical evidence using 30 years of real world temperature and precipitation records from three continents. The physics is the same for water vapor and carbon dioxide because they are both IR-active. In that the IPCC assume water vapor warms quite significantly (about 20 degrees per 1%) the GH conjecture is debunked by that evidence alone, as well as by physics.

        • JohnKl says:

          Hi mpainter,

          Thank you for your statement regarding GISS. You’re definitely correct regarding GISS activity, but NASA should be looked at concerning their space operations and other decisions.

          Have a great day and Thanksgiving!

        • Gordon Robertson says:

          @mpainter “Hardly seems right to blame NASA for the work of that crew…”

          Why? NASA has defended them. A few years ago a bigwig at NASA wanted to fire James Hansen and he was overruled.

          GISS tried to change the hottest year in the US from 1934 to 1998 but Steve McIntyre caught it and forced them to put it back.

          Let’s not mistake the fact that both NASA and NOAA are US government organizations and as such answer to the current administration. NOAA is currently involved in serious scientific misconduct and are being investigated by the US Congress.

  22. Propaganda fodder for the most gullible ones among the “skeptics” who reject the findings of climate science. Only hardcore conspiracy theorists who are fully out of touch with reality will probably believe the absurd assertions posted by Gosselin.

    • mpainter says:

      The author of the report, Dr. Friedrich Karl Ewert, Professor Emeritus of the University of Paderborn, is given as a data specialist in the blog article. I wonder what his cv says. Jan, why don’t you check it out and report back?

      • Who cares what the “CV” of this guy says? The claims by Ewert are so obviously bogus that his “CV” won’t help him, although I think the probability that he has ever published any actual research article in climate science is extremely low.

        That the claims are bogus is already clear from a simple sanity check. If there really was the alleged “huge NASA fraud” (it’s NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies in NYC that is specifically meant with the accusation), and the world had really been cooling since the 1940s as asserted by Ewert then this fraud couldn’t be limited to GISS. Then all research groups all over the world, who do similar surface data analyses, like NOAA, UK Met Office, the Berkeley group, the Japanese Meteorological Society, must be all involved in this alleged fraud, because all get basically the same results from their temperature analyses. There must be a global conspiracy committing this. Do you really believe that? I guess you do.

        And since the raw data are public, and the methodologies are published in the scientific literature, and the computer programs used for the analyses are public too, it should be easy, for someone who knows about these matters, to find where exactly this alleged fraud happens. On the other hand, the alleged report by Ewert with the alleged findings is not published. All that can be found are claims in blog posts about Ewert’s alleged findings. I wonder why that is.

        Here is a comparison of the temperature series between raw data and adjusted data for land and oceans combined:

        http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-opy7LoBO__w/VNoo9u5ynhI/AAAAAAAAAg4/_DCE5Rzm9Fw/s700/land%2Bocean%2Braw%2Badj.png

        Ooops. The global temperature trend over the last century is smaller after adjustments in comparison to the trend from the raw data. That was not supposed to happen. The cabal must really be incompetent.

        • Massimo PORZIO says:

          Evidently Meteosat’s eye has a different point of view at least in last 24 years.

          http://climategate.nl/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/04-Rosema.pdf

          “10. CONCLUSION
          The amazing finding of the present study is that we do not observe global warming in the period 1982-2006, but significant cooling. What could be the cause? The satellite data are from a reliable origin supported by the European meteorological community. Their accurate calibration has received due attention and efforts from Eumetsat. Our processing of these data has been simple and straight forward, involving only noon and midnight image composition, averaging and a filter to eliminate cloud effects. We have created similar planetary temperature change images for the unfiltered, 10, 20 and 30 day filtered data, clearly showing convergence towards the longer filters, indicating that cloud influences were effectively removed.
          Moreover, we do observe significant temperature increase at some locations which are due to human interventions, and which are quantitatively in line with the theoretically expected effects of these interventions. Therefore we believe the observed planetary temperature decrease for most of the hemisphere to be real.
          The cloud filtered temperature change patterns, in figure 2c, indicate that the largest decrease occurs in the more cloudy regions of the hemisphere: the tropics and the temperate zones, while in the desert belt the temperature decrease is much smaller.
          This suggests that cloudiness changes could be the mechanism behind the observed global cooling since 1982: an increase in cloudiness would decrease global radiation and increase rainfall and evapotranspiration. Both effects tend to decrease the surface
          temperature.”

          Have a great day.

          Massimo

      • mpainter says:

        Professor Ewert has documented the cooking of the data and cites specific episodes of these alterations, Jan. I suggest that you read his report instead of striking out wildly.
        By the way, do you have anything to do with the GISS temperature data? What, exactly, do you do at GISS?

        • You assert that Ewert had documented something in a “report”. What “report”? You haven’t seen any report. Where has it been published? Nowhere. How am I even supposed to read something that doesn’t exist?

          It is claimed that Ewert’s analysis of the non-“cooked” data showed global cooling after 1940. Where are the raw data he used? Where are the results presented? Where is the used methodology accessible? And the computer programs used for the analysis? (And where is his email-correspondence with his buddies over years back?)

          Apparently, no one needs to adhere to scientific standards in “skeptic” world, when it comes to assertions in agreement with the pre-conceived belief system of a fake skeptic and when it comes to libelous accusation against working scientists.

          mpainter about the scientists of GISS:
          “… crew, which has for years been reported as emanating a foul odor”

          You are a despicable character.

          • mpainter says:

            I see that Jan Perlwitz prefers to strike out wildly. The report is available over the internet, but he will never go look. What will he do when Congress demands his emails, I wonder? 🙂

            Oh, Jan: Hansen, Schmidt, & company have a rather unsavory reputation amongst skeptics. Just so you’ll understand when the boom comes down.
            Have a wonderful day.

          • “The report is available over the internet, but he will never go look.”

            And this is exactly why mpainter doesn’t provide a link where the report was allegedly publicly available over the Internet. I have looked. I haven’t found anything. mpainter is lying through his/her teeth. Like he/she is lying by pretending that he/she had seen and read the alleged report.

            mpainter about the scientists of GISS:
            “…crew, which has for years been reported as emanating a foul odor”

            mpainter, you are a despicable character.

          • mpainter says:

            Professor Emeritus Ewert’s investigation uncovered massive alterations of data during 2012, apparently by “boil the oceans” Hansen just before he skipped out and left his minions holding the bag.

            Minion. That’s you, Jan, in case you don’t realize it.

            Your best bet is to go to the chief investigator at the Committee and tell everything you know. Say that you were duped.

          • And still no link that allegedly exists, provided by mpainter to the alleged “report”. He/she just keeps lying.

            mpainter about the scientists of GISS:
            …crew, which has for years been reported as emanating a foul odor”

            mpainter, you are a despicable character.

          • mpainter says:

            The House Committee on Science and Technology will send you a copy, if you ask them politely. And its true, I’m afraid. The odor from GISS is pretty bad and has a lot of nostrils twitching. I would not be surprised to see the Committee Members wearing gas masks at the hearing.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            TRANSLATION OF THE REPORT

            Manipulated temperature data? Global warming – what was measured and how was it evaluated?

            Commentary by the Rechercherergebnisse geologist FK Ewert regarding extensive manipulation of global temperature data by the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in ACHGUT by the well-known television journalist Gnter Ederer has (and still does) raise grave concerns.

            On the site on which the Notrickszone English version was published, the operator Pierre Gosselin had already put on the brakes and has 2400 likes after the initial comments ….

            Prof. Dr. K.F. Ewert (EIKE)

            Two complexes have been studied in detail by the geologist: the recent changes in temperature data between 2010 and 2012 imply manipulation of data, regardless of the global trend in temperatures between 1880 and 2010.

            This is covered in detail in the attached pdf report, and also briefly mentioned is the manipulation in Section 2.2 and its later amendments in Appendix 2. This example illustrates: in March 2010, March 2012 and December 2012 the relevant data provided for the stations Darwin and Palma de Mallorca shows different temperature response lines – in December 2012 have appeared in the past – and thus the temperature – warmer than in March of 2010.

            Prof. Ewert as well as Gnter Ederer have, because of this article, received many, many requests from reputable institutions and scientists around the world who want to have more facts and details on these results. At least the German-speaking among them can be helped. Read the short and the long version of this pdf as scientific research.

            Global warming – what was measured and how was evaluated?
            Prof. Dr. Friedrich-Karl Ewert

            Mankind has always known that there are regular climate changes. The parable of the seven fat and seven lean years is an indication. With the development of science, people have recognized the causes of the changes – the sun changes its thermal radiation and the earth will change its orbit.

            (to be continued)

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            (continued)

            This periodic “force” existed since the formation of the Earth, due to the Milankovitch cycles, but is supposedly to have lost its effect with the beginning of a new warming phase in the early 1980s – when the atmospheric trace gas CO2 supposedly became effective and now determines the climate trends.

            In any case, between the first environmental conference in Stockholm in 1972 and the following conferences in 1992 in Rio de Janeiro and 1997 (recognized in Kyoto) this is what some environmental activists promulgated.

            This had two consequences:

            1) Environmental Protection involved climate change,

            and

            2) This was now a problem child of international policy in the area of ​​responsibility of the UN and within the mandate of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

            The activists were initially worried about the welfare of the earth, but scientists soon recognized their career opportunities and, from around 1980, sought evidence supporting the cause of global warming.

            It helped now having computers available, because with these data processing and modeling of future scenarios were possible. The scenarios predicted, in the event of further CO2 emissions, continual progression of the warming.

            Prof. John Christy, of the University of Alabama, has compared the combined predictions of the most important climate computers. He has found that all the results are different. The criterion for science is not satisfied, because it requires that several research approaches lead to the same result. The computer results show just the opposite: for the year 2020 there is warming up varying from 0.3 to 1.3C that is predicted. Which result is true if all are different? None!

            The climate data from the past few decades are enough according to a statement of the DWD, to calibrate the models for climate change in the future. This approach is not acceptable and, in the light of terrestrial climate history over 4.5 billion years, with a myriad of unknown events, can only lead to doubtful results. From a geological point of view and paleo climate facts from the past must be taken into account in the assessment of future trends.

            Ulrich Berner and Hans-Jrg Streif working for the Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR), the Lower Saxony State Office for Soil Research (NLfB) and the Institute for Applied Geosciences (GGA), all based in Hannover, as editors of the book “Climate Facts, the Past a Key to the Future” have scientifically analyzed climate trends from the geological past to the present.” They have shown, with reference to the facts, that global warming allegedly caused by us humans as a result of our CO2 emissions does not take place.

            Despite the technically correct analysis of John Christy and Ulrich Berner & Hans-Jrg Streif the official climate policy still claims that strong global warming is taking place, caused by we humans with our CO2 emissions.

            It is concluded that we need to reduce these emissions, so that the earth remains livable for mankind. Based on this assertion we still have the climate simulation models that predict a strong warming despite the current slowdown phase.

            Although the IPCC had emphasized early on that predictions for climate are not possible, because it is a chaotic nonlinear system with many factors that determine results, still the climate policy, as well as the decisions of the G7 conference in Ellmau are again confirmed.

            While this model has not been proven, there is ample evidence that the effects of CO2 emissions are insignificant. This evidence is also paid little attention in the assessment of climate change, as measured for more than a hundred years, with temperatures having been recorded by tens of thousands of weather stations around the world guards. Therefore, it was necessary to manually evaluate from 1881-2010 registered temperatures in detail. The results are contained the attached pdf-file report. The following chart summarizes the main results:

            (See chart in the German paper linked in my comment above.)

            Fig. 1 Shows …

            that between 1881 and 2010 there were four cooling stages with three warming phases in between that have alternated;

            that stronger warming and longer cooling periods were evident before the start of the anthropogenic CO2 emissions;

            that the temperature in the last century has slightly cooled overall, and

            that no influence of our CO2 emissions upon temperatures can be seen.

            The complete version can be downloaded in two parts as pdf from the annexure.

            PS: For any German readers, see the page “Grnde, warum es nicht Kohlendioxid” on my website:
            http://www.climate-change-theory.com/german.html

    • Gordon Robertson says:

      @Jan Perlwitz…”Propaganda fodder for the most gullible ones among the skeptics who reject the findings of climate science”.

      Your myopia is showing. You are posting on a site run by a climate scientist who doesn’t agree with your alarmist views.

      And what is your real name? Is this Gavin Schmidt? More likely you are Eli Rabbett who has been known to frequent this site. That would be the same Eli Rabbett, aka Josh Halpern, who got his butt kicked when he tried to rebutt the paper of Gerlich and Tscheuschner.

  23. geran says:

    JanP, Toneb, and all warmists, I really appreciate your desperate humor. Your ship is rapidly sinking but you’re arguing about the buoyancy of seawater! Hilarious.

    You don’t have any science on your side, all you have is pseudoscience. You cannot explain how atmospheric CO2 can warm Earth’s surface, using verifiable physics. All you have are “pal-reviewed” papers, dipped in pseudoscience. The temperature data you present have been corrupted to fit an agenda. You wrap yourselves in your beliefs while hurling ad homs at skeptics.

    Even though your humor is predictable, I still enjoy it.

    • You keep telling yourself this. And don’t remove the tin foil hat from your head. So we cannot make you one of us.

      • geran says:

        “Glug, glug, glug”–the sound of swallowing the seawater….

      • Doug~Cotton says:

        Go back to this comment Jan and the following two.

      • Norman says:

        Jan P Perlwitz,

        Here is one reason it is difficult to trust the integrity of the climate science community. I do not agree much with anything geran says but I think mpainter does have valid points.

        You have this claim:
        http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/

        “Both the sea ice thickness and sea ice area have fallen to new record lows for this time of the year (22.11.2015), even surpassing all of the worst previous years.”

        Then going here you find someone is not telling the truth.
        http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/

        Recent history of Arctic ice area show both 2012 and 2011 with less ice area at this same time.

        Have a great Thanksgiving!

        • JohnKl says:

          Hi Norman,

          Thank you for the information and have a great Thanksgiving yourself!

          • dave says:

            Two weeks ago, the sea ice in the North was well advanced for the time of year. Recently, some of it, in the open ocean, has been dispersed.

            The four million square kilometer Arctic Basin, itself, is in its normal condition for this time of year, viz. choked with ice. It was predicted by a Cambridge professor to have been ice-free this summer (‘cos the ice is in a “death spiral”), but the minimum ice extent was 2.6 million square kilometers.

            What I found interesting in the “arcticseaicenews” (which comes from a quasi-official body of the US government) was the statement:

            “Figure 4a [from Cryostat-2] shows thin (under a meter) ice over a wide area North of Greenland…this area has been shown by other studies to have some of the thickest (over four meters) sea ice in the Arctic.”

        • Massimo PORZIO says:

          Not really an Happy day for turkeys there, but…

          Have all a great Thanksgiving! 🙂

          Massimo

        • Norman,

          You believe that someone isn’t telling the truth there. You apparently haven’t considered the possibility that you simply misunderstand something.

          There is no contradiction between the data shown at the two links. And no untruth. The first link shows sea ice thickness and sea ice area. The data by NSIDC, the one at the second link show sea ice extend. The sea ice area is calculated from the percentage of ice cover in a satellite grid cell. The area fraction with ice coverage is summed over all cells. The sea ice extend, on the other hand, used by NSIDC is derived differently. When a grid cell has more than 15% ice coverage, then the whole cell is defined as covered with ice. The the sea ice extend is the total area of grid cells that fulfill that criterion. For instance, if you have two cells with 0.16 area fraction with ice, the first method gives you 0.32, but the second method gives you 2 as result. Thus, nothing sinister is going on somewhere there, when sea ice area shows a record minimum, but sea ice extend doesn’t. Sometimes it’s reversed. They are different metrics.

          So what again was supposedly mpainter’s valid point?

          • Norman says:

            Jan P Perlwitz,

            Thank you for the time to respond to my post. I often go to the NSIDC to check on Arctic and Antarctic Ice. I did make an error in my assumption that both were talking about the same thing.

            For mpainter I would have to look at past posts to show some good points.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            I see you’re back, Jan, but you apparently still cannot explain in your own words (with your own calculations based on verifiable physics) how the ocean surface receives the required thermal energy needed to maintain observed temperatures. Pierrehumbert failed dismally in doing so and his book is riddled with errors and fictitious fiddled physics. So don’t just refer me to his works, or IPCC “explanations” because, when I teach physics, I find that undergraduates learn best when encouraged to think for themselves. When you do you will realize you can’t answer the question with radiation calculations.

            So, Jan, Roy and others, if you don’t know what the mechanism is that supplies the thermal energy to the ocean surface, then you don’t know what would happen to ocean surface temperatures if carbon dioxide levels increased.

          • And I am observing with growing concern that I systematically spelled the word “extent” wrongly.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            That’s not the only thing you got wrong, Jan.

            I’m still waiting for your personal explanation as to what mechanism explains the necessary energy supply that supports the surface temperature, together with your computations that indicate a mean surface temperature in the vicinity of 288K.

            If you can’t explain the mechanism, then you can’t explain the results of that mechanism if carbon dioxide levels are increased above current concentrations that are around 0.04%.

            Silent readers can get ahead of Jan by reading my blog … it doesn’t take long at: https://itsnotco2.wordpress.com

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            Jan – please my three comments to dave, starting here for a detailed explanation of planetary temperatures and energy flows.

          • Doug~Cotton,

            “Im still waiting for your personal explanation…”

            I’m not aware that I owed you any personal explanation for anything. Why would that be? Who do you think you are? You don’t dictate what topic I have to discuss with you. Or that I would have to talk to you at all.

          • SkepticGoneWild says:

            Jan,

            NASA GISS is a disgrace to science. The nutcase Hansen ruined it. GISS’s original mission was to perform basic research in space sciences in support of Goddard Space Flight programs. “Climate Change” is not your mission. Gavin Schmidt is not even a scientist. He’s a mathematician that is so chickensh**, he refuses to debate Roy Spencer. No wonder, Schmidt does not have a scientific bone in his body. GISS is just wasting MY hard earned tax dollars. You clowns should all be fired.

          • mpainter says:

            It would be interesting to know the story on how the Goddard Institute of Spaceflght Studies became a hotbed of climate alarmists. I’ll bet it has a lot to do with James “boil the ocean” Hansen.

        • geran says:

          Norman says: “I do not agree much with anything geran says…”

          A few comments later, Norman says: “I often go to the NSIDC to check on Arctic and Antarctic Ice. I did make an error in my assumption that both were talking about the same thing.”

          Norman, you don’t agree much with what you say! Confused much?

          Hilarious!

          • Norman says:

            geran,

            The great thing about Dr. Spencer blog is it keeps you amused and lets you post your favorite word “pseudoscience”. I think you may use this word as often as Doug uses Uranus.

          • geran says:

            “Pseudoscience”!

            🙂

          • Gordon Robertson says:

            @Geran…”Pseudoscience!”

            It has advanced to scientific misconduct.

          • mpainter says:

            “Scientific misconduct”.
            Indeed it has come to that and nothing better illustrates the turpitude of the global warmers than the many examples of such misconduct.

  24. Doug~Cotton says:

    If the “skeptics” here want to challenge warmists like Jan, I would strongly suggest you avoid discussion of temperature trends and instead focus on the issue as to whether or not they can prove with verified physics that carbon dioxide warms the surface. See my questions to Jan (linked in the latest comment just above) and note that she will not be able to answer such, thus demonstrating that she has no valid science at all. The same goes for Lukes of course like Roy himself. But please avoid irrelevant comments relating to authority, peer-review etc. True physics (like the Second Law and the Stefan Boltzmann equation) is all well documented and peer-reviewed, and it’s all you need. Their stuff can be pal-reviewed as much as they like, but if it does not agree with the laws of physics well, so much for their pals. See the third topic on my blog for examples of the questions that can be asked and how to respond. https://itsnotco2.wordpress.com

  25. Doug~Cotton says:

    Roy and all others should read this profound statement:

    Because radiative flux is proportional to the fourth power of the temperature of a black body emitting it, the mean temperature attained by a widely varying flux (such as we have night and day, all over the globe) is considerably less than the temperature attained by a steady flux that is equal to the mean of that variable flux. That is a mathematical fact derived from the Planck function. That single fact demolishes the greenhouse garbage science that associates a mean of 390 to 396W/m^2 with a mean surface temperature of 288K.

    It is a totally different process which delivers most of the required thermal energy to the surface of Earth, and all the required thermal energy to the surface of Venus. You can read about it at http://climate-change-theory.com and not in any writings by anyone else to my knowledge. It is supported by copious evidence and experiments.

    • For the surface of a planet with negligible internal heat sources and no atmosphere, the effective radiative temperature is the upper limit for the actual average surface temperature. So far correct.

      But for a planet with an atmosphere that absorbs and re-emits longwave radiation that is emitted from the surface of the planet, the average surface temperature can be higher than the effective radiative temperature of the planet. The surface of the planet is not in radiative equilibrium with outer space. The radiative equilibrium condition is fulfilled at the top of the atmosphere, instead.

      The temperature at the surface is determined by the energy balance at the surface. The energy balance at the surface is given by the sum of solar radiation absorbed by the surface, longwave radiation emitted from the surface to the atmosphere, the longwave back-radiation emitted from the atmosphere and absorbed by the surface, latent heat flux from the surface to the atmosphere, sensible heat flux from the surface to the atmosphere, and the heat flux between the surface and the planetary layer below the surface. In equilibrium, the sum of these contributions to the energy balance is Zero averaged over the whole planetary surface.

      Arthur Smith’s proof of the atmospheric greenhouse effect:
      http://arxiv.org/abs/0802.4324

      • mpainter says:

        Jan Perlwitz gives a link that is a dead end. He must have picked that trick up from David Appell.

        From the abstract, it appears to be another black body at X temperature type of argument. Such arguments are fundamentally flawed in the assumption that the earth’s surface behaves as a black body. It does not. Energy (insolation) is cumulative in the ocean, which cools mostly by evaporation. Black bodies never accumulate energy, by definition, and cool by radiation, as per definition, never cooling by evaporation.

        There is little need to demonstrate the radiative properties of water, nor should it be difficult to establish the effects of atmospheric water vapor on climate,i.e., the so-called “greenhouse effect”. Nature shows us clearly: compare the dry Sahara with the humid tropics and we see that increasing atmospheric water vapor means moderating temperatures through reducing the diurnal temperature range, decreasing tmax and increasing tmin.

        This principle is clear enough and easily grasped. Therefore it is utterly unknown to the global warmers. Tsk, Tsk.

        • “Jan Perlwitz gives a link that is a dead end. He must have picked that trick up from David Appell.”

          The links to the full text for different formats are on the webpage on the right side. I assumed, apparently wrongly, that this was easy to see. Thus, I’m going to help you. Here is the link to the pdf-file:

          http://arxiv.org/pdf/0802.4324v1.pdf

          And the topic here isn’t about the role of water vapor at all. It’s about the principal possibility of a greenhouse effect by a planetary atmosphere with gases that are radiatively active in the longwave range of the spectrum, regardless what specific gases these are, which can raise the average surface temperature above the effective radiative temperature. Which is not possible for a planet with no atmosphere (or with a transparent atmosphere), if there are no relevant internal heat sources.

          Your claims about water vapor are recursive. I already have plentifully replied to them above, without getting any substantial answers from you to the content of my arguments.

          “Nature shows us clearly: compare the dry Sahara with the humid tropics and we see that increasing atmospheric water vapor means moderating temperatures through reducing the diurnal temperature range, decreasing tmax and increasing tmin.”

          It followed from your own numbers that the average temperature in the tropics is higher than in the desert.

          • mpainter says:

            Anything that is true bears repeating, plus, I enjoy your floundering around as you try to support a failed hypothesis, as in the way you ignore the difference in latitudes of the humid tropics vs the subtropics and the consequent difference in insolation in deriving your spurious “averages”, while the comparison I made was between the diurnal temperature ranges. Thanks for the example of AGW science. I guess you have nothing better to offer.

            Also amusing to see how you ignore the issue of spurious black body calculations of your link, more AGW science.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            And, Jan your quote about the dry Sahara makes no reference to any data what-so-ever. It is just one of the oft-repeated “old wives tales of climatology” I wrote about in an article published 3 or 4 years ago.

            In contrast, at the end of my peer-reviewed paper you will find a comprehensive study demonstrating that more moist regions have both lower mean daily maximum temperatures and lower mean daily minimum temperatures than do drier regions at similar latitude and altitude.

            The main IR-active gases are of course water vapor (varying from about 1% to 4%) and carbon dioxide coming a distant second with about 0.04%. The GH conjecture claims the combined effect is to raise the surface temperature by 33 degrees, and I would suggest WV would have to do the lion’s share. In fact the surface temperature is raised by more than 40 degrees in dry regions, and less in moist regions because, as you know, the temperature gradient is less (in magnitude) in the more moist regions. But the “raising” is not by radiation from the atmosphere. It happens for planets that have no such radiation worth mentioning, and no solid surface either. It is impossible for water vapor to raise the surface temperature (by what would be about 20 degrees for each 1%) and simultaneously reduce the magnitude of the temperature gradient. Just plot temperature on the y-axis and altitude on the x-axis and such a change would obviously increase the area under the graph and thus throw radiative balance with the Sun way out. What does happen is that the thermal profile rotates about a pivoting altitude, becoming lower at the surface end (and maintaining radiative balance) as water vapor level increase. This is quite the opposite of what the IPCC would like you to be gullible enough to believe.

          • mpainter,

            “I enjoy your floundering around as you try to support a failed hypothesis,”

            It looks like you still haven’t resent your memo yet, where you inform the scientific community about their “failed hypothesis”. Somehow, they still don’t get it. Despite your authoritative statements about this.

            “as in the way you ignore the difference in latitudes of the humid tropics vs the subtropics and the consequent difference in insolation in deriving your spurious averages, while the comparison I made was between the diurnal temperature ranges.”

            1. So, regarding your comparison between the tropics and the Sahara for summertime, according to you, the maximum of insolation is found in the tropics?

            2. Climate sensitivity (which depends on the strengths relative to each other of all the positive and negative feedbacks in the system, which determines the magnitude of the response of the Earth system to a change in the external forcing) describes a relation between radiative forcing and the average temperature. But not between radiative forcing and the magnitude of the diurnal cycle. Thus, the average temperature is the relevant variable here.

            “Thanks for the example of AGW science. I guess you have nothing better to offer.”

            Indeed, I have nothing better to offer than my views about anthropogenic global warming that are based on the scientific research as published in the peer-reviewed literature, with all its empirical evidence that has been published as well. In contrast, all what you have to offer are, well, blog comments. Blog comments that are not backed up with any actual science. No empirical evidence which would have to be established by the systematic study of data, and no scientific references. Nothing.

            “Also amusing to see how you ignore the issue of spurious black body calculations of your link, more AGW science.”

            Yes, I have ignored your strawman argument. I’m glad that this amuses you.

          • mpainter says:

            Jan Perlwitz,
            Regarding the “failed hypothesis”, I refer you to the satellite global temperature anomaly for this century. It’s plain that your doctrinaire approach to science will never allow observations to cause you to falter in your faith.

          • mpainter says:

            By the way the most up to date studies put climate sensitivity at 1.2. Chop chop fat tail, goodbye AGW, SL rise, etc.

          • mpainter,

            “Regarding the failed hypothesis, I refer you to the satellite global temperature anomaly for this century. Its plain that your doctrinaire approach to science will never allow observations to cause you to falter in your faith.”

            Let’s examine your assertion. Let’s take the RSS data.

            Temperature trend estimate together with the two-standard deviations interval since the year 2000: 0.016 plus/minus 0.188 deg. Celsius per decade. Thus, the two-sigma confidence interval is as large that it allows any trend between minus 0.172 and plus 0.204 deg. Celsius w/o that trend to be outside of the two-sigma confidence interval.

            On the other hand, the temperature trend from the RSS data since 1979: 0.122 plus/minus 0.063 deg. Celsius per decade.

            1. This trend since 1979 is highly statistically significant with the significance reaching almost four standard deviations.

            2. The trend since 1979 lies well within the two-sigma confidence interval of the trend since the year 2000. It follows that the shorter trend since the year 2000 is not statistically significantly distinguishable from the longer-term global warming trend. That is, any conclusion/assertion that the longer-term warming trend was not intact anymore since the year 2000 is not valid, based on sound statistical reasoning.

            Anyone can examine this oneself with an online trend calculator:
            http://skepticalscience.com/trend.php

            “By the way the most up to date studies put climate sensitivity at 1.2. Chop chop fat tail, goodbye AGW, SL rise, etc.”

            And again an assertion that is not backed up with anything. A climate sensitivity of 1.2 K? What kind of climate sensitivity? Equilibrium climate sensitivity? Transient climate sensitivity? It is already suspicious that no uncertainty interval is given with this number. If there is no uncertainty interval it is likely not from any scientific study at all.

            Here is a recent peer-review study with an estimate:

            S. Lovejoy, “Scaling fluctuation analysis and statistical hypothesis testing of anthropogenic warming”, Climate Dynamics, 2014, pp. 2339–2351, http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00382-014-2128-2

            Effective climate sensitivity to CO2-doubling, according to this study:
            3.08 +/- 0.58 Kelvin.

            In comparison, the range in the latest IPCC-Report for the equilibrium climate sensitivity to CO2-doubling was 1.5-4.5 K for the 66% probability range (which leaves a probability of 33% that it was higher or lower)

          • mpainter says:

            Does not fit your AGW template? Here is something else that does not fit:
            There has been no trend in the global temperature anomaly, but only a step-up at 2000-2002. This step-up (about .25-.3 C) connects two flat trends. Any trend line that shows a steady rising trend since circa 1980 is spurious.
            So did CO2 cause that stepup? Heck no. Best pretend that the data says something else, lest the whole collapsed AGW hypothesis gets even flatter.

            Call it noise. Then ignore it and start your trend line in 1965, lest you be fingered as an infidel.

            Those who like for their science to explain observations will look for an explanation of the stepup. There is your separator.

          • mpainter asserts:

            “There has been no trend in the global temperature anomaly, but only a step-up at 2000-2002.”

            http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/Fig.A2.gif

          • mpainter says:

            See UAH for unadulterated temperature data. GISS products are unreliable, being the inventions of James Hansen and Gavin Schmidt, two of the most discredited of scientists. For confirmation of their data alteration/fabrication, see the report of Professor Emeritus Friedrich Karl Ewert.The whole GISS was perverted from its original purpose (Goddard Institute of Space Studies) into a hotbed of AGW propagandists. It will not be included in a revitalized NASA. Chop chop thank you Mr prez.

        • Global surface warming over the past century would be larger without adjustments (which are needed to remove non-climatic influences in the data, biasing the analysis otherwise).

          Comparison of the (5-year smoothed) surface temperature anomalies (from land and ocean data combined) as calculated from the raw data and as calculated after adjustments:

          http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-opy7LoBO__w/VNoo9u5ynhI/AAAAAAAAAg4/_DCE5Rzm9Fw/s1600/land%2Bocean%2Braw%2Badj.png

          • mpainter says:

            The standard excuse for cooking the data to obtain an exaggerated warming during the instrument period. This is the obverse of the “hide the decline” coin. This adulteration/fabrication at GISS is exposed by Professor Emeritus Friedrich Karl Ewert in his report on the issue, recently discussed in the media. Interesting that Jan Perlwitz continues to deny the existence of the report.

          • Tsk, tsk. These evil climate scientists. They are fudging the data to make global warming over the past century smaller than it really was. According to mpainter.

            mpainter’s claim that I “continue to deny” Ewert’s “report” is a lie. There is no English version of the full text, but there is a German-language version. It was published on an Internet-website. That mpainter had read it is very unlikely, though. I even left a comment where it was published. I don’t expect that I will ever get a reply by Ewert to that comment.

            Ewert’s text is not peer-reviewed. As for scientific standards, it’s a joke. A lot of absurd nonsense in there, assertions not backed up with anything, unreferenced figures and data, and arbitrary assumptions. Just one example: Ewert seriously claims that Milankovitch cycles caused visible temperature variability on a time-scale of thirty years or less, and that this hadn’t be considered by climate science.

          • mpainter says:

            Jan Perlwitz no longer denies the existence of the report. He has shifted his position and declares, predictably, that Professor Emeritus Friedrich Karl Ewert is not “peer-reviewed”. Where have I heard that complaint before?
            Jan, I submit that you are in no position to judge, being part of the problem yourself. Another part of the problem is that Schmidt spends his time propagandizing on climate blogs when he is not cooking data.
            Ewert explains it all pretty well. But we don’t need Ewert. Gavin’s role in propagating alarmism has been documented for years. Look at climategate.
            Now, tell us Jan, how was it that the Goddard Institute of Space Studies became a hotbed of climate alarmism? Enquiring minds wish to know.

      • Doug~Cotton says:

        Jan wrote: “The energy balance at the surface is given by the sum of solar radiation absorbed by the surface, longwave radiation emitted from the surface to the atmosphere, the longwave back-radiation emitted from the atmosphere and absorbed by the surface, latent heat flux from the surface to the atmosphere, sensible heat flux from the surface to the atmosphere, and the heat flux between the surface and the planetary layer below the surface.”

        That is not totally correct. In fact, if you wrote out the “accepted” values for what you have listed the energy balance would be way out and you would have no “explaantion” of teh surface temperature. Try it and get back to us.

        The ocean surface temperature (if it were a true blackbody with a mean temperature of about 288K) would require (variable) Solar radiation with a mean of about 460W/m^2 taking into account the T^4 relationship in the Stefan-Boltzmann equation. Back radiation cannot be added because there is absolutely no input of thermal energy possible under the laws of physics from the colder atmosphere to the warmer ocean surface. All such radiation is scattered and its electro-magnetic energy is never converted to thermal energy. That’s the way that Nature ensures that the Second Law of Thermodynamics is not violated by the one-way independent process involving a pencil of radiation from the colder atmosphere to the warmer surface. Such radiation cannot transfer thermal energy into the warmer surface. In fact, it is well known that this radiation does not penetrate the ocean surface by more than a few nanometers – that being the expected depth before equivalent (scattered) radiation comes back out of the surface after a random walk of scattering events by atoms which do not absorb such photons. You can read more here from which I quote …

        “Photons are discrete units of energy – they do not share energy with atoms – they either are annihilated by an atom through complete absorption or they have no interaction with the atom other than scattering …”

        Hence you have a very serious deficiency of thermal energy into the surface of the ocean. In fact even the above figures I quoted would not be sufficient because the thin surface layer is almost completely transparent rather than being more like a layer of black asphalt.

        What DOES explain where the extra thermal energy comes from is explained at http://climate-change-theory.com and more briefly at https://itsnotco2.wordpress.com

        • Doug~Cotton,

          “Back radiation cannot be added because there is absolutely no input of thermal energy possible under the laws of physics from the colder atmosphere to the warmer ocean surface. All such radiation is scattered and its electro-magnetic energy is never converted to thermal energy.”

          Ah. According to you, a warmer body cannot absorb the photons emitted from a colder body at the direction of the warmer body. Only the colder body absorbs the photons coming from a warmer body.

          But you also assume in your arguments that the radiating warmer body was a black body, which is a body that absorbs all incoming radiation. So you are talking about a body that absorbs all incoming radiation, and that doesn’t absorb all incoming radiation, all at the same time.

          So, tell me. How does an absorbing and radiating body knows which ones of the arriving photons are coming from a colder body and which ones from a warmer body, and that it wasn’t allowed to absorb the photons coming from the colder body, only the ones coming from a warmer body?

          “Thats the way that Nature ensures that the Second Law of Thermodynamics is not violated by the one-way independent process involving a pencil of radiation from the colder atmosphere to the warmer surface.”

          The Second Law of Thermodynamic states that, in an isolated system, the change of the total entropy is always greater/equal Zero. It doesn’t state that the contributions from each partial process to the total entropy change must always be greater/equal Zero.

          A conceptional example. If you have two black bodies of different temperature, which are both emitting radiation toward each other. Energy is transfered from the radiating colder to the warmer body by photons that are emitted from the colder body and absorbed by the warmer body. Energy is also transferred from the warmer body to the colder body with the photon stream from the first to latter. Since the total energy of the photons emitted from the warmer to the colder body is larger than the total energy of the photons emitted from the colder to the warmer body, the net energy transfer is from the warmer to the colder body. This is all what is required by the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The total entropy production is greater Zero. That the energy transfer from the colder to the warmer body fractionally reduces entropy is not in violation to the Second Law. Only the total entropy is the relevant variable here.

          Besides, the Earth system is not an isolated thermodynamic system. Entropy is exported from the system to outer space all the time, because the outgoing longwave radiation has a much higher entropy than the incoming solar radiation.

          If entropy increasing processes were the only processes allowed in Nature, all that would be around us would be thermodynamic death. No structures, no life. We wouldn’t exist.

          • geran says:

            Jan says: “So, tell me. How does an absorbing and radiating body knows which ones of the arriving photons are coming from a colder body and which ones from a warmer body, and that it wasnt allowed to absorb the photons coming from the colder body, only the ones coming from a warmer body?”

            In Jan’s silly pseudoscience, if he had enough ice cubes he could bake a turkey.

            Climate comedy at its best!

          • Doug~Cotton,

            How does a body that receives radiation distinguish photons that come from a another, colder body from photons that come from a yet another, warmer body? According to you, former photons cannot be absorbed, but latter photons can be absorbed. Why is that? Can you answer this question?

            “Apparently, according to Jan, the Second Law is violated by the whole Earth system because it is supposedly losing entropy.”

            There is no violation, because the Earth system is not an isolated system. The Second Law of Thermodynamics is only valid for isolated systems. Non-isolated systems can export entropy to their environment. Without entropy export from the Earth system to outer space no formation of structured forms of matter on Earth, no weather, no climate, no life. Only thermodynamic death.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            My “heat creep” hypothesis does not assume the troposphere is isolated – of course the upper troposphere can be warmed by new solar radiation each morning, just as happens on Venus and Uranus. When you can explain how the required thermal energy then gets down to the base of the Uranus troposphere (making it hotter than Earth) by the same process that happens on Venus and Earth also, then you will have understood the “heat creep” hypothesis.

            You are also wrong for the same reasons that I have explained Roy is wrong in today’s new thread.

            I don’t suggest you try to teach me physics, my friend. What qualifications do you have in physics?

            “It is, however, the fruit of experience that very many thermodynamic systems, including supposedly isolated ones, do seem eventually to reach their own states of internal thermodynamic equilibrium. It is held by some that this is because they were not ideally isolated, but were merely practically isolated. A practically isolated system is subject to small, unnoticeable perturbations, that would be expected to provide microscopic noise that would lead to its practical internal thermodynamic equilibrium. This would account for why classical thermodynamics is often presented with the existence of states of internal thermodynamic equilibrium regarded as axiomatic.” [source]

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            And, by the way Jan, when an isolated system loses entropy it does not gain or lose any energy, let alone “export” energy to the environment or import “entropy” or whatever you seem to think. You still confuse entropy with energy or enthalpy. But I’m not here to teach you physics: I get paid for that.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            You see Jan, the isolated system does not “lose entropy” or “export entropy” at all. It GAINS entropy, so you probably fell for my trap in the previous comment.

            It ALWAYS gains entropy unless and until it reaches the state of maximum entropy which is its state of thermodynamic equilibrium.

            As a very reasonable approximation, a column of the troposphere in calm conditions at night acts internally like an ideal isolated system which is, none-the-less, losing a small percentage of its energy to Space and the environment, and gaining some thermal energy from the environment (eg the surface) also. In that the net gain or loss of energy at night is close to zero, we have a pretty good approximation of an isolated system, such as would be a sealed and perfectly insulated cylinder of air.

            However, just as a horizontal sealed and perfectly insulated cylinder of air would have a propensity to gain entropy and end up with isothermal conditions, the same cylinder of air, when orientated vertically, has a propensity to develop a non-zero temperature gradient as gravity acts on molecules in motion between collisions. And that is what causes the “33 degrees of warming” – not back radiation.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            Climatolgists love to use Jan’s argument that everything is wrong in physics because no isolated system exists and so the Second Law can be ignored. But even a single pencil of radiation between a source and a target acts like an isolated system and will thus never lead to a decrease in entropy. Besides, Einstein used the Kinetic Theory of Gases (based on isolated systems) quite successfully, and the Ideal Gas Laws can be deduced quite easily from Kinetic Theory. So, climatologists should thus not use the Ideal Gas Laws which they DO use to calculate the “dry adiabatic lapse rate” – they want to have their cake and eat it.

          • Doug~Cotton,

            “And, by the way Jan, when an isolated system loses entropy it does not gain or lose any energy, let alone export energy to the environment or import entropy or whatever you seem to think.”

            Reading here what you attribute to me what I allegedly said after what I actually said, I think that you are a confused person.

            You claim that you were teaching physics is very likely as much true as your claim that your Internet blog posts were “peer-reviewed” papers.

            You asked what my qualifications were. Well, they are a little bit higher than the ones of a Bachelor of Science, “my friend”. Latter one is yours, isn’t it?

            No answer to my question how a body distinguishes between photons coming from a colder body, to not be absorbed, and the ones coming from a warmer body, to be absorbed? I didn’t really expect any, though.

            Enough.

          • Doug-Cotton says:

            Jan:

            Whether or not your qualifications are in physics, which I strongly suspect they are not, you don’t understand entropy maximization, and you could learn a lot about such from my writings. It is critical to an understanding of planetary temperatures.

            The answer to your question is, as I said, in my paper on radiated energy which extends the work of a well-known Professor in this 21st century understanding of radiation.

            The issue in my hypothesis is a matter of physics, and not physics beyond B.Sc. level – even though I have studied atmospheric physics extensively in recent years.

            The temperature data relating to the source of radiation is contained in the mode of the frequency distribution (Wien’s Displacement Law) and the response of the target depends upon resonance. If a photon has the precise energy required to raise an electron through one or more quantum states then it will do so and be totally annihilated. This can be thought of as a type of resonance process. If another photon has less than enough energy it is merely scattered without having any effect on the atom. The energy from the first photon is stored temporarily as electron energy, and then a new identical photon is emitted without the energy ever having been converted to thermal (kinetic) energy in the molecule hosting the atom. (Physicists call the process pseudo-scattering.) Photons with more than enough energy are the only ones which will have their energy converted to kinetic energy because it is not initially taken in as electron energy. These “hotter” photons correspond to the area between the Planck functions of the warmer source and cooler target, if that is the scenario. There are none of them if the target is warmer. For more detail read the first few sections of the above paper linked from the ‘Evidence’ page of my website (linked in earlier comments) because you are obviously unaware of this 21st century breakthrough in our understanding of radiation.

          • Wien’s Displacement law tells what the frequency of the peak radiation of a black body is. But radiation nevertheless occurs over a whole spectrum of frequencies. The colder and the warmer body emit photons with identical frequencies. If the colder body is only slightly colder and the warmer body is only slightly warmer (the radiating atmospheric layer right above Earth’s surface is only slightly colder than Earth’s surface on average), the shape of the spectra will be very similar. Most of the radiation from the two bodies will be at identical frequencies. But, according to you, the photons coming from the colder body could not be absorbed, in contrast to the photons from the warmer body, even though when the photons coming from the two bodies have identical frequencies.

            There is no physical reason why photons with identical frequencies coming from the two different bodies would behave differently at the absorbing body. They are indistinguishable from each other. Your “explanation” why photons coming from a colder body couldn’t be absorbed does not explain anything with respect to your assertion.

            Your assertion about backradiation that it couldn’t be absorbed by Earth’s surface is not based on physics. Your “reasoning” according to which your claim would follow from the fact that only photons with resonating frequencies can be absorbed fails logic.

          • Doug-Cotton says:

            Jan

            No, you cannot assume that there is dependent radiation in the opposite direction. If radiation from the colder source were thermalized in a warmer target, then the new thermal energy added to the warmer target could “escape” by any heat transfer mechanism, or stay in the target for hours, days or months. It is not going to “remember” that entropy decreased in the first process and so it has to ensure entropy increases more. Your incorrect version of the Second Law could be used to “prove” water could flow up a mountainside and into a lake at the top, provided that it will subsequently, a month later, flow down the other side causing an increase in entropy that is greater in magnitude than the decrease of entropy in the first process a month ago. You don’t understand this physics, Jan, and that is why you have been so easily bluffed by the hoax. The Second Law says entropy cannot decrease: it cannot do so in any completed independent process. This has been a specialized field of study for myself and I am arguably a world expert in this.

            Regarding radiation, my response to you is in Sections 2 to 5 here the headings being …

            2. Does radiation transfer heat in both directions simultaneously?

            3. What physical mechanism must determine if thermal energy is transferred?

            4. Quantification of one-way radiation causing heat flow

            5. The concept of resonant scattering

          • Doug-Cotton says:

            Jan and others who don’t understand radiative heat transfer:

            Go and argue on his blog with this Professor of Applied Mathematics when you can fault his computations here:

            “As a transformer of radiation a blackbody thus acts in a very simple way: it absorbs all radiation, emits absorbed frequencies below cut-off, and uses absorbed frequencies above cut-off to increase its temperature.

            “A blackbody thus acts as a semi-conductor transmitting only frequencies below cut-off, and grinding coherent frequencies above cut-off into heat in the form of incoherent high-frequency noise.

            “We here distinguish between coherent organized electromagnetic waves of different frequencies in the form of radiation or light, and incoherent high-frequency vibrations or noise, perceived as heat.

            “A blackbody thus absorbs and emits frequencies below cut-off without getting warmer, while absorbed frequencies above cut-off are not emitted but are instead stored as heat energy increasing the temperature.

            “A blackbody is thus like a high-pass filter, which re-emits frequencies below a cut-off frequency while capturing frequencies above cut-off as heat.”

          • Doug-Cotton says:

            And Jan, the Second Law proves my point about the heat transfer being only one way and only occurring for whichever pencils of radiation strike cooler targets. The energy that is converted to thermal energy corresponds to the area between the Planck curves (as engineers know full well) because that radiation is what does not resonate with any atoms it can “find” in the target. If an atom does not have the precise step up between quantum energy states then the photon passes on to the next atom because in cannot remain in some reduced energy state – it’s all or nothing.

            The fact that a plastic bowl in your microwave oven is not warmed, though the Sun could warm it a bit, proves my point.

          • Doug~Cotton,

            The photons coming from the colder and the ones coming from the warmer body have identical frequencies (only the intensities differ at a given frequency, i.e., the number of photons). The receiving body cannot distinguish whether a photon of identical frequency comes from the colder or from the warmer body. Your explanation why the photons coming from the colder body could not be absorbed, but the ones from the warmer could, even though they have identical frequencies is bogus. Your “physics” is bogus. Your “papers” are not peer-reviewed. And it is not believable that you teach physics anywhere.

          • Doug-Cotton says:

            And Jan (and others):

            When two identical parallel metal plates radiate to each other at the same temperature there is no thermalization of any of the radiation. Some physicists liken it to standing waves, though the analogy is not accurate.

            Wien’s Displacement Law specifically says that the temperature is proportional to modal (peak) frequency in teh distribution. This enables us to deduce that the Planck function for the hotter body fully envelopes that for the colder body. So there are indeed common frequencies with common intensities.

            But the radiation from the warmer body that corresponds with that of the cooler body is not thermalized (as with the parallel plates) because only the excess radiation (between the Planck curves) is thermalized.

            Now, people think the Sun’s radiation is all thermalized in the surface, but in fact it’s not. It most cases none of it is, because the surface is already warmer than the solar radiation could make it. Yes, in a small percentage of the globe some of the solar radiation will be thermalized and thermometers will read more in the Sun than in the shade – but that’s not always the case. Think on that!

            There is only one way that a planet’s surface can get the required thermal energy, and I have been first in the world to explain how that happens. Like it or lump it, I’m right.

          • Doug-Cotton says:

            As I said, Jan, go and argue with the good professor, as I’m sick of your hand-waving assumptions which you make, despite the fact that your concept would violate the Second Law and despite the fact that you cannot personally (ie without citing others) provide any quantification (using Stefan-Boltzmann) that would explain the temperature of the ocean surface. Even Roy knows that back radiation only penetrates the ocean surface by a few nanometers. Do you seriously think that, by boiling those few nanometers (as all the energy would do) and thus evaporating such, that the backradiation is going to play a part in Stefan Boltzmann calculations of the surface temperature? There is no evidence of such boiling and no evidence of warming by backradiation at night in calm conditions, even though the intensity of the back radiation is similar to the solar radiation, given the former acts for 24 hours and the latter for 12 hours on average.

            And you don’t even realize, Jan, that the low frequency radiation in a microwave oven (despite its intensity) does not warm the plastic bowls (because some of it it passes through in a random walk between atomic scattering events) even though an electric bar radiator with similar intensity most certainly would. This shows you that you can’t just put a figure into S-B and get warming – the source has to be hotter.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            Jan wrote: “The receiving body cannot distinguish whether a photon of identical frequency comes from the colder or from the warmer body”

            Of course it can’t. But Stefan-Boltzmann calculations include the intensity of the radiation. When a warmer body radiates to a colder body, because that colder body is re-emitting the radiation corresponding with its own Planck function as part of its “quota” as per that Planck function, it can only do so for some of the photons having that frequency, not the extra ones that come from the warmer body.

            So, as I said, the energy that is thermalized is represented by the area between the Planck functions – the extra energy that does get thermalized because the cooler body can’t handle it and re-emit it within the limits of its Planck function.

            In that S-B is derived from the integral of the Planck function, the above area represents the difference in the S-B calculations. But, just because we calculate it that way, it does not mean that there are physically two opposing heat transfer mechanisms. In the real world there are also non-radiative transfers involved, and there is no dependence between the different directions of radiation. In fact the Earth’s surface radiates out far more than it receives by radiation, the difference coming via diffusion. In the shade on my balcony at the moment it is 37.7C but the thermometer has not been exposed to the Sun or much of the sky all day. The heat gets there by diffusion, as there is no discernible breeze.

          • Doug~Cotton,

            Now a plastic bowl in a microwave oven? Strawman argument, after strawman argument.

            A body receiving radiation cannot distinguish the origin of photons of identical frequency, whether they come from a colder body, or from a warmer body. But you claim that the receiving body would not absorb the photons coming from the colder body. You are the one who is doing the hand waving about that.

            Your alleged “physics” is bogus. You don’t even know how to write down a valid energy balance equation for the surface. Or for any arbitrary layer in the atmosphere, as a matter of fact. You also don’t know how to write down a valid equation for the entropy balance. Mainstream atmospheric physics knows how to do all these things. And the solutions are in agreement with the empirical data. It’s established, published science. In contrast, you have not published anything in atmosphere or climate science. You have not published anything. Period. Your “science” is not credible.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            Your misunderstanding, Jan, is epitomized in your statement “Your explanation why the photons coming from the colder body could not be absorbed, but the ones from the warmer could, even though they have identical frequencies is bogus.”

            That is not what I explained happens.

            Thermal energy is kinetic energy in any degree of freedom in molecules and atoms. To increase the temperature of a body there must be a net input of thermal energy.

            Radiation interacts with electrons in atoms and, when the energy of a photon exactly matches a potential change in energy between quantum levels for the electrons, the photon’s energy can be converted to electron energy. The opposite happens when a photon is emitted. This is the easiest thing – the “preferred option” if you like. If a photon can find an atom that is the same as the one which emitted it, then this can happen, but only up to a limit determined by the temperature, and thus the Planck function of the target. The target will emit another identical photon using that extra energy acquired from the incident photon. It is easier to do this than to convert some kinetic energy to electron energy. Besides, the electron is already in an excited state. This does mean that the target’s rate of cooling by radiation will be slowed (but not other cooling) because it is fulfilling its Planck quota using some of the incident radiation rather than its own thermal energy. But, if the target is cooler, there will be extra photons which, even though they have the same frequency, cannot find an atom in the lower energy state. It is their energy that gets thermalized because it can’t be immediately re-emitted by electrons. That radiation that is thermalized corresponds to the extra area between the Planck functions.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            The microwave oven is very relevant because it demonstrates how low frequency (very “cold”) radiation may not deliver thermal energy to a warmer target. Microwaves only warm water molecules (and some oils) because they are specifically generated with a frequency which resonates with the natural physical rotational frequencies of water molecules. Because they resonate they can increase the kinetic energy. But the process is very different from thermalization of radiation in a blackbody. In essence, the microwaves don’t warm anything by normal thermalization processes, and this demonstrates photons striking a target but not warming that target, just a back radiation does not warm the already-warmer surface.

            Your latest comment seems to have been written before you read either of my two previous comments, so I will excuse your repetition of your misunderstanding of what I explained, but ask you to read more carefully what I write and demonstrate appropriate comprehension.

            Now I suggest you turn your attention to what Loschmidt, Jelbring, “BigWaveDave” and I have all said about how the autonomous formation of a temperature gradient in a force field (now proven empirically) “obviates the need for concern about GH gases.” You could be relieved of such concern, Jan, but I suspect you would be relieved of financial support of some kind if and when the hoax is seen for what it is. Don’t bother with your calls to authority or “teaching” me what is in standard atmospheric climatology – I know it all every bit as well as you, but I have also pinpointed the errors which you are not recognizing.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            The typical K-T / NASA / IPCC energy budget diagrams are like that here on my website. This one shows:

            Solar radiation into the surface: 168W/m^2

            Net radiation surface to atmosphere: (390-324) 66W/m^2

            Non-radiative surface to atmosphere: 102W/m^2

            Total out 168W/m^2 = total in from solar radiation 168W/m^2.

            What I asked you to explain in your own words was how you think such figures tell us that the surface temperature has a mean of 288K. A blackbody receiving variable flux with a mean of about 460W/m^2 might well reach a mean temperature of 288K, but the surface is not a blackbody or a grey body. A flat blackbody receiving a steady 168W/m^2 day and night would reach about 233K which is 40 degrees below freezing point. I suggest there is a need for more thermal energy into the surface, and I have explained how that gets there in the book I published and the paper which preceded the book.

          • Doug~Cotton,

            Maybe I indeed misunderstood what you were saying.

            “Thermal energy is kinetic energy in any degree of freedom in molecules and atoms. To increase the temperature of a body there must be a net input of thermal energy.”

            I agree with that. But it is conceivable that this can happen in two ways. One is that a larger number of photons of a given frequency is coming in and they are directly absorbed, if there are electrons on a lower energy state that can be lifted to a higher state by this. The other way is that, even if the larger number of arriving photons at this frequency is not being absorbed, but scattered away, because there aren’t any electrons left that can absorb photons at this frequency, this prevents electrons from going back to a lower energy state by not emitting photons at this frequency, which otherwise would have been emitted. Both ways are a perturbation of the previous equilibrium state, and both come with a net input of thermal energy to the body. The second one by reducing the loss of thermal energy, which would have occurred by emitting photons that aren’t emitted. The effect of both ways to perturb the energy balance is the same: the body will be warming until a new equilibrium between total incoming and emitted energy has been reached.

            “Microwaves only warm water molecules (and some oils) because they are specifically generated with a frequency which resonates with the natural physical rotational frequencies of water molecules.

            I have some ceramic bowls at home, which get very hot in the microwave oven. Why is that? They must be some magic bowls.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            Jan, you really do demonstrate a lack of understanding of the brilliant work by Max Planck, winner of a Nobel Prize for Physics. In a blackbody there are various modes (or potential quantums of changes in electron energy) and the number of such quantums is proportional to the square of the frequency. To get the average energy we multiply these quantums by the probability that they will be occupied. We then multiply the average energy by the density of the states to get the energy density and thence the Planck radiation formula.

            My point is that this is all a statistical result and that’s why your last comment just doesn’t describe reality. You don’t even mention Planck, and yet that function is what controls the whole process and determines what gets thermalized and what just gets re-emitted as pseudo scattering. (Your use of the word “absorbed” is ambiguous.)

            When electrons are raised through quantums there is a much higher probability that they will fall back after a very short time interval for which there is a statistical distribution. This is why there is a physical limit on the number of photons which can be emitted at any given frequency by a black body at a given temperature. When the source of radiation is (after attenuation for distance, absorption etc) effectively warmer, then the action of incident photons raising electrons by these energy quantums completely dominates the conversion of kinetic energy into electron energy. But if the source is effectively cooler there are surplus electrons not being raised in energy by incident radiation and thus available to be thus raised by the kinetic energy in the target.

            Clearly incident radiation does slow the rate of cooling of a warmer target by radiation, though not the cooling by non-radiative processes because there has been no thermal energy added to the target. However, because the Sun’s direct radiation cannot warm the surface to a mean of 288K, the issue of the rate of cooling is irrelevant.

            I have been first in the world to explain how entropy maximization delivers the required thermal energy that raises the surface temperature each planetary morning. You could learn a lot from what I have written.

          • Doug~Cotton,

            I am aware of that this was a statistical process. Just rephrase it and say that the probability for electrons falling back to a lower energy state and emitting photons with the according frequency decreases, when the number of incoming photons at this frequency increases, and you get the same argument. It decreases the rate of energy loss that occurs by emitting radiation at this frequency. There is a net increase in thermal energy in the body by this perturbation of the equilibrium state, i.e., the body is warming up.

            The world is warming up, with increasing greenhouse gases and a resulting increasing back radiation. That is the empirically determined reality. Your understanding of the physics cannot be correct, because you can’t explain this empirical reality with your understanding.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            And Jan, nothing “decreases the rate of energy lost by radiation” for the simple reason that a blackbody will radiate in accord with its Planck function – never less. It’s just a question as to where it gets the energy for that radiation –

            (1) all from the incident radiation, if the source of the incident radiation is effectively hotter.

            (2) some from the incident radiation and some from its own kinetic energy if the source is effectively colder.

            Of course, if the source is effectively hotter, the target will warm because there is extra energy from the source being thermalized in the target up to a point where temperatures are effectively equal. Nothing keeps warming indefinitely.

            So the target will always cool if the source is effectively cooler and warm if the source is effectively warmer. No matter how many cooler sources there are, they will never in combination warm the target. There are two effectively cooler sources radiating towards Earth’s surface – the Sun and the atmosphere. They will never, even in combination, warm the surface to the observed temperatures.

            The surface of Earth (and other planets) is warmed because of what the brilliant 19th century physicist, Josef Loschmidt (first to estimate the size of air molecules) explained about the gravito-thermal effect, namely the autonomously formed temperature gradient due to gravity. This has been ignored by climatologists, and yet it can be proven to exist with correct physics and experiments with centrifugal force. Why should I be bluffed by climatology literature when I can see that they have obviously forgotten, or never learnt this physics? I’m not gullible like yourself, Jan.

            The Sun’s radiation reaching the surface has a mean of 168W/m^2 and so, being like an iceberg at -40C, the Sun’s radiation is effectively much colder than the surface. So too is the radiation from the colder atmosphere. Neither will warm the surface. Not even the sum of the Sun’s radiation and the atmospheric radiation (each being very variable) would raise the mean surface temperature above zero. And, in any event, it is not correct to add both together in Stefan-Boltzmann calculations.

            So you are left with absolutely nothing to support the greenhouse conjecture, Jan.

            Go and argue with the good professor who was first to produce the relevant computations about heat transfer by radiation.

          • Doug~Cotton,

            “And Jan, nothing decreases the rate of energy lost by radiation for the simple reason that a blackbody will radiate in accord with its Planck function never less.”

            At thermal equilibrium with another body, i.e., when the net energy flow between the two is Zero. But I am talking about a situation where the equilibrium is being perturbed, which occurs when the incident radiation emitted from the source body increases. What happens then? The radiation of the target body won’t just stay the same in that case. What if you have two sources for the incident radiation, and incoming radiation is in equilibrium with the outgoing radiation, but only for the total energy, but there is no equilibrium between target body and either source body? What if one source body is hotter, but the other one is colder, and only the radiation coming from the colder one increases? What happens then?

            “Its just a question as to where it gets the energy for that radiation

            (1) all from the incident radiation, if the source of the incident radiation is effectively hotter.

            (2) some from the incident radiation and some from its own kinetic energy if the source is effectively colder.”

            Thus, for case 2, please tell me, what determines how much energy that is radiated away from the target body comes from the incident radiation and how much from the body’s own kinetic energy? And what will happen when the incident radiation increases?

            “The surface of Earth (and other planets) is warmed because of what the brilliant 19th century physicist, Josef Loschmidt (first to estimate the size of air molecules) explained about the gravito-thermal effect, namely the autonomously formed temperature gradient due to gravity.”

            Thus, how do you reconcile this “theory” with empirical reality? Tell me, why has the planet been warming at the surface over the past century and ongoing? Because Earth’s gravitation has been increasing?

        • Doug~Cotton says:

          Firstly, Jan, you need to understand that artificially generated microwaves in an oven have far greater intensity than blackbody radiation with similar frequencies. So there will be some “overflow” that can’t be handled as well by ceramic bowls as by those specially designed bowls. Such bowls also conduct heat better from food, which itself has conducted heat from the water molecules it contains.

          As an experiment just now, I placed in my MW oven a dry ceramic bowl on top of one of the other MW bowls and a glass of water not touching either. In 90 seconds the water boiled, but the ceramic bowl barely rose 10 degrees or so to about 35C I would say. It could well have gained thermal energy by diffusion (through the air) from the water and hot glass containing that water barely 1cm away.

          The use of the word “absorb” can easily be misunderstood. I have used the word thermalized deliberately so as to distinguish between when the electro-magnetic energy is converted to kinetic energy (thermalized) or it just raises an electron through one or more quantum states, and then that leads to re-emission of an identical photon. This process looks as if the original radiation was scattered, and physicists in the 21st century have called it pseudo-scattering, which is fair description because there really are new (but identical) photons created.

          The warmer body has more than enough capacity under its Planck curve to convert all the incident radiation from a colder body to electron energy and then back to electro-magnetic energy in a new photon which photon becomes a part of the warmer body’s “quota” of radiation as per its Planck function. The warmer body cools more slowly, but it never gets hotter.

          As Nobel Prize winner Max Planck explained, the spontaneous blackbody radiation cannot exceed the intensity indicated by the Planck function for any frequency. So there is no surplus incident radiation to be thermalized if the target is warmer, but there is if it is cooler. If the source had been warmer its energy would supply all the Planck quota for the cooler target and more. The “overflow” is thermalized because it can’t be handled in the pseudo-scattering process, as that would cause the target to exceed its Planck quota.

          So there is no spontaneous cooling of the cooler target because it doesn’t have to convert any of its own kinetic energy to electron energy and thence to electro-magnetic (EM) energy. As we know, the cooler target warms (using that overflow) while ever there is an effectively warmer source radiating towards it.

          As the Planck curves approach each other, the area between them reduces, and that area represents the actual rate of the one-way effective transfer of thermal energy.

          All such heat transfers by radiation involve conversion of thermal energy to EM energy in the source and then conversion of EM energy back to thermal energy in the target. If the second process does not occur then there is no heat transfer and thus no violation of the Second Law.

          If radiation starts out from a planet’s surface it will, in effect, drop off some of its energy when (and only when) it strikes a cooler target, and the rest of the original energy then continues on its random way being effectively the cooler target’s own Planck quota of radiation. The process repeats until no further cooler targets are found in Space, where it is thought few objects would be colder than about 2K. Then it becomes part of that “background radiation” in Space.

          That is how Nature ensures that the Second Law is obeyed for every one-way pencil of radiation.

          It’s not hard to understand, Jan, and you could have saved my time by reading the paper of mine that was published on several websites in 2013 after being reviewed by a PhD scientist and available for open on-line review as well, without receiving any attempted refutation. My other paper and my book are also open for on-line review, and my book has received two positive reviews from persons involved with physics which you can read on Amazon. Anyone here is free to submit a review (or attempted refutation) of anything, even the videos, to my blog https://itsnotco2.wordpress.com.

          Footnote to Roy: I do not deliberately change my IP address: it happens automatically when my kids turn off the modem because their WIFI connection fails and restating the modem fixes it. Yes I have used names like “ItsnotCO2” and “LukesAreWrongTop” primarily to get comments like this accepted on sites like SoD and WUWT, and, when I copy the same comment here I need to be consistent or someone points it out as does DeWitt on SoD. I am opposed on principle to discrimination and restriction as to right of reply and/or freedom of speech.

          • Doug~Cotton,

            I do not bother to read through your “papers”. I read peer-reviewed publications for science purposes. I only need to look at your reference lists at the end of your “papers”, and I know that I don’t need to bother. Mostly Wikipedia entries and other blog posts in the Internet. Real scientific papers reference the scientific literature. If your understanding of physics, in general, and your understanding of quantum mechanics or atmospheric physics/climate, in particular, were to be correct, and your great scientific discoveries were real ones, you would have published all of this in high-standard peer-reviewed science journals in the fields of theoretical physics and climate.

            As for my ceramic bowls. I didn’t mean that my ceramic bowls were getting only slightly warmer. I meant that they get really, really hot in the microwave oven, whereas the food inside, even if it’s soup, does not.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            Well, Jan, if your level of understanding of physics is such that you think the microwaves are heating your bowl directly, rather than conduction from the food, then I rest my case. I gave you the credit of assuming your bowl was empty (like the one in my experiment) and insulated from the base plate, but it seems I greatly overestimated your understanding of heat transfer mechanisms. Obviously you are not qualified in physics, and neither are the majority of authors in the pal-reviewed circles of climatology: yet heat transfer is very much within the realm of physics.

            Your comment is the epitome of a “last resort” response when the fact is that you have no valid scientific response to the comments I have written and the questions I have asked – and you have no way of supporting the false GH conjecture with any evidence or any explanation as to why the Earth’s surface temperature is what it is. A mere 168W/m^2 of solar radiation entering the ocean is not what explains its temperature. Likewise you have no way of explaining with GH garbage science how the Venus surface rises in temperature by 5 degrees from 732K to 737K during 4 months on the sunlit side, or how the required thermal energy gets down to the base of the nominal troposphere of Uranus to make it hotter than Earth. Nor can you explain what keeps the core of our Moon far hotter than its surface – whereas I can.

            Who’s next to take me on? You can submit your attempted refutations on my blog, but any which show no evidence of having studied the “heat creep” hypothesis will not pass moderation.

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            And, Jan, do you know of any clay that does not contain water molecules? What is your ceramic bowl made from, Jan?

            Microwave ovens are designed to heat water molecules by way of resonance, not by normal atomic or molecular thermalization. Anything else that gets hot in a microwave oven, does so because it either contains water molecules or it is a good conductor obtaining thermal energy from something else that does contain water molecules, like food. Low frequency radiation, despite its intensity, does not raise the temperature of targets emitting higher frequencies. In fact the microwave oven, with its artificially generated high intensity low frequency radiation may be thought of as perhaps 1,000 very cold ice blocks each radiating spontaneously. This demonstrates that you can’t just add all the radiation together from those ice blocks (getting something like the microwave oven intensity) and put the total into Stefan-Boltzmann calculations. Yet that is what Hansen, Pierrehumbert et al do – they add the solar radiation and the back radiation, but even then they do not “explain” the surface temperature because the flux is very variable.

            Go and buy yourself some proper microwave bowls that don’t get heated by the low frequency radiation (like back radiation) because you’ve already had your fingers burnt enough on this thread, now haven’t you, Jan?

          • Doug~Cotton says:

            The good professor’s paper was cited in my first paper, and you can read Dr Hans Jelbring’s peer-reviewed paper in an 2003 edition of the journal “Energy and Environment” here if you wish. When I refer to Wikipedia it is so readers like yourself who don’t know what entropy is can read up on it.

          • Doug~Cotton,

            “Well, Jan, if your level of understanding of physics is such that you think the microwaves are heating your bowl directly, rather than conduction from the food, then I rest my case.”

            Thus, you are explaining to me now that the bowl was becoming as hot (it can become as hot that you can burn your fingers, while the food stays quite cold) by heat conduction from the colder food (it comes from the refrigerator) to the warmer bowl (it comes from the cabinet at room temperature). I guess, my understanding of physics must be deficient then, if I think that this explanation cannot be correct.

          • Doug*Cotton says:

            Jan:

            As you know, clay contains water molecules – as does your ceramic bowl. Microwave ovens are designed to emit radiation at just the right frequency so as to resonate with the natural (mechanical) frequency of water molecules. That’s why your ceramic bowl gets hotter in a microwave oven than do those special plastic bowls which are barely affected at all by the low frequency radiation, because they scatter such. You can read my paper on radiated energy, and the cited reference to a paper by a well-known professor.

        • JohnKl says:

          Hi Jan P Perlwitz,

          You state:

          “It decreases the rate of energy loss that occurs by emitting radiation at this frequency. There is a net increase in thermal energy in the body by this perturbation of the equilibrium state, i.e., the body is warming up.”

          It seems, the second sentence quoted cannot be true if the object absorbing radiation proves warmer than the source of the emitted radiation. Why? Because in any finite time period the warmer object emits more radiation than it receives from the cooler one. Your prior post claiming that their is a net input of energy (thermal or otherwise) could remain correct, but not a net INCREASE. The receiving warmer object at the end of any finite time period would still be cooler, whether or not it receives energy from a cooler object. Please let me know your thoughts and…

          Have a great day!

  26. jimc says:

    NOAAs climate change science fiction

    The environmental intelligence agency ignores satellite data

    By Lamar Smith – – Thursday, November 26, 2015

    http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/nov/26/lamar-smith-noaas-climate-change-science-fiction/

    • lewis says:

      Jimc,

      Rep. Lamar Smith leaves out the fact NOAA works for the White House – and that if they don’t say what the POTUS wants, they will lose their jobs. It has happened previously, so they know the threat is true.

      Merry Christmas

  27. lewis says:

    Jimc,

    What Rep. Lamar Smith leaves out is the fact NOAA works for the White House and that if they don’t say what the POTUS wants them to say, they will lose their jobs.

    Thus the report of warmest year on record comes out in a timely fashion, so they don’t get fired.

    Merry Christmas

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