Florida Major Hurricane Strikes: Still No Trend

October 11th, 2018 by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.

Note: The first plot had Michael’s wind speed plotted incorrectly, which has been fixed.

I’ve updated a plot of Florida major hurricane strikes since 1900 with Hurricane Michael, and the result is that there is still no trend in either intensity or frequency of strikes over the last 118 years:

This is based upon National Hurricane Center data. The trend line in intensity is flat, and the trend line in number of storms (not shown) is insignificantly downward.

Nevertheless, the usual fearmongers are claiming Hurricane Michael is somehow tied to climate change.

After all, the Gulf of Mexico is unusually warm, right?

Yes, but if you look at the history of Jul-Aug-Sept average sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies over the eastern Gulf (available here, 25N-30N, 80W-90W), you will see that since 1860, this summer is only the 9th warmest in the eastern Gulf of Mexico.

Even more astounding is that out of the top 10 warmest Gulf years since 1860, 7 occurred before 1970, which is before we experienced any significant warming.

So, all the “experts” can do is make vague claims about how major hurricanes like Michael are what we can expect more of in a warming world, but the data show that – so far at least – the data do not support the theory.

Major hurricanes are part of nature. As evidence of this, I will also remind people of the study of lake bottom sediments in Western Lake in the Florida panhandle, not far from where Michael made landfall, that showed the last 1,000 years have been relatively quiet for Category 4 to 5 hurricanes, but the period from 1,000 to 3,400 years ago was a “hyperactive” period for intense landfalls at that location.

Hurricane strikes in the U.S. are notoriously variable, as evidenced by the recent (and unprecedented) 11+ year “drought” in major hurricane landfalls, which was finally broken in 2017.

Where were the claims that the hurricane drought was due to global warming?

Crickets.

Attributing the latest hurricane in any way to global warming is the ultimate in cherry-picking the data. In fact, they don’t even show the data.

Which brings us back to those vague claims by the experts.

UPDATE:

I also included Michael in the count of ALL U.S. landfalling major hurricanes, again from NHC data. The marked downward trend since the 1930s, 40s, and 50s is quite evident:

Where is the news story about THAT?

More crickets.


1,187 Responses to “Florida Major Hurricane Strikes: Still No Trend”

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  1. Nate says:

    “So, all the experts can do is make vague claims about how major hurricanes like Michael are what we can expect more of in a warming world, but the data show that so far at least the data do not support the theory.”

    Are you saying that hurricanes passing over warmer water, all else being equal, do not become stronger?

    In the case of Michael, its rapid strengthening occurred over water that was ~ 2 C above normal.

    Clearly the amount of warming of the gulf we have had so far due to climate change has not been so large, 0.6 C or so?, that it overwhelms natural variations. But if warming continues then at some point it would matter.

    • Bart says:

      “Are you saying that hurricanes passing over warmer water, all else being equal, do not become stronger?”

      Sure. In a physically impossible fantasy scenario, you can make hurricanes do whatever you like.

      Storms are driven by temperature differentials, not absolute temperatures. The notion that CO2 will heat the water, but not the air, is completely bass-ackwards.

      • Nate says:

        See below. Also with Michael, it probably passed over the Loop Current which has deep warm water.

        • Bart says:

          Ignaratio elenchi. The hypothesized impact of GHGs is to reduce temperature gradients. Reduce the gradients, and you reduce storm activity.

        • Nate says:

          I see the strategy. Ignore my rebuttal and repeat the claim.

          • Bart says:

            Your rebuttal was irrelevant. That is what ignoratio elenchi means.

          • Nate says:

            You make vague claims about gradients. I talk about which gradients actually matter for hurricanes. Irrelevant? That’s willful ignorance.

          • Bart says:

            “I talk about which gradients actually matter for hurricanes.”

            There are no increasing gradients that can reasonably be linked to the increase in CO2 concentration as the causative agent. Increasing CO2 necessarily decreases the gradients.

            The “extreme weather” meme is a marketing ploy, not science.

      • David Appell says:

        Bart says:
        The notion that CO2 will heat the water, but not the air, is completely bass-ackwards.

        No one claims that.

        CO2 heats the air. The air is in contact with the water. The water warms.

        I don’t know how much direct IR warms the ocean, but the above holds in any case.

        • Mike Flynn says:

          DA,

          You wrote –

          “CO2 heats the air.” Are you sure? It doesn’t seem to apply in the absence of a heat source, does it?

          Air cools at night. Does this mean that CO2 cools the air as well? Marvellous stuff, this CO2!

          All seems a bit delusional. Heats and cools simultaneously – the average would seem to be zero. No effect at all. Gee, maybe you’re right, after all! Only joking. Increasing the amount of CO2 between the Sun and a thermometer makes the thermometer colder, not hotter. Not as much energy reaches the thermometer.

          Press on believing in the magical heating abilities of CO2.

          Cheers.

        • Bart says:

          You are missing the point. Storm power is driven by the temperature gradient. Even if what you say were true, it wouldn’t result in greater storm power. It would result in less.

          • Nate says:

            Does the engine of Hummer have a bigger temperature gradient than the engine of a Civic? Is that what makes the Hummer more powerful?

            No. The difference is the rate of fuel pumped in and burned.

          • Bart says:

            Inappropriate analogy. The engine and fuel source is the same here. The one that runs with a smaller gradient between internal and external temperature will be less powerful than the other.

          • nate says:

            “Inappropriate analogy”

            Why inappropriate?

            ” The engine and fuel source is the same here.”

            Never said otherwise.

            “The one that runs with a smaller gradient between internal and external temperature will be less powerful than the other.”

            As usual, you are just making declarative statements, not backed up by real facts about the specifics of hurricanes. Pointless.

  2. Nate says:

    If I start your plot at 1900, the trend is flat.

    The plot is essentially looking at a series of Craps rolls. Not meaningful.

    • Nate says:

      I’m referring to the 2nd plot.

    • Nate says:

      To reinforce the point, if I start the plot in 1960, the trend is also flat.

      • Steve S. says:

        And if I start the plot in 1970 it’s uphill.*

        It is a bit disingenuous to start that 2nd plot in 1930, in that the 1940s were the highest count of major hurricane landfalls since the 1850s.
        http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pdf/nws-nhc-6.pdf
        (See page 15, table 6)
        Anything commencing from there is going to be downhill.

        The plot over the entire 160 years since the 1850s is flat, though. And from the dearth of landfalls over the past years, the decade of 2011-2020 is shaping up to be in a 4-way tie with the 2nd lowest landfall count since then.

        * The 1970s were the lowest count of major hurricane landfalls over that 160 year period.

  3. ren says:

    The north front can very quickly lower the surface temperature of the Gulf of Mexico.
    https://pics.tinypic.pl/i/00972/eq0do8617448.png

  4. The climate is stuck in neutral.

  5. Bobdesbond says:

    Would you please do a GLOBAL analysis.
    Who cares about this sh**hole backwater of hick Trumpturds.

    • argus says:

      Hey, that hurts a little, especially if your people fought for equality in the War of Northern Aggression 🙂

      • Lewis guignard says:

        Actually it doesn’t hurt a bit. It only reminds me of the unjustified arrogance of the Soros sycophants.

        • David Appell says:

          So anyone who thinks differently than you is sponsored by George Soros?

          What a huge confirmation bias. And a cop-out, enabling you (you think) to have have to consider or respond to comments you immediately dismiss.

          Bob’s question is a good one — I’d also like to see the global data.

          • Norman says:

            David Appell

            I would agree that Bobdesbond question was a good one. I do not think his comment is good or valuable: “Who cares about this sh**hole backwater of hick Trumpturds.”

            It is the one thing I hate about the climate science issue. It is being destroyed by politics and tribal thought process. I want to stick only to the science of the issue.

            On this blog we have the irrational tribal thoughts of sides.

            We have a tribe labeled “denier” by the opposing tribe and “alarmist” by the other. Just stupid labels that do not address the science.

          • JDHuffman says:

            Norman claims: “I want to stick only to the science of the issue.”

            Norman, I salute your new reform!

            Too bad you can’t go back and delete all of your accusatory and insulting comments, huh?

          • Norman says:

            JDBuffman

            I have always stuck to the science, your torture and perversion of sound science prompt harsh reactions. Also you taunt posters constantly with nearly all your comments.

            You have two strikes against you. You torture science until it screams for someone to come to its defense and then you mock and taunt people who correct your tortured version of physics. What are you expecting when you behave in this fashion? Flowers and candy?

          • JDHuffman says:

            Norman, your new reform sure didn’t last long, did it?

            Like someone once said, “Reality is a bitch”.

          • David Appell says:

            Thanks Norman, for your comment. You’re right, and I agree with you.

          • Svante says:

            More tribalism:
            https://tinyurl.com/yd9vn6zn

            Only five exceptions on the right side of the aisle:
            Brian Fitzpatrick, R, PA-08, 100
            John Faso, R, NY-19, 100
            Brian Mast, R, FL-18, 83
            Carlos Curbelo, R, FL-26, 75
            Elise Stefanik, R, NY-21, 50

          • JDHuffman says:

            Svante, there’s a list of your tribe, now out.

            There’s about 14 of you, unless you and “Mark Mannion” count as 2?

          • Svante says:

            A political party informing you on physics, that’s one up on communism.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      B,

      The Earth’s surface is no longer molten.

      Over the long term, the average temperature seems to have dropped – globally.

      Are you stupid and ignorant enough to deny this? Have you got anything except your delusional fantasies to support your mad claims that the Earth has warmed since its creation?

      Maybe you think that increasing the amount of CO2 between the sun and a thermometer, somehow makes the thermometer hotter! Complete climatological pseudoscientific madness!

      You need more practice at being gratuitously offensive, if that is what you are attempting.

      Carry on.

      Cheers.

    • Norman says:

      Bobdesbond

      I am sad you feel such animosity for people who have lost lives, homes and possessions. You are the type of person that makes me really hope that the Republicans sweep the Mid-Term elections.

      I am a middle of the road political person. I used to like the left when it was Christian based and not full of hate, just slowly working to improve things and change hateful people with love not throwing bricks at them. I see the ANTIFA crowd in Portland and it really makes me dislike the direction the left has taken (on the wrong road!). Your post shows this very cold and calloused value system of a tribal caveman ready to club any who might have different thought process than you.

      Anyway I will supply your cold heart with the data you request. Jeff Masters has a graph of Global Cat 5 storms since 1990.

      https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/three-category-5-tropical-cyclones-2017

  6. Fritz Kraut says:

    Dr. Spencer says:
    “So, all the “experts” can do is make vague claims about how major hurricanes like Michael are what we can expect more of in a warming world, but the data show that – so far at least – the data do not support the theory. ”
    ____________________________________________

    I realy dont understand.
    Have we different data?
    My data show clearly an increase of major hurricanes:
    https://tinyurl.com/major-hurricanes-northatlantik

    Can anyone find a fault in this data? Please tell me, I will corrrect it and calculate again.

    • David Appell says:

      What’s the source of your data?

    • bilybob says:

      Fritz Kraut,

      It would be difficult to draw a comparison between satellite, pre-satellite and pre-flight periods (different data collection methods). Since it would be expected that as you go back in time, some major storms would have been missed, especially if they do not make landfall.

      Perhaps a better analysis would be to look at all major hurricanes that do make landfall, but include all of North America not just a particular country or state. One would think these should have been recorded except in rare situations. Though some could argue the older records do not have an accurate category rating.

      For what it is worth, looking just at the satellite period and all major storms, the maximum 5-year and 10-year trailing average occurred in 2005 at 4.4 and 4.0 major storms per year. Those averages are now 2.9 and 3.2. A reduction of 1 hurricane on average. But are higher than the 70’s and 80’s 5/10 year averages.

      • Fritz Kraut says:

        @bilybob
        satellite observations began 1966?
        Here is calculation since 1967: https://tinyurl.com/major-hurricanes-NA
        Increase is even stronger than for the whole period since 1850.

        • bilybob says:

          Yes, there is an increase from the 60’s (3.6 peak 5-year average) to a 1999 – 2008 (4.4 peak 5-year average). The most recent 5-year average is 3.2, but the season is not over. However, even with an additional major storm the average only goes to 3.4, still below the mid 60’s average.

          As far as comparing to the 1850’s, in my opinion, it is a waste of time. Many hurricanes would not have been counted. Even those major hurricanes that did make landfall and are counted may have weakened and recorded as a non-major hurricane.

          As such, focusing on the satellite data era would probably be your best bet in seeing if there is a strong relationship to global temperatures. However, given the averages in the early 60’s is higher than present would suggest the relationship is either very weak or Salvatore is correct and it has been a decade of cooling. Good luck though, the project seems interesting. Perhaps comparing amount of time at certain cat levels may reveal a better relationship.

        • bilybob says:

          One additional thought. There has been discussion on hurricanes as a function of the difference between ocean temperature and atmospheric temperature. This may explain both the early 60’s and 2005 – 2008 averages. Perhaps a more interesting analysis.

      • barry says:

        bilybob,

        One could easily miss a lot of information by using US-landfalling data, as opposed to total Atlantic (and indeed, global) hurricanes.

        US land-falling:

        https://tinyurl.com/y98cpgz3

        Total Atlantic:

        https://tinyurl.com/ya6btfg4

        • bilybob says:

          Thanks Barry,

          The landfall reference was only for comparing long term trends back to 1850 (apples to apples). So yes, one would miss a lot of information.

          Shorter term though, I agree, using all events would be better. And if possible, duration at each category level of the storm. Though going back to 1950, data may not be detailed enough, so a less robust analysis may have to be performed.

          The averages I posted above is from the data provided by Fritz, all major storms regardless if they make landfall. It shows early 60’s averages higher than current averages, so the relationship of global temp – hurricane intensity may be weak. I looked at both 5 and 10 year averages with similar results.

          I would think a better analysis would be to look at regional ocean temperature/lower troposphere temperature for the hurricane areas. There may be a higher R in the regression analysis. There may also be a relationship to the temperature differential. But I would leave that analysis to the research climate scientist. Maybe some post doc work for one of Roy’s students.

        • barry says:

          Have you trawled the existing literature?

          • bilybob says:

            It’s mixed, the following I found most interesting…

            “In short, the historical Atlantic hurricane record does not provide compelling evidence for a substantial greenhouse warming-induced long-term increase.”

            https://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/global-warming-and-hurricanes/

            and

            The US northeast coastline was used as the
            study region. The results of this analysis indicate
            that the number of landfalling hurricane events in
            the northeast US is likely to decrease in a
            warmed climate. However, the hurricane hazards
            in the study region were projected to increase at
            each design level (e.g., 300, 700, and 1700-year
            MRIs) under the RCP 8.5 climate scenario.

            https://www.researchgate.net/publication/280528944_Implications_of_Hurricane_-_Sea_Surface_Temperature_Relationship

          • barry says:

            While most on that page concurs with what I’ve read, the lack of clear distinction between projections and obs of storm frequency and storm intensity is a little disappointing. Projections for each of those are not the same – intensity is meant to increase, but frequency not necessarily, and a decrease in frequency is possible.

            Still, much to take away. It’s not too surprising that a clear signal, if any, has yet to emerge from the noise.

    • barry says:

      Fritz,

      Not so much fault as a questions.

      How do you account for better weather monitoring later in the record? Hurricanes in the past could easily have been undercounted with fewer eyes on the sky (eg, satllite).

      Would you construct the same analysis using only the satellite data (on the same source page)? From 1967.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_hurricane_season#Number_of_storms_of_each_strength_since_the_satellite_era

  7. Fritz Kraut says:

    Here is the dataset as csv-file: https://tinyurl.com/major-hurricanes-dataset

  8. Nate says:

    Fritz, yours is all hurricanes, not just us 48 hits. Your’s makes more sense.

  9. Nate says:

    Bart,

    We’ve discussed this at length before. Go back and look.
    a. The cold side of the hurricane heat engine is at the top of the troposphere.

    b. The rate of flow of water vapor into the hurricane engine is the gas pedal. Hotter ocean provides more water vapor.

    • Bart says:

      AGW says the top of the troposphere is supposed to warm the fastest, and your internal combustion engine analogy is thoroughly flawed. The bottom line is, you will not get more powerful storms with lower temperature gradients. The “extreme weather” meme is a flailing attempt to sell the product by fear.

      • Nate says:

        Vague assertions with nothing about the specifics of how hurricanes work. Willful ignorance.

        We discussed it before. You never think critically about your posts or learn.

        The temperature of this region is cold -60 C. Suppose it warmed by 1 C to 59C and the ocean warmed from 29C to 29.6 C.

        Then the Carnot efficiency of the engine (TH-TC)/TH, has increased from 89/302 to 88.6/302.6.

        Whoop de doo!

        Meanwhile it is well known that hurricanes are not stable over water < 26 C.

        They have highly nonlinear behavior with temperature of the water.

        • Nate says:

          warmed by 1 C to -59 C.

          Carnot efficiency of the engine (TH-TC)/TH, has decreased

        • Mike Flynn says:

          n,

          You wrote –

          “Meanwhile it is well known that hurricanes are not stable over water < 26 C."

          Tell that to people who die in cyclones (hurricanes) which originate in the tropics, and maintain stability below 40 S, where New Zealand sea temperatures are definitely below 26 C. Maybe you have been wrongly advised by GHE climatological pseudoscientific cultists.

          I wouldn't be surprised. Those fools can believe in anything!

          Cheers.

          • Nate says:

            MF. You pretty much constantly make sh*t up. Shows us the data.

          • Nate says:

            As you can see in the map, the vast majority of cyclones poop-out above latitude 30 degrees S.

            http://www.qhatlas.com.au/content/tropical-cyclones

          • Bart says:

            Not worth responding here, as Nate provided his own refutation.

          • Nate says:

            Bart, Unable to process maps, I see.

          • Nate says:

            Let me interpret the map. The vast majority of cyclone tracks end above 30S degrees latitude. A handful reach 40S. Hurricane stability is a strong function of SST.

          • Nate says:

            Here’s tracks for the whole world.

            https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/7079/historic-tropical-cyclone-tracks.

            Tracks that make it to 40 S are tropical storms.

            Notice differences between ocean basins. Warm Western Pacific has more high latitude hurricanes, compared to Eastern pacific. Same in Atlantic.

          • Bart says:

            “Hurricane stability is a strong function of SST.”

            Not of CO2-induced SST. CO2 induced warming reduces gradients.

            You are trying to pull a bait and switch, arguing that one alleged fact proves another wholly unrelated one.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            N,

            Do you suffer from a severe intellectual defect, perhaps? I will do my best to overcome your inability to find facts for yourself.

            You wrote –

            “Whoop de doo!

            Meanwhile it is well known that hurricanes are not stable over water < 26 C."

            A moment's searching finds –

            "Several memorable ET events have occurred in the New Zealand region. In April 1968, Tropical Cyclone Gisele re-intensified as it moved south over New Zealand, producing winds gusting to 75 m/s (270 kph) in Wellington, and sinking the interisland ferry Wahine with the loss of 51 lives. Cyclone Bola dumped over 900 mm of rain and produced hurricane-force winds in regions of northern New Zealand in March 1988. More recently, Cyclones Fergus and Drena brought torrential rain and storm-force winds to the North Island in December 1996, triggering an exodus of summer tourists from coastal resorts."

            You will find all the "data" you want, if you can be bothered looking for it.

            Have fun.

            Cheers,

          • Nate says:

            Mike,

            “More recently, Cyclones Fergus and Drena brought torrential rain and storm-force winds to the North Island in December 1996, triggering an exodus of summer tourists from coastal resorts.”

            These events a real and rare. And the North Island is above 40S degrees latitude, isn’t it?

            Though hurricanes are only stable over 26C or more ocean, we know very well that their dissipation is not immediate.

            E.G. Michael traveled 200 mi inland before losing its hurricane status.

            And “You will find all the “data” you want, if you can be bothered looking for it.”

            I already showed you the data, that you must have missed:

            https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/7079/historic-tropical-cyclone-tracks.

            A miniscule fraction of cyclone tracks make it as far south as New Zealand, and those that do are mostly tropical storms.

            These tracks are, globally, quite consistent with the 26C cutoff. In fact, there are no hurricanes forming in South-Eastern Pacific because the water never exceeds 26C there.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            N,

            Your statement was –

            “Whoop de doo!

            Meanwhile it is well known that hurricanes are not stable over water < 26 C."

            No mention of "usually", "mostly", "generally", or similar qualifiers

            I have pointed out that your assertion is wrong. There is no point blaming me because are unable to clearly communicate what you are thinking. Trying to get away with ". . . it is well known . . . " just makes you look stupid and ignorant.

            The exception does not "prove the rule". The exception shows that the rule is wrong.

            "As Albert Einstein famously said: No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong."

            Wriggle, wriggle, Warmist worm. Others may enjoy your discomforture. I don't care – you have the perfect right to appear as ridiculous as you wish.

            Carry on.

            Cheers.

          • Nate says:

            “No mention of “usually”, “mostly”, “generally”, or similar qualifiers”

            Well, Mike, how stupid are you?

            You go on and on that weather is chaotic. All weather events are described in terms of probabilities.

            The probability of a hurricane-strength storm making it to 40 S latitude is teeny tiny. Thats the best anyone can do for you.

            BTW, you mentioned “More recently, Cyclones Fergus and Drena brought torrential rain and storm-force winds to the North Island in December 1996”

            Both of these were BELOW hurricane strength (tropical storms) when they struck North Island of New Zealand.

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclone_Fergus#/media/File:Fergus_1996_track.png

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclone_Drena#/media/File:Drena_1997_track.png

        • Nate says:

          N “Hurricane stability is a strong function of SST.”

          Bart “Not of CO2-induced SST. CO2 induced warming reduces gradients.”

          More made-up declarative statements. Why do you think each new one will fly when none of the others have?

          Like playing whack-a-mole.

          The statement ‘Hurricane stability is a strong function of SST’ is proven by the global map I showed.

          QED

          • Bart says:

            This is idiotic. You’re either not arguing in good faith, or you’re just clueless. Either way, I have no time for it.

          • Nate says:

            A continuous stream of argument-by-assertion, while ignoring fact-based rebuttals is “not arguing in good faith”.

  10. pochas94 says:

    We may have a lull in hurricanes now, but with increased solar activity, they’ll be Baaaack!

  11. Mike Flynn says:

    Neither heat nor water vapour are necessary for high wind speeds. Antarctica is the driest continent, and the coldest.

    “The highest wind speeds recorded in Antarctica were at Dumont d’Urville station in July 1972: 327km/h (199 mph).”

    Maybe you might be worried more about deaths from atmospheric perturbations –

    “The 1972 Iran Blizzard, which caused 4,000 reported deaths, was the deadliest blizzard in recorded history. Dropping as much as 26 feet (7.9 m) of snow, it completely covered 200 villages. After a snowfall lasting nearly a week, an area the size of Wisconsin was entirely buried in snow.”

    If anyone can prove, (as in the mathematical sense, rather than the David Appell climatological pseudoscientific cultist sense), that any changes in frequency or intensity of weather events is not the result of the atmosphere behaving in a chaotic fashion, I would be interested in examining such a proof.

    As the IPCC wrote “The Earth’s atmosphere-ocean dynamics is chaotic: . . . “. I agree.

    Endlessly analysing the outputs of a chaotic system is of no help. It won’t even tell you whether the system is behaving chaotically at any particular time, or even over any particular period. Sad but true.

    No GHE. No AGW theory. Just shared delusion.

    Cheers.

  12. Fritz Kraut says:

    Mike Flynn says:
    Neither heat nor water vapour are necessary for high wind speeds.
    ______________________________________________________

    We are talking about hurricanes.

  13. David Appell says:

    Roy, what’s the Pearson coefficient (R) of your first graph? Hard to see how a linear trend with time is justified there.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      DA,

      I think you left out a word.

      You wrote “Hard to see how a linear trend with time is justified there.”

      You really meant to say “Hard to see how a linear trend with time is not justified there.”

      Oh well, you can’t always get it right the first time, can you?

      Better luck next time.

      Cheers.

  14. Mike Flynn says:

    FK,

    I’m fairly sure you don’t like the following hurricane definition –

    “a wind of force 12 on the Beaufort scale (equal to or exceeding 64 knots or 118 km/h).”

    Maybe you prefer the definition provided by the National Hurricane Center, whose data is used by Dr Spencer. You will note the definition is subject to various conditions and caveats.

    Maybe you could provide a rigorous scientific definition of your own, for the “hurricanes” of which you speak, or is your definition the usual climatological pseudoscientific definition – which is subject to instantaneous change, on the whim of the author?

    In any case, you haven’t given any reason, (let alone proof), for believing that any atmospheric activity is not chaotic and unpredictable in nature. How hard can it be?

    Carry on analysing your datasets. Maybe someone, somewhere, actually cares enough about your opinion to take notice of it. Good luck.

    Cheers.

  15. Bob Tisdale says:

    Roy wrote, “Where were the claims that the hurricane drought was due to global warming?

    “Crickets.”

    Perfect, Roy. I’m still smiling.

    Thanks,
    Bob

  16. John says:

    Thanks for the dataset, Fritz!

    I have played with it and here -> https://workupload.com/file/mvJs7KDb <- is the Bayesian model that considers the data as coming from a negative binomial distribution with an AR1 error structure.

    According to this model the posterior mean increase in Atlantic hurricanes is about 209%

    • Nate says:

      Binomial, I get. Why negative? And what’s AR1?

      • David Appell says:

        “AR” is “autoregressive.” In such a model, one month’s temperature (say) doesn’t depend only on CO2 (say), but also on the temperature of the month before. That is, a warm month is more like to happen after a warm month, and the same for cold. The “1” means one’s calculation only includes the effect of the earlier month, but not the month before that, or that one, etc, and is referred to as “lag-1.”

        This assumption about “autocorrelation” affects the calculation of trend uncertainties. It’s a huge subject, but just considering lag-1 autocorrelation is relatively simple — the number of points N is in essence reduced to an effective number Neff < N.

        Appendix A in this 2006 document, by Tom Wigley, gives the easiest treatment of the basics that I've found:

        https://library.wmo.int/pmb_ged/2006_temperature-trends-lower-atmosphere_en.pdf

  17. ren says:

    When I wrote that the growing season in North Dakota would be shorter, I was criticized.
    https://www.iceagenow.info/harvesting-wheat-in-the-snow/

  18. ren says:

    Pay attention to the influx of cold air over the Great Lakes in a few days.
    https://earth.nullschool.net/#2018/10/17/0000Z/wind/isobaric/70hPa/orthographic=-83.86,48.31,519
    Even better to observe in the autumn-spring period the circulation in the lower stratosphere.

  19. Carbon500 says:

    Dr. Spencer: I live in the UK, and I’m reasonably up to date with American English – but can you please tell me what is meant by ‘crickets’? It’s a new one on me! Thank you.

  20. Nate says:

    ‘Crickets’ is the sound you hear at night when no one is speaking. The sounds when people have no response.

  21. Mark B says:

    “Even more astounding is that out of the top 10 warmest Gulf years since 1860, 7 occurred before 1970, which is before we experienced any significant warming.”

    Most of those are before 1890 which would suggest that the data that far back is more than a bit sketchy. Excluding data prior to 1900 the warmest annual SST in that area occurred in the last three years and there’s a clear warming trend.

    • David Appell says:

      Roy’s own data shows the lower troposphere over the northern hampshire ocean is warming at +0.13 C/decade — the same rate as the global LT.

      Yet this has no impact on hurricanes?

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        You wrote –

        “Yet this has no impact on hurricanes?”.

        Are you sure? Why do you say this? I assume you are trying to divert attention away from the fact that there is no GHE, and that reducing the amount of sunlight reaching a thermometer makes it cooler, rather than hotter.

        Keep at it. Keep denying that the IPCC wrote that the prediction of future climate states is not possible!

        Some years have more hurricanes, some less. Some hurricanes are more intense than others. It’s called weather. Good luck with predicting weather any better than a twelve year old child with 30 minutes of training.

        Cheers.

  22. Mike Flynn says:

    From that bastion of objective scientific reporting, (only joking, of course), the New York Times –

    “”This is really an amazing event,” said Andrew Dessler, a professor of atmospheric sciences at Texas A&M University. “It came out of nowhere and really intensified rapidly.”

    Michael, he said, did not follow the common behavior of storms, which tend to weaken as they reach the shore because of interaction with the land. “It had the pedal to the metal all the way until it hit the coast,” he said.”

    Unfortunately, Andrew forgot to read the lead in to his remarks, which stated –

    “Little wonder that modern weather modeling got its start in chaos theory, which acknowledges that small changes can lead to enormous effects so that, as one founder of the field put it, the flap of a butterflys wing in Brazil might set off a tornado in Texas.”

    It appears that weather modelling is based on chaos theory, but professors like Andrew profess amazement at the results! Oh dear, Mother Nature remains unconvinced by the firmly held delusional fantasies of people like Andrew Dessler. The hurricane was not particularly “amazing”. Using stupid analogies – “It had the pedal to the metal all the way . . . “. Yeah. Right. No pedal, no metal – just another example of the unpredictably chaotic perturbations of the atmosphere.

    Ignorance is no excuse at law. It seems to be handsomely rewarded in climatological pseudoscience.

    Cheers.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        Proclaiming your ignorance won’t make it any more acceptable.

        Try proving your pointless graphic does not show chaos in action!

        Foolish person. Keep flapping your “evidence”. Even the IPCC accepts that chaos rules. Stupidity and ignorance won’t turn your delusional fantasies into facts.

        Keep trying – maybe a pointless and irrelevant gotcha might help, do you think?

        So sad, too bad. No GHE, no CAGW theory – just a second rate mob of fumbling bumblers incessantly preaching doom. The Earth’s surface has cooled for four and a half billion years, it seems. The interior is still molten, and still slowly cooling.

        Look at your “data” and calculate the theoretical surface temperature without input from the Sun, if you wish. Surprise, surprise – the nonsensical “GHE difference” has mysteriously vanished!

        Don’t forget to show your workings, if you disagree.

        Cheers.

        • David Appell says:

          You wanted to talk about chaos.

          OK. So where is the chaos in these climate data?

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_age#/media/File:Ice_Age_Temperature.png

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Ignoring things won’t make them vanish. What part of “Try proving your pointless graphic does not show chaos in action!” did you miss?

            Go your hardest. Devise a function or two that reproduces your “data” precisely. No “nearly”, “almost”, or “more or less”.

            According to the IPCC –

            “The climate system is particularly challenging since it is known that components in the system are inherently chaotic; . . . ”

            Lovely stuff, eh? You claim to know differently, but you can’t actually say why, can you? Carry on, David. Believe as you wish – it makes no difference. Chaos rules, until proven otherwise.

            Cheers.

        • David Appell says:

          PS: Do you still want to talk about the description of the GHE? You’ve suddenly dropped asking for it….

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Are you deranged? Why would you think I wish to talk with you about something that doesn’t exist?

            I do what I want. What you think is of little concern to me, in general.

            Is there a point to your irrelevant statement, or are you just trolling?

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            You’re constantly asking for a definition of the GHE, for a couple of years now at least.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Not so much asking, as pointing out the GHE doesn’t actually exist.

            If it did, I’m sure someone could describe it. People manage to describe other mythical concepts, such as unicorns, but the GHE is so mysterious it defies description!

            What a shame. Maybe you could flap a description into existence, with one of your irrelevant brightly coloured bits of paper? Say, one from an undistinguished mathematician called Gavin Schmidt?

            Give it a try.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Description of the greenhouse effect:

            “IN its normal state, the Earth-atmosphere system absorbs solar radiation and maintains global energy balance by re-radiating this energy to space as infrared or longwave radiation. The intervening atmosphere absorbs and emits the longwave radiation, but as the atmosphere is colder than the surface, it absorbs more energy than it emits upward to space. The energy that escapes to space is significantly smaller than that emitted by the surface. The difference, the energy trapped in the atmosphere, is popularly referred as the greenhouse effect, G.”

            – A. Raval and V. Ramanathan, Observational determination of the greenhouse effect, Nature v342 14 Dec 1989, pp 758-761
            https://www.nature.com/articles/342758a0
            https://www.nature.com/articles/342758a0.pdf

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            “The difference, the energy trapped in the atmosphere, is popularly referred as the greenhouse effect, G.”

            You foolish person. The atmosphere “traps” no energy at all, particularly each night. The Earth has cooled for four and a half billion years! Maybe your “authority” is referring to climatological pseudoscientific “heat” – the sort that doesn’t actually exist, which is no doubt why Kevin Trenberth can’t find it!

            Oh, what a travesty!

            Go out and trap some energy. Maybe you can sell it, if you can trap enough, and put it in a bottle. Let me know how you go.

            Carry on with your nonsense.

            Cheers.

      • Lewis guignard says:

        David,
        Now you’re quoting Wikipedia; an avowed purveyor of pseudo science.

        Please, stick to reliable sources. Even public schools don’t allow the use of wiki as it is so widely known to be inaccurate and politically biased.

        Lewis

        • David Appell says:

          Lewis, see the words “EPICA” and “Vostok” on that graph?

          Wikipedia cites all their data and claims in the scientific literature. Look for the labels and superscripted numbers….

    • Rob Mitchell says:

      After working a round of shifts of forecasting wx and sea states in the Gulf of Mexico, the so-called “pedal to the metal” was a 200mb ridge that set up along a line from the Yucatan Channel to the Florida Panhandle last Tuesday. This produced a near ideal upper-air condition for rapid intensification. Hurricane Michael DID NOT come out of nowhere. It was a tropical disturbance that stalled along the east side of the Yucatan Peninsula. When the wind shear diminished last weekend, the disturbance developed into Tropical Storm Michael. The upper level ridge led to its strengthening to a strong CAT 4 before landfall. I seriously doubt Dr. Chris Landsea will find some AGW fingerprint on Hurricane Michael. But leave it up to good ‘ol Dr. Andrew Dessler from my alma mater, he will pin it on human-caused global warming!

      • Nate says:

        Thanks Rob, interesting.

        What’s your take on Michael passing over the Gulf Stream Loop Current, with its deep source of warm water?

  23. ren says:

    A new wave of freezing air from the north is now fall above the north-central US.

  24. ren says:

    Currently the pressure over Tahiti are increased.
    https://www.longpaddock.qld.gov.au/soi/

    • Bobdesbond says:

      Dont tell me you believe that single-day contributions to the SOI are in any way significant regarding ENSO..

      • ren says:

        They show the current wind direction, from high to low.
        High pressure over Tahiti.
        Tahiti (hPa) Darwin (hPa)
        14 Oct 2018 1017.61 1010.50
        13 Oct 2018 1017.48 1010.85
        12 Oct 2018 1015.70 1011.35
        11 Oct 2018 1014.51 1011.40

  25. Andrew stout says:

    @Nate to paraphrase: ‘ so, the experienced .6c due to climate change hasn’t effected much… ‘. I wanted to nitt pick your charicterization in friendly fashion, assuming by climate change you mean AGW : By my *estimation, looking at UHA , it seems like we’ve been increasing an average of +/- .5c over the past 40 years. Also by my estimation, looking at ( any ) NON Mann proxy records, global temps routinely increase or decrease about 1c over 100 years. So, if we’ve experienced about .6c over 50 years ( the ‘start’ of AGW) we’re not changing at an alarmingly different rate or magnitude from natural variation. So you can suppose some warming is due to AGW, but you can’t attribute most of it to AGW… Its more plausible, imo, to attribute NO warming to AGW , than to attribute ‘alot’ if warming. Call it .1c , If I had to guess, although the reality is also that we’ve changed at a faster rate than 1c/100years in the past, too. Nobody really knows, but based on ledgitimate proxies, and ledgitimate contemporary temp records , nothing seems amiss…imo.

    • David Appell says:

      UAH LT shows warming of 0.5 C in 40 years, but RSS, measuring the same thing, shows 0.75 C of warming over the same time period.

      Surface measurements from several different groups show 0.9-1.0 C of warming since the last 19th century, 80% of which has happened since 1970.

  26. Nate says:

    Some things you say make sense. Others not.

    The 0.6C comes from Roy’s link to temp of gulf water. Take a look.

    “Its more plausible, imo, to attribute NO warming to AGW , than to attribute alot if warming. Call it .1c , If I had to guess”

    Where do you get this? Seems to be just assertion.

    Also surface temps have risen at higher rate than at any time in the record. Show us your record.

  27. Nate says:

    Andrew. Let me add that prior to ~1975, the record showed up or down 0.2 C for previous century. In 1980, it was predicted that the next decades would be warming. This has proven true. The amount, 0.7C, and pattern of warming was close to the predicted.

  28. Andrew stout says:

    @Nate No assertions, but (Admittantly) non ‘authoratative’ analysis ( I’m an Architect, not a professional Scientist). But follow me on this, because I’ve sent several thousand hours as an obsession looking into it: Im looking at the UHA sat records which is why I’m only going back 40 or so years, instead of longer, for a contemporary record to compare against the proxy record. You could throw in Radiosondes, my understanding is that they more closely reflect the findings of the Sattelites than NOAA.Im disregarding NOAA land measurements because by my ( and alot of other Authority’s) estimation, it’s been buggered beyond usefullness , when you look at it’s corrections, smoothed , selected, or fictionalized ‘measurements’. I’ve spent a lot of time validating the existence of the criticisms vs NOAA, and NOAA in my eyes, is left wanting. So I use UHA as a valid Contemporary Record. I’m figuring +/- .5c over the past 40 years as an AVG temp increase, not as a high or a low. Now that we have a couple temporary record of magnitude & rate if change, if you want something to compare that contemporary record against, I choose NOT to use MANN work or work Derrivitive of MANN. I’ve read several books detailing how fraudulent his data is. I’ve read the NAS report detailing how fraudulent it is ( although they try their best to candy coat the posin pill, forgiving him for ‘troubles indicative of new techniques’) Alarmists have flooded the Internet with misdirection, but Mann and the hockey stick has been Utterly discredited. I’ve also read every single IPCC report and it’s clear that ever since AR III (TAR), they’ve been desperate to walk back Mann’s ludicrus assertions. IE, in AR V, the IPCC has rediscovered the Little Ice Age, and Rediscovered the Medieval Warm Period (MWP), although they don’t have the hutzpah to call it that, they call it the ‘Medieval Climate Anomolie’ (MCA). I don’t think they’ve gone so far as to admit to the Roman Warm Period yet, because I suspect, the MCA would look a lot less anolomous if they admit to multiple climate cycles every 1000yrs or so. SO If you jettison Mann-Derrivitive work to suppress climate change in the past, you need another record. I use what Dr Spencer uses, the “Lungvist”(so?) proxy reconstruction. I like it because it provides a certain amount of resolution: it hasn’t been over-smoothed like Mann graphs into non-usefullness. If you simply draw a line at 2 arbitrary points and measure the delta of magnitude over time, you can find easily half a dozen periods or more, over the past 2000 years, where the rate is 1c/100 yrs. In some instances it’s quite greater – about 1c/ 75 yrs I think in one period out of the LIA. That’s not my assertion, that my amateurish analysis of other people’s data, but it isn’t rocket science, it’s an 8th grade Science graphing exercise. Ive done the same exercise with the AR1 (FAR) IPCC proxy reconstruction, and even though it has a low resolution, you can observe the same magnitude of change. It’s obvious why the IPCC erased that geological record from their Reports when they transferred the boogyman from Areosols to Global Warming: a comparison of modern climate change vs the proxy record was nothing remarkable. Hence why Mann had to torture the data to get his discredited Hockey Stick. So, If you use a Non-Mann Proxy, and compare it to a Non-NOAA/GISS contemporary record, you’ll see we’re barely deviated from normal, routine temperature change, in rate it in magnitude. In terms of Absolute temperature, yet again, even in recent history ( say the last 2000 years), we still haven’t matched past highs. I can verify that not just by proxy record but by Anthropological evidence: We’re starting to be able to grow a variety of crops in Greenland we haven’t been able to grow for a thousand years. When we can grow Barley commercially in Greenland, as dug up fossils have demstrated was happening ( and contextually written records reference), then you’ll know we’ve started to match the temperatures of the MWP.

    Very honored you read & Responded , I hope this explaination helps . – A

  29. Andrew stout says:

    Apologies for typos… on my phone…tiny keyboard. If something didn’t make sense I’ll try to correct for you.

  30. Andrew stout says:

    @Nate Oh and just to close the loop on your Q, I’m assuming the difference between past climate change and today’s climate change is all AGW, by my figures, about .5c observed in 40 years, when I figure it should have been more like .4c in 40 years without industry, per my Lungvist anslysis. But there’s no proof to that. Because of natural varibility It could be more, or a lot less- That’s what I don’t think anybody really knows.

    • Bobdesbond says:

      Given that solar intensity has been gradually falling for about the past 40 years, what natural process are you proposing for warming?

      • Mike Flynn says:

        B,

        Stupid gotcha.

        The natural process which results in hotter thermometers is called “increased heat”.

        CO2 provides none, of course. Have you considered using your mental abilities to find out where this “heat” might come from? No?

        Why am I not surprised? Are you a delusional GHE cultist, perhaps?

        Questions, questions!

        Cheers.

        • David Appell says:

          Do you think that CO2 doesn’t absorb infrared radiation, or do you think the Earth doesn’t emit any?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Your delusional fantasies show no signs of ameliorating.

            Do you think that bananas don’t absorb infrared radiation, or are you just stupid and ignorant?

            Still no GHE. No AGW theory. No science at all. What a surprise!

            Keep those gotchas coming. You obviously need the practice.

            Cheers.

          • Nate says:

            David, try my MF-noise cancelling headphones. They work.

  31. ren says:

    Another wave of cold air reaches out to Nebraska.
    https://files.tinypic.pl/i/00972/ai59fbynoq7b.png

  32. Andrew stout says:

    @Nate, I was double checking Ng my numbers last night & I’m partially talking nonsense, I’ve done too many all nighters , I was finding multiple.4c, .5c over 50 years looking at ljunvist, & somewhere in my head that meant .8 or +/- 1c per/100, although usually there’s a pause before another leg up or down. I’m not sure what Dr Spencer Calculates as the 40 (39?) year avg. Unless I’ve also got my numbers confused there as well, I guess it’s still about .1c difference , between UAH & Ljunvist 50 yr periods in the past. apologies for mistakes!

  33. CO2isLife says:

    There is real science backing the Green House Gas Effect, and the IPCC covers none of it. The question needs to be asked, “why are the models so wrong?” If I was going to model Weightloss and the variables I included in the model were # of Pens in home, area of driveway, distance one lives from Florida, I would expect my model to produce results like the IPCC Models. If you don’t include and weight the correct factor, you will never develop an accurate model. Everything regarding CO2 and its impact on global climate must revert back to CO2’s one and only mechanism by which to affect climate change, that being the thermalization of LWIR between 13 and 18 microns. That is the only defined mechanism for CO2, and therefore every observation must be explained in that context. LWIR between 13 and 18 won’t melt ice or warm water, in fact ice emits LWIR of around 10 microns, and very cold ice will emit LWIR between 13 and 18 microns. There is also only a limited amount of LWIR between 13 and 18 microns emitted by the earth and 100% of it is “trapped” by CO2 and H2O by the altitude of 5 feet. More CO2 would simply lower that level slightly towards the surface, but with the convection of the lower atmosphere, that becomes meaningless. Simply use MODTRAN, double CO2 in the atmosphere and measure the impact on the lowest 0.1km of the atmosphere. It has no impact.None, Nada, Zip. Focus on the significant factors. The oceans clearly dominate the climate, the oceans are warming, the oceans aren’t warmed by LWIR between 13 and 18 micron. What is warming the oceans is warming the climate, and what is warming the oceans is more incoming visible light, especially on the blue end of the spectrum. To warm the oceans you need fewer clouds over the oceans or a hotter sun, or both. The IPCC doesn’t focus on those factors so they will never have an accurate model.

    • Bobdesbond says:

      Your qualifications?

      • Mike Flynn says:

        B,

        Ooooo! Zinger – in your fantasy, of course.

        What is the point of your witless gotcha? Are you disputing fact, or just trolling because you are unable to support your mad GHE delusion?

        Off you go now. Try an appeal to the authority of the undistinguished mathematician Gavin Schmidt, who seems to be accepted by some as a “climate scientist “. What are his scientific qualifications? None? What a surprise!

        Cheers.

        • David Appell says:

          Gavin Schmidt has a PhD in applied mathematics, and 20 years of doing important work in climate modeling.

          What are your qualifications?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Gavin Schmidt’s work is completely pointless – expensive computer games from a supposed mathematician who said, in 2012 or so, that he saw nothing to convince him that the atmosphere behaved chaotically. I pointed out that the IPCC had expressed a somewhat different view.

            It seems Gavin got a little huffy,

            Gavin also claimed that 2014 was the hottest year ever, based on his calculation of a 38% probability!

            A coin toss gives 50%. 38% means less likely than that.

            This is your authority? On matters of science? More like climatological pseudoscience!

            What have my qualifications got to do with your delusional fantasies? I’m happy to let others decide for themselves whether I’m providing facts or not. I will state that I have never claimed to be a Nobel Laureate, unlike your other presumed authority, the geologist Michael Mann.

            Still no GHE, is there? No AGW theory, either. Just fanatical cultist belief in the non-existent.

            Cheers.

    • David Appell says:

      CO2isLife says:
      There is also only a limited amount of LWIR between 13 and 18 microns emitted by the earth and 100% of it is trapped by CO2 and H2O by the altitude of 5 feet. More CO2 would simply lower that level slightly towards the surface….

      This is a common talking point from deniers, known as the saturation fallacy. They’re wrong.

      It’s easy to see why it’s wrong by noting that the molecules in the atmosphere themselves radiate, up and down and every direction. So, in this case, molecules 5 ft above the surface absorb and then can radiate, in any direction, including upward.

      CO2 isn’t close to being saturated on Earth. It’s not even saturated on Venus.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        Who cares? You can’t even define the mythical GHE, can you?

        Make sure your description includes the GHE mechanism responsible for the cooling of the Earth over the last four and a half billion years.

        Complete rubbish – no GHE. No AGW theory. Just an ever diminishing ragtag mob of shrieking GHE cultists.

        Keep that delusion going. Maybe the funds will start to flow again.

        Cheers.

    • David Appell says:

      CO2isAGW wrote:
      The oceans clearly dominate the climate, the oceans are warming, the oceans arent warmed by LWIR between 13 and 18 micron.

      Says what?

      What is warming the oceans is warming the climate,

      Says what?

      Far more likely that what is warming the atmosphere is warming the ocean.

      what is warming the oceans is more incoming visible light, especially on the blue end of the spectrum.

      Do you have data showing this increase in visible light?

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        What a stupid gotcha!

        Neither you nor anybody else can even describe this mythical GHE, can you?

        Your continuing attempts to deny, divert, and confuse, can’t obscure the obvious facts that the IPCC states that future climate states are unpredictable, that climate is merely the average of weather, and that you appear exceptionally stupid and ignorant (to me, anyway).

        Maybe you could just come out and say that increasing the amount of CO2 between the Sun and a thermometer makes the thermometer hotter! Or do you think that CO2 provides heat by some magical pseudoscientific climatological means?

        Ah, the rich tapestry of life, eh?

        Cheers.

        • David Appell says:

          Mike Flynn says:
          Maybe you could just come out and say that increasing the amount of CO2 between the Sun and a thermometer makes the thermometer hotter!

          Is the CO2 in a planetary atmosphere?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            How about just answering the question? What difference does it make?

            Just for the sake of discussion, if you wish, assume a planetary atmosphere of 100% CO2. Or none at all. Or anything in between. Wriggle all you like.

            Now tell me you believe that increasing the amount of CO2 between the Sun and a thermometer makes the thermometer hotter, if you like.

            Try involving climatological pseudoscientific magic, if ordinary physics won’t help. Good for a laugh, at least.

            Cheers.

  34. PhilJ says:

    “The IPCC doesnt focus on those factors so they will never have an accurate model.”

    As long as they use a cold black body warmed only by the sun their model will remain broken..

    They need to use a hot ball of magma and gases with a sun that slows its cooling if they ever want to find a model that might work…

    • David Appell says:

      Why does any of that matter? What matters beyond total solar irradiance (TSI) at the Earth’s TOA?

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        Maybe you could explain why the Earth’s surface is no longer molten? Or even why surface temperatures vary from some +90 C to -90 C currently.

        Are you really, really, sure that TSI at TOA (meaningless sciency mumbo jumbo, of course), is the only thing that matters?

        Have you considered that a large ball of molten rock might have a surface temperature regardless of TSI at TOA?

        Nah. Of course not. Delusional GHE cultists never let facts intrude into their fantasies.

        Go David! Keep those gotchas coming!

        Cheers.

        • Lewis guignard says:

          Interesting thought. What would the surface temperature be without the sun and with or without an atmosphere.

          We can expect something along the lines of Antarctica I would expect. Where the surface, which continually radiates heat away, would cover something which is warmer as it gets closer to the molten center. I wouldn’t be conducive to life as we know it, but…

          As things are, where I live, piedmont of NC, the ambient temperature about 6 feet underground is around 55 degrees F.

          Warm enough to grow plants and animals.

          • Svante says:

            Mike Flynn’s heating effect would give us about -396 deg. F, isn’t that right Mike?

          • David Appell says:

            Lewis guignard says:
            Interesting thought. What would the surface temperature be without the sun and with or without an atmosphere.

            It’s not interesting at all.

            Without the Sun, there would not be an Earth. QED.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            S,

            Oh dear, gotcha time again is it?

            Before anyone starts thinking you might be less stupid and ignorant than you appear, consider this – does it take more energy to raise the temperature of a gram of water from 99 C to 100 C, or from 0 C to 100 C?

            Now apply the same physics to the Earth. Surprise, surprise!

            No need for a mystical GHE to explain the current surface temperature, any more than it is needed to explain the average temperature of more than 100 C before the first liquid water appeared.

            Now what was the point of your statement, again? Just more irrelevant stupid and ignorant trolling, isn’t that right?

            Cheers.

          • Svante says:

            Liquid water, yes.
            Appeared about 4.3 billion years ago, right?
            Earth cooled quickly thanks to T^4, didn’t it?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            S,

            What is your point?

            Are you practising the mysterious cultist method of disagreeing by not disagreeing? You don’t appear to be disagreeing with anything I said. Diversionary tactics are losing their effectiveness – what is it you are trying to say?

            Are you claiming that the Earth’s surface would be absolute zero in the absence of sunlight? Even you wouldn’t be stupid enough to make that claim, I assume.

            Likewise if you are claiming it takes the same amount of energy to heat a body to a certain temperature regardless of initial temperature.

            These are the sorts of things that would be believed by climatological pseudoscientific cultists – delusional fantasies, unconnected with reality.

            Off you go. Try posting some more diversionary (yet strangely stupid and ignorant) gotchas. Maybe you need more trolling instruction. You are not doing all that well.

            Cheers.

          • Svante says:

            Air cools at night. Does this mean that the earth cools the air as well? Marvellous stuff, this magma of the earth!

            All seems a bit delusional. Heats and cools simultaneously – the average would seem to be zero. No effect at all. Gee, maybe you’re right, after all! Only joking. Increasing the amount of magma between the Sun and a thermometer makes the thermometer colder, not hotter. Not as much energy reaches the thermometer.

            Press on believing in the magical heating abilities of magma.

            Cheerio!

          • Mike Flynn says:

            S,

            You wrote –

            “Air cools at night. Does this mean that the earth cools the air as well?”

            A particularly stupid and ignorant gotcha. Can’t you do any better?

            There are no “cooling” rays. No sources of “negative heating”. Matter loses energy, cooling as it goes, all by itself – in the absence of an external energy source.

            Don’t blame me if your fantasy is not supported by physics – you created it all by yourself. I understand you might wish to stick with climatological pseudo-physics – where cooling is warming, heating is cooling, thermometers get hotter by reducing the amount of energy they absorb, a testable GHE hypothesis exists, and so on.

            So sad, too bad. No GHE, no CO2 heating, and the Earth has cooled over the last four and a half billion years or so.

            Cheers.

    • Gordon Robertson says:

      PhilJ…”They need to use a hot ball of magma and gases with a sun that slows its cooling if they ever want to find a model that might work”

      According to Gerlich and Tscheuschner, two experts in thermodynamics, there is not enough computer power to support such a realistic model.

  35. .
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    .

    How Tamino proved himself wrong.

    Tamino has made it clear, that he is a slowdown, pause, and hiatus, denier.

    But in a recent post, Tamino has made a stupid mistake.

    In his eagerness to show how bad global warming is, Tamino has accidentally acknowledged that the recent slowdown exists.

    https://agree-to-disagree.com/how-tamino-proved-himself-wrong

    • David Appell says:

      ren specializes in posting a map taken at a single point in time and implying it says something about trends or the future.

      ren won’t learn.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        Climatological pseudoscientific cultists apparently believe that they can predict the future from “trends”. The IPCC disagrees, of course.

        Which type of foolishness do you subscribe to?

        Cheers.

      • Gordon Robertson says:

        DA…”ren specializes in posting a map taken at a single point in time and implying it says something about trends or the future”.

        ren agrees with the IPCC, that future climate states cannot be predicted.

    • Scott says:

      Headline: “Snow falls at Kansas City International Airport, breaking 120-year-old record”

      “The last time it snowed this early in Kansas City was on Oct. 17, 1898, when 3.3 inches of snow fell, according to the National Weather Service in Pleasant Hill.”

      “Kansas City has dropped to 31 this morning braking (sic) the record low of 32 which was set in 1943 and 1891!”

      https://www.kansascity.com/weather/article220035935.html

  36. ren says:

    You can see that the wind in the South Pacific does not react to changes in surface temperature.
    https://pics.tinypic.pl/i/00972/89e45ftkho5m.png
    https://www.longpaddock.qld.gov.au/soi/

    • David Appell says:

      Another snapshot in time that ren somehow thinks proves causality.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        How did you get on with the mind reading course refund?

        Or have you another reason to believe you can read minds?

        Your logic also appears faulty. How does somebody saying that something is apparently not influenced by another, “prove causality” (in your mind)? Climatological pseudoscientific cultists claim that correlation proves causality, in general.

        Or have the cultists abandoned their mad insistence that CO2 somehow provides energy to make thermometers hotter?

        Keep trolling. You might eventually get good at it.

        Cheers.

      • Gordon Robertson says:

        DA…”Another snapshot in time that ren somehow thinks proves causality”.

        Coming from someone who thinks a century-old proclamation by Arrhenius, that CO2 warms the atmosphere, proves causality.

        Neither he nor anyone since has proved it.

      • Mykey says:

        I am back from holidays and can see dumb and dumber are still at it.

  37. ren says:

    Where will ozone bring frost to now?
    https://pics.tinypic.pl/i/00972/7mp0q0v12l50.png
    This is the pattern of winter circulation in North America this year.

  38. Mykey says:

    Wonderful news !

    “Scottish Power has become the first of the UKs major energy firms to completely drop fossil fuels in favour of wind power. This is a pivotal shift for Scottish Power as we realise a long-term ambition. We are leaving carbon generation behind for a renewable future powered by cheaper green energy, said the companys chief executive Keith Anderson.”

    https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/scottish-power-wind-energy-renewable-drax-gas-station-climate-change-a8585961.html

    • ren says:

      There were 23,137 deaths between December 2017 and March 2018, according to the National Records of Scotland – the highest figure since 1999/2000.

      It also revealed that the seasonal increase in mortality – the number of “additional” deaths in winter – was 75% greater than in 2016/17.

      The main underlying causes of the deaths were influenza and pneumonia.
      https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-45876204

      • JDHuffman says:

        Very interesting….

        • Mykey says:

          Very irrelevant ..

          • Mike Flynn says:

            M,

            From your link –

            “While customers will still get some electricity from non-green sources that the company has purchased from other operators, . . . ”

            Oh dear. “Some?” 1%? 99%?

            Seems like a possibility for a scam here. Enormous Govt. subsidies, supported by cleverly buying electricity from non-green sources, and onselling at a considerable profit – all in the name of “green energy.”

            Some people (like yourself) have a large “bump of gullibility” in phrenological terms. Pseudoscience on top of pseudoscience. Go on, tell me how much of your own money you are investing. What could possibly go wrong with such a paragon of green moral rectitude? Good luck.

            Cheers.

  39. Mykey says:

    Well, I have tried to warn you. You can keep investing in fossil fuel stocks if you like. Me? I am making a fortune investing in renewable energy stocks.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      M,

      Good for you. I wish you every success. Just keep following the trend – predicting is only difficult if the future is involved.

      I’m not making anything at all, investing in anything. Why should I? Enough is enough, and there don’t seem to be any adverse consequences from being content.

      Thanks for the warning – I’ll ignore it, as usual. Completely useless, pointless, and irrelevant.

      Cheers,

      • Mykey says:

        “Im not making anything at all, investing in anything. Why should I? Enough is enough, and there dont seem to be any adverse consequences from being content.”
        Spoken like a true troglodyte.
        Except your are not content – judging by the quantity and content of your posts you seem awfully agitated.

        • Mike Flynn says:

          M,

          Your attempt to adorn your stupid and ignorant psycho-babble with any authority at all, has failed abysmally.

          I understand that a climatological pseudoscific cultist might redefine “contentment” to be “agitation”, but it won’t make it so, any more than redefining “cooling” to mean “warming” does.

          Do you think if you devoted more time to making an even greater fortune, it might bring you more contentment (or agitation, if you prefer)? On the other hand, you could waste your time failing to read my mind. Your choice, of course.

          By the way, how big is that fortune you are making? You must be enriching yourself at someone else’s expense – do they mind getting poorer, or don’t you give a damn? Keep at it.

          Cheers.

          • Mykey says:

            Please calm down.
            You are so agitated.
            Take my investment advice – I feel very contented.
            Remember:
            “Money can’t buy happiness, but it’s much more comfortable crying in a Mercedes”

          • Mike Flynn says:

            M,

            Are you trying to adopt the mantle of the previous psycho-babbler?

            I don’t intend to take your advice – I don’t need it.

            I never feel the need to cry, but if you feel the desire, by all means do so in the Mercedes of your choice. I presume you mean an electric Mercedes, of course. No doubt better than the Tesla?

            Choices, choices, eh? Best buy one of each from the fortune you are making – unless it’s a fantasy fortune. Then you might need to buy fantasy cars to cry in. Have fun anyway.

            Cheers.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            M,

            Hold on to your Mercedes!

            This chap had one, and bought a Tesla Model S –

            “I have decided to give up my Tesla when the buy-back agreement allows me to sell the car back to the company next August,” he said. “I will go and buy a conventional, gasoline-powered car, which is easier to refill and have much more reasonable insurance cover.”

            He owned a Mercedes E class previously.

            So you are right. Better to have a Mercedes, for some, at least!

            Cheers.

          • Mykey says:

            FYI, I am looking at both Tesla and Daimler (Mercedes Benz) share prices at the moment but am not interested.

            BTW, I tried reading your mind but the pages were blank.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            M,

            You appear a liittle odd. You wrote –

            “FYI, I am looking at both Tesla and Daimler (Mercedes Benz) share prices at the moment but am not interested.”

            Why are you wasting your time looking at things you profess no interest in? Is the fortune you are currently making not large enough, perhaps?

            I am pleased you now admit you cannot read my mind, for whatever specious reason you propose. Maybe you could try convincing people that you can actually describe the mythical GHE, rather than trying to impress people with your delusional claims of your fortune generating ability.

            You could always try applying part of this supposed fortune to establishing a testable GHE hypothesis, or funding some experiments to demonstrate the heat generating properties of CO2. Nobody has yet managed to do either, but maybe they did not have access to the funds which you claim to possess.

            Until then, of course, not even a useful GHE description. No testable GHE hypothesis. No magical CO2 heating properties. Nothing.

            Cheers.

          • Mykey says:

            I mean: I am not interested in buying those shares. I also hope you are not tempted to buy them.
            As to what I spend my fortune on, I am looking at a KOENIGSEGG CCXR TREVITA

            If I were you, I would spend some money getting a life and give up shouting at the clouds.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            M,

            I’m sure you are good at looking at things you can never own.

            Your hopes regarding what you wish me to do are likely to be dashed. I do as I wish – so far so good. I remain content.

            I don’t bother looking at stocks or other so-called “investments”. No need. I’m not greedy – I seem to be doing OK. Thanks for the interest you show in telling me how to spend my money, but I am rejecting your foolish advice as usual.

            I have a perfectly adequate life. I hope you enjoy yours.

            Cheers.

    • Dan Pangburn says:

      Eventually even non-engineers might realize that renewables (wind turbines and commercial solar) are not sustainable. Renewables do not produce as much energy in their lifetime as is consumed in their manufacture, installation and maintenance. Renewables can exist now only because of the energy provided by fossil fuels. The necessity for fossil fueled backup and/ or storage makes it worse.

      • Mykey says:

        Wrong.

      • David Appell says:

        Dan Pangburn says:
        Renewables do not produce as much energy in their lifetime as is consumed in their manufacture, installation and maintenance.

        Proof?

        • Mike Flynn says:

          DA,

          Are you disagreeing with Dan Pangburn’s statement? No?

          Just trolling for effect, eh?

          Why am I not surprised?

          Questions, questions. It’s a pity you have no answers.

          Cheers.

        • Dan Pangburn says:

          The fallacy of renewables is revealed with simple arithmetic.

          5 mW wind turbine, avg output 1/3 nameplate, 20 yr life, electricity @ wholesale 3 cents per kwh produces $8.8E6.

          Installed cost @ $1.7E6/mW = $8.5E6.

          Add the cost of energy storage facility and energy availability loss during storage/retrieval, or initial and maintenance cost of standby CCGT for low wind periods. Add the cost of land lease, maintenance, administration.

          Solar voltaic and solar thermal are even worse with special concern for disposal and/or recycling at end-of-life (about 15 yr for PV).

          The dollar relation is a proxy for energy relation. Bottom line, the energy consumed to design, manufacture, install, maintain and administer renewables exceeds the energy they produce in their lifetime.

          Without the energy provided by other sources renewables could not exist.

  40. More people should be talking about David Dilley. He correctly predicted the 2017 hurricane season in April 2017, when no other hurricane forecaster was predicting a harsh season, amd then a month later in May, 2017, correctly predicted the 2018 season would be just as bad. That’s a gutsy forecast, and he nailed it!

  41. Rob Mitchell says:

    I’ve always noticed that in public forums, liberals brag about their “wealth” more than anybody. And they don’t stop there. Then, they try to tell everybody else what kind of vehicle they should buy, and what kind of electricity to buy to power their homes. They have no respect for “freedom of choice.” Liberals want to use government force to make those decisions for you.

    How do I know this? Well, I happen to be a Tesla owner myself. And I communicate with fellow Tesla owners in the Tesla Forum. It is stunning to me to see how elitist and snobby many Tesla owners are, especially the ones from California. The Tesla leftists want to ban all gasoline powered motor vehicles, and shut down all coal/natural gas power plants. They actually believe solar and wind can replace fossil fueled power plants and meet world-wide energy demand with it.

    Of course this is fantasy world stuff. When I point this out to them, they just cover up their eyes and ears and go “lalalalalalalalalalalala.” Never mind the fact that not everywhere in the world has a lot of wind, or a lot of sun. Facts and the real world mean nothing to them. I have been advocating the growth of Tesla and Battery Electric Vehicles (BEVs) through the free market. Allow the individual to make the decision for him or herself about buying a BEV without any pressure from a government law or regulation. But that’s just not good enough for these liberals. “We don’t have enough time for that,” they say. The earth is heating up, and worldwide catastrophe will result.

    Many of the Tesla liberals are claiming the sea level will rise by 20 feet during this century if we don’t act on climate change. I challenged them about the Arctic sea ice. I told them the Arctic sea ice extent minimum in 2012 was 3,387,000 km2. For the 6 subsequent years in a row, the Arctic sea ice minimum has closed higher than the 2012 minimum. I told them it will close higher for an additional 5 years. I tried to get one of those liberals to challenge me. None of them would. Instead, they ran off with their tails in between their legs, yelping at me by calling me a climate change denier!

  42. barry says:

    I’m not sure I understand the point of the top post.

    Did someone somewhere say that there would be more US-landfalling hurricanes at +Cat3 over time?

    Did someone somewhere say that the number of Cat3 hurricanes anywhere would increase over time?

    As far as I’m aware the projection is not about more hurricanes but about hurricane intensity increasing in a warming world.

    And the US coastline is a small part of the Atlantic, so why is that particular metric supposed to be indicative of hurricanes generally?

    If there a scientific point being made here, or something else?

    • Norman says:

      barry

      My opinion of Dr. Spencer’s weather related posts is as a counter weight to MSM accounts of weather events.

      If some in the climate change community want to attribute hurricane Michael to global warming then they need to look at a long term trend of hurricanes in this area to determine if there is any noticeable difference.

      Here is one example:
      https://tamino.wordpress.com/2018/10/13/super-power-hurricanes-how-much-more-proof-do-you-need/

      https://www.skepticalscience.com/2018-SkS-Weekly-Digest_41.html

      If one group can use one hurricane to bolster emotional manipulation of the faithful, it is a valuable counter weight for Roy Spencer to show that such manipulation of not valid.

    • barry says:

      My opinion of Dr. Spencer’s weather related posts is as a counter weight to MSM accounts of weather events.

      The news sensationalizes things. I agree that Roy is posting in a similar vein with articles like these. It’s NOT a scientific point he’s making.

      If some in the climate change community want to attribute hurricane Michael to global warming…

      But that’s an inaccurate – and very typically inaccurate – statement. Neither article attributes the formation of hurricane Michael to global warming.

      See what happened when I specified? Of course that’s not strictly what you meant, but someone else reading your words won’t get it.

      The MSM muddies the waters. So does Roy with articles like the top post.

      In the game of perception management truth is lost.

      • Norman says:

        barry

        You sound like one of the few not bitten by the tribal bug of politics where you must choose a side and support that side rejecting truth in the process.

        You have a point with your post.

        Even if Roy Spencer acts like a counter weight it may still smear a complex picture. Always better to try and stick with the science.

        However, the more terrible the storm, fire or flood, there is a subtle but steady push to link these to climate change to attempt to create an emotional state in the common people (fear and panic) to evoke a change.

        The goal does not seem to use the logical and rational parts of the brain to convince the truth of a matter but more the emotional centers.

        Wouldn’t Roy’s counter weight release his/her readers from this state of emotional fear and panic and move the mind back to the rational logic centers for more intelligent debate over the issue?

      • barry says:

        What’s wrong with just coolly telling the whole truth?

        The “Story of the Week mentioned at skepticalscience is about the recent IPCC announcement and hurricane Michael, and includes this line early in the piece:

        “The fact that both events occurred within a few days of each other is pure coincidence, of course. But it does leave the feeling that Nature just put one or more planetary-scale exclamation marks on the main takeaway from the IPCC report…”

        The nuance in even the sensationalism is obscured with yet more sensationalism. The truth is lost.

        Creating confusion is a tactic that would suit one side of the debate only. That’s the result of infowars.

  43. Mike Roberts says:

    An AP fact check on this said,

    But looking at just major hurricanes that hit the United States is not the right way to gauge their activity. That’s because the U.S. coastline is such a small fraction of the overall Atlantic, Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico, where hurricanes brew and at times hit other countries, scientists said. Looking at just those hurricanes “is like using how much it rained in your region on a given week as a measure of how much it rained across the entire country,” said Texas Tech climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe.

    An Associated Press examination in 2017 of how many major hurricanes formed found that the past 30 years had 90 major hurricanes, an average of three a year from 1988 to 2017. That’s 48 percent more than during the previous 30 years. Scientists use 30-year time periods to take natural cycles into account.

    Read more here: https://www.thenewstribune.com/news/business/article220171985.html#storylink=cpy

  44. Mike Flynn says:

    M,

    “But looking at just major hurricanes that hit the United States is not the right way to gauge their activity.

    Well, yes, it is. Otherwise, you would look at something else, wouldn’t you?

    Typical stupidity from the likes of Borenstein and Hayhoe (amongst others). Journalistic and climatological pseudoscientific claptrap.The AP examination is nonsense. Try looking for the world wide objective data to back up the AP claim. I hesitate (not really) to point out that 95% of the worlds population lives in the 95% of the land mass that is not the USA.

    What about the other 95% of the world? Doesn’t matter? Did the rest of the world have a similar 12 year hurricane hiatus to the US? Does CO2 only work its magic in a completely unpredictable fashion in the US, but is predictable in the rest of the world?

    Complete nonsense.

    No GHE hypothesis. No AGW theory. Nothing. Borenstein and Hayhoe are suffering from some form of mental derangement – similar to that exhibited by Schmidt, Mann, Hansen and the rest of the climatological pseudoscientific cultists.

    All part of the rich tapestry of life, I guess.

    Cheers.

  45. barry says:

    Looking at US-landfalling hurricanes will tell you nothing about the connection between global warming and hurricanes, if any. It’s a small proportion of all hurricanes.

    I’m sure that if some other coastline showed a marked increase in landfalling hurricanes over time, “skeptics” would be making exactly the same point.

    • Mike Roberts says:

      Landfall is a rather haphazard feature of hurricanes and tropical storms. Better to check all hurricanes, their strength, their size, their rainfall and how long lived. Landfall is not really a feature of hurricanes themselves or a factor in determining if storms are getting more powerful or more frequent. Many Atlantic and some Pacific area hurricanes don’t make landfall or make landfall outside of the US.

  46. Snape says:

    Barry

    I cant even tell why Roys opinion is. Does he believe a warmer ocean wont necessarily produce stronger hurricanes, or is he saying the water off the US coast hasnt been getting warmer?

    Even more astounding is that out of the top 10 warmest Gulf years since 1860, 7 occurred before 1970,……

    I wonder if those years produced strong, landfalling hurricanes? After all, one of the top 10 occurred this year, and produced Michael.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      His opinion seems to be that this sort of thing –

      “Prof. Michael E. Mann of Penn State told me that Hurricane Michael should be a wake-up call. As should have Katrina, Irene, Sandy, Harvey, Irma, Florence,” he added wryly. “In each of these storms we can see the impact of climate change: Warmer seas means more energy to intensify these storms, more wind damage, bigger storm surge and more coastal flooding.”

      – is just climatological pseudoscientific cultist fearmongering. As are similar comments from similarly delusional persons.

      Dr Spencer might even accept that the atmosphere behaves chaotically, for all I know. Chaos theory might explain the unpredictability of weather, and hence climate. Fools, fanatics, and charlatans claim to be able to foresee the outcomes of chaotic deterministic systems, like the atmosphere.

      My view is that such people are deluded – quite mad. No testable GHE hypothesis, no AGW theory, and the Earth has been cooling for four and a half billion years.

      Seems pretty clear to me. You are free to believe what you like – just don’t expect me to pay for your fantasy.

      Cheers.

      • David Appell says:

        …and the Earth has been cooling for four and a half billion years.

        Though asked many times, you have never once shown data proving this.

        • Mike Flynn says:

          DA,

          Are you disagreeing with me? Have you a particular reason based on science, or are you just trolling? Are you as stupid and ignorant as the usual climatological pseudoscientific cultist, who seems to believe that the Earth was created at absolute zero, and some magical process later created a hot core, mantle, and so on!

          Feel free to believe whatever you like. You seem to be besotted with pal reviewed scientific papers authored by non-scientists, and various fools, frauds, and deluded cultists.

          Maybe you could chase up a few papers authored by real scientists, which seem to support my assumption that the Earth’s surface was originally molten, and has since cooled. Only if you wish, of course.

          Or you could just keep sprouting climatological pseudoscientific cultist nonsense. Still no testable GHE hypothesis, no AGW theory, and Michael Mann’s claim to be a Nobel Prize winner was pure delusion.

          Who cares anyway?

          Cheers.

    • barry says:

      I think one can get Roy’s general opinion fairly easily.

      He agrees that the world will get a bit warmer with more GHGs in the atmosphere.

      He thinks it very unlikely that this ‘forcing’ will produce change significant enough to warrant making it part of any policy plan at government level, because it would be a waste of govt/taxpayer money, which he sees as a very bad idea.

      He feels strongly enough about this to go to Washington and speak to Congress. Like James Hansen, but with an opposing view, he feels passionately enough to agree to enter the political arena and deliver his view on the science.

      It’s possible his faith plays a role. Apart from a signature on a faith-invested document on climate change, I have no further evidence to fashion a convinced opinion on that.

      And he is not shy about playing the perception game. Whatever drives him, and I don’t believe it is a dispassionate interest in truth, it leads him to create this blog and post a few times a month. Once on a technical update, and several times on various issues, from cautioning skeptics on bad arguments, to countering ‘perception’ issues with more rhetorical argument that duscursive science.

      He is a player, not a neutral party. Plenty of those around the debate.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        b,

        I am the bearer of sad tidings.

        Science doesn’t care whether you are a player, a neutral party, or a climatological pseudoscientific cultist.

        Newton’s Law of universal gravitation, which describes gravity as a force which causes any two bodies to be attracted to each other, with the force proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them, doesn’t respond to debate.

        Nor do the Laws of Thermodynamics, Avogadro’s Law, Ohm’s Law or any number of physical laws which totally ignore opinion.

        Perceptify away, Maybe you could come up with a testable GHE hypothesis (unfortunately you would have to describe the GHE in useful terms, first). That would be a great start.

        Just making a lot of noise about the evils of CO2 is not science. So sad, too bad.

        Cheers.

        • David Appell says:

          Description of the greenhouse effect:

          “IN its normal state, the Earth-atmosphere system absorbs solar radiation and maintains global energy balance by re-radiating this energy to space as infrared or longwave radiation. The intervening atmosphere absorbs and emits the longwave radiation, but as the atmosphere is colder than the surface, it absorbs more energy than it emits upward to space. The energy that escapes to space is significantly smaller than that emitted by the surface. The difference, the energy trapped in the atmosphere, is popularly referred as the greenhouse effect, G.”

          – A. Raval and V. Ramanathan, Observational determination of the greenhouse effect, Nature v342 14 Dec 1989, pp 758-761.
          https://www.nature.com/articles/342758a0
          https://www.nature.com/articles/342758a0.pdf

          Proof of the greenhouse effect:
          https://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/schmidt_05/curve_s.gif

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Still avoiding the point, by pushing delusional nonsense. “Heat trapping” does not exist. At night, the surface loses all the heat which the Sun supplied during the day, plus a little bit of the Earth’s interior heat. I’m just paraphrasing a scientist who is remembered by having a few things named in his honour.

            Unfortunately, your nonsense fails at night. The temperature falls. Likewise in winter, or even during a total solar eclipse.

            If you must appeal to authority, choose a better one. You sound like you believe in unicorns – many descriptions exist for this mythic beast. It is even depicted as part of the Royal Coat of Arms – “According to legend a free unicorn was considered a very dangerous beast; therefore the heraldic unicorn is chained, . . .”

            There you go – described, depicted and chained! Still doesn’t exist, just like yout mythical “heat trapping ” GHE!

            Keep me laughing.

            Cheers.

  47. Snape says:

    Darn it. When I use my wifes phone, quotation marks disappear (the sentence in the middle belongs to Roy, not me). Go figure.

  48. ren says:

    The surface temperature in region Nino 1 + 2 is important for circulation in winter in North America.
    https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/analysis/ocean/nino12.png
    Tonight the wave of frost will attack in the northeast.
    https://pics.tinypic.pl/i/00973/hsuyizn5wyd1.png

  49. ren says:

    The Beaufort Sea and the Canadian Archipelago quickly freeze.
    https://files.tinypic.pl/i/00973/z2privjemk27.png

  50. Ric says:

    So its interesting to see that the extent of ice coverage in the Beaufort Sea is the highest in five years. Is this correct, ren?

    • barry says:

      Interesting? I guess, if you’re interested in weather.

      It’s rained 2 weeks straight in my home town in a month where that doesn’t usually happen. I can’t remember it ever happening.

      Is it meaningful? If I want to know that there’s a bunch of questions to ask.

      The first is – what’s the long-term record say?

      That’s just the first question.

      If I’m interested in something more meaningful that random weather fluctuations.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        b,

        You wrote –

        ” . . . whats the long-term record say?”

        Over the last four and a half billion years, the record shouts “It’s a lot, lot colder!!”

        Feel free to pick a shorter period if you don’t accept inconvenient fact.

        Cheers.

        • Fritz Kraut says:

          Mike Flynn says:
          October 18, 2018 at 4:42 PM

          Feel free to pick a shorter period if you don’t accept inconvenient fact.
          __________________________________________________

          Why picking at all? Picking is always suspisious.
          Why dont you just use a COMPLETE data-serie with unique quality from the same source?
          One data-serie, for example, with very high quality is available since 1979.
          http://web.nersc.no/WebData/arctic-roos.org/observation/ssmi_range_ice-area.png
          Didnt you know it, or dont you like it for some reason?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            FK,

            Original average temperature of molten surface – more than now.

            If you disagree, please let me know why.

            Why would I prefer 40 years of data to four and a half billion years?

            The GHE experiment, performed by Mother Nature over a four and a half billion years, with a molten ball of rock, surrounded by an atmosphere varying from nearly 100% CO2, to dangerously low levels recently, shows that the mythical GHE has no heating effect whatsoever!

            The result of this experiment has resulted in thousands of degrees of cooling. Cooling. Look down between your feet if you doubt me. No longer molten.

            Away with ye, climatological pseudoscientific cultist! Try science, if you can cope with fact over fantasy.

            Cheers.

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            October 18, 2018 at 6:13 PM
            Why would I prefer 40 years of data to four and a half billion years?
            ____________________________________________

            Four and half a billion years??
            May I remember you what you just said:

            “…the extent of ice coverage in the Beaufort Sea is the highest in five years.”

            What do you want to tell us with this weatherevent?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            FK,

            You are confused.

            You might be referring to Ric, who wrote –

            “So its interesting to see that the extent of ice coverage in the Beaufort Sea is the highest in five years. Is this correct, ren?”

            You also seem to be confused about climate. Climate is the average of weather events taken over an arbitrary period. This is quite meaningless – the weather has already occurred. Averaging does not change the past, nor predict the future. A complete waste of time, but worshipped by climatological pseudoscientific cultists – who knows why?

            You cannot even describe the GHE, let alone proposed a testable GHE hypothesis. You just keep shouting that CO2 is evil, like every other stupid and ignorant cultist predicting the end of the world!

            Still no GHE. No AGW theory. Just an endless procession of nutters – some well meaning, but nutters nevertheless.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Proof of the greenhouse effect on Venus:

            https://tinyurl.com/y7o8kzyd (via Jo Nova)

          • David Appell says:

            Description of the greenhouse effect:

            “IN its normal state, the Earth-atmosphere system absorbs solar radiation and maintains global energy balance by re-radiating this energy to space as infrared or longwave radiation. The intervening atmosphere absorbs and emits the longwave radiation, but as the atmosphere is colder than the surface, it absorbs more energy than it emits upward to space. The energy that escapes to space is significantly smaller than that emitted by the surface. The difference, the energy trapped in the atmosphere, is popularly referred as the greenhouse effect, G.”

            – A. Raval and V. Ramanathan, Observational determination of the greenhouse effect, Nature v342 14 Dec 1989, pp 758-761.
            https://www.nature.com/articles/342758a0
            https://www.nature.com/articles/342758a0.pdf

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Bad luck. The surface cools at night. The Earth has cooled for four and a half billion years. No heat accumulation there. Your authority is deluded. Probably just as witless as Schmidt and his “CO2 control knob”!

            Keep posting the humour. What’s your next brilliant attempt to convert fantasy into fact? Maybe you could threaten to hold your breath until you go blue in the face?

            I’d like to see that.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            “The Earth cools at night” is hardly a counterpoint to the greenhouse effect, as described by Raval and Ramanathan.

            Actually, the fact the nighttime surface doesn’t *drastically* cool at night, as on the Moon and Mercury, is very good evidence FOR the greenhouse effect.

          • David Appell says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            Climate is the average of weather events taken over an arbitrary period. This is quite meaningless the weather has already occurred.

            That’s perhaps your stupidest comment yet.

            Averages always are about past events. Unless you can read the future.

            Baltasar Gracian: “Never from obstinacy take the wrong side because your opponent has anticipated you by taking the right one.”

    • Fritz Kraut says:

      Ric says:
      October 18, 2018 at 2:02 AM

      …extent of ice coverage in the Beaufort Sea is the highest in five years.
      ____________________________________________

      Isnt the development of whole arctis for a 39 years much much more interesting than cherrypicking just a few datas?
      http://web.nersc.no/WebData/arctic-roos.org/observation/ssmi_mdev_ice-area.png

      • Mike Flynn says:

        FK,

        Why should anyone care? Does it make a difference? Past happenings do not predict the future.

        Carry on worrying if you like. You can worry on my behalf, if it makes you feel better.

        Cheers.

        • Fritz Kraut says:

          Mike Flynn says:
          October 18, 2018 at 8:18 PM

          FK,

          “Why should anyone care?”
          For better reason than to care about change within 5 years.

          “Does it make a difference?”
          39 are a little bit mor meaningfull than 5 years.

          “Past happenings do not predict the future.”
          No, they just desribe the past.

          But I predict: Melting will go on for a very long time.

    • Carbon500 says:

      Fritz Kraut: A comment you attribute to Mike Flynn was actually made by Ric:
      October 18, 2018 at 2:02 AM
      So its interesting to see that the extent of ice coverage in the Beaufort Sea is the highest in five years. Is this correct, ren?

  51. ren says:

    Below are time series plots comparing sea ice extent over the last four weeks for this year compared to the last four weeks of the previous four years for the MASIE regions. Click on the image for a larger view.
    MASIE Time Series Plots

  52. barry says:

    Here’s the link for ren’s comment:

    https://tinyurl.com/ybwbmxul

    That’s for the Arctic regions. Only. Top graph is all-Arctic, the one’s below are sub-regions.

    This is for the last month. No long-term records on that page, just this past 30 days and the same 30 calendar days for the previous 4 years. So we are looking at weather fluctuation for the same month for the last 5 years – nothing else. This is not a look at long-term climate change (or not).

    Long-term records are available for anyone interested in something more than weather variety.

  53. Rob Mitchell says:

    Global Warming alarmists are always pointing to single weather events as evidence of human-caused global warming. ren is good at countering that game with a series of events that tells a different story.

  54. Rob Mitchell says:

    Here is an example how the global warming advocates are trying to show that tornadoes are shifting east because of climate change.

    https://apnews.com/9ddb3deeec9a49d6a1349b78f1ca0f03

    In the previous post by Dr. Spencer, he showed how the overall tornado count is way down for 2018. Some folks are trying to show that tornadoes are doing a climate change shift to the east. Hey, has anybody ever thought that the cold month of April might of had something to do with the lack of tornadoes in the usual places?

    • barry says:

      Hey, has anybody ever thought that the cold month of April might of had something to do with the lack of tornadoes in the usual places?

      https://www.google.com/

      • Rob Mitchell says:

        Is there some sort of point you are trying to make barry boy?

      • barry says:

        Yep. Rhetorical questions are rhetorical questions. I’m trying to help you displace the snipe with genuine curiosity. A lot of people lose the knack in these ‘debates’.

        • Rob Mitchell says:

          If I want your help, I would ask for it. I don’t need it. All I am doing is countering the mantra that any change in weather or climate is do to human-caused global warming.

        • barry says:

          Yep, you are bringing counter-mantra. I don’t think we need more propagandists, but whatever floats your boat.

    • David Appell says:

      Rob Mitchell says:
      In the previous post by Dr. Spencer, he showed how the overall tornado count is way down for 2018.

      One year does not make a trend. Surely you know that.

      • Rob Mitchell says:

        Hey DA, the tornado count has been down for more than just one year. The only point I am making is that the fear tactic by global warming alarmists that the earth will have more severe storms due to human-caused global warming isn’t panning out.

  55. Rob Mitchell says:

    The lack of global warming plus the lack of polar ice melting is resulting in hysterical reactions by the advocates for human-caused global warming theory.

    They say “we must act now before it is too late!” All we have to do is slap a big carbon tax onto the American worker, and the rest of the world will follow our lead. Anybody who believes that are the same ones who think the Arctic ice should have melted away to oblivion already.

    • David Appell says:

      Some countries already have a carbon tax.

      A carbon tax and dividend, where every American gets an equal proportion of the entire tax collected, would see most American workers get back more than they spend.

    • Svante says:

      Rob Mitchell says:

      They say “we must act now before it is too late!” All we have to do is slap a big carbon tax onto the American worker, and the rest of the world will follow our lead. Anybody who believes that are the same ones who think the Arctic ice should have melted away to oblivion already.

      They are not the only ones, it’s me too.

      America already has taxes, let’s cut some that cause the wrong behavior, for example income tax. It’s easier to tax a few fossil fuel producers than millions of workers. Imports can be taxed at the border unless they prefer to tax carbon themselves.

      As it is, we can not achieve Pareto optimum:
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality#/media/File:Negative_externality.svg

    • Bindidon says:

      “The lack of global warming plus the lack of polar ice melting is resulting in hysterical reactions…”

      Hysterical? Pfff.

      Look at the graph below, Rob Mitchell, and at the white plot showing the sum of ice extent near both poles.

      https://drive.google.com/file/d/1INFXAVHzkkxFAjdyORWFwhZoz720NzVA/view

      There is actually an uptick like in 2002-2003, 2007-2008 and 2012-2013, but to speak about a lack of polar melting is a bit strange, isn’t it?

      If there was no polar ice melting, wouldn’t the 12 month running average be pretty flat?

      • Mike Flynn says:

        B,

        More pointless graphology. Show me the graph that illustrates the progressive icing up of Antarctica, why don’t you?

        How many species of flora and fauna were wiped out by the cooling? You don’t care, do you?

        Have you a graph showing the coming and going of the glaciers which once covered Europe, and other places? All due to the pernicious effects of CO2?

        Colour me unconvinced. You’re pushing garbage, hoping that brightly coloured pictures will convince simpletons that you know more than they do. Try beads and mirrors – that seems to have worked in the past.

        Or you could try posing stupid gotchas, I suppose.

        Cheers.

        • Bindidon says:

          As usual: Flynn tries to supersede his dog’s barking, as Rose so nicely wrote, and utterly fails in the job.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            B,

            I am sure that that Rose is a fine example of a womanly woman’s woman, but it still doesn’t get rid of the inconvenient fact that the IPCC wrote –

            “The climate system is a coupled non-linear chaotic system, and therefore the long-term prediction of future climate states is not possible.”

            Try and show the IPCC was wrong. If you can’t, all your manly masculinity, combined with Rose’s womanly femininity (however directed), won’t change the fact that all your brightly coloured graphs are not worth a brass razoo.

            So sad, too bad. You appear to be just another witless climatological pseudoscientific cultist, lurching in all directions in a pointless effort to avoid facing realty. Gnashing your teeth, and rending your garments, (or Rose’s, if that makes you feel better), won’t miraculously produce a testable GHE hypothesis, will it?

            Keep praying – at least one of you should get down on your knees, don’t you think? Oh joy! Oh happiness! Oh Rose!

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            MF: Define “long-term.”

      • Rob Mitchell says:

        Click Sea Ice on the left. There is an abundance of sea ice data there.

        http://www.climate4you.com/

        During this multi-decadal warming period, tell me where the alarm is concerning polar ice?

  56. Dan Pangburn says:

    Average global temperature is about what it was in 2002.
    Atmospheric CO2 since 2002 has increased by 40% of the increase 1800 to 2017. CO2 (or any other ghg which does not condense in the atmosphere) apparently has little if any effect on temperature. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Dp50wMHU4AAl6J2.jpg

    • David Appell says:

      Amount of surface warming since Jan 2002 = +0.30 C = +0.54 F.

      (N.O.A.A. data;
      link not allowed here)

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        If a thermometer gets hotter, and CO2 doesn’t seem to be responsible, a real scientist might go looking for the heat source responsible.

        A climatological pseudoscientific cultist, on the other hand, would reject reality, and continue to believe in the magical and strangely evil properties of CO2.

        Such nutters would probably rush about proclaiming “Doom, doom!” – at some time in the future, of course. Standard for end-of-the-world fanatics.

        Cheers.

        • David Appell says:

          Flynnbot says:
          If a thermometer gets hotter, and CO2 doesnt seem to be responsible, a real scientist might go looking for the heat source responsible.

          CO2 *does* seem to be (in large part) responsible:

          “Increases in greenhouse forcing inferred from the outgoing longwave radiation spectra of the Earth in 1970 and 1997,” J.E. Harries et al, Nature 410, 355-357 (15 March 2001).
          http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v410/n6826/abs/410355a0.html
          “Radiative forcing measured at Earths surface corroborate the increasing greenhouse effect,” R. Philipona et al, Geo Res Letters, v31 L03202 (2004).
          http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2003GL018765/abstract

          “Observational determination of surface radiative forcing by CO2 from 2000 to 2010,” D. R. Feldman et al, Nature 519, 339343 (19 March 2015).
          http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v519/n7543/full/nature14240.html

        • Mike Flynn says:

          DA,

          Quite apart from anything else, the IPCC wrote –

          “The climate system is a coupled non-linear chaotic system, and therefore the long-term prediction of future climate states is not possible.”

          You obviously choose to disagree. Good for you – if you think being disagreeable helps you.

          Linking to witless papers using the term “radiative forcing” does you no good at all. There is no GHE description that leads to a testable GHE hypothesis. Fanciful nonsense involving “heat trapping” or “energy budgets” is just more climatological pseudoscientific claptrap.

          I might point out for the intellectually impaired, that correlation is not causation – if that is what you are trying to imply. No GHE, no CO2 generated rise in temperatures, no global heating.

          Just ever more strident predictions of doom, which even the IPCC denies is impossible, if future climate states are involved.

          Off you go, David, be even more disagreeable if you feel it wil help.

          Cheers.

      • Dan Pangburn says:

        DA,, Is that before or after adjustments??

        All reporting agencies are showing a downtrend following the 2015/2016 el Nino peak. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DnZKG7qUwAAXHyM.jpg

        • Bindidon says:

          How could it be else, Dan Pangburn, after the third highest El Nino peak since over 100 years?

          If you start a time series with a very high value and end it with a lower one, your trend estimate automatically becomes negative.

          But what are your trends worth anyway? They are based on such a small period (less than five years!) that their statistical significance mostly is zero dot zero.

          Look at Excel’s linear estimate for UAH 6.0 LT, jan 16-sep 18, in C / decade:

          -0.126 +- 0.239

          • Dan Pangburn says:

            Trends smooth out the effectively stochastic scatter of individual measurements. They have no predictive ability e.g. the 32 year downtrend from about 1941 to 1973 was followed by the 32 year uptrend from 1973 to 2005.

            Statistical inference is not an excuse to ignore common sense i.e. knowledge+logic. Blank out the influence of el Nino and the satellite measured average global temperature trend has been approximately flat since about 2002.

          • barry says:

            But then you’re arbitrarily omitting what you think must be omitted. You’re no closer to figuring out any change underlying the variability that will obscure it for such a short time period.

          • David Appell says:

            Dan Pangburn says:
            Trends smooth out the effectively stochastic scatter of individual measurements. They have no predictive ability

            Nobody thinks they do.

            But they do reflect forcings and feedbacks on climate.

          • David Appell says:

            Dan Pangburn says:
            Blank out the influence of el Nino and the satellite measured average global temperature trend has been approximately flat since about 2002.

            And blank out the influence of La Nina, too, right?

            Why do El Nino years keep getting warmer, La Nina years keep getting warmer, and neutral years keep getting warmer?

            graphic:
            https://davidappell.blogspot.com/2018/07/increasing-temperatures-of-enso-seasons.html

      • barry says:

        +0.2 C according to UAH, the lowest post-2000 trend among all data sets.

        http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah6/plot/uah6/from:2002/trend

    • barry says:

      Average global temperature is about what it was in 2002.

      Hmmmm.

      http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/wti/plot/wti/from:2002/trend

      Some recent monthly anomaly is equivalent to another monthly anomaly back then? Ok, but that’s a random result of variability. You can’t say anything about average global temperature, because that s a more general condition. And the positive trend indicates (but in no way proves) that the background temp is generally warmer.

      So let’s look at another metric:

      Ocean Heat Content

      Warmer now than in 2002, and I believe that is the case even factoring uncertainty.

      So let’s look elsewhere. Global sea ice?

      What other metrics shall we consider, Dan, to have a look at the entire system? Warming is meant to be of the entire system, after all, not just a variable thin slice of the lower atmosphere.

      And seeing as we are measuring temps only from 2002, we should make that consistent with CO2 development and only consider the percentage change from 2002 to 2017.

      373 –> 406 ppm

      That is a 9% increase.

      Now, the immediate climate sensitivity to CO2 increase (Transient Climate Response) is 1.75C for a doubling of CO2 at the time of doubling.

      So 9% of that figure is 0.16C – this is the IPCC mean estimate of response to CO2 warming over the period 2002 to 2017.

      As monthly and annual fluctuations are more than that amount, there would be no way to tell if there was such background warming just by comparing a month or even a year at the beginning and the end of the series.

      That is even if we KNEW for sure there had been that much warming, it could easily be obscured by monthly comparisons at each end of the series.

      The mean trend for the average of both satellite and two surface records for that period is 0.164 C/decade, which would equate to an overall warming of 0.262 C for the period – way higher than should have occurred according to the mean IPCC estimate.

      But the linear trend is not remotely statistically significant, and there is a whopper of an el Nino right at the end, so it would be foolhardy to trust in that mean trend.

      The UAH mean trend for the period, by the way, is 0.132 C/decade, yielding an overall warming of 0.211 C for the period – also larger than the amount according to IPCC immediate climate sensitivity. Of course, the same caveats apply.

      The takeaway?

      FFS stop trying to make claims based on short-term data. It’s either grossly ignorant or deliberately mendacious, and I don’t think you’re stupid, Dan.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        b,

        FFS stop being grossly ignorant or deliberately mendacious. The long term data needs only two points – as far back as possible, and now.

        Then – molten. Now, not molten. Cooling, and lots of it. No wonder nobody can put the GHE into words! A heating effect that cools things!

        Absolutely appropriate for climatological pseudoscientific cultists, who redefine cooling to mean heating!

        Keep up the humour – we ain’t never had too much fun!

        Cheers.

        • David Appell says:

          Flynnbot says:
          No wonder nobody can put the GHE into words!

          Why do you keep ignoring descriptions of the GHE?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Which description? You can’t seem to make up your mind.

            Obviously, any supposed description based on “heat trapping”, and which does not account for four and a half billion years of the Earth demonstrably cooling, is the product of a delusional mind.

            You might as well claim that a unicorn exists because it has been “described”!

            Provide something remotely connected to the scientific method, at least.

            Off you go. How hard can it be? Ask the IPCC for help, if you like.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Descriptions like this:

            “…the transmittance of the atmosphere increases as the amount of GHGs in it drops.”

            Mike Flynn, May 23, 2017 at 5:16 PM
            http://www.drroyspencer.com/2017/05/uah-global-temperature-update-for-april-2017-0-27-deg-c/#comment-247988

          • David Appell says:

            Or like this:

            “Less GHGs less impediment to radiation reaching the surface from the Sun, or being emitted by the surface to outer space.”

            – Mike Flynn, May 5, 2017 at 9:22 PM
            http://www.drroyspencer.com/2017/05/uah-global-temperature-update-for-april-2017-0-27-deg-c/#comment-245860

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            October 21, 2018 at 4:47 PM

            DA,

            Which description? You can’t seem to make up your mind.

            Obviously, any supposed description based on “heat trapping”, and which does not account for four and a half billion years of the Earth demonstrably cooling, is the product of a delusional mind.
            ______________________________________________
            Obviously heat-trapping is absolutly the correct basis of GHE.
            Greenhousegases trap infrared radiation — the radiant heat energy that the Earth naturally emits to outer space in response to solar heating.
            And of course this “trapping” works since 4 billions of years. Since atmosphere with greenhaousgases exist on earth.

      • Nate says:

        Mike,

        “Then molten. Now, not molten. Cooling, and lots of it.”

        Every spring, my hemisphere warms up-a lot.

        How could that be if the Earth is supposed to be cooling?

        20,000 years ago, the whole friggin Earth began warming, and kept warming for 10,000 years.

        How could that be if the Earth is supposed be cooling?

        It boggles the mind.

        Maybe YOU can explain. Or just quit spouting bullshit!

        You decide.

        • Dan Pangburn says:

          And besides that, there have been a snowball earth and at least three ice ages which happened during about 4 billion years of evolution, with only the last half billion or so on land.

        • barry says:

          I believe Dan and Mike think their comments are not just relevant but clever. I’m surprised they know how to spell.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            b,

            Close. I think my comments are factual until demonstrated to be otherwise. Generally relevant, as well. I am clever enough, compared to you, quite obviously.

            Your standard of cleverness is amply demonstrated by your comment that you are surprised that some people know how to spell.

            Did you spend much time devising that particular piece of nonsensical irrelevance?

            How are you getting along finding a useful definition of the GHE, capable of forming the basis of a testable GHE hypothesis? Not well? How hard can it be?

            Keep att it.

            Cheers.

        • Mike Flynn says:

          N,

          You don’t disagree with anything I said, but you can’t accept facts.

          The Earth is a large blob of molten stuff, floating in an environment of around 4 K. Try to convince a real scientist that it is heating rather than cooling, and you may well be subjected to gales of laughter.

          Your remark about the seasons is just pointless – every autumn, it cools down a lot, as well. The Sun still shines as it has done for four and a half billion years or so, but the surface is no longer molten. The Earth has cooled.

          If you think that the whole Earth began warming any length of time ago, you would be accepting climatological pseudoscientific cult claims, based on not much at all. Without energy input sufficient to offset natural energy loss (the same sort that resulted in the relatively cool solidified crust we live on), cooling continued.

          No magic – no need to boggle. Just physics.

          By the way, don’t fall into the same trap that Lord Kelvin did when he died believing his calculations of 20 million years for the age of the Earth, based on measurements of the rate of cooling. He was totally unaware of radiogenic heat slowing the cooling.

          Maybe you think that puerile attempts at being gratuitously offensive will bolster your authority. I decline to feel offended, in general, and you offer no compelling reasons why I should make an exception in your case.

          Your stupid and ignorant gotchas merely expose the shallowness of your thought processes.

          Keep believing in the magical heating properties of CO2, if you wish. Still no GHE, no AGW theory, and the Earth continues to cool.

          Cheers.

          • Nate says:

            Mike,

            “If you think that the whole Earth began warming any length of time ago, you would be accepting climatological pseudoscientific cult claims”

            Yes I do. They are called interglacial periods.

            If you must deny that such things ever happened, then you have lost the argument, haven’t you?

            Then you have graduated to buffoon status, or become a zealot spouting biblical passages, haven’t you?

            Go off, stand on the corner, read your bible, leave us alone.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            N,

            Unfortunately, you are trying to present your wishful thinking as fact. There is no arguing with fact. A large ball of molten stuff in an environment of around 4 K, with a distant heat source demonstrably unable to prevent it from cooling, must cool. No argument.

            Maybe you can find a magical CO2 heat source, which randomly creates vast amounts of heat from nothing, but I doubt it.

            Even the most fanatical climatological pseudoscientific cultist cannot state the present “temperature” of the Earth, let alone past “temperaturesl!

            No GHE. No AGW theory. No unicorns, or magical CO2 heat generation, either.

            Keep trying. Maybe you can transform fantasy into fact, but I doubt it.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            A large ball of molten stuff in an environment of around 4 K, with a distant heat source demonstrably unable to prevent it from cooling, must cool.

            Where is the data proving that?

            PS: The Earth is in an environment of 1365 W/m2, not of 4 K.

            PPS: Lies like your one here are why deniers like you are easily dismissed.

          • Nate says:

            “A large ball of molten stuff in an environment of around 4 K, with a distant heat source demonstrably unable to prevent it from cooling, must cool.”

            Mike’s mind has demonstrably gone over the edge of the flat Earth.

            He is oddly in denial that sunlight keeps the Earth nice and warm.

            Though he lives in the sunny tropics, which is so often warmer than the dimly lit arctic.

            He just can’t seem to make that connection.

            He has a solar hot water heater, we’re told. I wonder how that could work?

            Oh yeah, it must be the glass in between it and the sun making it hot.

            So many cobwebs in Mike’s head. Spooky!

  57. Tanner says:

    To address the specific graphs that Roy Spencer puts forth, I’ll point out that he is focussing only on Florida landfalls for the first chart and then US landfalls for the 2nd. However, if you look at the entire Atlantic Basin, the trend is up since 1966. It took me 10 minutes to chart this on a Google Sheet using NHC data from here:
    http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/tcfaq/E11.html

    Also note that the statistics go further back, but as the NHC article notes, data before 1966 (before satellite data) is not comprehensive, unless you are looking at storms that made landfall. So for my charts I only plotted data from 1966 forward. We really shouldn’t be using hurricane count data from before 1966 for any comparisons.

    I graphed it here with a trend line:
    https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1D1_wTxfePDZwz2pKBrr-V3MwGUeCbRIP5MDH_Q0Kdps/edit?usp=sharing

    All 4 charts are trending clearly up. To cherry pick data that suits your “story” Roy is being as misleading and hypocritical as the pop scientists you like to make yourself appear to be holding accountable. Let’s see if there are “crickets” from Roy on this.

    • Norman says:

      Tanner

      I appreciate you took the time to compile the graphs and present your case.

      I would ignore the Mike Flynn. I am still not convinced it is a human. It responds a lot like an AI program. Repeats often and really does not interact in a human way.

      I have asked the Mike Flynn poster to prove himself a human by posting a comment with an embedded link. I am not sure a bot can do this. To date this poster has not embedded any link in his many posts.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        N,

        Keep asking, I’ll keep refusing, and there is precisely nothing you can do about it.

        You can keep hoping I care about your opinion, if you wish. Fantasy is unlikely to become fact.

        Carry on advising others on how to behave. I’m sure some will be grateful.

        Cheerd.

        • Norman says:

          Mike Flynn

          Nothing in your post shows you are a human poster. What you post makes you look more like a bot than person.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            N,

            And I am supposed to care about your irrelevant and pointless comment because . . . ?

            Good luck with that.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Good point, Norman. MF has been posting nearly the exact same thing for a few years now. Almost to the word. He/it doesn’t notice or acknowledge replies, or often pretends not to care (then asks the same questions again).

            An Flynnbot would explain much of that.

          • Norman says:

            David Appell

            Yes that would be the issue. It has stated hundreds (if not thousands) that no one is able to come up with a valid explanation of GHE. I think every poster has given more than one valid explanation with several details and yet two posts later, “no one has come up with an explanation of the GHE”

            I have played with internet AI bots. At times they seem to have a real conversation but then they repeat and no longer seem to be able to interact. I would say Mike Flynn is a decent bot but it does not seem remotely human from my interaction with it.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            N,

            Tell me, which of the many supposed “explanations” of the mythical GHE do you consider to be correct? I would be interested in the reasons for different “explanations” for an effect which cannot even be described in any useful sense.

            Does the GHE supposedly involve temperature increases as a result of increasing the amount of CO2 between a thermometer and a heat source? This would seem to involve the creation of energy in contravention of the Laws of Thermodynamics.

            Surely, if you get together with David Appell, you can resolve this apparent contradiction. How hard can it be? Let me know when you are able to write out the GHE description, and its associated testable hypothesis.

            Hopefully, it shouldn’t take more than a few hours, between the two of you, should it?

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Flynnbot says:
            Does the GHE supposedly involve temperature increases as a result of increasing the amount of CO2 between a thermometer and a heat source?

            A temperature increase where?

            The increasing GHE cools the stratosphere….

          • Mike Flynn says:

            David,

            You must have missed the word “thermometer”. It’s an instrument used for measuring “temperature”.

            Try again.

            Cheers,

          • David Appell says:

            Flynnbot says:
            Does the GHE supposedly involve temperature increases as a result of increasing the amount of CO2 between a thermometer and a heat source?

            Yes. Though it’s far more observable when the heat source is a planetary surface and the CO2 is in an atmosphere in the lower troposphere.

  58. Mike Flynn says:

    T,

    Oooooh! Another graph! Do you think you might be another Nostradamus, and predict the future from your arcane calculations?

    If you can’t, what’s the point? What has happened, has happened.

    The atmosphere behaves chaotically – unless it can be demonstrated to be otherwise. So saith the IPCC, and I agree. No predictability of future climate states – none. So sad, too bad for you.

    Once again, what’s your point? Just trolling? I thought so.

    Cheers.

    • Mykey says:

      “Oooooh! Another graph! Do you think you might be another Nostradamus, and predict the future from your arcane calculations?”
      Of course we can. That is how we make money trading on the stock market while dinosaurs like yourself have your heads buried in the sand. If that is what keeps you content -so be it.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        M,

        Another fool who believes that the past predicts the future! The only fortune you are making in the stock market is the one which exists in your fantasy.

        Keep at it. How did you fare with Solyndra? I believe Tesla has managed to find buyers for at least 12 solar roofs. You have no doubt managed to predict how long the Government subsidies will last, as well. Tell me how your investment in Tesla goes. I hope you didn’t buy your Tesla shares at $380, did you? They are around $260 at present.

        No doubt you avoided such stupid investments as Tesla, although someone who apparently believes that CO2 has magical heating properties is obviously delusional, and bereft of common sense.

        Here’s a tip on how to make a small fortune – start with a large one, and believe you can predict the future from studiously examining the past. Good luck.

        Cheers,

  59. Snape says:

    Tesla went public in 2010. $17.00 a share.

  60. Ric says:

    So let me understand, Fritz: when its warm its climate; but when its cold its weather? Isnt a five-year cooling trend already something to be considered given all those alarmist statements?

    • Bindidon says:

      Well, Ric: despite all the allegations of some pseudoskeptic boasters, I am no alarmist.

      So yes: a five-year cooling trend is a five-year cooling trend: it is a major climate event.

      But I suppose you mean the UAH 6.0 temperature anomaly record, and

      – don’t see there any five year cooling trend (especially not when discarding the huge ENSO signal in 2016), and therefore
      – propose you to have a look at this graph below:

      https://www.nsstc.uah.edu/climate/2018/september2018/tot_201808_bar.png

      What about counting the number of blue bars since about march 2012, i.e. 6 years ago?

    • Bindidon says:

      Uuuuh! Ric, I owe you here an apology: I have done exactly what I blame others for: eye-balling!

      A quick look at Excel shows for UAH6.0 LT for the last 60 months a linear estimate in C / decade of

      -0.482 +- 0.262

      Even if we consider the very large CI, we keep a significant negative trend (of course, I repeat: mainly due to the period containing in its front a very high anomaly sequence).

      But… you were right, point final.

    • Bindidon says:

      Today I am really a bit out of line! I have to withdraw my apology.

      Because the linear estimate I computed was not over the five but over… the three last years! OMG.

      So sorry Rick, we come back to my first reply. My eye-balling for the trend wasn’t so bad:

      0.389 +- 0.142 C / decade.

      No cooling trend at all.

      In addition, we should consider that Excel does not account for special cases like time series, with their problems like autocorrelation etc, let alone would it perform things like Quenouille correction.

      Look at trends computed by Dr Kevin Cowtan, a real expert in the domain:

      http://www.ysbl.york.ac.uk/~cowtan/applets/trend/trend.html

      For UAH6.0 LT and the period sep 13 – sep 18, you obtain this:

      https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pQ36zWbwBAUyCj9UQF4D2op_0LSM8JQZ/view

      You see that Cowtan’s base trend estimate is a bit lower than Excel’s, but that his 2 sigma is way higher, making the estimate statistically insignificant.

    • barry says:

      No ‘alarmist’ I know of would make anything out of a 5 year ‘trend’ in global temperature, hotter or colder.

      Anyone with an awareness of stats and the topic knows that you need multidecadal periods to assess a climate trend.

      The IPCC makes projections in 30-year increments for that reason, though sometimes give a ‘prediction’ for 20 years, but no shorter.

      The minimum period for statistical significance varies according to the amplitude of the variance. Other metrics may need longer or shorter time series to determine a trend if any.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        b,

        Here’s what the IPCC wrote –

        “The climate system is a coupled non-linear chaotic system, and therefore the long-term prediction of future climate states is not possible.”

        Trends are utterly useless. Relentlessly re-examining past records, hoping to divine the future, is a complete waste of time. Fools, frauds and charlatans claim to be able to predict the future, particularly if some even bigger fool is prepared to pay them for their mystical mutterings.

        You would be better off wasting your money ringing a psychic “hot line” to get a prediction of the future. Or ask a reasonably intelligent twelve year old – cheaper, too.

        Keep believing.

        Cheers.

  61. ren says:

    This will be the record catch of anchovy in November.
    https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/analysis/ocean/cdas-sflux_sst_samer_1.png
    The conditions are perfect.

    • Fritz Kraut says:

      ren says:
      October 20, 2018 at 7:02 AM
      Extremely low solar activity.
      ______________________________________

      Yes. Decreasing the last decades.
      So solar activity cant be the reason for warming.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        F,

        Warming requires increased heat. If solar activity provides less heat, do you think that increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere will provide additional heat?

        What mechanism would you propose to explain this, and how could this be demonstrated experimentally?

        Cheers.

        • Mykey says:

          Please do something useful and feed your monkey.

        • Fritz Kraut says:

          Mike Flynn says:
          October 20, 2018 at 11:48 PM

          F,

          Warming requires increased heat. If solar activity provides less heat, do you think that increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere will provide additional heat?
          __________________________________________________

          It provides rising temperature. Of course.

          • MIke Flynn says:

            F,

            Unfortunately, Nature has carried out an experiment using the Earth, the atmosphere, and the Sun, over four and a half million years or so. She says you are delusional.

            Every experiment carried out by humans has verified Mother Natures conclusion. You are still delusional.

            Real experiments, of course, not the fantasy speculations of climatological pseudoscientific cultists. Bad luck for you. No useful GHE description, no AGW theory.

            Carry on dreaming, if you find reality too difficult to cope with.

            It might help you to know that the IPCC stated that predicting future climate states is impossible. Feel free to disagree with the IPCC – it still wont change the non-existence of CO2 heating.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Flynnbot says:
            Unfortunately, Nature has carried out an experiment using the Earth, the atmosphere, and the Sun, over four and a half million years or so.

            Wrong by a factor of one thousand!!

          • Mike Flynn says:

            David,

            Thanks for the confirmation that the Earth has been cooling for four and a half billion years.

            I’ll leave it up you to to decide whether I wrote “million” on purpose. Maybe you can read my mind, and let others know!

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Can’t admit you wrong, huh?

            And correcting your wrong age for the Earth says nothing about its temperature over that time.

            In fact, you have NEVER shown evidence for your claim. Not once.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Since you are obviously to stupid or lazy (or both) to look things up for yourself –

            “The inner core and the surface heat flow as clues to estimating the initial temperature of the Earth’s core”

            This should suit you. Lots of modelling and estimating. The conclusions do seem to accord with measurement.

            Keep believing the Earth’s core was colder at its creation, than it is at present, if your fantasy requires it.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Let’s see a time series of the Earth’s average surface temperature since it was formed 4.567 B yrs ago.

            You don’t have one, or anything like it.

  62. Mykey says:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_organ#/media/File:Karlsplatz_Christmas_Market_Vienna_(11).jpg

    Guess who is Mike, who is Ren and, for bonus points, who is Gordon in this picture.

  63. ren says:

    This is the forecast of circulation in North America on October 24. No El Nino.
    https://pics.tinypic.pl/i/00973/05rmhzu2h94g.png

    • David Appell says:

      A declaration of an El Nino requires 5+ months with the Nino34 Index >= 0.5

      Why are you so afraid of an El Nino, anyway? It’s a natural phenomenon….

      • Lewis guignard says:

        I don’t see where ren expressed an opinion about being concerned. Only making an observation. YOU, however, as is your wont, decided what you believed his opinion to be.

        David, is that what they taught in your physics classes, how not to read accurately and to read into sentences whatever you wished?

        REALLY DAVID, stop being such a Democrat.

        • David Appell says:

          ren’s link said absolutely nothing about a developing ENSO.

          Do you realize that, Lewis?

          In fact, his graphic is so poorly labeled that it’s not possible to tell WHAT it refers to.

        • barry says:

          It’s a chart of atmospheric ozone mixing for the 21st Oct.

          An utterly bizarre thing to show while talking about el Nino. Nothing remotely to do with the phenomenon.

          I’m also curious as to why ren doesn’t seem to want an el Nino to form. The indicators are looking that way, all the institutes are giving it a 70% chance, but ren rejects all that and posts weird charts that have nothing to do with ENSO.

          I’ve gathered that ren is some kind of ‘global warming skeptic’, and guess he doesn’t like el Ninos because they temporarily push global temp up. El Ninos are… off-message.

  64. David Appell says:

    Flynnbot says:
    …might reveal the secret of generating heat using CO2

    It doesn’t generate heat. You clearly don’t understand the concept, but criticize it anyway. Typical.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      DA,

      I am pleased that you confirm that CO2 does not generate heat. This is obviously a fact, as surrounding a thermometer with CO2 actually reduces its temperature very slightly, due to a reduction in the amount of energy reaching it.

      An example of this effect is noticed on Earth, where the atmosphere prevents something like 30% of the Sun’s radiation from reaching the surface. You may choose to claim that reducing heat makes things hotter, but you might find that only climatological pseudoscientific cultists agree with you.

      Maybe you can explain the “concept” you refer to, or even better, provide actual reproducible experiments which support your “concept”.

      At present, at least you accept that increasing the amount of CO2 between a thermometer and the Sun cannot make the thermometer hotter – no additional heat, is there?

      No GHE. No AGW theory.

      Cheers.

      • David Appell says:

        Mike Flynn says:
        I am pleased that you confirm that CO2 does not generate heat.

        Then why did you ask for proof of it?

        Flynnbot says:
        “…might reveal the secret of generating heat using CO2”

        You can’t even keep your own lies straight….

      • David Appell says:

        Mike Flynn says:
        Maybe you can explain the concept you refer to

        What’s wrong with the descriptions I’ve already provided?

        • Mike Flynn says:

          DA,

          Your mythical descriptions of your “concept” are like like Trenberth’s missing heat. It is claimed to exist in the finest climatological pseudoscientific tradition, but seems to be very elusive.

          Can’t be found anywhere, and it’s a travesty that it can’t.

          How many “descriptions” do you have? How many do you need?

          Let me know at your earliest convenience, if you would be so kind.

          Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            MF, you’ve already described the GHE very, very well:

            “Less GHGs less impediment to radiation reaching the surface from the Sun, or being emitted by the surface to outer space.
            – Mike Flynn, May 5, 2017 at 9:22 PM
            http://www.drroyspencer.com/2017/05/uah-global-temperature-update-for-april-2017-0-27-deg-c/#comment-245860

            “…the transmittance of the atmosphere increases as the amount of GHGs in it drops.”
            Mike Flynn, May 23, 2017 at 5:16 PM
            http://www.drroyspencer.com/2017/05/uah-global-temperature-update-for-april-2017-0-27-deg-c/#comment-247988

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Thank you once again for quoting me directly, providing the physical reasons why the GHE is nonsense.

            Less GHGs, higher surface temperatures – as in arid tropical deserts, the hottest places on Earth.

            And of course, temperatures are higher when transmittance of insolation is increased, due to lesser amounts of GHGs in the atmosphere. In the absence of sunlight, at night, temperatures drop much faster – once again, the arid tropical deserts demonstrate this effect nicely.

            Carry on quoting me. It makes me look even smarter, and you even more stupid and ignorant. I appreciate the flattery, but the irony of you using me as an authority in support of your delusional thinking probably escapes you.

            Carry on regardless – still can’t describe your GHE can you? What a travesty!

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            I”ve given you many descriptions of the GHE, both from you and from others.

            I can understand why you are now embarrassed to realize that you yourself have already describe the GHE.

            But don’t pretend the rest of us are as dumb.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            No pretence needed. Between the lot of you, you couldn’t summon the intelligence of a box of hair.

            Are you pretending otherwise?

            Cheers.

  65. David Appell says:

    Elusive? How?

    Here is clear evidence of the greenhouse effect on Venus:

    https://tinyurl.com/y7o8kzyd

    How is this observation wrong?

    • Mike Flynn says:

      DA,

      Are you raving mad? Is this some sort of prelude to “Bring on the Clowns (of the pseudoscientific climatological variety)”?

      Maybe you could furiously flap a multicoloured version of your link in someone’s face, screaming “Evidence! Evidence!” Definitely evidence of your precarious hold on reality – not much more.

      How are you progressing with that testable GHE hypothesis? Not well? I can’t say I’m surprised.

      Keep thrashing. Maybe you could link to some of your previous irrelevancies, or try for another gotcha!

      Cheers.

      • David Appell says:

        Tell us why that observation isn’t proof of the greenhouse effect.

        • Mike Flynn says:

          DA,

          Don’t be stupid. Or be as stupid as you wish – makes no difference to me.

          Maybe if you described the Greenhouse Effect, you might be able to provide some experimental support for it.

          Of course, you can’t, so you are reduced to stupid gotchas, and hoping people will believe that your delusions are connected to reality.

          Off you go now, David, back to Gotcha U. Maybe you could assume someone else’s identity, if you find the course too hard.

          Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Again, tell us why that observation isn’t proof of the greenhouse effect.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            First, you can’t describe this “GHE”, and it’s a travesty that you can’t. Just like Trenberth can’t find his “missing heat”.

            Second, a link to an untitled irrelevant and pointless graphic is only proof of the depth of your delusion.

            I suppose you are about to claim that the fact that the atmosphere warms up during the day, and cools during the night, is the result of some mystical and inexplicable GHE.

            Bad luck. In sunlight, things tend to warm. At night, things tend to cool. No mystery there.

            Still no GHE. No AGW theory. Keep at it. Maybe you can convert somebody even more gullible than you into the climatological pseudoscience cult. Good luck.

            By the way, bananas absorb and emit infrared. Is there a Banana Effect? Are we all doomed?

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            First, you cant describe this GHE

            I already have, many times, including quoting your own words that describe the GHE.

            Why do you keep denying this??

  66. Mike Flynn says:

    David Appell wrote –

    “Flynn still cannot understand, or admit, that some of the atmosphere is warming while some of it is cooling”

    David suffers from confusion as well as delusion, apparently.

    The atmosphere, when exposed to sunlight, for example, warms. When deprived of the same sunlight which warmed it, it cools. Basic physics.

    David adheres to the climatological pseudoscientific belief that CO2 both warms and cools the atmosphere simultaneously! Unfortunately, “cooling” rays do not exist, nor does CO2 provide any heat. Increasing the amount of CO2 between the Sun and a thermometer reduces the amount of sunlight being absorbed by the thermometer. The temperature of the thermometer falls as a result.

    Just as the temperature falls when a cloud passes between the Sun and a thermometer, or the Moon intercepts the Sun’s rays during a total solar eclipse.

    David thrashes about with mindless gotchas, diversions, links to pal reviewed nonsense papers by delusional authors, and generally anything which will enable him to maintain his delusionally psychotic beliefs. Good for him. I wish him well, and remind him that the British Phrenological Society did not expire until 1966, from memory. The climatological pseudoscientific cultist belief in the non-existent GHE may yet persist a while, so David will be among fellow climate clowns for the foreseeable future.

    Still no GHE, nor an AGW theory. Just more wishful thinking, supported by nothing more than fantasy.

    Cheers.

    • David Appell says:

      Mike Flynn says:
      David adheres to the climatological pseudoscientific belief that CO2 both warms and cools the atmosphere simultaneously!

      Depends on what part of the atmosphere you are talking about.

      More atmospheric CO2 warms the lower troposphere, while at the same time cooling the stratosphere and above.

      This is very well established science. And it’s observed.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        Ah, I see. The wriggling starts. Are you denying that the atmosphere warms in the presence of sunlight, and cools in its absence? No CO2 needed. As you said, CO2 provides no heat.

        As a matter of fact, less GHG in the atmosphere results in higher surface temperatures in sunlight,

        On the other hand, purging CO2 from a volume of air changes the temperature not one jot. No wonder this amazing GHE cannot be put into words in any useful scientific fashion. That’s because the concept is a delusional fantasy, adopted by a gaggle of second rate wannabes. Some of the more rational have recanted, and apologised for their previous gullibility. Some continue to demonstrate their stupidity and ignorance.

        No science – just pseudoscientific rubbish.

        Cheers.

        • David Appell says:

          Mike Flynn says:
          Ah, I see. The wriggling starts.

          Do you want accurate answers, or not?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Answers to what, precisely?

            Why would I take your word for anything? You can’t even describe the GHE! What a fool you are to expect me to believe you know what are talking about!

            Can you prove you are not quite mad? Answer fully, and accurately, if you wish. Provide proof.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            WHy? Because my answers have good science behind them. Not any of which you have ever disproven.

          • JDHuffman says:

            No DA, your answers have good “pseudoscience” behind them.

            You don’t even understand the relevant physics.

        • David Appell says:

          Mike Flynn says:
          On the other hand, purging CO2 from a volume of air changes the temperature not one jot.

          Proof?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Are you disputing my statement?

            Why would that be? Doesn’t quite fit your fantasy, or are you just trolling in lieu of doing anything rational?

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            I asked for proof of your claim.

            It appears you have none, as usual.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Einstein said –

            “No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.”

            Maybe you should read up on the scientific method, not the climatological pseudoscientific delusional avoidance method.

            Prove my statement incorrect by reproducible experiment, and I wil gladly admit error. Mann talking to bits of wood, or Schmidt claiming that he is so busy discovering new physics that he has no time to document his computer games, do not give reassurance that appealing to the authority of either supplants the need to support your experiment by actual physical experiment.

            Back into your fantasy, David. Much more comfortable than reality, I guess.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Stop playing games.

            I asked for proof of your claim.

            Clearly you do not have any.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            If you say so, David, if you say so.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Clearly you have no proof whatsoever.

            I win.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            I am pleased for you, of course. What is it that you win? Nothing at all? Well, at least there’s a saying that nothing is better than freedom. Enjoy.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            I win the argument between us, between you and me, the struggle between two people, the cosmic battle that is no less than between good and evil, bright and dark, life and death. I’ve come out on top, again, over your climate change denial, over your especially poor rendition of it, over all your misunderstandings and untruths, and yet again over the endless if unenlightened denialists who drag this site down into the black depths of vampires, demons and the undead. Into Hell.

            I win. Science wins. You lose. Denialism loses. As it always will. Joy from all directions to soothe the masses. Light descends from the heavens, covering the clothed and naked alike in truth, beauty and in the sweet, neverending glory of righteousness.

            Hallelujah.

            Hallelujah.

          • Mykey says:

            Yay brother!
            Verily it is so!

          • Mike Flynn says:

            So saith the trolls.

            Meanwhile, the Earth remains unmolten, having cooled a lot.

            Still no GHE. Still no AGW theory, of course.

            No doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

            Cheers.

          • JDHuffman says:

            DA fantasizes: “I win. Science wins. You lose. Denialism loses.”

            DA, do we need to have another talk about “reality”?

  67. Harry Cummings says:

    Verily I say unto you all climate denialists shall be case down to hell on judgement day

    Climate bible chapter 25 page 526

    Harry

    • Mykey says:

      Revelation 21:8
      But the cowardly, unbelieving, vile, idle and lying climate denialists they will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      H,

      Dang me! The climatological pseudoscientific cultist Book is revealed!

      Well done – the Warmist Church of Latter Day Scientism emerges from the shadows – more exclusive than the Exclusive Brethren, harder to find than the Elusive Brethren.

      Proving the triumph of faith over fact – who needs science when delusional fanaticism abounds?

      Onwards and upwards!

      Cheers.

      • Mykey says:

        “Dang me! The climatological pseudoscientific cultist Book is revealed!”
        Yep. Written by non other than the reverend Al Gore.
        We have also just canonised Michael Mann.

  68. Mike Flynn says:

    Fritz Kraut presents his thesis, attempting to join the congregation of the Delusive Brethren –

    “Obviously heat-trapping is absolutly the correct basis of GHE.
    Greenhousegases trap infrared radiation — the radiant heat energy that the Earth naturally emits to outer space in response to solar heating.
    And of course this “trapping” works since 4 billions of years. Since atmosphere with greenhaousgases exist on earth.”

    Well done, Fritz.

    Heat “trapping” since 4 billions of years has resulted in the surface cooling from its molten state. A miracle! Reduction in temperature due to heat trapping!

    A perfect disciple. Another triumph of ignorance and stupidity over fact.

    Good luck.

    Cheers.

    • Mykey says:

      Actually, it is the “the fiery lake of burning sulfur” that keeps the molten interior warm while it is the GHE which keeps the surface warm

  69. PhilJ says:

    Um, no. Its solar radiation and geothermal energy that keeps the surface warm, the surface and the sun warm the atmosphere…

    Back to basics… Entropy rules… A colder object cannot spontaneously heat a warmer object…

    • Bindidon says:

      “Its solar radiation and geothermal energy that keeps the surface warm…”

      Are you joking, PhilJ? It gives us in global average no more than 0.1 W/m2! That is way less than what is measured by the DLWIR devices for H2O and CO2 radiation.

      *

      “A colder object cannot spontaneously heat a warmer object”

      I would never pretend such a nonsense.

      • Fritz Kraut says:

        Mike Flynn says:
        October 21, 2018 at 10:08 PM

        Fritz says:
        “Obviously heat-trapping is absolutly the correct basis of GHE.
        Greenhousegases trap infrared radiation — the radiant heat energy that the Earth naturally emits to outer space in response to solar heating.
        And of course this “trapping” works since 4 billions of years. Since atmosphere with greenhaousgases exist on earth.”

        Well done, Fritz.

        Heat “trapping” since 4 billions of years has resulted in the surface coolin
        _______________________________________________

        No, it resulted and always results in higher temperatures.
        Higher than it would be wouthout greenhousegases trapping infrared radiation.

        BTW: The description of heat-trapping I plagiated from Dr Roy Spencer.
        So dont praise me but him.

        • Mike Flynn says:

          F,

          It doesn’t matter whose authority you appeal to, if you are wrong. No “heat trapping” at all.

          You wrote –

          “No, it resulted and always results in higher temperatures.”, and yet, after four and a half billion years or so, the surface has cooled. It is no longer molten, in case you haven’t noticed,

          As the temperature fell, it passed through 500 C. What temperature do you think it “should have been” at that point, and what climatological pseudoscientific cultist magic did you use to support your calculations?

          The Earth’s present surface temperature varies between about -90 C, and +90 C. Just as it should be – no more, no less. Hansen, Schmidt, Mann, Trenberth, and all their gullible and delusional fellow travellers are quite mad, and believe in something that not only doesn’t exist, but cannot be described! Even people who believe in unicorns can describe them, at least.

          Carry on believing. Maybe you can recruit more fools to your cult – there’s a saying “there’s one borne every minute”. You used one minute for yourself, but there are many more.

          Cheers.

    • Bindidon says:

      My lady Rose is away till December, so I copy & paste out of her stuff.

      Rudolf Clausius, 1887:

      THE MECHANICAL THEORY OF HEAT
      THIRD, REWRITTEN AND COMPLETED EDITION.
      FIRST VOLUME.

      SECTION XII.

      The concentration of heat and light beams and the limits of their effect.

      § 1. Subject of the investigation.

      What further regards heat radiation as happening in the usual manner, it is known that not only the warm body radiates heat to the cold one but that the cold body radiates to the warm one as well, however the total result of this simultaneous double heat exchange is, as can be viewed as evidence based on experience, that the cold body always experiences an increase in heat at the expense of the warmer one.

      *

      For purists we could substitute ‘radiates heat’ by ‘radiates’.

      It seems to me that Clausius had at the end of the 19th century the same kind of idea as what Johnson explains here:

      Mathematical Physics of BlackBody Radiation

      Claes Johnson 2012

      and therein

      Chapter 14
      Radiative Heat Transfer

      14.1 Stefan-Boltzmann for Two Blackbodies
      14.2 Non-Physical Two-Way Heat Transfer

      Here it is:
      https://tinyurl.com/ybbg8rc6

      This helps you in focusing on chapter 14:
      https://tinyurl.com/yb22u9jz

      If the surface warms the atmosphere, the atmosphere radiates in response in all directions, and thus partly back to the surface.

      My layman’s opinion (I’m no physicist!) is that the total energy radiated by the surface decreases as the energy radiated by the atmosphere increases, like in the example of Stefan-Boltzmann applied to a pair of blackbodies, even if the amosphere is rather a kind of diffuse graybody.

      I could well be wrong, of course! But I like the idea. It differs from the nonsense Johnson explains in Chapter 14.2.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        B,

        To your first comment –

        A body radiating 0.1 W/m2, assuming emissivity of 0.3, has a temperature around 40 K.

        In other words, to raise the temperature of that body to, say, 288 K, enquires less energy than if you started from absolute zero.

        Just as bringing water to the boil (100 C), from 99 C requires far less energy than if you start off with water at 20 C. Basic physics.

        Same for the Earth. No GHE needed to explain present surface temperatures, any more than a GHE is needed to explain the initial molten temperature, or any intermediate temperature as the surface cooled.

        As to Rose’s comment, she may well be a womanly woman’s woman, but she is clearly deluded. The surface, having lost heat, cools. The atmosphere does likewise, and cannot replace the energy lost from the surface, no matter how you play with semantics. Under still conditions, the physics is such that frost may form on the surface, even though the air temperature is above freezing. Air temperature may even rise with altitude, as a low level inversion forms.

        Step into the night, and observe the practical operation of radiative physics. The surface cools.

        And it has done so every night, in general, for four and a half billion years years or so.

        But, heck. Climatological pseudoscientific cultists don’t need facts. They have faith-based fanaticism. Off with you now – back to your endless reanalysing of records. Adjust, readjust, interpolate, massage – it still won’t help. The future will remain as unknowable as ever. The IPCC agrees. Bad luck for you.

        Cheers.

        • Bindidon says:

          Jeses what an arrogant, boring, egocentric stuff.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            B,

            And you cannot find any facts to support you in disputing anything I wrote? What a pity.

            By the way – what is a “jese”? Why do you more than one?

            Cheers.

      • JDHuffman says:

        Bindidon, 14.2 is correct. The only confusion is that the S/B equation is ONLY for one surface, i.e. ONLY one “T”.

        And I’m glad to see you admit you are not a physicist. Honesty is a rare thing on this blog….

        • Bindidon says:

          So you will tell us that Claes Johnson has it wrong in 14.1? Really?

          • JDHuffman says:

            Now I just mentioned “honesty”, and you start misrepresenting my words?

            Really?

          • Bindidon says:

            Not at all. You wrote

            “The only confusion is that the S/B equation is ONLY for one surface”.

            How else could I have understood that? Johnson shows in 14.1 a perfect derivation of the SB for TWO blackbodies.

            And of course I agree that 14.2 is correct. I should have written:

            “It differs from the alarmists’ nonsense Johnson explains in Chapter 14.2”.

          • JDHuffman says:

            Bindidon, I think we are trying to disagree, while we agree!

            My point is that two surfaces are NOT related to the S/B Law. The equation for two surfaces is a poor illustration, although it is often used as a teaching aid. It has no practical application in real-life applications.

          • Bindidon says:

            Sorry JDHuffman, but…

            … you are here beating around the bush (I hope it is the correct translation for ‘tourner autour du pot’).

            You can’t simply pretend that S-B would work only for one blackbody after having read Johnson’s chapter 14.1 which perfectly explains how it does for two.

            I am no physicist, but that does not mean that I did not spend nearly 6 years in universities.

            Thus I have, excuse me, some minimal requirements to scientific discussions, the first of them being that you can’t simply contradict a paper or lecture notes without presenting a scientifically accurate falsification of what you think is wrong in them.

            Neither do you present a valuable paper that is on par with the contribution you are criticizing, let alone do you show any own references.

            Simply to pretend things is useless.

            Thus I ask you again: do you fully agree with Johnson’s chapter 14.1 ?

          • JDHuffman says:

            Bindidon, you appear to want to argue about something, but I’m not sure what you want to argue about. So, I’ll just critique your own words:

            B: “You can’t simply pretend that S-B would work only for one blackbody after having read Johnson’s chapter 14.1 which perfectly explains how it does for two.”

            JD: The S/B Law applies to ONLY one surface, as I mentioned before. Claes explains in 14.2 how it has been used incorrectly.

            B: “I am no physicist…”

            JD: I agree.

            B: “…you can’t simply contradict a paper…”

            JD: I didn’t contradict the paper. I only attempted to help you understand it.

            B: “Neither do you present a valuable paper that is on par with the contribution you are criticizing, let alone do you show any own references.”

            JD: Again, I didn’t contradict the paper. I only attempted to help you understand it.

            B: “Simply to pretend things is useless.”

            JD: Agreed. That’s why I try to be careful to always understand what someone is saying, lest I accidentally misrepresent them.

            B: “Thus I ask you again: do you fully agree with Johnson’s chapter 14.1?”

            JD: I agree with my interpretation of what he is saying, with the clarification about the S/B Law.

          • Nate says:

            JD “The equation for two surfaces is a poor illustration, although it is often used as a teaching aid. It has no practical application in real-life applications.”

            Yeah, in the real world, there is never a situation of two surfaces at different temperatures radiating. Never happens!

            What a load or horse manure!

            And of course JD must deny 14.1, otherwise his Blue pate radiating a Net of 200 W/m^2 to the Green plate, while they are the SAME TEMPERATURE, would be impossible.

            Of course, as everyone except JD understands, it is impossible!

          • Bindidon says:

            So it is clear to me: you do not agree to Johnson’s 14.1 as is, which clearly states that S-B very well works for two blackbodies, but only to your personal interpretation of the chapter, which consists of accepting S-B only for one black body.

            Thus you contradict the paper, without presenting any scientifically valuable falsification.

            Understood.

            I think it is better to stop this fruitless discussion. Thanks for avoiding to reply to any of my comments in the future.

          • JDHuffman says:

            Yes Bindidon, feel free to make your own interpretation.

            Can I put you on the list that believes a colder black body can warm a hotter black body?

          • JDHuffman says:

            Also Bindidon, here is what I was referring to:

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stefan–Boltzmann_law

        • Fritz Kraut says:

          JDHuffman says:
          October 23, 2018 at 9:37 AM

          “Yes Bindidon, feel free to make your own interpretation.

          Can I put you on the list that believes a colder black body can warm a hotter black body?”
          ________________________________________

          Noone belives this.
          But everyone knows, “adding” any body, no matter which temperature, as “addititional” source of additional radiation will raise temperature. WHAT ELSE???
          This additional energy cant be lost.

          Its so incredible simple, that even the acting US president could understand it; if he just tried.

          • JDHuffman says:

            Fritz, is your typing class right after your English class?

            No time for physics, huh?

            Maybe next year….

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            JDHuffman says:
            October 23, 2018 at 12:55 PM

            Fritz, is your typing class right after your English class?

            No time for physics, huh?

            Maybe next year….
            __________________________________________________

            Remarkable reply
            Makes me really pensive.

          • JDHuffman says:

            That was the purpose.

      • Norman says:

        Bindidon

        YOU: “My layman’s opinion (I’m no physicist!) is that the total energy radiated by the surface decreases as the energy radiated by the atmosphere increases, like in the example of Stefan-Boltzmann applied to a pair of blackbodies, even if the amosphere is rather a kind of diffuse graybody.”

        I would not agree with this based upon all I have read. The energy radiated by the surface is only dependent upon the surface temperature and its emissivity. It does not decrease at all with the added energy radiated from the atmosphere. The long term effect is more energy is radiated by the surface with the added energy of atmosphere with the solar input. The surface reaches a higher temperature and radiates more not less energy with the radiating atmosphere.

        • JDHuffman says:

          Norman believes: “The long term effect is more energy is radiated by the surface with the added energy of atmosphere with the solar input. The surface reaches a higher temperature and radiates more not less energy with the radiating atmosphere.”

          Except that violates the laws of physics, and consequently has NEVER been observed.

          But Norman prefers his own comedy science-fiction over reality.

          • Norman says:

            JDHuffman

            Wrong! It has indeed been observed and measured. The Earth’s average surface temperature is much above what the solar alone would bring it up to be.

            This direct observation contradicts your unsupported and incorrect declaration.

            Such a condition does not violate any laws of physics and is actually supported by them.

            You are wrong about this and will continue to be wrong. I have some bad news for you g.e.r.a.n, making unsupported declarations does not mean you are right. So anyway wrong again. Like normal. Most your declarations are wrong and unsupportable by any experiment or valid physics.

          • JDHuffman says:

            Norman, Earth’s complicated systems maintain the average temperature, over heated by the Sun. Atmospheric CO2 is part of one of those complicate systems. If you want to believe CO2 can somehow warm the planet, go right ahead. Believing is easier than learning.

          • Dan Pangburn says:

            JD,, What Norman said does not violate the laws of physics. What he said is how it works. Apparently you (along with some others who post here) have never benefited from a decent course in engineering heat transfer analysis. It is part of the physics which competent engineers apply in design of many devices where thermal assessment is important e.g. satellites, power plants, air planes, coffee pots, etc. etc. Been there, done that.

          • JDHuffman says:

            Well Dan, if you believe a colder black body can warm a hotter black body, you obviously weren’t much use in any competent design work. Unless you were the typist. Someone has to take notes….

            (I assume you want to be added to the 2LoT Deniers list.)

          • Nate says:

            In one morning, JD the

            fraudulent fake-fizuks-fan failed to fool five folks with fabricated-fanciful-facts.

            Farcical feat!

          • Norman says:

            g.e.r.a.n

            I have some bad news for you JDHUffman, making unsupported declarations does not mean you are right.

          • Norman says:

            JDHUffman

            YOU: “if you believe a colder black body can warm a hotter black body,”

            Who is saying that? The temperature of the colder black body will directly effect the steady state temperature a HEATED black body will reach. Much different concept.

            If you increase the temperature of a colder black body the heated black body will go up. If you cool a cold black body the temperature of the heated black body will go down. (That is if the heated black body has a constant input energy and the cold black body is in the View Factor of the Heated Black Body).

          • JDHuffman says:

            Norman, if you add appropriate heat energy to a system, the temperature should go up.

            Very good.

            Did you just learn that?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            N,

            You have a problem, I think.

            Apparently, the Earth’s surface used to be molten.

            Now it is not.

            This is called cooling – a drop in temperature. Semantics and obfuscation cannot disguise this fact.

            The GHE appears not to have operated to cause heating over the longer average.

            Have you a cogent explanation, or do you wish to avoid this inconvenient fact?

            Cheers.

          • Norman says:

            g.e.r.a.n

            You are the one who does not seem to understand that.

            You are out of your league here. Go back to PSI, those people are impressed with people who make up stuff and declare things they know nothing about. You are wrong on almost all the material you post about, you still think making declarations makes your garbage good. Sorry, it does not. Your garbage is still garbage.

          • JDHuffman says:

            Norman ran out of pseudoscience and now must resort to insults.

            He’s so predictable.

          • Nate says:

            “Apparently, the Earth’s surface used to be molten.

            Now it is not.

            This is called cooling – a drop in temperature. Semantics and obfuscation cannot disguise this fact.”

            Mike, it is hard to believe this is a serious concern of yours.

            Apparently we had liquid oceans 3 Billion years ago. So the surface has cooled ~ 90 C since then.

            Assuming the cooling rate has not slowed (of course it has), this is a cooling rate of 3 millionths of degree per century.

            I think we can safely ignore it for now. That is undetectable.

            Meanwhile other effects are warming the Earth at a rate of 1.3 to 1.8 C/century. IMO its AGW.

            These things can BOTH be happening.

            Just as in my region we are cooling toward winter at a rate of ~ 0.1 C/day.

            This week we had a warm front come thru and warmed ~ 10 C in 1 day.

            Both these things are happening, slow, barely noticeable cooling, and fast, quite large, warming.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            N,

            You wrote –

            “Mike, it is hard to believe this is a serious concern of yours.”

            You are either mining your fantasy or believe you have mind reading abilities!

            What could possibly prompt you believe that a simple physical observation showing the non-existence of the GHE would be a “serious concern”?

            The point is that you are unable to disagree with my statement that the surface has cooled from its original molten state, so you are trying to avoid the fact that the Earth’s surface has cooled over the last four and a half billion years or so, entirely!

            Or maybe you believe that physical laws changed recently? Maybe the GHE which did not result in heating for billions of years, has suddenly leapt into action! What nonsense!

            If you saw a thermometer getting hotter, would you assume it was due to the miraculous properties of CO2, or would you examine the environment for increased heat reaching the thermometer? I know you would rush around shouting “GHE! GHE! – Doom, Doom!”, but sensible people might seek a source of increased heat.

            When you formulate your GHE hypothesis, (never, I’m guessing), make sure you include the reason it didn’t work for four and a half billion years or so.

            Cheers.

          • Norman says:

            JDHuffman

            Again you are wrong and it seems you will continue on this path.

            As I stated it is a waste of time discussing any science with you. You make up unsupported declarations. You think valid textbook science is pseudoscience, you won’t accept experimental data, you won’t do any experiments on your own.

            That is why I just post nonsense with you. Nothing of value matters.

            As Ball4 correctly understands your function on this blog. It is to amuse and entertain. None of your posts has any rational, logical or reasonable physics. No one will be able to learn any material from you except Poynting’s first and middle name were John Henry. That is about the bulk of your value. The rest of what you post it total crap. Like I said you should stick to posting on PSI that blog does not care about the scientific integrity of any of their posters. Seems it is a free-for-all of make up declarations that need zero support.

          • JDHuffman says:

            I see typing class got out late this evening.

          • Nate says:

            Mike: ‘You dont disagree with anything I said, but you cant accept facts.’

            MF “Apparently, the Earths surface used to be molten.
            Now it is not. This is called cooling a drop in temperature.”

            I accept this ‘fact’

            MF “What could possibly prompt you believe that a simple physical observation showing the non-existence of the GHE”

            I disagree with this non-sequitur.

            It doesnt follow. Here’s a fact: you fail at logic.

            Your tiresome, oft-repeated ‘fact’, is indeed a fact, but a thoroughly pointless and irrelevant one.

            It says nothing, diddly squat, nada, related to “showing the non-existence of the GHE”

            And, Earth IS WARMING, over last 50 y at a rate of 1.7C/century.

            This may or may not be due to the GHE. But your ‘fact’ has nothing to say about it.

            Warming of Earth, by any mechanism, cannot be ‘cancelled out’ by your cooling of the Earth by millionths of a degree C per century.

            The effects of your ‘fact’ are not only irrelevant but imperceptible!

            Maybe you could describe your favorite color or ice cream, and declare that these also show “the non-existence of the GHE”

            Maybe you think the exploits of your favorite Kardashian, can equally well show “the non-existence of the GHE”.

            Please, continue to lecture us on other unrelated facts that you find vaguely interesting.

        • Fritz Kraut says:

          Norman says:
          October 23, 2018 at 8:24 AM
          The energy radiated by the surface is only dependent upon the surface temperature and its emissivity. It does not decrease at all with the added energy radiated from the atmosphere. The long term effect is more energy is radiated by the surface with the added energy of atmosphere with the solar input. The surface reaches a higher temperature and radiates more not less energy with the radiating atmosphere.
          _____________________________________________________

          Good explanation.

          -A body receiving more energy than it emitts, beomes warmer.

          -While and because becoming warmer, it emitts more and more.(According to T^4-Law)

          -At some point it emitts as much as it receives.
          Now equilibrium is reached and warming has finished.

          And since no energy is created from nothing or disappears into nowhere, Law of Thermodynamik isnt violated.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            F,

            And the fact that the Earth has cooled over four and a half billion years indicates that it has emitted more energy than it received. Otherwise, its temperature would have remained the same, or increased.

            At night time, the surface also cools – no energy balance there.

            As winter approaches, your location is losing energy more rapidly than it can be replaced – cooling.

            These things work both ways. Still no magical GHE. Increasing the amount of CO2 between the Sun and a thermometer does not make the thermometer hotter – it just reduces the amount of heat reaching the thermometer. If you believe that reducing the amount of energy reaching a thermometer makes it hotter, you are crazier than I thought. That is beyond stupid and ignorant.

            Cheers.

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            October 23, 2018 at 8:56 PM

            F,

            And the fact that the Earth has cooled over four and a half billion years indicates that it has emitted more energy than it received.
            _____________________________________________________

            In each cooling period it emitted MORE energy than it received;
            and in each warming period it emitted LESS energy than it received.

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            October 23, 2018 at 8:56 PM

            At night time, the surface also cools no energy balance there.
            ____________________________________________________

            Yes. when cooling at night or in winter, the ground looses more energy than it receives.
            I see you understand the principle.

  70. Martin says:

    Incredible how we see these lower trends in storms (tornadoes, hurricane landfall/intensity, wildfires…etc) yet we see higher CO2 levels…hmmm this goes against the fear mongering predictions…. could something else be in play here that we don’t yet grasp? like that maybe….just maybe…. with all of our subjective data and formulas that mother nature is just too smart for all of on this board? The Earth is surprising the hell out of us every year – and every year we end up modifying our models due to missed targets.

    • Vincent says:

      I think the problems is that many people are not aware of the lower trends. In Australia, the recent Hurricane Michael has been reported on the news as the 3rd worse ever. On a recent Q&A (question and answer) program on the national ABC, an American visitor on the panel answering the questions, described Hurricane Michael as the worst ever.

      The fact, according to the American Hurricane Center, that Hurricane Michael was the 3rd worse since 1935, when CO2 levels were much lower than today, would logically imply that increased CO2 levels appear to reduce the intensity of hurricanes.

      Of course, we know that is not necessarily true. Over any period of time, hurricane frequency and/or intensity will likely increase in certain parts of the world, and decrease in other parts of the world, probably regardless of the minuscule levels of CO2 at present or in the recent past.

      • Martin says:

        So to call something the ‘worst ever’ would require one to know all hurricanes preceding Michael… as we can prove through sediment studies there have been some major/massive ones but worse or not one does not know.

        We continue to see ups and downs with various climate activities and some of these activities match up with certain ‘markers’ and sometimes they do not…..CO2 for example. We (as all of human civilization) won’t be able to make much of even a dent in our climate but can make an impact to our quality of local air, land and water… and we should. Cleaner is certainly better for us.

  71. PhilJ says:

    “I would never pretend such a nonsense.”

    Good, then i assume you agree that a colder atmosphere cannot heat a warmer surface.

    In contrast, a warmer interior CAN heat a colder surface.

    And this is a factor in deep ocean currents:

    https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/922a/2111bc02dd298ecb15df11d1a19558fb7403.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwi894KSiJveAhUGHDQIHaeIAT4QFjAaegQIABAB&usg=AOvVaw0V5xmA92-KqMxwKAC1MD35

    • Bindidon says:

      Thx for the paper, very interesting at a first glance.

    • Svante says:

      A less cold atmosphere can warm the surface.

      Paper looks good: “the anomalous heat flux leads to a
      1.5 x 10^−3 C [surface] warming”.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      P,

      The problem with the climatological pseudoscientific cultists is that they tend to be stupid and ignorant in relation to physics.

      Their semantic tricks collapse when faced with reality,

      Trying to increase the temperature of a teaspoon of water, using all the considerable heat energy in the Earth’s supply of ice, results in miserable and abject failure. No matter how many fantasy scenarios they come up with, no amount of concentrating, accumulating or focussing makes a blind bit of difference!

      Yet they still claim that the heat from a colder object can be applied to raise the temperature of a hotter – by using the miraculous yet curiously indescribable GHE.

      Referring to them as a pack of fools would no doubt result in a genuine pack of fools being deeply offended by the comparison, so I’ll stick with stupid and ignorant to describe the climatological pseudoscientific cultists.

      Have fun.

      Cheers.

  72. PhilJ says:

    “The Earths average surface temperature is much above what the solar alone would bring it up to be.”

    Well no kidding. Maybe because the sun did not bring the temp up from some cold rock but rather has slowed the cooling of a hot gaseous ball of molten rock…

    And Venus is even hotter because higher insolation has slowed its cooling to a much greater extent..,

    The simple answer is usually the right one…

    • Norman says:

      PhilJ

      Are you the programmer for the FlynnBot? The hot molten Earth cooled very fast. You can go to Hawaii and see how long it takes molten rock to cool even so you can touch it. Not long, maybe a few days. That is not the correct mechanism for explaining Earth’s elevated surface temperature.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        N,

        And that is why the surface has cooled. You will notice that lava cools – it is not “warmed” or “heated” by its colder surrounding environment. Even direct sunlight won’t stop it from cooling!

        Antarctica is a volcanically active region, even though temperatures can drop to -90 C or so. Not much global warming there. Mt Erebus actually has a lake of molten lava – not managing to cool much, it seems. You might be able to explain this by colder heating warmer – maybe you think the surrounding ice heats the rock to melting point, but even you would not be that silly.

        My assumption is that the Earth has a molten interior – cooling very, very, slowly. As solidified rock has greater density than its molten state, and lesser volume, this leads to some interesting consequences – I’ll let you consider the physical implications.

        You disagree, so I hope you have something logical to explain the inconvenient fact that the surface is no longer molten, after four and a half billion years or so.

        Cheers.

    • Svante says:

      PhilJ says:

      “And Venus is even hotter because higher insolation has slowed its cooling to a much greater extent..,”

      False, it’s albedo is higher, it absorbs less than earth so it should be colder.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        S,

        You are confused. Venus is quite dissimilar to Earth. How much radiogenic heat is still being produced? You don’t know? I’m not surprised.

        In any case, you might not be aware that lowering emissivity results in a lower rate of cooling. For example, a highly polished silver teapot allows its contents to cool more slowly than a heavily oxidised one.

        Hence, higher reflectivity results in slower cooling.

        Additionally, Venus is surrounded by a much thicker and denser atmosphere, which also retards the speed at which the planet cools. Just as surrounding your hot teapot with a thick tea cozy retards cooling. No heating, just slower cooling.

        No Hansenite “tipping point” or “runaway greenhouse”. Those are delusional fantasies, based on stupidity and ignorance, rather than science. Just as stupid and ignorant as the US National Science Foundation insisting that Archimdes’ principle did not apply to floating ice.

        So carry on making your witless one word declarations of what is true, backed up by nothing more than stupidity and ignorance.

        How’s that testable GHE hypothesis going? Not well, I’m guessing.

        Cheers.

  73. PhilJ says:

    Makes a lot more sense then cool warming hot…

  74. Mike Flynn says:

    Nate wrote –

    “Mikes mind has demonstrably gone over the edge of the flat Earth.

    He is oddly in denial that sunlight keeps the Earth nice and warm.”

    Why would I deny that it is warmer in sunlight than not?

    Your attempts to misrepresent me are looking quite bizarre. Maybe you could try quoting something I actually wrote, rather than delving into your delusional fantasies. You don’t seem to have mentioned the GHE, have you? Are you starting to realise that the supposed Greenhouse Effect is of no effect whatever!

    It certainly hasn’t stopped the surface cooling from its molten state. Neither has four and a half billion years of accumulated sunlight!

    Heat trapping seems to be a bit of a delusional fantasy, don’t you think?

    Cheers.

  75. Snape says:

    Earlier this year, Professor Flynn put forth several theories to explain why Venus is so hot. Most notable:

    a) the heat generated by its lack of moons

    b) the heat generated by its lack of earthquakes

    c) the heat generated by its clockwise rotation

    *****

    The musings of a genius!

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      You might convince people if you could actually provide quotes.

      Otherwise, it is possible that people might assume you are just suffering from a delusional condition, in which your perception of reality is severely affected.

      Cheers

  76. Snape says:

    Mike

    I’m confused, are you calling your own ideas delusional?

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      You wrote –

      “Im confused, . . . ” You certainly are.

      I’ll let the rest of your pointless gotcha go through to the keeper.

      Do you have a mental defect which prevents you from copying and pasting the comments with which you supposedly disagree?

      Still no GHE, and no AGW theory. The Earth has managed to cool over the last four and a half billion years or so, I wonder why? Not really, of course. I’m just having a bit of fun at your expense!

      Carry on fabricating – it’s all you have left, when the facts disagree with your mad notions.

      Cheers.

  77. Snape says:

    “The peculiarities of Venus – retrograde rotation, no moons, no apparent plate tectonics, and so on, combined with an atmosphere somewhat similar to that of the infant Earth, easily explain the high observed surface temperature.”

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      Thanks for quoting me directly. What has it to do with your nonsense – claiming that any of the things I stated create any heat?

      Is your inability to comprehend due to some mental defect, or just a result of congenital stupidity and ignorance?

      Maybe you could address what I said, rather than your delusional interpretations.

      So why do you think the high observed surface temperature of Venus cannot be reasonably easily explained using normal physics? What hypothesis do you have, and what is your reasoning? I assume you do not understand the difference between an hypothesis and a theory, which would be typical for a climatological pseudoscientific cultist.

      Thank you for your interest in my comments. I assume you make a record of them all, and spend hours poring over them, looking for a factual error. You need to spend more time learning to read and comprehend first, if you want to find fault.

      Otherwise, you might wind up being an object of ridicule.

      Cheers.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      Just as a matter of interest, somebody might feel inclined to calculate the energy released as a result of the “two different ways” mentioned.

      I had not considered the implications previously. Maybe Snape was inadvertently onto something when he incorrectly accused me of attributing heating to the retrograde rotation of Venus, or more accurately, the processes that led to it. Thank you, young Snape.

      “We thus end to a form of paradox where the retrograde rotation of Venus is the most probable result of a natural evolution, and not the result (always possible) of a strong accidental collision; but in same time, for a large part of the prograde initial conditions, it is possible to arrive in this state by two entirely different ways, that are not possible to distinguish with the observation of the present final state of the planet (Correia and Laskar, 2001).”

      In this case, not only is the future unknowable, but so, also, is the past! Such is the nature of chaos.

      Cheers.

  78. PhilJ says:

    “False, its albedo is higher, it absorbs less than earth so it should be colder.”

    Albedo changes… What do you think the albedo of the Earth was before it cooled enough for the atmosphere to rain out?

    Much like Venus I expect…

    • Svante says:

      Maybe, why do you ask?

      Venus got a runaway greenhouse effect and now its water is gone.

    • barry says:

      Here’s one for you, Phil.

      Venus, at twice the distance from the sun and with a much higher albedo, has a higher average surface temp than Mercury.

      What do you suppose causes that?

      • JDHuffman says:

        barry, elephants are much heavier than humming birds, yet they can’t fly.

        What do you suppose causes that?

      • Mike Flynn says:

        b,

        According to NASA, one hypothesis is based on the premise –

        “All the while, the radioactive decay of elements in the core continue to generate heat inside the planet.”

        I’ll let you tell me how reducing the emissivity of an internally heated body with a relatively constant results in an increased surface temperature.

        Does this satisfy your question, or were you just trying to indulge in a spot of trolling, by posing a pathetically inept attempt at a gotcha?

        Cheers.

        • Nate says:

          “I’ll let you tell me how reducing the emissivity of an internally heated body with a relatively constant results in an increased surface temperature.”

          I don’t know Mike, but I’ll let you tell us how a question, such as this one, with no relevance to the Earth, serves any purpose, other than to reveal your stupidity.

          Maybe you could have asked a non-strawman question, such as:

          ‘Tell me how reducing the emissivity of a body heated predominantly by external solar radiation, results in an increased surface temperature.’

        • barry says:

          I’ve imagined it as if the person who poses as g.e.r.a.n. is experimenting with different trolling persona – a character exercise – and Flynn, Huffman and possibly Robertson and ren, are all manifestations of this wonderful multi-masquerade. The common theme is all that makes up trolling – baiting, subject-changing, disruption, irrelevant commentary and any tactic that secures a rhetorical win or ensarement in a conversation with someone who only engages for the gamesmanship.

          It’s because I have a love for people that this occurs to me. And this narrative is the absolute best light in which I can resurrect such turgid, off-topic and self-serving behaviour in the likes of those named.

          Otherwise, you play with pigs, you get covered in mud.

  79. Brent Auvermann says:

    Dr. Spencer, how much leverage does the 1935 hurricane have on the regression and the implications? I suppose it’s possible that the 1935 storm was a freak occurrence for the time. Without it in the dataset, wouldn’t the intensity graph look quite a bit different, with a positive slope?

  80. David Appell says:

    “The Atlantic and Pacific Ocean hurricane season is most powerful on record this year,” USA Today 10/23/18.

    https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2018/10/23/hurricane-season-most-active-record-atlantic-pacific-combined/1741226002/

    • Nate says:

      Pacific “We’ve already had 34.5 major hurricane days this year, which shatters the old record of 24 major hurricane days set in 2015,” Klotzbach said.”

      • Mike Flynn says:

        N,

        “So far in 2018, the ACE for the Atlantic and eastern Pacific seasons together is 432 units of energy, shattering the record of 371, which was set in 1992, Klotzbach said.

        On average, the two ocean’s combined ACE is 221 units.”

        Doom, doom, thrice doom! A shattering 432 units of energy! Run for the hills, before an errant unit of energy stops you dead in your tracks.

        Or maybe it’s just more climatological pseudoscientific claptrap from a cultist who is confused about the difference between climate and weather.

        Who knows? Who cares?

        Cheers.

  81. Bobdesbond says:

    Counts of Atlantic Category 5 hurricanes by 20-year period:
    1920-39 … 8
    1940-59 … 2
    1960-79 … 7
    1980-99 … 5
    2000-19 … 11

    Counts of Atlantic Category 4 or 5 hurricanes by 20-year period:
    1920-39 … 24
    1940-59 … 25
    1960-79 … 22
    1980-99 … 24
    2000-19 … 39

    • Mike Flynn says:

      B,

      What is your point?

      Data is meaningless without context. The usual context for irrelevant tables of meaningless figures is that the poster is endeavouring to deny, divert and confuse. They find themselves unable to find facts to base valid disagreement upon, so instead adopt the ploy of simply attempting to be disagreeable.

      In their minds, they are demonstrating superior intelligence, but in fact are showing that they are merely stupid and ignorant.

      Still no GHE. No AGW. Even the IPCC states that future climate states are unpredictable.

      What was your point again?

      Cheers.

      • Mykey says:

        LOL
        What a classic denialist comment.
        Can’t or won’t understand the data.
        Then denies that data/observations have any relevance to the debate.
        Then repeats (for the umpteenth time) his discredited opinions. Just what you get from older people on the brink of dementia. Sad.

      • Bobdesbond says:

        You can’t see the point Mikey? How sad.

        The point is that, in any data set with a trend, unless there is 100% correlation it is ALWAYS possible to cherry pick a subset of the data that happens to buck the trend. That is what Mr Spencer has done by specifically choosing hurricanes that make landfall in Florida. Any reasonable person would ask – why only Florida?

        • Bobdesbond says:

          Oops – sorry Mykey – I hadn’t noticed that your name was almost the same as the idiot’s.

        • Mike Flynn says:

          B,

          Indeed. The Earth’s surface has cooled, from its initial molten state to now. Feel free to insert as many data points as you like, and cherry pick any subset you like. Over the last four and a half billion years, the trend is cooling.

          In any case, trends are completely worthless as a means of predicting the future, if that’s what your point is implying. Only the really stupid and ignorant believe that the past can be used to predict the future – whether in the stock market, corn futures, future economic outcomes, or anything else.

          Keep believing – it obviously keeps you happy, and provides happiness to realists who observe your climatic caperings with amusement.

          As to why the blog’s author chose tot address the subject he did, any rational,person might assume that Dr Spencer is perfectly free to dance to his own tune, rather than having to comply with the mad desires of every passing climatological pseudoscientific cultist.

          Start your own blog. Write what you want, ban whom you wish. I wish you every success. You still won’t be able to provide a testable GHE hypothesis, nor any theory of AGW. Future climate states will remain unpredictable, and I surmise your levels of stupidity and ignorance will remain much th3 same.

          Cheers.

          • Mykey says:

            “In any case, trends are completely worthless as a means of predicting the future”
            Really? What a naive statement.
            I can reliably predict that, as time goes by, your dementia will get worse.

          • Bobdesbond says:

            Really? How does the depth of the current ice age compare to the depths of the earliest ice ages? (note – I’m referring to ice ages, not glacial periods of the current ice age.)

          • Mike Flynn says:

            M,

            You seem to believe you can make an assumption at least as well as a three year old child. Your belief seems reasonable. Unfortunately, the future is unknowable – primarily because it doesn’t exist.

            You might pass your opinion on to the IPCC, which considers that future climate states are not predictable. Unfortunately, your sublime faith in your ability to predict the future from the past may not be accepted by anyone with a grain of sense.

            If you want a really, really, long trend, consider the Earth’s surface temperature. Over the last four and a half billion years, the surface has cooled. What’s your prediction of the future, based on a really, really long trend?

            Carry on peering into the past. That won’t achieve anything either.

            Cheers.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            B,

            You wrote –

            “Really? How does the depth of the current ice age compare to the depths of the earliest ice ages? (note Im referring to ice ages, not glacial periods of the current ice age.)”

            I presume you are trying to make a point, but your lack of clarity obscures whatever it is you are trying to say. You don’t appear to be disagreeing with anything I wrote, so maybe you have gone off on a trolling frolic of your own.

            Maybe you could quote me, disagree, and provide something to support your disagreement, or maybe not. What do you think? Are you a stupid and ignorant troll, or just stupid and ignorant?

            The world wonders.

            Cheers

          • Bobdesbond says:

            Gee – most people would have realised I was hinting at the fact that the current ice age is nowhere near as cold as the early ice ages. They were either snowball earths or very close to one. Even at its peak, the earth has not gone close to being HALF covered by ice during the current ice age.

            In fact, earlier than 540 million years ago, the ice ages are the only temperature record we have a semblance of confidence in. There is NO data from which anyone can conclude a 4.5 billion year trend.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            B,

            Guesses and hints, eh? That sounds like climatological pseudoscience to me.

            Are you denying that the molten surface of the Earth had a higher average temperature than now? No? Well, the average temperature has declined, whether you like it or not. No cherry picking, no selective assumptions about intermediate conditions.

            Just hotter to colder over the longest period there is.

            As to a supposed “snowball Earth”, which is pure speculation unsupported by credible evidence, you are faced with the problem that ice exposed to 1000 W/m2 from the Sun, normal to the surface, melts. I’m not sure how you ensure an appropriate amount of non-meltable ice to fit your speculation.

            Presenting speculation as fact is often a chacteristic of the climatological pseudoscientific cultist.

            The surface was very hot – molten. Now it is not. It has cooled. None of your febrile fantasies can make this inconvenient fact go away. No GHE. No AGW theory. Try guessing and hinting one into existence, if you like. Excuse my laughter – not good form, I know.

            Cheers.

          • Bobdesbond says:

            “As to a supposed ‘snowball Earth’, which is pure speculation unsupported by credible evidence, you are faced with the problem that ice exposed to 1000 W/m2 from the Sun, normal to the surface, melts.

            Then why is there permanent glacial ice in the Cayambe glacier, which sits right at the equator? Does incoming solar radiation decrease with altitude? Or is it just possible that you have grossly oversimplified the causative factors?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            B,

            Why can you not bring yourself to actually give a reason to support your disagreement? Because you are stupid and ignorant?

            You may not know how glaciers form – I’ll let you look it up for yourself. You will then realise how witless your gotcha was. For anyone else –

            “A considerable amount of snow accumulation is necessary for glacial ice to form. It is imperative that more snow accumulates in the winter than that which melts away during the summer.”

            You may have not read the words “normal to the surface”, or possibly not understood the meaning.

            If you have to ask me if 1360 is greater than 1000 (in relation to the second part of your gotcha), you are indeed either incredibly ignorant, or need more instruction in composing gotchas.

            As to your last gotcha – causative factors of what? The imaginary speculation you call “snowball Earth”?

            Maybe you learn some real science, rather than the climatological pseudoscience dished up by a wide variety of deluded wannabe second raters.

            Cheers.

          • Bobdesbond says:

            If you don’t believe that a location at the equator is closer on average to receiving the sun’s rays from directly overhead than any other location on the earth’s surface, then it is you who doesn’t understand “normal to the surface”.

            I know precisely how glaciers form. Why don’t you actually explain what that has to do with your BS claim.

            You might also want to explain what a comparison between 1360 and 1000 has to do with my question about whether incoming radiation decreases with altitude. Don’t tell me you believe that they are the actual values for the insolation at sea level and at the top of Cambayne.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            B,

            Maybe you could specify where you disagree with me. If it isn’t too much trouble, of course.

            I made a statement, you decide you prefer to substitute something more to your liking.

            You refer to my supposed “BS claim”, but you can’t quote what the “BS claim” actually is.

            I haven’t got the faintest idea why you can’t find the answer to your question. Is it because you are too stupid, or too lazy?

            You have no clue. Trying to avoid the fairly indisputable fact that the Earth has cooled over the last four and a half billion years, just shows how desperate the purveyors of climatological pseudoscience have become.

            No GHE, no theory of AGW. If there was, I’m sure you would have thrown it in my face by now. But alas, there isn’t! Carry on looking ever more desperate and ridiculous. I don’t mind at all – it’s all your own doing.

            Cheers,

  82. tonyM says:

    There seem to be a number of self appointed experts in cyclones; no surprise in this field. Perhaps for others it may pay to look at the fine print of sites which provide the data:

    https://www.spc.noaa.gov/wcm/adj.html
    ….the increase in tornado reports over the last 54 years is almost entirely due to secular trends such as population increase, increased tornado awareness, and more robust and advanced reporting networks

    Even with adjusted data:
    A significant drawback to this methodology is that we cannot add tornadoes to past days with zero tornado reports when tornadoes actually did occur but were never reported.

    NOAA site shows that YTD Oct, 2018 tornado number is close to the minimum since 1954.

    WUWT shows that the F3+ category tornadoes since 1954 is significantly down in number with a clear downward trend.

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/10/24/2018-u-s-tornadoes-on-track-to-be-lowest-ever-noaas-temperature-trends-blow-a-hole-in-climate-correlation/

    Given Climastrology conjecture predicts fewer but more extreme tornadoes it would seem that the claims of more Tornadoes by these self appointed experts falsifies the conjecture; an own goal.

    BOM also says that there has been no increase in Oz – in number or intensity and also pose the caveat of not being able to compare directly with the past.

    • David Appell says:

      Is an increase in tornadoes expected under AGW?

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        I don’t know. What do you think?

        Show your calculations, otherwise people might think you are just trolling.

        Cheers.

    • David Appell says:

      “One way of assessing the possibility of a change in the frequency of future thunderstorms is to look at historical records of observed tornado, hail and wind occurrence with respect to the environmental conditions (Brooks, 2013). This indicates that an increase in the fraction of severe thunderstorms containing non-tornadic winds would be consistent with the model projections of increased energy and decreased shear, but there has not been enough research to make a firm conclusion regarding future changes in frequency or magnitude.”

      – IPCC 5AR WG1 Ch12 Sec 12.4.5.5 “Extreme Events in the Water Cycle,” pg 1087.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        I see.

        “One way of assessing the possibility of a change in the frequency of future thunderstorms is to look at historical records of observed tornado, hail and wind occurrence . . . ”

        Unfortunately, that is a pointless waste of time, even if 97% of stupid and ignorant people believe that the future can be predicted by examining historical records.

        At least the IPCC shows a rare appreciation of reality by asserting that future climate states are not predictable.

        Carry on appealing to stupidity – it’s a change from appealing to authority.

        Cheers.

  83. Snape says:

    DA

    “The Atlantic and Pacific Ocean hurricane season is most powerful on record this year,” USA Today 10/23/18.”

    That’s doesn’t include the latest, and strongest of the bunch:

    https://www.npr.org/2018/10/24/660224741/super-typhoon-yutu-strongest-storm-of-2018-slams-u-s-pacific-territory

  84. Snape says:

    “Yutu is Earth’s tenth Category 5 storm of 2018, an astonishing total that has only been exceeded once on record (twelve, in 1997). Yutu is tied with Super Typhoon Mangkhut, which also had 180 mph winds, as the strongest storm of 2018.”

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      I’m sure you believe there is merit in repeating the claim that there were more category 5 storms 21 years ago.

      Is this supposedly due to, or in spite of, the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere?

      Cheers.

  85. Snape says:

    1997 (12 category 5’s) was of course the super el nino year, and topical Pacific SST’s were much warmer than usual.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      Ooooh. A super El Nio! Scary. Do the same physical processes leading to the super El Nio also create record numbers of category 5 storms around the world?

      You haven’t a clue, have you?

      Keep trolling if it makes you happy. I don’t mind you looking like a fool.

      Cheers,

    • Mykey says:

      “The earth’s strongest storm this year is striking US territories in the western Pacific Ocean.
      A strengthening Super Typhoon Yutu, with sustained winds of 290km/h, is on a trek through the Northern Mariana Islands.The storm is roaring across the islands of Saipan and Tinian, both US territories, and will become one of the most intense storms – if not the most – on record to hit the US.”

      • Mike Flynn says:

        M,

        Thanks for the weather report.

        Are you trying to make a point? Trolling for effect?

        Is there supposed to be some connection with the mythical GHE?

        Cheers.

  86. Mike Flynn says:

    Keep following the trends, eh?

    “Investors Mutual Fund investment director Anton Tagliaferro said things could still get worse but urged investors not to panic.

    “You can never predict the market. No one knows where it’s going to be next week, next month or next year.””

    No doubt some of the climatological pseudoscientific cultists disagree. Especially the ones boasting about the fortunes they are making – they have access to special never ending trends, I suppose.

    I wish I could get one of those never ending trends – unfortunately they seem to be imaginary. Just like the GHE.

    Cheers.

  87. ren says:

    The thirty day SOI index has been increasing since 03/10/2018.
    https://www.longpaddock.qld.gov.au/soi/

  88. Mike Flynn says:

    Bondesbond (along the way) wrote –

    “Dont tell me you believe that they are the actual values for the insolation at sea level and at the top of Cambayne.”

    I wouldn’t be surprised if he complains because I do as he demands. Bizarre pseudo-thought processes these climatological pseudoscientific cultists exhibit. It looks like they tell you what to do, and then whine if you do it!

    At the risk of making B appear even more ridiculous than he manages himself, why would I tell him that I believe something that I don’t, particularly when he has told me not to! Confusing, I know. All part of the increasingly worn out and grubby tapestry of pseudoscientific silliness referred to as climatology.

    Cheers.

  89. PhilJ says:

    Barry,

    Mercury , being far less massive began with a much lower total internal energy.
    Also because of its mass and proximity to the sun, it would have quickly lost any gaseous and lighter elements cooked off by the sun and blown away by the solar wind .

    With a much smaller volume and no atmosphere to speak of it would have cooled much more swiftly than Venus.

    Evidence of volcanic activity in the distant past and the now solid interior supports this hypothesis…

    • JDHuffman says:

      DA, notice ren is not attacking you for reporting local weather.

      Maybe he’s not so insecure and doesn’t feel he has to censor….

    • tonyM says:

      DA asked earlier:
      Is an increase in tornadoes expected under AGW?
      ……………………………………….

      Reverend Appell, glancing through your earlier incantations I thought you had cast out all the demons to hell it seemed and would know the answer. So, what a strange question!

      What is it that you don’t understand when I had said:
      Given Climastrology conjecture predicts fewer but more extreme tornadoes….

      Fewer means fewer; not an increase at all. This is in line with both AR4 and AR5 statements.

    • tonyM says:

      DA:

      You persist with more alarmist garbage re YUTU as strongest storm to evaaah hit US soil.

      I sympathise with people caught in any nasty storm but you lack any insight or perspective on Yutu. Do you ever stop to think beyond your pastoral duty of promoting junk in this field?

      First let me ask if you verified that it is a statement from NOAA. Then you could perhaps read some of the descriptors like wind speed of 178mph. Now such a wind speed is smack in the middle of an F3 TC a severe category. Oh it’s bad alright but hardly the strongest evaaah. If one looks on the NOAA site one can see that the US has sustained numerous devastating and incredible category hits …F4 and F5 respectively. This may help (NOAA):

      What was the strongest tornado? What is the highest wind speed in a tornado?

      Nobody knows. Tornado wind speeds have only been directly recorded in the weaker ones, because strong and violent tornadoes destroy weather instruments. Mobile Doppler radars such as the OU Doppler on Wheels have remotely sensed tornado wind speeds above ground level as high as about 302 mph (on 3 May 1999 near Bridge Creek OK)–the highest winds ever found very near Earth’s surface by any means. [In addition to having what we now would consider EF5-class winds, that tornado caused actual F5 damage.] But the greatest ground-level wind speeds in the most violent tornadoes never have been directly measured.

      Your religious fervour suppresses other clues in your ref article:
      “It’s one of the most powerful typhoons I’ve seen in my life,” former Gov. Juan N. Babauta said
      (… one of !!!)

      Judging by the description given by interviewees I suggest they would not be alive to tell their story if they had been subjected to an F5 incredible category hit.

      Rev Appell, why don’t you go contaminate your own site with your religious fervour; invite Pauchuri and your brethren/sistren. May your prayers be answered.

  90. Mike Flynn says:

    Earlier on, barry asked for an explanation of the high surface temperature of Venus, being unable or unwilling to try to find out for himself.

    I attempted to help the lad, and put him on the right track, hoping he would overcome his stupidity and laziness. After explaining, I wrote the following –

    “I’ll let you tell me how reducing the emissivity of an internally heated body with a relatively constant results in an increased surface temperature.”

    Nate leapt in, in his typically stupid and ignorant fashion, as follows –

    “I dont know Mike, but Ill let you tell us how a question, such as this one, with no relevance to the Earth, serves any purpose, other than to reveal your stupidity.”

    Others may realise that answering a question about Venus with information relating to Venus would seem logical. Nate, being slightly challenged in the comprehension and logic areas, takes umbrage.

    First admitting his complete ignorance about the answer relating to Venus, he then lurches off in a completely different direction, complaining that I didn’t answer a question relating to the Earth, which was never asked!

    Strange people, these climatological pseudoscientific cultists. A triumph of faith over fact, they believe. Ah well, their GHE god remains a most inscrutable and reclusive deity. Inexplicable and impotent – apparently sleeping soundly while the Earth cooled for four and a half billion years, having periods of wakefulness, followed by a series of naps.

    I suppose the delusional have to find something with which to populate their fantasies. Something that cannot be described or scientifically tested fits the bill nicely

    Cheers.

    • David Appell says:

      The Earth can still cool if it has a greenhouse effect. Obviously.

      The longest temperature record I’ve been able to find go back to about 530 M BCE. Where is your temperature data over the last 4.5 Byrs? Link please.

      Global temperatures varies up and down, with some eras as long as 100 Myrs. Why, if the Earth is constantly cooling since the beginning?

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geologic_temperature_record#/media/File:Phanerozoic_Climate_Change.png

    • Mike Flynn says:

      DA,

      Initial temperature – molten – pick an average temperature – certainly over 100 C average.

      Temperature now – average less than 100. Water in liquid form on surface.

      Temperature has fallen. QED.

      Inserting more intermediate temperatures changes nothing. The average has fallen. The GHE has apparently resulted in cooling, not heating.

      You wrote “The Earth can still cool if it has a greenhouse effect. Obviously.”

      The greenhouse effect has been of no effect – obviously.

      Neither you, nor I, nor anybody else has the faintest idea of global temperatures in the past. However, to claim that the Earth has increased its surface temperature in the past, a source of additional heat needs to be specified. As you acknowledge, the GHE heats nothing.

      Reality shows the Earth has cooled since its creation. Trying to cherry pick a short period based on fantasy temperatures is pointless. No additional heat (of a sufficient temperature, of course), no increase in temperature.

      I point out that additional heat energy is not sufficient, of itself, to raise temperature.

      Adding 500 ml of water at 275 K to 500 ml of water at 280 K nearly doubles the energy. However, the colder does not increase the temperature of the warmer, even though they are intimately mixed. The temperature of the warmer drops as it should.

      The added energy has resulted in a temperature fall.

      In order to heat the Earth, you not only need additional energy, but it must be at a higher temperature. I am unaware of any mechanism that related to CO2 that has this effect.

      No CO2 heating, therefore no possibility of a GHE.

      Cheers.

      • David Appell says:

        Where is your temperature data for before 530 Myrs BCE? You can’t produce any.

        There have clearly been ~100 Myr periods where global temperature increased. So much for your claim that the Earth has always always cooling. It’s certainly not cooling now.

        The interior Earth only radiates (now) a average of 0.086 W/m2 out the surface. Which first warms the atmosphere and ocean. By comparison, manmade CO2’s radiative forcing is now 2.0 W/m2, and the RF of all manmade GHGs is 3.1 W/m2.

        Your comments about the GHE are trolling, ignorant bullsh!t, as always.

        • JDHuffman says:

          DA claims: “CO2’s radiative forcing is now 2.0 W/m2, and the RF of all manmade GHGs is 3.1 W/m2.”

          Negative DA. That is NOT science. That is your false belief system.

          Your comments about the GHE are trolling, ignorant bullsh!t, as always.

        • Mike Flynn says:

          DA,

          The Earth has cooled. Hotter then than now. As long as the interior remains hotter than the surface, it will continue to cool. It has no choice.

          You can’t even say what the “global temperature” is right now, let alone in the past! All this nonsense about “radiative forcing” is just balderdash. Ice can emit more than 300 W/m2, but your chances of increasing the temperature of anything above freezing using this radiation is exactly zero.

          Put some ice in your coffee, and tell me how much hotter your coffee gets! Calculate as much radiative forcing as you like.

          CO2 radiates precisely no energy at all at absolute zero. If you heat CO2, and remove the source of heat, the CO2 will radiate at progressively longer wavelengths until it reaches absolute zero again.

          You said “The Earth can still cool if it has a greenhouse effect. Obviously.” Does your comment still apply? Under what conditions would this happen? Can you explain to other cultists who believe that the GHE makes things hotter, not colder?

          Have fun.

          Cheers.

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Reply
            Mike Flynn says:
            October 26, 2018 at 12:17 AM

            “The Earth has cooled.”
            _______________________________

            The whole universe has cooled since its origin.
            So what?

            Nevertheless we have a climate warming since 100 years, which will go on for a long time: and which will cause more and more very serious problems.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            F,

            So what? So your silly mythical GHE hasn’t stopped the Earth from cooling, has it? That’s what.

            Even David Appell accepts that fact.

            Maybe you need to redefine “cooling” to mean “warming”. Then you could claim that the mythical GHE has actually made the Earth warmer, rather than colder. I doubt that anybody apart from another climatological pseudoscientific cultist will accept the redefinition.

            Give it a try, if you like. Let me know how you get on.

            Cheers.

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            October 26, 2018 at 5:23 PM

            F,

            So what? So your silly mythical GHE hasnt stopped the Earth from cooling, has it?
            _________________________________________________

            I dont know any “mythical” GHE. Only the ordinary, physically well understood GHE. And this one indeed is warming.

            Warming is contrary to cooling.

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            October 26, 2018 at 5:30 PM

            Natural processes allowed the Earth to cool.
            …..
            So sad. Too bad.

            ___________________________________

            And physical processes just force the Earth to warm. Since 100 Years and it will go on.
            Really very bad.

          • David Appell says:

            MF says:
            If you heat CO2, and remove the source of heat, the CO2 will radiate at progressively longer wavelengths

            Wrong.

            Heating a molecule — changing its kinetic energy — does not affect its atomic structure until there is a phase change (and atmo CO2 is already a gas), so it doesn’t change its ab.sorp.tion and emission spectrum.

            There are some tiny effects, but nothing of the sort that you think exists.

            PS: Nothing can reach absolute zero. See 3LOT.

          • David Appell says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            So what? So your silly mythical GHE hasnt stopped the Earth from cooling, has it? Thats what.
            Even David Appell accepts that fact.

            Sometimes the Earth cools and sometimes it warms. Often it warms for very long periods of time.

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geologic_temperature_record#/media/File:Phanerozoic_Climate_Change.png

            Claiming (without evidence) it has net cooled over 4B yrs is, anyway, a useless statement in the context of understanding climate. Just more nonsensical deep trolling.

            The Sun will continue to warm (~1% more radiant every 110 Myrs) and will eventually become a red giant, vaporizing the Earth. There goes your the-Earth-is-always-cooling idea.

        • Nate says:

          “The Earth has cooled. Hotter then than now. As long as the interior remains hotter than the surface, it will continue to cool. It has no choice.”

          And yet, Mother Earth refuses to follow Mike’s orders, cuz she knows they’re pure nonsense.

          And Mike, freely repeats his silly straw men, paying no attention to their invalidation.

          http://www.drroyspencer.com/2018/10/florida-major-hurricane-strikes-still-no-trend/#comment-326612

          • Mike Flynn says:

            N,

            Natural processes allowed the Earth to cool. Those natural processes are unlikely to change, just because you find them inconvenient.

            So sad. Too bad.

            Have you managed to come up with a testable GHE hypothesis yet? The hypothesis will have to account for four and a half billion years of initial cooling, of course. This might prove a bit of a hurdle, but you might be able to overcome this by lurching off into irrelevancies.

            Deny, divert, confuse – all part of the worn out tactics of the climate clowns.

            Give it your best shot.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            Why do you keep asking for empirical evidence of the GHE when I’ve given you many?

            It’s because your real goal here is not understanding and gaining knowledge, it’s disruptive deep trolling. Is that really how you want to spend your life?

          • Nate says:

            Mike,

            Why do you keep repeating premises and things that do not follow from them?

            Are you very stupid? Apparently so, and too stupid to realize it.

            “As long as the interior remains hotter than the surface, it will continue to cool.”

            This is an example. Its not logical. And it neglects important things, like the sun.

            Here’s another.

            “Natural processes allowed the Earth to cool. Those natural processes are unlikely to change”

            Does not follow. Just a hope and desire, it seems.

            Natural processes have warmed the Earth’s surface, many times, and your hopeful declaration is proven wrong.

            What will you do now?

    • Svante says:

      David Appell says:

      The longest temperature record I’ve been able to find go back to about 530 M BCE. Where is your temperature data over the last 4.5 Byrs? Link please.We

      There is evidence of liquid water 4.3 billion years ago, so the 100 C mark was crossed by then.

      Nate says:

      Apparently we had liquid oceans 3 Billion years ago. So the surface has cooled ~ 90 C since then.

      Assuming the cooling rate has not slowed (of course it has), this is a cooling rate of 3 millionths of degree per century.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        S,

        And, as usual, you don’t have a point, do you?

        Just more mindless trolling.

        Oh well.

        Cheers.

        • Svante says:

          Your molten rock trolling is mindless as usual, that’s the point.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            S,

            Maybe you could quote me, and indicate the basis for any disagreement you might have. Or maybe not.

            On the other hand, you could just expect people to accept that your delusional fantasies should be believed, regardless of facts.

            If you choose to believe that the Earth’s interior is not molten, or that it does not cool in line with the Laws of Thermodynamics, feel free. Fanatics generally prefer faith and fantasy to fact.

            Off you go, now. Troll away, if you can’t find any relevant facts.

            Cheers.

          • Svante says:

            The Earth’s interior is molten, that’s not disputed, why do you keep repeating it?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            S,

            Now you have accepted the core is molten, how would you establish the average surface temperature?

            Assume that the core temperature is 5000 K (or another figure higher than the temperature of molten rock, if you prefer).

            Bear in mind that the surface temperature has obviously varied between more than 1000 C, and whatever it has cooled to now.

            Now discover that you cannot come up with any cogent reason why the Earth should not continue to cool, as it obviously has done for four and a half billion years.

            Or you could keep asking witless gotchas, and claim that the Earth is now getting hotter, due to some magical process which has apparently not worked for four and a half billion years, instead allowing the Earth to cool!

            No wonder nobody can propose a testable GHE hypothesis. You might as well just continue trolling, and stick to climatological pseudoscience.

            As to your stupid gotcha, why should I bother answering?

            Cheers.

          • Svante says:

            Mike Flynn says:

            Now you have accepted the core is molten, how would you establish the average surface temperature?

            It’s the product of A) incoming heat from the sun B) upwelling geothermal heat, minus C) heat flowing to space.

            Surface temperature is stable if A+B=C. We have roughly:
            A = 160 W/m^2.
            B = 0.087 W/m^2.

            B is negligible. What are your numbers?

            Assume that the core temperature is 5000 K (or another figure higher than the temperature of molten rock, if you prefer).

            Bear in mind that the surface temperature has obviously varied between more than 1000 C, and whatever it has cooled to now.

            It has been colder than now, but OK.

            Now discover that you cannot come up with any cogent reason why the Earth should not continue to cool, as it obviously has done for four and a half billion years.

            The earth will continue to cool, the surface may not because B) is negligible, the temperature is determined by A) minus C).

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            October 27, 2018 at 7:04 AM

            S,

            Now you have accepted the core is molten, how would you establish the average surface temperature?

            Assume that the core temperature is 5000 K (or another figure higher than the temperature of molten rock, if you prefer).

            Bear in mind that the surface temperature has obviously varied between more than 1000 C, and whatever it has cooled to now.
            ____________________________________________________

            What are you telling again and again?
            Believe me: Everyone knows and noone ever doubted the hole earth was hotter at its origin is still very hot under its crust.
            What are you trying to tell us, and what has it do doe with GHE?
            Doe you think the cooling of the earth causes Global Warming??

          • David Appell says:

            The Earth’s inner core is solid, because it is under immense pressure (about 350 GPa) that raises the boiling point of iron to about 6200 K. The outer core is molten.

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inner_core#Temperature_and_pressure

          • David Appell says:

            I should have written “melting point,” not boiling point.

          • Svante says:

            Thank you for correcting me David, I appreciate it.

  91. David Appell says:

    “Category 5 typhoon Yutu devastates the Northern Marianas in worst storm to hit any part of U.S. since 1935,” Washington Post 10/25/18.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/energy-environment/2018/10/25/category-typhoon-devastates-northern-marianas-worst-storm-hit-us-since/?utm_term=.69888a9dd09f

    • Vincent says:

      The fact that there was a worse storm in the general region in 1935, when CO2 levels were much lower than today, implies that we cannot necessarily protect ourselves from the severity of future weather events by reducing our CO2 emissions.

      That hurricanes, floods and droughts will become more extreme and/or more frequent as a result of increased CO2 levels, is the main alarm about anthropogenic climate change. However, the evidence seems to be lacking that such extreme weather events have increased on a global scale since 1950, according to the Working Group 1 technical summary from the AR5 IPCC report, released in 2013.

      As I understand, the 6th IPCC report is still a work in process. I’ll be interested to see what new evidence on extreme weather events has been gathered by Working Group 1, which is based on the physical sciences.

      Political summaries are political. I’m more interested in the hard evidence.

      • David Appell says:

        Hurricanes, floods and droughts are not the main concern from manmade climate change, IMO — I think sea level rise is, and heat waves. But yours are important too, and of course SLR causes coastal flooding. We are already committed to 1.5 m of SLR. If we continue business as usual, that commitment will be over 6 m by 2100. That would reshape civilization.

        Someone posted above info about North Atlantic storms. Since 1851, NA ACE is increasing by 2.7 per decade — total increase of 67%. Named storms have increased 109% in that time, hurricanes by 45%, and major hurricanes by 263%.

        data source:
        http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/tcfaq/E11.html
        graphs:
        https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1D1_wTxfePDZwz2pKBrr-V3MwGUeCbRIP5MDH_Q0Kdps/edit#gid=0

        • Mike Flynn says:

          DA,

          CO2 has precisely no effect on sea level. And, of course, nor does the GHE, or anthropogenic heat output, either.

          Marine fossils are found at altitudes greater than 6000 m, and at depths of more than 3000 below present sea levels. Relative sea levels change all the time. Parts of the US coast are rising, parts falling.

          Nothing to do with CO2. Just the ever changing chaotic motions of the crust.

          If you are worried about SLR, move inland. I’m not sure how to avoid storms, floods, droughts, earthquakes or meteors, though. Oh dear, life can be tough, can’t it?

          Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            In the 5000 yrs before the industrial age, sea level rose 1 meter in 5000 yrs — an average of 0.2 mm/yr.

            Now it’s rising at 4 mm/yr.

            Why the change?

        • Vincent says:

          David Appell says:
          October 25, 2018 at 9:17 PM
          Hurricanes, floods and droughts are not the main concern from manmade climate change, IMO I think sea level rise is, and heat waves. But yours are important too, and of course SLR causes coastal flooding. We are already committed to 1.5 m of SLR. If we continue business as usual, that commitment will be over 6 m by 2100. That would reshape civilization.

          ———————————————————-

          Australia, where I live, is known as the ‘land of droughts and floods’. In 2010-11, I personally experienced the effects of a phenomenal flood in the Brisbane area, described of course, at the time, as the worst ever. However, the BOM historical records later revealed it was the 6th worst since 1840, in that specific location in Australia.

          What I also later learned was that the flooding in Australia generally, at that time, was so severe that global sea levels fell by 7mm and didn’t continue to rise above pre-flood levels for another 18 months.

          The reasons are explained in the following article: https://phys.org/news/2013-08-global-sea-dampened-australia.html

          When I read that article, my immediate reaction was that it provided evidence for a solution to the current sea level rise. Build more dams.

          In other words, as glaciers gradually melt due to the slight, current warming, which no-one denies, we should transfer that additional water to the land (through the process of natural evaporation and rainfall which we capture).

          By building more dams in all countries and regions throughout the world that experience periodic flooding, we will not only reduce or even eliminate damage to property and infrastructure from future heavy rainfall, and save lives, but we will also stop sea level rises, and also be able to increase agricultural production in arid regions and during droughts, making our food supply more secure.

          • David Appell says:

            Dams are only temporary solutions, expensive to build, and harm rivers. Existing dams had been holding back only about 0.4 mm/yr of sea level rise, but were topping out in the last decade, no longer able to hold more water back.

            The far bigger problems causing sea level rise are melting land ice and the thermal expansion of sea water.

  92. Snape says:

    Tony wrote:

    “Your religious fervour suppresses other clues in your ref article:
    “Its one of the most powerful typhoons Ive seen in my life,” former Gov. Juan N. Babauta said
    (….one of !!!)”

    *******

    Eyewitness accounts will vary greatly, as will wind speeds between locations only a few miles apart. From the same article/

    “Rep. Ed Propst, a member of the commonwealth’s House of Representatives, said his family home’s storm boards flew away, their windows broke, and their table and chairs flew.

    He said his house flooded and the bedroom door ripped off its hinges. They all relocated into one bedroom, he said.

    “Never experienced any typhoon of this magnitude in my 45 years living here,” Propst said.”

    ******

    I only brought up Yutu to emphasize that the trend for landfalling hurricanes in Florida may not be the trend globally.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      You wrote –

      “I only brought up Yutu to emphasize that the trend for landfalling hurricanes in Florida may not be the trend globally.l

      Can you name anyone who would not be able to arrive at this conclusion without your need to “emphasize”? I assumed you were being a whining troll, of the climatological pseudoscientific cultist variety.

      I emphasise that trends are completely useless as a means of predicting the future. You do not seem to realise this, hence the emphasis.

      Cheers.

    • tonyM says:

      Snape:
      Not sure how your comments in anyway alters the thrust of what I said which was directed at Rev Super-troll Appell.

      Are you suggesting that article was officially endorsed by NOAA or that the max wind speeds were not of the F3 class (at about 180 mph) but actually exceeded 302 mph or there is something wrong with the classification?

      If the max wind speed and destruction of a slow moving TC don’t suggest an F5/EF5 category what are you questioning?

      Just as a side note meteorologist Steve Bowennoted on Twitter (3rd Oct)
      Today marks the 1,961st consecutive day without an F5/EF5 tornado in the United States. Currently ranks as the second-longest streak since 1950.

      He has a graph mapping the days between F5/EF5 strikes in the USA (clearly the US is hit by stronger TC as indicated on NOAA site!!!). WUWT article here:

      https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/10/04/2018-us-tornadoes-lowest-in-65-years-of-record-keeping.

  93. Snape says:

    Based on the current trend, I predict Flynn will contribute an additional 300 pieces of drivel between now and the new year.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      Do you have a point, or are you just trolling because your climatological pseudoscience is unable to cope with facts?

      Should anyone care?

      Cheers.

      • David Appell says:

        I care — about your endless distortions, your willingness to pretend ignorance, even stupidity, and about your refusal to confront evidence and ask the same dumb questions over and over again even when people have responded to your questions.

  94. Mykey says:

    Speaking of trends. Remember when some scientists were lambasted by denialists for suggesting an ice free Arctic ?
    Recent data shows sea ice extent to be at a record low for this time of year.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      M,

      I’m sure you think you have a point. Maybe you could communicate it to the rest of us?

      Cheers.

    • bilybob says:

      Remember? How could one forget, it is like a broken record repeating. Oh my, have I dated myself?

      I came across this resource, not sure of its legitimacy. I did verify a few of their sources and they appear to be accurate.

      https://climatechangedispatch.com/predictions-of-an-ice-free-arctic-ocean/

    • Bindidon says:

      “Recent data shows sea ice extent to be at a record low for this time of year.”

      https://drive.google.com/file/d/18wH0gYDGtpfbuezk6beQUv5oTI7O94q-/view

      No.

      Currently, the sum of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice extent show no record low.

      A big drop of their sum happened in nov/dec 2016, but that’s a while ago.

      • Mykey says:

        Don’t change the goal posts. The comment was specifically about Arctic sea ice you dummy.

      • Mykey says:

        And, specifically, “for this time of year”.
        What does your graph tell us about the current sum for this time of year?
        Finally, how good/brave were those scientists!

        • Mike Flynn says:

          M,

          Are you referring to the thoroughly delusional James Hansen?

          Ice free Arctic in 5 to 10 years from 2008, he predicted. Of course, 2018 isn’t over, I know. As is usual with “End of the world!” prophets, if the prophecy doesn’t come to pass, he’ll just find an excuse, and issue another prophecy.

          Or redefine “ice-free” to mean “not really ice-free”, or “almost ice-free”, or something similar.

          A good/brave scientist can still be deluded, stupid, and ignorant, of course. Goodness and bravery don’t affect physical fact, as far as I know.

          If you weren’t referring to James Hansen, would you mind naming the scientists to whom you refer?

          Maybe you meant Peter Wadhams, who said “Ice-free means the central basin of the Arctic will be ice-free and I think that that is going to happen in summer 2017 or 2018.” I believe the 2018 Arctic Summer is over. How is his 2016 issued prophecy going?

          Predict away. If you can do better than a 3 year old child, you’ll be going well.

          How is your fortune going? Do you have enough, or is your fortune not quite vast enough yet?

          Cheers.

          • Mykey says:

            Oh yes. I forgot about James Hansen and Peter Wadhams – both good/brave scientists.
            If the Arctic becomes ice free at any time soon they will be dutifully lauded, irrespective of whether it is 2019, 2020 or whenever.

            As to my fortune, thanks for asking. It took a hit this last week and so I may not be able to afford the KOENIGSEGG CCXR TREVITA right away.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            M,

            While you are waiting for your fortune to improve, (like Hansen and Wadhams are waiting for an ice-free Arctic), you can console yourself with a genuine Konigsegg Lanyard – only $12!

            Why did your fortune take a hit? Couldn’t you even predict the future one day in advance?

            Maybe you could ask Wadhams and Hansen for some help – or some other good/brave scientist.

            Do I get dutifully lauded for predicting a non ice-free Arctic? I have been doing it for a few years now – very accurately, I might add. Feel free to be in awe of my predictive ability.

            Cheers.

          • Mykey says:

            “Do I get dutifully lauded for predicting a non ice-free Arctic?”
            Sorry, no.
            Anybody who is familiar with predictions is aware of raw and real skill.
            Put simply, real skill is measured relative to that of a no-brainer prediction.
            Your predictions are “no-brainer” predictions. And have zero real skill.
            Is this too hard to understand? Never mind, you are a no-brainer after all.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            M,

            Awww, shucks.

            I should have known that climatological pseudoscientific cultists would discard correct no-brainer forecasts in favour of incorrect forecasts made with “real skill”.

            Maybe you could do better following the trend – Hansen has got it wrong every year.

            Making predictions is hard – particularly when the future is involved.

            Try examining the past more intensely. That might help.

            Cheers.

          • Mykey says:

            “Hansen has got it wrong every year.”
            I don’t think so.
            Your comment is more correctly delivered at Salvatore. The only denialist I know of willing to make a prediction and cop the flack (well deserved flack) of being continuously wrong.
            You, on the other hand, are typical of cowardly denialists who sit back with their fingers in their ears going “La la la la “.
            So sad.

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Mike Flynn says:
            October 27, 2018 at 12:00 AM

            “While you are waiting for your fortune to improve, (like Hansen and Wadhams are waiting for an ice-free Arctic)”
            _____________________________________________________

            Which “fortune”?
            Since 1979 yearly minimum of ice-area is decreasing nearly 11%/decade. Thats an average of 80000km^2/year.
            1979 the area was 7 mill km^2, now its 4 mill km^2

            Decreasing trend shows not the slightest signs of change.

            Not to mention that melting trend began long before satellite observation.

          • Gordon Robertson says:

            mickey…”“Hansen has got it wrong every year.”
            I don’t think so.”

            Doesn’t matter what you think, provide evidence that Mike is wrong. Since his bombastic, propagandist speech on television in 1988, nothing Hansen has claimed has come true. He admitted as much 10 years later and blamed his computer for having erred.

            Hansen has a degree in physics but he spent much of his career in astronomy before switching to climate modeling. He was obsessed with the theory of Carl Sagan that the atmosphere of Venus was caused by a runaway greenhouse effect and that CO2 in our atmosphere would have the same effect.

            Several of us posting here on Roy’s blog have been questioning the underlying premise of the GHE and AGW, particularly those elements that require a heat transfer from a cooler atmosphere to the warmer surface that allegedly warmed the atmosphere in the first place. That situation not only represents a contradiction of the 2nd law of thermodynamics, it is also a case of perpetual motion.

            The idea presented by some at GISS, where Hansen ruled the roost, that GHGs in the atmosphere can trap heat is ludicrous. Heat is a property of atoms and it cannot be trapped by other atoms/molecules.

            The theories of Hansen are based on a faulty understanding of basic thermodynamics and the Stefan-Boltzmann equation. S-B was about a heated body radiating to a cooler atmosphere. There are no provisions in it for a reverse flow of EM from a cooler body to a warmer body as claimed in the GHE or AGW. That notion leads to a net balance of energy, which is nonsense, and not supported in physics.

          • Gordon Robertson says:

            mickey…”If the Arctic becomes ice free at any time soon they will be dutifully lauded, irrespective of whether it is 2019, 2020 or whenever”.

            An ice-free Arctic would require solar energy all year round. How did climate alarmists manage to miss such an important point?

            There is not enough CO2 on the planet to raise the temperature of a region lacking a heat input via solar energy. The CO2 has to capture EM from the Sun, or a heated surface, in order to warm.

            That’s the problem with you alarmists, you are high on implausible theories and completely lacking in basic physics.

          • Gordon Robertson says:

            fritz…”Since 1979 yearly minimum of ice-area is decreasing nearly 11%/decade”.

            IN SUMMER!!!!

            Provided, of course, your stats are correct. Alarmists have a way of bs-ing fact.

            During the one month of summer in the Arctic. The rest of the year it is increasing and by mid-winter it is the same old, same old.

            By mid-winter, ice at the North Pole is 10 feet thick. Quite a feat with salt water on an ocean.

            Some explorers have walked to the North Pole in March and April hauling heavy sleds.

          • David Appell says:

            Gordon Robertson says:
            During the one month of summer in the Arctic. The rest of the year it is increasing and by mid-winter it is the same old, same old.

            Wrong.

            Arctic SIE has a negative trend for every month of the year, since records began in 1979. Here are the rates for each month, in Kkm2/yr, from N.S.I.D.C. data.

            J -48 Kkm2/yr
            F -47
            M -42
            A -37
            M -35
            J -48
            J -69
            A -75
            S -82
            O -78
            N -55
            D -47

            I’ve corrected you on this before, which means you are lying again.

            Source:
            ftp://sidads.colorado.edu/DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/

          • David Appell says:

            Gordon Robertson says:
            An ice-free Arctic would require solar energy all year round.

            Obviously wrong.

            Ice would not form on water whose temperature is always > 0 C, by whatever means. Basic physics, Mr. Engineer.

          • David Appell says:

            Gordon Robertson says:
            By mid-winter, ice at the North Pole is 10 feet thick.

            So wrong.

            This past January, the average thickness of Arctic sea ice (=PIOMAS volume/N.S.I.D.C SIE) was 1.23 meters (4.0 ft). It’s been decreasing by 15 cm/decade since 1979.

            Similar for other months, except in Sept it’s been decreasing by 32 cm/decade.

            Gordon writes nothing but nonsense here.

          • David Appell says:

            Gordon Robertson says:
            Since his bombastic, propagandist speech on television in 1988, nothing Hansen has claimed has come true. He admitted as much 10 years later and blamed his computer for having erred.

            I highly doubt it. Prove it, Gordon, or retract your claim.

            Hansen has a degree in physics but he spent much of his career in astronomy before switching to climate modeling.

            Another lie.

            It’s almost like Gordon can’t do anything BUT lie.

          • David Appell says:

            Fritz Kraut says:
            Since 1979 yearly minimum of ice-area is decreasing nearly 11%/decade.

            Yes, it’s bad. My calculations give -21% per decade.

            (=trend/average). How did you calculate your’s, Fritz?

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            David Appell says:
            October 27, 2018 at 3:49 PM

            Fritz Kraut says:
            “Since 1979 yearly minimum of ice-area is decreasing nearly 11%/decade.”

            Yes, its bad. My calculations give -21% per decade.

            (=trend/average). How did you calculate yours, Fritz?
            ________________________________________________________

            @David Apell
            I didnt calculate myself. Its from arctic-roos:
            http://web.nersc.no/WebData/arctic-roos.org/observation/ssmi_range_ice-area.png
            I guess you made some fault?

          • David Appell says:

            Fritz, no, I didn’t make a mistake.

            But the value depends on how “percentage change” is calculated.

            Your link doesn’t say how they did the calculation. I explained how I did mine.

          • David Appell says:

            James Hansen will be remembered as one of the greatest scientists of the 20th century. Esp 1000 years from now.

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            Gordon Robertson says:
            October 27, 2018 at 2:46 PM

            fritzSince 1979 yearly minimum of ice-area is decreasing nearly 11%/decade.

            IN SUMMER!!!!
            ______________________________________________

            Of course in SUMMER!!!
            Yearly minium is in SUMMER!!. When then, whem not in SUMMER!!
            ?
            Did you expect minimum ice-area of a year is in WINTER!!!?

          • David Appell says:

            Fritz: Since daily records began in 1979, Arctic sea ice extent, and sea ice volume, and avg sea ice thickness, is decreasing in ALL 12 months.

          • David Appell says:

            Gordon Robertson says:
            The theories of Hansen are based on a faulty understanding of basic thermodynamics and the Stefan-Boltzmann equation. S-B was about a heated body radiating to a cooler atmosphere. There are no provisions in it for a reverse flow of EM from a cooler body to a warmer body as claimed in the GHE or AGW.

            Gordon pretends not to understand the 2LOT.

            He’s pretended this for a long time.

            But why?

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            David Appell says:
            October 27, 2018 at 5:03 PM

            Fritz: Since daily records began in 1979, Arctic sea ice extent, and sea ice volume, and avg sea ice thickness, is decreasing in ALL 12 months.
            _______________________________________

            Yes, I know.
            But I spoke about decrease of yearly minimum, because thats relevant for ice-free arctis.

            The first time ice-free arctis most probably will be somewhere around early september.

          • David Appell says:

            Fritz, you still haven’t explained how your calculation was done. Will you?

          • Fritz Kraut says:

            David Appell says:
            October 27, 2018 at 4:45 PM

            Fritz, no, I didnt make a mistake.

            But the value depends on how percentage change is calculated.

            Your link doesnt say how they did the calculation.
            ___________________________________________________

            IMO its quite clear how to calculate the change in percent/decade:
            I refer to the linked trendline of yearly minimum.
            Decreas from 7.06 to 4.13
            Within 38 years, ie 3.8 decades.

            Here the calculation with your 21%:
            7.06 X (0.79^3.8) = 2.88
            Thats the way I would calculate.

            But what makes me honestly wonder:
            My own calculation results in -13.2%/dec. Not -10.57, as in the linked roos-graphik.

            Maybe roos calculated not with yearly values but 10year-averages?

          • David Appell says:

            No Fritz, you didn’t get my calculation right.

            As I wrote above, my definition is

            PctChg/time = linear_trend/average for the range of the data.

            Since you can’t reproduce the numbers you quoted, it’s clear you don’t know where your first numbers came from. Yet you had the audacity to call mine wrong.

      • Gordon Robertson says:

        binny…”Currently, the sum of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice extent show no record low”.

        Egad, yet another homebrew Excel fabrication from binny.

    • Gordon Robertson says:

      mickey…”Recent data shows sea ice extent to be at a record low for this time of year”.

      Weather!!!

      Every autumn is different, even in the Arctic.

      Back around 1920, they were claiming the same thing: a warm Arctic with less ice.

  95. Snape says:

    TonyM

    The articles are using the word “storm” as a general term for hurricanes, tropical cyclones, and typhoons. I don’t think anybody would argue that Yutu produced winds as strong as an F5 tornado.

    • tonyM says:

      Show me the physical evidence for your claim.

      The descriptors used are irrelevant. The max wind speed of around 180 mph stated in the articles referenced is far below an F5 category.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      You wrote – “I dont think . . .”

      Given that F5 wind speeds start at 420 mph (261 mph), you might need to show a bit of evidence if you want people to believe the opposite of what you wrote.

      Off you go now – how hard can it be?

      Cheers.

  96. Snape says:

    Where did I disagree? It’s a 10 second google search.

    F5 hurricanes have sustained winds (for at least one minute, if I recall) greater than 157 mph.

    F5 tornados had winds greater than 260 mph. F5 has been replaced by EF5, where winds only need to be greater than 200 mph.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      “I don’t think anybody would argue that Yutu produced winds as strong as an F5 tornado.”

      What you think or don’t think doesn’t seem to make much difference.

      If you think that Yutu produced winds as strong as an F5 tornado, maybe you could provide some measurements to support your “thinking”. Otherwise, some might think that you had no clue what you were talking about, and that you were confusing tornados with hurricanes, just as you might confuse weather with climate.

      Carry on expounding your fantasies. It doesn’t do much harm. It might even make people query some of your odd climatological pseudoscientific pronouncements.

      That’s a benefit, eh?

      Cheers.

      • Mykey says:

        “la la la la la”
        Take your fingers out of your ears ad listen for a change.

          • David Appell says:

            Maybe. But very biased, selective ears.

          • Lewis guignard says:

            Perhaps they do. They also have eyes. Unlike true believers of your faith.

          • David Appell says:

            Lewis, when you can post even the smallest, most miniscule scrap of science, I will pay attention to your comment.

            But you have never done that in the few years I’ve been reading your comments here.

            Because, clearly, you don’t know any science at all, nothing, but yet for some reason you still want to inject yourself into the discussion.

            Why?

        • Mike Flynn says:

          M,

          I have considered your demand, and I refuse to comply.

          What are you going to do about it? Confirm that you are a stupid and ignorant, not to say completely impotent, troll? Have a tantrum, perhaps?

          Or do you possess some awesome secret power, which will force me to accept your climatological pseudoscientific cultist faith?

          Carry on with denying the power of Mother Nature, and the pervasiveness of the laws of physics.

          You will lose. You cannot even describe this GHE deity which you slavishly worship, can you? A most inscrutable quasi-religious belief.

          You are apparently immune to –

          “Geological estimates are that the Earth loses heat at a rate of about 50 terawatts. That’s about 50,000 1 gigawatt power stations worth of heat loss, i.e. if power stations pump out power at a rate of 1 gigawatt then you’d need about 50,000 of them – that’s how fast the Earth is losing heat through the oceans, continental surfaces, volcanoes and so on,”

          You probably would not believe me if I wrote it.

          Now, all you have to believe is that a body losing energy is actually heating up, and you’re good to go. Just redefine “cooling” to “warming”, and invoke the magic of CO2.

          Another example of the amazing power of climatological pseudoscience to sway the minds of the extremely gullible or desperately feeble-minded. Keep it up.

          Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            I have given you a description of the GHE effect many times.

            Why do you ignore them?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Unfortunately, the meanderings of your fantasies are not reality.

            Maybe you can convince other people of the physical existence of a myth. I am sure you will find willing acolytes amongst the ranks of the feeble minded, or extremely gullible.

            For myself, I continue to ignore that which cannot be shown to exist – unless I find some absurd mythical creature which tickles my funnybone. The GHE, which is responsible for simultaneously creating floods, droughts, hot, cold, glaciers increasing and decreasing, the overturning of Archimedes’ principle by the NSF, the cooling and heating of the entire Earth, is such a creature. Oh, how I wish I had one! What fun it would be!

            It remains completely inscrutable. Nothing to do with science, but nonetheless worshipped by its devoted, but delusional, believers.

            CO2 is just CO2 – no heating ability at all. That’s just a myth.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            You’re ignoring the description, not the fact of it.

            Why?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            Thank you for telling me what I’m doing. I’ll let you tell me why, so you can further demonstrate your mind reading skills. Was the laughter soft enough for you?

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            You ignore information because you’re nothing but a destructive troll.

            A man of your age, spending his days as a destructive troll. So so sad.

          • David Appell says:

            MF says:
            CO2 is just CO2 – no heating ability at all. That’s just a myth.

            Does CO2 absorb many wavelengths of infrared radiation?

          • David Appell says:

            Does it absorb ANY infrared wavelengths?

          • Mike Flynn says:

            DA,

            You asked –

            “Does CO2 absorb many wavelengths of infrared radiation?”, and followed up with “Does it absorb ANY infrared wavelengths?”

            I’m surprised that you don’t know. Have you recently suffered a severe memory loss?

            There is a wonderful means of satisfying your lack of knowledge – it’s referred to as the Internet.

            If you cannot figure it out by yourself, I will be glad to assist. You don’t need to thank me, it’s my pleasure.

            Cheers.

          • Mykey says:

            “Does it absorb ANY infrared wavelengths?”
            I’m surprised that you don’t know. Have you recently suffered a severe memory loss?”
            Classic reply from somebody who has’nt a clue.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            Mykey wrote –

            “Classic reply from somebody who hasnt a clue.”

            The troll disputes nothing, but manages to commit a punctuation error anyway.

            Well done.

            Cheers.

          • David Appell says:

            MF: Since CO2 absorbs some IR, there is a greenhouse effect.

            In fact, ANY planet with an atmosphere will have a greenhouse effect, albeit small if it holds no GHGs, because of “collision induced ab.sorp.tion”: any two molecules can briefly act like a GHG molecule during their collision process. See, for example

            “The natural greenhouse effect of atmospheric oxygen (O2)
            and nitrogen (N2), M. Hpfner et al, GRL 2012

            https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1029/2012GL051409

            “We have found that on global average under clear-sky conditions the OLR is reduced due to O2 by 0.11 Wm-2 and due to N2 by 0.17 Wm-2. Together this amounts to 15% of the OLR-reduction caused by CH4 at present atmospheric concentrations.”

  97. Mike Flynn says:

    DA wrote –

    “James Hansen will be remembered as one of the greatest scientists of the 20th century. Esp 1000 years from now.”

    Oh, you mean the deluded nutter whose bizarre belief in the heating powers of CO2 caused him to go on a fanatical crusade against using coal to keep civilisation going?

    The same nutter who called coal trains “Trains of Death” (gee, I wonder what he was trying to associate coal with?j, and had various other mad speculations about “tipping points”, sea level rises, storms plucking boulders from the sea bed, and so on.

    He might well be remembered – as a delusional fanatic who refused to accept facts, preferring fantasy instead.

    Cheers.

  98. Vincent says:

    David Appell says:
    October 27, 2018 at 10:57 AM
    “Dams are only temporary solutions, expensive to build, and harm rivers. Existing dams had been holding back only about 0.4 mm/yr of sea level rise, but were topping out in the last decade, no longer able to hold more water back.

    The far bigger problems causing sea level rise are melting land ice and the thermal expansion of sea water.”
    ——————————————————-

    David,
    I think this issue deserves more attention. Considering myself to be a practical person, I always prefer to give priority to solutions that are certain and undeniable, rather than solutions that are merely possible or moderately likely to be effective.

    The effects of extreme weather events and rising sea levels are the major concerns about the current change in climate. I don’t find the constant, insulting, bickering on this site about the role of CO2 emissions in the current warming helpful. I’m concerned about real and practical solutions that are certain to work.

    Sea level rise can be reduced to the extent we can successfully prevent rainfall on land, flowing back to the sea. That’s certain and undeniable, isn’t it?

    Your figure of a 0.4 mm/yr rise, that existing dams have been holding back, is the net effect, after other uses of water have been considered, isn’t it?

    For example, in Australia, declining groundwater is a major problem. When the water is pumped to the surface for whatever use, there is run-off and evaporation. This partially cancels the effects of the stored water in dams reducing sea level rise. Building more dams so that we can leave that sequestered water in the ground, will significantly reduce SLR by much more than 0.4 mm/yr.

    Of course, it’s true that more dams will reduce the size of rivers, and possibly cause the extinction of a few species of fish. Wetlands and mangroves by the coast would also be affected if rivers were to dry up. These are negative effects. However, consider the positive effects. There needs to be a balance between the positive and negative effects.

    We know from the records that floods have cause massive damage and loss of human life throughout history, and continue to do so. Even if it were true that CO2 rises are the main cause of the current warming, which is obviously not certain, there is no reason to believe that reducing CO2 levels to pre-industrial levels will halt the frequency and/or intensity of current storms, floods and droughts. The damage and loss of life will continue until we are prepared to spend the resources on the real solution, which is the building of more dams, and stronger homes that can withstand hurricanes and cyclones.

    All this costs a lot of money of course, and is the main reason why it’s not being done. Building a large number of ‘flood mitigation’ dams, which are effectively inland lakes, does not seem like a good business investment if most of the time the dams have little water and sometimes are even completely dry. However, when you take into consideration the cost of damage to property during every major flood, and the incalculable cost of the loss of life, then building sufficient flood mitigation dams is a practical and moral solution, especially when it has the additional benefit of reducing sea level rise and protecting all those vulnerable people who live near the coast or on small islands, and also the additional benefits as a source of irrigation for crops or reforestation, until the dams become dry.

    The following links address the issue, and also reveal the complexity of the interacting forces.

    https://phys.org/news/2013-08-global-sea-dampened-australia.html

    https://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/gornitz_06/

    • David Appell says:

      Australia is quite small, compared to the globe. Whatever dams it builds will have only a tiny effect on global SLR, and it will be only temporary at that.

      If you need dams for other purposes, fine. But don’t advocate for them on the basis of restraining global SLR. Because they won’t.

      • Vincent says:

        You appear to have missed the point, David. It’s true Australia is quite small compared with the entire land mass of the planet, yet during the extreme precipitation of 2010-11, it was able to absorb a sufficient amount of water to halt global sea level rise for 18 months.

        If Australia had built more flood mitigation dams during the previous drought, in anticipation of the next La Nina, less water would have escaped to the sea and the dampening effect on sea level rise would have been even greater. The cost of building such dams would have been offset by the future savings due to less destruction of property and infrastructure whenever there is extreme precipitation which causes flooding in the absence of sufficient flood-mitigation dams.

        From the Australian BOM: http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/updates/articles/a020.shtml

        “The increased rainfall and cloudiness in the western Pacific associated with La Nia usually means above-average winterspring rainfall for Australia, particularly across the east and north.

        The six wettest winterspring periods on record for eastern Australia occurred during La Nia years. In the MurrayDarling Basin, winterspring rainfall averaged over all 18 La Nia events (including multi-year events) since 1900 was 22% higher than the long-term average, with the severe floods of 1955, 1988, 1998 and 2010 all associated with La Nia.”

        The presence of La Nia increases the chance of widespread flooding. Of the 18 La Nia events since 1900 (including multi-year events), 12 have resulted in floods for some parts of Australia.”

        The point you appear to have missed is that floods are always occurring in some part of the world every year. El Nino brings dry weather to Australia, but wet weather to South America and North America. I’m not suggesting that building more dams only in Australia will solve the problem of rising sea levels, but building dams everywhere that flooding takes place, in America, India, Southeast Asia, China, and so on. Got it?

        • Nate says:

          Its an interesting point, Vincent.

          Isnt the MurrayDarling Basin the main fertile agricultural area in Australia?

          Any storage reservoir of significant size would take up space in this small but important region, unless we figure out a way to pump it to the desert, which requires lots and lots of energy.

          Say we want to store 10 cm of sea level rise, in a reservoir with 10 m of rise.

          10 m because we need to do this over and over again.

          Need an area 1/100 of ocean.

          That is aprox 2 x area of all of Australia.

        • Nate says:

          Aral sea is a good example of a large place to store water.

          Formerly the fourth-largest lake in the world with an area of 68,000 km2. This is ~ 1/10,000 of ocean area.

          It has shrunk dramatically, fallen about 20 m, which could, theoretically be reversed.

          If we did completely refill it. It would lower Sea level by 20/10,000 m, or 2 mm.

          • David Appell says:

            But filling the Aral Sea is a one-time only decrease in ocean sea level, and 2 mm is only 50% of annual SLR.

            And there aren’t many Aral Seas in the world — 68,000 km2 is bigger than all the Great Lakes except Superior. This paper says existing dams increase water surface area by 305,000 km2:

            https://www.uni-frankfurt.de/45217810/Lehner_etal_2011_FrontiersEcoEnv.pdf

            or about 5 Aral Seas. That’s 10 mm of sea level, by your calculation. Doubling dam storage area would only increase that to 20 mm, or 5 years of SLR. Even increasing dam storage are by a very expensive, environmentally impactful factor of 10 would only be 50 yrs of SLR, at most (SLR is accelerating).

            According to books I’ve read like “Cadillac in the Desert,” the US west is essentially dammed-out — at least in terms of generating hydropower. Though besides a decrease in sea level, more dams could be useful for energy storage — pump water to them when electricity demand is low, like nighttime, then release that water when electricity demand is high.

          • Svante says:

            Another desperate idea, can Greenland glaciers be propped up by walls?
            Warming seas eat away underneath and increase the flow from inland. If that contact can be prevented blocked water may re-freeze in the winter. Might be easier than building walls all around the world?
            Antarctica may be a bit more difficult.

          • Nate says:

            David,

            Yes-I agree. Doesnt seem useful.

    • David Appell says:

      Even if it were true that CO2 rises are the main cause of the current warming, which is obviously not certain, there is no reason to believe that reducing CO2 levels to pre-industrial levels will halt the frequency and/or intensity of current storms, floods and droughts.

      Yes it is certain.

      Yes there is reason to believe that. Obviously.

      • Vincent says:

        Not according to my standards. I believe in the rigorous requirements of applying the true ‘methodology of science’ before certainty can reasonable be declared. Even when certainty is justified, after repeated experimentation under controlled conditions have always produced the predicted results, and all attempts to falsify a particular theory have failed, the theory is sometimes later found to be incorrect as new observations are made or new evidence becomes available.

        One might be able to conduct controlled experiments to demonstrate that CO2 is a greenhouse gas which absorbs certain lower frequencies of the Electromagnetic Spectrum more readily than other gases, but to then deduce that the minuscule levels of CO2 in the atmosphere are the main cause of the current warming is ‘drawing a longbow’. It’s analogous to mixing cancer cells with lemon juice in a petri dish, observing that the cancer cells die, then claiming that drinking lemon juice is a cure for cancer.

        I often wonder if those who appear to have such a strong belief in computer models that predict the effects of rising CO2 levels, would be prepared to take a new drug which had not been through the rigorous testing procedures which often begin with mice and rats under very controlled conditions, and then groups of humans in double-blind placebo-controlled clinical trials, after the experiments with mice have produced positive results.

        Would you take a new drug based only on computer models that predict it would be effective, David?

        Even when new drugs have successfully completed the testing procedures, they are sometimes later found to have serious long-term side effects. What are the testing procedures that give rise to certainty, that rising CO2 levels will cause great harm through changes to the climate?

        • Fritz Kraut says:

          Vincent says:
          October 28, 2018 at 7:07 AM
          I often wonder if those who appear to have such a strong belief in computer models that predict the effects of rising CO2 levels…
          ___________________________________

          You dont need any computermodels.
          Greenhouseeffect was known long before computers. And it was even roughly calculted with slide-rule.
          Will you complain now about “strong believe in slide-rules”?

        • David Appell says:

          Vincent: we can’t do “controlled” experiments in climate science, because there is no control Earth. Observations have to suffice. But this is also true in several other sciences, like geology, astronomy, and medicine.

          There is universal agreement among scientists that man is altering climate via burning fossil fuels.

    • David Appell says:

      vincent – please acknowledge and reply to my comment above, instead of pretending it doesn’t exist.

      http://www.drroyspencer.com/2018/10/florida-major-hurricane-strikes-still-no-trend/#comment-326902

      • Mike Flynn says:

        DA,

        If Vincent isn’t bending to your will, maybe you need to adopt a more worshipful attitude. You could always grovel in mortification, or try a bit of self flagellation. Only joking.

        It might help if you stop pretending you know he’s pretending that your stupid and ignorant comments are not worth a response. Who knows?

        Keep on trolling.

        Cheers.

  99. David Appell says:

    Roy wrote:
    “Note: The first plot had Michael’s wind speed plotted incorrectly, which has been fixed.”

    Roy, again, what is the R^2 of your graph? It does not look to me that a linear fit is justified.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      DA,

      What difference does it make whether something looks justified to you?

      Who would care? Does your pointless opinion change a single fact?

      Questions, questions. There’s obviously no point seeking answers from you, so I’m not expecting you to respond. Feel free to refuse to reply – I probably would.

      Cheers.

  100. Mike Flynn says:

    Svante wrote –

    “Mike Flynn says:

    Now you have accepted the core is molten, how would you establish the average surface temperature?

    Its the product of A) incoming heat from the sun B) upwelling geothermal heat, minus C) heat flowing to space.

    Surface temperature is stable if A+B=C. We have roughly:
    A = 160 W/m^2.
    B = 0.087 W/m^2.

    B is negligible. What are your numbers?

    Assume that the core temperature is 5000 K (or another figure higher than the temperature of molten rock, if you prefer).

    Bear in mind that the surface temperature has obviously varied between more than 1000 C, and whatever it has cooled to now.

    It has been colder than now, but OK.

    Now discover that you cannot come up with any cogent reason why the Earth should not continue to cool, as it obviously has done for four and a half billion years.

    The earth will continue to cool, the surface may not because B) is negligible, the temperature is determined by A) minus C).”

    Svante, in typical climatological pseudoscientific fashion, avoids having to face the inconvenient fact that he cannot calculate the surface temperature at any time. His “formula” is quite irrelevant – wattages bear no relationship to temperatures. He also introduces a variable, C, which is undefined, and therefore meaningless. What a fool!

    He acknowledges that the Earth will continue to cool, but the surface “may” not, because the temperature is “determined” by 160 W/m2 minus some unspecified quantity of something. Good luck with trying to stop the surface of a big blob of molten rock from cooling! You can’t even stop a hot potato from cooling with CO2, can you – even if you put it in sunlight at the same time!

    Not brilliant, just stupid and ignorant. He states that incoming heat from the sun is 160 W/m2. Ice can emit in excess of 300 W/m2, or nearly twice as much as Svante’s sun. Climatological pseudoscience is inscrutable indeed!

    CO2 heats nothing. Never has, never will. As has been demonstrated, thermometers show increases in temperature in the presence of additional heat. Certainly not CO2, or any mythical GHE.

    Keep wriggling. At least the exercise might do you good.

    Cheers.

    • Mykey says:

      Two simple questions that undergraduate can answer:
      If C =160 W/m2, then what does the Stefan Boltzmann Law say about the temperature of a black body emitting this amount?
      Secondly, why is the surface temperature of Earth so much higher than this ?

      Sorry, I should have specified “science undergraduate”. Retired engineers, especially those with early signs of dementia, are exempted.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        M,

        Why are you asking stupid questions? Don’t you know the answers?

        Do you need help to explain why the Earth’s surface was once molten? What is your wondrous “C”? Another meaningless climatological pseudoscientific attempt to deny, divert, and confuse?

        Carry on exhibiting trollish stupidity and ignorance. With practice, you could probably get close to the intellectual deficit level of David Appell!

        In the meantime, try to convince yourself that a body losing energy at a rate of around 40 terawatts or so, exposed to a distant heat source incapable of raising the temperature of the surface above 90 C, and having a molten interior, is getting hotter!

        Learning physics, for starters, might help to dismiss the delusional fantasies t9 which you are attached. No CO2 heating. No mysterious climatological pseudoscience capable of preventing the Earth from cooling over the last four and a half billion years or so.

        Cheers.

    • Svante says:

      Mike Flynn says:

      “He states that incoming heat from the sun is 160 W/m2. Ice can emit in excess of 300 W/m2”.

      CO2 heats nothing, it makes the surface warmer. Heat is the net power, you confuse it with one way radiation of ice.

      Apart from that you have no numbers, just more confusion.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        S,

        You wrote –

        “CO2 heats nothing, it makes the surface warmer. Heat is the net power, you confuse it with one way radiation of ice.”

        Ah, the wonders of climatological pseudoscience! CO2 heats nothing, except thermometers on the surface, by making them warmer – is that it? Heat is the net power – of something undefined, apparently.

        Keep at it. Soon you’ll be saying that cooling is warming, warming is not the result of the application of heat, and the energy radiated by a body above absolute zero doesn’t count if it radiates in straight lines!

        Are you having some sort of mental difficulty? If you want numbers, a telephone directory has plenty.

        Cheers.

        • Svante says:

          “Are you having some sort of mental difficulty?”

          • Mike Flynn says:

            S,

            Imitation is the sincerest flattery. It won’t get you anywhere, if that’s what you are hoping.

            But thanks anyway. I appreciate the thought.

            Cheers.

          • Mykey says:

            Svante, obviously he does.
            And for quite some time.
            And it is getting worse.
            Especially as denialists are in full retreat and the world is moving on.
            You’ve got to feel a bit of pity (not really).

          • Svante says:

            Yes Mykey.

            I was hoping he could provide some substance to his enigmatic molten rock talk.

            Just like the “no GHE”, there was nothing to back it up, and zero chance of a sensible exchange of ideas.

          • Mike Flynn says:

            S,

            You wrote –

            “I was hoping he could provide some substance to his enigmatic molten rock talk.”

            There’s a saying “Hope in one pot, p**s in the other – see which fills up first.”

            The ignorant and stupid go out of their way to avoid facing inconvenient facts, preferring to indulge in avoidance, pointless attempts at being gratuitously offensive, stupid gotchas, and irrelevant trolling.

            If you disagree with something I present as fact, you could always provide some factual support for your disagreement. For all I know, you believe in the luminiferous ether, phlogiston, unicorns, or the inscrutable and indescribable GHE.

            Off you go – keep hoping. Keep up your semantic exercises – you can only improve.

            Cheers.

          • Nate says:

            “wattages bear no relationship to temperatures”

            Right Mike, no electric watts needed for my electric heater.

            and similarly,

            Eating food bears no relationship to hunger.

            And salaries bear no relationship to wealth.

            Right, Mike?

            “If you disagree with something I present as fact, you could always provide some factual support for your disagreement.”

            He did just that, Mike. He explained that your internal heating is .087 W/m^2, while the external heating is 160 W/m^2.

            Hence the internal heat you keep babbling on and on about is negligible, diddly squat, insignificant, irrelevant, pointless, in comparison to the external heat.

            He asked for you to provide alternative numbers.

            You offered none. Instead more obfuscation, silliness, par for the course.

    • ren says:

      The surface will cool down when the force of the Earth’s magnetic field drops.

  101. Snape says:

    Fritz, DA

    My math skills are shit, but looking over your methods of calculating sea ice loss, you both seem to be getting the concept wrong.

    To keep the math simple, I’ll make up dates and values:

    1984 minima: 100 km^2
    1985 minima: 95 km^2
    Extent loss: 5 %

    1985 minima: 95 km^2
    1986 minima 89 km^2
    Extent loss: 6.3 %

    1986 minima: 89 km^2
    1987 minima: 85 km^2
    Extent loss: 4.5 %

    1987 minima: 85 km^2
    1988 minima: 78 km^2
    Extent loss: 8.2 %

    *******

    Year 1) 5 %
    Year 2) 6.3 %
    Year 3) 4.5 %
    Year 4) 8.2 %

    Now calculate the trend of percentage loss

    • Fritz Kraut says:

      @Snape,
      when talking about percentage change, at first has to be clear where this percent refer to.
      It can refer to each last year/decade, or to the start-value.
      Roos seems to refer to the starting value and got 11%/decade.

      I referred to each last decade and got 13%.
      Each decade, compared to the decade before, decreased 13%.
      The same did you, but not decade to privious decade, but year to previous year. Average decrease (year to previous year)for the whole serie is -1.4%/year.

    • Fritz Kraut says:

      Snape says:
      October 28, 2018 at 7:56 AM

      1984 minima: 100 km^2

      1988 minima: 78 km^2

      Now calculate the trend of percentage loss
      ____________________________________________

      From year to year its exactly 6.02255%.
      Because 100 X 0.93977^4 = 78

      Average yearly loss of the initial area: 22% complete loss / 4years = 5.5%

      • David Appell says:

        Except for noisy data we calculate the trend by linear regression, not by just using the endpoints.

        Using linear regression you can calculate the percentage loss L using

        1/L = average/(trend*interval) – 1/2

        where average is over all the y data, and the interval is the range over the x-axis.

        See:
        https://davidappell.blogspot.com/2012/06/long-term-loss-of-arctic-ice.html

        I seems how you define the average percentage loss can vary. I’ve seen people use trend/average; above I used trend/y1, which seems to me to align more with the definition of percentage loss/gain for just two points: L=(y2-y1)/y1.

    • David Appell says:

      Snape: I’m calculating the pct loss using the trend from linear regression, not a change in the two endpoints.

      For a one year change it doesn’t make a difference, of course.

      See my other comment very close to this one.

  102. PhilJ says:

    “CO2 heats nothing, it makes the surface warmer.”

    Do you not see how contradictory this statement is?

    • Svante says:

      Heat is well defined in physics, spontaneously it can only move from hot to cold, not from CO2 to the surface.

      CO2 can raise surface temperature by reducing its energy loss rate to space, while having little effect on incoming solar power. Warming occurs if input exceeds output power.

      • Mike Flynn says:

        S,

        You wrote –

        “CO2 can raise surface temperature by reducing its energy loss rate to space,”

        Unfortunately, at night, the temperature falls. The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has not changed. No temperature rise at all.

        Maybe you could try to raise the surface temperature by throwing a thick layer of insulation over it. Nope, that might reduce the rate of cooling, but the temperature keeps falling.

        Climatological pseudoscientific cultists get around this inconvenient fact by redefining cooling to mean warming, which supposedly creates higher temperatures in the absence of increased heat – even though real thermometers show falling temperatures at night!

        Cheers.

        • Fritz Kraut says:

          Mike Flynn says:

          Unfortunately, at night, the temperature falls. The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has not changed.
          No temperature rise at all.
          ___________________________________________

          Of course there is.
          Also nighttemperatures are higher than they would be without greenhousegases.

        • Svante says:

          Mike Flynn says:

          “Unfortunately, at night, the temperature falls. The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has not changed. No temperature rise at all.”

          If night temperature falls less, what will that do to the average night time temperature?

          If daytime warming starts higher, how will that affect the daytime average? On top of that, there is reduced daytime cooling.

          If both night and day temperature are higher, what will that do to the average?

        • David Appell says:

          MF: How much would the nighttime temperature fall if there were no atmospheric GHGs?

          In fact, the Earth’s surface receives twice as much downwelling energy from the atmosphere than it does from the Sun.

    • Nate says:

      “CO2 heats nothing, it makes the surface warmer.”

      Do you not see how contradictory this statement is?”

      Nor more contradictory than:

      ‘A coat heats nothing, it makes my skin warmer’

      ‘The oven door heats nothing, it makes the oven warmer’

      ‘The glass on Mike Flynn’s solar hot water heats nothing, it makes the water hotter’

  103. Snape says:

    Or simply: SIE minima decreased by an average of 6 % per year.

  104. Snape says:

    PhilJ

    [“CO2 heats nothing, it makes the surface warmer.”

    Do you not see how contradictory this statement is?]

    *****

    It’s a matter of semantics. To heat something implies a heat source, rather than some sort of insulation that slows the rate of heat loss. Both can raise a body’s temperature.

    Do you want to say, “wool socks heat my feet”? Or, “wool socks make my feet warmer”?

    I prefer the latter.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      S,

      Increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is supposed to raise the temperature of thermometers, I believe.

      Now thermometers do not show a raise in temperature merely because you surround them with insulation. As a matter of fact, putting more insulation between the thermometer and the heat source, reduces the temperature of the thermometer.

      You appear to be saying that a thermometer can indicate a higher temperature in the absence of more heat being provided. This makes no sense at all. Putting a thermometer in a vacuum flask insulates it very well, but makes it no hotter at all!

      It’s a matter of physics, not semantics. Your semantics do not change physics, or facts.

      CO2 heats nothing. No heating, no warming. The Earth cools at night in the absence of sunlight. A cylinder of 100% CO2 cools in the absence of an external heat source.

      No GHE. Semantics won’t help, nor will diverting into socks, mittens, overcoats, or any other items of clothing.

      Cheers.

      • Fritz Kraut says:

        Mike Flynn says:
        October 28, 2018 at 4:59 PM

        Increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is supposed to raise the temperature of thermometers, I believe.
        _____________________________________________________

        Your belief is wrong. Its the higher temperature of surrounding matter which raises temperature of a thermometer.
        Thermometers measure temperature; they dont analyse gases.

    • Mykey says:

      Snape, don’t waste your time on trying to help poor old Mike.
      Remember the saying:
      You can lead a horse to water to water but you can’t make it drink.

      BTW- one of the best all time tracks is Jethro Tull’s “Thick as a brick”.

  105. Anderson Snapewood says:

    Svante,

    “Yes Mykey.

    I was hoping he (Mike Flynn) could provide some substance to his enigmatic molten rock talk.”

    *****

    Nothing wrong with his idea per se, it’s just irrelevant.

    The earth cooled for ~ 4.5 billion years, from a molten state to the first ice age. Since then (a comparatively short 2.5 million years) the global average has been up and down, but the “long term trend” is clearly negative.

    • Svante says:

      Yes, except the Huronian ice age was 2.4 billion years ago.

    • Mike Flynn says:

      A,

      I am not aware of any mechanism which could alternately freeze and reheat the entire surface of a slowly cooling ball of molten rock, if the external heat source is solely the Sun, some 300,000,000 km distant.

      If I am ignorant of such a mechanism – involving real science – I would be grateful to learn something new. My experience with molten metal, or hot things in general, is that they progressively lose heat to a cooler environment, eventually becoming more or less isothermal, at which time they will be in equilibrium with that environment.

      I have never seen a cooling object spontaneously increase its rate of energy loss, followed by a decrease in energy loss (or vice versa).

      As far as I can see, the molten Earth has now cooled to its current temperature, and continues to do so, at a current rate of between 1 and 3 millionths of a Kelvin per annum. Different geophysical researchers derive different rates from relatively sparse measurements of heat loss.

      If you can provide any new facts, I would be grateful.

      Cheers.

      • Svante says:

        Mike Flynn says:

        “I am not aware of any mechanism which could alternately freeze and reheat the entire surface of a slowly cooling ball of molten rock, if the external heat source is solely the Sun, some 300,000,000 km distant.”

        There are many ways.
        You say earth is cooling at a rate of “around 40 terawatts or so”. Incoming solar power is about 180000 TW.
        It has increased by 60000 TW since the earth was molten, so that could bring the temperature up.

        Aerosols in the atmosphere can bring the temperature down by blocking sunlight.

      • Nate says:

        “I am not aware of any mechanism”

        Hilarious!

        “If I am ignorant of such a mechanism – involving real science – I would be grateful to learn something new.”

        Yes, Mike, you are quite ignorant. You could be less so, but you have to really want it.

        You see ‘ignorant’ contains the word ‘ignore’ inside it. But ignore is what you always do when offered facts and science.

        Actually it takes a concerted effort to remain as ignorant as you, given the availability, just outdoors, of information about the surprising heating abilities of the 300,000,000 km distant sun!

  106. Anderson Snapewood says:

    Svante

    Are you saying the Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose got it wrong? ……..lol!

    https://www.cdm.org/mammothdiscovery/wheniceages.html

  107. Anderson Snapewood says:

    Fritz

    Yes, sorry about that. I was actually more incredulous of DA’s method.

    The trend of percentage loss, though, is different than the average percentage loss. For example, the percentage loss could be increasing at a rate of + 1.0 % /year. (Is that right, or do I have it backwards? i.e. – – 1.0 % /year?)

    Anyway, I think such a trend is relevant, because, if and when there is an ice free artic in September, it will represent a 100% decrease from the previous September!

    So it seems to me, between now and then the percentage loss should be slowly increasing.

    OTOH, actual extent loss, in Km^2, should be slowing decreasing because each year will have less ice to begin with. A lot more ice would melt if a summer started with 100,000 Km^2 than if it started with only 50,000 Km^2.

    *******

    So I’m guessing there will be two diverging trends – increasing percentage loss, decreasing actual loss.

    • Fritz Kraut says:

      Anderson Snapewood says:
      October 28, 2018 at 5:41 PM

      “Fritz

      The trend of percentage loss, though, is different than the average percentage loss. For example, the percentage loss could be increasing at a rate of + 1.0 % /year. (Is that right, or do I have it backwards? i.e. – – 1.0 % /year?)”
      ___________________________________________________

      Yes, the value for acceleration should be positiv. And double minus is also plus.
      But unit for acceleration is %/year^2.
      And I think you are right: Percentage rate of loss (referred to each previous year) should increase.
      Absolut value in km^2 should DEcrease. And also relative value in % which referres to some fix area.

    • David Appell says:

      if and when there is an ice free artic in September, it will represent a 100% decrease from the previous September!

      And that would be true.

      But looking at a trend of just two years is rarely justified.

  108. Mike Roberts says:

    If one takes a look at accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) one gets a very different picture from what Roy Spencer is trying to show here, with his limited data set.

    https://twitter.com/philklotzbach/status/1055248810945871872

    In that tweet, the ACE is above average for the N Atlantic and the E Pacific set a new record. But this is just one year. It’s been getting worse everywhere.

  109. Vincent says:

    David Appell says:
    October 29, 2018 at 12:44 PM
    Vincent: we can’t do “controlled” experiments in climate science, because there is no control Earth. Observations have to suffice. But this is also true in several other sciences, like geology, astronomy, and medicine.
    —————————————————————

    Excellent point, David. You’ve highlighted the problems with certainty. If the issue doesn’t allow, or lend itself to controlled experimentation, whatever the discipline, we can’t be certain. There must always be doubt, or a degree of skepticism.

    The history of science is full of such examples of a prevailing consensus in the past being found to be wrong, as more observations and evidence come to light.

    Consider the laws of gravity, founded by Sir Isaac Newton. If each object is exerting a gravitational force of attraction on surrounding objects, why is the universe not contracting or collapsing on itself? Newton was religious. His only explanation was that God prevented it.

    The consensus of scientific opinion, that the universe was static, was so universal that Albert Einstein had to introduce a ‘cosmological constant’ into the equations of his first theory of relativity, in order to conform with the consensus that the universe was not expanding, which his theory implied without the constant.

    Einstein is reported to have said that was his biggest blunder, after Edwin Hubble later demonstrated the universe was in fact expanding, by observing the ‘red shift’, using more advanced telescopes.

    The Big Bang theory resulted, and there was a consensus of opinion that, at the present time, 13 or 14 billion years after the Big Bang, the expansion was slowing down, and would eventually come to a halt, and the universe would then begin to contract.

    However, after later observations with more advanced telescopes in outer space (Hubble telescope), it became apparent, in relation to our current astrophysical theories, that the expansion of the universe is mysteriously accelerating.

    Are our astrophysical theories wrong, or is there some other factor that we are unaware of? We simply can’t be certain. There is a current consensus of opinion that the existence of an invisible and undetectable substance we’ve named Dark Matter and Dark Energy is exerting a negative pressure on the gravitational force, which would account for the acceleration of the expansion.

    It remains to be seen whether the existence of ‘Dark Matter and Energy’ will ever be discovered. In the meantime, perhaps another Albert Einstein will explain the observations with a new theory of astrophysics. There would then be no need to waste time searching for the invisible.

    The climate change issue is of course more ‘down to earth’, but the causes are still uncertain because of the complexity and chaotic nature of the situation, and the relatively long time-scales involved before a significant trend can be observed.

    However, there are a few things about the effects of CO2 that we can be certain of.
    It is essential for all life, and most plants thrive and grow more abundantly in elevated levels of CO2, especially in dry, water-stressed conditions. This can be demonstrated with controlled experiments which conform with the most rigorous methodology of science, which is always required for certainty on any issue.

    • Fritz Kraut says:

      Vincent says:
      October 29, 2018 at 7:28 PM

      However, there are a few things about the effects of CO2 that we can be certain of.
      It is essential for all life….
      __________________________________________

      Oh, many many other things are also known and certain about CO2.
      We know it adsorbs infrared radiation upwelling from the ground.
      We know its warming itself up, when adsorbing this radiation.
      We know it becomes radiating itself when warmed.
      We know, half of this radiation is sent downward.
      We know, ground is warming when radiated…

      Which knowledge or certainty exactly is missing to conclude the existenz of CO2 induced GHE?

      Even the only possible “experiment” about reaction of a whole planet to increasing CO2-content, which is running now since 100 years, shows the for physical reasons expected warming.

      Is there any serious reason, GHE not to take as a fact?

      • Vincent says:

        I’m not arguing that CO2 is not a greenhouse gas. CO2 is essential for all life and greenhouse gases are also essential. Without them it would be too cold.

        By far the most significant greenhouse gas is water vapor and clouds, which together perhaps account for as much as 75% to 85% of the greenhouse effect. A slight increase in a particular greenhouse gas, such as CO2, from around 0.03% to about 0.04% of the atmosphere, over a century or so, doesn’t sound particularly alarming to me.

        However, the amount of water vapor and clouds in the atmosphere is constantly changing, which makes it far too difficult to precisely quantify on a global scale the role that the water vapor and clouds have on changing temperatures, and also difficult because of the complexity of the negative and positive feedback effects of clouds.

        • Fritz Kraut says:

          Vincent says:
          “I’m not arguing that CO2 is not a greenhouse gas.”
          ____________________________________________________

          So why didnt you mention the greenhouseeffect when talking about “the few things which are certain about CO2”?

          That CO2 is essential for photosynthesis is neither doubted by anyone nor the point we are discussing here.
          What doe you want to tell with this completely superflous remark about plantgrowing?

          Vincent says:
          “A slight increase in a particular greenhouse gas, such as CO2, from around 0.03% to about 0.04% of the atmosphere, over a century or so, doesn’t sound particularly alarming to me.”
          ____________________________________________________

          An icrease of 30% isnt “slight”. And it will be surely 100% within the next decades. Level today already is higher than some 100 000 years before.

          But nevertheless: This alone wouldnt be alarming to anyone.
          Its about the warming effect this causes.

        • David Appell says:

          Vincent says:
          A slight increase in a particular greenhouse gas, such as CO2, from around 0.03% to about 0.04% of the atmosphere, over a century or so, doesn’t sound particularly alarming to me.

          The whole point of science is to find the reality of nature, because “common sense” or intuition (like yours here) is often wrong about it.

          • Gordon Robertson says:

            DA…”The whole point of science is to find the reality of nature”

            That’s real science based on the scientific method. The pseudo-variety posited by alarmists like you is based on unvalidated climate models and consensus. No proof is provided and none of your claims have been verified by the scientific method.

          • David Appell says:

            Gordon, have you read the last chapter of the IPCC 5AR WG1 on model validation? (It’s the longest chapter in the book.)

            If not, why not? Until then, you are speaking from ignorance.

          • Gordon Robertson says:

            DA…”have you read the last chapter of the IPCC 5AR WG1 on model validation?

            Why would I do that:

            1)When the IPCC claimed in TAR (third review) that future climates cannot be PREDICTED then they turn around and try doing exactly that with unvalidated climate models? They got away with it till expert reviewer Vincent Grey forced them to change PREDICT to PROJECT.

            So, IPCC 5AR WG1 is all about fantasy projections from unvalidated models.

            2)When the IPCC releases the Summary for Policymakers, written by 50 politically-appointed Lead Authors, before the main review, written by 2500 reviewers, then uses the review to rewrite the main report? In other words, all the IPCC OPINION is based on the opinions of 50 politically-appointed Lead Authors.

            3)When the IPCC invents a fantasy rating of confidence levels to evaluate their own opinions? All the IPCC has ever claimed about AGW is that it is likely. They have offered no scientific proof based on the scientific method.

            The IPCC is corrupt and John Christy of UAH pretty well gave direct evidence of that from the times he sat as a Lead Author and a reviewer.

        • David Appell says:

          Vincent says:
          However, the amount of water vapor and clouds in the atmosphere is constantly changing

          Water vapor isn’t. The atmosphere will only hold so much water vapor, depending on temperature. Try to put more in and it will just rain and snow out.

          So the temperature has to first change (as from CO2) for the globally averaged concentration of water vapor to change. And then it changes fast — 7% per degree C. See the (Clausius-Claperyon equation.) This is a strong feedback on AGW from CO2+.

      • Gordon Robertson says:

        fritz…”We know, ground is warming when radiated”

        Explain how heat is transferred from CO2 molecules that are at a colder temperature than the surface atoms.

        Explain how CO2, at 0.04% of the atmosphere, could possibly supply enough energy to warm the surface, especially after the surface suffered humungous losses while heating the same molecules.

        This is especially suspect given what you claim, that only half the energy received by the CO2 is transmitted back.

        Have we discovered a super gas that can amplify heat?

        In fact, explain how heat can be recycled so as not to represent perpetual motion.

        • David Appell says:

          Gordon,

          Have you done the necessary calculations to conclude CO2’s radiative transfer has no effect at 0.04%?

          Let’s see them.

          • Gordon Robertson says:

            DA…”Have you done the necessary calculations to conclude CO2s radiative transfer has no effect at 0.04%?

            Lets see them”.

            If you were not so blatantly stupid and obtuse I’d go through it for you again, as I have several times before. For those not familiar with the proof, it’s about the Ideal Gas Equation.

            PV = nRT

            Presuming a constant volume, or nearly, for the atmosphere, that becomes P = (nR/V)T with the values in brackets a constant. That leaves P essentially equal to T.

            If you want to divide the atmosphere into definite layers of constant volume, same thing.

            Dalton: the total pressure of a mixed gas equals the sum of the partial pressures.

            Therefore P1/T1 = P2/T2….etc.

            It is blatantly obvious that N2/O2 will make up 99% of the pressure or there abouts and CO2, a tiny fraction of the total pressure. That translates to mass-perecent since mass and pressure are equivalent.

            Therefore, CO2, with a mass-percent of about 0.04% can contribute no more heat than a small fraction of 1C, for a temperature rise of 1C.

            There will be perturbations on top of that steady state (lapse rate) due to weather (rising thermals, local changes in pressure, etc.), but overall, CO2 will have no more than a small fraction of 1% of any change in warming.

            The atmosphere is warmed by N2/O2 and that’s all there is to it.

    • David Appell says:

      Vincent wrote:
      It remains to be seen whether the existence of Dark Matter and Energy will ever be discovered.

      They’ve already been discovered, we just don’t know what they are. If they are something new, we may never know them as more than “dark matter” and “dark energy,” but hopefully science can classify their properties and forces they experience, and potentially how they interact with “ordinary matter.” (But maybe not.)

      (Actually our “ordinary matter” is anything but ordinary in the universe — it’s only about 1/6th of all matter in the universe and 5% of its energy. We’re the minority.)

    • David Appell says:

      Vincent says:
      If the issue doesnt allow, or lend itself to controlled experimentation, whatever the discipline, we cant be certain. There must always be doubt, or a degree of skepticism.

      There is some nonzero doubt about every scientific finding, but there are degrees of doubt. You know this and trust scientific results every day.

      Do you expect your car to start every morning, or do you worry to laws of thermodynamics were overthrown overnight?

      Do you get a flu shot? Do you expect your computer to suddenly stop working because the laws of quantum mechanics were found to be wrong last night, so the chips inside stopped working?

      Do you think it will be found tomorrow that CO2 doesn’t absorb infrared radiation? Or that the Earth doesn’t emit any? Will heat seeking missiles stop working because the Stefan-Boltzmann law is actually false?

      AGW is based on very simple science. It’s not surprising — it’s basic physics. The surprise would be if the planet WASN’T warming.

      • Gordon Robertson says:

        DA…”Do you expect your car to start every morning, or do you worry to laws of thermodynamics were overthrown overnight?”

        According to you alarmists, the 2nd law no longer exists. You have heat being transferred from a colder atmosphere to a warmer surface that allegedly warmed it.

        You have 1% of the atmosphere, of which CO2 is a microscopic 0.04%, heating the surface to a temperature beyond what it is heated by solar radiation.

      • Vincent says:

        Again, you seem to have missed the point I am making, David. I trust the science used in products that can be thoroughly and repeatedly tested under controlled experimentation. I have no reason to have doubt that my TV will not work one day because the scientific theories behind its construction are faulty. I understand if it suddenly doesn’t work one day, it’s because a particular component has worn out or there’s an interruption to the electricity supply, and so on. Also, I can verify for myself that this is true because every time a product stops working, it is able to be fixed by replacing the faulty part or addressing whatever the cause might be.

        However, not all products are in this category. Flu vaccines and antibiotics have a relatively quick effect. When they don’t work, it becomes apparent quite quickly that they haven’t had the expected effect, and a scientific analysis can often reveal that the reason it hasn’t worked is because particular strains of bacteria, that the vaccine or antibiotic is supposed to target, have become resistant.

        This is an example of mother nature at work, restoring a balance. We create a new vaccine or antibiotic that is initially very effective, then gradually it will become less effective as the targeted bacteria adjust and become resistant, and so the cycle continues.

        The more complex the situation is, and the greater the number of variables, and the longer the time-frame that is required for results to be observed, the less control we have of the situation. Imagining we can control the climate by reducing minuscule percentages of CO2 in the atmosphere is sheer hubris.

        Let’s consider another analogy from the medical profession. The humble aspirin has been around for a long time. We can ascertain with certainty that it can reduce certain types of pain because we can observe the results within a few hours or days. This is equivalent to determining that CO2 is a greenhouse gas because we can observe it immediately absorbing frequencies in the infrared range, associated with heat.

        But what about the long-term effects? In the case of the Aspirin, there’s some evidence that taking a small dose every day will have the long-term effect of reducing the risk of cancer and heart disease. However, there is divided opinion among the experts in the field. Some medical researchers claim that the risks of internal bleeding outweighs the benefits, and others claim the benefits outweigh the risks.

        A recent, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial, involving over 19,000 elderly people, found no beneficial effect at all, of taking regular small doses of aspirin. Here’s the story. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180916152706.htm

        There are numerous examples of uncertainty regarding the long-term effects of drugs, health supplements, specific foods and various types of diet, and so on. The reasons for such uncertainty are because it’s too difficult, or even impossible in the case of CO2, to apply the true methodology of science with the full rigor required for certainty.

        • David Appell says:

          Vincent wrote:
          Imagining we can control the climate by reducing minuscule percentages of CO2 in the atmosphere is sheer hubris.

          That’s an emotional statement, and unscientific.

          We know the ab.sorp.tion spectrum of CO2. We know the Planck law is good, hence we know how the Earth radiates.

          Hence here is a greenhouse effect. (It’s also measured from space.) It remains only to calculate it as a function of the concentrations of the GHGs, which determines how much it will change as the concentrations change. (Some of these changes can be measured.)

          You want to avoid doing this calculation in favor of emotional statements.

          Re: aspirin – human bodies are far more complex than the laws of radiative transfer and more much complex than climate models. The effects of aspirin can’t be calculated; the effects of GHGs can.

        • Fritz Kraut says:

          Vincent says:
          … CO2 is a greenhouse gas because we can observe it immediately absorbing frequencies in the infrared range, associated with heat.

          But what about the long-term effects?
          __________________________________________________

          Thats absolutely the same.
          CO2 will absorb radiation and radiate itself until eternity.
          Makes no sense to hope, laws of physics might change one day.

  110. Snape says:

    DA

    I didn’t really understand what you were doing to calculate the artic trends, so I shouldn’t have said anything. My bad. And yes, I of course agree that it’s better to use all the data rather than just the end points.

  111. Nate says:

    Vincent,

    ‘slight increase in a particular greenhouse gas, such as CO2, from around 0.03% to about 0.04% of the atmosphere, over a century or so, doesnt sound particularly alarming to me.’

    It may not sound alarming, but that is not really scientific, or consistent with your complexity argument.

    Unlike water vapor co2 never condenses. Because water does condense, its response to warming or cooling is nonlinear.

    Sims show that removal of co2 causes deep cooling and oceans freezing over, an iceball Earth.

    • Vincent says:

      Nate,
      Alarm has nothing to do with science. It’s an emotional response that doesn’t require even the most basic knowledge of any science. Science can examine the causes and the processes of the emotion of alarm, but alarm itself is non-scientific and hinders the process of objective scientific investigation.

      By ‘sims’ do you mean simulations and computer models? I have no doubt that removing either CO2 or water vapor would be disastrous for all life, regardless of any cooling effect. To remove all CO2 requires the removal of either all Carbon or all Oxygen. If only Carbon is removed then I doubt that the Earth would become an iceball because water vapor, which is the most significant greenhouse gas, would still exist. If all oxygen were removed, there could be no CO2 nor H2O. The planet would be extremely cold but not an iceball because ice requires water to exist, and without oxygen there can be no water.

      • David Appell says:

        Without the CO2 the average global temperature would fall below freezing, and most of the water vapor would snow out of the atmosphere.

        “One sometimes hears it remarked cavalierly that water vapor is the ‘most important’ greenhouse gas in the Earth’s atmosphere. The misleading nature of such statements can be inferred directly from Fig 4.31…. If water vapor were the only greenhouse gas in the Earth’s atmosphere, the temperature would be a chilly 268 K, and that’s even before taking ice-albedo feedback into account, which would most likely cause the Earth to fall into a frigid Snowball state…. With regard to Earth’s habitability, it takes two [water vapor and CO2] to tango.”

        – Raymond Pierrehumbert, “Principles of Planetary Climate,” (2011) p. 271

          • Gordon Robertson says:

            DA….”R. Pierrehumbert, Principles of Planetary Climate (2011)”.

            ************

            Pierrehumbert is more a philosopher than a physicst. He works in highly theoretical areas that make little sense in observable science.

            From page 95 in the pdf at your link:

            “The Second Law of Thermodynamics states that entropy never decreases for energetically closed systems systems to which energy is neither added nor subtracted in the course of their evolution. The formal derivation of the law from the microscopic properties of molecular interactions is in many ways an unfinished work of science, but the tendency towards an increase in entropy an increase in disorder seems to be a nearly universal property of systems consisting of a great many interacting components. A process during which the entropy remains constant is reversible , since it can be run both ways ….”

            This is an example of Pierrehumbert misinterpreting and destroying the 2nd law. He even got the source wrong, denying Clausius and offering Boltzmann as the author of entropy. He credits the discovery of entropy to statistical mechanics while ignoring the real author of entropy and the 2nd law as Clausius.

            In doing so, he completely mangles the meaning of entropy and the message of the 2nd law. He relates entropy to a generic energy whereas Clausius introduced entropy only in relation to heat. In fact, Clausius defined entropy as the sum of infinitesimal changes of heat at a temperature T at which the changes occur. He mentioned nothing about generic energy or open/closed systems.

            Pierrehumbert is confused, so much so, that he describes our atmosphere in terms of math, while remaining totally oblivious to what the Ideal Gas Law or the 2nd law are stating about the physical atmosphere.

            I don’t think Pierrehumbert has the ability to divorce himself from the math and observe the atmosphere for what it is, an aggregation of molecules in a gas under the influence of gravity, influenced locally by rising thermals of air.

            There is no such thing in the atmosphere as an adiabatic parcel of air that does not exchange heat with other parts of the atmosphere. The notion of a parcel of air rising in a vertical column without transferring heat to to air outside the column is nonsense. That would require an insulated enclosure.

            From this mathematical and highly theoretical hodge podge of bad science comes the notion that the reduction of temperature with altitude is governed by a mysterious lapse rate, having nothing to do with the reduction in pressure with altitude.

            Pierrehumbert admitted pressure drops with altitude and in a linear manner as observed by weather balloons. Yet he completely fails to equate the reduction in pressure to gravity. Of course, that means he also fails to equate temperature to pressure even though he analyzes the Ideal Gas Law and notes that temperature does decrease with pressure and altitude.

            He is so busy converting the IGL to other forms that he completely misses what it is saying.

          • David Appell says:

            Gordo, heat transfer is only one example in the broad field of classical thermodynamics.

            Entropy has a meaning far beyond that of a heat transfer at constant temperature.

            Learn something Gordon, OK?

        • Vincent says:

          It’s an interesting concept, David. Thanks for the link to the long article, but I can’t find any statements on page 271 that claim that removing CO2 from the atmosphere would result in freezing global temperatures. Could you highlight where those statements are, and explain in layman’s terms why it would be the case?

          This is of course a ‘science fiction’ scenario. If we were able to magically channel even half of the current levels of CO2 to outer space in a very short period of time, there would be a massive food shortage and a significant slowdown of the growth of most plants and all forests. That’s what I would call a major disaster.

          The first sentence in the preface to the Pierrehumbert article summarizes the problem of climate science very well. To quote:

          “When it comes to understanding the whys and wherefores of climate, there is an infinite amount one needs to know, but life affords only a finite time in which to learn it; the time available before ones fellowship runs out and a PhD thesis must be produced affords still less.”

          How on earth can there be certainty on such an issue as climate change?

      • Nate says:

        Vincent, “If only Carbon is removed then I doubt that the Earth would become an iceball because water vapor, which is the most significant greenhouse gas, would still exist.”

        ‘water vapor would still exist’, is not a quantitative statement, not accounting for what I mentioned about the non-linearity of water vapor with temperature.

        Simulations, which include the known properties of the atmosphere and global circulation, show that if CO2 is removed, the initial drop in temp due to loss of CO2 produces a water vapor drop, which in turn produces more cooling, which produces more sea-ice with greater albedo, and more water vapor condensation, a runaway effect that causes Earths oceans to freeze over.

        The presence of CO2 is a backstop preventing that freeze-over, because CO2 never condenses.

  112. ren says:

    In three days, there will be an inflow of freezing air far to the south in the central US.
    https://files.tinypic.pl/i/00973/3v51nkem97jh.png
    The area of ozone growth is the area where the temperature will drop the most.

  113. Gordon Robertson says:

    Just want to report there are no tornadoes, hurricanes, water spouts, freezing weather, icebergs, or other calamities in the Vancouver, BC area.

    No climate change or global warming to report. Sea levels are normal.

    Same old, same old.