How to lie statistically?

originally posted by: DBCowboy
This message was brought to you by The Church of Climatology.

REPENT!

Our god is an awesome god
He may make rains or dry from above
With greed, control, and if you disagree you'll get a shove
Our god is an awesome, pseudoscientific, globalist god.

Or, if you prefer... Donny Osmond in AlGore and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Hoax.

originally posted by: melatonin

originally posted by: DBCowboy
People tend to ignore me when I bring up legitimate concerns over the data collected.

Or maybe it just not worth bothering. Easier to pick the most obvious angles to highlight the specious nature of denialist argumentation clearly and concisely.

Job's a goodun D:

Yeah, who wants legitimate data when conducting science.

pfft!

originally posted by: DBCowboy
Yeah, who wants legitimate data when conducting science.

pfft!

Keep an eye on your emails - I'm sure that scientists from all over the world will be clamouring for your insight and expertise on variance D:

originally posted by: melatonin

originally posted by: DBCowboy
Yeah, who wants legitimate data when conducting science.

pfft!

Keep an eye on your emails - I'm sure that scientists from all over the world will be clamouring for your insight and expertise on variance D:

If they were smart, they would. I'm quite good at what I do.

originally posted by: DBCowboy
If they were smart, they would. I'm quite good at what I do.

Quite good?

Hmm. They'll call you I'm sure.

Anyway, I'll leave this thread here. Think there's little to discuss - I'm gonna go pray to to my methane gas boiler (:

a reply to: melatonin

So you mention water vapour, methane and CO2. All are major GHGs, lol.

By your definition, so are oxygen, nitrogen, argon, neon, radon, and about every other gas known to mankind. But yeah, carbon dioxide is special. Al Gore said so.

Gawd - this same argument could have happened 10 years ago. It's a well-established definition, of course it's not debatable, lol.

It is not well-defined that anything is a 'major' 'greenhouse gas,' unless you want to talk water vapor. It has orders of magnitude more spectroscopic range and exists in amounts up to 100 times as much as carbon dioxide. So I could maybe go along with that one.

Understand that the word major implies that there is a significant effect. Carbon dioxide can be a 'greenhouse gas' without producing a significant effect.

Wow, OK. It's data from a scientific study.

It's where scientists publish their data.

Not my numerology, lol. I just posted the numbers.

No, you performed linear operations on clearly-specified non-linear system components. The 40% figure was what you made up by ignoring the non-linear properties of the data.

You'd be lucky to even find a denialist scientist to agree with you. They generally suggest lower forcing, but not that's it's unappreciable.

Not applicable. As I said before, science doesn't work on a one-person one-vote arrangement. That's politics.

Wut? Tyndall showed the nature of GHGs in 1859. That's over 150 years ago. It's ancient news for science. The definition is well-established.

But your extension to the definition is not.

TheRedneck

a reply to: DBCowboy

Don't look now, but I think he's pulling out the big book of curses:

originally posted by: melatonin

I'm gonna go pray to to my methane gas boiler (:

Better fireproof everything. It's about to really get hot now.

TheRedneck

originally posted by: TheRedneck
a reply to: Greven

Do you have a link to his data? It would be nice to know exactly which department he works in. Perhaps I could ask him about his work.

TheRedneck

UAH lower troposphere v6.0

originally posted by: melatonin

originally posted by: Teikiatsu
CO2 certainly is a greenhouse gas, with a logarithmic effect.

Super - we're in agreement them (:

When did we disagree? I never said CO2 wasn't a GHG. I was pointing out that the video was not a robust experiment, with the intent to scare people who didn't have all the facts.

Aww, sorry if I intimidate you ):

Okay, that made me lol right there.

Good - why so serious D:

Because science is being twisted to push a political agenda, and that should bother a lot more people.

While the OP was actually on "How to Lie Statistically". The author took a single incidence of measurement error and generalized it to "all statistics lie (that I don't agrees with)". The the general discussion of climate change/warming/whatever you want to call it today came up with quite a bit of good information thrown around - thank you all.

I just received this link from a friend:

Government Report Finds Drastic Impact of Climate Change on U.S.

www.nytimes.com...

The conclusion of the report:

“Evidence for a changing climate abounds, from the top of the atmosphere to the depths of the oceans,” a draft of the report states. A copy of it was obtained by The New York Times.

The authors note that thousands of studies, conducted by tens of thousands of scientists, have documented climate changes on land and in the air. “Many lines of evidence demonstrate that human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse (heat-trapping) gases, are primarily responsible for recent observed climate change,” they wrote.

Recall the OP used one perhaps flawed study to discredit the majority of climate science.

Apparently both sides of the issue are worried about this Government Mandated Report.

Scientists are afraid that it will be suppressed or 'changed' by the Administration.

And the Science deniers are worried that the Administration won't act decisively enough to bury it.

Strange - n'cest pas?

The E.P.A. is one of 13 agencies that must approve the report by Aug. 18. The agency’s administrator, Scott Pruitt, has said he does not believe that carbon dioxide is a primary contributor to global warming.

There is a link to the actual draft document being circulated for approval within the article.

The article is somewhat confused as it appears to report that the paper is 'attributing' local weather events to climate warming directly in a linear fashion. My knowledge of Systems Theory is that you must consider the whole terrestrial system in a dynamic fashion to reach valid conclusions.

You would be able to predict more and stronger 'Weather Events' but not where or when as the systems tries to return to a state of equilibrium.

As I said the article is somewhat confused and I've not read the report. Have at it folks.

originally posted by: Teikiatsu
Because science is being twisted to push a political agenda, and that should bother a lot more people.

I know. Check out Oreskes' 'Merchants of Doubt'. I noted it earlier.

Anyway, have fun (:

www.youtube.com...

originally posted by: TheRedneck
a reply to: melatonin

So you mention water vapour, methane and CO2. All are major GHGs, lol.

By your definition, so are oxygen, nitrogen, argon, neon, radon, and about every other gas known to mankind. But yeah, carbon dioxide is special. Al Gore said so.

Gawd - this same argument could have happened 10 years ago. It's a well-established definition, of course it's not debatable, lol.

It is not well-defined that anything is a 'major' 'greenhouse gas,' unless you want to talk water vapor. It has orders of magnitude more spectroscopic range and exists in amounts up to 100 times as much as carbon dioxide. So I could maybe go along with that one.

Understand that the word major implies that there is a significant effect. Carbon dioxide can be a 'greenhouse gas' without producing a significant effect.

Wow, OK. It's data from a scientific study.

It's where scientists publish their data.

Not my numerology, lol. I just posted the numbers.

No, you performed linear operations on clearly-specified non-linear system components. The 40% figure was what you made up by ignoring the non-linear properties of the data.

You'd be lucky to even find a denialist scientist to agree with you. They generally suggest lower forcing, but not that's it's unappreciable.

Not applicable. As I said before, science doesn't work on a one-person one-vote arrangement. That's politics.

Wut? Tyndall showed the nature of GHGs in 1859. That's over 150 years ago. It's ancient news for science. The definition is well-established.

But your extension to the definition is not.

TheRedneck

It is quite true that water vapor is the most significant greenhouse gas - due to both the wavelengths it absorbs and the sheer quantity of it in the atmosphere relative to other greenhouse gases.

However, what allowed that water vapor into the atmosphere to begin with?

Recall, the Earth's atmosphere as a whole is about 255ºK. Without the effect of greenhouse gases, temperatures near the surface would be pretty close to that temperature. This is about -18ºC, which is well below freezing.

So, what warmed the Earth such that water vapor can exist?

a reply to: Greven

So, what warmed the Earth such that water vapor can exist?

That's simple...

Solar radiation warms the surface of the planet. Heat is transferred to the lower atmosphere by conduction/convection.

Radiation is not the only way heat can travel. The very fact that the lower levels of the atmosphere are so much warmer than the upper layers indicates conduction/convection is the primary method of heat dissipation at the surface... not radiation.

TheRedneck

originally posted by: burdman30ott6

originally posted by: growler
captain 'murica, single digit iq matching his shoe size.

Cute... Im a licensed professional Civil Engineer, son. I've done more with the "science" behind the AGW scam than you'd believe. But go ahead and keep playing the game and thinking mankind has an impact.

Cute--licensed civil engineer--when did you get that 2-year degree? You say you've done more "science" and claim it to be a scam. You do not believe humans have an impact--how can you honestly think that. You mentioned aerosol cans. That was one piece of the puzzle--just because you disagree doesn't mean you have to hurt the environment. Try not to fart.

a reply to: burdman30ott6

The Democrats will never learn...99.99% of the people on earth know this.

originally posted by: WeowWix

originally posted by: burdman30ott6

originally posted by: growler
captain 'murica, single digit iq matching his shoe size.

Cute... Im a licensed professional Civil Engineer, son. I've done more with the "science" behind the AGW scam than you'd believe. But go ahead and keep playing the game and thinking mankind has an impact.

Cute--licensed civil engineer--when did you get that 2-year degree? You say you've done more "science" and claim it to be a scam.

4 year Bachelor of Science in CE plus 10 credit hours shy of a master's, minors in macroeconomics and advanced mathematics... and professional licensure in 4 states. Welcome to reality, where actual scientists and engineers don't make their money off tax funded grants and, therefore, can openly voice dissent against the falsehoods of AGW.

originally posted by: WeowWix

And I have a 100m swimming certificate (backstroke, but failed the rest), a silver medal in the 1996 UK Blockbusters Gaming tournie, and a letter from my doctor noting my asthma.

Read it and weep!

originally posted by: TheRedneck
a reply to: Greven

So, what warmed the Earth such that water vapor can exist?

That's simple...

Solar radiation warms the surface of the planet. Heat is transferred to the lower atmosphere by conduction/convection.

Radiation is not the only way heat can travel. The very fact that the lower levels of the atmosphere are so much warmer than the upper layers indicates conduction/convection is the primary method of heat dissipation at the surface... not radiation.

TheRedneck

And on the opposite side of the Earth at the time? What then?

Solar radiation does indeed warm the surface, but your explanation would be insufficient. Recall, emission is W/m^2 = σKelvin^4 , while Stefan-Boltzmann law says inbound energy = outbound energy and inbound radiation is (1-albedo)*solar constant/4. Because of the inbound=outbound, this can be turned into Kelvin = ((1-albedo)/σ * solar constant/4)^(1/4). Solar constant is 1370 W/m^2 (though satellites measure between 1361 and 1366 pretty regularly). Earth's albedo is approximately 0.31. σ is the Stefan-Boltzmann constant = 5.670367×10^-8 W/m^2K^4. Thus, the Earth is at about 253.9 Kelvin, which is pretty close to what I get here:

originally posted by: Greven
If we did not have greenhouse gases, the Earth as a whole would be approximately 255°K - below freezing. That's for today - the Sun is thought to have increased in its output as it has aged. Now, that 255°K would be for the whole of the atmosphere. Pressure determines mass; a good rule of thumb is that 50% of the remaining mass of the atmosphere will be below every 5.6km increase in altitude. Thus, 50% of atmospheric mass is within about 5.6km of the surface, 75% is within about 11.2km, 87.5% is within about 16.8km, and so on. More than 98% of the Earth's atmospheric mass is below about 33.6km.

UAH for example defines 'lower troposphere' to be from near the surface up to about 8km. Temperature falls with altitude above the surface in the troposphere (the lowest 75% of the atmosphere), as anyone who has been on top of a mountain will understand; this lapse rate is about -6.49 °K/km. Given a mean surface temperature of 288°K, you can guess the temperature for 3/4ths of the atmosphere and about how much mass it makes up. Let's do it roughly by taking the start temperatures and saying that's how much a particular section is (this is slightly inaccurate):
00km: 288.00°K @ 0%
01km: 281.51°K @ 11.3% * 288.00°K = 32.54400°K
02km: 275.02°K @ 10.2% * 281.51°K = 28.71402°K
03km: 268.53°K @ 09.3% * 275.02°K = 25.57686°K
04km: 262.04°K @ 08.4% * 268.53°K = 22.55652°K
05km: 255.55°K @ 07.5% * 262.04°K = 19.65300°K
06km: 249.06°K @ 06.7% * 255.55°K = 17.12185°K
07km: 242.57°K @ 06.1% * 249.06°K = 15.19266°K
08km: 236.08°K @ 05.4% * 242.57°K = 13.09878°K
09km: 229.59°K @ 04.8% * 236.08°K = 11.33184°K
10km: 223.10°K @ 04.2% * 229.59°K = 09.64278°K
11km: 216.65°K @ 03.8% * 223.10°K = 08.47780°K
77.7% of atmospheric mass totals to 203.91011°K

From 11km to 20km is the tropopause, where it's roughly the same temperature and where most remaining mass is:
Pause: 216.65°K @ 18.1% * 216.65°K = 39.21365°K
18.1% of atmospheric mass adds 39.21365°K

This leaves about 4.26% of atmospheric mass unaccounted for; the stratosphere is above the troposphere (by some definitions it includes the relatively constant tropopause) and actually goes up in temperature with height, averaging about 250.15°K. It also makes up almost all of the remaining atmospheric mass.
4.2% of atmospheric mass adds 10.5063°K

The total then is 253.63006°K, though it should be 255°K by the Stefan-Boltzmann calculation; probably this discrepancy is the stratospheric portion (warmer 9-11km range in some latitudes) or small errors in rounding from these calculations... but it's pretty close.

Here is where your idea falls short - at its most direct, the sun on a cloudless day is about 1000 W/m^2. Given the calculation above, we can calculate the temperature at about 332.1°Kelvin or 59 °Celsius... which is certainly hot enough to evaporate water. Sounds good for your idea, right?

Alas, it is not. This amount of energy is only over a small surface area; due to the shape of the Earth and simple geometry, most of the Earth is not going to receive anywhere near that amount of energy. Further, as the Earth rotates, this is relatively fleeting (save for the poles at and near their respective equinoxes).

Something else to consider - that 1000 W/m^2 sounds pretty high, but the specific heat capacity of ice is 2108 J/kgK. 1 kg of water is 1 liter, and 1000 liters are in a cubic meter; 100 liters could be thought of as representing 1 square meter. Consequently, it would take 2108 J/kgK for each of the 100kg for each of the 18+ degrees rise up to freezing, or 3,794,400 J. This would take 3794.4 seconds, or 63.24 minutes. Now it's at approximately 0°C and we're looking pretty good, right? Unfortunately, there's the heat of fusion to consider - another 333000 J/kg to turn that into water, for a total of 33,300,000 J... another 33,300 seconds or 555 minutes... 9 hours and 15 minutes. This is still assuming 1000 W/m^2, which sure ain't happening over that span. This is a bit of a problem, considering that the average energy received by the Earth is about 340 W/m^2, or about 29,376,000 J per day. Oh, and we still have another 14°C (288°K) to go to reach the mean temperature near the surface where we live, for an additional 5,852,000 J needed... another 5,852 seconds or 97.5 minutes.

Do you see the problems with your theory?

Regarding your conduction/convention idea, you seem to be unaware that while temperature decreases with height up through the troposphere, this stops at the tropopause and remains almost constant for a considerable amount of altitude. Notice this in the explanation above.

Indeed, this temperature decrease with height reverses after the tropopause for most of Earth's remaining atmospheric mass: temperature increases with height. This again stops at the stratopause at about 258°K for a fair amount of altitude before it flips back to declining, which slows dramatically around the mesopause and then inverts once more!

originally posted by: Greven
Do you see the problems with your theory?

You're aiming too high. You're effectively arguing with the climate equivalent of flat earthers. It's quite quaint (:

Go low, and then a little lower D:

This UG handout on IR absorption is helpful. Page 5 has IR data for O2 vs GHGs, lol.

irina.eas.gatech.edu...

a reply to: Greven

And on the opposite side of the Earth at the time? What then?

A little thing called "thermal mass."

I'm not sure what you're getting at here. Your calculations appear sound on the surface, but I fail to see where they disprove conduction/convection atmospheric heating. I have mentioned the high specific heat and heat of fusion of water many times to explain why the predictions of massive sea level rise are not realistic.

There is conduction/convection heating of the atmosphere, but there is also radiative emission occurring; the two are not mutually exclusive. There is some ice sheet melt occurring, and there is some not occurring. There is some absorption/re-emission of infrared emissions. None of that is in question; only how much is in question.

Assuming for the moment your 1000 W/m^2 figure (I was thinking it was closer to 1500, but that's not important right now), how many watts of energy are absorbed and how many are reflected (albedo)? What change in temperature will the absorbed energy create (specific heat)? What rate of heat transfer to the atmosphere will occur from this (conduction)? How much heat will escape as blackbody radiation? What will be the frequency spectra of this radiation? How much of this radiation will be absorbed/re-emitted by atmospheric gases? How much atmospheric heat will be dissipated by wind (convection)?

The answer is, we don't know. We have estimates being tested in computer models, but it is simply not possible to exactly calculate those variables. The albedo, for instance, can change drastically from one area to the next, even within a span of a few feet. The local thermal mass can shift drastically simply based on when it rained last. Blackbody radiation calculations are theoretical, meaning they are based on the perfect blackbody, which does not exist in reality.

Now, we can get some pretty close approximations on several of these variables, but there is also the question of what effect local variations have on the overall calculations. Wind, for instance, is primarily caused by uneven surface heating... wind contributes to convection heat exchange... so how do we calculate that? We really can't. It wasn't supposed to rain yesterday, but it did. We calculated the effects of the air masses moving through and made a guess, and the guess was wrong. If I had lived ten miles away, the guess would have been right. It was right for most people in this general area.

Do you see the problems with your theory?

Which theory? That the surface of the earth is warmed by solar radiation and heats the atmosphere through conduction/convection? That's not my theory; it's a proven fact.

It almost sounds like you are trying to prove that the fact that water evaporates is proof that carbon dioxide is heating the atmosphere because there's not enough solar radiation to do so. If so, that is ridiculous. Carbon dioxide does not produce heat; under the right circumstances, it can affect the direction of radiative heat energy through spectroscopic absorption/re-emission. It cannot produce heat.

TheRedneck