SkS "Myths" - Debunked

Skeptical Science (SS) is a disinformation site which more correctly should be labelled UNSkeptical UNScience.

It is run by a cartoonist John Cook who likes to dress in SS costume. The image above was on that site but has since been removed.

UPDATE

It has since been revealed the "Reichsführer J. Cook" has stolen the identity of Physicist Luboš Motl to post on both his own SS site and also on the UWA site.

What a grub!

 An example of Cook's Work was

Quantifying the consensus on anthropogenic global warming in the scientific literature (link)

 From the abstract:

We analyze the evolution of the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming (AGW) in the peer-reviewed scientific literature, .......... Among abstracts expressing a position on AGW, 97.1% endorsed the consensus position that humans are causing global warming.

However a paper by Legates et al found: (link)

inspection of a claim by Cook et al. (Environ Res Lett 8:024024, 2013) of 97.1 % consensus, heavily relied upon by Bedford and Cook, shows just 0.3 % endorsement of the standard definition of consensus: that most warming since 1950 is anthropogenic.

Whooops! Slight error - 97.1% found to be 0.3%.

And yet that uncovers why the topic of climate change is so controversial, exploding a
number of climate myths along the way.

Previous about on SS: (link)

This site was created by John Cook. I'm not a climatologist or a scientist but a self employed cartoonist and web programmer by trade. I did a Physics degree at the University of Queensland and while I achieved First Class Honours and could've continued onto a PhD, I instead quit academia and became a professional scrawler. Too much doodling in lectures, I think. Nevertheless, I've pursued a keen interest in science and if anything, found my curiosity about how the world works increased once I wasn't forced to study for impending exams.

Skeptical Science (SS) have detailed 176 "myths" with an "explanation." We debunk all SS's myths. After the SS "myths" we will address some extra myths.

Thanks to various contributors and especially Anthony Cox for the majority of the work.

Over 4 pages:

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	SS 'Myth’ What the science REALLY says 1 Climate has changed before Although SS claims humans are the dominant force behind change, this is not so. See - LINK 2 It's the sun SS claim that it is not the sun is false.  The Sun has a greater correlation than CO2. 3 It's not bad SS says GW has negative impacts. In fact the reverse is true. 4 There is no consensus SS claims there is a 97% consensus but as has been shown above, this is from a flawed study by SS's Cook. 5 It's cooling SS explanation is wrong. It is cooling according to both RSS and UHI data sets. 6 Models are unreliable Models are unreliable. Completely and utterly. Even Gavin  Schmidt thinks so     7 Temperature record is unreliable SS explanation is incorrect and the temperature record is indeed unreliable 8 Animals/plants can adapt SS says mass extinctions of species will happen but that is a theory ready for extinction. 9 It hasn't warmed since 1998 It hasn’t warmed since 1998. Longer according to McKitrick’s peer reviewed paper. Again, the IPCC agrees there has been a pause since 1998. So does the MET (LINK) 10 Antarctica is gaining ice Antarctica IS gaining ice. Sure is. Land or sheet ice has to be distinguished from sea ice which no one disputes is increasing.  A slew of papers and research confirm the sheet ice is increasing. 11 Ice age predicted in the 70s Ice age predicted in the 70s. Sure was, and everyone, scientists, politicians  and the media were predicting it. 12 CO2 lags temperature CO2 lags temperature but amplifies warming. Nope.  The climate sensitivity of CO2 has been greatly exaggerated and cannot amplify warming. 13 Climate sensitivity is low Anthony Cox, David Stockwell and  Lord Christopher Monckton, 3rd Viscount Monckton of Brenchley show  that Global Warming is definitely not the most serious issue facing the world today. 14 We're heading into an ice age We’re heading into an ice age. Sure are. We’re currently in an  interglacial which is no different from previous interglacials and is about at its end 15 Ocean acidification isn't serious Ocean acidification isn’t serious. That it is because it is not happening 16 "Hockey stick is broken" Hockey stick IS broken. In fact it never existed. See items 16, 27,85,  108, 120, 172.  The McShane and Wyner paper clearly established the  Hockey Stick was a product of dud statistics. Here is a full discussion of  McShane and Wyner with the alarmists doing their worst and being shot  down in flames. See especially McShane and Wyner’s rejoinder 17 "Climategate emails - conspiracy" The CRU emails show a conspiracy by pro-AGW scientists to censor and lie about AGW. They revealed fraud and unscientific process. The best review of all the emails is by Dr John Costella and the Montford review of the whitewash enquiries shows the  support from within the ranks of academia to this conspiracy 18 "Hurricanes aren't linked to GW" Hurricanes aren’t linked to global warming. This is as good a statement of  alarmists believing something which their own ‘science’ disproves as you’ll get. See Nature; see the IPCC and see Richard Muller. The evidence is clear: if AGW is real, hurricane frequency and intensity will DECREASE. 19 Al Gore got it wrong Al Gore got it wrong. This point more than any other shows that Skeptical Science (SS) is a bad joke site. The Gore law case shows 9 fundamental errors in Gore’s film. These ‘errors’ were about things which did not exist or were exaggerated. Lord Monckton takes it even further by noting 35 errors. But make no mistake the Gore trial established that Gore got it wrong. 20 Glaciers are growing Glaciers are growing. Glaciers declined during the 20thC because it got warmer, naturally. That decline was strongest in the first part of the 20thC which contradicts AGW. The rate of decline is now slowing, because it is not getting warmer. It’s all here in this comprehensive peer reviewed paper. 21 It's cosmic rays It’s cosmic rays. This is a smug objection. Svensmark’s great work about cosmic rays and their potential effect on clouds is a work in progress with new papers supporting it coming out all the time. Saying cosmic rays do not effect climate is like saying clouds do not effect climate (see items 67, 123). 22 1934 - hottest year 1934 – hottest year on record; in the US. Actually 1936 in the US despite attempts by GISS to remove this fact from the record. Can you extrapolate from the US to the world? Here’s one reason, the number of temperature recording sites, why you can. The point is we know alarmists have manipulated temperature records and been prepared to lie as the email scandal shows so maybe it was a hotter world-wide than the alarmists are prepared to say. 23 It's freaking cold! It’s freaking cold. The point being made here is that weather, short term events, is different from climate. The alarmists have determined what is a climatically valid period; 17 years. On that basis the pause in temperature is climatically real 24 Extreme weather isn't caused by GW Extreme weather ISN'T caused by global warming. Again the alarmists will go against their own IPCC ‘science’ to suit the narrative.  AR5 has explicitly disavowed the idea that extreme weather is caused by AGW. 25 Sea level rise is exaggerated Sea level rise IS exaggerated. See items 68, 157. Plenty of papers show this is the case. Houston and Dean is as good as any. Ablain et al 2009 and Cazenave et al 2008 confirm the slowdown in rate of sea level rise, consistent with the pause in temperature. The 2008 Cazenave paper looks at the period from 2003-2008 and finds a decomposed (into the steric or heat and eustatic or volume components) sea level rate of increase of ~2.3mm pa. The 2009 Ablain paper looks at the period from 2005-2008 and finds a rate of increase of ~1.3mm pa. During the 20thC the rate of sea level increase was ~ 1.8mm pa. But there were periods when the rate was more and when it was less, even negative, arguably in correlation with PDO phase shifts. This is exactly what we are seeing since 1992. From 1992-2003 we saw a rate of increase greater than average; from 2003 we have seen a rapidly decreasing rate of increase, again arguably in correlation with PDO phase shift.  See also HERE 26 It's Urban Heat Island effect It’s the Urban Heat Island effect. AGW ‘science’ now asserts the artificial heating of urbanisation causes no exceptional heating. This is garbage and Kauffman’s 2007 paper is still the best rebuttal of this nonsense. Figure 6 tells it all. See item 142. 27 Medieval Warm Period was warmer Medieval Warm Period WAS warmer. It was certainly warm hence the name. Was it warmer than today? Depends on who you talk to and when. The IPCC thought so in 1990, see Figure 7.1. The IPCC also thought so in 2007, Figure 9.10.  There are also plenty of peer reviewed papers which say not only was the MWP warmer than today but global; see here, here, here. The thing about the alarmists is the MWP, like all their evidence, is subject to suspect revision as the  Huang et al controversy shows. 28 Mars is warming Mars IS warming. Alarmist Andy Pitman says Mars warming is not relevant to Earth. But the Sun has increased its output during the period of Martian warming. So if the Sun was warming Mars during the 20thC surely it was warming Earth as well? Maybe it was Mars CO2? Mars atmosphere is 95% CO2, Earth has 0.04%. But Mars CO2 is not relevant to its warming because Mars atmosphere is too thin. Alarmist logic: more Sun warms Mars but not Earth; but more CO2 doesn’t warm Mars but less CO2 warms Earth. 29 Arctic icemelt is a natural cycle Arctic ice melt is a natural cycle. Sure is. See items 44, 95. First of all  the alarmists predicted the Arctic would be free of Summer ice in by 2013.  That was wrong. Peer reviewed papers show the Arctic had less ice in the  Holocene warm period 6-10000 years ago. That was natural. The current Arctic ice reduction, not loss, which sounds much worse, is correlated with the Sun, what a surprise, and is also natural; so natural that scientists cannot distinguish natural warming from any alleged AGW.See Here and Here 30 Increasing CO2 has little/no effect Increasing CO2 has little to no effect. Correct. It’s the log decline in extra CO2. This means more CO2 has LESS effect on temperature. It’s a diminishing return. This has been known for a long time. Even the IPCC concedes this noting that for CO2,  RF increases logarithmically with mixing ratio. But alarmists still maintain temperature could go up basically forever (items 7, 34, 91, 110); this is another prime example of alarmists ignoring their own ‘evidence’. Professor William Happer has a straightforward explanation of where the IPCC goes wrong in respect of the log effect. 31 "Oceans are cooling" Oceans are cooling. See item 90. They sure aren’t warming according to  ARGO; see here, here and here. The bottom line is this: Trenberth’s missing heat is not  being added to in the oceans. In fact it’s leaving the planet. 32 It's a 1500 year cycle It’s a 1500 year cycle. There are plenty of cycles of lessor and greater length which plainly dominate climate. The longer one is the Milankovitch cycle. The shorter one is the PDO and AMO cycles. Arguably all the 20thC warming can be attributed to PDO phase changes because there were 2 +ve or warmer PDOs and only one –ve or cooler PDO and the +ve PDOs were asymmetrically warmer. AGW assumes a symmetry in nature which has not been true for geological periods. 33 Human CO2 is tiny % of CO2 emissions See Human CO2 is a tiny percentage of CO2 emissions. SS wrong again. 34 IPCC is alarmist Yes, The IPCC IS Alarmist - See  UN IPCC -an alarmist organisation 35 Water vapour is the most powerful GHG Water vapour IS the most powerful greenhouse gas. No question. Ramanathan, one of the great climate scientists showed that Water Vapour has 2.5 times the radiative forcing of CO2. Ferguson and Veizer show CO2 is secondary to water vapour and the primary climate control ‘knob’ (see item 174), the Sun. 2 other interesting papers on condensation by Makareiva and Gibson show that water vapour processes dwarf any forcing by CO2. 36 Polar bear numbers are increasing Polar bear numbers are increasing. They are. And  AGW caused extinctions is another alarmist ‘scary’ story 37 CO2 limits will harm the economy CO2 limits will harm the economy. Any cost on CO2, not carbon, is a straight tax on endeavour and profit. Every cost benefit analysis from Lomborg in Cool It, to Nordhaus, to Monckton all say that if AGW is real then adapting to it would be vastly cheaper than attempting to control temperature by reducing CO2 emissions in King Canute fashion by fiddling with a knob. But the real cost of controlling CO2 is not with the grants, the bureaucrats and the overpaid academics wailing about the end of the world. The real cost is renewables. Peter Lang and Martin Nicholson critiqued the alarmists’ plan to replace all other energy sources in Australia with renewables and concluded it could work if energy use declined by over 60% and Australia was prepared to cop the cost of over $4 trillion. World-wide this idiocy would cost about $76 trillion! After that there would be no economy left to harm. Maybe that is the alarmists plan. 38 It's not happening It’s not happening. The temperature pause says it all: it’s not happening. See item 49 39 Greenland was green Greenland WAS green. Hence the name. Alarmists are surreal. Some facts. Greenland was warmer between 1920-1930 than today with many of the glaciers retreating to a greater extent in the past. Greenland was warmer 3-5000 years ago and the ice sheet smaller. The melting in Greenland today is possibly natural and due to geothermal heat, something which Cliff Ollier’s paper discusses. Only greenies could object to something being green. 40 Greenland is gaining ice Greenland IS gaining ice. It is, on an historical basis, according to ice expert Dr Box. As above (#39) 41 CO2 is not a pollutant SS explanation is wrong, CO2 is NOT a pollutant. The EPA over nearly a decade sought legal vindication for its claim CO2 is a pollutant despite relying on discredited IPCC ‘science’. The final Supreme Court verdict in 2014 gave the EPA the right to regulate existing large scale emitters of CO2 but not the vast number of small ones. More importantly the Supreme Court specifically resisted the EPA’s intention to interpret statute according to its bureaucratic criteria. The Supreme Court strongly advocated the EPA was bound by Congress. The upshot of this is if a Republican sceptic gets into the Whitehouse when Obama’s term ends with republican majorities in both houses this decision will change if new legislation that CO2 is not a pollutant is introduced. In short currently CO2 is a pollutant by virtue of the EPA’s ideological position and political fiat not the science. 42 CO2 is plant food SS explanation is wrong, CO2 definitely is plant food. No doubt. Sage’s seminal study shows if CO2 had not increased from 200 to 270PPM about 12000-15000 years ago and enabled agriculture to develop than modern society would not have been established. It is beyond doubt that current levels of CO2 are good for food plants and plants in general. We know that greenhouse farmers inject CO2 into their plants to promote growth and this works up to levels above 1000PPM. We know the nitrogen and water issues have been resolved or proven to be overstated in typical alarmist exaggeration. CO2 has greened the world and contributed to crop production increase. Only alarmists would see this as bad. 43 Other planets are warming SS explanation is wrong Other planets are warming. The sun has not cooled, it warmed to 2000 and has slightly cooled since. Temperature is strongly correlated with this. It makes sense that other planets have also warmed and they have. The alarmists have no answer for the warming on other planets and simply dismiss the idea that the sun has warmed Earth. My money is with Abdussamatov 44 Arctic sea ice has recovered Arctic sea ice has recovered. It has. The IPCC in Far, Figure 7.20, page 224, shows the low point for Arctic sea ice was in 1974 which was before the weather satellites began in 1979 (Figure 7.19 here). The Arctic had much less ice 6000 years ago. In the modern era Arctic sea ice peaked before 1950 and declined. The decline continued until 2013 when it increased. 2013 is important because it was predicted by Gore and other alarmists that the Arctic would be ice free in Summer by 2013  (See more HERE) 45 There's no empirical evidence There is no empirical evidence to support AGW. True. For 2 main reasons. Temperature and CO2 are not correlated; example the modern era. From 1959. 20thC. 1659. Longer. Secondly there is growing evidence CO2 increase is not caused by human emissions. See Pettersson’s work, one, two, three and overview. Salby’s work. (see item 139). Quirk’s paper. Knoor and Gloor’s work is summarised here. So even if CO2 causes temperature, for which there is no empirical evidence, there is cogent evidence that the increase in CO2 is not caused by humans. So, not is there no empirical evidence to support AGW, there is empirical evidence against it. (LINK) 46 No correlation between CO2 and temp here’s no correlation between CO2 and temperature. As above. Plus an interesting post by David Stockwell following on from Beenstock’s 2 papers. Basically temperature and CO2 are different statistically which means there is limited correlation between them. When you combine that with the log decline of the effect of CO2 on temperature (see no. 30 above) you can comfortably say at the very most the correlation between CO2 and temperature is effectively finished at concentrations well below the current level of CO2.  See More HERE. 47 We're coming out of the LIA We’re coming out of a little ice age. Yep and the same factor which  caused the LIA caused the coming out: the Sun. TSI from 1611, says it all 48 It cooled mid-century SS explanation is wrong. It cooled mid-century. It wasn’t aerosols, it was a –ve or cool Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). The irrelevance of CO2 and dominance of natural variability in the form of the PDO is starkly shown here. Professor Easterbrook explains it all in straightforward fashion 49 Global warming stopped in 1998, 1995, 2002, SS explanation is wrong. Global warming has stopped. The time it stopped depends on which temperature indice is used. McKitrick’s paper says 19 years. Even the IPCC reluctantly says the warming has slowed down, effectively stopped, 0.05 (-0.05 to +0.15). This is indistinguishable from zero. As for 2010 being the hottest year ever recorded. This is clearly wrong and entirely dependent on choosing the hottest temperature measurement, GISS. See items 5, 38, 141. 50 CO2 was higher in the past SS explanation is wrong. CO2 was higher in the past but the Sun was cooler. No doubt. This is known as the Snowball Earth/ faint-Sun paradox. The alarmists get into a tizzy about this because temperature was freezing with high CO2 levels so it must have been the faint Sun. This paradox occurred during the Archean, about 4000-2500 million years ago. The Sun at this time was about 75-82.5% of its current glorious self (for those interested in this sort of thing the formula for calculating this is 1/(1 - 0.38*t/4.55), where ‘t’ is the number of billions of years from now, negative for in the past. From James Kasting). The alarmists say not even huge CO2 levels, up to 550 times today’s value, could have compensated for the reduced Sun so this does not impact on AGW today where a piddling amount of CO2 can dominate the Sun which is much hotter than it was. But really CO2 was just as irrelevant back then as it is today. Theories abound to explain how Earth could be so cold with high CO2 levels and more importantly what mechanism, if not CO2, could get the Earth out from a snowball condition. The main reasons offered are clouds and albedo. And if you look at graphs comparing CO2 and temperature from 600 million years ago ( another snowball Earth scenario is suggested for 543 million years ago. See item 153) it is plain that faint Sun or not, and at this time, the Sun had grown to about 96% of its current level, CO2 and temperature have no correlation regardless of what the Sun is doing. 51 It warmed before 1940 when CO2 was low SS explanation is wrong.  It warmed before 1940 when CO2 was low. It was a positive PDO. See items 32 and 40 above 52 Satellites show no warming in the troposphere SS explanation is wrong. Satellites show no warming in the Troposphere. True. RSS has shown none for at least since 1998, and UAH for longer 53 It's aerosols SS explanation is wrong.It's aerosols. The science of aerosols is very uncertain (Steven Sherwood’s paper no less) and for that reason no certainty can be attached to AGW. Despite this alarmists, including Sherwood claim aerosols have caused the cooling from 1940-1976 and have masked the recent AGW warming by a process called dimming. Firstly the 1940 cool period was a product of a –ve PDO (see item 48). It can’t have been aerosols because since aerosols are human produced the cooling would have been greater in the Northern Hemisphere where most people and human production of aerosols occurs. In fact the Southern hemisphere cooled more. This is consistent with a –ve PDO which is ocean based and there is more water in the Southern hemisphere. Secondly, aerosols warm, even Hansen found this. But this warming effect of aerosols depends on where the aerosols are located with aerosols capable of cooling the surface and warming the atmosphere. It is clear that the effect of aerosols is not clear; any conclusions that they have caused cooling or masked warming as the alarmists claim is wrong. 54 It's El Niño SS explanation is wrong. It’s El Nino. Correct. To say El Nino or more correctly ENSO, has no trend is ridiculous. ENSO and its agglomerate form, the PDO (see items 32 and 48), is a crucial part of natural variability (see item 1) and can generate a trend. The alarmists would have the public believe that without AGW nature would stay the same. This is ridiculous. A more pertinent issue is how much natural variability, including PDO, has contributed to trend. There are many papers on this: see here, here, here, and here. The alarmists position was enunciated by Foster et al which disputed McLean et al’s findings that natural variability in the form of the Southern Oscillation Index (which is associated with ENSO) could produce most of the temperature trend. McLean et al were vindicated and the process of peer review by which Foster et al got their paper published but McLean et al were refused a right of reply in itself revealed the evidentiary sham of AGW. If AGW is correct why does it stoop to censorship 55 2009-2010 winter saw record cold spells SS explanation is wrong. 2009-2010 saw record winter cold spells. Weather is not climate claim the alarmists but just watch every hot spell, real or imagined will be evidence of AGW according to the alarmists. Hypocrisy aside, well no, there’s nothing else except hypocrisy. There is ample evidence that cold is far worse than heat for humans to adapt to, and this applies to all time scales. As well there is strong evidence that heat was more of a problem in the past. The perversity of alarmism is that if AGW were real it would be more beneficial to humans than a cooling world. (as per item 3). 56 It's not us SS explanation is wrong. It’s not us. Alarmists want to blame humans. There is a strong strain of misanthropy in AGW alarmism . See item 135. Pollution used to be what harmed humans but under the misanthropy of AGW alarmism it has become what interferes with pristine nature. Given everything humans do interferes with nature, from building schools to building power plants humans automatically pollute under alarmism’s definition. As well as misanthropy alarmism is informed by tremendous arrogance: believing that humans can control the climate on this planet is an act of tremendous egoism. The alarmist position is hopelessly contradictory; on the one hand alarmists think humans are like a disease or a virus infecting the Earth, on the other alarmism regards humans as like gods who control the climate. This cognitive dissonance was wittily depicted in Kingsman. It’s not us, it’s the alarmists. As for “fingerprints”; 2 fingerprints are claimed by alarmism and are essential for it: firstly a tropical hot spot (THS), which is not happening; secondly, Stratospheric cooling, again not happening since 1995 after the Pinatubo eruption 57 It's a natural cycle SS explanation is wrong, It’s natural; yep; see items 1 and 54. As for “fingerprints”, item 56. One of the really strange things about the primary alarmist “fingerprint”, the THS, apart from the fact that it is not happening, is that alarmists even dispute the THS is a “fingerprint”: see here and comments here. 58 Kilimanjaro's ice loss is due to land use SS explanation is wrong. Mt Kilimanjaro’s ice loss is due to land use. Plus glaciers are declining. Yes, land-use. Plenty of glaciers are expanding or not shrinking. Then there was the Himalayan glacier scandal where the IPCC faked the data 59 There's no tropospheric hot spot SS explanation is wrong. There’s no tropospheric hot spot. No, there’s not, see items 56, 57 and part 6 here. Like all alarmist evidence the THS is shrouded with junk science, particularly by Sherwood (see section 7 here for his first effort, and here for his second). But the evolution of the alarmist position on the THS is also amusing. The THS is an essential element of AGW theory; AGW says more CO2 in the atmosphere will cause more evaporation and since water is a powerful green-house gas the extra water will cause greater warming. This will be most pronounced in the Tropical atmosphere since the Tropics have the most water. In email 1939 Peter Thorne, a prominent AGW scientist says: Observations do not show rising temperatures throughout the tropical troposphere unless you accept one single study and approach and discount a wealth of others. Despite Thorne's reservations the IPCC published a major diagram, Figure 9.1, in its 2007 AR4 report purporting to show a THS caused by greenhouse gases. As is plainly visible the pattern of a THS from greenhouse gases is very different from Tropical heating caused by other factors. There is no justification for this. Thorne has contributed to two other major studies on the THS done after AR4. In the first study in 2008 Thorne et al concluded that the model predictions and observations about a THS were in good agreement and that pre 1979 radiosonde temperature data, which is from weather balloons, had been responsible for any disagreement. In his second 2011 study Thorne et al concluded that the observations since 1979 disagreed with the model predictions but when the observations from the radiosondes from 1958 were added the models and observations were in reasonable agreement. Everyone is allowed to change their minds. However, Thorne's latest paper disagrees, in varying ways, with studies by Paltridge 2009, Christy et al 2010, McKitrick et al 2010, McKitrick et al 2011, McKitrick et al 2011 and Fu et al 2011. So, there is no THS “unless you accept one single study” which is Thorne’s. 60 It's Pacific Decadal Oscillation SS explanation is wrong.  It’s Pacific Decadal Oscillation. Yep. See item 54. The PDO produces trend. Dr Syun Akasofu shows how. And in response to Akasofu’s work and the spirit of true scientific integrity the alarmists spat their dummies 61 Scientists can't even predict weather SS explanation is wrong. Scientists can’t even predict weather. So how can they predict 100 years into the future. A valid point. Look at the Bureau of Meteorology (BOM). Their short term predictions and forecasts are abysmal and have been for a long time. They haven’t improved. They get basic things wrong such as saying the worst Queensland drought in 80 years when a rudimentary check of their own records would show the drought was the worst in 9 years. And at Alice Springs a crucial temperature site because it covers such a large area and can influence national trends, the BOM can’t even read its own thermometer. Anyway the CSIRO is just as bad as forecasting as the BOM. The problem with the BOM is that its short term forecasts are tainted by the alarmist long term predictions and AGW ‘science’. This means a failed theory is dictating short term forecasts. How serious this is was brought home by the Wivenhoe floods in 2011. The Wivenhoe dam was built as a flood mitigator after the worse 1974 floods but due to alarmist predictions of endless drought the dam was full as a drought mitigator. As a result it could not mitigate the floodwater. 62 IPCC were wrong about Himalayan glaciers SS explanation is wrong. IPCC was wrong about the Himalayan glaciers. They were; see item 58. 63 Greenhouse effect has been falsified SS explanation is disingenuous. See LINK 64 2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts GH theory SS explanation is wrong. 2nd Law of Thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse effect. See above. The argument has its adherents (see above, the Slayers). A good discussion of the main principles is here. Basically the adherents say a cooler atmosphere cannot warm an already warmer surface thus refuting backradiation, the deus ex machine of alarmism. It is a pity that alarmism, a theory, which like greenhouse, is contradictory and so full of holes it makes Swiss cheese look like a brick fence, should denigrate an interesting discussion. For those who are interested in the nitty gritty here is Nahle’s paper, Postma’s response to Spencer, and Robitaille’s papers are of interest 65 CO2 limits will hurt the poor SS explanation is wrong. CO2 limits will hurt the poor. Absolutely. The third world needs reliable and cheap power to lift themselves out of poverty. Renewables do not work (see energy density, and Installed Capacity, capacity Factor and Reliability Point, plus EROEI), they are a vanity exercise for the rich. Here’s a couple of examples of how renewables create obscene costs and affect the poor 66 The science isn't settled The science isn’t settled. Most of the science is junk, contradicted by the only criteria, empirical evidence. But what do you expect when the IPCC reports were audited in 2010 by the IAC and found to be completely deficient. The word is uncertainty and alarmism is full of it. No More grants then. 67 Clouds provide negative feedback Clouds do provide negative feedback. Absolutely; they did in the past and they still do. Here, here, here, here. Spencer and Braswell present an interesting paper showing clouds moderate temperature trends; that is if it’s cooling, clouds warm and if warming then clouds cool. This moderating effect is also discussed in other papers. Generally the top of clouds reflect Short-wave radiation and by doing so cool, while the underneath trap Long-wave radiation and warm. The SW reflection cools more than the LW trapping heats. 68 Sea level rise predictions are exaggerated Sea level rise predictions are exaggerated. (item 25) Anyway they are. Like every aspect of alarmism the aim is to scare and frighten (see item 34). Look at this typical depiction of the effect of predicted sea level rise, complete with shark swimming down the main street. Everywhere from the pacific islands to every major coastal city, falling polar bears included, is going to drown due to sea level rise. Green councils refuse to allow development because of sea levels. There is of course no evidence to substantiate this nonsense with Houston and Dean’s paper showing sea level rise declining. But who can forget prominent alarmist tax –payer funded Robyn Williams predicting  69 It's the ocean It’s the ocean. It’s a water world. All the energy is in the ocean (from here). Which is why the alarmists claim the missing heat is in the ocean. It’s not. 70 IPCC were wrong about Amazon rainforests IPCC were wrong about Amazon rainforests. Yep the IPCC effectively lied about the Amazon. The IPCC is based on grey, unqualified literature from green activist loons. The number of scandals like Amazongate is well over a 100. There are many false citations sourced from green groups. You can’t trust the IPCC. 71 Corals are resilient to bleaching Corals are resilient to bleaching. Corals are resilient full stop, to bleaching and warming where there is evidence they thrive. Take the Great Barrier Reef (GBR). It’s been around for 18 million years. During that time sea levels were up to 120 meters lower than today and 10 meters higher. Temperatures have been 10ºC hotter and colder and CO2 levels higher. The reef survived. That hasn’t stopped alarmists like Hoegh-Gulberg making outrageous and failed predictions continuously. Despite the alarmism UNESCO did not put the GBR on the endangered list. In doing so the lies, hysteria and exaggeration of alarmism have been revealed again. 72 Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans. We don’t know; we haven’t discovered all the submarine volcanoes; about 80% of volcanoes on Earth are in the deep ocean. The main source of opposition to the idea that volcanoes are the main source of CO2 is Gerlach. Gerlach’s 1991 paper is here. A critique of Gerlach is here. A fuller exposition is here which details the gross underestimation of CO2 emissions from subaerial volcanoes while detailing the lack of knowledge about submarine volcanoes. Plimer’s books deal with this issue but the alarmists hate him because he has their measure. Newsflash: new study finds large increase in heating from ocean floor via submarine volcanoes. 73 CO2 effect is saturated See items 30, 46 and 145. Adding more CO2 does not have the same response as previous additions of CO2. After a certain level further CO2 has imperceptible effects on temperature. Its effect is said to be saturated: no more IR can get through or be absorbed. CO2 absorbs radiation from one main wavelength, 15μ but also at 4.3μ. The alarmist argument is that when the 15 band is saturated pressure broadening will see the 4.3 band begin to absorb. As well, as the lower levels of CO2 saturate the final release of the absorbed IR will occur higher which will cause the Stratosphere to cool as energy is released there. We have seen the Stratosphere is not cooling (see item 56). In regard to pressure broadening stopping CO2 from being saturated, see here, here, here. Basically CO2 does all of its absorbing at very low heights, less than 10 meters; pressure broadening whereby the other CO2 absorption wavelength of 4.3 starts absorbing does not undo the saturation at 15 and it too becomes saturated at a lower level. Adding more CO2 does not make the atmosphere higher merely feeds more trees. There is no evidence that more heat is being trapped on Earth by more CO2; in fact the energy is leaving the planet 74 Greenland ice sheet won't collapse See item 39. The Greenland ice sheet has been smaller in warmer conditions in the past, 3-5000 years for instance. Much further in the past during the Eemian Greenland had hardly any ice sheet. There was no collapse, just a reduction but collapse sounds much more dramatic. In fact over the last 3 million years the Greenland ice sheet has survived much warmer periods and shown itself to be very stable. It’s not just the distant past; Greenland has shown little warming from the 1800s as Jones and Briffa show, and it had a higher rate of warming in the 1930s 75 CO2 is just a trace gas See item 33. CO2 is a trace gas but it is compared by alarmists with poisons. This reflects on the alarmists since humans are carbon lifeforms and inhale air with about 400PPM of CO2 while exhaling up to 6000PPM. In fact CO2 production by exhaling is about 9% of all human emissions. By saying CO2 is a poison alarmists are not only insulting trees, which eat CO2, but demonstrating their misanthropy (see item 56 76 It's methane Sceptics don’t worry about methane. Alarmists do. The increase in methane is natural. The increase has stopped. The end 77 CO2 has a short residence time Yep, but alarmism needs along residency time for CO2 to explain their predicted warming centuries into the future. Lots of studies say short. Essenhigh is a good one. The alarmists wheeled out Cawley to refute Essenhigh and the merits or lack thereof, of Cawley’s paper are discussed here. Residency can be based on one molecule of CO2 or on a bulk basis, lots of CO2 molecules. But really, calculating the approximate residency time of a molecule of CO2 is pretty straightforward and can be done using ‘official’ IPCC data [sic]. On page 515 of AR4, at Fig 7.3, the annual fluxes of CO2 are listed; the total of these fluxes is 218.2 Gt; of this 8 Gt is from human activity, or 3.67% of the total. The other relevant data is from the US Department of Energy at Table 3. This shows the total emissions and absorptions; of that 218.2 CO2 flux from Fig 7.3 98.5% is reabsorbed leaving about 1.5% of emitted CO2 from all sources to remain at the end of the year. How much of that 1.5% is from human sources can be simply calculated by 1.5/100×3.67/100=0.000552. Put another way, after 1 year 1 CO2 molecule has a 1 in 1811.594203 chance of still being in the atmosphere; in the second year a 1 in 120772.9469 and so on. Like every other aspect of AGW the notion of long residency periods for CO2 is nonsense 78 CO2 measurements are suspect Not in the modern era. The historical measurements to which the modern ones are compared are however very suspect. Plant stomata is a more reasonable method of measuring historical levels of CO2. The usual method of ice cores is subject to preferential fractionation of the CO2 in the air pockets in the ice. This simply means as pressure compacts the ice the CO2 contained in the air trapped in the ice is the first to go. This leads to false low levels of historical CO2. Once it is recognised that past levels of CO2 were neither much less than today or at a constant level than the claim that the high levels of CO2 today must be due to humans falls over 79 Humidity is falling It is and this confirms Miskolczi who the alarmists love to hate (see section 4). See also Miskolczi’s 2014 paper. Basically Miskolczi theorises that as CO2 increases humidity drops and in that way the greenhouse effect as measured by the optical depth (OD) of the atmosphere does not change. The OD is the number of times infra-red radiation leaving the surface is absorbed and emitted by the atmosphere before it leaves the top of the atmosphere. Has humidity declined and the OD remained constant. Yes and yes. Alarmism really needs more humidity and the lengths alarmism will stoop to prove that humidity is increasing is shown by the Paltridge-Dessler debate. 80 500 scientists refute the consensus s per item 4. The consensus is a dreadful idea. John Cook has made it popular. Tol and Legates et al deal with the Cook paper and I have an interesting exchange with Mr Cook here. But when it comes to numbers the alarmists have not bettered the Oregon Petition. 81 Neptune is warming Despite what SS says, Neptune IS warming 82 Springs aren't advancing Springs aren’t advancing. Or season creep. Apparently they are creeping with some creepy papers alarming about it; fleeing species and dodgy data. However, its all part of the tropical expansion which is apparently due to PDO. 83 Jupiter is warming Jupiter is warming. (see 81). Good, why should the alarmist elites living on Neptune get all the benefit from rising real estate prices caused by warming. 84 It's land use Actually land use can effect rainfall as David Stockwell has shown and the Urban Heat Island Effect (UHIE) shows that urbanisation can increase temperature. Nothing to do with CO2 85         Scientists tried to hide the decline' in global temperature Medieval Warm Period (MWP), about 1000 years ago, was at least as hot as today. But the alarmists changed this to produce the Hockey Stick. Secondly, not content with changing the tree-ring proxy records of the past to produce cooling the alarmists have removed completely the tree-ring data from the present. Why? Because that tree-ring data contradicts the modern temperature record. From 1960 onwards the tree-ring data shows cooling while the instrument record, the modern thermometers, show warming. Here’s the problem: if tree-ring data doesn’t match the modern instrument record how can we be sure the tree-ring temperature record used by the alarmists to prove the past was cooler is correct? We can’t. And that means the foundation of alarmism-that today is warmer than the past-has no scientific basis.

Continued on SS myths debunked -2