Tag: Climate change

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New Study Confirms Climate is Warming, Pause Never Happened

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NOAA buoy“Warming of the climate system is unequivocal.” This was the conclusion of the most recent IPCC 5th Assessment Report (AR5). Also, human activity has been “the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century.” There has been no pause.

The climate is warming and we are the dominant cause, primarily through activities such as the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation that emit huge amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere and oceans. The data are clear on this conclusion.

So why do politicians (universally, Republican politicians) claim the climate has not warmed? The facts prove them wrong. Unequivocally. Undeniably. The year 2016 just set the new record for warmest year, surpassing the previous record year of 2015 (which surpassed the previous record year of 2014). All of the hottest years have been recent years (aka, since the date lobbyists like to claim started a period of “no warming”). How someone can argue the climate isn’t warming when we keep setting climate heat records is a big question, one whose answer is obvious.

In any case, climate deniers desperately need the “pause” talking point, no matter how unsupportable the notion. In 2015, a scientific study was published that put the rest the false idea of a pause. Led by NOAA scientist Thomas Karl (and co-authored by nine other scientists), the study showed that any slowing was an artifact of changes in measurement methods and not a reflection of actually decreases in the rate of warming.

Republican lawmakers reacted to the Karl study by attacking the authors. Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) and House Representative Lamar Smith (R-TX) and other similarly fossil fuel-dependent politicians began harassment campaigns against the scientists involved, supported with talking points written by fossil fuel and libertarian lobbying groups/campaign contributors.

And now a new scientific study by a completely independent group of scientists has confirmed what the earlier study had effectively demonstrated – there was no pause, and the earlier scientists were correct in their analysis. The new study just published in Science Advances by UC-Berkeley researcher Zeke Hausfather confirms that the Karl analysis was correct. Further, Hausfather and his co-authors demonstrate that other researchers should reassess their own data sets accordingly.

Which gets us back to the pause that was not a pause. This talking point was invented by the denier lobbying industry through several steps of cherry picking. First, they chose 1998 as the starting date because it was a year of a huge spike in temperatures due to the strongest El Nino event in recent history. That artificially high spike was, not surprisingly, followed by “normal” high temperatures that appeared less because of the selected starting point. Shifting the start date one year forward or back eliminated the faux pause effect. Second, they use only a single satellite data set, the only one that gave them a trend that they could misuse to show their preferred narrative. The fact that the data set and investigators are highly adjusted and uncertain (and, arguably, irrelevant) may also explain the sometimes questionable choices made in its interpretation. Third, they choose to ignore all the surface level temperature data sets that inconveniently for them refute their conclusions.

In addition, there is the fact that there are long-term trends, and there are short-term variations in those trends. We had several years of events that tend to slow warming (e.g., La Nina) with fewer events that increase warming. In the last few years we’ve seen more “speed up” events (El Nino), which has helped the records set in 2014, 2015, and 2016 spike even warmer (i.e., they would have have been warmer even without the El Nino, but the El Nino pushed the spikes even higher, just as they did in the 1998 event that deniers like to cherry pick to start their “it hasn’t warmed” falsehood.

So there was no pause. The newest data confirm what we already new. The climate system is warming. Unequivocally. Undeniably. As John Abraham notes in his Guardian article:

Finally, and for those who read my posts regularly, I am sounding like a broken record. Global warming is happening, it never stopped, it never paused, and the models have gotten it right.

As he notes, and has been offered repeatedly on this page, humans are warming the climate. As with all other previous problems identified, it’s time to take responsibility and do something about it.

[Cross-posted from The Dake Page]

David J. Kent is an avid science traveler and the author of Lincoln: The Man Who Saved America, now available. His previous books include Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and Edison: The Inventor of the Modern World (both Fall River Press). He has also written two e-books: Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time and Abraham Lincoln and Nikola Tesla: Connected by Fate.

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President Obama Went to Alaska; Here’s Why That is Important to Climate Change Communication

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AlaskaIt’s been a big week in climate change, in more ways than one. This is especially true for President Obama. First he went to New Orleans, and then he spent several days in Alaska. That’s a big deal for climate communication.

The New Orleans visit was on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Ostensibly the focus of the trip was to show the federal government hasn’t forgotten about those who are still struggling to recover. Despite Republican Governor Bobby Jindal’s request that Obama not mention climate change, he did. And it was appropriate to do given that much of New Orleans still lies below sea level…and sea level is rising. Which means the next Katrina could be even worse.
But it’s the Alaska visit that is most critical. Using a variety of modern media methods to reach out to the populace – Twitter, a “survival” television show appearance, Instagram, and video blogs, the President highlighted the importance of places like Alaska in climate change effects, and why solutions are needed.
He even talked about gigatons!

The above is a partial cross-post of the full article on The Dake Page. Please click on the link above to read further. Thanks.

David J. Kent has been a scientist for over thirty years, is an avid science traveler, and an independent Abraham Lincoln historian. He is the author of Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity (now in its 5th printing) and two e-books: Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time and Abraham Lincoln and Nikola Tesla: Connected by Fate. His book on Thomas Edison is due in Barnes and Noble stores in spring 2016.

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What President Obama’s Clean Power Act Does for Climate Change – It May Surprise You (from The Dake Page)

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On Monday, August 3, 2015, President Barack Obama and the Environmental Protection Agency released final rules designed to curtail coal-based power plant emissions. Called the Clean Power Plan, the goal is to reduced carbon emissions contributing to man-made climate change. The impact of this plan will surprise a lot of Americans.

The following video is only a little over 2 minutes and worth watching:

Reaction has been about what you might expect. The Republican candidates for president and their Republican colleagues in the House and Senate have falsely attacked the plan for the usual false reasons. The Democratic candidates and in Congress largely agree that the steps proposed are necessary to deal with the unequivocal science demonstrating humans are warming the climate system.

Media reporting of the Clean Power Act shows its critical importance. Time magazine says that the President is taking the lead on this “superwicked problem.”  CNN says the President “unveils major climate change proposal.” To the New York Times this is a “crucial step on climate change.” Other media outlets also note the unprecedented action by the White House and EPA.

Of course, there are also the denial lobbyists saturating the blogosphere with anti-Clean Power Act rhetoric. All provide opinions based on a single negative “report” produced by, you guessed it, one of the denial lobbyist organizations in their network. That’s a common tactic of lobbyists – create a biased report and then get all your friends to cite your biased report as “unbiased.”

Meanwhile, the response from the scientific community has generally been positive, as might be expected given that nearly every climate scientist agrees that 100+ years of published science unequivocally demonstrates a need to address man’s contribution to climate change. There are some, like outspoken climate scientist James Hansen, who feel the Plan is merely a drop in the bucket and won’t in itself create significant progress in dealing with our changing climate.

Hansen is probably right.

So let’s assume that the Clean Power Plan is insufficient to deal with climate change….

[Read the rest on The Dake Page]

The above is a partial cross-post of a full article on The Dake Page. Please click on the link above to read further. Thanks.

David J. Kent has been a scientist for over thirty years, is an avid science traveler, and an independent Abraham Lincoln historian. He is the author of Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and the e-book Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time. He is currently writing a book on Thomas Edison.

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Climate Denier Tactic – Lying About Actual Scientific Studies (from The Dake Page)

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June 2015 Arctic Sea Ice Extent trendWe’ve talked about several of the tactics used by climate deniers to intentionally mislead the public. This past week provided a prime example of one tactic – intentionally lying about what a study says. Let’s take a closer look at how this works.

Recall that the climate denial industry, in their role as lobbyists, are well-experienced in manipulating public opinion. Going back to the days of tobacco companies denying smoking causes cancer, they learned to develop a network of “manufacturers” (i.e., to manufacture doubt), “spreaders” (to get the doubt out there), and “repeaters” (to saturate the blogosphere with misinformation). This process was described earlier.

The misinformation process is often employed to spread their own non-science opinions, other non-peer-reviewed and unsupported blog posts, and the occasional paper they get through the peer-review process. But it works also when they want to spin (i.e., misrepresent) the findings of actual real scientific papers by actual real climate scientists. Such is the case this past week when the blogosphere became saturated with a false conclusion drawn from a presentation made at the Royal Astronomical Society meeting held in Wales.

One paper – not yet published or peer-reviewed, merely presented at a scientific meeting for discussion – noted that the study authors used a model that concluded solar activity conditions by the 2030s could be similar to the solar activity conditions experienced during the Maunder Minimum. That was the extent of their conclusions.

The Maunder Minimum was a period of time popularly linked with the “Little Ice Age,” a perhaps overzealous term given to a period of excess cooling in some parts of the world (mainly the UK) from around 1550 to 1850.

But here’s the thing.

[Continue reading on The Dake Page]

The above is a partial cross-post of a full article on The Dake Page. Please click on the link above to read further. Thanks.

David J. Kent has been a scientist for over thirty years, is an avid science traveler, and an independent Abraham Lincoln historian. He is the author of Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and the e-book Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time. He is currently writing a book on Thomas Edison.

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How Scientific Peer-Review Works – The Series (from The Dake Page)

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Huh CommunicationEarlier this year I posted a series of articles explaining what scientific peer-review is, and what it isn’t. The series was very popular so I’ve decided to create this single post that links to all the previous ones.

In Part 1 we gave a basic definition of peer-review, described the process, what it is expected to accomplish, and what it is not expected to accomplish. In a nutshell, scientists conduct research and then write that research up in a formal paper (including methods, results, how the statistics were done, conclusions, and some discussion of what it all means). The paper is then submitted to a scientific journal, whose editors send it out to other scientists in the field who are capable of reviewing it for clarity, content, and value to expanding our collective knowledge. The reviewers don’t validate or invalidate the work, just make sure it meets some basic scientific principles and complete enough for others to 1) know what the researchers did, and 2) replicate it.

Part 2 looked at how peer-review can go wrong. Standards for scientific journals can differ, with some being akin to Ivy League colleges while others may be less stringent. The relatively rare problem of “pal-review” (common among climate deniers) was examined, as was the difficulties caused by some (but not all) of the new “open access journals.”

[Read Part 3 and Part 4 on The Dake Page]

The above is a partial cross-post of a full article on The Dake Page. Please click on the link above to read further. Thanks.

David J. Kent has been a scientist for over thirty years, is an avid science traveler, and an independent Abraham Lincoln historian. He is the author of Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and the e-book Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time. He is currently writing a book on Thomas Edison.

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Katharine Hayhoe at the Citizens’ Climate Lobby 2015 (from The Dake Page)

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CCL logoThis week the Citizens’ Climate Lobby (CCL) held its 6th annual International Conference in Washington, DC. The keynote speaker was Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, an atmospheric scientist at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas. In addition to being a climate scientist, Hayhoe is an evangelical Christian, which generally would be irrelevant to the discussion except that she, with her husband, pastor Andrew Farley, wrote A Climate for Change: Global Warming Facts for Faith-Based Decisions. The fact that most religions have acknowledged the science was emphasized this past week with the release of the Pope’s climate and environmental encyclical last week.

Dr. Hayhoe offered several valuable points during her presentation, several of which are worth expanding upon.

Most scientists are conservative: Conservative in the true sense of the term, not the hijacked definition of “conservatism” that is prevalent in today’s political circles. Scientists, and science in general, are inherently conservative. Science is built on incremental gains in knowledge derived over time from thousands of scientific studies looking at ever smaller pieces of the puzzle. With respect to climate science, rather than be “alarmist” (as climate deniers falsely claim), scientists actually have traditionally downplayed the risks from climate change. In fact, as more and more data are collected, and as we see climate change impacting Arctic sea ice, land-based ice sheet melting, and other visible signs of change, the data have clearly shown scientists that have been underestimating the dangers.

Scientists are hesitant to speak out: Historically, scientists have tended to stay in their “ivory towers” doing research, either in the laboratory or out in the field. They have left the communication of the science to others (e.g., journalists, teachers), and done the same for policy decisions (policy-makers). Part of the reason is that policy-making isn’t particularly interesting to scientists, but part of it is because scientists have been so often attacked for simply documenting the science. You can ask Galileo about how trying to communicate science worked out for him, or in more recent times you can ask climate scientists like Ben Santer, Jim Hansen, and Michael Mann, all of whom have been viciously and falsely attacked by climate denier lobbyists.

The data are out there: One common fallacy is that the public will understand the need to take action if only we can just get more of the science to them. While communicating science to the public can often be difficult, the problem isn’t a shortage of information or the lack of trying to get it across. Just in the last two years there have been a swarm of “state-of-the-science” reports, including (but not limited to) the IPCC AR5, the US Climate Assessment, a National Academy of Science/Royal Society report, and many others. All have the same basic message:

“warming of the climate system is unequivocal” and “human influence has been the dominant cause of the warming.”

So the public has the information it needs to understand. Many do understand, while others either are too busy living their lives to care (which is perfectly fine) or choose to deny the science (which is not fine).

[Read the rest at The Dake Page]

The above is a partial cross-post of a full article on The Dake Page. Please click on the link above to read further. Thanks.

David J. Kent has been a scientist for over thirty years, is an avid science traveler, and an independent Abraham Lincoln historian. He is the author of Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and the e-book Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time. He is currently writing a book on Thomas Edison.

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The Pope’s Climate Encyclical and Why Climate Deniers are Their Own Worst Enemy (From The Dake Page)

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Pope climate encyclicalIt should go without saying that when you deny reality long enough, eventually reality makes you look foolish. Climate deniers have been denying the science behind man-made climate change for so long that they have lost even the illusion of credibility. They have become their own worst enemy, and as such have put themselves on a path of complete irrelevancy.

Deniers have chosen this path, of course. By blatantly denying even the most basic science and by egregiously promoting the most obvious and ludicrous falsehoods, deniers have marginalized themselves to the point of inconsequentiality. Deniers now find themselves being taken as seriously as Donald Trump’s presidential run. Yes, they have become that buffoonish.

And alone.

Deniers used to hide behind ideological blinders, seeking protection for their anti-science beliefs in the arms of “conservatives,” the “religious,” and “Republican” comfort groups. Now deniers find themselves in a category among themselves. In contrast, intellectually honest and informed people who identify within these traditional labels no longer provide cover for denial.

Religions do not condone denial of the science

This point is brought home as Pope Francis, leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics, issues the Vatican’s papal encyclical on climate change and the environment. [Here is a summary of the main points; and here is the full letter, in English] In it the Pope acknowledges the unequivocal science demonstrating human activity is causing our climate to warm, and that the changes observed and coming present a significant risk to humanity.

Let me stop here and reinforce this to make it clear, because this is a point that climate deniers have intentionally tried to confuse as they attack the Pope.

[Continue reading the full post on The Dake Page]

The above is a partial cross-post of a full article on The Dake Page. Please click on the link above to read further. Thanks.

David J. Kent has been a scientist for over thirty years, is an avid science traveler, and an independent Abraham Lincoln historian. He is the author of Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and the e-book Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time. He is currently writing a book on Thomas Edison.

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How Climate Scientists Can Communicate the Science to the Public (from The Dake Page)

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Huh CommunicationLast week we took a look at how climate scientists can communicate the science to policy-makers, so today in Part 3 we’ll look at how scientists can communicate directly with the public. Together these are a three-part series on how to communicate climate science to all three target audiences – other scientists, policy-makers, and the public.

Communicating with the public is actually the most important of the three target audiences, and the one that scientists are least likely to have spent much time doing in their careers. And that’s a shame because policymakers (notwithstanding the disproportionate influence of lobbyists and rich campaign donors) are most influenced by public opinion. It is the public who are the real drivers of change. It is they who give policymakers permission (or pressure) to take action. If enough of their constituents demand action, they will act.

But reaching out to the public is inherently more difficult for scientists. Scientists, like all professionals, have usually spent considerable time (and expense) getting specific education, training, and life experience in their area of expertise than the general public. In these days of specialization it seems we all have our expertise, whether it be in some climate related science, economics, brain surgery, law, plumbing, or bridge design. Each field builds up its own set of jargon, technical words that have specific meanings within their field but may have no meaning to anyone outside that field (or worse, mean something completely different outside the field).

So it’s critical to reach out to the public, but scientists have to do so in ways that can be understood and are meaningful. Here are a few examples, though this by no means should be considered an exhaustive list:

1) Speak at libraries, churches, schools, etc.: Talk about science in a church? Of course. I was recently in a church whose stained glass windows included one celebrating several of our greatest scientists – Albert Einstein, George Washington Carver, and others. Libraries, churches, and schools all have one thing in common – they are places where the community comes together to learn. Off to give a talk about your area of specialty.

[Continue reading items 2 through 5 on The Dake Page]

The above is a partial cross-post of a full article on The Dake Page. Please click on the link above to read further. Thanks.

David J. Kent has been a scientist for over thirty years, is an avid science traveler, and an independent Abraham Lincoln historian. He is the author of Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and the e-book Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time. He is currently writing a book on Thomas Edison.

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How Climate Scientists Can Communicate the Science to Policymakers (from The Dake Page)

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Huh CommunicationLast week we took a look at how climate scientists can communicate the science to scientists in other fields. That was Part 1 of a three-part series on how to communicate climate science to all three target audiences – other scientists, policy-makers, and the public.Today in Part 2 we’ll look at how scientists can communicate with policy-makers.

Why this is so important should be self-evident. Policy-makers – Congressmen, Presidents, Executive Agencies (like EPA), and their equivalents at state and international levels – are the ones charged with determining the correct policies needed to address the unequivocal science of man-made climate change. Sure, virtually all the candidates from a particular party who want to be president have offered up various versions of denying the science and/or have argued no action is necessary, but the fact is the science is so unequivocal that even that particular party will have to take action. So how do scientists adequately communicate the science to these policy-makers and policy-maker wannabes?

Obviously this starts with having a clear understanding of the science, something we’ve talked about in previous posts. Let’s assume that’s the case. Here are some things that climate scientists can do in an effort to reach out to policy-makers:

1) Write white papers: But keep them short, preferably bullet points. Despite the conventional wisdom, policy-makers are busy people who spend many hours keeping up with debates with colleagues on the Hill (for example) while maintaining contact with constituents back home (not to mention all those fundraisers with lobbyists and supporters). They are not going to be reading any actual scientific literature, nor would they likely understand it if they tried. [Note: by “they,” I mean their staffs.] So write shorter white papers, again with a lot of white paper and bullet points, that succinctly summarize the main points and gist of the science. As much as you think policy-makers need the details, they don’t. All they need are the basics so that they can grasp the unequivocal nature of the data and conclusions.

One caveat on this point. Some policy-makers, e.g., regulators or science-trained legislators, will want more detail and will ask tons of pertinent questions. When you find one of these by all means be ready to devote significant effort to accurately and clearly keep them informed of the science. As I write this the name Sheldon Whitehouse, Senator (D-RI) immediately pops into mind.

[Continue reading Items 2 though 5 at The Dake Page]

The above is a partial cross-post of a full article on The Dake Page. Please click on the link above to read further. Thanks.

David J. Kent is a science traveler and the author of Lincoln: The Man Who Saved America, in Barnes and Noble stores now. His previous books include Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity (2013) and Edison: The Inventor of the Modern World (2016) and two e-books: Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time and Abraham Lincoln and Nikola Tesla: Connected by Fate.

Check out my Goodreads author page. While you’re at it, “Like” my Facebook author page for more updates!

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How Climate Scientists Can Communicate the Science to Scientists in Other Fields (from The Dake Page)

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Huh CommunicationA few weeks ago we talked about how to communicate climate science to all three target audiences – other scientists, policy-makers, and the public. We touched on how scientists “do science,” i.e., through research, data analysis, conference attendance, and scientific publication. Today we’ll take a closer look at how scientists can communicate climate science to other scientists, including those scientists who specialize in other fields.

1) Publish the Research: As already noted, the main way for scientists to communicate the science to other scientists is to publish it in peer-reviewed journals. Doing so allows scientists to carefully lay out the premises, the methods, how the data were analyzed, the results, and the conclusions, all so other scientists can evaluate – and recreate – the work. I’ve discussed peer review in depth in previous posts. [Click on these links to read Part 1 (basics of peer review), Part 2 (when peer-review goes wrong),  Part 3 (abusing the system), and Part 4 (using the internet to bypass peer-review) of the series.] Once published, the research is further scrutinized, which may confirm or refute the work, and usually leads to more studies…and more publications. Many climate researchers, for example, have hundreds of peer-reviewed scientific papers (whereas most climate deniers have few, if any, peer-reviewed publications).

But think about the scientific publishing process for a moment. Like physicians, for example, where individual doctors may specialize in endocrinology, brain surgery, dentistry, or podiatry, scientists may specialize in astrophysics, archeology, biology, chemistry, mathematics, geology or dozens of other specialties. The more specialized the professional training and expertise, the greater the likelihood that a given scientist won’t be keeping up to date on advancements in other fields. A biologist is likely to have memberships and subscriptions to several biology-related organizations and journals, but may not be reading a physics journal discussing heat transfer in atmospheric systems.

This presents the dilemma that while journal publication is critical, it is largely focused on communicating with other scientists within your own field. That said, despite the tendency toward greater specialization, there is also a greater need for multidisciplinary collaboration. For example, ecologists looking at migratory patterns will see that those patterns are being modified by climate changes.

So how does one reach out to scientists in other fields?

[Continue reading at The Dake Page]

The above is a partial cross-post of a full article on The Dake Page. Please click on the link above to read further. Thanks.

David J. Kent has been a scientist for over thirty years, is an avid science traveler, and an independent Abraham Lincoln historian. He is the author of Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and the e-book Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time. He is currently writing a book on Thomas Edison.

Follow me by subscribing by email on the home page.  And feel free to “Like” my Facebook author’s page and connect on LinkedIn.  Share with your friends using the buttons below.