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#46    Vigilanis

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Posted 13 April 2012 - 04:48 PM

View PostJayMark, on 13 April 2012 - 02:36 PM, said:

A religion is based of beleifs. Climatology is based on science. Your way of comparing both things is pathetic. No harm intended.

Actually the science is deeply flawed but that is another issue, and I was referring to 'people'and the feverish devotion with which people defend their religious beliefs is now akin to the adamant defence of this new 'environmental' religion. The way 'people' are making it such a deeply entrenched part of society and whomever chooses to speak out against it is hypothetically put against the wall and stoned to death, or burned for being a witch, or branded a heretic for saying the earth isn't the centre of the universe.

Your method of simplifying the matter in this child like manner is what is pathetic, this isn't a 'black and white' issue, no harm intended.

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#47    JayMark

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Posted 13 April 2012 - 05:14 PM

View PostVigilanis, on 13 April 2012 - 04:48 PM, said:

Actually the science is deeply flawed but that is another issue, and I was referring to 'people'and the feverish devotion with which people defend their religious beliefs is now akin to the adamant defence of this new 'environmental' religion. The way 'people' are making it such a deeply entrenched part of society and whomever chooses to speak out against it is hypothetically put against the wall and stoned to death, or burned for being a witch, or branded a heretic for saying the earth isn't the centre of the universe.

Your method of simplifying the matter in this child like manner is what is pathetic, this isn't a 'black and white' issue, no harm intended.

I understand. Science has it's flaws. It will be so as long as we don't know everything about it. That is an established fact.

Of course, as far as climate change is concerned, there is a lot of matter in there on which you could debate on because we certainly do not know with precision how all the mechanisms of climate work. And even within our current observation and evaluation methods, there is always a part of uncertainty. But even within this uncertainty, the two main conclusions remain the same. It is warming, we are the main cause.

We know that temperature is rising. No need to make fastidious calculations and studies to know it. It is something that can be directly observed in real-time, directly and indirectly.

Now concerning the causes, I could very well try to explain to you how we know for sure that we are the main cause (including the uncertainty) but I fear that it would perhaps be too "childish" for you.

I have nothing against debating the question of AGW but if you want to try to prove it wrong, you'll need to have something a little more credible that this. If what I'm talking about is too childish, it shouldn't be too hard for you to demonstrate how bad is the physics I relate to and how flawed it is.

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#48    Guyver

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Posted 13 April 2012 - 05:33 PM

View PostTerryZ, on 12 April 2012 - 01:02 PM, said:

It's all a question of math, or in this case probability statistics of experimental science. The earth's climate has never been fixed and stable and we observe climate change only after the fact and over millions of years not decades. The tools used for measurement have sampled local weather conditions for only the past 150 or less years. Their accuracy has changed dramatically in that time. Their sample size and distribution has not been uniform across the planet and is much too little in too short a time frame.Secondary methods of CO2 and climate estimations from fossil studies are even less accurate and more sparse.

To be brief, we are in a post-glacial warming cycle for the past 10,000 years. Past times have been a lot warmer with greater CO2 than we have now (by point measurements). Finally, there is not enough data to accurately predict a worldwide trend much less data with sufficient accuracy to justify the contention that one source of CO2 is a greater contributor than any other. These poorly developed climate models are no more accurate than predicting the end of the world by the Mayan calendar. Their models don't account for all the proper variables and their boundary conditions are poorly established.

By the way you don't need to be a atmospheric scientist to recognize poor theoretical model building and data gathering. This is basic knowledge from any undergraduate physics lab.

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#49    socrates.junior

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Posted 13 April 2012 - 06:27 PM

View PostJayMark, on 12 April 2012 - 02:37 PM, said:

Sorry. English isn't my first language.

Plants in many places will die either as a concequence or droughs, floods or forest fires. Also erosion can also take out vegetations off coasts. Algae will die in many places (already happening) as a result of water acidification. CO2 converts to H2CO3 into water. When you see a green lake turning clear blue for instance, it means algae died.

If all of this occurs in warm climates with abundant CO2, then what did the dinosaurs eat? I mean, 13 degrees warmer, a bunch more CO2, they must have been living on a barren planet, according to you.

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Right. But it'll get worst over time.

Still, the problem isn't global warming so much as distribution problems. And it'd be getting worse over time with increased agriculture anyway. Not something that is only affected by global warming.

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Already more than half the wolrd's population live close to coastal areas. Many very populated coastal areas are also under sea level. We are talking about millions if not billions of endangered people.

Yeah, so they should move. As I said, a foolish move in light of geologic history in the first place.

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No. The point here is that it'll have very negative effects in many places for humans. If it was a breeze and not a problem, we wouldn't care. People have adapted to current climate and if the change is to abrupt, they won't all be able to adapt new climate as much as it'll keep changing. Not everyone is rich and living in the comfort of a big industrialized city.

Adapt to current climate, adapt to new climate. I don't know how fast it's going to be moving for humans to be unable to keep up with it. If anything, the big industrialized cities aren't as able to adapt to new climates.


The mechanisms behind that are very complex and I am no expert in the matter. But I know it's hard to predict with precision how/where/when it's going to happen.

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Keep in mind though that the energy supplier of a hurricane is heat (thermodynamics). By getting warmer, water will provide more energy.

Alright, that makes sense. But haven't ocean temperatures been steadily rising? Why haven't we seen a similar steady increase in hurricane size and frequency? Is it possible that the issue is being oversimplified?

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The Wolrd Bank made a 400 pages report about the current costs (2010) of climate changes and how it's going to evolve depending on multiple scenarios. The economic problem related to it is already set in stone and will become a real crisis if we do nothing. If you want to think that they lie or don't know what they talk about, feel free to e-mail them. You can't take the economy out of climate changes. Not at all.

If it is set in stone, we can by definition do nothing about it...so are you saying we can't do anything, but should do something? I never advocated taking the economy out of it. I said that the economy should obviously try to adapt to it.

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There is always a cause for extinction. And past massive extinctions didn't involve humans but still had concequences on other species. You don't seem to understand that if a great deal of species become extinct as a result of global warming we will be in major crap. During the Permian–Triassic extinction event, temperature and greenhouse gases have abruptly raised and that killed 95%+ of marine species and 70% of vertebrates. We are talking of about 8°C of warming. Our current warming could get us already to 5°C+ by 2100.

Really? Extinctions have a cause? And here I thought that it was all based on magic. Do you have any idea of what caused the Permian-Triassic extinction? No, clearly you do not. It wasn't the temperature. It's been fairly settled on that it was anoxia, due to massive amounts of CO2 basically smothering life, resulting from the eruption of the Siberain Traps. Glaciation climate change, as a rule, causes more extinctions than warming climate. Look at the Ordovician, or the Pleistocene. Or the KT extinction (although that's a little more hazy.) Correlation doesn't imply causation.  

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I am simply saying that a raise in temperature will provide an accute liberation of non-anthropogenic greenhouse gases that will lead to even more warming. Like methane hydrates for instance. This is a very dangerous timed bomb.

Yep, warming causes more warming. I'm shaking in terror.

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We have the power to change things and minimize the impacts of it. But the more we wait, the worst it's going to be. There is a soon-to-be-reached point of "non-return" ahead.

Sure, it's going to be worse. But it's going to be worse for us. It'll be our own fault. I'm a lot more comfortable operating from that basis. Our own action or inaction is predicated on saving our own butts. That's what action should be based on.

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Not optimistic but you mostly lack knowledge in the matter. I'm not saying that to insult. It's ok to not know things. But when I see you going around and say so much non-sense, I need to point it out.

Odd, there wasn't much nonsense in what I was saying. If anything, it's nonsensical to hyperbolize current and long-standing problems, and attribute them to global warming. You've looked at a lot of current data, and that's admirable. But you're a little weaker on recognizing and having a long-term view of the Earth. This planet isn't a magic human biosphere. It's a complex and constantly changing geoid that flings itself around a giant ball of nuclear fusion. Everything doesn't revolve around humans.

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Peace. No harm intended.

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#50    JayMark

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Posted 13 April 2012 - 08:31 PM

View Postsocrates.junior, on 13 April 2012 - 06:27 PM, said:

If all of this occurs in warm climates with abundant CO2, then what did the dinosaurs eat? I mean, 13 degrees warmer, a bunch more CO2, they must have been living on a barren planet, according to you.

I was refering to either droughs, fire or floods that could kill dense vegetation in some areas. That would be an indirect concequence of a rise of temperature which is partially a concequence of a rise in carbon dioxide. Of course, vegetation will grow and life will flourish in many other places. But we will need to adapt, move and it's not as easily done as it can be said. That is one of my main concern about humans. Adaptation. We do not all have the strenght and ressources to be able to go through this.

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Still, the problem isn't global warming so much as distribution problems. And it'd be getting worse over time with increased agriculture anyway. Not something that is only affected by global warming.

Main cause of current distribution problems are a concequence of global warming as far as I know (radiative balance). It affects the thermodynamics of air currents and physico-chemical properties of water (water currents) for instance.

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Yeah, so they should move. As I said, a foolish move in light of geologic history in the first place.

Fair enough. But for many people, moving away to a better place can be a real challenge especially when your only objective, everyday that you wake up, is to make sure you don't die of dehydration and hunger. We are talking about millions of people as we speak. Many wont have the energy and ressources to adapt the climate changes.

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Adapt to current climate, adapt to new climate. I don't know how fast it's going to be moving for humans to be unable to keep up with it. If anything, the big industrialized cities aren't as able to adapt to new climates.

Fair enough again. The point here is that millions if not more will have a very hard time doing so and many will die. Not to mention the economic problems we will face when we'll have to re-locate entire cities that could be flooded for instance. I have a full report covering the economic issues. I'm currently going through it.

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Alright, that makes sense. But haven't ocean temperatures been steadily rising? Why haven't we seen a similar steady increase in hurricane size and frequency? Is it possible that the issue is being oversimplified?

It has been rising but not always steadily and not everywhere. Global and local are two diffrent things, same with air and ground temperature. As I said, the mechanisms behind it are complex so predicting how/what/where/when is hard. The dynamics of heat distribution could radically change as well from what I understand and that is also hard to precisely predict. The overal idea is that we will most probably see more "extreme phenomenons" more frequently and with greater amplitude in the future (again, in some places, not all).

Where I live (Québec) that is exactly what is going on since the end of last century. Many never-seen and unusually intense phenomenons have manifested and are more and more frequent as a result of global warming. The loses have been astronomical. There are always direct economical costs/losses but also indirect ones that can be in many cases much greater.

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If it is set in stone, we can by definition do nothing about it...so are you saying we can't do anything, but should do something? I never advocated taking the economy out of it. I said that the economy should obviously try to adapt to it.

We could do something about it. But it'll only reslut in minimizing the ampliture of climate changes to some degree that depends on how fast and effectively we make a move. What is set in stone is the fact that acting on it, as much as doing nothing will result is great costs and losses. Only that the inaction will result in more costs/losses especially if we don't do something by the next 8 years or so (estimated by the World Bank).

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Really? Extinctions have a cause? And here I thought that it was all based on magic. Do you have any idea of what caused the Permian-Triassic extinction? No, clearly you do not. It wasn't the temperature. It's been fairly settled on that it was anoxia, due to massive amounts of CO2 basically smothering life, resulting from the eruption of the Siberain Traps.

I never said the temperature was the cause of the great extinction. I agree it wasen't too clear though and I should have elaborated on it.

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Glaciation climate change, as a rule, causes more extinctions than warming climate. Look at the Ordovician, or the Pleistocene. Or the KT extinction (although that's a little more hazy.) Correlation doesn't imply causation.  

Fair enough. But we are not undergoing a glacial age here so I don't see how this is so relevant with current warming. It dosen't reduce the risks involved with current situation even if it has been worst in the past in diffrent contexts. If that's not what you meant, I apologize.

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Yep, warming causes more warming. I'm shaking in terror.

Well you shouldn't because I'm not.  :lol:

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Sure, it's going to be worse. But it's going to be worse for us. It'll be our own fault. I'm a lot more comfortable operating from that basis. Our own action or inaction is predicated on saving our own butts. That's what action should be based on.

Fair enough. But not only worst for us though. We also depend on other species that are currently endangered. Like bees for instance.

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Odd, there wasn't much nonsense in what I was saying. If anything, it's nonsensical to hyperbolize current and long-standing problems, and attribute them to global warming.

I understand what you mean. I didn't mean to insult. With this very message, I get a better picture of what you mean. I certainly don't always make sense either.  ;)

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You've looked at a lot of current data, and that's admirable. But you're a little weaker on recognizing and having a long-term view of the Earth. This planet isn't a magic human biosphere. It's a complex and constantly changing geoid that flings itself around a giant ball of nuclear fusion. Everything doesn't revolve around humans.

Well put. I'm always learning. But where did you get the idea that I say it all revolves around humans? I may have expressed myself in a way that seems to imply it but it's not my intention. My basic point concerning humans is that we are the main cause of current global warming and that we have the power to minimize the long term negative impacts. I am well aware there is so much more to it but since we have no actual control on natural phenomenons (we can only affect them directly or indirectly) I tend to talk more about the human impacts and risks.

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Don't worry, no harm given. Peace.

Ditto. I have nothing against respectful debates.  :tu:

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#51    Doug1o29

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Posted 13 April 2012 - 10:54 PM

View Postsocrates.junior, on 11 April 2012 - 06:56 PM, said:

What are the horrific downsides to global warming?
Worst case scenario:  business-as-usual triggers a runaway greenhouse effect that raises the planet's mean temperature to near the boiling point.  Fallout:  extinction for most forms of life now on earth, including us.

There are a few problems with the research in this area, though.  It depends on a new evaporation basin opening in a warm-water area.  What, exactly, causes that is unknown.  Five of the six past "Great Dyings" have come about through this mehcanism.  The other was the dinosaur extinction.

Evaporation from the sea surface concentrates salt, making water heavier.  When the heavier water sinks, it flows along the ocean bottom, imparting its temperature to methane hydrate deposits on the ocean floor.  Currently, the world's major evaporation basin is in the North Atlantic, so sinking water is cold, only a few degrees above freezing.  If a warm-water basin should develop, the warmer water will melt methane hydrate and cause the release of methane, a greenhouse gas, into the atmosphere where it will trap more solar radiation, warming the planet further, releasing more methane.

In the past, there hasn't been enough methane plus CO2 to prevent the planet's recovery after a hundred thousand years or so, but if we keep burning every bit of coal, oil, tar sand and shale oil we can find, there will be.

A few years ago we had a scare when we found that the Arctic Ocean was releasing large amounts of methane.  Several years of monitoring showed no changes in release rates, so it appears that this is just normal procedure for the climate system.  But there were a lot of people thinking we had passed the point of no return and were on the road to extinction.  Next time, they might be right.

A recent project reported methane releases in Colorado 4% higher than previously thought AND we are releasing (or burning) waste gas from those new wells in North Dakota.  My daughter said she could see eighteen flares from here well site (She's a geo-stearer - the person who tells the driller where to drill.).
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#52    Doug1o29

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Posted 13 April 2012 - 11:19 PM

View PostVigilanis, on 13 April 2012 - 04:48 PM, said:

Actually the science is deeply flawed ...
It's time to get specific.  Exactly what flaws are you referring to and how should they be corrected?

Last week I started a climate study of the Ouachita National Forest using dendrochronology.  I should be able to reach back about 300 years.  I am just starting, so it will be several months before I have anything.  I am using a non-parametric method called Regional Curve Standardization.  The actual data will be smoothed using a Hugershoff model.  Series without pith dates will be truncated after the inflection point and modeled using a negative logarthym.  Models will be standardized to modern data, then used to project past temperatures, rainfall, drought, and both large and small ice storms.  I will attempt to make this accurate to the year, but there are some problems with the weather models that may prevent that.

If you know of a flaw in this method, now is your chance to speak up.  I hope to submit it for publication in six-to-eight months.  You have a chance NOW to head off a mistake if you see one.  You have one chance to make a contribution instead of just whining.  Do you intend to take it?
Doug

P.S.:  if you actually make a contribution that gets used, I am offering to include you as third author (There are already three.).  Then you can be one of the people whose work is being criticized as "deeply flawed."
Doug

Edited by Doug1o29, 13 April 2012 - 11:22 PM.

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#53    socrates.junior

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Posted 14 April 2012 - 02:07 AM

What six "Great Dyings" are you talking about? I'm assuming first that you're discussing extinction events. There are five major extinction events...and numerous smaller extinctions mixed in there.

A little sourcing as to what you're discussing would work well here.
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#54    Simbi Laveau

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Posted 14 April 2012 - 03:58 AM

http://www.huffingto..._n_1424492.html

In my inbox today.Fake expertise is what it's being called.
Aka,smoke and mirrors
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#55    Vigilanis

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Posted 14 April 2012 - 09:15 AM

View PostDoug1o29, on 13 April 2012 - 11:19 PM, said:

It's time to get specific.  Exactly what flaws are you referring to and how should they be corrected?

Last week I started a climate study of the Ouachita National Forest using dendrochronology.  I should be able to reach back about 300 years.  I am just starting, so it will be several months before I have anything.  I am using a non-parametric method called Regional Curve Standardization.  The actual data will be smoothed using a Hugershoff model.  Series without pith dates will be truncated after the inflection point and modeled using a negative logarthym.  Models will be standardized to modern data, then used to project past temperatures, rainfall, drought, and both large and small ice storms.  I will attempt to make this accurate to the year, but there are some problems with the weather models that may prevent that.

If you know of a flaw in this method, now is your chance to speak up.  I hope to submit it for publication in six-to-eight months.  You have a chance NOW to head off a mistake if you see one.  You have one chance to make a contribution instead of just whining.  Do you intend to take it?
Doug

P.S.:  if you actually make a contribution that gets used, I am offering to include you as third author (There are already three.).  Then you can be one of the people whose work is being criticized as "deeply flawed."
Doug

Well, firstly, thank you for proving my theory of religious feverish devotion, here I am voicing an opinion against your enviro-religion and you choose to 'stone me to death'. There are a plethora of people who claim to have irrefutable evidence that climate change exists, the climate does change and vary but not in the 'end of the world' manner that is peddled by scientists and pseudo scientists alike. And yes I have come across plenty of people who throw out lots of scientific terminology in an attempt to lend credence to their beliefs but it continually is disproved, whether the findings are acknowledged or not.

So in response to your sanctimonious attack....

Regional Curve Standardization in Dendroclimatology is in itself subject to a few problems, where I agree that individual tree indices are represented in low and mid frequencies, one flaw of this method is RCS detrending and its failure to incorporate the average slope which it omits from the individual tree measurement, the average slope being the data which is obtained from all trees. This results in a 'trend-in-signal' bias, as you will know this occurs when the underlying growth forcing signal has variances on timescales that approach or exceed the length of chronology. This will bias and affect the start and end of your RCS.

Then we move onto the problem of contemporaneously growing trees which might represent a modern sample as you mentioned. You get biasing of the RCS curve by the residual climate signal in age aligned samples and the undesirable subsequent removal of this signal variance when using an RCS application. Then there is the spurious trend over your modern chronology caused by differing contemporaneous growth rate.

So you instantly lose some data, therefore creating a flaw in your findings by having to use (respectively) signal free RCS in the first case then multiple sub RCS curves in the latter. This biasing therefore flaws your data.

Hugershoff Curve Fit in itself has start and end fitting problems, oh dear another flaw.

So before you come on here and start throwing around scientific terminology in an attempt to stun people with your brilliance, just remember...there is always someone out there a lot smarter than you, not me no, but plenty of others. So no I will not be putting my name to any paper, feel free to shoot yourself in the foot, i'm not helping you.

And pal, just because I don't come on here and ram terminology down peoples throats constantly doesn't mean i'm whining, i'm merely voicing an opinion, i'm confident enough with the REAL scientists out there who are proving that these environmental problems you waffle so well about are wrong or at the very least flawed without me needing to try and bend peoples brains in some minor forum. Perhaps you should be a little less smug in your scientific pursuits.

Best of luck with your publication my friend. I will continue to differ in my opinion.

And no I don't claim to be a scientist, I am just a humble medical professional, educated in my own field.

Edited by Vigilanis, 14 April 2012 - 09:36 AM.

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#56    questionmark

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Posted 14 April 2012 - 11:23 AM

View PostSimbi Laveau, on 14 April 2012 - 03:58 AM, said:

http://www.huffingto..._n_1424492.html

In my inbox today.Fake expertise is what it's being called.
Aka,smoke and mirrors

Yep, and most probably done by the same old recipe as the stunts before, some people will have some more money to declare on taxes...

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#57    PeacefulAnarchy

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Posted 14 April 2012 - 01:01 PM

View PostVigilanis, on 13 April 2012 - 08:13 AM, said:

The biggest problem I can see is that all of this 'Environmental' vogue, has just become the latest religion to riddle the planet. And we are already arriving at the stage where, in the same vein as the world religions, you cannot question their validity without being branded a heretic and being viewed negatively by society.

I look around the English landscape which is now full of the growing malignant cancer that is the wind turbine, something that would probably have to work it's whole life just to offset the so called 'carbon footprint' of it's own construction and erection, and can't help looking at the hysteria this new religion is causing. Unlike the other religions though, I hope this one goes away.

I mean come on...Al Gore wins accolades for film making?..it just shows, anyone can jump on the band wagon and become a champion of the new faithful.

:tu:  :clap:  That's the problem, no true debate. Just accept it or else!
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#58    Essan

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Posted 14 April 2012 - 01:36 PM

View PostVigilanis, on 14 April 2012 - 09:15 AM, said:

Well, firstly, thank you for proving my theory of religious feverish devotion, here I am voicing an opinion against your enviro-religion and you choose to 'stone me to death'.

And yet it appears to me that you are the one with all the stones in their hand ;)

Edited by Essan, 14 April 2012 - 01:36 PM.

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#59    Doug1o29

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Posted 14 April 2012 - 05:07 PM

View PostVigilanis, on 14 April 2012 - 09:15 AM, said:

There are a plethora of people who claim to have irrefutable evidence that climate change exists, the climate does change and vary but not in the 'end of the world' manner that is peddled by scientists and pseudo scientists alike.
That climate varies naturally is no secret.  What is meant by "global warming" is surface warming caused by human activities.  There are several lists of global temperature anomalies, among them, Hansen's list which goes back to 1880 and shows a very definite warming trend since 1908, interupted briefly in the 50s and 60s.  That's the one I use, but there are others, all of which show that same "Hockey Stick" shape.  The antis offer no evidence to counter this.  Do you have some?

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Regional Curve Standardization in Dendroclimatology is in itself subject to a few problems, where I agree that individual tree indices are represented in low and mid frequencies, one flaw of this method is RCS detrending and its failure to incorporate the average slope which it omits from the individual tree measurement, the average slope being the data which is obtained from all trees. This results in a 'trend-in-signal' bias, as you will know this occurs when the underlying growth forcing signal has variances on timescales that approach or exceed the length of chronology. This will bias and affect the start and end of your RCS.
I think you're trying to sucker me into something here.  You have exactly reversed the problems/advantages of RCS.  RCS, in its pure form, does not use detrending; thus, it doesn't have the "stair-step" problem that results when detrended series are averaged. For that reason, it can be used for time intervals beyond the span of the component series.

ALL of the samples in my datasets come from living trees.  There are several series that date to 1700.  A single series that covers the entire time span in question does not have the problem of interpolation between series.

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Then we move onto the problem of contemporaneously growing trees which might represent a modern sample as you mentioned. You get biasing of the RCS curve by the residual climate signal in age aligned samples and the undesirable subsequent removal of this signal variance when using an RCS application.
RCS does not use regression, except as a smoothing function for the finished chronology; the chronology does not have to be smoothed and smoothing can be accomplished using other methods.  No regression, no residuals.

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Then there is the spurious trend over your modern chronology caused by differing contemporaneous growth rate.
I am unsure which trend you are talking about here.  The chronology does have more series from young trees than from old ones.  And with few exceptions, they are contemporaneous.  I am actually using 10 of my own chronologies from the Ouachita Chronology plus the Shortleaf Canyon, McCurtain County Wilderness, Lake Winona and Hot Springs chronologies.  That's 722 series from 14 chronologies, so differential growth rates caused by endogenous disturbances should be more than averaged out.  Growth rate differences caused by suppression and release are handled in the cross-dating process.

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So you instantly lose some data,
The inflection point in the Hugershoff model for Ouachita Shortleaf pine, occurs in Year 4.  Simply delete the oldest four years of the series and it can be fit with a negative logarythm.  Of course, those are the very years you most want to know about, but you can't have everything.

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therefore creating a flaw in your findings
If the lack of the oldest four years from two-thirds of your series is a flaw, then it is a flaw, but it does not distort the rest of the data.  And I still have over 200 pith-dated cores that can fill in those years.

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by having to use (respectively) signal free RCS in the first case
Again, making the dataset signal free is the whole idea behind RCS.  "Signals" from regressions are artificially induced, so it is desireable to eliminate them if possible.  RCS does this.

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then multiple sub RCS curves in the latter. This biasing therefore flaws your data.
Again, RCS does not use detrending; therefore, no multiple curves to combine; thus, no biasing.

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Hugershoff Curve Fit in itself has start and end fitting problems, oh dear another flaw.
In this case, the Hugershoff model is used only to smooth the RCS dataset.  It could be smoothed as easily (in fact, more easily) with a running average.  Fitting it with regression puts undue weight on the ends, but one can fit it with numerical methods, basically, trial-and-error (Number crunchers are good at that.).  A partial solution to this problem is to cut off the chronology at some minimum number of series (I'm using eight, but might increase it.).  That way, the end weighting problem gets cut at the same time.

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So before you come on here and start throwing around scientific terminology in an attempt to stun people with your brilliance, just remember...there is always someone out there a lot smarter than you,
You might take your own advice.  You are good at using big words, but you fail to understand the concepts behind them.

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i'm confident enough with the REAL scientists out there who are proving that these environmental problems you waffle so well about are wrong
Name some.  There are experts in other fields (like medicine) who don't seem to understand that a Ph.D. doesn't mean they know everything.  What are CLIMATOLOGISTS saying?  Name a few who disagree with global warming theory.  What are ECOLOGISTS saying?  Name a few who don't think that warming is the cause of a great many of those changes noted in ecological journals.  And how about atmospheric chemists and physicists?

Yes.  There are differences of opinion over minor issues.  But the overall concepts are no longer being debated.

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And no I don't claim to be a scientist, I am just a humble medical professional, educated in my own field.
You did a good job with RCS, even though your conclusions are based on a complete misunderstanding of the process.  But you're right:  you should stick to medicine.
Doug
If I have seen farther than other men, it is because I stood on the shoulders of giants.

The beginning of knowledge is the realization that one doesn't and cannot know everything.

#60    Doug1o29

Doug1o29

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Posted 14 April 2012 - 05:14 PM

View Postsocrates.junior, on 14 April 2012 - 02:07 AM, said:

What six "Great Dyings" are you talking about? I'm assuming first that you're discussing extinction events. There are five major extinction events...and numerous smaller extinctions mixed in there.

A little sourcing as to what you're discussing would work well here.
Oops.  Can't count.  Good memeory, but short.
Doug
If I have seen farther than other men, it is because I stood on the shoulders of giants.

The beginning of knowledge is the realization that one doesn't and cannot know everything.




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