quote:
The idea that political messaging and public policy involving climate change should reflect the small degree of uncertainty that is characteristic of all scientific research. While there are limits to our ability to observe and model the outside world, the overwhelming probability is that climate change is real and man-made, and action should be taken as if that were the case.

The idea that models are "uncertain" in any meaningful sense exists in total contradiction with a vast body of evidence. You might as well be uncertain about the existence of gravity.

Now this is a very well articulated counter to Stephens inferred position of inaction based on his editorial.

The "consensus" as he frames it is already a consensus built around a range of probabilities. 1.5 to 4.5 degrees celsius rise in temperatures if a doubling of Co2(or comparable greenhouse gasses) is unleashed into the atmosphere compared to pre-industrial levels.

Is it possible that the real results will be outside that range? Yes, and the consensus acknowledges that as well.

But at this stage, to take the position against action, would basically put Stephens in a situation where he places the threshold so high in order to justify even minor policy action toward negative externalities, that to be logically consistent would place him in a camp arguing the consensus on the level of harm of second hand smoke is not high enough to justify policy to address it yet.

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Posted by Clames

Member since Oct 2010

16746 posts

Posted on 5/3/17 at 4:16 am to bonhoeffer45

quote:
Is it possible that the real results will be outside that range? Yes, and the consensus acknowledges that as well.

Actually the consensus doesn't. You see, even the absolute best case predictions peddled by your consensus is still several times higher than what has actually occurred in the last nearly 40 years alone and those best case estimates are way lower than their median predictions. This all goes back to flawed models, flawed data analysis fed into those models, and the fact that current raw computational power is not even close to what it needs to be to make even reliable short-term trend predictions. Your consensus recently released a paper that showed the modeled trends are showing warming that is almost double what is actually being observed. This is the point you fail to understand here, you are asking for actions to be taken based on predictions made by those who are staking the continued flow millions of dollars of research funding on pushing trends predicted by computer models that are nowhere close to reality...