Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Yet more illustrations for the Right

Boy, isn't the increase in Antarctic sea ice getting a run for the money from the Right wing ignorance machine?

Looking around the web, here's a couple of comparisons for illustration:

The Arctic, today, at the end of summer, showing the extent of ice compared to a longer term average, compared to Antarctica with a similar comparison.



I'm not sure why even the likes of Andrew Bolt can't understand the point that loss of sea ice in summer in the Arctic is a much more significant issue for warming compared to an increase in sea ice in Antarctica in winter (because there is little sun in winter to have any effect anyway), but insist on adding up total sea ice and saying "Ha!" is what they do.

This recent paper also illustrates the complexity of the Antarctic situation, where there is the issue of the ozone hole and its contribution to circulating winds.   It appears that increasing winds have led to a decreasing or flat lining of sea surface temperatures much around the continent; and interestingly, a significant change in trend happened around 1980.

Climate change isn't simple, and not every effect at every part of the globe has been perfectly foreseen.

But it is clear to anyone who reads on the topic that the current Antarctic sea ice situation does not mean that global warming is not happening.

25 comments:

nottrampis said...

link didn't work Steve

anon said...

Stepford

So the Ice cover is going the opposite way, the models rooted and you still haven't got your head around the fact that the theory is broken.

Talk about religion.... Gaia 'whore ship', you Gaia whore.

nottrampis said...

Has is your expanding arctic ice going JC. you still cannot read!

anon said...

Homer, you're so freaking useless, not even Centrelink would have you as a "client".piss off.

Steve said...

Link fixed, I think.

JC, you lap up the climate change denialism propaganda as enthusiastically as the rest of the gullible readers of Catallaxy.

Go find that scientist bloke who you spoke to once who convinced you AGW was real; until you changed your mind.

nottrampis said...

Really you're the one caught out all the time being wrong just like now.

it is quite fun how much you do it.

anon said...

Stepford,

The issue isn't whether gerbil warming is real or not. The issue is what do we do now when the data strongly suggests the rate of change is far slower than the models suggest. Then what to do about it economically?

23 dollar tax, mitigation policies, no nuke and subsidising the subsidy whores was never the way to go. You support this nonsense. You ought to be ashamed of yourself.

Paxton, stop trying to sound relevant. Buzz off you mental Pygmy.

Steve said...

My attitude to this economic analysis of climate change is that:

a. if I can't trust economists to reliably predict a global financial crisis and recession within 12 months of it starting, why should I have any particular faith in their forecasts of the effect of climate change on global GDP in 50 or 100 years time?

b. part of the economists' problem with such forecasts is to do with the scientific forecast of regional effects, yet we know that the smaller the regional effect, the harder they are to predict. The entire decision to say that we can "live with" a 2 degree global increase is mere educated guesswork, too.

c. This all renders the David Friedman "opportunity cost" arguments which you believe in superfluous.

d. The main contribution of economists to the issue should be the best way to push the globe towards CO2 reductions, and given the experience with previous cap and trade, and preventing ozone depletion, we can trust them when they say a combination of pricing carbon emissions (possibly with a trade scheme) and government regulation will set capitalism on a course to deal with the issue.

e. As to trusting economists to judge whether its worth doing it in terms of opportunity costs - no way. Just use your common sense as to what modelling indicates as real risks and be cautious - fast climate change to a level over 2 degree globally is just obviously going to stuff up a lot of the planet with effects that could be very far reaching indeed (sea level rises impossible to keep ahead of, droughts, famine, worse and more frequent floods hard to keep ahead of, etc) not to mention the rate of ocean acidification being faster than anything we've seen in hundreds of millions of years (and for which there is no realistic way of stopping except for reducing CO2).

So just use your common sense - the decision should be to start turning the ship around with effective government policy to encourage capitalism into clean energy. And ironically, it's the soft left side of politics that has more faith in capitalism, given the right settings, being able to handle the transition than the small government "capitalism is fantastic" group of numbskull libertarian economists.

Steve said...

My take on the matter is given academic support in this paper that I linked to back in April:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0040162514000468

nottrampis said...

wow JC what a cutting remark from a bloke who can't tell the difference between the arctic and antarctic.
By the way if they had enough measuring equipment the hotness in the Arctic would mean world temperatures have risen!
Then we haven't even taken into account the strongly rising temperatures in oceans at all.

As always JC shows off his vast amount of knowledge.

anon said...

Stepford... Making economic policy on expectations in terms of impact is NOT Macroeconomic forecasting, which you appear to have a problem distinguishing between.

We know that if you charge more for something less will produced and consumed.... We know if you charge a lot more, a lot less will be produced and consumed.

Denying economics has a vital say in these matters is actually being not only a denialist, but a zombie denialist.

Changing the way we produce energy is a major thing in terms of human progress, because such a change has occurred on very few occasions. These changes occur over the very, very long term and to argue we could move towards renew balls is laughable. It's too diffuse and the storage technology is simply not there.

The so- called market based system has failed simply because it isn't a market based system but a tax on energy consumption... It's a tax on the short term to impact long term production. This strategy simply doesn't work as we've seen with the EU cap&trade which has fallen apart.

The best thing to do in terms of dealing with it is to issue a short edict. ... That by 2060 say no energy can be produced by coal fired plants.

You require long lead times for this sort of thing. That gives us enough time to figure out things like thorium and salt water reactors.

John said...

IF the warming is slower than expected that is all the more reason to move quickly because it means we have a greater chance to avoid the worse effects.

This isn't just about warming. Coal fired power stations emit dangerous elements, including mercury, and environmental levels of mercury are already way too high. Diesel nanoparticles are clearly implicated in respiratory conditions. China has huge problems with emissions and is working very hard to overcome this.

So whichever way we look at it we must be developing strategies to stop burning all this shit. It is damaging too much.

anon said...

Move quickly? Why, because of the climate emergency. LOL

You have it arse backwards Johnno. If it's a slow warm as it increasingly looks like it is, there's no reason to move quickly. In addition if the rate peaks at 2 degs as some people even on the IPCC believe there could actually be net benefits.

Stop the school girl antics and man up a little. There are far too many frightened beta males on the gerbil warming wagon.

Steve said...

I'm not sure that you're actually disagreeing with me clearly about what economics can tell us about climate change.

I said it can tell us the best strategy to reduce CO2 emissions; but it can't credibly tell us what the different economic effect will be in 50 or 100 years time between ignoring the issue, and taking serious action.

This means that all of the economists arguing on different sides of the fence of "is it worth it or not" - Nordhaus, Stern, Tol and Friedman - are all arguing about economic modelling that we don't have any reason to trust in any case.

The only thing that can be said in their favour is that those economists who argue it won't cost a huge amount are (I think history tells us) probably right to encourage us in that belief. I say that because it is a common thing to hear industries grip about government mandated changes and allege that it'll really hurt - unleaded petrol had complaints from oil refineries and car associations; CFC's were going to cost and arm and a leg to replace; catalytic converters on cars to reduce smog would make new cars so expensive - yet when the change is mandated, everyone adapts, technology gets cheaper, and the earlier warnings are seen to be self interested exaggerations.

I reckon we are seeing the same thing now, with some very self interested billionaires conning the gullible into thinking big changes to energy production introduced over several decades are going to kill the global economy, hurt the poor, etc etc.

But if it's got to happen, it happens.

Steve said...

....hear industries gripe...

nottrampis said...

Who is moving quickly?

The increase in fires and poles in Australia had a greater impact then the ETS which was over-estimated by Treasury. They thought it would ad 0.75 pp to the CPI . It added around 0.25 although Davidson clearly didn't understand this or anyone else over at Catallaxy.

this means you have a gradual change and there have been huge changes in renewables which you clearly are unaware of as usual.

John said...

I'm not frightened. At a personal level all this is completely academic to me. I'll long be dead before it becomes a problem. The future of humanity is a logical concern for those with children, for people like myself it is irrelevant.

anon said...

The increase in fires and poles in Australia had a greater impact then the ETS which was over-estimated by Treasury.

Poles? Is that like pole dancing. WTF are you talking about you imbecile.


They thought it would ad 0.75 pp to the CPI . It added around 0.25 although Davidson clearly didn't understand this or anyone else over at Catallaxy.

So Treasury made an over -estimation and you're saying Sinc made an error which you haven't evidenced, but Sinc's the bad guy in all this. Christ you're a moron.



this means you have a gradual change and there have been huge changes in renewables which you clearly are unaware of as usual.

What huge change you invertebrate? At a global level they will be be lucky to take up 5% by 2050.

Get lost, you idiot. You ever make a pertinent comment. Seriously Paxton, piss off.

anon said...

So johnny, if the rate of change is slower and the peak, on estimates, is getting lower and lower by the day, you want to mitigate faster and cause more unneeded economic pain.

What's your IQ?

nottrampis said...

poles and wires.
Davidson made a famous statement after the CPI came out on the effect the ETS had. He said Treaury under-estimated,I have it on my blog.
You could well say he did a JC!

you are not up to date on current information on renewables but you never are.

John said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
anon said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
anon said...

Why are you deleting my comment when it didn't have any searing, stepford, you ignoramus?

Steve said...

Seeing John swore at you due to provocation, I thought I should reduce the provocation too. Maybe I should have deleted some of your earlier, merely abusive, comments...

By the way, do you like my post today about the hysterical claims made by car makers in the 70's about how devastating catalytic converters would be? Just like listening to Moran today...

Big tiers are not optional said...

Moron Steve ducks up again. Pity your Flannery idol turned out to be a breathing retard.