Did Global Warming Cause the Air France Crash?

Anthropogenic Global Warming is nothing but a modern doomsday cult.

I just wish they'd put on their Nikes and get it over with.

In the mean time there is no point in reasoning with them, just as there is no point in reasoning with any religion.

What the he'll, DK! You somehow insist that I am denying that climate change is real even though I specifically mention that the phenomena pre-dates mankind's arrival? I am not denying that it exists; in fact I'm eluding to the idea that the mega trend is that of cooling.

As to carbon release into the atmosphere: the Earth puts far more into than mankind does and it always has: volcanic activity, carbon sinks like the ocean. Better check the evidence, the carbon that's released from the ocean is released after the temps rise. I simply believe that the scientific community that's investigating and testing this climate change have been perverted with funding, group-think and cronyism to get the funding, and the pessimistic bias that is so pervasive within people. The pervasive pessimistic bias is just manifesting itself in different ways now that most end-of-days forecasters have been discredited and the alien being believers has lost it's cache.

But thanks for attempting to answer the question, DK, and for not reading into things that never were written. Once again you did not disappoint.

vidyohs -

RE: "Don has only been making that lucid point for at least two years I know of, it is the pack of Chihuahuas on the porch that can't understand it."

What are you going on about?? Obviously he's been making this point for years and I'm not (never have to my knowledge) challenged or disagreed with that basic premise. I just think some people in the thread were going in the direction of "Al Gore is bankrupting us" - which is a somewhat bastardized version of what I think Don was trying to say. I thought the whole point was that he was trying to get past the stupid "economists and bloggers pretending they're climatologists" thing that tends to happen a lot.

OK - this is comment three for me, so I'm done I think.

Please, stop calling me disingenuous. I'm not.

Gilhuahua,

Back on the porch puppy.

"Would you call Don Boudreaux disingenuous for not stating he denies climate change, vidyohs?"

Is it disingenious for you to suggest that Don is disingenious for your totally wrong and wrongly stated reason? Well, yes it is. To my certain knowledge for the two years I have been coming to the Cafe, Don has never denied climate change. No one I have seen comment here has either, we all know that climate change is real, and our words point that out repeatedly and succinctly. It is Gil, and his packmates, that are disingenious in attempting to twist words and misquote. Furthermore, I have never seen Don deny that there is global warming, for that matter he doesn't edeny that there is also global cooling, a position echoed by all the other intelligent commenters. What you have seen and read is disagreement on the cause of climate change and any localized heating or cooling that goes on within that broader spectrum.

The Goreacle and his fanatical followers have been caught out in crappy science and direct and intentional lies, which IMHO makes his whole religion false. I repeat see http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/<br>
for a good synopsis.

"However, the real question is:"

You say this is the real question, but I don't see a whole of of echo yet in the words of other commenters. I disagree, that isn't the real question. In MHO the real question is who benefits and profits from all the real power and wealth transferred by the draconian measures the chicken littles of GW want cast upon innocent people?

"do governments have the right to deal with 'negative externalities'?"

Gilhuahua, is it disingenious of you to suggest that governments have rights, when any little teeny bit of your Chihuahua thought would tell you that governments can only have permission given them by an either willing or acqiescent majority. A legal fiction can have no rights, only individual humans can have rights.

Posted by: Gil | Jun 11, 2009 8:03:45 AM

In answering you thus I have made all your other ramblings irrelevant, IMHO.

Is it disingenious of me to do this in such a fashion, you betcha; and, I can play the game as well as anyone, and make better points, speak more truth, than you in doing so.

Disingenious Kuehn,

"The point is - the point I think Don is trying to make - is that these groups try to impose their view of what to do about it on the rest of us."

Do ya actualy think it, duh. Don has only been making that lucid point for at least two years I know of, it is the pack of Chihuahuas on the porch that can't understand it.

"Impose that action on others because we are just too damn smart to be wrong or denied!"

Every single thread on this Cafe contains the same wisdom and is recognized by far and away the vast majority of customers.

The length and content of any particular string of comments is measured by the ignorance of those who contest it.

It's the same point that can be applied to the stimulus plan, to any and all aspects of socialism.

WTF, is difficult in seeing and understanding that simplicity?

Gil -

Thanks for bringing this back to something that has to do with Don's post.

I was thinking about this post and the Hayek post on the way into work, and really they're very similar. Some people assume they can connect all the dots where nobody else can, and they are specially gifted with the insight that the plane crash was caused by climate change or Katrina was caused by climate change, etc. etc.. Or, alternatively, they think that they know better than a large portion of the scientific community that climate change is not real.

The point is - the point I think Don is trying to make - is that these groups try to impose their view of what to do about it on the rest of us. Climate change could be a real threat. Claiming that it's absolutely not because of uncertainty isn't very helpful, and claiming that we need to go whole hog on a draconian solution because of all the things it "could" do isn't very helpful either.

It's really the inverse of Don's Hayek post. In the Hayek post, the "well educated" were delluding themselves by assuming they knew and could do the auto mechanic's or other "average citizen's" job. The USA Today letter writer made a similar mistake by assuming that they could knew and could do what the "well educated" climatologist does.

And Don MIGHT have just found the exception that proves Hayek's rule: ANY OF US could edit USA Today better than the current editors do :-P :)

If 500 is increased by 1%, the result is 505. You claimed that raising the air temp by 5°F only increases its energy by 1%.

500°F is the only temperature where that works.

Do you really not understand that the only temperature scales that are proportional to energy are scales based at absolute zero?

Absolute zero is -460°F. Therefore 40°F is 500 degrees Fahrenheit above absolute zero. Raising the temperature of 40°F air by 5°F raises its energy 1%. Raising the temperature of 80°F air by 5°F raises its energy by something less than 1%.

This is basic, basic stuff. You simply cannot work with percentages of temperatures on scales whose zeros are not absolute zero.

Would you call Don Boudreaux disingenuous for not stating he denies climate change, vidyohs? Or is Don Boudreaux disingenuous if he'is using diplomatic language where he doesn't really believe in climate change but he's 'playing it safe' for those who do?

However, the real question is: do governments have the right to deal with 'negative externalities'? Is it "no" because government doesn't own the 'commons' therefore has no right to regulate? Or is it "no" because 'negative' externalities are counterbalanced by greater 'positive' externalities? Or is it "yes" because people shouldn't have the right to palm off their costs onto others because some places can't be obviously privatised?

So:

"Yeah the Industrial Revolution was tough and living standards went down for a while but quickly went back up and exceeded the standard of living prior to it."

or

"Yeah the Industrial Revolution caused a great deal of pollution and waste but we'd all be half-starved Medieval farmers if they didn't proceed and London is considerably less polluted than two hundred years ago anyway."

http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/

Especially watch the "35 errors" movie.

Now DK, this is not the only place where the Global Warming hoax can be seen for what it is, it is just a good one.

Now, DK, are you disingenious? Well, yes that is exactly your behavior in the past.

Dr. Wayne Dwyer taught me, that people teach other people how to treat them, and I then spent some years observing and verifying that truth.

You've taught me to see you as disingenious, and respond to you in that vein. You're the source of your own problem.

Now teach me that you've turned over a new leaf and will not be disingenious beginning now, and I will consider dropping my tag for you.

You obviously have a decent education and you write well, so I don't believe that you aren't aware of how your words are percieved, at least I would hope that you do at least proof yourself for content and accuracy before hitting "post".

It is disingenious to constantly deny the socialist label, yet just as constantly come back to socialist scripture for your solutions or proposals. If it is disingenious like a duck........it's disingenious.

It is disingenious to make a major point about GM going through an abnormal bankruptcy, and then not at least acknowledge why that bankruptcy was abnormal; then, dodge the issue through exchange after exchange.

The reason I admire Don, Russ, and this Cafe is that Don and Russ can argue the fine details of theory and have ready at thir fingertips all the reading and knowledge they have acquired, which they then can explain generally in language that a dummy like me can understand; but, the crucial thing that I admire is their ability to generate what is clearly their own thoughts on the theory and relate it to current events. Their own thoughts, DK.

Many other commenters can do the same.

DK, you seem to have a fine mind, much to fine to have been violated by an original idea.

Work on it.

Till then, you remain for this commenter, Disingenious Kuehn.

It's amazing to me that in a post where Don explicitly says "I'm not saying that global warming is not occuring", so much of the debate here is about whether climate change is real.

Climate change is not settled, of course, but it is a very reputable theory. It's not junk science. And I think Don's point is that even if you take a fairly reputable theory, people can get fanatical about it (opposed OR in support of, I might add!!) and make weird connections of inferences that don't make any sense!

Take LCJ's question - it's similarly spurious in the way that this airplane connection is spurious. Perhaps he truly hasn't heard the case made, but no advocates of climate change claim that the carbon content of the atmosphere is the ONLY driver of the climate. Climate has fluctuated naturally over time for a variety of reasons. That's wholly unrelated to the recent, exogenous spike in carbon in the atmosphere which is expected to cause a short term (in geological terms) spike in temperature. I have a feeling LCJ understands this, and if he does his impulse is the same as the USA Today letter writer: making spurious cause-and-effect connections to butress or dispute climate change.

vidyohs - I see you're on this morning. If you respond to me I'm asking you nicely not to call me "disingenuous".

Think about global warming as a problem that mankind can rectify? Naw, only people with egos the size of 18 wheelers can be that arrogant. Arrogant enough to think humans caused it in the face of the evidence of the planet cycling through heat and extreme cold over and over since its creation/formation, a planet devoid of humans until a mere 2.5/3 million years ago. Arrogant to believe that what we don't know how to cause is something that we can fix.

Now, K. Ackerman, Al Gore , yourself, et. al., are obviously capable of some real thinking? Naw, maybe you better than Al Gore, but we will have to wait and see about that.

Now what really concerns me is the idea of Bangladesh flooding.

What will I do about home repairs without the Bangies to fix what they erected? And, my automobile, constructed in Bangladesh, how will I get a new one if Bangladesh floods? My home furnishings were all made in Bangladesh, how will I replace them when they wear out if that hotspot of economic productivity which is Bangladesh floods?

And, what about my church with its international HQ in Bangladesh, will they continue to operate and send out evangelicals and priests to enlighten the world as they do now?

Where will I send my kids to get advanced education if Bangladesh floods and all those fine universities have to close?

That does it, I am parking my SUV today, and bicycling everywhere I go, and I am burning stone (carbonless fire) in my fireplace for heat, and eating stone for meals. I'll wear stone and play with stone.

I'm guilty, oh God I am so guilty!

Is the question that difficult to answer or by ignoring it do you hope to prentend it's not really there begging a solid explanation? Go ahead and state something that makes we sense in order to shut me up!

Oh, and I don't dismiss global warming.

I just doubt that humans caused it, and doubt even more that the Statist solution will do more good than harm.

People might contribute to it, and if it was just a linear process, then there would be no problem.

There is no certainty that human activity is responsible for the 100ppm increase of CO2 in the atmosphere since the start of the industrial age, but there are some compelling reasons to believe it.

First, the 100ppm increase means we can put a weight to the increase if we knew how much the entire atmosphere weighs... and we do. It turns out that it only takes 32 years to make up this weight at the rate we burn fossil fuels. Given that 50ppm occurred in just the last 30 years, then we are in the ballpark for accounting purposes.

Another reason to think the increase is from us is because the 10,000 years prior only saw minuscule variations in CO2 levels, and that indicates some equilibrium seemed to have been reached.

The sharp rise in ppm - 36% - in just the last 200 years indicates the equilibrium is broken, and the fact that all our burning has to go somewhere indicates maybe it is going into the air.

What we need to know is if the increase in ppm can lead to higher temps, and if so, will the higher temps trigger an even higher concentration of CO2.

I could care less about a 5-degree rise in temps if that was it. We redraw the coasts and move on. The possible problem is not the 5 degrees, it's the shape of the increase after that. That curve may be self-reinforced.

The confusers like to throw out figures such as water vapor, by percentage, is a greater contributor to the greenhouse effect.

That's true, but water vapor is self-regulating as it evaporates and precipitates. CO2 is in a gaseous form, or it's dry ice. It doesn't rain and self-regulate. It hangs around like a blanket displacing water vapor and more transmissive gasses. It gets dissolved in the ocean, but if the ocean warms up, it expels more of the stuff into the air.

Who knows?

Not us, but it would be prudent to find out fast. Again, that non-linear thing could be problematic.

I was actually arguing whether global warming cannot be regulated even if were true as the government can't claim ownership over the atmosphere and therefore does not have a right to regulate anyway? Er, right, brotio? Besides it could be argued that global warming can't be proved beyond a doubt anyway. Even if slightly higher temperatures are recorded in 2100 it could be just attributed to unusual but random heat waves. After all, the Earth's distance from the Sun is still going to 148 million kilometres in a century's time.

80°F is 540 degrees above absolute zero, so 5 degrees is something less than 1%.

Nice shift.

If 500 is increased by 1%, the result is 505. You claimed that raising the air temp by 5°F only increases its energy by 1%.

500°F is the only temperature where that works. You can't just raise any number by 1% to yield a difference of 5 from the original number. It has to be a very specific number, and it's somewhere between 499 and 501.

And the half a degree example you offered is something less than 0.1%.

0.1% of what? The wind speed increase? The wind went from 140mph to 156mph with a 0.5°F temp increase.

What is 10% of 140?

So we are talking about a better than 10% increase for a half degree change.

It's based on an average sample of recent hurricanes. It's not meaningful except as an alert to monitor more carefully. Only the media would judge it conclusive, and in the process, skew credibility.

K Ackermann: June 10th, 5:48 PM on this very thread I asked a point blank question that did not provoke a reply from you; why was that?

Here's another: what do scientists estimate the temp of Earth was back in the Hadean Eon? Make a time-series graph with that info and the Earth's current data and ask yourself what was responsible for that climate change. Will I get crickets again?

Oh, and I don't dismiss global warming.

I just doubt that humans caused it, and doubt even more that the Statist solution will do more good than harm.

did you think there really was a problem with the ozone layer as it was reported before the ban on CFC's?

Nope.

I did, and still do agree with this side of the debate:

http://www.junkscience.com/Ozone/ozone_seasonal.html

Oh, and I also think Rachel Carson should be accorded her rightful place with Hitler and Stalin on the list of "Deadliest Humans Ever Born". What's your opinion of DDT?

I just ran your formula through my supercomputer and after a while it showed that the only condition under which the energy level of air rises 1% from a 5-degree rise in temp is if the air was 500 degrees to start out with. That would pose a different problem.

80°F is 540 degrees above absolute zero, so 5 degrees is something less than 1%. And the half a degree example you offered is something less than 0.1%.

Let's all be thankful I didn't posit a temperature change from 0°C to 1°C.

Nobody will think less of you if you start to use math.

Uh, yeah.

C'mon, brotio. You know how I feel about the government as a whole.

The cleptocrats are puppets on a stick being bushed around by the masters of the universe.

A new administration comes in for 4 or 8 years, does the maximum damage it can in that timeframe, and hands of the levers to the next batch of winning bids for their turn at the trough.

The thing is, Bush stuffed the government to the rafters with cronies who did everything they could to censure the reports under their control, but they tried to leave the original author's name on them.

The scientists welcomed that in the same way the church would welcome something named Saint John's Abortion Clinic.

Good scientists don't live in a vacuum. They live or die in peer review. Bad scientists work for cigarette companies and oil companies.

The only time I came close to dismissing global warming out of hand was when the military reported it as the top threat to our security in the future.

Let me ask you, did you think there really was a problem with the ozone layer as it was reported before the ban on CFC's?

Sorry, Gil.

Your post did nothing to convince me that I should take Government's word without question.

What is the secret to accepting the Word of God Government without question? - brotio

Is another take that of the 'tragedy of commons'? No one 'owns' the atmosphere therefore no one ought to have the right to prohibit what people dump in the atmosphere? "Not yours to regulate", eh? Even if a global warming scenario become true, let's say - Bangladesh becomes uninhabitable due to extreme floding, then no one's to blame because the flooding came from 'the atmosphere' which no one owns therefore no one in particular is liable?

"... global warming could pose a risk.

And it very well could not. I think that the Anticarbonism preached by the Church of AGW is a far greater risk. But, the Church has spoken, and Cardinal Torquemuirduck will carry out his Inquisition.

I know that you, Wile E KAckermann: Super Genius, are on a transcendental plane that few of us mere mortals could ever hope to attain. Oh, please share with us your wisdom that would make us take the Statist's word over liberty! I await salvation in your Church!

What is the secret to accepting the Word of God Government without question?

Zero sense? Raising the average temperature of the air 5°F adds a paltry 1% to its energy. You think that outweighs the effect on the gradient due to the cold air warming 7 degrees while the warm air warmed only 3?

MikeP, I just ran your formula through my supercomputer and after a while it showed that the only condition under which the energy level of air rises 1% from a 5-degree rise in temp is if the air was 500 degrees to start out with. That would pose a different problem. Nobody will think less of you if you start to use math.

And speaking of apples and oranges, your gradient example applies to the global dynamics of wind and air currents.

My comment was in response to:

in a warmer world hurricanes become more frequent, but they also become much weaker on average.

A hurricane is not driven by temperature differentials in the air, or even between air and water. A hurricane needs low wind, warm water, and lots of humidity to form. Once it forms, it draws energy from condensing moisture picked up over the ocean.

There is no agreement on how many hurricanes, or the rise in intensity from a warmer ocean. There are only statistics.

One stat is that 2005 had the largest number of named storms on record, and another stat is this one from wiki:

Wind speeds for the strongest tropical storms increased from an average of 140 miles per hour (230 km/h) in 1981 to 156 miles per hour (251 km/h) in 2006, while the ocean temperature, averaged globally over the all regions where tropical cyclones form, increased from 28.2 °C (82.8 °F) to 28.5 °C (83.3 °F) during this period

If forced to make a statistic out of that, you would have to say that for every degree fahrenheit rise in temperature, hurricane winds increase 32 miles per hour.

A scientist would say that nothing can be drawn from that statistic because it is not conclusive. They would also say that it is what it is. Insurance companies are saying "damn!". Knuckle-draggers say it's not true and don't believe it.

It is what it is, and only a fool would not keep an eye on it.

brotio, vidyohs, others... I have tried several times to will away the idea that global warming could pose a risk.

I've been using blind faith, but I keep forgetting to stop thinking about the science behind it.

What is the secret to stop thinking? How do you folks do it?

A sufficiently complex system, especially one which contains both positive and negative feedback loops, will always permit ANY change of output be explained by ANY change of input.

The solution, as a wise physicist once said, is to "Shut up and measure!"

I am Cardinal Yasafi Torquemuirduck of the Church of AGW! I've been sent here by His Holiness: The Divine Prophet Algore I to warn you that this heresy will not go unpunished!

You! Methinks!

You! Vidyohs!

You dare to mock the Church of AGW?! We will make you regret your impertinence!

You! LowcountryJoe!

You question the holy word? Heretic! You will repent!

DO NOT CHALLENGE ME ON THIS! I studied the Holy Scriptures extensively before recently turning my attention to economics! CROSS THE HOLY CHURCH AT YOUR PERIL!!!!!!!!!!

global warming??? Fucx'n Stupid

This has reached the point of parody.

There's no longer any need to refute the global warming hoaxers. They are obviously spinning out of control all on their own and are starting to over-reach.

Really what's new about this? Positions have been staked out, arguments have been made, all that is left is to poke fun at it like Methinks.

Who's for the next whack at the dead pony?

Dr. T,

What's wrong with being stone age? We have much more stone than oil?

It is inexcusable that we use oil and let stone just lie about.

Some people actually build walls with it to get it out of their fields.

Stone rules!

Actually according to one looney talk show host today, the Air france plane was most likely brought down by Arab terrorists.....I kid you not.

That no group has claimed credit has, I guess, no bearing on that theory; and, on top of that, consider that all one has to do to conquer France is to threaten to take away their government subsidies. Ouch, now that was cynical.

"Note that I am not here saying that global warming isn't occurring." - D. Boudreaux

Why not? Are you afraid you'll be arrested or fined for saying otherwise?

P.S. Apparently some find Methinks' humour trolling funny.

The claim makes zero sense given that extra energy is available to the system.

Zero sense? Raising the average temperature of the air 5°F adds a paltry 1% to its energy. You think that outweighs the effect on the gradient due to the cold air warming 7 degrees while the warm air warmed only 3?

Climate and weather theories and models show that in a warmer world hurricanes become more frequent, but they also become much weaker on average. However, the IPCC and the anthropogenic global warming fascists suppressed this information

Dr. T, do you have a link? The claim makes zero sense given that extra energy is available to the system.

These global warming fascists you speak of must be extraordinarily powerful to be able to suppress scientific models and theories in this age of the Internet.

Bush had to go right to the source to suppress science and rewrite findings.

Climate and weather theories and models show that in a warmer world hurricanes become more frequent, but they also become much weaker on average. However, the IPCC and the anthropogenic global warming fascists suppressed this information: they wanted everyone to believe that hurricane Katrina was something we will see more of if we don't eliminate the burning of fossil fuels (and return most of the world to the Stone Age).

'And, in this beautiful irony...is reducing the globe's average wind speeds.'

At first thought, I am not so sure a warmer atmosphere changes the global circulation. A smaller pressure gradient between the poles and the equator will produce less wind, but that means cold polar air can build into a higher pressure mass again, and raise the gradient, and raise wind speeds. It seems to me there is a hysteresis that is independent of temperature.

LCJoe, apparently you have not heard that the debate is over. Your pathetic attempts at debate will not be tolerated! I blame Bush and Reagan.

What explains climate change prior to mankind arriving on nature's scene? I have really got to get an answer to this before I buy into this notion that mankind makes any measurable contribution to the climate. Anybody willing to provide any?

There is a substantial argument sometimes made that air travel saves more lives than it costs:

1) Air travel is statistically many times safer than the private automobile.

2) Air travel permits patients to travel to medical specialists who would otherwise be out of reach.

Further, CO2 in the jets' exhaust contributes, in however small measure, to growth of flora - and is thus "green".

"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt." ~ Abraham Lincoln

The USA Today has provided a valuable public service, removing all doubt concerning both the author and the publication.

This is why I buy the USA Today several times a week(as opposed to an awful local paper). The letters and views posted in that section more often than not give me belly laughs. Completely worth my dollar.

This is from FOX news website:

"Two names on doomed Air France Flight 447's passenger list also appear on a list of radical Muslims considered a threat to France, according to French investigators."

Balderdash!

We all know those needless deaths fall squarely on the shoulders of the irresponsible and dangerous economic ideas of Milton Friedman and F.A. Hayek.

Without their poisonous screeds about free trade and the need to open markets, none of those poor souls could have afforded a ticket for the flight!

Mike,

It's still ironic.

Lighten up.

'And, in this beautiful irony...is reducing the globe's average wind speeds.'

I fail to see the irony, the average has nothing to do with extreme events.

Except that the same effect is likely to reduce extreme events as well.

It is well established that global warming tends to increase the temperature of cold air more than it increases the temperature of warm air. Since winds and storms form from differentials in temperature, the plainly obvious hypothesis is that global warming will reduce both average and extreme storm strength.

That the opposite is presumed and/or parroted by the media is merely an example of people looking for things to blame global warming on.

Victims? Hardly. Flying creates a HUGE carbon footprint. These people can't be victims and perpetrators at the same time. Perhaps we shouldn't even mourn these anti-gaia terrorists at all. Perhaps we should only mourn those victims of global warming who couldn't outrun a hurricane (clearly a symptom of GW - Larry David's ex-wife and Cheryl Crow said so!) using green transportation like bikes and skateboards or those who drown crossing the ocean from France to Brazil and back again on an uber super duper green sailing vessel.

That was supposed to read very good catch. I must be hungry.

Very food catch. We are seeing it everywhere, and it is dangerous.

News, and even some research is not so much reported as shaped, and people buy into it.

Out-of-context soundbites and slogans are constantly used to trigger reflexes, and hence, get our attention.

For a news organization to get our attention with zero, or wrong information is like pulling into a gas station and having the gas tank siphoned.

The MSM is nothing but marketing and propaganda.

It would be nice to find out that Mr. Danforth has a wicked sense of humor and pulled one over on USA Today. I could have written his letter on a really good day.

'And, in this beautiful irony...is reducing the globe's average wind speeds.'

I fail to see the irony, the average has nothing to do with extreme events.

I agree with your overall conclusion though, people extrapolate differently due to their biases.