Dr Trenberth says,
“In fact there are no predictions by IPCC at all. And there never have been. The IPCC instead proffers “what if” projections of future climate that correspond to certain emissions scenarios.”
There are an awful lot of policy makers and others driven by the the content of the Al Gore movie and the general blizzard of scary predictions of the future pumped out by the media, that are sure acting as though they believe the IPCC makes predictions; and good, believable predictions too.
For the full statement by Dr Trenberth and many comments, go to the Climate Science: Roger Pielke Sr. Research Group Weblog.
So could the media have got it so badly wrong?
I read the Dr Trenberth statement and comments on it with interest. Perhaps he has read the recently published ‘Falsification of the Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse effects within the frame of Physics’ by G. Gerlich and R.D.Tscheuschner arXiv:0707.1161v1[Physics.ao-ph] 8 July 2007, sorry I haven’t a link.
Though most of it is over my head, the simple experiments in it point to the false statements and conclusions about the “Greenhouse Effect” that occur in Encyclopedias, textbooks, IPCC papers throughout the last century.
2 Gerhard Gerlich and Ralf D. Tscheuschner
Abstract
The atmospheric greenhouse effect, an idea that authors trace back to the traditional
works of Fourier 1824, Tyndall 1861 and Arrhenius 1896 and is still supported in global
climatology essentially describes a fictitious mechanism in which a planetary atmosphere
acts as a heat pump driven by an environment that is radiatively interacting with but
radiatively equilibrated to the atmospheric system. According to the second law of
thermodynamics such a planetary machine can never exist. Nevertheless, in almost
all texts of global climatology and in a widespread secondary literature it is taken for
granted that such mechanism is real and stands on a firm scientific foundation. In
this paper the popular conjecture is analyzed and the underlying physical principles are
clarified. By showing that (a) there are no common physical laws between the warming
phenomenon in glass houses and the fictitious atmospheric greenhouse effects, (b) there
are no calculations to determine an average surface temperature of a planet, (c) the
frequently mentioned difference of 33 C is a meaningless number calculated wrongly,
(d) the formulas of cavity radiation are used inappropriately, (e) the assumption of a
radiative balance is unphysical, (f) thermal conductivity and friction must not be set to
zero, the atmospheric greenhouse conjecture is falsified.
The paper is a 115 page PDF, be warned!
RE: #2 – Joshua Halpern (and the rest of the GISSites) is threatened by this. He’s been madly posting purported gas spectra and other “proofs” at his “Rabbet Run” blog.
Re #3 – RealClimate was obviously worried too as I posted something similar to #2 plus a link to results on the effect of Ozone on plants in a raised CO2 atmosphere, which is the subject of the present top Thread there, so off topic could not be a reason for non posting.
A reply to my posting at ‘Thunderbolts forum’ “Death of the GreenHouse Effect?” gave me a link
xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0707/0707.1161v2.pdf
Unless there is some giant mistake or hoax involved, and I have no reason to suspect it, this paper could be a turning point in the AGW debate, and perhaps some of the billions of dollars treating CO2 as the enemy can be used to protect and prepare us from all types of climate extremes.
Where and when will that paper be published? Or has it already? The AGW-proponents are big on citing published and peer-reviewed science. Unless that makes print in a scientific periodical, it will likely be disregarded….
Hi Matt, the letters and numbers after the authors names should be the publication identifier, presumably the journal ‘Physics’
‘Falsification of the Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse effects within the frame of Physics’ by G. Gerlich and R.D.Tscheuschner arXiv:0707.1161v1[Physics.ao-ph] 8 July 2007,
It is worth reading, download it from the link in #4 above, and see how the basic premises of ‘co2 climate science’ are shot down from first principles, never mind the maths.
For Matt
This is the official site of Gerlich’s paper: arxiv.org/abs/0707.1161
The “arXiv” «is an e-print service in the fields of physics, mathematics, non-linear science, computer science, quantitative biology and statistics. The contents of arXiv conform to Cornell University academic standards. arXiv is owned, operated and funded by Cornell University, a private not-for-profit educational institution. arXiv is also partially funded by the National Science Foundation».
Sure not amateurs antienviromentalists… 😉
arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1003/1003.1508v2.pdf
Gerlich and Tscheuschner, On The Barometric Formulas
“… another popular but incorrect idea communicated by some proponents of the global warming hypothesis …. since the venusian atmosphere is opaque to visible light, the central assumption of the greenhouse hypotheses is not obeyed…..”
You’d think they’d bother to look this stuff up.
They’re asserting a belief without citing any evidence.
You can look at pictures taken on the surface of Venus in visible light, and look up what the color of the sky is from the surface of Venus. It’s not black.
Here, for example.
www.mentallandscape.com/C_CatalogVenus.htm
www.mentallandscape.com/CS_Venera09.jpg
Hank,
I found this on NASA’s webpages on the Venus space probes:
“Thick clouds of sulfuric acid cover Venus. Because visible light cannot penetrate the clouds, astronomers cannot see the planet’s surface with even the most powerful optical telescopes.”
Here’s the link – www.nasa.gov/worldbook/venus_worldbook.html