In his March 20th What’s Natural? column, Jim Steele winds up in a conundrum because he’s obsessing on Greenland while trying to figure out California’s sea level rise. It got me to thinking about those six blind men grappling to make sense of an elephant while focusing on individual parts.
Steele’s conundrum will never get resolved until he pulls back and starts taking in the whole of our Global Heat and Moisture Distribution Engine.
The biggest problem is that Steele’s confusion is deliberate. See, Jim’s no teacher, he’s a performance artist who has become skilled at taking bits and pieces of true facts, ignoring great swaths of important information, then concocting just so stories to entertain and sooth, rather than inform and prepare.
He gets away with it because his audience wants to be deceived - and because rationalists fear to confront such belligerent self-certain willful ignorance.
Why do I care? Because I love this planet and truth matters!
Because someone needs to be a Witness for honesty and defender of We The People’s right to learn about this wonderful fantastical planet Earth that created us >>> without the constant cross screaming of malicious dedicated liars!
I’ve dissected March 20th’s Pacifica Tribune’s What’s Natural? because it offers me another opportunity to examine ‘libertarian’ fraud in action, while giving me an excuse to share a treasure trove of related links to solid educational resources for the curious.
REPRINTED UNDER PROTECTION OF FAIR USE COPYRIGHT LAWS.
My intention is a point by point review of 'libertarian' deception in action.
Click on image for better viewing and comparing.
Peter Hadfield made an easy to follow overview of the meme Jim’s parroting.
{Since spring is here and the days are getting crowded again, I need to streamline this process a little. I’ve taken Steele’s What’s Natural column, sectioned it with reference letters. Please open it in a second independent window as you read my running commentary.
Following the commentary I share a good many relevant links for the curious.}
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#A) For a column called What’s Natural? it was difficult puzzling out what the purpose of resurrecting the Glacier Girl’s story was. But, I wrestled with that conundrum in my previous post so lets skip ahead.
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#B) Paragraph 3 starts with,
Steele writes: “In contrast, climate scientists claim Greenland will increasingly lose ice as (atmospheric) CO2 increases.”
In contrast to what? In contrast to weather happening?
In contrast to year-to-year differences in snow fall? In contrast to the North Pole being 50°F above normal in February 2018? What is Jim talking about?
To help clarify Steele’s conundrum, we must first and foremost realize, it’s the atmospheric insulation!
Increasing atmospheric CO2 increases the amount of heat being circulated within our global weather engine. Everything else flows from that fundamental overriding reality.
This increasing warmth will in turn continue soaking into our global cyrosphere, softening it up around the edges and creeping towards the interior. Of course it will cause increasing disintegration and melting, as we’re witnessing throughout our global cryosphere. It’s only natural.
Natural variability will ensure that regional differences will continue.
Now, here’s a telling blunder,
“Greenland gaining ice at rate 4 feet per year”
Silly guy, Greenland gains falling snow which is subsequently compacted into glacial ice over years.
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#C) Steele continues,
“But (ice loss) is rapidly reversing.”
That’s crazy delusional. Fixating on year to year variations won’t help Jim through this contrived conundrum.
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#D) I can well appreciate planners struggling with these issues, it’s a scary uncertain future. We can bicker about some exact rate of warming and resultant change till everyone’s blue, still, the trend and direction remains unmistakeable. Like the sand flowing through an hourglass.
And Jim's recommending peddle to the metal, like there's no tomorrow.
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#E) Another example of Steele going off the rails:
“Fearing accelerating rise, some argue we abandon the coast.”
Seriously? The coast is a very long thing.
Who in the world is arguing for abandoning the coast? Oh yeah, ‘libertarians’ make it up as they go along. Got it.
Although, lets not forget California's varied coastline include many coastal cliffs.
Naturally, coastal cliffs are made to be pounded to smithereens.
Particularly with rising seas and intensifying storms. Feeling entitled to put your house or public highways on doomed cliff edges, also entitles one to deal with the down stream, down to Earth, consequences. It’s only natural.
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#F) “We should protect homes with seawalls”
Another notion Jim hasn’t thought through.
Seawalls require massive materials and treasury and construction time (etc, etc, etc,) and wouldn’t work along most of California’s coast anyways. This is the sort of 'libertarian' fantasizing that we’ve allowed them to get away with way too much, way too long.
When are rationalists going to start confronting such GOP crazy-making with Reality Checks such as I’m demonstrating?
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#G) Understanding Greenland’s snow and ice dynamics and cycles isn’t any more or less critical than also learning about what’s happening to Antarctica’s cryosphere, or our mountain glaciers - and just as critical as appreciating how our planet’s weather bands are migrating and changing in character, and how that will impact regional weather behavior.
Incidentally,
Incidentally,
Antarctica is colder than the Arctic, but it’s still losing ice
Michon Scott | March 12, 2019
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#H) "no matter what scary climate stories suggest."
'Libertarians' always seem to pick the biggest idiot in the crowd for their authority on representing us reviled environmentalists.
'Libertarians' always seem to pick the biggest idiot in the crowd for their authority on representing us reviled environmentalists.
Why don’t rationalists correct them every time they try stupefying their audience?
Anyone who has any interest whatsoever, learned about Greenland’s cracked bowl shape back in geography kindergarten!
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#I) Oh. So, Jim does understand about Greenland glaciers.
Then, what the heck was that goofy introduction about? Confusing. Oh yeah, that’s the point, sowing confusion.
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#J) Sure, no arguing those fundamentals.
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#K) The next paragraph continues accurately enough, although Jim could have done without his manipulative melodramatic flourishes. “Trumpeted!”
Trumpeteers indeed. Jim, the physical evidence is what it is, scientists share it with the public. Jim why shouldn’t we be informed loud and clear?
Trumpeteers indeed. Jim, the physical evidence is what it is, scientists share it with the public. Jim why shouldn’t we be informed loud and clear?
I want this information trumpeted so all of us can learn and understand.
Then Steele really goes off the rails in his last sentence by implying there’s a significant long term reversal unfolding. It’s ridiculous, as these observations I share make clear.
What’s happening is the usual oscillations that permeate Earth’s natural processes. Year to year differences tell us little about the long term trend, which Steele so diligently hides from his audiences.
Nature’s folds within folds of cumulative harmonic complexity, flowing down the cascade of time. ;- ) Check out the supplemental information I share at the end of this.
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#M) Oh that ‘libertarian’ tendency towards vague wording (deniability). Excellent for hiding one’s cherry picking and specifics. Please notice the graphs I’ve shared, see for yourself if anything looks like it’s trending towards any imminent reversal.
Also note that Jim Steele is dependent on ignoring our insulating atmosphere’s increasing greenhouse gas levels and the fundamental fact that this is where our Earth’s warming originates.
Also note that Jim Steele is dependent on ignoring our insulating atmosphere’s increasing greenhouse gas levels and the fundamental fact that this is where our Earth’s warming originates.
Everything else is simply energy being moved around, short term cooling trends here and there won’t be changing that fundamental geophysical reality. Jim knows it, he’s not as stupid as he writes, that’s why I call him out. I’m still looking for scruples and a conscience in the man. Well, that and a good honest constructive debate.
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#N) “Admitted” - Libertarian’s love using such loaded words to distort perception. Nothing needed to be “admitted”!
Data gets collected, processed and published, no need to invoke melodrama.
Incidentally, Steele’s not exactly wrong about recent Greenland temperatures, but he does the complexity an injustice, plus his conclusions regarding the future are way off. I suggest trusting what the experts working these instruments and issues have to show us:
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(see below for additional info)
Furthermore, scientists certainly have learned how to differentiate between natural and anthropogenic influences, take a look at the foot notes.
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#O) “Similar Warming … decades earlier”
Nope, there was nothing similar to about it! The ’20s, ‘30s warming was a convergence of natural oscillations producing a regional warming. Current global warming is, well global, driven by increasing atmospheric insulation because of increasing greenhouse gases. Two very different mechanisms.
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#P) Either Steele is quoting an ancient IPCC report or he’s mistaken. Here’s something up to date:
“Intriguingly, much lower CO2 concentrations still resulted in similar warming (on Greenland).”
Confoundingly, Steele still doesn’t grasp the difference between Earth’s atmospheric insulation and weather patterns.
Oh yeah, he doesn't exactly "believe" in CO2's physical properties either.
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#Q) Typical ‘libertarian’ manipulation and misrepresentation of the facts - all the while ignoring the rest of the story.
For the record, in the 1930s Greenland was the global freak thanks to a convergence of natural cycles.
Remember, globally this was a period when excessive particulate air pollution was masking increasing atmospheric’s CO2’s increasing insulating effect.
Today it’s reversed with the rest of the planet and particularly other regions of the Arctic warming up while Greenland, due to its unique geographic position, is again playing the outlier. Though an informative Nature paper tells us that a natural atmospheric “blocking” cycle is blamed for the past decade’s slight cooling, and its due to reverse itself - then Greenland is expected to return to more warming along with reinvigorated glacial and permafrost thaw.
Look at the data, the ‘libertarians’ much talked about New Ice Age has really and truly been canceled, stop trying to resurrect it using a few months worth of data.
Face it, our grand geophysical experiment is in full swing with projected results showing up in every corner of our globe.
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#R) Here Steele should have quit while he was ahead.
Yes, “current trend is too short.”
FULL STOP !
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#S) That’s precious Jim,
“I boldly blogged!”
Yeah, right, boldly blogged something scientific papers were suggesting.
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Jim called it, Greenland’s glaciers are growing again.
Yippy. Not!
He’s taking his audience for a ride, year to year variations are part of the process as the graphs I share clearly illustrate. Consider it this way,
Lindsey writes: “Said another way,
if the Greenland Ice Sheet could put on 44 billions tons of ice each year going forward, it would take 82 years to get back to its 2002 self.”
Greenland Ice Sheet's 2017 weigh-in suggests a small increase in ice mass
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#U) Steele writes:
“There is absolutely no consensus regarding climate’s sensitivity to a doubling of CO2.”
That’s criminally false!
Please refer to the supplement for more on that.
As for the consensus position on what to expect from a doubling of CO2 that remains near three degrees Celsius.
What good is demanding it be more exact, when you’re ignoring the most basic fundamentals!?
Sure scientists should keep striving to get it as accurate as feasible, but for forty years now, the majority of incoming data continues pointing at the same ~3°C predicted some 40 years ago!!!
That should tell us all we need to know, to appreciate that anything less than a radical downturn will, given a few more decades, end in complete catastrophe for our society. It's really stupid to laugh off compounding interest or cascading consequences.
Impossible expectations is another form of fraud.
Beyond that, realistically speaking, we don’t actually know what 3°C or 2°C or 4°C even means in terms of specific long term cascading changes it’ll produce these next decades. Best we can do is rough guesses, based on informed honest logical decisions, so why go nuts demanding an impossible exact number? Oh yeah, to confuse and stall and stall and stall.
We'd be better off standing back to appreciate the interconnected complexity our society requires. Instead, most take it for granted, lost in blissful entitlement.
We'd be better off standing back to appreciate the interconnected complexity our society requires. Instead, most take it for granted, lost in blissful entitlement.
All we really know is the tempo of changes we’ve experienced this past half century. If you've been paying attention you know that's bad enough. Weather has gone from outbursts of “rouge weather” in the 90s, to a steadily increasing tempo of infrastructure and life destroying local and regional extreme weather catastrophes.
We’ve entered the age of Extreme Destructive Weather Roulette, while Jim wants us to remain lost in his ‘libertarian’ haze, with the pedal stuck to the metal.
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Climate change science marks 40th anniversary of three key events that signified turning point
Anne M Stark | February 25, 2019
Climate change science marks 40th anniversary of three key events that signified turning point
The Charney report
In 1979, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences published the findings of the Ad Hoc Study Group on Carbon Dioxide and Climate. This is frequently referred to as the Charney report, named after the lead author of the report, Jule Charney of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
“The report’s principal findings have aged really well,” said LLNL climate scientist Mark Zelinka, also a co-author of the paper.
In one key finding of the report, Charney and his co-authors estimated the most probable global warming for a doubling of CO2 to be near 3 degrees Celsius, with a likely error of 1.5 degrees C. “This estimate agrees with our current understanding, but is now bolstered by a mountain of evidence that did not exist in 1979,“ Zelinka noted. …
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#V) “We're adaptable people, (build seawalls)"
Like a spoiled child. Oh, just build a bunch of seawalls to protect us. No problem. Feed 'em cake.
Sure, just toss up seawalls everywhere. Easy as covering another hillside in MacMansions. Daddy will pay for it.
Not an iota of understanding, let alone appreciation for the complexities, the upheaval, the costs, the externalities, the unintended consequences, competing needs, the time factor. So la de da.
This same self-styled authority then dismissively assures his gullible audience sea rise will turn out be inches, a pittance,
"Certainly not 5 or 10 feet of sea level rise.”
As though we're going to see some leveling off in our future.
Actually, in our real physical world, between society deciding to go it peddle-to-the-metal with emissions along with what’s evolving on Antarctica, Greenland and continental glaciers, 5 to 10 feet is becoming more plausible with every retrospective update.
Yes, it’s damned alarming!
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#W) Now comes Steele’s Daddy Warbucks’ sales pitch:
Crisis, what crisis? Hey folks, be happy, no worries.
Lets do nothing for yet another twenty years.
What’s there to lose?
Everything you fools !
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PBS NewsHour | Published on Apr 10, 2019
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRe1ymYR45k
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PBS NewsHour | Published on Apr 10, 2019
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRe1ymYR45k
Antarctica is losing ice at an accelerating rate. How much will sea levels rise?
The frozen continent of Antarctica contains the vast majority of all freshwater on Earth. Now that ice is melting at an accelerating rate, in part because of climate change. What does this transformation mean for coastal communities across the globe? William Brangham reports from Antarctica on the troubling trend of ice loss and how glaciers can serve as a climate record from the past.
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