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Science/Tech See other Science/Tech Articles Title: Skeptic now subscribes to global warming In this Friday, Oct. 28, 2011 photo, Richard Muller, left, and his daughter, Elizabeth Muller, hold a globe as they talk about their study on climate at their home in Berkeley, Calif. A new study of Earth’s temperatures going back more than 200 years finds the same old story: It’s gotten hotter in the last 60 years. What’s different is the scientist behind the latest study - Richard Muller. The California physicist was doubtful of what climate scientists have been saying - until he did his own research, partly funded by climate change skeptics. Elizabeth Muller, co-founder and executive director of the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study, ran the study. WASHINGTON (AP) — A prominent physicist and skeptic of global warming spent two years trying to find out if mainstream climate scientists were wrong. In the end, he determined they were right: Temperatures really are rising rapidly. The study of the world's surface temperatures by Richard Muller was partially bankrolled by a foundation connected to global warming deniers. He pursued long-held skeptic theories in analyzing the data. He was spurred to action because of "Climategate," a British scandal involving hacked emails of scientists. Yet he found that the land is 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit (1 degree Celsius) warmer than in the 1950s. Those numbers from Muller, who works at the University of California, Berkeley, and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, match those by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA. He said he went even further back, studying readings from Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. His ultimate finding of a warming world, to be presented at a conference Monday, is no different from what mainstream climate scientists have been saying for decades. What's different, and why everyone from opinion columnists to cable TV 's satirical"The Daily Show" is paying attention is who is behind the study. One-quarter of the $600,000 to do the research came from the Charles Koch Foundation, whose founder is a major funder of skeptic groups and the conservative tea party movement. The Koch brothers, Charles and David, run a large privately held company involved in oil and other industries, producing sizable greenhouse gas emissions. Muller's research team carefully examined two chief criticisms by skeptics. One is that weather stations are unreliable; the other is that cities, which create heat islands, were skewing the temperature analysis. "The skeptics raised valid points and everybody should have been a skeptic two years ago," Muller said in a telephone interview. "And now we have confidence that the temperature rise that had previously been reported had been done without bias." Muller said that he came into the study "with a proper skepticism," something scientists "should always have. I was somewhat bothered by the fact that there was not enough skepticism" before. There is no reason now to be a skeptic about steadily increasing temperatures, Muller wrote recently in The Wall Street Journal's editorial pages, a place friendly to climate change skeptics. Muller did not address in his research the cause of global warming. The overwhelming majority of climate scientists say it's man-made from the burning of fossil fuels such as coal and oil. Nor did his study look at ocean warming, future warming and how much of a threat to mankind climate change might be. Still, Muller said it makes sense to reduce the carbon dioxide created by fossil fuels. "Greenhouse gases could have a disastrous impact on the world," he said. Still, he contends that threat is not as proven as the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says it is. On Monday, Muller was taking his results — four separate papers that are not yet published or peer-reviewed, but will be, he says — to a conference in Santa Fe, New Mexico, expected to include many prominent skeptics as well as mainstream scientists. "Of course he'll be welcome," said Petr Chylek of Los Alamos National Lab, a noted skeptic and the conference organizer. "The purpose of our conference is to bring people with different views on climate together, so they can talk and clarify things." Shawn Lawrence Otto, author of the book "Fool Me Twice" that criticizes science skeptics, said Muller should expect to be harshly treated by global warming deniers. "Now he's considered a traitor. For the skeptic community, this isn't about data or fact. It's about team sports. He's been traded to the Indians. He's playing for the wrong team now." And that started on Sunday, when a British newspaper said one of Muller's co-authors, Georgia Tech climate scientist Judith Curry, accused Muller of another Climategate-like scandal and trying to "hide the decline" of recent global temperatures. The Associated Press contacted Curry on Sunday afternoon and she said in an email that Muller and colleagues "are not hiding any data or otherwise engaging in any scientifically questionable practice." The Muller "results unambiguously show an increase in surface temperature since 1960," Curry wrote Sunday. She said she disagreed with Muller's public relations efforts and some public comments from Muller about there no longer being a need for skepticism. Muller's study found that skeptics' concerns about poor weather station quality didn't skew the results of his analysis because temperature increases rose similarly in reliable and unreliable weather stations. He also found that while there is an urban heat island effect making cities warmer, rural areas, which are more abundant, are warming, too. Among many climate scientists, the reaction was somewhat of a yawn. "After lots of work he found exactly what was already known and accepted in the climate community," said Jerry North, a Texas A&M University atmospheric sciences professor who headed a National Academy of Sciences climate science review in 2006. "I am hoping their study will have a positive impact. But some folks will never change." Chris Field, a Carnegie Institution scientist who is chief author of an upcoming intergovernmental climate change report, said Muller's study "may help the world's citizens focus less on whether climate change is real and more on smart options for addressing it." Some of the most noted scientific skeptics are no longer saying the world isn't warming. Instead, they question how much of it is man-made, view it as less a threat and argue it's too expensive to do something about, Otto said. Skeptical MIT scientist Richard Lindzen said it is a fact and nothing new that global average temperatures have been rising since 1950, as Muller shows. "It's hard to see how any serious scientist (skeptical, denier or believer — frequently depending on the exact question) will view it otherwise," he wrote in an email. In a brief email statement, the Koch Foundation noted that Muller's team didn't examine ocean temperature or the cause of warming and said it will continue to fund such research. "The project is ongoing and entering peer review, and we're proud to support this strong, transparent research," said foundation spokeswoman Tonya Mullins. From among 10,000+ comments: Gee Bee There are two issues: 1) Is the climate warming; and 2) If it is rising, what is causing it. This study was done properly, it did not confuse the 1st issue with the 2nd issue. There will be 4 BILLION people living the modern life style that uses large amounts of hydrocarbons by the year 2025. So weather it is causing the increase in global temperature or not does not matter, we are not going to change our use in the foreseeable future. Instead of wondering and arguing what is causing the change, we need to look at the prehistory and historical record, come to a conclusion on how to prepare and make a plan for the long term pattern we are in. The ocean has risen close to a foot in the last 20 years, by 2050 if the present trend continues it will be over 3 feet more, the impact of that will be huge if we are not prepared. Living space, food production, storm protection, shipping, water supplies, sewage processing, roads and bridges and much more in many, many areas, could be affected adversely. Monitor, prepare and be flexible, in the past when the climate changed, and it always has, these traits were possessed by people who survived, those that did not disappeared. G. Edward • Terre Haute Go with me on this. Humor me… Think of the Earth’s climate as a kind of swimming pool. On one end is a drain letting a set amount of water out of the pool and on the other end is a water hose letting a set amount of water into the pool. The Earth, in its pristine state, was designed by our Creator (or by accident…whatever floats your boat, I guess) to exist within certain parameters with slight fluctuation now and then. We’ve got volcanoes, dinosaur, cow and bacteria farts and other such things creating carbon dioxide (our water hose putting water into the pool) and we’ve got trees and such (our drain out of the pool) taking it out and creating oxygen. It’s an over-simplified example, but keep going with me; don’t let your eyes roll back yet. Now let’s introduce humans, no biggie here for a long time because up until the industrial revolution, humans lived in a certain balance with the Earth (Native Americans kind of had this right). The population gets too out of whack with the environment and we’ll have a plague or something to thin everything out. But when the industrial revolution comes along and humanities’ creations begin to belch carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and with medicine and cleaner and cleaner habitats in which to live, human life spans increase along with fertility which then, of course, creates a need for living space and living spaces, trees and other green growies are removed. Now, add to this cutting large swaths of trees down for animals that need to graze, etc. (see where I’m going here?). With industry and carbon dioxide pollution increasing (along with the aforementioned volcanoes and animal farts still with us), the water hose on one end of our pool is putting more and more water into the pool but with the removal of trees the drain on the other end is becoming less able to remove the excess water because it's clogged by dead leaves or something and, thus, the pool overflows, floods your basement, cracks your foundation, and POW your property is messed up and it's going to be cheaper for you to bulldoze your house than to repair it. I’m a Libertarian and even I realize that we’re screwing ourselves! Trice The official definition of Global Warming is referring to the Earth's core getting warmer. They changed to the phrase "Climate Change" because the uninformed thinks it means that the weather everywhere will be warmer. JOHNd They didn't change the name LMAO. Both terms are in use. According to the U.S. National Climatic Data Center: "Seven of the eight warmest years on record have occurred since 2001 and the 10 warmest years have all occurred since 1995." What's your source for saying the earth is cooling? According to the USGS and every expert source, volcanoes in recent centuries put out millions of tons of CO2 on average, per year. And people put out billions of tons of CO2, from burning fossil fuels, well over 100x as much as volcanoes. Get your facts straight - you can look it up at USGS yourself by typing in "Which produces more CO2, volcanic or human activity?" Or, you can keep listening to crap from whatever source of science "information" you trust now instead. Democritus Shouldn't a physicist be offering his opinion on something, oh, I don;t know, physics related? Why does the opinion of a man whose only knowledge is based on the research of others more significant than my opinion from the same information? Physicist ≠ Climatologist AndyF Physics is the theory of everything. Tommy B Global stupidity is way more prevalent. ___ Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
#1. To: Tatarewicz (#0)
Which is why whenever someone supposedly smart, opens their pie hole and says something incredibly stupid, they should have their teeth knocked out. When they're stooped over crying, and picking up their broken chicklets, you kick them squarely in the ass as hard as you can. Then when they're down, you tell them politely, "nobody gives a damn what you think. You're not important, and by being a scientist, it doesn't give you authority or credibility to speak on things that create the reason for stupid people to react in stupid ways." The whole lie of Climate Change, is about taking wealth away from everyone, and putting it into the hands of liars, who say they can fix the sky, when the sky itself isn't the problem. It's the hot air coming from the bullshitters trying to take your money, that is the problem. "Call Me Ishmael" -Ishmael, A character from the book "Moby Dick" 1851. "Call Me Fishmeal" -Osama Bin Laden, A character created by the CIA, and the world's Hide And Seek Champion 2001-2011. -Tommythemadartist
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