6 ms·

Qing-Bin Lu doesn't have a good record in climate science as discussed here: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/07/lu-from-interesting-but-incor

Qing-Bin Lu doesn't have a good record in climate science as discussed here: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/07/lu-from-interesting-but-incorrect-to-just-wrong/ http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/07/lu-fro..., so I'm not holding my breath over this one.

pvnick 13y ago
It may help if you refuted the central argument rather than attacking the source.
- 3am 13y ago
  They're both wrong. Global warming is caused smartphone batteries. And don't give me the old, "That's obviously stupid" response. I demand a good faith refutation that treats my central thesis seriously, even though my predictions have a poor track record and my thesis is outside of mainstream consensus.
  - duncan_bayne 13y ago
    http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem.html http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem.html
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
    - 3am 13y ago
      Are you agreeing with me, or not? Sending me that link without any other kind of comment, as if I were one of the few dozen people on the internet that are unfamiliar with the ad hominem fallacy, is a bit patronizing. My point is that attacking someone's argument by noting their poor academic track record is not ad hominem, it's a perfectly valid approach. Otherwise non-science people seeking to alter scientific consensus would have a trivial loophole to DoS the process.
  - baddox 13y ago
    Well, for one thing, you didn't even show a graph that at least hints at a correlation between smartphone batteries and global warming. I wouldn't attack your track record, I would attack your complete lack of an attempt at demonstrating evidence for your claim.
    - VikingCoder 13y ago
      I'm sure a graph could be made, something like this: http://www.venganza.org/images/PiratesVsTemp.png http://www.venganza.org/images/PiratesVsTemp.png
      - baddox 13y ago
        It could be made, but it wasn't in this case, which was my point.
        VikingCoder 13y ago
        You're missing my point: Graphs are completely meaningless. Correlation does not imply causation. Asking for a graph is the last thing you should do. Ask for a hypothesis about why there might be a causal relationship. Test that hypothesis.
        Botono 13y ago
        Correlation very much implies causation, it just doesn't guarantee it. After you test that hypothesis, you'd find correlation if the hypothesis was correct. Saying "correlation is not causation" is useful for dismissing data offhand, but where you find causation you'll find correlation. Also, graphs are demonstrably NOT completely meaningless. They can absolutely be misleading, but they can also accurately depict the underlying data. I think the point of this thread is that the authors of this study have proposed a hypothesis and collected data that supposedly reinforces it. The data (and methodology) can be analysed and verified. There's no need to start from scratch, in this case, to determine if the findings can be substantiated.
  - msandford 13y ago
    There have been plenty of times that ideas outside of mainstream consensus are right and the consensus was wrong. Is this guy a genius who'll prove everyone wrong? Personally I seriously doubt it. But that doesn't mean the scientific community should pooh-pooh his paper. Treating this paper as if an adult wrote it can only do good things for the climate debate. Even if it doesn't really deserve that kind of treatment.
    - 3am 13y ago
      There are many times that people test positive for pregnancy tests but are not pregnant. Basic Bayes theorem. The odds are very poor that this persons thesis is correct in the first place, and the odds are not improved based on: unsubstantiated warming mechanism in his model, lack of experimental data, almost complete lack of consensus support, previous bad results, extremely well supported competing model... I mean, what set of heuristics would you go by to give this guy the time of day? I can point you to a couple of poorly written books by hobbyist mathematicians with purported proofs of Riemann's hypothesis and Goldbach's conjecture. If you want to wade through the insanity you're than welcome to spend weeks of your life coming to the conclusion that they are wrong.
  - pvnick 13y ago
    Someone in my public speaking class several years ago, during a persuasion speech, actually tried to dismiss CO2, CFCs, et al as a cause of global warming in favor of methane from cow farts (bovinepogenic global warming?)
    - asdfs 13y ago
      Interestingly, methane from livestock is a large factor. >According to a new report published by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, the livestock sector generates more greenhouse gas emissions as measured in CO2 equivalent – 18 percent – than transport. http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2006/1000448/index.html http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2006/1000448/index.html (Though it's worth noting that that report is a few years old at this point.)
- btilly 13y ago
  Given that he's making the same argument that was refuted previously, the link is very applicable. In any case estimating the relative impact of different chemicals in the air right now is a relatively straightforward modeling problem. And from that we know that our introduction of CFCs contributes a lot less radiative forcing to the atmosphere than our CO2 and methane increases. (What is much harder is estimating future growth in gasses, and the variety of feedback loops. But current impact of changes is something we know pretty reliably, and CFCs are not the top cause.)
  - smegel 13y ago
    "What's striking is that since 2002, global temperatures have actually declined" What about this claim? Is this verifiable? A 10 year decline in global temperature would be quite extraordinary, given that global CO2 emissions have increased over the last 10 years (despite efforts of some, they are nothing compared to the growth of India and China).
    - btilly 13y ago
      It all depends on what data set you look at. The best data sets that we have for the whole globe indicate continued heat absorption, with a high absorption of that heat by the oceans. However data sets taken from land do not show a clear warming trend. So, of course, that is what this particular researcher uses. The discrepancy between global absorption of heat and global temperature becomes very understandable when you note that a lot of that absorption of heat takes the form of melting ice. And when you melt ice you both absorb a lot of heat energy, and flood the environment around you with cold water that cools it off. (It is worth noting that this particular absorption pattern cannot continue forever. For instance see http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/05/28/arctic_sea_ice_global_warming_is_melting_more_ice_every_year.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/05/28/arctic_s... for information about how quickly we're losing the arctic ice cover.)
      - gwright 13y ago
        But don't the climate models that predict global warming take into effect the ocean's heat absorption and the resulting ice melt and the resulting change in the earth's albedo and so on? I know it is complicated but the 'conventional wisdom' has been that the best climate models take all these feedback mechanisms into consideration and predict a catastrophic increase in temperatures and that the science is 'settled' on this. We've been told over and over again that the models are trustworthy and beyond criticism. All the radical regulatory and economic policy recommendations are based on these models being correct. Anyone who doubts this is labeled as a 'denier' and politely escorted out of the room. And yet, you say that the land temperatures are not increasing as predicted by these trustworthy models. Hmmm.
guelo 13y ago
It actually seems like the Lu paper being debunked in that RealClimate link is the same paper that for some reason has been republished in another journal now. http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0217979213500732 http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S021797921350... http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0370157309002865 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0370157309...
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- waterlesscloud 13y ago
  Those appear to be different, though related, papers. It looks like the new paper contains attempts to address the previous criticisms. The new paper is on arxiv, for the curious http://arxiv.org/pdf/1210.6844.pdf http://arxiv.org/pdf/1210.6844.pdf

pvnick 13y ago

It may help if you refuted the central argument rather than attacking the source.

3am 13y ago
They're both wrong. Global warming is caused smartphone batteries. And don't give me the old, "That's obviously stupid" response. I demand a good faith refutation that treats my central thesis seriously, even though my predictions have a poor track record and my thesis is outside of mainstream consensus.
- duncan_bayne 13y ago
  http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem.html http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem.html
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - 3am 13y ago
    Are you agreeing with me, or not? Sending me that link without any other kind of comment, as if I were one of the few dozen people on the internet that are unfamiliar with the ad hominem fallacy, is a bit patronizing. My point is that attacking someone's argument by noting their poor academic track record is not ad hominem, it's a perfectly valid approach. Otherwise non-science people seeking to alter scientific consensus would have a trivial loophole to DoS the process.
- baddox 13y ago
  Well, for one thing, you didn't even show a graph that at least hints at a correlation between smartphone batteries and global warming. I wouldn't attack your track record, I would attack your complete lack of an attempt at demonstrating evidence for your claim.
  - VikingCoder 13y ago
    I'm sure a graph could be made, something like this: http://www.venganza.org/images/PiratesVsTemp.png http://www.venganza.org/images/PiratesVsTemp.png
    - baddox 13y ago
      It could be made, but it wasn't in this case, which was my point.
      - VikingCoder 13y ago
        You're missing my point: Graphs are completely meaningless. Correlation does not imply causation. Asking for a graph is the last thing you should do. Ask for a hypothesis about why there might be a causal relationship. Test that hypothesis.
        Botono 13y ago
        Correlation very much implies causation, it just doesn't guarantee it. After you test that hypothesis, you'd find correlation if the hypothesis was correct. Saying "correlation is not causation" is useful for dismissing data offhand, but where you find causation you'll find correlation. Also, graphs are demonstrably NOT completely meaningless. They can absolutely be misleading, but they can also accurately depict the underlying data. I think the point of this thread is that the authors of this study have proposed a hypothesis and collected data that supposedly reinforces it. The data (and methodology) can be analysed and verified. There's no need to start from scratch, in this case, to determine if the findings can be substantiated.
- msandford 13y ago
  There have been plenty of times that ideas outside of mainstream consensus are right and the consensus was wrong. Is this guy a genius who'll prove everyone wrong? Personally I seriously doubt it. But that doesn't mean the scientific community should pooh-pooh his paper. Treating this paper as if an adult wrote it can only do good things for the climate debate. Even if it doesn't really deserve that kind of treatment.
  - 3am 13y ago
    There are many times that people test positive for pregnancy tests but are not pregnant. Basic Bayes theorem. The odds are very poor that this persons thesis is correct in the first place, and the odds are not improved based on: unsubstantiated warming mechanism in his model, lack of experimental data, almost complete lack of consensus support, previous bad results, extremely well supported competing model... I mean, what set of heuristics would you go by to give this guy the time of day? I can point you to a couple of poorly written books by hobbyist mathematicians with purported proofs of Riemann's hypothesis and Goldbach's conjecture. If you want to wade through the insanity you're than welcome to spend weeks of your life coming to the conclusion that they are wrong.
- pvnick 13y ago
  Someone in my public speaking class several years ago, during a persuasion speech, actually tried to dismiss CO2, CFCs, et al as a cause of global warming in favor of methane from cow farts (bovinepogenic global warming?)
  - asdfs 13y ago
    Interestingly, methane from livestock is a large factor. >According to a new report published by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, the livestock sector generates more greenhouse gas emissions as measured in CO2 equivalent – 18 percent – than transport. http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2006/1000448/index.html http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2006/1000448/index.html (Though it's worth noting that that report is a few years old at this point.)
btilly 13y ago
Given that he's making the same argument that was refuted previously, the link is very applicable. In any case estimating the relative impact of different chemicals in the air right now is a relatively straightforward modeling problem. And from that we know that our introduction of CFCs contributes a lot less radiative forcing to the atmosphere than our CO2 and methane increases. (What is much harder is estimating future growth in gasses, and the variety of feedback loops. But current impact of changes is something we know pretty reliably, and CFCs are not the top cause.)
- smegel 13y ago
  "What's striking is that since 2002, global temperatures have actually declined" What about this claim? Is this verifiable? A 10 year decline in global temperature would be quite extraordinary, given that global CO2 emissions have increased over the last 10 years (despite efforts of some, they are nothing compared to the growth of India and China).
  - btilly 13y ago
    It all depends on what data set you look at. The best data sets that we have for the whole globe indicate continued heat absorption, with a high absorption of that heat by the oceans. However data sets taken from land do not show a clear warming trend. So, of course, that is what this particular researcher uses. The discrepancy between global absorption of heat and global temperature becomes very understandable when you note that a lot of that absorption of heat takes the form of melting ice. And when you melt ice you both absorb a lot of heat energy, and flood the environment around you with cold water that cools it off. (It is worth noting that this particular absorption pattern cannot continue forever. For instance see http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/05/28/arctic_sea_ice_global_warming_is_melting_more_ice_every_year.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/05/28/arctic_s... for information about how quickly we're losing the arctic ice cover.)
    - gwright 13y ago
      But don't the climate models that predict global warming take into effect the ocean's heat absorption and the resulting ice melt and the resulting change in the earth's albedo and so on? I know it is complicated but the 'conventional wisdom' has been that the best climate models take all these feedback mechanisms into consideration and predict a catastrophic increase in temperatures and that the science is 'settled' on this. We've been told over and over again that the models are trustworthy and beyond criticism. All the radical regulatory and economic policy recommendations are based on these models being correct. Anyone who doubts this is labeled as a 'denier' and politely escorted out of the room. And yet, you say that the land temperatures are not increasing as predicted by these trustworthy models. Hmmm.

guelo 13y ago

It actually seems like the Lu paper being debunked in that RealClimate link is the same paper that for some reason has been republished in another journal now. http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0217979213500732 http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S021797921350... http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0370157309002865 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0370157309...

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
waterlesscloud 13y ago
Those appear to be different, though related, papers. It looks like the new paper contains attempts to address the previous criticisms. The new paper is on arxiv, for the curious http://arxiv.org/pdf/1210.6844.pdf http://arxiv.org/pdf/1210.6844.pdf