Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Monce Replies to Achenbauch

You may have seen the list of 100 climate skeptics who signed a statement that was published in yesterday's Washington Post.

The Post's Joel Achenbauch wrote about the statement, and in particular called out one signer, Micheal Monce of Connecticut College, an atomic and molecular physicist:

Now back to that ad in the Post: Who ARE these people? "Scientists," is the answer, but what kind of scientists? Are they climate experts?

Let's take a look at "Michael Monce, Ph.d., Connecticut College":

"His area of expertise lies in atomic and molecular physics, particularly atomic collisions."

Probably a smart guy. But why do we care what he thinks about climate change? How many of these people have actually published something on climate change in a peer-reviewed journal?

So I wrote to Monce, and he courteously replied with his thoughts on the controversy:
"Wow... I guess I've suddenly become a lightning rod, and in some sense I can see why which leads me to answer your first question:"

No, I have never published about climate change in peer reviewed journals.

My response to Achenbach would be along the lines as: As a physicist I understand energy fairly well. Also as an experimentalist I have some experience in looking at physical data and analyzing what it means, What lead me to my present thoughts on climate change was when I was researching the topic in preparation for a course I was going to teach on energy issues about 4 years ago. As I looked more into the data and also the models that were being generated, a lot of it didn't add up to me. There's fairly good data that there was a warm period greater than what we are experiencing at the moment during medievel times when CO2 was much less than today. Also in historic terms, the current warming actually started in about 1840 when the earth emerged from the Little Ice Age. Why would it do that without a large human CO2 emission? The IPCC models generated in the late 1990's seem to have failed to predict the current leveling of temperature for the past decade. There are many more instances I can cite all of which tend to lead me to think that perhaps the current temperature trends are more due to natural variabillity than due to human causes. So, as a scientist, I came to the conclusion that many of the IPCC's basic premises may not be valid. If the data changes I will change my view.

As to your third question, if a climatologist had an opinion on a new finding in atomic physics, yes I would be skeptical. However, any scientist should always approach any new finding with some skepticism; that's our job. New findings must be verified independently by other researchers, and even then we may continue to try and find holes... that's what drives science. However, maybe that climatologist may have a different insight into the atomic physics finding that would be useful. Here's the real point as an example of how science really works: even today we are trying to find flaws in Einstein's work. Why? Because by finding the flaws we learn more about how nature runs. Wasn't it a physicist (Alvarez) who came up with the idea of the asteroid/comet impact extinction of the dinosaurs? Cross disciplinary discoveries do happen and are often met, appropriately, with great skepticism. However, such discoveries, when verified, lead to greater understanding of nature.


8 comments:

Steve Bloom said...

Well, to borrow Al Gore's phrase, every bit of that is wrong:

"There's fairly good data that there was a warm period greater than what we are experiencing at the moment during medievel times when CO2 was much less than today."

No, there isn't. In fact there's direct evidence that the planet has already warmed more than in the mid-Holocene, which until recently was thought to have been the warmest post-glaciation period.

Regardless, the issue isn't comparing these relatively slight differnces, but whether we can expect much higher CO2 levels to drive climate to temperature levels not seen for millions of years.

"Also in historic terms, the current warming actually started in about 1840 when the earth emerged from the Little Ice Age. Why would it do that without a large human CO2 emission?"

CO2 isn't the only thing that affects climate. Analyzing past slight climate variations like the LIA is inherently difficult due to the lack of precise records of temperatures and forcings, but things like the Medieval Warm Period and LIA appear to have been driven by some combination of slight changes in solar irradiance and atmospheric dust. Recent work is pointing more and more to volcanic activity or the lack thereof as the principal factor.

"The IPCC models generated in the late 1990's seem to have failed to predict the current leveling of temperature for the past decade."

The models don't claim to do such short-term variations. The principal reason for this is the inability to predict the timing and intensity of things like the El Nino cycle, volcanic activity and the big surge in soot production in China.

As Jim Hansen continually points out, climate science relies on paleoclimate, observations and models *in that order*. The first two provide a more than sufficient basis for alarm regarding present climate trends.

What's disturbing about both Dyson and Monce is that they were willing to go public with their views despite having looked into climate science in the most casual possible manner. That's just irresponsible.

Hansen et al's recent "Target Atmospheric CO2" paper summarizes the current science and places it into a policy context. Monce should read it.

Anonymous said...

Well here is a pretty smart string physicist quoting a couple of climate scientists.

http://motls.blogspot.com/2009/03/lindzen-spencer-on-climate-sensitivity.html

"Richard Lindzen (MIT) explains the value of the climate sensitivity. The bare value 1.2 °C is modified by a strong negative feedback and the resulting sensitivity about 0.3 °C is roughly ten times smaller than what the IPCC wants you to believe:"


Mr. Bloom, if you are truly concerned about co2 join Dr. Hansen and back accelerated LFTR ( the "green" nuclear) development.

charlesH

Steve Bloom said...

I'm afraid your Czech bounced, charlesH. Did you know that Lindzen has been flogging this same idea for twenty years, with less and less success as time goes on?

Re LTFR, as is Hansen, I'm happy to see the research done to prove the technology. More than that is premature at this point.

Anonymous said...

Mr. Bloom,

I am very happy to see that you support research to prove the LFTR technology. I have always thought that LFTR was technology that both skeptics and warmers alike can/should/will support. I don't share Dr. Hansen's fear of co2 but I respect his intellectual honesty in observing that nuclear (LFTR in particular) is needed to reduce coal usage.

I do wonder why warmers such as yourself don't welcome the possibility that climate sensitivity is much less than the IPCC assumes. If Lindzen et al is right then we have time to make the transition from coal to nuclear/LFTR without serious harm to the environment nor the world's economy.

charlesH

Dano said...

I do wonder why warmers such as yourself don't welcome the possibility that climate sensitivity is much less than the IPCC assumes.

Well, at the very least it is fun to explore the widdle fears of those in the small minority whose ideologies are negated by man-made climate change, and the forms their denial takes.

Best,

D

Hank Roberts said...

You can't explain the ice ages if you assume a low climate sensitivity.

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?sourceid=Mozilla-search&q=ice+ages+%22climate+sensitivity%22

That assumption, convenient for the know-nothing-do-nothing position, is just wishful thinking

Hank Roberts said...

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16892-natural-mechanism-for-medieval-warming-discovered.html

Anonymous said...

Hank,

Do nothing? On the contrary. Aggressively bring LFTR technology up to date in the next 5-10yrs per Dr. Hansen's recommendation. Continue with battery research for a PHEV conversion ramp.

The alternatives, cap and trade, wind, solar, bio etc have not yet demonstrated the ability to reduce coal/co2 where they have been aggressively tried (e.g. Europe).

Plus, it is highly doubtful one can pass a significant US cap and trade bill due to concerns about resulting job loss.

charlesH