Everything is a Red Herring

Everything is a red herring...almost. A red herring is most likely a true statement, but it distracts from what's truly important. Here are some examples:

Federal Deficit and Debt

The out-of-control Federal spending is leading us to a fiscal crisis. I recently posted about D.O.G.E in response to red herrings related to the department. These red herrings point to specific examples of cuts that will cause harm. Still, none of them address the real problem: the interest payments on our debt are already more than our defense spending, which will soon be our country's biggest expense item, surpassing both Social Security and Healthcare spending. I've written about this for over 15 years here, here, here, and here.

Cyberwarfare and Political Polarization

We are under attack. Cyberwarfare is conducted against the U.S. by Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, and others. These attacks are well documented in "This Is How They Tell Me The World Ends: The cyber weapons arm race" by Nicole Perlroth, and "Sandworm" by Andy Greenberg. Our enemies' goal is to create chaos in the U.S., and they are succeeding. I've written about the polarization in the U.S.  here and here. Most of the political polarization is just intentionally induced red herrings.

Environmental Sustainability

The discussions around Global Warming or "Anthropogenic Climate Change" have resulted in a red herring food fight. The problem is that the activists are blatantly manipulative, causing the skeptics to reject any scientific basis. I've participated in this here, here, here, here, and here. I recommend you read this one: Global Warming: Here's a better story.

The real problem is governmental policies that depend on and drive growth. Our Earth can't sustain unlimited growth, and for 99.9999% of us, there's nowhere else to go. For additional insights, read "Prosperity without Growth" by Tim Jackson and "Doughnut Economics" by Kate Raworth.

From ChatGPT:

🔵 Red Herrings from Climate Change Advocates

1. "The world will end in X years"
   → Overstating urgency with doomsday timelines can discredit valid concerns and scientific models.
   Red herring: Shifts focus from actionable mitigation to fear-based speculation.

2. "Anyone who questions anything is a denier"
   → Not all critiques are denial; some are about policy, economics, or priorities.
   Red herring: Avoids engaging with legitimate nuances.

3. "It's all the fault of big oil"
   → While fossil fuel companies play a major role, blaming them exclusively avoids discussing individual or governmental responsibility.
   Red herring: Oversimplifies a complex, systemic issue.

4. "We must act now, regardless of cost"
   → Urgency is real, but ignoring economic trade-offs can alienate support.
   Red herring: Sidesteps cost-benefit or equity discussions.

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🔴 Red Herrings from Climate Change Skeptics

1. "The climate has always changed"
   → True, but irrelevant to the current rate, causes, and human contributions.
   Red herring: Distracts from the core issue of anthropogenic climate change.

2. "It was really cold last week"
   → Weather ≠ climate.
   Red herring: Uses short-term data to undermine long-term trends.

3. "Scientists used to warn about global cooling"
   → A fringe hypothesis in the 1970s, not a serious consensus.
   Red herring: Undermines current science by misrepresenting past uncertainty.

4. "Environmentalists are hypocrites who fly in jets"
   → Even if true, it doesn't disprove the reality of climate change.
   Red herring: Attacks the messenger, not the message.

Global Warming: Here's a better story

I think we need to change the story we are using to solve the anthropogenic climate change (ACC), global warming problem.  What do I mean?  Well, a story needs:

• A good problem or conflict to resolve
• A character that:
• We can identify with 
• Who ends up being the hero that solves the problem
• Who grows and learns about themselves in the process
• The story needs to be believable, credible.

What is the ACC story?

We are facing the worst ecological disaster since the extinction of the dinosaurs.  People caused this by our reckless burning of fossil fuels.  People must give up driving cars and all modern conveniences and become vegans in order to stop the disaster.  We also need to give politicians more power so they can be the heroes.

Not a very fun or engaging story.  It reads more like a sad tragedy or horror.  The failures are:

1.  A character we can't and don't want to identify with.
2. Our character isn't the hero.
3. We didn't learn anything good about ourselves.
4. There's not a credible hero or solution to the problem.  
5. The conflict seems exaggerated since it puts all blame on humans leaving out other causes such as the earth being in a 400+ years of thawing since the last ice age, polar bear deaths are due to hunting for population control, etc.  You can read my previous post here on these facts.

Here's a better story:

As our population grows and third world countries rise above poverty, our resources will need to be shared more effectively.  This includes food (from farms and fishing), fresh water, raw materials (metal, plastic, wood, etc.)  As always, we find a way to adapt.  This includes sustainable processes, new technologies, new economies, open scientific exploration and understanding of the problem, etc.  Through this transformation we realize that mankind has been continually evolving, from hunter gatherer, to farmer, to cities; traveling on foot, then on beast, then on machine.  As borders disappear due to cities overlapping, continued legal migration, the Internet and social media, we learn that greater collaboration is needed.  

Why is it better?

1. We can better identify with the character.
2. The hero actively solves the problem.
3. The hero grows and learns about themselves.
4. The story is more believable because we are addressing current observable trends instead of a future calamity predicted by a computer model. 

This second story may not be perfect; but I prefer it over the current (first) story and I think it has a greater chance of actually saving the world.

Review of Glacier Change and Sea Level Rise (live public talk) by Dr. Alex Gardner

This is a review of a talk found on YouTube “Glacier Change and Sea Level Rise” by Dr. Alex Gardner from JPL.  https://youtu.be/ZJYs8L84L4s

Accepted Facts

The science in this presentation is very impressive. 

The following are facts that I accept

• CO2 is increasing
• Global Temperatures are rising
• Oceans are rising

I agree that this can have an enormous economic impact as we try to address increased flooding in coastline areas and other costs.

Some helpful points from the video:

At 4:58, The discussion of solar heating and thermal cooling.

At 7:38, the presentation of ice cores for determining climate history (CO2 levels and temperature levels)

At 10:42, the current CO2 levels

At 15:28, the presentation of rising temperatures and the discussion of the hiatus.

At 16:39, the discussion of how much of an impact a small temperature change can have.

At 17:08, the discussion of rising sea levels

At 19:24, the mostly negative effects of climate change.  I give Dr. Gardner credit for actually showing a positive consequence, such as more land and improved agriculture (this shows intellectual honesty).

At 21:03, the melting of the glaciers

At 25:37 to 27:59, the discussion of the impressive sensors that NASA has to measure glacier loss and sea level rises.

At 28:00 to 33:30, the discussion of what is happening today

At 43:40 to 46:44, presents impressive future satellites that will be deployed to help measure changes.

At 47:20 An argument for the attention to Climate Change is that the attention has resulted in investment that has contributed to improvements to the science. 

Disputed Science

I dispute the public discussion of climate change science because it excludes the following points:

1. Ice loss has been occurring for 400 years and is primarily due to an over accumulation of ice in the last mini ice age
2. As the earth warms, the thermal emissions get proportionally greater with an increased counter cooling effect.
3. Model predictions of the future are unreliable.

I discuss these points in further detail.

Lacks full Disclosure of Causes for Climate Change

The IPCC technical report states our current glaciers are out of balance since the build up during the “Little Ice Age” and have been melting for about 400 years and will continue melting even without man-made warming . 

“There is high confidence that current glacier extents are out of balance with current climatic conditions, indicating that glaciers will continue to shrink in the future even without further temperature increase.”[1]

The IPCC technical report is the only place I’ve seen this information and I’ve never heard it discussed by climate change supporters.

59:45 A question was asked about when was the last ice age.  This would have been a perfect opportunity to talk about the “Little Ice Age” but the question wasn’t answered.

Model predictions of the future are unreliable

I have over a decade of experience in scientific modeling.  This experience includes using real world data to validate the models.  All models use approximations and the smallest thing can result in an inaccurate model.  The “Butterfly Effect” is proof of the instability in predictive models for complex systems.  While the power of modern computing and sophistication of the science that goes into models is awe inspiring, it can blind the scientist to these limitations. 

35:00 “What happens next?” The presentation begins a lengthy discussion of numerical modeling which is used to predict 50 to 100 years in the future.

Dr Gardner shows his bias towards the value of models with statements like:

·         “One thing we can be certain of” (13:18),

·         “Fantastic ocean models” (39:56)

·         “We know where it’s going in the future” (35:57)

·         “The question is not if this is gonna happen.. That was already determined” (47:44)

The problem that I have with model predictions is that you can’t predict the future.  While CO2 levels and temperature are strongly correlated, there are many other factors that prevent models from predicting decades into the future.

1.       Water is a more significant greenhouse gas than CO2, yet our models can’t tell what will happen as the earth warms.  Will more water evaporate, creating a blanket that blocks the sun and results in cooling?

2.       There are large natural cycles in CO2 and temperature.  What natural forces were at play?  How will nature respond to increased CO2 over the coming decades?  For example, increased CO2 results in more plants.  Will a greener planet clean up the CO2 naturally?

I might accept a model predicting trends a few years into the future but decades as shown in:

·         Presentation of temperatures at the end of the century (13:18)

·         Shows a 1 to 2 meter rise in sea levels over the next century (18:31)

·         Simulation of melting glaciers runs to the year 2500 (36:55)

Dr. Gardner does provide acknowledgement of some of the limitations

·         “The problem is that we only have a very short record” (38:56)

·         “We’re working on the details of how much and how fast” (47:44)

Disregard for Thermal Cooling

As the earth heats up, the amount of thermal cooling is proportional to the 4^th power of temperature.  I ran MODTRAN simulations to determine that temperature changes were about a quarter of the predictions found in the literature at the time (2009).[2] The latest IPCC technical report seems to have corrected this mistake, however there seems to be a general disregard for this powerful cooling effect.

At 50:00 in the video, the first question from the audience was regarding runaway temperatures after all of the ice melts.  Dr. Gardner’s response included no insight on how the earth temperatures would be moderated by thermal cooling.  It’s not the ice that is keeping earth cool.

At 51:42 in the video, Dr Gardner does allude to this cooling by stating that temperature rises more slowly as CO2 levels get higher and higher.  

Attitudes of Alarmist and Deniers

I also take issue both Climate Change Alarmists and Climate Change Deniers on the following points:

·         The attitudes they take towards each other

·         The sensationalism of information

·         Ignoring information

·         Taking a balanced approach instead of all or nothing

An example of attitudes toward others is found at 3:24 when Dr Gardner tells the story of his surgeon asking if humans are contributing to climate warming.  He then refers to climate change as “a done deal” and wonders why “we haven’t been able to reach these smart individuals”.  The audience laughs.  He brings up his surgeon again in a dismissive tone at 20:46.

Regarding sensationalizing, both sides use it to support their viewpoints.  For example, a climate change denier might point to a freezing winter scene and ask sarcastically, “What Global Warming?”

At, 23:40 a video of an iceberg calving is shown.  It’s stated that this represents 1% of all the ice in New Zealand, but the video is of a glacier in Greenland.  Creating a statistic using an unrelated smaller land mass is sensationalizing.  Dr. Gardner states that the calving event was so large that it was measured by a seismograph in North Dakota.  This is sensationalizing the event.  Is climate change creating much larger seismic calving events or do regular, seasonal calving events also trigger seismic readings? 

Extreme events happen so let’s be honest when they are due to normal seasonal changes.

Perspective

At 48:03, the perspective is given showing that on a tiny spec of a planet, all known life exists.

I believe that man has stewardship over the earth and a responsibility to take care of it.  The problem is that if we put an imbalanced focus on climate change, we may allocate more attention on this problem than potentially more critical environmental concerns such as managing our resources: the oceans, forests, etc.  and limiting other sources of damaging pollution.

Let’s be more honest about climate change.  Man doesn’t have as much to do with climate change as the alarmists claim and we can’t know what will be happening 50 to 100 years in the future.

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[1] https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg1/WG1AR5_TS_FINAL.pdf

[2] http://wrauny.blogspot.com/2009/12/global-warming-leave-co2-alone.html

Global Warming Update: Polar Bears vs. Melting Glaciers

Let's discuss two concerns regarding the changing climate:  endangered Polar Bears vs. Melting Glaciers.

Which do you think is the biggest problem?

The findings may surprise you.

	Fear	Reality
Polar Bears	The extinction of the polar bears could upset the entire ecosystem of the Arctic and may represent a "canary in the gold mine" scenario.  If they are wiped out, what species is next?	There are 20-25,000 polar bears and the populations have been stable for 30-40 years.  Many areas use hunting to keep the populations in check.  The biggest threat to polar bears right now is hunters. [1]
Melting Glaciers	The melting of glaciers is a serious problem.  The areas of the glaciers will be turned into deserts and the oceans will rise and flood islands and shoreline.	The glaciers have been melting since the end of the Little Ice Age 400-500 years ago and will melt even without Global Warming. "There is high confidence that current glacier extents are out of balance with current climatic conditions, indicating that glaciers will continue to shrink in the future even without further temperature increase." [2]

I think that a bigger risk than endangerment of polar bears and melting glaciers is the lack of honesty in the climate change discussion.  This disregard for reality creates skeptics.  If climate change is real and a risk for our futures, let's be honest about it so that we can work together to figure out a solution.

References:
[1] http://www.worldwildlife.org/species/polar-bear
Two months ago I reviewed the World Wildlife Foundation website regarding Polar Bears.  It clearly stated that the polar bear populations have been stable for the last 30-40 years and that hunting is used for population control.  The website has been redesigned and this information is no longer available.  The primary focus is on the risks of Climate Change.  The previous site had a map of subpopulations showing which ones were increasing in population, which were stable and which were decreasing.  The new site only states that 8 of 19 subpopulations are in decline.  Here is the old graphic (which I luckily saved)

[2] The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Technical Summary for 2013 regarding melting glaciers.  http://www.climatechange2013.org/images/report/WG1AR5_TS_FINAL.pdf  page 41

Cool It

I just finished reading "Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming" by Bjorn Lomborg.  This book is a rare instance of someone crossing lines in the Global Warming battle, resulting in "friendly fire" from his fellow environmentalists.  I will provide a quick summary, provide my review, and then provide an alternate solution.
 
Quick Summary

Here's the book in a nutshell:

1. Global Warming is bad, but not nearly as bad as people are saying.
2. Rather than spend money to stop Global Warming, the money would be better spent prioritizing the problems we fix (HIV/AIDS, malaria, malnutrition, sanitation and water supply).
3. We should also spend money on R&D to fix Global Warming.
4. This approach will result in the world being stronger and more capable of fixing Global Warming when it starts to become a real problem.

 Whether these solutions cause the knot in your stomach to tighten or loosen is an indicator of which side of the battle you are on.  Since I am trying to be more civil, open and objective, I recommend that you resist the temptation to either brand Bjorn a traitor or fist pump and think "Yes! One more point for the AGW skeptics!". 

My Review

1. I agree with Bjorn that the estimates of Global Warming are exaggerated, however this is based on my own analysis [1]
2. I agree that focusing on solvable social problems makes more sense.
3. I disagree with Bjorn's analysis on the cost-benefit analysis of these fixes.  As with any attempt by political scientists to "fix things", the hidden costs are ignored.  There are many issues he didn't address, for example the environmental impact of the oceans absorbing CO2. (I remember an experiment in my college Chemistry class where we put a digital acid meter in a cup of water.   When we stirred the water or blew bubbles in it with a straw, the acidity increased).
4. I was glad to see someone willing to have a conversation about what to do.  It is much more palatable than "The debate is over.  We have to pass Cap and Trade now or else the oceans will boil, all the continents will turn into deserts and all animal life will die!!!".

Bonus Material - Alternate Solution

Congratulations!! You made it this far, so you get to hear my solution. 

By the year 2100, the world's population will grow to over 18 Billion (at current growth rates) which is 300% growth from the year 2000.  By 2100, each person would need to reduce their CO2 emissions by about 80% (Our current CO2 emissions need to be 40-80% of our current levels.  In 2010, each person's share is 1/3 or 13-27% of current levels, or a 73-87% reduction).  Breathing represents around 6-10% of all CO2 emissions, so there isn't much more to cut.

The real problem is not how much CO2 each person emits but how many people are on the earth!  Since it is politically unacceptable to reduce the number of living people while at the same time acceptable to reduce the number of births (abortions and China's one child policy), we need to provide incentives to reduce the population.

1. Create CO2 tax on fashion and cosmetics.  Attractive people = more babies = more CO2 = bad.
2. Create CO2 tax on alcoholic beverages.  Just reducing the attractiveness of people is not enough.  We also need to reduce the alcohol induced attraction.  I once saw a bumber sticker that read "Beer - Helping ugly people have sex for over 100 years".  Alcohol Consumption = more people = more CO2 = bad.  
3. Create CO2 tax on automotive industry.  Any car shown to be a "chick magnet" should be slapped with a CO2 tax (This is also a nice payback to Japan for Kyoto and Europe for the Copenhagen Climate Summit).  Sexy car = more couples = more babies = more CO2 = bad.
4. Create CO2 tax on Hollywood.  Any movie or TV show that shows people having sex or that show lavish lifestyles is a stimulus for irresponsible CO2 emissions.  Sex/Luxury = more babied and energy consumption = more CO2 = bad.

These solutions are of course silly, but I challenge anyone to show how Cap and Trade or other policies are more effective over the long run.

Global Warming: Leave CO2 Alone!

I find it confusing when I see groups with strong positions in direct opposition to each other. Somewhere between the two extremes is some version of the truth, and I wish more than anything to discover the truth. With Global Warming I think I'm getting closer to the truth.

First, I think I should disclose that I have sympathized more with the Global Warming deniers. This comes partially from distrust and discomfort with phrases like "the debate is over", "everyone knows", "if we don't do something now...", etc. However, I decided that in my quest for truth, I needed to be willing to accept the truth, whatever it might be. I have therefore put on my objectivity hat making myself willing to accept the truth.

I've tried to make my analysis as simple as possible, since global climate is extremely complicated. My focus is on the question: Are humans increasing the emissions of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) and are CO2 emissions causing the planet to warm up?

To save you time from reading this whole posting, I'll give you my conclusions up front, with the analysis after. I found some surprises.

Global Warming Conclusions:

1. CO2 levels have been rising for the last 50 years.
2. Humans may be responsible for CO2 rising (CO2 growth appears to match population growth).
3. CO2 DOES act as a greenhouse gas with a warming effect (this was a surprise to me).
4. The CO2 warming effect is much weaker than reported by the media.

Besides CO2, I think that humans are affecting the environment and we should be serious about monitoring what we are doing. Still, draconian measures are not yet justified.

CO2 levels have been rising for the last 50 years

The primary support for this are the CO2 measurements at Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii [1] [2] These show a steady rise in CO2. Although this might be expected near an active volcano, other data from around the world show the same trend [3]. The data before 1959 are not as reliable, but an interesting study has been done by Beck [4].

Man may be responsible for CO2 rising

This required a little more analysis. I tried to find reliable data for CO2 from fossil fuel emissions and finally settled on data from the CDIAC [5]. The fluctuations in the fossil fuel data don't show up in the atmospheric CO2 data. The atmospheric CO2 data does look suspiciously like an exponential growth curve. The world population also follows a exponential growth, so this is included as well. It's reported that people exhale about 1 kg of CO2 per day (by my calculations, people breathing produces about 30% as much as fossil fuel use).
This chart (click to enlarge) shows the CO2 from fossil fuels, atmospheric CO2 concentration above 265 ppm (since we are talking about an increase over some supposed baseline), and world population. Both CO2 levels are scaled (normalized) to the 1959 population data. I purposely picked a 265 ppm baseline since it shows how closely atmospheric CO2 and population growth are correlated. The most important note is the fluctuations in fossil fuel consumption are not reflected in the atmospheric CO2 concentrations.

This chart of the Carbon Cycle [5] also shows that CO2 from fossil fuels is only a small part of the overall carbon cycle (Though there is no reference to where the numbers come from).

The chart below shows the fluctuations of CO2 concentrations derived from ice core data for the last 400,000 years. It would be interesting to know what caused these fluctuations (volcanoes, natural climate change cycles, etc.). These numbers are used to show that we are currently at the highest levels in 400,000 years, although it is disputed whether or not the ice core data accurately show peaks in CO2 occuring, this site attempts to dispel this as a myth [6].

CO2 acts as a greenhouse gas with a warming effect

Much of the "proof" that CO2 is a hazardous greenhouse gas comes from complex computer models of the climate. While I don't have the expertise to critique these models, I do have enough experience to be suspicious of the claim that CO2 is a problem.

I use a simple model. Consider a sphere just slightly larger than the earth and its atmosphere. If more energy goes into the sphere than comes out, the inside heats up. The energy going in is solar radiation and the energy coming out is reflected solar radiation and thermal (infrared) radiation from the earth. CO2 doesn't absorb the solar energy but it does absorb some of the infrared energy. See my post on Black Body Radiation for more info.

My suspicion comes for the fact that CO2 absorbs 100% of that thermal radiation (energy) over a short distance and increasing CO2 shouldn't result in more absorption.

An analogy for this is a car parked in direct sunlight. The car gets hot inside since the sunlight goes through the window and heats up the interior. The thermal or infrared radiation from the interior is then blocked by the window glass (glass is opaque in the infrared). Making the glass in your windshield slightly thicker is similar to increasing CO2 levels and unlikely make your car hotter.

Luckily we don't have to depend on my hunches or an analogy to show whether CO2 acts as a greenhouse gas. There is a computer model (MODTRAN) that has been well verified for computing the transmission of radiation through the atmosphere. MODTRAN can be run using a simple web interface that allows setting atmospheric CO2 concentration and surface temperature of the earth [7]. This is much better than many of the crude calculations I've seen on the Internet [8][9] The chart below shows the MODTRAN output for a Mid-Latitude Summer Day, 375 ppm CO2. The red line is the energy leaving the earth's atmosphere. The big dip in the middle (between wave numbers 600 and 800) is due to CO2 absorption.
The next chart is the same results with no atmospheric CO2. You can see the dip is missing, which means with no CO2, the energy is escaping the earth's atmosphere.
The next chart shows the difference in radiation leaving the earth for 375 ppm and with CO2 doubled at 750 ppm.
The total area under the blue curve is the radiant energy at 375 ppm. The red curve (mostly overlayed by the blue) is for 750 ppm. There are small differences at the edges of the CO2 absorption band. Though small, this does show that CO2 acts as a greenhouse gas, blocking some radiant energy.

The CO2 warming effect is much weaker than reported by the media.

Two questions need to be answered:
1. How much energy is trapped due to the CO2 greenhouse effect?
2. What is the effect on temperature?

Update Jan. 20, 2010: The IPCC refers to this as "radiative forcing" or "the change in net (down minus up) irradiance (solar plus long-wave; in Wm^-2) at the tropopause AFTER allowing for stratospheric temperatures to readjust to radiative equilibrium, but with surface and tropo-spheric temperatures and state held fixed at the unperturbed values".IPCC definition of "Radiative Forcing"

I will show that the IPCC definition is flawed, since allowing the surface temperature to change significantly offsets the green house effect.

MODTRAN can be used easily to demonstrate this. The next step is to balance the radiative forcing (solar in, thermal out) while assuming solar irradiance is constant. As the earth heats up from the green house gas, it emits more thermal radiation, which is only partially absorbed by CO2. So the earth only needs to heat up slightly to create a balance.

The table below shows calculations for various CO2 concentrations. The Radiant Intensity is how much energy (Watts) is leaving the surface of the earth per square meter (300 Watts is the same as three 100 Watt light bulbs). The surface temperature was determined by running MODTRAN with various surface temperatures until the radiant intensity matched the baseline. As you can see, the temperature changes are not as severe as those predicted by the experts [10].

	Atmospheric CO2 (ppm)	Radiant Intensity (W/m2)	Surface Temperature (Kelvin)	MODTRAN Predicted Temperature Change due to CO2 (C)	Measured and Predicted (p) Temperature Change (C)
Baseline	265	281.093	290	-0.21	-0.25 (m)
1959	316	280.371	290.21	0	0 (m)
2007	375	279.648	290.41	0.20	0.35 (m)
Double	750	276.791	291.27	1.06	2.5-3.5 (p)
Worst Estimate of CO2 in 2100	1000	275.598	291.64	1.43	4.4 (p)

Notes

• My analysis does not address the hypothesis for the potential magnifying effects of CO2 (i.e., slight CO2 warming causes more water vapor in the atmosphere. The water vapor acts as a stronger greenhouse gas than CO2.). See The Climate Effects of Water Vapour
• Besides energy transfer outside the earth's atmosphere, there is also transfer at the earth's surface (land and oceans). There are many potential processes here (geothermal, ocean warming/cooling, etc). The only human activity that I could think of was mining/drilling and then burning fossil fuels (converting chemical energy into thermal energy). I calculated this effect to be less than 1% of the greenhouse effect.
• Melting glaciers and polar ice caps cools the atmosphere (Most likely by a very small amount).
  
• Water (clouds and humidity) have a much greater greenhouse effect than CO2
• Other gases (Methane, etc.) from human activities were not included in my analysis. If they are the real problem, than I think we should stop talking about CO2 and focus on emissions of these other gases.
  
• Climate change addresses local variations, global warming addresses thermal energy being added to the whole system.

Cosmic rays the real cause of Global Warming?
Update Jan. 16, 2010: Climate experts divided on implications of brutal cold spells
Evidence of Arctic Warming
Update Dec. 2, 2011: The climate may not be as sensitive to carbon dioxide as previously believed
Update Oct. 14, 2012: Global warming stopped 16 years ago
Update Oct. 17, 2012: No, Global Warming Hasn't Stopped
More info at the Petition Project
Update Jan. 20, 2018: Worst case global warming scenarios not credible study

Greg Mortenson in Person

Thursday night I went to hear Greg Mortenson speak. I was moved by his book, "Three Cups of Tea" and I luckily got tickets before they sold out. He shared many great thoughts, which I should probably share, but I've been a little obsessed by Global Warming (trying to understand it) and Greg mentioned something that started me thinking.

I will point out one thing: Greg is passionate that educating girls is the key to bringing peace to the world. It makes sense. There are many reasons and statistics to back up his stance. I agree with him 100%.

Greg said “In the holy Koran when a young man goes on a jihad he first has to get permission and blessing from his mother. If a woman has an education she is much less likely to condone her son to get into violence or to terrorism.”

This is the point I want to focus on. He said that Islamic extremists (Taliban, Al Queda) are going into the illiterate, uneducated villages to recruit since mothers elsewhere are getting too smart to give their sons permission to become terrorist.

So what could this possibly have to do with Global Warming?

First start by looking at the Climate Conference in Copenhagen where they are proposing that wealthy countries send billions of dollars to poor countries to help them deal with the effects of climate change.

While it seems like the right thing to do to follow this solution, I believe the backers of this solution are worst then the terrorist recruiters. It is becoming more and more difficult to squeeze money out of our prosperous country, because we are getting too smart. So "they" get smarter and design a plan to send wealth to impoverished countries. These countries are like the illiterate villages, where it will be easy to siphon off some of the GW reparation money.

I know it sounds a little like a wacko conspiracy idea, but who honestly thinks that billions of dollars will in any way be effectively spent to deal with climate change?

Here's my question to anyone that thinks a lot of money can do any good:

If I gave you $1 million, could you do something good for your community, without wasting a penny? (Most people answer yes or probably).
How about if I gave you $10 million? (Most people realize that it's a little harder to track this much money)
How about if I gave you $1 billion? (There are plenty of examples of how hard it is to insert this much money into a community to help them. Usually it results in unintended consequences like what happens to lottery winners).

Oh, and here's an interesting report from Copenhagen

Black Body Radiation and Global Warming

Here's a quiz:

You hear about a new band called "Black Body Radiation" and you think:
a) Just another rock band with meaningless long names like "Red Hot Chili Peppers", "Bare Naked Ladies", "Stone Temple Pilot", "Nine Inch Nails"
b) A racially motivated name
c) A name based on some obscure sexual innuendo
d) A name created by science nerds

The answer of course would be d). Any other answer would be an amazing coincidence.

I remember learning about "Black Body Radiation" and scratching my head at the name. Surprising I ended up spending 10 years of my career focused primarily on this subject. So what is it?

First, I need to explain how things heat up.

1. Touch something hot (also called "conduction"). The heat moves from the hot thing to the thing touching it.
2. Blow hot air (also called "convection"). This is where the convection oven gets its name.
   
3. Stand by the radiator (also called "radiation"). Invisible light called thermal or "infrared" radiation is put off by warm objects. This is where "Black Body Radiation" comes in.

The hotter an object, the more thermal radiation it puts out. You can test this by putting your hand close to your face with your eyes closed. Without touching your face, you can feel the heat from your hand. This is the radiation part of "Black Body Radiation".

If I take two pieces of metal and polish one to a mirror finish and paint the other with black paint, the black piece will feel hotter if I put my hand near it (without touching). This is the "Black Body" part since its black and any thing solid is called a "body". The reason scientists like "black bodies" is because then they can use mathematical formulas to figure out exactly how much energy is being radiated.

Here's an online calculator (Not the best).

Another interesting thing that happens as things heat up is that the "peak" of the thermal energy gets closer to visible light. The first color is a red, thus the term "red hot". As it gets hotter, it gets orange, then yellow. Here's an online viewer for the color of hot objects. As you slide the temperature back and forth you can see how the color goes from black (invisible radiation) to various colors. The temperature input is in Kelvin. If you want to convert it, type "convert 500 K to F" in google and it will do it for you).

A 1 sq. ft plate (black of course) at room temperature (70 F) emits (puts out) about 12.5 Watts.

To double the energy emitted from the plate to 25 Watts, the temperature has to be 170 F (40 degrees below boiling).

To equal a 100 Watt light bulb, you would have to heat the 1 sq ft plate to 430 F and it will start to glow a faint red. This is just below the 451 F required to burn books! (Just ask Ray Bradbury).

A wall (at room temperature) 8 ft tall and 10 feet long would put out 1000 Watts. In a room 10 ft by 10 ft (4 walls, floor and ceiling), 8500 Watts are being emitted! That's equal to 85 100 Watt light bulbs.

Now for Global Warming. The earth emits from its surface roughly 100,000,000,000,000,000 (100,000 trillion) Watts. If the earth heats up just 1 degree F, it will emit an additional 600 trillion Watts. What that means is the earth is losing this energy, or in other words the cooling power is almost the same as the CO2 greenhouse effect.

More on this later.

Eat to Live

I remember one summer my parents decided our family was going to go on a "fruit fast". I guess they hadn't invented the word "vegan" yet. We ate fruits and vegetables, not meat, and maybe some whole grains. My parents both claimed they felt wonderful. I remember being very hungry, though it was nice breaking the sugar addiction.

This memory came flashing back two weeks ago when my wife came home from visiting friends and introduced me to Joel Fuhrman's book "Eat to Live". It sounded a lot like my childhood "fruit fast", and since it made my parents feel better, I figured it might work for me.

I started reading the book the same time we started the diet and found it convincing. I tried to find critics of "Eat to Live" and the only critics I could find where on a forum at a Low Carb website (Adtkin's Dieters who love their meat).

I was enjoying our new diet and started losing some of my midsection (I went from 201 lbs to 196) while my wife, who was more interested in losing weight (along with the health benefits) GAINED 4 lbs. I couldn't believe anyone could gain weight on this diet.

After she visited a doctor, we are on a new diet. We'll keep eating healthier but include more protein. My wife has already lost 5 lbs. in less than a week.

This all leaves me a little puzzled trying to reconcile the research that Dr. Fuhrman presented. He made a very convincing argument that eating food derived from animals (meat, milk , eggs, cheese, etc.) resulted in higher incidents of heart disease, diabetes, cancer, etc.

I still need to read How to Lie with Statistics, but I'm guessing there is something related here. What I want to understand is whether eating meat is like playing Russian Roulette, if you eat it you have a greater chance of dying? or whether it depends more on your genetic makeup whether or not you should eat meat.

Either way, I heard a very compelling argument for the "Eat to Live" lifestyle. Basically, it is more sustainable, since every pound of meat takes 50 to 100 pounds of food (from plants). Therefore, a meat based diet takes 50-100 times as much water and produces a lot of nasty waste. I would think that the Global Warming, Anthropogenic Climate Change zealots would adopt "Eat to Live" as part of their morality.

A final note: The 50-100 pounds of food making one pound of meat is reason that we don't eat carnivores (Lions, etc.), since every pound of Lion takes 50-100 lbs of meat, which takes 50-100 pounds of plants. In other words, 1 pound of carnivore takes 2,500 to 10,000 lbs of plants. It's just not economical.

"Global Warm This..."

In a recent post I told about the upcoming 2009 International Conference on Climate Change. It happened last week. From the Heartland Institute website it says:

The world’s largest-ever gathering of global warming skeptics took place in New York City on March 8-10, 2009, to confront the issue, “Global warming: Was it ever really a crisis?”

About 800 scientists, economists, legislators, policy activists, and media representatives attended the event...

I followed this up with my blog post on Global Warming. This is my second official Global Warming posting.

I titled it "Global Warm This..." as a response to the GW hysteria.

Here are some silly facts:

• Using Google increases Global Warming [1]
  
• Divorce increases Global Warming [2]
  
• Compact Fluorescent Light (CFL) Bulbs help Global Warming but are bad for the environment (If you break one, it could cost $2000 to clean up the spilled mercury)[3]
  
• Fat people are bad for the environment[4]
  

And now you can really commit yourself to helping the environment!!!

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Global Warming and Computer Models

I have no expertise in the science of climatology, so I really can't do more than regurgitate my favorite facts and figures. There is already enough regurgitation on this topic.

I do have over a decade of experience with scientific computer models. I'll share some of my observations and let you draw your own conclusions. A key to reading this is that if you come across technical mumbo-jumbo, just read it as "bla bla bla". I'm only including the technical descriptions to provide some legitimacy.

What is a scientific computer model?

A scientific computer model is different from Hollywood special effects or video games in that it needs to do more than just look cool. It needs to take inputs and provide outputs that can be verified by real world measurements.

Validation

My first experience with modeling was at the Center for Laser Studies at the University of Southern California. We were trying to develop optical switches and were experimenting with semiconductor quantum well structures (Remember, you can read this as "bla bla bla"). I created a software model of the quantum wells using Airy's functions. Hughes Malibu Research labs fabricated thin films of alternating layers of GaAs/AlGaAs to create the quantum wells. We used one laser for the signal and another as the switch. We took data and compared the results. I felt good about the agreement between theory and measurement even though it wasn't perfect (since the model couldn't possibly include all variables).

Professional Courtesy

Many professions have a different standard when judging themselves. Police don't give other police officers tickets. I worked in a Physics lab in graduate school and my adviser said that all scientists should support superconducting super colliders (even if you think they are a waste of money, like I do) since "Money for science is hard to come by and we should support any money spent on science". How many scientists support the theory of Global Warming? More importantly, why?

Management Substitutes Money for Brains

There's a joke about the junior scientist assigned to use a computer model. He's asked by the lead scientist how the model is and he calls it:
"A bunch of crap!!!"
The lead scientist realizes that he can't say crap to his boss so he calls it
"Cow manure"
His boss realizes he can't say manure to the director, so he calls it
"Fertilizer"
The director can't say "fertilizer" to the board of directors, so he says
"The new computer model promotes growth"

I started my first real job in the Infrared/Visual/Acoustics group and we were modeling the infrared or "heat" signature of the Stealth Bomber. My first job was to learn and use the CAVITY computer model. The tailpipe on the airplane was designed so that you couldn't see the hot turbine engine, however some of the radiating heat would reflect out. We weren't confident in the model so we tried a geometry with 500, 1000, 1500 polygons and got different results every time. Our management said "Get a bigger computer. Try 5000 and 10000 polygons to make it work". Or in other words, throw money at it. My mentor, with his PhD in Physics, had a better idea. We used a box of 5 polygons. We could perform hand calculations and compare the results. This I did and discovered a bug in CAVITY. Basically, they got the rows and columns mixed up in a matrix operation. When we fixed it, it worked great. We ran it with 500, 1000, 1500 polygons and they all basically agreed.

PhDs are always right, even when their wrong

My next assignment was to develop the Infrared Workstation to model and analyze flight test data. Part of our contract was to validate our models with flight test data so that they could be used for difficult to test points (i.e., Subarctic Winter Night). Many methods were used to get carefully calibrated data. I determined the conditions of the flight test and with our models generated synthetic images to compare to the real data. For the most part there was good agreement. The problems were at grazing angles (Think of putting your eye against the wall or table. As you look along it, it appears more reflective then looking straight at the surface). The reflectance provided by our lab was measured at the wrong angles. I pointed this out to the PhD lab director (One of the smartest people I have ever met). He disputed that his results were 99.99% accurate. I replied that they were wrong for what we were modeling. He replied "Of Course, but they are still 99.99% right). This PhD had to be right.

Garbage In, Garbage Out

I traveled all over the U.S. attending infrared modeling conferences: Austin TX, Colorado Springs & Boulder Colorado, Tennessee, Rome New York, Massachusetts, Dayton OH, etc. State of the art modeling techniques were presented at these conferences. An unconventional presentation was given at one meeting. The Air Force wanted to see if they could get the same results using non-experts running the models. The results were discouraging. Two people with the same training got different results.

Pick Your Inputs, Pick Your Results

Later, I was assigned to a new program. Each program had a specification, or numbers you would have to meet for certain conditions. For example, "The airplane shall have a MWIR signature of less than 45 Watts from a front looking aspect at a Mid-Latitude Summer Day standard atmospheric condition."

We struggled with the design for weeks to get into spec, but with no luck. Then the Air Force changed the spec to use the "1976 Standard Atmosphere" instead of "Mid-Latitude Summer Day" ). We reran the model and everything was in spec!!! Good news for us unless they decide to arbitrarily change the model back. You can really influence the outputs based on assumptions for the inputs. Unfortunately we didn't have control of these inputs.

Modeling Instability

My mentor told me about the famous "Butterfly Effect". Basically, someone was running a long simulation and something happened that made them want to repeat the results. They looked back through the reams of paper and used the numbers for an earlier time to restart the model. At first both runs agreed. Then they started deviating drastically. After scratching their heads for a while, they figured that the numbers on the printout were slightly different that what was in the computer. They surmised that this was the equivalent of a butterfly flapping it's wings in the U.S. which then results in a monsoon in China months later.

Most recently I worked with flight control engineers who were designing a new simulation. Some of the modeled flight paths were physically impossible. When we finally fixed the flight code and simulation, the aircraft behaved as expected. Running a simulation over a long period magnifies greatly any errors. The "Butterfly Effect" is NOT a tool for a brilliant, mad scientist to take over the world with highly trained butterflies. Instead, the "Butterfly Effect" reveals instabilities in complex models.

This was my experience. I'm sure none of these things have happened while using models to prove Global Warming ;-)