Two New Books Confirm Global Warming is Natural; Not Caused By Human Activity

The Wigley 1993 reference might be useful here. Ask and Google shall giveth:

Balancing the carbon budget. Implications for projections of future carbon dioxide concentration changes

First note: makes a deal about the so-called "missing carbon sink". My recollection is that this has been better quantified since 1993, and though there's still a gap, it's only abou 15-20%, not like 50% in the 1980s. I think they nailed more boreal forest CO2 uptake than expected for part of the reduction.

Second note: I think that the question can be related to to a (dastardly simple) kitchen sink model of atmospheric CO2 concentrations. Imagine a nearly-full sink where the water is pouring in from the faucet and the drain is open. The flow from the faucet has been adjusted such that the level of the water in the sink is not changing at all.

On the kitchen counter, you have a five gallon bucket of water colored red with food coloring. You start to add water from the bucket into the sink. Questions: what will happen to the level of the water in the sink, and what will happen to the color of the water in the sink?

Answer to question 1: the level of water in the sink will rise. What is responsible for the rise? Answer: the water being added from the bucket is entirely, 100%, totally responsible for the rising level of water in the sink.

Answer to question 2: the water in the sink will slowly get redder. But because the red water being added is mixing with the much larger volume of water in the sink, it will take considerable time for the water to get appreciably red. So even though the water being added from the bucket is 100% responsible for the increase in the level in the sink, it's only a small part of the total amount of water in the sink. So a small measured dilution effect can indicate a much more significant change. Right?

If we imagine that the sink is the atmosphere, the water from the faucet is the CO2 flux from the ocean (and other places). [Noting that current measurements indicate that the ocean is a net CO2 sink, a point that I'm not sure drrocket has addressed.*] drrocket appears to be indicating that even though we're obviously adding water from the bucket (anthropogenic CO2 emissions), the reason that the water in the sink (atmospheric CO2 concentrations) is rising is that the flow rate from the faucet (natural oceanic flux) is increasing.

Right?

* I tried to get some of the Pieter Tans et al. references to support this (there are several), but they are all in Science or Nature.

This appears to be the stock, AGW comparison of the Keeling data with the Vostok record. The maximum recorded in the Vostok ice cores is about 298.7 ppmv.

Actually, I was thinking EPICA.

There are bigger problems. Vostok is surrounded by the cold ocean sink for CO2. Mauna Loa is in or near a CO2 chimney. It is located near a warm ocean source, and is down wind from the vast and intense west equatorial Pacific outgassing of CO2. The Vostok CO2 concentration should be markedly less than the Mauna Loa record. Reading the TAR, the climatologists do not seem to have made the calculation, and instead rely on the assumption that CO2 is well-mixed globally.

It is incumbent on you to show evidence indicating otherwise, if you think that assumption is a problem. Let me ask this: if CO2 was not well-mixed, would the Keeling curve show annual variability related to the annual boreal spring/summer uptake of CO2 by northern deciduous forests? Would the Keeling curve have shown a three-year response to the Pinatubo eruption if CO2 was not well-mixed?

Back to first principles: does part of your presentation rely on an assumption that the increase in atmospheric CO2 since about 1850 is predominantly due to an increase in the natural flux from oceans to atmosphere due to warming oceans?

Are you aware of the cooler period of 30 or so years before the 1970's?

The 1930s were a particularly warm decade. There was a cooling trend from that decade through the 1970s and early 1980s. Then things have been warming up.

You forgot to mention that. Increased sun spot activity since then?

There hasn't been a significant increase in sunspot activity since then. We've had the basic "11-year" cycle.

The thickening of Antarctic ice on most of the continent? Bet you are real good at ignoring this.

The central Antarctic has exhibited a fairly strong decoupling from global climate trends. But note that warmer oceans put more moisture into the atmosphere, which will convert to snow over cold regions.

Moving on -- A scientist I trust more than anyone else on this planet works in a complex with three labs whose goal is to convince the public of GW being man-made.

Why do you trust him so much?

Stop drinking the kool-aid. You'll freeze your tongue off (tongue in cheek). Or are you being paid to push the GW BS here on FR???

If I was I'd have a lot more money than I have now. My motivation is to try to improve the basic knowledge of FReepers who have gotten erroneous information from many other sources, so that some of them might possible be able to have an informed opinion. That's why I try to concentrate on the scientific issues.

1. cogitator asks, “Underlined section interpreted as indicating that the observed increase in atmospheric CO2 is not primarily due to anthropogenic sources. Yes or no?” In context, the underlined section is

>>Another AGW tenet is that the buildup of CO2 in the Mauna Loa Record is an accumulation of CO2 throughout the brunt of the industrial era. To make that accumulation viable, AGW advocates claim the duration of CO2 in the atmosphere is a century or more.

>>To the extent that the mean residence time of CO2 is less than a century, THE BUILD UP MUST BE FROM OTHER SOURCES. Others have claimed the residence time is the order of five years or less, and that appears to be supported by their calculations of the total concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere and the flux into the biosphere and especially the ocean. With such short CO2 persistence, the AGW conjecture needs shoring up with a new rationale for the 150 year growth in CO2. Underscore capitalized, http://www.rocketscientistsjournal.com/2006/11/gavin_schmidt_on_the_acquittal.html.

Impliedly, the increase is attributed by AGW peers to industrialization, i.e., is anthropogenic.

Also by implication, cogitator tries to establish a contradiction by relying on the calculated isotopic fraction he discusses next. Proof by rubbing.

2. What is the accuracy in measuring the various isotopes of C and O? Are the errors correlated between different isotopes? What is the sensitivity to temperature? What is the resulting error in the fractions? Without this information, conclusions cannot be drawn from the isotopic data.

Always beware of a parameter calculated as the ratio of noisy variables! They can have very poor characteristics, including instability and divergence. For example and in particular, consider the following:

>>The effective isotopic signatures of various processes calculated by either the Keeling plot approach or theoretically differ widely from the known d13C of the source and are very often indistinguishable in the light of the uncertainties. A back calculation from well distinct fluctuations in pCO2 and d13C to identify their origin using the Keeling plot approach seems not possible. Fischer et al., Use and abuse of Keeling plots in paleoatmospheric research: What can we learn from ±13CO2 in polar ice cores? 4/2/06. http://web.awi-bremerhaven.de/Publications/Fis2006d.pdf

3. You wrote, “This 14C decline cannot be explained by a CO2 source in the terrestrial vegetation or soils.” That still leaves the ocean and subsurface as possible sources, and not just man.

4. All plants do not have the same isotopic carbon preference as implied in your next to last paragraph. Biologists divide the plants into classes called pathways, designated for example as C3 in photosynthesis and C4 for tropical and marsh grasses, with marine processes overlapping.

5. You say, “Indeed, the 13C fractions in the atmosphere and ocean surface waters declined over the past decades. This fits a fossil fuel CO2 source and argues against a dominant oceanic CO2 source.” Is your point the following from the TAR?

>>The amount of carbon dioxide, for example, has increased by more than 30% since pre-industrial times and is still increasing at an unprecedented rate of on average 0.4% per year, mainly due to the combustion of fossil fuels and deforestation. We know that this increase is anthropogenic because the changing isotopic composition of the atmospheric CO2 betrays the fossil origin of the increase.

So what? BTW, is the 30% figure based on ice core data?

First, what is calculated is not the isotopic fraction of the increase, but of samples allegedly representative of the whole CO2 reservoir in the atmosphere.

Second, suppose the entire atmospheric reservoir were replaced by fresh ACO2 in any time period you might choose. What does that have to do with global warming?

Third, why don’t you use the rate of total CO2 increase and the rate of 14C decrease and compute the relative concentration of ACO2 in the atmospheric reservoir? That might be interesting for the carbon cycle, but still irrelevant to global warming.

6. You quote the following

>>The natural source is dominantly the oceans. CO2 concentration has increased because the oceans are warming, and have been since the Little Ice Age and since the last glacial period.

to ask

>>Please discuss the statement above with regard to the 13C isotope data indicating that increasing atmospheric CO2 is predominantly of anthropogenic origin, not oceanic ("natural").

First, as shown in the Acquittal of Carbon Dioxide, during the paleo period the natural source of CO2 was solely the oceans. We assume that the laws of physics are invariant, so it should be true today.

Second, global warming is apparent, and the natural efflux of CO2 from the oceans should be increasing due to an invariant solubility relationship.

Third, I remain skeptical that the data show what you claim, especially without quantifying “predominantly”. You don’t measure the 13C isotope of the increase, but something between a regional concentration and the whole atmospheric reservoir. Where is calculation that takes you from the domain of the measurements to the increase?

Try calculating, on an order of magnitude basis, the mass of pure sulfuric acid that would be reqired to change the PH of the worlds oceans by even .001%.

I brought up ocean acidification because we've all heard of the problem of acid rain from coal plants altering the PH of lakes.

I've read that aerosols precipitate out of the atmosphere much faster than CO2 "sinks" (carbon sinks), so we would have to continuously pump sulfur...

The sulfur would increase the acidification of the oceans, which some say already suffer from CO2-caused acidification.

In fact the greater threat from CO2 might stem not from global warming, but from ocean acidification.

"The 1930s were a particularly warm decade. There was a cooling trend from that decade through the 1970s and early 1980s. Then things have been warming up."

You are right. I expect the cycle to continue with things to start cooling down again within a decade IMHO.

"There hasn't been a significant increase in sunspot activity since then. We've had the basic "11-year" cycle."

Yes, but we are also reaching the end of a more significant 60 year cycle that may be the highest level in the last 1000 years. However, I don't consider this to be incontestable fact.

"The central Antarctic has exhibited a fairly strong decoupling from global climate trends. But note that warmer oceans put more moisture into the atmosphere, which will convert to snow over cold regions."

So you agree. Most GW propagandists only refer to the peninsula or the western part, while ignoring the majority of the continent. As a whole it looks like the continent is gaining more ice than it's losing.

"Why do you trust him so much?"

I've known him my whole life and he's the rare breed of modern person/scientist that has integrity, always tries to be honest and cannot be bribed on any scientific issue. His life is dedicated to exposing the scientific truths others hide, ignore, obscure or just don't have the brain power to see. He's also a one-in-a-million genius. I was rated in the lower end of the genius scale on IQ tests, but compared to him, I'm an idiot and so is everyone else I know. He's spent most of his scientific life exposing errors in scientific reasoning. His biggest beef right now is that there is an epidemic of science using faulty premises that are assumed fact. When a scientist presents a paper where the first 'fact' is wrong, the paper is a joke. I just talked to him the other night and he was exposing a fraudulent paper that was based another 'peer reviewed' paper that has since been proven to be wrong. He deals with this all the time and says this error is increasing dramatically in the science community. Peer review in the GW community means other like-minded scientists sign off on a paper when they agree with the conclusion without testing or analyzing the 'facts' to obtain that conclusion. To review a paper one must look to disprove it. The GW scientists do not do this. Ergo FRAUD!

"My motivation is to try to improve the basic knowledge of FReepers who have gotten erroneous information from many other sources, so that some of them might possible be able to have an informed opinion. That's why I try to concentrate on the scientific issues."

Then you should present all the facts, not just what fits your beliefs. You also might want to double check your sources for erroneous info. My friend would suggest you quintuple check. You seem more knowledgeable, reasonable and well read that most all others pushing the GW caused by man theory, so you should be able to double check your sources.

What do you think about CO2 from volcanoes versus the level of man's output?

What do you think about the period 700-1000 years ago that was warmer than today, yet man was not putting industrialized CO2 into the atmosphere? This alone makes me a major skeptic. There are many other reasons to doubt also.

The worst thing of all in my mind is not the faulty/selective science, but the ulterior motive of using it to install a socialist society in the USA where our freedoms are eroded, the economy is damaged and the government gains more and more power over our lives. You know a nanny state. GW is the socialist/communist dream come true. You should be absolutely sure of what you present when you are helping these a-holes. "Just the facts ma'am" as Joe Friday would say. You should also look into some of the bios of those that started a lot of the environmental organizations. Many have direct ties to the Communist Party USA. The ACLU (#1 on my evil list) was also started by communists. Read 'The Naked Communist' from the early 60's. It has a list of communist goals. One being using environmental groups to harm America's economy. When you are siding with anti-Americans you'd better check your sources VERY seriously.

If you really want a dialogue, we must concentrate on one or two issues at a time. I have only a limited amount of time to respond here, and I can't answer 100 questions in every post.

Another AGW tenet is that the buildup of CO2 in the Mauna Loa Record is an accumulation of CO2 throughout the brunt of the industrial era. To make that accumulation viable, AGW advocates claim the duration of CO2 in the atmosphere is a century or more.

See my analogy posted earlier. The increase is almost entirely due to anthropogenic CO2, because that is the only CO2 flux to the atmosphere sufficiently large to counter the CO2 fluxes from the atmosphere. A huge number of measurements indicate that the oceans are a net carbon sink (start HERE and you might also figure out where Hawaii really is on that plot). The carbon isotope measurements fully support this (the observed Suess effects are consistent with the isotopic signature of fossil fuel CO2 emissions AND the amount of these emissions).

Also by implication, cogitator tries to establish a contradiction by relying on the calculated isotopic fraction he discusses next. Proof by rubbing. 2. What is the accuracy in measuring the various isotopes of C and O? Are the errors correlated between different isotopes? What is the sensitivity to temperature? What is the resulting error in the fractions? Without this information, conclusions cannot be drawn from the isotopic data.

You can read a multitude of papers that have established this technique in the determination of carbon fluxes in paleoclimate studies, modern climate studies, oceanography, land biosphere, etc. to get the answers to your questions. Such procedures are performed with instruments like mass spectrometers, and can be performed with high accuracy.

And what contradiction are you talking about?

Your reference refers to the use of isotopic ratios for the investigation of paleoclimate fluxes; the application to the modern era is more straightforward because the fluxes can be estimated directly from the measurements rather than inferred from the model.

3. You wrote, “This 14C decline cannot be explained by a CO2 source in the terrestrial vegetation or soils.” That still leaves the ocean and subsurface as possible sources, and not just man.

I didn't write that. Perhaps there are other sources, which is why I provided the next reference, where the abstract concludes with "Model calculations indicate that in 1950 industrial CO2 emissions are responsible for at least 85% of the delta C-14 decline, whereas natural variability accounts for the remaining 15%."

5. You say, “Indeed, the 13C fractions in the atmosphere and ocean surface waters declined over the past decades. This fits a fossil fuel CO2 source and argues against a dominant oceanic CO2 source.” Is your point the following from the TAR?

I believe that the TAR paragraph may refer to both 14C and 13C/12 C.

So what? BTW, is the 30% figure based on ice core data?

So... if you're insisting that the current increasing CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere are due to outgassing from warmer oceans, you're wrong. And you also need to read Sigman and Boyle 2000, "Glacial/interglacial variations in atmospheric carbon dioxide". Forgive me if you've read it already, it doesn't appear that you have.

And Vostok isn't the only ice core ever drilled.

First, what is calculated is not the isotopic fraction of the increase, but of samples allegedly representative of the whole CO2 reservoir in the atmosphere.

The isotopic ratios in either living samples (tree rings) or actual atmospheric measurements are being examined.

Second, suppose the entire atmospheric reservoir were replaced by fresh ACO2 in any time period you might choose. What does that have to do with global warming?

If the concentrations remained the same, nothing. The issue is what's causing the concentration to increase.

Third, why don’t you use the rate of total CO2 increase and the rate of 14C decrease and compute the relative concentration of ACO2 in the atmospheric reservoir? That might be interesting for the carbon cycle, but still irrelevant to global warming.

The issue is what is causing the increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration since the mid-1800s.

First, as shown in the Acquittal of Carbon Dioxide, during the paleo period the natural source of CO2 was solely the oceans. We assume that the laws of physics are invariant, so it should be true today.

Notwithstanding the huge amounts of fossil fuel CO2 emissions? So is it truly your position that natural CO2 fluxes are so large that the contribution of mankind's activities (primarily combustion of fossil fuels) is negligible?

Second, global warming is apparent, and the natural efflux of CO2 from the oceans should be increasing due to an invariant solubility relationship.

That's why you have to read Sigman and Boyle 2000. Bulletin: Increasing ocean temperatures during glacial/interglacial transitions could only be responsible for at most 10% of the observed increase in CO2. The amount of ocean warming since the mid-1800s is not even close to enough to provide the amount of CO2 increase observed. But all the other data is consistent with the amount of CO2 produced by fossil fuel burning in that period.

Third, I remain skeptical that the data show what you claim, especially without quantifying “predominantly”. You don’t measure the 13C isotope of the increase, but something between a regional concentration and the whole atmospheric reservoir. Where is calculation that takes you from the domain of the measurements to the increase?

The measurement is made on atmospheric and ocean water samples. The change in the ratio (speaking of stable carbon here, i.e., 13C/12C) is a function of the increase and indicative of the source.

Feel free to respond; I will be unable to respond again until tomorrow.

You are right. I expect the cycle to continue with things to start cooling down again within a decade IMHO.

It'd be great if you were right. I don't expect you to be.

Yes, but we are also reaching the end of a more significant 60 year cycle that may be the highest level in the last 1000 years. However, I don't consider this to be incontestable fact.

Good, considering that the observed warming isn't correlated with increasing numbers of sunspots.

As a whole it looks like the continent is gaining more ice than it's losing.

And that's not inconsistent with a trend in warmer sea surface temperatures around Antarctica.

(your next part was read without comment)

What do you think about CO2 from volcanoes versus the level of man's output?

Gases: Man versus the Volcanoes

Volcanic Gases (just to show I double check)

What do you think about the period 700-1000 years ago that was warmer than today, yet man was not putting industrialized CO2 into the atmosphere? This alone makes me a major skeptic.

Solar activity then was about the same as today, and it was lower in between (Maunder Minimum/Little Ice Age). The jury is out -- and of course you don't like the Hockey Stick -- as to whether it was actually warmer or about the same as the 20th century, up to the last 15-20 years.

You should be absolutely sure of what you present when you are helping these a-holes.

Reducing ignorance and addressing bad science should help anyone that wants the truth.

Thanks, now I need a drink.

I'm confused, does this mean we are still doomed?

My countdown ticker's still got 7 hours left, but that drink iza coming!

What do you think of the threat of ocean acidification from CO2? Elizabeth Kolbert wrote in the New Yorker that it threatens the very basis of most ocean life.

The tiny plankton have soft shells that have started to dissolve from increased ocean acidity due to more CO2 in the oceans, so the story goes.

Perhaps a more measurable and dire threat than global warming.

What do you think of the threat of ocean acidification from CO2?

It's a significant area of concern.

The tiny plankton have soft shells that have started to dissolve from increased ocean acidity due to more CO2 in the oceans, so the story goes.

The plankton groups that would be affected are those that form their shells out of CaCO3 (calcium carbonate). Diatoms, which are siliceous, are probably OK. But corals would also be affected.

"Reducing ignorance and addressing bad science should help anyone that wants the truth."

I agree with you here.

cogitator’s Citations

In your recent posts, you linked to three documents as if they supported your writing. They don’t, and here’s why.

1. Coker, Rory, “Distinguishing Science and Pseudoscience”. http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/pseudo.html

You refused to defend your charge in post 171 that my work is “pure pseudoscience at its best”. You would not define pseudoscience, nor state the factors you perceive in my work by which you reached your conclusion. As a result, any reader would be quite unable to verify your accusation.

In post 171, you linked to a 1/30/05 paper by Coker posted on Quackwatch, “Your Guide to Quackery, Health Fraud, and Intelligent Decisions”. The paper is entitled “Distinguishing Science and Pseudoscience”. It contains a rambling discussion of pseudoscience as perceived by the author, lumped into 22 non-exclusive categories. You refused the opportunity to show how my paper fit even one of those categories. The paper itself is scientifically worthless as it fails to defined either science or pseudoscience, and is all concluionary. Science begins with language and the definitions of terms. No scientist would rely on such a work.

If you need a good defintion of science, you might be able to find my out-of-print book, Evolution in Science, Hollowbrook, New Hampshire, 1992 in a local library. It answers that question in full. (Watch for this book to be posted on my blog this year.)

2. Sigman, D. M. & E. A. Boyle, Glacial/interglacial variations in atmospheric carbon dioxide, Nature, Vol 407, 10/19/00, 859-869. http://www.geosc.psu.edu/Courses/Geosc320/Sigman.pdf

You cited Sigman & Boyle when asked what was your basis for quoting the frequently claimed 30% increase in CO2. On that subject, Climate Change 2001 says,

>> The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has risen from close to 280 parts per million (ppm) in 1800, at first slowly and then progressively faster to a value of 367 ppm in 1999, echoing the increasing pace of global agricultural and industrial development. This is known from numerous, well-replicated measurements of the composition of air bubbles trapped in Antarctic ice. P. 187.

In case you missed it, this says the increase is a comparison of Mauna Loa data with polar data! Furthermore, necessary to this logic is that the CO2 is well-mixed, or at least that polar measurements may be intermixed with tropical! This is as weak as the well-mixed argument.

The IPCC also says,

>>East-west gradients of atmospheric CO2 concentration are an order of magnitude smaller than north-south gradients. Climate Change 2001, p. 185

This observation about ill-mixed CO2 is never resolved in the Report. The north-south gradient is caused by the sinks at the polls and the sources at the equator. As I wrote to you, Keeling warned against reliance on two sets of measurements where either is near a sink or a source. In this case, both are.

Regardless, the Sigman paper doesn’t seem to support your reliance on an 1850 concentration in any way and so doesn’t answer the question.

On the plus side, Sigman makes one valuable and most significant point for the Global Climate model. That is on page 862 where he formulates the dissolution process in sea water by the following two lines of equations:

>> CO2(gas) <--> CO2(aqueous)

>> <--> H2CO3 <--> H[+] + HCO3[-] <--> 2H[+] + CO3[2-]

The first equation is the physical uptake CO2 from the atmosphere into solution. The second string of reactions are chemical, taking place in the ocean. As shown, they occur not from CO2 available in the atmosphere, but from CO2 in aqueous solution. Aqueous CO2, not gaseous CO2, is the reservoir for the chemical processes.

To the contrary, the IPCC says, “CaCO3 … takes up CO2 from the atmosphere in a 1:1 ratio.” P. 189. And it omits the first equation above from its Figure 3.1(c), p. 188.

The IPCC says, however, that dissolved, non-ionic CO2 in the surface sea water is “about 1%” of the total Dissolved Inorganic Carbon (DIC). Interpretting Figure 3.1 (a), the total DIC is 38,000 PgC, so 1% to one significant figure would be about 380 PgC or a range of 190 PgC to 570 PgC. The same Figure 3.1 places the total atmospheric carbon at 730 PgC. These numbers do not suggest a bottleneck in uptake by solubility.

Nevertheless, the IPCC reported

>>Uptake of anthropogenic CO2 by the ocean is primarily governed by ocean circulation and carbonate chemistry. The fraction of anthropogenic CO2 that is taken up by the ocean declines with increasing CO2 concentration, due to reduced buffer capacity of the carbonate system. Climate Change 2001, p. 185.

This statement and conclusion replace the physical solubility pump with a chemical reaction between the atmosphere and the ocean’s carbonate chemistry. Instead, the solubility pump is a validated model for the physical exchange of a gas between the atmosphere and water. The carbonate chemistry operates within the water, on the aqueous CO2 in solution, as modeled by the two lines of equations.

The flux model is important because, as shown by David Archer in numerous publications, the chemical reaction is extremely slow. Archer calls himself a computational ocean chemist, and he is a contributor to Climate Change 2001 and to RealClimate.org, a cite that openly promotes AGW. But Archer concludes that the residence time of carbon in the atmosphere is between 30 and 35 kyears. (Climate Change 2001 is more circumspect, but seems to suggest 5 kyears. See ¶3.2.3.2, p. 199.) Archer has wrongly presumed that the reaction is between CaCO3 and CO2(gas) when it’s actually between CaCO3 and CO2(aqueous)! Therein lies a contribution by Sigman.

On the other hand, Sigman is in the company of a large number of climatologists who carelessly express partial pressure in the units of concentration (ppm or ppmv). This is off–putting to the reader versed in physics. Climate Change 2001 makes clear that the units of pressure or partial pressure are Pascals, bars, or millimeters of mercury (mmHg). Pp. 869-870. But it violates its own rule, as in

>>[T]he equilibrium pCO2 in seawater increases by about 10 to 20 ppm per °C temperature increase. Climate Change 2001, p. 200.

and just to be sure of the definition of pCO2, we have “the partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2)” on p. 199.

A relationship will exist between partial pressure of CO2 and its concentration in the atmosphere because, as shown in the Acquittal of Carbon Dioxide, the natural concentration is determined by the solubility pump. As is well known, solubility varies with temperature and partial pressure.

Climatologists need to straighten out their units and dimensions before they will be able to implement CO2 correctly as a feedback.

3. Feely, R. A., C. L. Sabine, T. Takahashi, R. Wanninkhof, Distribution of the Climatological Mean Net Sea-air CO2 Flux, in Uptake and Storage of Carbon Dioxide in the Ocean: The Global CO2 Survey, 2001. http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/pubs/outstand/feel2331/mean.shtml

You wrote,

>>The increase is almost entirely due to anthropogenic CO2, because that is the only CO2 flux to the atmosphere sufficiently large to counter the CO2 fluxes from the atmosphere. A huge number of measurements indicate that the oceans are a net carbon sink (start HERE and you might also figure out where Hawaii really is on that plot).

First, you are confused. Anthropogenic CO2 does not counter any other fluxes. There is no bottleneck, restriction, or competition between manmade and natural sources.

Perhaps your confusion stems from an erroneous analysis in the IPCC Third Assessment Report. It computes an annual budget for CO2 emissions (6.3 PgC), subtracts the atmosphere increase (3.2 PgC), and apportions the difference to the net uptake flux to the ocean and land. See Climate Change 2001,Table 3.1, p. 190. It concludes, “Currently the ocean and the land together are taking up about half of the anthropogenic CO2 emissions.” P. 7. The reliance on the net is clumsy modeling, but it is common in the AGW field.

Without some way to discriminate between natural and manmade CO2, there is no way for the uptake of CO2 to have one rate for natural CO2 and another for anthropogenic. The isotopic fraction and the preference some biological pathways have for one or another fraction is neither sufficient nor well enough developed to be said to be such a discriminant.

The IPCC says in the same Report that the atmosphere holds 730 PgC (p. 188), and that the annual uptake is 270 PgC to leaf water (p. 191), 120 PgC to photosynthesis (p. 191), and 90 PgC to the ocean (p. 188). That’s a total annual uptake of 480 PgC, or 66%.

The Report, however, omits the leaf water in its graphical representation of the “natural carbon cycle”. Figure 3.1(a), p. 188. If the leaf water is not included, the annual uptake according to the report is 210 PgC, or 29%.

The 50% analysis on the net basis (p. 7) doesn’t match the results using the IPCC uptake data as they are aggregated by the IPCC, which yield 29% and 66%.

Referring to Feely (2001) in post 207, you say that I “might also figure out where Hawaii really is on that plot”. You must be referring to the “Mean Annual Air-Sea Flux for 1995”. In fact that chart is the source of my claim in Post 200 that Mauna Loa sits in the chimney of a massive outgassing of CO2, while the ice core data are taken from an area surrounded by the deepest CO2 sink.

You falsely imply that I misplaced Hawaii on that chart.

The AGW conjecture is full of errors. This is a natural consequence of a deception.

About cogitator

cogitator posted a flimsy, unsupported attack on my papers posted on www.rocketscientistsjournal.com. That was his comment 171. I responded in post 178 putting about eight questions or challenges to him. He posted a lengthy response in the form of a rational dialog. It is categorical, organized as quotation/response, a style which cog uses with some regularity.

However the categorical appearance is misleading because cogitator doesn’t actually answer any of the matters put to him. He gives a hint of his upcoming nonresponsiveness in his opening paragraph of post 207 where he whines that he isn’t able to answer 100 questions in every post. So he answers approximately none.

cogitator’s pretends to be authoritative, but his style is attacking by flailing. His work includes snippettes of real science, plus citations which he does not quote, or quotes which he does not cite, each of which frequently proves tangential to the subjects. As a result, a response requires an investment in research to maintain a semblance of a dialog.

In post 171 addressed to palmer, cog says one of my main points was “utterly wrong”, and suggests it was obviously so. He refuses to defend that attack, or even state what he thought wrong. So one must search for what “main point” he means.

Here may be a clue. In post 177, palmer later says incorrectly, “Glassman’s main point is correct, that for the most part, CO2 lags temperature.” To the contrary, my main point is that the CO2 in the Vostok record is entirely represented by the solubility of CO2 in water, indicating that pre-man, CO2 was supplied by the oceans. Whether this is the best model is secondary to the problem it poses to climate modeling. For natural CO2, the model is obliged to produce a concentration record curved in relation to temperature as shown by the solubility curve. Otherwise, the model will not fit the data and it will be invalided. Thus in climatologists’ terms, natural CO2 is a feedback and not a forcing as they currently implement it. That is the main point.

Contrary to palmer’s reading, and as stated in my paper, the fact that CO2 lags temperature in the paleo record is confirming of the main point. To say it was decisive would be to place correlation above cause and effect. While this is the crux of the AGW conjecture, it is not good science.

More than once in post 207, cogitator says the issue is the cause of the increase in CO2 concentration. This is not so and is disruptive.

In my paper, the fact that the PALEO record is all natural is implicit. cog changed the subject by trying to establish that the increase seen in the MODERN record was manmade. He even failed in his diversion.

cog’s method was to rely on little extracts from papers on the isotopic ratio of carbon in atmospheric CO2. He implies by the placement of his citations that the isotopic ratio measurements are taken from the INCREASE in atmospheric CO2. No investigator makes a claim that the isotopic measurements are made from the increase in CO2, and indeed it would be quite impossible. When challenged on these points, cogitator says effortlessly, “what contradiction”, for all the world sounding like Dumb and Dumber. cog doesn’t want to be engaged on points.

In 171, cogitator complains of the “tone and attitude” of my work, saying it is “pure pseudoscience at its best”. He refused to defend that insult. In post 177, palmer follows suit with the stinging remark about my work, “Sure, his physics is weak”. palmer owes everyone an explanation. His remark appears to be a parroting of Gavin Schmidt’s unsupported accusation, which is fully rebutted on my blog.

Also in 171, cog asserted that Schmidt’s reference was to the physics of solar insolation! That, too, is false and unsupported, as I stated in 178 and which cog subsequently ignored. Neither Schmidt’s accusation nor my papers said anything about solar insolation.

Just as cog’s snippettes are vaguely relevant, so are his citations.

Conclusion

cogitator is able to construct reasonably coherent sentences and paragraphs on the subject of climatology, and they invite debate. He shows enough familiarity with the subject to give the appearance of a scientific literacy. However he lacks a scientist’s ability to argue.

He refuses to engage in the point/counterpoint of a dialog. He shows no ordinary, much less scientific, debating skills. His posts burden the readers with verbosity and tangential diversions. He is spring-loaded to recite AGW dogma. He cannot be pinged. Instead of helping the argument converge on issues or points of disagreement, his style is to cause the discussion to diverge in each response. In spite of a multiplicity of long posts, we have converged on nothing on the subject of climate. On climate and in this forum, cog is a virus.

Your previous two posts have a lot of material to consider. If I attempted to respond to all of it at once, my response post would be three times as long as yours. That's not reasonable or useful.

I don't care what you think of me. If you want to make progress, let's do it one step at a time. All of the issues you want to discuss are documented in your previous posts, and can be referenced and cited when necessary.

I need the answer to one question to get started:

Do you (or your thesis, if you prefer) contend that the observed increase in atmospheric CO2 concentrations commencing approximately 1850 A.D. (as seen in ice core data) is due entirely to degassing of CO2 from a warming oceanic water column?

I apologize for the flimsiness of my attack. If you want to go through it step-by-step, we can. It will take a while. I wouldn't want the discussion to "diverge".

Sorry, one other thing:

In fact that chart is the source of my claim in Post 200 that Mauna Loa sits in the chimney of a massive outgassing of CO2, while the ice core data are taken from an area surrounded by the deepest CO2 sink. ... You falsely imply that I misplaced Hawaii on that chart.

No, I figure you knew where it was. I place Hawaii at about 20 N Latitude, 160 W Longitude. That puts it in an area on the map that's light green or light blue. Those are indicative of areas with small negative fluxes (sink areas) or small positive fluxes (source areas). Most of the major source is in the eastern Pacific south of the Equator. So I'm not sure what you mean when you say "Mauna Loa sits in the chimney of a massive outgassing of CO2".

Sorry to ask about two issues at one time, but I was pretty sure I knew where Hawaii was on that plot.

Thank you for the courteous reply. You ask,

>>Do you (or your thesis, if you prefer) contend that the observed increase in atmospheric CO2 concentrations commencing approximately 1850 A.D. (as seen in ice core data) is due entirely to degassing of CO2 from a warming oceanic water column?

Ans.: No.

>>In fact that chart is the source of my claim in Post 200 that Mauna Loa sits in the chimney of a massive outgassing of CO2, while the ice core data are taken from an area surrounded by the deepest CO2 sink. ... You falsely imply that I misplaced Hawaii on that chart.

>>No, I figure you knew where it was. I place Hawaii at about 20 N Latitude, 160 W Longitude. That puts it in an area on the map that's light green or light blue. Those are indicative of areas with small negative fluxes (sink areas) or small positive fluxes (source areas). Most of the major source is in the eastern Pacific south of the Equator. So I'm not sure what you mean when you say "Mauna Loa sits in the chimney of a massive outgassing of CO2".

Ans.: My version of the chart was animated by month for 1990, so it had 12 different views. See for example http://ingrid.ldeo.columbia.edu/SOURCES/.LDEO/.Takahashi/.dataset_documentation.html. Run the animation and you’ll see large variations in the intense outgassing directly south and east of Hawaii. The Islands can be seen on this series as about a one pixel spec.

For my comments I also relied on descriptions of the atmospheric flow from the surface at the equator. The air initially rises, divides north and south, slowly heads poleward, and begins to cool. It appears to me that the heavier CO2-rich air should settle and feed the prevailing northeast trade winds that bathe Hawaii year round. All this is in lieu of any discovered analysis of the global CO2 pattern. After all, a massive amount of CO2 is emitted from the eastern Equatorial Pacific, and it has to go somewhere by some reasonable route.

In post 177, palmer follows suit with the stinging remark about my work, "Sure, his physics is weak". palmer owes everyone an explanation. His remark appears to be a parroting of Gavin Schmidt's unsupported accusation, which is fully rebutted on my blog.

Yes and no. I admit the remark was flippant and I should support it. But then I bashed the physics on both sides in this "debate". My comment was meant to be very general in that physicists tend to argue in static terms rather than be forced to model complex dynamic systems. Your own work, with all due respect, has the same weakness. You admit there is a complex ocean circulation that controls the uptake and release of CO2, you prove its existence, and you have strong arguments that it is the dominant flow of CO2. But you don't model it to show quantitative proof. Hence your arguments, while strong, are qualitative.

In the same way, as you state: "[i]n a stronger CO2 greenhouse climate it is hypothesized that the hydrologic cycle will intensify". Numerous physicists on the AGW side take this to mean warming will occur based on an average increase in water vapor. This is an unsupportable conclusion since an average water vapor can not be predicted or even measured. Anyone making a water vapor claim without making detailed models of weather is not going to obtain accurate quantitative results. To give one small example, tropical convection that is concentrated (localized) will produce negative feedback (a cooler climate) and weaker convection will warm the climate, all other things being equal. There is absolutely no way to determine cumulative feedback effect without models. Numerous claims are made to the contrary (e.g. http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/08/climate-feedbacks/) but they are rather spurious and look like a lot of cherry picking of positive feedbacks while ignoring negative ones.

A quick note about this forum, it is political, not scientific, so expect a lot of quick flippant answers like mine and not a lot of deep analysis. But we appreciate you coming here and giving us yours. And one quick question: what do you think of (admittedly very crude) measurements showing rises in oceanic CO2 (e.g. http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/ftp/cdiac140/cdiac140.pdf) table 8?

Thanks for your comments and replies.