[Vision2020] Bad Science

Sun Jan 1 17:03:16 PST 2006

Phil, Pat, John D. et. al.

I agree with John D. that it is questionable to imply the Science Magazine
article [*Science* (vol 310, p 1313)] referenced in a newspaper report "bad
science," if that is indeed what Phil intended.  He did not make it
perfectly clear if he thought the actual Science Magazine article in
question to be "bad science," or just that the newspaper article he
referenced that reported on this article contained errors.

One of the critical conclusions of the Science Magazine article, that the
levels of atmospheric of CO2 are now higher than at any time in the past
650,000 years, is reported in the newspaper article Phil calls "bad
science."  However, I agree with Phil this newspaper article needed some
editing for accuracy, and that the ignorance of basic scientific thinking on
the part of many in all forms of public reporting does a disservice to the
public when they distort the findings of science.

Phil wrote:

"...the reporter could not have come near to this bad a job of reporting if
the artilce it is grounded in was clearer."

It is easy to make errors reporting the highly technical, very complex and
abstract theoretical details of science, even when the scientists make their
ideas as clear as humanly possible.  The reporter may have not done his
homework for the newspaper article you found flawed.

Please quote the Science Magazine article in question to demonstrate the
lack of clarity you reference.  Science Magazine articles are among the most
carefully reviewed and edited in the world of science.

Two links are offered below, one for a pdf version, for text directly from
the Science Magazine in question discussing the ice core CO2 findings:

http://www.climate.unibe.ch/~stocker/papers/brook05sci.pdf.

http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:Yv0eumtbdAYJ:www.climate.unibe.ch/~stocker/papers/brook05sci.pdf+science+vol.+310+page+1313&hl=en

Here is another report on the same Science Magazine article that does not
demonstrate the Science Magazine article in question lacked clarity, with
links to related articles and web sites at the bottom:

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8369

Record ice core reveals Earth's ancient atmosphere

   - 19:00 24 November 2005
   - NewScientist.com news service
   - David L Chandler

[image: A thin cut of the ice core shows the dark bubbles of ancient
atmosphere, trapped in dark bubbles between ice grains (Image: W
Berner/University of
Bern)]<http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn8369/dn8369-1_500.jpg>
Enlarge
image<http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn8369/dn8369-1_500.jpg>
A thin cut of the ice core shows the dark bubbles of ancient atmosphere,
trapped in dark bubbles between ice grains (Image: W Berner/University of
Bern)
[image: Drill head and ice core from a depth of 2874 metres - this section
was drilled in November 2002 (Image: L
Augustin/LGGE)]<http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn8369/dn8369-2_450.jpg>
Enlarge
image<http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn8369/dn8369-2_450.jpg>
Drill head and ice core from a depth of 2874 metres - this section was
drilled in November 2002 (Image: L Augustin/LGGE)

The longest ice-core record of climate history ever obtained has hugely
extended the detailed history of Earth's atmosphere, and shows that levels
of greenhouse gases really do march in lockstep with changes in temperature.

The frozen record of the Earth's atmosphere is 3270 metres long and covers
the last 650,000 years – 50% longer than before. It was obtained from the
tiny air bubbles trapped in a deep ice core from Antarctica.

The tight coupling between temperatures and the greenhouse gas levels
revealed by the core matches the predictions from climate models used to
forecast future global warming. It also bears some good news: the warm
interglacial periods between ice ages can last a long time, contrary to the
view that we may already be due for the onset of the next ice age.

The European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica (EPICA) team has spent
years drilling the ice core in Antarctica's Ice Dome Concordia. They had
previously analysed its record of global temperatures, but have just
completed the detailed analysis of the trapped air. The bubbles record how
the planet's atmosphere changed over six ice ages and the warmer periods in
between. But during all that time, the atmosphere has never had anywhere
near the levels of greenhouse gases seen today.

Today's level of 380 parts per million of carbon dioxide is 27% above its
previous peaks of about 300 ppm, according to the team led by Thomas Stocker
of the University of Bern in Switzerland.
Validation and refinement

Edward Brook, an ice-core researcher at Oregon State University, US, who was
not involved in the project, told *New Scientist* that the good match
between climate model behaviour and the ice core data "really validates" the
models' predictions of what should happen as greenhouse gas levels increase.
The precise new data in addition provides baselines that can be used to
further refine climate models, Brook says.

The data also show that half of the previous six interglacial periods each
lasted nearly 30,000 years – far longer than the roughly 10,000 years of the
most recent cycles. The current interglacial period has persisted for about
10,000 years so far.

In the future, it should be possible to push the record even further back.
The ice core dates back to 890,000 years ago but has yet to be analysed. And
Brook adds: "There is undoubtedly 2-million-year old ice there. But we need
to see it in sequence" in order to determine the ages of different layers.
That may be hard, as ice sheets are dynamic, and layers can be shuffled.

However, such a long record would be of great interest because it would
cross the boundary when, for unknown reasons, the duration of complete
ice-age cycles suddenly shifted from 40,000 years to 100,000 years. Those
cycles are known through measurements of isotopic variation in sea floor
sediments.

Journal reference: *Science* (vol 310, p 1313)
 Related Articles

   - Interview: The ice man
cometh<http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg18825272.000>
   - http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg18825272.000
   - 26 November 2005
   - Record ice core gives fair
forecast<http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn5094>
   - http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn5094
   - 09 June 2004
   - Oldest ever ice core promises climate
revelations<http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4121>
   - http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4121
   - 08 September 2003

 Weblinks

   - EPICA<http://www.esf.org/esf_article.php?activity=1&article=85&domain=3>
   - http://www.esf.org/esf_article.php?activity=1&article=85&domain=3
   - Edward Brook, Oregon State
University<http://www.geo.oregonstate.edu/people/faculty/brooke.htm>
   - http://www.geo.oregonstate.edu/people/faculty/brooke.htm
   - Science <http://www.sciencemag.org/>
   - http://www.sciencemag.org

On 12/31/05, Pat Kraut <pkraut at moscow.com> wrote:
>
> Did anyone else watch the 2020 myths, lies etc last night? I only saw the
> last part but what I saw was great. It talked of the bad science that it
> reported on many subjects. I found the parts I saw very interesting.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Phil Nisbet" <pcnisbet1 at hotmail.com>
> To: <vision2020 at moscow.com>
> Sent: Saturday, December 31, 2005 12:44 PM
> Subject: [Vision2020] Bad Science
>
>
> I read this particular New Your Times Op/Ed with more than the average bit
> of laughter;
>
> "A BLAST FROM THE PAST To find out whether human activities are changing
> the
> atmosphere, scientists took ice cores from ancient glaciers in Greenland
> and
> Antarctica. Bubbles of air trapped in the ice provided a pristine sampling
> of the atmosphere going back 650,000 years. The study, published last
> month
> in the journal Science, found that the level of carbon dioxide, one of the
> greenhouse gases that can warm the planet, is now 27 percent higher than
> at
> any previous time. The level is even far higher now than it was in periods
> when the climate was much warmer and North America was largely tropical.
> Climatologists said the ice cores left no doubt that the burning of fossil
> fuels is altering the atmosphere in a substantial and unprecedented way."
>
> Let's start with the fact that the planet is a few billion years older
> than
> a mere 650,000 years and realize that there have been periods on the globe
> when conditions in the atmosphere were higher in CO2 than they are
> currently.  As a matter of fact, the atmospheric content of CO2 was three
> or
> four orders of magnitude higher than it is presently during the Archaean.
>
> Further, the base condition over the last 650,000 years has been one
> dominated by glaciations or rather thin interglacials, so relating it to
> other periods of planetary history and paleo-atmospheric conditions need
> to
> be considered.
>
> The next statement that North America was a tropical environment at some
> point over the last 650,000 years comes out of the blue in the next
> sentence.  Never happened.  There is no basis for making a claim that ice
> core data can make any such determination.  Yes, North America many years
> prior to any data that is layed out in ice core had a tropical
> environment,
> but we have no means related to ice cores of determining what the
> paleo-atmospheric CO2 content of those periods were.  Further, the
> tropical
> environments of the Paleocene, 50,000,000 years ago, occurred when the
> North
> American continent was at completely different latitudes than it currently
> occupies.  Continental drift has impacts on paleoclimate, which is why you
> can also find tropical regimes in the stratigraphy of Antarctica.
>
> Yes, human induced warming is occurring and it needs to be dealt
> with.  But
> No, putting out bad science does not serve the cause of finding solutions
> to
> what is not currently a crisis.  These sorts of writings remind me most of
> the old saws they used to put out in schools about smoking dope and having
> your nose fall off in consequence.  Those bad science anti-drug messages
> did
> little to stem the flow and usage of drugs and breed contempt for the
> messengers.
>
> Phil Nisbet

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Vision2020 Post by Ted Moffett
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