|
NZCPR
Guest Forum
Opinion piece by Dr Vincent Gray
20 October 07
IPCC
Wins the Nobel Prize for Peace
So,
I have made it at last! There have been two previous occasions
in my life when I was close to a Nobel Prize (thereby hangs a
tale), now it has arrived. I expect the cheque in the post any
time, plus an invitation to the awards ceremony.
I
am one of the 35,000 scientists who contributed to the last
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Report. I
wrote no less than 1,878 comments on the Draft for the first
Report, many of which were rejected. It is a little puzzling
as to what the IPCC can contribute to world peace, since much
of its influence encourages unnecessary economic damage, and
thus conflict. But at least it is good that the prize is
not for Physics as, in my opinion, much of the science is
unsound.
The
“globe” is simply not “warming”, for all of eight
years. This year it will probably cool. Since all of the
IPCC's models "project" the
"likelihood" of a steady warming over this period,
all of them must be wrong, and we can expect similar failures
for all the other "projections".
The
IPCC was set up by the United Nations Environment Programme
and the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) in 1988 to
assess scientific information on climate change and its
impacts and mitigation.
The
Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC) 1992 defined
"climate change" as changes in climate caused by
human interference with atmospheric composition. All the
signatories to that Convention (which included NZ) accept this
definition.
The
task of the IPCC, therefore, has been to accumulate
evidence to support this belief that all changes in the
climate are caused by human interference with the atmosphere.
Studies of natural climate change have largely been used to
claim that these are negligible compared with "climate
change".
The
reports of the IPCC are closely controlled by representatives
of the Governments who have signed the FCCC and
accepted its definition of "climate change". They have to approve the entire Reports, they choose or approve the Lead
Authors and approve line-by-line a "Summary for
Policymakers", which is really a "Summary by
Policymakers".
No
evidence that greenhouse gas emissions are harming the climate
has been found from the extensive studies of the IPCC, but a
series of scientific arguments which appear to support it have
been assembled. If examined closely, these are found to
be based on unsound scientific and mathematical foundations.
The
IPCC has always been reluctant to reach firm conclusions,
using ambiguous pronouncements such as, "The balance of
the evidence suggests a discernible human influence on the
climate".
A
statement such as this is eagerly interpreted by some to imply
support for the greenhouse theory, but it does not actually
say so.
The
IPCC Reports depend crucially on the absurd assumption that
the climate is exclusively controlled by atmospheric
greenhouse gas concentrations, and that this can be
successfully simulated and forecast by mathematical
models.
None
of these models has been subjected to a "validation"
process of rigorous testing, which must include evidence of
capability of future prediction to a satisfactory level of
accuracy. Without such testing no model is suitable for future
prediction.
The
IPCC accept that their models cannot "predict" the
future by claiming only that their models provide
"projections" not "predictions'. They then violate
this principle by estimating the reliability of the
"projections" solely on the "expert opinions"
of those providing the models. The "projections" and
their levels of "likelihood" and even
"probability" associated with them, have no
scientific basis. They
are merely the opinions of so-called "experts" with
a conflict of interest, since most of them have a financial
interest in continual funding of the work on models.
Much
emphasis is placed on the “Annual Global Mean Surface
Temperature Record” which is used to claim that the globe
has “warmed” by a measly 0.6 ºC between 1978 and 1998
(but not after). No actual average temperature measurements of
any place on the earth’s surface are used for this record.
Instead they use the average of the maximum and minimum
temperature, taken only once a day, which any statistician
will tell you is biased, by an amount which could exceed the
measly 0.6ºC.
Then,
they do not have a representative sample. It is like judging
the next election from results in only one town. The
temperature measurement is almost always near towns where
urban change causes a rise.
When
you try to “correct” the errors in this system, as has
been done for the USA and for China, “Global Warming” all
but disappears. It does also when you make more reliable
measurements in the Lower Atmosphere and even when you have a
well kept local station.
Atmospheric
carbon dioxide is supposed to be a constant and
“well-mixed”. But this is only because they suppress the
results that show it is variable, such as the 90,000
measurements that were made before 1958. This is so that when
they calculate the radiation effects of carbon dioxide, using
a logarithmic formula, they can get a higher figure by using
an “average”, than from a range.
Most
people do not realise that a correlation, however convincing,
does not prove causation. By adjusting the poorly-known
parameters in the models, it is sometimes possible to fit them
into certain climate sequences. But this does not prove that
the model is right.
We
are told that the sea level is rising and will soon swamp
all of our cities. Everybody knows that the Pacific Island of
Tuvalu is sinking. Al Gore told us that the inhabitants are
invading New Zealand because of it. Around 1990 it became
obvious that the local tide-gauge did not agree - there was no
evidence of “sinking". So scientists at Flinders
University, Adelaide, were asked to check whether this
was true. They set up new, modern, tide-gauges in twelve
Pacific islands, including Tuvalu, confident that they would
show that all of them are sinking.
Recently,
the whole project was abandoned as there was no sign of a
change in sea level at any of the twelve islands for the past
16 years. In 2006 Tuvalu even rose.
But
all was not lost. There was a Pacific hurricane in 1998 which
depressed the sea level for all of the islands, so you can
draw a straight line through the lot which gives a spurious rise;
provided you do not start from 1999 after which the sea was
level. So it looks like we are safe, so far, for ocean
invasion in New Zealand.
There
is widespread panic
because the globe is not warming, so the phrase “global
warming” is no longer used by the scientists, the
Governments or the journalists. Instead you must use
“Climate Change”. Every last drought, flood, hurricane,
ice melt, heat wave, is assailed by hordes of Reporters and
scientists asserting that it is “unprecedented", and
caused by “Climate Change” - provided you do not look too
closely at how often these things have happened in the past.
The
entire IPCC process is one of seeking to support a prior
foregone conclusion. They do not follow normal accepted
scientific procedures as free discussion of their conclusions
is not permitted. There are no scientifically established
"predictions", so it is inevitable that sooner or
later we will know that their models do not work. The absence
of "global warming" is just a beginning. The
reputation of the IPCC as a promoter of Peace, let alone Science is
sure to decline but much harm may have been done to the world
economy before this happens.
Your
Comments:
If you
would like to comment on this issue please click
here
|
