Talk:Climate change/Archive 39

New Images


I've removed Image:CO2_increase_rate.png because I don't think it communicates relevant ideas for the article. It's also quite confusing; what's on the y-axis? Is the x-axis time?

I also think it would be good to discuss the ice trend images before adding them into the article, but since they have labeled axes, I'm personally leaving them in for the meantime. It is imperative to say what the anomaly is relative to, though. - Enuja (talk) 03:37, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm sorry. I uploaded a new version with axes labeled.  Is that better? New Image Uploader 929 (talk) 07:59, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I now (and after reading the NASA text) understand what this is: The year-over-year increase of CO2, plotted over the years (i.e. its not concentration/year, but concentration change/year). With the current labels, the image is still very confusing. I wold suggest to put in explicit axes and put the labels on the axes. It also needs a better description, I would say. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 08:07, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I think I labeled the axes better just now; I will try to implement your other suggestions. New Image Uploader 929 (talk) 11:04, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Much better. I would also also add a vertical axis, though. And I would caption it as e.g. "Variations in the yearly increase in CO2. In the 1960s, the average annual increase was 37% of what it was in the period from 2000 through 2007.".


 * There is nothing wrong with the ice trend images but I still propose to remove them. This is an overview article, only the most important data and figues should be in it. Everything else makes it confusing. Also, we already have the glacier ice thickness graph. I think that one is sufficient. Splette :) How's my driving? 10:48, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Well the whole section on feedback has no illustration then. New Image Uploader 929 (talk) 11:04, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Its not like every section has to have an illustration. There are plenty of illustrations in the article already. Also, I feel showing a graph of the melting Arctic does not illustrate the ice-albedo feedback well. Splette :) How's my driving? 13:04, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I decided to be bold and removed them. Splette :) How's my driving? 03:33, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Time to put up or shut up on Overwhelming consensus
I've been skimming down the comments regarding the consensus, and it is very clear that no substantial proof is being offered to support the assertion of an overwhelming consensus despite the repeated quests for same. As such, it is clearly breaking quite a few policies and so the article needs to stop referring to this consensus as a fact and at the very least start using phrases such as "it is widely believed ... it is thought that .... there is an overwhelming consensus".

It is time that this phrase was made compliant with Wikipedia policy by either being supported by factual evidence or being amended to reflect the lack of factual evidence. Bugsy (talk) 20:13, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Covered in the FAC Raul654 (talk) 20:15, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * If | this is what is called "evidence" then it is at best an opinion about an opinion, an opinion that there is a consensus rather than real evidence of a consensus and out of date opinion to boot. It is no longer current and clearly doesn't take account of the recent downturn in temperatures. And you are effectively saying the article needs to be amended to make it clear that there is no current evidence to support the claim of a consensus.

Let me be more specific. Whilst it is quite possible that some important person at some point of time might have believed there was an overwhelming consensus, recent evidence of a cooling in the 21st century may well have caused some or even all of those holding this view to change. Without knowing the origin of this assertion that there is a consensus, and therefore without being able to know exactly to what it refers, it is impossible to know whether it is accrate to describe it as an actual current consensus, as oppsed to a consensus at some point in history.

Either the consensus must be backed up by specific facts which can be validated and can be dated. Or it must be justified as an opinion held by certain people and expressed at a certain time, so that if these people were to change their mind, it is possible to correct the article.

PUT UP OR SHUT UP and let those who want a wikipedia compliant article correct this hitherto unsubstantiated claim. Bugsy (talk) 20:25, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The quote in question is sourced and the source has a date. Looking at further sources, we have quite a number of statements by major scientific bodies supporting the consensus in 2007, despite you imagined "evidence of a cooling in the 21st century". If you have similarly weighty sources opposing this, bring them up....or in your words, "put up or shut up". --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:00, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The sources are linked in the article. Yes, a lot of people come to the talk page and complain about the idea of consensus about anthropogenic global warming.  These people have not read the sources, or do not agree with the Wikipedia policies about verifiability and reliable sources, or at least don't agree with the policies in so far as they include scientific societies as reliable sources.  No, not too many different people argue with every single new complaint on the talk page; most people keep silent and only speak up when they are needed.  However, everyone who has this article watched is always speaking up in the sense that we've come to a consensus on the existing language and continue to edit the article back to that language.   Personally, I have serious problems with using the same word that the source uses; I think this article should be in its own words.  However, the sentiment behind the wording is supported by reliable sources, and I've accepted that I'm in the minority about the stylistic choices.  Since the current wording isn't plagiarism, I'm willing to go along with the stylistic consensus.  - Enuja (talk) 23:13, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * (Raises Hand) I've read the sources and I agree with Wikipedia polices about verifiability and reliable sources, but I agree with Bugsy.  The citations do not offer any proof, just opinions with no evidence to justify those opinions.  I know of at least 31,000 scientists who say AGW is either non-existanct or insignificant.  How many scientists constitute the so-called 'consensus'?  Oh, that's right, no one has the slightest idea. Also, one should not confuse a consensus of scientists who work for the IPCC (or other political organization) with a consensus of all  scientists with knowledge of climate change.  --Sirwells (talk) 23:42, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The Oregon Petition, which now claims to have 31,000 "scientists", defines scientist to include anyone with a Bachelor of Science degree, which is not the way most people would use the term "scientist". Dragons flight (talk) 00:23, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Gee. I guess your right.  Looks like only about 9,000 have phD's.  Um, how many scientists constitute the so-called 'consensus'?  Oh, that's right, no one has the slightest idea.--Sirwells (talk) 03:22, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * What counts are peer reviewed publications, not mere opinions of, say, some economist who claims to have knowledge of climate science. How on Earth could be verify that the scientist in question knows more about climate science than my grandmother? So, the only relevant scientific opinion is in the peer reviewed publications and in the conference proceedings. Count Iblis (talk) 00:25, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * That's nice. Will someone please point out to me which peer reviewed publication is claiming there to be a consensus.--Sirwells (talk) 01:32, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * We use reliable sources because it is highly non-trivial to come to our own judgement. You may not understand how the national academies, or the meteorological societies, or authors of survey papers arrive at their conclusion, but that does not invalidate them. I could just as well demand to get General relativity explained in elementary arithmetic... And I seriously doubt your 31000 scientists. Please be more specific.  --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:29, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * (Raises Hand again) I would also like to challenge these so-called 'reliable sources' directly. Since Enuja, Stephen Schulz, Iblis and others seems to think us "deniers" have a lack of understanding of wikipedia's policies on verifiability and reliable sources.  Let's examine them shall we?


 * Source #1, The Royal Society's Guide to Facts and fictions about climate change. According to verifiability and reliable sources, "Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy."  Also, "All articles must adhere to Wikipedia's neutrality policy, fairly representing all majority and significant-minority viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in rough proportion to the prominence of each view." This 'guide' by the Royal Society has not been published in any journal, it has not been 'peer-reviewed', and it clearly does not adhere to wikipedia's policy on neutrality.  Furthermore, wikipedia's policy states that "Sources should directly support the information as it is presented in an article and should be appropriate to the claims made."  The RS document offers no support, in the form of fact checking,  whatsoever to it's claim, rather it relies on the opinion of the authors.  Further, it was authored in part by Sir John Houghton FRS, former chair of Working Group I of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). This obvious conflict of interest alone should render the document as questionable as it relies heavily on propoganda from the IPCC.  Finally, the RS document states that "the overwhelming majority of scientists....agree on the main points.", but it does not specify what those main points are, nor does it even imply that these 'main points' are precisely the same as the 'IPCC's main conclusions.'  Yet the wikipedia article is currently saying "the overwhelming majority....agree with the IPCC's main conclusions.". So apparently we also have a quote being misrepresented in a way to make the wikipedia article very misleading.


 * Source #2, BEYOND THE IVORY TOWER Essay written by Naomi Oreskes. Here have an ESSAY which also violates wikipedia's policy on neutrality.  Just in case some don't know.  An essay is piece of writing, written from an author's personal point of view.  A simple browse of Sciencemag's Special collection section places this article in the category of 'commentary'  As a reminder, wikipedia's policy on neutrality indicates "Assert facts, including facts about opinions—but do not assert the opinions themselves." So why is a someone's opinion being used as a direct citation as an attempt to establish fact?


 * Also, as a reminder, wikipedia's verifiability and reliable sources policy indicates that "Exceptional claims in Wikipedia require exceptionally high-quality reliable sources; if such sources are not available, the material should not be included." The claim of a so-called consensus about global warming is quite exceptional, especially given the fact that it is being made in defiance of overwhelming evidence that tens of thousands of scientists do not agree with this so-called 'consensus' viewpoint, and that more and more peer-reviewed papers are being published which directly contradict the so-called 'consensus' view.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sirwells (talk • contribs) 01:25, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Publications by scientific societies including the Royal Society and the American Academy of Science are precisely "reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy". This is why, in my explanation of why so many comments on the talk page have a problem with the "overwhelming consensus", I included the phrase "or at least don't agree with the policies in so far as they include scientific societies as reliable sources".  In my personal analysis, the IPCC's publications themselves are also exactly and precisely "reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy".  The IPCC is a consensus summary of information published in peer-reviewed journals.  The IPCC is a better source than a single peer-reviewed article is, because it's a compilation of the information from lots of different peer-reviewed articles.  It's become really popular for global warming skeptics to trash the IPCC as partisan body with a pro-Anthropogenic global warming agenda, but that analysis is simply false.  Among climate scientists, the IPCC is seen a sluggish and conservative ( = skeptical ) review of the literature.  The claim of a scientific consensus in the presence of political and grass-roots opposition is not an extraordinary claim at all.  It's quite common and believable, especially in the context of scientific literature that argues about the extent, sensitivity, and feedbacks of anthropogenic global warming instead of arguing about the existence of the mechanism and increase in anthropogenic carbon dioxide (and other greenhouse gases). - Enuja (talk) 02:04, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The Royal Society document being cited as evidence for a consensus was not publisheded by a third-party, nor was in peer-reviewed. It was self-published.  You also did not address any of my other points above.  Particularly the one about how Sources should directly support the information as it is presented in an article. Besides this, I suspect all of the global warmists blockers well know they have all blocked and denied many opposing and credible sources from getting in for far weaker arguments.  --Sirwells (talk) 03:22, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Sources directly supporting the information as it is presented means that the source needs to, in fact, state that there is a strong consensus about the reality of global warming. That part of the policy is to prevent us from citing "The Great Global Warming Swindle" (even if it were a reliable source) for saying that there is a consensus supporting the reality of anthropogenic global warming.


 * The Royal society is a reliable third party that published a global warming guide. You are correct, the guide in question is not in a peer-reviewed journal. Enuja (talk) 03:40, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * You miss the point. Verifiability makes a distintion between third-party and self-published sources.  The Royal Society document being cited as evidence of consensus falls into the category of a self-published source (it's basically a pamphlet which appears on thier own website).  Thus it has not undergone any of the scrutiny involved in third-party checking facts which wikipedia uses to measure reliability.--Sirwells (talk) 03:51, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Now that's a weird and convenient interpretation. So we can also discard the NAS? And many of the most respected journals are published by scientific societies. Does that make them parties? But on the other hand, the IPCC reports (at least up until 2001 - it always takes a while until they appear) have been published by Cambridge University Press.... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:46, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Please try and stay on point. Is the Royal Society Document published in a third party publication?  Or isn't it?  --Sirwells (talk) 23:08, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Surprising and inconvenient as it ay be, you do not get to define the scope of the debate. The Royal Society, as one of the oldest and most respected scientific organizations, is an excellent and reliable source. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:54, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * The Royal Society is a third party. It is not an involved, partisan member of a dispute.  It is a reliable third party publisher with a reputation for excellent fact checking.  (That's essentially it's mission statement.)  The Royal Society invented the whole concept of peer review!  - Enuja (talk) 23:45, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Attention Enuja and Stephan, the Royal Society is not a "source" they are the "author" of a source. See WP:RS --Sirwells (talk) 02:36, 1 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I'd like to note that the consensus at WP:RS/N is that there's no problem whatsoever with information sourced to the National Academy of Sciences or the Royal Society. Not only are those extremely credible organisations, but their publications undergo significant internal review and fact-checking. Their internal publications, like the Human Development Report from the WB, and what-not, are carefully-researched statements of the current position in academia. -- Relata refero (disp.) 15:01, 2 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I am not aware of any credible source I have argued against using. I can't "block" anything; I can just argue for or against using it.  You and I have exactly the same individual power on this page.  In fact, no individual here has the power to "block" the use of a source.  There are some administrators who can block users who are vandals (or sockpuppets), but their analysis of a source as reliable or not (should) have the exact same weight as my analysis and your analysis.  - Enuja (talk) 03:40, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * When I said 'block' I was referring to handful of users who 'watch' the global warming articles and instantly revert anything which goes against thier opinion, giving innane and weak reasons for doing so. (or no reason at all in many cases.)  Sorry if that was confusing.--Sirwells (talk) 03:51, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

—Apis (talk ) 07:06, 31 May 2008 (UTC)''
 * Has a new meta-study been produced altering the conclusions of Oreskes? If not, we go with the sources we have. ''

I'd just like to add these links for people who do not understand the Scientific method or what is meant by Scientific consensus - see also: Scientific opinion on climate change Hexalm (talk) 06:12, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Cooling denier
You might be interested in this newly created article: Cooling denier Splette :) How's my driving? 14:02, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Why don't the global warming deniers just cool down a bit? :(  Count Iblis (talk) 14:08, 2 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Here is the AFD discussion for those who are interested. Splette :) How's my driving? 14:28, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I did a minor edit
I just did a minor edit. I changed "via the greenhouse effect" to "via an enhanced greenhouse effect." I wanted to emphasize that it's not the usual, natural effect. I know it's in the quote, but I wanted to make it more clear. I forgot to write it in the edit description, so I'm writing it here. Shoeshinecs (talk) 00:43, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Protection of global warming and related pages
After another apparent round of sockpuppet vandalism, User:Raul654 decided to take the step of fully protecting the following pages (at least, these are the ones from my watchlist):
 * Global warming controversy
 * Politics of global warming
 * Climate change denial
 * List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming
 * Effects of global warming
 * Global warming
 * Attribution of recent climate change
 * Climate change
 * Scientific opinion on climate change
 * Effects of global warming

Basically, this means that for an indefinite amount of time only administrators may edit these pages. I believe this to be a drastic and unwarranted step (especially since only a few of these were actually targeted by vandals, the rest were preemptive) that will result in the degradation of these articles and is contrary to the protection policy and the third pillar of Wikipedia. I oppose this action in the strongest possible terms. That being said, I'd like to hear what the editing community thinks about this issue. I've pasted below some related talk from User Talk:Raul654 so that this discussion can continue here. Oren0 (talk) 16:21, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

--Start pasted user talk--

Looks like I can't edit the global warming pages. I guess that this has something to do with the Scibaby problem, perhaps he is editing from my neigborhood with a similar IP address? :)

I would be glad if you can fix the problem, but it is not urgent. There is just one edit on the GW pages by me that needs to be improved:

I edited the global warming controversy and the climate change denial pages yesterday, mentioning a new NASA report containing the results of an official investigation that concluded that there had been political pressure on scientists. I gave a newspaper as the source, but I think that a better source can be found, perhaps the report itself. Count Iblis (talk) 13:43, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I found another drawer full of socks this morning. After 6 months, it's readily apparent that the 'drain the swamp' approach (which entails blocking his socks, his IPs, and his ranges) isn't working well, so I decided to adopt a new approach. This morning I fully protected a half-dozen or so of his favorite targets. (That's why you can't edit them) They had been semi-protected but that too was not working. I'm not sure if there is a technical fix that would allow you to edit them while preventing him from doing it. Raul654 (talk) 13:49, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Doesn't that seem a little like throwing the baby out with the bathwater, or shooting a fly with a rocket launcher? We can't fully protect all of these actively edited pages to deal with one vandal (especially when I didn't see his latest round of edits on some of them, so it's more of a preemptive strike).  What are we going to do, leave these pages fully protected forever?  I think this should be undone, or at least some discussion should be had as to whether this is the best step.  As far as I can tell, fully protecting a page in response to a sockpuppet is contrary to both the letter and the spirit of WP:PROT.  I assume that administrators such as yourself and others on the pro-AGW side (there aren't any regular 'skeptic' editors who are admins as far as I know) wouldn't use this protection to edit these pages as they see fit, but I still believe that if the decision is to be made to protect these pages it should at least be done by an admin who isn't regularly involved. Oren0 (talk) 16:08, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

--End pasted user talk--

The protection was not pre-emptive, nor a violation of the protection policy. Scibaby has previously used sockpuppets to vandalize every single article I protected (and some others that I did not fully protect). As for Oren0 not seeing his latest round of edits, I can only say that Oren must not be paying very close attention since he's made several dozen edits over the last 5 days. Raul654 (talk) 16:28, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I see recent Scibaby edits to three of the ten pages you protected. Thus, I'd say the other seven are preemptive.  I don't see where WP:PROT allows full protection for a case like this, and I still believe that doing so unfairly boxes out the vast majority of good faith editors to these pages. Oren0 (talk) 16:32, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * As I have already said - he has vandalized every single one of them at one point or another, some more recently than others. Thus, none of the protection was pre-emptive. As for the protection policies, full protection is used in cases where semi-protection is ineffective, which is the case here. Raul654 (talk) 16:38, 6 June 2008 (UTC)


 * There is nothing in WP:PROT to justify using full protection as a response to sockpuppetry. I hope the sockpuppets can be blocked ASAP and this is only a temporary expedient. I would also suggest permanent semi-protection. I think the guy has been posting to my talk page, so Raul654 might want to check there as well. (-: Kauffner (talk) 17:05, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I have been blocking his sockpuppets, IPs, and ranges for 6 months - upwards of 500 blocked accounts and something like 3 million IP addresses. I permanently semi-protected the articles several months ago. Neither step was effective. Full protection is the next step. Raul654 (talk) 17:17, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * And for the record, yes, that was another sockpuppet of his on your talk page Raul654 (talk) 17:18, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * So just to be clear you're suggesting that this full protection should be permanent? Oren0 (talk) 19:16, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * They should be fully protected until we know he's lost interest. Raul654 (talk) 19:19, 6 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Hmm. It is a real shame but perhaps a proportionate response to a determined SPA sock master. I think if it has to be done we should view it as Scibaby's fault not the blocking admins. --BozMo talk 19:20, 6 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm not happy with this. I'd rather see occaisional bouts of sock-related vandalism, whereupon they get blocked, than permanenet full protection. I haven't checked them all, but loooking at List-of, I can't see any scib stuff there in the past month; it wasn't even semi'd, because it didn't need to be. This is an overreaction (and I'm not even sure what its a reaction to). Assuming this is the correct place for centralised discussion, I propose unprotecting at least 1/2 these pages immeadiately, and reviewing the rest. If Raul is getting burnt out blocking Scibaby, there are plenty of the rest of us happy for our chance William M. Connolley (talk) 20:32, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The problem, WMC, is that there isn't anyone else with checkuser access who patrols these pages on a regular basis. And you can't hunt Scibaby without it. Otherwise, I'd be *more* than happy to give someone else a chance to do it. Raul654 (talk) 20:35, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Also, FYI, what prompted it was this Raul654 (talk) 20:36, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * OK, thats a lot of socks, and I thank you for blocking them. However... they weren't causing any great problems, that I noticed. Maybe I'm not paying attention, but the GW-related pages seem to have been quite trouble free for a fair while. Any socks that actually cause trouble can be blocked; those doing low-level fiddling with the odd word are not worth full protection William M. Connolley (talk) 21:15, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * He uses some accounts to start out making minor edits so the accounts become auto-approved and can edit semi-protected articles. At which point, he comes here to vandalize.
 * The GW articles have been relatively quiet because I block about 80% of Scibaby's accounts before he has a chance to use them here. That is very time consuming for me. And that's why I want these fully protected. Raul654 (talk) 21:35, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * OK, thats problem for you, and while the rest of us can block socks we can't run checkuser. I'd still rather see more vandalism and no full prot. But I'll let others comment here before saying more William M. Connolley (talk) 21:42, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, other admins can block Scibaby's socks, but if they can't tell which accounts are Scibaby's with checkuser, then we're inevitably going to end up with (1) some Scibaby socks being allowed able edit and (2) unsuspecting newbs being blocked. Raul654 (talk) 22:02, 6 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I think one can deal with this problem by agreeing to some new rules about reverting the page in case of controversial edits by newcomers that are technically not vandalism. In that case the 3RR rule should not apply for regular editors, provided they revert to a previous uncontroversial version.


 * One cannot abuse this to make new edits that are potentially controversial (the regulars know all too well what this means in practice). So, at certain times of the day when only one regular editor is watching the page he/she can revert many Scibaby socks without being reported for 3RR. Count Iblis (talk) 22:21, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * WP:3RR already doesn't apply in this case. One exception is "Undoing actions performed by banned users."  I agree with WMC here, I'd rather see some vandalism than full protection.  Raul, if you're tired of blocking these socks someone else can do it. Oren0 (talk) 22:42, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I was away from my computer for several days earlier this week while traveling. In that time, Scibaby registered about a dozen accounts, made over two dozen disruptive edits, and by your own admissions neither you nor WMC (nor anyone else) noticed, let alone block him. And, to be blunt, even if you had, you're not an admin and neither of you have checkuser, so you would have had to get someone else to track him down. So, to be perfectly frank, when you say Raul, if you're tired of blocking these socks someone else can do it I hope you realize that that is demonstrably false. Raul654 (talk) 03:09, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * In that time, Scibaby registered about a dozen accounts, made over two dozen disruptive edits, and by your own admissions neither you nor WMC (nor anyone else) noticed, let alone block him - indeed. And that is because nothing disruptive enough to need a block occurred. The edits were trivial. I'm astonished that so few people are commenting on this protection William M. Connolley (talk) 16:23, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree. Where are the rest of the GW regulars, on both sides?  It's possible that some people ran into protection on the some of the other pages and didn't know there was centralized talk about it here (though I guess in that case we'd expect to see talk on those pages, right?). I think there is a clear and strong consensus here to remove this protection.  It'd be nice if Raul would undo them himself but what's the etiquette on this if he doesn't?  Can/will one of the admins here unprotect or should we go to WP:ANI or what? Oren0 (talk) 17:22, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * After reviewing the mainspace edits of both of the users you point to above, I'd say there's a reason nobody noticed them. Checkuser evidence notwithstanding, I'm not convinced that both of these users are Scibaby socks.  I'd say that all of User:Benjamin Weaver's edits seem reasonable.  They're not all great, but none of them seem terribly disruptive and they all seem to be relatively good faith attempts to get citations and improve these articles.  Maybe this is part of the "edit nicely for a while, then start adding crap" strategy but I think it's a bit ridiculous that you assume that anyone using one of the "3 million" IPs that might belong to a sock who makes any edits to global warming-related pages is automatically a sockpuppet.  You can't wait to see any evidence of bad behavior at all?  I still don't believe these editors being sockpuppets makes the action you took justifiable, especially since they weren't even being very disruptive, but how sure are you that both of them even are? Oren0 (talk) 17:40, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * The 3 million IPs I referred are refer to the sum total of the range blocks applied against him; the actual number of IPs he's used one or several hundred.
 * Your own feelings and intuition not withstanding, the checkuser match is absolutely conclusive. Don't ask me why - I will not discuss specifics of checkuser in a public forum, or with anyone I don't implicitly trust. Furthermore, The edits these sockpuppets made are exactly the kind that he was banned for - global warming denial, and attempts to downplay consensus. And your interpretation of policy dead wrong - registering a new sockpuppet DOES NOT mean we have to wait until he causes trouble before banning the new sockpuppet. Banned means exactly that - banned, as in "Not allowed to participate on Wikipedia". So, to summarize: you're wrong about them not being his sockpuppets; You're wrong that they shouldn't have been banned; You're wrong that my actions are not justified; and you're wrong that this page shouldn't be protected. Raul654 (talk) 17:51, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * "So, to summarize: you're wrong about them not being his sockpuppets" - I didn't say they weren't. I said evidence isn't strong that they are, notwithstanding whatever checkuser info you may have.
 * "You're wrong that they shouldn't have been banned" - Again, you're assuming that you're correct on these being his sockpuppets. I understand that banned means banned, but banned doesn't mean anybody on the same ISP in the same area code who edits a global warming page is also banned.  I don't know everything about how checkuser works but I don't see how evidence could be "absolutely conclusive" anyway.  What if, for example, Scibaby edits from an office with a single external proxy and the guy in the next cubicle is trying to make normal edits?  IP alone can never tell you with 100% certainty who's sitting at that computer.
 * "You're wrong that my actions are not justified; and you're wrong that this page shouldn't be protected." - Well just about every editor here disagrees that the actions were justified. Innocuous and non-disruptive edits by supposed sockpuppets do not justify cutting off these articles from the entire editing community. I think it's clear that you're not willing to discuss this rationally or budge from your position no matter what everyone here thinks and so I'm going to be posting this at WP:ANI. Oren0 (talk) 18:37, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * What's with the rush? Wheel-warring with Raul is one of my favorite pastimes. However, I'm not so convinced that he is wrong about the protection. There has been a steady inflow of new editors, all with the same modus operandi - make a few neutral edits, maybe even make some few cosmetic improvements, and then make little, tiny POV edits, each of which individually is so small that few would care. The accumulative effect, however, is significant, and the effort to keep the pages clean is even bigger, as each edit needs to be individually checked. This wastes a lot of time. As I understand it, a large number of theses editors has now been linked with Scibaby, so this is not coincidence, but part of a campaign. Yes, full protection is very undesirable. But do you have an alternative suggestion? And there is always Template:Editprotected. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:57, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Almost any alternative is better! The status quo was easily better.  This move is equivalent to permanently grounding all air traffic because some people who fly might be terrorists.  This is a risk we have to take, and it's something we can deal with.  Full protection is meant to be used when a page is getting out of hand.  A look at the edit histories of most of these pages indicates relative calmness.  Every page on Wikipedia has been a target of vandalism.  Would it be easier to fully protect every page?  Sure.  But that's not what Wikipedia is about.  I've never seen indefinite full protection in the Wikipedia mainspace for vandalism/sockpuppetry, not even in the most trolled and most vandalized pages.  As for editprotected, I don't want to have to fight on the talk page every time I see a grammar mistake, want to update a source, etc.  The whole thing is just over the top and unnecessary. Oren0 (talk) 19:24, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually, it's the equivalent of only having established aircraft fly established routes, and not let pilots from somewhere fly unregistered aircraft anywhere. See controlled airspace. The majority of users are readers, who are not affected by protection at all. They are affected by vandalism, though. As far as I can tell, the Scibaby sockmaster is now trying to grind down as many editors as possible. Some of our best have already left in frustration. I've spend half an our today reviewing and discussing a number of suspicious edits. I'd much rather have looked into better sourcing for military science fiction. I don't think protection is a good situation, but I'm not convinced we have a better option. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:56, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Your analogy sounds more like semi-protection to me, but I digress. I would also take issue with the idea that the reader doesn't suffer.  As a believer in the idea of a wiki, I believe that articles improve over time as a result of communal editing, thus I'd say that the articles will be worse (not to mention less updated) as a result of this protection than they would've been otherwise.  Really, you think full protection is a better option than the status quo? Oren0 (talk) 20:13, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

(remove indent) I agree with WMC that full protection is too much. Yet, Raul has had much on his hands. Is there any way to get checkuser privs for a trusted editor on the GW pages. I have not seen Raymond Arritt in a while, but he would be a good candidate. Just an idea. Brusegadi (talk) 23:10, 6 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Raymond is burnt out and it may be some time before he returns (if ever). Dragons flight (talk) 16:08, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Oren, I don't think 3RR has a provision for us to revert in case we are not sure that the edit is by a Scibaby sock. We could just make a list of all the regular editors. They are allowed to revert any other editor (who is not on the list) an unlimited number of times. If we just notify all admins on wikipedia about this rule then we are all exempt from 3RR when reverting any new users (scibaby socks or not).

The reason why Scibaby is trying so hard to create the socks is because he thinks he can have enough accounts to send an Armada of socks here and take over the page. The 3RR rule will then protect his version, at least for a while. He may even succeed getting a few regulars banned.

So, if we just neutralize this loophole he may not even try or if he does, he won't be effective. Count Iblis (talk) 23:39, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Also, note that people can just recruit socks from all over the world on forums. So, checkuser won't necessarily be effective. We really need a rule in which regulars can revert new users without limits. Count Iblis (talk) 23:52, 6 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree that Scibaby has been a disruptive force in these articles, but full protection for practically an entire field of articles is clearly excessive. It'd be nice if there was a way to commission a bot to seek out vandal-only new accounts and shut them down, but there would probably be misidentification issues associated with that. In any case, I think that there are enough trustworthy regulars here to keep the vandalism problem under control if a 3RR exception were to be made in this case. After all, we're still (presumably) talking about one person. The guy has to eat sometime. ~ S0CO ( talk 00:07, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Also, as far as the Armada hypothesis goes, I don't really see it happening. If a bunch of editors with less than fifty edits and a common agenda banded together to try to ban editors with established reputations and extensive edit histories, it'd be pretty obvious what was going on. ~ S0CO ( talk 00:13, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I start doubting that scibaby is actually one person. No single human being can have that much disruptive stamina... Splette :) How's my driving? 00:18, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * You should take a look at the archives of the 9/11 talk page :) though I wouldn't really be surprised if Scibaby has branched off. ~ S0CO ( talk 00:20, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Posted to ANI
So that we can keep this discussion from forking too badly, I just wanted to let everyone know that this topic is being discussed at the administrators' noticeboard. Oren0 (talk) 20:13, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Proposed solution
The problem seems to be that small POV changes are being made that go unnoticed. These edits accumulate over time. We could deal with this as follows:

On the talk page we'll have a link to a "latest consensus version". We update this every week. We discuss on the talk page if the current version is acceptable as the "latest consensus version". If not, then we change the latest version of the article and then set the "latest consensus version" link to the latest version. If there are disagreements about some changes that have happened to the article during the week, then we'll stick to the text of the old version on that point. Count Iblis (talk) 20:30, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Interesting. My gut reaction to this is that it sounds like a lot of work.  We're really going to do this every week on all of these pages?  I don't know how much work people are doing fighting these socks, but 10 of these discussions every week sounds like a lot of discussing.  We'll effectively be arguing about every minor change and addition twice: once when it's added and again at our "weekly meetings." Oren0 (talk) 20:36, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * It doesn't have to be a lot of work. The arguments about changes to the article during the week will be the same as they are now. During the weekly meetings everyone simply compares the current verion to the consensus version. If someone disagrees with some particular change, he/she can object. Everyone has a veto right.


 * Of course other editors can discuss with the person who objects to try to change the mind of the person who is objecting. Then, say, after one or two days, one looks at all the objections that are still there and the article is reverted back to the old consensus version on all these points and that latest verion then becomes the latest consensus version. Count Iblis (talk) 21:16, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Need to include negative feedbacks for accuracy
This article needs to include negative feedbacks, not cherry-picked positive feedbacks, if it is intended to be balanced at all. 1) First and foremost, the rate of increase in temperature with the concentration of greenhouse gases is sublinear. If you had an infinite amount of any gas, it would only absorb a certain fraction of incoming radiation; only that which matches its absorption window.  This is basic optical physics.  This maximum amount of absorbed energy is the asymptotic maximum. Or in plainer language, if you had an infinite amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, it would directly increase the earth's temperature by a finite amount, because it only absorbs certain frequencies of infrared radiation. The net impact of this is that doubling the concentration of CO2 will not double the radiative forcing, it'll increase it by a small amount.  This reality (sublinear forcing with concentration) needs to be recognized in the article.

2) Increased evaporation causes an increase in water vapor concentration, and water vapor is a GHG, but evaporation also causes evaporative cooling, whereby the energy of the water vapor is moved up into the atmosphere, where it is more readily released to space when the water condenses into a cloud. Thus increased evaporation due to increased temperature may cause net cooling, and definitely will cause net cooling if the water vapor concentration is high enough to be near the asymptotic maximum absorption rate.  This is a powerful negative feedback, which any accurate climate model would have to include.Evaporative_cooling

3) The IPCC models noted substantial disagreements on clouds. This article shows extreme bias in suggesting that clouds may warm the earth, where the IPCC couldn't agree on it (read their summary article), and where it's pretty obvious that if you block out the sun's visible and UV rays, the earth will cool, regardless of blocking out many (but not all) IR escape windows.  Convective cooling is still operational when radiative cooling diminishes due to clouds.  Anybody who is outside during the day when a cloud goes over notices the cooling as the sunshine goes away, and that cloudy days are significantly cooler on average; why should we pretend that the partial IR absorption of clouds (which if powerful enough, would eventually break up the cloud and cause convective cooling) dominates the far more potent sunlight reflection?  My suggestion: don't speculate, just mention that the impact of clouds is uncertain.

To summarize, I don't dispute that radiative forcing from GHGs raise the atmospheric temperature, but I do dispute the assumption that all feedbacks are positive, which is the assumption needed to calculate catastrophic global warming. There are negative feedbacks, and there have to be, or else the ocean would have burnt off long ago.

I also recommend this site, for those who wish to learn about how our atmosphere really works: http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/ Cuberoot31 (talk) 21:02, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * That T increases with log(CO2) isn't a negative feedback. The primary negative feedback is R ~ T^4 William M. Connolley (talk) 21:26, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * (edit conflict) JunkScience is indeed a site that lives up to its name. I suggest you don't trust anything you find there, except maybe the name of the author. The site may be right about some things, but only by accident. As to your points: The temperature reaction to CO2 is indeed sublinear -it's approximately logarithmic, that's why climate sensitivity is given as fixed increase per doubling of CO2.  This is reasonably explained in this and the associated articles. Your number 2 is not something that models "have to include", its something that models simulate very well from basic atmospheric physics. This is one of the reasons why models predict increased tropospheric warming. The negative feedback is in this article, about half-way down Global warming.  As for clouds, the article describes exactly the uncertainty you mention. And if we talk about anecdotal evidence, everybody who goes out at night knows that clear nights are a lot colder than cloudy ones...  --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:00, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * You're handwaving on some things that I don't agree with either here. Climate sensitivity does not address the question here.  I find, instead, Greenhouse_gas to be a watered down half-answer to the current questions.  It sounds very reasonable that an average value (W/m^2) can be given for the additional radiative forcing of CO2 in the atmosphere.  The first poster here was right saying that the differential increase decreases with each bit of CO2 addition, but it's not exactly a decaying exponential, it's a LOT of decaying exponentials added up (meaning that the curvature is still negative but behavior is more elusive).


 * There is nothing that should preclude Wikipedia from providing the internals of the foundation calculations, which are NOT horrendously complicated as some people would like you to believe, except for the fact that no one will do the work. Things like Climate sensitivity go straight to the conclusions, which is one part of the coverage.  The other parts should be the exact greenhouse radiative forcing effect of the compounds in the atmosphere. -Theanphibian (talk • contribs) 14:30, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Stephan, you didn't respond to my objections, and I'm not just basing my physics arguments on some website; I have a detailed knowledge of optical physics; my master's project was a computer program that calculated various optoelectric properties of thin films. The Feedbacks section only mentions lowered temperature differentials as a negative feedback, while picking every possible positive feedback, and spinning clouds (which have a net negative feedback during the day, when it is hottest) as having a net positive feedback; it should go no further than saying the impact of clouds is disputed. What it does say about clouds is not NPOV; it's biased speculation. The sublinear marginal impact of increased concentrations of carbon dioxide on radiative forcing is highly relevant to the impact of increased concentrations on global temperature, and it is not mentioned at all in the article. The only reason I can see for excluding the nonlinear impact of increased CO2 concentration on radiative forcing is to push a particular Point Of View. The Feedback section should explicitly mention evaporative cooling, which is a powerful negative feedback. Models used by the IPCC may or may not include evaporative cooling, but if they don't, their results are wrong (garbage in -> garbage out), and if they do, the impact would show a strong negative feedback from evaporative cooling when the H2O absorption window is nearly saturated. There is tremendous energy involved in evaporative cooling. One more thing about the source I mentioned; just because you don't like what JunkScience says, doesn't mean their math or physics are wrong, and I consider it unbecoming of a contributor to Wikipedia to reject a source that way, or else their contributions may become "right about some things, but only by accident". If their math or physics were demonstrably wrong, they could be rejected, but just ignoring them because they cause cognitive dissonance is unacceptable.Cuberoot31 (talk) 20:32, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The criticism needs to be referenced from a peer reviewed source. If climate scientists have ignored evaporative cooling and if this is indeed a huge effect as you mention, then that's a new result which is publishable in Nature. So, we have to wait until it is published in Nature or some other high quality peer reviewed journal (but not on JunkScience). Count Iblis (talk) 20:56, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Evap cooling is in all the GCMs, if that makes you happy. Junk science is junk; using it as a source labels you; best not to do it. If they have, accidentally, got something correct then they've copied it from somewhere else, and you're better off using that as a source. Its sweet that you're able to decide, just off the top of your head, that increases in cloud cover must obviously cool the earth, but sadly we can't use that as a source for the article William M. Connolley (talk) 21:26, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

If Evaporative Cooling is in the GCMs, why is it excluded from the feedbacks section? Why is sublinear increase of radiative forcing completely excluded from the article, when it is highly relevant? Why does the article get into speculating that clouds are a net positive feedback, when even the IPCC isn't willing to say that? That's pure POV-pushing that isn't backed by any solid science. Remove the speculation, and leave clouds as disputed; that's what I'm asking for. This article cherry-picks positive feedbacks, ignoring most negative feedbacks, apparently to push a POV. I don't see how using real scientific arguments labels me as anything other than a scientist, as opposed to a POV-pusher. I'm quite happy to read and consider all arguments, including ones I disagree with. Have you actually read their discussion on climate and refuted any of their arguments?Cuberoot31 (talk) 17:00, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Let me try to explain it again. "Evaporative cooling" is not added to models as an arbitrary feedback, but is an emergent feature of the basic physics employed. It's also a misnomer, as the water of course recondenses, so no heat is lost from the system directly. Heat transport by evaporation/condensation and convection is one of the major reasons why the mid troposphere is warming stronger than the ground, i.e. it leads to a decreased lapse rate, which leads to more heat loss, and hence is a negative feedback and described in the Feedback section. This is not a separate effect, it is one of the mechanisms of the effect we already describe. We might go into more detail, but then this article is a high-level overview. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:28, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Wow, thats cool. Am I getting it wrong or do the models actually reproduce the feed-back?  Sounds similar to "endogenous variables" in econ models.  If my above words form a correct statement, then, at least, I learned something today :) Brusegadi (talk) 01:34, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Evaporative cooling cools the surface, which transfers heat higher into the atmosphere, causing convective cooling and also increasing radiation from higher up in the atmosphere (when the heat is released during condensation). This lowers the surface temperature, causing decreased lapsed rate as you mention, and is a negative feedback. It's a fact of basic physics, but it's also clearly a negative feedback that decreases the impact of CO2. If you're going to mention the IR absorbed by water vapor, you should also mention that the water vapor is carrying substantial heat up from the surface by evaporative cooling. One is a positive feedback (IR absorption) the other negative (Evaporative Cooling). Heat is lost in the transfer of thermal energy up the atmosphere by evaporated water, as the Greenhouse Effect (which this article is based on) is the slowing of heat transfer up the atmosphere. As evaporative cooling is a major effect (meteorologists regularly measure "wet-bulb" temperatures), it shouldn't be lumped in with decreased lapse rate due to atmospheric warming from increased absorption of IR. With regards to the unsubstantiated speculation that clouds are a net positive feedback, just eliminate it. It's a clear violation of Wikipedia's NPOV policy, as even the IPCC isn't willing to go that far. I still have yet to see a reason why decreased marginal radiative forcing with concentration of CO2 is completely left out of the article, when the article is based mostly on radiative forcing from CO2.Cuberoot31 (talk) 20:27, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
 * As to evap cooling, what you're looking for (guv) is a nice WP:RS discussing it as a negative feedback. Then it may or may not belong. As to why the exact shape of the CO2-rf curve should be in here, I don't know. You're not still under the mistaken impression that its a -ve feedback, are you? William M. Connolley (talk) 21:27, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Do I need a RS that steam rises? Evaporative cooling is basic weather physics.  How about Evaporative Cooling or Anti-Greenhouse_Effect.  It's the same effect, whether sublimation on Pluto or evaporation on Earth.  As you acknowledged in your past comment, it's in the GCMs; it does impact climate.

Regardless of what you want to call it, negative feedback or reduced marginal impact, the sublinear impact of increasing CO2 concentrations on radiative forcing is known and based upon the fact that there is only a finite amount of radiation to absorb in any particular absorption band; it is highly relevant to any discussion of CO2 and the greenhouse effect. And don't forget to remove the cloud speculation.Cuberoot31 (talk) 00:00, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The sublinear effect of increasing CO2 is a fact, but that it is based "upon the fact that there is only a finite amount of radiation to absorb in any particular absorption band" is a common misunderstanding. The increasing optical thickness of the atmosphere makes it harder for radiation to escape the atmosphere. Neither of your "sources" (Wikipedia articles are not good sources) is useful in this discussion. In particular, Anti-greenhouse effect is completely irrelevant. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:27, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The increased absorption only impacts particular bands; radiation in the other bands passes right through the atmosphere and out to space, so only a slight increase in temperature will be necessary to raise the T^4 radiative output through the unblocked bands (and convective cooling) sufficiently. CO2's bands are narrow, so even if its concentration was 100% the net impact would be less than that of water vapor over the ocean (which is most of the planet).  Optical "thickness" is a bad analogy; what you have is a bunch of resistances in parallel, and you're increasing the resistance on only one of them; the other resistors will increase current to compensate with only a slight voltage increase (especially since radiative thermal flux is proportional to T^4).  Pluto's "Anti-greenhouse effect" is sublimation cooling, which is equivalent to evaporative cooling (solid to gas vs. liquid to gas), and powerful enough to cool Pluto by multiple degrees Celsius.  I'm still surprised that you're asking for a reference for the fact that steam rises.  Here's a reference from a government site that mentions in passing the obvious fact of evaporative cooling Forests.  It's hard to find references that state in detail such obvious facts.Cuberoot31 (talk) 05:46, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * See WP:SYN. You need to find a source that makes the particular argument, not one that supports a basic assumption from which you reason. And you might want too look e.g. at Image:Atmospheric_Transmission.png. Earth is radiating over a wide spectrum, a small shift in peak energy frequency density will not have much of an effect on CO2 and get us into more trouble with other Greenhouse gases.--Stephan Schulz (talk) 06:12, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Found a modern source: Evaporative Cooling that quotes NASA: "Evaporation of water is the source of atmospheric moisture that carries heat energy away from Earth’s surface." and describes evaporative cooling. Evaporative cooling is a major cooling effect, as said web page explains in detail.  As an example of how obvious and how well-known this fact is, I found a mention of it from an encyclopedia written in 1802: .  About Carbon Dioxide: you are correct, the earth radiates over a wide band, so even if CO2's bands are completely saturated with an infinite amount of CO2, it will only warm the earth a finite amount by trapping a small subset of the radiation.  That is why the CO2 effect is sublinear; every climate model that isn't laughably inaccurate acknowledges the sublinear forcing effect.  Here's a citation of the (roughly) logarithmic dependence from a UN web article that explains global warming:  "It has been suggested that the absorption by CO2 is already saturated so that an increase would have no effect. This, however, is not the case. Carbon dioxide absorbs infrared radiation in the middle of its 15 mm band to the extent that radiation in the middle of this band cannot escape unimpeded: this absorption is saturated. This, however, is not the case for the band’s wings. It is because of these effects of partial saturation that the radiative forcing is not proportional to the increase in the carbon dioxide concentration but shows a logarithmic dependence. Every further doubling adds an additional 4 Wm-2 to the radiative forcing.".  The same article mentions that understanding of clouds is limited; please remove speculation about clouds having a net positive effect, and leave it as disputed.  I have cited solid references for all of my claims.  Please fix the article.Cuberoot31 (talk) 16:24, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Your initial discussion points said in part: "Thus increased evaporation due to increased temperature may cause net cooling...". Though I think we agree on the nature of evaporative cooling, as of right now you seem to have offered no reference for the impact of evaporation taken as a whole.  My impression has always been that in all the models the greenhouse effect of increased water vapor dominates and that evaporation is a net positive feedback.  If that is the case, it would seem strange to build any significant discussion of evaporative cooling.  Strictly speaking, there is also another part that appears to be missing.  The greenhouse effect of water vapor depends on its absolute abundance in the atmosphere, which we expect to increase in a warming world.  Evaporative cooling depends on the rate of transfer of water from the surface to the air.  Though it is seems likely that the rate of water exchange in a warmer world also increases, it is not self-evident and would also need to be justified.  Dragons flight (talk) 17:50, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Evaporation as a whole (assuming you had no vapor in the air to start with) has a net positive feedback; the Earth would probably be an iceball like Mars if we didn't have water vapor providing the primary greenhouse effect. You are also correct that Evaporative cooling is based upon the rate of evaporation, where IR absorption is based upon (roughly the log of) the concentration of water vapor.  As the evaporation rate (and hence also concentration) goes up exponentially with temperature, you get a three-part graph of net temperature feedback vs. temperature over the ocean: Initially, positive feedback rises rapidly due to slight evaporation greatly increasing the greenhouse effect.  Evaporative cooling is minor at this stage.  This probably is at temperatures below or near the freezing point of water (earth average temperature is around 14C higher). In the second stage, the evaporation rate rises rapidly, and the marginal greenhouse warming impact diminishes as it becomes saturated, so the net (marginal) temperature impact starts to flatten out.In the third stage, the H20 greenhouse effect is nearly saturated, and large amounts of evaporation occur, so there is a net negative feedback.  I would venture that this net (marginal) negative feedback happens at the temperatures in the tropics (30C+), as my previously mentioned link on the impact of forests on evaporative cooling suggests.So, it's complicated.  I think the simplest accurate statement would be to say that evaporation increases greenhouse warming due to IR absorption, but it also causes evaporative cooling, cooling the earth's surface.  Which dominates depends on temperature, ground water levels, and wind speed.  Clearly both happen, and they are both powerful forces, so if you mention one, you should mention the other.  The sublinear marginal impact of greenhouse gas concentrations on radiative forcing is critical to understanding how the Earth's temperature stays in balance, and why the Earth hasn't become an iceball or boiled off its oceans.Cuberoot31 (talk) 22:37, 11 June 2008 (UTC)


 * This is where it would be useful for you to provide sources rather than speculating. For example Kiehl and Trenberth 1997 put the global budget for energy transfer between the atmosphere and surface via evapotranspiration at only 22% of the energy transfer via greenhouse gas absorption.  Given that, it is easy to imagine that the effect of  marginal changes in water vapor content are still dominated by the greenhouse effect, though we'd need significantly more detail to say with confidence.  Do you have any evidence that the cooling effect of increased evaporation offsets more than say 50% of the warming effect due to an increased greenhouse effect?  Dragons flight (talk) 23:22, 11 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Okay. It's relatively simple to understand the evaporative cooling has an impact, and that there is a temperature above which it will dominate marginal IR absorption.  The (NASA) reference I previously cited on forests said that increase evaporation from tropical rain forests causes net cooling.  I believe that should be all that is necessary to mention it as a negative feedback.  That said, here's a reference of significant cooling over the ocean due to an increased rate of evaporative cooling: Wind Cooling.  Here's another NASA article saying that evaporative cooling dominates marginal IR absorption increase in the tropics:
 * "Large-scale effects on the regulation of tropical sea surface temperature" By Hartmann, Dennis L.; Michelsen, Marc L., 11; 14; 6; ISSN 0894-8755; Journal of Climate; p. 2049-2062; United States. That's a Google cache link; this might be more stable: Direct LinkCuberoot31 (talk) 00:28, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
 * A relevant quote from the NASA article just cited: "For fixed exchange coefficient and relative humidity, the dependence of evaporative cooling on surface temperature is strongly stabilizing, and this estimate would indicate that it is large enough in magnitude to overcome the destabilizing effect of surface longwave cooling." They calculate a forcing of 7.2W m-2 K-1 at 300K, which is quite significant, and  substantially greater than their peak IR absorption gradient of about 3Wm-2 K-1 between 300K and 310K (read from a graph).  It's also significant relative to the roughly 4W m-2 forcing calculated for doubling the CO2 concentration.  Note that these results are for tropical ocean, which is warm and has plenty of water to evaporate.Cuberoot31 (talk) 04:58, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Clouds
The article currently states:


 * Feedback effects due to clouds are an area of ongoing research. Seen from below, clouds emit infrared radiation back to the surface, and so exert a warming effect; seen from above, clouds reflect sunlight and emit infrared radiation to space, and so exert a cooling effect. Whether the net effect is warming or cooling depends on details such as the type and altitude of the cloud. These details are difficult to represent in climate models, in part because clouds are much smaller than the spacing between points on the computational grids of climate models. Nevertheless, cloud feedback is second only to water vapor feedback and is positive in all the models that were used in the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report.


 * Referenced to:



That article appears to say exactly what it is purported to say, namely that cloud cover changes are a positive feedback in all IPCC models (specifically for the A1B scenario). The problem with this is that the IPCC (WGI report, Chapter 10, Section 10.3.2.2 18MB PDF) apparently comes to a different conclusion. They state specifically that the models disagree on the sign of the cloud radiative forcing response. In particular, see figure 10.11. I am somewhat loath to remove the Soden & Held reference outright, but I agree with Cuberoot31 that the coverage of this point is unbalanced at the moment. Dragons flight (talk) 17:21, 11 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm probably wrong - but as i read both Soden&Held and the AR4, the cloud feedback is positive in all models (ie. increased cloud cover) but the radiative feedback is roughly equally divided between showing negative and positive radiative forcing. So the text is misleading not the paper or the AR4. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 17:50, 11 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Soden & Held are talking about radiative forcing, not abundance. See for example their Figure 1 which is labeled dimensionally as W/m^2/K which are the dimensions of radiative forcing.  Dragons flight (talk) 18:00, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Chapter 8 says cloud feedbacks "amplifies the basic response by ... 10 to 50%"; and see fig 8.14. But it all seems rather complex (section 8.6.3.2.2) and 8.6.3.2.4 Conclusion on cloud feedbacks is vague William M. Connolley (talk) 20:51, 11 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Cloud feedback is disputed, even within the IPCC. The article cited (Soden&Held) is a study of studies that excludes some studies and attempts to extract information that wasn't explicitly made available from the studies it examines.  I doesn't seem to delve much into the underlying physics for why it should be one way or another, and the resulting "standard deviation" it comes up with (between studies, which is a bad way to compare) for cloud feedback is extremely large; which seems to be clear enough evidence that cloud physics isn't well understood or agreed upon.  I don't think studies of studies are generally good science, and this one isn't worth using as a source for Wikipedia, especially since it disagrees with the IPCC conclusion that cloud feedback is still disputed.  What if more than half the studies have an error in their calculations or just a bad or too sparse grid layout?  I've seen studies of studies for physical properties of materials that averaged out lots of bad results for people that didn't purify their material enough, where all the good results (which a decade later everybody obtained consistent results for) were all in agreement within a small margin of error over a span of decades, but most of the results were wrong, skewing the results low (the purer, the higher the result).  What is wrong with saying that the sign of net cloud feedback is disputed within the scientific community, and citing the IPCC where it says so?Cuberoot31 (talk) 14:49, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

please add this chart in the solar variation article
http://co2sceptics.com/news.php?id=1396

here is the chart [img]http://co2sceptics.com/attachments/database/1212569190.jpg[/img] —Preceding unsigned comment added by Manchurian candidate (talk • contribs) 07:56, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
 * No. Read WP:RS.  Brusegadi (talk) 08:41, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

2006 & 2007 temperatures?
I was reading through the Global Warming articles and several related articles, and I could find no mention of the 2006 & 2007 global average temperature. Is that data not yet available? I would think the most recent data would be important given the predictions for over 1 degree C increase over the next hundred years.

I am also curious: how does our current temperature stack up against past temperature models such as the ones charted in the "Climate models" section? For instance, is the current temperature about .07-.08 degrees warmer than it was in 2000, using measurements comparable to that chart? While I look at the chart, I am wondering: is it plotting global average land temperature, ocean temperature, atmospheric temperature, or what? --Coopercmu (talk) 16:57, 13 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Errrm, well it says "global", and if you click on the pic and read the text it says "This image shows the instrumental record of global average temperatures as compiled by the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia and the Hadley Centre of the UK Meteorological Office. Data set HadCRUT3 was used. HadCRUT3 is a record of surface temperatures collected from land and ocean-based stations". I've bolded the bit you missed. All the rest is the traditioanl weather-vs-climate William M. Connolley (talk) 21:33, 13 June 2008 (UTC)


 * What about 2006/2007 temps? How does our current temperature compare to the climate model predictions shown in the chart? --Coopercmu (talk) 21:43, 13 June 2008 (UTC)


 * You are confused by the difference between weather and climate. Climate models don't make predictions for individual years (and indeed, if you're thinking of the IPCC, they make projections, not predictions) William M. Connolley (talk) 21:49, 13 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Is there an actual reason to pick to 2005 as the end date? You can fiddle with start and end dates and conclude that the Earth warming or cooling -- pretty much anything you want. Kauffner (talk) 12:03, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Not really. Or maybe Gore sent a memo and I missed it :)  Anyways, I think it does not really matter, two observations will not change the trend.  If you want to and can update it, go for it. Brusegadi (talk) 13:20, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually I wouldn't be so hasty. The year 2005 is given because it is the year for which the most recent IPCC report gives values. Since the IPCC reports are going to be the most comprehensive they'll be the preferred source. -- Leland McInnes (talk) 16:12, 15 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Now I am confused because there are multiple references to 2005 "weather" data in the article. See the Temperature Changes / Recent section.  Either this "weather" information about the year 2005 should be removed, or it should be updated to the latest year available.  Additionally, I wonder how one would validate the accuracy of a "climate" model "projections"?  Perhaps one would examine the data from several years up to and including the most recent date.  Or maybe it's just over my head and I will get confused again. :) --Coopercmu (talk) 14:43, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, all the pictures need to be updated with current information. Seems the graphs all stop at some point a few years ago. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.63.144.242 (talk) 16:42, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Some questions, and does the article (or subtopic articles) have this information?
Hi. I have not yet read the entire article but am reading a book (Six Degrees) about it, and have read many other books. Is El Nino's effects mentioned? El Nino causes rainfall over the Acatama Desert. Some studies suggest that El Nino may become intense or even permanent, but the agreement is not universal. However, could that undry the Acatama? Any mention about that? What about the effects on the lower stratosphere? The possible collapse of the Amazon once temperatures get past two degrees? The so-called "weak underbellies" of the Antarctic sheets, Pine Island Bay in west Antarctica, and the Totten and Cook glaciers in East Antarctica (source: With Speed and Violence)? What about economical and agricultural impacts? Have any studies been done for global warming in 200 years, 500 years, 1000 years? What about extinction risk suring that time? Might the negative feedbacks start a new ice age (suggested by The Coming Global Superstorm)? When, if ever, is the Arctic Ice cap predicted to melt in the Winter as well? Does saltwater hinder its formation? Paleoclimatic studies? Temperature comparisons to the Cretaceous era, and might temperatures exceed that? If melted freshwater piles over, say, 30 metres of the current ocean, what does that do to the ocean currents? One thing about the Atlantic Conveyor halting theory always confuses me: are the implications worldwide, or just in the Atlantic? Do the worldwide currents slow down or stop as well? Might the warm currents disconnect from the cold currents? Have any studies been done on that? Might El Ninos weaken Atlantic hurricanes? Is it possible for ocean currents to seperate warm and cold, but still function? If ocean currents weaken, what does that do to monsoons? Coastal deserts? What are its effects on lakes such as the Great Lakes system? Might Lake Erie drop low enough to weaken Niagara Falls? The Caspian Sea? Any studies on how water might flood into the area with a ~25m sea level rise? Sorry if this all sounds like speculation, but I'm pretty sure most of this information can be supported by credible sources. Or, should I ask on the reference desk? I'm in no way critisizing the amount of information in the article, I haven't even read most of it, plus it's featured! It's just that global warming as a whole is a huge topic, and I just wanted to make sure that Wikipedia has sufficient coverage of all the main subtopics. Thanks. ~ A H  1 (TCU) 02:13, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Latest revert
Just reverted some amends which inter alia fail to distingush spot temperature from climatic (longer term) averages. Otherwise the weather reverses the effect of global warming every winter of course. --BozMo talk 18:44, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

"Potential effects" vs. "expected effects"
The reason I changed the wording here is that some of the effects listed here are fairly dubious. Both the "trade route" and "disease vector" effects are listed as things that "may" happen over at effects of global warming, so it seems reasonable that they'd be "potential" rather than "expected." Oren0 (talk) 00:40, 19 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Hello. I think most things would fall better under the expected category as opposed to the potential category, specially since they are so broadly defined and, in a way, many of them are already documented to some minor extent.  I really would not like to discuss this too much, so if you disagree with me just revert and if no one else has a problem I'll be ok.  Brusegadi (talk) 05:34, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Data to 2005
Why does the data on this page stop at 2005? Where are the most current graphics showing what happened to global temperatures in 2006 and 2007? By the way, in 2007 all climate research shows global temperatures dropped enough to wipe out almost all of the warming of the last 100 years. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Steve0999 (talk • contribs) 21:27, 19 June 2008 (UTC)


 * It does not. The graph is up to 2006, as far as I can make out. You can compare the original HadCrut graph, which is current up unto the last months here. I don't think it tells a different story. The 2005 cut-off date in the lede is because it's based on the IPCC report, which had a cut-off date in 2005. If you have a reliable source that is more up to date, bring it on. I don't know who lied about you on the 2007 issue. Apart from the fact that a single year temperature has no statistical significance, even on the face of it the statement is plain wrong. See the HadCrut data set here. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:47, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

US Army research office says sun is behind global warming
more proof that the sun is behind global warming http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/06/army-vs-global.html

and now NASA stating that they marginalised climate data http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,362023,00.html

please make a separate article on global warming on other planets.it got deleted as it was thought to be base less but now when the US military says that the sun is behind Gw it must be highlighted.So called green campaign like imposing carbon tax,carbon credits which is a joke and restricting freedom through environmentalism.

here are other articles sating other planets are heating up


 * http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2006/12/17/222712/69
 * http://www.channel4.com/science/microsites/U/ukweather2080/guides/planets.html
 * http://motls.blogspot.com/2006/05/global-warming-on-jupiter.html
 * http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2002/pluto.html
 * http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=192
 * http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20070404/sc_space/duststormsfuelglobalwarmingonmars;_ylt=AiVxN.mGF7G8fZ3EHMojv.3MWM0F
 * http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/060504_red_jr.html
 * http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/1998/triton.html
 * http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200607/s1697309.htm —Preceding unsigned comment added by Manchurian candidate (talk • contribs) 14:27, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Have you read what you cite? And have you read this article? NASA says they have downplayed global warming due to political pressure. And the scientific opinion has been that there are several sources of the current warming, with the predominant (not exclusive) one being the increase in greenhouse gases. This is what this article says, it's what Attribution of recent climate change says, and it is even what your Army scientist concedes ("up to 70% man-made"). For the alleged warming on other planets, see Talk:Global warming/FAQ and the following topics in the FAQ. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:38, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Your heading refers to the work Bruce West, of Scafetta and West, who's work is already referenced prominently in the article. Dragons flight (talk) 16:15, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

what i have come to relaize that wiki is also in the debunking bandwagon.the proof is everywhere.Why are you guys del the global warming on other planets article? here the the graph of solar irradience http://co2sceptics.com/news.php?id=1396 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Manchurian candidate (talk • contribs) 15:31, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
 * "Why are you guys del the global warming on other planets article?" For the same reason as why your article 2007 invasion of Iran was deleted :) Count Iblis (talk) 16:17, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
 * No, seriously, why would you object to having an article on global warming on other planets? What's the objection?  --GoRight (talk) 21:28, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
 * For starters, because it doesn't exist except in the minds of global warming deniers. Raul654 (talk) 21:31, 20 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't think so. I personally don't object to having such an article. It was deleted, however, because it was essentially devoid of content, containing nothing but some external links. If an extraterrestrial warming article can be properly written, I doubt anybody would object. ~Amatulić (talk) 21:37, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Ocean heat
Of interest, though it needs to settle: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=572


 * Link to the original abstract here. I'd prefer that (and RC, of course), to Mac's ENN report, although that one, apart from the title, is not too bad either. The big news is not the increase of the increase, I think, but the much improved fit of models and data, and the much better correlation of the data to known external forcings. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:33, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

US gov't (NOAA leading) finally expresses an opinion on storm strength
Good news, everyone! Well, good news that the bad news finally has the NOAA imprimatur. It only took seven years since Section 515 of the Treasury and General Government Appropriations Act (Public Law 106-554) authorized it, but now the wait is over:  The National Assessment of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program was published Thursday, June 19. Rejoice!

It's called: Karl, T.R., et al., eds. (June 2008) "Weather and Climate Extremes in a Changing Climate -- Regions of Focus: North America, Hawaii, Caribbean, and U.S. Pacific Islands" Synthesis and Assessment Product 3.3, U.S. Climate Change Science Program and the Subcommittee on Global Change Research (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Commerce, NOAA National Climatic Data Center, 164 pp. 10 MB PDF; statement size brochure summary, 4 pp.)  What an exhilarating title! It gives me goosebumps just typing it, and cramps.

We last heard from these fine folks in 2000 when they were authorized and appropriated under an entirely different set of laws, and called the subtly different U.S. Global Change Research Program. But back then, they weren't willing to tell us much about storm strength save for a passing aside about higher storm surge in a buried paragraph on rising sea levels. Hallelujah, this important topic is no longer relegated to the redacting Sharpie of the White House Office of Science Policy. Yay!

Enough of the exuberances, let's get to the meat. Quoth the NOAA:

And there, ladies and gentlemen, you have it, the premier weather forecasting agency of the government of the United States of America.

Are there any peer reviewed publications in literal agreement with these "very likely" and "likely" assessments in the last column of the last three rows? 75.61.106.191 (talk) 09:24, 20 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Should it be added already? Brusegadi (talk) 19:39, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Put some criticism, please
Or stop calling this stuff a free encyclopedia. You are FULL of criticisms, yet none passed on the main page. Oh yes, now please wrote pages of bla bla bla.83.103.38.68 (talk) 14:15, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * What encyclopedia would allow nonsense quoted from blogs to be given equal weight to peer reviewed scientific publications? Count Iblis (talk) 14:26, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

In your entry concerning global warming, under the heading "causes", the last sentence says "Climate commitment studies indicate that even if greenhouse gases were stabilized at 2000 levels, a further warming of about 0.5 degrees C (0.9 degrees F) would still occur". The statement cites the 2005 article by Meehl, Gerald et al in the 3/18/05 edition of Science entitled "How Much More Global Warming and Sea Level Rise".

I wonder what Mr. Meehl (PhD?) would have to say about the 0.2 degrees F global cooling which has supposedly occurred over the latest ten years? Given the ocean's known heat capacitance, there seems to be a major cooling trend occurring as you read this... and it isn't caused by decreased greenhouse gases; indeed, if it weren't for the increase in greenhouse gases, the world of today might be in the beginnings of another ice age, as was the "scientific concensus" of decades ago.

"Consensus" of scientists does not equate to good science. Just ask Christopher Columbus... the world was flat by consensus in his day.

The geophysicist (talk) 16:02, 22 June 2008 (UTC) The world was not flat in Columbus' day. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_Earth#Later_Medieval_Europe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_sphaera_mundi BritishJoe (talk) 00:39, 25 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Also somewhat apropos might be Talk:Global_warming/FAQ. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:48, 25 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I think Dr. Meehl would say that warming is not predicted to be monotonic and choosing only ten years to claim something about a long-term climate trend is not good practice. (If you disagree, please point to a reliable source stating otherwise.)  Moreover, there was never a consensus about global cooling in the 70's, as seen in the published work of scientists .  And please do ask Christopher Columbus about the consensus of the Earth's shape in his time. Jason Patton (talk) 18:35, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Scibaby's return
Does this edit seem familiar to anyone? It should: sock. Is this enough for an immediate block (identical edit and summary)? Oren0 (talk) 03:58, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Given the discussions we had in WP:ANI after Raul protected pages (basically, strong blocking in this set of pages, instead of full protection) I would block now if I had the tools. Brusegadi (talk) 04:03, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
 * And in case we didn't have enough evidence, see this latest edit compared to this confirmed sock edit. I too would block were I an admin.  Enough watch this page that I'm sure he'll be blocked before long. Oren0 (talk) 04:05, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Nacor is now blocked. --Akhilleus (talk) 04:13, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

The Empire Strikes Back? Count Iblis (talk) 15:18, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

I hope it was obvious to you guys that Xjet (who popped into this page immediately after you blocked Nacor) is another Scibaby sockpuppet. And, you should make a habit of checking the log. Using one logged-in account to register another is tactic used by Scibaby (and nobody else). It also tells you what other accounts he has lying around. And last, tagging a sockpuppet but not blocking him (e.g, as Kim did with User:Stenge) is not suffecient. Raul654 (talk) 15:34, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and lastly - I suggest you guys start a long-term RFCU page, get all the checkusers to watchlist it, and start bringing these cases there. Specifically, every time Scibaby pops up, you need to get a checkuser to block any IPs he's used for one year (a full block - no account creation, no anons, no logged in users), and then check the range and issue a range block (/24 at least, full block or anon-only depending on whether or not there are innocents in the range). Raul654 (talk) 15:40, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Who the heck is Scibaby and why was he blocked? I am just curious. Is there a place to go to find out the details? --GoRight (talk) 01:01, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I am sure there is but I don't know where. 122.105.220.129 (talk) 02:30, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

PNG or SVG graph
Since my efforts to replace the Global Temperature PNG graphic with a SVG version have been reverted a couple of times, I like to figure out: why? Image use policy says vector graphics should be prefered to raster images. ––Bender235 (talk) 14:17, 24 June 2008 (UTC)


 * This has come up a number of times. I think the last discussion is here. Vector graphics are preferred if all other things are equal. But the general feeling has been that the PNG is much superior aesthetically, and is clearer and easier to read. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:42, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Requests for adminship/oren0
Those who watch this page may be interested in Requests for adminship/oren0, since One major reason I'm applying for this is that the recent unprotection of several global warming pages and the subsequent retirement from the issue of a checkuser admin has left a void which needs to be filled by more admins to protect from sockpuppetry and vandalism. William M. Connolley (talk) 21:22, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

adding the solar irradence graph from NOAA
here is the graph http://co2sceptics.com/attachments/database/1212569190.jpg http://co2sceptics.com/news.php?id=1396

CAn someone add this in the solar variation page. 08:52, 27 June 2008 (UTC)