Arctic is warmest it's been in 10,000 years

[Matrix Dragon]

Darn hurricanes. Seems to be a lot of them lately.

[Rajvik]

No matrix, there hasn't been. Roughly the same number year to year, sometimes more hit the US, sometimes they stay out to sea

[Matrix Dragon]

EDIT: No, you know what. Fuck it. Descending to the level of petty insults and childish comments like this was originally is a wake up call. I'm out.

[robkelk]

Darn hurricanes. Seems to be a lot of them lately.

There are, yes. Stormfax has been keeping track.

[Epsilon]

BA, you are incorrect there, at least where I am concerned.  The only reason I don't have solar panels right now is because we will be replacing this house within a few years and we are saving the money for doing that with the new house. That said, supposed global warming is not why we will do it but the redundancy of a solar backup for when a hurricane knocks out our power again and the reduction in our power bills.

Oh hey I notice how Rob Kelk posted proof that definitively disproves your supposed rebuttal but now you don't want to talk about it anymore.

Just like you don't want to engage me about high school level physics.

So, again, Rajvik, do you believe in science or is it a giant leftist conspiracy?

[Dartz]

I'd say they'd add to the capital value of the house if you want to sell it.

They'll definitely knock back your aircon bills during the daytime. They're at their best when matched to the amount of electricity you burn during the day, or if you've electric heating/cooling/ how water. Here you get your best ROI if you don't put the biggest possible array on - because your power company doesn't pay for the electricity you export back, but merrily sells it to someone else.

But even in Ireland the investment has a good return.

I sell the yokes. I know what it takes to make them pay for themselves. I know who it can be done wrong, right, and where the snakeoil is.

I have thermal panels on the family home - even though thermal as a market died a death thanks to *reasons*. Since it's only partly occupied, they heat a storage tank of water during the day, and that tank's used either to keep the house from going cold, or make hot water. Right now - in march/april where there's longer days but it's still cool out - the system's actually doing the central heating for the house. (Everything is hydronic in Ireland - not air-based)


Just last winter it - and some other modifications - halved oil consumption from about €1000 worth - to €500 worth - with higher utilisation. The total cost of the work was about €4500. See that back in about 8-9 years. Faster, if the Saudis turn off the sauce again. And that's still running the same old rusty diesel-burner in the garden. .

From a purely fatcat-dollar-burning capitalist standpoint that makes a hell of a lot of money sense. And there were no grants to do it.

[Rajvik]

The house is a nearly 50 year old prefab that has been modified in a half assed manner over the last 30 years. I'm spending more time and money keeping it livable for me and my sister's animals than we will end up spending to replace the building. Considering that we own, (outright, no mortgage) the 16 acres its on puts us in a decent position, my sister just wants to up her credit score before she takes out a mortgage to build the new house.

Matrix, say what you will, I may fire back, I may ignore it, but I will see it.

No Epsilon, science isn't the conspirator, the scientists that seem to have an agenda of upping their grants on the other hand, they seem to be hip deep in it, or did you conveniently forget East Anglia U.

[Labster]

No Epsilon, science isn't the conspirator,  the scientists that seem to have an agenda of upping their grants on the other hand, they seem to be hip deep in it, or did you conveniently forget East Anglia U.

No Rajvik, the Republican Party isn't the conspirator, the Republicans that seem to have an agenda of upping their donations on the other hand, they seem to be hip deep in it, or did you conveniently forget Teapot Dome?

[robkelk]

BA, you are incorrect there, at least where I am concerned.  The only reason I don't have solar panels right now is because we will be replacing this house within a few years and we are saving the money for doing that with the new house. That said, supposed global warming is not why we will do it but the redundancy of a solar backup for when a hurricane knocks out our power again and the reduction in our power bills.

Oh hey I notice how Rob Kelk posted proof that definitively disproves your supposed rebuttal but now you don't want to talk about it anymore.

Just like you don't want to engage me about high school level physics.

So, again, Rajvik, do you believe in science or is it a giant leftist conspiracy?

To be fair, I posted evidence. "Proof" is extremely difficult to come by in real science - we don't even have proof that we're alive, just evidence.

[RMH999]

2017 numbers (links to sources I pulled the numbers from)

Federally funded climate research: $2.8 Billion dollars
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/27/us/po...check.html

Number of climate scientists in the USA: 31,000
https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R43061.pdf
____
Average money per scientist if split equally: $90,322
- University overhead (avg is 28%): $25,290 Universities charge costs for space, electric, general support that come out of grant money.

Total per climate scientist: $65,032
This is to cover research (computer, field time, data acquisition, materials, etc), pay post docs and technicians (Universities don't cover their pay), pay grad students depending on the university and program, pay themselves (Depending on university - for example, I'm in biomedical research and the university pays the salary of 4 administrative people. We have approximately 110 other staff, professors, students, post docs at last count, every single one having to be paid for by grants), and so on.

Number of climate scientists who say climate change is real: 97%

Please, tell me again how the scientists are in it for the "big grant money"

[Black Aeronaut]

I'd say they'd add to the capital value of the house if you want to sell it.

They'll definitely knock back your aircon bills during the daytime. They're at their best when matched to the amount of electricity you burn during the day, or if you've electric heating/cooling/ how water. Here you get your best ROI if you don't put the biggest possible array on - because your power company doesn't pay for the electricity you export back, but merrily sells it to someone else.

But even in Ireland the investment has a good return.

I sell the yokes. I know what it takes to make them pay for themselves. I know who it can be done wrong, right, and where the snakeoil is.

I have thermal panels on the family home - even though thermal as a market died a death thanks to *reasons*. Since it's only partly occupied, they heat a storage tank of water during the day, and that tank's used either to keep the house from going cold,  or make hot water. Right now - in march/april where there's longer days but it's still cool out - the system's actually doing the central heating for the house. (Everything is hydronic in Ireland - not air-based)


Just last winter it - and some other modifications - halved oil consumption from about €1000 worth - to €500 worth - with higher utilisation. The total cost of the work was about €4500. See that back in about 8-9 years. Faster, if the Saudis turn off the sauce again. And that's still running the same old rusty diesel-burner in the garden. .

From a purely fatcat-dollar-burning capitalist standpoint that makes a hell of a lot of money sense. And there were no grants to do it.

They don't pay you for the energy you put back into the grid?  Most places here in the US pay the going rate - they check the meters even as the run backwards, and some people get checks.  Not much, but they do get the credit for it.

[Rajvik]

Yes RMH, that is what the US is paying, now what is the UN paying in addition, and various special interests? (Actual question, not sarcasm)

Labster, I will see your Teapot Dome, and raise you Tammany Hall, or better yet, the up and coming Uranium One. Neither side has clean hands at all, and I question both, it just so happens that the real world evidence that I have seen with my own eyes, it doesn't seem to back your side.

Also note, we have only been able to really note all the hurricanes/tropical cyclones for about the last 60 years or so, not a significant sample size.

[RMH999]

UN 2018: $381.5 million total (worldwide)
https://www.unenvironment.org/about-un-e...ding-facts

if we scale the number of scientists using the USA total (which it isn't, it will be much less), that says 657,576 scientists worldwide.

Which means the UN contributes an amazing $580 to each research scientist.

Special interests: Not easy to find. I'd have to look up each group, plus I'd also have to look up all the anti-climate change funding to balance it out. I may try to do so, to get a rough idea, but it's not the work of 5 minutes on the internet (as all my other posts were).

[Labster]

Again, y'all're arguing the same topics and letting the same person troll you. Yes, he really believes this and does not think he is trolling. But if the standard of evidence is as he stated above, things he has seen with his own eyes, no proof could possibly convince him otherwise. He's like the Calormen dudes at the end of The Last Battle wondering where the door to the barn is.

[Epsilon]

No Epsilon, science isn't the conspirator,  the scientists that seem to have an agenda of upping their grants on the other hand, they seem to be hip deep in it, or did you conveniently forget East Anglia U.

Ohhh! You're one of those people who think a single email quoted out of context taken from a private conversation somehow disputes seventy years of scientific research.

Like, I remember this particular quote out of context: "We both known the probable flaws in Mike's recon, particularly as it relates to the tropical stuff." (Ed Cook to Keith Briffa, 17 Jun 2002)

But wait it goes on to say:  "The only way to deal with this whole issue is to show in a detailed study that his estimates are clearly deficient in multi-centennial power, something that you actually did in your Perspective piece, even if it was not clearly stated because of editorial cuts."

Or the massively popular: "I've just completed Mike's Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) and from 1981 for Keith's to hide the decline." (Phil Jones)

Or "The fact is we can't account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can't." (Kevin Trenberth)

Man, those quotes got a lot of play on your favorite "news" network, didn't they!

That word trick is really suspicious man. I would hate for it to be something that is commonly used in basically every scientific field from chemistry to computer science to biology to describe a clever method of doing something. Oh wait, it is. I can quote dozens of papers from various fields where the use of the word trick not only appears in the opening paragraph of the paper, published for anyone to read but even often in the title of the paper. Sounds to me more like you're conflating a jargon word with a colloquial word. I bet you don't believe in the 'theory' of gravity or the germ 'theory' of disease either!

Yet, oh man, they gotta "hide the decline". That's a scary term there. One email from one university certainly countermands seventy years of studies! Global temperatures are going down. Just look at that word decline. That's obviously what it means right? The only way the word decline is every used in the English language by anyone is to refer to global temperature, right? It's never used in any other context?

Or...

Maybe they were referring to an apparent change in global temperatures based on one indicator (tree ring data). Perhaps there is some variance in the responsiveness of tree rings to changes in climate. Perhaps there was (at the time) an ongoing debate about the usefulness of tree ring data for measuring global temperatures in pre-industrial periods. Maybe they were more concerned about using actual ("real") measured data in those years rather than one which was, at the time, controversial.

But what about that travesty comment? Well, in context they were talking about the well documented 11 year solar cycle which resulted in brief cooling in 2008~9 (the El Nino and La Nina cycle). But Trenberth in the quote was actually in a debate with two other scientists, both of whom disagreed with him on that fact. Hey, did you know what scientists sometimes do? They disagree. But one scientist's opinion on science is not going to upturn seventy years of climate studies. Because unlike you, Rajvik, we don't base our outlook on the world on pronouncements by experts, not even experts that agree with us. Experts are required to actually back up their claims with data and theoretical models with predictive power and experiments that sustain those predictions. So one scientist having a small disagreement on one small factor whether the 11 year solar cycle accounts for the changes in two years of data is not actually a major factor.

And before you go on about how they are hiding these conversations behind locked doors... But if you read the actual email in full Trenberth was referring to a paper her wrote and published that expressed those same doubts. So wait... wait... this supposed gotcha secret conspiracy was actually... just a public debate that had been going on in the academic papers and scientific journals for much of that year! Right out in public! I'm certain you, being a steely-eyed science man, did your research on this, Rajvik. After all, Trenberth only gives the URL of his paper in the very same email that your favorite conspiracy peddlers quote-mined.

But I mean, all those emails are out there. Go ahead, trawl through them. Find your supposed proof that the conspiracy exists. I'll wait. If you think I'm spinning this I invite you to confirm yourself. Go ahead and see if the word trick is used in many fields on published sceintific papers. Go ahead and see if the word decline is used to refer to global temperatures or tree ring proxies, or whether Trenberth's article exists and so on and so forth. And if you have other examples from the emails, you can present those instead. You're a big boy. 

You just said you believed in science. Prove it.

[classicdrogn]

Funny how this argument still sounds the same as what both sides were saying in 1992, just with different names tossed around.

[Dartz]

Like I said. Planet's fucked. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Didn't understand that Rajvik was demolishing his current gaf and rebuilding. Then, yeah, it makes sense not to invest in dead timber. Still, there's a lot of money that can be saved by spending some cash upfront if it's available. I work with this stuff - I've done the maths and I know how to make it pay in cold hard cash - not just in green cred.

Although I've seen some fucking snakeoil being sold as the latest 'greenest' thjing. I've seen a lot of people get ripped off - so it's one area you really need to do your work in.,

[RMH999]

Oh, I knew I was being trolled. Had some bad family medical news yesterday and was feeling combative - better to argue on the internet than go out and do something even more useless ^^

But anyway... going back to finish my numbers

Private scientific research funding in the US: 322.5 Billion, 110 of which is biomedical research. This leaves 212.5 Billion for everyone else.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Funding_of_science
https://www.researchamerica.org/news-eve...e-how-long

Total engineers & scientists in the US: 6.9 million
Climate scientists: 31,000 or 0.0045% of the total

Looking at the numbers for federal funding, climate scientists get about 4x what they would get if spread out equally, so I'll use that multiplier for the private funding as well.

212.5 Billion x 0.018 = 3.825 Billion for private climate research.
F&A rate - 28% (yep, on private funds too): $2.754 Billion

Final per person: $88,838

Final per climate scientist total (Private, public, UN): $154,451

I've had yearly mouse bills almost that high.

And I'm done here - I just wanted to get a final rough number estimate as it would drive me nuts otherwise.

[classicdrogn]

Wait, what? Mouse bills? Like... damage caused by mice, or what?

[RMH999]

Wait, what? Mouse bills? Like... damage caused by mice, or what?

Housing costs for transgenic mice, purchasing new strains, etc.  We've reduced the strains/numbers of animals, but our housing costs are still ~$5000 per month for mice and depending on experiments, we may spend 2-3K more in a month.  We're currently maintaining approximately 30 different strains for our experiments.

RMH

[Black Aeronaut]

Wait, what? Mouse bills? Like... damage caused by mice, or what?

Housing costs for transgenic mice, purchasing new strains, etc.  We've reduced the strains/numbers of animals, but our housing costs are still ~$5000 per month for mice and depending on experiments, we may spend 2-3K more in a month.  We're currently maintaining approximately 30 different strains for our experiments.

RMH

..... Well, that's certainly a domestic situation that is not what you call common.

[RMH999]

Wait, what? Mouse bills? Like... damage caused by mice, or what?

Housing costs for transgenic mice, purchasing new strains, etc.  We've reduced the strains/numbers of animals, but our housing costs are still ~$5000 per month for mice and depending on experiments, we may spend 2-3K more in a month.  We're currently maintaining approximately 30 different strains for our experiments.

RMH

..... Well, that's certainly a domestic situation that is not what you call common.

[DHBirr]

Transgenic mice.... I wonder what you're engineering for—

Well, errrr, I for one welcome our new rodent overlords.... They probably can't do a much worse job than our human "leadership."

[SilverFang01]

Denying anthropogenic climate change at this point is like believing in a flat earth, a geocentric universe, that the moon landings were fake or being an anti-vaxxer (at least without the punch on sight felling that anti-vaxxers generate in me).

We have had the chance, as Lord Vetinari puts it, of grabbing events by the collar and at least try to mitigate the damage and disruption it will cause. Instead, thanks to stupidly unwise people with more money than brains, events have grabbed us by the throat.

Does that mean I should stop fighting? No. I have an obligation to my nephews and nieces to do what I can until the bitter end.

[Black Aeronaut]

There was once an old man that lived in a little cabin on an island in a lake at the foot of a mountain.

He doesn’t live there anymore because he didn’t believe the volcanologists that tried to warn him of the terrible danger he was in.

There were people living on small islands in the Chesapeake. They don’t live there anymore because they didn’t listen to the sheriff when he warned them about the hurricane that was coming. Even after he asked for the contact info of their next of kin.

The best thing we can do is to try to warn these people and prepare for the inevitable. Hopefully there will be a lot less stupid to go around after the dust settles.