Global warming is grossly exaggerated

Freeman Dyson at Edge.org:

The main subject of this piece is the problem of climate change. This is a contentious subject, involving politics and economics as well as science. The science is inextricably mixed up with politics. Everyone agrees that the climate is changing, but there are violently diverging opinions about the causes of change, about the consequences of change, and about possible remedies. I am promoting a heretical opinion, the first of three heresies that I will discuss in this piece.

My first heresy says that all the fuss about global warming is grossly exaggerated. Here I am opposing the holy brotherhood of climate model experts and the crowd of deluded citizens who believe the numbers predicted by the computer models. Of course, they say, I have no degree in meteorology and I am therefore not qualified to speak. But I have studied the climate models and I know what they can do. The models solve the equations of fluid dynamics, and they do a very good job of describing the fluid motions of the atmosphere and the oceans. They do a very poor job of describing the clouds, the dust, the chemistry and the biology of fields and farms and forests. They do not begin to describe the real world that we live in. The real world is muddy and messy and full of things that we do not yet understand. It is much easier for a scientist to sit in an air-conditioned building and run computer models, than to put on winter clothes and measure what is really happening outside in the swamps and the clouds. That is why the climate model experts end up believing their own models.

More here.

Comments

[Scott Ahlf]

While I have always admired Dyson's anti-nuclear and anti-nationalism stand, and his solid moral objectives, I think ideology gets in the way of science on mr Dysons part on this issue. With nuclear power being brought up as a option to burning ancient sunlight (a view I do not support), this fly directly in the moral face of a person who has taken a lifelong anti-nuclear position.
I agree, the "real world" is messy, with many feedback loops possible, and not linear---
However, the "messy" evidence is overwhelming, visible, and the models are performing (if anything, underperforming)-
Dyson's expertise is quantum mechanics, solid-state physics, and nuclear weapons--
not meteorology--
I believe if all evidence is checked, we will find Mr. Dyson blinded by ideology over good science--

[JonJ]

I was interested in his suggestion about increasing biomass. Probably quite impractical, but there might be something to it theoretically. After all, he is a theoretician.

Let's see what the RealClimate people have to say about this essay.

[Hummer]

Thank you, Freeman. Your new Hummer will now be delivered to your driveway.

[j@ne futzinfarb]

Dyson presents a striking viewpoint - striking for how patently flawed it appears to me, and at so many places. As the first comment states, climate models do perform. Also the long term Mauna Loa CO2 data are hard and clear evidence that the "topsoil effect" does not automatically "fix" the climatically significant excess carbon - that extraordinary data presents an unequivocal historical and quantitative record of rising atmospheric CO2 concentration tracking with fossil fuel use and without corresponding offset from increased biological fixing in topsoil. Further, Dyson's argument seems to suggest that resources that might go to reducing CO2 emission would be better spent on reducing "poverty, underdevelopment, unemployment, disease and hunger" as though resources somehow would then flow automatically to achieve those ends absent concern about global climate change, all evidence to the contrary. And this even though he recognizes that the effects of climate change - a potential effect of doing nothing about CO2 emissions - could mean death and misery for billions of people. Dyson admits both that we don't fully understand the impact of fossil fuel generated CO2 on the climate (though it's greenhouse effect is extraordinarily straightforward) and that potential consequences of CO2 generated climate change could be cataclysmic to current patterns of human culture and settlement, yet fails to even mention, much less question, the incredible recklessness of continuing our conduct of an experiment in which we dump trillions of pounds of the stuff into the atmosphere every year. Even Dyson's hundredth of an inch of topsoil seems misleading, overlooking how rapidly biochemical processes in topsoil return its carbon to the atmosphere as CO2 (once again, see the Mauna Loa data) and presented in a way that makes an extraordinary volume of material appear insignificant (e.g., a dump truck load of topsoil for every man, woman and child, for every human being, each year, year in and year out). Really, terribly disappointing - and perhaps very, very scary - could it be that Freeman Dyson, brilliant scientist and committed humanist, having examined the alternatives maintains that our BEST option is to stay the course, recognize the consequence could be the death and suffering of billions, and hope for the best?

[anonymous]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20122975/site/newsweek/page/0/

[doug l]

Dyson's self-admitted heresies are an effective device to reveal by way of contrast certain observations that he and his considerable experience find wanting in the broader discussions and these heresies are intended to be provocative and do so on a level that, while by definition flying in the face of the majority of the scientific community, bring to the fore some very crucial questions, the answers for which are tenuos, especially when compared to the vast complexity of the ongoing process we're attempting to understand. In the end it calls for increased scientific research and increases in the efforts to bring relief to those who suffer as a result of the effects of the impacts from unchecked human expansion informed by greater understanding of science and history.
It's sad that the mere expression of a contrary view, crafted to help our understanding of the controvery, brings such negative and cynical criticism to his perspective and underscores what he observes among even his scientific fellows.
I'm looking forward to reading the book and suspect that it will become something of a benchmark and required reading in the future discussions on our relationship with the planetary biosystems.
If there is to be disappointment, better that Dyson is wrong than that critically important questions go un-asked.

[beajerry]

That's a good point to make Doug, however there are many poor communities in the world who don't have the time to wait for Dyson to be proved wrong. They need direct help RIGHT NOW for their flooding/drought ALONG WITH drastic changes in world CO2 emissions to keep the tipping point from looming down upon them.

Now perhaps that's giving into a rash set of action (without the full consensus of the science), but it seems to me THAT's something better to be wrong about than Dyson being proved wrong.

But maybe you already said that.

[Jesse M.]

A poster on an internet infidels forum thread on this made some pretty good points:

All climate models are tested against real-world data. Their ability to accurately simulate past climate change is a good indicator that they will accurately predict future changes as well. And of course no model is plucked from thin air; they're all based on well-tested knowledge about how the atmosphere works. In the case of climate models, we're not talking about inputs with subtle effects. Basic physics tells us that increasing GHGs is going to play a big role, so griping about the flaws of any given model is quite beside the point. If they are off, they are just as likely to underestimate warming as to overestimate it.

For Dyson, who is a physicist, to dismiss models because the real world is "messy" is exceptionally ironic. Physics makes heavy use of models all the time, concerning everything from atoms to galaxies. These things are far "messier" in real-life than the simplified models that represent them, yet no one denies their marvelous predictive power. Surely Dyson is no stranger to this; perhaps he's chosen to selectively ignore those models that aren't saying things he disagrees with.

[david]

Dyson has also — if I recall correctly, it was for a Long Now presentation a year or so ago in San Francisco — rather airly dismissed the threat of flooding as being of little concern as it would mostly involve areas of little global importance, economic or cultural. It was an amazingly obtuse statement and has forever colored my view of him. Further proof that otherwise intelligent people can say and belive stupid things. I think anything he says on this topic has to be taken with more than a few grains of salt and a load of carbon offsets.

[Barry]

Add to all of the above the raw dishonesty:

"This is a contentious subject, involving politics and economics as well as science. The science is inextricably mixed up with politics."

With no mention of who's doing their best to politicize the science.

"Everyone agrees that the climate is changing, but there are violently diverging opinions about the causes of change,..."

Um, yes - there's the mainstream consensus in climatology on one side, and cranks on the other side. The sort of 'balance' which appeals to ignorant journalists, but which I strongly doubt that Dyson tolerated in his research.

"I am promoting a heretical opinion,...."

Straight out of crankdom - 'look, I'm Galileo!!!!'.

[Michael Tobis]

I reply to Dyson in some detail here .

[Sam Grove]

With no mention of who's doing their best to politicize the science.

Given that much of the research is done on government grants and the IPCC report is the product of a political body, it should be held as a given that the science is politicized.

Also, the premise that CO2 is a significant driver of climate has not been demonstrated outside of computer models.

The role of the most significant greenhouse gas is not adequately understood and therefore very poorly modeled.