[briga]

Using events like this to illustrate that global warming is happening is about as scientifically significant as when Trump used the recent US cold snap to imply that global warming isn't happening. I'm not saying climate change doesn't exist--it certainly does--but outlying events like this aren't by themselves particularly unusual. "Normal", after all, is at the top of a bell curve, and deviations from normal should be expected.

[mikeash]

This is a false equivalence. The reasons they’re being linked are important too. When Trump and others point to cold snaps as evidence against climate change, they’re just drawing a straight line from one to the other with no rationale or explanation in between. When extreme events like this are linked to climate change, they’re presented as illustrative of a well studied phenomenon that definitely causes this sort of thing to happen.

It’s like if I take the Lord’s name in vain and then get sick and you tell me this shows that I shouldn’t swear. Then you lick a handle on the subway and get sick and I tell you this shows how disease is transmitted by germs. The two may look superficially similar, but the underlying reasoning is important.

[notdonspaulding]

I don't think the main thrust of your argument is wrong, however, your sickness example is also a false equivalence.

There's nothing logically or philosophically or scientifically preventing both explanations for why we each got sick from being simultaneously true. You're attempting to draw a dividing line between "religious thinking" and "rational, scientific thinking". No such division existed throughout history. Even today many "scientists" think along religious terms while many religions are evidence-obsessed. Counter-examples abound.

[mikeash]

It’s not about one explanation being logically impossible. It’s about one explanation being factually untrue.

[mrow84]

The scientific significance of these two events (Arctic warming and the recent US cold snap) is not comparable. If you would like more information, you can start by referring to the wikipedia article on climate change in the Arctic [0], and the skeptical science page on why cold weather isn't evidence against global warming [1]. There are numerous other publications available online which discuss these issues that I'm sure you will be able to find.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_in_the_Arctic

[1] https://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-cold-weather...

[lisper]

Even single data points can be statistically significant if they are extreme enough. But here is a fact that often gets ignored: the Northwest Passage, which was famously impassable for centuries, now regularly has civilian cruise ships navigating it in the summer. I was on such a cruise a few years ago. Not only was the NWP navigable, we actually had to go out of our way to find any sea ice at all.

[joshuahedlund]

They're different by orders of magnitude. This spike is occurring in context of record low winter ice following a record low the previous winter following decades of a declining average. Yeah, the 25 number is a spike on the edge of the bell curve, but this bell curve is consistently shifting, and thus so are these spikes.

[nashashmi]

That's OP's point. It is only a spike, not an event that points to climate change. A climate change event example would be an average yearly temperature changing significantly.

[ianai]

As a lay person, I think the poles are much more symbolic of the total state of the weather/water system in the micro level than anywhere else on earth. An observation with several sigmas of difference from average at the poles probably translates to very widespread conditions.

[graeme]

This comment shows up on every thread on this topic. Have a look at this data another user posted: http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php

The last three years have been highly above average in the arctic. This isn't "arctic has one warm day!". It's "the entire year is abnormally warm in the arctic, like the past three!"

The appropriate comparison would be the US having a whole winter which is 10-20 degrees colder than normal.

[discoursism]

I don't know global warming is happening because of this news article. This news article worries me because I know global warming is happening.

[vixen99]

How does the 'I know' bit advance the discussion?

[skywhopper]

At some point, it's silly to expect every comment to make a full and comprehensive argument. Like how I can worry about something falling from the sky because "I know" gravity exists. So when I see something straight above your head growing larger coming straight towards you as it falls, I know it will not change course, and I don't feel the need to explain general relativity to you before I suggest you ought to get out of the way.

[aaomidi]

The discussion isn't about whether we know it's happening or not. We should stop letting deniers move the goal posts.

The discussion is we know this is happening, what do we do to stop it?

[discoursism]

I don't understand what you mean by "advance the discussion."

[jacquesm]

When Trump uses the expected weather for the time of year to illustrate nothing is happening it is not exceptional so does not prove a thing. But if something exceptional happens it is a data point in a data set indicating there is a change.

Hot weather in July in the Northern hemisphere is not unusual and does not require explanation or study. Snow in July would be unusual and would require explanation and study.

[bromuro]

We are talking about average values with an high degree of deviation - so it is normal the values to be out of the average (“normality” never happens in meteorology).

The problem is how much and how often this happens: global warning is very likely to be caused by human activity.

Future looks ugly, everybody is (maybe unconsciously) afraid and at fault. And instead of looking for a solution I use my brain 40 hours/week to solve useless problems. Those who have also money send cars in the space. What could go wrong.

[Applejinx]

It's all about chaos theory. The degree of deviation is directly relative to the amount of energy in the system. Cool the system off, and the deviation (weather) will cover a smaller range. Add energy to the system, as we are doing, and what you EXPECT to see is a titanic chaotic system behaving as chaotic systems do: becoming more chaotic, and widening its range of possible outcomes (and most likely, shortening their duration, because everything becomes more unstable).

Insane heat waves AND insane cold snaps is very much part of 'global warming', or the consistent moderate increase in energy we're doing.

Thousand and ten-thousand-year storms and extremes become yearly or monthly events as the range of the system's outputs has changed. Expect other cold snaps… and ridiculous, dangerous heat waves… and other sorts of dangerous and destructive weather events.

[analogic]

Solution easy, just get all countries in the world to agree to stop burning fossil fuels now whatever the cost. Then just have to tell all the poor people in [poor country] that they can't live like we do because we got there first and messed it all up.

We're all sure gonna be kicking ourselves after it all goes Mad Max. Completely avoidable, yet all but inevitable with no off-switch in sight in the real world.

[KozmoNau7]

We can barely even get people to sort their trash or turn off the lights when they leave a room.

So yeah, we're doomed.

[noiv]

> bell curve

The thing is the curve is moving towards higher temperatures and we get unexpected deviations more on one end than the other. And have you considered these events may be not significant - yet, because the science department is hopelessly understaffed?

[nareiber]

I think this is meant just to be a 'cherry on top' type of data point, as it's almost universally understood that our climate is indeed changing.

[GuiA]

Isolated abnormal events aren't significant to illustrate global warming is happening, but an increasing frequency of abnormal events is.

[Applejinx]

Bigtime. And the range of 'abnormal' event, and its frequency. And these events can include unseasonal coldness.

[briga]

Granted, but I can just picture the people posting this to Facebook citing it as definitive proof that the world is melting.

[baddox]

The fact that it is easy to imagine someone misusing a piece of data is hardly worth mentioning. There is no conceivable piece of data which couldn’t easily be misused by someone.

[tachyoff]

There’s definitely a fine line, but let’s be real, Facebook was never really about fine lines and nuance.

[IntronExon]

If your standard is worrying about what people will post on FB then paralysis is your only option.

[briga]

What? Facebook shapes public opinion, so does this site. Is public opinion not worth worrying about?

[IntronExon]

A huge majority of public opinion as expressed on FB is just the echo of some bot, somewhere. Maybe it matters in some sense, but again, if you pander to thst standard you will never say a word.

[sinh]

There is a qualitative difference which makes it beyond improbable that the changes we observe happen by chance.

Let's say your assumption is that the things we observe happen by chance. Now, we have, say 100 years of temperature records. If only the last year just happens to be the warmest year of all observations, there would be an 1:100 probability that this was by chance.

Now, Wikipedia says: "A 2013 article published in Geophysical Research Letters has shown that temperatures in the region haven't been as high as they currently are since at least 44,000 years ago and perhaps as long as 120,000 years ago. The authors conclude that "anthropogenic increases in greenhouse gases have led to unprecedented regional warmth."[12][13]"

So it is way more than one warm year in 100 years.

But to comprehend the unlikelihood that this happens by chance, consider another record. Look at this graph:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f8/Gl...

It shows that the instrumental temperature record sind 1880 to today. You see that since 1980, every year was warmer than all the years before.

What is the probability of that for the hypothesis this happened by chance? From 1880 to 2017 are 137 years. The last 37 years have higher temperatures than all the years before. Assuming that no systematic change is happening, the probability is the same as putting the numbers from 1 to 137 into a box, drawing blindly 37 from them, and discovering that you have drawn the numbers 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, and so on, until 137. What is the probability of this?

It is given by the binominal coefficient:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combination

with n = 137, k=37, 1 : n! / (k! (n - k)!).

Using Python:

    >>> def fak(n):
    ...     if n <= 1:
    ...         return 1
    ...     return n * fak(n-1)

    >>>def binom(n,k): 
    ... return fak(n) / (fak(k) * fak(n-k))
    
    >>> n=137
    >>> k=37
    >>> binom(n,k)
    3902541575254646835963436276286280L

So, the probability it happens by chance is

1 / 3902541575254646835963436276286280

Do you still think it happens by chance?

[posterboy]

I think OP was implying that your kind of reasoning is desperately needed, not just isolated evidence (although, I didn't read the article yet). Alas, your comment is preaching to the choir, not the audience OP might have had in mind. Although, the article is on an academic site -- so much for the audience.

xkcd had a nice illustration: https://xkcd.com/1732/

[brentm]

At this point believing or not believing in climate change is analogous to religion. I have trouble believing any facts or data would swing a significant portion of either side of the debate. Denying climate change is easy. We're not going to see places like New York City move swiftly underwater and the problem is so abstract it's easy to call BS. Short of Trump changing his mind and using his super power of convincing conservatives to go along with things they otherwise never would have gone along with we will continue in this pattern for probably our life time.

[tinco]

As someone who is convinced of climate change, I like to think my mind would be changed rather easily with some comforting graphs and believable theories on how those graphs show the earth is in fact not warming ever more rapidly since the industrial revolution.

I mean, that would be really really nice.

[ThomPete]

As far as I understand the argument from people like Alex Epstein and a host of other climate alarmist sceptics is a little different.

Everyone is agreeing there is climate change, in fact there have always been climate change and according to them the climate have been much worse than it is now.

Most sceptics even agree that humans affect the climate.

The discussion as far as I can understand is to what degree do humans affect it. I.e. is it enough for us to worry about it.

There is as far as I have been able to learn no actual consensus, in fact, ICSC has been lowering their projections over the last 10 year or so.

If you want to figure out whether you should worry or not may I suggest you try and find out what the official consensus on humans effect on the climate is. You will be surprised how little certainty you will find. I certainly was.

[polotics]

Enough certainty for us to have now solidly moved from prisoner's dilemma to campers' dilemma http://cassandralegacy.blogspot.ch/2017/06/facing-climate-be...

[ThomPete]

Then show me the numbers.

I am pretty agnostic here, but if you want me to worry I need to see more than "enough certainty" and as many say "enough significance" without ever providing any actual hard numbers.

I am not a scientist but I know that if you can't actually show any concrete numbers then you have interpretation i.e. no consensus.

It's frustrating when you are trying to figure out what's up and down in this discussion.

[madaxe_again]

Oh man, if someone dug up actual, solid data that showed that all of our understanding of ice cores and historic temperature and co2 was wrong, and irrefutably so, I'd be overjoyed.

This is, after all, rather like living with the sword of Damocles over my head. I'd really rather not have it dangling there, glinting menacingly at me, but wishing the sword wasn't there doesn't help one jot.

[zipwitch]

Climate change denialism has more in common with Flat Earth Theory than religion of any stripe. (Which makes so many Americans buying into it all the more frighting.)

[bleachedsleet]

...and flat earth theory also has a lot in common with religion.

I'm sorry, but it is impossible to be a truly intelligent person that also believes in any religion without serious cherry picking or psychological compartmentalization. I say this as someone that loves studying religion (I have a degree in it), but I study it as an artform of human expression or an oddity that once was, not as a serious pursuit of self-completion. Hopefully, we can one day study those that deny basic climate science and geology the same way...

[discoursism]

> ...and flat earth theory also has a lot in common with religion.

I wouldn't say so. At least not in the epistemic/anti-epistemic way that parallels climate-change denialism. Most religions make a lot of unfalsifiable claims. Since opponents cannot conclusively falsify those claims, it gives religious adherents an epistemic place to hide and claim personal religious experiences, etc.

Most religions have not, in the main, been conclusively refuted, since they involve events that happened thousands of years ago, and even when something is shown to have not happened, the adherents have good precedent for claiming that a given portion is allegorical. Since religious interpretation is rife with different viewpoints, they'll even have a respected theologian to point to who called it in advance.

Flat-eartherism is a horse of a different color. It makes a bunch of falsifiable predictions, which have subsequently been falsified many different ways. Then its proponents just ignore the evidence and keep on believing their viewpoint anyway. Epistemologically, climate change denial has a lot more in common with this than it does with religion.

I say this as an anti-theist. I don't have much good to say about religion, but I'd rather deal with someone who believes things which can't be proven rather than someone who believes things that have been conclusively disproven. Religious people are in that way a lot like anyone else. They aren't as deluded as someone who can look at clear evidence and simply ignore it.

[enraged_camel]

>>Most religions have not, in the main, been conclusively refuted

That's because most religions have as their central tenet a completely unfalsifiable claim: that there is a god.

[erikpukinskis]

One should remember that many unfalsifiable things are true.

Zero falsified things are true (plus some false negative rate)

Personally, I believe in God because it’s tautological. Saying there is a god is like saying half of children are above average. As soon as you reference a line in the universe, there is inevitably an ultimate point on it.

Edit: I will add that I don’t think God is truly omnipotent. She is bound by the laws of physics, same as us, and will die with the universe. Perhaps sooner. But my article of faith is that she will long outlast me. If I’m wrong, and God dies on my watch, that’s a bridge I needn’t worry about til I get there.

[discoursism]

This is just what I said, but, yes, you are grasping the thrust of my comment.

[tntn]

I like to think of myself as intelligent, and I am religious. I'd like to gain some insight into exactly what kind of serious cherry picking I'm doing. Could you provide some examples of what you had in mind when you wrote your comment?

I have a hard time understanding how someone can get a degree in religion without noticing how unfalsifiable most religions are.

I'd also be interested to hear what great new evidence has arisen since the 19th century that makes religion so foolish. Take Maxwell for example. He knew about the age of the Earth and recognized the validity of Darwin's theory of evolution. Yet he was by all accounts a very religious man.

[bleachedsleet]

I think your example of Maxwell makes my point. Let's assume Christianity for a moment, since Maxwell was a Christian. In order to accept the consensus of evolutionary theory while still maintaining one's faith, one must either cherry pick ("the Genesis account was wrong"), compartmentalize ("I accept evolution as true and ignore the conflict with my faith") or appeal to the problem of interpretation that all religions face ("Genesis was obviously not meant to be taken literally and is mere metaphor"). The last option tends to fall under cherry picking itself since it changes with time. Until evolution was accepted as fact, it was mostly taken for granted that the Genesis account was literal. Now days, unless you adhere to creationism, you must assume part of your theology to be metaphorical under no rational basis or risk being outed as a fool that believes in fairy tales. Thus, while Maxwell was a great scientist and definitely had smarts in that area, it would seem to me that he compartmentalized, accepting a philosophy as true that his own scientific pursuit would otherwise find false. A modern example would be William Lane Craig who I find to be a very eloquently formed speaker and obviously quite learned, but for some reason, ignores basic scientific truths in order to preserve his faith.

[svskeptic]

Lets start with why you think the particular religion you practice is the one?

If you think, all are the same, then you are now moving towards existence of a superior being and possibly creationism.

[erikpukinskis]

Pretty much all major religions are compatible with each other. You can move towards a particular sect if you have specific needs. A polytheist Christian would tend towards Catholicism, etc.

I don’t think you need to adhere closely to one single tradition in order to be “religious” if that’s what you’re getting at.

To answer your question directly though, I was raised in a Christian church. I adhere to some basic form of that. Humility, forgiveness, we were made in Gods image, the original sin of the knowledge of good and evil, etc.

[derriz]

I think religion is a better comparison or at least an aspect of religion. Climate change denialism strikes me as having similar features with creationism. Both require believing in a vast global conspiracy of compromised academics - motivated by atheism or liberalism. Both willfully dismiss scientific evidence and consensus if it challenges their world view. But they will proudly admire the very rare academic (invariably not qualified in climate science or biology) who - outside of normal scientific process - become celebrities by providing bias reinforcement.

[jakeogh]

"Flat Earth" is not about convincing normal people Earth is flat. Sure you get a few that genuinely believe it because they lack the skills to evaluate evidence, but that's not the point. By using it, you have "fallen" for it's utility. It's a common theme if you study disinformation.

[ThomPete]

Actually claiming there are a lot of climate change denialist out there is probably more religious.

Most skeptics if not all of them agree there is climate change, most of them even agree some of it is man-made.

The discussion is how much and you won't find any consensus on that no matter how much you try to ask for it.

[loverofthings]

In similar ways, majority of people that believe in climate change do nothing (or barely anything) to fight it. No one is reducing their heating/cooling, no one is changing their diet, no one is measuring their heating patterns and trying to optimize it (by no one I mean barely anyone).

People still want their 24/7 AC, their steaks, their huge cars, their big heat inefficient houses, their plane flights etc.

No one does a thing.

Believing in climate change, or not believing, when reflected in the actions of people, is in my eyes completely equivalent.

[mirimir]

That's not true. Many people in "developed" countries reduce their energy use, and their use of energy-intensive products, in order to help reduce climate forcing. And they've done so for decades.

However, it is true that too few people in "developed" countries do that. And it's also true that too many people in "less-developed" countries lust after energy-intensive lifestyles. So overall, its unlikely that overall climate forcing will decrease. Unless solar energy and battery usage take off exponentially enough.

Even worse, there's already enough CO2 in the atmosphere to drive substantial climate change. And the poles are warming fast enough to drive substantial CO2 and CH4 outgassing from melting permafrost.

So maybe it's just too late. And so maybe the rational option for those alive now is to party hearty. Russia and China probably like that path.

[jtzhou]

Or live wisely so you have the financial means and health to move you and your family elsewhere when need arrives, probably in our lifetimes for 80% of the world.

[mirimir]

Right. That's arguably the prudent take on "party hearty". There's always the tension between "do fun stuff now when you can enjoy it most" and "save for later when you'll have more free time and less likely income".

[jtzhou]

Ah understood. You were looking at the national level with countries like China and Russia "party[ing] hearty" by not significantly curbing C02 emissions. Those individuals who benefit directly from oil and coal (as they do in the US) will extract gains and use it to pad offshore bank accounts. Meanwhile the rest of us should take a prudent life and be prepared for shocks ahead (like land and cost of living soaring in climate-friendly cities). On a more personal level, ideally savers find ways to extract more late-life enjoyment out of their deferred-enjoyment lifestyles.

[loverofthings]

I'm not sure that many people do that.

A good comparison would be FOSS. Richard Stallman inconveniences himself to the point of absurdity, but I'm pretty sure barely anyone does anything close to it.

I changed my diet, I live in good housing, but when I put the numbers on paper, I'm not doing much at all, and could do much more.

[craigsmansion]

> Richard Stallman inconveniences himself to the point of absurdity

I'm not sure that's an apt comparison. rms simply has a workflow that doesn't require the use of proprietary software. It's not that inconvenient for him.

In on-topic comparison, it would be having a lifestyle where you'd simply have no use for a car: you live close to work, enjoy riding a bicycle, etc.

Of course, finding that workflow or lifestyle might limit some options, but once you accept that, it's not all that inconvenient.

[loverofthings]

So do vegans have a workflow that makes their diet convenient. The thing is, one has to start somewhere, and no one starts anywhere because they see the change as inconvenient.

[bulatb]

"Eat your vegetables" is never the answer. In climate change, because of the coordination problems, "Eat your vegetables" is so emphatically not the answer that it shouldn't even be discussed as anything except a desperate, ineffective stopgap.

People will keep eating candy. They will never eat their vegetables, unless they taste like candy. It's pointless to imagine worlds in which they eat their vegetables and everything is great because, although it's possible to write a plan to get from here to there, those worlds are strictly fantasy. The plan can not be followed. I could also write a plan for the sun to rise in the west—and it would also fail, for largely the same reason.

If you want to solve the problem, make a better, cheaper vegetable that tastes like candy.

[loverofthings]

Vegetables are expensive because subsidies are small. There's no free market in agriculture.

I'm not exactly sure how candies are causing climate change.

[bulatb]

Sorry, I don't follow. Are you extending the metaphor or answering literally? Candy is the fossil fuel-intensive lifestyle and eating vegetables is choosing to cut back.

[loverofthings]

I thought candy was delicious CO2 intensive food. Not a complete lifestyle.

Although, food is just one part of the equation. I've never said diet is the only change necessary to make. A person in the first world would do more by not using AC and heating than switching to a different diet, so one might optimize there. Although, not many want to optimize there, so it's easier to change the diet if they wish to lower their footprint.

[Noumenon72]

"Eat your vegetables" at least works for some people, myself for one. It's not like climate change where being good helps only if everyone is. Anyone who internalizes the reasons vegetables > candy will want to eat vegetables and be personally better off.

[toasterlovin]

It's even worse than that: the small percentage of people who have changed their consumption patterns out of concern for the environment are probably having zero or negative impact.

For instance, the following products are worse for the environment than their alternatives:

1. Hand-crafted, locally produced goods

2. Non-factory farmed food

3. Organic food

[microtonal]

There are also simple things that one can do, that have an impact. For example, one could go on holiday to a local destination rather than flying half the world. Or you could cycle to work rather than traveling by car every day.

(Sure, in the grand scheme of things, these will make small differences, but we have to cut our use of fossil fuel everywhere.)

[xg15]

Or you could try to affect the things that do matter in the grand scheme of things: E.g , demand more regulation for CO2-heavy industries, find ways to support CO2-neutral energy production, demand anti-deforestation clauses in trade agreements, etc.

[ShorsHammer]

Having one less child has far more of an impact than all of those lifestyle changes combined.

[toasterlovin]

Yeah, but then you are probably reducing the frequency of people who care about the environment in future populations, which may be a net loss.

[jtzhou]

And providing education for and/or adopting other children so that they learn how to live responsibly.

[toasterlovin]

I think this advice can be simplified greatly: reduce your expenditures. If you're spending less money, then you are consuming a smaller share of the world's bounty.

[Decade]

Reducing energy use doesn’t necessarily mean reducing expenditures. I mean, reducing expenditures can be good if you’re saving for something else, but you don’t have to.

Instead of buying and fueling the car, you can buy the luxury bicycle.

Instead of flying to Venice, you can rent a sailing yacht. Or whatever is local to your area.

It’s like dieting. The impulse is to reduce, naturally because you’re cutting things out, but eventually you figure out that you can fill your life with other experiences.

[api]

If you save that money instead it goes into a pool that is invested in things that then go and spend it elsewhere.

[xg15]

So we should exclusively eat factory-farmed food to save the environment?

Despite factory-farming being one of the main drivers of CO2?

[toasterlovin]

Factory farming is very resource intensive, but it is less resource intensive per unit of food produced. Just look at the prices at your local grocery store!

[spodek]

Check out the Leadership and the Environment podcast (disclosure: I host it).

http://joshuaspodek.com/podcast

[umanwizard]

> We're not going to see places like New York City move swiftly underwater

How do you know?