Richard: “Evidence for the AGW hypothesis would be provided by some climate change that the AGW hypothesis alone explains.”
What is required is that AGW theory should ‘better’ explain current climate change than any other theory or hypothesis. That is, the evidence should be more consistent with, and not falsify, AGW theory over other hypotheses.
The fact that you can’t produce any likely evidence that would “alone” explain AGW shows that you are asking the impossible.
There’s a similarity here with aspects of the ‘debate’ over evolutionary theory. For example, creationists, and latterly the ID crowd, often demand the production of ‘transitional forms’ as ‘proof’ of evolution. The best the evolution defender can do is point to factors such as natural selection and genetics, and the fact that all forms of life are in a sense transitional. The creationist, of course, demands to see the ‘smoking gun’, while ignoring the weight of evidence that supports the theory.
“And as I explained to you previously, actions taken in response to the AGW hypothesis threaten the lives of millions of people.”
Lack of action against AGW may also threaten human life. That said, sceptics are quick to condemn warmists for ‘alarmism’, but are just as quick to indulge in their own form of alarmism.
“If GCMs cannot model the climate effects that do affect global climate then there is no reason to accept the GCMs’ ‘projections’of AGW’s effects.”
I was talking about the ability of climate models to forecast long-term warming, ie the injection of additional heat energy into the atmospheric system. The models used to forecast long-term effects are not suited to the short term. Obviously, short-term ESNO-type effects are very important for peoples’ lives, but as I understand it, there is an increasing focus on these phenomena, as per the recent Keenleyside study.
“The IPCC HAS dropped the hockey stick and it is NOT in the latest IPCC report (AR4).”
Ch 6 of the Working Group Report – The Physical Science Basis has an extensive discussion of the “hockey stick” reconstruction of recent temperatures and shows a hockey-type graph on p 467.
“Indeed, that Institute is very right wing…”
I wasn’t criticising Heartland’s political orientation, rather its tendency towards conspiracy thinking. A conspiracy requires above all secrecy, and yet sceptics are screaming to the rooftops about this alleged AGW conspiracy. Just another piece of illogic from people who also demand ‘debate’ with those they believe are inveterate liars.
“It matters not if some people do or do not accept the AGW hypothesis.”
It does matter if you want to have a “debate” about climate. Taking again the 1998 claim, the term ‘global warming’ is accepted shorthand for ‘anthropogenic global warming’ or AGW. Therefore, the claim that ‘global warming stopped in 1998’ means that: ‘until 1998, AGW was occurring, but it stopped in 1998’.
However, most sceptics would reject the claim that ‘until 1998, AGW was occurring’. In that case, sceptics who claim that ‘global warming stopped in 1998’ are in effect saying: ‘until 1998, global warming was not occurring, and it stopped in 1998’. This further piece of illogic shows that the 1998 claim has little to do with science and a lot to do with ideology.
