OT-Reputable scientists getting nervous about IPCC

[newshound]

[Andy Burns]

Sorry, our model was a bit wrong, but that's *great* as it buys more time to reverse climate change.

No, how about we wait and see if your model was a *lot* wrong before we retreat to the stone age?

[dennis]

There is nothing new, those with *any* understanding of science know they are wrong. Its the harrys of the world that still believe the cr@p that are the problem.

[alan_m]

I'm not sure how a climate model can be wrong? Don't they just run it thousands of times until a result matches their pet climate theories?

Perhaps the results they have been discarding were closer to the true nature of the chaotic atmosphere behaviour.

[Andy Burns]

Then they make predictions, the future becomes the present, and the results don't match ...

[newshound]

Thinking on similar lines, I looked up the great von Neumann quote earlier today

"With four parameters I can fit an elephant; with five I can make it wiggle its trunk".

I'm not sure how many fudge factors sorry I mean parameters the current models use.

And astonishingly, here is how to do it

Wikipedia also has another fascinating von Neumann quote, again by Freeman Dyson

"I remember a talk that Von Neumann gave at Princeton around 1950, describing the glorious future which he then saw for his computers. Most of the people that he hired for his computer project in the early days were meteorologists. Meteorology was the big thing on his horizon. He said, as soon as we have good computers, we shall be able to divide the phenomena of meteorology cleanly into two categories, the stable and the unstable. The unstable phenomena are those which are upset by small disturbances, the stable phenomena are those which are resilient to small disturbances. He said, as soon as we have some large computers working, the problems of meteorology will be solved. All processes that are stable we shall predict. All processes that are unstable we shall control. He imagined that we needed only to identify the points in space and time at which unstable processes originated, and then a few airplanes carrying smoke generators could fly to those points and introduce the appropriate small disturbances to make the unstable processes flip into the desired directions. A central committee of computer experts and meteorologists would tell the airplanes where to go in order to make sure that no rain would fall on the Fourth of July picnic. This was John von Neumann's dream. This, and the hydrogen bomb, were the main practical benefits which he saw arising from the development of computers."

[Brian Gaff]

I'm sorry but is not the one place where we can survive a little too precious to take chances over?

Its my planet too! Brian

[Chris Hogg]

I get the impression there were nearly 100 models tried, so in essence you're right.

and (from Spencer) Curve fitting on a grand scale. Keep changing the paramaters until they get the right answer, but they never do. Hardly predictive science. Spencer has a comment .

[The Natural Philosopher]

It is wrong when it doesnt match reality

Well yeah?

[newshound]

That final link was entertaining!

[Tim Streater]

If a couple of billyun people were to self-immolate and a couple of billyun more were to get their tubes tied that would about do it. Any volunteers?

[bert]

But if you make predictions for 100 years hence no-one can prove you wrong before retirement age.

[pamela]

It's nice to be reminded of von Neumann's quotes.

"You wake me up early in the morning to tell me that I'm right? Please wait until I'm wrong."

[bert]

Must use that on you-know-who.

[Andrew Gabriel]

They did, but the results had gone sufficiently wrong after just a few years, that the model can be shown to be incorrect long before 100 years. I think that's happened to every IPCC long term prediction so far.