[Daniel1960]

mike777, on 2013-March-13, 12:55, said:

The problem with agriculture is water, in the southwest the water table is drying up. It limits the amount of land we can bring into production. Water is a problem worldwide.

Because of this I expect agriculture will be a lucrative sector of the world economy for the next two or three decades. Expect the price of food and farm land to skyrocket. You can see this in rising prices today.

--------------


American farmers may have suffered an historic drought last year, but the price of their land is skyrocketing.

In Iowa, the US's biggest producer of corn, the land prices jumped 24 percent in 2012 and and have gained 63 percent over the last three years, according to a study by Iowa State University.

The drought and heat wave last year may have severely damaged crops, but ironically it has made crop land ever more valuable.

The higher prices for crops helped compensate for lower yields, for one thing.

Farmers also recovered some $14.7 billion in insurance payments for crop damage, a record sum.

It left farm incomes on average just three percent lower from 2011, and so lingering near their highest level in 30 years. US government forecasters expect overall farming income to gain 14 percent this year.

http://au.finance.ya...-081139438.html

Yes, farming worldwide has depended on the rains. Fortunately for many, the rains have increased in recent decades (with a few hiccups along the way). Farming has always been overlooked in the global economy, with farmers holding the lowest level. Hopefully, the money earned will go towards the people tilling the land, rather than the infrastructure (shipping costs, irrigation, etc.). Much prime farmland has been lost to urbanization worldwide, maybe this will move the pendulum back into the farmers favor.

[Winstonm]

billw55, on 2013-March-13, 08:48, said:

There seems to be a popular body of thought that I find silly, which consists of the following:

- there is one true, correct, and best climate
- said correct and best climate is the one of about 100-200 years ago (i.e. right before the observable effects of man-made warming began)
- any weather events which are unusual in comparison to the correct and best climate are consequences of man-made warming,
- this includes any change in precipitation, whether more or less; any change in temperature, whether higher or lower; and many other events, in either direction from the "norm"
- any such deviation is judged as (a) bad (b) unnatural and c) preventable
- we are morally obligated to permanently fix the climate at the correct and best climate of 100-200 years ago, and capable of doing so.

Perhaps the problem you have is your source of information. I do not think any credible scientist has offered an opinion on "best climate" or said weather is controlled by AGW. It would be rather like listening to Rush Limbaugh tell me what Obama said about taxes.

[Al_U_Card]

Al_U_Card, on 2013-March-11, 20:13, said:

Oh those hockey-stick proxies that rely on spliced, different resolution, time series...

To quote Steve McIntyre on this paper and its statistical manipulations:

While the article has so many problems that it’s hard to know where to start, it doesn’t actually use “Mike’s Nature trick” (as properly defined at Climate Audit,) Mike’s Nature trick (as UC dissected) was the splicing of temperature data with proxy data for smoothing, with the smooth chopped back to the end of the proxy data. It’s tricky, so to speak.

The Marcott study conspicuously doesn’t show temperature data, spliced or unspliced. One reason may be a rather severe divergence problem. Their SH extratropics reconstruction maxes out at 1.22 deg C in AD1900, declining to the reference period 0 in 1961-90 (not shown in the article.) This dramatic decrease in SHX temperatures in the 20th century will doubtless come as a surprise to many.

Similarly their NHX temperature increases all comes between 1920 and 1940. If Marcott is right, the ability of early 20th century Northern Hemisphere societies to cope with the 1.9 deg C increase between 1920 and 1940 bodes well in my opinion for the prospects of adapting to the lesser temperature increases projected in the next 60 years in most climate models. Of course, it is also possible that the 20th century portion of the Marcott reconstruction is completely worthless.

So, Mr. McIntyre inquires of Dr. Marcott, the nature of his study that supports the claim to hockeystick fame...

The uptick occurs in the final plot-point of his graphic (1940) and is a singleton. I wrote to Marcott asking him for further details of how he actually obtained the uptick, noting that the enormous 1920-to-1940 uptick is not characteristic of the underlying data. Marcott’s response was unhelpful: instead of explaining how he got the result, Marcott stated that they had “clearly” stated that the 1890-on portion of their reconstruction was “not robust”.

But we did get the final bonus round from FOIA with the final set of over 200K Climategate emails.

Ah, climate science, the grift that keeps on giving...

[Al_U_Card]

And then this from the editor of "Science", publishing journal of the Marcott results:

By coincidence, Science Editor-in-Chief Bruce Alberts was in Washington recently testifying before a House Committee on the importance Science places on authors sharing all their data, being highly suspicious of their own results, and releasing data and/or code as necessary to permit others replicate their results.

Alberts described the journal’s efforts to make data more readily accessible to scientists seeking to replicate or refute published findings. He also responded to general concerns about scholarly papers that are found to be in error.

The journal has long required that “all data necessary to understand, access, and extend the conclusions of the manuscript must be available to any reader of Science,” Alberts explained. Science also recently strengthened its rules regarding access to computer codes needed to understand published results, and it now requires all senior authors to “sign off” on each paper’s primary conclusions. To comply with such rules, Alberts said, scientists must be assured of long-term federal support for critical research databases. Scientists who want to assess published findings also need appropriate tools for working with data, he added.

…

“My conclusion,” Alberts said, “is that the standards are lower in some subfields of science than others, and we need to work on setting higher standards.” He also urged individual scientists to more critically assess their own work. “It’s easy to get a result that looks right when it’s really wrong. One can easily be fooled. Every scientist must be trained to be highly suspicious about his or her results.”

[Daniel1960]

Al_U_Card, on 2013-March-14, 06:37, said:

And then this from the editor of "Science", publishing journal of the Marcott results:

By coincidence, Science Editor-in-Chief Bruce Alberts was in Washington recently testifying before a House Committee on the importance Science places on authors sharing all their data, being highly suspicious of their own results, and releasing data and/or code as necessary to permit others replicate their results.

Alberts described the journal’s efforts to make data more readily accessible to scientists seeking to replicate or refute published findings. He also responded to general concerns about scholarly papers that are found to be in error.

The journal has long required that “all data necessary to understand, access, and extend the conclusions of the manuscript must be available to any reader of Science,” Alberts explained. Science also recently strengthened its rules regarding access to computer codes needed to understand published results, and it now requires all senior authors to “sign off” on each paper’s primary conclusions. To comply with such rules, Alberts said, scientists must be assured of long-term federal support for critical research databases. Scientists who want to assess published findings also need appropriate tools for working with data, he added.

…
“My conclusion,” Alberts said, “is that the standards are lower in some subfields of science than others, and we need to work on setting higher standards.” He also urged individual scientists to more critically assess their own work. “It’s easy to get a result that looks right when it’s really wrong. One can easily be fooled. Every scientist must be trained to be highly suspicious about his or her results.”

Alberts was specifically addressing the reliability of published data on potential drug targets. Any connection to the Marcott results are conincidental. That said, all scientists, including Marcott and others, should be suspicious of their own results, and encourage other scientists to attempt to (dis)prove their results. That is the crux of his argument requiring data and computer codes be readily available to other scientists.

[Al_U_Card]

I can only wonder at the nature and scope of this, relative to...say, relativity?

Numerous experiments confirm the theory and its validity and veracity. Not much money is made on or from these fundamental studies but they do have far-reaching effects for things like GPS signals etc. Even the slightest discrepancy would create shocks in the world of physics and require the closest of scrutiny to determine where lay the differences.

Climate "science" OTOH, has holes the size of Omaha and is continually not just refuted but its core tenets are proven to exist only in the computer sims that produce its catastrophic projections. (The tropospheric "hot-spot" due to H2O vapor amplification of CO2 GHG effect comes to mind among so many others...) There is, however, a boat-load of money involved and that is where the rub lies.

Marcott used the same data from his doctoral thesis (it did NOT show a rise in modern temps) but, for Science (the rag...errr mag) the data was tortured until it came up with a Mannian (non-robust, singular-type data point) hockey-stick and could be used to shore up the failings of the faithful.

[Daniel1960]

Marcott has stated that the graph published in Science is not robust, which leads ones to wonder why it was included in the first place. Apparently, some proxies were removed from the research before pubication in Science. This selectivity resulted in the hockey stick graph, where one did not exist previously.

http://judithcurry.c...tle/#more-11332

[Zelandakh]

Daniel, if you read the link you will find out that no proxies were removed, only re-dated. The removal of proxies would be no big deal, this is done all the time. On the other hand, the re-dating does appear on the surface to be fairly blatant, and possibly even fraudulent in a scientific sense, due to the apparantly systematic way it was done. That said, we have not heard the defence yet. It is not impossile that the 1008 year aging was an accident and that there are good grounds for the other changes. At the moment I would not draw too many conclusions from this article, neither in terms of the warming trends contained within it, nor of unreasonable manipulation of data. Note that whatever the truth turns out to be, the effect is pretty minimal overall imho.

[Daniel1960]

Zelandakh, on 2013-March-21, 07:37, said:

Daniel, if you read the link you will find out that no proxies were removed, only re-dated. The removal of proxies would be no big deal, this is done all the time. On the other hand, the re-dating does appear on the surface to be fairly blatant, and possibly even fraudulent in a scientific sense, due to the apparantly systematic way it was done. That said, we have not heard the defence yet. It is not impossile that the 1008 year aging was an accident and that there are good grounds for the other changes. At the moment I would not draw too many conclusions from this article, neither in terms of the warming trends contained within it, nor of unreasonable manipulation of data. Note that whatever the truth turns out to be, the effect is pretty minimal overall imho.

Thank you. I misread the article.

[Al_U_Card]

I expect the ensuing hand-waving to increase the ACE-index numbers.

Despite sensitivity testing for all changes EXCEPT redating (for obvious reasons) the exclusion of certain proxy data (ones that produce decreasing temps at the end of the proxy record) is also of interest.

Despite this, the hoopla and Mannly support for this particular hokeyshtick was the take-away and I doubt that any of this will make a corrigendum, let alone the same MSM that promulgated its dissemination.

[Al_U_Card]

Bundle up and have a frost fair on the Thames?

A thing of the past....present and likely future

[mike777]

yet i read another story about water shortage......and i plsce my bets


fwiw I am still trying to invest in burma but mostly cons. inflation usa bonds


barbell strategy


too be honest Not sure what al card is saying or where his skin in the game is?

I still think next ten years solar will expand by much but i dont know how to bet and win on it.

[Winstonm]

mike777, on 2013-March-23, 23:05, said:

too be honest Not sure what al card is saying or where his skin in the game is?

From Scientific American:

Quote

Psychologists have found that conservatives are fundamentally more anxious than liberals, which may be why they typically desire stability, structure and clear answers even to complicated questions. “Conservatism, apparently, helps to protect people against some of the natural difficulties of living,” says social psychologist Paul Nail of the University of Central Arkansas. “The fact is we don't live in a completely safe world. Things can and do go wrong. But if I can impose this order on it by my worldview, I can keep my anxiety to a manageable level.”

[Al_U_Card]

The only "skin" that I have in this game, is exposing it to the light of day and reason.
That people question my motives and background is but poor debating skills. Look at the data and information in question.
Interpretation is a function of background and mindset.
Dealing with the facts eliminates both.

So, Winston and Mike, no comments about the Marcott manipulation?

Such malfeasance is egregious and needs to be presented for examination. Otherwise we end up taking Mann and his fellow-travellers at their word and getting less than nothing for our trust.

Joe McCarthy appears to have been a lesson forgotten along the way.

[Daniel1960]

mike777, on 2013-March-23, 23:05, said:

yet i read another story about water shortage......and i plsce my bets


fwiw I am still trying to invest in burma but mostly cons. inflation usa bonds


barbell strategy


too be honest Not sure what al card is saying or where his skin in the game is?

I still think next ten years solar will expand by much but i dont know how to bet and win on it.

Mike,
Water could become the most sought after commodity in the coming years. In many places, the people have overextended themselves, and are depleting much of the available water supply (Aral Sea, Ogallala aquifer, Colorado River, Australia, etc.). Water scarcity could become the next oil crisis.
There are many possibility for energy production, so I cannot say which path will be the most fruitful in the future. Currently, natural gas has the upper hand, so I would go with the hot source wight now, and wait and see what develops in other areas later.

[Al_U_Card]

Or, you can look into LFTR (like the Chinese are...)

The "low-carbon", efficient and reliable energy of the future.

http://youtu.be/D3rL08J7fDA

[FM75]

Daniel1960, on 2013-March-25, 06:55, said:

Mike,
Water could become the most sought after commodity in the coming years. In many places, the people have overextended themselves, and are depleting much of the available water supply (Aral Sea, Ogallala aquifer, Colorado River, Australia, etc.). Water scarcity could become the next oil crisis.
There are many possibility for energy production, so I cannot say which path will be the most fruitful in the future. Currently, natural gas has the upper hand, so I would go with the hot source wight now, and wait and see what develops in other areas later.

One might read a lot about water supply, shortages, etc. Let's think about this within the closed system of the planet.

1) Is this reasonable? - Yes, the earth is not losing hydrogen or oxygen to space.

2) If we can accept 1, then we know that the potential quantity of water on earth is constant. - The potential quantity of water molecules is then limited to the minimum of half of the number hydrogen atoms and the number of oxygen atoms.

3) 2 is irrefutable (ignoring fission and fusion - neither of which is significant for the two atoms in question on earth). So the supply of water boils down to the chemistry.

4) When we talk about water, we are usually concerned with its quantity in the liquid state. To be sure, if we are concerned about shortages, ice might be an issue. Let's agree that nobody is concerned that the geographic quantity of ice is increasing (in the near term). The limit of atmospheric water is pretty limited unless you reach temperatures that are well beyond those that support life - The earth is not a high pressure boiler.

5) So now we are concerned only with the normal chemistry of water - which brings us to the water cycle that is taught in elementary science books. If the quantity of water is to change substantially, the normal equilibrium of transitions to H20 and from H20, or H2 and O2 must have a driving force causing an increase in some other hydrides and oxides.

6) Absent a demonstration of that globally - all water discussions become "local", not geographic.

So if there is a water shortage, it must be accompanied somewhere else by a water surplus.

In this argument, I am not considering whether there is enough water to support an increasing human population.

[onoway]

Al_U_Card, on 2013-March-25, 15:17, said:

Or, you can look into LFTR (like the Chinese are...)

The "low-carbon", efficient and reliable energy of the future.

http://youtu.be/D3rL08J7fDA

Interesting talk. Learned a lot

[hrothgar]

FM75, on 2013-March-25, 21:25, said:

One might read a lot about water supply, shortages, etc. Let's think about this within the closed system of the planet.

1) Is this reasonable? - Yes, the earth is not losing hydrogen or oxygen to space.

2) If we can accept 1, then we know that the potential quantity of water on earth is constant. - The potential quantity of water molecules is then limited to the minimum of half of the number hydrogen atoms and the number of oxygen atoms.

3) 2 is irrefutable (ignoring fission and fusion - neither of which is significant for the two atoms in question on earth). So the supply of water boils down to the chemistry.

4) When we talk about water, we are usually concerned with its quantity in the liquid state. To be sure, if we are concerned about shortages, ice might be an issue. Let's agree that nobody is concerned that the geographic quantity of ice is increasing (in the near term). The limit of atmospheric water is pretty limited unless you reach temperatures that are well beyond those that support life - The earth is not a high pressure boiler.

5) So now we are concerned only with the normal chemistry of water - which brings us to the water cycle that is taught in elementary science books. If the quantity of water is to change substantially, the normal equilibrium of transitions to H20 and from H20, or H2 and O2 must have a driving force causing an increase in some other hydrides and oxides.

6) Absent a demonstration of that globally - all water discussions become "local", not geographic.

So if there is a water shortage, it must be accompanied somewhere else by a water surplus.

In this argument, I am not considering whether there is enough water to support an increasing human population.

Few quick comments.

1. There are some interesting temporal dynamics at play. Traditionally, lost of water gets locked up in snow packs and glaciers during winter months and then released during the spring / summer. If said snow packs don't form / melt more quickly the water all rushed out to the sea during the winter.

2. Warmer temperatures means that more water gets stored in the atmosphere. As a result, when it rains it pours.

3. A number of places are significantly depleting underground aquifers

[hrothgar]

FM75, on 2013-March-25, 21:25, said:

One might read a lot about water supply, shortages, etc. Let's think about this within the closed system of the planet.

1) Is this reasonable? - Yes, the earth is not losing hydrogen or oxygen to space.

2) If we can accept 1, then we know that the potential quantity of water on earth is constant. - The potential quantity of water molecules is then limited to the minimum of half of the number hydrogen atoms and the number of oxygen atoms.

3) 2 is irrefutable (ignoring fission and fusion - neither of which is significant for the two atoms in question on earth). So the supply of water boils down to the chemistry.

4) When we talk about water, we are usually concerned with its quantity in the liquid state. To be sure, if we are concerned about shortages, ice might be an issue. Let's agree that nobody is concerned that the geographic quantity of ice is increasing (in the near term). The limit of atmospheric water is pretty limited unless you reach temperatures that are well beyond those that support life - The earth is not a high pressure boiler.

5) So now we are concerned only with the normal chemistry of water - which brings us to the water cycle that is taught in elementary science books. If the quantity of water is to change substantially, the normal equilibrium of transitions to H20 and from H20, or H2 and O2 must have a driving force causing an increase in some other hydrides and oxides.

6) Absent a demonstration of that globally - all water discussions become "local", not geographic.

So if there is a water shortage, it must be accompanied somewhere else by a water surplus.

In this argument, I am not considering whether there is enough water to support an increasing human population.

Few quick comments.

1. There are some interesting temporal dynamics at play. Traditionally, lost of water gets locked up in snow packs and glaciers during winter months and then released during the spring / summer. If said snow packs don't form / melt more quickly the water all rushed out to the sea during the winter.

2. Warmer temperatures means that more water gets stored in the atmosphere. As a result, when it rains it pours.

3. A number of places are significantly depleting underground aquifers