Simon_R wrote:Kaiser Jeep
Using a model to smooth and extend a curve will work (and may even predict and backcast successfully), but
until you can replicate this with a bottom up model, you will get the derision of the scientific community. A model like this, can only be the starting point, so it can be replicated by a bottom up approach, then it is useful, both as a predictive tool, and gives us the ability to vary individual components and see how the model performs/predict different outcomes.
AFAIK in science it is not enough to know that a thing occurs, you must know why. Interestingly this was the basis of the witch trials of the middle ages.
Simon
The very success of the OFT tool indicates that the global climate "system" is way too complex - possibly two orders of magnitude too complex - to model "bottoms up". At least, that is the lesson learned by 150+ years of Fourier Analysis and several hundred years of experience with what used to be called "harmonic analysis" all the way back to the Greeks who first described the phenomenon when analyzing water waves and in early astronomy.
Simon, I know you mean well, but the actual problem with Evans' work is not the methodology or the math itself - those are absolutely solid and verifiable by anyone who will take the time to play with the figures. The real problems are twofold. Firstly, to admit that the FA-based math works is tantamount to admitting that "bottoms up" modelling never will work - not at least until we have computers that can handle complex matrix computations with (off-the cuff estimate) about 14 virtual dimensions and several thousand variables. Take it from me, even the most powerful computer my former employer built:
....is still way too slow do do that. This giant scientific processor is still in application development at the US Government's NREL (National Renewable Energy Laboratory) where it will eventually be providing simulations of various implementations of the intelligent electrical grid.
If you had a million of these systems networked, I still think you are way short of the computing power needed for a "grounds up" climate model.
Secondly, Evans has committed an unforgivable sin: his very accurate and working climate model shows that the "carbon forcing effect" that dominates all existing climate models is pure hokum. Evans' model says carbon dioxide has about 10% of the impact ascribed to it by the existing models, and that increased amounts of water vapor in the upper atmosphere will reduce the TSI - and the heat absorbed versus reflected back into space.
The implication being we can continue to burn FF's and not cook the planet. That's the real problem - and the reaction of the scientific community to this heretical concept is akin to the Roman Catholic Inquisition - as in "How DARE this man question the climate orthodoxy...".
"Science" with a capital letter is after all, the new religious orthodoxy. The modern day priests wear lab coats and jealously guard the "scientific journals" where the gospels are published, from those heretical souls who would question the pre-determined conclusions of the "ninety-seven-percenters". No articles questioning climate politics can now be published, nor do many researchers even attempt to do so, because their R&D grant money would be jeopardized if they published an unorthodox (or IOW "non-PC") conclusion.
Evans has also in the past been employed by researchers to elaborate upon their conventional climate models. The "ninety-seven-percenters" who question his math would also be casting doubts upon his contributions to their models. This is probably what drove him to create a climate model of his own.
Well, look for increasing numbers of the "ninety-seven-percenters" to defect beginning in 2017, and by 2030, only the boneheads will be left in the "97%", which should by then be about 15%, and possibly below 10%.
Time will tell - but there will still be boneheads here at PO.com, arguing for the orthodoxy of climate doom.