BIG IDEA In Climate Science: We Are Already Above A DOUBLING OF CO2

Abstract: The Physics Nobel 2021 Was Given To Climate Scientists. The “positive feedback loops” today’s 2021 physics Nobel prize laureate speaks about are ALREADY HERE. No wonder: we are already above the 600 ppm in CO2 EQUIVALENTS…

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I never heard of the three 2021 Nobel Laureate in Physics. I have heard of more fundamental climate scientists, though, and the Nobel Committee did not mention them, because they are long dead, thus do not need money, and apparently money is everything: the Nobel money was divided in two, half was given to two eminent scientists, and professor Parisi from Italy got the other half. 

When prizes are given, presumably the top thought-givers should be rewarded. Or, at least, remembered. But the Nobel Committee seems determined to avoid this task, this historical examination… Which should not be so arduous. Remember Socrates saying the unexamined life was not worth having? Is the unexamined prize worth having? 

How do the prize committees evaluate the most important act of thought? (I know there are 900 or so physicists on the Nobel consulting committee or so… Half from the US… Not that diversified; but that’s not my main objection: there are not geographically diversified, historically thorough and causally explicit…) 

The top climate physicists rewarded by the 2021 Nobel all work for top establishment institutions, and presumably did detailed work.

However, as far as I am concerned, what counts is who got the main idea first. 

Actually I am not the first one to think of that: even the US Patent System works that way. Conception and Reduction To Practice. One cannot be an inventor if one just engaged in Reduction To Practice. When somebody makes a computer model of someone else’s major idea, it is a reduction to practice, not a conceptualization. 

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I will write another essay on some of the historical main thought-givers of Climate Science, since the Nobel committee made such a bad job of it. A topmost mathematician (Fourier) figures prominently, so does a woman. 

But let me point out to a crucial idea: talking about CO2 all day long is not enough. Contributions to Radiative Forcing are also made by other MAN MADE greenhouse gases. And they are HUGE. Those can be acted upon more readily than on CO2 emissions themselves (actually many governments are aware of this point).

The contribution to PLANETARY HEATING from ARTIFICIAL MAN-MADE Greenhouse Gases is ENORMOUS, On TOP Of CO2…

Yes, CO2 is natural, much of it stuck in permafrost, and so is released during warming episodes caused by changes in Earth orbit which warm up the Northern Hemisphere (where most of the permafrost and warmable ground ice is). So during warming from orbital fluctuation happens, CO2 accentuates the warming. 

But the MAN MADE greenhouses released today are from human activity, and none are so striking as these gases which do not occur in nature.

And they contribution is enormous: around 60%, the IPCC/GIEC graph is clear (IPCC = International Panel Climate Change, the UN world experts commission).

Now we are at 420 ppm in CO2 (instead of 280 ppm in 1850). So, the total is well above 600 ppm of CO2 equivalent. That means a guaranteed rise of 2.5 degree Centigrade above the 1850 baseline (we are at 1.3-1.5 C above it right now).

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Conclusion: Even in science, there is too much emphasis on celebrities, a form of fascism and tribalism, and thus fundamentally anti-intellectual. Instead of telling us three guys are bigger than big in climate science, a distortion of reality, one should focus on two ideas: artificial man-made greenhouse gases contribute for more than one-third of the greenhouse forcing and we have already achieved more than a doubling of CO2 in equivalent gases, making a 2.5 C rise unavoidable… That is a doubling of the temperature rise already observed, which should force the Earth average temperature from the present 15C to 16.5 C.

Teaching science and subtlety instead of unfair and unbalanced celebritism, would teach the world community how to think in a more complex fashion rather than just scoring celebrity points… and appreciation thereof.

Ironically enough, the 2021 Physics Nobel was given for complexity studies relating to climate… The fundamental enemy of progress and understanding, let alone empathy, is simplemindedness… And it does not matter where it comes from.

Patrice Ayme

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P/S: Let’s use one of the newly anointed celebrities we are supposed to revere, Professor Parisi from Italy, who just got half of the 2021Physics Nobel:

Parisi was thankfully explicit in answer to a question from a reporter at this morning’s Nobel award announcement ceremony in Stockholm. “It is urgent that we make real, very strong decisions, and move at a very strong pace” to address climate change, Parisi said, “because we are in a situation where we can have positive feedback and that may accelerate the increase of temperature. It is clear that for future generations we have to act now in a very fast way, and not delay.”

It is not just question of future generations: entire ecosystems are now going up in smoke. I saw it from my very eyes… Running in smoke, dodging literally helicopters embarking dozens of tons of water in lakes, struggling in devastated forests where it is hard to move because collapsed tree trunks are all over…

The “positive feedbacks” show up as exponentials. Now the funny thing is that the temperature augmentation depends logarithmically on the CO2. Instead, we see temperature graphs which are clearly linear, if not already exponential. That means that the “positive feedback loops” are ALREADY HERE. So here we see why Parisi got a Nobel: he says it is “urgent” because we can have positive feedback and that may accelerate the increase of temperature. But of course if we have “positive feedback” we have “acceleration” and actually an exponential. So Parisi is underemphasizing the total emergency we are in… to the point of saying something nearly as silly as saying that shooting ourselves in the head may accelerate our demise. Yes, indeed.

Tags: Climate Science