Sir, I am writing in response to the letters of C. Summerhayes (7/11/13) and J. Cowie (11/12/13) to try to set a factual foundation for debate as opposed to assumptions and models which disregard established scientific laws. I wish to make clear that I regard the current environmental problems associated with the emission of toxic chemicals into the atmosphere and water, the extinction of species and the general degradation of our environment caused by overconsumption among a small number of privileged individuals as extremely serious and in urgent need of attention. The myth of AGW is an unhelpful distraction from these problems.
The Earth's temperature is the consequence of a chemical process system: temperature affects CO2 levels, CO2 levels do not affect temperature. The solubility of CO2 decreases as the temperature of water increases, so as the air temperature increases so does the level of CO2 in the atmosphere. This is exactly what we see in the ice core data where temperatures change before CO2 levels change. Whether the lag time between the changes in the temperature are in the order of 800 years or only a few decades is irrelevant: temperature leads the CO2 levels and the latter are a direct consequence of the former. Furthermore since 1800 CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere have increased, yet during this period temperatures have fluctuated by at least 1 degree C both downwards and upwards. Since 1940 the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere have risen sharply, yet global temperatures fell between 1940 and approximately 1980: the impact of Mankind putting more CO2 into the atmosphere has been to decouple the hitherto relatively linear link between temperature and CO2.
With reference to the greenhouse gas models which assume that CO2 has an impact on temperature, the following facts are of some importance. The first 50 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere will absorb about half of the tiny fraction of the total solar radiation energy to reach the Earth's atmosphere. Each additional 50ppm will absorb half of the remaining fraction, so that at 380-400ppm concentration of CO2 the total additional solar radiation which is absorbed will be close to zero. If CO2 concentrations were to reach 1000ppm there would be no discernible difference in absorption/emission of solar radiation energy. This follows the Beer - Lambert Law which states that the intensity of radiation decreases exponentially as it passes through an absorbing medium. The evidence that suggests that CO2 levels in the geological past were associated with higher average global temperatures is not a proof that the former were the cause of the latter. From basic physics this causal link does not exist. I do not know what caused the remarkable increase in temperatures at the Palaeocene - Eocene boundary, but it seems from physics that the high concentrations of CO2 associated with this event were a consequence of the increase in temperature and not a cause. The problem with using analogies from the past is that we cannot know of or measure all of the variables that were operating then, and as we do not even know about or understand the complexity of modern geochemical and geophysical systems, trying to understand the complexity of the past through our limited knowledge of the present is naive.
There are no greenhouse gases in physics. Gerlich and Tscheuschner (2009) proved that there is no such thing as a greenhouse gas because there is no glasshouse on Earth (or any other planet for that matter). The UN IPCC models incorrectly assume that the Earth's radiation to space decreases as temperature increases. This violates the Stefan-Boltzmann Law which states that all bodies radiate proportional to their temperature: as the temperature of a body increases so does its radiation. In 2009 R. Lindzen verified that the Earth obeys this law. The UN IPCC and all other AGW models are empirically based and are therefore wrong. In fact the Earth's temperature cannot be modelled mathematically for control because the mathematical criteria devised in the 1960's to ensure that a system is measurable, observable and controllable are not satisfied.
Meteorologists, climatologists and physicists of the IPCC have tried to discredit the link between solar activity and global temperatures by using highly selective data in support of their assumptions and ignoring other data which show their assumptions to be wrong. The IPCC claim that there has been a 0.1% variance in solar irradiance for many centuries and that this could not have a significant impact on temperatures. Using the data they quote this is true, but importantly it misses the wider picture. If the much more significant extreme ultra-violet radiation variation is measured a very different pattern emerges. This is very closely related to temperature variation both in the measured (i.e. instrumental) record and in the historical record (as measured via proxies). According to the data presented at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union held in 2013, the extreme UV variation has been falling as the current sunspot cycle has declined, and that the fall in extreme UV radiation can be closely correlated with the cooling trend of the past decade. Even more there is a close correlation between temperature variation and sunspot activity since 1600 when accurate records of sunspots started to be collected by direct observation. In particular the Maunder Minimum was a period of severe cold, some of it related to large volcanic eruptions which may in turn have been induced by activity of the sun. Extreme UV radiation varies with sunspot activity and offers a testable hypothesis to explain the medium (c.400 year) variations in temperature that are recognised from historical sources and temperature proxies. By contrast he UN IPCC models do not, and nor does any other greenhouse gas based model.
In conclusion scientific proof is not established by consensus: it is established by reference to evidence correctly interpreted through known and observable scientific laws. Scientific theories are supposed to be testable, and if falsified should be rejected. The theory of AGW has been tested and falsified. It can also be shown to be based on a set of assumptions which are demonstrably wrong to anyone who is ready and willing to challenge them. Politics and the politics of science however have got in the way of people understanding this, so that as I have already written, scientists are in very real danger of discrediting both themselves and the processes that they claim to value and defend.
Reference
Gerlich G and R D Tscheuschner 2009: Falsification of the Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effect Within the Frame of Physics, Int. Jol. Mod. Physics B v 23. no3 Jan 6 2009 pp 275-364. (This can be downloaded free at: http://www.arxiv.org/PScache/arvix/pdf/0707/0707.1161v4.pdf)
Stephen Foster