Physicist offers $10,000 for anyone to scientifically disprove climate change

To be clear, given the current data it's very likely that the climate is warming.

But there are no empirical data that show we can do anything about it.

A better contest in response to this post would be awarding $10,000 for proof that any plan (cap-and-trade bill X, global carbon tax of Y%) would be a net benefit over a given period of time (50 years, a century?).

This contest wouldn't prove anything either, but it does demonstrate something more profound about the limits of empirical decision making.

Please provide the comments why the evidence failed to prove the point.

So while we can show correlation and come up with hypotheses and theories etc ad nauseum, as I understand it, you can't "prove" anything. Supposedly. You can just show that your current theory is better than what we had before, basically.

So the "$10k to disprove" works scientifically. The "$10k to prove" should not.

Or so I understand it.

Any data gathered from physiological models I will just arbitrarily ignore... just because...[waves hands]

I believe the cause for concern among the proponents of awareness and regulation is that a notable change is happening, and we desperately want the status quo. Whether or not this change falls within normal variations is irrelevant to this argument.

(I am not a climate scientist so I don't know what the main data points are that are employed in the arguments. I also don't know if your claim that your question can not be answered is correct or not)

And, quite interestingly, these two independent lines of evidence, match. (There are several others.)

In other words, you doubt the relevance of historical data. But the evidence is not just historical, it's also based on our understanding of the underlying physical mechanism.

The term "man-made climate change" is a term for the truth of these three claims:

1. Human activity has increased the concentration of CO2 (and other green-house gases) in the atmosphere.

2. The global temperature has risen over the last 150 years.

3. An increase in the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is the cause of the rise in global temperature over the last 150 years.

Point 2 is simple scientific fact by now. Measurements show that this is the case, despite being critically revised and corrected for sampling biases over the years. Point 3 is also scientific fact; the theoretical effect has been shown to be true in simple laboratory expirements (it has been known for over 100 years) and the strong correlation of CO2 concentration and temperature over the last 150 years overwhelmingly implies that this laboratory effect applies for the atmosphere as well.

That could still mean that the source of all of this greenhouse gas is natural. Still seems plausible, but again scientific evidence shows that the large majority of this "new CO2" is sourced by human activity [1]. Various sources of evidence exist; the isotopic signature of CO2 in the atmosphere is atypical for natural sources, the concentration of CO2 in the oceans is rising fastest near the surface, and there are many more pieces of evidence.

It is true that there is still a large degree of ignorance on how global temperature varies "naturally" over long periods of time. However, we can show that this specific warming we're observing today is not just a natural variation. It is caused by humans.

[1] http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-increase-is-natural-not-...

But establishing that a threat exists is quite a lot different from establishing whether it's being overestimated or underestimated in the media, so the whole segment was a non sequitur - it didn't respond in any way at all to the news article it was allegedly answering.

My guess is that they had Bill Nye, wanted to do this gag, couldn't come up with any valid reason to do it based on any actual news stories, then said "heck, let's do it anyway; maybe nobody will notice!"

(As a side note, if you look into how the claims of "97% agreement" were determined, you'll find that most "skeptics" would also be in the 97%. It's pure propaganda at this point to claim 97% support for some vague "the consensus" without actually specifying what exactly "the consensus" they agree to IS. The original value of "the consensus" seems to have been: (a) CO2 is a greenhouse gas, (b) it's gotten warmer recently, (c) human activity has had a significant warming effect, where both the nature of the "human activity" and the meaning of "significant" are usually left vague and unstated.

Oh, and to get a number as high as "97%" what gets measured is usually not the level of agreement among "scientists" but rather among a tiny subset, such as "those climate scientists who publish the most in the field".)

Religion is a correct analogy. If in a certain culture, women are submitted, that doesn't hurt people outside it.

People globally feels - and is, actually - threatened by global warming, so it's understandable to have ahem heat directed to people with power and without sense of collaboration (and I'm using an euphemism here), which is the current requirement for working out the problem.

The entire question is a fraud of course : the argument for climate change is based on statistical likelihood of existing trends continuing based on past measurement. While that does satisfy some standards used in science, no scientist in his right mind would refer to that as "proven", because it isn't.

So here's my version :

1) There is no argument from either maths, or even a simulation from first principles (NOT measured data and statistics and correlations) that shows a scenario like global warming.

2) principle of the excluded third ("tertium non datur") was an accepted standard in logic before Christ was born. It states that any statement that cannot be proven from first principles is disproved just by that fact (NOT wrong, but that wasn't asked)

Ergo, climate science disproved. Or at least, there is no known proof. There is loads and loads of statistical correlations indicating it exists, but there is no correct argument from first principles known, which is what I'd require to say "proof". It is overwhelmingly likely (well I haven't checked, but I believe them) that it exists, but not proven.

Now please keep in mind what I am and am not claiming here before you vilify me. I am claiming that climate science is very far from satisfying the standard used in exact sciences that is referred to when scientists use the word "proof".

Obviously I am not claiming that global warming will reverse or is just a mistake or whatever. The graph has been rising pretty constantly for 150 years or so, and yes, it absolutely does not look like it will reverse. This is however very far from having an explanation from first principles for climate change.

We certainly tolerate people who think unicorns fly out of pots of gold at the ends of rainbows, but we don't let them make decisions that will affect the health and well-being of a significant part of the planet's population.

Or we could tolerate a society where your private correspondences will be read where your home will be invaded and your every move monitored.

Or a society which takes your wealth and funds a bloated military industrial complex, banking system, or anyone else with a large enough lobby group.

But it's the internet, spouting assertions from positions of ignorance is common place.

Here's a counter-question: why is it that when people who have extraordinary or extraordinarily extreme opinions are questioned or challenged there seems to almost always be an attempt to deflect the discussion toward one revolving around respect and tolerance instead of the merits of the issue involved? (That's kind of a rhetorical question, really--my long and varied experience on topics of this sort has led me to one conclusion if nothing else, and that is this: people who hold such views and attempt such deflection aren't interested in honest dialog.)

So, maybe a bet that includes more measurements (green house gas emissions, etc.) would be needed to prove man-made global warming. The outcome of the total of those bets would either support or not support the theory. But that might be a lot of bets and a mixed result could complicate things.

I look at the tech world (which I know very well) and "experts" are wrong all the time. I can't imagine it being much different in other fields.

I see people here on HN making comments about the economy. Should all of these opinions be ignored because they aren't experts?

Look at the guy that discovered bacteria: The experts of his time shunned him and he died in an insane asylum.

Scientists pretty much lose their career overnight if they have any study or research on non man-made climate change.

How can we really have an honest debate when this kind of behavior is going on?

Denial, is old and dead amongst the well informed. Join us.