Is Roy Spencer a "natural climate change denier"?

D

Dawei

New member
A recent blog entry by Spencer rants about how AGW proponents are, in his words, "natural climate change deniers", arguing that the climate always changes, sometimes by very large amounts.

Yet he himself is a strong proponent of low climate sensitivity and strong negative feedbacks, and believes that it is only natural for a certain climate forcing to cause another negative forcing, which will perfectly offset this forcing. I believe he uses the laws of thermodynamics as evidence for this position.

So basically, the climate changes naturally--often and by very large magnitudes--but it is at the same time remarkably stable and highly resistant to anything that might cause significant temperature changes?

Can anyone who understands this explain to me how these two ideas can be held simultaneously?
 
I think his judgment is clouded by either religious loyalties, political loyalties, or a medley of the two.

Here's what he had to say on Evolution:
"I finally became convinced that the theory of creation actually had a much better scientific basis than the theory of evolution"

To show that I'm not taking him out of context, I'll reproduce the comment in full:
The time came when I began to realise, to my initial surprise, that there was a group of scientists who believed that the universe and all life within it had been created by some greater intelligent Being, not by mere chance. They were seemingly able to do so using scientific arguments, not just religious dogma. I began to study their case and after some months of analysis I finally became convinced that the theory of creation actually had a much better scientific basis than the theory of evolution, for the creation model was actually better able to explain the physical and biological complexity in the world.
 
They are not synonomous. He is clearly right, that climates have changed dramatically. That doesn't mean that they are going to change dramatically just because you want to blame humans on it. Are you really seriously suggesting that climates can only be sensitive to CO2 changes in order for their to be variability? Think about it before you cause Dana to go off the deep end.
 
As I understand it, negative feedbacks are relatively stable, there are other forces to reign them in, thus- no runaway effects. I see no contradiction in his positions.
 
Easily.

The climate does have low sensitivity.... it needs to be moved by something really significant... namely the sun -- against which the negative feedback items don't stand a chance.
 
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