Talk:Climate commitment

(William M. Connolley 23:41, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)) I've substantially revised SEW's text. I'm not at all sure that "these models don't include small ice caps" is right: the IPCC projections certainly do, and since ~2.5 oC -> 0.5 m/c, 0.5 oC -> 0.1 m/c would be consistent with the small ice caps being included.

Umm.. that was your text. [1] (SEWilco 09:34, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC))

(William M. Connolley 09:53, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)) Oops! I pasted that in from Nature without reading it carefully, then forgot. Well, I suppose it must be true then.

Why "At the time of the TAR there were not yet studies of the levels of unrealized climate commitment that might remain in the current climate"?

(William M. Connolley 11:45, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)) I don't understand why you (Silverback) insist on putting this in. There is a perfectly good link right there to a GRL pub at the time of the TAR considering just this point. What you have added is wrong, as demonstrated by that link (have you looked at the publication?). The only reason I can see for you putting this is is because you want this to be a new idea, and the only reason I can see for you wanting this is some kind of anti-IPCC bias.

I did look at the link, and I believe even thanked you for it (on my talk page?) That article was from 2001, the same as the TAR, but, I believe it wasn't in time to make the TAR, because I didn't see it discussed in the TAR. Is it listed in the references?--Silverback 14:02, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)

I just did another check of the TAR and did not find the paper in any of the references. It appears, as I suspected, that the paper was after the TAR was published, or at least after it had taken shape.--Silverback 14:18, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)

based on

I don't get it. How does "doubling or quadrupling" fit to "assuming no further increase"? Sebastian (talk) 09:52, 2005 Apr 27 (UTC)

(William M. Connolley 17:49, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)) Assuming no further increase *past* the doub ling or quadrupling....

I'm sorry, i still don't find it clear. As a layperson, i first assumed that "given level" refers to the latest level we measured. I gather that's not what you mean. Do you just simply mean: "assuming an arbitrary constant level"? Why not write this instead? This seems much clearer than "assuming no increase above the given level", which leads to misunderstandings. The fact that the level is often 1, 2 or 4, and never 3 or 5 times the currently measured level seems, at least as it stands here, not very relevant to a general definition of such studies. Moreover, the assumption that there is a sudden jump from 1 to 4 right now seems very counterintuitive. — Sebastian (T) 06:17, 2005 Apr 28 (UTC)

(William M. Connolley 14:33, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)) Yes, " a given level" means an arbitrarily chosen level, not current levels. Errr... would it be better if you re-wrote it, because clearly my words aren't making sense to the educated layperson. If you re-write it I'll check it.

I'm not secure enough to write it in the article, but here's what I would write:

Climate commitment describes the fact that climate reacts with a delay to influencing factors ("climate forcings") such as the presence of green house gases. Climate commitment studies assess the amount of future warming that is "committed" under the assumption of constant forcings. For this so-called "given level" they may assume the present level or some other arbitrary value.

I have two problems with this, though:

• why does it make sense to admit any arbitrary value?
• how does the study treat the past, where we know that the value was not 4 times the present value? Or do these studies start at some time in the future? What sense does this make, given that we want to deal with delays? — Sebastian (talk) 07:23, 2005 Apr 30 (UTC)