I particularly wonder about the premise here. If CO2 is the climate driver than increases in CO2 should cause warming first in cold dry places like the arctic. Since the gradient in temperature and humidity between the arctic and the tropics are supposed to be a significant part or the driving force of cyclones, wouldn't global warming be likely to decrease frequency and intensity of these storms? I know this was a part of the theory while we dragged through the turn of the millenia with several years of low cyclone activity. Now some are acting as if GW should increase hurricane intensity? The underlying understanding had some huge change?

If we in fact had a large increase in Hurricane frequency or intensity that would in fact falsify the theory of Greenhouse warming by CO2. So don't jump on the bandwagon too fast. However, there appears to be no evidence for such an increase.

Man-made global warming? Worry about the sun

http://www.newsletter.co.uk/3425/OPINION-Manmade-global-warming-Worry.4467252.jp?articlepage=1

Excerpt;
Future historians will laugh about how climate science went crazy, but meanwhile life is not so funny for my friend Henrik. For 12 years, I've watched scientists who take the official line bad-mouthing him, starving him of funds and making it hard for him to publish his reports. Other physicists who think that the Sun rules the climate, or merely criticise the man-made warming theory, report similar experiences. They've certainly not had the open discussion of the evidence that scientists are accustomed to expect.

And:

Climate case built on thin foundation

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24315169-7583,00.html

Excerpt:
The IPCC has misled us into believing the primary claims were widely endorsed by authors and reviewers but in fact they received little support and came from a narrow self-interested coterie of climate modellers.

Look up the heat capacity of the worlds oceans.
They warmed up for 20 years, then the heat source droped away.
It would take years for the to begin to show measurable cooling.
With the PDO now shifting to the cool phase in the northern hemisphere, the cooling will simply continue.
BTW. The cooling of 2008 alone wiped out nearly all of the warming of the last century.
That is pretty signifigant. Even AGW believers have to admit that.

Former Skeptic,

I mean both weather and climate models. Especially climate models. Given that we cannot model weather more than seven days ahead, how the hell can we even contemplate that climate models that try to predict up to a century ahead are going to be more accurate? The number and interaction of variables that affect climate are far more complex than weather systems. No climate model is accurate and is increasingly being shown to be inaccurate as the cooling climate was not predicted by those climate models. And yet there is a wide view in the scientific community that the earth is about to enter a cooling phase for between 12 and 40 years depending on the research. No climate model has predicted this and the High Priest of modelling (Dr. James Hansen) still insists on dismissing the coming cooling of the climate system.

VJ,

Climate modelling is no more accurate here in Australia than anywhere else. When will people understand that there actually was variability in weather prior to industrialisation. Every vagary of weather these days is blamed on AGW. Sure, get enough weather variability and the models will be right (maybe 2 times out of 10?).

It is nonsense to even think that the weather today is somehow more extreme than 100 years ago. There is no empirical evidence of it and model outcomes are not empirical evidence.

Now "Global Cooling" is caused by CO2.
You had to know this was comming!

You just can't make this stuff up.

http://news.smh.com.au/national/big-chill-a-symptom-of-climate-chaos-20080901-46yx.html

WMO International Workshop on
Tropical Cyclones, IWTC-6, San Jose, Costa Rica, November 2006:

14. Through the work of many researchers (Emanuel 1999, Emanuel et al. 2004, Free et
al. 2004, Holland 1987, Holland 1997, Tonkin et al. 2000, Persing and Montgomery
2003, Montgomery et al. 2006) there is a developing theory governing maximum
tropical cyclone intensity. The key concept is that for a given ocean temperature and
atmospheric thermodynamic environment there is an upper bound on the intensity a
tropical cyclone may achieve. This upper bound is referred to as the Maximum
Potential Intensity (or MPI). As discussed in the papers by Emanuel, Holland and
collaborators, few tropical cyclones actually achieve their MPI, as before such a state
can be achieved they make landfall, recurve, undergo an unfavourable atmospheric
environment (such as vertical wind shear) or experience an unfavourable thermal
structure of the upper ocean. Emanuel (1987) and Tonkin et al (1997) presented
evidence that CO2 induced climate change would bring about a substantial increase in
the MPI of tropical cyclones around the globe. Knutson and Tuleya’s (2004)
idealized hurricane model experiments support the theoretical predictions of the MPI
theory in the context of CO2-induced climate warming. Given, however, that only a
small percentage of tropical cyclones attain their MPI and that the sensitivity of
hurricane intensity to CO2-induced warming is 3-5% per degree Celsius in these
simulations and theories, Knutson and Tuleya (2004) have speculated that CO2
induced tropical cyclone intensity changes are unlikely to be detectable in historic
observations and will probably not be detectable for decades to come.

17. Concerning future changes in tropical cyclone intensity, there is substantial
disagreement among recent global and regional climate modelling studies, although
the highest resolution models available show evidence for some increase in intensity
(Oouchi et al, 2006; Walsh et al., 2004), in support of both potential intensity theory
and idealized hurricane model simulations. A limitation of the climate models used
thus far is that the simulated tropical cyclones are substantially weaker than
observed—and dramatically so for the lower resolution models—and the models have
not demonstrated that they can reproduce the observed increase of attainable tropical
cyclone intensities with increasing SST. In cases where this relationship has been
examined (e.g., Yoshimura et al. 2006) the dependence is much weaker than
observed.

I see that Pielke's comments are closed for that post. Were they always closed? And why don't the denialist trolls make a big fuss about how Pielke is censoring them?

From Henderson-Sellers et. al. (1998). Tropical Cyclones and
Global Climate Change:A Post-IPCC Assessment. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Soc. 79(1): 19-38.

"there is no evidence to suggest any major changes
in the area or global location of tropical cyclone
genesis in greenhouse conditions;
• thermodynamic “upscaling” models seem to have
some skill in predicting maximum potential intensity
(MPI); and
• these thermodynamic schemes predict an increase
in MPI of 10%–20% for a doubled CO2 climate but
the known omissions (ocean spray, momentum restriction,
and possibly also surface to 300 hPa lapse
rate changes) all act to reduce these increases."

Also from Shapiro and Goldenberg (2007) see: http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=2240463

"Although SSTs are of secondary importance to vertical shear in modulating hurricane formation, explaining only ∼ 10% of the interannual variability in hurricane frequency over the ∼50% explained by vertical shear, the results support the conclusion that warmer SSTs directly enhance development. The lack of correlation with major hurricanes implies that the underlying SSTs are not a significant factor in the development of these stronger systems."

Average global temperature is irrelevant to cyclone formation and intensity.

http://www.almanac.com/timeline/
Excerpt:
Over the past century, climatic conditions have run from cool in the 1900s to warm in the '30s to cool in the '60s to warm in the '80s (scroll the time line above), and many of us have come to believe that mankind has been responsible for the swings. Scientists have blamed us for generating warming greenhouse gases, then polluting the air with sun-blocking particulates, and raising temperatures through urbanization, deforestation, and greenhouse gases.

Ice age is coming ... again.

This thread proves one thing for sure. Talking about climate eliminates humor and increases self centered bitterness. I knew Global Warming was good for something.

I'm gonna go to some other site and discuss subjects that lend themselves to more pleasant convos hmmmm politics and religion should do it!

All this whole discussion is is a nagging matter of cognitive dissonance. These are the facts:

Global Mean Temps HAVE NO EFFECT ON HURRICANE FORMATION. That is the fact, and there are many sound reasons, apparently much to complicated for Rick the Dick to grasp. Here's a small primer for those of you who may still yet be salvageable. First and foremost Hurricanes, like tornadoes form as the result of a temperature gradient, NOT HEAT ALONE. This is why they form most often where two bodies of air/water meet (ie hurricanes in the south Caribbean and Pacific/Indian Ocean boundary). THE BIGGER THE TEMPERATURE GRADIENT, THE BIGGER THE TORNADO OR HURRICANE, FACT! The bigger the difference in temperature in air masses, the more turbulent the flow of heat from the warm to the cold is. With a bigger gradient you get things moving so quickly one way, they "overshoot" and shift the gradient such that they are then drawn back where they came from. This oscillation is what drives the cyclone effect tornadoes and hurricanes share. This is the direct manifestation of the First Law of Thermodynamics which has stood as unassailable law for centuries (though Richard likely has his doubts). Thus, the reason we have had a strong hurricane season is the same reason we had one in 2004, the Atlantic is much cooler than the Gulf. I lived in Florida then, the Atlantic coast waters were 65 degrees in JULY. Of course, this is a clear and verifiable fact to anyone not wearing a tinfoil helmet. And while I'm sure some of you will try to crowbar some AGW based rationale into the reasons why, the facts are as follows. The Atlantic is cooler due to oscillation cycles that are independent of climate, and the Gulf is hotter because the southeast had a dry spring and early summer, and thus less solar heat was lost to above-surface humidity and instead absorbed by the gulf. In short, Pielke's assertion is exactly right (in addition to being the only one offering science rather than insults). The heating of the Gulf, cooling of the Atlantic, and frequency of hurricanes does not correlate to either global mean temps or manmade CO2 emissions. Another easily verifiable fact.

Let me also note that some real scientists have found that Hurricanes tend to grow more intense when they are void of overlying high pressures, ie a hurricane will be more intense if it has COOLER air above it. Of course this widely accepted theory implies:
1) temperatures aren't getting too much hotter
2) the "upper tropospheric warming" once predicted as part of AGW has not happened. Though the conspirists already knew that and have been avoiding the topic entirely

And of course all of this science and logic is why Richard and ol Seth Boringtheme are revving the engines of cognitive dissonance. It is becoming harder to ignore the facts and not sound like an idiot these days.

But cognitive dissonance is a b-i-t-c-h. Once you sign up for the agenda, facts don't matter. And when you have a website tailored to the agenda, you have definitely signed up. So Richard, you have done what everyone expected. You met science with opinion and insult, and when you were called out for it, you opted for deeper insults. Yet all the while you make yourself look stupider and stupider to those who are not living in the same state of delusion. And as the science becomes clearer and clearer, and the experts more and more learned, you just look like more of a jackass.

But hey your whole: "What if the temperature goes up 10 degrees?" counterpoint to the First Law of Thermodynamics was priceless nonetheless. A smart-ass totally irrelevant hypothetical scenario, that you yourself don't know the answer to. That's how you shoot holes in perhaps the most firmly established scientic law? Sorry I doubted your brilliance. What a joke you are...

When you start attacking someone's use of an exclamation point, you've really lost the argument. People with only a "passing interest in science" should never write about things they know nothing about. It makes them look foolish and intellectually barren. Why are AGW alarmists such a nasty group of people? It's like watching the bully in the playground beating up on the nerd. Now that's unbecoming.