When you can't be right all the time, make it up so you can
Paul from Wizbang points to a story on Reuters (from a couple weeks ago) where climate researchers made the following bold statement.
The study, to be published on Wednesday in Geophysical Research
Letters, found that climate model simulations show a "robust increase"
in wind shear in the tropical Atlantic during the 21st century from
global warming.
Wind shear, a difference in wind speed or
direction at different altitudes, tends to tear apart tropical
cyclones, preventing nascent ones from growing and already-formed
hurricanes from becoming the monster storms that cause the most damage.
So, I'm curious. As an armchair meteorologist I want to know which way you want it. Is it that global warming causes stronger hurricanes or suppresses stronger hurricanes. Because, you know, I may move to Florida someday and would like to know what to cheer for.
There are two types of wind associated with this story. The political breeze that floats through these reports and the hot air they're blowing up our collective skirts (kilts, if you prefer, makes no difference). Why can't scientists come out and say "we really don't know"? I was looking over an information guide that the National Weather Service puts out about tornadoes and saw that they describe how a tornado forms. Call me crazy, but if they actually knew how a tornado formed, wouldn't the warnings be 100% accurate? They're not, because meteorologists don't know what causes tornadoes. Yes, the basic information might be there, but they don't really know. Just like tropical meteorologists can't tell you exactly where a hurricane is going to be three days from now (except Joe Bastardi, he's uncannily good sometimes), local meteorologists can't predict exactly which storm produces a tornado. Heck, we had a 70% chance of rain yesterday. Guess how much we got? Zip.
And with all this uncertainty in the fairly new science of meteorology, we still claim that a climatologist can predict what the Earth will be like in 2050? Get real. We're all guessing.