I should have dropped this last night.

Similar to the “easy problem” and “hard problem” in neuroscience/philosophy, there is an easy and hard problem in climate science. Easy problem: Calculating the *initial* radiative forcing via GHG increases alone is relatively simple because you only need elementary radiative transfer physics to do it: Graybody temperature of a planet: Tg=[((1-a)*S)/(4σε)]^(1/4). Basically if you have the planet’s albedo, the solar constant, the Stefan-Boltzmann constant, and emissivity, you can calculate its average surface temperature. Approximation for CO^2 radiative forcing: ΔF=5.35ln(C/C0). Essentially the total radiative forcing in watts per square meter can be approximated by taking the natural logarithm of the concentration of CO^2 divided by the pre-industrial reference concentration (~280ppm). Each GHG has its own formula but essentially this is all you need to do. The hard problem: Calculating the spatiotemporal response by the earth system to any external radiative forcing is astronomically complicated due to the sheer volume of variables involved, as well as their multiple, multidimensional degrees of freedom. The resources and computing power required to *realistically* simulate this is massive. And even then, it’s unlikely you’d be able to adequately capture internal climate variability (almost every model has failed to do this, even with global temperature records being adjusted to better-reflect model output). Our climate models are wholly inadequate for this purpose. It’s sort of the unspoken yet obvious truth that most scientists already know. But it’s the best we can do for now.

Pretty strong West/East gradient that summer. Not really the beastly, sprawling, monster heat ridge mid continent that Phil has been selling for months now. But it was definitely hot in the East.

Definitely not a danger to society. Now he's making it life or death. Down an already steep and slippery slope. Someone is going to get hurt because of this language.

Maybe not... just anecdotal at SEA where most years have been wetter than normal over the last decade but summers have been warmer/drier.