This is a message I sent in reply to Naz:
I agree with you. Assuming black-body behaviour means ignoring factors such as the trapping of
infrared by the atmosphere, i.e. the greenhouse effect. So Monckton is disproving the greenhouse
effect by using an equation which only works if there is no greenhouse effect..
I dont know the details of the climate modelling, but I'm sure that a large computational effort in
these models is spent on estimating the net energy input from the sun at the earth's surface and
the net effect of irradiation back into space through the atmosphere, i.e. the modelling of
deviations from the SB law, which are essential to understand if one wants to predict climate on a
complex very-unblack body like the earth. So that whole section of Monckton's criticism is pure
crap.
His statement that there was no ice at the poles in 1421 since the chinese sailed around it is
apparently purely based on a sensationalist book which is also pure crap (see http://www.
1421exposed.com/
Despite that I thought that his criticism of the "hockey-stick graph" and its misuse rings true. I
can easily imagine a single influential scientist misprepresenting the data like that, in part out of
carelessness, in part out of sloppiness. And I can imagine that such representations may easily get
picked up and used way beyond the expectations of the original authors, given the politically
charged atmosphere. Scientists can be very naive in that way. But the issue of climate change and
its modelling is a huge body of work, most if it highly rigorous, and it does not all boil down to
one (possibly) misleading and misused graph.
I also dont believe Monckton's graph in which the Mediaeval Warm Period is a monstrous bulge
bigger than the current temperature blip. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_warm_period
shows a variety of plots in which the MWP appears but is far less prominent than in Monckton's
plot. Apparently there is evidence that the MWP was rather local to northern Europe.
best wishes
malcolm
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