When I started this blog it was with some trepidation as I outlined in my very first post, http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/000549.html .
And I wondered whether anyone would comment. I like comments because I like to know what I might have got wrong, and what I might have got right and I like to read different perspectives and have my ideas challenged.
Louis Hissink definately gets the prize for the most comments at this blog.
Sometimes I laugh, sometimes I cringe, sometimes I learn something, when I read the comments from Louis.
If you do a google search on Louis you will find comment that includes:
“Regarded as the best diamond field geologist in Australia.”
“His free time is spent researching ancient history, writing comments on environmental or mining matters and, as frequently happens, re-installing the operating system on the computer. He is a book worm and writes book reviews for Henry Thornton,
http://www.henrythornton.com/contributors.asp?contributor=9 .”
Louis has won a prize for posting the “worst argument” against global warming. Given the judge (Tim Lambert) listed other contenders as
McKitrick & Michaels, Baliunas and Soon – he can perhaps feel honoured.
There was a period recently when there were no comments from Louis. I gather he had headed off bush for 3 weeks to Wooleen,
http://www.wooleen.com.au/
Louis has written about Wooleen:
“I think it (the homestead) cost 145,000 pounds to build a century ago – wool really was the go then. Not now any more – current stocking is 2000 head from the usual 14,000. Drought is in 5/7 year cycle, so another 2 years of pain apparently.”
Thanks Louis for your contribution, for taking the time to comment.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
Yes, I enjoy Louis’ comments too, even if I do not always agree. The nice thing about this blog site is that nobody, as far as I can see, has yet got shrill and abusive. Let’s keep it up.
I hope I did not offend Louis by threatening to emulate my crusty Welsh ancestor, Captain Flewellen, with regard to leeks, look you.
Well I guess the blog site has been worth it to sort yourself, Louis, John, and Malcolm out on global warming.
Crikeys Jen,
I need to go to a quiet room and blush a little 🙂 But thanks for the compliment 🙂
Incidentally Michael Mann has publicly listed his Fortran program allegedly forming the basis of the IPCC Hockey Stick reconstruction and Steve McIntyre has posted it plus his initial analysis.
The upshot is that it took mining industry types, familiar with the diverse means that entrepreneors use to guild the various mining property lilies to wonder over the basis of the Hockey Stick Graph.
I myself wondered where the MWP disappeared to and found that the steep rise in 20th Century had the appearance of being “grafted” onto the earlier data. While simplistic, this interepretation has now been shown, more or less, to be correct.
John Ray on his Greenie Watch has posted a comment on this Fortran program, and we can now add, sadly, another Greenie scare to the failed list. Malthus and his predictions, Erlich and his population timebomb, Greenies and ice ages, and now global warming.
The crucial matter now is where Greenpeace and its minions will strike next.
We are indeeed living in interesting times.
Louis that is the biggets load of drivel I have seen ! Rolling around the floor laughing …
After the events of this week you must be joking …. you have learned absolutely nothing and have read nothing … back to your 1950s reference collection…
The first time Louis challenged my opinion , he concluded: “Oh forget it, this could end up being a soliquey………”
I reluctantly let him off the implicit correction.
Through the transition of time and his argumentative perseverance, I have become less generous.
With his most recent faux pas “…humans are not terribly welcome in those areas. Not many Aboriginals around either.” I corrected, “The two groups are not mutually exclusive!”
Nevertheless, the breadth of significance of any argument is constrained by its contraposition and Louis contributes an important part to this Web-log’s dimension. Its value would suffer for his exclusion.
But I challenge Louis to travel north, mid-wet season; between December and March, to the sacred heart of the Daintree World Heritage estate, to consider the wealth of nature’s masterpiece. Where those that call themselves scientists scrutinize only one out of nine-hundred-thousand hectares of tropical rainforest.
Such an undertaking would bring him unambiguously face-to-face with the beneficiary of a global warming.
David,
Leaks or leeks or whatever, no I was never offended – though one should regard my lack of comment in the usual manner. As a devotee of the well known English Welshman “Neddy Seagoon” and his mad companions of the Goon Show, one should quickly realise where I stand in matters of great seriousness.
But let’s do note the silence in the quarters of the usual suspects.
ps. Argument for the worst argument against global warming remains something I have not checked out – I suspect being in the company of the others Jen mentioned above that further enquiry would be a waste of time, and an overeaction to some of the fleabites one gets from commenting in the blogosphere.
David,
Which one takes that as you cannot counter the argument, you attack the messenger.
Global warming -if the earth cools, so it warms, one cannot exist without the other and no one really knows why it happens, only that it has.
Perhaps you might explain to the readers here how Greenland froze up, and remains a cold place, because if you cannot do that David, you cannot also claim to know how the earth warms up either.
Such gross certainty over such palpable uncertainty. Reminds me flying and cuckoo nests.
My mother always used to say that if you cannot say anything nice then don’t say it.
David,
If you believe that we climate sceptics have been disproven, then perhaps you and I are not on the same page – Kyoto is dead and buried, and Mann et al now have serious problems with the veracity of the Hockey Stick and how it was derived.
In the mining game we have a word for it but the lefty lawyers from hell preclude us from saying it aloud.
Personally I think it is a classic case of pathological science.
HELLO HELLO Louis – have you ready anything since 1950. HELLO EARTH TO LOUIS – are you receiving…
You may not know – BUT IS HAS BEEN TOLD TO YOU AT LEAST 50 TIMES IN THESE HALLOWED BLOGS. There is now PEER REVIEWED independent confirmation of the “Hockey Stick” argument. OH DEAR. The opposition are not and are just part of the smear FUD campaign… which has now been found wanting… They are NOT peer reviewed published. Whoopsa daisy…
AND – you know what – even if is wasn’t correct it doesn’t matter in the science argument.
Actually I’ve changed my mind – yes Louis you’re right – I’m wrong ….the 1000s of scientists involved in IPCC are are all wrong/deluded/on the take. You win.
Incidentally what are you going to recommend to our state Premiers on water supply – what’s your advice?
Basically Jen – very few anti-AGWs ever keep up with the debate. Stick to the old hackneyed arguments. Recycle over and over and over.
Don’t follow up any web site suggestions on alternatives – don’t even bother to read them.
Present no debate to that information. Just keep parroting the same old rhetoric. Coz that’s all they have got.
AND WHAT is fascinating – NEVER publish nor present a cogent alternative explanation.
At least get onto Exxon and get some better spurious arguments and while you’re about it look up the definition of sophistry.
Louis,
Please be more specific about which David you are talking to. I may take offence at one directed at my namesake, and vice versa. Please to address me as Davey Gam Esq. in future, look you. Diolch yn fawr-er-thanks very much.
What an interesting URL
http://www.henrythornton.com/article.asp?article_id=3266
Louis – are you responsible for this laughable bit of science quackery…. surely you’re kidding – have you shown this any qualified meteorologist/climatologist ?
David Gam, when I replied David Vader was the only David on the thread. It was blindingly obvious to whom I was referring.
I make therefore zero apologies.
I also note that your post post dates all my comments except this one.
I am prompted to post this comment by a good geochemist mate of mine who is, incidentally, as left as they get – we never debate politics.
“Science Show (ABC Radio National) – listening to absolute CRAP from an ecologist about global warming!!
infuriating – Terry Root, Stanford, proc US Academy of science – absolutely unscientific rubbish – i have never heard such drivel!!”
David Vader,
There is no peer reviewed confirmation of the Hockey Stick graph. If there were this debate would not be happening. This suggests that the fraud is a bit more widespread than most of use suspect.
Whoops Apologies to David Ward – I just noticed his short initial post – missed it scrolling up. My error.
In any case David Ward, it is fairly obvious to whom i am referring considering you did not vilify me.
Waiting for David Vader to come up scientific information on how Greenland froze up since the Norse occupation a long time ago. I suspect we might close the discussion as life is too short to wait forever.
Loius – BTW still waiting
Another one of those one-off anomalies that keep happening ….
Heat records across the USA West:
• Las Vegas, Nevada, reached 117 Tuesday, tying the record set in 1942.
• Reno, Nevada, set a record for that city’s most consecutive days of 100-degree heat in a row — 10.
• Tucson, Arizona, has reached at least 100 degrees 39 days in a row, tying the record.
• Denver, Colorado, tied its record for the hottest day of all time with 105 degrees on Wednesday.
• Grand Junction, Colorado, set a heat record Thursday with 106 degrees.
•Big Bear Lake, California, hit 94 degrees on Monday, the highest ever recorded.
•200 cities and towns in the West set daily record highs this week.
David Vader,
Please be a little more honest about the “Hockey Stick” and peer-review. You seem to be behaving like a proponent of anthropogenic global warming and omitting the information that you don’t like!
1. The original “hockey stick” paper by Mann, Bradley and Hughes (MBH) was subject to to peer-review, apparently some what superficial because neither data or methodology were made available. This failure to disclose is in contravention of US policy on publicly funded research.
2. After several non-peer reviewed papers, still raising valid issues and citing data sources – and after numerous unsuccessful requests to MBH for description of their methodology and data so that the “hockey stick” could be verified – McIntyre and McKitrick’s peer-reviewed paper appeared in Geophysical Research Letters earlier this year.
M&M showed that the methodology was predisposed to finding hockey-stick shaped curves. Their paper has not only been reviewed but others have tested their metodology and found the same results.
3. Other studies which appear to support MBH come back to the same issue – the validity of the proxies that are used to determine temperature. At a critical point in 15th century data the growth rings on bristlecone pine trees are used but even Mann (back in 1999) ackwoledged these rings to be unreliable because growth is a product of many factors – heat, sunlight, rain, fertliser etc. (If anyone knows of studies which do not use bristlecone pine as a temperature proxy through that period I would like to learn about it.)
4. The “Hockey Stick” is now being examined by members of the US House of Representatives with MBH being required to provide all papers, notes, data, both published and unpublished, that was relevant to the creation of the original “Hockey stick” paper. This request is causing a political ruckus and if very recent reports are correct, Mann, Bradley and Hughes have tended towards lengthy statements which address just a few of the several questions put to them rather than provide direct and specific answers.
So, after a positive peer-reviewed paper, a negative peer-reviewed paper, positive peer-reviewed papers that apparently use the same data as the original (and hence may contain the same flaws), we now have the US Government seeking to get to the crux of the matter – the validity of the much-used graph.
That’s the full picture as I understand it. I’ll provide references if anyone wants them.
Jen – don’t edit this out.
Louis you are BLIND. You only read what you want to read.
And your analysis is UTTERLY AMAZING. I dare you to email Mann and seek his reponse to your detailed “scholarly” mining truck critique…
Mann et al have made full disclosure and are not in breach of anything….
Listen to yourself “if very recent reports are correct” …. you haven’t read them have you – ADMIT IT !!! If you have not read them – then Sir you are a cad and a bounder. I you have not read the latest posted info in these hallowed blogs then you are simply a scallywag.
And let’s assume you are correct on all forms of paleo-dating – THEREFORE WE KNOW ABSOLUTELEY NOTHING ABOUT THE PAST – ZERO … really great mate ! What paleo studies do you support – coz we’re going to use the same spurious non- arguments on them too – it’s only fair.
For the 100th time….
The various claims of McIntyre and McKitrick — including the ones repeated in
your question — have been exhaustively examined by two different groups of climate
researchers who have found their objections to be unfounded.5 See also National Center
for Atmospheric Research, Media Advisory: The Hockey Stick Controversy New Analysis
Reproduces Graph of Late 20th Century Temperature Rise (May 11, 2005) (available at:
http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2005/ammann.shtml). Moreover, it is my
understanding that several other groups of climate researchers have examined McIntyre
and McKitrick’s criticisms and also have found their criticisms lacking in merit. On the
other hand, I know of no independent scientific group that has found any of McIntyre and
McKitrick’s claims to be valid.
Nor is that surprising. Energy & Environment is not a peer reviewed scientific
journal; it is a journal primarily devoted to policy rather than science that appears to
engage in, at most, haphazard review of its articles. And neither McIntyre nor McKitrick
is a trained climate scientist. According to the biographical data on their websites, Mr.
McIntyre is a mining industry executive with no formal training in any discipline related
to climate research and Mr. McKitrick is an economist with no scientific training, hardly
credentials that lend force to their academic arguments. See
http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/cv.html and
http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/stevebio.doc.
I’m sure the Ollie North’s on the Energy Committee are impartial. The Chairman is a true patriot I tell you. Brought to you by WMD and Iran/Contra and capturing control of world oil supply – yuk yuk sure….
David Vader,
Mining Truck critique? That is a new one. I suspect with Tim Lambert’s initial retraction re Storsch we might find a few more retreats in the near future.
Thanks for the free advertising for the Henry Thornton site.
And I await your erudite explanation for the cooling of Greenland.
Ender,
Thanks for your patience – but surely you should have addressed it to David Vader.
Or are your side exempt from the errors you seem to attribute me with.
Cooling eh …. well Louis I await yours actually ….
Science, Vol 297, Issue 5579, 218-222, 12 July 2002
Surface Melt-Induced Acceleration of Greenland Ice-Sheet Flow
H. Jay Zwally,1* Waleed Abdalati,2 Tom Herring,3 Kristine Larson,4 Jack Saba,5 Konrad Steffen6
Ice flow at a location in the equilibrium zone of the west-central Greenland Ice Sheet accelerates above the midwinter average rate during periods of summer melting. The near coincidence of the ice acceleration with the duration of surface melting, followed by deceleration after the melting ceases, indicates that glacial sliding is enhanced by rapid migration of surface meltwater to the ice-bedrock interface. Interannual variations in the ice acceleration are correlated with variations in the intensity of the surface melting, with larger increases accompanying higher amounts of summer melting. The indicated coupling between surface melting and ice-sheet flow provides a mechanism for rapid, large-scale, dynamic responses of ice sheets to climate warming.
The interaction among warmer summer temperatures, increased surface meltwater production, water flow to the base, and increased basal sliding provides a mechanism for rapid response of the ice sheets to climate change. In general, a direct coupling between increased surface melting and ice-sheet flow has been given little or no consideration in estimates of ice-sheet response to climate change (35). In addition to the direct effect of increased water pressure on the basal sliding, the flow of surface water at approximately 0°C to basal ice, at the PMP of -1.0°C, transfers heat for additional basal melting. The occurrence of this melt-driven acceleration in the equilibrium zone implies that the mechanism may be occurring throughout much of the ablation zone of the ice sheet, or at least where the basal temperature is at the PMP. Therefore, the rate of retreat of the ice-sheet margin under climate warming is probably faster than predicted by estimates based only on the direct increase in surface ablation (36). Enhanced basal sliding from surface meltwater may have contributed to the rapid demise of the Laurentide Ice Sheet during increased summer insolation and surface ablation circa 10,000 years ago (37) and to extensive melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet during the last interglacial (38), by causing a faster flow of ice to the margins, an increase in the thinning rate, and more rapid inward migration of the ablation zone.
1 Oceans and Ice Branch, Code 971, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771, USA.
2 Code YS, NASA Headquarters, 300 E Street, SW, Washington, DC 20546, USA.
3 Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, MIT Room 54-618, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
4 Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA.
5 Raytheon Inc., Code 971, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771, USA.
6 CIRES, University of Colorado, CB 216, Boulder, CO 80309, USA.
Louis – it’s Hans von Storch actually not Storsch
And I think Tim Lambert has given a fairly reasonable assessment of his colleagues from a “independence” perspective – lots of familiar names … AND what retraction was that then ???
Do tell …
No comment on http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2005/ammann.shtml – cat got your tongue – no critique ?
No advice to our state Premiers on their water supplies – nothing to worry about is your opinion I take it ??
Still haven’t read Mann’s reponse to the House Committee I guess?
oh well ….
Oh dear – Louis favourite scientist is USING A COUPLE AOGCM MODEL. OH my God !!!!
But how can this be Louis ???
Reconstructing Past Climate from Noisy Data
Hans von Storch,1* Eduardo Zorita,1 Julie M. Jones,1 Yegor Dimitriev,1 Fidel González-Rouco,2 Simon F. B. Tett3
Empirical reconstructions of the Northern Hemisphere (NH) temperature in the past millennium based on multiproxy records depict small-amplitude variations followed by a clear warming trend in the past two centuries. We use a coupled atmosphere-ocean model simulation of the past 1000 years as a surrogate climate to test the skill of these methods, particularly at multidecadal and centennial time scales. Idealized proxy records are represented by simulated grid-point temperature, degraded with statistical noise. The centennial variability of the NH temperature is underestimated by the regression-based methods applied here, suggesting that past variations may have been at least a factor of 2 larger than indicated by empirical reconstructions.
1 Institute for Coastal Research, GKSS Research Centre, Geesthacht 21502, Germany.
2 Department of Astrophysics and Atmospheric Physics, Universidad Complutense, Madrid 28040, Spain.
3 UK Meteorological Office, Hadley Centre (Reading Unit), Meteorology Building, University of Reading, Reading, RG6 6BB, UK.
John McLean
1. The Mann et al provided all material that was necessary for replication of his study and complied with his obligation to the National Science Foundation of America which they have confirmed. Where is your reference from the NSF that the original study did not conform to acceptable scientific standards? The data and methodology has been available from the very start.
2. M&Ms paper was NOT peer-reviewed. The publication you mention is not a scientific publication that rigourously peer reviews its content. When M&Ms work was examined it was found to contain basic errors and omissions that a competant scientist would not have made.
3. ALL studies that have used the same data as Mann et al have confirmed the basic research. They did not need the IP computer code to do this just the data as any competant scientist would.
4. The letter from Rep Barton is a attack on basic science and was rightly condemned by just about every science body in the US. The responses address ALL the question asked the problem is to find the people to understand then. I think Rep Barton will have a time reading the responses.
You have the picture of the FUD campaign that is neither complete or accurate. I suggest that you desist these stupid posts while you have some credibility.
Jennifer, I’m curious. Why did you want to specifically write a post about Louis? It can’t just be because he comments a lot. Ender comments just about as much as Louis here, but you haven’t written anything about him. And in fact, I hope you don’t rate your commenters contribution by how much they comment. I am sure you are inspiring thought in readers who don’t comment at all. They should be valued too. Why single out Louis? You don’t need a reason to justify anything, you can do what you want. I’m just curious.
Louis, were you offended by the (I thought) condescending tone of Jennifer’s post of you? Do you think that she regards you as at least slightly off the mark? This is the impression that I got from her post.
Steve,
Writing is a way of organising thoughts and providing information.
I was not trying to be condescending when I posted “Louis Hissink”.
I would genuinely like to post something about Ender.
Early on, I did a post titled “Warwick Hughes”, see http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/000559.html .
Steve,
I am not fazed at all with Jen’s initial posting though it was totally unexpected. I was embarrassed but having a hide impervious to metaphorical Schambock attacks, went on with life.
So it as a compliment.
Posts by Ender and D. Vader, et al, are irritating flea bites which actually are less irritating than the effects of sandflies and mosquitoes in the West Australian Murchison area.
That I might be eccentric? Sure – if some wish to think that, what can I do – change my thinking to a more politically correct format?
No, if the facts change, I change my mind (attrib to Maynard Keynes)l. But the facts are paramount, not my interpretation of them.
And it does raise the issue of who thinks and who mindlessly repeat what they have been indoctrinated, which neeeds to be emphasised here.
I am known in the industry as a De Bonian, a lateral thinker, an enfant terrible, a prickly indivual, square peg in a round hole and so on – all indications of an individual who would be exterminated in a totalitarian society.
I may reject plate tectonics as a real process in geoscience, but I do not then support earth expansion as proposed by Carey and his followers. I am, first and foremost a mining geologist, though specialising in diamonds.
So I regard negative thinking as the highest form of analysis – in the sense that by negating contrary explanations one is still left with a large number of other possibilities which might, in a future time, better explain one’s observations in terms of what one knows now.
David Vader,
Just what are your scientific qualiications?
Mine are Bachelor and Master of Science, nothing to shout home about.
Ender,
Do give us a break and get your facts straight before you comment!
1. Copies of “please explain” letters to Mann, Bradley, Highes and IPCC’s Pachauri can be found at http://energycommerce.house.gov/108/Letters/06232005_1570.htm
2. The problems that McIntyre and McKitrick had in obtaining details of the “hockey stick” curve van be found at http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/trc.archive.html and in the vrious links from that page.
I also see that the above page states “The Corrigendum in Nature today (July 1, 2004) by Professors Mann, Bradley and Hughes is a clear admission that the disclosure of data and methods behind MBH98 was materially inaccurate.”
Given that the “hockey stick” was published over 3 years earlier (in time for the 2001 TAR from the IPCC) the claim “The data and methodology has been available from the very start.” is without substance.
3. My understanding is that Geophysical Research Letters is a peer-reviewed publication. Gosh, even at your “bible” realclimate.org Michael mann and Gavin Schmidt say “McIntyre and McKitrick (2005), in a paper they have managed to slip through the imperfect peer-review filter of GRL,…”
4. You say “The letter from Rep Barton is a attack on basic science and was rightly condemned by just about every science body in the US.” No it was not – it certanly wasn’t condemned by all but perhaps only condemned by those who can’t stand the heat of scrutiny. Mann, Bradley and Hughes are apparently unable or unwilling to answer the questions that were put to them (see below).
What are they afraid of? If their work is robust then it should be able to withstand scrutiny from any quarter!
4. From Steve McIntyre on 23 July 2005 some reading matter with plenty of links to follow… (I apologise for its length but I think it relevant)
Answers to the House Committee on Cross-Validation Statistics
In a recent post , I showed that MBH had calculated cross-validation R2 statistics, but this information had been excluded from their summary of cross-validation statistics in their Supplementary Information here. We had surmised this in our original article, but had previously been unable to absolutely prove it. The House Committee requested information from M,B and H about whether they calculated the R2 and other cross-validation statistics. It’s interesting to look at their responses with this information in mind.
The question to all three was as follows: (question 7 to Mann, question 6 to the others):
7. Provide a detailed narrative explanation of these alleged errors and how these may affect the underlying conclusions of the work, including, but not limited to answers to the following questions:
c. Did you calculate the R2 statistic for the temperature reconstruction, particularly
for the 15th Century proxy record calculations and what were the results?
d. What validation statistics did you calculate for the reconstruction prior to 1820, and what were the results?
Hughes does not provide a sequential answer to the questions sent to him by the House Committee. Instead, he writes a discursive letter, selectively replying to questions, but nowhere answering these questions.
Bradley does provide a sequential letter, but his response to his question 6 likewise does not answer either of these questions. Instead, he editorializes on journal review procedures and cites a realclimate posting . The cited realclimate post does not contain any information about whether MBH calculated the R2 and other cross-validation statistics. I’ve responded to the issues in this realclimate posting in posts Errors Matter #1 , #2 , #3 and here , as well as elsewhere on this blog
So now to Mann. As usual, Mann is not short of verbiage. The answer to 7C essentially re-states a position previously put forward at realclimate here , in which Cook et al [2004] as well as Luterbacher et al [2004] were cited. I provided a reply to this here , noting ironically that Cook et al [2004] used an R2 statistic . Cook et al is not cited to the House Committee. So Mann’s down to one citation. The Wilks’ citation is also interesting. If you look at equation 7.20 in Wilks, the RE statistic is necessarily lower than the R2 statistic if the series meet stationarity conditions required to establish a linear relationship. At most Wilks says that an R2 statistic is not sufficient (not that it is not necessary). If you watch Mann’s argument, he switches from sufficient conditions to necessary conditions with a conjurer’s skill. For example, he’ll find a text saying that an R2 statistic is not sufficient for statistical significance (a point with which I agree) and then say that this shows that an R2 statistic is not necessary for statistical significance – a point with which I disagree and which he’ll have a hard time finding any reputable statistical authority outside the climate science community to endorse. I’ll re-visit these issues on another occasion.
Here I want to focus on his answer to 7D (which is avoided by Bradley and Hughes), Mann says:
A(7D): The Committee asks “[w]hat validation statistics did you calculate for the
reconstruction prior to 1820, and what were the results?” Our validation statistics were
described in detail in a table provided in the supplementary information on Nature’s
website accompanying our original nature article, Mann, M.E., Bradley, R.S., Hughes,
M.K., Global-Scale Temperature Patterns and Climate Forcing Over the Past Six
Centuries, Nature, 392, 779-787 (1998). These statistics remain on Nature’s website (see
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v392/n6678/suppinfo/392779a0.html) and on our
own website. See ftp:holocene.evsc.virginia.edu/pub/Mannetal98.
First if you go to the Nature website http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v392/n6678/suppinfo/392779a0.html and follow the links, you will find that the statistics are deleted (I pointed this out a few months ago.) I continue to be blocked from Mann’s FTP site at UVA, but my recollection is that these statistics are not at this website. (I’ll verify and edit this point.) However, the statistics do still maintain a precarious existence at the original Umass FTP site : ftp://eclogite.geo.umass.edu/pub/mann/ONLINE-PREPRINTS/MultiProxy/stats-supp.html.
As I pointed out yesterday , the cross-validation R2 statistic is not included in this table, but was definitely calculated in Mann’s recently released source code, as was the Nino RE statistic (for which only the R2 statistic was reported). So Mann has given an incorrect and highly misleading answer to the House Commitee on a point that is not incidental, but at the heart of the matter. Mann sure seems to be playing with fire.
Filed under: MBH98 – Steve McIntyre
Ender, please stop wasting my time with your assertions with you provide no evidence to support them.
John M,
spend some time on Tim Lambert’s weblog:
http://www.timlambert.org.
You mightn’t like the tone or timL or the commenters, but I believe you will find all the links and more that you need to support Ender’s side of the story, and cast light on the one sidedness of your own account.
John – I do have my facts straight and reposting FUD from M&M does not constitue ‘evidence’
1. I asked for you reference from the NSF, the ‘watchdog’ of American science, that the original study did not comply with scientific reporting standards. The NSF found that MBH complied with ALL relevant standards.
2. The difficulties that M&M had was that they were not competant climate scientists and did not understand that the usual course of action for scientists is to publish their data and methodology for other scientists to replicate. M&M wanted step by step instructions. None of the other teams that replicated MBH’s work had any such difficulty and confirmed MBHs work and refuted M&M criticisms.
3. to be continued
Louis
What a self serving discourse. Don’t bother answering any questions – just slap your self on the back a bit more ….
When you’re in the Murchison – note the land degradation from people who didn’t understand the implications of climate variation…
And there are no totalitarians out to get you Louis – you’re doing a good job with your own “logic” of rhetorical self assassination …
John McLean – and so the independent verification of Mann by Amman doesn’t do anything for you either ?
http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/ccr/ammann/millennium/MBH_reevaluation.html
Take a read of the new Australian Climate Risk and Variability report, prepared by Allens Consulting for the Australian Govt:
http://www.greenhouse.gov.au/impacts/publications/risk-vulnerability.html
There’s a chapter on the current status of global warming knowledge that Louis and everyone else will find interesting.
I am not continueing my post as I am sick to death of the whole thing.
Read my opinion at
http://stevegloor.typepad.com/sgloor/2005/07/hockey_stick_fu.html
ATTENTION ANYONE WITHOUT A VESTED INTEREST!
Proponents of anthropogenic global warming (like Ender and David V) are full of assertions but notoriously short on evidence. When asked to produce evidence they will usually just resort to personal attacks and bluster. David, to his credit, provided some references in one post but regretably they rely on mathematical models which Ender claims(!) are reliable but continue to lack verification.
Quite simply, the evidence of meteorological observations around the world shows that temperatures have not increased above what they were at the start of 2002 and even then were below 1998 levels. Further, the evidence provided by Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology is almost identical.
If temperature is not increasing as carbon dioxide increases then it is glaringly obvious that we must question just how much influence carbon dioxide really has.
Okay, that’s the present, now for the past.
Numerous studies have examined physical and documentary evidence and concluded that the Medieval Warming Period (from about 850 to 1150) was not simply a region phenomenon in Greenland that was found in ice cores from the ice cap but that the warming took place across most of Europe and the North American continent.
If you consider that this might not be enough to make it global then consider that a recent study by Pat Michaels found that 12% of the area of the earth accounted for 78% of the warming between 1950 and 2000. Further, Jones and Moberg report that the warming from 1975 to 2000 was found to be significant only at 19% of locations and these were largely heavily populated area and industrial areas. (Details in Khandekar, Pure and Applied Geophysics (16)2005.)
In short, the evidence is very strong that a Medieval Warming Period did exist and only the statistical and mathematical models are trying to tell us otherwise.
Does it matter anyway? No, probably not. The Greenland ice cores show that about 200BC temperatures were on par or higher than today, that about 1100 years before that they were warmer again and that around 7,000 and 8,000 years ago temperatures were higher again (but with a big dip in that thousand year period). (By the way, the fact that we can get this data and earlier from Greenland’s ice cap tells you that it didn’t completely melt with those higher temperatures.)
Go back about a million years if you want to. Temperatures were higher and carbon dioxide was much higher. Did we get a runaway greenhouse effect then? No, or we wouldn’t be here today!
In short there is no clear evidence that we are in any kind of serious danger!
OK John – I’ll be nice…. (goes against the grain though 🙂 )
Well to do this properly Jen would have to facilitate a better debate. We would have to work through a list and work out which bits of science we agree and disagree on.
Most of the Artic is warming (a huge area – see the very big report at http://www.acia.uaf.edu/) except for Greenland; although the ice sheet is losing mass rapidly . I could suggest some hypotheses (well others have) but you’d be into me on that…
MWP is a controversial issue – the realclimate line is that is not that globally widespread so we’d have to debate that out. Same for Little Ice Age.
I suggest the role of CO2 as a greenhouse gas is well known and proven from basic physics. So surely if we know the flux contribution and can measure it this is significant. see http://www.iup.uni-heidelberg.de/institut/studium/lehre/Uphysik_Litertur/scholl.ppt
We also have considerable ocean studies which look at the warming (pls don’t dismiss this without at least reading it)
Science, Vol 309, Issue 5732, 284-287, 8 July 2005
Penetration of Human-Induced Warming into the World’s Oceans
Tim P. Barnett,1* David W. Pierce,1 Krishna M. AchutaRao,2 Peter J. Gleckler,2 Benjamin D. Santer,2 Jonathan M. Gregory,3 Warren M. Washington4
A warming signal has penetrated into the world’s oceans over the past 40 years. The signal is complex, with a vertical structure that varies widely by ocean; it cannot be explained by natural internal climate variability or solar and volcanic forcing, but is well simulated by two anthropogenically forced climate models. We conclude that it is of human origin, a conclusion robust to observational sampling and model differences. Changes in advection combine with surface forcing to give the overall warming pattern. The implications of this study suggest that society needs to seriously consider model predictions of future climate change.
1 Climate Research Division, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, 0224, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
2 Program for Climate Model Diagnoses and Intercomparison/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Post Office Box 808, Livermore, CA 94550, USA.
3 UK Met Office Hadley Centre and University of Reading, Reading RG6 6BB, UK.
4 National Center for Atmospheric Research, Post Office Box 3000, Boulder, CO 80307, USA.
I am not suggesting a runaway greenhouse effect.
And at million year time scales we have planetary orbital forcings that cool the place down.
I’m not suggesting any of what I said will suddenly convert you – but if it at least gives you some doubt – we have basis for discussion. Yes I have doubts too …. but for me most of the ducks are lining up in the global warming is happening direction…
I’m always on for following up so will look into your other bits n pieces. Also still awaiting broken link re-advice on other post.
John – look up the latest work on the Permian Extinction.
What do you think the extra CO2 will do? Will it go away? What will the extra heat do??
David, John,
What about you each emailing me (c/ jmarohasy@ipa.org.au would be easiest) a potential blog post that focuses on a refeered journal piece or some data from a recognised institution (or something else that has potential standing) as a point of discussion. I would be happy to consider them as the first of a potential series (i.e. series of posts from you both) – assuming they generate interest and advance knowledge.
Or how would you like to advance this?
Jen.
Last year was the fourth warmest since the late 1800s and climate conditions in place could cause 2005 to be the warmest, NASA scientists said this week.
The analysis of 2004 data by NASA confirms figures for 2004 released in December by the World Meteorological Organization. The numbers are based measuring stations around the globe, with each day’s high and low being averaged. Temperatures are recorded on land and at sea, in part with satellite data.
The 2004 average temperature at Earth’s surface around the world was 0.48 degrees Celsius above the average temperature from 1951 to 1980, NASA scientists said.
The warmest four years since 1890s, when reliable record-keeping began:
1998
2002
2003
2004
Jen – well it’s fascinating to contemplate a structured dialogue where we dispense with the jocular invective (fun though that is…)…
Jen – you’ll probably scream – but what’s the IPCC reports ? I guess John and Louis would say – it’s rubbish.
The issue is that all our knowledge is imperfect. So it’s a question of risk and expected benefit/loss from errors either way.
So yes the models are imperfect – we need to know a lot more – but on the other hand if we’re wrong and obfuscate it may be too late with some dire extreme events consequences.
So do we debate each point from first principles upwards. Do we pick totem issues like the Hockey Stick which is only a small part of the issue. It’s far too totemic really.
Or is it that we want to establish that there may be a significant risk (or not). I personally believe that risk is signficant. We don’t want to go there if we can avoid it.
However I’m not suggesting that we want to destroy our economy or way of life either. This isn’t about being left, right, green or brown. It’s a darn serious issue. And all that Kyoto has done has shown how hard the issue is… if implemented it would only delay things a few years at best. i.e. little real use.
I can’t see how anyone looking out the window in Australia watching the 1990s drought stay with us, very very fast tropical cyclones, an absent cyclone climate in Queensland, a litany of world-wide meteorlogical extremes and drying trends across eastern Australia and SA, and SW WA and not be concerned. To have no doubt. De-salination plants in Australia, nuclear power – wow – this is major league changes for all of us.
So is there a sizeable anthropogenic effect on world climate and on Australia or not?
Or is there no effect and we just are stuck with whatever the inherent variability throws up.
What was the Dirty Harry line – “In all the excitement I can’t honestly remember. Was it 5 shots or 6 – do you feel lucky !!”
OK a long winded discourse – to your question. I think it’s about do we believe there’s an effect and how risky might it be.
P.S. Good to see Ender has rejoined the fray.
Different people are impressed/influenced by different things. Some people are impressed by what important people say.
However, you will find the climate skeptics tend to be irreverent by nature. The are instinctively suspicious of committees and governments and experts.
I am not saying this makes them right or wrong – but it is worth taking some time to understand ‘the type’.
They will be impressed by a snippet of information that clearly appears to prove or disprove an hypothesis. They are looking for correlations and what matches and doesn’t match. It is the nature of the person.
So why not start with the most compelling bit of ‘evidence’ for a link between increasing co2 levels and temp? Just a thought.
Another one of those darn one-off’s …. just a snippet of info …
Highest-ever monsoon rains flood Mumbai
July 27, 2005 – 6:36PM
The strongest rain ever recorded in India shut down the financial hub of Mumbai, snapped communication lines, closed airports and forced thousands of people to sleep in their offices of walk home during the night, officials said today.
Police officials said landslides had killed at least 59 people and buried 130 in India’s western Maharashtra state following flash floods caused by the monsoon rains.
“The death toll from landslides across western Maharashtra is 59 … but the number could rise as at least another 130 have been trapped,” said an official in the chief minister’s office.
He said the information came from an official communique.
The government declared a public holiday in Mumbai as people waded waist-deep in the streets of India’s financial capital, where weather officials said a record 66.6 centimetres of rain fell in the last 24 hours.
“We have declared a public holiday and ask people to stay indoors,” Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh said, adding that schools in Mumbai and neighbouring Thane district had also been asked to close for two days.
Troops were deployed after the sudden rains – measuring up to 94.4 centimetres in one day in some areas of Mumbai, the capital of Maharashtra state – stranded tens of thousands of people.
“Most places in India don’t receive this kind of rainfall in a year. This is the highest ever recorded in India’s history. We have to compare it with world records to find out if this was the highest in the world,” R V Sharma, director of the meteorological department, told The Associated Press.
The state-run All India Radio reported about 150,000 people were stranded in railway stations across Mumbai, India’s main financial centre.
Early today, Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, the state’s top elected official, called the army, navy and home guards to help with the relief effort.
“Inflatable rafts will be used to reach stranded people. Please try to stay where you are and don’t leave your homes,” he said.
Tens of thousands of people were stranded for hours on roads in Mumbai, and its airport – one of the busiest in the country – was shut yesterday evening. All incoming flights were diverted to New Delhi and other airports.
India’s previous heaviest rainfall, recorded at Cherrapunji in the northeastern Meghalaya state, one of the rainiest places on Earth, was 83.82 centimetres on July 12, 1910, Sharma said.
Rail, road and air traffic to and from Mumbai was suspended for a second day as the weather bureau forecast very heavy rains in the city for the next 24 hours and warned fishermen not to set out to sea.
“Waterlogging has completely disrupted life in Mumbai as the rains have coincided with high sea tides,” a weather bureau official said.
“Police rescue teams have still to reach affected villages as they’re inaccessible due to the heavy floods,” senior inspector Sunil Dareghan said.
Trading was halted on Mumbai’s bond, commodity and currency markets. The stock market remained open but trade was thin.
OK Jen – Two issues then:
Forget satellites and terrestrial obsverations. End of Hockey games and Greenland anomalies.
Let’s look at the oceans…
Science, Vol 309, Issue 5732, 284-287, 8 July 2005
Penetration of Human-Induced Warming into the World’s Oceans
Tim P. Barnett,1* David W. Pierce,1 Krishna M. AchutaRao,2 Peter J. Gleckler,2 Benjamin D. Santer,2 Jonathan M. Gregory,3 Warren M. Washington4
A warming signal has penetrated into the world’s oceans over the past 40 years. The signal is complex, with a vertical structure that varies widely by ocean; it cannot be explained by natural internal climate variability or solar and volcanic forcing, but is well simulated by two anthropogenically forced climate models. We conclude that it is of human origin, a conclusion robust to observational sampling and model differences. Changes in advection combine with surface forcing to give the overall warming pattern. The implications of this study suggest that society needs to seriously consider model predictions of future climate change.
1 Climate Research Division, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, 0224, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
2 Program for Climate Model Diagnoses and Intercomparison/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Post Office Box 808, Livermore, CA 94550, USA.
3 UK Met Office Hadley Centre and University of Reading, Reading RG6 6BB, UK.
4 National Center for Atmospheric Research, Post Office Box 3000, Boulder, CO 80307, USA.
*******************
2nd issue let’s look at a direct calculation of the greenhouse flux…
http://www.iup.uni-heidelberg.de/institut/studium/lehre/Uphysik_Litertur/scholl.ppt
David,
I suggest you pick a piece of evidence from the above and present it as an argument for human induced global warming.
I suggest you include some data or a graph (an image/data series can be worth a thousand words).
If you email it to me I will do it as a post.
Best,
Hi David,
Good to see some material supported by references.
Let’s see…
1. You mentioned Amman earlier. (I missed it because names appear in light blue on this blog and they appear very feintly on a LCD display.)
This must be the guy who said “”Unlike the current climate situation, where CO2 buildup in the atmosphere is forcing changes in the climate, in the past the situation was probably reversed — CO2 concentrations were determined by temperature changes.”
Strangely he seems very coy about the assumptions in his mathematical model of recent climate. If his model is like many others, it includes the unproven assumption that CO2 is a strong driver is warming – sadly an unproven claim that recent temperatures tend to refute.
By the way, oceanic absorption of carbon dioxide is negatively affected by an increase in temperature. In other words an increase in temperature causes oceans to absorb less CO2 (as a nett effect because transfer is actually both ways). Warming therefore causes higher atmospheric CO2!
2. Arctic warming – yep. true. And very similar to the warming that occurred in the 1940’s (documented both by temperature observations available at http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/station_data/ and by a Russian study of ships’ documentation which described several islands being circumnavigated in those years but impossible since then.)
Also Moberg and Jones have commented (in Vol 16 of the “Journal of Climate”)
“Warming is not continuous but occurs principally over two periods (about 1920–45 and since 1975). Annual temperature series for the seven continents and the Arctic all show significant warming over the twentieth century, with significant (95%) warming for 1920–44 for North America, the Arctic, Africa, and South America, and all continents except Australia and the Antarctic since 1977.”
You should also note that most of the warming took place where ocean currents bring water from lower latitudes and that’s a good indication of the likely source of warming. (This makes sense because heat does flow from warm to cold!)
But be careful, the ACIA study said that the Arctic starts at 60N and that means all of Alaska, most of Scandinavia and a large chunk of Russia. One wonders how different the findings would have been if they had used the more common cut-off of the Arctic Circle!
Take no notice of the ACIA claim that polar bears are dying because of the temperatures. Like the rather selective comments about temperature the ACIA forgot(?) to tell you that polar bear numbers reportedly increased a few years ago and there are now more bears fighting for essentially the same amount of food.
3. Barnett’s study also relies on a mathematical model and to give that study any credibility at all we would need to be absolutely certain that the model has been properly verified – which I don’t believe it has. (Funny how these days we place more credibility on theory and computer models that on the real evidence from observations!)
By the way, I’ve been told that work at Univ of Florida has tracked the passage of warm blobs of sea water from the tropics to the poles. The travel time varies from 5 to 8 years, probably depending on winds.
By the way, don’t be surprised if Barnett’s work doesn’t find its way into the next IPCC report. In particular it will probably be used to explain why CO2 increased in the 1950’s but global average temperatures didn’t really increase until about 1975. I’m already hearing the claim that CO2-induced heating went into the water. Given that land-based temperatures show no increase for 15 to 20 years after CO2 started rising we can only conclude that the heat energy was smart enough to target water and not land 😉
4. David, in a later post you say “I can’t see how anyone looking out the window in Australia watching the 1990s drought stay with us, very very fast tropical cyclones, an absent cyclone climate in Queensland, a litany of world-wide meteorlogical extremes and drying trends across eastern Australia and SA, and SW WA and not be concerned.”
Have you never heard of the Federation Drought from 1895 to 1902 that affected a very large chunk of Australia. Or perhaps the the 1937-42 drought (or about that time) that affected about 90% of Australia? Australia’s average temperature only started to increase about 1949 so what caused those two very significant droughts? Was it cooling?
Note also that those two droughts were the most significant prior to the recent droughts and only 42 years apart compared to the roughly 60 year spell before the recent intensive droughts.
There might be an argument here that despite the severity of the recent drought the early droughts were more devatating.
5. I just looked at the Scholl’s PPT at the link you provide. It falls down on the second slide by assuming that solar radiation is constant – but it’s not! That same slide is based on calculation which include various assumptions. Are these provable or not? I see nothing to say they are. Slide 3 shows how little is known about climate factors – so what does that tell you about how many assumptions must be made in the predictions?
Later the validity of the temperature and humidity corrections can be questioned. Just take a look at slide 12: They’ve assumed that they can adopt a mean value but what if that’s wrong?
Slide 13: “Only 1/3 of measured vater vapor increase is due to green-house gases:” – the claim comes from the use of (yet another) mathematical model (see slide 11) but again this lacks verification.
Maybe the published paper fills in some of the gaps but I doubt it.
Finally, a comment to Steve. I’ve seen the Climate Report from Allen Consulting and thought it a complete crock. It’s loaded with unsupported assertions (starting with its opening comment that greenhouse gases are causing most of the warming!) and it selectively ignores the current research which is (a) showing an increase in solar emissions in the last 20 years and (b) showing that soot and other aerosol pollutants can have a major impact.
From its concentration on assertions and lack of raw data, selective omission of some rather vital issues and its claim that greenhouse gasses have a major effect (despite what temperatures over the last 10 years show), I cannot decide if our correspondent “Ender” had a hand in it or whether the Greenhouse Office is determined to justifiy its own existence.
cheers
Jennifer,
Please don’t attempt to categorise “the type” as being unimpressed by important people (whoever they are?), irreverent, “instinctively suspicious of committees and governments and experts” and so on.
Speaking personally and on the basis of my contact with many “dissenters” they are very concerned about honesty and scientific integrity.
I’m sure there are a few hardliners who would impossible to convince of anything but the majority acknowledge that the balance of laboratory evidence is that an increase in CO2 will cause some amount of warming but they question how much warming it causes and whether the laboratory findings (usually in closed vessels) can accurately be transferred to the open air.
They also question almost every aspect of global warming, including
(a) whether anthropogenic changes to physical environments are distorting temperature measurements (ie. UHI effects and more),
(b) whether models are anywhere near accurate enough to be meaningful (and the ultimate test is the verification of models!),
(c) whether the many assumptions behind AGW theory have any validity whatsoever,
(d) whether data is accurate and reliable,
(e) whether similar conditions are known to have already occurred in the past and
(f) whether perfectly natural events can provide explanations for climate change.
(There’s probably 20 more issues I could list here but I won’t bore readers.)
These dissenting scientists will also argue that scientists should be sceptical if they are to be honest to their profession, and that scientific matters are not determined by consensus but by verification of both other scientists and the evidence of the real world.
From this perspective it is no surprise that they should have very serious reservation about the claim that anthropogenic global warming is happening and that it is caused by greenhouse gases.
John, The reference to ‘type’ was not meant in a derogatory way – but I was trying to impress on David (and Ender) that their seemingly endless appeal to “authority and consensus” was not necessarily going to impress many of those whom they categorize as “climate skeptics”. This is in no way suggesting either side lacks integrity or honesty – but that they may be impressed by different types of information. Why do you think climate sketpics and believers so often seem to argue at cross purposes – or don’t you think that they do?
PS I consider myself a ‘climate skeptic’.
I started writing a very very long reply then I had a flash of insight… and deleted it.
Not much point in continuing the discussion Jen -yep John & Louis – you win and good luck to you all.
So every scientific paper not written by Patrick Michaels is wrong. I now see the kindly Exxon corporation who brought all that kindness to those fisherman as the good guys. How could I have been so wrong.
The whole literature is wrong. All models are wrong. 1000s of evil scientists are deluded and intent on destroying our way of life.
On the droughts – yep I know about the Federation more than you could know – I was only commenting on the current frequency of droughts as “unusual” El Ninos vs La Nina frequency seems to have changed. Added to all the other “unsual” stuff. Note you didn’t have a go a cyclones or any of the warmest years stuff. All in all nothing conclusive – just that the funny climate things keep happening …. see that Indian rainfall – I’m sure it was just a freak thing…
The radiation wouldn’t change that much in the course of their study. But yep the radiation paper is wrong. Worst piece of work I have ever seen. Funny how they close to the theoretical answer. Must have fudged it.
You haven’t even had the decency to read Barnett’s paper. It’s a model and it’s wrong … read it for heavens sake !! And listen to yourself “I don’t believe it was validated” BELIEVE !! YOU BELIEVE … jeez
We don’t have the basis for any discussion at all Jen. It utterley utterly pointless. Let’s howl at the moon.
Funny that George W is investing in all that hydrogen gas technology and FurtureGEN stuff for nothing too. John better warn him !!
Would be good if John could tell us which literature to read so we don’t waste any time reading the wrong stuff. A web site list perhaps? Coz he likes to cite some references – just not any that I read… I really really wish I knew how to read the “right” ones.
Anyway let’s all just sit here and watch what happens. And ask “do we feel lucky” – utterly sure there’s no problem. If there is we’re sure we can tech our way out. All bids in – all done…. gentlemen and Jen – the blogs all yours…
P.S. I’ve decided to take up smoking too. I reckon it’s good for you. Phillip Morris told me so…
David – came to the same conclusion.
Time will give us the answer however by then it will be too late. Lets just hope that Louis and John and Jennifer are correct and nothing happens.
Mind you, they are “betting the farm” on being right.
Ender, I have never said that climate won’t change. Just that the contribution of increasing atmospheric co2 levels to climate change is ambiguous.
Even ‘Friends of the Earth’ have acknowledged that this is my position in their recent press release see http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO0507/S00436.htm
Jennifer – What difference does it make?
I guess I am less concerned about making a difference and more concerned about understanding the world about me.
I guess I believe that if we get some agreement on what the facts of the matter are, we are in a better position to move forward – to be able to do the right thing.
BTW Did you get the questions from Sydney Uni that I sent you offline? Could we/I do a piece on this?
> By the way, don’t be surprised if Barnett’s work doesn’t find its way into the next IPCC report.
John, this sums up the situation for me. I assume that you think Barnett’s work will be rejected due to some conspiracy to support the pro GW argument, rather than rejected on merit.
You hold to the *belief* that a process like the IPCC is corrupt. I *trust* that it is not.
You quickly decide that the Allens Consulting report for the AGO was a crock. I regard Allens Consulting as one of the more conservative consulting firms out there, who I’d imagine would be reluctant to unnecessarily allow their image to be tinged greenie/lefty. I therefore find their report quite authoritative.
I am no climate scientist, but I like to read a lot and I think about the authority of those who make arguments.
For me, the belief that a process like the IPCC, which involves hundreds of scientists and is subject to enormous scrutiny, might be totally corrupt and produce results that are completely without merit, is implausible.
And when you start throwing references about, you aren’t convincing me otherwise. The references you quote – people like Pat Michaels for example, are not publishing peer reviewed work, or, if they do (such as the M&M paper about the hockey stick) it is only a single paper against a mountain of papers that disagree.
In order to dispute that human-induced global warming as a result of our emissions of CO2 is occurring, you pretty much have to argue that the entire scientific community is bunko – that the process of peer review, of the rise and fall of papers, ideas, theories in peer reviewed, prestigous journals, is fraught (on a large scale) with corruption, innaccuracy, and is politically compromised.
I’m sorry, but I just don’t find that realistic, any more than I find it realistic that the CIA were responsible for September 11. Conspiracy theories suck – unless they are backed by evidence.
You can argue til you are black and blue in the face about the science, and quote as many references as you like. But you won’t convince me. That’s not because I am a die hard blinkered greenie, that’s because you have little authority next to other sources of info, and the attempts to attack the authority of processes like the IPCC and peer review are not plausible.
I don’t mean to scorn you. I have no problem at all with you being that interested in climate science that you are trying to work it all out for yourself. But I personally don’t need to (or indeed, think I can) understand the minutae of climate science in order to find an authoritative enough source for my opinion.
Steve
Futher to Steves post it really does not matter what you believe in. What matters is the consequences of being right and wrong. The skeptics believe they are right however then could well be wrong. AGW people also believe they are right but we also could be wrong. Here is what I believe are the implications of both sides being right and wrong
So lets define the 2 positions.
Position 1 – the AGW skeptics. This is defined as the position where the warming of the atmosphere is either natural, not happening or insufficient evidence exists. From this position flows the idea that there is nothing that we can do to stop climate change or that climate change will not happen. Therefore we do not need to reduce power consumption, CO2 emissions or change our lifestyles.
Position 2 – AGW proponents. This is defined as the position where sufficient evidence exists to say that CO2 from human activities is building up in the atmosphere and will cause some unknowable amount of climate change though heating. From this position flows the ideas that we need to eliminate or reduce fossil fuel CO2 emissions and we need to make some changes to our lifestyles to reduce energy use.
Having defined the 2 positions what is not usually done is to consider the implications of the 2 positions being right and wrong.
So there are exactly 8 Cases:
1. Position 1 right – AGW is not happening and nothing happens
2. Position 1 right – AGW is not happening and the climate changes anyway
2. Position 1 wrong – AGW is happening and the climate changes
3. Position 1 wrong – AGW is happening and nothing happens
4. Position 2 right – AGW is happening and the climate changes
5. Position 2 right – AGW is happening and nothing happens
6. Position 2 wrong – AGW is not happening and nothing happens
8. Position 2 wrong – AGW is not happening and the climate changes anyway.
If you reduce this to cases where the climate changes as a result of policies enacted that are consistent with the positions then we are left with:
1. Position 1 right – AGW is not happening and nothing happens
2. Position 1 wrong – AGW is happening and the climate changes
4. Position 2 right – AGW is happening and the climate changes
6. Position 2 wrong – AGW is not happening and nothing happens
Position 1 Discussion
As AGW is natural or not happening there is no real need to waste money switching to alternatives. There is plenty of coal to generate as much power as society needs for centuries. The money would be better spent on health care and infrastructure. Also as oil based transport is convenient and reasonably efficient there is not need to fix what is not broke. Also there would not be large unsightly wind turbines dotting the landscape.
Case 1. – WIN – This is the best case scenario. The Earth is fine and nothing happens to the climate that is caused by humans.
Case 2. – LOSE – This is the worst possible outcome. As we have been living with the assumption that nothing will happen we are not prepared for climate change. We still have huge centralized power stations with massive distribution networks that are venerable to damage from the resulting climatic extremes. Nothing is done to make energy production more sustainable so large disruptions to food and energy supply happens. Also as no effort has been made to reduce CO2 the resulting climate change larger and more violent that if the forcing were reduced.
Position 2 Discussion
This is where widespread acceptance of AGW takes place. Large scale changes are made to both transport and energy to enable a distributed power distribution network based almost entirely on renewable power. A large worldwide power efficiency campaign is carried out to reduce energy use. This has the effect of reducing CO2 output to a level that the IPCC considers will not cause dramatic climate change.
Case 4. – WIN – Even though the climate changes the human race is reasonably well placed to cope with it. Populations are moved in an orderly fashion from low lying areas. The distributed power network resists damage from climatic extremes as local power sources power technology. As CO2 output has been reduced the climate change is less and less violent due to forcing reduction.
Case 4 – WIN – Even though changes have been carried out nothing happens as the Earth’s climate was never going to change from AGW.
I am not considering the economic cost only the implications for the Earths ecosystem of the respective positions. Case 4 can obviously be argued as a LOSE if you accept that changing to renewables will result in massive economic damage and plunge the world into a financial disaster.
I believe that Case 4 does not have to involve financial ruin. Consider that it will result in a robust distributed power system powered by an energy source that will not run out for 500 million years. Also as most cars will be electric or hybrids the jugular vein of Western society, the oil supply, will not be a problem that we have to fight for.
Whatever your position is on Anthropogenic Global Warming you must consider the implications of it. The skeptic position is a WIN-LOSE situation. You are betting the farm on you being right. If you are wrong the implications are terrible. With the AGW acceptance position you get a WIN-WIN situation for the Earth no matter what happens. So even if you are skeptical of AGW then it makes sense to enact the policies of the opposition just in case.
David –
(a) What I said was that I didn’t believe that Barnett’s model has been verified (by which I mean by observations, not by other models).
(b) Sadly you seem to be resorting to the old slur that Michaels must be funded by Exxon and therefore must be biased.
(c) Sadly the majority of scientists were wrong about the earth being the centre of the universe, about a miasma causing a major disease rather than contaminated water (cholera I think it was, but I can’t be bothered confirming it for this post). Would you also claim that the scientist who challenged the conventional opinions was wrong to suggest that “1000s of evil scientists are deluded and intent on destroying our way of life.” ?
(d) You might have been commenting on the frequency but so was I when I said that very severe droughts are now less common. The Indian rainfall doesn’t surprise me much. Studies have shown that extreme weather events receive far more press coverage than they did 50 years ago and the only way to get an hinest assessment is to go back to the data.
(e) You say “The radiation wouldn’t change that much in the course of their study.” Wouldn’t or didn’t? Have you actually looked at the data? That’s the important thing here as with just about all climate issues – what does the data (primary if possible!) actually tell us?
Enjoy your break. I’m happy to discuss things with you any time because at least you attempt to provide some references for your comments and they are not simply assertions.
Steve –
(a) You say “I assume that you think Barnett’s work will be rejected due to some conspiracy to support the pro GW argument, rather than rejected on merit.” but why on earth would I think that? What I am saying is that Barnett’s paper is likely to feature highly in the next IPCC report – regardless of its correctness!
(b) Please feel free to continue to have blind faith in your “authorative” sources if that is the best you can do. Just don’t try to convince us of the arguments because X tells us and you believe in X. Science is not about belief but is about provable correctness (or as close as you can get because as Popper tells us, it is much easier to disprove something than to prove it.)
Ender – got it wrong again, haven’t you? You say “This is defined as the position where the warming of the atmosphere is either natural, not happening or insufficient evidence exists. From this position flows the idea that there is nothing that we can do to stop climate change or that climate change will not happen.”
Well, let’s be honest here. Climate has always changed – even before hiumans came along – and there is no reason to believe that it will not continue to change.
Sceptics of AGW also accept that according to lab experiments SOME degree of warming is to be expected with increased carbon dioxide but as far as they can see – ie. as far as the evidence shows – that warming is very minor when compared to natural forces. Sadly for proponents of AGW the temperatures of the last 60 years tend to confirm that position – temperatures still fluctuate much as they have always done, regardless of increased CO2 and various supposeldy positive feedbacks.
If one accepts the EVIDENCE that CO2 has bugger-all effect on warming, then where is the sense in adopting Kyoto or its alternatives? There is simply is none!
Of course if one is not prepared to look at the evidence…
John McLean or anybody?
Is there a natural greenhouse effect on Earth. Do we really know that?
At a molecular level why does a greenhouse gas “warm up” from the sun’s radiation.
What role does CO2 play in the natural greenhouse effect. Any ? and how much if any.
In the case that you find that CO2 is a greenhouse gas what would stop more warming of the atmosphere if we had more CO2.
More clouds maybe to reflect radiation back to space. But wouldn’t more clouds hold the heat in too.
On what basis do they say that methane is a stronger greenhouse gas than CO2?
Has the Earth become more cloudy? Do we know that?
If it’s just more sunlight warming the earth is there a good reference that shows what the radiation levels have done in the last 100 years.
Do they leave out cities when they work out global average temperatures.
How do they know the thermometers are any good.
John, you ignored my argument completely.
You try to cast me as having blind faith, and yourself as being interested in science.
My point was that, I have faith in the interpretation of the IPCC, the best summary of climate science there is, whereas you have faith in your own opinion. Good for you for having faith in your own opinion, but for me, your opinion is irrelevant next to more authoritative sources of information.
I think scepticism can and is an often valuable contribution to society. However, when scepticism is combined with an oversized contempt for existing, accepted institutions, and paranoia that everyone else is corrupt and only your own analysis can be pure, then it becomes an obsessive and timewasting exercise.
You value your own non-expert opinion, and beleive that your choosing of a handful of references is sensible against the mountain of evidence summarised in IPCC documents. I would question that.
By the way, the majority of scientists were not wrong on the earth being the centre of the universe. I believe that was the church who were wrong, and scientists corrected them.
In my exile/ self-imposed vacation from this blog I intended to discipline myself by taking up smoking and reading John McLean’s anti-sites as penance…
Well I have had two Alpines and I don’t think I can take up smoking so onto phase II.
So I randomly pick this site to start my re-education. And it will be a very difficult re-education as I have to un-learn everything I know. I must be open to new ideas and not be the rampant pro-AGW fanatic which John says I have become (well I had some doubts on a number of things but given John says I am a fanatic then I must be .. coz he’s right you see and he’s very sure of himself – totally).
Anyway John’s web site “CO2 and the dire predictions” :
http://mclean.ch/climate/CO2.htm
On the 1959-2004 table John shows us some interesting numbers then does a linear projection (which I get different numbers for)to 2100. But I thought the old reality CO2 in the real atmosphere graph was going exponential in shape – why are we doing linear projections. And are not the IPCC scenario ranges dependent on what mankind does with CO2 emissions?
So how does this work then. I just having a little bit of trouble understanding.
Then we have a look at the next table and he shows us that life doesn’t add up… but then I notice that 1976 was a La Nina “cold event” which will influence global temps down and that 2004 was a mild “warm event” which will bias global temps up. SO I have to do some learning about using this point analysis stuff.
And I don’t understand how temp records look like they make be broken in 2005 ….
And are there also not a few other things going on like solar activity, volcanism , global dimming, seasonal, interannual and decadal effects. And that’s why you need to model things to take into account all these interactions. Just like in:
http://meop0.troja.mff.cuni.cz/workshop05/
Gee if I didn’t know that John was really good I would think he was just picking numbers to suit his argument, ignoring other intercations – like well known effects of El Nino and La Nina on global temperature, and doing linear transforms on non-linear problems.
Gee I just had a really dreadful thought – what if John was a naughty sophist after all…
gee this would drag a lot of his creds into doubt wouldn’t it.
Anyway silly me – that wouldn’t be right. Anyway might try Benson and Hedges and see if they work better.
P.S. Thanks John – you liitle beauty – I really couldn’t have believed it was that simple. – Ender and other “worried about possible GW” colleagues – read John’s site and ROFTL….
This wouldn’t pass Grade 8 science !!
So who’s been a naughty boy then – coz he’s obviously a lot smarter than Grade 8.
P.P.S. Yes we need to be careful where we get our advice from. And Jen if John’s sites are the basis of your skepticism – you’re going to hack to march down the back at the demos I’m afraid. We have our reputations to protect.
Now where was that copy of Barnett’s paper John told me to throw away……
The more you think about the anti-AGW argument the more you miss the point.
World is near Peak Oil – mobile energy is about to become a major issue.
Hydrogen is a long way off – leaks like crazy, dangerous, no distribution infrastructure, most generation methods produce CO2, probably damages the ozone layer. Biofuels don’t add up – not enough arable land. Fusion still not viable. Fission – well hell I don’t mind but most do. AND nobody is prepared to go back to the Stone Age or ride their bikes.
But USA has about 250 years of coal – Australia has several 100s of years. So we can use relatively mature coal gasification technology to produce gasoline. Fischer Tropsch synthesis of liquid hydrocarbons…
Only one problems – heaps of CO2 !!
SO explains the position of the USA House Energy Committee on Mann et al doesn’t it. The whole business as usual gig is at stake from scientists who may know too much. So we’ll rough them up and discredit them.
Explains our recent little pact with USA, China and India too eh?
So strap yourself in guys we’re gonna at least go triple pre-industrial CO2 atmospheric concentration – anyone for quadruple ?? Anyone concerned – chicken if you are ! Bet you the transatlantic conveyor doesn’t budge an inch.
John’s right – RELAX – it will just make the plants grow and there will no effects on climate.
Is that the same John McLean’s website who is commenting here?
I took a look at the website. Started off on the home page (some nice photography!) then moved to the global warming pages.
The first thing I read – at the top of the first global warming page (http://mclean.ch/climate/global_warming.htm) – was that global temperatures were not increasing, because they had been going down since 2002 – a 2 year trend.
I stopped reading after that. Anyone who begins their argument with such a weak point is not worth listening to. I’ve got better things to do with my time.
No John I did not get it wrong I said if you read it properly:
This is defined as the position where the warming of the atmosphere is either natural, OR not happening or OR insufficient evidence exists.
The ORs are in capitals so that you can see them. I tried to cover all the bases.
So you accept that some AGW warming will occur. That puts you in the second group of skeptics. The ones that cannot explain away the science of AGW so they say “well it will not be much compared to natural so we do not have to worry”
Hope that increase in El Nino frequency has nothing to do with GW!!
Global Patterns of Predator Diversity in the Open Oceans
Published online July 28 2005; 10.1126/science.1113399 (Science Express Reports )
Boris Worm 1*, Marcel Sandow 2, Andreas Oschlies 3, Heike K. Lotze 1, Ransom A. Myers 4
1 Biology Department, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, Canada B3H 4J1; Leibniz Institute for Marine Science, Düsternbrooker Weg 20, 24105 Kiel, Germany.
2 Leibniz Institute for Marine Science, Düsternbrooker Weg 20, 24105 Kiel, Germany.
3 Leibniz Institute for Marine Science, Düsternbrooker Weg 20, 24105 Kiel, Germany; National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, SO14 3ZH, UK.
4 Biology Department, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, Canada B3H 4J1.
* To whom correspondence should be addressed.
Boris Worm , E-mail: bworm@dal.ca
The open oceans comprise most of the biosphere, yet patterns and trends of species diversity are enigmatic. Here, we derive worldwide patterns of tuna and billfish diversity over the past 50 years, revealing distinct subtropical “hotspots” that appeared to hold generally for other predators and zooplankton. Diversity was positively correlated with thermal fronts and dissolved oxygen and a nonlinear function of temperature (~25°C optimum). Diversity declined between 10% and 50% in all oceans, a trend that coincided with increased fishing pressure, superimposed on strong El Niño Southern Oscillation-driven variability across the Pacific. We conclude that predator diversity shows a predictable yet eroding pattern signaling ecosystem-wide changes linked to climate and fishing.