I know it’s a tough job – but let’s just check the International Panel on Climate Changes (IPCC) iconic, widely-quoted conclusion* and parse its meaning:
“Most of the observed increase in globally-averaged temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic GHG concentrations.”
How should one interpret this ex cathedra declaration to the faithful?
IPCC helpfully defines ‘very likely’ as ‘90-99% certain’, but they don’t tell us how they reached such well-defined certainty.
What remarkable unanimity!
Just how many and whom did they poll?
IPCC doesn’t define the word ‘most.’ We may assume it means anything between 51 and 99%. Quite a spread.
But a footnote informs us that solar forcing is less than 10% of anthropogenic [0.12/ 1.6 W/m2]; so ‘most’ must be closer to 99% than to 51%.
OK; let’s check out the data since 1958. But we don’t want to rely on contaminated surface data – which IPCC likely used – although they omitted to say so.
Atmospheric data were readily available to the IPCC in the CCSP-SAP-1.1 report (Fig 3a, p.54; convening lead author John Lanzante, NOAA), with independent analyses by Hadley Centre and NOAA that agree well. And further, according to GH models, atmospheric trends should be larger than surface temperature trends.
1958 – 2005: Total warming of +0.5 C (But how much of that is anthropogenic?)
1958 – 1976: Cooling
1976 – 1977: Sudden jump of +0.5 C (Cannot be due to GHG.)
1977 – 1997: No detectable trend
1998 – 1999: El Nino spike
2000 – 2001: No detectable trend
2001 – 2003: Sudden jump of +0.3 C (Cannot be due to GHG.)
2003 – present: No trend, maybe even slight cooling
In conclusion: The IPCC’s ‘most’ is not sustained by observations; the human contribution is very likely only 10% or even less.
By Fred Singer, who lives in Arlington, Virginia, and holds a B.E.E. in Electrical engineering from Ohio State University and an A.M. and PhD in Physics from Princeton University
***************************
*IPCC Synthesis Report, Summary for Policy Makers, November 2007
Photograph of Fred Singer taken in New York by Jennifer Marohasy in March 2008.
This note is from SEPP Science Editorial #17 (December 27, 08), ‘Keeping the IPCC honest’ http://www.sepp.org/
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
1976 – 1977: Sudden jump of +0.5 C (Cannot be due to GHG.)
sorry, but this is simply stupid.
sod “1976 – 1977: Sudden jump of +0.5 C (Cannot be due to GHG.) sorry, but this is simply stupid”.
Stupid?? Fred Singer is far more qualified as an atmospheric physicist than you’ll ever think of being. That applies to all the wannabees at RC as well.
Here’s his general qualifications:
http://www.sepp.org/about%20sepp/bios/singer/biosfs.html
Here’s his resume:
http://www.sepp.org/about%20sepp/bios/singer/cvsfs.html
Here’s what he’s done since 1998:
http://www.sepp.org/about%20sepp/bios/singer/profact.html
You show me one contributor to realclimate who has anywhere near Singer’s qualifications or accomplishments. That doesn’t stop RC’s Connolley, the computer programmer, being rude to Singer on Wikipedia, and talking down his nose at him, as if he knows the first thing about climate science or physics. It doesn’t stop desmogblog, whose owner is affiliated with the David Suzuki Foundation, from insulting him either.
If you had the least bit of intelligence, you’d be getting it by now that the activists and AGW types can only attack Singer by trying to link him to big oil and tobacco. They don’t have the brains to attack him with climate science.
His statement that you quote is simple. ‘IF’ CO2 can cause warming, it cannot cause a spike in temperature unless it has a sudden spike in it’s emissions. How would that happen to cause a warming spike in the 1970’s, that no one can explain, and which has caused modern scientists to rewrite the record because they ‘think’ it was not possible?
from the beginning of this graph:
http://noconsensus.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/temp-data.jpg
the temps leap about 0.4degC or so
why is it “simply stupid”?
the only stupid I see is those who believe in AGW, despite the total absence of evidence.
Is Singer going senile? That would have to be the lamest argument ever presented.
This is a little off topic. I hope you think it is worthwhile. I have sent these questions to Dr Chapman at CT.
Dr William Chapman,
Can you please explain a couple of things on the Cryosphere Today “Compare side-by-side images of Northern Hemisphere sea ice extent” product, please?
Why does the snow in the more recent dates cover areas that were previously sea inlets, fjords, coastal sea areas, islands and rivers? (Water areas, most easily discernible in the River Ob inlet)
Why does the sea ice in the older images cover land areas? (Land areas, most easily discernible in River Ob inlet)
See this overlay:
http://i44.tinypic.com/330u63t.jpg
Looking forward to your answer,
Mike Bryant
Don J. Easterbrook, Ph.D., emeritus professor of geology at Western Washington University, asked, “What does it take to ignore 10 years of global cooling, sharply declining temperatures the last couple of years, record setting lack of sun spots . . . failure of computer models to predict real climate, predictable warming and cooling climates for the past 500 years. The answer is really quite simple — just follow the money!”
And now they tell us that cold weather and snow proves the planet is getting warmer? To me that’s like eating a steak to PROVE you are a vegetarian!
SOD:
“1976 – 1977: Sudden jump of +0.5 C (Cannot be due to GHG.)
sorry, but this is simply stupid.”
That was the year the PDO shifted from a cool phase to a warm phase.
How does CO2 make such a bump and then do little for years afterwards?
Is there a CO2 captured heat storage building in the sky we need to know about?
SJT:
“Is Singer going senile? That would have to be the lamest argument ever presented.”
A classless ad hominem.
You are running on empty when that is all you can come up with.
2000 – 2001: No detectable trend
could anyone please tell Fred Singer, that drawing a line through two data points next to each other is NOT considered a trend….
10am-11am slight cooling. no global warming
1pm-3pm sudden increase in temperature, global warming not involved.
7pm-11pm cooling again!
what happened to global warming today?
To say the world is warming is false – only the NH is warming.
The best temp charts IMO are at http://www.climate4you.com/ where they are all presented in a similar style and scale so comparison is simple.
If you scroll down you will find the individual SH,Tropics and NH temperature charts. The tropics and the SH have remained stable for the past 30 years as has the antarctic (which has in fact dropped) . The only increase in temp occurs in the NH and the arctic and that’s why all world charts show warming.
In fact if you look at the monthly spatial temperature diagrams since 2005 most of the temperature variation occurs in Russia.
So why is the supposed CO2 induced warming only occuring in the NH and in the most unpopulated areas of it? i.e. Russia, Alaska and Canada.
How does CO2 make such a bump and then do little for years afterwards?
obvious answer: it (nearly) doesn t. the effect of CO2 is visible in the TREND over a (long enough) period of time. a sudden bump is a random effect of normal random fluctuation. we call it WEATHER.
Janama,
“So why is the supposed CO2 induced warming only occurring in the NH and in the most unpopulated areas of it? i.e. Russia, Alaska and Canada.”
Just a wild guess – maybe because it isn’t being caused by increased CO2 levels?
Maybe the old measurements were unreliable, being done by people who had other jobs?
Maybe the locals are burning more oil and gas and heating the environment in the vicinity of the surface thermometers?
Maybe arctic warming and cooling is a multidecadal natural cycle. There’s some evidence for this in history.
To say the world is warming is false – only the NH is warming.
sorry, but this claim is simply false. again.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/Fig.A3.lrg.gif
So why is the supposed CO2 induced warming only occuring in the NH…
the effect is stronger in the NH, because there is so much more water in the SH. but what do i know, why don t you ask a SCIENTIST?
…and in the most unpopulated areas of it? i.e. Russia, Alaska and Canada.
was this an attempt to contradict the claim that the “urban heat island effect is causing all warming”? did you really just kill the purpose of Watts station survey?
Just a wild guess – maybe because it isn’t being caused by increased CO2 levels?
yup! that’s what I figured also.
did you really just kill the purpose of Watts station survey?
you obviously haven’t been following Anthony and Steve’s recent articles on Russia’s measuring stations.
Yes, poor form Will; calling Singer senile would be worse than calling Hansen certifiable, or Flannery an egotistical fruitcake, or Karoly a ruthless and ambitious spiv, or Schmidt a statistical fraudster; speaking of Schmidt and little sod, who seems to have grafted himself on here to spread the implacable and irrational hostility of the pro-AGW sites (good on you sod); sod has picked up on cherry-picking as his main line of attack on the ‘denialist’s’ pov. There is no doubt statistics can be used to back up any absurd argument; sod, for instance, has reverted to Tamino’s favourite day/night anology to make his swiss-cheese point; alternatively, we could talk about how Santer is a serial manipulator, or how Amman and Wahl are just liers, or how Mann’s statisitical methods will enable you to produce a hockey-stick with any random data, regardless of beginning and end points, but how about we use Schmidt to show how upfront and honest the AGW camp is when it comes to supporting their case; based on this, if Singer is senile than Schmidt is a 20 year old corpse;
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2008/gavin-spins-with-spaghetti-diagrams/
Sod you’re really getting desperate, the change over from cool to warm phase PDO (76 to 77) was entirely natural and so was the temp rise of half a degree.
Can you please explain how this step up was caused by GHG’s, remember to make it credible because if you can’t the entire AGW fraud is exposed just by this one event.
Simply put subtract .5c from .6c and you’re left with .1c of sweet fanny adams, of course we’re supposed to wreck our economy on this .1c of evidence.
This incredible evidence of .1c of warming is mighty slim on top of a recovery from a minor ice age 150 years ago don’t you think?
I’m sure there is a STUPID side of this argument and I’m sure you’re on that side.
Anyhow explain how GHG’s caused a step up of almost the entire warming since 1910 after a cool phase PDO that lasted for 31 years.
“You are running on empty when that is all you can come up with.”
The banality of Singer’s argument defies any sort of a reasoned response. It reminds me of that 16 year old girl who was the darling of the blogosphere a few years ago. You look at the hours of serious research that goes into the papers that make up the knowledge base of the IPCC report, you read and try to understand the IPCC report, then you come up against Singer’s logic. It’s not an example scientific reasoning based on science, he’s just lining up a selection of cherries and waving his arms because he’s so excited at how pretty they look.
SJT
What is actual banal is your pretence here of understanding hours of serious research that goes into the papers that make up the knowledge base of the IPCC report, you read and try to understand the IPCC report, then you come up against a wall of total incomprehensibility – because SJT, you have never demonstrated to actually understand climate science.
You are commenting way beyond your pay scale.
“So why is the supposed CO2 induced warming only occuring in the NH and in the most unpopulated areas of it? i.e. Russia, Alaska and Canada.”
Good question janama. I guess it must be really tough to estimate temperatures in unpopulated areas. Of course it is also much tougher to dispute the estimates.
Bloody sick of denialists – time to start locking them up and reprogramming them. No more debate! Just wack’em. And no bloody Xmas or New Year either.
Luke spoken like a true fundamentalist, authoritarian believer. Come the revolution I wouldn’t want to be anywhere close to your goodself because I’m sure you’d behave in a way that Hitler, Stalin and Mao would be proud of.
““So why is the supposed CO2 induced warming only occuring in the NH and in the most unpopulated areas of it? i.e. Russia, Alaska and Canada.””
Why don’t people just read the existing case and the literature for it? Then questions like this would not need to be asked.
There is more ocean area in the the SH than the NH. The oceans tend to slow the rate of the temperature rise, (as predicted by the models).
Whew! Luke, you are truly a lunatic! I don’t think your mental hospital should really allow you access to the internet. Please, go back to sleep!
Well we can only hope in 2009 Rudd gets some backbone and outlaws spurious scepticism.
sjt,
Give it a rest mate, your homespun truths are getting tiresome.
People do read and comprehend, despite what you say, the difference is, we weigh up the evidence.
It may be nice and comfortable to subscribe to an idea and stick to it, but it is not very productive .
Somewhat like the Kalvinist idea of predestination.
SJT:
“The banality of Singer’s argument defies any sort of a reasoned response. It reminds me of that 16 year old girl who was the darling of the blogosphere a few years ago. You look at the hours of serious research that goes into the papers that make up the knowledge base of the IPCC report, you read and try to understand the IPCC report, then you come up against Singer’s logic. It’s not an example scientific reasoning based on science, he’s just lining up a selection of cherries and waving his arms because he’s so excited at how pretty they look.”
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
Congratulations!
You said absolutely nothing rational.
You are indeed running on empty.When all you can do is post ad homonems as regular prose.You attack a 16 year old girl who is not even remotely connected to Dr. Singers opinion you never factually attack.
You never provided a counterpoint against what Dr. Singer opined.That is why you come across as offering nothing more than blarney for us to laugh over.
luke; will there be a scale of spurious? For example in the criminal code there is facility for exculpatory exceptions to otherwise done and dusted crimes; in respect of the crime of spurious scepticism could there be exceptions for innocent and ignorant spurious scepticism? And what about spurious scepticism (let’s call it sc) done out of misguided loyalty or motherly affection? I would like to see the AGW judiciary retain considerable discretion on this with the capacity to quantify the degree of spuriousness; accordingly a 5% sc offence would attract a much lighter punishment than an irredeemable 90-100% offence. And speaking of punishment; would spending a day with Clive Hamilton be considered a greater or lessor punishment than spending a day with Greg Hunt? And to whom would the fines be paid to; Al Gore or Tim Flannery, who as you know have equivalence in the prediction stakes. In any event this is going to be another boon for jaded lawyers.
Cohenite,
We all know that Luke (BSc. Hons in geology) is a well known opinionater here. Given that the mining industry for the past seven years experienced a boom in commodity prices, resulting in a chronic shortage of geologists to do field work, one starts to wonder why our Luke, (and I use “our” in the same sense that the Jews use the term when they defend the views of the Lubavitchers with the reply that “they are out Lubavitchers”) , never availed himself for the over-priced salaries paid to any geologist with a ticket during the last commodities boom.
Luke BSc.Hons could not find employment in geology during a mining and exploration boom and preferred to do what he does, whatever that might be, and spend the last three, or more, years attacking the politically incorrect here? Maybe Luke has an Enid Blyton University qualification and thus cannot find employment using his Tertiary qualifications.
And now we read he wants to round us up and subject us to brainwashing.
But your suggestion of a proposed scale of spuriousness is well put.
I doubt, however, he/she/it will be up to the task to defend it.
Whoops – “that “they are out Lubavitchers” should be “that “they are our Lubavitchers”
Relevance to price of eggs? Zilch. Or on the other hand Louis perhaps you’re an eccentric kook who hasn’t enough resources or sense to retire? hmmm let’s see …. have fun in the caravan – LOL
… Gramps the reality is that you regularly feel the need to rationalise your scummy existence. Others don’t. Insecurity ? Chip on the shoulder perhaps?
Luke,
Thanks, best summary for surrender yet,
“You are indeed running on empty.When all you can do is post ad homonems as regular prose.You attack a 16 year old girl who is not even remotely connected to Dr. Singers opinion you never factually attack.”
The connection is obvious, they use infantile arguments.
Marcus,
Its ‘Calvinist’ not ‘Kalvinist’.
Jeremy C
“Its ‘Calvinist’ not ‘Kalvinist’.”
Only in English Jeremy. Allow me to use my spelling.
Hi Louis; luke does seem to have got out of bed on the wrong side post-xmas; perhaps he is overcompensating for some natural AGW doubts; I don’t know; all I can offer him is this advice; those who demean their elders will be punished by old age; those who respect their elders will be rewarded with wisdom; and a spot in the Will. I am of course assuming luke is a mere sprog.
Xmas humbug, Just more production of greenhouse gases…
Just remember Cohers you’re commenting (not publishing) on a backwater blog. The real action continues unabated as can be seen from the Australian Climate Policy draft and the Hadley Science Work Plan – all this is just noisy static against the real science effort. Mere political flotsam and jetsam. But of course you guys don’t have a plan for anything – you’re only recruited by vested interests in a drastic last ditch effort to tear down the real science.
Luke, SOD, SJT, Dano, and all the other warmers visiting here, if climate science is the study of weather over extended periods and areas, a real world solution must be about real world impacts that change weather events consistently in the short term to get a measurable impact over that extended time and space. What are your solutions that fit this need?
I’ve looked at the monthly data trends more than anyone should have over the past few months so I can provide a little check on Mr. Singer’s statements:
1958 – 2005: Total warming of +0.5 C
– CHECK (all the major temp indices are around+0.5C)
1958 – 1976: Cooling
– CHECK (all the major indices cool about -0.2C)
1976 – 1977: Sudden jump of +0.5 C
– CHECK (from mid-76 to mid-77 Temps jumped +0.4C)
1977 – 1997: No detectable trend
– Semi-CHECK – GISS has a 0.2C increase – other indices flat
1998 – 1999: El Nino spike
– CHECK – GISS doesn’t have much of a spike but all others do.
2000 – 2001: No detectable trend
– Semi-CHECK – temps are relatively stable but some indices are a little higher than 1997
2001 – 2003: Sudden jump of +0.3 C
– CHECK – but there are ups and downs in all the series at different times so I wouldn’t put this one in
2003 – present: No trend, maybe even slight cooling
– CHECK – I might say 2007 and 2008 only
– GISS is up 0.35C since 1958, Hadcrut3 is up 0.33C and NCDC is up 0.38C: Hansen’s Scenario B forecast increased about 0.75C from 1958 to 2008.
Cohenite,
Luke has more or less admitted that climate policy is driven by politics not science. Hadley was set up for this very purpose by Thatcher.
What Luke seems not to grasp is we don’t have a plan for anything because global warming is a non problem – but being a public servant, Luke needs justfication for his existence – hence they are always trying to create new plans to sucker the taxpayers yet again.
Luke: “The real science effort”??????????
Science is the business of explaining observations with previously acquired empirically determined knowledge.
Engineering is the application of proven science to produce something.
AGW is simply climate science being used to justify social engineering – and I get this from the horse’s mouth in the ALP people I happen know. The looney left are hell-bent on imposing their sustainable paradigm onto the rest of us by carbon trading.
SJT:
“The connection is obvious, they use infantile arguments.”
RONFLMAO!
You posed no argument at all.Just a series of empty words.
Try something else.
Luke’s real science comment must be the biggest giggle of the year. When are we going to see real science measured in the real atmosphere instead of fairyland science ahla idiotic computer models?
Spencer’s results show the real science and when the tiny co2 influence is in turn influenced by clouds and water vapour you eventually end up with a small negative feedback.
Let’s have some real science to either confirm or dispute the Aqua satellite team’s findings because computer models are just another fairytale.
Spencer/s results !@$$$*&- splutter giggle barf – from some creationist dude who couldn’t even analyse his own satellite data – I mean WTF !!!!
Neville – mate you drones wouldn’t even know good science if you fell over it. You’re all just chugging away on the denialosphere ganga….
Luke,
Dummy spit is it? I would back Ropy Spencer’s science against your politically correct science any time – and since you have raised the ad hom of attacking a person’s religious beliefs, that only shows how utterly shallow your whole argument has become – why don’t you post on John Quiggin’s site – he definitely needs some activity there.
Come to think of it. don’t bother, Quiggin will have you censored in very short time. Probably why you infest this blog as no one else appreciates your colourful phraseology.
Louis,
It is inconceivable that the well funded greeny groups,eg Climate Insitutute, WWF, ACF, Gore funds et al, with their fuller than full cofffers are not spending a some of that money by paying people to inhabit/contaminate blogs that may be neutral if not sceptical about AGW, just to stir and obfuscate.
Their aim would be that anything goes, in order to stop any or disrupt any site becoming a focal point, that may expose the scaremongering, politicalisation of AGW, and indeed just how fraudulent and inadequate a lot of the science really is.
They would be the blog equivalents of the “Steve Irwin”, or indeed an extension of Al Gores communicators program, whereby dim wit ex footballers and other morons, are paid to go out and give lectures on AGW, al la Gore.
There would be several ways these bloggers could be put into place, but the simplest would probably be by a retainer, or a rate per post of say $100.
Now the trick here is spot the paid blogger.
I reckon there are some dead ringers for paid blogger of the year award on this site.
I’ve looked at the monthly data trends more than anyone should have over the past few months so I can provide a little check on Mr. Singer’s statements:
sorry, both of you don t understand the basics. the problem is NOT with the numbers, but with the “analysis”.
– GISS is up 0.35C since 1958, Hadcrut3 is up 0.33C and NCDC is up 0.38C: Hansen’s Scenario B forecast increased about 0.75C from 1958 to 2008.
subtracting the lower number from the higher does NOT give you a good idea about the temperature TREND over a period.
what you and Singer are doing, it is statistic analysis at a kindergarten level!
the result of your “analysis” completely depends on your CHOICE of start and end date. we call that cherry picking!.
(by pure chance you chose a rather high starting point. pretty convenient, eh?)
a much better analysis is fitting a TRENDLINE.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/gistemp/from:1958/to:2008/plot/gistemp/from:1958/to:2008/trend
immediately we get an increase of 0.126°C per decade or 0.63°C over those 50 years. this is pretty close to the Hansen scenario!
(Hansen did NEVER attempt to “predict” the increase between 2 randomely chosen years. to claim he did, is simply stupid.)
so what do we get: Hansen was right, Bill and Fred wrong. no surprise.
Well Malcolm they certainly seem dimwitted and moronic enough believing AGW against any real scientific evidence, so you may be on the money.
There would be several ways these bloggers could be put into place, but the simplest would probably be by a retainer, or a rate per post of say $100.
somehow i didn t make it into the paid program so far. so i hope that greenpeace will finally send me some cash this week!
Sod,
Just wondering but did you study statistics?
I wonder if you are confusing statistics with maths – the two are quite different.
Statistics are numerical summaries of the measurements of a group of objects.
Trendlines and the like are better understood as mathematical functions describing an objects spatial behaviour wrt time.
That raises the nonsensical idea that the price of a chicken egg is dependent on its position around the sun.
Put simply, you blather nonsense, so sod off.
Malcolm Hill,
I think you might have touched a raw nerve with your last post – I had not considered the possibility that our “esteemed” Luke might be paid by a Soros source of funding.
But his Lukiness has been less prolific in his posts here, suggesting that there remains hope that even the dimmest in his circle of followers might see a light.
Isn’t this what drives all religions? Hope?
this is pretty close to the Hansen scenario!
oh really – so why don’t we put the Hansen forecast scenario A (i.e increase in GHG @ 1.5% per year) up against the observed temps in scale.
This is what we get
http://users.tpg.com.au/johnsay1/Stuff/temp15.jpg
over a 6.0C range he is 4.5C out!! he’s not even half right.
Hansen is wrong!
Gosh you guys are clever =- yes I am paid per post by Al Gore to make war on you guys. $250 USD per post. Cohenite is my accomplice and double agent. A mole in fact and you fell for it. You guys … LOL
Sinkers – why is your gravatar that of a big dumb chook?
Anyway have a another puff on the ganga guys.
sod; wearisome; a temperature trend between 2 points is a temperature trend period; however, a trend doesn’t tell you the rate of change nor does it tell you whether that rate of change is correlated with a causal factor; what Singer is showing is that an overall trend between 2 designated points cannot be causally connected with CO2; the overall trends are a product of sudden and large steps; look at this;
http://i38.tinypic.com/16aa03o.jpg
The graph shows the large 1976 ‘step-up’ which has been well described in many papers; the temperature rise of 0.5C in one year was maintained by a succession of El Nino events which has been described by Bob Tisdale and White and Cayon and Tsonis amongst others, most recently Compo and Sardeshmukh. Try asking yourself how a designated causal agent such as CO2 which is almost linear in increase can produce not only such large haphazard jumps in temperature but also produce declines such as between 1940-1976 and from 1998 onwards.
Your reliance on GISS and the Mad Hatter’s prognistications is trollish.
Sod,
Just wondering but did you study statistics?
well, sort of.
I wonder if you are confusing statistics with maths – the two are quite different.
no. statistics are a part of mathematics. wiki says:
Statistics is a mathematical science pertaining to the collection, analysis, interpretation or explanation, and presentation of data.
it makes sense to distinguish the pure from the applied math. but its still math.
Trendlines and the like are better understood as mathematical functions describing an objects spatial behaviour wrt time.
again, you got this wrong. a trendline (or linear regression..) is a mathematical (or statistical) tool to analyze the relationship between variables. while “time” might be part of the data, it surely is not part of the methodology.
a trend line over the scatter plot showing scientific understanding of people and their view of AGW should give a pretty interesting result…
That raises the nonsensical idea that the price of a chicken egg is dependent on its position around the sun.
again, you don t understand the basics. not of statistics, neither of math nor on climate science.
Sod,
First of all, mathematics is not science. It is a tool of understanding.
Your second point is correct – a linear regression is indeed a mathemtical derivation of how two variables are associated. However trying to calculate a trend line between “scientific understanding of people and their view of AGW” is not possible, unless human activity could be reduced to simplistic numbers.
As for the Chook Egg Price example, this is based on the observation that the price of eggs incsreases with time. They don’t but then perhaps I might be excused for having lived a tad longer than you.
Cohenite – really stupid posting now from yourself. Step functions? AGW is putting an extra forcing on a system that has annual, inter-annual and decadal phenomena – what would you actually expect. The SHEER dishonesty of the denialist position is breathtaking.
I enjoyed this – http://www.skepticalscience.com/empirical-evidence-for-global-warming.htm it’s called a balance of evidence doopies… Note movement of whole circulation systems.
Singer’s little analysis is so utterly pathetic – why even bother with it?
Sod – Sinkers doesn’t even understand what an anomaly is – what waste your time of a big dopey eccentric chook still locked in some 1950s cold war still dreaming of WMC. Actually there’s usually a kooky Dutchman or two in all those places like Kununurra. Probably good technicians but that’s about it. Normally they just get ignored.
oh really – so why don’t we put the Hansen forecast scenario A (i.e increase in GHG @ 1.5% per year) up against the observed temps in scale.
you used kindergarten analysis again, to get that result.
you can t just clue Hansen s work to the high point in a different dataset.
here s what you get, when you do it in a more scientific way:
http://www.realclimate.org/images/Hansen06_fig2.jpg
i am looking forward to any comparison between Hansens work and some denialist “scenarios”. please bring them on!
a temperature trend between 2 points is a temperature trend period;
yes. a kindergarten trend.
however, a trend doesn’t tell you the rate of change
sure it does. you are supposed to take a look at the graph. have some knowledge about the field. and use multiple statistical tools to analyze it.
Try asking yourself how a designated causal agent such as CO2 which is almost linear in increase can produce not only such large haphazard jumps in temperature but also produce declines such as between 1940-1976 and from 1998 onwards.
you might not know it, but CO2 is NOT the only factor influencing temperature. actually there is quite some WEATHER fluctuation in the data.
nobody would claim anything, but CO2 being the main factor influencing the long term TREND over the last decades.
looking at those “jumps2 shows some serious lack of understanding of climate FORCINGS.
Luke,
Spooked you have I?
“clue” was supposed to be “glue” in my post above…
First of all, mathematics is not science. It is a tool of understanding.
nice philosophical question. but completely irrelevant to the false claims you made above.
However trying to calculate a trend line between “scientific understanding of people and their view of AGW” is not possible, unless human activity could be reduced to simplistic numbers.
it can be done. we could use a simple method, like going by years of education. or by giving numbers to academic degrees. or we could have a board of scientists test the people over a month, giving marks.
and the funny thing is, the results would be the same, if we use a big enough group and avoid systematic bias!
As for the Chook Egg Price example, this is based on the observation that the price of eggs incsreases with time. They don’t but then perhaps I might be excused for having lived a tad longer than you.
you are mixing up “causation” and “correlation” in this example. most scientists don t do that.
“You posed no argument at all.Just a series of empty words.”
Honestly, it’s hard to know how to debate complete stupidity.
luke; for the New year can you at least read your links before you post; the SC link quotes Ghosh on isotopes and the climate sensitivity efforts of Annan and others; they’ve never looked like being right; and now you’re resorting to telling me that AGW is capable of sudden movements in temperature; so, AGW can accumulate and step but PDO can do neither; or was that NT who said that? No matter, with Will and this new purveyor of Hansenite genuflection, sod, I’m finding it hard to distinguish any of you. Sod wants to debate Hansen’s “work”; shades of Koutsoyiannis, is this the best your side can do?
http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2008/06/gret-moments-in.html
Cohers – all this indicates you haven’t got a clue. A linearist. Anyway we’ll just wait – when the temperature starts to trend up you guys will have NOWHERE to hide !! Nowhere. You guys think this is a daily game – it isn’t.
here s what you get, when you do it in a more scientific way:
you mean like this 🙂
http://users.tpg.com.au/johnsay1/Stuff/temp18.jpg
To Sod and others, yes there is cherrypicking on both sides. The warmers as well often cherrypick their starting points and restate older predictions/numbers to make the newest ones look better.
Here is a chart with no cherry-picking at all. It contains all of the monthly temperature observations on the same baseline since each record began versus CO2.
The actual observations to-date are about half of the trendline predicted by the global warming models (this one is a little less than Hansen’s Scenario B).
http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/2626/tempobsrvvsco2ct4.png
Bill; you haven’t got that graph with time on it by any chance?
To cohenite:
CO2 has increased every year since 1850 (other than a very slight decline and pause in WWII) (and CO2 doesn’t rise every month so there are a few months in the chart where there is a pause) but, generally, the dots start in January 1850 and progress out by month until November 2008.
The main charts I built were based on taking the ENSO and AMO natural variation out and then assuming the remainder was global warming. The ENSO and AMO variability (+/-) is removed but the overall trend of 0.7C of warming is maintained.
Here is the chart for Hadcrut3 (starting in 1871 when reliable ENSO figures became available) with the ENSO and AMO variation removed.
http://img510.imageshack.us/img510/811/finalwarminggw8.png
Thanks Bill; the whole isolation of the AGW effect interests me; you will be aware that Douglass and Christy isolated an AGW effect of 0.07C PD for the period 1979-2008; in an earlier paper published in Nature, vol 367, 27 January 1994, Christy and McNider found an AGW effect of 0.09CPD for the period 1979-1994; Trenberth has found an AGW effect for the period 1950-1998 of 0.0925PD; I try to make sense of this here;
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2008/10/temperature-trends-and-carbon-dioxide-a-note-from-cohenite/#comments
Perhaps you could kindly comment.
My numbers for 1979 onward are 0.046C per decade for RSS ranging up to 0.058C per decade for GISS, (the UAH trendline is 0.03C per decade which is too low in my opinion.)
– RSS (with ENSO and AMO pulled out)
http://img368.imageshack.us/img368/6820/rsswarmingdi8.png
– GISS (with ENSO and AMO pulled out)
http://i463.photobucket.com/albums/qq360/Bill-illis/GISS1979Warming.png?t=1230507604
I would make two other significant comments:
– The AMO should be used rather than the PDO. The AMO has similar long-term cycles to the PDO but the AMO explains temperature variation much better than the PDO. The PDO doesn’t have a very good correlation. Secondly, the AMO is tied to the deep ocean circulation system and, consequently, is a significant node of energy exchange between the oceans and the atmosphere and, consequently, is more logical to include than the PDO. The northern Pacific ocean is shallow at deep ocean circulation depths and thus is not really part of the ocean circulation system.
The AMO matches the long-term cyclical changes in the climate very closely – the downswing from 1900 to 1919, the upswing from 1920 to 1945, the downswing from 1946 to 1976 and the upswing from 1977 to 2005. It also has big spikes in some super El Nino years like 1877-78 and 1997-98. In fact, half of the temperature increase in 1997-98 was due to the AMO and only half was due to the El Nino.
http://img111.imageshack.us/img111/3383/amoanomalynp6.png
– Southern Hemisphere temperatures (which may be of interest to you) have very unusual trends – lots of rapid ups and downs and strange cycles. In fact, they are hardly correlated with the ENSO at all (is Australia temps correlated with the ENSO, precipitation is but is temperature?). If you are going to correct global temperatures for natural variation of ocean cycles, you need to be able to explain the southern hemisphere temps as well (it is half the globe afterall.)
For example, here is the monthly Southern Hemisphere temps from Hacrut3 (what a mess).
http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/7797/shtempanomalybq1.png
Southern Hemisphere temps are not correlated with the ENSO but they correlated with the AMO and what I have been calling the southern version of the AMO, the Southern Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation. It has similar characteristics to the AMO, in that it has long cycles and it is a major part of the deep ocean circulation patterns in the southern hemisphere.
I used the SST anomalies for this region to build the southern AMO and when you include this region, you have a pretty good match to the SH temps.
http://maps.google.ca/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&ll=33.137551,-49.921875&spn=164.593939,360&z=1&msid=110686680343951250375.00045cd66a477c08c6d08
There are other areas along Antarctica that could be used in this index but you have to be careful to not include too much of the ocean to explain global temps since the ocean SSts are part of global temps.
When you put all that together, you get a Hadcrut3 reconstruction like this.
http://img510.imageshack.us/img510/8456/finalhadcrut3modeljs7.png
This method works on all the major temperature series and most of the smaller zonal components as well. I’ve left out the Southern AMO for some reconstructions since it is not a recognized ocean indicator and the reconstructions are almost as good without it (but it is needed for the southern hemisphere.)
There is a very good match to the tropics zone for example.
http://img205.imageshack.us/img205/8008/rsstropicsnw0.png
In terms of the global warming signature left over after you pull out this natural variation (and it doesn’t change the 0.7C increase, just the +/- cycles out), it is, at most, only half of the predictions of the global warming models. The pro-AGW crowd have used aerosols to explain the difference (Hansen and GISS have -0.3C built in for aerosols now). The newest one is that deep oceans are absorbing some of the global warming temperature increase which will push out the date we get to 3.0C per doubling by as little as 35 years and as much as 1,000 years (my numbers say at least 500 years). The deep oceans are warming very slightly however.
Bill; some amazing stuff; are you a dedicated amateur or do you fulfill the Peer-review gauntlet laid down by the AGW bien pensants? One final question; you say the AGW 0.07CPD AGW signature is solid; isn’t this subject to a logarithmic decline so with more CO2 the actual rate delines; you also may have noticed Lucia’s isolation of the AGW effect for 2001 onwards was actually a -ve temp trend; any thoughts on that?
To cohenite, yes I am just an amateur. But when you start down this road of trying to actually adjust temperatures for the ENSO etc. on a monthly basis and you start putting all the data in, it starts taking you down so many roads …
Yes, the CO2 impact is logarithmic and my warming reconstructions are based on the LN of CO2 (with CO2 as a proxy for all the greenhouse gases).
But CO2 is growing at a slightly exponential rate right now (an increase in the rate of 0.002 ppm each month).
We are at a point in the logarithmic impact of rising GHGs where the warming is nearly linear (and it will stay nearly linear for as much as 90 years before it starts to flatten out in the future). It is just a characteristic of the formulae.
The exponential section of the growth started about 1955 and ended about 1990 after which it will be roughly linear for 100 years or so assuming GHGs continue growing at their current rates.
I’ve built these charts showing the current growth rates of CO2 and the log warming impact of CO2 from 1 ppm to 560 ppm (which you probably have not seen before but it is an accurate reflection of the situation) and then how it works in a more normal “temp versus time” chart.
http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/1071/co2forecastwz0.png
http://img216.imageshack.us/img216/9652/logwarmingillustratedkn7.png
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/3930/hadcrut3scattervj2.png
http://img510.imageshack.us/img510/811/finalwarminggw8.png
This log warming chart is based on the Hadcrut3 dataset and it produces the largest warming rate of the temperature series at 1.62C per doubling. GISS produces 1.54C per doubling, and NCDC produces 1.32C per doubling. The theory now says the warming will continue for another 35 years or more after one reaches the 560 ppm doubling level before one reaches the 3.0C or 3.25C per doubling temperature level but the trends to date indicate that will not happen – it will take hundreds of years more or it will just not happen at all.
… and RSS from 1979 on produces just 0.7C per doubling …
… (since 1979, the warming rate of all the temperature series declines – maybe the satellites are keeping them honest now – the warming since 1979 from all the temperature series indicates that the historic data may have been artificially adjusted to increase the trend by about 0.3C.)
http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/6140/zoominrsslogwarmingar8.png
Sure that S. Fred didn’t pwn you Jen? This strangeness is not on his site, and FWIW, it is so weird that Eli is not sure he didn’t pull it down from shame.
On the other hand, it does establish how ignorant the cheerleaders here are. C’mon, averages from two consecutive years are not a trend.
Well, he finally posted it. . . .poor guy