Merged Global Warming Discussion II: Heated Conversation

[r-j]

I'm not surprised that some people are ignorant about the blip.

At 06:25 28/09/2009, Tom Wigley wrote:

Phil,
Here are some speculations on correcting SSTs to partly
explain the 1940s warming blip.
If you look at the attached plot you will see that the
land also shows the 1940s blip (as I'm sure you know).
So, if we could reduce the ocean blip by, say, 0.15 degC,
then this would be significant for the global mean -- but
we'd still have to explain the land blip.
I've chosen 0.15 here deliberately. This still leaves an
ocean blip, and i think one needs to have some form of
ocean blip to explain the land blip (via either some common
forcing, or ocean forcing land, or vice versa, or all of
these). When you look at other blips, the land blips are
1.5 to 2 times (roughly) the ocean blips -- higher sensitivity
plus thermal inertia effects. My 0.15 adjustment leaves things
consistent with this, so you can see where I am coming from.
Removing ENSO does not affect this.
It would be good to remove at least part of the 1940s blip,
but we are still left with "why the blip".
Let me go further. If you look at NH vs SH and the aerosol
effect (qualitatively or with MAGICC) then with a reduced
ocean blip we get continuous warming in the SH, and a cooling
in the NH -- just as one would expect with mainly NH aerosols.
The other interesting thing is (as Foukal et al. note -- from
MAGICC) that the 1910-40 warming cannot be solar. The Sun can
get at most 10% of this with Wang et al solar, less with Foukal
solar. So this may well be NADW, as Sarah and I noted in 1987
(and also Schlesinger later). A reduced SST blip in the 1940s
makes the 1910-40 warming larger than the SH (which it
currently is not) -- but not really enough.

http://www.examiner.com/article/cli...-server-hacked-revealing-documents-and-emails

 

[Reality Check]

I'm not surprised that some people are ignorant about the blip.

Wow, r-j, why am I not surprised that the ClimateGate nonsense has raised its ugly head again !
(on the other hand maybe it is still April 1st wherever you are)

Quite a number of people here probably know about the 1940s warming blip in ocean temperatures (I do!). I am a little surprised that there was a reflection of this on land mentioned in this 2009 email when there was reasons for it to be operational errors:
Buckets to blame for wartime temperature blip (Nature 2008).

"We know roughly the size of the bucket measurement errors," says John Kennedy of the UK Met Office Hadley Centre. "The engine room error is more difficult because it depends on exactly where the pipe that brings water in is."

The first estimates suggest that the late 1940s temperatures in the global temperature record are about 0.3°C below what they should be. That roughly corresponds to the entire 1945 dip, but researchers at the Hadley Centre are calculating the exact adjustments required.

No one should be surprised to see speculations about how to include this dubious data in the existing data.

ETA: Since you insist on citations to the scientific literature, r-j, (but oddly enough you cite an personal email!):
A large discontinuity in the mid-twentieth century in observed global-mean surface temperature

Data sets used to monitor the Earth’s climate indicate that the surface of the Earth warmed from ~1910 to 1940, cooled slightly from ~1940 to 1970, and then warmed markedly from ~1970 onward1. The weak cooling apparent in the middle part of the century has been interpreted in the context of a variety of physical factors, such as atmosphere–ocean interactions and anthropogenic emissions of sulphate aerosols2. Here we call attention to a previously overlooked discontinuity in the record at 1945, which is a prominent feature of the cooling trend in the mid-twentieth century. The discontinuity is evident in published versions of the global-mean temperature time series1, but stands out more clearly after the data are filtered for the effects of internal climate variability. We argue that the abrupt temperature drop of ~0.3 °C in 1945 is the apparent result of uncorrected instrumental biases in the sea surface temperature record. Corrections for the discontinuity are expected to alter the character of mid-twentieth century temperature variability but not estimates of the century-long trend in global-mean temperatures.

ETA2: This 1940's cooling was part of a wider pattern: Why did climate cool in the mid-20th Century?

The average global surface temperature decreased slightly from 1940 to 1975. The main reason behind this mid-century cooling was global dimming due to anthropogenic sulfate aerosol emissions.

 

[Megalodon]

I'm not surprised that some people are ignorant about the blip.

And this is why we will always need Universities, even if all the information is available online. I would ask one of my students if anything happened in the world in the 40s that might have compromised the reliability of temperature measurements.

What would you answer to that?

 

[Megalodon]

Bait-and-line is not your forte, obviously, but at least you've tried it. Ambush predation is indeed what nature has shaped you for. Can you help it if you love it?

You mean ramming full-speed int unsuspecting prey and biting the life out of them? Can't imagine why you would say that.

 

[a_unique_person]

I've seen both sides seek to improve and expand the data, using computer models, assumptions about areas not covered, as well as "correcting" past records, and even going out and physically documenting station sites that cause temperature readings to be higher.

If the data makes no sense, there is something wrong with the data. And the lack of data, as well as lack of long term readings, from good stations, is a real problem for the global record.

Just taking data at face value stopped a long time ago. Anytime the readings don't "seem" right, somebody is trying to "adjust" the data to fit with what they "believe" it should say. This does not mean it's even wrong, as sometimes the data is not accurate.

Die hard deniers went through all this already, with the BEST project. They did all the analysis you could ever ask for, and came up with the answer we already had. Temperature records for over a century are very useful, but they didn't have the technology we have today. Sophisticated techniques for over coming those limitations have given us the answer.

 

[CapelDodger]

I'm not surprised that some people are ignorant about the blip.

I'm not surprised you assume people are ignorant. It's a behaviour commonly known as "projection". What appears as erudition to you is common knowledge to most people here.

http://www.examiner.com/article/cli...-server-hacked-revealing-documents-and-emails

SlimeItGate again. You really should give up hope that there's a conspiracy behind events. There isn't.

This subject was openly discussed, and in fact Steve McIntyre claimed credit for detecting the "blip", so the fact that it took a criminal enterprise to reveal an email does not make the email important. The adjustment has been made to the record and the world remains just as warm and getting warmer (due to the enhanced greenhouse effect resulting from our human industriousness).

Leave the past to the old and past-it (such as Steve McIntyre) and look at the present and the future. It's going to take more than pettifogging about how things were in the past to make it all go away.

 

[r-j]

This is really quite funny. I used to wish the victims of the email theft would just publish explanations, but it seems they probably enjoy the confusion it has created. Like we see here, even the defenders of anything don't understand what they are talking about.

I would ask one of my students if anything happened in the world in the 40s that might have compromised the reliability of temperature measurements.

What would you answer to that?

You don't have any idea what this is about. Nobody here does. Now that is actually sort of surprising.

 

[CapelDodger]

Die hard deniers went through all this already, with the BEST project. They did all the analysis you could ever ask for, and came up with the answer we already had.

To the surprise of many. The BEST confirmation of UHI adjustments was particularly important, but in general it's not possible to finagle a substantially different result from the data. As I said when it was first announced, a gross tactical error. People like McIntyre have never made the mistake of doing anything with data, for chrissake.

Temperature records for over a century are very useful, but they didn't have the technology we have today. Sophisticated techniques for over coming those limitations have given us the answer.

The AGW denier concentration on the past is simply displacement activity in a sandbox where they can always claim uncertainty. The fact that the uncertainty makes no substantial difference to anything is never going to disturb their playtime. Only squirrels can do that.

 

[CapelDodger]

This is really quite funny. I used to wish the victims of the email theft would just publish explanations, but it seems they probably enjoy the confusion it has created.

Explanations of what?

Like we see here, even the defenders of anything don't understand what they are talking about. You don't have any idea what this is about. Nobody here does. Now that is actually sort of surprising.

What is "this" about then?

 

[r-j]

Exactly. I used an example from the climategate emails to show how the past is modified, and it's obvious that the defenders of the faith, don't even realize what they are trying to defend.

 

[Reality Check]

I used to wish the victims of the email theft would just publish explanations,

You seem to not know that explanations were published even before the emails were stolen, r-j!
Those explanations are of course the scientific literature.

Authors of personal emails are under no obligation to publish explanations of the emails when the emails are stolen and lied about. Some of the lies about the emails were addressed.

 

[Reality Check]

...

Hmm, r-j, must have me on ignore since he has the fantasy that no one here knows about the mid-century cooling of ocean temperatures. Perhaps someone can quote my post.

 

[r-j]

I don't have you on ignore. It's your "explanation" that I am laughing about. You don't even know what they were discussing in the email.

 

[a_unique_person]

Exactly. I used an example from the climategate emails to show how the past is modified, and it's obvious that the defenders of the faith, don't even realize what they are trying to defend.

I don't have you on ignore. It's your "explanation" that I am laughing about. You don't even know what they were discussing in the email.

The only person here who doesn't understand the issue is you. The explanation has been given but you appear to be unable to comprehend it.

 

[r-j]

Quite a number of people here probably know about the 1940s warming blip in ocean temperatures (I do!). I am a little surprised that there was a reflection of this on land mentioned in this 2009 email when there was reasons for it to be operational errors:

There's a good example of how being focused on only one thing, in this case "prove everything wrong before understanding what is even on the table", can mess you up.

The issue of "blips" isn't limited to them "correcting" the SSTs down, which is clear if you read the entire email. That they were concerned with having to explain the land temperatures being high, when the SSTs were "corrected" to make it seem cooler, that is only part of what is being discussed.

In any case, what I stated is obviously true, based on the evidence on just one email. In this case, in 2009 climate experts are discussing how and how much to change the records from the 1940s.
http://di2.nu/foia/1254108338.txt

The concern is that the land record will still show this warming, which it is noted, is always the case in the temperature records. So how much they "adjust" the data has to be considered (it certainly isn't discussing the issue of measurement changes on ships). That the land shows the expected increase following the SSTs makes that excuse a sham of course.

No, what is actually going on there is quite the interesting science.

 

[macdoc]

Moving on to reality...

Climate change forces flower festival forward a month since 1960s, study shows
Date:
April 2, 2014
Source:
Coventry University
Summary:
Organizers of flower festivals are being forced to adapt to increasingly early first blooming dates in spring, according to a study. The early flowering phenomenon is caused by the UK's increasingly mild springs, specifically a mean rise in March and April temperatures of 1.8 degrees Celsius since 1969.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/04/140402095438.htm

 

[Reality Check]

There's a good example ...

of you not reading my post which was focused on several issues, r-j, one of which was:

I am a little surprised that there was a reflection of this on land mentioned in this 2009 email when there was reasons for it to be operational errors: ...

And you are wrong about them trying to change the original 1940's records - they did not have a time machine .
They were trying to account for the cooling. They knew that there were a couple of possible causes (e.g. aerosols) They knew that it was not solar. So they speculated about adjusting for the known anomaly by correcting the temperatures that were read. This is done frequently, e.g. there was a change in weather station design and temperatures were adjusted to account for the change.

This is what scientists do when talking to each other. They throw out ideas. Many get shot down. Some get support. Some end up in the scientific literature.

Of course the idiocy of quoting an email out of context leads to more questions, e.g. What exactly is the "1940s warming blip"?
There is the wartime "blip" in ocean temperatures (my first thought and so my surprise at the mention of land temperatures) thought to be caused by wartime operational changes: A large discontinuity in the mid-twentieth century in observed global-mean surface temperature
Or is it the 1940 to 1975 "blip" in land and ocean temperatures thought to be caused by anthropogenic sulfate aerosol emissions: Why did climate cool in the mid-20th Century?
The latter is the most probable given the email contents. But it would be nice to have this confirmed by the attachment they mention or further emails.

 

[lomiller]

show how the past is modified

I know right! I mean at first dinosaurs were big slow reptiles now people are trying to change the past and say they are more closely related to birds!!! When will the scientists realize that once the truth is discovered it's fixed in stone!!! they need to stop changing the past and just accept the facts as they have always been!!!

 

[Trakar]

I know right! I mean at first dinosaurs were big slow reptiles now people are trying to change the past and say they are more closely related to birds!!! When will the scientists realize that once the truth is discovered it's fixed in stone!!! they need to stop changing the past and just accept the facts as they have always been!!!

definitely needs a spit-warning tag!
That's okay it was time to clean off the monitor again anyway!

 

[Megalodon]

There's a good example of how being focused on only one thing, in this case "prove everything wrong before understanding what is even on the table", can mess you up.

And yet you fail to answer my question.

The issue of "blips" isn't limited to them "correcting" the SSTs down, which is clear if you read the entire email.

I did not read the entire email, in much the same way I don't buy stolen property. Those emails are private and were stolen, and the fact that the thief posted them online doesn't make them less private. I'm strange this way.

Also, I don't care about what they were concerned in a private conversation. I care about what was published in peer-reviewed literature.

<snip>

In any case, what I stated is obviously true, based on the evidence on just one email. In this case, in 2009 climate experts are discussing how and how much to change the records from the 1940s.

Don't be ridiculous, no records were changed. You can still access the original data, and while you can your objections are just delusions.

The concern is that the land record will still show this warming, which it is noted, is always the case in the temperature records. So how much they "adjust" the data has to be considered (it certainly isn't discussing the issue of measurement changes on ships). That the land shows the expected increase following the SSTs makes that excuse a sham of course.

If only they had refined their discussions, written them up and submitted them to some sort of easily accessible medium, where it got... I don't know... reviewed by their peers, and trounced if scientifically unsound