Moderated Global Warming Discussion

[Mikemcc]

Yes, just find the anomalies in the record and apply the same basic formula. The change isn't linear, so a tripling in the 30's can easily represent more damage than a quintupling in the 1980's.

Answer the question asked. Has there been a growth in the number of structures susceptable to damage from storms that, coupled with inflation, explains the 5-fold increase in losses in 2010 compare to the decade before? no ramblings about the 1920s or 30s.

More likely, as pointed out repeatedly by a number of posters (with links to the evidence), there has been a significant increase in the number of extreme weather events in 2010 and 2011.

 

[Mikemcc]

Good grief indeed.

In scientific papers, if you wish to know where something like "The 20th Centrury average for combined global land and ocean surface temperature" comes from the best place to look is the "References"

The "References" are a handy feature in every scientific paper, they acknowledge and give credit to those who may have contributed to the paper, directly or indirectly.

In this case the "References" give us the following vital information:

Smith, T.M., and R.W. Reynolds (2005), A global merged land air and sea surface temperature reconstruction based on historical observations (1880-1997), J. Clim., 18, 2021-2036.

Smith, et al (2008), Improvements to NOAA's Historical Merged Land-Ocean Surface Temperature Analysis (1880-2006), J. Climate., 21, 2283-2293.

Smith, et al (2008), Improvements to NOAA's Historical Merged Land-Ocean Surface Temperature Analysis (1880-2006), J. Climate., 21, 2283-2293.

For those of us familiar with scientific papers we can immediately see the "20th Century Average" was first calculated for the years 1880-1997. This was done in 2005. Then in 2008 the final decade 1997-2006 was added.

For those of you less familiar with scientific papers you could have looked at the x-axis of the graphs in the paper, they clearly indicate the averages start in 1880 and end in 2006.

You really are grasping at straws on this. a simple google search for the first paper leads initially to the ERSL website for the merged NOAA sea and surface temperature dataset (http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/gridded/data.noaamergedtemp.html) which explains that the anomalies are determined from the 1961-1990 period. A date range of an analysis does not imply an average over that period - you've clearly pulled the phrase "20th Century average" out of thin air.

Even within the abstract for the first paper it explicitly refers to data points within the 19th Century!

...For the nineteenth century, when sampling is most sparse and the error estimates are largest, the differences between the averaged reconstruction and the simple averages are largest. ...

http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI3362.1

Similar statements in the second one cited (which you repeated by the way)
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.1175/2007JCLI2100.1

...Improvements in the late 19th century...

 

[Pixel42]

Good grief indeed

I can't believe you're still trying to maintain that you're right about this.

The references of the papers you quote are irrelevant, as those papers are not the source of the quote which led you to bizarrely and wrongly assert that global temperatures have risen 0.5C since 1880.

No-one disputes that the instrumental temperature record began in 1880, and that NOAA's data therefore covers the period from 1880 to the present. I'm sure there are many papers and calculations that use all that data. That doesn't mean that their every statement and calculation does, particularly when they clearly state one doesn't by using the phrase "20th century average".

I've pointed you to the definition of "20th century average" NOAA actually gives on the website that uses it in comparisons such as the one you originally quoted, and it means exactly what anyone with any sense knew it meant.

I've pointed you to a graph of the instrumental temperature record which shows how much global temperatures have actually risen since 1880, and it's not 0.5C. Your error in taking the difference between current temperatures and a previous average to mean the rise since the start of the period averaged is even more egregious than taking "20th century average" to mean something other than the average from 1901 to 2000.

 

[Halsu]

I don't know what you mean?

As far as measuring the warming trend, it doesn't matter whether a meter shows i.e. 10 degrees too high temperatures, or if UHI affects the meters by 5 degrees or whatever - as long as that error doesn't change over the decades.

An example: a "correct" temperature record could be i.e.

11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20

degrees over a period of time "X", and a "biased" reading could be

21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30

degrees over time of "X".

Now, which one of these shows more warming? Whaddyaknow - both show the exact same amount, even when the 2nd series is 10 degrees too hot overall.

Good grief indeed.

In scientific papers, if you wish to know where something like "The 20th Centrury average for combined global land and ocean surface temperature" comes from the best place to look is the "References"

...and you think they use the whole range of those time series for 20th century average? Newsflash: you're wrong.

 

[Furcifer]

I can't believe you're still trying to maintain that you're right about this.

And you're grasping at nothing to maintain you're right. If you read the supporting papers you'd realize this.

The references of the papers you quote are irrelevant, as those papers are not the source of the quote which led you to bizarrely and wrongly assert that global temperatures have risen 0.5C since 1880.

What? Those are the papers that calculate the "20th Century Average" for which this Summer is 0.5C above. It's very clear and very specific.

No-one disputes that the instrumental temperature record began in 1880, and that NOAA's data therefore covers the period from 1880 to the present.

No, the "20th Century average cover 1880-2006, not to the present. I suggest you read the paper and take a very close look at the graphs.

I've pointed you to a graph of the instrumental temperature record which shows how much global temperatures have actually risen since 1880, and it's not 0.5C. Your error in taking the difference between current temperatures and a previous average to mean the rise since the start of the period averaged is even more egregious than taking "20th century average" to mean something other than the average from 1901 to 2000.

I don't know what you are talking about, it's 0.5C above the 20th Century average ITS A QUOTE FROM NASA It doesn't mean 1901-2000, you made that up.

 

[Furcifer]

...and you think they use the whole range of those time series for 20th century average? Newsflash: you're wrong.

So is NASA then I suppose.

Take a closer look at how they've calculated the "20th Century Average", it clearly indicates the years 1880-2006. Clearly.

They will not wait until 2100 to begin calculating the 21st Century Average either. The notion they would is absurd.

 

[Furcifer]

A date range of an analysis does not imply an average over that period - you've clearly pulled the phrase "20th Century average" out of thin air.

It's from the NASA website.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2010/7


The combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for July 2010 was the second warmest on record, behind 1998, at 16.5°C (61.6F), which is 0.66°C (1.19°F) above the 20th century average of 15.8°C (60.4°F).

It's obvious people don't read any of the links provided in this thread. The only exception is me of course.

 

[Furcifer]

Answer the question asked. Has there been a growth in the number of structures susceptable to damage from storms that, coupled with inflation, explains the 5-fold increase in losses in 2010 compare to the decade before? no ramblings about the 1920s or 30s.

More likely, as pointed out repeatedly by a number of posters (with links to the evidence), there has been a significant increase in the number of extreme weather events in 2010 and 2011.

Well if you have the data I'll gladly walk you through it. You don't seem to understand this is a relative measure. 400 years ago there would have been very little damage from 10 times as many tornadoes in the same area.
You seem to be falling victim to the myths surrounding tornadoes.
It's a common misconception that tornadoes don't hit cities when in fact they do. The same number of tornadoes hitting a downtown area will do considerably more damage than if they touched down in rural areas. The extent of the damage depends heavily on where they touch down, not how many or how big.

 

[Pixel42]

I don't know what you are talking about, it's 0.5C above the 20th Century average ITS A QUOTE FROM NASA

Your original quote from NASA was

For the year-to-date, the global combined land and ocean surface temperature of 14.31°C (57.82°F) was the 11th warmest January–July period on record. This value is 0.51°C (0.92°F) above the 20th century average.

You interpreted that quote as meaning that global temperatures had risen

0.5C in the last 130 years.

This is wrong because

1. "20th century average" means the average from 1901-2000.

2. The figure given is a comparison of a current value to a long term average. It is not the rise since the beginning of that averaged period.

It's from the NASA website

So's the definition of what they actually mean by "20th century average", for which I've already provided the link. Here it is again, with added bolding:

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/2007/500mbexp.html#ytdhist

the 20th century (1901-2000) average

I see no point in continuing to try to explain this to you, I'm clearly wasting my time. I'm sure anyone reading this thread will be able to see for themselves that you're talking utter nonsense.

 

[Trakar]

What is the definition of "tornado alley". How can we measure the growth of "tornado alley"? Isn't "tornado alley" just a colloquial term?

Exactly so. Back when this colloquialism was coined, it primarily referred to a relatively narrow corridor that stretched through the Texas panhandle, oklahoma, kansas, and nebraska (a few border areas in a couple of some surrounding states), but that was about it. Now, in accordance with maps linked back up thread, the range pretty much extends across half of the contiguous states of the nation.

 

[Trakar]

Good grief indeed.

In scientific papers, if you wish to know where something like "The 20th Centrury average for combined global land and ocean surface temperature" comes from the best place to look is the "References"

The "References" are a handy feature in every scientific paper, they acknowledge and give credit to those who may have contributed to the paper, directly or indirectly.

In this case the "References" give us the following vital information:

Smith, T.M., and R.W. Reynolds (2005), A global merged land air and sea surface temperature reconstruction based on historical observations (1880-1997), J. Clim., 18, 2021-2036.

Smith, et al (2008), Improvements to NOAA's Historical Merged Land-Ocean Surface Temperature Analysis (1880-2006), J. Climate., 21, 2283-2293.

Smith, et al (2008), Improvements to NOAA's Historical Merged Land-Ocean Surface Temperature Analysis (1880-2006), J. Climate., 21, 2283-2293.

For those of us familiar with scientific papers we can immediately see the "20th Century Average" was first calculated for the years 1880-1997. This was done in 2005. Then in 2008 the final decade 1997-2006 was added.

For those of you less familiar with scientific papers you could have looked at the x-axis of the graphs in the paper, they clearly indicate the averages start in 1880 and end in 2006.

None (or should that be "neither" as there only appear to be two listed) of these references refer to that entire range as "the 20th century average." That seems to be your inventive, if inaccurate, interpretation.
There are several mentions of the historic national or regional data record periods that extend back to 1860 or 1880, but none of the authors of any of the references you provided support that 19th century data is included in the calculation of any 20th century average temperature.

 

[Trakar]

It's from the NASA website.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2010/7


The combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for July 2010 was the second warmest on record, behind 1998, at 16.5°C (61.6F), which is 0.66°C (1.19°F) above the 20th century average of 15.8°C (60.4°F).

It's obvious people don't read any of the links provided in this thread. The only exception is me of course.

You do know that NOAA and NASA are two entirely different agencies,...don't you?

 

[Trakar]

It's from the NASA website.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2010/7


The combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for July 2010 was the second warmest on record, behind 1998, at 16.5°C (61.6F), which is 0.66°C (1.19°F) above the 20th century average of 15.8°C (60.4°F).

It's obvious people don't read any of the links provided in this thread. The only exception is me of course.

As I've repeatedly said, reading is fundemental. Let's pull out all of the qualifiers and modifiers and see if the core of the sentence makes more sense to those who seem to be having a difficult time understanding what it is actually stating:

The combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for July 2010 was the second warmest on record at 16.5°C, which is 0.66°C above the 20th century average of 15.8°C.

First of all its important to understand that they are talking about the 20th century averages for the month of July. You can verify this by looking back at March where we see (btw you are linked to 2010 not 2011) "...above the 20th century average of 12.7°C..." obviously this means that they are comparing these recent month's anomolies to the average temperature of these individual months during the 20th century.

 

[Mikemcc]

It's obvious people don't read any of the links provided in this thread. The only exception is me of course.

Well if you have the data I'll gladly walk you through it.

That will be reading the links except where they go against your bias...

Posted by me (#3354)

You STILL don't understand what happens when the mean value shifts, do you - you get a greater number of extreme events. Funnily enough that's being seen:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/2010-2011-Earths-most-extreme-weather-since-1816.html
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/02/110208144927.htm

and 2011 is following suit:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=noaa-makes-2011-most-extreme-weather-year
http://daviddegraw.org/2011/08/unpr...f-2011-leads-to-record-265-billion-in-losses/

Personally I don't call $265 billion losses insignificant.

CNN were also reporting on it this week:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/08/20/weather.disasters/index.html

 

[Mikemcc]

It's from the NASA website.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2010/7


The combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for July 2010 was the second warmest on record, behind 1998, at 16.5°C (61.6F), which is 0.66°C (1.19°F) above the 20th century average of 15.8°C (60.4°F).

It's obvious people don't read any of the links provided in this thread. The only exception is me of course.

frankly I don't care if your jaw drops, please state where NOAA defines 20th century includes either dates prior to 1st Jan 1900 or after 31st Dec 1999 (OK, being pedantic, the dates should be one year later!), just because they display graphs with their full range of data does not mean that they use data outside of the bounds of the 20th century to form a 20th century average. This detail is something you appear to have made up.

The closest description I have found so far is here:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cmb-faq/anomalies.php

9. Why do some of the products use different reference periods?

The maps show temperature anomalies relative to the 1971-2000 base period. This period is used because it has the widest distribution for historical data, which enables more resolution (detail) for comparing region-by-region effects. For the global-scale averages (global land and ocean, land-only, ocean-only, and hemispheric time series), the reference period is adjusted to the 20th Century average for conceptual simplicity (the period is more familiar to more people, and establishes a longer-term average). The adjustment does not change the shape of the time series or affect the trends within it.

 

[Mikemcc]

And you're grasping at nothing to maintain you're right. If you read the supporting papers you'd realize this.



What? Those are the papers that calculate the "20th Century Average" for which this Summer is 0.5C above. It's very clear and very specific.



No, the "20th Century average cover 1880-2006, not to the present. I suggest you read the paper and take a very close look at the graphs.



I don't know what you are talking about, it's 0.5C above the 20th Century average ITS A QUOTE FROM NASA It doesn't mean 1901-2000, you made that up.

Neither of the papers that you linked to use the term "20th century average" in them at all, that it uses data from outside the 20th century is absurd and a figment of your imagination. That they display graphs showing data that ranges outside of that period (the full NOAA dataset) does not imply that the C19 or C21 data was used to determine an average of C20 data!

 

[Reality Check]

Special pleading by exclusion. That' original.
[/quiote]
Actual argument from the subject of this thread. That's reading comprehension.

Indeed you are, and did so by trying to infer that this was not part of the "global" average. Whether it does or doesn't contribute to that average remains to be seen.

I stated quite clearly what the situaton is:

• The US temperatures are regional temperatures.
• The global temperatures are ... global !

Of course the global temperatures are calculated from all of the regional temperatures from areting the world (including the US).

So whether these regional temperatures do or do not change the contribute to that average remains to be seen.

Evidence? They obviously don't if there's a 10C bias. I don't think you realize the implications of what you're implying.

I do not think that you know the climate science.
Absolute temperatures do not matter much. It is temperature anomalies that are used. The calculation of global temperatures is designed to minimize the effect of out-lier measurements such as the ones mentioned in the Arctic. For these reasons, it is extremely naive to think that a big number in any reported bias will result in a big change in global temperature anomalies.

The big point is that these will have an even smaller impact on the trends in the temperature anomalies.

The scientific evidence is that the global temperatures from surface stations match the global temperatures from satellites (but usually stated as temperature anomalies).
See Are surface temperature records reliable? which concludes

The well-known and widely-cited reconstructions of global temperature, produced by NASA GISS, UEA CRU, and NOAA NCDC, are replicable.
Independent studies using different software, different methods, and different data sets yield very similar results.
The increase in temperatures since 1975 is a consistent feature of all reconstructions. This increase cannot be explained as an artifact of the adjustment process, the decrease in station numbers, or other non-climatological factors.

The US bias cancels out as stated in the paper.

Erroneous Arctic Temperature Trends in the ERA-40 Reanalysis: A Closer Look
This only looks at the Arctic climate. Once again no stated analysis on the impact on global temperatures.

Atmospheric temperature measurements biases on the Antarctic plateau
More regional stuff and no analysis on the impact on global temperatures.

So basically the future result of these papers will be that the biases in these measurements will be compensated for and we will get more reliable readings from these surface stations.

This is good science.

 

[Furcifer]

This is wrong because

1. "20th century average" means the average from 1901-2000.

No, not for that data set. I showed you the paper, please read it.

2. The figure given is a comparison of a current value to a long term average. It is not the rise since the beginning of that averaged period.

Yes, it's what it says it is, 0.5C over the 20th Century Average. It's not very much in that 130 year period considering the average is what, 15C or 16C?

So's the definition of what they actually mean by "20th century average", for which I've already provided the link. Here it is again, with added bolding:

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/2007/500mbexp.html#ytdhist

I see no point in continuing to try to explain this to you, I'm clearly wasting my time. I'm sure anyone reading this thread will be able to see for themselves that you're talking utter nonsense.

That's precipitation. Please, read the paper it's taken from and not some unrelated webpage. In some of the averages they use the truncated period, and in some they don't.

 

[Furcifer]

None (or should that be "neither" as there only appear to be two listed) of these references refer to that entire range as "the 20th century average." That seems to be your inventive, if inaccurate, interpretation.
There are several mentions of the historic national or regional data record periods that extend back to 1860 or 1880, but none of the authors of any of the references you provided support that 19th century data is included in the calculation of any 20th century average temperature.

Clearly it is, please read the papers cited. You'll immediately see your error. I believe the analysis on anomalies uses a truncated data set and the averages use the entire 1880-2006 period (look for the "gridded" values on the NOAA website)

 

[Furcifer]

The combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for July 2010 was the second warmest on record at 16.5°C, which is 0.66°C above the 20th century average of 15.8°C.

This is 2011.

First of all its important to understand that they are talking about the 20th century averages for the month of July.

Correct, I believe this year was the 11th warmest "on record".

You can verify this by looking back at March where we see (btw you are linked to 2010 not 2011) "

Pixel did, I don't see the relevance either. More goal post moving I presume.

...above the 20th century average of 12.7°C..." obviously this means that they are comparing these recent month's anomolies to the average temperature of these individual months during the 20th century.

I believe this is correct and probably why you're confusing the applicable years and the term "20th Century Average".