How To Be A Global Warming Sceptic

[TrueSceptic]

As ever, he seems to have exited on a hissy-fit.

Things have wandered a bit just recently, but this is where we mostly talk about them rather than to them. Don't y'all be a stranger, you hear ?

Yes, I noticed this yesterday. We are drifting away from the OP towards discussing the science, or at least what GWS claim is the science, and I played a part in this. If we're not careful this will look like most other GW threads.

 

[TrueSceptic]

Maybe you should have Megaladon make some more pretty graphs after the February temperature data comes out?

Observations trump theory....every time.

[qimg]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/imagehosting/thum_1032347c0b9baf2fdc.jpg[/qimg]

Can you tell us where this cherry-picking graph came from? Was it a blog?

 

[TrueSceptic]

Coming from someone who thinks statistics is not science and Siberia is warm, one can't expect much thought.

Megaladon, is it warming? You really don't know much about constructing graphs for analysis do you?

Does this make it bit more understandable? See, in order to understand what's going on, to create a graph showing it has warmed since 1979 does not allow for analysis to see what the current decade is doing. There is a clear downward trend in all four data sets. I asked the same question last year: Which way will it go, up? Capeldodger, how's the Hansen scenario looking nowadays? No doubt Spencer Weart will at some point claim the climate models predicted this all along, and all the RealClimate groupies will shout AMEN!

[qimg]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/imagehosting/thum_1032347cdfd29586ae.jpg[/qimg]

Can you tell us where this graph came from?

 

[TrueSceptic]

The IPCC cherry picked the research that fit their agenda. Further, the authors of the chapters in many cases used their own work as evidence and ignored competing research, or simply ignored any research that conflicted with their conclusions.

Shall we discuss that aspect?

Typical unsupported GWS claim. Is it a conspiracy or incompetence?

So far AUP, all you've done is reference IPCC, blogs and essays.
We have provided the science articles.

That's quite a claim. Can you support it?

 

[a_unique_person]

Can you tell us where this graph came from?

The answer appears to be "No".

 

[a_unique_person]

The IPCC cherry picked the research that fit their agenda. Further, the authors of the chapters in many cases used their own work as evidence and ignored competing research, or simply ignored any research that conflicted with their conclusions.

Shall we discuss that aspect?

So far AUP, all you've done is reference IPCC

The IPCC presents the summary of a wide range of research and scientific papers. They provide references for every claim made.

What is their 'agenda'?

 

[Megalodon]

Megaladon, is it warming? You really don't know much about constructing graphs for analysis do you?

Dave, you really crack me up... you're not paying attention to what's going on on the thread, are you?

Your latest straw to grasp is laughable. It takes an idiot to look at an outlier and fit a trend through it. The graphs I've posted show what has happened so far: an obvious warming in the last four decades. You are the person that predicted, among other things:

that removing the 1998 data would cancel the warming trend of 30 years



and I proved you wrong;

You changed that to from 1998 it's not warming



and I proved you wrong;

You claimed that the oceans weren't warming



and I proved you wrong;

you implied (based on 7 years out of 40) that CO2 doesn't correlate with temperature



and I proved you wrong again...

I have to ask... are you a masochist?

Here it is, your cooling, sweeping in as a red tide



You're depressing...

 

[TrueSceptic]

The answer appears to be "No".

The earlier one seems to be from Joe D'Aleo at ICECAP, which I'd call a blog.

It can't be too hard for DR to tell us, can it?

 

[mhaze]

Yes, I noticed this yesterday. We are drifting away from the OP towards discussing the science, or at least what GWS claim is the science, and I played a part in this. If we're not careful this will look like most other GW threads.

Indeed it might!

Hockey Stick Debunked:

A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-treering proxies
(Energy & Environment 18(7-8): 1049-1058, 2007)
- C. Loehle

Comment on "The Spatial Extent of 20th-Century Warmth in the Context of the Past 1200 Years"
(Science, Vol. 316. no. 5833, p. 1844, 29 June 2007)
- Gerd Bürger

Corrections to the Mann et al (1998) Proxy Data Base and Northern Hemisphere Average Temperature Series
(Energy & Environment, Volume 14, Number 6, pp. 751-771, 1 November 2003)
- Stephen McIntyre, Ross McKitrick

Highly variable Northern Hemisphere temperatures reconstructed from low- and high-resolution proxy data
(Nature 433, 613-617, 10 February 2005)
- Anders Moberg, Dmitry M. Sonechkin, Karin Holmgren, Nina M. Datsenko and Wibjörn Karlén

Hockey sticks, principal components, and spurious significance
(Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 32, L03710, 2005)
- Stephen McIntyre, Ross McKitrick

Proxy climatic and environmental changes of the past 1000 years
(Climate Research, Vol. 23: 89–110, 2003)
- Willie Soon, Sallie Baliunas

Reply to comment by Huybers on "Hockey sticks, principal components, and spurious significance"
(Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 32, L20715, 2005)
- Stephen McIntyre, Ross McKitrick

Reply to comment by von Storch and Zorita on "Hockey sticks, principal components, and spurious significance"
(Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 32, L20714, 2005)
- Stephen McIntyre, Ross McKitrick

The M&M Critique of the MBH98 Northern Hemisphere Climate Index: Update and Implications
(Energy & Environment, Volume 16, Number 1, pp. 69-100, January 2005)
- Stephen McIntyre, Ross McKitrick

 

[Round Robin]

The IPCC cherry picked the research that fit their agenda. Further, the authors of the chapters in many cases used their own work as evidence and ignored competing research, or simply ignored any research that conflicted with their conclusions.

That is a bold and serious claim. Do you have evidence to defend this statement? I'm sincerely curious; I've heard this claim made frequently, but never with attribution.

 

[Megalodon]

That is a bold and serious claim. Do you have evidence to defend this statement? I'm sincerely curious; I've heard this claim made frequently, but never with attribution.

No, you won't get any evidence for that... This is the typical insult that is made by denialists to a whole class of professionals: corruption, conspiracy and incompetence.

Yet, when I point out that they're idiots, they try to claim the high ground... go figure...

 

[Megalodon]

What is R2, and why is it so important? I'm not much cop at statistics.

R^2 is the coefficient of determination, and basically it tells you how much of the yy variation can be explained by xx, in this case assuming a linear model.

In the case of my CO2vsTemp graph, 70% of the temperature variation can be explained by the CO2 changes.

Of course, correlation is not necessarily causation, but just telling it will not prove anything.

Also, in a caothic system is very easy to pick small chunks of data and "prove" anything. And apparently, Dave is grasping at someone that knows that very well...

 

[TrueSceptic]

That is a bold and serious claim. Do you have evidence to defend this statement? I'm sincerely curious; I've heard this claim made frequently, but never with attribution.

Sadly, you have to treat the claims of GW Sceptics/Denialists/Contrarians (pick whichever you prefer) in much the same way you would treat the claims of paranormal practitioners, CT fanatics*, and Creationists:-

1. Assume they are dishonest until you know otherwise;
2. Assume they are delusional until you know otherwise;
3. Assume they are incompetent until you know otherwise.

You aren't left with much after going through those filters.

*Most GWS have to assume some conspiracy somewhere.

 

[mhaze]

That is a bold and serious claim. Do you have evidence to defend this statement? I'm sincerely curious; I've heard this claim made frequently, but never with attribution.

http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/p...olicy_general/000318chris_landsea_leaves.html

Chris Landsea's letter of resignation from the IPCC may be of interest.

 

[Round Robin]

http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/p...olicy_general/000318chris_landsea_leaves.html

Chris Landsea's letter of resignation from the IPCC may be of interest.

Thank you for the link; I was only superficially familiar with this incident, and am glad to have read his letter. My understanding--confirmed by reading his actual letter--was that he was concerned about the public comments of a single individual (Kevin Trenberth) regarding the impact of AGW on increased hurricane activity. This is an issue that, as I understand it, is still a topic of research and debate(?). Trenberth was making some non-scientific statements (declaring an opinion rather than describing the state of research) and did not identify his comments as his own; because he was invited to speak as a contributor to the IPCC, his comments could be misconstrued as speaking for the IPCC rather than his own personal opinions. Is that a fair representation of the event?

I would agree that individuals should identify when they are speaking their opinion rather than the current consensus (if there is one in this case), but I don't see how this incident pollutes the entirety of the IPCC. This was the word of a scientist outside of his work on the IPCC.

And indeed, Trenberth's personal opinion did not seem to affect the IPCC's discussion of correlations (if any) between AGW and hurricane activity. Even Roger Pielke acknowledged the balance of the final report on this issue:

"Despite the pressures, on tropical cyclones they figured out a way to maintain consistency with the actual balance of opinion(s) in the community of relevant experts." [...] "So there might be a human contribution (and presumably this is just to the observed upwards trends observed in some basins, and not to downward trends observed in others, but this is unclear) but the human contribution itself has not been quantitatively assessed, yet the experts, using their judgment, expect it to be there. In plain English this is what is called a 'hypothesis' and not a 'conclusion.' And it is a fair representation of the issue."

Admittedly, this is a cursory analysis that I did in only about 15 minutes: reading your link and searching for additional information. I'm likely missing something because this does not seem to suggest that the final IPCC report was in any way not a balanced reporting of the current research. Nor does this controversy and its outcome confirm any political bias or cherry-picking of data.

 

[steverino]

For you warm-mongers out there, I found this enlightening:

 

[jimbob]

As this seems to have degenerated into a discussion as to whether there is any warming:

here is a graph I did earlier:

I am still using excel 5 at home so it is a little awkward, but here it is:

Target at LTA:

Target 0.22°C below LTA, seems to roughly usual temperature until 1920's

Target 0.225°C above LTA:
Around about the 1980's, but now is warmer

ETA: these were the 1-year average temperatures.


and here is the raw data, doesn't really need a cusum:

ETA2, except that it does show when the temperature was running at particular "typicals"

 

[mhaze]

Sadly, you have to treat the claims of GW Sceptics/Denialists/Contrarians (pick whichever you prefer) in much the same way you would treat the claims of paranormal practitioners, CT fanatics*, and Creationists:-

1. Assume they are dishonest until you know otherwise;
2. Assume they are delusional until you know otherwise;
3. Assume they are incompetent until you know otherwise.

You aren't left with much after going through those filters.

*Most GWS have to assume some conspiracy somewhere.

If you keep practicing, you may get good at producing propaganda (science...nope!).

Meanwhile in the real world -

2008 International Conference on Climate Change, Speaker Bio's

 

[steverino]

We're screwed:

 

[TrueSceptic]

As this seems to have degenerated into a discussion as to whether there is any warming:

here is a graph I did earlier:

These GW threads always end up like this (sigh).

This is supposed to be about GWS claims and behaviour. I refer you back to the OP.