GISS record changes

Changes? Well hardly. Apparently the shocking "dog bites man" story of minuscule changes in GISS global anomaly data is making the rounds on denier sites.

A poster here embedded the copy/pasted accusation in an off topic thread, it goes thus:

Looks like Hansen/GISS is up to their old tricks;

Here are the June global temperature anomaly comparisons:

GISS .63C

RSS .075

UAH .001

GISS is way above the other two, but it does not end there apparently 2007 has now replaced 1998 as the second hottest year on record this was achieved not by rigorous scientific study and evaluation but by sleight of hand an the part of GISS.

This has been achieved by lowering the 1998 J-D average temperature anomaly to 0.56 , and raising the 2007 J-D average temperature anomaly to 0.57. Last month they were viceversa.

This of course would give the impression that global temps are ever increasing keeping Hansen et al in a job. One day people like Hansen will be called to account for their actions, i hope i live long enough to see that day.

He asks

how can GISS change the temp of a year, 11 years after the
fact. Also how can GISS have June anomoly at 0.63 a whole 0.55 above
RSS and .629 above UAH? Surely GISS must be in error.

Firstly about the insinuation of fraud in the name of giving of an impression of greater warming. Here's the current temperature record from GISS's website:

Now here's a close up of the last few years before and after the new adjustment:

Before After

Shocking. (Yes, they are identical pictures did anyone expect a 0.01oC to show?). So, conspiracy theorists would have us believe NASA scientists are manipulating the data in a way that does not show, not telling anyone about and...what exactly? This is supposed to restore NASA GISS's slashed funding?

But why would they change the temperature reading of a year eleven years after the fact? Let's not forget that this record is not taken from some giant global thermometer, the reading recorded year by year, written on a piece of paper and then put in a drawer. This is a complicated reconstruction made from thousands of data sources, subject to active research and the algorithms that turn it into a table of anomalies is constantly being scrutinized and refined. Why would anyone expect that it would not change as improvements are made?

One of the other questions was why is GISS so much higher. Well, I have not verified this claim, this may be an apples to oranges comparison, preliminary numbers, incomplete data filled in with estimates, I have no idea. But one thing to remember about the GISS record is that it is the only one that includes the arctic, which is one of the fastest warming regions in the world.

I wonder how our poster knows there was no rigorous study involved, but rather it is "sleight of hand"? He doesn't, of course. It is pure paranoia (if he believes it himself). I recall a lot of yelling when NASA adjusted a temperature down.

Up or down, it is all part of the plot!

More like this

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The latest story doing the rounds of the global warming deniers (Drudge, Instapundit, Andrew Bolt, Tim Blair etc ), is this one Michael Asher: Scientists quoted in a past DailyTech article link the cooling to reduced solar activity which they claim is a much larger driver of climate change than man…
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Every month NASA GISS comes out with the new data for the prior month's global surface temperature, and I generally grab that data set and make a graph or two. In a way this is a futile effort because the actual global surface temperature month by month is not as important as the long term trend.…

One of the other questions was why is GISS so much higher. Well, I have not verified this claim, this may be an apples to oranges comparison, preliminary numbers, incomplete data filled in with estimates, I have no idea.

Different base periods:

GISTEMP: 1951-1980
RSS & UAH: 1979-1998
Hadcrut: 1961-1990

Different base periods

Which Watts - and most of his followers - hilariously believe effects the trend.

They don't understand that (t1-B) - (t0 - B) = t1 - t0 regardless of B(aseline).
.

And which they have already so often mistaken (ie the different baselines) that you like to call for a doctor to get their minds checked.

Citation Anthony-there-is-a-problem-with-the-thermometer-Whatts
"I was surprised to learn that only 5% of the GISS data-set was on the cool side of zero, while a whopping 95% was on the warm side. Even with a rising temperature trend, this seems excessive.

When the distribution of data is so lopsided, it suggests that there may be problems with it, especially since there appears to be a 50% greater distribution on the cooler side in the HadCRUT data-set."

Hilarious, as dhogaza said.
see
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2008/03/02/whats-up-with-that/

Makes this comment of Watts rather ironic.

Reader: Fraud. Simple as that.

REPLY: Letâs not use that word. Never assign malice where simple incompetence will do. â Anthony

BTW, I have noticed during the last few weeks that Watts has repeatedly directed his readers to e-mail scientists and/or congressmen on specific issues. Is it a new tactic of his or an old habit?

BTW, I have noticed during the last few weeks that Watts has repeatedly directed his readers to e-mail scientists and/or congressmen on specific issues. Is it a new tactic of his or an old habit?

Not sure about e-mailing scientists, but he asked readers to flood their Representatives regarding the cap-and-trade bill that was voted on recently, and more recently Senators. Since the bill date has been pushed back, he'll probably lay a bit low on those requests until a bit before the committee and then floor vote dates.

RSS and UAH measure troposphere, not surface, so there may be some room for variation there too (I'm not sure).

Because RSS and UAH are satellites, I thought they also measured high latitudes, so unless I'm wrong then they also cover the Arctic.

Because RSS and UAH are satellites, I thought they also measured high latitudes, so unless I'm wrong then they also cover the Arctic.

Apparently ice reflect microwaves so there are issues with trying to create a robust temperature product for the Arctic and Antarctic.

6 and 7: Some garbling has occurred on the information path to you.

RSS and UAH are making use of the MSU and AMSU. (Isn't is wonderful we can do away with words, in favor of acronyms?) The MSU and AMSU flew/fly on polar orbiting satellites. This doesn't give them the entire globe, but they do observe fairly close to the poles (iirc, 2 degrees away). The instruments are passive microwave -- sit back in orbit and measure how much energy is coming up.

Problems for doing atmospheric temperatures by microwave are that ice is a much better emitter of microwave energy than water is, cold atmospheres let the satellite see lower into the atmosphere, and elevated ice surfaces (Greenland, Antarctica) are much higher in the atmosphere. Combine them, and ice covered surfaces under cold atmospheres are problematic. If your icy surface has also been experiencing a climate trend, as both polar regions have, then the results are seriously contaminated by that ice trend -- aliasing it in to a temperature trend.

Richard Swanson documented the problem several years ago in the Geophysical Research Letters. Spencer and Christy (UAH) have not, as of my last check, ever responded to the problem. RSS does not continue their analysis into the Antarctic (stopping at 72.5 S) and limits the Arctic to 82.5 N (it's possible that this is merely the instrument's poleward limit, I'm not as familiar with AMSU as SSMI and AMSR).

Thanks for the detailed response, I was unaware that RSS had earlier extended their analysis into the Antarctic (I was aware that UAH does and that this might one source of the difference between the two products).

And thanks for correcting me on my "reflects" faux pas. Passive microwave sensors, duh :)

Now how could you ban me Coby when i give you such great material.

I assume i have a right of reply?

Firstly i asked how could GISS change the temp figure 11 years after the fact? Judging by your response you have no idea either and thats OK i would not expect you to know it was a retorical question.

Is it scientifically based to change the historical temp record for what seems an undisclosed reason? Then run around telling the world it is getting hotter due to CO2? I would have thought since 1998 recieved such fanfare as being the hottest year, this new discovery that 2007 is now the hottest year would have recieved the same, but yet no it is changed quietly.

Secondly i asked how could GISS be over 0.5C above RSS and UAH? If we have 3 independant bodies measuring the global temps albeit from differing methods and one is considerably different from the other two then the obvious question is are they in error?

Response to Blugrue Post # 1

Agreed if the average temp for your baseline is different to another then your anomaly value will be different. This raises another issue which i did not mention in my original post which is the divergence between the 3. In other words no matter what your baseline is all 3 bodies should measure the same change in temps, maybe we could discuss this at greater length.

Post #2 dhogaza, re above, maybe this is what you are refering to? Could you please give me more detail (if you like)

In regards to post 7, dhogaza there are issues with all measuring devices, with sats they cannot or do not orbit directly over the poles so there maybe a small issue with that. With the land surface measurements the thermometers are few and far between around the poles so they suffer what is in the end a similar problem the kerfuffle over whether the Antartic is warming or not is a classic example of this.

Firstly i asked how could GISS change the temp figure 11 years after the fact? Judging by your response you have no idea either and thats OK i would not expect you to know it was a retorical question.

You have very poor reading skills, crakar. I did admit I did not know the specific reason but the general case is that this analysis is the subject of active research. Entertainment material aside, your insistence on pretending that your questions remain unanswered undermines any value your posts might have. Seriously, what is hard to understand about developing research arriving at differing results?

Is it scientifically based to change the historical temp record for what seems an undisclosed reason?

Why don't you relate to us the effort you have gone to to find out what these changes are about? Typically these things are disclosed in papers, or if they are more minor at conferences or just personal communications.

Then run around telling the world it is getting hotter due to CO2? I would have thought since 1998 recieved such fanfare as being the hottest year, this new discovery that 2007 is now the hottest year would have recieved the same, but yet no it is changed quietly.

A hallmark of paranoia, given two choices, either one confirms your pre-existing conclusion! Announce it or change it quietly, it fits in so nicely either way, right?

Secondly i asked how could GISS be over 0.5C above RSS and UAH? If we have 3 independant bodies measuring the global temps albeit from differing methods and one is considerably different from the other two then the obvious question is are they in error?

and you got your answer, which you reference below, so why is it you re ask the very same question?

In other words no matter what your baseline is all 3 bodies should measure the same change in temps

As they cover different temperatures (surface vs lower troposphere) and have different coverage of the globe, differences are to be expected. Furthermore, UAH seems to have a serious problem. That's all I can add to a meaningful discussion on this subject, I'm not an expert.

Is it scientifically based to change the historical temp record for what seems an undisclosed reason?

The denialsphere screams that the ground-based stations have issues which impact the accuracy of the ground-station temperature record.

The denialsphere screams whenever NASA GISS tweaks its algorithms used to build a robust temperature product from that imperfect data.

1. What is "undisclosed" about the need to correct for such errors, or the fact that NASA's GIStemp team's *job* is to build the temperature product they can despite being faced with such problems.

2. Don't you think it's a bit hypocritical for the denialsphere to simultaneously complain that temp stations have issues, and that NASA GISS continues to correct for detected problems in the reported data?

I cannot believe your having this discussion. Of course GISS changes the past temperatures, did any one bother to read Hansen et al (2001)? For stations that are missing any data, GISS and Hansen, rather than infilling with data by determining what the close stations are, recomputes the infilled data every time they update with new temperature. This causes past temperatures to become lower and more to date temperature to be warmer. There were also at least three major changes that I am aware of that caused major changes to the record. The Y2K bug, the switch from HAD's SST to a different one, and the redaction of some Antarctic cells.

Personally, constantly changing the past temperatures in a way that lowers them and raises the current temperature is a problem. No I am not making this up, read Hansen (2001).

It boils down to credibility.

Hansen's June 2009 temperature anomaly record was 0.63C, compared to - RSS 0.075, UAH 0.001. The difference around 0.56C of this one month is almost equal to the entire global warming in 110 years.

The fact is the GISS data keeps on changing. For example between August 05 to Sept 07 there were 4,784 "updates" affecting 24,323 months. Tens of thousands of updates! What makes it more surprising is that these updates change the trends making them steeper and GISS has always had the highest trends of any temperature records.

GISS makes many mistakes like someone noticed that the GISS Russian October 08 temperatures were very similar to the September figures. October is generally colder in Russia than September, as Napoleon found out to his cost. Then the individual noticed that the similarity was in fact exact in dozens of stations. The same temperatures were used for both the months, though for several stations the temperatures were available online. These mistakes also tend not only to raise the temperatures but also increase the trends.

Hansen did say that you would see record temperatures these next 4 years. Well June 09 does seem to be a record in GISS data.

The claim that warming stopped in 1998 raised a lot of controversy. Coby argued long and hard in http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/04/warming-stopped-in-1998.p… , which was posted in 1996, that this was in fact an optical illusion due to the unusually high 1998 temperatures due to an El Nino and that a trend of 7/8 years were too short a time to be of statistical significance. Both claims having some validity. (Now it is 11 years and that trend has not reversed).

Now however someone has come up with a hypothesis that the era of consistent record-breaking global mean temperatures will not resume until roughly 2020. A twenty year break in the records!

Of course one would expect such a hypothesis from a "denialist" website but the trouble is that the website that has hosted this hypothesis is none other than Climate Audit - which people here would hardly classify as "denialist".

This is what the hypothesis states: "We hypothesize that the established pre-1998 trend is the true forced warming signal, and that the climate system effectively overshot this signal in response to the 1997/98 El Niño. This overshoot is in the process of radiatively dissipating, and the climate will return to its earlier defined, greenhouse gas-forced warming signal."

Then he goes onto to say: "If this hypothesis is correct, the era of consistent record-breaking global mean temperatures will not resume until roughly 2020."

Boy that 1997/1998 El Niño certainly did a lot of damage if its effects are to be felt right upto 2020, 23 years! (Though there is one today also announced by NOAA, and Coby predicted somewhere that the records would be broken this year or next).

He admits that this "halt" "..appears quite marked in the HadCRUT3 data, less so in GISTEMP.." - (warmers who dispute this please note). He does not mention the satellite temperatures.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/07/warminginterrupte…

The arguments he uses are "plausible", but let us see what will happen in the next 5 years or so. If cooling takes place instead of warming, with each passing year they will seem less credible.

Both claims having some validity. (Now it is 11 years and that trend has not reversed).

Sure it did. 1999-2008 shows warming, not cooling.

Or ... the fact that changing an endpoint by one year can change the slope of the curve from negative to positive is a result of what statisticians have been saying about climate data since the standard 30-year timeframe was adopted by the WMO back in the 1950s: 9, 10, 11 years is too short to say anything about trends.

Of course one would expect such a hypothesis from a "denialist" website

Not at all, since Swanson and Tsonis aren't arguing that climate scientists are wrong about climate sensitivity to CO2. They're not denying anything. They're not suggesting the end result in say 2100 will be different than currently projected.

What they're suggesting is that the increase will show itself in a stepwise manner. That's all.

Richard -

What point, exactly, are you trying to make by referncing the work of Swanson and Tonis? The authors clearly state that they expect the longterm trend to continue, which hardly supports the claim that global warming stopped in 1998.

dhogaza,

your half right, Swanson on RC is saying that. Tsonis is saying that if the models did not show this non-warming period, who know what the climate is going to do after 2020.

When interviewed, Tsonis answered a direct question:

In your expert opinion, would you agree that the release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere via anthropogenic sources contributes to the increase in average global temperature?

Tsonis: Yes.

dhogaza,

nice bait and switch but that is not the question. Yes CO2 will cause a temperature increase due to being a GHG but that has nothing to do with the sensitivity. You do know the difference between GHG and sensitivity, so why did you attempt to mislead? Sorry, I was assuming you knew the difference, so maybe you were not trying to be misleading.

Well here is what Dr. Tsonis has to say on the issue:

From an interview on carbonpurging, which is hardly a skeptic site.

http://carbonpurging.com/blogs/mjewett/2009/04/01/exclusive-interview-w…

CP: Would a break in the mean global temperature trend suggest that anthropogenic sources are or are not the main cause of average warming global temperatures from 1880 onward?

AT: If the overall warming is due to anthropogenic sources (and not some unknown very low-frequency feature of our climate system), then a break will indicate that at this point the natural variability signal is stronger than the anthropogenic signal.

Did you miss this dhogaza?

Yes CO2 will cause a temperature increase due to being a GHG but that has nothing to do with the sensitivity.

Sensitivity is the sum of the effects of forcing by CO2 AND feedbacks, not just feedbacks.

How many thousands of times have you been told this?

a break will indicate that at this point the natural variability signal is stronger than the anthropogenic signal.

Well, yes, and that's what they argue in their paper. That's why they argue they believe that the AGW signal won't reappear until 2020. That natural variability will swamp it for another decade or so, then it will reassert itself, on and on.

So effing what?

dhogaza,

I cannot believe you at times.

Climate sensitivity: In Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports, equilibrium climate sensitivity refers to the equilibrium change in global mean near-surface air temperature that would result from a sustained doubling of the atmospheric (equivalent) CO2 concentration.

However what you quoted from Dr. Tsonis was "In your expert opinion, would you agree that the release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere via anthropogenic sources contributes to the increase in average global temperature?
Tsonis: Yes."

definition of a GHG: A gas, such as water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs), that absorbs and re-emits infrared radiation, warming the earth's surface and contributing to climate change (UNEP, 1998)

These are two different things and if you cannot tell the difference, well ... .

Climate sensitivity: In Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports, equilibrium climate sensitivity refers to the equilibrium change in global mean near-surface air temperature that would result from a sustained doubling of the atmospheric (equivalent) CO2 concentration.

Yep. Net effect of CO2 forcing + feedbacks.

Tsonis said yes, CO2 contributes to warming. He said nothing about sensitivity, i.e. the magnitude of forcing+feedback.

Adam at #19

"What point, exactly, are you trying to make by referncing the work of Swanson and Tonis?". The points are:

1. The acknowledgement that there has been stasis since 1998.

CP: "Do you agree that average global temperatures have continued to increase since 2001?"

Anastasios Tsonis (AT): "No. In fact it appears that the (average) global temperature has at least leveled off if not decreasing."

AT: "Right now we would say that the rapid warming in the 80s and 90s has stopped and we are entering a cooler regime."

This has been fiercly disputed on this blog.

2. The acknowledgement that "natural variability" can over-ride anthropogenic "CO2 forcing"

AT: "If the overall warming is due to anthropogenic sources (and not some unknown very low-frequency feature of our climate system), then a break will indicate that at this point the natural variability signal is stronger than the anthropogenic signal."

I have always said I believe this to be the case because the Earth is a highly homeostatic system and the CO2 forcing will have a negative feedback, unlike the positive feedback of all IPCC models.

3. The acknowledgement that, (horror of horrors), there is an IF to overall warming being due to anthropogenic sources AND THAT there may even be the possibility of some "UNKNOWN very low-frequency feature of our climate system" causing the warming.

4. The excuse of the El Nino of 1998 being flogged a little too much. According to NOAA there is an El Nino that is on right now even as it snows in Buenos Aires and Columbia

"The authors clearly state that they expect the longterm trend to continue, which hardly supports the claim that global warming stopped in 1998."

AT: "Right now we would say that the rapid warming in the 80s and 90s has stopped and we are entering a cooler regime."

Richard -

1. The acknowledgement that there has been stasis since 1998.

Which, even if true, is decidedly NOT the same thing as saying it stopped in 1998. The authors state they expect consistent record setting temperatures starting again after 2020. How anyone thinks this is the same thing as "global warming stopped" is beyond me.

The acknowledgement that "natural variability" can over-ride anthropogenic "CO2 forcing"

On the short-term, yes, and this is not something anyone has ever disputed. It's pretty clear the authors expect the CO2 forcing to 'reassert' itself in the long-run. As dhogaza points out, the key phrase from that quote you show is "at this point."

The acknowledgement that, (horror of horrors), there is an IF to overall warming being due to anthropogenic sources AND THAT there may even be the possibility of some "UNKNOWN very low-frequency feature of our climate system" causing the warming.

Shocker, scientist admits we don't know everything about the climate system. I can't decide, Richard, if you really just are incredibly ignorant, and honestly believe that this is the first scientist to acknowledge this, or if you know otherwise, and just ENJOY looking stupid. I suppose there's a third option, of just standard denialist incoherency of thought.

The excuse of the El Nino of 1998 being flogged a little too much. According to NOAA there is an El Nino that is on right now even as it snows in Buenos Aires and Columbia

I thought denialists were all about the natural explanations for warming. I would have thought you'd be all over El Nino being the sole cause of the 1998 record (for one dataset anyway). I guess, after all, you're not quite as predictable and boring as I expected. Well, you still make bad arguments, so at least that's comforting.

Just as a closing, I"ll leave you with this quote from them:

Electricity and magnetism are those forces of nature by which people who know nothing about electricity and magnetism can explain everything.

Substitute the words âmodes of natural climate variabilityâ for âelectricity and magnetism,â and wellâ¦, hopefully the point is made.

It's almost like they know you personally, Richard.

Adam,
How come you argue about inconsequential things and miss the essentials? You revel in definitions but fail in comprehension. What do you understand of the sentence "Right now we would say that the rapid warming in the 80s and 90s has stopped and we are entering a cooler regime."?

The main point is that CO2 is increasing but the temperatures are not going up. IPCC and other climate models do not show this. Wigley et al - 2 to 3 F by 2030, MIT R Prin et al - 5.2 C by 2100, Smith et al - 0.3 C by 2015. If their hypothesis is true then the models are wrong. The test of science is in the predictions.

Can you only cut and paste? You show a pathetic lack of originality and independent thought.

Electricity and magnetism are those forces of nature by which people who know nothing about electricity and magnetism can explain everything.

Substitute the words âclimate modelsâ for âelectricity and magnetism,â and that is not almost, but completely you Adam

climate models are those forces of nature by which people who know nothing about climate models can explain everything.

PS "I thought denialists were all about the natural explanations for warming. I would have thought you'd be all over El Nino being the sole cause of the 1998 record." Can you think of only one natural cause that there could ever be and that is El Nino? Do you have the sun where you live? Go out and bask in it. You will be astonished its warm.

4. The excuse of the El Nino of 1998 being flogged a little too much. According to NOAA there is an El Nino that is on right now even as it snows in Buenos Aires and Columbia

Don't believe everything you read at WUWT

Can you only cut and paste? You show a pathetic lack of originality and independent thought.

This coming from someone who just repeated Anthony's accidental claim that it's currently snowing in Buenos Aires.

I have always said I believe this to be the case because the Earth is a highly homeostatic system and the CO2 forcing will have a negative feedback, unlike the positive feedback of all IPCC models.

Swanson and Tsonis do not, in their paper, suggest there's a negative feedback. Go read the paper again, please, not the "understanding" of it you undoubtably got from Anthony "It's snowing in Buenos Aires as I speak!" Watts.

Do you have the sun where you live? Go out and bask in it. You will be astonished its warm.

Yeah. Climate science has ignored the sun. They don't know it exists because they were born in the very computer centers that host the computers that run the climate models, and have never been outside.

Richard Lindzen at the Heartland Institute's last anti-AGW conference: "Skeptics have to stop saying "it's the sun", it's not" (paraphrase).

Leif Svalgaard, solar physicist, denialist, and frequenter of WUWT says the same thing.

It's only ignorant people like Richard who say "it's the sun".

The issue discussed in this tread is GISS changing past temperatures. I see the alarmist are quick to ignore the facts and lead the thread off in to the bushes. The fact remains that GISS changes the past temperatures and the results of the changes adds a warming trend ALL WAYS. I happen to believe that any adjustment that actually adds a trend is the wrong methodology.

Actually, for CONUS, the total adjustments and the trend are the same which does seem significant.

Richard -

How come you argue about inconsequential things and miss the essentials? You revel in definitions but fail in comprehension. What do you understand of the sentence "Right now we would say that the rapid warming in the 80s and 90s has stopped and we are entering a cooler regime."?

My understanding of that quote is that it is the exact type of quote a denialist would choose to pretend supports their conclusion. And, lo and behold, I am correct.

More seriously, the only thing I ever heard from denialists regarding "global warming stopped in 1998" was either the implicit or explicit suggestion that we are entering a period of global cooling. This is decidedly NOT what Swanson and Tonis are saying.
"...the rapid warming in the 80s and 90s has stopped.. entering a cooler regime."

If their hypothesis is true then the models are wrong. The test of science is in the predictions.

And if their hypothesis is wrong, will you suddenly turn around and proclaim confidence in the models? Somehow, I doubt that.

Can you think of only one natural cause that there could ever be and that is El Nino? Do you have the sun where you live? Go out and bask in it. You will be astonished its warm.

Wow, this was particularly astonishing to me. I have never claimed that there is only one cause to anything regarding the climate, and did so in this instance only to mock those who do. I'm also a little confused by your "You will be astonished its warm." comment. I admit to not understanding what your point of saying that is. I suspect you're trying to be clever, and failing miserably at it, but you can never be too sure.

The fact remains that GISS changes the past temperatures and the results of the changes adds a warming trend ALL WAYS.

Not true, the error McI found and that was subsequently corrected for by GISS moved recent temps down a bit.

I happen to believe that any adjustment that actually adds a trend is the wrong methodology.

So if one of the sources of raw data comes to GISS with data for missing stations that hadn't been communicated in the past, or corrected data that's been found in error, etc, GISS should just ignore that?

Dumb.

Vernom

The issue discussed in this tread is GISS changing past temperatures. I see the alarmist are quick to ignore the facts and lead the thread off in to the bushes.

Considering it was Richard who first brought up the Swanson and Tonis paper in comment #16, I will accept your apology and enjoy watching you accuse your fellow denialist of "ignoring the facts and leading us off into the bushes."

Aside from that, you are quite correct and good on you to refocus the thread.

The fact remains that GISS changes the past temperatures and the results of the changes adds a warming trend ALL WAYS.

There has always been a warming trend in the GISTEMP data. The "BIG SCARY NUMBER" of changes that Richard identifies doesn't change the overall trend meaningfully.

On another note, as dhogaza already said in #13
"Don't you think it's a bit hypocritical for the denialsphere to simultaneously complain that temp stations have issues, and that NASA GISS continues to correct for detected problems in the reported data?"

Yes, yes I do.

4. The excuse of the El Nino of 1998 being flogged a little too much. According to NOAA there is an El Nino that is on right now even as it snows in Buenos Aires and Columbia

Richard, I recommend you reread WUWT. The reports are from 2007. All of them. It's in the small print and the linked articles.

The reports are from 2007.

Watts originally posted without the "flashback: 2007" note. Says he meant to but the article showed up accidently because he doesn't know how to use the scheduling feature.

Personally, given his track record, I'm reasonably certain that he didn't realize he'd found reports from 2007, and his explanation is an exercise in saving face.

Regardless, he sure got Richard, didn't he? (snicker)

dhogaza,

Coby says your a valued contributer to this site, so how does willful misrepresentation and name calling contribute? I find you very disingenuous.

I am sure your not stupid, but that last post of yours is questionable. There are two classes of changes that GISS makes, one time corrections and monthly. I specifically am talking about Hansen (2001) and the monthly changes specified there and you pop up with the only one time change that ever lower the present temperatures.

You further say

So if one of the sources of raw data comes to GISS with data for missing stations that hadn't been communicated in the past, or corrected data that's been found in error, etc, GISS should just ignore that?
Dumb.

I feel like I am talking to the intentionally stupid. What I said and what is in Hansen (2001) is:

For stations that are missing any data, GISS and Hansen, rather than infilling with data by determining what the close stations are, recomputes the infilled data every time they update with new temperature. This causes past temperatures to become lower and more to date temperature to be warmer.

Further, Hansen (2001) clearly shows (try page 18) that Hansen's methodology for doing that missing data adjustment adds a warming trend, which I feel cannot be the correct way to infill past temperature data.

You cannot deal with Hansen's actual study so you set up a straw-man to take cheap shots at me. No where did I say that they should ignore missing data.

So how about you stop the straw-men and red-herrings and point out where I am wrong on how GISS and Hansen constantly adjust the past temperature in a way that addes a warming trend.

Here's Hansen 2001 or at least the only relevant paper I can find.

Show me where it says this, please:

For stations that are missing any data, GISS and Hansen, rather than infilling with data by determining what the close stations are, recomputes the infilled data every time they update with new temperature. This causes past temperatures to become lower and more to date temperature to be warmer.

Don't rehash *your* understanding of what's being said, we already know you have a remarkable almost Wattsian ability to read "black" where "white" is written.

And don't rehash CA or other denialist cruft.

Show me where, in the paper, it says this.

"Swanson and Tsonis do not, in their paper, suggest there's a negative feedback." True, I never said they did. I do and I said it. Which would explain why temperatures are not increasing despite CO2 rising.

Even if snowing in Buenos Aires is wrong that is merely a mistake in current news - doesnt change temperature facts which are Satellite temps for June show it to be lower than the 1998-2008 average.

Not a mistake in understanding something technical or scientific Dhogaza #7 "Apparently ice reflect microwaves so there are issues with trying to create a robust temperature product for the Arctic and Antarctic"

True, I never said they did. I do and I said it. Which would explain why temperatures are not increasing despite CO2 rising.

Swanson and Tsonis undermine your hypothesis. Why would you reference it at all, then?

Even if snowing in Buenos Aires is wrong that is merely a mistake in current news - doesnt change temperature facts which are Satellite temps for June show it to be lower than the 1998-2008 average.

Love that 1998, dontcha!

Not a mistake in understanding something technical or scientific Dhogaza

And my response to being corrected after making a boneheaded statement (I knew they were passive sensors)?

And thanks for correcting me on my "reflects" faux pas. Passive microwave sensors, duh :)

I won't repeat my error over and over and over again, unlike most of those who pollute the denialsphere.

That's the difference between seeking knowledge and denialism...

"Richard Lindzen at the Heartland Institute's last anti-AGW conference: "Skeptics have to stop saying "it's the sun", it's not" (paraphrase)." How come Richard Lindzen has become your great authority then?

Richard Lindzen did caution sceptics from believing only one chief cause like the sun for the recent global warming. But then unlike you I am not obliged to believe something that is a consensus view at a meeting. We all believe, looking at the evidence, that the explanation that "CO2 done it" doesnt add up - there has to be some other explanation. Richard Lindzen is an eminent climate scientist and he may well be right. I favour the sun and I will post on it when I have time in reply to Adam on the CO2 blog.

"Swanson and Tsonis .. Why would you reference it at all..?

Fact CO2 is rising temperatures are not.

Swanson and Tsonis explanation 1998 El Nino caused temperatures to overshoot the mark now it will take 22 years to get back to the real CO2 warming.

Me 22 years? Oh my gosh! There could be another explanation negative feedback. Possible? Probable? If not why not?

Fact CO2 is rising temperatures are not.

As I said, unlike denialists, I won't repeat my error over and over and over again.

Richard -

Swanson and Tsonis explanation 1998 El Nino caused temperatures to overshoot the mark now it will take 22 years to get back to the real CO2 warming.

Me 22 years? Oh my gosh! There could be another explanation negative feedback. Possible? Probable? If not why not?

So you reference it because it doesn't support your ideas at all? That makes no sense. Besides, if you're going to claim that we're going to see 22 years of temperature stasis, you need to explain it a little more. What is this negative feedback? Why does it last only 22 years? And, importantly, what is the evidence of this feedback? Just loudly proclaiming something doesn't make it true.

Adam,

Though I have done engineering, I sometimes write science lessons for my mum, who is a schoolteacher. Even her 12/13 year olds understand simple concepts, but you just dont seem to get it sometimes.

I dont reference it because it doesnt support my ideas. I reference it because the paper gives a hypothesis to explain the lack of warming in the last decade, despite the increase in CO2.

They clearly admit that warming has "paused", been "interrupted", call it what you will.

Professor Anastasios Tsonis could not be more clear when he replied in answer to the question "Do you agree that average global temperatures have continued to increase since 2001?" that "No. In fact it appears that the (average) global temperature has at least leveled off if not decreasing."

That is why I have referenced it.

This is the fact that has to be addressed. Temperatures have not gone up, CO2 has.

They have their own explanation - the El Nino of 1998 causing temperatures to overshoot the mark.

I have my explanation - negative feedback.

I did not say that the negative feedback lasts for only 22 years.

They hypothesised that the effects of the El Nino would last for 22 years, and the temperature would resume after that. Which I find hard to believe, as there is an El Nino on right now so why should the El Nino of 1998 have such a long lasting effect.

I say that negative feedback is an inherent quality of our climatic system. It will always be there.

Do you understand now? If not I give up, let someone else who may have understood explain it to you.

Richard,

I think i understand the confusion between you and Adam, let me explain in more detail.

In essence the IPCC's version of the AGW theory states that if CO2 increases the oceans and land will warm, this warming will increase evaporation or water vapour among other things (methane etc). The atmospheric WV content will increase and no it will not lead to more rain and simply be "washed out" this is explained in Chapter 9 AR4. As the WV increases so will the temps causing more evaporation and CO2 to leave the oceans as they warm even more.

The warming of the oceans will also cause ice to melt (read Arctic ice extent) reducing the albedo of the planet and also increasing the WV in the atmosphere and so the process goes on as by now i am sure we are all well aware.

Now this is the important bit so listen carefully, the IPCC version of the AGW theory does not allow for -ve feedbacks, in other words there is no mechanism that will cause the temps to stabalise or even fall.

The only way the temps can fall is if CO2 is reduced hence the cap 'n' trade schemes that are so popular nowadays.

So here is are conundrum CO2 levels are increasing and yet the temps are not (after ten years at least) as the theory does not allow for this a new theory is needed to patch up the old one. The question is what could be causing the temps to not rise?

The popular theory is the its only weather which i would agree with except 10 years is a lot of weather then of course you have the more extravagant ones about AGW hiding in the shadows only to return when we least expect it. The bottom line is that the IPCC's version of AGw does not allow for these temps not rising and that should be the only topic being discussed not flights of fancy about what "might happen in 2020" or whatever the latest stab in the dark is.

So here is are conundrum CO2 levels are increasing and yet the temps are not (after ten years at least)

Once again, temperature has risen over the last ten years.

You, too, have forgotten that 1998 is 11, not 10, years ago.

You, too, need to learn that cherry-picking is a two-way street.

You, too, need to learn that if you can change the slope of a "trend" from positive to negative by changing an end point by a single year, THEN IT IS NOT A TREND.

The bottom line is that the IPCC's version of AGw does not allow for these temps not rising

The technical description for claims such as this one is ... TOTAL BULLSHIT.

Nothing in the so-called IPCC version of AGW states that noise in the climate signal will magically stop due to our adding CO2 in the atmosphere.

I'm sure you've been told that 100s of times.

Coby, stuff like this is a total waste of everyone's time. The posting of a strawmen version of climate science is not a "discussion of the science".

But dhogaza, that doesn't appear to be what Vernon is saying. He says that the IPCC version does not allow for -ve feedbacks. He isn't talking about noise.

Is he right or wrong on this point? Just asking.

But dhogaza, that doesn't appear to be what Vernon is saying. He says that the IPCC version does not allow for -ve feedbacks. He isn't talking about noise.

He doesn't acknowledge the existence or possibility of noise, otherwise he wouldn't state "The bottom line is that the IPCC's version of AGw does not allow for these temps not rising".

Regardless of negative feedbacks (and of course he's wrong about that, too), in a noisy system we expect flat intervals, declining intervals, etc as well as intervals that rise much more quickly than the trend etc.

Do you think that as soon as we enter a one year accelerated warming period due to El Niño crakar will suddenly say "OH MY GOD IT'S THREE TIMES AS BAD AS THE IPCC SAYS!"?

Naw, suddenly crakar will know all about noise imposed on a trend.

I take your point, dhogaza, but at the risk of sounding repetitive could I raise once more Vernon's specific point about -ve feedback. Does the IPCC version allow for it or doesn't it?

Richard -

I say that negative feedback is an inherent quality of our climatic system. It will always be there.

Yes, this is true. The important question, however, is not whether they are present, but how significant they are and whether they are greater than the anthropogenic forcing + positive feedbacks. I've seen no evidence that they are, so if you are in possession of some, please share it with us. Rereading my previous comment (#47), I realize I was not fully clear about this, so my apologies for that.

Which I find hard to believe, as there is an El Nino on right now so why should the El Nino of 1998 have such a long lasting effect.

Just like anything else, not all El Niño or La Niña periods are the same. They vary in strength, and the one in 1998 was particularly strong (1983 was strong also).
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ensocycle/soi…

Crakar -

Most of what you say is usually pretty ignorant, but I do admit to a light-hearted chuckle (as opposed to the usual contemptuous snort or guffaw) when I read this:

... then of course you have the more extravagant ones about AGW hiding in the shadows only to return when we least expect it.

Other than that, dhogaza adequately skewered your argument, though I imagine you'll keep repeating it ad infinitum. If only we could harvest denialist ignorance as a clean energy source, all our problems would be solved.

I take your point, dhogaza, but at the risk of sounding repetitive could I raise once more Vernon's specific point about -ve feedback. Does the IPCC version allow for it or doesn't it?

For starters, there's no "IPCC" version, just like there's no "IPCC version of quantum mechanics". The IPCC exists to SUMMARIZE the underlying science as done by researchers around the world.

So, then, you're asking, I guess, if climate scientists accept that there might be negative feedbacks to increased warming.

I think you know the answer without being told.

So, for those who really think climate scientists, including those who write models, don't consider negative feedbacks, if true, why would people like Gavin Schmidt write (about feedbacks in general):

A positive feedback occurs when a change in one component of the climate occurs, leading to other changes that eventually âfeeds backâ on the original change to amplify it. The classic ones in climate are the ice-albedo feedback (melting ice reduces the reflectivity of the surface, leading to more solar absorption, more warming and hence more melting) and the water vapour feedback (as air temperatures rise, water vapour amounts increase, and due to the greenhouse effect of the vapour, this leads to more warming), but there are lots of other examples. Of course, there are plenty of negative feedbacks as well (the increase in long wave radiation as temperatures rise or the reduction in atmospheric poleward heat flux as the equator-to-pole gradient decreases) and these (in the end) are dominant (having kept Earthâs climate somewhere between boiling and freezing for about 4.5 billion years and counting)

Of course there are plenty of negative feedbacks ...

See?

Sheesh.

Well dhogaza, credit where credit is due: that strikes me as a pretty good answer. Are you happy with that Vernon?

Richard:

"I have always said I believe this to be the case because the Earth is a highly homeostatic system and the CO2 forcing will have a negative feedback"

Can you provide any evidence to support this? Also, can you explain how your evidence (which you do have, right?) reconciles with the existing body of empirical evidence indicating that climate sensitivity is moderately high i.e. 2.5-4.5oC?

dhogaza,

I do not really care for the character attack, [...] read the post your answering that ends with....

Posted by: crakar14 | July 20, 2009 12:33 AM

[coby here: yes it seems your name got attached to Richard's comment. I take it you have no trouble acknowledging the mainstream view represented by the IPCC does in fact allow for the existence of negative feedbacks? Richard, care to give up on a defeated talking point?]

Sorry, Vernon, I got confused by Snowman's post:

I take your point, dhogaza, but at the risk of sounding repetitive could I raise once more Vernon's specific point about -ve feedback. Does the IPCC version allow for it or doesn't it?

I didn't bother to check to make sure he had his facts right. Given that snowman's been trying hard recently to have a productive discussion, I won't make any snarky observations about that :)

Adam #54, yeah i thought it was good one aswell, i am glad i could brighten up your day.

Dhogaza, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008. Yep thats ten years alright.

I call it the IPCC's version of AGW due to Pough's legitimate complaint awhile ago. It is the IPCC's version because they not only summerize scientific work from paid employees but they also make predictions on the future state of the climate and from this they form policy statements for political parties. So yes it is the IPCC's version of AGW as opposed to the one from 100 years ago.

Who is Gavin Schmit? is he a paid employee of the IPCC? Does he take part in the drafting of IPCC reports? Does his theory of negative feedbacks appear in any IPCC litrature?If not then what he has to say, whilst maybe informative is not relavent to the point i raised and just to repeat, the IPCC theory does not allow for temps to fall if CO2 is increasing.

So why dont you run off and find a negative feedback from increased CO2 in the IPCC litrature that can explain the examples given below.

You mention noise why? Did i mention noise? According to the theory as the CO2 has been increasing for the past 10 years so to has the WV and the ice has been melting why have we not seen the temps rising, why have we seen the ocean temps not rising, why have we seen sea levels begin to flatten out.

Now you can call me names and insult me or you can even point to a non IPCC theory about why this is happenning OR you can try and explain why according to the IPCC version of AGW none of this should be happenning.

I mention nothing of trends so your end point fallacy has no basis here.

Yes Vernon i agree dhogaza does owe you an appology.

Richard, care to give up on a defeated talking point?]

Oh, and Coby, it was actually crakar who made that specific comment.

I know, I know, it's hard to keep 'em all straight at times...

Coby,

I have no problem with the idea that IPCC has both positive and negative feedbacks. What I disagree with is the sensitivity they have. I cannot see anyway that climate drivers as listed in the IPCC reports could ever go from the 280ppm to glaciation. Hunt did some work in 2005 with climate models and found that they could not do the mwp or lia:

It was therefore concluded that these fluctuations were generated by stochastic processes intrinsic to the nonlinear climatic system. While a number of characteristics of the MWP and the LIA could have been partially caused by natural processes within the climatic system, the inability of the model to reproduce the observed hemispheric mean temperature anomalies associated with these events indicates that external forcing must have been involved. Essentially the unforced climatic system is unable to sustain the generation of long-term climatic anomalies.

Or

Why there is a climate driver which has not been identified that will overcome warming till 2020 as being discussed on RC.

It is the IPCC's version because they not only summerize scientific work from paid employees but they also make predictions on the future state of the climate and from this they form policy statements for political parties...

Who is Gavin Schmit? is he a paid employee of the IPCC?

So the Man Who Would Overturn Climate Science and hates the IPCC doesn't even know what the IPCC is or how it does its work.

And doesn't even know who Gavin Schmidt is.

This is hilarious.

Crakar, this is perhaps the most revealing post you've ever made (and you were nearly naked before having made it).

You mention noise why? Did i mention noise? According to the theory as the CO2 has been increasing for the past 10 years so to has the WV and the ice has been melting why have we not seen the temps rising, why have we seen the ocean temps not rising, why have we seen sea levels begin to flatten out.

And, no, you did not mention noise. That's the point. You don't acknowledge its existence, probably because you don't know what it is in the statistical sense. If you did, you'd realize your statement's ... a bit off the mark.

Vernon:

Why there is a climate driver which has not been identified that will overcome warming till 2020 as being discussed on RC.

Well, the two people making the claim that warming will be stalled until 2020 DO NOT SUGGEST THAT THERE IS AN UNKNOWN CLIMATE DRIVER.

They're talking about HOW THE SYSTEM RESPONDS TO THE EXTRA ENERGY PUT INTO IT AS CO2 INCREASES.

Swanson, at RC, complains about how his paper is being misused by people like you. It is clear that he wishes people like you would not do that. So ... STOP.

The system, in this case, is mostly ocean and atmosphere.

Crakar -

You should pursue a career in comedy; the field of data analysis is apparently not your strong suite.

why have we seen sea levels begin to flatten out?

Here's a plot showing the, ahem, 'flat' sea level rise:
http://sealevel.colorado.edu/current/sl_noib_global.jpg

why have we seen the ocean temps not rising
'Static' Ocean temps:
http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/heat_content55-07.png

why have we not seen the temps rising
Sigh. Just sigh. We've been over this one so many times already, and I don't want my comment to get stuck in moderation with a 3rd link, so I'm not even going to bother. See dhogaza's post #50.

I mention nothing of trends so your end point fallacy has no basis here.

This actually hurt my brain. If you don't care about the trend, how are you making any rational, coherent statements about whether temperatures are increasing, decreasing or staying the same? You've made the claim "why have we seen the ocean temps not rising?" This is an assertion about the temperature trend!!!! So, no, dhogaza's point is decidedly not a fallacy. In fact, it's the most important part of the whole discussion on temperature trends, and is one of the reasons why you need 20+ years to make a statistically valid claims about the trend. If you can significantly change the trend by changing one end point, you're looking at something dominated by noise, NOT the true trend of the data.

Adam,

You better buy a clue dude. Did you just miss the part about recent and then point to a trend from 1993 to the present? Duh.

Cazenave et al (2008)
sciences.blogs.liberation.fr/home/files/Cazenave_et_al_GPC_2008.pdf
This can be summarized as follows: since 2003, sea level has continued to rise but with a rate (of 2.5 +/â0.4 mm/yr) somewhat reduced compared to the 1993â2003 decade (3.1+/
â0.4 mm/yr).

Ablain et al (2009)
www.ocean-sci-discuss.net/6/31/2009/osd-6-31-2009.html
These new calculations highlight a reduction in the rate of sea level rise since 2005, by ~2 mm/yr. This represents a 60% reduction compared to the 3.3 mm/yr sea level rise (glacial isostatic adjustment correction applied) measured between 1993 and 2005.

Better try next time. Odd, that warming stops and sea level accelerated rise goes away.

Temperature trends (Least squares trend line) 2001 â 2009

HAD -0.011 (June not in yet)
RSS -0.017
UAH -0.014

GIS -0.001

Looks like cooling to me.

Vernon is back to cherry picking. Why did you choose 2001 as your starting date Vernon?

How many times do you have to be told that cherry picking is dishonest?

Why don't you take some elementary statistics courses? [...]

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 20 Jul 2009 #permalink

If Anthony Watts were to have a sex-change operation, his weather-forecast broadcasts might look like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32YKaPxAxwA

Fast-forward 1:35 into the video to catch the Anthony-Watts display of brainpower.

By caerbannog (not verified) on 20 Jul 2009 #permalink

Vernon's funny. After his denialist supporter Snowman misled me into thinking it was he, rather than someone else, who doesn't understand statistics, causing Vernon to complain, and gathering an apology from me...

Vernon posts his total ignorance which makes clear why Snowman confused him with another statistical illiterate.

Rock on, Vernon!!!

Crakar -

I come back to what I thought was some semblance of a discussion along orderly trains of thought to find absolute chaos here.

I thought I was fairly clear in what I said. Your attempt to clear the confusion between me and Adam, before even waiting for his reply, though laudable, seems to have added more confusion to the mix.

If clearing of confusion was what you wanted to do, you do not seem to have succeeded in your objective.

Snowman,

âI take your point, dhogaza, but at the risk of sounding repetitive could I raise once more Vernon's specific point about -ve feedback. Does the IPCC version allow for it or doesn't it?â

Alas you too seem to have added to the confusion. If you make a search on this page for "negative feedback", Vernon hasnât mentioned it, I raised it at #27, âI have always said I believe this to be the case because the Earth is a highly homeostatic system and the CO2 forcing will have a negative feedback, unlike the positive feedback of all IPCC models.â.

Perhaps you meant to say Richard instead of Vernon?

Then the question raised perhaps should be what are the feedbacks for CO2 forcing? Not whether they allow for negative feedbacks. The answer - All IPCC climate models have positive feedbacks for CO2 forcing. Every single one of them.

Paul H,

I have always said I believe this to be the case because the Earth is a highly homeostatic system and the CO2 forcing will have a negative feedback

"Can you provide any evidence to support this?"

Yes please look at my post #48. CO2 rising - temperature not - can be explained by negative feedback of the climatic system to CO2 forcing.

"Also, can you explain how your evidence (which you do have, right?) reconciles with the existing body of empirical evidence indicating that climate sensitivity is moderately high i.e. 2.5-4.5oC?"

You are perhaps confusing IPCC climate model projections for emperical evidence.

The existing body of emperical evidence does not indicate that climate sensitivity is moderately high i.e. 2.5-4.5oC.

The existing body of emperical evidence says that our current rate of temperature increase, (UAH for the past 30 years) is around 0.126C/decade. We have only about 7 to 8 decades left for CO2 to reach 560 ppm, where climate sensitivity is defined.

So the existing body of emperical evidence does not support the IPCC model.

The answer - All IPCC climate models have positive feedbacks for CO2 forcing. Every single one of them.

Of course, they have both positive and negative feedbacks.

Why should they ignore physics that don't agree with your deeply-held, unscientific, ideological beliefs?

I have always said I believe this to be the case because the Earth is a highly homeostatic system and the CO2 forcing will have a negative feedback

Yes, you've always said that we're living on snowball earth, and the only reason we don't recognize it is because of the LSD in our water.

This is *perhaps* the stupidest statement by any denialist I've ever seen...

The existing body of emperical evidence says that our current rate of temperature increase, (UAH for the past 30 years)

You're really claiming that USH is the only existing body of empirical evidence?

Even though they've been forced to admit error several times in the past, and just today Christy admits that their annual cycle of lower anomaly in summer is a real problem they need to address?

So the existing body of emperical evidence does not support the IPCC model.

There is not "IPCC model".

Good effing deity ...

Richard,

I'm not trying to be snarky but this doesn't make sense:

"I have always said I believe this to be the case because the Earth is a highly homeostatic system and the CO2 forcing will have a negative feedback"

Specifically, you say that "the CO2 forcing will have a negative feedback", which makes no sense. The CO2 forcing is a perturbation to a system and not the system itself, the system, the Earth's climate has feedbacks, but CO2 forcing having feedback? No. Perhaps you could clarify what you're trying to say? Do you mean that the climate system has negative feedbacks, or do really mean you think that the climate system has more negative feedbacks than positive and that climate sensitivity is low?

You direct me to your post #48 which you suggest provides evidence of temperatures not rising. You cite a quote from Tsonis regarding 2001. Can you verify that there is a statistically significant trend in temperatures from 2001 to present. This is a good test as to whether you're over-interpreting noise in the data or not. In fact, let me save you the bother: the trend is insignificant. You say that this is proof of low climate sensitivity. Can you show your workings for how you determine this? I.e where is your evidence of a significant cooling trend? How are you able to attribute the change in GHG forcing over 7.5 years to your statistically significant trend?

"You are perhaps confusing IPCC climate model projections for emperical evidence.

The existing body of emperical evidence does not indicate that climate sensitivity is moderately high i.e. 2.5-4.5oC."

No, when I wrote empirical evidence I meant it. You seem to be under the mis-apprehension that all moderately high estimates of climate sensitivity come from models. They don't. Any idea what the other evidence is?

"The existing body of emperical evidence says that our current rate of temperature increase, (UAH for the past 30 years) is around 0.126C/decade. We have only about 7 to 8 decades left for CO2 to reach 560 ppm, where climate sensitivity is defined.

So the existing body of emperical evidence does not support the IPCC model."

So you're claiming that the present trend from a single observational dataset is a good predictive tool for future rises in temperature? Can you provide support for this method? When has this assumption been useful in the past? It certainly would have failed you in 1975, or 1935, or 1900.

Also, you're assuming that we'll reach 560 ppm in 7-8 decades. But, we have good indications from projected economic expansion that this rate of CO2 increase will not be static. Of course, you could use that to argue that climate sensitivity was even lower, but I have zero confidence in your methodology because you ignore any real physical effects of CO2.

Well Richard there did seem to be some confusion on Adams part as to what a -ve feedback is, and he seemed confused when it was mentioned by you.

I thought it would be a good time to introduce the fact that the IPCC theory does not include a -ve feedback mechanism to increasing CO2 levels, this i thought was why Adam was having a hard time understanding why you brought it up.

Since then as usual people that do not comprehend english beyond the written word jump in with unsubstantiated claims. For example poor old dhogaza now believes i have never heard of one G.Schmit.

The fact still remains that nowhere in the IPCC reports does it mention a -ve feedback due to CO2 increase (none that i can find anyway).

This piece of information should reaffirm what you were saying in post #48 etc. But as i said comprehension of english and all.

It would appear as we have abandoned the idea of calling this lull in AGW as "its only weather" and have moved onto "its only noise" and i agree as to call 10 years of no temp rises as weather is a bit of a stretch.

If only someone could explain what 10 years of "its only noise" is and where this fits into the AGW theory as that would solve all our problems and we would have nothing to debate.

Paul H,

Yes because of negative feedbacks the climate sensitivity would be low.

"No, when I wrote empirical evidence I meant it. You seem to be under the mis-apprehension that all moderately high estimates of climate sensitivity come from models. They don't. Any idea what the other evidence is?" Please tell me.

Please correct me if I am wrong. As I understand it climate sensitivity, as defined by the IPCC, is the response of the the climate, specifically the annual mean global surface temperature to a doubling of atmospheric CO2.

According to IPCC's best estimate if CO2 is doubled from the pre-industrial level of 280 ppm to 560 ppm then the temperatures should increase by 3C. Also since the greenhouse effect of CO2 is higher at lower concentrations than at higher ones, the temperature increase should be more when CO2 goes up from 280 to 420 ppm than when it goes up from 420 to 560 ppm.

If the temperature went up at more than this rate the sensitivity would be more if less than less. Well so far it has been less. CO2 has gone up to 390 ppm and the temperature has during this period gone up by only 0.6C. You are right we may reach 560 ppm even sooner but the temperature trend shows no catching up to reach that 3C rise.

"..the trend is insignificant. You say that this is proof of low climate sensitivity. Can you show your workings for how you determine this? I.e where is your evidence of a significant cooling trend?"

I never said there was a significant cooling trend. And the trend may not be significant - but the fact is CO2 has risen temperatures have not. This points to low sensitivity and negative feedbacks.

Talking about showing workings. Where has IPCC shown its workings in its key finding that global average temperatures have "very likely" increased due to increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gasses?

"So you're claiming that the present trend from a single observational dataset is a good predictive tool for future rises in temperature?"

No I am not. I am not making any predictions. Merely pointing out that IPCC's predictions so far have failed.

Well Craker, Adam didnt actually say he was confused about negative feedbacks and he didnt seem grateful for your explanation. Its always dangerous to read a persons mind and then base your argument or explanation on what you think he is thinking. Best wait till he addresses you and tells you directly.

GISTEMP rewrites history. This can be seen by comparing the archived data sets found at web.archive.org with the current GISTEMP data set.

20052009
YearJ-DJ-D
1880-22-25
1881-17-19
1882-19-22
1883-21-23
1884-25-30
1885-25-30
1886-21-25
1887-30-35
1888-22-26
1889-12-15
1890-33-37
1891-24-28
1892-29-32
1893-29-32
1894-29-33
1895-24-27
1896-13-17
1897-10-12
1898-21-24
1899-13-17
1900-7-10
1901-14-16
1902-22-27
1903-28-31
1904-30-34
1905-22-25
1906-17-20
1907-34-39
1908-32-34
1909-32-35
1910-31-33
1911-31-34
1912-29-34
1913-28-32
1914-12-15
1915-5-9
1916-27-31
19812226
198265
19832526
198479
198535
19861212
19872726
19883031
19891919
19903738
19913235
19921412
19931414
19942423
19953738
19962529
19974039
19985656
19993332
20003233
20014748
20025456
20035255
20044848

I show the beginning and end to illustrate the changes. If you plot the least squares trend you see that GISTEMPâs âadjustmentsâ changed the trend from:

2005 dataset trend was 0.4849 (1880-2004)
2009 dataset trend was 0.5295 (1880-2004)

That is a 9.2% increase in the trend which does cause temperatures in the present to be warmer. That is why it matters.

Ian Forrester | July 20, 2009 8:41 PM

"How many times do you have to be told that cherry picking is dishonest?

Why don't you take some elementary statistics courses? Fraid that it might show up your ignorance and dishonesty?"

I picked 2001 because that is the point that the climate changed from warming to cooling (or stalled) per the latest discussion over at RC. Also, it is the first year in this century, first year in this decade, etc. Why Ian, do you have a problem with 2001 and if so, why? Is there any date you prefer starting from to capture the changes GISTEMP is making and if so, why?

Coby,

where is the moderation? I do not see this being much in the way of civil discourse at the moment.

Posted by: dhogaza | July 20, 2009 9:17 PM

"Vernon posts his total ignorance which makes clear why Snowman confused him with another statistical illiterate."

Lets see, how is it bad statistics or cherry picking to show the difference between the 4 major data sets trends? Looking at the last 8 years, GISTEMP is nearly flat, while the other 3 show nearly the same cooling trend. I guess your not smart enough to know that while the values may be different due to different base line periods, which I did not bother to zero, the trends should be similar. UAH, RSS, and Hadley are, GISTEMP is not.

How does that show a lack of understanding of statistics?

Once again we get a full load of his usual rubbish and deceit from Vernon. Do you actually think that anyone who knows your dishonest tactics takes your word for anything without checking?

Vernon said:

I picked 2001 because that is the point that the climate changed from warming to cooling

Well Vernon, 2001 had an anomaly of 0.45, the following years has anomalies of: 0.57, 0.52, 0.50, 0.61, 0.53, 0.59, 0.43 (2008).

Please tell me how many of these are less than 0.45. Since you obviously have trouble with numbers the answer is that only 2008 (0.43) is lower than 2001. How can you then say that cooling started in 2001?

Vernon, you ask:

How does that show a lack of understanding of statistics?

Simple really, you cannot calculate or report a trend if the result is not statistically significant. You do understand what that means, don't you?

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 21 Jul 2009 #permalink

Vernon -

How does that show a lack of understanding of statistics?

Because you're completely ignoring the uncertainty in the measurements. You don't understand that the data is very noisy, so cherry picking short-time spans (yes, 8 years is a short time span) will cause your resultant trend to be dominated by noise. That's why you need longer time periods to make statistically valid claims.

As calculated by Tamino over at Open Mind:
'For the 2000s we have:.... This time the linear regression trend rate is 0.0126 +/- 0.0218 deg.C/yr, so once again the uncertainty is much larger than the estimate."
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2009/06/26/embarrassing-questions/

it would appear as we have abandoned the idea of calling this lull in AGW as "its only weather" and have moved onto "its only noise"

Both statements are equivalent in the climate system.

Also since the greenhouse effect of CO2 is higher at lower concentrations than at higher ones, the temperature increase should be more when CO2 goes up from 280 to 420 ppm than when it goes up from 420 to 560 ppm.

At equilibrium, yes.

CO2 has gone up to 390 ppm and the temperature has during this period gone up by only 0.6C. You are right we may reach 560 ppm even sooner but the temperature trend shows no catching up to reach that 3C rise.

No, we haven't reached equilibrium.

Merely pointing out that IPCC's predictions so far have failed.

Climate science predicts it takes decades to reach equilibrium, thus the full 1.2C or os rise we should be seeing from the 280 ppm to 390 ppm increase isn't predicted for, well, some decades still ... apparently this prediction is holding up quite nicely, thank you.

Richard,

"As I understand it climate sensitivity, as defined by the IPCC, is the response of the the climate, specifically the annual mean global surface temperature to a doubling of atmospheric CO2."

Correct, but climate sensitivity as the IPCC uses it is merely a specific definition of lambda: the specific equilibrium temperature increase in Kelvin due to an increase in radiative forcing in watts per meter squared. This is expressed:

lambda = Temp. (K) / Radiative forcing (Wm-2)

To get to the IPCC's usage we take the radiative forcing due to one doubling of CO2 i.e. 3.8 Wm-2 and multiply this by lambda.

I can show you evidence, not from models but from data, which shows that lambda has a central estimate of roughly 0.75-0.8. With an error range of between 0.5-1.2.

It's worth emphasising, apparently, that you need to use the equilibrium temperature to derive lambda. We've not yet reached an equilibrium due to the radiative forcing of the CO2 in the atmosphere right now, so it's premature to use current trends to derive climate sensitivity from the current radiative forcing perturbation. You can't therefore claim that the IPCC's predictions haven't come true. Indeed, current trends are well within the expected trends bounded by natural variability.

"I never said there was a significant cooling trend. And the trend may not be significant - but the fact is CO2 has risen temperatures have not. "

But the lack of a trend over such short intervals isn't beyond what we'd expect from natural variability. Given that you agree in the lack of a trend, can you try convincing Vernon of this? One would also have to be incredibly selective in order to contrive a single 10 year lack-of-a-trend. Pick 1997 and 1999 as your start dates to present and you'll find statistically significant upward trends, dhogaza, coby, do you concur? So, to summarise, using a cherry pick you can contrive a lack-of-a-trend, but this is not beyond what is expected from modelled natural variability.

I thought it would be a good time to introduce the fact that the IPCC theory does not include a -ve feedback mechanism to increasing CO2 levels

Please define what you mean by a "-ve feedback" - precisely, preferably mathematically - so I can try to figure out why the general term "negative feedback" is not inclusive of your specific definition.

dhogaza

"Climate science predicts it takes decades to reach equilibrium, thus the full 1.2C or os rise we should be seeing from the 280 ppm to 390 ppm increase isn't predicted for, well, some decades still"

1. Surely that should be 1.7C or so and not 1.2C or so if the first half of the rise of 1.5C, (at equilibrium) is to be more than the second half of the rise.

2. How many decades pray? Where exactly does it specify this in the IPCC predictions? So far as I can make out from their graphs the temperatures go up at ever increasing rates, specially when CO2 does the same, as it has been doing now quite some decades now.

Please look up the formula for negative feedback in any electronics book. The output voltage is reduced by the fraction of the voltage being sent back in a non inverting terminal.

For the climatic system, the example I gave of negative feedback of the brake and the accelerator of a car is a pretty good one, both serve to keep the speed constant when speed increases or reduces, the basic servomechanism.

A non technical definition of negative feedback would be, to paraphrase Gavin Schmidt's quote above: A negative feedback occurs when a change in one component of the climate occurs, leading to other changes that eventually âfeeds backâ on the original change to reduce it.

PS I dont know about "the IPCC theory" that quote was from Craker. What I said was all IPCC models have a positive feedback for CO2

1. Surely that should be 1.7C or so and not 1.2C or so if the first half of the rise of 1.5C, (at equilibrium) is to be more than the second half of the rise.

280 to 390 represents about a 40%, not 50% increase. So if the rise were linear not ln then we'd see about the 1.2C I threw out. I'll give you 1.5C, doesn't matter regarding what science predicts.

How many decades pray? Where exactly does it specify this in the IPCC predictions? So far as I can make out from their graphs the temperatures go up at ever increasing rates, specially when CO2 does the same, as it has been doing now quite some decades now.

The projections come from averaging many model runs, as had been stated a bunch of times.

so:

1. " Where exactly does it specify this in the IPCC predictions? "

It comes out of the modeled physics, there's no "delay specification" per se. So the projections you see include the phenomena inherently.

2. "So far as I can make out from their graphs the temperatures go up at ever increasing rates, specially when CO2 does the same, as it has been doing now quite some decades now."

The slope is lower than it would be if there were no ocean (the thermal inertia of the ocean is the major factor that causes a lengthy time period for full effects of CO2-forcing to be felt).

As far as the "ever increasing rate" bit goes, remember these are averages of many model runs. Each run has variability much as we see in the real climate measurements (the so-called "global cooling" we've supposedly been seeing over recent years show up in *individual* model runs).

If we had 100 earths with 100 different initial conditions (100 butterflies might do the trick), and averaged all the climate measurements together, you'd see something stable rather than "wiggly" when that average would be graphed, too.

It's like the difference between 1 slot machine and a thousand slot machines. We only have one earth but we can run the models multiple times to give an expected projection + error bars.

A non technical definition of negative feedback would be, to paraphrase Gavin Schmidt's quote above: A negative feedback occurs when a change in one component of the climate occurs, leading to other changes that eventually âfeeds backâ on the original change to reduce it.

I know what a negative feedback is, I'm trying to get crakar to define what he thinks his "-ve feedback" is, since apparently he's thinking of something different. Or he's ignoring the fact that climate modelers do, of course, include the physics that lead to negative, as well as positive, feedbacks. The *net* is positive (that's a result of the physics, not an *assumption*), not all of the *individual* feedback physics are.

Richard -

PS I dont know about "the IPCC theory" that quote was from Craker. What I said was all IPCC models have a positive feedback for CO2

You apparently are being intentionally obtuse. The examples you cite are very simple systems. The climate is very complicated. There is more than one output.

There are numerous feedbacks resulting from increasing temperatures, some negative, some positive. Overall, the expectation in the near-term (the next at least, very probably much longer) is for positive feedbacks to dominate. In the long-run, as befits any real system, yes, negative feedbacks will dominate and the temperature will come back down.

See the quote dhogaza posted in #56 from Gavin Schmidt. Your intentional failure to understand this is why we are unable to have a nice conversation.

Re 81,

I removed the last part of Ian's comment, it was unneccesarily disparraging. But Vernon really, cherry picking can only be the result of one of two things: dishonesty or ignorance. It has been explained to you many many times that you are choosing particular years for the sole purpose of making your point and violating basic statistical principles, so it is difficult for us to believe it is because you do not know better.

I have not yet read further in the thread.

Dear readers,

Don't overlook comment #87 which was caught in moderation and therefore off the radar before posted.

Thanks Paul.

And to answer your question, yes I agree that, as expected in noisy data, short term trends up down and sideways can be created by changing start dates. That is why you can't use short term trends.

Richard, further to the delayed response of the climate to a forcing and why you can not use (simplisticly) current observations to derive sensitivity, please see this article.

Coby,

Thank you but it seems you to are missing the point. That being that the trends from the four are diverging. GISTEMP is pretty much level and the other 3 are show a similar cooling trend.

The cooling is also backed up by the two studies I presented that show sea level rise has stop accelerating and the rate has dropped significantly in the last six years. Climate theory says that has to be due to the oceans cooling off.

This thread is about GISS making retro active changes to GISTEMP. That was the point of my posts. I do not see how it is cherry picking to show multiple sources that indicate that three of the global temperatures one direction, which is supported by the slowing sea level rise and one, GISTEMP that is not.

Thank you but it seems you to are missing the point. That being that the trends from the four are diverging. GISTEMP is pretty much level and the other 3 are show a similar cooling trend.

You are missing the point. None of these short-term exercises in cherry-picking show any statistically valid trend.

WE DON'T CARE ABOUT NON-SIGNIFICANT SO-CALLED TRENDS IN NOISY DATA.

You've been told this literally hundreds, if not thousands, of times. There's not a statistician or scientist in the world who's going to care that YOU ignore statistical significance.

The cooling is also backed up by the two studies I presented that show sea level rise has stop accelerating and the rate has dropped significantly in the last six years. Climate theory says that has to be due to the oceans cooling off.

So if the sea is cooling, sea levels will remain constant? That's a good one, Vernon.

dhogaza,

You are so, so, so willfully ****. The warming during during the 1979-1998 period caused the sea level to accelerate from 1993-2003. From 2003-2009 two studies show that the sea level rise started slowing ~2003 and even more since 2005.

Why do you lie about what I say? I never said that the sea level stopped rising, I said that the accelerated sea level rise stopped. Currently, sea levels are rising at or below the pre-1993 level.

Oh, and about trends in noisy data. Does putting your fingers in your ears and chanting no! no! no! Really help?

When RC has a guest post that says warming has stopped since 2001 and is not going to start till 2020, then they can read the writing on the wall too.

BUT BACK ON TOPIC - this is about GISTEMP rewriting history and do not see you addressing post 80. I guess 124 years is a long enough trend and yes, since 2007, GISTEMP has been adjusted so that 2009 now has 9.2% more warming than in the 2007 data.

he warming during during the 1979-1998 period caused the sea level to accelerate from 1993-2003. From 2003-2009 two studies show that the sea level rise started slowing ~2003 and even more since 2005.

Why do you lie about what I say?

I don't. A slowing in sea level rise supports a short term slowing in warming, neither of which is unexpected in the noisy climate record.

It doesn't support cooling. If the combined ocean/atmospheric system is cooling, we should see an actual contraction of the portion of the sea level change that's due to ocean temps.

Vernon -

this is about GISTEMP rewriting history and do not see you addressing post 80. I guess 124 years is a long enough trend and yes, since 2007, GISTEMP has been adjusted so that 2009 now has 9.2% more warming than in the 2007 data.

I know it's fashionable to accuse climate scientists of malfeasance. All denialists eventually have to get to sort of paranoid tin-hatism. Maybe you'd care to provide some evidence, Vernon, like an internal memo by James Hansen that tells everyone to fudge the trend upwards? Until you provide some evidence, there's no reason for anyone to consider you anything other than a frustrated loon positing conspiracy theories.

dhogzaz,

You said "So if the sea is cooling, sea levels will remain constant? That's a good one, Vernon."

I said "Why do you lie about what I say? I never said that the sea level stopped rising... ."

You said "I don't."

Gee, I read that and see that you flat out lied and denied it in you next post. Coby may think that you contribute, but mostly I just see a self righteous individual that says what they feel like and lies when they are called on it.

I am sure my post will be redacted, but your has been up for half a day and you lied.

Gee, I read that and see that you flat out lied and denied it in you next post.

OK, dear, please tell us how a rising sea supports your claim that the world is cooling.

Oh, and about trends in noisy data. Does putting your fingers in your ears and chanting no! no! no! Really help?

When RC has a guest post that says warming has stopped since 2001 and is not going to start till 2020, then they can read the writing on the wall too.

They can read that Swanson and Tsonis do not claim that warming over multi-decadal timescales will be any different than proposed by climate scientists today. Their claim that global temps will stay more or less stable for another decade also includes a claim that a decade or two after that will see another HUGE super-ENSO event like the 1998 spike.

Altogether, the end result is the same - if we don't take action, 3C+.

The paper doesn't dispute this.

To discuss further, the basis for Swanson and Tsonis claiming that the last ten years is significant is based on their conclusion that the last super-El Niño caused a STATE CHANGE. One driven by an underlying AGW trend combined with two or more reinforcing natural factors.

This is not at all like the unstatistical argument regarding trends that you try to make, so, no, I don't have to "put my fingers in my ears" and not hear the argument. Their argument doesn't impact the long-term statistical trend. They're talking about relatively lengthy DEPARTURE FROM TREND downward followed by a very rapid UPWARD departure from trend. With these rapid upward departures signaling a state change TO A WARMER WORLD. Not "cooling" but "stuck on hot" until it then jumps upward again to HOTTER.

They don't argue there's no long-term trend.

Got that? They fully accept AGW in their paper.

They're talking about relatively lengthy DEPARTURE FROM TREND downward

And, since I'm sure you'll misunderstand, a downward departure from TREND doesn't necessarily mean a negative trend, in fact, the Swanson specifically says THE WORLD IS NOT COOLING.

Swanson also points out that the higher natural variability they posit may well reflect a HIGHER sensitivity to CO2, not lower.

How you guys manage to turn a paper discussing the system's response to warming into "warming isn't happening" is beyond me.

Vernon the changes go back further than that, you can see the 1999 USA data here:

h.t.t.p://www.john-daly.com/usatemps.006

and the 2008 data here

h.t.t.p://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/Fig.D.txt

Here is an example of GISS processing.

The santa rosa station in the US, originally on a deserted beach by a lake (1900), is now surrounded by boat yards and suburbia has a temp record going back to 1900. The raw data from USHCN shows the temp trend going from 14.75C in 1900 to 14.4 in 2008 (a slight -ve trend).

The GISS processed data shows 1900 at 12.8C and 2008 being 13.5C (a slight +ve trend)

Now i am not saying that the GISS adjustments are unjustified but rather, for GISS to make so many adjustments to the data especially data recorded over 100 years ago the original data must be so erroneous that is it even worth using.

How can we base a trend on data that is so poor that we have to constantly adjust it? Obviously there must be a point in time (year 19XX) that we can consider to be fairly accurate and start our "official" data set from there.

In regards to feedbacks

h.t.t.p://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/Report/AR4WG1_Print_Ch08.pdf titled "Climate Models and Their Evaluation" page 631

It would appear that i was slightly incorrect, the models do take into account a -ve feedback which is called the WV lapse rate, i dont quite understand how this works but essentially the lapse rate works in opposition to the +ve feed back from WV and they are dependant on each other. The models vary in this regard and they simply reduce the WV +ve feedback by as much as the lapse rate -ve feedback. So WV accounts for only %50 of the +ve feedback. Maybe some one can give a good explanation of this?

dhogaza,

It would appear that quite a bit is beyond you. So once again for the attention challenged:

Cabanes et al (2001)
www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/294/5543/840
The 3.2 ± 0.2 millimeter per year global mean sea level rise observed by the Topex/Poseidon satellite over 1993-98 is fully explained by thermal expansion of the oceans.

dhogaza, see the word thermal, that means it got hotter.

Cazenave et al (2008)
sciences.blogs.liberation.fr/home/files/Cazenave_et_al_GPC_2008.pdf
This can be summarized as follows: since 2003, sea level has continued to rise but with a rate (of 2.5 +/â0.4 mm/yr) somewhat reduced compared to the 1993â2003 decade (3.1+/
â0.4 mm/yr).

Ablain et al (2009)
www.ocean-sci-discuss.net/6/31/2009/osd-6-31-2009.html
These new calculations highlight a reduction in the rate of sea level rise since 2005, by ~2 mm/yr. This represents a 60% reduction compared to the 3.3 mm/yr sea level rise (glacial isostatic adjustment correction applied) measured between 1993 and 2005.

Now dhogaza, this may be hard for you to grasp, but if sea rise accelerated due to thermal expansion, then there must have been energy added. We call this warming.

Since the acceleration of the rise stopped and when back to pre-1993 levels or actually lower, then that additional energy is no longer being added. This means it is not warming.

Sea level rise is a pretty good indicator of whether we are warming or not. It was pretty funny to hear you say that while it took 14 years into the warming period, 79-93, to start the accelerated rise, only a few years were needed to stop it.

As for S7T's paper, it had nothing to do with warming. Is this another time where you did not bother to read the paper under discussion but are just parroting someone else talking points? The paper was not about the systems response to warming but rather, to quote the authors:

"Specifically, when the major modes of Northern Hemisphere climate variability are synchronized, or resonate, and the coupling between those modes simultaneously increases, the climate system appears to be thrown into a new state, marked by a break in the global mean temperature trend and in the character of El NinËo/Southern Oscillation variability."

Come on, read the work your going to talk about. This makes the second time this month that you have opined on document you have not read, just followed the talking points from the advocacy sites.

Not that matters, what matters is that GISTEMP has made adjustments in the last two years that has caused a 9.2% increase in warming. They did this, as is clearly shown in post 80, by lowering the earlier temperatures.

Vernon, you said:

"The cooling is also backed up by the two studies I presented that show sea level rise has stop accelerating and the rate has dropped significantly in the last six years. Climate theory says that has to be due to the oceans cooling off."

First thing wrong with that is that you seem to be over interpreting natural variability, so what that sea level rise rate has slackened? What does that have to do with climate?

Second, you ridiculously state that climate theory states that the oceans should be cooling off. Dhogaza called you on this, though, IMO, rather imprecisely. Either way, how do you arrive at the conclusion that the oceans are cooling from in your own words an ocean whose "sea level rise has stop accelerating and the rate has dropped significantly in the last six years." Given that you do, apparently, believe in the phenomenon of thermal expansion, how do you reconcile the two?

So, you started the paragraph with: "The cooling is also backed up by....". Let's summarise your evidence, it's laughable: you quote one wholly useless piece of evidence (short term sea level rise variability) and utilise one outright lie (cooling oceans).

Bottom line, that paragraph is BS so you should stop defending its nonsense.

Now dhogaza, this may be hard for you to grasp, but if sea rise accelerated due to thermal expansion, then there must have been energy added. We call this warming.

Since the acceleration of the rise stopped and when back to pre-1993 levels or actually lower, then that additional energy is no longer being added. This means it is not warming.

Vernon, maybe with less of dhogaza's erm...colorful rhetoric I can get you to understand his point:

Any rise at all indicates added energy, it does not have to be an accelerating rise. Warming = rising, accelerated warming = accelerated rising. So if the rate of rise has slowed this does not imply a cooling ocean at all, just a less rapidly warming one.

Granted not all of the rise is thermal expansion, but the lion's share of it is. Regardless, the balance that comes from melting glaciers and ice sheets also indicates a warming world.

Vernon,

"dhogaza, see the word thermal, that means it got hotter. "

So you do accept that warming oceans should expand. Why then do you say:

"Since the acceleration of the rise stopped and when back to pre-1993 levels or actually lower, then that additional energy is no longer being added. This means it is not warming."

To highlight you say: "This means it is not warming."

Weird, you accept rising sea level is a sign of a warming ocean, yet fail to grasp that a sea level rise of ~1.3 mm yr-1 is also a sign of warming (just not at the same rate as earlier). Yes, even most of this 1.3 mm yr-1 is believed to be due to thermal expansion. Anyhow, can explain what any this short term variability has to do with climate? All you're proving so far with this fretting of short term trends is that you're innumerate.

Glad to see that people are starting to understand Classic Vernon.

He plays this game on every physical aspect of climate science.

Really, what is the value of this kind of input?

His posts are much like those you see at Uncommon Descent, tilting against the biological science windmill.

Worthless.

Why clog the internets finitely-bound available spinning electrons with this crap?

Really?

He posts often on WUWT and is accepted there. Probably on a bunch of 1+1 = 3.14156 sites as well. He's been dropped by people like RC and Open Mind and I'm sure many others.

He's anti-science. How does this contribute to a discussion of science?

Any rise at all indicates added energy, it does not have to be an accelerating rise.

Vernon claims to be an engineer. Presumably not a sanitation or railroad engineer.

So he understands this. He's dishonest. He's lying.

If i may add something to the recent posts,

We have only been able to accurately measure the ocean temps since 2003 by using the ARGO data. I say accurately due to the coverage. The ARGO data originally showed in 2003 that the oceans had cooled dramatically, however they (Josh Willis and his team) suspected the old XBT data to have a warm bias (measured too high a temp) and so it appeared as the oceans had cooled dramatically.

Once the old XBT data was corrected it then matched with the ARGO data, since 2003 the ARGO bouys have shown a slight decrease in temp as shown in the link provided (you have to down load the extract).

h.t.t.p://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3152

Now seven years does not constitute a trend so it is rather pointless debating which way it is heading but it does raise the question as to why the oceans are slightly cooling and the atmospheric temps are can i say slightly cooling aswell. So what has changed? CO2 is still going up, can a quiet sun be considered as noise?

Cheers

Crakar

Crakar, have you read Levitus et al, 2009? What you describe as "a slight decrease in temp" isn't obvious in their data.

dhogaza,

I keep forgetting you do not have a clue about any of the science, which is my mistake in presenting it to you like you do. I am sorry. Lets get even more basic.

The historical perspective.

Man made CO2 has only been visible since the 1970' prior to that the half baked there assumes that aerosols hid the warming. That means that CO2 was not responsible for any of the warming or cooling prior to that time.

The historical record shows that the sea level has been increasing at ~1.8mm/year before CO2 warming started.

During the CO2 based warming period 1979 to 2001 sea levels continued to rise at 1.8 till about 1993. Then the rate started to accelerate.

Since 2003 sea level rate of rise started falling. By 2005 the SLR rate was back to the pre-CO2 base warming rate or a little lower.

Now if you were not too ignorant of the science and actually researched the topic rather than running to an advocacy site for talking points, you would know how ignorant your post and that your the liar.

What has made the sea level rise before man made CO2, that appears to be unanswered in the literature. What is apparent is that your MO is to flame, flame, and then flame some more. I fail to see how you add anything to the discussion.

I keep forgetting you do not have a clue about any of the science...

Yes, I'm sure you're right, and I'm sure you've convinced everyone that not only I, but thousands of professional scientists in the field don't know anything about it, either.

I bow down to the superior knowledge and intellect of Vernon.

I eagerly await the day when the rest of the world does, too.

Until then ... I bid you adieu. You can post your drivel unchallenged by me in the future.

Not that matters, what matters is that GISTEMP has made adjustments in the last two years that has caused a 9.2% increase in warming. They did this, as is clearly shown in post 80, by lowering the earlier temperatures.

You keep asserting this, meaning to imply fraud on the part of Hansen and everyone else at GISS. How about providing some evidence of fraud?

Vernon,

"Man made CO2 has only been visible since the 1970'"

We have been able to detect enhanced levels of background CO2 in the atmosphere due to human combustion of fossil fuels since 1750. However, perhaps you mean, warming due to "
"Man made CO2 has only been visible since the 1970'"? Please clarify.

"That means that CO2 was not responsible for any of the warming or cooling prior to that time."

I see no reason to suspect that this is true. Just because we've not been able to discern unequivocally CO2 forcing prior to that it doesn't mean the forcing was non-negligible. In fact, it certainly wasn't, we'd reached 310 ppm by 1950 which you can see from the link is equivalent to ~0.75Wm-2. This isn't really relevant to the discussion, it's just one more example of your failure to fact check the most basic of information.

Given the topic of discussion and your bold pronouncements I'll assume that you really are familiar with this and this. So you'll know that we can look at the temperature trends over different parts of the globe and compare it to the trend in sea level rise, like the oceans, the southern hemisphere, and the Southern latitudes. In case it's not really obvious, the larger variability (particularly the decreasing bit which you drew our attention to) in global average surface temps in the period between 1940 and 1970 is primarily a feature of the land surface record, and, in particular, the Northern hemispheric land surface record. And, in case it's not obvious now, the upward trend in sea level rise is not inconsistent with the trend in sea surface temperatures during the 20th Century.

"Now if you were not too ignorant of the science and actually researched the topic rather than running to an advocacy site for talking points, you would know how ignorant your post and that your the liar."

Look up! There are 100,000 matchsticks falling from the sky right now.

dhogaza,

I expect no less from you. If you cannot deal with the science and your basic flaming technique does not work, then off you go in a huff.

I see you still not address the fact that GISTEMP has been adjusted upwards since 2005. That is after the Y2K was suppose to be.

Now that John Gault has present what I posted earlier, that GISTEMP has a warming bias due to the way they in fill missing data when combining records.

Adam,

I do not imply fraud, I imply lack of quality control. I do not have to present evidence of fraud, since I am not claiming any, what I have presented is the 2005 record and the current record. They clearly show that the modern temperatures have been increase and the past lowered.

This is why Coby is wrong in saying that it is meaning less. When you take the +10% increase due to the station combining and infilling process used to create GISTEMP and add another 9.2 per cent increase for changes since 2005, it is pretty clear that the warming being shown by GISS is an artifact of their processes not real.

Here are a couple of links for Vernon,

One is from 1999 and the other is from 2008, it would seem that GISS has been adjusting the temps for quite some time.

h.t.t.p://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/Fig.D.txt

h.t.t.p://www.giss.nasa.gov/data/update/gistemp/graphs/FigD.txt

Paul H, re post #109 i have changed the wording regards atmospheric temps, any other comments?

If i may add something to the recent posts,

We have only been able to accurately measure the ocean temps since 2003 by using the ARGO data. I say accurately due to the coverage. The ARGO data originally showed in 2003 that the oceans had cooled dramatically, however they (Josh Willis and his team) suspected the old XBT data to have a warm bias (measured too high a temp) and so it appeared as the oceans had cooled dramatically.

Once the old XBT data was corrected it then matched with the ARGO data, since 2003 the ARGO bouys have shown a slight decrease in temp as shown in the link provided (you have to down load the extract).

h.t.t.p://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3152

Now seven years does not constitute a trend so it is rather pointless debating which way it is heading but it does raise the question as to why the oceans are slightly cooling and the atmospheric temps are not increasing. So what has changed? CO2 is still going up, can a quiet sun be considered as noise?

Cheers

Crakar

Wrong metric crakar but thanks for making the change. Levitus discusses ocean temperatures derived from the ARGO network. Their analysis seems to disagree with Loehle's result.

PaulH,

While you while away the time looking at pretty graphs, why not try looking at the data. First, it has been proven that the infilling method used by GISS for GISTEMP adds an artificial warming trend as an artifact of the process they use. Basically, the reference station method sound great, but the way it was implemented just wrong. Additionally, there have been what I would consider dramatic adjustments that have added 9.2% increase in the warming trend. So, why does GISTEMP have record highs, because they adjust it that way.

Please, look at Coby's talking points. The reason we did not see CO2 induced warming is because of aerosols. Even though there were no studies back up this guess, I will let it stand for this discussion. Due to the clear air act, per Coby's talking points the nasty aerosols went away and presto, we could see warming due to CO2 in the late 70s.

That is what I am talking about. There was some underlying warming that has been going on for 19k years that has caused the sea levels to rise. That is the base line. If sea level rise is faster, then the seas are warming, if slower then the seas are cooling.

The studies I presented show that sea level rise is at or below the pre-70's level so either warming has ended or cooling has begun.

Paul H,

You caught me out, i tried to open the link you provided but it was taking a really, really long time so i gave up and took a punt on the air temps.

In regards to ocean temps even Josh Willis says the oceans have cooled slightly (which was why i thought you were referring to air temps).

Either way 10 years does not a trend make, so we are just speculating on what will happen in the next ten years or twenty for that matter.

This short term lull in air and ocean temps has been refered to as noise by dhogaza which is fair enough this is why i mentioned the sun, as the sun has gone quiet the temps have levelled off (is that OK) could this be the noise dhogaza is talking about? We also have a -ve phase shift in the PDO and AMO which historically lower the temps or act in conbination with "other things" could this also be considered noise or have i completly misunderstood the definition of noise?

By the way the thing that gives Australia droughts is the Indian dipole which is unfortunately still in the wrong phase, although we are still getting good winter rain

Cheers

Crakar

Vernon,

That is what I am talking about. There was some underlying warming that has been going on for 19k years that has caused the sea levels to rise. That is the base line. If sea level rise is faster, then the seas are warming, if slower then the seas are cooling.

As is clear from this graph: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Post-Glacial_Sea_Level.png the sea level rise that started 19Kyr bp mostly ended some 8000 years ago. It is ridiculous to infer some kind of "baseline" behaviour from that.

It also defies common sense to think the sea level just always rises and it only accelerates its rise when the climate warms. Seriously.

Regarding your claims about GISS, if their methods put them so far off, why does the CRU analysis agree? (Remember we are talking the whole 100+ year record, and you seem to be claiming some 15-20% exagerated warming on the part of GISS)

Vernon,

"That is what I am talking about. There was some underlying warming that has been going on for 19k years that has caused the sea levels to rise. That is the base line. If sea level rise is faster, then the seas are warming, if slower then the seas are cooling."

Wrong yet again. Warming for the last 19k years? You're having a laugh! If you claim that 6 years of "cooling" can affect sea level rise then surely you believe that the long term cooling trend since the holocene climate optimum (8k ago) till modern times will have caused thermal contraction in the oceans, right? The ice age ended 10k years ago. Since 8k years ago we've had a prolonged slow cooling until recently.

"While you while away the time looking at pretty graphs, why not try looking at the data."

They do use lots of pretty colors in their graphs, don't they? I guess you were dazzled by it all and forgot to retract your nonsense about inconsistencies in the oceans. So, you don't like GISTEMP, what about HADCRUT? You won't find any trends in their data which are inconsistent with SLR. Your last recourse is to invoke some kind of dark conspiracy. Not very impressive.

oby,

I see you would like to discuss SLR vs the facts presented about GISTEMP, well I guess I would too if I had no way to answer them and they look pretty damning.

So about SLR. Please point to a study which does not show the tidal gauge record showing a ~1.8mm rise for about as long as we have been keeping records. It is incredible that you do not accept the very cites you use in how to talk to a climate change skeptic.

http://sealevel.colorado.edu/tidegauges.php
Table 1: Estimates of Global Sea Level Rise from Tide Gauge Records

Barnett, 1984 1.43 ±0.14 1881-1980
Barnett, 1984 2.27 ±0.23 1930-1980
Gornitz & Lebedeff, 1987 1.2 ±0.3 1880-1982
Peltier & Tushingham, 1989 1.2 ±0.3 1880-1982
Douglas, 1991 1.8 ±0.1 1880-1980
Unal & Ghil, 1995 1.62 ±0.38 1807-1988

Sea level rise was happening prior to the warming that started being seen in the late 1970s. I am referencing your scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/03/what-about-mid-century-cooling.php, are you now saying that is wrong?

I am saying that the cause of warming that started 19k years ago and still has not been identified, warming prior to CO2 as can been seen in SLR.

We have returned to that level. Therefore we are not currently warming from CO2.

Coby, this is a science blog. Instead of going for pictures from a wiki, why not use peer reviewed science?

Vernon -

I am saying that the cause of warming that started 19k years ago and still has not been identified, warming prior to CO2 as can been seen in SLR.

Considering that all those studies about sea level rise you reference start in the 1880's, and we observe warming since the 1880's, well, what are you trying to show? That increasing temperature causes increasing sea level rise? Well, yes. This is no mystery. Sea Level Rise doesn't depend on CO2, it depends on temperature. You make yet another laughably bad argument, and yet again reference papers that don't support your point in the slightest.

Hell, I could have shown you this image:
http://www.globalwarmingart.com/images/0/0f/Recent_Sea_Level_Rise.png
and spared you this discussion.

Oh, so now your going to produce a study that shows CO2 based warming since 1880. You can only point to pictures rather than studies.

I can see why you go straight to denial, sucks when your belief system is falling apart.

SLR was ~1.8mm prior to the "CO2 warming" and have since 2003 slowed back down till in 2005 they at or lower than the rewarming period.

I guess your just not bright enough to deal with this.

Conceding on GISTEMP trends being an artifact of too many postive adjustments and poor implimentation in GISTEMP Step 1?

No, Vernon. That's merely your assertion that you've handsomely failed to support.

"SLR was ~1.8mm prior to the "CO2 warming" and have since 2003 slowed back down till in 2005 they at or lower than the rewarming period.

I guess your just not bright enough to deal with this."

Your cited articles on SLR (some of which will have been used in the wiki graph we used) certainly don't refute what we're saying. 20th C SLR is consistent with oceanic temperature records over the 20th C. Try looking at the graphs. You've been asserting that warming started in the 1970s and that we had cooling prior to that. This qualitative statement is only really true for the land not the oceans, and, particularly, in the northern hemisphere. Why don't you look at the data?

Oh, and, btw, why are you still trying to make something out of statistically insignificant trends?

PaulH,

I notice that everyone is big on looking at the graphs but no one of you wants to discuss the actual studies. Please point me to a study that says SRL was zero prior to CO2 warming.

Well, since CO2 theory says that there was no CO2 based warming until the 1970's which is what Coby has on his site. Why don't you point to a study that shows CO2 based warming prior to the late 1970's?

I guess your not very good with logic. The SLR was happening at ~1.8mm/yr from 1880-1980. Now I do not claim to know what was causing the seas to warm, but it was not rising CO2.

The period that you alarmist claim shows CO2 based warming starts in the late 70's after an assumed reduction in aerosols.

The SLR did not start accelerating until 1993, 14+ years after CO2 warming started. However, SLR is now at pre-CO2 warming start levels or lower. This indicates that the additional thermal expansion that could have come from CO2 base warming has ended. The underlying warming trend, as see prior to the CO2 claimed warming period is still happening, but CO2 base warming is not.

So quit with the lets look at wiki pictures which are posted by anyone and since this is a science blog, to the science.

Vernon,

"Please point me to a study that says SRL was zero prior to CO2 warming."

Why do I need to do that to support my argument? I would only have to do that if you weren't tying yourself in knots with a multitude of logical fallacies.

"Well, since CO2 theory says that there was no CO2 based warming until the 1970's which is what Coby has on his site. Why don't you point to a study that shows CO2 based warming prior to the late 1970's?"

As I explained earlier CO2 RF was non-negligible even in the 1950s. I pointed you to graphs from studies tracking CO2 RF over the 20th C. Also, there are other RFs affecting climate. Solar forcing, for instance, appears to have played a role in the warming in the earlier 20th C. CO2 forcing didn't just magically switch on the 1970s it had been steadily rising until that point and took off steeply after that period of slower increase.

You've totally missed the point. SLR, at your magical baseline rate of 1.8 mm yr-1, was occurring during a time of a consistent upward trend in SSTs. This warming likely occurred due to the influences of a variety of positive forcings. Aersols certainly wasn't one of them: as I've said (which you've carefully ignored repeatedly), aersol forcing primarily affected Northern hemispheric land temperatures, and it would have cooled the oceans, but it didn't because the aerosol's relatively short lifetime prevented that from happening.

You're using a circular argument, btw:

GISTEMP is bad -> slower rises in SLR support that claim due to apparent divergence (which you claim is statistically meaningful apparently). At this point we point out that GISTEMP shows apparent SST warming during the 20th C consistent with you baseline rate. Then you claim GISTEMP is bad -> etc. -> etc -> etc. -> etc.

"Now I do not claim to know what was causing the seas to warm, but it was not rising CO2."

That's a strong positive claim. Evidence, please. While you're at it, explain how that evidence refutes the effects of known rising CO2 RF prior to the 1970s. As I see it there are many more reasons to believe that that non-negligible CO2 RF had some impact of climate than not. You're ignoring most of those obvious reasons to contrive a ridiculous argument by misrepresentation.

"So quit with the lets look at wiki pictures which are posted by anyone and since this is a science blog, to the science."

Ad hom, Vernon. Those graphs are derived from peer reviewed literature and scientific and technical analyses of the data. Explain why they're not valid using a logical argument not a logical fallacy.

Paul H,

First, your ignoring the fact that GISTEMP has a ~10 percent positive warming that is an artifact of the GISTEMP StepOne Reference Station infilling implimentation in the code.

Second, your ignoring that GISTEMP was "adjusted" between 2005 and the present to add another 9.2 percent increase to the warming trend.

I am going to take your lack of discussion on these to points to be that you cannot address this and cannot defend why GISTEMP makes "adjustement" which all artificially raise the warming trend.

Third, the SLR. You say you do not have to provide any studies to support your argument, when I suspect the real reason is that you have no studies that show CO2 based warming having any measurable impact prior to the late 1970s.

Since Coby has a talking point that addresses this issue, why no apparent warming prior to the late 70, I think you do need to present some studies that show Coby was wrong.

So lets address your arguments that you say need no studies to support:

1. Man made CO2 based warming was present before the late 70's.

2. You claim that aerosols do affect LST but not SST, and that is why CO2 warming would affect the SST but not the LST.

3. You claim that there was a long term upward trend in SST prior to the CO2 based warming period, but it ended and CO2 based warming is what is driving SST.

Well, I disagree. If you cannot point to studies that support your position, then, while you can say anything, it is pretty meaningless.

Finally, it is not an ad hom to say that the graphs that are posted on an advocacy site or a public wiki do not constitute science. An ad hom is an attack on the person rather than the data or logic. I did attack you as an individual, but challenged you to present some science. I am guessing you feel it is a personal attack to ask you to present the studies that support your claims rather than just accepting your right.

Sorry, typo, should have said:

I didnot attack you as an individual, but challenged you to present some science. I am guessing you feel it is a personal attack to ask you to present the studies that support your claims rather than just accepting your right.

Vernon said:

challenged you to present some science.

Vernon, people constantly present science to you but you either ignore it or claim that it is not science. From your previous postings it is obvious that you don't really understand what science is all about.

Also, check out these sites, which I have referred to you before and you will see that you are lying when you claim GISS data is "wrong." The four major sets of data which scientists use are all in pretty good agreement, certainly GISS is not 19.2% different from the other data sets.

You are a liar and ignorant of science if you continue to claim that GISS is "rigged" to show greater warming.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Satellite_Temperatures.png#file

http://atmoz.org/blog/2008/04/14/comparable-global-climate-metrics/

Get a life and quit posting rubbish.

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 26 Jul 2009 #permalink

Ian,

Once again I do not consider wikipedia a solid scientific source. If you want to actually look at that their references are and cite some thing in a published work or data from an official agency, then I will look at it.

It just seems really strange that all anyone hears from you is it must be peer reviewed science but when the argument is not supported by science, you fall back to wiki's and advocacy sites.

Actually the atmoz blog is right, the only problem is that it does not apply. Because Coby lets you call me liar, ignorant, etc. does not mean I can return the favor to you but why not buy a clue? The review at atmoz was for the period 1979 - 2008. So please explain how GISTEMP adjustments in the 1880-1878 period will be reflexed in that analysis. Thats right they are not. Nice shell game, normally I would accuse you of deception and lying but over the years I have come to realize, YOU JUST DONT KNOW.

I am sorry but I never claimed that they inflated it by 19.2 percent. Let me parse it out for you:

1. GISTEMP step one creates an warming trend as an artifact of the why reference station is implemented in software.

2. When comparing GISTEMP 2005 with GISTEMP 2009, the warming trend increase 9.2% for the years 1880-2004 (see apples to apples).

Since GISS does not post why they make changes or adjustments, there is no way to tell how much of the trend they present is an artifact and not the actual trend.

Ian, I know you did not bother to do more than read the talking points but the reason you compare like periods is so the comparison has meaning. Comparing the work by atmoz done for the satellite period and with the full GISTEMP record is nearly worthless. I do not say that what atmoz did was worthless, I am saying that your trying to draw inferences from it is.

Finally, I am guessing you did not actually read the post where I shows that part of the adjustements by GISTEMP were to lower the past temperatures and raise the present temperatuere. Both are clearly shown on post 80.

Finally, since you claim to be a scientist, but regrettably it does not show and I for one really hope that is not true. I do not know how to reference data, you do not understand the basics, and you sure do not understand logic.

Typing too fast. Last paragraph should read:

Finally, since you claim to be a scientist, but regrettably it does not show and I for one really hope that is not true. I do know you do not know how to reference data, you do not understand the basics, and you sure do not understand logic.

Some days...

Vernon in #131:

First, your ignoring the fact that GISTEMP has a ~10 percent positive warming that is an artifact of the GISTEMP StepOne Reference Station infilling implimentation in the code.

Second, your ignoring that GISTEMP was "adjusted" between 2005 and the present to add another 9.2 percent increase to the warming trend.

Vernon in #134:

I am sorry but I never claimed that they inflated it by 19.2 percent.

I know you went on from there but it is still unclear to me. How much do you think GISS is off by, and which other record shows this to be likely?

Coby,

The I truly do not have the time to recreate all the changes that GISTEMP has adjusted into the record. I would say at a minimum 10% and a high probability of it being higher. One issue I did not want to drag into this is we know that GISTEMP lowered the record in 2007 when the NOAA change was caught. So we know that the flawed data was in the 2005 record, was removed in the 2007 record, and yet GISTEMP is 9.2% higher then 2005 for the same period.

Is there any better record than GISTEMP itself?

While it is much to short a time to declare cooling, it is more than evident that we are not warming. The other three suggest that we are either not warming or possibly cooling.

Which is why I presented the SLR studies to support my argument.

Do you consider a positive 10% warming bias in the StepOne reference station code to be significant?

Do you consider that even with the 2007 correct to fix the "bad data" from NOAA, that 2009 is still has the warming trend increase by 9.2% for the same period?

I do happen to consider them significant.

Coby,

You did a post of the current talking point of the day, GISTEMP making changes are too small to matter. You suggested that there is no measurable change. Now that I have demonstrated that there is significant change your position morphs into, "whatever adjustements they make result in a more accurate product." That was not your initial position. That is not the topic of this discussion.

Are you conceding that GISTEMP makes adjustments that are of a significant change? If so, this argument is done. Do you want to open another one about whether changing the past record is good or not?

Vernon, you're the one morphing the topic. The subject of the post is the single very recent change described in it. It is insignificant.

You have brought up other adjustments allegedly done over the years and also their basic methodology as well. On that different topic, my position is they seem to have a good product that is consistent with the other temperature products and the wild insinuations of fraud from WUWT et al and your claims that they are incompetent are not born out by the evidence.

If you just want to hear me say that GISS adjusts the raw data in ways that are significant, no problem, they certainly do. Don't we all agree that the raw data is full of artifacts from equipment changes, citing changes and local environmental changes? Don't you expect them to correct for these things as they are discovered?

Coby,

I agree your post was that GISS's adjustment was insignificant, if you ignore reality. You point to how small the change was in recent years and ignored how they had at the same time been lowering the past temperature.

No, I do not want to hear you say that GISS adjusts raw data, I want to hear you say that GISS adjusts already adjusted past data in ways that are significant. From 2005 to the present GISS changed some present and a lot of past data to change the warming trend by 9.2%. I consider that a significant change.

Let me get this straight, your claiming now that all these changes to the past are GISS correcting equipment changes, citing changes and the local environment? Oh, they just happen to find new fixs every month and that almost all of these adjustments lower the past recorded temperatures, yeah, right. You do know that the last time there was changes like that was with Hansen et al (2001). They have already adjusted for station history, UHI, TOB, max/min temp adjustment, and changing instruments. What are you proposing was suddenly discovered, not be announced, that justifies rewriting the past? I really want to know.

since GISS was finally forced to release the GISTEMP code, we know that Step One reference station adds an artificial warming trend. That just looks like incompetence, but maybe not, maybe the millions spent could only product crap for code.

I never have never accused them of fraud. Sloppy programming, yes, fraud, no. Where have I said that they have committed fraud?

Please point to any other temperature source that rewrites the past, month after month and year after year. I have found that with the other sources, when they do major "adjustments" like GISS does continuously, they do not hide the old data, keep the same name for the new data, and not bother to post why the data was changed.

So, put away your red herring and just admit that for reasons undocumented on their site, the GISTEMP temperature trend has been significantly "adjusted" to be warm.

Well i think you will find that it was my comment which initiated this topic by Coby, i did not raise this issue because of this latest "insignificant change" but as Vernon highlights, the continual manipulation of data. It was i that suggested Hansen is manipulating the data and said he should be called to account for his actions.

In the 3 records that use satellite data:

1, The warmest recent year is 1998 which coincides with an exceptionally large El Nino event
2, The warming trend continues to about 2001
3, There is a cooling trend from 2002

The Giss data (the only record not to use sat data) is quite different:
1, The warmest recent year is 2006
2, The warming trend continues to 2006

Add the www.

junkscience.com/MSU_Temps/RSSglobe.html

From RSS, Sat data only

junkscience.com/MSU_Temps/UAHMSUglobe.html

Uni of Alabama NASA aqua sat data only

junkscience.com/MSU_Temps/HadCRUG.html

Hadley centre use sat and land based thermometers, although Hadley use the same land based thermometers as GISS they process it differently

junkscience.com/MSU_Temps/GISSglobal.html

From GISS land based thermometers only, run by Jim Hansen, no sat data despite the word âspaceâ in the name.

Add http://

cdiac.ornl.gov/epubs/ndp/ushcn/ts.ushcn_anom25_diffs_urb-raw_pg.gif

This graph is lifted from cdiac.ornl.gov/epubs/ndp/ushcn/ndp019.html

and shows the corrections made to the raw US land thermometer data by NOAA, in degrees F boosting the temps reported by GISS from 1960 and especially in the 1990's.

The corrections to the raw data in 1934 were minimal, but by 2000 the raw data was "corrected" upward by about 0.3C. Yet the smoothed US temp reported by GISS was only 0.2C higher in 2000 than it was in 1934.

So the smoothed raw temp was 0.1C higher in 1934 than it was in 2000. Or to put it another way without the "corrections", the GISS picture of rising temps over the century largely vanishes.

This document was published in 2008 and only covers up to 2000, what has happened since then we may ask? All 3 sat data sources show cooling yet GISS still shows warming.

This problem is not just confined to the USA, Siberia and China also show serious flaws in GISS data quality.

Vernon said:

blah blah blah blah blah

And yet all the other temperature records agree well within error margins with GISS. Explain that or drop it.

I never have never accused them of fraud. Sloppy programming, yes, fraud, no. Where have I said that they have committed fraud?

Where did I say you said that? Unfortunately this is typical of our discourse on the less personal issues as well.

So, ad hom when I the facts do not support your position. Is this what you where discussing in the comments post. That it is ok to insult me if you cannot address the facts?

I can see why Ian Forrester and dhogaza are valued, they do the same thing. You accuse me of calling Hansen and GISS of falsifying the data in a fraudulent manner, which I have not, and when you could not find any place I have said that, here we go with ad homs.

I guess this is not so much a science site as an advocacy site where any science or discussion that does not march in lock step is derided and the author vilified.

So while you were busy ad hom'ing me, does this mean that you do not consider a 9.2% change significant or that some of GISTEMP reported temperature trend is an artifact of the programming, not actual warming.

Vernon, don't be obtuse. I told you I never said you accused GISS of fraud. Why not just acknowledge that, since you can't quote me doing it. This is why discussions with you go in circles, you misrepresent what others say and you never close of any points of discussion.

And by the way, you do not understand what ad hom is. Not every insult or ridicule is an ad hom, especially when your points have already been answered.

Vernon -

You've spouted a lot of nonsense here, so I'll ask a simple question. Do you have any rigorous analysis/evidence to show that they are guilty of "sloppy programming?" Right now, you're just asserting that "they changed something, therefore they're wrong." Things that do not count as evidence are showing that there was a change (i.e referencing your post #80).

Also, if you are so convinced they are so completely incorrect, you should write a paper and submit it to a journal.

Courtesy of Ian, you've been shown the general agreement between the 4 data sets (#132), and you've been linked to an explanation of the USHCN changes (#145). All you have is nonsensical ramblings about, hilariously, incompetence!

Crakar -

So the smoothed raw temp was 0.1C higher in 1934 than it was in 2000. Or to put it another way without the "corrections", the GISS picture of rising temps over the century largely vanishes.

Is this a serious statement?!?! Crakar, throughout all the discussions that have taken place, are you still so ignorant as to why that statement is not even wrong? That's like saying 2 + 2 = eleventeen.

Coby,

First, I would like to apologize, I read post 140 and took it to mean you were lumping me into those saying GISS was committing fraud. That did irritate me since I have never done that, which made me be sharper with you than warranted.

Second, I want to take that comment in order:

143. I take it as an ad hom when you link my "post" to the tin foil hat people. That is a direct attack on me and not on my argument.

145. Ian, please read what you linked too and explain how that applies to the reference station methology that NOAA does not use? Your link points to why the adjustments to USHCN are proper, etc. however what has that got to do with the discussion. I am pretty sure I said the station reference methodology that was proposed by Hansen. Since USHCN does not used that why do their adjustments matter?

146. Thanks Coby, this was what caused me to realize you were not lumping me in with those. But, no the issues have not been address they have been ignored.

147. Well you will not like this but I have found several fairly detailed analysis of GISTEMP Step 1, only none of the pro sites are doing them.

http://yourvoicematters.org/articles/gistemp-nostep1.htm
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/07/22/giss-step-1-does-it-influence-the…

I do not feel any need to write to GISS about this. I am addressing a point that you raised and pointing out what I feel was an error in your presentation. Namely that you talked about adjustments but only showed one end of the graph, which was not going to show the changes anyway.

The fact remains that GISS has made a 9.2% increase to the warming trend to the 1880-2004 period between 2005 and the present. This is after the 2007 NOAA error was found and corrected.

I addressed the atomz evaluation once, shall I do it again?

I do want to be sure of your position, rewriting the past is ok if it gives the result you want to see now?

Coby,

why don't you see if you can get RC to break out the code and have them publish an analysis of what is done and how.

Vernon, June 2009 GISS anomaly - 0.63C; June 2008 Hadcrut3 anomaly - 0.503C (note different reference point).

Are you accusing all climate scientists of "sloppy programming"?

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 27 Jul 2009 #permalink

No Ian, I have not done that. But since no one has ever seen CRU's methodology and the British government has not seen fit to force Jones to release the code or even the station lists, it seems that pretty much no one out side the clique has. I do not have a clue what they are doing nor have I made such a claim.

I do see that you ignored the fact that your post to rebut me with the justification for NOAA's adjustments, which did not apply to the discussion, was meaningless in this context.

Have you ever considered reading up on the subject so that your comments are more relevant to the discussion? I never said that the reference station methodology was flawed, I said the GISTEMP implimentation of it was. I actually think that Hansen's RSM is very elegant way to handle multiple scribal records for the same station.

Now I feel your pain. It must be quite plain that GISTEMP has been adjusted repeatedly for undocumented reasons. The Step 1 reference station code has been shown to add additional warming as a artifact of the programming. You cannot admit that making undocumented changes to the past to increase the warming trend is an issue, if not a problem, because that goes against your faith, not the science.

Vernon said:

I do see that you ignored the fact that your post to rebut me with the justification for NOAA's adjustments, which did not apply to the discussion, was meaningless in this context.

Utter rubbish. You are slandering honest scientists with the rubbish you post. Please stop it immediately. At first we just thought you were ignorant of science but your consistent posting of the same rubbish over and over again after been shown how wrong you are means that you are putting out this rubbish intentionally. You are a deplorable troll.

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 27 Jul 2009 #permalink

Adam,

Let me try again, but first i will make the assumption that you read and understood the links i provided in my previous post.

Here is a graph that shows the five adjustments carried out on the raw data

Add http://

jennifermarohasy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/hammer-graph-2-us-temps1.jpg

The five adjustments are

1) The black line is the adjustment for time of observation.

2)The red line is for a change in maximum/minimum thermometers used.

3)The yellow line is for changes in station siting.

4)The pale blue line is for filling in missing data from individual station records.

5)The purple line is for UHI effects.

Here is a graph that shows the effects these adjustments have on the temp record

Add http://

jennifermarohasy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/hammer-graph-3-us-temps.jpg

Now lets take a look at the raw data with these adjustments

Add http://

jennifermarohasy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/hammer-graph-4-us-temps.jpg

Now lets take a look at the raw temp record before the adjustments are made

Add http://

jennifermarohasy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/hammer-graph-5-us-temps.jpg

Here is a graph which compares the two (raw and adjusted) together

Add http://

jennifermarohasy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/hammer-graph-1-us-temps.jpg

Now getting back to your original statement

"Is this a serious statement?!?! Crakar, throughout all the discussions that have taken place, are you still so ignorant as to why that statement is not even wrong? That's like saying 2 + 2 = eleventeen."

When looking at the above graphs it is painfully obvious that the corrections GISS make have gotten larger and larger as time has gone on. The corrections in 1934 was minimal compared to the corrections made in 2000, thus without these so called corrections most of the century warming according to GISS simply vanishes.

Do you agree or are you going to simply respond with another mathematical absurdity?

Ian,

you sure are consistent. When in a bind, lie. I have never slandered anyone nor have I attributed motive to why GISTEMP is so poorly coded or documented. To be honest, GISTEMP would have been unacceptable in a 201 FORTRAN class in the 70's when FORTRAN and COBAL were the main languages. But enough about that.

I feel like following a valued contributer to this sites policy of calling a spade a spade. You really do not know that what you posted as rebuttal was meaningless in reference to the discussion. I have to admit, at first I though you were trying for humor, but then I realized that your pointing to RC for a comment on the USHCN adjustment to rebut my points about the Reference Station Methodology was because you did not know. That lead me to wonder why to you keep trolling all the posts calling people names. I looked it up on some pysch sites, sad.

You always call people names when you cannot win the debate. You have even claimed to be a scientist, but you do not read the science nor seemingly understand it.

Well, since your name calling is going to be a valued contribution and mine is heading for redaction, I will be ignoring all your posts until they actually address the subject being debated.

Do you agree or are you going to simply respond with another mathematical absurdity?

Jennifer's blog is an absurdity, pure and simple. Worse that WUWT whose "blog scientists" "proved" that low antarctic temps cause CO2 snow to fall in the interior.

And what is this "mathematical absurdity" crap? Math and stats are the bread and butter of modern science. If you don't like that, you're back in the stone age.

Do you agree or are you going to simply respond with another mathematical absurdity?

Of course, there's also the picture is worth a thousand words bit.

It's melting

Worse than expected.

Vernon, just about every post you make slanders scientists. Your ability to understand English syntax is at an all time low if you do not even know that what you are saying is slanderous.

I do not call people names unless they deserve it and you certainly deserve all the anger that is directed at you. You are anti-science and anti-scientist.

You consistently use ad hominem arguments:

GISTEMP would have been unacceptable in a 201 FORTRAN class in the 70's when FORTRAN and COBAL were the main languages

I don't call people names when I "cannot win the debate". I call them what they are as they portray themselves by their postings. Any honest contributor to this blog will see exactly what it means when I call a spade a spade.

You have actually posted one honest statement:

I do not have a clue what they are doing.

This applies to all the scientists who you are slandering. Try reading some honest texts and you will not be so clueless.

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 27 Jul 2009 #permalink

I do want to be sure of your position, rewriting the past is ok if it gives the result you want to see now?

LOL! That's nicely worded. I would put it more like this: reprocessing the data is ok if it improves the accuracy of the resulting analysis.

If it shows that the globe is warming, well maybe, just maybe, it is.

Dhogaza,

My post was a response to Adam, not that i mind you responding but Adam did say 2+2=eleventeen which is of course a mathematical absurdity. The only connection to Jennifers blog was the graphs, i could have used the graphs from another site but of course this would not have changed the content only the source.

As usual your post bears no relavence to mine but as Vernon has said you as is Ian are one of the valued contributors so i guess it is OK for you to ramble on about nothing.

So far i have essentially posted the same thing twice and on both occasions the point has been completely missed.

I seem to recall you said you were from Vancouver? I thought they spoke English there but maybe i am mistaken and some form of bastardised French is your native tongue.

Next time you post please stay within the framework of the debate.

Crakar and Vernon,

Don't be so insecure. This line about "valued contributors" is a rewriting of history (again). I called them "regular supporting commenters" and you guys "regular antagonistic commenters" - no value judgement.

Coby,

Thanks for the clarification, in regards to my original post which generated this hotly debated topic i called for GISS/Hansen to be called to account for their data manipulation. Both Vernon and myself have highlighted the numerous changes to the temp record via so called corrections which seems to have over inflated the temp trend over the past 120 odd years.

If the GISS process was completely transparent and full disclosure and justification of these corrections was made for all the world to see we would not be having this debate, unfortunately this is not the case. So as long as 3 out of 4 agencies show the same trend, but a differing trend to GISS then one can only assume GISS is the incorrect one.

As Adam and dhogaza clearly have nothing more to add to the debate should we now consider it closed?

One question i wish to ask is of the 3 different methods we have of measuring global temps which one would you consider to be the more relavent?

1) Sat data only
2) Surface data only
3) Combination of the two

Cheers

Crakar

Coby,

So, your position is that GISS's constantly rewriting history is ok if it give the correct result. That a 9.2% change in the trend in four years is not significant. Would you be saying the same thing if one of the other sources could be shown to constantly rewriting history in an undocumented manner and they were lowering the warming trend by 9.2%.

Some how I just do not think that you would find that change acceptable. It looks like a bad implimentation is ok, if it gives the results you want.

Vernon @ 80:

That is a 9.2% increase in the trend which does cause temperatures in the present to be warmer. That is why it matters.

No Vernon, what matters is the trend, especially over the past 2 to 3 decades. Using the data you provide (where did you get your "2005" data?) I did a linear regression of your 1981 to 2004 data. If you do that you will find that the changes made between 2005 and 2009 (if we can believe your numbers) shows a very slight LOWERING of the rate of increase from 0.171C per decade (2005 data) to 0.170C per decade (2009 data).

Hardly the "9.2% increase" you are claiming.

Once again Vernon, you have been shown to be posting rubbish.

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 28 Jul 2009 #permalink

Ian, thanks for bring that up. There are several archival sites that keep data from almost all web pages. It is odd that GISTEMP is the only major source that does not archive their own data and have change logs to explain why past data was changed.

Now, I have to ask, why did you cherry pick those dates? Since I have repeatedly stated that GISTEMP's adjustments are largely lowering past data, what did you hope to achieve by cherry picking that period? Why are you ignoring the changes to the full record?

The full record from 2005 and 2009 (last week):

20052009
YearJ-DJ-D
1880-0.22-0.25
1881-0.17-0.19
1882-0.19-0.22
1883-0.21-0.23
1884-0.25-0.3
1885-0.25-0.3
1886-0.21-0.25
1887-0.3-0.35
1888-0.22-0.26
1889-0.12-0.15
1890-0.33-0.37
1891-0.24-0.28
1892-0.29-0.32
1893-0.29-0.32
1894-0.29-0.33
1895-0.24-0.27
1896-0.13-0.17
1897-0.1-0.12
1898-0.21-0.24
1899-0.13-0.17
1900-0.07-0.1
1901-0.14-0.16
1902-0.22-0.27
1903-0.28-0.31
1904-0.3-0.34
1905-0.22-0.25
1906-0.17-0.2
1907-0.34-0.39
1908-0.32-0.34
1909-0.32-0.35
1910-0.31-0.33
1911-0.31-0.34
1912-0.29-0.34
1913-0.28-0.32
1914-0.12-0.15
1915-0.05-0.09
1916-0.27-0.31
1917-0.36-0.4
1918-0.29-0.32
1919-0.18-0.21
1920-0.17-0.19
1921-0.11-0.13
1922-0.22-0.24
1923-0.19-0.2
1924-0.19-0.21
1925-0.13-0.16
19260-0.01
1927-0.11-0.13
1928-0.09-0.11
1929-0.22-0.25
1930-0.04-0.07
19310-0.01
1932-0.04-0.06
1933-0.15-0.17
1934-0.05-0.05
1935-0.09-0.1
1936-0.03-0.04
19370.060.08
19380.10.11
19390.040.03
19400.030.05
19410.120.11
19420.040.04
19430.080.1
19440.190.2
19450.090.07
1946-0.03-0.04
194700.01
1948-0.02-0.04
1949-0.03-0.06
1950-0.13-0.15
1951-0.03-0.04
19520.040.03
19530.120.11
1954-0.09-0.1
1955-0.11-0.1
1956-0.19-0.17
19570.060.08
19580.110.08
19590.070.06
19600.01-0.01
19610.070.08
19620.040.04
19630.090.08
1964-0.17-0.21
1965-0.1-0.11
1966-0.02-0.03
1967-0.020
1968-0.04-0.04
19690.080.08
19700.020.03
1971-0.11-0.1
197200
19730.120.14
1974-0.11-0.08
1975-0.06-0.05
1976-0.14-0.16
19770.110.13
19780.020.01
19790.10.08
19800.160.18
19810.220.26
19820.060.05
19830.250.26
19840.070.09
19850.030.05
19860.120.12
19870.270.26
19880.30.31
19890.190.19
19900.370.38
19910.320.35
19920.140.12
19930.140.14
19940.240.23
19950.370.38
19960.250.29
19970.40.39
19980.560.56
19990.330.32
20000.320.33
20010.470.48
20020.540.56
20030.520.55
20040.480.48

LSTrend0.0048487250.005294624
SD0.210483560.225975677
CI0.0368986940.039614531

It is easy to see that the older years have been extensively lowered between the 2005 and 2009 data sets.

If you want to say that only the last 24 years matter, then please provide statical reason why.

Oh and yes, 2009 trend/2005 trend is 1.091962 or 9.2%.

Vernon said:

Now, I have to ask, why did you cherry pick those dates?

How stupid can you be? These were the latest dates you gave which had both sets of data.

Another thing, I doubt very much if you can do a linear regression since 1880 since the trend lines are different at differing points in time. In other words there is not a linear trend from 1880 to 2004.

Anyone who is knowledgeable about climate change knows that it is the trend over the past few decades which is important since that is the time period when CO2 effects are the dominant driver. You do understand what that means, don't you? During the early part of your data CO2 was not a major driver and only played a minor role in warming.

Vernon said:

Oh and yes, 2009 trend/2005 trend is 1.091962 or 9.2%.

Are you referring to 1880 to 2004? As I explained earlier, that is meaningless since the trend has not been linear over that time period. Also, it is the recent trend which is important since it is mostly due to increasing levels of CO2. Go and ask Tamino if you want further clarification on why you can't do a linear regression on non-linear data.

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 28 Jul 2009 #permalink

Ian,

So basically, you have decided that a least squares trend line cannot be done for the entire series and your only going to count the part of the series that supports your point of view. You do not know statistics do you?

Once again your in a indefensible position and it is back to the name calling.

I guess it is too much to point out that it does matter since the only way to get exceptional warming is to lower the past temperatures, but that may be beyond you.

There is no requirement for me to go and ask someone to defend your position. You go to Tamino if you want and see if he will post how your right. I do not possibly see how but, go for it.

Since your back to name calling and nothing to support your position, once again I will ignore, well until you post something else that dumb to knock down.

Vernon, I do not call you names. The rubbish you post speaks volumes more than I can ever take the time to write about you.

How can you use a "linear regression" on non-linear data? The trend over the past 2 to 3 decades is what is important. Your lies about GISS altering the data to increase the trend by 9.2% is just rubbish. The change in GISS data has in fact reduced the recent (most important trend for climate scientists) by a very small amount. Get a life.

And it will save valuable band width if you just stop posting rubbish rather than ignoring me since all of my comments about your behaviour are honest and true and can be verified by anyone who wants to waste their time by going back and checking your previous posts, on this site and the others which still allow you to post (that number gets smaller and smaller as you continue to post your lies and misinformation all over the web).

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 28 Jul 2009 #permalink

Well, I see the noise ratio is going up.

Since no one else wants to try and defend the position that a 9.2% change in four years insignificant, I guess that Coby was wrong with this thread, the adjustments that GISS makes to GISTEMP are significant.

Vernon said:

Well, I see the noise ratio is going up.

The more you post the more noise there is. No one wants to waste their time by showing how stupid and wrong your idea that the GISS adjustments have made a 9.2% difference is. You can't use a linear regression on non-linear data and the trend over the last 2 to 3 decades is what is important.

Come back when you havc some thing useful and honest to say.

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 28 Jul 2009 #permalink