Roy Spencer's testimony before congress backs up Monckton's assertions on climate sensitivity

I was going to forward this to you, but you beat me to the punch.
I wonder if Sen. Boxer had the guts to pay attention to the info presented here. I can hope she did, but knowing how entrenched her opinion is on AGW, I doubt it.

No one from Trenberth’s office went there because they are still in denial of Anthony’s presentation of the surface stations.

Nailing your thesis to the church door sometimes gets you in trouble.
And that is precisely what just happened. Let the debate commence anew.

I think someone needs to point out to Spencer that his reference 6 to Schwartz is no longer applicable in that Schwartz himself no longer argues for a climate sensitivity that implies “the real climate system does not exhibit net positive feedback”. See his reply to the comments on his paper here: http://www.ecd.bnl.gov/steve/pubs/HeatCapCommentResponse.pdf
Schwartz’s estimate 1.9 +- 1.0K for the equilibrium climate sensitivity is now considerably overlapping with the IPCC’s estimate of 2.0 to 4.5 K. (No net positive feedbacks would imply a sensitivity of ~1.1 K or less, so this just barely overlaps with Schwartz’s estimate.)

Thank you for posting this.
Frank Ravizza,
We can expect many ex post facto rhetoric from those who’ve staked their reputations on AGW. In time it will be self-evident just how wrong they are. True, Spencer will be maligned and ignored but others will follow with more evidence supporting his work despite attempts to stop the debate. Who else has noticed the garbage being ramrodded through the “science” journals using climate models as their predictive tools? Great huh? A hypothesis used to form a hypothesis. That’s science?
What was missing in this has been the observational evidence to support/refute CO2 AGW. Spencer has simply opened the door by publishing his first article last August which showed the atmosphere behaves exactly opposite the climate model predictions. It was somewhat ignored, but those who read it began to understand just how horribly wrong the AGW hypothesis is. As the satellite data keeps rolling in, it will be difficult to support the “consensus”.
After Spencer published his second article referenced above, RealClimate attacked with their usual volley of ad hominen logical fallacies, but failed to acknowledge as Spencer noted, that Held and Forster agreed with him which effectively neutered Raypierre and the rest of the malcontents at RealClimate. Why anyone takes them seriously is puzzling.
Now the true believers are backed to the Arctic being their last stand, their Little Big Horn, but even that isn’t working out well. Strange it is that the three major postulates presented as the cause for the anomalous 2007 Arctic melt doesn’t mention CO2 🙂 Yet Hansen declares just last month without evidence it is rising GHG causing the melt. These preachers of doom can’t even show it is warmer now in the Arctic and Greenland than it was ~70 years ago.
http://www.arm.gov/science/research/pdf/R00143.pdf
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=impure-as-the-driven-snow
http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/lookingatearth/quikscat-20071001.html

Perhaps APS would have Dr. Spencer submit his paper for the next edition of the Physics and Society newsletter. Keep the debate going.

Joel unwittingly helps here with the question of this “consensus”, “settled science”, in his reference:
http://www.ecd.bnl.gov/steve/pubs/HeatCapCommentResponse.pdf
“The continuing high uncertainty associated with estimates of Earth’s climate sensitivity pertinent to climate change on the multidecadal time scale has motivated an effort to determine this sensitivity empirically within an energy balance framework.”
Doesn’t sound like “settled science” or the basis of a consensus.

Douglas: But, Spencer is using Schwartz to re-enforce his claim about climate sensitivity being low. Why would he cite work that he knows is faulty (when it supports his claim)…but now you are trying to tell me that the analysis isn’t valid (now that an error in it has been corrected and it no longer supports the claim)?
The work of Schwartz has been cited many many times by commenters on this blog. Now, it seems that it wasn’t so great after all? Hmmm.
DR says: “Did Schwartz have Spencer’s data to make those determinations?…
That is the difference. Observations trump theory, every time.” Well, both of the papers rely on a combination of observational data and analysis of that data so I don’t see how you can say that one trumps the other on this sort of simplistic basic.
Smokey says: “I disagree with Joel Shore’s estimate of the UN/IPCC’s predictions, because the IPCC makes so many predictions.” The latest predictions are in the 2007 Fourth Assessment Report. That report states clearly that the equilibrium climate sensitivity is likely between 2 and 4.5 C and is very unlikely to be less than 1.5 C.
Glenn says: “Joel unwittingly helps here with the question of this ‘consensus’, ‘settled science’, in his reference:” It is not “my reference”. It is simply the updated analysis in a reply to comments given by Schwartz, which is the reference that Spencer cites. And, noone claims that there is not a considerable amount of uncertainty in climate sensitivity. Clearly, even a range of 2 to 4.5 C, the IPCC “likely” range, demonstrates that there is a considerable amount of uncertainty. However, that does not mean there is no scientific consensus whatsoever and any opinion is equally regarded in the scientific literature as any other.

I watched the testimony before the EPW committee today (webcast at http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Hearings.Home); the title of the hearing is quite misleading: Full Committee hearing entitled, “An Update on the Science of Global Warming and its Implications.”There were only a few committee members in attendance and all they were wanted to know is “Did President Bush tell the EPA to throw out recommendations on regulation of CO2?” Dr. Spencer gave any opening statement and was asked no more questions. Jason Burnett, Former Associate Deputy Administrator, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, was the principal witness. Sadly, it appeared that these policy makers are not willing to hear anything that differs from their viewpoints.

Bill Marsh says: “If the mathematics of ln(C/C0) holds, then we’ve actually seen more like 70% of the warming we’re going to see with doubling of CO2 from 260-520 ppmv. You’ll get the most increase in warming in the first 30% of increase.”
Even ignoring the facts that the accepted value I usually see used for pre-industrial levels is 280ppmv, that there is a lag time in the warming (i.e., equilibrium climate sensitivity differs from transient climate sensitivity), and the cooling and warming effects of aerosols and other greenhouse gases, I don’t see how you get 70%. Using your 260ppm value (and using 385ppm for the current value), I get that we have gone a little less than 57% of the way toward a doubling of CO2 levels, i.e., log(385/260)/log(2) = 57%. Using the more accepted 280ppm value, lowers that to 46%.

I would like to take this opportunity to express my deepest thanks to Dr. Spencer, Lord Monckton, Dr. Singer and the many other scientists unknown to me who refused to believe the anthropogenic global warming (AGW) alarmists’ predictions just because it was the politically and fiscally “smart thing to do”. By questioning the establishment, at a minimum they put their reputations on the line; and although I am unware of a specific case, I can’t help but believe many of them have put their livelihoods on the line as well. They did this in part because they observed politically-influenced science being practiced on a large scale, and as true believers of science-science not political-influenced-science, they couldn’t and didn’t stand idly by and say nothing. Even if in the end it turns out they are incorrect (an outcome whose likelihood is diminishing daily), I will still feel I owe them a debt of gratitude. They may be the primary reason we avoid whatever problems and catastrophes would ensue had the political-scientists gotten their way. If the AGW alarmists basic premise that man’s industrial activity (in particular man’s increased production of CO2) (a) will cause global warming and (b) global warming is in the aggregate bad for the Earth, by delaying action we may do some damage to the Earth. But given the fact that since 2001 measurements show that the Earth has cooled, it’s extremely hard to believe that the apocalypse will occur if we delay taking action by a few years. Between the two alternatives: (1) massive and immediate changes to energy production, and (2) taking a risk that by delaying doing something we cross the threshold of temperature stability and bring on the apocalypse, I for one am happy to take the risk.
Reed Coray

At the very end of Dr. Spencer’s spoken testimony he said the following and I thought it was significant and pretty scary. I transcribed it from the video. I hope I got it right.
First time using the blockquote tag. Please work!

Joel Shore,
You clearly have not been keeping track of Spencer’s work this past year. That’s ok, he has been ignored……until now. He’s been building up to this point for the last two years. Now Pandora’s box has been opened. What’s inside?
His first paper showed observational data from satellites clearly disagreed (exactly opposite in fact) with GCM outputs on atmospheric behavior in the tropics.
His second paper consisted of forming a hypothesis as to why this was occurring. In case you missed it, Held and Forster (look them up) agreed, but not on a quantifiable basis.
His third paper is the observational evidence to support his second paper.
In any event, observations are diametrically opposed to IPCC GCM’s. There are now myriads of studies demonstrating this. G Stephens 2005 was the first big hit on GCM assumptions on cloud dynamics. Roe & Baker further bloodied them up on climate sensitivity. There are many more.
One would assume you believe there is still “heat in the pipeline”. If this were the case, as OHC is declining, where is the heat going? Josh Willis and Kevin Trenberth are a bit perplexed by this. It is not continuing to warm on land or sea as IPCC (ala Hansen et al) claimed it would as GHG emissions continue to rise.
I don’t see how pitting Monckton vs Spencer will help your cause. If you have read Spencer’s work closely, (I don’t have it in front of me) I believe he places the actual real world warming attributable to 2xCO2 at .2C……..that’s not too far off from Monckton now is it? Have you dissected Monckton’s mathematical calculations? Where is he in error? Where is Spencer wrong?

Dr Spencer’s findings are very interesting.
On the issue of climate sensitivity, one thing has always puzzled me.
Is there any “orthodox” explanation of the mechanism(s) whereby in the Carboniferous era (the clue’s in the name!), around 320 million years ago, CO2 went from c.7,000 ppm in the early period, to 350 ppm in the middle period?
If I understand the positive feedback theory correctly, once a tipping point is reached (presumably purported to be well under 7,000 ppm) this *couldn’t* happen, right?
Or did I miss something?

Here is how I think why and how climate change is occurring.
1. Cloud cover is varying over the oceans. Evidence (see Palle abstract below).
2. The cloud cover causes changes in ocean temperatures by modulating the amount of solar radiation being absorbed.
3. The changes in ocean temperatures cause much of the observed changes in temperature over land (see Compo abstract below).
4. Part of the changes in land temperatures are also caused by land use changes (Pielke, Sr.), urban heat islands (McKitrick and Michaels), and poor siting of thermometers (Watts).
Additional comments:
1. The Compo paper states: “Indeed we find compelling evidence from several atmospheric general circulation model simulations without prescribed GHG, aerosol, and solar forcing variations (Table 1) that the continental warming in Fig. 1a is largely a response to the warming of the oceans rather than directly due to GHG increases over the continents (Table 2).” In other words, they simulate the observed climate changes without any changes in greenhouse gases.
2. The cloud cover variations reported by Palle are consistent with the recent cooling of the oceans based upon the Argo buoys and are inconsistent with the GHG warming theory.
3. The oceans cannot be warmed by additional downward radiation from additional greenhouse gases since this radiation is absorbed in the upper few microns of the oceans. Indeed Compo says the heat is flowing out of the oceans and not into it, so this also eliminates the hypothesis the greenhouses gases warm the air which is mixed into the oceans warming them.
4. Cloud cover over the oceans varies and this modulates the amount of solar radiation reaching the surface which modulates the ocean temperatures. Cloud cover variations are probably natural unforced internal variations of the climate system. It is unlikely that cloud cover and ocean temperatures are ever in equilibrium and hence one can expect oscillations over decades and centuries as seen by El Nino, PDO, AMO, NAO, the 1500 year cycle, etc.
5. Palle reports that the internal forcing is several watts per square meter. The observed temperature variations are in the tenths of a degree. The implied climate sensitivity therefore is very low. The low climate sensitivity means that the postulated forcing by greenhouse gases will have little effect of temperatures.
6. Studies that neglect internal unforced variations in cloud cover will lead to an overestimation of climate sensitivity (for example, Schwartz). You would need to remove all the unforced variations from the temperature record and then apply Schwartz’s techniques to calculate climate sensitivity. I am not sure if this is possible.
7. Some of the cloud cover variations may be forced by solar variations as suggested by Svensmark.
8. Spencer seems to hold views similar to the ones above.
Pallé E., P. Montañés-Rodriguez, P. R. Goode, S. E. Koonin, M. Wild, and S. Casadio, 2005: A multi-data comparison of shortwave climate forcing changes, Geophysical Research Letters.
The abstract reads:
“Traditionally the Earth’s reflectance has been assumed to be roughly constant, but large decadal variability, not reproduced by current climate models, has been reported lately from a variety of sources. We compare here the available data sets related to Earth’s reflectance, in order to assess the observational constraints on the models. We find a consistent picture among all data sets of an albedo decreased during 1985–2000 between 2–3 and 6–7 W/m 2, which is highly climatically significant. The largest discrepancy among the data sets occurs during 2000–2004, when some present an increasing reflectance trend, while CERES observations show a steady decrease of about 2 W/m 2.”
Compo,G.P., and P.D. Sardeshmukh, 2008: Oceanic influences on recent continental warming. Climate Dynamics, in press.
The abstract reads:
“Evidence is presented that the recent worldwide land warming has occurred largely in response to a worldwide warming of the oceans rather than as a direct response to increasing greenhouse gases (GHGs) over land. Atmospheric model simulations of the last half-century with prescribed observed ocean temperature changes, but without prescribed GHG changes, account for most of the land warming. The oceanic influence has occurred through hydrodynamic-radiative teleconnections, primarily by moistening and warming the air over land and increasing the downward longwave radiation at the surface. The oceans may themselves have warmed from a combination of natural and anthropogenic influences.”
Sorry for the long post.

I think the exchange of ideas in places such as this will be sufficient to bring about change. You don’t have to have the best hand to win at cards and you don’t have to be in the majority in the court of public opinion to make the biggest impact in public policy.
What this information is used to accomplish is more important than the information itself, a sad fact indeed. I think the IPCC sees this as an “Ends justify the means” situation. Regulating CO2 equals regulating energy. It is the biggest sword a governing body could weild (aside from religion). Whether increasing or decreasing energy usage the result would be the same, complete control of the world economy and by proxy, control of the world.
I don’t think the proponents of AGW theory are being misled by bad science, quite the opposite. If the governing bodies are finally given control over speech and scientific discourse, they will have won a resounding blow against liberty and resistence to globalization of goverance.
I am very happy to be able to post this and to participate in free exchange of information. Let us all pray this privelege is never allowed to be taken from us.

Bravo to Mr. Spencer. Excellent report.
Sounds like the folks at NCAR aren’t too thrilled about a challenge to their mind virus. One of these days, things will be different.

DR says: “I don’t see how pitting Monckton vs Spencer will help your cause. If you have read Spencer’s work closely, (I don’t have it in front of me) I believe he places the actual real world warming attributable to 2xCO2 at .2C……..that’s not too far off from Monckton now is it? Have you dissected Monckton’s mathematical calculations? Where is he in error? Where is Spencer wrong?”
That Spencer and Monckton get the same end result of a low climate sensitivity is not surprising since that is what they are both aiming for. This does not mean the two papers are consistent…and in fact they are not.
As for whether I have dissected Monckton’s calculations, the answer is yes. And, as to where he is wrong, the short answer is pretty much everywhere. Tim Lambert has a pretty good analysis here: http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2008/07/moncktons_triple_counting.php One could quibble with whether what Monckton did is best characterized as “triple counting” but the basic underlying errors are correctly noted and they completely invalidate the whole paper. I know that there will also be responses to Monckton’s piece in the FPS newsletter that will explain where he was wrong…I have already read over and commented on one draft response that a friend from physics grad school is writing and it is very good at explaining in great detail where Monckton went wrong.
As for Spencer, his work is clearly a much more serious scientific attempt than Monckton’s. I am not really qualified to say where he might be wrong…although I do know a couple of things. One is his claim that Schwartz’s result supports his claim of net negative feedbacks is no longer true, as I noted. The second is that the fit shown in Fig. 3 is not very impressive given the free parameters that he has to play with…And, I think the RealClimate folks had more to say about that and about the values he had to choose for those parameters in order to even do as well as he did.
In time, climate scientists qualified to evaluate Spencer’s work will weigh in on it, as it should be. In the meantime, what you have is some work that other scientists have not had a chance to digest and respond to that contradicts lots of other evidence in the field. In any field of science at any given time, this is usually the case…It seems to be only in fields like climate science and evolution (i.e., ones that generate political controversy) that many seem to think that this means that we have to be paralyzed and act as if we know nothing.

The moderator says: “Spencer has published, look it up. Then you can so that you can ‘dissect it in an appropriate scientific discourse.’ or whatever method you choose.” Spencer has published some of what he presents, not all of it. As for dissecting it, I have made a few points but I am not sure that either counters or myself are the best ones to do this. I don’t pretend to be a climate scientist and although my background in physics and my reading of climate science in my “free time” give me some ability to comment on work that appears, I have no illusions that I can do so as well as someone working in the field.
The moderator says: “By the way, you can’t actually have ‘appropriate scientific discourse.’ and be an anonymous coward at the same time. Peer review is done by real, known people that put their name behind their work.” Actually, in the cases that I am familiar with, peer review is done anonymously…at least anonymously to everyone but the editor. In fact, I have a friend who works as an editor for the APS journal Physical Review and they have their system designed so that even he is unable to see who refereed the papers that he published there before he became an editor.
REPLY: I’m familiar with the process. Peer reviewers are known by the journal editor and selected based on credentials, experience, and expertise. You can’t gauge any of those from Internet phantoms that don’t use their name or put forth any details on expertise. They aren’t even known to the moderator. For “counters” to imply that a rigorous examination can occur the same way by himself and others is simply an erroneous fantasy.

“I hope that the Committee realizes that, if true, these new results mean that humanity will be largely spared the negative consequences of human-induced climate change. This would be good news that should be celebrated — not attacked and maligned.”
This is so obvious that it shouldn’t need saying. As a non-scientist (but avid follower of this blog) I don’t understand all the science but I have spent all my life believing that good news is preferable to bad news.
I would have hoped that in a rational world the IPCC and the UN itself and most of the world’s governments would have been delighted that a prominent climate scientist has come up with a realistic thesis that may tell us that AGW is not actually happening and that we don’t need to spend trillions of dollars in combating it.
Perhaps one day somebody will come up with a cast-iron explanation of why this is not the case since I cannot for the life of me work it out for myself.

@ Joel Shore
Actually Spencer only points to Schwartz’s works as an example of other researches that find that “the real climate system does not exhibit net positive feedback”.
In its 2008 revision Schwartz writes: “The revision in estimated climate sensitivity relative to that of S07 results in a revision of Table 3 of that paper in which total forcing and forcing other than by greenhouse gases were presented; that revision is shown here as Table 2. Perhaps most important here is the revision in the forcing other than by greenhouse gases, which is attributed mainly to forcing by anthropogenic aerosols, which is given now as -1.1 ± 0.7 W m-2, substantially greater (negative) forcing than given in S07. The conclusion of S07 that changes in atmospheric composition over the industrial period would, for concentrations of forcing agents held constant at present values, lead to minimal additional heating “in the pipeline” is unchanged.”
In other words, the recent corrections made by Schwartz don’t contradict his previous findings that were referenced by Spencer. Also, their methods are different and you can not claim that they directly support/refute each other. Scwartz himself points that “Attention is called also to other recent independent estimates of climate sensitivity that are likewise at the low end of the IPCC [2007] range: 0.29 to 0.48 ± 0.12 K/(W m-2) [Chylek et al., 2007]; 0.49 ± 0.07 K/(W m-2) [Chylek and Lohmann, 2008]; and 0.65 ± 0.28 K/(W m-2) [Scafetta and West, 2007]” This is the most important: that the science is not settled and there is an ample scientific evidence for that.

Douglas: Could we say your proposition with which i agree 100%” should read “this is what causes climate” not climate change?. Isn’t climate inherently changing by definition?

Joel Shore (12:12:48)
“Actually, in the cases that I am familiar with, peer review is done anonymously…at least anonymously to everyone but the editor…”
I am somewhat puzzled about this part. How Mokton and Spencer came to know exactly who the reviewers were. Of course, now a days no one really wants to review papers and the author has to supply names of potential reviewers (generally five), but most often the editor adds those names to the database and use other reviewers. The name of the reviewers are known only to the editor and his/her secretary. Editors generally discourage reviewers even from communicating with the author. So I really cannot figure out how they know exactly who the reviewers are.

I’m just a lurker here but it seems if AGW becomes any more apparent of a fraud then one of the many things it will take down with it is the ‘peer-review’ process. As it will become a joke not only to scientists but to all citizens who have had to listen to that mantra while trying to decipher the debate. In my understanding of the IPCC they already perverted the use of peer-review beyond repair and Oreskes did much damage to the reputation of the peer review process via her claims of consensus in her non-peer reviewed paper. As for Monckton, I think of him as more of a reporter on the science and thus easily dismissed by those who strongly want to. But I see him as much more qualified to speak on the issue than Al Gore who is held as an expert by the dopey press.

Joel Shore said at 19:46:40
“Yes, they are both arguing for low climate sensitivity. However, they are doing so with completely different arguments and, in fact, the arguments can’t really both be right.”
Your logic is false. Oh yes, they both can be right. Earth climate is a multivariable spatio-temporal system. The whole issue is debated by mapping of complex chaotic variables onto a single value called “global temperature”, which was designed for political appeal. There are myriad ways to map the variety of climatic variables into a single number. In fact, all these “theories” of sensitivity are no more than statistical curve fitting. The involved parameters (forcings and feedbacks) have no physical meaning, are immeasurable, and cannot constitute a system where any known law of physics would hold. Curve fitting to noisy experimental data can be done in many equally valid ways. Monckton and Spencer use slightly different angles, but arrived to the same result: IPCC theoretical projections and estimations are blown out of proportion with reality. The CO2-centric AGW theory is falling apart, and no friends from graduate school of physics could save it.

I believe Monckton is certainly better qualified than Al Gore in this topic, Al Gore is a politician who found an opportunity in AGW. But when Monckton equates editorial review with peer-review in his strongly worded letter, in my opinion it diminishes his credibility.
As for Spencer, unfortunately I do not really trust him. It seems there is a stretch between his reviewed publications and his public opinions – in his unreviewed writings he seems to exaggerate the significance of his work in order to cast doubts on AGW. This particular one is not different, it seems to me. Here is the clue, when he said: “ To be fair, in a follow-up communication Piers Forster stated to me his belief that the net effect of the new understanding on climate sensitivity estimates would likely be small. But as we shall see, the latest evidence now suggests otherwise.” I believe the first part, which is the reviewer’s opinion; but I do not believe in the second part, which is Spencer’s opinion. If Christy was the one making these statements, I will have little hesitation in giving him the benefit of doubt.
I see so much criticism on peer-review process. It is best process we have to keep a level of standard and integrity in the published literature. As with any other great systems created by imperfect human beings, most often it works fine. It is easy to criticize the process, but it is difficult to come up with a different better process to achieve the same objective.

What surprises me in all these discussions is that Roy Spencer’s conclusions are rather obvious when the satellite data – as used by Palle and others, are studied – the period of ‘global warming’ currently attributed to carbon dioxide also corresponds to a global cloud thinning (ISCCP data) and increased Short Wave flux to the surface of the order of 6 watts/sq m over many years compared to the computed CO2 radiative forcing by Long Wave radiation of 1.8 watts. This radiative flux data supports Spencer and should have shown IPCC that something was wrong. The changing clouds are likely related to the oceanic oscillations – but more, there is a large literature on the correlation between ocean surface temperature/oscillations and the solar cycle. The mechanism may or may not be as Svensmark and colleagues believe – there are other candidates, but there is very likely one that links the solar cycle to ocean surface temperatures via cloud density. And of course, the solar flux has increased 230% in the last 100 years (now perhaps about to decline), and this may be what has ultimately warmed the oceans – with some time lags when the oscillations amplified the effects.
When I reviewed this material a year ago (www.ethos-uk.com) I concluded that these factors could account for about 80% of the warming – thus reducing considerably the assumed climate sensitivity to carbon dioxide.
I spent some time reading the IPCC working group reports – no one was thinking ‘ecologically’ – i.e. each discipline operated separately and there was clearly no one with an effective overview of the science – it requires solar scientists to talk to oceanographers, oceanographers to talk to satellite data analysts in atmospheric sciences – and all of them to review the paleo-ecology of the Holocene, which would lead them to look for a ‘missing factor’ to explain previous natural fluctuations (as indeed Svensmark did).
I would expect it to take several years, but eventually the data that now contradicts the models will cause the models to be revised – already there are attempts to factor in ocean oscillations. How this will affect policy is another matter!

Al Tekhasski says “Your logic is false. Oh yes, they both can be right. Earth climate is a multivariable spatio-temporal system…”
No, they can’t both be right when one claims that the radiative forcing due to CO2 is about 3.7 W/m2 and the other claims it is one third that. And, they can’t both be right when the disagree on what the sensitivity in the absence of feedbacks is.
And, the simplest reason that they can’t both be right is that one of them…Monckton…is definitely wrong (which leads immediately to the conclusion that they can’t both be right)! The “skeptic” crowd would stand itself in better stead if it acknowledged total pseudoscientific junk when it is used to support your point-of-view. The lack of discrimination, i.e., the willingness to use anything as a basis of support no matter how bad it is, really doesn’t do much to help your cause.

Jason Salit: “So other than man-made computer simulations… what evidence is there?”
This is a very good question. What kind of evidence can we find and what kind of experiment can we do to validate (or invalidate) AGW? Obviously we cannot do a controlled experiment. We have to use whatever data we have. With that, either we have to use correlations (like those who are using with PDO) or one has to use some type of cause effect relations, which invariably will end up as a computer model since the problem is do difficult to tackle without using numerical methods. So, I am very curious what kind of data or what kind of experiments can we suggest to satisfy an AGW skeptic? I do not believe I have seen an answer to that yet.
By the way, computer simulations are not all that bad. Companies like Amgen use computer simulations to develop new drugs, it is actually very effective. There are lots of other examples. Computer models are simply the numerical version of the physical mechanisms we are aware of about a phenomenon. As long as we incorporate every important mechanism in the code, then we cannot claim that our correlative judgments are better than computer models. As time goes on, models will get better and better with the incorporation of new mechanisms.

Jeez – Sorry, If my post prompted you admonition. But when we get toward the ends of these threads my pea little mind wants to kind of “sum things up”. My rationality keeps nagging at me to point out that we seem to be quibbling over unknowable’s (currently) modeled ad nauseam. We clearly (I hope admittedly by all) do not sufficiently know the input parameters anywhere near to the degree that we try to sell the output accuracy of these models. It doesn’t make sense to me. That’s not to say that I don’t respect those who are honestly trying. I just don’t think that we’re near to the point where we can start making predictions and “policy”… EGAD!
John – Thank you for the thoughtful reply. As a computer consultant I am truly hip to how useful computers can be. And I’m truly appreciative for what they can do for us (my living not withstanding). In climate modeling I think that the computer basically gives us a false sense of control/understanding. I’m certain that good honest work is proceeding (in good faith) to try and figure these things out in the digital arena (and I agree that they will get better over time). But when so much of the output is based upon “estimations” on the input side… It leaves me flat/unconvinced. So, for now… I’d like to see some actual data showing causality (not simulated). Also, *I’m* curious why you phrased your question:
“So, I am very curious what kind of data or what kind of experiments can we suggest to satisfy an AGW skeptic?”
Does that mean that you’ve seen enough hard science to convince a “believer”? Not being argumentative. My point is simply that the threshold should be the same for both camps. Empirical data. Science. Not a computer model (at least not in lieu of data).
Respectfully,
jp

@Peter Taylor
Hmmm… href tags didn’t work?
http://www.space.dtu.dk/upload/institutter/space/research/reports/scientific%20reports/isac_final_report.pdf
Please delete, if this link is shown in my last posting.
Thanks!

Joel Shore (19:10:07) :
Even Schwartz proffered the caveat that his original effort was incomplete and welcomed critique. It was a first-shot, and it’s not the results but the overall methodology that Schwartz is trying to develop. A recent rev. to Schwartz’ first range moved the center up & expanded the variance. So Spencer & other knowledgeable readers understand that Schwartz’ methodology is still under development.
The point of Spencer’s announcement is to show that a different empirical approach shows a disparate result.
Here’s the big problem: Why aren’t we getting real empirical data for CO2, water vapor & temperature readings from point-source CO2 sources? You know, taking radiosonde or direct in situ observations from w/in a lonely plume of clean, non-aerosol (no sulfates, nitrates, ozone or soot) CO2 at a methane-powered generating plant that’s downwind from nowhere.
Using radiosonde or laser interferometry the study would gauge the CO2-water vapor-temperature response over the course of a year. The results would probably be surprising, just as the huge soot surprise discovered using robotic planes w/in brown clouds (Ramanathan, et al, 2007).
The problem is, and continues to be, we lack solid empirical data for CO2-driven GW. We have an edifice of empirical data for a great many parts of climatology – rossby waves, long waves, wind shear & temperature, satellite data, deep ocean data and so on., But although the perceived level of scientific understanding may seem great, it could just as well be that there’s something crucial being missed.
Spencer is making this very point, as are others like Lindzen, Christi…. even Trenberth himself conceded a biggie just this past February, that some unforeseen ocean and/or air mechanism evidently let a great deal of anticipated heat radiate back into space. It was a big deal that Keenlyside admonished us not to become complacent, conceding that the expected hockey-stick trend stalled. The discovery that the Antarctic is far drier than thought represents a tempered view of warming over the South Pole.
The continued studies into the lower-than-expected relative humidity in the mid- and upper-troposphere were yet another indicator that there are problems in the bulk formula analysis approach of the current computer models. Taken along with the inexplicable lack of the tell-tale AGW “hot spot” predicted by the climate models and we know that the troposphere is doing something unanticipated.
And now we have proof the sun’s well into a dimming phase (already down by -0.1 degrC since early 1990’s), with heliophysical models and trend analysis showing the sun’s dynamo has shifted into a new regime that will be in full onset by 2020 (SC #25). This would be important news even for ardent AGWers and policy planners, b/c it portends a wider window of opportunity, with a TSI offset of easily another -0.1 to -0.2 degrC alone. Coupled with cosmic ray effects, the upper range may settle into -0.3 – 0.5.
Instead the news about the sun comes with few admissions from the IPCC that net solar forcing had to have played a role in the warming trend of the late 1970’s – 1990’s. And they have the gall to accuse Chris Monckton of being a charlatan?
It’s enough to have some doubt about science being able to model something that by its nature inheres a poorly constrained empirical scope, but to then IGNORE EVIDENCE that is knocking empirical nulls into the hull of the juggernaut and it looks science hasn’t changed much at all… orthodoxy and consensus still reify theories into facts, no matter the path has always been littered with minefields riven with empirical snobbery.
Case in point: We just discovered that neutrons are in fact mutually attractive, and this new proof nucleon-nucleon attraction is going to upset a great many articles of faith in the standard model. Other examples abound in describing the dangers of hubris in science and yet we continue to see the human factor conflating evidence for self and empiricism for ego. Karl Popper called it, but who listens to him?

““If the mathematics of ln(C/C0) holds, then we’ve actually seen more like 70% of the warming we’re going to see with doubling of CO2 from 260-520 ppmv. You’ll get the most increase in warming in the first 30% of increase.”
Even ignoring the facts that the accepted value I usually see used for pre-industrial levels is 280ppmv”
See the post on Becks’ recent offering.
We do not agree on the facts. Why are you arguing about the consequences?
19th century average was 330ppm. I don’t care who’s carcass you gurney out in support of your value, the volumetric analysis of the French drying with H2SO4 under counted CO2 and their representation is narrow and minor.
Ice core data is worthless for atmospheric estimates, CO2 is soluble and bubbles’ CO2 monotonically collapse.

Gary Gulrud says: “We do not agree on the facts. Why are you arguing about the consequences?”
Well, you are right. If you don’t believe in the accepted CO2 measurements, [Sorry Joel, the personal attacks have to stop on both sides~Charles the moderator]

leebert says: “Even Schwartz proffered the caveat that his original effort was incomplete and welcomed critique. It was a first-shot, and it’s not the results but the overall methodology that Schwartz is trying to develop.” Yeah…Well, there is nothing I disagree with there…and yet, that didn’t stop lots of folks from saying that Schwartz’s result was the definitive nail in the coffin of AGW. In fact, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if some of the same people who said that are those who now say, for example, that Miskolczi’s paper is.
leebert says: “The continued studies into the lower-than-expected relative humidity in the mid- and upper-troposphere were yet another indicator that there are problems in the bulk formula analysis approach of the current computer models.” Not sure what data you are referring to…but Brian Soden has done some nice work showing that the expected water vapor signature is there: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;310/5749/841
leebert says: “Taken along with the inexplicable lack of the tell-tale AGW ‘hot spot’ predicted by the climate models and we know that the troposphere is doing something unanticipated.” Well, the hot spot is not due to AGW but rather to moist adiabatic lapse rate theory that is expected regardless of the forcing (see http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/12/tropical-troposphere-trends/ ) and is in fact seen for temperature fluctuations on monthly to yearly timescales (see http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;309/5740/1551 ). It is a bit of a mystery why it is not seen in the data for the longterm multidecadal trends but given the problems with the data (see http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2008/05/tropical-tropopshere-ii/langswitch_lang/in ), this is by no means conclusive evidence that the models are wrong.
leebert says: “Case in point: We just discovered that neutrons are in fact mutually attractive, and this new proof nucleon-nucleon attraction is going to upset a great many articles of faith in the standard model. Other examples abound in describing the dangers of hubris in science and yet we continue to see the human factor conflating evidence for self and empiricism for ego. Karl Popper called it, but who listens to him?”
I guess I am not keeping up on my particle physics but I seem to have missed this story on the neutrons and a quick web search failed to find it? (Also, the existence of the nuclear force binding the nucleus together has been known for a long time.) Could you give me a reference?
As for revolutions in science, sure they do happen from time-to-time. But, the current scientific viewpoint is still the best that we have to go on to make decisions…and we are far better off going with the current science than ignoring it when we don’t like its conclusions. And unfortunately, I think that for every person who really does make a revolutionary discovery, there are at least a hundred…if not a thousand…who mistakenly think that they have.

I’m not a scientist…just an average guy being asked to accept completely destroying our economy, losing my job, and totally disrupting my way of life because the world is going to end otherwise. So I’ve been watching these AGW discussions with something more than academic interest.
What I’ve gleaned to date;
(1) We’ve had maybe 1C temperature rise to date (debateably), none for the last 7-8 years, and most of that’s been lost this last year.
(2) That the proponents of AGW have engaged in widespread dishonesty by falsifying data (hockey stick, NASA temp charts, etc.) to “prove” their case. (3) That there is no consensus, and there has been little actual debate on the subject, with critics of AGW being muzzled, scorned in the media, and have had funding cut, their jobs threatened (or lost), and generally being marginalized on a systemic basis.
(4) Let’s not forget the poor polar bears…and the summertime pics showing them adrift on an ice floe, and how the real experts say they’re thriving.
If the world was about to self-destruct over AGW shouldn’t we be seeing some actual, quantifiable warming? If AGW is real, and requiring life-altering measures to prevent it, shouldn’t the proponents be able to scientifically prove it? Instead of fluffing data, engaging in media witch hunts, and getting scientists fired for disagreeing with it?
Am I missing something here? Because all I’m seeing is a marriage of far left environmentalists (who think we oughta all go back to painting ourselves blue, hunter/gathering, and being one with the Earth), demagogues/bloated plutocrats (like Al Gore who are making a fortune off of selling AGW), and so-called scientists like Hansen who are likewise making a killing personally and professionally off of AGW. Oh, and let’s not forget the UN, who on the strength of the IPCC report immediately demanded billions of dollars in AGW “reparations” from the US.

If I have set it down it is because that which is clearly known hath less terror than that which is but hinted at and guessed.SirArthurConanDoyleSir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles

Rather than put forth a falsifiable AGW hypothesis and defend it, they continuously mount really scurrilous <ad hominem attacks against serious scientists like Lindzen, Monckton, Spencer and other reputable scholars who have a different point of view, and who provide verifiable facts to back their positions.”

Where are the ad hominem attacks? I see lots of ad hominem attacks against Hansen and Gore on this webiste. Against Lindzen, Monckton, and Spencer, I see mainly attacks on their scientific points. In fact, most of our scientific points in this thread have gone completely unanswered despite the fact that there are many more of you than there are of us on the website.

When one side is forced to resort to tactics that would never be permitted either in a moderated debate or in a peer reviewed paper, they have lost the argument, and everyone knows it.

You mean like putting out a completely deceptive news release regarding an article published in a newsletter? Yes, I agree that is an indication that Monckton and associates have lost the argument. It is pretty desperate when you want to claim that an article in a newsletter that contains elementary mathematical and scientific mistakes is a major peer-reviewed article in a learned journal that gives a mathematical proof.
You mean like producing and then promulgating deceptive graphs, such as the ones that you posted and I deconstructed above, which carefully cherrypick the data sets that they use and the time periods they look at and the relative scaling of the temperature and CO2 axes in order to mislead? Yes, I agree that this is an indication that the skeptics have lost the argument.

Reasonable people can point out errors or unanswered questions regarding the science. But there is no reasonable way to debate “He’s lying,” or “He’s a shill for Exxon Mobil.” That type of truly reprehensible arguing — which we hear constantly from the AGW promoters — shows only that they are desperately trying to contain an argument that is not going their way.

You are the first person here to mention Exxon Mobil in this post. And, you are also a poster who has posted long diatribes about environmentalists, for example (saying things that are easily proved false by a 30 sec web search). Honestly, both sides tend to demonize the opposition somewhat. The difference, however, is that we are pointing out that there are always going to be a few scientists (or non-scientists like Monckton) who, because of strongly held political beliefs and assisted by corporate money in some cases, will be arguing against AGW. And, sure, there will always be some scientists who, because of strongly held political beliefs and assisted by environmental organizations, are going to argue for AGW.
However, what you would have us believe is that the vast middle that is represented for example by the IPCC, the National Academy of Sciences and the analogous organizations in the other twelve G8+5 nations, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Geophysical Union, the American Meteorological Society, the American Physical Society, etc., etc. have all somehow been co-opted. And that, frankly, requires a pretty good conspiracy theory!

jc stout (11:06:44) : As a suggestion and not an excuse
— In case some other fool is going to make my mistake you
should know that, without a preview, by the time I knew my error there
was no way to pull it back.
Yeah. It’s a real nuisance. There’s one person here who habitually
makes entire posts in italics, perhaps because of a lack of preview.
I’ve been using Nvu ( http://www.nvu.com/ ). I do a cut and paste into the HTML source page. There are other WYSIWYG html
editors too. Also there’s at least one check web page:
http://jmarshall.com/easy/html/testbed.html .
One problem is that WordPress comment entry forms don’t completely conform to W3 standards so what works in the WYSIWG may not work in the
post and vice versa. Nvu has a tendency to want to insert font changes for things like italics. So I find myself editing from the HTML source page instead of the “normal” page. Also, WordPress insterts a BR tag for CRLF but makes viweing in Nvu bothersome and Nvu has a tendency to “fix” your
HTML (like removing “extraneous” CRLFs).
Better than nothing though.

John McLondon (13:14:04) :
Thanks for a thoughtful response. However, I think you have taken my statements too literally. Perhaps you need some background on why I would raise the replication question. You asked:
“Exactly how can we do that? This is a large scale experiment. May we can stop using fossil fuel immediately for 10 to 20 years and then use 10 times as much fossil fuel as we are using now for another 20 years, etc. and see whether there is an effect. But this is not practical. Can you please suggest another experiment that we can do?”
What I intended is a systematic program whereby each and every foundational study is independently replicated. I hope nobody is actually daft enough to ask for a replication of reality, but I don’t blame you for not assuming in that regard.
For your consideration, over at Climateaudit.org, Steve McIntyre has been trying to independently audit – not replicate – many of the works that end up in IPCC documents. As I interpret Mr. McIntyre’s writings, he continually runs into a good ole boy network that plays games with the availability of data, methods, and code at such a level as to make an auditing function – not a even replication function – generally impractical to do. If AGW advocates want me to believe in their work they need to not only support an auditing function, they need to support a systematic, clique free, replication program. AGW advocates are the ones who have stated how high the stakes are – all I am doing is requesting the level of proof (based on preponderance of evidence, not formal math) commensurate with the stakes established by others.
“OK. I am all for it, as I mentioned in my last paragraph. But how do we replicate phenomenon like global warming? Please suggest a practical way to do that.
On a related topic, most scientists now believe in the Big Bang theory. How exactly can we replicate that, if replication is taken as a minimum requirement?”
I will take it that neither of us is a fool. I am willing to infer much about the big bang theory from dimensional similitude starting with F=G*m1*m2/R^2, and resolving the units of G. It certainly implies volume changing with time to me. Red shift is convincing enough to me too.
But since you brought it up, it is worthwhile to point out why some things are good enough to me and others aren’t. My econ prof taught me more about theories than all my science classes combined – and according to him – theories are a simplification of reality because reality is to complex to reproduce (which I believe you and I agree upon completely based on the thrust of your argument) and that one judges theories based on their ability to explain what we do see and predict what we will see. In short, I will continue to believe in the big bang theory as long as the astronomers that are suggesting I do so keep correctly predicting the location of previously-unknown planets, etc.
Failing to predict reality is where AGW advocates keep coming up short. Convincing me is going to take some high quality (known in advance) predictions of reality that turn out to be true. On this point, you may want to check in on: http://rankexploits.com/musings/ . Lucia keeps her statistical and math skills at a much higher level than I, but no one seems to be blowing holes in her statistical arguments about verifying or falsifying trends within certain confidence limits. You won’t need to reproduce reality to convince me, just a solid record of explaining and predicting reality.
“Sometimes there are idealizations and approximations in our simulations, those could result in some errors. But we use computers for designing structures, predicting planetary motions, designing chemical plants, etc etc. as log as we use appropriate laws correctly, the outcome will be correct. As we know more about the mechanisms, they will improve the programs also.”
OK. Suppose I was assigned to design the superstructure of a bridge. I would employ the tools you describe and I would write a Design Study Report with appendices containing all my calcs, along with references to appropriate design standards and methodologies. I would also include a statement of my assumptions and a companion list of recommendations. One of my assumptions would be that the substructure being designed by another engineer is suitable for the applied loads, and we would communicate in detail about those assumptions. I would also assume (with some healthy safety factors) that structural corrosion and scour at the bridge piers is not a problem and recommend a detailed program of how to regularly check for corrosion, scour, etc, in relation to my complete list of assumptions. Engineers have learned the hard way that it is long-term changes about our assumptions that get us in trouble far more often than our calcs. In my reading about AGW I have not seen much evidence that AGW advocates understand the enabling power and consequences of assumptions very well and they do not seem to me to rigidly document and monitor their assumptions the way that good engineers do. The lackadaisical approach I perceive is one of the reasons I may be harder to convince than some others.
“I am becoming less and less concerned about AGW with increasing oil price. It would make economic sense to find other cheaper and hopefully better energy source as quickly as we can, rather than having so much dependence on fossil fuel.”
That argument would hold more water with me if mindless environmental voting was not a large component of the artificially high prices in the first place.
Now it is my turn to ask you for a more realistic grasp on what is practical. How is it that so many people seem to disbelieve in clean oilfield and offshore production technology that survives hurricanes every year, but they do believe in affordable alternative energy sources that not even one person has been greedy enough to market? Why do so many people seem to believe that the laws of thermodynamics can be over-ruled by artificial taxes that will direct the money to an unstated destination for an unstated purpose? Why do so many people believe that I should distrust those folks with the ingenuity, fortitude, technological excellence, and financial sophistication required to sell me cheap energy in the first place, and I should place all my faith in people who have never (other than through subsidies) lowered the price of a single good I buy? Put another way – you asked what it would take to convince me – AGW advocates have a long way to go just to overcome their mindless demonization of energy companies and the science they can produce. When they get back to that level playing field, then they can start to demonstrate some excellence so that I can feel good about placing my faith in them.

I’d like to applaud EVERYONE who has contributed to this discussion (which I have not made it completely through yet). It is clear that many of you have a excellent understanding of where I’ve been going in my research, and frankly, I’m happy to see that ANYONE “gets it”. (AND I’m also praising those who have advocated caution regarding my most recent results, which are only a few weeks old and haven’t been written up yet.)
Yes, there are still uncertainties, and I’m working on them. It’s interesting to me as an observationalist that much of what I have found recently would not have been possible without a simple model to figure out what the satellite data are telling us. Maybe one could say, “models don’t kill creativity…people kill creativity”.
My greatest hope is that one or more modelers that now ascribe to the IPCC party line will have enough of an open mind and curiosity to enter the “forbidden zone” and see for themselves.
-Roy
REPLY: Thanks for dropping in Roy. Getting the word out throught he blogosphere is only one step. For it really to reach those that might take note, public opinion must be swayed. A good start to all this is to do simple things, like write letters to the editor of local newspapers, and to magazines that publish such stories.

Oh, on the last paragraph questions, I am afraid many of the questions are not clear to give answers. They are also highly political issues, where I do not have much interest to begin with. So, I will give just a one time broad answer, but I would not want to elaborate.
“How is it that so many people seem to disbelieve in clean oilfield and offshore production technology that survives hurricanes every year, but they do believe in affordable alternative energy sources that not even one person has been greedy enough to market?”
I do not know, even the Republicans in Florida are objecting to that. It is mainly self-interest. Just like people in Nevada are refusing to accept nuclear waste. Just like the Republicans in Florida, who are generally unfriendly to environmental laws, are using the Fish and Wild life Protection Act to get more water (to feed the rare fish) from Georgia in their water dispute with Georgia and Alabama.
“Why do so many people seem to believe that the laws of thermodynamics can be over-ruled by artificial taxes that will direct the money to an unstated destination for an unstated purpose?”
???? Thermodynamics and global warming do not have to be on the opposite side.
“Why do so many people believe that I should distrust those folks with the ingenuity, fortitude, technological excellence, and financial sophistication required to sell me cheap energy in the first place, and I should place all my faith in people who have never (other than through subsidies) lowered the price of a single good I buy? Put another way – you asked what it would take to convince me – AGW advocates have a long way to go just to overcome their mindless demonization of energy companies and the science they can produce.”
We can assign predicates like ingenuity, fortitude, etc. to almost any technological company. In fact the technology involved in solar cells, controlled nuclear fusion, etc are a lot more sophisticated than oil drilling.
I do not know anyone (other than the radical left) demonizing oil companies, oil companies are just like any other company in search of improving their bottom line. But it is clear that they have an interest in keeping oil price high which improves their profitability. But not all oil companies are against the AGW theory. Back from 1997 the British Petroleum had accepted the AGW understanding (http://dieoff.org/page106.htm ).
But placing trust in a company? Not a good idea at all. In my opinion companies would do anything to increase their bottom line, as long as they know that the chances of getting caught is low. Dumping toxins in rivers and ground (otherwise we wouldn’t have the so called superfund cleanup sites -Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA, 42 U.S.C. § 9601–9675) ), sending it and dumping it in developing countries, telling that nothing is wrong with smoking, pumping out lots of mercury saying that it is OK, exposing employees to unnecessary exposure, misinterpreting clinical data to sell drugs, delaying the disclosure of potentially bad clinical trial data (see how long it took Merck to disclose the trial results, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/15/business/15drug.html ), avoiding FAA inspections on planes suspected of bad record keeping or bad maintenance, etc… The list is long. Very long. I am not an environmentalist, but you don’t want to know how many people suffer from health problems caused by environmental conditions. Take a simple (hopefully a harmless) example, we do not know exactly what it does (bad or good, probably bad), but every one in the world somehow carry PFOA in their blood, which is a chemical used for making Teflon (http://www.webmd.com/cancer/news/20050113/is-teflon-chemical-toxic-epa-seeks-answers ). That is how the environment works. We have to be careful with environment and companies.
No no, we cannot trust profit oriented companies, unless their product and prices are somewhat regulated. That is why we have anti-trust laws, food and drug administration, FAA, etc.
One can ask a different question also. Why are so many people so interested in keeping fossil fuel as the main energy source and discouraging the use (or even the research) of any alternate energy source?

Joel Shore said:
>>>>
The “skeptic” crowd would stand itself in better stead if it acknowledged total pseudoscientific junk when it is used to support your point-of-view. The lack of discrimination, i.e., the willingness to use anything as a basis of support no matter how bad it is, really doesn’t do much to help your cause.
<<<<
I agree with this.
However, by the same token I was starting to be pretty convinced about the credentials of the folks at RealClimate until I read their rebuttal regarding the Mann Hockey Stick controversy. This really damaged their credibility for me. It is pretty easy for me to see for myself how Mann et al’s study was deeply flawed. I really don’t understand how they can try to say otherwise and expect to maintain their credibility. And then to see the rest of the paleo’s rally to Mann’s defense with more highly questionaable studies is actually a bit eye opening for anyone (or – at least me) who is looking for objective evidence for bias in the scientific work going on within AGW.
It seems pretty clear to me that there was a MWP and LIA and that these were natural variations. Moreover, based on the new solar data we have it is pretty clear that these cannot currently be explained. The old explanation (for LIA) was based on LEAN’s reconstruction of solar variability which LEAN does not even believe in anymore (she was a co-author of WANG). Here is the latest reconstruction of TSI from Leif Svalgaard: http://www.leif.org/research/TSI-LEIF.pdf
Also, I believe that the early 20th century warming is in large part attributed to an increase in TSI which we now know did not happen – thus we cannot explain this either. To my knowledge the modelers have not yet taken this new information into account. I believe Hansen 2007 is still using the old LEAN reconstruction which, again, LEAN does not even believe in anymore.
To me this is convincing evidence that we do not yet have a satisfactory understanding of natural climate variation within which we can say with any reasonable amount of certainty what the additional warming effects of some particular amount of CO2 are.

John McLondon
Let’s get back to the original question – what does it take to convince a critic about AGW?
You wrote: “In fact peer-reviewers make sure that components used in any work are in itself repeatable.” To paraphrase the fictional character Detective John McClane, in the Die Hard movies, ‘Welcome to climate science, pal.’ You really do owe it to yourself to read the Wegman Report. You wrote a very long paragraph about not being able to trust any company anywhere, and yet you appear to trust so completely in the AGW field. I do not share your faith and I urge you to read enough to know why.
“On that range, Hansen’s prediction (the middle one – curve B – I am assuming that you have seen it) was very good. Also what would be your response to the Youtube version? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9ob9WdbXx0”
I am not as impressed with Hansen as you seem to be, particularly since his predictions fell completely apart by 2008. Also, Hansen continues to adjust past temperatures at GISS — so much so that his temperature series now look like an outlier to all the others. I can accept that someone should evaluate a hypothesis that rising CO2 can change the climate of the future, but I refuse to believe that anything is capable of changing the past. I am kind of a stickler on the whole ‘cause comes before effect’ thing. 😉
(BTW, if you want a good discussion of that particular Hansen graph, see: http://rankexploits.com/musings/2008/what-forcings-did-hansen-use/ . In the comments you can follow Steve McIntyre’s links to more than most people actually want to know. Steve makes it clear his analysis had detractors. Use the dates to track the other side of the discussion at Realclimate, Tamino, etc.)
As far as the youtube version goes, why would you think I would be impressed with Attenborough’s worship of computer models based on my writings so far? I must be getting too vague with age. 😉
“Well, Engineers had so many opportunities to study that. With slow changing climate, we do not have that much opportunity to study precisely the effect of each variable.”
Then why in heck would anyone believe in a house of cards built on variables that have not been precisely studied? Parameterized models are highly susceptible to initial, boundary, and propagated errors. http://rankexploits.com/musings/2008/the-poor-hapless-butterfly-a-haiku/ provides a very accessible discussion that illustrates key points in a simplified way. Googling Tom Vonk and Gerry Browning at ClimateAudit will take you to more in-depth material, although I have to warn you that Browning’s aggressive responses can be hard to bear even as a lurker.
“But placing trust in a company? Not a good idea at all.” Yet, your writings indicate nearly unlimited trust in bureaucratic government programs. Tell you what – you watch companies and keep them honest, I’ll watch government and try to do the same thing. But just remember one thing – everyone is allowed to say ‘no’ when a company wants to sell you something. Will anyone be allowed to say ‘no’ to the climate change juggernaut? That remains to be seen. Hansen’s recent call for criminal trials for people who disagree with him is not very encouraging in that regard.

I have always been skeptical of the dominant positive feedback hypothesis simply because, as a feedback controls engineer, I know that positive feedback, no matter how small, will eventually assert itself and drive the system unstable all on its own. Since it has not done so in prior epochs when atmospheric concentrations of CO2 were higher than today, it follows that positive feedback is not dominant.
Now, I know that in nonlinear systems, one can reach a tipping point were previously negative feedbacks become marginally stable and then destabilizing. But, it does not appear plausible to me that the Earth’s climate system can be that mercurial given that it has survived to this day. That’s a judgment call, given the level of information I have had. But, this research by Dr. Spencer appears to support my intuition.

John McLondon says: “That is why one has to do sensitivity analysis, error estimates, etc. We routinely solve non-linear equations with many problems (it is common in many body problems), not all of them are chaotic, and even if some of them are, there are also rules and patterns one could find in randomness (eg. self diffusion coefficient in Brownian motion).”
To be more specific, it is true that climate models exhibit sensitivity to initial conditions. And, indeed, if you start them with perturbed initial conditions, you do find that the “jigs” and “jags” that you get are different. However, over a long enough period of time, the different runs show the same basic response to a forcing such as CO2, despite the differences in the internal variability. So, all this talk about chaos and sensitivity to initial conditions is basically a red herring…Yes, it is true and understood and it would certainly keep you from predicting the weather far in advance or even the yearly variations in climate far in advance; however, it does not keep you from determining a response to a significant external forcing such as an increase in CO2.
The one caveat on that is that it is known that nonlinear systems that are forced can exhibit “tipping points” beyond which they run off to a totally different state. Unfortunately, however, that should not be very re-assuring to us as we embark on the current experiment of raising CO2 to levels that haven’t been seen in millions of years.
Bart says: “But, it does not appear plausible to me that the Earth’s climate system can be that mercurial given that it has survived to this day.” Well, I think the paleoclimate evidence shows that the climate has been pretty mercurial in the past. In fact, I find that lots of “skeptics” argue (using bad logic) that the fact that the climate has been so changeable in the past is evidence against the current changes being caused by us. There are some hypothesized stabilizing feedbacks on geological timescales (see, e.g., this discussion of the “faint young sun paradox”: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faint_young_sun_paradox ) but those occur far too slowly to help us in our current predicament.
At any rate, I think most of those who study paleoclimate actually tend to draw the conclusion that the earth’s climate system is at least as sensitive as the IPCC estimates, if not moreso. See, for example, here: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/sci;306/5697/821

John McLondon
I wrote another long response in our continuing conversation, but I am really troubled by something and I decided not to post it until we sort it out. Your last post included the following:
‘Hansen’s recent call for criminal trials for people who disagree with him is not very encouraging in that regard.’
“Hansen did not ask for criminal trials for people who disagree, as I understand it, he asked for trials for the oil executives. There is a big difference.”
Remember your statement:
“I do not know anyone (other than the radical left) demonizing oil companies, oil companies are just like any other company in search of improving their bottom line.”
So in the span of a couple of posts you are now willing to accept Hansen segregating people into ‘oil executives’ and the rest of us. Sound familiar in a historical context? Care to reconsider where you really are in your own views?
Just so you have no doubts about me. Hansen’s statement was a deliberate attempt to foster a climate of fear and to stifle debate. It is inexcusable – period – and it troubles me greatly that anyone accepted it. In fact, it is a clear sign of complacency about mental illness in our society that he did not immediately lose his job. It is neither cute nor funny to venture towards shared psychopathology, espicially when nobody argured it was some kind of joke. Mental health is precious and must be protected at all times. Lysenko happened, and people were murdered. The Banality of Evil should teach us a lesson about what can happen in every society, not just one special case.
So, at this point, I choose to refrain from discussing miscellaneous details until the premise of what is acceptable is resolved. If you really believe:
“he asked for trials for the oil executives. There is a big difference.”
we have nothing left to talk about.

JC Stout,
I try to stay with the extreme syntactic and semantic interpretation – at least try. As I said before, I try to take exactly what they said, not what they implied.
“If you really believe: “he asked for trials for the oil executives. There is a big difference.” we have nothing left to talk about.”
I do not have to believe in anything here, it is simply so clear on what exactly Hansen said. He called for trials of oil executives. But not all oil executives disagree with Hansen (like some from BP and may be others) and not all people who disagree with Hansen are oil executives. So he is actually calling for trials for those oil executives who agree with him also. Just too obvious. That is why I interpreted the way I did.
“Hansen’s statement was a deliberate attempt to foster a climate of fear and to stifle debate. ..”
His statement was just one man’s opinion. It doesn’t have any effect. We all know that. I do not know how it could foster fear. I also made it clear that Hansen should stay away from making such statements, and just do his science than getting involved in policy statements. Just like Spencer, who could improve his credibility significantly (at least in my opinion) by simply doing science and publishing it rather than spinning it in blogs, I think Hansen should improve his credibility by not making such political statements.
BUCKO36,
As a practical matter, I doubt we will be allowed to use coal without a carbon sequestration process, whether or not CO2 is a greenhouse gas. Some environmentalists won’t allow nuclear, and people in Nevada will not allow the safe storage of nuclear waste in their state. It is not clear from your statement whether you approve alternate fuel that are not proven yet but could be proven in the future. In any case such fuel has to be practical to be used widely.

@JC Stout
I don’t know if I’m right here, but what you wrote a few postings above about Hansen’s graph, seems simply a matter of the base line.
I guess, a 30 years base line produces too much error deviation. To keep those error outliers small, I tried to reconstruct the data to a decadal base line, which is more adequate and reduces error outliers, as you can see here in Fig. 1
http://umweltluege.de/sceptics/giss_lie/index.php
This error corrected data is now plotted against MSU LT 5.2 data in Fig. 2 and there is nearly congruence with a correlation of 0.803.
I think, Hansens intention was to chose a 30 year base line only to show his doom more aggressive. He was calculating with the error deviation for eye-wiping, I guess.

Exhaust the little moment. / Soon it dies. / And be it gash or gold / it will not come / Again in this disguise.GwendolynBrooksGwendolyn Brooks

BUCKO36,
Almost all scientific societies, most Nobel Laureates in Science, and most scientists endorse the AGW theory. Exactly what it would take for AGW critics to accept that as a “verified scientific assurance”? Well, that is exactly what I was trying to find from JC.
China is a notorious place for pollution. I go there often and every time I am surprised to see that. But it will come to haunt them, in terms of human misery and health care cost. The so called Green GDP increase (after filtering out the environmental cost) is either flat or negative in China. I do not think we want that kind of a progress.
I am all for nuclear fuel. But I do not share your optimism of nuclear waste disposal. It took more than a decade for us to come with with a plan to store nuclear waste in the Yucca Mountain Repository, which was supposed to be working since 1998. But now they are talking about 2017 – may be.
“Yes, I do approve of alternate fuel source’s, but not at the expense of the earth’s “economy” or “food supply”. ”
I do not have any arguments here. Ethanol from corn is one of the most reprehensible development I have seen so far.

Someday, after mastering winds, waves, tides and gravity, we shall harness the energy of love; and for the second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire.PierreTeilharddeChardinPierre Teilhard de Chardin

John McLondon (08:10:04)
Thank you for your well wishes.
Yes, I was addressing the following:
1.) The current “The sky is falling” Environmental Movement.
Which to me, has always been around to some extent (ie.The tree huggers, save the whales and spotted owls etc., but their mass has now been further expanded to include those “brainwashed” by our
education systems, to achive a “Political agenda”. I don’t mean just in the US, but throughout the civilized world.
and
2.) Those, who’s goal (ie. the UN and the likes of Al Gore) it is to establish a “socialistic” World Order, political agenda in general, bent on financial gains and control of the World masses.
Not a world I want to live in.
I understand your concerns about polution effects on the longivity of man on this earth, but that is “way beyond” my knowledge and capibilities on how to effectively address all of those possiblities.
I don’t think that “band aids”, without understanding the “critical” drivers will do it. It is Just maybe the worlds population
explosion that is taking place, thas doomed mankind to go the
way of the dinosaurs.
I, like you realize that oil, natural gas and coal are polutants, but
they are currently available to us in large quantities and they must be utilized until a better solution replacement is found.
It is stupid that nucular power has been banned in this country because we haven’t found a waste storage solutionl.
Wind and solor technology are not an effieient replacement.
There are no easy/quick fixes.
With regard to your question on what influances the AGW critics:
Like you, I am also a Christian, but I do not believe that has been what has influanced my stance on this issue.
I am not a scientist, however, I first got interested in this subject, back when the crisis was “Global Cooling” in the late 90’s. I read everything I could find on the subject and I was somewhat concerned about it, because it had happened before in the LIA. Then all of a sudden we were told that that GC was no longer a crisis, because now the earth was going to face the crisis of AGW
(ie Al Gore). Again I spent my time reading everything I could
about the subject.
I found that the Earth had been much “warmer” and much “colder”
in the past and that we really don’t know to what degree man has had an impact.
In the line of work I was in before retiring, we had a joke
saying about computers models. It was “Garbage In/ Garbage Out”.
As complex as the contributing “variables” of the Earth’s Climate System is, if someone has an “agenda” he can develop a model that will provide “his desired answer”.
Enough said.

BUCKO36,
Just few concluding comments (regarding your last post):
May be we don’t know everything, but I think we should do everything we can with what we know to improve the chances of human survival into the distant future.
In my opinion, rapid population growth is probably the one single cause for most of the environmental problems. No amount of conservation can compensate for the demand for resources from population growth. This certainly includes the U.S. also, where the per capita energy needs are much higher.
On wind and solar energy, please take a look at this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_energy
We need 15 TW, which is a small fraction of 86,000 TW solar energy we get or the 870 TW of wind energy. I do not believe we are asking too much if we look for a technology to convert a very small fraction of this natural energy to meet our energy needs. Nuclear fusion is a relatively clean energy source, and we have an abundant supply of deuterium and plenty of Helium-3 on the surface of the Moon (according to the Chinese, just two trips to the Moon will give us enough Helium-3 to power the entire earth for a full year). Yet, the U.S. was not so enthusiastic in ITER, although the total cost of the ITER project is less than $ 10 billion. I think we can invest considerably more for alternate energy – the cost is very small compared to the almost $200 billion on the stimulation package, or what it costs per week in Iraq, or the annual U.S. electricity sale ( $210 billion), etc.
The earth might have been warmer and cooler in the past, but that was when we had a small and highly mobile population, without skyscrapers and financial centers developed on the edge of the sea. We didn’t have to feed so many people. But even then, human caused disasters were not uncommon, for example we now know what happened to the Mayan civilization from over population and deforestation.
Well, if we give “garbage in” to any system, we are going to get garbage out, computers are no exceptions. But we are not giving garbage in most cases. Quantum chemistry can be done entirely with computers and the results are verifiable with experiments. Computer design was the basic tool Boeing used for designing Boeing 777. We use computers for drug discovery, DNA sequencing, etc., the list is long. There is an impressive array of accomplishments with computer models. Just like with any other scientific tools, a determined person can develop a model (and computer program) to obtain the desired answer, but in general that will not survive the scientific scrutiny, especially in a field like climate science where the evaluation and scrutiny is more intense. Also, one could interpret that capability in both ways; a skeptic could design a computer code to support his/her view, but I have not seen a computer model (after surviving the scientific scrutiny) that does not predict warming with increasing CO2. As I said earlier, I do not find it to be probable that we have an international conspiracy by most scientists and scientific organizations in advancing AGW.

BUCKO36 (00:11:24) :
“People are short sighted and are not interested in change until it is really required and right now it is not. Lots of relativly inexpensive oil, coal, natural gas and dams are availible.”
True. But the question is whether we should we act on the basis of short term goals and benefits or based on a strategic long term plan including the cost of environmental issues?
“As I understand it they are not available for review and may really be very biased towards Hansen’s agenda.”
I believe many of them are available. Here is one from Hansen’s place, anyone can play with it, change the input etc and verify whether everything is correct. It has the source code, so one can verify whether the code itself has any mistakes.
http://aom.giss.nasa.gov/
“I am really not very confident in Wikipedia as a “factual/unbiased” source of Scientific Data.”
We can verify that from other sources. For example here is what Susan Hockfield, the President of MIT, said: “The amount of sunlight that reaches the Earth’s surface in an hour contains enough energy to meet the world’s current energy needs for a year.” Please see:
http://web.mit.edu/hockfield/speeches/2008-aaas.html
The U.S. imports about 12 million barrels of oil per day
( http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/country/index.cfm ) being the number one importer of oil. That is, at the current price, we are paying 1.5 billion dollars per day or more than half a trillion dollars a year. That is a staggering amount of money flowing to other countries, some of which are not exactly our friends. With the current technology (or promising technology in the immediate future) there is no chance we can meet our demands, and sustain it for a reasonable period of time, even if we start drilling everywhere. There is no option for us other than developing other energy sources.
Smokey,
If you look at today’s news you will see a report by Amnesty International criticizing China (and only China) for their human rights violations. Yes, it is not environmental, but organizations do criticize other countries, even though they know that in countries like China it may not make much of a difference.

jeez: Thanks for posting that USA Today article debunking the claim made regarding that Gallup poll; I respect your intellectual honesty.
Smokey says:

1. Whether a source is 70 years old, 17 weeks old, or seven minutes old, it is either truthful, or untruthful. Truth does not change. I simply linked to a Gallup poll, the results of which Mr. Shore simply can not abide.
[I could have linked to a more current site, such as: click. But Mr. Shore doesn’t like that site, either.]

No…The point is that scientific opinion on climate change has changed in 17 years. And, it is not a matter of the age of the cite…It is a matter of the age of the poll. Besides being 17 years old, the USA Today article notes that the number was “taken out of context” which (from what I have read other places) appears to mean basically made up…and that in fact 66% of the scientists surveyed even back in 1991 believed that human-induced climate change was occurring.
Anyway, the main point is that we have a much more recent poll, http://stats.org/stories/2008/global_warming_survey_apr23_08.html taken of AGU and AMS members by a similarly reputable polling organization that obtained the results that I noted above and that all can read in the link.

That is why those on the Left hate the National Center For Policy Analysis so. They hate every organization, and every individual, that refutes their Sacred Cow of Global Warming. Any questioning of the Al Gore globaloney orthodoxy must be attacked and destroyed by any means, ethical or not. That is the Left’s modus operandi.

Yes, because I am sure that if I gave you a fact from, say, the National Resource Defense Council or Greenpeace, you would accept it on fact value? The reason that I don’t trust the NCPA is because they have a strong point-of-view and they don’t seem to mind distorting the evidence to fit that view. It is natural for those on one side of a debate not to trust what are clearly very partisan sources on the other.
Unfortunately, however, in this debate, the “skeptics” seem to define partisan sources to include the IPCC, the National Academy of Sciences and its counterparts in the other G8+5 nations, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the editors of Science and Nature, the councils of the American Meteorological Society, the American Physical Society, the American Meteorological Society, etc., etc. Presumably even Shell Oil, BP, Ford, etc., who have all basically accepted the science on global warming. That is kind of ridiculous!

Smokey,
“..appeal to authority argument, and several red herring arguments..”
I have to disagree with some of those mindless logical rules. There is nothing wrong with appeal to authority. Are we going to trust the opinion of a medical doctor or a climate scientist when the topic is on a medical issue? Appeal to authority is fine as long as the authority is legitimate. We are not all experts in every field to find out for ourselves all the subtle details of every issue in that field, we have to depend on authority. But where exactly is the red herring???
I can only say that AGW is true. I have not gone through the details of Hansen’s climate sensitivity analysis (or what type of interactions he has included), and without knowing those details I cannot really say whether those predictions will be true or not. So, I cannot wager on this. I interpret this as a discussion on AGW, not about Hansen. So I am willing wager that even if the temperature takes a dip in one year, or two years, on average it will move up, not down. It will never reach those values set back in 70s or 80s no matter we wait for 30 years, and whether the PDO is reversed or sunspots are gone. Also, even if Hansen’s predictions are shown to be inexact, that does not mean AGW is wrong.
Are you interested in a wager on whether or not AGW is true?

Jeez: “This is why I often use the term groupthink to describe what is occurring.”
I think you’re being unduly pessimistic. If science reduces to groupthink, then science becomes no better than opinion. Most scientists would reject that, and would argue that science provides them with a method that is more reliable than opinion, and which enables them to arrive at convincing explanations about the way the world works.
However, you may be using “groupthink” to describe the pro-AGW side, in which case you would have to show that only AGWers are prone to groupthink, while sceptics are free of this tendency.

Glenn: “Do you have a reference for this, Brendan?”
I was referring to this link:
http://stats.org/stories/2008/global_warming_survey_apr23_08.html
“Although I wouldn’t call 74% a consensus…“substantial” means.”
Strictly speaking, AGW consensus refers to the scientific views as expressed in IPCC reports, not to any general agreement among climate scientists, even if properly surveyed. “Substantial” is my word, not the survey’s.

Sorry for the delayed post. So busy!
Jeez,
On the lack of data about research papers, methodologies, etc, there are two practical solutions (although I believe in complete disclosure): one is to repeat the experiments from the beginning to end. Instead of just asking for raw data from Keith Briffa and others and then looking for statistical errors in that data, I think the critics should repeat the same experiments by collecting raw data independent of Briffia’s results. This is hard, but that is the only way we can satisfy full repeatability. Checking for statistical errors alone is not going to assure the science. I think similar initiatives could be used for cross-checking methodologies, input parameters, etc., but for some reason the critics are not willing to go that far, although I wish they do. There may be other reasons why researchers may not want to give all the raw data, and in general they may consider asking the raw data in a confrontational way to be offensive. There were only few cases of scientific fraud, like Jan Hendrik Schon and Hwang Woo Suk. But most (by an overwhelming majority) are honest scientists, and in those few cases when they are not honest they were caught by other scientists just by studying their publications (not with the raw data. In fact, people like Schon were asked to submit the raw data only when there was sufficient reason to believe that he had committed fraud). Apart from Wei-Chyung Wang, there are no allegations about any climate scientists. The system works well in the long run. So many scientists may feel personally offended by asking for raw data, when there are no allegations against them.
Also, as in the legal discovery process, where lawyers could exasperate the system by asking for lots and lots of things, or proposing to pack with lots and lots of witness testimonies. If it is not done with proper judgment, asking for raw data for every paper could sound like the defense lawyers’ efforts to derail the court system.
Given this background, the second solution is to help to develop an environment where at least the reasonable people on both sides can trust each other, as I outline in the next part.
Anthony,
Thanks for your comments. As you said, time will tell the truth.
On the second solution, trust is hard to come by in an unnecessarily adversarial environment like this. In this case as Brendan H said earlier (“who goes first”), someone has to reach out first. As you said, we have to develop real courteous communications between these two sides. We all know it is so easy to make someone look very bad; we have seen how Sen./V.P. Dan Quayle, who was an accomplished Senator by all account as even acknowledged by Sen. Kennedy, was portrayed with the “you are no Jack Kennedy” insult and the Potato spelling incident and few other statements he had made. We all make spelling mistakes from time to time but when it is publicized so heavily, it can be used to tarnish someone’s image. In my opinion even the most accomplished scientists are afraid of how they will be portrayed in front of the public if others find even some inconsequential errors. Since even the most trivial errors can be publicized to look them bad, they don’t want to be portrayed as incompetent in algebra or averaging, etc., so they may not want to give that occasion by revealing all the details.
So, here is my suggestion to Anthony. You have a great audience here, and you can lead to change the present climate of distrust. May be you can reach out to Hansen and others, call him or meet him and if you can assure them that you will come to their defense if personal attacks are made against them and if trivial criticisms are made about their work. Then there is a good chance they might open up. I do not know of anyone more suitable than you to do that – you have electric cars, solar power, etc. You are doing what they are preaching others to do, although for different reasons. May be eventually you could post joint (or two parts articles) here addressing various issues with Hansen and others, instead of having all those public debates. I may be naïve, but I have seen people responding much better if they think the other side can be trusted, and that is the environment we have to create. I have not gone through Real Climate to see what kind of personal attacks they use, but comments like “Hansen bulldog Gavin Schmidt” and his private time “flexibly includes 9 to 5” “has provided bulldog services on behalf of his boss”, etc. from McIntyre is not very helpful in fostering collaboration, or even open communication. I hope you can take the initiative to change that.

Jeez,
Trouble is that some likely think that death and misery are a necessary evil, to prevent more further down the road, even to human extinction. I don’t believe this far off the mark with the public that has bought into these dire predictions from the scientific community, UN, federal governments, and movies, be it hothouse or iceage.
If it were so, so be it. But as you say, let’s base our actions on good science and good planning. But from what I’ve seen, it’s all a sham, and way out of hand, and we may really have reached a tipping point of no return. I don’t see how this unscientific and irresponsible behavior is going to stop now or later.

jeez (20:50:27) : “….have witnessed the history over the last 10 or 20 years and yes you are being naive”.
May be, but not necessarily. It took Presidents Reagan and Gorbachev, with more trust and respect between each other, to end the cold war. Supreme Court justices Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg are great friends, which takes away lots of the cynical interpretations about their opinions, even though ideologically they are poles apart. William F. Buckley, Jr. and long time ACLU Director Ira Glasser were great friends, which brought a sense of sincerity and openness to their discussions. I can go on….
Someone must work hard to remove the adversarial relationship between AGW supporters and critics, and if they can establish a level of trust between each other through this effort, it can bring a fresh more beneficial atmosphere for an open discussion.

statePoet1775 (09:11:55) : “But our real enemies are not flesh and blood as the Good Book says.”
Absolutely.

Jeez,
I am all for complete disclosure. But let us look the situation from the other side. Occasional demands on raw data seem fine. But the context in which such requests are made is important. Systematic requests, particularly targeting at IPCC editors, appear suspicious. Most often complete raw data is requested only when there is a suspicion of fraud, or other consistency problems. These requests are generally made by other scientists actively working in the area, not by outsiders with a pre-established and well publicized view on the topic whose main objective, as it appears to any reasonable person, is nothing but to look for mistakes so that they could make a disproportional case out of the smallest mistakes.
Many journals do not have a clear raw data disclosure policy, although if there are suspicions of fraud they all will require raw data. Even for Royal Society journals, the requirement is not without boundaries (“As a condition of acceptance authors agree to honour any reasonable request by other researchers for materials, methods, or data necessary to verify the conclusion of the article.” Any REASONBLE request by other RESEARCHERS).
But requesting data is not the main problem. In my opinion, some of the articles here and in other blogs appear to criticize scientists based on trivial reasons, and it is with this background such raw data requests are made: (1) Hansen refusing to accept the debate organized by a unofficial student organization, (2) now we have the two quotes from the IPCC Chair, who was actually installed there by President Bush because he wanted to remove the previous IPCC Chair Watson, to make him look stupid with a picture to portray him as a caveman (it was changed now to invoke another repulsive feeling among the followers – association with Gore) (3) Monckton’s intense claim that an unreviewed publication was indeed peer-reviewed and APS should somehow acknowledge that “at once”, (4) McIntyre’s comments like “Hansen bulldog Gavin Schmidt” and his private time “flexibly includes 9 to 5” “has provided bulldog services on behalf of his boss”, in his blog, etc. creates a perception of unreasonableness and personality interest from the side of AGW critics. When we look at such rhetoric from AGW critics, it is clear the relationship is adversarial. I am unhappy about this, because it is undermining the credibility of blogs critical of AGW. It also gives the perception that these inquiries are not about scientific integrity or curiosity, rather they are a means to further the preconceived beliefs held by those who are requesting those data.
Now, I have not gone to the AGW believers’ side to see what tactics they use, I assume the AGW endorsers’ blogs by non-scientists may contain such problems. But whatever the AGW people are saying, it is not going to change what we see with the critics’ side. The thing that distresses me the most is the determination of AGW critics to keep it that way. I wish the situation was different.

Jeez,
“Scientist do not have to “trust” to behave like scientists. If they don’t disclose they are not scientists. Period. End of story. That’s all she wrote. The fat lady has sung.”
No no, don’t make her sing too fast!
I was talking about the general environment (in which case my previous post is fully valid), but I understand your position is a narrower one regarding raw data disclosure alone. For one thing, we cannot take the narrower view without putting it within the general context. But for argument sake let us move on.
I was looking at few journals, for example “Climate”, “geophysical research letters” etc. and I cannot find a raw data disclosure policy. I am not even aware of such policies in journals I deal with in my field. All data must be provided with patents for someone to duplicate the invention. But for scientific papers I am not aware of a requirement that all data must be provided, without probable cause for further investigation. Apart from the Royal Society Journals (where there is a clear policy for reasonable requests), I really cannot find such policy statements where I looked. You think I am not looking at the right place?

your blog is getting better )

By the way, the blogger “tamino” has done a nice job explaining what how he thinks Spencer is fooling himself here: http://tamino.wordpress.com/2008/08/01/spencers-folly-3/
Tamino’s criticisms make the most sense if you look at Spencer’s full presentation given at Colorado State University: http://climatesci.org/wp-content/uploads/spencer-ppt.pdf rather than just the abbreviated version presented in this post.