Chill in the air: record low temps in 10 states

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cumbria/7691893.stm
No comment.
Perry

Global warming is no longer the issue.
Its Climate Change.
This allows the alarmists to smoothly transition between warming and cooling conditions without having to change their mantra.

In fact, it looks like balmy WEATHER for a lot of the globe.
(Scroll down to the third map)
http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp2.html
http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp4.html
http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp11.html
http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp5.html
http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp10.html
http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp8.html
Let’s keep in mind these are only surface air temps – and not ocean temps where the real energy is.

I live near one of those ‘record lows’. It started early last year, when the overall temps took a plunge. Been a steady decline since then. It seems to coincide with the failure of the SC24 to take off. Of course, it’s locales that see the big change, with other locales somewhat balancing things out. Try telling that to the folks caught smack in the middle of one of the ‘colder’ locales. They would be the same ones that endured it last time, during the Dalton Minimum. We see it as a step-down function. It stepped down and didn’t step back up.

UAH seems to have it just a bit cooler, worldwide, than Oct, 2007, but not much.

deadwood (10:30:50) :
“Global warming is no longer the issue.
Its Climate Change.”
Which is why, to hang them with their own petard, we must always insist upon the first phrase.
(record breaking)Cold in Oz too:
http://news.theage.com.au/national/nsw-cold-snap-over-for-weekend-bureau-20081023-57if.html

Off topic, sorry.
Can I trust the following graphic?
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/current.area.jpg
It shows 2008 Arctic sea ice just a tick higher than 2007 levels.
But when you look at the photos, 2008 is clearly way over 07.

Here in the northern Sacramento Valley in Northern California, this October’s been aweful warm (low to mid 80’s so far); sure could use some of that cool and wet !
John D.

To Pierre Gosselin:
The anomaly data in the wxmaps files are a comparison to the centennial average 1901 to 2000. I wonder who has taken the early data e.g. for the inner part of northern Greenland, where a 8 degree centigrade warming is shown (now -20 Celsius instead of -30 Celsius). There must be a lot of interpolation and extrapolation in those centennial averages.
Important is the trend, found by comparison to 2007 and 2006.

Mary Hinge:
I believe we will see a slightly colder winter globaly starting already in November.
How can i say that?
Polar temperatures have been quite low until sep-oct.
Reason for the sep-oct warmth in the arctic: The top layers of open waters in the polar area will loose a lot of heat. The ice isolates. But this year we saw an almost intact icesheet until August when a HUUUGE whole appeared very quiclky due to the thin ice. Therefore this year, the heat of top layers of a very big arctic ocean layer was released in a very small time window.
This led to very hot temperatures in the arctic but only for a short while.
Now: The ice has closed. And now we can se wheather forecasts for the huge Siberia that goes very cold in 1´st half of november. This cold also affect eastern and middle europe.
so:
1) The unusual warming of the arctic and Siberia is OVER around NOW. This will affect temperatures from Europe to China.
2) The SOI index has been above 6 for 9 weeks! 8 weeks historically means LA NINA! And the SOI index in the last weeks has even been increasing, no signs of last minute change now.
3) Befores these events mentioned above, we actually have the same temperatures now as we had last year under La Nina..
4)The temperature level in the arctic BEFORE the thin ice collapsed was very low, in fact slightly below normaltemperatures since 1958. So actually this indicates whats waiting for us now that the ice has closed again.
(This “50-year-back-normal” is usually used for the arctic, and the arctic only. Funny, because going back a little longer, in the 1930-40´ies there was much higher temperatures thus included in “normal”…)
So by some good winter clothes… 🙂

“But what interests me most is that temperatures have been running a steady 10 degrees or so below “normal” for several days running.”
Boy, a few more years of that, and you might actually have a local trend going.

I agree Pamela.
VERY cold weather predicted over the UK in the next few days. Tuesday night is going to be -1 in the south! This time last year daytime temps were 18 or 19 C.

We will be at/near record cold in NC all week…

@crosspatch (11:23:46)
When that cold air starts pushing down across the Great Lakes in December and January as “Alberta Clippers”, there is going to be some serious cold in the lower 48.
And piles of snow measured in feet.
With enough of these anomolous temp readings and soon we’ll have a serious trend to speak about…

Fernando is 100% Pamela

Just back from seeing the “anointed one” at Colorado State University, where he spoke in person while visiting his ill grandmother in Hawaii. Temperatures are about 19 degrees below normal here today at 44F – the surrogate Gore effect.
He told the very enthusiastic crowd that Bush is evil, McCain is Bush, and we need to get out of Iraq because their economy is doing better than ours. (A few months ago he wanted to abandon Iraq to Al Qaida because it was a hopeless quagmire,) Then he warned the crowd that “the other guy” was going to “say bad things” about him during the next week.
It was some of the most childish, empty oratory I have ever heard, and the crowd of 50,000 young people couldn’t stop screaming or swooning.

Love it!
Lived in Calgary for 44 years. I’ve seen halloween nights that were -30C with blizzard conditions, cold and blowing snow, a foot on snow on the ground, I’ve seen rain, and +20C with a pleasant scent from the still green foliage. (I use Halloween night as an example because I have clear childhood memories of it).
The cool part is, WEATHER VARIES, and far too much to get anxious in either direction about any particular weather event, season, decade, or century.
It’s crappy weather here today, too, but not nearly as cold as it COULD be. Also, by late October we have usually had some sort of snowfall, but other than a few flakes concealed in light rain there has been nothing.
This current weather pattern reminds me of 1995-96, which ended up being the coldest winter I can remember. We exceeded 30 days in a row below -30C in January and February. It was purely brutal.

Just can’t wait for 2009
CO2 limits and Bottom up Economics

[snip] sorry this was mostly a personal attack, feel free to rephrase – moderator

REPLY: Single weather events can’t be said to predict climate, only when multiple sustained trends emerge does it qualify for such a label.- Anthony
Okay, so what “multiple sustained trends” have we not seen in order for it to qualify for such a label? And, of course, which ones have we seen? And which qualifies it as false: if humanity has zero contribution, or if humanity just has less of a contribution than alleged by the AGW movement?

“BUT it is just as silly to rely on similar time periods to draw conclusions in relation to global cooling. ”
I don’t believe anyone is actually trying to use the weather as “proof” of anything… I see it more as poking fun at the AGW crowd, not dissimilar from the cartoon regarding the letter received by the weather man that said “I just shoveled 2ft of ‘partly cloudy’ off my door step.”
Steven Hill (15:32:05) :
“…Bottom Up Economics”
That’s actually close to a reality now. With approx. %48 of the working population paying zero income taxes, we are soon at a point where the majority (non taxpayers) will control the minority (tax payers).
Jim

Just as a curiosity here in NE Alabama we have been running about 5-10 degrees f lower for lows this past two weeks and about 20 to 15 degrees lower for highs this same past two weeks. no records but it makes you wonder if the regional short term trend might be cooler for the south east this year. I know that I have 3 cords of fire wood cut split and stacked under shelter and am thinking about getting more. I am now raising extra grand kids (4) and the price of propane heating fuel has become restrictive. I thank the good Lord that I have enough property to have the hard wood available to harvest for fire wood. I expect it to soon be taxed also.
I wonder if they ever think about the amount of wood burnt for fuel before the change over to coal and oil. It seems that is also carbon based and the quality of housing wasn’t what it is today. I would think it would have been an immense amount of uptake. Not to mention the amount of ash to change the abedo effect. I very doubt that it would have reached high enough in the atmosphere to have caused any cooling. Just wondering.
Bill Derryberry

Kohl Piersen (13:51:22) :
“I get a bit frustrated with all this “weather” talk!”
It is weather that we experience first hand, no?
“It has to be recognised that these things go up and down in the natural course of events – always have, always will.”
…
“In my opinion, relying on a few days, months, years to draw conclusions in relation to global warming trends is just silly. BUT it is just as silly to rely on similar time periods to draw conclusions in relation to global cooling.
So whether the weather goes up a bit or down a bit shouldn’t really decide anything – the causes of the late global warming and the present global cooling must continue to be investigated, we simply do not know ‘the answer’ at this point in time.”
The crux is on “decide anything”. Unfortunately a lot of decisions have been taken with this line of arguments and much worse ones are in the pipeline.
How can one stop with saying ” we do not know the answer” when the people with power to tax the globe into poverty say they do know?
Every little bit of cold weather helps, particularly if the Thames freezes over again :). That might wake people up.

I was at the beach in England during mid-July 2003. It was miserably cold, but the next week began a heat wave which lasted several weeks and became the European AGW poster child. The Met Office has been promising a repeat nearly every year since.
In the mind of the AGW Borg, short term “weather” patterns are only “climate” if they are hot. Otherwise they are irrelevant.

Thinking about records it would be a record if records were not being broken.
The factors in a record are:
time:
any combination of hour/hours,day/days,week/weeks,month,season,year.
Weather type:
most rain,least rain,lowest temp,high temp,wind,snow,sunlight,storm.
area:
weather station,state/county/provence,country.
If you multiply all the factors invloved in a record together then there must be a huge number of potential records. Then consider that there are not many records much more than 100 years old and that anything in say the top or bottom 5% are good enough to get a mention then i would expect records to be broken.
Suppose whats important is not if records are being broken but in what direction they are. Since the “earth has a fever” we should be seeing a lot more warm records than one would expect so the fact that there are cold records says something.

Patrick Henry (21:46:57) :
Hadley’s CET record is littered with those type of events. Extremes butting up against their opposite.
Risking Leif telling me the Sun did not do it I must insist that the planets did indeed do it via their influence on the Sun. This is how ancient meteorologists worked out planetary influence on weather/climate.
They would label planets as “warm”, “wet”, “cold”, etc to describe the individual and combined effect of their conjunctions, syzygies and oppositions on our growing seasons (primarily). They risked being killed for getting it wrong. Talk about incentive. Enough were successful and helped their communities to get through the lean periods for the “science” to endure, some of it to the modern era, albeit encapsulated in anecdotes and “old wives tales” (yes Leif, also astrology. There, I said it.)

Mary Hinge (11:31). Yes the cooling globally now and during the last year is due to natural causes; PDO. What a pity that climate models missed these natural causes, since this means they missed that the temperature isn’t rise.
The model and actual temperature as a blend of Hadley CRUT3 and UAH satellite data [1]:
http://climate-skeptic.typepad.com/.a/6a00e54eeb9dc18834010535b4046b970b-pi
–
[1] http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2008/07/why-does-nasa-o.html

Mary Hinge:
First of all thanks for writing, and funny with the hats and all 🙂
Mary, this is a neutral description of the dynamics concearning SOI, La Nina and El Nino:
http://www.weatherzone.com.au/climate/indicator_enso.jsp?c=soi&p=weekly
Its written by people that are not sceptics. People with experience and knowledge of the past.
We have indeed seen a 9 weeks periods of SOI over 6, actually much higher than 6 (!) so what puzzles me is, tha when this indicator CLEARLY says La Nina, you don’t want to trust it?
Interesting for me is that you even now predicts a El Nino en December???
While the SOI is in fact increasing??
?
Then you compare the La Nina oct 2007 with upstarting La Nina 2008…?!
Mary, of course its wrong to compare an ongoing La Nina 2007 with a just-starting La Nina 2008.
If you want to take a view at the 2007 La Nina in its opstarting face, do so!
The similar view of an upstarting 2007 La Nina is here, FEBRUARY 2007:
http://www.osdpd.noaa.gov/PSB/EPS/SST/data/anomnight.2.20.2007.gif
Since then the La Nina was only getting stronger and stronger. And notice, you do NOT see any of those things you demand to see on the upstarting La Nina 2008.
No, Mary, stick to the only thing we have got, SOI. A VERY secure indicator. If you generally compare SOI with global temperatures, you will see that SOI precedes temperatures with 3-6 months with impressing accuracy. So even if La Nina very unexpectedly should not develop…
But Mar, what puzzles me the most: Of course you must know that you cannot compare SST between a ½ year old La Nina and an upstarting La Nina.
So why do you do that?
Is it because you think that La Ninas can only start in October ? Or?
Then you write. “Looking at the Arctic in three dimensions thn this summer had a record melt..”
Mary, Please look at it in three dimensions as you say: The ice was exceptionally thin…!
So the VOLUMEN of ice melted this year was much lower than 2007.
Come on Mary?!

As I write this, it’s 6°F at the Regina airport, just above the North Dakota border!
Yes it’s really cold out West – frost warning in central Texas! Low teens in Montana.
Someone tell Hansen these are yet more ominous signs of the coming ice age.
http://www.weatherbonk.com/weather/summary.jsp?where=%5B44.10829587357286%2C44.86949623772188%2C-73.70315551757811%2C-72.75558471679688%5D%3A10

Everyone talks about the weather but nobody does anything about it.
Wooops…. Sorry that’s right…. Removing CO2 like we’re being told to will make it just right!

Snow forecast across much of Spain – in October!
http://www.snow-forecast.com/maps/static/europe/next3days/snow

Basil,
True. In DC the ‘normal’ range in October is 70 – 45 (weather.com)
We have been roughly 10 degrees below the high and 4-5 below the lows for the last week and the forecast through the end of the month is
Tue Oct 28 H 53° L 36°
Wed Oct 29 H 50° L 31°
Thu Oct 30 H 56° L 37°
Fri Oct 31 H 62° L 42°
As of the 26th ASU temps are .12C below October of 08 and Oct 08 was below Oct 07.

Mary: I wouldn’t write off a possible La Nina for this winter just yet. As for the “first time” that Arctic Ice was surrounded by water, that’s the kind of rhetoric favored by desperate AGWers to manipulate the ignorant. Nothing climatological that is happening on Earth at present is doing so for the first time, least of all Arctic melting.
John Finn: The anomalies you post for the past 30 days are incorrect for the Arctic. One clue to this is the seriously low anomaly over Alaska and the seriously high anomaly over the Beaufort Sea. Another clue: The dramatic refreeze of ice throughout the Arctic basin. Another clue: northernmost temperature stations don’t reflect anything other than cold for the past 30 days.

“deadwood
Global warming is no longer the issue.
Its Climate Change.
This allows the alarmists to smoothly transition between warming and cooling conditions without having to change their mantra.”
I believe that Frank Luntz, a Republican strategist, is credited with first using this term politically.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2003/mar/04/usnews.climatechange

I really believe this will be a “classic” winter. Been a while since the last one. We will see some mild periods, too, as the cold reloads. Each shot being a little colder than the first, along with some intense storms.

I’m wondering whether the people who believe we can somehow “stabilise” the world’s climate by adjusting CO2 levels, like selecting values on a thermostat, have a clear idea of what would be the perfect state of worldwide heat and cold?
I’m not just talking about the ideal ppm for CO2 but about the length of summers and winters in different places around the world, the frequency of hurricanes, the rates that glaciers recede or advance.
Putting it another way, is there a snapshot or a perfect period of time in the past, that AGW proponents would like to return to, in terms of world climate? The 1860s? The 1920s? If there is one, and once that desired state is achieved, is there anyone who believes that global climate would remain in that ballpark, so to speak, for perpetuity, so long as CO2 levels stayed at 350 ppm, (or whatever the ideal value is)? I’m curious and have searched for evidence of some sort of consensus on the matter, but no luck so far.
(Putting it yet another way, AGW proponents want to avert the negative outcome of global warming; so what positive (and measurable) outcome are they aiming for?)

The Sun still sleeping, North Pacific cold pool ramping up again, heliosphere shrinking, Earth’s magnetic field weakening, global economy in a tail spin, food growing scarce, WMD proliferation amongst those who hate us … nothing to see here, move along.

Maybe a snowstorm in the Northeast.
This guy has a good take on things.
Link

Brute (10:28:31) : My thinking is that over the course of 100 years, (1900 – 2000) the extreme high temperature records achieved should show up in the latter half of the 20th century when CO2 levels were higher, (if the CO2 = higher temperature theory were correct). You’d think that out of all 50 states that at least a slightly higher percentage of record highs would be broken after 1950.
If you think about it, not really. The records are extremes. The premise behind global warming is an increasing average. It’s not hard at all to increase the average temperature and simultaneously remain within previous extremes.
A maybe not so good example: the conterminous U.S. has east and west extremes at the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. It’s quite possible for the center of population (a location) to move toward one extreme or the other without going past either. To use this example, pretend temperature is location. The average temperature is approximately where most of the daily temperatures appear.
It’s also possible to have a new record without appreciably changing the average value.
Even so, one expects the number of extreme values to increase over time. at a rate logarithmic to the number of observations.
More talk about records and the extreme value fallacy.

Well if you’ve been measuring “weather” (isn’t hat what GISStemp does) and maybe doing it for say 100 years.
Then in any perfectly ordinary year, on any date, at any “weather station”, you should on average expect to get 3.65 new record lows, and 3.65 new record highs, 3.65 new wind highs, and 3.65 new rain highs; etc.
If you only report say the record highs, you convince people it is warming, but if you only report the record lows, then you convince the same people it is cooling.
All GISStemp reports is what their algoritm computes from whatever raw data they get from their “sites”, and in the end, none of that is actually “Climate”. it is just anecdotal information about a very small number of arbitrary spots on earth. I’ve read that the number of actual weather reporting sites in the arctic (+60-+90 Lat) was about 12, 100 years ago, and increased up to 80 something at maximum, and is now down to 70 something; and this is supposed to be a reliable history of conditions in that region ?

OT note to Anthony…..
I just came from Andrew Bolt’s site.
Did you know that Alex Lockwood mentioned you in a speech he gave?
Here’s the link to the written version. First paragraph on page 4.
http://www.ajeuk.org/papers/2008_09_12%20AJE%20Alex%20Lockwood.pdf

George E. Smith (12:49:35) : Then in any perfectly ordinary year, on any date, at any “weather station”, you should on average expect to get 3.65 new record lows, and 3.65 new record highs, 3.65 new wind highs, and 3.65 new rain highs; etc.
That may be true but the values changes from the previous record will become less and less over time. After a while, the record can only be broken by a value that has more precision than the measuring equipment. IOW: you will asymptotically approach the “real” extreme.

George E Smith – “The global sampling system used to determine GISStemp, violates the Nyquist sampling theorem criterion by orders of magnitude. Whatever its algorithm computes, it in no way can be represented as a mean global temperature.”
Now you’re talking! But I can’t see how this ‘average’ thing works at all. For example, what am I to make of the fact that the average between a daily max. and min. is not necessarily the same as the average of a set of measurements taken at set periods over the 24 hour period? What does it ‘really’ mean to say that either one of these is the average temperature for that day? And of course, this is the data which then feeds into the whole average global temperature thing.
Is it just me or is there a real stink hanging over the rational behind this whole thing?
Brute said – “My thinking is that over the course of 100 years, (1900 – 2000) the extreme high temperature records achieved should show up in the latter half of the 20th century when CO2 levels were higher.”
To which DAV replies – “If you think about it, not really. The records are extremes. The premise behind global warming is an increasing average. It’s not hard at all to increase the average temperature and simultaneously remain within previous extremes.”
Seems to me that whilst this is correct as far as it goes, nevertheless there is a problem. The extremes on any graph of daily/monthly etc weather are themselves averaged to obtain the smoothing necessary to try and ‘make sense’ of the data. Isn’t it these smoothed (averaged?) figures that are fed into the global average thing. And therefore, are we not immediately involved in an average of extremes? And in the real (climate) world, wouldn’t an increasing average be accompanied by higher maximums and higher minimums? And wouldn’t absence of such higher maximums and minimums argue against any underlying ‘increasing average’.
And continuing the population centre example – what would it mean to say that the ‘average population centre’ was at such and such a location? Isn’t that the very problem with average temperatures?
Sorry, more questions than answers!

A bit of cool weather in a few places is not the end of AGW. I don’t know how anyone could seriously believe that it does. The level of certainty expressed by so many here, the certainty that AGW is false and the uncompromising position that no policy decisions should be made on the basis of it being true make it seriously look to me like a vocal group with a political agenda trying to hijack this issue. The consequences of choosing to continue the expansion of emissions by choosing to disbelieve the consensus scientific view will be very serious. I don’t want to bet the future climate of the planet on the opinions of a few maverick scientists who, a. have already lost the scientific debate, b. mostly can’t even get published in the relevant science journals, c. complain that it’s innate prejudice against their conclusions when their work just isn’t good enough. They losers and they’re sore losers. Why would I bet anything on the losers being right and the whole science establishment being wrong?
I expect the government of my country to take the advice of the international body it helped set up to advise on climate change, to take seriously the findings of the scientific institutions that study climate and to look to the peak science associations and academies to guage the consensus scientific view. Unless of course they are in serious disagreement with each other. Unless there were fundamental disagreements between IPCC and climate research orgs like NCAR, NOAA, Hadley CRU, CSIRO, unless the peak science associations and Academies found the science flawed, unless the FBI found there really is a conspiracy to reject scientific publication that disagree with them in order to undermine civilisation and democracy, it would be a serious deriliction to choose to presume they are wrong. If there were serious fundament disagreements then I might take the complaints that the process is flawed seriously. There aren’t.
Sorry, I just can’t take the fuss over a bit of cool noise in a long term warming trend as seriously indicative of anything except the capacity of people to support opinions that align with their political prejudices.

Look, you guys are going to have to speak, (write) English with me. Nyquist sampling theorem criterion is slightly out of my league.
If the “average” temperature is rising, shouldn’t the extreme high temperature rise also?…… Somewhere?…. At sometime during the course of the 100 year period? Is it simply because we are discussing such infinitesimally small increases? Are you guys suggesting that there is a ceiling or limit on extreme high temperatures?
Keep it simple for my sake please.
I don’t have any numbers or sources; however, I have to believe that the number of temperature monitoring stations has had to increase and become more widely dispersed over the last 100 years especially in the western United States.
Now, I’ve seen the sloppy work of many of the weather monitoring stations that Anthony has showcased, but even factoring in temperature monitors mounted on asphalt parking lots in Death Valley should indicate an extreme high temperature post 1950 if CO2 were the cause, right?
(I still can’t believe that we are discussing an “average” increase of .7 degrees “averaged” over 150 years, “averaged” over the entire surface of the globe and some in society have come to believe that this is a problem).

“John D. (11:48:57) :
Here in the northern Sacramento Valley in Northern California, this October’s been aweful warm (low to mid 80’s so far); sure could use some of that cool and wet !
John D.”
That’s not in any way abnormal, for that location. Wait until tomorrow (if it has not already hit you today).

Ken Fabos,
You’ve forgotten to post the obligatory “Gore 08” slogan at the bottom of your comment.

alexjc38 (10:58:11) :
“I’m wondering whether the people who believe we can somehow “stabilise” the world’s climate by adjusting CO2 levels, like selecting values on a thermostat, have a clear idea of what would be the perfect state of worldwide heat and cold?”
This was raised by George Smith in another thread, when he said “…and what temperature would you set it to if you could?”
Which prompted me to think about WHO gets to decide where to set it?
Talk about a political mess. I do believe it’s an excellent question to ask someone engaged in this debate tho. It at least makes them think about something they haven’t been programmed to respond to…yet.
Jim

But, but, but the arctic’s melting:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article5014744.ece

” DAV (13:37:17) :
>> deleted <<
That may be true but the values changes from the previous record will become less and less over time. After a while, the record can only be broken by a value that has more precision than the measuring equipment. IOW: you will asymptotically approach the “real” extreme. ”
Well DAV, that presupposes that what is being measured is supposed to be some value that never changes. Also many physical processes exhibit something like 1/f noise; that are actual variation in observed value, (so they are real data) but the variations from any sort of main trajectory can grow indefinitely but at ever reduced frequency.
Now if you average every single data point (of a single variable) that has ever been measured, then I agree that the next data point is going to change the mean by a diminishiong amount (on average)
I have been known to claim that the “big bang” was just the bottom end of the 1/f noise spectrum.
And for hungry Brute out there; Nyquist is quite simple and you are very familiar with it unless you just never watched a horse opera movie or TV show. TV and movies are sampled data systems, in that you are presented with discrete pictures taken at certain intervals of a scene that is continuously changing; for example the wagon wheels on the runaway wagon with the maiden in distress, are rotating at some speed so the spokes move around at a certain rate, and unless they are non uniformly spaced, each spoke eventually replaces its neighbor at some frequency. If you sample at exactly that frequency, the spokes appear to be stationary; whcih is a false reconstruction of what is really happening.
A fairly simple statement of the Nyquist sampling theorem, would be:- “Any BAND LIMITED continuous function; f(x,y,z) can be completely reconstructed from a set of discrete samples of the function , so long as the sampling rate is at least twice the highest signal frequency contained in the band limited signal. So for example an audio music signal that contained no signal frequencies higher than say 20 KHz, must be sampled at least as fast as 40 KHz, in order to accurately reconstruct the original music, without distortion. if the sampling rate was 40 KHz, but the original music included signals as high as 25 KHz, which would be entirely inaudible to most people, upon reconstruction, would yield a noise component that was 5 KHz BELOW the 20 KHz band limit, or 15 KHz, so it now appears as an in band signal that is erroneous, and in an audio system would be eminently hearable. signal at twice the band limt or 40 KHz, same as the sample rate, would appear at zero frequency, which is the average value of the signal, and so even the average is not recoverable for just a 2:1 undersampling.
No central limit theorem, or other mathematical prestidigitation can rescue you from Nyquist violations; the noises are in band and cannot be filtered out (unless some how you know exactly where they are and could devise a narrow band filter to exclude that band, whcih would also exclude any real signal that was there.
Now in Global temperature determination, you ahve spatial variations over the globe, covering a total temperature variation range that could go from +60 C or hotter, to -90 C, all on the same day. A 6PM weather map of just the SF Bay area for example last night, showed over a 10 deg F range of temperatures occurring over a spatial extent of no more than 50 x 50 miles.
As for time variations; I understand that most of these weather stations report daily min/max temperatures. If the daily temperature excursion was simply sinusoidal, thent eh min, and max would occur 12 hours apart, and you would in fact record two samples per complete daily cycle, which is OK. But the daily temperature record is not sinusoidal, and even if you ignore clouds moving around during the day, it is not sinusoidal, since heating under a 6000 Kelvin solar source, and cooling by IR radiation to outer space, are not comparable processes. So the daily min/max strategy is already in violation of Nyquist even without cloud changes during the day, and cloud changes do change the amount of heating or cooling that aoccurs in that area.
Heat island measurements observe local ofsets due to the heat island, but they are often used to represent a much larger areal extent, than just where the temperature hots pot offset occurts; and that is the crux of the heat island problem; not that heat islands report abnormal temperatures due to very local effects; but that those abnormal numbers are then used to represent remoter areas; that is a Nyquist violation. the heat island is aphenomenon well outside the “band limit” of the GISStemp sampling process..
But in any case; suppose you could actually measure the true average surface temperature of the earth (you can’t afford to); there is no scientific validity or meaning to the result; because the heat flows, into or out of planet earth; which is what you are really wanting to know (are we heating or cooling), are not simply related to local temperatures. Some effects are related more to the fourth power of the absolute temperature; not to the average temperature. (such as Infra-red radiation from the surface). Other effects are more dependent on the fifth power of the local temperature. The peak radiant emittance of the emitted IR varies as the fifth power of absolute temperature; and the wavelength at which that peak occurs varies inversely as the absolute temperature, so the amount of IR radiation that falls within say the resonance absorption band of the CO2 molecule, varies in a very complex way with both the surface (emitting temperature) and the receiving (atmospheric) tempertaure, which determines the kinetic statistics of the CO2 molecules, and hence the Doppler broadening extent of the intrinsic CO2 line width.
The thermal processes over water are quite unlike those over a rocky desert, or an alpine tundra, ar a tropical rain forest. So even an accurate knowledge of the true earth average temperature; tells you nothing meaningful about the net heat balance of the planet. It’s what i call a phone book average.
You can average all the telephone numbers in your local phone directory, and come up with an average telephone number for your region. It might even be a real telephone number that would ring if you dialled it; but unless it is your telephone numebr, it is of no earthly interest or use to anyone, and even more useless, is what happens to the average telephone number when they print a new edition of your phone book with some new numbers.
You can apply statistical analysis to any set of numbers you want to; even the calculated output values of F(x); but that doiesn’t mean there is any meaning to the results. Some numbers are jsut meant to be different.

For Ken Fabos,
Could you please point us to the scientific evidence that has proven that AGW is true.
Please note Ken, I’m asking for scientific evidence, not PR announcements.

Basil:”New records, given how long a history we have now of temperature data, are going to be, by their nature, extremes that are outside any reasonable range of what’s considered “normal.”
I would agree only if the records are well outside and isolated from a consistant range. If the record is simply the lowest of a lot of close by low temps, then that could and should be considered part of the normal range of temps. Same with high temps. For example, if there are a bunch of low temps over time for a certain date between 47 and 50 degrees with 47 being the lowest on record, then you could say that it is still part of a normal range. But if there were no other low temps under , let’s say 54 degrees, then the 47 would be an extreme outside the normal range. The point I was trying to make was that I think it misleading to focus in on a single temperature and call it normal or average. No one could possibly think that a low temp of 63 degrees would be “abnormal” when the cited normal temp is 65 degrees. Yet isn’t that what all these charts, graphs and models try to do? They try to pin down a specific data point as the benchmark for every other data point. I think using ranges is a better way to go, especially when dealing in generalities with the public.

Have you seen paper Dr Vincent Gray released? It talks about average temps.
I case any of you want to read it the link is here.
http://nzclimatescience.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=369&Itemid=1

George E. Smith (17:24:07) : Well DAV, that presupposes that what is being measured is supposed to be some value that never changes. Also many physical processes exhibit something like 1/f noise; that are actual variation in observed value, (so they are real data) but the variations from any sort of main trajectory can grow indefinitely but at ever reduced frequency.
Now if you average every single data point (of a single variable) that has ever been measured, then I agree that the next data point is going to change the mean by a diminishiong amount (on average)
I have been known to claim that the “big bang” was just the bottom end of the 1/f noise spectrum.
Not at all — at least not in the near future. It is highly unlikely that the Earth’s temperature will rise indefinitely if one is to take the lessons of thermodynamics to heart.
Don’t confuse mathematical model with reality.
Brute (15:56:10) : If the “average” temperature is rising, shouldn’t the extreme high temperature rise also?…… Somewhere?…. At sometime during the course of the 100 year period? Is it simply because we are discussing such infinitesimally small increases? Are you guys suggesting that there is a ceiling or limit on extreme high temperatures?
Well, yes and no. How’s that for simple ? 😉
Temperature (large scale) is connected to heat energy. The availability of energy affects the maximum temperature. The max/min records can only get wider by definition. There’s only so much energy to go around.
Another max/min example: Take an auditorium of 1000 people.. There’s an obvious limit to how loud or quiet any given set of occupants can be because there is a limit to how loud or quiet any given person can be without electronic or mechanical aid. The audience can’t only be at maximum loudness if it consists of the 1000 loudest individuals. Now if there are more loud people than quiet people, the audiences will become louder on the average. However, just because there are more people who are louder doesn’t mean the loudest possible persons have gotten louder.
Kohl Piersen (14:28:11) : … er, I’m no going to quote all of that. Let me just say there are usages of averages that are meaningful — center of mass, e.g. I have to admit that locating the center of population might not have much use to most people.
Since you’ve a lot of questions, the ones that should be uppermost in your mind is “can the Earth really have an average temperature?” and “If so, what would it mean (no pun intended)?”
Here’s someone pondering just that.

Perhaps we should add this to the discussion.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/state/20081026-2032-wst-maunakea-snow.html

Apparently, AGW has had a significant impact on Walden Pond…time for another concert?
http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/10/climate-change.html
Jim

When I read an article that tells me that there’s a) been a 4deg increase in temperatures at Walden Pond in the past 100yrs, and b) lilacs, along with %36 of the other plants at Walden Pond are in “imminent danger” because of this increase…well…I guess I really am a skeptic.
Jim

JimB, I’ve said many times that it is foolish to put so much faith in people that sit on their butts all day in a climate-controlled office staring at a computer model. Ask somebody that’s spent their life outdoors, and I’m not talking about an 18-year-old surfer.
/Heading out to feed the livestock on a record cold day for both highs and lows in my section of Florida.

Hey Anthony
The Brit Met office is forecasting 2 consequetive nights of frost. For October, if they occur, that is very rare, I think.
sorry about conseq;;;; don’t know if that is spelt right

Mary Hinge (02:44:58) Frank. Lansdner (04:55:53) is right, the NOAA CFS ensemble suggests La Nina into the middle of next year.
H/t David Smith.
==================================

Although habitat loss due to succession and development (e.g., loss of wetlands, abandonment of farms, reforestation, and construction of homes and roads) has contributed to decreases in abundance for some species in Thoreau’s Concord (20), climate change may also help to explain the seemingly nonrandom pattern of species loss among certain plant groups.

MAY also help explain… Famous weasel words which really mean “we have to add AGW in so our funding comes through”. Let’s see some actual evidence that a half degree C average rise (if it’s actually that much) causes plants to die.

Here in south England we’ve just had nine hours of snowfall – while the leaves are all still on the trees. In my 50 years I’ve never known snowfall like that in October in southern England. Just weather, of course, but I hope that’s all!

Roy,
I think “crisp” is the new politically correct word for “cold” which has been officially removed from public discourse. Please, everyone, adjust your thinking and vocabulary.

Flanagan (01:45:38) :
“Did anyone notice that the AMSU global temperatures are right now simply the highest ever measured for this time of the year? ”
The majority on this blog won’t believe you, if the data doesn’t show cooling the results must be either faulty, skewed, unbalanced, fraudulent, lies or part of a great AGW conspiracy. I bet some are already thinking this is caused by UHI!!

Mary Hinge (03:08:21) Did you even look at the graph of the NOAA’s CFS ensemble? La Nina from now until mid next year.
Mary Hinge (03:17:58) If you are right, being outnumbered won’t make you wrong. Did you check the figures, or are you just blathering? Please, don’t be silly.
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Steve: I’m talking of course about tropospheric temperatures
http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/execute.csh?amsutemps+001
not temperatures at altitudes of about 36 000 feet, where temps should be stable or slightly cooling over time. Mary, you were right.

Steve Berry (03:21:52) :
“Flanagan. I don’t know which planet you’re talking about, but it’s not this one http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/execute.csh?amsutemps+004”
See Flanagan, told you it wouldn’t be too long. Steve, try it at 3,3000 feet or 14,000 feet.
kim (05:21:16) :
“Did you even look at the graph of the NOAA’s CFS ensemble? La Nina from now until mid next year.”…..”Please, don’t be silly.”
Kim, I think your are straning beyond the limits of sillyness to something a little more worrysome. You seem to be clinging on to the increasingly desperate scenario of a big global freeze and are blocking out anything that does not agree with your opinion. The Ocean SST’s, especially to the east of the Pacific, are not condusive to La Nina formation. The Australians and their dynamic models ( I believe the NOAA’s is a static model though I am not 100% sure of this) ALL predict a neutral ENSO at least until the autumn (SH).
I’ll repeat this once again : Given current conditions, trends over the past few months and climate model forecasts, neutral conditions are likely to remain until the end of the year and throughout the southern summer – there is now very little potential for El Niño or La Niña conditions to develop.

Mary Hinge (03:17:58) :
“Flanagan (01:45:38) :
“Did anyone notice that the AMSU global temperatures are right now simply the highest ever measured for this time of the year? ”
The majority on this blog won’t believe you, if the data doesn’t show cooling the results must be either faulty, skewed, unbalanced, fraudulent, lies or part of a great AGW conspiracy. I bet some are already thinking this is caused by UHI!!”
Yes…you’re right. It’s very very difficult to overcome a severe lack of credibility.
Two words…”boy” and “wolf”.
So you’re saying that this time…THIS time, after all of the other times that have been proven to be inaccurate/false…that THIS is the time everyone should believe your side?
Jim

Mary Hinge (06:12:51) You really should go look at the NOAA CFS ensemble graph. It has a range of model runs with the mean clearly in La Nina territory through the middle of next year. Gad, I’ll have to go look for the URL for you. Furthermore, Harry van Loon expects a moderate La Nina this winter, deepening next year.
We are cooling, Mary, for how long, even kim doesn’t know. The PDO has flipped to a 30 year cooling phase, and the sun is quiescent. If we are entering a Grand or Lesser Solar Minimum we will cool for anywhere from 20-100 years. Encumbering carbon in such an event will starve and freeze any number of the world’s poor. And the longer the world believes the false CO2=AGW paradigm, the worse it will be for those poor people, and the worse the moral disapprobation for those who clung to an overly simplified conception of climate far past when climate data showed them to be in error. How cold does it have to get before you quit trusting Wikipedia, and join the real world? Yes, real world, rather than your fantastical, inadequately modeled one.
Now I’m not nearly as certain of this scenario of global cooling from natural cycles as you are of your scenario of global warming from CO2, but the temperatures are dropping as CO2 continues to rise. Now, that’s silly.
===========================================

Mary (06:39:10) Now you’ve gone beyond silliness to projection. You are the one ‘clinging’ to an outdated paradigm of CO2=AGW in the face of declining temperatures.
If the coming cooling is deep and prolonged a partial die-off of the human race in likely, and will be worsened if it comes upon us by surprise as we are deluded into the false belief of global warming from CO2. It will be worse if carbon is artificially encumbered, since the best way to avoid a die-off holocaust will be energy as cheap as possible, which in this day and age means fossil fuels. A die-off of even 5% is 350,000,000 human souls and no matter how protected you feel in your first world incubus, you will not be safe from the repercussions of such a worldwide disaster.
I repeat, how cold does it have to get, and for how long, before you can look at the objective data with other than the jaundiced eye you’ve apparently got from the likes of Connolley’s Wikipedia, and the captive site, RealClimate?
============================================

Mary Hinge. Dear oh dear! Yes, I tried them all before I posted. The 3,300 ft is consistently below 2007 – just very ocassional peaks. The 14,000 graph is even worse – for you. Bang on the 20-year average up until 2-3 months ago – but still below 2007. But why choose two out of nine? The other seven are all below anyway! Straws and grasping, on your part, me thinks!
Flanagan. What about 25,000 feet? Did you conveniently forget that one? Oh, I think you did. Lucky I’m here to let us all see it then http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/execute.csh?amsutemps+003 Flanagan (and Mary!) Try ticking all the year-boxes and see what happens to the 2008 line. Oh I think you’re in for a shock.

Mary (06:12:51) My last comment is also directed to your 06:12:51 comment. By projection, I mean this. You claim I am ‘clinging on to the increasingly desperate scenario of a big global freeze and are blocking out anything that does not agree with your opinion’. It is you who are bitterly clinging to the CO2=AGW paradigm and ignoring dropping temperatures worldwide, a cooling phase PDO, a quiescent sun, and falling sea levels. Now, who’s being desperate?
==========================

Had to do this. Couldn’t help it. Some things we write just beg for it.
Mary, that’s funny! “…there is some strange weather out there.”
It’s October. I get up to frost every morning here in the PNW. Funny that. Frost in autumn. How strange. Elsewhere we are having a bit of the Indian Summer. LOL! The north east part of the country is complaining of bitter cold! LMAO!! The ocean is languishing in neutral!!!! ROTFLMAO!!!!! For all we know, we could be facing SNOW soon!!!!!! Now that is STRANGE!
snark off

kim (06:32:51) :
Good grief! For the last word on the ENSO over the next few months follow this link. http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/tropnote/tropnote.shtml
For the dynamic model forecasts go to his link: http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/ahead/ENSO-summary.shtml
Kim, I know you think you mean well, and we all worry about effects on the world’s poor but you are being misguided bigtime. We know that small changes in the composition of the earths atmosphere can have large consequences, even small rises in temperatures can have devestating results due to changes in currents, jet streams etc. The people who will be most affected by these are the very people you are worried about.
I will also put you straight on Wikipedia. If you look at all my posts you will see I have mentioned them only once as a pointer to further reading. I don’t trust Wikipedia totally but they have improved immensely in the last 18 months in all fields and I would always suggest cross referencing their work.
As for the real world, well global temperatures are starting to rise again, the sea level is continuing to rise, oh,and its colder than average in some parts of the world, warmer in others!

Mary Hinge (03:17:58) :
Mary, it’s interesting how you automatically supported Flanagan without apparently looking at the numbers. You even threw in your standard ad hominem attack
“The majority on this blog won’t believe you, if the data doesn’t show cooling the results must be either faulty, skewed, unbalanced, fraudulent, lies or part of a great AGW conspiracy. I bet some are already thinking this is caused by UHI!!”
How about science instead of political advocacy?

Confession of a skeptic:
I just installed a pellet stove. I’ve been told that if everyone in North America converted from fuel oil to wood pellets for heat, it would reduce our C02 emmissions by %8. Never mind the fact that we’d likely have to cut down every tree from coast to coast on the continent to accomplish this….I’m GREEN, baby! 🙂
Jim

Dee,
I’m certain that the link (I visited but haven’t digested) is very applicable.
However…we can’t get people to invest 20mins of their time to actually investigate their claims. I’m skeptical (once again?…still?) that folks will invest the time to read them, or the discipline to apply them.
Nonetheless, the link is on my list, and I’ll start taking swings at it in free moments, as priorities allow.
Thanks,
Jim
Reply: It is not a very long posting, but with WUWT nudging toward 1 million views per month, it save on moderator wear & tear in addition to resulting in more productive discussions if the bulk of us understand the principles it contains. – Dee

Jeez…
according to, well, all warming scenarios the troposphere should be warming AND the stratosphere cooling. All these observations just simply confirm the existence of a greenhouse effect. The only way for the stratosphere to be warming would be that the observed warming is sun-induced.
oops!
PS how strange the fact that a day being colder than the same day in 2007 and/or 2006, but higher than any other day ever measured, is seen as a “proof” of cooling.

Mary Hinge (09:03:57) No, I am not embarrassing myself when I refer to climateaudit.org—it is a highly scientific site. Have you looked at the graph of CFS ensembles which is from NOAA? It projects a La Nina into the middle of next year. Do you have a good reason why you are attempting to ignore this graph?
I’m suspicious of those two dots on your graph without the intervening dots which I’ve seen on other graphs which show a drop in sea level by TOPEX/Jason. You’ve not addressed why your graph looks so peculiar.
Of all the oceanic oscillations, which together help determine the globe’s climate, the PDO is the strongest and most influential of the them, so yes, it determines global temperature, at least more than the others.
Sorry, atmospheric temperatures are not showing what has been projected by your inadequate climate models. For disconfirmation of your models see lucia’s Blackboard at rankexploits.com. Furthermore, the Argos buoys show a slight drop in oceanic temperatures to about two miles, and the oceans hold a lot more heat than the atmosphere.
And if you’ll look carefully, I have attacked your points rather than you. Show me an ad hominem that I’ve written.
=============================================

Flanagan: “..temperatures at altitudes of about 36 000 feet, where temps should be stable or slightly cooling over time.”

Mary, you’re still doing it, or rather not. Go to the 25,000 feet (400mb) and click all the year boxes. Come back here and tell me what you found.
And please be polite and accurate. I didn’t cherry pick as you said, and neither did I choose the high altitude ones either. If you cannot accurately reflect what people have written then we’re all wasting our time.

The snow we had here in the UK yesterday was the first October snow since 1934, with some parts reaching -4 degrees C!

RECORD EVENT REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE JACKSONVILLE
1245 PM EDT WED OCT 29 2008
…LOW TEMPERATURE SHATTERS RECORDS AT JACKSONVILLE THIS MORNING…
THE TEMPERATURE AT JACKSONVILLE INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT DROPPED TO 33
DEGREES AT 743 AM THIS MORNING…SETTING A NEW RECORD FOR THE DATE.
THE PREVIOUS RECORD WAS 39 DEGREES SET IN 1987.
NOT ONLY WAS THIS A NEW RECORD FOR THE DAY…IT IS ALSO THE COLDEST
TEMPERATURE ON RECORD FOR OCTOBER GOING BACK TO 1871…AND…IT IS
THE COLDEST READING SO EARLY IN THE FALL SEASON.
LOW TEMPERATURES ELSEWHERE AROUND JACKSONVILLE INCLUDE…
CECIL FIELD……. 30 DEGREES
CRAIG FIELD……. 38 DEGREES
JACKSONVILLE NAS.. 38 DEGREES
MAYPORT NS…….. 41 DEGREES
Lots of low temperature records being set from North Carolina down to the Florida panhandle.
Meanwhile, the weather has been amazing here in San Diego and the monthly average is about 4 degrees above normal. Oct 2008 is the first month in at least 18 months that was above normal.

Basil (12:29:56) :
“It sounds like maybe you are trying to say that the PDO is ultimately neutral with respect to long term global temperature trends”
The PDO itself is approximately neutral which is why it should be described as a negative (which is what is happening now) and positive. the terms ‘cool’ phase and ‘warm’ phase are misleading. (look at recent SST anomoly maps to see why.
The PDO has historically had an effect on ENSO and it is this that can produce significant warming or cooling. Generally a -ive PDO increases probability of more frequent and stronger La Ninas and the +ive phase more and stronger El Nino. We had a strong La NIna a few months ago that falls into the pattern but to show it is only increased probability rather than a PDO direct cause, the ENSO will be neutral this SH summer.

Flanagan (01:05:17) Don’t let Lief Svalgaard see this post. What about Solar Cycle 24 starting up makes you think that will warm the globe back up? There is a big prize for the mechanism you suggest you have.
==========================================

Flanagan: “..temperatures at altitudes of about 36 000 feet, where temps should be stable or slightly cooling over time.”
and: “References available upon request.”
I already asked for a reference but I’ll gladly do it again. Even a Realclimate reference will be appreciated.

In case there will be stable climate the political bandwagon which claims that the western world must stop its indutries they maybe rephrased it as Climate Something. 😉

Gene L (09:08:30) He’s becoming an object of ridicule, hasn’t he, poor guy. I really believe that Hansen started out with good intentions, to save the world, but somewhere along the way he’s gone off the path of objective science, and is leading us to Hell.
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