Reader Markx writes:
The title says it all here: “…Retrospective prediction…” indeed. How could a researcher keep a straight face and write such a title? (Maybe a subversive element at work?)
Retrospective prediction of the global warming slowdown in the past decade
Virginie Guemas, Francisco J. Doblas-Reyes, Isabel Andreu-Burillo
& Muhammad Asif
The Abstract:
Despite a sustained production of anthropogenic greenhouse gases, the Earth’s mean near-surface temperature paused its rise during the 2000–2010 period1. To explain such a pause, an increase in ocean heat uptake below the superficial ocean layer2, 3 has been proposed to overcompensate for the Earth’s heat storage. Contributions have also been suggested from the deep prolonged solar minimum4, the stratospheric water vapour5, the stratospheric6 and tropospheric aerosols7. However, a robust attribution of this warming slowdown has not been achievable up to now.
Here we show successful retrospective predictions of this warming slowdown up to 5 years ahead, the analysis of which allows us to attribute the onset of this slowdown to an increase in ocean heat uptake. Sensitivity experiments accounting only for the external radiative forcings do not reproduce the slowdown. The top-of-atmosphere net energy input remained in the [0.5–1] W m−2 interval during the past decade, which is successfully captured by our predictions.
Most of this excess energy was absorbed in the top 700 m of the ocean at the onset of the warming pause, 65% of it in the tropical Pacific and Atlantic oceans. Our results hence point at the key role of the ocean heat uptake in the recent warming slowdown. The ability to predict retrospectively this slowdown not only strengthens our confidence in the robustness of our climate models, but also enhances the socio-economic relevance of operational decadal climate predictions.
http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nclimate1863.html
Meanwhile, reality continues to be a bitch:
Betts at the UK Met off tweeted much the same thing this weekend. These idiots are absolutely convince that their models are 100% accurate in spite of masses of data contre.
But then we have this from National Public Radio. “In fact, the planet would be frozen solid if we didn’t have any carbon dioxide in the air.” Richard Harris, NPR, March 10, 2013.
Evidently, all those millions and millions of temperature measurements need more “adjusting”.
So let me get this right. The models didn’t work so they “modified” them so they would explain certain anomolies without knowing whether they would explain futre data without further “modifications” and then they claim that this proves that their models worked in the first place. Is that right?
Am I allowed to retrospectively predict lottery numbers?
Are you certain that headline is not actually from “The Daily Onion”?
“Predictions are hard, especially about the future”- Yogi Berra.
AGW extremists have become a self parody.
We should encourage them in every way possible, except giving them more money or power.
One is required to ask why this ocean uptake only kicked in during the past ten years and not before.
It’s all in the epicycles, man. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deferent_and_epicycle
So what laws of physics supposedly changed at the turn of the century so that the oceans started to increase their heat uptake?
How can Nature published such drivel? That’s all Folks!
I’m even better than they are. I actually predicted that they would retrospectively predict this. Who’s the fortuneteller now, baby????
seriously, retrospective prediction is absolutely worthless in a chaotic system. Ask anyone who’s lost several grand in the stock market by relying on their wonderful new analytical model that has a perfect retrospective data fit. (yes, people try that all the time) It’s like predicting next year’s Super Bowl winner by looking only at past super bowl winners – doing that would give you strange ideas like thinking that Jerry Jones and his Cowboys might have a pretty good shot.
The entire idea is based on the belief that Correlation IS Causation. I guess this is the final proof, if any was needed, that these people don’t deserve the name of “scientist”. These are religious fundamentalists who think they’re too smart to fall for a fundamentalist religion. They’re no longer even worth any serious respect, on any of our parts. They are frauds, through and through.
Incredible. And the have the bloody cheek to call it a “Science”.
… but also enhances the socio-economic relevance of operational decadal climate predictions.… helps us keep our government paid jobs for another decadeTo validate this model they should run it from 1900 with no parameter changes and it will show the ocean heat uptake that must have happened in the 1930’s and in the 1960’s.
Slow down? Latest numbers for April show temperatures are 0.2C down since last October. Remember how the Met Office and NOAA were claiming this was at the “tail end of La Nina”
http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2013/05/14/april-global-temperatures/
OT but as I predicted some time ago and definitely going out on a limb my bets are that NH ice WILL NOT decline to outside normal Standard deviations this WHOLE year and will continue to increase every year (but may stay within higher bounds of SD), for the next 30 years LOL
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/icecover.uk.php
One can only hope that the IPCC is dumb enough to pick this ball up and run with it.
I’ve just retrospectively predicted last week’s lottery numbers.
Now where’s my money ?
And most of the warming occured at the onset? I.e. before most ARGO floats were deployed? How convenient… I wonder how many years of more or less flat OHC we will need before they have to find another set of epicycles to add to their theory?
Global warming has not slowed it has stalled and in some data sets has fallen.
In the UK March and April were coldest for years and May looks set to be the coldest on record with the SW some 10C below the seasonal average. (For Dr Rachel Warren, UAE SES that is 18F).
It is non too warm in the East Midlands either.
Brain…exploding…
But ocean heat content uptake has slowed down.
And is just one-fifth of their GHG net forcing.
Climate science doesn’t really care if their numbers add up. In fact, it is looked down upon.
It’s models all the way down.
I predict England will win the world cup in 1966
Up to 5 years ahead, of the 2000-2010 pause…
Wow, just imagine how popular these researchers will be if they can adapt their techniques to retrospectively predict the 1996 US elections.
Quick, someone give these people a grant now, and maybe they can figure out in time who’ll win in 2000!
Richard
That’s nothing. I retrospectively predicted the results of the Grand National horse race which took place a month ago. When I went into the bookmakers to claim my winnings they threw me out. They are obviously unsophisticated people who know nothing at all about climate science
tonyb
Who pays for this garbage? Look at the effort that is being expended trying to show that us skeptics are wrong and that our hard earned money needs to flow into the government coffers to pay for idealistic and costly renewable energy. Wow…
Muhammad Asif helped out with this important work. That seems about right!
I am completely baffled as to why they would use the phrase “Retrospective prediction.”
Why not “retrospective modeling”, which is exactly what it was?
Perhaps there is a subversive element there wanting to expose the farce?
Or a climate scientist who figures that in this rock star world any publicity is good publicity?
Or, maybe just someone there who enjoys yanking chains?
Anthony,
Actually, global warming has not slowed down, it continues at a fairly steady pace as indicated by the heat increase rates going down to the 2000 meter level based on data collected by NOAA in the NODC and the WOD. ref. Levitus et al 2012
That said, I’m curious as to what you and your readers think about the following video produced by the National Academy of Sciences called ‘Climate Change: Lines of Evidence’
It’s only a basic overview of the science and I wish it had more detail. Maybe more in the future?
This is hardly anything new. The ‘science’ of AGW has used this method from the beginning. They build models to ‘explain’ recent observations with the prerequisite that models must support the AGW theory. When they get a model that ‘curve fits’ their very brief time frame, they proclaim that the existence of their model proves the theory!
The science of AGW is not an attempt to understand the reality of climate, it is a game academics play. The object is to build a model that supports the AGW theory AND fits recent observations. The game is getting harder and harder to win.
“How many researchers does it take to change a light-bulb? None if it’s a retrospective study, because the light-bulb has already changed itself.” From the Institute of Work and Health.
Clearly from the comments, WUWT readers get what;s going on here. Now, if we can just get the rest of the general public to be able to see the same thing, we will have this problem solved (the problem being the lack of science & alarmism, not CO2)
2020: In retrospect we predicted the drop in temperatures, global warming still threatens life as we know it, due to burning fossil fuels, please send $.
2030: In retrospect we predicted the continued drop in temperatures, climate change still threatens life as we know it, due to burning fossil fuels, please send $.
2040: We predict continuing falling temperatures, climate change threatens life as we know it, due to burning fossil fuels, please send $.
2050: In retrospect we predicted the pause in falling temperatures, climate change still threatens life as we know it, due to burning fossil fuels, please send $.
2060: In retrospect we predicted the rise in temperatures, global warming threatens life as we know it, due to burning fossil fuels, please send $.
2070: We predict continuing rising temperatures, global warming threatens life as we know it, due to burning fossil fuels, please send $.
2080: In retrospect we predicted the pause in rising temperatures, climate change still threatens life as we know it, due to burning fossil fuels, please send $.
2090: OH NO, 2100 is coming, We’re DOOMED! …. No, really. Predictions a century ago left no doubt that by 2100 we’d be toast, no doubt about it, settled.
2100: We predict that there will be a temperature, “CC” threatens life as we know it, due to burning fossil fuels, please send $.
Joe says:May 14, 2013 at 6:34 am
Hi Jo, here’s another!:
How many climate researchers does it take to change a light-bulb?
None. They sit around in the dark watching and waiting until it gets changed, then create a computer model showing that all along they knew exactly how and when that would happen.
A short history of ‘Climate Alchemy’.
In 1972 the NIMBUS team resurrected Aarhenius’ hypothesis, including ‘back radiation’, when no truly professional scientist or engineer can accept this misuse of radiative physics.
In 1973 Lacis and Hansen adapted Sagan’s aerosol optical physics to Climate Alchemy. Sagan had made a mistake, originating in van der Hulst’s work of the 1950s The sign of the aerosol warming from clouds is wrong; it’s the real AGW.
In 1981, Hansen’s first modelling paper claimed that CO2 acted by reducing OLR in the 7-14 µm range. That was a mistake but it seems they had become committed..
In 1997 it was discovered that CO2 followed T rise at the end of ice ages, Mann’s ‘fraudulent’ hockey stick was created.
In 2004 NASA substituted incorrect ‘surface reflection’ physics for Twomey’s partially correct physics, apparently to make AR4 plausible.
In 2009, Trenberth introduced into the ‘energy budget’ imaginary ‘missing heat’ in the oceans.
In 2011, Hansen claimed aerosol cooling, direct + indirect, exactly offsets AGW thus explaining no warming.
It appears that AR5 is to be built around the ‘missing heat’.
Any scientist who accepts this ‘science’ is correct is failing in their first requirement, to be objective and professional. ‘Retrospective prediction’ proves this point beyond reasonable doubt.
Mmmmm, let me also take a retrospective look.
There, fixed. 😉 Just joking.
I didn’t realize we had anything even remotely resembling of accurate temperature data from the briny depths, not to mention a plausible explanation of how heat from the surface might get there.
Besides, what these guys don’t seem to be able to understand is we live on the surface of our planet. Global warming is measured up here. As far as I know we’re still a long way from getting a reliable reading of global warming up here.
What is the mechanism by which this uptake took place? Why did it suddenly begin?
But I thought the models were robust. FAIL. Now, where are the Warmists to call out these Climastrologists on the use of the word “predictions”? I was told by well informed Warmists that climate criminal scientists don’t make predictions but projections. Just how many times do I have to catch out these conmen?
“Here we show successful retrospective predictions of this warming slowdown up to 5 years ahead, the analysis of which allows us to attribute the onset of this slowdown to an increase in ocean heat uptake.”
Excellent! We are agreed that a decrease in ocean heat uptake causes ‘global warming’. Now we can forget about CO2, and start the important business of figuring out how to tax ocean heat uptake. Right?
Jimbo says: May 14, 2013 at 6:51 am
“Projections” vs “predictions”
Ha! Very good point…
I have a feeling these poor researchers may have all the notable ‘climate scientists’ coming down on them like a tonne of bricks about now!
Why is it that as the gap between the claims and reality grows the “purposefully mendacious” (Anthony) alarmists seem to think their best play is to pile up more and more BS?
Can they not recognize how they are simply piling up more embarrassment?
The entire adventure is being recorded into history and they are not worried at all?
FEMA realized that, just like empirical evidence for AGW, the spontaneous reports from disaster zones may not provide the desired narrative. FEMA then created “Innovation Response Teams” of paid actors, to appear at crisis times and provide the required backstory. Several websites provide video clips of many actual situations. To avoid conspiratorial discussions, no links are furnished. But, FEMA does not deny this program, which begs the question, why do we need paid actors to provide on-scene witness commentary, when REAL witnesses are available ? ? ?
“In time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act” ~ George Orwell
You are mistaken. This was not a science report. It was the premier anouncement for “Back to the Future 2,034,545-The Gorebull Years”.
What the researchers failed to say is this:
One of the possibilities predicted by our models was that warming would not occur. However, we ignored this prediction because it did not meet our expectations. Instead we went with the prediction that warming would occur.
The problem with all models is that the future is not predictable given our current understanding of mathematics and physics. The future is not like the present simply offset in time. The future exists as a probability function with many different outcomes possible given the exact same climate forcings.
Which is exactly what the climate models show. Each time you run the models they give a different result, without any change in the forcings. However, climate science ignores what their own models are telling them, and use the average of all their runs as a prediction. This is a nonsense.
You cannot average the future to arrive at the present. An average of (warming + cooling + unchanged) / 3 = unchanged. However, that answer is wrong as a prediction, because it ignores the possibility that we may get warming or cooling. Using the average ignores what the climate models themselves are telling the modellers.
It is time that climate science woke up and recognized what the models themselves are telling the climate modellers. Both warming and cooling are possible if we double the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. The models themselves are predicting this.
If you float a “retrospective prediction” in an engineering setting, you will get laughed out of the room. But at least these folks seem to have a grasp of the task at hand, which is more than I can say for the Hockey Team lately. A topic becomes “settled science” only after multiple sophisticated predictions are conclusively shown to be accurate. While the Team members seem to be distracted by their personal interests and word wars, at least these folks are looking at how to clear the prediction hurdle. The problem is that as a group, climate scientists are rank amateurs at managing hierarchical uncertainty.
Their problem is that surface tension blocks heat transfer.
Surely this is dreadfully simple stuff:
If you create even the most simplistic model and run it with more energy going in than is coming out, your modeled object will get warmer.
In the case where the expected modeled warming is not observed in real life, run the model again with the same energy input, except this time provide a modeled, previously unused heat sink, allocating exactly the now known ‘missing heat’ to that heat sink.
Voilà! You were correct all along!
That’s great, I’ll add that to my list:
STRATOSPHERIC AEROSOLS
“The team concluded that models miss an important cooling factor if they don’t account for the influence of stratospheric aerosol, or don’t include recent changes in stratospheric aerosol levels.” http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2011/20110721_particles.html
OCEAN CURRENTS
“Our results suggest that global surface temperature may not increase over the next decade, as natural climate variations in the North Atlantic and tropical Pacific temporarily offset the projected anthropogenic warming.” http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7191/abs/nature06921.html
ENSO
“The current stand-still of the 5-year running mean global temperature may be largely a consequence of the fact that the first half of the past 10 years had predominantly El Nino conditions, and the second half had predominantly La Nina conditions.” http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2013/20130115_Temperature2012.pdf
SOLAR ACTIVITY
“….as a result of declining solar activity in the subsequent five years, average temperature in 2019 is only 0.03-0.01°C warmer than in 2014. This lack of overall warming is analogous to the period from 2002 to 2008 when decreasing solar irradiance also countered much of the anthropogenic warming.” http://www.environmentportal.in/files/Earth%20surface%20temperature.pdf
SMALL VOLCANOES
“Global warming was slowed between 2000 and 2010 because of sulfur dioxide spewed forth by volcanoes, researchers from the University of Colorado Boulder (CU-Boulder) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) claim in a new study.” http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1112795104/volcanoes-spewing-sulfur-dioxide-slow-global-warming-030213/
A pure scientist’s motivation by definition is to solve scientific problems, to understand the physical reasons for what has and will happen. An activist on the other hand is driven to push an agenda.
If the scientist is an activist (For example James Hansen, Michael Mann, Ben Santer, Kenneth Trenberth, Gavin Schmidt, and Stefan Rahmstorf) and if the scientist had a lack of moral fiber (i.e. other climate scientists are pushing the agenda to get grants and to get media attention, why not me also?), they might be tempted to manipulate analysis and hide data to push the agenda.
The lack of warming for the last 16 years indicates that something is fundamentally incorrect with the extreme AGW theory (Hint: Detailed observational analysis in the tropics show there is no water vapor amplification of the CO2 forcing and tropical cloud cover increases or decreases to resist forcing. There is negative feedback in the tropics rather than positive feedback).
The alternate greenhouse gas hypothesis is the lukewarm AGW theory (lukewarm AGW occurs if the planet resists the forcing, negative feedback.)
The following are two additional observations, logic pillars, to support the lukewarm AGW theory.
1) NO TROPICAL TROPOSPHERIC WARMING
A fundamental pillar of the extreme AGW theory is the predicted tropical tropospheric warming at roughly 10 km is. If there is to be substantial warming of the planet (more than 1C for a doubling of atmospheric CO2) due to the increase atmospheric CO2, there needs to be tropical tropospheric warming to amplify CO2 warming. The observations indicate that there is neither warming in the tropics and in addition there is no tropical troposphere warming. These two observations support each other.
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/DOUGLASPAPER.pdf
We examine tropospheric temperature trends of 67 runs from 22 ‘Climate of the 20th Century’ model simulations and try to reconcile them with the best available updated observations (in the tropics during the satellite era). Model results and observed temperature trends are in disagreement in most of the tropical troposphere, being separated by more than twice the uncertainty of the model mean. In layers near 5 km, the modelled trend is 100 to 300% higher than observed, and, above 8 km, modelled and observed trends have opposite signs. These conclusions contrast strongly with those of recent publications based on essentially the same data. … …We have tested the proposition that greenhouse model simulations and trend observations can be reconciled. Our conclusion is that the present evidence, with the application of a robust statistical test, supports rejection of this proposition. (The use of tropical tropospheric temperature trends as a metric for this test is important, as this region represents the CEL and provides a clear signature of the trajectory of the climate system under enhanced greenhouse forcing.) On the whole, the evidence indicates that model trends in the troposphere are very likely inconsistent with observations that indicate that, since 1979, there is no significant long-term amplification factor relative to the surface. If these results continue to be supported, then future projections of temperature change, as depicted in the present suite of climate models, are likely too high.
2) PLANET RESISTS FORCING CHANGES RATHER THAN AMPLIFIES FORCING CHANGES
Tropical cloud cover increases or decreases, thereby reflecting more or less sunlight off into space which resists forcing changes, negative feedback.
This is the second paper by Lindzen and Choi on this subject. The warmist scientists had a number of criticisms concerning the first paper’s analysis techniques. Lindzen and Choi address every criticism with more data and multiple analysis techniques to confirm the conclusion is valid. Tropical planetary cloud cover increase or decreases to resist forcing, negative feedback. The warming due to a doubling of atmospheric CO2 will be less than 1C is the planet resists rather amplifies the CO2 forcing.
http://www.johnstonanalytics.com/yahoo_site_admin/assets/docs/LindzenChoi2011.235213033.pdf
On the Observational Determination of Climate Sensitivity and Its Implications
Richard S. Lindzen1 and Yong-Sang Choi2
We estimate climate sensitivity from observations, using the deseasonalized fluctuations in sea surface temperatures (SSTs) and the concurrent fluctuations in the top-of-atmosphere (TOA) outgoing radiation from the ERBE (1985-1999) and CERES (2000- 2008) satellite instruments. Distinct periods of warming and cooling in the SSTs were used to evaluate feedbacks. An earlier study (Lindzen and Choi, 2009) was subject to significant criticisms. The present paper is an expansion of the earlier paper where the various criticisms are taken into account. … ….We again find that the outgoing radiation resulting from SST fluctuations exceeds the zerofeedback response thus implying negative feedback. In contrast to this, the calculated TOA outgoing radiation fluxes from 11 atmospheric models forced by the observed SST are less than the zerofeedback response, consistent with the positive feedbacks that characterize these models. ….
…The heart of the global warming issue is so-called greenhouse warming. This refers to the fact that the earth balances the heat received from the sun (mostly in the visible spectrum) by radiating in the infrared portion of the spectrum back to space. Gases that are relatively transparent to visible light but strongly absorbent in the infrared (greenhouse gases) interfere with the cooling of the planet, forcing it to become warmer in order to emit sufficient infrared radiation to balance the net incoming sunlight (Lindzen, 1999). … …However, warming from a doubling of CO2 would only be about 1C (based on simple calculations where the radiation altitude and the Planck temperature depend on wavelength in accordance with the attenuation coefficients of well mixed CO2 molecules; a doubling of any concentration in ppmv produces the same warming because of the logarithmic dependence of CO2’s absorption on the amount of CO2) (IPCC, 2007). This modest warming is much less than current climate models suggest for a doubling of CO2. Models predict warming of from 1.5C to 5C and even more for a doubling of CO2. Model predictions depend on the ‘feedback’ within models from the more important greenhouse substances, water vapor and clouds. Within all current climate models, water vapor increases with increasing temperature so as to further inhibit infrared cooling. Clouds also change so that their visible reflectivity decreases, causing increased solar absorption and warming of the earth. Cloud feedbacks are still considered to be highly uncertain (IPCC, 2007), but the fact that these feedbacks are strongly positive in most models is considered to be an indication that the result is basically correct. Methodologically, this is unsatisfactory. Ideally, one would seek an observational test of the issue. Here we suggest that it may be possible to test the issue with existing data from satellites.
It appears there is unequivocal evidence that some scientists are activists. Is there evidence that some scientists will manipulate data and analysis to push the extreme AGW agenda?
http://www.climatechangefacts.info/ClimateChangeDocuments/LandseaResignationLetterFromIPCC.htm
With this open letter to the community, I wish to explain the basis for my decision and bring awareness to what I view as a problem in the IPCC process. The IPCC is a group of climate researchers from around the world that every few years summarize how climate is changing and how it may be altered in the future due to manmade global warming. I had served both as an author for the Observations chapter and a Reviewer for the 2nd Assessment Report in 1995 and the 3rd Assessment Report in 2001, primarily on the topic of tropical cyclones (hurricanes and typhoons). My work on hurricanes, and tropical cyclones more generally, has been widely cited by the IPCC. For the upcoming AR4, I was asked several weeks ago by the Observations chapter Lead Author—Dr. Kevin Trenberth—to provide the writeup for Atlantic hurricanes. As I had in the past, I agreed to assist the IPCC in what I thought was to be an important, and politically-neutral determination of what is happening with our climate.
Shortly after Dr. Trenberth requested that I draft the Atlantic hurricane section for the AR4’s Observations chapter, Dr. Trenberth participated in a press conference organized by scientists at Harvard on the topic “Experts to warn global warming likely to continue spurring more outbreaks of intense hurricane activity” along with other media interviews on the topic. The result of this media interaction was widespread coverage that directly connected the very busy 2004 Atlantic hurricane season as being caused by anthropogenic greenhouse gas warming occurring today. Listening to and reading transcripts of this press conference and media interviews, it is apparent that Dr. Trenberth was being accurately quoted and summarized in
such statements and was not being misrepresented in the media. These media sessions have potential to result in a widespread perception that global warming has made recent hurricane activity much more severe.
Moreover, the evidence is quite strong and supported by the most recent credible studies that any impact in the future from global warming upon hurricane will likely be quite small. The latest results from the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (Knutson and Tuleya, Journal of Climate, 2004) suggest that by around 2080, hurricanes may have winds and rainfall about 5% more intense than today. It has been proposed that even this tiny change may be an exaggeration as to what may happen by the end of the 21st Century (Michaels, Knappenberger, and Landsea, Journal of Climate, 2005, submitted).
It is beyond me why my colleagues would utilize the media to push an unsupported agenda that recent hurricane activity has been due to global warming. Given Dr. Trenberth’s role as the IPCC’s Lead Author responsible for preparing the text on hurricanes, his public statements so far outside of current scientific understanding led me to concern that it would be very difficult for the IPCC process to proceed objectively with regards to the assessment on hurricane activity. My view is that when people identify themselves as being associated with the IPCC and then make pronouncements far outside current scientific understandings that this will harm the
credibility of climate change science and will in the longer term diminish our role in public policy.
The average depth of the Gulf of Mexico is ~1,615 m (Turner, 1999). It has nice mixing currents. According to many recent posts, the Oceans are absorbing all this excess heat between 0-2000m.
The Gulf, being a nice relatively contained region, should therefore show warming far in excess of the ~0.01C. But it appears to have a cold temperature anomaly of ~1.0C [being kind].
I suppose that the Gulf of Mexico is not part of the Oceans, well, since it has the name Gulf of Mexico. /sarc
The Mediterranean Sea is also nicely contained with less currents and mixing. Its average depth is ~1500m.
It appears that we have to “Oceans” to determine where all of this heat is going!!
Step Up AGW, prove your “Heat into Oceans” theory.
Anything is retrospectively predictable if you have 20/20 hindsight.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but air doesn’t warm water. Rather, water warms air. Sunlight warms water.
So are they proposing that there was some previously undiscovered solar mechanism that increased heat into the oceans? Or some previously undiscovered atmospheric mechanism that alters evaporation/convection thus to prevent the oceans from releasing heat to air.
Oh. Wait. They still rely on the undiscovered mechanism whereby greenhouse gasses will warm the atmosphere, which will in turn warm the oceans.
Peter J. says:
May 14, 2013 at 6:30 am
Actually, global warming has not slowed down, it continues at a fairly steady pace as indicated by the heat increase rates going down to the 2000 meter level based on data collected by NOAA in the NODC and the WOD. ref. Levitus et al 2012
What nonsense. At what point did the heat decide that instead of heating the air it would heat, apparently by magic the deep oceans?
Your video is grade-school level pseudo-scientific propaganda. Pure bilge of the sort only an idiot would be impressed with.
“So let me get this right. The models didn’t work so they “modified” them so they would explain certain anomolies without knowing whether they would explain futre data without further “modifications” and then they claim that this proves that their models worked in the first place. Is that right?”
Thats basically what you have to do when you cannot control the experimental conditions.
It’s pretty simple.
Suppose you have a model of car braking. You model predicts that if you slam on the brakes
at 72 MPH your stopping distance will be 102 ft.
You go to the test, you record the data and when you look at the data you find that the
the stopping distance was 105 feet. You examine the actual vehicle speed and find out
that the driver hit the brakes at 74 mph. So you re run the model using 74 mph instead of 72.
your answer comes out at 105.
What they are doing is standard practice in any large physical simulation where parameters
have uncertainty and where experiments cannot be controlled with exactitude.
Our cucumber distilling machine has sprung a leak: please send $millions.
Riddle me this:
Why do we continue to show the pre-2013 AR Scenarios? should we not show them, at least, paled-out, and only solid AFTER 2013?
For the Scenarios to have “truth”, we have to
1) have temps to go from where we are now to where the Scenario shows them to be in 2100, and
2) show a mechanism for the temps to rocket up from now to get there.
As far as I know, there are no climatological scenarios in which sudden acceleration happens. If that were the case, we would not have huge certainty OR specific Scenarios, but a broad band within which any up-or-down motion could happen. The future would be a crap shoot, and the scientific interconnections involved in climatology, pure chaos theory.
We know what happened between 1988 and 2013. The Scenarios as shown between those dates are all wrong except for the one, if there is one, that is identical to what actually happened, or, being generous, included what actually happened.
Scenario A has no meaning going forward if there is no mechanism or internal variability that allows the end position in 2100 to be reached from where we are today.
Why are we still showing and talking about Scenarios that do not include the last 25 years of actual events?
I predict that this paper will be discussed a month ago in this post.
Good posts by AlecM and Astley. History will record the “Global Warming” story as one of political activism mixed with scientific corruption by a clueless media.
Methodical temperature measurements on a global basis do not exist at the surface even today. The USCRN is a good start. Satellites are ok since 1979. Argo is a good start for the oceans.
Only a few well maintained surface thermometers are needed to show that there has been no significant warming in the industrial era. There is no real evidence that the 20th century was warmer than the 19th, based on the few good surface thermometers. The evidence that the 20th century was warmer using proxy and anecdotal photos of glacial retreats is not evidence of CO2 causation. Recorded history shows that climates vary on the century and millenial scales due to natural causes.
Basic accounting shows that fossil fuel burning only increases the carbon cycle fluxes by 3 percent, that amount is easily absorbed by biological sinks.
More proof that the globe is not warming is found at the four good Antarctic science stations, Vostok, Halley, Davis and Amundsen-Scott. All show zero warming since 1957. If the alarmists saw any warming at those stations, they would be screaming “look at that data” 24 hours a day.
Moving the goalposts again
In retrospect, I predicted that Y2K wouldn’t be a big deal.
@Steven Mosher on May 14, 2013 at 8:02 am
Actually the analogy to CAGW is more like:
The model predicts the car would stop in 105 feet when brakes are applied at 75mph. The government claims this is too dangerous and threatens to impose a dangerous car usage tax.
Finally some measures the stopping distance and it’s 50 feet and condidered perfectly safe.
Scientists rework the model, claim their model predicted 50feet all along, and concludes the car is even more dangerous now because it’s “worse than we thought”
“The ability to predict retrospectively this slowdown not only strengthens our confidence in the robustness of our climate models, but also enhances the socio-economic relevance of operational decadal climate predictions.”
I think the “socio-economic relevance” is the clincher here. These people simply cannot stop themselves. They cannot just do science. They have to do science that saves the world. And to do science that saves the world your science must always show that the world needs to be saved.
As we get rid of religion in the world, we also throw out any easy access to meaning in life. So now we have people who are in desperate need of some substitute meaning manufacturing causes and emergencies that allows them to give themselves an artificial injection of the stuff.
Retroactive predictions are all that these climate models are good for. Not much use to anyone. The sign of a good theory is the ability to make predictions that are later observed. The IPCC’s climate
predictionsprojections have failed time and again. The theory has failed – it’s time to throw the theory in the garbage can of pseudoscience. It’s time honest Climastrologists came out.Bruce Cobb says:
May 14, 2013 at 7:48 am
It’s not my video actually. It was done by the National Academy of Sciences.
Two key factors are apparently involved in the increased heat transport to the deep oceans.
1. The PDO, a natural climate variable, is now negative.
2. There has been an increase in the tropical zonal winds which causes evaporative cooling and increases saline density, which causes more heat to sink deeper in the ocean.
Ooops. I meant to use the strike tag for “predictions”
Sooooo, one presumes there will be new model outputs that do not show catastrophic warming? Thought not.
Their new modeling
The question is WHY there would have been an increase in ocean heat uptake, and if this paper were a theory of the why they would tout it in the abstract. Apparently they are just assuming an unexplained increase in ocean heat uptake (that is, they are just modeling Trenberth’s widely asserted assumption) and pretending that simply modeling the obvious implications of the assumption is adding something.
“Yay. Trenberth is right: if more heat is removed by the oceans, the surface doesn’t get as hot.” But nothing about whether this actually happened. The infinite sycophancy of a batch of rent-seeking second-tier third world graduate students, eager to climb the lowest rung of the global warming gravy train, as mindless as bacteria following food.
Nature should be renamed Nurture.
Let’s review:
They could not deny the pause.
They rejiggered the models to show the pause that happened.
Because the models now show the pause that happened, they claim the models have predicative power.
If people in the financial services tried pulling this, saying their models would have predicted what the markets did do so they and their models should be trusted, after “tuning” the models to show what was already known to have happened, several government agencies would be investigating them for possible fraud and related.
But this is Climate Science, no harm, no foul. It’s not like billions are being stolen, with the elderly and vulnerable rendered so poor they freeze to death in winter from being unable to afford heating, right?
Question: What assumptions are still in the models? Did they figure this temporary pause would end after another year or two, and then we’re right back to the warming, so everyone needs to keep working to lower those “carbon emissions” or we will really suffer after this brief respite?
@Steven Mosher May 14, 2013 at 8:02 am
So what you’re saying is that if the output of a model is off, you can go back and see if the inputs were different from what you assumed, and if they were, you can change the inputs to what they really were and see if the new outputs match reality.
If they couldn’t get the inputs right before, how are we to know if they’ll get them right this time around?
Steven Mosher says:
May 14, 2013 at 8:02 am
““So let me get this right. The models didn’t work so they “modified” them so they would explain certain anomolies without knowing whether they would explain futre data without further “modifications” and then they claim that this proves that their models worked in the first place. Is that right?”
Thats basically what you have to do when you cannot control the experimental conditions.
It’s pretty simple.”
The problem is that these people might have trained a hundred models, then tested the hundred models on the validation period, and eliminated 99 of them. Meaning that de facto the validation period has been used for selection, i.e. training as well.
I didn’t read the paper. If they are honest they show the results of all their model candidates before pruning, during the training period as well as during the validation period.
An interesting observation is: If model B beats model A during the training period, does it also beat it during the validation period.
I don’t think they publish something like that, and am convinced all their models are useless junk anyway, but that is what I would demand from a model comparison.
From the charts I see they use “ensemble means”. So these are mathematical numpties. Averaging several runs of a simulation of a chaotic system is a sign of mental ineptitude. Of course, it is also the Gold Standard of climate science.
The editor of Nature has gone off his trolley completely.
Bad analogy Steven Mosher,
Suppose you have a model of car braking. Your model predicts that if you slam on the brakes at 72 MPH your stopping distance will be 102 feet in the SM1. It’s been widely publicized and claimed that the SM1 vehicle based on your modeling results will stop in 150 feet from 100 mph.
You go to the test facility; you find that the stopping distance is 155 feet from 74 mph. You examine the model and realize you had used static friction where sliding friction ought to have been. Correcting the model it indeed comes out to 155 feet. Now, where’s the new stopping distance for 100 mph? Is it necessarily accurate?
Now that “Ocean heat uptake” has been corrected what is the new outcome for 2100? Has it changed the uncertainty? Do we know (and can predict) the variations in “ocean heat uptake”? What is the long term destination of this energy? Will it continue transferring towards the abyss where for all practical purposes it would be lost forever without noticable effect? Is this a feedback to warming or some cyclic behavior? Etc. etc. etc.
If you needed any proof that “climate science” is a pseudo science, the 21-st century equivalent of Lysenkoism, than this is it.
Alec Rawls says:
May 14, 2013 at 9:29 am
Well done, you’ve highlighted how the AGW team rolls. This can also be seen from Dana1981 who states: “Guemas et al. (2013) adds to the growing body of evidence that the slowed global surface warming over the past 10–15 years can in large part be explained by an increase in ocean heat storage.” http://www.skepticalscience.com/guemas-attribute-slowed-surface-warming-to-oceans.html
The team is highly skilled in the art of climate cellular division; and starting with an assumed cell no less.
Peter J:
Thanks for giving a link to the “lines of evidence” video we all paid for. I would like to comment on this.
1. I don’t think many people would argue with the basic premise that the globe has been warming over the last century. Indeed, that information probably constitutes the consensus we all hear about, but doesn’t go any further.
2. New data, as in a prolonged pause in warming (to the direct contradiction of your comment) has caused a re-think about the nature of the warming, and this has resulted in many scientists seeing natural variations as the major driver in temperature increases in the last half of the 20th century. Peer reviewed study after study in the last decade have shown that only about half of the warming has been cause by CO2. Land use changes have a role to play, too.
3. The video did not put the current warming into perspective. The rise in temp over the last century MUST be shown with reference to the Little Ice Age, which supposedly ended at the end of the nineteenth century. Plus, there was no mention that rising CO2 levels have historically followed increases in temperature.
4. If the video was meant to be an honest depiction of current science, the canard of CO2 causing extreme weather would have been addressed.
In brief, it seems to me that the video was organized to deliver a message out of context. If it is used to counter skeptical climate positions, it is nothing more than a straw man. We all agree on most of the basics, but the catastrophic stuff is where you have run off the tracks.
By comparing the average of a number of their model runs to a reference temperature curve, they are implying that the Earth’s average temperature behaves like the average of the average global temperatures of several of their modelled virtual Earths.
Hey, hussah! We have one that just fell into a glaciation and two with boiling oceans and seventeen that are in between, average them all and you get… Earth! Nobel price!
‘socio-economic relevance ‘ words tell us its a serious BS altert time
But a quick question, how much actual vaild temperture measurements do we have for the deep ocean , given its vast size?
John
“Now that “Ocean heat uptake” has been corrected what is the new outcome for 2100?
They would have to run the model to 2100. That is a months long job, but clearly it is something you would want to do. Maybe Ar6. Also, this is only ONE MODEL, there are 20+ models that would all have to go through the same process. Its years of work.
“Has it changed the uncertainty?”
What do you mean by “the uncertainity” uncertainity in what? this is one model. What they showed was that they could improve that one model. Now you will have to see if other modelling groups can duplicate what they did.
“Do we know (and can predict) the variations in “ocean heat uptake”? ”
We know that 2+2 = 4, everything else is an informed judgement. The issue here is are they doing something “unscientific’ by fixing a model. The answer is no. This is exactly how you
fix high complexity physics models. Does every improvement make a modell suddenly valid?
no. but I dont think its rational to criticize men who are working to improve their tools. You might
argue thatthese tools will never be good enough. But to be fair these guys are doing nothing different than anybody else who works with complex models.
“What is the long term destination of this energy? Will it continue transferring towards the abyss where for all practical purposes it would be lost forever without noticable effect? Is this a feedback to warming or some cyclic behavior? Etc. etc. etc.”
Those are good questions, but they have little to do with my point. my point is simple. these guys are doing what everybody else in the field does to improve a model. Build a model, make predictions. find your mistakes, change the model, re run, find the problems, fix the model, re run. find the problems, fix the model…
Dirk
‘The problem is that these people might have trained a hundred models, then tested the hundred models on the validation period, and eliminated 99 of them. Meaning that de facto the validation period has been used for selection, i.e. training as well.”
Looks like you have never looked at GCM code or looked at tuning excercises. One issue that isnt what you claim is the use of 100s of models. quite the opposite, when it comes to ocean models there are only a few code bases that 20+ GCMs use for ocean models.
Also the tuning process is different than what you think..
“The ability to predict retrospectively this slowdown not only strengthens our confidence in the robustness of our climate models, but also enhances the socio-economic relevance of operational decadal climate predictions.”
Ha ha ha ha thats sooooo funny, is this an april fools joke? Seriously, retrospective predictions somehow strengthen confidence in the models that didnt forecast it happening? It somehow enhances socio-economic relevence when a model can only get it right AFTER the fact? LMFAO!
The stupid… it burns!!!
DavidL
‘Scientists rework the model, claim their model predicted 50feet all along, and concludes the car is even more dangerous now because it’s “worse than we thought”
Hmm I dont see anyone claiming they predicted this all along.
I see two groups of people looking at ambiguous data drawing conclusions that confirm their biases… Skeptics screeching that the models are falsified and the climerati claiming that they are validated. The truth.. all models are wrong, some are useful. So, define your purpose and you’ll have a better handle on model evaluation that is free from subjective bias confirmation.
I guess I’m missing the part where ocean heat uptake increased.
It hasn’t. It has dropped to a tiny/nearly flat 0.46 W/m2.
Now if 0.5 W/m2 ocean heat uptake / top-of-the-atmosphere net energy imbalance is supposed to cause some large warming, someone better tell Mr. Stefan and Mr. Boltzmann that they got their formula wrong. It will result in next to no warming. Which just happens to be what is happening.
Mystery solved.
So, when skeptics predicted BEFORE it happened, they were wrong. But when alarmists predicted it AFTER it happened, they were right?
Steven Mosher says:
”these guys are doing what everybody else in the field does to improve a model. Build a model, make predictions. find your mistakes, change the model, re run, find the problems, fix the model, re run. find the problems, fix the model…”
Agree that’s what they should be doing, but without communicating to the politicians and public about how sure they are that this or that is going to happen and whoa how bad it’ll be; demonizing anyone who doubts either their “calculated” results or their prophesized consequences. I can remember being absolutely ridiculed for merely suggesting in the late 1990’s that the ocean, being a huge heat sink, might absorb a portion of any excess heat in the system lessening the consequences of an “Enhanced Greenhouse Effect”. And now here it is being touted as the saving grace of the whole scaremongering campaign. Give me a break.
So when they told us over and over again that global warming was “accelerating, irreversible, and catastrophic,” they were actually telling us that global warming would “slow” for a prolonged period of time. Who knew?
So if the ocean is currently absorbing the “missing” energy only to be released at a later time. Shouldn’t this mean, since the physics are the physics, that the warming observed 1980-2000 was from energy absorbed by the oceans from an earlier time? Or is the physics new now, and the oceans just NOW started absorbing energy to be released later, and all the warming 1980-2000 is was from CO2 emissions?
Steven Mosher says:
May 14, 2013 at 12:31 pm
“Looks like you have never looked at GCM code or looked at tuning excercises. One issue that isnt what you claim is the use of 100s of models. quite the opposite, when it comes to ocean models there are only a few code bases that 20+ GCMs use for ocean models.
Also the tuning process is different than what you think..”
First why should I look at the mess; I’ve seen more big Fortran codebases than I wanted to in my life. Second, you know the term parametrization. I don’t care HOW they arrive at the parameter set that gives them the best fit to their training data; I called it training because that is what a variation- and selection process is, whether you do it with a genetic algorithm or with the cerebral activity of a containerload of grant grabbers.
And I know that there are only a few actual codebases; and they all get parametrized.
In other words, a hundred different models are the same codebase each one being parametrized differently.
“Muhammad Asif helped out with this important work.” [RIck at 0610, 5/14/13]
Should do a lot to “make [Muslims] feel good about their … contribution to science… “*. LOL.
*Charles Bolden, head of NASA, has stated that the “foremost” task President Obama gave him is [quoting Obama] “to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with predominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering.” [See: http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2010/07/026682.php%5D
Steven Mosher says:
May 14, 2013 at 8:02 am
…
Suppose you have a model of car braking. You model predicts that if you slam on the brakes
at 72 MPH your stopping distance will be 102 ft. You go to the test, you record the data and when you look at the data you find that the the stopping distance was 105 feet. You examine the actual vehicle speed and find out that the driver hit the brakes at 74 mph. So you re run the model using 74 mph instead of 72. your answer comes out at 105.
….
————
m’kay, I agree with most of your larger points, but I’d like to point out the obvious and say that a simple linear or near linear relationship like that is alot more amenable to the ‘successive approximation’ approach than climate models are.
Speaking for myself, it’s just irritating that they decided to use that language Steven.
*So .. we were completely correct in our predictions because our models were wrong, but this only emphasizes how accurate our errors were as the they relate to the confirmed mistaken projections… what matters though is why our beliefs were invalidated, it gives us reasons to be incorrect in the future in our effort to save the planet.. OR SOMETHING…*
(*) interpretation based in ridicule and delivered with mocking sarcasm..
I have a headache now.. maybe I can trade some carbon credits for eco friendly analgesic.. or something..
Steven Mosher asks:
”What do you mean by “the uncertainity” uncertainity in what?”
Simply that if we don’t know why the ocean heat uptake rate changed or whether the increase is the usual or the unusual or whether it’s episodic or not or any idea how long this rate will last vs. another rate then we have less (not more) confidence in the modeled outcomes for 2100.
As others have already pointed out at this point we don’t know it wasn’t a reduction in ocean heat uptake rate that caused the 20th century warming.
At any rate, even if we assume we’re in an unusually high ocean heat uptake rate we can’t foresee how long it will last or how many of these episodes we’ll see between now and 2100.
The whole idea that we know enough about the climate to make any sort of century scale predictions or projections is ludicrous, has been ludicrous for last 20 years of doom saying, and will remain ludicrous until climate scientist stop looking at everything through CO2 colored glasses. JMHO.
“… the tuning process is different than what you think.” [Mosher at 1231, 5/14/13, addressed to Dirk]
No doubt it is, What is clear, nevertheless, is that the modellers are perpetually re-tuning their machine (a.k.a. “model”) to fight yesterday’s war. An exercise in futility, pointless but for their goal of promoting AGW.
They will NEVER win the battle for TRUTH.
(and, apparently, that is not their goal, either)
I think they are actually getting closer to the truth. Now all they need to do is realize the warming from 1975-2005 was due to oceans releasing heat to the atmosphere. Program that into the models while eliminating most of the CO2 forcing and they will not only be able to predict the past better, but they will now have a chance of predicting the future.
Affirmative action in science.
This really starting happening in the sixties, when we began giving awards to the losers. We started passing students who couldn’t pass, now we are a goner. Dishonesty is in academics is now a fully entrenched post-modern habit, the implication that there’s no such thing as being wrong. Don’t underestimate these folks. So long as scientists tow the progressive line, they will continue to receive affirmative action no matter the quality of the work.
They are going to get funding; you won’t. That’s that Jack.
Now they are unimpeachable since they approve themselves. No matter how far off, they may simply absolve themselves.
“I meant to do that!”
James Hansen is speaking at a public lecture at the LSE in London on Thursday this week. Perhaps he should be asked what new predictions he’ll now make in retrospect.
“These guys are doing what everybody else in the field does to improve a model. Build a model, make predictions. find your mistakes, change the model, re run, find the problems, fix the model, re run. find the problems, fix the model…”
What postulates of a chaotic system allow you to do this?
Here’s my analogy:
We have a diver jump off platform of various heights into a swimming pool. We measure the velocity when the diver strikes the water. Next we go to Acapulco and have the diver jump off various height cliffs and again measure the velocity.
Based on our observations, we come to the conclusion that the speed of a falling object increases with height. The science is settled.
Al Gore makes a documentary called: “The Inconvenient Weight”, warning about how we will all be crushed if we don’t give up fossil fuels, CARBON-ated beverages and snacky treats. Anyone that questions us is branded a denier and accused of receiving funding from Big Blimps.
We build a model and confidently predict (project) the velocity of the diver jumping out of plane at 3,000 feet. But our model is wrong. The diver only achieves a maximum velocity of about 120 MPH. We take the plane up to 5,000 feet and try again. We take the skydiver to South America and try again.
We make adjustments to our data for TOB. Still not right. We lament that the diver is not falling faster. We study fallen meteorites and use them as proxy data to homogenize (remove) the MGP (Medieval Gravity Period – a local gravity event).
We search and search for the “missing gravity”, finally blaming the Moon for stealing the Earth’s gravity. Our model was correct after all. Whew!
Do you think a business plan based on retrospective prediction of stock prices could hold water? I would especially enjoy having a huge government loan guarantee on developing that idea, along with juicy funds collected from environmental NGOs.
Surely never before has science been so corrupted. These people are a disgrace to a noble profession, and should be exposed as charlatans.
Is it my imagination, or does historical “warming” seem to occur when science goes from one level of technical detail to another? I.e. old mercury thermometers read manually to digital read automatically, temps taken from intake valves on ships or buckets thrown overboard to floating Argo bouys. What I’m saying is that I don’t think that changes to oceanic heat uptake have really been demonstrated.
Seems it wasn’t so long ago there was the phrase that “We can’t account for the warming ” unless we include the effects of CO2 in the models. Now that you CAGW people “apparently” have discovered a new natural phenomena not considered previously (ocean energy cycling) maybe it is time to go back and revisit the models and see if the late 20th century warming can INDEED be explained by almost entirely natural processes. While you guys are at it, maybe you can restore the MWP and LIA to the temperature records and quit pretending the Hockey stick represents reality.
On second thought, what was I thinking… please DON”T go back and include ocean cycling in your models… I am sure the result you guys will come up with is “ITS WORSE THAN WE THOUGHT”.
LOL, alcheson (“ITS WORSE THAN WE THOUGHT”), of course! #[:)]
**********************************************************
“… We search and search for the ‘missing gravity’, finally blaming the Moon for stealing the Earth’s gravity. Our model was correct after all. Whew!'” [Reg Nelson, 5/14/13 at 1519]
Great analogy, Reg Nelson. If I may, I’d like to “tune it” just a bit… .
[Given: Before they announce this, the current investors in Holy Cars, curly-fry light bulbs, and the like, sell off their inventory and re-tool their plant to produce pogo sticks.]
“… … finally blaming HUMAN BEINGS for stealing the Earth’s gravity. … .”
From then on, taxpayers will fund pogo st– er, I meant to say, “Anti-gravity Waste” [see, the same acronym can be used, to create confusion, in the midst of which the current AGW modellers can hide the fact that they were wrong about AGW, — to avoid having to answer the embarrassing question: “So, why should we believe you now?”] devices.
Mechanical engineers will get grants for how to make a better pog-, er, AGW device. Physicists will get grants to prove how well the AGW devices are doing at saving the gravity of the planet, etc… etc… .
The serfs won’t be able to do much work after commuting 15 miles (or even 1) on their pogo sticks, so, the engineers will come up with a nifty two-stroke engine-powered model. That will be too noisy, so a 4-stroke will come in (battery power — ARE YOU KIDDING? — oh, yeah, that may be where Bloomberg and his fat police come in, to be sure people are so skinny that the pogo-stick can lift the battery that powers it long enough to get more than one block down the street). THEN, there will be nifty exhaust systems and padded handles and seats and stereos and….
The title of the paper is incorrect. The word they are looking for is “Postdiction.” /yes yes sarc
“So long as scientists tow the progressive line”
“Toe the line” is correct. As any literate person knows, the idiom means “to stand with ones toes on a line”. Several origins have been suggested for the phrase. The most probable seems to be from the Royal Navy in the days when barefoot sailors assembled on deck.
And there is nothing progressive about dishonesty.
Janice Moore says:
“… … finally blaming HUMAN BEINGS for stealing the Earth’s gravity. … .”
____
Our grandchildren will never know what a falling apple or a falling star looks like. And countless species will become extinct as they are flung out into space.
Reg @ 5:45PM. LOL.
Steven Mosher says: May 14, 2013 at 12:36 pm
Hmm. I don’t see anyone claiming they predicted this all along.
Skeptics screeching that the models are falsified and the climerati claiming that they are validated.
I think it is all about how well ‘climerati’ (geez… what does that mean … gotta go with CAGW proponents) understand what is happening,
and the answer to that would clearly appear to be “Not nearly as well as they said they did!”
And… “Skeptics screeching” ….. “climerati claiming” … (hmmm, a nasty bias on Mosher’s part? …. or just showing a hitherto invisible poetic streak? )
Reg Nelson says:
May 14, 2013 at 5:45 pm
…Stealing gravity …
“… And countless species will become extinct as they are flung out into space…”
It’s worse than we thought!
Do you realize with about 100,000,000 species on earth, if only 0.01% of these are flung into space each year that will be 10,000 species lost per year!
http://wwf.panda.org/about_our_earth/biodiversity/biodiversity/
It’s simple. They copied us in advance.
@Steven Mosher: They guess that the heat is in the oceans and call it a day. Your car stopping analogy is over sophomoric.
Could it be that the brake pads faded more than expected? Or brakes were incorrectly sized? Perhaps they incorrectly factored in for wind friction at higher speeds? Or maybe the tire temperatures did not provide the grip they had expected? Or perhaps they were trying to stop on tarmac which had a different texture than their model?
Climate science is more complex than stopping a car, and they are just guessing by plugging in some other “fudge factor” to prove they must have been correct because now climate can now be predicted based on everything they already knew plus the one missing variable.
I sure hope that somewhere , the original recorded data is being safely stored for the future when these ‘scientific’ charlatans can be brought to account and the temperature record of the Earth can be returned to a ‘common set of numbers’.
Here we show successful retrospective predictions of this warming slowdown up to 5 years ahead…
“retrospective predictions”!!!
I guess what these bozos mean is that hindsight is 20/20.
And they expect us to take climate psience seriously!
Mosher
Those are good questions, but they have little to do with my point. my point is simple. these guys are doing what everybody else in the field does to improve a model. Build a model, make predictions. find your mistakes, change the model, re run, find the problems, fix the model, re run. find the problems, fix the model…
You didn’t get the point Mosher. This is not what everybody does. And actually it is what everybody tries to avoid because we learned about epicycles and luminiferous ether hundreds of years ago.
You probably never did theoretical physics what can be translated as “building models”.
When you build epicycles and the model fails, you will try to improve it aka add new hypothesis and/or free parameters.
But, and this is the real point, the physicists learned that this process may be done ONLY a few times but not over and over as you suggested.
Indeed if you have to do it too often, it is a sure sign that what you are doing are actually epicycles.
And then what a real scientist does is to ABANDON the model because he realizes that the probability that it is incorrect is simply too high.
What did these guys do? They realized that the models they have been developping for the last 30 years and that devoured billions have completely missed the internal oceanic heat transfer. Even you have to agree that this is a major paradigmatic failure – not just some minor parameter adjustment. If you get the oceanic heat transfer wrong, what can you get right ?
Yet up to 2006 or so, the word was that the models projections (aka ensemble averages) were “robust”. How could it have been “robust” if the major process, of oceanic heat transfer, was not ?
The prevailing paradigm still today (and this paper is no exception) is that “climate is not weather”, e.g the former is deterministic even if the latter is chaotic.
The competing paradigm (see f.ex Tsonis et al) is that “climate is weather”, e.g chaotic.
Already 10 years ago there was an interesting thread by Gerald Browning on Climate Audit about “exponential divergence” which argued that the climate models dramatically failed and had to fail when confronted with the chaotic behaviour of the fluid dynamics.
Now the writing is on the wall – the body of evidence is growing that the climate is chaotic and the materialisation of the chaotic behaviour which are the oceanic oscillations at all time scales is what governs the climate.
But if that is true and it is my conviction, then it is really about time to throw the models out.
for if the climate (via oceanic oscillations) is chaotic then it is NOT predictable. The only hope of climate science would be then to try to find the probability distribution of future states if it is invariant what is far from certain. A whole new physics (non linear dynamics applied to climate) would have to be developped for that and if it doesn’t happen soon, we will just discover over and over new “unexpected events” which will have to be “retropredicted” in order to fix the epicycles which will go on failing again a bit later.
This doesn’t look like science to me like to the majority of posters here.
Re. Bob says:
May 14, 2013 at 11:27 am
Re. your point 2.
I think many are looking at this incorrectly. The deep ocean has shown large scale continued warming during the pause.
The paper from Levitus shows the scale of eh warming since 1955 at 24.0 +/- 1.9 x 10^22
With a negative PDO sinking heat, plus increased evaporative cooling and MOC state… these are a reasonably clear indicator as to why there is a pause in the surface warming.
I think many people are looking in the wrong direction.
Natural variation is clearly important, but that does not change the steady increase in heat energy accumulation.
Re. your point 3.
Very good point. I would like to see how the NAS explains the little ice age as well as the fact that CO2 in the paleo record increases after warming occurs.
Re. your point 4.
Again an excellent point. Why don’t they address this? If they are going to make videos about climate, they should get into more detail.
I’m not sure it qualifies as a straw man, but I agree that they (NAS) are not addressing skeptical concerns.
I noticed they also have a booklet that came out with the movie. I will have to read more in the booklet to see if they address any of these issues.
http://nas-sites.org/americasclimatechoices/new-resources-about-climate-change/
Steven Mosher says:
May 14, 2013 at 12:28 pm
But to be fair these guys are doing nothing different than anybody else who works with complex models.
=================
Every computer model has two inputs. The data and the model builders. When model builders ignore the fact that they are one of the inputs, they fall victim to the one of the most basic of model building fallacies.
The problem with computer models is that they are much better at predicting what the model builders expect to see than they are at predicting the future. This ability of models is what makes them so seductive to model builders. The model builders develop great faith in their models because the models are so powerful at showing the model builders exactly what they expect to see. Models are the ultimate “yes men” – they tell you exactly what you want to hear.
Thus, one of the most basic steps in building a model is to independently test it using data that is hidden from both the model builders and the model. If the model can predict the missing data, then it may have predictive power, or it may have gotten the right answer by chance. However, if it cannot predict the missing data, then it has no skill. At no time is it valid to test the model using data that is known to the model builders, because of the very strong ability of the models to correctly predict what the model builders expect.
What the divergence over the last 15 years has shown is that the models have no skill at predicting hidden data when that data is also unknown to the model builders. To look at data after the fact, when it is known to the modellers is no test. It is worse than no test. It is a false and misleading test. The model builders are simply fooling themselves.
***
Steven Mosher says:
May 14, 2013 at 8:02 am
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False analogy. If what you say were correct, the earth’s avg surface temp would be close to the avg temp of the ocean volume — 5C or so.
Fail.
I see Julia is still in the news – at the Met office’s latest newsletter.
In climatology, “predict” is a polysemic term, that is, a term with more than one meaning. When an argument employs one or more polysemic terms, as is the case here, its conclusions are logically improper.
TomVonk says:
May 15, 2013 at 2:40 am
Now the writing is on the wall – the body of evidence is growing that the climate is chaotic and the materialisation of the chaotic behaviour which are the oceanic oscillations at all time scales is what governs the climate.
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The underlying assumption in ensemble climate models is that the Climate, specifically global temperature, is subject to the Law of Large Numbers. However, this a fallacy that has never been demonstrated to be true.
For the Law of Large Numbers to apply to global temperature, there must exists a global “mean” temperature around which temperatures will converge. However, it is clear that there is no global mean temperature. Temperatures have generally been falling for the past 8000 years with brief periods of warming every 1000-2000 years. Prior to that temperatures were much lower for tens of thousands of years.
Expecting an ensemble of models to converge on an answer that does not exists is mathematical nonsense. Add to this, the Law of Large Numbers also expects a constant variance. However, when one looks at temperature records it is clear that there is no constant variance. As the scale increases, so does the variance, which strongly argues that climate is a fractal distribution. The larger the time slice, the greater the swings in temperature one sees.
It is well known that fractal distributions do not converge. You cannot average them and expect the Law of Large Numbers to hold. Yet climate modellers continue to build fantasy upon fantasy, having neglected to apply the most basic of statistical tests to their data to determine beforehand if it is suitable for modelling.
Despite a sustained production of anthropogenic greenhouse gases, the Earth’s mean near-surface temperature paused its rise during the 2000–2010 period
And S= UT + 1/10 A T squared After all it give the right answer after a pause.
If Harris is serious about CO2 saving the planet from freezing solid, he must be desperate to maintain and increase it.
@ferdberple says:
May 15, 2013 at 5:42 am
Your posts are terrific. Take this as a “like”
The article is an admission that temperature is not a good proxy for energy balance in the Earth Sun system. Need more proof? Read the article again. What else does it mean? Temperature is a political proxy for climate balance. Need more proof? Read the article again. What else it means is the pro-big green movement is willing to say and invoke anything real or imagined to push their agenda. Need more proof?