Climate History: Cato Boffins Discovered “Anti-information”
By Patrick J. Michaels and Paul C. “Chip” Knappenberger
While doing some historical studies in preparation for an article in Cato’s Regulation magazine, we found that we once discovered the information equivalent of antimatter, namely, “anti-information”.
This breakthrough came when we were reviewing the first “National Assessment” of climate change impacts in the United States in the 21st century, published by the U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) in 2000. The Assessments are mandated by the Global Change Research Act of 1990. According to that law, they are, among other things, for “the Environmental Protection Agency for use in the formulation of a coordinated national policy on global climate change…”
One cannot project future climate without some type of model for what it will be. In this case, the USGCRP examined a suite of nine climate models and selected two for the Assessment. One was the Canadian Climate Model, which forecast the most extreme warming for the 21st century of all models, and the other was from the Hadley Center at the U.K Met Office, which predicted the greatest changes in precipitation.
We thought this odd and were told by the USGCRP that they wanted to examine the plausible limits of climate change. Fair enough, we said, but we also noted that there was no test of whether the models could simulate even of the most rudimentary climate behavior in past (20th) century.
So, we tested them on ten-year running means of annual temperature over the lower 48 states.
One standard method used to determine the utility of a model is to compare the “residuals”, or the differences between what is predicted and what is observed, to the original data. Specifically, if the variability of the residuals is less than that of the raw data, then the model has explained a portion of the behavior of the raw data and the model can continue to be tested and entertained.
A model can’t do worse than explaining nothing, right?
Not these models! The differences between their predictions and the observed temperatures were significantly greater (by a factor of two) than what one would get just applying random numbers.
Ponder this: Suppose there is a multiple choice test, asking for the correct temperature forecast for 100 temperature observations, and there were four choices. Using random numbers, you would average one-in-four correct, or 25%. But the models in the National Assessment somehow could only get 12.5%!
“No information”—a random number simulation—yields 25% correct in this example, which means that anything less is anti-information. It seems impossible, but it happened.
We informed the USGCRP of this problem when we discovered it, and they wrote back that we were right, and then they went on to publish their Assessment, undisturbed that they were basing it models that had just done the impossible.
Weather forecasts for tomorrow are fairly accurate, for the day after that less so and for the third day; you’re looking at a little better than evens. Does that behaviour sound familiar? A whole branch of Mathematics, called rather fittingly Chaos Theory, grew out of that sort of ‘spiralling unpredictably out of control’ behaviour exhibited by one of the first attempts to simulate the weather on a computer.
http://thepointman.wordpress.com/2011/01/21/the-seductiveness-of-models/
Pointman
This is funny.
Models that predict two times worse that plotting random numbers?
It’s like a nonsense that is twice more gibberish than an utter gobbledygook.
Or an idiocy that is twice more stupid than being brain-dead.
Anti models actually sound useful – you could use anti-models to eliminate ranges of values from the probable path of future climate. Who knows, after AR5, by inverting the model projections, eliminating values which the models predict, we might actually have a prediction landscape which yields useful insights into future climate.
😉
” …… model can continue to be tested and entertained.”
Do models eat popcorn while being entertained?
(Sorry, couldn’t resist.)
Yeah, its just like climate sensitivity less than 1.5degrees C being ‘ruled out’ in IPCC AR4. Yet that is what the temperatures are doing.
Most times a climate alarmist says something is ‘very unlikely’, ruled out, ‘can’t happen’, ‘is not in the consensus’, one can take it for granted that it is more likely to be true and correct, because anything that is true but against alarmism is specifically targeted by an army of researchers to try and be countered by ‘pal review’.
No, weather forecasts are NOT accurate today, a little less tomorrow and so on.
After having lived in the High Rockies for three years I have found that the typical weather forecast for today is 5-10 degrees off of low and high. It may have predicted snow for today and none, or with a prediction of no snow we get eight inches.
The 15 day forecast is so horrendous that I emailed the weather channel help and comment desk where I was informed that it is their “best guess” for those days. Rhe 15 day forecast is accurate ZERO percent of the time and I said so while asking why do you even bother with the 15 day. No response.
So, I cant get an accurate prediction now for later today….EVER, and people mean to tell me to within hundredths of a degree the temperature 100 years from now?
This is so beyond absurd I havent any expression for it.
gaelan, weather forecasts in most areas are getting very accurate. Obviously there are some locations that either are too chaotic for the models to work with, or the sensors feeding the data into them are not properly situated or calibrated.
Just a few years ago, weather forecasting was primarily a manual task. A meteorologist examined the “current” weather conditions and, based on training and experience, decided what the likely future weather would be.
There was a situation in Calgary (similar location relative to the Rockies to Denver) a few years back where the Environment Canada forecaster, NOT a Calgarian, had an almost perfect record for forecasting… for over a year the vast majority of his forecasts were just about as wrong as could be. In the last few years, especially since they’ve installed Doppler (Canada took its time getting this tech deployed), the forecasts for one, two, even three days are quite accurate, and even the 10 days are closer than they ever used to be.
However, no matter how good a meteorological model is, it is still dependent upon the input (current conditions, usually from automated sensors), and the fundamental assumptions (such as typical airflow through the region, what kind of real temperatures are likely to occur from an incoming pressure system, etc.) As these assumptions are tuned the models improve.
Obviously, “climate models”, developed by people who think they’re several rungs up the evolutionary ladder from mere “weathermen”, don’t care about anything other than unproven assumptions, like GHGs and other trivial phenomena. This is why they’re wrong, and always will be until the basic assumptions are moved closer to reality. Personally I don’t foresee that happening any time soon.
Whether weather forecasts are accurate only for 10 minutes out or 10 hours or 10 days, we’re still talking an incredibly brief amount of time relative to years, decades, and centuries… which is why I 100% agree with this:
(the only expression I can think of is ‘hubris’)
These guys cheat more than my golf buddies.It was never about the climate . It was never about the environment. It was never about conservation or pollution. It’s about the destruction of capitalism and control over the human race. Unlike my golf buddies these people are evil.
[Anti-information] in science smells as sweetly as falsification!
Are we done, is the hypothesis falsified, is not all else to follow mere ADHOCKERY shoring up a failed argument?
Darn the typo; it should be Anti-information. But like a cat’s hairball, they’ll retch warmism up again and again until it is swallowed by the gullable.
If they show persistent anti-skill, they are the first climate models that are useful (We know that what they predict will NOT happen.)
This all sounds like a Terry Pratchett novel (see Pyramids and the predictive robot in there) or Larry Niven (Ringworld; the girl with the genetic predisposition to be lucky.)
gaelan clark says:
May 23, 2013 at 3:52 am
————————————————
In Florida they are always correct but not very accurate.
Here we understand it’ll be warm and muggy and ‘it might rain’.
We get pop-up thunderstorms and lots of lightning.
It’s not easy living with a governor of a regional climate system.
h/t to w.
cn
btw …. Do climate governors include such things as arctic winds and heavy rain cycles or are they considered something else?
gaelan clark says:
May 23, 2013 at 3:52 am
“No, weather forecasts are NOT accurate today, a little less tomorrow and so on.”
That would depend on where you are forecasting. For instance, on the SW Gulf coast of Florida you can forecast that from now through Sep day time highs will be around 92 with a 30% chance of thunderstorms. Any fronts or disturbances that come our way are easy to see making it easy to predict what changes they will bring. Life is so much easier in warm weather.
This is one of the funniest posts I’ve seen in a long time. It reminds me of “the Andy letter”.
http://www.cartalk.com/content/andy-scale-0
The sad thing is, people are trying to set public policy on this comedy, which is not funny at all.
-BillR
It strikes me that if a model consistently does worse than randomness, then it is predicting against the hypothesis. For example it is showing CO2 warming when CO2 actually causes cooling. This means these model show what will more likely not happen than happen.
Doug Huffman says:
May 23, 2013 at 4:26 am
[Anti-information] in science smells as sweetly as falsification!
Are we done, is the hypothesis falsified, is not all else to follow mere ADHOCKERY shoring up a failed argument?
———————————
Nice term. Would that be a verb?
Ad Hockery: An argument which attempts to shore up a failed argument.
or
Would that be Post Hockery since it’s to sustain a falsified argument?
cn
Yes, but remember that we are regularly told that their predictions get better the further out in time they are applied!
gaelan clark says:May 23, 2013 at 3:52 am
I agree with your synopsis of the precision of weather prediction. I live in the Rockies and have heard that meteorologists train in Colorado because weather systems are formed and redirected by the mountains, making it one of the most difficult areas to forecast. There is a saying here, “if you don’t like the weather, wait ten minutes…”
Even though these models apparently are pretty good at predicting what will not happen, the EPA is going to set policy based on these models as if they predict what will happen. Is this Alice in Wonderland now?
It’s obvious why the prediction was so far off, they intentionally DESIGNED the data to make a point, it was just the wrong point. I can’t figure out if if the climate scientists are really stupid enough not to understand that predicting something means one day it can be proven false, or if they are just overcome with religious zeal and believe all the crap they print.
This may be related to the Gore Effect – an anti-dis-information phenomenon.
Mike jarosz says:
May 23, 2013 at 4:11 am
These guys cheat more than my golf buddies.It was never about the climate . It was never about the environment. It was never about conservation or pollution. It’s about the destruction of capitalism and control over the human race. Unlike my golf buddies these people are evil.
——————————————–
True but if you remind your buddy he took a drop on the 3rd hole and actually got a 6 he will correct his score.
A warmists golfer will declare, after the fact, there was an ant hill down by the lake where his ball was and he was allowed a free drop. He says he got a 5 on the 3rd hole so his score will stand. If you ask him to show you where he dropped he says go find it yourself.
I’m sure I wouldn’t want to play golf with an alarmist.
cn
Maybe they would have been more accurate using log(2) / log(√2) = 2 expressed as a Brownian motion fractal 🙂
William C Rostron says:
May 23, 2013 at 4:55 am
It reminds me of “the Andy letter”.
http://www.cartalk.com/content/andy-scale-0
================
Well worth the read. Answers the age old question: Do two people that know nothing about a subject know even less than one person that knows nothing about a subject?
In this case we have two climate models that know nothing about the future. The question is: Do they know even less about the future than one model, a random number generator, that knows nothing about the future? Apparently they only know 1/2 as much about the future as a model that knows nothing.
This points to real progress in climate forecasting. Climate Science has finally found a way to predict what will not happen in the future. Thus, we can apply the Sherlock Holmes method to climate forecasting. With enough climate models predicting what will not happen in the future, whatever they are not predicting, no matter how unbelievable, must be the truth.
@gaelan clark: Not to worry. In ten or twenty years you’ll have learned that every drainage in a mountain range has its own weather and you’ll be able to formulate your own 24-hour forecast to a reasonable degree of accuracy. Or, just wait five minutes and it’ll change anyway.
starzmom says:
May 23, 2013 at 5:35 am
Even though these models apparently are pretty good at predicting what will not happen, the EPA is going to set policy based on these models as if they predict what will happen. Is this Alice in Wonderland now?
———————————-
No. Try 1984.
cn
Indeed a breakthrough. Now, we are breathlessly awaiting the discovery of “dark information.”
Since USGCRP has done it, it is prima facie not impossible, by whatever means. However, it is certainly implausible. Ain’t political science wonderful!
hmmm. Does this mean we need a new definition of what GIGO is? FIFO? Fraud In Fraud out?
I think we have to be careful beore we condemn short term weather forecasts. Every day there are some 300,000 scheduled commercial aircraft flights. Each light must file a Flight Plan, including a weather forecast. There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that the weather forecasts used by commercial airlines lead to any problems whatsoever.
thingodonta, you write “Yeah, its just like climate sensitivity less than 1.5degrees C being ‘ruled out’ in IPCC AR4. Yet that is what the temperatures are doing.”
I may have dificulty trying to explain my thoughts on this issue. I have been having an ongoing discussion with Steven Mosher over at Climate Etc on this sort of issue. My point is that, since climate sensitivity cannot be measured, using my definition of what measured means, we simply dont know what the value of climate sensitivity is. Steven seems to argue that getting numeric values from climate models gives us more information. It seems to me that theses guesses that “scientists” get for the value of climate sensitivity by using models is worse than useless. If models are behaving worse than using random numbers, then values of climate sensitivity derived from models are useless, and it is better to recognise that they are useless, rather than pretending that they are giving us useful information.
The meteorologist Phil Preflester says “Panic is not advised although it is recommended.”
http://spongebob.wikia.com/wiki/Pineapple_Fever_(transcript)
This is another example of why Patrick Michaels is one of the most important of the analysts and thinkers among sceptics.
bobl says:
May 23, 2013 at 4:56 am
“It strikes me that if a model consistently does worse than randomness, then it is predicting against the hypothesis. For example it is showing CO2 warming when CO2 actually causes cooling. This means these model show what will more likely not happen than happen.”
Here is how I think it works. CO2 that is emmited by tropical oceans is rapidly transported by thunderclouds to the upper atmosphere. These CO2 molecules collide with air and water molecules in those clouds. It follows that the CO2 molecules will radiate at the temperatures at TOA or the tops of clouds. Clouds should capture the IR toward the surface while there is an open window to space. This would mean that CO2 “sensitivity” used in models should be negative.
In essence, it is not a “bunch of monkeys” developing these models. it is a bunch of Developmentally challenged monkeys running them!
How about setting an upper bound on climate sensitivity by comparing the best possible reconstruction of “adjusted” average global temperature (assuming that’s possible) for the period 1850-80 with the period 1980-2010 and attributing all the “observed” warming to CO2 increase from 285 to 395 ppm (or whatever), then extrapolating at an appropriate curve to a doubling to 570 ppm later in this century or early in the next?
I haven’t done this, but IMO conducting such an operation would yield equilibrium CS under two degrees C for the first doubling. When adjusting for natural variability, I’d guess around one degree, ie about equal to the direct solar radiation effect, with positive & negative feedbacks cancelling each other out.
Actual data (even if adjusted) trump models in real science.
It’s tempting just to treat this as a punchline, but maybe there’s something really here.
Seriously. If it did worse than random, the model really does have utility. It implies that it is dealing with some of the correct variables and relationships and that some essential assumption in the theory is consistently wrong.
The “suprise” in this is that they even wrote back to tell you that you were right.
Mark Bofill says:
May 23, 2013 at 7:33 am
It’s tempting just to treat this as a punchline, but maybe there’s something really here.
Seriously. If it did worse than random, the model really does have utility. It implies that it is dealing with some of the correct variables and relationships and that some essential assumption in the theory is consistently wrong.
————-
Nah, I didn’t think that through. A model saying ‘temp = -170C’ would be consistently wrong, no utility there.
Oh well, just a punch line then.
Re-write: “We thought this odd and were told by the USGCRP that they wanted to ex[ploit] the [most im]plausible limits of climate change.” That becomes an assessment on the basis of the most extreme projections (are models anything but?) of temperature and precipitation. Fair enough? Not even close.
Need any more proof that this is not about science but generating fear so that people accept policies designed to destroy capitalism and freedom?
If I recall correctly, this was the assessment report which embarrassingly selected two models which were often directly opposite when it came to the change in soil moisture content we’d see from changes in temperature and precipitation.
I think it has been long established that people leaning to (what is conventionally called) the left of the political spectrum seem to think of themselves as intellectuals, and disparage the more practically minded as intrinsically stupid. Of course real evidence and the grand experiment of the 20th century shows that socialist/communist economic systems inevitably lead to decline (and often war) and yet latter day socialists still think that theory trumps evidence and all that is needed is the correct application of the theory. It takes a special kind of stupid to fly in the face of overwhelming evidence and still think of oneself as an intellectual and yet here they are making policy based on predictions that are always more wrong than right. The observation has been been attributed to Einstein that the height of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
I remember being told an anecdote (maybe an urban myth) about a wager between some engineering students and some meteorology students at MIT (or similar prestige institution). Since I am an engineer, I declare my own bias upfront. The wager was who can more consistently predict tomorrow’s weather (i.e. a one day forcast) over a several month period. The engineers simply predicted todays weather would continue much the same tomorrow, and so on each day, whereas the meterology students tried to predict with all the computational tools at their disposal, and no one here will have trouble believing that the meteorology students lost. Maybe the lesson there (if true) is that basic regression (on good data) is better than theoretical predictions on phenomena that is not fully understood.
There is also the phenomenon described by the late Paul Smith (on his website “Safespeed”) that he called regression to the mean. Often statistical outliers, or concentrations of events, (like accident “hotspots” on the road or perceived concentrations of BSE/CJD outbreaks during the mad cow hysteria) simply go back to average with no outside intervention. However politicians and administrators put up a series of measures (like lower speed limits or gun control measures etc) and then congratulate themselves on the success of their actions which have no effect on what is simple statistical variability.
The statisticians among us, I am sure, will know well that to be more wrong than random has to contain some information. Negative information is information none the less so something that is consistently more wrong than random, and fails to regress to the mean , which is random, then there must be some phenomenon that has the opposite effect than that being touted in the hysteria. Maybe there is some value in the models?
It is too kind to just point out that they are using bad models. From an accounting point of view, an answer LESS THAN the random expectation is DECEPTION, as it clearly is designed to go away from the real data, not toward it.
One recalls how Steve McIntyre and Ross McKitrick demonstrated that random numbers correlated better to actual temps than Mann’s proxies.
Models are a priori constructs, not evidence of anything. They are nothing but a distraction from gennuine science.
Mike jarosz says:
May 23, 2013 at 4:11 am
These guys cheat more than my golf buddies.It was never about the climate . It was never about the environment. It was never about conservation or pollution. It’s about the destruction of capitalism and control over the human race. Unlike my golf buddies these people are evil.
___________________
It’s all too often about getting a big paycheck.
Worse than pure chance? That’s actually valuable information. Means one has a better chance to win by betting against the model’s projections.
Re: Chuck Nolan at 5:16AM, 5/23/13 (re: Doug Huffman at 4:26AM)
” [Anti-information] in science smells as sweetly as falsification! … mere ADHOCKERY shoring up a failed argument?” [Huffman]
———————————
“Nice term. … Ad Hockery: … or would that be Post Hockery … ?” [Nolan]
LOL, you clever gents, that rose would be called “hockeystickery,” a.k.a.,
a lie.
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
A Little Fable About a Little Mann
(about how “anti-information” (i.e., a lie) is worse than, no answer at all)
Speeding along the highway, you come to a fork in the road. “Right? or Left?” you wonder. A leprechaun named Lucky suddenly appears, standing before you in the Y. “Which way to Belfast?” you ask. “We’re in a hurry!”
“That weh, me fine gentlemen,” says Lucky, confidently jerking his thumb toward his right. Off you go, booking along at top speed, down the broad, well-paved, left fork. Being leprechaun country, there are no warning signs, such as, “Road Ends in 500 feet,” as would have been apropos, here, aaaaand……………. off you go……down………. down…….. dooooooooowwwwwwwwwwn.
If Lucky had shrugged, “I don’t know,” at least, being the reasonably prudent driver that you are, you would have proceeded with caution — even moreso if Lucky had been able (and willing) to at least tell you that one of the roads leads to a cliff.
Lesson: Never trust a leprechaun. (or any “green” person — bwah, ha, ha, ha, ha, haaaaaaaaaa!) and, also, as a rule, going Left is generally NOT a wise choice.
re: several bloggers above shrewdly observing that one could bet against the model and win:
JUST A LITTLE FUN
The ol’ headhunter-liar logic illustration 8[:o|]:
Running from your enemy, down a jungle path, you come to a fork in the way. You know that one path leads to the lying (they always lie) headhunters’ village — it’s called “Ip’c’c,” not that it really matters — and the other to the safe village (they always tell the truth) — it’s called Wattsville. You can’t remember which way to go! Ah, but there’s a find local native standing at the Y. You can ask her! You don’t know which village she is from, however… . Hm. What do you ask her? (you only have time to ask one quick question)
Answer below the lines of ###### below (so you can avert your eyes if you like):
################################################################################################################################################################################################################################################################
Answer: Which is the way to your village? [:)]
Whoa! Sorry about the loooong line of ###’s!!!
I didn’t realize I needed to do a line break — the comment box is constantly auto-inserting line breaks, so, I thought it would then, too! I just leaned on the “#” key for awhile and called it good.
Oops! (and, yes, I just changed that 1 to a ! … why-I-don’t-know — hubris, not doubt… (good call, Codetech, re: your above ON topic remark).
Do noT doubt me. Bwah, ha, ha, ha, ha, haaaaaa!
Thanks Janice… at least someone seems to actually see my comments… lol
All models are inaccurate. Some models are useful. A good scientist can tell the difference.
Holy CO2 Heaters, Watts-Man!!!
It IS worse than we thought! This is beyond Chaos.
It’s…..It’s (shuddering with the horror) Anti-Information!!!
At first I laughed, as I read the post. Could they :really be that inept? Apparently. That’s what spawned the paraphrase from the old ‘Batman’ show. However, the more I reflected on it, the more disgusted I became with this blatant fraud. Our hard earned money is paying for this ‘research’ fraud and the output of the fraudulent models is being used by the EPA to perpetrate a nationwide fraud of epic proportions.
Obamas ‘new’ Energy Secretary wasted no time, making it clear to all of his employees that there was no room for dissent on AGW. http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/05/22/Obama-s-Energy-Secretary-Says-Climate-Change-Not-Debatable
I despair for my once great country.
One fudged climate model is worth a thousand peer-reviewed weasel words… and Trillion$ in EPA fraud!
MtK
Chuck Nolan says:
May 23, 2013 at 5:42 am
Mike jarosz says:
May 23, 2013 at 4:11 am
—————————————-
Assuming that the drop is taken from the anthill behind the Tigeresque ‘moveable obstruction’ giant rock where there was no shot to be had … a ‘climate clown’ golfer would take his next shot from the middle of the fairway and claim that save for the anthill and the rock, this is where his ball would lie … akin to hindcasting forecasts, if you get the drift 😉
“…
The differences between their predictions and the observed temperatures were significantly greater (by a factor of two) than what one would get just applying random numbers.
…”
So instead of GIGO it’s GI=2GO then?
I’ve heard that saying every where I’ve lived.
According to that law, they are, among other things, for “the Environmental Protection Agency for use in the formulation of a coordinated national policy on global climate change…”
So the models wont accurately predict what will happen in 100 years but to balance that, policy set today wont have any impact on society in 100 years either. I guess it all works out in the end.
So just what were the random numbers? What distribution?
Can one laugh while sobbing in sorrow? Seems so…
“It takes real skill to be that incompetent…”