A note from Richard Lindzen on statistically significant warming

Spectator Sport / Betting
With all them True Believers seemingly believing in their consensus-backed, scíence-is-settled, super computer-modelled catastrophic climate scenarios, I was surely thinking I could make a fortune taking them to the climate cleaners. So imagine my utter disappointemt when I found out they weren’t willing to bet on anything more than non-catastrophic, very mild climate changes.
In fact, many would be afraid to even bet on a positive SLR, let alone 50 cm. Talk about confidence and certainty.
Hmm…could be an amusing Powerpoint slide (like Gore’s Oreskes slide):
Scientists saying sea levels to rise 40+ cm next 100 yrs: 14,358
Number ready to bet on SLR of 40+ cm next 100 yrs: 0

Lee says “Actually, it is NOT “technically” correct that there is no statistical warming. I don’t know where Lindzen pulls this analysis from, but it is simply wrong. A regression line fit to that data has a positive slope with statistical significance at better than .99 level.”
Lee, from what years are you using for your trend line? Lindzen is saying that it is statistically flat from 1997 to present, but the graph starts BEFORE that. Just eyeballing the graph, it looks like from just those years the trendline would be flat or pretty close.

Anthony,
A resource page is a great idea. The tricky thing about finding a good stats resource is that the sorts of climate science issues that are popular on blog discussions involve a mix of basic and more advanced concepts. A good resource would pick out some of the necessary concepts and – here’s the important part, in my mind – take a couple of paragraphs to apply them to a climate example or two.
For instance, up-post a bit people were discussing error bar sizes. If you read a stats book, you’ll encounter this concept pretty quickly under “the sampling distribution of the mean,” or similar terms. For stats novices, I’ll bet that the significance of sample size to this distribution will pass unnoticed, without a specific pointer to where it applies to climate.
Anthony, here’s an idea fwiw: what about a wiki-like resource, that various people could write and edit, tailored to introduce stats concepts, as applied to climate science? That way various knowledgeable people could contribute bit by bit when they have time. Of course, you’d have to administer it, and I’m sure you have enough to do… ; ) Does this make sense to anybody else?

For those of you who haven’t done real measurements it’s not ok to just assume confidence intervals or assume a Gaussian shape just because you did a certain amount of measurements. In the real world outside of climate science, you actually have to demonstrate that the amount of data collected was sufficient to give a Gaussian distribution – typically by plotting the data. Only after demonstrating a Gaussian have you demonstrated that the data collected was sufficient to allow you to eliminate skews and bias and hence assign confidence intervals. If no Gaussian is obtained then there is really no such thing as a confidence interval. Of course I’d dearly like to see those Gaussian plots of global temperature anomaly but they apparently don’t exist which means that any error bars you see in temperature plots are bogus. Now that IS stats 101 and I see everyone failing it.

The data is from the USHCN. I believe it’s from http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ushcn/ . It’s their mean max monthly (filnet) product, although other temperature data will look very similar.
REPLY: Thanks so much!

How to construct a world-wide panic
The essential elements of an effective global panic consist of two parts:
First, one needs to identify a potential source of a world-wide catastrophe. Second, one needs to convince everyone that that actions of man are about to trigger that catastrophe. This is best illustrated by this following theoretical example:
It is well known that a “Super Volcano” lies under Yellowstone park. This volcano went undetected for many years, because its sheer size is so large it escaped notice when looking for something more familiar in size.
The consequences of another eruption of this monster can be fairly well predicted. First, it will simply blow away a fair-sized piece of Montana, and falling ash will bury cities for many miles beyond. The atmospheric ejecta will blanket a large portion of the earth, blocking out the sun and producing a “nuclear winter” for a significant portion of mankind. Crop failures and other effects of rapid cooling will lead to the death of untold billions of both human and animal inhabitants.
In fact, there are some significant geothermal and other indicators in Yellowstone that suggest this monster is again on the move. This has sparked at least one major television presentation discussing the potential for another eruption and the obvious catastrophe that would follow if it does. But this information in itself has not created much in the way of panic. Most citizens are resigned to the fact that mega-disasters, should they occur, can not be prevented by human action because they are part of the natural behavior of the planet and worrying excessively can not change anything. Don’t worry, be happy, we’re all in this together.
To turn the Yellowstone Super Volcano into a world-wide panic, we need a convincing piece of junk science as a trigger. Taking our cue from the “man-made CO2 is causing global warming” hoax, here’s one distinct possibility as far as Yellowstone is concerned:
Professor Wilfred Brimstone at the University of Mongolia has developed a model which clearly shows the buildup of human population on both the east and west coast of the United States is putting excessive pressure on both sides of the North American plate. The accumulation of vast amounts of additional weight in the form of people, buildings, automobiles, and other man-made items is creating such an excess of plate pressure at the edges, that magma is being forced laterally toward the center of the country, and in particular towards a weak crust zone in Montana centered at Yellowstone park. In the same manner as popping a pimple by squeezing from two opposing sides, the “coastal weight effect” is squeezing the magma beneath the crust and causing a rapid pressure buildup of the Yellowstone Super Volcano. Man’s greed to live near the ocean has tipped the balance of nature, and it is now only a matter of time until Yellowstone blows its top.
….. unless we take quick action to arrest and reverse this process.
It is critically important to immediately evacuate everyone from both coasts, and dismantle all heavy structures and begin transporting them to the center of the country, redistributing them evenly over a wide area until the overall plate pressure has been suitably equalized and the danger has passed. Senator Barbara Boxer has introduced a bill which will impose a stiff tax on any item weighing more than six ounces in order to pay for the weight relocation. A new $100 million Center for Building Weight Studies is currently under construction in Santa Barbara.
If you do not want to be dislocated from your present home, former Vice President Al Gore has just formed a new company, Relocation Unlimited, in which you can invest in “weight offsets” and not have to move. For a price, Mr. Gore will arrange have an equivalent weight of ordinary dirt dug up and relocated instead of your own 3 bedroom ranch.
It is also of immediate importance that we educate our children in the nature of this pending disaster that their parents’ over-building has created. Children everywhere should quickly make costumes that resemble blocks of concrete and conduct ritualistic marches in the general direction of the central Midwest. This, combined with the waving of signs and the singing of Kumbaya will quickly spread the word throughout the public school system and draw the attention of the mainstream media which is also critical to this effort. Working together, we can all stem this rapidly looming disaster.
incidentally, you can purchase your STOP YELLOWSTONE NOW t-shirts by visiting our online store, and our book by the same name is available on Amazon.com. A prime time television special is currently in production.
Did I get it right?
James A. Peden
Shoreham, Vermont on a chilly Sunday Morning

El Nino started in the spring months of 1997, so I’m afraid it’s not terribly honest to suggest 1997 as a year of reference …