Chill in the air: record low temps in 10 states

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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