Blink comparator of GISS USA temperature anomaly – h/t to Zapruder
The last time I checked, the earth does not retroactively change it’s near surface temperature.
True, all data sets go through some corrections, such as the recent change RSS made to improve the quality of the satellite record which consists of a number of satellite spliced together. However, in the case of the near surface temperature record, we have many long period stations than span the majority of the time period shown above, and they have already been adjusted for TOBS, SHAP, FILNET etc by NOAA prior to being distributed for use by organizations like GISS. These adjustments add mostly a positive bias.
In the recent data replication fiasco, GISS blames NOAA for providing flawed data rather than their failure to catch the repeated data from September to October. In that case they are correct that the issue arose with NOAA, but in business when you are the supplier of a product, most savvy businessmen take a “the buck stops here” approach when it comes to correcting a product flaw, rather than blaming the supplier. GISS provides a product for public consumption worldwide, so it seems to me that they should pony up to taking responsibility for errors that appear in their own product.
In the case above, what could be the explanation for the product changing?
Leif: Off topic, but I see NASA has detected a large number of cosmic rays, probably from a local source; local being a kiloparsec.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/19nov_cosmicrays.htm?list91627
Might tie in well with the cosmic ray/cloud connection….
Well, if you want to set something off that you are quoting, you have a couple of ways, both of which involve surrounding the text you are quoting with HTML tags.
Eg, <b> some text </b> should appear as some text
How’s that for a short intro.
Les Johnson (14:22:30) :
NASA has detected a large number of cosmic rays, probably from a local source; local being a kiloparsec.
These are rare. From the blurp:
“During five weeks of ballooning in 2000 and 2003, ATIC counted 70 excess electrons in the energy range 300-800 GeV”
so don’t do much for the climate.
Tim Clark (13:39:21) :
I need someone to tell me how to italcize on this blog.
<i>in italic</i> ==> in italic
<b>in bold</b> ===> in bold
Leif Svalgaard (14:38:31) :
As you can see, you have to type that VERY carefully 🙂
Les Johnson (14:22:30) :
NASA has detected a large number of cosmic rays, probably from a local source; local being a kiloparsec.
These are rare. From the blurp:
“During five weeks of ballooning in 2000 and 2003, ATIC counted 70 excess electrons in the energy range 300-800 GeV”
so don’t do much for the climate.
Tim Clark (13:39:21) :
I need someone to tell me how to italcize on this blog.
<i>in italic</i> ==> in italic
<b>in bold</b> ==> in bold
Lief: Thanks. Apparently I missed that part about 70 electrons with a high energy range.
My bad.
Peter (11:57:58) said:
The fatal flaw here is the assumption that it takes the warming from CO2, or any other greenhouse gas with the exception of water vapor to trigger the warming but, once this is done, the temperature increase from water vapor keeps the ’spiral’ going.
How come the temperature increase from current water vapor levels (above what the temperature would be in the absence of water vapor) doesn’t by itself trigger the ’spiral’ in the first place?
Read that article again; they documented the increase in water vapor with warming in general. Warming from any source (e.g. greenhouse gases, increasing solar….) will increase the absolute humidity.
The existence of this positive feedback to warming has been disputed by many in the skeptical community.
The reason that the greenhouse effect from water vapor does not spiral temeratures out of control is because there is another phenomenon that removes water vapor from the atmosphere. This phenomenon is called “rain”.
However, at higher temperatures, it takes more absolute humidity to get water to condense and form rainclouds. So, if the atmosphere warms up, the absolute humidity level of the atmosphere must increase until a new equilibrium is reached.
As I said before, this is basic physics. In this universe.
Les Johnson (10:20:39) :
You’re trying to glean more from that paper than is in there. The authors of the paper concluded that the change in heavy metals was the result of the switch to the cleaner use of fuels. They do not mention aerosols.
Maybe someone will take their results, do the calculations, and figure out what this means in regard to aerosols (both the cooling ones, and the warming ones). Until then, it’s just speculation.
Tim Clark (13:39:21) :
I need someone to tell me how to italicize on this blog.
in italic ==> in italic
in bold ==> in bold
Richard Sharpe (14:33:47) :
Thanks, aged individual, = novice blogger
If it’s any consolation, I still know Fortran.
Tim said:
My first was Basic on mark sense cards. Then Fortran on a PDP 11/40 … Then Pascal, then Simula 67, later PL1, then some crazy assembly hodgepodge called TML, but it’s been mostly C and C++ (with a smattering of scripting languages) for a long time now.
Chris V: your
You’re trying to glean more from that paper than is in there. The authors of the paper concluded that the change in heavy metals was the result of the switch to the cleaner use of fuels. They do not mention aerosols.
Aerosols are pollutants. Cleaner fuels have less pollutants.
Just as oxygen isotopes can be proxies for temperature, so can heavy metals in ice, be proxies for aerosols.
There is no way for heavy metals to be deposited in Greenland ice, except as aerosols.
Leif Svalgaard (10:43:43) :
” anna v (10:00:19) :
I get your point:
You are trying to explain why the contra argument is attracted by the TSI arguments.”
and by the cosmic ray/planetary alignments/etc arguments…”
Well, I am partial to cosmic rays, not the high energy ones of course, which are rare, so I would exclude them from your list.
I started my graduate work with a spark chamber triggered by cosmic rays :). There is about 1 muon per cm per second at sea level (all energies over a few MeV) , if I remember the ball park correctly. Must be many more higher up ( absorption/decay/scatter). This is the kind I would check for influencing cloud formation/ albedo etc. Not galactic ones per se.
As far as I am concerned, it is clear that it is the albedo that controls heating and cooling and any mechanism that can affect it is worthy of study ( not of dogmatism).
I suspect though that in the end we will establish that it is the chaotic oscillations of the ocean/land/atmosphere system that are driving everything, and everything else is a small perturbation.
Simple documentation showing that temperatures has not rised the last 9 years and 8 months. (- And counting!)
http://www.klimadebat.dk/forum/attachments/flatcurves.jpg
For GISS, i can go back to Jan 2001 and still have flat trend curve, thats 7 years and 10 mths.
For RSS, i can go back to feb 1997 and still have a flat trend curve. Thats 11 years 9 months.
Average: 9 years 8 months.
I have included thr trend of the Hansen B curve, the “plausable” curve…
L.Svalgard
If they are so easy to counter then why is there the debate? The issue is not whether something is science or correct, but solely what the perception is. The whole debate is pseudo-science so a pseudo mechanism [the Solar connection] is fitting.
Why is there debate ? Do you really ignore that or was it only a rhetorical question ?
There is debate because it is easier to do pseudo-science than science .
Especially if the pseudo-science can be wrapped up in millions of lines of “creative” algorithms that makes it effectively opaque for any inquiring mind .
There is debate because people discovered that it is easier to obtain chairs , budgets and media attention if one behaved like Nostradamus and frequented political seminaries in exotic places (Hansen , Schmidt , Pachauri etc) instead of doing hard work and publishing .
There is debate because Nostradamuses always easily gather uncritical followers who don’t understand complicated issues and prefer empty propaganda- “CO2 pollutes and kills . Let’s save the planet .”
I agree with you that THIS debate is not even pseudo-scientific .
But as science is taken in hostage by the Nostradamuses , a scientist can’t avoid it .
Indeed it is easy to satellise a “rabid AGWer” with scientific arguments but what is not easy is to convince him that scientific arguments actually count .
As for the Sun , well , like AnnaV I consider that the 2 by far most important factors in climate evolution is the cloudiness because it governs albedo and the large scale oceans’ behaviour because that’s where the energy is . A far third interacting with both previous factors would be the water phase changes because there is a lot of energy flow and storage too .
The Sun plays a role in the behaviour of those dominating factors and as it is ultimately THE engine of the whole Earth system it can’t be discounted .
Of course an argument that some parameter , sunny or otherwise , varies “only” by 0,1% never automatically means that its influence can be neglected in a chaotic system .
Sometimes it is yes and sometimes it is no . Never possible to say without a good understanding of the system and a deep study .
For me there is clearly no naive , direct , immediate , deterministic link between some Sun parameters and some climate parameters like temporal averages of regional temperatures .
But there may be low intensity , indirect , time delayed “nudges” that play a very important role in the evolution of the climate trajectories .
The former is uninteresting but the latter is .
Chris V., your water-vapor feedback, if true, occurs during any temp change, whatever it’s caused by, not just CO2.
Latest analyses of water-vapor trends do not show any appreciable increase, in fact, decreasing slightly at most altitudes.
TomVonk (03:16:07) :
There is debate because it is easier to do pseudo-science than science .
You miss the whole point. At least, ‘anna v’ got it.
As for the Sun , well , like AnnaV I consider that the 2 by far most important factors in climate evolution is the cloudiness because it governs albedo and the large scale oceans’ behaviour because that’s where the energy is
Again you are so angry at the AGW crowd, that you miss the whole point: the all-important clouds and albedo vary together, but do not vary with the solar cycle, as far as our observations go, e.g. http://www.leif.org/research/cloud-cover.png and http://www.leif.org/research/albedo.png
The Sun […] is ultimately THE engine of the whole Earth system it can’t be discounted.
Again, you miss the whole point. You are falling back on the tired old argument: ‘turn off the Sun and see what you get’. Even if the Sun was absolutely constant [which it very nearly is] the climate system would probably still have its chaotic swings.
The pseudo-science that involves the Sun is rooted in the [desperate] need for a mechanism, any mechanism, to counter what the AGW crowd think is their mechanism, right or wrong doesn’t matter as it is their perception and beliefs that counts for them. In any debate or discussion with an AGWer the question will come up as to what causes climate change. He will have his mechanism and what do you have? random fluctuations? He’ll laugh at you! so you fall back on the old crutch: it is the Sun, and eventually [as you just did to me] you’ll spring the turn-off-the-sun trick on him. You should not counter bad science with worse science.
Anthony,
Can you point me to the data you used for these graphs?
Chris V:
I did read and understand what was written, but that’s beside the point.
Higher temperatures, from any source, will increase water vapor, assuming there’s water around to be evaporated. That’s not in dispute. What is in dispute is whether this gives rise to negative, positive or neutral feedback. (see the point on ‘rain’ below)
And that phenomenon called ‘rain’, as well as cloud formation, also removes heat from the (lower) atmosphere and the surface – including that which results from ‘greenhouse’ gases.
Temperatures in the tropics (especially daytime temperatures) are much higher than the global ‘average’ so the absolute humidity must be higher as well – conversely, temperatures in the polar regions are much colder than global averages. If water vapor was a positive feedback then tropical temperatures would rise much faster than polar temperatures in response to rising CO2 levels. But indications are that the opposite is happening – strongly suggestive of an overall negative feedback.
” Leif Svalgaard (10:04:11) :
TomVonk (03:16:07) :
There is debate because it is easier to do pseudo-science than science.”
Leif, Tom, here is where the debate has lead us:
It’s demogogy wrapped in pseudo science.
President Obama in under fifty words:
“Few challenges facing America — and the world — are more urgent than combating climate change. The science is beyond dispute and the facts are clear. Sea levels are rising. Coastlines are shrinking. We’ve seen record drought, spreading famine and storms that are growing stronger with each passing hurricane season.”
Response from Alan Sullivan:
The facts are indeed clear. Sea level is not rising, according to data from 3000 newly deployed Argo buoys. Drought is not increasing. The dollar damage of floods and hurricanes has risen only because there is more developed property in the path of these natural disasters. Their frequency and severity are not changing. There is dearth but no famine in the world today — however famine will come, if green policies are pursued with sufficient zeal.
Who is going to debunk the President elect statement in fifty words and win the debate? Is there any debate to win?
Published at: http://www.seablogger.com/?p=12260#comments
Ron de Haan (11:44:12) :
Leif, Tom, here is where the debate has lead us:
It’s demagogy wrapped in pseudo science.
And let us not add the ‘Solar Connection’ to the pseudo science. The climate is changing as it always is and we just have to learn to live with it and adapt to it, as we always have. This will benefit some and hurt some, as it always has. In a sense, I’m arguing for Anthony to even drop the solar interest [and me] 🙂 except it may be useful to keep reminding people that ‘it is not the Sun, stupid’.
Leif:
Why should skeptics have to come up with some alternate mechanism to explain what’s happening, when nobody is really sure what is happening, or if it’s substantially different to what has always been happening? It’s up to those who propose a theory to prove it. It’s not sufficient to say that the theory is right because we can’t (or won’t) think of anything else it could be. The best the rest of us can do is to point out flaws (and there are many) in the theory.
At the time (1981) that Hansen published his paper on global warming, it was a theory of what could happen in future times – the trend in global temperatures was still decidedly downwards, as it had been for several decades, and upswings and downswings in the trend were regarded as ‘random fluctuations’ which nobody bothered to try explain. If not for the global warming theory, they would probably still be regarded as ‘random fluctuations’ of poorly-known mechanisms.
There simply wasn’t enough, or accurate enough data (and still isn’t) to explain these fluctuations, due to the various known and unknown cycles and processes involved being decades to centuries or more in length.
However, some AGWers are so set in their beliefs that I think they’d still be arguing the toss after several decades of sharp cooling.
Leif,
It’s not the sun and it’s not CO2.
So what’s the cause of a Dalton or Maunder Minimum if it’s not the sun?
I think a lot of scientists have to go back to school and a lot of scientific reports and publication are fit for the fire place.
The biggest question I have is how to stop the current AGW hysteria and the draconian and incredible stupid government policies directed at reducing carbon emissions.
Peter (12:24:47) :
“Why should skeptics have to come up with some alternate mechanism to explain what’s happening”
Simple, if you want to be taken seriously in a scientific context you need an alternative mechanism. if you want to carry on doing the easy stuff of deconstructing theories instead of being constructive than carry on blah blahing in blogland.
REPLY: Well, Mary I’ll point out that you spend a lot of time on this blah blah blog. – Anthony
Mary Hinge,
Regarding your post above @15:04:17, you have it exactly backward.
The long accepted paradigm is that the climate naturally fluctuates, and the current fluctuations are well within the historical norm. In fact, they are mild.
Your new “alternative mechanism” is catastrophic AGW/CO2/ runaway global warming. But it is up to those promoting that hypothesis to prove it.
They have failed: catastrophic AGW has been repeatedly falsified.
According to the Scientific Method, now it’s back to the drawing board for proponents of their failed AGW/CO2 hypothesis.
Hope that helps.
From Heliogenic Climate Change:
“The most hideously egregious data fabrication”
“In comparison, Mann 08 uses initially questionable data which has not been calibrated to temperature (tree rings), chops the end off of nearly every proxy and pastes fake temperature data on the end as a replacement ( I could have previously imagined) calibrates the fake data to temperature using methods which amplify recent trends compared to history and then throws away anything which doesn’t fit his pre-determined conclusion. This asinine method is how the latest hockey stick was made.
If I worked in this field you would have to put a gun to my head to get me to put my name on it. I thought for a moment of marketing hockey stick toilet paper made from actual tree rings.
I believe now that these math and scientific method errors are done with intent (the ends justify the means) but that is a subject of another post. I just wanted to point out that simplified rational temperature reconstructions are available, the results are inconvenient for the IPCC, Real Climate and Tamino.
The climatology community MUST reject this kind of work to retain any sort of credibility. I brought it up with the Tamino crowd and they simply refused to address the obvious and (I believe) intentional errors in methodology. I tried to address the issues with Real Climate and my posts were simply deleted. So far other scientists seem to have avoided reference this ridiculous false paper but until and unless this work is rejected the climatology community has no credibility in my eyes.” “Comparitive criticisms of temperature reconstructions”
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2008/11/20/comparitive-criticism-of-temperature-reconstructions/
Peter (11:34:09) said:
If water vapor was a positive feedback then tropical temperatures would rise much faster than polar temperatures in response to rising CO2 levels. But indications are that the opposite is happening – strongly suggestive of an overall negative feedback.
It’s hard to see how water vapor could be a negative feedback if 1) water vapor is a greenhouse gas (undeniable); and 2) water vapor increases with temperature (supported by theory and observations).
Since water vapor is a feedback (increasing with temperature) anything that might be a feedback to increasing water vapor (like clouds-maybe) can never drop you down to the temperature you started at. Because as the temperature did drop (through increased cloudiness), water vapor would also decrease, which in turn would cause cloudiness to decrease, which would lessen the amount of cooling…
You could never get back to where you started, so you would always be left with more water vapor in the atmosphere. Since water vapor is GHG, that would mean a net warming.