UPDATE#2 I finally found a graph from Professor Akasofu that goes with the text of his essay below. I’ve added it above. You can read more about Akasofu’s views on climate in this PDF document here. (Warning: LARGE 50 megabyte file, long download) The two previous graphs used are in links below.
UPDATE: Originally I posted a graph from Roger Pielke Jr. see here via Lucia at the Blackboard because it was somewhat related and I wanted to give her some traffic. As luck would have it, few people followed the link to see what it was all about, preferring to question the graph in the context of the article below. So, I’ve replaced it with one from another article of hers that should not generate as many questions. Or will it? 😉 – Anthony
THE IPCC’S FAILURE OF PREDICTING THE TEMPERATURE CHANGE DURING THE FIRST DECADE
Syun Akasofu
International Arctic Research Center
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Fairbanks, AK 99775-7340
The global average temperature stopped increasing after 2000 against the IPCC’s prediction of continued rapid increase. It is a plain fact and does not require any pretext. Their failure stems from the fact that the IPCC emphasized the greenhouse effect of CO2 by slighting the natural causes of temperature changes.
The changes of the global average temperature during the last century and the first decade of the present century can mostly be explained by two natural causes, a linear increase which began in about 1800 and the multi-decadal oscillation superposed on the linear increase. There is not much need for introducing the CO2 effect in the temperature changes. The linear increase is the recovery (warming) from the Little Ice Age (LIA), which the earth experienced from about 1400 to 1800.
The halting of the temperature rise during the first decade of the present century can naturally be explained by the fact that the linear increase has been overwhelmed by the superposed multi-decadal oscillation which peaked in about 2000.*
This situation is very similar to the multi-decadal temperature decrease from 1940 to 1975 after the rise from 1910 to 1940 (in spite of the fact that CO2 increased rapidly after 1946); it was predicted at that time that a new Big Ice Age was on its way.
The IPCC seems to imply that the halting is a temporary one. However, they cannot give the reason. Several recent trends, including the phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), the halting of sea level increase, and the cooling of the Arctic Ocean, indicate that the halting is likely to be due to the multi-decadal change.
The high temperatures predicted by the IPCC in 2100 (+2~6°C) are simply an extension of the observed increase from 1975 to 2000, which was caused mainly by the multi-decadal oscillation. The Global Climate Models (GCMs) are programmed to reproduce the observed increase from 1975 to 2000 in terms of the CO2 effect and to extend the reproduced curve to 2100.
It is advised that the IPCC recognize at least the failure of their prediction even during the first decade of the present century; a prediction is supposed to become less accurate for the longer future.
For details, see http://people.iarc.uaf.edu/~sakasofu
* The linear increase has a rate of ~ +0.5°C/100 years, while the multi-decadal oscillation has an amplitude of ~0.2°C and period of ~ 50-60 years, thus the change in 10 years is about ~ -0.07°C from the peak, while the linear change is about ~ +0.05°C.
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TonyB (14:46:09) : said
Foinavon
You must be well aware of this paper
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2008/02/11/a-2000-year-global-temperature-record/
and well aware of the work of the medieval society who have accumulated dozens of studies of the period.
You must also be perfectly aware of the Roman optimum. If not you can go on an interesting walk with Prof Hunt following in the footsteps of Hanibal over one of the high level Alpine passes used by the Romans (and Hanibal) which would now be impassable.
Do you still believe in the authenticity of Dr Manns hockey stick and the spaghetti derivatives?
—————————————-
You can perhaps add the excavation of the Viking burial site in the permafrost in Greenland.
Older sites along the coast are also in danger. As the Arctic warms up, archaeologists fear the frozen turf that covers Qeqertasussuk, a 4,500-year-old settlement where evidence for the earliest settlement of Greenland was found, may be melting. Gronnow–who excavated the remote site for the first time in the 1980s–is headed back this summer, and he is not optimistic. “I’ve been working in Greenland for 30 years now,” he says. “I can see with my own eyes how it has changed.”
If you Wicki Permafrost you will see two men using a jackhammer, I think we have a little further to go before we reach the temps of the Viking era.
http://www.archaeology.org/0903/etc/climate_change.html
Paul S (15:18:41) :
Fair enough. You are happy to accept unsupported assertions that don’t accord with the scientific evidence. That’s fine…
Read the paper Paul. The analysis is based on the empirical sea surface temperature covering the Pacific basin (termed the PDV or “Pan-decadal Variability”). In part of the analysis the contribution of ENSO was removed to isolate the contribution from the entire Pacific decadal variability. I expect that’s where Dr. Bosilovich’s expertise was employed.
Incidentally, in general one needs to be specific about criticisms of models. After all Dr. Akasofu’s assertion of a post LIA temperature trend resulting from a “linear recovery” overlaid by a “PDO oscillation” is a model. It’s just a model without empirical or theoretical evidence or parameterization.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with models. Ultimately it’s all about the evidence. Chen et al, and Hoerling et al, and all the other science published in the scientific literature is supported by evidence. Akasofu’s assertions are not….
foinavon:
“Smokey, those are just unattributed pictures.”
Not really foinavon. Apparently your cognitive dissonance has impaired your reading comprehension.
At the bottom of the central chart it states: Chart prepared by Climatologist Cliff Harris & Meteorologist Randy Mann”.
And the chart above was from greenworldtrust, as anyone can see by clicking the link. And Mr. Helmand would certainly be miffed if you claim his link is unattributed.
And your verifiably wrong statement…
…was refuted as reported in the World Climate Report, CO2 Science, and other sources linked by several other posters. Putting your hands over your ears and shouting, “LA-LA-LA-LA!!” is a clear example of cognitive dissonance in action.
Presuming that just because you believe there are no studies contradicting what you said, doesn’t mean there are no studies, as we’ve seen right here.
+ + + + + + + + + +
What’s left of foinavon’s credibility took another hit here when he said he’d never heard of the Roman Optimim.
Those IPCC graphs are of the kind of the Hockey Stick, because of the scale used. These do not worth discussing about them.
The minimum scale to be used it should be the minimum difference of temperatures we can truly feel. Does anybody can feel a difference of 0.1°C?
foinavon (10:50:33) :
Huh? I could see exponential “decay” climbing to the average level.
What are the asymptotes of the hyperbola? If we’re heading on an increasing rate for a vertical one, then we’ll reach a time when the temperature zooms to infinity. If we’re heading for one at an angle, then we’ll reach a period of steady climb. Oh, perhaps you’re talking about one much like my exponential example above when the average level is the asymptote we’re approaching.
A hyperbola isn’t defined by a time constant, that term is generally used only with exponential growth and decay and is related to the amount of time required for something to reach 63% of its final value.
Nope, that sounds like the slope of the recovery will get steeper and steeper.
CodeTech (14:36:09) :
Why’s that CodeTech? The Wikipedia article is just a compliation of studies published in the scientific literature. We could each easily find each of the original studies and inspect these.
If you’ve got a criticism you need to be a bit more specific!
smokey,
The real worry is the long term cooling trend shown on one of your links. It seems that for most of the last 4000 years temperatures have been higher than for the last 1000.
As for Foinavon, I’m still trying to figure out how you compute an anomaly from a mean without at some stage computing the mean. Gibberish!
Smokey (16:20:36) :
.
Yes but where’s the data from Smokey? Which scientific study/studies determined and compiled it and where is it published? I could show you a chart “prepared by somebody and someone else”, but we wouldn’t be able to assess its realiability/accuracy without recourse to the original published data.
and the same goes for the chart from “greenworldtrust” and your “Mr Helmand”.
Blogs and web sites Smokey. If we’re skeptical we really want to see data that is of sufficient quality to be publishable in the scientific literature….We’ve already looked at one of the sources linked by other posters (Loehle’s). But that’s demonstrably incorreect and was based on a misunderstanding by Loehle of the conventions concerning putting all paleotemperature data on a common temporal scale. That’s what happens if one attempts to create/cherrypick analyses that conform to a preconceived view. It’s likely to be flawed..
..far better to access the science in the cientific literature…
Mike McMillan (14:07:43) :
Even at that rate, a snail could outrun the encroaching shoreline.
That was the best smile Ive had all day. 🙂
If you adjust out the effect of the natural ocean cycles and then take into account the Urban Heat Island (which Phil Jones just resurrected for us) (and the poor siting which Anthony has demonstrated) and if you assume at least half of the other “adjustments” made to the temperature record were made in “error”, …
… the temperature rise over the last 140 years falls to a low 0.05C per decade.
The models, in not accounting for the effect of at least ocean cycles and UHI secondarily have over-estimated the warming which has occurred by more than 66%.
Now let’s see if any of the modelers on this thread can prove this statement wrong (because they should know it is right).
TerryBixler (15:10:47) :
Terry, I responded to tallbloke here: [foinavon (14:17:41)]. Everyone seems to be responding to my posts, so it’s difficult to keep up, but I’m certainly not disregarding tallbloke (heaven forbid!).
The scientific data tends to cast doubt on the basic assertions of the climateaudit blog. That particular storm in a teacup has been dragged through the blogosphere for 10 years, but the issue seems to be pretty settled in the science. The “wiki recons” is not a “wiki reconstruction” at all of course! It’s a compilation of paleoreconstructions available up to around 2005/6 I believe). One could add a couple more to that compilation now. The point is that each of those reconstructions is a study published in the scientific literature (as the citations to the discrete studies by the graphed compilation indicates)…
There is indeed an odd disconnect between the text and the graphics used as illustration. Dr Akasofu’s thesis is that the IPCC predictions have failed, yet the supporting charts are from this paper published by Roger Pielke in Nature Geoscience which actually found that …
Figure 1a compares the IPCC 1990, 1995,
2001 and 2007 temperature predictions (its
‘best estimate’ for the realized emissions
scenario) with observational surface (NASA,
UKMET) and satellite (UAH, RSS) data. The
observations fall between the best estimates
presented by the IPCC in 1990 and 2001,
which is consistent with the conclusions of
Rahmsdorf et al.
Rahmsdorf et al is this paper which concluded …
Overall, these observational data underscore
the concerns about global climate change. Previous
projections, as summarized by IPCC, have
not exaggerated but may in some respects even
have underestimated the change, in particular
for sea level.
Rahmstorf is Professor of Oceanic Physics at Potsdam University. Here are his publications.
Roger Pielke (Jr) is a Professor of Environmental Studies at the
University of Colorado and Director of the CIRES Center for Science and Technology
Policy Research. His views on climate change are nicely summarised in this testimony
Nothing in this testimony should be interpreted as contradicting the assessment of climate change science provided by Working Group I of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).4 The IPCC has concluded that greenhouse gas emissions resulting from human activity are an important driver of changes in climate. And on this basis alone I am personally convinced that it makes sense to take action to limit greenhouse gas emissions.
Doesn’t quite add up does it? I mention only in passing that Dr Akasofu has no academic credentials or publications whatsoever in the field of climate science.
foinavon
“That’s what happens if one attempts to create/cherrypick analyses that conform to a preconceived view. It’s likely to be flawed..”
Like certain temperature estimates?
Maybe you know, you seem to be a smart fella/gal.
1) Why does temperature rise precede CO2?
2) Why net the ocean effects to the mean instead of their individual climate areas?
3) When does the extra water vapor in the atmosphere saturate the atmosphere to the point it can’t hold anymore? And then what happens?
Nope. The notes say that one piece of data came from an individual (so apparently you can’t easily “find” it) and that one of the studies in the source article did not have data in a format which could be easily processed.
foinavon:
foinavon me boy, your original statement was that I had posted ‘unattributed pictures.’ I showed with the attributions that you were wrong. I pointed out that the sources were right in the links, and I quoted them to you. I answered your question.
But now you’re asking for something entirely different: the original data that was used to produce the charts. That’s not the question you originally asked, is it? You’re a game player.
foinavon, I’m not playing a fool’s game with the King Of The Moving Goal Posts. You do this all the time; asking a question, and then when it’s clearly answered, asking another, different question, ad nauseum. You never man-up.
And you never answer any uncomfortable questions put to you, do you? No. On that score you keep your tail tucked firmly between your legs, and change the subject.
I’ve repeatedly asked you to personally point out [without using your usual google-fu cut ‘n’ paste of hastily searched abstracts] exactly where in the climate “pipeline” is the hidden heat you claim is hiding there. Where is it, exactly? And why haven’t satellites, Argos buoys, or radiosonde instruments indicated where your fantasy heat is “waiting in the pipeline” to emerge and cause runaway global warming? Where, exactly, is this heat hiding? Show it to us.
But you never answered that question. Instead, you play your games, avoiding giving answers when cornered — and always moving the goal posts when someone else solidly refutes one of your claims. It’s your M.O.
I’ve answered your question. Now it’s your turn to answer mine: Where, exactly, is that spooky heat hiding in the climate pipeline? Provide strong empirical [real world] evidence, please, not your usual opinion, or the results of always-wrong models.
The ball, as they say, is in your court.
Foinavon,
Wikipedia is not reliable enough to cite as a source in a college paper. Remember the journalist who was shocked to discover he was involved in the JFK assassination? Ask a college professor why it is not considered reliable.
Excellent summation by Syun Akasofu.
The IPCC is wrong both in it’s claim of the cause of warming and in it’s predicted temperature trend.
Smokey (17:25:43) :
foinavon is exactly right about the link you posted that purports to show global temps going back to 2500 BC- the website gives only the vaguest allusion as to where the data comes from: “Many factors were studied to arrive at their conclusions, such as sea-surface temperatures in the oceans, particularly in the Pacific (El Nino and La Nina), dendrochronology (tree rings), volcanic cycles, tidal cycles, solar ‘sunspot’ cycles, lake bed data, core samples, human migrations, ancient writings and so forth.”
You wouldn’t accept that level of explanation in a paper published by Mann or Hanson; why do you accept it for this source????
And the “heat in the pipeline” isn’t “hiding” somewhere. The oceans warm up a lot slower than the atmosphere, so an equilibrium temperature won’t be reached until the oceans warm up.
Anthony: thanks for the update, because the original post was VERY confusing.
GISS takes an odd track at the end of 2003. It takes a strange turn at the beginning of 2006.
“And the “heat in the pipeline” isn’t “hiding” somewhere. The oceans warm up a lot slower than the atmosphere, so an equilibrium temperature won’t be reached until the oceans warm up.”
So, the heat will transfer from the atmosphere to the ocean, cooling the atmosphere and heating the ocean?
foinavon, Loehle wasn’t shown to me “wrong” he issued a correction to his original paper with only slight (and immaterial) changes to his conclusions. Just going to the paper and scroll down to “Correction to…”
John Philip, Roger’s paper was flawed (at least for temperature) because he was eyeballing an anomaly, not looking a the actual trend. Rhamstorf, who you hold up as some pinnacle of greatest, did the same thing. Perhaps you should trying following the work of David Stockwell in trying to understand what it is Rhamstorf did?
http://landshape.org/enm/category/reviews/rahmstorf/
At any rate, Lucia over at the Blackboard, a believer in AGW, has been looking at recent data and concluded that the IPCC’s projections are to high. Check it out:
http://rankexploits.com/musings
Also, Roger’s personal views of his and others own work is irrelevant. And so are doctor Akasofu’s-after all, James Hansen is an Astronomer.
Should say “Akasofu’s credentials” You really are engaging in pathetic ad hominem, though, which is why I jokingly respond in kind.
foinavon (13:18:30) :
Analysis of the Earth’s temperature response to enhanced greenhouse forcing in the past indicates a temperature response of the order of 3 oC of warming per doubling of enhanced CO2.
Foinavon, there is no doubt that you are a worthy, able and knowledgeable proponent of AGW but you appear to be unable to resist inserting the above cited gratuitous assertion in a number of your posts. Since the amount of feedback from increased atmospheric CO2 concentration is not well understood, the assertion, especially where it is not germane to the subject, weakens the thrust of your posts. Nevertheless, even when I do not agree with you, I value your willingness to come here and do battle in a dignified manner.
Ohioholic (17:11:03) :
foinavon
“That’s what happens if one attempts to create/cherrypick analyses that conform to a preconceived view. It’s likely to be flawed..”
Like certain temperature estimates?
Maybe you know, you seem to be a smart fella/gal.
1) Why does temperature rise precede CO2?[/quote]
The question has an unspoken assumption that this is always the case, but it has not always been the case, only sometimes.
The reason this has been observed in the Malinkovich cycles, was because periodic changes in orbital tilt kicked off a warming cycle in the northern hemisphere due reduction in albedo.
The CO2 emissions were of increased temperature, and but also produced a further increase in temperature, based on the evidence of the 400,000 year Vostock Ice core data, and modeling of these effects.
In fact CO2 emissions by huge numbers of volcanoes in Siberia produced a global warming event which robbed the oceans of oxygen and caused mass extinction at the end of the Permian Era 250M years ago.
Today’s increase in CO2 stems from human industrial activities, rather than emissions of natural sources under the influence of warming as in the past 400,000 years.
“2) Why net the ocean effects to the mean instead of their individual climate areas?”
]
This seems like foolish question. If your objective is to estimate the global average temperature change, you need to average the temperature changes over the entire globe.
“3) When does the extra water vapor in the atmosphere saturate the atmosphere to the point it can’t hold anymore? And then what happens?”
I don’t understand the point of this question?
There is a relation between maximum vapor pressure and temperature, which increases about 7% per degree celsius. When that point is reached you form clouds.
When the water drops in the clouds get big enough it rains.