There has been a development over the last 10-15 years or so in the scientific peer reviewed literature that is short circuiting the scientific method.
The scientific method involves developing a hypothesis and then seeking to refute it. If all attempts to discredit the hypothesis fails, we start to accept the proposed theory as being an accurate description of how the real world works.
A useful summary of the scientific method is given on the website sciencebuddies.org.where they list six steps
- Ask a Question
- Do Background Research
- Construct a Hypothesis
- Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment
- Analyze Your Data and Draw a Conclusion
- Communicate Your Results
Unfortunately, in recent years papers have been published in the peer reviewed literature that fail to follow these proper steps of scientific investigation. These papers are short circuiting the scientific method.
Specifically, papers that present predictions of the climate decades into the future have proliferated. Just a two recent examples (and there are many others) are
Hu, A., G. A. Meehl, W. Han, and J. Yin (2009), Transient response of the MOC and climate to potential melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet in the 21st century, Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L10707, doi:10.1029/2009GL037998.
Solomon, S. 2009: Irreversible climate change due to carbon dioxide emissions. The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Published online before print January 28, 2009, doi: 10.1073/pnas.0812721106
Such studies are even reported in the media before the peer reviewed process is completed; e.g. see in the article by Hannad Hoag in the May 27 2009 issue of Nature News Hot times ahead for the Wild West.
These studies are based on models, of which only a portion of which represent basic physics (e.g. the pressure gradient force, advection and the universal gravitational constant), with the remainder of the physics parameterized with tuned engineering code (e.g see).
When I served as Chief Editor of the Monthly Weather Reviews (1981-1985), The Co-Chief Editor of the Journal of Atmospheric Sciences (1996-2000), and as Editor-in-Chief of the US National Science Report to the IUGG for the American Geophysical Union (1993-1996), such papers would never have been accepted.
What the current publication process has evolved into, at the detriment of proper scientific investigation, are the publication of untested (and often untestable) hypotheses. The fourth step in the scientific method “Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment” is bypassed.
This is a main reason that the policy community is being significantly misinformed about the actual status of our understanding of the climate system and the role of humans within it.
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don’t tarp me bro (20:44:19) :
‘Siemens writes this in their financual reports big turbine admits forecast limitations
Disclaimer “forward looking statements”…’
I think that’s the same disclaimer the US Congress uses.
it will be my post that is snipped rather than the highly ridicule-filled rant above which calls into question the integrity of the work of many dedicted, honest people.
Why would you assume your post would be snipped? It happens here, but not very often.
I would further suggest that there are honest, dedicated people on both sides of the debate. Either (or both) are wrong. Both cannot be right. But being wrong does not mean one lacks integrity. Neither does being dedicated and honest necessarily mean one is right.
Leif Svalgaard (21:28:03)
crystal-clear insight
Leif you got lucky five times, your crystal-clear insights have had a home.
I have had these but, unfortunately they do not have a home!
No one cares if you have the answers to solve a problem 20 years from now!
no one is concerned over something that may happen IF.
And being mentally handicap is no picnic. lol
I see there is a white faculae count going back to the 1900s in nasa data.
would this not be a way to side step the warming of the dark spots?
these white areas are visible and SHOULD remain so during warming of sun spots.
I have a name of the JPG but no link (faculae1911_14a.JPG)
I have not seen any thing from you on this, have you any study’s linking f10.7 to faculae and IMF?
What I am looking for is something tangible to prove a leaving from the same old normal. my bible my sole say so but need hard proof.
crystal-clear insights may not be our own but a gift, a momentary gift .
Thanks Leif
on topic this climatology is not of the scientific sort or it would have been laughed at when a certain et al 2009 had a temperature of .119 when we measure to xx.x
significant digits http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Significant_figures
and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accuracy_and_precision
Tim
OT but what with Einstein and Born in the discussion I was reminded of Feynman’s reminiscences on how he got the idea of the Feynman diagrams, which I was fortunate enough to hear during a workshop in the early 1980s. He was very descriptive.
He said he had blue jeans on and lying perpendicular to the wall on his bed with his legs up the wall, when he “saw” how the diagrams would work with the integrals and all. He had eidetic memory anyway, seeing the pages of books when wanting to remember formulae.
This was during some meetings where there were all the wise men ( Schwinger I think was part of them) calculating crossections in the old laborious way that took about a week to get a result for a process. So Feynman would go to the meeting, pick up the current assignment for crossection calculation, go to his room and in a few hours get the result, which he would tell them the next day, without telling them how he got it. They labored along for a week to come out with the same result. Feynman had some fun, before disclosing his method.
I agree with Leif here, it is rare for scientific discovery to follow the orderly path laid down above.
Very often it is anomalies in experimental measurements that generate new hypotheses.
Secondly the experimental process often leads to a refinement of the theoretical framework which in turn leads to more refined measurements. This feedback loop is a very critical part of the process that is left out in lay discussions.
I’d suggest something like this is a more appropriate description
I’ll note that climate science is mostly an observational one that relies on the underlying physics being understood and modeled well enough to avoid direct empirical measurements. In this case the behavior of the model are “real world” enough that you can’t ab initio predict how the model will behave (even if you wrote every single line of code for the model yourself).
Leif,
I agree that not all science follows the classic process, and I can see why some research may be reorganized to conform to a classic formula. There is one important step of what may be considered traditional scientific method that I still feel is vital, and that is testing a hypothesis with observation or experimentation. Computer modeling does not seem to be the best substitute for this in current climate science. I have been impressed with what has been accomplished with physical experimentation for systems that might initially appear too big for the laboratory. The aurora experiments to back up the hypothesis of solar wind come to mind. I also recall fluid tank experiments on standing waves to answer questions relating to the red spot on Jupiter. I am also looking forward to the results of the Cloud experiment at CERN.
O/T Could you point me to the current theory for what is driving solar cycles? I have read a lot of debate on weather these cycles influence climate, but I would like to know what drives these cycles themselves.
As I recall from the ol’college years in physics and engineering, after you formed a Hypothesis, you tested it by attempting to prove it wrong. In engineering, we actively look for ways to make designs or processes fail so that we can improve them.
Today, this seems totally opposite to the so called “science” of AGW models, where all of there science is dedicated to finding ways to SUPPORT their theory. That’s not science, that’s propaganda.
Fluffy Clouds (Tim L) (22:54:47) :
I have not seen any thing from you on this, have you any study’s linking f10.7 to faculae and IMF?
Peter Foukal has studied this:
http://www.leif.org/research/Foukal-F107-Rz.pdf
I’m giving a paper on this next week at the Solar Physics Divison of the American Astronomical Society meeting in Boulder, CO.
Here is an abstract:
(Leif Svalgaard, Luca Bertello [MWO], Ed Cliver)
Three independent datasets support the finding that a discontinuous change of ~20% was introduced in the Zurich Sunspot Number, Rz, when Max Waldmeier took over the production of Rz. The range of the diurnal variation of the geomagnetic field (the East-component) is controlled by the EUV-induced conductivity of the dayside ionosphere and indicates a 23% increase of Rz from 1946 on. The Greenwich Sunspot Areas (and the Group Sunspot Number derived from the Greenwich data) indicate a 17.5% increase of Rz. A CaII K-line index derived from recently digitized Mount Wilson Observatory spectroheliograms indicates an 18.5% increase in Rz. Friedli [2005] notes that “The new observer-team in Zurich was thus relatively inexperienced and Waldmeier himself feared that his scale factor could vary”. We suggest that his fear was not unfounded and that the Zurich Sunspot Number be increased by 20% before 1946.
——
I take this in small steps. I already know that the Group Sunspot Number is too low by some 40% before ~1880 based on the geomagnetic data that the above abstract validate. You know, “the magnetic needle”. But we do that in the next paper. First we have to overcome the notion that the sunspot number is sacrosanct.
So Foukal’s finding that F10.7 has changed it long-term behavior with respect to the sunspot number should really be re-interpreted as the sunspot number being systematically wrong early on.
At the recent Space Weather Workshop, Ken Tapping, who measures the 10.7 cm radio flux from the Sun, that in the past was an accurate proxy for the sunspot number [actually the other way around], has just presented this paper: Title: The Changing Relationship Between Sunspot Number and F10.7 Abstract: Sunspot Number and the 10.7cm solar radio flux are the most widely-used indices of solar activity. Despite their differing nature and origins at different places in the Sun, these two indices are highly-correlated to the point where one can be used as a proxy for the other. However, during Solar Activity Cycle 23 we started to see a small but definite change in this relationship….
I have myself studied this [and concur with Tapping]: http://www.leif.org/research/Solar%20Radio%20Flux.pdf
and you may find this one amusing: http://www.leif.org/research/The%20SWPC%20Solar%20Flux.pdf
Konrad (23:02:33) :
O/T Could you point me to the current theory for what is driving solar cycles? I have read a lot of debate on weather these cycles influence climate, but I would like to know what drives these cycles themselves.
Here are some current ideas:
http://www.leif.org/research/Jiang-Choudhuri-2007.pdf
http://www.leif.org/research/Percolation%20and%20the%20Solar%20Dynamo.pdf
http://www.leif.org/EOS/2005GL025221.pdf
and the grand-daddy of them all:
http://www.leif.org/EOS/Babcock1961.pdf
and my own take on this:
http://www.leif.org/research/Polar%20Fields%20and%20Cycle%2024.pdf
@Allan M R MacRae (20:46:34) :
“Then with absolute proof and lack of counter-evidence, that Theory becomes a Law, as in the Law of Gravity.”
I’d like to hear an explanation of how that force of gravity is transferred between two masses. Like the apple and the earth. When I drop an apple, what mechanism is causing the force of gravity to be transferred. In other words, how does the earth “feel” the apple and vice versa.
Just curious since its a law and all it should be easy to answer….
I have a school teacher friend who informs me questions on “Climate Change”
figure large in this years Geography exams here in the UK.
I wonder how these youngsters will regard “science” in the years to come.
That description of science is naive, simplistic, and IMHO silly. It’s the kind of thing teachers would tell school children (look at the link to see where it came from).
Adults should make a distinction between science and one description of one aspect of science. It’s like democracy; there are many ways to practice it. Science (and democracy) are ways of thinking, not rituals.
But the point of the article is well taken. There are a number of climatologists etc who are abusing science and its principles. That is the problem. (Go to Climate Audit for details of specific cases).
And by the way, computer models do have a perfectly valid role in science, but only if they are done right and that has not been shown yet for climate models.
The fourth step in the scientific method “Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment” is bypassed.
Dear Professor
The argument will go that the fourth step is not bypassed because the modelling is the experiment. I may well be wrong but if the number of variables were limited then would it not be acceptable to model an experiment?
Of course I recognise that with Climate modelling the number of variables are immense and the current understanding is not sufficient to prepare predictive models which could be experiment.
My view is that the experiment has already taken place historically.
The trouble is no matter what methodology of Science you choose to apply, the classical ideal, Kuhnian paradigm shifts, or Leif,s aha moments of inspirational innovation with ex post facto justification, the AGW hypothesis won’t cut the mustard. Its’ development followed somewhat along the lines described by Leif, as anomalies in temperatures and CO2 concentration raised a question about what was occurring in the climate and a hypothesis was suggested, but there the process quickly departed from anything resembling science. A few runs of some dubiously constructed GCMs and presto!, a weak hypothesis miraculously paradigm shifted right past theory, to a cast in concrete, “settled science,” no debate called for or allowed, gosh darn natural law. Now the only the only thing they will accept as contradictory evidence is incontravertable proof of an alternate mechanism, because, after all, what else could it be?
Benjamin P. (23:52:55) :
@Allan M R MacRae (20:46:34) :
“Then with absolute proof and lack of counter-evidence, that Theory becomes a Law, as in the Law of Gravity.”
I’d like to hear an explanation of how that force of gravity is transferred between two masses. Like the apple and the earth. When I drop an apple, what mechanism is causing the force of gravity to be transferred. In other words, how does the earth “feel” the apple and vice versa.
Just curious since its a law and all it should be easy to answer….
How is the force of electricity transfered between positive and negative charges?
answer: by the electromagnetic field
similar for gravity: by the gravitational field.
It makes sense because the equations resulting from such a description work predictively. Otherwise we could be talking of leprechauns working hard to keep the force up :).
A quantum way of looking at it is where Feynman diagrams come in useful: the electrons play ball throwing virtual photons to the ions and vice versa.
Similarly it is expected that the apple is throwing gravitons at the earth and vice versa, except that gravity has not been quantized yet ( may be with string theories).
IMHO, the present AGW Agenda system is:
1) Ask: What question will get funding?
2) Do Background Research: What do my funder and friends believe?
3) Construct a Hypothetical model: Write code to embody “background” expectations.
4) Tune Your Code While Running it: Repeat until expectations met.
5) Analyze Your Printout and Write a Conclusion: Make sure it matches funding and expectations.
6) Communicate Your Results: Especially in mass media and to funder. Lay groundwork for next grant request. Hype consequences of non-funding…
IMHO, that is what I see happening. Science as I learned it looks to be dead. I have lost the sense of wonder and admiration for “science” as practiced today. Where I used to consider it the focal point of “keeping a tidy mind” and an ideal tool to reach understanding (and it was, long ago) I now see nothing but agenda driven manipulation from the most politicized of patronage systems you would ever want to run away from… I have advised my kids to avoid any “career” in science.
Realize I was the Science Geek as a kid. Chemistry set at about 8 years old. Built radios at 10 from scrapped TV set parts -Tubes! Had a biology menagerie in my room and went on specimen collecting trips at 12. Math award in high school. I would read the encyclopedia for fun and imagine being the great discoverer of a new truth like the scientists who’s biographies I read. Loved Geology field trips in College – still have, and cherish, my well worn rock hammer and feel pride remembering when I first learned the “knack” of opening a soda can with the pick end with a clean strike and no spillage 😉 in the days before “pop tops” … I could even make a large and small hole cleanly to the rim. Then discovered computers and Econometrics. Built an Altair Mits from a kit… (one of the first “personal computers ever). I’m about as much a Science Geek as you could ever find. I do chemistry for recreation and learned how to make a nuke because it was an interesting puzzle.
So you see why it pains me greatly to say that I discouraged my kids from looking to “science” as a career. But it was the right thing to do, given what the current “process” has become. They don’t need to spend their lives in backbiting and groveling for patronage. Maybe someday the system will be returned to it’s former glory. I’ve seen some folks with their honor and integrity intact, trying to push against the Diablo ex machina. I wish them well and hope they succeed, someday…
And folks wonder why America has so few folks entering Science and Engineering as career paths… Maybe because selling Wind Turbines to government subsidized farmers pays better, you get an expense account and a company car, and you don’t need to learn any of the stuff in ‘the hard classes’… Oh, and folks don’t turn away from you at parties when you say what you do for a living… “Stock Trader” gets far more positive attention than “Unix Programmer”, or worse, “Manager of Information Services” ever did.
Leif,
Thank you for the links, and thank you for your continuing contribution to WUWT.
Leif Svalgaard (23:36:58) :
But Leif, what IF the spots have warmed up before? reducing the numbers seen?
it can only be faculae that remains; the dark “spots” have warm to none exesistance
this paper is on track http://www.leif.org/research/Foukal-F107-Rz.pdf
but is not quite there.
this hard to type out for me lol
Thank you for your reply
Pamela Gray (20:20:43) : Leif, I am reminded of the life course Albert Einstein found himself on as he wrote his first major paper — as a patent clerk. Talk about a weird scientific process. His was all in his head! And he wasn’t even an employed scientist at that time.
And that, IMHO, is why sites like this are important. We, collectively, are doing Real Science. No grant groveling. No agenda driven research. Just a community of like minds, going where the data and discussion lead us. I have no doubt what so ever that if one of the folks here turned up unimpeachable proof and repeatable experimental validation that CO2 was causing warming, we’d accept it and move on in short order. I’m just as certain that if a causal mechanism for the Solar Angular Momentum Shiny Thing could be shown and experimentally tested as true, even Leif would be on board (perhaps after a long chunk of exhaustive confirmation 😉
That is how science ought to be, IMHO. The One Bright Light I see on the horizon for the future of the Science I loved, is public science done by volunteers communicating via the internet. Truth driven, truth seeking Community Science… how I imagine it was for Einstein, admiring his own particular Shiny Thing problem and worrying it until he found an answer worthy of his standards…
kim (18:31:24) :
Everyone come gather around the campfire
Put that bloody fire out! There’s a war on co2 dontcha know. 😉
anna v (00:18:23) :
Similarly it is expected that the apple is throwing gravitons at the earth and vice versa, except that gravity has not been quantized yet ( may be with string theories).
Is this partly because no-one has ever detected a graviton yet?
Leif – moments of epiphany.
Schweeet!
The process described above is fine once you have a handle on how to approach a problem.
There is a period before that where TOO MANY things are unknown for a logical process to work effectively.
Often a scientist’s career is noticing something by chance and seeing a way to use that to use the above process in a scientifically rigorous manner.
I was working years ago in cancer research. My PhD student was trying to make mice expressing a particular protein in the breast. We noticed, by chance, that we couldn’t generate any males carrying two copies of the gene. It was weird, but it led to a new area of research, which others continued to show that a particular protein was important for the implantation of embryos into the female mother’s uterus. Hardly logical that! But it’s how science sometimes works………
I met an aerospace engineer once who told me that his academic career, which started in his mid 40s, was predicated on an insight that all the key ‘beliefs’ held in a particular area of aerospace engineering were based on assumptions founded in the limitations of technology available in the 1930s. When he flipped the world upside down by questioning those, he opened up new areas of near-net-shape manufacturing technology. So understanding assumptions and questioning them is key for scientific revolution………
Finally, free association of ideas may be key. My father’s physics mentor won a Nobel Prize for confirming the existence of a key fundamental particle. His key experimental idea was to use thin photographic films in the upper atmosphere, then collect them and analyse the results. He designed his films by watching his wife doing the ironing, and realising that the way to generate the thin films would be using a similar sweep of an iron-like implement…….so the daily chores can sometimes be the inspiration for Eureka too, you know…….
Leif Svalgaard (20:01:48) : …. so the data ‘asks the question’….
Spot on – as ever… Thank you…
My more cynical view of the process comes from studying economics:
1) Find a data anomaly
2) Reverse engineer a formula to explain the anomaly
3) Cherry pick the data
4) Write a self-promoting article detailing your wonderful discovery
5) Mushroom manage the publication process i.e. keep in the dark and feed bullshit
6) Climb up the greasy pole to a position of power while you are “famous for fifteen minutes”
7) Suppress and subvert other wannabe researchers via the review process
8) Chase the money via sponsors, writing and media appearances
9) Consolidate your credentials and power
A problem not discussed is what politicians (or regulators) need from scientists. Quite properly, regulation regarding safely matters, is necessary – hence traffic lights and suchlike. However, on many other issues such as safe levels of exposure, the science is not clear at all. This presents problems because regulation does not admit to maybe’s or could be’s. Therefore, science, in which probability figures large is unacceptable and has been largely sidelined by such things as the “precautionary principle”. Unfortunately, scientists instead of banding together and refusing to suck up to the impossible demands of politicians and regulators (and of course the greens), have simply rolled over and done what they’ve been told to do.
FatBigot (20:56:37) : I hate to disagree with my friend Mr Leif [Svalgaard, 20:01:48], but I have to. Fat Bigot, that is a fascinating story of yours, it would be good to hear it properly.
But I agree with Leif, I think he has the principles exactly right regarding science in practice. And I’m sure Leif’s understanding of this rises out of his own eureka! moment that he describes so poignantly further on [21:28:03]. Thank you Leif for those enlightened and enlightening posts. My respect for you rises!
Another excellent story, “The Big Splash”, that clearly exemplifies Leif’s stages, is the discovery by Dr Louis A. Frank of “small comets” that are, apparently, bombarding the Earth’s atmosphere at the rate of around 20 small-house-size water comets every minute. This only amounts to a rise in sea level of one inch every 10,000 years, but over 4.5 billion years, that amounts to all the oceans. Dr Frank is a brilliant scientist and – as he says, and as his whole approach testifies – essentially conservative. He found an anomaly, dark spots on UV photographs from the 1981 Dynamic Explorer satellite. For several years he did all he could to explain it away. When that failed, he started looking at it as a phenomenon in its own right, that needed its own hypothesis. This involved painstaking background study. He found ways of testing the hypothesis. He eventually communicated his results – and even as an esteemed NASA scientist he was harshly repudiated. He worked overtime for years, investigating all the criticisms and challenges – some of which led to a deeper understanding of his hypothesis – but none led to the hypothesis being shown as inadequate. I believe that his theory is slowly coming to be recognized and accepted now. [Is this a possible post for you, some time, Anthony?]
Matt Bennett (21:39:25) :
David Holliday (19:15:47) :“Anyone who thinks a prediction based on a computer model is science is an idiot!”
And anyone who thinks AGW theory relies on computer models is
Well, it does.
It is just a fact, and reflects nothing on the person who observes it.
On Models
Now a person who believes a computer model does anything but automate the speed and complexity of error you can commit (so you can find out where you are wrong) simply does not understand the proper use of research models. Only after extensive testing can even the most simple model be used for prediction (and even then each prediction must be tested).
At one time in my life I ran a site that used one of the fastest supercomputers in the world to model a single plastic fluid inside a metal mold for fabricating a single part at controlled temperatures and pressures. We had great success, and about 1 in 10 ten runs gave us unexpected failures. Mold marks. Weld lines. Etc. So we had to test each “solution” before cutting the final production die sets and committing to volume.
A model informs your ignorance, it does not provide truth.
David Holliday is exactly right. A computer model can never tell you the scientific truth. It can tell you what it predicts so you can compare that with reality and then decide where the model is wrong, incomplete, unstable, or usable-though-limited and thus where to polish your understanding.
All AGW hypotheses are based on modeled temperature anomalies
At the very base of AGW theory is the temperature anomaly. That is based on codes, such as GIStemp (that I have shoved my brain through more than I care to consider…). These codes pretend to turn the temperature record into a model of anomalies and trends.
These codes are the very foundation, the “it is getting warmer” basis, and they are broken. They contain unfounded assertion, bald data manipulation, False Precision is the extreme, and several other flaws. See:
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/category/agw-and-gistemp-issues/
for several articles detailing these errors. (The latest two are more opinion pieces, so scroll back a bit in time…)
Now if you would like to assert that the AGW research does not use the temperatures and anomalies from NASA GIStemp and similar computer processing, I’d love to see your proof… Just show me what thermometers they use, accurate AND precise to 1/100th degree, evenly distributed over the surface of the earth and present for the last several thousand years and I’ll be happy to shut up and sit down.
But since they don’t exist (both spacial and temporal distribution are severely limited; and the accuracy of the data record was only recorded to whole degrees of F.) the “anomaly maps” are created to “fill in the gaps” with computer modeled fantasies… and these are extended out into the 1/100 of a degree where absolutely no history exists.
So you see, the very statement that a problem exists is based on computer models… You can not say “the earth warmed this year by 0.024 degrees” without accepting a computer model generated FANTASY. There is no record of data in USHCN or GHCN to that precision AND NONE CAN BE CREATED with it being False Precision and playing in the error band of a whole degree F temperature record.
The Oxymoron of “Scientific Concensus”
But of course, since I completely agree with the scientific consense, (which is not all that difficult to understand if you actually give it a go and leave the politics behind),
I don’t know how to break it to you, but “scientific consensus” is an oxymoron. Science proceeds from violation of consensus. Politics are based on consensus. Group think is based on consensus. Science is based on overturning consensus. But despite that, yes, I’ve read the work of “the consensus” and understand it. I also understand just how horridly it is broken. From the “raw” data right on up to the final leap of the cliff of conclusion…
I come to all of the AGW hypothesis with an open mind and NO political agenda. I frankly wish that it were true ( I’d make more money from carbon offset trading – uninhibited by feelings of fraud… and I would not have to spend a bunch of time and money preparing for the next 20 cold years.) But I must go where evidence clearly shows me truth is to be found. And that is not with the AGW hypothesis. They have explanations that are clear, simple, elegant, and wrong.
What Works, and What Must Work
I trade stocks, bonds, and commodities for a living. IFF the AGW thesis gave me a better prediction of wheat harvests, oil consumption, or insurance payouts, I’d jump on it in a heartbeat. I need to know, and need to be right about those things. And it does not matter one whit to me if it is warmer or colder or wetter or dryer or no change; it just needs to be right. AGW is not right. It does not give me correct predictions (or projections or whatever you want to call statements of the form “foo will happen in the future”.) EVERY SINGLE TIME the AGW hypothesis tells me what to expect, it is wrong. That costs me money. No food on the table.
That is not acceptable to me and it is the most important thing I care about.
Now consider the alternative: A prediction that it’s going to be cold in Canada and the wheat crop is going to have problems. Oh, and heating oil demand will go up. I could (and did) buy JJG (a grains futures note) and various oil stocks. I have done both and I have made money. Enough to pay my bills this month.
And that is all that matters. Truth, accuracy, honesty, and a theory that works; reliably and well. And AGW is none of those.
Read The Code, Luke!
Now I know I’m an odd duck. It is a pretty small part of the population that would go READ the computer source code for the temperature record / anomaly map creating process to assure that it was right; but that’s the kind of person I am. I can’t change that about me. And what I found was junk.
I’m not just a guy who dabbles in computer stuff. I’ve been employed professionally as a computer consultant for most of my professional life. I’ve managed teams of computer programmers and I’ve developed software products from first idea all the way to production ship (several times). I also have written code myself for many many years. I’m pretty good at this stuff. I can state, as a professional opinion that would literally stand up in court, that the base data product on which the AGW thesis rests is fundamentally and irretrievably broken; and that product is made via a complex of computer programs that would properly be called a ‘model’.
(The first half is not, it is a data integration / merge / standardize format step; though it does have an egregious shifting of the past temperatures via a fixed subtraction step that is, In My Professional Opinion, a fabrication of a false temperature bias in the past.
The second half is an anomaly creation step that makes assumptions about how a limited set of thermometers can be used to create fantom temperatures where there are none, then calculates “anomalies” based on these fantoms. That is a computer model of how temperatures are expected to behave over time and space; and it is wrong. Again, IMPO – In My PROFESSIONAL Opinion.)
So IS It Wrong to Believe in Building Models in the Sky?
it will be my post that is snipped
Haven’t been here long, have you. Here it is the crucible of truth that burns the hottest, not a censor. Unlike the AGW sites…
rather than the highly ridicule-filled rant above which calls into question the integrity of the work of many dedicted, honest people.
My my. Full of emotion and hate. Maybe you could learn to be centered, calm, non-judgmental, just look at the facts and not go leaping around in an indignant tizzy…
I’m sure most of the folks who believe the AGW mantra are all highly dedicated and honest. And also largely basing there work on a broken belief in something that is wrong.
I strongly believe in the mantra “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity”. It is not the fault of the person writing a paper of the form “Assuming AGW is true, this is what it will do to Bolivian Frogs” that AGW is a crock. It is the fault of depending on the premise.
Very few papers or centers actually look at the base data and theory. I’ve looked at lots of the papers. They mostly start from the AGW conclusion and look at projected results. Many just look at the theory and accept the “anomaly maps” as data. That is an error and does not impugn their honest nor their integrity: Just their thoroughness and competence.
But not everyone can read old crufty FORTRAN and render a professional opinion of the audit; so even then, I cut those folks some slack. But none of that makes the AGW hypothesis right… nor does it make the papers written based on that base right… nor does it make the papers written on THOSE papers as a base right. Etc. etc. etc. And yes, I worked my way down that stack of papers about papers about papers until I reached the base where the seeds of error were first planted. It took me a couple of years.
THAT was the moment I concluded AGW was bunk. Not before.
I suggest that you take that same journey, with an open mind, and see just what quicksand AGW is built upon…
In Closing
BTW, I strongly suggest that you NOT buy stocks or futures contracts until you let go of the AGW thesis; it will only lose you money… Insurance weather loses are down, not up. Coastal flooding is down, not up. Hurricane intensity is down, not up. Crop failures are up, not down. Heating oil demand is up, not down. And the U.S. Government is going to try to auction a few hundred $Billion of treasury notes to finance it’s AGW programs and that will drive the dollar down vs other currencies, not up; and bonds denominated in dollars are going to lose value in the next 2 years in a large way, not be safe… And yes, I’m betting substantial sums of money on those evaluations and I’m specifically betting against the AGW hypothesis – because that bet makes me money by being right.
It already paid the house payment this month 😉