The BBC posted a surprising story this past weekend that has skeptics cheering and alarmists hopping mad.
Here’s the opener:
This headline may come as a bit of a surprise, so too might that fact that the warmest year recorded globally was not in 2008 or 2007, but in 1998.
The headline?
What happened to global warming?
By Paul Hudson
Climate correspondent, BBC News
This headline may come as a bit of a surprise, so too might that fact that the warmest year recorded globally was not in 2008 or 2007, but in 1998.
But it is true. For the last 11 years we have not observed any increase in global temperatures.
And our climate models did not forecast it, even though man-made carbon dioxide, the gas thought to be responsible for warming our planet, has continued to rise.
So what on Earth is going on?
Climate change sceptics, who passionately and consistently argue that man’s influence on our climate is overstated, say they saw it coming.
They argue that there are natural cycles, over which we have no control, that dictate how warm the planet is. But what is the evidence for this?
During the last few decades of the 20th Century, our planet did warm quickly.
Sceptics argue that the warming we observed was down to the energy from the Sun increasing. After all 98% of the Earth’s warmth comes from the Sun.
But research conducted two years ago, and published by the Royal Society, seemed to rule out solar influences.
The scientists’ main approach was simple: to look at solar output and cosmic ray intensity over the last 30-40 years, and compare those trends with the graph for global average surface temperature.
And the results were clear. “Warming in the last 20 to 40 years can’t have been caused by solar activity,” said Dr Piers Forster from Leeds University, a leading contributor to this year’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
But one solar scientist Piers Corbyn from Weatheraction, a company specialising in long range weather forecasting, disagrees.
He claims that solar charged particles impact us far more than is currently accepted, so much so he says that they are almost entirely responsible for what happens to global temperatures.
He is so excited by what he has discovered that he plans to tell the international scientific community at a conference in London at the end of the month.
If proved correct, this could revolutionise the whole subject.
Read the complete story here at the BBC
RR Kampen:
“…I wouldn’t be able to prove to you that it is an irrational number.”
I defer to you on all things irrational. You’re the expert. [BTW, I see that you dodged the question of censoring by the “better” alarmist blogs.]
matt v., enlighten me. Explain to me the dynamics of the relevant natural cycle(s). As long as you cannot, I will have to remain in my interpretation of ‘natural cycle’ as being a somewhat religious concept!
Smokey, I didn’t dodge, I’m just waiting for a rephrase. I wasn’t speaking about ‘alarmist blogs’ but about ordinary weather/climate fora where professionals and amateurs discuss weather, climate and climate change. There is a couple of real skeptics there too and they remain very welcome, because they enlighten the discussion with real arguments and insights and point out real problems with the AGW-hypothesis. They are not the kind that tells us ‘the earth is cooling down’ over and over again without being able to corroborate that statement with anything.
[snip] skepticism is dissent where discussion and science starts. Dissent is not an end, it is a beginning. This is the one great way to distinguish between real skeptics and flat (un-)believers (you know, the people who still try to quadrature the circle), who I suspect are not really interested in climate mechanics at all.
RR Kampen (04:23:51) :
Re: David Ball (12:26:14) :
Much dissent against AGW has not been muzzled, but dismissed because the arguments are bad.
How then to explain the near total silence on subject of Antarctic ice growth across the satellite record? Here we have the accumulation of 80% of Earth’s fresh water and 90% of Earth’s ice – and the satellite record showing ice growth of about 5% since measurement began. Surely this is a reasonable (not bad) argument to question how AGW can be the main cause of global ice melt. Even NASA experts are perplexed:
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/antarctic_melting.html
Yet no discussion from “climate scientists” in the main stream media. No videos balancing the drowning polar bear scenarios. No open debate with skeptics and alarmists in the public forum. Is it not obvious why? Because the news of Antarctic ice expansion does not fit the global warming message. Thus suppression of knowledge in the interest of a political agenda. In the coming months as more is revealed of these tactics – the alarmist will be asked to explain their actions.
And it will not be a pretty sight.
RR KAMPEN
Austria’s provincial capitals are expected to see their earliest snowfalls in history this week as Arctic air sweeps the country and Germany. Sooner or later similar events will take place in your neck of the woods. When AMO, NAO,ENSO/La Nina all turn cool, they will enlighten you about their nature . You were probably too young when they all were last cool together.
RR Kampen
“I will have to remain in my interpretation of ‘natural cycle’ as being a somewhat religious concept”
So you would categorise the Atlantic Multidecadal osscillation, the ENSO, the PDO, the Interdecadal Pacific osscillation, the Arctic osscillation, the north Atlantic and North Pacific osscillations, the sunspot cycles, the Milankovich cycles (does the earth in fact orbit the sun at all?) the ice ages and interglacials, all as religious concepts?
How do you react to the exposure of the selective use of Yamal tree ring data by Briffa et al. to not only flip up the hockey stick in the last 2-3 decades largely thanks to a single tree, but also a curious editing out of datapoints during the MWP. The aim that is clear to all is to force the climate record to become like your own dear homeland – flat.
In referring to your own conversion from sun-worship to AGW you are putting
up a straw man – not many scientists on this site advocate a dominating role for the sun any more than for CO2 – both are similar errors in fact. See the posts by Lief Svalgaard for instance. In this respect your use of the term “climate mechanics” is instructive. Simple mechanical systems can be simply controlled by one or a few factors. The consensus developing on this site is that non-linear non-equilibrium dynamics are dominant in climate cycling, so that internally generated cycling from complex systems (complex in a fundamental sense, not just meaning “there’s lots of things in it”) does not have to appeal to some dominant driving factor in order to be accepted from evidence as real.
The confusion of others on this site on this point is quite amusing – “we cant really believe in changes because we cant find a single hero factor obviously driving the change”.
It seems to me bizzare to propose that the climate timeline of a planet like earth or any other should be assumed by default to be Netherlands-like flat. On the contrary, understanding of dynamically chaotic oscillating systems would lead to the opposite assumption – even in the (hypothetical) absence of evidence – to expect cycling over all timescales as normal. (How can you be Dutch and against cycling 🙂 ?? )
The colder it gets, the more of this we will see.
Good on the BBC for starting to ask sane questions.
And it is getting colder, and accelerating as we have the time lags from the PDO flip wear down.
As I type this I’m watching it rain out back. Not the occasional sprinkles we get this time of year, a full on gully washer. Frog strangler. Fish drowner. This is the full on winter storm that usually comes about a month from now.
And this is not just local weather. It is part of a shift of the PDO back to the “cold phase” and all that it brings with it. The whole northern plains are getting cold. We won’t even talk about Denver and the game…
I have a very vague memory of about 1/2 century ago when I was a wee lad and sitting in the car as Dad drove us up to see the “big snow” at Tahoe. It was a record snow year (something like 18 feet of snow where we stopped, and has been more like 4 to 7 feet since). I remember looking out the car windows UP to the top of the channel plowed through the snow. Every year since that I’ve driven up that road, I remember that visage and wonder if it would ever return.
There is something about the weather this year that reminds me of then.
I can’t quite place it, but I remember a something that feels similar. An edginess. The early rains. The “something is coming” and you ought to be going feeling.
Now I have no idea if we will get record setting snow in the Sierra this particular year or if it will take a couple; but I can say that ‘the something’ feels like it did a very long time ago and like I’ve not felt it since.
RR Kampen (04:23:51) “Warming in Holland is outside of natural variation and that is statistically provable. I mean by this an even stronger situation than ’statistically significant’.”
This claim is based on untenable assumptions.
–
RR Kampen (04:23:51) “[…] simply impossible until say 1988.”
See here:
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/CumuSumAO70.png
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/CumuSumDJFM_NAM.png [NAM = Northern Annular Mode]
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/CumuSumDJFMwinterNAO.png
Annular Modes Website:
http://ao.atmos.colostate.edu/
particularly:
http://ao.atmos.colostate.edu/introduction.html
I encourage you to dig into the (short-list) of references (at the bottom) here:
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/DRAFT_VaughanPL2009CO_TPM_SSD_LNC.htm
–
RR Kampen “I learnt here about the AMO and temperature of the Barentzsea (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/10/08/new-paper-barents-sea-temperature-correlated-to-the-amo-as-much-as-4%C2%B0c/), which has had considerable consequences for my thinking about the decline of Arctic sea ice.”
We had a healthy exchange here:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/09/17/nsidc-still-pushing-ice-free-arctic-summers/
[For example, see where the comment of Dave Wendt (23:22:02) led the discussion.]
The following provides many interesting leads:
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/RS_Arctic.htm
Also, see here …
Tisdale, B. (2009). A Closer Look At The ERSST.v3b Southern Ocean Data. http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/04/closer-look-at-ersstv3b-southern-ocean.html
… in conjunction with …
Sidorenkov, N.S. (2005). Physics of the Earth’s rotation instabilities. Astronomical and Astrophysical Transactions 24(5), 425-439.
http://images.astronet.ru/pubd/2008/09/28/0001230882/425-439.pdf
… and with the works of Yu.V. Barkin.
RR Kampen, you showed me a graph dating back 100 years. The records you claim show “hockey-stick” show nothing of the kind. The warming started long before the industrial revolution, and this is the inconvenient truth you choose to ignore. You have consistently been slaughtered over and over in your arguments and yet maintain the same position. Scott Mandia, Joel Shore, ajones, have all been handed their hat and yet refuse to accept that their theory of Co2 driven climate is hollow. Who are the real deniers here? Very sad.
David Ball
I do not know why you imply I support the theory that CO2 has any significant effect on climate. I suggest your read my postings here and elsewhere more carefully.
Kindest Regards
It’s true, a jones doesn’t belong with those alarmists.
Thank you Smokey
Kindest Regards
Apologies to a jones, sorry mate !!
RR Kampen never did answer my question anyway.
I mistook your post regarding cherry picking on Pielke Jr’s site as a criticism. If you reread it , you might see how I misinterpreted.
David Ball.
No problem. I know a great deal about statistical analysis and am constantly amazed at how the AGW crowd abuse it, sometimes perhaps from mere ignorance, many seem to lack basic mathematical education, but again sometimes through what can only be called deceit or even malice.
Lies, damned lies and statistics.
But the article referred to, which Lucia has also examined, see her board which takes these things more seriously than I do, is such a delightful expose of the stupidity of trying to get some great long term import out of essentially meaningless short term data that it had me rolling in the aisles.
Kindest Regards
Thank you for accepting my apology. I followed the battle between Lucia and Tamino. It was amazing. The resultant banning from Tamino’s site reinforces the question I posed to RRKampen regarding the need for proponents of AGW to silence those who raise cogent questions regarding all aspects of the science. I truly wish I could spend a lot more time following all the great skeptic sites and postings. I joke that I have cut back and I am only working half days now. 12 hours instead of 24!!! 8^] All the best to you , …. Dave
Re: David Ball (17:56:56) :
RR Kampen, you showed me a graph dating back 100 years.
You can find some more records yourself. I am not doing it for you because I will be accused of ‘cherry picking’ no matter what. Do you understand and accept this?
The records you claim show “hockey-stick” show nothing of the kind.
Of course they do. That’s actually why there is so much talk about climate change.
Here’s another graph: http://nlweer.com/png/DeBiltJaarJDTgraf.png . 2007 is ex aequo 2006, 2008 was top ten at +10.6 and this year is running a little warmer again. The top nineteen of warmest years are all 1988 or after. That’s hockeystick. If you go back in our record until 1706, the stick just gets longer.
The warming started long before the industrial revolution, and this is the inconvenient truth you choose to ignore.
Of course I don’t. And the other inconvenient truth I quit ignoring (remember I’d have preferred ice age if any change) is the fact that by far most of the warming happened since 1900, and most of that after 1980. See the graph. See the physical effects on Dutch nature and agriculture if you wish to think that warming cannot be measured by the one thing it can be measured with: thermometers.
You have consistently been slaughtered over and over in your arguments and yet maintain the same position.
If you find a contradiction, check your hypotheses. You will invariably find at least one of them to be false. Some people here have slaughtered frantically with knives made of wet toiletpaper. Shout but no substance at all.
: E.M.Smith (12:31:27) :
The colder it gets, the more of this we will see.
Quite so!
And it is getting colder, and accelerating as we have the time lags from the PDO flip wear down.
So how do you explain the fact it’s getting warmer as of July, with September already second place again? Are you holding graphs upside down??
Re: Phlogiston (11:12:10) :
How do you react to the exposure of the selective use of Yamal tree ring data by Briffa et al. to not only flip up the hockey stick in the last 2-3 decades largely thanks to a single tree, but also a curious editing out of datapoints during the MWP. The aim that is clear to all is to force the climate record to become like your own dear homeland – flat.
—
Hoax.
References:
1. http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/09/hey-ya-mal/
2. http://rabett.blogspot.com/2009/10/read-effing-editorial-guidelines.html
Politics: Bush dumped this EPA-report, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/13/AR2009101303897.html .
Author: matt v.
Comment:
RR KAMPEN
Austria’s provincial capitals are expected to see their earliest snowfalls in history this week as Arctic air sweeps the country and Germany.
Let’s check.
First, Austria had an incredibly hot summer and autumn (again), so some snow would be nice again… E.g. http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/global_monitoring/temperature/tn11147_90.gif .
Second, I can find no reference to ‘record early snow’ in Austria. I can find some places reporting more early oktober snow than in 25 years, Seefeld 37 years – but those are not records, of course. Look at Septembers for them.
Records are more like this: http://www.zamg.ac.at/aktuell/index.php?seite=1&artikel=ZAMG_2009-10-09GMT05:32
Or better still: http://www.abendblatt.de/vermischtes/article1221353/Oktoberrekord-mit-fast-31-Grad.html#reqRSS .
I understand and accept that you cannot back up your claims that all the warming has been recent. We are currently at the tail end of a warming cycle, do you understand and accept this. Rabbet and realclimate are not good reference sources at all. Have read anything on this site?
“Rabbet and realclimate are not good reference sources at all.” – In fact, they are quite excellent. Good arguments, very well documented and referenced. Perhaps the problem is that they do see the reality?
There may be cycles; superimposed on them is the increased ‘greenhouse’-effect by increasing [CO2]. This has become the dominant driver of global temperature. That is why 2007 and 2008 did not end up in the ten percent coolest years since 1900, but in the top ten warmest. Downward turn of cycle will not keep 2010 out of medal position, mark my words.
Of course, even if the years 2010-2020 become succesively hotter starting at a temperature over that of 1998, some of you have already found a safety measure for that duration. Saw a citation of an article sporting a ten year lag between solar variability and global temperature response, that will do…
2007 and 2008 are much better evidence for GW than the unique year 1998. That year cannot be used to establish a change for the past decade or so, it is a cherry pick year! Use 1999 for a starting point and find 2005 to be the warmest: without a strong Niño.
Looks like a real life debate has broken out on a BBC (Hudson’s)Blog.
Judging from some of the comments it looks like Real Climate wacko’s are wading in – maybe time for a bit of evening up the numbers?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/paulhudson/2009/10/a-few-points-about-my-article.shtml#comments
“Good arguments, very well documented and referenced. ”
Because all comments pointing out the holes in their arguments and showing that their data is faked are scrupulously censored. As this cooling trend continues it won’t be possible to cherry-pick a rising trend up to today’s data. Looking forward to the skating this winter?
Remko, I acknowledge your De Bilt hockey stick blade, but I don’t make the assumption you make about its causes.
As I’ve shown (via links to graphs) upthread, NAM flipped tendency in 1988. I’ll share a little more.
Note the time on the following graph when LNC/3 slid into anti-phase with |Pr’|:
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/Phase_Pr._LNC.png
Note the corresponding breakdown in co-trending here:
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/-LOD_aa_Pr._r.._LNC.png
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/-LOD_aa_Pr._r.._LNC_Env_MorletPi.png
(This is a sign that other harmonics need to be considered.)
You may also be aware that we are currently very close to the extremum of a 205 year cycle. (graph available here: http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/DRAFT_VaughanPL2009CO_TPM_SSD_LNC.htm )
1998 was not some ‘fluke’ year. According to Barkin, it was a year in which Earth’s shells “galloped” relative to one another. I think you need to reconsider the following:
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/CumuSumGLAAM.png
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/CumuSumPDO(76,88,98).png
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/CumuSum(-SOI).png
I also think you will benefit from extending your view to other regions and thinking about inter-hemispheric oscillations:
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/04/closer-look-at-ersstv3b-southern-ocean.html
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/CumuSumSAM.png
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/CumuSumAO1899.png
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/CumuSumJFM_AO1850.png
http://www.sfu.ca/~plv/PWP&LOD2.png
Please clarify: On your graph I see “J-D”; does that mean “January-December”?
http://nlweer.com/png/DeBiltJaarJDTgraf.png
Regards,
Paul.