The great thing about old magazines is that once published, they can’t be adjusted. Jo Nova has a great summary of some recent work from occasional WUWT contributor Frank Lansner who runs the blog “Hide the Decline” and what he found in an old National Geographic, which bears repeating here. – Anthony
Human emissions of carbon dioxide began a sharp rise from 1945. But, temperatures, it seems, may have plummeted over half the globe during the next few decades. Just how large or how insignificant was that decline?
Frank Lansner has found an historical graph of northern hemisphere temperatures from the mid 70’s, and it shows a serious decline in temperatures from 1940 to 1975. It’s a decline so large that it wipes out the gains made in the first half of the century, and brings temperatures right back to what they were circa 1910. The graph was not peer reviewed, but presumably it was based on the best information available at the time. In any case, if all the global records are not available to check, it’s impossible to know how accurate or not this graph is.
The decline apparently recorded was a whopping 0.5°C.
But, three decades later, by the time Brohan and the CRU graphed temperatures in 2006 from the same old time period, the data had been adjusted (surprise), so that what was a fall of 0.5°C had become just a drop of 0.15°C. Seventy percent of the cooling was gone.
Maybe they had good reasons for making these adjustments. But, as usual, the adjustments were in favor of the Big Scare Campaign, and the reasons and the original data are not easy to find.
Above: Matthews 1976, National Geographic, Temperatures 1880-1976
Now compare the 1935-1975 decline for the same area – the entire Northern hemisphere – presented by CRU/Brohan 2006:
Source: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/science/monitoring/CR_data/Monthly/HadCRUGNS_3plots.gif
And when the old and the new are overlaid…hey where’s the decline?
Above: The blue line is the adjusted CRU average from 2006, overlaid on the 1976 Nat Geo graph.
If temperature sets across the northern hemisphere were really showing that 1940 was as hot as 2000, that makes it hard to argue that the global warming that occurred from 1975 to 2000 was almost solely due to carbon, since it wasn’t unusual (at least not for half the globe), and didn’t correlate at all with our carbon emissions, the vast majority of which occurred after 1945.
The US records show that the 1930’s were as hot as the 1990’s. And the divergence problem in tree rings is well known. Many tree rings showed a decline after 1960 that didn’t “concur” with the surface records. Perhaps these tree rings agree with the surface records as recorded at the time, rather than as adjusted post hoc? Perhaps the decline in the tree rings that Phil Jones worked to hide was not so much a divergence from reality, but instead was slightly more real than the surface-UHI-cherry-picked-and-poorly-sited records?
Esper – Tree ring widths declined from 1940-1975. Records after 1960 are sometimes ignored because they don’t fit the “temperature record”. (All timeseries were normalized over the 1881–1940 period. RCS, regional curve standardization; TRW, tree-ring width.) Thanks to ClimateAudit. (Link below)
Steven McIntyre discusses the Esper data here.
Frank Lansner also discusses the data from Scandinavia, which originally showed that temperatures were roughly level from mid-century to the end of the century, but that the large decline from 1940 to 1975 was…adjusted out of existence. (My post on that here).
Scandinavian Temperatures: 25 data series combined from The Nordklim database (left), compared to the IPCC’s temperature graph for the area.
Frank points out that while the older graph is not peer reviewed, the modern data sets are also not peer reviewed, so even if the papers they are published in are peer reviewed, it’s meaningless to claim this is significant when the underlying data can be adjusted years after its collection without documentation or review.
The CRU has an FAQ on their datasets, and it includes this comment on the accuracy of the hemispheric records:
In the hemispheric files averages are now given to a precision of three decimal places to enable seasonal values to be calculated to ±0.01°C. The extra precision implies no greater accuracy than two decimal places.
Do I read that correctly? After an adjustment that may be in the order of 0.34°C, the accuracy is ±0.01°C?
At the time when there was a Global Ice Age Scare, this graph appeared in Newsweek.
Newsweek: Global Temperatures 1880-1970 (NCAR)
Either 70% of the decline has been hidden in the years since then, or the climate scientists at the time were exaggerating the decline in order to support the Ice Age Scare (surely not!).
Full references available on Frank Lansner’s & Nicolai Skjoldby’s Blog. Stanley is derived from an NAS document. Mathews from National Geographic.
Thanks to Frank for his good work.
Brohan 2006 is linked here, with a pdf.
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Even if you reworded this into “attempting to assemble a proper dataset” it would be too kind. Are you just trying to find something nice to say about someone who needs to be put out to pasture?
Jones’ and Hansen’s works do not hold up well to scrutiny. What good are datasets of adjusted data, without the original data and extensive notes to justify all their modifications? Should professionals be complimented for slip-shod work that doesn’t come close to meeting professional standards?
wolfwalker (20:15:50) :
There is a simple, obvious explanation: the data from the National Geographic article was collected using older, less accurate instruments.
What evidence do you have that this explanation is wrong?
(Note that I am not arguing this explanation is right. I am offering it as a hypothesis and asking you to disprove it.)
Since when is it anyone’s job to disprove a hypothesis? Here is a hypothesis that I want you to disprove. God exists in a dimension that allows him to see all and know all and live forever. So please disprove this. Now for a more science based theory, quarks are actually made up of tiny energy particles called niseies. Please disprove this.
Theory is just that, a guess now I can provide evidence to ‘PROVE’ my theory. But all it is is proof that a theory is correct. Anytime someone says disprove a theory they are talking, in my opinion, about science incorrectly. You may show that evidence does not support a theory thus rendering the logic that says a theory is correct in disarray but even then it is not disproving the ‘theory’
Just my thoughts on that.
Gee that first chart looks a little familiar. Take a peek a http://justdata.wordpress.com/ and scroll down to the 7th chart. Try overlying that on the first chart of this posting.
And the data for Eugene Zeien’s analysis is from NCDC (GHCN), done with a relatively simple statistical method. WUWT??
Turns out I still have an old Encyclopaedia Brittanica printed in 1974. Their temperature graphs end in 1960, and are broken up by latitude. They show a CLEAR decline in temperature from 1950 to 1960 that echoes National Geographic 1976. I scanned it and put it here:
http://knowledgedrift.wordpress.com/2010/03/17/national-geographic-1976-brittanica-1974/
Re: D. Patterson (Mar 17 04:45),
Yes, you could get current data from the major sites without difficulty. But data from decades ago was only available on written records, widely dispersed.
And Rod Smith, again you’re describing the handling of current air force data. I’m talking about historic, distributed data.
Re: rickM (Mar 17 07:45),
There’s no issue that the data Hansen and Jones use existed then. I’m just talking about the fact that in 1975 only a small subset could have been assembled for a graph like this. And Steve Milesworthy has now verified this. It was “a group of stations in Europe and America with the longest-period series of observations”.
Nick Stokes (13:48:16) :
For which periods and locations?
“Where’s the decline?” this post asks? Well, you can see it in the GISS US record. because, as Steve Milesworthy (Mar 17 10:58) found, this plot is based on US and European stations. And the US temps did decline in the ’60s. The CRU global temps shown in the head plot are something quite different.
Re: D. Patterson (Mar 17 13:56),
For which periods and locations?
I’m not sure what you’re referring to. But if it’s the major Australian sites, certainly the state observatories had three-hour observations going back some time, available digitised. And probably the major airports, including Defence (it’s a while back now, and I don’t remember all details). But my job was to try to assemble gridded data for the whole of Australia.
Fortunately the BoM had undertaken a very recent effort to collect and digitise (and QA) the handwritten rural data. But that was 1979, and very recent – in fact, it was only partly complete.
Re: Nick Stokes (Mar 17 13:59),
Broken link – here is the GISS US record.
@Smokey
> By putting quotation marks around the term skeptics you show disdain for the scientific method.
No, I show disdain for those that abuse the term beyond recognition. Those that credulously accept obviously flawed material because it fits their biases and – rather than respond to substantive critical points – instead handwave and pontificate.
> When has that been done by the current crop of climate scientists? Cite names and examples, please.
Would a skeptic choose to change the subject and ask a diversionary question, or would a skeptic be more likely to doggedly pursue the subject at hand until their curiosity for the truth of the matter was satisfied?
As I (and others) have said, you’re comparing two entirely different things. A smoothed plot of the ’70s using the data available now, and an unsmoothed plot based on a subset of that data that was available at the time, covering a smaller proportion of the Earth’s surface. And you’re comparing that *visually*.
Would a skeptic not enquire about these things? You haven’t – you’ve just got on your soapbox and lambasted scientists in baseless and unfounded terms.
Odd that the 1975 temperatures lie outside of the confidence interval of the CRU graph. LOL.
Dave (14:13:40)
You have perfectly described the CRU.
“Would a skeptic not enquire about these things?”
That is up to the particular scientific skeptic. Skeptics inquire about a lot of things. But they’re blown off. Then they use the FOI process — and the CRU kisses up to the local FOI officer, and the data, methods and code requested remain stonewalled, until time runs out.
When the alarmist crowd decides to honestly follow the scientific method, instead of treating skeptics like the enemy… wake me. Because that will be the day their preposterous runaway AGW conjecture gets completely falsified to the point that even the NY Times will have to admit it’s been debunked.
They’re certainly not keeping the hidden data and methods secret because it would prove them right; they’re hiding them because opening the books would decisively falsify CAGW. The climategate emails already showed that to be the case, when Jones stated that he would destroy the data before turning it over to skeptics. And Jones isn’t out of a job for being excessively honest.
Dave (07:58:39) :
Thanks, that was great insight. Apparently to be a “skeptic”, one needs to be incredibly condescending, avoid responding to substantive points about a specific claim while waving ones hands and pointing at some vague holistic approach to evidence, and then throw in a few cracks about anyone that disagrees with you being closed-minded or unable to think for themselves.
It seems querying methodology and looking for simple explanations is frowned upon by “skeptics” – clearly a true “skeptic” accepts simplistic analyses such as this one without a second thought.
Who’d have thought.
It appears to me your first paragraph somewhat covers your original post. A little projection perhaps. Your second paragraph is a contradiction that makes no sense.
A question for climate science: Why would data for northern hemisphere be inferior to whole-globe data for evaluating CO2 forcing of climate change?
1. Is there not partial isolation of the northern from the southern hemisphere atmosphere? Most weather systems stay on one side of the equator or the other, and ocean currents can only bring heat energy equilibium across the equator over years and decades.
2. In the last hundred years, and still true today, there has been far greater human CO2 emission in the northern hemisphere.
3. So if there is a signal amidst the climate noise that indicates that human generated CO2 is changing the climate, it ought to be more apparent in the northern hemisphere.
Yet some in the thread above seem to argue that the 1940-1970’s cooling trend was mostly in the northern hemisphere, and should be discounted as evidence against AGW.
It would make more sense to argue that in the 1940 to 1970’s the massive industrialization of the northern hemisphere was pumping aerosols into the atmosphere, differentially affecting the climates (north vs south) and then the clean air movement of the 1970’s reversed the trend. Aerosols declined and the North then disproportionately warmed. At least this would roughly fit the real data and make sense.
I didn’t get the memo about me having to let you know whether or not I accept this.
BTW William Connolley has a better (well, bigger anyway!) reproduction here http://www.wmconnolley.org.uk/sci/iceage/DSCN1557-nat-geog-1976_1200x900.JPG
Squinting, it seems the graph credit is ‘Graphs by William, H Bond National Geographic Art ‘. Now there was a staff illustrator/Artist at NG named William H Bond
http://www.postalmuseum.si.edu/artofthestamp/SubPage%20table%20images/artwork/Artist%20Bios/williambond.htm
so a reasonable deduction is that these graphs were hand drawn.
REPLY: Gosh, hand drawn. Why, that’s terrible. How could anything hand drawn and not coming out of a computer be of any value? /sarc Of course it is hand drawn. Computer plotting wasn’t around much in 1976 and when it was, it was typically x-y pen plotter output. The fact that it is hand drawn doesn’t detract. Welcome to the light by the way Mr. Clarke. -A
“The decline apparently recorded was a whopping 0.5°C.”
Let’s be careful not to tell whoppers like the warmists. The 0.5 on either side does not deserve the ‘whopping’ label; it’s all within the bounds of natural variation.
Try Bureau of meteorology Australia for unadulterated version still on current website with cooling weel shown! Worth a new topic!
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/global/timeseries.cgi?graph=global_t®ion=global&season=0112&ave_yr=4
Cheers Ian
Nick Stokes (13:48:16) : “And Rod Smith, again you’re describing the handling of current air force data. I’m talking about historic, distributed data.”
NO, no, no. I was talking about the world’s weather data in any shape or form as coded anywhere near WMO standards. And I was talking about conditions in 1971, some 39 years ago this fall. I’m not sure what “historic distributed data” even means. I suspect you mean “distribution of” data rather than “distributed” data.
I was in error in my quoted 77 circuit count. That was mis-keyed – sorry – and I think we had 37 circuits, each dual terminated in paired, CTMC’s.
As to Australian data, I was charged with collection of that when I was running USAF weather editing/collection site in the Philippines in the mid 60’s. I believe we might have collected some of it via radio intercept and some directly from an RAAF relay in Changi, Singapore, but that was a long time ago so I may be mistaken. I do not have any recollection that AU data was not reasonably timely. I do remember that Australia provided my only link to Swan Island, Victoria, about 38S and 145E (kind of in the boondocks). I remember always looking for the Swan Island reports to gauge the days report efficiency from Australia. If I got it then the rest of AU data was very likely reasonably complete.
I can’t speak to your problems of collecting data, but Australia was the least of my problem areas.
Ok, here’s something you don’t see a lot of:
Red Bluff, CA raw –
http://www.robertb.darkhorizons.org/TempGr/RedBluff.GIF
Contrasted to GISS –
http://gallery.surfacestations.org/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=1208&g2_serialNumber=2
And the uglier than previously imagined airport site –
http://gallery.surfacestations.org/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=1161&g2_serialNumber=4
So, why is there no warming in Red Bluff’s raw data?
a.) Oops – we forgot to apply monster mash formula to raw data
b.) UHI is dead in Dead Bluff, Ca
c.) It’s already naturally suffocated being at the end of the Sacramento Valley
Option (c) seems the more likely case. There may be a dome of CO2 in Red Bluff, but then there’s already no natual circulation…the place is pegged from the start.
Which brings up a question: Is there an upper limit to UHI?
Because if there is, the cities are already as warm as they can be. They will cool as the climate cools when the climate decides to cool.
You can’t have runaway AGW if there’s an upper limit to UHI.
Phil Clarke (15:22:49) :
“Hand Drawn”
Steve Hempell (13:16:50) :
I case nobody noticed, the aforementioned graph by Eugene is a very close match to the National Geographic chart for the period ~1900 to 1976
Eugene’s chart is computer generated, using the very latest graphic/statistical software generated by an undoubtedly up to date statistical software program using the very latest NCDC (GHCN) raw data. sarc/off
Sorry, but the stuff put out by GISS/CRU/Hadley ad nauseum is looking less and less credible by the day.
@Smokey
> You have perfectly described the CRU.
Or: “I’m rubber, and you’re glue”. The rest of your message is more uninteresting evidence-free pontificating. Wake me when you’re prepared to question or defend the substance of this post.
@richard M
> It appears to me your first paragraph somewhat covers your original post.
Interesting – that also seems to translate as “I’m rubber and you’re glue”. I sense a theme emerging.
> Your second paragraph is a contradiction that makes no sense.
Explain how. There is a qualitative difference between “simple” and “simplistic”.
And again, wake me when you’re prepared to discuss the criticism of this post.
A very similar position was advanced in an article by Hubert H. Lamb (then Director of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia) which was published in the August/September 1973 issue of Unesco Courier magazine. The article entitled “Is the Earth’s Climate Changing ?” brings in many strands of evidence to support the overall conclusion that “For the past 30 years the temperature of our planet has been steadily dropping.” These strands of evidence include measurements of sea ice are and thickness and length of growing season, in addition to the “Computations in the United States from surface temperature observations all over the world”.
Since scientific skeptics have nothing to either prove or defend, the burden is entirely on the alarmist crowd to defend CRUs rewriting of history.
The CRU credulously accepted obviously flawed data – when they could even find it – because such data fit their biases. Rather than respond to skeptical criticism, they corrupted the FOIA officer so information requests could safely be ignored. Now they have gone further, into historical revisionism.
The evidence for those facts is in this article, and also here: click
And the evidence for the pathological science practiced by the climate alarmist crowd is here: click. [The alarmist contingent is currently between #5 – #6, having predictably gone through each prior step in order.] Catastrophic AGW/runaway global warming has taken four or five torpedoes; it’s going down.
It is unfortunate that due to ignorance of the scientific method, it must be repeatedly pointed out that scientific skeptics have nothing to prove. Promoters of the CAGW hypothesis have the burden of showing that CAGW explains reality better than the current theory which, as Dr Roy Spencer explains, is the long accepted theory of natural climate variability.
The present global climate is, in fact, well within its long term historical parameters — which do not suddenly begin in 1979. There are verifiable historical records of the warmer MWP and the much colder LIA. Nothing unusual is occurring. Any small effect of CO2 is swamped by other climate effects. Otherwise, the one-third increase in CO2 since the mid-1800s would be causing a steady, measurable rise in global warming, rather than a reversion to the mean temperature rise since the LIA: click
We are fortunate to be living in a historically warm period, with sufficient carbon dioxide to provide for the accelerated growth of crops necessary to feed the population.
The fact that alarmists feel the need to re-write the decline shows that they do not have the evidence required to support their falsified CAGW hypothesis.
Lacking real world evidence, the CAGW hypothesis then becomes simply a conjecture, unable to make reliable and accurate predictions, and unable to show that the current climate is outside the parameters of natural variability.
Re: rbateman (Mar 17 16:52),
I notice the annotation to your airport picture says it has been photoshopped. What is the point of such a picture?