I thought this might be an April fools joke. It isn’t. I therefore preface it with this maxim:
Climate doesn’t kill people, weather does. – Anthony
from BNET By Chris Morrison | Apr 1, 2010
If Global Warming Kills Us, Blame the Weatherman
Who do Americans trust more than any other type of media personality? The weatherman. Sometimes formally trained meteorologists, sometimes not, our news station weathercasters nevertheless command more attention than other journalists; for local news stations, the weather report is very often the most popular segment.
And over the years, the reliability of meteorologists has improved significantly; next-day forecasts, at the very least, are pretty reliable. But a new study says that weathercasters are reaching much further into the future with their reporting. According to George Mason University’s Center for Climate Change Communication, some 87 percent of weathercasters also talk publicly about climate change.
As you might gather from its name, the Center would be happy with that number if weathercasters also generally believed in climate change — specifically, anthropogenically-caused global warming. But for the most part, they don’t. Another majority, 63 percent, told George Mason that global warming mostly stems from natural causes, while 27 percent called the entire theory of global warming a “scam”.
The problem, for George Mason (and me; I should note here that I generally accept AGW) is that modern meteorologists combine two qualities: the first is that they’re one of the most skeptical scientific groups toward climate change, following only oil and gas geologists; the second is that they’re probably America’s most visible scientists, by a long shot.
See the rest here: If Global Warming Kills Us, Blame the Weatherman
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DirkH (12:47:07) :
Again and again the idea pops up that it’s as easy to prognosticate what the entire planet is doing in 100 years than what a certain region will have for weather in 3 days.
I don’t know, i absolutely have no clue whoever had that idea in the first place, and i don’t know by now how it can be defended. I haven’t seen a good defense of this completely unfounded, crazy idea.
I think the idea stems from observing other areas of science/engineering and then (incorrectly as far as I am concerned) extrapolated it into climate “science”.
The idea of being able to accurately model something on a larger scale (time, distance, mass etc.) that can’t be accurately modelled on a smaller scale is a valid one in, say, orbital mechanics. We sure as hell can’t work out all the quantum-level subatomic interactions that make up the solar system as we know it but we can say with some certainty and accuracy where the planets will be at any given time in the future.
Applying this type of mindset to climatology is a flawed approach though. The relative scales of weather and climate are too close and there is a lack of solid data for the larger scale processes that could allow us to form suitable rules without the need to reflect back into the more chaotic world of weather.
Cheers
Mark
For instance, if you try to model all the quantum level interactions between all
MattB (14:13:52) :
I would be curious to see a breakdown of ages of the responders. I would not be surprised to see a trend that the younger ones were more likely to believe in AGW and older ones were in the group that were skeptical. (hey I could be wrong but I think there is a testable hypothosis in there somewhere, testable in our lifetimes even)
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If other countries are like the UK, the older ones would not only be more experienced, but would also have received a better education in the first place. Both would make them less inclined to uncritically accept bullshit in an area where they were competent to form their own opinions.
Van Denton who is on WGHP is by far the best in North Carolina.He explains the weather and thing to look for.He doesn’t just go on TV and tell you what NOAA is saying like some i’ve seen.
That’s what I like about the forecasters here in PDX. They actually show the upper level flow and features and explain for the avg person what it means. It also gives those of us with a background in meterology light into their reasoning.
It’s a truism that weathermen are not particularly good climatologists. However, it’s becoming clear that they are better climatologists than many “climatologists”.
Steve Goddard (11:27:27) :
Climate models are essentially extended weather models + some parameters that vary over long periods of time.
Everyone who works with these models understands that weather models are of very limited value after about three days, due to chaos. So it is astonishing that climate scientists believe these same core models for decades or centuries.
The whole concept of climate feedback is that today’s weather affects tomorrow’s. If you can’t get today right, you definitely won’t get tomorrow right either. This is known as compounding errors.
It would be hard to guess correctly when you, in particular, will die, but insurance companies can guesstimate the “life expectancy” of people like you very well.
It would be hard to predict what a random roll of a die would produce, and making that prediction 6000 times would not make you any more proficient, but you could predict pretty closely how many sixes you would roll in 6000 tosses.
It’s also hard to predict the exact weather for Honolulu 3 years from now (April 2) by making 1095 sequential one day forecasts, but knowing its climate helps one make a very good guesstimate:
http://www.to-hawaii.com/images/clip_image002.gif
This is known as using the appropriate concepts for the problem at hand.
This is why physics and chemistry are two separate fields of science.
This is why meteorology and climatology are two separate fields of science.
Here’s a good read in the German press on climate issues in general:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,686697,00.html
Long, but worth reading! Cheers & Happy Holidays, and thanks to Anthony and moderators!
I have a lot of respect for meteorologists, who put their reputation on the line each time they produce a forecast. However, I have little respect for the current crop of climatologists who over-promise then under deliver. Why are these people still trying to prove the falsified theory of CAGW instead of trying to discover how our climate system really works?
I came across this interesting article on the topic today, which illustrates some of the problems.
“…But when it comes to providing a reliable idea of what the weather will be like in five days’ time, the Met Office has admitted that its computer-generated forecast is about as dependable as an August bank holiday heatwave. Amid criticism from academic researchers and rival forecasters, the state weather agency confirmed yesterday that its popular online five-day weather service, used by thousands to plan their weekend activities, cannot be relied on to give an accurate forecast.
The admission comes after academics called for all Met Office predictions to be made the subject of independent scrutiny and for them to avoid over-simplification of forecasts. One survey found that over a three-week period, two-thirds of the Met Office five-day forecasts failed to remain consistent, in one case making a prediction for one 24-hour period of heavy thunderstorms that then changed to clear sunshine and then to rain in successive days…”
Full article here:-
http://www.derbygripe.co.uk/forecast.htm
Interestingly, the Met Office, despite their poor performance, have this item on their web site:-
Global Comparisons
“The World Meteorological Organization compares similar statistics among national met. services around the world. These show that the Met Office is consistently one of the top two operational services in the world.”
God help the rest!
“Anu (12:51:13) :
[…]
It would be hard to predict what a random roll of a die would produce, and making that prediction 6000 times would not make you any more proficient, but you could predict pretty closely how many sixes you would roll in 6000 tosses.”
You seem to assume a certain distribution of outcomes here. Okay, so let’s assume that the outcome of a weather prediction is in such a distribution. And the climate model describes the distribution, right?
But the climate models are used to predict an unprecedented (unprecedented in the era of the modern instrument record) event, namely a rise of the temperatures.
That’s like your model for the roll of a dice says it will show 7.
Also, thanks for the detailed explanation of the disctinction between physics and chemistry and their relationship to weather and climate. I didn’t think about it this way before. A real eye-opener.
Steve Goddard (11:27:27) : Climate models are essentially extended weather models + some parameters that vary over long periods of time.
Everyone who works with these models understands that weather models are of very limited value after about three days, due to chaos. So it is astonishing that climate scientists believe these same core models for decades or centuries.
Not at all astonishing at all if you are familiar with physics and the relation between statistical mechanics and fluid mechanics in particular. The ‘real’ equations for a simple gas are the equations for the individual molecules with their interactions, i.e. Newton’s equations, a system of 3N equations in 3N unknowns, the coordinates x,y,x of each molecule, where N the number of molecules is HUGE. This system is chaotic so using it to predict the trajectories a fraction of a second later is futile since the computed and actual trajectories diverge in a fraction of second. NONETHELESS by appealing to the appropriate AVERAGES this set can be reduced to the familiar analytic equations of fluid dynamics which describe the evolution of averages (which is what temperature, pressure, fluid velocity etc really are) for a MUCH longer period (hours, days, etc, depending on the particular flow).
Alternately one can use the Monte Carlo method when it is computationally feasible. This involves producing many different ‘predictions’ of the molecule trajectories and then using these to construct the evolution of the appropriate averages (i.e. temp pressue, etc). Remarkably even though the individual trajectories are inaccurate, THE AVERAGES are.
Magic? Tell that to the physicists of the 19th century who discovered it.
The climate problem can be approached similarly as a Monte Carlo experiment by producing a collection of ‘weather predictions’ by running a weather prediction or GCM model many times. The evolution of the ‘climate’ is then extracted by taking the appropriate averages.
Tom W (13:43:03) :
Remarkably even though the individual trajectories are inaccurate, THE AVERAGES are.
So, even though things are chaotic at the micro, there’s a discernible and predictable pattern at the macro — for example, an air mass approaching a mountain range will create predictable winds based on known factors — and the closer you are to the micro, the less certainty and the closer to the macro, the more certainty?
R. Gates (14:55:41) :
Bruce Cobb said:
(regarding climatologists…)
“They don’t have a clue what is happening to our climate, or why.”
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Ouch…
But somehow the AGW skeptics do, right?
REPLY:
An expert is someone who knows their limitations and is humble because reality has smacked them in the face several times. In my favorite sports, rock climbing, caving and horse back riding someone who is arrogant and thinks they are an expert can end up severely injured or dead. I have lost several friends to “accidents” due to their arrogance.
Climate Scientists do not have the expertise of meteorologists because they can model and prognosticate to their hearts content without actually having reality deliver any sharp lessons. That is why meteorologists and geologists are more apt to be skeptics.
Skeptics by definition are saying if you have a theory then PROVE IT. Give us the data, let others test it and validate your findings, We know the climate is very complicated and we know we have only a very sketchy understanding of it. As has been stated many times it is up to the climate modelers to prove their theory, it is not up to skeptics to come up with the “truth” Our job is to point out the emperor has no clothes and nothing more.
all i hear is “if you don’t agree with what the cardiologist says about your heart, ask your dermatologist.”
weather = snapshot of short term state of the atmosphere which is very sensitive to the accuracy of initial conditions.
climate = long term statistics of atmospheric variables based on modeling boundary conditions (insensitive to initial conditions/errors in initial conditions).
if someone tells you they can predict rain on a specific day next year, they are wrong. if they tell you they can predict whether an area will have relatively more or less rain compared to normal (as in predicting ENSO) they are more likely to be correct.
forecasting jobs generally require less schoolin’ . . . maybe that has something to do with it? if you intend to make a living doing climate research you need a Phd, while you can get by as an operational forecaster with a BS. i got my BS in atmospheric science with hopes of becoming a forecaster, but after some time in grad school i now think climate is more interesting. they’re just different topics and they attract different people. personally, i could care less about chasing/observing severe weather. you really ought to stop confusing the two fields though.
-i also don’t care for capitalization 😉