Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
Professor Muller of the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) project is always interesting, but he just keeps digging his personal hole deeper. He recently gave an interview titled “Scientists Often Pigeonholed By Political Debates” and answered questions on NPR. To his credit, he is standing up straight and tall for science, for full transparency, for the scientific method. I like that. He is also one of the few mainstream scientists who has publicly said that Climategate showed horrible behavior and scientific malfeasance, and he repeated that on NPR:
CONAN: And that’s, you would say, would be at the heart of the so-called Climategate story, where emails from some scientists seemed to be working to prevent the work of other scientists from appearing in peer-reviewed journals.
Prof. MULLER: That really shook me up when I learned about that. I think that Climategate is a very unfortunate thing that happened, that the scientists who were involved in that, from what I’ve read, didn’t trust the public, didn’t even trust the scientific public. They were not showing the discordant data. That’s something that – as a scientist I was trained you always have to show the negative data, the data that disagrees with you, and then make the case that your case is stronger. And they were hiding the data, and a whole discussion of suppressing publications, I thought, was really unfortunate. It was not at a high point for science.
And I really get even more upset when some other people say, Oh, science is just a human activity. This is the way it happens. You have to recognize, these are people. No, no, no, no. These are not scientific standards. You don’t hide the data. You don’t play with the peer review system.
I wholeheartedly agree. I only fear that Muller doesn’t realize the full extent of the problem. I’m afraid he hasn’t noticed how that whole “we’re on a noble mission to save the world from itself” mentality has deeply infiltrated and corrupted an entire field of scientific inquiry.
I also found his comments on “pigeonholing” quite revealing. In the interview he divides people into “deniers”, “skeptics”, and “exaggerators”, and discusses what he sees as the characteristic claims of his neatly pigeonholed groups … and then he claims he doesn’t like pigeonholing?
Here’s a pro-tip, Dr. Muller.
A man who dislikes pigeonholing doesn’t use the term “denier”. It makes people doubt both your sincerity and your goodwill. You’ve been told many times that I and many other people out here find that term insulting. You continue to use it. Is that stupidity, or do you just not care that you are insulting people, or are you insisting that you have the right to insult people? Whichever way … it’s not good.
Next, he wants to play both sides of the street, viz:
CONAN: How much of that [warming] is attributable to humans? But do you agree that at least – does the data show that at least some part of it is attributable to humans?
Prof. MULLER: Yes, yes. It’s us. People call me a skeptic, because I drew attention to many of the exaggerations that in – is in former Vice President Al Gore’s movie. But I think a scientist has to recognize when there are exaggerations and settle down on what is solidly known.
OK. That’s clear. Regarding the warming, “It’s us.” He’s not a skeptic, he says he’s talking about what is “solidly known”. However, he continues …
Temperature has been rising over the last 100 years. That’s pretty clear. How much is due to varying solar activity and how much due to humans is a scientific issue that we’re trying to address.
Huh? How can he say “It’s us” so confidently, how can it be “solidly known” as he claims, if it is still “a scientific issue that we’re trying to address.” ?? Make up your mind, Dr. Muller, because clearly the Olympic back flip-flop isn’t your best event …
I did greatly enjoy Dr. Muller’s indirect takedown of Jerome Ravetz, however, viz:
CONAN: Well, given the analysis that you reached, aren’t there urgent policy decisions that need to be made?
Prof. MULLER: Oh, that’s the irony. The policy decisions are so urgent that people tend to abandon the scientific method. It’s ironic that when something’s important, they sometimes feel they have to not be so candid and unbiased because it’s urgent. I think just the opposite. When things are urgent, that’s the time the scientist has to settle down and show – do things using the unbiased methods that they’ve been taught.
Thank you, Professor Muller. Jerome Ravetz keeps pushing “Post-Normal Science”, the idea that when the stakes are high and decisions are urgent, we should change the way we do science. I agree with Muller that when things are urgent is the time when we need the full rigor of the tried-and-true scientific method even more than ever.
Next, Muller says:
CONAN: Urgency, though, is the critical word here, is it not?
Prof. MULLER: Well, I think one of the things we’re trying to do at Berkeley Earth is determine how urgent it is. The global warming attributed by the IPCC, the big U.N. Council that makes this consensus report, attributes about half a degree, half a degree Celsius of warming to humans. But is it .4? Is it .3? If so, we have a lot more time. Is it .6 or.7? If so, we’re in a big rush.
I find this curious. Does anyone know where he gets that “half a degree” of anthropogenic warming from the IPCC report? (And I love his description of the IPCC report as a “consensus report”, he must not have twigged that “consensus” is what you get when you squash all opposition. But I digress.)
In any case, I don’t see how his work with BEST relates to any urgency. Does he really believe that BEST finding a difference of 0.1°C or 0.2°C in the observational record will suddenly make the situation “urgent”? As he points out, the issue is not whether the world is warming, it is whether humans are the cause. His work will not elucidate that question in the slightest.
Finally, I emphatically did not like his dig at Anthony Watts.
CONAN: You mentioned Anthony Watts. He runs a website for climate deniers, said he was prepared to accept whatever result your group produced, even if it proves my premise wrong. After your testimony, he said the hearing was post-normal science political theater.
Prof. MULLER: Well, I think Anthony can be forgiven for his ups and downs. I think he has done a great job, a real contribution, and I think his work has proved really essential.
Professor Muller thinks he is entitled to advise us to forgive Anthony for his “ups and downs” because of the great weight of Anthony’s contribution to science? Man, the good Doc’s sense of entitlement knows no bounds, it’s been far too long in the ivory tower for that boy. Having transgressed badly himself, he now wants to lecture us on proper behavior as though we were his college students?
Now, that comes close to undoing all the good Prof. Muller did above with his defense of honest science. Here’s my take-home message for Professor Muller:
Professor Muller, there’s a lot of folks like me out here who are deciding whether or not to forgive you for your un-necessary public attack on Anthony, using data he had given you in confidence. Your arrogant and patronizing attitude in this interview merely helps us make up our minds whether you are worth forgiving or not.
My vote is still yes, Dr. Muller, we should forgive you. But that’s based on your profound but probably curable naiveté about climate science and your general likability, and not based on your contrition or probity, because you seem woefully short on both of the latter. The good news is that at least you stand revealed. From here out any man who tells you anything in confidence is a fool. You have shown us that you won’t shirk to first publicly betray the man’s confidence, and then to top it off you’ll advise us to forgive the man for being so crude as to get upset at your betrayal …
Again, let me say that none of this says anything about whether the BEST results will be good, bad, or meaningless. That is a totally separate question, about which to date we know far too little to comment.
w.
Mosh, you also say:
Hogwash. What, you think he should get a free pass for any actions prior to some future date? Not on my planet. He is accountable for his actions, as we all are.
w.
mosh says:
Why are you raggin’ on me? You’re making baseless assumptions. Of course I knew it was a chart from Lucia’s blog – it says so right on it. And clicking on Zeke’s name brought up Lucia’s site, where I got the chart from.
You do this because you’re avoiding my point: the GISS chart is extremely alarmist, deliberately so. At first glance, the reaction is “Yikes!!” But on closer scrutiny, we see that it’s only a model projection, and we know how inaccurate computer models have been.
You can argue with Bill Illis if you don’t like his chart, but he’s pretty careful. And his chart is based on the real world, not on GCMs.
Are you all serious ?? RR Kampen is part of BEST ??
This the guy who swore that he knew that Arctic ice volume was decreasing but couldn’t put numbers to the equation:
a – b = c
Posted right on here many months ago, probably on a Catlin “three stooges” expedition thread ??
After about 20 of his obfuscating (actually moronic responses), I gave up.
I suspect he still can’t grasp the principles of a – b = c even.
Any more mathematical midgets on the BEST program ??
REPLY: I’ve met the BEST team in person, and AFAIK RR Kampen, whoever that is, isn’t a member. Also, when Kampen posts here, his IP address traces to an ISP in the Netherlands, so it seems doubly unlikely. Smokey needs to retract that statement. – Anthony
Willis Eschenbach says:
April 14, 2011 at 3:54 pm
“Mosh, you also say:
‘In the end, Muller either will or will not share his data and code. Until such time it is pointless to discuss his ethics.’
Hogwash. What, you think he should get a free pass for any actions prior to some future date? Not on my planet. He is accountable for his actions, as we all are.”
Spot on, Willis. An action is right or wrong when it is committed. Apparently, Mosher holds the view that an action becomes right or wrong as time passes. A moment’s thought would reveal that if Mosher’s view were true then whenever a person undertook an action he would not know at that time whether the action is right or wrong. Surely, I don’t have to say that on such a view our knowledge of right and wrong is never timely and, for that reason, cannot guide our conduct. “Reductio Ad Absurdum.”
Also, when clicking on your name I noticed your GISS chart. The GISS y-axis is quite exaggerated, isn’t it? And the chart itself is scary – until it becomes apparent that the scary part is mostly future model predictions. For a real world chart of what is actually occurring, see here [chart by Bill Illis].
Smokey. As I pointed out this is NOT ZEKES CHART. so why call it his chart?
Further its not a Giss chart. Finally, its not scary at all. I’m objecting to your characterization because its innacurate, emotional, and non factual.
You cannot compare one chart which is intended to show model projections and another chart which does not. Apples meet oranges. Finally, how do you expect to test a model without GRAPHING THE NUMBERS IT SHOWS.
But you had nothing better to do than to try to slam zeke. fail.
it’s pointless to discuss his ethics. unless you were there, unless the agreement was recorded, you have no facts willis. you have what we call hearsay.
I’ll return to this later and we can draw some analogies or get further into the nitty gritty.
steven mosher says:
April 14, 2011 at 5:44 pm
“it’s pointless to discuss his ethics. unless you were there, unless the agreement was recorded, you have no facts willis. you have what we call hearsay.”
Muller attended a Congressional hearing that was public and in that hearing he rendered the judgements that Anthony’s surfacestations.org and Anthony’s not yet published article have no consequences for climate science. To render a judgement in public on an article that is under review is to willingly embrace responsibility for the failure or success of the article before it has seen the light of day. That action is morally wrong. There is nothing that could have happened between Muller and Anthony that would excuse that action. If Anthony had given Muller written permission to judge the article, that fact would make no difference to the rightness or wrongness of Muller’s action. Muller freely chose to assert his opinion about the article and, in so doing, he bears responsibility for whatever untoward results follow from his assertion. If nothing untoward follows from his assertion, that fact does not make it excusable; rather, it means that Muller is lucky and does not owe Anthony for additional harm suffered by Anthony. At minimum, Muller’s assertion alerted the Warmista and the world that Anthony’s article should not be treated as important. That is a concrete act of harm for which Muller and only Muller bears moral responsibility. Finally, we must keep in mind that Muller was speaking to Congress and the world. This was not a case of scientists talking shop with other scientists. The moral standards that are appropriate are the standards that apply to any testimony before Congress that is not under oath.
I’m willing to give Dr Muller the benefit of the doubt. He is really caught between a rock and a hard place when it comes to public appearances: i would suggest that he needs to appear to be at least a luke-warmer for the BEST efforts to be taken seriously.
I will wait until BEST presents their results and judge them on their science. I dont think its helpful to call out Dr Muller just yet, in fact it may make him reluctant to discuss his methodology with us.
“IIRC…” Not, I guess. I was wrong about Kampen being part of BEST. My apologies, I was mistaken.
steven mosher says:
“As I pointed out this is NOT ZEKES CHART. so why call it his chart?
Further its not a Giss chart. Finally, its not scary at all. I’m objecting to your characterization because its innacurate, emotional, and non factual.”
When I post a chart [and I post a lot of them], people often refer them as to “your chart.” They’re simply referring to the chart I posted, so in this case I think you’re just nitpicking.
Furthermore, I commented to Zeke: “I noticed your GISS chart…” Obviously, I meant the chart that Zeke had posted, which was based on GISS data, because right on the chart it reads: GIStemp Land and Sea Temperature Anomaly Trend. And it notes the source of the GISS data that was used to construct the chart. Like I said, nitpicking.
Finally, I stand by my opinion that the GISS chart was constructed to have a scary y-axis. My comment was not “innacurate, emotional, and non factual.” That is only your opinion, based on something which you cannot possibly know.
With a normal y-axis, the chart would have been more like this than like this.
Not using a zero axis makes the apparent trend sharply higher – and scarier.
Anthony has clearly said what he agreed that Muller was not respected when Muller gave his testimony. That is evidence enough. Don’t know what Mosher is waffling about on this. But for sure, I trust Anthony and Willis’ words and ethics. I have no such trust on Mosher’s words, in this subject.
Willis writes: “The famous example is Thoreau’s”: “Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout in the milk.”
Owe you for that, Willis… had never seen it before. Sweet!
Prof. MULLER: Well, I think Anthony can be forgiven for his ups and downs. I think he has done a great job, a real contribution, and I think his work has proved really essential.
—————————————————————————-
‘Damned with faint praise’ is the expression that comes to mind. This is typical of academics – it is so snide and slimy because one cannot attack it but bear it with what dignity is left for you. Ii is a loathsome put down. I would never trust a person who uses it.
Douglas
steven mosher says:
April 14, 2011 at 5:44 pm
Maybe that’s all you have, and if so, you’re missing half the picture, you’re throwing out half the evidence. There’s a whole lot more that isn’t hearsay. I also have Muller’s actions. I have Muller’s responses after the fact. I have Anthony’s actions and responses.
And I have the knowledge that in a court of law is called the “reasonable man” standard, that no reasonable man would knowingly agree to give Muller the data if he knew that Muller was going to parade it before Congress.
And no reasonable man would take confidential data and conclude “I’m free to testify to Congress about this” unless that was a specific clause in the agreement … and neither man has claimed that.
There’s not a whole lot of conclusions that I can draw from that, Mosh. Your unwillingness to draw them speaks well for your desire for true justice in some perfect ideal world, but it speaks poorly for your real-world judgement.
We discuss the actions and the morality of people who have been dead for years. Your idea that we had to be the fly on the wall and have seen and recorded everything, in order to determine whether someone transgressed ethical boundaries, is simply nonsense. Juries assign guilt or innocence all the time, based on not much different information than we have here – visible actions and concrete facts allow us to infer conclusions and hidden facts, just like with the trout in the milk. You are right, it’s circumstantial … but very damning just the same.
I don’t understand how you explain the situation. Is your contention that Muller truly believed he couldn’t publish his analysis, but despite that he was free to discuss his analysis with Congress?
Because if you think Muller honestly signed on to the agreement with that in mind and just honestly forgot to mention it … well, I just don’t know what to say, but it doesn’t pass the reasonable man test.
My problem, Mosh, is that I can’t construct a realistic scenario that fits the facts except the scenarios where Muller is way out of line … what is your scenario that does that?
I don’t buy that Muller believed he was free to testify before Congress. That doesn’t pass the “reasonable man” test. Muller would have to be an idiot to believe that any confidentiality agreement would allow that, and he’s not an idiot.
Now, you can wait until 2035 for Muller to write his memoirs and reveal all before you make your judgement. That’s OK with me. I, on the other hand, will judge him now on the basis that he has given us to date — his actions and his words.
For example, he has not claimed he was right to testify about his Surfacestation analysis, nor has he apologized in any sense. One or the other of these are generally the response of an honest man who is accused of something … again, Mosh, you can wait until he deigns to explains himself.
For me, the fact that at the end of the day and after all Muller has done and said, he is unwilling to either defend or explain his actions speaks plenty loud enough for me.
At this point, a reasonable man adds up all of the evidence and concludes that Muller is not an honest man … which doesn’t mean he does bad science, or that his conclusions are wrong.
It just means that at this point the fabled “reasonable man” wouldn’t trust Muller with a sharpened popsicle stick, much less confidential information.
w.
pete says:
April 14, 2011 at 6:46 pm
I gave Dr. Muller the benefit of the doubt until he proved himself untrustworthy. Continuing to give someone the “benefit of the doubt” after that is called “enabling behavior”, and is generally not recommended in the better circles.
Ooooh, right, I’d forgotten, we wouldn’t want to make him “reluctant to discuss his methodology”, that would never do, so we should just not make any waves and not say anything, because he might not share his wisdom with us …
pete, are you aware who you sound like? Because Neville Chamberlain comes to mind …
w.
PS – No, he’s not “caught between a rock and a hard place” regarding discussing his work. If he has nothing to discuss, he should not discuss it. If he has confidential data, he should not discuss it. How is that so freakin’ hard?
The problem is that, like many mainstream climate scientists, his mouth is physically unable to shape the words “We don’t know” or “I can’t say.” It’s a congenital oral problem, as far as I can see, it’s known to pass genetically from a Professor to his post-doc students.
Muller was picked for BEST based on the same criteria that Muir Russell was picked to head the Oxburgh inquiry: they could both be counted on to play the piper’s tune that they were being paid to play. Ethics was never a consideration. In fact, ethical behavior was an obstacle to the agenda.
I’m looking forward the BEST’s assurance of complete transparency by the middle of this year. That means no later than June 30th. Transparency doesn’t just mean publicly archiving data and methods. It means fully and completely answering all questions about its data and methods, including follow-up questions.
I don’t believe that will happen, because it will necessarily get into MBH98/99, the IPCC, etc., and the cat will be out of the bag. Dr Muller has 2 1/2 months to prove me wrong.
John Trigge says:
April 14, 2011 at 12:25 am
Willis,
I would expand on your statement “As he points out, the issue is not whether the world is warming, it is whether humans are the cause. and add ‘and what difference will it make?’.
If one accepts that there has been a rise on global temps since the LIA then, surely, one must also accept that the global climate has improved since then (eg, no more River Thames ice fairs).
Why is it that the climate improvement due to rising temps since the LIA is OK but any further rises, caused by us or not, are going to be disastrous?
The answer to your question is obvious. The world is non linear.
Some foods like sugars in small amounts are good for you, but eat too much of it and you get obesity and diabetes!
There comes a point where rising temperatures hurt more people than they help. We haven’t reached that point yet, but it is not correct to rule out the possibility that if temperatures rise significantly beyond where we are that problems will result. Climate scientists who have studied this find that this will be the case.
It seems like this is all about the use of the D-word by Muller, but there is no reason to get terribly upset. Actually categorization is an important technique in science, especially in biology and psychology.
I am sure that Dr. Muller believes Anthony Watts is in the “properly skeptical” category. That is why he launched the BEST project in the first place. Anthony should feel honored, to have his surface stations project be the catalyst, that got the BEST project launched by a (sort of) bonafide climate scientist.
Let the scientific chips fall where they may, as the BEST project concludes its analysis. Of course we should be “properly skeptical” of the results when they come out, especially if they disagree with the other temperature data sets, all of which say that the global average temperature has increased about 0.75C in the last century.
Venter says:
April 14, 2011 at 3:32 am
Paul
You did not get it. Willis’ criticism was not about the 2% data Prof.Muller talked about. Willis’ criticism was about Prof.Muller dissing Anthony’s surfacestations work about station siting, saying that there was no difference observed due to station siting, without explaining how he arrived at that conclusion, what methods he used etc. That was what Willis always has been criticising about Muller’s testimony.
You should read the testimony, read Willis’ comments and get the whole picture.
Muller was very specific about what was done with the surface stations data, and did not “dis” Anthony’s work as you claim.
http://www.berkeleyearth.org/findings
The Berkeley Earth team has been working very hard over the past two weeks, and has now also taken an in-depth look at the issue of station quality. This analysis has been done on 100% of the stations that have been ranked by the Watts team – and is therefore distinct from the 2% results. All of the sites ranked by Watts are located in the United States.
In the testimony Muller says the following about Anthony’s temperature stations data.
http://www.berkeleyearth.org/Resources/Muller_Testimony_31_March_2011
Many temperature stations in the U.S. are located near buildings, in parking lots, or close
to heat sources. Anthony Watts and his team has shown that most of the current stations
in the US Historical Climatology Network would be ranked “poor” by NOAA’s own
standards, with error uncertainties up to 5 degrees C.
Did such poor station quality exaggerate the estimates of global warming? We’ve
studied this issue, and our preliminary answer is no.
The Berkeley Earth analysis shows that over the past 50 years the poor stations in the
U.S. network do not show greater warming than do the good stations.
Thus, although poor station quality might affect absolute temperature, it does not appear
to affect trends, and for global warming estimates, the trend is what is important.
It seems that he recognizes that the poor stations have absolute values of temperature that are way off, and that Anthony is right to call these stations poor. However he finds that the temperature trend, ie change over time, is unaffected by these problems.
eadler says:
April 15, 2011 at 1:28 pm
“Many temperature stations in the U.S. are located near buildings, in parking lots, or close
to heat sources. Anthony Watts and his team has shown that most of the current stations
in the US Historical Climatology Network would be ranked “poor” by NOAA’s own
standards, with error uncertainties up to 5 degrees C.
Did such poor station quality exaggerate the estimates of global warming? We’ve
studied this issue, and our preliminary answer is no.
The Berkeley Earth analysis shows that over the past 50 years the poor stations in the
U.S. network do not show greater warming than do the good stations.
Thus, although poor station quality might affect absolute temperature, it does not appear
to affect trends, and for global warming estimates, the trend is what is important.”
What Muller says is a Red Herring and he knew it. Anthony never claimed that the purpose of his work was to show that the poor stations reported temperatures that are too high. That was not his claim at all. Anthony’s claim was that the observable conditions of the stations made it obvious that they were poorly managed to such a degree that data from them should be thrown out.
Red Herring. You know what that is, right? It is when you substitute a claim that sounds similar to the claim under discussion but is really a very different claim that changes the topic. That is what Muller did and he knew it.
eadler says:
April 15, 2011 at 1:28 pm
“It seems that he recognizes that the poor stations have absolute values of temperature that are way off, and that Anthony is right to call these stations poor. However he finds that the temperature trend, ie change over time, is unaffected by these problems.”
This is merely an excuse to dismiss Anthony’s work on surface stations. According to Muller, all that is wrong is that the poor stations reported temperatures that were higher and Muller has the ability to take all the bazillions of records and remove exactly the right amount of excess with his magical statistical wand. Stop the BS. Why would anyone think that the bad siting of the poor stations produced merely higher readings? It produced Wildly Strange readings that are worthless and that should be tossed.
We must get the big picture here. The photos of poor stations on surfacestations.org are irrefutable evidence of the stupidity and carelessness of the people who installed and managed the stations. To use the reports from those people as definitive evidence for changes of one tenth of a degree per decade is truly insane.
Utter tosh, eadler. You’re obfuscating and throwing a red herring like Theo said. Read Anthony’s and Willis’s reasons which they explained for why they criticise Muller. What you’re waffling about is nothing related to that.
Theo Goodwin says:
April 15, 2011 at 9:10 pm
eadler says:
April 15, 2011 at 1:28 pm
Professor Muller says:
“Many temperature stations in the U.S. are located near buildings, in parking lots, or close
to heat sources. Anthony Watts and his team has shown that most of the current stations
in the US Historical Climatology Network would be ranked “poor” by NOAA’s own
standards, with error uncertainties up to 5 degrees C.
Did such poor station quality exaggerate the estimates of global warming? We’ve
studied this issue, and our preliminary answer is no.
The Berkeley Earth analysis shows that over the past 50 years the poor stations in the
U.S. network do not show greater warming than do the good stations.
Thus, although poor station quality might affect absolute temperature, it does not appear
to affect trends, and for global warming estimates, the trend is what is important.”
What Muller says is a Red Herring and he knew it. Anthony never claimed that the purpose of his work was to show that the poor stations reported temperatures that are too high. That was not his claim at all. Anthony’s claim was that the observable conditions of the stations made it obvious that they were poorly managed to such a degree that data from them should be thrown out.
Red Herring. You know what that is, right? It is when you substitute a claim that sounds similar to the claim under discussion but is really a very different claim that changes the topic. That is what Muller did and he knew it.
There is no red herring here. I find it odd that Anthony Watts or anyone one else would not expect the BEST team to use Anthony’s data the way they did.
The whole purpose of the BEST project is to determine whether the analysis of the global temperature thermometer data done by GISS, NCDC and CRU was falsely indicating that the earth has been getting warmer. The thermometer data was called into question by the work of Anthony Watts surface stations group showing that most of the weather stations in the US were substandard. Some of Anthony’s data had already been analysed by NOAA to determine whether the temperature trend from good and bad stations was different. BEST found that their was no difference in the temperature trends, in agreement with NOAA.
The answer may not be what you were expecting, but the type of analysis was certainly part of BEST’s charter and was certainly what would be expected of them given the charter that they have. No one is denying the correctness of Anthony’s work.
eadler says:
“I find it odd that Anthony Watts or anyone one else would not expect the BEST team to use Anthony’s data the way they did.”
Spoken like someone who is also completely lacking in professional ethics.
eadler says:
April 15, 2011 at 1:01 pm
Miss the point much?
w.
Eadler,
Like all good Warmista, you just cannot get it. The purpose of surfacestations.org is to get the Warmista’s noses out of their computers for one minute and into the real world. The real world shows sitings with surface stations next to window air conditioners. Have you never seen or operated a window air conditioner? Can you predict when it will be on and when it will not be on? Of course, you cannot. It is on and off at the whim of the owner and depending on the owner’s financial condition, luck, and a million other things. One cannot adjust for such behavior and come up with a rational TREND that enables use of the temperature reports.
Let me see you deny what I have just said. You cannot do it without contradicting yourself.
Let me say it again: the main benefit of surfacestations.org is not to improve Warmista calculations of TRENDS; rather, it is to show the world the worthlessness of the data used to calculate TRENDS.