Alternate title: Something wonky this way comes
I try to get away to work on my paper and the climate world explodes, pulling me back in. Strange things are happening related to the BEST data and co-authors Richard Muller and Judith Curry. Implosion might be a good word.
Popcorn futures are soaring. BEST Co-author Judith Curry drops a bombshell:
Her comments, in an exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday, seem certain to ignite a furious academic row. She said this affair had to be compared to the notorious ‘Climategate’ scandal two years ago.
Here’s the short timeline.
1. The GWPF plots a flat 10 year graph using BEST data:
2. The Mail on Sunday runs a scathing article comparing BEST’s data plotted by GWPF and the data presented in papers. They print this comparison graph:
Note: timescales don’t match on graphs above, 200 years/10 years. A bit naughty on the part of the Sunday Mail to put them together as many readers won’t notice.
3. Dr. Judith Curry, BEST co-author, turns on Muller, in the Mail on Sunday article citing “hide the decline”:
In Prof Curry’s view, two of the papers were not ready to be published, in part because they did not properly address the arguments of climate sceptics.
As for the graph disseminated to the media, she said: ‘This is “hide the decline” stuff. Our data show the pause, just as the other sets of data do. Muller is hiding the decline.
‘To say this is the end of scepticism is misleading, as is the statement that warming hasn’t paused. It is also misleading to say, as he has, that the issue of heat islands has been settled.’
Prof Muller said she was ‘out of the loop’. He added: ‘I wasn’t even sent the press release before it was issued.’
…
But although Prof Curry is the second named author of all four papers, Prof Muller failed to consult her before deciding to put them on the internet earlier this month, when the peer review process had barely started, and to issue a detailed press release at the same time.
He also briefed selected journalists individually. ‘It is not how I would have played it,’ Prof Curry said. ‘I was informed only when I got a group email. I think they have made errors and I distance myself from what they did.
‘It would have been smart to consult me.’ She said it was unfortunate that although the Journal of Geophysical Research had allowed Prof Muller to issue the papers, the reviewers were, under the journal’s policy, forbidden from public comment.
4. Ross McKittrick unloads:
Prof McKittrick added: ‘The fact is that many of the people who are in a position to provide informed criticism of this work are currently bound by confidentiality agreements.
‘For the Berkeley team to have chosen this particular moment to launch a major international publicity blitz is a highly unethical sabotage of the peer review process.’
5. According to BEST’s own data, Los Angeles is cooling, fast:
Septic Matthew says:
October 30, 2011 at 9:37 am
Steve From Rockwood: Tom P – you are full of crap.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/best/last:120
If you honestly believe there is a trend in the last 10 years of BEST data, then congratulations – you are a climate scientist.
OLS produces a positive trend line over the last 10 years, despite an enormous negative outlier. If you eyeball it the data look flat, and the variance is great, nevertheless the trend is positive.
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Matthew – there is no trend in the data. Note the use of the words “statistically significant”. The equation to the line is y = +0.0172x – 33.56 with an R-squared of 0.017 (which means no trend). The year over year variation exceeds +/- 0.5 degrees. The slope is 1/50th of the variation.
If you extrapolate the BEST data to the end of 2010 using a 0.0 temperature anomaly the trend line changes to y = -0.0051x + 11.042 with an amazingly high R-squared of 0.0014.
But you are right Matthew, the trend is statistically insignificantly positive.
Hadley Central England Temperatures (HadCET) versus Berkeley going back to 1659.
HadCet would have formed a large fraction of the Berkeley data in the early 1800s but it is more variable than the whole Berkeley dataset.
12 month moving average first – some of the HadCet temperatures in 1730 for example would be just as high as today – HadCet has really fallen in the last few years – I see a lot of cycles in this data which puts the 1980s increase into perspective.
http://img820.imageshack.us/img820/500/berkeleyvshadcet12mon.png
Now the monthly anomalies which shows just how much the climate can change from month to month – one can see the highest highs and the lowest lows are not much different over time. The 1690s in England were very cold. Other periods were just as warm as today.
http://img405.imageshack.us/img405/7411/berkeleyvshadcetmonthly.png
Jeremy – you’re the one who wants to ignore the vast majority of the climate record. What I know better than you do is how to understand the data. If it’s not statistically significant, don’t draw conclusions from it. Now I do look forward to your explanation of why statistical significance doesn’t actually matter.
old construction worker: “Over the same time period the “world temperature” has either been flat or has decline, has it not?”
I told you before, “Internal variations dominate on this timescale and you cannot say anything about the effect of CO2 since 2000.” What don’t you understand? Over the last ten years, the global warming trend is indistinguishable from zero. It’s indistinguishable from +0.2C per decade. It’s indistinguishable from -0.2C per decade. This is because ten years is TOO SHORT A TIME from which to determine the trend in global temperatures. Only a fool would attempt to draw a conclusion from the last ten years. Don’t be that fool.
[Anthony, Didn’t understand your comment to Steven until I saw the update#2 – thanks!]
I’ve used ‘outlier’ twice recently, once for the April 2010 sample and once for the BEST 30 year trend. I’m pretty confident of the first; the second might be begging the question as Steven suggests; maybe I’ll tone it down. But as far as I can make out BEST has a much higher trend (2.79K/century) over the last 30-odd years than the rest of the land-based datasets, which are themselves considerably higher (2.0-2.25K/century) than the land-ocean ones (1-4-1.6K/century).
But maybe BEST is right? Who knows, I’m just the messenger (and I would really appreciate it if someone could check my process here!)
Paul Clark: “2006 matches other datasets, 2010 doesn’t”
HADCRUT for 2006 shows about .15C off the trendline. BEST shows +1.0 off the trendline.
I would hardly call a 7x difference “matches”.
Julian Williams in Wales says:
October 30, 2011 at 8:46 am
I always poo-poo the word conspiracy, because I do not believe in them. But in this case I am not sure what word I should substitute? stupidity? dim?
The correct word is “Global Governance” and it is no conspiracy.
World Trade Organization Director-General Pascal Lamy: http://www.theglobaljournal.net/article/view/56/
Global Governance 2025: at a critical juncture (by US & EU Intelligence Agencies): http://www.acus.org/event/global-governance-2025-critical-juncture
The UN’s role in Global Governance: http://www.unhistory.org/briefing/15GlobalGov.pdf
An Article on the history: From Carroll Quigley to the UN Millennium Summit
The fact it is now “Out of the Closet” scares the heck out of me.
If you look at the World Trade Organization, ISO (International Standard Organization) look at the United Nations FAO and OIE “Guides to Good Agricultural Practices” and look at “Harmonization” it will shock you at how far along world government is. Input by citizens not required the plan is to get around that by using NGOs with nonvoting membership as “representing “the interests of the people”
USA Food and Drug Admin on “Harmonization”: http://www.fda.gov/InternationalPrograms/HarmonizationInitiatives/default.htm
FAO GAPs:
http://www.fao.org/prods/gap/ [has links]
OIE:
http://www.oie.int/fileadmin/Home/eng/Food_Safety/docs/pdf/GGFP.pdf
http://www.oie.int/doc/ged/D7201.PDF%5DGood Dairy Farming Practice.pdf
Mosher: “In looking through datasets you will find that some datasets have series that start 10 years ago. This is data that will be dropped from CRU. It tends to be data that warms.”
Why would new stations that were dropped show more warming than old stations that were kept?
What Roman and Jeff did was for their own benefit. No one here knows if their results are meaningless or not meaningless. No one here knows, for example, what they did about UHI.
http://www.eike-klima-energie.eu/uploads/media/How_natural.pdf
This paper was sent to Judy and needs to be read by everybody.
How Natural is the Recent Centennial
Warming? An Analysis of 2249 Surface
Temperature Records
Electronic version of an article published in International Journal of Modern Physics
C, Vol. 22, No. 10, doi:10.1142/S0129183111016798 (2011), copyright World Scienti c
Aethelred says:
October 30, 2011 at 9:10 am
I always poo-poo the word conspiracy, because I do not believe in them. But in this case I am not sure what word I should substitute? stupidity? dim?
Why do bank robbers rob banks? Why do politicians seek office? Where greed and lust for power exist no conspiracy is necessary.
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AMEN!
And when you own billions and are bored silly the idea of World Power sounds like an interesting new chess game to you and your billionaire buddies.
Ordinary humans are not even considered as “Human” by the “Chess Players”
http://www.alternet.org/investigations/147414/how_goldman_sachs_caused_a_%27silent_mass_murder,%27_gambling_on_starvation_in_the_developing_world/?page=entire
I can never understand why anyone balks at the idea there may be some out there who lust after the power of a world government after Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Napolian, Hitler…..
All I see is that they have gotten a lot more subtle.
With the BEST April data point updated I get a trend since 2001 of 0.036 C per decade. But if I look at the trend since 1998, it is 0.156 C per decade. When I compare that April 2010 data point from BEST to the data for HadCrut3 it looks like this:
BEST
March 0.859
April -1.035
May 1.098
HadCrut3
March 0.583
April 0.571
May 0.516
UAH and RSS also show no drastic drop in April. Either the BEST April data point shows an error in the BEST code or it shows an error in recording of the results. I should note that the BEST land data has about three times the variation that the other souces of global data have.
My suggestion is that we don’t get into a feeding frenzy about the GWPF chart, because we may well pay for it later.
The Sunday Mail also had a good story on shale gas versus wind power:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-2053686/UK-shale-gas-Coal-industry-tatters-gas-running-alternative.html
Now factor in Anthony’s work and what is the result?
Dr. Ball saw through the BS even before Curry’s admission
http://drtimball.com/2011/the-best-is-the-worst-global-temperature-measures-redux-not/
REPLY: And still he can’t put up a blogroll, even though wordpress provides an easy to use tool for that. – Anthony
“Yesterday Prof Muller insisted that neither his claims that there has not been a standstill, nor the graph, were misleading because the project had made its raw data available on its website, enabling others to draw their own graphs.”
Muller has adopted a form of logic unique to the climate science industry. It is maybe a kind of post-normal scientific standard. Arguments and assertions are by definition not “misleading” if the data behind them is otherwise available.
I have heard this form of argument many times before. It is a defense mechanism for climate scientists who know they are being misleading.
I would like to see these scientific frauds picked apart by lawyers in a law suit.
Gail Combs says:
October 30, 2011 at 6:09 am
======
Here’s more from Eisenhower, the liberals never seem to mention:
“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.
In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.
Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.
The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present
and is gravely to be regarded.
Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientifictechnological elite.”
The April 2010 number from Berkeley is clearly just a typo. A “-” got inserted into the database which happens often enough. It should be +1.035C.
Berkeley is very similar to the NCDC and the largest variance they have with the NCDC going back to 1880 is about 0.8C. For the most part, it is just +/-0.2C. April 2010 with the -1.035 used would be off by 2.4C which would make it 4 times larger than any other variance in any other month going back to 1880.
Change Berkeley’s April 2010 to +1.035C
Ishtar Babilu Dingir says:
October 30, 2011 at 9:22 am
……The truth, both sides of this debate have an agenda. Governments have invested far too much in AGW to see it fail now. Climate scientists will not get funding unless their work is in support of the AGW theory. Oil companies are the only ones rich enough to be capable of funding the sort of research it will take to bring down AGW once and for all, despite this handy own goal by Muller and Co……
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The Oil Companies being on the side of the skeptics is just media spin.
It is Governments, IPCC, Banks and Oil Companies on one side and independent skeptics on the other.
Follow the money: http://joannenova.com.au/2010/03/the-climate-industry-wall-of-money/
CRU were originally funded by BP and Shell oil.
Climategate e-mail on Global Governance & Sustainable Development (B1)
Here is who Ged Davis is (Shell Oil executive with IPCC connection)
Then there is BP. This is from anEYE WITTNESSS
“…..the last time a BP CEO was in the Oval Office.
On that day, August 4, 1997, then-CEO, (then-Sir) John Browne, joined by Ken Lay, met in the Oval with President Clinton and Vice President Gore.
Their mission that day? As revealed in the August 1, 1997 Lay briefing memo whiih I was later provided — having left a brief dance with Enron after raising questions about this very issue — it was to demand that the White House ignore unanimous Senate instruction pursuant to Art. II, Sec. 2 of the Constitution (“advice”, of “advice and consent” fame), and to go to Kyoto and agree to the “global warming” treaty.
Oh, and to enact a cap-and-trade scheme….. http://biggovernment.com/chorner/2010/06/15/bps-excellent-oval-office-adventure/#more-132782
Stevo:
What you have to look as also is have the last 10 years indicated a change in trend?
One way of doing this is to use the same data set, or else the exercise becomes meaningless.
Has there been a legitimate change in trend? You are correct, that 10 years is too short of a time frame to statistically say this. However, one of the traits of an astute marketer is to detect changes in trend while they are occuring, rather than after confirmation. By then the market has moved, and to enter it is too late.
The same rough analysis can be used for climate.
EVERY data set better show a rise over that period of time as that shows the recovery from the LIA. That is not AGW, that is natural recovery from an extremely cold period.
Now just looking at the NCDC CONUS data set, we see a 1.2degF/century trend since 1895. Interesting to note that the trend from 1995 to 2011 is 0.3degF/century. Most of the recent rise in the continental US happend in the 20 year period from 1975 to 1995 with very little happening since.
I am going to simmer down a little here and let things work their way out. I am interested in Jeff Id’s math error. I agree with Dr. Curry that the way this has been handled with regard to the press is “unfortunate” though I think that is a very diplomatic way of putting it. “Boneheaded” might suit me better (and that is being charitable) though my gut tells me there is economic motivation behind this.
More proof global warming announcements are propaganda with a science cover.
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DocMartyn,
Here is a quote from the Abstract of the paper you are referring to:
Agree that it should be looked at. This paper has interesting timing!!
Does this new paper look like shades of the paper ‘McShane & Wyner 2010’ ?
John
u.k.(us) says:
October 30, 2011 at 11:47 am
Here’s more from Eisenhower, the liberals never seem to mention:
________________________________________
Eisenhower certainly pegged it didn’t he and that was back in the 1950’s. His “predictions” have held a lot better than Hansen and others.
stevo says:
October 30, 2011 at 11:07 am
Ten years may not be a long of time, but if you know why this occurred than it is not necessarily not long enough. Do you know why this has not occurred to be so confident it is not long enough?
About half global sets + ocean data sets show no warming for 12 years, so is this not long enough too?
Is 17 years long enough where since 1934 this is the only period where warming has occurred?
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1998/plot/hadsst2gl/from:1998/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1998/trend/plot/hadsst2gl/from:1998/trend/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1980/to:1998/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1980/to:1998/trend/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1934/to:1980/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1934/to:1980/trend
There have been much longer periods of no warming than warming over the past 77 years. Finally CO2 is an internal climate responce and so are internal variations covering the 17 years of warming and 60 years of no warming. So you are telling us that in a 77 year period there sshould be no natural warming?
steveo: “Internal variations dominate on this timescale.”
Unless you can identify the internal variation that is responsible, you are simply hand waving. The ENSO events are roughly balanced and there have been no major volcanoes.
Bill Illis: “The April 2010 number from Berkeley is clearly just a typo.”
Do you think January 2007 is 2.053? What a ridiculous number.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/crutem3vgl/from:2006/to:2008/plot/best/from:2006/to:2008
Best/mean:60 is a very disturbing curve.
Why is there no reference to that?