In June 1986, Dr. James Hansen made a prediction to an AP newspaper reporter, which was carried in Oxnard, CA, of a 2 degree temperature rise by 2006. This was two years before, almost to the day before he and Senator Tim Wirth duped a bunch of Washington legislators with stagecraft on a hot June day by turning off the a/c in the hearing room while complaining about global warming and urging the need for “immediate action” (translation: cash).
Like Dr. Hansen’s 20 year sea level prediction, it hasn’t come true. In honor of the 80’s, when a popular TV commercial for a fast food restaurant had inspired a whole nation to say the catch phrase, I ask Dr. James Hansen, regarding your claims of global warming, “Where’s the Beef”?!
Let’s have a look at Exhibit A: Hansens’ GISTEMP graph, distributed worldwide from the GISS headquarters above Jerry Seinfeld’s favorite Monk’s Restaurant in New York City. Annotations in blue mine.
Source: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/
Exhibit B: The GISS Data, available here. Let’s do the math.
Global Land-Ocean Temperature Index (C) (Anomaly with Base: 1951-1980) ---------------------------------- Year Annual_Mean 5-year_Mean ---------------------------------- 1986 0.13 0.18 1987 0.28 0.20 1988 0.33 0.26 1989 0.21 0.31 1990 0.36 0.28 1991 0.35 0.24 1992 0.13 0.24 1993 0.14 0.25 1994 0.24 0.24 1995 0.39 0.30 1996 0.30 0.39 1997 0.41 0.40 1998 0.58 0.40 1999 0.33 0.43 2000 0.35 0.46 2001 0.48 0.46 2002 0.56 0.49 2003 0.55 0.54 2004 0.48 0.55 2005 0.62 0.56 2006 0.55 0.53
Finding the difference: 0.55C – 0.13C = 0.42C
Predicted change 2.0C compared to Actual change 0.42C = Climate Fail
Exhibit C: Where’s the Beef?!
Note: I realize that I could have placed the top prediction at 2.13C, but why pile on? 😉 What’s 0.13C between friends? Besides he said “nearly” and it is near well enough.
Don’t believe me? Read for yourself. The Press-Courier – Google News Archive Search
Big h/t to Steve Goddard at Real-Science for finding this one.
UPDATE: Some commenters suggested Hansen may have given the 2 degree number in Fahrenheit rather than Celsius. Another article on the same day suggests he did.
Read article here: http://news.google.com/newspapers
So at 4F we have 2.2 C If the reporter in the first story took the middle between 2-4F as 3F we have 1.67C or “nearly 2 degrees higher in 20 years” as the reporter from Oxnard states.
The 2010 Annual Mean Temperature anomaly from GISS is 0.63 C
So, no matter how you look at it, Hansen’s 1986 prediction has not come true,
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steven mosher says:
March 8, 2012 at 8:15 pm
“Projections are conditional predictions where you cannot control the experimental conditions.”
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Sounds suspiciously like lawyer speak for: collateral damage.
DirkH says:
March 8, 2012 at 8:25 pm
#########
the difference between a projection and a prediction is easy to understand.
I set up a test for dropping bombs. The test protocal is this.
A. release the bomb at 30000 AGL, 400 kts. with no winds aloft.
My projection is this: IF, the bomb is released at those conditions, Then the bomb will hit
the surface 3.467 nm from the release point.
The problem is I cannot control the test conditions precisely. If the pilot slips up a bit,
or the wind kicks up, my conditional is not met. he releases at 30067 AGL into a slight
headwind. ugg, cant control the test conditions. Its not a lab. But we make do.
Contrast that with a highly controlled experiment. I tell you, if you jump from 500 feet, you will die.
So, we take you up to 500 feet exactly and have you jump. Nice, we predicted something. We could control the test conditions, I can test my theory easily.
In climate science you have the same problem. IF c02 goes up X, and IF there are no volcanoes, and IF methane goes up by Y, and IF the sun stays constant, and IF and IF… Then temperatures
will go up by Z
Plus everybody knows GISTEMP is a junk.
More, global average is close to 1986 so the whole issue is a non-issue.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/from:1986/plot/rss/from:1986/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1986
I’ll copy and paste my comment from BH as it’s still relivant.
He really doesn’t care about the science (why constantly stick up for what history will show is a piece of cr*p hockey stick), just send him the money and he’ll be happy.
Funny thing is Mann you may have finally made your millions of dollars you expected to get because your a scientist but history will not have JPEG’s of your bank balance in them.
@rossbrisbane
“Projection MAY COVER a RANGE of POSSIBILITIES whilst PREDICTION is statement that A OUTCOME is EXPECTED.
”
A mathematical projection contains two statistical elements: a confidence interval which pertains to the mean value distribution and the larger prediction interval which pertains to the individual value distribution.
The AGW crowd loves smoothed and otherwise manipulated datasets so they would never worry about a prediction interval but rather focus on the confidence interval of the projection.
@ur momisugly steven mosher on March 8, 2012 at 11:31 pm:
Nice example. So when your commander orders you to bomb a factory, and instead you take out a nearby village, you can successfully defend yourself at the court martial and before the war crimes tribunal by pointing out you only projected you’d hit the factory, you never predicted it. Makes sense. Why accept responsibility for your work when you don’t have to?
Regarding projection vs prediction, what concerns me most is this “Hansen .pre/pro…”
In real science, the actor doing the projection/prediction is a methodology. It is the scientific method which is responsible. If Hansen were a scientist he would merely be the person who followed the method and came up with the answer that anyone else following the method would come to.
So, real science is usually done in the third person “It is predicted”, “science predicts”. If their is ownership, it is usually part of a consensus: “we predict” or “The NASA centre for climate lunacy … predicts”.
I predict … that is the way soothsayers and crystal ball gazers talk, not a scientist.
Friends:
The “prediction” or “projection” argument is about the use of weasel words to avoid accountability for error.
The important point is that an assertion of “the world will warm” is a prediction. The accuracy of the prediction is determined by comparing the magnitude of the predicted warming with the magnitude of the resulting warming. And the precision of the prediction is the range of predicted values of the warming.
There are many ways such a prediction could be made. One such method is extrapolation of existing trends. This extrapolation could be said to be a “projection” because it projects the trends into the future, but it is a prediction based on assumption that the trends will be sustained.
Hansen’s 1986 prediction of “of a 2 degree temperature rise by 2006” was right in its sign (the world did warm and not cool) but there was a better than 50:50 chance it would be right in its sign (because the world was warming at that time). However, his prediction was grossly inaccurate to the extent of being misleading.
This is like a weather forecaster saying on a rainy day that there would be severe rain tomorrow so people should not venture outdoors on that day. But when ‘tomorrow’ had elapsed that day only had a light shower for less than 5 minutes.
It is weasel words to assert that Hansen did not make a prediction but only made a “projection”.
I think the following anecdote is pertinent to the present discussion of the weasel words.
A decade ago I was one of 16 scientists from around the world who were invited to present briefings on the science of climate change at the US Congress. There were three Sessions and 4 of us formed a panel for each Session with one of the 4 being asked to Chair the Session. In each Session the Panel members each gave a presentation and the Chairman then invited questions from the floor.
During questions in the second Session a questioner asserted
“The IPCC does not make predictions”.
As Chairman of the Session, I replied;
“You say the IPCC does not make predictions. The IPCC says the world is going to warm. I call that a prediction.”
There was no response.
Richard
the difference between a projection and a prediction is easy to understand……etc.
……………………………………………………………………………………………….
To be completely reductive then, the only prediction anyone can make concerning increased atmospheric CO2 is if the concentration doubles and all other factors known and unknown remain constant, then the global av. temperature will rise 1C.
In other words predictions are certain outcomes while projections are guesses, in which case they are next to worthless for policy setting.
Ross James of Brisbane says:
As Hansen would have been termed a secularist prophet – the most likely outcome would be PROJECTIONS rather then using the term prediction as in religious.”
His religious manipulation of data and sets of mathematical equations caused his PROJECTIONS to end up like most secularist Prophets PREDICTIONS. USELESS.
steven mosher says:
March 8, 2012 at 11:31 pm
Scientists weasel with words just as much as lawyers, so I can weigh in here. Your use of words is atrocious in this situation. We are not dealing with technical jargon here.
Your analogy limps badly. How is what Hansen doing an “experiment?” This has nothing to do with an experiment. I could have made the same prediction/projection as Hansen, even though I know nothing about the technical side of the subject. Hansen comes out forthrightly and says “temperatures will rise 2 degrees C by the year 2006.” He is either making an estimate or statement of future conditions on the basis of known historical data, coupled with HIS interpretation of that data, or he is not doing anything but making noise. The characterization going on here is essentially a distinction without a difference. The dictionary definition of a “prediction” is “a thing predicted: a forecast.” The dictionary definition of a “projection” is “an estimate or forecast of a future situation or trend based on a study of present ones.” There is a lot of similarity in those definitions, isn’t there, Mosh? A “projection,” perhaps, is just a bit more of a sophisticated prediction. But it is a prediction nonetheless.
You scientists are giving yourselves a bad name by trifling with the language on the theory that your technical activities justify you making a special use of basic definitions. This is not one of those situations where the technical nature of the subject justifies playing fast and loose with language. Not even our legal jargon can be stretched to that breaking point.
If I were a judge asked to decide a dispute whether what Hansen said is a “prediction” or a “projection,” I’d throw all of you out of my courtroom. And I would agree with Roy Spencer.
What you’re forgetting is that Hansen is not wrong because it ‘may ‘ also happen in the future and given the infinitely flexible time base he works to. That means he must be right at some stage no matter what claim he makes .
I think its rule three of climate science , ‘predictions of doom are never wrong , merely miss-timed ‘
It’s a bit like the return of god and the end of the world some religions people is about to happen , ever time it fails to arrive , its because for some reason its delayed not that the idea is BS in the first place .
Too predictable. Must be because Spring is in the air… since January.
Thank goodness 1934 has cooled down a bit. I don’t know how my parents could have stood it at the old temperature!
H/T to someone called Mike I believe.
We should not be talking degrees centigrade or Fahrenheit. We should be talking about the absolute temperature – degrees Kelvin. This is because earth is radiating heat out into space. and the temperature of space is zero degrees Kelvin.
Heat loss to space increases by the fourth power of temperature, measured in degrees Kelvin.
So negative feedback, rather than positive feedback, is built into the system.
Hansen and co are so obviously wrong that they have to know they are lying.
Shouldn’t people who profit from telling lies go to jail?
They do in the business world.
Jim Petrie
How to differentiate between projection and prediction: They project alarm, but predict disaster.
Or stated differently: They project confidence in their doomed predictions.
There, easy as eating american pie. :p
In the Miami News article, it said “he said a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide by 2040, teh number of days each year with temperatures over 80 degrees would rise from 35 to 85 in Washington DC and (somewhere..). So how is this panning out? Has there been any increase?
projection [pruh-jek-shuhn]
Example Sentences
pro·jec·tion [pruh-jek-shuhn] Show IPA
noun
1.
a projecting or protruding part.
2.
the state or fact of jutting out or protruding.
3.
a causing to jut or protrude.
4.
the act, process, or result of projecting.
5.
Cartography . a systematic construction of lines drawn on a plane surface representative of and corresponding to the meridians and parallels of the curved surface of the earth or celestial sphere.
EXPAND
Origin:
1470–80; < Latin prōjectiōn- (stem of prōjectiō ) a throwing forward. See project, -ion
Related forms
pro·jec·tion·al [pruh-jek-shuh-nl] Show IPA, adjective
non·pro·jec·tion, noun
self-pro·jec·tion, noun
Synonyms
1. jut, overhang, protrusion. 9. prediction.
Prediction
[pri-dik-shuhn] Show IPA
noun
an act of predicting.
an instance of this; prophecy.
Origin:
1555–65; < Latin praedictiōn- (stem of praedictiō ) a foretelling.See predict, -ion
Synonyms
2. forecast, augury, prognostication, divination, projection.
They are both Synonyms for each other!
I have just spent the last 3hrs cutting up tomatoes and onions to make tomato relish using a unique Australian product called ezi sauce. This goes very well with beef, around twenty pints [us] this will most likely see me out for a tasty condiment till the end of the global warming scam.
Though I do hope the weather in the coming years is conducive to the growing of more tomatoes.
More failed projections
Not only did the projection fail, but it’s not true to say that the North Pole has never been ice free. Why don’t rags like the National Geographic check before publishing this piece of misinformation?
Here is evidence of ice free central Arctic Ocean within the last ~ 11,000 years. (And it’s had ice-free periods an other times in history).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2010.08.016
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2007AGUFMPP11A0203F
http://geology.geoscienceworld.org/cgi/content/abstract/21/3/227
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/10/30/new-peer-reviewed-paper-says-there-appear-to-have-been-periods-of-ice-free-summers-in-the-central-arctic-ocean/
Whilst I understand the meaning of projected and predicted, I fail to understand the practicalities of this difference if reliance is being placed upon a projection?
Is it not the case that government policy is being driven by projections? In so doing are governments not effectively raising the status of a projection into an anticipated happening, ie., they are viewing a projection as if it were a prediction.
crakar24 says: (March 8, 2012 at 3:46 pm) “It was a projection not a prediction dont you guys know anything!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” as if that is intended to excuse the accuracy of the projection, and to suggest that it should not be scrutinized or held up for reliance. Fine I say, provided that such (or similar) projections are not used to form government policy.
If such projections are worthless (and we know they are) they should simply be confined to the bin; they are not worthy of news reporting, still less should they in any way whatsoever be used to influence government policy.
DirkH says:
March 8, 2012 at 8:22 pm
Streetcred says:
March 8, 2012 at 8:08 pm
“Projections come from data; predictions come from a crystal ball … usually BS.
Modelled AGW data comes from a crystal ball therefore projections and predictions from the AGW peddlers have the same meaning … BS.”
Projections are scenarios that cannot be validated. Predictions try to predict the future and can therefore be validated by comparing the prediction with what actually happens.
The UNIPCC and its many suborganisations are very careful to avoid making predictions. They need wiggle room.
=======================
The IPCC does make predictions, they’re that arrogant.
Wiggle room in hiding connections between terms used and adding more confusion in that they get the acolytes to say they make projections not predictions, that’s the meme I see constantly repeated. Mealy mouthed use of “projections” as a limiting factor by the warmist sycophants claiming these are not “predictions”, just isn’t cutting it as an excuse. They’ve all sold this whole fraud on giving the impression of certainty to their claims, they should all be held accountable.
http://www.ipcc-data.org/ddc_definitions.html
“Definition of Terms Used Within the DDC Pages
Location: Definitions
Projection
The term “projection” is used in two senses in the climate change literature. In general usage, a projection can be regarded as any description of the future and the pathway leading to it. However, a more specific interpretation has been attached to the term “climate projection” by the IPCC when referring to model-derived estimates of future climate.
Forecast/Prediction
When a projection is branded “most likely” it becomes a forecast or prediction. 50-100% probability, and extremely
unlikely – 0-5% probability) may also be used in the AR5 when appropriate.”
So, is the “virtually certain” the same as “most likely” which they say is prediction?
I don’t care, what I care about is that we have been clubbed about the head repeatedly by the deliberate impression of certainty, the “very likely” which expands here to mean 100% – without the 10% uncertainly factor.
On http://climatechangefacts.info/ they give an example of IPCC prediction “most likely” –
“The IPCC 2007 Climate Forecast for this Century:
■Temperature increase. For the next 2 decades, 0.2 deg. C (0.4 F) temperature rise per decade, slightly higher later in most models. The models are all different and respond differently to different assumptions. For the end of this century, IPCC provides 7 best estimates (for 7 assumptions) ranging from 0.6 – 4.0 C (1.1-7.2 F). Warming is likely to lie in the range 2-4.5 deg. C (3.6-8.1 F), with a most likely value of about 3 deg. C (5.4 F). Since the 1800s the temperature has risen 0.76 deg.C (1.4 F). The warming is to be greater on land, in high northern latitudes.”
So, I think it’s a waste of precious time to be arguing about what they mean by projection and prediction, they’ve set it out already. Better use of time imho would be to put together a coherent, easily understood at a glance presentation of how they have consistently exaggerated the certainty of disaster and their abject failure to come anywhere near their disaster mongering scenarios created out of their gigo computer models, with the manipulation of temperature records the certain scientific fraud method. More of Smokey’s pictures and key points and comparisons from those with easy familiarity, would be most welcome. Such as these points, from the last link:
“The IPCC Projections do not Comport with Reality
…The Earth’s ability to absorb CO2 has apparently been underestimated and the climate models need revision per the 31 December 2009 validation of work by Wolfgang Knorr that shows “No Rise of Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide Fraction in Past 160 Years”.
■The projected temperature rise is unrealistic, given that the USA and global temperatures have risen by only 1 deg F (.5 C) in 100 years (revised, NOAA, 1 May 2007 ), (or 150 years using the full instrumented data set) during the height of industrial expansion. Even if all this rise is correct, and is attributable to human causes, it is a trivial amount in the natural variation of the Earth, and to suggest the rise would accelerate 5 fold (IPCC best estimate) in this century is incredible. Even after the release of the new data set and procedures by NOAA on May 1, which addressed some of the urban heat island issues and dropped the warming 44% (below IPCC 2007), significant other urban heat island issues still remain.”
Keep it simple..
To think that all this started when the astronomer / physicist Dr. James Hansen became obsessed with Venus then turned his attention to our wonderful Earth.
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/staff/jhansen.html
http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/hansencv_201201.pdf
Next time a Warmist tells you that based on university qualifications that so and so is not a climate scientist you tell them that neither is James Hansen or Glieck for that matter. 😉
@Larry in Texas
…”If I were a judge asked to decide a dispute whether what Hansen said is a “prediction” or a “projection,” I’d throw all of you out of my courtroom. And I would agree with Roy Spencer.”
Here here! Well said!!!
This all reminds me of slick Willie (Bill Clinton) and his torturing of the definition of the word “is”.
It was just a projection.
Its not like we are trying to completely change our energy industry, tax structure and implement international treaties based on it.