Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
A while back, I noticed an oddity about the Hadley Centre’s HadISST sea ice dataset for the Arctic. There’s a big change in variation from the pre- to the post-satellite era. Satellite measurements of ice areas began in 1979. Here is the full HadISST record, with the monthly variations removed.
Figure 1. Anomaly in the monthly sea ice coverage as reported by the HadISST, GISST, and Reynolds datasets. All data are from KNMI. Monthly average variations from the overlap period (1981-1994) have been subtracted from each dataset. All data are from KNMI (see Monthly Observations).
There’s a few points of note. First, the pre-1953 data is pretty useless, much of it is obviously not changing from year to year. Second, although the variation in the GISST dataset is doesn’t change in 1979, the variation in the HadISST dataset changes pretty radically at that point. Third, there is a large difference between the variability of the Reynolds and the GISST datasets during the period of their overlap.
I had filed this under unexplained curiosities and forgotten about it … until the recent publication of a paper called Observations reveal external driver for Arctic sea-ice retreat, by Notz and Marotzke, hereinafter N&M2012
Why did their paper bring this issue to the fore?
Well, the problem is that the observations they use to establish their case are the difference in variability of the HadISST during period 1953-1979, compared to the HadISST variations since that time. They look at the early variations, and they use them as “a good estimate of internal variability”. I have problems with this assumption in general due to the short length of time (25 years), which is way too little data to establish “internal variability” even if the data were good … but it’s not good, it has problems.
To their credit, the authors recognized the problems in N&M2012, saying:
Second, from 1979 onwards the HadISST data set is primarily based on satellite observations. We find across the 1978/1979 boundary an unusually large increase in sea-ice extent in March and an unusually large decrease in sea-ice extent in September (Figures 1b and 1d). This indicates a possible inconsistency in the data set across this boundary.
Ya think? I love these guys, “possible inconsistency”. The use of this kind of weasel words. like “may” and “might” and “could” and “possible”, is Cain’s mark on the post-normal scientist. Let me remove the GISST and Reynolds datasets and plot just the modern period that they use, to see if you can spot their “possible inconsistency” between the 1953-1979 and the post 1979 periods…
Figure 2. As in Figure 1, for HadISST only.
The inconsistency is clearly visible, with the variability of the pre- and post-1979 periods being very different.
As a result, what they are doing is comparing apples and oranges. They are assuming the 1953-1979 record is the “natural variability”, and then they are comparing that to the variability of the post-1979 period … I’m sorry, but you just can’t do that. You can’t compare one dataset with another when they are based on two totally different types of measurements, satellite and ground, especially when there is an obvious inconsistency between the two.
In addition, since the GISST dataset doesn’t contain the large change in variability seen in the HadISST dataset, it is at least a working assumption that there is some structural error in the HadISST dataset … but the authors just ignore that and move forwards.
Finally, we have a problematic underlying assumption that involves something called “stationarity”. The stationarity assumption says that the various statistical measures (average, standard deviation, variation) are “stationary”, meaning that they don’t change over time.
They nod their heads to the stationarity problem, saying (emphasis mine):
For the long-term memory process, we estimate the Hurst coefficient H of the pre-satellite time series using detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA) [Peng et al., 1994]. Only a rough estimate of 0.8 < H < 0.9 is possible both because of the short length of the time series and because DFA shows non-stationarity even after removal of the seasonal cycle.
Unfortunately, they don’t follow the problem of non-stationarity to its logical conclusion. Look, for example, at the variability in the satellite record in the period 1990-2000 versus the period 2000-2005. They are quite different. In their analysis, they claim that a difference in variability pre- to post-1979 establishes that human actions are the “external driver” … but they don’t deal with the differences pre- and post-2000, or with the fact that their own analysis shows that even the variability of the pre-1979 data is not stationary.
Finally, look at the large change in variability in the most recent part of the record. The authors don’t mention that … but the HadISST folks do.
03/DECEMBER/2010. The SSM/I satellite that was used to provide the data for the sea ice analysis in HadISST suffered a significant degradation in performance through January and February 2009. The problem affected HadISST fields from January 2009 and probably causes an underestimate of ice extent and concentration. It also affected sea surface temperatures in sea ice areas because the SSTs are estimated from the sea ice concentration (see Rayner et al. 2003). As of 3rd December 2010 we have reprocessed the data from January 2009 to the present using a different sea ice data source. This is an improvement on the previous situation, but users should still note that the switch of data source at the start of 2009 might introduce a discontinuity into the record. The reprocessed files are available from the main data page. The older version of the data set is archived here.
08/MARCH/2011. The switch of satellite source data at the start of 2009 introduced a discontinuity in the fields of sea ice in both the Arctic and Antarctic.
Curious … the degradation in the recent satellite data “probably causes an underestimate of ice extent and concentration,” and yet it is precisely that low recent ice concentration that they claim “reveals an external driver” …
In any case, when I put all of those problems together, the changes in variability in 1979, in 2000, and in 2009, plus the demonstrated non-stationarity pre-1979, plus the indirect evidence from the GISST and Reynolds datasets, plus the problems with the satellites affecting the critical recent period, the period they claim is statistically significant in their analysis … well, given all that I’d say that the N&M2012 method (comparing variability pre- and post-1979) is totally inappropriate given the available data. There are far too many changes and differences in variability, both internal to and between the datasets, to claim that the 1979 change in variability means anything at all … much less that it reveals an “external driver” for the changes in Arctic sea ice.
w.
Willis, The Web of Science is the most trusted citation index by Thomas Reuters. You can check it yourself to confirm whether I am misrepresenting this – only three papers (in Diversity and Distributions (2012), Thunderstorm Thermostat in Energy & Environment (2010), and Nature (2004)) are given there with zero citations. The Tuvalu sea level rise paper in Energy & Environment is somehow not included in the Web of Science. But even if we include that, your H-index is one – I am not sure that will make someone a real scientist. This is not personal opinion, just facts – please check it yourself.
On a different issue, Energy & Environment is considered as a journal with a bias and lax review procedures. It is the same journal that published the paper by Ernst Beck on 180 years of CO2; although it required a lot of work to write that article, most scientist will say it is largely meaningless. Your paper on seal level rise in that journal was criticized (just like in this forum) by many others, like http://staff.acecrc.org.au/~johunter/p925.pdf Church & White quotes you suggesting there is controversy, then disagrees with you and Morner. I do not know how that can be taken as a positive thing.
Rob, you don’t seem to understand that everything that you say is an ad hominem argument—that my claims are incorrect because I am not a “real” scientist in your eyes … as if that mattered to anyone but you.
I’m happy with my work. Yes, there’s not a lot of it, but I have published in the journals. What other amateur scientist can you name who has anything published in the scientific journals, much less Nature magazine? It’s an uphill climb for me to get published because I don’t have a PhD … which makes my publications MORE impressive, not less.
Next, the lack of citations of my work is hardly surprising, it goes against the “consensus”, so I’d be surprised if it were cited a lot.
But looking at numbers of citations, that’s just another logical fallacy, the “head-count fallacy”. Whether my claims in this or any other study of mine are true or not has nothing to do with whether I’m a “real” scientist in your mind. It has nothing to do with how many times I’ve been published, or how many times they’ve been cited. Science is not a democracy, the validity of claims is not settled by voting as you seem to think.
All that matters is whether my claims are true or not … and given that, anyone like you who wants to change the subject to whether I’m a “real” scientist or not is just running from the issues.
w.
Rob,
I trust Willis Eschenbach’s work more than 99% of those with a PhD. He is a real scientist, a man for all seasons, and your opinion is irrelevant. As is your appeal to the consensus.
The Climategate emails showed Michael Mann conspiring with Phil Jones to dishonestly inflate the number of Jones’ papers, and Jones went along with it. Those mendacious people publish in the journals they have cowed, and as a result they don’t mean squat.
You say, “Energy & Environment is considered as a journal with a bias and lax review procedures.” “Considered” by whom?? By the same dishonest clique that couldn’t corrupt E&E like they corrupted the others? As I’ve often commented, if it were not for psychological projection the alarmist crowd wouldn’t have much to say. That includes you. E&E is a more credible peer review journal than the pet pal review journals used by Mann and Jones.
It is scandalous that Mann can get an error-riddled paper published in less than a month, while the esteemed head of MIT’s atmospheric sciences department has to wait more than a year for publication. You seem to have lost your moral bearings, and cannot distinguish right from wrong. Sad, and typical of many climate alarmist lemmings.
The paper used questionable data and crappy statistics to “find” a causal relationship between human activities and the “variation” in sea ice. What dark hole did they pull the “human driver” inference out of?
You can call that “science” if you want to. I call it putrid crap.
Nuff said. Close this troll-laden thread, please. Why WUWT allows fake name commenters is beyond me. Even the local deadtree press requires full real names on Letters to the Editor. I recommend that policy, Anthony. You have nothing to lose but cockroaches.
Willis, My original post was just a passing comment, and I never expected it to be a long discussion. I never said your claims are incorrect because you are not a “real” scientist – please read my statements carefully (and please do not add anything more to what I have said). Whatever I said is the truth – I like reading your posts. I do not generally believe you because, as I mentioned earlier, I think you have already made up your mind, which is of course a subjective view after looking at your posts and all your colorful descriptions about scientists you criticize (comments like “Ya think? I love these guys, “possible inconsistency”….). If you are criticizing them only on factual issues in a serious way, probably I would not have come to that conclusion, or made any reference to whether you are a “real” scientist. It is surprising that you take some of my factual statements as ad hominem arguments, when you use extensive colorful teasing to make other scientists with longer credentials appear foolish. That is where I find the problem.
Citations have nothing to do with head count fallacy. In general (although not always) citations is a direct measure of the impact, value, correctness, etc of a scientific work – it means that others are using it in some form or other. Richard Lindzen is cited a lot even though his view is not consistent with the scientific majority.
Smokey, I have nothing against you having your own beliefs, I appreciate that you consider Willis with high regards. But, your allegation is untrue, so far I have never appealed to consensus in my posts. I have read many E&E articles and arrived at that opinion. Also its impact factor is very small, which is another indicator that the wider community does not find those articles important enough to address. None of this has anything to do with consensus. This is what I see as Roger Pielke’s comment “[E&E] has published a number of low-quality papers, and the editor’s political agenda has clearly undermined the legitimacy of the outlet,” Pielke says. “If I had a time machine I’d go back and submit our paper elsewhere.” Now about the bias, this is what I see as the statement made by the editor “I’m not ashamed to say that I deliberately encourage the publication of papers that are sceptical of climate change,” said Boehmer-Christiansen, who does not believe in man-made climate change.” Do you still believe it is all a psychological projection? See: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/feb/25/real-climate-libel-threat
Talking about Lindzen, he goes along with most of the current basics of climate science – that CO2 is a green house gas (he calls those who disagree “nutty”), that human activities are increasing CO2, and CO2 will warm the planet, etc. In addition he is also saying that there are other mechanisms by which the warming effect is reduced – namely the iris effect. This actually puzzles me why people who think CO2 is not a green house gas support him. This article and its links will tell us how many mistakes Lindzen had made (which he admitted as stupid mistakes) and why his paper was not accepted (reviewers recommended by him agreed with that decision). http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/01/science/earth/clouds-effect-on-climate-change-is-last-bastion-for-dissenters.html
Mike Dubrasich, I am not sure Smokey is his/her actual name either – with your plan he will be prevented from posting? I can expand my last name, but how does that help, there are many with that name. Are we then going to ask my phone number too? I do not believe I have said anything improper in my posts, just facts, and never called anyone any “names” (please correct me if I am wrong). While addressing/implying me, I am rather surprised to see words or phrases like “cockroaches”, “putrid crap”, “don’t have the balls”, “coward”, etc. I do not understand what is the source of this hostility and intolerance. Really surprising!
Rob, I give up. You seem determined to discuss things like Energy and Environment, Richard Lindzen, Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen, citation counts, whether in your august opinion I’m a “real” scientist, and whether you “believe” me. You’ll discuss anything but the science, it seems. For example, you say you don’t believe me. Is it because you have found some fault in my logic? Is it because you have discovered mathematical errors in my work?
No, no, nothing as prosaic as that … it’s because you think I’ve “made up [my] mind”.
Made up my mind? Who cares about that? Whether my scientific claims are true has nothing at all to do with whether or not my mind is made up. That’s just a pathetic excuse.
Come back when you want to discuss the science. I’m not interested in your whining about how you don’t believe me because you don’t like my colorful descriptions. That just more of your ad hominem nonsense. IT’S NOT ABOUT ME, Rob. It’s not about my language. It’s not about whether my mind is made up, or whether I published in E&E (I did) or Nature magazine (I did). It’s not about Lindzen, or Boehmer-Christiansen. It’s about the science, and it seems that despite several invitations to talk about the science, you’d rather talk about anything but.
OK by me … just don’t expect anyone here to do much other than point and laugh when you start ranting about why some paper of Lindzen’s wasn’t accepted and citing, of all things, the New York Times as support for your meaningless claims … the NYT? Bastion of AGW alarmism? That’s your evidence? Be assured, we’re not laughing with you, we’re laughing at you.
w.
Willis, Lindzen, E &E, Boehmer-Christiansen, etc came up mainly because Smoky brought it up, I was responding to him or her, and it was mentioned in the section addressed to Smokey. About your blogs, I do not have nearly enough time to work out all the statistical details of your posts to determine whether they are correct or not, I read them because of curiosity – but I have read all your published papers, and after you pointed out that your paper on sea level in E&E was cited by others, I read those papers that cited your work also. Many of them (including Church & White) cited errors in your work and disagreed with your conclusions. (Mike Dubrasich – I do not see any questionable data in Church & White). Some like Rob Dekker criticized your procedures in getting to the conclusion in this topic and elsewhere. So, I am happy on your determination to work in these topics and you are putting so much effort. My hesitation on believing your work, as I repeated before, are the criticisms I read about your work in blogs and other papers and your tone about other scientists. I think they matter to establish credibility. If you show some real respect to other scientists in your blogs, considering that most of them are not all that stupid or dishonest and have similar dedication to work as you have, it will have a significant positive effect. There are so many blogs with posts filled with people with little or no training or background in climate science (as stated in the NY Times article I posted in my last post). Readers do not have time to check all their claims, there are too many – that is where credibility and writing style are important factors. You have said this before in a long advice related to a case where one of the writers did not use paragraphs – where you advised that it is not just what he said that is important, but how he presents it. That is not “ad hominem nonsense” as you suggest, it is just practical reality.
Willis Eschenbach said: “…and citing, of all things, the New York Times as support for your meaningless claims … the NYT? Bastion of AGW alarmism? That’s your evidence? Be assured, we’re not laughing with you, we’re laughing at you.”
One more thing… please just read what you wrote. Instead of looking at what NY Times is saying (they gave enough links to the original sources they used), you dismissed them because it is NY Times. Then how can you complain about my doubts about your blogs? I am doing exactly what you are doing, but in a milder way. At least I read your work and what others are saying about them.
Rob G,
Citing the NYT as an authority is not credible: Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus. We’re still laughing at you.
Smokey says: “Citing the NYT as an authority is not credible: Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus. We’re still laughing at you”.
That is OK, I am not too worried about people laughing at me. But what is interesting is that you both think NY Times is not credible (and you do not see any fallacies here) so you dismiss it, but then you find my distrust on Willis’ posts, for similar reasons, to be problematic. Once false, false every time can be applied in both cases. If mine was an ad hominem attack, then what you and Willis are saying contain the same fallacy. At lest NY Times has more credibility among the public. Very interesting.
re ‘falsus en uno, etc’ – nobody is laughing. they are conjuring imagery of snickering and sneering and other semiotics that convey nothing but disapproval and that they imagine is a legitimate substitute for a reasoned argument or an honest but curt dismissal.
cackle away, little gangstah boyz. you don’t know it yet, but there are others a lot smarter than you who don’t admire punks and thugs. way to argue credibility, kids- by mob appeal. 🙂
that makes me laugh – but i think retards are nature’s clowns.
Willis said :
Willis, if you critique a paper, it does not hurt to read it. The answer to your question is on page 2 :
Because we find very close agreement of the statistical properties of the pre-satellite record with both the linearly-detrended satellite record (see section 5) and with the model simulations of internal variability, we assume that the properties of the pre-satellite record are a good estimate of internal variability. For example, the standard deviation of the pre-satellite record is spresat = 0.36 10^6 km2, whereas ssat, detrended = 0.35 10^6
km2 and smodel = 0.37 10^6 km2
Now that we know that your arguments against the variability presented in this paper were caused by you yourself, by disingenuously including the change in seasonal cycle in your presentation of “variability” in figure 1 and 2, it seems that YOU are the one who needs to clarify the error bars in YOUR determination of “internal variability”.
And so far, all we have gotten in response is lectures on what “ad hominem” means and chest beating of how much of a scientist you are.
Rob Dekker says:
May 15, 2012 at 1:21 am
If I were interested in assumptions, either yours or theirs, I would have asked for assumptions. If I were interested in error bars on de-trended data, I’d have asked for that. I’m not interested in either one. I’m interested in mathematical calculation of the actual error bars for the data trends and all, not guesses and assumptions.
Since neither you nor they have presented error bars, both of you are just blowing smoke. Come back when you have numbers to put where your mouth is.
For example, their pre-satellite data only covers the cold half of the PDO … how much has that affected the variability? They don’t say. You don’t say. Instead, you just attack me over and over and over.
Finally, it seems you are back to your desperate tactic of calling me deceptive. Rob, I’m presenting the facts as I see them. I have made no effort to hide what I have done. There is nothing at all deceptive in my work. Your continued attempts to paint me as “disingenuous” are just more of your pathetic ad-hominem arguments. Yes, I included “the change in seasonal cycle in your presentation of “variability”. Why?
Because there IS a change in the seasonal cycle, which IS a change in variability. I’m sorry you don’t like that, but I described exactly what I did, and I see no theoretical reason to change it.
All they offer above is a very basic look at the variability in the detrended records. Please reconsider the meaning of “internal variability”, and then you can explain to us the justification for ignoring trends when you are measuring internal variability.
This misunderstanding is particularly important because they claim that the key evidence is that the trend of the satellite era data takes it outside what they ASSUME to be the internal variability of the pre-satellite data … yet they have not included trends in their assessment of internal variability.
w.
Rob G. says:
May 13, 2012 at 11:52 am (Edit)
If your claim rests on the “original sources they used”, then quote the original sources and leave out the middle-man. Quoting a biased third-hand source just makes folks laugh.
w.
Willis, The sources in NY Times relates to Lindzen’s work, that was not included in my answer to you. But I am surprised that you characterized NY Times as a biased source and a “Baston of AGW alarmism”. When you characterized the belief in human caused climate change as alarmism, I am assuming you will probably dismiss the publications of a vast majority of scientists (as you are doing here) many of them with much longer history of reputable research, by creating your own reasons. Most of your objections probably will not get published in real scientific journals. But after accusing NY Times of bias and refusing to look at it, this is what you wrote, “Made up my mind? Who cares about that? Whether my scientific claims are true has nothing at all to do with whether or not my mind is made up. That’s just a pathetic excuse.” The problem is, you excuse is more ”pathetic” since NY Times has more credibility than any one of us. I am surprised you do not see any double standard here.
A word about your characterization of alarmism: ignore IPCC but please take a look at the other topics in this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change Are you going to claim that they are all wrong and Willis and few other are correct? Now, you have a point that I am not scientifically criticizing your work, with a full time demanding work it is difficult for me to devote time to do that. But in one of your future post, I will take that up that task as well.
Rob G. says:
May 15, 2012 at 9:01 pm
As usual, when you say “I am assuming” your assumptions are nonsense. You should refrain from assumptions, none of yours so far have been correct.
For example, I do not “dismiss” anything. I post up my scientific objections to exactly what I object to … and unlike you, I am not impressed by whether someone has a “much longer history of reputable research”. You might start here if you wonder why, then you could take a look at Ioannidis, “Why Most Published Research Findings Are False” … only a fool would believe something based on the credentials of the author, or because it has been published in a peer-reviewed journal. Richard Feynmann famously said “Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts”, but it seems you didn’t get the memo. Still unconvinced? Swing on over to Nature magazine and read “Beware the creeping cracks of bias“, which is subtitled “Evidence is mounting that research is riddled with systematic errors”. Left unchecked, this could erode public trust”. Seems like you’re the last person standing that thinks that you can blindly believe someone because they are a scientist … me, I don’t believe anyone, including myself …
In any case, you still are going on and on about the personalities and your fantasies of what I “dismiss” and the NYT and the like … when are you going to provide a comment about the actual science? Your continuous whining about me and what I might believe is boring.
w.
PS—You cite a Wikipedia page on climate that puts forward the well-known argumentum ad populum, the logical fallacy also known as the “headcount fallacy”? Seriously, you really should get out more and read up on logical fallacies, that one has been known to be a bogus argument since Aristotle … but ignoring that, you ask if I am going to claim that “they are all wrong and Willis and a few others are correct?”
No, that’s YOUR fantasy. I make no such blanket claims. I claim only what I claim, which is not any kind of blanket nonsense of the type you seem to think I follow.
In any case, you seem impressed by the climate wisdom of organizations like those noted climate experts, the Soil Science Society of America and the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Society for Microbiology … although it would actually make sense that you garnered your own climate wisdom from microbiologists …
Tell me, Rob, how many of these organizations actually polled their members before making the statements, and how many of them are merely the politically correct statements of a few of the leaders?
It’s a serious question. Come back when you have the answer. I haven’t found a single organization yet that had the balls to actually poll their members before giving the polloi the benefit of their august soil science or child health or microbiological wisdom about climate, but I might have missed it.
Your move …
PPS—The statement by the Soil Science Society is hilarious, where they agree that:
They are not only experts on soil, and climate change, but also on the stability of societies … not only that, but they come out foursquare to say the climate is changing.
The climate is actually changing? Gosh, there’s some breaking news, who could have guessed …
PPPS—You also say:
I didn’t “refus[e] to look at it”, that’s your fantasy on steroids again. I read it and laughed, and I wrote:
The NYT has been on the global warming bandwagon for years. They just published James Hansen’s op-ed on climate science, and they’ve provided the same bully pulpit to him before … point out to me where they have done the same, provided space in their opinion page, for any noted skeptic like Richard Lindzen or Roger Pielke or Roy Spenser or the like? Never, as far as I know … but you think they’re “credible”. What evidence do you have for that?
Finally, I was objecting to you using a newspaper as a citation for a scientific claim … try that in a scientific paper and see how far you get. That’s why I said people would point and laugh, citing a newspaper in support of a scientific claim marks you as a zealot rather than a scientist.
Willis said :
No, Willis. It is not a change in ‘variability’. It is a change in ‘trend’.
If your definition of ‘variability’ includes the change in trend over the past 30 years, then the Arctic sea ice can melt out completely in September and you would still call it a change in ‘variability’.
Willis, There were so many surveys among scientists (either directly or indirectly), including those by the Heartland Institute. The results were fairly consistent – with few exception. So I do not buy the argument that the statement by some of these organizations are untrue because they have not polled the members. I have not seen a single poll in the societies I belong to, such policy statements are made using input from various committees. But of course individual members are free to start their own drive, they have done that in APS, but could get only 80 members (out of thousands of members), which matches with a study in PANS a super majority of scientists subscribe to AGW. http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/06/04/1003187107.full.pdf
That excuse does not go too far.
On your so called head count fallacy: You are enamored with fallacies and advice others to read on it, but then you are making so many silly mistakes in the process (or you also commit the same fallacy as in the NY Times case). Opinions by experts are exempted from Argumentum Ad Populum (see: http://philosophy.lander.edu/logic/popular.html at the end) – it is only valid for popular opinions, not by people “in-the-know”. I cannot believe you think expert opinions belong to such a fallacy.
I am not worried about American Academy of Pediatrics, but the National Academy of Science matters. If I have to read all the papers related to a topic before I do a specific work or develop my belief rather than depending on a expert, I will do very little in my life. Should I read all the papers on beam design, and aging and vibration of beams etc, before I build a new house, or have a trained engineer do that for me; should I read all papers on internal combustion engines before I buy a car, or should I depend on the opinion of a trained auto mechanic; should I cover journal papers on gene expression and recombinant DNA before I eat genetically modified food; should I read thousands of papers on statins before taking Lipitor or cholesterol??? Should a person read all the papers about aerodynamics or structural elasticity, or reliability analysis of every critical component before he gets into a plane (?) – there are strong disagreements on various aspects of the functions of various components.
As the exception to the ad populum fallacy, the example is useful – A super majority of scientists and physicians say that high fat diet is unhealthy. There are many who say it is not. There are papers on both sides. To what level would you like to go before you take a side? Read all the papers, one can always find some problems or excuse not to accept the findings in a paper. So should we go one step further and do our own experiments and surveys (and who knows how many errors are there). We depend on experts, and experts do not always agree, and we do not have time to check everything on every topic and do our own experiments. That is not an ad populum fallacy. Most of us do not do such an indepth investigation for more important and critical topics directly related to survival of people. So why should climate science be an exception, compared to other areas? Should I believe the 98 % scientists or a handful of scientists on the other side accompanied with an army of bloggers most of whom with absolutely no training in that area but with lots of time in their hands? Or why should I spend all my time searching the journals on climate science when scientists are already doing that?
ps. I should say for APS only 80 signed opposing their stated policy on AGW
One more things – sure there are errors in papers and even in our understanding. But other expert scientists will check and find them eventually and that will be corrected. I have a difficult time in assuming that 98 % of the scientists are either incompetant or dishonest (or both), to come up with such an AGW theory.
Rob G. says:
May 16, 2012 at 7:39 am
Incompetent? Dishonest? What are you on about? That is the fallacy of the excluded middle. There is a third possibility, that they are just wrong. Not incompetent. Not dishonest. Just wrong.
For years, the consensus was that the continents couldn’t move. It took a long time for the idea of continental drift to become established.
But contrary to your claim, that didn’t mean that “98 % of the scientists” saying no to continental drift were “either incompetant or dishonest (or both)”.
It just meant that they were wrong … all 98% of them … go figure.
w.
PS—You can go on and on about the head-count fallacy and the value of consensus for months, I’m sure, particularly since it keeps you from actually addressing the science. You say you don’t have time to address the science, but somehow you find time to make, re-make, and make again your claims about consensus.
Let me say it one last time. Science is not settled by consensus. if you are talking about consensus, you are not talking about science.
Come back when you want to discuss the science, I’ve had it with you and your consensus.
Willis Eschenbach says: “Incompetent? Dishonest? What are you on about? That is the fallacy of the excluded middle. There is a third possibility, that they are just wrong. Not incompetent. Not dishonest. Just wrong.”
Every time you talk about logical fallacy, unfortunately you are wrong without an exception; so I would very much appreciate if you do not quote from the collection of logical fallacies from freshmen philosophy. If 98 % of the scientists are wrong, and that other 2% are correct, then I would say the 98 % are incompetent in developing a correct understanding of the phenomenon. Looking from the AGW nonbelievers’ perspective, even after repeatedly telling them that they are wrong, these 98 % of scientists keep on arguing from the wrong side bringing even more unreliable evidence – they cannot even understand what is wrong with their theory even though Willis and others are describing that in great detail. That is total incompetence from the 98% group.
Who said science is settled, and who used the word consensus? I did not. But since you brought up the consensus issue, what other option do I have? Should I believe the 2 % scientists? Based on what reason. Please answer this question. They don’t even have consensus among themselves (William Gray and Roy Spencer do not exactly agree with John Christy, who disagrees with Patrick Michaels, etc., on the real cause and effect of climate change?) Or do you expect me to read 7,560 papers on sea level rise, 25,840 papers on global warming, 20,300 papers on greenhouse gases, etc., …..? Just to make up my mind on global warming, and similar number of papers before I eat genetically modified food, etc.,…. Wow,
Since you are making too many mistakes on elementary logic, I am not sure how reliable your science is. But whatever you were discussing here on ice variability is statistics and curve fitting, very little to do with real science. As they say, there is statistics and statistics, which is especially obvious when we see that Rob Dekker has correctly criticized you on your statistics. But, I will be happy to take it up when you deal with real science.
Rob, I see it differently.
Rob G., you say “One more things – sure there are errors in papers and even in our understanding. But other expert scientists will check and find them eventually and that will be corrected.”
Rob, that is the real problem right there. Yeah, normal molasses paced science will uncover all of the errors and wrong assumptions, missing negative parameters in about 50-100 years, disproving the 98%, after the entire of humanity has driven into the ground by the political decisions bases upon a mere hypothesis that does have many, many huge holes in it already. Many of the 2% are not willing to just stand by a watch as this fallacy plays out. I used to just accept AGW for about twenty years until I myself decided to delve into the data and see if it was in fact firm and correct. That is not what I found. (Thanks to WUWT for the thousand links to the actual data!)
If politics, investment, companies, taxes, freedoms and markets were not involved in this topic I would say great, let’s just wait the some 50-100 years because it is my belief that the 98% will surely be proven wrong, once again. But that too is not the case due to the couple to politics. You are the one seeming to live in an imaginary nana land of science. Science is no longer the pure entity you seem to think it still is. That science died long ago in the 60’s-80’s.
If you are anything like a scientist, or even a scientific type mind, it is your command, by science, to always be skeptical of the 98%. You should know Feynman’s great and true saying, do it, in the data, not in the paper’s words.
Wayne, I appreciate your experience, although I am not sure it will take that long for our understanding to change. One reliable set of ice data that shows very high CO2 and low temperature (or the opposite – high temperature and low CO2) for a geologically significant period of time will dismantle the entire theory in a hurry. Or reliable evidence that temperature is leading CO2 change will do the same, just like if the net kinetic energy on earth goes down (lowering temp) while CO2 is going up while the other factors are relatively constant for a statistically significant period of time. It is fairly easy to dismantle a theory, we need only one or two convincing deviations. So I am optimistic that it will not take 100 years for a course change, if AGW is not the correct understanding.
But help me out in this area, there are several aspects in the AGW theory – CO2 is a greenhouse gas, CO2 is increasing, most of that increase is caused by human activity, there is a positive feedback mechanism, climate sensitivity, average temperature near the earth surface and ocean is rising, rising temperature can melt ice and raise sea levels, and a lot of similar results if AGW is true. Which aspects in this list did you find wrong from your own experience, eg. CO2 is not a greenhouse gas (as many bloggers believe), or CO2 rise is from natural causes (like Roy Spencer or Fred Singer), or the cause of global warming is unknown (like John Christy or Robert Balling), or global warming will have insignificant negative effects (like Patrick Michales),….? If we go with Lindzen, he believes CO2 is a greenhouse gas, CO2 is increasing, and human activity is one the main causes – he only questions the magnitude of climate sensitivity. So which are the wrong components in AGW – I would very much appreciate if you can help me on this. What puzzles me is that this 2 % scientists have different beliefs and conclusions – many of them accepts different components of AGW, but not all the components.From what I see, Willis is attacking all the components whenever it is convenient.
Rob G. says:
May 16, 2012 at 7:34 pm
Gosh … so according to you Einstein didn’t just show that the consensus of physicists who believed in Newton was wrong … he showed that they were incompetent or dishonest. And Wallace showed that the consensus that thought continental plates couldn’t move weren’t just wrong, they were incompetent or dishonest as well … who knew that there were that many incompetent geologists?
For those curious about the “fallacy of the excluded middle”, it means that you set up a false dichotomy which doesn’t include all the possibilities. For example, Rob had said (emphasis mine):
The only two choices that Rob considers are that the scientists are either incompetent or dishonest. But there is a third possibility, which is that they are competent and honest … and wrong.
By the exclusion of that possibility, Rob has committed the fallacy of the excluded middle. Instead of facing that obvious fact, he has, hilariously, accused me of being wrong about the nature that particular logical fallacy.
I say hilariously because in my case he allows for the third possibility that he so vehemently denied above, that I’m neither incompetent nor dishonest but simply wrong …
I leave it to the reader to determine which one of us is correct … or neither of us, or both of us, I don’t want to exclude the middle …
Rob G., at the risk of repeating myself, let me repeat myself:
w.