UPDATE: 12:55PM Dr. Mann ducks a TV station reporter who requested an interview afterwards, see below.
Steve McIntyre recently published a new graph on his website Climate Audit.
Alerted to the fact that Dr. Mann would be speaking at the OC Water Summit, I was asked to submit a question, but I could not make it there in time given the short notice. A suitable proxy, our friend Roger Sowell, was kind enough to attend and ask a question. Here’s what I sent him in way of a primer, I don’t know the actual question he asked, but we hope to have a video presentation later as I was told it was recorded.
Figure 1. Yamal Chronologies. Green – from Hantemirov _liv.rwl dataset; red- from Briffa et al 2008.
How interesting it is that the Hantemirov data in green, diverges from the CRU 2008 “Hockey Team” data in red. This is due to a larger data sample. One tree core, YAD061 is responsible for most of the difference, when a small set of tree core data is used.
This graph demonstrates how trees simply don’t show a hockey stick shape when all of the data is used.
In MBH98, your paper Dr. Mann, has a similar problem to the Briffa data. Your solution was to not use tree core data after 1960 and to splice on the instrumental temperature record to in effect “hide the decline” of the trees after 1960.
How do you respond to the charge that the tree ring data was cherry picked to show a desired result, and that Mr. McIntyre has falsified your work by showing that the premise of a hockey stick falls apart when all of the data is used?
===========================================================
Roger Sowell was in the audience this morning (thank you for responding on short notice). I received this answer via text from Roger Sowell, to a question he asked:
He responded that it was Bradley as coauthor, and his (MBH98) work did not use the Briffa data.
Said the decline or divergence is well known but not understood, so is being studied.
Basically dodged the question; called it “specious”.
He said the warming is real and he addressed all this in his book.
It was hoped that Steve McIntyre would have provided a question for submission, but there was no email response from him in time.
Roger Sowell has done some excellent work in climate skepticism, I urge readers to read his recent presentation, here’s the primer:
The following is the presentation I made on April 17, 2012, to the Southern California Section of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), at their monthly dinner meeting held at Long Beach, California. The title for the presentation is “What if the Warmists are Wrong? Is Catastrophic Cooling Coming? Implications.” My heartfelt thanks to Mr. Alan Benson, chair of the Southern California Section, for the invitation to speak. I also appreciate those who attended, and especially for their questions. As always, it is an honor to address AIChE members.
The presentation was approximately one hour, followed by another hour of questions and answers. The presentation is in three parts, as suggested by the title: 1) Are the Warmists Wrong? 2) Is Catastrophic Cooling Coming? and 3) Implications.
Background: this topic could easily require a week to present the many aspects and interesting details. With a mere hour at my disposal, this presentation necessarily hits only the major points. My purpose here, firstly, was to inform the audience of what has transpired in the climate science arena in part 1, primarily as to the quality of the data and the climate models. It is important to note the scarcity of agreement between the model projections and actual data. Secondly, my purpose was to present the case for imminent global cooling in part 2. Thirdly, my purpose was to describe a few of the many and serious implications for imminent global cooling in part 3, tying this in to what engineers can expect. Engineers are problem-solvers, and this presents a great many problems to solve. I also described a few of the legal ramifications of imminent global cooling.
Full presentation here, well worth bookmarking.
============================================================
UPDATE: 11:40AM I’m told via telephone that a local TV station is going to be interviewing Dr. Mann, and also Mr. Sowell due to his question. He promises more details later. Stay tuned.
UPDATE2 11:55PM: I wrote to Roger Sowell, after getting the above message, he reports Mann ducked the interview with KOCE-TV, the PBS station in Southern California. When Mann can’t even appear on warm-friendly PBS, you know he’s on the run.
On Friday, May 18, 2012, Anthony wrote:
Dear Roger,Thank you most sincerely for taking time out of your busy schedule to do this, I am in your debt. Anthony,
He replied:
My pleasure. This has been noteworthy.
Dr Mann refused the interview, and according to the reporter, he was extremely rude about it.
My interview went ok, I believe.
Roger
I’ll post that interview if it becomes available online.
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otter17 says:
Not sad at all, “otter”. We don’t need some Team-infested journal to tell us what Mann wants us to think. The graph at the top of this thread with the two colors (green for reality; red for Mann’s fantasy) is sufficient-that is, unless you’re color blind.
What’s sad is you’ve apparently been sucker-punched by The Team, promoting The Cause, to make Big Payola (for them–you get to pay, and worry, and fret, and in the end feel foolish).
Mann can not live by cred’ alone.
Thanks, Anthony, for posting my small part in this rather interesting episode. I appreciate the link to my little blog, too! The Orange County Water Summit was actually quite interesting, as water is also a favorite topic with me.
Regarding the question I asked, I tried to stay as close to the two short paragraphs as stated in the body of this post. I wrote it out on a piece of paper, and read it when my turn to ask arrived.
Here is what I asked to the best of my recollection (this can be confirmed if and when the video/audio is available):
“My question is for Dr. Mann. Dr Mann, in your 1998 paper co-authored with Dr. Briffa and Dr. Hughes, you showed a warming since 1960. The same hockey-stick graph was shown earlier today. However, you chose to not use tree core data after 1960 but instead to splice on the instrumental temperature record to in effect “hide the decline” of the trees after 1960.
How do you respond to the charge that the tree ring data was cherry picked to show a desired result, and that Mr. Steve McIntyre has falsified your work by showing that the premise of a hockey stick falls apart when all of the data is used?”
Mann then proceeded to state that my question had false information, since it was Bradley, not Briffa as co-author. OK, we can grant him that small point. He went on to say, as I emailed Anthony and shown in the post above, the decline is well-known but not understood; research is on-going; then dodged the question and called it “specious;” then made a plug for his book (about the third or fourth time, I believe) saying the warming is real and he addressed all this in his book.
There were a couple of other questions from skeptics, one related to Dr. Richard Lindzen of MIT. Mann replied that Lindzen is a maverick, and that the consensus is what we follow in science. He stated that we don’t believe in Evolution theory simply because Darwin proposed it, but because it has withstood the test of time and many scientists’ verification for more than 100 years (I think I have his answer pretty close to verbatim).
Now, about the Nobel-prize: Mann stated at the outset that he did not win the Nobel prize, and explained that he merely shared in it as a contributing scientist to the IPCC, which organization did win.
I actually enjoyed Mann’s presentation, because it reminded me a bit of being in a final exam in university, where the goal is to spot the errors, omissions, and misleading statements. Mann’s presentation was full of such things. For example, he showed a graph of Arctic ice decline, during a segment on the many threads of evidence that proves the globe is warming. His graph stopped at 2007, at the lowest point in the record. He did not explain that the graph was for summer minimum extent, which I think it must have been. That cherry-picked endpoint made the graph take a dramatic downward trend, and was most impressive. And, very misleading because the minimum extent has stabilized and slightly increased since then.
Another was the latest 12 months in the USA being the hottest 12 month period on record. No mention of Europe or Asia, though, which just ended brutally cold and bitter winter.. Again, misleading.
Another was the intense rainfall on the East coast from hurricane (or was it tropical storm?) Irene. Mann stated that the intense rain was due in part to global warming, since the Atlantic Ocean was unusually warm when Irene passed over it and collected water vapor to dump on shore as rain. That raised my suspicions, since I have never heard that before; perhaps it is true; I just don’t know.
He also presented a graph to show how superbly well the climate models match the actual temperature trend since Dr. Hansen made his speech to congress in 1988. What he didn’t mention, though, is that the “actual data” has been severely manipulated and approximately half the warming is due to adjustments. His “actual data” also either 1) stopped before the recent leveling off, or 2) showed a warming for the past 12 or so years; I could not read the time-scale on the chart from my seat near the back of the room. Either way, that was (again) very misleading.
Finally, he showed the (is it obligatory?) photo of a polar bear on a tiny ice floe. He spent some time talking about his little daughter and how he wants to leave a good world for her. The polar bear on the ice floe was displayed during this portion of the speech. Again, extremely misleading since polar bears have plenty of ice on which to sit, and their numbers are growing, not declining.
Mann tied in global warming to the water topic, saying the models forecast a much more arid climate for the US southwest. This, of course, will make the existing water shortages in California and other Western states much, much worse. He then confused us all by saying it was not clear if more La Niñas or El Niños would prevail. He noted that global warming creates warmer oceans, which would mean more El Niños, which almost always bring more rain, not less. I must note, here, that the existence of multiple models, as Mann mentioned, is a clear indication that the science is not settled. My words not, not Mann’s, but if a person on a journey had 12 different maps, and took the average of the 12 routes and directions to his destination, one must wonder if he would reach the destination at all.
Thank you to all the commenters above for the kind words on my speech to the AIChE. That speech was a lot of fun, and it was rewarding to have a few college students from California State – Long Beach in attendance. They seemed to not be aware of any of the points I made, and it came as somewhat of a surprise to them.
Just a few words about the television interviews, that Dr. Mann declined and I accepted. I was asked by a very nice young lady to step out of the convention hall into the hallway, where she confirmed that I had asked the question of Dr. Mann. She then said that was an excellent question, and a news reporter from PBS would like to interview me, would I consent to the interview? I said I would be happy to do so. I met the reporter, David, and I apologize to him that I didn’t catch the last name. He’s a very interesting and quite nice fellow. We went through the preliminaries, my name, occupation, and he asked my affiliation. I told him I’m in solo practice and was here on my own, not representing any organization. That seemed to perplex him, and I stated that I am just one of many thousands of climate skeptics. Some others wanted to attend today but could not for various reasons, so I came alone. He seemed more relieved when he asked what kind of law I practice and I told him Climate Change law.
David then decided he wanted to interview Dr. Mann first, then me second to get the skeptic view. He asked me to step away and return in 10 minutes. I went back to the presentation and took my seat. I could see Dr. Mann across the room, and he went out for a few minutes then returned. So, I went back out to find David and his camera-man. At that point, David told me that he did not interview Dr. Mann after all. He said, and I’m paraphrasing here, that Dr. Mann refused the interview and got angry. I believe David told him that he was to be interviewed first, then me, although I was not identified by name but by the question I asked. It could be that Dr. Mann did not want to be interviewed then have a skeptic follow him, with no opportunity to rebut. This is just speculation on my part, though.
In the actual interview, David asked me a few of the questions he had intended to ask Dr. Mann, such as what is global warming, and what role does mankind play in this? I can’t recall my exact words, which should be available soon if and when the video is aired and placed on-line, but here is what I believe I said.
I said that global warming is the fact that the world has warmed somewhat, perhaps one degree F, in the past 150 years. The cause of the warming is mostly natural forces, since mankind has not placed much CO2 in the air until the past four decades.
He asked other questions, such as what is the skeptic view. I told him that I don’t believe that CO2 causes much, if any warming, and that the more important issue is global cooling due to the weak solar cycle.
David ended by asking why I thought Dr. Mann was so rude in his refusal to be interviewed, and I replied that I don’t know, but I do know he is party to some litigation. It is possible his attorneys have advised him not to do interviews. This is a pure guess on my part.
Seth says:
May 18, 2012 at 7:46 pm
Your side should then get Mann to fight his battles in Tron rather than on the world stage where deep-thinking critics don’t suffer fools gladly.
But your comment about being “vilified” is a dodge as bad as Mann’s: the above graph is not a political statement at all but shows without controversy that he was WRONG! Might I also point out it uses data in the field in which Mann claims to have expertise and was also computer generated so if anything his geekiness should be an asset.
Apparently your definition of “vilified” is when someone proves him wrong. Well, using that definition, Mann is the Villain of Villified–and in his own scientific realm, yet; a much more appropriate job description than the accolades you’re applying.
Since this was a Water Summit in California, much was made of the forecasts of sea level increase. The particular focus of today’s conference was the California Delta, where two major rivers meet, and then flow into one channel into San Francisco Bay. The two rivers are the Sacramento (flowing from the north), and the San Joaquin (flowing from the south).
What struck me was the blatant statement that sea level would rise 55 inches (1.4 meters) by the year 2100. That statement was not challenged by anyone, as far as I could determine. The mid-century mark was to be about half of that. The point was made that the Delta region has many miles of levees, with only approximately one foot freeboard at high tide presently. Therefore, something must be done to all the levees before the sea level rises 55 inches. This is important, because the dry land behind the levees has subsided, in many places as much as 30 feet below sea level. All of that land is subject to flooding, permanently, if the levees are not modified to increase their height — and the sea level does indeed rise.
That amount, 55 inches, is far beyond what I recall as the most likely prediction, even from the IPCC.
Rockroad wrote:Apparently your definition of “vilified” is when someone proves him wrong.
No, I mean how in venues like this he gets “Mann has done more damage to science than any hack in recent memory. He is, at best, a physics school dropout” – Mark T above.
But this vilification is nothing to do with his work. In science he is well respected:
From wiki:
Awards
Mann was awarded the Phillip M. Orville Prize in 1997 for an outstanding dissertation in the earth sciences at Yale University. His co-authorship of a scientific paper published by Nature won him an award from the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) in 2002, and another co-authored paper published in the same year won the NOAA’s outstanding scientific publication award. He was named by Scientific American as one of fifty “leading visionaries in science and technology.” The Association of American Geographers awarded him the John Russell Mather Paper of the Year award in 2005 for a co-authored paper published in the Journal of Climate. The American Geophysical Union awarded him its Editors’ Citation for Excellence in Refereeing in 2006 to recognize his contributions in reviewing manuscripts for its Geophysical Research Letters journal. Mann’s work and that of several hundred other scientists who contributed to the IPCC’s Third Assessment Report received recognition with the award of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007. In 2012, he was elected a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union. He was awarded the Hans Oeschger Medal of the European Geosciences Union in 2012.
Re:Roger Sowell’s comments
Amazing!
Btw, Building miles of levees with only 1′ of freeboard seems like it was at bad engineering decision to begin with to me. I wonder about the rest of the story there.
Thanks for sharing.
davidmhoffer wrote: Science doesn’t have to appear in a journal to be credible.
Its a good start.
There are over 100,000 scholarly papers in the field of climate science. There’s plenty of controversy in the peer reviewed literature.
If someone’s claims (such that proxy temperature reconstructions are wrong) don’t appear in the literature, then it’s a fair assumption that they’re more crackpot than science. It’s a generalisation, but the best use of your time would be to read the peer reviewed literature first.
The other advantage of the peer reviewed literature, is that the scientific community would have read it, and you can find their response or lack it.
davidmhoffer wrote: “If you were a scientist who, in the course of your research, became aware of an impending natural disaster, only days away, that would kill millions of people, would you disclose your data and methods to the public in order to convince them to take action?”
Things to note:
1) Mann’s data is available.
2) Mann’s work has been paleoclimatology, not any impending effects. He’s looking back in time, not forwards.
But to answer your question:
I imagine not, I expect that I would be busy making my own preparations.
@ur momisuglydavidmhoffer (May 18, 2012 at 7:09 pm)
“…Redirect…”???
Chill out dude. We are not in disagreement. I just couldn’t find what I was thinking of (which was your link) and so used Wikipedia, while expressing my dissatisfaction at that source. However, I think the particular answer to FTM as to what “raw data” had been plotted was fairly close (he seemed to doubt that a temperature index had been plotted). Thanks for finding the link to the spaghetti graph. That links complements my previous links very nicely. UPDATE: Your link was embedded in my first link.
@ur momisuglydavidmhoffer (May 18, 2012 at 7:12 pm )
Au contraire, mon ami. As shown in my first comment, the instrumental record was clearly grafted onto the proxy record in the WMO graph with no indication of that “trick.” That point was conceded with the excuse that the caption was incorrect. However, I am in agreement with you that the sum total of what he did goes far beyond that. UPDATE: A further clear example of a splice of instrumental data onto the proxy record by Dr. Mann is at MBH98 Figure 7.
TomB said:
“… I’ve read here that the algorithm used would create a hockey stick graph no matter what you plugged into it. …Now you’re saying the algorithm is valid but the data they used was insufficient and cherry picked. Ok, which one is it?”
TomB, you seem to have a problem understanding the basics. GED’s response is a good one. Re-read it. Nobody said Mann’s algorithm is valid. You are mixing apples and oranges, raw data versus algorithmic garbage.
A Question: What is the difference between Bing Crosby and Walt Disney?
An Answer: Bing sings. Walt Disney.
(Tip: Say it in a Glasgow accent.)
Seth ~ But to answer your question:
I imagine not, I expect that I would be busy making my own preparations.
——
Problems with ‘mann’s data is ‘available’,’ aside, You just gave the Perfect reason why the junk science movie ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ should never have been made!
Geez MtK, you might be one of 6% of the population with a genetic retinal cone problem but your cognitive capacity for descriptive analogy is well developed. Very funny retort. 🙂
Phil Clarke says:May 18, 2012 at 2:43 pm “Perhaps Steve could be interviewed… to explain himself?”……..
Smokey says:May 18, 2012 at 3:50 pm Phil, you devious conniver…………..
Mac the Knife says: May 18, 2012 at 6:14 pm
Smokey,
Very Nice! You caught him in a deliberate deceit by omission, trapping him like a repugnant fly transparently displayed in amber for all to examine at their leisure. Nice!!!
MtK
davidmhoffer says:
May 18, 2012 at 9:42 pm
You’ve made that silly argument in several threads and been mocked for it repeatedly. Science doesn’t have to appear in a journal to be credible (just ask the patent office) and appearing in a journal doesn’t make something credible science either. Can you come up with some new material?
______________
It isn’t an argument, but a challenge. Can you actually put together a formal body of research and submit it through the scientific process?
The way the scientific process has worked since the days of Isaac Newton and the founding of the Royal Society goes something like this. Peer review catches methodology/accuracy errors and should bring the research and presentation of the paper up to a journal’s standards. Rebuttals provide a means for submitting evidence to the contrary of other papers. When certain hypotheses and collections of papers become cited, further reinforced by research, or built upon in other ways, a body of research pointing towards a theory begins to take shape. The scientific journals have been the proving ground for grand scientific ideas and subjects such as evolution, astronomy, electro-magnetism, etc.
When you have several reconstructions using other paleo evidence that reinforce the Mann et al reconstruction, it is an indicator of where the science is coalescing. When you have complaints concerning those lines of evidence on a blog, it doesn’t say much in the scientific sense. It is completely reasonable for someone to be skeptical of notions that are NOT sent through the scientific process. Lay people that decide to uncritically accept notions that have not gone through this process, yet discredit notions that have been proven in the process, are clearly exhibiting behavior that is non-skeptical.
@Reed Coray….
(1) Sound the alarm and present all of your data/methods without reservation to the scientific community at large, and ask that community to either confirm or hopefully (who wouldn’t hope the world isn’t headed for disaster?) refute your findings.
Unfortunately that method doesn’t work any more. Look at what happened to the head of the Italian neutrino project. He came up with a result that seemed wrong, but couldn’t determine where his error was. He did (1) exactly: opened up everything to the scientific community, which then worked on the problem in a remarkably honest way. And what did he get for it? Got fired.
In most parts of the “scientific” establishment, option (2) is the only way to keep your job and reputation, the only way to stay in the game. The problem is much larger than Mann. He’s an outstandingly awful product of the system, but the system will always produce more Manns.
Real science must be done outside the system.
otter17 knows nothing, he’s just winging it. Peer review is not important. The scientific method is what maters, and the scientific method requires complete transparency of all data, methodologies, metadata and methods in order to replicate experiments and validate or falsify hypotheses.
But fourteen years after MBH98/99 Mann has still not released all his data, metadata and methodologies. MBH98/99 are still referenced in new pal reviewed papers, despite the thorough debunking of their conclusions including a major Corection published in Nature
Michael Mann’s cherry-picked ‘reconstructions’ are not science, they are runaway global warming propaganda intended to advance Mann’s alarmist narrative, and otter17’s credulous belief in Mann’s pseudo-science puts him squarely in the lemming category.
Smokey says:May 19, 2012 at 4:57 am
Well stated. Madame Sklodowska-Curie and Pierre Curie would agree. As would other scientists.
Thank You Roger Sowell and Anthony.
Why am I not surprised that Mann ducked the interview? I do not think he is capable of holding his own against anyone of above average intelligence armed with facts and he darn well knows it. You can not appear to be an all knowing “Godlet” if you are shown to be a buffoon in public, hence he ducks any chance of that happening.
Seth says:
May 18, 2012 at 7:46 pm
….He has however, contributed much to the field, and he is a hero of the climate wars for the science team.
__________________________________
You forgot the /sarc tag Seth.
What Mann and “The Team” have done is dragged the reputation of science and scientists in the mud. As a chemist I became so disgusted with the bandwagon following the team I quit both professional societies I was a member of for decades.
When all the dust clears and the next cooling period hits with a vengeance, which it will, the team will leap ahead of the perpetrators of the Piltdown Hoax as the worst science hoax in history. At least with the Piltdown Hoax they were not trying to siphon off the wealth of an entire civilization before they killed it dead.
Mann reminds me of this guy. He’s nothing but a humbug. No wonder he doesn’t want to answer a reporter’s questions.
otter17~When you have complaints concerning those lines of evidence on a blog, it doesn’t say much in the scientific sense.
—
As I had figured- otter17 (you wouldn’t also go by st0at, would you?) is attempting to make it appear to new readers, as though the scientific arguments on this scientific blog, are somehow not science, not valid, nothing more than ‘complaints’ by non- ‘climate scientists.’
Wrong on Every count, bub.
Seth: I don’t know if you chose your nom de plume, but it is very appropriate, as it describes your comments AND Mr. Mann to a T.
“Representations on gravestones in Upper Egypt, dating from the third millennium BC, attribute to Seth a donkey-like appearance, with long legs, long and broad ears, and a short upright tail.”
“A trickster, he was a sky god, lord of the desert, and master of storms, disorder, and warfare.”
It is interesting how the sub-conscious reveals itself. GK
otter17 says:
May 19, 2012 at 2:34 am
….It isn’t an argument, but a challenge. Can you actually put together a formal body of research and submit it through the scientific process?…..
_____________________________________
Research has been submitted as I told you before. If it does not have the “get out of peer review free card”, a statement like “This research in no way contradicts the theory of man made global warming”it gets kicked into a black hole.
Caspar and the Jesus paper is one example.
Editor-in-Chief of Remote Sensing Resigns from Fallout Over Our Paper is another example.
I lost the reference but Dr Jaworowski was refused funding when he wanted to look into CO2 measurements done in ice cores and whether they were valid.
I found another reference, a PDF you should read in full.
I am not going to go hunt down the e-mails that validate that gate keeping was in full force by the team. They are address in old WUWT and I will leave hunting them as an exercise for the reader.
You want papers that support an alternate view? Pop Tech has been kind enough to make a listing.
1000+ Peer-Reviewed Papers Supporting Skeptic Arguments Against ACC/AGW Alarm
Please note the papers often have the “get out of peer review free card” in them so they would be published. No scientist wants to commit employment suicide by not echoing those who hold his career in their hands. Therefore it is the body of the study that matters.
I am not actually answering you but addressing the fence sitters. You keep answering and I will keep answering because the truth will sway the fence sitters.
So I awoke this morning to see if Seth, Otter17 or DR_UK had the cahonies to answer my question. Of the three, only Seth responded:
“But to answer your question:
I imagine not, I expect that I would be busy making my own preparations.”
I figured there woulde be some way to weasel out of the issue and Seth found it. He wouldn’t even TRY to save a few million lives by warning people of the impending disaster, he’d just save himself. What does that say about Seth?
But if we presume that Seth’s attempt to wiggle off the hook is a credible answer, we should then consider if the “Team” is perhaps behaving in the same manner and protecting themselves from the impensing disaster that they are predicting. Are they buying property in northern climates? Are they seeking citizenship in northern countries? Are they taking steps to ensure that what little patches of earth are left that are suitable for human habitat after the dreaded CAGW ruins the planet will be reserved for them, their children, and their grandchildren?
No they are not. Al Gore recently bought beach front property for crying out loud. Why would he invest millions in something he says he is certain will be drowned by CAGW?
So…. we have Seth, who wouldn’t even bother to warn the rest of us, and the climate scientists who warn us on a daily basis, but won’t explain for certain how they know, and are taking zero steps to protect themselves and their children from the disaster they claim is certain.