UAH Global Temperature Update for August, 2012: +0.34 deg. C
By Dr. Roy Spencer
The global average lower tropospheric temperature anomaly for August (+0.34 °C) was up from July 2012 (+0.28 °C):
Here are the monthly departures from the 30-year (1981-2010) average:
YR MON GLOBAL NH SH TROPICS
2012 1 -0.09 -0.06 -0.12 -0.13
2012 2 -0.11 -0.01 -0.21 -0.27
2012 3 +0.11 +0.13 +0.10 -0.10
2012 4 +0.30 +0.41 +0.19 -0.12
2012 5 +0.29 +0.44 +0.14 +0.03
2012 6 +0.37 +0.54 +0.20 +0.14
2012 7 +0.28 +0.45 +0.11 +0.33
2012 8 +0.34 +0.38 +0.31 +0.26
As a reminder, the most common reason for large month-to-month swings in global average temperature anomalies (departures from normal) is small fluctuations in the rate of convective overturning of the troposphere, discussed here.
I posted the preliminary Reynolds OI.v2 sea surface temperature anomaly data for August 2012 yesterday:
http://bobtisdale.wordpress.com/2012/09/05/preliminary-august-2012-sea-surface-temperature-anomaly-update/
The data won’t be official until Monday Sept 10th
Regards
Looks like it might get cold in 2013. Then again, just a few months left still for the end of the world to happen/sarc.
Needs the standard disclaimer about the polynomial.
“By Dr. Roy Spencer
The global average lower tropospheric temperature anomaly for August…”
======================================================
Roy, what sort of average is it actually, is it arithmetic or geometric or median or any other kind of average? And the second question is, can it be rightfully called “global”? You guys did not really measure the temperature really everywhere constantly, did you, so why do you think the sample you have is representative for the whole globe? I guess you believe it is, but who and how proved scientifically that it is so?
Global Warming is “real”.
1/3 of one degree ….. since the baseline was set. In the 1970’s.
So, 1/3 of one degree.
The choice of reference problem?
The warmists consider the temperatures to have started rising due to CO2 to be about 1975. The IPCC hasn’t thought that the human-induced signature could be detectable until the late ’80s. So if we wish to refer to the same start-point as the warmists – which should be our goal, regardless of what we think causes the warming, I’d suggest that the above “normal” for the period of discussion should be about 0.2C cooler. That would make the current UAH global temp anomaly about 0.54C, still far below what the IPCC predict for CO2 warming, but more in keeping with what Hansen goes on about.
However we feel about the debate, we need to keep our numbers referring back to the same place, as the warmists set the rules of this conflict. We say 0.34, they say 0.65 or more. Looks to me like it is a reference point problem as well as a data manipulation problem.
Another thing:
I agree with the appropriateness of a sinusoidal curve to fit the data, as we fundamentally say that sinusoidally-inducing processes of a stellar and AMO/PDO nature are causing the neartime temperature rises. However, prior to 1979 there was both a low time and a decline time from 1945 to 1975 or so. If you take that period into account, the curve in 1979 should be coming up prior to 1979, perhaps to 1980. The curve you are using suggests that prior to 1979 there was a time of higher temperatures, not lower.
A fix of some type is needed – it is not saying that the math of creating this curve is incorrect, but that outside data knowledge should be incorporated to its start point.
Bill says:
Needs the standard disclaimer about the polynomial.
There is nothing standard about disclaimers on fitted trend lines. I had never seen one until I saw one of Spencer’s old graphs. I thought it was odd. Glad he got rid of it.
I suspect the monthly anomalies will vary between 0.5 and -0.5C for about the next 100000 years, so really we need to stop watching this farse and get on with our lives LOL
RACookPE1978 says:
September 6, 2012 at 10:55 am
Global Warming is “real”.
1/3 of one degree ….. since the baseline was set. In the 1970′s.
The mean temperature for the 1981-2010 period is the baseline. The mean temperature for August 2012 is 1/3 of a degree higher than the 1981-2010 August mean temperature.
Needs the standard disclaimer about the polynomial.
Better off removing it.
Global flat-lining continues! Remarkable how little the climate has changed (in either direction) over the past 15 years.
The continuing elevated lower troposphere temperature is due to an enourmous amount of energy having left the ocean and dispersed into the atmosphere over the last four months.
There is a graph in this post which illustrates this well.
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2012/09/02/2012-el-nino-looking-unlikely/
JJ says:
September 6, 2012 at 11:12 am
Bill says:
Needs the standard disclaimer about the polynomial.
—-
There is nothing standard about disclaimers on fitted trend lines. I had never seen one until I saw one of Spencer’s old graphs. I thought it was odd. Glad he got rid of it.
————————————
Not sure he did get rid of it.
Looks like an omission.
If anything he might just note how it was produced, and remove the entertainment part, but I don’t think that is the case.
Pure conjecture on my part.
The polynomial fit is just an attempt to “hide the rise” in temperatures, trying to fit one cycle of a trend line, when other longer term data does not support that fit is just dishonest.
u.k.(us) says:
Not sure he did get rid of it. Looks like an omission.
Given that he omitted it last month as well, evidence is mounting that the ommission is by intention. By ‘climate science’ standards, if it is gone next month we will be able to conlcude that the odds of it having happened by accident are greater than the number of stars in the universe.
🙂
There has been a pronounced pattern in the anomaly in the last couple of years, It reaches its maximum in the NH summer and minimum in the NH winter. Curiously the SH and tropical ocean follows the same pattern , although weaker, So its not directly a seasonal effect. Probably ENSO related.
The biggest trend is in the south polar land which continues cooing, especially in the SH winter. That the coldest place on Earth is getting even colder, I find somewhat ominous.
Here are the detailed UAH numbers.
http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/t2lt/uahncdc.lt
2012 in Perspective so far on Five Data Sets
2012 started off rather cold but has warmed up since then. So the present rank is not the most meaningful number. Therefore I will also give what the ranking would be assuming the latest month’s anomaly will continue for the rest of the year. I will also indicate what is required for the rest of the year in each case to set a new record.
Note the bolded numbers for each data set where the lower bolded number is the highest anomaly recorded so far in 2012 and the higher one is the all time record so far. There is no comparison.
With the UAH anomaly for August at 0.34, the average for the first eight months of the year is (-0.089 -0.111 + 0.111 + 0.299 + 0.289 + 0.369 + 0.28 + 0.34)/8 = 0.186. If the average stayed this way for the rest of the year, its ranking would be 7th. This compares with the anomaly in 2011 at 0.153 to rank it 9th for that year. On the other hand, if the rest of the year averaged the August value, which is more likely if the El Nino gets stronger, then 2012 would come in at 0.237 and it would rank 4th. 1998 was the warmest at 0.428. The highest ever monthly anomalies were in February and April of 1998 when it reached 0.66. In order for a new record to be set in 2012, the average for the last 4 months of the year would need to be 0.91. Since this is way above the highest monthly anomaly ever recorded, it is virtually impossible for 2012 to set a new record.
With the GISS anomaly for July at 0.47, the average for the first seven months of the year is (0.34 + 0.40 + 0.47 + 0.55 + 0.66 + 0.56 + 0.47)/7 = 0.493. This is about the same as in 2011 when it was 0.514 and ranked 9th for that year. 2010 was the warmest at 0.63. The highest ever monthly anomalies were in March of 2002 and January of 2007 when it reached 0.88. If the July anomaly continued for the rest of the year, 2012 would end up 10th. In order for a new record to be set in 2012, the average for the last 5 months of the year would need to be 0.82. Since this is close to the highest monthly anomaly ever recorded, it is virtually impossible for 2012 to set a new record.
With the Hadcrut3 anomaly for July at 0.477, the average for the first seven months of the year is (0.217 + 0.194 + 0.305 + 0.481 + 0.474 + 0.477 + 0.446)/7 = 0.371. This would rank 11th if it stayed this way. This is slightly above the anomaly in 2011 which was at 0.34 to rank it 12th for that year. 1998 was the warmest at 0.548. The highest ever monthly anomaly was in February of 1998 when it reached 0.756. If the July anomaly continued for the rest of the year, 2012 would end up 10th. In order for a new record to be set in 2012, the average for the last 5 months of the year would need to be 0.796. Since this is above the highest monthly anomaly ever recorded, it is virtually impossible for 2012 to set a new record. One has to back to the 1940s to find the previous time that a Hadcrut3 record was not beaten in 10 years or less.
With the sea surface anomaly for July at 0.386, the average for the first seven months of the year is (0.203 + 0.230 + 0.241 + 0.292 + 0.339 + 0.351 + 0.386)/7 = 0.292. This would rank it 11th compared to 2011 when it was 0.273 and ranked 12th for that year. 1998 was the warmest at 0.451. The highest ever monthly anomaly was in August of 1998 when it reached 0.555. If the July anomaly continued for the rest of the year, 2012 would end up 10th. In order for a new record to be set in 2012, the average for the last 5 months of the year would need to be 0.67. Since this is above the highest monthly anomaly ever recorded, it is virtually impossible for 2012 to set a new record.
With the RSS anomaly for July at 0.292, the average for the first seven months of the year is (-0.058 -0.121 + 0.073 + 0.332 + 0.232 + 0.339 + 0.292)/7 = 0.156. If the average stayed this way for the rest of the year, its ranking would be 12th. This compares with the anomaly in 2011 at 0.147 to rank it 12th for that year. 1998 was the warmest at 0.55. The highest ever monthly anomaly was in April of 1998 when it reached 0.857. If the July anomaly continued for the rest of the year, 2012 would end up 10th. In order for a new record to be set in 2012, the average for the last 5 months of the year would need to be 1.10. Since this is above the highest monthly anomaly ever recorded, it is virtually impossible for 2012 to set a new record.
So on all five of the above data sets, for their latest anomaly average, the 2012 average so far is close to that of 2011. If present trends continue, 2012 will be, for the most part, close to 2011, and a record is out of reach on all sets. My projection for the five sets above is that 2012 will come in 10th on 4 of the sets, but 4th on UAH.
On all data sets, the different times for a slope that is flat for all practical purposes range from 10 years and 11 months to 15 years and 8 months. Following is the longest period of time (above 10 years) where each of the data sets is more or less flat. (*No slope is positive except UAH which was +0.0022 per year or +0.22/century up to July, however the August value will make the slope a bit larger still. So while it is not flat, the slope is not statistically significant either.)
1. UAH: since October 2001 or 10 years, 11 months (goes to August, but note * above)
2. GISS: since March 2001 or 11 years, 5 months (goes to July)
3. Combination of 4 global temperatures: since November 2000 or 11 years, 9 months (goes to July)
4. HadCrut3: since February 1997 or 15 years, 6 months (goes to July)
5. Sea surface temperatures: since January 1997 or 15 years, 7 months (goes to July)
6. RSS: since December 1996 or 15 years, 8 months (goes to July)
RSS is 188/204 or 92.2% of the way to Santer’s 17 years.
7. Hadcrut4: since December 2000 or 11 years, 8 months (goes to July using GISS. See below.)
See the graph below to show it all for #1 to #6.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1997.08/trend/plot/gistemp/from:2001.16/trend/plot/rss/from:1996.9/trend/plot/wti/from:2000.8/trend/plot/hadsst2gl/from:1997/trend/plot/uah/from:2001.75/trend
For #7: Hadcrut4 only goes to December 2010 so what I did was get the slope of GISS from December 2000 to the end of December 2010. Then I got the slope of GISS from December 2000 to the present. The DIFFERENCE in slope was that the slope was 0.0049 lower for the total period. The positive slope for Hadcrut4 was 0.0041 from December 2000. So IF Hadcrut4 were totally up to date, and IF it then were to trend like GISS, I conclude it would show no slope for at least 11 years and 8 months going back to December 2000. (By the way, doing the same thing with Hadcrut3 gives the same end result, but GISS comes out much sooner each month.) See:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2000/to/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2000.9/trend/plot/gistemp/from:2000/plot/gistemp/from:2000.9/to:2011/trend/plot/gistemp/from:2000.9/trend
Elizabeth–What model are you using for your prediction? Seems unlikely that the earth’s climate will be that stable for 100,000 years. Over such time scales, changes in the sun and in earth’s orbit can become important. Even the lowest estimates for sensitivity to green house gases will have big effects over much shorter time scales.
So much for the AGW theory that not only are temps going up, but the rate of change is so increasing. Seems the rate of change is actually dropping. But isnt CO2 still going up? WUWT?
The right hand side of the polynomial trend line is looking a little ‘flat-ish’? Heaven forbid that it should start pointing upwards.
I’m being a bit dense. So from the start of the 1970 until today, what is the “temp. damage” again ?
Since everyone seems interested in rate of change maybe we should try plotting it …
http://i46.tinypic.com/2wocgw2.png
Monthly rate of change of Dr Spencer’s UAH data since 1979 filtered with various gaussian filters.
The longer filters loose a bit at each end since I have not used Mike’s Nature Trick ™ to fill the filter window with spurious data. Sorry.
With the 24 month filter we see about 0.05 C/year in 1995, that’s 5C / century. We can see why some were getting worried.
That plot only just dips into cooling some time in 2005 and it looks like we’ll be back into slight warming around 2010 once a bit more data is in.
Interesting how much easier it is to see the rate of warming / cooling when you plot the rate of change instead of trying to fit straight lines to the not linear temperature plot and then arguing about when it shoudl start and end.
SanityP says:
September 6, 2012 at 2:24 pm
I’m being a bit dense. So from the start of the 1970 until today, what is the “temp. damage” again ?
=====================================================================
Here in the US, several trillion and climbing.
If it wasn’t for that several trillion we might be at .065C.
For real? Did I understand that correctly ? Really ? No? You jest surely? No ? .065C?
From the 1970’s untill today, 7 Sept., 2012 there is this measley .065C degree rise in “average global temperature” ? I need to sit.
Philip Bradley says:
September 6, 2012 at 1:29 pm
>>
There has been a pronounced pattern in the anomaly in the last couple of years, It reaches its maximum in the NH summer and minimum in the NH winter. Curiously the SH and tropical ocean follows the same pattern , although weaker, So its not directly a seasonal effect. Probably ENSO related.
The biggest trend is in the south polar land which continues cooing, especially in the SH winter. That the coldest place on Earth is getting even colder, I find somewhat ominous.http://i45.tinypic.com/htrx8g.png
>>
Interesting comment. I decided to do the rate of change plot for each hemisphere as well. There has been a steady, notable change in the pattern since the ’80s. Usual comments about larger swing in NH being due to larger proportion of land area do not seem to apply.
Now SH is showing more variation. Also a couple of years of phase lag in NH, whereas before all was in phase.
Is anybody studying rate of change apart from drawing inappropriate straight lines on a time series??
RACookPE1978 says (September 6, 2012 at 10:55 am)
So, 1/3 of one degree.
———
Which is 1/3 more than Lewandowsky should have got in academia. 😉
Werner Brozek says:
September 6, 2012 at 1:53 pm
Thanks Werner, I find these lists very informative.
Bill: “Needs the standard disclaimer about the polynomial.”
Sure: “Product is not food-safe. Do not take internally. Known by the State of California to induce tardive dyskensia in elephants.”
Gunga Din: “If it wasn’t for that several trillion we might be at .065C.”
I see you are a supporter of the Ben Bernanke Green Initiative. A truly marvelous idea to print our way to riches and climate stability via unchecked anthropogenic greenback emissions. The only drawback is that when we’re all rich enough to burn $100 bills then it’s quite likely we will have need to do so for warmth. This rather offsets the initial carbon sequestration process, but I’m sure it’ll work itself out in time.
If it were not for the sun being in a funk, we would hockey stick over heated by now. 😉
Greenland was green at one time, back when man was overburning the trees of Europe. The trees were all burned up and the mini ice age snowed Greenland back over. Now Coal and Oil are melting Greenland once again. It’s okay though, the USA is going to ban coal and price oil so high it will only be used by China. 🙂
If you study that graph, it has a flaw in it. The temp. never really dropped after 2010, it’s still going up. Bush had the grap fixed and it’s controlled by big oil. 😉
We are at .8 up, not .34? What is Spencer thinking….oh my, we are all going to die of heat exhaustion caused by big oil and coal. Tune in tonight for 4 more years of windmills and solar panels. I use to sell A123 battery cells, but wanted to quit supporting the Governement. Woops, did I say that?, I meant, I did not build that or something like that.
For Chr*st’s sake, how about some error analysis? What’s the standard deviation in these measurements? How accurately are we really able to measure “global” temperatures. Now, given that, can we really say anything?
Andrew W. – There is no satellite data before 1979.
And Sorry guys. It does need the disclaimer. As someone pointed out, this polynomial would imply that it was warmer before 1979 when in fact it was cooler.
I believe he is using the polynomial in a somewhat serious, somewhat humorous way which would explain why he used the line he did about it being for entertainment only. The serious part of it is he does think that it could have an underlying natural cycle due to natural variability due to something like ocean currents. As a scientist you don’t want to fit data to just any old equation. For it to make sense it needs to have some physical basis. An engineer may need to fit a curve exactly to get the best fit for safety or other reasons but there won’t necessarily be a physical meaning for all of the constants. You can always get a better fit with more parameters but this does not lead to insight or understanding. You want to fit something with the least number of parameters when you want to understand the system.
Bill says:
September 6, 2012 at 7:27 pm
Andrew W. – There is no satellite data before 1979.
I know Bill, that’s why I said “when other longer term data does not support that fit”.
Tim Neilson says:
September 6, 2012 at 4:41 pm
Werner Brozek says:
September 6, 2012 at 1:53 pm
Thanks Werner, I find these lists very informative.
Thank you! I realize these lists are not everyone’s cup of tea, but I find them interesting. By the way, I got most of the rankings from Lubos Motl’s site so I owe him thanks for that. In case you are interested in the rankings for the last 30 years on many of these sets, go to http://motls.blogspot.ca/ and type in RSS in the search line for example.
And your point is?
0.06C is well inside the error bands of measurement and due to averaging so not significant.
RACookPE1978: Spencer’s base line includes temperatures up to Dec 2010. That’s why his chart only shows 0.34 when other charts show more like 0.8C
I’ve been running a model of UAH temperatures based on the ENSO, AMO, Solar cycle TSI, Volcanic forcing and a left-over warming trend correlated with the Ln(CO2).
Its matching pretty well right now.
http://s16.postimage.org/bgwxdm20l/UAH_Model_Aug_2012.png
It also leaves a global warming signal which is much lower than the basic numbers – only 0.04C per decade (which is the same trendline going back to 1870 using Hadcrut3 with the same approach).
http://s14.postimage.org/q6etngovl/UAH_Model_Warming_Aug_2012.png
Bill says:
And Sorry guys. It does need the disclaimer. As someone pointed out, this polynomial would imply that it was warmer before 1979 when in fact it was cooler.
No, that polynomial does not imply that it was warmer before 1979.
Fitted trend lines are not inherently predictive. All polynomial (including linear) trend lines head to infinite magnitude in both directions. For the vast majority of graphs presenting trend lines, that condition is not merely not implied, it is physically impossible. Yet none of those graphs contains a disclaimer. What about Roy Spencer requires that he use disclaimers where no one else is required to?
Just eyeballing that chart, it certainly looks like something close to a steady state, oscillating around El Nino/La Nina, since 2001.
Bill , I’d be very interested in seeing what you’ve done but even with constrast and brilliance wound up to 100% it’s damn near illegible.
How about a more conventional , white background?
It may also be interesting to run your model using the SST data before Hadley do all their bucket adjustments and regridding. That all makes significant changes to long term variations.
http://judithcurry.com/2012/03/15/on-the-adjustments-to-the-hadsst3-data-set-2/
It would be worth seeing whether that affects the numbers that come out of your model in a significant way. There’s a link to the data at the bottom of that article.
Re: polynomial fit and reference points for anomalies\
The purpose of any curve or line is to indicate trends. We’re way beyond entertainment in the debate. And the non-CO2 proposed factors are cyclic. So a curvilinear representation of the fundamentals of temperature variation vis-a-vis global warming is appropriate. It is true, however, that mathematical analysis cannot find a pattern if the data in which the pattern is present is less than a couple of cycles. Which is what the 1979-2012 data is, about 1 1/2 cycles. In these cases it is better to add templating or PROXY (!) non satellite data to the beginning and get a good running start.
The edges of graphs are like maps, not valid due to no other side of end-of-data trends. So we have to clip ’em back beginning and ends. However, mere academic perfection is not the point in the debate, but to show what is going on. Horrors of horrors! some subjective, human-mind injection of information and imagination is appropriate.
So I say the polynomial is “in”, but pre-’79 trend analysis should be injected in to get the beginning appropriate.
As to the use of 1980 – 2010 average for the baseline: yes, mathematically this is correct. But what we are involved in is a dispute with the warmists, whose basic claim is that post about 1975, temperatures globally started to rise due to GHG man put in the atmosphere. All their gnashing of teeth is about the change since that start. So when we reboot to the 1980 – 2010 comparison time period, we are producing an orange to their apple. Which means they can argue that we are being disingenuous.
We should use the same reference period and value as the warmists. We feel that the instrument errors, UHIE and inappropriate adjustment procedures have given then the 0.65 to 0.80 C rise, and that corrections would bring this down. But we are not saying that the change they are talking about is 0.34C, because they are using a different reference point.
We must be consistent in order to argue and convince. The UAH satellite data looks to me to say that since the mid 70’s, there has been about a 0.54C global temperature rise, compared to the Hansen report that says there is a 0.65 or 0.80 C rise. But I’m guesstimating here.
Doug Proctor:
In your post at September 7, 2012 at 12:06 pm you say
“some subjective, human-mind injection of information and imagination is appropriate”? Really?
Have you greased this slope or do you think it is already sufficiently slippery? Just asking.
Richard
To Greg House, September 6, 2012 at 10:52 am:
I suggest you take a look at http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/ for an explanation of the source of the global temperatures.
Downdraft says:
September 7, 2012 at 3:21 pm:
To Greg House, September 6, 2012 at 10:52 am:
“I suggest you take a look at http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/ for an explanation of the source of the global temperatures.”
=================================================
Thank you, but your link does not answer the questions I asked in my previous comment on this thread (September 6, 2012 at 10:52 am).
Except for the slight kick in the butt after the 1998 Super El Nino (i.e., what is seen from 2003 to 2008) there really hasn’t been much of a change in temperature since 1987.
Bill Illis
I always appreciate your comments.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/09/06/uah-global-temperature-up-06c-not-much-change/#comment-1073119
Maybe you could give much more detail on what your doing and why (i.e., explained in a way so that even a 5th grader could understand) and submit it to Anthony as a guest post?
Amino Acids in Meteorites says:
September 7, 2012 at 7:59 pm
>>
Except for the slight kick in the butt after the 1998 Super El Nino (i.e., what is seen from 2003 to 2008) there really hasn’t been much of a change in temperature since 1987.
>>
Maybe you missed my plot of rate of change higher up:
http://i46.tinypic.com/2wocgw2.png
There was a change equivalent to about 4 or 5 K/century for much of the 1990s. The rather spurious assumption that that would continue unabated for the next 100 years is what all the fuss has been about.
P. Solar
I did miss that. I usually don’t read every comment, especially late on Friday night when I’m tired from the week. But when I’m scrolling through the comments I stop on a few names. Bill Illis is one of them. That’s why I saw his.
So much for it being the hottest July on record, just shows you how much NOAA and other government agencies are lying to you.
Eric, there is more to the world than the U.S. (it makes up less than 2%).
Reading these comments I cans see why there’s such a problem in perception. It’s not 1/3 of a degree Celsius of increase over a flat line (as depicted), it’s a 1/3 of a degree increase over a 13 month average. If that 13 month average is rising, which I’m guessing it is, then we have global warming. One other thing… I’ve always wondered.. How do you increase greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere and NOT have global warming? Is that Republican math? Watts up with that?
John P says:
“Reading these comments…”
It appears that John P hasn’t been reading much of anything. Global warming has been happening since the end of the Little Ice Age, at a steady rate. The rising temperature trend has been the same whether CO2 was low or high. If John P was a thinking person, he would conclude that CO2 has very little effect on temperature.
Well I think the good Dr Roy has maybe fallen off the wagon; who knows if Professor Christy did too.
The most notable thing about Dr Roy’s latest information, is that those blokes no longer declare the entertainment value of their fourth degree polynomial fit.
Are you saying you have found an effect Roy, or did you encounter a big flash of light while on the road ?
“””””…..Doug Proctor says:
September 7, 2012 at 12:06 pm
Re: polynomial fit and reference points for anomalies\
The purpose of any curve or line is to indicate trends……”””””
The hell you say !. I always thought the purpose of any curve or line was to show the value of the dependent variable over some range of the independent variable. If you say it doesn’t do that, then don’t draw the line, and suggest it reports facts not in evidence.
Mother Gaia always knows what the trends are; she isn’t going to tell us till it’s done with.
John P says:
September 8, 2012 at 10:45 am:
“I’ve always wondered.. How do you increase greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere and NOT have global warming?”
===================================================
It is very easy, John. For example, if “greenhouse gasses” can not physically cause warming, their increase in the atmosphere can not cause “global warming”.
I understand that the term “greenhouse gasses” suggest warming, but historically some scientists like 150-100 years ago just thought that they can warm and never proved that. They just (mistakenly) thought that real greenhouses got warmed because of “back radiation” from the glass and since knew that some gasses produce back radiation, they concluded that this back radiation from certain gasses must warm the surface and called them therefore “greenhouse gasses”.
Later in 1909 a well known scientists demonstrated that this “back radiation” does not work and the “greenhouse gasses” hypothesis died scientifically. However, this scientific dead body was dug out by some clever persons later in 1970s and now we have a scientific zombie walking around and scaring people.
Bill says: September 6, 2012 at 7:27 pm
“And Sorry guys. It does need the disclaimer. As someone pointed out, this polynomial would imply that it was warmer before 1979 when in fact it was cooler.”
I disagree with you Bill – there was global cooling from about 1940 to 1975, so it was WARMER before 1979.
Check the surface temperature (ST) records. The warmest USA temperatures in the data record were in the 1930’s during the Dust Bowl.
Not sure the global surface temperature records are worth much due to lack of quality control – even the USA ST record shows a warming bias due to poor siting, urban growth, etc.
BTW, I like the polynomial – it shows a half-period of about 30 years, for a full-period of about 60 years, similar to the PDO. Global cooling should be evident by about 2020-2030, as I wrote in an article in 2002.
Let’s compare my (our) prediction to the IPCC’s prediction of catastrophic global warming, which should be evident by now, but is NOT !