People send me stuff, today it was this “editors picks” from John Micklethwait, editor of The Economist. After years of being pro-warming, I was shocked to see this headline as a “pick”. It seems a change in editorial position may be afoot.
The article is quite blunt, and quite interesting for its details, here is the introduction:
OVER the past 15 years air temperatures at the Earth’s surface have been flat while greenhouse-gas emissions have continued to soar. The world added roughly 100 billion tonnes of carbon to the atmosphere between 2000 and 2010. That is about a quarter of all the CO₂ put there by humanity since 1750. And yet, as James Hansen, the head of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, observes, “the five-year mean global temperature has been flat for a decade.”
Temperatures fluctuate over short periods, but this lack of new warming is a surprise. Ed Hawkins, of the University of Reading, in Britain, points out that surface temperatures since 2005 are already at the low end of the range of projections derived from 20 climate models (see chart 1). If they remain flat, they will fall outside the models’ range within a few years.
The mismatch between rising greenhouse-gas emissions and not-rising temperatures is among the biggest puzzles in climate science just now. It does not mean global warming is a delusion. Flat though they are, temperatures in the first decade of the 21st century remain almost 1°C above their level in the first decade of the 20th. But the puzzle does need explaining.
The mismatch might mean that—for some unexplained reason—there has been a temporary lag between more carbon dioxide and higher temperatures in 2000-10. Or it might be that the 1990s, when temperatures were rising fast, was the anomalous period. Or, as an increasing body of research is suggesting, it may be that the climate is responding to higher concentrations of carbon dioxide in ways that had not been properly understood before. This possibility, if true, could have profound significance both for climate science and for environmental and social policy.
…
Clouds of uncertainty
This also means the case for saying the climate is less sensitive to CO₂ emissions than previously believed cannot rest on models alone. There must be other explanations—and, as it happens, there are: individual climatic influences and feedback loops that amplify (and sometimes moderate) climate change.
…
That last paragraph meshes very well with recent publications about lower climate sensitivity, which they reference.
Read the entire article here: http://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21574461-climate-may-be-heating-up-less-response-greenhouse-gas-emissions
While we are on the subject of sensitivity, they mention the recent paper by Nic Lewis who writes:
It even cites a paper that I’ve recently had accepted for publication, and which I think will at least get a mention in AR5 WG1.
They also have an editorial which says:
All in all, I think this is tremendous progress. Kudos to The Economist for embracing this maxim:
When my information changes, I alter my conclusions. What do you do, sir?
h/t to Nic Lewis and Dr. Roger Pielke Sr.
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Seems like the first few cautious steps in the start of a climb down but that last step can be a doozy!
stopped buying the Economist years ago after their alarmist garbage was printed as fact…. not going to buy again anytime soon…..
Time for a polite note discussing the reality, the magnitude, and the scope of the Little Ice Age.
Anecdote is not the singular form of data, and things like the frozen Thames aren’t “scientific measurements of temperature”. But they do highlight that the actual problematic portion of The Hockey Stick is -not- the grafted-on instruments (which, at least, have the virtue of being instruments!), but instead the shaft of the stick rewriting history.
Most journalism was and still is about fear mongering. That is what attracts eyeballs to the advertising, which is their business model.
When the AGW thingy was pushed by our media savvy Greenies, they tailor made it for journalists to have a new and easy fearmongering topic. . . . Just reprint the EcoGreenie Press releases and viola! Job done. Same logic for the politicians . . . The greenies lined up a parade of fearful citizens and politicians jumped on the AGW bandwagon and realized that leading this parade got them reelected.
And the of course we have the scientists who saw a Fame and Gravy train roll into the station and quickly realized they could keep their careers on the easy track as long as the fearmongering “science basis” of the scare was validated by their peer/pal reviewed papers.
But every Great Sky is Falling grift comes to and end and the players start looking around for the Next Great Thingy to Scare the Folks with.
That is what the Econmist is doing. Life goes on.
Thank God the Guardian is here to prove to us that 2 + 2 = 5:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/mar/27/climate-change-model-global-warming?mobile-redirect=false
I wish somebody would tell The Economist that the one-degree rise they quote is due to fiddling of the historic record. One example of across-the-board tweaking is at Iceland’s Teigarhorn station. The Jan 1900 temp was showing 0.7C two years ago, -0.2C last year, and is now showing -0.4C.
Those cheeky monkeys at GISS are cooling the past in order to create a spurious warming trend. http://data.giss.nasa.gov/tmp/gistemp/STATIONS/tmp_620040920000_12_0/station.txt
I wonder if Mr. Hanson is aware of the cooling past?
The Economist? 78% of its readers read it while sitting on the toilet.
Paul Westhaver says:
March 27, 2013 at 4:05 pm
People don’t change.
The agenda of these jerks was wealth redistribution…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Given the Cyprus financial mess. (The Russian oligarchy who were the target of the haircut managed to spirit away their deposits via branch banks including one in the UK. info from 2 days ago and today ) I imagine the economic types really want to use anything as a diversion.
S&P has put Deutsche Bank on Ratings Watch and the Bernanke was doing a real dance around the question of can a ‘Haircut’ happen to US depositors. It was hard to find anything that was not a video but I did find a transcript HERE The Bernanke mutters something about no haircuts for depositors unless there is a run on American banks. Oh and the The ‘big five’- Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, hope to establish a new bank taking the place of the IMF and World Bank BRICS plan new 50bn bank to rival World Bank and IMF
So with all that happening in the financial world, I am sure those pulling the strings at the Economist are looking for any and all diversions. ‘Breaking News’ on climate of this sort is a good one since it hits the same group who are awake enough to question what is happening in the banking scene. So yea, the timing is rather ‘useful’
Two things about this article. The Economist does not give the author of it. Why ?? It would be interesting to know.
Secondly it is interesting to read the comments on it in the Economists. Hardly any religiously defending AGW. Most are similar, in tone at least, to those above.
I do have the feeling that the tide is turning, but you can be sure that a new global threat scam will eventually emerge to replace it. Global scamming schemes are hugely profitable for those behind them.
I’m really good at multiple choice questions, but this one leaves me stumped.
Too bad that Keynes didn’t change more of his conclusions, since the facts were rarely on his side. This quotation of his has to be the most ironic of all time.
The Economist just went socialist with its part owner, The FT, along with their parent company Pearson (Which sells a lot to the Public Sector). Normal Self-interest at work.
Don’t forget the “Scientific” American. They had NO good reason to sell out to the AGW nonsense.
Somewhere lurking in the AGW undergrowth is the UK’s New “Scientist”.
My subscriptions to all these august journals lapsed as their content became less rational.
From the article:
“Or, as an increasing body of research is suggesting, it may be that the climate is responding to higher concentrations of carbon dioxide in ways that had not been properly understood before. This possibility, if true, could have profound significance both for climate science and for environmental and social policy.”
————-
I wonder what social policy this increasing body of research is suggesting will be profoundly signified?
cn
Hey TomB
“Change is to climate as wet is to water”
We need CG3 contents. Now, please.
Technically, only 1 model from IPCC AR4 is below Hadcrut3 (as of January, 2013). When February’s lower number for Hadcrut3 comes out, the spread of ALL 23 models will be higher than Hadcrut3.
Zoom-in of the average of all 23 models versus Hadcrut3.
http://s13.postimg.org/hhwlkq313/IPCC_AR4_vs_Hadcrut3_Jan_2013.png
Steve from Rockwood says:
March 27, 2013 at 4:46 pm
The Economist? 78% of its readers read it while sitting on the toilet.
=============
the rest burn it to try and stay warm
“RossP says:
March 27, 2013 at 4:59 pm
Two things about this article. The Economist does not give the author of it. Why ?? It would be interesting to know.”
That has been their policy for all articles forever.
let’s face it…the weather is having an effect:
27 March: Guardian: Cold weather to continue for a month, say forecasters
UK braces for freezing Easter weekend, with temperatures expected to stay below average until end of April
by Rebecca Smithers, Tamsin Rutter and Sarah Butler
The Met Office issued a cold weather alert for much of England, with a 100% probability of severe cold weather and ice until Friday. Its outlook for Sunday until Tuesday 9 April predicts cold, dry weather, with a few light snow flurries and widespread frost and icy patches overnight. And it warned that temperatures are unlikely to recover to closer to normal levels until the latter part of April.
Ladbrokes now has a white Easter as odds-on, offering 5/1 that it will be the coldest Easter weekend ever. It has also offered odds-on of Sunday’s Oxford-Cambridge University Boat Race – last year sabotaged by a swimming protester – being disrupted by ice on the Thames…
In western Scotland, thousands endured a sixth day without power after being cut off last week, and across the UK many transport routes remained impassable because of deep snow drifts.
After embattled sheep farmers reported the deaths of thousands of lambs in snow-affected areas such as Shropshire, north Wales, west Cumbria and the Peak District, the supermarket Waitrose said that from Thursdayit would be delivering 30,000 “macs” (light plastic coats which are 100% biodegradable and recyclable) to protect lambs against harsh weather conditions to farmers it works with in Wales and the west country…
At Arthur’s Field, a 63-pitch campsite in Treloan, Cornwall, only 25 families had booked for the bank holiday weekend, but half of those had already cancelled…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/mar/27/cold-weather-continue-month-forecasters
RossP says (March 27, 2013 at 4:59 pm) : The Economist does not give the author of it. Why ??
——
There is hardly ever any attribution in the Economist.
I hope the banksters who read the Economist will have second thoughts about their ‘global warming’ investments.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-07/investors-embrace-climate-change-chase-hotter-profits.html
As I said in a comment (lost at the bottom but with most ‘likes’) the banks are the ultimate contrarian indicator. If they want to lose our money all over again by hurling money at CAGW, so be it. The rest of us can laugh all the way to, er, any country that doesn’t steal our money to fund bank bailouts.
You do seem to have missed one crucial element, the numerous papers which present a lag between temperature and CO2, showing it as an effect and not a cause. There have been three in the past few months alone and even Al Gore’s graph could be seen to do so when enlarged closely enough, which challenges the effect of CO2 on temperatures altogether.
The Economist was and is as bad informed about South Asia- where I live – as about Climate Change. Did they see the economic crisis coming a few years back?
Not much of a fact based publication, more of a policy pusher in disguise.
I don’t see much change here. From the text:
“But given the hiatus in warming and all the new evidence, a small reduction in estimates of climate sensitivity would seem to be justified: a downwards nudge on various best estimates from 3°C to 2.5°C, perhaps; a lower ceiling (around 4.5°C), certainly. If climate scientists were credit-rating agencies, climate sensitivity would be on negative watch. But it would not yet be downgraded”
so, this is typical damage control mode. Try to pose as ‘reasonable’ while actually not conceding anything. People, don’t delude yourselves, those jerks are never gonna change.
Bill Illis says:
March 27, 2013 at 5:53 pm
Technically, only 1 model from IPCC AR4 is below Hadcrut3 (as of January, 2013).
================
Ask enough monkeys the answer to 1+1 and occasionally you will get 2 as the answer. might as well predict climate with a dart board or pair of dice. just as accurate and a whole lot cheaper and quicker.
while it takes millions of dollars and years of programming to get the wrong answer with a super duper climate computer, a pair of dice can deliver the same accuracy in seconds.
take a look at any place on the earth where people live. 1/3 chance it will be warmer next year, 1/3 chance it will be cooler, and 1/3 chance it will remain the same. my dog can predict climate as well as the climate models by how fast he wags his tail.