First some background graphics before we demonstrate the cherry pick.
We’ll start with the IPCC graphic from the AR5 draft.
Then we’ll look at Christy and Spencer’s recent graph.
![CMIP5-73-models-vs-obs-20N-20S-MT-5-yr-means1[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/cmip5-73-models-vs-obs-20n-20s-mt-5-yr-means11.png?quality=75)
Now let’s look at what Marlo Lewis brought to our attention at globalwarming.org. He writes:
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Seeing is believing, but things are not always what they seem. Skeptical Science, a Web site devoted to “debunking” global warming skepticism, asserts that Spencer’s claim about recent warming being only 50% of what the model consensus projects is “flat-out ridiculously wrong” (original emphasis). Observed warming has been “spot on consistent with climate model projections,” Skeptical Science contends. The evidence, supposedly, is in the graph below (click on it to activate the presentation if it doesn’t animate).
![Skeptical-Science-Predictions_500[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/skeptical-science-predictions_5001.gif)
Figure explanation: This animation compares the observed global temperature change since 1990 (black curve) to projections of global temperature change from the first four Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports (red, pink, orange, green) and from various “climate contrarians” (blue, purple, green, gray dashed). The observations are given by the average of 3 primary global temperature datasets (NASA GISS, NOAA NCDC, and HadCRUT4). All of the IPCC projections have proven to be quite accurate, suggesting high reliability. The contrarian projections all underestimate the global warming substantially, and in fact they erroneously predict global cooling and are quite unreliable.
So who’s right: Spencer and Christy or Skeptical Science (SS)? The SS graph and commentary are misleading in two ways.
The period covered in the SS graph is a decade shorter than that covered by the Spencer-Christy graph and looks suspiciously like cherry-picking. By starting their graph in 1990, SS can use the Mt. Pinatubo-induced cold period of 1992-93 to tilt the trend to be more positive. The Spencer-Christy graph begins at the start of the satellite record — 1979 — providing a longer and more representative period.
More importantly, SS uses global surface temperature datasets, which do not accurately represent heat content in the bulk atmosphere. In contrast, Spencer and Christy use temperature data from the tropical troposphere — the place where the models project the strongest, least ambiguous, greenhouse warming signal.
As Christy explained in testimony last August, the popular surface datasets often touted as evidence of model validity are not reliable indicators of the greenhouse effect. Land use changes (urbanization, farming, deforestation) “disrupt the normal formation of the shallow, surface layer of cooler air during the night when TMin [daily low temperature] is measured.” Over time, TMin gets warmer, producing a trend easily mistaken for a global atmospheric phenomenon.
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Full essay here: http://www.globalwarming.org/2013/06/10/climate-models-epic-failure-or-spot-on-consistent-with-observed-warming/
I can’t tell you the number of warmists that I deal with who proclaim that if SkS says it, then it’s true and anyone who disagrees is probably in the pay of the Koch brothers.
Lance Wallace says:
June 10, 2013 at 1:32 pm
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CO2 levels have actually risen a bit faster than the “business as usual” scenario’s forecast.
At the time nobody was predicting the rapid industrialization of both China and India.
Regarding the SS vs SkS controversy.
Several prominent warmists have proclaimed a desire to see us skeptics put on trial for crimes against humanity.
I’m not inclined to cut them much slack.
@kadaka:
The Big Band Theory?
The cartoonist and his lapdog are going full on for the ’cause ‘ has their looking to be ‘leaders’ of the area . Its actual a good thing they are , for one things its funny as and two the more extreme they get the quicker the people right them off as nutters. Has with Mann and Dr Doom , keeping them in the spot light and under pressure will result in much ‘good ‘ for the very people and ideas they hate ,
Hmm – images don’t post? Never tried before…
Try this: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/9b/Mancinimercer003.jpg/300px-Mancinimercer003.jpg
Again I say to you: The real deniers are people like SkS, Mann, Hansen, et al, they keep denying the truth.
@ur momisugly Ryan:
” If the models are SO WRONG it should be easy to just slap up all of the various IPCC projections and well-known models along with their ranges of uncertainty and plot it against measurements.”
Since you asked nicely, I’ll once again post this little spreadsheet of IPCC projections and observations… https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/78507292/Climate%20Models.xlsx
Enjoy!
In 1979 you buy a stock portfolio on the recommendation of a broker. It does well until 1998. Since then your net return has been 0%. You contact your broker complaining, and he says “dont cheery pick numbers. It’s gone up over all. It definitely will go up gangbusters in the future, my model says so.”
This then begs the question: How many more years of no growth to your funds do you wait before you finally realize your broker is wrong?
Akasafou does not disappoint.
He subtracts the recovery from the LIA (and another natural variable) to arrive at a flatline. And keeping in mind that upward adjustments were made (yearly) to temp data which biases it towards the poorer, less compliant sites, I would say he is bringing some reality to the problem.
He seems to be showing a slight downturn in temps after 2012.
So if any legislators are looking at this, smaller independent grids, and cheap abundant energy from fossil fuels is the best way to flexibly respond to cooling (or even warming) temps, natural disasters, or in the event of an Electromagnetic Pulse Weapon. A more centralized grid, smart meters, and worthless wind turbines will not respond well to future needs or in emergencies and are already devastating economies in Europe. Most of all, adding electric cars to the grid must be looked at with great wariness – Although I am sure it is fun to be caught up in a fashion whirlwind and to show off one’s trendiness to friends, it really is a horrible idea, and unnecessary. The public should not be coerced into adding worthless, powerless, and expensive electric vehicles as a further demand on existing grids. Or perhaps that is the idea: add vehicles to the demand, diminish the supply with worthless wind turbines, and then claim a new, centralized, remotely controlled grid is needed?
From TonyG on June 10, 2013 at 2:58 pm:
Yup! Sailed through spell check, and we don’t yet have contextually-aware phrase check. BTW, I’m old enough to know about them, but not to have danced to them.
For your reward, just reach behind like when you zip up your dress and pat yourself on the back. Enjoy!
I don’t see this mentioned in the original post, or in the subsequent comments, but I think another important deception was used in the SkS graph.
Look at the IPCC “Observed” and match it to the SkS “Observed”…they used the high point of the error range bar of the IPCC graph for observed temp anomaly for each point in their graph (which does not contain error bars).
Looks to me like they are taking the “mid-line” of the model projections from the AR5 graph and plotting them against the same observations shown in the AR5 graph.
Their graph is not incorrect, it’s just not nearly as useful as the AR5 graph. The models are not their midline.
I also do not understand why any sensible scientist clings to using the surface temp data sets for the computation of a global temp when the satellite data is available. Goes double when you are plotting data that falls completely within satellite era.
Ryan says:
June 10, 2013 at 1:07 pm
There are a couple of problems with that. The first is the one highlighted by Christy above.
The second is that the models are tuned to hindcast global surface temperatures. As you might expect, to tune for one measurement induces errors in other measurements (tropospheric temperature, rainfall, etc.).
As a result, while the models all do a passable job of hindcasting surface temperature, they’re worse, and often much worse, at hindcasting just about anything you might mention.
As illustrated by Spencer and Christy above regarding the size of the tropical tropospheric “hot spot” predicted by the models …
Of course, the current hiatus in the warming has already shown that “Past performance is no guarantee of future success”, as the stock brokerage ads warn us. None of the models predicted this at all. In fact, the models are constitutionally incapable of predicting cooling on average, unless there chance to be volcanoes. So far, the only thing they can do is what they were tuned to do—hindcast the 20th century.
w.
Here’s a thought.
Who in their right mind, when naming an organisation chooses one with the initials SS?
Do we really think that a media savvy operator like John Cook chose the name of his blog…by accident?
No I’m afraid that Cook does in fact see himself as an elite Climate Warrior, fanatical, loyal and prepared to do anything for the cause.
Worth bearing in mind that the Nazi SS was established by minor civil servant, Heinrich Himmler; a podgy, little, creepy guy with delusions of grandeur.
Kadaka – sadly, the picture didn’t post. It illustrated your typo nicely 🙂
Wait a minute! Look at the AR5 observations and the ones SkS is using. Take ’98 for example. The AR5 graph shows the value at ~.5 but the SkS graph shows the same data point at ~.6! Similarly the ’90 point is at ~.3 (AR5) and ~3.5 (SkS). It looks like the anomalies are skewed between the charts pushing the data up in the SkS chart so it alines more closely with the IPCC trend lines. I tried readjusting the observation line to account for the offset (by eye) and it looks like it lines up with Akasofu’s line very nicely. Can anybody verify this?
Tony said June 10, 2013 at 4:21 pm:
Link showed up the second time, have to click on it…
Lawrence Welk! Local PBS staple programming here in Pennsylvania and undoubtedly elsewhere. Before digital transition, on bow tie antenna, got it on both 33 (Harrisburg) and 44 (Wilkes Barre-Scranton), parents would watch it as there wasn’t much else on. Now we lost 33 but get 44.1 to 44.4 when the weather behaves and the Sun is quiet (Note to Vuk, does not indicate a sun/weather correlation).
And on one or more of those sub channels, at least on the weekend guaranteed, “The Best of the Lawrence Welk Show” WILL be on.
Turn on the bubble machine!
How hard is it for these guys? Lets see an r-squared value for all their fits. That’s a measure of how good the model matches the prediction. Also, inspection of the residuals between the model and the actual values will help show if the model holds value. For example, are the residuals normally distributed about zero? Where are the statistical analyses? All I ever see are cute animated graphs.
I miss Reverse Polish Notation.
What Lance Wallace said. Plot the IPCC business as usual graph versus actual temperatures and stand back and laugh.
[Zeke]Akasafou does not disappoint.
Google returns zero(0) results for “Akasafou” (and it’s closest matches don’t look relevant)
[Zeke]Akasafou does not disappoint.
Google returns zero(0) results for “Akasafou” (and it’s closest matches don’t look relevant)
evanmjones said on June 10, 2013 at 5:02 pm:
Hurry up or you’ll miss it more.
http://www.amazon.com/HP-NW250AA-15C-Scientific-Calculator/dp/B005EIG3MW
Now I gotta go check where I left my original one. I’m pretty sure I had taken the old button batteries out…
Surely the models must specifically identify which temperatures they were tuned to and which they are predicting. Either they are troposphere averages or they are average surface temperatures. They cannot be both. This is a question which has an easily determined and unambiguous answer. Someone is right and someone is wrong. Who is it?