Note: On Thursday of this week, NOAA/NCDC will attempt to rewrite the surface temperature record yet again, making even more “adjustments” to the data to achieve a desired effect. This story by Mr. Core is worth noting in the context of data spin that we are about to be subjected to – Anthony Watts
Guest essay by E. L. Core
Grandma hangs up the phone, beaming. She has just talked with her daughter-in-law, Gabrielle, who had said, “Final report cards are out, and Gavin has straight A’s!” So, Grandma hurries over to see this remarkable report card for herself.
Sitting down at the kitchen table with Gabrielle and Gavin, Grandma opens the report card expectantly — though she has noticed a sheepish look on her grandson’s face. She looks the report card over. And over. And over. Instead seeing of all A’s, she’s seeing three A’s, two B’s, one C, and a D.
Puzzled, and with a sheepish look on her own face now, she hesitatingly asks her daughter-in-law, “Didn’t you tell me… Dear… that Gavin got straight A’s?”
“Yes, I did”, Gabrielle replies.
Noting the look of confusion on her mother-in-law’s face, she continues, “Here. Let me explain.”
“There are three A’s on the report card. You see them” — she points — “here, here, and here. So, we know he gets A’s.”
“Now, this first B, here,” Gabrielle continues. “You must understand that Gavin didn’t like that class. If he had liked that class, he would have put in more effort, and he would have gotten an A. So, that B should really be an A.”
Grandma sits quietly.
“And this other B, here,” Gabrielle says. “You must understand that the teacher just had it in for Gavin. If he had had a different teacher, he would have gotten an A. So, that B, too, should really be an A.”
Grandma sits quietly.
“Now, the C,” her daughter-in-law continues. “You must understand that Gavin didn’t like the class, and the teacher had it in for him, too. If Gavin had liked the class, and if he had had a different teacher, he would have gotten an A. So the C should really be an A.”
Grandma sits quietly.
“Now, the D,” says Gabrielle. “Gavin liked that class, and he had a good teacher, too. But three of his friends got an A in this class; they also got A’s in the very same three classes that Gavin’s report card has A’s in. So, the D should really be an A.”
“And that’s why I told you that Gavin has straight A’s.”
Grandma sits quietly.
Then, Gavin’s sister walks into the room. A sheepish look comes over her face when her mother asks Grandma, “Would you like me to explain how Gavrilla really won at the track meet?”
Grandma leaves quietly.
E. L. Core has a B.S. in Mathematics and Computer Science and is an associate editor at the Catholic Lane website, catholiclane.com. His series “Uncommon Core: Climate Sanity” is forthcoming later this year.
While some of Gavin’s excuses are a little weak, one must understand that he started off the year knowing he was going to get straight A’s at the end. After trying all the various ways to learn, he got a result. This result did not fit his mental model. Obviously the problem lay in the data, as the model was perfect and exactly what he needed for further progress in school.
Thus the data must be defective and had to be corrected for bias, first to change them to A’s and then an explanation conjured justifying each. He had two friends examine the original and corrected data and they agreed with the process and complimented him for the fine work he had put in throughout the year. They both needed to make adjustments to their raw data as well because there was something obviously wrong with each data set. Gavin agreed to return the favour and examine their work to see if it met the same standards he had used, a method which he already had validated by two external reviewers.
When parents criticised the result Gavin explained they were not students in these classes and had no standing to comment. Only students could understand the pressure they were under to produce A-Grade work and how he was harassed by incompetent teachers.
An investigation of the whole matter by fellow students concluded that the locks on the doors in the men’s bathroom were faulty and needed upgrading.
I imagine Gavin still sucks his thumb a lot.
John
I skipped school because I don’t like going to classes. I became an aerospace engineer. That should count for straight A’s in the school I didn’t go to.
My wife takes size six shoes, but she wears nines because they’re more comfortable.
Anthony, I refer to your article of June 6, 2012:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/06/06/noaas-national-climatic-data-center-caught-cooling-the-past-modern-processed-records-dont-match-paper-records/
Your following comment was spot on:
“Is this purposeful mendacity, or just another example of confirmation bias at work? Either way, I don^t think private citizen observers of NOAA’s Cooperative Observer Program who gave their time and efforts every day for years really appreciate that their hard work is tossed into a climate data soup then seasoned to create a new reality that is different from the actual observations they made. In the case of Arizona and changing the Climate Divisions, it would be the equivalent of changing state borders as saying less people lived in Arizona in 1934 because we changed the borders today. That wouldn’t fly, so why should this?”
One way to treat data that isn’t well behaved is to just take the logarithm of it and then plot that. If it’s not quite right, just take the log of it again. That usually works.
If it’s necessary to match up thermometric data with proxy data, you might have to try a few adjustment factors to get them to match up.
Gavin Schmidt — I Got The Data In Me
(most sorry Kiki Dee)
I got no troubles at NASA
I’m a rocket nothing can stop
Survival’s always the first law
And I’m in with those at the top
I heat up
I cool down
A site I don’t like I discard it
The high and the mighty can frown
So say what they want they reward it
Man is the measure
Of all things that be!
The Progressive Alliance
And its New Age Science
Say I got the data in me!
I work in the mists and the fogs
By methods that none can review
To hide like a fox from the dogs
The premise of all that I do
The thermometers all want skilling
If their readings are not alarming
As the early ones all need chilling
So the later ones all need warming
Man is the measure
Of all things that be!
What Protagoras said
Onto Nietzsche led
So I got the data in me!
The truth’s a Consensus of thought
We agree to agree about
A joy for which long we have sought
Our minds ever free of all doubt
We are born uncertain of heart
And live in fear of things unknown
But Consensus is truly the start
Of our souls becoming our own
Man is the measure
Of all things that be!
To Progressive drums
The Superman comes!
And I got the data in me!
I heat up
I cool down
A site I don’t like I discard it
The high and the mighty can frown
So say what they want they reward it
Eugene WR Gallun
As long as everyone here takes this as a joke nothing will happen. This is in fact criminal activity akin to Mafia criminal activity. This needs to be taken up by lawyers and the people doing this need to be charged.
When I was a lad, there were two things you just did not do in the laboratory. One was work without eye protectionm and the other was alter your ovservations. I [guess] in computer labm you don’t need the eye protection either…
I’ve got my originals.
Pointman
Pointman — A real message??? That is just too good to be true. — Eugene WR Gallun
An anecdote – are you serious?
Weather stations measure the temperature of air in thermal contact with the underlying terrain. Each site has a different terrain, and for a host of landscape features documented by Pielke Sr., the temperature patterns will differ, even in nearby locations. However, if we have station histories (and we do), then trends from different stations can be compared to see similarities and differences..
In summary, temperatures from different stations should not be interchanged or averaged, since they come from different physical realities. The trends can be compiled to tell us about the direction, extent and scope of temperature changes.
https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2015/03/20/auditing-the-abuse-of-temperature-records/
The process I use is to calculate the difference between one day and the next for each station, If a station is changed, it effects only that day or range of days. I feel like the only accurate baseline for a station is itself.
It’s not perfect, but all of the other ways (guessing, or a baseline of averages) has so many other things that can go wrong, I wanted to see how each station’s temp evolves.
It’s the same reason I don’t infill or homogenize. I also don’t exclude data based on it’s value unless it’s drastically off, like about or below 200F/-200F.
I do some station exclusion based on the number of yearly samples, depending on what I’m looking for, but I also produce a report of the station I used, sample size and a few other parameter.
When I compiled trends of stations in SE USA, i got something looking very much like this:
Because I don’t infill and work with stations that are missing data, I tend to just look at the day to day change.
Here’s the US
Baseline starts at 0, so the offset can be whatever.
read willis.
over 90% of temperature variation is determined by latitude and elevation.
second, nobody in their right mind averages temperatures.
Glad to hear it.
What is really needed to solve this problem is a global temperature proxy that goes up to the 1980s. After that we have satellite data. Does such a proxy exist? Seems like there are all kinds of proxy records. This may already exist but has not been synced up with the satellite data.
“What is really needed to solve this problem is….
What’s really needed is a cogent understanding of the why and how of homogenization rather than the wild and unsupported claims of conspiracy. Mr Watts has promised to issue a paper on this topic, but it has failed to appear. Why?
Well Mr. Beeton, it’s because of people like you who will attack it for sport, we have been very very careful, almost to a fault. We completely started over [from] our original effort, and since the paper is being done with zero funding (again because of people like you that will attack us even getting a dime for the effort) it takes a very long time when everything is volunteer. That’s all I’m going to say about it, but feel free to be as upset as you wish.
@Mr. Watts.
My handle is warrenlb. Where do you get ‘Beeton’ from?
“What’s really needed is a cogent understanding of the why and how of homogenization rather than the wild and unsupported claims of conspiracy. Mr Watts has promised to issue a paper on this topic, but it has failed to appear. Why?”
1. The code that explains adjustments has been posted for a very long time. Nobody cares to read it or run it. Nobody cares to look at why it handles specific cases the way it does. Iceland is a good example.
2. The adjustments cool the record. Skeptics dont want to address that beccause it doesnt fit the fraud/conspiracy theory.
3. Watts 2012 ( yet to published ) if correct, still won’t address the issue. the land is 30% of the total. the US records are less than 5% of the total. The US is the worst record in terms of radical changes to observation practice. In other words, even if you found that the land in the US was biased high by 50% since 1979, that would not change core science in any material way.
Perhaps Mr Watts’s paper hasn’t appeared because he’s trying to work out the footwork to explain how cooling adjustments are really warming adjustments.
Why is Iceland “a good example”? A “good example” of what?
A cross-blog consortium of senior sceptics need to come together to work on this one. There’s too many divisive ego’s getting in the way of highlighting what is an outright scandal.
* Select adjusted data examples.
* Show how far they’ve been adjusted, and the consequences of the ‘new’ data.
* Challenge the relevant data provider to explain the adjustments, with workings.
* Demand politicians launch official inquiry.
We have Fifa execs’, bank interest-rate setters and individual FX traders being charged for manipulating data to enrich themselves. Climate science guys are doing that AND misdirecting £billions of public monies. These people need holding to account. Why the silence?
“Why the silence?”
My question is why do you believe in worldwide conspiracies?
Because the so-called “conspirators” – and there is nothing “conspiratorial” at all about their stated claims and world-wide behavior – have spent billions worldwide promoting their goals, their methods, and their motives. YOU are the ones who use “conspiracy” and all of its implied hidden agendas. This IS United States policy, the US “highest global security threat” for the President AND Sec of State, DOD, and all of its subordinate agencies and all of their 92 billions in CAGW monies…..
It is totally political and political-economic driven and political-Gaea-theist. No conspiracies at all needed.
@RACookPE1978
“This IS United States policy, the US “highest global security threat” for the President AND Sec of State, DOD, and all of its subordinate agencies and all of their 92 billions in CAGW monies…..”
In order for this amazing statement of yours to be true, ALL these parts of the US Government are complicit in your posited deception.
What’s more, ALL the nations of the planet must be in on it as well, since the National Science Academies of every nation on Earth –China, Japan, UK, France, Germany, Canada, Australia, etc take formal positions concluding AGW. EVERYONE. Plus NASA, NOAA, major Universities, and all Scientific Professional Societies.
A bit of a stretch, as they say… or perhaps you don’t say…
cheshire, GWPF is doing pretty much what you ask for:
http://www.thegwpf.org/inquiry-launched-into-global-temperature-data-integrity/
They are doing an inquiry and have a call for evidence, to be submitted by June 30th.
You’re right, cheers. I’d forgotten about that one. Hope it delivers results.
Actually Roger Peilke Sr. called for a collection of mutually agreed upon experts, none of which had an interest in the outcome.
So, not a team of skeptics. Not a team of non-skeptics, but a mutually agreed upon experts.
GWPF had an opportunity to follow Roger’s prescription ( one endorsed by Anthony BTW) ,but GWPF failed.
* Select adjusted data examples.
* Show how far they’ve been adjusted, and the consequences of the ‘new’ data.
* Challenge the relevant data provider to explain the adjustments, with workings.
* Demand politicians launch official inquiry.
Data adjustments are all explained in papers that skeptics refuse to read and code which they refuse to review.
Data adjustments COOL THE GLOBAL RECORD.
Slight bit of deception…. Data adjustments COOL THE PAST to enhance the warming rate… which then helps bring the rate of change more in line with the defective models. Unfortunately, falls are coming earlier and winters lasting longer. Today’s climate seeming to be very similar now as to what it was back in the 70’s, to anyone who has been around that long, cause disbelief in credibility of the adjustments. In addition since satellites and weather balloons completely go against the warmists strong desire to show rapid and soon to be catastrophic warming. It is very highly unlikely that the adjustments can be correct, they do NOT fit with peoples observations.
“Cool the global record”? This must be a case of somebody saying one thing and meaning another.
Look at the graph “Global Temperature (meteorological stations)” in Hansen’s 1999 paper (Figure 4). Compare that with the current “Global Temperature (meteorological stations)” at the GISS website. The rise in temperature over the 20th century is practically doubled.
As I understand it, the common practice is to use a 1200 km gridded system to in-fill missing data and homogenize the data. To put that into context, that would be like comparing Baltimore, MD where I live with Ocala, FL. That is ludicrous in every sense of the word. Two completely different climatic areas. You could use January temps in Baltimore to cool the January temps temps of Ocala from the past.
wrong.
see Willis’ post on the relationship between latitude, elevation and temperature.
My favorite story about how ‘data adjustment’ can work in real life can be summed up in the punch line: “If you can’t afford the surgery to remove the tumor, Mr. Johnson, for a fraction of the cost I could touch up your X-rays.”
Has anyone on this thread read Dr Moshers posts and links about data homogenization, understood them, and care to post their own point by point explanation vs his?
warrenlb
I answer your questions in turn.
Yes, yes, and no because his sophistry is not worth the bother of refuting;
e.g. when he writes “Cool the global record” he means ‘cool the past to increase the apparent warming rate’.
Richard
Mr. layman here.
My impression is that the surface station info is trying to be used for something for which they were not designed. They were set up for local conditions, not global. The data can’t be changed (adjusted, homogenized, etc.) to give a truly accurate global result.
But they can be changed to give a desired or expected result. (Desired by the politicians and “political scientist”. Expected by the prevailing hypothesis.)
If the goal is to gain a better understanding of the Earth’s Climate, then the effort should be made on ensuring the quality and quantity of the data going forward.
Why bother looking at data from the Griffith Observatory from the 1940’s when you’ve got a Hubble Space Telescope. It doesn’t make any scientific sense to use sparse and flawed data from the past.
It most certainly does make sense if you are going to make a statement regarding the present in comparison to the past.
I’ve always had a problem with the data adjustment, because it changes the trend within the raw data. IF a temp is taken every day at 10 a.m. … and it produces a trend …. it is not likely that that trend is going to change had the temp been taken every day at 5:30 a.m. Moving max and mins are also not a good measure, outside of establishing records here and there.
If I ever win the lottery, I’m going to get into climate science … simply because I want to answer a lot of questions that aren’t being answered.
To suggest that NOAA deliberately adjusts temperature data in order “to achieve a desired effect” is a very serious charge and should not be made lightly.
If the author has evidence to show that scientists have deliberately misapplied TOBS adjustments or miscalculated homogenization with the specific intent of skewing the results in a specific direction, then he should present such evidence.
Otherwise such charges border on “bearing false witness against your neighbor”.
David, why the incessant need to always keep going back to fiddle with temperatures from the past?? Here, let me answer this for you since you likely will not answer honestly. Answer: Because the models which every warmist believes must be right, show considerable warming as CO2 rises and believe that at least 3C or more warming must occur between 1900-2100. The data, uncorrected do NOT show the expected warming. Thus, the warmists conclude there MUST be errors in the data and so come up with reasons as to why the adjustments must be made. And as long as the plateau continues, there will always be a need to correct the past in order to show that the warming continues unabated. Support in this answer is seen in the growing discrepancy between satellites and the ground based temperature with every new correction.
Yes, such a charge is serious.
So is destroying the world’s economy and killing millions of innocents, in order to …. nothing.
all the more reason why the author should provide evidence to back up his accusations..
@David Sanger
Posters on this forum repeatedly make such accusations without evidence; moreover, Mr Watts claims to have written a paper ‘proving’ that the data is fraudulent, yet we have not seen it.
It’s all part of the process of rejecting AGW by proving there’s a conspiracy to commit fraud. The only problem with this scenario is that the entire world of science must be ‘in on it’, since every Science Academy, Scientific Professional Society, and major University in the world assert Earth is warming and Man is the Cause.
You would think these folks would be trying to figure out why the adjustments are made, instead of making unsupported accusations. It seems apparent they do so not because of supporting evidence, but because they don’t like the answers of Science re: AGW.