Looking for longtime readers and Internet search wizards to help us identify our “best of category” posts for the following items:
- Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming
- CO2 and Climate
- Climate Models
- Alarmist Predictions
- Sea level Rise
- Climategate
- Extreme weather
- Climate Economics
- Intermittent Wind and Solar
- 97% consensus
- Polar Bears
- Ocean Acidification
- Ocean Heat Content
- Global Temperatures
- Electric Vehicles
- Glacial Cycles
- Ice Sheets
- Coral Reef Health
Note: Some, but not all of the above, correspond to our blog categories. Others are new and combine multiple site categories.
List your links to our all time best posts below.
Ocean Heat Content
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/10/06/we-must-get-rid-of-the-carboniferous-warm-period/
Satire may not be everyone’s ‘cup-of-tea’, I bookmarked Brad Keyes’ brilliant essay.
Alarmist predictions.
Penguins dying out in Antarctic.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/03/02/remember-when-we-were-told-penguins-dont-migrate-theyre-dying-never-mind/
Calling John Cook to the stand. 😉
Please include the best URLs.
W. E. With cloud feedback hypothesis 2016/9/4 and later
CO2 and climate:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/09/21/the-greenhouse-effect-a-summary-of-wijngaarden-and-happer/
Ice Sheets, sure I remember something about CO2 freezing…
CO2 and climate:
Nooooo! I still haven’t recovered from that huge controversy. I was deeply involved in that dialog, it was finally put to rest with https://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/13/results-lab-experiment-regarding-co2-snow-in-antarctica-at-113f-80-5c-not-possible/
It led to Tony Heller leaving WUWT as a frequent poster, he may still believe CO2 frost is possible.
Too bad for all of us that Tony left WUWT over that disagreement. His contributions to climate common sense are immense.
Best of WUWT or Greatest?
It was certainly one of the most significant of WUWT posts. Albeit a little thermodynamically challenged.
Methane which is already being banned in various cities around the world isn’t on the list of categories – LINK.
We are never told how much methane will run up global temperatures, but depending on which IPCC Assessment you read, we are told that it’s 63, 56, 62, 72 or 85 times more powerful than CO2 at trapping heat.
The Global Warming Potential numbers in the IPCC reports are a classic example of misdirection. Their only purpose is to be a scary statistic and not convey any useful information.
Denying natural gas to residential homes is an odious overstep of governmental power.
By 2100 methane’s contribution to global temperature will be essentially nothing.
Here’s a WUWT post
Methane warming exaggerated by 400%
be sure read through the comments
Here’s a good one:
Methane: The Irrelevant Greenhouse Gas
I’ve been following WUWT from the very beginning and it’s taught me so much about the science of climate. Out of all the posts, my most favourite post is a recent one from Willis:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/25/wheres-the-emergency/
It is an outstanding take down of the CAGW fallacy that is full of superb visuals that a non-scientist (“bloke in the street”) can understand. It needs to be shared far and wide.
Oh, and any post ripping the pompous Mike Mann a new one is always good for a giggle. Could you perhaps make a “Michael Mann” category?
Regarding your most favorite post, and it’s a good one, be sure to read the comments.
The comments on any post are often the best bit. The amount I’ve learned from comments at WUWT is virtually immeasurable.
+1
WTF?
A CO2 and climate category, and no solar and climate category or internal variability and climate category?
It is clear that WUWT is about negating a determinant role for CO2, but not about other possible climate change drivers.
A polar bear category and no Arctic sea-ice category? Is this a climate place or an ecology place?
Dumb choice of categories in my opinion. Not much thought appears to have gone into it.
Perhaps you should just put up a link to the best of the category you do not see instead of a useless rant.
The best articles on those categories not reflected in my opinion are mine, so I am not going to propose them. The question is why contribute to WUWT if the categories I contribute are considered irrelevant and below polar bears, electric vehicles and coral reef health.
I guess I’ll just post at Climate Etc. and watch WUWT repost them.
Don’t let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya…
Yes, I’ll do that. The level of WUWT commenters has fallen too low for my taste.
I am surprised at you since YOU can easily post YOUR choices by article and links irrelevant to blog category.
Please post your choices to help illuminate what is important to you then the rest of us can read them.
12 Ocean Acidification
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/09/scripps-paper-ocean-acidification-fears-overhyped/
The finding that ocean pH is not constant in the first place has been very overlooked.
One of my all-time favorites. This one I always keep in my bookmarks.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/26/northeast-us-blizzard-proves-global-warming/
This is interesting, it could be the basis of an E-Book about a real discussion about Climate, or even a textbook.
7: Extreme weather
I am extremely biased on this item as several of my posts have looked at past extreme weather, sometimes showing other extreme weather around that time.
However, my very favorite of my posts, and (here’s the bias) I think one of the best posts on WUWT, is https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/11/10/35-years-ago-the-witch-of-november-come-stealin/ about the storm that sank the Great Lakes ore freighter the Edmund Fitzgerald and related storms in earlier years.
The comments really added to the story, and came from people who crewed ore freighters on the Great Lakes to Roy Spencer recounting his early days at the NWS office in Sault Ste. Marie during the title storm, to someone recounting his grandfather and uncles being on the Mississippi River in the storm.
For the 97% consensus:
Shredding the “climate consensus” myth: More Than 1000 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims – Challenge UN IPCC & Gore
I’m not sure into which category this falls, but it’s epic:
Video analysis and scene replication suggests that Al Gore’s Climate Reality Project fabricated their Climate 101 video “Simple Experiment”
A couple more of my bookmarked “97% consensus” articles.
What else did the ‘97% of scientists’ say?
The madness of 97% 98% consensus herds
Another good one from 7 years ago:
The temperature forecasting track record of the IPCC
Glacial Cycle: https://judithcurry.com/2016/10/24/nature-unbound-i-the-glacial-cycle/
19: Solar effects [N.B. – missing category!]
Early on in WUWT’s history, Anthony reported on a long running study of weakening magnetic fields in our sun’s spots and that would lead to their invisibility. This might have been what happened during the Maunder Minimum. The weakening tailed off a couple years later, though I suspect we’ve missed a number of weak spots. Since then Leif Svalgaard kept us updated when solar activity had enough data to comment upon.
While the hypothesis didn’t pan out, this was one of the best examples of new, good science that wasn’t being reported in most other sources we read.
The best post is https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/09/18/suns-magnetics-remain-in-a-funk-sunspots-may-be-on-their-way-out/ . The original post is https://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/06/02/livingston-and-penn-paper-sunspots-may-vanish-by-2015/
20: Miscellaneous [another additional category!]
This likely doesn’t warrant being put on a pedestal, but here’s a post about today’s “Chemistry Sets” with no chemicals. It didn’t take long before commenters, including me, posted on the days back when childhood chemistry was fun and entertaining (i.e. explosive) and how common sense was expected when it came to keeping all your fingers intact.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/04/29/friday-funny-science-safety-run-amok/
Which category covers daft conspiracy theories?
“I send Michael Mann a free WUWT calendar as a Christmas gift, and he goes full conspiracy theory
As WUWT readers know, we’ve had the Josh 2013 Skeptic Calendar done independently in the UK via Bishop Hill, and of course we gauged interest here at WUWT. Josh sent over the artwork via email which I turned into the USA version. (Note: Dr. Mann probably doesn’t realize that Josh is a professional illustrator in the UK who gives his climate caricature services to skeptics free each week, just for fun.) Last week I sent out a few free copies to some folks that I thought could really use some Christmas cheer: Dr. Mike Mann, Dr. Gavin Schmidt, Dr. Peter Gleick, and Dana Nuccitelli.
Never beyond my wildest dreams did I think it would turn into a #Kochmachine conspiracy theory issue. But then again, there’s this strange pervading idea that skeptics are well funded and well organized. Here’s what Dr. Mann Tweeted today:
Where did #AnthonyWatts (#WUWT) get
funds for widely distributed #climatechange
#denier calendar? on.fb.me/12H62WI
#KochMachine.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/12/22/too-funny-i-send-mike-mann-a-free-wuwt-calendar-as-a-christmas-gift-and-he-goes-full-conspiracy-theory/
There should be a humorous category too.
2: CO2 and Climate
One page I’ve shared frequently (including here!) is Willis Eschenbach’s wonderful explanation about how the Mauna Loa CO2 sampling is done and how they exclude contamination from CO2 emitted by Hawaii’s volcanoes. Everyone who reads WUWT should read https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/06/04/under-the-volcano-over-the-volcano/ . Everyone who has read it should share as necessary to reduce the amount of misinformation on the WWW.
Thank you Willis.
Most welcome.
w.
I posted a portion of a WUWT article with the link
It has been moderated and disappeared.
What does that say about WUWT articles???
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/12/22/too-funny-i-send-mike-mann-a-free-wuwt-calendar-as-a-christmas-gift-and-he-goes-full-conspiracy-theory/
When you have your moderation sorted out let me know.
You censored your own output
Bizarre.
And now it’s back.
I won’t pretend to understand what is going on. I don’t.
The WordPress automatic filters seem to be inscrutable, the mods do a pretty good job of rescuing useful comments.
I suspect WordPress also sometimes completely looses a comment, I suspect it may be a “race condition” if two people comment on a post at exactly the same time and they’re handled by two different servers.
Ultimately, you aren’t the only one who doesn’t completely understand what is going on. 🙂
Ric, I’ve seen the WordPress code. Used to run a self-hosted blog with it.
It’s kinda surprising it works at all…
6 Climategate
I think the best post is the first post, https://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/19/breaking-news-story-hadley-cru-has-apparently-been-hacked-hundreds-of-files-released/
I used to track WUWT posts and the number of comments, but that program breaks every time there’s a big change in the blog, and I haven’t gotten back to it since the last break in 2019.
That post had 1,616 comments, I believe that’s the most comments to <b>any</b> WUWT post by far.
That post kept me up until 3 AM that night. I got into work late that morning….
See also:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/climategate/
The WUWT reference page on Climategate.
https://wermenh.com/climate/HARRY_READ_ME.txt
The infamous Harry readme. Any software engineer or scientific programmer here should read it.
Anything Jim Steele wrote.
Climate warming /alarmism/crisis/ and of course healing, to me is all condensed in the scientist at large: Bill Nye: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/12/30/bill-nye-we-want-to-engage-everybody-by-declaring-economic-war-on-climate-skeptics/
My choice would be any one of Willis’ tales of the South Pacific – eg http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/02/16/the-missing-cashbox-and-the-nguru-patrol/
I liked his tour of the UK. Wild cows and medieval clocks.
Mr. Stokes: I second your choice. (Wasn’t as hard to agree as I anticipated).
We need to find the conversations on WUWT that show how cows are carbon dioxide neutral and how farmers ought to be subsidized to raise more cows.
I’ll second Javier’s observation that there is a ‘CO2 and climate category’, but no ‘solar and climate category’ or ‘internal variability and climate’ category. My personal opinion is that CO2 might represent as much as a third of recent warming, but that other climate change drivers larger in their overall combined effect are certainly present.
Other missing categories large enough to be their own separate category would be ‘Energy Public Policy’ and ‘Energy Technology’, both of which happen to be my own personal areas of AGW debate topical interest.
A category I would dearly love to see is the ‘The Hydrological Cycle’ and its climate influence.
It is a subject which, I believe, has been deliberately omitted from the computer programs by the IPCC and has been systematically removed from mention in the mainstream media; so deserves a thoroughly good airing.
My own investigations into this cycle reveals that it is VERY INCONVENIENT for the CAGW MESSAGE. which explains much.
One way to sort posts would be by number of quality comments.Start with total number, then discount the obvious troll subthreads. The more quality comments, the better the likely post quality/interest. Judith used to do something similar for her Climate Etc ‘year in review’ summaries.
Charles, I would like to suggest an additional category: ‘The trouble with….’
It would incorporate the climate instrumentation difficulties. Examples would include the surface stations project, sparse global surface stations, ARGO, Satellite sea level altimetry, homogenization and UHI, tide gauges and vertical land motion, the CFL constraint on climate models forcing parameterization, error compounding in iterative climate models, and such. Much has been written at WUWT on the inadequacies of climate ‘instrumentation’ that is unknown generally because ignored by the ‘climate scientists’.
97% – Doran Zimmerman analysis / takedown
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/18/about-that-overwhelming-98-number-of-scientists-consensus/
Also, I recall something 2012-ish about “warming would cause a new ice age” but so far I can’t find it again.
The Good, the Bad and the Null HypothesisBy David Middleton
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/04/17/the-good-the-bad-and-the-null-hypothesis/
The Total Myth of Ocean AcidificationBy David Middleton
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/06/05/the-total-myth-of-ocean-acidification/
The 1970s Global Cooling Consensus was not a MythBy Angus McFarlanehttps://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/11/19/the-1970s-global-cooling-consensus-was-not-a-myth/
For me, WUWT’s best thread so far doesn’t fit into any of the categories listed. It was Willis’s response to Judith Curry, here:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/02/25/judith-i-love-ya-but-youre-way-wrong/
The problems Willis identified back then are even worse now. But that post may have helped to spur Judith into a more objective view.
Neil Lock 10:23
Many thanks for reminding me of that. A fine discussion.
Agree w/that — Willis stated & questioned in a plain-spoken, thorough way something we all wanted to say, even tho Judith is perhaps one of the “good guys”. But if she’s the good guy……..
I have been reading WUWT daily since August 2008 when I tried to figure out why the sky looked like late September in August and my potatoes where not setting a 3rd flush. I found all of the post regarding the relationship between solar variation and climate fascinating and informative. Especially the posts during the early debate over regarding the relationship between solar minimum increases in cosmic radiation and cloud formation and cooling…..2009-2013, Joe Bastardi’s long range winter prediction for 2011-2013. Any of the solar posts with long debates with Leif Svalgaard on the relationship between solar variation and climate… and cosmic radiation variation and climate. I didn’t know enough to have an opinion…. but it has been fascinating as a layman to watch the progression of science in in WUWT especially regarding the understanding the relationship between solar variation and the earth’s climate.
This one might be overlooked as 97 is not in the title:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/18/about-that-overwhelming-98-number-of-scientists-consensus/
my favourite wind upset (so to speak):
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/03/19/wind-turbine-infrasound-as-a-weapon/
dissing CAGW:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/10/24/water-vapour-the-big-wet-elephant-in-the-room/ and
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/08/10/the-diminishing-influence-of-increasing-carbon-dioxide-on-temperature/
Larry’s best on Alarmist Predictions
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/04/15/the-noble-corruption-of-climate-science/
Good luck, you’re welcome!
Not sure how these two fit in but …
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/04/13/weather-cows/
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/04/17/explosives-may-be-used-to-dislodge-frozen-cows/
Caribou move? Who knew?
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/11/24/caribou-supposedly-roasted-by-global-warming-found-unharmed/
My favourites: (sorry Canadian);
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/05/23/climate-change-alarmism-as-a-class-war/
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/21/the-latest-co2-fantasy/
One of my favorites:
Africa from space Record heat, same area on ground, No data.. h/t Tony Heller
Another Gem.
Study: 99% of Coral Will Bleach Every Year Within a Century…Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Coral survived the Cretaceous / Paleogene extinction event which wiped out the dinosaurs, when a 6 mile wide Asteroid crashed into the Gulf of Mexico 66 million years ago. Coral survived the Permian–Triassic extinction event 252 million years ago, when the Siberian Traps were formed, a colossal series of volcanic eruptions which covered almost three million square miles in lava, contaminating the entire world with toxic fumes and volcanic ash. But apparently its all going to come to an end, if we add a few hundred ppm more CO2 to the atmosphere.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/01/06/study-99-of-coral-will-bleach-every-year-within-a-century/
James’ all of global warming…as it would look plotted on a thermometer
https://suyts.wordpress.com/2021/04/15/what-global-warming-looks-like-on-an-alcohol-thermometer/
Deleted
This one is almost 10 years old:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/04/23/earth-day-2012-top-10-positive-climate-developments/
so there may be newer ones that make the same point. Which is that a Warmer World Is a Better World. Perhaps WUWT needs an update on that topic, and even a Category.
The entire CAGW myth is built on the erroneous assumption that somehow a warmer world would be disastrous. Arguments regarding the factors that might lead to warming aside, the lockstep mainstream paranoia about the alleged “problems” of warming is baseless. A warmer Earth is nothing to fear but rather to be welcomed.
Defuse the paranoia and the alarmists will be disarmed.
When I saw this post on best-of WUWT my immediate reaction was, at least one or two of Dr. Robert Browns (aka: rgb@duke) frequent contributions must be included somewhere in here. It was very enjoyable to go back and reread a number of his posts and comments. They are all worthy of consideration, imo, but I’ll suggest this comment elevated by Anthony to a post almost 10 years ago for consideration in the first, CAGW category.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/03/02/why-cagw-theory-is-not-settled-science/
I think in category 10, 97% consensus, maybe Kenji should be there (whether or not he is a part of the 97% of the 3%):
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/10/07/friday-funny-the-newest-member-of-the-union-of-concerned-scientists/
For intermittent wind and solar and why too much of it’s a problem.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/12/13/grid-stability-basics/
…”our all time best posts”
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Impossible, my depth of knowledge just keeps increasing with every visit.