THIS PAGE HAS BEEN ACTIVATED AS THE NEW STATESMAN BLOG IS NOW CLOSED FOR COMMENTS
At 10am this morning, the New Statesman finally closed the Mark Lynas thread on their website after 1715 comments had been added over a period of five months. I don’t know whether this constitutes any kind of a record, but gratitude is certainly due to the editor of of the New Statesman for hosting the discussion so patiently and also for publishing articles from Dr David Whitehouse and Mark Lynas that have created so much interest.
This page is now live, and anyone who would like to continue the discussion here is welcome to do so. I have copied the most recent contributions at the New Statesman as the first comment for the sake of convenience. If you want to refer back to either of the original threads, then you can find them here:
Dr David Whitehouse’s article can be found here with all 1289 comments.
Mark Lynas’ attempted refutation can be found here with 1715 comments.
Welcome to Harmless Sky, and happy blogging.
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10,000 Responses to “Continuation of the New Statesman Whitehouse/Lynas blogs.”
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Peter
Here are five graphs of hadcrut up to august 2008.
http://digitaldiatribes.wordpress.com/2008/08/18/august-2008-update-on-global-temperature-hadcrut/
It is a pretty fair minded site which jeff id also uses. The data from Aug 2008 would show a continued slight cooling contuing the trends shown here. It is too short a period to be anything more than interesting, but it certainly was not expected in models. With sea temperatures still low it may well be the slight cooling trend will continue, I don’t know, but neither do the IPCC
TonyB
TonyN your 5234
Looks like the former Royal Society green activist turned insurance co apologist did have an impact on the site. Their motto used to be words to the effect that ‘nobodys word is final’ but that has turned into ‘respect the facts’
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/3357/
Science seems very nervous about discussing the ‘facts’ about AGW. I wonder why that should be?
TonyB
Funny Peter, the graph in this article looks nothing like your 30 year graph.
Global Warming’s No Longer Happening
By Lorne Gunter
So far this month, at least 14 major weather stations in Alberta have recorded their lowest-ever March temperatures. I’m not talking about daily records; I mean they’ve recorded the lowest temperatures they’ve ever seen in the entire month of March since temperatures began being recorded in Alberta in the 1880s.This past Tuesday, Edmonton International Airport reported an overnight low of -41.5 C, smashing the previous March low of -29.4 C set in 1975. Records just don’t fall by that much, but the airport’s did. Records are usually broken fractions of degrees. The International’s was exceeded by 12 degrees.
To give you an example of how huge is the difference between the old record and the new, if Edmonton were to exceed its highest-ever summer temperature by the same amount, the high here some July day would have to reach 50 C. That’s a Saudi Arabia-like temperature. Also on the same day, Lloydminster hit -35.2 C, breaking its old March record of -29.2 C. Fort McMurray—where they know cold—broke a record set in 1950 with a reading of -39.9C. And Cold Lake, Slave Lake, Whitecourt, Peace River, High Level, Jasper and Banff, and a handful of other communities obliterated old cold values, most from the 1950s or 1970s, two of the coldest decades on record in the province. This has been an especially cold winter across the country, with values returning to levels not often seen since the 1970s, which was an especially brutal decade of winters. Temperatures began to plummet on the Prairies in December. The cold weather did not hit much of the rest of the country until January, but when it hit, it hit hard.
Even against Canada’s normally frigid January standards, “this particular cold snap is noteworthy,” Environment Canada meteorologist Geoff Coulson said this past January. Many regions across the country had not been as cold for 30 years or more, he added. Does this prove fear of global warming is misplaced? On its own, probably not. But if records were being broken the other way—if several Alberta centres had recorded their warmest-ever March values—you can bet there would be no end of hand-wringing, horror stories about how we were on the precipice of an ecological disaster of unprecedented proportions.
Environmentalists, scientists who advance the warming theory, politicians and reporters never shy away from hyping those weather stories that support their beliefs. But they tend to ignore or explain away stories that might cast doubt. In 2005, the summer and fall of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, when several major ‘canes pummeled North and Central America, we were told again and again that this was proof warming was happening and it was going to be bad.
Al Gore has emissions from industrial smokestacks swirling up into a satellite image of a hurricane on the DVD box for his propaganda film An Inconvenient Truth to underline the point that more and eviler hurricanes will be the result of CO2 output. But since 2005, only one major hurricane—this year’s Ike—has struck North America. And now comes a study from Florida State University researcher Ryan Maue, that shows worldwide cyclonic activity—typhoons, as well as hurricanes—has reached a 30-year low (tinyurl.com/bunynz).Indeed, the hiatus may go back more than 30 years because it is difficult to compare records before about 1970 with those since, since measurements four or more decades ago were not as precise or thorough. Current low activity may actually be the lowest in 50 years or more. If Maue had proven hurricane activity were at a 30-year high, of course his findings would have been reported far and wide. But since he is challenging the dogma of the Holy Mother Church of Climate Change, his research is ignored. For at least the past five or six years, global temperatures have been falling. Look at the black trend line on the chart at http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/ put out by the man who runs NASA’s worldwide network of weather satellites.
Also, in the past few months, two studies—one by the Leibniz Institute of Marine Science and the Max Planck Institute of Meteorology in Germany and another by the University of Wisconsin—have shown a slowing, or even a reversal of warming for at least the next 10 to 20, and perhaps longer. Even the Arctic sea ice, which has replaced hurricanes as the alarm of the moment ever since hurricanes ceased to threaten, has grown this winter to an extent not seen since around 1980.Global warming is not only no longer happening, it is not likely to resume until 2025 or later, if then. So why are we continuing to hear so much doomsaying about climate change? There are a lot of people in every age who think they know better than everyone else and, therefore, have a right to tell everyone how to live. In the 1950s, it was country-club and parish council busybodies with their strict moral codes. In the 1970s, it was social democrats with their fanciful economic theories. Today, it’s environmentalists. Same instinct, different wrapper.
Brute,
No it doesn’t look anything thing like either the GISS graphs or the Hadley ones either.
On this graph they have 1993 as being cooler than 1981. No one has ever claimed that before even on the basis of the UAH data. It all looks very fishy to me. I’d like to see some refernce for this graph and the data that was used to draw it.
At the moment it just looks to be a fake. There have been historical problems with the UAH data. But even so it doesn’t look like the graph that seems to be popular on contrarian websites at the moment.
I was looking at your links of Daniel Haddon. He’s not an UK MP but a UK MEP based in Brussells. There is a difference.
He seems a bright, sharp guy and it would be interesting to see how he’d perform as an MP in the London Westminster system.
He wouldn’t be received in quite such polite silence there. He’d have to learn to take it as well as hand it out. Its the same in the Australian Parliament of of course. It gets pretty rough in there and you’ve got to be quick witted to survive.
Its a pity that your Presidents don’t ever get grilled in the same way. Bush or Reagan would never have made it anywhere near the top jobs if they’d been Australian. Paul Keating would have torn them to shreds.
This is Paul in action:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=roIeVEf5alk
Hi Peter,
Coming back to your “virtual” temperature curve (5236), let me first commend you on a beautiful chart.
Unfortunately, besides being purely hypothetical it has a few basic flaws that would make it misleading to the average viewer.
Firstly, it is based on a cherry-picked short 30-year “blip” in the record, rather than on the entire record.
Secondly, as a result, the warming “trend” of 0.6°C over 30 years (or 0.2°C per decade) is misleading, even though IPCC has made the silly mistake of using this short-term cherry-picked “trend” to predict what will happen over the first few decades of the 21st century (incorrectly, as the actual facts have shown).
The actual physically observed long-term linear warming trend is 0.041°C per decade. This appears to be a pretty solid number. Over the 158 years since the Hadley record started, this represents a total warming of 0.65°C. This long-term underlying rate appears to have held up since we have been coming out of the Little Ice Age.
Your “sine curve” analogy makes some sense, except that the actually observed multi-decadal oscillations are not on an 11-year cycle as you have suggested, but appear to be on more like a 50 to 60 year cycle. We have had three warming cycles since the record started and two full cooling cycles (in addition to the one that has now started and a short one at the beginning of the record). I have hand drawn in a sine curve that reflects the actual record (as you did on a more theoretical basis).
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3587/3388575505_fa0e252455_b.jpg
If this cyclical development should continue (along with the underlying warming trend) we should cool by around 0.2°C below the 2000 level (0.24°C) by around 2030 and then warm back up to around 0.4°C above the 2000 anomaly by around 2065, before cooling back down to around 0.1°C below the 2000 anomaly by 2100.
The linear warming from today to year 2100 would then be around 0.4°C, following the long-term trend line.
(Interestingly, this also checks with other estimates of warming by year 2100, per earlier posts.)
Please note, Peter, that this is not a “forecast”. It is not a “prediction”. It is not even a “projection”. It is simply an extrapolation, based on the continuation of the observed long-term trend since 1858.
But it is based on the real temperature record and trend from 1850 through 2008 rather than just on virtual simulated values, so it is a bit more realistic than the hypothetical chart you posted.
Regards,
Max
PS I will be absent from my computer for the next few days. Will check in again after April 1. In the meantime, you may wish to reflect on the causes for the current cooling trend (see earlier posts).
Peter: so, instead of giving a clear answer to a reasonable question, you bleat that it’s “dumb”. Very impressive.
Re: 5252, TonyB
I seem to remember that Lord May had a hand in that one too.
Max, Brute et al
Am writing this from the potting shed after being banished from the house following last nights debacle. I had insisted we sleep in our dinghy on the lawn waiting for the upsurge in sea water levels my models had predicted.
I must have missed a decimal point off somewhere as the innundation didn’t arrive.
My wife went back to bed at 4AM and I was banished here. Went to the sea first thing to ensure someone hadn’t placed a dam there overnight and blocked off the expected rise, as models don’t lie. Inexplicably the water level has dropped right back again!
Really perplexed about this so asked the harbour master what was happening.
He invited me to take a look at his tide tables. I said I was in no mood to buy furniture. He reckons this up and down movement is due to the moon! Really! What does he know about sea levels anyway, he needs to leave it to professionals with big computers. He’ll be saying the sun has an effect on our climate next!
I need to carry out some more modelling rather than this physical observation lark. It’s more fun, keeps me warm and in coffee, and satisfies my deep rooted preconceptions better.
Before I start this serious work though I’ll have a few hours on the new computer game that arrived this morning- “Fantasy climate’ from those nice games developers over at Nasa.
It’s great. You can put in any theoretical scenario you want and instantly you will get all sorts of nice coloured graphs and calculations showing the scenario is robust.
Nasa -together with their commercial partners-have quite a comprehensive set of these games;
“Fantasy global temperatures”
A comedy version called “Fantasy global temperatures to 1850”
“Fantasy sea surface temperatures”
“Fantasy Polar ice levels”
“Fantasy CO2 scenarios”
All marketed under the ‘Unprecedented’ brand name-in association with the IPCC.
I’m off to play their latest “Fantasy sea level rises to 2100” for a few hours and hope to pick up some useful tips.
First, I need some help dragging the dinghy back to its mooring but I don’t think my wife will co-operate at present. Before emptying the porridge over my head and slamming the door, she muttered that fluctuating sea levels over the short term might teach me something about a fluctuating climate over the long term. Amateur! What does she know? Her computer is much smaller than mine anyway.
Will post again on this rapid fluctuating sea level mystery later. I reckon next time I look it could well be up again. Or Down
TonyB
My apologies to TonyN if this is too OT.
But as the BBC cropped up earlier and it’s vaguely on the subject of global warming.
I posted a comment that has been rejected on a HYS forum. It broke no house rules, and was a direct response to a previous comment and within the context of the debate. Censorship is alive and well?
DEBATE:Does God have a role in the world today?SENT:26-Mar-2009 15:48
COMMENT:If they would admit to their quite understandable motivation for denial then we can get beyond the emotion and address the real problems of climate change.
Karl Popper, UK
The motivation is quite simple Karl, there is no proof of AGW. Proof of climate change yes, but don’t confuse that with AGW. I don’t expect you to take my word for it. Spend a bit of time looking around the web and ignore the main stream media. The evidence against AGW is stacking up, but it’s NEVER reported.
COMMENT STATUS:Rejected
I’ve made a complaint, but I’m 100% sure it will be ignored.
TonyN: It probably isn’t completely OT, but it is certainly on the wrong thread. The way that BBC blogs are moderated is an interesting subject in its own right. See the update at the end of this post. If you want to comment on the BBC, then please do so on a relevant thread.
TonyN
Fair enough, sorry.
Not all threads seem to display for me, some are just title and author.
Can I endorse Barleysanes comments in 5260 they dont display for me either and I think Peter had the same problem
TonyB
Sort of closing the barn door after the horse has already escaped, but they don’t display for me either……just title and author.
Tonyb,
Based on your reports I convinced my friends and neighbors to divert their monetary resources and purchase 642,000,000 sandbags, 6,000 motor boats and a sea wall to contain the rising waters…… They traded in their farming tools and purchased now useless fishing gear. We all have these pieces of paper, that we paid lots of money for, signed by someone named Gore that make us feel somewhat better but can’t figure out what they’re for and what they were supposed to have accomplished.
Being that the water has receded my fellow citizens are righteously angry.
My question to you is, what do we do with all of the life jackets and rubber boats? Can we expect a government bailout now to reimburse us for our rash and unsubstantiated decisions based on your obviously flawed computer models?
BarelySane and TonyB
Many thanks for the feedback. Could you please both let me know what browser you use, and version if possible.
Is there anyone else who has this problem, or is there anyone who definitely does not have it? Name of browser would help again.
TonyN
This PC is IE6 version 6.0.2900.2180 sp2
Dear Mr Brute
I would like to point out these were clearly computer predictions not statements of fact. We can accept no responsibilty for loss or accidental purchase, based on advice that was obviously experimental.
Please address any further complaints to the IPCC climate change complaints dept Geneva. Closed Mon to Sat. Also closed Sundays.
I understand that a Mr J Hansen is eager to acquire sound boats for his epic film
“Me and Noah told you -But would you listen?”
Yours sincerely
On behalf of TonyB
TonyN
Internet Explorer 7. You will recall I cant post graphics either-for which small mercy be thankful.
Tonyb
Fox News posted an item on the UN discussion document today on climate change
I followed it through to the entire UN paper which-if true-is dynamite.Here is the link
http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/032709_informationnote.pdf
Whilst everyone should scrutinise each line in order to confirm it contains the real agenda behind the IPCC (they couldn’t seriously believe all their models could they) some highlights are;
Page 6 item 17
page 8 item 25 and 27
page 9 item 34
page 10 item 37
page 14 item 60
Conclusions on p15
Any comments from anyone?
Tonyb
BarelySane and TonyB
Thanks. It sounds as though this may be a browser issue, but it shouldn’t happen. I’ll see what I can do.
This is an update to my 5268
This is the ad hoc working group composition and its stated aims, who feed into the UN document above
http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2008/awg6/eng/08.pdf
These are the Chairs
harald Dovland Norway –chair minister for environment http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-180526631.html
Mam Konate Mail Vice chair http://www.iisd.ca/climate/cop11/enbots/enbots1704e.html
Chan Woo-kim Republic of korea http://74.125.77.132/search?q=cache:py3_vPi45-wJ:www.unescap.org/esd/environment/mced/singg/documents/Programme_SINGG_Final.pdf+chan-woo+kim+republic+of+korea&cd=18&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk
Ms Christiana Figueres Costa rica http://figueresonline.com/
Nuno Lacasta Portugal http://www.wcl.american.edu/environment/lacasta.cfm
Brian smith new zealand (also a bryan Smith-same person?
Marcelo Rocha Brazil http://www.berr.gov.uk/files/file50347.pdf
Talking about carbon markets and here
http://www.iisd.ca/vol12/enb12378e.html
Any comments on the document?
Tonyb
Hah, I look at the monitor and type on the keyboard……sometimes I give the thing a kick if it doesn’t work. I don’t know from Browsers or Domains.
Sorry TonyN, I have know idea what horsepower this thing is.
TonyB:
I’ve looked at the extraordinarily boring document you referred at at 5268. I suppose it has some slight use in that it spells out just how complex matters become when you try to determine how the entire world should comply with an absurd agenda. But that’s surely obvious to anyone with half a brain. In reality of course, what the UN wishes to do would be unimaginably more complex even than this. And, considered in relation to the real world (see my 5214), it simply bureaucratic twaddle and a total waste of time. Who pays for all this?
Tonyb,
Thank you for providing the link @ 5268. I’d heard a little about this on the radio today but didn’t get the details. I’ll read it as I’m driving home.
Thanks again.
A note to all – except Peter. We’ve established recently that Peter:
(1) cannot produce a list of any of the scientists who have gone on record that they believe that AGW is a serious threat;
(2) having conceded that science is not determined by majority vote, cannot explain why there’s any further point in referring to “consensus” and the “overwhelming majority” of scientists; and
(3) cannot explain why is it cooling now despite all-time record human CO2 emissions.
In your experience, is this inability to deal with simple requests typical of warmists – or is Peter just a poor representative?
Brute
Can you let me know which bit you kick? I’m prepared to try anything.