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.
(Click the ‘comments’ link below if the input box does not appear)
10,000 Responses to “Continuation of the New Statesman Whitehouse/Lynas blogs.”
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
Vermont sets ‘all-time record for one snowstorm’…
http://cdn.necn.com/notfound.htm
Iowa temps ‘a solid 30 degrees below normal’…
Feeling cold? We’re at 30 below normal
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20100103/NEWS/1030352/-1/SiteMap/Feeling-cold?-We-re-at-30-below-normal
Peru’s mountain people face fight for survival in a bitter winter
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jan/03/peru-mountain-farmers-winter-cold
World copes with Arctic weather…
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240319/As-Britain-told-expect-snow-10-days-rest-world-coping-Arctic-weather.html
Next Cold Blast Will Be Even More Brutal, Widespread
http://www.accuweather.com/regional-news-story.asp?region=midwestusnews
Peter M
You wrote (8836)
Yeah. It was also warmer during the period from around 900 to 1100 AD, when CO2 was not measured, but is believed from ice core data to have been lower than today.
But that is immaterial to our discussion.
Look at the HadCRUT graph more exactly, Peter (but put on your glasses first). You’ll see that a linear trend line will show a net cooling after 2000.
And change of temperature (resulting from climate forcing) is what we are talking about, not the absolute temperature anomaly (with all it’s warts and blemishes, which TonyB have pointed out to you repeatedly).
So 2009 may be the “5th warmest” year (since the record started in 1850).
2010 might be the “10th warmest year”
2011 might be the “11th warmest year”
etc. (ad nauseam)
But we could be in the midst of a continued cooling trend, such as we have seen after 2000.
And the GH theory tells us it should be warming, as a result of the record increases in atmospheric CO2 content.
And that is your dilemma, Peter.
The Met Office rationalization that this cooling is being caused by “natural variability” (a.k.a. natural forcing) only makes the dilemma worse.
If these natural factors have been strong enough to more than offset record increases in CO2 over the past decade, how can we assume that they were not instrumental in the warming we have witnessed in the 20th century?
A true dilemma, which you have been unable to resolve (and unwilling to even acknowledge or address).
Tell me, Peter, do Australian emus also stick their heads in the sand like ostriches?
Max
Heaviest snowfall in Seoul, South Korea in 70 years:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100104/ap_on_re_as/as_asia_storms
How To Link Record Cold And Snow To Global Warming…
17 12 2008
…in a few easy steps!
1. If a winter is warmer than the average, claim that as evidence that the globe is warming and the climate is changing, because winters are supposed to be cooler
2. If the following winter is warmer than the average, go back to 1.
3. If the following winter is average or colder, claim that as evidence that the globe is warming and the climate is changing, because even if winters were initially supposed to be as cold as the average, since recent winters have been warmer than that, then an average or cooler winter is a change in climate (and it is due to global warming because everything is)
http://omniclimate.wordpress.com/2008/12/17/how-to-link-record-cold-and-snow-to-global-warming/
Peter (8844)
melting Arctic ice
Is it?
TonyB
Thanks for going through the linear regression of the Perth temperature (8848) to show Peter that it has essentially not changed since 1977, despite Peter’s “eyeball” opinion that it showed “a long term rise” (8842).
“Eyeballing” the curve myself, I came to the conclusion of no significant warming, which your linear regression confirmed (maybe my eyeballs are better than Peter’s, or maybe it’s because I’m not wearing doomsday-colored glasses, as he is).
In any case, I guess it’s always best to check out the figures, rather that just relying on the “eyeballs”.
But the whole discussion on Perth temperature is a typical Peter red herring, which just happened to backfire on him, because he did not first check the data.
Max
Just a question: Do the UK MET office run separate sites for weather and climate? I seem to remember that their main centre was in Bracknell.
James P
Yep. Every year.
And then it freezes back again every year.
Same happens with Antarctic sea ice.
They call it seasons.
Polar bears and penguins love it.
Sailors don’t like it all that much.
Max and JamesP
Of course as well as seasonal arctic melt it also melts in very frequent cycles. The last time from 1920 onwards. This from 1922
http://docs.lib.noaa.gov/rescue/mwr/050/mwr-050-11-0589a.pdf
tonyb
Hi Peter
The Met Office /Hadley centre are to all intents and purposes operating from the same site and share a lot of facilties. They have a physically separated section (by removable panels)where the climatologists cluster to read the tea leaves every morning, but this is still an integral part of the same met office building.
The Met office was previously located in a number of old fashioned buildings clustered round Bracknell in Berkshire-nearer London where everyone was much more mixed up.
They moved from there about 6 years ago to state of the art premises in Exeter-Devon.
They have a world class library there but unfortunately do not enjoy a high reputation locally. We live on the coast some 15 miles away from Exeter and the Met office are quite incapable of predicting our weather-so what hope is there that they can predict the cimate?
Tonyb
Max and TonyB,
I’d like to see how you arrived at your conclusions about Perth’s temperatures.
This graph:
shows that the temperature there has risen by approximately 1.2 degC or 2degF since 1945
Climategate: Michael Mann’s very unhappy New Year
Michael Mann – creator of the incredible Hockey Stick curve and one of the scientists most heavily implicated in the Climategate scandal – is about to get a very nasty shock. When he turns up to work on Monday, he’ll find that all 27 of his colleagues at the Earth System Science Center at Penn State University have received a rather tempting email inviting them to blow the whistle on anyone they know who may have been fraudulently misusing federal grant funds for climate research.
Under US law, regardless of whether or not a prosecution results, the whistleblower stands to make very large sums of money: it is based on a percentage of the total government funds which have been misused, in this case perhaps as much as $50 million. (Hat tip: John O’Sullivan of the wonderful new campaigning site http://www.climategate.com)
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100021135/climategate-michael-manns-very-unhappy-new-year/
Peter M
Here is a graph showing the Perth Airport temperature record from 1976 to 2008.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2734/4246072371_21515726e0_b.jpg
It shows a clear cooling trend of 0.12°C per decade.
If you will recall, I said it looked like there had been no warming from around 1975.
Looks like that is what the data show.
But, Peter, this is all a diversionary tactic, which started with you telling us that it had reached 39°C in Perth (as proof of “global warming”).
Forget it and move on, Peter.
Max
Peter M
Just for clarification, the GISS temperatures for Perth (Airport) which I plotted are annually averaged figures.
It looks like your chart used January or February figures (?).
But I think we need to move on; this topic is meaningless, even if TonyB and I were right and you were wrong.
Max
peter
Are you quite sure? Try calculating 280ppm as a percentage, then do the same for 380ppm. You have to get past quite a few zeros to notice the difference.
Max,
There is no way that I would ever say that one graph can be presented as “proof” of global warming. Evidence, yes, proof, no. My graph showed the whole range of data which was available from the Australian BOM. Yours was cherry picked, from GISS of all places, to produce a decline. I’ll have to have a word with James Hansen, and the great worldwide conspiracy, to get that altered :-)
In any case the point wasn’t so much about that anyway. It was to let the “Little Englander” types who inhabit this blog know that globally there is no such thing as Winter and Summer, and that London, or the UK, is not the centre of the the known universe. It is not even the centre of an Empire anymore. I like the UK, and England, but if the truth be told, it is just a small European island country which is in great danger of disintegrating politically.
Peter
You are exactly making my point about global temperatures, which of course consist of nothing more than thousands of local temperatures strung together (the location and number of which vary monthly).
These started off life measuring the micro climate around them, say 100 years ago.
Inevitably a city has grown up around them or they have moved- often to an airport. The conditions subsequently being measured consequently bear no resemblance whatsoever to the original site.
To compemsate for this GISS apply a number of factors, some of them frankly bizarre. These allow for difference in height, uhi (but a very tiny and unrealistic amount)if the information is missing it is grabbed from the next ‘similar’ site (which in Australia can be hundreds of miles away and thereby represent an entirely different microclimate)
Airports are treated in a number of ways, for example a large international one is classed as a rural site if the lights are switched off by 11pm and therefore has a different ‘adjustment’ made to one that keeps its lights on and is considered urban.(google ‘Chiefio’ if you have the stomach to get to the bottom of this)
The Perth Airport figures are a good microcosm of what has gone wrong. This is a photo of the Perth Airport weather station. Do you think it was in that sort of urbanised location when it started off? Do you think the readings bear any resemblance to the original micro climate that was measured?
http://weather.gladstonefamily.net/site/YPPH
The Airport data is a good case in point whereby the raw information is adjusted and up to 12 different versions will be produced, all of which will vary to a greater or lesser extent.
A journalist recently interviewed James Hansen in his offices and described them as ‘comically cluttered’. Hansen phoned up in a hurt fashion and said they were much better than they used to be.
Peter, the GISS figures are so ‘comically cluttered’ they are laughable. The idea that these individual pieces of nonsense are stitched together to create a so called global figure would be hilarious if it didn’t have such serious consequences for the world economy.
Reverting to the met office, they get tens of millions a year in grants, much of it specifically to prove global warming exists. They are dancing to the tune of their political masters with a cabal of three eco political activists at the top.
Google the cv of John Napier current Chairman who is astonishingly biased, and then Chris Smith head of the EA who work very closely with the Met office. Chris Smith is another activist and is also head of the UK Adverising Standards authoriity, so ultimately was responsible for ruling on the absurd co2 TV adverts we all complained about.
AGW is a political matter Peter, with doctored figures geared to achieve certain political objectives.
I don’t suppose you read my article on the politics (complete with links) that is posted on my site?
Or the one about arctic ice melt in the 1820’s and 1920’s?
http://climatereason.com/Articles/
To repeat Peter, Global temperature figuers are a complete and utter nonsense (especially the further back in time you go) and many of the local ones leave a lot to be desired.
These figures need to be independently audited.
Tonyb
WRT Met Office accuracy, this comment to Christopher Booker’s recent piece is revealing. I’ve often thought that the normal radio/TV forecasts would be a lot better if they had to be preceded by a summary of the previous day’s efforts!
Christopher Booker’s article on the Met Office reminds me of an astonishing insight into its procedures, from the magazine “Practical Boat Owner”, December 2009, p.82. It was an article on maritime weather forecasts, which are rather important – indeed vital – to those who go to sea.
The magazine asked if the Met office makes comparisons between its maritime safety forecasts and what actually happens in the real world.
“Well, no, we don’t” was the answer. “We’re quite happy with what the computer tells us. We produce what customers say they want; if they are unhappy, they’ll probably tell us. We have all the data – we’ll produce what they ask us for…”
Good to know they still ‘have all the data’ :-)
Barelysane,
So, if there lots of zeros in front of the first significant figure of a decimal, you wouldn’t notice the difference?
Just as an exercise: try measuring the size of your little toe, but in kilometers. Then do the same for another part of your anatomy. Also in km.
You’ll get two numbers which both have lots of zeros after the decimal point.
So both your body parts are the same size? Never mind. Size isn’t suppose to matter that much.
Peter
ok, now your following what i was getting at i’ll repost my 8843
Wouldn’t you agree?
Hmm, Peter – ““Little Englander” types” eh? Well, see this from the Times: Arctic freeze and snow wreak havoc across the planet. But not to worry: “Guo Hu, the head of the Beijing Meteorological Bureau, linked this week’s conditions to unusual atmospheric patterns caused by global warming.” So that’s all right then.
But, incredible though it may seem (to anyone who hasn’t tried to exchange views with you), you still haven’t got my point: the proven incompetence of the UK Met Office – proven over summers and winters. Got it now?
This article dates from 1956.
http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/feature/2010/1/carbon-dioxide-and-the-climate/1
Who said that concerns over the role of atmospheric CO2 only come from large computer models?
Peter #8873
Yes, and they have been rebutting the co2 theory since before your 1956 paper. In it reference is made to Callendar.
As you know I went down this road two years and obtained Callendars archives where his selection of Co2 readings at the low end of the spectrum is very evident. He was a man with a theory and Keeling was very eager to follow the same route.
Giles Slocum demolished Callendars work very elegantly in 1955
http://www.pensee-unique.eu/001_mwr-083-10-0225.pdf
As it says in the paper referenced above, various printed books-which I have seen- considered around 400ppm at the beginning of the 20th century to be normal. Co2 had been regularly measured as an ordinary part of life since Saussure in 1830.
Elizabeth Gaskill wrote of co2 levels in cotton factories in her novel ‘North and South’ and the Britsh govt had been well aware of levels since around 1850. They legislated in 1889 to keep it below certain limits in factories. These limits were monitored by the UK factories inspectorate.( A fearsome regulatory body)
So high co2 levels in the atmosphere at around 350-400ppm were considered normal, they were measured regularly by many very fine chemists and patented analysing machines came into being to ensure compliance with the factories Act.
If asked whether I believe direct Co2 measurements taken at the time by some of the finest scientists of the day, or proxies by way of tree rings and ice cores taken in the supercharged political atmosphere we have today, I am afraid my money is on the former.
Callendar deliberately selected low Co2 values and we live with those consequences to this day. So when you read the 1956 paper you cite, bear this in mind when you the much better one from Giles Slocum
tonyb
below certain limits in factories
Any idea what those were? I’ve worked in greenhouses with deliberately elevated CO2 (1000-1200 ppm) and would not have detected it if I hadn’t already known. I imagine that in Victorian steam-driven factories, CO would have been a far greater hazard (and curious to think that the inspectors were more concerned about CO2 than unguarded belts and machinery!).