Jul 062008
I have not all my facts yet, but I do not think there are any insuperable difficulties. Still, it is an error to argue in front of your data. You find yourself insensibly twisting them round to fit your theories.
This quotation turned up rather unexpectedly in something I was reading this week, and it sounds like good advice for all climate scientists. Unfortunately I can’t offer a prize for identifying who these wise words are attributed to, but can anyone supply the answer WITHOUT using Google?
Maybe I’m stupid, Tony, but your quotation doesn’t make sense to me. When the author says “I do not think there are any insuperable difficulties”, does he/she mean difficulties about getting “all the facts” or about arguing a theory? And does “argue in front of your data” mean put the case with the data to hand or before all the data is available? Presumably the latter – but it could have been better phrased.
I haven’t any idea who said it.
Oh my God this is dramatic.
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_timeseries.png
Thinking further, I believe that even David and Peter Martin accept this data source and if accurate, it demonstrates just how volatile the Earth’s weather really is. Such a difference in only one year? Candidly, I would have expected a more modest increase, (or decrease), but this is truly amazing. It really does demonstrate how little we know about our climate. The “experts” predicted that the Arctic ice would be gone by this year?
Wonderful news, isn’t it Peter? We’ve managed to elude planetary disaster (at least for the time being).
Max,
Is Hansen capable of “adjusting” this data?
Hi Brute,
You asked (of the NSIDC): “Max,
Is Hansen capable of “adjusting” this data?”
Don’t think he has his “fingers” in there directly, as he does in the GISS record.
What is going on with Arctic sea ice? It depends which month you look at. June 2008 shows a recovery back to June 2004 level while May 2008 showed a recovery back to May 1989 level.
The “April-August” curve you cited shows that this year we are somewhere between where we were last year (2007) and the “1979-2000” average for these months.
Looking at several months, it looks like the average rate of decrease (since records started in 1979) is around 3% per decade, which means (if it continues at this rate) the Arctic sea ice will all be gone in 330 years (just to put things into proper perspective).
If the rate from 2005 to 2008 continues, of course, it will mean that Arctic sea ice extent will grow rather than recede.
Who knows what will happen now that solar cycle 24 has started off with an extremely inactive sun? Hansen’s models? (Kinda doubt it, since they haven’t been able to predict temperatures at all, and that is supposed to be his “specialty”.)
It turns out that GCMs are no better than “crystal balls” or “ouija boards” (just more expensive).
Regards,
Max
Hi TonyN,
Give us a clue: is it a real live person or a fictitional character?
(Haven’t cheated yet by googling.)
Regards,
Max
Robin and Max
As I read it,the first sentence provides context only; it refers to problem solving generally, even elementary ones. The second sentence warns against putting forward a hypothesis on the assumption that supporting data will become available. Finally the spectre of conclusion bias raises its ugly head, further impairing the deductive process.
Well – who said it?
ANSWER
Max was heading in the right direction when he asked whether a real or fictional character spoke these words. But no one noticed the clues in my number #5 when I mentioned both ‘deduction’ and ‘an elementary problem’.
These words were put into the mouth of Sherlock Holmes in a story called ‘The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge’, included in ‘His Last Bow’.
Why mention it? Well Conan Doyle was a scientist (medical doctor) before he was an author, and his inspiration for the Holmes stories was the diagnostic reasoning used by one of his professors. This story was first published nearly a century ago in 1917, but the warning about sloppy reasoning is as relevant today as it was then.
The development of super computers with processor speeds that can be measured in petaflops may make detailed modelling of the earth’s climate feasible, but if you do not have all the facts at your deposal, and argue ahead of your data, then you are likely to fall into the trap of conclusion bias however hard you may try to be objective.
What would Holmes have made of the IPCC’s AR4 Summary for Policymakers I wonder?
Hi TonyN,
To your question: “What would Holmes have made of the IPCC’s AR4 Summary for Policymakers I wonder?”
At 1000+ pages (groan!) of pseudoscientific gibberish, I doubt he would have said:
“Quite elementary, my dear Watson.”
Max
Hi TonyN,
Found the Holmes quotation on Google.
The same source quotes Holmes (p.55):
“We must fall back upon the old axiom that when all other contingencies fail, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”
Is that what is going on today?
“all other contingencies” = the GCM projections linking predicted 0.2C per decade 21st century warming to predicted continued increase in atmospheric CO2
“the truth” = continued increase in atmospheric CO2 with no actually observed warming (i.e. no link between CO2 and warming)
Regards,
Max
Max:
It’s a good point.
My problem with the AGWH has to do with the ‘all contingencies’ part of the argument. Our understanding of how climate functions as a vast multicoupled, non-linear chaotic system is anything but complete, so we have no idea what ‘contingencies’ might exist that we have yet to identify.