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threadShredder at 05:51 AM on 21 July 2012Vision Prize Results
Yes, I know about the updates. But I've noticed some posts could have been integrated or at least linked in some of the myths and weren't. I understand this is a voluntary effort from posters, and that the volume of material precludes any sort of comprehensive effort on single contributors. Given that, my suggestions are simply to suggest some inclusion if they are appropriate and may have been overlooked by busy people. I appreciate the site a lot, and wish I could be of more help, but I'm still a novice. Have been through all the myths and making my way through the posts as time allows. The site has come in quite handy for internet spats with deniers. -
Atomant at 05:22 AM on 21 July 2012The Mid-Wales floods of June 2012: a taste of things to come?
That is spot on John. Great post. The intense cold spells we've seen in recent winters were result of the same 'stalling' no doubt. The future of the british isles looks like one of very wet and very dry seasons. I do have an issue with the increase in atmospheric water vapour caused by GW and recent expansion of Polar Mesospheric clouds (NLC's in lower latitudes) The issue itself being that at those heights solar UV busts apart the water molecule into its constituent atoms and the lightweight hydrogen atom bubbles up to the top of the atmosphere and escapes. Although for the size of a human there seems to be a lot of water on Earth, in proportion to the volume of the planet there is very little water indeed. Hydrogen is rare on earth, the main storages being H2O and CH4, therefore, like in Venus, when it all flies away water will be a thing of the past. This of course will not occur during our lifetimes, but it will certainly happen if GW is not slowed or stopped. As you mentioned 1 degree is about 7% increase of WV and at the same time, as the atmosphere warms, it expands leaving more room for higher humidity content. No matter which way you look at it is not looking good in the long term. We broke the sky :( -
desertphile at 05:19 AM on 21 July 2012Andrew Dessler's New Paper Debunks Both Roy Spencer And Richard Lindzen
Dr. Dessler's paper is available here: http://geotest.tamu.edu/userfiles/216/Dessler2011.pdf The link at the top of this page is obsolete. -
dana1981 at 04:54 AM on 21 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
Note the authors say"Calibration/verification with instrumental data is temporally robust and no evidence for divergence was noted."
So it does seem that the divergence problem simply isn't an issue with their MXD analysis, not that they made a specific effort to remove the divergence. -
dana1981 at 04:50 AM on 21 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
Wheels OC -"it seems like the [divergence] problem simply didn't occur in their analysis, not that they've come up with a methodology that removes it.
I believe that's correct, but I'm far from a dendrochronology expert. -
dana1981 at 04:48 AM on 21 July 2012Vision Prize Results
Note by the way that Anthony Watts has enlisted his minions to ruin the second round of the Vision Prize. Ironically, the second round is about the Arctic sea ice decline, which is a subject on which WUWT reader predictions have an absolutely abysmal record. -
WheelsOC at 04:21 AM on 21 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
Seems I was a little slow in posting! -
WheelsOC at 04:21 AM on 21 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
The apparent resolution of the Divergence Problem is what interests me about the study, but either I'm denser than the maximum latewood measurements or the solution wasn't discussed here or at RC. From what I could glean in the comments there, it seems like the problem simply didn't occur in their analysis, not that they've come up with a methodology that removes it. -
dana1981 at 04:20 AM on 21 July 2012Vision Prize Results
We do try to update the myths database with information from new blog posts, when relevant. When we do so we usually add a note to the bottom of the blog post noting that we've updated the myth rebuttal. -
dana1981 at 04:19 AM on 21 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
It's just a result of their MXD reconstruction that it matches instrumental temperatures well, Martin. If you want a more technical answer, that's beyond my paygrade :-) -
Hyperactive Hydrologist at 04:17 AM on 21 July 2012The Mid-Wales floods of June 2012: a taste of things to come?
Housing in flood risk areas should be insured by the government. This would ensure new developments are built outside flood risk zones and existing at risk properties are given adequate protection. Unfortunately flooding soon drops off the political radar. This was demonstrated recently by the big cuts to the Environment Agency budget of nearly 30% despite numerous reports stating spending need to increase every year just to maintain the existing level of protection. The design process is also lacking. I work as a surface water and drainage modeller and we are only required to protect properties against a 1in40 year rainfall event. The design storms we use are based on the Flood Evaluation Handbook, which only uses data up to 2000 I believe. Climate Change is not factored into the design process. Hard engineering options, such as up sizing of pipe or large storage tanks, are preferred to sustainable options for maintainence reason. Responsibility is also an issue. Currently the EA is responsible for river flooding and the water companies are responsible for urban drains. Things like culverted water course and engineered open channels in urban regions seemed to be a bit of a grey area. What is needed is an integrated approach with complete stakeholder participation ideally on the catchment scale. Things are starting to head in this direction with councils being given the overall management role. However tight council budgets have meant that flooding is not seen as a priority. -
Trent1492 at 04:11 AM on 21 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
Just donated $50.00. I am sorry that this is a necessity but, I gladly contribute -
Martin at 04:05 AM on 21 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
Could you explain how exactly they resolved the divergence problem? -
threadShredder at 03:50 AM on 21 July 2012Vision Prize Results
Yes, dana, that one. I think it would be very helpful to new folks for post writers to incorporate as many new posts as possible into the myths, according to appropriateness, of course. That is, if the writers of the new posts are aware of the totality of the myths topics, which I assume most are. Just providing links in the myth pages can help tie in new stuff to the myth topics, and give new folks like myself more continuity (if that makes any sense). -
Chris G at 01:49 AM on 21 July 2012The Mid-Wales floods of June 2012: a taste of things to come?
Nice post, John. It is a natural counterpart to Rob's post on the US Midwest, but I'm stating the obvious. I'm baking here in Kansas, and have reduced my gardening efforts to simply trying to keep the rhubarb and asparagus alive. The current drought and heat here have made climate change more topical in the local paper, and I have come across comments to the effect that you guys are getting a lot of rain; therefore, it is just natural weather variability. I try to point out that less precipitation in some areas, and more precipitation in others is a long-standing prediction. Hence, the term 'climate change'. There is always debate about whether or not any event in particular is a result of climate change. I'm not sure what the alternate hypothesis is; that you can significantly change the energy balance of the planet without affecting weather? Side note: My father is an ex-Brit and he went to university in Wales. Cheers -
dana1981 at 01:48 AM on 21 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
Sceptical Wombat - that gets to another inconvenient fact about the MWP. It wasn't simultaneously global. In various geographic locations there were 'MWP' peaks at different times. China wasn't hot at the same time as northern Europe, for example. Some areas were relatively hot from 900-1000, others from 1000-1100, and so forth. -
Robert Murphy at 21:28 PM on 20 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
Sceptical Wombat @3: "I know that the MWP is a very slippery beast but I thought it was supposed to run from about 900 to 1300. The period of high temperatures in Fig 1 appears to be much earlier than this." Not only that, the LIA is gone in their graph, at least the LIA we're used to. Their LIA ends a little after 1500, then temps are mostly stable until the 19th century. I'm sure there's a lot of useful information in these new proxies, but they have to be integrated with many other regional studies in order to understand what was going on at a hemispheric level, let alone a global one. -
John Mason at 18:15 PM on 20 July 2012The Mid-Wales floods of June 2012: a taste of things to come?
PS should explain that in the UK it is almost impossible to get a mortgage on a building that they won't cover against flooding. Hence this could become a big problem over the coming years. -
John Mason at 18:13 PM on 20 July 2012The Mid-Wales floods of June 2012: a taste of things to come?
Thanks, Neven! I regard sea-level rise as a slower threat - and much of Wales is of high enough elevation that the overall shape of the country will be little changed if all the polar caps went - but the downside is the loss of much fertile growing land. Shoyemore - interesing point WRT flood insurance. There are some properties I know of locally that have flooded in recent years and one has been on the market three years with no takers - I suspect it's because nobody will insure the place any more. The house in question is hundreds of years old.... -
shoyemore at 18:00 PM on 20 July 2012The Mid-Wales floods of June 2012: a taste of things to come?
In Ireland we have similar concerns to Wales. There have been a couple of unprecedented flooding episodes in the last couple of years. Some areas of Cork city have been flooded twice and insurance rates are coming under pressure. This year, the Irish Met Office raised the average temperature used in their forecasts by 0.5C, and also precipitation expectations (while of course saying "this may be due to natural variation, not climate change"). Though local councils were supposed to take account of climate change for 10 years or so, many new housing estates were built on flood plains during the housing "boom". As a personal anecdote, the nice leafy housing estate where I live and the adjacent one are divided by a small stream which runs down a culvert. While it seems insignificant, the local council did a study which showed that a 1-in-100 year flood could overtop the culvert and inundate about 1/3 of our estate and 2/3 of the adjacent one. Flood walls upstream are projected, but some downstream estates are worse affected, and they may get precedence in the work. It would all cost a few million euros, but our situation is multiplied by many around the country. Money has been set aside by central government, but inevitably there will be winners and losers. While my house would not be affected by a flood (by sheer luck, we bought a house on higher ground), it will no doubt cost people in insurance, and possibly render tham homeless after a flood. Just one way climate change will impact ordinary people as "1-in-100 year" floods become more common. -
Tristan at 17:22 PM on 20 July 2012Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data
So...are we the xenomorphs? -
Sceptical Wombat at 17:02 PM on 20 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
I know that the MWP is a very slippery beast but I thought it was supposed to run from about 900 to 1300. The period of high temperatures in Fig 1 appears to be much earlier than this. -
dana1981 at 14:32 PM on 20 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
Generally true Composer. The climate contrarian spin from the paper was "Roman and Medieval times were as warm as present", which aside from being rather irrelevant (as discussed in the post), is not something this paper is capable of showing, except for temps specifically in northern Scandanavia. -
Composer99 at 12:52 PM on 20 July 2012Esper Millennial Cooling in Context
As far as I can tell, the Earth has been cooling slowly since the end of the Holocene climatic optimum, with some ups and downs along the way... until the Industrial Revolution. This paper does not seem to alter this impression in any meaningful way. -
TS.Davis at 11:29 AM on 20 July 2012The Debunking Handbook: now freely available for download
oh yes, Thank You! -
TS.Davis at 11:29 AM on 20 July 2012The Debunking Handbook: now freely available for download
Need a Spanish translator? My wife is a psychology student but previously translated to judges in court. Her English and Spanish are superb. -
Daniel Bailey at 10:38 AM on 20 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
Gee, wonder if I can get the CSLD Fund to comp me for my time lost on this thread? (after all, time is money) It is transparently obvious, the inherently fact-impoverished position of denial. Witness the arduous contortions evident in this thread alone needed to both manufacture debate where none exists and to then resuscitate an argument that was dead before it arrived (DBA). -
Daniel Bailey at 10:31 AM on 20 July 2012Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data
So Chip says:"Correct – the satellite-based, balloon-based, and thermometer-based global temperature records show no warming whatsoever over the past decade. Claims that the Earth’s temperature is rising at an unprecedented rate are clearly false – nothing could be further from reality."
Hmmm, he needs to get his pal Michaels back on the agenda-train. Cue Michaels in 3, 2, 1...:"You've all seen articles say that global warming stopped in 1998. Well, with all due respect, that's being a little bit unfair to the data...it was a huge El Niño year, and the sun was very active in 1998...make an argument that you can get killed on, and you will kill us [skeptics] all..if you lose credibility on this issue, you lose the issue."
-Patrick Michaels, 6 September 2009 [Source] You heard rightly, folks. Michaels is calling Game-Over on his pal Chip. -
skywatcher at 10:07 AM on 20 July 2012Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data
A brief example of Knappenberger vs Knappenberger from KR's DC link. First:"Correct – the satellite-based, balloon-based, and thermometer-based global temperature records show no warming whatsoever over the past decade. Claims that the Earth’s temperature is rising at an unprecedented rate are clearly false – nothing could be further from reality."
And Chip's comment a little later..."For some reason, most folks in this thread seem to think that I don’t think the world has been, is, and will continue to warm. I am not sure where this notion comes from."
Maybe the notion comes from your published words, Chip. "The world is warming"; "no warming whatsoever". Which is it? The whole purpose of Easterling and Wehner's 2009 GRL article was to falsify claims such as the second sentence of the first statement by Michaels and Knappenberger above. Claims that the Earth’s temperature is rising at an unprecedented rate ... are entirely true! The 2000s do not contradict that, they actually support it strongly! See Tamino's excellent recent post - the 2000s actually lead to an increase in the overall warming trend, when added to the trends from 1980-2000. The 1980-2000 trend is smaller than the 1980-2011 trend! It doesn't give you much confidence in Michaels and Knappenberger's ability to summarise or interpret material published by other authors, as exemplified in the OP. -
Andy Skuce at 07:36 AM on 20 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
To return to the original subject of the post, here is another article on ATI's latest FOIshing trip, in Texas. Climate science attack group turns sights on Texas professors Andrew Dessler is the target, Katharine Hayhoe was hit last year. I note the irony that ATI is a "charitable" organisation, allowing their funders a tax break so that they can squander taxpayers' money by wasting the time of climate scientists, by forcing them to comply with vexatious FOI requests. In the article, Climate Science Legal Defense Fund attorney Jeff Ruch is quoted as saying: "Before they were going after interactions between individual scientists. This is basically a spying operation to see who are you talking to, but presumably the idea is the same: to find material that is potential[ly] of use in discrediting a scientist." -
Tom Curtis at 07:30 AM on 20 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
dubious @190, I am growing tired of this endless discussion of a trivial issue. When I say trivial, I think it is absolutely absurd that McIntyre made a blog post on the issue, and even more so that having done so he got every fact of legal interpretation wrong. But, given that it is so tiresome, I will be dropping out of any further discussion of the issue, after making one point. You said,"Effectively, there is nothing that McIntyre could have said to Dr Karoly which would not fall into that definition. "I think you're wrong" would be a "threat of legal action" on that definition. "Please tell me where I have promulgated misinformation" would pass the same test. "I would be grateful if you would support your allegation" would also pass the test. There would be almost no step McIntyre could have taken, if he believed Dr Karoly had been unprofessional in posting an inaccurate review, which would not have passed Tom Curtis' test for being a "threat of legal action". Similarly any contact with Dr Karoly asking that he meet basic norms of professional behaviour to withdraw an inaccurate allegation and apologise would have passed Dr Karoly's definition ("a request to the author of the material, requesting that they withdraw it and apologise"). Almost the only way of NOT meeting Dr Karoly's definition would have been to not contact him at all."
That claim is simply absurd. All that McIntyre needed to do so that the letter did not have the form of a concerns notice under Australian law was to drop the phrase "defamatory". By excluding that word, the letter no longer makes a claim of defamation and therefore no-longer clearly presents claims of defamation. Further, McIntyre's claim that his only intention was to persuade Karoly to "behave as a professional" is dubious. A professional, and certainly a scholar is concerned to b truthful. Simply alleging that Karoly's claims where untruthful would have been sufficient if McIntyre's purpose had only been to persuade Karoly to desist from allegedly unprofessional conduct. Given that, the only point in including the term "defamatory" would appear to be to make Karoly (at a minimu) reflect on his legal situation - and if that was the intent it was definitely an implicit threat. On McIntyre's say-so I will accept that his letter was poorly drafted for his stated intent. But as drafted, it was legally a "concerns notice" and as such represented a threat of legal action. -
Neven at 07:03 AM on 20 July 2012The Mid-Wales floods of June 2012: a taste of things to come?
Great post, John. My wife and I considered moving to Wales about a year ago, but I feared that big ocean west of Wales and what climate change might make it do. So we're still living south of the heart of Europe, where I fear the Mediterranean drought. ;-) I wink, but it's serious. -
JohnMashey at 06:31 AM on 20 July 2012Climate change denial and the abuse of peer review
Since Wegman is back in the news, here and here: a) Plagiarism was the simplest problem. b) But only a few pages of the 91-page Wegman Report avoided problems. The science was often wrong and even the statistics was wrong c) And then there was the misrepresentation, where they plagiarized Bradley, but changed conclusions they didn't like. -
dana1981 at 06:23 AM on 20 July 2012Vision Prize Results
You mean the 'no consensus' myth, threadShredder? I was actually thinking about that this morning. I'll try to remember to update it this weekend. -
John Mason at 05:36 AM on 20 July 2012The Mid-Wales floods of June 2012: a taste of things to come?
Indeed, Gareth. Some respite though is on the cards as things have finally stirred into motion: high pressure moves east over us this weekend and following a few unsettled days early next week it reloads from the west. I can hear the sound of a thousand fishing-rods being dusted - but will the mackerel still be around? It has been a difficult summer in the garden: today I harvested the shallots before they rotted in the ground and in 95% of cases all foliage was died-off to ground-level. Many small ones, but I'll replant them next March for green onions late April through to July. But it just makes me wonder how I should plan for coming years, as a grower. I never realised that resilience-thinking was needed in grow-yer-own, but it seems that it is! -
threadShredder at 03:19 AM on 20 July 2012Vision Prize Results
You should update the myth on this topic with the results of this study. -
Bernard J. at 02:47 AM on 20 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
So I asked four colleagues to parse McIntyre's letter and tell me if they thought it was a threat of legal action. Based on:"It has come to my attention that you have made the following untrue and defamatory statement about me..." "...the failure of these panels to explicitly identify errors speaks strongly against your allegation of promulgating “misinformation”." "I request that you either provide me forthwith with specific examples of the “misinformation” that you allege that I’ve promulgated or withdraw the allegation with an apology."
three of them said that they would take it as a threat, or at least forward it to Legal. The last one, who had familiarity with McIntyre, said he doubted that McIntyre would "have the balls" (because it would initiate 'official' scrutiny of McIntyre's errors), but if it had been someone else he would have asked for Legal's opinion. That aside, I find the subsequent paragraph:It is evident that the error had not been discovered by the authors or by peer reviewers at the time that Climate Audit raised the issue of screening procedure in Gergis et al on May 31, 2012 here, a discussion that quickly identified the error. I do not believe that you identified the error independently of the discussion at Climate Audit and accordingly it is my opinion that your failure to acknowledge Climate Audit in your public statement constitutes the use of ideas and/or work derived from Climate Audit without the appropriate acknowledgement.
as an extraordinary example of hubris. Not only does McIntyre have no evidence to support his allegation, but he somehow turns the use of Karoly's own data into an act of plagiarism by Karoly. My colleague's opinion of McIntyre's legal bravado might be dim, but it takes some big ones to demand that he be credited when someone else has simply scrutinised their own work. Oh, and anyone who relies on the Wegman Report, so ably mascerated by John Mashey and Deep Climate, as a defense of competence needs to start doing some serious reading.Moderator Response: [Albatross] Bernard J we cross posted, so I have to give your reference to Gergis et al. a pass. Everyone, please move any responses to BernardJ's comments about Gergis et al. to the suggested thread. As for Wegman, that discussion can be carried out here. -
John Hartz at 02:43 AM on 20 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
Phillipe: I completely agree with your assessment. Thank you for posting it. -
Philippe Chantreau at 02:31 AM on 20 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
This thread has effectively been hijacked and degenerated into a "look, squirrel" type of distraction. It is unfortunately typical, and indicative of the difficulty of conducting any kind of useful debate when faced with certain methods. Whether or not Karoly or McIntyre said this or that, the reality is that scientists in a given field are under such pressure that CSLDF became necessary. I find it regrettable that there are multiple threads active right now with vastly more interesting stuff than this, yet this ends up being the most active. McIntyre is quite good at using language. His website is full of half veiled allegations, innuendo and so forth. That's the recent stuff. A few years ago, the messages were much crude and clear. Commenters at his site have had no problem attributing the worst of motives to scientists whose work they hardly understand. Meanwhile, humans are being a geological force of unprecedented speed, unearthing -in a century and a half- billions of tons of carbon that took millions of years to sequester. And this is what we talk about. Truly concerning. -
dubious at 02:23 AM on 20 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
I should add that there is a marked difference between McIntyre's behaviour, when he finds something he posted is inaccurate, and many people here. As soon as McIntyre heard the suggestion that the book review had been moved behind a paywall, he posted that news (giving full credit to Dr Karoly for the new information). When people later doubted that it had in fact been moved behind a paywall, he confirmed it had, posting "the article is presently in the $6 current issue." How many people here have corrected their posts suggesting that Dr Karoly took the article down on the advice of his lawyers? Tom Curtis posted earlier "the more reasonable inference is that Karoly was instructed to take them down because his universities (sic) legal department did not want the expense of defending them." doug_bostrom posted the more cautious: "Karoly may have asked ATR (sic) to remove the piece, or ATR (sic) itself found the comments generated by the piece to be a distracting waste of time to moderate. I see from the archived copy that the article had already attracted some ire; perhaps ATR (sic) didn't like the noise it encountered. "Point is, we don't know what happened. It would be helpful if we did but in the meantime let's not make the mistake of substituting with our imaginations what actually happened." McIntyre corrected himself immediately. In contrast Dr Karoly has left it completely open and mysterious what role McIntyre's ClimateAudit blog played in uncovering the errors which led to the withdrawal of the Gergis article. Would Dr Karoly like to shed light on that?Moderator Response: [Albatross] I am now removing myself from this thread to moderate. As Philippe noted, this three dis being driven off topic. And the attempt by dubious to further debate Gergis when it is not even mentioned in the OP is part of that problem. So while McIntyre's original posts did contain factual errors that needed to be corrected, there is nothing concerning Karoly or Gergis et al. that news to be corrected in this OP. Everyone, please post comments on this thread. Any subsequent posts containing discussion of, or speculation about Gergis et al., or attempts to divert attention away from the main post will be deleted. Thank you. -
dubious at 02:05 AM on 20 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
Daniel Bailey @184: I really don't think I was "distort(ing) his expression of his opinion" given that: 1) his words were just 4 comments up and 2) I quoted the strongest part of what he actually said - the part which came closest to supporting his "threat of legal action" claim. Let's look at what people have actually said here. Tom Curtis @185 asks: "Was it reasonable for Karoly, who did not know McIntyre's intentions, to conclude that the probability of his being sued by McIntyre was greater given that he had received the letter than the probability of his being sued if he had not received the letter?" and argues: "even though it did not threaten legal action (ie, contain the words, 'and if you do not comply I will sue' or the equivalent)." it was (reasonable to conclude the probability was greater) and "ergo" that "it was not a false claim" (that this was a "threat of legal action"). While I'm sure Dr Karoly appreciates Tom Curtis's support, I doubt that even he actually believes that line of argument. Effectively, there is nothing that McIntyre could have said to Dr Karoly which would not fall into that definition. "I think you're wrong" would be a "threat of legal action" on that definition. "Please tell me where I have promulgated misinformation" would pass the same test. "I would be grateful if you would support your allegation" would also pass the test. There would be almost no step McIntyre could have taken, if he believed Dr Karoly had been unprofessional in posting an inaccurate review, which would not have passed Tom Curtis' test for being a "threat of legal action". Similarly any contact with Dr Karoly asking that he meet basic norms of professional behaviour to withdraw an inaccurate allegation and apologise would have passed Dr Karoly's definition ("a request to the author of the material, requesting that they withdraw it and apologise"). Almost the only way of NOT meeting Dr Karoly's definition would have been to not contact him at all. Or to go back to an alternative to the example I suggested earlier. Suppose your landlord tells you that he is not renewing your lease. Suppose a "first part of a legal action" to evict you from the house you rent is to tell you that the landlord does not want to renew the lease. The landlord doesn't quote any aspect of tenancy law, or refer to lawyers, or the law at all, or consequences if you refuse to vacate the property. There is no threat. There is simply the statement of fact, that the landlord does not want to renew the lease. I don't consider that it would be reasonable to say "I've just received a threat of legal action" even though that is a likely consequence of failing to leave the house. I would consider it an exaggeration to say "I've had a threat of legal action" or even "I've had a threat of eviction" because - quite evidently - there has been no threat. As I said, even Dr Karoly cannot bring himself (and I think most/all the commenters here) cannot bring themselves to actually repeat the claim (and it is to their credit that they can't) that Dr Karoly had "just received a threat of legal action". -
Alexandre at 01:13 AM on 20 July 2012Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming - Revised
Ok, in that discussion I mentioned on my comment #119 I replaced this assertion: "Troposphere is warming while stratosphere is cooling. This too is consistent only with an enhanced greenhouse efect" by this: "The vertical profile of the atmospheric warming is consistent with the human-enhanced greenhouse effect." It seems to be more accurate in light of Tom's explanation. I still have the nagging feeling that that would deserve a correction in the Guide (maybe in a future updated version?). As one of the translators, I'm very proud of it and I'd like it to be spotless. -
KR at 23:25 PM on 19 July 2012Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data
More of Michaels and Knappenberger's work, in this case textual rather than with graphs: Deep Climate has a review of their "appropriate and on the mark" (???) coverage of Easterling and Wehner, 2009 and Solomon et al 2010, with Michaels and Knappenberger claiming they were mainstream climate science indicating "no warming whatsoever over the past decade". The Michaels and Knappenberger articles were shown to be seriously cherry-picked and quote-mined, taking text out of context to remove critical conclusions from those works. This included not quoting statements that decadal trends were just not statistically significant (see The Escalator). This is not "...disagree(ment) as to what the main message was that the authors conveyed in their papers", it is distortion and misrepresentation. In my opinion, this is an ongoing pattern - paper after paper, time and again, cherry-picked, quote mined, and graphically edited to remove conclusions that contradict Michaels and Knappenbergers talking points. Actions that (again, IMO) goes well beyond the usual realm of a "advocacy science consulting firm", as Michaels and Knappenbergers group describes itself, to behaviors that I would find difficult to properly describe within the SkS comments policy... -
garethman at 19:46 PM on 19 July 2012The Mid-Wales floods of June 2012: a taste of things to come?
Great post. It does not make life much better living on Ynys Mon where we are starting to feel like a worn out sponge, but at least we know the dynamics behinds this awful weather, and it underlines the issue that climate change is not all about heat waves and drought. -
Dikran Marsupial at 19:44 PM on 19 July 2012New research special - methane papers 2010-2011
@pauls sorry, hope Mike finds the caveat worthwhile then! -
pauls at 19:12 PM on 19 July 2012New research special - methane papers 2010-2011
Dikran Marsupial - I was responding to Mike and his question about US methane emissions. -
Doug Bostrom at 16:49 PM on 19 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
tlitb1: I would offer to modify [thread evolution metaphor] to a quantum wave function collapse. The wave functions’ existence could appear more important than any disappointing single reality it may collapse to once observed ;) Hah! That's great, much more fun and usefully descriptive than a sagging balloon! -
tlitb1 at 15:27 PM on 19 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
doug_bostrom at 18:09 PM on 18 July, 2012 I have taken your advice and posted a query at the CSDLF contacts page along the lines suggesting that they should update their page with more up to date information about their current work and inform us about supported scientists other than Michael Mann. My curiosity about the status of a fund for supporting victims is based on my feeling that the funds other unintended effect could outweigh its primary overt purposes i.e. could the fund’s actual existence reach a stage where it outweighs it actual current usefulness? Once you realise this as a possibility (and I think it is possible for all such bodies) then I think it is fair to ask about its continuing status, and suggesting that making it clear that it is working for more than one single person on one issue is a start towards that. The appearance of a dynamic functioning entity involved in continuing work means, like a shark, it is moving and keeping itself alive. The hyper fine debate over whether David Karoly really thought he was about to be legally victimised being run in parallel on this page makes me think that the appearance of being threatened can sometimes be more important than the actuality. Doug Bostrom has used the metaphor of a balloon inflating, deflating and reflating to track this saga; I would offer to modify it to a quantum wave function collapse. The wave functions’ existence could appear more important than any disappointing single reality it may collapse to once observed ;) -
Doug Bostrom at 12:19 PM on 19 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
Unfortunately we're still missing a little bit of information, causing us to begin vigorously attempting to reinflate the squashed balloon of conjecture left us after David's visit. Did David take advice from a lawyer? I'll add a couple of strokes to the speculation pump and say that his description leaves me thinking he didn't just guess or use wiki.answers to assess the situation. Maybe we'll actually learn what happened, again? I must say ABR's migration of the review behind a paywall because of high traffic left me both surprised and amused. I'd never have guessed that was the answer; hats off to value-add by the McIntyre groupies! Equally humorous was the long delay on this thread of comments before that matter was cleared up, long enough for some folks to go way out on a limb, too far in some cases. -
Tom Curtis at 10:50 AM on 19 July 2012What is the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund?
dubious @183, there are two questions you need to ask. 1) Did McIntyre intend to commence legal action against Karoly if Karoly did not comply with his requests? 2) Was it reasonable for Karoly, who did not know McIntyre's intentions, to conclude that the probability of his being sued by McIntyre was greater given that he had received the letter than the probability of his being sued if he had not received the letter? On McIntyre's say so, the answer to (1) is no. But given that the letter had the form of a legal document used as a prelude to suing, the answer to (2) is clearly yes. Therefore the letter constituted a threat of legal action (ie, the answer to two was yes) even though it did not threaten legal action (ie, contain the words, " and if you do not comply I will sue" or the equivalent). The key point is that the claim in Karoly's first comment would have been true if the answer to either (1) or (2) was true. Ergo it was not a false claim. This is a very simple point that everybody gets when it is not inconvenient for them to do so. If I say that, " Were I on the beach, a tidal wave would be a threat to my safety" neither you nor McIntyre would argue that my sentence was false because tidal waves don't have intentions, and besides which the tidal wave has never communicated any intention to drown me. You would understand immediately what was said, because it is plain English. It follows further that you understand perfectly if I say that undersea earthquakes just off shore constitute a threat to the safety of people on the shore. In other words, they are a threat to safety, even if (as is normally the case) a tidal wave does not eventuate. In the exact same sense, the claim that Karoly "... received a threat of legal action" was true. If he had said, instead that McIntyre had threatened him with legal action, his claim would have been false. As it stands, however, it is not. Finally, as to not repeating the statement - repeating the true but minimally informative information in the original statement when Karoly had far more explicit information that McIntyre had no intention to sue would have been deceptive.
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