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Comments 110751 to 110800:

  1. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    #1 Moderator Response Graham Much of your article is about data quality. The long Trenberth quote is essentially an attack on the ARGO data quality. You even state "Now call me picky if you like, but if there’s a lot of discussion about the accuracy of the data, the methods of analysing it, and what it all means, then surely it would be more prudent to make clear the uncertainty". Is this questioning the data quality? I'm not moving the debate anywhere, I'm directly responding to what you say. You want to focus on the 2004-2009 period, I see that, but that particular argument interests me less than Dr Pielke's main argument which is can an accurate OHC data set tell us more about the climate. I'm interested in whether as Dr Pielke's states this metric is more definitive than say atmospheric temperature in accessing global warming. whether OHC can, without lag or much temporal variability, give us relatively quick answers on the build up of energy in the system and radiative forcing. and also whether the measuring system is robust enough. These are constructive comments on the part of Dr Pielke's, absolutely is the spirit of discovery rather than mythbuilding. You should try taking him at face value and move on from the short term trends to look at the bigger picture. 30.J Bowers My eyes see what your eyes see. What I also know is that a near global measure of OHC only came into being with the advent of ARGO and it's expansion around 2003/2004. Other ocean metrics are pointing to the fact that the SH and NH waters and different ocean basins don't seem to act in tandem. I'm prepared to look at data quality and long term trends with these in mind. This page from the ARGO website should give you an insight into what I'm talking about http://www.argo.ucsd.edu/Novel_argo.html
  2. How we know the sun isn't causing global warming
    omnologos - Although this is the advanced version, the influence of the sun on recent global warming is actually pretty straightforward: there is NO trend over the last 30 years in any of the known solar factors that might influence climate. Whether we're talking about total solar irradiance (the most direct), solar open flux and cosmic rays (different from UV), sunspots, or cycle length, there's simply no trend, whereas temperatures have shot up rather substantially and anomalously in such a short period. Temperature doesn't just change by itself - it has to be forced. There's still a lot to learn about how the solar influence is amplified by various feedbacks, although the response due to the solar cycle gives us some bounds to work with. Galactic cosmic rays are interesting to consider, but we know relatively little about their influence (especially compared to the vast amount of knowledge regarding greenhouse gas forcing). But again, our understanding of the details is pretty much trumped by the fact that nothing about the sun has changed during the most recent period of global warming. Lockwood and Frohlich (2007) sum it pretty well: "Our results show that the observed rapid rise in global mean temperatures seen after 1985 cannot be ascribed to solar variability, whichever of the mechanisms is invoked and no matter how much the solar variation is amplified." In other words, this isn't about our "low level of scientific understanding", it's just that the sun has to do something if we are to attribute recent warming to it. It hasn't. -Alden
  3. A detailed look at climate sensitivity
    If the actual humidity in our atmosphere has gone down in real terms measured by radiosones and satilites by NOAA the discution about climate feedbacks of co2 being positive is over.You have to have higher humidity to trap more heat.Am I wrong....anyone?
  4. A detailed look at climate sensitivity
    I'm still puzzled by one group of scientists saying humidity in the atmosphere of our planet has trended down since 1958 and another group that says it has gone up with the rise in temperature.The downward trend was measured by NOAA.Am I missing something here....anyone?
  5. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Did anyone post that the Atmosphere was cooling at the same time that the oceans were cooling according to both the GISS and UAH satellite temperature readings. http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/from:2005/to:2009/plot/uah/from:2005/to:2009/trend So the heat isn't in the oceans and it isn't in the atmosphere, where did it go ? To the Lithosphere ? I doubt it. I agree with Dr Pielke that the heat cannot leave the system and return. It could go from atmosphere to ocean and back but it cannot leave if Global warming is happening. In fact since the atmosphere warming is so slight since 1995 the claim has been made that the positive feedback heat is somehow hiding in the oceans to cause rapid warming in the future. BTW: I object to the term "deniers" with it's obvious connotations without specifying exactly what is being denied. I do not deny it has warmed slightly. [for example]I do deny there is a catastrophe coming in the next 100 years.
  6. How we know the sun isn't causing global warming
    I love Pierrhumbert's concluding description! "Coffin with so many nails in it...". But the truly amazing thing about it is that so few realize that it already has all these nails. Perhaps the basic version will do something about that. And yes, 'omnologos' should change his moniker to 'amnologos', since yes, he really is missing a lot in the post. Just as the concluding description says: there are so many nails in it is is hard to know where to put a new one. Yet 'omnologos' missed them all, to come up with thei red herring about uncertainty concerning solar radiation.
  7. How we know the sun isn't causing global warming
    Unless I am misreading the above, this blog entry is of rather poor quality. For example, there is the glaring omission of "The Sun and the Earth’s Climate" by Joanna D. Haigh: Joanna D. Haigh, "The Sun and the Earth's Climate", Living Rev. Solar Phys. 4, (2007), 2. URL (cited on Sep 8, 2010): http://www.livingreviews.org/lrsp-2007-2 Dr Haig is well known in the field, and references to her work appear at least four times in AR4-WG1-Chapter2. Her last sentence? "Perhaps when these questions are answered we will be confident that we really understand how changes in the Sun affect the climate on Earth". Furthermore, and notably, AR4 classifies the “level of scientific understanding” for Solar Irradiance is “Low”, and for the component linked to cosmic UV rays as “Very low”. It then proceeds to mark the solar forcing estimate as "moderately confident". All these nuances appear nowhere in dana1981's text. Given also that in the first section of the blog entry above there is no mention of scientific articles published after the publication of AR4, its conclusions appear to be unwarranted.
  8. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Tom #54 And of course you can demonstrate the degree of uncertainty of the ocean heat measurement statistically by using resampling statistics and/or central limit theory. It's around this point that many people with engineering backgrounds whose education does not prepare them well for assessing uncertainty start to get the heebeejeebies, which is one reason why we see so many so called sceptics with mining or other engineering backgrounds.
  9. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke: "Moreover, if global annual average cooling occurs, such as from a major volcanic eruption, the global warming "clock" is reset regardless of the long term trend." I suspect I'm not the only person who'd appreciate an elaboration of that remark. Are you speaking of surface temperature? Does that mean if we're confronted w/a record of many years and showing a 5:1 proportion of years with increases versus decreases in temperature we can conclude nothing about a trend in temperature? Each year with a downturn means we start fresh, as though we had no data?
  10. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Roger Pielke Sr wrote "There does not need to be years of record to obtain statistically significant measures of upper ocean heat content. This is the point of using heat. We just need time slices with sufficient spatial data. A trend is unnecessary." That's an, um, well, extraordinary statement. Because it is amazingly wrong. What is of interest is the "population" of upper ocean heat content--the "true" heat content of the upper ocean in an entire year. Each measurement by each buoy or other device is merely a sample from that population. Even the mean of all those samples has less than a 100% chance of being identical to the population's value. Increasing the spatial sampling reduces but does not eliminate the uncertainty about the spatial population, and does nothing to improve the sampling of the populations of time and other conditions. Each of two years' sample means has less than a 100% chance of being identical to its year's population value. The difference between two years' sample means has less than a 100% chance of being identical to the difference between those two population means. The difference between two years' means is a "trend," so Pielke's statement that "a trend is unnecessary" is nonsensical. How do we estimate the probability of that two-year sample difference being representative of the populations' differences? We use inferential statistical methods that Pielke says are unnecessary. Given the sparsity of our sampling of the entire freakin' ocean, we also need to increase the sampling across time, by looking at the sample trend across more than just a few years.
  11. Is Arctic Sea Ice 'Just Fine'?
    chriscanaris: Re: Do we have proxies for ice sheet extent predating this period [1870]? There are multiple ways to look for arctic climate information besides the satellite record for arctic ice and thermometer readings. Try these: There are multiple peer reviewed papers that use Canadian lake sediment cores that have temperature indicators going back 200,000 years (that is longer than the Greenland ice cores). These are particularly instructive as they indicate a cooling trend for year 1 up until 1950 (which is what you would expect due to orbit inclination) after which there is a warming trend (even though orbit inclination would generate continued cooling). Just google "canada arctic lake sediment temperature" and check out what pops up. These are good because they are based on multiple locations by multiple scientists The cores also include temperature information related to LIA and MWP if this interests you. One look at the satellite photos of the islands of the Canadian archipelago will tell you why there are no tree ring studies - no trees. There are also some arctic ocean sediment cores. Just google "arctic ocean sediment cores" and see what you find. Another indicator is studies of decreasing ice volume of the ice caps in the Canadian archipelago, such as the Devon Ice Cap. Try google "canadian archipelago ice cap shrinking" or check out the canadian ice caps one by one. Also google "ellesmere island ice shelf" and take a look before they all disappear. This one is pretty scary, so if you would rather believe that nothing is happening, don't look at this topic. Check out the estimates of how long the ice shelves have been around before they broke off - hint several thousand years. The ice cores from Greenland have temperature information and these include LIA and MWP information. I would not get too hung up on LIA and MWP as these can be caused by factors that are not relevant to the current situation. The key is to determine what caused these fluctuations (it wasn't magic, must be physics). Check out the limited explanations and lack of support for the explanations offered for these events and ask yourself if they have proved what caused these events or have they merely offered up a logical explanation based on a single factor. Also ask what it is about these periods that are relevant to the current situation. To be relevant, you would need to show precisely what caused the original event and whether similar conditions are operating today. The mere existence of these prior events proves nothing. Yes there is natural variability, so what does that prove?
  12. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke, I have just re-read what you wrote earlier: "There does not need to be years of record to obtain statistically significant measures of upper ocean heat content. This is the point of using heat. We just need time slices with sufficient spatial data. A trend is unnecessary, and indeed can be misleading when the signal is substantially nonlinear." I think we need to be very clear, you made a statement concerning the change of OHC as a function of time or over a (very short) time interval, but time nonetheless. What you say above is true for a given point in time, but you are categorically saying that based on those few data points that global warming has "halted". I fail to see how the problems with that statement continue to elude you. Just like any other metric OHC is quite a noisy signal, displaying marked inter-annual variability, and is no different than the global SAT record in that regard. If one wishes to determine whether or not the there is a sustained and statistically significant signal in a noisy dataset then one requires a large number of data points. We are not talking about extrapolating beyond the training data for the OLS model fit to the data here. Yes, of course, that can be misleading, but anyone who knows their stats knows not to apply the regression beyond the limits/range of the training data. Also, note that between 2003 and 2008 the OLS model clearly fits von Shuckmann's data very well.... If there are any statisticians reading this please feel free to chime in.
  13. A detailed look at climate sensitivity
    Whoops, this is the climate sensitivity article. In which case I suggest that eric re-read it.
  14. A detailed look at climate sensitivity
    On that note from scaddenp, I refer eric to my climate sensitivity article.
  15. What do you get when you put a climate scientist and 52 skeptics in a room?
    I thought that the woman who said that she was convinced by the bathtub analogy was really saying (subtly) that she thought that Schneider was clearly the more reasonable one in the exchange with the GP who was aggressively accusing him of avoiding the question. In other words, the GP did not make his own side look good with his rudeness. By remaining calm under such provocation, Schneider looked a lot better and that impressed her. (I could be wrong).
  16. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke, As for your beliefs on statistically significant trends in data, I think statisticians would err on my and others' understanding. You had better inform Lyman, von Shuckmann, Trenberth, and others to remove those trend lines then. As for your questions and references to GISS (yes, the traces over a short time window diverge, got it), this is not a test, and it is clearl that you are trying to move the goal posts and detract from the main issue here-- you making misleading statement in public on OHC (and sea level and Arctic ice, and SAT if you still support the CATO letter). Interesting, you are now saying @ 48 that: "this clearly shows the lack of substantial warming since 2004" That is most definitely not the same as saying: "This means that global warming halted on this time period." I can support the former statement made @48, not the latter for the reasons that I and other shave discussed ad nauseum. If you now believe the former is correct, please correct the record both on your blog and at WUWT, with the caveat that it is a short time interval and does not preclude an acceleration in warming in the future. Thank you.
  17. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke, I did not paraphrase, I used quotation marks to cite verbatim what you stated in the paper. You support hypothesis 2a. On a related note, since you brought up the EOS paper, did you not openly support this petition from CATO? http://www.cato.org/special/climatechange/cato_climate.pdf Well, at least that is what your friend Anthony Watts claims here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/31/dr-roger-pielke-senior-support-for-cato-letter-and-advertisement/ In the petition they state: "Surface temperature changes over the past century have been episodic and modest and there has been no net global warming for over a decade now." That was in November 2008. Do you still support that assertion?
  18. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    I am a layman and claim absolutely no scientific expertise in these matters. That being said, I have to say that this thread of discussion has been almost enjoyable from the standpoint that there seems to be some actual 'dialogue' happening amongst some of the brightest and most respected scientists on this matter. Keeping it respectful is truly helpful. More importantly, in my opinion, is the fact that different views are being expressed and bantered about. This is what I feel is missing in the entire discussion around global warming and the many aspects of it. I feel that I must add a bit of "advice" to Dr. Pielke about the use of quotes attributed to him (whether intended or not on his part); most of which appear to be directly quoted. I honor your knowledge and your expertise greatly and I truly believe you have the best intentions in your comments. However, when other people of substantially less reputable nature and with extreme ideas and purposes take your comments and use them falsely, I feel it is then your responsibility to publicly critique and deny the usage of your comments. This I feel you have not done and I have no way of knowing why. This does not mean that you deserve to be treated disrespectfully. But as my father used to say, when you lay with pigs you surely will get dirty. I feel you should avoid your association with certain extreme anti-global warming skeptics and fanatics and publicly claim that global warming is occuring and that you many other respected scientists are working on answers to the cause and any possible solutions. Until then, if I were you, I would be prepared to suffer some name calling and grow a much thicker layer of skin. With all due respect....
  19. Roger A Pielke Sr at 08:00 AM on 9 September 2010
    Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Albatross - you write "You choose your hypothesis 2a which down plays the relative (is that better?) contribution/importance of long-lived GHGs on the climate system." We did not downplay anything. Your paraphrasing misstates what we wrote in our paper. We are elevating the other human climate forcings. In terms of CO2, we do not even need to discuss global warming to be concerned by uncontrolled increases in its atmospheric concentration. We see directly from observations of atmospheric concentrations of CO2 that humans are increasing its levels. If global warming were not occurring at all, we should still be concerned.
  20. Roger A Pielke Sr at 07:54 AM on 9 September 2010
    Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Albatross - There does not need to be years of record to obtain statistically significant measures of upper ocean heat content. This is the point of using heat. We just need time slices with sufficient spatial data. A trend is unnecessary, and indeed can be misleading when the signal is substantially nonlinear. Moreover, if global annual average cooling occurs, such as from a major volcanic eruption, the global warming "clock" is reset regardless of the long term trend. With respect to the Lyman 2010 data presented in the orginal post on this weblog, this clearly shows the lack of substantial warming since 2004. The Von Schuckmann figure also shows small warming since 2004 which is when the Argo data became sufficient to provide a good estimate of the heat content (that is why Willis provided me data starting in 2004). Lets accept the Von Schuckmann data since 2004. What do you obtain as the heating rate in Watts per meter squared and how does this compare with the GISS predictions? What do you expect will be the magnitude of warming in the upper ocean in Joules through mid-2010 when the data is updated this Fall?
  21. What do you get when you put a climate scientist and 52 skeptics in a room?
    Brilliant performance by Schneider.
  22. A detailed look at climate sensitivity
    Well eric, firstly I dont think you can have some local perturbations somehow messing an average. And would support that by noting the determinations of sensitivity from GCMs match rather well with estimates of sensitivity from empirical techniques such eruption response and LGM data.
  23. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    KL @ 14 - "I must admit that I was unimpressed by the story of the Willis 'Eureka' moment. Well, whatever your reaction may have been, I was intrigued by Willis & Lyman's ocean cooling paper, especially considering Willis' earlier work with Takmeng Wong. I particularly liked the quote “We let Josh know, diplomatically of course, that all signs were pointing toward his data,” says Wong. Kl @ - "Argo is not anywhere near a complete story for measuring OHC" Good to see you finally acknowledging that. No need to repeat that sorry saga with the MSU satellite data all over again. Kl @ - "but I would expect a helluva lot better than what preceded it (XBT etc). See my next post." Indeed, once all the teething problems are sorted out.
  24. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Re @44, Some good points. But in some cases the exact wording is critical, and it is not just a case of being pedantic. In a problem this importance one has to be very careful. And "skeptics" and those in denial about AGW have seized on Dr. Pielke's ill-thought out wording. That aside, the question of the amount of data required to obtain statistically sig. trends is unavoidable. I agree with what Riccardo said above @42. There are parts of the ocean (e.g., Labrador sea) where it is known that mixing occurs down to depths exceeding 2000 m. Trenberth wrote a piece in Nature in 2010 on this very OHC issue: http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/Trenberth/trenberth.papers/NatureNV10.pdf Please read it. If anyone on this planet wants to solve this riddle it is Trenberth. His track record on climate science is impeccable. So let us please not question his contributions to advancing climate science. If anything, IMHO, Dr. Pielke is distracting people (and scientists) from the pertinent issues by not choosing his words carefully and by making misleading comments. Scientists are well aware of the issues surrounding OHC and are working hard on it, regardless of what Pikele Snr may opine on the issue.
  25. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Albatros, agreed on "halted" and I too have problems with the statistical validity of the claim, hence Riddle Me This where Tamino argues to look at the whole dataset and delta sigma bandwidth before reading too much in small jiggles in the measurements. I went the same way as you to find the post, also without luck. I did a search and found an abstract showing deep convection (2000m) in the Mediterranean (of all places). This shows me that deep convection is probably happening in other places as well and possibly even deeper too, but perhaps not enough to account for the missing heat as Dr Pielke stated, I don't know. Anyway, I'd like to read more about it, so I would really appreciate a link to the paper showing how much vertical heat flux is moving down the column to below the Argos measuring range. I found a reference to J. K. Willis, D. P. Chambers, R. S. Nerem 2008, but that's about sea level rise afaik (and behind a paywall)...
  26. actually thoughtful at 06:32 AM on 9 September 2010
    Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    I don't perceive this is as an argument over science, as much as an argument over presentation. For example: (all positions paraphrased_ Dr. Pielke Sr.: For a 4 year period the body that holds 90% of the earth's heat showed no notable increase in heat; we can therefore assume no notable global warming occurred during that period GPWayne: We can say nothing about long term climate trends from a 4 year period of data (questionable data at that). These two statements are NOT at odds with each other. That neither said it the "Mother may I" format the other desired does not change the fact that there is little-to-no real disagreement between the two positions. I personally find Dr. Pielke's voice very helpful (and I would even say useful) - you can point out to a so-called skeptic - this is what real skepticism looks like - you use the actual data and you draw conclusions. Whether there ought be climate papers written and published about a 4 year period of time is a question for the editors of those journals - those same editors whom most on this site laud as keepers of intellectual purity in most cases. Finally - we know that GHG and other forcings are a trend, not a monolithic march up and to the right on a given graph. So why can't it be true that for 4 years natural variability swamped the trend? At the level of intuition/common sense (and as someone who studies heat moving through water on a daily basis - but not a climate or oceanographic expert) - it is REALLY hard to imagine heat moving downwards in a body of water unless it is VERY well mixed. Are there any smaller bodies of water which are well studied in regards to vertical heat movement (ie ponds, lakes, etc.) OK - my REAL final point - Trenberth has noted the travesty and Pielke Sr is publishing papers - which do you think will motivate a faster drive for better OHC data? People on both sides of the debate should thank Dr. Pielke Sr for keeping attention focused on ~90% of the heat sink of the planet.
  27. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke, You claim: "Thus to conclude that I have ever not been concerned about the addition of CO2 and how it affects the climate system misrepresents my perspective. I am particularly concerned with respect to the biogeochemical effects of added CO2." Hang on, but in your paper you state, and I quote: "We therefore conclude that hypothesis 2a is better supported than hypothesis 2b, which is a policy that focuses on modulating carbon emissions." You choose your hypothesis 2a which down plays the relative (is that better?) contribution/importance of long-lived GHGs on the climate system. So you are skeptical of the science presented in the IPCC assessments, and of the role of long-lived GHG forcing. In fact on your blog you say: "The 2007 IPCC failed to adequately consider anthropogenic land cover change in their assessment of how humans can alter the climate system on the regional and global scales. This serious oversight needs to be remedied in the next assessment." I think that I have fairly presented your position on this....and even defended you against others people's choice of a certain undesirable descriptor. What are your thoughts on the anthro cooling associated with widespread irrigation as discussed in this JGR paper by Puma and Cook (2010)? http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/09/100907171644.htm Seems we humans can cool regions too.....
  28. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    "With respect to OHC, the objective conclusion is that the annual average heating of the well sampled upper ocean halted for at least a 4 year time period." I find this sentence a bit disappointing. It makes the pair with the claim that summer arctic ice ice has recovered. Anyone doubts that 2008 showed more ice than 2007 and 2009 more than 2008? No, i guess. Does it mean the the decades of decreasing ice we've seen is over? No, we can't say that. It looks like we're playing with words. Take the 5 years from 2004 to 2008. Assuming that the measurements we have are "perfect" we can say that the upper ocean OHC didn't change. Ok. Than what? We can not claim that global warming halted, not even that the decades long OHC increase did. What we can say, and i'm sure we all agree, is that we still cannot explain climate variability. Following GISS, the temperature anomaly in 2008 and 2009 were 0.43 and 0.57 °C. The "objective conclusion" is that there has been a trend of 14 °C/century. A good laugh. So, let's not use these words so easily, we're trying to do science afterall.
  29. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke, Thanks for your response. You state that "The EOS article is introduced to document that we have identified a wide range of human climate forcings, beyond the radiative forcing of CO2." That may be true, but is irrelevant to this discussion on OHC; sorry, but you are arguing straw men. You also state that "This does not mean that future global warming will not occur." Well, of course! That is what this is all about. You previously did NOT provide that critical caveat, nor did you provide the caveat that 4 years is way too short period to determine a statistically significant trend. Moreover, given the well-known uncertainty in the OHC measurements, making such assertive statements as you have done is especially irresponsible. So are you going to do the right thing and set the record straight and post a corrigendum on your blog? In fact, I am urging you to do just that. You also say "To refute this claim, present data for these 4 years that conflicts with this finding." GPWayne has provided you TWO sources which do just that-- von Shuckmann and Lyman et al. (2010). Yet you choose to ignore them.
  30. Roger A Pielke Sr at 05:48 AM on 9 September 2010
    Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Cynicus - The statements that "global warming halted on this time period' and "global warming of upper ocean halted on this time period' both are correct, but the former requires an additional assumption. To heat lower levels of the ocean (below ~700m), heat would have to flow downward through the Argo network undetected. Such heat flow of a large enough value has not been observed, based on analyses discussed by Josh Willis on my weblog. Albatross - The EOS article is introduced to document that we have identified a wide range of human climate forcings, beyond the radiative forcing of CO2. The IPCC is too conservative at presenting these other forcings. These are in addition to the human caused CO2 forcing. Thus to conclude that I have ever not been concerned about the addition of CO2 and how it affects the climate system misrepresents my perspective. I am particularly concerned with respect to the biogeochemical effects of added CO2. With respect to OHC, the objective conclusion is that the annual average heating of the well sampled upper ocean halted for at least a 4 year time period. This is a science question and should be addressed that way. To refute this claim, present data for these 4 years that conflicts with this finding. This does not mean that future global warming will not occur. However, to better understand the climate system, we need to understand why this halt occurred. Moreover, we need to see if in the coming years the heating will be amplified so as to catch up to the model predictions.
  31. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Cynicus @38, IMHO, using the word "halted" is still highly misleading, it is very definitive and assertive, and says nothing about what will happen down the road-- the interpretation of that is going to be especially troublesome for someone who is not in the know. I can imagine people concluding this: "Did you hear that a famous scientists says that global warming has stopped, so what is the big deal?" And it still remains to be answered, so what if the increase in OHC slowed or even decreased slightly in that 5-year window? It is still way too short a time interval to make any statistically robust conclusions. The unfortunate part is that Dr. Pielke Snr knows that, yet opined publicly about it anyways, and from their it was echoed/trumpeted loudly by the denialosphere. IMHO, Dr. Peilke's public musings on such matters (in the manner he has chosen to do so thus far at least) is not unacceptable and not in keeping with proper scientific protocol. After Tamino's run in with a particularly hostile contrarian earlier this year, a number of pages on Tamino's blog have gone AWOL (I used the URL for the post in question but the page is now blank). I also tried the waybackmachine but had no luck.
  32. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke, leaving all other issues aside, I humbly feel that your original claim: "This means that global warming halted on this time period." would probably need rephrasing to: "This means that global warming of upper ocean halted on this time period" based on your following statement: "However, the data is clear that for this period of time, global average annual upper ocean heating halted." (emphasis mine) Do I see that correctly?
  33. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke, Instead of keep referring to your EOS paper, could please state here specifically which findings you believe to be relevant to this discussion on OHC [I have not been able to find anything pertinent]. Thank you. PS: GPWayne, if you read the EOS article it seems Dr. Pielke supports their stated hypothesis 2a. So, again, I agree with Pielke that associating him with those in denial about AGW/ACC is incorrect. That said, contrary to the majority of climate scientists, Dr. Pielke does NOT believe the following to be true: "Hypothesis 2b: Although the natural causes of climate variations and changes are undoubtedly important, the human influences are significant and are dominated by the emissions into the atmosphere of greenhouse gases, the most important of which is CO2. The adverse impact of these gases on regional and global climate constitutes the primary climate issue for the coming decades." So if I interpret this correctly, he does seem skeptical of the importance/contribution of GHGs and the severity of the expected negative impacts associated with doubling CO2. Perhaps that is why he is latching onto short-term trends which indicate that things are perhaps not as bad as originally expected. Well, IMHO, doing so it simply deluding oneself and smacks of confirmation bias. It is worth mentioning that reputable scientists such as Dr. Schmidt have taken issue with how Pielke et al. (2009) framed the problem.
  34. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    People reading this may find this exchange with Pielke Snr of interest: http://thingsbreak.wordpress.com/2010/02/19/on-constructive-debate This is not the first time Pielke Snr has gotten into trouble for making misleading claims on climate science...
  35. Roger A Pielke Sr at 04:49 AM on 9 September 2010
    Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    RSVP Thank you. You have actually very clearly framed the issue that is causing the misunderstanding in several of the above comments. You wrote "Another "dumb" or "naive" question... Why is oceans warming always published in Joules, while global warming is expressed in degrees Centigrade?" The reason is that heat involves mass and Joules includes mass. When global warming is expressed as a trend in degrees Centigrade, it is incomplete, as this is just part of the heat. Jim Hansen agrees that the monitoring the ocean heat change is the most appropriate reservoir to monitor global warming (as he stated at a National Research Council meeting on the 2005 report National Research Council, 2005: Radiative forcing of climate change: Expanding the concept and addressing uncertainties. Committee on Radiative Forcing Effects on Climate Change, Climate Research Committee, Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, Division on Earth and Life Studies, The National Academies Press, Washington, D.C., 208 pp. http://www.nap.edu/openbook/0309095069/html/). The only relevant issues in the above comments that pertain to this metric are the short duration of the lack of heating and the sampling issue. With respect to the later, satellite altimetry data is used to complement the Argo network. Except for ice covered areas (which is only a small fraction of the ocean), since 2004 the coverage is accepted by oceanographers as being adequate to diagnosis heating and cooling, within observational uncertainties as illustrated by Josh Willis in my Physics Today article. The short duration of the lack of global average, annual cooling (4 years unless it extended beyond 2008) is correct. It may not have continued. However, the data is clear that for this period of time, global average annual upper ocean heating halted. It is important to emphasize, of course, that this observation says nothing about the role of humans within the climate system, nor of the importance and cocern with the continued increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. I note so far that none of the commenters have discussed the findings we presented in our paper Pielke Sr., R., K. Beven, G. Brasseur, J. Calvert, M. Chahine, R. Dickerson, D. Entekhabi, E. Foufoula-Georgiou, H. Gupta, V. Gupta, W. Krajewski, E. Philip Krider, W. K.M. Lau, J. McDonnell, W. Rossow, J. Schaake, J. Smith, S. Sorooshian, and E. Wood, 2009: Climate change: The need to consider human forcings besides greenhouse gases. Eos, Vol. 90, No. 45, 10 November 2009, 413. Copyright (2009) American Geophysical Union. http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/files/2009/12/r-354.pdf
  36. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    I think Tamino's "Riddle Me This" post would be most revealing in this discussion, but I can't find it. Anyone who has a link?
  37. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke, With respect, I find your position on this issue and your refusal to acknowledge what you have recently stated concerning Arctic sea ice, sea-level rise and now OHC was (and is) highly misleading to be most troubling (and this is coming from a scientist who works in your field). As others have repeatedly pointed out to you (most recently KR), one cannot conclude that global warming has stopped based on only 5 years worth of data, and that fact is especially true when working with OHC data. Surely you understand that by applying your logic one could erroneously claim/conclude that global warming has "stopped" multiple times over the last century-- yet the long term trend (which IS statistically significant) remains positive (see Hansen et al. 2010 in press). I honestly thought it was only some lay people who mistakenly thought that AGW translated into a monotonic increase in global temperatures. Hansen (and others in the know) would also most certainly take issue with your claim that there is no lag in the climate system, especially when it comes to the oceans. From Hansen et al. (2008): "The lag of GHGs after temperature change is several hundred years (Fig. 6 of [6]), perhaps determined by the ocean overturning time" And "Let us consider climate change averaged over a few thousand years-- long enough to assure energy balance and minimize effects of ocean thermal response time and climate change leads/lags between hemispheres [22]" And "The deep ocean can carry a temperature change between hemispheres with little loss, but because of the ocean's thermal inertia there can be a hemispheric lag of up to a millenium" For more on lags in the climate system because of thermal inertia also see Meehl et al. (2005), Wigley et al.(2005), Friedlingstein and Solomon (2005), Hansen et al. (2005). There are, of course, many more examples in the literature as well which speak to lags in the climate system. The biosphere has been positive energy imbalance (e.g., Murphy et al. (2009) for many decades now because of increased levels of long-lived GHGs from human activities; why do I get the distinct feeling that you seem to have trouble accepting that fact and the associated consequences? I trust Dr. Trenberth on this file; as for trusting you, well after this fiasco, not so much, and that saddens me greatly. Had you been willing to concede your mistakes, then I might have felt very differently.
  38. Ocean cooling: skeptic arguments drowned by data
    Many posters have alluded to a lack of a mechanism for transporting surface heat to the abyssal depths. Here is my take on this problem, please let me know if I have gone off the rails on this. As cold water moves from the antarctic it warms. As it warms more water is evaporated thus causing an increase in salinity. Some of this evaporated water will rain out over land thus the salinity will not be reduced. As the water goes further north it warms even more and we experience an El Nino event. This warm water evaporates and becomes even more saline. Since the equator seems to act a a barrier to further movement of the water it remains at rest when it nears the equator (at least it will not go further north). It warms even more, more is evaporated and it becomes even more saline. The more saline it becomes the more dense it becomes. Eventually it become so dense that it begins to sink into the less dense (less saline) water below. When this happens the El Nino is over and the water is replaced by cooler less saline water from further south and we experience a La Nina. This warm, highly saline water eventually makes it to the abyssal depths where it remains for a long time. There are a number of papers coming out showing an increase in the temperature of the abyssal water but it is still spotty so it is difficult to measure the increased energy content of this part of the ocean. Hopefully more research will be forthcoming in this very relevant area.
  39. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    RSVP, you could as easily ask why an expanded sample base couldn't be introducing a spurious 'cooling' effect (perhaps causing the leveling off since 2004). There is always the possibility of instrument errors... in either direction. Could the changing measurement methodologies be resulting in skewed OHC results? Yes. In fact, several such errors HAVE been found and adjustments made in an effort to correct them. It is an ongoing process. That said, even if we just take the earliest measurement tools and continue them through to present we get an increasing OHC trend. Ditto using just the latest / most accurate tools. Ditto proxies. Et cetera. Thus, the idea that the whole warming trend might be error induced is belied by multiple lines of evidence to the contrary. There is alot of uncertainty around the OHC data, but not so much that the multi-decadal warming trend is in doubt. As to joules vs degrees... most humans on the planet are very familiar with surface temperature readings in degrees (either C or F usually). Thus, it just makes sense to express warming as anomaly values on those units. How often do you hear about the ocean temperature at 1000 feet below the surface? Pretty much never. It would be a pretty strange way to express things as that water at 1000 feet down could be in a current which moves it away and replaces it with warmer or colder water quite quickly. Joules are a better measurement because they (theoretically) give the total amount of energy which has accumulated in the oceans... regardless of how that energy is distributed three dimensionally.
  40. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Another "dumb" or "naive" question... Why is oceans warming always published in Joules, while global warming is expressed in degrees Centigrade? Also, no one ever answered my other question on the original thread,... how could one know the difference between a real increase in Joules over the last 60 years vs. effects of improvements in data taking and an expanded sample base? Only asking because I am sure the sample base has always increased and the methodology has always been improving...
  41. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    1. Humanity Rules -- "The NODC near realtime update of OHC shows that the oceans haven't been warming since 2004ish." Just as well your own graph goes all the way back to 1955 for a more meaningful look at the data, then. What do your own eyes tell you?
  42. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke remarks indirectly on something we've noted here many times, namely the unfortunately inadequate instrumentation of the ocean basins. The true meaning of Trenberth's "missing heat" cannot be resolved without better measurement capability. The nature of "missing" is ambiguous without more information. Dr. Trenberth is also widely quoted thanks to his use of the word "travesty." The real travesty here is that amateurs and professionals alike agree the oceans are the bulk repository of whatever energy is accumulating on the planet thanks to anthropogenic warming but we've still got a huge gap in our data collecting ability. There'a an assumption operating here that thermally speaking the deep oceans are somehow disconnected from shallower waters, yet repeated measurements at sadly sparse stations in various ocean basins actually do seem to consistently hint at increasing heat content of the deep ocean. We could wish for a dynamic buoy system similar to ARGO but capable of deeper operations and indeed the folks running the ARGO network are trying to attack that problem. In the meantime, "simply" planting some instrumentation capable of logging temperatures at the deep ocean stations currently used for infrequent measurements would be a very beneficial thing. A few years of relatively continuous recordings at a few sites would go a long way to resolving the question of how heat is "missing." As well as engaging in argumentation about issues that cannot be settled without more data, let's also encourage folks such as Dr. Pielke Sr. to exert whatever leverage they can apply to improving our instrumentation of the oceans.
  43. Is climate science settled? Especially the important parts?
    CBW If the science is "good enough", it should be able to quantify the trade offs and make clear exactly what action is needed. In fact, if the science is so advanced, peers should produce a chart that has "ocean rise cm" vs. "action", where "action" quantifies how much GHG needs to be cut back. If you are aware of this "recipe", please let me know. Thanks in advance.
  44. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    To be even more clear on my last post, drawing unqualified conclusions on 5 years of data is statistically unsupportable. Making a qualified statement such as "The current data is not showing a warming trend, this may be statistically significant in a few years" would be entirely supportable. But absolute statements based on short time frames and noisy data? No.
  45. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Dr. Pielke, thank you for your comments here. I believe, however, that gpwayne's point in this post still holds; that stating "...global warming halted on this time period" is simply not justified from the short period of time and the noise inherent in current measurements of ocean heat content. Looking at the data available, it appears that a 15-20 year period would be the absolutely shortest time frame from which to draw a definitive conclusion about trends. We absolutely need to improve our measurements, and the joules present in the ocean are an excellent metric, within our ability to measure them. Given the current measurement issues, sampling rates, calibration concerns, S/N ratio, etc., 5 years of data is not sufficient to draw any firm conclusions whatsoever. Gwayne's point (and with which I must agree) is that you have drawn such conclusions from a very short time frame, and, that such conclusions are not statistically supportable.
  46. Roger A Pielke Sr at 02:50 AM on 9 September 2010
    Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    I have read the Reply [as Moderator] to my comment [I would appreciate if you could identify yourself. :-)] On the issues, you seem to be assuming that climate change is synonymous with global warming. Global warming, however, is a subset of climate change. "Global warming" occurs when Joules accumulate within the climate system, of which the oceans is the largest reservoir for heat changes within the climate system. I agree that other climate indices have changed (e.g. Arctic and Antarctic sea ice), but these are not direct measures of global warming. With respect to the quantitative accuracy of the upper ocean heat data, even Kevin Trenberth admits there is "missing heat" as discussed in the web posts that are in my Comment that I provided the links for earlier today. Josh Willis, also, places uncertainly bars around his data in his figure in my paper Pielke Sr., R.A., 2008: A broader view of the role of humans in the climate system. Physics Today, 61, Vol. 11, 54-55. http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/files/2009/10/r-334.pdf so the statement such as "there was no global average warming in the upper ocean from 2004 to 2008" are consistent with his analysis. If they find an error, of course, that would need to be changed, but until it is, it is a robust, peer-reviewed scientific finding. I still feel you are missing my main point. With all of the remaining unresolved uncertainties and systematic biases in the land surface portion of the multi-decadal global surface temperature trend, as we reported, for example, in Pielke Sr., R.A., C. Davey, D. Niyogi, S. Fall, J. Steinweg-Woods, K. Hubbard, X. Lin, M. Cai, Y.-K. Lim, H. Li, J. Nielsen-Gammon, K. Gallo, R. Hale, R. Mahmood, S. Foster, R.T. McNider, and P. Blanken, 2007: Unresolved issues with the assessment of multi-decadal global land surface temperature trends. J. Geophys. Res., 112, D24S08, doi:10.1029/2006JD008229. http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/files/2009/10/r-321.pdf and Klotzbach, P.J., R.A. Pielke Sr., R.A. Pielke Jr., J.R. Christy, and R.T. McNider, 2009: An alternative explanation for differential temperature trends at the surface and in the lower troposphere. J. Geophys. Res., 114, D21102, doi:10.1029/2009JD011841. http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/files/2009/11/r-345.pdf we should move towards the more appropriate global warming metric of heat which is Joules, most of whose changes occur in the ocean. The ocean below 700m does not seem to be a major reservoir for this heat, as discussed in the web posts I sent in my first Comment. Even with the remaining issues with the quantitative accuracy of the ocean heat content measurements, it should become the primary metric to diagnose global warming and as a measure to compare with the IPCC models. Until about 2004, the comparisons between the GISS model and the upper ocean heat content changes, for instance, were quite good as I reported on in my post Update On Jim Hansen’s Forecast Of Global Warming As Diagnosed By The Upper Ocean Heat Content Change. http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2010/05/21/update-on-jim-hansens-forecast-of-the-global-radiative-imbalance-as-diagnosed-by-the-upper-ocean-heat-content-change/. Since 2004, however, the model predictions have not been as good. Perhaps, this is a short term effect associated with natural variability. If so, we should see a resumption of heating rates that were seen up to 2004. This comparison with models, as a test of their accuracy, is the basic scientific method of hypothesis testing. Why you chose to label me a skeptic or a denier, besides being completely incorrect in this labeling, obscures the actual scientific issues and valuable discussions that could take place on your weblog.
  47. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Were we able to close the energy budget (i.e. better measurements) we could take advantage of the integral nature of OHC. Unfortunately we still can not. It is unfortunate that reputable scientists like Prof. Pielke Sr. have recently shown the attitude to downplay the need of decades long datasets to assess the trends. This tendency has led him to the highly unlikely, and for sure unproven, claims that global warming has stopped since 2004 or that there has been a recovery of the arctic ice since 2008. I'm with ProfMandia (#9) hoping for the always wellcome loyal opposition to any mainstream scientific theory.
  48. A detailed look at climate sensitivity
    I teach chemistry at the university level. The Atmosphere is a chemical system in equilibrium with the chemical sytem of the oceans. Le Chatalier's principle states that a system in chemical equilibrium reacts to external stimulus to maintain that equilibrium. So the system may react to changes by maintaining it's equilibrium. What happens is this: the system changes very little until it's ability to react is overwhelmed, then changes are rapid and drastic. This is why climate scientists talk about a "tipping point" beyond which the Earth cannot comfortably recover.
  49. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Simple question from a layman... If, what Dr Pielke claims is correct, that "global warming has stopped during this time" should there not be a corresponding measurement in the satellite record showing that incoming and outgoing radiation are in balance? Would that not be the smoking gun to prove the statement? Conversely, if we are still seeing an energy imbalance then shouldn't we be discussing where the heat is instead of saying there is no warming?
  50. Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger
    Eyeballing from the graph presented so authoritatively by HR and using short periods as approved by expert climate scientist Dr Pielke Sr I can firmly conclude that global warming did not happen in the periods: 1977 - 1982 1985 - 1990 1991 - 1996 1996 - 2001 2004 - 2009 So, there has been no global warming or it even cooled 25 of the 32 year period between 1975 and 2010! Shock..horror!!! Lots of ice has melted this year too as glaciers and Arctic sea ice shrunk which means the ocean is even cooler after 2010 (everyone knows that melting ice cools water). We must therefore conclude that a new ice age could be imminent. We need to burn more carbon quickly!

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