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Comments 125101 to 125150:

125101. Albatross at 08:58 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        Jpark, Sigh, any luck with those other global temp data yet? No? Thought so. The global SAT data are robust, deal with it. I, for one, am becoming quite tired of people using the "I am open minded" or that "I am here to learn" charade, all while simultaneously trying to obfuscate and derail the discussion. The content of your posts reveals your true intentions, and it is clearly not to understand the science. Riccardo @90 hit the nail on the head. The planet has been in a net energy imbalance since the fifties and consequently the atmosphere and oceans are warming, even at a time when solar forcing is decreasing and negative forcing from antrho aerosols is on the rise. The main culprits for the observed warming psot 1950 are GHGs. This is still very early days in this experiment, yet we can already see some disturbing signs (loss of Arctic ice, loss of ice on WAIS and greenland, and even the EAIS, worlwide retreat if glaciers, more flooding events, more heat waves in certain regions like Australia etc.). Also consider that we will easily surpass doubling of CO2 levels, in part, because of the actions of people like Pielke Jnr&Snr, D'Aleo, McIntyre, Watts and their cohorts-- their goal is to confuse and delay, sadly you and others are falling for their deception. The "arguments" of these self-proclaimed 'skeptics', when held to close scientific scrutiny are shown to be nothing more than beguiling. Finally, your "skeptisism" seems to be unidirectional-- which ivalidates claims of being a true "skeptic". So how about subjecting Watts et al. to your scrutiny?
125102. Doug Bostrom at 08:47 AM on 27 January 2010
        The IPCC's 2035 prediction about Himalayan glaciers
        Phillip64: Already handled by IPCC, which has apparently learned the danger of leaving smoldering piles of BS laying about unextinguished: "The January 24 Sunday Times ran a misleading and baseless story attacking the way the Fourth Assessment Report of the IPCC handled an important question concerning recent trends in economic losses from climate-related disasters. The article, entitled “UN Wrongly Linked Global Warming to Natural Disasters”, is by Jonathan Leake. The Sunday Times article gets the story wrong on two key points. The first is that it incorrectly assumes that a brief section on trends in economic losses from climate-related disasters is everything the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (2007) has to say about changes in extremes and disasters. In fact, the Fourth Assessment Report reaches many important conclusions, at many locations in the report, about the role of climate change in extreme events. The assessment addresses both observations of past changes and projections of future changes in sectors ranging from heat waves and precipitation to wildfires. Each of these is a careful assessment of the available evidence, with a thorough consideration of the confidence with which each conclusion can be drawn. The second problem with the article in the Sunday Times is its baseless attack on the section of the report on trends in economic losses from disasters. This section of the IPCC report is a balanced treatment of a complicated and important issue. It clearly makes the point that one study detected an increase in economic losses, corrected for values at risk, but that other studies have not detected such a trend. The tone is balanced, and the section contains many important qualifiers. In writing, reviewing, and editing this section, IPCC procedures were carefully followed to produce the policy-relevant assessment that is the IPCC mandate." MORE: http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/presentations/statement_25_01_2010.pdf
125103. Berényi Péter at 08:25 AM on 27 January 2010
        The chaos of confusing the concepts
        It's funny. We may be on the verge of a serious glaciation, deeper than any of the recent ice ages and much more permanent. I would not like that, not even in ten thousand years. The last time most of Europe was under ice, it was damn cold and dry where I live. Biodiversity has definitely improved since then. Also, I don't think carbon dioxide would be a remedy. The albedo discontinuity at the edge of the ice sheet they are talking about is very real. Ice is white in the visible and pitch dark in IR. It is the same for the snow which is all over the place right now, making the nights chilly. I have no choice but to generate carbon dioxide by destroying some methane, otherwise the family, including the kids would get frozen. "For the best-fit run, transition to the large Eurasian ice sheet occurs shortly after the present. Our results therefore suggest that the actual climate system may have been geologically close (10^4­-10^5 yr) to the final phase of a 50-Myr evolution from bipolar warm climates to permanent bipolar glaciation. (Presumably, future society could prevent this transition indefinitely with very modest adjustments to the atmospheric CO2 level.)" Vol 456 | 13 November 2008 | doi:10.1038/nature07365 LETTERS Transient nature of late Pleistocene climate variability Thomas J. Crowley & William T. Hyde http://www.geos.ed.ac.uk/homes/tcrowley/crowley_Nature08_iceages.pdf
        Response: I'm not sure I'd call between 10,000 to 100,000 years as being "on the verge of a serious glaciation". The forcing from orbitally forced albedo changes is quite small compared to the forcing from CO2 and operates over geological time scales as opposed to the dramatic response of climate to CO2 that happens over decades.
125104. Riccardo at 08:09 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        jpark, it's typical that people understand only what they want to understand. I hope that your understanding of that blog post allows you to understand the its bias (Pielke only quoted himself) and some of the more evident mistakes he made. If not, i should go back to my first sentence and think that you would not understand any rebuttal of his post.
125105. Riccardo at 07:54 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        sbarron2000, mathematically (and i'd say logically) the choice of the baseline is totally irrelevant. It's hard for me to understand your surprise that there is "a lot of geospatial averaging". Isn't a global "geospatial average" exactly what we are looking for? It is described in details because, you know, it's a scientific paper and it's customary to describe the data processing. But, to reassure your "uninformed skepticism", other groups use different processing and the differences in the final results are minor. Beyond this, Menne et al. are comparing two different datasets and the most important thing is that they use the same method for both.
125106. jdevlin at 07:51 AM on 27 January 2010
        Why does CO2 lag temperature?
        I am impressed with the quality of the contributions to this topic but it is a struggle for a non-scientist like myself to fully grasp the complexity involved. Apologies therefore for my question from ignorance but it is this: if temperature leads CO2 AND CO2 leads temperature, what stops this being an endlessly self-reinforcing cycle?
125107. jpark at 07:38 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        sbarron - I agree, looking at some of the temp charts the anomalies are so huge I cant believe they can be statistically significant. But I may be missing something. I hope I have an open mind too. But this is the skeptical skeptics site..
125108. jpark at 07:33 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        I think I have found something of an answer - something I can understand at any rate.. http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2009/07/03/roger-a-pielke-sr-comments-on-the-ncdc-talking-point-response-to-the-report-“is-the-us-surface-temperature-record-reliable”by-anthony-watts/
        Response:

        Note that the blog post you link to, dated from July last year, is not responding to Menne 2010 but a report posted on the NCDC website.

125109. sbarron2000 at 07:26 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        Menne 2010 says "The geographic distribution of stations that fall into the two categories is shown in Fig. 1 (note that just over 40% of the 1218 total USHCN Version 2 sites had available ratings)." A quick glance at surfacestations.org shows that they have ratings for 78% of the total 1221 USHCN stations. Why does Menne 2010 not use those other 38%? They are leaving almost half of the station data that has been collected unaccounted for in their study. And why 1218 vs 1221 total stations? Also, according to surfacestations.org, 61% of the stations have a temperature error of > or = to 2 degrees C, and 8% have a temp. error of > or = to 5 degrees C. Doesn't that put a pretty wide error band on the anomaly results, too? Can you draw meaningful conclusions from data when 69% of your stations have a minimun error of 2 degrees C? I guess if you just take averages for the anomalies, you could consider the error to be washed away for purposes of the results, but I'm not sure that's "scientifically" accurate. Is that why there are no error bands on anomaly results? I realize I'm asking a lot of questions, but I'm interested, and have an open mind. ;-)
125110. Vinny Burgoo at 07:23 AM on 27 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        JC: 'I would be quite happy if you were to take the time to find more papers showing contrary results to papers currently listed. I appreciate the feedback you provided on forest growth and crop disease. It's not a competition to see who gets the biggest list but an effort to portray the state of the science.' I don't think that's possible with a tabulation like this. It's not a worthwhile exercise. I provided forest-growth and crop-disease info solely to make that point. The only way that listing single studies could work would be if you could somehow provide studies that were the most representative of the current state of the science in each area of impact - and surely no single individual knows enough about the enormous literature of anthropogenic climate change to be able to do that. Crowd-sourced offerings from commenters aren't the solution, either. How can you know that we know what we're talking about? (And how can your readers?) You have said that you'll use synthesis papers (overviews, reviews) when they become available instead of single studies. That's a better approach but you'd still need to be seriously well-informed about all aspects of the literature. Recent syntheses are available for several of the slots currently occupied by single studies in your tabulation but you haven't used them. Why is that? Possibly because the field is too large even when synthesized by experts. Ideally, you need to recruit a vast international organization packed full of experts in many different fields organized into various teams to evaluate the various claims made by the enormous literature and present an honest, informed picture of the whole thing. Oh. That's been tried. And it failed to be objective. Never mind. It's the best there is. Do you honestly think your blog can do better?
125111. jpark at 07:19 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        I guess we are all waiting for a riposte..til then http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2010/01/15/professional-discourtesy-by-the-national-climate-data-center/
125112. djb95054 at 06:30 AM on 27 January 2010
        There is no consensus
        In the section "Scientific Oranisations Endorsing the Consensus", there is a broken link. I believe the link http://www.giss.nasa.gov/edu/gwdebate/ (NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies) should be http://www.giss.nasa.gov/staff/jhansen/gwdebate/
        Response: Thanks for the link. However, upon reflection, I've removed that link - it's not so much an official statement by the GISS organisation as the opinion of James Hansen, a GISS employee. I'm not sure if NASA or GISS have published an official statement on climate change.
125113. sbarron2000 at 06:27 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        I'm not a climate scientist, and I don't really care to recreate the work done by Menne. But what is the effect of all of the things he does to the temp. data before he creates his anomaly chart? From Menne 2010, at page 5... "Specifically, the unadjusted and adjusted monthly station values were converted to anomalies relative to the 1971–2000 station mean. The anomalies were then interpolated to the nodes of a 0.25° × 0.25° latitude– longitude grid using the method described by Willmott et al. [1985] -- separately for the good and poor exposure stations. Finally, the interpolated maximum and minimum temperature anomalies were grid-box area weighted into a mean anomaly for the CONUS for each year as shown in Fig. 2." What is the effect on the data when it is "interpolated to the nodes of a 0.25° × 0.25° latitude–longitude grid?" Further, the "interpolated maximum and minimum temperature anomalies were grid-box area weighted into a mean anomaly." What do these mean, and what happens to the data once you do it? I'm a layman, but I think this is a lot of geospatial averaging of the monthly anomalies and the mean anomaly which goes on prior to actually making our comparisons of temperature anomalies, right? Why was this done? What is the effect of doing it? Would the results be different if you didn't? Just skeptically thinking out loud here. ..
125114. sbarron2000 at 06:23 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        Marcus at 22:02 PM on 24 January, 2010 Marcus, do you see that because the 1960's, 70's and 80's temperatures are included in the "average" temperature by which your anomaly are calculated, comparing those anomalies to the 1990's and 2000's temperature anomalies is mathematically a little misleading? The change in temperature for the 80s has already been taken into account in establishing the baseline, so it is artificially low when compared to the 90s and 00s. This is the kind of thing that makes me skeptical. Those facts as presented are misleading, whether it’s intentional or not. I won't argue that it’s not getting warmer. I think it is. But how much warmer and why are big question marks for me.
        Response: "I won't argue that it’s not getting warmer.  I think it is.  But how much warmer and why are big question marks for me."
        
        Note that the choice of the baseline period (eg - 1960 to 1990) has no bearing whatsoever on the temperature trend. As you say, the trend or "how much warmer" it's getting is what we're interested in when we look at temperature anomaly. And of course, you're correct that one of the most important questions is why it's getting warmer.
125115. djb95054 at 06:22 AM on 27 January 2010
        Can you make a hockey stick without tree rings?
        Sorry. I keep finding these one at a time. The link for Smith 2006 gets a strange "cookie" error (my browser is set to accept cookies, but the site complains of an error). I believe a better link for Smith 2006 is http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/pubs/smith2006/smith2006.html
        Response: No need to apologies, many thanks for spotting all the broken links (the pitfall of linking to external websites). I've updated all three links here as well as on the hockey stick page.
125116. djb95054 at 06:18 AM on 27 January 2010
        Can you make a hockey stick without tree rings?
        The Huang 2000 link is also broken (gets "Access forbidden" error. I believe the correct link is http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/~peter/Resources/Seminar/readings/Huang_boreholeTemp_Nature%2700.pdf
125117. djb95054 at 06:15 AM on 27 January 2010
        Can you make a hockey stick without tree rings?
        Mann 2008 link above is broken. I believe the correct link is http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/pubs/mann2008/mann2008.html
125118. Albatross at 06:10 AM on 27 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        JPark, re #71 (really, are you just here to randomly throw out red herrings?) The article by Richard Foot in the very, err, "reputable" (not) Vancouver Sun is consistent wityh other misinformation that they have published on AGW. This is the same Foot who was fawning over the "maligned" McIntyre a while ago. Foot also makes extensive reference to D'Aleo et al. Also, Foot does not even know how to cite James Hansen (not Hanson as Foot claims)! Wonder which denialists website he got his ideas from? Also, the Canadian Arctic is warming rapidly (as per Environment Cnada data; 1.7 C per 62 years [years with data to date] for Arctic Tundra and 1.3 C for the Arctic Mountains and Fiords), so by excluding those Arctic data GISS are actually underestimating the warming, not overestimating it. There are many reaosns for excluding certain data, reasons that Richard Foot, you and D'Aleo et al. seems to not be able to grasp. Jpark, let us for a second assume that the instrument-based SAT record is rubbish (it is not, as has been demonstrated over and over again, but whatever). Now, go and look in the long-term trends in oceanic heat content (no UHI there), trends in global radiosonde network (RATPAC) and trends in global satellite MSU data (RSS, UAH take your pick)-- no UHI or microclimate problems there either. Now look at the long-term trends (30-yrs) and compare them with those of the instrumented global SATs. Then please get back to us with the trend data from all four datasets (RSS, UAH, GISS, RATPAC).
125119. djb95054 at 05:52 AM on 27 January 2010
        Scientists can't even predict weather
        The link above to Hansen 2007 is broken. I believe the correct link is http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2007/2007_Hansen_etal_1.pdf
        Response: Thanks, that's the problem with linking to external websites - they change. I've updated the link and many thanks for pointing this out.
125120. canbanjo at 05:40 AM on 27 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        to tadzio: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot
125121. Berényi Péter at 03:05 AM on 27 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        IPCC Fourth Assessment Report: Climate Change 2007: Working Group II: Impacts, Adaption and Vulnerability Chapter 13: Latin America 13.4 Summary of expected key future impacts and vulnerabilities 13.4.1 Natural ecosystems http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg2/en/ch13s13-4.html#13-4-1 "Up to 40% of the Amazonian forests could react drastically to even a slight reduction in precipitation; this means that the tropical vegetation, hydrology and climate system in South America could change very rapidly to another steady state, not necessarily producing gradual changes between the current and the future situation (Rowell and Moore, 2000). It is more probable that forests will be replaced by ecosystems that have more resistance to multiple stresses caused by temperature increase, droughts and fires, such as tropical savannas" You can follow IPCC peer review process on this paragraph at http://ipcc-wg2.gov/publications/AR4/ar4review_access.html Both First & Second Order Draft Comments worth reading. Unfortunately it's impossible to cite or quote them. However, I can tell you that there is nothing in the reviews concerning 13.4.1 except some anonymous insistance in Second Order Draft (expert) Comments to increase the perceived probability of savannization of the Amazon with no reference whatsoever. Still, there is a reference in the text itself to Rowell and Moore, 2000. WWF/IUCN Global Review of Forest Fires Prepared by Andy Rowell & Dr. Peter F. Moore http://data.iucn.org/dbtw-wpd/edocs/2000-047.pdf It is not a peer reviewed paper, but a pamphlet sponsored by NGO pressure groups. Still, Rowell and Moore may be respected scientists. Are they? It depends. Andy Rowell is an award-winning freelance writer and investigative journalist specialising in environmental and health issues. http://www.tcij.org/about-2/teachers-and-speakers/andy-rowell Dr. Moore is a Policy Analyst & Forest Fire Management Specialist with high-level policy and analytical skills and a strong understanding of government administration. http://www.ifmeg.com/CV/Dr%20Peter%20Moore.pdf Enuff said. Still, the core claim, savannization of parts of the Amazon basin can be real. Not due to global warming perhaps, but landuse change. Triggered by increased demand to alcohol for fuel as a renewable energy source. One sets the forest on fire, plants sugarcane, manufactures fuel, sells it and takes the money. It's as simple as that. If the net result, after leaving the land alone once again were savannah or forest regrowth, we do not know, at least not based on IPCC AR4. There might be refereed scientific literature on the subject, but it was not utilised in this case.
125122. HumanityRules at 01:16 AM on 27 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        Data from Hawaii Ocean Time-series (HOT) Station ALOHA. Seems biological, biochemical and biophysical data has been collected from 1980's to present. One paper identifies acidification of the ocean http://www.pnas.org/content/106/30/12235.full.pdf Several others have identified increase in primary production and biomass of plankton http://icesjms.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/61/4/457 http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2007/2006JC003730.shtml The biomass increases are seen at depth which has seen greatest increase in pH (small point is Turley paper in ocean acidification peer-reviewed? It appears to be a DEFRA (UK government) publication)
125123. barry1487 at 23:58 PM on 26 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        November 2008

        Some folks have commented that becuase I’ve posted my “How not to measure temperature…” series, that I’m only focused on finding the badly sited stations. While they are a dime a dozen and often visually entertaining, actually what we want to find are the BEST stations. Those are the CRN1 and 2 rated stations. Having a large and well distributed sample size of the best stations will help definitively answer the question about how much bias may exist as a result of the contribution of badly sited stations. Since the majorty of sttaions surveyed so far seem to be CRN 3,4,5 with CRN1,2 making up only 12% of the total surveyed stations thus far, it is important to increase the sample size.

        http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/11/24/a-note-to-wuwt-readers/
125124. Jacob Bock Axelsen at 23:08 PM on 26 January 2010
        The chaos of confusing the concepts
        Steve It is not an easily understood subject, and in this discussion forum I will only expand on what I wrote. Anybody who is interested in real learning needs to read a good textbook, like "Nonlinear dynamics and Chaos" by S.H. Strogatz or perhaps this online book: http://staff.science.nus.edu.sg/~parwani/c1/book.html Seasons are probably a very minor global temperature regularity: just plot every 6th global temperature of the monthly averages - all you get is the well-known global warming curve. Seasons are not a proof that global climate is not chaotic. The 'not-chaotic' statement should have been after I mention Stefan-Boltzmann's law. The trained eye really requires a record of periods of unpredictable oscillations to say anything. It could be a small fraction of a chaotic oscillation - but before anyone makes that leap they find it is strongly prevented by the records (even just the Hockey Stick) and the radiation physics. There are two overall possibilities of chaos: 1. Either heat is trapped or moving around on global scale - and the best illustration is the autonomous fluidity of air in the weather. For the climate El Niño is the incredible Hulk of such phenomena - but it has its origin in the weather. 2. The external forcings vary chaotically. A chaotic Sun variation of 10% over 10 years will undoubtedly lead to chaotic global temperatures. Note that turbulence is not the predecessor of deterministic chaos. Turbulence is not a deterministic system i.e. the trajectories cannot be plotted with confidence and no simple equations can describe them. Consider the stunning power of radiation physics: It can explain the Earths surface temperature, greenhouse effect included, to about 288K -+ 10K or an error of 3%, perhaps much lower depending mostly on the variations in the general albedo term. BTW: I can easily see how the T^4 term for the radiated power can make one think that the radiation can fluctuate wildly for a small temperature change. However, T^4 is almost linear for the temperature interval from 280K to 300K. The surface albedo, greenhouse gases, aerosols and clouds are mostly described by the radiation physics, and they almost explain the 4K variation in the ice cores. Also, the error bars in the IPCC report are about the error in the understanding of their effect on radiation. The expected stochasticity/chaos is then bootstrapped by the records in combination with the level of understanding of the present state. Or less concisely: What is unknown is perhaps only -+1K or less, including chaotic external forcings as well. That is where chaos has been confined historically and that is why I mention the oceanic climate indices in my post. The most reasonable expectation must then be, to first order, that this is what we can expect in the future. Runaway feedback effects in the global temperature of e.g. crossing the bifurcation point at 450 ppm CO2 are not ruled out. It is just not chaos.
125125. HumanityRules at 23:05 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        At present extreme weather has the greatest impact on lives when it strike the poorest. The only thing that will change that is greater wealth in the poorest countries. The surest route to wealth for these people is unrestrained economic development. There is no attempt here to calculate the death/quality of life from trying to counter global warming through contracting economic development. I'm not sure if there are peer-reviewed papers on this topic, it doesn't seem a priority amoung many global warming scientists.
125126. Philip64 at 22:40 PM on 26 January 2010
        The IPCC's 2035 prediction about Himalayan glaciers
        This error was trumpeted yesterday in the overwhelmingly skeptic Daily Mail in the UK; but the article went on to link the inclusion of the WWF report to the wider issue of whether climate change was responsible for natural disasters. How have they managed to do this? And how should this disinformation be countered? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1245695/UN-climate-change-panel-blunders-wrongly-linking-global-warming-rise-severe-floodings.html Note the poll added beside the article...
125127. Riccardo at 22:07 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        Marcus, resource scarcity may well cause the collapse of a civilization but it's not the only possible outcome. It's all up to the impact of the change and to the choices the society makes.
125128. Riccardo at 22:00 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        HumanityRules, that's the benefit of burning fossils fuels, not global warming.
125129. HumanityRules at 21:28 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        Benefits of global warming. Well if we put it down to the last 150years of burning fossil fuels then were to start..... 1) General improved living conditions of all of humanity. Not a peer-reviewed statement but no less wrong. I heard a beutiful statement today "the people of Bangladesh in 100 years will have the same quality of life as presently enjoyed in the Netherlands". Again non peer-reviewed but a better asperation than doom for us all. (the more progressive amoung us might demand it comes quicker)
        Response: "the people of Bangladesh in 100 years will have the same quality of life as presently enjoyed in the Netherlands"
        
        Actually, 100 years from now, as Bangladesh is such a low lying country, it is one of the regions that will be worst hit by rising sea levels (Dasgupta 2007).
125130. Marcus at 20:54 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        Another analogy Riccardo. The Anasazi were also faced with the same warming event the Mayans faced. For them it caused a decline in the size & number of available trees for construction. Yet even as their available resources became increasingly depleted, they actually became *more* opulent in their consumption patterns. Again, sound familiar? You see, climate change or not, our world is increasingly facing shortage of a number of key resources-water, oil & even coal. Yet instead of curbing our consumption, we're *increasing* our consumption. That's a recipe for societal suicide-much as occurred with the Anasazi, who have disappeared-leaving behind only their huge stone houses!
125131. Marcus at 20:51 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        Riccardo. The Mayans were faced with ever increasing droughts as a result of a much, *much* slower warming period. Eventually it wiped them out as a civilization. Yet I bet that, if you could go back & ask them if they thought these droughts might mean the end of civilization as they knew it, they probably would have answered "no"! I sometimes feel its the same today, that we're so convinced that modern Western Civilization can never end, that we're walking-open eyed-towards our own destruction!
125132. Riccardo at 20:39 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        It's highly misleading to point out that the ecosystem, in some form or another, survived even to huge mass extinctions. Shifting the point of view from humans to nature as a whole is like accepting an eventual self-caused extinction of the human race, or at least of its civilization (beware, i'm not saying it's going to happen, but it's a possible consequence of that kind of reasoning). While it will probably happen anyway in a more or less far future, i'd not be so self-destructive to accelerate our fate.
125133. Riccardo at 19:55 PM on 26 January 2010
        It hasn't warmed since 1998
        michaelkourlas, temperature is not global warming, the trend in temperature is. And, as will be repeated over and over, short term trends has no meaning whatsoever, even just statistically. Look critically at the data shown, ask for the uncertainty in the determination of the trends, look at the determination coefficient (whre shown). And take care, making hypothesis is easy untill you confront them with the known science. Any claim need to be justified quantitatively, which i can't see in the link you posted. Remember, climate change has (don't know why) a strong emotional impact on people, both "alarmists" and "deniers". The most conservative choice is stick to an expert advice, from climatologists; it's the very same thing we all do in our daily lives.
125134. Riccardo at 19:30 PM on 26 January 2010
        We're coming out of the Little Ice Age
        michaelkourlas, you can surely use just a few years to calculate a trend but you can not establish it this way; it would be just a mathematical exercise. Physics, and climate science as well, uses mathematics as a tool but they also give a meaning to the numbers. When the data points have a "noise" of about 0.2 °C and a trend of about 0.17 °C/decade even common sense should convince you that it makes no sense at all to use just 7 years to calculate a meaningful trend. If you really want to understand what is going on with our climate, it would be a good idea not to use "blind" google searches. You know, the internet is a great tool, but you can find almost anything you want. Given that we not always have the knowledge to state the credibility of a source by ourselves, an a priori reasoned choice is mandatory. Or anyone can fool you.
125135. Arkadiusz Semczyszak at 19:21 PM on 26 January 2010
        It's a 1500 year cycle
        "Changes in solar activity do affect the planet's energy imbalance but over the last 50 years, the sun has showed a slight cooling trend." The fact is, however, that before the sun was at its highest activity of 8 thousand. years (max - XIX solar cycle) http://www.aanda.org/images/stories/highlight/vol471-1/7704Usos.gif. We also believe that the sun gives its energy through the ocean - with a delay caused by the cycles presented here (solar, LNC: influencing THC - AMO, PDO, EN(LN)SO, NAO, AO, etc.). We believe, that global, hypothetical most probable period of delay is c. half of the Gleissberg cycle. F.e: light cool twenty-first century may be the result of the extended time of local solar minimum weak, from the 60s twenty century (XX solar cycle).
125136. Arkadiusz Semczyszak at 19:19 PM on 26 January 2010
        It's a 1500 year cycle
        "In contrast, current global warming is occuring in both hemispheres and particularly throughout the world's oceans, indicating a significant energy imbalance." The fact remains that in the natural cycle of climate change we are (were?), when the phase of growing - rising - warming in NH - which show modern statistical data ("For smoothing we use local linear regression ...") presented here: http://www.rni.helsinki.fi/research/info/sizer/fig2big.jpg. It’s not Cherry Picking. "Many palaeoclimate records from earth's North Atlantic region depict a millennial-scale oscillation of climate, which during the last glacial period was highlighted by Dansgaard-Oeschger events that regularly recurred at approximately 1,470-year intervals (Rahmstorf, 2003 )."(by Idso K. and C., 2006). "The 1500 year cycles, known as Dansgaard-Oeschger events, are localized to the northern hemisphere and accompanied with cooling in the southern hemisphere." NIPCC, skeptics, We draw attention to a hypothetical series of circa 4.2 thousand. years (3 x Bond Events). Impact is stronger here - and the SH is only (weaker) warming; and circa 6 thousand. years solar cycle. We propose the following scheme for research: warming causes an increase in water vapor content of atmosphere - K.E. Trenberth, J. Fasullo, L. Smith, 2005: Trends and variability in column-integrated atmospheric water vapor. Fig 11. in this paper: here - on the map - we see that the place of the strongest growth of evaporation are related with the strength and reach of the north of THC (vitally affecting the AMO and AO). We know that present not only evaporation but also the strongest warming - it’s in the Arctic. This results in increased emissions of CO2 from the Arctic Sea, but also warming of Tundra: "Lloyd and Taylor (1994) found that the relative sensitivity to temperature change is much greater for soils at LOW temperatures than for warmer soils. For example, in the absence of moisture limitations, an increase from 0 to 1 deg C would result in a 22% increase in respiration, while an increase from 25 to 26 deg C leads to a 5% increase.", "Thus, modest global change scenarios resulting in a 1 to 2 deg C increase in mean temperature would have the most significant effect on the 60 g C/m2 year respired by tundra. [... and in the tundra - c. 1 / 5 land area - where the temperature has risen the most - from 2 to 3 deg C; and soil detritus is a great weight - most of the accumulated 21,6 kg C x m -2 (average) ...] (http://www.biology.duke.edu/bio265/ajm21/intro.html). At present, oxidation occurs at the age of detritus of several thousand to 10. thousand years. The ratio of carbon isotopes 14/13/12C - so here is similar to the fossil carbon. We believe that the cyclicality of the climate (in this and the Millennium) have a decisive influence solar cycles - direct; and through its impact on the moon - an indirect (LNC-LNO). We recommend to discuss in particular, the work: - http://ansatte.hials.no/hy/tide/default.htm, - Lunar nodal tide effects on variability of sea level, temperature, and salinity in the Faroe-Shetland Channel and the Barents Sea (Yndestad H. at al., 2008); - The 18.6-year lunar nodal cycle and surface temperature variability in the northeast Pacific (McKinnell, SM , and WR Crawford; 2007 ), - The impacts of the Luni-Solar oscillation on the Arctic oscillation (Ramos da Silva, R. , and R. Avissar; 2005 ), - Trends and anomalies in sea-surface temperature, observed over the last 60 years, within the southeastern Bay of Biscay (Goikoetxea N.; 2009), - Solar Forcing of Changes in Atmospheric Circulation, Earth's Rotation Solar (Mazzarella A.; 2008).
125137. Marcus at 18:30 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        We're not burning fossilized dinosaurs, RSVP, we mostly burn fossilized trees. As for the benefits of global warming in winter-time, what about the negative impacts during spring & summer? Excessive warming can create major shifts in the spring & summer rainfall on which our agriculture relies. Increased warming can also lead to increased senescence, which in effect means that crops will "grow old before their time", resulting in decreased biomass. Also, there are signs in the literature that increased CO2 levels pushes plant biomass from seed production towards vegetative biomass. These 3 factors could combine to substantially decrease the amount of edible biomass on the planet (well for humans at any rate). This doesn't just impact on humans directly, but also on the biomass of the livestock animals which eat vegetable matter. That seems a pretty poor substitute for warmer winters to me (especially when one considers the role of winter weather in recharging aquifers). As to the ability of past animals & plants to survive in warmer conditions-well isn't it funny how 99% of the animals that thrived then no longer seem to be with us? Also, whilst dinosaurs, conifers & ferns might have thrived in a warm CO2 rich atmosphere, the mammals & edible grasses-on which our modern agriculture depends-all evolved in a cooler low-CO2 environment.
125138. RSVP at 17:49 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        As the snow blows sidewise in the darkness outside, I make my best effort to convince myself of the negative effects of global warming. As created, I am egotistic by nature, and what might be positive to me, could well be negative to someone else. There is also this aspect of degree. A little global warming might be generally beneficial, a lot on the other hand, catastrophic. As far as concerns for Nature, there was a time when life thrived on a very much warmer planet. Not sure why this is never mentioned on this site. Maybe there is some connection afterall between AGW and burning fossilized dinosaurs.
        Response: "there was a time when life thrived on a very much warmer planet.  Not sure why this is never mentioned on this site"
        
        This idea is explored when considering whether animals and plants can adapt to global warming. The reason why nature is at threat from current global warming is because the rate of current warming is so rapid (and expected to accelerate), we're heading into temperatures that most existing species have never experienced and species are already under threat from other human impacts.
125139. Tom Dayton at 16:53 PM on 26 January 2010
        We're coming out of the Little Ice Age
        michaelkourlas wrote "maybe I'm making a mistake, but I thought that the black line was the IPCC trend." Michael, you are indeed making a mistake, as Riccardo tried to explain to you. The IPCC prediction is the entire gray area in that figure. The black line is merely the mean, which is merely the most probable point-by-point portion--the central tendency of the prediction, not the range of the prediction. The range is the gray area. Nobody, least of all the IPCC, expects the actual values to always fall exactly on the line. Nobody even expects the actual values to always fall within the gray area. Instead the expectation is that sometimes the actual values will be above the line and sometimes below the line, but on average they will fall more or less the same amount of time above as below the line, and almost all of the time they will fall within the gray area. When you pick out the most recent four years as being below the black line, you are conveniently ignoring the several periods before that being above the line. Oh, but then you could point to the previous couple years being below the line. But then you'd be ignoring the years before that being far above the line.... And so on. If you play that game all the way back to the start of the graph, you see that on average the actual values spend nearly as much time above as below the line, and always inside the gray area. There are formal, systematic ways of doing the above analysis. They were not invented for climatology. They have been used for many decades in many different fields of science and technology. They are being applied to climatology in exactly the same way. You can start to learn about them by reading Tamino's post "How Long?"
125140. barry1487 at 14:56 PM on 26 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        Thanks for this post. At Deltoid I posted a few links to Watts commenting on requests for analysis of the good stations, including his advice that he'd do it when 75% of the USHCN stations were surveyed. http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010/01/so_thats_why_surfacestationsor.php#comment-2226935 I was very intrigued to see what happened at WUWT after reading Menne et al, and not overly surprised that there has been nothing thus far - even though the denizens there make sure that anything interesting to them hits WUWT within a few hours of being put online. I hope there will be a post on Menne et al. It will provide a fine opportunity to pin Watts down on the analysis question. Hopefully some bright sparks will post something polite and on the money, that he will look dishonest if he wriggles.
125141. michaelkourlas at 13:52 PM on 26 January 2010
        It hasn't warmed since 1998
        

        Look at this link for information on global warming stagnation since 2002: LINK The site is run by Ole Humlum, Professor of Physical Geography at the Department of Geosciences, University of Oslo. He says that "all five global temperature estimates presently show stagnation, at least since 2002. There has been no increase in global air temperature since 1998, which was affected by the oceanographic El Niño event. This does not exclude the possibility that global temperatures will begin to increase again later. On the other hand, it also remain a possibility that Earth just now is passing a temperature peak, and that global temperatures will begin to decrease within the coming 5-10 years. Only time will show which of these possibilities is the correct."

125142. michaelkourlas at 13:33 PM on 26 January 2010
        It hasn't warmed since 1998
        In reply to the above ocean comment, doesn't the fact that measurements conflict depending on depth cast doubt on whether or not the oceans are warming or cooling?
        Response: No, it shows that the upper ocean exchanges heat with the deeper ocean, leading to more variability in the upper ocean but a steadier trend in the overall ocean.
125143. Marcus at 13:04 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        Actually, on a bright note, CSIRO scientists recently found that the rise in temperature needed to melt the methane clathrates is actually *higher* than previously thought. Doesn't help us much with CO2-induced warming, but a sudden release of methane from the clathrates could have resulted in a mass extinction much like that at the Permian-Triassic boundary!
125144. J Bowers at 12:45 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        "Response: While looking at your papers, I discovered AGW Observer has a page devoted to papers on methane emissions which I'll need to peruse when I get the chance (well, rediscovered as AGW Observer is in my blog reader)." Yes, it's an excellent resource. Go to the Index page for a wealth of resources.
125145. michaelkourlas at 12:40 PM on 26 January 2010
        We're coming out of the Little Ice Age
        Also look here for the natural vs anthropogenic prediction information (http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/PredictionFromCycles.htm)
125146. Marcus at 12:38 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        Oh, here are some papers which might be of value for the impacts page: There's this paper about reduced micro-nutrient uptake by plants in high CO2 environments. "Rising atmospheric CO2 and human nutrition: toward globally imbalanced plant stoichiometry?"
125147. trrll at 12:38 PM on 26 January 2010
        On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
        Some of the comments seem to reflect a fundamental confusion between precision and accuracy. Precision is the reproducibility of measurement, whereas accuracy is how well the value corresponds to the real value. The use of temperature anomalies recognizes that it is possible for a measurement to be precise but not accurate. For example, a temperature station that is located close to an air conditioner will, on the average, read warmer than one that is located far from the air conditioner. Fortunately, to evaluate climate change, you don't need accurate measurement of absolute temperature, you only need to determine how the temperature has changed over time, by subtracting the average temperature to compute the temperature anomaly, any average bias is subtracted, allowing precise determination of how temperature change over time. So are Watts's photos of temperature stations next to air conditioners irrelevant? Well, not necessarily. Suppose the temperature station is at some point moved closer to the air conditioner. Then there might be an increase in the temperature anomaly that does not reflect an increase in the average temperature at that site. Now, it seems pretty improbably that this would happen frequently enough to affect the trend appreciably, but somebody who desperately wants to disbelieve in global warming will clutch at any straw. So how do you test whether poor siting of temperature measurement stations really is associated with a greater warming trend, which could possibly be due to increased exposure to environmental factors that increase the measured temperature? You compare the trend in the temperature anomalies of the well-sited stations to that of the poorly sited stations. And what is the result? The poorly sited stations slightly underestimate the warming trend, rather than overestimating it. This pretty conclusively disposes of the bad siting hypothesis for the warming trend. I'd have to agree that it is a bit suspicious that Watt and colleagues have not reached, and reported, this conclusion themselves. It is hard not to suspect that they got the same results and chose not to report it because it didn't fit their hypothesis. To be charitable, sometimes when people get results that are inconsistent with a pet hypothesis, they are emotionally incapable of accepting that fact, and fall into perseveration, collecting more and more data in the hopes that if they get enough data the numbers will turn around--a bit like a compulsive gambler riding a losing streak deeper and deeper into debt in the conviction that sooner or later his luck will turn.
125148. Marcus at 12:26 PM on 26 January 2010
        Peer reviewed impacts of global warming
        Peter, how much easier will it to be to get people that education if they're not dirt poor? Over-reliance on non-renewable sources of energy has kept many nations deeply in debt to those nations who have large surpluses of those resources-& so the cycle continues. I'm not suggesting its the only cause of poverty, but imagine how much more money they'd have to spend on health & education if they didn't have to spend billions per year-to foreign nations-on enough fossil fuels to keep vehicles running & the lights running.
125149. michaelkourlas at 12:16 PM on 26 January 2010
        We're coming out of the Little Ice Age
        This is a good site for examining IPCC predictions and their failures.
125150. michaelkourlas at 12:14 PM on 26 January 2010
        We're coming out of the Little Ice Age
        One can establish a trend from just a few years. The question is whether or not that trend is enough to justify spending large amounts of money and devastating certain economic sectors in the name of 'saving humanity'. I don't think 30 years of data, 10 of which show a decline in temperature, is sufficient for this. As for the IPCC predictions, maybe I'm making a mistake, but I thought that the black line was the IPCC trend, and the blue and red lines showing temperature have deviated from that line since 2005. That's at least 1/6th of the 30 year trend off course.

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