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Comment Search Results

Search for Patrick Michaels

Comments matching the search Patrick Michaels:

There's no empirical evidence

scaddenp at 14:08 PM on 25 March, 2019

More links to issues with Michaels.

https://skepticalscience.com/skeptic_Patrick_Michaels.htm
LINK

There's no empirical evidence

scaddenp at 11:00 AM on 25 March, 2019

Firstly, let me apologise for the insult, which it was. I still find the statement extraordinary but my response was over the line.

Your comment about logging might be true but utterly irrelevant. What the science does is study what has been done, good or bad, and then log what its effect on climate parameters are. My point is that climatalogical effects from human land-use activity was accounted for and plainly visible in the reports.

In my experience of working in science in for 40 year, is that scientists are most skeptical people I know. On this site, we dont swear by some predicate on global warming, we swear by whereever the evidence takes it. Much of my working life has been in coal then oil, and I can assure that evidence disproving a risk from CO2 emissions would be most welcome. My government has effectively cancelled funding of fossil fuels and so my colleagues and I have been reassigned.

What we do scoff at is garbage pulmagated by disinformation which distort or malign science for generally political and/or ideological goals. For more detail on what Michaels has said, Try here. Remember too that the IPCC only summarizes what the published science has stated. If you think it has got it wrong, then where is your evidence for that? If it doesnt come from an area where you have specialist domain knowledge, then it had better be peer-reviewed. Science commentary from institutions created to push a political ideology has to be especially suspect. As I wrote here, liberatians in particular seem have a problem with climate mitigation solutions. The correct response however isnt "I cant see a solution that is compatiable with my ideology, ergo problem cant exist".

There's no empirical evidence

JoeZ at 10:30 AM on 25 March, 2019

Good forest mgt. is NOT deforestation. Deforestation is the destruction of the forest for some other purpose, like a huge solar farm- which causes that landscape to no longer sequester carbon nor produce oxygen. Without good forest mgt. which means some timber cutting based on proper silviculture- you can't live in wood houses with wood furniture and with paper products. And there are "environmentalists" in Massachusetts (who strongly influence others around the USA) who really do want to stop all forest mgt. since they can't grasp the consequences and they can't grasp that good forest mgt. will NOT have to result in less carbon stored in forests. Most forests are in poor condition from past bad logging practices. The way to improve them so they can do a better job of carbon sequestering and oxygen production is through silviculture. Look it up. As for peer reviews papers- I've been a professional forester since Nixon was in the White House so they have nothing on me. I find it ironic that this site is supposed to be about having a skeptical attitude but I find that those who swear by the idea that humans are the cause of global warming, while enjoying criticizing anyone who doesn't believe that, have no sense of skepticism of the the IPCC. I'd suggest a true skeptic will be skeptical of just about everyone including scientists, all religeons, all governments, all organizations. I certainly am. So, I'm not a "deniar" but I don't think the IPCC has all the answers either. As for Patrick Michaels, all I see so far is that he is a lobbyist- I see little commentary on what he has actually said. Since he was once the national president of the associaton of state climatologists- I find it odd that some people consider him not to be qualified to offer his thoughts. Instead, you use an "ad hominem" with your "This is an astonishing statement and does not give me confidence about your discernment skills." Personal insults aren't convincing.

There's no empirical evidence

John Hartz at 03:08 AM on 25 March, 2019

JoeZ @370: You opine:

I sense that few people have more qualifications to discuss the subject than Dr. Michaels.

Wrong! There are hundreds of legitimate climate scientist throughout the world who are eminently more qualified than Patrick Michaels to speak on the topic.

Please read DeSmog's profile of Michaels:

https://www.desmogblog.com/patrick-michaels

There's no empirical evidence

JoeZ at 00:50 AM on 25 March, 2019

I've read much of this thread. I'm sitting on the fence because I can see and appreciate ideas from both sides. Here's my question: what percentage of climate change is due to human causes, and that being mostly carbon emissions? Of course the climate is changing and of course CO2 is greenhouse gas. But I haven't yet seen any convincing argument that it's almost entirely due to carbon emissions. My skepticism of GW due primarely from human causes comes from the work of Dr. Patrck Michaels: https://www.cato.org/people/patrick-michaels. He may be wrong but he's certainly not a "flake". His YouTube video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fA5sGtj7QKQ is very convincing- yet I'm not convinced- only keeping my mind open to all ideas. As to why I'm expecially interested in this subject- I may get into at some other time. I sense that few people have more qualifications to discuss the subject than Dr. Michaels.

30 years later, deniers are still lying about Hansen’s amazing global warming prediction

Oortcloud at 01:12 AM on 27 June, 2018

Patrick Michaels is not the only one presenting false information. Here (https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/enso/mei/) is the NOAA ENSO record. YThe author cherry-picked his start date so as to eliminate the 1998 El Nino event. Since 1999 there has been 0ne lengthy La Nina immediately following the 1998 El Nino event. All 5 of the others have been short and weak. What the author has failed to mention is that the period he chose is the period of the pause in warming. The 2015 El Nino upped temperatures tremendously, but the latest La Nina and current neutral period has dropped temps down to pause level again.

Hansen made no "prediction" about the warming rate in arctic. "Arctic amplification" is a known effect of the Hadley circulation and had been known well before Hansen's testimony.

We have not seen "dramatic" warming as the author puts it. Warming has been less than 1C and is well within natural variability as shown by paleo reconstruction of the LIA and RWP.

Researching climate change communication at George Mason University

Martin Gisser at 01:17 AM on 9 September, 2016

GMU had quite a bad name - until recently? Patrick Michaels, S. Fred Singer, Ed Wegman. Lots of Koch brothers money.

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/George_Mason_University

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/04/16/858016/-George-Mason:-Climate-Denial-U

http://www.desmogblog.com/koch-and-george-mason-university

But now: Great to see you go there!

Climate scientists' open letter to the Wall Street Journal on its snow job

ryland at 21:10 PM on 29 January, 2016

Apologies. On reflection it occurred to me that I don't know how the temperature increase due to El Mino can be estimated to "tenths of a degree". Can an estimate be that precise? And how is the estimation of the proportion due to El Nino actually made? I also don't know how Patrick Michaels can assert the temperature rise in 2015 was due to El Nino without some attempt to substantiate that assertion.

I guess this is the problem with explaining climate science to the layman, its not possible to be as definitive as, for example, I can be in giving the results from some biochemical measurement.

What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper

mwsmith12 at 20:37 PM on 18 June, 2015

This is important because it illustrates how contrarians leverage these details into doubt and suspicion.

This is a quote from post by Patrick Michaels, Richard Lindzen, and Paul Knappenberger over at WUWT. I don't read that site, but posts from there get used everywhere, so I had to deal with this one:

"In addition, the authors’ treatment of buoy sea-surface temperature (SST) data was guaranteed to create a warming trend. The data were adjusted upward by 0.12°C to make them “homogeneous” with the longer-running temperature records taken from engine intake channels in marine vessels.

"As has been acknowledged by numerous scientists, the engine intake data are clearly contaminated by heat conduction from the structure, and as such, never intended for scientific use. On the other hand, environmental monitoring is the specific purpose of the buoys. Adjusting good data upward to match bad data seems questionable, and the fact that the buoy network becomes increasingly dense in the last two decades means that this adjustment must put a warming trend in the data."

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/06/04/noaas-new-paper-is-there-no-global-warming-hiatus-after-all/

The authors are trying to convince me that homogonization is cheating. They put it in quotes. Well, I already know why homogenization is important and how it improves data qaulity, but even so, why add 0.12C to all the buoys when the buoys were designed for this and should be more accurate than measurements from ships that are just trying to get from A to B as fast as possible?

And despite my being a career software engineer who at least reads a lot of climate science reportage and the occassional paper, and who understands the scientific method and the concepts of statistics etc, I was still left with some doubt because it isn't clear to me why data that seem to me to be more accurate are adjusted up to be compatible with data that seem to me to be less accurate.

Having now understood the explanation, I can't believe the three authors of the WUWT post don't know it already. And if so, their objection is disingenuous at best. But it would be very useful to the general public if each scientific paper could have an accompanying link to a page on which these explanations are provided, together with the perhaps bogus objections that require them.

Maybe a section here at Skeptical Science, where these papers are catalogued toghether with all the contributed explanations for questions like: Why did we add 0.12C to the buoy data, and why is that the right thing to do?

The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator

Philip Shehan at 23:22 PM on 11 June, 2015

Thanks for the comments KR. Fully understand that you are too busy to deal with theose long posts . (And thank you moderator).

A summary then:

The problem with Whitehouse (first link) is that he basically says that non statistically significant warming translates to evidence for a "pause."

This is acommon argument I get from "skeptics".

Their argument is that less than 95% (actually 97.5%, as half the 95% confidence limits are on the high side) probabiility of a warming trend equates to evidence of no warming trend.

Whitehouse also wants to exclude the years 1999 and 200o from trends on these grounds:

“It occurred immediately after the very unusual El Niño of 1998 (said by some to be a once in a century event) and clearly the two subsequent La Niña years must be seen as part of that unusual event. It would be safer not to include 1999-2000 in any La Niña year comparisons.”

To which I commented:

Whitehouse thinks it is entirely kosher to start with the el nino event of 1998 in a trend analysis and presumably include the years 1998 and 1999 in that trend, [ to justify a pasue claim] but you must not start with the years 1999 and 2000. [Starting at 1999 for UAH data gives the same warming trend as for the entire satellite record. Not statistically significant. "Only'' a 94.6% chance that there is a warming trend from 1999. ]

Is it only me who finds this gobsmacking?

I also wrote

[Whitehouse] says “Lean and Rind (2009) estimate that 76% of the temperature variability observed in recent decades is natural.”

No. On the graph itself it states that the model including natural and anthropogenic forcings fits the data with a correlation coefficient r of 0.87.

And the Figure legend says that “Together the four influences [ie natural and anthropogenic] explain 76% r^2 [0.87 x 0.87] of the variance in the global temperature observations.”

Patrick J. Michaels, Richard S. Lindzen, andPaul C. Knappenberger (second link) write of the recent paper by Karl et al:

“The significance level they report on their findings (0.10) is hardly normative, and the use of it should prompt members of the scientific community to question the reasoning behind the use of such a lax standard.”

Yet further on Michaels, Lindzen,and Knappenberger claim:

“Additionally, there exist multiple measures of bulk lower atmosphere temperature independent from surface measurements which indicate the existence of a “hiatus"…Both the UAH and RSS satellite records are now in their 21st year without a significant trend, for example.”

Here are the trends for UAH, RSS and Berkeley data (the most comprehensive surface data set ) from 1995 at the 0.05 level

0.124 ±0.149 °C/decade

0.030 ±0.149 °C/decade

0.129 ±0.088 °C/decade

So, Michaels, Lindzen, and Knappenberger object to statistical significance at the 90% level used by Karl et al.

Yet they base their claim of “multiple measures of bulk lower atmosphere temperature independent from surface measurements which indicate the existence of a “hiatus” on two data sets which have a probability of a “hiatus” or a cooling trend of 4.8% (UAH) and 34.5% (RSS).

Again, is it just me or is these double standards here amazing?

Then there is Springer (third link)

Singer objects to non satellite data “with its well-known problems”. and write of RSS data:

“the pause is still there, starting around 2003 [see Figure; it shows a sudden step increase around 2001, not caused by GH gases].”

I note:

UAH 0.075 ±0.278 °C/decade

RSS -0.031 ±0.274 °C/decade

So UAH shows a slight warming trend and RSS shows a slight cooling trend but unsurprisingly, for a 12 year time frame, you can drive a bus between the error margins.

As for the step claim. Nonsense, aided by selecting a colour coded graph that foster that impression. No more a step than plenty of other places on the non-colour coded graphs.

Singer also writes:

“Not only that, but the same satellite data show no warming trend from 1979 to 2000 – ignoring, of course, the exceptional super-El-Nino year of 1998.”

Again “skeptics” have been cherry picking the exceptional el nino of 1998 to base on which to base their “no warming for x years” claim for years.

But because it does not suit his argument, Singer wants to exclude it here.

Then Singer decides that non-satellite data is kosher after all because it suits his argument.

I am told that I must bow to the experts here.

Am I crazy or are these people utterly incompetant or dishonest when it comes to statistical significance?

The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator

Philip Shehan at 00:38 AM on 10 June, 2015

Have been getting all sorts of grief over at Bolt for pointing out a number of problems with "skeptics" use of temperature data, and using the trend calculator for this purpose.

I am told that I should contact directly the people whose interpretation I criticise and offer tham right of reply. Just like the "skeptics" do with scintistrs they bucket on blogs. (Yes, sarcasm.)

Actually I have on occasion have failed to do so in the case of Fred Singer, David Whitehouse and Patrick J. Michaels, Richard S. Lindzen, and Paul C. Knappenberge

I have told one critic, on numerous occasions that i have checked the trends with those produced by , among others, Monckton, McKitrick, and those who leapt on Jones' "admission" that a 15 year warming trend was not statistically significant, but nearly so, and the trend calculator results match theirs. I have also explained repeatedly the necessity for autocorrelation to be used with temperature data and referred him to this link.

Yet he wrote today.

The calculation that he [that is me] uses is a method written by a shill that just doesn’t make sense and comes out two to three times larger than you would get if you treated the noise as just random.

I will encourage him to represent his argument here.

But thank you for this valuable tool

Of interest this week are the following posts of mine;

On Anthony Watts blog, Patrick J. Michaels, Richard S. Lindzen, and Paul C. Knappenberger dispute a recent paper by Karl et al which questions whether there has been a “hiatus” in global warming.

This new paper, right or wrong, does not affect my primary argument on claims of a “hiatus”.

Which is that such claims do not meet (in fact do not come within a bulls roar of) the criterion of statistical significance.

What is of interest is that the criticisms of Michaels, Lindzen,and Knappenberger again demonstrate the way that skeptics apply totally different standards of statistical significance depending on how they want to spin the data.

The critique of the paper says:

True, the usual standard of statistical significance is the 0.05, 95% or 2 sigma level. The 0.10 level means that there is a 90% probability that the trend is significant

Yet further on Michaels, Lindzen,and Knappenberger claim:

Here are the trends for UAH, RSS and Berkeley data (the most comprehensive surface data set ) from 1995 at the 0.05 level

0.124 ±0.149 °C/decade

0.030 ±0.149 °C/decade

0.129 ±0.088 °C/decade

The Berkeley data shows statistically significant warming trend, as do 5 other surface data sets, with mean trend and error of

0.122 ± 0.093 °C/decade

So, Michaels, Lindzen, and Knappenberger object to statistical significance at the 90% level used by Karl et al.

I mean, these people have the chutzpah to write “the use of [a confidence level of 90%] should prompt members of the scientific community to question the reasoning behind the use of such a lax standard” yet pin their case for a “hiatus” on such a low statistical probability for two cherry picked data sets.

Why we need to talk about the scientific consensus on climate change

JoeK at 08:45 AM on 21 November, 2014

Do you think that Obama's tweet was a fair representation of your study? I'm thinking particularly of the way that he added 'dangerous' to the consensus. I may have missed it, but I couldn't find the word danger in your ERL publication, or the Guardian blog post you linked to announcing it.

Does this matter? I think it does. Many skeptics (including e.g. Christopher Monckton, Patrick Michaels and Roy Spencer) have claimed that they are part of 'the 97%' on the grounds that they believe climate change is real and man made.

I suspect that if the consensus was 'real, man made and dangerous' then they would have a much harder time claiming to be part of the consensus.

To quote one of your critics, Andrew Montford:

"Differences over extent of any human influence is the essence of the climate debate. The vast majority of those involved – scientists, economists, commentators, activists, environmentalists and sceptics – accept that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas that will, other things being equal, warm the planet. But whether the effect is large or small is unknown and the subject of furious debate. The IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report shows a range of figures for effective climate sensitivity – the amount of warming that can be expected from a doubling of carbon dioxide levels. At one end are studies based on observations and suggesting little more than 1◦C of warming per doubling. If true, this would mean that climate change was inconsequential. At the other end are estimates based on computer simulations, which would, if realised, be disastrous."
http://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2014/09/Warming-consensus-and-it-critics1.pdf

In short, these skeptics often claim that your study simply missed the point.

It may be that you're not interested in engaging with skeptics such as Montford or Michaels, and are more interested in talking to a wider 'unconvinced' public (although even there, I believe you have things wrong). Have you considered the possibility that some of the "criticisms from scientists who accept the science on climate change" arose because those scientists are engaging with a different audience, skeptics such as Montford and Michaels, where simply asserting that climate change is 'real and man made' does indeed miss the point?

IPCC overestimate temperature rise

Bob Loblaw at 11:40 AM on 13 November, 2014

As a followup to KR's last sentence, you can get a look at what a pseudo-skeptic does with this comparison by looking at this Skeptical Science post about Pat Michaels.

IPCC model global warming projections have done much better than you think

KR at 22:56 PM on 1 October, 2013

fretslider - Astounding. You make claims of data distortion by linking to a figure that has in fact been airbrushed and reworked to remove critical data.

Even with the incorrect 1990 baselining, the draft figure 1.4 (seen here) includes a light grey region that shows the range of model variations and the uncertainties in temperature measurements, the expected range around model means due to natural variation. Observations are well within those bounds. McIntyre's reworked figure that you point to above lacks the range of model variations, showing only the range of model ensemble means - see denial tactic #2 in the opening post.

That reworked McIntyre figure (along with other 'skeptics' like Patrick Michaels in Forbes, who edited the figure captioning and falsely claimed: "The very large grey zone is irrelevant to the forecasts that were made") is a clear distortion. I would go so far as to say it is a demonstrable lie about the science on McIntyre's part. Don't be fooled.

Patrick Michaels: Cato's Climate Expert Has History Of Getting It Wrong

Phronesis at 16:33 PM on 22 September, 2013

Under the heading "Patrick Michaels' Losing Bets", there is only one losing bet. The second bet listed is his new bet about a 25-year pause. This is not a losing bet, as it is currently active, and will not be resolved until 2021/2022. Shouldn't this be removed as a "losing bet"?

The Economist Screws Up on the Draft IPCC AR5 Report and Climate Sensitivity

Tom Curtis at 14:38 PM on 25 July, 2013

Richard Lawson @19, I would be interested in how you found that "slew" of papers. A search of google scholar for "climate", "sensitivity" post 2008 returned 282,000 hits. I doubt you have read even 10% of them so as to be able to determine that they are dominated by low sensitivity results. I suspect that you may have read about the "slew" of papers on some denier site where (if they are like Patrick Michaels or WUWT), they only report the few papers returning a low climate sensitivity and not those many others reporting a high climate sensitivity. Thus they will not have reported on Haywood et al, (2013) which reports climate sensitivities from 2.7 to 4.1 C per doubling of CO2 from a comparison of the output of eight models with pliocene conditions (table 2). Nor on Eagle et al (2013), which report a high regional climate sensitivity in central China. Nor on Li et al (2013), which report a climate sensitivity of 5.4 C per doubling of CO2. Nor (finally) on Previdi et al (2011), who report that the Earth System Sensitivity, ie, the climate response allowing for slow feedback such a the retreat of ice sheets etc, may well have an impact in periods short enough to be relevant to policy.

However, it is not true that all recent low climate sensitivity estimates have been based on simple energy budget models, nor that their use are the cause of the low estimate. Schmittner et al, for example, use the Uvic earth system model, but reach their low sensitivity estimate because of the (probably unrealisticly) low estimate of the difference in temperature between the LGM and the present. Nic Lewis's recent two recent efforts (only one of which was peer reviewed) have low sensitivities at least in part because they do not allow for the effects of recent La Nina's (which will cause the estimated climate sensitivity to be low).

Patrick Michaels: Cato's Climate Expert Has History Of Getting It Wrong

Old Mole at 08:52 AM on 17 July, 2013

I have a couple of problems with this article, although I am by no means a fan of Pat Michaels.

"Yet during that time [2007 to July 2011], Michaels only published four peer-reviewed climate articles. In comparison, 97 percent of the most actively publishing climate researchers agree that "most" of recent warming is manmade, and 84 percent of climate scientists say the public should be told to be worried or "very worried" about climate change. Despite this, USA TODAY, The Washington Post, and CNN all hosted or quoted Patrick Michaels in 2012."

I have no data to go on (although John Cook may well have, having just done a paper ) but based on no more than the SkS policy of citing learned articles as (Whozitz, 2013) and not (Whozitz, 2013a, b, and c) that one peer-reviewed article per year would put him in at least the upper quartile of those publishing, not the lower quartile as this paragraph rhetorically implies. I would be much more interested in how he got the sort of nonsense he persists in spouting in interviews past peer review.

Yes, he does get 40% of his funding from the fossil fuel industry, and yes, the Cato Institute was the Charles Koch Foundation for the first two years of its existence. You justifiably heap scorn on his claim that scientists support AGW because of "funding" (not money ... I think there is a difference) because that is an extraordinary claim for which he provides no evidence. But where is your evidence that Pat Michaels would be saying anything different if he did not receive any money from the fossil fuel industry? While not directly stated, the imputation is of venality on his part, and while I can believe there are some people who would be willing to prostitute themselves into saying anything in their client's interest, most of them go into law rather than science. Corelation is not evidence of causation.

Today is the 68th anniversary of the first field test of the biggest science project in history, in Los Alamos, New Mexico. I wish you all the best of luck keeping politics out of your science project ,,, at least much more than those scientists had.

Best wishes,

Mole

Patrick Michaels: Cato's Climate Expert Has History Of Getting It Wrong

citizenschallenge at 14:06 PM on 14 July, 2013

This is too timely and too good not to share.

Thanks.

Patrick Michaels - renowned AGW contrarian - a closer look

http://whatsupwiththatwatts.blogspot.com/2013/07/patrick-michaels-renowned-agw.html

Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus

danielbacon at 22:55 PM on 30 October, 2012

There is must to-do about the 97-98% but who are the 2%’ers really.
If they are publishing in field, what are they saying (links to their abstracts). I realize the surveys will not list the participants, but I really cannot come up with 2%

If we exclude the non-scientists nuts who is left?

I know of:
John Christy
Roy Spencer

I would exclude “Patrick Michaels” he only has one published work in Nature or am I wrong not to include him. Anyway it would be nice to have a post of these 2%’ers and their works.

Record Arctic Sea Ice Melt to Levels Unseen in Millennia

Mal Adapted at 06:17 AM on 6 September, 2012

funglestrumpet @ 31:

DesmogBlog maintains a denier database. Their entry on Pat Michaels is here. It includes some funding info.

Record Arctic Sea Ice Melt to Levels Unseen in Millennia

funglestrumpet at 01:55 AM on 6 September, 2012

I seached for any information regarding any funding that he might have received from what might be considered 'undesirable' sources, but found none. I think such information would be valuable. I found something about Patrick Michaels recently, but have forgotten where. I think I just assumed that should I need it again, this site was bound to have it. Wrong!

This information would help in forming an opinion regarding someone's veracity and it would best be found under their'skeptics' section entry. If none is known, then perhaps it should clearly state 'no known funding issues' or such like.

Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change

David Lewis at 15:17 PM on 24 August, 2012

He doesn't know anything about climate change. [-snip-]

Eg: When he appeared alongside Fred Singer, Patrick Michaels, Lindzen, Tim Ball, etc., in the movie The Great Global Warming Swindle, Moore explained to the world why climate change became a major issue:

"The shift to climate being a major focal point came about for two very distinct reasons. The first reason was because by the mid-'80s the majority of people now agreed with all the reasonable things we in the environmental movement were saying they should do. Now, when a majority of people agree with you, it's pretty hard to remain confrontational with them. And so the only way to remain anti-establishment was to adopt ever more extreme positions. When I left Greenpeace, it was in the midst of them adopting a campaign to ban chlorine worldwide. Like I said, 'You guys, this is one of the elements in the periodic table, you know. I mean, I'm not sure that's within our jurisdiction to be banning a whole element. The other reason that environmental extremism emerged was because Communism fell, the wall came down, and a lot of peaceniks and communists moved into the environmental movement, bringing their neo-Marxism with them, and learned to use green language in a very clever way to cloak agendas that actually have more to do with anti-capitalism and anti-globalization than anything with ecology or science"

Patrick Michaels' 1992 claims versus the 2012 reality

Composer99 at 04:50 AM on 23 August, 2012

MarkR:

I am referring to comparisons such as:

IPCC 1990: "models show a significant equilibrium increase in global average surface temperature due to a doubling of CO2 which ranges from 1.9 to 5.2°C...Most results lie between 3.5 and 4 C...[including other evidence] a value of 2.5°C is considered to be the best guess in the light of current knowledge."
Patrick Michaels, 1992: "The mid-1980s’ General Circulation Models (GCMs) for climate change stated, in aggregate, that the planet would warm up some 4.2 C due to doubling of the natural CO2 greenhouse effect"

or:

IPCC, 1990: "The areas of warming are generally greater at high latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere than at low latitudes"
Patrick Michaels 1992: "They further predicted that the warming would be greater and sooner in the Northern Hemisphere...The Northern Hemisphere shows none; the Southern Hemisphere...shows more"

or:

IPCC, 1990: "The Greenland ice sheet contributes positively to sea level rise, but...the uncertainties are very large"
IPCC 1990: "...future increases in temperature and consequently, sea level are unavoidable"
Patrick Michaels, 1992: It is also pretty hard to melt the Greenland Ice Cap in winter, so much of the concern[s] about sea level rise vanish." [Emphasis mine.]
[I have concatenated the two relevant IPCC quotes for which the same Michaels quote is used.]

or:

IPCC 1990: "All three [satellite, weather balloon & thermometer] datasets show a small positive trend over the period 1979-1988...These trends are not significantly different over this short period"
Patrick Michaels, 1992: "Since 1979, we have had orbiting platforms that can measure the temperature of the lower atmosphere with an accuracy of +0.01 C, and they have found no warming" [Emphasis mine.]

Michaels may or may not have been expressing scientifically-minded skepticism in 1992, but it seems clear to me that he was nevertheless incorrectly characterizing such accumulated evidence as was available at the time.

Global Warming - A Health Warning

Bob Lacatena at 22:45 PM on 22 August, 2012

Dale,

First, your chemistry is out of whack. The only building block one needs to create ozone is O2. Pollutants accelerate the production of ozone, but are not necessary. So your statement that "it doesn't matter how much higher the temp is" is completely false. In either a polluted or a pollution free environment higher temperatures coupled with UV radiation will produce more ozone.

But for now, in a pollution-intense environment, reducing pollutants is having a notable effect.

Your statement on thermal inversion impacts is confusing. Inversions are a local phenomenon, caused by many local factors. What does global warming have to do with more inversions? Inversions will simply help to create an environment where global warming can cause more days of dangerously high ozone levels.

I already addressed your statement about trends. Monthly and annual averages are useless because if you double the "dangerous ozone level days" from 2 to 4, your average may still drop because ozone levels other days drop.

All the trends now show is that anti-pollution action is helping. It says nothing whatsoever about global warming.

At the same time, once again... there are many effects that you will not statistically recognize after 0.6˚C to 0.8˚C of warming, effects that will be very pronounced with 2˚C to 4˚C of warming.

You are like the man who jumped from the top of the skyscraper, and was heard to say every time he passed an open window: "so far, so good."

Lastly, you previously said:

I ask because I'm curious (I'm in Australia, so UV and ozone are of concern for me), not to say "ah ha".

Yet you are insistent on the tired old meme that "it hasn't happened yet, so it won't happen." You should look at this recent post about how Patrick Michaels did the same thing back in 1990.

You've been given explanations as to why your logic is flawed, and yet you cling to the hope that this is a non-issue, and you close your eyes to the problem.

Sorry, Dale. From what I can see, you're a climate ostrich.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

Daniel Bailey at 10:31 AM on 20 July, 2012

So Chip says:

"Correct – the satellite-based, balloon-based, and thermometer-based global temperature records show no warming whatsoever over the past decade. Claims that the Earth’s temperature is rising at an unprecedented rate are clearly false – nothing could be further from reality."

Hmmm, he needs to get his pal Michaels back on the agenda-train.
Cue Michaels in 3, 2, 1...:

"You've all seen articles say that global warming stopped in 1998. Well, with all due respect, that's being a little bit unfair to the data...it was a huge El Niño year, and the sun was very active in 1998...make an argument that you can get killed on, and you will kill us [skeptics] all..if you lose credibility on this issue, you lose the issue."

-Patrick Michaels, 6 September 2009 [Source]

You heard rightly, folks. Michaels is calling Game-Over on his pal Chip.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

KR at 07:51 AM on 18 July, 2012

Chip Knappenberger - I will simply point to an earlier post I made in this thread.

Patrick Michaels and Chip Knappenberger are principals in New Hope Environmental Services, "an advocacy science consulting firm" that apparently contracts with various fossil fuel interests (Patrick Michaels - 40% of income from the fossil fuel industry)[ ]

...presenting edited graphs (and misquoting papers) IMO crosses the line between advocacy and, to be frank, deception. A harsh statement, but I feel well supported by the data, as presented in the OP here and on the links in various comments. Michaels and Knappenburger are living examples of the Nick Naylor character from Thank You For Smoking.

Glimmer of hope? A conservative tackles climate change.

Dennis at 06:42 AM on 16 June, 2012

Tom @4: Do you know of any of the conservative think tanks (e.g., Cato, Heritage, AEI) that accepts the IPCC scientific reports, or major scientific organization (e.g., AAAS, NAS, AGU) scientific statements on climate change? My mind wanders to a guy like Patrick Michaels at Cato, who clearly does not.

When you write about "tolerance of diversity of opinion" at conservative think tanks, I can't think of any regarding climate science. In fact, I find the opposite, as I mention above. Adler is at a university -- a very different beast entirely -- and yet another community that conservatives routinely attack as part of the "liberal bias" -- even for science!

Wall Street Journal 'Skeptics' Misrepresent the IPCC

dana1981 at 17:27 PM on 5 March, 2012

We also discussed the role of CFC emissions reductions in Patrick Michaels Continues to Distort Hansen 1988, Part 1 and the Advanced rebuttal to "Hansen's 1988 prediction was wrong".

As also discussed in those posts, climate scientists are not in the business of predicting how GHG emissions will change. That is primarily a policy question, decided by policymakers and the public. That's why climate scientists create so many potential emissions scenarios, and create climate projections for those scenarios.

Wall Street Journal 'Skeptics' Misrepresent the IPCC

Albatross at 05:17 AM on 4 March, 2012

Bob @55,

"They've started each IPCC prediction from the single value for that year, rather than a more realistic middle-of-the-noise value. "

You raise a very valid point and yet another problem with their graphic that misrepresent the IPCC. It is interesting that you also noticed that, as I was pondering that very point myself this morning and the Tamino post that you linked to also came to mind.

Using Lindzen et al's faulty logic, they would have felt justified in starting the predictions at the peak in 1998 had the AR been released that year, and that of course would be very wrong.

This is just as bad, if not worse than Pat Michaels' repeated misrepresentation of Hansen et al''s 1988 prediction (well Hansen said it was "treading close to scientific fraud"). I guess the fake skeptics have, for now, given up on that one and have found a new set of predictions to tamper with to mislead the public.

I wonder how MIT feels about one of its profs engaging in potential scientific fraud in the public eye?

What is lost in this fake debate though is how well subsequent predictions have performed:

Caption: Annual global temperatures from NASA GISS (red) and Hadley Centre (blue) up to 2010, compared to the temperature projections of the IPCC TAR (grey dashed lines and grey range, as shown Figure 5d of the TAR Summary for Policy Makers). [Source]

Rahmstorf:
"Temperature trends are now near the centre of the TAR projections, with linear trends of 0.19 and 0.17 +/- 0.08 ºC per decade in the GISS and Hadley data, as compared to projected linear trends ranging from 0.15 to 0.20 ºC per decade in the TAR projections (depending on emissions scenario)."

[Source]

The Latest Denialist Plea for Climate Change Inaction

Phila at 04:56 AM on 1 February, 2012

If this is the best today's climate fake skeptics can do, perhaps, as Patrick Michaels suggests, they are losing the battle.

The quality of the arguments doesn't matter because they're not intended by consumption for knowledgeable or even curious people. The point is to give people who don't want AGW to be real a reference to cite. It doesn't matter what the reference is or what it says; what matters is that it's a "reference" by "top scientists." And that it confirms misinformation that the readers have already bought into, like the Trenberth quote.

In articles like these, it's not just acceptable but also beneficial to present a mishmash of contradictory arguments; the more excuses for disbelief you can provide, the more readers you can reassure. Different claims appeal to different readers, so toss 'em all in! It's not like they're gonna compare notes.

It also doesn't matter if the authors lack any real authority, because the people who want to believe this stuff will magnify the authors' credentials beyond all bounds for the sake of their own credibility. And that's what it's all about, ultimately: Convincing people who are desperate to be right that they're not only right, but smarter than everyone else.

Which is very light work, of course. They know they'll get no serious criticism from their audience because that would require a level of self-skepticism that their audience can't afford to have.

Much as I dislike this industry and its cynical approach to rhetoric, I do have a grudging admiration for its grasp of human psychology.

Patrick Michaels Continues to Distort Hansen 1988, Part 2

Martin Lack at 22:04 PM on 26 January, 2012

Two excellent posts, thank you. I notice that Patrick Michaels is not allowing comments upon his response. Why is that, I wonder?

Patrick Michaels Continues to Distort Hansen 1988, Part 2

Tom Curtis at 14:06 PM on 25 January, 2012

dana @16, interesting that the average might be most appropriate. That being the case, however, post 2006 then both should be shown. Indeed, if Michael Mann has copied his graph from Hansen's 2006 paper, but deleted the land-ocean temperature then his offense is as least as great as Michaels' and Knappenberger's in deleting information from the Gillett et al graph, or the Schmittner et al graph. Please note the hypothetical. I do not have any evidence that that is what he has done. His error may just be negligence, but it is certainly something he should correct in any future presentations of the graph.

In this case it is particularly unfortunate that somebody who is subject to so much illegitimate criticism by fake skeptics should give them a genuine reason to criticize him.

2012 SkS Weekly Digest #1

actually thoughtful at 06:26 AM on 23 January, 2012

KR - on the issue of whether sites will hold themselves to the standards they "set" for SkS - I can answer that the site called Wattsupwiththat (WUWT) will -

Here is what WUWT says about SkS (the only site WUWT holds out for special treatment): "(unreliable) due to (1) deletion, extension and amending of user comments, and (2) undated post-publication revisions of article contents after significant user commenting."

Other than my post at 58 I know nothing about (2).

But I can tell you that yesterday, on WUWT moderator amending my comments (by deleting harmless links to SkS) - I say harmless because it didn't involve any controversy, just answering another posters claims with an appeal to the facts (handily categorized here at SkS).

I then responded by asking the moderator to allow a debate on the science to occur. Deleting request to allow science on WUWT

I don't know what "extension" means -but the moderators did comment (inside my post) - which might be what extension means.

So yes, a double standard is now documented. I doubt there is much surprise.

I implore SkS to give us a site that is above this type of tit-for-tat - transparency, transparency, transparency!

Beyond the borehole type concept KR mentions, I think serious consideration needs to be given to an archive for update/erroneous articles - this could have all kind of labeling that marks it as old/out of circulation/errant/wrong etc. - but transparency means you can see how things looked. And yes - our mistakes will be there for the world to see - even after we fix them.

And any serious, credible person will put SkS up another 2 or 3 notches in respect for having the balls to do it.

I note that *doing it right* always takes more effort than doing the minimum acceptable. I hereby offer some of my time to help in the *do it right* effort.

As always, I sincerely appreciate all the behind the scenes work, and benefit from the end results.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

Albatross at 05:29 AM on 20 January, 2012

Daniel and John,

"All of the SkS authors are unpaid volunteers."

In contrast, Pat Michaels and Chip Knappenberger have quite the fiscal (-snip-) to do what they do. They are paid generously apparently for the purpose of (-snip-) debate, (-snip-) doubt and (-snip-) Congress and the American people about climate science.

A Comprehensive Review of the Causes of Global Warming

Albatross at 04:34 AM on 20 January, 2012

Readers,

What emerges from this literature review and from the data presented in the figures, is that even given the inherent uncertainties, there is a convergence towards a relatively narrow range of values from multiple independent research papers showing that humans most contributed between 75% and 90% of the warming over the last 100-150 years, and that "over the most recent 25-65 years, every study put the human contribution at a minimum of 98%, and most put it at well above 100%". That is a significant and robust finding. That is the message that is being conveyed here and that should cause us all concern.

It is also a nail in the coffin for people like Dr. Patrick Michaels who repeatedly to try and mislead Congress and the American people by trying and demonstrate that the majority of the observed warming is not attributable to the GHGs that we humans have been adding to the atmosphere.

Here was Dr. Michaels' most recent (failed) attempt and Dr. Ben Santer was having none of it. Additionally, none of the six papers discussed above support the claims being made by "skeptics".

When will the public finally tire of the misinformation and distortion being peddled by "skeptics" and those who deny the theory of AGW? I have.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

dana1981 at 04:32 AM on 20 January, 2012

Coincidentally, Watts is now censoring my comments on WUWT, and of course there are no comments allowed on WCR, so obviously any discussion of Michaels' data deletions will have to occur on SkS.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

Utahn at 07:03 AM on 19 January, 2012

Not that you're responsible for Forbes, Chip, but it should be noted that no mention of adapting a figure was made in Michaels' post there.

In addition, upthread was mentioned another example, where a figure legend explicitly negated Michaels' claim about it, yet was conveniently deleted from the figure.

See comments under the post here for details.

I do think this is real evidence of "serial convenient deletions". As I mentioned above, I know Michaels thinks he's "the good guy", but his actions show that he is more than willing to do what he accuses others of doing, "leaving out facts that would dilute the message".

Projection is his profession, and he's darn good at it - but we should all be aware, or suffer the consequences for taking his view at face value.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

Daniel Bailey at 05:15 AM on 19 January, 2012

@ Chip Knappenberger @ 51

"At WCR we presented the data in a figure that well-corresponded to the papers’ abstracts."

Wrong and undeniably wrong. As shown very clearly in the OP above. Adulterating the graphics provided by the authors of articles and passing them off as that of the author due to a demonstrated lack of the change by you is "being deliberately misleading and deceptive". That you can no longer perceive this truth so obvious to persons of conscience is telling, indeed.

"So, perhaps, it is the primary findings of those papers that is really the heart of the issue."

Still wrong. Despite your obvious agenda of handwaving and goal-post moving to the contrary, the issue is Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data. And also obvious to all but the most obdurate of fake-skeptics is that Pat is apparently unable to mount any defense here personally for his conduct and his publications that eradicate the line between duplicity and outright falsification.

@ Chip Knappenberger @ 63

"While data might be sacred, how it is displayed or used, is not. Sort of like the saying that you are entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts."

Very ironic that you end your prosecution of your agenda by testifying against yourself in the same breathe. QED.

Suggestion to all: DNFTT

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

Bernard J. at 23:12 PM on 18 January, 2012

That Patrick Michaels and Chip Knappenberger (and Watts, in his evasive turn) do not and/or will not acknowledge that this altering of the material is an egregious misrepresentation of the data, seems to reflect the more broad crisis of rational cognition that afflicts those who deny the validity of climate science.

It's the intellectual equivalent of the punctum caecum. Just as with a visual blind spot, they are unable to see what is in that part of the field-of-view, and just as with a visual blind spot their brains fill in the gap with what it thinks should be there.

For several years now I've been ruminating over the fact that humans as a species seem too fundamentally flawed to perceive, as a whole, the pickle that they're entering of their own volition. Given their audience's response and the authors' own comments after the criticism that has been justly levelled at them, I think that this (...in and of itself, insignificant...) little antic of Michaels and Knappenberger (and by extension, of Watts) has cemented for me that the propensity for exaggerated subjective ideology/mythology is a phenotype too prevalent in the human genotype for the species' long term extancy.

Or, more succinctly... Michaels, Knappenberger and Watts are proof that we're stuffed.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

KR at 16:43 PM on 18 January, 2012

For those new to the discussion: - Patrick Michaels and Chip Knappenberger are principals in New Hope Environmental Services, "an advocacy science consulting firm" that apparently contracts with various fossil fuel interests (Patrick Michaels - 40% of income from the fossil fuel industry).

I have seen a great deal of "advocacy" papers over the years. Many of them are worth reading - presenting interesting data that may have been overlooked, that supports their position.

However, presenting edited graphs (and misquoting papers) IMO crosses the line between advocacy and, to be frank, deception. A harsh statement, but I feel well supported by the data, as presented in the OP here and on the links in various comments. Michaels and Knappenburger are living examples of the Nick Naylor character from Thank You For Smoking.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

Albatross at 16:38 PM on 18 January, 2012

KR @37,

Actually Patrick Michaels also omitted key portions of the text from Gillett et al., so either way their readers have been mislead.

Same deal with Schmittner et al. (2011).

Now can you imagine their outrage and indignance had someone done that to one of their papers. Well, they now officially have no grounds whatsoever to complain about how anyone presents one of their papers.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

Albatross at 16:22 PM on 18 January, 2012

KR @36,

Good points and valid ones too-- Michaels et al. have in the past modified the text of scientific papers to change its meaning as I noted at #4 above.

It is very sad that Patrick Michaels apparently still has not got the decency to come here and defend his own transgressions, instead we have to repeatedly hear from a loyal apologist.

If the graphics were immaterial to their case/narrative then why did they have to doctor them or even bother including them for that matter? The fact remains that they did both. You saying they are being disingenuous is being incredibly generous.

Now this is when reasonable and rational people would apologize to both the authors and the journal, and would replace the doctored figures with the originals. But I they probably won't. If so, then I sincerely hope that the AGU goes after them.

That is the nice thing about being a fake skeptic, you never have to concede error or correct mistakes. There is simply no accountability.

There are more problems with Michael's sad attempt to justify his scientific misconduct while slander (SkS and Dana; for all we know Chip co-authored that response), but I'll let Dana have the pleasure of dealing with that.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

Albatross at 13:31 PM on 18 January, 2012

Chip @25,

"Try as I might, I honestly cannot see why the uproar over our treatment of either Schmittner et al. or Gillett et al."

Seriously? You are that numb to the severity of your actions?! (-snip-). People are very good at rationalizing and defending even the most indefensible of crimes Chip. It is also probably because you chose to simply ignore/dismiss Dr. Urban's and Dr. Hansen's legitimate concerns-- ignore them and the problem goes away, at least in your mind.

If you fail to see the uproar, just shows how completely divorced you are from acceptable and ethical scientific practices. You and Michaels are routinely engaging in scientific misconduct-- but you will deny that, just as you deny the seriousness of continuing along our current emissions path.

Anyhow, I for one will from now on respond only to Patrick Michaels (the promulgator of misinformation, distortion and half truths, and the deleter of inconvenient data) (-snip-).

I hope your conscience, (-snip-) does not let you sleep well tonight.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

Albatross at 13:16 PM on 18 January, 2012

Chip @25,

Please let Michaels speak for himself. Why does Pat Michaels send someone else to cover up his dirty work for him? This speaks volumes about Pat Michaels, he likes to try and control the message-- no one is allowed to comment at WCR. How cowardly, how totally untransparent and how nicely designed to evade critique. The double standards at WCR are astounding.

I suggest that from now on you let Pat speak for himself and defend his own transgressions. Surely he is man enough to to defend his own work, rather than have a foot soldier do the work for him?

What stuns me is that in trying to defend/rationalize/justify his doctoring of graphs, Michaels then elects to propagate more half truths, and misinformation, while making a good few strawman arguments to boot. (-snip-).

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

logicman at 11:12 AM on 18 January, 2012

Remember, folks, Patrick Michaels is the guy who republished a map with two entire islands missing and claimed it was accurate, see Michaels Mischief #3: Warming Island

I'd bet Michels never won a spot the difference competition.

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

prokaryotes at 13:23 PM on 17 January, 2012

Extensive profile of Patrick J. Michaels, and an entire page only about Patrick_J._Michaels's funding

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

John Hartz at 05:44 AM on 17 January, 2012

Dana's excellent article has been cross-posted in its entirety on both Climate Progress and on Planetsave.

"Cato’s Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data” Climate Progress

"Patrick Michaels Loves to Delete Inconvenient Data” Planetsave

Patrick Michaels: Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data

angliss at 03:25 AM on 17 January, 2012

I know of at least one other related example. In Michaels' blog "The EPA to the greens: so sue us", Michaels deletes a caption for a figure from the USGCRP that contradicted Michaels' claims.

Remarkably convenient, that.

Skepticism About Lower Atmosphere Temperature Data

Albatross at 09:14 AM on 10 January, 2012

Pat Michaels engages in some very disingenuous cherry picking and lying by omission in his Forbes article. Sometimes I wonder if people like Taylor and Michaels have an honest bone in their bodies….

One especially good example of this is his very confident claim that:
"The average warming trend in the one-third century of satellite data is 0.14°C per decade, but the warming rate in the UN’s midrange climate models is 0.25°."

Ironically, the warming rate of 0.25 C/decade is from Santer et al. (2011), a paper that includes amongst it conclusions that:
"There is no timescale on which observed trends are statistically unusual (at the 5% level or better) relative to the multi-model sampling distribution of forced TLT trends. We conclude from this result that there is no inconsistency between observed near-global TLT trends (in the 10- to 32-year range examined here) and model estimates of the response to anthropogenic forcing."

So Pat is using data from a paper that finds no statistically unusual in the trends between the rate of warming predicted by the models and found satellite estimates to try and demonstrate that the models are wrong and that there is no concern for doubling or trebling CO2. Similarly to Santer et al. (2011), Thorne et al. (2010) find that:
"It is concluded that there is no reasonable evidence of a fundamental disagreement between tropospheric temperature trends from models and observations when uncertainties in both are treated comprehensively."

Now it is true that the models are running slightly too warm, at least when compared against the satellite estimates, but the satellite data are far from the gold standard and still have unresolved issues. Not for one minute does Michaels share with readers the possibility that the satellites have unresolved cool biases as noted by Mears et al. (2011):
"This further confirms our finding for our data set that unambiguously resolving the diurnal drift effect correction and its impacts is likely to be a key determinant in reducing the uncertainty in long term tropospheric temperature changes from MSU/AMSU records."

Michaels then goes on to make his uber confident statement of fact:
"....the UN’s average forecast of 3.2°C of warming this century is off by about 40%, which should spell the victory of the lukewarmers and the death-knell of apocalyptic global warming."

Note how definitive his language is, completely void of any qualifiers or mention of uncertainty. He says "is off by 40%" (not "perhaps", "could be", "may be"). This brazen overconfidence in "skeptics" assertions while calling into doubt the findings of real climate scientists is a consistent theme in this misinformation campaign being waged by people like Michaels and Taylor.

Additionally, Michaels chooses not to share with readers that part of the outstanding discrepancy between the model estimates and satellite estimates could be attributable to the fact that the any of the model runs have not included some negative forcings (e.g., increased aerosol loading, the recent prolong solar minimum). Instead, Michaels is trying to have people believe that the sole reason for the discrepancies is attributable to "model response errors" and for that reasons there is no cause for concern should we double or treble CO2. Wrong, and I suspect deep down he knows it.

Sorting out Settled Science from Remaining Uncertainties

daisym at 17:35 PM on 2 November, 2011

Thanks for your feedback.

Please see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming

This link will provide names of scientists who disagree that the science is settled. There's no point to include the Oregon Petition or Sen. Inhofe's list of 700. Others have already managed to discredit ALL 30,000 names on the Oregon Petition, and Inhofe's 700, as well. Make sure any such list includes the names of Professors William Happer, Harold Lewis, Ivar Giaever, Fred Singer, Roy Spencer, Patrick Michaels, Bjorn Lomborg, Ian Plimer, John Christy, and Roger Pielke, Sr.

Also see:

www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/icdc7/proceedings/abstracts/gruberFF335Oral.pdf (Oceanic Sources and Sinks for Atmospheric CO2 -- Gruber et al). Apparently, outgassing of CO2 is occurring in some areas, with uptake occurring in other areas. Do the oceans outgas only manmade CO2?

I find it curious that no one commented on a question I raised: If natural forces are powerful enough to cool and offset warming attributed to manmade CO2, why aren’t they also powerful enough to cause the warming attributed to manmade CO2 to seem greater than it really is? It’s the $64,000 question.

El Niño: Unaffected by climate change in the 21st century but its impacts may be more severe

KR at 11:17 AM on 19 October, 2011

Sphaerica - SourceWatch lists that site here; it's 'a blog published by New Hope Environmental Services, "an advocacy science consulting firm" run by ... Patrick J. Michaels' (emphasis added).

adrian smits - The translation of "advocacy science consulting firm" is "lobbying group". Their posted information will be biased towards their customers - not a good place to look for science.

El Niño: Unaffected by climate change in the 21st century but its impacts may be more severe

Rob Honeycutt at 10:58 AM on 19 October, 2011

Sphaerica... In the "Staff" section we find...

Chief Editor: Patrick J. Michaels
Contributing Editor: Robert C. Balling, Jr.
Contributing Editor: Robert E. Davis
Administrator: Paul C. Knappenberger

So, I think you're correct. This is a CATO funded site. What was Michaels' quote? That 40% of his funding comes from oil interests? I think that's accurate.

Michaels Mischief #3: Warming Island

logicman at 11:39 AM on 5 October, 2011

Now that there has been some discussion, I would like to sum up my case for SkS readers as a judge might sum up a case for the benefit of a jury.
The facts:
Greenland is a very large island covered with a single great ice sheet and many regional ice caps.
An overwhelming majority of climate scientists assert that the ice sheet and the ice caps are shrinking, supporting this with real evidence from accumulated data, photographs and satellite images.
In 2005 Dennis Schmitt announced his discovery that the shrinking ice has revealed that a part of Liverpool Land formerly thought to be a cape was actually an island: this assertion was supported by photographic evidence.
Schmitt asserted that he had visited the region by land 10 years earlier at which time the cape was not seen to be an island: this assertion is supported by the record of satellite images.
In 2008 Patrick Michaels was shown a book of photographs (Arctic Riviera, Ernst Hofer, 1957) by his friend Paul C. Knappenberger; in Michaels' opinion the map of Greenland found in that book showed that the new island already existed as such in 1957; in Michaels' opinion a temperature series from a weather station 800km distant supports his opinion about the 1957 map; in subsequent comments Michaels has referred to maps of the island in the plural but has never demonstrated the existence of more than one map.
The article which Michaels wrote in 2008 has been cited by various bloggers and commenters, some of whom have asserted, or have used words to the effect, that Dennis Schmitt lied about his discovery.
Dennis Schmitt in 2008 rebutted Michaels assertions citing inter alia the prevalence of fog in the relevant region.
It is a notorious fact that fog is of frequent occurrence in the Arctic and especially along the relevant coastal area.
Michaels has presented no evidence whatsoever to show that the map in question is based on accessible scientific data or was produced by a known cartographer or was intended by the author Ernst Hofer or his publisher to be taken generally as an accurate map or specifically as an indication of the existence of a new island.
It is clear from the context in which the GISS data is used by Michaels that the intention is to persuade the viewer to infer - from the short term interannual variations in temperature at a far distant location within a fjord - a virtually identical series of interannual variations in temperature in the exposed coastal region of the new island.
The width and southern extent of the ice stream which affects that coast varies from year to year and has a very strong influence on coastal temperatures, as noted in 1822 when William Scoresby Junior first described that ice stream in a scientific manner.
More evidence needed:
Michaels has made an assertion which needs to be proven. He has asserted that maps - plural - exist which support his ideas. It is not for scientists to provide his evidence for him: he, not they, must perform the necessary cartographic research. Michaels may wish to purchase one of the very many maps produced by Ernst Hofer's employer: Lauge Koch, if he can find one of these accurate and data-backed maps to support his hypothesis.
If the regional ice cap and glaciers had in fact retreated sufficiently to reveal the width of water shown in the 1957 map, then it is for Michaels to furnish evidence of e.g. precipitation to show that glacial ice had grown back by 1985 to the extent shown in the satellite image from that year.
Michaels must furnish evidence in rebuttal of Ernst Hofer's relevant statements in his book to the effect that:
summer temperatures within fjords are generally much warmer than temperatures on coasts adjacent to the East Greenland ice stream;
the book is a book of photographs;
the author makes no assertions of scientific discoveries;
the author describes his work as the taking of photographs mainly for the scientific benefit of geologists.
Michaels must also show intent: that is, the intent of the author Ernst Hofer to demonstrate, speak of or mention in even the least way the existence in 1957 of the island now known as Warming Island.
In my submission: if Patrick Michaels cannot prove such intention on the part of Hofer then the map - which bears no mark of authorship or of authenticity on its face - cannot be described legally and scientifically as 'Hofer's map'. Rather, in my submission, it is an inaccurate sketch map of no scientific value which happened to suit the purposes of a self-described advocate.

Michaels Mischief #3: Warming Island

skywatcher at 09:13 AM on 4 October, 2011

Another issue with weather stations in Grenland is exposure to wind, not just open coast vs fjord, but also katabatic winds from the interior. I don't know if this area is vulnerable to katabats, but it's another reason in your long list why not to use a single station hundreds of kilometres away.

Patrick, this is a superb rebuttal - it's always a pleasure to read work from someone who does their research thoroughly. Every time Michaels or his cohorts open their mouths on this subject, this article should be rammed down their throats.

Michaels Mischief #3: Warming Island

Albatross at 07:44 AM on 4 October, 2011

The very first post on this thread by "renewable guy" nicely sums things up:

"Long wrong Patrick Michaeals. Some people are paid to be accurate and correct in what they do. Others are paid to be professionally wrong"

It is truly depressing and sad that some are willing to sell their souls and ethics to support their ideology, not to mention their complete disregard for future generations. What is worse they claim to do it in the name of science. Anthony Watts has once again showed his one-sided skepticism and bias by uncritically accepting whatever paid misinformers like Michaels state. Yet Pielke Snr assures us that Watts complies with highest scientific standards. I'm sure that we can expect a correction at WUWT an day now ;)

Michaels Mischief #3: Warming Island

logicman at 06:39 AM on 4 October, 2011

It's amazing how some people will jump on a bandwagon without first checking to see if it has any wheels.

"there is nothing new about ‘Warming Island’ — it was clearly shown on maps with this name more than 50 years ago, long before the global warming scare began."
Christopher Booker

Maps? Plural? Where did that come from?
Ah, yes!

"As it turns out, maps show that Warming Island, indeed, was very much an island a mere 50 years ago, when Greenland, in fact, was warmer than it has been for the last 10 years."
Patrick Michaels

If Patrick Michaels has maps - plural - then he has a duty in science to show them to the world.

Michaels Mischief #3: Warming Island

logicman at 06:15 AM on 4 October, 2011

dana1981: Middleton seems not to understand how his temperature reconstructions have no bearing on the Warming Island coastal microclimate issue. Greenland isn't a tiny island, it's a very big place. Here is what has been said in a similar context regarding Antarctic temperature reconstructions:

"The problem with Antarctic temperature measurement is that all but three longstanding weather stations are on or very near the coast. Antarctica is a big place, about one-and-a-half times the size of the US. Imagine trying to infer our national temperature only with stations along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, plus three others in the interior."

Yes, one must approach such reconstructions with a great deal of skepticism, according to the author of the article which I quote above - Patrick Michaels.

Michaels Mischief #3: Warming Island

logicman at 04:22 AM on 4 October, 2011

Re: comment #1 - a note on ad hominem.

Pointing to a scientist's funding sources is ad hom only if it has nothing to do with the scientific topic at hand.

Patrick Michaels runs New Hope Environmental Services. It is a self-described advocacy science consulting firm.
Science sifts all available argument and evidence for cogency, validity, relevance and accuracy in order to discover facts.
Advocacy selects evidence which seems plausible enough to support a pre-determined "fact".

The term 'advocacy science' is an oxymoron. One is either a scientist in search of fact or an advocate of some preferred "fact". One cannot be both.

Patrick Michaels used to focus on climate and crops, when he wrote some very interesting papers. Since he switched to writing about climate change per se he has become a source of widely copied erroneous 'climate facts'.

Climate Communication: Making Science Heard and Understood

Clippo UK at 01:53 AM on 17 September, 2011

As usual, because I read around blogs so much, I tend to come into discussions late. However, the subject of science communication to ‘non-scientists’ has interested me for many years – indeed I was a qualified trainer in industrial science matters for several years.

I applaud your efforts immensely but I fear they will fail to largely counteract the AGW skeptic spin.

In my opinion, most ‘ordinary’ people, (now out of Education), learn about diverse subjects from either printed media, (magazines, newspapers etc.) and Television / Film. Of these two main groups I think Television / Film is the more persuasive since the audience is more ‘captive’ than those casually reading – altho’ I accept they can switch the telly off.

The evidence I claim that supports my view is, for example, Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth on the one hand, and for example, the UK TV program “The Great Global warming Swindle “by (“You’re a big daft c**k”) Martin Durkin which was found by independent enquiry to have been partial.

Further support comes from Sir Paul Nurse’s expose of AGW denier James Delingpole and the three part UK TV series by the BBC, The Climate Wars by Dr Ian Stewart. In this latter series of 3 programmes, Spencer, particularly, is exposed as the fraudulent scientist he is – and even Patrick Michaels admitted on camera that GW was real! I find it strange that the BBC hasn’t released this series on DVD.

I’m sure any of you readers will recall similar ‘visual’ presentations affecting public learning.

So what has this to do with climate change communication and http://climatecommunication.org/. ?

Well, I simple believe the only way to convince large masses of ‘ordinary’ people of the gravity and causes of Climate Change is by film or television documentary by recognised non-political scientists.

That is not to say printed media should be ignored but it is generally recognised that in the USA, much of the media is literally in the pockets of fossil fuel interests and they will never admit to any publishing any real facts that will diminish the profits of those interests, or ‘hurt’ the US economy as they define it. Newspapers also deliberately try to generate debate – to improve sales.

So I urge http://climatecommunication.org/ to really consider a series of scientifically based TV documentaries, by appropriate independent scientists and/or effective questioning media presenters, to be sold around the world.

A new SkS resource: climate skeptics and their myths

John Hartz at 06:09 AM on 28 August, 2011

Yet another reason why Patrick Michaels has to be included in the top tier of climate deniers…

"Get Real: Hurricane Irene Should Be Renamed "Hurricane Hype'” by Patrick Michaels, Forbes, Climate of Fear Blog, Forbes, Aug 26, 2011

To access this inane article, click here.

How many pounds of crow does Michaels eat during the course of a year?

Michaels Mischief #1: Continued Warming and Aerosols

Eric the Red at 05:30 AM on 27 July, 2011

Albatross,

If you look at some of the previous posts, KR @28 stated, "temperatures are increasing at an increasing (higher than linear) rate." Skywatcher at @21 also referred to the temperature increase as "steeper-than-linear." Bibliovermos @27 is also using 10-year averages to make a similar statement. I have stated my disagreement with them about the manner in which they are using statistics to make their claims.

Am I alone here in stating that the temperature increase of the naughts was less than the nineties? This does not equate to a temperature decrease, short term changes aside. I do not agree with Michael's claim about no warming since 1996. However, I will place someone claiming accelerated warming in the past decade, by choosing a particular set of statistics, in the same club as Michael's.

I understand that many people here do not like Patrick Michaels. Fine, I do not care for him either. But how can people tolerate someone who is making a claim that is just as bad in the opposite direction?

Michaels Mischief #1: Continued Warming and Aerosols

KR at 04:19 AM on 27 July, 2011

Back to the topic - Patrick Michaels statements on "no rise in temperature" are indeed statistically meaningless. Short term data is far too noisy to draw such conclusions from, as we've discussed here.

I have to say that the discussion has only emphasized how deceptive these unsupported "no warming since..." claims are. But then, Michaels runs New Hope Environmental Services, described as "an advocacy science consulting firm", as well as being associated with the Cato Institute, the George Marshall Institute, and other advocacy/lobbying groups. He's focused on advocacy, not science.

Who's your expert? The difference between peer review and rhetoric

Paul Magnus at 14:40 PM on 17 June, 2011

Mags like Forbes need an ass kicking...
http://blogs.forbes.com/patrickmichaels/2011/06/16/peer-review-and-pal-review-in-climate-science/

Are you a genuine skeptic or a climate denier?

Tom Curtis at 14:15 PM on 2 June, 2011

Eric(Skeptic) @169, I'll pause for a moment to ponder the irony of your accusation that Hansen libelled the CEOs of fossil fuel corporations. It is ironic in that it is itself a libel, and (as I understand the law) Hansen's testimony to Congress cannot be a libel even if it were false, for it is protected by privilege. (I'm not a lawyer, still less an American lawyer, so I may well be wrong on that point).

More importantly, Hansen's claims are not libellous because they are true. In particular, various fossil fuel companies have funded the Cato Institute, the Heritage Foundation, and Patrick Michaels. They also funded the Global Climate Coalition, and in doing so, it turns out, they acted against the advise of their own scientists.

As to your criminal status, are you claiming that you are knowingly obfusticating the issue? In this case ignorance of the facts, while puzzling, and irrational, is a defence.

Infographic: 97 out of 100 climate experts think humans are causing global warming

Daniel Bailey at 04:15 AM on 12 May, 2011

ExxonMobil is connected to nine of the top ten authors of climate change denial papers, according to a “fact-check” website.

Analysis by The Carbon Brief found that the ten authors are responsible for 186 of the over 900 peer-reviewed papers skeptical of man-made global warming.

The most prolific climate-skeptic author on the list was Sherwood B. Idso, president of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, a think-tank which the Carbon Brief said has been funded by ExxonMobil. Idso authored or co-authored 67 of the 938 papers analyzed, or seven percent of the total.

The second most cited is Patrick J. Michaels, with 28 papers. Michaels has said that he receives about 40% of his funding from the oil industry.

Researchers Willie Soon and John R. Christy are both affiliated with the George C. Marshall Institute, which receives Exxon funds, the website found. Another author, Ross McKitrick, is a senior fellow at the Fraser Institute, which also benefits from Exxon funding, the Carbon Brief said.

Eight of the ten have direct links to ExxonMobil, the analysis found, while a ninth researcher, Bruce Kimball, is linked to the oil giant because all of his papers were co-authored with Sherwood Idso.

Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?

logicman at 04:29 AM on 8 May, 2011

#170 - Albatross
Here's a similar quote from Michaels posted on Forbes.
"In an unbiased world there should be an equal chance of either underestimating or overestimating the climate change and its effects, which allows us to test whether this string of errors is simply scientists behaving normally or being naughty.

What’s the chance of throwing a coin six times and getting all heads (or tails)? It’s .015. Most scientists consider the .050 level sufficient to warrant retention of a hypothesis, which in this case, is that the UN’s climate science is biased."
Forbes.com

The worst counterfactual statement there by Michaels is:
"Scientists, as humans, make judgemental errors. But what is odd about the UN is that its gaffes are all in one direction. All are exaggeration of the effects of climate change."

Elsewhere, the new maths: 54 = 1
Last week, the most popular article from among those recently published in the American Geophysical Union’s (AGU) Journal of Geophysical Research-Atmospheres was one which presents a 225-yr reconstruction of the extent of ice melt across Greenland.
my emphasis.
The image posted shows the paper as 54th most popular download.
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/...

Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?

Daniel Bailey at 13:22 PM on 5 May, 2011

I'd like to thank Chip for taking the time to come here and discuss the paper that is the subject of this thread (FKM 2011). I'd also like to thank each of the contributors for their interest displayed and for their zeal displayed in the furtherance of science.

Participants displayed keen interest and depth of knowledge; even when things got heated, restraint and decorum ruled. The passion for learning on display was gratifying to see. For that is why science is done: to learn things and to then share that learning.

(I wish I could have participated more, but an ill-timed multi-day bout of BSOD kept me busy recovering from repeated system crashes. Fingers crossed...)

It is that passion for learning and zeal for knowledge that finds it's embodiment in the advancement of the science through the formulation of hypothesis' and studies and experiments designed to test them.

In the case of climate science and global warming in general, and the Greenland Ice Sheet in particular, glaciologists like Dr. Jason Box and Dr. Mauri Pelto (and many others over the generations) have built our knowledge of ice sheet dynamics based on observational data (what the various forces acting on the ice sheet are and how the ice sheet has then responded to them) which has then led to a robust understanding of the underlying physics of the ice sheet response.

The meta-analysis of existing GIS data undertaken by Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels was an interesting method of using existing data to draw various insights into past modeled GIS response to temperatures at various times in the past. A shortcoming of the methodology was the lack of context into the manifold forces acting on the GIS that help then determine the response of the sheet (for example: the effects of the loss of ice shelf buffering and reduced sea ice and landfast ice along the Greenland perimeter, the effect of each is to reduce backpressure along the calving/ice-egdge front, leading then to thinning of the ice streams due to increased basal melt resulting in ice also then moving more quickly along the glacial bed of the streams; this vector change then propagates upglacier, etc).

This lack of context reduces the overall value of the FKM methodology to one of evaluating the impact of the new method itself, which (given the above mentioned limitations in this comment and others) is of little interest to those already aware of the state of knowledge of the GIS, such as working glaciologists and other interested parties. Why? Because to them, FKM 2011 adds nothing to the science and is thus obsolete.

Where the authors truly missed on an opportunity to both add impact and also advance the state of the science was the record melt of 2010. By September of 2010, the melt season which was the focus of the FKM study (June, July and August, or JJA) was "in the can". Not only were glaciologists everywhere aware of the record melt, but the news had already penetrated the lay news outlets. Had the authors then obtained this data (which surely would have been available upon request even if in rough form only), incorporating it into the FKM study would have pushed the study to the forefront of the field.

No, the data would not have been in the proper format the authors were accustomed to dealing with. But that is merely a technical limitation and could have been dealt with. After all, the Muir Russell Commission was able to replicate the entire "hockey stick" from original data in a mere two days (something the auditors still have not yet completed themselves), pronouncing it something easily accomplished (cf page 48 of the report) by a competent researcher.

Given the providential opportunity to make a meaningful, lasting contribution to the science by stepping up and making the most of the opportunity, the FKM authors instead took the opposite tack, and further themselves relegated their study to the dustbin of science; of interest to statistics mavens only.

That zeal for learning, the desire to increase the state of the science in a specific area, was critically missing in the final form of the FKM study: a 2010-shaped void left its mark by its absence.

On the whole I'd say that most of what else I'd planned on saying already got said. Those of who said it must know who you are, so thanks for that. :)

A few general observations, then. The regional warming notable in GIS data in the early-to-mid 20th Century certainly could only add little contribution to SLR due to the confining limitations of both the buttressing ice shelves, thick landfast ice and the widespread existence of heavy pack ice.

A few illuminating historical charts of Arctic Sea Ice edges, courtesy of Patrick Lockerby's Chatter Box blog:

[Source: Philips' Handy Volume Atlas 1930 Arctic map]

[Source: Russian map of Arctic, 1955]

Compare and contrast the ice edges defined in those images to this recent image:

[Source: September/March ice edge(1995-2009 mean)]

Left unexplored, and a topic of a future comment by me: The editorial and decision making process at the heart of the publication of an obsolete paper.

Best,

The Yooper

Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?

logicman at 17:26 PM on 3 May, 2011

Chip Knappenberger

1 - Why are comments not allowed in response to your post on this paper at worldclimatereport.com?

2 - How is interesting historical data from a few sites relevant to the multiple integrated observations of warming and melting over most of Greenland, the Canadian Archipelago and indeed the entire Arctic?

I ask question 2 in the context of Patrick J. Michaels' post at the Cato Institute in which he uses this already obsolete paper in conjunction with another debunked paper to conclude that:
"...the recent increase in melt across Greenland (contributing to a negative trend in SMB) may in part a result of rising temperatures from sources other than dreaded greenhouse warming, and therefore extrapolating the observed trends in SMB forward may not be such a great idea."
http://www.cato.org/...

It is interesting that Michaels seems focused on the idea that beachfront property is - presumably - a good investment because coasts are not at risk. Would you do him the kindness of directing him to recent studies which show that he should rapidly dump any such investments which he may have in more northern latitudes?
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/73737/title/With_warming,_Arctic_is_losing_ground

It is ironic that Michaels posts under the banner 'current wisdom'. Wouldn't the banner 'obsolete folly' be more apt?

Lindzen Illusion #1: We Should Have Seen More Warming

logicman at 07:38 AM on 23 April, 2011

"The models do say you should have seen 2-5 times more"

I think the source for that idea can be found in the testimony to Congress of Patrick Michaels:
"Ground-based temperatures from the IPCC show a rise of 0.11°C, or more than four times less than Hansen predicted."
In his testimony, Michaels showed a graph in support of his claim in which only Hansen's scenario A is shown. B and C were omitted, with B being Hansen's most likely scenario.
This cherry-picking on the grand scale was noticed at the time:
http://www.logicalscience.com/skeptic_arguments/models-dont-work.html

Skeptical Science nominated for Climate Change Communicator of the Year

Alexandre at 10:30 AM on 14 March, 2011

snapple #9

I confess I share your surprise. For example, there are many GMU policy advisors at the Heartland Institute (a notorious denialist institution), and even Pat Michaels is a "distinguished senior fellow in public policy" at MCU (not sure what it means).

But this initiative is welcome. I will hope this means ideology stopped being a hurdle to accept science. (VERY optimistic, I know...)

A broader view of sea level rise

muoncounter at 15:50 PM on 21 February, 2011

Chemist
You're citing the World Climate Report: Chief Editor - Patrick Michaels, as if it's a scholarly source?

In the post in question, he seems to take issue with the IPCC's sea level rise rate, quoted in the blog as:
the average rate of global mean sea level rise is estimated from tide gauge data to be 1.8±0.5 mm yr–1

He then goes on to praise GPS-corrected sea level data, which concludes:
when compared to the GIA-corrected data, the GPS-corrected data are better “both on the global and the regional scale, leading to a reconciled global rate of geocentric sea level rise of 1.61±0.19 mm/yr over the past century in good agreement with the most recent estimates”. -- emphasis added

Are you seriously suggesting there is a meaningful difference between these two rates? May I ask what branch of chemistry you practice? What chemicals are involved?

Meet The Denominator

JMurphy at 07:40 AM on 17 February, 2011

Another charming paper that gives the game away by its very title :

The greenhouse effect: Chicken Little and our response to global warming, (Journal of Forestry, Journal Volume 87, Number 7, pp. 35-39, 1989) by Patrick J. Michaels (again !)

Again, no wonder he had to go to the Journal of Forestry...

Now, how many of the many thousands of papers that agree with the consensus view, have the word 'alarm' in the title ? It's not even worth checking, is it ?

Meet The Denominator

JMurphy at 06:49 AM on 17 February, 2011

An Alternative View of Climate Change for Steelmakers,
(Iron & Steel Technology, Volume 5, Number 7, pp. 87-98, July 2008) by John Stubbles...

Is NOT a peer-reviewed paper - it is an article printed in that journal.

The Failure of the Popular Vision of Global Warming,
(Arizona Journal of International and Comparative Law, Volume 9, Number 1, pp. 53-82, 1992) by Patrick J. Michaels...

Is NOT a peer-reviewed paper - it is a "Conference Proceeding with Prescreened Review".

And how about this for an unbiased view :

Alarmist Misrepresentations of the Findings of the Latest Scientific Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, (The Electricity Journal, Volume 20, Issue 7, pp. 38-46, August-September 2007) by Henry R. Linden

Tells you right off how he's going to slant that paper, doesn't he. No wonder he had to go to 'The Electricity Journal' !

The more we can see of this little list, the more ridiculous and desperate it becomes. This thread has become a good source which can be used against anyone who dares to bring up this list again. Well done everyone.

Meet The Denominator

JMurphy at 03:51 AM on 16 February, 2011

The following four papers from that little list are basically the same paper submitted to four different journals :

Changing Heat-Related Mortality in the United States, (Environmental Health Perspectives, Volume 111, Number 14, pp. 1712-1718, November 2003)
Robert E. Davis, Paul C. Knappenberger, Patrick J. Michaels, Wendy M. Novicoff

Decadal changes in heat-related human mortality in the eastern United States,
(Climate Research, Volume 22, Number 2, pp. 175-184. September 2002)
Robert E. Davis, Paul C. Knappenberger, Wendy M. Novicoff, Patrick J. Michaels

Decadal changes in summer mortality in U.S. cities
(International Journal of Biometeorology, Volume 47, Number 3, pp. 166-175, May 2003)
Robert E. Davis, Paul C. Knappenberger, Wendy M. Novicoff, Patrick J. Michaels

Seasonality of climate–human mortality relationships in US cities and impacts of climate change, (Climate Research, Volume 26, Number 1, pp. 61-76, April 2004)
Robert E. Davis, Paul C. Knappenberger, Patrick J. Michaels, Wendy M. Novicoff

Is it really that easy to pass off the same basic paper as four 'unique' ones ?
And as Michaels has his name next to another 26 papers on that list, it is easy to see how quickly the numbers add up from using papers (even from 'relevant' magazines like WASTE MANAGEMENT and the CATO JOURNAL) by a limited number of so-called skeptics.

Meet The Denominator

JMurphy at 09:28 AM on 15 February, 2011

How can anyone take seriously any list that has the following :

The Failure of the Popular Vision of Global Warming
(Arizona Journal of International and Comparative Law, Volume 9, Number 1, pp. 53-82, 1992)
- Patrick J. Michaels

I can find no more than the first page (as you can see from the above link), which seems to be arguing against a 1990 article in JGR (Potential Evapotranspiration and the Likelihood of Future Drought) and the output of some models from the early 80s. It certainly makes clear that the previous IPCC Report (from 1990) is not what some individuals would describe as 'alarmist' - whatever that actually means.

Elsewhere, this article is described thus :

**Conference Proceeding with Prescreened Review

Can that realistically be described as peer-reviewed ?

As for the journal itself :

The purpose of this organization shall be to publish a journal, which presents scholarly articles concerning international and comparative law issues, including tribal/indigenous peoples law.

So, an article which is nearly 20 years old, presented in a law journal, and arguing against some selected articles, is claimed to be 'against AGW Alarm' - whatever that means.

Can the use of that paper in that little list really be based on one page ? Surely there's more ?

There is no consensus

muoncounter at 14:15 PM on 27 January, 2011

Interesting news, identifying how some of those non-consensus scientists get their funding.

Waxman Asks Upton to Examine Dr. Patrick Michaels’s Testimony

Dr. Patrick Michaels of the Cato Institute testified that widely accepted scientific data had “overestimated” global warming and that regulation enacted in response to that data could have “a very counterproductive effect.” ... In its “Morning Energy” column, Politico described a CNN appearance by Dr. Michaels in which he gave “40%” as his estimate of how much of his funding comes from the petroleum industry.

But that would never compromise their opinions.

The 2010 Climate B.S.* of the Year Award

John Hartz at 05:47 AM on 18 January, 2011

Speaking of Patrick Michaels (see 4th place in Glieck’s award article)..

“The Koch Brothers' Climatologist” by Russell Baker (Huffington Post, Jan 14, 2011) does a nice job of explaining who Patrick Michaels is and what he’s up to.

To access Baker’s article, go to:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/russ-baker/the-koch-brothers-climato_b_809014.html#postComment

The 2010 Climate B.S.* of the Year Award

memoryvault at 14:21 PM on 31 December, 2010

THE BS AWARDS – A SUMMARY

FIFTH PLACE goes to a news editor who insisted his reporters
– Report only the facts.
– Don’t take sides in their reporting, and
– Point out that in matters relating to climate change, some people question the claims being made.

WOW – talk about BS. How dare a news editor demand fair, unbiased and balanced reporting from his staff. What next, equal air time for skeptics?

FOURTH PLACE goes to Patrick Michaels for misrepresenting the “facts” of human induced climate change to a senate committee. How do we know he did this? Because Ben Santer says so, that’s how.

THIRD PLACE goes to every “climate denier” who ever pointed to a single cold weather event as “proof” that climate change didn’t exist. Well gee – I wonder where we learned that from?

Here’s a link to TEN YEAR’s worth of increasingly extreme cold weather events. I wonder how many “singular” events it takes to suggest a “trend”?

http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/andrewbolt/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/winters_are_sure_colder_than_they_predicted/

SECOND PLACE goes to all those people who found something untoward suggested in the climategate emails.

You know, like all those folk who took offence at destroying material subject to legal FOI requests, plotting to ruin other people’s reputations, and stuff like that. Not to mention of course, the HARRY_READ_ME file, or the “fudges factor” line of code that ensures one gets a hockey stick even when random numbers are input.

FIRST PLACE goes to anybody who dares to suggest that maybe whatever was happening as far as warming went, has now stopped and maybe things are starting to cool off.

I guess this could apply to just about any of the approximately 3 billion people now experiencing record and near record LOW temperatures, and record and near-record HIGH snowfalls.

Yes, perhaps it’s time all us “deniers” started feeling a little ashamed of ourselves.

What are the chances of this getting posted?
Buckley’s – Now THAT’s “fair and unbiased” for you.

How to explain Milankovitch cycles to a hostile Congressman in 30 seconds

robert way at 09:12 AM on 7 December, 2010

Ben Santer Mangles Patrick Michaels at minute 39 (ish) at the following link. Catches him lying about indirect versus direct aerosol radiative forcing effects.

http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/ChangePa

It's Urban Heat Island effect

hadfield at 09:35 AM on 1 September, 2010

This page starts with the statement that "A paper by Ross McKitrick ... and Patrick Michaels ... concludes that half of the global warming trend from 1980 to 2002 is caused by Urban Heat Island." (McKitrick & Michaels). It then provides evidence for the contrary view.

An obvious question is not addressed as far as I can see: are the arguments presented by McKitrick & Michaels wrong, and, if so, why?

Newcomers, Start Here

robert way at 03:37 AM on 16 August, 2010

Interesting comment on CNN debate

Gavin and Economist Sachs say we have the technology and act now. Michaels says we should just wait to see if technologies come up...

Fareed Zakaria "Mr. Michaels, is your research funded by oil companies?"

Patrick Michaels-Not much of it

Fareed "Mr. Michaels, how much of your research is funded by oil companies?"

Michaels-I don't know, 40%

CO2 levels during the late Ordovician

actually thoughtful at 17:04 PM on 15 March, 2010

Galloping camel wrote:

"Ten years ago the Hockey Team was supreme; anyone who dared to question their views was branded as stupid, venal or even evil. The "science was settled" was being trumpeted throughout the "Main Stream Media" and woe betide any brave soul who dared speak against AGW. You talk about "ad hominem" attacks but have you forgotten how dissenters were treated? If you need reminding, the Climategate emails may help. Take a look at the ones mentioning Patrick Michaels or Fred Singer. "

I don't recall this series of events. As I recall, folks wanted to argue with Al Gore about whether warming was happening. In the context of whether CO2 causes warming (ie is a greenhouse gas, and is being released ed by humans) he said "the science is settled." 10 years later it still seems that ALGORE was correct.

Can you point me to the emails that are melting the arctic or Greenland? Emails showing people being people do not change the science, nor most people's opinion of the science.

Tom

It's the sun

Patrick 027 at 03:03 AM on 24 May, 2009

That cartoon you referenced, Gord:

http://www.ilovemycarbondioxide.com/ipcc_oven.html

is one of the most idiotic things I've ever seen. Replace James Hansen and Gavin Schmidt with people like Patrick Michaels, Richard Lindzen, and Fred Singer, and rewrite:

" No [________], this is EXACTLY what the UN IPCC dogma wants you to believe.
See The Greenhouse Effect Poppycock for more details."

As:

" No [________], this is EXACTLY what Gord wants you to believe.
See Gord's comments at http://www.skepticalscience.com/solar-activity-sunspots-global-warming.htm for more details."

and then it would make a lot more sense.

Because, Gord, most people would assume, correctly, that thermal radiation emitted by a hot piece of chicken would be reflected back at the chicken if surrounded by mirrors, and would also assume, correctly, that the process doesn't create energy - but that if the chicken is recieving heat from some other source, partly surrounding the chicken with mirrors will reduce the portion of the chicken's radiation that escapes to a cooler environment, so the chicken's temperature will rise until it can radiate enough radiation for the portion that escapes balances the heat input (plus any radiation from the cooler environment, but let's say the environment is absolute zero so we don't have to deal with that issue). Switching from reflection to absorption and emission - Seriously, Gord, what do YOU think would happen if you wrapped some object (with nonzero albedo in solar wavelengths) in a material that is transparent to solar radiation but has some nonzero absorptivity in the wavelengths that are emitted by the object? Even if the material is porous and some convection occurs through it, the rate of convection depends on a temperature gradient - same with conduction; do you not think the temperature of the object would get higher with such a covering material than if it were exposed? So we disagree on whether sets of electromagnetic waves with opposing group velocities can be considered to have their own energy fluxes - which is important to the microscopic processes regarding thermal radiation - but the mathematics for what I call the net energy flux - what you call THE energy flux - is the same, so for Pete's sake, just take the fluxes from Kiehl and Trenberth and subtract opposing fluxes to find the fluxes you would consider to be real, and you wouldn't have a problem - (well you might, since you should really take solar radiation and terrestrial radiation together if their could only be one electromagnetic wave energy flux at a given place and time, in which case you'd find that the surface is being heated by radiation, but it is less than the total heating of the surface by the sun, so maybe you wouldn't have a problem - I don't care because your understanding of this area of physics is absurd, but anyway... - if you lump convection in with radiation, you'd find zero energy fluxes).

Do you not feel warmer outside on a cold day if you put a coat on - even though the temperature of the coat never gets exactly as warm as your skin? Or would you rather freeze to death than find out?

Models are unreliable

Quietman at 11:10 AM on 7 April, 2009

"Remember this: a climate model is really nothing more than a scientific hypothesis. If a hypothesis is consistent with observations, then it is standard scientific practice to say that such a hypothesis can continue to be entertained. In this case, that hypothesis can then serve as a basis for other subsidiary models or, in reality, subsidiary hypotheses. If the hypothesis is not consistent with observations, it must be rejected. That does not mean that human-induced climate change may or may not be real, but it does mean that (in this case) the magnitude of prospective change has—with high probability—been overestimated. That means that all subsidiary hypotheses on economic costs, strategic implications, or effects on health are similarly overestimated."
TESTIMONY OF PATRICK J. MICHAELS TO THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT OF THE COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE, U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES..

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