Bishop Hill NYT "almost always" exaggerated
Jun 12, 2013 Climate: Surface Justin Gillis, the New York Times' deep green correspondent writes about the plateau in surface temperatures today. If truth is to be told he starts pretty well, explaining scientists's bemusement and confusion over exactly what is behind it.
...given how much is riding on the scientific forecast, the practitioners of climate science would like to understand exactly what is going on. They admit that they do not, even though some potential mechanisms of the slowdown have been suggested. The situation highlights important gaps in our knowledge of the climate system, some of which cannot be closed until we get better measurements from high in space and from deep in the ocean.
Then, however, he goes on to say this:
As you might imagine, those dismissive of climate-change concerns have made much of this warming plateau. They typically argue that “global warming stopped 15 years ago” or some similar statement, and then assert that this disproves the whole notion that greenhouse gases are causing warming.
Rarely do they mention that most of the warmest years in the historical record have occurred recently. Moreover, their claim depends on careful selection of the starting and ending points. The starting point is almost always 1998, a particularly warm year because of a strong El Niño weather pattern.
Is that last point true? We sceptics "almost always" pick 1998 as the start point? I know Lucia doesn't. I certainly don't. David Whitehouse didn't in his report on the plateau. A brief perusal of the results of a search for "no warming for 15 years" turned up nothing at all.
Now don't get me wrong. I'm sure there are people out there who have started at 1998. But my impression is that these are in a small minority.
I wonder if Justin Gillis can back his claim up?
Reader Comments (75)
I like starting at the year 1700, but the warmists say that isn't fair either.
As if it were proof of CAGW, the NYT article trumpets the latest Warmist War Cry: “most of the warmest years in the historical record have occurred recently.” Doh…
Bearing in mind that the earth’s climate has been trending warmer since the last Ice Age, that brilliant statement could be applied to almost any period in the past 12,000 years (excepting, of course, the LIA). The same holds true for sea level rise, all without the help of anthropogenic CO2. It’s amazing how frightening ‘facts’ can appear when you’re ignorant of the context. As Goethe said, “Es ist nichts schrecklicher als eine tätige Unwissenheit.”
Since, the Minoan warming, the Roman, MWP average temps - they've gone down, since the LIA thankfully we've had some natural warming, since circa 1980 when Jim et al fixed them - who the hell knows?
What is a given................... and John Shade puts it so eloquently:
MMCO2 & runaway warming - is gone, busted, defenestrated - dead.
That work for you Justin?
But historical data suggests there have been warm periods in the past - at least until the data has been adjusted of course. e.g. An Adjustment Like Alice.
http://notrickszone.com/2012/03/01/data-tamperin-giss-caught-red-handed-manipulaing-data-to-produce-arctic-climate-history-revision/
http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2011/11/19/giss-and-their-african-temperatures/
http://www.real-science.com/new-giss-data-set-heating-arctic
etc.
No comments allowed. A good indicator for a lightweight, poorly researched or partisan story.
Thanks Bish for introducing yet another brain-dead knob-jockey to your regulars. I was rather hoping I would shuffle off this mortal coil without knowing that Justin Gillis existed. And for what it is worth I always choose 9 February 1266 as my start date as I think it has a certain ring to it?
And as I am sure those with more patience than me will point out; the period for how long it has not warmed depends on the end date e.g. today, now, this minute, rather than a start date. Ok, I fully understand that I just cherry-picked the end date. It's a fair cop. Put the bracelets on.
The reason he's whining about "1998" is because its is becoming a common tactics for skeptics to use that data to show you can cherry [pick] any date to show what you want short term. They don't like it because it forces them to explain why they only use data for say the north pole from 1980 onward or any of a host of other cherry picked short term data sets. Plus remember that from 89 to 98 we had "unbelievable warming that SHOCKED scientists". Now we have "unbelievable cooling" from 98 to now.
End run they don't like it when their propaganda is both exposed and thrown back in their collectivist faces.
Pedants' corner:
It's "we sceptics", Bish.[Spotted that too. Thanks BH]
What the alarmists always fail to mention when they claim cherry picking of the el nino year (aside from the possibility that that el nino caused the warming that means those years were the warmest in the short record of world temperatures) is that the year was followed by two strong la nina years. In any useful statistical model these balance out the el nino.
Manfred
Yeah, when you're copy 'n pasting PR / planted stories ..... comments can be embarrassing. War mist bulk bilge pumping happens in episodes - simultaneous sympathetic stories / screeds served up by the usual suspects. It all appears just too conveniently close in time not to be scripted </foil hat>
When I say no warming since...the date I am choosing is NOW. Then I go back through the years until I find an increasing trend. Hasn't been one since 1998? This is not cherry-picking. Now is now.
I see Justin Gills uses the old religious argument similar to people like Gavin Schmidt, "sceptics say this disproves AGW". Ignoring the real argument that AGW has to explain the temperature plateau if it is valid. Until it does explain it, then its validity is seriously questions.It is very tiring to hear "this doesn't disprove God".
Also using the Gore argument that most of the hottest years have been recently as proof of AGW is nonsense, The ignorance of basic statistics is embarrassing. Clearly an increase in the mean temperature will also produce an increase in slightly higher temperature for a very large number of probability density functions assumed for the temperature - NO MATTER THE CAUSE of the increase in temperature.
"most of the warmest years in the historical record have occurred recently".
That's also what happens when a random walk hits a maximum. Not that I'm saying the temperature record is a random walk, just that sceptics ignore this claim for good reasons.
I was under the impression that the starting point was today and that you simply have to go backwards until the slope of the graph changes from down or level to up, towards the present. The point you reach is the date from which no warming has occurred. You cannot fix it or cherry pick it as it is already a fixed temperature point from the past (Unless you are Hansen of course in which case you would adjust it downwards to show warming)
There's a double peak in 2003-2004 which I take as the natural break point.
1998 - the year 'global warming' became 'climate change'.
Hmmmm.
Is it daft to say that the El Nino of 1998 pushed an awful lot of heat into the system and therefore the high temperatures since that date could be caused by residual heat in the system?
Yeah, I tried that and got 120,000,000 results too. They included "for 16 years" and "for 17 years" too. Lots were on-line media or sites exposing "denialist lies".
I also tried:
'no warming for 15 years' site:bishophill.squarespace.com
and got 77,000,000 results. Are there that many comments on this blog?
"...warmest years in the historical record have occurred recently"
The history of Greenland includes dairy farming in the MWP. How's that going nowadays?
“The slowdown is a bit of a mystery to climate scientists”...........”computer forecasts of climate change suggest that pauses in warming lasting a couple of decades should not surprise us”.
So we don’t know the mechanism that is causing the warming plateau, so it couldn’t have been included in the models, but models predict a warming plateau of a couple of decades even without inclusion of the underlying mechanism causing it. Eh?
There's an interesting article by David Whitehouse on the gwpf: Before and after the temperature standstill, looking at the impact of volcanic eruptions and ENSO on the temperature record since 1980.
(BTW: Whitehouse refers to the lack of warming over the past 16 years.)
More importantly, and one that doesn't get the attention it deserves, is that climate scientists of the AGW variety believe they got it right first time. They worked out the theory covering a chaotic, coupled, and highly complex system at their first attempt. That is the conclusion to be drawn from their insistance that any contradictory paper or data is in error.
This level of misguided scientific hubris deserves derision not deference.
Rhoda is right. If I say "Arsenal haven't won the FA cup since 2005", that's not cherry picking.
Can anyone explain the relevance of Bish's headline?
The 2008 NOAA "State of the Climate" report, referring to the output of climate models, said :-
“Near-zero and even negative trends are common for intervals of a decade or less in the simulations, due to the model’s internal climate variability. The simulations rule out (at the 95% level) zero trends for intervals of 15 yr or more, suggesting that an observed absence of warming of this duration is needed to create a discrepancy with the expected present-day warming rate.”
Counting 15 years back from 2013 takes you to 1998.
James P said:
We happy sceptics, we band of brothers.
And of course most of the "no warming for 15 years" statements returned by the search were made before 2013, so it's not actually the same statement.
And note how Justin Gillis says "They typically argue that 'global warming stopped 15 years ago' or some similar statement", but then hinges the rest of his argument on the particular invidiousness of using 1998. So he is attacking that precise statement, not a similar one.
Phil Jones and Richard Lindzen say "no statistically significant warming since 1995", and Lindzen said on WUWT in 2008 "why bother with the 1998 El Nino anomaly?".
We are fast approaching Santer's 17 year test by Davis Rose' 1997 start point.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/06/12/the-warming-plateau-may-extend-back-even-further/
What a straw man.
OK, so start in 1945, roughly the undisputed start of the AGW period.
I think that come sto around 1 degree per century. Still leaves the alarmism unsupported by the evidence.
The standstill does indeed disprove AGW. According to the hypothesis the temperature was supposed to go parabolic due to the ever-increasing CO2. We had been told by the IPCC that natural variation was in decline and that man was now dominating the climate system. Clearly it was all hubristic hype and base lies. The standstill was not supposed to happen and was not expected by the alarmists. Hardliners like Rahmsdorf are even still denying there even is a standstill. All the rest of the clowns just put forward contradictory excuses for their failures. The simple answer is that there is no AGW. They won't accept that because turkeys don't vote for Xmas.
The only reason that standstills appeared in model hindcasts is because they were tuned to do so. Any further induced model randomness is not in any way reflective of natural variation: It is just randomness, no more, more less. The ups and downs of which do not match reality even vaguely.
And also no warming since 1066 !
"And also no warming since 1066" - another significant moment in Britain's relations with her European neighbours.
+1 rhoda
This is a common fallacy, or error in perception. The IPCC geniuses made the same mistake in inverse. They fixed the end point at 'present' and drew trend lines backwards further and further into the past. They concluded, since visually the straight-lines had increasing slopes *starting from 19th century*, that the rate of warming must be increasing. Whereas the correct conclusion would have been its opposite (!) - as one goes further and further back in time, the rate of warming decreases.
This was exactly Doug K's point - when you say 'warming', or cooling, under what model, under what frame of reference?
The 'Zit' got 129M hits for 'no warming for 15 years' and then claims to have analysed 'most of which'. Now that's what I call a lie. But then, Zit was using the Cook/Nuccy/Whiskas analysis method.
"And also no warming since 1066 !"
I am going to apply to DECC for a massive grant to prove that the science is settled and that globull warming will be a disaster for this country. The last time it was warm the Normans invaded, the time before it was the Romans. My theory is that we were producing so much wine that we were all too pissed to repel jonny foriegner. All I need is lots of dosh to buy lots of wine and a venue for a bloody good punch up.
If you're expecting exponential warming, a "plateau" is rather hard to explain.
Do a search for "no warming since 1998" and you get
About 98,200 results (0.23 seconds)
Do a search for "no warming for 15 years" and you get
About 43,200 results (0.13 seconds)
Doubting Rich you say '[1998]....is that the year was followed by two strong la nina years. In any useful statistical model these balance out the el nino.'
I am not sure this is true, a La Nina is not the opposite of an El Nino. A La Nina also helps to shift warmth around the planet, just in a different direction. You should read 'Who turned on the heat' by Bob Tisdale.
http://bobtisdale.wordpress.com/
I am standing on the landing at the top of the stairs.
I am now higher than I have been all morning.
The last few seconds were among the highest I have been all morning.
If I were to carry on climbing at the average rate I climbed over the whole morning, I would soon be higher than I have ever been.
But I am still standing on the landing at the top of the stairs.
I weigh myself every year. I had a period of about 25 years when I got heavier and heavier every single year. Some of my heaviest years have been in the last decade. Does this tell me anything about my weight in 10 years' time? 20 years' time?
Do you see the shift here ? The "climate concerned" are stuck in a model of perpetual growth - like the stock exchange or inflation or most of the graphs we see in everyday life. In this worldview the graphs always go up and to the right. If it levels off this is only a temporary pause before the relentless increase towards infinity resumes. Throw in a different model like human weight where there is a peak and then a decline and nobody's weight is infinite. This is one good argument for the man in the pub.
AC1: "If you're expecting exponential warming, a "plateau" is rather hard to explain."
Not really it means your hypothesis is wrong if the data don't match your forecasts. If, of course, you've persuaded vast numbers of politicians to tax their constituents until, as Denis Healey said, "The pip squeaks", then your hypothesis can't be wrong because the polliticos will crucify you on behalf of their constituents to try and placate said constituents.
"I wonder if Justin Gillis can back his claim up?"
Can any warm-monger back up any claim? Ever?
1998 did they start using super computers to analyis weather data.
Other than do it by hand.
Theres an old scientific saying about the moment you observe something you change it
You change the method you change the results.
More super computors more monitoring station more accurate. I E the weather has always been like this.
"........most of the warmest years in the historical record have occurred recently ......."
Perhaps Mr Gillis should be invited to clarify this by saying that "...... most of the warmest years since thermometers were invented have occurred recently ........"
He is evidently not aware that the world was warmer during the Medieval Warm Period, the Roman Warm Period, the Minoan Warm Period, the Holocene Optimum, during most of the interglacials before the Holocene, and for most of the 600 million years prior to the current Pleistocene ice age. Oh, and probably for the 4 billion years prior to that too.
Apart from that, now is the warmest ever !
"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."
The AGW fanatics are moving around in between the first three, and we are winning.
I consider myself to be extremely lucky to have lived in the warmest years since the last time, except for the whining of course.
"Rarely do they mention that most of the warmest years in the historical record have occurred recently."
Except for explaining exactly why it is not a significant point every single ****ing time anyone raises it!
If wishes were horses, skeptics would beggar their arguments with cherry pie. Gillis's crust falls apart, flimsily fabricated of recycled straw.
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It does make me wonder if these people have any notion about what a “plateau” is. As a plateau is the highest level of a rise in the vicinity, then all of it will be higher than the surrounding plains. If you doubt me, have a look at the plateau atop Mount Kilimanjaro. It is not exactly level – there are some spots higher than others – however, there is no place there that is lower than anywhere on the Serengeti, nor is there anywhere on the Serengeti that is higher than anywhere on the plateau of Mount Kilimanjaro. Similarly, the plateau of the Serengeti is higher than the coastal plain. Not exactly rocket science, is it?
This is also why sceptics are not dismissive of the possibility that temperatures could rise further – just because you are on a plateau, it does not mean that you are the peak.
For the zealots, common sense has not only left the building, but is now on permanent vacation is some remote location (take a look at the comments here, where they would be demanding citations for the claim that the dew is wet).
We should take a moment to consider this type of article.
To me, it smacks of Allinsky tactics: freeze a target and personalise it. The fact is that there appears to have been an absence of warming. The NYT article attempts suggest that reporting confounding data is some nefarious confidence trick.
I'd like to freeze the issue right back at them. How does "scientifcally illiterate NYT" sound?