Tuesday
Feb172015
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Climate change by numbers
Feb 17, 2015 BBC Diary dates Tamsin Edwards points us to the BBC's latest efforts on the climate change front, to be broadcast on 2 March at 9pm. Details are remarkably thin on the ground, but here's what they are willing to tell us:
Presented by 3 mathematicians, this programme gives a unique perspective on climate change by taking 3 key numbers to tell the story of our climate's past, present and future.
I gather from the comments at WUWT that the mathematicians involved are Hannah Fry of UCL, Norman Fenton of QMUL and David Spiegelhalter of Cambridge. Tamsin says she was involved as a consultant and I gather that Doug McNeall was on board too.
Not the usual suspects then.
Update on Feb 17, 2015 by
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill
Here's a (somewhat rough and ready) rip of the TV trailer.
Reader Comments (81)
As far as I can see, neither Fenton nor Fry nor Spieglhalter have any specific climate-related papers, though the latter contributed to a RS report.
A guess: 288 and 288,8 will not be THE numbers.
Bengt
If you look at the trailer, you can see what the numbers are.
David has written on his blog about climate science, e.g.
http://understandinguncertainty.org/more-deaths-due-climate-change-or-maybe-not (2014)
http://understandinguncertainty.org/node/887 (2010)
and has also mentioned it in publications and talks on the visualisation of uncertainty and risk.
But, as you noticed, the intent was to have it presented by statisticians who don't do climate research.
Not sure if / what limits there are to what I can say before broadcast. I think you'd "approve" of the third consultant - have just emailed to ask if he minds me naming him here / on Twitter. Obviously he's named in the credits - he just might prefer to delay any attention until broadcast! He's not on the blogosphere / social media.
I was the most involved consultant of the three, and I would say the program is as close a representation of my views as I could hope for, given they also have constraints of time and of trying to make it understandable and interesting :)
Tamsin
100% chance of being BBC propaganda disguised as fair and balanced.
How about we wait until seeing it before damning it?
They overlooked 97 & 350.
You never know, it could be a first for the Beeb....
Norman Fenton link may need some attention Bish.
OK, everyone clear your lounge of throwable objects, just in case 95% turns out to be a measure of certainty. My entire house is coming down if it turns out to be the percentage of scientists who "agree with the science", to use orrible Harrabin's phrase for "those who are right".
Sorry, but mathematicians just don't have enough insight into physics to realise that the Earth is a tad more complicated than a gas jar.
Tamsin
That sounds encouraging. I shall watch with interest.
Can it be any worse than the Climate Wars program? Will give it a watch.
If it turns out to be objective and prepared to accept that the science is far from settled and that sceptics do have a genuine point of view I shall be very, very delighted. I shall also be very, very surprised.
You know what they say: "fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me". We have all lost count of the times the BBC has fooled us all on climate and you can hardly blame us for being more than a tad cynical that they are about to do it again, even with your input.
Especially now that we're in the build-up to Paris and the propaganda machine is charging ahead full throttle.
Feb 17, 2015 at 12:53 PM | Unregistered CommenterTamsin Edwards
Well said.
I'm setting my prejudices aside until I've watched it at least twice.
I'll hang it when I've given it a fair trial ;)
Ha, some excellent responses here...
Regarding the numbers: this is a program about the maths of climate science :)
Such is the institutional climatism of the BBC it is reasonable to be cynical about any forthcoming programme out of their Augean Stables. But we who are on the side of the angels here must, for the sake of our moral and intellectual wellbeing, give them the benefit of what little doubt there is ahead of actually seeing it. It is not always easy being good.
Not the usual suspects!
Speigelhalter is always at the BBC, he gives them courses on risk, and would never say anything "sceptical' lest it bite the hand that....
It looks like another trashy BBC tabloid graphics spectacle. I only hope it's lit by candles like Wolf Hall which is otherwise silly. I bet this will be sillier.
All three scientific consultants do research that focuses on the inadequacies of climate models. Hopefully that should give you some idea of whether it is a propaganda piece or not*...
*It's not
All three main parties have signed a non-aggression pact over the catastrophism of AGW.
If this programme is in any way unbiased at all it would be far too controversial to broadcast before the election.
I'll wait until I see it before saying how it is a mockery of science.
But I know why it is a mockery of science.
If that 95% is the IPCC certainty then statisticians won't have a lot to say about it since there is no justification beyond it being bigger than the previous 90%; ie an overtly political number with zero science or stats behind it.
The 0.85K is, I presume, the headline value the IPCC used for temp rise from 1880 to 2012, which seemed to me to be selected purely because it was an apparently bigger number than the previous 0.6/century and 0.7/century despite it translating to 0.6K/century; ie no change. So again a political number that tells us absolutely nothing about the extent of manmade warming - as Doug Keenan eventually got the Met Office to admit. To get the manmade contribution you need a physical model but alas these are all demonstrably crap.
With that start I doubt the other number will be other than political either.
The Beeb seem to be compensating already...
Sigh...
I read Spiegelhalter's blog post (linked to by Tamsin) and I fear for Bob Ward's heart.
Tamsin: Yes you're right, of course I should watch first and reserve judgement until then.
However experience of the BBC's views and reporting on climate change point to this programme reaching only one conclusion. It would take an almost 180 degree corporation U-turn to be anything else, and let's face it, that just isn't going to happen. Nonetheless in the interests of balance will wait with baited breath. :-)
Part of the MSM indoctrination efforts leading up to Paris 2015.
Climate change by numbers
"I was the most involved consultant of the three, and I would say the program is as close a representation of my views as I could hope for,"
So Tamsin, can we expect a numerically qualified and supported extension of your views as expressed here:
+++++
The first problem uncertainty brings is the extra difficulty for the expert in explaining their results, and the non-expert in understanding them. For example, over the past 17 years or so there has been a slowdown, even a pause, in the rate of warming of the atmosphere. We’re confident the climate is still changing, because the ocean is still warming, the land losing ice, sea level rising, and we predict the atmosphere will start to warm again after this temporary blip.
We think there are several contributing factors to this pause, including a change in the movement of heat around the planet, a dip in the brightness of the sun, reflection of the sun by pollution and volcanic eruptions. But because we need to use computer models to understand it, and because 17 years is not that long when it comes to climate, we don’t know the exact contributions of each. Clearly this is not simple, sound bite science.
http://blogs.plos.org/models/love-uncertainty-climate-science/
+++++
?
Yep, I stand by that excerpt from my TEDx talk, which was intended to be a representation of current understanding (in part quoting from the statements that were assigned highest confidence by the IPCC). So for references I refer you to climatechange2013.org :)
To be fair, the focus of my talk *was* our uncertainty! (as is the second paragraph of that quote).
not banned yet
Tamsin's statement sounds like 'we* expect the horse to back to its rightful place as the main mode of transport after this temporary blip'. After all, there are more cats in Manchester than at any time since the Medieval Warm period and more pigs in troughs in Westminster since the Great Fire of London .
*The Honourable Company of Saddle Makers" established 700bc
In terms of "details being thin on the ground" Bish - I believe at some point there may be a press release, and the website will have content too. Two weeks away is a long time in telly land :)
Also they're keen to keep things mostly a surprise so people tune in to watch it!
JamesP, and that is what will happen again.
I suspect the contributors who think they're making a science programme will be disappointed when they complain also.
Tamsin, I am currently unable to watch the preview, and will accept the statement made by you and others, not to pass comment until after its airing. However........
Can you confirm now, whether you have approved the final edit, or is this (still) outside your control?
I would not want anyone to be Nurseing bad feelings in a few weeks.
In that case Tamsin, I'll watch it. I'm looking forward to seeing the numbers supporting your views go on the public record in an easy to access and reference format whilst avoiding the pitfalls of "sound bite science". When I saw the trailer comment suggesting the show is built on just three numbers, I feared it would be likely to present an over-simplified-to-the- point-of-useless story.
Wonder what Christopher Monckton thinks...so far. Likely not a lot?
The Maths have driven into the error bar zone...so whats the point, other than scares about CO2 belching here and there?
If this gets too "numbery" then I think the BBC4 audience in the main is going to get "yawny". So the first and last sentences of the prog are likely to be remembered...the scary babble.
Literally the silliest and most desperate thing I ever heard was when a poor young man from the University of The Sticks was pushed on to the global stage to announce that the heat from human CO2 had suddenly decided to trouble the oceans, not the air. At the exact moment that his climate pals had made embarrassingly wrong forecasts about air temperature. The entire history of air based climate science was now apparently irrelevant and we should probably forget the whole thing !
In America, one of the issues in the de-criminalising of drugs is the truly vast number of people employed in criminalising them. What will they do ?
I'd second Golf Charlie's enquiry as to whether Tamsin has seen the programme in full, as a final edit. Too often what one thinks is going to be a full and fair exposition turns out to be a most blatant rigging of agendas.
I seem to recall I am disappointed by Spiegelhalter on Climate so far. He has the ability to tear a lot of the media maths apart but has not done so. Instead he's made vague support of alarmism maybe something like 'you've got to go with consensus' . However I noticed that he never specifically comes out to support alarmist maths either.. I'd got him down as another one of those people stuck with his children at hippy schools and hippy friends etc. so he can't risk rocking the boat, so he goes with the flow.
Well using 'settled science' and models I can tell you want it will say
its worse they we thought
97%
there is no pause
the models are right
'deniers ' are evil
warmest year ever
raising sea levels
extreme weather more often
to little rain
to much rain
and anything else they are feed by green groups who they repeat without question nor thought
And the odd thing is my guess work is probable a lot more accurate that the super climate models that cost a lot of cash, which can only of course be 'understood ' by the great climate 'scientists'
KnR
You can absolutely guarantee it. How the BBC works is that we get to see 49 minutes of happy children, untroubled by the future. In the 50th minute, we see the water rising over their innocent, little heads as sharks approach.
"maths of climate science :)"
The climate changes, we know this, no one argues that it doesn't change, one only has to look out of the window, what is meant here "climate change" is a euphemism for, man made warming.
The mathematics?
Probably should be "quantification"...... albeit an impossible calculation - of a chaotic system, in which all of the inputs and outputs are poorly understood - other than propagandizing the so called noise effect of "man's contribution ±5%" - what possible value can this al-beeb programme have?
What are the predictions as regards the viewing figures....apart from us saddoes, that is! Perilously close to absolute zero is my "projection" .
It's not going to be a sceptic show, but presentation of the debate as a debate rather than a spurious consensus would still represent considerable progress.
One Trillion Tonnes cumulative CO2 emissions since 1750 is the new tipping point and apparently with the same stated goal of 350.org and keeping the climate models below a 2.0C increase.
If temperatures rise by 2°C per trillion tonnes of carbon released into the atmosphere, to avoid more than 2°C of warming we need to limit total cumulative emissions to below 1,000,000,000,000 tonnes of carbon.
Based on emission trends over the past 20 years, we expect the 1,000,000,000,000th tonne will be emitted on Tue, 02 Aug 2039 18:34:53 GMT
http://www.trillionthtonne.org/questions.html#8
one trillion tonnes is a number concocted to impress the naive. It's like those pics representing all waters in the world as a small planet to next Earth and people getting scared by how small it is - when the actual message should be, that the Earth is really really big.
Anybody over the age of 10 should be capable to understand that neat round figures such as 2C and 1Tt are as scientific as fairy tales, and especially so regarding the climate
I'll second the comment about being fooled before but hope that Tamsin's common sense will prevail at the BBC. Given the impact of the issue on our lives, it deserves absolute honesty by those who demand change and let's say that up to now the BBC has been very economical with the truth and some of the time it tells absolute porkies. I find it hard that this might change on the run up to Paris but maybe they've seen the error of their ways.
I've been watching a lot of tutorials on 3d modelling recently and been charmed by the 'warts and all' approach. They show the mistakes and then how they back track and get it right. They show everything, up to and including the embarrassed pauses, exclaims of relief when they get it right or sighs of resignation when stuff won't go to plan. The real world is made up of stuff like that. Nobody expects climate scientists to be perfect but we do expect them to recognise flaws, admit them and have a plan to improve.
Tamsin: The trailer seemed to be typical BBC broad-brush over the top epic, but I'll give the program a view.
But I'm intrigued by your "It's all about the maths of climate science" (paraphrased, OK?): do you really mean that it's all about the maths in the models?
And in any case, will the program examine the paradox that the maths did not come up with the answer: 18 years 2 months?
Yep, it's confirmed! Climatology is numerology!
Update: When I say, "maths in the models", I mean, "or will there be some discussion of the McIntyre maths: ie: the statistics?"
95% - ah, yes, that will be the proportion of climate models that are wrong then. . . . .
Bishop Hill " its not going to be a sceptic show, but a fair representation...."
That is what I would love to see, but how do you, or Tamsin know that what we, the public gets, is what you expect? The BBC has a tendency to give the public what the BBC wants to give the public, in accordance with BBC guidelines. Public information, and propaganda merge for the beauty of the BBC, not the beholder.