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Absolutely not. Sorry for the confusion. I just can't find any papers on why the satellite data is wrong other than hand waving about how peer reviewed research

Absolutely not. Sorry for the confusion. I just can't find any papers on why the satellite data is wrong other than hand waving about how peer reviewed research into bias correction is wrong. And I also can't find anything explaining what the satellite data means. That NOAA paper you linked has some interesting issues. But even if it is correct (it's probably not), it shows a low sensitivity to CO2.

mikeash 11y ago
I wasn't sure, so I'm glad I asked instead of assuming! Anyway, I'm afraid I can't really help, I just don't know enough about all the various issues involved. The interpretation of temperature data seems to boil down to a whole bunch of "it's complicated." I lean heavily towards the people who say "it's complicated, but when you analyze it properly it shows warming" over the people who say "the data shows there is no warming" just because the latter tend to see calibration as a ploy and tend not to be well versed in the actual science, whereas the former is usually from people who study this stuff for a living. I will certainly admit that this is not the most solid approach, but it seems to be about the best a person can do without dedicating a significant part of your life to studying it in depth.
- merpnderp 11y ago
  You are absolutely correct. It is complicated. And given a healthy dose of scientific skepticism, there is no good way to know for sure right now. For instance that NOAA study you linked uses UAH satellite tropospheric data to fill in for missing grounds stations, which is highly controversial (because how does that work), and even more so over the poles, since UAH data their is poor and scattered. Then the .12C difference between ship and buoy sea surface temps seems like is too convenient. I have a feeling that if they were honest with their confidence intervals, they'd be larger than the possible signal. After working through tons of this stuff, reading papers, replicating the math where I can (hard to get source data, and harder to get actual algorithms), I'm left with "who knows?" But the satellite data is clear (and is the only contiguous pole to pole measurement of the atmosphere we have). No warming for over 20 years.
  - mikeash 11y ago
    I'm curious (since it sounds like you've done the work, while I have not), does the trend remain flat if you remove the massive outlier year of 1998? A great deal of the pause seems to be reverting to the previous trendline after a weird spike. But I could be way off!

mikeash 11y ago

I wasn't sure, so I'm glad I asked instead of assuming! Anyway, I'm afraid I can't really help, I just don't know enough about all the various issues involved. The interpretation of temperature data seems to boil down to a whole bunch of "it's complicated." I lean heavily towards the people who say "it's complicated, but when you analyze it properly it shows warming" over the people who say "the data shows there is no warming" just because the latter tend to see calibration as a ploy and tend not to be well versed in the actual science, whereas the former is usually from people who study this stuff for a living. I will certainly admit that this is not the most solid approach, but it seems to be about the best a person can do without dedicating a significant part of your life to studying it in depth.

merpnderp 11y ago
You are absolutely correct. It is complicated. And given a healthy dose of scientific skepticism, there is no good way to know for sure right now. For instance that NOAA study you linked uses UAH satellite tropospheric data to fill in for missing grounds stations, which is highly controversial (because how does that work), and even more so over the poles, since UAH data their is poor and scattered. Then the .12C difference between ship and buoy sea surface temps seems like is too convenient. I have a feeling that if they were honest with their confidence intervals, they'd be larger than the possible signal. After working through tons of this stuff, reading papers, replicating the math where I can (hard to get source data, and harder to get actual algorithms), I'm left with "who knows?" But the satellite data is clear (and is the only contiguous pole to pole measurement of the atmosphere we have). No warming for over 20 years.
- mikeash 11y ago
  I'm curious (since it sounds like you've done the work, while I have not), does the trend remain flat if you remove the massive outlier year of 1998? A great deal of the pause seems to be reverting to the previous trendline after a weird spike. But I could be way off!