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While it's true that there's no consensus on the source of the warming, it is true that the planet is warming. That's something that tends to get lost in the s

While it's true that there's no consensus on the source of the warming, it is true that the planet is warming. That's something that tends to get lost in the shuffle, and it's really scary what percentage of the American public believes that the fundamental point is false. It also seems to me that Lindzen is exaggerating the degree of dispute over the future climate trends. I do agree that there's not a lot of evidence we can prevent the climate from warming considerably over the next 50 years or so, but there is a general consensus that the climate will warm considerably over the next 50 years. It also seems there's a general consensus this is a problem, even if it's purely natural. Lindzen is doing his fellow researchers a disservice by confusing the politics and science of the issue.

hga 16y ago
Hmmm, that's not my impression. The data reevaluation that resulted in 1934 being declared the hottest year in the 20th century, the "hide the decline" games, the fierce debate over the existence of the Medieval Warm Period and its extent (I think the alarmists now admit its existence, but debate its scope, e.g. there's a lack of data in the Southern Hemisphere and the oceans), they all suggest to me that the science here is not settled. The only way you're going to convince "skeptics" like myself (I only deny that the science is settled) will be to retrieve the original data sets the CRU lost and then do the science again in a totally open manner. Share the data, publish the code and methods, etc.
- DrSprout 16y ago
  >The data reevaluation that resulted in 1934 being declared the hottest year in the 20th century This whole argument is getting extraordinarily tired, but 1934 could well be the hottest year on record in the 20th century without invalidating the claim that the climate has warmed on average by several degrees since then. Outlying data points are in every single data set. >the "hide the decline" games As I recall there was a single game, in a single email. >the fierce debate over the existence of the Medieval Warm Period and its extent Europe? As I understand that's where the data is from. But even so, even if the temperatures have precedents, that doesn't disprove the warming trend - it just casts some doubt on the alarmism. And that's what I'm trying to get at. Warming is happening. It will continue.
  - hga 16y ago
    The point here is not which year was the hottest but the incorrect research that said a recent one was. An additional point would be the big deal the alarmists made when the first results came out and their silence on the correction. Your recollection is incorrect, "hide the decline" is found throughout the source code in the CRU archive leak (quoted like that in comments and directly expressed in the code). There's also the green line in that IPCC graph that just ends in the middle of a thicket of intersecting lines. If it had been continued, it would have ... declined. It's a pretty big deal since it throws into doubt the entire tree ring approach (not to mention the explicit or implicit fraud). Agreed on the "casts some doubt on the alarmism", although I'd say more than "some", since they went to some effort to disappear it in the first place. Hmmm, maybe I should ask, "Warming tend over what period?" Since the last Ice Age, obviously. Since the Little Ice Age, certainly. Beyond that? The time series of data really matters in this debate, for if recent increases do not correlate with anthropogenic CO2 increases (e.g. if it got warm in the 20th century before that was big, and now is getting cooler) then it calls the whole alarmism crusade into doubt (at best).
    - cgranade 16y ago
      Did you actually read what "hide the decline" meant? Go learn about proxies and you'll see that what they mean is that there is a false decline in proxy temperatures that must be corrected for, likely due to increased CO₂ concentrations changing how tree rings are formed. There's no deception here-- they were up front and honest about this problem, and referred to data analysis techniques to correct for a false decline.
      - hga 16y ago
        These "data analysis techniques to correct for a false decline" at best consisted of substituting thermometer readings for tree ring proxies. I wouldn't call that a "data analysis technique". They also "improved" the curve for the 1930s as ESR learned from the code and data (http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1447 http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1447): "This, people, is blatant data-cooking, with no pretense otherwise. It flattens a period of warm temperatures in the 1930s — see those negative coefficients? Then, later on, it applies a positive multiplier so you get a nice dramatic hockey stick at the end of the century." Also note how this meshes nicely with the paper that started this thread that did not until it was corrected show that 1934 was the hottest year in the 20th century.

hga 16y ago

Hmmm, that's not my impression. The data reevaluation that resulted in 1934 being declared the hottest year in the 20th century, the "hide the decline" games, the fierce debate over the existence of the Medieval Warm Period and its extent (I think the alarmists now admit its existence, but debate its scope, e.g. there's a lack of data in the Southern Hemisphere and the oceans), they all suggest to me that the science here is not settled. The only way you're going to convince "skeptics" like myself (I only deny that the science is settled) will be to retrieve the original data sets the CRU lost and then do the science again in a totally open manner. Share the data, publish the code and methods, etc.

DrSprout 16y ago
>The data reevaluation that resulted in 1934 being declared the hottest year in the 20th century This whole argument is getting extraordinarily tired, but 1934 could well be the hottest year on record in the 20th century without invalidating the claim that the climate has warmed on average by several degrees since then. Outlying data points are in every single data set. >the "hide the decline" games As I recall there was a single game, in a single email. >the fierce debate over the existence of the Medieval Warm Period and its extent Europe? As I understand that's where the data is from. But even so, even if the temperatures have precedents, that doesn't disprove the warming trend - it just casts some doubt on the alarmism. And that's what I'm trying to get at. Warming is happening. It will continue.
- hga 16y ago
  The point here is not which year was the hottest but the incorrect research that said a recent one was. An additional point would be the big deal the alarmists made when the first results came out and their silence on the correction. Your recollection is incorrect, "hide the decline" is found throughout the source code in the CRU archive leak (quoted like that in comments and directly expressed in the code). There's also the green line in that IPCC graph that just ends in the middle of a thicket of intersecting lines. If it had been continued, it would have ... declined. It's a pretty big deal since it throws into doubt the entire tree ring approach (not to mention the explicit or implicit fraud). Agreed on the "casts some doubt on the alarmism", although I'd say more than "some", since they went to some effort to disappear it in the first place. Hmmm, maybe I should ask, "Warming tend over what period?" Since the last Ice Age, obviously. Since the Little Ice Age, certainly. Beyond that? The time series of data really matters in this debate, for if recent increases do not correlate with anthropogenic CO2 increases (e.g. if it got warm in the 20th century before that was big, and now is getting cooler) then it calls the whole alarmism crusade into doubt (at best).
  - cgranade 16y ago
    Did you actually read what "hide the decline" meant? Go learn about proxies and you'll see that what they mean is that there is a false decline in proxy temperatures that must be corrected for, likely due to increased CO₂ concentrations changing how tree rings are formed. There's no deception here-- they were up front and honest about this problem, and referred to data analysis techniques to correct for a false decline.
    - hga 16y ago
      These "data analysis techniques to correct for a false decline" at best consisted of substituting thermometer readings for tree ring proxies. I wouldn't call that a "data analysis technique". They also "improved" the curve for the 1930s as ESR learned from the code and data (http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1447 http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1447): "This, people, is blatant data-cooking, with no pretense otherwise. It flattens a period of warm temperatures in the 1930s — see those negative coefficients? Then, later on, it applies a positive multiplier so you get a nice dramatic hockey stick at the end of the century." Also note how this meshes nicely with the paper that started this thread that did not until it was corrected show that 1934 was the hottest year in the 20th century.