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> The most conservative scientific estimate that the Earth’s temperature will rise 1 to 7 degrees in the next 30 years, said Brown." This quote seems suspiciou

> The most conservative scientific estimate that the Earth’s temperature will rise 1 to 7 degrees in the next 30 years, said Brown." This quote seems suspicious. The only place I see it is in this AP article, as a quote from this one person, and from a bunch of denialist websites that link to this article. I couldn't find any original source for the number (or any indication whether it is Fahrenheit or Centigrade, which of course makes a large difference.) If the quote was from 1989 then it was presumably referring to the IPCC report of that year, for which Wikipedia quotes: under [BAU] increase of global mean temperature during the [21st] century of about 0.3 oC per decade (with an uncertainty range of 0.2 to 0.5 oC per decade); https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPCC_First_Assessment_Report https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPCC_First_Assessment_Report which would be 0.6 to 1.5C over 30 years, or roughly 1F-3F. So the 7 degrees seems to be nothing to do with the IPCC report, and it is unclear where it comes from (or even what unit it has, but since he is from NY it seems plausible that it is F rather than C). Perhaps he was misquoted? Or he was quoting extreme outer bounds of the probability distribution. Building a case of inaccuracy on one poorly attributed number seems excessive. In reality, temperature trends have tracked IPCC predictions remarkably closely, and that fact is far more significant than a single poorly attributed quote.

rjf72 7y ago
Noel Brown was the director of the UN Environmental Program in North America. He's going to be sourcing whatever internal figures they're working with. And yeah, given that he is the directory of the program in North America, I expect you're right that he was referencing fahrenheit and not celsius. I assumed celsius as he was described simply as a "senior UN Environment official." Given he directed the program in North America and was likely being interviewed in this context for public consumption, I agree it was probably fahrenheit. This, however, does not really change the point. Hitting 1.2 when you claim that "1 to 7" is "the most conservative scientific estimate" indicates a general tendency of inflation. The reason I chose this report was it was the earliest authoritative statement I could find on climate change that we could then test against reality. I'm sure you appreciate that this sort of hyperbole is not an isolated incident. Would it really change your mind if I dug up x more authoritative sources of predictions that were completely unrealistic? Even with the IPCC report we ended up barely squeeking by the bottom of their range which was 0.6. So results are putting us at or below the bottom of most all estimates. Why is this? And going forward, why should we expect the results to be more accurate? I don't think these are particularly radical questions to ask. To be clear I'm completely in favor of mitigating against carbon emissions, even for reasons that have nothing to do with climate change. I enjoy the outdoors. Millions of internal combustion engines, fossil fuel driven refineries, etc do not do pleasant things to the outdoor experience. The only thing I'm not in favor of is people freaking out to the point that they think climate change is "the most probable factor for the possibility of a near-term extinction event." That's nonsense by any measurement and is counter productive to ever actually getting anything done, though you might help spur on a loony or two with a few screws loose. [1] - https://archive.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/far/wg_I/ipcc_far_wg_I_spm.pdf https://archive.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/far/wg_I/ipcc_far_wg_I_s... [2] - https://archive.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_ipcc_first_assessment_1990_wg1.shtml https://archive.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_i...
- Angostura 7y ago
  > Noel Brown was the director of the UN Environmental Program in North America. He was the head of the New York Office. I'm not sure those two things are synonyms.
  - rjf72 7y ago
    A quick search for 'Noel Brown unep director' will resolve any doubts, and incidentally also provides lots more information on him and other commentary he's provided over the decades.
- morsch 7y ago
  What I'll take away from this: the estimates given in the early days of the debate -- the IPCC was formed in 1988 -- were surprisingly accurate.
- martinpw 7y ago
  Again, why are you focusing on this one person when there is an entire report backed up by hundreds of scientists that has the actual numbers, which are not 1-7F? This makes no sense at all. So one guy misspoke, or was misquoted, or exaggerated. His stuff on the ice age was also nonsense as you pointed out yourself. The important thing is that the actual IPCC prediction was accurate - that is the real "authoritative statement" and can be read at length on line - that is what you should be quoting.

rjf72 7y ago

Noel Brown was the director of the UN Environmental Program in North America. He's going to be sourcing whatever internal figures they're working with. And yeah, given that he is the directory of the program in North America, I expect you're right that he was referencing fahrenheit and not celsius. I assumed celsius as he was described simply as a "senior UN Environment official." Given he directed the program in North America and was likely being interviewed in this context for public consumption, I agree it was probably fahrenheit. This, however, does not really change the point. Hitting 1.2 when you claim that "1 to 7" is "the most conservative scientific estimate" indicates a general tendency of inflation. The reason I chose this report was it was the earliest authoritative statement I could find on climate change that we could then test against reality. I'm sure you appreciate that this sort of hyperbole is not an isolated incident. Would it really change your mind if I dug up x more authoritative sources of predictions that were completely unrealistic? Even with the IPCC report we ended up barely squeeking by the bottom of their range which was 0.6. So results are putting us at or below the bottom of most all estimates. Why is this? And going forward, why should we expect the results to be more accurate? I don't think these are particularly radical questions to ask. To be clear I'm completely in favor of mitigating against carbon emissions, even for reasons that have nothing to do with climate change. I enjoy the outdoors. Millions of internal combustion engines, fossil fuel driven refineries, etc do not do pleasant things to the outdoor experience. The only thing I'm not in favor of is people freaking out to the point that they think climate change is "the most probable factor for the possibility of a near-term extinction event." That's nonsense by any measurement and is counter productive to ever actually getting anything done, though you might help spur on a loony or two with a few screws loose. [1] - https://archive.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/far/wg_I/ipcc_far_wg_I_spm.pdf https://archive.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/far/wg_I/ipcc_far_wg_I_s... [2] - https://archive.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_ipcc_first_assessment_1990_wg1.shtml https://archive.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_i...

Angostura 7y ago
> Noel Brown was the director of the UN Environmental Program in North America. He was the head of the New York Office. I'm not sure those two things are synonyms.
- rjf72 7y ago
  A quick search for 'Noel Brown unep director' will resolve any doubts, and incidentally also provides lots more information on him and other commentary he's provided over the decades.
morsch 7y ago
What I'll take away from this: the estimates given in the early days of the debate -- the IPCC was formed in 1988 -- were surprisingly accurate.
martinpw 7y ago
Again, why are you focusing on this one person when there is an entire report backed up by hundreds of scientists that has the actual numbers, which are not 1-7F? This makes no sense at all. So one guy misspoke, or was misquoted, or exaggerated. His stuff on the ice age was also nonsense as you pointed out yourself. The important thing is that the actual IPCC prediction was accurate - that is the real "authoritative statement" and can be read at length on line - that is what you should be quoting.