Where do certain global warming skeptics get their information from?
I've just flicked through some of the most recently asked questions in this section, they're littered with errors, distortions, misrepresentations, half truths and in some cases - outright lies.
We all make mistakes and have opinions - that's fine. However, each of the following statements were given as fact, no attempts were made to qualify them, none were substantiated.
I appreciate some of the statements could have made due to errors and misunderstandings, that's to be expected given the amount of inaccurate information that's been produced, but in many cases I believe they were made as deliberate attempts to deceive.
Question global warming by all means but do so openly, honestly and responsibly (as some on this forum do). Resorting to underhand tactics demonstrates an inability to rely on factual evidence and shows contempt and disdain for other users.
Why do some skeptics feel it necessary to adopt this apparoch and where is the erroneous data originating from?
Here are some of the errros from some of the questions (the list could easily have been a lot longer).
● The dark ages were hotter than it is now
● When the Vikings landed on North American there were no glaciers on Greenland
● The caribou and the polar bears are doing better now than ever.
● All weather cycles are app: 40 years
● NASA has found that the polar ice caps on Mars are melting
● just over 2% of the total carbon emissions are contributed to human activity
● we just happen to be in a period of [natural] global warming
● One Chinese power station produces more CO2 in a week than Britain's cars do in a year
● Co2 has increased from 280 ppm (parts per million) to 360ppm this century
● MAN has contributed about . 000001 (that's 10 MILLIONTHS OF ONE (1) DEGREE)
● the Globe isn't really warming
● There's record cold in the southern hemisphere.
● The sun is causing warming
● from 1910 to 1940 shows a higher rate of warming than we have now
● the current [decadal] rate of change looks to be close to half that [0.2°C]
● The last 10 years have been cooling
● No reputable scientist claims that the temperatures are still increasing
● co2 is not causing warming
● South America is experiencing multi year of far below average temperatures
● Mt st helens put out more co2 in 10 minutes than man has put out in 150 years
● scientist work for the governments
● Shame on environmentalists, thirty years they used the same crap science for global cooling
SOME RESPONSES TO ANSWERS:
POBERT: All opinions are valid, I effectively stated this in the question. However, being a climatologist my opinion is perhaps more educated than that of some other people. You'll find there's very few experts who disagree with global warming, I've worked with hundreds since the 80's and know of only a handful of skeptics. The precise (instrumental) record is limited to approx 150 years but we have an accurate record going back many thousands of years.
JIM: Very few people, be they alarmists, skptics or undecided know very little of the science and this leads to a great many mistakes from both sides. I made a list of skeptics errors, a similar list or alarmists errors could be made although in truth I think you'd find it considerably shorter and more based on errors than deliberate distortions, fabrication and lies.
BUBBA: I like the term 'obstructionists' I think that could accurately be applied to some people.
VLADOVIKING: You’ll see from my previous posts that I’m not a fan of Al Gore, I never refer to him, I never refer people to him or his movie as I consider there are better and more impartial sources.
RANDALL: Please see my comments to Ron C.
KRISTINE: The data were updated because of advances in technology, it’s still being updated and there may be more ‘hockey sticks’ in the future. Let’s take things to a ridiculous extreme regarding the MWP and LIA and assume that they were 10°C warmer and cooler than present temperatures, it would still be that temps are changing faster now than during these periods. If we accept what some skeptics are claiming, namely that the MWP was about 0.3°C warmer than now, it means that temps are presently rising 17 times as fast (and that’s a figure based on a long term mean, if I’d have used the standard, shorter, mean it would be more like 30 times as fast).
RON: The work you linked to by Dr Loehle is a fantastic piece of work. I’ve worked on similar comparisons myself and they’re mind-numbingly boring. What he’s produced there is a very worthwhile document.
However, there is a problem. Not in Dr Loehle’s work but perhaps in your interpretation. Briefly, Loehle’s graph ends in 1980, if it were continued to 2007 it would show current temps to be approx 0.2°C higher than the MWP.
I’ll explain. Loehle uses 2000 years worth of data from which he takes a mean to create a data range from 1 to 1995AD, to this is applied 30 year smoothing giving a final range of 16 to 1980AD – this is what’s plotted on the graphs.
Because of inconsistencies in the 18 source datasets he has had to calculate a base period unique to his graphs, unfortunately his text doesn’t provide an absolute temperature value thus making it incomparable with the conventional temperature records (in short, his zero is not the same as zero on other graphs). It’s not a problem, it just means there’s more numbers to calculate.
The last value on his graph (1980) has an anomalous ave value of approx 0.18°C and an extreme of 0.49°C. Using his process of a 30 year running mean applied to an average across more recent datasets shows that in 1980 the ave global temp anomaly was 0.085°C, by 1992 (the most recent year to which a 30 year mean can be applied) the temp anom was 0.308°C, by interpolation we can deduce a value for 2007 of 0.565°C i.e. 0.308 + ((0.308 – 0.085 / (1992-1980+1)) x (2007-1992)) = 0.565. By following Loehle’s method we find that since 1980 the ave global temp has increased by 0.480°C (0.565 – 0.085).
If we extend Loehle’s graph to 2007 we get an anomalous average value of approx 0.660°C (0.180 + 0.480) and an extreme of 0.970°C (0.490 + 0.480). The peak of the MWP has an anomalous average value of approx 0.450°C and an extreme of 0.759°C. Thus, temperatures are currently about 0.2°C higher then the climax of the MWP.
What’s especially pleasing here is that I’m currently working on what we believe to be the most accurate, extensive and user friendly global temperature record. Our calculations put 1992 as the time when temps exceeded the peak of the MWP, Loehle’s method puts the year at 1991.