Unable to save raw data in database.

O:9:\"MagpieRSS\":22:{s:6:\"parser\";i:0;s:12:\"current_item\";a:0:{}s:5:\"items\";a:10:{i:0;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:11:\"Forecasting\";s:4:\"link\";s:55:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/forecasting.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:64:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/forecasting.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Mon, 23 Aug 2010 15:34:42 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:17:\"Warming Forecasts\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=2032\";s:11:\"description\";s:359:\"One of the defenses often used by climate modelers against charges that climate is simple to complex to model accurately is that “they do it all the time in finance and economics.”  This comes today from Megan McArdle on economic forecasting: I find this pretty underwhelming, since private forecasters also unanimously think they can make [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:1292:\"

One of the defenses often used by climate modelers against charges that climate is simple to complex to model accurately is that “they do it all the time in finance and economics.”  This comes today from Megan McArdle on economic forecasting:

I find this pretty underwhelming, since private forecasters also unanimously think they can make forecasts, a belief which turns out to be not very well supported.  More than one analysis of these sorts of forecasts has found them not much better than random chance, and especially prone to miss major structural changes in the economy.   Just because toggling a given variable in their model means that you produce a given outcome, does not mean you can assume that these results will be replicated in the real world.  The poor history of forecasting definitionally means that these models are missing a lot of information, and poorly understood feedback effects.

Sounds familiar, huh?  I echoed these sentiments in a comparison of economic and climate forecasting here.

\";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:60:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/forecasting.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:3:\"160\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:359:\"One of the defenses often used by climate modelers against charges that climate is simple to complex to model accurately is that “they do it all the time in finance and economics.”  This comes today from Megan McArdle on economic forecasting: I find this pretty underwhelming, since private forecasters also unanimously think they can make [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:1292:\"

One of the defenses often used by climate modelers against charges that climate is simple to complex to model accurately is that “they do it all the time in finance and economics.”  This comes today from Megan McArdle on economic forecasting:

I find this pretty underwhelming, since private forecasters also unanimously think they can make forecasts, a belief which turns out to be not very well supported.  More than one analysis of these sorts of forecasts has found them not much better than random chance, and especially prone to miss major structural changes in the economy.   Just because toggling a given variable in their model means that you produce a given outcome, does not mean you can assume that these results will be replicated in the real world.  The poor history of forecasting definitionally means that these models are missing a lot of information, and poorly understood feedback effects.

Sounds familiar, huh?  I echoed these sentiments in a comparison of economic and climate forecasting here.

\";s:14:\"date_timestamp\";i:1282577682;}i:1;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:44:\"Why It Is Good to Have Two Sides of A Debate\";s:4:\"link\";s:88:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/why-it-is-good-to-have-two-sides-of-a-debate.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:97:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/why-it-is-good-to-have-two-sides-of-a-debate.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Thu, 12 Aug 2010 17:27:22 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:23:\"Temperature Measurement\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=2029\";s:11:\"description\";s:313:\"With climate alarmists continuing to declare climate debate to be over and asking skeptics to just go away, we are reminded again why it is useful to have two sides in a debate.  Few people on any side of any question typically are skeptical of data that support their pet hypotheses.    So, in order to [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:2323:\"

With climate alarmists continuing to declare climate debate to be over and asking skeptics to just go away, we are reminded again why it is useful to have two sides in a debate.  Few people on any side of any question typically are skeptical of data that support their pet hypotheses.    So, in order to have a full range of skepticism and replication applied to all findings, it is helpful to have people passionately on both sides of a proposition.

I am reminded of this seeing how skeptics finally convinced the NOAA that one of its satellites had gone wonky, producing absurd data (e.g. Great Lakes temperatures in the 400-600F range).  Absolutely typically, the NOAA initially blamed skeptics for fabricating the data

NOAA’s Chuck Pistis went into whitewash mode on first hearing the story about the worst affected location, Egg Harbor, set by his instruments onto fast boil. On Tuesday morning Pistis loftily declared, “I looked in the archives and I find no image with that time stamp. Also we don’t typically post completely cloudy images at all, let alone with temperatures. This image appears to be manufactured for someone’s entertainment.”

Later he went on to own up to the problem, but not before implying at various times that the data is a) trustworthy  b) not trustworthy  c) placed online by hand with verification and d) posted online automatically with no human intervention.

This was the final NOAA position, which is absurd to me:

“NOTICE: Due to degradation of a satellite sensor used by this mapping product, some images have exhibited extreme high and low surface temperatures. “Please disregard these images as anomalies. Future images will not include data from the degraded satellite and images caused by the faulty satellite sensor will be/have been removed from the image archive.”

OK, so 600F readings will be thrown out, but how do we have any confidence the rest of the readings are OK.  Just because they may read in a reasonable range, e.g, 59F, the NOAA is just going to assume those readings are OK?

\";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:93:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/why-it-is-good-to-have-two-sides-of-a-debate.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:2:\"20\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:313:\"With climate alarmists continuing to declare climate debate to be over and asking skeptics to just go away, we are reminded again why it is useful to have two sides in a debate.  Few people on any side of any question typically are skeptical of data that support their pet hypotheses.    So, in order to [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:2323:\"

With climate alarmists continuing to declare climate debate to be over and asking skeptics to just go away, we are reminded again why it is useful to have two sides in a debate.  Few people on any side of any question typically are skeptical of data that support their pet hypotheses.    So, in order to have a full range of skepticism and replication applied to all findings, it is helpful to have people passionately on both sides of a proposition.

I am reminded of this seeing how skeptics finally convinced the NOAA that one of its satellites had gone wonky, producing absurd data (e.g. Great Lakes temperatures in the 400-600F range).  Absolutely typically, the NOAA initially blamed skeptics for fabricating the data

NOAA’s Chuck Pistis went into whitewash mode on first hearing the story about the worst affected location, Egg Harbor, set by his instruments onto fast boil. On Tuesday morning Pistis loftily declared, “I looked in the archives and I find no image with that time stamp. Also we don’t typically post completely cloudy images at all, let alone with temperatures. This image appears to be manufactured for someone’s entertainment.”

Later he went on to own up to the problem, but not before implying at various times that the data is a) trustworthy  b) not trustworthy  c) placed online by hand with verification and d) posted online automatically with no human intervention.

This was the final NOAA position, which is absurd to me:

“NOTICE: Due to degradation of a satellite sensor used by this mapping product, some images have exhibited extreme high and low surface temperatures. “Please disregard these images as anomalies. Future images will not include data from the degraded satellite and images caused by the faulty satellite sensor will be/have been removed from the image archive.”

OK, so 600F readings will be thrown out, but how do we have any confidence the rest of the readings are OK.  Just because they may read in a reasonable range, e.g, 59F, the NOAA is just going to assume those readings are OK?

\";s:14:\"date_timestamp\";i:1281634042;}i:2;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:79:\"Just When I Thought I Had Seen the Worst Possible Peer-Reviewed Climate Work…\";s:4:\"link\";s:120:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/just-when-i-thought-i-had-seen-the-worst-possible-peer-reviewed-climate-work.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:129:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/just-when-i-thought-i-had-seen-the-worst-possible-peer-reviewed-climate-work.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Thu, 12 Aug 2010 17:09:17 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:23:\"Climate Science Process\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=2026\";s:11:\"description\";s:295:\"This is really some crazy-bad science in a new study by Welch et al on Asian rice yields purporting to show that they will be reduced by warmer weather.  This is an odd result on its face, given that rice yields have been increasing as the world has warmed over the last 50 years. Now, it [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:3126:\"

This is really some crazy-bad science in a new study by Welch et al on Asian rice yields purporting to show that they will be reduced by warmer weather.  This is an odd result on its face, given that rice yields have been increasing as the world has warmed over the last 50 years.

Now, it is possible that temperature-related drops in yields have been offset by even larger improvements in other areas that have increased yields, but one’s suspicion-meter is certainly triggered by the finding, especially since the press release on the study says that yields have already been cut 10-20% in some areas, flying in the face of broader yield data.

Willis Eschenbach dove into it, and found this amazing approach.  How this passed peer-review muster is just further evidence as to how asymmetrical peer review is in climate (ie if you have the “right” findings, they will pass all kinds of slop)

First, it covers a very short time span. The longest farm yield datasets used are only six years long (1994-99). Almost a fifth of the datasets are three years or less, and the Chinese data (6% of the total data) only cover two years (1998-1999)….

But whichever dataset they used, they are comparing a two year series of yields against a twenty-six year trend. I’m sorry, but I don’t care what the results of that comparison might be. There is no way to compare a two-year dataset with anything but the temperature records from that area for those two years. This is especially true given the known problems with the ground-station data. And it is doubly true when one of the two years (1998) is a year with a large El Niño.

In fact, he goes on to point out that simultaneous to the two-year trend in China showing yields falling  (I still can’t get over extrapolating from a 2 year farm yield trend) temperatures in China did very different things than their long-term averages might predict

For example, they give the trend for maximum temps in the winter (DecJanFeb) for the particular location in China (29.5N, 119.47E) as being 0.06°C per year, and the trend for spring (MarAprMay) as being 0.05°C per year (I get 0.05°/yr and 0.04°C/yr respectively, fairly close).

But from 1998 to 1999, the actual DJF change was +2.0°C, and the MAM change was minus 1.0°C (CRU TS Max Temperature dataset). As a result, they are comparing the Chinese results to a theoretical trend which has absolutely no relationship to what actually occurred on the ground.

Further, though Eschenbach only mentions it in passing, there likely is another large problem with the data.  The researchers do not mention what temperature station they are using data from, but if past global warming study methodology is any guide, the station could be hundreds of miles away from the farms studied.

\";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:125:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/just-when-i-thought-i-had-seen-the-worst-possible-peer-reviewed-climate-work.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:1:\"3\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:295:\"This is really some crazy-bad science in a new study by Welch et al on Asian rice yields purporting to show that they will be reduced by warmer weather.  This is an odd result on its face, given that rice yields have been increasing as the world has warmed over the last 50 years. Now, it [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:3126:\"

This is really some crazy-bad science in a new study by Welch et al on Asian rice yields purporting to show that they will be reduced by warmer weather.  This is an odd result on its face, given that rice yields have been increasing as the world has warmed over the last 50 years.

Now, it is possible that temperature-related drops in yields have been offset by even larger improvements in other areas that have increased yields, but one’s suspicion-meter is certainly triggered by the finding, especially since the press release on the study says that yields have already been cut 10-20% in some areas, flying in the face of broader yield data.

Willis Eschenbach dove into it, and found this amazing approach.  How this passed peer-review muster is just further evidence as to how asymmetrical peer review is in climate (ie if you have the “right” findings, they will pass all kinds of slop)

First, it covers a very short time span. The longest farm yield datasets used are only six years long (1994-99). Almost a fifth of the datasets are three years or less, and the Chinese data (6% of the total data) only cover two years (1998-1999)….

But whichever dataset they used, they are comparing a two year series of yields against a twenty-six year trend. I’m sorry, but I don’t care what the results of that comparison might be. There is no way to compare a two-year dataset with anything but the temperature records from that area for those two years. This is especially true given the known problems with the ground-station data. And it is doubly true when one of the two years (1998) is a year with a large El Niño.

In fact, he goes on to point out that simultaneous to the two-year trend in China showing yields falling  (I still can’t get over extrapolating from a 2 year farm yield trend) temperatures in China did very different things than their long-term averages might predict

For example, they give the trend for maximum temps in the winter (DecJanFeb) for the particular location in China (29.5N, 119.47E) as being 0.06°C per year, and the trend for spring (MarAprMay) as being 0.05°C per year (I get 0.05°/yr and 0.04°C/yr respectively, fairly close).

But from 1998 to 1999, the actual DJF change was +2.0°C, and the MAM change was minus 1.0°C (CRU TS Max Temperature dataset). As a result, they are comparing the Chinese results to a theoretical trend which has absolutely no relationship to what actually occurred on the ground.

Further, though Eschenbach only mentions it in passing, there likely is another large problem with the data.  The researchers do not mention what temperature station they are using data from, but if past global warming study methodology is any guide, the station could be hundreds of miles away from the farms studied.

\";s:14:\"date_timestamp\";i:1281632957;}i:3;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:36:\"Computers are Causing Global Warming\";s:4:\"link\";s:80:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/computers-are-causing-global-warming.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:89:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/computers-are-causing-global-warming.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Thu, 12 Aug 2010 16:55:35 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:23:\"Temperature Measurement\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=2023\";s:11:\"description\";s:316:\"At least, that is, in Nepal.  Willis Eschenbach has an interesting post looking into the claim that Nepal has seen one of the highest warming rates in the world (thus threatening Himalayan glaciers, etc etc).  It turns out there is one (1) GISS station in Nepal, and oddly enough the raw data shows a cooling [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:2187:\"

At least, that is, in Nepal.  Willis Eschenbach has an interesting post looking into the claim that Nepal has seen one of the highest warming rates in the world (thus threatening Himalayan glaciers, etc etc).  It turns out there is one (1) GISS station in Nepal, and oddly enough the raw data shows a cooling trend.  Only the intervention of NASA computers heroically transforms a cooling trend into the strong warming trend we all know must really be there because Al Gore says its there and he got a Nobel Prize, didn’t he?

GISS has made a straight-line adjustment of 1.1°C in twenty years, or 5.5°C per century. They have changed a cooling trend to a strong warming trend … I’m sorry, but I see absolutely no scientific basis for that massive adjustment. I don’t care if it was done by a human using their best judgement, done by a computer algorithm utilizing comparison temperatures in India and China, or done by monkeys with typewriters. I don’t buy that adjustment, it is without scientific foundation or credible physical explanation.

At best that is shoddy quality control of an off-the-rails computer algorithm. At worst, the aforesaid monkeys were having a really bad hair day. Either way I say adjusting the Kathmandu temperature record in that manner has no scientific underpinnings at all. We have one stinking record for the whole country of Nepal, which shows cooling. GISS homogenizes the data and claims it wasn’t really cooling at all, it really was warming, and warming at four degrees per century at that

In updates to the post, Eschenbach and his readers track down what is likely driving this bizarre adjustment in the GISS methodology.

\";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:85:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/08/computers-are-causing-global-warming.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:1:\"1\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:316:\"At least, that is, in Nepal.  Willis Eschenbach has an interesting post looking into the claim that Nepal has seen one of the highest warming rates in the world (thus threatening Himalayan glaciers, etc etc).  It turns out there is one (1) GISS station in Nepal, and oddly enough the raw data shows a cooling [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:2187:\"

At least, that is, in Nepal.  Willis Eschenbach has an interesting post looking into the claim that Nepal has seen one of the highest warming rates in the world (thus threatening Himalayan glaciers, etc etc).  It turns out there is one (1) GISS station in Nepal, and oddly enough the raw data shows a cooling trend.  Only the intervention of NASA computers heroically transforms a cooling trend into the strong warming trend we all know must really be there because Al Gore says its there and he got a Nobel Prize, didn’t he?

GISS has made a straight-line adjustment of 1.1°C in twenty years, or 5.5°C per century. They have changed a cooling trend to a strong warming trend … I’m sorry, but I see absolutely no scientific basis for that massive adjustment. I don’t care if it was done by a human using their best judgement, done by a computer algorithm utilizing comparison temperatures in India and China, or done by monkeys with typewriters. I don’t buy that adjustment, it is without scientific foundation or credible physical explanation.

At best that is shoddy quality control of an off-the-rails computer algorithm. At worst, the aforesaid monkeys were having a really bad hair day. Either way I say adjusting the Kathmandu temperature record in that manner has no scientific underpinnings at all. We have one stinking record for the whole country of Nepal, which shows cooling. GISS homogenizes the data and claims it wasn’t really cooling at all, it really was warming, and warming at four degrees per century at that

In updates to the post, Eschenbach and his readers track down what is likely driving this bizarre adjustment in the GISS methodology.

\";s:14:\"date_timestamp\";i:1281632135;}i:4;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:21:\"Garbage In, Money Out\";s:4:\"link\";s:64:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/garbage-in-money-out.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:73:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/garbage-in-money-out.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Thu, 29 Jul 2010 17:44:55 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:17:\"Warming Forecasts\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=2019\";s:11:\"description\";s:318:\" In my Forbes column last week, I discuss the incredible similarity between the computer models that are used to justify the Obama stimulus and the climate models that form the basis for the proposition that manmade CO2 is causing most of the world’s warming. The climate modeling approach is so similar to [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:4102:\" \";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:69:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/garbage-in-money-out.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:2:\"56\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:318:\" In my Forbes column last week, I discuss the incredible similarity between the computer models that are used to justify the Obama stimulus and the climate models that form the basis for the proposition that manmade CO2 is causing most of the world’s warming. The climate modeling approach is so similar to [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:4102:\" \";s:14:\"date_timestamp\";i:1280425495;}i:5;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:57:\"You Know it Has to Be A Skeptic Writing When You See This\";s:4:\"link\";s:101:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/you-know-it-has-to-be-a-skeptic-writing-when-you-see-this.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:110:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/you-know-it-has-to-be-a-skeptic-writing-when-you-see-this.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Wed, 21 Jul 2010 04:50:54 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:23:\"Climate Science Process\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=2014\";s:11:\"description\";s:343:\"I have followed Roy Spencer’s work for a while on trying to measure climate feedback effects from satellite data.  In general, I give him Kudos for actually working on what is really THE critical problem that separates climate catastrophe from climate rounding error.  It is good someone is working on this, rather than, say, how [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:2126:\"

I have followed Roy Spencer’s work for a while on trying to measure climate feedback effects from satellite data.  In general, I give him Kudos for actually working on what is really THE critical problem that separates climate catastrophe from climate rounding error.  It is good someone is working on this, rather than, say, how global warming might affect toad mating, or whatever.

I have never been totally convinced by this part of Spencer’s work.  Again, I give him kudos for trying to isolate the effect of single variables in a complex system through actual observation, rather than the lazy approach of running experiments inside computer models of dubious accuracy.  I am not convinced he has achieved this, but I must admit I have not spent a ton of time working it through.

Anyway, Spencer has a long discussion of his methodology in answer to some critics.  I reserve judgment until I have studied it further.  But I was captivated by this bit:

On the positive side, though, MF10 have forced us to go back and reexamine the methodology and conclusions in SB08. As a result, we are now well on the way to new results which will better optimize the matching of satellite-observed climate variability to the simple climate model, including a range of feedback estimates consistent with the satellite data. It is now apparent to us that we did not do a good enough job of that in SB08.

Really?  You shared your data, were criticized, and are modifying your approach based on this criticism?  I thought from the study of the habits of mainstream climate scientists the correct scientific procedure was to 1) hide your data like it was Russian nuclear secrets; 2) prevent any opposing view from getting published; and 3) defend a flawed methodology by getting 10 of your friends to use the same methodology and summarize it all in an IPCC spaghetti graph.

\";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:106:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/you-know-it-has-to-be-a-skeptic-writing-when-you-see-this.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:2:\"16\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:343:\"I have followed Roy Spencer’s work for a while on trying to measure climate feedback effects from satellite data.  In general, I give him Kudos for actually working on what is really THE critical problem that separates climate catastrophe from climate rounding error.  It is good someone is working on this, rather than, say, how [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:2126:\"

I have followed Roy Spencer’s work for a while on trying to measure climate feedback effects from satellite data.  In general, I give him Kudos for actually working on what is really THE critical problem that separates climate catastrophe from climate rounding error.  It is good someone is working on this, rather than, say, how global warming might affect toad mating, or whatever.

I have never been totally convinced by this part of Spencer’s work.  Again, I give him kudos for trying to isolate the effect of single variables in a complex system through actual observation, rather than the lazy approach of running experiments inside computer models of dubious accuracy.  I am not convinced he has achieved this, but I must admit I have not spent a ton of time working it through.

Anyway, Spencer has a long discussion of his methodology in answer to some critics.  I reserve judgment until I have studied it further.  But I was captivated by this bit:

On the positive side, though, MF10 have forced us to go back and reexamine the methodology and conclusions in SB08. As a result, we are now well on the way to new results which will better optimize the matching of satellite-observed climate variability to the simple climate model, including a range of feedback estimates consistent with the satellite data. It is now apparent to us that we did not do a good enough job of that in SB08.

Really?  You shared your data, were criticized, and are modifying your approach based on this criticism?  I thought from the study of the habits of mainstream climate scientists the correct scientific procedure was to 1) hide your data like it was Russian nuclear secrets; 2) prevent any opposing view from getting published; and 3) defend a flawed methodology by getting 10 of your friends to use the same methodology and summarize it all in an IPCC spaghetti graph.

\";s:14:\"date_timestamp\";i:1279687854;}i:6;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:35:\"Does This Sound Familiar to Anyone?\";s:4:\"link\";s:78:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/does-this-sound-familiar-to-anyone.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:87:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/does-this-sound-familiar-to-anyone.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Fri, 16 Jul 2010 18:45:58 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:42:\"Climate Science ProcessTemperature History\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=2008\";s:11:\"description\";s:393:\"Greg Mankiw on scoring the federal stimulus package: the CEA took a conventional Keynesian-style macroeconomic model and used those set of equations to estimate the effect the stimulus should have had.  Essentially, the model offers an estimate of the policy’s effect, conditional on the model being a correct description of the world.  But notice that this exercise is [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:3665:\"

Greg Mankiw on scoring the federal stimulus package:

the CEA took a conventional Keynesian-style macroeconomic model and used those set of equations to estimate the effect the stimulus should have had.  Essentially, the model offers an estimate of the policy’s effect, conditional on the model being a correct description of the world.  But notice that this exercise is not really a measurement based on what actually occurred.  Rather, the exercise is premised on the belief that the model is true, so no matter how bad the economy got, the inference is that it would have been even worse without the stimulus.  Why?  Because that is what the model says.  The validity of the model itself is never questioned.

Does this sound like climate science or what?  The same models that are used to predict future temperature increases are used to decide how much of past warming was dues to Co2 and how much was due to natural effects.  Here is the retrospective IPCC chart which assigns more than 100% of post-1950 warming to CO2 (since the blue “natural forcings” is shown to go down, see more here)

Here is the stimulus version, showing flat employment, but positing that the stimulus created jobs because employment “would have gone down without it” (sound familiar?)

This kind of retrospective look at causality has the look of science but in fact is nothing of the sort, and can be not much more than guesses laundered to look like facts.

But this may in fact be worse than guessing.  In both cases, these graphs are drawn by folks who think they know the answer (in the first case that CO2 caused all warming, in the second that the stimulus created millions of jobs).  Since in both cases the lower “without” case (either without CO2 or without stimulus) is horrendously, almost impossible to derive and totally impossible to measure, there is good reason to believe it is merely a plug, fixed in value to get the answer they want.  But if I plugged it just on the back of an envelope, everyone would call me out for it, so I plug it in an arcane model where numerous inputs can be tweaked to get different results, to avoid this kind of unwanted scrutiny.

Readers of climate sites will also recognize this criticism of Obama’s self-serving stimulus analysis

Moreover, the fact that other organizations simulating similar models come to similar conclusions is no evidence about the validity of the model’s simulations.  It only tells you the CEA staff did not commit egregious programming errors when running their computer simulations.

Sounds like the logic behind the hockey stick spaghetti graphs, no?

\";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:83:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/does-this-sound-familiar-to-anyone.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:2:\"20\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:393:\"Greg Mankiw on scoring the federal stimulus package: the CEA took a conventional Keynesian-style macroeconomic model and used those set of equations to estimate the effect the stimulus should have had.  Essentially, the model offers an estimate of the policy’s effect, conditional on the model being a correct description of the world.  But notice that this exercise is [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:3665:\"

Greg Mankiw on scoring the federal stimulus package:

the CEA took a conventional Keynesian-style macroeconomic model and used those set of equations to estimate the effect the stimulus should have had.  Essentially, the model offers an estimate of the policy’s effect, conditional on the model being a correct description of the world.  But notice that this exercise is not really a measurement based on what actually occurred.  Rather, the exercise is premised on the belief that the model is true, so no matter how bad the economy got, the inference is that it would have been even worse without the stimulus.  Why?  Because that is what the model says.  The validity of the model itself is never questioned.

Does this sound like climate science or what?  The same models that are used to predict future temperature increases are used to decide how much of past warming was dues to Co2 and how much was due to natural effects.  Here is the retrospective IPCC chart which assigns more than 100% of post-1950 warming to CO2 (since the blue “natural forcings” is shown to go down, see more here)

Here is the stimulus version, showing flat employment, but positing that the stimulus created jobs because employment “would have gone down without it” (sound familiar?)

This kind of retrospective look at causality has the look of science but in fact is nothing of the sort, and can be not much more than guesses laundered to look like facts.

But this may in fact be worse than guessing.  In both cases, these graphs are drawn by folks who think they know the answer (in the first case that CO2 caused all warming, in the second that the stimulus created millions of jobs).  Since in both cases the lower “without” case (either without CO2 or without stimulus) is horrendously, almost impossible to derive and totally impossible to measure, there is good reason to believe it is merely a plug, fixed in value to get the answer they want.  But if I plugged it just on the back of an envelope, everyone would call me out for it, so I plug it in an arcane model where numerous inputs can be tweaked to get different results, to avoid this kind of unwanted scrutiny.

Readers of climate sites will also recognize this criticism of Obama’s self-serving stimulus analysis

Moreover, the fact that other organizations simulating similar models come to similar conclusions is no evidence about the validity of the model’s simulations.  It only tells you the CEA staff did not commit egregious programming errors when running their computer simulations.

Sounds like the logic behind the hockey stick spaghetti graphs, no?

\";s:14:\"date_timestamp\";i:1279305958;}i:7;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:35:\"Might As Well Be Walking on the Sun\";s:4:\"link\";s:79:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/might-as-well-be-walking-on-the-sun.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:88:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/might-as-well-be-walking-on-the-sun.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Wed, 14 Jul 2010 16:48:39 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:23:\"Temperature Measurement\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=2002\";s:11:\"description\";s:341:\"Steve Goddard and Anthony Watt have a series of posts on an old favorite topic on this site — how data manipulations back in the climate office is creating a lot of the “measured” warming.  This particular example is right here in Arizona, and features several sites my son and I surveyed for Anthony’s site.  [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:1785:\"

Steve Goddard and Anthony Watt have a series of posts on an old favorite topic on this site — how data manipulations back in the climate office is creating a lot of the “measured” warming.  This particular example is right here in Arizona, and features several sites my son and I surveyed for Anthony’s site.  They have a followup on another Arizona station here.  Check out all the asphalt:

This is a hilariously bad siting.  It demonstrates how small things can sometimes have big effects.  The MMTS sensor has a very limited cable length.  This does not mean that it only comes with a short cable (begging the question of why they can’t just buy a longer one), but that it can only have a short cable due to signal amplification issues.  As a result, we get this terrible siting because it needs to be close to the building, whereas even a hundred yards away there were much better locations

Carefree is a fairly rural (at least suburban) low density town with lots of undeveloped land.  They had to work to get a siting this bad.  A monkey throwing darts at a map of the area would have gotten a better siting.

\";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:84:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/might-as-well-be-walking-on-the-sun.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:1:\"6\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:341:\"Steve Goddard and Anthony Watt have a series of posts on an old favorite topic on this site — how data manipulations back in the climate office is creating a lot of the “measured” warming.  This particular example is right here in Arizona, and features several sites my son and I surveyed for Anthony’s site.  [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:1785:\"

Steve Goddard and Anthony Watt have a series of posts on an old favorite topic on this site — how data manipulations back in the climate office is creating a lot of the “measured” warming.  This particular example is right here in Arizona, and features several sites my son and I surveyed for Anthony’s site.  They have a followup on another Arizona station here.  Check out all the asphalt:

This is a hilariously bad siting.  It demonstrates how small things can sometimes have big effects.  The MMTS sensor has a very limited cable length.  This does not mean that it only comes with a short cable (begging the question of why they can’t just buy a longer one), but that it can only have a short cable due to signal amplification issues.  As a result, we get this terrible siting because it needs to be close to the building, whereas even a hundred yards away there were much better locations

Carefree is a fairly rural (at least suburban) low density town with lots of undeveloped land.  They had to work to get a siting this bad.  A monkey throwing darts at a map of the area would have gotten a better siting.

\";s:14:\"date_timestamp\";i:1279126119;}i:8;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:20:\"Absolutely Hilarious\";s:4:\"link\";s:64:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/absolutely-hilarious.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:73:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/absolutely-hilarious.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Wed, 14 Jul 2010 16:44:17 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:23:\"Climate Science Process\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=2000\";s:11:\"description\";s:276:\"I know I am late on this but I am trying to spool back up on this site so allow me to catch up.  It turned out that that the IPCC’s Amazon claim (that 40% of the rain forest was at risk from global warming) came from the Facebook page of a 12-year-old girl.  OK, [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:625:\"

I know I am late on this but I am trying to spool back up on this site so allow me to catch up.  It turned out that that the IPCC’s Amazon claim (that 40% of the rain forest was at risk from global warming) came from the Facebook page of a 12-year-old girl.  OK, just kidding, it didn’t, but the source is not much better — apparently the claim was just thrown up on a web page of a Brazilian activist organization in 1999, and then pulled down in 2003.  Everything since has been one long game of “telephone.”  The whole story is fascinating and worth reading.

\";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:69:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/absolutely-hilarious.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:2:\"10\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:276:\"I know I am late on this but I am trying to spool back up on this site so allow me to catch up.  It turned out that that the IPCC’s Amazon claim (that 40% of the rain forest was at risk from global warming) came from the Facebook page of a 12-year-old girl.  OK, [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:625:\"

I know I am late on this but I am trying to spool back up on this site so allow me to catch up.  It turned out that that the IPCC’s Amazon claim (that 40% of the rain forest was at risk from global warming) came from the Facebook page of a 12-year-old girl.  OK, just kidding, it didn’t, but the source is not much better — apparently the claim was just thrown up on a web page of a Brazilian activist organization in 1999, and then pulled down in 2003.  Everything since has been one long game of “telephone.”  The whole story is fascinating and worth reading.

\";s:14:\"date_timestamp\";i:1279125857;}i:9;a:14:{s:5:\"title\";s:38:\"Great Academics Go Along With the Pack\";s:4:\"link\";s:82:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/great-academics-go-along-with-the-pack.html\";s:8:\"comments\";s:91:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/great-academics-go-along-with-the-pack.html#comments\";s:7:\"pubdate\";s:31:\"Wed, 14 Jul 2010 16:13:35 +0000\";s:2:\"dc\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";s:5:\"admin\";}s:8:\"category\";s:23:\"Climate Science Process\";s:4:\"guid\";s:38:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/?p=1997\";s:11:\"description\";s:331:\"It would be an understatement to say that much of the focus in villifying skeptics has been on the skeptic’s funding.  The storyline goes that skeptics are only fighting the obvious because they are paid off by oil and coal companies. But of course, it turns out that global warming alarmists get far more funding than [...]\";s:7:\"content\";a:1:{s:7:\"encoded\";s:3997:\"

It would be an understatement to say that much of the focus in villifying skeptics has been on the skeptic’s funding.  The storyline goes that skeptics are only fighting the obvious because they are paid off by oil and coal companies.

But of course, it turns out that global warming alarmists get far more funding than skeptics, likely 100x as much or more (funding for skeptics is at most a million dollar or two a year, and that may be high — funding for alarmists by governments alone is in the billions a year).  The quick reply of leading alarmist scientists is that the money is incidental.

I am generally willing to take them at their word — I find trying to look into other people’s hearts to be a hopeless exercise.  And besides, does anyone really think the folks who, say, believe in or oppose string theory are taking those positions for the money.  If I really had to discuss incentives, I would argue that prestige and wanting to belong are actually stronger motivations for alarmist scientists, as preaching doom seems to lead to fame while being a skeptic seems to lead to academic shunning.

So I have generally avoided the topic of monetary motivation of alarmists, but what am I to think when Penn State makes the case in its report on Michael Mann?  In a rather straight-forward way, they make the case that Mann is a good climate scientist because he is good at obtaining funding

This level of success in proposing research, and obtaining funding to conduct it, clearly places Dr. Mann among the most respected scientists in his field. Such success would not have been possible had he not met or exceeded the highest standards of his profession for proposing research…

Had Dr. Mann’s conduct of his research been outside the range of accepted practices, it would have been impossible for him to receive so many awards and recognitions, which typically involve intense scrutiny from scientists who may or may not agree with his scientific conclusions…

Clearly, Dr. Mann’s reporting of his research has been successful and judged to be outstanding by his peers. This would have been impossible had his activities in reporting his work been outside of accepted practices in his field.

This argument is OK as far as it goes, but implicitly defines a great academic as “someone who goes along with the pack.”  Note that skeptics cannot claim to get  a lot of research grants, because the alarmists control the funding.  Skeptics can’t get into peer-reviewed journals, because, as the East Anglia emails make clear, a small group of alarmist scientists are blocking their publication.  Mann’s research has been judged outstanding by his peers because he agrees with his peers.

In a large sense, Penn State’s only test of Mann’s ability is that he is currently a member in good standing of the small in-crowd that dominates climate science.  His science is good because it comes to the right conclusions.

Unlike many skeptics, I have no desire to “get” Professor Mann.  I don’t need him fired or even investigated by Penn State.  The way to refute him is to refute him, not haul him in front of tribunals.

That being said, Penn State did start and investigation and as such has some responsibility to do the thing right.  And boy was this a joke.   The most charitable thing I can say is that his work is fraught with more questionable decisions and practices and approaches than anything I have ever seen that was taken this seriously.  We could talk about it for days, but here is one example to get you thinking.

\";}s:3:\"wfw\";a:1:{s:10:\"commentrss\";s:87:\"http://www.climate-skeptic.com/2010/07/great-academics-go-along-with-the-pack.html/feed\";}s:5:\"slash\";a:1:{s:8:\"comments\";s:2:\"30\";}s:7:\"summary\";s:331:\"It would be an understatement to say that much of the focus in villifying skeptics has been on the skeptic’s funding.  The storyline goes that skeptics are only fighting the obvious because they are paid off by oil and coal companies. But of course, it turns out that global warming alarmists get far more funding than [...]\";s:12:\"atom_content\";s:3997:\"

It would be an understatement to say that much of the focus in villifying skeptics has been on the skeptic’s funding.  The storyline goes that skeptics are only fighting the obvious because they are paid off by oil and coal companies.

But of course, it turns out that global warming alarmists get far more funding than skeptics, likely 100x as much or more (funding for skeptics is at most a million dollar or two a year, and that may be high — funding for alarmists by governments alone is in the billions a year).  The quick reply of leading alarmist scientists is that the money is incidental.

I am generally willing to take them at their word — I find trying to look into other people’s hearts to be a hopeless exercise.  And besides, does anyone really think the folks who, say, believe in or oppose string theory are taking those positions for the money.  If I really had to discuss incentives, I would argue that prestige and wanting to belong are actually stronger motivations for alarmist scientists, as preaching doom seems to lead to fame while being a skeptic seems to lead to academic shunning.

So I have generally avoided the topic of monetary motivation of alarmists, but what am I to think when Penn State makes the case in its report on Michael Mann?  In a rather straight-forward way, they make the case that Mann is a good climate scientist because he is good at obtaining funding

This level of success in proposing research, and obtaining funding to conduct it, clearly places Dr. Mann among the most respected scientists in his field. Such success would not have been possible had he not met or exceeded the highest standards of his profession for proposing research…

Had Dr. Mann’s conduct of his research been outside the range of accepted practices, it would have been impossible for him to receive so many awards and recognitions, which typically involve intense scrutiny from scientists who may or may not agree with his scientific conclusions…

Clearly, Dr. Mann’s reporting of his research has been successful and judged to be outstanding by his peers. This would have been impossible had his activities in reporting his work been outside of accepted practices in his field.

This argument is OK as far as it goes, but implicitly defines a great academic as “someone who goes along with the pack.”  Note that skeptics cannot claim to get  a lot of research grants, because the alarmists control the funding.  Skeptics can’t get into peer-reviewed journals, because, as the East Anglia emails make clear, a small group of alarmist scientists are blocking their publication.  Mann’s research has been judged outstanding by his peers because he agrees with his peers.

In a large sense, Penn State’s only test of Mann’s ability is that he is currently a member in good standing of the small in-crowd that dominates climate science.  His science is good because it comes to the right conclusions.

Unlike many skeptics, I have no desire to “get” Professor Mann.  I don’t need him fired or even investigated by Penn State.  The way to refute him is to refute him, not haul him in front of tribunals.

That being said, Penn State did start and investigation and as such has some responsibility to do the thing right.  And boy was this a joke.   The most charitable thing I can say is that his work is fraught with more questionable decisions and practices and approaches than anything I have ever seen that was taken this seriously.  We could talk about it for days, but here is one example to get you thinking.

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