Having read the whole dang Muir-Russel report and being underwhelmed by its scope and astonished on the leaps in logic and rational to reach its conclusions, this article summed up all of these "inquiries" the best.
Interesting thread. I think the column you link through is weak and the first comment is pretty well on the mark. For those that don't wish to follow the link to read a simple reader comment, here it is. I hope this is not against copyright rules.
This is misleading and out of touch with reality. The proof that the planet is warming to dangerous levels because of the amount of greenhouse gases that humans are pumping into the atmosphere is overwhelming.
"Climate-gate" and other so-called investigations have been pushed forward by the denialosphere: a hodge-podge of industry front groups, fake scientists, conservative activists, deniers, and cranky, contrarian journalists who've decided to set reason aside and go on constant attack mode despite the facts.
Yes, there are probably a couple mistakes in the thousands upon thousands of pages of scientific reports. No, not a single one of them undermines the research. Hell, the phone book has more typos than the IPCC report.
Here's the big green truth: our addiction to fossil fuels is destroying our planet and wrecking our economies. The BP oil disaster is the most visible evidence of why we need to transition to a clean energy economy. The 21st century will be lead by the nations and industries that embrace a low-carbon future.
It would be great to see the Atlantic feature more articles that cover these exciting developments that could get our country going again, rather than giving a soapbox to deniers who want to continue to chain us to the dirty energy and toxic politics of the past.
This is misleading and out of touch with reality. The proof that the planet is warming to dangerous levels because of the amount of greenhouse gases that humans are pumping into the atmosphere is overwhelming.
"Climate-gate" and other so-called investigations have been pushed forward by the denialosphere: a hodge-podge of industry front groups, fake scientists, conservative activists, deniers, and cranky, contrarian journalists who've decided to set reason aside and go on constant attack mode despite the facts.
Yes, there are probably a couple mistakes in the thousands upon thousands of pages of scientific reports. No, not a single one of them undermines the research. Hell, the phone book has more typos than the IPCC report.
Here's the big green truth: our addiction to fossil fuels is destroying our planet and wrecking our economies. The BP oil disaster is the most visible evidence of why we need to transition to a clean energy economy. The 21st century will be lead by the nations and industries that embrace a low-carbon future.
It would be great to see the Atlantic feature more articles that cover these exciting developments that could get our country going again, rather than giving a soapbox to deniers who want to continue to chain us to the dirty energy and toxic politics of the past.
Reads like some eco-boy with a huge agenda
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Interesting thread. I think the column you link through is weak and the first comment is pretty well on the mark. For those that don't wish to follow the link to read a simple reader comment, here it is. I hope this is not against copyright rules.
This is misleading and out of touch with reality. The proof that the planet is warming to dangerous levels because of the amount of greenhouse gases that humans are pumping into the atmosphere is overwhelming.
"Climate-gate" and other so-called investigations have been pushed forward by the denialosphere: a hodge-podge of industry front groups, fake scientists, conservative activists, deniers, and cranky, contrarian journalists who've decided to set reason aside and go on constant attack mode despite the facts.
Yes, there are probably a couple mistakes in the thousands upon thousands of pages of scientific reports. No, not a single one of them undermines the research. Hell, the phone book has more typos than the IPCC report.
Here's the big green truth: our addiction to fossil fuels is destroying our planet and wrecking our economies. The BP oil disaster is the most visible evidence of why we need to transition to a clean energy economy. The 21st century will be lead by the nations and industries that embrace a low-carbon future.
It would be great to see the Atlantic feature more articles that cover these exciting developments that could get our country going again, rather than giving a soapbox to deniers who want to continue to chain us to the dirty energy and toxic politics of the past.
You think the column is weak, but that comment is not?!?!?
I'll say it again: I've read the report and the column I linked sums it up fairly well. What does that comment have to do with the inquiries? Nothing.
"Readers of both earlier reports need to know that both institutions receive tens of millions in federal global warming research funding (which can be confirmed by perusing the grant histories of Messrs. Jones or Mann, compiled from public sources, that are available online at freerepublic.com). Any admission of substantial scientific misbehavior would likely result in a significant loss of funding."
Pretty weak.
Pastiche uses the fossil fuel link to attack on a guys argument. That is ad hominem. An attack on a persons character to attack their argument.
Pat Michaels uses the funding link as circumstantial evidence as to why they are covering their butts. If you follow Zulu's link you get this nice quote. Moving on, the report then says, in effect, that Mann is a distinguished scholar, a successful raiser of research funding, a man admired by his peers -- so any allegation of academic impropriety must be false.
That article has a direct quote from the investigation. So it seems funding does play a strong role. Hardly Ad hominem.
Last edited by HOZ; 07-15-2010 at 05:03 PM.
Reason: correction
I won't disagree that is a possibility. Another possibility is someone who views issues with a broader perspective and has observed the cost of petroleum beyond the price at the pump. In the last decade the United States has engaged in a war with a country that now looks like nothing more than an effort to control over a region where the most oil in the world is produced. They have also experienced two of the most devastating coastal events that has released raw crude into the ocean and caused numerous dead zones because of it. Pragmatically it makes sense to start moving away from reliance on petroleum products.
Quote:
Originally Posted by zuluking
You think the column is weak, but that comment is not?!?!?
I'll say it again: I've read the report and the column I linked sums it up fairly well. What does that comment have to do with the inquiries? Nothing.
The comment is about the column, not the inquiries. I said the column was weak, and I stand by that comment. Some demands for investigation are superfluous and not worthy of the effort or expense to conduct. Without being privy to the details of the request for the original investigation it is impossible to say was handled inappropriately or not. Since the original emails released were very selective in nature, and obtained through illegal means in their own right, I would say that condemning any review or inquiry without being privy to all details is, as I called the column, weak.
I won't disagree that is a possibility. Another possibility is someone who views issues with a broader perspective and has observed the cost of petroleum beyond the price at the pump. In the last decade the United States has engaged in a war with a country that now looks like nothing more than an effort to control over a region where the most oil in the world is produced. They have also experienced two of the most devastating coastal events that has released raw crude into the ocean and caused numerous dead zones because of it. Pragmatically it makes sense to start moving away from reliance on petroleum products.
The comment is about the column, not the inquiries. I said the column was weak, and I stand by that comment. Some demands for investigation are superfluous and not worthy of the effort or expense to conduct. Without being privy to the details of the request for the original investigation it is impossible to say was handled inappropriately or not. Since the original emails released were very selective in nature, and obtained through illegal means in their own right, I would say that condemning any review or inquiry without being privy to all details is, as I called the column, weak.
Stimpy, you're missing the point. The column is critical about the inquiries and I can at least vouch for some of the points as they pertain to the Muir-Russel report. If you read the report, which you haven't, the details of the scope of inquiry are clearly stated within the document, so to suggest the columnist isn't privy to those details is blatantly incorrect. Sure, you stand by your comment, but you don't back it up with anything. It's a baseless opinion. The comment you've chosed to back up your opinion has nothing to do with the column at all - it's a typical eco-soap-box rant about so-called irrefutable science and the opposing force of big oil money. What does that have to do with a commentary on the inquiries into Climategate (emails only, by the way.)
Climategate Redux: Settling the Science When Science Won't Settle Itself
The folks that brought us Climategate (FOIA.zip) have released another pile of internal communications at UAE (FOIA2011.zip). This link seems to have a pretty good comprehensive list of excerpts:
SHUSH! zuluking! Stages of warmists grief...
Stage 1: they aren’t real emails
Stage 2: they are real emails but they aren’t in context
Stage 3: they are in context, but that’s how scientists work
Stage 4: ok, this isn’t really science, but you guys stole the emails!
Stage 5: this is old stuff
Stage 6: this is nothing
Stage 7: look everyone! Winter storm! See, we have proof of our theories now.
Repeat as needed
“When we look at our reconstruction, we can see that the decline that has occurred in the last 50 years or so seems to be unprecedented for the last 1,450 years,” Christian Zdanowicz of the Geological Survey of Canada said Wednesday.
“It's difficult not to come up with the conclusion that greenhouse gases must have something to do with this,” added Mr. Zdanowicz, one of the co-authors of the report in Nature.
“We cannot account for this decline by processes that are ‘natural.’”
Mr. Zdanowicz and his team combined 69 different data sources to determine the extent of sea ice for every decade going back about 1,000 years and every 25 years beyond that.
The team examined tree rings, ice cores from glaciers and lake and ocean sediments. To check the validity of their approach, scientists compared their calculations for the last couple of centuries with real-world observations from satellites, ship logs and other historical accounts.
They found that by the mid-1990s sea ice had fallen even further than in previous lows such as the so-called Medieval Warm Period between 800 and 1300.
“When we look at our reconstruction, we can see that the decline that has occurred in the last 50 years or so seems to be unprecedented for the last 1,450 years,” Christian Zdanowicz of the Geological Survey of Canada said Wednesday.
“It's difficult not to come up with the conclusion that greenhouse gases must have something to do with this,” added Mr. Zdanowicz, one of the co-authors of the report in Nature.
“We cannot account for this decline by processes that are ‘natural.’”
Mr. Zdanowicz and his team combined 69 different data sources to determine the extent of sea ice for every decade going back about 1,000 years and every 25 years beyond that.
The team examined tree rings, ice cores from glaciers and lake and ocean sediments. To check the validity of their approach, scientists compared their calculations for the last couple of centuries with real-world observations from satellites, ship logs and other historical accounts.
They found that by the mid-1990s sea ice had fallen even further than in previous lows such as the so-called Medieval Warm Period between 800 and 1300.
Science: measuring Arctic sea ice using "tree rings, ice cores from glaciers and lake and ocean sediments."
I know I haven't read the whole study and I'm no scientist (as you'd all vehemently agree), but these types of newspaper articles and leaps of logic are getting ridiculous, in that by merely publishing or posting, the uneducated masses are meant to just accept it. "Nothing more to see here, move along."
Yet, when we have a glimpse inside the staid, steady and irreproachable "science" behind so many of these studies, and we see politics, gamesmanship, bullying, and secrecy, those are dismissed offhandedly, like Tinordi, or "officially" like the Muir-Russel report on the original Climategate. "Nothing more to see here, move along."
Science: measuring Arctic sea ice using "tree rings, ice cores from glaciers and lake and ocean sediments."
I know I haven't read the whole study and I'm no scientist (as you'd all vehemently agree), but these types of newspaper articles and leaps of logic are getting ridiculous, in that by merely publishing or posting, the uneducated masses are meant to just accept it. "Nothing more to see here, move along."
Yet, when we have a glimpse inside the staid, steady and irreproachable "science" behind so many of these studies, and we see politics, gamesmanship, bullying, and secrecy, those are dismissed offhandedly, like Tinordi, or "officially" like the Muir-Russel report on the original Climategate. "Nothing more to see here, move along."
Here is the abstract, no nasty newspaper ($32 for the full article):
Here we use a network of high-resolution terrestrial proxies from the circum-Arctic region to reconstruct past extents of summer sea ice, and show that—although extensive uncertainties remain, especially before the sixteenth century—both the duration and magnitude of the current decline in sea ice seem to be unprecedented for the past 1,450 years. Enhanced advection of warm Atlantic water to the Arctic6 seems to be the main factor driving the decline of sea ice extent on multidecadal timescales, and may result from nonlinear feedbacks between sea ice and the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation. These results reinforce the assertion that sea ice is an active component of Arctic climate variability and that the recent decrease in summer Arctic sea ice is consistent with anthropogenically forced warming.
Here we use a network of high-resolution terrestrial proxies from the circum-Arctic region to reconstruct past extents of summer sea ice, and show that—although extensive uncertainties remain, especially before the sixteenth century—both the duration and magnitude of the current decline in sea ice seem to be unprecedented for the past 1,450 years. Enhanced advection of warm Atlantic water to the Arctic6seems to be the main factor driving the decline of sea ice extent on multidecadal timescales, and may result from nonlinear feedbacks between sea ice and the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation. These results reinforce the assertion that sea ice is an active component of Arctic climate variability and that the recent decrease in summer Arctic sea ice is consistent with anthropogenically forced warming.
Thanks. I do note that "seem" and "may" become "is" by the conclusion (and in the article, too.) This bothers me in that they postulate a theory, but present it as fact. And then nasty newspaper articles aggrandize it.
The climategate emails were not "debunked"; they were marginalized and excused.
No, they were investigated SIX times by completely different bodies with nothing coming out of it.
Of course the conspiracy loon would say that that proves that all six bodies are in on the conspiracy...
Heck even the guy in the video who misrepresented (lied) about what the emails said and was funded by the denial machine to go out and do a completely separate analysis came up with a data set that completely supports the other 3 supposedly corrupted data sets.
Quote:
Originally Posted by zuluking
Thanks. I do note that "seem" and "may" become "is" by the conclusion (and in the article, too.) This bothers me in that they postulate a theory, but present it as fact. And then nasty newspaper articles aggrandize it.
Only if you don't read it closely. The "seem" and "may" are around their observations or explanations, and the "is" is part of the actual hypothesis they're trying to disprove.
Your hypothesis can't have a "may" in it, since the hypothesis needs to either be supported or contradicted.
Your observations always have error bars and conclusions are always based on a set of assumptions (previous observations, etc), so there's always room for error.
As for arctic ice:
__________________ Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position.
But certainty is an absurd one.
Fun stuff with your graph photon:
In cooler months (the least amount of deviation), there is a spread of about 2.5 standard deviations. If we take 2.5 standard deviations out, the chances of one not being the other are about 2.5% aka 97.5% confidence that one isn't equal to the other. I think the general cut offs are at 95% or 90% though...
My point? None really. Just applying stuff I rarely get to use to kind of explain that graph a bit better. Though I have to stress that from that data alone, all you can state is that one isn't the other. The original data could have been from icier years or the new ones an aberation in data.
1. Rant, post blogs, etc that you aren't really sure about.
2. Avoid all questioning of rationale.
3. Go to 1. Rinse and repeat.
Case in point. Your behaviour here and his in the below video. Note the similarity between his behaviour to being asked a question with yours in this thread.
3:12 mark.
Squirm, squirm, squirm, deflect, squirm a bit more, and then try and manipulate the conversation back to where he can talk more with question avoidance.
__________________
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