Jim Steele seems to be addicted to making up stuff. Today he wrote a long article for Anthony Watts' blog WUWT, picking on Katharine Hayhoe and Don Cheadle, who featured in the Years of Living Dangerously (which I haven't seen). Jim wrote a long article short on facts and long on his normal rejection of science (archived here). At one stage he wrote:
The truth is there has been no climate warming in Texas.
To support his claim he put up a chart that he described as "Plainview TX temperature trends found online from the US Historical Climate Network". I don't know why he stopped at 2012. Anyway, I've got a better chart if you want to know about Texas temperatures. It's a statewide chart, not just one small town in the north of the state. The data is from NOAA. I converted it from Fahrenheit to Celsius and plotted it as an anomaly from the twentieth century mean.
 |
| Data Source: NOAA |
You can see how much hotter it's been getting, consistently - in Texas. It's been hotter for longer for any time in the record going back to the late 1800s. Much hotter, with 2012 being nearly two degrees Celsius above the twentieth century average.
I can't be bothered going through the rest of Jim's diatribe. He does end up blaming Joe Romm for whatever Katherine Hayhoe said. Jim's a climate science denier. He's written a book about his denial. It pays to check every word he writes. What I suggest for anyone who's come looking to find out more about Jim Steele, you can type his name into the search box above. This is by no means the first time he's lashed out at scientists or misrepresented data.
You can read about how Jim doubled down when I pointed out he'd got his seas wrong and his seasons wrong. [Update: You can see Jim continues to "double down" in the comments below. Not once has he conceded that the NOAA data shows warming or that the paper he himself cited states that Texas has warmed (which it does). Not only does the paper state that Texas has warmed, it attributes some of this warming to human factors! Sou 2:10 pm AEST Thurs 17 April 2014]
Better yet, have a look at the Years of Living Dangerously and tell us what you think of it.
It's a great film, can't wait for the next one. You can see the first episode (& hopefully the next soon) free on youtube here https://www.youtube.com/user/Years - not sure how to subscribe in the UK to the whole series. Can anyone can work it out?
ReplyDeleteYears of Living Dangerously is airing on the US premium cable channel Showtime, so it may be a while before the episodes are available through other outlets. (The first episode being available on youtube is, I suspect, just a teaser to get people to sign up for Showtime.) This series is going to drive Watts crazy. It's probably going to be more popular, more approachable, and more in depth than An Inconvenient Truth was 8 years ago. I've gotten emails from US-based environmental groups about watching parties as a way to get concerned citizens in the same room. I don't know about Showtime's availablity in other countries (I'm in the US), but from what I know that seems to be the best way to see the series as it airs. -- Dennis
ReplyDeleteEven better yet anyone can watch episode 1.
ReplyDeleteJim Steel doesn't know the first thing about climate data.
ReplyDeleteHere is what the chart he used is supposed to look like.
http://cdiac.ornl.gov/cgi-bin/broker?id=417079&_PROGRAM=prog.gplot_meanclim_mon_yr2012.sas&_SERVICE=default¶m=TMEAN&minyear=1889&maxyear=2012
For a start you should be looking at mean temperatures, not just max, otherwise you are ignoring the other half of the dataset.
Also, you should be looking and accentuating the adjusted dataset (which Steel tries to deemphasise by using a dotted line), which corrects for any errors in the data, NOT the raw data, which is emphasised and put in bold black. (Of course this goes against the denier ideology, as homogenisation and correction equals CONSPIRACY!!!!!)
Viewed it. I cringed a bit when I saw a celebrity take a plane and an helicopter to document deforestation - I can imagine the hypocrital screams from "skeptics". The "Al Gore is fat" line is known, and I think film makers should avoid it.
ReplyDeleteThe part with Katherine Hayhoe was very good. She reconciled me with faith, to be honest - she was the perfect example to be shown to evangelists. And Texas was a good example of "it happens near us, be careful"
But the part about Syria ... it was imho the best one. And the scariest one. The most honest : no, AGW is not the only cause of the Syrian civil war, other factors have to be taken into account ; but the messaging was clear and strong : if we do not act and if we continue to deny what happens like El-Assad did, this will happen again. ( And I'm glad that someone at last reminds the world about the roots of the syrian tragedy, instead of going "good democrat vs bad dictator" vs conspiracy theories)
Revkin did not like this episode, and the usual jumped and screamed about it. Therefore it should be good :]
sorry about the poor phrasing : "the most honest" it was not, as the other parts are very accurate ;what I meant is that scientists did not try to say "AGW therefore war" but "AGW increase droughts, which cause problems ; and, in some dire cases, droughts can be devastating to a nation, to the point that a collapse occurs".
DeleteSo just finished watching it. It's amazing that even after watching a documentary like Years of Living Dangerously, a denier will still try and rationalise his ideology. Instead of compassion and sympathy, and perhaps even an urge to do something constructive, they are dismissive, and try and debunk the facts. They resort to lies and misinformation in the form of selective pseudoscience.
ReplyDeleteI can see now why Steele picked Clearview TX, as it has clearly been devastated by a crippling drought, and was one of the subjects of the the documentary. Steele tries to convince the Wattie readership that it's due entirely to the PDO. Yes, the PDO has an influence, but it is a cycle that waxes and wanes. If we actually look at the precipitation in Clearview, it is the lowest on record.
http://cdiac.ornl.gov/cgi-bin/broker?id=417079&pvar=CPRECIP&_PROGRAM=prog.gplot_totalclim_mon_yr2012.sas&_SERVICE=default&minyear=1890&maxyear=2012
So it can't be just the cycles of the PDO, as you would also expect other similar events during other PDO cycles. But it's just not visible in the data. Clear evidence that it's something else.
If you look at the citations of the Steele piece, you will see this.
Dai (2012) The influence of the inter-decadal Pacific oscillation on US precipitation during 1923–2010. Climate Dynamics, vol
But if we look at some of Dai's other work, you will see that AGW does have an influence of drought, which is only set to worse.
http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/adai/papers/Dai-drought_WIRES2010.pdf
(BTW, It's kinda weird that Steele should mention Dai, since in the NIPCC report, they try to rebuff him.
http://www.nipccreport.org/articles/2012/sep/25sep2012a5.html)
Ahh Sou always quick to distort and denigrate anyone that is a skeptic. My use of Plainview data was because that was the documentary's focus. I stopped at 2012 because that is all that could be downloaded from the USHCN webste. But Sou never hesitates to twist such examples into some evil intents.
ReplyDeleteAnd obviously no one here read the NOAA paper where they said "Yet, no systematic changes in the annual and warm season mean daily temperature have been detected over the Great Plains and Texas over the 62-yr period from 1948 to 2009 (Groisman et al. 2012), consistent with the notion of a regional ‘‘warming hole’’ (e.g., Kunkel et al. 2006). Indeed, May–Octobervmaximum temperatures over the region have decreased by 0.98C (62 yr)21, which is statistically significant according
to Groisman et al. The authors surmise that ‘‘It may well be that the maximum temperature decrease was caused by wetter warm seasons in the last decades rather than an opposite inference.’’ Their assessment of an increase in regional summertime rainfall is consistent with results of a century-scale analysis that also shows significant increases in precipitation"
But me and the 10 NOAA scientists and the USHCN data set must all be deniers because Sou disagrees. The contrary temperature data posted here simply shows how easily people can manipulate a data set to make their case. I use maximum temperature because minimum temperatures are greatly affected by landscape changes. Sou exemplifies Sagan's baloney alert. Those who attack the arguer and not the arguments are not honestly discussing the science. If people here truly want to discuss Texas climate and the drought let discuss the expert's paper from which I drew my conclusions. As I referenced read Hoerling et al (2013) Anatomy of an Extreme Event. Journal of Climate, vol. 26
Jim, in case you missed it, HotWhopper exists to demolish disinformation. You wrote:
DeleteThe truth is there has been no climate warming in Texas.
You were wrong (again) as the chart shows quite plainly. Not only is Texas getting consistently hotter, but 2012 was almost two degrees Celsius above the twentieth century average. That's two whole degrees - the average over a whole year for the entire state of Texas. That is what warming means.
In the abstract of the very first paper you has in your reference list at the bottom of your WUWT article, and which you call upon again here in the last sentence of your comment, was the statement:
About 0.6°C warming [Sou: this is in Texas] relative to the 1981–2010 mean is estimated to be attributable to human-induced climate change, with warming observed mainly in the past decade.
Interesting conspiracy theory you have there, too with your "manipulation" of a data set. Having read some of your writing, it's no surprise to find that sort of thinking. You seem to be convinced that you are right and all the world's real scientists have been wrong - for decades. Not only that, you think all the world's scientists are "manipulating" data for goodness knows what weird reason. Just how all these independent teams of scientists working in quite different fields and disciplines all around the world have managed to coordinate their findings so well to point to the same inescapable conclusion - well, it seems you have yet to come up with an explanation. And how they've managed to hoodwink all the people who work for journals, all the general public, all the government agencies in the world ... You really have your work cut out for yourself, haven't you.
Maybe you'll write another book on the subject.
As for your "denigration" - that's coming from someone who doesn't think twice about "denigration" to the point where one wonders what is behind what seems like a personal vendetta. (What did Camille Parmesan ever do to Jim Steele, one wonders.)
If I am wrong then so are all the NOAA experts. The question any objective person must ask is why do these trends differ. Why do 10 of NOAA's top climate experts publish that since 1948 "no systematic changes in the annual and warm season mean daily temperature have been detected over the Great Plains and Texas" are they deniers???
DeleteAnd who ever mentioned conspiracy. Only the devout CO2 advocates suggest conspiracy suggesting that even when scientists who have spent their live protecting the environment disagree, then they must be funded by the Koch brothers or big Oil.
What did Parmesan do to me? Nothing personal. But bad science has misdirected conservation efforts away from the real problems. And so I attack her science not her personally. But pushing Dr. Sagan's baloney mete to high alert, Sou always attacks the arguer. For example I never ever placed Kivalna in the wrong geographic position. But because I noted Bering sea ice had been expanding not retreating, Sou creates a scenario suggesting am ignorant of geography. Sou actually demonstrates the lies the CO2 advocates will create in order to denigrate those who dare to point out contradictory evidence. Sou's fabrications actually do much more to reveal the ugly distortions that are the foundation of global warming advocacy and any objective person who reads my original posts will quickly see through Sou's deception. For example why didnt Sou discuss how the subsidies supporting biofuel industry are raping Indonesia's rainforest?
For all those objective critical thinkers please read my original post and check the research I presented, Then decide who is distorting the truth. Read Exploiting Human Misery and Distorting the Science: An environmentalist’s critique of “Years of Living Dangerously” at http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/04/14/exploiting-human-misery-and-distorting-the-science-an-environmentalists-critique-of-years-of-living-dangerously/
The paper jim refers to is here
Deletehttp://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/csi/pubs/docs/Anatomy_FINAL_RevisedPaper_JCLIM.pdf
Jim - I know you cannot bring yourself to admit it but you are wrong with the statement you made:
DeleteThe truth is there has been no climate warming in Texas.
It's not just there in the data as I showed, the very paper that you keep citing disagrees with you on that score. It's there in black and white in the abstract of all places. You can't have missed it. Hoerling et al (2012) wrote (for link see my previous comment):
About 0.6°C warming [Sou: this is in Texas] relative to the 1981–2010 mean is estimated to be attributable to human-induced climate change, with warming observed mainly in the past decade.
(I see you are still denying that you got the sea wrong at Kivalina and got the season wrong as well. Your denial knows no bounds.)
The only plausible explanation consistent with your denial of global warming is that which you have offered yourself - "manipulation" of data. Which would not only require collusion but would require that everyone else who makes independent observations that confirm global warming be complicit. That makes it a conspiracy. Thing is, if 97% of climate and earth system scientists are conspiring to hide the facts from you, surely someone would have blown the whistle by now. Scientists are a competitive lot. They love to steal a march on their competitors. Your "theory" is beyond fantastic.
As I've said before, if you stuck with your own expertise you could make a contribution to the world. By rejecting mainstream science (and carrying on with your personal vendettas), you come across as just another hard-headed irrational climate science denier with a big chip on his shoulder.
Yes, that's the one, Catmando. I've linked to it already. You can see the quote in the abstract.
DeleteJim's own source points out that temperatures have risen in Texas and "about 0.6°C warming", not since the industrial revolution, mind you, but relative to the 1981-2010 mean, is estimated to be attributable to human-induced climate change!
There's a quote from the conclusion that seems relevant too:
Delete"We determined that the mean summertime temperature increase relative to pre-industrial conditions is +1.2°C from such an analysis, double the estimated warming relative to 1981-2010."
Sounds like warming to me. The authors also keep talking about summer temperatures so I wonder what the trend is in winter temperatures.
Sou, sorry I repeated your link.
Jim, read Sagan's baloney detection kit again, especially point 7 - if there's a chain of argument, every link must work.
BTW, Jim, you know nothing of Indonesia's rainforests. I've lived there...it's slash and burn, replace by palm just like in the film. Malaysia is quite similar (where I've also lived). I remember the 1997/98 fires vividly. You could barely breath some days. Biofuels had nothing to do with it. Read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deforestation_in_Borneo
DeleteAs far as Texas, just admit you're wrong. Sou has the chart (and the text from your article) to prove it. You're sinking deeper and deeper with each post.
"But because I noted Bering sea ice had been expanding not retreating" (Jim).
DeleteI can imagine Sou wildly hopping around to help you find out what sea you meant. She might've gone south, even.
Whatever, Bering sea ice does not expand. In fact, and this IS somewhat notable, there is no trend.
You just gotta laugh when Jim comes here to try and defend his ideology, especially when he contradicts himself.
DeleteThe documentary focussed on the drought in Texas, and as anyone with the most rudimentary knowledge of the climate knows that any change in mean temperatures on land have very little to do with the amount of precipitation, its sea surface temperatures that matter, not whether or not Texas has warmed. It's irrelevant anyway. (Also isn't funny that the his quote mentioned mean temperatures and not max temperatures. What a doofus. Everyone knows that it's the mean temperature which is consistently used. His conspiracy laden explanation is simple without foundation. Also, as we all know, it's min temperatures which are most affected by AGW, but his ideology simply won't accept that, so it's just another Morton's daemon excuse.)
Also no one here is a 'CO2 advocate', just as no one here is a gravity advocate, or a heliocentric advocate. He just sounds plain silly when he tries to politicise the situation. Also, we are all objective critical thinkers, which is why we don't disagree with over 150 years of science. To do so means rejecting physics and the observations made my countless scientists and instruments. We have all objectively looked at the evidence, and have come up the same conclusion that hundreds of other climate scientists have. It is Jim who lacks the objective critical thinking skills, as he is the one who his been fooled into thinking that an ideology based on disinformation, cherry picked pseudoscience and ignorance, and actively funded by the fossil fuel industry, is actually valid.
cRR, I pointed Jim north but he was having none of it :)
Deletehttp://blog.hotwhopper.com/2013/07/jim-steele-another-wuwt-science-denier.html
Ha! I remember that article - Jim couldn't tell the difference between the Bering Sea and the Chukchi Sea or he could but was trying to misinform. Also, looking at cRR's link - it looks like even his professed trend in the Bering Sea has withered since the post. As you noted in that article - this is the same Jim that says CO2 has nothing to do with heat waves, which is a careful way of sidestepping whether global warming has anything to do with heat waves (and the fact that CO2 causes global warming).
DeleteI didn't expect a honest discussion from slandering Sou and CO2 devotees who cherry pick lthings out of context o denigrate. So I will stand by the conclusion of 10 NOAA experts who must be denying Texas warming. No one here has mentioned there conclusion,
Delete"finally regarding the possible impacts of human-induced climate change
and its connection with anticipating the 2011 event several specific science challenges for the region of the southern plains remain. In particular, there is a need for a complete and physically based explanation for why there has been a lack of overall warming during the last century over this region; providing reasons for the overall increase in rainfall would be key to understanding such a lack of warming."
I expected nothing but slander here but you all must deal with those facts.
Just released. Check this out.
Deletehttp://news.cisc.gmu.edu/doc/CA_drought_research.pdf
Also, when reading scientific papers, it helps that you read it to the end, as the conclusion usually contains 'the best bit'
Here is what one of the papers that Jim quoted from actually says.
"We found substantial changes in heavy, very heavy, and extreme precipitation over the central United States during the past several decades (10%–40% increase with a 40% increase in the frequency of daily rain events above 154.9 mm) but no changes in the moderately heavy precipitation events. This leads to a redistribution of intense precipitation across its intensity distribution spectra.
The 1979–2009 period is characterized by approximately 0.58C warmer TNH than the previous three decades. At the same time there was a substantially increased duration of the El Nino events at the expense of La Nina events. We showed that both these global factors can be responsible (completely or partially) for the observed increase in intense precipitation over the central United States with the changes associated with the increase in hemispheric temperatures being most congruent to the observed change.
Regional maximum temperature in the warm season (Tmax) has decreased during the 1979–2009 period compared to the previous decades. This regional decrease in Tmax may be considered as a possible consequence of the observed increase in intense precipitation and land use change."
(Groisman et al. 2012)
Kinda makes Jim look like a complete and utter fool.
So let's see if I can make it simple, so that even Jim can understand.
CO2 creates higher temperatures.
Higher temperatures change the water cycle, (i.e. higher sea surface temperature leading to more evaporation and land use changes which lead to higher transpiration) leading to more rain.
More rain in some areas leads to locally cooler temperatures.
Jim just looks at the cooler temperatures bit and says 'Ha, see no global warming', but he ignores the bigger picture, and so looks like a prat. He then defends his ideology and looks an even bigger prat.
Jim, why do you even bother?
Dave says "The documentary focussed on the drought in Texas, and as anyone with the most rudimentary knowledge of the climate knows that any change in mean temperatures on land have very little to do with the amount of precipitation, its sea surface temperatures that matter, not whether or not Texas has warmed."
DeleteThis is is typical for followers of slandering Sou who make false attributions. In my post at WUWT I wrote "Climate models driven by CO2 had predicted extreme drying in the southwest during the 80s and 90s. But those model predictions failed due to misunderstanding ocean cycles.2 Actual observations revealed a trend of increasing precipitation during the 80s and 90s due to more El Ninos. The most recent drought has occurred as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) reversed again to its cool phase, just like devastating Texas droughts of the 50s that happened when the PDO entered its cool phase and promoted more La Ninas."
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/04/14/exploiting-human-misery-and-distorting-the-science-an-environmentalists-critique-of-years-of-living-dangerously/
It was Sou that made Texas temperatures the focus, so Dave you are laughing at Sou.
Then Joe attack with "you know nothing of Indonesia's rainforests" 'Biofuels had nothing to do with it."
Indeed the fires and deforestation have many causes and the 1997 fires were in part driven by the dry conditions created by El Nino. But Joe you reveal that you did not read my article or the references I provided and If you want to save the rain forests and Orangutans, you should attack the Palm OIl subsidies not me.
In addition to my original reference try going to orangutan project website http://www.orangutan.org.au/palm-oil
They write "Palm oil plantations are the main driver for deforestation in Indonesia and Malaysia. These two regions account for 85 percent of global production of palm oil." Maybe you could learn a little more about the issues first Joe then we can talk.
And for those who lack evidence to refute all the facts in my original post that I have shared from peer reviewed journal, then please keep referring to Slandering Sous fabrication about my geography skills. It is a desperate attempt to denigrate via lies and ad homs. Anyone who reads my original post will see why there is a pile of baloney at Hotwhoppers.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/07/31/will-the-cost-of-the-climate-wars-be-the-bbcs-integrity/
Jim, can I remind you of Professor Sagan's baloney detection kit - don't use ad Homs.
DeleteSince you post at WUWT and the "discourse" there is a lot less civil than you find on this site, you might want to consider the hypocrisy of your statement about "slandering Sou". If you can't take the heat, mitigate.
Jim, another part of Sagan's kit:
DeleteArguments from authority carry little weight - so your ten (though I count nine actually working for NOAA) are meaningless if you are keen on using Sagan to support you.
Really Jim? You said "the subsidies supporting biofuel industry are raping Indonesia's rainforest." Yet fuels are just 5% of usage: http://www.rainforest-rescue.org/uploads/photos/palm-oil-consumption-global.jpg And, to my specific point, they weren't driving even 5% of palm oil usage in 1997. I went and read thanks to your prompt, and while fuel use is increasing...it's not about European subsidies. In fact exports of palm oil have stopped growing in Indonesia because they're using more of the palm oil for domestic fuel consumption (still way less than half of total usage, though) to cut fuel imports ("reduce import costs and narrow the current-account deficit." http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-02/palm-oil-export-growth-stalling-in-indonesia-on-biodiesel-surge.html). When you say "biofuel industry" is "raping Indonesia's forest" and link to a study on European subsidies to then say "the most powerful driver" of disappearing rain forests is "climate fear mongering" in your article, you are clearly making wrong statements. It's just not the most powerful driver. If anything it's still food use with arguable, growing fuel use by Indonesians themselves to curtail fuel imports and improve their current account deficit.
DeleteAlso El Nino was not the main driver in 1997. If you lived there you'd know it's farmers and corrupt groups taking control of land, just like Wikipedia states:
"Causes
The 1997 Southeast Asian haze was caused mainly by slash and burn techniques adopted by farmers in Indonesia. Slash and burn has been extensively used for many years as the cheapest and easiest means to clear the lands for traditional agriculture. Fire is also used during the long fallow rotation of the so-called jungle rubber in Sumatra and Kalimantan to remove most of the biomass, including the woody parts before new plantations are re-established.
Fire may also be deliberately used as a weapon to claim property on the islands and provinces where land ownership is not clear, an action taken by both smallholders and large operators alike. After burning out its previous owner, the smallholder or large operator plants their own crops there, gaining de facto control over the disputed land.
During the dry season, dry fuels readily ignite and lead to large wild fires. These accidental fires may have the same underlying socio-economic and institutional problems. In cases like this, fire suppression can be very difficult and costly especially when they reach the highly flammable peat-swamp areas."
Nobody disagrees that palm oil demand is causing deforestation. I said, "it's slash and burn, replace by palm just like in the film. "
Also, so there's no lack of clarity, I will stand corrected on biofuels having "nothing to do" with recent forest devastation. But it's not climate fear mongering as the most powerful driver, it just isn't. Also, it wasn't driving the 1997 deforestation. You should admit to these mistakes, just like you should admit to your other mistakes. It will give you more not less credibility than squirming your way through these conversations here. If you're trying to understand the culture here at HotWhopper - that's it.
Delete"Ahh Sou always quick to distort and denigrate anyone that is a skeptic"
DeleteOut of the gate with an ad hominem, followed by lies and incompetence ... a typical denier, not skeptic.
When Sou writes "Jim Steele seems to be addicted to making up stuff" it is slander and to call her on it is not hypocrisy. Everything I wrote can be found in the literature. Yet it is Sou's hypocrisy that needs to be chastised as she completely makes up issues about geography whenever she lacks the ability to deal with facts.
ReplyDeleteI notice you didn't comment on either of the bits quoted from your first reference which refer to warming. You prefer to keep parroting the quote you prefer. And I mention your hypocrisy when you feel you have been singled out for ad hominem attacks and then use them yourself. The first focus of your piece was Texas so it is not unreasonable for someone to check whether you are correct or not. When it is pointed out you are not, you use an argument from authority. Whichever way you want to slice Sagan's baloney, you are not looking good on it. You say everything can be found in the literature so I'll remind you of another bit of the detection kit: spin more than one hypothesis. You seem wedded to one and one only. You could argue that Sou and I are too. However, you are the one making a claim that runs contrary to the evidence, the physics.
DeleteBy the way, I have noticed how sensitive deniers are - they don't mind giving it out but don't like receiving criticism .
Jim wrote: When Sou writes "Jim Steele seems to be addicted to making up stuff" it is slander and to call her on it is not hypocrisy.
DeleteNo, Jim. It isn't slander. You could try to mount an argument for libel but I don't think it would fly. There's ample evidence to show you are just making up stuff again. For example, you wrote:
Everything I wrote can be found in the literature.
That is a blanket statement that would be unlikely to be true.
However even if it were true, it wouldn't necessarily negate what I wrote. Misrepresenting facts that others have misrepresented still constitutes "making up stuff" in my book.
For example, you wrote:
The truth is there has been no climate warming in Texas.
Which is wrong, not true, aka "making up stuff". Now you pointed to a paper that you claimed was from where you "drew your conclusion" about Texas temperature. But that paper stated very clearly that Texas has warmed. So that constitutes another two "making up stuff" equivalents in my book, all from one small wrong sentence you wrote. I've written elsewhere on stuff you've been "making up". Do a search for Jim Steele.
Sou is dead right when she states "Jim Steele seems to be addicted to making up stuff", and you have proven she is right in black and white in the statements you have made here.
DeleteYou will selectively quote and misrepresent a body of work to suit your ideology. Pointing that out does not make the people here "CO2 devotees", and pointing out your misrepresentations is not slander, it is simply science. You better get used to it, since that is what this site is all about. It's even in the byline, 'We Demolish Disinformation"
What you do is take a study, part of a body of work, which says A causes B which causes C which causes D, and then twist it and misrepresent it to suit your baseless and unsupported ideology. We have seen it countless times and you have relentlessly done it here. What you do is say X causes D, selectively quoting where the study talks about D. This is the heart of your logical fallacy, and while you continue to this, you will look like a complete fool. (This is not slander, but giving you some sage advice) And then after we have given you this sage advice, and showing where you have gone wrong, you come back all miffed, and go on an ad hom attack. You act like you have a very thin skin, unable to be humble and take any objective criticism. Instead you act petulantly, and arrogantly fly off the handle which a spray of ad homs. I think you are too used to the hallowed and unquestioning arena that is WUWT, where the readership will just blindly agree with what you and any old crackpot will say, so long as it confirms their ideology. They don't see all the errors, all the logical fallacies. They have all been brainwashed into believing that their evidence free ideology is correct, and anyone who panders to them is considered a hero.
Jim, you are just like any other professional misinformer, of which I consider Monckton the worst offender. On the surface, the arguments put forward might look reasonable to an unsuspecting and gullible public, but when taken apart and examined in detail, the agregious distortions and misrepresentations is readily revealed. You are no different. So my advice is, stop using the argument from authority logical fallacy, stop the ad homs, and stop selectively quoting scientific papers which have a totally different conclusion to the point you are trying to make. That way, you won't look like a fool, and you might even sound credible. (But somehow I doubt that you will follow this advice as your ideology is so powerful and overwhelming.)
I have merely reported what 10 NOAA climate scientists have published that "there is a need for a complete and physically based explanation for why there has been a lack of overall warming during the last century over this region" So Sou and her ilk are accusing the climate experts of "making stuff up" But to hide the inconvenient truth you play shoot the messenger and engage in fabricted character assassinations
DeleteAnyone truly interested in the science must ask why why did those scientists make such a claim and why is it at such odds with the graph created by Sou. IS Sou making things up?
Those who want to slander and denigrate anyone who dares to mention such contradictory scientific publications will launch ad hominems against the messengers. I have shown this post to 11 colleagues and all agree: Slandering Sou is defiling the scientific debate and actually doing more to undermine the global warming alarmists. Thank you Sou.
Anyone interested in honest scientific debate will address my arguments and avoid slander. All my essays are referenced to scientific papers and posted on landscapesandcycles.net
Jim, you still haven't learnt have you. You are cherry picking to suit your ideology, which is that CO2 and global warming has no effect on drought. But the paper which you quoted actually says that AGW does have an effect.
Delete"About 80% (2.3°C) of the observed 2011 Texas heat wave magnitude of 2.9°C was estimated to have resulted from natural variability, principally through physical processes associated with the severe rainfall deficits.
About 0.6°C (20%) of the heat wave magnitude relative to 1981-2010 mean was estimated to be attributable to human-induced climate change, based on analysis of time-evolving summertime surface temperature trends over Texas in observational and various model data."
(Anatomy of an Extreme Event, Martin Hoerling)
So it's clear, that the heatwave and associated drought has been made worse by AGW. This is pretty much in line with the conclusions made in the documentary.
If you actually read the literature, you will find plenty of other corroborating studies.
Here is an example. (Please read it so you don't continue to look like a fool)
http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/adai/papers/Dai-drought_WIRES2010.pdf
You can try and dodge your way out of this, but the paper which you cite, says that you are wrong and the documentary is right. No amount of ad homs or stamping your feet is going to change what you have done. Tell an outright manufactured lie!!
No, Jim. You continue to "make stuff up". You haven't "merely reported" - you have completely misrepresented what the "10 NOAA scientists" wrote, by cherry picking bits of text and ignoring whole, particularly the part where they attribute recent warming in part to human factors.
DeleteNot only that, you can't even get the "10 NOAA scientists" bit right. Only nine of them are affiliated with NOAA :) (John Nielsen-Gammon is with the Department of Atmospheric Sciences, Texas A&M University not NOAA. He is also the Texas State Climatologist.)
It's worth pointing out that Martin Hoerling, the lead author, is generally very conservative when it comes to attributing climate events to human factors. So when he is lead author of a paper that states in the abstract that not only has Texas warmed, with "warming observed mainly in the past decade" (contrary to what you've written but consistent with my chart in the article above), but that some of that warming is attributable to human factors, you really need to sit up and take notice.
Sou it is you who cherry pick. The researchers talk about a lack of warming for the century.You cherry pick the warming from the 80s to 2000. Relative to the 30s and 40s there was no warming. Stop cherry picking and get over that fact that nature does not support your beliefs.
DeleteSo indeed they wrote that "About 0.6 C (20%) of the heat wave magnitude relative to 1981–2010 mean was estimated to be attributable to human-induced climate change, based on analysis of time-evolving summertime surface temperature trends over Texas in observational and various model data."
However they then talk about the problems with their estimates of attribution due to conflicts between the models and observation. They wrote, "There are various difficulties in interpreting such an analysis and assessing its relevance to understanding observations. First, no summertime warming over Texas in the long historical record has been detected, and we emphasized in this paper that the CMIP5 model-simulated Texas warming over the last century is inconsistent with observations. In the absence of a detected warming over the long record, and in light of the uncertainty in the magnitude of climate change in this region based on CMIP5 experiments, these estimates of changes in event probability drawn solely from CMIP5 must be viewed with great caution. Second, the CMIP5 models have considerably greater summertime temperature variability over Texas than is observed, with the consequence that greater event probabilities for temperature thresholds are estimated from the models than likely exist in nature."
Finally you can nit pick my mentioning of 10 NOAA vs 9 NOAA scientists plus the Texas climatologist but that smells of more desperate attempts to avoid the argument and slander the arguer. But since they all agree that for the century there was no warming, what data did you use to fabricate your warming graph? Why do YOU keep denying their work and their data and why do YOU keep making up stuff. Your chart suggests warming for the century, and they repeatedly say otherwise. So why should anyone believe a slanderer over all those scientists. It is not about me at all , although you keep trying to obfuscate the issue with personal attacks. It is about top scientists disagreeing with slandering Sou.
Jim for some reason accuses me of doing something or other, writing "You cherry pick the warming from the 80s to 2000".
DeleteYet my chart above, of his favoured NOAA data, mind you, doesn't show any particular warming "from the 80s to 2000". And I don't anywhere specify any particular period other than "recent", although I may have referred to the incredibly high 2012 temperature.
Jim, in answer to your question about where I got the data to fabricate my "warming graph" - I've linked to the source below the graph. In the bit where it says "Data source: NOAA" - click on that and it will take you straight to the source. Yes, your favoured NOAA.
If you look at the chart of NOAA data for Texas above, the "recent" period of warming is clearly from the late 1990s onward, mostly this century.
And yet Jim's still trying to argue that the words written on the pages of the paper he cites don't mean what they mean.
What an utter nutter. (How's that for slander, Jim?)
Here's some of what I wrote to an email query on the topic earlier today. The writer was asking what was being referred as the "warming hole" (which in itself was a reference to an earlier paper). I suggested that the authors would be best placed to answer that (sometimes scientists are happy to respond to email questions from strangers, sometimes not in my experience. But it doesn't hurt to ask).
You'll notice that the passage seems to pertain to summer temperatures (see Fig 1 in the paper - which includes data for June, July and August) not annual temperatures. They refer also to summer precipitation having been put forward by other scientists as a possible explanation. [Sou: Re-reading the Hoerling paper, I see that the phrase might also pertain to annual temperatures but only to 2009, obviously not to more recent years.]
Regardless, when it comes to annual temperatures it's clear from NOAA data that Texas as a whole has been consistently warmer for longer recently than the twentieth century average. And the authors state quite clearly that this is so, and that some of the recent warming (particularly the 2011 heat wave as far as I can tell) is due to human factors.
You might be interested in one of John N-G's articles about the incredible summer in Texas, too:
http://blog.chron.com/climateabyss/2011/08/texas-drought-spot-the-outlier/
Here are two more recent papers on the subject:
http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/cmb/bams-sotc/extreme-events/Rupp-et-al.pdf
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JHM-D-13-069.1
Most science I read shows that it is difficult to attribute a single event to human factors, but that it is quite feasible in many cases to do so by examining probabilities. John N-G discusses that on his blog, where he also discusses some of the press reports on the Rupp paper I linked to above.
http://blog.chron.com/climateabyss/2010/08/did-it-happen-because-of-global-warming/
By the way, if you click on the chart in my article, you'll immediately see there is quite a difference between the few warm years during the 1930s (and the 1950s) and those of this century. Many more years were warmer this century, plus it's been hotter this century than it was back then.
DeleteAstute (and not so astute) people will also notice that there has only been one year this century that was cooler than the twentieth century average - unlike the 1930s or any other decade last century.
DeleteIt might be worthwhile to check this out. (It's good not to rely on just a single dataset)
Deletehttp://berkeleyearth.lbl.gov/regions/texas
Or this one.
http://berkeleyearth.lbl.gov/regions/united-states
I think it is Jim who desperately needs to "get over that fact that nature does not support your beliefs".
But to be frank, there was nothing in the documentary was misleading or incorrect. Also it had been fact checked by leading climate scientists who are professors. I just don't get it how people (like Jim) who do not have the slightest qualification or real world experience in climate science can all of a sudden run roughshod over a massive body of evidence. Look, it has been known for decades now, that anthropogenic greenhouse gases are accumulating in the atmosphere at a rate unprecedented in the earth's history, and that the energy trapped by these greenhouse gases affects the climate. It's also known that these affects include changes in the water cycle. There is no debate on this. It's just the observable facts.
Dear Jim,
DeleteI've come late to the discussion but the following are for your edification and I think are self explanatory:
Congressional Temperature Trends for Texas which are in agreement with the graphic Texas, Temperature, January-December 1895-2013 which was generated from NOAA's Climate at a Glance which are in agreement with the graphic at the head of Sou's article/post.
And the following from Climate Central's The Heat is On: US Temperature Trends which, if you click on the state of Texas, includes a graphic of the warming trend in Texas which is labelled "Texas is the ninth fastest warming state (at 0.575 degF per decade since 1970)".
I believe that you've overlooked average annual temperatures and focused too much on "summer temperatures" in your quoted research paper.
Warmest Regards,
George
PS My apologies to other commenters if you've already brought the above links to Jim's attention.
To paraphrase a misquote...
Delete...it's warming Jim, but not as you misunderstand it.
It's not slander when it's fact. You are an incompetent and a serial liar.
DeleteHere is another good paper, a bit old, but still relevant.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.texasclimate.org/Portals/6/Books/ImpactTX/Ch2Nielsen-Gammon.pdf
"Despite the fundamentally different nature of decade-scale temperature variations throughout the year in Texas, the century-scale trends are quite uniform across seasons. Far West Texas has the largest trend, 1.1-2.2°F per century. The warming trends are more moderate, 0.4-0.9°F, in the Panhandle and Plains and Southeast Texas. Only a very slight warming is present in East Texas and South Texas, and a very slight cooling is present in West Central Texas and South Central Texas. The cooling in North Central Texas is –0.1 to –0.7°F per century. All trends except for Far West Texas are smaller than the global mean temperature trend over the same period."
The discussion here should be about different data representations and the causes of those temperature.
ReplyDeletePeople have presented different references and as Dave has shown Only a very slight warming is present in East Texas and South Texas, and a very slight cooling is present in West Central Texas and South Central Texas. The cooling in North Central Texas is –0.1 to –0.7°F per century. All trends except for Far West Texas are smaller than the global mean temperature trend over the same period." That supports the Hoerling paper and the USHCN graph of Plainview Texas being cooler.
In contrast Sou's graph is supported by Far West Texas has the largest trend, 1.1-2.2°F per century. The warming trends are more moderate, 0.4-0.9°F, in the Panhandle and Plains and Southeast Texas. The question is how does all that get combined to have generated such opposite interpretations. Were the data homogenized and if so was it documented. Homogenization creates totally different trends as I have documented here http://landscapesandcycles.net/why-unwarranted-temperature-adjustments-.html
The second question is whenever we ferret out the correct trend for Texas, what are the causes. What climate dynamics were so powerful that they cooled half of Texas despite rising CO2. And if those dynamics could cool much of Texas do similar dynamics cause warming and are aliased onto CO2 warming?
Slanderous Sou defiles the attempt to have an honest scientific debate with comments like "utter nutter", but that is exactly what I have come to expect from such an intellect. SOU you need to choose. Are about you sincerely science debate and follow the truth not matter wher it takes us? Or are you simply trying to suppress scientific debate via personal attacks?
Jim, as Dave pointed out, that book is old. It was published by January 2008 therefore the data can only go to 2006 at the very latest. And if you check you'll see that is so.
DeleteAs for your looking for an "honest scientific debate" - you've not shown any inclination to be honest, let alone "debate". You've been fudging, denying what is staring you in the face, misrepresenting the very report you've relied upon. And still you won't admit that you were wrong when your wrote: "The truth is there has been no climate warming in Texas."
As for scientific, you wouldn't know science if it bit you in the bum (to quote an Aussie expression).
My article wasn't about the cause of the warming. It was all about exposing the lie in that single statement of yours. It was only after you came in waving Hoerling12 about that in the comments it has emerged that some of the recent warming in Texas has been attributed by your "NOAA scientists" to human causes.
I've had enough of your pathetic filibustering, obfuscation, whining and snivelling. And I don't imagine I'm the only one. You have no hesitation in vilifying scientists who are much more successful at their profession than you ever were. Until you come up with data to support your statement or admit you were wrong, any further comment from you will be deleted.
And the temperature data you come up with had better be for the whole state of Texas and go to 2013. It can go back as far as you want. The data I showed goes back to 1895 - I challenge you to find data that shows different. Or, as I say, a simple admission that you were wrong in that statement would suffice. (I'm not demanding an apology and doubt you'd give one anyway. From what I see you are not that sort of man.)
Stainless Steele, do you accept that Hoerling & al twice state that there is warming in Texas and clearly indicate that a proportion of it is anthropogenic? If not, why not, since both sections have been quoted to you? Since you are keen on an honest debate, perhaps you would, in future, post your items on a site other than WUWT where an honest debate is impossible?
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DeleteJim writes
Delete"What climate dynamics were so powerful that they cooled half of Texas despite rising CO2. And if those dynamics could cool much of Texas do similar dynamics cause warming and are aliased onto CO2 warming? "
Well if you bothered to read the reference I provided, the answer is in there.
"What does the present relative lack of warming imply for projections of future climate change in Texas? Knutson et al. (2006) examined the spatial patterns of temperature change throughout the globe and their reproduceability in an advanced coupled climate model. An area of negative century-long temperature trends extends from central Texas across the southeastern United States. This region is one of the few areas of cooling over the entire globe. While ensemble runs of the coupled climate model, including both anthropogenic and natural forcing, produced realistic historical simulations over most of the globe, they completely failed to reproduce the observed cooling in the south-central and southeastern United States.
Robinson et al. (2002) took a close look at this anomaly. The climate model they used was able to reproduce the anomaly, whether or not anthropogenic forcings were included, as long as the atmospheric model was driven by observed sea surface temperature patterns. Through a series of experiments, Robinson et al. (2002) found that the key region for driving the cooler temperatures in the south-central and southeastern United States was the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean, where warm sea surface temperatures led to increased water vapor and cloud cover over the southern United States, thereby reducing temperatures throughout the year.
While these studies provide interesting evidence, they are far from conclusive. If portions of the Pacific Ocean are indeed responsible for the suppressed warming in Texas, it is still not known whether those sea surface temperature variations are part of a natural cycle or are themselves a response to global warming. Alternatively, the mechanisms in the climate model and the real atmosphere may be different, and the actual cause of the suppressed global warming response in Texas may be a consequence of cloud-aerosol interactions, land use changes, or other natural or anthropogenically- forced regional climate modes.
At this point, there is no evidence that the climate patterns responsible for the lack of a century-long temperature trend in Texas and the southeastern United States are caused by anthropogenic influences, and natural processes, particularly those driven by variations in ocean circulation, are likely to be cyclical. Furthermore, recent temperatures in Texas are among the highest on record. Thus, it seems prudent to assume that the relative lack of 20th century warming in Texas is a temporary climate phenomenon, and that temperatures are likely to rise significantly in Texas over the coming decades."
So given that this was written about 5 years ago, and in those 5 years, Texas has seen it's hottest year on record, the statement of "relative lack of warming" needs to be revised, to include the most up to date records.
The main problem as I see it, is that Jim has relied too much on old, and out of date studies to base his conclusions on. As new data comes in, the conclusions of previous studies also needs to be updated. At the time the 9 NOAA scientists (NOT 10) were correct in their conclusions, but Texas has continued to warm, so much so, that the trend has now changed. But Jim, is stuck in the past, trying to argue his way out of a hole with accusations and misrepresentations. It's 2014 now, not 2006. In that time the climate has changed. Probably why it's called climate change. That's one of the pesky things about climate science, it's a fast moving subject, and relying on old and superceded studies will get you into trouble. It's a common occurrence with deniers.
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DeleteI'll give Jim one more chance to redeem himself by repeating my request. It relates to his statement about which I wrote the above article. Jim wrote: "The truth is there has been no climate warming in Texas."
DeleteI decided enough was enough and wrote to Jim:
Until you come up with data to support your statement or admit you were wrong, any further comment from you will be deleted. And the temperature data you come up with had better be for the whole state of Texas and go to 2013. It can go back as far as you want.
Jim's written four more comments so far but hasn't complied with my request.
Possibly the most encouraging post I've seem for a while is from your blog-roll:
Deletehttp://www.skepticalscience.com/news.php?n=2496
No-one shows up for the quasi-skeptics any more. That's not to say that you (Sou) or other people should stop what you're doing yet! These guys are still influencing politicians, so it's nice to have forums where people can see how the Non-IPCC science is peddled.
IMO, Jim's deleted posts should still be available to see, in the HotWhoppery.
DeleteDone.
DeleteHe also said "the most powerful driver" of disappearing rain forests is "climate fear mongering" in his WUWT article. I commented above that this is actually wrong. It is not "found in the literature" like "everything" else he claims. He has not responded back. Would be great if he would correct that mistake, too.
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Delete"Slanderous Sou defiles the attempt to have an honest scientific debate with comments like "utter nutter""
DeleteHey, asshole, perhaps if you hadn't opened your comments by falsely accusing Sou of slander, you might have a leg to stand on.
"Slanderous Sou defiles the attempt to have an honest scientific debate with comments like "utter nutter""
DeleteHey, asshole, perhaps if you hadn't opened your comments by falsely accusing Sou of slander, you might have a leg to stand on.
Oh heck I been missing all the fun.
ReplyDeleteI've had a very hectic couple weeks so have had very little computer time.
Past few days I've tried to get back to this jazz and in fact have been going over this very same Steele atrocity of an article.
Did anyone else notice Steele's eye for detail.
Ten times he misspells Katharine Hayhoe's name and it still hasn't been corrected.
Incidentally, Steele still hasn't responded to the various deceptions of his articles attacking Dr. Parmesan.
http://whatsupwiththatwatts.blogspot.com/2014/03/fabricatingclimatedoom-steeles-science.html
Sou, allow me to share some random thoughts that came to me as I'm navigating Steele's wormhole of an article/argument regarding "Years of Living Dangerously."
ReplyDeleteSteele shares extremely biased opinions because he's got Blinders on,
just like them old draft horse,
his vision doesn't extend beyond the road in front of his feet.
Sadly he doesn't recognize his own Blinders.
He refuses to acknowledge superseding information,
nor consider modifying his own misconceptions.
I know that's true of all of us to some extent.
~ ~ ~
But,
Here's the big difference
between the faith-based, politically driven ideologue and
the curiosity driven scientific type,
with their interest (ay, passion...) in observation and understanding.
We appreciate we have our own custom fitted Blinders.
We are open to critique, reproach, having our own errors exposed -
no doubt it can be painful,
we'll even struggle against it defending less and less defensible convictions.
But, all the time new information is being listened to... digested... allowed to
develop by its own merits.
Learning does happen,
mistakes are our greatest learning tools,
we grow and improve.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
So be aware we are dealing with folks
who want to protect dogma and turf above all else.
How to deal with that ???
The hate-on for scientists is fueled by unspoken religion emotions
rather than any evidence of systemic deception.
The system of science has more honesty checks-and-balances
than any dogmatic faith defending system focused on protecting turf.
So one side we have dogmatists and on the other we have rationalists -
and the river of time waits for none of us.
For whatever it's worth, here's that detailed critique of Jim Steele's article, including plenty of links to sources of further solid information.
ReplyDeleteFriday, April 25, 2014
Jim Steele Exploiting Human Misery and Distorting Science
http://whatsupwiththatwatts.blogspot.com/2014/04/jimsteel-distorting-science.html