Sunday, January 18, 2015

Bob Tisdale is confused, miffed and bewildered by record hot seas at WUWT


Update - see below - plus there's also an addendum with a map showing all the places which broke new heat records in 2014.


The record heat is causing much confusion at WUWT. Bob Tisdale in the comments invited me to write an article about his latest protest at the record hot 2014 (archived here). Well, not exactly invited, what he suggested was that rooter come here to make his points about Bob Tisdales article - twice - here and here. (Both times he finished in passive-aggressive fashion in the style of Willis Eschenbach, writing through gritted teeth "have a good day" after calling rooter a "troll".



When is an average an average?


So what did rooter write that got Bob so upset that he told him he wasn't welcome at WUWT? Well, he asked about this:
January 17, 2015 at 9:22 am
This is a gem:
That is not so say that there were elevated sea surface temperatures in specific parts of other ocean basins, but in general, those elevated temperatures in basins outside of the North Pacific had no impact on the record highs.
Just how is that mathematically possible? What happens when removing areas with temperatures above the global mean? The mean will be unaffected by that?
Just incredible.
Tisdale did of course not plot the global mean with those other areas removed. And NE Pacific retained.
We all know why he is reluctant to do that. 


Three non-objections to the record hot year


How about I backtrack. In his WUWT article, Bob Tisdale lists three and a bit objections to the NOAA announcement that 2014 is the hottest year on record. In particular, he takes issue with NOAA/NCDC's State of the Climate report of the Global Analysis - Annual 2014.

1. Confidence intervals should have been written higher up the page

Confidence intervals for globally averaged surface temperature are listed too low on the web page for Bob's liking. (Seriously)

Bob also didn't like it that some information, which was made available as supplemental information, was only linked to rather than included on the front page. (Although as you'll see it was part of the much publicised press conference.)

Bob wanted to see, on the front page, the probability factors associated with the ranking of 2014 in various categories (warmest year, one of five warmest years etc). (I think this is confusing to the layperson and I'm not surprised to see it befuddled Bob. See more below.)


2. They should have said it was an El Nino year, even though it wasn't

Bob disagrees with NOAA (and NASA and BoM) that 2014 was not an El Nino year, and he thinks that NOAA should agree with him.


3. NOAA shouldn't have mentioned the other record hot areas of ocean, only Bob's north Pacific warm spot

Bob protested this passage in the NOAA report:
In 2014, the warmth was due to large regions of record warm and much warmer-than-average temperatures in parts of every major ocean basin. Record warmth for the year was particularly notable in the northeastern Pacific Ocean in and around the Gulf of Alaska, much of the western equatorial Pacific, parts of the western North Atlantic and western South Atlantic, and much of the Norwegian and Barents Seas. Nearly the entire Indian Ocean was much warmer than average with a broad swath between Madagascar and Australia record warm. Part of the Atlantic Ocean south of Greenland and the Southern Ocean waters off the southern tip of South America were much cooler than average, with one localized area near Antarctica record cold.
Bob complained that they only mentioned his favourite bit of warming "in passing".  What I gather he really objects to is that they mentioned any other areas where there was record warmth for the year. He wrote:
An unusual weather event in the North Pacific (along with the El Niño conditions) was, in fact, the primary reason for the elevated sea surface temperatures in 2014.  That is not so say that there were elevated sea surface temperatures in specific parts of other ocean basins, but in general, those elevated temperatures in basins outside of the North Pacific had no impact on the record highs.

You can read his words for yourself and decide whether or not rooter misrepresented him (see up top). And whether or not I'm misrepresenting him in quoting them as well.  Let's do a little exercise and see if record numbers make a difference to an average. First I put in some numbers for five areas, then I averaged them. (Click to enlarge.)





Yep, it does make a difference if more areas are at record highs than if just one area is. One for rooter, zero for Bob. Arithmetic isn't something that deniers are known to excel at so don't think too badly of Bob Tisdale for not understanding how averages are calculated.

To "prove" the other record hot parts of the ocean didn't contribute to the record hot sea surface, Bob decided to plot all the rest of the ocean (minus the north Pacific) against all the areas of the ocean including the north Pacific. What he found was that without the North Pacific, the ocean as a whole would not have been a record hot year. What he didn't do was plot all areas of the ocean including the north Pacific but minus the other parts of the ocean that also had record hot temperatures. In other words, he added the record hot North Pacific to the record hot oceans elsewhere and then declared it was only the north Pacific that made it a record hot year.

Without doing that other exercise (plotting SSTs in all oceans including the north Pacific but excluding the other record hot areas), it is hard to say whether it would have been a record year for sea surface temperatures if the north Pacific hadn't got as hot as it did. However, whether or not the North Pacific added disproportionately to the global average is neither here nor there. What the NOAA reported was all the areas of ocean that recorded sea surface temperatures never before seen in the instrumental era. That's what Bob seems to have objected to the most. In my opinion, it would have been remiss of NOAA to only refer to one area and not the other areas that had record warmth.


Addendum


I probably should have included this chart from the outset, but I was a bit pushed for time. Anyway, here you can see all the areas where there were records set in 2014, compared to the only bit that Bob Tisdale sees. Click to enlarge.

Source: NOAA

Added by Sou 18 January 9:44 pm AEDT


How likely was it that 2014 was a record hot year?


Which leads me on to the confusion surrounding the likelihood of 2014 being a record hot year. The answer is that it is much more likely that 2014 was a record hot year than that any particular previous year was the record hot year.

From what I gather, the likelihood numbers below are based on a Monte Carlo analysis. Here is how it was presented at the press shindig:



NOAA and NASA use different methodologies. Both indicate that the likelihood of 2014 being the hottest year on record as considerably higher than any other year. However as Bob Tisdale found, the table on the NOAA website raises questions. Here is the table from the supplementary info page:



You can see how Bob got confused. Applying the scale to the "probability of warmest year" indicates that it is "more unlikely than likely" that 2014 was the warmest. However I think that what the scale shows is a comparison of 2014 to any other year, not to a particular other year. In other words, if you look at all the warmest years, it is much more likely that 2014 was the warmest on record than that any other individual specified year was the warmest on record. But if you take all years, then it is almost equally likely that there was another year (any year, not a specific year) that was the warmest on record.

Do you follow? What I think it shows is that 2014 was much, much more likely to be the warmest on record than that the next hottest year, 2010, was the warmest on record. However it's almost a 50/50 chance that *any* year (say from the past ten years or so) that *one* of them (not a specific year) was actually warmer.

I'm happy for a statistician to chip in here, but that's my take on it. It's a shame that NOAA doesn't allow for denier misinterpretations and explain their tables more clearly.


Update


See David Sanger's comment below which makes more sense than my interpretation. David wrote:
The way I see it, using NOAA figures they say there are five primary years that are the highest recorded global temperature (2014, 2010, 12005, 2013 and 1998). It is 90% certain that one of these is the hottest. The chance that is is 2014 is 48%, The chance that it is 2010 is 18%. The chance that it is 2005 is 13%. The chance that it is 2013 is 6% and the chance that it is 1998 is 5%. In other words, of all the years considered in the historical record, it is MOST likely that it was 2014 that has been the hottest so far.

Sou 18 January 2015 6:27 pm AEDT 



The upshot of all this is that Bob Tisdale is being either mischievous or ignorant when he writes:
Therefore, NOAA has biased the “Global Highlights” of their State of the Climate report by failing to note the likelihood, actually unlikelihood, that 2014 had the highest global surface temperatures on record.
Given his confusion with averages, I'm happy to put it down to ignorance on his part.


On greenhouse warming and the oceans


I'll just make one more observation. Bob doesn't understand that the water in the oceans moves around and so does air and moisture in the atmosphere, which is surprising for someone who's constantly writing about Kelvin Waves etc. In other words, different places will get hotter at different times. He wrote:
It’s unrealistic to assume the warming of the surfaces of the North Pacific in 2013 and 2014 were caused by manmade greenhouse gases, when they hadn’t warmed in at least 23 years before then.
That's what is known as a strawman. It would take quite a bit of research to determine the extent to which elevated greenhouse gases contributed to a particular event such as the warming of the north Pacific.

In other words, Bob misses the point (or is being deliberately misleading). The point being that averaged globally, sea surfaces have never been hotter in the instrumental record. It's not that any one little part of the ocean got warm, it's that averaged over the whole lot of the oceans, the sea surface has never been hotter. That's because of greenhouse warming. If it were not for greenhouse warming, then one part of the ocean could be warm and another part compensatingly cool (simplistically applying the conservation of energy). This is why Bob likes to focus on only one bit of the ocean at a time. He is a greenhouse effect denier after all.


From the WUWT comments


Most of the comments were about how "it can't be happening" because it's "impossible" to get a globally averaged surface temperature (which is why analyses are based on anomalies). Or that records are adjusted (referring to homogenisation and corrections). That way the deniers can deny. It's a logical fallacy of personal incredulity.

Others write about money, which is a common subject at WUWT. In the comments, Bob takes irrational objection to people who point out the fallacies and errors in his article. He ends up name-calling and telling them they aren't welcome at WUWT.

Just the same, from this article and from other protest articles at WUWT, one can see that deniers are  getting a bit anxious that the ice age that WUWT keeps promising isn't to be seen anywhere on the horizon.

Gotta go so no time to add some comments. You can read them here if you've nothing better to do.

49 comments:

  1. I got the impression that Bob spent the first half of 2014 insisting that there was going to be no El Nino and the second half insisting that there was, of course, an El Nino.

    After all, record global temperatures without an El Nino is a bad look for someone who insists that record temperatures are caused by El Nino.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I don't think so, David. Bob didn't start saying there was an El Nino till very late in the peace. In his no. 18 update he was still writing "assuming one forms" in this regard.
      https://archive.today/KKsEy

      It wasn't until 31 October in his no. 19 update that he decided there was an El Nino - by redefining things.
      https://archive.today/oxQlD

      This was around the time it became clear that 2014 was a record hot year for global sea surface temperatures.

      Delete
    2. Oh and in February last year Bob wrote there wouldn't be an El Nino:

      https://archive.today/AP0g2

      By March last year he was saying that all indicators pointed to a moderately strong El Nino:

      https://archive.today/QOpYT

      But by April he was castigating other people for saying much the same thing:

      https://archive.today/MtwFo

      And for all his complaints about "warmists" writing about El Nino, it was Bob himself who surpassed them all by a very wide margin - with more than 21 articles on the subject over the year.

      Delete
    3. The abrupt u-turn came about late in the year once Tisdale realised his dopey 'El Nino causes global warming' canard was about to be thoroughly debunked by a record warm year with no El Nino.


      Delete
    4. The three of you obviously haven't read Bob's posts in their entirety. If you had bothered to examine every plot and followed every linked article, you would have seen that you are misunderstanding his argument. Or are simply idiots. Have a nice day.

      Delete
    5. Brandon: missed the smiley face?

      Delete
    6. Tisdale and Curry seem that since the technical definition of an El Nino is to some extent arbitrary, and conditions in 2014 were only a hairsbreadth from that technical definition, then it's misleading to make anything of it not being an El Nino year. Which it is, arguably. What we can say is that it wasn't a strong or even medium El Nino year, unlike, say, 1998.

      The choice of 95% for statistical significance is also arbitrary, which makes it misleading to argue that 93% is not statistically significant. pH 7 as the divide between acid and alkaline is also arbitrary, so arguing that nothing above pH7 can be acidifying is misleading. Hurricane levels are arbitrary so arguing that Sandy wasn't a hurricane because it's windspeeds were marginally low is misleading.

      I doubt they'll take the same approach to those examples, but such is life.

      Delete
  2. The analysis for 2013:

    http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2013/13/supplemental/page-1

    ReplyDelete
  3. I think that the NOAA/NASA treatment of probabilities does add confusion, and as far as I can tell, isn't right. The CI's that NASA quotes (+-0.05) are based on coverage. I think NOAA is similar. IOW, for any one year, how much would the answer vary if a different spatial distribution of stations was sued. They do this by subsetting, mainly back when GHCN had many more. I don't know what they do about SST.

    But in comparing 2010 to 2014, there isn't much change in station distribution. So what counts is the smaller component of variability that is independent in time, rather than being a function of location that is likely to be similar in 2010 and 2014.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Okay, thanks, Nick. You're suggesting the confidence intervals are narrower if the station distribution is very similar, which it is between 2010 and 2014. That is, comparing between years. That makes sense.

      Delete
    2. Nick,

      Is it possibly the result of more stations simply being warmer in 2014 than in 2010? I mean, in 2010 there may have been more extremely warm regions offset by some moderate or cool ones; whereas in 2014 it might be the case that more stations were just warmer than average across a wider area.

      Delete
  4. The way I see it, using NOAA figures they say there are five primary years that are the highest recorded global temperature (2014, 2010, 1005, 2013 and 1998). It is 90% certain that one of these is the hottest. The chance that is is 2014 is 48%, The chance that it is 2010 is 18%. The chance that it is 2005 is 13%. The chance that it is 2013 is 6% and the chance that it is 1998 is 5%. In other words, of all the years considered in the historical record, it is MOST likely that it was 2014 that has been the hottest so far.

    The average global temperature anomaly in 2014 was measured as +0/69 ±0.09 ºC. In other words it could have been as high as +0.78 or as low as +0.60 ºC (95% confidence interval)

    The second most likley year to be the hottest was 2010 which was +0.65. If the originally reported error range of ± 0.07ªC
    still holds, then it could have been as high as +0.72 or as low as +0.58 (95% confidence interval)

    ReplyDelete
  5. If Tisdale is really worried about the accuracy of the annual average then the obvious solution is to look at things like the decadal average.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I've added a map from NOAA that shows where new heat records were set in 2014 - and the only bit that Bob Tisdale sees.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fantastic illustration of just how cherry-picked Tisdale's data is. Because, you know, "USING A GLOBAL DATASET TO REPRESENT GLOBAL WARMING IS MISLEADING"

      So sad.

      Delete
  7. A little OT, but has anyone taken a sqiz at the latest Monckton paper in a Chinese journal.

    Here are some howlers I found

    Fig1. Compares the FAR SURFACE temperature projections with a ""satellite-derived lower atmospheric surface temperatures"

    Fig2. Misrepresent the FAR projections. Monckton claims that the FAR projections were 0.19 - 0.43 oC/decade but if one actually reads the FAR, it says

    "under the IPCC Business-as-Usual (Scenario A) emissions of greenhouse gases, a rate of increase of global mean temperature during the next century of about 0.3°C per decade (with an uncertainty range of 0 2°C to 0 5°C per decade), this is greater than that seen over the past 10,000 years This will result in a likely increase in global mean temperature of about 1°C above the present value by 2025 and VC before the end of the next century The rise will not be steady because of the influence of other factors under the other IPCC emission scenarios which assume progressively increasing levels of controls rates of increase in global mean temperature of about 0 2°C per decade (Scenario B), just above 0 1°C per decade (Scenario C) and about 0 1 °C per decade (Scenario D)"

    Fig 4. Is 'adapted' from Figure 6 in this paper
    http://earthweb.ess.washington.edu/roe/Publications/Roe_FeedbacksRev_08.pdf

    Now, the original is showing the effect of different feedback strengths on a traditional simple model. Monckton then 'adds' to that figure, what he claims were the feedback strengths from 1.3 to 2.9. First fraud is that these numbers were NOT mentioned in the original paper, i.e. he just made them up. Second fraud is that he claimed to run the model not only with the feedback sum dimension, but also with with a loop gain dimension from 0.4 to 0.9, but this loop gain dimension IS NOT an axis on the chart.

    What a charlatan.

    That is just a few, there are many more. How about make it a bit of a game to see who can pick more howlers.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. And Then There's Physics has a post about it: "The designers of our climate".

      It may be easier to explain what is right about the article.

      Delete
    2. It would probably be quicker. So far as I can tell, ink used is the correct shade of black.

      Delete
    3. DJ quotes from the Monckton paper:

      "Fig1. Compares the FAR SURFACE temperature projections with a ""satellite-derived lower atmospheric surface temperatures""

      I don't know if there's any significance, but Curry used this same phrase when justifying a statement by US republican politician/denialist (that's almost redundant, isn't it?) Ted Cruz:

      "So, what is wrong with Cruz’s statement? Well, assuming that by ‘recorded warming’, he means the satellite-derived lower atmospheric surface temperatures his statement is absolutely correct. "

      Quoted in Sou's 1/17/2015 post about Curry and Plait.

      Delete
    4. Good catch FL. It's an odd expression for anyone, including deniers. Most people say 'lower troposphere' not atmosphere, and who else calls it 'surface'?

      Is Christopher ghost-writing Judy's articles or is a third person writing both or is Judith so steeped in deniersville that she's adopting all the lingo?

      Next we'll be reading about naturally-fuelled sunlit recharge-discharge oscillators in the north Pacific 😄

      Delete
    5. I expect the term will spread like a nasty rash in a commune.

      Delete
    6. Just a correction.

      Monckton's paper didn't actually say "satellite-derived lower atmospheric surface temperatures"

      the actual terms they used were

      "the mean of the RSS, UAH, NCDC, HadCRUT4 and GISS monthly global anomalies"

      Which is pretty much the same anyway. Combining troposphere with surface temperatures vs a FAR projection of surface temperatures ONLY.

      But it was their 'adapted' Fig 4 with I think is the most heinous of frauds. A basic copy and paste with their own 'figures' photoshopped on. They certainly did NOT run a traditional simple model with those parameters as claimed.

      Delete
    7. Looks like the peer-reviewed literature may have been redefined after all.

      Under 'Empirical Evidence of models running hot, Monckton et al inform us that

      "In 1990, FAR predicted with
      ‘‘substantial confidence’’ that, in the 35 years 1991–2025,
      global temperature would rise by 1.0 [0.7, 1.5] K, equivalent
      to 2.8 [1.9, 4.2] K century-1. Yet 25 years after that
      prediction the outturn, expressed as the trend on the mean
      of the two satellite monthly global mean surface
      temperature anomaly datasets [9, 10], is 0.34 C, equivalent
      to 1.4 C century-1—half the central estimate in FAR
      and beneath the lower bound of the then-projected warming
      interval (Fig. 1)."

      This is disingenous, as DJ pointed out, what the FAR actually said was:

      "under the IPCC Business-as-Usual (Scenario A)
      emissions of greenhouse gases, a rate of increase of
      global mean temperature during the next century of
      about 0 3°C per decade (with an uncertainty range of
      0 2°C to 0 5°C per decade), this is greater than that
      seen over the past 10,000 years This will result in a
      likely increase in global mean temperature of about
      1°C above the present value by 2025 and VC before
      the end of the next century The rise will not be
      steady because of the influence of other factors "

      So what was the forcing regime envisioned under Scenario A? Well for all GHGs it was an increase in forcing of 2.95 W/m2 by 2000 and 4.59 by 2025 (CO2 1.85 and 2.88). How does this compare to the actual outcome? Well, it was an overestimate, in the paper itself, Monckton uses the IPCC values

      "the greenhouse gas radiative forcings including that from CO2, which, applying Eq. (2) to pre-industrial and 2011 forcings of approximately 280 and 394 ppmv, respectively, is 1.82 W m-2"

      In fact this is far nearer to IPCC FAR Scenarios B-C, which all have CO2 at around 1.75 by 2000 and 2.35 by 2025. For these scenarios, the IPCC actually projected:

      ", average rates of increase in global mean temperature over the next century are estimated to be about 0 2°C per decade (Scenario B),
      just above 0 1°C per decade (Scenario C) and about 0.1 °C per decade (Scenario D) "

      Which, given that Monckton estimates the actual trend at 0.14C /decade, means that he just confirmed that the IPCC FAR was spot on! Its the usual trick - cherry-pick the most extreme scenario, even though reality took a different course.

      Another nugget:, Monckton doesn't like IPCC RPC 8.5, deriding it as 'unrealistic'. Guess which RCP the 'sceptics' (eg Spencer & Christy) nearly always use to 'prove' that the models are too hot?

      Lastly, I was amused by Nick Stokes wry observation, given Monkton's branding of those agreeing with the science as 'climate communists', that he published in the journal of the Science Academy of the People Republic of China.





      Delete
    8. Comment Tennis at WUWT?

      Under ‘Empirical Evidence of models running hot’, the paper states that the IPCC FAR predicted a trend in global mean temperature of 2.8K / century 1990-2025, and correctly states that the actual warming (so far) was rather less.

      Fair enough, this was IPCC Scenario A, described as ‘business as usual’. However, 25 years later we now know that Scenario A did not come to pass. It had a CO2 forcing of 1.85 W/m2 by 2000 and 2.88 by 2025. Actual outcome, as stated in the paper was a rather smaller 1.82 by 2011. In reality, IPCC scenarios B, C and D were closer, with CO2 forcing values of at around 1.75 by 2000 and 2.35 by 2025. For these scenarios, the IPCC actually projected:

      “average rates of increase in global mean temperature over the next century are estimated to be about 0 2°C per decade (Scenario B), just above 0 1°C per decade (Scenario C) and about 0.1 °C per decade (Scenario D) ”

      Which, given that the paper estimates the actual trend at 0.14C /decade, apparently means that IPCC FAR was spot on!

      I would be interested in learning why the paper uses the 1990 Scenario A projection to illustrate ‘model failure’, when it was based on forcing projections that simply did not materialise. It may show that the IPCC were unduly pessimistic about emission trajectories, but tells us naught about model performance.

      Monckton of Brenchley January 21, 2015 at 4:49 am

      We did not use any of the scenarios in the First Assessment Report. We used the central prediction for medium-term global warming that appears in the Summary for Policymakers. It [] was that estimate that started the scare. It was based on modelling, and it was double what has transpired. It was wrong. On that exaggerated prediction the scare was built.

      If this is the case, perhaps this should have been mentioned? The references section cites the FAR itself only. I can find references only to scenarios in the policymakers summary and none to a central medium term prediction (or projection) in the policymakers summary. Could you perhaps help me with a page number? And also where the range 1.0 [0.7, 1.5] K is stated, because I am unable to locate these numbers anywhere in the summary or the report.
      The figures stated in the paper are consistent with Scenario A, which was not 'central', but considerably higher than Scenarios B-D, which turned out to be closer to the reality of how forcings evolved.
      Also the words 'substantial confidence', quoted verbatim in the paper, appear not in the Policymakers Summary but in the body of the report and only in the phrase :
      "Nevertheless, for reasons given in the box overleaf, we have substantial confidence that models can predict at least the broad scale features of climate change"
      certainly not linked to a specific number.

      The SPM states this clearly

      "Based on current model results, we predict:
      • under the IPCC Business-as-Usual (Scenario A)
      emissions of greenhouse gases, a rate of increase of
      global mean temperature during the next century of
      about 0 3°C per decade (with an uncertainty range of
      0 2°C to 0 5°C per decade), this is greater than that
      seen over the past 10,000 years This will result in a
      likely increase in global mean temperature of about
      1°C above the present value by 2025
      and 3C before
      the end of the next century The rise will not be
      steady because of the influence of other factors

      • under the other IPCC emission scenarios which
      assume progressively increasing levels of controls
      rates of increase in global mean temperature of about
      0 2°C per decade (Scenario B), just above 0 1°C per
      decade (Scenario C) and about 0 1 °C per decade
      (Scenario D)"


      As we now know Scenario A did not come to pass, actual forcings were substantially less (so far) whereas Scenarios B-D turned out to be more prescient, and their temperature predictions on the money.and so it would appear that 'empirical evidence of models running hot', is in fact no such thing.

      Thirty-Fifteen?

      Delete
    9. New balls, and on we go.

      Monckton of Brenchley January 21, 2015 at 11:00 am

      In answer to Mr Clarke, there is a prominent section in the summary for policymakers in the First ASSessment Report, headed by the words “We predict” (which shuts up those who quibble about the difference between prediction and projection). The prediction was that there would be 1 K warming by 2025, plus 50% or minus 30%. That’s 1.0 [0.7, 1.5] K. We’re so far below even the least estimate that there’d have to be a great deal of global warming over the next decade to put global warming back on the IPCC’s predicted interval.

      Phil Clarke 22 January - currently in moderation.

      I am sure we all wish the peer-reviewed literature to be accurate. This paper is flawed. Here is some free peer-review:

      The only section in the Policymaker's Summary of the FAR that meets Lord Monckton's description is the one I quoted above. Here it is again

      Based on current model results, we predict:

      • under the IPCC Business-as-Usual (Scenario A)
      emissions of greenhouse gases, a rate of increase of
      global mean temperature during the next century of
      about 0 3°C per decade (with an uncertainty range of
      0 2°C to 0 5°C per decade), this is greater than that
      seen over the past 10,000 years This will result in a
      likely increase in global mean temperature of about
      1°C above the present value by 2025 and 3C before
      the end of the next century The rise will not be
      steady because of the influence of other factors

      • under the other IPCC emission scenarios which
      assume progressively increasing levels of controls
      rates of increase in global mean temperature of about
      0 2°C per decade (Scenario B), just above 0 1°C per
      decade (Scenario C) and about 0 1 °C per decade
      (Scenario D)

      (Policymakers summary page xii)

      This, despite his Lordship's insistence that 'we did not use any of the scenarios'. The paper has

      "In 1990, FAR predicted with‘‘substantial confidence’’ that,
      in the 35 years 1991–2025, global temperature would rise by
      1.0 [0.7, 1.5] K, equivalent to 2.8 [1.9, 4.2] K century-1."

      This is wrong, the words 'substantial confidence' have been borrowed from another paragraph, which refers only to 'broad scale features of climate change', and the 1C by 2025 prediction was clearly conditional, based on a particular scenario - Scenario A, under Scenarios B-D, the prediction was for 0.1-0.2C per decade. The report later gives the forcing trajectories for each scenario and Scenario A had CO2 forcing at 1.85 in 2000 and 2.88 in 2025. (Scenarios B-D all had around 1.75 and 2.3 respectively). This information is in Table 2.7, page 57.

      Monckton et al state that the 2011 value for CO2 forcing was 1.82 W/m2, in other words by 2011 we were still below the value Scenario A, the one used by Monckton et al, reached 11 years earlier! The forcings for Scenarios B-C were closer to the mark, as were their temperature projections. No doubt one can find empirical evidence of model-observation discrepencies but this is not it. The IPCC gave 4 predictions for 4 scenarios, this paper misrepresents 1 of those scenarios, which did not come to pass as the IPCC prediction. It was not. This should be removed.

      Also, Fig 1 in the paper has the following flaws,

      - As proven above, it plots just 1 of the 4 FAR scenarios. One which did not materialise.

      - It is wrongly captioned. The caption says the blue line is 'RSS, UAH, NCDC, HadCRUT4 and GISS monthly global anomalies'. It is not, it is RSS and UAH only, as the graph legend correctly states (the most basic peer review should surely have spotted this?)

      - There are no error bars on the observed temperatures

      - The FAR trend line should start with the 95% confidence interval bounds associated with the uncertainties of the underlying time series (in other words, not a point start but an interval start). It does not.


      You're welcome.




      Delete
  8. So Monckton ask's

    "Why models run hot: results from an irreducibly simple climate model"

    Well if one looks at Box TS.3, Figure 1 c, page 63 of AR5, over the long term (1951-2012) the models are spot on. Yes, they seem to run hot over short timeframes, but that has got to do more with the unpredictablity of natural variation and a small sample size.

    If one also looks at Figure TS.9 a, page 60 AR5, the models are matched to observations from 1860 - 2000 with a small discrepancy from 2000-2010. So if one looks at an a long term dataset the models don't run hot at all. The Monckton paper is just a hodgepodge of rubbish dressed up with ideology.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I did start to write something about that paper but gave up. The simple model isn't a simple model. There are simpler models around. I've got to say I found it weird that Christopher referenced Professor Ross Garnaut, an economist - twice at least, when talking about climate science. And at the end he let his politics show as his motivation.

      ATTP tackled it and I couldn't have done any better. It's an embarrassment to the journal (I think - not knowing much about the journal. Maybe it's the usual fare.). For all the touting at WUWT, according to its website, the journal has an impact factor of 1.32, which I doubt makes it the "Orient's equivalent of Science or Nature" - which have impact factors of 31.48 and 42.351 respectively.

      You may have noticed that there is a claim at WUWT that in the IPCC's FAR report there was "substantial confidence". Anthony Watts wrote:

      In 1990, the UN’s climate panel predicted with “substantial confidence” that the world would warm at twice the rate that has been observed since.

      I checked. The only time the FAR report used the words "substantial confidence" was in a section about uncertainty:

      Thirdly climate models are only as good as our understanding of the processes which they describe, and this is far from perfect. The ranges in the climate predictions given above reflect the uncertainties due to model imperfections, the largest of these is cloud feedback (those factors affecting the cloud amount and distribution and the interaction of clouds with solar and terrestrial radiation), which leads to a factor of two uncertainty in the size of the warming Others arise from the transfer of energy between the atmosphere and ocean, the atmosphere and land surfaces, and between the upper and deep layers of the ocean The treatment of sea-ice and convection in the models is also crude Nevertheless, for reasons given in the box overleaf, we have substantial confidence that models can predict at least the broad scale features of climate change.

      So the substantial confidence was only in the broad scale features of climate change. Not in the projections of near term global surface temperature change.

      I'd be surprised if anyone bothers with it in the literature. It might get a few blog posts pointing out various things that are wrong with it. Deniers won't like it too much either. Even though the gang of four are arguing that temps won't rise much, they still acknowledge the greenhouse effect is real. WUWT has shifted on that lately and has many more articles arguing it's not real. To try to shore up readers of the idiot kind I expect, Whatever Anthony can get.

      Delete
    2. The link to the ATTP article is here:

      https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2015/01/15/the-designers-of-our-climate/

      Delete
    3. This is how Monckton et al come to a low estimate of ECS:

      "In Fig. 5, a regime of temperature stability is represented
      by g∞ ≤ +0.1, the maximum value allowed by process engineers designing electronic circuits intended not to oscillate under any operating conditions".

      I kid you not: this is really all there is to it.

      Delete
    4. What's interesting about Monckton et al. (2015) are the bits of standard physics the model is based on. This is not comforting to the closet Sky Dragon Slayers at WUWT, and the comment thread there is a case study in the dissonance that happens when one's heroes publish the enemy's arguments in the form a peer-reviewed primary literature. I'm having particular fun watching Monker's defenders explain that a) yes a mathematical formula is a "model" and b) that "models" only approximate reality.

      Delete
    5. Process Engineers designing electronic circuits???

      Are we seeing the fingerprint here of David Evans, aka Mr. Nova, aka Dr. Notch?

      Delete
    6. I was on the floor with the comment 1:58 pm Brandon Gates comment who quoted the paper, and was replied with

      "mpainter January 16, 2015 at 5:39 pm
      Gates:
      You should take your litany of unsupported assumptions and misapplied theory to SKS. You might impress someone there. Like rooter. Or HotMoma. But it will not play here."

      Pure gold.

      He didn't realise it, but he was lambasting Mockton's paper.

      Pure gold.

      Delete
    7. Lars, above:

      "This is how Monckton et al come to a low estimate of ECS:

      "In Fig. 5, a regime of temperature stability is represented
      by g∞ ≤ +0.1, the maximum value allowed by process engineers designing electronic circuits intended not to oscillate under any operating conditions".

      I kid you not: this is really all there is to it."

      Breathtaking!

      That must be an example of the application of 'common sense', that favorite process of the audacious but doddery far-right.

      Delete
    8. DJ, I had much fun putting that post together, and more fun watching the responses come back calling me an idiot or content-free. I am far from understanding as much of the physics as I'd like, but not so clueless as to not recognize many of the standard formulations.

      Delete
  9. There are some strange parallels in the ol' Climate Wars. For example, in an off-the-record e-mail carefully selected from the Climategate haul, Phil Jones said:

    I can't see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow - even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!

    In 2015, Bob Tisdale said:

    I can't see 2014 being the warmest year ever recorded without an El Niño. I'll keep this out of the record books even it I have to redefine what El Niño is!

    (OK, Bob didn't actually say that. But then again, 'Bob Tisdale' isn't actually Bob Tisdale either. Proper attribution can be so difficult sometimes :-))

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Good one.

      (Someone figured that Bob Tisdale's name is Bob Tisdale, which means nought. Some WUWT-ers call him Dr, but he's not. He's just an ordinary run-of-the-mill denier of the slayer kind, albeit one with a fixation on the temperature of the seas.)

      Delete
    2. Another parallel is that in both cases the emotional response was or will be rejected by the scientific community. The articles were mentioned in the IPCC report and El Nino will not be redefined to please Tisdale (but might for other reasons).

      Delete
    3. Call him Wayman.

      Wayman is the master of the "just-so" narrative, accompanied by empty charts.
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-so_story

      Willis is of course very good at the just-so story as well, angling to be the Rudyard Kipling of his generation.

      Skeptics seem to gobble this kind of stuff up.

      Delete
  10. also of interest is this chart Gavin posted on his twitter page
    https://twitter.com/ClimateOfGavin/status/556140695162200064/photo/1

    cabc

    ReplyDelete
  11. Thank you very much for this. As Gavin and ATTP pointed out to me yesterday, the pseudoskeptics (especially WUWT) will always find something to confuse the issue. However I think that a lot of pseudoskeptic spin could have been avoided if NASA and NOAA had used the wording that you and David came up with in all of their most accessible public-facing material. The sotc briefing is not easy to find - in fact I couldn't find it until you provided the link. Hind sight is always 20/20...

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  12. When learning how to designing amplifiers back in 1970. I was taught that too much gain led to instability. This phenomena is well understood in any field when the something or other thingy went into complex number space especially if it was reiterative. This is now known as chaos theory. Lorenz had a bit to say about this
    In the past electronic engineers would use just these parameters to stop an amplifier from turning into an oscillator.
    These morons are rediscovering science at a glacial pace. They have clutched at the straw of climate stability and invoked a mythical gain to prove that TCR is about 1C. All the glaciers will have melted before they catch up. Bert

    ReplyDelete
  13. A few years ago, Tisdale was fixated on that NE Pacific area because it was anomalously cool and it 'confirmed' whatever twaddle he was pushing at the time.

    From your summary, he's as delusional and self-important as ever, and rooter's observation has pantsed him utterly. So expect a quantum increase in ponderous nonsense. How blessed we all are to have Bob.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. "A few years ago, Tisdale was fixated on that NE Pacific area because it was anomalously cool and it 'confirmed' whatever twaddle he was pushing at the time."
      That helps explain it.

      Delete
  14. I haven't read the entire paper but the abstract of he reference quoted in the NOAA report (Arguez et al, 2013) says:

    "The current separation among the warmest observed years is relatively small compared to the standard errors of the NOAATMP time series. However, each year between 1997 and 2012 was warmer than the vast majority of all other years since 1880 at the 95% confidence level"

    ReplyDelete
  15. Trying to redefine 2014 as an El Nino year encounters the problem that the satellite data contradicts this.
    Every other year that has been a record during the 'hiatus'(?) has been an El Nino and MUCH warmer in the satellite lower troposphere (or atmosphere if you are a denier). For instance in the satellite record I think 1998 is still the record because it magnifies the ENSO cycle. especially the warm peaks.

    This year is onlt the 3rd or 4th warmest in the satellite record which is a good indication that whatever sort of 'El Nino' some people may want to claim for this year, it was most unlike any previous El Nino according to the satellite record.

    izen

    ReplyDelete
  16. "If it were not for greenhouse warming, then one part of the ocean could be warm and another part compensatingly cool (simplistically applying the conservation of energy). This is why Bob likes to focus on only one bit of the ocean at a time. He is a greenhouse effect denier after all."

    Bob loves to see the trees and not the forest. He's unique that way. He's also special in his lack of understanding of energy conservation. The two kinda go together as you pointed out.

    ReplyDelete
  17. "Without doing that other exercise (plotting SSTs in all oceans including the north Pacific but excluding the other record hot areas), it is hard to say whether it would have been a record year for sea surface temperatures if the north Pacific hadn't got as hot as it did." said Sou.

    It would have been a record year for SST.
    I'm guessing Bob Drivel Tisdale tried the exercise and didn't like the result so breathed not a word.

    ReplyDelete

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