How the media has warped the debate about AGW

[futurecurrents]

Quote from jem:

.. because I do believe your agw nutters scientists have fudged the data (which they now refuse to produce) and that there were warmer periods cyclically in the past.

Oh yes jem, the scientists have fudged multiple data sets from satellites and thermometers and tree rings from all over the earth. They also fudged multiple data sets looking at the ice, glaciers and CO2 levels from different areas around the world. Plus they managed to all fudge them the same way with the same amplitudes. They all abdicated their personal and professional ethics in a plot to make Al Gore rich and give control of the US to the UN.

 

[futurecurrents]

The British newspaper the Mail on Sunday and its writer David Rose are notorious for publishing misleading (at best) climate-related articles, as we have discussed previously here, for example. They have recently struck again, claiming that according to a "quietly released" Met Office report, global warming stopped 16 years ago (a myth which Skeptical Science debunks here and here). This assertion is entirely fabricated, as the Met Office explained by publishing David Rose's inquiry and the Met Office's responses.


"Firstly, the Met Office has not issued a report on this issue. We can only assume the article is referring to the completion of work to update the HadCRUT4 global temperature dataset compiled by ourselves and the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit.

We announced that this work was going on in March and it was finished this week. You can see the HadCRUT4 website here."


Rose's factually challenged article was predictably reproduced uncritically by the usual climate denial blogs and referenced by Fox News, perhaps in an attempt to distract from this year's record-breaking Arctic sea ice minimum. However, virtually every point made in the article was factually incorrect, as Rose would have known if he were a Skeptical Science reader, because we recently pre-bunked his piece.

Rose Tries to Lead the Witness Down the Up Escalator

Rose attempted to elicit a statement from the Met Office by asking a question which would be described in court as "leading the witness":

"First, please confirm that they do indeed reveal no warming trend since 1997."


The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator can be used to test this question. The trend in the HadCRUT4 global surface temperature dataset since 1997 is 0.084 ± 0.152°C per decade (although we have not yet updated the HadCRUT4 data, the GISS and NCDC datasts show a similar warming trend since 1997). While the trend is not statistically significant, the central value is positive, meaning the average surface temperature has most likely warmed over this period.

The Met Office also explained that Rose is essentially trying to go down the up escalator (Figure 1) by focusing on short-term noise while ignoring the long-term trend.


"Over the last 140 years global surface temperatures have risen by about 0.8ºC. However, within this record there have been several periods lasting a decade or more during which temperatures have risen very slowly or cooled. The current period of reduced warming is not unprecedented and 15 year long periods are not unusual."

 

[PHOENIX TRADING]

Quote from futurecurrents:

The British newspaper the Mail on Sunday and its writer David Rose are notorious for publishing misleading (at best) climate-related articles, as we have discussed previously here, for example. They have recently struck again, claiming that according to a "quietly released" Met Office report, global warming stopped 16 years ago (a myth which Skeptical Science debunks here and here). This assertion is entirely fabricated, as the Met Office explained by publishing David Rose's inquiry and the Met Office's responses.


"Firstly, the Met Office has not issued a report on this issue. We can only assume the article is referring to the completion of work to update the HadCRUT4 global temperature dataset compiled by ourselves and the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit.

We announced that this work was going on in March and it was finished this week. You can see the HadCRUT4 website here."


Rose's factually challenged article was predictably reproduced uncritically by the usual climate denial blogs and referenced by Fox News, perhaps in an attempt to distract from this year's record-breaking Arctic sea ice minimum. However, virtually every point made in the article was factually incorrect, as Rose would have known if he were a Skeptical Science reader, because we recently pre-bunked his piece.

Rose Tries to Lead the Witness Down the Up Escalator

Rose attempted to elicit a statement from the Met Office by asking a question which would be described in court as "leading the witness":

"First, please confirm that they do indeed reveal no warming trend since 1997."


The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator can be used to test this question. The trend in the HadCRUT4 global surface temperature dataset since 1997 is 0.084 ± 0.152°C per decade (although we have not yet updated the HadCRUT4 data, the GISS and NCDC datasts show a similar warming trend since 1997). While the trend is not statistically significant, the central value is positive, meaning the average surface temperature has most likely warmed over this period.

The Met Office also explained that Rose is essentially trying to go down the up escalator (Figure 1) by focusing on short-term noise while ignoring the long-term trend.


"Over the last 140 years global surface temperatures have risen by about 0.8ºC. However, within this record there have been several periods lasting a decade or more during which temperatures have risen very slowly or cooled. The current period of reduced warming is not unprecedented and 15 year long periods are not unusual."

OMG the sky is falling,

 

[futurecurrents]

One of the other pieces of bullshit coming from the moron deniers is that in the 70's the scientist were predicting an ice age. It is pure malarkey and if they an ounce of objectivity about it they would find out that they are mistaken. But they have no interest in facts, only in lies distortion and intentional ignorance of the facts that contradict their ideological dogma.

"By 1980 the predictions about ice ages had ceased, due to the overwhelming evidence contained in an increasing number of reports that warned of global warming. Unfortunately, the small number of predictions of an ice age appeared to be much more interesting than those of global warming, so it was those sensational 'Ice Age' stories in the press that so many people tend to remember.


The fact is that around 1970 there were 6 times as many scientists predicting a warming rather than a cooling planet. Today, with 30+years more data to analyse, we've reached a clear scientific consensus: 97% of working climate scientists agree with the view that human beings are causing global warming.

 

[futurecurrents]

In Four Years, Sunday Shows Have Not Quoted A Single Scientist On Climate Change. Of those who were asked about climate change on the Sunday shows, 54 percent were media figures, 31 percent were politicians and not one was a scientist or climate expert. This is consistent with a previous Media Matters analysis which found that none of the Sunday shows quoted any scientists on climate change between 2009 and 2011. By contrast, two-thirds of those interviewed or quoted on the nightly news programs in 2012 were scientists. [Media Matters, 4/16/12]

Sunday Shows Obscured Scientific Consensus On Climate Change. Not only did the Sunday shows shut out those who accept the science of climate change, but they also failed to inform their audiences that the vast majority of climate scientists agree that climate change is occurring and is driven by human activity. Only 11 percent of coverage implied that scientists agree on global warming, while 44 percent failed to correct a guest who questioned the science. By contrast, 60 percent of nightly news coverage alluded to the scientific consensus.

 

[gwb-trading]

Quote from futurecurrents:

One of the other pieces of bullshit coming from the moron deniers is that in the 70's the scientist were predicting an ice age. It is pure malarkey and if they an ounce of objectivity about it they would find out that they are mistaken. But they have no interest in facts, only in lies distortion and intentional ignorance of the facts that contradict their ideological dogma.

"By 1980 the predictions about ice ages had ceased, due to the overwhelming evidence contained in an increasing number of reports that warned of global warming. Unfortunately, the small number of predictions of an ice age appeared to be much more interesting than those of global warming, so it was those sensational 'Ice Age' stories in the press that so many people tend to remember.


The fact is that around 1970 there were 6 times as many scientists predicting a warming rather than a cooling planet. Today, with 30+years more data to analyse, we've reached a clear scientific consensus: 97% of working climate scientists agree with the view that human beings are causing global warming.

This is pure nonsense. Just limit the dataset to 68 papers and believe it is representative. The link provided by pspr provides links to hundreds of scientific papers and media stories from the 1970s.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/03/01/global-cooling-compilation/

I lived in the 70s. There was not '6 times as many scientists predicting a warming rather than a cooling planet'. This is absolute nonsense...as well as an example of someone re-writing history.

 

[Ricter]

Great discussion. Meanwhile, the world's ice continues to melt.

 

[gwb-trading]

Quote from Ricter:

Great discussion. Meanwhile, the world's ice continues to melt.

Only in the northern hemisphere while ice is increasing in the southern hemisphere. Do you think this simply correlates with short term changes to the axial tilt of the earth.

 

[futurecurrents]

Quote from gwb-trading:

This is pure nonsense. Just limit the dataset to 68 papers and believe it is representative. The link provided by pspr provides links to hundreds of scientific papers and media stories from the 1970s.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/03/01/global-cooling-compilation/

I lived in the 70s. There was not '6 times as many scientists predicting a warming rather than a cooling planet'. This is absolute nonsense...as well as an example of someone re-writing history.

Oh brother, you are dense. Yes there many ARTICLES about it because of media hype, but there were not many SCIENTISTS predicting a cooling.

It's really academic anyway. Climatology is light years ahead of where it was then. We have computers now and much more good data. Plus the logic of saying that because they may have been wrong in the past therefore are wrong now does not pass muster. There is probably some Latin term for it.

 

[pspr]

Quote from gwb-trading:

This is pure nonsense. Just limit the dataset to 68 papers and believe it is representative. The link provided by pspr provides links to hundreds of scientific papers and media stories from the 1970s.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/03/01/global-cooling-compilation/

I lived in the 70s. There was not '6 times as many scientists predicting a warming rather than a cooling planet'. This is absolute nonsense...as well as an example of someone re-writing history.

The study all the AGW nutters rely on is the Peterson study done in 2008 of the 70's scientific papers. There is no easy way to verify Peterson's work as we don't know the methodology or how many cooling papers were missed. But, it is obvious this study comes from an AGW promoter after seeing 10 years of AGW model failure and looking to save the AGW community.

However, the CIA published a report in 1974 that says the major scientists of the day were proponents of global COOLING as it states below.

Despite what NCDC’s Thomas Peterson, Wikiwrangler William Connolley, and John Fleck would like you to believe as a “myth” (The Myth of the 1970s Global Cooling Scientific Consensus), there was in fact serious consideration of the global cooling issue in the 1970’s thanks to this 1974 document from the CIA. – Anthony

The CIA Report and the Warning from Wisconsin

In August, 1974, the Office of Research and Development of the Central Intelligence Agency produced a report entitled “A Study of Climatological Research as it Pertains to Intelligence Problems” – available online at: http://www.climatemonitor.it/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/1974.pdf Some interesting bits of the report follow:

“The western world’s leading climatologists have confirmed recent reports of a detrimental global climate change. The stability of most nations is based upon a dependable source of food, but this stability will not be possible under the new climatic era. A forecast by the University of Wisconsin projects that the earth’s climate is returning to that of the neo-boreal era (1600- 1850) – an era of drought, famine and political unrest in the western world.

Climate has not been a prime consideration of intelligence analysis because, until recently, it has not caused any significant perturbations to the status of major nations. This is so because during 50 of the last 60 years the Earth has, on the average, enjoyed the best agricultural climate since the eleventh century. An early twentieth century world food surplus hindered US efforts to maintain and equalise farm production and incomes.”

“The University of Wisconsin was the first accredited academic center to forecast that a major global climatic change was underway. Their analysis of the Icelandic temperature data, which they contend has historically been a bellwether for northern hemisphere climatic conditions, indicated that the world was returning to the type of climate which prevailed during the first part of the last century.” “Their “Food for Thought” chart (Figure 7) conveys some idea of the enormity of the problem and the precarious state in which most of the world’s nations could find themselves if the Wisconsin forecast is correct.”

Once again futurecurrents is the fool following the lies of the AGW nutters.