Quote from jem:
When you post maps like that - to be taken seriously you should post the appropriate disclaimers. I clicked on it and immediately saw that the map was only comparing it to 1950 to 1980. (the were speculating about the coming ice age during the 70s.)
There are no disclaimers. There is a
fact that the change is relative to 1950-1980 baseline. This is clearly shown on the image. What is your problem with that?
The assertion that there was a consensus amongst scientists in the 1970s that the world was cooling is not true, regardless of newspaper articles. Even back then the major concern was about warming driven by CO2.
Next question is - how was the data collected and smoothed.
The current temperature readings come mostly via the World Meteorological Organization from the National Meteorological Services of countries around the world. Climate researchers do not choose the stations to use - they use what is provided by each individual country. Historical data is compiled from every available source. It is available to anybody free from the Global Historical climatology Network.
All the nonsense about stations being dropped from the record is due to the fact that many historical sources are no longer are being updated.
A account of how the GHCN database is maintained is found here
http://www.babytrollblog.com/archives/images/ghcn_temp_overview.pdf
How NASA GISS process the data (to correct for issues such as urban heat island) is described here:
http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2001/2001_Hansen_etal.pdf
The details of data processing have been publicly available for years.
The crooked scientists running the show have made all thinking persons suspicious of all this data.
No allegations have been substantiated and none are likely to be.
Now you get in to Environmental Impact Reports and political corruption in just about every level of the system... I saw.
No doubt corruption occurs, but that doesn't mean that the environmental issues are not real and of pressing urgency.
