Mike sent me his own plotting of the data from his post numbered 1813, including a cubic fit.

Mike's Version


Mine

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

Could you generate a number for each of the 133 stations showing whether temperature rose or fell from 1998 to present? Use whatever method seems appropriate for judging the slope of the temperature over that time period. This would allow us to judge just how many stations Justin's hypothesis holds up on, how strongly, and where they are located. If you could include longitude and latitude of each station in the sorted data as well, this would be good. If you could provide an estimate of statistical significance, such as we can divide the stations between those showing significant warming, significant cooling and those unclear in the middle, this might be good.

Here's what I did. I started with the whole dataset of Justin's stations. I subtracted the 1998 temperature from the 2008 temperature for all months for all stations that had data in both years. This was 107 stations. I ended up with an array of 108 rows and 14 columns (one row is headers, and two columns are used for station number and lattitude) and sent it to you as a text file.

Here are the average values and standard error of the mean for the 107 stations for each month. Nine months were warmer on average in 2008 than 1998, eight of these look significant. Three were cooler, one of which (July) looks significant.

The region represented by these 107 stations was warmer in 2008 than in 1998 for most of the year with the exception of mid-summer.

Jan 1.27 ± 0.29
Feb 1.99 ± 0.31
Mar 3.76 ± 0.39
Apr 0.51 ± 0.21
May 3.02 ± 0.18
June 0.99 ± 0.22
Jul -1.12 ± 0.09
Aug -0.57 ± 0.34
Sept 1.97 ± 0.2
Oct 4.81 ± 0.3
Nov 6.44 ± 0.54
Dec -0.32 ± 0.42

The grand average of all 1284 values was +1.89 with standard error of the mean of 0.11.

Justin's hypothesis is rejected.

Where did this idea of recent warming in Siberia come from? It certainly did not come directly from the data in the database Justin flagged.

Is it because some of the individual values showed temperature declines? Of the 1284 values, 437 showed declines and 847 showed increases. So yeah, one can cherry pick hundreds of specific examples showing cooling over the 1998 to 2008 period.

For example, Station 25594 (Бухта Провидения) Lat 64° 25º Long 186° 46º shows eight months with lower 2008 temp than 1998 temp and a lower annual average in 2008 than in 1998.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

Where did this idea of recent warming in Siberia come from? It certainly did not come directly from the data in the database Justin flagged.

Good question. I asked a similar question a while ago and got no response. Justin???

If one googles phrases like global warming siberia meteo you can find skeptic and denialist blogs and forums with claims similar to Justin's. I haven't found any articles that look rigorous, but I haven't looked all that hard.

The NY Times did an article on the Arctic Oscillation, Polar Pressure, Snowstorms and Sea Ice. Nothing profound, but as it touches on our recent Siberian discussion, I thought I'd link it in.

A little video lecture for the resident denialists. I note that the Cosmic Rays theory is shown to be utter BS.

Originally Posted by Odin

A little video lecture for the resident denialists. I note that the Cosmic Rays theory is shown to be utter BS.

Hmm.... Last I heard Cosmic Rays weren't utter BS. The time scale is just so absurdly slow as to make the Milankovitch Cycles seem like short term noise. Of course, thinking such extreme long term effects relevant to the last few century's anomalies would be utter BS.

But you should address such things to the skeptics, not the denialists. The skeptics would look at the evidence, weigh it rationally, and present counter arguments. The denialists will just mutter about conspiracy theories and come up with reasons to dismiss evidence. You shouldn't bother with the denialists.

The Times of India reports Climate change far worse than thought before

The IPCC isn't due to put out another formal state of the globe report until 2013, but the last report had an envelope of best case and worse case scenarios.

Reality is turning out to be worse than the worse case...

While the scientific community is plotting the warming trend as getting worse, the skeptics... Well. We've had a lot of cold and snow in Asia, Europe, and North America. It follows, of course, that the global warming hypothesis has been disproved?

Well... Except I thought that pattern of cold, snow and storms in those locations was awfully familiar. A few minutes of Googling reveals that the arctic oscillation went into a very strong cold phase in early December.

The good news? The more strongly negative the AO stays, the better for the melting arctic ice cap and the polar bears. The bad news? Commuting is going to be a mess.

There's a difference between skepticism towards minutiae of the climate science behind the current global warming models, and skepticism toward the more general idea that pumping a whole lot of CO2 into the atmosphere will cause/is causing global warming. For that more general idea to be wrong, it would take more than minor errors in construction of models. It would require that the laws of physics as we understand them cease to function. The physics behind the greenhouse effect is so well-established that any skepticism toward the general idea of AGW is simply credulous, believe-because-one-wants-it-so nonsense. And that's why I'm uninterested in taking the time and effort to discuss things like Justin's cherry-picked temperature readings. There is no point in arguing against nonsense; if he were being rational he wouldn't believe silliness like that to start with, and so he isn't going to respond well to rational argument. So why bother?

However, where some caution is advised is in the projections of exactly how much warming will result from how much increase in CO2, and what will happen as a consequence. This in turn means that we should be cautious about what climate scientists tell us we need to do in order to resolve the problem. When the IPCC says that if we peak greenhouse emissions by 2015 and begin lowering them by 2020 we will cap the temperature increase at under 2 degrees celsius -- that's where one must be skeptical. They don't necessarily know that. But the thing is, they could just as easily be wrong in one direction as the other.

What that means to me is that we need to err on the side of caution. We need to do more than tighten our energy belts. We need to transition entirely (or nearly so) away from a fossil-fuel energy economy, so that it no longer is true that the amount of greenhouse gases we add to the atmosphere is a function of the amount of energy we use. In doing that, we can cut greenhouse emissions radically, almost to zero. And if that turns out to be more than we need to do, what of it? Better that, than doing to little.

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

However, where some caution is advised is in the projections of exactly how much warming will result from how much increase in CO2, and what will happen as a consequence.

I was trained as a chemist and not a climatologist. From a chemist's point of view, what worries me is what happens as ice water melts:

If one examines a simple system, such as an ordinary tumbler of ice cubes and water, and if we suppose that the surrounding temp is such that the ice begins to melt, it's important to note that nothing much happens to the temp of the tumbler of ice water. It stays pretty much in the neighborhood of the freezing point of water. However, once the ice is all melted, the temp can now increase very rapidly since new calories coming into the system can now be devoted to increasing the temp, and not to just melting ice any more.

So, let's say that the Arctic ice cap all melts in some summer in the near future. At that point heat flowing into the Arctic Sea will simply increase the temp of the sea instead of melting a bit of ice while the overall temp stays more or less the same. I think this is the aspect of the global warming death spiral that concerns me most.

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

The physics behind the greenhouse effect is so well-established that any skepticism toward the general idea of AGW is simply credulous, believe-because-one-wants-it-so nonsense. And that's why I'm uninterested in taking the time and effort to discuss things like Justin's cherry-picked temperature readings. There is no point in arguing against nonsense; if he were being rational he wouldn't believe silliness like that to start with, and so he isn't going to respond well to rational argument. So why bother?

Prudent of you not to join in. Thing is, I've seen all together too much values driven conversation going nowhere. If someone insists Vietnam wasn't a civil war, how can one make reason apply? JDG has his cold war dominated perspective on Vietnam, and is unwilling or unable to consider that it was a complex situation involving multiple aspects. JPT has his anti-communist view of US History, where the noble pro business elites have been fighting evil marxists since long before Marx. People are quite capable of building internally consistent ways of looking at the world, and not being willing to budge off them.

Global warming at least should be a field where there is data to resolve the basic questions. I came here for a bit of vacation. I was getting a bit tired of red menace values.

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

However, where some caution is advised is in the projections of exactly how much warming will result from how much increase in CO2, and what will happen as a consequence. This in turn means that we should be cautious about what climate scientists tell us we need to do in order to resolve the problem. When the IPCC says that if we peak greenhouse emissions by 2015 and begin lowering them by 2020 we will cap the temperature increase at under 2 degrees celsius -- that's where one must be skeptical. They don't necessarily know that. But the thing is, they could just as easily be wrong in one direction as the other.

What that means to me is that we need to err on the side of caution. We need to do more than tighten our energy belts. We need to transition entirely (or nearly so) away from a fossil-fuel energy economy, so that it no longer is true that the amount of greenhouse gases we add to the atmosphere is a function of the amount of energy we use. In doing that, we can cut greenhouse emissions radically, almost to zero. And if that turns out to be more than we need to do, what of it? Better that, than doing to little.

Thing is, we're not erring on the side of caution. Sorry. Have to repeat the 'time to panic' spiel.

The scientists gave a target that should be striven for to avoid disaster. The politicians thought the target unachievable. They decided on the 2 degree number as the best that might possibly happen. Of course, after Copenhagen, it is becoming clearer that the 2 degree target isn't going to be hit.

Problem is, there is good reason to take the 2 degree number very seriously. Two degrees warmer has historically left the planet with no ice to speak of on either pole. Once Antarctica goes, history suggests a 4 degree C rise follows. That large a temperature swing generally results in mass extinctions...

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

There's a difference between skepticism towards minutiae of the climate science behind the current global warming models, and skepticism toward the more general idea that pumping a whole lot of CO2 into the atmosphere will cause/is causing global warming. For that more general idea to be wrong, it would take more than minor errors in construction of models. It would require that the laws of physics as we understand them cease to function. The physics behind the greenhouse effect is so well-established that any skepticism toward the general idea of AGW is simply credulous, believe-because-one-wants-it-so nonsense.

This is not strictly correct. No serious skeptic denies the effect of CO2 and other greenhouse gases on climate. The question is sensitivity of the climate to CO2 forcings. If other factors are unknowingly contributing to observed temperature rise, then the sensitivity of the climate to CO2 may be less than is currently believed.

In fact, it is generally accepted by climate scientists that the early 20th century rise was not primarily caused by the greenhouse effect--other factors were producing the warming. It is also generally accepted that in the mid-century, the warming expected based on the known greenhouse mechanism was masked by another (cooling) effect that overwhelmed it, resulting in an overall temperature decline.

The previous examples of temperature trends not consistent with the known forcings provided by greenhouse effect imply that recent (rising)temperature trends could conceivably reflect other factors that have not been properly taken into account, reducing climate sensitivity to the greenhouse effect alone. For example, the population of the Earth has nearly doubled from its level in the mid-1970's. If changes in land use patterns have a larger than expected impact on temperature, then more of the temperature rise since then would reflect this mechanism as opposed to the greenhouse effect.

The reason for ignoring the skeptics isn't because the science behind the current view of global warming is 100% unassailable. It is because the science promoted by almost all skeptics is either laughably bad or outright dishonest. Case in point. Justin makes a claim that Siberian temperatures show recent cooling and points to a database evidence. Yet this same database says the exact opposite of what Justin claims it says.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

This is not strictly correct. No serious skeptic denies the effect of CO2 and other greenhouse gases on climate. The question is sensitivity of the climate to CO2 forcings. . . . The reason for ignoring the skeptics . . . is because the science promoted by almost all skeptics is either laughably bad or outright dishonest.

Emphasis added. If the science of the skeptics is "laughably bad or outright dishonest," on what grounds can they be called "serious" skeptics? Which is pretty much my point.

The basic science behind global warming is 100% (well, 99.99%) unassailable (no science is ever really 100%). The details are another question, though.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

In fact, it is generally accepted by climate scientists that the early 20th century rise was not primarily caused by the greenhouse effect--other factors were producing the warming. It is also generally accepted that in the mid-century, the warming expected based on the known greenhouse mechanism was masked by another (cooling) effect that overwhelmed it, resulting in an overall temperature decline.

The theory I've heard on the mid 20th Century cooling factor is global dimming. Fossil fuels were being burnt in a soot causing way. If the burns are dirty enough, the sulphate cooling effect of a factory can more than offset the greenhouse warming...

Have you heard other theories?

The New York Times did yet another Arctic Oscillation story, Cold Arctic Pressure Pattern Nearly Off Chart. Nothing really much new here, but with the skeptics politicizing the weather, someone seems to want the mechanism behind it understood.

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

Emphasis added. If the science of the skeptics is "laughably bad or outright dishonest," on what grounds can they be called "serious" skeptics?

I said almost all. This particular skeptic has sound science, for example.

The basic science behind global warming is 100% (well, 99.99%) unassailable (no science is ever really 100%).

Yes, and I said no serious skeptic questions this science of the greenhouse effect.

The details are another question, though.

And one of those details is to what extent will the greenhouse effect, as transmitted though the complex climate system, affect global temperatures.

The record of temperature and increasing greenhouse forcing are facts. The "law of physics" fact about the greenhouse effect is the known forcing produced by a column of cloudless atmosphere containing greenhouse gases. Skeptics who try to deny these facts are part of the large number of unserious skeptics. That there are so very many of them is what makes climate skepticism smack of crank science.

But those on the other side can occasionally point to one of a handful of skeptics who are not cranks. Since a serious skeptic accepts the greenhouse effect, he accepts that the greenhouse effect since 1970 has shifted the radiative balance to add at least 0.25 C of warming at equilibrium (and will add at least another 0.5 C over the rest of this century). If he doesn't, then he is not serious.

This is as far as the "law of physics" aspect of the greenhouse effect can carry you. Consensus climate science holds that most of the rest of the post-1970 warming also reflects the greenhouse effect. That is, that the sensitivity of the climate to greenhouse forcings is much higher than serious skeptics maintain. This means that the amount of greenhouse-produced temperature rise already in the system since 1970 could be 0.8 C as of now, with another ~1.6 C added on top of that by the end of the century, for a total temperature rise of 2.5-3 C since the beginning of industrialization.

Given the fact of warming, for the sensitivity to be as low as serious skeptics argue, there must be other forcing(s) whose net effect is of comparable or greater size as the known greenhouse forcing. And this forcing cannot be solar or cosmic ray-related because solar and cosmic ray intensity have not changed significantly in half a century.

It is the absence of evidence for this alternate forcing, and the papering over of this absence by all skeptics, that causes the vast majority of observers who understand the science such as the climate science community (or me for that matter), to be very skeptical of what the handful of serious skeptics are saying.

That said, it is still inappropriate to characterize the research of practicing physicists as contrary to the laws of physics.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

I said almost all. This particular skeptic has sound science, for example.

"As I try to demonstrate below, the truth is probably somewhere in between, with natural causes probably being more important over the past century, whereas anthropogenic causes will probably be more dominant over the next century."

He's not really a skeptic.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

The theory I've heard on the mid 20th Century cooling factor is global dimming. Fossil fuels were being burnt in a soot causing way. If the burns are dirty enough, the sulphate cooling effect of a factory can more than offset the greenhouse warming...

Have you heard other theories?

That is the factor I was thinking of. What it shows is how another factor can overwhelm the greenhouse signal. Consider, over the 1940-1979 period, a period when the 11-year smoothed HADcrut3 series went from -0.24 to -0.24 C (i.e. unchanged) CO2 rose by 9%. Since 1979 Co2 rose another 15%. Since the forcing is proportional to the log of the relative increase in CO2, the temperature impact the greenhouse effect over the 1940-1979 period was about 3/5's the impact of the greenhouse effect since 1979. That effect of completely obliterated by the aerosol effect.

The greenhouse effect from 1900 to 1940 (when temperature rose 0.35 C) is only 47% of that from 1940-1979 (when temperature did not rise at all). Put another way, the greenhouse effect was 230% greater over the 1979-present period as it was over the 1900-1940 period, yet temperature rise over the recent period was only 25% greater.

These facts show the operation of other factors. One set, operative over 1900-1940, produced extra warming over what was produced by the fact of the greenhouse effect, the other, operative over 1940-1979 produced cooling that offset the fact of greenhouse warming over than period.

Since you have shown an interest in this topic, I encourage you to check out my webpage on global warming that I wrote in order to understand for myself the science of global warming. As the saying goes, one often only learns a subject when one tries to teach it.

http://my.net-link.net/~malexan/Climate-Model.htm

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

"As I try to demonstrate below, the truth is probably somewhere in between, with natural causes probably being more important over the past century, whereas anthropogenic causes will probably be more dominant over the next century."

He's not really a skeptic.

Well he thinks concern over global warming is way overblown. His view is about 1.2 C of warming from rising CO2 levels from 1900 through 2100. Total temperature rise since 1900 is already 0.8 C, of which he believes at least half is due to solar effects, which could easily be reversed between now and 2100. That is, he believes the temperature in 2100 could be as little as 0.4 C warmer than now, which nobody thinks is going to have catastrophic consequences. Wouldn't you call this view that of a skeptic?

Remember all serious skeptics must accept the greenhouse effect (in terms of forcings) as fact. And since greenhouse gases will rise, warming will necessarily result from the accumulation of those gases. If solar activity is to decline over the next 90 years (as is not unlikely) then any warming seen will be entirely due greenhouse effects.

That you see his positions as not that of a skeptic (when he most definitely is, check out Real Climate) shows just how much of the broader skeptic community is "Captain Koo Koo Pants", as Detective Vera in Cold Case would put it

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

The New York Times did yet another Arctic Oscillation story, Cold Arctic Pressure Pattern Nearly Off Chart. Nothing really much new here, but with the skeptics politicizing the weather, someone seems to want the mechanism behind it understood.

I was wondering why Fargo got hit by a big finger-shaped wedge of -30F air comming up the Red River Valley over New Years...

Perhaps because it's...

Fargo?

I've enjoyed reading others input here, but I'm not fluent enough in this technology to do more than tsk-tsk or nod in agreement. I did find an interesting ebook on the general subject, that covered more territory than I wanted to explore. I spent most of my time reading about the development of models, and how they have slowly converged. To skeptics like Justin, models are reason to be skeptical. I came to the opposite conclusion.

In any case, a good read.

Originally Posted by antichrist

Perhaps because it's...

Fargo?

It usually doesn't get THAT cold.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

I've enjoyed reading others input here, but I'm not fluent enough in this technology to do more than tsk-tsk or nod in agreement. I did find an interesting ebook on the general subject, that covered more territory than I wanted to explore. I spent most of my time reading about the development of models, and how they have slowly converged. To skeptics like Justin, models are reason to be skeptical. I came to the opposite conclusion.

In any case, a good read.

That's a great source. I used it extensively when I was learning about how global warming works.

There was a bad dry stretch the last few years in Texas that seems to be breaking. For once nobody seems to be blaming global warming, but the Pacific Oscillation gets a strong mention. For discussion purposes...

Originally Posted by NY Times

“In the 1950s, they were always able to get the crop up and growing — the yields weren’t good — whereas in ’09, we couldn’t get it growing at all,” he said.

State officials say the period from September 2008 to September 2009 was the driest on record in the state.

Mr. Nielson-Gammon said the drought owed much to the two winters in which surface water temperatures along the equator in the Pacific Ocean were above normal, a phenomenon known as El Niño. In addition, the tropical storms that raked the Texas coast in 2008 dropped almost no rain inland.

But this winter the Pacific cooled off, producing the pattern known as La Niña, which generally brings wet weather to Texas, he said. The central region around Austin and San Antonio received 8 to 12 inches more rain than normal from August to October. Farther south, around Corpus Christi, a wave of storms in November and December dropped up to 10 inches more rain than usual, he said.

Thing is, the article seems to have got the El Nino facts wrong. We have been under an El Nina the last few years, which is a dry time for Texas. Only recently are we switching to an El Nino pattern, which tends to be wet in Texas.

The Arctic Oscillation might also be in play. The last few weeks have had the AO in a very strong cold cycle, pushing storms well south.

A while ago, during the Climategate flap, I made a few crude attempts to subtract known factors effecting Siberian and global temperatures. What would the temperature charts look like if volcanic activity or the El Nino Sourthern Oscilation weren't present?

I found an article, Exogenous Factors, where some pros with better tools than I had tried the same thing. Without volcanoes and El Nino one gets...