Friday 25 September 2009

JUST FOR CHRIS HILL

In the early 1980s, with funding from the U.S. Department of Energy, scientists at the United Kingdom’s University of East Anglia established the Climate Research Unit (CRU) to produce the world’s first comprehensive history of surface temperature. It’s known in the trade as the “Jones and Wigley” record for its authors, Phil Jones and Tom Wigley, and it served as the primary reference standard for the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) until 2007. It was this record that prompted the IPCC to claim a “discernible human influence on global climate.”

Putting together such a record isn’t at all easy. Weather stations weren’t really designed to monitor global climate. Long-standing ones were usually established at points of commerce, which tend to grow into cities that induce spurious warming trends in their records. Trees grow up around thermometers and lower the afternoon temperature. Further, as documented by the University of Colorado’s Roger Pielke Sr., many of the stations themselves are placed in locations, such as in parking lots or near heat vents, where artificially high temperatures are bound to be recorded.

So the weather data that go into the historical climate records that are required to verify models of global warming aren’t the original records at all. Jones and Wigley, however, weren’t specific about what was done to which station in order to produce their record, which, according to the IPCC, showed a warming of 0.6° +/– 0.2°C in the 20th century.

Now begins the fun. Warwick Hughes, an Australian scientist, wondered where that “+/–” came from, so he politely wrote Phil Jones in early 2005, asking for the original data. Jones’s response to a fellow scientist attempting to replicate his work was, “We have 25 years or so invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it?”

Reread that statement, for it is breathtaking in its anti-scientific thrust. In fact, the entire purpose of replication is to “try and find something wrong.” The ultimate objective of science is to do things so well that, indeed, nothing is wrong.

Read it all:

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZTBiMTRlMDQxNzEyMmRhZjU3ZmYzODI5MGY4ZWI5OWM=&w=MA==

10 comments:

Dr Chris Hill said...

Hi Morg,

Great thanks for the info (that I've been asking for for the last week), now I can check out the source and try to get to the bottom of this story.

I agree that refusing to provide any scientific data, simply because you suspect the request comes from someone who is critical of your work, seems unjustified (to say the least). But I'll hold off on giving an opinion in this particle case until I've read both sides of the issue (which is only fair I think you'll agree).

Keep well.
From
Chris Hill
(Lancaster)

Dr Chris Hill said...

Hi again Morg,

Just a quick first comment about the website and article you link to.

1.
This site appears at first glance to have all the credibility of the National enquirer.

2.
Taken from the article itself:
"McIntyre was told that he couldn’t have the data because he wasn’t an “academic.” So his colleague Ross McKitrick, an economist at the University of Guelph, asked for the data. He was turned down, too."

So it turns out that he wasn't turned down because he was critical of their findings. He and an friend (who is an economist not a scientist)were turned down because they are not part of the scientific community.

But I'll continue to look into this and let you know (hopefully by Monday next) what I find. Believe me I'll try not to prejudge the issue.

Chris Hill
(Lancaster)

Sir Henry Morgan said...

I actually gave you a couple of other cases too - Michael Mann's "Hockey stick" graph for instance - he refuses to hand over vital data for other people to check. I've given relevant links on that last thread we were arguing on.

But as you might have noticed, I really can't be bothered even talking about this really - certainly can't be bothered arguing about it - until the breeding problem is sorted. Until then it's utterly pointless.

Dr Chris Hill said...

Hi Morg,

You're trying to dissociate over population and climate change, but in-doing so you're missing the very point: the second (at least in part) is a direct result of the first. Solving the massive over population problem is, I agree, the only long term solution to many of our planets problem. Unfortunately any such permanent solution will take many decades (or more likely Centuries) to have any real affect on our numbers, but the catastrophic effects of Global Warming may well start manifesting themselves within a few tens of years. We need to introduce temporary measures (temporary meaning 75+ years) until then.

Nit-picking individual pieces of research (that may or may not be compromised) does not invalidate the 99.9% of reliable scientific work undertaken by climatologist, and other related scientific disciplines, that taken together show Global Warming to be an undisputable (at least by rational people) fact.

So to sum up: "I think we agree that human over population is the greatest threat the planet has seen in the last 10,000 years, we just disagree on the short and medium term actions needed to solve some of the problems caused by that overpopulation." What disturbs me is that you seem to be in denial about the need for those short and medium term solutions. Long term we agree that human numbers need to be reduced, I say to 1-2 billion (early 20th Centaury levels) you say 50 million (Iron age levels), but reducing them even to my proposed figure is a massive challenge that will take at least three generations. To reduce the number to 50 million is at least a 175 year process ((6.7x10^9)(0.5^( 175/25)) even if we stared today. I'm afraid you can't deny the fact that short and medium term solutions are needed.

Keep well
Chris Hill
(Lancaster)

Dr Chris Hill said...

PS.

Give a 3 generation overlap, a world population of 50 million would require each generation to be only 17 million (at a steady population state ie. two children per couple) so that's more like 200 years than 175.

Freeborn John said...

In the mid 70s there was a major study done on climate in the UK as part of a survey on "acid rain", which at the time was the fashionable bogey man that "global warming" is today.
Local councils all over Britain were required to maintain weather stations to monitor rainfall, temperatures, wind conditions, particulates and Sulphur Dioxide levels, with the results sent off each day to be collated by an agency called Warren Springs Laboratories, and woe betide the council if this wasn't done.
I had just started work at a certain local council at the time and this job fell to me, being as green as grass I rushed all over the borough until the day I bumped into the guy who had done the job before me and asked him for some tips...
"Make it all up" he said "I always did, and so did the lad before me. I just looked out of the office window and guessed the rest." The job was a lot easier after that.
I've never trusted official government figures ever since...

Sir Henry Morgan said...

Chris

"...disociate ..."

Don't use psychobabble on me - I know far more about it than you, having spent four years of my life at two different universities qualifying myself to postgrad level.

As far as I'm concerned, this conversation is over. Get back to me when the human races start addressing the numbers problem - it is, after all, the basis of every other problem we possess. Sort the numbers and virtually all other problems will just disappear.

Dr Chris Hill said...

Hi Morg,

You said;
"Don't use psychobabble on me"

I say:
I had to look the word "psychobabble" up, so I really don't think you can accuse me of deliberately trying to use psychology to muddy this thread.

As for my posting itself I was only trying to put the problem of Global Warming in perspective, and to agree with you the most likely cause: ie human overpopulation.

Anyway when I've looked over those links I'll post again with my thoughts on the subject.

Keep well.
Chris Hill
(Lancaster)

Dr Chris Hill said...

Dear Freeborn John (09:01),

I too remember the acid rain threat in the 1970's: lakes devoid of fish; trees stripped of leaves etc. But the encouraging thing about it is that we were able to find a solution, and avoid an environmental disaster. Industrial emissions of sulfur were drastically reduced, and the problem solved. The lakes and forests of Scandinavia and central Europe (the areas most affected) have now, I believe, recovered. As a species we took action to remove the (man-made) pollution and thereby avoided permanent environmental damage.

As a species the human races are very destructive, but we are also very resourceful. This should provided encouragement for us in our current attempts to correct the climate changes produced by mankind's collective madness.

Keep well
Chris Hill
(Lancaster)

Dr Chris Hill said...

Hi Morg,

I'm sorry but I've had some major computer problems over the weekend (I'm sending this from my old laptop) so I've been unable to do the work on those links you give me. But I should be back up and running by Tuesday, so hopefully I'll be able to give you a response by the weekend.

Chris Hill

yaz