Re: May was 11th warmest on the 129-year NASA global data record.
0ZNB0
"Lloyd" <lpa...@emory.edu> wrote in message
news:97c6ea08-9925-4190...@m45g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
> On Jun 9, 2:21 pm, "tvor" <n...@chance.com> wrote:
>> "Roger Coppock" <rcopp...@adnc.com> wrote in message
>>
>> news:9e2cbb82-d7a2-4da2...@r37g2000prm.googlegroups.com...
>>
>> > May was 11th warmest on the 129-year NASA global data record.
>>
>> > Even though May of this year is 11th warmest, it still is
>> > above the 129-year trend line. In the long term therefore,
>> > global mean surface temperatures continue an accelerated rise.
>>
>> Arctic temps accounts for the majority of the increase of the
>> 'average'
>> global temperature. Dirty snow causes up to 94% of the observed
>> arctic
>> temperature changes. Soot is the problem, not CO2.
>
> The rest of the world is warming too. It's mostly CO2.
ROTFLMAO
Can We Really Trust NASA's Temperature Data
Steven Goddard
5th June 2008
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/06/05/goddard_nasa_thermometer/print.html
QUOTE: The discrepancies between NASA and other data sources can't help
but make us consider Einstein's advice: "If the facts don't fit the
theory, change the facts."
Painting by numbers: NASA's peculiar thermometer
The story is that the world is heating up - fast. Prominent people at
NASA warn us that unless we change our carbon producing ways,
civilisation as we know it will come to an end. At the same time, there
are new scientific studies showing that the earth is in a 20 year long
cooling period. Which view is correct? Temperature data should be simple
enough to record and analyze. We all know how to read a thermometer - it
is not rocket science.
Previously
(http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/05/02/a_tale_of_two_thermometers/) we
looked at how US temperature data sets have been adjusted - with more
recent versions of historical data sets showing a steeper rise in
temperature than they used to. Here, we'll be looking at current NASA
data and why their temperature maps appear hot-red, even when others are
cool-blue.
To recap the earlier article, the graph below shows additional
adjustments to the data set
(http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/US_USHCN.2005vs1999.txt) since
the big "correction" in 2000.
We observe that the data has been consistently adjusted towards a bias
of greater warming. The years prior to the 1970s have again been
adjusted to lower temperatures, and recent years have been adjusted
towards higher temperatures.
NASA's published data is largely based on data from the US Historical
Climatology Network (USHCN), which derives its data from thermometer
readings across the country. According to USHCN
(http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ushcn/ushcn.html#QUAL)
literature, the raw temperature data is adjusted to compensate for
geographical movements in the weather stations, changes in the 24-hour
start/end times when the readings are taken, and other factors. USHCN is
directly affiliated with the Oak Ridge National Laboratories' Carbon
Dioxide Information Analysis Center (http://cdiac.ornl.gov/), an
organisation which exists primarily to promote the idea of a link
between CO2 and climate.
The map
(http://www.climateaudit.org/wp-content/uploads/2007/06/usgrid79.gif)
below shows what the raw unadjusted USHCN temperature trends for the US
in the 20th century looked like.
20th century temperature trends - USHCN raw data (lots of blue)
Prior to any adjustments, more than half the US shows declining
temperatures over the 20th century - blue and green colors - i.e. the US
is cooling down. However, subsequent to the adjustments the country goes
dominantly warmer (red and yellow) - as seen in the image below
(http://www.climateaudit.org/wp-content/uploads/2007/06/usgrid81.gif).
20th Century temperature trends - USHCN raw data (lots of red)
Below is a video showing the USHCN adjustments in action.
Divergence
So how does NASA's data compare with other temperature sources? As we
explained in our earlier article, NASA data is derived from a grid of
ground-based thermometers. During the last thirty years, we also have
the benefit of more sophisticated technology - satellites which can
indirectly record temperatures across most of the planet. The satellite
data is from Remote Sensing Systems
(http://www.remss.com/pub/msu/monthly_time_series/RSS_Monthly_MSU_AMSU_Channel_TLT_Anomalies_Land_and_Ocean_v03_1.txt)
(RSS) and the University of Alabama at Huntsville
(http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/t2lt/uahncdc.lt) (UAH).
In 1998 (left side of the graph below) NASA and the satellite data
sources RSS and UAH all agreed quite closely - within one-tenth of a
degree. Ten years later - in March 2008 - NASA is reporting temperature
anomalies more than 0.5 degrees warmer than UAH. The divergence between
NASA and UAH has increased at a rate of 0.13 degrees per decade (red
lines below.) In contrast, RSS has converged with UAH over the period
and is now within 0.02 degrees (blue lines below.)
Differences between reported temperature anomalies, NASA, RSS and UAH -
with UAH as the baseline.
Lost Continents
The divergence is now quite striking. Looking closer at March 2008,
NASA's data
(http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt) shows the
month as the third warmest on record. In sharp contrast, UAH and RSS
satellite data showed March as the second coldest on record in the
southern hemisphere, and just barely above average for the whole planet.
How could such a large discrepancy occur?
Viewing the NASA 250-mile map for March below, what immediately grabs
the attention is that NASA has essentially no data (gray areas) in most
of Canada, most of Africa, the Greenland ice sheet, and most of
Antarctica. This begs the question, how can one calculate an accurate
"global temperature" while lacking any data from large contiguous
regions of three continents?
So what was NASA missing?
NASA Temperatures March, 2008 - 250-mile smoothing radius - looks hot
We can find NASA's lost continents in the UAH satellite data for March
below.
UAH Satellite Temperatures March, 2008 - looks cool
Not surprisingly, the missing areas in Canada and Africa were cold. The
NASA data thus becomes disproportionately weighted towards warm areas -
particularly in the northern hemisphere. As can be seen in the UAH
satellite map above, the warm areas actually made up a relatively small
percentage of the planet. The vast majority of the earth had normal
temperatures or below. Given that NASA has lost track of a number of
large cold regions, it is understandable that their averages are on the
high side.
Additionally, NASA reports their global temperature measurements within
one one-hundredth of a degree. This is a classic mathematics error,
since they have no data from 20 per cent of the earth's land area. The
reported precision is much greater than the error bar - a mistake which
has caused many a high school student to fail their exams.
Cherry picking
A second important issue with NASA's presentation is that they use the
time period of 1951-1980 as their choice of baseline. This was a well
known cold spell, as can be seen in the 1999 version
(http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/hansen_07/fig1x.gif) of the
NASA US temperature graph below.
NASA US Temperature Map August, 1999. Note the cooling trend since 1930,
and particularly between 1951 and 1980.
Temperatures dropped enough during that period to trigger concern about
the onset of an ice age
(http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,944914,00.html).
Newsweek magazine went so far as to mention a proposed "solution" of
spreading soot (http://www.denisdutton.com/cooling_world.htm) in the
Arctic to melt the polar ice caps. 1978 was the coldest winter on record
(http://www.sws.uiuc.edu/atmos/statecli/Winter/coldhard.htm) in much of
North America. By using a cold baseline, all recent temperatures become
relatively warm - which causes the NASA maps to be covered with lots of
hot red and brown colors. From looking at the NASA map above, one could
easily believe that that the earth is having a meltdown. By contrast,
the UAH map makes most of the earth look quite cool.
When we look at the temperature data for Alaska, the disparity is again
quite striking.
The NASA temperature map for March above shows Alaska temperatures much
above "normal", while the UAH map shows Alaska temperatures well below
"normal". This is partially due to the fact that the 1951-1980 NASA
baseline period was unusually cold in Alaska - due to the cold phase of
a dominant ocean cycle, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation
(http://www.atmos.washington.edu/~mantua/REPORTS/PDO/PDO_egec.htm)
(PDO), as shown below. The graph below indicates variations in Pacific
temperatures, showing a cold period from 1950-1980 which exactly matches
NASA's baseline period.
The Pacific Decadal Oscillation in its cold phase from 1951-1980 (the
period of the NASA baseline)p>
When the PDO ocean pattern is in its cold cycle, the Pacific remains
dominantly in the La Nina phase, causing cold temperatures -
particularly around the Pacific basin. La Nina also causes cold northern
hemisphere winter temperatures across much of the world - as measured in
2008.
(http://regmedia.co.uk/2008/06/02/antartica_full.jpg)
NASA's colourful Antarctic makeover
We can see how dramatic an artistic makeover can be. On the left, NASA's
Goddard Space Flight Center shows that
(http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003100/a003188/index.html) "the
interior of Antarctica is generally cooling". Indeed, most of the
landmass is cooler, or the same as it was, with patches of warming
around the periphery.
On the right, NASA's Earth Observatory warns that
(http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Study/WilkinsIceSheet/) "Between 1981
and 2007, most of Antarctica warmed" - and the graph is correspondingly
crimson. For the colourists at the Earth Observatory, a mere +0.01C is
needed to colour the continent red.
Conclusion
One month does not make a temperature trend, and the point of this
article is not to ascertain whether or not the earth is warming towards
Armageddon. We are not qualified to analyze that or second-guess the
experts. What is being examined is the quality and stability of the data
being used by people making those claims.
For example, whatever motivations NASA had for picking the 1951-1980
baseline undoubtedly have some valid scientific basis. Yet, when the
data is calibrated in lockstep with a very high-profile and public
political philosophy, we should at least be willing to ask some hard
questions. Dr. James Hansen at GISS is the person in charge of the NASA
temperature data. He is also the world's leading advocate of the idea of
catastrophic global warming, and is Al Gore's primary climate advisor.
The discrepancies between NASA and other data sources can't help but
make us consider Einstein's advice:
"If the facts don't fit the theory, change the facts." ®
Credits Thanks to Evan Jones from Watts Up With That
(http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com) for pointing me to the USHCN
temperature maps, and Steve McIntyre
(http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=1687) for generating them.
--
Warmest Regards
Bonzo
Get The TRUE Facts At
http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/index.html
Excellent Links At
http://www.warwickhughes.com/
"...and I think future generations are not going to blame us for
anything except for being silly, for letting a few tenths of a degree
panic us"
Dr. Richard Lindzen, Professor of Meteorology MIT and Member of the
National Academy of Sciences
"What most commentators-and many scientists-seem to miss is that the
only thing we can say with certainly about climate is that it changes"
Dr. Richard Lindzen
[most of the current alarm over climate change is based on] "inherently
untrustworthy climate models, similar to those that cannot accurately
forecast the weather a week from now." Dr. Richard Lindzen
V for Vendicar
"0ZNB0" <0Z...@do00od00.com> wrote
> Can We Really Trust NASA's Temperature Data
Nope. NASA is part of the global warming conspiracy.
Here are the other members of the KKKonspiracy that you have identified for
us Bonzo.
A current list of the stated Global Warming Conspirators.
01) The New York Times
02) Virtually Every Scientist on earth
03) all of the scientific press, both journals and textbooks
04) All Environmentalists
05) the vast majority of anyone with an advanced degree
06) the UN
07) the IPCC
08) All professional scientific societies, but the Petroleum Institute
09) U.S. Defense Department
10) Wikipedia
11) The World Meteorological Organization (WMO)
12) The National Auronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
13) The British Antarctic Survey
14) The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
15) Realclimate.org
16) The Hadley Center
17) The Royal Society
18) The Royal Astronomical Society
19) The National Academy of Sciences
20) The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
21) The American Physical Society
22) The American Institute of Physics
23) The Woods Hole Research Centre
24) The American Chemical Society (ACS)
25) The American Geophysical Union (AGU)
26) The U.S. Geophysical Service (USGS)
27) The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)
28) The National Resources Defense Council (NRDC)
29) The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS)
30) The National Wildlife Federation (NWF)
31) The World Wildlife Federation (WWF)
32) The Audubon Society
33) The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
34) Accuweather
35) Greenpiece
36) The world Conservation Union
37) The Sierra Club.
38) The board and article reviewers of the journal Nature
39) The board and article reviewers of the journal Science
40) The staff of Scientific American magazine
41) The staff of New Scientist Magazine.
42) The Queen of England
43) Michael Gorbachev
44) Muammar al-Gaddafi
45) Maurece Strong
46) Bill Gates
47) Ted Turner
48) Warren Buffet
49) Rupert Murdoch
50) Bill Moyers
51) Dr. David Suzuki
52) Stephen Hawking
53) ABC News
54) NBC News
55) CBS News
56) The Public Broadcasting system
57) And lets not forget - Al Gore.