Are any of the claims in this chemist's rant true?

Dana1981

New member
Most global warming 'skeptics' seem to have little to no scientific training, so I tend to expect better arguments from those who do. But the self-proclaimed geologists and chemists on this site never fail to disappoint me.

In a recent question, the self-proclaimed chemist went off on a semi-coherent rant which seems full of misinformation.

"The strongest evidence is of course the evidence which is most manipulated or the surface temperature data. It is nothing short of fraud the way they present that manipulated data. You get activists making wild and completely bogus claims that this is the warmest March, January or whatever..." [are the scientists at UAH frauds for 'manipulating the data' to show January and March 2010 as the hottest January and March on record?]

"They are comparing manipulated data from selected stations and comparing that to far more station data in the past. The data from the past is also averaged differently. It is like comparing apples to oranges but when it comes to propaganda, any bogus claim is justified in their eyes. It is about religions and leftist politics first and reality only gets in the way. They eliminated all but one site in the arctic for example. They kept one site that was exceptionally warm to average out the rest. They included data from their last idiotic claim where Finland was listed as 80 degrees warmer than it was. That alone shifted the temperature something like 2 percent. They would never err on the side of it being cooler but they don't even correct obvious errors like that. Their weather monitoring stations are pathetic. The vast majority are affect by urban heat island effects and they dramatically minimize that effect. Sometimes they even change adjust the urban heat effect the wrong direction. They manipulate the data to reduce old reading and maximize recent ones and even with all their bogus data, they don't even get a degree in a century. It is still cooler than it was a thousand years ago in spite of their fraudulent efforts by anti-science kook activists like Mann, Hansen, Jones and a host of others that tried to cook the books.

The actual evidence in the real world is exceptional strong that significant climate sensitivity to CO2 is just a fantasy."
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AkSucKiN6dO7rkQuKgmqBfvty6IX;_ylv=3?qid=20100420123307AAphwlh&show=7#profile-info-WiR1IEQnaa

Is there a shred of evidence to support any of the claims in this self-proclaimed chemist's rant? Shouldn't a supposed scientist provide such evidence before calling thousands of climate scientists frauds?
If such a link exists, perhaps you should provide it, Ottawa. Otherwise you're really no less dishonest. In fact it's probably more dishonest to claim evidence exists when it doesn't than to simply make an unsubstantiated lie.
coldfuse - yes, it is. By the way, I suggest you re-read the linked article, because EM Smith is not who you think he is. Or better yet, just throw the thing in the trash where it belongs.
bz - you could have just said no. Repeating the same bunch of garbage with one blog link doesn't make it any less wrong.
 

coldfuse

New member
Is this report inaccurate?
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/NOAAroleinclimategate.pdf

(P.S. - just acknowledging that icecap challenges AWG and that I'm sure D'Aleo must be trashed in some quarters)

Did programmer E.M. Smith eliminate 75 stations that were primarily higher latitude, higher altitude or rural (no urban heat island) locations?


Strange case of moving weather posts and a scientist under siege
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/01/dispute-weather-fraud



I suppose we will continue to see attacks on geologists, meteorologists and the like. Are they "buying in" at a lower rate?
 

PaulB

Member
Pure fantasy. "It is still cooler than it was a thousand years ago in spite of their fraudulent efforts by anti-science kook activists like Mann, Hansen, Jones and a host of others that tried to cook the books. "

This despite the copious and publicly available data to the contrary:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png

That’s

…/wiki/File:2000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png

Also, the National Academies Press has released a book (free online) discussing the climate for the past 2000 years, and how well we know it: Tree rings, ice cores, error bars, the lot:

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=11676

That’s

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.
php?record_id=11676


So is the rant you quote pure piffle? No; it does not rise to so high a standard. I no longer even bother to dignify the person who wrote it with a thumbs down.
 

Raiden

Member
While I'll agree that there wasn't any proof provided and could be considered a rant, I'll let bravozulu speak for himself. If you are truly curious to see if he has any proof then why don't you e-mail him? Maybe others here could respond with details but l won't seeing as how I don't follow a whole lot of the science or what he was talking about. The way I look at all this global warming/climate change stuff is not by using the science but what I believe is simply logic.

Now if there is anything that I have actually learned from this question and the answers is that the satellite data apparently goes back until 1979. I am seriously shocked. If this is really true (I am going to confirm it for myself) and I see someone quoting this data to try and prove global warming I will certaintly have a laugh. What an absolute joke. It's bad enough that certain temperature data we have only goes back 100+ years but now I hear this. Only 31 years of satellite data which is being used to try and prove global warming? Hell, I've even heard some say that time periods such as 30 years is needed to make more accurate conclusions about climate. Pretty hard to do when you only have a single 30 year period to work with. The way I see things, we seriously need more data. I mean.....wow. We are talking about a planet that is millions of years old which has apparently had extreme climatic changes such as ice ages!

You know, I said to someone in a previous question that scepticism doesn't neccesarily mean being 'on the fence' so to speak. It can be someone that may be unconvinced and/or express doubts. If anything, this new information has only made me MUCH more unconvinced and even more doubtful of catastrophic global warming.
 

NWJack

New member
Yes, there is a great deal of proof for much of what he says, but you do have some valid points as well. The satellite data is independent of the problematic thermometer data, and it does show the warmest March and January since satellite records began in 1979 for all but the lower stratosphere.
http://www.ssmi.com/msu/msu_data_description.html#msu_amsu_time_series

Since 1979, we have been able to verify our temperature data with the satellite data, and much of it looks fairly good.
http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/4way.jpg
Nasa's data is an exception to that rule.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/Fig.A2.lrg.gif
This is because Nasa incorporates questionable data for the Arctic averaging far too few thermometers for too large an area.
http://diggingintheclay.blogspot.com/2010/04/canada-top-of-hockey-league-part-1.html
The sudden rise in Arctic temperature did actually begin with the loss of 200 recording thermometer stations for the Arctic in 1989.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_vYBt7hixAMU/S8DQA9OkPXI/AAAAAAAAAZM/6knnbtjRNzs/s1600/Canada+dT.png
There is also evidence that those stations that report warming trends stay in business longer than those that report cooling trends.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_vYBt7hixAMU/S7_XdzmXCsI/AAAAAAAAAYc/ED6RRRUSNC0/s1600/Canada+vs+world.png
Also, while the few Canadian stations located in urban areas were adjusted for the Urban Heat Island effect (slightly downward), for unexplained reasons, the temperature trend slopes for the many rural ones were adjusted slightly upward!
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_vYBt7hixAMU/S8Gff_f6lhI/AAAAAAAAAZ8/_TpnRMDzmxc/s1600/Canada+Adjustment+table.bmp

No, that is not quite as extreme as stated in your quotes, but what was stated is partly true.

Edit @Beren:
The graphs are seriously different even if you account for the scales. Yes, they both contain the "GISS" data, but one comes directly from the NASA site, and the other comes from the tamino blog site. Also, the comparison is being done verses the SSMI, or satellite data site.

SSMI: Temperatures peaked in 1998 no other years were close to that.
GISS/NASA: 2004 and 2008 are greater. 2006 is equal. 2002 and 2004 are nearly equal.
GISS/Tamino: Integrating under the curve (bright red line), nothing comes close to 1998 in agreement with SSMI. The data is clearly different than the data on the NASA web site.

Conclusion: Regardless of scale, the NASA/GISS data neither agrees with the SSMI data nor even the GISS/Tamino data. Go figure.
http://www.appinsys.com/globalwarming/Hansen_GlobalTemp.htm
 

DrFeelgood

New member
This in itself is THE biggest question whether the temps taken and the homogenization of the temp data is in fact true or not. I believe it to be biased but i do believe temps have increased although the real reason for such is debatable. After studying up on temp stations it's very easy using common sense to see the pattern of placement of such stations were done by morons. Even i could have placed them in better locations and/or moved them when encroached upon by more construction instead of making up a system of homogenization to tweak the data. Also satellite data is almost worthless as was said dating back to only '79.
 
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