Anthony Watts’ blog has rolled out the comedy this week.
For example, there’s this, which reveals just how boring the latest set of climate-scientist emails is. WUWT actually manages to raise suspicion because Kevin Trenberth suggests a gift idea for Susan Solomon. What a scandal! As one reader responds,
John says:
August 25, 2012 at 11:30 amSo there was really nothing interesting in the e-mails then?
There’s also this, in which David Middleton first revives the zombie canard that “The homogenized USHCN supports AGW by artificially cooling the past and artificially warming the present,” then proceeds to artificially warm the past and cool the present. He also gets the latest month’s USA48 temperature value wrong — after displaying the NCDC news announcement which prints it plainly, and linking to the data which states it plainly.
Here’s his graph of July temperature in the continental USA:
You can get the data from the same place he got it. It reveals that the label he put on the graph for July 1901 is correct (76.91°F), as well as July 1936 (77.43°F) and July 2006 (77.26°F). But for some reason he labels the July 2012 value “77.4” (which is the value he plots). He feels the need to explain this, saying
I’m sure that the actual 2012 July temperature must have been a few 1/100ths of a degree warmer than 77.4°F; otherwise July 2012 is actually a bit cooler than July 1936, despite the homogenization.
What he should have done is look more closely at the data file, which says 77.56°F. Or he could have looked at his own first graphic — click the image for a larger, clearer view, then read the first sentence of the body of the text:
The really funny part is how Middleton disappears the 2012 record value after getting it wrong.
Rather than calculate a temperature anomaly relative to a fixed reference period, I decided to calculate it against what I think the contemporaneous reference period would have been (AKA a different take).Example: The 1931-1940 anomaly is calculated against the 1901-1930 reference period.
Yes, what he’s done is take the July values in each decade and subtract the average July value for the preceding 3 decades. That gives him this:
Let’s try an experiment. Take some artificial data consisting of a constant upward trend plus random noise:
Now let’s use Middleton’s method of computing “anomaly”:
Presto chango! If you want to make warming disappear, Harry, Ron, and Hermione combined couldn’t have done better.
But the funniest of all, in my humble opinion, is this, in which Anthony Watts soars to new heights. He’s not satisfied that the Antarctic peninsula has really been warming as fast as is claimed, so he actually tries to blame the increase in the observed data on … (put your coffee cup down) … the “urban heat island” effect. Why didn’t we think of that??? After all, as his last sentence makes clear, “The Antarctic peninsula is the most populated place in Antarctica.”
Open Mind 
I’m sorry . . . I had something to say, but I can’t stop giggling. I’ll remember in a minute.
Oh – are the gulls in the comment stream roaring approval of Middleton’s Folly? I would look, but my head would explode, and I have to teach on Monday.
Are they roaring approval?
Not really. There’s not a single “that’s brilliant” comment. A couple of weak thank you’s. Some off topic replies. Comments are mostly of the type ‘it’s not hot where I live’ and ‘1930s’ and ‘warmer is better’ and ‘why would you trust adjusted temperature records, we want raw data’.
I didn’t see challenge to what he wrote.
“(put your coffee cup down) ”
My computer screen and I thank you for the warning.
However, you forgot to warn about removing cat. Applying the band-aids.
“The Antarctic peninsula is the most populated place in Antarctica.” I’d like to think the Antarctic urban heat island effect means that Watts’s spirit has been broken, and that repentance is just around the corner.
Sure. The same corner concealing the sea ice recovery.
I can assure you that his spirit hasn’t been broken any more than final nails have been driven into the coffin of, or final stakes driven through the heart of, the great AGW conspiracy.
Anthony will forever be fully invigorated to fight his campaign – no valid evidence and/or evidence of invalid analysis will ever be an obstacle. He just doesn’t roll that way.
But you certainly do seem to troll that way. Or is this a Poe?
Think about it again.
No valid evidence will be an obstacle for him = he will do what he does regardless of what the evidence says.
No evidence of invalid analysis will ever be an obstacle = he will never let evidence that shows his analysis to be wrong stand in his way.
Neither troll nor poe. Just an Internet dude laughing at Anthony.
Daniel: maybe I’m being too gentle, but I just took Joshua’s comment as a description of how Watt’s would react, not an endorsement of Watt’s position.
Of course, Joshua’s intent may only be clear to Joshua.
Apologies to Joshua. I’ve been moderating too many deniers this weekend. Time for a beer. Or three.
No probs, Daniel.I can see how the sarcasm didn’t go through. I thought that reference to the final nails/final stakes would make it clear that I was imitating the words of a “skeptic.”
What’s funny is that given what “skeptics” do write, we probably could read a post from one saying that Anthony would never let valid evidence get in the way of him forming an opinion.
So, as I understand his argument, the icecore data from the Antarctic Peninsular has been contaminated by an urban heat island effect because a Stevenson Screen was located 2 meters from an insulated two man hut at a temporary camp in the Australian Antarctic Territory in Eastern Antarctica. And after two days of comments, none of the astute “skeptics” at WUWT have even picked up on the fact that Watts has illustrated his story with a picture from the wrong half of the continent, let alone the fact that the thermometer would get a greater heat contamination from being read than from the presence of an insulated hut at that distance.
Is there no depth of stupidity that Watts and his acolytes will not plumb?
No.
This has been another episode of obvious answers to obvious questions.
An urban heat island effect on the Antarctic Peninsula (which is in West Antarctica) from a hut in East Antarctica. Wow, that’s some heat island. More like a heat continent.
Why stop with continents? Why not a heat world? A sort of global heat island effect?
…I wonder if you could get anyone over at WUWT to by into a world wide heat island. The cognitive dissonance when they realize what that implies would be hilarious.
I wonder just how much heat he thinks a few hundred researchers a year can put out. Perhaps he’s using an exceptional reference point. If he was to base his calculations on himself, for example, all that hot air would surely skew things high.
More seriously, the link he provides for population data lists only two bases, one of which is occupied only in the summer and the other has less than four dozen people at any one time. He can’t be serious, can he?
Following on from this premise, the UHI effect in real urban areas must be so intense that it would add whole multiples of degrees celcius to the record.
Someone remind me – didn’t Watts’ own project demonstrate the opposite? The daft bugger must be using different concepts of sensitivity of physical heat transfer, for different continents.
” He can’t be serious, can he?”
Yes, he can. This is just the point: how he and so many of his admirers can be so idiotic. Or desperate.
WUWT for Best Creative Statistics Blog (vote early vote often).
Best science fatnasty blog! Only the completed manuscript will have been turned down by too many publishing houses because of it being very dull and with 2 dimensional characters.
(Mind you that didn’t stop Michael Crichton)
Didn’t spit out any beverage, but I sure did laugh…my wife thinks I’m reading a joke website.
Goddard, too–the recent post which he uses his cell phone to re-photograph a computer screen shot of a sea ice satellite image, and then uses the resulting blur to argue that there’s more ice than NSIDC lets on because “[his] phone has some kind of gamma correction software” is really jaw-dropping. (No, I’m not making that up.)
Goddard’s site “Real Science” should be Real Science Fiction…mixed of course with just the right amount of humor.
i think i saw them do that on CSI one time.
What would benefit Goddard most would be beta correction software.
Don’t think it’s available yet, though, ‘cept maybe for Droids
Watts on the Antarctic heat island reminds me of this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jumping_the_shark
I love the complete absence on his site of any mention of the record-breaking ice minimum happening right now – I imagine Watts is having a hard time dealing with reality right now. These posts you highlight definitely betray a certain desperation.
Middleton in his own special way has shown that in times of global warming, extreme events become more likely. I just wonder if he really believes the spin he’s trying to put on it, or if he’s actually having a laugh at Watts and his bootlickers’ expense.
I actually went over there yesterday to see how they were spinning the latest from NSIDC, but they didn’t seem to be attuned to the breaking news. Odd. (LOL)
> “The Antarctic peninsula is the most populated place in Antarctica.”
Oh, the urbanity!
Watts is likely to ignore the sea ice reports until late September except for the occasional gleeful jab at the prediction of the ice-free conditions made in 2007 being wrong.
His blog and commenters never focus on ice volume and any attempt to discuss quickly gets shot down in a rant about how the models don’t work.
I’m glad Tamino has posted this – it’s more permanent than Twitter.
Watts has said I’m no longer welcome to post on WUWT because I suggested his objection to denigration didn’t last long.
https://twitter.com/SouBundanga/status/237956063176060928
(If the above appears as a quote, you can click on the date link to get to the tweet conversation – extended.)
Watts wrote a whole article ranting that Bill McKibben had deleted a tweet (not so!) then, very shortly after Bill was very gracious about Watts’ mistake, Anthony turned around and repaid his courtesy by publishing a long article rubbishing Bill McKibben for something Bill hasn’t written, but might say at some time in the future.
(I’ve posted about this irrational and rude behaviour on my blog.)
Since then I’ve tweeted a few observations instead, for example:
https://twitter.com/SouBundanga/status/238635692438220801
https://twitter.com/SouBundanga/status/239224679771033600
I think Watts is getting sillier by the day, in proportion to his increasing irrelevance. I could be wrong, he could always have been just as silly. Until recently I rarely visited the site.
For example, he’s been posting supposedly ‘hilarious’ emails but he hasn’t yet posted on the broken record in the Arctic, despite apparent prior interest in the subject. (Earlier this month there was a post about the prediction game he runs, giving rise to comments like (paraphrasing) ‘it’s not happening’, ‘it’s not important’, ‘it will be a good thing’ and ‘the record winter recovery disproves global warming’ and ‘we’re about to have an ice age’.)
Still waiting for the “unprecedented” actual full research paper that Watts made such a ballyhoo about back in July. By Jove, I think he’s really lost it (in many regards) this time…
What I don’t get is why Pielke Sr. goes out of his way to validate Watts and never criticizes his obvious and considerable BS. I’ve asked about this on a number of sites and from a number people and they generally answer with a puzzling circumspection.
What is Pielke’s deal? Is he deteriorating? Is he miffed at how he and his climate (land use) concerns have been treated?
I personally continue to read him and even allow him to slightly temper my lay-person climate views, but I don’t see how blowing Watt’s horn helps either his case or his credibility.
It’s very simple, Watts is Pielke Sr.’s creation. Just follow the threads too and from the Surface Stations nonsense. Doing it this way allows Pielke to pretend he is still worthy of respect.
But, still, Pielker Sr. seems not to be without some merit. Maybe I’m the last person on Earth in the AGW camp to read him regularly, although less so all the time (almost exclusively because of his fawning over Watts). Seems to me that if he really wanted to be taken seriously in the discussion at all, even if he’s truly concerned about station siting, that he wouldn’t deliberately be donning the clown suit. Is he oblivious to the fact that uncritical support for Watts is a huge, red, clown nose that doesn’t lend itself to respect? Does he care? Something doesn’t add up.
Shelama, I think Pielke Sr can be described as “have nail, look for hammer” (no, I did not mean it the other way around!). He thought he had something big with his land-use changes, but after all these years, he still has not been able to show to the vast majority of his colleagues that it is really relevant. He can’t change his views – he’d be making himself completely irrelevant since he hasn’t done much (anything?) else of any impact. And thus he desperately looks for anything that he can use to drive in his nail, getting frustrated because it just doesn’t go in. It made a slight dent, and that’s it.
Just imagine you are a scientist and think you have a brilliant idea. Your first hit with a hammer…and the nail goes in a bit! Hit it again! Oi….no deeper? Take another hammer. Hmmmm…maybe it went in a little deeper, or did it? Try again…not sure. Oh, but look at all those other scientists paying attention, how nice! Better get me yet another hammer. Darn, why isn’t anything happening? I *know* that nail is important and should go in deep! Ah, but the others are at least still paying attention, so I surely must be on to something. As long as they are not doing anything in this area, I can show all my scientific prowess. There, it’s all in…huh, what happened? The others just pushed it out?!
And so on and so forth. It’s a bit like a one-trick pony. His fawning over Watts is because Watts is his way of maintaining “relevance”. If the scientists don’t believe him, at least there’s others who see the enormous importance of land-use changes.
Just my two cents of psychological evaluation ;-)
Marco, perhaps it is that bad. I think since I’ve stuck with Pielke so long that I’m probably trying to save him from the Lindzen dustbin. I’ve wondered if he’s not miffed and acting out of pique. Someone once suggested possible, early Alzeihmer’s. Hope not. I’ve been glad to see his occasional engagement on Skeptical Science and with Tamino and, rarely, with RealClimate, although I don’t think I’ve ever seen him persuasively prevail on anything.
Pounding nails, now that you mention it, seems to also apply to some of the more trivial issues on his blog.
But supporting Watts seems almost criminal and possibly suicidal. I kinda doubt he actually reads the bulk of the trash from either Watts or his posters.
Shelama, I happen to know a little bit about Alzheimer’s, and that’s definitely not apparent from his behavior. He does know what he did just a moment ago and he’s able to maintain an argument (even if it is foolish and wrong). Someone with Alzheimer’s would not be able to do that. So, let’s not go there.
Yes I suspect that both Pielkes are suffering from a bad case of cranial rectal inversion rather than early onset dementia.
Is that not something akin to what Bob Carter did? By taking the anomaly against a moving average you get rid of the trend.
This is my first time posting here, though I’ve been a long-time reader … I made my first excursion into WTF a few weeks back, and after a day of commenting I got banned for pointing out the obvious fallacies in the research Watts likes. The irony of the response there was pretty terrible. I didn’t get officially banned either, just my comments got deleted before they ever appeared.
It’s like the denialists at that website are engaged in a quite psychologically deep act of projection – almost every thing they complain about “warmists” doing they themselves do in spades. This week’s effort to put error bars on the hockey stick was a great case in point – a whole paragraph devoted to complaining about the lack of uncertainty estimates in IPCC graphs, backed up by a link to a graph that contains uncertainty estimates, on a website whose “analysis” consistently fails to include any measures of uncertainty whatsoever (and is consistently criticized for it). That’s beyond “chutzpah” and straying into a disturbing lack of introspection …
anyway, I like your efforts here and thought I’d add my 2 yen worth …
That is the best takedown of Watts I have read yet.
Can I ask you to rewrite it in a tone that’s less inflammatory?
I don’t have an issue with your comments but if it were written with more neutral language, it’s more than good enough to be published on a news site or a larger climate blog.
You could ask Climate Progress or Skeptical Science to republish it or grant guest posting privileges.
Thanks both of you! I don’t think I can do “less inflammatory” though … that could hurt my brain …
Yes, and McIntyre’s super powers of auditing fail every time Watt’s publishes yet more junk.
i have no idea what you’re complaining about: McI’s perfect 180° scepticism is exemplary.
[anti-poe: ;-) ]
Don’t forget Pielke Sr. put up two posts about how NOAA had a warm bias… and put up pictures of global anomalies based on DIFFERENT BASELINES… it was a classic Watts mistake, actually. Clearly, Pielke has been learning from his protege rather than the other way around…
-MMM
ps. The Pat Frank post was pretty bad. I can’t believe anyone buys his “20 degrees uncertainty in 100 years” junk. If that were true, climate models themselves would be diverging by 20 degrees… and, what a surprise, they’re not!
I’ve noticed throughout history that when some who’ve placed themselves atop a pedestal of lies and misinformation for a number of years are suddenly forced to face the fact that that pedestal is crumbling–forced to recognize and acknowledge their fading prospects, their decreasing fame, their diminishing influence, their shrinking circle of sycophants, their increasing status as just another outlier–they tend to do one of three things:
1) They slowly amble off into their well-deserved obscurity.
2) They continue on their same path, content to rest on their faded and tattered laurels, either unaware or not caring that time has passed them by and they’ve been relegated to history’s dustbin.
3) They dig in their heels and double down on their blather, fighting desperately to cling to the top of that pedestal and the “power” and “prestige” they think it once brought them.
Option one is dignified, if not a little anticlimactic. Option two is non-disruptive in a natural way. But option three starts out laughable, then just turns sad. Pity that Watts has selected the latter.
The text “field huts” on the postcard of the Antarctica thread should have been an indication that this was a temporary setup. The latest comment seems to set the record straight:
I expect Watts to demand full name and address, certified copy of the birthcertificate and travel documentation plus a few onsite photos. After that he may append the original post, blaming the Australian postal service for this mess.
“After that he may append the original post, blaming the Australian postal service for this mess.”
several months later, so that no one in his circle of sycophants will notice. He’s taking care of their (short) temper, you know, not hurting and baby-sitting them.
A commenter on WUWT (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/08/23/antarctic-peninsula-was-1-3c-warmer-than-today-11000-years-ago/#comment-1065260) has personally apologized for the Antarctic temperature record contamination. I have copied it here in its entirety, as it’s just too funny:
Hint to WUWT – check your sources!
The last comment in the “Antarctic peninsula urban heat island” post is worth a read.
———————————————————————–
Dear WUWT
I guess I owe the world a humble apology for personally contributing so much to the urban heat island in Antarctica, and hence to misinterpreted climate records.
The badly sited meteorological screen in your photo is at an Australian summer camp in the Northern Prince Charles Mountains, near Mt Jacklyn – in the background. Temperatures measured here were for local information of pilots and field parties only – it is useful to have an idea of how many layers of clothes to put on before exiting your Antarctic shelter. Temperatures here were only measured for less than 2 months over a couple of seasons and have NEVER been used for any climate record.
This photo was taken in the 1988/89 austral summer when I, and a colleague Andy, lived in the UNHEATED shelter nearest to the meteorological station. I didn’t realise that I was so hot that my body heat could influence temperatures measured on the Antarctic Peninsula, thousands of kilometres away. It must have been Andy!!!
Ian
Wonder if Tony’s considered the effect of bourbon heat islands.
Seems like those would be important down there too.
Anthony’s starting to crack, I tell ya.
Nah, after his UHI on Antarctica, he’s now back to recycling nonsensical complaints about ‘anomalies’. (I’m sure someone’s explained them to him, but it still hasn’t sunk in.)
I also like how he got quite cross when someone commented that he still hasn’t posted about the record melt in the Arctic. I expect he’s giving himself time to think up a suitable spin. He’ll probably blame it all on the recent low. Ordinarily you’d that wouldn’t work too well because when he posted on the storm a while back, many of his fans said the low wasn’t that unusual. However, given their ability to play ‘Schrodinger’s Cat’ with facts, might not be such a problem!
Oh, you mean this? Yes, comical Tony has struck again, with a guest poster who claims that the physics of the GHE don’t justify the use of anomalies as a way to relate changes in temperature over time.
“Anthony’s Ice”
— by Horatio Algeranon (based on Sou’s great image)
Anthony’s Ice, like Schroedinger’s Cat
Is both “dead” and “alive”
In a state of “Lossrecovery”,
Unwatched, it will survive.
Ha ha – what did I tell you? Watts has finally succumbed but has blamed melting ice on the storm of a few weeks ago. And he is scoffing at a journalist for quoting a scientist who links the disappearing arctic sea ice to global warming. (I can’t claim to be the first to predict this response from deniers.)
Not much imagination, has he. He could have said it’s cosmic rays sent from little green men upset at being invaded by Curiosity – and some of his fans would undoubtedly have responded with ‘brilliant post’.
Sou, it gets better. When Walt Meier of the NSIDC comments saying the Tony is wrong Tony says “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
That thread is most entertaining with all the regulars trotting out the tired old lines.
It sounds like the fat lady singing to the Greek Chorus to me.
I’m actually really serious. I think Anthony’s going to crack. First you have his “Earth-shattering” paper where you gotta know McIntyre is still trying to walk him through all the problems (being that Watts included McI’s name as an author). And we have truly Earth-shattering loss of sea ice this year. Now he’s attributing warming in Antarctica to UHI? The cognitive dissonance going on in his head has to be excruciating! Eventually he’s gonna to pop.
I hope those poor Australians took the UHI effect into account when they read those temperatures, they might have gone out in shorts and t-shirt by mistake, when they really needed their thermals on.
WUWT is already back for an encore — this time it’s confusing surface temperatures with TOA temperatures. Linky here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/08/26/lies-damn-lies-and-anoma-lies/#more-69983
Poor, poor Tony. It seems as though everything is stacked against him.
Well, some enjoy the role of victim so that may not necessarily be a negative.
Rattus Norvegicus:
I just checked out your link and It appears that poor Willard A Watts has become completely estrange from reality, he now has posted the single most demented statement ever at his science fiction blog
.”Seems almost a planned effort this week, Sea Ice, Iasaac, and now the AMS statement.”
I would like Watts to explain how those evil scientists managed to not only create a hurricane, but have it arrive at the same time the Arctic ice reached a record minimum.
I wish I wish I was able to post a comment at WUWT, but unfortunately I was banned on my very first post for having asked Lord Monckton why he has been avoiding his promised debate with Peter Hadfield (potholer54). I have subsequently learned that the mere mention of the name Peter Hadfield results in comments being flushed down the memory hole at WUWT.
Sometimes when you live in a non-fact based reality….reality bites. Hard.
I posted the following; I hope it’s allowed since all my previous comments at WUWT were science based arguments with the wattbots, and I’ve never had a comment moderate or withheld there:
‘“Seems almost a planned effort this week, Sea Ice, Iasaac, and now the AMS statement.”
– If you believe the AMS (or any other organisation) is responsible for more than one out of those three, you might need to be examined by a head doctor! Also, be careful about deciding which one WAS a planned effort. Hint: not the first two ;-)
Are Sea Ice and Tropical Storm Isaac somehow conspiring against you? What a bizarre statement.’
whoops and you are out of there. Watts reads this blog, he’ll know who you are now.
Naw Barry as far as I can see my comment stands and I have not incurred the wrath of Watts. But that might be because my comment has been lost in the noise of Smokey providing a brick wall for KR to bang his head against.
The depths of Watts pettiness was revealed when he gave his reason for abruptly cancelling the Hadfield-Monckton debate – because Hadfield had a video call with Peter Sinclair aka Greenamn3610 whom TonyBoy despises.
Nothing disparaging against WUWT or Watts was said during that call – listen for yourself at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZKzJwMOWAI&
In fact, Hadfield praised Watts several times during the call for permitting the debate.
When it come to the peninsula, you have to remember the millions of seals wiped out in the 1800s on. Technically, it’s been populated far more densely in the past and so should be freezing up.
(Note: this is wronger than a wrong thing on a wrong day having an ‘extra wrong’ moment. So… should pass Wattsian Blog Review.)
So Middleton has rediscovered the derivative and when he plots it gets a roughly constant positive value. Awesome.
So now Watts is claiming there’s no record minimum because the MASIE product isn’t showing a record minimum.
This means, of course, that it’s more accurate than the other sources, even though Meier points out that well, this isn’t true, actually …
Sigh.
If there’s denial to be done, Tony’s the one!
There’s yet another record sea-ice low in the house! Anthony Watts outdoes himself yet again! When Walt Meier shows up to try and be helpful, Watts rejects him by saying, ” Walt, respectfully, MASIE says 4.7, IMS says 5.1. If MASIE and IMS are the same product, how can they show different numbers?” What Mr. low-Watt-bulb missed was that MASIE was reporting data for August 26th, and IMS was reporting for August 22nd. It would have been hard to miss – “Current ice extent (8/22): 5.096”. Given that IMS noted a 750,000 km2 loss per week, 4 days would be… about 400,000… or just about right to make IMS and MASIE equal again.
-MMM
Yes, that is quite amazing. When Tony Willard tries to argue with Walt Meier it gets pretty entertaining. Now I read the MASIE Watts linked to in the record low part one post it was pretty clear that this was an operational description of where the ice *edge* is, not what the extent is. The purpose of the daily maps is clearly stated to be navigational — Willard doesn’t seem to know that ships need to know where they might start encountering ice, and that is the purpose of MASIE.
So now we know what the next step in the denial is, and it is sort of like the Columbus method of typing: find a key and land. In this case it is find a dataset, any dataset, no matter the caveats attached to it, and point out that it shows more ice than the data sets designed to track long term changes. I think they call that moving the goalposts.
“Ridicruel?”
— by Horatio Algeranon
It’s not polite to ridicule
When nonsense rears it’s head.
Much better, as a general rule,
To just make fun instead.