Uncertain T

What’s the present trend in global surface air temperature? Good question.

Gone with the Wind

A recent post at RealClimate by Matthew England discusses the results of his (and others’) recent paper (England et al. 2014, Recent intensification of wind-driven circulation in the Pacific and the ongoing warming hiatus, Nature Climate Change, doi:10.1038/nclimate2106) about changes in wind patterns in the tropical Pacific, their impact on ocean circulation, and the resulting impact on global temperature.

Debating Gravity

I thought some of you might enjoy this post from Scott Mandia:

Republican Meteorologist & Entrepreneur: Debating Cause of Climate Change is Moral and Scientific Equivalent of Debating Gravity

Cherry p

Here’s some data, annual values for the time span from 1979 through 2013:

Which would you choose?

One of the main accusations leveled in a recently discussed video was that the data set was chosen, deliberately for the purpose of making the warming look bigger.

Suppose you needed to plot mid-troposphere temperature, but your real goal was to make the warming look as big as possible. Which data set would you choose?

Q: How do you Outdo Anthony Watts?

A: Add Glenn Beck.

Watts has posted about a video from two of Glenn Beck’s minions, in which (it is claimed) “two guys with a ruler blow up the white house global warming video claims.” You can watch their video, or you can read Anthony Watts’ take on it.

I know, I know, why am I bothering with such tripe? Because this is just too good to pass up.

CryoSat-2

A reader recently asked about a news item regarding recent results from the CryoSat-2 satellite mission. One of its purposes is to measure sea ice thickness throughout the Arctic. By combining that with data for sea ice concentration, one can estimate the total volume of Arctic sea ice.

Cowtan & Way

You probably recall that not too long ago, Kevin Cowtan and Robert Way re-processed the data used in forming the HadCRUT4 global temperature data set. Their goal was to interpolate across unobserved areas in the best way available, by Kriging. They also used satellite data to supplement the interpolation.

As I’ve said before, since the Berkeley team released their “methods” paper I’ve believed that Kriging is the best way to approach the interpolation issue. It was one of those “Doh! — Why didn’t I think of that!” moments. Therefore, despite its relative newness, I think we should consider treating this data set as one of the “main” global temperature data sets. Only time will tell whether that comes to pass.

Concern Trolls

I’m on a roll. I’ve been hitting the fake “skeptics” where they live by showing just how stupid is the stupid shit they’ve been saying.

How can I tell that the fake skeptics are feeling the heat? Simple: the concern trolls are coming out of the woodwork.

Tiny Graphs

In the discussion of climate change, a lot of people show a lot of graphs. I’m probably one of the more prolific blog graphers myself. There’s one fault with graphs which I think sabotages their very purpose: creating a plot in which the y-axis is so small that all the variation is squeezed into a tiny space. This makes variation a lot harder to see, which is rather nonsensical since the real purpose of graphs is usually to make the changes which are present visible.