How not to cherrypick

The New Zealand Climate Science Coalition go for a variation of the global warming ended in 1998 cherry pick:

"The NIWA record tells us that the current pother on global warming was caused by the sudden temperature increase in New Zealand of 1.8ºC from 1993 to 1998, caused by the El Niño-Southern Oscillation ocean event of 1998. Since then temperatures are plunging, and are currently below the average of the last 50 years.

Unfortunately, they have forgotten the first rule of cherrypicking: don't let the rubes see the data you left out. They include a graph of New Zealand temperatures which show that the increase didn't start in 1993 -- there has been an increasing trend over the past hundred years with oscillations about that trend line every twenty years or so:

i-58e64864176d1a6bcc3777d298a38dde-f9dfc048c93980250d67.gif

They even make the mistake of linking to the NIWA page, which states:

This shift is probably due mainly to a Pacific-wide natural fluctuation that is being called the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO, Mantua et al., 1997), which exhibits phase reversals about once every 20-30 years. The influence of the PDO is well-known in the North Pacific, and has recently also been noted in Australian rainfall ( Power et al., 1998). Scientists from Pacific Island countries attending a workshop in Auckland in November 2001 put out a press release suggesting the PDO underwent another phase reversal in 1998.

Long-term warming trends are superimposed on these decadal climate variations. Individual El Nino events bring cooler conditions to New Zealand (see the NIWA El Niño page). However, since 1977 temperatures have continued to rise, resulting in warmer night time temperatures and fewer frosts nationwide, and a increase in very hot days in eastern areas in recent decades.

That doesn't stop NZCSC's Vincent Gray from saying:

"NIWA themselves could put an end to this misleading speculation by being more forthcoming about the results of their own temperature records," said Dr Gray, who has just published a paper that shows that while there has been some warming on the surface of the Earth, none has been detectable in the lower atmosphere where climate models claiming CO2 as the cause of warming say it must be happening.

Oh, and his paper was published on the NZCSC website rather than in a journal and in it Gray gets the stratosphere mixed up with the troposphere.

More Gray:

"While they're at it, NIWA could remind New Zealanders that CO2 is not only a natural and ever-present constituent of the Earth's atmosphere, mostly derived from natural sources as it has been for centuries, and it is a gas that served the dual purposes of helping to prevent us from freezing to death while being an essential aid to plant growth. The amount of CO2 emitted by man is infinitesimal by comparison with the bulk that originates from natural sources such as volcanoes, oceans, plants and the like.

Let's see how infinitesimal anthropogenic emissions are compared to volcanoes. The USGS says

Scientists have calculated that volcanoes emit between about 130-230 million tonnes (145-255 million tons) of CO2 into the atmosphere every year (Gerlach, 1999, 1992). This estimate includes both subaerial and submarine volcanoes, about in equal amounts. Emissions of CO2 by human activities, including fossil fuel burning, cement production, and gas flaring, amount to about 22 billion tonnes per year (24 billion tons) [ ( Marland, et al., 1998) - The reference gives the amount of released carbon (C), rather than CO2.]. Human activities release more than 150 times the amount of CO2 emitted by volcanoes--the equivalent of nearly 17,000 additional volcanoes like Kilauea (Kilauea emits about 13.2 million tonnes/year)!

And plants absorb about as much as the emit while oceans absorb more. Sheesh.

Via Doug Clover.

More like this

Wow, I'd heard the volcano line before, but I never saw the comparison numbers.

Itr's strange just how many people I find that don't understand the basic high-school Carbon Cycle. Once in a while, I'll see someone on the left make that mistake when arguing against Bio-fuels (They still produce CO2 when you burn them!)

But to see erstwhile scientists arguing against global warming when they scan't seem to grasp the basics of high school biology leaves me breathless.

They also can't seem to grasp the basic concpet of cause and effect.

How did a "pother" arising from something that supposedly started in 1993 prompt the 1988 Rio Conference to identify global warming as a major risk ot the environment?

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 08 Jun 2006 #permalink

Unfortunately, they have forgotten the first rule of cherrypicking: don't let the rubes see the data you left out...[t]hey even make the mistake of linking to...

Tim, they didn't make a mistake in posting linkies to the data.

They know their rube audience won't be bothered to fill their ideologically pure skulls with environazi lefty science "facts".

Best,

D

I have not read the gray paper so I do not know his sources.What I do know is you have limited knowledge of the Co2 ch4 and so2 chemogenisis and quantitative outputs from geothermal activity.

Indeed this this is an important part of the WCRP projects for updated research.Especially the effects of volcanic emissions on stratospherical ozone and the climatic causality on both the Arctic oscillation and ENSO .

Mt Pinatubo directly effected the climate for 3-4 years and the changes to natural varibility such as the ocean latent heat sink anomoly for 6-7 years.

The volcanic ouputs of VOCand GHG far exceed the exisitng models.

By maksimovich (not verified) on 08 Jun 2006 #permalink

A great quote my dad sent me today:

"To readers who distrust science, knowledge found through experimentation, and the secular truths of reason in favor of simply believing - I ask you - why should affirming belief in something be a virtuous concept if it misleads? Why should demanding proof be soulless and cold if it keeps you from ignorance and victimization? And why do they always want your money?"

By Stephen Berg (not verified) on 08 Jun 2006 #permalink

Isoprene and monotorpene were monitored after Pinatubo,uptake is thought to be from the thermal updraft.There is also around 10% shown from geothermal activity areas.

Here I am including the entire geothermal complex as a disussion point,this provides a better overview for the qualitative measurement.

The spacial heterogeneity of the geothermal complex provides difficulties in exact measurement,indeed the IPCC identiifed the problem at the WCRP conference in may and how the accuracy of the natural emissions may be only 20% of the global budget,

With regard to methane we do know the IPCC model is out by around 20-45% depending on the source data.

We also know the elevated soil sourced co2 emissions rises during volcanic activity as part of the water transport.

I recommend you read Stenchikov et al 2006,especially the importance of natural emissions on ozone depletion and the resulting degradation of the stratosphere temperature gradient 1979-2003,and its related importance of change to the AO.

By maksimovich (not verified) on 09 Jun 2006 #permalink

Mark, it is usual to provide a journal, volume and page when citing a reference. When this is not done one checks one's hands for missing fingers.

Your original statement was that "The volcanic outputs of VOCand GHG far exceed the exisitng models." which implies that the VOCs were emitted in the volcanic eruption. Is this the case, or were they from surrounding vegetation vaporized in the eruption, or were they from increased vegatation growth due to a fertilization effect and what kind of model are you talking about. Further, which VOCs and GHGs far exceeded what predictions from which sort of model. How does the excess CO2 from soils compare in amount with that emitted from fossil fuel burning?

The bit about ozone depletion and natural emissions also is one of those free floaters.

If you are goint to depend on Stenchikov it might be well to look at the first figure on his web site which shows an excellent match between GCM calculations and global temperature. Obviously his opinion differs slightly from yours. http://www.envsci.rutgers.edu/~gera/ .

My goodness Eli you seem to be cherrypicking reread the first figure and look at the model differential and the observation are you only trying to see what you want for natural forcings we see to have an anomaly.

Ramaswamy also stated the level of understanding at the wcrp conference of may this year as very low with regards to natural forcing.

I suggested you read the paper by Stenchikov and Ramaswamy as I suggested then we will discuus the OBSERVATIONS objectively.

By maksimovich (not verified) on 09 Jun 2006 #permalink

"I suggested you read the paper by Stenchikov and Ramaswamy as I suggested then we will discuus the OBSERVATIONS objectively."

Can I suggest that if you provide a citation it might make it easier for Eli to do so?

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 10 Jun 2006 #permalink

I rather suspect that Stenchikov and Ramaswamy were not the only authors, but we shall see. However the search has already brought a number of interesting (not in the Maksimovich sense) papers to my attention.

My initial statement was the hypothesis that initial author of this post does not have sufficient knowledge of the geothermal complex and its chemical and mechnastic process.

The experiments to identify knowledge base of the commentators here seem to be within the observations (comments) so far.

One there is selected detail,omitted in the primary thread.
Two Observation is poor and not objective.
Three There is indeed insufficient knowledge of the complex and process by the poster and commentators.

Firstly I am only trying to introduce reason in to balanced objective arguments.It is the mechanics of the process and the interdependent relationships including the understanding of the process involved.(IE how the constructs were evolved ,and the methodology of the proofs)

Now here I will use Gell-Mann analogy,"if the design of the experiment is incorrect,no matter how it correlates with your hypothesis or indeed proves your hypothesis,if the construct is incorrect so are you"

Of course a corrally may be introduced to reflect the observations.

Secondly an observation going back to the primary post,ie the link to the PDO and its phase change,what is the connection between the natural phase change (oscillation)?how does that disprove Grays hypothesis?( sorry I have not read his paper)

Um Ian ,Eli showed he knows where the papers are in his backlink.

By maksimovich (not verified) on 10 Jun 2006 #permalink

Maksimovitch we are still awaiting the reference (journal, volume, page of the articles you claim to be referencing. The fact that you have not yet produced them is strong evidence that you are simply blowing smoke. It would not surprise me that you have picked up some statement from a web site and are paraphrasing it.

Hi.

Just as a point of clarification, the link back to the NIWA page wasn't their error of judgment.

I posted their release on Scoop.co.nz . It was send out with the graph but no caption. Since I didn't understand the graph (and wanted to clarify if it included 2005) I asked for one. I felt it appropriate to include the backlink too.

Nice work.