You didn't expect EVERYBODY to be happy did you? A lot of people want to hurl stones and no report will ever stop that.

Are the "skeptics" holding each other to the same standards that they hold the scientists? Or will they be permitted just to keep saying whatever they like, and never being accountable?

John

Well, the good news is you'll likely be able to spend the rest of your life clinging to global warming, and that is nice.

Santa, either you don't understand or you are being deliberately obtuse.

I have maintained in every discussion that I am not competent to judge the content of the science. I am, however, opposed to those even less competent to judge who are throwing up one bit of nonsense after the other to push an agenda. It is the pretense of competence that is the real problem.

What I oppose is dishonesty.

John

Politics at it's worst.

But John, I do understand and I believe you not being competent to judge the content of the science puts you on even keel with the leadership of the global warming movement.

Ah Santa, when you have nothing intelligent to say, at least you can be witty. Occasionally tedious, but always witty.

But seriously, if there is a movement, I'm not part of it.

John

In the news today:

Associated Press

WASHINGTON-Scientists from around the world are providing even more evidence of global warming.

“A comprehensive review of key climate indicators confirms the world is warming and the past decade was the warmest on record,” the annual State of the Climate report declares.

Compiled by more than 300 scientists from 48 countries, the report said its analysis of 10 indicators that are “clearly and directly related to surface temperatures, all tell the same story: Global warming is undeniable.”

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/tech......1655436/

“The conclusion is unmistakable – yes, the planet is warming,” said Derek Arndt, a co-editor of the report, called State of the Climate, which was published by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA.

“The facts speak for themselves, and speak simultaneously,” said Mr. Arndt, who runs the Climate Monitoring Branch at NOAA. “And, they all point toward the same conclusion – the globe is warming.”

The report – co-edited by researchers in the United States, Canada, Britain and Australia – pulled together data from 10 climate indicators measured by 160 research groups in 48 countries. The scientists compared the figures decade by decade as far back as possible, more than 100 years in some cases. They concluded 2000 to 2009 was the warmest decade ever, and the Earth has been growing warmer for 50 years. Each of the past three decades – 1980s, 1990s and 2000s – was the hottest on record, the researchers said.

This year is shaping up to be even warmer. For the first six months of 2010, the combined global land and ocean temperature was the warmest on record, according to the NOAA.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/bams-state-of-the-climate/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9f3zFVK0hU

No, there was and is fraud. Everyone knows it now and the fact is the planet is just fine. Manmade global warming is B.S.

I think Glen is right. The planet is just fine. Everyone knows it! Never been better!

I agree. I just looked outside. It isn't that hot. Those 300 scientists from those 48 different countries are all just working on an agenda to take over the world and control the economy. Next thing you know, the scientists will be running everything--EVIL scientists with lab coats and goggles...

I think all those 48 countries are working together to take over the world...

Tell me how human activity is warming the moons of Saturn.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/27/scienc......tml?_r=1

Woland

Do you agree that from 1995 to the present there has been no statistically-significant global warming?

Yes, but only just.

Tommy,

At least as far as surface-based weather-station temperature results are confirmed, the data are severely limited. Two other factors are very important:

1)Increasing urbanization in the areas around weather stations.
2)The change from whitewash to white paint in weather station construction and maintenance in the 1970s.

When non-urban weather stations are analyzed separately from urban weather stations, the increased temperature trend is observed only in the urban weather stations.

An independent analysis of surface weather stations can be found here:

http://www.surfacestations.org/

70% of weather stations surveyed to date are "Class 4" or "Class 5":

Class 4 (CRN4) (error >= 2C) - Artificial heating sources <10 meters.

Class 5 (CRN5) (error >= 5C) - Temperature sensor located next to/above an artificial heating source, such a building, roof top, parking lot, or concrete surface."

There is no credible evidence to suggest that any of the apparent changes in our climate over the past 100 years are anything unusual in the overall scheme of things, much less directly or indirectly due to any human activity -- other than imprecise and biased measurement!

Woland

Sir, think of the consequence of not filling the vacuum. Unless you can up with a better idea than Global Warming please be quite.

Tamino:

"Suppose you have a child, a son — he’s 10. You want to know whether or not he’s growing normally, so every day you measure his height with a tape measure.

You’ve done so since he was 5. You even plot the data on a graph, and notice two things about it. First: the measurements show a fair amount of jitter, sometimes they’re a wee bit higher, sometimes a wee bit lower, there’s noise in the data. Second: there’s also a trend. Your kid is a lot taller at 10 than he was at 5, in fact the trend over the observed time span is upward and reasonably steady. You even do a statistical analysis, estimate the growth rate, and determine that it’s definitely statistically significant — so it’s not a false trend due to noise in the data, it’s real. Your son is growing normally.

Then you’re interviewed by a reporter from the Daily Mail. He asks, “Can you prove — with statistical significance — that your child has been growing since last Tuesday?”

You reply that no, even though the trend over that time span is upward, it’s not statistically significant.

The next day you read the article in the Daily Mail which is titled, “Growthgate U-turn as parent admits: There has been no growth since last Tuesday.”

You protest. “I never said my child wasn’t growing! I just said that the data over such a short time span didn’t show it with statistical significance! That’s only because on such a short time scale, the noise obscures the trend.”

Alas, it’s too late, the damage is done, because 3500 blogs have repeated the article from the Daily Mail and child protective services has been asked to investigate your fitness as a parent.

Sound familiar?"

Can we surpose that one day you will have grown up?

Are you being funny or just foolish?

And on what grounds do you establish whether a scientific claim is "credible"? Are you scientifically competent to judge the volumes of peer-reviewed science that disagrees with you? Or have you simply picked web sites that agree with your preconceptions?

John

John,

Thanks for noticing my comment.

1) First of all, temperature data in general are very poor. Almost all "temperatures" recorded prior to the 20th century are guesstimates, approximations, and extrapolations. 20th century data are scanty and compomised by technical problems.

2) What is the "world climate" anyway? To combine all of the available temperature readings around the world into a single index is a work of interpretation, not analysis.

3) Simple inspection of the climate record, as weak as it is, shows that the world has been as warm or warmer than it is now many times previously.
Those who claim that the current period is signficantly warmer than any previous climate period have done so largely by ignoring the Medieval warm period. When you remember that the Alps were free of ice and snow when Rome was at her height, you realize that the climate warms and cools with benefit of human activity, and that the warmer periods in recorded history are those during which you would have preferred to live. The ice ages, and the mini ice ages, were far worse than any warm period.

4) Even were I to accept that the current period is warmer than previous warm periods, there is no convincing evidence that human activity has anything to do with it. When you consider that other planets appear to be warming, you realize that any warming we observe today is likely the result of fluctuations in solar activity.

5) Coming back to ice ages, the current prolonged quiescence of the sun is of more concern than human production of CO2. A major ice age would be truly devastating.


Woland