You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an alternative browser.
You should upgrade or use an alternative browser.
350
- Thread starter biffvernon
- Start date
Gareth Hughes
Member
- Messages
- 2,741
- Location
- In the wilds of East Anglia
Hmmm. "Chippy" n. A carpenter, who turned up here, posted some offensive and ill-informed rubbish and disappeared. "Joiner" n. a carpenter, who turned up here, posted some offensive and ill-informed rubbish and disappeared. Sounds familiar.
Oh, and Schoolmarm isn't Nemesis. I thought we got that straight last time you graced us with your presence...
Oh, and Schoolmarm isn't Nemesis. I thought we got that straight last time you graced us with your presence...
Penners
Member
- Messages
- 17,294
- Location
- Suffolk, England
Awww - are we to be without Chippy's/Joiner's cheery contributions to our learned debates?
The days will seem so long.......
The days will seem so long.......
FamilyWiggs
Member
- Messages
- 3,452
- Location
- Flintshire, N Wales.
biffvernon said:It's August. The French are on holiday.FamilyWiggs said:Interestingly Biff, I'm in France at the moment where wind power seems much more evident. However, even on windy days the majority of the turbines are still. Not sure why.
Yes - the whole country seems closed, except for an hour on a Thursday morning. The rest of the time they are sitting in the shade of a tree eating unspeakable bits from anything with fur/hair.
Schoolmarm
Member
- Messages
- 1,894
- Location
- edgworth, lancs
Penners said:Awww - are we to be without Chippy's/Joiner's cheery contributions to our learned debates?
The days will seem so long.......
:lol: :lol:
I shouldn't laugh really as I never contribute to the learned debates as I feel intimidated by the degree holders and learned chaps and chapesses.
FamilyWiggs
Member
- Messages
- 3,452
- Location
- Flintshire, N Wales.
FamilyWiggs said:biffvernon said:It's August. The French are on holiday.FamilyWiggs said:Interestingly Biff, I'm in France at the moment where wind power seems much more evident. However, even on windy days the majority of the turbines are still. Not sure why.
Yes - the whole country seems closed, except for an hour on a Thursday morning. The rest of the time they are sitting in the shade of a tree eating unspeakable bits from anything with fur/hair.
The unspeakable bits are actually delicious, and we have just spent a delightful afternoon at Chenonceau chateau with the kids - walking beneath the oaks, collecting acorns (a few of which we may plant back in Wales) and explaining to them how fab oak is and how important it was in building our navy - with which we harried the French and Spanish no end!
I wonder if passport control on the way back will be hot enough to spot me importing these dangerous foreign plants into the UK - on the way out we didn't even get the usual derisory Gallic shrug on the French side. Not a single piece of border control either side of the Channel...
biffvernon
Member
- Messages
- 4,607
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Expecting global warming then. Getting French varieties of oak established in Wales in preparation for hot dry summers, eh?FamilyWiggs said:collecting acorns (a few of which we may plant back in Wales)
Schoolmarm
Member
- Messages
- 1,894
- Location
- edgworth, lancs
Nooooooooo to foreign oaks!!!! I though we were meant plant native ones only?
biffvernon
Member
- Messages
- 4,607
- Location
- Lincolnshire
What and miss out on Japenese knot weed?
On the other hand, global warming is likely to proceed at a pace too fast for plants to spread with the changing climate zones so may need a helping hand in mitigation. In the case of oaks, French and English varieties are so similar it's hard to see what risks there are. Our borders are so porous on the biosecurity front, unlike the policies in Australasia, which seem a pretty smart.
On the other hand, global warming is likely to proceed at a pace too fast for plants to spread with the changing climate zones so may need a helping hand in mitigation. In the case of oaks, French and English varieties are so similar it's hard to see what risks there are. Our borders are so porous on the biosecurity front, unlike the policies in Australasia, which seem a pretty smart.
Thought i'd share the article below. I'd underline the last few bits, this is not to suggest that we shouldn't take steps to reduce emissions etc. but this article demonstrates why some of us get so frustrated with the evangelical nature of some eco-lobbyists.....this is just sloppy science and I would argue that until this was uncovered, they were misleading the public over the key data in their records
Roger Pielke is a professor of environmental studies at the Center for Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He also has appointments as an Associate Fellow at the Institute for Science, Innovation and Society at Oxford University's Said Business School and as a Senior Visiting Fellow at the Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes at Arizona State University. Since 2008 he has been a Senior Fellow of The Breakthrough Institute, a progressive think tank.
He writes ...
Steve McIntyre, of ClimateAudit, is a determined individual. While this may be no fun for those who fall under his focus and happen to have something to hide, more sunlight on climate science cannot be a bad thing.
Lately Steve has been spearheading an effort to get the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia to release the data that underlie its analysis of global temperature trends. Such a request should not at all be controversial. Indeed the atmospheric sciences community went to great lengths in the 1990s to ensure that such data would be openly available for research purposes, culminating in World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Resolution 40 on the international exchange of meteorological and related data and products. The Resolution states ...
• Members should provide to the research and education communities, for their non-commercial activities, free and unrestricted access to all data and products exchanged under the auspices of WMO . . .
• WMO recognized the need to protect commercial activities, but placed no restrictions on the exchange of climate information described as follows: All reports from the network of stations recommended by the regional associations as necessary to provide a good representation of climate . . .
Obviously, the ability to do good research depends upon good data with known provenance. At the time WMO Resolution 40 was widely hailed in the atmospheric sciences community as a major step forward in data sharing and availability in support of both operations and research.
Thus it is with some surprise to observe CRU going through bizarre contortions to avoid releasing its climate data to Steve McIntyre. They first told him that he couldn't have it because he was not an academic. I found this to be a petty reason for keeping data out of the hands of someone who clearly wants to examine it for scholarly purposes. So, wanting to test this theory I asked CRU for the data myself, being a "real" academic. I received a letter back from CRU stating that I couldn't have the data because "we do not hold the requested information."
I found that odd. How can they not hold the data when they are showing graphs of global temperatures on their webpage? However, it turns out that CRU has in response to requests for its data put up a new webpage with the following remarkable admission:
"We are not in a position to supply data for a particular country not covered by the example agreements referred to earlier, as we have never had sufficient resources to keep track of the exact source of each individual monthly value. Since the 1980s, we have merged the data we have received into existing series or begun new ones, so it is impossible to say if all stations within a particular country or if all of an individual record should be freely available. Data storage availability in the 1980s meant that we were not able to keep the multiple sources for some sites, only the station series after adjustment for homogeneity issues. We, therefore, do not hold the original raw data but only the value-added (i.e. quality controlled and homogenized) data."
Say what?! CRU has lost track of the original data that it uses to create its global temperature record!? Can this be serious? So not only is it now impossible to replicate or re-evaluate homogeneity adjustments made in the past - which might be important to do as new information is learned about the spatial representativeness of siting, land use effects, and so on - but it is now also impossible to create a new temperature index from scratch. CRU is basically saying, "trust us." So much for settling questions and resolving debates with empirical information (i.e. "science").
To be absolutely clear, none of what I write here should be taken as implying that actions to decarbonize the global economy or improve adaptation do not make sense - they do. However, just because climate change is important and because there are opponents to action that will seize upon whatever they can to make their arguments, does not justify overlooking or defending this degree of scientific sloppiness and ineptitude. Implementing successful climate policy will have to overcome the mis-steps of the climate science community, and this is a big one.
Roger Pielke is a professor of environmental studies at the Center for Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He also has appointments as an Associate Fellow at the Institute for Science, Innovation and Society at Oxford University's Said Business School and as a Senior Visiting Fellow at the Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes at Arizona State University. Since 2008 he has been a Senior Fellow of The Breakthrough Institute, a progressive think tank.
He writes ...
Steve McIntyre, of ClimateAudit, is a determined individual. While this may be no fun for those who fall under his focus and happen to have something to hide, more sunlight on climate science cannot be a bad thing.
Lately Steve has been spearheading an effort to get the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia to release the data that underlie its analysis of global temperature trends. Such a request should not at all be controversial. Indeed the atmospheric sciences community went to great lengths in the 1990s to ensure that such data would be openly available for research purposes, culminating in World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Resolution 40 on the international exchange of meteorological and related data and products. The Resolution states ...
• Members should provide to the research and education communities, for their non-commercial activities, free and unrestricted access to all data and products exchanged under the auspices of WMO . . .
• WMO recognized the need to protect commercial activities, but placed no restrictions on the exchange of climate information described as follows: All reports from the network of stations recommended by the regional associations as necessary to provide a good representation of climate . . .
Obviously, the ability to do good research depends upon good data with known provenance. At the time WMO Resolution 40 was widely hailed in the atmospheric sciences community as a major step forward in data sharing and availability in support of both operations and research.
Thus it is with some surprise to observe CRU going through bizarre contortions to avoid releasing its climate data to Steve McIntyre. They first told him that he couldn't have it because he was not an academic. I found this to be a petty reason for keeping data out of the hands of someone who clearly wants to examine it for scholarly purposes. So, wanting to test this theory I asked CRU for the data myself, being a "real" academic. I received a letter back from CRU stating that I couldn't have the data because "we do not hold the requested information."
I found that odd. How can they not hold the data when they are showing graphs of global temperatures on their webpage? However, it turns out that CRU has in response to requests for its data put up a new webpage with the following remarkable admission:
"We are not in a position to supply data for a particular country not covered by the example agreements referred to earlier, as we have never had sufficient resources to keep track of the exact source of each individual monthly value. Since the 1980s, we have merged the data we have received into existing series or begun new ones, so it is impossible to say if all stations within a particular country or if all of an individual record should be freely available. Data storage availability in the 1980s meant that we were not able to keep the multiple sources for some sites, only the station series after adjustment for homogeneity issues. We, therefore, do not hold the original raw data but only the value-added (i.e. quality controlled and homogenized) data."
Say what?! CRU has lost track of the original data that it uses to create its global temperature record!? Can this be serious? So not only is it now impossible to replicate or re-evaluate homogeneity adjustments made in the past - which might be important to do as new information is learned about the spatial representativeness of siting, land use effects, and so on - but it is now also impossible to create a new temperature index from scratch. CRU is basically saying, "trust us." So much for settling questions and resolving debates with empirical information (i.e. "science").
To be absolutely clear, none of what I write here should be taken as implying that actions to decarbonize the global economy or improve adaptation do not make sense - they do. However, just because climate change is important and because there are opponents to action that will seize upon whatever they can to make their arguments, does not justify overlooking or defending this degree of scientific sloppiness and ineptitude. Implementing successful climate policy will have to overcome the mis-steps of the climate science community, and this is a big one.
biffvernon
Member
- Messages
- 4,607
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Frankly, it's safe to assume that anything written by McIntyre or Pielke (snr. and jnr.) or published on ClimateAudit is complete cobblers. Life is far too short to waste any more time on these guys. If you want to know more about this read up on RealClimate. Better still have a nice bank holiday weekend.
Lime
Member
- Messages
- 2,749
- Location
- East of England
Yeah! Right!
"Off went the Emperor in procession under his splendid canopy. Everyone in the streets and the windows said, "Oh, how fine are the Emperor's new clothes! Don't they fit him to perfection? And see his long train!" Nobody would confess that he couldn't see anything, for that would prove him either unfit for his position, or a fool. No costume the Emperor had worn before was ever such a complete success.
"But he hasn't got anything on," a little child said.
"Did you ever hear such innocent prattle?" said its father. And one person whispered to another what the child had said, "He hasn't anything on. A child says he hasn't anything on."
"But he hasn't got anything on!" the whole town cried out at last.
The Emperor shivered, for he suspected they were right. But he thought, "This procession has got to go on." So he walked more proudly than ever, as his noblemen held high the train that wasn't there at all."
http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersholt/TheEmperorsNewClothes.html
"Off went the Emperor in procession under his splendid canopy. Everyone in the streets and the windows said, "Oh, how fine are the Emperor's new clothes! Don't they fit him to perfection? And see his long train!" Nobody would confess that he couldn't see anything, for that would prove him either unfit for his position, or a fool. No costume the Emperor had worn before was ever such a complete success.
"But he hasn't got anything on," a little child said.
"Did you ever hear such innocent prattle?" said its father. And one person whispered to another what the child had said, "He hasn't anything on. A child says he hasn't anything on."
"But he hasn't got anything on!" the whole town cried out at last.
The Emperor shivered, for he suspected they were right. But he thought, "This procession has got to go on." So he walked more proudly than ever, as his noblemen held high the train that wasn't there at all."
http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersholt/TheEmperorsNewClothes.html
Flyfisher
Member
- Messages
- 10,202
- Location
- Norfolk, UK
That maybe true, or maybe not, I don't know. But is it relevant, since the offending statement in Pford75's post seems to be from the CRU itself.biffvernon said:Frankly, it's safe to assume that anything written by McIntyre or Pielke (snr. and jnr.) or published on ClimateAudit is complete cobblers.
biffvernon
Member
- Messages
- 4,607
- Location
- Lincolnshire
It is true. And CRU know it so, wisely, do not have any truck with these people. Pford ought to know better too.
Flyfisher
Member
- Messages
- 10,202
- Location
- Norfolk, UK
OK, let's say it's true. End of.
Now, what about the real issue - i.e. the CRU quote admitting it has lost track of the multiple source of it's historical data? The implication being that this data can no longer be independently verified or directly subjected to newly-developed analytical techniques. Isn't that a cause for some concern?
Now, what about the real issue - i.e. the CRU quote admitting it has lost track of the multiple source of it's historical data? The implication being that this data can no longer be independently verified or directly subjected to newly-developed analytical techniques. Isn't that a cause for some concern?
biffvernon
Member
- Messages
- 4,607
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Hang on, that was Pford75 quoting Pielke saying that CRU said that... Too many steps through unreliable sources to lend any credence.Flyfisher said:Now, what about the real issue - i.e. the CRU quote admitting
FamilyWiggs
Member
- Messages
- 3,452
- Location
- Flintshire, N Wales.
biffvernon said:Hang on, that was Pford75 quoting Pielke saying that CRU said that... Too many steps through unreliable sources to lend any credence.Flyfisher said:Now, what about the real issue - i.e. the CRU quote admitting
Biff - this is the CRU webpage comment in full:
http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/availability/
That should take a few steps out!
biffvernon
Member
- Messages
- 4,607
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Yes, so what's the problem (other than in Pielke's mind)?
We know that there were others, but cannot locate them, possibly as we've moved offices several times during the 1980s
:roll: Quoted from the CRU website.
As for
....it just so happens that I happen to 'know' some people at UEA and there is a huge degree of embarassment over thisPford ought to know better too.
I have to say that i've noticed a trend...whenever there is an article which calls into question any aspect of the eco-lobby, the approach is always to discredit the source and describe them as dangerous lunatics. It is this refusal to admit error and personal attacks which so frustrates those of us who are undecided. I'd have a lot more respect for the eco-lobby if on occasion they held up their hands and admitted they got something wrong.
Seems that might be a little too scientific though
biffvernon
Member
- Messages
- 4,607
- Location
- Lincolnshire
As you have pointed out, CRU have held their hands up. No cover-up there. But Pielke et al are dangerous lunatics and have been discredited long ago. Move along now. What is it you are undecided about Pford?