Not A Lot Of People Know How Paul Homewood Propagates Fake News About the Arctic!!

February 28, 2017CensorshipChristopher Booker, MASIE, NALOPKT, Paul Homewood, Ron ClutzJim Hunt

A couple of days ago we explained how Christopher Booker explained that blogger Paul Homewood:

Has drawn on official sources.. to uncover what is actually happening [in the Arctic]

Have we got news for you Christopher? That’s not how it works in the cryodenialosphere! Mr. Homewood’s article about Mr. Booker’s article about Mr. Homewood’s previous article(s) is littered with factual errors. This is what happens should you be foolish enough to attempt to correct such errors.

Here is what we typed into the comment section of Mr. Homewood’s blog:

Of course if Mr. Booker were to have considered Arctic sea ice volume he might have thought twice about his “there is even more of it today than in February 2006, and it is also significantly thicker.” remark?

Followed by:

When that failed to make an appearance:

When Ron Clutz sang the praises of MASIE yet again:

Here is what Paul Homewood cherry picked to publish to his loyal readership:

Can you spot the difference? Our juiciest cherries all ended up on Paul’s cutting room floor!

The 2017 Antarctic Sea Ice Minimum Extent

February 28, 2017AntarcticAntarctic, Bremen Uni, Concentration, Extent, JAXA, NSIDCJim Hunt

In 2017 Antarctic sea ice extent is beating all the records. All flavours of the metric are already below the minimum of all previous years in the satellite record, and it looks like there’s still some more melting left to go. Here’s the NSIDC’s 5 day averaged extent:

and here’s JAXA’s 2 day averaged version:

Finally, for the moment at least, here’s the current map of Antarctic sea ice concentration from the University of Bremen:

[Edit – March 12th]

It seems highly likely that the 2017 Antarctic sea ice minimum extent has now been reached. Here’s the NSIDC 5 day averaged extent graph:

The minimum extent of 2.106 million square kilometers was reached on March 3rd. Here’s the University of Bremen’s Antarctic sea ice concentration map for March 3rd:

Shock News! The Telegraph is Propagating Fake News About the Arctic!!

February 26, 2017SatireAFW, Christopher Booker, DMI, Fake News, NALOPKT, NASA, NOAA, NSIDC, Paul Homewood, Rutgers, Shock News, Snow Cover, Telegraph, Tony HellerJim Hunt

David Rose is mercifully quiet this weekend, but there’s no rest for the wicked! Christopher Booker in the Sunday Telegraph leads a bunch of the usual Alt-facts suspects in a barrage of fake news about our dearly beloved Arctic sea ice. According to Mr. Booker in the “Arctic Myths” section of his column today:

As the fake science of global warming continues to crumble, one scare story the zealots are determined to hold on to at all costs is their claim that ice in the Arctic is dangerously vanishing. Yet again lately we have been treated to a barrage of such headlines as “Hottest Arctic on record triggers massive ice melt”.

The nearest we got to such a headline here at the Great White Con was “Arctic Sea Ice News from AGU” in which article we showed images which said things like:

That’s because last year was the *hottest year on record in the Arctic! Undeterred by mere facts Mr. Booker continues:

But that ever-diligent blogger Paul Homewood has drawn on official sources such as the US National Snow and Ice Data Center to uncover what is actually happening. Under “Arctic Fake News”, on NotALotOfPeopleKnowThat, he posted a graph showing that last week the extent of sea ice was much the same as it has been at this date ever since 2001. Indeed, according to the Danish Meteorological Institute, there is even more of it today than in February 2006, and it is also significantly thicker. Back in 2008 much of the ice was only a metre thick. Today that has risen to two metres, and in some places four.

Mr. Booker appears to be more than somewhat confused, since this is what the DMI Arctic sea ice extent graph he links to reveals:

In addition the DMI thickness maps he refers to aren’t available at any of the places he mentions! Not a lot of people know that he was probably thinking of another recent article by Paul Homewood entitled “Arctic Ice Fake News“, which includes these two DMI thickness maps:

Even without considering other sources of Arctic thickness and/or volume data it is quite clear from the two volume graphs that according to the Danish Meteorological Institue Arctic sea ice volume is significantly lower this year than it was in 2008. If Arctic sea ice extent is greater this year and the volume is lower then the laws of physics (which not even the combined talents of Messrs Homewood and Booker can change) dictate that its average thickness must be LESS this year than in 2008!

Mr Booker blunders on:

The DMI data also show that the Greenland ice sheet, which we are told is melting at horrendous speed, is actually growing this year at a record rate, to a size way above its average for the past 26 years. And the most authoritative record of Northern Hemisphere snow cover shows this year’s ranking as one of the six highest since 1967.

He seems blissfully unaware that the “DMI data” to which he refers is the output of a DMI climate model that attempts to determine the “surface mass balance” of the Greenland ice sheet. He seems to think it’s a measurement of the mass of the Greenland ice sheet, which it isn’t. However this is, courtesy of NASA:

In his bubble of astounding Arctic ignorance Mr. Booker continues:

The Deplorable Climate Science blog, run by US expert Tony Heller, gleefully reproduces a 2007 headline: “Scientists: ‘Arctic is screaming’, global warming may have passed tipping point”. As Heller comments: “The Arctic is indeed screaming at climate scientists – to shut up.”

Now as luck would have it I have been (vainly!) attempting to persuade Mr. Heller “to shut up” on the very article Mr. Booker references! Let’s take a quick look at a couple of highlights shall we?

February 22, 2017 at 12:01 am

At the risk of repeating myself, need I say more?

It seems safe to assume that Mr. Booker wasn’t reading Mr Heller’s blog on or after February 22nd does it not? Otherwise he would surely have had second thoughts about writing such a ludicrous phrase as “there is even more of it today than in February 2006”?

Then of course there’s the burning question of the “Hottest Arctic on record”

February 22, 2017 at 5:59 pm

At the risk of (repeating myself)² AZ, here’s some “higher atmospheric air temperatures” for you:

If Mr. Booker had browsed Mr. Heller’s blog slightly more diligently he might even have seen this from the much maligned NOAA:

February 20, 2017 at 11:06 am

You seem to have forgotten about spring Gail? Here’s April:

Here’s the May graph from “the most authoritative record of Northern Hemisphere snow cover” for good measure:

To summarise, Messrs Booker and Homewood could have confined their due diligence on their assorted Arctic articles to reading my comments on Mr. Heller’s blog. Having done so it would quickly have become apparent to them that every single point they made was in actual fact a “fake fact”.

The inevitable conclusion is that they have no interest whatsoever in establishing the actual facts about the Arctic. All they are interested in is propagating “fake news” about the Arctic as far and as wide as possible in pursuit of a common “agenda”. As is David Rose.

* Since satellite records began.

The 2017 Arctic Sea Ice Maximum Extent

February 22, 2017ExtentAMSR2, Area, CT, Extent, JAXA, NSIDC, SII, UH, WipneusJim Hunt

It’s far too early to be sure about this yet, but it’s not beyond the bounds of possibility that the 2017 maximum is already in place. Here’s our favourite high resolution extent graph calculated by “Wipneus” from University of Hamburg/JAXA AMSR2 data:

The current maximum Arctic sea ice extent for 2017 is 13.49 million square kilometers on February 19th. Here’s Arctic sea ice area for good measure:

The current maximum area for 2017 is 12.88 million square kilometers on February 20th. Here also is the NSIDC’s 5 day averaged extent:

This reveals a current maximum extent for 2017 of 14.302 million square kilometers on February 20th.

[Edit – March 1st]

Here are the high resolution AMSR2 area and extent graphs for the end of February:

With each day that passes the highs of February 19th/20th look more likely to have been this years maximum. Nonetheless past experience suggests it’s still far to soon to be sure about that.

[Edit – March 10th]

Arctic sea ice area and extent are declining again, having reached new heights for the year on March 3rd:

However the 2013/14 winter showed a late surge is still possible.

[Edit – March 18th]

A “late surge” is looking increasingly unlikely. That being the case, here is our provisional long term graph of NSIDC daily Arctic sea ice extent:

Subject to an unanticipated “surge” the 2017 maximum of 14.447 million square kilometers occurred on March 5th.

JAXA extent has dropped steeply over the last couple of days, and it is now once again “lowest for the date since records began”:

The 2017 JAXA maximum of 13.878 million square kilometers occurred on March 6th.

In the continuing absence of updates to Cryosphere Today area, here’s the high resolution Arctic sea ice area graph calculated by “Wipneus” from University of Hamburg/JAXA AMSR2 data:

The maximum for that particular metric was 13.03 million square kilometers on March 3rd.

Watch this space!

O-Buoy 14 Awakens in the Heart of the Northwest Passage

February 21, 2017WebcamsNWP, O-BuoyJim Hunt

Enough sunlight is now reaching O-Buoy 14 for it to power up briefly every day after a long sleep through the Arctic winter blackness:

The buoy’s position has suddenly been revealed deep into the Northwest Passage after driting a considerable distance whilst out of radio contact:

Not only that, but the ice on the buoy’s camera has melted enough to reveal a distant horizon:

[Edit – February 24th]

The glaze over the webcam’s lens is gradually melting:

As suggested by “Oale” below, here’s the CIS ice chart for the Canadian Arctic Archipelago:

[Edit – February 25th]

O-Buoy 14 is waking up earlier each day, and the view is getting clearer too:

[Edit – February 26th]

The lens of O-Buoy 14’s has cleared, resulting in some very pretty pictures being beamed back to base:

[Edit – February 28th]

There’s now enough energy stored in O-Buoy 14’s batteries when the sun is above the horizon to keep her operating into the long nights:

Watch this space!

Shock News! 19 years without warming?

February 21, 2017TemperatureBill the Frog, Mt Pinatubo, NCEI, NOAA, Shock News, TLT, UAHJim Hunt

In the wake of the 2015/16 El Niño, recent weeks have seen the denialoblogosphere inundated with assorted attempts to proclaim yet again that there have been “19 years without warming”. In another of his intermittent articles Great White Con guest author Bill the Frog once again proves beyond any shadow of a doubt that all the would be emperors are in actual fact wearing no clothes. Without further preamble:

Ho-hum! So here we go again. The claim has just been made that the UAH data now shows no warming for about 19 years. A couple of recently Tweeted comments on Snow White’s Great White Con blog read as follows…

For the nth time, nearly 19 years with no significant warming. Not at all what was predicted!!

and

Just calculated UAH using jan: R^2 = 0.019 It’s PROVABLE NO DISCERNIBLE TREND. You’re talking complete bollocks!!!

Before one can properly examine this “no warming in 19 years” claim, not only is it necessary to establish the actual dataset upon which the claim is based, but one must also establish the actual period in question. A reasonable starting point within the various UAH datasets would be the Lower Troposphere product (TLT), as most of us do live in the lower troposphere – particularly at the very bottom of the lower troposphere.

However, one also has to consider which version of the TLT product is being considered. The formally released variant is Version 5.6, but Version 6 Beta 5 is the one that self-styled “climate change sceptics” have instantly and uncritically taken to their hearts.

The formally released variant (Ver 5.6) is the one currently used by NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) on their Microwave Sounding Unit climate monitoring page. As can be seen from the chart and the partial table (sorted on UAH values), the warmest seven years in the data include each of the four most recent years…

The above chart clearly doesn’t fit the bill for the “no warming in 19 years claim”, so, instead we must look to the Version 6 Beta 5 data. Before doing so, a comparison of the two versions can be quite revealing…

In terms of its impact on trend over the last 19 years or so, an obvious feature of the version change is that it boosts global temperatures in 1998 by just over 0.06° C, whilst lowering current temperatures by just over 0.08° C. Therefore, the net effect is to raise 1998 temperatures by about 0.15° C relative to today’s values. That is why some people refer to a mere 0.02° C difference between 1998 and 2016, whereas, NOAA NCEI shows this as 0.17° C.

(It is not difficult to imagine the hue and cry that would have gone up if one of the other datasets, such as NASA Gistemp, NOAA’s own Global Land & Ocean anomalies or the UK’s HadCRUT, had had a similar adjustment, but in the opposite direction.)

Anyway, it seemed pretty obvious which variant would have been used, so the task was merely to establish the exact start point. It transpires that if one ignores all the data before January 1998, and then superimposes a linear trend line, one does indeed get an R² value of ~ 0.019, as mentioned in one of the Tweets above. (The meaning of an R² value, as well as its use and misuse, will be discussed later in this piece.) In the interim, here is the chart…

Those with some skill in dealing with such charts will recognise the gradient in the equation of the linear trend line,

Y = 0.0004X + 0.1119

As the data series is in terms of monthly anomalies, this value needs to be multiplied by 120 in order to convert it to the more familiar decadal trend form of +0.048° C/decade. Whilst this is certainly less than the trend using the full set of data, namely +0.123° C/decade, it is most assuredly non-zero.

The full dataset (shown below) gives a far more complete picture, as well as demonstrating just how egregious the selection of the start point had been. Additionally, this also highlights just how much of an outlier the 1998 spike represents. Compare the size of the upward 1998 spike with the less impressive downward excursion shown around 1991/92. This downward excursion was caused by the spectacular Mt Pinatubo eruption(s) in June 1991. The Pinatubo eruption(s) did indeed have a temporary effect upon the planet’s energy imbalance, owing, in no small measure, to the increase in planetary albedo caused by the ~ 20 million tons of sulphur dioxide blasted into the stratosphere. On the other hand, the 1997/98 El Nino was more of an energy-redistribution between the ocean and the atmosphere. (The distinction between these types of event is sadly lost on some.)

The approach whereby inconvenient chunks of a dataset are conveniently ignored is a cherry-picking technique known as “end point selection”. It can also be used to actually identify those areas of the data which are most in line with the “climate change is a hoax” narrative. Once again, it is extremely easy to identify such regions of the data. A simple technique is to calculate the trend from every single starting date up until the present, and to then only focus on those which match the narrative. Doing this for the above dataset gives the following chart…

It can clearly be seen that the trend value becomes increasingly stable (at ~ +0.12° C/decade) as one utilises more and more of the available data. The trend also clearly reaches a low point – albeit briefly – at 1998. This is entirely due to the impact that the massive 1997/98 El Nino had on global temperatures – in particular on satellite derived temperatures.

The observant reader will have undoubtedly noticed that the above chart ends at ~ 2006. The reason is simply because trend measurements become increasingly unstable as the length of the measurement period shortens. Not only do “short” trend values become extreme and meaningless, they also serve to compress the scale in areas of genuine interest. To demonstrate, here is the remainder of the data. Note the difference in the scale of the Y-axis…

Now, what about this thing referred to as the R² value? It is also known as the Coefficient of Determination, and can be a trap for the unwary. First of all, what does it actually mean? One description reads as follows…

It is a statistic used in the context of statistical models whose main purpose is either the prediction of future outcomes or the testing of hypotheses, on the basis of other related information. It provides a measure of how well observed outcomes are replicated by the model, based on the proportion of total variation of outcomes explained by the model.

In their online statistics course, Penn State feel obliged to offer the following warning…

Unfortunately, the coefficient of determination r² and the correlation coefficient r have to be the most often misused and misunderstood measures in the field of statistics.
…
The coefficient of determination r² and the correlation coefficient r quantify the strength of a linear relationship. It is possible that r² = 0% and r = 0, suggesting there is no linear relation between x and y, and yet a perfect curved (or “curvilinear” relationship) exists.

Here is an example of what that means. Consider a data series in which the dependent variable is comprised of two distinct signals. The first of these is a pure Sine-wave and the second is a slowly rising perfectly linear function.

The formula I used to create such a beast was simply… Y = SinX + 0.00005X (where x is simply angular degrees)

The chart, with its accompanying R² value, is shown below, and, coincidentally, does indeed bear quite a striking resemblance to the Keeling Curve…

The function displayed is 100% predictable in its nature, and therefore it would be easy to project this further along the X-axis with 100% certainty of the prediction. If one were to select ANY point on the curve, moving one complete cycle to the right would result in the Y-value incrementing by EXACTLY +0.018 (360 degrees x 0.00005 = 0.018 per cycle). A similar single-cycle displacement to the left would result in a -0.018 change in the Y-value. In other words, the pattern is entirely deterministic. Despite this, the R² value is only 0.0139 – considerably less than the value of 0.0196 derived from the UAH data.

(NB There is a subtlety in the gradient which might require explanation. Although the generating formula clearly adds 0.00005 for each degree, the graph shows this as 0.00004 – or, more accurately as 0.000038. The reason is because the Sine function itself introduces a slight negative bias. Even after 21 full cycles, this bias is still -0.000012. Intuitively, one can visualise this as being due to the fact that the Sine function is positive over the 0 – 180 degree range, but then goes negative for the second half of each cycle. As the number of complete cycles rises, this bias tends towards zero. However, when one is working with such functions in earnest, this “seasonal” bias would have to be removed.)

Summing this up, trying to fit a linear trend to the simple (sine + ramp) function is certain to produce an extremely low R² value, as, except for the two crossover points each cycle, the difference between the actual value and the trend leaves large unaccounted-for residuals. To be in any way surprised by such an outcome is roughly akin to being surprised that London has more daylight hours in June than it does in December.

So what is the paradox with the low R² value for the UAH data? There isn’t one. Just as it would be daft to expect a linear trend line to map onto the future outcomes on the simple (sine + ramp) graph above, it would be equally daft to expect a linear trend line to be in any way an accurate predictor for the UAH monthly anomalies over the months and years to come.

Nevertheless, even although a linear trend produces such a low R² value when applied to the (sine + ramp), how does it fare as regards calculating the actual trend? Once the “seasonal” bias introduced by the presence of the sine function is removed, the calculated trend is EXACTLY equal to the actual trend embedded in the generating function.

Anyway, even if the period from January 1998 until January 2017 did indeed comprise the entirety of the available data, why would anyone try to use a linear trend line? If someone genuinely believed that the mere fact of a relatively higher R² value provided a better predictor, then surely that person might play around with some of the other types of trend line instantly available to anyone with Excel? (Indeed, any application possessing even rudimentary charting features would be suitable.) For example, a far better fit to the data is obtained by using a 5th order polynomial trend line, as shown below…

Although this is something of a “curve fitting” exercise, it seems difficult to argue with the case that this polynomial trend line looks a far better “fit” to the data than the simplistic linear trend. So, when someone strenuously claims that a linear trend line applied to a noisy dataset producing an R² value of 0.0196 means there had been no warming, then there are some questions which need to be asked and adequately answered:

Does that person genuinely not know what they’re talking about, or is their intention to deliberately mislead? (NB It should be obvious that these two options are not mutually exclusive, and therefore both could apply.)

Given that measurements of surface temperature, oceanic heat content, sea level rise, glacial mass balance, ice-sheet mass balance, sea ice coverage and multiple studies from the field of phenology all confirm global warming, why, one wonders, would somebody concentrate on an egregiously selected subset of a single carefully selected variant of a single carefully selected dataset?

The Great White Con 2017 “New Einstein” Award

February 19, 2017SatireAndyG55, Ben Pile, Gator69, Mike Haseler, New Einstein, Tony HellerJim Hunt

Our regular reader(s) will be all too familiar with the 2015 and 2016 editions of our annual Great White Con “New Einstein” Award. The jury has now finished its deliberations on the 2016 award in a smoke filled igloo just outside the Great White Con Ivory Towers, not far from Santa’s swimming pool. I am pleased to be able to announce that the first prize of the loan of a polar bear suit kindly donated by the Daily Telegraph plus a battered big board from Cotty’s quiver has been awarded to none other than Ben Pile (AKA @clim8resistance) with this extremely witty remark way back when in March 2016:

Aw, fuck off, @jim_hunt, you're a waste of time.

— Ben Pile (@clim8resistance) March 11, 2016

Here are the initial entrants for the 2017 competition:

1) Mike Haseler, whose Twitter profile tells us that his heart’s greatest desire is a “Scotland free from the EU”. We’ll forgive Mike his minor typo and give him lots of credit for his imaginative use of a cryptic computer programming language to impart a similar message to Ben Pile’s award winning entry last year:

Go forth and multiple
or is that
Forth> : go multiple And ;

— Mike MPE (Planetary Engineer) #Endlockup #NoMuzzle (@scotpolitik) February 17, 2017

2) AndyG55, who is another expert emitter of ad homs in a long line of such creatures on the blog of Tony Heller (AKA “Steve Goddard”).

Over at “Steve’s” recently renamed “Deplorable Climate Science” blog I had the temerity to point out that the deplorable emperor was somewhat scantily clad, having claimed “Over the past nine years, there has been a huge increase in the area of thick Arctic sea ice”:

Balderdash Tony!

Need I say more?

To which Andy wittily responded:

2017 extent above 2016 for this day.

Need I say more.!

You are starting to look even more STUPID and IGNORANT than usual Jimbo.

Off you trot and get some info on long term Arctic sea ice history from your Exeter bum-chums.

Or are you going to continue to be CLIMATE CHANGE DENIER #1.

3) Gator69, who is another denizen of “Deplorable Climate Science” and a regular entrant in our “New Einstein” contests. In response to my PIOMAS post above, Gator fired back with a by now familiar theme:

Starvation Jim! How many times must I rub your nose in your genocide before you get it?

Please feel free to provide feedback to our 2017 jury in the space provided below.

Climategate 2 – Episode 3 of David Rose’s Epic Saga

February 19, 2017TemperatureClimategate 2, Daily Mail, David Rose, GWPF, HadCRUT, Hadley Centre, John Kennedy, Met Office, NOAAGate, Peter StottJim Hunt

This morning’s instalment of the Mail on Sunday’s serialisation of David Rose’s latest piece of fantasy fiction is headlined as follows:

“US Congress launches a probe into climate data that duped world leaders over global warming”

David is a bit slow on the uptake, since we reported on the “US Congress probe” several days ago. He also seems not to have taken on board any of the copious quantities of evidence that his “climate data that duped world leaders over global warming” allegations are the purest fantasy. This time around Mr. Rose claims, amongst other things:

Last week Peter Stott, head of climate monitoring at the UK Met Office, admitted that notwithstanding the Pausebuster, it was clear ‘the slowdown hasn’t gone away’.

The ‘pause’ is clearly visible in the Met Office’s ‘HadCRUT 4’ climate dataset, calculated independently of NOAA.

Let’s see if we can discover if Peter Stott has any recollection of being interviewed last week by the Mail on Sunday and/or The Mail’s leading fantasy fiction writer shall we?

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/833257983018672128

Here’s the HadCRUT 4 data we’ve been showing assorted “skeptical” fellows on Twitter this week:

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/831835739222638592

Perhaps David Rose can assist them by pointing out where exactly the alleged “pause” is located?

[Edit – February 19th PM]

Peter Stott has confirmed my suspicions. David Rose’s “last week” was egregiously inaccurate:

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/833389662953668610

In addition John Kennedy, also from the UK Met Office, pointed out to Mr. Rose that:

Re: your final paragraph. January 2017 HadCRUT4 isn't out yet. @DavidRoseUK https://t.co/nkUtGwHDSL

— John Kennedy (@micefearboggis) February 19, 2017

Do you suppose that David & Judy have another “whistleblower” embedded deep within the Hadley Centre?

[Edit – March 4th]

The UK Met Office have at long last published the HadCRUT4 January 2017 update:

Global average near-surface temperature from HadCRUT4 for January 2017 was 0.74±0.16°C above the 1961-1990 mean https://t.co/nkUtGwHDSL

— John Kennedy (@micefearboggis) March 3, 2017

A theory is proposed that doesn’t involve time travel:

https://twitter.com/GarethSJones1/status/838136044251975682

[Edit – March 18th]

The online version of the Mail on Sunday have just published a “correction” to the most egregious of their long list of recent errors and inaccuracies. It reads as follows:

On February 19 we reported a Met Office official’s announcement that the average global temperature in January 2017 was about the same as in January 1998. In fact, this was incorrect, and the temperature was 0.25C higher.

So there you have it. This buck doesn’t stop on David Rose’s desk, or Benny Peiser’s desk, or John Wellington’s desk, or Geordie Greig’s desk. We’re expected to believe it stops on an unidentified desk of an unknown official somewhere inside the UK Met Office.

We won’t get fooled again. Will we?

[Edit – March 19th]

The expert opinion of Peter Thorne (op. cit.) on the Mail on Sunday’s excuse for a “correction”:

Just repeating GWPF's 'excuse' here – an excuse w/o basis in facts AFAICT @richardabetts @micefearboggis @markpmcc @LeoHickman

— Peter Thorne (@climpeter) March 19, 2017

Alternative Facts in the Arctic – Case Study 2

February 15, 2017VolumeMike Haseler, PIOMAS, VolumeJim Hunt

I had the profound joy of bumping into Mike Haseler on Twitter earlier today. After much bandying of words about global temperature the “debate” headed north to the Arctic. Here are the edited highlights:

I feel sure this story will run and run, but I’ve got to rush off up the M5 soon. Consider this as an appetiser, with the main course to follow in due course.

Watch this space!

David Rose’s Climatic Alternative Facts and Deceptions

February 12, 2017TemperatureAlt Facts, Benjamin Friedman, Climategate 2, Daily Mail, David Rose, Donald Trump, Judith Curry, Lamar Smith, NOAA, NOAAGateJim Hunt

For some relevant background to this weekend’s dose of “Alternative Facts” from David Rose in the Mail on Sunday you may wish to peruse this article in our sister journal “Alternative Facts Wetware™“:

How Trump Won

From the conclusions to that article on Donald Trump’s rise to power:

Reflecting on the implications of this analysis for the specifics of this election, we can see that many Trump voters knew full well that their man was a reprobate, that they deplored his crudities and that they saw him as a risky choice. And yet in a world where the system is seen to be against “us” and where things appear to be driven in the wrong direction by “them,” the really irrational thing to do is to vote for the conventional candidate who represents sticking with that system.

Getting back to this morning’s batch of post truth alternative facts from the poison pen of David Rose, the latest porky pie fresh off the Mail’s production line is entitled:

“How can we trust global warming scientists if they keep twisting the truth”

It is of course Mr. Rose who is “twisting the truth” yet again. His opening salvo:

They were duped – and so were we. That was the conclusion of last week’s damning revelation that world leaders signed the Paris Agreement on climate change under the sway of unverified and questionable data.

A landmark scientific paper –the one that caused a sensation by claiming there has been NO slowdown in global warming since 2000 – was critically flawed. And thanks to the bravery of a whistleblower, we now know that for a fact.

Mr. Rose wouldn’t recognise “a fact” if it hit him in the back of the head at a million miles an hour. The “landmark scientific paper” in question isn’t “critically flawed” anywhere but in the fertile imagination of David Rose and the other “Merchants of Doubt”. Take a look at the facts:

As predicted yesterday, I’m off down to the local paper shop. I wonder if there’s an associated editorial this week too? I’ll be back in a bit with more. As David Rose so eloquently put it this morning:

We cannot allow such a vital issue for our future to be mired in half truths and deceptions.

[Edit – February 12th PM]

My pocket is now £1.70 lighter in exchange for the following information:

It seems that is what passes for “due prominence, and — where appropriate — an apology” in MailSpeak? Here’s the actual facts once again:

I don’t see an accurate graph in Mr. Rose’s profuse apology. I see no mention of “World leaders not duped, Mail readers conned again”. Do you?

[Edit – February 15th]

This will come as no shock to seasoned Lamar Smith watchers. The U.S. House Science, Space, and Technology Committee have issued another news release:

“Committee Probes Allegations of Politicization of NOAA Study”

By now you can probably guess what it says:

Lamar Smith (R-Texas) today sent a letter to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Acting Administrator Benjamin Friedman requesting information on the Karl study following reports the study ignored NOAA standards, was rushed to publication, and was not free from political bias.

“Allegations of politicization of government funded scientific research cannot be ignored. The Committee has a constitutional responsibility to conduct oversight in instances of alleged fraud, abuse, and misconduct especially where the government’s scientific integrity is called into question. Dr. Bates’ revelations raise additional questions as to whether the science at NOAA is objective and free from political interference. In light of this new information, the Committee requests the below information to better understand the depth and scope of internal debate at NOAA related to the Karl study,” the letter states.

Today’s letter requests documents and communications related to the release of the Karl study, the datasets used in the Karl study, concerns raised about datasets used in the Karl study, and the scientific integrity of the study. The committee also requested a briefing on the independent experts NOAA is engaging with to review this matter.

The letter can be found here.

The news release continues to describe the alleged “background”, but I think we’re all pretty familiar with that by now? The letter itself is addressed to Benjamin Friedman, NOAA’s acting administrator. It demands to see a big pile of documents “related to the Karl study”. It will come a no surprise whatsoever to our regular readers that it references the leading actors in the David & Judy show!