Trouble is Gandalf, some people will always believe what they want to beleive and if you tell them what they want to beleive they will believe it ...

Scientists have the problem of having to accept the facts regardless of what they want to believe.   Who'd be a scientist, eh?

If you think abou it SC, there are no facts about anything, only observations....  We're slipping into philosophy here.... Everything you (think you) know is based on what you detect with your senses - there are no facts, merely thoughts derived from inputs....

So, I don't think your response separates climate science from any other learning.

Trouble is Gandalf, some people will always believe what they want to beleive and if you tell them what they want to beleive they will believe it ...

Scientists have the problem of having to accept the facts regardless of what they want to believe.   Who'd be a scientist, eh?

Solar Cycles wrote:

But in climate science there are no facts, merely observations!

Essan wrote:

Scientific observations are facts.   If one observes that the liquid reached boiling point at 96.2 seconds, then it is a fact that the liquid reached boiling point at 96.2 seconds.  Regardless of whether that is the result you wanted or expected.

Trouble is Gandalf, some people will always believe what they want to beleive and if you tell them what they want to beleive they will believe it ...

Scientists have the problem of having to accept the facts regardless of what they want to believe.   Who'd be a scientist, eh?

Essan wrote:

But in climate science there are no facts, merely observations!

Solar Cycles wrote:

 

Scientific observations are facts.   If one observes that the liquid reached boiling point at 96.2 seconds, then it is a fact that the liquid reached boiling point at 96.2 seconds.  Regardless of whether that is the result you wanted or expected.

Essan wrote:

Well on that basis there is no Man Made Anthro warming....

Trouble is Gandalf, some people will always believe what they want to beleive and if you tell them what they want to beleive they will believe it ...

Scientists have the problem of having to accept the facts regardless of what they want to believe.   Who'd be a scientist, eh?

Robertski wrote:

But in climate science there are no facts, merely observations!

Essan wrote:

 

Scientific observations are facts.   If one observes that the liquid reached boiling point at 96.2 seconds, then it is a fact that the liquid reached boiling point at 96.2 seconds.  Regardless of whether that is the result you wanted or expected.

Solar Cycles wrote:

Well on that basis there is no Man Made Anthro warming....

Essan wrote:

So why is it warmer in central London then?

I think he answered that one last week..... something about Parliament and hot air......

I have been perusing the Internet this evening and stumbled upon a site, called "Pete'sPlace".  It features an article by the one and only Roy Spencer, predictably setting out his case for the warming being not significant and there being insufficient proof of man's involvement.   It included a graph which has been constructed using alternative data and excluding tree rings.  So far so good.  

Following the link, you end up with a paper produced by a Craig Loehle, who works for the National Council for Air and Stream Improvement (yes, there is such a body).

Now I come to the point of the post....

In Loehle's paper it contains the statements:

• Other sites had data at irregular intervals. This data is now interpolated to put all data on the same annual basis. In Loehle (2007), interpolation was not done, but some of the data had already been interpolated before they were obtained, making the data coverage inconsistent. In order to use data with non-annual coverage, some type of interpolation is necessary, especially when the different series do not line up in dating.
• When missing values were encountered, means were computed for the sites having data.
• The corrected point estimates of global temperature anomalies produced by taking the mean of the smoothed deviations

Having recently experienced the righteous indignation of certain posters here about climate scientists 'manipulating the data' I just thought that the numerous references to adjusting the data were highly amusing, coming from a paper cited by Spencer presenting a sceptical position.  

Were this an A-level exam I would be tempted to say "Compare and contrast this approach to that adopted by climate scientists when confronted with similar issues with data.'

So the people who did the initial interpolating didn't just mess up their own work they messed up Craig's work too and made verification impossible.

And Gandalf blames Craig ?

Priceless.

Interpolation is not necessary or desirable, indeed it could be said to be fraudulent. If the raw uninterpolated data has no significance then interpolation does not add significance, merely speculation, and often speculation biased in some preferred direction at that.

If one cannot get a meaningful result without interpolation then no conclusions should be drawn until additional raw data is available.

Stephen, I will assume you have the lost temporarily the ability to read.   It is quite clear that Loehle did his own 'interpolation' - nice try, aiming the blame eslewhere, but it's not what the work states.

So, once again you have missed the point.

As far as I know, and clearly in the case of climate science, interpolation is necessary if you have incomplete records.  To suggest that it is fraudulent is, even by your standards, a quite bizarre suggestion.

I would agree that, in an ideal world, an explanation of the extrapolation would be provided - if that extrapolation is material to the conclusions being drawn from the data.

Gandalf, you said:

"In Loehle (2007), interpolation was not done, but some of the data had already been interpolated before they were obtained,"

So I can read after all.

Er no.  From my post above - in very clear English....

In Loehle's paper it contains the statements:

• Other sites had data at irregular intervals. This data is now interpolated to put all data on the same annual basis. In Loehle (2007), interpolation was not done, but some of the data had already been interpolated before they were obtained, making the data coverage inconsistent. In order to use data with non-annual coverage, some type of interpolation is necessary, especially when the different series do not line up in dating.
• When missing values were encountered, means were computed for the sites having data.
• The corrected point estimates of global temperature anomalies produced by taking the mean of the smoothed deviations

I was referring to the 2007 paper.

But I wasn't...

No I didn't, to be precise.... It was included in part of the piece I quoted - and is not relevant to the point I was making.

As you know perfectly well...

Well, if including it in the piece you quoted does not amount to mentioning it then of course you would be right.

It was highly relevant to the point that I wanted to make.

Craig had to do what he did in the later paper because the warmists had messed up the raw data for themselves, for him and for everyone else with no hope of verification.

Yet you criticised Craig for doing his best with their load of rubbish in a later paper.

Priceless.

That's not remotely close to what it says Stephen.  Is this wishful thinking on your part?

Cool It
Bjorn Lomborg with a more rational approach.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPUcfQS-slo

Bjorn Lomborg is associate professor of statistics in the Department of Political Science at the University of Aarhus, Denmark.

Clearly an expert on climate science.

Well done Four.

Oh, and how predictable Robert. 

I'm not sure that matters Gandalf. I haven't seen the film but from what I know of Lomborg and from viewing the trailer it seems to be about looking for a pragmatic political response to climate change. I think that's fair enough.

yes but it is not just Bjorn, is it?. Your response is equaly predictable..

Thanks NS.  Maybe I'll take a look.  My default position with anything Robertski posts is to check for sceptic bias....