Trawling through our National Archives, Lance Pidgeon has found stories of how a heatwave in 1932 was so extreme that it caused mass bird deaths across outback Australia. The PDF is posted on Warwick Hughes blog. As Lance says, imagine the headlines if that had happened 80 years later. Presumably some would blame coal, airconditioners, and SUV’s for “killing billions of birds”. These old newspaper records also raise questions about our national temperature databases. Things appeared to be hotter then, than history now records them? I’ve only had time for a quick look and a cut and paste.
Great numbers were killed alone by the fortnightly train to Alice Springs. These fell exhausted on the railway line. A large number flew into the fans in the carriages and perished. Thousands fell exhausted in water pools and were drowned. A letter from Minnie Downs told of the death of thousands of birds on one day. The temperature that day was 125 degrees in the shade— and there was no shade. One woman at Tarcoola filled a 40-gallon drum, with shell parrots in one afternoon. Trees actually snapped under the strain of flight after flight of birds which swarmed exhausted on them. More than 60,000 dead parrots, it was estimated, were in one dam. Dams and wells for hundreds of miles were piled with dead birds. In places the dead birds were lying two feet deep over the ground. Almost every bushman is a bird lover, and they saved thousands of their feathered friends.”
Note “figures run into billions.” and “The temperature that day was 125 degrees in the shade “. The original stories from the “Mammologist” and more here.
The birds had been doing well and spread farther north than normal… I gather some bounties had even been offered to cull them, but the heat appeared to do the job far more effectively than human hunters.
“From one of his dams he said he took out and burnt about five tons of Parrots. ‘ We made a net with wirenetting,’ he said, ‘and dragged it from one side to the other and then extracted the birds, as the fisherman does his fish.” From here.
There was a human toll from the 1939 heatwave too, more than a hundred people expiring.
The heat covered a huge area. Reports began to come in of phenomenal temperatures. The heatwave stretched far and wide. From Western Australia here to Tasmania, the papers all began to report the heat.
Lance finds many instances where newspaper describe record temperatures (121 – 126 F which is in the order of 50C+!) that don’t match current BOM data. Like this:
The Adelaide Advertiser, Sydney Morning Herald and Burnie advocate preserve the incredible high temperatures recorded at places like Ouyen on the 27th of January at 124 Degrees F (51.1 Degrees C). Here , Here and Here. For some reason that record is a no show at the BOM here. Note also that the Ouyen temperature is hotter than the BOM’s Australian record maximum temperature here.
Thanks to Lance for doing all the work, and Warwick Hughes for hosting the 5 page PDF.
I’m still at the Gold Symposium in Sydney. Most enjoyable. Good to meet the skeptics here too 🙂
The numbers sound amazing because most of us have never seen birds in such hugh flocks. However . . .
http://www.wbu.com/chipperwoods/photos/passpigeon.htm
“The Passenger Pigeon, once probably the most numerous bird on the planet, made its home in the billion or so acres of primary forest that once covered North America east of the Rocky Mountains. Their flocks, a mile wide and up to 300 miles long, were so dense that they darkened the sky for hours and days as the flock passed overhead.”
90
I recall reading that George Bass and Matthew Flinders recorded in their journal when making the first circumnavigation of Australia a flock of an incomprehensible number of birds flying very closed packed for a very long time. I think they may have been mutton birds.
80
Ted am Just back from Kangaroo island. While I was down there I was told that there were not many reports of penguins from the early visitors like Flinders until after the American seal hunters reduced the seal population. The locals who love the penguins seem very upset about some new fishing laws that will destroy the economy and grow the seal population. So the fishing industry and penguins may be wiped out together.
One day humans may be counted as being needed on this planet!
71
The temperature has increased since then making such events more likely.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1935/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1935/trend
336
And Hansel and Gretel ate parts of the witches house before she tricked and imprisoned them. Next fairy story please James, most of the ones you post here are old and stale. Regulars to this site have moved on from your infantile posts.
352
Typical response.
111
typically infantile of you to say so.
41
James even if those average temperatures were trustworthy this is about extremes not averages. While averages may have gone up extremes seem to have gone down in both frequency in amplitude. As one commenter on WUWT (NetDr) puts it here,
So surely if CO2 allows more heat to move horizontally without needing as much convection to move then both temperature extremes and weather extremes will be less now as CO2 helps to reduce the difference between extemes. I doubt CO2 is having much effect on anything at all but NOW TAKE ANOTHER LOOK AT YOUR OWN GRAPH. You can see the older extremes have a larger amplitude.
Lance
160
Your link is to post titled “Dear readers your help needed in fun crowdsourcing project”, be specific about where you get your data from.
They are yearly global temps, not localised daily or weekly measurements of extremes.
07
“be specific about where you get your data from.”
James. Who do think you can fool here with your antics?
My link was not to data and you had no trouble finding it or understanding where it was from.
“They are yearly global temps”
Again nobody is fooled but you.
This slight variation of your chart shows that it is NOT yearly data.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1916/to:1918/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1916/to:1918/trend
Now here is your challenge find any modern two year period with a greater amplitude variation than the one you have just been shown. Just one will be enough.
70
Global Monthly temps then. Jo’s post is not about a Global extreme.
Looking deeper at the PDF shows they are a bit causal with their anecdotal evidence.
Hobart was 33.9 on the 27th and the days either side were 22.6 & 18.4. Yeah a massive heat wave there!!
In 1932 Sydney had a max of 40.9 on the 22nd, with the days either side below 25. So Sydney had a hot day, not in the 45’s as stated in the report, nor was it “way beyond anything recent”. In 2010 Sydney recorded 41.3 as the highest in Jan and the monthly mean was 1.2 degrees hotter than in 1932. Feb’s monthly mean was 1.9 degrees hotter.
Well in 1932 it was. Now it stands with Oodnadatta. As for Port Augusta, the nearest station with long enough records is Snowtown. The monthly Jan average for 2001 exceeds that of 1932.
So much for anecdotal evidence.
06
James I will give you the benefit of the doubt here and just assume you were not reading carefully. You had me thinkin I had made a big mistake for a while.
“Sydney reached a temperature way beyond anything recent. With parts of the city at 113.6 degrees F(45.33 degrees C)”
Here is the bit you left off the beginning.
“During the heatwave of January 1939, the human toll went way over the hundred in both the number killed and the numbers of those who collapsed in the streets without even counting the toll from the fires.
30
You’re right, I didn’t note the change in year from that of the title of the document.
Concerning 1939 one hot day does not constitute a heatwave (In Australia, a heat wave is defined as five consecutive days at or above 35 °C (95 °F), or three consecutive days at or over 40 °C (104 °F).).
The Jan monthly mean for 2012 was equal to 1939, 2011 was hotter, as was 2010 and 2009. Considering we’ve been in La Nina conditions recently I am surprised we reach higher temps than a so called “record breaking heatwave of 1939”.
If you download Sydney data, plot a graph showing days at or over 40 and add a trendline, the trend goes upward. Do the same for at or over 30 degrees, the same result.
That’s local weather for you – right?
03
It’s only role in that document was to give a quick example of a human death toll. Apart of course from showing that extremes are normal in this country, the story was about bird deaths from heat, bounties and from having a war declared on them.
Ah so if a ” Wave” of “heat” 1000 degrees C rolls over the entire country slowly and burns all life to sand but does not linger any place for more than 2.9 days it is not a “heatwave”. Got it! I’ll bet that definition works well in the Antartic too!
The 1939 heatwave is well known and earnt ist’s name from it’s temperatures and duration in other parts of the country. There are other records apart from those on display from the BoM where the 15th Jan is missing for sydney observatory. There you will find Richmond RAAF (067033) only 49.4Km away has missing data made more suspicious by the bottom of the page showing the temperature for the 14th of Jan 1939(47.8 C or 118F) while it is missing from the main table. The modern replacement site Richmond RAAF(067105) has nothing near that high in recent times.
How can you be sure when a day of data is missing?
December 1938, Jan 1939 and Feb 1939 were extreme La Nina.
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/enso/climaterisks/years.risk.html
Is that UHI?
20
“You’re right, I didn’t note the change in year from that of the title of the document.”
You are not the only one James. My bad proof reading is just as much to blame!
We have added “1939” to the line above to reduce the confusion.
“There was a human toll from the 1939 heatwave too, more than a hundred people expiring.”
10
James, that is the very point in question as Jo says: These old newspaper records also raise questions about our national temperature databases ….
Begging the question (Latin petitio principii, “assuming the initial point”) is a type of logical fallacy in which a proposition relies on an implicit premise within itself to establish the truth of that same proposition (Wiki).
170
Anecdotal evidence raises anecdotal questions.
09
Which each raise many many more questions until it can be clearly seen that describing each and every tip of the iceberg as “anecdotal” was just a stunt akin to name calling delay tactic. How many contradictions and exposed errors and omissions will it take?
60
No, not name calling at all. Just pointing out that the evidence cannot be verified.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anecdotal_evidence
15
Aw James, are you just getting used to evidence that can’t be verified?
50
So much for “The Science is Settled”
50
That’s right James, there is enough anecdotal evidence now to suggest that the entire BOM temperature record from 1900 has been corrupted to conform to the CAGW narrative and that a thorough and independent audit be carried out by a future LNP government.
61
You might be startled to read about the 16 year pause in global warming
And given that CAGW is based on the following logical chain – Increasing Atmospheric CO2 -> Increased Warm Temps -> Climate Effects.
The break in the chain at the middle – means that there can be no change in climate effects over the last 16 years.
Or do you propose that the middle part of the change be swapped for “magic” or perhaps “faith” is more appropriate in your case?
200
No I’m not startled to read that on WUWT. Ignoring the OHC and focussing on one surface temp record for a specific amount of years might lead to such a conclusion.
The data shows heat accumulates in the ocean –> http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/
A scientist considers ALL evidence rather than cherry picking one of several temperature records.
111
Right… The heat from the atmospheric greenhouse effect doesn’t make itself apparent in the atmosphere but rather in the ocean…
Could you care to explain how the atmosphere heats the ocean without the atmosphere being hot itself? Please keep in mind that the only the very bottom layer of the atmosphere only can warm the very top layer of the ocean (unlike for eg the sun which can penetrate deeper). But wait, the greenhouse effect is meant to occur much higher in the atmosphere.
So this is your chain of logic.
The Upper atmosphere is being warmed by greenhouse effect, which than transfers heat to lower atmosphere which then transfers heat to top surface of ocean which then transfers heat to deeper water.
And you accept that this heat “accumulates” in the ocean which is why we can’t find any warming in the atmosphere?
91
The warming occurs in the atmosphere too. This graph is on Roy Spencer’s website – a well known “skeptic”.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_Sep_2012_v5.5.png
OR get it, and the data from here: http://woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/plot/uah/trend
Perhaps you didn’t realise UAH measures the atmosphere? Today is then a great day, you learn something about temps, we learn something about you.
19
Looks a lot like a sine wave that is not complete yet. Are you in a state of terrible fear fifty times every second that the 240AC mains Voltage is going to get too high?
71
Which is the better statistical representation of the data James – a linear regression or a best fit polynomial?
30
Richard, I imagine you’d quite a few mathematical formulas to fit better than linear regression.
03
Whoops – my apologies – I didn’t pick up that James’ last sentence “A scientist considers ALL evidence rather than cherry picking one of several temperature records.” included a link.
James – ask your self this question – where does GISS get the Rest of the World data from? – I.e. non CONUS data.
50
James says…
The 30+ year plot shows warming which is not controversial.
The question is – what has happened over the last 15 years, and what does the CAGW hypothesis predict should happen.
Does the hypothesis match the measured data or not?
40
Richard – are you suggesting that the temp record follows a polynomial? i.e. at some stage it will spiral unendingly upwards or downwards? And at its origin it started there?
A polynomial fit to the temperature data is completely meaningless, especially if you are using it to predict anything. WHich of course is how it is always presented with the future tailing down and down and down.
14
Richard I note that “polynomials are worthless outside the range of the observed data”
http://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=is%20a%20polynomial%20regression%20useful%20to%20predict&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CB8QFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.stat.lsu.edu%2Ffaculty%2Fgeaghan%2Fexst7034%2Ffall2005%2Fpdf%2F17-polynomials.pdf&ei=vbmHULqzL-qWiQeXwIDgDg&usg=AFQjCNE8ikpnqBnKP4WcDGypczdYXSWYhQ
12
James, Mattb
The best representation of data returns the best coefficient of determination (R2). For temperature data (unless it is essentially linear), a polynomial returns an R2 value closer to 1. Sure there’s a bunch of trend types but we’re disputing linear vs polynomial (even curvilinear):-
A polynomial is the more useful SHORT-TERM predictor e.g. MATLAB or Excel. Obviously there are limits to the length of prediction.
No, other way round and it changes as new data is added (Scafetta’s oversight in HadCRUT3 recently)
20
>”I note that “polynomials are worthless outside the range of the observed data””
Your URL doesn’t work but not everyone agrees with you:-
POLYNOMIAL FORECASTING
http://www.mooretechllc.com/PolynomialForecasting.pdf
20
The thing about choosing your fit is that if you choose a polynomial, then you have a lot more parameters to play with, and of course you get a better fit. There is a statistical test that tells you whether (say) a quadratic fit (3 parameters) is better than a linear fit (2 parameters), allowing for the extra parameter the quadratic gives you. For most graphs that look roughly linear, the linear fit turns out to be best.
22
See previous statement and consider ALL evidence.
02
@Richard C (NZ)
I see Roy’s Polynomial ends higher than it begins. Back to the point of the argument – the atmosphere has warmed.
02
>”I see Roy’s Polynomial ends higher than it begins. Back to the point of the argument – the atmosphere has warmed”
Great that you’re discovering multi-decadal oscillation and yes the atmosphere has warmed but so what?
What is the trend in the data right now?
Clue: it’s the poly trend that represents the data better (R2 closer to 1) than linear due to the fluctuation.
Roy’s poly trend is changing as the new data comes in. Nicola Scafetta has built his model on a rising quadratic established in HadCRUT3 some years back but that is invalid now (negative EMD inflexion in HadSST2/3). So even though his model is tracking better than any other right now, Dan Pangburn’s will usurp it soon because Scafetta’s assumption has been to project a fixed quadratic that isn’t fixed and no longer a quadratic.
The IPCC projections (predictions) are essentially just the curvilinear rise of the forcing expression dF = 5.35 ln(C/Co). That’s proven to be a fallacy this century:-
http://curryja.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/christy-fig.jpg?w=808&h=622
20
I’m well aware of oceans oscillations and failed attempts to blame it for long term warming – so what?
The trend “right now” is as SHORT TERM as it gets. Cherry picking is not good practice.
The IPCC projections have no way of knowing actual aerosols emission rates for forthcoming years, no way of knowing how long extended solar minimums will last.
But let’s for a moment consider “skeptics” predictions – http://www.skepticalscience.com/comparing-global-temperature-predictions.html
HA! Still waiting for Jo to make one. Can’t trust the models! So let’s use a pocket calculator then.
03
>”But let’s for a moment consider “skeptics” predictions”
I notice Akasofu gets the 21st century trajectory right. As does Scafetta (conspicuously missing from SkS):-
http://www.oarval.org/Scafetta_thumb.png
Laptop model makes the IPCC supercomputed GCM projections look silly.
http://curryja.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/christy-fig.jpg?w=808&h=622
Although we now know that the Russian Academy of Sciences has got the 21st century trajectory right in an update to that graph. I guessing they might have got the gas characteristics and radiative transfer right i.e. conforming to established science (Hottel/Leckner pathlength curves):-
http://tallbloke.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/eggert-co2.png
CO2 forcing ineffective past 200 ppm.
>”The trend “right now” is as SHORT TERM as it gets”
If CO2 forcing is not evident over the last 15 years, I think we can forget about it being the planet’s “control knob”
40
>”The data shows heat accumulates in the ocean –>”
By NODC. By UKMO just the opposite in the ARGO era:-
http://bobtisdale.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/figure-7.png
Plenty of heat accumulating in Hansen’s 2005 model mean though.
40
Thanks. Now wheres the rest of the data, or does the ocean only go to 700 meters now?
03
>”Now wheres the rest of the data, or does the ocean only go to 700 meters now?”
The mixed layer (relevant to the flux to surface and used by modelers) varies from about 10m to a little over 1000m on rare occasions but predominantly less than about 500m. Planetary boundary layer (pbl) is similar.
Paul K at The Blackboard creates a one-heat-sink model (single ocean heat capacity model) to assess net flux (among other things) graphed here:-
http://rankexploits.com/musings/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/bestmatchrevisedtemp-500×375.jpg
Fromm ‘Pinatubo Climate Sensitivity and Two Dogs that didn’t bark in the night’
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2012/pinatubo-climate-sensitivity-and-two-dogs-that-didnt-bark-in-the-night/
Adding mixed layer heat to deep heat matches observations but the effective level is very shallow. Quote:-
The period being about 3 years. Skeptical Science and Nuccitelli et al would have us believe that such data is only “noise” and 5 year smoothed data used down to 2000m depth (at least).
If you look at O-GCM papers, there’s plenty to show that a one-heat-sink model like Paul K uses is perhaps oversimplifying things e.g.:-
Lorbacher, Dommenget, Niiler and Kohl 2005 ‘Ocean mixed layer depth: A subsurface proxy of ocean-atmosphere variability’:-
http://ecco.mit.edu/pdfs/reports/report_38.pdf
HEAT AND SALINITY VARIABILITY OVER THE UPPER-OCEAN IN TWO GLOBAL RE-ANALYSES [1960 – 2006, 0 – 300m, 0 – 500m]
S. Masina, S. Dobricic, P. Di Pietro, N. Pinardi
http://www.godae.org/~godae-data/Symposium/posters/S4.36-046_S_Masina-INGV-CMCC.pdf
Fig 4: Integrated Heat Content Anomaly time series, top 300m (A) and top-bottom [0 – 500m] (B)
Global 0 – 300m (cyclical, 2006 at early 1960s level)
Global 0 – 500m (compare (B) to NOAA 0 – 700m http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/ ……..different profiles, GODAE cyclical, large differences 2000 – 2006 climatologies)
North Pacific (no increase, cyclical)
North Atlantic (spectacular increase)
Indian (no increase since 1980)
A similar but more recent paper updates that analysis:-
‘GLOBAL OCEAN RE-ANALYSIS FOR CLIMATE APPLICATIONS’
Simona Masinaa Pierluigi Di Pietrob, Andrea Stortoa and Antonio Navarraa, 2011
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0377026511000145)
Shown is the 0 – 700m Global Ocean (cyclical), North Atlantic (spectacular rise) and North Pacific (cyclical) differences starkly contrasted:-
Fig. 12. Heat content (0–700 m) time series (10^22 J) calculated as anomalies with respect to each climatology for the global ocean (a), North Atlantic (b) and North Pacific (c).
http://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0377026511000145-gr12.jpg
In other words, the NOAA/Willis/Levitus et al/Nuccitelli et al climatology is not the only OHC dataet and global OHC rise is NOT global.
And basically, if there’s no anthro signal in the 0 – 700m layer, there’s no anthro signal.
40
“Thanks. Now wheres the rest of the data, or does the ocean only go to 700 meters now?”
And what if you don’t find the missing heat? Why stop there? Keep digging, eventually you might get to through bedrock and on through the earth’s mantle and eventually you’ll discover the hot molten metal core of the earth.
Bingo! Proof of global warming at last!
50
Jeepers, so many links to blogger images/research and little cement to your arguments. Try forming proper sentences in future.
I point out that the ocean is much deeper than 700m, you respond with evidence from 0-300m, 0-500m and 0-700m!
The data shows heat gaining even below 700m, regardless of whether a “skeptics” is able to explain or understand how the heat is transferred.
http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/
03
>”so many links to blogger images/research”
Read the papers (scientific literature) and you might learn something about upwards heat flux
>”…and little cement to your arguments”
Little needed, All supported by the literature.
>”I point out that the ocean is much deeper than 700m, you respond with evidence from 0-300m, 0-500m and 0-700m!”
Yes because that’s where the anthro signal would be (but it’s not) and that’s where the O-GCM modelers determine the observed SST from climatological OHC and simulated OHC flux (read the papers linked).
>”The data shows heat gaining even below 700m, regardless of whether a “skeptics” is able to explain or understand how the heat is transferred”
No-one has any idea when deep ocean heat was deposited, it could have been decades or centuries ago and has been transported horizontally by current systems since. There is no way you or anyone can isolate an anthro signal in the deep ocean.
Then you have the problem of around 30,000 plus hydrovents pumping superheated water (up to 400 C) into the deep ocean in seismically active and climate-critical regions (e.g. East Pacific) predominantly at 2000 – 2500m depth – how do you isolate that heat from (supposed) anthro heat?
40
@Richard C (NZ)
And yes, they do know when the heat was deposited because it wasn’t there before, and now it is. I look forward to you presenting science on hydrovents showing the amount of heat is it causing.
I do read the papers. They say heat continues to accumulate in the oceans.
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/pip/2012GL051106.shtml
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2011/2011GL048794.shtml
01
And a third one for you to pnder.
Evidence for external forcing on 20th-century climate from combined ocean-atmosphere warming patterns
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2012/2012GL053262.shtml
01
Ho hum, James @ various.
Amazing that all the crap you submit still adds up to a big fat zero.
No statistically significant warming over the last 16 years. So live with that very tangible fact of life.
And get one…a life, that is. Either that or go post your crap where someone might care.
00
@Mark, you seem to be quoting only surface temps again. Down the ladder you go.
01
James, the only ocean heat inputs are solar and geo. Since GHGs are not ocean heating agents, the “external” forcing has to be a combination of those two only and the most recent solar/cloudiness observations converted to forcings support that.
Linear trends from 1955 or 1961 completely ignores what has gone on in the post 2003 ARGO era (the best OHC data available ,even Hansen agrees). UKMO shows 0 – 700m OHC peaked out in 2003, NODC presents the opposite from the same datasets. Someone is fibbing.
Given the SST polynomial trend is down, I’m inclined to think it is NODC doing the fibbing. I Note Levitus et al state “excluding some Argo float data”. When that data is left in – as I assume UKMO do – it’s a different story in the ARGO era.
In any case, SST and OHC are not following an almost monotonic curvilinear CO2 rise – there’s no correlation whatsoever despite Levitus et al’s arm waving and complete absence of physical mechanism.
20
@Richard C (NZ), take your own advice, read the science.
01
James says…
[1] You can read the full story at the Daily Mail where you will find the UK Met Office quoted to say that…
[2] So what is wrong with the Hadcrut 4 temperature database – why does it diverge from the expected warming? OR – Is there something wrong with the theory of Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming in that it has been predicting a warming in the atmosphere that hasn’t occurred.
[3] Is the UK Met office simply wrong to state that “there has only been a very small amount of warming in the 21st Century.“?
[4] You seem to be “focussing on one surface temp record for a specific amount of years” – to use your words. Is this a case of “It’s wrong if you do it – but right if I do it”? I will give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume that this is just a mistake – and that you are not being a hypocrite.
[5] That’s an excellent suggestion – perhaps you may like to reconsider that you have only linked to the 3M_HEAT_CONTENT data and what that action looks like in the light of your last sentence.
[6] Speaking of science – what is the specific part of the Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming hypothesis that predicts that the following will occur
—(a) While CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is increasing by approximately 30 ppm over an approximately 15 year time frame.
—(b) The atmosphere will show no statistically significant warming over the same time frame.
—(c) The Oceans will show rising heat content
—-Looking for predictions made in and around 1997.
[7] Also speaking of science – if a 16 year pause in atmospheric warming does not shake your faith in CAGW – what specific, measurable events would refute the hypothesis of Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming – I.e. What are the falsification Criteria.
I just want to be sure that we are discussing science – and not pseudo-science, – You do know the difference don’t you?
80
“what specific, measurable events would refute the hypothesis of Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming – I.e. What are the falsification Criteria”
Now you’ve asked the million dollar question. Unfortunately I have never EVER received an answer to this question by any CAGW adherent.
James, or Matt B would you care to offer one now? Or will ignore this question and prove once and for all how unscientific your faith in CAGW truly is.
Time starts now…
60
[1] Seems they have misquoted. The Met site does NOT contain that statement.
[2] Who’s suggesting it is wrong and for what reason? I’m saying you should consider ALL evidence.
[3] Find the MET saying that first, not some blog making up words.
[4] As stated on many occasions, I am happy to consider ALL evidence, not just OHC. Surface temps, Atmospheric temps, OHC, Radiation balance, melting ice and glaciers, plant and animal species migration, sea level rise.
[5] It’s the simplest most obvious one that effectively counters your argument. But please be my guest and read more science on the matter.
[6] Why do you require such a thing? Will that stop the planet from warming?
[7] I don’t have faith in AGW. I’ll believe whatever the data presents. At the moment, looking at ALL the data, the planet is still gaining heat.
03
James,
[1] & [3] I’ll recheck that.
[2] If you have a series of observations – you need to be able to fit them all within your theoretical framework – or else you have problems with the theory.
[4] Is Ok – we are in agreement.
[5] Is OK too – obsoleted by more recent comments.
[6] Having testable predictions matters – otherwise you don’t have a theory – just disconnected observations without a framework in which to understand them.
[7] Your response is a non answer. Please re-read the question – it goes to the heart of your methodology.
30
James.
WRT [1] & [3].
From your link Met Office News you will find the following comment below the post by a Mr Dave Britton – who apparently works for the Met Office.
I think that that pretty convincingly answers point [1] and [3] above.
BTW: 0.03 degrees per decade is hardly alarming? That would be 0.3 degrees in a century. This is well below UN IPCC predictions of 0.2 degrees per decade.
30
[1] Dave Britton (not the MET) is referring to the HadCRUT4 surface temperature data, not to a question about planetary heat. If you read further, Dave Britton goes on to mention Foster and Rahmstorf who remove the noise to find a clearer warming signal.
[2] Or your observations are not complete enough. Please be properly skeptical.
[5] Obsoleted by what? Reference please.
[6] Sure test the theory, test alternate ones too. Let’s compare? What you got?
[7] It’s an answer – just not one you like. Flipping it around – why would you ignore all other sources of evidence and only focus on hadcrut4?
01
Hi James,
WRT [7] your still not getting it.
You need to be able to demonstrate that you do not have an “Unquestionable Assumption” – Such assumptions are indistinguishable from dogma.
The way to do it is to consider what are the events that if they were to occur would refute the hypothesis of CAGW.
For example – would a period of cooling that lasted 30 years while CO2 concentrations increased from 394 to 454 ppm falsify the hypothesis of CAGW?
My concern is that if you have that the hypothesis of CAGW is beyond questioning – then you have a dogma – and are not capable of thinking clearly about CAGW.
10
“The temperature has increased since then making such events more likely.”
And right on cue, here is an example of just such an event caused by increased temperature.
http://www.news.com.au/news/sudden-cold-weather-and-fog-sees-thousands-of-migrating-birds-plunge-into-the-sea-and-drown-off-english-coast/story-fnejlrpu-1226504405193
00
If I died in a 1932 heatwave, and then didn;t die again in a 2012 heatwave, would that make the 1932 heatwave worse? Or would it mean I wasn’t there to die?
126
Mattb there had been worse heat waves before and after that heatwave. 1896 and 1939 are examples. So your question in context with this translates to… Was the heat worse back then or did natural cycles increase the bird population via an abnormal period of cold and damp near the beginning of the 20th century?
Which do you think Mattb?
110
who knows… I’ll toss in changes in vegetation spread caused by land clearing, and fewer sources of water than in previous hot spells (ie a hot day vs a hot day in the middle of a drought, and also land management practices leading to fewer year round water sources). The options are limitless. But indeed a hot hot summer after a few temperate ones with good winter rainfall, coupled with land use changes => deaths.
It is also possible that nowadays there are more sources of year round water, better managed vegetation buffers etc. WHo knows, certainly no one who’s source of information is this particular blog post.
111
who’s – apology for apostrophe abuse.
211
.
Actually it’s a spelling abuse Matt.
The word you’re struggling for is “whose”.
110
MV I had originally typed “no one who’s relying on this…” and edited but didn’t correct the who, if you must know.
18
.
It’s okay Matt, no need to explain.
I wouldn’t have even bothered commenting except that the error being in the middle of a sentence condemning the collective intelligence of this blog quite tickled my funny bone.
Even then I would not have commented had you not drawn attention to your own error –
and got your correction wrong!
Something to do with people in glass houses throwing stones I believe.
.
Priceless.
150
Whatever… I guess you thought I thought I should have put Whos’? I wasn’t condemning the collective intelligence of this blog in the slightest.
011
Mattb are you saying that droughts and some supposed effects of land clearing were worse back then than in 2012?
50
for sure some combined effects of land management would have been worse back then… but I’m not suggesting either way to be honest. It is a meaningless observation of a localised event in the past.
211
My guess is that there is less cleared land today than back in, say, the 1940’s.
Because graziers and wheat farmers have learned that clearing marginal land for more pasture or cropping isn’t economical. Since the 1980’s numerous economic studies have shown that abandoning marginal country to go back to bush and focusing the agri-business on the prime land is the way to go.
The trend toward reforestation is also reinforced by demographics. The bush has depopulated. Farmers are an old lot and getting older. Most of their kids today would rather sell the farm when inherited rather than work it. There are fewer people in the bush today than there were in 1900. Less horse, bullock and rabbit as well. There are less sheep in Australia today than in 1920. Might be more black angus and stupid Lamas today.
There is definitely far more roo and wallaby today than in 1900, because no one depends on them for afternoon tea today.
I drive the Leichhardt from Goondiwindi to Rocky often. All the way, where the land is marginal millions of hectares are slowly returning to stands of bush. Northeast NSW once had a thousand dairies… almost all of those have been divided into tree change properties or for specialty crops like coffee, tea, spliff or orchards that use only the best bits. The rest becomes landscaped for diversity or goes back to the wild. In NSW continuous greenbelts are forming between the national parks and state forest, leaving only a few major highways, like the Pacific, as barriers between faunal breeding colonies.
The same reforestation trend is happening all over Australia and North America without a single lame Greenie planting a single bloody tree. It’s just happening naturally.
So when you hear the mindless mantra: “The loss of native vegetation and habitat is a major threat to Australia’s environment.” That’s bullshit. The bush is getting better and bigger every day and will continue to do so, at least until we sell the bush to the Chinese.
162
note 3 downs for me, and one up for Wes, even though we appear to agree?
113
Mattb where exactly did Wes say “It is a meaningless observation of a localised event in the past.”
I think Wes understands that the claims of increasing extremes are scare stories used to prey on those inflicted first with indoctrinated ignorance of the many old and not many recent events just like this one which was localised all the way from Western Australia to Tasmania.
110
Wes George:
I think you mean Llamas or maybe Alpacas.
Stupid Lamas live in the inner cities and swallow green stuff.
20
Who knows?
Ecactly!
Out here in the southern MDB the bird population has exploded.
That certainly doesn’t match the ‘consensus’.
Who knows?
30
Or maybe it was simply hotter then than now?
50
.
Mattb
October 23, 2012 at 2:32 pm · Reply
So this is your answer to explain this occurance in 1932?
Sorry – what about 1899 – was land management even worse in the Gulf of Carpentaria & Cape York? Look up Cyclone Mahina where over 400 people were killed as a result. Also considered as the worst cyclone recorded in recorded current history in Australia.
So which one is your answer:
1. CAGW caused both (cyclone and heatwave)?
2. CAGW caused one only (heatwave)?
3. CAGW caused one only (cyclone)?
4. CAGW caused neither?
5. CAGW con trick is the cause of all your answers?
6. None of the above (new explanation)?
7. Refer Flim Flam Man for explanation?
8. Election coming up (I can’t answer truthfully)?
Hint: check heatwaves & floods prior and after the dates mentioned above.
30
I have listened to first hand accounts of heatwaves in 1896/97. I can assure you we have had nothing like it since.
One old timer kept in his house candles that were bent and pointing downwards, this was the summer of 96/97. Warm enough inside to soften candle wax is what temperature?
100
Any temperature you like, depending on what they were made from.
Were they made on the farm or bought?
If farm made they could have been tallow based and fairly low melting point. As these stink, and the farmer saved the bent candles, it would seem not so, and that such melting was unusual.
With paraffin wax; might be 50-55℃ MP (most likely) or possibly 60-65℃ grade. The addition of stearic acid as a ‘hardening agent’ (raised MP) was well known by then.
With animal wax;
A higher MP could be achieved by converting the tallow to stearic acid, as in soap making. The MP would depend on the amount of oleic left after processing. Pure stearic acid has a melting point of 72℃, but the usual grades are around 60-65℃. I think we can rule out beeswax, which was rather expensive. Spermaceti (from whales) use would have been declining by then.
Note that all these will deform slowly at temperatures somewhat below their melting ranges. I would guess paraffin wax type with additive(s) and a deformation temperature around 50℃. Hot enough?
30
In Adelaide, in the 50s and 60s, the summer heat regularly made our Christmas candles droop into shapes that would elicit vulgar remarks from people less nicely bred than the readers of this blog.
60
I’d have to agree Sliggy. I think Adelaide’s worst heat wave was just a few years ago, rather than back in 1896 or 1939.
03
It means you now have air conditioning in the malls, at work and home.
There was one heat related death in the pink batts episode.
kk
60
“It means you now have air conditioning in the malls, at work and home.”
not much use if they don’t have a decent electricity supply though.
Smart meters to shut down those air-cons, just when they are most needed.. that’s the future.
80
That seems like a ridiculous analogy Mattb, (from one you once accused of having the brain the size of a pea, fortunately I don’t give a rats, I’ve been insulted by experts!). If I died on a particularly dangerous corner in a 1971 Holden but somehow survived in the same model 30 years later what does that tell you about a) me, the crap driver b) the corner an c) the cars. The second part of your question seems to be some sort of existential sidebar which I suspect you placed as an afterthought. We pea brains can see through that stuff.
20
just to add to all this on a lighthearted note:
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100185903/freedom-of-speech-is-deader-in-australia/
Jo was mentioned in JD’s blog. I thought you all might like a good read. To the above, never ceases to amaze me how the warmist brigade seize upon anything which might bolster their faltering take on reality yet carefully airbrush, deny or simply ditch any data which doesn’t fit their world view. A bit like some of the early archeologists of yore who would discard any facts which did not suit their theories at the time.
cheers and keep up the good work – we all need good analysis and reporting in order to form our views and assist our understanding of nature.
Bill
100
Quote J Delingpole:
“Why are not their crappy environmental correspondents, their hysterical leftist beardies (that means YOU, Jon Faine) and their vast batteries of union-protected support staff being subjected to a day or two’s lecturing on hard climate science by Ian Plimer or Bob Carter?”
.
That would be because the Australian Gillard GreenLaboUr Government is so afraid of what Plimer has to say, that ‘they’ have their own propaganda pages against Plimer.
⚛
Much like Albert Einstein’s response to the 1931 pamphlet “100 authors against Einstein,” commissioned by the German Nazi Party as a clumsy contradiction to the Relativity Theory, said, “If I were wrong, then one would have been enough.
90
Yes, you nailed it with the Einstein quote. Climate “skeptics” are a lot like Einstein nutters. They have a lot of different reasons why Einstein was wrong. Climate “skeptics” have a lot of reasons why AGW is wrong. Just one would do. Of course, those who stick to just one reason (the Slayers) are certified nutcases (sorry, but its true). All the other “skeptics” simply jump on any passing bandwagon, no matter how rickety.
15
Johnny,
After all the years you’ve hung out on Jo’s blog, you can’t think of a single reasonable observation that falsifies the CAGW hypothesis?
Who’s the nutter?
You exhibit the classic symptoms of a clinical case of psychological denial. Better get it checked out before it develops into full blown Climate Change Dementia as listed in DSM IV, and you start sequestering your poo in the freezer.
The power of human beings to be absolutely dead blind to some obvious reality right before their very eyes is awe inspiring. Yet these same people can drive cars, do the shopping and hold down a job, in short, navigate through life without bumping into walls or falling down wells. The blindness is utterly selective.
It is not because cognitively it is more difficult to figure out that CAGW can not possibly be a useful description of the climate, than it is to navigate to Woolies and execute a shopping list.
No, something else is going on. Something emotional… something to do with the reptilian part of the brain seizing control of the neo-cortex whenever a certain idea threatens to come into focus, throttling conscious awareness for a moment. Paradoxically, these seizures of conscious awareness can occur even while the patient is driving in city traffic without any loss of control of the vehicle.
Remarkable.
21
Who kept the records?
My father told me that in 1939 from memory Merriwa, NSW, topped the state temperature reading for a number of consecutive days at a very high figure for that area, from memory he said 119 degrees, about 48 Celsius.
One of the local gentry objected violently to this blackening of Merriwa’s reputation, and the record was changed.
The highest temp that ever I saw there was 45 Celsius, once in January 1964? and three consecutive November days in about 1968.
70
Ted did a little search for you and found Merriwa at 119F on one day in 1939 but it seems to have been beaten on that day by Ivanhoe at 122F.
This could be one of those consecutive days.
http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/39021897?zoomLevel=5
20
Hey, that’s funny. Ivanhoe “set a new record” recently of 47C, which from my memory was an average day. 122F = 50C – 3C more than the recent “record”. The climate history revisionists strike again!
60
Beer Whispere. To put things in perspective the highest temperature recorded anyplace in Australia with the now massive network and all the UHIs in…
Jan 2012 was 117.5 F
Jan 2011 was 119.3 F
Jan 2010 was 120.6 F
Jan 2009 was 120.2 F
Jan 2008 was 120.6 F
Jan 2007 was 117.3 F
Jan 2006 was 118.8 F
Jan 2005 was 118.2 F
Jan 2004 was 119.3 F
Jan 2003 was 120 F
Jan 2002 was 118.4 F
Jan 2001 was 118.4 F
Jan 2000 was 115.7 F
It beats the 21st century so far!
The above have been converted to F from here.
20
It’s 48.5C (119.3F) on 15 February 2004 on Wikipedia, so it must be true i guess. Never mind we came home from Sydney January 1980 and the day before was reported as 51C at Ivanhoe and 50C at Hillston, further south-east. Mum reckons it was hotter in the 60s, although anecdotal evidence is the domain of the warmists. To hear years later of a “record” that was beaten every day for two weeks straight two decades before is hard to swallow. Australia is insanely hot, and always has been.
60
I don’t believe any maximum temp over 48.
03
Thanks for that.
10
Proof that Nature is self-regulating. The heat wave was caused by all the CO2 those birds were breathing out. After they died and the CO2 was absorbed the temperatures dropped. If we want to avoid that sort of heat wave in the future, we should all stop breathing.
“The temperature that day was 125 degrees in the shade— and there was no shade.”
So how do they know it was 125 degrees in the shade?
“One woman at Tarcoola filled a 40-gallon drum, with shell parrots in one afternoon.”
Superfluous comma. Reading that must have caused the superfluous comma in
“Things appeared to be hotter then, than history now records them?”
70
Thousands of budgies flock to outback waterholes
Updated Mon Oct 22, 2012
Anthony Molyneux from the Alice Springs Desert Park says the explosion of budgie numbers is a rare phenomenon.
“The largest flock I’ve seen is about 5,000,” he said.
“I was sitting on a dam wall and they flew up and around me.
It gave me goose bumps.
It’s an experience that I will never forget and will stay with me forever.
• Apparently, alarmist global warming will do that….☺
40
2 weeks ago I saw the largest flock (?) of ducks I have ever seen. When they were startled, they blocked out the sun.
10
Back in the 80s, cockatoos swarmed on the cricket ovals and ate them in a single day. Droughts become rather obvious in those circumstances. Still not as funny as the neighbour who had his new timber deck eaten in a single afternoon!
20
And not one fossil formed from billions of dead birds spread over a continent.
Perhaps the Lyellian “the key to the past is the present” needs reviewing in light of this data.
73
cuckoo?
011
Acknowledging your own reality? Or lack thereof…
60
Every Autumn, just before winter, when I’m walking in the bush, just before it turns really cold.
Spread across the track and undergrowth, there are puffs of feathers where a bird used to be.
And somewhere in the scrub nearby is a red belly black with a full belly ready for winter.
No wonder there are no fossilised birds.
They were all eaten.
KK 🙂
20
OK Louis, name your timeframe and your evidence.
00
.
GA
Ok – I’ll take a punt!
1. Name your time frame? (50 million years ago to 20 million years ago.)
2. Name your evidence? (Canberra Birds Notes)
Name some parrot, masked owl, frogmouth or kingfisher fossils from this period?
00
Dave thanks for the comment.
I’m not sure what you are asking exactly. Louis seemed to be implying that there are no fossil records for birds (none,zero) which is patently not true. If Louis had replied I would have given him a small sample of the many publications describing such fossils in Australia, and asked him to bug his local vertebrate or avian museum curator if he wanted to view some.
I also would have conceded the point that flighted birds are underrepresented in the fossil record. Can you guess why? For the same reason, they are even underrepresented as sub fossils in recent times when people wrote about and drew them (so we have independent evidence that there were birds flying about).
If by your question you are asking if fossils have been uncovered for ancestral forms of every bird group throughout their evolution then I wont attempt to answer. I’m sure most readers know why. If your question was otherwise can you please clarify.
10
Mods: sorry for the bold above. It was meant for only the word “flighted”
(Fixed) CTS
00
ta
00
Whoever first thought of appropriating the weather as a partisan brickbat to bludgeon his political opponents with was an evil genius.
As in… The Greens support fine weather… Vote Green for Good Rains and Cool Evenings. Liberals support Austerity and Drought!
This is exactly the sort of catastrophe that the politically savvy Greens have set themselves up to take advantage of. All the Greens have to do is wait patiently on the political sidelines honing their demagoguery for the day when it comes…
We can only imagine the political fall-out should something like this happen today…. the lynch mobs in the streets, the ABC 24/7 propaganda blitz and the calls for parliament to past new legislation banning drought and heat waves. The calls for state licensed blogs and the suspension of Habeas corpus by our “progressive public intellectuals.”
The reputation of thousands of journalists, academics researchers, politicians and the careers of thousands of technocrats in Gillard’s 37 different climate change programs depend on catastrophic weather visiting us soon… before the political tides change.
That’s sick.
110
It is sick; they are like vultures; may the political change be like the heatwave of 1932 and these vultures be struck from the skies!
81
Birds fell out of the sky on the Nullabor in the summer of 1978/79. I did not see it but remember it well; on the strength of those reports I left a stinking hot Adelaide at 2am the next morning bound for Perth on a motorcycle. I thought I might have to do most of the trip in short sections, not wishing to risk cooking the motor during the heat of the day or collect a camel, wombat, emu or kangaroo at night. A cool change of sorts arrived while I was re-fuelling in Port Augusta and I got into my leathers and took advantage of the relatively benign condtions. Can’t remember what the temperatures were out there the day the birds were dropping but the cool change was short lived, the next evening when I rode into Perth it was quite hot, the maximum had been 44 C (from memory). This would have been near the beginning of the recent warming period, would it not?
42
j.b. I rode over to Perth and back to Canberra in 1986 and was amazed at all the dead things on the road early each morning and how they were all cleaned up by the birds during the day. The following morning dead things all over again. Three and a half days riding over and the same on the way back. No night riding at all there as you say it is far too risky. “short sections” What?! There are no short sections. I think the motor would be happier with a long steady high speed of wind than idling at city traffic lights. The recent warming period began in the year 1739 did it not?.
00
Australia’s carbon tax con: A video from the Phillipines explaining the long term damage the tax and emissions trading is doing to our nation and to us;
http://kzoo.co/VfEZvW
30
In Newcastle in the fifties we had plagues of birds that got into roof cavities,
crapped all over the placed and brought lice and black death to town.
Not sure about the black death, but.
They were all poisoned and people lived healthily ever after.
KK
Starting to feel itchy.
30
Thank you Jo, I am never let down when I check in to this site, the warmists must despise this site.
80
don’t know how to copy from here, but some temps for the 32 heatwave; below the following story is an un-highlighted article about multiple bushfires in riverina district, incendiarism suspected, but i wonder if the heat had anything to do with them.
1 Feb 1932: Trove: SMH: Tropical Disburbance coming
Dubbo – two collapse & die; others prostrate.
112 degrees Bourke & Walgett
High temperatures in Queensland
Quilpie Qld 121 degrees, max temp for the week 119 degrees, 116 dirranbandi, Thargomindah 113 degrees. many people prostrated.
http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/16837806
30
Hi pat and thanks. To copy the text from there you click on the fourth blue button along from the top left. It is the “TXT” one. Then mark and copy as if it were any normal document but it helps if the error prone text has been fixed up first.
Lance
30
I think the actual conditions on the day could have a lot to do with bird deaths. A few years ago we had a very still day of 48C temp. The birds dropped out of trees. Another day, 49C and windy, and we did not notice any dead birds under trees. Wind can have a cooling effect, even on such hot days.
20
Actually, I had a different experience on a 45C day in Perth. I was on my bike, and as I rolled down a hill, got hotter and hotter. It was like being hit by warm air from a heater – it made things even warmer.
13
Yes it seems there is a limit to the wind chill effect.
Probably comes into play at 37 degrees plus. (over body temp).
Heat always travels from the hotter object to the cooler one.
Much like the sun (heat source) dominates the temperature of earth as opposed to carbon dioxide which has no heat content to speak of.
00
John,
What an extraordinary experience!
I generally get hotter when cycling uphill.
Were you perhaps dehydrated or over-dressed?
Did you know that African Bushmen because they are able to sweat well can chase down Antelopes in the full heat of the day until they collapse from overheating?
Do you understand how a car cooling radiator needs a fan to blow air over it at times; like when the car is stationary?
And roosting fruit bats flap their wings to try and keep cool on a hot day….. and, and, is that enough?
20
Bob even a car’s radiator would not be able to reject heat to the surrounding air if the air was hotter than the liquid in the radiator 80 deg +.
John’s observations are correct. A fan or a headwind at 40 degrees plus will not help you cool down. (although this is not strictly true if your skin was wet with perspiration in which case your sweats phase change from liquid to gas will draw heat from your skin).
This is why people buy AC units. Fans just don’t always do the trick 😉
00
Sonny,
Birds and dogs etc pant when they are hot whereas humans cool more elegantly and efficiently by perspiring over a larger body area, depending on dress and adequate hydration. Wind increases the evaporation rate as demonstrated in evaporative air conditioners that must utilize a fan to provide airspeed even when the air is hotter than the water. The evaporation rate also increases with higher ambient temperature difference.
00
thanx lance,
if i find another u haven’t posted so far, i’ll give it a go.
u’ve got me reading all kinds of stuff. thanx.
10
was determined to find one more so i could try out copying the text, but this is 1927.
15 Jan 1927: Adelaide Advertiser: 123 DEGREES AT WENTWORTH.
Broken Hill, January 14.
Broken Hill is experiencing a heat wave. The maximum temperature to-day was 108 deg; yesterday it was 107; on Wednesday, 103; on Tuesday, 98; on Monday, 97;
and Sunday and Saturday 100. Meuindie, on the River Darling, is also suffering a heat wave, the temperature having been over the century on each day since Saturday until to-day, with the exception of Monday, when it was 97. To-day the temperature was 119. This was beaten by Wentnworth, which had to put up with 123.
http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/40757070
that’s it.
30
Thanks Pat. Looks like that one was yet another “localised event”…effecting three states!
http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/45967543
Have a go at login and correcting some text now so others can find these things. You know you will enjoy it. Go on, I dare ya!
20
This report is all lies – as everyone knows, the climate in Australia (and everywhere else, come to that) only started in 1985…
60
The BOM hasn’t been silly enough to replace the high temperature records with a different figure, those high figures have simply gone missing. You see back then temperature measurements were taken and recorded manually. It wasn’t unusual for a day to be missed at a temperature station from time to time. The BOM software which calculates long term temperature trends caters for missing data by doing other statistical calculations to fill the holes.
But if you were to perhaps deliberately remove extreme high temperature records from the 1930’s you would achieve two things statistically:
1.You would make the average temperatures earlier this century seem lower than they really were, thus creating artificial ‘warming’ to present day temperatures. When we have had no statistical warming in the last 16 years, and the warming the alarmists are trying to concern us about amounts to just 0.5C – 0.8C per century (0.74C IPCC AR4), it is easy to see that some simple data manipulation could create most if not all of that warming.
2.You make more recent high temperature extremes appear to be ‘record high temperatures’ when they clearly were not!
Warwick Hughes makes a good point; if we are supposed to believe that increasing human greenhouse gas emissions are dangerously warming the world, it does make you wonder why we haven’t experienced thousands of birds dropping from the skies, and animals and humans collapsing of heat exhaustion and the sort of record temperatures which were achieved way back in 1931/32 – eighty years ago, before most of the world’s industrialisation and burning of fossil fuels had really taken off?
80
Thanks Jaymez.
My hope is that we have reckoning and the data fiddlers at the BoM suffer greater public humiliation and greater financial penalties than Lance Armstrong.
The CAGW cheersquad are a blight on science and can be regarded as “useful idiots”, but the data fiddlers are the ones who feed the idiots and do untold damage to the wider science community.
Gaol terms should be an option for those who screw with the historical record to suit their political ends.
40
I say thanks to you both, for giving me an opportunity to put this on record:
I’m not especially religious, but what the lying, conniving scumbags of the “political science” movement have done to my first love, Science, makes me really, really hope that there IS a Satan.
60
YOU are the kind of person that makes us give a damn. Never give up or in. We are here with you. Not long to wait now because the truth will always out.
10
I think it’s absolutely shocking that this event wasn’t recognized as the early warning of impending disaster that it really was. Heads should roll! An investigation of the negligence should begin at once.
20
Or just go to Death Valley in the summer.
Heat happens!
10
Often!
10
😉
00
Maybe there’s hope of justice yet. I see in London’s Metro of today’s date that six scientists and a former government official were jailed for 6 years for failing to properly warn of the deadly Italian earthquake in L’Aquila in 2009.
I see also that the Guardian has a report too.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/22/italian-scientists-jailed-earthquake-aquila?newsfeed=true
Those BoM scientists need to be careful or that’s where they’ll go. The heats on.
Maybe Flim Flam Flannery should join them for the $billions of waste that he encouraged governments to spend building desal plants and not dams. This could get really hot.
40
If there’s one thing we’ve learned from the tobacco industry, that’s get ’em young and you have them for life. Cynical, yes. Element of truth, hell yes.
This is where it’s at with the Green theology these days, brainwash ’em young to build the electoral vote of the future. Another glaring example of this folly is the government funded CarbonKids program:
Carbon capture should be defined as follows:
“The voluntary destruction of one third to half of a country’s fossil fuel resources based on the premise that CO2 emissions will catastrophically change the global climate system.”
40
A suprisingly balanced piece about the impact of the CO2 tax on the Australian CPI. The focus of teh article is on the many uncertainties in trying to measure such thing:
http://www.smh.com.au/business/carbon-economy/carbon-price-blame-game-to-begin-20121024-284lj.html
If only climate advocates were as forthright about the uncertainties in the field of climate science, we might not find ourselves in the mess that we are in.
40
Combet gets his logic so twisted that he argues removing the CO2 tax would increase the sovereign risk associated with Australia:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/carbon-tax/carbon-tax-repeal-a-threat-combet/story-fndttws1-1226502216470
Say what??? This is as twisted as the scientists who argued that the CAGW theorem should be adopted as the H0 hypothesis, and that the onus should be on sceptics to disprove it. Combet is delusional if he truly believes what he is saying, but I doubt that he is really that stupid.
50
Hi Jo,
this just in – let the games begin!! 🙂
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/10/23/michael-mann-never-fully-investigated-thus-never-exonerated/
also over at Climate Depot:
cheers
Bill
00
He’s gambling on an Obama victory perhaps?
00
Once again I am struck be the similarity between macroeconomic pundits and CAGW alarmists. In the following article just read “multiplier” as “feedback” and you’ll see how it relates:
http://www.investorsinsight.com/blogs/thoughts_from_the_frontline/archive/2012/10/23/the-perils-of-the-fiscal-cliff.aspx
Economists can’t seem to agree on what the fiscal multipliers are in these recessionary times … at least they are honest enough to recognise the disagreement, unlike climate scientists who sound like a choir singing off a single song sheet.
50
This passage is perhaps the most telling:
Sound familiar?
30
Well said Bulldust!
Unlike the economists who use very similar technology and methodology, the ‘climate modellers’ exhibit a remarkable lack of humility and responsibility.
But maybe it’s not them?’
Who is/should be accountable for ‘overstating’ the hypothesis?
It reminds me of a cute quote.
‘ Why does everybody pick on the economists? They correctly predicted 13 of the last 5 recessions!’
🙂
20
Wind turbines now kill thousands of birds & that’s acceptable to the government.
50
And ESPECIALLY to the greens !! They love wind turbines !!
and obviously aren’t to keen on birds. Environmentalists, I think they call themselves. !!
30
24 Oct: SMH: Peter Hannam & Bloomberg: Solar mapping to shed light on rich resource
For potential developers of large-scale solar power plants, radiation records are needed to bolster investment certainty as they try to secure finance from bankers or government agencies…
The Australian Solar Institute, due to be rolled in to the larger Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) at the end of the year, has earmarked funds for solar resource forecasting techniques.
The ASI funding will be announced within weeks with CSIRO and its partners’ bid seen likely to succeed. The institute co-sponsored a talk yesterday by Dr Coppin at the Sydney offices of law firm Baker & McKenzie.
The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO), a member of the bid consortium along with the Bureau of Meteorology, installed an advanced forecasting system for wind four years ago to help it manage a big increase in wind farms…
Dr Coppin said the wildfire spread of solar PV is already straining the power grids of some regional areas, with so-called “hosting capacity” being reached.
WA’s government-owned Horizon Power, for instance, is restricting new capacity in some towns such as Carnarvon where the grid can’t cope with the intermittent supply that comes with solar power…
The ASI has alone invested $150 million in 60 solar projects around the country and there are at least two more large-scale solar projects approved, as the emerging technology takes hold across the sunnier regions of the country.
Earlier this month, First Solar, the world’s biggest maker of thin-film panels, officially opened its 10-megawatt Greenough River project in Western Australia, the nation’s first large-scale solar plant. The solar project, owned by General Electric and Verve Energy, may quadruple capacity.
According to AEMO’s 2012 report on national forecasting, rooftop PV will supply 3.4 per cent of annual energy generation by 2021 – although tumbling panel prices may see that tally exceeded. A separate recent government report tipped solar PV and onshore wind to have the cheapest generation costs by the mid-2030s.
The funding bid, which also includes the Bureau of Meteorology, universities and German and American groups, would aim to deliver the new mapping system by the end of 2014, Dr Coppin said…
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/solar-mapping-to-shed-light-on-rich-resource-20121024-2846z.html
formerly Austn Govt, Uni of Melb., ANU, CSIRO, BP, GlaxoSmithKline, Rolls Royce etc, with $150m of taxpayer money:
ASI Board
http://www.australiansolarinstitute.com.au/board-page/.aspx
10
some – like James Hanson, Ziggy Zwitkowski, George Monbiot, Fred Pearce – may think these are good CAGW subsides. i don’t, but it fits with my theory that there are two CAGW factions, the Nuclears and the Renewables, both demanding huge amounts of taxpayer money:
22 Oct: Independent: Steve Connor: Government to rip up rulebook and subsidise new nuclear plants
Academics claim ministers are set to break promise not to write blank cheques in bid to reassure foreign investors
Under a major policy U-turn being considered by ministers, the taxpayer would be left to cover the cost of budget over-runs or building delays at new nuclear plants. Costly setbacks are almost inevitable with such complex construction projects.
The proposals, which would break a long-standing Government promise never to subsidise the nuclear industry, are intended to reassure multi-national energy firms into investing in a new fleet of nuclear plants in Britain…
Costly and late: Britain’s nuclear option
Were Britain to build a new nuclear power station it would most likely be a European Pressurised Reactor model, a newer version of the Pressurised Water Reactor variant used the last time one was built here. Two EPR plants are currently under construction in Europe – at Olkiluoto in western Finland and Flamenville in Normandy, France.
Flamanville
Construction began in December 2007. It was originally expected to start operating in 2012 and to cost €3.3bn, but quality control problems, including the discovery of cracks in the concrete base of the reactor, mean the estimated cost has risen to €6bn and the start date has been pushed back to 2016. Protests have been staged across France against the project.
Olkiluoto
Work began in 2005, with the plant originally set to open in 2009. It is now expected to begin operating no earlier than 2015. The cost was estimated at €3bn, but the final price is expected to be closer to €5bn. The joint enterprise between Areva (France) and Siemens (Germany) has been beset by issues with supervision of inexperienced contractors…
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/government-to-rip-up-rulebook-and-subsidise-new-nuclear-plants-8219870.html
00
ANALYSIS: Retiring EUAs only realistic EU ETS fix before 2016
LONDON, Oct 23 (Reuters Point Carbon) – EU Parliamentary elections and the time it takes to pass EU legislation mean most options tabled by the EU Commission to fix its carbon market next month will be unfeasible before 2016.
http://www.pointcarbon.com/news/1.2032394
lower than yesterday’s low:
“Dead” U.N. offsets slump further below 1 euro
LONDON, Oct 23 (Reuters Point Carbon) – U.N. carbon credits hit fresh record lows below 1 euro on Tuesday as traders were wary of buying the near worthless units while EU lawmakers consider banning some of them
http://www.pointcarbon.com/news/1.2032320?&ref=searchlist
Poland to gather opposition to EU CO2 support plan
LONDON, Oct 23 (Reuters Point Carbon) – Poland has called for another meeting of six eastern European countries this week to muster support to block the EU Commission’s controversial plan to temporarily lift carbon prices, the country’s environment ministry said on Tuesday…
http://www.pointcarbon.com/news/1.2032322?&ref=searchlist
btw it’s hilarious to watch sky business channel when the Dow Jones plunges by nearly 250 points. whereas sky business will show dow jones non-stop around the clock, 365 days of the year provided it goes up, is flat or loses only a few points, they simply don’t show it at all when it plunges! every stock market in the world, but not Dow Jones…well, except for Dow Jones futures, which didn’t drop by anything like 250. talk about living in an unreal world.
00
Thanks James for answering my question about how the atmosphere warms the ocean..
Here’s another one.
Your data shows a 0.4 degrees increase over the past 30 years.
(notwithstanding the last decade which shows no global warming).
1. How exactly is this evidence that human beings are responsible considering we had the same rate of increase from 1900 to 1940? Why has global warming not increased in proportion to our industrial output? And why has it not increased in over 10 years?
2. How can I be confident that such a tiny margin (0.4 degrees) is not an artifact of the myriad of data processing and averaging applied to it?
The human body cannot detect a 0.4 degree rise in temperature. Yet amazingly billions of dollars, an entire political ideology and the careers of many government employed “climate scientists” rests on it.
120
More questions that will never be acknowledged by our warmist friends.
They are indeed very selective about which topics they respond to.
James Brookes?
Matt B?
James?
30
So so so sorry for not replying to every single freeking question regardless of whether it is on topic or not.
1. Co2 is not the only thing to affect surface temperatures. Solar, aerosols play a part too. Oceans cycles and our ability to monitor add noise.
2. You can get involved and do the math yourself. Or if you’re not willing to, then you should (as I do for most things) defer to the experts in the field of climate science.
Yeah amazing how ecosystems, weather patterns, the melting of glaciers don’t really care if the human body is designed to detect 0.4°C change in temp.
01
only reported on ABC Rural of course.
what to make of this, including the Nielsen Poll’s alleged results?
22 Oct: ABC Rural: Farmer floored by carbon tax costs
A majority of Australians say the carbon price and compensation package is making no difference to them, according to a September Nielsen Poll.
But Tasmanian farmers with big irrigation electricity bills say that’s not the case for their businesses.
Most people have now received at least one electricity account since the Clean Energy Future Act put a price on carbon pollution rom 1st July this year.
Campbell Town district farmer and Primary Employers president, Ferdie Foster, says his electricity provider itemises the carbon tax in its charges and it is costing him the equivalent of the wages for one worker on his farm.
“Energy is one of our four big costs,” Ferdie Foster said.
“It would be around $200,000 to $250,000 a year. That’s the total cost, yes.
“The carbon tax equates to approximately 50 per cent of the actual energy cost [for off peak electricity].
“To think we in Tasmania are copping this, and 95 to 98 per cent of our energy is generated through hydro.”
http://www.abc.net.au/rural/tas/content/2012/10/s3615575.htm
00
More fraud and con tricks from the IPCC.
http://climateaudit.org/2012/10/22/ipcc-check-kites-gergis/#more-17121
They are now using the withdrawn Gergis, Karoly paper in a draft of AR5 report. Do these people have any shame at all?
What’s next a rehash of the Himilayan glaciers disappearing by 2035 BS? Yet our resident true believing fundamentalists will probably lap up this fraudulent rubbish, as easily as they deny soaring non OECD co2 emissions.
40
“as easily as they deny soaring non-OECD co2 emissions”
oh.. I thought Germany was part of the OECD 😉
10
Just quietly and in a nutshell, how do they measure “emissions” from a particlar country or region?.
10
>”…how do they measure “emissions” from a particlar country or region?”
JAXA IBUKI GOSAT measures net emissions. Last update turned out a bit embarrassing for those pointing fingers at developed nations:-
http://www.jaxa.jp/press/2011/10/20111028_ibuki_e.html
10
Interesting, much of it over my head but how does a satellite “see” something that exists at such tiny amounts in the atmosphere. Just asking…
00
>”…how does a satellite “see” something that exists at such tiny amounts in the atmosphere”
Optics. Explained (with diagrams) in this paper:-
Kuze, A., H. Suto, M. Nakajima, and T. Hamazaki, 2009: Thermal and near infrared sensor for carbon observation Fourier-transform spectrometer on the Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite for greenhouse gases monitoring.
http://www.gosat.nies.go.jp/eng/proposal/download/GOSAT_RA_A_en.pdf
Note that is a 2009 paper so the flux distributions in the figures have been superseded but Figure A 2-9, ‘Global distribution of carbon dioxide’, is instructive nonetheless.
Highest concentrations over Northern India/Bangladesh and tropical West Africa – neither region being an especially prominent industrial powerhouse.
00
just came to this story but I am interested as to why none of the “more here” links work.
10
Janama go here and click on the link “Download the 5 page pdf report”.
http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=1797
00
Slightly OT but I read with interest the jailing of scientists in Italy over their failure to be more animated about a possible earthquake risk in their region. The media as per usual initially got it wrong and reported it as “a failure to predict” which we here in Christchurch know is at this stage impossible. I suspect they were under pressure from authorities to not create panic and disruption whatever their suspicions. What they can do using models (THAT word again) is surmise an aftershock sequence within a range of possibilities which I have to say has been reasonably accurate thus far for each individual event. I suspect international pressure and wiser heads will prevail and that decision will be overturned or Italian justice will look decidedly bonkers. It does pose questions about our particular concerns though and where it ends up. If it does go to court, are judges capable or could it be an Italian job.
20
Saw that on the news last night too.
I thought the take home message was: if you don’t know what you’re doing, don’t say you do.
More likely the government is trying to scapegoat a bunch of scientists simply as a distraction from their own culpability for this disaster. Because one guy DID predict an earthquake in l’Aquila, but the government GAGGED him because he erred by 1 week.
Yes, apparently you don’t need seismometers in boreholes, you just need to watch out for emigrating frogs and lots of radon gas coming out of the ground.
Then there is the small issue that earthquakes have levelled the town twice before during the 20th century.
George Carlin said it best.
What is it with these people in Hawaii who build their house on the side of a volcano, then act so surprised when they have lava come through their living room?
10
The only recent case of thousands of birds dying was in Esperance a couple of years ago. Of course it turned out to be lead dust from trains carrying lead to port.
23
Define recent? Mutton birds and bee eater migrations a few years ago had some bad outcomes.
Barn Swallows in Africa.
Apart from some human related incidents, there are other examples with different forms of stress being the cause. Most are coupled events; migration with food stress or with storms, unusual headwinds etc. In the cited example, apart from the deficient data from the new report, there is also a lot of context missing. Lots of arid zone birds are migratory in some way and rely on seeking ephemeral food sources. I’d guess the heat was killing stressed birds that were gathered in this region for a specific but unknown reasons.
30
John,
You say “Of course it turned out to be lead dust from trains carrying lead to port.”
Interesting! Do you have a reference link to this discovery?
20
TONY BROWN,
If you are passing by can you please help? I can remember you quoting maybe two years ago some accounts from the late 1800’s (?) in Oz where they were lamenting about the extraordinary heat and that parakeets (using an old spelling like paraquetes) and fruit bats were dropping dead from the trees in vast numbers. (in western NSW?)
I’m struggling to find it but it is a different and supportive parallel account for Jo’s article. It may come to me how to find it in the shower in the morning but at the moment I can’t crack it.
30
Bob
Happy to oblige. THe account was actually from the 1790’s in Sydney by Watkin Tench and its part of Chapter 17 of this ebook.
http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/t/tench/watkin/
“December 27th 1790. Wind NNW; it felt like the blast of a heated oven, and in proportion as it increased the heat was found to be more intense, the sky hazy, the sun gleaming through at intervals.
At 9 a.m. 85 degrees At noon 104 Half past twelve 107 1/2 From one p.m. until 20 minutes past two 108 1/2 At 20 minutes past two 109 At Sunset 89 At 11 p.m. 78 1/2
[By a large Thermometer made by Ramsden, and graduated on Fahrenheit’s scale.]
December 28th.
At 8 a.m. 86 10 a.m. 93 11 a.m. 101 At noon 103 1/2 Half an hour past noon 104 1/2 At one p.m. 102 At 5 p.m. 73 At sunset 69 1/2
[At a quarter past one, it stood at only 89 degrees, having, from a sudden shift of wind, fallen 13 degrees in 15 minutes.]
My observations on this extreme heat, succeeded by so rapid a change, were that of all animals, man seemed to bear it best. Our dogs, pigs and fowls, lay panting in the shade, or were rushing into the water. I remarked that a hen belonging to me, which had sat for a fortnight, frequently quitted her eggs, and shewed great uneasiness, but never remained from them many minutes at one absence; taught by instinct that the wonderful power in the animal body of generating cold in air heated beyond a certain degree, was best calculated for the production of her young. The gardens suffered considerably. All the plants which had not taken deep root were withered by the power of the sun. No lasting ill effects, however, arose to the human constitution. A temporary sickness at the stomach, accompanied with lassitude and headache, attacked many, but they were removed generally in twenty-four hours by an emetic, followed by an anodyne.
During the time it lasted, we invariably found that the house was cooler than the open air, and that in proportion as the wind was excluded, was comfort augmented.
But even this heat was judged to be far exceeded in the latter end of the following February, when the north-west wind again set in, and blew with great violence for three days. At Sydney, it fell short by one degree of what I have just recorded: but at Rose Hill, it was allowed, by every person, to surpass all that they had before felt, either there or in any other part of the world. Unluckily they had no thermometer to ascertain its precise height. It must, however, have been intense, from the effects it produced. An immense flight of bats driven before the wind, covered all the trees around the settlement, whence they every moment dropped dead or in a dying state, unable longer to endure the burning state of the atmosphere. Nor did the ‘perroquettes’, though tropical birds, bear it better. The ground was strewn with them in the same condition as the bats.”
Tonyb
20
Globally it would seem I am right in my earlier comment.
Increasing frequency, intensity and duration of observed global heatwaves and warm spells
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2012/2012GL053361.shtml
Well pickle me Granpa!
01
What simpler way could there be to “get rid of the 1940s blip“. Which should really have been called the 1930s blip. Too much to expect the authors of those incriminating emails to get that much right.
You will note the above date is 1932. 1939 is also mentioned.
http://tomnelson.blogspot.com.au/2011/12/climategate-email-warmist-tom-wigley.html
10
Sorry, your link doesn’t contain data regarding heatwaves, all it has is a conspiracy theory based upon an out-of-context quote.
03
Oh no, Jamesybaby. The context is clear for all to see. Your’s is the typical reaction of all “warmers” when they have the duplicity and mendacity of their heroes thrust in their faces.
20
Yes, I’m sure all 9 independent enquiries are part of the global coverup.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/Climategate-CRU-emails-hacked.htm
01
Yes notice how every effort now goes into diverting the argument away from the 1950-2011 “study period being far far too short.
Does simple logic need to be actively avoided when it does not support the religion?
Any form of heat study that starts at the beginning of the cooling period that culminated in the 70s ice age scare and ends just after the peak of the recent solar cycle max is doomed to show warming. How could any other result be possible?
What the hell is a “calculated warm spell” anyway? James you were so keen to explain how a 1932 heatwave should be defined now define what “calculated warm spells” are.
So that we can all understand what the outcome may have been if the study had been “calculated warm spells for 1930–1978 are analysed”
00
The solar cycle referred to above is the Gleissberg/Wolf cycle.
10
[…] http://joannenova.com.au/2012/10/heatwave-kills-thousands-of-birds-this-was-climate-change-in-1932/#… […]
00
James October 24, 2012 at 2:02 pm
Says: “….Global Monthly temps then. Jo’s post is not about a Global extreme.
Looking deeper at the PDF shows they are a bit causal with their anecdotal evidence…..”
C’mon James. Let’s not be unreasonable.
If you were perhaps of a warmist bent you would be quite happy to trot out one single storm (say… named Sandy) and tout it as a proof of AGW.
10