The Global Warming Challenge

When the situation is complex and there is uncertainty about causal relationships, forecasting principle 6.6 dictates that forecasters should “Use few variables and simple relationships”. The opposite approach was used in the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change models, and there have been calls (1 , 2) for even more money to enable modelers to create models that are even more complex. Patrick Frank, in an article in Skeptic (2008, 14:1) titled “A climate of belief”, showed that a very simple model with CO2 as the only causal variable and using the IPCC assumptions about the direct and indirect effects of changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations makes predictions of global average temperatures that are closer to the IPCC’s “ensemble average” of complex model forecasts than are those of any of the individual complex models. In other words, putting aside whether the forecasts are accurate or not, there is no need to have complex models in order to make those forecasts.

Frank’s simple model illustrates part of the purpose of principle 6.6; namely to aid understanding and reduce forecasting costs. We aren’t sure what the cost of the complex relative to the simple modeling efforts were but, given the number of people and computer time involved in the complex models, a ratio of 1 million to 1 is a conservative guess. Frank’s simple model is simple enough for anyone to understand. That’s a good thing, because the modeler’s assumption are clear and can be tested and disputed, and the disputation can be understood by others. This makes it easier to reject a false model and thereby to advance scientific understanding. Thus the use of simple models reduces mistakes, another purpose of the principle.

The primary purpose of many of the forecasting principles is naturally enough to improve accuracy; principle 6.6 is no exception. Frank demonstrates that the IPCC grossly under-reports the cumulative uncertainty of the model forecasts. The figure below from Frank’s article shows that, when proper allowance is made for uncertainty about the effects of clouds and greenhouse gases on global average temperatures, the complex IPCC models cannot legitimately tell us better than that the temperature change by the end of the century will be somewhere between +120-degrees-C and -120-degrees-C. It would be foolish indeed to base public policy on forecasts from such models.

Patrick Frank’s article is available from the Skeptic site.

Read this article and more at PublicPolicyForecasting.com.

There are 19 forecasting principles that provide guidance on identifying, collecting, and preparing data to be used for forecasting. These principles include 3.3 Avoid biased data sources, 3.4 Use diverse sources of data, 4.1 Use unbiased and systematic procedures to collect data, 4.2 Ensure that information is reliable and that measurement error is low, 4.3 Ensure that the information is valid, 4.4 Obtain all of the important data, 4.6 Obtain the most recent data, 5.1 Clean the data, and 5.4 Adjust for unsystematic past events. While some of these principles at least may appear to be common sense, they are nevertheless often violated in practice with the consequence that forecasts are poor or even invalid. The Climate Audit site reports the findings of the often painstaking detective work required to determine whether the data used by climate scientists are consistent with these principles.

Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne announced on May 14, 2008 that he is accepting the recommendation of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dale Hall to list the polar bear as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The listing is based on the best available science, which shows that loss of sea ice threatens and will likely continue to threaten polar bear habitat. This loss of habitat puts polar bears at risk of becoming endangered in the foreseeable futures”. See the U.S. Department of the Interior website for the full announcement.

This extraordinary announcement is at odds with evidence that the polar bear population is currently thriving, and is based on false assumptions and unscientific forecasting procedures. The forthcoming Interfaces paper by Armstrong, Green, and Soon, provides evidence that the “best available science” does not support a listing.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute presented three videos by climate and forecasting specialists. Among the three are: Dr. Joseph D’Aleo, a former meteorology professor at Lyndon State College in Vermont and the first director of meteorology at The Weather Channel; Dr. Kesten Green, of the Business and Economics Forecasting Unit at Australia’s Monash University, and: Dr. Jim O’Brien, State Climatologist of Florida and director of the Center for Ocean Atmospheric Prediction Studies.

All three videos are available at GlobalWarming.Org. Kesten Green, adviser to this website, is featured below.

Kesten Green claims that the IPCC climate models incorporate just 15% of the principles and procedures appropriate to scientific forecasting. Many IPCC scientists seem to be unaware of forecasting methodology as a scientific discipline, he adds. Instead, the Monash University specialist charges that the models’ elaborate mathematical formulas reflect the IPCC staff’s own opinions at both the input and output stages.

One senior scientist and author with the IPCC ducks the charge of unscientific methodology, according to Green, by saying the UN climate models do not constitute forecasts or predictions. However, the specific words “forecast” and “prediction” reoccur many times in IPCC reports and they’re viewed that way by the public. If the IPCC in fact hasn’t made scientific forecasts, the Australian queries, what reason is there to be worried about climate change at all?

(From DOB Magazine Online)

Recently one of our visitors, Will, wrote the following comment:

“Is there somewhere on here that points out step by step the premises and conclusions of the Inconvenient truth and states why the incorrect ones are wrong? I just see one side claiming one thing and the other side claiming the other while no real comparison can be made on the subject by laypeople. What I would like to see is the above step by step disproving of the “I.T.” using scientific explanation as to why the claim is false. i.e. the statement that such and such amount of ice has melted off the poalr ice caps is simply wrong we measured it and there is such and such amount of ice still there which disproves there claim. Because when two sides of an argument state factually that a claim is one way or another than one of them is either lying or wrong. Please help me out here.”

We invite Will and all of our readers to explore Christopher Monckton’s DVD lecture, as well as several of his pieces where he does just that:

• The sun is warmer now than for the past 11,400 years (Sunday Telegraph, 05/11/2006)
• 35 Inconvenient Truths (Science and Public Policy Institute, 10/06/2007)
• A Science-based response to Al Gore’s Global Warming Commentary in London’s Sunday Telegraph (11/19/2006)
• IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (02/2007)

Below are excerpts from the Q&A session between Armstrong and Senator Boxer. Full Text of Examining Threats and Protections For the Polar Bear.

Senator Boxer. Now, Dr. Scott, you are a Ph.D. in what? Dr. Armstrong.

Mr. Armstrong. I went to MIT, so I basically had three areas, one was economics, the other was social psychology and the other was marketing.

Senator Boxer. Economics, social psychology and marketing. Are you a biologist?

Mr. Armstrong. No.

(more…)

Below are excerpts from the Q&A session between Armstrong and Senator Inhofe. Full Text of Examining Threats and Protections For the Polar Bear.

Dr. Armstrong, when you were talking, this chart up here, first of all, did you say that you had a paper that you wrote in 1978?

Mr. Armstrong. I was writing books on long range forecasting then.

Senator Inhofe. You were writing books in 1978?

Mr. Armstrong. Well, I have been in this field for 48 years now.

Senator Inhofe. Wow. I thought maybe I heard wrong. You are the forecasting expert, I recognize that.

(more…)

Below is Armstrong’s testimony from YouTube; it is approximately 6 minutes in length. Before you watch the video, please take this brief poll. Based on the image, what do you think will be the trend for the rest of the 21st century? Then, after watching the video, click to see Exhibit 3 found at the end of this post to see how Hunter et. al came to their conclusions.

I think the trend will be:
1) sharply upward
2) upward
3) slightly upward
4) hard to say
5) slightly downward
6) downward
7) sharply downward

View Results

Click here to see Exhibit 3. It shows the data used to estimate the key relationship.

Decimation of the polar bear: bearfaced lies?
A leading expert in forecasting tells spiked that research into the impact of climate change on polar bears has been shockingly shoddy.
Tim Black

Despite the steady growth of the polar bear population over the past 40 years - it now stands between 20,000 and 25,000 - there is no shortage of doom-laden reports about the bears’ imminent demise on our warming planet. Some refer to polar bears as the ‘canaries of climate change’. Indeed, so strong is the misery-mongering about polar bears that the US is currently trying to list them as an endangered species; and its campaign has been aided and abetted by several pieces of US government-sponsored research into polar bear numbers. Yet according to experts in the field of forecasting methods, official rumours of the polar bear’s demise have been greatly exaggerated.

(more…)