Holy Skewed Temperature Samples, Batman!

Just because some call it “science” does not make it so:

Eighty-nine percent of official U.S. temperature measurement stations are corrupted by poor site selection that gives false warming signals, according to a new study  by meteorologist Anthony Watts.

According to the federal government’s own siting criteria, the corrupting influences at those stations create a margin of error larger than the entire asserted warming of the twentieth century.

Eighty. Nine. Percent.

For those who don’t understand how embarrassing this is for the entire CO2-is-warming-the-planet theory, let me explain.

There are two key points here: the climate data itself is corrupted, and the climate models that use that data are unproven.

Climate Data is Corrupted

Computer models are the main support for the idea that CO2 warms the planet in the first place. There is no other evidence, to my knowledge, that supports CO2 as a primary driver for warming. These models are pretty much it. In fact, historical ice cores show the opposite, that CO2 is a symptom of warming, not a cause, and that the CO2 buildup lags the warming by about 800 years.

Those computer models, of course, need a bunch of historical data points as input in order to crunch the numbers and make predictions into the future.

Among the data they need, of course, is temperature data. And apparently, 89% of that data is basically garbage.

If the input data is garbage, then it doesn’t matter how great the rest of the modeling software is, the conclusions it presents are garbage too.

Climate Models are Unproven

And as it happens, the computer models used by the IPCC are suspect as well, because they haven’t published the source code so that it can be peer reviewed. Here’s why that is important.

I’ve worked in the software industry for over 25 years, most of that as a software developer. Computers are not magic. They can only do what the code they are running tells them to do. If that code has even minor errors in logic, the results are suspect.

To accept the conclusions of a software model that predicts the future, obviously you have no reality to compare the model’s conclusions with. So you need to have a “code review” by unbiased software developers who did not write that code, in order to check for logic errors, remove potential biases, ask questions like “why are you doing this here”, etc. It has to be examined, line by line, to see exactly what is going on in there, what inputs it is using, what it does with those inputs, the assumptions it makes about the effect of the different inputs, etc.

For all we know, a climate software model that hasn’t had a code review could be reading Ted Williams’ stats from baseball-reference.com and then saying “look, the planet is heating up!”. Who really knows? You can’t. Computer software is inherently secretive unless the source code is accessible to experts who can de-cipher it.

And until that code is available for the experts to examine, the models themselves are little more than a plaything.

What Science Does and Does Not Look Like

Yet, somehow, these playthings have been accepted as proof positive by the IPCC and the various governmental agencies the world over. They are untroubled by the lack of accountability on the part of the climate modelers.

That, my friends, is “advocacy”, not “science”.

So. The temperature samples are flawed, and so are the climate models that use the temperatures samples as input. Which means we have not just one, but two layers of obfuscation hampering our predictive ability regarding climate.

And according to the article above, the margin of error just from the bad sampling methodology alone is greater than the entire asserted warming of the twentieth century. Let that soak in for a second.

We keep hearing about a “scientific consensus” that CO2 is warming the planet. What does all of the above that tell you about the “scientists” who formed that consensus? What does it tell you about the degree of confidence we can have in their conclusions?

Science isn’t about “consensus”. This ain’t American Idol.

Science is about proof, and facts, and using those facts to prove (or disprove) theories. Scientists are supposed to be their own worst critics, and turn every implicit assumption on it’s head, and try to disprove their own theory. The science itself must stand on its own, otherwise, it’s bad science, and deserves to be ignored.

Where is the skepticism, the sharing of ideas, the spirit of pushing knowledge forward for the good of all mankind?

Real scientists do not hide their methods and threaten their questioners. Real scientists welcome examination of their data and methods in a spirit of inquiry and the advancement of mankind.

But in today’s increasingly bizarre world, to question any of this is to risk being considered a lunatic. Supposedly, the sane people are the ones who believe in skewed samples and flawed models. How did that happen? It’s like Pope Benedict and Galileo all over again. As Pope John Paul said about that dark period of scientific history, “This led them unduly to transpose into the realm of the doctrine of the faith, a question which in fact pertained to scientific investigation.” And so it seems to be happening again.

But as I must constantly remind myself, global warming isn’t about science, it’s about politics and using fear to scare us into supporting new taxes on our energy use and lifestyle.

And it is all based on the most ridiculous “science” one could possibly imagine: bad data feeding bad models. Now hand over your money!

I am always open to theories that are logically sensible and supported by evidence. And I invite anybody who disagrees with my points above to both (a) point me to a qualified review of any IPCC climate modeling source code, AND (b) disprove the conclusions of Anthony Watts regarding corrupted temperature samples. Real science requires that *all* of the steps along the way be correct. Every. Step.

Until such time, I’ll be disregarding all talk about warming the planet with CO2.

And I have to say I’m not wild about money-grubbing politicians and “scientists” using advocacy and obfuscation to deceive me into throwing money at them, on the pretense that it will fix a future problem for which there is no reliable supporting evidence.

Sorry, I’m not riding that train. Why would anybody?

Getting Wise Down Under

Good Beer and Demanding Evidence: Two Qualities to Admire in a Country

Australia, at least, is starting to ask serious questions about the “science” behind global warming. Heaven and Earth, a book by Ian Pilmer, is credited with starting that global warming backlash in Australia.

Quoting Rick Moran at the American Thinker piece linked just above:

Cap and trade is not about saving the planet. It is about enriching government at the expense of private industry. Obama expects that selling of carbon credits will bring in hundreds of billions of dollars that will finance his health insurance power grab and other schemes. They are not interested in the science. They are interested in the dollars.

And the American family – to the tune of at least $1300 in increased energy bills – will pay for it.

Exactly right. Same as it ever was.

Read the whole thing.

Our governments are lying to us and treating us like idiots while they prepare to forcibly take our money to pay for a “solution” that won’t work.

Putting aside for a moment all the highly-charged emotion about this … why would anybody want that?

Fight Back, or Get Used to Sending More of Your Money to the IRS to Slay Imaginary Dragons

In a stunning development, we have learned that Congress is right now crafting legislation that is not just useless, but dangerous and expensive too.

Which, like, hardly ever happens!

It’s called the Waxman-Markey bill. You might not know about it, but you should, because it is just the latest example of how government deceives you in order to take your money. It’s what they do.

It presumes a global warming crisis that is actually unraveling as we speak, as new, compelling evidence emerges nearly every week that we are now entering a historic cooling period.

It assumes that even if this climate crisis did exist, it is best fixed by … collecting money. Really. This is what Congress does: think up ways to waste our money on mostly ineffectual and sometimes downright dangerous “solutions”. When the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

And even if you buy into all that silliness, the proposed solution hasn’t worked very well in Europe.

Summing up then:

1. A crisis that doesn’t exist,
2. used to coerce you and me into paying more money into our government,
3. to fund a solution that won’t work.

A perfect storm of pandering.

I know global warming is the current “hot button” issue of the day, and lots of people view it as a crisis that needs our attention. But it doesn’t take very long to discover that the “science” behind it is extremely shaky; in fact, it is not science at all. That’s why they use words like “global warming denier”: it’s a belief system.

Usually, investing your faith where it doesn’t belong is a pretty bad idea. Render unto Caesar, etc.

And we don’t need lies in order to pursue reasonable energy and environmental policies. There were already plenty of good reasons to support the “green” lifestyle. For years, I’ve supported recycling, fuel conservation, and research into new sources of energy. I could support things like wind farms if there was any hope that such a thing could work in a huge country like the United States. And we need to re-open drilling in places like ANWR in Alaska and offshore. The caribou and the godforsaken mosquitoes in ANWR  won’t mind, and other countries are drilling off our shores already, so what do we gain by sitting it out?

But what we don’t need is fear-mongering based on half-baked theories, and taxation that couldn’t fix it anyway. Plus, of course, the meddling in economic markets, which didn’t work out too well with the mortgages.

And even worse, all the social divisions created by all of it. You risk being called ridiculous names by “scientists” if you dare to question their methods and conclusions. Really?

Cute documentaries with polar bears is one thing; turning the junk science behind it into a demand for tax revenue is quite another.

We don’t need the Waxman-Markey bill, or anything remotely like it.

Things We “Know” That Aren’t True

Facts are stubborn things. By their very nature, they are immutable, unmovable, eternal. There is no equivocation with a fact. It just is, always and forever.

That’s why we like them. Their “truthiness” is an intrinsic good, with real value.

Then we have pop culture facts. Things we “know”, that aren’t really true. These are far less valuable, but we seem to uncover more and more of them every day.

Some of the best pop culture facts are “green” myths. For example, from a csmonitor.com green blog, a few of the Top Ten Green Living Myths:

• Green myth: Recycled paper is better for the environment than virgin paper. Fact: It depends!
• Green myth: Local food is always greener. Fact: It depends!
• Green myth: Washing dishes by hand uses less water than a dishwasher. Fact: It depends!
• Green myth: An electric car is best for the environment. Fact: It depends!
• Green myth: If you want to help alleviate global warming, plant trees. Fact: It depends!

But don’t worry. I’m sure all those *other* environmental crises are based on solid, true facts that you can take to the bank, instead of the pop culture kind.

And while you’re there, take out a bucketful of cash to help pay for all the new taxes that we’ll soon have to pay. In order to somehow stop warming that has already stopped.

Not only that, the dangerous warming has turned into dangerous cooling. Potentially historic cooling, the kind that kills crops. Which causes starvation.

Also, the silly idea that CO2 is dangerous and even toxic to our health seems to be losing momentum.

A bunch of pop culture facts we thought we knew. Turns out … a lot of it is b.s.!

Imagine that.

“Scientists”, “Journalists”, and other Useful Idiots

Someday, when sanity again rules the Earth, some may look back on today as the most ridiculous time in the history of mankind.

Why is that, you ask?  Because lots of otherwise-smart people today waste their time arguing about Artic Sea ice.

“Oh, look!  it’s shrinking!  What are we going to do?”

Here’s what I do:  pour myself a nice cold Manhattan, and flip on the TV.

Peeking Under the Education Rock

For Secretary of Education, Obama has nominated Arne Duncan, the current Superintendent of the Chicago Public School system.

Duncan apparently is a fan of charter schools, and for that he earns points with me. Another good sign: he is not completely in bed with the NEA.

But he implemented policies from the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, the project run by Bill Ayers, noted radical lefty loon and esteemed Education professor — but I repeat myself. The explicitly stated goal of this political organization was to filter all education through a radical political filter.

Some of us find this unsettling. Me, too.

Ah, you say, but a leader of a large public school system must often implement policies he/she is not supportive of, in order to trade this requirement from the NEA against that requirement from the budget, vs. yet another from the school board. Note that the only group not explicitly represented here is students.

So, yes, it is more or less a political position, where you must find common ground and provide leadership to lead competing interests to a place where all are reasonably satisfied.

But the fact that an idea as outlandish as politicizing students can be traded back and forth like just another bargaining chip is precisely the point. Not that long ago, you’d have been disregarded as a nut if you stood behind such an idea; now, people look, shrug, and say, “big deal”.

That is not progress. Science is the pursuit of objective truth, not social justice. And anybody who perverts it by teaching social justice under the guise of Science is doing a disservice to the students, their parents, the community at large, and eventually, our entire country, by turning out people who can’t think their way out of a paper bag.

To quote from one of Ayer’s education textbooks (i.e, where they teach the teachers):

The marriages between capitalism and education and capitalism and science have created a foundation for science education that emphasizes corporate values at the expense of social justice and human dignity.” The alternative? “Science pedagogy framed around social justice concerns can become a medium to transform individuals, schools, communities, the environment, and science itself, in ways that promote equity and social justice. Creating a science education that is transformative implies not only how science is a political activity but also the ways in which students might see and use science and science education in ways transformative of the institutional and interpersonal power structures that play a role in their lives.”

This “social justice” agenda has, according to the American Thinker piece above, “become de rigueur and a condition of hiring”.

There is a great speech by Albert Brooks in the movie “Broadcast News”, about how the Devil will use flash over substance to lower our standards, in order to gain influence:

“He will just bit by little bit lower standards where they are important. Just coax along flash over substance. Just a tiny bit.”

Education would be one of those standards that is important, no?

Via Cassy Fiano.

Yep, This Sounds Perfect

The Economist notes Changes in countries’ greenhouse-gas emissions since 1990:

Barack Obama said on Tuesday November 18th that his presidency will “mark a new chapter in America’s leadership on climate change”. According to new UN figures on greenhouse-gas emissions much remains to be done. Some 40 industrialised countries (though not China and India, for example) report emissions data to the UN as part of its Convention on Climate Change. Some of these countries, notably in eastern and central Europe, have shown big reductions from 1990 to 2006, driven in part by the collapse of heavy industries. By contrast emissions in Spain, Portugal and Ireland grew enormously as their economies surged ahead. Australia, Canada and America also pumped out more climate-warming gases. Despite a 5% decline since 1990 across the 40 countries, the recent trend is upwards. Since 2000 emissions from the former Soviet Union countries have grown by 7.4%, and those of rich countries by 2%.

I see. So the ideal CO2 plan, then, is to:

• be a nation named “China” or “India” (this is really the key, right here); or
• lose whatever heavy industry you have left that hasn’t already moved to China or India.

Sounds awesome!

Or, if you are into “economic growth” and other Evil Capitalist concepts — so your people can, I don’t know, have jobs and food and houses and other bourgeois b.s. like that — then you could follow the lead of countries like Spain, Australia, and America. Sure, you could do that, too.

What-EVER.

The Inuits: Why Do Greens Hate Them?

Think about this lunacy the next time you complain about the high price of gas … or about dependence on foreign oil … or about slowing our economy with unnecessary restrictions … or about scaring people with doomsday scenarios … or about using flawed science to drive policy.

In what is becoming a true Alice in Wonderland existence for me, all three presidential candidates buy into this faulty view of the world. Of course, politicians are used to lying and pandering to buy votes, so I shouldn’t be surprised.

Here’s a fact: computer models of complicated climate systems — that we don’t even fully understand yet, especially how ocean currents affect climate — cannot be accurate. You have to understand the system you’re modeling before you can write computer code to mimic it. And even if you do understand the system, sometimes people write bad code.

So … mortgaging the future on unproven computer models of unproven climate theory? Bad, bad idea.

We should all keep the GIGO law in mind when somebody throws the phrase “computer models” at us. Especially if they are excited about some bleak future outcome, and trying to impress us.

No thanks, I’m trying to cut down.

UPDATE: Also see this memo from the Pacific Legal Foundation, which defends property rights.

Why Does Science Hate Green Leafy Plants?

Australia’s Koalas at risk from climate change:

CANBERRA, Australia – Koalas are threatened by the rising level of carbon dioxide pollution in the atmosphere because it saps nutrients from the eucalyptus leaves they feed on, a researcher said Wednesday.

CO2 is “pollution” now?

Green leafy plants, which rely on photosynthesis, and therefore thrive in high CO2 environments, might just disagree.

Nice Theory. Too Bad It Seems To Have Killed People.

Deaths in diabetes study halt therapy, stun experts

Here we go again, with the assumptions that driving down a number via drugs is the same thing as making somebody healthy enough in all the standard, normal ways so that the number goes down on its own.

When the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Aggressively driving blood sugar levels as low as possible in high-risk diabetes patients appears to increase the risk of dying from a heart attack or stroke, according to major government study.

The startling discovery, announced Wednesday, prompted federal health officials to immediately halt one part of the massive trial so thousands of the Type 2 diabetes patients in the study could be switched to less risky treatment.

Global Freezing May Be On The Way

Changes in the Sun’s Surface to Bring Next Climate Change

January 2, 2008

Today, the Space and Science Research Center, (SSRC) in Orlando, Florida announces that it has confirmed the recent web announcement of NASA solar physicists that there are substantial changes occurring in the sun’s surface. The SSRC has further researched these changes and has concluded they will bring about the next climate change to one of a long lasting cold era.

Today, Director of the SSRC, John Casey has reaffirmed earlier research he led that independently discovered the sun’s changes are the result of a family of cycles that bring about climate shifts from cold climate to warm and back again.

“We today confirm the recent announcement by NASA that there are historic and important changes taking place on the sun’s surface. This will have only one outcome – a new climate change is coming that will bring an extended period of deep cold to the planet. This is not however a unique event for the planet although it is critically important news to this and the next generations. It is but the normal sequence of alternating climate changes that has been going on for thousands of years. Further according to our research, this series of solar cycles are so predictable that they can be used to roughly forecast the next series of climate changes many decades in advance. I have verified the accuracy of these cycles’ behavior over the last 1,100 years relative to temperatures on Earth, to well over 90%.”

90% accuracy over 1,100 years, eh? Pretty impressive.