You simply can’t make up the absurd, deluded, arrogant antics of the hardcore deniers. Want proof? Check out Deep Climate’s post, Terence Corcoran whopper: Mann’s hockey stick “eliminated some of the data from 1960 forward … and then spliced on actual temperature data”:
Corcoran’s commentary on the recent Russell “climategate” email review lays one error-laden defamation on top of another, as he attempts to demonstrate that the report “provides plenty of evidence that climate science has been and remains an uncertain shambles”.
Along the way, Corcoran even manages to confuse a little known Phil Jones graphic with Michael Mann’s “hockey stick” millenial temperature reconstruction. This leads to the astonishing (and entirely wrong) accusation that the hockey stick creators “eliminated some of the data from 1960 forward … and then spliced on actual temperature data”. Yet neither the “hockey stick” graph (the real one) nor the associated Mann et al study are mentioned in the report at all!
I can’t recommend this post highly enough, and I’m intentionally quoting only this snippet as a way to entice you to click through and read it in its entirety.
The attacks on Mann and the hockey stick graph won’t end, of course, for one very simple reason: It’s an incredibly effective way to communicate with newcomers. You show them the graph, say, “this axis is time, this one is temperature,” and it speaks for itself.[1]
Therefore, if you have an overriding financial or ideological interest in not seeing us take the obvious steps to dramatically reduce our CO2 emissions, then the hockey stick graph and Michael Mann simply must be discredited, regardless of the underlying truth. If you’re so inclined to do such things, then let me suggest you don’t make yourself look like one of the biggest clowns in the entire publishing world. Unless, that is, you don’t mind hurting your own cause and giving the reality based community a good laugh at your expense…
[1] This is not to say that I’m 100% conversant with all the technical details of this particular graph (I’m not) or that I unwaveringly support it. I think the evidence for climate being real and almost entirely man made is overwhelming, regardless of the merits of the hockey stick graph. Please note that my comment above was about the graph’s effectiveness.
What will those evil scienttists think of next? Imagine the absurdity of using real data? S. Fred Singer must be appalled!
Scott A. Mandia, Professor of Physical Sciences
Selden, NY
Global Warming: Man or Myth?
My Global Warming Blog
Twitter: AGW_Prof
“Global Warming Fact of the Day” Facebook Group
McMann? Is that short for Michael Mann, or a typo?
Mark: Yikes! Thanks for catching that mistake. I’ll fix it momentarily.
Philosophically, I would add the following.
Various writers, investigators, and scientists are forced to defend AR4 – when all reasonable folks looking at current data can see that they were unreasonably understating the actual state of the science. Ice is melting faster, glaciers are retreating faster, weather patterns are reacting more drastically and in general, if AR4 was wrong, it is in the understatement of the effects, timing and nature of climate change. This, of course, resulted in the changes mandated by the political process of gaining full approval of all of the member nations of the United Nations. I would like to see a report telling us what the authors really thought, unvarnished by the politics, which would reflect, I fear, real reason for panic by those who might be paying attention.
But I digress. In asking for the real data to be reported, would I be at odds with those who are now finding themselves trying to defend the understated conclusions of AR4? Is this a part of the overall plan in the disinformation campaigns? If the next IPCC mandated report reflects the actual state of changes, will the AR4 team not be reviled as the ones who mislead us, and all who defended them discredited?
These are a purely hypothetical questions for now, but in a few years we will find out.
Chuck: There was a follow-up report, which I think was from a subset of the IPCC authors (although I’m fuzzy on that part) not too long ago. I’ll have to try to dig it up.
Chuck: I found two studies that seem to be pretty close to what you were talking about, in terms of an IPCC follow-up:
The Copenhagen Diagnosis
and
The UNEP Climate Change Science Compendium