-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
B.E.S.T., Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature, is the organization, formed by Richard Muller, Professor of Physics at the University of California at Berkeley and self-proclaimed climate skeptic, to analyze temperature data. B.E.S.T. has received a total of $623,087 in financial support, with the largest contribution, $150,000, coming from the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation. B.E.S.T. directly addressed concerns including urban heat island effect, poor station quality, and data selection bias.
Their results: “Global warming is real.” Before the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, Muller testified that “we see a global warming trend that is very similar to that previously reported by the other groups.” That similarity can be seen in the graphs below.
The issue of temperature stations in the U.S. located near buildings, in parking lots, or close to other heat sources has been raised by climate change skeptics such as Anthony Watts. Muller testified:
Did such poor station quality exaggerate the estimates of global warming? We’ve studied this issue, and our preliminary answer is no.
The Berkeley Earth analysis shows that over the past 50 years the poor stations in the U.S. network do not show greater warming than do the good stations.
Thus, although poor station quality might affect absolute temperature, it does not appear to affect trends, and for global warming estimates, the trend is what is important.
Regarding the urban heat island effect, the study concludes that:
The urban heat island effect is locally large and real, but does not contribute significantly to the average land temperature rise. That’s because the urban region of the Earth amount to less than 1% of the land area.
Anthony Watts is a weather-caster turned global warming skeptic who stated, “I’m prepared to accept whatever result they produce, even if it proves my premise wrong.” That was in March. Now, Watts “consider[s] the paper fatally flawed.” Watts’ reaction moves him from the category of global warming skeptic to global warming denier. Watts has gained a certain amount of fame by claiming that the temperature data was flawed. If he had accepted the B.E.S.T. results as promised, his celebrity status would be lost.
H/T: Zingularity, LA Times, Brad Plumer, Ron Chusid.
Bdaman,
Why should I? You never answer my questions.
Bron,
My self-esteem is just fine and I should have a job shortly (it’s not Mickey D’s, but I’m doing what I love…). And believe me, the last problem I have is inactivity. I’m not trying to prove I’m right to a guy on the internet, I’m trying to show a community that I’m a part of that one of its members is talking out of his ass (and you have been).
You seem to have a stereotyped opinion of “academics” as ivory-tower liberals who do research that is completely inapplicable to the “real world” you pretend to understand. While this may be true of some disciplines (although I doubt to the degree that you blithely assume), I hail from the world of math and science where we either prove our results beyond all possible doubt or subject them to the most rigorous testing available. Right now I’m in the process of putting my ideas to the test in the market — to flourish or perish on their merits. Not just my professional ideas, but all of the bleeding heart liberal claptrap that you think is so bad for business is exactly what I think will make my business successful. So just remember that even though you’d like to think that being an academic somehow makes my opinion unreliable, in the real world that just isn’t true.
Bdaman:
did this Mueller fellow have a mathematical model of climate? If he didnt he should have, modeling natural systems using math makes it true.
Yes and either Kevin totally missed this or he totally ignored it.
Note not from Briepart 🙂
From a few days ago.
Slartibartfast could you please tell us who Doug Keenan is and how he is wrong. You being the famed mathematician and statistician your are 😉
The Economist asked me to comment on four research papers from the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) project. The four papers, which have not been published, are as follows.
Decadal variations in the global atmospheric land temperatures
Influence of urban heating on the global temperature land average using rural sites identified from MODIS classifications
Berkeley Earth temperature averaging process
Earth atmospheric land surface temperature and station quality
Below is some of the correspondence that we had. (Note: my comments were written under time pressure, and are unpolished.)
Unless the data is measured with error, you never, ever, for no reason, under no threat, SMOOTH the series! And if for some bizarre reason you do smooth it, you absolutely on pain of death do NOT use the smoothed series as input for other analyses!
If, in a moment of insanity, you do smooth time series data and you do use it as input to other analyses, you dramatically increase the probability of fooling yourself! T
http://www.informath.org/apprise/a5700.htm
Bdaman:
did this Mueller fellow have a mathematical model of climate? If he didnt he should have, modeling natural systems using math makes it true.
Even though there could have been a 100 different variables in the model of Adriatic predator species, it appears from the literature that only a couple of variables were looked at.
I am beginning to wonder if mathematical modeling is like statistics, you just use the data you want and write the equations you want so that your “prediction” matches your personal bias.
Probably not, we all know how ethical and pure research scientists are in the pursuit of knowledge.
The ClimateGate thing was a scandal. It’s terrible what they did. It’s shameful the way they hid the data.”
Mueller according to Curry and others has done the exact same thing.
Muller: “That’s ridiculous. I mean, some people say I proved that there was no ClimateGate. No. NO! The ClimateGate thing was a scandal. It’s terrible what they did. It’s shameful the way they hid the data.”
Muller is asked if he’s in the Al Gore camp. Muller: “Al Gore camp? That’s ridiculous…what I point out is that most of what appears in An Inconvenient Truth is absolutely either wrong, exaggerated, or misleading.”
The Muller “results unambiguously show an increase in surface temperature since 1960,” Curry wrote Sunday.
Wow oh my gosh 50 years is an eternity. So we can determine that in fifty years the Earth has never before warmed this much. Hottest on record. Very very alarming. We must act now. If not Cat 5 hurricanes will become the norm. Severe droughts and floods like the world has never seen. Tornado’s of severe magnitude. More earthquakes etc etc.
So even though we are past the CO2 350 PPM safe zone and THERE ARE NO INCREASES to the above natural disasters we must act now because……
The world’s ten deadliest floods occurred when CO2 was below 350 ppm.
24 of the deadliest tornado’s happened when CO2 was below 350 ppm.
The strongest and deadliest US hurricanes occurred when CO2 was below 350 ppm.
Nine of the world’s ten deadliest hurricanes and typhoons occurred when CO2 was below 350 ppm.
In the worlds history CO2 has been higher up to 20 times of what it is today but we are all still here.”
Slarti:
what do you think of this model?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/10/18/replicating-al-gores-climate-101-video-experiment-shows-that-his-high-school-physics-could-never-work-as-advertised/
Slarti:
go get a job. Work at McDonalds, do something.
You are starting to lose it from inactivity. You are arguing with a guy on the internet and trying to prove you are right.
OK, if it makes you feel better you are right about modeling and I dont know shit about the subject.
I hope that lifts your self esteem.
rafflaw,
Does the sun still revolve around ithe Earth too?
Elaine,
You’re not suggesting that Bdaman linked a source that had less than exemplary journalistic standards, are you? Because that seems un-possible…
Elaine,
Don’t you know that the world is still flat?
Bdaman,
Here are the last three paragraphs from the excerpt I posted in my previous comment:
And that started on Sunday, when a British newspaper said one of Muller’s co-authors, Georgia Tech climate scientist Judith Curry, accused Muller of another Climategate-like scandal and trying to “hide the decline” of recent global temperatures.
The Associated Press contacted Curry on Sunday afternoon and she said in an email that Muller and colleagues “are not hiding any data or otherwise engaging in any scientifically questionable practice.”
The Muller “results unambiguously show an increase in surface temperature since 1960,” Curry wrote Sunday. She said she disagreed with Muller’s public relations efforts and some public comments from Muller about there no longer being a need for skepticism.
*****
It doesn’t sound as if Curry has claimed that global warming was over.
GLOBAL WARMING IS OVER, SAYS EXPERT
IT’S one of the hottest feuds in science – climate chance zealots insist that we’re still destroying the planet but now another scientist has warned the cast-iron evidence just isn’t there.
FOR a minute there it seemed the global warming debate had finally been resolved.
http://www.express.co.uk/features/view/280948/Is-global-warming-over-
Some do but most O know are turned on by a bald head.
Richard Muller, Global Warming Skeptic, Finds Climate Change Real In His Own Study
10/31/2011
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2011/10/31/richard-muller-global-warming-skeptic-study_n_1066788.html
Excerpt:
On Monday, Muller was taking his results — four separate papers that are not yet published or peer-reviewed, but will be, he says — to a conference in Santa Fe, New Mexico, expected to include many prominent skeptics as well as mainstream scientists.
“Of course he’ll be welcome,” said Petr Chylek of Los Alamos National Lab, a noted skeptic and the conference organizer. “The purpose of our conference is to bring people with different views on climate together, so they can talk and clarify things.”
Shawn Lawrence Otto, author of the book “Fool Me Twice” that criticizes science skeptics, said Muller should expect to be harshly treated by global warming deniers. “Now he’s considered a traitor. For the skeptic community, this isn’t about data or fact. It’s about team sports. He’s been traded to the Indians. He’s playing for the wrong team now.”
And that started on Sunday, when a British newspaper said one of Muller’s co-authors, Georgia Tech climate scientist Judith Curry, accused Muller of another Climategate-like scandal and trying to “hide the decline” of recent global temperatures.
The Associated Press contacted Curry on Sunday afternoon and she said in an email that Muller and colleagues “are not hiding any data or otherwise engaging in any scientifically questionable practice.”
The Muller “results unambiguously show an increase in surface temperature since 1960,” Curry wrote Sunday. She said she disagreed with Muller’s public relations efforts and some public comments from Muller about there no longer being a need for skepticism.
Yeah? I’ve been unemployed for almost 2 years – I forget, do chicks find that sexy?