So if your (or Watts in this case) objection is that recent tree ring data diverges from the instrumental record and therefore is unreliable then what about all the other hockey sticks from data not dependent on tree rings?

Actually what is most unreliable is getting information from ExxonMobil funded blog sites like Wattsupwiththat and co2science but you knew that already.

From http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/09/hey-ya-mal/.

Interesting news this weekend. Apparently everything we’ve done in our entire careers is a “MASSIVE lie” (sic) because all of radiative physics, climate history, the instrumental record, modeling and satellite observations turn out to be based on 12 trees in an obscure part of Siberia. Who knew?

Indeed, according to both the National Review and the Daily Telegraph (and who would not trust these sources?), even Al Gore’s use of the stair lift in An Inconvenient Truth was done to highlight cherry-picked tree rings, instead of what everyone thought was the rise in CO2 concentrations in the last 200 years.

Who should we believe? Al Gore with his “facts” and “peer reviewed science” or the practioners of “Blog Science“? Surely, the choice is clear….

More seriously, many of you will have noticed yet more blogarrhea about tree rings this week. The target de jour is a particular compilation of trees (called a chronology in dendro-climatology) that was first put together by two Russians, Hantemirov and Shiyatov, in the late 1990s (and published in 2002). This multi-millennial chronology from Yamal (in northwestern Siberia) was painstakingly collected from hundreds of sub-fossil trees buried in sediment in the river deltas. They used a subset of the 224 trees they found to be long enough and sensitive enough (based on the interannual variability) supplemented by 17 living tree cores to create a “Yamal” climate record.

A preliminary set of this data had also been used by Keith Briffa in 2000 (pdf) (processed using a different algorithm than used by H&S for consistency with two other northern high latitude series), to create another “Yamal” record that was designed to improve the representation of long-term climate variability.

Since long climate records with annual resolution are few and far between, it is unsurprising that they get used in climate reconstructions. Different reconstructions have used different methods and have made different selections of source data depending on what was being attempted. The best studies tend to test the robustness of their conclusions by dropping various subsets of data or by excluding whole classes of data (such as tree-rings) in order to see what difference they make so you won’t generally find that too much rides on any one proxy record (despite what you might read elsewhere).

****

So along comes Steve McIntyre, self-styled slayer of hockey sticks, who declares without any evidence whatsoever that Briffa didn’t just reprocess the data from the Russians, but instead supposedly picked through it to give him the signal he wanted. These allegations have been made without any evidence whatsoever.

McIntyre has based his ‘critique’ on a test conducted by randomly adding in one set of data from another location in Yamal that he found on the internet. People have written theses about how to construct tree ring chronologies in order to avoid end-member effects and preserve as much of the climate signal as possible. Curiously no-one has ever suggested simply grabbing one set of data, deleting the trees you have a political objection to and replacing them with another set that you found lying around on the web.

The statement from Keith Briffa clearly describes the background to these studies and categorically refutes McIntyre’s accusations. Does that mean that the existing Yamal chronology is sacrosanct? Not at all – all of the these proxy records are subject to revision with the addition of new (relevant) data and whether the records change significantly as a function of that isn’t going to be clear until it’s done.

What is clear however, is that there is a very predictable pattern to the reaction to these blog posts that has been discussed many times. As we said last time there was such a kerfuffle:

However, there is clearly a latent and deeply felt wish in some sectors for the whole problem of global warming to be reduced to a statistical quirk or a mistake. This led to some truly death-defying leaping to conclusions when this issue hit the blogosphere.

Plus ça change…

The timeline for these mini-blogstorms is always similar. An unverified accusation of malfeasance is made based on nothing, and it is instantly ‘telegraphed’ across the denial-o-sphere while being embellished along the way to apply to anything ‘hockey-stick’ shaped and any and all scientists, even those not even tangentially related. The usual suspects become hysterical with glee that finally the ‘hoax’ has been revealed and congratulations are handed out all round. After a while it is clear that no scientific edifice has collapsed and the search goes on for the ‘real’ problem which is no doubt just waiting to be found. Every so often the story pops up again because some columnist or blogger doesn’t want to, or care to, do their homework. Net effect on lay people? Confusion. Net effect on science? Zip.

Having said that, it does appear that McIntyre did not directly instigate any of the ludicrous extrapolations of his supposed findings highlighted above, though he clearly set the ball rolling. No doubt he has written to the National Review and the Telegraph and Anthony Watts to clarify their mistakes and we’re confident that the corrections will appear any day now…. Oh yes.

But can it be true that all Hockey Sticks are made in Siberia? A RealClimate exclusive investigation follows:

We start with the original MBH hockey stick as replicated by Wahl and Ammann:

Hmmm… neither of the Yamal chronologies anywhere in there. And what about the hockey stick that Oerlemans derived from glacier retreat since 1600?

Nope, no Yamal record in there either. How about Osborn and Briffa’s results which were robust even when you removed any three of the records?

Or there. The hockey stick from borehole temperature reconstructions perhaps?

No. How about the hockey stick of CO2 concentrations from ice cores and direct measurements?

Err… not even close. What about the the impact on the Kaufman et al 2009 Arctic reconstruction when you take out Yamal?

Oh. The hockey stick you get when you don’t use tree-rings at all (blue curve)?

No. Well what about the hockey stick blade from the instrumental record itself?

And again, no. But wait, maybe there is something (Update: Original idea by Lucia)….

Nah….

One would think that some things go without saying, but apparently people still get a key issue wrong so let us be extremely clear. Science is made up of people challenging assumptions and other peoples’ results with the overall desire of getting closer to the ‘truth’. There is nothing wrong with people putting together new chronologies of tree rings or testing the robustness of previous results to updated data or new methodologies. Or even thinking about what would happen if it was all wrong. What is objectionable is the conflation of technical criticism with unsupported, unjustified and unverified accusations of scientific misconduct. Steve McIntyre keeps insisting that he should be treated like a professional. But how professional is it to continue to slander scientists with vague insinuations and spin made-up tales of perfidy out of the whole cloth instead of submitting his work for peer-review? He continues to take absolutely no responsibility for the ridiculous fantasies and exaggerations that his supporters broadcast, apparently being happy to bask in their acclaim rather than correct any of the misrepresentations he has engendered. If he wants to make a change, he has a clear choice; to continue to play Don Quixote for the peanut gallery or to produce something constructive that is actually worthy of publication.

Peer-review is nothing sinister and not part of some global conspiracy, but instead it is the process by which people are forced to match their rhetoric to their actual results. You can’t generally get away with imprecise suggestions that something might matter for the bigger picture without actually showing that it does. It does matter whether something ‘matters’, otherwise you might as well be correcting spelling mistakes for all the impact it will have.

So go on Steve, surprise us.

See you continue to place words in my mouth and say I am making a generalization that I didn't make. YES, I did say that he was wrong when I said:

"To say that people in charge care more about their personal benefit than of AGW is very wrong."

But, just because I claim that statement is wrong DOES NOT MEAN THAT I AM CLAIMING THE OPPOSITE TO BE TRUE.

OMG, I even put in BOLD the very next sentence when I said:

"Sure there are people out to earn a penny in the process..."

That very sentence marks my claim that YES, there are global warming advocates that are out for money. Therefore, I'm conceding that not ALL advocates of AGW are good to the core.

Not sure how else I can spell it out for you. What is surprising is that you quoted me right, but you just don't understand the meaning of the sentence. Just because I claim one thought to be wrong does not mean I am inferring the opposite to be true.

But you went beyond saying he was wrong and stated:

You made a generalization. "to say that people in charge". you did not qualify it by adding "he said" or "some".  You left it as all, and we clearly know that not all people are in it for altruistic reasons, some are in it for their own gain.

most people do not mean the generalizations they make, they make them for effect.  As did you.  I am not putting any words in your mouth, just using your own words.

But, you're wrong, because that is exactly what I said. The verb "to say" in my statement refers directly to what he said. (I'm saying this for like the 3rd time...) My statement was NOT: "People in charge do not care more about their personal benefit than of AGW." If I had said that, then yes, I would've generalized. But I had "To say" before it which makes it in reference to what he said.

Let me break it down for you with this beautiful little story about John and Mike...

"People who wear blue shirts are dumb.", said John.

"To say that is wrong, John." said Mike.

Now, if you look at those statements, does that mean that Mike is calling people who wear blue shirts smart? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! That is structured exactly like how I structured my comments.

I could add back in the implied articles in the sentence that might make it more clear for you since you do not understand that part of it, but the english language is what it is and my statement as it was typed is NOT a generalization. That's my last post on it, because it is derailing what this thread is really about.

Now stop calling me out like that and read what I type carefully next time.

Same thing with the all of the criticism of the hockey stick. As pointed out in reply #851 there are at least 8 basically independent peer reviewed published sources that support the hockey stick. There are precisely ZERO credible criticisms of it.

Plus it's not everything else that is *wrong*, it's only the recent tree ring data that is anomalous, everything else is consistent.

Mumbles, you never fail to depress me.  I tell you something is so, and instead of actually checking to see if I'm right, you just go by your precious third party information sources.  This while posting graphs that show trends supporting my premise yourself.  It takes thirty seconds to use google to fact check what follows.

The satellite record shows a fraction of the warming in the lower troposphere as is occuring at the surface stations, the opposite of what should be happening.  Where the CO2 is should be the hotspot for the warming trend.  The amount of infrared blocked at the surface is negligible, that's where it's created to begin with.

The Greenland core samples show a temperature climb that started before 1900, and both steeper and higher climbs previously.  The Greenland core samples do not agree with AGW, showing the increase predating the emissions and being completely normal.  This shouldn't be a surprise since news papers were abuzz about Greenland melting away in the fucking 20's.  Vostok shows a whopping .5 degree change over the last century.  Just five hundred years is enough time to have a 3 degree change in the same time frame.  If you look over the past two hundred, you find that the current upward trend predates the industrial age by half a century.  Yeah, your precious CO2 is trailing it there too.

I don't know why so many scientists are saying the opposite of reality, but it is the opposite of reality.  You can whine about right wing conspiracy theories all you want, it wont stop being true.  The only source of data that shows a radical increase in temperature, is the temperature station data set, and only after modification, and even they don't match previous climbs just in the last thousand years.  CO2 is trailing, nothing agrees with the surface stations, and there isn't anything new here.

You're wrong, get past the first stage of grief already.

When I compared you to Zyxpsilon I wasn't joking. While not quite as incomprehensible as he is you often are really not that far behind. You make vague references to something I posted in my last reply or in a reply that I made 30 pages ago with an equal lack of specitivity. You make great hand waving arguments with a claim that I could verify them in thirty seconds, if so then spend the 30 seconds yourself and make the point that you're trying to make.

Look, I'm not going to do your work for you. If you want to make a point then it behooves *you* to make the point in a logical, clear and consise manner. This means you need to say what you mean explicitly and not make people guess what it is that you're talking about. You also need to provide your sources (credible ones not Watts or some other crap) but you need to not simply provide links but you need to quote detailed selected excerpts from the work that in fact prove your point.

Pretend it's a high school book report because otherwise all you've been doing is waving your hands in a hysterical manner for the last 31 pages and I doubt anyone has any idea what any of your points really are.

Make a logical cogent argument based on reasonable stated premises and reaching a logical conclusion. Even if you can't actually "prove" the point you're trying to make it still goes a lot further than your current method of argument which as far as I can tell is limited to proof by vehement assertion.

http://www.endgame.org/moore.pdf

What was the proposed solution? I don't recall mentioning that I am in agreement with any solution that was talked about. Just because I say that we should combat global warming doesn't mean that I was saying HOW we should do it. I am definitely going to look at that link you posted. Sounds really interesting. I doubt it would be effective to just combat the symptoms of global warming without regard for the cause itself. But it may be the best short term solution. For example, what about the environments that will change and the endangered species that will die off? I am no environmental activist, but you certainly can't ignore nature in such regard. Does he has a solution for even that?

Like I said, I was not for or against any solution. Just because I said that I am for combating global warming doesn't mean that I was pro any particular method of doing so. I am a very open-minded person. But, when looking at things long term, it is never optimum to simply fight the symptoms of a problem without regard to the cause itself.

Actually you make a good point that a lot of global warming scientists research on. It is widely known that during the pre-historic era there was much more volcanic activity going on. This accounted for a ton of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. So while they didn't drive any SUVs, there were still a ton of greenhouse gases that caused warmer temperatures to occur. The earth during say the Cretaceous was a much different earth than it was today.

But, what some scientists are looking into is studying the earth during periods with similiar situations of today and are finding some startling discoveries. They are finding that the atmosphere is more sensitive than we realize.

Here is an article from the United States Geological Survey:

http://soundwaves.usgs.gov/2009/01/

(PS, Nice job at being a smark aleck though.)

indeed, but "people in charge" is all encompassing.  You did not differentiate, and hence lead the reader to beleive that all were of immaculate conception.  That is a generalization.  Clearly in your defense of your original statement you are making clear you do not believe that, and I accept that.  I am as lazy a writer as they come, and I sure make my share of faux pas'.  I accept you did as well, but then it begs the question - perhaps Timmy did in his post as well?

However one point you make in your "article" is the belief that "the original comment that I am rebutting is an attempt to rebut one of my own articles, but the blogger never posted there."

It was not.

My reply #851 of this *thread* https://forums.galciv2.com/370739/page/35/ was a specific response to your reply #845 of this same *thread*, a fact which should have been clear since I did quote an entire paragraph from your reply #845 as the header to my reply.

Another point is that I am not a "blogger". I am a long time GalCiv2 player that has hung around the GalCiv2 forums for a few years now. This may in fact be semantics because Stardock forums and blogs do share the same database but I do believe that there are significant differences between "blogs" and "forums" that contribute to a certain amount of difference in opinion and outlook.

For one “bloggers” seem to have a far greater proprietary interest in their “articles” and often seem, from my perspective at least, to be far more defensive of their point of view, whereas the OP (original poster) of a “thread” in a “forum” is simply the guy that happened to bring up the topic. Again perhaps this is just semantics but it is something that perhaps you should keep in mind when your audience is not just the JU blog site but also includes numerous game sites that are supposedly suitable for 13 year olds.

In any case this is a "thread" and not an "article" and while that may be a technicality it is most certainly a reality because SivCorp has not created a blog on either of Stardock's two blog sites, JU or Impulsedriven.

It also should be noted that there are differences in how things are treated "here" in the Off-topic forum (https://forums.galciv2.com/forum/412) accessible from multiple Stardock game sites as well as JU and forums that are only accessible from the JU site. Specifically this is defined in the following sticky thread for this forum that was created when this forum was only accessible from game sites and not accessible from JU.

https://forums.galciv2.com/132685

"While the OTF here is the catch-all place for anything you want to discuss that's not games-related, we request that users refrain from starting overtly political and religious threads here, or others that are very likely to veer to such topics. Such threads more often than not degenerate into flamewars and do nothing to engender friendship and camaraderie among fellow players; in fact they often do the opposite and drive players away.

That is not to say that Stardock has anything against such discussions; this is just not the place for them. Users are welcomed to discuss matters of any kind over on the JoeUser.com Forums (which, being Stardock owned, will use the same login as here so you can just pop right on over and start posting if you like). You can even start your own blog there, be it political or based on another topic.

Thanks for cooperating and helping to keep things friendly here."

In actual practice the effect of this policy is that threads with some political content, of which this is undoubtedly one, are tolerated "here" in the Off-topic forum as long as they remain relatively civil but if and when that stops being the case they are moved to JU or perhaps simply locked if bad enough.

So basically from my perspective JU is where "bad" threads go to die.

I have gone on record as saying that I don't particularly care for the JU site nor would I in general want to associate with most people that inhabit the site. That's not to say that I don't on occasion go "there" and respond in a few "articles" but that's the exception rather than the rule and pretty much every time that I have done so it simply reinforces my opinion that most folks on JU are not people with whom I care to associate.

Your reply #845 posted a graph and a link to a Wattsup article about the hockey stick and in particular expressed concern about the problem of the divergence of the tree ring record and instrumental record over the last few decades. The article with which I replied certainly seemed to address that point. If it happened to address more than that then that was merely fortuitous.

I posted the response from RealClimate and copied it in its entirety instead of just providing a link simply to show the pretty pictures that documented that there are (at least) 8 different sources of hockey stick shaped temperature reconstructions other than being exclusively dependent on tree rings (or even ice cores for that matter).