*EL NINO/LA NINA FORECAST 2010-2011*

[woodstove]

The latest weekly SST departures are:

Niño 4: +0.1 degree C

Niño 3.4: -0.5 degree C

Niño 3: -0.6 degree C

Niño 1+2: -0.2 degree C

from tinyurl.com/d5pkty

[twawki]

Thanks Woodstove - how you been?

[icefisher]

Jun 16, 2010 12:14:40 GMT woodstove said:

The latest weekly SST departures are:

Niño 4: +0.1 degree C

Niño 3.4: -0.5 degree C

Niño 3: -0.6 degree C

Niño 1+2: -0.2 degree C

from tinyurl.com/d5pkty

Since ENSO state is determined by Niño 3.4 we are in La Nina conditions now and all that has to play out is for the band to get in formation and make the official announcement.

The subsurface numbers are a bigger anomaly than the last El Nino suggesting this might be a bigger La Nina than minus 1.8 which is 4/10's deeper than the 2008 La Nina and 2/10's deeper than than the 2000 La Nina. Maybe a super La Nina that we haven't seen hide nor hair of since 1973.

It would be nice to see the subsurface estimates of the earlier in this decade La Ninas to better understand whether that is a good indicator or not.

The two super La Ninas in the record both produced annual average temperature drops in excess of .3 deg C (both taking 3 years to realize it fully). . . .but those were in the days when peak oil estimates were just a fantasy of the AGW crowd mom's and dad's if that matters for anything.

[dontgetoutmuch]

I'm moving to Alaska, I want my AGW, they promised!!!

[socold]

Jun 16, 2010 2:06:19 GMT magellan said:

Jun 15, 2010 19:03:12 GMT socold said:

You don't seem to even read what you link to. It's saying that the three global records are not independent - they use the same underlying station data. They are independent in methodology but not entirely in the input data. That's nothing about them being "phony", your off-base conclusion perhaps reflects that your perception of GISTEMP being "phony" is baseless in general. perhaps your whole understanding of the surface record is limited by such misunderstandings.

Uh, no. You appear to have selective perception disorder.

The differences between the three global surface temperatures that occur are a result of the analysis methodology as used by each of the three groups. They are not “completely independent”. This is further explained on page 48 of the CCSP report where it is written with respect to the surface temperature data (as well as the other temperature data sets) that

“The data sets are distinguished from one another by differences in the details of their construction.”

Ah, the differences in the details of their construction. Now whatever could that mean?

It doesn't mean they are "phony" by any stretch of your imagination.

With respect to the Arctic, GISS Arctic temperature values are not based on measurements. It is made up. Phony. A plastic banana.

They are based on measurements, measurements which are extrapolated. Noone is pulling the values out of thin air, the process of generating the arctic values is objective - the method is public and as station data is reported each month independent observers can calculate the new GISTEMP values. There is no inherent warming built in, if the high latitude land stations weren't showing such warming, GISTEMP wouldn't be showing such arctic warming!

So it isn't "made up", it's not "phony". Additionally Hansen has already showed that without the GISTEMP extrapolation the record is closer to HadCRUT. So everyone knows the difference between HadCRUT and GISTEMP recently is due to arctic extrapolation that GISTEMP uses. (interestingly when people quote hadcrut as a global value they are implicitly extrapolating arctic temperatures without realizing it)

You have no defense because one does not exist. This is why the Hansen apologists gave up defending it on WUWT.

The defense is easy. Why GISTEMP does or does not use a particular source of data in the arctic is an esoteric detail that I would only expect to find out by asking Hansen himself, or someone else knowledgable about the history of GISTEMP development, or through rooting around the GISTEMP website or through some of the papers published about GISTEMP. It's possible skeptics have done neither.

Every dataset included is a choice. For example GISTEMP chose to include USHCN for the US and SCAR datasets for antarctica. It could have just stuck to GHCN data instead. I don't know why such choices were made, again it's esoteric knowledge which I would have to look up. I find it more than likely however that if Hansen was in a room with joe public making "why did you do this..why did you do that" accusations, Hansen would completely school their ass.

Skeptics have a choice - if they really care - instead of unproductively moaning on and on about the latest daily nitpick over what GISTEMP has or has not included, the skeptics could just produce their own surface temperature record using what they think should be included. Then we could see what temperature graph shape "doing it properly" yields. I bet it would look close to GISTEMP and HadCRUT and the satellite records. But we'll never know because skeptics shy away from doing it.

bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2010/06/may-2010-sst-anomaly-update.html

OI in OI.v2 stands for Optimum Interpolation
www.emc.ncep.noaa.gov/research/cmb/sst_analysis/

The website says:
"The analysis uses in situ and satellite SSTs plus SSTs simulated by sea ice cover"

"The most significant change for the OI.v2 is the improved simulation of SST obs from sea ice data following a technique developed at the UK Met Office. This change has reduced biases in the OI SST at higher latitudes."

It's got everything you hate - interpolations, proxies, simulations and the UK Met Office. I notice those large warming spikes correspond with the summer decline of arctic sea ice...

But how else are they going to measure arctic sea surface temperature when much of the sea is covered by ice for most of the year and that ice cover pattern changes from year to year (and trends downwards over decades)?

So perhaps the reason GISTEMP doesn't use this data is because they don't regard it as much better than what they are doing already.

Aside from the fictitious Arctic values, how reliable are surface station records?

icecap.us/images/uploads/EPA_ChristyJR_Response_2.pdf

Below is an example for East Africa (grid square bounded by 5°S – Eq, 35°E – 40°E). Here we see the two flaws in the popular datasets (HadCRUT3v and GISS NASA). First, the reliance on a very few stations leads to large errors (popular trends > +0.3 °C/decade vs. +0.1 when all stations are used with rigorous techniques) and secondly, the use of TMean which incorporates the warming effects of surface development in TMin which are mistakenly assumed to be driven by greenhouse gases (Christy et al. 2009).

And UAH shows a greater warming trend over the US than HadCRUT. Despite all those AC units in the US...

March 210 anomalies for UAH and GISTEMP:
UAH +0.66
GISS +0.57

Point being, I wouldn't expect tropospheric and surface temperatures to match - not on short timescales and not in small regions. They aren't measuring the same thing.

As for East Africa, I agree coverage is too small - as reflected in the uncertainty range. But removing that region from GISTEMP doesn't invalidate recent warming or the human warming influence on climate, so I don't see an argument there.

[woodstove]

Jun 16, 2010 12:28:29 GMT twawki said:

Thanks Woodstove - how you been?

Thriving in this beautiful world, TWAWKI. Went stand-up paddleboarding for the first time today on the Colorado River right here in Austin. How are you?

[magellan]

Jun 16, 2010 23:35:19 GMT socold said:

Jun 16, 2010 2:06:19 GMT magellan said:

Uh, no. You appear to have selective perception disorder.

The differences between the three global surface temperatures that occur are a result of the analysis methodology as used by each of the three groups. They are not “completely independent”. This is further explained on page 48 of the CCSP report where it is written with respect to the surface temperature data (as well as the other temperature data sets) that

“The data sets are distinguished from one another by differences in the details of their construction.”

Ah, the differences in the details of their construction. Now whatever could that mean?

It doesn't mean they are "phony" by any stretch of your imagination.



They are based on measurements, measurements which are extrapolated. Noone is pulling the values out of thin air, the process of generating the arctic values is objective - the method is public and as station data is reported each month independent observers can calculate the new GISTEMP values. There is no inherent warming built in, if the high latitude land stations weren't showing such warming, GISTEMP wouldn't be showing such arctic warming!

So it isn't "made up", it's not "phony". Additionally Hansen has already showed that without the GISTEMP extrapolation the record is closer to HadCRUT. So everyone knows the difference between HadCRUT and GISTEMP recently is due to arctic extrapolation that GISTEMP uses. (interestingly when people quote hadcrut as a global value they are implicitly extrapolating arctic temperatures without realizing it)



The defense is easy. Why GISTEMP does or does not use a particular source of data in the arctic is an esoteric detail that I would only expect to find out by asking Hansen himself, or someone else knowledgable about the history of GISTEMP development, or through rooting around the GISTEMP website or through some of the papers published about GISTEMP. It's possible skeptics have done neither.

Every dataset included is a choice. For example GISTEMP chose to include USHCN for the US and SCAR datasets for antarctica. It could have just stuck to GHCN data instead. I don't know why such choices were made, again it's esoteric knowledge which I would have to look up. I find it more than likely however that if Hansen was in a room with joe public making "why did you do this..why did you do that" accusations, Hansen would completely school their ass.

Skeptics have a choice - if they really care - instead of unproductively moaning on and on about the latest daily nitpick over what GISTEMP has or has not included, the skeptics could just produce their own surface temperature record using what they think should be included. Then we could see what temperature graph shape "doing it properly" yields. I bet it would look close to GISTEMP and HadCRUT and the satellite records. But we'll never know because skeptics shy away from doing it.



OI in OI.v2 stands for Optimum Interpolation
www.emc.ncep.noaa.gov/research/cmb/sst_analysis/

The website says:
"The analysis uses in situ and satellite SSTs plus SSTs simulated by sea ice cover"

"The most significant change for the OI.v2 is the improved simulation of SST obs from sea ice data following a technique developed at the UK Met Office. This change has reduced biases in the OI SST at higher latitudes."

It's got everything you hate - interpolations, proxies, simulations and the UK Met Office. I notice those large warming spikes correspond with the summer decline of arctic sea ice...

But how else are they going to measure arctic sea surface temperature when much of the sea is covered by ice for most of the year and that ice cover pattern changes from year to year (and trends downwards over decades)?

So perhaps the reason GISTEMP doesn't use this data is because they don't regard it as much better than what they are doing already.

Aside from the fictitious Arctic values, how reliable are surface station records?

icecap.us/images/uploads/EPA_ChristyJR_Response_2.pdf

Below is an example for East Africa (grid square bounded by 5°S – Eq, 35°E – 40°E). Here we see the two flaws in the popular datasets (HadCRUT3v and GISS NASA). First, the reliance on a very few stations leads to large errors (popular trends > +0.3 °C/decade vs. +0.1 when all stations are used with rigorous techniques) and secondly, the use of TMean which incorporates the warming effects of surface development in TMin which are mistakenly assumed to be driven by greenhouse gases (Christy et al. 2009).

And UAH shows a greater warming trend over the US than HadCRUT. Despite all those AC units in the US...

March 210 anomalies for UAH and GISTEMP:
UAH +0.66
GISS +0.57

Point being, I wouldn't expect tropospheric and surface temperatures to match - not on short timescales and not in small regions. They aren't measuring the same thing.

As for East Africa, I agree coverage is too small - as reflected in the uncertainty range. But removing that region from GISTEMP doesn't invalidate recent warming or the human warming influence on climate, so I don't see an argument there.

As for East Africa, I agree coverage is too small

Then what makes you think it doesn't apply to the Arctic? Oh but anomalies are the only important thing, not spatial coverage or location, remember? The anomaly method fixes everything. I can't find it, but recall Gavin Scmidt or Hansen stated they could diagnose global warming with only a handful of thermometers. The Christy papers are prime examples supporting my contention that Zeke, Tamino & co. are accomplishing nothing all by simply replicating GISS results. Not everyone falls for their shell game.

I notice those large warming spikes correspond with the summer decline of arctic sea ice...

Then present the evidence for temperature rather than winds and ocean currents causing 2007 ice melt. Now, what do you suppose caused that spike?
----------------------------------------------------------------------

So perhaps the reason GISTEMP doesn't use this data is because they don't regard it as much better than what they are doing already.

Or perhaps confirmation bias (best case) should be excluded from their methodology.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Skeptics have a choice - if they really care - instead of unproductively moaning on and on about the latest daily nitpick over what GISTEMP has or has not included, the skeptics could just produce their own surface temperature record using what they think should be included. Then we could see what temperature graph shape "doing it properly" yields. I bet it would look close to GISTEMP and HadCRUT and the satellite records. But we'll never know because skeptics shy away from doing it.

What the hell do you think Christy did? Maybe you missed it:

Basic scientific inquiry should encourage EPA to listen to those of us who actually build these datasets (from scratch) as our message has equal if not greater credibility.

How about this: everyone should be interested in the utmost accurate data used in temperature reporting, whether skeptics or true believers. On the other hand, maybe its not a good idea to play both scientist and a political hack calling for civil disobedience (the ends justify the means).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

They are based on measurements, measurements which are extrapolated.

GISS is always high in the Arctic. It NEVER has even a modestly close to normal Arctic. Just because they have no temperatures measured there, that’s no reason to doubt their imaginings, though… /sarcoff>
------------------------------------------------------------------------

I find it more than likely however that if Hansen was in a room with joe public making "why did you do this..why did you do that" accusations, Hansen would completely school their ass.

There's no need when gullible Joe "socold" public buys whatever he says. OTOH, Hansen refuses such discussion with his peers where he would be ferreted out.
----------------------------------------------------------------------

(interestingly when people quote hadcrut as a global value they are implicitly extrapolating arctic temperatures without realizing it)

Really? Show me where HadCRUT is implicitly extrapolating Arctic temps. Well socold, IPCC uses HadCRUT as the gold standard, but now that GISS has rediscovered global warming...... As I do read other blogs, even RC, recently Gavin allowed this post to appear in response to a Hansen guest post January concerning GISS temperature records.
www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2010/01/2009-temperatures-by-jim-hansen/comment-page-9/#comments

Beginning at post #401

"I’ve been talking about the qualitative problems that I noticed in the GISS charts in figure 3 above. So I thought that I would try to take a rough shot at quantizing the problem as well. I used the HadCRUT 2005 chart and the GISS 2005 chart to make comparisons. And I wanted to compare the HadCRUT gridcell row that was furthest north to the GISS gridcell row that occupied the same position. First I counted the number of gridcells in a row. There are 72. Then I counted the number of HadCRUT cells that have data in that row. There are 24. This means that the topmost HadCRUT row has 30% coverage. So I added up all of the covered gridcell anomaly values in the row. The total was 43.8. Dividing by 24 I got an average covered gridcell value for the HadCRUT row of 1.85 C. The GISS row obviously had 100% coverage using interpolation and extrapolation. When I added all of the gridcell anomaly values together for the GISS row I came up with 300. Dividing by 72 gave me an average anomaly value of 4.17 C. So the anomaly for the top row of GISS is 2.25 times as large as that of HadCRUT.

It seems to me that this reflect very badly on the GISS interpolation extrapolation algorithm. The other problem is that there are 6 cells in that top row that HadCRUT has negative values for. GISS turns them all to the maximum positive value. The difference is 6.7 C or greater per cell for those 6 cells.

I can only conclude from this that the GISS divergence from the HadCRUT data is an artifact of the GISS processing algorithms and not a reflection of actual temperature variance at the poles."

Skip through the typical RC groupie responses and only read Tilo and Gavin's. You will notice as time goes on Tile Reber is beginning to figure out something is way out of whack with GISS, on top of what he found in his original post. Rather than replying with substantive material, Gavin's SOP response: "read GISS papers" or "this is silly" with other tripe and ad hom he's known for. Unfortunately, Gavin does not acknowledge GISS completely deleted all Arctic SST and simply replaced it with extrapolated/interpolated (there is a difference) values which by itself is a complete discontinuity from HadCRUT. Why didn't he? It doesn't appear he knew. There are even instances where HadCRUT cells indicate cooling which GISS replaced with very high temps.

Tilo knew something was very odd, and now we know from Bob Tisdale, GISS Arctic values are based on phantom numbers. You can obfuscate and explain away as much as you want, the facts are there.

BTW, GISS also plays games with Antarctic as well, possibly worse than the Arctic.

You and glc have been consistent in claiming how closely in agreement the various temperature products are. Your favorite link is to Tamino's jumbled spaghetti graph that nobody can discriminate. However, peeling away the bark, as some of us have been saying for a long time, GISS is diverging. In recent years it is not debatable.

----------------------------------------------------------

And UAH shows a greater warming trend over the US than HadCRUT. Despite all those AC units in the US...

March 210 anomalies for UAH and GISTEMP:
UAH +0.66
GISS +0.57

So what are you suggesting?

[glc]

You and glc have been consistent in claiming how closely in agreement the various temperature products are. Your favorite link is to Tamino's jumbled spaghetti graph that nobody can discriminate.

You don't need to use Tamino's stuff. The data is available - plot your own. However, because, different anomaly base periods are used you will need to offset the GISS and Hadcrut if you want to compare it with the satellite data.

You can also calculate the trends. But be careful not to read too much into short term trends. There will be differences in the short term due to the different methodologies used and the different response times (lags) to events such as El Nino and La Nina. These issues tend to smooth out over longer periods.


March 210 anomalies for UAH and GISTEMP:
UAH +0.66
GISS +0.57

So what are you suggesting?

What does it suggest to you?

[icefisher]

Jun 16, 2010 23:35:19 GMT socold said:

It doesn't mean they are "phony" by any stretch of your imagination.

They are based on measurements, measurements which are extrapolated.

Where is the disagreement?

Thats exactly how they make plastic banana's.

Sorry couldn't resist that one!

[icefisher]

Jun 17, 2010 7:19:47 GMT glc said:

March 210 anomalies for UAH and GISTEMP:
UAH +0.66
GISS +0.57

So what are you suggesting?

What does it suggest to you?

That the actual values of the base period upon which the anomaly is calculated is lower in the UAH dataset.

[twawki]

Sounds like fun. Been busy here - bit engrossed in blog lol getting things in order to move to country etc Watching the sun, skies etc Piers Corban is predicting major rains and floods worldwide in July. Japans Space agency was saying the same for Australia in spring

Jun 17, 2010 2:25:32 GMT woodstove said:

Jun 16, 2010 12:28:29 GMT twawki said:

Thanks Woodstove - how you been?

Thriving in this beautiful world, TWAWKI. Went stand-up paddleboarding for the first time today on the Colorado River right here in Austin. How are you?

[magellan]

Jun 17, 2010 7:19:47 GMT glc said:

You and glc have been consistent in claiming how closely in agreement the various temperature products are. Your favorite link is to Tamino's jumbled spaghetti graph that nobody can discriminate.

You don't need to use Tamino's stuff. The data is available - plot your own. However, because, different anomaly base periods are used you will need to offset the GISS and Hadcrut if you want to compare it with the satellite data.

You can also calculate the trends. But be careful not to read too much into short term trends. There will be differences in the short term due to the different methodologies used and the different response times (lags) to events such as El Nino and La Nina. These issues tend to smooth out over longer periods.


March 210 anomalies for UAH and GISTEMP:
UAH +0.66
GISS +0.57

So what are you suggesting?

What does it suggest to you?

Answering a question with a question. Smooth.

During El Nino (ENSO events), there is an amplification of temperature in the LT compared to the surface. Now figure out why GISS temps are on steroids.

What's wrong glc, don't you have a legitimate response to the post?

As far as plotting graphs, I've done enough of those and wasted too much time arguing with you, who while throwing stones lives in a glass house.

[socold]

Jun 17, 2010 4:16:16 GMT magellan said:

As for East Africa, I agree coverage is too small

Then what makes you think it doesn't apply to the Arctic?

It does. Converage is too small in the arctic, if it wasn't GISTEMP wouldn't be using extrapolation.

I can't find it, but recall Gavin Scmidt or Hansen stated they could diagnose global warming with only a handful of thermometers.

That's the idea that there is redundancy in the number of thermometers in the world. That's only true of some regions such as the US which has tons of the things. The idea is that if you remove 90% of the stations at random the result looks pretty much the same. So the idea is testable.

The Christy papers are prime examples supporting my contention that Zeke, Tamino & co. are accomplishing nothing all by simply replicating GISS results. Not everyone falls for their shell game.

What Zeke, Tamino & co have accomplished is to show that the global temperature results don't rely on Hansen's methods. They didn't replicate GISS results, they reproduced them. So logically the global temperature record shape we are all familiar with cannot depend on anything Hansen or Phil Jones has done. If anything they should be congratulated for getting the shape right.

I notice those large warming spikes correspond with the summer decline of arctic sea ice...

Then present the evidence for temperature rather than winds and ocean currents causing 2007 ice melt. Now, what do you suppose caused that spike?

The low point of 2007 was contributed by winds and ocean currents, but the reason it got so low was decades of degredation of the ice due to increasing temperature in the arctic. Just as the reason 1998 got so hot compared to 1900 was because of a strong el nino but also global warming had raised the "normal" temperature since 1900.

So perhaps the reason GISTEMP doesn't use this data is because they don't regard it as much better than what they are doing already.

Or perhaps confirmation bias (best case) should be excluded from their methodology.

Even if it is confirmation bias I don't see the problem. We know what the record looks like with and without the extrapolation, and we also have HadCRUT whcih doesn't use the extrapolation. Neither Hansen nor Phil Jones can pull the wool over anyone's eyes because they don't control what the data shows.

Skeptics have a choice - if they really care - instead of unproductively moaning on and on about the latest daily nitpick over what GISTEMP has or has not included, the skeptics could just produce their own surface temperature record using what they think should be included. Then we could see what temperature graph shape "doing it properly" yields. I bet it would look close to GISTEMP and HadCRUT and the satellite records. But we'll never know because skeptics shy away from doing it.

What the hell do you think Christy did? Maybe you missed it:

Basic scientific inquiry should encourage EPA to listen to those of us who actually build these datasets (from scratch) as our message has equal if not greater credibility.

Christy hasn't made a surface temperature record. If he had we could have seen what it would look like according to the skeptics think is the right method.

Afterall we could go 100 years of skeptics claiming they don't like how GISTEMP and HadCRUT are done. Wouldn't it just be easier for all of us if skeptics spent just one year making an alternative to GISTEMP and HadCRUT? At the very least it would allow us to contemplate the differences the skeptics are saying should exist. But in the design itself many skeptics might realize why certain decisions were making in regard to GISTEMP and HadCRUT.

How about this: everyone should be interested in the utmost accurate data used in temperature reporting, whether skeptics or true believers. On the other hand, maybe its not a good idea to play both scientist and a political hack calling for civil disobedience (the ends justify the means).

He seems to have done a good job of it so far - HadCRUT and all those independents managed to find a similar result.

They are based on measurements, measurements which are extrapolated.

GISS is always high in the Arctic. It NEVER has even a modestly close to normal Arctic. Just because they have no temperatures measured there, that’s no reason to doubt their imaginings, though… /sarcoff>

High compared to what? If you mean 1970, then sure I think most of the world is generally warmer than 1970, especially the higher latitudes which have warmed more. Here's one month that had a cooler than 1951-1980 arctic:
data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/do_nmap.py?year_last=2010&month_last=5&sat=4&sst=1&type=anoms&mean_gen=04&year1=2009&year2=2009&base1=1951&base2=1980&radius=1200&pol=reg

I don't see how extrapolation can guarantee warming. If the stations that are used to extrapolate the arctic temperatures turn in cold monthly values then those cold values will be extrapolated into the arctic.

If the Earth is indeed going to cool at high latitudes on land in coming years, then GISTEMP will extrapolate that cooling trend into the rest of the arctic.

I find it more than likely however that if Hansen was in a room with joe public making "why did you do this..why did you do that" accusations, Hansen would completely school their ass.

There's no need when gullible Joe "socold" public buys whatever he says. OTOH, Hansen refuses such discussion with his peers where he would be ferreted out.

I've seen where countless accusatory questions raised against Hansen have led - debunked. So I have no confidence in new questions skeptics raise. Often the skeptics haven't investigated all the basis.

(interestingly when people quote hadcrut as a global value they are implicitly extrapolating arctic temperatures without realizing it)

Really? Show me where HadCRUT is implicitly extrapolating Arctic temps.

Well they don't include them, so if you quote HadCRUT as global you would be implicitly assigning the arctic the mean of the rest of world. So when people compare GISTEMP to HadCRUT they are comparing one record that extrapolates the arctic using nearby stations with another record that extrapolates the arctic using the mean of the rest of world.

Well socold, IPCC uses HadCRUT as the gold standard, but now that GISS has rediscovered global warming......

If the IPCC picked the record with the most warming surely they would have picked GISTEMP for AR4.

Gavin does not acknowledge GISS completely deleted all Arctic SST and simply replaced it with extrapolated/interpolated (there is a difference) values which by itself is a complete discontinuity from HadCRUT. Why didn't he? It doesn't appear he knew. There are even instances where HadCRUT cells indicate cooling which GISS replaced with very high temps.

You are right, he probably doesn't know details like that off the top of his head. Does Gavin even work on GISTEMP?

Tilo knew something was very odd, and now we know from Bob Tisdale, GISS Arctic values are based on phantom numbers. You can obfuscate and explain away as much as you want, the facts are there.

The GISS arctic values are based on extrapolation of nearby land stations. If you want to call that "phantom numbers" rather than estimating values where no value exists.

BTW, GISS also plays games with Antarctic as well, possibly worse than the Arctic.

All irrelevant unless you are claiming HadCRUT does too.

You and glc have been consistent in claiming how closely in agreement the various temperature products are. Your favorite link is to Tamino's jumbled spaghetti graph that nobody can discriminate. However, peeling away the bark, as some of us have been saying for a long time, GISS is diverging.

They are close - and that's the fatal flaw in your argument. The flaw that there is not enough difference to worry over. Yet worry over it you do anyway. Why?

We are talking about the last few years. No amount of extrapolation is going to keep such a divergence going. HadCRUT and GISTEMP had diverged before and probably will diverege again in the future. Differnet methods, different results.

In recent years it is not debatable.

Thanks for showing it, it really isn't a big deal at all. I think that kind of difference will be within the uncertainty of both records.

And UAH shows a greater warming trend over the US than HadCRUT. Despite all those AC units in the US...

March 210 anomalies for UAH and GISTEMP:
UAH +0.66
GISS +0.57

So what are you suggesting?

I said what my point was straight after the part you quoted - my point is you cannot expect tropospheric and surface temperture anomalies to match in small spaces or small time periods.

[poitsplace]

I hadn't really thought about it before but an El nino isn't JUST a failure of the ocean currents...its also a failure of the air currents that do a lot of the energy movement to the radiative zone. (or more to the point its first a failure of the air currents which then causes the ocean currents to falter.

[magellan]

socold you still don't get it, and attempting to have a constructive conversation is near impossible as your MO is to make up new things as the discussion progresses. Honestly socold, in your mind you may think you're winning points, but your arguments are hardly worth

I'm sure John Finn will understand the following because he appears to have a wider range or sources, but who knows.

First, I posted detailed information on GISS non-measured Arctic temperature values. There is no argument to made using empirical evidence to support Hansen's recent runaway warming based on untested assumptions. It is made up, pure and simple. Get over it. Gavin Schmidt was a loss for words to defend his boss once Tilo started to unravel the mystery.

Second, the 2009 Christy paper clearly identifies errors in the surface station network and despite your efforts to redirect, the facts are laid bare. It is not a comparison of satellite to surface, it is surface to surface. Read the damn paper before making ignoramus statements of whether he constructs temperature records or not.

Finally, now that you've taken the bait trying to explain (incoherently) why or why not the satellite doesn't match surface, if I've said it once I've said it a hundred times; they shouldn't match. Both you and glc continue throwing out recent GISS vs UAH "convergence" as if it has legitimacy. In reality it means nothing. If somehow GISS is now agreeing with satellite, then we should expect all previous years since 1979 to agree as well, including 1998. We should also expect GISS to drop the same amount as UAH will in the next 12 months, but it never seems to work that way now does it?

What part of this is too difficult to understand? Unfortunately, some, as does you, make the claim HadCRUT don't include Arctic temperature. Sorry, you're wrong about that as well. They only include what is measured, not what is not measured! There is a metrological definition of what a measurement is, look it up.

On GISS vs UAH, read carefully:
wattsupwiththat.com/2010/05/17/gistemp-is-high/

(1) It is well known, and widely published, that year-to-year surface temperature anomalies are magnified with height, This is due to moist convective transport of heat from the surface to the atmosphere by evaporation and precipitation; It’s been seen in radiosonde data before there were ever satellites.

(2) It is similarly well known that this heat transport takes some time to occur, especially on large space scales (e.g. the tropics) with a 2 month or so average time lag between peak surface temperatures and peak tropospheric temperatures in the case of El Nino/La Nina.

The magnified warming with height is the same effect as the so-called “hot spot” that is expected with *long-term* warming, but which the satellite data do not seem to support so far. Some think this is a big deal, others not so much, and still others think is an artifact of errors in one or more of the measurement systems.

Had-Crut shows this same amplification in the current El Niño (seen below) with positive ENSO months consistently amplified in RSS relative to normalised Had-Crut.

Got it? GISS no longer shows this amplification which is well documented in meteorological records long before the satellite era. So, once again, GISS is getting results that don't agree with observations, they are making it up to match satellite. Both UAH and RSS should have zoomed well past GISS the past few months. But he'll get what he wants; a record warm year to give the politicians fodder and will make sure he is out in front calling drastic action immediately. Oh, and it won't hurt to have all the media attention that GW suppressed by limiting Hansen to only 1400 interviews pushing his AGW agenda on the taxpayer's dime.

Personally it is my belief that James Hansen is a dishonest individual who at some point crossed the moral line of integrity into corrupting his field of science by working for an agenda rather than just doing the science. If he thinks civil disobedience (destruction of private property) and jailing "contrarians" is acceptable to "save the planet", what makes you think he wouldn't stoop to making up the science, or at least allow confirmation bias to cloud his judgment?

Fish rot from the head first.