Maggie's Farm

What will those crazy climate scientists come up with next?!

Bulldog: No politics, just the facts, as they say.

Lindzen has published a lot of useful research, but none of it has significantly impacted the prevailing consensus concerning anthropogenic climate change.

2015 set a record high for the instrumental surface temperature beating the record set way back in 2014.

1. What will those crazy climate scientists come up with next?!

It is climate scientists who study past climate, including historical changes in climate, as well as current climate patterns.

2. Lindzen has published a lot of useful research, but none of it has significantly impacted the prevailing consensus concerning anthropogenic climate change.

Knowing that Lindzen "says" that significant anthropogenic climate change isn't occurring, but that Lindzen, the climate scientist, hasn't published research "showing" that it isn't occurring, is useful knowledge.

3. 2015 set a record high for the instrumental surface temperature beating the record set way back in 2014.

Fact.

Ten: Is the data above reliable or is it not? More specifically, what causes the cyclical temperature record?

It's based on proxy studies, and is largely reliable. There are a number of causes of climate change, including orbital variations (Milankovitch Cycles) that then result in positive feedbacks with greenhouse gases and albedo.

Alan Robertson: When was the last time that you heard one of the climate fear persuaders mention that their "record high for the instrumental record", means "warmest since the Little Ice Age"?

The global instrumental record is generally considered to begin in 1850, which is at the end of the Little Ice Age. Temperatures from the Little Ice Age include some direct measurements, but largely has to rely on proxies.

Alan Robertson: Most of the warming since the Little Ice Age took place before 1950, before scientists tell us that enough CO2 could have been added by man to have any effect on climate.

That is incorrect.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/image/9/c/hadcrut4_new_logo.1850-1900_600.jpg

Alan Robertson: Are current temps the warmest in recorded human history? Emphatically NO!

Current temperatures are higher than the Medieval, and probably the Roman period as well.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/globalwarming/paleolast.html

But keep in mind that current warming isn't the problem, but projected warming, which will rapidly exceed any of those previous warming periods, and in a world that is far more densely populated, and an ecosystem already under stress.

Alan Robertson: No, Zachriel, I was not incorrect. The physics of CO2 science says that mankind did not add enough CO2 to the atmosphere before 1950 to cause any change in climate.

Your claim was "Most of the warming since the Little Ice Age took place before 1950". What you might have said is that a significant amount of the warming since the Little Ice Age took place before 1950.

There are many reasons why the Earth's mean surface temperature changes, including changes in solar irradiance, volcanism, orbital variations, continental drift, mountain building, variations in sea currents, changes in greenhouse gases, even cometary impacts. The Little Ice Age was probably due to increased volcanism and diminished solar activity.

James the lesser: http://motls.blogspot.com/2016/04/research-in-prague-quantifies.html

Interesting paper; however, the problem is that estimates which are most precise use different methodologies than those that have lower precision. It's quite possible that the differences in methodologies result in the bias. It's important to note that precision is not the same as accuracy.

Assistant Village Idiot: So you note that it might, possibly, be wrong

Luboš Motl, at the linked site, claims "It proves that the set of the authors of papers on climate sensitivity is dishonest."

The paper makes no such claim, saying "Though meta-regression analysis is generally considered to be a statistically efficient tool, the corrected climate sensitivity estimate is a reference value. It averages across many methods, primary data sets, and factors influencing CS, and if there is another aspect influencing all the studies, this MRA will also be biased."

Pointing this out is sufficient to debunk Motl's claim. Furthermore, precision is not the same as accuracy.