Michigan Liberal - This Does Explain Much

SEARCH BLOG: CLIMATE

I don't often get the experience of ad hominem attacks regarding my blogs, so I was surprised when the Michigan Liberal blog decided to pick on a rather innocuous post regarding the improbability of massive climate change in the foreseeable future... and the light-hearted comment from Nick at Right Michigan.



Michigan Liberal... Right Michigan... I should have seen the writing on the wall from the start, but I chose to treat it as an opportunity for open and reasonable dialogue. Ooops.

This is an excellent example of attacking the author instead of refuting the work. I'm called an "idiot" and considered unqualified to have learned and researched and reasoned in a field other than that which originally trained... MS in Industrial Management... despite the fact that I've had considerable experience with computer data models and analysis. I was using computerized statistical analysis as early as 1976 on a Honeywell mainframe. I understand the difference between correlation and causation. One can have no credibility in climate data analysis unless you have a background in climatology.

Data is pretty much data. In fact, one of the best authorities on climate data analysis is a retired employee of a mineral exploration company, Steven McIntyre. The fact that he was able to apply his analytical skills in a new environment has forced some shoddy work by scientists and government agencies to be revised or rejected. Steven's award-winning blog is now recognized as a key source of climate data analysis worldwide.

Data is pretty much data. A century ago, a clerk in Switzerland ventured outside of his career field and the world of atomic energy was born. Data is pretty much data [except that time]. Stepping out of a career path doesn't equate to incompetence. That doesn't equate me with Einstein either; I'm fully aware of that. Moving on....

Albert Einstein as a clerk in Bern, Switzerland, 1905. Harvard University Press

The data analyses I have worked on beginning early in 2007 challenged the notion that there was a significant increase in extreme high temperatures that would be consistent with the global warming thesis. So, had the criticizers made a little personal effort, they could have ascertained quickly that it was not my data, but U.S. government agency ... NOAA... data that provided the basis in fact.

[While, admittedly, I could have phrased a few comments on the Michigan Liberal post a bit more elegantly, the process of making a quick comment on a post often means shortcuts. I did provide a number of links to further information and experts.]

Still my work stands [click here for details]. It is not earth changing... it is a piece of the puzzle... but no one has come forward to show that it is wrong. Some may not like the results, but that is a political or personal issue.


Decadal Occurrences Of Statewide Maximum Temperatures

Because I referred to the primary spokesperson for RealClimate... Dr. Gavin Schmidt... as the author of the blog rather than specifying that others do post there [an irrelevant issue anyway], once again my credibility is attacked. [For those of you who read my blog, I often refer to Dr. Roger Pielke, Sr. as the author of the blog Climate Science, who has also testified before the U.S. Congress about the impact of human activity on climate ... although there are many guest authors.] Still my work stands.

Then because my data is limited to the U.S. temperature record instead of a non-existent comparable world-wide database, once again my credibility is impugned. It is convenient to ignore the fact that most of the continuous, historical temperature data is from the U.S. Still my work stands.

Then because I pointed out that the global warming thesis is built upon starting from a very cold period virtually guaranteeing a rising temperature trend [U.S. data by the way], I was ridiculed for not accepting the fact that that was the record [if, of course, you insist on using that starting period]... rather than any consideration of the point I was making as having validity. Still my work stands.

Had the criticizers bothered to actually read the information available from the sources that I cited, they would have learned about the various attempts to build global temperature histories from disparate and often contradictory series [data splicing... a methodology that leads to some interesting, devious, and, often, absurd conclusions for parts of the globe with sparse or discontinuous data ... most recently in Antarctica with 20th century data]. But it is easier to attack the author than the data analysis. Still my work stands.

When you have a political agenda rather than a scientific one, you attack the opposition personally rather than intellectually. You do not refute what is said... only who says it... "your work has been debunked... you're an idiot... you have no qualifications... you're just googling for your information..." but no refuting the actual work. My comment that... "Actually, there is a difference between the political science of climate and the actual science of climate and weather. Our present administration has effectively used the former." I was criticized for referring to political science... actually the art of politics... but that is exactly what I meant and, ironically, the "science" of left-wing politics being used to personally attack me rather than my work. Still my work stands.

So, do I feel abused by Michigan Liberal commentary? To the contrary, I feel amused... and possibly hopeful that there might be planted the seed of reason in the forest of rhetoric. My work still stands. Do the criticizers at Michigan Liberal have comparable work that stands the critical tests of climate experts? Are they just "googling" for their information? Should we simply write vitriol about them personally?

Climate changes continuously for a variety of reasons... including actions that work in opposite fashion [cooling pollution vs. warming pollution; increasing vs. decreasing moisture from land use; etc.] . The simplistic political agenda behind controlling CO2 has little to do with controlling climate change and everything to do with controlling political change. Note that the term "global warming" has nearly been abandoned in favor of an ominous "change." Cooling is change, too.

Go to Michigan Liberal and read for yourself.

I have to admit that their political science [artistry] may be better than mine given my lack of willingness to make nasty personal comments about writers who incorporate verifiable and verified data.

I'll just chalk this up to political mudslinging from a group of young, inexperienced, and politically enthusiastic people. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'll have to see their data... not just "Gavin said so."

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