Revised Temperature Data?
Nov 27th, 2007 by Micah Tillman | 7 Comments |
Anybody seen this?
[T]he latest US satellite figures [show] temperatures having fallen since 1998, declining in 2007 to a 1983 level - not to mention the newly revised figures for US surface temperatures showing that the 1930s had four of the 10 warmest years of the past century, with the hottest year of all being not 1998, as was previously claimed, but 1934.
I didn’t have time to track down the article’s sources, so I can’t give any more clarification or specifics, but it reminds me once again of what I shall dub “The Antinomy of Science” (a la Kant):
(1) Science is the way we discover fact.
(2) Science is progressive, and therefore always ready to change its mind.
Puts you in a bind when you want to start making moral argument based on “scientific” premises.
HA! Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
:D
I shall. Right now.
Oh. Wait. I don’t have one.
“Pretty soon we’re going to get nasty letters saying, ‘Where’s my waterbuffalo?’ ‘Why don’t I have a waterbuffalo?’”
Have you tracked down the sources? I’m a global warming skeptic myself, but I find it suspicious that he doesn’t cite where that information is coming from. He displays a pretty clear bias in the rest of the article. Doesn’t mean he’s wrong, but it does make me more cautious about checking out his sources.
He’s correct about the revision of surface temperatures, but I am unable to confirm his claim about satellite temperatures. It should be pointed out that 1998 was an unusually warm year (as was 1934) due to the El Nino effect. So, even if temperatures have been lower since 1998, this is still perfectly consistent with the global warming hypothesis. Moreover, the United States only makes up about 2% of the world’s landmass so the aforementioned revision has had a negligible effect on global temperatures.
I have no doubt that global warming is, in fact, occurring. I have some doubts that it is occurring due to human activity (as does the IPCC report which gives it about a 90% probability), but I agree with the IPCC that it is more likely than not. I have much graver doubts about whether A) we can do anything about it, B) we should do anything about it, C) that the catastrophic scenarios occasionally suggested will actually occur, and D) that the process will continue to go on, even if we don’t do anything about it in a coordinated way.
I certainly agree that it is tempting to simply dismiss these people out of hand. The two things that can be said about doomsayers are 1) they have always existed and 2) they have always been wrong. However, that doesn’t mean that they will always be wrong. A broken clock is right twice a day.
Having said that, ideally we should certainly try to move from carbon-based fuels to cleaner sources of energy like nuclear power or (best of all) hydrogen fusion power, assuming it can be made practical. You don’t have to be an environmental zealot to agree that burning fossil fuels is a dirty and damaging process and in a perfect world we would transition past them.
Andrew, may I just say that I admire your brain? I am very doubtful that humans have any substantial impact on global warming, but I agree wholeheartedly with everything else you just said.
Casey, thanks for the compliment. I could be wrong on any of the above, of course. As Mr. Tillman says, science is progressive and always ready to change its mind.
I agree. Science is progressive and always ready to change its mind. I just wish the same could be said about scientists in general.