Why do AGW skeptics continue to question the surface temperature measurements?

Question

Anthropogenic global warming deniers and skeptics continue to raise the issue of the validity global surface temperature measurements and the effects of urban heat islands on those measurements. Although this has been dealt with before:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Ahj_9Ts6XCPlEPR8x0ZiSSPsy6IX;_ylv=3?qid=20070913123734AAgAWkc

The issue continues to come up. An important point is that measurements of the troposphere from satellites agree with the surface temperature measurements:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Satellite_Temperatures.png

Note that these are Christy's measurements. He was featured in the Swindle as saying they didn't agree, which was due to an analysis error which Christy has since corrected.

Considering that there are no urban heat islands in the atmosphere, can we now all agree that the surface temperature measurements are valid?

Hehe I like this jello eating guy. Saves me the trouble of having to correct the other Jello guy.

Answer 1

I was originally going to provide an answer about how skeptics are selective with the data. Mr Jello has now perfectly illustrated the point I was going to make.

That list of his looks quite impressive until you realise that it's a small, non-representative, cherry-picked sample from a list of over 1000 locations. The COMPLETE list is here http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/

Of course, there are some locations which show cooling but the majority show warming and the overall global trend is one of warming.

It brings us back to the skeptics tried, tested and failed method of selective distortion. Take a few pieces from a jigsaw and it could be anything, take all the pieces and put them into place and there's only one thing it can be. Skeptics deal with pieces, believers wait until they have all the pieces before drawing conclusions.

Answer 2

You know what. I'm tired of people who can't see both sides of the picture. I can see good points on both sides of the "Global warming crisis". A good point for the skeptics which I will stick to b/c it involves this question. Is that the surface air temperatures are inaccurate. You can't tell me that surface and satellite temps match b/c that is entirely incorrect. How can the temperature gage at an airport not read higher. You have concrete, taxi services, and not to mention freakn jets!!!! So basically your telling me that the Urban Heat Island effect doesn't exist when it clearly does, its been PROVEN!! The Urban Heat Island effect will create warmer daytime measurements and especially warmer night time measurements since that's when most of the heat is being dispersed back into the atmosphere. Gages should be placed in grassy fields and no where else. The problem with that is maintenance. The only temperature gages that did have good agreement is the weather balloon temp readings and the satellite, not satellite and surface readings. Satellite readings show a 0.1 degree Celsius increase where ground show a 0.5 or so increase. That's a decent difference. You cannot say it doesn't make a difference. I'm not saying man is not creating global warming I'm just saying there are other factors at play as well that we have no control over and nobody ever mentions. If we are causing global warming then the whole earth should be warming not just the northern hemisphere. The southern hemisphere is showing a slight cooling when you use satellite temp readings. Can you global warming enthusiasts honestly sit here and tell me that you know it is man causing global warming. I can't honestly tell you it's not. So don't disregard evidence of poor surface readings just b/c it doesn't fit into your belief, that you don't have all the facts for anyway!!

Answer 3

The surface temperature is not well known nor is there accurate data of many points on the globe. Most of the Earth is covered by water and there has never been any measurement done of changes on the ocean surface. This is important because the Earth radiates energy as a blackbody does. As the temperature rises the radiation increases by quite a lot. Same thing applies for cooling of the surface so its really hard to see how the overall temperature can ever change reguardless of what some people rant on about.

Answer 4

The problem with surface temparature measurements is that the surface of the globe has never been completely monitored so that a true global average temperature could be determined. What has been done is to take whatever measurements are available and to estimate from those what the global average might be.

Most of these instrumental reconstructions of surface temperatures begin in the mid-19th century when, in the view of many scientists, enough scattered thermometer readings were taken to attempt the global estimates. Actual coverage, however, was a small fraction of the globe in the early decades, from 1850 to 2000, with much of the oceanic rergions (especially in the Southern Hemisphere) and large continents like Antartica, Africa, and South America almost completely void of any readings at all.

Through time, the coverage increased, though even today large portions of the oceans and continents are not directly monitored at the surface.

Crude estimates of the global temperature have been developed using proxy data (tree rings, corals, ice cores, etc.) that extended backward much farther in time. A common feature of these non-instrumental reconstructions is that the 19th century appears as the coldest or near coldest period of the last 1,000 years. From a period of relative warth around A.D. 1,000, these records show an unsteady cooling to the 19th century and then a steady rise.

Recent data from NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) now show the hottest year since 1880 was 1934. Nineteen-ninety-eight dropped to second, while the third hottest year was way back in 1921. Indeed, four of the 10 hottest years were in the 1930s, while only three were in the past decade.

The real 15 hottest years are spread over seven decades. Eight occurred before atmospheric carbon dioxide began its sharp rise; seven occurred afterwards.

James Hansen, has asserted that nine of the 10 warmest years in history have occurred since 1995, with 1998 the warmest. When NASA was confronted with evidence provided by Climate Audit, a blog run by Stephen McIntyre devoted to auditing the statistical methods and data used in historical reconstructions of past climate data, it reversed itself. Without the fanfare used to hype the global warming fanaticism it had earlier supported, NASA now says four of the top 10 years of high temperatures are from the 1930s. Several previously selected "warm" years - 2000, 2002, 2003 and 2004 - fell behind 1900.

GISS now says its previous claim that 1998 was the warmest year in American history is no longer valid. The warmest year was 1934.

Statements by idological environmentalists that thousands of IPCC scientists agree on anything is simply untrue and misrepresents the process. The IPCC reports are written by a selection of (mostly) government-nominated scientists whose backgrounds vary from the most accomplished scientists to relatively unknown bureaucrats. None of the 122 lead authors of the latest IPCC report, released in August 2001, ha the opportunity to place a stamp of approval on every statement. Though drafted by a small group of IPCC scientists, the brief account of the main points used by the media and called the Summary for Policymakers, was actually edited and approved by a political body.

Given this bit of background, it is somewhat of an overstatement when the IPCC 2001 says that "the increase in Northern Hemisphere temperature in the 20th century is likely to have been the largest of any century during the past 1,000 years." ONE SHOULD BE AWARE THAT THE PAST CENTURY REPRESENTS THE ONLY PERIOD OF EXTENDED WARMING TO HAVE OCCURRED IN THE PREVIOUS 1,000 YEARS, WHICH WERE GENERALLY DOMINATED BY A COOLING TREND.

Will the man made global warming alarmists pay any attention to the above truths? Probably not. That is why it's a futile endeavour to convince an ideological fanatic with factual truths about anything. Once the Matrix program of ideological environmentalism is installed and running, only those who are self aware, instrospective and sincere enough to recongnize there's something very wrong with the man made global warming hysteria, with the whole political philosophy of ideological environmentalism, can break out of that powerful matrix, like Neo and Morpheous did in the movie thriller, The Matrix.

Will the man made global warming ideologues and alarmists ever be willing and ready to swallow the red pill?

Answer 5

That's a great plot Dana, the red slope (the atmosphere) has been warming at a slower rate than the blue (slope) the surface temperature. Doesn't that kind of put a dent in the AGW theory? So either their is urban heat island contamination or their is no AGW global warming. Thanks for helping point out the reasons why skeptics bring these things up.

Answer 6

Mr Jello,

Isn't the whole point of global temperatures to make a mean of the whole world, and not just some places?

The current climate change with increasing energy in to the Biosphere stipulate that some places get cooler and some get hotter, but that the overall trend is one of heating.

I would also like to see where they got that data from, but I do not speak Spanish(?).

Answer 7

Actually, I think it is immaterial if global temperatures are rising. Since the Vostok ice core data shows that global temperatures have risen abruptly in the past, sans any human involvement, the existence of a temperature change is indicative of nothing.

Of greatest import is the indication of the Vostok ice core data which shows that not once, in 450,000 years has a rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration preceded a rise in global temperatures. This indicates that atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration changes are a response to temperature changes and not vice-versa.

In the absence of a causal link between atmospheric CO2 concentration and global temperatures, there is no justification for an anthropogenic cause. If humans do not--more accurately, cannot--cause global temperature changes, then they are equally incapable of mitigating them.

Answer 8

well, this is kind of off topic, but i'll say it anyway.

we've been doing co2 tracing for what? a couple decades? not long. we use to to predict temp. levels hundreds and sometimes thousands of years ago, and get it right to tenths of a centigrade, which means we have to be pretty sure of accuracy before we draw conclusions. however, before we can confirm that these co2/temp models are completely correct (for the measurements that go back hundreds of years), we would have to wait hundreds of years (and then see if we get the same measurements) before we can confirm anything. we would have to see just how accurate the traces are.

Answer 9

It isn't an issue, as such. It's an "ad hoc" arguement (one advanced simply to avoid giving up one's postition on an issue when the positian can't be logically supported).

Psychologically, it basically boils down to not being willing to admit they are wrong, so they invent "issues" like questioningthe accuracy of temperature measurements.

These peopple are not trying to engage in a legitimate debate (obviously). But what they do seek is a sort of validation--if they can suck others into a "debate" it lets them creat the illusion they have a valid position.

The best thing to do is to ignore them--that's the one thing that they can't handle. Basically the whole thing is attention-attracting behavior. Unfortunately, some of them create superfically plausible arguements, using misinformation and half-truths--or outright lies. I do respond to some of those--simply as a corrective so that people--especiallly young people--won't be misled or confused as often.

Answer 10

Yes, surface temps are valid. And lets take a look at several surface temps to get an accurate picture of the trends of the climate.....

Please refer to the attached links.

http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/adelaide3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/amundsen3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/bikaner3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/brisbane.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/calipuerto3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/hama3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/Horta3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/Newkirk3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/marruecos3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/darbhanga3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/madagascar3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/nanning3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/ostrov-vize3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/willows3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/puntarenas3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/vostok3.gif
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/chart/kirensk3.gif

Clearly we see that there is a long term global trend that temps are declining world wide.

Added: Somehow I should be shocked at the character assassination, but clearly it's not above the believers to do so as long as it protects their little fiefdom. I remember how badly they trashed good men like Dr. William Gray because he didn't toe the line.

By charts were never intended to show that lowering temps were exclusive, only that they existed. From the way believers talk, it's warming all over the planet.

I also left out the graphs where it showed the temps were static over the last 100 years as well.