Is there a website that is as scientifically rigorous as climateaudit.org but conclusions tends to favor AGW?

Question

I would also welcome criticism of the methods and data used by climateaudit.org.

I read realclimate, it does provide a contrasting opinion, but the detail shared there falls short of climateaudit.

sourcewatch provides a bit of background, but I am impressed by the methods and data rather than the credentials, so I don't rely on it much.

(Here's where I will really generate some hate mail) The IPCC's published procedures have convinced me that their first concern is influencing policymakers, while scientific rigor is a secondary concern. While others accept them as the world's #1 authority, I feel that I must verify every detail of what they publish.

Captain Algae:

I am not seeking someone to believe, I am seeking an opposing opinion to challenge my own bias. Though I try to critically evaluate the info on climateaudit, it has bias. While they may heavily reference their work, every reference could support only one side of the issue. Even checking references can leave a heavily biased perspective.

At some level, I must rely on the interpretations of others. For example, I do not expect to do ice core studies, but I can read the opinions, the methods, results, and supporting data presented by those with differing perspectives.

I am looking for a site that actually provides the supporting data. Extremely few peer-reviewed articles bother to do so McIntyre is performing a great service simply by demanding the underlying data and methods.

Bob:

Thank you for the references.

MEEHL, ET AL PAPER – I’ll try to find it
NEWSCIENTIST & PROFEND – I read these and get good info there
WIKIPEDIA – I’ll look at it

IPCC
Clearly, our perspectives of the IPCC differ grossly. I would request that you read the IPCC’s “PROCEDURES FOR THE PREPARATION, REVIEW, ACCEPTANCE, ADOPTION, APPROVAL AND PUBLICATION OF IPCC REPORTS” and in particular the statement, “Changes … made after acceptance by the Working Group or the Panel shall be those necessary to ensure consistency with the Summary for Policymakers or the Overview Chapter.”

I cannot get past the place where the authors reserve the right to CHANGE THE DATA to match the conclusions. I wonder how they arrived at a Summary and an Overview that require data changes.

Still, it is the bible for AGW supporters, so it must be read.

FINALLY
Clearly, the text “realclimate is managed by Dr. Hansen” was entered by Mr Jello.

Answer 1

Scientifically rigorous? If you want that, you can forget the blogs and start reading stuff that's peer-reviewed. Here's one:
http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/wg1-report.html

If you want a good scientifically accurate website, try this one:
http://www.realclimate.org

Finally, it's just flat out weird that McIntyre (a guy without an advanced degree: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Stephen_McIntyre ) is spending so much time and effort taking potshots at the idea that the earth really IS getting warmer, as that's the easiest part of global warming to prove. Hasn't he seen the latest data from the arctic?

Answer 2

When you say that "climateaudit.org" is scientifically rigorous, it needs to be understood that it is both scientifically rigorous AND biased. In other words, the climateaudit.org folks are not seeking the truth in a disinterested way, they are trying to prove an hypothesis (an anti-AGW hypothesis), but they are constrained by scientific rigor from falsifying data or making causal arguments incompatible with the laws of physics. That's fine. The encouraging thing for pro-AGW advocates is how little headway the climateaudit.org people have made, despite their bias. Of course there are errors and problems with the pro-AGW arguments and data, and it's good to have them corrected. In order to arrive at some semblance of the truth, however, someone besides climateaudit.org needs to be looking for the errors that come out in the direction of favoring the pro-AGW hypothesis. Such people can be found on "realclimate.org"

Answer 3

RealClimate as listed by Patrick is run by climate scientists, so it's quite possibly the best resource available on the web. I refer to the IPCC report quite often, as well.

I believe climateaudit.org has made a big deal about the locations of surface temperature probes, but studies have shown that their readings are indeed quite accurate and any influence by urban heat islands is negligible.

And no, James Hansen does not run the Real Climate website.

Answer 4

I recommend you go to a college library. Read this:

Meehl, G.A., W.M. Washington, C.A. Ammann, J.M. Arblaster, T.M.L. Wigleym and C. Tebaldi (2004). "Combinations of Natural and Anthropogenic Forcings in Twentieth-Century Climate". Journal of Climate 17: 3721-3727

Or download and read this. You'll need Adobe Acrobat and some time. But it blows the website you listed out of the water. Read it before you tell me it's biased, and explain why you think that afterwards. I think it's as impressive a scientific document as I've ever seen.

http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/Report/AR4WG1_Print_Ch02.pdf

The shortcut is to read all (linked)27 pages of this.

http://environment.newscientist.com/channel/earth/dn11462

but you'll need to read the links for the scientific rigor behind it.

Of course you could ask yourself why the people below, who have read the stuff above, don't agree with climateaudit. Unless you believe in mysterious conspiracies.....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change

I think this site is superb, but once again, you'll need to read the links for the rigorous detail.

http://profend.com/global-warming/

I estimate I've spent at least a couple of hundred hours studying global warming. If you want rigor, you'll need to devote serious time to this. But at least some of the websites above should meet your qualifications.

"realclimate is managed by Dr. Hansen"

Care to provide evidence of that?

Answer 5

See...here is the problem...

Instead of reading and understanding the science yourself, you are/want to rely on the interpretations of others.

Kids at home: This is why you must pay attention during school and learn your science. That way you can make your own intelligent assessments and not wait for Fake News to tell you what to think or some blog or some web site.

Answer 6

the main 11 contributors all have PhD's and study climate change, hundreds of other climate scientists post here as well:

http://www.realclimate.org/

EDIT

jello, Dr. Hansen is not involved with the real climate website

Answer 7

Climateaudit has discovered many errors that were posted on NASA's website.

What's interesting is that climateaudit is an independent objective website, realclimate is managed by Dr. Hansen and contains many of the same errors found by Steve McIntyre at climateaudit.