Global Warming?

flaja wrote:

As a scientist I am talking about the satellite and balloon temperature readings as a group of individual facts/statistics, which requires plural use according to 2. above.

You're so cute and cuddly, flaja. Unbelievable.

So you're a scientist?

The satellite and weather balloon data as reported in 2005 in The politically incorrect guide to science.

Even when they try to manipulate the data and make excuses, global warmongers freely admit that temperature data are inconsistent and that the atmosphere isn't getting hotter the way global warming says it is supposed to be.

http://www.lanl.gov/news/index.php/fuseaction/home.story/story_id/2030

My understanding is that matter in the atmosphere absorbs heat energy and then release it again at different wavelengths. Satellites measure the wavelengths of the heat energy that is released by the atmospheric matter and the measurements are then converted to temperatures that correspond to these wavelengths.

As far as I know temperature data from weather balloons come from actual thermometer readings. I see that none of you have bothered to refute the balloon data- which also shows no warming of the atmosphere contrary to what global warmongers expected.

Contrary to what this website goes on to say, I believe it is proper to use data as a plural in scientific contexts. I cannot say right off if I have ever known a scientist to use data as a singular noun.

old europe wrote:

flaja wrote:

As a scientist I am talking about the satellite and balloon temperature readings as a group of individual facts/statistics, which requires plural use according to 2. above.

You're so cute and cuddly, flaja. Unbelievable.

So you're a scientist?

Of course he is a scientist. Scientists always get their data from books written by lawyers and published by the Heritage foundation. How else are you going to get "unbiased" science?

Why on earth would a scientist bother to check a scientific paper before declaring it was written to support a bias?

Don't you think a scientist would "know" that even though light moves at 186,000 mps if a device registering the wavelength is moving toward or away from the light source it is "biased" to take that movement into account when figuring the wavelength emitted by source.

With a bachelor's degree in biology I do have professional training as a scientist and I am entitled to call myself a scientist.

Both the satellite and balloon data show warming in the troposphere.

I continue to fail to see why you are using data from before 2000. If the reality is the way you claim it is why don't you use up to the date information?

Yes and light travels at 186,000 mps which means if you fail to account for decay of the orbit there will be a slight shift in your readings.

So much for your knowledge of radiosonde readings by weather balloons.

Radiosonde readings DO show a warming of the troposphere up to the tropopause.

They then show a cooling in the stratosphere. But this too is a calculated reading. It is not taken from a thermometer but rather a thermistor and they have to try to account for several things that can affect the accuracy of the reading.

You also have to remember that the way the radiosonde readings are taken has changed over time so to find a trend becomes hard when you compare early data to later data.

Here is a rebuttal of your arguments flaja and points out the dated figures your source is probably using.
http://timlambert.org/2004/08/gwarming2/

flaja wrote:

Contrary to what this website goes on to say, I believe it is proper to use data as a plural in scientific contexts. I cannot say right off if I have ever known a scientist to use data as a singular noun.

I work with around 150 engineers and scientists on a daily basis and data is commonly used as a collective noun per the third definition you posted. I'm very surprised you haven't heard it that way since it is a common usage and it obviously pisses you off.

With a bachelor's degree in biology I do have professional training as a scientist and I am entitled to call myself a scientist.

When and where have I cited anything from the Heritage Foundation? Furthermore, I don't automatically accept any published information at face value. I don't automatically accept any information from politicians, such as Al Gore, at face value either, but apparently some of you global warmongers do.

Don't you think a scientist would "know" that even though light moves at 186,000 mps if a device registering the wavelength is moving toward or away from the light source it is "biased" to take that movement into account when figuring the wavelength emitted by source.

Furthermore, if the satellites are moving relative to the matter they are observing, at what point did scientists realize this fact and thus realized that they needed to "correct" the data the satellites were gathering?

parados wrote:

Both the satellite and balloon data show warming in the troposphere.

Prove it. You've yet to give me any documentation for anything regarding the balloon data and all you have provided regarding the satellite data either indicates that scientists were too stupid to realize that the satellites weren't working properly for years or scientists are "correcting" the satellite data by contaminating it with ground-based data.

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I continue to fail to see why you are using data from before 2000. If the reality is the way you claim it is why don't you use up to the date information?

As I have already pointed out the data was still current as late as 2005.

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Yes and light travels at 186,000 mps which means if you fail to account for decay of the orbit there will be a slight shift in your readings.

Haven't scientists known for decades that satellite orbits can decay? So why did it take years and years to realize that the temperature-measuring satellites had decaying orbits and were thus giving erroneous data? If it took scientists so long to realize something this simple, what guarantee do we have that they haven't been just as stupid or lazy when it comes to collecting all of the other global warming data that they spout?

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So much for your knowledge of radiosonde readings by weather balloons.

Since I haven't researched the details of how weather balloons operate, how can I be expected to know with certainty how they operate? Your insulting tone and condescending attitude is absolutely uncalled for.

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Radiosonde readings DO show a warming of the troposphere up to the tropopause.

Documentation?

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They then show a cooling in the stratosphere. But this too is a calculated reading. It is not taken from a thermometer but rather a thermistor and they have to try to account for several things that can affect the accuracy of the reading.

Why would scientists suspect the accuracy of the readings if they weren't trying to make the resulting data agree with other data in order to support a hypothesis that they already want to believe? You have two sets of conflicting data. So isn't the first a good scientist should do is reevaluate his hypothesis and not try to massage the data to make them agree?

Why must the therministor readings be wrong simply because they don't agree with data from other sources? How do we know that it is not the data from the other sources that are wrong?

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You also have to remember that the way the radiosonde readings are taken has changed over time so to find a trend becomes hard when you compare early data to later data.

Most land-based weather stations are located in or near urban centers. The tend over recent decades is to surround these weather stations with more and more urban sprawl. Where I live the official weather records are taken at the airport. When the airport was built 40 years ago it was surrounded mostly by woodland. Now it is surrounded by housing communities, warehouses, industrial parks, shopping centers, roads and parking lots- all things that store heat that shows up in the official temperature records.

Naturally the trend in these records over the last 40 years is up. So the way we have taken land-based temperature records has changed over time. So by your standards to find a trend becomes hard when you compare early data to later data. But because the trend is in a direction you global warmongers want to accept you don't question the data.

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Here is a rebuttal of your arguments flaja and points out the dated figures your source is probably using.
http://timlambert.org/2004/08/gwarming2/

I see a date on this page of August 17, 2004. Isn't this too old by your standards- you have complained about me relying on data from 2005.

And who is this Lambert character? Is he a lawyer? Is he affiliated with a liberal version of the Heritage Foundation? What are his credentials that I should trust what he has to say?

You'll find, Parados, that Herr Flaja will consistently demand "proof" from others, but won't bother to offer any himself. On those few occasions when i've seen him offer "proof," it is almost always not actually referential to the subject, or from a dubious source.

He demands "proof" at a ratio of about 20:1 in comparison to those times when he himself actually offers "proof."

You cited the book The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming by Christoper C Horner.

Bethel.

flaja wrote:

Bethel.

You mean Tom Bethell? The journalist (not scientist)? The guy who denies that HIV causes AIDS?

That Bethell?

Where is your data on ..
1. The satellite data shows the atmosphere is cooling
2. The balloon data shows the atmosphere is cooling
3. Rural areas are cooling.

There is quite a difference between articles published in peer reviewed science journals and books promoted by a think tank.

The first one is reviewed by peers and critiqued for any possible errors. The second has no such process. Whether I agree or disagree with the conclusion really has nothing to do with the standard of one being superior to the other.

If all of the peers accept the same dogma, what good does peer review do? If a scientist wants to believe in global warming, what chance is there that he will disagree with a colleague's data or conclusions that support global warming?

parados wrote:

Where is your data on ..
1. The satellite data shows the atmosphere is cooling
2. The balloon data shows the atmosphere is cooling
3. Rural areas are cooling.

I have already given you documentation for this information. I also pointed out that even global warmongers admit that satellite data indicate a cooling of the atmosphere even when they make excuses for the data.

http://www.borderlands.com/newstuff/research/cycle23/warming.htm

Notice the graphs. The one for urban temperature readings shows a sustained upward trend, while the one for rural areas shows that the 5 year average temperature has fluctuated within a very narrow range. Thus rural areas are not warming and thus the globe is not warming.

http://www.junkscience.com/jan99/skewed.htm

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,166150,00.html

"When University of Alabama-Huntsville researcher Roy Spencer, a prominent climatologist, factored the newly reported corrections into his calculations, his estimate of atmospheric warming was only 0.12 deg. C/decade -- higher than the prior estimate of 0.09 deg. C/decade, but well below the Science study estimate of 0.19 deg C/decade and the surface temperature estimate of 0.20 deg. C/decade.

"As to the claimed errors in the weather balloon measurements, Spencer says that no other effort to adjust the balloon data has produced warming estimates as high as those reported in the new study and that it will take time for the research community to form opinions about whether the new adjustments advocated are justified.

"Climate expert Dr. Fred Singer of the Science and Environmental Policy Project says the temperature adjustments are ?'not a big deal.'
?'Greenhouse theory says (and the models calculate) that the atmospheric trend should be 30 percent greater than the surface trend -- and it isn't,' says Singer. ?'Furthermore, the models predict that polar [temperature] trends should greatly exceed the tropical values -- and they clearly don't ... In fact, the Antarctic has been cooling,' adds Singer."

So Antarctica is cooling. How rural can you get?