Jump to content

Talk:Climate change/Archive 54

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Archive 50←Archive 52Archive 53Archive 54Archive 55Archive 56→Archive 60

NASA funded study shows increase in the suns radiation output

In what could be the simplest explanation for one component of global warming, a 2003 study shows the Sun's radiation has increased by .05 percent per decade since the late 1970s. http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/sun_output_030320.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by EricTyle (talk • contribs) 04:05, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

You want Solar variation guv. Plus the grace to realise that we've already read all the 2003 studies of any interest. Ecclesiastes 1:9-14 William M. Connolley (talk) 08:58, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Don't sweat the condescension EricTyle. There are a number of editors that try to minimize any information that doesn't pander to their AGW GHG bias, especially that relating to the possibility that variations in total solar irradiance are significant climate change forcings Dikstr (talk) 21:16, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
What's being minimized? The study referred to in the space.com article was published by R. Willson, et al. in Geophysical Research Letters in 2003. It's used twice in the Solar variation article (footnotes 6 and 30). And if you really want to know what NASA says about the sun's influence on our climate, it's best to go to them directly: [1]. Scroll down and see "Solar irradiance". Or, see NASA's FAQ What is the role of the sun and solar cycles in climate change and global warming?. You'll see that the "Solar variation" section in this article is consistent with what NASA says. —Preceding unsigned comment added by CurtisSwain (talk • contribs) 21:50, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
The JPL (NASA) references are worth perusing as a summary of the view of solar forcing among climate modelers at least up to the past decade. However, science marches on and more recent findings indicate variations of total solar irradiance may account for up to 50% of the climate forcing during the industrial era, for example: Scafetta, N., and B. J. West (2007), Phenomenological reconstructions of the solar signature in the Northern Hemisphere, surface temperature records since 1600, J. Geophys. Res., 112, D24S03, doi:10.1029/2007JD008437.Dikstr (talk) 19:29, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
Please stop responding to Scibaby threads. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 22:10, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Not exactly a monument to the exchange of ideas.Dikstr (talk) 19:29, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Look the fact is the whole solar system is warming up because of increased radiation output from the sun. This is relevant to this article especially considering it begins "Global warming is the increase in the average temperature of the Earth's near-surface air and oceans since the mid-20th century and its projected continuation." This puts the data from NASA well within the scope of the article. EricTyle (talk) 11:03, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually, that "fact" is wrong. See Talk:Global_warming/FAQ Q16. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:31, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Global Warming Graphs

Should we really have this many Hockey-stick graphs on the page? Skeptics might catch on to our plan to skew the data based on old errors.--EchoRevamped (talk) 06:32, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

I had added a more recent graph from Satellite temperature measurements (File:Satellite Temperatures.png) to the graphs on this page. It is not currently supportive of the premise of global warming. It is however accurate and more recent than the graphs currently displayed. The current graph is 10 years out of date. The data on this page is stale. I will add the graph again unless I hear of any valid objections.Veteran0101 (talk) 04:18, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for attempting to update this graph, but I am not sure where it is...did you add the updated version? Can we have one with actual error bars on it? Subsumee (talk) 04:27, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Satellite_Temperatures.png . It is already linked to the following pages. 
   * Satellite temperature measurements
   * Leipzig Declaration
   * Talk:Global warming
   * Temperature record
   * User:Dragons flight/Images
   * Friends of Science
   * Talk:List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming/Archive 7
   * List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming
Veteran0101 (talk) 05:23, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
Are those lines linear least square fits to the individual data sets? If so, is there an accompanying R-squared "goodness-of-fit" value for each? Thank you. 72.57.184.21 (talk) 21:03, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
See Satellite temperature measurements for a further explanation. Veteran0101 (talk) 01:14, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
What "current graph" was 10 years out of date? As far as i can see, they are (and were) all pretty up2date. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 01:56, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
I got permission to upload and use a 'Global Temperature' chart File:Chart-LongtermGTemps.jpg that demonstrates the various periods of global warming since 2500 BC. It offers a much better perspective and frame of reference on recent warming trends (and fluctuations). I'm just not sure where to incorporate it into the article yet.
-K10wnsta (talk) 20:10, 7 November 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the though but no, we won't be using that. It is just about sourceless, and badly wrong, and we already have better ones William M. Connolley (talk) 23:04, 7 November 2009 (UTC)
Agreed. It has no methodology, it's not published in a peer-reviewed venue, and it contains extremely dubious historical claims unrelated to climate (the Hebrew exodus from Egypt is generally considered a myth). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:20, 7 November 2009 (UTC)
Its source is very legitimate (scientifically) and very clear. How is it 'badly wrong'? It's far more up to date than most of the charts provided on this page (and largely agrees with the data they present).
The Hebrew exodus may well be a myth, it's only pointed out for context as to the era. Any notable event (myth or otherwise) from that era can be used for frame of reference.
--K10wnsta (talk) 21:38, 12 November 2009 (UTC)
How is it scientific? Where was it published? Does any other temperature reconstruction agree with this one? What data was used in generating the graph? Where can we verify it? How do we know it is not just someone who has drawn this out of free fantasy? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 21:47, 12 November 2009 (UTC)
K10wnsta-Your interest in global warming and your desire to improve this article is much appreciated. I want to encourage your continued exploration of this topic, and I'd like to suggest you start by reading this critique of the graph you discovered. It provides a concise explanation of why it's considered of dubious value.--CurtisSwain (talk) 00:44, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
Kim, the original chart, which should be sourced in the release (if I did it right), was compiled by a climatologist and meteorologist using three works: Climate and the Affairs of Man by Dr. Iben Browning, "Climate...The Key to Understanding Business Cycles...The Raymond H. Wheeler Papers." By Michael Zahorchak, and Weather Science Foundation Papers in Crystal Lake, Illinois.
Curtis, I thoroughly examined the information you linked as to the veracity of the chart's creators and a couple things trouble me about it:
  • The posting states: 'Finally, if you look up Cliff Harris and Randy Mann, you will find that they are two guys who run a website [2] and that neither are trained as a climatologist or a metereologist...' but the claim doesn't mesh with the credentials listed in the link.
  • The posting attacks their character with the statement 'Harris apparently is a conservative Christian who believes in looking in the Bible for clues on what the weather will be' and cites a blog as its source. But if you go to that blog and check its source for the remark, it sends you back to another forum posting.
From a completely neutral perspective on the matter, those blogs and forums are rather questionable, especially given the obnoxious summaries of their discussion (ie. their titles even resort to name-calling). I'm not saying the meteorologist and climatologist are infallible in their discussion of the matter, but their credentials are a good deal more respectable than their detractors standing soapboxes behind a wall of anonymity.
--K10wnsta (talk) 04:42, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
So lets summarize:
  • The chart is not published anywhere (except on some website) => not scientific, not a reliable source (this alone makes the graph inadmissible)
  • The credentials of the "climatologist" are extremely dodgy. He hasn't published anything from what i can determine via Google scholar[3]. He claims to be "one of the top ten climatologists in the world", but there are no mentions of him anywhere of notice.
  • The "meteorologist" is a broadcast meteorologist not a scientist. (The AMS seal doesn't require any education)
  • They compiled the graph from dodgy sources... (sorry but they are)
    1. Do you really think Iben Browning is reliable?
    2. A book by apparently a business investor [4]
Sorry - but this tallies up to ... nothing really. Certainly not science --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 05:24, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
Yes, and a graph without a Y-axis isn't really a graph at all.--CurtisSwain (talk) 20:16, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

NASA research in journal Science indicates role of methane in global warming underestimated

[comments by blocked sockpuppets of scibaby have been stricken --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 10:46, 8 November 2009 (UTC)]

I have added some content to the article, noting the latest peer reviewed NASA research in the journal Science that indicates the role of methane in global warming has been underestimated. http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/326/5953/716 and also see http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/environment/2009-10-29-methane-global-warming_N.htm Artwerkgal (talk) 05:01, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

You mentioned when undoing my edit that there are other very recent sources. I went through all of them, and found these two:
  1. Reducing abrupt climate change risk using the Montreal Protocol and other regulatory actions to complement cuts in CO2 emissions published 12 October 2009
  2. Escape of methane gas from the seabed along the West Spitsbergen continental margin published 6 August 2009
I think that the first of these is definitely too recent, and the second is likely too recent, so I'll probably be removing them removing or resourcing associated material.
The issue with talking about new research, especially that published in journals like Nature and Science, is that there can be issues with the research. That is when other researchers write in comments, and the original authors respond. It is therefore important to wait to see if other scientists have issues with the research.
Others issues in contributing to this reasonably complicated-to-edit article is that every scientific source is peer-reviewed (making stating that redundant), and since it is a featured article, the sources should be referenced in the same style as the others, Awickert (talk) 07:37, 6 November 2009 (UTC)
Are the ubiquitous IPCC reports peer reviewed? Are these a "scientific source." ? Artwerkgal (talk) 08:16, 6 November 2009 (UTC)
  • The IPCC reports are summaries of peer-reviewed literature that are written by committees of scientists (peers). So yes. Awickert (talk) 08:24, 6 November 2009 (UTC)
  • Yes. The IPCC reports go through multiple levels of review, with both internal and external reviewers. You will often see "sceptics" claiming the status of IPCC reviewers. The IPCC also has the advantage that it only surveys existing literature, i.e. it already is one level higher than individual research papers, and thus more robust against errors. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 08:25, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

This is a thread of a banned user, but An observationally based energy balance for the Earth since 1950 may interest some watching this page. -Atmoz (talk) 17:33, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

The 'thread of a banned user' is the abstract of a published paper in a highly respected journal. It has far more significance than most of the jibber-jabber in this section. Dikstr (talk) 21:32, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

I agree. Let's find a way to include this compelling data. 173.126.68.245 (talk) 02:13, 7 November 2009 (UTC) 20:29, 7 November 2009 (UTC)Dikstr (talk)

Where is the Wikipedia rule that states the latest peer reviewed research cannot be included in articles? If this is the case, we better get our DELETE buttons ready, as there will be a great deal of material to remove from many technical articles to bring them into compliance! Y4spinmast8 (talk) 06:36, 8 November 2009 (UTC)
"The latest peer-reviewed research" can be included, but we ned to keep WP:WEIGHT in mind. Not every published paper can be included, especially not in a general article such as this. This paper is about a relatively obscure aspect of global warming, namely the global warming potential of different gasses in combination with other pollutants. It does not change the big picture. To be able to gauge the impact of this paper, we need to wait for reactions from the scientific community. Thus, there is no good reason to include it now (and probably never in this article, though it may be more suitable in global warming potential). People react skittish to the proposal to include this paper because Artwerkgal is an obvious (and now confirmed) sock puppet of the long-term abusive editor Scibaby, who has created on the order of 600 sock puppets, all to disrupt work on the global warming articles and, in particular, to waste our time. See Category:Wikipedia sockpuppets of Scibaby and Category:Suspected Wikipedia sockpuppets of Scibaby. After people have explained the same story or very similar stories to about 50 or so new users, all of which eventually turn out to be disruptive socks, their enthusiasm for these discussions drops. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:29, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Development over time

The article should describe how the reports of the seriousness of global warming have changed over time. Is this methane problem as substantial, more substantial, or less substantial than the variations in median temperature predictions in the scientific literature over time? A tertiary source like an encyclopedia should be honest and forthright about how the secondary literature has changed. In this case it should be easy to compare projections from the 1990-era IPCC reports with modern projections, shouldn't it? 76.254.70.140 (talk) 07:36, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

You've changed your IP, but you're still the same person. And you're still banned. -Atmoz (talk) 14:00, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Greenland ice sheet

A new study to keep track of for an possibly move into the effects section and/or article: Michiel van den Broeke et al, Partitioning Recent Greenland Mass Loss in Science, compares climate-model simulated behavior of the Greenland ice sheet, with gravitational satellite data, and finds that a) they agree (validating GCMs (or Einstein ;-)), b) ice sheet reduction is about 190 cubic km/year in the 2000s, increasing to 273 cubic km/year for the last two years. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:13, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Changes in the icesheet of Greenland validates Einstein? What did Einstein predict about the Greenland icesheet? DasV (talk) 12:23, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Einstein's Theory of general relativity is our best current description of gravity. So if the gravimetric and the climate models agree, you can see this either as a validation of climate modeling, or as a validation of gravity... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:34, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Secondary GHGs

Is it worth including this http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2009/10/09/0902568106.full.pdf Maybe in one of the other GHG articles, if not this. Andrewjlockley (talk) 14:21, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Removing scibaby junk

So it seems I need to justify removing the scibaby junk. I cut:

Recent research suggests the contribution of methane to global warming has been underestimated.[1] A UN report indicates livestock generate more greenhouse gases on a global scale than the transportation sector.[2]

Taking the second point first. The UN report (seems to have disappeared from [5], but available from [6]) actually says that if you include deforestation, pasture degrading then livestock CO2 is 11% (with large uncertainties). Compressing that down to "livestock generate..." is too inaccurate to be allowed to live. Our Greenhouse_gas page says trasnport is 14% (of total GHG) anyway, and 14 !< 11. For the first point, I have a long-standing preference for *not* including recent research unless there is a very good reason for including it; since it is here but a minor side-point, I can't see the need. There would be no harm in reconsidering this in 3 months time perhaps.

Anyway, (a) that whole section is too big and probbaly needs chopping (b) probably the more interesting thing about methane is that it has levelled out William M. Connolley (talk) 18:30, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Ack, that was me. I've been traveling and haven't kept up with you-know-who's antics. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 19:19, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Methane from ruminants - not foregone

We have two sentences in this article that seem to report an open-and-shut case that livestock are a bad thing for the climate: "Recent research suggests the contribution of methane to global warming has been underestimated.[29] A UN report indicates livestock generate more greenhouse gases on a global scale than the transportation sector.[30]"

Those references are not well formatted, but [7] looks to me like a blog posting, and the other looks to be purely about the climate forcing effects of CH4 etc, not its production by animals.

I was recently at a talk by Patrick Holden of the Soil Association (name dropper!) who said that research is showing that the atmospheric methane contributions from farm animals could be traced directly to their bad diet and bad animal husbandry in the non-organic, non-free-range farming sector. [8] says, "supplementation ... may reduce methane production per unit of milk or meat by a factor of 4-6". [9] says, "Heifers on "ad lib" ryegrass in March and April produced only one-tenth the CH4 per kg of gain as heifers on LRG of 1 h". These paper were summarised for the NY Times at [10].

In the light of these papers, should we balance the existing statements with something hopeful based on these results? Is this matter covered in more depth in one or more of the other related WP articles where more detail would be appropriate? --Nigelj (talk) 18:40, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

D'oh! I've just seen that the offending sentences have been removed as more scibaby junk. OK, shall we just forget it, then? --Nigelj (talk) 18:58, 14 November 2009 (UTC)
Quite interesting but perhaps Greenhouse_gas is a better place for it anyway --BozMo talk 19:51, 14 November 2009 (UTC)
The matter is only mentioned briefly, and neutrally, there, but the point is already made in Methane, although using different references. It only seems worth getting into all this when somebody tries to make a spurious point by overlooking the facts and possibilities. Maybe it shouldn't be, but at least my refs are on record here now, if any of us want to add a subsection or paragraph somewhere.
It does seem to be part of a pattern that AGW deniers are beginning to pick up: "CO2? Oh, that's mostly volcanoes. CH4? Oh, that's animal farts. Nothing to do with my 4x4 or my shopping habits (cheap meat), and nothing we can do about any of it". So it might be worth covering in detail somewhere. --Nigelj (talk) 21:23, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Lifetime of methane in the atmosphere

Tne article doesn't mention what the lifetime of methane in the atmosphere is. I think I read somewhere that this is just a few years. Count Iblis (talk) 19:41, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Greenhouse_gas#Global_warming_potential gives 12 +/- 3 years. Probably the nest place for it. --BozMo talk 19:50, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Cooling trend?

88.110.76.120-I think you raise some valid questions, but I believe they've already been covered in both the FAQ (see #3) and in the article itself under Temperature changes. Your suggestion that this article "explain that 8 years is not significant in scientific terms and that the recent cooling is much smaller than the overall warming during the instrumental record" is a good idea, and that's basically what the section on Temperature changes does. It's just articulated differently and it's not in the lede section. And, I think you're correct in that many commentators are saying that "global warming has stopped", but this is certainly not due to a "lack of reporting of the recent cooling by the scientific community." Where do you think the popular press get their temperature readings? They aren't monitoring global temperature trends themselves. They get their information from the scientific community, and then misinterpret it and spin it in a way that sells newspapers. That's why we use peer reviewed scientific literature and not the mass media. But, thank you for bringing up the whole "cooling trend" issue. It's a definitely a popular misperception, and it should probably be expounded upon in Global warming controversy.--CurtisSwain (talk) 23:21, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Also, of course, the paper is not "from the NCEE", but from an unauthorized "report" by an unqualified individual employee - an economist. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:26, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
More importantly, it appears that the whole 'cooling phase' issue only arises based on global temperature data that does not take proper account of the Arctic (i.e. Hadley Center data, rather than GISS data) [11] If we're going to discuss the limitations of focussing on ~10 years of data in a century-sized trend with large 11- to 30-year cyclic trends, this is probably an even more important point. --Nigelj (talk) 18:27, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

You want: http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2009GL037810.shtml William M. Connolley (talk) 22:38, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

telegraph.co.uk

Climategate: the final nail in the coffin of 'Anthropogenic Global Warming'?: how best to squeeze dissenting scientists out of the peer review process. Gwen Gale (talk) 21:04, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

And? -Atmoz (talk) 21:10, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
...and that "squeeze" refers to the 2003 de-Freitas scandal at Climate Research, where an editor pushed highly flawed papers through "peer" review, the publisher called in Hans von Storch as editor in chief to clean up, but did not like it when he really tried it, leading to the resignation of von Storch and half the editorial board of the journal. Six year old news, and not a conspiracy either, but rather an attempt to reestablish the integrity of scientific publishing in this venue. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:26, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
No, the article is highly critical of de Freitas. Gwen Gale (talk) 21:37, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
The blog doesn't even mention de Freitas. -Atmoz (talk) 21:42, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
(ec) The article is about recent email disclosures, not de Freitas (only a later comment mentions de Freitas), the article is not about de Freitas, it is not "six year old news." Gwen Gale (talk) 21:44, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Indeed. And the line you chose to quote misrepresents exactly the reaction to the de-Freitas/von-Storch/Climate Research controversy. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:54, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Erm? You can't be serious? Just read the first paragraph and ask yourself whether this is a reliable source or not. If you come to the former rather than the latter conclusion then i'm truly sorry for you. If you come to the latter conclusion - then what are you posting it here for? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 21:48, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Agree. It discusses the open possibility that they might be fake and carefully avoids claiming that they are not. --BozMo talk 21:52, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
First someone says it's about de Freitas, but it's not about de Freitas. Then someone misquotes the first paragraph and says they feel sorry for me. No need. Posted, done. Gwen Gale (talk) 21:57, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
I'm not sure what you expected. Your first post wasn't clear what you thought should be done to our article based on your source. The "squeeze" was about de Freitas. But the article didn't mention de Freitas. I'm not a mind reader (not sure about the other who responded), so you actually need to write what you're thinking. How would you use this source (or perhaps a better one) to improve the article? -Atmoz (talk) 22:13, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
(e/c)Sorry - but i don't seem to recall that i have misquoted anything from that article.... On the other hand you might have noticed that you yourself quoted the text: "how best to squeeze dissenting scientists out of the peer review process." which is located deep within that article - and that part is about the de Freitas controversy in Climate change and is from 2003. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 22:17, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

I wouldn't pay much attention to a piece about "alleged emails – supposedly exchanged" that talks of "conspiracy" and "eco-fascist activists." It doesn't exactly appear to be a piece of quality journalism. --CurtisSwain (talk) 22:27, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Look hard and you'll find my name in there. Meanwhile, http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/11/the-cru-hack/ William M. Connolley (talk) 22:41, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

It seems to be bigger than just the telegraph:

Isonomia (talk) 12:04, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

<snip>

Wow! How on earth are we going to include this in the article? Isonomia (talk) 12:11, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

There is no way the article can ignore all this stuff!

Kevin Trenberth (failure of computer models): The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t. The CERES data published in the August BAMS 09 supplement on 2008 shows there should be even more warming: but the data are surely wrong. Our observing system is inadequate.
Phil Jones (witholding of data): The skeptics seem to be building up a head of steam here! ... The IPCC comes in for a lot of stick. Leave it to you to delete as appropriate! Cheers Phil. PS I’m getting hassled by a couple of people to release the CRU station temperature data. Don’t any of you three tell anybody that the UK has a Freedom of Information Act ! Garygateaux (talk) 12:46, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
From e-mail by Phil Jones of Hadley CRU: I've just completed Mike [Mann]'s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) amd from 1961 for Keith's to hide the decline.[12] Of course, the global warming theory never made any sense as science -- and now it appears to be a fraud as well. Kauffner (talk) 13:18, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
*Yawn*. Nothing of this discussion is about global warming or improving this article. If it has run its way through the blogosphere and something useful remains, it might go into global warming controversy as an interesting anecdote, although it would probably be better suited to our new article conspiracy nut-o-verse. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:25, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

This is becoming a BLP infestation on various pages. Kevin E. Trenberth could do with being semi'd, as could Mann's page. Yes I've raised it at WP:BLPN William M. Connolley (talk) 21:57, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

The New York Times published this article on the subject. A new, separate article for this topic is justified. Grundle2600 (talk) 22:15, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

We should certainly consider doing so. We should certainly not rush into doing so when so much is obscure William M. Connolley (talk) 22:28, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
Just FYI-There seems to be some confusion as to where the stolen emails came from. The NYTimes, Daily Mail, Washington Post, and BBC are all reporting it was the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit that was hacked. But, the Telegraph, American Thinker, Yahoo! News, and some other news outlets are saying "Hadley CRU," and someone tried to slap this story onto the Hadley Centre page. Now, I'm not certain about this, but as far as I can tell, UofEA's CRU collaborates with the the Hadley Centre at various times, but they're not connected to it or part of it. Additionally, a new article has been started about this. It's called...Climategate!--CurtisSwain (talk) 00:38, 22 November 2009 (UTC)
The Hadley Centre is a government laboratory associated with the UK Met Office while CRU is a unit within the University of East Anglia. They're on the opposite sides of England (Exeter and Norwich, respectively). They're so distinct that one is in a square building and the other is in a round building. That the two is are being confused is as apt a commentary as any on the journalistic quality of the Telegraph and American Thinker. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:53, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Oh well, I suppose it was inevitable: Climatic Research Unit e-mail controversy William M. Connolley (talk) 10:58, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Its a 30 year issue. Why cant people wait an extra couple of weeks for the "gotchya"? Im quite happy to see the exposure of this (seriously, sometimes these guys cause more damage with their hide-it-all routine than the skeptics they despise) but A> its not encyclapedic (not that half the stuff that ends up on wiki is, or even a quarter) and B> some people need to re-read WP:Deadline —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.58.120.11 (talk) 06:52, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

delete most of

The IPCC concludes that most of the .... change to The IPCC concludes that the observed ... delete most of would make the lead read so much easier and better. Brian Everlasting (talk) 22:01, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

...and wrong. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:43, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
Seeing as the IPCC is currently being discredited it might be less embarrassing for the wiki editors to remove all references entirely, except as a footnote to the hoax perpetrated as a result of science being dominated by carpetbaggers imho. DDB (talk) 02:46, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
And since when is the IPCC being discredited? (even if we go by the email "scandal", its a teeny tiny part of the IPCC, and not even a base evidence point). --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 13:55, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
No. We can write good without 'em. Awickert (talk) 16:40, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Characterizing Uncertainty in Climate Assessment

Characterizing Uncertainty in Climate Assessment just got created. It can't live as it is now. It probably needs to die as OR. Just drawing this to your attention in a neutral and unbiased fashion. See-also the authors other edits William M. Connolley (talk) 08:45, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

"Uncertainty", "Climate", and "Assessment" should all be lowercase, WP:NC. Beside that it's also been deleted for copyright infringement. Hello WMC :), it's been a while. ChyranandChloe (talk) 01:04, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

Nice new pic

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2009JD012105.shtml (An observationally based energy balance for the Earth since 1950, by D. M. Murphy et al.) apparently contains: http://www.skepticalscience.com/images/Total-Heat-Content.gif (ref'd by http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-stopped-in-1998.htm). We should include it somewhere William M. Connolley (talk) 18:58, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

Nice find Will, but probably too soon to include just yet. It was published just last month and has yet to be cited, and don't we usually let new research "marinate" at least a few months while it goes through the comments/response cycle?--CurtisSwain (talk) 21:22, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
Yes, fair enough, just bringing it up before I forget William M. Connolley (talk) 21:55, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
I mentioned this under #NASA research in journal Science indicates role of methane in global warming underestimated. :-) -Atmoz (talk) 03:16, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
The page that shows the graph has a 2007 comment on a 2009 paper. (Seems like a red flag to me.) Also, I object to graphs that are missing a proper zero. Q Science (talk) 06:18, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
What would be a "proper zero"? -Atmoz (talk) 15:46, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
Well, it is a delta graph. Perhaps something indicating the total number of joules in the ocean, or the number of joules absorbed and re-emitted each year. I also object to using joules since most other climate change data uses watts per square meter. Q Science (talk) 16:48, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
It's a time integrated, full volume measurement. I don't see how watts per square meter could even possibly make sense. Its more equivalent to measuring a temperature change than an energy flux. Dragons flight (talk) 20:47, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
Well, if x joules are added each year, divide by the number of seconds in a year and by the surface area of the ocean to determine equivalent Watts per square meter. This way, it is would be obvious how significant the energy increase is. Numbers without a reference are useless. Q Science (talk) 07:25, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
Yes you could figure out the net flux at the boundary, and that's a related quantity, but that's not what they purport to characterize and it seems less useful to me than the integrated long-term change. It's like comparing the rate CO2 enters the atmosphere to the total CO2 in the atmosphere. Both are related but I'd say the later is far more informative, and the quantity of more direct utility. Same thing here. The accumulated change is far more instructive than the flux. But if you want to scale 200×1021 J to something, I'd suggest a more interesting benchmark is that this is equivalent to heating the whole ocean by ~0.035 C. Dragons flight (talk) 07:40, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
I agree, temperature would also be a useful benchmark. My point was really that delta joules has no meaning unless there is a value associated with the zero. My preference would be to use several different equivalents so that more people can correctly interpret the data. Q Science (talk) 08:08, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
Like Wikipedia, skepticalscience.com updates their pages with new information as it becomes available. Dragons flight (talk) 20:56, 25 November 2009 (UTC)

Global warming peaked in 1998

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

FAQ Q3 says it all. Has there been an outbreak of dyslexia?

See:- [[13]] Global warming peaked in 1998 despite CO2 levels continuing to rise. Where then is the cause and effect of CO2 causing global warming? Any chance of a mention of this in the article?  SmokeyTheCat  •TALK• 20:52, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes, we know all about that, thanks. See Talk:Global_warming/FAQ Q3 --Nigelj (talk) 22:20, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
This is a biased article and the FAQ is biased too.  SmokeyTheCat  •TALK• 12:34, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
This article and its editors make a point to exclude anything which contradicts the IPCC, an organization known for its alarmism and use of fudged data. This is contradiction with Wikipedia's standard on neutral point of view and should be corrected. Global warming, if it is defined as "the increase in the average temperature of the Earth's near-surface air and oceans since the mid-20th century and its projected continuation," then it hasn't happened since the late 1990s. There's nothing you can do to change the facts. Sorry. Macai (talk) 13:01, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
Have you actually looked at the temperature data? Short-term cooling has occurred repeatedly within an overall warming trend. There is nothing to suggest that the current slight cooling is any different. Mikenorton (talk) 13:11, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
I don't recall claiming that global warming is false. I do, however, recall claiming that global warming hasn't progressed since the late 1990s, and I do recall citing that claim very well. Do you have any beef with the claim itself? Aside from it making global warming look bad, of course, since I think we can all agree that we want to keep this encyclopedia neutral, and without political bias. Macai (talk) 13:22, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
I presume that you still haven't actually looked at the data yet. The smoothed average (used to remove the effects of annual variability) has yet to show a fall. However, even if it does, it will be some time before it's possible to say that there has been any change to the overall upward trend. Compare data for the last few years with other periods where the average has taken a brief downward turn. Mikenorton (talk) 13:45, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
I have not claimed a fall. I have claimed a lack of increase in temperature. Stop misrepresenting my argument. Refute the claim that the temperature has not gone up since the late 1990s or concede. Macai (talk) 15:12, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
The data refute your claim that this is anything significant enough to be mentioned in the article, I don't need to. Only the long term overall trend matters here, short period variability is irrelevant. Mikenorton (talk) 16:03, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
Short term period variability is not irrelevant to "the increase in the average temperature of the Earth's near-surface air and oceans since the mid-20th century and its projected continuation", which happens to be Wikipedia's own definition of global warming. Are you suggesting that Wikipedia's opening sentence is incorrect? Because a good way to make the claim irrelevant would be to simply change Wikipedia's definition. I do not intend to come off as snide, but this is a valid suggestion given the context of the article. Macai (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 16:07, 29 November 2009 (UTC).
You've still not looked at the data have you? Obviously this article is referring to the overall trends in temperature over periods of tens of years. Do you think that we should describe every yearly change here? Anyway I will not waste my time further here. Read the FAQ, look hard at the relevant data and stop edit warring on the article. Mikenorton (talk) 16:20, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
Well, since it started in the "mid 20th century", I'll say it started January 1st, 1950. Okay, so "global warming" as defined by Wikipedia has gone on for just under 60 years - it's about a month off. Now, for just about 12 of these years (also about one month off), the phenomena hasn't happened. (12 / 60) x 100 = 20% of the time it is supposedly happening, it isn't happening at all. This is hardly short term, and this is hardly not noteworthy. If you disagree, at what point would it become noteworthy? 50%? 75%? Would it ever become noteworthy? Put a number on it. Macai (talk) 16:29, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
You're right, a point to point comparison of global temperatures from 1998 to 2010 indicates a cooling trend for the past twelve years. However by doing so, your argument ignores the surrounding data points, and makes fallacy inappropriate generalization. You're also right that short term variations is not irrelevant, but in the wrong sense. Climate isn't year by year, it's a trends that evens out the variations, and you can't do that with two points, which is why in terms of linear regression you can use the correlation coefficient "r" and run a null hypothesis test something along the lines H0: r=0, and Ha: r>0. This is a really cheap way of doing it (please don't laugh guys), but that's the idea. I know you don't like the IPCC, and I can help you look for another scientific source if you want, but figure b page 32 of the Technical summery gives you the "number" on it. They used the Monte Carlo method, I think looks like a binomial distribution, but the number is "virtually certain" or >99% that there has been an increase in temperature. Climate models such as HadCM3 using SRES are the "projected continuation". Please join the discussion down the page, they're on the same topic you. ChyranandChloe (talk) 07:22, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Reference Keenlyside/Latif

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The paper is unclear as to whether the predicted steady temperatures will be one year or ten, and the discussion has since dried up

From this to this version the Keenlyside/Latif Nature article was mentioned, I've unhidden it again. --Pevos (talk) 11:04, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

I refer to this sentence in the section "Climate models":
A 2008 paper predicts that the global temperature may not increase during the next decade because short-term natural fluctuations may temporarily outweigh greenhouse gas-induced warming.[62]
Lt. Gen. Pedro Subramanian had hidden ("commented") it in the latter version, using WP:COMMENT. The action of hiding it was hardly noticeable, see http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Global_warming&diff=prev&oldid=314468535 --Pevos (talk) 20:10, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
Fair point. I've ripped it out entirely. There is no reason why we should be referring to this one minor paper William M. Connolley (talk) 22:04, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
Hide the decline? --Pevos (talk) 06:28, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
Well, apparently you "hid the revert", with a misleading edit-summary[14]. As WMC said it is a minor paper, and one that has (according to Mojib Latif himself been severely misused) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 08:37, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
1. Did I "hide the revert" if I reinserted an improved version of the text which W. Connolley had deleted and if he after deleting it had made another minor edit 2 minutes later so that I was not able to revert it directly?
2.Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Hkelkar#Removal_of_sourced_edits_made_in_a_neutral_narrative_is_disruptive. And like Nsaa I am confused about how people act here.
3. Where does Latif say that it was misused? Would it mean that he does not confirm it?
--Pevos (talk) 18:43, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
I'm sure we can find it if we must. But the main point is: this is a minor paper of no great significance. We don't pick out other minor papers to add to that section. Is there some special reason why you find this paper especially interesting? William M. Connolley (talk) 18:49, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
Is there some special reason why you want to exclude it?--Pevos (talk) 18:59, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
No. It is but one of hundreds of thousands of papers all of which aren't relevant ot important enough to include. there is nothing special about it. Now, how about you actually answer the relevant question, which is why this should be included? William M. Connolley (talk) 19:24, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
1. Yes, reverts should be marked as such (with rv in front) Edit-summaries must be comprehensive - yours wasn't.
2. Sorry but that particular Arbcom items is misused whenever someone finds consensus against him/her. WP:WEIGHT is still the major policy to follow. (and that is what is being cited as the reason for not including it).
3. Read the Mojib Latif biography (where it is sourced).
--Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:50, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
  • When someone's presenting a reliably-sourced journal article neutrally, the burden should be on those removing it to show why it shouldn't be included (inaccurate, redundant, particularly minor or technical). For the particularly legalistic, WP:FACR requires featured articles to be comprehensive. The analysis by Latif doesn't seem to be in the article yet - and it's certainly an interesting, on-topic analysis which is not minor (in the technical sense of narrow details). Bernard, I would feel comfortable putting the information back in. If there's continued resistance, appeal to WP:RS/N where you should be supported. II | (t - c) 19:38, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
I'm going the inclusion route on this one. It's gotten cited in 24 other articles, and is a year and a half old. It doesn't deserve its own paragraph, but why not put in a sentence that says something along the lines of, "Over the next decade, natural variability may outweigh greenhouse warming"? Awickert (talk) 19:46, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
Simply because it would be wrong. The forecast was only up to 2015 (and that doesn't make it the next decade), you are confusing media reads of the paper with the paper itself. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:53, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
I [Expletive] hate nature abstracts; I should stop thinking they have any relation to the articles. The abstract says "decadal"; the plots in the article only stay flat to 2010 actually, so actually indeed only one more year of predicted steady temps. But then the text says to 2015 so now I'm completely confused and have tentatively decided that the article is self-inconsistent. I've stricken my previous comment. Awickert (talk) 20:04, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
Keenlyside is about the AMO. From 3 works that cite K:
  • Decadal time scale variability, such as predicted weakening of the Atlantic overturning circulation (Keenlyside, et al., 2008)...
  • As far as the [Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation] is concerned, skillful initialization may be possible up to a decade or so (Keenlyside et al. 2008), although multidecadal skillful initialization has not yet been demonstrated.
  • However, it should be noted that the North Atlantic Ocean is a region where natural hydro-climatological variability is large (Keenlyside et al. 2008).
If K needs to be added somewhere, it should be in Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation. -Atmoz (talk) 20:54, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
  • I'm sort of with Awickert. The abstract says "Using this method, and by considering both internal natural climate variations and projected future anthropogenic forcing, we make the following forecast: over the next decade, the current Atlantic meridional overturning circulation will weaken to its long-term mean; moreover, North Atlantic SST and European and North American surface temperatures will cool slightly, whereas tropical Pacific SST will remain almost unchanged. Our results suggest that global surface temperature may not increase over the next decade". I'll admit that I can't really follow the paper itself: the graphs with stable/declines only go to 2010 [15], and the graph which goes to 2020 shows an increase [16]. Don't understand it. Feel free to remove. II | (t - c) 22:37, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

There isn't room in this section on the GW page for all the papers on climate models. K et al. just isn't a very good paper, as noted above and at RC etc. If we wanted a paper on prediction of decadal trends, the Doug Smith et al. paper is far better quality. But it doesn't say anything of interest to the skeptics so you've never heard of it William M. Connolley (talk) 23:02, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Oh, and I nearly forgot: we should take out Douglass et al. too, cos that is junk William M. Connolley (talk) 23:03, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

But it is true – For the last 11 years we have not observed any increase in global temperatures

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Another debate the could have been avoided if only people would read FAQ Q3.'

According to this article "What happened to global warming?" (http://www.webcitation.org/5leUd5b2a) BBC states "But it is true. For the last 11 years we have not observed any increase in global temperatures." and from Der Spiegel we have this article Climatologists Baffled by Global Warming Time-Out (http://www.webcitation.org/5leUpWdnY) which states "why average global temperatures have stopped rising over the last 10 years.". Should not this be worked into this article? Nsaa (talk) 17:46, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

See Question 3 in the FAQ. Lt. Gen. Pedro Subramanian (talk) 17:49, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
Are you serious? I have read the FAQ and agree on the methodology Talk:Global_warming/FAQ describes. Please read the source again given. In Spiegel article they state "Just a few weeks ago, Britain's Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research added more fuel to the fire with its latest calculations of global average temperatures. According to the Hadley figures, the world grew warmer by 0.07 degrees Celsius from 1999 to 2008 and not by the 0.2 degrees Celsius assumed by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. And, say the British experts, when their figure is adjusted for two naturally occurring climate phenomena, El Niño and La Niña, the resulting temperature trend is reduced to 0.0 degrees Celsius -- in other words, a standstill.". Nothing about only using 1997/98 to get a declining trend. So please, this is NOT relevant point for this case. Nsaa (talk) 18:07, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
If you have truly read and understood all of the answer to Question 3 in the FAQ, then what do you make of this statement? "Choosing this abnormally warm year [1998] as the starting point for comparisons with later years produces a cooling trend; choosing any other year in the 20th century produces a warming trend...Another important point is that 10 years isn't long enough to detect a climate trend. The World Meteorological Organisation specifies 30 years as the standard averaging period for climate statistics so that year-to-year fluctuations are averaged out." If there is some other point to this, I don't see what it is. --TS 19:34, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
You quote something from where? Not one of the articles I quoted from above. Again both sourced say something else than what you assert. We have two very reliable sources stating that we "For the last 11 years we have not observed any increase in global temperatures" and "why average global temperatures have stopped rising over the last 10 years.". This has clearly a place in this article and normaly removing well sourced information like this is "8) It is disruptive to remove statements that are sourced reliably, written in a neutral narrative, and pertain to the subject at hand." Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Hkelkar#Removal_of_sourced_edits_made_in_a_neutral_narrative_is_disruptive. For the last couple of days when I first encountered these environment articles I've seen so much of this that I'm really confused about how people act. Nsaa (talk) 17:47, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
Because of the amount of controversy involved, we reference only peer-reviewed scientific sources here; you would not believe how much the press gets wrong, and almost everything is spun towards one extreme or another. Although it may be obvious that temperatures have been rather stagnant in the recent past - let's say 8 years or so, saying 11 falls into the El Niño trap - using newspapers is a slippery slope to getting every unqualified opinion written down here (as indeed here they say 11, which is cherry-picking). If you need help obtaining scientific papers, leave me a message. But, looking at plots, the present-day stagnation doesn't look significantly different than previous noise in the data, so it could be that scientists haven't written a whole lot about it yet. But I don't really know; I haven't read much myself, Awickert (talk) 18:23, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
Reliable sources covering the controversies over the science and the peer review process itself as certainly appropriate to include. ChildofMidnight (talk) 20:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
Ahhh... could you start a new section as to not hijack the conversation? Danke, Awickert (talk) 20:12, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
As an compromise: Ok then we should state that this is a statement from two journalists referring to a couple of scientist (""At present, however, the warming is taking a break," confirms meteorologist Mojib Latif of the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences in the northern German city of Kiel. Latif, one of Germany's best-known climatologists, says that the temperature curve has reached a plateau. "There can be no argument about that," he says. "We have to face that fact.""). This is as correct as it can be. Ok? Nsaa (talk) 20:20, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
That just doesn't have anything to do with the warming since the middle of the 20th century - nor does it have anything to do with the expected increase. Its not even climate - its temperature fluctuations, which are rather normal, both with and without global warming. And if you'd read abit on Latif, then you'd have noticed that what Latif says is that while its having a "breather" (because natural forcings at the moment are negative), the anthropogenic forcing is still increasing, and that every such period of plateau-ing will be followed by accelerated warming (ie. to catch up to the forcing). That is also what FAQ Q3 states. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 21:16, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Too much influence on Earth?

There seems to be a lot of information on Global Warming on earth in this article but it seems to discount Global Warming that is affecting other planets as well; notably Mars. --RobertGary1 (talk) 22:15, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. It seems that this article is focused on the theory of man made global warming often credited to Al Gore, also known as Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW). Perhaps this article should be renamed and a new article on Global Warming could discuss things generally, explain AGW and link to the AGW article. Then again, the media only covers AGW and calls it Global Warming so wiki accurately reflects most peoples current understanding. A neutral POV article on global warming would point to the research by the Danish scientists who linked hundreds of years of sun spot data directly to observed temperated changes. Thus, the warming detected by our satellite and infra-red devices on other planets are logically explained by the same sun spot (electro-magnetism) variations.

--Knowsetfree (talk) 06:20, 25 November 2009 (UTC)

Please read Talk:Global_warming/FAQ before posting well meaning but not well informed comments such as this. --BozMo talk 07:14, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
Hi BozMo, thanks for the reference to the FAQ. First, your characterization of the comments being "not well informed" is presumptuous. Are you not aware of the warming detected on other planets in our solar system? Your FAQ page that you cite neglects to mention these undisputed findings at all. So we'are left wondering if you reject the scientific measurements of temperature rises on other planets, or if you assumed that the planetary issues were somehow addressed in the FAQ. What is your point? -- Knowsetfree (talk) 03:00, 4 December 2009 (UTC)
Perhaps "inaccurate" would be kinder than "not well informed." You get off to a bad start by repeating the misinformation "often credited to Al Gore" without acknowledging it as a politically motivated tactic designed to foster the impression that global warming is a theory developed by politicians rather than scientists. You then propose to rename this article as "Anthropogenic global warming" when in fact it covers all contributions both positive and negative to the fluctuations in the Earth's temperature observed during the past century and their projected continuation. The consensus view of more leading scientific academies and societies worldwide than any AGW-denier can shake a stick at supports the claim that the average temperature of the Earth's near-surface air and oceans rose during that period and will continue to rise, making the article appropriately named. That consensus view includes the claim that this rise is largely of man-made origin; however it would be inaccurate to therefore rename the article "Anthropogenic global warming" because the article in its present form treats all contributions both natural and man-made. That the latter appear to dominate is not Wikipedia's fault; Wikipedia articles are based on consensus and are obliged to report the consensus view. If you disagree with the consensus view, that places you in the camp of AGW deniers. Your point about other planets is certainly relevant to their temperature, but "global warming" as standardly understood refers to the recent increase in the Earth's temperature. Hence to avoid confusion you'll need to come up with some other term for temperature fluctuations of other planets than "global warming" and write an article about that if you feel well informed on that subject, bearing in mind the articles on effective temperature, the sun, the solar system, sunspots, etc. Of particular relevance to your interest is solar variation#Global_warming which seems to cover exactly what you wanted to see in Wikipedia, though possibly not with the conclusions you were hoping for. As pointed out there and at [17] the role of sunspots in global warming appears to be negligible by comparison with the impact of greenhouse gases. The Wikipedia article adds that these Danish scientists you speak of "and other researchers keep presenting the old misleading graph." As I said at the beginning, "inaccurate" would be kinder, but your selection of inaccuracies makes it hard to avoid thinking "politically motivated." --Vaughan Pratt (talk) 19:29, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

Leaked information about scientists making up global warming data

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Time to take this discussion to Talk:Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident, where discussion of coverage of the incident is more appropriate.

Should this be mentioned here? Saw it on AP a bit ago. Thank you so much, I like my sugar with coffee and cream. 05:46, 25 November 2009 (UTC)

I believe you're referring to the topic covered in telegraph.co.uk above.--CurtisSwain (talk) 05:52, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
I would vote in favor of inclusion. My recollection of the newspaper and television coverage was that there were 3 particularly important elements. First, there were eMails wherein anthropogenic (man made) global warming AGW proponents were organizing to delete emails wherein certain topics which could harm public perception of the AGW theory. Second, there was evidence of adjustments made with the intent of hiding or reducing the observed temperature declines since 1998. And third, there was collusion by AGW proponents to try to harm the professional standing of periodicals which published evidence or papers harmful to the AGW theory. But perhaps it would be better, at least initially, to start with an article on what some have been calling "ClimateGate". Actually, I didn't search maybe there is one. Because AGW has some really fervent supporters, as well as detractors, direct editing to the article should be done carefully after discussion here, And with carefully cited references. --Knowsetfree (talk) 06:10, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
There is a whole article on the subject at Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident. This article is about the established science. The existence and causes of current global warming are beyond doubt, not a 'theory' that can be shaken by a few e-mails whatever their content, even though some non-scientific bloggers and unscientific journalists would like to believe otherwise. If we see some scientific bodies of national standing publishing alterations to their existing very clear positions in the light of these e-mails, then those changes will be covered here. See also Scientific opinion on climate change for more detail about the actual current position. --Nigelj (talk) 08:13, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
There is an article on this particular controversy (Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident). It seems to me that it might be worth a sentence or two in the Debate and Skepticism section of this article, with a link to the main article on the incident. EastTN (talk) 17:18, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
I don't think so. It has had no influence on the position of any scientist or scientific organization, i.e. its irrelevant for the state of the science. It also violates WP:NOTNEWS. I think it lives more comfortably in global warming controversy. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:24, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
I agree. If there is anything relevant to climate science here, then the situation would evolve similarly to the Jan Hendrik Schön case. You could then get all the relevant news from the scientific journals. Count Iblis (talk) 17:35, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
I disagree. If there is reliable information that refutes the findings of this article's topic, then it is relevant to be included. If not, then we are only doing what the Climate Change scientists are being accuased of, which is suppressing information.--Jojhutton (talk) 17:53, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
  • But in this case, there is no information refuting the findings of this article's topic. There is no suppression of information going on here, as the hacking incident is clearly visible and available as a separate article on Wikipedia. One might argue that it constitutes a POV fork, but I can't see how. The incident has had zero effect on the science of climate change. The only place it has had any effect is in the controversy. ~Amatulić (talk) 18:19, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
The particular section we're talking about is Debate and skepticism - not the sections dealing with the science of global warming. This section summarizes the material covered in the Global warming controversy and Politics of global warming articles. It seems appropriate to have a dedicated article (Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident) that discusses it in detail, a section in the Global warming controversy article summarizing the material and then a sentence or two with a link in the higher level summary in this article (Global_warming#Debate_and_skepticism). The issue isn't one of refuting the scientific material in this article, but of providing a good summary of the global warming debate - and making it easy for readers to find other Wikipedia articles that address related topics. To do that, a straight up sentence or two describing that this particular twist in the debate has occurred and linking to the appropriate article seems appropriate. (As for NOTNEWS, it's clear that we don't have the final answer on what the e-mails mean or how they were obtained yet, but it's highly unlikely that this incident won't be a part of the debate for years to come.) EastTN (talk) 19:45, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
No. This is plain recentism. The political debate has been going on for more than 20 years. The CRU emails have been published not even a week ago. I'd say the odds are better than even that not a single person has read all the emails yet. It's a hot topic today, but not even a blip in the big picture. If this still is considered significant in a few months, we can add something. But now it just does not warrant the attention. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:55, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
Sadly I cannot disagree with Herr Dr Schulz on this. highly unlikely that this incident won't be a part of the debate for years to come is one of the oddest opinions I have seen since being told by the Sunday Times that the Hitler diaries would transform our view of WW2.--BozMo talk 21:17, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
I'll defer to whatever consensus develops here, of course. But do you really think this is incident isn't going be part of global warming skeptics' rhetoric for a long time to come? I just don't see them dropping it. Whatever the truth and appropriate context may be, some of the emails simply make too good sound bites for critics to ignore. EastTN (talk) 21:25, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
Oh, they'll use it as long as the creationists will use the Second Law of Thermodynamics and moon dust - that's just part of their normal repertoire. The question is if anybody will still be listening. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:30, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
Huh? "the Second Law of Thermodynamics and moon dust"? Go on, enlighten me chez moi if needed. Mind you I am not sure I have met a creationist... aren't they a myth invented by Richard Dawkins? --BozMo talk 21:37, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
Is anybody listening now? -Atmoz (talk) 21:33, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
Yeah, who would listen to stories like this anyway? --Childhood's End (talk) 21:46, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
You refered to them being part of "the debate". If you meant "the debate amongst Aliens abducted my dog conspiracy theorists and other TSSOAPs" whereever they hang out then I defer to your opinion. If you mean any serious scientific debate I haven't seen anything in them yet which will last a year but as has been said perhaps there is something substantial to come. --BozMo talk 21:35, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
I'm talking about the public policy debate that is played out in legislatures and the media. That's somewhat different from the scientific debate, but equally important. I don't doubt that the emails may be of little or no value to the scientific debate, but from a public relations standpoint they look terrible. Rightly or wrongly, some of them create the appearance that efforts were made to influence the peer review process. This has the potential to undermine, in the eyes of legislators and the public, the credibility of the science. That seems certain to affect the public debate, even if there is no affect on the scientific debate. That is significant, because it is the public policy debate that will determine what the world actually does, or doesn't do, about global warming. EastTN (talk) 23:11, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
This post by Monbiot may help explain my point. Regardless of the exculpatory details, the emails and the way they have been handled are damaging to the public perception of climate science. EastTN (talk) 23:19, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
The e-mails show that CRU and company are misusing the peer review process to get skeptics fired and keep them from being published. To the extent that AGW is "scientific consensus", "settled science", and all that, it is because of this political manipulation. Does anyone think that evolutionary scientists plot against creationists this way? Kauffner (talk) 15:55, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
Evolutionary scientists would certainly object to creationists publishing nonsense in high quality journals. Count Iblis (talk) 16:01, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
Of course they would. But one would hope that they would trust the peer review process to work and not try to short-circuit the process. In the legal realm, we insist on a full and fair trial, even if we know the criminal involved is guilty as sin. That's not just for the benefit of the accused - it's also for the benefit of the process and also for all of the rest of us. If the peer review process is weakened, it ultimately hurts everybody. Forget the skeptics - if well-known scientists really have manipulated the peer-review process, from whatever motives (good or bad), they have hurt you and they have hurt all of their colleagues. EastTN (talk) 16:12, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

While a defensible case can be made that the hacking incident and the subsequent fall-out may damage public perceptions of science, it is not relevant to this article because the incident has no bearing on the science. --TS 16:15, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

The section of this article we're talking about is Debate and skepticism, which summarizes the material covered in the Global warming controversy and Politics of global warming articles. That section does not deal with the science of global warming, but rather with the policy debate, public opinion and skepticism. As an aside, the incident may already have had an impact - look at this WSJ article (and this Telegraph article). It seems to me that if this has the potential to kill cap and trade in the U.S., then it's certainly relevant to a discussion of "Debate and skepticism." EastTN (talk) 16:39, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
Just out of curiosity - are you aware of how many times Inhofe has made similar comments? (ie. unrelated to CRU). --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 18:23, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
I definitely think we should hold off on this. At the moment it appears to be a simple stunt by someone in an attempt to derail the Copenhagen talks. If it has that effect or if the climate change bill fails in the Senate then it may happen that we will be including references to reliable sources attributing these failures to the hacking incident. At the present time it's impossible to say, and since this is an encyclopedia and not a newspaper we should wait and see. As Kim suggests, Jim Inhofe's opinion of Cap and Trade isn't new. --TS 18:34, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
Certainly Inhofe has been trying to kill cap and trade for a long time. The point is that this has now become a now become a notable part of the debate. We may want to dismiss it as a "stunt," and the timing may well be intended to derail the Copenhagen discussion, but the scientists involved were indiscreet enough to commit to email statements that are genuinely embarrassing (I recognize that we don't have the full context, and that emails are often written "in the heat of the moment," but some of this stuff flat out looks bad). As I said, I'll defer to the group consensus, but I think you're just kidding yourselves if you don't believe this will have a significant affect on the public policy debate and the credibility of climate science over at least the mid-term. This isn't science - it's politics and public relations. It's too early to know exactly how it will all play out, but it's not too early to see that this is a significant PR setback (especially given how poorly it's been handled). EastTN (talk) 20:02, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
It may well be that it will have a lasting impact on public policy debate (personally i doubt it), but that is not something that we determine (see: WP:NOTCRYSTAL). The Inhofe claim is non-notable since Inhofe claims such again and again (which was why i asked if you were aware of how often he comes with such claims) - perhaps the wolf is really coming now - but Inhofe has yelled "Wolf!" too many times. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 21:27, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
I don't think WP:NOTCRYSTAL is the right analysis. This event has already occurred, and the coverage in newspapers of record from more than one country make it quite clear that it's notable and already a part of the policy debate. Like I said, I'm willing to wait, but I suspect we're running a real risk of basing our analysis on WP:IDONTLIKEIT rather than on the merits of the sources. EastTN (talk) 21:48, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
No, sorry. What you are talking about is impact in the political debate. Such impact can only be determined in hindsight. Its impossible at this moment to determine whether this particular case will have an impact or not - thus to determine it, you are projecting your personal opinion into the future. (thats the crystal ball part). --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 22:40, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
That's too easy. Take the U.S. healthcare reform debate for example. We don't know whether it will pass or not (that would be the Crystal Ball part), but it's clear that the cost issue is an important part of the debate (we can absolutely nail that down with reliable sources right now). You don't have to wait to find out who wins the debate to identify the issues that shape the debate. Beyond that, it ignores the nature and seriousness of the charges. We didn't have to wait for Ken Starr to finish his report and for the impeachment attempt to fail to know that the Monica Lewinski scandal was going to be a notable part of the Clinton presidency (despite how fervently the Clintons must have hoped it would go away). Frankly, I think it's politically naive to imagine that this is going to be a three day wonder that won't affect both the public's trust in climate science and the policy debate. We've already seen enough - again, in newspapers of record on both sides of the Atlantic - to know that's not true.EastTN (talk) 03:02, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
I don't think this is likely to be a game-changer, from what we've seen of it so far. From the fact that some researchers said some potentially embarrassing things in private emails that have been taken out of context in a predictable manner, to the possibility of this becoming more than a nine-day wonder, is something we shouldn't speculate on. We'll know more about this question in due course as it plays out. Meanwhile there's no hurry to add material. We can afford to wait. --TS 05:37, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
That's a judgment call, and as I said, I'm willing to follow the consensus. I do think, though, that given the information we already have it's quite naive to even hope this is going to be no more than a nine-day wonder. We're not just talking about "some potentially embarrassing things" - we're talking about statements that, regardless of the context or circumstances, on the surface at least seem to indicate an unwillingness to release scientific data even in response to a freedom of information request, a desire to keep reports that drew other conclusions out of the IPCC process, and a desire to manipulate the peer review process. It hardly matters that the CRU now says that it will release the data. As far as the policy debate is concerned, the "scandal" has never really been about the data - it's been about the credibility of the scientists and the process. Our science and technology have become both advanced and specialized enough that we really cannot hope to stay current in more than our own specialty. What that means is that legislatures and the public do not make decisions about issues like global warming based on the data and the science, they make their decisions based on the word of the scientists. From that standpoint, it really does not matter whether anything in the emails casts doubt on the data - what matters for the public discourse is whether it creates doubt about the ethics of the researchers. I'll say straight up that I am not qualified to understand whether the data adjustments discussed in the e-mails were appropriate or not - but I am able to understand the inappropriateness of manipulating the peer review process. And that's the basic problem here - 99% of the public are in the same boat I am. We're not going to understand all of the details of the science, no matter how carefully you try to explain it to us, because we don't have the time and we don't have the background. But we do have to decide whether we believe it - and ultimately, that means we have to decide if we trust the scientists. That's why this is damaging - the issues raised strike at the heart of that trust. It may not change the science, and it may not ultimately be a "game-changer" for the debate, but it is damaging in an important and significant way.EastTN (talk) 21:38, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
Here's a Christian Science Monitor article that illustrates my point about public trust.EastTN (talk) 21:47, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
You must feel pretty strongly about this EastTN. The issue is trust, and when such situations strike so strongly at its heart, it must be infuriating. But I wonder. Maybe the real issue isn't about who to trust. Maybe the point is to plainly give people the power to understand for themselves. I will tell it won't be easy, but I don't think this should be an excuse for giving up. There is a division that runs between the scientific community and general public, and there are two bridges: the first covered in mud has forgone its foundation, the second is under-construction. Do the builders of the second mirror what the first have done? It would be accomplishing nothing new, and standing on nothing sound. The original issue was science, politics is second, and I think we're forgetting that. How about you EastTN? ChyranandChloe (talk) 01:04, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
I'm routinely a part of the peer review process within my own field, and I understand the importance of peer review to the credibility and integrity of my chosen profession. I've also had to deal with the political process many times during my career. It's never just about the technical issue, unless you truly are in an ivory tower and don't care about what happens in the real world. It's easy to say "give the people the power to understand for themselves." We should make every effort to inform the public, but ultimately, they must decide whether or not to trust the experts (and which experts to trust). I'm well educated, but I'm simply not qualified to make judgments about the quality of an atmospheric model. If I were, I would not be qualified to make judgments about the Congressional Budget Office's estimates of the likely impact of the Obama health care plan. Those who can reproduce the CBO work aren't qualified to review the adequacy of the safety rules for nuclear power plants, or the construction of the new Boeing Dreamliner, or judge the safety of genetically modified crops. Trust is vital in a society as complex as ours, and far too many people distrust science as it stands.
Bottom line, I would suggest two things: 1) The nature of this incident, and the coverage we've already seen, makes it clear that it's going to a significant and likely ongoing bone of contention in the public policy debate, because it goes to the heart of the public trust in climate science and climate scientists that's at the heart of that debate. 2) The public policy debate is relevant to the Debate and skepticism section of the article. If you believe that the science suggests that action is necessary, then isn't it important for readers to understand not only the science, but the political process and debate over what actions will or will not be taken? EastTN (talk) 03:17, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
And no I didn't say politics were unimportant, only "second". Without the science, climate politics would collapse; but without politics, science would still stand. If you want someone qualified, ask WMC or SBHB, WMC worked on climate models back in the day, SBHB wrote most of the "Climate models" section. Does the incident belong in "Debate and skepticism"? So far it's only been an embarrassing event; and there won't be an impact, defined as policy, until Copenhagen. Can you wait another week or two? By then you'd have a really good concrete case, and you wouldn't need to beg the question by assuming this event significant either. ChyranandChloe (talk) 07:53, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

I fundamentally disagree that this event and the discussion of it should be moved into a minor and less-central article. George Monbiot, one of the foremost climate change journalists in the UK, has described the release of these emails as, 'a major blow... [they] could scarcely be more damaging. I am now convinced that they are genuine, and I’m dismayed and deeply shaken by them... There appears to be evidence here of attempts to prevent scientific data from being released, and even to destroy material that was subject to a freedom of information request.' He also comprehensively demolishes some of the arguments above which try to minimse the importance of these discussions to the credibility of climate change science: 'Pretending that this isn't a real crisis isn't going to make it go away. Nor is an attempt to justify the emails with technicalities. We'll be able to get past this only by grasping reality, apologising where appropriate and demonstrating that it cannot happen again. No one has been as badly let down by the revelations in these emails as those of us who have championed the science. We should be the first to demand that it is unimpeachable, not the last.'

Clive Crook, the highly-respected FT and former Economist journalist (a supporter of action against climate change) has said: 'this scandal is not at the margins of the politicised IPCC process. It is not tangential to the policy prescriptions emanating from what David Henderson called the environmental policy milieu. It goes to the core of that process. One theme, in addition to those already mentioned about the suppression of dissent, the suppression of data and methods, and the suppression of the unvarnished truth, comes through especially strongly: plain statistical incompetence... Can I read these emails and feel that the scientists involved deserve to be trusted? No, I cannot. These people are willing to subvert the very methods–notably, peer review–that underwrite the integrity of their discipline. Is this really business as usual in science these days?'

The response of editors here to downplay and sideline the importance of all this is unencyclopedic. This decision must be revisited and there must be notation of these activities in the this main article. FinScribe (talk) 11:33, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Really? What about the falsification by industry groups for the last 20 years, the politicization and manipulation of scientists from the denier community or the deliberate distortions the other way? Won't that fundamentally alter the process? Guess what - it has, to the point that for most people who were convinced that AGM is real, the bar to disprove it has been raised very high because of the orchestrated and malicious campaign to destroy it. At such, one incident, even with 'well noted experts' is not enough to change things. You'll note that the Copenhagen conference is still going to occur. You'll note that there are not scientific papers suddenly published now that that 'the floodgates have been opened'. Yes, there has been manipulation of the peer review process.

Now that it has been exposed, let us see peer reviewed papers using the RIGHT process disprove AGM. Or do you expect us to believe that one hack placed on a russian website suddenly disproves 20 years of science?

This information does not belong in this article until it shows up in a peer reviewed journal. If you think you can change the perceptions of society to make climate science 'psuedo science' then maybe that might hold water, but guess what - it doesn't. And I'm not holding my breath either. Manticore55 (talk) 21:47, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Global warming peaked in the late 1990s, and I can source it

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

See FAQ Q3. It isn't just about 1998, it's about claims based on carefully selected subsets of the data.

I've made the edit pointing out that global warming has peaked in the late 1990s. However, it got reverted by Atmoz as seen here . My sources were the British Broadcasting Corporation and Der Spiegel. As far as I'm concerned, these are both valid sources as per WP:RS News organizations. I'd like a direct answer to this question: would you consider either the BBC or Der Spiegel unreliable news sources? Macai (talk) 17:42, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

BBC and Der Spiegel are not reliable sources for scientific statements, especially not if there are no peer reviewed articles that make similar statements. We cannot assume that statements made there about scientific matters are correct or not misleading to such a degree that you could rely on such sources without much problems. It doesn't mean that everything they write is suspect. Count Iblis (talk) 17:51, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Well, neither, is the IPCC, but that's another debate to be had. Anyway, WP:RS#News organizations says that reliable news sources are welcome. Wikipedia's policy does not say anywhere that scientific claims must be backed by peer reviewed sources, and therefore they don't necessarily have to be backed by peer reviewed sources. Now, then, is either the BBC or Der Spiegel reliable...or not? Yes or no, please. Macai (talk) 18:08, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
No, to both sources. They are not science. See also the above, as well as the FAQ Q3. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 18:41, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
I think you meant they aren't scientific. It's no biggie, though. Anyway, they don't have to be scientific, just mainstream to be reliable. Any other objections? Macai (talk) 18:48, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
How many times does this need to be discussed? -Atmoz (talk) 18:16, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
As many as is required for someone to give a valid reason to remove material with citations to reliable sources. Macai (talk) 18:19, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Search the archives here. See this. And remember that the press screws it up a lot. 1998 was the warmest year on record, but not due to global warming. Neither is the IPCC - no, the IPCC is a reliable scientific source, and is actually a rather conservative organization. Awickert (talk) 18:28, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
In the quest for NPOV it can be a never ending back and forth. This page, as it is now, is wieghted toward the dogmatic "it's warm and getting warmer" POV. Dogma and wikiarticles are like trying to push two magnetic poles together, it just won't work. This page needs more text on the other side, that questions the data, indeed, it needs more on the very fact that people question the theory of 'global warming'. Mytwocents (talk) 01:42, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
This is fine, so long as they are reliably sourced in scientific publications. If the restriction to the scientific articles is an issue, the reliable source noticeboard is the place to go. Awickert (talk) 18:35, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
  1. The IPCC bases its conclusions in part on the Climatic Research Unit, which is known for conspiring to exclude contradictory data. The IPCC is not a reliable source until it does so. Sorry.
  2. Wikipedia's policy explicitly states that I can post claims from mainstream news organizations. Since you don't get much more mainstream than the BBC or Der Spiegel, you can't say they're not mainstream sources.
  3. Even the CRU says I'm right:
The warmest years were 1999 and 1990 with an anomaly of 1.16C and again 2005 is not distinguishable from this value given the uncertainties in the data.
As you can see, even the CRU claims the warmest year was in the late 1990s. What were you saying? Macai (talk) 18:46, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
We were saying: See FAQ Q3. You may also want to see WP:RS#Science article in the popular press. You may also want ponder why Latif isn't a global warming sceptic, and that he doesn't say that global warming peaked. (there is a not very subtle difference between current temperature record having a peak in 1998 and global warming having peaked) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:00, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
  1. FAQ Q3 does not address Wikipedia's policy. It also has nothing to do with the claim. The claim is not that there has been a cooling trend, the claim is that global warming has reached its current peak in the late 1990s, and it has.
  2. WP:RSE#PSMM does not mandate that you exclude news organizations, only that you present the scientific consensus on the issue. In my edits, both are presented.
  3. WP:UNDUE does, however, mandate, that all significant viewpoints be represented in the article. The idea that global warming has stopped in 1998 is a significant viewpoint. Therefore, it needs to be represented in the article.
Any other objections? Macai (talk) 19:14, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
In case you've missed it, despite the headlines none of your two articles state that global warming has peaked. At any given time there will be a "current peak", and such a peak is rather uninteresting for climate (which is long term averages). It does mandate that when we have scientific sources (which we have), then news reporting isn't as reliable. And finally your argumentation is not a "significant viewpoint" (that stands as your own personal assertion), that global warming should have "stopped" is simply scientific non-sense, since global warming isn't that detailed (try reading what Latif has written on this - he is saying the exact same thing as me), and is an argument from ignorance (thinking that global warming must give a monotone increase). Try to actually read and attempt to understand FAQ Q3. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:25, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
  1. The fact that at any given time, there will be a "current peak" does not invalidate the fact that the current peak is 1998.
  2. Since the current peak happened over a decade ago, that represents about 20% of the total time global warming is supposed to have taken place so far. You want to omit 20% of global warming's history and call it "uninteresting"? That's you, not me.
  3. Find me a scientific source that says the current peak of global warming is something other than the late 1990s, and then you'll have a point. As it stands right now, there is a claim made by mainstream news organizations (which are welcome), and no peer reviewed scientific source to trump it or claim that it's simply not true.
  4. If mainstream sources and a huge portion of the population do not constitute a "significant viewpoint", what does?
  5. I don't recall claiming that global warming stopped. Please don't put words in my mouth, Kim.
  6. FAQ Q3 talks about cooling trends and the year 1998. It does not talk about global warming's current peak and 1998. The two are not the same topic. Sorry.
Any other objections? Macai (talk) 19:33, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Yes, several. But i'm of the impression that you are not willing to listen. "Current peak" is uninteresting. None of your sources say global warming has peaked. And climate is average over decades (trends) not from "last peak", no popular opinion is not a "significant viewpoint" on science. The peak/cool argument is the same. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 20:30, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Low on time, but yes. Temperature peaks. Global warming is only one term that influences temperature, and there is no indication that this has peaked yet. Awickert (talk) 19:36, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Hence the use of the term "current peak". While Robert Wadlow is the tallest man now, someone might grow taller than him in the future. Likewise, while global warming's current peak is 1998, that peak might be topped in the future. Any other objections? :) Macai (talk) 19:40, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
I may have written too quickly, because your response is not to what I was trying to say (though I agree with what you say). My point is to differentiate global warming, which is a trend, from temperature, which is what is measured. Awickert (talk) 19:49, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
There is a serious objection on weight. We have an opening summary supported by " basic conclusions..endorsed by more than 40 scientific societies and academies of science,[B] including all of the national academies of science of the major industrialized countries" and you are seeking to vary the text based on much less substantial sources (single papers and reporting of single papers). For me interference with the opening on those grounds is so far out of line as to be clearly disruptive. Changing wording further down the article looks a bad call but not so obviously bad as to count as disruption.--BozMo talk 19:50, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
But my text doesn't actually contradict those sources. All I put there was the current peak of global warming. Macai (talk) 19:53, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
It may have passed you by - but none of your references state that "global warming has peaked". --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 20:19, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
The BBC article says:
This headline may come as a bit of a surprise, so too might that fact that the warmest year recorded globally was not in 2008 or 2007, but in 1998.
The other says that temperature has not climbed since the late 1990s. So, yes, they do substantiate the claim that it peaked. Sorry. Macai (talk) 23:15, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

As an aside, why is everyone so hung up on 1998? CRU lists 1998 as the hottest year, but both NOAA and NASA GISS consider 2005 to have been slightly hotter than 1998. In all three cases, the reported uncertainty is larger than the difference between the years, so any ordering is only a best guess to begin with anyway. Dragons flight (talk) 19:45, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

As an aside to an aside, given the recent hullabaloo regarding CRU, you'd think there would be interest in using a different temperature metric since the CRU one is clearly biased. Perhaps the JMA one. Their highest temp anom was 1998 too. They're probably in on the conspiracy with CRU to end global in 1998. -Atmoz (talk) 19:58, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
This is why we need scientists and mathematicians: to analyse complex, error-prone, noisy, disparate datasets, to sort out statistical significance from random artefacts and anomalies, to quantify and allow for superimposed cyclical trends (space weather, ocean circulations etc). If journalists could do all this in their heads, they would be Nobel Prize winners, not journalists. If we want to distinguish what is known from guesswork, we must focus on peer reviewed science and meta-analyses. --Nigelj (talk) 21:55, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Because they're smarter than you. They've got a science degree! Macai (talk) 22:23, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Is that a pro-creationist rap? Well, there's a first for me. Yeah, I try not to lump global-warming deniers in with creationists, but sometimes it's hard. --Nigelj (talk) 22:33, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Nah, I'm not a creationist, nor do I deny evolution. I just think the premise that people with degrees in scientific fields are somehow magically the only people able to rationally interpret data, even complex data, is absurd. Macai (talk) 23:07, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Climategate, etc.

  • Ho hum and la de da, as per usual on Wikipedia we have a cohort of editors protecting this page from factual observations that disturb the article's premise, and removing easily sourced material by claiming that it is "unsourced". Nope, I'm not gonna stick it back in. Nope, I'm not gonna argue. I'm gonna wait. After years of covering up the truth (please, don't tell me they didn't cover it up.. "cover" means "hide"... and they hid...) the CRU has flatly admitted deleting the data that its reputation is built upon. ASSUMING that the scientific community has any integrity (which does indeed require a bit of hopeful thinking and a minor leap of faith), the "consensus" meme will need to be discarded... in a couple months... and this article can be edited to better reflect reality. Meanwhile: you can have your little edit wars for now. Later! Ling.Nut (talk) 06:06, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Cute. I'm in a cohort now? I wasn't aware. I believe that this is my first edit to this article or anything related to it? I also don't really have an opinion on global warming...
Anyway, on to the content. Perhaps it should be shortened—to not give the information undue weight—and sourced... Near as I can tell, the entire rest of the scientific community supports still this. One organization's failings and lies != all of the research conducted about global warming is not true. (of course, it doesn't mean that it is true, either) —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 06:16, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
'Near as I can tell.....' is less-than-convincing advocacy and you are most certainly wrong about the 'entire rest of the scientific community'. The AGW 'consensus' was always just a rhetorical tool and now it's reserved for use by those who don't wish to appear credible.Dikstr (talk) 20:09, 4 December 2009 (UTC)
This article needs a section about the climategate, fast!!!! More than 2000 google news sources and counting, forbes, new york times, telegraph. Our wikipedia cohorts will now ban all publications and declare that IPCC is the only reliable source in the planet? That is a really big joke... [3] —Preceding unsigned comment added by Echofloripa (talk • contribs) 10:21, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
More exclamation points are always a sign of carefully considered posts. WP:NOTNEWS, and this article has, for a long time, concentrated on the scientific side. The science is as solid today as it was two weeks ago, and more solid that it was a year or 5 years or 10 years ago - when, btw, the basics of climate change caused by antropogenic greenhous gases already was well understood. The correct place for public hubbub is global warming controversy, or, in this case more specifically Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 10:36, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Almost 100 years ago there were other technical ideologues who didn't believe an iceberg could sink their Titanic. AGW, as the dominant climate change forcing, has encountered its iceberg and is sinking fast.Dikstr (talk) 20:40, 4 December 2009 (UTC)
Stephan, in case you missed the point, the point is that the science is mysticism (or something devised by P.T. Barnum) rather than science. The research results were cooked; the data was tossed. No science here folks. Move along. Nothing to see. Ling.Nut (talk) 13:24, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Now if we could only get all of the AGW scientists to read that article and see themselves, maybe they would come out and admit what the rest of the world is now seeing. The science today....is complete BS, based on presumption of a theory with statistics manipulated to fit that theory and collusion of scientists to keep all opponents to that theory out of the scientific literature. The limited evidence that CO2 has contributed to global warming has been shown to be a complete and utter lie. Arzel (talk) 14:15, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
I see. So what about the thousands of scientists who have independently come to the same conclusion, both from first principles and from observations, many of them even before email was invented? I assume they are all communist agitators bent for UN world domination to usher in the reign of The Beast? Even the ones who found the basic principles before the UN was founded (and before the League of Nations was founded, too...)? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:24, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Give it up Stephan! First of all, thousands more scientists oppose the AGW theory. Furthermore, science isn't about taking a poll and seeing how many people agree with you. It's about a logical premise that isn't full of contradictions. JettaMann (talk) 16:09, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Give it up Jettaman! Hey, I've got this website with the emails hacked from the most prominent AGW denier website that Proves that AGW deniers are all creationists. Let me post it here, because I picked it up from a website.
What should we suggest you guys read? You could try reading some of the rest of this Talk page, as it's all been discussed to death above and you have no new revelations. You could try reading the article - lots of good information in there. Just, please, try to get up-to-speed on the subject itself and at least some of the facts involved. --Nigelj (talk) 16:32, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Apparently the basis of the AGW science is now in question because scientific methods were trampled by those controlling the empirical temperature data. The data, upon which the IPCC decisions were made, were deleted and manipulated to produce a particular result consistent with the purpose of those funding the research. The "peer review" process was undermined and dissent was eliminated. Access to data and research methods was denied. Phil Jones, director of the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit has resigned and Penn State's Michael Mann is being investigated. Failure of Wikipedia to properly recognize these earth-shaking events only damages the credibility of Wikipedia. Freedom Fan (talk) 19:14, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Considering that the graphs on this page are known to be fraudulent

Why is this page still locked down? This page is absolutely full of what is now proven to be lies and graphs from known-to-be tampered-with data, spread by Mann, Jones, and the rest of the cabal associate with East Anglia University and the Hadley/CRU "Hockey Team" (a monicker they took on themselves for their own PROVEN FRAUDULENT "hockey stick" graph.

Until this page is open up, and MASSIVE corrections made, Wikipedia has zero credibility as being anything other than a shill for left-wing politics through deceitful propaganda campaigns. Akulkis (talk) 02:01, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

This article MUST address the IPCC's reliance on the CRU of the University of East Anglia or incorporate more sources

The UN IPCC, which relied heavily on data from the CRU, is used to cite numerous conclusions, temperatures and predictions. Climategate: Whether the data was lost or destroyed, the CRU no longer has their data and the credibility of the reports used by the IPCC from the CRU has recently waned. The computer program comments released describe explicitly the alteration and falsification of data used in CRU reports. This has implications. The IPCC is an authority because the sources of its reports are authorities on climate. Wikipedia should diversify its sources or cite where the raw data from the IPCC reports came from.Techn0scho0lbus (talk) 01:38, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

I agree. This article must address ClimateGate if it is to have credibility with readers. The very foundation of the climate science is now in question because of alleged malfeasance by major contributors to IPCC. For example, in one case empirical tree ring records, a proxy for paleo-climatic temperature, had more recent portions deleted and replaced with modern temperature recordings, to better match the warming narrative. Freedom of information requests to verify the data and the methods were routinely ignored. Dissenting views were frozen out of the "peer review" clique. Just burying the scandal in another article, with no summary in the main article, is insufficient and misleading. Freedom Fan (talk) 02:13, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
If anybody editing this talk page has reliable sources for the alleged "facts" that are being bandied about here, we need those sources at Talk:Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident. If you don't have reliable sources for the notion that the edifice of global warming science is crumbling, then it's probably best to stop arguing that it is. Our opinions of the issues count for little on this encyclopedia. The known facts are all that matters. --TS 04:17, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
http://www.anenglishmanscastle.com/HARRY_READ_ME.txt This is code comments from the CRU explicitly describing the falsification of data and rigged conclusions. It would be silly to keep denying evidence. Also, my 'alleged facts' are that the CRU has lost credibility and the IPCC relies on CRU data. Techn0scho0lbus (talk) 13:03, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Just a suggestion: mention Climategate in the skepticism section

Wikipedia is supposed to represent all views fairly and without bias. At least that's what WP:NPOV says. Now, we are talking about the skepticism section, here. Prominent global warming skeptics have said some very strong things about climategate, and global warming deniers in general really do seem to be taking this incident very seriously. For this reason, I think it merits mention. The skeptics' perspective does not need to be stated as fact. It can be stated in the third person, in a neutral manner. An example:

A compilation of e-mails written by climate scientists were stolen and published<citation(s) here>, in what is now referred to as "Climategate".<citation(s) here> Many prominent global warming skeptics have claimed that these e-mails demonstrate bias in the scientific community. <citations here>

Both sentences are true. Neither sentence is controversial. I can cite reliable sources for both claims. I think it's fair to allow the use of mainstream news sources, since we're discussing released documents and the opinions of prominent pundits, not the nature of physical reality in a scientific context. The text doesn't take up a lot of space, and does not dominate the global warming article, granting due weight to the event but nothing more. Macai (talk) 04:03, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Well, this article is about the science. The above item is current affairs, if it's anything. We do mention the hacking incident and the reaction of some skeptics in several articles: including an entire article about the incident itself. Coming here and wanting to read about the reactions of skeptics to the hacking incident is a bit like going to dinosaur and expecting to read about creationist reactions to the Paluxy Formation. --TS 04:28, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
This article is about the IPCC science, not the overall science. This article states explicitly that man is the cause of global warming due to the release of greenhouse gases, and more specifically CO2. The release of the emails and data puts some question to the validity of that science. As such it is perfectly reasonable to mention that the science backing up most of the claims of this article are now greatly debated because of the methods used by those same scientists of; apparent collusion against disenting opinion, the refusal to release the models and data used to make these claims, and the apparent attempts to manipulate the data to back up the claims. Arzel (talk) 04:51, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
"IPCC science, not the overall science" sounds like special pleading to me. The IPCC doesn't perform research of its own, it only summarises the consensus view of thousands of individual measurements and studies. And no, it doesn't rely unduly on the CRU data, and no the integrity of the CRU data is not in question. --TS 04:55, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
Well... yes, the the integrity of the CRU data is in question. This article should include that reality. Mytwocents (talk) 06:20, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
If only we had a reliable source for every "reality" or "fact" that was so apparent to our editors, our work of constructing an encyclopedia would be so much easier, wouldn't it? --TS 06:27, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
Tony, can you tell me what should be in the skepticism section of the article, if not commonly cited reasons for being skeptical? You're trying to omit a very relevant aspect of global warming. Wikipedia is supposed to collect the sum of all knowledge, and here you are making a concerted effort to exclude some rather notable knowledge on the topic. Let's also not forget that the credibility of the IPCC has been rather diminished since it uses data from a source that has conspired to exclude evidence contrary to their predictions. You may as well state the claims Exxon Mobile scientists make in the opening paragraph as objective truths. Macai (talk) 16:43, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
The credibility of the IPCC has not been diminished one jot. Some gas-guzzling Americans and cigar-chomping big-businesses would like you to think that the whole of science was hanging by a thread anyway, so that soon we can get back to enjoying our right of dominion until the end of days, that's all. And they are sadly wrong. --Nigelj (talk) 19:23, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
So an institution that has recently been found to base its conclusions on a source that admits to using statistical "tricks" to misrepresent data, coercing scientific journals to not publish papers contending with their perspective, and conspiring to compel said institution to include their views while excluding others hasn't had any of its credibility diminished one jot? Are you for real? Macai (talk) 20:49, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
You know, reading is more than spelling out the letters. Your Guarding source, e.g., does not mention "tricks", nor the "misrepresentation of data". Have a look at confirmation bias if you can spare the time. I notice that the only scientific organization that has issued a comment, the AMS, has strongly confirmed its previous support for the mainstream (IPCC) position. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:59, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
The guardian source said this about "tricks":
He confirmed that all of the leaked emails that had provoked heated debate – including the now infamous email from 1999 in which he discussed a "trick" to "hide the decline" in global temperatures - appeared to be genuine.
What were you saying? Macai (talk) 21:15, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
Ummm. You know that there is a difference between singular and plural? I'm not a native speaker, but I have been given to understand that the letter "s" at the end of a word is somewhat significant. And if you read the email instead of the sentence, you will see that they do not talk about the "misrepresentation of data", but offer no value judgement - instead, they link to CRU [18], where you can see that they were talking about the well-published divergence between tree rings and temperature starting in the 60s. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:49, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
It's a common colloquialism in English to refer to things in the plural form in some cases even though there is only one. An example would be if someone bought a pizza, and you were to give them a hard time about it, you could speak of "all these pizzas you bought", even though they only bought one. My apologies. I really should keep my language formal since not all users are native English speakers.
I did, however, read the link. It's silly to say that this is a "refutation" of the claim. Imagine if Bill O'Reilly said on his show that "Hitler is proof that atheism is bad" (which he's done, albeit in different words), and then he later decided to try to backpedal out of his comment and "explain" that he didn't really mean to imply that Hitler was an atheist (which he has also done, again, in different words). I have the e-mails on my hard disk. I can tell you right now that the context of the e-mail in question suggests they're trying to hide the temperature decline, and if it's desired, I can post the e-mail in its full form to prove it. Macai (talk) 23:23, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
It seems you may be misreading the information - perhaps because people are tending to take an out-of-context statement ("hide the decline") from an out-of-context email. The email doesn't state which decline they're trying to hide. Given that, using real data to hide a real decline would be rather stupid, as it would do no such thing. Thus I'm more than inclined to accept the official statement, that the decline they were trying to "hide" was that of apparent temperature in the proxy data, which didn't match the known real temperatures. Thus they put the real temperatures into the mix. Using proxy data to hide a decline in real temperatures would potentially be a scandal - but using real data to hide the decline in proxy data may raise questions about the validity of the proxy data, but otherwise is unlikely to be a significant concern, except, of course, politically, but that's outside of the scope of this article. - Bilby (talk) 10:27, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

I've seen a few references to the file "HARRY_READ_ME.txt" and have even tried reading it. If it's supposed to be a discussion-killer, I just don't see it. It seems to be a set of notes typical of a project working with heterogeneous source data and trying to produce reliable, dependable data sets for analysis. This is how we do it, folks. If you crossed a bridge on the way to work this morning, or drove or rode on some kind of mechanical transport, you depended on somebody sitting in a back office somewhere hunting through noisy data and using his judgement to sort out the signal. --TS 23:31, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

I think that the whole climate gate thing is utterly rediculous personally. Nevertheless, upon reflection, this article is NOT "The science of global warming" but "Global Warming" which means that it must take major non scientific policy shifts into account. The UN itself is getting involved. MOST of the comments about this are all right wing smoke and mirrors, but it has reached a sufficient creschendo that it is now indeed irrevokably a part of the narrative. The sources are notable. The issue is notable. It should not be forked off to a sub article because it is central to the discussion of the item itself. However, it should, at the same time, have no more than a single sentance and should be countered with another sentance putting it in context such that there are no official NON HACKED findings, no peer reviewed journals that indicate anything and a lot of calls for investigations. Manticore55 (talk) 18:09, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

That sounds rather shrill. Let's wait for a while and see what becomes of it. I won't be holding my breath, but I don't think anybody can credibly claim that the science of global warming is affected by some guys hacking some documents from the University of East Anglia. --TS 02:11, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

Featured Article Review

Perhaps it's time we put the Global Warming page under Featured Article Review WP:FAR again. This would be in direct response to lack of any mention of Climategate in the article. This would be the first step towards delisting the page as an WP:FA Of course, all of us want to keep the page as an FA; But because of the locked status, lack of NPOV, forking of Climategate and other topics to other pages (some locked) and admins courting wheelwars, I think it's time to place the FA status under a new light. The over arching goal of all editors should be to have a complete article. One that is NPOV has sections that point to sub articles written in a summary style and avoids forking of controversial thoughts to other pages.

Here is what I think is the pertinanat guidline that we should use to improve this article;

Articles whose subject is a POV Different articles can be legitimately created on subjects which themselves represent points of view, as long as the title clearly indicates what its subject is, the point-of-view subject is presented neutrally, and each article cross-references articles on other appropriate points of view. Thus Evolution and Creationism, Capitalism and Communism, Biblical literalism and Biblical criticism, etc., all represent legitimate article subjects. As noted above, "Criticism of" type articles should generally start as sections of the main article and be spun off by agreement among the editors. -- Mytwocents (talk) 18:32, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Actually I think the current article is way too long winded to be a Featured Article, mainly because of too many compromises with people really wanting to get their own little view or paper into it. But I have not seen anything positive come out of previous FARs. And I do not think an FAR would improve the chances of those who which to get their own POV inserted at above its natural weight. An FAR would waste lots of time again. Should we just delist it until we can get it more coherent? --BozMo talk 18:44, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
I thought that previous consensus was that this article was primarily about the science of global warming rather than the public hype. Of course, there is certainly room for improvement and I'd be happy to help. But before any WP:FAR gets going, we should decide what this article is about. Awickert (talk) 18:52, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
We're currently in a rather heated period of debate. This doesn't seem like the best of times for a nice quiet discussion. We should wait till the fun has died down - re-propose this in a month, if you still care William M. Connolley (talk) 19:29, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
I agree with Mytwocents that this article should be placed under featured article review. Currently the article fails to mention the massive amount of new information which challenges the credibility of the science and the peer review process itself, which is essential to establishing the "consensus position" comprising the main thrust of the article. A summary of this important issue would complete the article. Freedom Fan (talk) 20:17, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Put that way the request starts looking like a bad faith attempt to get inappropriate content into the page having lost all the rational argument. --BozMo talk 20:27, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Certain articles also stop the vast hoard of Ron Paul fans who want to edit war from slopping whatever information they want into whatever article that they can find. There might be room for criticism in this article, but the fact is, the protection is quite wise. I see mainstream OPINION peices showing problems on this, and I see the Right Wing noise machine making a big deal about 'Congress to investigate' ie the single crackpot Republican Senator from a coal state with no subpoena power, but not so much about the actual SCIENCE involved.
AGW deniers, due to the shenanigans previously pulled and the fact that their main rhetorical weapon at this point consists of HACKED EMAILS have the credibility of Phillip Morris or Scientoligists as far as I'm concerned.
In fact, some of them might BE scientologists who have a stake in decrediting science. Manticore55 (talk) 21:21, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Please don't puke on the talk page, Manticore.
While I don't think it would serve as appropriate grounds for FA revocation, I agree with EastTN: the CRU email controversy would seem to merit attention in the section on debate and skepticism. I don't see this going away any time soon. »S0CO(talk|contribs) 00:09, 3 December 2009 (UTC)
Let's not start assuming bad faith here. The article does already include a Debate and skepticism section, so content dealing with the Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident is not inherently out of scope. We can argue about whether that incident is notable or is having a demonstrated effect on the debate (though I think it's becoming pretty clear that both are true), but the public debate is not outside the current scope of the article. EastTN (talk) 22:03, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose submission to FAR at this time. No no no folks. Please do not send this article to FAR for at least two months or so. Let the dust settle, or it will be pointless. • Ling.Nut 02:16, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Two editors with rather sparse editing histories suddenly appear on the talk page of an article about science and suggest a featured article review because a hacking incident isn't mentioned. Don't hold your breath, Lingnut. --TS 04:36, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

I think the readiness by which multiple editors suppress comments on this article does call for a third party review by people that have not edited it before. While the violations are technically within Wikipedia policy, the speed with which they take place, rather than seeking clarification indicates an assumption of bad faith on the part of the majority of editors in my opinion, which is, in itself, a violation of Wikipedia policy. Manticore55 (talk) 18:06, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

If you were correct then in any case you should start a RFC not an FAR. It seems unlikely though that the speed at which additions are deleted is to do with anything other than the number of people who watch the article and the rather transparently dubious nature of the additions. --BozMo talk 21:10, 4 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Support Featured article are about placing pictures and citation correctly within the article, and have nothing to do with the articles correctness. This article fails on two levels. First: it is factually correct. Second: The article doesn't have enough pictures and the not every sentence is referenced. Clearly would not pass at WP:FAC as presently written. -Atmoz (talk) 21:24, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Request

{{editprotected}} The template {{Sprotect2}} is a redirect {{Pp-semi-indef}}, and since this article is at present fully protected, please replace it by <!-- {{Pp-semi-indef|small=yes}} To be restored after reinstalling indefinite semi-protection. -->. Debresser (talk) 13:17, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

 Done —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 15:29, 4 December 2009 (UTC)
Thank you. Debresser (talk) 16:15, 5 December 2009 (UTC)
  1. ^ http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/326/5953/716
  2. ^ http://www.sciencewa.net.au/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=693&Itemid=587
  3. ^ http://news.google.com/news/search?aq=f&cf=all&ned=uk&hl=en&q=climategate
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Climate_change/Archive_54&oldid=1136616466"