Talk:Instrumental temperature record/Archive 2

Gavin/Roger Quotes

I certainly don't think Gavin's quote belongs, but am interested in discussing whether to keep Pielke's. I do not believe both are of equal merit for inclusion. This is, in part (referenced in my revert comment), because Gavin is critical of something that hasn't yet taken place, nor has it been claimed to have taken place (namely the quantification of microclimate effects on temperature records). Pielke's quote, on the other hand, merely points out the importance that this documentation has to climate science--a much more relevant statement (the documentation allows the aforementioned analysis to take place). The question is, therefore, whether Pielke's quote is important enough to keep. I say it is. Zoomwsu 05:50, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

I lean twoards thinking that both the Gavin and Pielke quotes should be included. While Pielke is given a lot of weight already, I don't think the inclusion of a perfectly relevent statement by him on Watt's project makes much differance. Revolutionaryluddite 06:00, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Both out. There is too much Pielke in here already William M. Connolley 08:49, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

+1 oC?

I disagree with [1]. The on-line presentation is not a RS (its not PR; you can say anything at a meeting). Nor is it accurate: the source says "estimate". Its also rather unclear how the "estimate" is made William M. Connolley 15:12, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

It is too a RS--the presentation was given at a university-sponsored workshop and was given ample time for comment and feedback. It may be "unclear" how the estimate was made, but a scientific study and presentation estimated that the majority of stations have >1 degree of error, so inclusion of this info is warranted on this page. Zoomwsu 15:33, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Meetings are just for fun. There is really no way that you can be critical at meetings. There is not enough time to let the stuff sink in. Q&As at meetings are mostly to satisfy curiosity. Finally, the audience is not representative of the relevant community at large because the sample is too small and it sufferes from selection bias (those there decided to attend the meeting.) So we cannot use this as a substitute for a PR process. Meetings are for fun! Brusegadi 15:38, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Wishful thinking does not a RS make. It's a non-peer-reviewed presentation. People can and do say all sorts of nonsense at meetings, even ones sponsored by professional organizations. Meetings are good for floating ideas and seeing what the reaction is from colleagues, but the simple fact that someone presented something at a meeting does not imply that it's gone through any critical vetting. Raymond Arritt 15:43, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

If you guys are going to keep it out, please at least make it a complete sentence. I still disagree that it shouldn't be included and I find it very frustrating to have to fight these silly little battles time and time again. BTW, it's not about criticism at the meeting. Watts allowed a few weeks for comment and feedback before posting his presentation. IF there were a problem with the conclusions, those concerns should have already have been voiced. Zoomwsu 15:45, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Its not so simple. Finding mistakes can be very difficult; it requires effort. There is no guarantee that such effort was placed on the review of this material. It is also funny that much of the literature here is based on the work of many, work that has passed peer review and has been subject to years of questioning; but then you intend to make that as credible as one non peer revd presentation given by one man. What happened to the skepticism? Brusegadi 16:09, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

It has become apparent to me that my philosophy on what should be included differs from some here. My bar is lower. Watts is notable in his field and has done more research on this subject than anyone else. He has put himself in the public eye and staked his reputation on his work. He has presented results at a scientific workshop and on a public website. To me, this seems sufficient to be included in Wikipedia, whereas others think only peer-reviewed, published research papers should be included. I think that bar is set too high, at the expense of including good, quality information that will enlighten the reader. Simply put, I strive for inclusiveness, and unless something is obviously false or biased, is worthy of inclusion. Zoomwsu 16:33, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

"Watts is notable in his field and has done more research on this subject than anyone else." Tell me you're not serious. Please. How thoroughly have you surveyed the literature in this field? Did you somehow overlook people like Tom Karl and Tom Peterson? As far as I can tell Watts has never published a peer-reviewed paper on anything. Raymond Arritt 17:05, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Allow me to clarify: Watts has done more research and documentation on the quality of USHCN surface stations more anyone else in the field. If this is not the case, please include the information from that other research here! Zoomwsu 17:32, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

See the two aforementioned authors. I feel unsporting; given that Watts has published precisely zero papers on the topic, it's like shooting fish in a barrel. Raymond Arritt 17:40, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Ah, but thats precisely *why* he can be trusted! A real publication record makes you part of the Kabal :-). More seriously, its clear Z has no idea what makes for a RS. This could be remedied by reading RS. But in the meantime, Z's assertion that putting something onto a website makes it an RS is wrong William M. Connolley 17:55, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

It should go without saying that peer-reviewed, published research is more reliable than a presentation or non-reviewed (but publicly accessible) scientific paper. That said, I don't think Wikipedia needs to ignore quality work that may not, in your opinion, rise to the level of inclusion on Wikipedia. Wikipedia was designed, in part, to avoid the type of intellectual elitism you and your cohorts promote. Wikipedia is egalitarian in nature and the information that is included should reflect that. I'd also appreciate it if you'd give me a little more respect, as you mischaracterize my positions and opinions (e.g. this "Kabal" business) in a way that insults my intelligence. Zoomwsu 18:14, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Please do consider William's suggestion to read up on Wikipedia's guidelines for reliable sources and the related policy page on verifiability, paying particular attention to the discussion of self-published sources. Raymond Arritt 18:44, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Arritt, Dr.Connolley, and Brusegadi-- although his "Meetings are for fun!" comment disturbs me-- that the powerpoint link isn't reliable. The presentation was performed in front of a select audience without the ability to face independent criticism. Revolutionaryluddite 01:46, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikiproject Earth

Hello i have recently proposed the Wikiproject Earth. This Wikiproject`s scope includes this article. This wikiproject will overview the continents, oceans, atsmophere and global warming Please Voice your opinion by clicking anywhere on this comment except for my name. --Iwilleditu^{Talk :)Contributions} —Preceding comment was added at 15:39, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Preliminary results 2

The surface stations group stuff keeps piling in and the trend of many bad stations persists. Class 4+5 categories are now 69% of the 534 stations currently recorded. That's 43.73% of the entire set of stations. The question remains when the blinders will come off and those for whom these results are inconvenient to their own theories will admit that the data should be included in the article.

Here's a proposed edit: "A private open source effort called surfacestations.org is ongoing to rate the entire USHCN network according to NOAA's guidelines with follow on targets to rate the entire world. At present time, x% of the US network is complete and y% of the surveyed sample is rated as having an error rating higher than 20th century global warming observed by those instruments. Editorial oversight is maintained by the project rule providing that any individual site survey may be challenged and fixed." TMLutas (talk) 13:36, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Encourage them to write something up for peer reviewed publication. Seriously. Dragons flight (talk) 14:53, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

You're missing the point. I think that the biggest ever physical review project of the instrument temperature record is, in itself, something that qualifies for mention in a wikipedia article on the instrument temperature record. I think that papers are likely (if they already haven't started) to come out of this but the project itself is noteworthy and I find the false requirement (see two sections up) of peer review that some keep bringing up to be... less than helpful for the goal of a complete, accurate, NPOV article on this subject. I *have* encouraged the project people to make sure that they have independent editorial review in my brief correspondence with them but was assured that I was already late to *that* party.

Peer review is a comfortable crutch, a nice, very functional example of independent editorial review that usually works quite well (though everybody can think of at least some instances where it's been worthless). It is not the sum total of independent editorial review nor is it adequate for dealing with something like this where you're only likely to get papers about the analysis some scientist did of the data coming out of the project, not the project itself. We can do better and the rules specifically allow us to. It would be foolish to put in artificial constraints above and beyond the rules without changing the actual rules (which nobody seems interested in doing). TMLutas (talk) 12:20, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

Correct. Peer review is not required. As was pointed out to me by User:William_M._Connolley on the talk page of Urban_heat_islands. In fact he made that very point to defend the use of a simple newspaper article in supporting the view that he holds which is -- UHI do not bias the temperature records. Therefore -- regarding Watts site -- I see no reason why the same logic cannot apply. Whether or not Watt's work is peer reviewed in a formal journal is not really the point. As an online encyclopedia, WP:NPOV is required but that does not mean peer review is required. SunSw0rd (talk) 15:31, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

I find that funny. If you look above, you may detect WMC taking the opposite point. Or am I reading his prior remarks on this page too closely? I haven't checked the UHI page and will take you at your word on your characterization. TMLutas (talk) 05:01, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

The simple fact is -- it is not valid to disqualify a point that is backed up by a secondary source, if the only objection to that secondary source is that it is not a peer-reviewed publication. My point is -- peer-review is "nice to have" but is not a requirement. Some examples of secondary sources discussing surfacestations.org may be found here:

Surface Stations and here:

Anthony Watts Has An Excellent Summary Of His Research So Far and here:

December 2007 Session ‘The “Divergence Problem’ In Northern Forests and a more critical link here:

The Surface Stations Project: Science Auditers or Enviro Vigilantes? and a semi-critical link here:

Pouring Salt On Climate Critics "Contaminated" Wounds and a news article here:

Meteorologist Documents Warming Bias in U.S. Temperature Stations

Hope these links are of use. SunSw0rd (talk) 17:42, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Very interesting - but not a single of these are a reliable source, most are self published sources/blogs and one is a political advocacy site. The only one that could be argued as such (reliable source) is climatesci - but that puts too much weight on Pielke Sr.. The opinion of the blogosphere/political think-tanks is (while interesting) not usable in science. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 18:15, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

To expand, Pielke Sr's opinion is already noted in the article, in what is (at the very least) close to undue weight. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 18:17, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Well one must be careful when indicating whether they are, or are not, reliable sources. For example, in this case, we are talking about references to a website run by an organization. Therefore, the typical references in this era are of course mainly going to be blog entries. But as long as the blog owners are not writing about themselves, and are writing in their field of expertise, like climatesci, are reasonable. As for heartland, the story was under the area of environmental and climate news. You may argue that they are a "think tank" or "political advocacy site" and their "opinion" is "not usable in science". Says who? In fact, you and I had a discussion on this very point on the UHI talk page -- and there and then YOU took the diametrically opposite position. The point was whether David B. Sandalow was a reliable source. I asserted that (a) he was quoting an anonymous source and (b) he is not a scientist but a lawyer and (c) that he posted at a political advocacy site. And you responded to me and I quote: "That would only be relevant if you have any reason to assume that the Sandalov reference is unreliable. The threshold for inclusion in wikipedia is attribution to reliable sources - not truth."

So. IF David B. Sandalow writing for an advocacy organization is acceptable, to you, for a citation in UHI, I don't see how you can stand by your current statement regarding heartland. If one is good, so is the other. Otherwise exclude them both. But otherwise it appears you accept the one if it backs a position you support, then reject the other when it argues against a position you support -- but both sources can be criticized equally and should either both be excluded or both accepted. SunSw0rd (talk) 17:44, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Try to separate different articles and discussions - the context is rather different. Focus on thís article, this discussion and the policies.

I didn't say that climatesci in all cases is unreliable (it is here for what you want to use it for - but thats another issue) - but because it would give undue weight to Pielke Sr.'s view, which are already overrepresented on this page. I also suggest that you read through and understand WP:SPS. Weight and SPS are the two major problems you have here. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 18:31, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the problem is very much double standards, at least in some editor's views. Rules are either convenient excuses to bash something you don't like or objective standards that we're all to follow. I rather like the latter vision myself. TMLutas (talk) 18:26, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

I reread your request that WP:SPS be consulted. Since Watts is mostly publishing the surveys that other people are gathering, isn't this quite a bit different than somebody cooking up a theory and putting up a website on his own supporting it? Furthermore, wouldn't a professional weatherman be exactly the kind of person who would be considered an expert in the instrumental temperature record and therefore overcoming the normal burden of WP:SPS? Aren't these stations bread and butter for weathermen? TMLutas (talk) 19:18, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

No it wouldn't make it better - since you are both referencing self published surveys and original research based upon it. And no, a "weatherman" is not an expert on the instrumental temperature record. There is no need for any form of education to become a weatherman. And afaik Anthony Watts has no formal (or informal) education to make him an expert. If the research is worth-while, then it will end up in the peer-reviewed press, and then we can mention it. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 20:33, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Question for Kim. Is it not the case that realclimate.org is in fact a self published source? And is it not the fact that the wiki page for that site has a large number of self references?? SunSw0rd (talk) 19:56, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Yep, RC is a WP:SPS - and it falls under the exceptions given in SPS. (Previously published experts talking about the subject that they are experts in) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 00:10, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

You would think then that a weatherman with decades of experience and who runs his own weather equipment company would similarly fall under the same exception on a site that devoted to rating weather equipment. Do you agree then that surfacestations.org is just as meritorious as realclimate.org? TMLutas (talk) 22:35, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

You'd think you'd know the difference between weather and climate by now. Or between someone who makes the kit and the people who use it. Or... William M. Connolley (talk) 22:45, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Please do not knee jerk your response. The types of errors on discussion (site placement bias, instrument bias, materials bias) affect both weather and climate equally. If latex paint ups temps on the stevenson screens, the bias does not only magically hit the weather community and not the climate community. 207.145.26.125 (talk) 17:10, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

And you should try not to knee-jerk your conclusions ;) No homogeneous bias has been shown in the temperature record yet. And a bias at regional locations may affect weather conclusions - but not necessarily climate conclusions. They are different beasts. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 17:34, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Whether or not the bias you describe has been demonstrated or not is irrelevant to whether a weatherman is qualified as the sort of expert that earns the exception in WP:SPS. These stations are dual use by both climatologists and weathermen. Both communities should be given the same sort of deference or neither of them should. If anything, surfacestations.org should earn wider latitude because its ambitions are much more objective. The reports are stored individually and anybody who would like to can challenge them/change them. Realclimate.org's narrative and debate format is inherently less subject to editorial oversight. That's not a criticism but rather an observation that they're not engaged in data gathering but debate and that's much more of a judgment call. So why does realclimate.org seem to get more latitude when it should be getting less? TMLutas (talk) 06:12, 26 May 2008 (UTC) (apologies, forgot to log in so I'm re-signing)

Just as many other large websites that are centered on a specific issues aren't mentioned on the respective issues. This one isn't either. If and when they publish something - or are significantly mentioned in the scientific media - then it should go in.

We as editors have no idea whether what they are doing is non-sense or a valuable contribution. And its not our job to decide it. That is reserved for secondary sources. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:40, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

If you can provide a reasonable definition for significantly mentioned and scientific media (or references, that's fine too) around which to form a consensus, I think I can live with that. TMLutas (talk) 04:58, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

request: definition of global average temperature and how it is calculated

Hi there. The global warming article talks about average temperature of the Earth's near-surface air and links to this article here. However, I do not find any information here about how this average temperature is defined and calculated from the individual measured values. Also, the physical meaning of an average of temperature values is not inherently obvious. Check out this paper here [2] for more information. (Note that the article I'm referencing to links "global temperature" to the article on Climate, where I cannot find any useful information about the basics behind a global average temperature either). Am I right with suggesting that more information about that should be added into this article here, or rather into the articles about global warming, or climate? A substantial part of the global warming discussion relies on the concept of a global average temperature, but I've found no justification for that concept so far. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 14:25, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

A global average temperature exists, and is defined as... the global average temperature. But what you want is how the values are caculated. Wiki doesn't seem to have this info. I have no refs to had (except [3]). In essence... each station in converted into anomalies; these are then averaged into some suitable division, such as 5x5 degree boxes, and the global mean computed. You need some scheme for filling in holes, especially in earlier years. The sea is treated slightly differently; I'm fairly sure the recent Hadley datasets use some kind of EOF-guided interpolation to fill in the blanks William M. Connolley (talk) 19:26, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

If you follow the article's link 2, 3 and 4 the calculation methods and procedures are explained. It seems sufficient so. Gabriel Kielland (talk) 22:23, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Even in the refs you're pointing me to I cannot find sufficient information. Sure, I think including something about how data is computed (division into grid, filling blanks, ...) would also do the article good. But I'm actually looking for the fundamental definition and physics behind a global average of temperature values. The thing is, that the use of such a value in climatology somehow implies that the "global average temperature" (as commonly used) is regarded as a meaningful physical quantity. As such, it requires to be defined in a physically unique way. Defining the "global average temperature" as an average is not unique because there are many ways to calculate an average. I'm disappointed that none of the refs I've read so far even points out which average is used. I think it's the arithmetic mean, but I'm still looking for the proof. Also I've seen some notions that some kind of a weighting scheme is used, but what are the values weighted with? For example from a physical perspective, it would make some sense to weigh the values with the local heat capacity of the air (which depends on pressure and temperature). Therefore a (sourced) mention of which average is used is absolutely necessary. Further I would suggest, since considerable doubt exists about the physical relevance of an average of temperature values (see the paper I referenced to above), a subsection about the physics behind the ominous "average global temperature" wouldn't hurt either, though it seems to be tough to find information about that. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 07:39, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Disputing the existence of a meaningful global avg T in theory is the sign of a wacko who has been reading too much McKitrick and Essex. So is wondering if the avg is arithmetic or otherwise. Sorry if thats a bit harsh, but thats reality for you. The answer is that (of course) the averaging is arithmetic. No-one but the wackos will suggest otherwise William M. Connolley (talk) 18:06, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure how much of the following belongs on this discussion page, but your notion of me being a wacko is a bit too much to be ignored. Sorry if the following may sound a bit harsh sometimes, but it's primarily intended to be accurate and clear. First of all, I am NOT making any claims that I cannot defend here. Check out the WP article on average to find out that the word "average" alone does NOT automatically mean arithmetic mean. I AM reading the Essex/McKitrick/Andresen paper (and it's the first global warming sceptics paper that I'm reading) and I'm reading it critically and I'm checking the science VERY carefully. I've already worked my way through most of it, and so far I DO understand the science they're employing and I find that it's undeniably CORRECT. So are their fundamental conclusions (note that they do NOT make any judgment about whether global warming is happening or not, please read and understand their paper first to realize what they are in fact pointing out). I DO have some issues with that paper, but so far those are minor and have nothing to do with the underlying science or the basic conclusions. I HAVE SEEN that the authors are torn apart in the blogosphere, I NOTICED the "flaws" in their example calculations, but I also noticed that those are minor flaws that can be easily corrected and the example modified in a minor way (by changing one of the starting values) so that qualitatively the same results are obtained. I DO NOT CARE who the authors are or whether global warming is scientifically proven or not, I am just arguing on the basis of fundamental science. BTW, I do NOT believe that exchanging the arithmetic mean by another will SIGNIFICANTLY alter the results or the conclusions. But I DO believe that most scientists who are working with the "average global temperature" are NOT aware that this value is actually not a physical quantity (or has not been proven to be so), but merely a statistical index which is USED as if it HAD a physical meaning (which to my knowledge has not been proven). I am MERELY pointing out that the provided definition of an "average global temperature" is NOT sufficient (because it's not unique), and that no physical background for such a value is provided. I am currently NOT suggesting that Essex's/McKitrick's/Andresen's take on the subject should be used for expanding the article, because they are apparently not representative for the field, and what the article needs is a description of how it IS done (well-sourced, please), and the physical justification by those who ARE working with the "global average temperature". I cannot prevent you from not taking me serious, but I strongly encourage you to come up with the proof that the science and the fundamental conclusions of the author's or my own argumentation are incorrect, if you want to sustain your assertions. If you want reality, however, I can post a derivation here or on my talk page, that will show how the construction of a physically plausible definition of a global temperature can lead to either the arithmetic mean, harmonic mean, or more complex structures, depending on which non-trivial assumptions are made in the model. Let me know if there's need for further elaboration. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 22:58, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Hm, the silence here disturbs me a bit. If you believe that this is just hairsplitting or that, for some reason, using the arithmetic mean is the only obvious, logical and reasonable choice, then I'm afraid you're fatally mistaken. Check out Molar mass distribution to see an actual physically important example of how different averages of molar masses in the case of a molar mass distribution of a polymer have a different physical meaning (and those meanings have been proven by theory!), or check out this WP article here [4] to learn about a specific case of physically reasonable temperature averaging. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 11:32, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Offline for a bit. First, Essex and McKitrick are the wackos, not you. You are suffering from reading too much E&McK, which is bad for you. As is SHOUTING. All your examples are not using geometric, say, means, just weighted arithmetic. The T record uses weighting, of course, since a 5x5 cell at the equator is bigger than one at the pole. As for why E&McK are wackos, try http://rabett.blogspot.com/2007/03/open-book-test-in-comments-over-at.html William M. Connolley (talk) 16:57, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

First of all, apologies for the impatience and the capital letters. It was really not intended as shouting at all, I was just trying to make my statements as clear as possible. I understand this reads like shouting, so I won't do it again, thank you. As for the blog-reference: I've already looked at too many of those. I've looked into this one now, but nothing has caught my eye that would prove E&McK&A wrong. If you have a specific point, please let me know. But be careful: A vast majority of the contributors to these blogs don't really understand the underlying physics, as becomes obvious in some of the remarks from time to time. However, most reviewers of articles in a journal like non-equilibrium thermodynamis do know the physics, and to be fair, the physics that E&McK&A employ to prove their points is really not higher than undergraduate level. I won't judge whether the authors are wackos or not, but the science in their publication is undeniable and correct. If you know something about physical chemistry it would actually do you good to read it.

However, I realize that a discussion about whether they are right or wrong on this page might last forever (at least as long as you don't read and understand the paper), so most likely it won't lead to any improvements in the article. As I said, I'd prefer the information from the actual guys who are working with that stuff. The data treatment and averaging is far from trivial and at least it should be made clear in the article that this is so. I think useful sources could be the following: [5], [6], [7] and references given therein. Detailed descriptions of the data treatment can be found (though it gets arbitrarily complicated), but none of the papers I've looked at reasons a physical relevance of either the global average T, or the anomaly value (BTW, the "temperature anomaly" is used in the charts, but is not explained in the text. It's not a trivial measure, and is not the same as the average global temperature. If I find time, I might add something about it next week).

As to the examples I was giving, among the molar mass means Mw and Mz are weighed with the molar mass itself or its square (not sure if that's still arithmetic strictly speaking), Mv however has a power mean structure. For another example, look here to learn that joining ohmic resistors in parallel fashion leads to a resistor with the harmonic mean of all the individual resistors. Another example I can give you (can't source it unfortunately) is again the temperature after joining two systems. You point out yourself that the individual temperatures are weighed with the size (proportional to the volume) of their gridboxes. This may seem trivial or obvious to you, but if you think about it, there's nothing else behind that thought than to scale the temperatures according to the total number of gas molecules in that box. The physical aspect behind that is that the internal energy is proportional to temperature times number of gas molecules. By assuming that the number of gas molecules only depends on the size of the box, you arrive at your weighed arithmetic mean. However, the number of gas molecules also depends on pressure and temperature (according to the ideal gas law), therefore you would also need to include those in the weighing scheme. If you work out the equations, you will in fact end up with a weighed harmonic mean instead of an arithmetic mean (because the number of gas molecules scales with 1 devided by T)! In fact just today I tried to treat the original gridbox data (from [8], I chose just the years 1997 to 2007) with both models and see what happens (lacking pressure data, I assumed the pressure to be the same for all boxes in the second model, which is a non-trivial assumption as well). As I expected (see above), the differences between the two models are not significant at all (the anomaly value of both models is in very good agreement), though indeed a few month can be found in which the one model shows a warming trend, and the other a cooling trend or the other way around (but only for a single month in a row). However, the complete picture remains unchanged. My point is simply this: E&McK&A are right, but personally I don't expect a big impact from their findings. I can just hope that finally Climate scientists will equip their "global average temperature" and "temperature anomaly" with some fundamental science and a real physical meaning in theory. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 23:46, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

there's nothing else behind that thought than to scale the temperatures according to the total number of gas molecules in that box - no; its according to the area of the planet being represented William M. Connolley (talk) 07:02, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

My argument is that in order to design a physically meaningful global temperature (and my particular example is in fact to define the global temperature as the final temperature after equilibration through a certain thermodynamical process) you have to weigh the values with the gridbox size because the heat capacity (which is proportional to the number of gas molecules) is proportional to the gridbox area, and out of no other reason. But apparently what is done is to ignore physics and just weigh the values with the area because it seems the right thing to do - again, without any physical background. Therefore, the global temperature which is used is physically absolutely meaningless. To claim that this value can indicate whether an alleged physical process like "global warming" is taking place would simply be an interpretation of that temperature index without any foundation.

Let me try to give you a demonstrative example. Analogies to the global warming case are given in parenthesis. Consider a storehouse (globe) that has both cotton (cold areas) and silk (hot areas). The price of cotton is 2$/m² (temperature of cold areas), the price of silk is 20$/m² (temperature of warm areas). Now all the pieces of textiles are stored in paper boxes of equal size (surface area grid boxes), and the number and size of the boxes never change. However, the amount of textiles (number of gas molecules, total heat capacity of the air) in each of the boxes may change due to storage, withdrawel, or re-sort (climate dynamics, local warming or cooling). Let's assume for simplicity that we have such a large number of boxes that there's either cotton or silk in each box, but never both of them (homogeneous temperature within each gridbox; only two possible temperatures for each gridbox in this particular example). Now we are interested in the "storehousal average price" ("global average temperature") in order to find out whether "storehousal cottoning" (global cooling) or "storehousal silking" (global warming) is occuring. One possibility to form an average would be to simply calculate the arithmetic mean of the textile prices of all boxes, an easy task, given that all boxes have equal size. Another possibility would be to weigh each price value of a box with the amount of textiles in that box (take the variable density of air into account). Now let's calculate those averages for a particular case: Consider 4 boxes with the following content: box 1: 1m² cotton, box 2: 1m² cotton, box 3: 0.2m² silk, box 4: 0.2m² silk. Try to do the calculation yourself (the prices of cotton and silk are given above)! The results for the "averages" in question are (with "average#1" being the former and "average#2" the latter): average#1 = 11$/m², average#2 = 5$/m². Now we store 0.6m² silk into the last box and also put the 0.2m² silk from the third box into the last box, while cutting the cotton from box 2 in two pieces of 0.5m² each, putting one of them into the third box: box 1: 1m² cotton, box 2: 0.5m² cotton, box 3: 0.5m² cotton, box 4: 1m² silk. Now the "averages" change to: average#1 = 6.5$/m², average#2 = 8$/m². The result is that when we use average#1, we observe "storehousal cottoning" by 4.5$/m², while when using average#2, we see "storehousal silking" by 3$/m². If you don't care for the physics, then there is absolutely no way to decide between the two averages. If you do care for the physics, then please read the E&McK&A paper. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 12:48, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

This is all meanignless, because the heat stored in the air is fairly small, so you're not interested in its heat capacity William M. Connolley (talk) 13:10, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

You're totally missing the point. The absolute value of the heat capacity is of no importance for the arguments given above. The only thing that counts is the relative difference between the heat capacities of different places. If all heat capacities are equal, then they cancel out in the weighing scheme - not because they are small, but because they are equal. If they are different you can express them as some "standard" value times a relative deviation from that standard. Then the standard value cancels out and you're left only with those relative deviations.

If your point is that the heat stored in the air is meaningless for climate, then the question is rather how much significance an average of those air temperatures has at all. However, this problem is a whole different story and has absolutely nothing to do with the question how to do the averaging. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 14:01, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

The temperature is essentially a skin temperature. It doesn't relate to heat capacity. Its used because those are the measurements we have. As for E&McK, you must have missed [9]. But I'm sure you'll explain it away William M. Connolley (talk) 15:59, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

If you would take your time to read and understand my arguments and the E&McK&A paper you would realize that an arbitrary average of temperatures is not automatically a temperature itself, and that the average which is used has not been derived by physics at all. Therefore your "skin temperature" is not a temperature itself, but rather a statistical index (with the unit of a temperature) that may tell you something useful, but not necessarily does so. To fully understand this point you really need to read and understand E&McK&A's paper (at least the first part of it), or the textile storehouse example I was giving above (in that example the average#1 price per m² doesn't have the "physical" meaning of a price any more). Simply defining an average as "skin temperature" has no physical foundation and no physical implication by itself. Those claims remain to be proven. The heat capacity comes into play in my own personal attempt to design a physically meaningful average. I'm not claiming that my solution is any better than the current one. It just serves as an example to show a possibility of how to average temperatures on a physical basis.
I believe I have provided you with sufficient arguments and good examples to help you to understand the point, but obviously you're either incredibly stubborn or you simply didn't pay attention to the arguments or you don't understand the issue. I for my part have always replied to your claims (which are really nothing more than unsubstantiated claims), using plausible arguments and by explaining them with undeniable physics, not by explaining them away. These solid arguments are nothing that you can just slur over, but that's exactly what you did.
As for the Tim Lambert Blog, I read that one some time ago. I have by no means made any claims against my own knowledge here. It's true that it's embarrassing for scientists to make such silly mistakes, but the actual science they are doing remains untouched. Just because it's possible that two different averages can show different trends doesn't mean that they will show different trends in every example. Above I said myself: "I do NOT believe that exchanging the arithmetic mean by another will SIGNIFICANTLY alter the results or the conclusions." But I've also provided you with examples that do prove E&McK&A's point, in addition they are providing more examples in their paper (note, however, that one of them (coffee cup example) has another flaw, but by changing one of the (arbitrary) starting values it works even after correcting that minor mistake). Any credible scientist would immediately notice that those minor flaws have absolutely no impact on the correctness of the scientific points and conclusions of E&McK&A. The fact that Tim Lambert obviously ignores this speaks volumes. However, if you have no knowledge in physical science yourself, and if you trust Tim Lambert's skill more than mine, then why don't you invite him do have a look at what I wrote here and reply to it? If you have any reasonable doubt that my logic is wrong, please point me to the mistakes that you think I'm doing. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 01:31, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Your argument is defensible, but it's not the one offered by Essex&Co. Physics does tell us how to average temperatures, just as it does tell us how to average fabric prices in your example. You've shown that Essex&Co are wrong. You're right that the conventional method (weight by cell area) is a simplified version of the correct physical model. I doubt that this makes a significant difference to temperature trends -- if it did Exxex&Co would have told us instead of the contrived examples they give (the average of the 200th power of the temperature!!). --TimLambert (talk) 08:44, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

WMC is an actor in the debate on global warming. He is an advocate and works in the field. You might profit from googling his name to understand who you are talking to. What conclusions you draw after that are up to you. TMLutas (talk) 06:12, 26 May 2008 (UTC) (apologies, forgot to log in so I'm re-signing)

Thanks for that clue, TMLutas! FeelFreeToBe (talk) 22:05, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Tim, thanks for your quick respose! I'm glad that we already agree on a few things (for example your last sentence). However, there is still need for further discussion. Let me reply to some of your statements:

Your argument is defensible, but it's not the one offered by Essex&Co. For most people, simply taking the arithmetic mean and calling it average temperature just seems to be the obvious and only logical choice (most people just don't care about the physics), which makes it hard for me to convince people who have apparently fallen into that trap. That's why I needed to come up with an alternative average that can be demonstrated to make even more sense than the beloved one. This is not a point that Essex&Co are interested in making in their publication (see below why).

Physics does tell us how to average temperatures. That's wrong. Physics does not tell us how to average temperatures, physics can only tell us how to calculate the temperature of a homogeneous system or subsystem, or multiple temperature values in form of a scalar field in the case of inhomogeneous, non-equilibrium systems. If we decide to calculate the temperature that the atmosphere would have after a well-defined physical equilibration process, physics can tell us how to do that. But that temperature depends on the process that we choose. The process I chose in my model is the following: Keep the total internal energy constant; consider all gridboxes as closed containers with fixed volume; allow the temperatures to adjust to an equilibrium value; the pressures may vary individually in each box. There is an infinit number of possible processes that you can choose from. For example, if you chose a similar but reversible process (entropy is constant) by allowing work to be extracted from the gas, the final temperature is the (weighed) geometric mean instead of the arithmetic.

You've shown that Essex&Co are wrong. No, actually I haven't, nor have you or anybody else. In order to understand that my model is by no means a simple solution to the problems that Essex&Co are revealing (that is lack of physical basis), one has to question whether my model is fulfilling the requirement to be physically meaningful. Being the (real, physical) temperature of a hypothized system after a certain equilibration step is only one part of the story. The missing part is: What physical relevance does that value have for the global climate? I cannot answer this question, nor can Essex&Co, which is most probably why they don't propose any alternative model themselves. What they say is this: In special circumstances averaging might approximate the equilibrium temperature after mixing, but this is irrelevant to the analysis of an out-of-equilibrium case like the Earth’s climate. Just for clarification, consider an example in which this problem doesn't occur: The number average molecular weight of a polymer is proven to be physically meaningful: If this particular average value increases then a decrease of the osmotic pressure of a solution follows strictly (keeping the total mass constant). However, to my knowledge, such a physical connection between the "average global temperature" and physical climate processes has neither been proven nor demonstrated.

You're right that the conventional method (weight by cell area) is a simplified version of the correct physical model. If you know any reliable source for that "correct" physical model and its simplifications, please let me know. That's exactly what I'm searching for since the beginning of this discussion. That's what is needed for improving the article. Regards. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 22:05, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

This paper here might be of some use: [10]. Unfortunately it's rather old and is also not well-cited in the literature of the scientific community. I'm still searching for better references. If anyone here finds a paper that clearly defines the currently used "global temperature anomaly", possibly with some physical background as well, please post the reference here! Thanks. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 08:23, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Here's another interesting paper (Pielke et al, 2007), concluding: This paper presents reasons why the surface temperature is inadequate to determine changes in the heat content of the Earth’s climate system. Interestingly, it employs a non-trivial definition of global average surface temperature based on heat content of the land-ocean-atmosphere system, radiative forcing, and climate feedback. That definition is obviously taken from a 2005 NRC report. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 09:18, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

If you liked that, you'll find more of the same on his blog; its a line he's been pushing. What he is "forgetting" is that the ocean heat content isn't well enough known to construct an accurate record from William M. Connolley (talk) 18:25, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! So, let me sum up: We have one method to calculate an apparently meaningful quantity, but it's not possible to calculate it accurately (that is, with small enough error bars in order to conclude something); and we have another (commonly used) method that provides an accurate record, but in order to conclude something from it you first have to believe that it is physically meaningful... Splendid! FeelFreeToBe (talk) 07:05, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Ok, sorry for the fruitless discussion above (in terms of improving the article), but I think there's one thing at least that should be done, and that's adding some information about the temperature "anomaly". If I have understood correctly, for each measurement station, averages of absolute temperatures are calculated for a reference/base period (1961-1990) for each of the 12 month. Those averages are then substracted from each individual temperature value (after calculating monthly averages) to yield the "anomaly" value for that station for that month of a particular year. Those values are then used for spatial averaging (to obtain the gridded values, hemispheric averages, and global average), and further temporal averaging (to obtain annual averages, or to smooth the plots of glob. temp. anom. vs time). Now, the reason for using the anomaly values instead of absolute temperatures is that a number of possible systematic errors cancel out in the substraction step.[11] Do you know any reference which comprehensively describes all the advantages of the anomaly values over absolute values? I think it's necessary to provide that information, primarily out of the following reason: The "surface temperature record" plot shows monthly averages. If not pointed out that reference values are substracted for each month, and those reference values are different from each other for each month by several °C (!!!), this plot is misleading the reader, since the plot that one would expect to be looking upon actually would show huge annual oscillations without an obvious trend. (BTW, I suspect that those oscillations come from the fact that there's much more land and less ocean on the northern hemisphere, but it would be nice to see the reference in which those discrepancies have been identified and found to be taken care of by using anomalies). I'd be happy if you could point me to the sources. Thanks. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 07:05, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

NOAA/UN doubts about instrumental temp record

Tripped across this and don't see it in the article but I'm rushed right now so I'll just do a doc dump and ask that the information be included.

From http://www.surfacestations.org/about.htm

In fact in 1997 there were concerns expressed by a National Research Council panel about the state of the climate measuring network.

In 1999, a U.S. National Research Council panel was commissioned to study the state of the U.S. climate observing systems and issued a report entitled: “Adequacy of Climate Observing Systems. National Academy Press”, online here The panel was chaired by Dr. Tom Karl, director of the National Climatic Center, and Dr. James Hansen, lead climate researcher at NASA GISS. That panel concluded:

   "The 1997 Conference on the World Climate Research Programme to the Third Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change concluded that the ability to monitor the global climate was inadequate and deteriorating."

From http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/hofn/

The 1997 Conference on the World Climate Research Programme to the Third Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change concluded that the ability to monitor the global climate was inadequate and deteriorating. As a result, the National Research Council (NRC) undertook an assessment of the U.S. climate observing capacity. The NRC recommended that a system of performance measures be developed and monitored on a regular basis because it would be unwise to wait for a major environmental assessment or data archeology effort to discover that problems that occurred 10 or 20 years earlier had already inflicted considerable damage to the climate record. The NRC also recommended that an institutional infrastructure be developed to assess the quality of data sets and correct problems as they occur.

---

The system of alerts that's mentioned in the noaa site does not seem to actually be in place. Did I miss something? Shouldn't we be giving prominent mention of the UN and NOAA worries about uncertainty in the climate record? TMLutas (talk) 20:47, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Preliminary results

The section:

Preliminary results as of September 16, 2007 indicate that the best rated and worst rated stations have similar overall temperature trends. Steven McIntyre stated that "between the 1930s and 2000s, the differences are material, but for comparisons over the past 30 years in the U.S., the differences are less." He also stated that "CRN1 [class 1] stations turn out to be skewed to the east, especially the southeast, while CRN5 [class 5] stations are skewed to the west." He argued that, when they are compared to the highly rated station results, "The profound differences between NOAA and NASA [overall] results obviously point to substantial differences in their adjustment methods" and "the NASA [temperature] history for the U.S. looks more reasonable." Co-bloggers at McIntyre's website have argued "There is good agreement between" the GISS, CRN1 plus CRN2, and CRN5 station records.

has been removed. I agree that it shouldn't be in the article (or, at least, should not be in the article right now). Setting WP:SPS aside just for the sake of arguement, the results are "preliminary" and have not been subject to any kind of peer review. Revolutionaryluddite 21:54, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

This is inconsistent - none of the Watts stuff has been PR'd William M. Connolley 08:49, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the PowerPoint section should also be removed. Revolutionaryluddite 20:07, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Every single data point was offered to the respective station maintainer. They had the right to correct any errors and still have that right. That's effective peer review and built into the data gathering process. Since nobody else has done the data gathering, there's nobody else who could actually PR this stuff but the people actually on site, either the survey taker or the site maintainer. It's nonsense to say it's not been peer reviewed when the data gathering and checking process is this open and any site maintainer can correct errors easily and quickly.

WP:SPS is a red herring as the data I included (late October) was only put out for public consumption after the UCARS talk, the data was released for two weeks of review, and nobody came and offered any corrections. So we have two levels of review, certainly not academic journal level (unless you're on the Lancet fast track perhaps) but certainly better than the type of self-published source that is intended to be stopped by WP:SPS.

I didn't want to make a big deal out of this data and give it undue weight. I put in what I believed were appropriate caveats as to the incompleteness and preliminary nature of the results. But if they hold up (and they do seem to be broadly holding up) somewhere north of 50% of the USHCN network will end up being CRN category 4 or 5 stations with noise exceeding signal. I don't believe that *anybody* including most skeptics would have thought that things were that bad and the strong nature of the data so far and the post conference review led me to believe that fair minded editors would let this in. TMLutas 18:14, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

"Peer reviewing" a data point is not the same thing as peer reviewing an analysis of several data points. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 19:37, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

We're not talking rocket science analysis here. You apply the CRN standards to the survey results. They get you a CRN rating. My understanding is that the individual station maintainers can challenge the CRN rating as well as the photos, diagrams, and survey forms. That's the data point. The only thing not peer reviewed is the arithmetic, how many 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 rated sites are there. It's a pretty trivial exercise since everything is available on site. Are you saying Watts doesn't know how to add or is adding dishonestly? What else isn't reviewed? Sure, you could say that it would be original research to actually tote up the ratings but come on. TMLutas 02:34, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

I doubt it is that simple. The fact that they can say the magnitude of the 'error' tells me that something more complicated is taking place. Brusegadi 02:43, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

More to the point, it has become obvious that TMLutas doesn't understand what "peer reviewed" means. Raymond Arritt 02:46, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

What I'm getting at is that peer review is not the be all and end all of independent editorial review. Especially in cases of simple observation, peer review is actually less useful than review using Watt's method. Peer review is a crutch, a simple standard that everybody can agree on. It is not the only standard to determine reliability and when this particular project is peer reviewed, the peer review is very likely not going to provide an awful lot of additional reliability. How could it when the reviewers have no way of knowing whether the data is correct or fabricated? Only the site maintainers know that and they have already reviewed the data.

In cases where there's a little data gathered and a lot of interpretation, peer review is the best method. I am suggesting that in cases where what's going on is mostly data gathering such as this study, independent review of all data points is a much higher level of meaningful review than peers who are not going to be going across the fruited planes to check out 1200 sites independently. When the only analysis in a project is the equivalent of =SUM(x) in Excel I cannot understand the blind insistence that only peer review matters. TMLutas 00:34, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Brusegadi - No, it really is that simple. The CRN created an objective system for assigning error ratings, a 5 point scale with associated temp error magnitudes. The study simply takes the CRN standard and applies it. If you're a category 5 station, you're doing something incredibly stupid like sticking a temperature sensor on a black tar roof right next to an AC exhaust vent and thus you get assigned the CRN error factor for a category 5 site (5C or greater). There's no actual error measurement involved in the study, just a measurement of distance to the nearest concrete, artificial heat source, or other factor identified in the CRN standard, documenting it, getting the site maintainer to sign off that the surveyor is accurately describing the site, and then submitting it to Watt's website. Now you can go attacking the CRN standard but that's a pretty steep hill to climb and very different than taking on Watts' project. I can understand the confusion but you can certainly double check that this is what the CRN system does independent of my explanation and judge from there. TMLutas 00:34, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Then, where does the error above 5 Celsius come from? Being able to say that X station has an error >5 seems pretty non-trivial to me, at least in the context you speak of. How do they determine that? Brusegadi 01:37, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

CRN calculated that if you do certain forms of site stupidity, you know that your temps are going to be off by more than x, x changing depending on CRN category and the observed site stupidity determining the CRN category. It's a simple value pair. If you are a category 5 site, the error rating is =>5C. If you're a category 4 site, the error rating is =>4C, and so on. Watts is compiling surveys, diagrams, and pictures and applying the CRN rules to determine which category applies. The temperature error rating sort of comes along for the ride. That's very mechanical but nobody seems to be challenging the CRN rules themselves. TMLutas 13:53, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Last time I looked at the site there was a heavy bias towards urban stations. (Not surprising considering the fact that this is a mostly volunteer project, so stations near high population-density areas can expect to have more volunteers.) That's one thing that the peer-reviewed process is meant to catch. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 14:00, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Since the project is going to go through all 1200+ sites, urban bias is a passing problem. The effect is real though amd worth discussing. The bad stations have dropped in % from the mid 70s to the high 60s to my observation. That's why I'm interested in working out how low the 4+5 total % has to be before it's no longer considered significant. 68% at 1/3 done equals at least 22% bad even if zero stations that are 4/5 rated are found for the rest of the project. Is 22% of the network being 4 or 5 on the CRN scale a big deal or is it a small thing? If we agree that 22% USHCN bad sites is a significant result, the project has already met the threshold of whether it should be included. We still need to wrestle with standards of independent review (peer review v. USHCN site maintainer oversight) but we'll have settled a big issue, when does finding bad weather stations stop being an isolated, unimportant instance and when does it start being a serious challenge to conventional studies that depend on these weather stations for some or all of their conclusions. Then we'd have an easily followed consensus on when the preliminary stuff should start getting a mention. So can we start with a number? Let me toss out 10% 4/5 rating as already being a problem. If you disagree, give a better reason and a better number. TMLutas 03:17, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Let me toss out zero peer-reviewed publications as being a problem. (Yes, this is becoming tiresome.) Raymond Arritt 03:32, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, you've said this. The question is whether you'll say anything else. The standard for inclusion is *not* peer review. It's independent editorial oversight. The data being discussed for inclusion does not have peer review but has an alternative system of independent editorial oversight. I have explained the system. You have not progressed beyond your original point other than to call my attempts at working towards a consensus 'tendentious'. I sent you a note on your page to sort that accusation out too. You have yet to respond constructively there either. Either engage fully to work things out or stop the broken record routine. TMLutas 13:59, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like a problem to me. As RA points out, however, without peer-reviewed publications who are we to say how big a problem it is or whether it even is a problem. Do you see now how this is not just a matter of whether or not the individual data points are accurate and why peer-review is relevant? Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 13:48, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

We are supposed to keep out stuff that doesn't have independent editorial oversight or at least give such material much higher scrutiny. Peer review is a handy way to demonstrate independent editorial oversight; I agree that it's quite useful. This does not establish that it is the sole method of oversight. I would say that in a certain number of cases, probably small but nonzero, alternate arrangements are sufficient for inclusion in wikipedia.

1. The material should be important, having large implications in the field. - probably check

2. The material should be transparent, easily checked by anyone (open source "many eyes" method) - check

3. The material should have independent checkers not associated with the project, ideally people who have an interest contrary to the way bias is likely to run - check

4. The material should have a good prospect of transitioning to more conventional editorial insight, ie this is a patch that is worth applying because of the importance of getting an early heads up disseminated widely. - maybe check

5. The material should be unique, ie there shouldn't be peer reviewed alternates available. - check

Now I think items 1 and 4 are satisfied but I freely admit that they're the weakest of the list. One can say that the list is insufficient. Good, give me some other conditions to add to it. But you can't say that the lack of peer review sinks it because that's not part of the wikipedia rules, policies, or guidelines. Peer reviewed stuff is to be preferred. But nobody else has done the physical review of the USHCN (and no doubt later, other networks). The unique nature, importance, transparency, and likelihood of future publication make the case for overriding the usual procedure. This is not an easy set of conditions to meet. If there were serious unanswered methodological questions it would sink on condition 2 (and condition 2 is the direct answer to your immediate question of how are we to judge). So far, there don't seem to be any.

I sometimes don't like Wikipedia's actual rules but I recognize that they need to be defended in order to preserve the viability of the project. Peer review only could be one of those rules but it currently isn't. If editors want it to be, they should change the rule articles. But they don't do that. They just revert. And when there are enough reverters or deleters violating actual wikipedia standards it *can* be made to stick for a time. It isn't good for wikipedia though and sets up a backlash. The backlash is coming. There's an active boycott of wikipedia financing (not over science articles though) and that sort of thing either has to get addressed or it's going to grow.

I want to be clear. I'm including this edit and fighting for it in talk based on its merits. This episode does, however, fit into this larger pattern of people not bothering with going through the process of changing the rules but simply using energy and numbers to impose by fiat alternative rules so I would prefer that both the small and larger issues be addressed. If people don't want to open the larger can of worms I can understand that and we can just talk about this particular edit so long as we stick to the actual rules. Wikipedia has no common law. TMLutas 14:31, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

TML, please read Wikipedia's essay on tendentious editing: "On Wikipedia, the term also carries the connotation of repetitive attempts to insert or delete content which is resisted by multiple other editors." You're pressing the same point over and over again, not just on article talk pages of articles but on the user talk pages of individuals who disagree with you.[12][13][14] Raymond Arritt 15:07, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Read it, doesn't apply, mostly because I'm currently not trying to actually edit anything. One cannot be tendentious over an edit one has conceded isn't going to make it at the present moment. I'm trying to figure out how to form a consensus on when preliminary results flip over into stuff that qualifies under WP:RS and apply it to the edit so the next time I put the thing in, the edit will stick. Contrary to what you seem to think, I don't actually like edit wars. On a fairly fast moving target like the Watts project I believe the best bet is to form a consensus on when to include it in accord with WP:RS. TMLutas 02:57, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

The consensus is to consider including it when it's been published in a peer-reviewed journal. You reject that consensus, so you're trying to wear the rest of us down by sheer repetition and weight of verbiage. Raymond Arritt 03:20, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

You cannot, by consensus, change WP:RS without actually changing WP:RS. The reason is that it's a false consensus. The actual rule being applied is not what is being stated, that scientific articles can only have peer reviewed sources in them. If it were, there would be a gutting of Wikipedia's science articles, especially stuff on the cutting edge. Go change WP:RS, or at least try to and I won't be using this argument anymore. We've bumped heads enough in the past that you know I don't persistently go against actual rules, policies, or guidelines. My prediction is that if someone were to actually try to change WP:RS along these lines, they would get slapped down, hard and thus this false claim of consensus is raised but the rule is never actually changed because the guys monitoring *that* article would not appreciate or agree with the change in rules that RA and others propose. TMLutas 21:40, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Raymond William M. Connolley 22:06, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Fair enough WMC, what, exactly do you agree with? TMLutas 15:37, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

There are lots of problems here. TML seems to be pushing "the stuff is effectively peer reviewed": "Every single data point was offered to the respective station maintainer. They had the right to correct any errors and still have that right." - who says so; and is there any evidence that this has actually been done? Edit comment of "421 results, 421 ind reviewers" appears to suggest that TML believes ?all? 421 points have been reviewed?

Also the T errors: being assigned (even by an experienced observer, let alone an unknown) to a cat5 does *not* mean the T is in error by 5 oC. How could it? The error must vary by time of day, etc etc. At best it can mean that an error of this order is possible. Thus this edit [15] is unacceptable.

And "The unique nature, importance, transparency, and likelihood of future publication make the case for overriding the usual procedure" is completely wrong William M. Connolley 14:40, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Let me start by conceding a small error. I should not have said "That's effective peer review and built into the data gathering process" but rather "That's effective independent editorial oversight and built into the data gathering process". Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. Of course peer review is not the standard by which one includes information according to WP:RS. Sources with effective independent editorial oversight qualify just fine. The exact words are "Reliable publications are those with an established structure for fact-checking and editorial oversight". That exists for Watts' efforts.

Further relevant text in WP:RS with which I have no problems

Academic and peer-reviewed publications are highly valued and usually the most reliable publications in areas where they are available, such as history, medicine and science. Material from reliable non-academic publications may also be used in these areas, particularly if they are respected mainstream publications. The appropriateness of any source always depends on the context. Where there is disagreement between sources, their views should be clearly attributed in the text.

In other words, the rote reliance on including only peer reviewed articles is simply does not conform with WP:RS as written and I would suggest either dropping that de-facto standard or get busy rewriting WP:RS. If there was some sort of published peer reviewed article regarding a physical review of surface weather stations it should absolutely be preferred over the preliminary stuff at surfacestations.org. Do such papers exist? I don't think they do. So absent publishing the most reliable data available on the subject should be included at least in some form. Otherwise the article leaves a false impression about the current state of things.

You are correct that sticking a weather station in the exhaust vent stream of a 2 ton commercial AC unit does not mean that it will be off by exactly 5C all the time. I never said it did. Watts never said it did. The CRN never said it did. Straw man much? What is being said is that if one were to do such a daft thing, you're going to be at least 5C off and quite possibly more. The US taxpayer funded CRN to come up with such a standard and they have. That you don't like it is neither my fault, Watts' fault, nor should it be an impediment to reporting application of the CRN standard in a relevant wikipedia article. You can certainly provide the proper nuance and improve my edit. By all means go ahead. But that wasn't what happened. All of my edits on the subject were reverted, not improved. That's not supposed to be a first choice but it seems to be the first choice in this sub-community.

That each data point (defined as filled survey form, diagrams, and photos) is reviewed by the site maintainer is part of the design of the survey. If the volunteer hasn't done it, Watts says he's not publishing it. I've no doubt that if a site maintainer were to say that he wasn't consulted and Watts wouldn't let him correct the record it would be big news. This is a dog that has not barked. So yes, I think it's fairly safe to say that Watts is not committing academic fraud, or at least that's the point we should start from.

The last bit of your comment WMC is too general for me to reply to without an unproductive level of snark. All wrong? Really? I guess I should be satisfied you had as much intellectual engagement as you did prior to descending to a less productive style. I'll take half a loaf on that one and await your answers to my replies. TMLutas 02:57, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Most of that is simply repetition of errors. There is no case here for overriding procedures. There is no evidence that oversight has actually occurred (the issue is not site maintainers asking for corrections that haven't occurred: the issue is whether any site maintainers have ever bothered to check Watts people). Reliable publications are those with an established structure for fact-checking and editorial oversight - indeed. There is no evidence for Watts efforts having any such. If you care to be more polite, I could try to explain the T errors stuff you've failed to understand in more detail William M. Connolley 22:05, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

You have to either assume that the project is lying (Watts' surveyors don't actually follow procedures and explain and clear things in advance with site maintainers) or that out of 421 surveys published so far the number of people who said 'yeah, let me see what you've got before you leave' is insignificantly small or nonexistent. That doesn't pass the laugh test with me especially as Watts' efforts are not exactly low profile. No evidence indeed, it's hard to find evidence when you assume so little good faith on the project's part.

You can explain your objections on the T errors stuff or not as you please. If you refuse to explain it, your objections on those grounds should not be taken into account. Fits of pique should not be catered to in a debate over scientific evidence and argument from authority remains a logical fallacy. "I know you're wrong but I won't demonstrate how" is not a sustainable method for maintaining wikipedia. Do you even consider how the other side in any debate could use the same tactics against you? TMLutas 15:37, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

"You have to either assume..." No one has to assume anything. Given that it is not a reliable source, the assumptions are made for us by the foundations of wikipedia. Brusegadi 17:11, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

I just thought I'd come back and put a period on this section. The entire point of the discussion was whether the site is a reliable source. There's no given about it. In the subsequent year since the discussion, the further surveys haven't changed the overall facts that the best national network on the planet sucks by its own standards. There's a separate question over whether statistical corrections can correct for the suckage but the suckage itself deserves mention in an article about the instrumental temperature record. TMLutas (talk) 19:36, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

What makes you think its the best national network? William M. Connolley (talk) 20:25, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

I think it because I've read assertions that it is and no counter-assertions that some other network is better. Do you know of a national network better than the US? I'll concede that Lichtenstein might have one but then again, that's something of a trivial case. What are you asserting here? TMLutas (talk) 02:30, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

That the UK in particular and Europe in general is better William M. Connolley (talk) 07:23, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

uncertainty paragraph ordering

WMC reverted me because he's of the opinion that more recent data should come before older data. My position is that you start with a general statement of the issue, that the UN and other groups and individuals have concerns about the condition of the network and then you move on to descriptions of how those concerns have been addressed. I'm willing to talk things out here. I firmly believe that by no means is WMC's position obvious or self-evident. TMLutas (talk) 00:08, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

My opinion is that the natural order of the paragraph would be this: 1.) "The uncertainty in annual measurements ...", 2.) "There is significant concern ...", 3.) "A number of scientists and scientific organizations ...". The numerical uncertainty estimates actually are a very general statement. The fact that the other one is older doesn't make it more general. To me it seems better to first shortly deal with the statistical errors (~0.05°C) and errors caused by spatial coverage. Further, the NOAA statement is a conclusion, so I would naturally present it after some general facts about which sources of uncertainty exist. FeelFreeToBe (talk) 06:00, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

It seems old, thought. Is there any more recent statement? Brusegadi (talk) 06:08, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

The nature of the situation seems to be that there was a conference, the consensus was that things were bad and getting worse, and by the look of the NOAA site, they haven't gotten better because the procedures that were agreed would actually improve things haven't been adopted. What the section has been so far is conflating two things, statistical estimates of climate difference without any actual evaluation of the temperature sensors and their conditions and a partial examination of the case of those who look at the physical condition of the instruments and worry about GIGO. Both are sources of uncertainty but very different from each other. TMLutas (talk) 02:49, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

1999 US National Research Council Panel

A legitimate panel raised further concerns about our weather station infrastructure in 1999. The concerns were temperature as well as other problems. I put in a para discussing it including a nice quote. This was reverted. I'm not going to die for any of the particulars but the 1999 panel should be mentioned in some appropriate fashion. Aggressive reverts are not helpful. TMLutas (talk) 14:51, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

The report is not focusing on weather station infrastructure, or on temperatures. What it was focusing on was the whole climate observation network (of which land weather stations are merely a part). I reverted it because its a cherry-pick without context. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 15:44, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

If the general climate observation infrastructure including temperature is a problem, the report is on topic for this article because the instrumental temp record is a subset of the weather/climate sensing system. Again, if you would like to improve the quote instead of mindlessly reverting, have at it. I've no objection to reasonable improvements. 207.145.26.125 TMLutas (talk) 20:12, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Your statement is WP:SYN/WP:OR. It certainly doesn't follow that when a report on A, that draws conclusion B in general, then it subsequently applies to all its subtopics in specific.

The onus is on the contributor to provide the rationale and the sources to back the inclusion. Not the other way around. And you haven't provided neither rationale nor sourcing to back this up. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 20:53, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Let's start off that it is simply not WP:OR as I didn't actually research anything other than finding the report, reading it, and pulling a juicy quote. WP:SYN, I think you'll need to explain a bit how it applies here.

Could you perhaps be a bit more specific as to your objection? Are you saying that the temp measurement system is just peachy, that the panel was not addressing, among other things, land temperature measuring infrastructure, that the report doesn't actually have the quote I pulled? What, exactly, are you objecting to, other than the inclusion of material that does not seem to fit your preferred narrative? TMLutas (talk) 07:49, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm getting rather tired of trying to explain this. Yes the panel existed. Yes the quote is accurate. But the quote is about all of the weather/climate sensing system. It is original research to claim the quote is accurate for a small subset of the total sensing system. Why are you staking out that quote anyways? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 08:23, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

In the article, I did not make such a claim. The panel looked at climate. They claimed the climate measurement systems are bad. It is a compelling quote *for a section that is supposed to be about criticism* because it doesn't mince words about how much the systems suck. If you were to put in a better quote or maybe do something with this source material other than try to bury as much of it as you can, I'd feel better about your contributions. You ask why I'm staking out that quote. The answer is simple, I'm not. I'm defending against what I see as POV pushing by trying to stuff legitimate material down the memory hole. TMLutas (talk) 09:08, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

You can't just apply criticism uncritically. The quote is not about the instrumental temperature record, thus it doesn't belong here. What you can do, and apparently have started doing, is to find elements that are. But i have to say that from what i've read of the report, its not about the temperature record, but about stations and station data. Most critically the metadata for each station. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 09:43, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay, I missed this one. The quote *is* about the instrumental temperature record. It's also about the instrumental precipitation record which they also seem to think needed revamping, along with a number of other instrumental records all of which tend to show up in stevenson screened packages right next to each other. And the metadata is critical for understanding whether the actual temperature record is worth the hard disk space used to store it. If you have a welder operating 12 hours a day 2 feet from a temperature sensor, the temperature record may be flawless as well as worthless (and no, this isn't an accusation that welders are operating near temp sensors, it's just an example). The metadata of instrument siting and instrument bias can't be separated from the data of the instrumental temp record unless you don't actually care about getting accurate science out of the effort to record temperatures. The plain fact of the matter is that the temperature record comes from stations. It *is* the collection of station data. If the stations and station data are bad (the direct quote) it means that the temperature data is also bad. Garbage In, Garbage Out is not just for the IT industry. TMLutas (talk) 00:45, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Just to show I'm not just willy nilly reverting for the heck of it out of some mule headed attachment to my own edit, I've gone back and pulled specific information about the panel's temperature conclusions. I'm essentially paraphrasing the Table 2 chart subsection that has to do with temperature and giving a stub pointer to the 10 principles the panel used to evaluate the systems. Some cooperation on improving instead of just reverting would be helpful. TMLutas (talk) 08:07, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Its very nice that you've taken the time to read the report - but your analysis gives us rather little information on what the consequences or the implications are for the accuracy of the instrumental record. So there is 9 deficiencies, but do they affect the record? How much do they affect it? In which way? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 08:23, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Wouldn't that be WP:OR if I were to do that research? Weren't you just complaining about WP:OR? TMLutas (talk) 08:59, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm assuming that this information is buried in the report. If it isn't what is the purpose of mentioning it here? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 09:43, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

The report does not pretend to do the work you're asking of it. It's a general observation that the system is not good, it's getting worse, and here are some general deficiencies and where they are relevant. This does not mean that it is not critical of the current state of affairs or that it is irrelevant to the section I put it in. TMLutas (talk) 00:48, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

1999 USNRC Panel quote contest

I'm looking for a better quote than my original one from the forward. Best quote to go into the criticism section on land temp.

Are we making the measurements, collecting the data, and making it available in a way that both today's scientist, as well as tomorrow's, will be able to effectively increase our understanding of natural and human-induced climate change? The Panel on Climate Observing Systems Status would answer the latter question with an emphatic NO.

Conversely, if there isn't anything better, I think that this really should go back in somehow because it shows that the problems with land temperature aren't something in isolation, that the problem is one of climate measurement, and the fact that it's just a really cool quote. So can anybody beat this? The report can be downloaded for free. TMLutas (talk) 09:19, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

May i note that you are going at it the wrong way? You are searching for critique, instead of trying to describe the field. That particularly is POV, and a scewing of WEIGHT. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 09:45, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Since you asked, yes you may note. It's a free country. I'll note that in a section marked "Criticism of the United States land surface temperature record" one would expect the focus of that section to be critique and changes to that section to be above average weight on critique. That's the entire purpose of a criticism section, after all, to stick the critiques in one spot so that a decent treatment of these viewpoints can be made in one area without scattering the brickbats throughout the article. So can we can the false appeals to standards that don't properly apply? The criticism section is rather small compared to the rest of the article. TMLutas (talk) 05:08, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

I just like how someone tagged the Uncertainties as not being neutral. How can you have a position that's against something while still being neutral. I would kill it for now, but the discussion about this article started way before me, and will continue way after I've forgotten about it. 69.207.47.45 (talk) 03:32, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

How old before we remove the graphs?

The graphs seem to be stuck on 2006. How out of date should they get before the current versions shouldn't be in the article anymore? TMLutas (talk) 22:35, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

oops, take it back, they've been adjusted to 2007. They were on 2006 for quite a while though so the question itself is still relevant. Discuss among yourselves while I get some new glasses B-)

TMLutas (talk) 22:37, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Could we update them again? 2008 is over (Or do I need a magnifying glass to read them???) I can't do the update myself in any credible manner. Thanks. --Xyzt1234 (talk) 21:53, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

The graph is up to date with 2008 being the last data-point. (just click on the graph to get a larger view) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 22:37, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

X may be talking about File:Short Instrumental Temperature Record.png. -Atmoz (talk) 23:12, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Parochialism

Some US folks need to remember that GISS is not the only series [16] William M. Connolley (talk) 17:08, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Methodology

I'm looking for the methodology used to calculate global temperature. The sources here seem a little unclear. There's a reference to "There are three main datasets showing analyses of global temperatures", but the description then seems to go on to describe only one set of raw data 78.105.167.241 (talk) 13:25, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Christy Quote

I added a notable quotation by UAH professor John Christy, a former IPCC lead author regarding the uncertainty of the temperature record due to urbanization, land use and relocation effects. Zoomwsu (talk) 23:34, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Due to the mangled sentence at the end of the first paragraph in the following subsection, which is referred to as being in conflict, I had downloaded the cited source. This quote from Christy, by my guess. is from 2001 (The Sunday Times clearly hadn't done a recent interview with him). The claim that a lack of metadata makes correction impossible vastly ignores the past decade, including many of the points and cited sources in the paragraphs that immediately followed.

Following the references, including the Sunday Times and names contained therein, to find who made what claims, why and when, I've noticed that the Times article's collection and references are almost bizarre in their presentation. Ross McKitrick, another person in that article has chosen to ignore thermal research of the individual gases that have stood for a century with no research contradicting such things as the thermal capacity and proportion of the atmospheric gases (ignoring increases of carbon therein). His "research" outside of economics consists of incidentals and, again, ignores available research stated in said subsection. Watts, another referred to meta-researcher and meteorologist made the same assumptions and blissfully ignored the follow-up research by the The Journal of Geophysical Research which found the siting claims resulted in a minor bias...towards cooling (available at the end of his own wiki-article). Mills, another economics expert, merely seems to repeat a note about temperatures rising two other times in the last millenium, which skims over the aforementioned physical chemistry research and relative increase in tempuratures (currently, we are exceeding the Medieval Warming Period, something ironically confirmed by said physical chemistry).

I have altogether ignored the Times' bias, and I feel anyone actually using the references in this article could point out the separation of scientific research to this point from claims made by individuals in Economics and a Meteorologist whom have chosen to ignore follow-up research to their claims, as well as, the basic physical chemistry research which has otherwise been deemed a solid basis for much modern chemistry. I do not understand neither the Christy quote, the skewing of the National Academies' review, or continued presentation of dated meta-research that can actually be countered by the references in Wikipedia. 173.242.89.38 (talk) 05:20, 16 February 2011 (UTC)EAZen, occasionally logged in,

Overcoverage?

Someone (I don't know who) added an "overcoverage" tag to the US section. Now a succession of anons want to remove it ([17] is the latest). It seems plausible to me though William M. Connolley (talk) 17:14, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Seems fairly obvious to me that the section is overly US-centric. -Atmoz (talk) 22:27, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

I disagree. Just because the information relates to the US observation system doesn't mean that it's over-coverage. Granted, ideally we'd be able to discuss evaluations of other countries' systems (and someone may have good sources on that), but that's not a reason not to cover what we have on the reliability of the US system. We would have a problem if the text misled the reader into believing the sources cited here related to all observation systems, but that doesn't appear to be the case; it seems to do a good job of identifying exactly which system is being discussed.

Here's what I'd suggest. 1) Move the heading down one level so that it's a subheading under "Uncertainties in the temperature record," and 2) remove the tag. Moving the heading down will give less prominence to the topic relative the the article as a whole. It might also make sense to 3) add an "expand" or "globalize" tag to the parent "Uncertainties in the temperature record" section. Ultimately, that seems to me what the article needs - parallel information on other observation systems. EastTN (talk) 15:31, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

User:KimDabelsteinPetersen has stuck the tag back in. I still disagree, because discussing the reliability of the US land system seems a reasonable subtopic under a discussion of uncertainties in the temperature record. What creates a problem is not inclusion of that information, but a lack of parallel information on other systems, and particularly on non-US systems. I would argue that the best way to improve the balance of this discussion is to bring in additional information, rather than exclude the information on the reliability of the US land-based system. EastTN (talk) 21:19, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

No, i did not put the tag back in. I put an entirely different tag on it: Undue-section. The reason for that tag, is that almost the whole section is based upon a minority viewpoint (Pielke Sr.) and a rather substantial amount of synthesis, this has been discussed here before. Strangely enough the mainstream position Peterson is only provided a single sentence. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 21:37, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

You're right - you did put in the Undue-section tag rather than the Overcoverage tag. In any event, it seems to me that the section does a good job of identifying the studies involved, who did each, and that Peterson and Pielke disagree about the significance of these issues. If you can expand the discussion of Peterson's view, that would be helpful. Ideally, it would seem that the discussion of his rebuttal should be of roughly comparable length and detail as the discussion of the reports he's disagreeing with. Beyond that, if we could find a good secondary source documenting which conclusions regarding these particular technical issues are majority views, which are minority views, and the relative prominence of each in the profession, that would be very helpful. EastTN (talk) 19:31, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

UKMO ref

Add in http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/science/explained/explained5.html ? William M. Connolley (talk) 22:04, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

Done. Gabriel Kielland (talk) 12:14, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

What is a "climate observing system"?

E.g. it could be: 1) a network of sensors stations 2) an organization with a network of sensor stations and their own practices and standards 3) a single sensor station. Velle (talk) 01:57, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Temperature anomaly?

This article uses the phrase "temperature anomaly" a lot. It is used exclusively as the measure of temperature (temperatures are never given in absolute terms, only as "anomaly" degrees). Yet the article never once defines temperature anomaly, or explains what it is with respect to. Nor is there a Wikipedia article on Temperature anomaly. This makes the whole discussion fairly useless. Can a section be added which explains what this is? (I'd add it myself, but I seriously don't know what it means and Google only turns up vague answers.) —MattGiuca (talk) 03:40, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Repetitive citations

I'm thinking of changing the IPCC citations in this article. I would change the citations so that they use Template:Harvard citation no brackets as is done in effects of global warming. The change would remove a lot of repetitive information contained in the existing IPCC citations. The change could also be applied to any other citations which contain repetitive information. I'd probably make the changes gradually, perhaps revising a few citations in each edit. Enescot (talk) 05:12, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Scientific background section

I took this out again [18]. Sorry, but the entire thing seems far too Hansen-centric. It might be suitable for NASA's website, but not here. Also, the refs-in-front-of-each-para is ugly, but thats comparatively minor William M. Connolley (talk) 09:16, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

While I agree that my edit was less-than-ideal, I still think that it contained some useful information. As I'm sure you're aware, several issues are important to the analysis of global temperature, e.g., the correlation of anomalies across large areas, and why temperature anomalies are used in preference to absolute temperatures (see also the "Temperature anomaly?" thread above). Perhaps you could take a look at this other NASA public-domain source: [19]. In my opinion, some of its content could be adapted for use in this article. Its focuses on the NASA temperature analysis, but I still feel that it may be of some use. Enescot (talk) 05:27, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

Indented below, I've pasted some public-domain content that I would to add to this article. The text below is not a draft, and would need to be rewritten before it is added to the article::

"Our analysis concerns only temperature anomalies, not absolute temperature. Temperature anomalies are computed relative to the base period 1951-1980. The reason to work with anomalies, rather than absolute temperature is that absolute temperature varies markedly in short distances, while monthly or annual temperature anomalies are representative of a much larger region. Indeed, we have shown (Hansen and Lebedeff, 1987) that temperature anomalies are strongly correlated out to distances of the order of 1000 km" [20]

"Q. What do I do if I need absolute SATs, not anomalies ? A. In 99.9% of the cases you'll find that anomalies are exactly what you need, not absolute temperatures. In the remaining cases, you have to pick one of the available climatologies and add the anomalies (with respect to the proper base period) to it. For the global mean, the most trusted models produce a value of roughly 14°C, i.e. 57.2°F, but it may easily be anywhere between 56 and 58°F and regionally, let alone locally, the situation is even worse." [21]

Enescot (talk) 05:05, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

I agree, the "Calculating the global temperature" deserves expansion. Use of anomalies, and correlation-lengthscale, are important points that should be mentioned. Incidentally I think the "freeware" bit should be revised - jvv's is (I think) dead but (again, I think) GISS now use the python version from CCC William M. Connolley (talk) 09:10, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

I've put together a draft revision of the "Calculating the global temperature" section. I suggest that the"Calculating the global temperature" section is moved up the article so that it is below the "Global records databases" section. The concept of temperature anomalies is used throughout the article, and I think that it is worth explaining near the top of the article.

"(existing text)...In the late 1990s, the Goddard team used the same data to produce a global map of temperature anomalies to illustrate the difference between the current temperature and average temperatures prior to 1950 across every part of the globe.[35]

(new section) Absolute temperatures versus anomalies

Records of global average surface temperature are usually presented as anomalies rather than as absolute temperatures. A temperature anomaly is measured against a reference value. For example, if the reference value is 15 °C, and the measured temperature is 17 °C, then the temperature anomaly is +2 °C (i.e., 17 -15).

Temperature anomalies are useful for deriving average surface temperatures because they tend to be highly correlated over large distances (of the order of 1000 km). In other words, anomalies are representative of temperatures over large areas and distances. By comparison, absolute temperatures vary markedly over even short distances.

Absolute temperatures for the Earth's average surface temperature have been derived, with a best estimate of roughly 14°C, i.e. 57.2°F. However, the correct temperature could easily be anywhere between 56 and 58°F, and uncertainty increases at smaller (non-global) scales.

(existing section) Temperature processing software

In September 2007, ..."

Enescot (talk) 04:36, 28 December 2012 (UTC)

Subsurface ocean temps

This article erroneously defines the ITR as being only about surface temp. That's false, but I don't enough about the subsurface instrumental record to write good text. Help please? — Preceding unsigned comment added by NewsAndEventsGuy (talk • contribs)

Um. Initially the instrumental temperature record only documented land and sea surface temperature, but in recent decades instruments have also begun recording sub-surface ocean temperature is too simplistic. People have been documenting sub-sfc temperatures for ages. The correct sequence is land-sfc before the others, then ocean sfc thinly, with sub-sfc coming in slowly. The difference in recent decades is in volume of coverage, ie quantitative, not qualitative William M. Connolley (talk) 12:54, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

I'd welcome your expertise revising the text to include subsurface! You say "ages", and I don't know...I'm a layman. But I can read, and in Mann & Krump's "Dire Predictions", in the glossary, it says the land surf record is 150 years, and ocean subsurface record goes back only 5-6 decades. If that's "ages" for subsurface then I guess I agree. How would you phrase it better? And please do! NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 13:09, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Is there any reason why the warmest decades aren't written in their most familiar form?

Also, they are in the reverse order. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 23:47, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

You can reverse order by clicking at the top right-hand side. I'm trying to update using the data source which has been updated since 2009 but 1st checking math on the table as stated in the article. http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata_v3/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt I may have some questions :)2601:C:6783:8416:BD19:9DFE:2A64:FBE3 (talk) 19:40, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

User Afasmit added false data

This edit from August 2014 https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Instrumental_temperature_record&diff=prev&oldid=619368050 added various errors to annual data, based on a cite which points to monthly averages. prokaryotes (talk) 12:22, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

All I did was add data for 2013 and appropriately round the numbers already there, following the referenced sites previous editors had entered. The water-and-land-combined numbers look virtually the same as they are after your edits anyway (I suppose somehow separate land and water annual deviations are not available). Also, us eukaryotes don't go around yelling from the rooftops that someone made a mistake. Afasmit (talk) 01:56, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

I'm sorry but mistakes need to be pointed out in this matter, and we need to use official numbers here, and this is also relevant for other editors. We are all a little guilty, sorry if i made a to strong remark, thanks for your reply. prokaryotes (talk) 02:09, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

Articles for individual years

Anyone else interested to add new articles for individual years? prokaryotes (talk) 12:44, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

I'm somewhat dubious; you'd need RS's for saying stuff. Are there really many years to say interesting things about? William M. Connolley (talk) 17:10, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

We could start with exceptional years, such as 1998 (El Nino), 2007(record low sea ice extent), 2014 (hottest year), 2020 (Disintegration of ice sheet X) etc. I think establishing dedicated articles can help to understand the context of climate change better, and it would help to track remarkable events from the past. A list article could then offer an overview of the exceptional years. prokaryotes (talk) 17:46, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

This article isn't very long. For what it's worth, my suggestion would be to write the text you propose for these years as subsections here - maybe under an overarching section heading like Exceptional years. If they work out and they're getting long, they can be split out into separate article(s) per WP:SPLITOUT. --Nigelj (talk) 18:15, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Hmm, but this article is dedicated to the temperature records, adding a sub section with content about El Nino, or sea ice seems a bit to broad. Rather, once there are dedicated articles, sub sections here with the scope on temps, could then direct to the main article. prokaryotes (talk) 19:14, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

I'm also dubious, but that's only because the proposal is entirely vague and I'm not feeling creative at the moment. If you develop a draft in your userspace, then the rest of us would have an example, and then we could give a more substantive response. NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 00:38, 20 May 2015 (UTC)

Okay, will prepare something with a ruff outline, maybe in the next 24 hours, maybe a bit later (: prokaryotes (talk) 01:12, 20 May 2015 (UTC)

We already have articles on significant individual weather events, e.g. Blizzard of 1977, 2006 European heat wave. I suppose a page like Weather of 2014 could provide a unifying home to discuss the events of the year. One should keep in mind though that on the time scale of a single year, most of the interesting bits are actually extreme weather processes, whereas climate (and climate change) is generally less of an issue. Dragons flight (talk) 05:44, 20 May 2015 (UTC)

Just noticed these articles for events and individual years https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014 prokaryotes (talk) 17:19, 21 May 2015 (UTC)

Surface and ocean record sub-section

For NOAA 2014 : +0.69 ± 0.09 : 8/10 records listed are on this range and we can see on the graph a little below that ranking annual records on this manner seems not really relevant.Atchoum (talk) 23:53, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Update template

I've added the "out of date" template to a section whose data predate the Cambrian Explosion (j/k, but they are seriously old). If someone fixes that, I'd be delighted to see it removed. CometEncke (talk) 18:30, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

structure

It seems to me that the ordering on this page doesn't make much sense. It should start with what goes into the 'instrumental record' (i.e. GHCN and similar collections of weather stations, iCOADS and Argo for the ocean etc.). Then it should discuss the global collations (which are estimates of the global mean anomaly, not instrumental measurements per se), after which discussions of the warmest years and uncertainties makes sense. thoughts?Aproposdenada (talk) 02:59, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

Disagree. If you come here you most likely want to know what temperatures have been doing. This should probably focus much more on trends than warmest years. Certainly there should be more explanation of what goes in eg SST from satellites and land temperatures from x number of weather stations, but I think this is more technical detail for later in the article.

Some helpful materials regarding 2016

Here is a comparison of the rank order of years among the five groups releasing their data yesterday: [22]. Everyone agreed that 2016 was a new record, though not everyone agreed it was the third record in a row.

Here is a useful discussion from the UK Met Office discussing the five groups results (plus ERA-Interim) and why there are differences: [23] Dragons flight (talk) 09:10, 19 January 2017 (UTC)

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2019 the second most warmest year

WE should update this article and add 2019 in the second place — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.154.23.73 (talk) 13:59, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

quasi-global coverage

There is no "quasi-global coverage" of stations in 1880. There was no station in Antarctica, 2 station in south america, in allmost every land in asia was no station, 2 stations in africa, and no reliable data from auatralia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:4DD5:70D0:0:4446:25C8:1236:C1E4 (talk) 12:46, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

Seems like you’ve been misled by whoever peddled you that information. See here for an indication of observational coverage in 1880: [24] TimOsborn (talk) 20:20, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Possible source of confusion

"Absolute Temperature" normally refers to temperature scales that start at absolute zero. There doesn't seem to be an article for the sense of the phrase that is used in this article. ZFT (talk) 21:34, 19 October 2021 (UTC)

Removed content about global temperatures

I've removed this content because it was messy and unsourced (should it be reinstated but properly done?): Trends in global temperatures since January 1979 (the beginning of the satellite temperature record), measured in degrees Celsius per decade, at as 31 October 2019: Instrumental record: NOAA: +0.171 GISS (NASA): +0.185 HadCrut (UK Met Office): +0.171 Berkeley (Air): +0.188 Berkeley (Water): +0.165 JMA (Japan): +0.138 Satellite Record: RSS: +0.206

UAH: +0.130 EMsmile (talk) 14:36, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

A question about the article title

I am wondering if the article title is ideal (perhaps there has been a long discussion about it in the past; I couldn't find much in the talk archives). On its own, I find it hard to grasp for lay persons. I am wondering if a title like this might be better: “Recorded earth surface temperature since 1850” (similar to “Retreat of glaciers since 1850”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retreat_of_glaciers_since_1850), or variations thereof. Shouldn't the word "Earth" or "surface" be part of the title? Interestingly, these are the redirects to this article that are so far in place:

• Surface temperature record
• Historical temperature record
• Temperature record since 1880
• GISTEMP (redirect page)
• Instrumental temperature history
• Average surface temperature
• Warmest years on record
• Hottest years on record
• Warmest decades on record (redirect to section "Warmest decades")
• Hottest year on record (redirect to section "Warmest years")
• Hottest years (redirect to section "Warmest years")

Also, have we covered the main search terms that people might put into Wikipedia and placed redirects for them? EMsmile (talk) 22:56, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

• The present title aptly distinguishes from proxy-based studies, and I think this distinction should be placed in the lede to simplify for the lay reader. It looks like the proxy-instrumental distinction isn't even in the article body at present; this distinction could be remedied fairly concisely through ordinary editing. I'm definitely against pinning the article down to a particular year since some record pre-date 1850 by almost two centuries (see File:20190731 Central England Temperature (CET) (annual mean, beginning in 1659).png). And it may be more than a question of brevity to add "Earth..." and "surface..." since it might be a good idea to include measurements other than these. —RCraig09 (talk) 23:38, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

I've amended the lede to distinguish from proxy-based reconstructions, and to remove the "surface" limitation from the first sentence. —RCraig09 (talk) 00:33, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

Thanks. That's making it a little bit clearer. When I read the title of the article I ask myself: temperature of what? And what kind of record? The second question is because the English word "record" is so ambivalent (think "record heat wave". I would be in favour of a different word if possible? In terms of what we're measuring, the first sentence now says "the temperature of Earth's climate system". As a layperson I still find that unclear because I would think that temperatures would relate to either air, surface or water. But what is the temperature of Earth's climate system? I guess that's somehow everything together? (OK, I checked climate system and understand a little better now). How about "instrumental temperature data of Earth's climate system"? (I know it's a bit lengthier but apart from that, is is more accurate?).EMsmile (talk) 17:21, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

Good points... I've simplified the language further, but see my edit comment. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:45, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

I am suggesting "instrumental temperature data of Earth's climate system" as a new title of this article. Comments? (I forgot to sign this, it's old now but still: EMsmile (talk) 15:11, 24 March 2022 (UTC))

Proposal regarding the lead (reusing content from the climate change article

I am wondering if we should copy those paragraphs from the main "climate change" article, section "observed temperature rise", that relate to instrumental temperature record to the lead of the article. They are likely better than what is there at the moment, given that the climate change article is WP:FA. I mean some of the paragraphs from here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change#Observed_temperature_rise EMsmile (talk) 17:23, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

I have made a related proposal here on the climate change article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Climate_change#Suggestion_about_the_section_on_%22observed_temperature_rise%22 EMsmile (talk) 15:57, 24 March 2022 (UTC)

The section "Regional temperature changes"

In my opinion, the section "Regional temperature changes" should stay rather small (like it is now) as otherwise it might start to overlap with effects of climate change. If people disagree with my suggestion, please suggest what kind of content should go there? I see it more as a summary and link across to the other article. EMsmile (talk) 15:20, 24 March 2022 (UTC)

This section is much more relevant to Climate variability and change#Variability between regions than to Effects of climate change. The instrumental temperature record relates to climate change itself, much more than to climate change's effects. I've just added a navigational link to Climate variability and change#Variability between regions. I'm OK with this section remaining small, though at present it's actually tiny! —RCraig09 (talk) 16:56, 24 March 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 17 March 2022

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: no consensus. While some shortcomings have been identified with the present title, the discussion has failed to come up with an alternative which better satisfies WP:CRITERIA. (closed by non-admin page mover) Colin M (talk) 15:54, 25 March 2022 (UTC)

---

Instrumental temperature record → Instrumental temperature data of Earth's climate system – To make it clearer to our readers what this article is all about EMsmile (talk) 15:41, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

See also discussion so far here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Instrumental_temperature_record#A_question_about_the_article_title EMsmile (talk) 15:41, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

oppose - completely pointless and very hard to type or remember. Have you really nothing better to do with your time? William M. Connolley (talk) 16:01, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

And you, do you have "nothing better to do with your time" than attack and insult people on a Wikipedia talk page?! Very disappointing, especially coming from an experienced editor. Just for the record I spent about 4 hours improving this article today. Your kind of comment is very disappointing and hurtful at the end of a long and hard work day. If you don't like my suggestion fine. But an attack like "completely pointless" and "Have you really nothing better to do with your time?" is uncalled for. EMsmile (talk) 16:33, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

Sorry, but "completely pointless" isn't an attack; if you're seeing it as one, then you need to back off a bit and try to regain balance. As to my time... I would like to not be wasting it opposing pointless moves; but your idea would make wiki worse, so I feel obliged to oppose it for the common good William M. Connolley (talk) 10:18, 18 March 2022 (UTC)

Oppose. I think the word "temperature" already suggests climate, and adding "Earth" is unnecessary as there are no competing articles for other planets. I also think "record" is preferable to "data" since "data" suggests an unorganized collection. The "of" in "of Earth's climate system" suggests a single measurement of the entire climate system, whereas the measurements are organized by time and location. The present title is WP:concise and is well explained in the opening sentence. —RCraig09 (talk) 16:27, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

The present title is unclear. It is unclear because: the temperature of what is the content of this article? The fact that the first sentence explains it is irrelevant in my opinion. The article title should be self explanatory. Currently it is not. Well let's see if we get more inputs from other people. Maybe my proposal will be shot down in flames by lots of people, like William M. Connolley did already, let's see. One is still allowed to make a suggestion and not be ridiculed, right? EMsmile (talk) 16:37, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

I've had another idea: "Global instrumental temperature record". This would only add one word to the title but would make it at least somewhat clearer what it's all about. EMsmile (talk) 17:17, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

I wasn't ridiculing you. I understand that the present title treats WP:conciseness as being more important than complete WP:precision, and there are often trade-offs when renaming. Here, I don't see an obvious way to make the title exhaustively accurate without being almost as long as the opening sentence; adding "Global..." overlooks regional or local datasets such as Central England temperature to render that title change misdescriptive. Probably the main way readers arrive at this article is not by a keyword search, but rather than by being linked from an article related to climate change or the environment, in which case the readers already have that context in mind. —RCraig09 (talk) 19:09, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

(I wasn't referring to you when I said I don't appreciate being ridiculed. Thank you for being kind. :-) ). Thanks for the explanations. It's true that many readers will get to this article after being linked from a main article. That's also how I found it. But I think part of the reason might be that it has such an obscure title. Given that the topic is mega important (surely many people put into Google things like "is Earth getting warmer? Are global temperatures rising?"), I just feel the title doesn't do it justice. Mind you, there is also quite a bit of overlap with effects of climate change and climate change which also link to it (both naturally also take about changes in global temperatures). And I do think this article is mainly about global issues, global warming, not about regional temperature changes. Yes, it does use all sorts of datasets but the article is about the global situation. Whereas regional aspects can be in effects of climate change. The first sentence says "The instrumental temperature record is a record of temperatures within Earth's climate based on direct, instrument-based measurements of air temperature and ocean temperature." When I read "Earth's climate system" I think of "global". That's why I thought that maybe "global" could be a good shorthand for "Earth's climate system". - It might be that I still misunderstand the purpose of this article. Would you say it's more about the methodology that is being used to measure global temperatures rather than the predictions that are coming out of the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report? EMsmile (talk) 08:49, 18 March 2022 (UTC)

This article is mainly about the temperature records themselves (which includes raw datasets) and data collection, organization, robustness, etc—peruse the table of contents. It's natural, I suppose, for editors to also add content as to what the records show (in terms of global warming), but what the records show is the central focus in other articles. —RCraig09 (talk) 15:59, 18 March 2022 (UTC)

Support the suggestion Global instrumental temperature record or how about Worldwide instrumental temperature data - neutral on the original suggestion. Chidgk1 (talk) 10:57, 20 March 2022 (UTC)

Some of the article relates to less-than-global temperature records, such as Central England temperature and El Nino/La Nina internal (regional) variations. —RCraig09 (talk) 16:45, 20 March 2022 (UTC)

Regarding this sentence: "It's natural, I suppose, for editors to also add content as to what the records show (in terms of global warming), but what the records show is the central focus in other articles.", Rcraig09? Are you saying the article is supposed to be about the methodology and not the actual findings of the data? If not, then where is that data meant to sit? At effects of climate change? If so, then we should perhaps move that content across now? Or how do you envision ensuring that the same content about, for example, regional variations is not added here and also at effects of climate change in future? I think we should get the structure of the article so clear so that future editors don't feel the need to add the same information in two places. Also I don't understand what you meant with the Central England temperature thing. That is mentioned exactly once in the article and only in the lead with this sentence: "The longest-running temperature record is the Central England temperature data series, which starts in 1659." (it should have a reference to go with it and it should also be mentioned in the main text?). In which sense does that one sentence contradict that the article is about the global situation? It is NOT about the situation in one particular country. EMsmile (talk) 09:12, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

Also, when I read "temperature records" I automatically think of peak values ("hottest month on record"). That's why I find the term "record" sub-optimal here. Chidgk1 suggested "Worldwide instrumental temperature data" which I think would work. But there's still the question if it might be better to cull it down to be only about the methodology and rather put the findings of the temperature measurements into effects of climate change. Pinging Femkemilene with respect to the potential overlap with effects of climate change. EMsmile (talk) 09:12, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

We should not move information about "climate change" sic to "effects of climate change". The section "Observed and future changes in temperature" is solely a background section to put other sections into context (how much warmer is it now, how much warmer is it likely to get), and should remain short (4 paragraphs / no subheadings).

Agree that record is the standard term for this, and not convinced of the alternatives. Don't know if there is one that is scientifically accurate, and not confusing. Femke (talk) 17:16, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

@EMsmile: I think this discussion shows miscellaneous observations of how the present title is not ideal, but without a specific suggestion of a title that is ideal. I won't respond to each of your points, but I think the distinguishing purpose of this article (see its Table of Contents) is to emphasize temperature record(s) that are based on instrumental readings rather than proxy deductions. The present title captures this purpose extremely WP:concisely and rather WP:precisely. Like most Wikipedia articles, the first sentence clarifies what the title actually encompasses. Without a clear consensus of an undeniably better title, I don't see a reason to change it. —RCraig09 (talk) 20:24, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

OK, no worries. Let's close the discussion then. Maybe one day in future someone can think of a more ideal title. Shall I remove the "move" tag or wait until someone else closes the discussion officially? EMsmile (talk) 14:37, 23 March 2022 (UTC)

Either way is fine with me. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:41, 23 March 2022 (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.