Comments on: Loehle and Moberg

By: MarkW

MarkW — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 16:10:57 +0000

This is a very different situation from usual multiproxy studies which use sophisticated methods to ensure that a proxys weight in the final result reflects its ability to record some variance in the temperature field (whether local or not).

Translation: Those proxies that show what I’m looking for count more than those that don’t.

By: steve mosher

steve mosher — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 13:56:59 +0000

re32. yes. I lean toward camp, but my slow response here wouldnt show that

By: Neil Haven

Neil Haven — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 06:24:51 +0000

I would second Bender’s comment regarding JEG. It appears JEG’s work is on the right track: clearly state a parameterized error model for the proxies then use Monte Carlo to estimate confidence intervals. Then people can shift their efforts to more productive arguments about the sources of error, the appropriateness of particular error models, and their parameterizations. That smells like progress to me.

By: lucia

lucia — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 04:18:57 +0000

@pp — 40
It appears some snark about JEG comments only being open to the “team” and my grousing about blogger comments may be a bit misplaced.

It appears JEG has posts open for comments generally, and a few are restricted. That’s a bit unusual for blogs– but it’s also fine. I happened to want to make what I thought an encouraging comment on the open letter, but had no particular comment on the other articles.

In cases were comments are truly open, it appears JEG also chose the option that permits people to log in without logging into their blogger account– so JEG is really and truly open for comments most of the time. (That said: I still don’t like blogger’s interface, but that’s hardly JEG’s fault. Blogger is free. So, even though I would love JEG to spend the $50 or so a year of his money to buy a domain name run a WordPress blog for my convenience, using blogger is hardly nefarious.)

By: bender

bender — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 02:54:09 +0000

JEG wants answers. But to get answers, he needs data. And to get data, he needs collaborations. Power to the man looking for answers.

By: jeez

jeez — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 02:42:28 +0000

RE 26 Lucia:

Comments on this blog are restricted to team members.

Think the irony is intentional?

By: bender

bender — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 02:36:39 +0000

Furthermore, JEG appears to be a man of action. Rather than whine about Loehle he is looking into Monte Carlo bootstrap methods as a way of calculating robust confidence intervals. If he’s so agenda-driven, why would he waste his time doing such a laborious, yet honest calculation? Skeptics should welcome his efforts to clarify the amount of uncertainty on the MWP. Skeptics should welcome him bringing statistical rigor to the Mann lab. Moreover he appears to be accepting of the principles of disclosure and due diligence.

By: bender

bender — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 02:09:25 +0000

Mike B,
Your motive hunting is leading you astray. JEG appears by all counts to be a free-thinking person. No one is “obsessed” with JEG. His perspective has value. Calling him a 20-something the way you did is an ad hominem attack. Are you going to dismiss Kristen Bynres because of her age? His “objective” (which you seem to mistrust) appears to be robust estimation of confidence intervals. This is a serious flaw in the Loehle paper, and I agree with his judgement on that count. His comment that Loehle (2007) is “pseudoscience” is about as unfair as labelling MBH9x “pseudoscience” (Although the papers have very different problems, they do share a common problem: confidence interval estimation.) Using that term is a rookie mistake that he may regret, but I doubt it. Loehle certainly isn’t all broken up about it. Finally, in what position are you to judge his statistical competence? Tell us some things that he’s doing wrong and how he could fix them.

By: _Jim

_Jim — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 02:01:15 +0000

with this twenty-something who is close-minded about AGW, and not nearly as competent in statistics as half a dozen or so CA principals or regulars? If you think you’re going to “win him over,” you’re just being naive.

For a moment, I thought the object of this discussion was sod …

By: BarryW

BarryW — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 01:42:17 +0000

2.1 Use of vague, exaggerated or untestable claims
2.2 Over-reliance on confirmation rather than refutation
2.3 Lack of openness to testing by other experts
2.4 Lack of progress
2.5 Personalization of issues
2.6 Use of misleading language

Seems to be a good fit to some of Mann’s work.