You have seen more versions of global temperatures than most people and indeed I think you even question the meaning of a global temperature, as do I. I seek guidance. If I were to make a submission to the EPA, which has a link that goes gas emission > climate change including temperature > human health, which graph would you use to demonstrate temperature change in the instrumental period?

This is a problem that the EPA must take on if it is to be ethical in its action. It is so easy for them to choose a convenient one, so maybe they should be steered to one that has reasons for justification.

Steve: Ken, puh-leeze. Give me a break. I’m not trying to start a crusade on this thing. I’m just commenting on a topical issue, because I think that the “community” should realize that stonewalling, obstruction and non-transparency could have a price.

Steve, that was a rhetorical Steve M to which I referred and not necessarily you. I suspect that you have more faith in these apparent contradictions being ironed out under the current systems whereas my view would be more inline with changes coming from a change in the consensus thinking and not from the process working “right”.

My point is that, unless one has a popular “unpopular” cause to pursue and thus can obtain the help of a large organization in sympathy with the cause, all these contradictions will not be ironed out on a case by case basis.

It is important for people to point to these apparent contractions so we can better understand how the system works in practice as opposed to theory.

Ryan, IMO, it’s more that the people involved have no idea what an “engineering-quality” study looks like. Responses by climate scientists to my long standing request are always to tiny little articles, which, however meritorious they may be as articles, look nothing like engineering documents and merely demonstrate that the climate scientist in question doesn’t have a clue about what engineering does.

When I read this, I thought of very large scientific projects such as the Large Hadron Collider. Aside from the accelerator itself there are a number of detectors each of them costing tens of millions of dollars. The planning of such a facility must take into account the types of experiments that are possible and the cost of the infrastructure that is needed to perform them. This is essential so that decision makers can select those experiments that are of sufficient value to warrant the massive expenditure required to support them. From those decisions would flow the engineering plans for a multi-year construction cycle. For this to go ahead with any chance of success full scale engineering plans must have been drawn up. In the case of the LHC, there was a major mistake in the design of the superconducting magnets that cause an explosion when they were first powered up. The release of helium was of such extend that the building had to be evacuated. This is an example of why adequate engineering studies are necessary for such a project.

For my reading here, climate science projects are miniscule compared to the LHC, the Hubble telescope, multiple Mars launders etc. However the capacity for doing proper engineering planning must exist in the scientific community. To build the large physics experiments that they do, such capability is essential. The IPCC with its plans to reshape the world economy cannot plead ignorance of engineering planning capability. Such capabilities must be widespread among physicists, astronomers etc. If the IPCC chooses not to perform the necessary planning, it not for lack of capability in the physics community.