McIntyre and McKitrick have done a great job casting doubt on the first part of the Mann "Hockey Stick" and I will be surprised if the IPCC can still retain it in its original form.
However, we are still up against the second part of the "Hockey Stick" the alleged surface temperature record, as promulgated by Jones, Hansen and Karl., which continues to claim that the current temperature is "unprecedented"
Very little has been done to challenge the accuracy and reliability of the surface record.
I am attaching my own modest attempt, which was originally submitted to Geophysical Research Letters but after interminable delays was originally published on John Daly’s website, where it can still be seen.
It consists of a study of the 5°x5° average temperatures, as calculated by Jones et al from 1900 to 1996, divided into rational regions. I show that there is great variability between boxes, and regions, with much discontinuity of records. I showed that the Russian/Siberia results had a large influence on the averages. McKitrick has shown that this is so, and that there are a large number of gaps in the Russian records. Also, I showed that many of the boxes depended on a very small number of records, in some cases one or two.
It is scandalous that they are allowed to get away with using such defective records. I would like to see a study to identify worthless and defective records and eliminate them from the averages. The Americans (e.g. Vose and Menne Climate Research 2004 2961-2971) have established that you need at least 25 stations for a fair average. They also showed great variability in instrumentation and record keeping, even in the USA. The methods for "correcting" the data have never been fully revealed. The Sea Surface data have been shown to be defective by Christy, Parker et al Geophys Res Letters 2001 Vol 38 183-186, but nothing has been done to correct them.
It is time for a scientific assault on the supposed surface record. Actual visits to key stations with a study of history, records, technical expertise, and instrumentation is needed. Can you find some keen young students who could get a grant to do some of this?
With much encouragement
Regards
Vincent Gray
Climate Audit 
6 Comments
The fact that the temperatures are averaged in 5×5 blocks is precisely the point – temperatures are intensive variables and cannot be simply “averaged” with any sensible meaning. Intensive variables are not countable quantities in themselves, but are weighting factors applied to a countable object.
The only time when simply averaging temperatures is correct is when identical thermometers are the objects that the temperatures are related to.
But then the average temperature so calculated is the average of the thermometers, not the atmosphere in which they are immersed.
It my mind demolishing the surface temperature record should be an easy matter if the essential difference between intensive and extensive variables is stressed as Ross and Steve did some years back in the Dr Thermos Chapter.
Quite frankly this computational error is recognised in ore-reserve computation 101.
The problem is that the concept of “global temperature” (with all of its theoretic flaws) has escaped Pandora’s Box. There’s no way to persuade people that such a concept has no real scientific foundation.
Also, Ross McKitrick co-authored the book “Taken By Storm” with Chris Essex, which has the chapter about Doctor Thermos. For those interested, the website is http://www.takenbystorm.info
Whoops, correct – Chris Essex, not Steve, my error.
Yes, Pandora’s box has been opened, but I have had some success arguing along that line, so it remains a potent weapon in the armoury. Of course isotherms are also problematical but their use is pretty well entrenched, so lifelong habits won’t be easily changed. This whole issue gives one a new appreciation of Galileo’s problems in his time.
I am no atmospheric scientist, which is a real advantage to see things from a different perspective… I challenge ‘climate change adepts’ to expose the age of the monitoring stations resp. their locations and urbanization progressing in their vicinity. I live in Spain, where experts agree not to understand a yota of the many “micro climates” making up the “generalized picture” for that country… They simply “forgot” to investigate. Where Prof. Seiler c.s. asserts that winter seasons in Europe are shortening and summer’s lasting longer, my gasoil consumption the last 5 Spanish years has grown some +33% due to considerable longer periods of continuous low(er) daily temperatures in my region (Granada-Altiplano) between October and April… For us here it appears as if the Ice Age is coming! Who measures what, how and where and how is his/her location changing due to urbanization and other, similar human influences (cutting woods etc.). A Pandora’s Box full of ‘weather chaos’ may have been open for a long time already…
Climate science predicts that the higher latitudes will warm the most. So, why not just check and see if the ice is melting in the cold parts of the planet. Is the arctic summer ice cap melting? Are glaciers all over the world melting? Is sea level rise accelerating? Is CO2 a greenhouse gas? The answer is yes to all. What more could one possibly need to know?
Re: steve johnston (#5),
Oh my god Steve, you are so passé.
Everything you say is wrong. oh exceot one.
Climate science predicts that the higher latitudes will warm the most. So, why not just check and see if the ice is melting in the cold parts of the planet.see NOAA/NCDC site ans NO
Is the arctic summer ice cap melting? See cryosphere site. ans NO
Are glaciers all over the world melting? NO glacias in alaska expanding. ans NO
Is sea level rise accelerating? NO nin some places it is now falling.
Is CO2 a greenhouse gas? The answer is yes to all. What more could one possibly need to know?
ans YES but 0.04% of atmosphere means it is a trace gas. I spent many years in research trying get gases to this level of purity, that 99.96% pure.!!!