[Vision2020] National Snow Ice Data Center: Arctic Sea Ice Decline During June Continues Below Record 2007 Low Extent

[Paul Rumelhart]

Just to make sure I haven't skipped anything important, I'm going to 
comment on every last fucking thing in your post...

Ted Moffett wrote:
> If you don't have the time or are under duress, don't feel any 
> obligation respond to this post.  It's only Vision2020, after all...

I happen, gods willing, to have some free time this afternoon.

>  
> I have read your skeptical arguments regarding climate science over 
> and over and there was nothing fundamentally new in your last 
> response.  But maybe someone else reading your skeptical arguments 
> will find your comments useful.

But there was something new.  I'll get to that shortly.

>  
> Given the polarized politicized emotional nature of many discussions 
> on anthropogenic climate warming, it is necessary to repeat the peer 
> reviewed scientific consensus on this issue over and over, especially 
> as new peer reviewed scientific publications and evidence becomes 
> available (such as the 2009 MIT Integrated Global System Model:
> http://globalchange.mit.edu/resources/gamble/no-policy.html
> http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/2009JCLI2863.1 ),
> because of the powerful interests working to discredit this science.  
> Therefore I repeat basic points regarding climate science over and over.

I'm not sure that constant repetition is the best way to go about 
getting your points across, but that's up to you.  Also, as an aside, 
global climate models are not "evidence" of anything.  They can be 
useful in telling you where to look or how best to flesh out a 
hypothesis and they can be used to make predictions, but "evidence" 
involves real measurements of real things. 

>  
> But considering your admonition regarding "hesitating before 
> describing some climate change skeptics as
> having confirmation bias filters" I wonder why you again do not 
> address the "confirmation bias filtered website" that I referenced 
> regarding the 2010 Arctic sea ice extent trends.  This is after I 
> requested you address the specifics in my post, and the first 
> "specific" I mentioned that you were not addressing was this "climate 
> change skeptics confirmation bias filtered website"

Yes, I saw that you referenced it.

>  
> If you are going to offer condescending advice, you might defend this 
> advice or withdraw it, when evidence indicates the advice was ill 
> conceived.

Take this as a "defense" of that advice. 

>  
> Here is my first comment on this website in the thread on "National 
> Snow Ice Data Center: Arctic Sea Ice Decline During June Continues 
> Below Record 2007 Low Extent":
>  
> http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/2010-June/070679.html
>  
> "So much for the Arctic sea ice extent "recovery" promoted by some 
> climate change skeptics confirmation bias
> filtered websites (
> http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/04/29/another-arctic-sea-ice-milestone/ 
> ) as evidence to question the seriousness of anthropogenic climate 
> warming."

Yes, I did read that.  Yes, he was perhaps jumping the gun a bit.  As it 
turned out, sea ice extent dropped below the 2007 levels and has 
remained there for the last few weeks.  However, here is the point of my 
response:

You may be doing the same fucking thing.

Here is the current IARC-JAXA sea ice extent daily graph for July 3rd 
(I'm attaching the image to this email because if you go to the link 
tomorrow it will show tomorrows graph):

http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/AMSRE_Sea_Ice_Extent_L.png

Take a look at the graph.  When Anthony Watts made his blog post, the 
red line (2010) was way above the dark green line (2007).  See how the 
red line dropped below the dark green line around the beginning of 
June?  That's the point at which it started to look like Anthony Watt's 
blog posting was premature.  When you posted to V2020, the red line was 
below the dark green line and was running mostly parallel to both the 
dark green line (2007) and the light green line (2006), but looked like 
they might have been starting to converge.  That was when I posted that 
new bit of information you missed: that it's possible that those lines 
might converge at a later date, causing the 2010 data not to end up 
lower than the 2007 data for summer sea ice extent numbers.  Today, the 
lines are nearly crossing.  We'll have to watch over the next few days 
and see if they do actually cross.  If they do, then there is a pretty 
good chance that 2010 will stay above 2007 as the annual time for 
minimal sea ice extent approaches, which is in the September time frame.

So, basically, our argument went something like this:

Anthony Watts (paraphrased):  Ha!  2010 sea ice extent is going to be 
higher than 2007!  Naner-naner-naner!
You (paraphrased): Confirmation bias!
Me (paraphrased): Well, actually... he might be right.  Take care when 
thou useth the "confirmation bias" phrase, lest it rebound back upon thee!

We'll have to wait and see if he ends up being right.  Personally, I 
think that both you and Anthony Watts (who I have never met or 
corresponded with) should tone down your rhetoric.

> --------------
> Here is your response, a response that makes no mention of the 
> specific website content I specifically referred to above:
>  
> http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/2010-June/070688.html
>  
> "I'd suggest hesitating before describing some climate change skeptics 
> as having confirmation bias filters."
> --------------
> I responded to explain why I described this website as having a 
> "confirmation bias filter," and stated flatly that */I will not 
> hesitate to point out such a bias when it is clear it is present, in 
> the following response:/*
>  
> http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/2010-June/070695.html
>  
> "Please address the specifics of my post.  I have no clue why you 
> ignore my specific comment on the "climate change skeptics 
> confirmation bias filtered website" I referenced.  I implied that the 
> following website was describing the "recovery" in Arctic sea ice 
> through a bias confirmation filter.  This statement from this website 
> is an expression of what I meant:
>
> http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/04/29/another-arctic-sea-ice-milestone/
>
> "...the indications are that we’ll have another summer extent that is 
> higher
> than the previous year, for the third year in a row."

You had confused me here, since I thought that I *had* responded to both 
your post and his blog posting.

>
> Note that this statement was posted on April 29, 2010.  I doubt that 
> any competent climate scientist would issue such a statement at that 
> time of the year, knowing full well that many different variables 
> between April 29 and the final September maximum low Arctic sea ice 
> extent, could alter the
> outcome, so that the 2010 maximum low Arctic sea ice extent might be 
> either higher or lower than the previous year.  The statement under 
> discussion from this anthropogenic climate warming skeptic web site 
> amounts to nothing more than wishful thinking, inspired by the well 
> known bias of this website.
>
> I will not hesitate to point out a confirmation bias filter when it is 
> clear someone is apparently under the spell of one."
> ----------------
> In your last response below in this thread (National Snow Ice Data 
> Center: Arctic Sea Ice Decline During June Continues Below Record 2007 
> Low Extent), as I stated, you do not address what was the first point 
> I emphasized in the post you were answering, regarding the website 
> under discussion as having a "confirmation bias filter."  You 
> obviously found my statement regarding "confirmation bias filters" on 
> climate science previously of interest, given your advice to hesitate 
> regarding this description.  Therefore it is puzzling why you write 
> below that you did not respond to "everything in your post" but to "a 
> portion of it that interested me," then do not respond to what did 
> interest you, my description of a website as having a "confirmation 
> bias filter."

What interested me was not Anthony Watt's blog posting itself, it was 
the fact that you jumped in there with both feet exhibiting what I saw 
to be the same behavior you were condemning.

Perhaps it would be better if we didn't treat every single post as if it 
were  a debating class.  Try dropping the agenda and laying down the 
mantle of saving the world for a few minutes and just converse as if we 
were two buddies sipping beer with  access to the salient facts at our 
disposal.  If I end up being wrong, it won't invalidate everything a 
skeptic has ever said.  Likewise, if you end up being wrong about 
something, it won't invalidate the whole of the AGW theory.

Paul

(I've deleted the earlier emails in order to save some space.)

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