Originally Posted by livefree

Another long refuted denier cult myth.

Key claim against global warming evaporates

Satellite and weather balloon data based on faulty analyses, studies find

By Ker Than
updated 2:51 p.m. PT, Thurs., Aug 11, 2005

For years, skeptics of global warming have used satellite and weather balloon data to argue that climate models were wrong and that global warming isn't really happening.

Now, according to three new studies published in the journal Science, it turns out those conclusions based on satellite and weather balloon data were based on faulty analyses.

The atmosphere is indeed warming, not cooling as the data previously showed.
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While surface thermometers have clearly shown that the Earth's surface is warming, satellite and weather balloon data have actually suggested the opposite, that the atmosphere was cooling.

Scientists were left with two choices: either the atmosphere wasn't warming up, or something was wrong with the data.

"But most people had to conclude, based on the fact that there were both satellite and balloon observations, that it really wasn't warming up," said Steven Sherwood, a geologists at Yale University and lead author of one of the studies.

Oops!
Sherwood examined weather balloons known as radiosondes, which are capable of making direct measurements of atmospheric temperatures.

For the past 40 years, radiosonde temperature data have been collected from around the world twice each day, once during the day and once at night.

But while nighttime radiosonde measurements were consistent with climate models and theories showing a general warming trend, daytime measurements actually showed the atmosphere to be cooling since the 1970's.

Sherwood explains these discrepancies by pointing out that the older radiosonde instruments used in the 1970's were not as well shielded from sunlight as more recent models. What this means as that older radiosondes showed warmer temperature readings during the day because they were warmed by sunlight.

"It's like being outside on a hot day—it feels hotter when you are standing in the direct sun than when you are standing in the shade," Sherwood said.

Nowadays, radiosondes are better insulated against the effects of sunlight, but if analyzed together with the old data—which showed temperatures that were actually warmer than they really were—the overall effect looked like the troposphere was cooling.

The discrepancy between surface and atmospheric measurements has been used by for years by skeptics who dispute claims of global warming.

"Now we're learning that the disconnect is more apparent than real," said Ben Santer, an atmospheric scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and a lead author of another of the studies.

Argument evaporates
According to Santer, the only group to previously analyze satellite data on the troposphere -- the lowest layer in Earth's atmosphere -- was a research team headed by Roy Spencer from University of Alabama in 1992.

"This was used by some critics to say 'We don't believe in climate models, they're wrong,'" Santer told LiveScience. "Other people used the disconnect between what the satellites told and what surface thermometers told us to argue that the surface data were wrong and that earth wasn't really warming because satellites were much more accurate."

The Alabama researchers introduced a correction factor to account for drifting in the satellites used to sample Earth's daily temperature cycles.

But in another Science paper published today, Carl Mears and Rank Wentz, scientists at the California-based Remote Sensing Systems, examined the same data and identified an error in Spencer's analysis technique.

After correcting for the mistake, the researchers obtained fundamentally different results: whereas Spencer's analysis showed a cooling of the Earth's troposphere, the new analysis revealed a warming.

Using the analysis from Mears and Wentz, Santer showed that the new data was consistent with climate models and theories.

"When people come up with extraordinary claims -- like the troposphere is cooling -- then you demand extraordinary proof," Santer said. "What's happening now is that people around the world are subjecting these data sets to the scrutiny they need."

© 2009 LiveScience.com. All rights reserved.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.)





So sary, prove global warming isn't a huge problem, and see if we can't refute your 'proof'. C'mon little dude, show us all why you're so convinced.



The way you put it makes it seem you still think the Earth is flat. LOL.

Beyond that you're just being absurd if you think it wasn't really a "FACT" that the Earth was round until it was "proven".

"fact: noun
1 : something that has actual existence : a matter of objective reality"



Even besides the fact that you still seem to think the world is flat, your whole statement is one of the stupidest things I've ever heard.

Global warming and the climate changes that it is producing are very real and scientifically well observed and will cause great human suffering in the decades and centuries to come and those are facts that certainly don't depend on ideologically blinded, scientifically illiterate denier cultists accepting them as "FACT".

Originally Posted by Anthony1

Global warming is the worst debate ever. Look at you people.

Originally Posted by Frogger

With each passing day more and more scientists are saying that AGW is simply not happening. The steamroller has slowed, stopped and is reversing direction.

Originally Posted by Saryk

Good way to spin what I had said. I stated that People thought the world was flat, yes it wasn’t. But until someone proved the Earth was round, everyone thought it was flat. You know showing the other side they are incorrect. Which your side has yet to do..............

Originally Posted by Saryk

And besides did you even look at the links I provided. NASA a cultist organization, how much Kool-Aid have your been drinking….

Originally Posted by livefree

Actually, sary, you AGW denier cultists have been shown to be "incorrect" and full of beans a thousand times on this forum, using the mountains of evidence that the world's climate scientists have accumulated. Like most of your brethren in your cult, you apparently stick your fingers in your ears and shout LA-LA-LA-LA every time the evidence is presented to you. You have no actual evidence for your "belief" that AGW is false, it is just an article of faith for you, based on your right wing ideology and your obvious lack of education in the sciences.



Your 'link' to NASA leads nowhere and the rest are right wing blogs.

Originally Posted by Frogger

Some are lying and some are simply relying on faulty data. The results are the same though, an overblown panic about something that isn't even happening.

Originally Posted by Saryk

http://science.nasa.gov/newhome/head...d06oct97_1.htm

Fixed.............

For someone talking about right wing news sources, very convenient that you use a very left wing news source. Bring some unbiased news source next time………….

Originally Posted by MannieD

From your link:
"Unlike the surface-based temperatures, global temperature measurements of the Earth's lower atmosphere obtained from satellites reveal no definitive warming trend over the past two decades. The slight trend that is in the data actually appears to be downward. The largest fluctuations in the satellite temperature data are not from any man-made activity, but from natural phenomena such as large volcanic eruptions from Mt. Pinatubo, and from El Niño. So the programs which model global warming in a computer say the temperature of the Earth's lower atmosphere should be going up markedly, but actual measurements of the temperature of the lower atmosphere reveal no such pronounced activity."

So why did he change his mind in this more recent article :
"“Global warming” refers to the global-average temperature increase that has been observed over the last one hundred years or more."

Originally Posted by livefree

Over the next decade, as the consequences of these delaying tactics become more obvious and more deadly, it is my hope that those responsible will be brought up on charges of 'crimes against humanity' and hung like Nazi war criminals.