Ross Anderson wrote:
This is why this story is wrong:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/05/27/climate-skeptics-think-you-shouldnt-worry-about-melting-polar-ice-heres-why-theyre-wrong/
Chris Mooney (in the WaPo) is correct that "Melting of... ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps can contribute substantially to sea level rise — whereas sea ice melting cannot." Ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps are examples of what is called "grounded ice," meaning that it rests on the ground, rather then floating on the ocean. When grounded ice melts, the meltwater generally finds its way into the oceans, eventually, affecting sea-level.
But it's a straw-man, because Taylor never suggested otherwise.
Foul ball -- Strike One on Mooney.
When Mooney gets around to discussing grounded ice, he blunders very badly. He wrote, "The chief threat that the melting poles pose to the globe is the way they can raise sea level." But the reality is that there clearly has been no overall acceleration of grounded ice melt due to anthropogenic GHG emissions, because the rate of sea-level rise hasn't accelerated at all in the last 85 years.
Swing and a miss -- Strike Two on Mooney!
Mooney also blundered by credulously citing the discredited Chapman piece. Chapman's response is small on facts and big on insults, and very big on unintentional irony.
For instance, Chapman says that those, like Taylor, who disagree with him, "either lack a basic understanding of science or are intentionally misleading in order to promote an agenda." But then Chapman ironically plotted an inappropriate linear regression of data which obviously isn't linear.
It was also ironic that Mr. Chapman railed about "cherry-picking," yet started his own graph with 1979, with no mention of the fact (despite the fact that Mr. Taylor had mentioned it in his article) that 1979 was a peak year for Arctic sea ice extent (though not Southern Ocean ice).
Satellite measurements of sea ice via passive microwave instruments did not begin with Nimbus-7 in 1979. They began in 1973, with Nimbus-5.
1979 was a peak in Arctic sea-ice extent because it was the tail end of the 1970s global cooling scare. You can see the 1979 peak in this graph from the IPCC's 1995 Second Assessment Report (SAR), which starts with the 1973 Nimbus-5 measurements, instead of the 1979 Nimbus-7 measurements:
http://suyts.files.wordpress.com/2013/11/image432.png
Nimbus 5 was the first satellite with a microwave band instrument which could view ice through clouds. It collected data from 11 December 1972 through 16 May 1977. Unfortunately, NASA has apparently lost the data from Nimbus 5, Nimbus 6, and Seasat 1. That provides a convenient excuse for starting graphs of sea ice extent in 1979, with Nimbus 7 data. So starting sea ice graphs in 1979 isn't necessarily an intentional cherry-pick, but it has the same effect as using an intentionally cherry-picked starting point.
Taylor compared 2013-2015 (current) to the average levels of the 1970s, 1980s & 1990s, and noticed that they're essentially unchanged. Which is right. The trend is approximately zero except for slight dips in 2006-2007 and 2011-2012, and a slight peak around 1979.
Chapman's "linear trend" wasn't a trend, it was an artifact of what happens when a linear regression is calculated from data that has a few noise spikes in it near one end.
Three Strikes, yer OUT, Mooney!
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Chris Mooney (in the WaPo) is correct that "Melting of... ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps can contribute substantially to sea level rise — whereas sea ice melting cannot." Ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps are examples of what is called "grounded ice," meaning that it rests on the ground, rather then floating on the ocean. When grounded ice melts, the meltwater generally finds its way into the oceans, eventually, affecting sea-level.
But it's a straw-man, because Taylor never suggested otherwise.
Foul ball -- Strike One on Mooney.
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Ross Anderson, do you know who Chris Mooney is?
Chris Mooney (in the WaPo) is correct that "Melting of... ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps can contribute substantially to sea level rise — whereas sea ice melting cannot." Ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps are examples of what is called "grounded ice," meaning that it rests on the ground, rather then floating on the ocean. When grounded ice melts, the meltwater generally finds its way into the oceans, eventually, affecting sea-level.
But it's a straw-man, because Taylor never suggested otherwise.
[Please note: Your comment will be reviewed by Forbes staff before appearing on the site.]
Chris Mooney (in the WaPo) is correct that "Melting of... ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps can contribute substantially to sea level rise — whereas sea ice melting cannot."
But... (to be cont'd)
Ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps are examples of what is called "grounded ice," meaning that it rests on the ground, rather then floating on the ocean. When grounded ice melts, the meltwater generally finds its way into the oceans, eventually, affecting sea-level.
But it's a straw-man, because Taylor never suggested otherwise. .. (to be cont'd)
[Please note: Your comment will be reviewed by Forbes staff before appearing on the site.]
Ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps are examples of what is called "grounded ice," meaning that it rests on the ground, rather then floating on the ocean. When grounded ice melts, the meltwater generally finds its way into the oceans, eventually, affecting sea-level.
But... (to be cont'd)
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I give up. Forbes isn't letting me post anything of substance. So here's my reply:
http://www.sealevel.info/forbes_reply_to_ross_anderson.html
