cc: "Hulme Mike (E-mail)" , "Mearns, Linda (E-mail)" , "Wratt, David (E-mail)" , "Whetton, Peter" , "Jones, Roger" , "Hennessy, Kevin" date: Tue, 3 Aug 1999 12:25:00 +1000 from: "Pittock,Barrie" subject: RE: Chapter 3. to: 'Timothy Carter' Dear Tim, Sorry to not be pulling my weight on Chapter 3 - I will try to look at it again after getting a prelim. draft of 12 out to local reviewers later this week. Meanwhile, the question of the change in Precip. maps in the "Interim Characterizations..." document: The point is NOT whether the other authors howl in protest at having their regions blanked out, but which representation of the results is appropriate to giving the best advice on what changes to expect. As the object is NOT to prove that change will occur, but rather to provide the best estimate of it, plus uncertainty, I think the obviously best solution is to show all results, with the scatter plots to show relation to natural variability. But I have accepted Mike's compromise for the stuff he is supplying to the WWF, which is to show results at one s.d. If Mike can that for WWF, then he must be set up to do it for IPCC, or I would have thought so. If he/you do not do so, I would have thought you were misleading authors into thinking the changes in the blanked out regions are not of practical importance, and this is clearly wrong - they matter a lot in terms of implicit changes in the frequency of extremes, and e.g., in the frequency of successive droughts which might threaten a given water-dependent enterprise. The great danger of doing things the way we are, in our rush to prepare these IPCC reports, is that we are not submitting this stuff to peer review before using it. This makes it even more important that we bend over backwards to get it right. I know it is a bother, but that is life. I am genuinely sorry to be such a stickler about it, but there we are. Best regards, Barrie. Dr A. Barrie Pittock Post-Retirement Fellow*, Climate Impact Group CSIRO Atmospheric Research, PMB 1, Aspendale 3195, Australia Tel: +61 3 9239 4527, Fax: +61 3 9239 4688, email: WWW: http://www.dar.csiro.au/res/cm/impact.htm * As from 1 March 1999 I have become a CSIRO Post-Retirement Fellow. This means I do not have administrative responsibilities, and am working part-time, primarily on writing for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Please refer any administrative matters or contract negotiations for the CIG to Dr. Peter Whetton, the new Group Leader, at , tel. +61 3 9239 4535. "Far better an approximate answer to the right question which is often vague, than an exact answer to the wrong question which can always be made precise." J.W. Tukey as cited by R. Lewin, Science 221,636-639. > -----Original Message----- > From: Timothy Carter [SMTP:tim.carter@vyh.fi] > Sent: Monday, 2 August 1999 22:58 > To: Pittock,Barrie > Subject: Re: Chapter 3. > > Barrie, > > I have noted your flagged points for Ch 3, and I did see some of the > correspondence with Mike about the WWF scenarios, etc. so I understand > your > concerns on that. > > I'm not sure about the feasibility of replacing all of the maps Mike has > produced with "more tolerant" 1 SD limited maps. I see your point, but > perhaps we only need to act on this if we get howls of protest from the > authors whose regions are blanked out on the maps. I suppose it might have > been better (though tricky to do in a user-friendly way) to show changes > in > ALL regions with a separate shading mask over 1 SD or 2 SD modelled > natural > variability. However, recall that the scatter plots, when they're ready, > will show ALL information, albeit for regional domains chosen by us. > > Please remind Peter about the papers to send - I am in the office Tuesday > before leaving for London Wednesday morning. > > In addition, I hope that Linda will be in touch with you about updating > section 3.7. Since neither of you will be in attendance, we won't be > dealing much with this section in London - I am relying on you two to help > me out ready for the First-order draft! > > I also appreciate that you have Ch 12 to work with too. > > Best regards, > > Tim > > > ************************************************ > > Dr. Timothy Carter > Finnish Environment Institute > Box 140, Kesäkatu 6, FIN-00251 Helsinki, FINLAND > > Tel: +358-9-40300-315 > Fax: +358-9-40300-390 > Email: tim.carter@vyh.fi > > ************************************************