"Was 1934 the hottest year on record?"
No. Even if it had been true, events we've precipitated have overtaken this old #ClimateMyth, which found its roots in a peculiar set of circumstances.
This statistic was -always- irrelevant in the big picture:
"Zooming out of the USA - making up around 2% of the world's surface - to the whole globe, however, shows that 1934 was in fact a rather chilly year."
Finito. Done and dusted.
We've revised this #ClimateMythRebuttal.
What's the difference between the Little Ice Age and anthropogenic global warming?
Why doesn't the Little Ice Age (LIA) exculpate us from our climate oops?
Key terms: "little" and "global." Climate forcings acting together can produce powerful effects, but none so muscular as us.
We've updated our #ClimateMythRebuttal for this fizzled #ClimateBunk, now with at-a-glance treatment. Does it make sense? Let us know via the conveniently provided form at the article.
<p>The main driver of the warming from the Little Ice Age to 1940 was the warming sun with a small contribution from volcanic activity. However, solar activity leveled off after 1940 and the net influence from sun and volcano since 1940 has been slight cooling. Greenhouse gases have been the main contributor of warming since 1970.</p>
This week's #ClimateMythRebuttal refresh might be considered an appendix to last week's treatment of "hide the decline," a full explanation of the dendrochronological roots of the #Climategate fiasco. Critiques welcome!
There's basic irony in play here, given that recent divergence of tree growth from what's been typical for millennia seems to be our fault, while #ClimateScienceDeniers were going into a positive lather over a juicy pull-quote from stolen emails.
<p>The divergence problem is a physical phenomenon - tree growth has slowed or declined in the last few decades, mostly in high northern latitudes. The divergence problem is unprecedented, unique to the last few decades, indicating its cause may be anthropogenic. The cause is likely to be a combination of local and global factors such as warming-induced drought and global dimming. Tree-ring proxy reconstructions are reliable before 1960, tracking closely with the instrumental record and other independent proxies.</p>
Sound and fury signifying nothing and called #Climategate erupted 15 years ago, back when coastal flooding was less of a nuisance, alpine glaciers were larger and old temperature records still held.
If we had perfect instrumentation we could probably measure Climategate's success in making things a bit worse today. Procrastination was always Climategate's destination-- and here we are, warmer than need be.
We've updated this #ClimateMythRebuttal; reviews welcome!
Like a falling calendar leaf in a vintage cinematic calendar montage, here's our weekly release of rolling #ClimateMythRebuttal revisions.
This time it's about confusing climate models with weather prediction. Despite claims to the contrary, imperfect weather prediction skill does not speak to #ClimateModel validity.
Even less helpfully for climate model detractors, with steadily increasing skills climate models are showing distinct promise with seasonal climatic prediction duties.
Not only is human-caused #ClimateChange settled science by consensus of experts on climate itself, but signals of consilience confirming accidental climate change abound via indirectly related fields of inquiry.
Still, politicians and other "thought leaders" fall back on "science doesn't really know" when discussing our climate mess- the laziest reply.
Updated: our explanation of how science "knows" who owns climate change. Opinions solicited!
<p>Science is never 100% settled - science is about narrowing uncertainty. Different areas of science are understood with varying degrees of certainty. For example, we have a lower understanding of the effect of aerosols while we have a high understanding of the warming effect of carbon dioxide. Poorly understood aspects of climate change do not change the fact that a great deal of climate science is well understood.</p>
The PDO, or Pacific Decadal Oscillation is not responsible for global warming, as plainly indicated by "oscillation."
Oscillations don't produce monotonic trends, one-way movement. But this hasn't stopped #ClimateScienceDeniers working on behalf of the multi-trillion dollar fossil fuel industry from trying to confuse the public with the PDO.
We've updated our #ClimateMythRebuttal on the PDO, adding our new at-a-glance treatment. As always, feedback is welcome!
<p>PDO as an oscillation between positive and negative values shows no long term trend, while temperature shows a long term warming trend. When the PDO last switched to a cool phase, global temperatures were about 0.4C cooler than currently. The long term warming trend indicates the total energy in the Earth's climate system is increasing due to an energy imbalance.</p>
#ClimateChangeDenial variations on a theme of variability: "it's natural cycles."
Many cyclic influences control climate, spanning from millennia to months. Normal wavering is ideal fodder for deceiving the public.
We're seeing the combined influence of the El Niño Southern Oscillation -and- human-caused climate change right now. Which "wins?"
We've updated our #ClimateMythRebuttal on a statistical deceit for hiding the obvious secular trend of #GlobalWarming.
Refreshed with our at-a-glance treatment: "Human fingerprints on climate change rule out natural cycles."
This #ClimateMythRebuttal addresses #ClimateDisinformation centered on "climate's always changing," misdirection leading to various inapplicable truths. Orbital forcings, ENSO and the PDO and flood basalts are a few exculpated #ClimateChange truths-- none matter now.
The "it's cycles" truth that matters in our current predicament: we've broken the carbon cycle.
Taking all sources together, the long term overall trend of Earth's albedo is that of darkening, in part a positive feedback of warming.
This doesn't stop mental magicians such as the notorious Anthony Watts from inventing whatever story is necessary for confusing the public, including putting an opposite sign on albedo's trend.
In reality several factors are leading to decreased albedo.
Feedback (+ or - !) on our update of this #ClimateMythRebuttal appreciated!
Skeptical Science