-- by Horatio Algeranon
To divine the trend on a 10-year scale
The following method will not fail:
Consult a fellow with Y-shaped stick
Who knows the ancient dowsing trick
For finding water underground
(Don't laugh, the science here is sound.)
He'll use the stick like dowsers do,
On temperatures from the Hadley CRU.
If it points down, our work is done.
If it points up, it's just the sun.
The following method will not fail:
Consult a fellow with Y-shaped stick
Who knows the ancient dowsing trick
For finding water underground
(Don't laugh, the science here is sound.)
He'll use the stick like dowsers do,
On temperatures from the Hadley CRU.
If it points down, our work is done.
If it points up, it's just the sun.
Added May 10
To find the temperature trend, some folks rely on "witching", while others (eg, Tamino: Five Years) use simple averaging.
Which do you trust?
Witching?
Or averaging?
Witching?
Or averaging?
Data points are successive non-overlapping 5-year means. Smoothed curves are a lowess smooth of the original data. (Graph by Tamino)
The effect of averaging is to smooth out the "bumps" (ups and downs from year to year) caused by "noise" (el Nino, la nina, etc), leaving only the "trend" which you can see is quite clearly upward -- despite what the man with the dowsing stick might tell you.
