Shootout at the O Curry Corral

--by Horatio Algeranon

This is the tale of an epic fight
A battle between watts wrong and right
"Mediated" by the Climate Etcetera gal
A shootout at the O Curry Corral

The Cowboy leader is ol' Big Mac
Who led the FOI attack
And various and sundry email feuds
With Phil Jones and the Science Dudes

Mac's faithful steed is Mr. Edit
It's only fair to give him credit
For spreading manure far and near
To elevate the public fear.

The local sheriff is Wyatt Schmidt
Who wasn't going to idly sit
While lies were spread about the Dudes
Poisoning public attitudes.

Wyatt set out to tame the border
To restore the physical law and order
So lacking with the Cowboy crowd
Where bunk and slander are both allowed.

In the end, he'll win this fight
For the science determines who is right
Physical law is like a bullet
You can't dodge it, and you can't fool it.

For more on Mr. Edit, click here.

Of course, Tombstone is the place where this is all going down...and there have been rumors for some time now (all unconfirmed by science) that Global E. Warming is among its most famous interments.

God clears NOAA of any wrong-doing

or, the Department Of Commerce Inspector General does, at least.

-- by Horatio Algeranon

The Inspector General’s thorough review
Of emails stolen from East Anglia's CRU,


Cleared the NOAA of the allegation
Of “mishandling climate information”:


"No evidence of NOAA violations
Of Information Quality Act obligations"


"No evidence of NOAA manipulations
Of GHCN surface stations"


"No evidence of peer review evasion
Before release of information."


"No evidence of any improper behavior
In handling of the climate data."


A slap for Inhoax and the Stooges 3 
Who claim a Climate Conspiracy.

Inspector General’s Review of Stolen Emails Confirms No Evidence of Wrong-Doing by NOAA Climate Scientists

Fiddles and Lyers

-- by Horatio Algeranon

Fiddles and Lyres

And RomanM pyres

The hero Nero

Still inspires.

But the fiddle fiddling
And lyer lying
Prohibit progress
No denying.

 

Inspired by Tamino's post "While we fiddle..."

 

Though the common saw has it that "Nero fiddled while Rome burned", as pointed out by Kevin McKinney (the resident music expert) in the comments at Tamino's, Nero actually played the lyre (and undoubtedly was one too -- being Roman Emperor and all).

 

For more on fiddler fiddling and/or lyer lying, Horatio gives you The Middle Fiddle (Faddle).

 

 

 

Peeoor Review

--by Horatio Algeranon

Peer Review

Called "Poor Review"?

What to do??

Don't stew...

Or redo...

Just sue.

Inspired by the Real Climate post E&E Threatens a Libel Suit.

Horatio dedicated a stanza to E&E in I Love Stats 

I've an E&E paper that's hot off the press
It's all full of holes and it sure is a mess
While most wouldn't read it, unless under duress
I'll debunk it with glorious stats

But of course, no one ever sues an anonymuse (Can't get any more pathetic than that).

The Scientist and the Journalist

-- by Horatio Algeranon

(based on a stanza from "The Walrus and the Carpenter",
Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass, 1871. Original drawing by John Tenniel)

The time has come," the Scientist said,
"To talk of many things:
Of denial--and lies--and pseudo-science--
Of Koch Bros.--and Heartland flings--
And why the sea is getting hot...
And the climate canary sings."

H/T Eli Rabett.

The Blog Not Taken

-- by Horatio Algeranon

(based on Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken, 1920)

Two blogs diverged in a warming world
And sorry I could not reconcile both
And be one blogger, with Italian flag unfurled,
I looked down one to where it quarreled
With the gravity of warming and CO2 growth;


Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because there was logic and science there;
Though as for that, why should one care,
If in fact, "climatology is just a game"?


And both that morning equally lay
On internets no peer-reviewer had censored black.
Oh, I kept the second for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.


I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two blogs diverged in a warming world, and I --
I chose the one that was keen to deny
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost is one of Horatio's favorites and, for what it's worth (probably not much), Horatio humbly begs his forgiveness -- for the above and other sacrilege (James Hansen Sits and Stopping by Winnebagos on a Hot Summer Evening).

Scientists (and Mother Nature) are not above The Law

-- by Horatio Algeranon

We'll pass a bill on what will be

The "Climate in-Sensitivity"

Suspend the law of gravity

Fix the value of pi at 3

Show them that the laws of Nature

Are no match for the Legislature.

Climate Sensitivity is

"usually expressed as the temperature change associated with a doubling of the concentration of carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere...estimated, by the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) as likely to be in the range 2 to 4.5°C with a best estimate of about 3°C, and is very unlikely to be less than 1.5°C. "  (from Wikipedia)

Of course, calling it "Climate in-Sensitivity" implies that the CO2 added by humans has no significant impact on climate (that the Climate Sensitivity is essentially 0°C), as a bill just introduced in the Montana State Legislature would have people believe.

This is certainly not the first time members of a legislative body have tried to get in on the act of "legislating physical law" (and probably won't be the last, unfortunately.) Last year, a committee in the legislature of the State of Utah (Horatio's old stomping grounds) passed a non-binding resoultion opposing the EPA's CO2 emissions reductions policy. As Brigham Young University Chemist Barry Bickmore has pointed out in "Enemies of Democracy" (Climate Change Extremism in Utah).

"The original version of the resolution referred repeatedly to a “climate data conspiracy,” and proceeded to back up this claim with a number of red herrings, and the like.  When the bill was first considered in committee (click here for the audio file,) Rep. Mike Noel (R-Kanab) argued that climate science has been serving a global conspiracy to impose population control by forced sterilization. " 

H/T Tamino (The Champion)

Mr. Edit

 -- Horatio Algeranon's rendition of the "Mr. Ed" theme song 

(with apologies to the horse, of course)

"Hello, I'm Mister Edit"

A hoax is a hoax, of coax, of coax

and no one can talk to a hoax of coax,

that is of coax, unless the hoax,

Is the famous Mister Edit!

Go right to jamokes and ask the hoax.

He'll give you the answer from Talltaleblokes.

He's always on a steady coax.

Talk to Mister Edit.

People yak-it-ti-yak a streak

and waste your time of day,

but Mister Edit will never speak,

unless he has something to say...

A hoax is a hoax, of coax of coax,

And this one will talk 'til he's coaxed the folks.

You never heard of a talking hoax?

Well, listen to this...

"I am Mister Edit"

There are those who have accused climate scientists of perpetrating a "hoax" on the public, but it's not hard to see what the real hoax is in this case (Hint: it ain't being perpetrated by climate scientists).

PS If you don't know who "Mr. Edit" is, you've obviously been asleep for the past few years.

And if you don't know who "Mr. Ed" is, well, you don't know what you missed (not much).
Click here to listen to "Mr. Ed" TV show theme song.

Owed

-- Horatio Algeranon's rendition of "Ode" , by Arthur O'Shaughnessy (1874)

 

We are the trouble makers,
    And we are the schemers of schemes,
    Blogging about lone hockey-stick breakers,
    And other such desperate themes;—
    World-losers and world-forsakers,
    On whom the Palin moon gleams:
    Yet we are the movers and shakers
    Of the world for ever, it seems.

It's all Greek To Me

-- by Horatio Algeranon

Alpha is for "Animated"
Circus sensations
Beta is for "Ballyhooed"
Photos of stations.

Gamma is for "Graphics"
That tell a Tall Tale
Delta is for "Dr. Tony's"
"Elixir for Sale."

Epsilon is for "Erroneous"
Charges and hypes.
Zeta is for a "Zebra"
Who changes his stripes.

Eta is for "Ersatz"
Logic and stats
Theta is for odd "Things"
And Cat-in-the-Hats.

Iota is for "Ignorance"
Of science and maths
Kappa is for "Kimbots"
On the wrong paths.

Lambda is for "Laughable"
Hilarious goofs.
Mu is for "Material"
For outlandish spoofs.

Nu is for "Novel"
"Theories" and such.
Xi is for "Siamese"
Twins who don't touch.

Omicron is for "OMG"
"I can't believe that"
Pi is for "Picking"
The year for a stat.

Rho is for "Rowing"
The boat up a stream

Without any oarlocks

Like in a bad dream.

Sigma is for "Senseless"
Claims of causality
Tau is for "Tortured"
Logic and mentality.

Upsilon is for "Oops, so long."
"You can't say that here."
Phi is for "Philosophy"
Ayn Rand, over beer.

Chi is for "Correlation"
Of temperature with sunspots.
Psi is for "Sigh"
That there haven't been lots.

And finally, Omega
Is for Oh, "Watts Up With That?"
Where everything's Greek
(But the earth is still flat.)

The ancient Greeks suspected that the earth was a sphere as early as the 6th century BC and Eratosthenes even "demonstrated" it and estimated the earth's circumference in about 240 BC fairly accurately.  

But there are obviously still some holdouts who don't buy it...

The Speculator on Speculations

 -- by Horatio Algeranon

I am a "Speculator on Speculations"

A master of sciency affectations,
The "Megaphone Game" is my vocation.
For peer reviewers, I've little patience.
I'm not an expert on antarctic stations.
My job's to speculate on duplicitous relations,
"Skeptic exclusion" and other temptations,
"Climategate" and like sensations,
To garner blogger adorations,
Adulation and congratulations.

Not to be confused with an Interpreter of Interpretations  or with an Incliner of Inclinations, which, stuperficially at least, share some common traits. Horatio knows it is all very confusing (and becomes more so with each passing day). 

The Incliner of Inclinations

-- by Horatio Algeranon

I am an "Incliner of Inclinations"

Of short-term trends from surface stations,
The "Regression Game" is my vocation.
For climate journals, I've little patience.
I'm not an expert on auto-correlations.
My job's to point out "Falsifications
Of IPCC prognostications"
From inclinations of brief durations,
To garner skeptic adorations,
Adulation and congratulations.

Not to be confused with an Interpreter of Interpretations , which is something quite different (sort of).

The End

 -- Horatio Algeranon's rendition of the Jim Morrison song

This is the end

Global warming trend

This is the end

My only trend, the end

Of the IPCC, the end

Of the Conspiracy, the end

No Kyoto or Cap & Trade, the end

All those plans that we made, the end

Can you picture what will be?

No Dividend and Fee

Desperately in need...of Judith Curry's hand

In an... uncertain land

Lost in a Mannian ...wilderness of pain

And all the scientists are insane

All the scientists are insane

Waiting for the rain (...in Spain ...that falls mainly on the plane), yeah

There's an Uncertainty Monster on the edge of town

Ride the Denier's highway, baby

Weird scenes inside the Denier Mind

Ride the highway west, baby

Ride the snake, ride the snake

To the lake, the ancient lake, baby

The snake is long, seven miles

Ride the snake...he's a star, and his blog is bizarre

The Watts is the BEST

The Watts is the BEST

Get here, and we'll do the rest

The Deniers bus is callin' us

The Deniers bus is callin' us

Driver, where you taken' us

The Denier awoke before dawn, he put his skates on

He took a broken hockey stick from the trash

And he skated on down the rink

He skated up to where Mike Mann stood, and...then he

Threw the stick at him, and then he

Skated on down the ice, and

And he came to the goal ...and he looked inside

Phil? yes son?, I want to JAIL you

Jones...I want to...WAAAAAA

C'mon baby,--------- No "take a chance with us"

C'mon baby, take a chance with us

C'mon baby, take a chance with us

And meet me at the back of the Deniers bus

Breakin' a "Team" stick

On a Deniers bus

Breakin' a "Team" stick

C'mon, yeah

Jail, Jail, Jail, Jail

This is the end

Global warming trend

This is the end

My only trend, the end

It hurts to "set you free"

But you'll never follow me

The end of the IPCC and corrupt lies

The end of endless FOIs

This is the end

If you actually believe that the global warming trend is over, Horatio has a bit of prime ocean front property for you in Arizona.

As Tamino pointed out recently in How Fast is earth Warming?

the globe is warming, and shows absolutely no sign whatever of stopping or even slowing its warming. Any talk of “cooling” or even a “leveling off” of global warming over the last decade is absolute nonsense.

You can see that for yourself. Tamino performed a "multiple regression" analysis to

"remove the estimated impact of el Nino, volcanic eruptions, solar variation, and the residual annual cycle, leaving only the global warming trend and any remaining natural variation. This gives us an adjusted data set for each source."

The result:

 

"Annual averages of the adjusted data sets, which shows just how strongly the different sources agree with each other" (from "How Fast is earth Warming" by Tamino)

Hackuracy

 --by Horatio Algeranon

"Accuracy is over-rated"
Quipped the science 'journalist.'

"Hackuracy is better fated"
"Gives a pearcing a special twist."

The Monster is Certain

-- by Horatio Algeranon

The only thing certain with the science of climate
Is that some will continue to nickel and dime it.

Twisting the words that the scientists utter,
Dragging them through the proverbial gutter.

Acting as "interpreters of interpretations"
Mangling meanings with transliterations:

"The science isn't settled" means "The science is settled".
"Not knowing everything" means "Knowing nothing"
"Paper rejected" means "Reviewers connected"
"Hogwash exclusion" means "Active collusion"
"Study of oceans" means "Preconceived notions"

"Tree-ring temp proxy" means "Dead orthodoxy"
"Hockey stick samples" means "Scandalous examples"
"Support for consensus" means "Funds for expenses"
"Target for warming" means "Political swarming"
"Science defenses" means "Criminal offenses".

The Monster is certain, as certain can be
To savage the scientists most viciously.


For context, see Tamino's post "Not a Misquote. A Nonquote"

Horatio finds it particularly "interesting" (and more than a little illogical) that climate scientists are regularly faulted for being quite honestly "uncertain" at some specified confidence level about the various aspects of the science while simultaneously being (falsely) accused of having claimed that "The science is settled" (i.e., effectively 100% certainty). 

For example, scientists are criticized for not being able to "nail down" climate sensitivity ( the amount by which global temperature increases for a doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere) and therefore always reporting a "range" of values into which sensitivity likely falls ("2 to 4.5°C with a best estimate of about 3°C", according to the latest IPCC report)

... and scientists are simultaneously accused (falsely) of having claimed that "The science is settled" as Gavin Schmidt just was even when they have explicitly claimed just the opposite as Gavin Schmidt did some time ago when he said he agreed that the "The science isn't settled."

But of course, as Horatio and others have noted "Not knowing everything is not knowing nothing" (another simple idea that many seem to have difficulty with).

As Sherlock Holmes once said to a climate change "skeptic", "Your logic, my dear Sir, is simply unpackable." 

Spencer's Eraser

-- by Horatio Algeranon

Occam's Razor

Is Tried and True:

"Don't add complexity

When simple will do."

Spencer's Eraser

Is The Great Unknown

Which won't leave 
Tried and True alone.

Horatio also wrote about this issue in Of Upward Slopes and Isotopes and Of Upward Slopes and Isotopes (2)