US temperature data are not real but “adjusted”

June 29, 2014

It would now seem to be confirmed that US temperature data are being “adjusted” to meet the requirements of the adjusters.

This is more than confirmation bias. It is the fabrication of data. 

Real Science:

I have posted this graph dozens of times, and hopefully this time it will be clear to everyone. The graph shows the average final temperature for all USHCN stations minus the average raw temperature for all USHCN stations.  This is a very simple calculation which shows the average adjustment for all USHCN stations.

It shouldn’t be a surprise to NOAA or anybody else that an exponential increase in adjustments is occurring, as I have been showing the same graph (crying wolf) for many years.

USHCN adjustments - Real Science

USHCN adjustments – Real Science

While Real Science has been claiming this fabrication of data for some time it is only recently that it has started receiving serious attention. And it would seem that there are no real temperatures any more across the continental US. Where measuring stations no longer exist, temperatures are just  made up for the purpose of “continuity”.

Paul Homewood has been looking at these and he posted this about the temperature adjustments at Kansas stations

Following much recent discussion on USHCN temperature adjustments, I have had a chance to analyse what has been going across the state of Kansas.

Altogether there are 30 USHCN stations, currently listed as operational in Kansas, and I have compared the mean temperatures from the USHCN Final dataset for January 2013, with the actual station measurements as listed in the State Climatological Reports. (There is one station at Lawrence, which I have excluded as the file seems to be corrupted). …..

  • Nearly every station has had the actual temperatures adjusted upwards by about half a degree centigrade.
  • There are 8, out of the 29 stations, which have “Estimated” temperatures on USHCN. This is a ratio of 28%, which seems to tie in with Steve Goddard’s country-wide assessment.
  • Of these eight estimates, five are because of missing data, as listed at the bottom. Four of these are now shut.
  • There seems to be no obvious reason why the other three estimates have been made , at Ellsworth, Liberal and Ottawa. The adjustments at these though don’t appear to be significantly different to the non estimated ones.

 In addition to recent temperatures being adjusted upwards, we also find that historical ones have been adjusted down. So, for instance we find that the January 1934 mean temperature at Ashland has been adjusted from 3.78C to 3.10C, whilst at Columbus there is a reduction from 4.00C to 3.52C.

In total, therefore, there has been a warming trend of about 1C added since 1934. It has always been my understanding that the various adjustments made for TOBS, etc, have been made to the historic data, and that present temperatures were left unaltered. Certainly, the cooling adjustments of about half a degree in the 1930’s would seem to tally with what NOAA have been publishing.

But this leaves the question of just why there is a need to continually adjust current temperatures upwards.

WUWT is also on the case:

What is going on is that the USHCN code is that while the RAW data file has the actual measurements, for some reason the final data they publish doesn’t get the memo that good data is actually present for these stations, so it “infills” it with estimated data using data from surrounding stations. It’s a bug, a big one. And as Zeke did a cursory analysis Thursday night, he discovered it was systemic to the entire record, and up to 10% of stations have “estimated” data spanning over a century. ……… And here is the real kicker, “Zombie weather stations” exist in the USHCN final data set that are still generating data, even though they have been closed. ……

There are quite a few “zombie weather stations” in the USHCN final dataset, possibly up to 25% out of the 1218 that is the total number of stations. In my conversations with NCDC on Friday, I’m told these were kept in and “reporting” as a policy decision to provide a “continuity” of data for scientific purposes. While there “might” be some justification for that sort of thinking, few people know about it there’s no disclaimer or caveat in the USHCN FTP folder at NCDC or in the readme file that describes this, they “hint” at it saying:

“The composition of the network remains unchanged at 1218 stations”

But that really isn’t true, as some USHCN stations out of the 1218 have been closed and are no longer reporting real data, but instead are reporting estimated data.

This is the fabrication of data – institutionalised – to satisfy a pre-determined conclusion.

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UK is not necessary for the Fourth Reich of the United States of Europe

June 28, 2014

My somewhat jaundiced and cynical view of what Juncker’s selection as President of the European Commission and Cameron’s defeat means. Cameron failed in his attempt to block the appointment of Juncker, but the EU failed in achieving a consensus.

In fact the French and the Germans have made it clear that the UK is not necessary in their definition of a European consensus.

The ultimate aim of the European Project is the creation of a United States of Europe where Brussels maps to Washington. This will require each member state to finally give up any semblance of sovereignty to the bureaucracy in Brussels and to the European parliament. A United States of Europe will favour the population-rich central part of Europe. That Germany and France endorse this goal is all too clear because they believe it will effectively be the start of the Fourth Reich of a Holy Franco-German Empire. The southern Europe states go along because they see greater economic benefit for themselves in being vassals and being supported by their masters in the richer north. The far northern states of Europe are small and just do not have the population and market size for their own home markets to be self-sufficient or to allow them much growth. They need the large markets of central and southern Europe to fuel their own growth. So they go along with the Project and dig their little heels in where they can.

The UK is the odd man out. While the UK has some clout due to its population, the Project is well aware that the UK – as it is – values its own sovereignty so high that its continued membership is entirely inconsistent with the aim of creating a United States of Europe. Better for a UK – if it stays united – to leave the EU than that it subverts the whole concept by remaining a member. The French and Germans would love to see the Balkanisation of the UK and an independent Scotland (perhaps followed by an independent Northern Ireland and an independent Wales). That would allow the fractured bits of the UK to stay within the EU but without the strength to jeopardise the Project. For an independent Scotland or Wales, ceding all power to Brussels rather than to London would not be all that bad. Moreover the markets of the fractured UK countries would then remain available to the EU but each of the new countries would have to accept the inevitability of the Fourth Reich.

It should be fairly obvious that while I would like the EU to remain as a free trade and free movement of labour area, any political union must come in a natural way and cannot be forced as Brussels and the Franco-German alliance are trying to do. If true economic union is achieved then political union across country boundaries becomes almost inevitable and a non-issue. Economic pressures have to be addressed first. Opening the political valve across an economic boundary is best done when pressures have equalised.

And yet the member states of the EU have already ceded many of their powers to the bloated Brussels bureaucrats. And inevitably their practices reduce to the lowest common behaviour. Rather than promoting best practices the EU enshrines the worst common practices. The EU parliament is about the most undemocratic institution there is where the members are not accountable to their constituencies, follow party guidelines and ultimately represent only themselves.

Just imagine the Canadians or the Mexicans having to follow bureaucratic diktats from Washington.

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Posted in Behaviour, Europe, European Union | 1 Comment »

Midnight sun and Ramadan splits Muslim theologians

June 27, 2014

This year the holy month of Ramadan, the ninth month of the Islamic calendar,  is expected to begin on June 28th and will finish on July 27th. It is supposed to represent the month during which the Koran was revealed and the main – and characteristic – practice for Muslims globally is fasting from dawn to sunset. No food, no drink, no cigarettes, no sex while the sun is up.

In Kiruna in northern Sweden in the Arctic circle, there is no night from the end of May till the middle of July.

Muslim theologians and interpreters of the holy scriptures have found various ways to avoid following the Koran and fasting for a whole month in the land of the midnight sun. There is no consensus though, between Sunnis and Shias or within the various sects as to the correct practice to be followed. But they generally agree (except for the Saudi mullahs of course) that the Koran need not be followed literally in the Arctic circle. Mullahs consulted in the Middle East find themselves well outside their areas of competence but that does not stop them exhibiting their ignorance or from issuing their fatwas. (Common sense of course is not something of much value to any theologian).

  1. Some scholars have suggested that fasting could wait till the autumn – but this is considered a cop-out by other, stricter, holier eminences.
  2. Egyptian scholars –  a pragmatic lot – allow that if the length of day is longer than 18 hours then the time in Mecca or Medina may be followed.
  3. “The Azhar Fatwa Committee in Egypt has issued a fatwa permitting Muslims in Scandinavia and Northern countries to fast according to Mecca time”.
  4. Iranian mullahs have decreed that long days do not provide an excuse for not fasting but leave it to the individual as to what time should be followed or if Muslims should just move to a more suitable location for the holy month.
  5. Saudi mullahs – may they live forever – insist that the local time must be followed and mere death should not be allowed to intervene.

Mullahs do not even entertain the heretical possibility that perhaps Islam is not a religion intended for the Arctic or the Antarctic.

As a compromise, some Kiruna muslims are following the times of sunset and sunrise in Stockholm – which still gives them a very long day and a very short night.

Mohammed was not an Inuit.

 

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Biter bit: Suarez banned for 4 months including 9 international matches

June 26, 2014

Luis Alberto Suárez Díaz, the serial biter / footballer has played his last match at this World Cup.

BBC: 

Uruguay striker Luis Suarez has been suspended from all football-related activity for four months for biting Italy defender Giorgio Chiellini.

Fifa’s independent disciplinary committee imposed the ban after finding the 27-year-old guilty of misconduct.

Suarez has also been banned for nine international matches, ruling him out of the rest of the World Cup.

Reuters: Suarez was also suspended from any football-related activity for four months and fined 100,000 Swiss francs ($111,000).

“Such behaviour cannot be tolerated on any football pitch, and in particular not at a FIFA World Cup when the eyes of millions of people are on the stars on the field,” Claudio Sulser, chairman of the FIFA Disciplinary Committee, said in a statement.

“The Disciplinary Committee took into account all the factors of the case and the degree of Mr Suarez’s guilt in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Code. The decision comes into force as soon it is communicated.”

Nothing is reported (yet) as to whether he

  1. will be required to wear a muzzle whenever he plays
  2. will have to take an AIDS test before every match
  3. will have his “wisdom” teeth extracted
  4. will have to provide a written guarantee to all opposing players before every match
  5. will have to provide his club Liverpool with a personal indemnity for his future actions
  6. will have to attend psychiatric counselling
  7. will be prosecuted for assault

Liverpool will not get very much for him when they do finally get rid for him.

Best to write his financial value off.

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No sentience without sapience

June 26, 2014

There was a great deal of publicity last week but I am not very convinced that the computer program Eugene Goostman actually passed the Turing test. But whether it did or not, I got to wondering how to distinguish sapience from sentience.

I find that I tend to use “sapience” to imply the capability for thought while I take “sentience” to be a quality of consciousness of self. Which of course leaves rather diffuse and undefined what precisely “thought” involves and what “consciousness of self” consists of. But is sapience linked to sentience? Can one have one without the other? Or does the quality of being conscious only become possible once thought exists?

Rene Descartes’ Cogito ergo sum (I think therefore I am) should perhaps be modified to be Cogito ergo, ego ut sit (I think therefore I may be). “I think therefore I am” requires a pre-conception of individuality, of the “I”. To be aware of the “I”, to be conscious of oneself and to be able to articulate that consciousness would suggest that thought is already present before consciousness of self can come into play. Clearly my computer “thinks” in a fashion, as do many animals – in their fashion. But while some minimum capability for thought may be necessary for consciousness, it is also clearly not sufficient. A certain level of sapience may be necessary for sentience but sapience does not necessarily lead to sentience. Some other attribute or quality is required for a thinking entity to be said to have the level of consciousness necessary for sentience.

The Turing test is, I think, a test of reaching a particular level of sapience but it is not a test of sentience. But I also think that there is a scale of sapience. All  “artifical intelligences” show varying levels of applying “thought” and could be said to be sapient to some degree. Sapience would seem therefore to be on a continuous scale. Many animals and birds also exhibit some level of thought and clearly exhibit different degrees of sapience. But chimpanzees and gorillas and dolphins and even elephants seem to recognise themselves in a mirror while monkeys do not. They would seem to have different levels of self-consciousness and – it would seem – different levels of sentience. I take gorillas and chimpanzees and maybe elephants to be sentient – just – but not dogs or cats. Is there then a scale of sentience which is constrained (or enabled) by, and depends upon, an entity’s position on a scale of sapience?  I suspect that whatever it is I intuitively consider to be sentient depends upon a combination of sapience and the level of consciousness of self of an entity.

Therefore my tentative definitions / conclusions become

  1. Entities may be “alive” or “inert”.
  2. Only some entities are sapient to any significant degree but sapience is independent of being alive.
  3. There is no sentience without sapience.
  4. Only some “living”, sapient entities are sentient.
  5. Sentience is a composite quality and – I propose – depends on the level of sapience and the level of consciousness exhibited by an entity.

 

sapience and sentience

sapience and sentience

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Was Suarez paid to bite an opponent?

June 25, 2014

I just saw this article on Swedish Radio’s website:

Betting site Betsafe offered odds of 175-1 that Suarez would bite an opponent during the World Cup. Over 100 people won.

Jonathan Brack from Stockholm was one of them. ……. 

The Swede won over 14 000 kronor after the game and is now planning a trip to Manchester to see his favorite team Machester United play.

This was just in Sweden. And when there is big money or big odds at stake I tend to suspect that some kind of fixing could have taken place. If the bookies have paid out then it can no longer be in doubt for FIFA that he did the deed.

Luis Suarez’ action was so stupid and so outrageous – considering that he has done this twice before – that I cannot help suspecting that he could have been paid to do what he did.

The numbers are compelling. Just suppose he had placed – through a friend of course – $100,000 with someone offering 175:1. With $17.5 million, being suspended for just 2 years would be no big deal! Or suppose that 1,000 punters worldwide each bet $1,000. That would have provided a pot of $175 million to be shared with Suarez if he ensured that they would win!!

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AIDS scientist charged with fraud

June 25, 2014

I have long held that scientists, like many other professionals, should be subject to a sort of “product liability”, if they employ fraud, engage in some other misconduct or in some way fail to meet the standards to be reasonably expected.

If a scientist is to be considered “responsible” for his work then this must be mirrored by a corresponding “liability”. In my experience a lack of liability is always accompanied by the absence of responsibility.

The product that researchers and scientists produce is publications – mainly as papers published in scientific journals and as books. Scientific misconduct (whether plagiarism or faking data or inventing data or cherry picking data) leads occasionally to dismissals (but not always) and generally very little else. It seems to me that the concept of tort or “product liability” should be applicable to the work of scientists and researchers where their work is the result of faking data, fraud or other misconduct since it would be work that “had not been done in good faith”. Tort would apply because the ramifications of their misconduct would extend far beyond their employment contracts with their employers.

Now an AIDS scientist who faked his data is being charged with criminal offences.

Responding to a major case of research misconduct, federal prosecutors have taken the rare step of filing charges against a scientist after he admitted falsifying data that led to millions in grants and hopes of a breakthrough in AIDS vaccine research.

Investigators say former Iowa State University laboratory manager Dong-Pyou Han has confessed to spiking samples of rabbit blood with human antibodies to make an experimental HIV vaccine appear to have great promise. After years of work and millions in National Institutes of Health grants, another laboratory uncovered irregularities that suggested the results – once hailed as groundbreaking – were bogus. 

Han was indicted last week on four counts of making false statements, each of which carries up to five years in prison. He was set to be arraigned Tuesday in Des Moines, but he didn’t show up due to an apparent paperwork mix-up. A prosecutor said Han will be given another chance to appear next week. …….

Experts said the fraud was extraordinary and that charges are rarely brought in such cases. The National Institutes of Health said it’s reviewing what impact the case has had on the research it funds.

…… Oransky, a journalist who also has a medical degree, said there have been only a handful of similar prosecutions in the last 30 years.

He said Han’s case was “particularly brazen” and noted that charges are rarely brought because the U.S. Office of Research Integrity, which investigates misconduct, doesn’t have prosecution authority, and most cases involve smaller amounts of money. …… 

According to the indictment, Han’s misconduct caused colleagues to make false statements in a federal grant application and progress reports to NIH. The NIH paid out $5 million under that grant as of earlier this month. Iowa State has agreed to pay back NIH nearly $500,000 for the cost of Han’s salary.

Han’s misconduct dates to when he worked at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland under Michael Cho, who was leading a team testing an experimental HIV vaccine on rabbits. Starting in 2008, Cho’s team received initial NIH funding for the work. Cho reported soon that his vaccine was causing rabbits to develop antibodies to HIV, which left NIH officials “flabbergasted,” according to a criminal complaint against Han. Cho’s team sent blood samples in 2009 to Duke University researchers, who verified the apparent positive impact on the vaccinated rabbits. The confirmation was seen as “a major breakthrough in HIV/AIDS vaccine research,” according to the complaint.

Iowa State recruited Cho in 2009, and with his team – including Han – he soon received a five-year NIH grant to continue the research. The team kept reporting progress. But in January 2013, a team at Harvard University found the promising results had been achieved with rabbit blood spiked with human antibodies.

An investigation by Iowa State pinpointed Han, after he was caught sending more spiked samples to Duke University. In a Sept. 30, 2013 confession letter, Han said he started the fraud in 2009 “because he wanted (results) to look better” and that he acted alone.

Individual researchers are unlikely to have the means to make restitution for all the financial waste they may have caused by their misconduct. Universities and Institutions have  some possibility of being forced to repay grants obtained by fraud but are rarely asked to do so. Careers of other researchers could also have been compromised.

It should still be possible for someone damaged by scientific misconduct to make a civil case for damages even if criminal charges are not brought.  But what that needs is that the output be considered “product” and that the scientist and his institution have then some “product liability”. That implies a duty of good faith and of application of some reasonable level of competence. Misconduct and even gross negligence on the part of the institution or the scientist could then give rise to a claim for damages. Even the journals, their editors and reviewers  ought to have some responsibility and potential liability.

If every published paper carried some product liability, the rush to publish nonsense and lies may reduce even if the publications industry would not be pleased. But it would improve the quality of publications no end.

Retraction Watch covers the story and has a discussion about the criminalisation of scientific fraud.

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Suarez – 3 bites and time to pull his teeth

June 25, 2014

A dog which bit 3 times would most likely be put down.

After having attacked Branislav Ivanovic and Otman Bakkal in the past, Luis Suarez was at it again at yesterdays World Cup match between Uruguay and Italy. This time he managed to sink his teeth into Giorgio Chiellini’s shoulder.

Time to put him down. Or only be allowed to play after a long suspension provided he has all his teeth pulled and plays with an empty mouth.

Luis Suarez - 3 bites and out

Luis Suarez – 3 bites and out

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Posted in Behaviour, Football, World Cup | 2 Comments »

Shifting maps of Europe over 200 years from 1815 – 2014

June 23, 2014

On 28th June it will be 100 years since the assassination in Sarajevo of Franz Ferdinand, heir to throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire  and the onset of World War 1. The maps of Europe changed drastically before and after the War from 1914 to 1920 and this is a an excellent yet simple presentation of the changes.

Before and after WW1

Before and after WW1

Before and after WW1

But it is worth noting that squabbling in Europe was going on long before WW1 and still continues today with the Balkans having recently redrawn their maps. And maps will continue changing, as in the Crimea and now perhaps also with Scotland breaking away from the United Kingdom.

But it is not so long ago that the map of Europe looked completely different. After Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo in 1815 the Congress of Vienna redrew the map of Europe.

 map by thelessonlocker

europe after vienna 1815

europe after vienna 1815

And now, 200 years later the map of Europe is still changing. This map by Omniatlas is up to date as of March 2014.

Omniatlas map of Europe 2014

Omniatlas map of Europe 2014

What will the next 100 years bring?

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A drunk for President of the EU Commission?

June 22, 2014

If it was only the Daily Mail it would have to treated with a certain amount of skepticism and great caution for journalistic licence. But in fact the original article about the drunken behaviour of Jean-Claude Juncker who is expected (with the support of Merkel and Hollande but against the wishes of Cameron) to become the next President of the EU Commission comes from Der Spiegel.

And Der Spiegel is nothing if not staid and politically correct. So when the usually circumspect magazine states that Juncker’s normal state is one of being inebriated and where he is a problem “not with alcohol but only without alcohol” then it gives a lot more credibility to the extravagant claims in the Daily Mail.

I suppose the EU and the EC have both sunk so low that having a drunk as President cannot bring them further into disrepute.

Der Spiegel: Achtung, Alkoholkontrolle!

The more often Juncker’s name is mentioned, the more the questions which arise as to whether he would be robust enough for the office of President. Long-time companions report a string of  human weaknesses almost unknown to the general public.   .. Juncker threatens to be something of a political alcohol-test. 

… The journalist Pascal Steinwachs wrote in “Lëtzebuerger Journal,” mischievous tongues said, Juncker was actually not a problem with alcohol, only without...”

Daily Mail: ‘A drunk who has cognac for breakfast’

……. a Mail on Sunday investigation uncovered a number of fresh reports about his drinking:

  • A senior diplomatic source told this newspaper: ‘Mr Juncker reportedly has cognac for breakfast’.
  • He was allegedly ‘blind drunk’, acted in a ‘vulgar’ way and repeatedly used the f-word in a meeting.
  • A respected German news journal claimed he had ‘drunk too much for years’ in an article headlined Achtung, Alkoholkontrolle! (Attention. Breathalyser Test!).
  • A top Dutch politician called him a ‘stubborn drinker’, forcing Mr Juncker to issue an angry denial.

An EU envoy told The Mail on Sunday: ‘Juncker and his boozing is the worst-kept secret in Brussels. He is politically and personally unsuited to run the EU.’ 

His supporters, however, claim he is the victim of a dirty-tricks campaign. One said: ‘He has a proven track record in taking tough decisions.’

I like my occasional cognac as well. But cognac for breakfast does seem a bit much.

Hollande and his mistresses and Merkel and her drunks. Add to that a drunken EC President who is not elected but instated by consensus and it makes a wonderful advertisement of European democracy at its best!

 

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Posted in Behaviour, European Union, Politics | Comments Off on A drunk for President of the EU Commission?

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