Climate scientists admit fresh error over data on rising sea levels

Guardian ^ | Sunday 14 February 2010 | Robin McKie, science editor

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Climate experts have been forced to admit another embarrassing error in their most recent report on the threat of climate change.

In a background note – released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) last night – the UN group said its 2007 report wrongly stated that 55% of the Netherlands lies below sea level. In fact, only 26% of the country does. The figure used by the IPCC included all areas in the country that are prone to flooding, including land along rivers above sea level. This accounts for 29% of the Dutch countryside.

"The sea-level statistic was used for background information only, and the updated information remains consistent with the overall conclusions," the IPCC note states. Nevertheless, the admission is likely to intensify claims by sceptics that the IPCC work is riddled with sloppiness.

The disclosure will intensify divisions between scientists and sceptics over the interpretation of statistics and the use of sources for writing climate change reports, disagreements that have led to apologies being made by both sides of the debate. Last week a key climate-change sceptic apologised for alleging that one of the world's leading meteorologists had deliberately exaggerated the dangers of global warming.

In an email debate in the Observer, Benny Peiser, head of the UK Global Warming Policy Foundation, quoted Sir John Houghton, the UK scientist who played a key role in establishing the IPCC, as saying that "unless we announce disasters, no one will listen".

But in a letter to the Observer, Houghton said: "The quote from me is without foundation. I have never said it or written it. Although it has spread on the internet like wild fire, .....

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

fyi

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Direct from the IPCC....

[jwparkerjr]

If this were a movie I would have long since walked and demanded for my money back.

[Minn]

This news is a few weeks old.

Still, it's interesting how all the innocent mistakes these people make are all in the same direction; just like the butcher whose thumb is always pushing down on the scale, not up.

[TigersEye]

Claim That Sea Level Is Rising Is a Total Fraud

Dr. Nils-Axel Mörner is the head of the Paleogeophysics and Geodynamics department at Stockholm University in Sweden. He is past president (1999-2003) of the INQUA Commission on Sea Level Changes and Coastal Evolution, and leader of the Maldives Sea Level Project. Dr. Mörner has been studying the sea level and its effects on coastal areas for some 35 years. He was interviewed by Gregory Murphy on June 6 for EIR.

31,000 Scientists Rejecting Global Warming Theory to be Named Monday

[VRWC For Truth]

Lies, damn lies, and statistics.

[Army Air Corps]

Ping.

[Dallas59]

Roll the climate data up and smoke it.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

What is new is that IPCC is admitting something.,...I believe.

[Marine_Uncle]

Looks like we are in for one long litany of errors they will start admitting. As I just posted you elsewhere. If the news paper is correct, now Jones admits there has been no increase in global warming for the past some fifteen years, and that there was natural global warming back in the middle ages.
But that news must be further verified.

[Chaguito]

The disclosure will intensify divisions between scientists and sceptics over the interpretation of statistics and the use of sources for writing climate change reports, disagreements that have led to apologies being made by both sides of the debate. Last week a key climate-change sceptic apologised for alleging that one of the world's leading meteorologists had deliberately exaggerated the dangers of global warming.

Anybody else see anything terribly wrong with the sense of these sentences?

e.g. the "division" between "scientists" and "sceptics." Uhhh, many of the skeptics are scientists, including me.

e.g. the climate-change sceptic "apologized", our journalist thus implying that he had yielded ground on data quality or interpretation to the AGW person, which he did not do. He apologized for opining in public about the inferred dishonesty of the AGW person. There is no moral or substantial equivalence in faking data ( in the extreme) and committing a social faux pas.

[airborne]

I'm sure it's all just an honest mistake.

Inadvertant math error or putting the decimal point in the wrong place.

"...Benny Peiser, head of the UK Global Warming Policy Foundation, quoted Sir John Houghton,..."

But in a letter to the Observer, Houghton said: "The quote from me is without foundation. I have never said it or written it."

Well now, it appears that someone completely made up a quote! Looks like a big, fat, bold-faced lie!!!

Not so honest a mistake after all! Not even a mistake! It's practically criminal even!

[Chaguito]

As my sainted former boss said, “After a certain point it becomes impossible to distinguish between incompetence and malice.”

[Steely Tom]

If these "errors" were really errors, wouldn't there be a few that tended to understate global warming?

[steelyourfaith]

Thanx !

 

Beam me to Planet Gore !

[Paladin2]

It’s good to be able to again relax at the beach rather than running for higher ground to await the new beach’s arrival.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

But in a letter to the Observer, Houghton said: "The quote from me is without foundation. I have never said it or written it."

Now we are getting to some FUN Stuff!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

I was worried I might have to move to higher ground!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

LOL...Right!