Chuck, I'm not going to argue with you, because you have adopted, yet once more, your
usual Luddite position, operating on semantics and documents that are as full of holes
as Emmenthal cheese.. Let us simply agree that the jury is out on the mediaeval
warming period, which has no relevance to the current situation, in any case, and that
Martian climate has no relevance to the earth's, a total red (planet) herring.

Brian

On 18 Dec 2003 at 17:09, Chuck Dolci wrote:

> Brian Ellis wrote:
>
>  >
>  > However, even Greenpeace postulates that the hockey stick may well
>  be
> right:
>  >
>  >>
> According to the Cambridge International Dictionary of English the
> definition of "postulate"  verb [I or T] to suggest a theory, idea,
> etc. as a basic principle from which a further idea is formed or
> developed."
>
> But Greenpeace postulating (or even opining) that the hockey stick is
> right doesn't make it so.
>
> It is convenient to credit "Greenpeace" with such postulations, that
> way we can never get an answer to the question, "Well, is Greenpeace a
> qualified statistician competent to assess the quality of the data or
> the conclusions drawn from it?"  I would like the identity and the
> qualifications of the person or persons at Greenpeace who postulates
> that the "hockey stick" is right.
>
> But consider the recent work done by Stephen McIntyre and Ross
> McKitrick. McKitrick is with the Department of Economics, University
> of Guelph, Ontario, Canada. I believe McIntyre is a successful
> Canadian businessman. In a paper recently published in the British
> periodical "Energy & Environment" Vol.14, No. 6, 2003 they report
> [from the abstract] "The data set of proxies of past climate used in
> Mann, Bradley and Hughes (1998) [the report which produced what is
> commonly known as the "Hockey Stick"] ("MBH98" hereafter) for the
> estimation of temperatures from 1400 to 1980 contains collation
> errors, unjustifiable truncation or extrapolation of source data,
> obsolete data, geographical location errors, incorrect calculations of
> principal components and othe quality control defects. We detail these
> errors and defects. We then apply MBH98 methodology to the
> construction of a Northern Hemisphere average temperature index for
> the 1400 - 1980 period, using corrected and updated source data. The
> major finding is that the values in the early 15th centruy exceed any
> values in the 20th century. The particular "hockey stick" shape
> derived inthe MBH98 proxy construction - a temerature index that
> decreases slightly between the early 15th centruy and early 20th
> century and then increases dramatically up to 1980 - is primarily an
> artefact of poor data handling, obsolete data and incorrect
> calculation of principal components."
>
> The entire article can be found at
> http://www.multi-science.co.uk/ee_openaccess.htm
>
> The debate can be found at
> http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/trc.html
>
>
> Brian also states:
>
>   In any case, isn't this rather academic when we are faced with vast
> increases of
>  > atmospheric CO2 and correlated increased global average
>  temperatures
> over more
>  > than a century, as shown by the business end of the hockey stick?
>
> Correlation, even strong correlation, is evidence of nothing. There is
> a strong correlation between people who had coffee with their
> breakfast and fatal car accidents on the way to work.  Correlation
> proves nothing other than a coincidence in time and or space, it does
> not prove causation.
>
> I won't deny a correlation between higher levels of CO2 and warmer
> climate, but maybe that is because warmer temperatures lead to higher
> levels of CO2.
>
> The following is an Associated Press article from a couple years ago.
>
> (Thursday December 6, 2001) AP Article:
>
> Study Suggests Mars Ice Caps Eroding
>
>
> By PAUL RECER, AP Science Writer
> WASHINGTON (AP) - Vast fields of carbon dioxide ice are eroding from
> the poles of Mars, suggesting that the climate of the Red Planet is
> warming and the atmosphere is becoming slightly more dense.
>
> Experts say that over time such changes could allow water to return to
> the Martian surface and turn the frigid planet into a "shirt-sleeve
> environment."
>
> Michael A. Caplinger, a scientist with Malin Space Science Systems,
> said that if the rate of carbon dioxide erosion from the Mars poles
> continues for thousands of years, "then it could profoundly amend the
> climate of Mars."
>
> "You would go from having to wear a spacesuit to just wearing a coat
> and an oxygen atmosphere," said Caplinger.
>
> Caplinger is co-author of a study appearing in the journal Science
> that analyzes photos of Mars taken by an orbiting spacecraft. The
> photos were taken in 1999 and in 2001, a period of time that
> represents one Martian year. Mars is farther from the sun than the
> Earth and it takes the Red Planet about 23 months to complete one
> year, a single solar orbit.
>
> Observers have long known that in the Martian winter there is a snow
> of carbon dioxide caused as temperatures plunge and the gas freezes
> out of Mars' thin atmosphere.
>
> But the new study suggests that a dense cap of frozen carbon dioxide
> thought to be permanent at each of the Mars poles may not be all that
> permanent, said Caplinger.
>
> "It is eroding away at a rapid pace and is going to continue to do
> that," said Caplinger. "This is not a seasonal change."
>
> He said the photos suggest that the polar caps are dense slabs of
> frozen carbon dioxide that may have been deposited over centuries,
> much like the way seasonal snow on Earth accumulates to form a
> glacier.
>
> "This stuff has been there for quite a while," he said. "It is packed
> down and very smooth. We don't see evidence that it is blowing around
> or drifting."
>
> Instead, said Caplinger, the glacier-like carbon dioxide ice is
> eroding, rather like the way a glacier melts on Earth.
>
> The key clue, he said, comes from examining the light patterns on pits
> at the Martian south pole. Comparing pictures taken a Martian year
> apart show that the pits are getting wider and deeper as a result of
> the retreat of the carbon dioxide ice, said Caplinger.
>
> As the C02 ice erodes, it adds carbon dioxide to the Martian
> atmosphere, causing the "air" to get thicker over time. This would
> enable the planet to hold more of the sun's heat and, perhaps,
> eventually warm the whole planet enough for water to return to the
> Martian surface.
>
> Caplinger said it is not known if there is enough carbon dioxide in
> the polar caps to bring about such an atmospheric change.
>
> But his co-author, Michael C. Malin, said in a statement that if the
> atmosphere of Mars becomes dense enough, it would "permit liquid water
> to persist at or near the surface."
>
> Other studies have shown that Mars was once awash with great basins of
> water, but the water is thought to have disappeared or become
> subsurface ice as the planet cooled and developed a thin C02
> atmosphere.
>
> Some experts suggested that any speculation about a Martian climate
> change is premature.
>
> "This is a really neat observation," said Allan H. Treiman of the
> Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston. But he said the pictures
> span a time too short to make predictions about permanent changes in
> the Mars climate.
>
> "We don't have enough data on Mars to draw any clear conclusions about
> climate change," he said.
>
>
>
> Chuck Dolci
>