The ‘Hockey Stick’ Lives

[SecularMotion]

Source: NY Times

Few images in the climate change debate have stirred as much controversy as the storied “hockey stick” graph, which shows average temperatures in the northern hemisphere holding roughly steady for 900 years or so, until the 20th century, when they rise sharply.

First unveiled in 1998 by the paleoclimatologist Michael Mann, the graph became an icon of global warming after it was featured in the summary of a crucial report by a United Nations climate panel from 2001. A version also appeared in the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.”

The validity of Dr. Mann’s graph has been under attack by climate skeptics ever since, with some contrarians going so far as to claim that data was deliberately manipulated or omitted to produce its signature shape.

Read more: http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/23/the-hockey-stick-lives/?ref=science

[AlbertCat]

1. You stopped pasting after only 3 paragraphs....

... don't you get 4 paragraphs? If you had included a 4th you coulda posted this:

Yet while the attacks continue, the “hockey stick” graph’s basic premise — that the planet’s recent warming is unprecedented over at least the last millennium — continues to draw support from a growing number of independent studies.


or this:

Two new studies bolstering the “hockey stick” hypothesis were published just recently. One that appeared this month in the journal Geophysical Research Letters analyzed seashell deposits on the North Atlantic seafloor and determined that 20th-century warming in the region “had no equivalent during the last thousand years.”

Instead of ending with a "validity is under attack" and "data was manipulated" take away.

But of course.... the title says it all.

[SecularMotion]

2. There were no ulterior motives involved

I stopped at 3 because the next 2 "paragraphs" were parentheses and a quotation.

As you stated - the title says it all.

[groundloop]

3. It's way past time to quit discussing validity of global warming and actually do something about it

Study after study after study after study has shown the only possible, logical conclusion that can be drawn is that the climate is warming and that the cause is us. It's high time all the greedy bastards that are afraid they'll lose wealth if we attack this problem shut the hell up and quit spewing their lies.

[tclambert]

4. People wanting to take action is exactly the problem the brave oil companies are fighting against.

And all those thousands of scientists going around measuring things like lake floor sediments and seafloor sediments, ice cores, coral reefs, and tree rings--they are threatening the hard earned profits the oil companies so nobly labored for. Clearly Al Gore and the polar bears hate oil companies! That's why big oil has to spend millions of dollars on public relations campaigns calling all this sciency stuff into question. Without their valiant educational efforts, the public at large might demand conservation efforts. Conservation! That would cut into profits, taking the caviar out of the mouths of oil executives' children.

[Javaman]

6. While completely agree that it's way past the time of discussing it

like 30+ years past, I fully expect the world body to convene many more meetings so they can...discuss it.

Like everything else we humans deal with, we will wait till the last minute to fix it. We only react, never plan ahead. Once upon a time in this nation we did plan ahead with such things as SS and medicare, but those were exceptions rather than the rule.

members of congress will be wearing water wings and treading water and still "debating" what to do.

Since Washington DC is of the lower sea level variety of city, my hyperbole image really isn't all that far from the truth.

[Uncle Joe]

5. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, SecularMotion.