Two German Scientists Say GISS Has “Squandered Much Credibility” …Playing A “Shady Role”

Vahrenholt_LüningBy Dr. Sebastian Lüning and Prof. Fritz Vahrenholt
(Translated/edited by P Gosselin)

Photo: Vahrenholt/Lüning; Source: DkS

The GISS-Institute of NASA is playing a shady role in the climate debate. For years it was directed by creedal climate activist James Hansen, and has since squandered much credibility. Now his years-long colleague Gavin Schmidt is at the helm, also an activist. Dubious data alterations with the GISS datasets will likely become interesting material for science historians.

GISS went public with a press release on December 18, 2015. The first part of the release was quite reasonable. Indeed we should not neglect calibrating the models with the known temperature history. Various climate factors have been at play and all had impacts in their own way:

Examination of Earth’s Recent History Key to Predicting Global Temperatures
Estimates of future global temperatures based on recent observations must account for the differing characteristics of each important driver of recent climate change, according to a new NASA study published Dec. 14 in the journal Nature Climate Change. To quantify climate change, researchers need to know the Transient Climate Response (TCR) and Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (ECS) of Earth. Both values are projected global mean surface temperature changes in response to doubled atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations but on different timescales. TCR is characteristic of short-term predictions, up to a century out, while ECS looks centuries further into the future, when the entire climate system has reached equilibrium and temperatures have stabilized.”

Very good, we thought. Did GISS finally realize that CO2 sensitivity had been over-estimated for years? See our earlier reports on the subject:

No chance. After the good introduction came the return to the climate alarmism mode: Climate sensitivity is not lower, rather it is higher than previously thought, Schmidt & Co spin. Anyone wishing to read the sad story in its entirety can do so at their press release.

45 responses to “Two German Scientists Say GISS Has “Squandered Much Credibility” …Playing A “Shady Role””

  1. yonason

    “For years it was directed by creedal climate activist James Hansen, and has squandered much credibility.” – P.G.

    Yes, credibility is lost when one attempts to force reality conform to fantasy.

    And “creedal” doesn’t even begin to describe his lunatic devotion to warmunism.

    Where are the psychoanalysts when ya need ’em?
    http://drsanity.blogspot.com/2006/02/scientizing-politics.html

  2. yonason

    It seems that the links to M. Crichton’s material in my 3rd ref., no longer work, so here’s a very relevant one preserved by the Wayback Machine (which does have some, though limited, utility).

    So, from past experience we can be sure that when they finally admit that warming isn’t the problem, they will be at least just as sure that cooling is, …or racial tensions they’ve exacerbated, or the economy that they’ve screwed up, etc., etc.

  3. David L

    “Examination of Earth’s Recent History Key to Predicting Global Temperatures”

    That comment reminds me of an old saying about the US stock market:
    “The US stock market has predicted 10 of the last 3 recessions.”

  4. Felix

    Of course neither are climate scientists.

    Sebastian Luening
    New Ventures Petroleum Geology Manager
    https://www.linkedin.com/in/sebastian-luening-b6834852

    Fritz Vahrenholt was on the Board of Directors of Deutsche Shell, but has also worked in the wind power industry. Has a PhD is chemistry. Still, not a climate scientist.

    1. DirkH

      Hey Felix, now go on a hunt to find out what education James Hansen has! I won’t give any clues! Good luck!

      1. sod

        “now go on a hunt to find out what education James Hansen has”

        Hansen has worked on atmospheres. you could not get closer to climate science back then!

        1. yonason

          He’s also heavily into fraud and criminal mischief.

          And that’s OK with you?

        2. DirkH

          “Hansen has worked on atmospheres. you could not get closer to climate science back then!”

          He is an astrophysicist BY EDUCATION. Not a climate scientist. That he later WORKED on climate is exactly my point. Thanks for confirming me.

          1. David A

            Gavin? why who better then a mathematician to prove the old saw, “Liars figure, and figures lie.”

      2. BruceC

        While he’s at it, he can also check up on Gavin Schmidt’s credentials.

  5. tom0mason

    The degradation of science began when scientists, willfully, or stupidly, started to believe that correlation can directly equate to causation, and from that shaky footing built models and prediction intended to alarm the public into funding more and more nonsense research. Funds are now deflected from the worthy areas such as understanding (IMO researching the fundamentals of clouds and the interaction of oceans currents and land temperatures, etc.)
    Climate science is now of low merit as too often it fails to acknowledge the chaotic nature of the subject and thus any ’cause and effect’ coupling rarely has a straight-line, easily predictable, relationship.

  6. DirkH

    Warmunist billionaire destroys about 1400 square meter of a coral reef with anchor chain of one of his 100m-yachts.
    http://twitchy.com/2016/01/29/a-giant-yacht-owned-by-a-billionaire-climate-alarmist-destroyed-a-protected-coral-reef-in-the-cayman-islands/

  7. Denis Ables

    There is NO empirical evidence that co2 has EVER had any impact on global warming even over geologic periods when it was several times higher than now (2,000 pmv +) and for long durations. In fact, the available empirical evidence shows that temperature variation occurs FIRST, and co2 variation is very similar (tracking both up and down trends) but 800 to 2800 years LATER).

    Currently both our weather satellites show no additional increase in tempeature over the past 18+ years, and co2 level now at its highest in a very long time.

    Dr Craig Iso (co2 specialist) states that during the past 4 interglacial periods (covering the past 340,000 years) the temperature in each was 2 degrees warmer than during our current interglacial period, and yet, co2 is, in this one, 40 percent higher, which indicates very little impact on temperature by the higher co2 level.

    Our current warming (such as it is) began not in the mid 1800s, but in at the bottom of the Little Ice Age, in the mid 1600s. That’s 200 years of natural warming before co2 level began rising. Not only that, but even the most rabid alarmists admit that it would have taken a century for co2 increase to have had any impact on the temperature, so 300 years of NATURAL climate warming which brings us to about 1950. There was a coolng from the 40s to the 70s, and then the only recent warming, from the mid 70s to about 1998. No additonal warming since then. How long can alarmist base their frantic claims on this cherry-picked duration?

    1. sod

      “There is NO empirical evidence that co2 has EVER had any impact on global warming even over geologic periods ”

      In those periods, CO2 was following temperature mostly. It had a feedback effect, of course.

      We also do not need such empirical evidence from the past, as we can show the CO2 effect in Labs.

      ” In fact, the available empirical evidence shows that temperature variation occurs FIRST”

      Yes, that is what happened in the past. The situation is different now.

      “Currently both our weather satellites show no additional increase in tempeature over the past 18+ years,”

      Yes, the satellite datasets have a big problem. But beware, the last few months already show a new (monthly) record!

      “Our current warming (such as it is) began not in the mid 1800s, but in at the bottom of the Little Ice Age, in the mid 1600s”

      the 1600s was not the bottom of the little ice age. That is easy to spot on the map posted on this very blog recently.

      https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=zvwgQ0tAjx_k.keO5eR4ueHXE

      ” so 300 years of NATURAL climate warming”

      You are making stuff up.Please check that map again. There were periods with a little lower temperature, but most of those were not lower than today.

      ” There was a coolng from the 40s to the 70s, and then the only recent warming, from the mid 70s to about 1998.”

      You are comparing totally strange stuff. proxies from the 16th century to climate variations measured by thermometer in the early 20th century to satellite data now. You always pick the numbers that you like. This is anti-science!

      ” How long can alarmist base their frantic claims on this cherry-picked duration?”

      You are cherrypicking the datasets you like. Scientists are looking at the data from the relevant timespan (30+years). And that data shows warming in all datasets!.

      1. yonason

        sod has drunk the Koolaid, or has been reading too much of John Cook’s “Skeptical Science,” (pretty much the same thing, actually.

        Significant relationship of CO2 to temperature = THERE IS NONE

        “We also do not need such empirical evidence from the past, as we can show the CO2 effect in Labs.” – silly delusional sod

        I’d love to see you try to provide a link to that, sod. In fact, I’ll give you the best experiment I’m aware of (1.st item there) that directly addresses the greenhouse effect. It is either incredibly tiny, or non-existent, most probably the former.

        “Yes, that [“…temperature variation occurs FIRST…”] is what happened in the past. The situation is different now.”

        Is that because human CO2 doesn’t physically or chemically behave the same as ‘natural’ CO2? Talk about ‘magical thinking’.

        Please note CO2 is beneficial, not dangerous.

        Here are the numbers. WATER VAPOR RULES!

        1. sod

          “I’d love to see you try to provide a link”

          The experiment in your link (salt and glass cover?) has no relationship to the CO2 effect discussed here.

          You can get basic informations here:

          http://scied.ucar.edu/carbon-dioxide-absorbs-and-re-emits-infrared-radiation

          you can also look at absorption bands:

          http://clivebest.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/595px-atmospheric_transmission.png

          and here is a video showing some part of the effect:

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGaV3PiobYk

          1. yonason

            “The experiment in your link (salt and glass cover?) has no relationship to the CO2 effect discussed here.” – sod

            Yes, it does. It is the essence of “greenhouse” theory. IR is supposed to cause warming because it is being “trapped” by the glass which is opaque to IR, but when it isn’t trapped, you get so close to the same warming as when it is. So, the only conclusion is for convection of trapped air to be the primary cause of greenhouse warming. In other words, there isn’t even any “greenhouse” effect for a greenhouse, so how could there be one for the atmosphere, which is an open system?

            And, yes, I know that “greenhouse gasses” absorb radiation and re-emit it. So what? All that does is to SLIGHTLY slow the loss of the heat. But on a dry day, when the sun goes down, it gets cold. The dry atmosphere does not retain the heat (that’s the re-emitting half of the process). And it’s fast, which is why when the sun goes down temperatures can drop 50 Degrees F or more, then warm up the next day to what they were the day before.

            E.g., The air over the desert has just as much CO2 as everywhere else, but very very low humidity, so while the desert air heats up during the day, it CAN NOT RETAIN THE HEAT, and temperatures plummet at night – day after day, every day, with no accumulation of heat. If heat doesn’t build up, AGW goes poof. I hope this is simple enough for you to comprehend?

            I’ll get to your links in a bit, but they won’t change the fact that dry air is not a blanket.

          2. yonason

            “you can also look at absorption bands…” – sod

            How about we look at what “Clive Best” responded to a comment on his blog?

            Brad Keyes says:
            January 24, 2013 at 1:02 pm

            My formatting was unclear, but this:

            If climate has not “tipped” in over 4 billion years, it’s not going to tip now due to mankind. The planet has a natural thermostat.

            was a quote from the Professor. Though, as I suggested, it might as well have come from a junior-school geology teacher. It’d be just as self-evident.

            Again, unless I’ve missed some subtlety, it seems to me that every able-bodied person in climate science is morally obliged to bring about the collapse of “the whole lot” now, if not sooner.
            Reply

            Clive Best says:
            January 24, 2013 at 6:22 pm

            You have it spot on.

            The argument of Lindzen is convincing. The Earth must have a natural thermostat because otherwise life could never have evolved over the last 4 billion years. Liquid Oceans have existed for well over 3 billion years and are essential for multi-cell life. The Oceans have not boiled away despite a 30% increases in solar output, Meteor strikes, super volcanoes, super novae and (far less important) CO2 levels 10 times greater than today. The oceans must be the Earth’s natural thermostat.

            You could call it the “anthropic principal”.

            The climate is stable to external CO2 forcing since otherwise we, the IPCC, and Greenpeace would not even be here to worry and fuss about it. Overall the Earth is immune to whatever minor disturbances humans can produce.”

            That’s what I call, and argument from reality, as opposed to warmunistas’ arguments from paranoid fantasy.

            “and here is a video showing some part of the effect:” – sod

            LOL – CO2 absorbs the light, and scatters it, so the the image is more diffused, that’s all. It isn’t “trapping” it, it’s smearing it out.

            Keep chasing that laser spot, sod. You can catch it. We’re rooting for you.

          3. David Appell

            “If climate has not “tipped” in over 4 billion years, it’s not going to tip now due to mankind.”

            So unless the Earth falls into a runaway greenhouse effect, you think all is fine?

          4. yonason

            @David Appell

            “…unless the Earth falls into a runaway greenhouse effect,…”

            And what exactly will be the cause of that demented Leftist fantasy?

            What part of MUCH higher [CO2]’s and higher temperatures in the past never resulted in a “runaway greenhouse,” so they won’t now, don’t you understand?

            Are you talking about the e.g., of Venus? The situation on Venus is not the same as Earth, at all.
            http://motls.blogspot.com/2010/05/hyperventilating-on-venus.html

            Bottom line, it ain’t gonna happen here.

          5. David Appell

            Yonasen: As usual, you completely missed the point, which was about the uselessness of claims that the climate has not tipped in over 4 billion years. It has.

          6. David Appell

            Yonason wrote:
            “And, yes, I know that “greenhouse gasses” absorb radiation and re-emit it. So what? All that does is to SLIGHTLY slow the loss of the heat.”

            We have a word to describe the slowing of heat loss:

            “warming”

          7. David Appell

            Yonason wrote:
            “If climate has not “tipped” in over 4 billion years, it’s not going to tip now due to mankind. The planet has a natural thermostat.”

            The Earth will indeed enter a runaway greenhouse state in a few hundred million years.

            How will that happen, if the planet has a “natural thermostat?”

          8. David Appell

            Yonason wrote:
            “The argument of Lindzen is convincing. The Earth must have a natural thermostat because otherwise life could never have evolved over the last 4 billion years. Liquid Oceans have existed for well over 3 billion years and are essential for multi-cell life. The Oceans have not boiled away despite a 30% increases in solar output….”

            All that says is that we’re far enough from the Sun so that a runaway greenhouse state would not yet occur on Earth. (The critical distance from the Sun, at its current irradiance, is about 0.95 AU, according to research by Jim Kasting at Penn State and his research team.)

            But as the Sun’s irradiance continues to increase — about 1% every 110 M yrs — it will indeed lead to a runaway greenhouse state at some point. Probably. The question is complicated by potential changes to the Earth’s orbit as the Sun expands. I wrote an article about this for Scientific American several years ago:

            “The Sun Will Eventually Engulf Earth–Maybe” Scientific American, September 2008, p. 24.
            http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-sun-will-eventually-engulf-earth-maybe/

          9. yonason

            slight correction to my last.
            “(a net change of zero if you do the sums)”
            is only true when the photon leaving the earth (cooling it by one photon’s worth of heat) is scattered back to earth (warming it back to what it was before emitting it). In fact, about 1/2 the photons absorbed by the CO2 are not back-scattered, so it’s a net deficit, or would be if the sun weren’t resupplying what was lost. But, again, at night there’s no re-supply, and there is a net loss of heat by the earth.

        2. David Appell

          “…CO2 absorbs the light, and scatters it, so the the image is more diffused, that’s all.”

          It’s actually absorption and re-emission, but, what happens to the IR that is directed downward? Where does its energy go?

          1. yonason

            “It’s actually absorption and re-emission, but, what happens to the IR that is directed downward? Where does its energy go?” – D.A.

            Absorbed, and re-emitted at random is called “scattering,” David.

            Light from the sun is split about 40:40 between visible and IR. It warms the earth by day, which then cools at night. Heat coming back up from the earth, and going through very dry atmosphere, goes out to space.

            To see this clearly, go spend a 24 hour day in the desert, you might notice that temperatures can drop 100 degrees between day and night, and then climb back up by as much the next day. That’s because after the sun sets, there is no incoming energy, and so it gets radiated back out to space. There is no “trapping” of energy by CO2, because if there were it wouldn’t cool off rapidly and extensively.

            But I presume the answer you were angling for is regarding the “back radiation?” …the portion of light scattered back to the earth from the CO2 that absorbed it from the earth (a net change of zero if you do the sums), which slows down the loss, …slows down, but does not trap.

      2. Lars P.

        Sod says: “We also do not need such empirical evidence from the past, as we can show the CO2 effect in Labs.”
        Yes sure, “no need of such empirical evidence” lol. There is a huge difference between knowing CO2’s effect in lab and the effect it has in the atmosphere, but why get confused by facts?
        http://claesjohnson.blogspot.co.at/2013/03/the-fabrication-of-co2-alarmism-decoded.html

        Like the stories of the vikings farming in Greenland, all Erik’s successful propaganda, and the farms in permafrost are just… just what?

        To me GISS is a total fraud. What part of this is not clear?
        ttps://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2014/08/12/what-part-of-this-isnt-clear-3/

        1. Lars P.

          oops missing an “h” at the second link…

        2. yonason

          “We also do not need such empirical evidence from the past…” – sod

          Right on, sod! We don’t need no stinken facts!

    2. yonason

      @Denis Ables

      Nice gif of glaciers melting (Canada thawing out) on a geological time scale.

      “The Earth was a much colder and drier place then. Deserts were more extensive, summers were short, and winters brutal. Approximately 1/5 of the forests on the planet were obliterated by the great ice sheets. Over 1/2 of the continent of North America was a desolate wasteland of ice.”
      http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/global_warming.html

      If humans really were warming the globe, which we aren’t, but if we were then I’d say, let it warm!, because, like you, I also prefer an inter-glacial climate to it’s alternative.

      1. David Appell

        Has it ever occurred to you that the poor will suffer from climate change much more than you, esconsed in front of your keyboard in an air-conditioned dwelling, including the 40% of the world’s population who live in the tropics?

        Or don’t they matter to you?

        1. yonason

          It’s the warmists and their tools, like yourself who could care less.

          Without the energy that wind and solar can not provide, they will remain in poverty, with all it’s attendant disadvantages. Doing what you advocate is the worst thing for them.

          As to feeding them, we could do that. But wasting food to make ethanol deprives many of the nutrition they need.
          http://www.c3headlines.com/2010/09/obamas-real-legacy-ethanol-burning-food-to-make-fuel-is-not-only-immensely-stupid-its-flat-out-immor.html

          And in a warmer world with more CO2, we could feed yet more people.
          http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/global-grain-yields.jpg

          No. It’s not us who don’t care. It’s you. But I know that doesn’t bother you, because you have no conscience. If you had, you wouldn’t be pushing for ever more destructive policies to be implemented.

        2. gallopingcamel

          @David Appell,

          It is brave of you to show up on a website that does not censor comments as your infamous “Quark Soup” does.

          Thanks for mentioning the immorality of “Climate Science” that uses the “Reverse Robin Hood” principal to rob the poor in favor of the rich. Thus the poor must pay more for electricity so that FP&L, Solyndra and other politically well connected organizations can feed at the gumment’s trough:
          https://diggingintheclay.wordpress.com/2013/06/02/electric-power-in-florida/#comment-5507

          For a better explanation please refer to Alex Epstein at Industrial Progress. Alex impressed me when he was an undergraduate at Duke university and I like what he is doing today:
          http://industrialprogress.com/?s=moral&x=0&y=0

          GRBs (Gamma Ray Bursters),the brightest events in the universe, depend on Inverse Compton Scattering. Given that you claim to be a physicist I would love to hear your comments on how that process was used to create the world’s brightest gamma ray source.
          http://www.tunl.duke.edu/web.tunl.2011a.howhigsworks.php

          1. yonason

            @gallopingcamel

            Nice material. Good Refs I wasn’t aware of. Thanks.

  8. Two German Scientists Say GISS Has “Squandered Much Credibility” …Playing A “Shady Role” – sentinelblog

    […] No Tricks Zone, by Dr. Sebastian Lüning and Prof. Fritz Vahrenholt (Translated/edited by P […]

  9. Sam Pyeatte

    All Federal agencies have become politicized to an extreme degree due to the meddling of the Obama Administration. Saul Alinsky rules are in play. Scientists that work for the government must toe the political line if they want to keep their jobs.

    1. David Appell

      What is your evidence that scientists must “toe the line?”

  10. David Appell

    If your two scientists had something real to say, they’d have done it in a peer reviewed journal paper. Your two scientists know that is how science works.

    So I wonder why that didn’t do that?

    1. yonason

      “…I wonder why that didn’t do that?” – D.A.

      Luening has.

      Now go after the IPCC, who base their nonsense on gray literature and fanatical greenie advocates…
      http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/06/22/the-ipcc-cant-learn-from-past-mistakes-wants-more-grey-literature/
      …many of the real scientists not agreeing with their conclusions.

    2. AndyG55

      “Your two scientists know that is how science works.”

      WRONG AGAIN.. that’s how Science Journalism works.

      Your ignorance of what science is about, is again highlighted by your own words.

    3. DirkH

      David Appell 3. February 2016 at 8:07 AM | Permalink | Reply
      “If your two scientists had something real to say, they’d have done it in a peer reviewed journal paper. Your two scientists know that is how science works. ”

      David, never to cheap to spread lies. Read Popper. Peer review is a modern gatekeeping mechanism. It has nothing to do with the scientific method. Or are you too stupid for logical thinking.

  11. David A

    David Appel says, “Has it ever occurred to you that the poor will suffer from climate change much more than you.”
    =======================================================
    Are you a prophet David? Or by “climate change” do you mean natural flux in droughts, tornadoes, hurricanes, floods etc? Yes, in general the poor get hit harder by that kind of natural climate change, but you mean CAGW climate change don’t you. This removes your assertion from science to belief, of faith, making you a claimed prophet, for certainly it is not a scientific statement.

    There has been no global increase in extreme weather events, droughts floods change in snow coverage, hurricanes, tornadoes, etc. The “C” in your CAGW theory is MIA. Hell David, the G and the W are MIA as well.

    What would happen right now Mr. Appel if the atmosphere dropped to 280ppm CO2. Then the poor would certainly suffer, and so would most as World War Three ensued due to a global drop in food production of 15 to 20 percent.

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