Sunday, March 23, 2014

Sea levels and satellites...

Sea levels and satellites...  If you're an anthropogenic global warming skeptic, one of the most frustrating discussions you can have with warmists is about rising sea levels.  They are typically absolutely convinced that sea levels are rising swiftly, and that large chunks of the planet's land will soon be underwater.

The truth is just a tad more complicated.  The evidence about sea level changes isn't even close to being rock solid.  There are so many complicating factors when it comes to simply measuring sea level that nobody really knows for sure whether sea levels are even changing, much less whether they're going up or down!

An especially frustrating facet of this debate comes from satellite-based sea level measurements.  The assumption that most people make is that satellite-based sea level measurements are direct and unambiguous – but in fact they are not, for many reasons.  Most of the articles I've read about sea level measurement challenges are highly technical.  Here's one that anybody at all can understand – not just about the satellite measurement challenges, but all of them.  Good stuff, by a clan of Irish scientists.

This article is a great illustration of the enormous uncertainties that afflict just about every aspect of climatology.  Even measurement is hard in climatology, unlike in must other branches of science!

Here's another great article from the same folks about problems with the U.S. temperature data from surface weather stations...

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