Australian politicians, and the media they sponsor, have been throwing their hands in the air and screaming unprecedented climate change - particularly over the last two weeks. A focus has been on the record number of new record hot days. But in all of this, there is no mention that the method used to actually measure hot days has changed.
This week's Four Corners program began by interviewing Karl Braganza from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology. Braganza explained that it is really only since the 1990s that we have started to see the extreme heat. What he didn't mention is that a totally new method of measurement came into effect on 1 November 1996 - with the transition continuing, so each new year, additional weather stations have their mercury thermometer replaced with an electronic probe taking one-second spot readings.
For example, the Bureau claimed a new record hottest day for September for the state of Victoria on 23 September 2017, which was actually a one-second spike from an electronic probe installed in June 2012. The Bureau reported this as the hottest September day back to 1889. Yet between 1889 and 1996 a completely different method was being used to measure maximum daily temperatures at Mildura.
According to the Guinness World Records, a record must be standardisable and verifiable. Yet the new record from Mildura was not measured according to world standards of calibration for the use of electronic probes which specifies that one-second readings be averaged over at least one minute. Meanwhile this questionable data is being used to justify ever more expenditure on Australia's perceived climate catastrophe - without any questioning by leading Australian journalists Michael Brissenden or Sarah Ferguson, who presented Monday night's program that lamented the new record hot days.
In not reporting that the incidence of "extreme heat" corresponds with a change in how maximum temperatures are measured, these two journalists, Brissenden and Ferguson, have withheld important information from the Australian public.
Given the new, very different, method of measuring temperatures, it would be assumed that there are dozens of reports published by the Bureau that document how comparable the measurements from electronic probes have proven at different locations, and under different conditions. Yet there are none!
The Bureau claims, when asked, that temperatures from its electronic probes and traditional mercury thermometers are comparable - without providing any actual evidence. My analysis of temperature data from Mildura indicates that there is a statistically significant different - with the first probe (in place from 1996 to 2000) recording too cool, and subsequent probes too warm relative to the mercury thermometer (often by up to 0.4 degrees Celsius).
I have been attempting to bring this to the attention of the media, particularly the ABC for some months. But their journalists turn-away. They don't want any scrutiny of this much revered institution, the Australian Bureau of Meteorology. Gambling at an Australian mobile casino is a popular and fun pastime for many people. It's easy to jump in at any time and many casinos have a very wide range of games to choose from. The popularity of online casinos is based not only on the good odds but also on the fact that you can play games from the comfort of your own home, which is why mobile casinos in Australia have developed at such a rapid pace.
Even in the Australian parliament there is a closing-of-ranks. Rather than consider my evidence, Monday before last Senators Richard Di Natale and Anne Urquhart from the Australian Greens claimed that the questions I have been raising about the integrity of the temperature data amounted to 'climate denial' and harassment of the Bureau's CEO, Andrew Johnson.
In reality, my few emails to Johnson have focused on the single issue of how temperatures are measured, which really has nothing whatsoever to do with denying climate change. Indeed, if we are to accurately quantify the magnitude of global warming, then the integrity of the temperature databases is paramount. Yet the number of documented anomalies continues to grow - as does the indifference of our political class.
Sarah Ferguson introducing Michael Brissenden on Monday night's ABC Four Corner's program that ostensibly reported on climate change. Four Corner's is a publicly funded news program, that claims to be investigative. On Monday night it could be best described as climate porn, or climate propaganda with critical information withheld - perhaps through ignorance.
Perhaps an approach should be made to Senator Bernardi to have the matter debated in Parliament. Of course the Greens are going to obstruct and protect the BoM from scrutiny because they are from the same tribe. It is not just the failure to follow the scientific method that has created this mess, but also the active adulteration of historical records by the BoM. It is unconscionable and indefensible.
With regard to your comparison of climate alarmism and Christianity, as discussed in your email newsletter, I fear that you are undermining your own credibility. Firstly, you acknowledge that your original assertions were amiss. Secondly, you look at the miracles of Jesus, and in particular, his resurrection, as events that need be verified by repeatable scientific experiment. The point about the resurrection is not whether it is verifiable by experimentation, but whether it actually happened. Certainly rising from the dead is on the surface biologically impossible (but then, not so long ago, organ transplants were considered biologically impossible), however it is recorded as having actually happened. Don't forget that Jesus was no mere man either, but God incarnate (a spiritual concept that science can have no part in).
History can rarely be verified by repeatable scientific experiment, but is routinely verified by forensic science. Our legal system is founded upon, and underpinned by, the principles of forensic verification "beyond reasonable doubt". Murderers are convicted, not by repeating their crime, but relying upon forensic and eyewitness evidence.
The death of Jesus and his subsequent resurrection have been examined forensically by many great scholars and scientists and have been found to be entirely verified. The evidence that Jesus was dead (the issue of blood mixed with water from his abdomen, for example) is incontrovertible. The testimony of over 500 eye witnesses to his appearance following his resurrection is also incontrovertible from a forensic and legal evidence perspective. The most elementary and essential evidence to verify Jesus' death and resurrection have been provided.
To trivialise and mythologise it is disingenuous and undermines your commitment to the veracity of the scientific method to determine truth. Christians do not need to rely on science to verify history, but wherever it can be so verified, the historical record of the Bible is always confirmed. You need not appease nor patronise us on issues of science. Truth is truth and science is but one tool to discover it. Sadly, the BoM and their enablers like the Greens are not interested in either.
[…] last week, I blogged on the issue of the unreliability of the temperature measurements as narrated by Michael Brissenden […]
It is not too difficult to figure out why we are in this mess. I would venture to say that it is because the upper levels of management, all over the place, are occupied by pea brains, with no qualifications to make the claims they do, whether about the climate or any other field involving science or engineering knowledge.
On a completely different matter, why else would the NSW government suddenly discover that a new fleet of trains, costing $2+ billion, that they have signed a contract for, are too wide to negotiate the 10 tunnels on the Blue Mountains railway line, so they are caught between fudging the numbers in the safety standards to circumvent the fiasco, or closing the very busy line for a period to widen the tunnels?
It takes a very perverse level of incompetence to make such monumental blunders.
Siliggy
Answer to your fridge question - 41.8C.
John
Don't worry. NASA GISS has made sure it hasn't been too cool in the states in Jan.
I believed one of the Great Lakes froze but you wouldn't think that from this map.
https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/maps/
Any fine level instrument needs to be checked. As an apprentice, I worked for a while in the engineering company's metrology (NOT meteorology) unit, where all of the measuring instruments used in engineering production were checked regularly. If the BOM didn't do a DOCUMENTED comparison check, then why should anyone believe them?
Hi Richard Bennett
Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment.
I wrote much about the Bureau setting limits on how cold an individual AWS could record temperatures during July and August last year at this blog/website. In short, the Bureau have had a mechanism in place to rounding-up recordings below minus 10 degrees at several sites for over a decade. This was acknowledged, in a round-a-about way in the AWS report that was published by the Bureau last year, in September.
You can read more about this here: https://www.spectator.com.au/2017/09/not-really-fit-for-purpose-the-bureau-of-meteorology/
Cheers, Jennifer