cc: "Folland, Chris" <chris.folland@metoffice.gov.uk>, Hans.von.Storch@gkss.de, Keith Briffa <k.briffa@uea.ac.uk>, "Brohan, Philip" <philip.brohan@metoffice.gov.uk>, Eduardo.Zorita@gkss.de
date: Wed, 23 Feb 2005 12:29:03 +0100
from: Hans.von.Storch@gkss.de
subject: Re: FW: More on the "Hocky Stick"
to: "Tett, Simon" <simon.tett@metoffice.gov.uk>

   Simon,
   I think one should list three publications which have stirred some disucsions, namely ours,
   the one by Anders Moberg and colleagues and Steve Mcintyre's  in GRL.
   I would assign the following significance ot these articles (just among us, please):
   -- ours: methodical basis for hockey stick reconstruction is weak; discussion was unwisely
   limited by IPCC declaring MBH to be "true". (Stupid, politicized action by IPCC, not MBH's
   responsbilkity. IPCC did one more of these silly oversellings -  by showing the damage
   curve by Munich Re without proper caveat in the fig caption);
   -- Moberg: an alternative suggestion - this may turn out to be more or lesa accurate at a
   later time, but it is at least a serious hypothesis, which is consistent with the
   independent bore hole reconstruction and our model simulations.
   -- Mc&Mc: As far as I can say (we did not redo the analysis, but Francis Zwires did) the
   identfied glitch is real. One should not do it this way. HOWEVER, we have tested the
   implication of this unwise set up in the logic of ERIK, and we found that it does not
   matter in this setup (see attachment, submitted to GRL).
   I should also mention the Crok analysis - Crok is a Dutch journalist who researched the
   whole field quite extensively. It turns out that the social process, within which the MBH /
   Mc&Mc drama evolved, was certainy not geared twowards best science, but towards defending
   turfs and claims.
   I have pdf's of all these articles; if you need them, let me know.
   I do not know what the status f gerd Brger's paper is, but I find it relevant -
   demonstrating that we still have many things to think about.
   Does this help?
   Cheers
   Hans
   Hans von Storch
   Institute for Coastal Research, GKSS Research Center
   Max-Planck-Strasse 1, 21502 GEESTHACHT, Germany
   ph: +49 4152 87 1831, fx: +49 4152 87 2832
   mobile: + 49 171 212 2046
   http://w3g.gkss.de/staff/storch; storch@gkss.de

   "Tett, Simon" <simon.tett@metoffice.gov.uk>

   21.02.2005 23:53

                                                                                            To

   Keith Briffa <k.briffa@uea.ac.uk>, Hans.von.Storch@gkss.de, "Folland, Chris"
   <chris.folland@metoffice.gov.uk>

                                                                                            cc

   "Brohan, Philip" <philip.brohan@metoffice.gov.uk>

                                                                                       Subject

   FW: More on the "Hocky Stick"

   Keith/Hans/Chris,
                   Defra do ask the impossible! Can you help me?
   Are there other papers I should be aware of?  Hans/Chris are the
   statistical criticisms of Mackintyre and McKitrick OK?
   Philip -- do you have any thoughts? [Beyond that the paleo community
   cannot do stats!]
   (Keith/Hans we can claim to the EU that SOAP is informing policy now!)
   Simon
   Dr Simon Tett  Managing Scientist, Data development and applications.
   Met Office       Hadley Centre (Reading Unit)
   Meteorology Building,  University of Reading Reading RG6 6BB
   Tel: +44 (0)118 378 5614  Fax +44 (0)118 378 5615
   Mobex: +44-(0)1392 886886
   E-mail: simon.tett@metoffice.gov.uk   http://www.metoffice.gov.uk
   Global climate data sets are available from http://www.hadobs.org
   -----Original Message-----
   From: Johnson, Cathy (GA) [mailto:Cathy.Johnson@defra.gsi.gov.uk]
   Sent: 21 February 2005 14:16
   To: 'Simon Tett'
   Cc: Warrilow, David (GA); Oliver, Sophia (GA); 'Vicky Pope'
   Subject: RE: More on the "Hocky Stick"
   Dear Simon
   Thank you for bringing this to our attention. As there have been a
   number of developments in this area lately, we would find it very useful
   to have a short briefing note (1 page maximum) summarising the present
   state of knowledge. Please can you prepare one for us?
   It should cover:
   Mackintyre and McKitrick's criticism of Mann et al (from  a year or two
   ago) von Storch et al's critique of Mann et al
   Mackintyre and McKitrick's latest criticism of Mann et al
   the new paper from Moberg et al
   anything else you think we should be aware of
   a summing up
   many thanks
   Cathy
   -----Original Message-----
   From: Simon Tett [mailto:simon.tett@metoffice.gov.uk]
   Sent: Wednesday, February 09, 2005 1:19 PM
   To: Johnson, Cathy (GA)
   Cc: Vicky Pope; Tim Osborn; Keith Briffa; Chris Folland; Simon Tett
   Subject: More on the "Hocky Stick"
   Cathy,
                   Tomorrow  Nature is publishing  a paper, by Moberg and others,
   called "Highly variable Northern Hemisphere temperatures reconstructed
   from
   low- and high-resolution proxy data". It reconstructs past temperature
   variability from 200 AD to present and finds much higher variability
   than is in  the Mann "Hocky Stick". They claim that temperatures around
   1000 to 1100 are roughly the same as the 20th century prior to 1990.
   Moberg et al  combine data from low temporal resolution proxies (Ice
   cores, ocean sediments and others) with high-resolution proxies (mainly
   tree-ring data). Tree rings have problems estimating low-frequency
   temperature variability due to the need to correct for tree growth. So
   they time-filter the tree-ring data to remove low frequencies and
   combine this with the low frequency variability.
   However, Tim Osborn and Keith Briffa (who know much much more than I do
   about proxy reconstructions) have grave reservations about the paper's
   methodology. Their main concern is how the low-resolution data was
   calibrated in order to convert changes in the proxy to changes in
   temperature. The supplementary information to the paper (which is not
   available to us right now) may reassure them (or may reinforce their
   views).
   yours
   Simon
   P.S. If you want to discuss more then I am in Exeter today/Thursday and
   can be contacted on 01392 886886
   --
   Simon Tett <simon.tett@metoffice.com>
   Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra)
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