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Y2K rears its head again...
Aug. 10th, 2007 12:55 pmhttp://www.dailytech.com/Blogger+finds+Y2K+bug+in+NASA+Climate+Data/article8383.htm
Summary: The NASA study that had 1998 as the warmest year on record, and a sharp upturn in US temps in '99/'00? Bad software doing the analysis. At fault? A Y2K bug. Ouch.
Authors of study have conceded the bug, and released new results.
Warmest year was actually 1934, and 5 of the 10 warmest years are now *before WWII*.
I would hope that this would get the same sort of mainstream coverage as the original study, since it's a valid correction by the original authors, but my bet is that those sites that *do* cover it are screamed into submission as oil industry apologists. Fox News is going to be all over this like white on rice, of course, which isn't going to help any sort of rational discourse.
Regardless of one's position in the climate change sectarian violence of words, bad data is bad data is bad data. Trend is still upwards, but I'll be shocked to see if "1998 warmest year on record" stops getting used in the mainstream press as gospel. No one wants to admit they were wrong - kudos to the study authors on fessing up and modifying their results. That's good science in action. Too bad the general public gestalt can't work a bit more like that. :P
Summary: The NASA study that had 1998 as the warmest year on record, and a sharp upturn in US temps in '99/'00? Bad software doing the analysis. At fault? A Y2K bug. Ouch.
Authors of study have conceded the bug, and released new results.
Warmest year was actually 1934, and 5 of the 10 warmest years are now *before WWII*.
I would hope that this would get the same sort of mainstream coverage as the original study, since it's a valid correction by the original authors, but my bet is that those sites that *do* cover it are screamed into submission as oil industry apologists. Fox News is going to be all over this like white on rice, of course, which isn't going to help any sort of rational discourse.
Regardless of one's position in the climate change sectarian violence of words, bad data is bad data is bad data. Trend is still upwards, but I'll be shocked to see if "1998 warmest year on record" stops getting used in the mainstream press as gospel. No one wants to admit they were wrong - kudos to the study authors on fessing up and modifying their results. That's good science in action. Too bad the general public gestalt can't work a bit more like that. :P