Global Warming Fraud Exposed

alanbrad: There is simply no way to prove the “modifications” done to the South American data was done correctly. As the modifications are public and based on statistical and metrological methods, it is possible to show whether or not the modifications were done correctly. Alternatively, you could analyze the original data with your own independent methodology. Zachriel

hrun0815 and Zachriel: You are ignoring the main point of my origional post. There is simply no way to prove the "modifications" done to the South American data was done correctly. And, conviently, the "modifications" do end up supporting the Global Warming theory. I simply cannot support a theory that is dependent on untested calculations to be then used to make my electic bill more expensive. You can trust these men to do things correctly, but I don't. It is too easy to make up a bunch of data that supports your theory. alanbrad

alanbrad: it just shows that there is no credibility left in the theory of Global Warming. Its pretty obvious at this point. It's pretty obvious at this point. It just shows you didn't read the study, not even the abstract. alanbrad: the study is saying its contravercial, then does its own modifications They didn't do "modifications", but looked for the trend at rural stations, ignoring urban stations. Zachriel

Zachriel: it just shows that there is no credibility left in the theory of Global Warming. Its pretty obvious at this point. The defenders of the “modifications” are saying it is because of the heat island effect, and the study is saying its contravercial, then does its own modifications. The reality is, the whole thing is just a lame attempt to cover up some very obvious manipulation done to get more grant money.

Translation: I have no clue what the hell is going on, but I do know that those scientists are bunch of greedy lying liars who lie because they are greedy! hrun0815

Zachriel: it just shows that there is no credibility left in the theory of Global Warming. Its pretty obvious at this point. The defenders of the "modifications" are saying it is because of the heat island effect, and the study is saying its contravercial, then does its own modifications. The reality is, the whole thing is just a lame attempt to cover up some very obvious manipulation done to get more grant money. alanbrad

alanbrad: From the article you posted: “The conclusion ... So they cite three groups that find the urban heat effect is not significant. Then the study you quote does it's own study, using an independent methodology. Do you understand the study and what they found? Zachriel

From the article you posted: "The conclusion of the three groups is that the urban heat island contribution to their global averages is much smaller than the observed global warming. The topic is not without controversy." Of course there is a contraversy, because these temps were measured too close to the city in the past. How do you know you are right unless you go back in time and measure the temp further away, calculate the error, then compare it to what you are calculating now? alanbrad

alanbrad: The problem I have with this manipulation of data is that there is no way to know if they are doing correctly. That is incorrect. You can study the raw data and the methodology yourself. Here's one such study: http://berkeleyearth.org/summary-of-findings Zachriel

The problem I have with this manipulation of data is that there is no way to know if they are doing correctly. If you doubt the scientists, you are labeled a "denier" or "anti-science" or a ludite. I know from experience that it is easy to get things wrong if you have no way to test your calculations before using them. There has been no discussion of this, the "climate change" proponents are just saying that it is an ajustment for the heat island effect. So we are just supposed to trust them because they are "scientists" and we aren't? Sorry, but I am not doing that. There is too much at stake just to let people get away with passing off untested theories as fact. alanbrad

I would like to add that selecting individual press reports that seem to confirm one's position while ignoring tons of peer-reviewed literature that contradicts it is also a fallacy (cherry-picking). Piotr

OK skram and hrun , stop patting each other on the back http://drtimball.com/blog/ Eugen

... and this round ended like all the other ones about global warming. A ridiculous OP, after a little while a sound refuting of the ridiculous OP, and everybody moves one. hrun0815

Yes, hrun0815, it seems like Barry and others have no interest in discussing the rebuttal presented on Curry's blog by Rohde, Hausfather, and Mosher. Maybe we can pique their interest with a few more excerpts, this time from thread comments. Mosher writes:

There was charge laid out long ago, a charge that continues to be brought up. NOAA cooked the data and Hansen and GISS cooked the data. Adjustments were a fraud and possible criminal. You know I have friends in the business who actually had to stop working and spend a long time answering investigators questions. Words have consequences. Booker doesn't get that, Shub doesnt, Carrick doesnt and perhaps Judith doesn't. These guys could not do their science, they had to convince investigators that they hadn't been cooking the books. The news went from a blog to fox news to a congressman to the GSA.. and good people suffered. On to adjustments. We decided that a better approach would be an algorithm. 1. you couldn't accuse it of having political motives 2. you could test it on synthetic data 3. you could vary parameters and test it. 4. you could repeat the same work and get the same answer. 5. it could scale to 40000 stations. In short we decided to take a hands off approach. Test the approach independently. verify that it wasn't biased. then apply it to the problem. The approach will warm some stations and cool others. Period. Along comes a booker or a delingpole or homewood, whoever, and they pick a station that warms. 1. They claim that the adjustment is a scandal. 2. people link to comments that adjustments are criminal And then you ask me to explain the adjustment!! WTF? The explanation is simple: an algorithm tested to be fair, adjusted the station. It had no “reasons” no “motives” no human bias. It looks at the neighbors and decided that the station was inconsistent with its neighbors.

Where do you see fraud, Barry? The adjustments have been done not manually, not in one direction, but by a transparent algorithm, with the net effect close to zero globally. The code of the algorithm is available, so is the data, and anyone with a minimum technical ability can check that. This is as transparent as it can be. What is your response? skram

Your move, Arrington.

What do you mean, your move? He already stomped his foot on the ground and whined about the nefarious and incompetent climate scientists. What more do you want him to do? hrun0815

And the code doing adjustments is openly available. No need to blindly "trust the guys doing the monkeying." Anyone with time and minimal expertise can check what the code does. Your move, Arrington. skram

Barry Arrington: the temps have been monkeyed with but you can trust the guys doing the monkeying; it makes no difference. Nowadays, the process of homogenization is done by statistical methods, subject to review, and confirmed by more than one methodology. Zachriel

Barry:

I see a skeptic saying that the temps have been monkeyed with. I see a conformist say yes, the temps have been monkeyed with but you can trust the guys doing the monkeying

Go ahead and reread the rebuttal for you don't understand its substance. It wasn't the "conformists" who adjusted the data with their own bias. It was done by an unbiased code. That is why some adjustments are up, some down, and the net is close to zero. UDEditors: You say the code was unbiased. That, in itself, is reason to believe that it was biased. skram

skram @ 46, I see a skeptic saying that the temps have been monkeyed with. I see a conformist say yes, the temps have been monkeyed with but you can trust the guys doing the monkeying; it makes no difference. Well, if it makes no difference, why do it? One thing I do know, after climategate, "hide the decline," refuse to show the source data, almost uniformly wrong computer projections, the hockey stick, etc., etc., etc. the alarmists have zero credibility. In that respect, they are kind of like you. So, when I see a conformist come in and say, "don't worry; all is well; we would never mislead you," I am skeptical. Barry Arrington

Barry, we can argue all day about Curry's position on the skeptic scale. That would be an interesting diversion. What do you have to say on the substance of the technical rebuttal? skram

Failed Climate Predictions EnjoY! Be sure to check out all of the categories... Joe

OK Scram, if you want to use Wikipedia as a source, this is what Wikipedia says concerning her:

While Judith Curry supports the scientific opinion on climate change, she has argued that climatologists should be more accommodating of those skeptical of the scientific consensus on climate change.

Suggesting, as she does, that skeptics should not be tarred and feathered, does not make her a skeptic. As for your facile charges of hypocrisy, this is not a matter of the genetic fallacy. You ask the readers to believe you when you say Curry is a skeptic (for the obvious reason of attempting to insulate her views from a charge of bias). Should we believe you? This is a matter of evaluating your credibility as a witnesses. You have none Mr. "the Holocaust might be alright for all I know." Barry Arrington

And note, Barry, that our side didn't simply call Booker a nut and stopped at that. We provided links to a substantial rebuttal by technically competent people. Here is, once again, a summary of that rebuttal:

In summary, it is possible to look through 40,000 stations and select those that the algorithm has warmed; and, it’s possible to ignore those that the algorithm has cooled. As the spatial maps show it is also possible to select entire continents where the algorithm has warmed the record; and, it’s possible to focus on other continents were the opposite is the case. Globally however, the effect of adjustments is minor. It’s minor because on average the biases that require adjustments mostly cancel each other out.

What do you have to say to this? Nothing so far, except throwing ad hominem bombs. skram

Barry:

At any rate, nothing you say has any credibility.

There we go with the genetic fallacy again. And who was it on this thread that said

Piotr and REC, engage in the genetic fallacy much?

May I call you a hypocrite? skram

Barry:

Judity Curry does not believe she is a warming skeptic. In fact, she says in this letter that skeptics need to be “countered.”

Nice of you to quote a single word from a 2009 letter, Barry! Curry's position has been evolving: she has been steadily distancing herself from consensus. To such a degree that she now appears on the Wikipedia's list of scientists questioning the accuracy of IPCC climate projections, along with Richard Lindzen and Freeman Dyson. None of them denies the reality of warming. All three disagree with the consensus that the warming will be substantial and that we need to do anything about it. Here is an extended quote from a recent (2013) interview at NPR:

Curry actually entered the public eye in 2005, with a paper in Science magazine warning that hurricanes were likely to become more intense as a result of climate change. But in the years since then, she's soured on the scientific consensus about climate change. Her mantra now is, "We just don't know." This message plays well in the House of Representatives, so it's no surprise that Curry was called to testify at a subcommittee hearing there this spring. ... "If all other things remain equal, it's clear that adding more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere will warm the planet," she told the committee. But, she went on, not all things are equal. She says there's so much uncertainty about the role of natural variation in the climate that she doesn't know what's going to happen. She says a catastrophe is possible, but warming could also turn out to be not such a big deal. ... Her message that day on Capitol Hill was, in essence, that while humans may be contributing to climate change, we simply don't know how the climate will behave in the coming decades, so there may be no point in trying to reduce emissions.

I think that's enough for an informed person to understand where Judith Curry stands on climate change. She is not a fire-breathing critic like McIntyre or Goddard, but she is in the same category as Lindzen. skram

And if skram wants to talk about conspiracy nuts it doesn't have to look ant further than his own ilk who scream "CONSPIRACY" at the mention of Academic Freedom bills. Talk about seeing stuff tat isn't there- Booker has nothing on evolutionists. Joe

The 19th century saw an end to the little ice age. That we are warmer now should not be any surprise because we are no longer in that cooler era. The warming anomaly is less than the daily temperature variation. AND we have daily temperature changes that dwarf the warming anomaly. The climate changes- that is what it does and it does so regardless of us. When the next Maunder minimum occurs the alarmists will see the real driver of our climate doing its thing. Joe

Barry Scepticism is a matter of degree and comes in all sorts of flavours. Curry may not regard herself as a sceptic but it would be hard to find a climatologist who is more sceptical. But instead of scoring debating points against Skram why not address the points in the link he gave? Or do you now accept that Booker was wrong? Mark Frank

Skram:

Judith Curry is another warming skeptic

Judity Curry does not believe she is a warming skeptic. In fact, she says in this letter that skeptics need to be "countered." In my objectivist ethical framework, trying to win an argument by misrepresenting the viewpoint of experts I cite is unethical. Does your subjectivism help you do that? Of course, I suppose we should not be surprised. You recently suggested that it is possible that the Holocaust might have been an affirmatively good thing. I guess we shouldn't put anything past someone who could say that. At any rate, nothing you say has any credibility. Did you really think I wouldn't check on this? Barry Arrington

#34 Skram Thanks for that link (from a technically literate but sceptical community) which pretty much clears up why the adjustments are made and shows they have no net effect globally. As one of the (clearly sceptical) commenters said:

Don Monford wrote: “You convinced me some time ago that BEST is about as good as we are going to get with what we have to work with in the surface data realm.” +1 And I used to be very suspicious indeed. I think that Booker and Delingpole suddenly jumping all over this will eventually reflect badly on them. Which is a shame, as they have previously shone a spotlight on some terrible scientific malpractice by alarmists. I think they hope the adjustments are the silver bullet that will finally kill CAGW alarmism. They aren’t.

Mark Frank

Barry, I say it is a good answer... However, I have made some friends up north of Canada they may not agree with your assumptions. They live there... I have asked them to provide a full report... I hope you don't mind...? Quest

Judith Curry is another warming skeptic with strong credentials in climate studies. Head to her blog and read a guest post by Robert Rohde, Zeke Hausfather, and Steve Mosher Berkeley Earth: raw versus adjusted temperature data. The post begins:

Christopher Booker’s recent piece along with a few others have once again raised the issue of adjustments to various temperature series, including those made by Berkeley Earth. And now Booker has double-downed accusing people of fraud and Anthony Watts previously insinuated that adjustments are somehow criminal.

I'll skip the technical details and go straight to the summary:

In general, noise and inhomogeneities in temperature data will make a temperature field rougher while homogenization practices and spatial averaging will make it smoother. Since the true temperature distribution is unknown, determining the right amount of homogenization to best capture the local details is challenging, and an active area of research. However, as noted above, it makes very little difference to the global averages. In summary, it is possible to look through 40,000 stations and select those that the algorithm has warmed; and, it’s possible to ignore those that the algorithm has cooled. As the spatial maps show it is also possible to select entire continents where the algorithm has warmed the record; and, it’s possible to focus on other continents were the opposite is the case. Globally however, the effect of adjustments is minor. It’s minor because on average the biases that require adjustments mostly cancel each other out.

So, as has been said multiple times on this thread, Christopher Booker is a conspiracy nut who sees fraud where there is none. skram

Barry, through the loudspeaker in the ceiling:

UDEditors: Did you even read the sentence that we’ve highlighted for you. This does not support your “nothing to see here” dismissal.

Yes, I did. Did you read the next sentence? Let me highlight it here for you:

However, I am not quite certain about the size and relevance of this effect and I feel very uncomfortable about many climate skeptics’ knee-jerk emotional reaction showing that they hate the very idea of an adjustment.

And maybe a full paragraph further down:

Adjustments are a good thing and the instinctive criticism of all adjustments as a matter of principle is simply not right. I agree with Mosher: these “principled” critics of all adjustments are surely throwing the baby out with the bath water. And by the way, I do agree with the description of those who get crazy whenever somebody mentions the word “adjustment” as anti-science nut jobs, and yes, I do think that a large number of such people exists among the WUWT regular readers (but probably among most laymen in the world, too, and maybe they are a majority among the TRF readers as well, sorry).

Anti-science nut jobs—Motl is looking at you. skram

Similar news: Food fat warnings 'should not have been introduced' Official warnings against the consumption of saturated fats are based on flawed data and should not have been introduced, claims new research http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/health/news/11401724/Food-fat-warnings-should-not-have-been-introduced.html Alex73

Oh Barry, you are just a charmer. Graham2

correction to post 26. nitrogen makes up 78% of the atmosphere instead of 70% as I mistakenly typed bornagain77

Barry: It wasn't the climate thing, it was your sudden discovery of the value of 'evidence'. Slippery thing, this 'evidence' thing, isn't it ? Sometimes its real useful, sometimes we just don't need it. UDEditors: G2, this may be the most idiotic thing you've ever written. Impressive, because the bar there is really high. Graham2

We return to our regular programming. skram

Dr. Ross points out that the extremely long amount of time it took to prepare a suitable place for humans to exist in this universe, for the relatively short period of time that we can exist on this planet, is actually a point of evidence that argues strongly for Theism:

Anthropic Principle: A Precise Plan for Humanity By Hugh Ross Excerpt: Brandon Carter, the British mathematician who coined the term “anthropic principle” (1974), noted the strange inequity of a universe that spends about 15 billion years “preparing” for the existence of a creature that has the potential to survive no more than 10 million years (optimistically).,, Carter and (later) astrophysicists John Barrow and Frank Tipler demonstrated that the inequality exists for virtually any conceivable intelligent species under any conceivable life-support conditions. Roughly 15 billion years represents a minimum preparation time for advanced life: 11 billion toward formation of a stable planetary system, one with the right chemical and physical conditions for primitive life, and four billion more years toward preparation of a planet within that system, one richly layered with the biodeposits necessary for civilized intelligent life. Even this long time and convergence of “just right” conditions reflect miraculous efficiency. Moreover the physical and biological conditions necessary to support an intelligent civilized species do not last indefinitely. They are subject to continuous change: the Sun continues to brighten, Earth’s rotation period lengthens, Earth’s plate tectonic activity declines, and Earth’s atmospheric composition varies. In just 10 million years or less, Earth will lose its ability to sustain human life. In fact, this estimate of the human habitability time window may be grossly optimistic. In all likelihood, a nearby supernova eruption, a climatic perturbation, a social or environmental upheaval, or the genetic accumulation of negative mutations will doom the species to extinction sometime sooner than twenty thousand years from now. http://christiangodblog.blogspot.com/2006_12_01_archive.html

As a Christian, I like the metaphor of 'preparing for a wedding' that Dr. Ross uses in the following video to illustrate the disparity that 'The Anthropic Inequality' presents in terms of time:

Hugh Ross - The Anthropic Principle and The Anthropic Inequality - video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/8494065/

There is much more that could be brought out in regards to the fine-tuned ecology of the earth, but for a brief sketch on a blog, I think the point has been made. i.e. When taking the bigger picture of earth's entire climate history into consideration, the Global warming argument loses much of its steam. Verse and Inspirational video:

Isaiah 45:18-19 For thus says the Lord, who created the heavens, who is God, who formed the earth and made it, who established it, who did not create it in vain, who formed it to be inhabited: “I am the Lord, and there is no other. I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth; I did not say to the seed of Jacob, ‘seek me in vain’; I, the Lord speak righteousness, I declare things that are right.” View from the ISS (International Space Station) at Night - video https://vimeo.com/45878034#

bornagain77

Since oxygen readily reacts and bonds with many of the solid elements making up the earth itself, and since the slow process of tectonic activity controls the turnover of the earth's crust, it took photosynthetic bacteria a few billion years before the earth’s crust was saturated with enough oxygen to allow a sufficient level of oxygen to be built up in the atmosphere as to allow higher life:

Earth’s Oxygen: A Mystery Easy to Take for Granted - October 3, 2013 Excerpt: But the oxygen disappeared almost as soon as it was formed. That’s because oxygen is an enormously friendly element, forming bonds with a wide range of molecules. It attached to the iron in rocks, for example, creating rust. It joined with the hydrogen spewed out from volcanoes to form hydrogen peroxide and other compounds. Our planet, in other words, was a giant oxygen vacuum in its early years. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/03/science/earths-oxygen-a-mystery-easy-to-take-for-granted.html?ref=scienceandtechnology&_r=1& The origin of complex life as a mining operation: Rob Sheldon’s thought experiment - March 13, 2014 Excerpt: You (and many others) have mentioned the necessity of oxygen to permit most of the body plans of the Cambrian in the first place. That is, if there isn’t much oxygen around, there’s no need for lungs, for gills etc. The unmentioned point, is that the oxygen was the result of algae, toiling away for millennia without any appreciation, without any audience, turning sunlight and carbon dioxide and water into oxygen. What this paper is saying is that there was a necessary precursor, even less loved than algae, called cyanobacteria (aka pond scum) that weren’t quite as prolific as algae, but had this remarkable ability to convert N2 into NH3 into amines, to take an inert gas out of the atmosphere and make it water soluble. This is critical for proteins since every amino acid in a protein has an amine. No nitrogen fixation, no life. But oh, is it difficult. N2 is enormously stable, which is why nitroglycerine wants to become N2 at the slightest provocation. It takes a lot of energy and clever enzymes, working in the total absence of oxygen, to make NH3. What I had not realized, was that the enzymes that cyanobacteria need require vanadium and molybdenum, two transition metals that are not exactly common in the ocean. But wait, glaciers grind down mountains and dump the tailings in the ocean–a perfect mining operation. And the whole earth was covered in glaciers for 200 million years before the Cambrian Explosion. It all comes down to timing. And I thought ice ages were a waste of time. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/the-origin-of-complex-life-as-a-mining-operation-rob-sheldons-thought-experiment/

Moreover tectonic activity, besides being crucial for bringing the atmosphere on earth to a point where it can host human life, also now plays a crucial role in keeping the atmosphere in balance (i.e. keeping the atmosphere stable):

The Life and Death of Oxygen - 2008 Excerpt: “The balance between burial of organic matter and its oxidation appears to have been tightly controlled over the past 500 million years.” “The presence of O2 in the atmosphere requires an imbalance between oxygenic photosynthesis and aerobic respiration on time scales of millions of years hence, to generate an oxidized atmosphere, more organic matter must be buried (by tectonic activity) than respired.” - Paul Falkowski http://www.creationsafaris.com/crev200810.htm#20081024a The Goldilocks principle: New hypothesis explains Earth's continued habitability - March 19, 2014 Excerpt: Researchers from USC and Nanjing University in China have documented evidence suggesting that part of the reason that the Earth has become neither sweltering like Venus nor frigid like Mars lies with a built-in atmospheric carbon dioxide regulator – the geologic cycles that churn up the planet's rocky surface. Scientists have long known that "fresh" rock pushed to the surface via mountain formation effectively acts as a kind of sponge, soaking up the greenhouse gas CO2. Left unchecked, however, that process would simply deplete atmospheric CO2 levels to a point that would plunge the Earth into an eternal winter within a few million years during the formation of large mountain ranges like the Himalayas – which has clearly not happened. And while volcanoes have long been pointed to as a source of carbon dioxide, alone they cannot balance out the excess uptake of carbon dioxide by large mountain ranges. Instead, it turns out that "fresh" rock exposed by uplift also emits carbon through a chemical weathering process, which replenishes the atmospheric carbon dioxide at a comparable rate. "Our presence on Earth is dependent upon this carbon cycle. This is why life is able to survive," http://phys.org/news/2014-03-goldilocks-principle-hypothesis-earth-habitability.html Earth's Capacity To Absorb CO2 Much Greater Than Expected: Nov. 2009 Excerpt: New data show that the balance between the airborne and the absorbed fraction of carbon dioxide has stayed approximately constant since 1850, despite emissions of carbon dioxide having risen from about 2 billion tons a year in 1850 to 35 billion tons a year now. This suggests that terrestrial ecosystems and the oceans have a much greater capacity to absorb CO2 than had been previously expected. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091110141842.htm

Interestingly, for the last 10 million years the oxygen percentage has been holding steady around 21%. 21% happens to be a 'very comfortable' percentage for humans to exist. If the oxygen level was only a few percentage lower, large mammals would become severely hampered in their ability to metabolize energy; if only a few percentage higher, there would be uncontrollable outbreaks of fire across the land (Denton; Nature's Destiny).

Composition Of Atmosphere - Pie Chart http://www.ux1.eiu.edu/~cfjps/1400/FIG01_010.JPG

Even nitrogen, which makes up 70% of the atmosphere, is shown to be extremely fine-tuned for life. Just how crucial, and finely tuned, the nitrogen cycle is is revealed by this following study:

Engineering and Science Magazine - Caltech - March 2010 Excerpt: “Without these microbes, the planet would run out of biologically available nitrogen in less than a month,” Realizations like this are stimulating a flourishing field of “geobiology” – the study of relationships between life and the earth. One member of the Caltech team commented, “If all bacteria and archaea just stopped functioning, life on Earth would come to an abrupt halt.” Microbes are key players in earth’s nutrient cycles. Dr. Orphan added, “...every fifth breath you take, thank a microbe.” http://www.creationsafaris.com/crev201003.htm#20100316a Planet's Nitrogen Cycle Overturned - Oct. 2009 Excerpt: "Ammonia is a waste product that can be toxic to animals.,,, archaea can scavenge nitrogen-containing ammonia in the most barren environments of the deep sea, solving a long-running mystery of how the microorganisms can survive in that environment. Archaea therefore not only play a role, but are central to the planetary nitrogen cycles on which all life depends.,,,the organism can survive on a mere whiff of ammonia – 10 nanomolar concentration, equivalent to a teaspoon of ammonia salt in 10 million gallons of water." http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090930132656.htm Global Nitrogen Availability Consistent for Past 500 Years Linked to Carbon Levels - Mar. 21, 2013 Excerpt: "Our best idea is that the nitrogen and carbon cycles were linked tightly back then and they are linked tightly today," McLauchlan said. "Humans are now manipulating both nitrogen and carbon at the same time, which means that there is no net effect on the biosphere.",,, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/03/130321105100.htm

bornagain77

While the photosyntheic bacteria were detoxifying the oceans of iron, and depositing them as ores that would be of future benefit for man, sulfate reducing bacteria were also detoxifing the earth of toxic levels of heavy metal and depositing them as useful ores that would someday be of benefit to modern man:

Bacterial Heavy Metal Detoxification and Resistance Systems: Excerpt: Bacterial plasmids contain genetic determinants for resistance systems for Hg2+ (and organomercurials), Cd2+, AsO2, AsO43-, CrO4 2-, TeO3 2-, Cu2+, Ag+, Co2+, Pb2+, and other metals of environmental concern.,, Recombinant DNA analysis has been applied to mercury, cadmium, zinc, cobalt, arsenic, chromate, tellurium and copper resistance systems. http://www.springerlink.com/content/u1t281704577v8t3/ The role of bacteria in hydrogeochemistry, metal cycling and ore deposit formation: Textures of sulfide minerals formed by SRB (sulfate-reducing bacteria) during bioremediation (most notably pyrite and sphalerite) have textures reminiscent of those in certain sediment-hosted ores, supporting the concept that SRB may have been directly involved in forming ore minerals. http://www.goldschmidt2009.org/abstracts/finalPDFs/A1161.pdf Similar organisms deal with life in the extreme differently, research finds - September 24, 2012 Excerpt: One single-celled organism from a hot spring near Mount Vesuvius in Italy fights uranium toxicity directly – by eating the heavy metal and acquiring energy from it. http://phys.org/news/2012-09-similar-life-extreme-differently.html The Concentration of Metals for Humanity's Benefit: Excerpt: They demonstrated that hydrothermal fluid flow could enrich the concentration of metals like zinc, lead, and copper by at least a factor of a thousand. They also showed that ore deposits formed by hydrothermal fluid flows at or above these concentration levels exist throughout Earth's crust. The necessary just-right precipitation conditions needed to yield such high concentrations demand extraordinary fine-tuning. That such ore deposits are common in Earth's crust strongly suggests supernatural design. http://www.reasons.org/TheConcentrationofMetalsforHumanitysBenefit Bombardment Makes Civilization Possible What is the common thread among the following items: pacemakers, spark plugs, fountain pens and compass bearings? Give up? All of them currently use (or used in early versions) the two densest elements, osmium and iridium. These two elements play important roles in technological advancements. However, if certain special events hadn't occurred early in Earth's history, no osmium or iridium would exist near the planet's surface. http://www.reasons.org/BombardmentMakesCivilizationPossible

To this day, various types of bacteria maintain an essential minimal level of these heavy metals in the ecosystem which are high enough so as to be available to the biological systems of the higher life forms that need them yet low enough so as not to be poisonous to those very same higher life forms. And on top of the fact that poisonous heavy metals on the primordial earth were brought into 'life-enabling' balance by complex biogeochemical processes, there was also an explosion of minerals on earth which were a result of that first life, as well as being a result of each subsequent 'Big Bang of life' there afterwards.

The Creation of Minerals: Excerpt: Thanks to the way life was introduced on Earth, the early 250 mineral species have exploded to the present 4,300 known mineral species. And because of this abundance, humans possessed all the necessary mineral resources to easily launch and sustain global, high-technology civilization. http://www.reasons.org/The-Creation-of-Minerals Newly Discovered Bacterium Forms Intracellular Minerals - May 11, 2012 Excerpt: A new species of photosynthetic bacterium has come to light: it is able to control the formation of minerals (calcium, magnesium, barium and strontium carbonates) within its own organism. ,, carbonate rocks that date back some 3.5 billion years and are among the earliest traces of life on Earth. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/05/120511101352.htm (of note: Calcium carbonate, of which chalk, limestone and marble are made, also makes up corals, shells of snails and other animals, and stromatolites. Strontium Carbonate is used in Ceramics, Pyrotechnics, Electronics and metallurgy. Barium carbonate is widely used in the ceramics industry as an ingredient in glazes. It acts as a flux, a matting and crystallizing agent and combines with certain colouring oxides to produce unique colours not easily attainable by other means. In the brick, tile, earthenware and pottery industries barium carbonate is added to clays to precipitate soluble salts. Magnesium carbonate also has several important uses for man.) "Today there are about 4,400 known minerals - more than two-thirds of which came into being only because of the way life changed the planet. Some of them were created exclusively by living organisms" - Bob Hazen - Smithsonian - Oct. 2010, pg. 54 Ancient Minerals: Which Gave Rise to Life? - Nov. 25, 2013 Excerpt: Carnegie's Robert Hazen compiled a list of every plausible mineral species on the Hadean Earth and concludes that no more than 420 different minerals -- about 8 percent of the nearly 5,000 species found on Earth today -- would have been present at or near Earth's surface. By contrast, thousands of mineral species known today are the direct result of growth by living organisms, such as shells and bones, as well as life's chemical byproducts, such as oxygen from photosynthesis. In addition, hundreds of other minerals that incorporate relatively rare elements such as lithium, beryllium, and molybdenum appear to have taken a billion years or more to first appear because it is difficult to concentrate these elements sufficiently to form new minerals. So those slow-forming minerals are also excluded from the time of life's origins. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/11/131125164814.htm

As well, the long term tectonic cycle, of the turnover the Earth’s crustal rocks, must also be fine-tuned to a certain degree with the bacteria, and thus the tectonic cycle also plays a important foundational 'biogeochemical role' in the overall ecology of the earth. In other words, there are good reasons to believe that the tectonic cycle, rate of erosion and bacterial life, are 'fine-tuned' so as to eventually allow higher life to exist on earth and then maintain a balance once that higher life appears:

Ancient Earth Crust Stored in Deep Mantle - Apr. 24, 2013 Excerpt: New research,, demonstrates that oceanic volcanic rocks contain samples of recycled crust dating back to the Archean era 2.5 billion years ago.,, This indicates that the sulfur comes from a deep mantle reservoir containing crustal material subducted before the Great Oxidation Event and preserved for over half the age of Earth. "These measurements place the first firm age estimates of recycled material in oceanic hotspots," Hauri said. "They confirm the cycling of sulfur from the atmosphere and oceans into mantle and ultimately back to the surface," Hauri said. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130424132705.htm

bornagain77

Geobiologist Noffke Reports Signs of Life that Are 3.48 Billion Years Old - 11/11/13 Excerpt: the mats woven of tiny microbes we see today covering tidal flats were also present as life was beginning on Earth. The mats, which are colonies of cyanobacteria, can cause unusual textures and formations in the sand beneath them. Noffke has identified 17 main groups of such textures caused by present-day microbial mats, and has found corresponding structures in geological formations dating back through the ages. http://www.odu.edu/about/odu-publications/insideodu/2013/11/11/topstory1 Scientists find signs of life in Australia dating back 3.48 billion years - Thu November 14, 2013 Excerpt: “We conclude that the MISS in the Dresser Formation record a complex microbial ecosystem, hitherto unknown, and represent one of the most ancient signs of life on Earth.”... “this MISS displays the same associations that are known from modern as well as fossil” finds. The MISS also shows microbes that act like “modern cyanobacteria,” http://www.cnn.com/2013/11/13/world/asia/australia-ancient-life/ AMBER: THE LOOKING GLASS INTO THE PAST: Excerpt: These (fossilized bacteria) cells are actually very similar to present day cyanobacteria. This is not only true for an isolated case but many living genera of cyanobacteria can be linked to fossil cyanobacteria. The detail noted in the fossils of this group gives indication of extreme conservation of morphology, more extreme than in other organisms. http://bcb705.blogspot.com/2007/03/amber-looking-glass-into-past_23.html Static evolution: is pond scum the same now as billions of years ago? Excerpt: But what intrigues (paleo-biologist) J. William Schopf most is lack of change. Schopf was struck 30 years ago by the apparent similarities between some 1-billion-year-old fossils of blue-green bacteria and their modern microbial counterparts. "They surprisingly looked exactly like modern species," Schopf recalls. Now, after comparing data from throughout the world, Schopf and others have concluded that modern pond scum differs little from the ancient blue-greens. "This similarity in morphology is widespread among fossils of [varying] times," says Schopf. As evidence, he cites the 3,000 such fossils found; http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Static+evolution%3A+is+pond+scum+the+same+now+as+billions+of+years+ago%3F-a014909330 Scientists discover organism that hasn't evolved in more than 2 billion years - February 3, 2015 Excerpt: Using cutting-edge technology, they found that the bacteria look the same as bacteria of the same region from 2.3 billion years ago -- and that both sets of ancient bacteria are indistinguishable from modern sulfur bacteria found in mud off of the coast of Chile. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/02/150203104131.htm The Paradox of the "Ancient" (250 Million Year Old) Bacterium Which Contains "Modern" Protein-Coding Genes: “Almost without exception, bacteria isolated from ancient material have proven to closely resemble modern bacteria at both morphological and molecular levels.” Heather Maughan*, C. William Birky Jr., Wayne L. Nicholson, William D. Rosenzweig§ and Russell H. Vreeland ; http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/19/9/1637

Moreover, not only have Stromatolite fossils, Microbial Mat fossils, and the oldest bacterium fossils, not changed for as far back as has been measured, this first life on earth has been shown to be continually preparing the earth, (i.e. terraforming the earth), for higher life forms to later appear on earth.

Microbial life can easily live without us; we, however, cannot survive without the global catalysis and environmental transformations it provides. - Paul G. Falkowski - Professor Geological Sciences - Rutgers

From 3.8 to .6 billion years ago photosynthetic bacteria, and sulfate-reducing reducing bacteria, dominated the geologic and fossil record (that’s over 80% of the entire time life has existed on earth). Photosynthetic bacteria, besides producing oxygen that would one day support higher lifeforms on earth, also detoxified the ocean of excess iron and deposited it as iron ore:

Iron in Primeval Seas Rusted by Bacteria - Apr. 23, 2013 Excerpt: The oldest known iron ores were deposited in the Precambrian period and are up to four billion years old (the Earth itself is estimated to be about 4.6 billion years old). ,,, This research not only provides the first clear evidence that microorganisms were directly involved in the deposition of Earth's oldest iron formations; it also indicates that large populations of oxygen-producing cyanobacteria were at work in the shallow areas of the ancient oceans, while deeper water still reached by the light (the photic zone) tended to be populated by anoxyenic or micro-aerophilic iron-oxidizing bacteria which formed the iron deposits.,,, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130423110750.htm Banded Rocks Reveal Early Earth Conditions, Changes Excerpt: Called banded iron formations or BIFs, these ancient rocks formed between 3.8 and 1.7 billion years ago at what was then the bottom of the ocean. The stripes represent alternating layers of silica-rich chert and iron-rich minerals like hematite and magnetite. First mined as a major iron source for modern industrialization, BIFs are also a rich source of information about the geochemical conditions that existed on Earth when the rocks were made. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091011184428.htm

bornagain77

In regards to the Global Warming scare, it is interesting to note that life has continually been on earth, unabated, for almost 4.0 billion years. In fact, contrary to materialistic thought, we now have evidence for extremely complex photosynthetic life suddenly appearing on earth, as soon as water appeared on the earth, in the oldest sedimentary rocks ever found on earth.

The Sudden Appearance Of Life On Earth (3.9 billion years ago) – video https://vimeo.com/92413648 When Did Life on Earth Begin? Ask a Rock (3.85 bya) http://www.astrobio.net/exclusive/293/ When did oxygenic photosynthesis evolve? - Roger Buick - 2008 Excerpt:,, U–Pb data from ca 3.8?Ga metasediments suggest that this metabolism could have arisen by the start of the geological record. Hence, the hypothesis that oxygenic photosynthesis evolved well before the atmosphere became permanently oxygenated seems well supported. http://rstb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/363/1504/2731.long When Did Life First Appear on Earth? - Fazale Rana - December 2010 Excerpt: The primary evidence for 3.8 billion-year-old life consists of carbonaceous deposits, such as graphite, found in rock formations in western Greenland. These deposits display an enrichment of the carbon-12 isotope. Other chemical signatures from these formations that have been interpreted as biological remnants include uranium/thorium fractionation and banded iron formations. Recently, a team from Australia argued that the dolomite in these formations also reflects biological activity, specifically that of sulfate-reducing bacteria. http://www.reasons.org/when-did-life-first-appear-earth Scientists unlock some key secrets of photosynthesis - July 2, 2012 Excerpt: "Photosystem II is the engine of life," Lakshmi said. "It performs one of the most energetically demanding reactions known to mankind, splitting water, with remarkable ease and efficiency.",,, "Water is a very stable molecule and it takes four photons of light to split water," she said. "This is a challenge for chemists and physicists around the world (to imitate) as the four-photon reaction has very stringent requirements." http://phys.org/news/2012-07-scientists-key-secrets-photosynthesis.html The Miracle Of Photosynthesis - electron transport - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hj_WKgnL6MI "Remarkably, the biosynthetic routes needed to make the key molecular component of anoxygenic photosynthesis are more complex than the pathways that produce the corresponding component required for the oxygenic form."; Early Life Remains Complex By Fazale R. Rana (FACTS for FAITH Issue 7, 2001)

The geologic and fossil record also reveals, during this time, many of these very first bacterial life-forms lived in irreducibly complex, symbiotic, (i.e. mutually beneficial), colonies called Microbial Mats and/or Stromatolites.

Microbial Mat Ecology – Image on page 92 (third page down) http://www.dsls.usra.edu/biologycourse/workbook/Unit2.2.pdf Biologically mediated cycles for hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, sulfur, and iron – image of interdependent ‘biogeochemical’ web http://www.sciencemag.org/content/320/5879/1034/F2.large.jpg

,,,Please note, that if even one type of bacteria group did not exist in this complex cycle of biogeochemical interdependence, that was illustrated on the preceding sites, then all of the different bacteria would soon die out. This essential biogeochemical interdependence, of the most primitive different types of bacteria that we have evidence of on ancient earth, makes the origin of life ‘problem’ for neo-Darwinists that much worse. For now not only do neo-Darwinists have to explain how the ‘miracle of life’ happened once with the origin of photosynthetic bacteria, but they must now also explain how all these different types bacteria, that photosynthetic bacteria are dependent on, in this irreducibly complex biogeochemical web, miraculously arose just in time to supply the necessary nutrients, in their biogeochemical link in the chain, for photosynthetic bacteria to continue to survive. Moreover, the first photosynthetic bacterial life on earth, (and sulfate reducing bacteria), were not just randomly trying out one thing and then trying out another thing, as would be expected on a neo-Darwinian view. The Stromatolite fossils, Microbial Mat fossils, and the oldest bacterium fossils, found on earth demonstrate an extreme conservation of morphology throughout time. A extreme conservation which, very contrary to evolutionary thought, simply means they have not changed through time and look very similar to Stromatolites, Microbial Mats, and bacteria of today.

Odd Geometry of Bacteria May Provide New Way to Study Earth's Oldest Fossils - May 2010 Excerpt: Known as stromatolites, the layered rock formations are considered to be the oldest fossils on Earth.,,,That the spacing pattern corresponds to the mats' metabolic period -- and is also seen in ancient rocks -- shows that the same basic physical processes of diffusion and competition seen today were happening billions of years ago,,, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100517152520.htm

bornagain77

Thanks to Darwinists and Warmists, the scientific community can no longer be trusted. Crooks and liars, all of them. LOL. UDEditors, Mapou, this really is the tragedy of the whole thing. When this myth is finally exploded beyond the slightest doubt, the public's confidence will be irreparably damaged. And after falsely crying wolf so long, what will happen if there really is a crisis? No one will believe them. They have sold their credibility for a mess of pottage. Very sad. Mapou

Barry, 1/3 of northern Canadian ice is missing coz it melted... For the first time in like forever the Canadian northern passage has been safe and it has been opened to regular ship voyages... few... but still some religious people think the Earth is being gradually converted to what it was when the paradise condition were all over the globe... UDEditors: And the Canadian ice was even lower 76 years ago before all of the so-called global warming occurred. This year the antarctic ice reached a record high. Yes, some people are letting their religious views cloud their judgment. I agree with you on that part. Quest

Lubos Motl, formerly a professor of physics at Harvard, a global warming skeptic, and generally a conservative contrarian, has these words of caution for Barry:

Many skeptics' adjustment-phobia unmasks their anti-scientific credentials Christopher Booker, whom I met in Nice a few years ago and whom I like, wrote the most read Earth-category article in the Telegraph over the last 3 days, The fiddling with temperature data is the biggest science scandal ever. The title summarizes the main point of this article that presents many examples suggesting that the temperature data from the weather stations have been repeatedly retroactively adjusted. I tend to agree that these adjustments are likely to have made the warming trend look higher – and the case for global warming more robust – than the most accurate data would manage. However, I am not quite certain about the size and relevance of this effect and I feel very uncomfortable about many climate skeptics' knee-jerk emotional reaction showing that they hate the very idea of an adjustment. For this reason, I also agree with Steven Mosher, an independent climate skeptic (with experience in graduate studies in literature and management in 3D graphics companies) who has also co-authored a book about Climategate. In a guest blog post, Guest post : Skeptics demand adjustments, he is presented as a co-author of the Berkeley Earth temperature record (BEST). He criticizes the climate skeptics who want to interpret every adjustment as something criminal. ... Adjustments are a good thing and the instinctive criticism of all adjustments as a matter of principle is simply not right. I agree with Mosher: these "principled" critics of all adjustments are surely throwing the baby out with the bath water. And by the way, I do agree with the description of those who get crazy whenever somebody mentions the word "adjustment" as anti-science nut jobs, and yes, I do think that a large number of such people exists among the WUWT regular readers (but probably among most laymen in the world, too, and maybe they are a majority among the TRF readers as well, sorry).

Mosher's post, by the way, is link number 2 in Piotr's first comment on this thread. Will you, guys, read the links and calm the heck down? UDEditors: Did you even read the sentence that we've highlighted for you. This does not support your "nothing to see here" dismissal. skram

Graham2, you are not the least bit skeptical that almost all of the adjustments adjusted temps up? Barry Arrington

Why don’t you just come out and say that evidence does not matter Um Barry ... you are pulling our leg, right ? right ? Graham2

I thought this was old news. http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/06/06/noaas-national-climatic-data-center-caught-cooling-the-past-modern-processed-records-dont-match-paper-records/ Latemarch

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRFz8merXEA#t=146 REC

PaV, did you read the first link of the first comment? skram

PaV @ 13. They will decline your invitation to engage the evidence. That is why one should always put irony quote marks around "Skeptical" when one speaks of The "Skeptical" Zone. They are skeptical all right, skeptical of anything that challenges their dogmas and prejudices. Pathetic. Barry Arrington

Here's the blog that Booker's article is based on. https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2015/01/20/massive-tampering-with-temperatures-in-south-america/ Let the GW alarmists debate the results shown there. There is a very wholesale revision of "raw" data that is alleged to have taken place. Did this, or did this not, happen? So stop with the ad hominem's and address Homewood's allegations, please. PaV

Jim Smith @ 10: As I mentioned in 11, also grounds for suspicion is the fact that the "adjustments" are, for all practical purposes, 100% one way. One would assume that if there were errors the errors would be distributed randomly between too high and too low. Nope. Almost all of the errors are "too low." And the denizens of The "Skeptical" Zone swallow that right down. Pathetic. Barry Arrington

Alarmists: Practically 100% of the quality control "adjustments" increase the temperatures. And you swallow that right down? Why don't you just come out and say that evidence does not matter, that truth and integrity do not matter, that the only thing that matters is that data is manipulated to show what your politics want it to show? Pathetic. Barry Arrington

The adjustments are supposed to have been done for scientific reasons such as to correct for increasing urbanization, which caused heat around a measurement station. So you have to examine the issue carefully and consider each adjustment individually. But if you click through the telegraph article to the blog it is based on some of the adjusters refuse to explain their adjustments ... which is grounds for suspicion. Jim Smith

@BA "If “Christopher Booker is a poopyhead” is all you’ve got, you aint’ got much and should just move along." They are very childish Barry but we can be assured that their content free ankle biting is just an admission of the weakness of their position when it comes to this article. mrchristo

Barry, Piotr @1 has already provided excellent links that refute the story. I was just making fun of your ability to find the crankyest of cranks, the bottom of the barrel in support of your beliefs. REC

Until then, kindly desist from injecting fallacious arguments into the discussion.

Funny to hear it from a guy who relies on an ad hominem fallacy to dismiss his opponents' arguments. skram

It's hard to take seriously scientific claims of a guy who thinks asbestos is as harmless as talcum powder. And note Barry, that we're not just dismissing Booker because he is a known crank. Have you followed Piotr's links? They are quite relevant to the current story. skram

REC, talk about being discredited. You say the Holocaust might not have been evil. Pot, meet kettle. Also, your only argument in this thread relies exclusively on the genetic fallacy. As I've said, if that is all you have you should move on. If you have anything -- anything whatsoever -- that relies on silly outdated concepts like, you know, evidence and logic, we would be happy to hear it. And if the report is false, we will retract this thread and issue an apology. Until then, kindly desist from injecting fallacious arguments into the discussion. Barry Arrington

Come on Barry--how many retracted articles, total BS and monetary settlements does one journalist need before being discredited? Also, since you bring it up, several of your supporters allow that God must have willed the Holocaust for some greater good. Mind going to yell at them? I know that thread is a near-total loss for you, but do be consistent. REC

Piotr and REC, engage in the genetic fallacy much? Do you have ANY information that leads to the conclusion that the report is false? If "Christopher Booker is a poopyhead" is all you've got, you aint' got much and should just move along. For people who seem to pride themselves in appeals to cold rational logic and reason, you show a surprising lack of it sometimes. Especially REC, who allows that the Holocaust might not have been evil. Barry Arrington

Barry, Would you like some asbestos, mad cow disease and some cigarettes with your whine? 'Cause Christopher Booker also denies the science that any of those are the least bit harmful. REC

Christopher Booker can deny six things before breakfast. You'll be pleased to know that he's also an ID sympathiser. https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2015/01/25/puerto-casado/ https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2015/02/09/guest-post-skeptics-demand-adjustments/ (Just passing by -- I don't intend to stay.) Piotr