Someone questioned a scientist’s climate change figures and got owned in the best way
Although 97% of scientists agree that worrying climate change is happening and that human behaviour and practices are largely responsible, there remain some detractors, including the President of the USA. Environmental scientist, Dr. Peter Gleick recently shared a graph he’d used in a talk on the topic, which showed a marked upturn in temperature behaving badly.
I gave a #climate talk & showed this graph of global temperature anomalies. Climate scientists see & discuss this graph literally all the time, but this audience said "wow, why don't I see that on the front page of newspapers? It's so convincing." Dear newspapers: over to you. pic.twitter.com/edHgJnKdtI
— Peter Gleick (@PeterGleick) November 13, 2018
Scary stuff – but not everybody was happy with the graph – civil engineer, Mike Friesen, questioned the size of the data set.
I don't doubt that climate change is occurring, but a 137 year graph based on averages from 1951-1980 (not even 30 years). Seems like a pretty small sample set.
— Michael Friesen (@MikeyFriesen) November 14, 2018
But Dr Gleick had an answer for him – several, in fact.
Fine. Here is 2000 years. pic.twitter.com/qnpMyJxGDD
— Peter Gleick (@PeterGleick) November 14, 2018
And if you want 800,000 years of CO2 readings (which match the changes in temperature as well), here you go. pic.twitter.com/NHG9DR4uIq
— Peter Gleick (@PeterGleick) November 14, 2018
The exchange went viral thanks to this tweet.
Scientist Runs Over Man With Truck. pic.twitter.com/5yogPTP8E6
— Dave Anthony: "Vote for Rancid Ham 2020" (@daveanthony) November 22, 2018
This reply sums up the situation perfectly.
I'm constantly amazed that people think they can do an aha-gotcha on scientists who have spent their careers researching their specialism.
— Delph (@delphzzzz) November 22, 2018
We look forward to Dr Gleick’s TED talk on how to win an argument.
