John L. Daly is not forgotten

John Lawrence Daly was a straightforward, straight-speaking Aussie whose clear-eyed intelligence saw through the bluff and bluster of the HAFs and their manic forecasts that the end of the world is nigh.  His premature death in 2004 silenced a much-needed and persistent voice expressing commonsense.  There can be no better example than this e-mail brought to light by 'Climategate II', the second release of a huge number of pirated e-mails from East Anglia University.

For those not familiar with this old battlefield, one of the problems facing the HAFs was their inability to know for sure what global temperatures were prior to the 19th century when measurements began.  Of particular concern to them were the indications of two historical periods, the Medievil Warm Period (MWP) and the Little Ice Age (LIA), which if confirmed would break Michael Mann's (in)famous 'Hockey Stick' graph which had become the global icon of the HAF religion:

As you can see, this 'reconstruction' of ancient temperatures shows them as virtually flat up until naughty Mankind got the furnaces blowing, so to speak, in the industrial era, at which point Anthropological Global Warming (AGW) began.  This iconic graph forever associated with Prof. Michael Mann of Penn State University became the badge, the 'regimental colours, if you like, of the entire Global Warming movement.  The entire construction depended on the use of physical proxies, that is, ancient but still existing items such as ice cores and corals.  However, the proxie of prime importance in confirming Mann's hypothesis was tree rings whose pattern is altered by alteration in temperature.  By taking cores from very old trees we would be able to look back in time and see the temperature fluctuations, if any.

Sounds good when you first think of it but, as John Daly demonstrated, it only takes a second or third thought to realise the proposition is bollocks!  Here, in plain language in an e-mail from February 2001 he explains why:

Take this from first principles.

A tree only grows on land. That excludes 70% of the earth covered by water. A tree does no grow on ice. A tree does not grow in a desert. A tree does not grow on grassland-savannahs. A tree does not grow in alpine areas. A tree does not grow in the tundra We are left with perhaps 15% of the planet upon which forests grow/grew. That does not make any studies from tree rings global, or even hemispheric.

The width and density of tree rings is dependent upon the following variables which cannot be reliably separated from each other. sunlight – if the sun varies, the ring will vary. But not at night of course.

cloudiness – more clouds, less sun, less ring.

pests/disease – a caterpillar or locust plague will reduce photosynthesis

access to sunlight – competition within a forest can disadvantage or advantage some trees.

moisture/rainfall – a key variable. Trees do not prosper in a droughteven if there’s a heat wave.

snow packing in spring around the base of the trees retards growth temperature – finally!

The tree ring is a composite of all these variables, not merely of temperature. Therefore on the 15% of the planet covered by trees, their rings do not and cannot accurately record temperature in isolation from the other environmental variables.

In my article on Greening Earth Society on the Hockey Stick, I point to other evidence which contradicts Mann’s theory. The Idso’s have produced more of that evidence, and a new article on Greening Earth has `unearthed’ even more.

Mann’s theory simply does not stack up. But that was not the key issue. Anyone can put up a dud theory from time to time. What is at issue is the uncritical zeal with which the industry siezed on the theory before its scientific value had been properly tested. In one go, they tossed aside dozens of studies which confirmed the existence of the MWE [Medievil Warm Era] and LIA [Little Ice Age] as global events, and all on the basis of tree rings – a proxy which has all the deficiencies I have stated above.

The worst thing I can say about any paper such as his is that it is `bad science’. Legal restraint prevents me going further. But in his case, only those restraints prevent me going *much* further.

Cheers

John Daly

I should add that it was this controversy over tree rings which became one of the main attack platforms for Steve McIntyre at Climate Audit as he persisted with his forensic examination of the 'evidence' and the conclusions drawn by the HAFs in regard to tree ring cores.

John Daly was your archetypal, intelligent outsider.  He thought, and then he wrote, and he wrote with great clarity - I miss him!

 My thanks to Anthony Watts and Rick Werne of WUWT.

 

Comments

[Andra]

A lot of Aussies used to have common sense in abundance.

Sadly, this seems to disappearing now.

[David Duff]

It's all those Brit immigrants you let in!

[Andra]

Well, maybe, but I think most of them went back home, didn't they?
Really, I think it comes down to what they are taught, or perhaps not taught, in school.
Children have become mostly sheep who are driven around in air-conditioned 4-wheel drives from one appointment to another and spend their at-home time in front of their I-Pods or whatever they are and tweeting everybody they know every 30 seconds to see if there's any news.
There isn't, for them, because they don't f.....g do anything!

[David Duff]

Don't get me started on 'skools'!