The blog andthentheresphysics is a particularly dogmatic and extremist website. Most of the time it provides extremely partisan opinion pieces on climate science, but last week the anonymous blogger had a post “Puerto Casado” concerning an article in the Telegraph about Paraguayan temperature by Christopher Booker. I posted the following comment

The post only looks at one station in isolation, and does not reference original source of the claims.

Paul Homewood at notalotofpeopleknowthat looked at all three available rural stations in Paraguay. The data from Mariscal and San Jan Buatista/Misiones had the same pattern of homogenization adjustments as Puerto Casado. That is, cooling of the past, so that instead of the raw data showing the 1960s being warmer than today, it was cooler.

Using his accountancy mind set, Homewood then (after Booker’s article was published) checked the six available urban sites in Paraguay. His conclusion was that

“warming adjustments have taken place at every single, currently operational site in Paraguay.”

Then he looked at all 14 available stations in neighbouring Bolivia. His conclusion

“At every station, bar one, we find the ….. past is cooled and the present warmed.”

(The exception was La Paz, where the cooling trend in the raw data had been reduced.)

Homogenization of data means correcting for biases. For a 580,000 sq mile area of Central South America it would appears strong adjustment biases to have been introduced in a single direction.

Homewood references every single site. Anyone can easily debunk my summary by searching the following:-

Jan-20 Massive Tampering With Temperatures In South America

Jan-26 All Of Paraguay’s Temperature Record Has Been Tampered With

Jan-30 Cooling The Past In Bolivia

My comment did not contain the hyperlinks or italics. It has been deleted without passing through moderation. The only bit of the moderation policy I believe that I fall foul of is the last.

This blog is also turning out to be both more time consuming and more stressful than anticipated. Some moderation may be based purely on whether or not I/we can face dealing with how a particular comment thread is evolving. This is not a public service and so, in general, any moderation decision is final.

The counter-argument from ATTP is

If you look again at the information for this station the trend before adjustments was -1.37^oC per century, after quality control it was -0.89 ^oC per century, and after adjusting for the station moves was +1.36 ^oC per century. Also, if you consider the same region for the same months, the trend is +1.37 ^oC per century, and for the country for the same months it is +1.28 ^oC per century. So, not only can one justify the adjustments, the result of the adjustments is consistent with what would be expected for that region and for the country.

Paul Homewood has investigated all the other stations in Paraguay or in neighbouring Bolivia and found similar ad hoc adjustments. It completely undermines ATTP’s arguments. This anonymous individual is wrong. Rather than face dealing that he is wrong, ATTP has deleted my comment. He is entitled to his beliefs, and in a free society can proselytize to his heart’s content. But there are boundaries. One of them is in suppressing evidence that undermines the justification for costly and harmful public policies. That is policies that are harming the poor here in Britain, but (and more importantly) can only be remotely successful by destroying the prospect of increasing living standards for over half the world’s population. Paul Homewood and others are increasingly uncovering similar biases in the temperature record in other parts of the world. The underlying data for the global surface temperature sets is in need of a proper, independent audit, to determine the extent of the biases within it. But when the accusation that the Paraguayan temperature data set is corrupted, people will point to ATTP’s blog post as evidence that there is but a single instance, and that instance has been debunked. Another boundary is a value that that many in the criminal justice system also hold dear. The more emotive the subject, the greater all concerned must go out of their way to compare and contrast the arguments. That way, the influence of our very human prejudices will be minimized. Again, independent audits will help eliminate this. If ATTP thinks he has all the answers then he will not be afraid to encourage people to look at both sides, evaluate by independent standards, and make up their own minds.

Kevin Marshall

Instances of biases in the temperature sets

This will be added to when I get time.

Paul Homewood on San Diego data 30-01-15

Shub Niggareth looks into the Puerto Casado story 29-01-15

Paul Homewood on Reykjavik, Iceland 30-01-15

Jennifer Marohasy letter on Australian data 15-01-15

Update 01-02-15

I have invited a response from ATTP, by posting #comment-46021.

ATTP

You have deleted two of my comments in the last 24 hours that meet all of your moderation criteria except one – that you cannot face dealing with a challenge. That is your prerogative. However, the first comment, (now posted on my blog) I believe completely undermines your argument. Paul Homewood has shown that the Puerto Casado dataset homogenization did not make it consistent with neighbouring non-homogenized surface temperature stations, but that all the Paraguayan and neighbouring Bolivian surface temperature stations were “homogenized” in the same way. That is, rather than eliminating the biases that local factors can create, the homogenizations, by people far removed from the local situations, effectively corrupted the data set, in a way that fits reality to the data.

I might be wrong in this. But based on your arguments so far I believe that my analysis is better than yours. I also believe that who has the better argument will only be resolved by an independent audit of the adjustments. If you are on the side of truth you would welcome that, just as a prosecutor would welcome the chance to prove their case in court, or a pharmaceutical company would welcome independent testing of their new wonder-drug that could save millions of lives. Even if I am wrong, I will be glad at being refuted by superior arguments, as I will know that to refute my claims will require you to up your game. Humanity will be served by my challenging a weak case and making it stronger. You have generated over 500 comments to your post, so an appeal for help via email should generate some response. If that does not work there are many well-funded organisations that I am sure will rush to your assistance.

There are at least seven options I think you can take.

1. Ignore me, and pretend nothing has happened. Bad idea. I will start analysing your posts, as you did with Wattsupwiththat, only rather than your pea-shooters firing blanks, I have the heavy artillery with HE shells.
   
2. Do an attack post – like desmogblog or Bob Ward of the Grantham Institute might do. Bad idea, I will take that as perverting or suppressing the evidence, and things will get rather rough. After all, I am but a (slightly) manic ex-beancounter, and you have the consensus of science on your side, so why is should sending in the PR thugs be necessary unless you are on the losing side?
   
3. Get together a response that genuinely ups the game. Win or lose you will have served humanity as I and others will have to rebut you. Engage and all will gain through greater understanding.
   
4. Admit that there are other valid points of view. A start would be to release this comment, which will get posted on my blog anyway. I quite accept that you cannot come up with a rebuttal at the drop-of-a-hat. A simple comment that a response will be made sometime this year is fine by me.
   
5. Also call for a truly independent audit of the surface temperature set. It could be for your own reasons, and if truly independent, I will support it. If a whitewash, like the enquiries that Gordon Brown ordered into Climategate, an audit will do more harm than good.
   
6. Close down your blog and do something else instead. You choose to be anonymous, and I respect that. Walking away is easy.
   
7. Admit that you got this one wrong. You will take some flack, but not from me.