Summary of Willie Soon: Global warming: Mostly human-caused or natural? | Tom Nelson Podcast #79

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00:00:00 - 01:00:00

Willie Soon, a scientist at SeriesDesign.com, challenges the claims made by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) regarding global warming. Soon argues that the IPCC's statements regarding the increase in global land surface temperatures and the negligible impact of non-climatic factors on thermometer readings are flawed. He also questions the IPCC's emphasis on CO2 as the primary contributor to global warming, stating that natural factors such as the sun and volcanoes have been too simplified in the IPCC's analysis. Soon advocates for a more nuanced understanding of climate science and argues that there is still much to learn. He also discusses the importance of reliable data collection, addressing biases in temperature records such as the urban heat island effect and the importance of assessing rural stations alone.

00:00:00 In this section, Willie Soon begins by expressing his gratitude for the opportunity to discuss his work on global warming. He acknowledges that it has taken about 20 years to reach the current level of understanding of the topic and emphasizes that the focus should be on settling one basic question: how good is the thermometer record and can it be explained as mostly human-caused or mostly natural? He further notes the problems associated with the urban heat island effect and other issues that plague the accuracy of the thermometer record. Additionally, Soon criticizes the way in which science is being approached and presented to the public as cartoon science, turning important topics into animations. He calls for a more civil and urgent discussion of these critical issues.
00:05:00 In this section, Willie Soon, a scientist at SeriesDesign.com, challenges the claims made by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) regarding global warming. Soon argues that the IPCC's statements regarding the increase in global land surface temperatures and the negligible impact of non-climatic factors on thermometer readings are flawed. He also questions the IPCC's emphasis on CO2 as the primary contributor to global warming, stating that natural factors such as the sun and volcanoes have been too simplified in the IPCC's analysis. Soon advocates for a more nuanced understanding of climate science and argues that there is still much to learn.
00:10:00 In this section, Willie Soon begins by discussing the reliability of the global land thermometer record. He explains the six steps of data collection and assessment, noting the problems caused by non-climatic biases such as the urban heat island effect, and the importance of assessing rural stations alone. He takes issue with the automatic quantity system for statisticians who correct the data, and argues that solar forcing has largely been ignored. Soon also acknowledges the difficulty of funding the Heartland Institute but credits them for their contributions to the conference and his ability to talk. Willie Soon provides a historical perspective on the collection of temperature data including Vladimir Copen and Edward Brooklyn and the 30-year cycle assigned to data collection.
00:15:00 In this section, Dr. Willie Soon discusses the history of climate change research beginning with the early days of simply asking if the climate changes. He then moves on to talk about the different stages of research, including global cooling and global warming hypotheses. While not wanting to get into debates about whether CO2 causes global warming or not, Dr. Soon emphasizes the importance of understanding the magnitude of climate change and focusing on temperature modeling.
00:20:00 In this section, Willie Soon discusses the political context surrounding the 1988 Senate hearing in which James Hansen testified about global warming. While acknowledging the importance of Hansen's testimony, Soon argues that the evidence he presented was weak and that his confidence was based on a graph that was not sufficient to prove the existence of global warming. Soon also discusses the formation of the IPCC and critiques the way raw data is homogenized, arguing that it is not always necessary and can lead to inaccuracies. He also challenges the belief that the hiatus in global warming has been proven, as he believes that combining urban and rural data, as well as using only homogenized data, can skew results.
00:25:00 In this section, Willie Soon discusses the reliability of raw station records and the non-climatic biases that can affect them. One of these biases is a step change, which can be caused by changes in instrumentation, thermometer shelter, station movement, or observation methods. The second bias is subtle trend biases over years, which can be caused by systematic changes such as urbanization of the area. To address these biases, Soon and his colleagues are working on a paper on how to properly adjust temperature data for US rural stations. They also discuss the example of the urban heat island effect, which is a human-caused climate change that has nothing to do with greenhouse gases and can affect the accuracy of temperature data.
00:30:00 In this section, Willie Soon discusses the importance of independent examination of scientific problems, using the example of the examination of the Version 3 of the Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN) record by colleagues Roland and Michael Connolly. They divided the record into fully urban, fully rural, and intermediate to see the difference. The difference was half a degree Centigrade or one degree Fahrenheit per century, which is a significant factor and indicates that it is a big deal whether there is a warming trend or not. Soon highlights the challenge in adjusting raw temperature readings to account for non-climatic factors, including changes in observation time, and discusses the need for individual basis adjustments instead of relying on computer programs.
00:35:00 In this section, Willie Soon discusses the data available from rural temperature stations in different regions such as the USA, China, Arctic, and Island. He explains that while the data is scanty, it is improving, and the stations show a different trend than the government's IBCC curve. He suggests that combining rural and urban stations shows a doubling of the warming trend, indicating that the urbanization bias is at least 40%, which is higher than what the IBCC claims. Furthermore, Soon talks about the importance of replicating other people's results, and his team's goal of quantifying all non-climatic factors to establish a key paper in quantifying the differences in temperature.
00:40:00 In this section, Willie Soon compares the rural-only temperature data with the urban-plus-rural data and highlights the problems with using homogenized data and the urban effect. He then compares the temperature data with the ocean sea surface temperature and the temperature proxy from three rings and a glacial length record. Soon points out that while the proxy data is similar to the rural-only temperature data, it has a smaller amplitude and is not a good sampling method. Soon also notes that their work has been published in several papers, including a review paper in 2021 and an updated version in 2022, but their work is often disregarded by scientists who disagree with their perspective.
00:45:00 In this section, Willie Soon discusses the importance of data collection in understanding global warming scientifically. He notes that the majority of stations are in the northern hemisphere, and the US has a significant amount of data due to the Co-Op system that started in 1895. Soon emphasizes the importance of not making policy without understanding the underlying basis, which IPCC fails to do with its rush to make policy. Soon explains the homogenization problem and rural and urban problem, stating that homogenization is much more important than changing from version 3 to version 4. He adds that homogenization flattens the temperature curve, making the trend appear steeper and even exaggerates warming in certain areas.
00:50:00 In this section, Willie Soon discusses the homogenization problem with climate data and the inconsistencies in NOAA's homogenization methods. He explains that the method for homogenization changes every time a program is run, producing different results each time. This creates a lack of consistency and reliability in the data. He also highlights the importance of downloading and keeping track of different versions of data since they are not readily available to the public. Despite the political hesitation around contributing to a climate change paper, Soon expresses his appreciation for those who helped provide metadata on the Dutch and German stations.
00:55:00 In this section, Willie Soon discusses the issues with using station data to create a temperature record. He highlights the limited number of stations available for use and the problems with the homogenization process that is used to adjust station data. Soon describes the urban blending problem where homogenization can lead to mixing of urban and rural station data in a way that creates a messy and unreliable temperature record. He suggests that if this problem persists, funding may be cut, or there may be nothing left to do. Soon also provides a thought experiment that shows the unpredictability and complexity of the homogenization process.

01:00:00 - 01:15:00

Dr. Willie Soon spoke about the importance of using rural weather stations to study climate change in order to separate the effects of urban heat islands. He argues that the iconic curve used by the IPCC to claim that global warming is mostly human-caused is based on contaminated temperature records from urban areas, resulting in misleading trends. Dr. Soon also discusses the impact of solar radiation on climate change and the issue of funding for climate research, urging people to support his work in securing funds from private donors to pursue his ideas, including a video project. He also faced attacks on his character but dismisses them as untrue, stating that he is only a skeptical scientist, trying to understand the underlying science of climate change.

01:00:00 In this section, Dr. Willie Soon discusses the issue of urbanization and homogenization in climate data. He argues that urbanization contaminates rural data and that homogenization, while reducing the effect of urbanization, also contaminates the data by mixing urban and rural temperature records, resulting in misleading trends. Dr. Soon mentions a real-world example in Beijing where the most urbanized stations have higher warming trends than less urban stations. He also discusses how these issues have political implications, insinuating that climate trends are not necessarily reflective of the entire population's experience. Dr. Soon proposes a solution that involves a proper discussion of scientific evidence.
01:05:00 In this section, Dr. Willie Soon discusses the importance of using rural weather stations to study climate change in order to separate the effects of urban heat islands. He explains that the iconic curve used by the IPCC to claim that global warming is mostly human-caused is based on contaminated temperature records from urban areas. Dr. Soon also questions the accuracy of solar simulations and the range in absolute values of sunlight output measurements, which he argues is crucial for climate models. He highlights a review paper he co-wrote with Ronan Connolly that includes more comprehensive data and references than the IPCC.
01:10:00 In this section, Willie Soon discusses his research on the role of solar irradiance in climate change. He argues that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is not considering the urbanization bias and the impact of solar radiation on climate change properly. Soon believes that the sun could not fit the IPCC's curve based on the recent results of his studies and encourages the audience to review their work on their website. Soon has recently faced attacks on his character and has been accused of being a "greedy white old man who is war hungry." However, he dismisses these allegations as untrue and asserts that he is merely a skeptical scientist trying to understand the underlying science of climate change.
01:15:00 In this section, Dr. Willie Soon discusses the issue of funding for climate research and his efforts to secure funding for research from private donors, as he sees it as a serious problem. He notes that many reasonable and serious scientists do not have access to funding from organizations such as NASA. He suggests that people who support his work can donate to help fund climate research. Dr. Soon also expresses that he is open to working with other scientists and is looking for more talent to add to his team as they have many ideas to pursue, including a video project. Finally, he comments on the attacks he has faced from activists who criticize him and suggests that they need to challenge other scientists, such as Michael Mann, instead of attacking him.