It’s easy to do, just follow these steps:

And that’s the way you do it …



That’s the way Steve Goddard does it. Here is the entirety of his post “Coldest Arctic Start To Autumn Since 1996”:



The early and fast start to winter in the Arctic is due to cold temperatures not seen since 1996. Temperatures north of 80N have been normal to below normal for five months, obliterating global warming theory. http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php



Has temperature north of 80N really been “normal to below normal for five months”? It’s curious that Goddard refers to data from DMI, which is a “reanalysis set” — data from a computer model! Scary. What’s even scarier is that the DMI data shouldn’t be used to look for climate change because they’re the output from not one, but three different computer models: one covers the time span 1958 to 2002, another for 2002 to 2006, and yet a third from 2006 to the present.

Did Goddard even know this? Did he bother to investigate, or to question his assumptions? I guess not — that’s what a real skeptic might do.

If you’re going to use a reanalysis data set, at least be consistent — use a single reanalysis for the time period you’re studying. Here’s one, the NCEP/NCAR reanalysis data. Here’s its estimate of monthly average surface air temperature anomaly north of 80N:

If monthly data is too noisy for you, here are annual averages (although 2011 isn’t complete yet)

Does the latest value (for 2011) look “normal to below normal” to you? Here are averages for the months of April through August (the last 5 months):

Does the latest value (for 2011) look “normal to below normal” to you?

Not only were none of the last 5 months “normal to below normal” temperature, two of those months — July and August 2011 — were the hottest July and August in the NCEP/NCAR reanalysis:

Of course, the warming seen in summer months in the Arctic is dwarfed by the warming seen in winter months. Like December:

Now, what would have predicted this faster warming in winter than summer? Could it be … global warming theory?

So where, you wonder, did Goddard get his idea? Maybe he’s referring to the fact that there was an exceptionally cold couple of days in the Arctic at the start of Autumn. How cold? Is he really that excited about “cold temperatures not seen since 1996“? A few cold days — not even that cold — and he declares “obliterating global warming theory”?

Can he really be that deluded? Yes. That’s one of the secrets to being a fake skeptic.