This will be a short diary -- it's basically a summary of what Dana Rohrabacher learned from me when I tried to have a twitter-discussion with him about global temperature data. (Of course, it goes without saying that any summary of what Dana Rohrabacher actually learns about science will always be very short.)
I've been trying to engage Dana Rohrabacher on twitter in an attempt to convince him that NASA and NOAA haven't been manipulating temperature data.
I even tweeted him links to results I got when I ran raw (i.e. non-adjusted) temperature data through a simple gridding/averaging routine I coded up some time ago. I tried to show him that the global-warming trend seen in the data really is robust, and that no adjustments are needed to confirm the NASA/NOAA results.
I tried to convince Rohrabacher (by showing him my own global-temperature results) that the temperature adjustments largely cancel each other out for global-scale averages, and that the majority of the difference between raw and adjusted data results is the result of corrections for station moves. (The raw data contains no station-move corrections, while the adjusted data does contain those corrections).
I tweeted him a link to a post I put up on my home-town newspaper's on-line forum, a post where I put up my own global temperature results and then explained in very straightforward language what the results mean.
Here is a link to that post:
My Rebuttal to the Latest Temperature Manipulation Charges
And what was Rohrabacher's final response to me? Look below the orange squiggle to see.
Link to Rohrabacher's Tweet
Yep -- I provide Dana Rohrabacher material proving that NASA and NOAA don't manipulate temperature data (written in language that any high-school student should be able to understand), and that's how he responds.
The next two years are going to be very ugly years for scientists.
10:54 AM PT: Made the rec list? Thanks much!
Just a few followup notes -- folks raised very good points in the comments about how it's futile to reach anti-science ideologues by presenting more science.
Those are excellent points; any attempt to discuss science with Rohrabacher in a private setting would be a complete waste of time and effort. However, when it's a public forum, a nice audit-trail is created for use against Rohrabacher and others like him in the future.
My intention isn't so much to teach him (I may as tell teach my cat to perform long-division), but to leave juicy "electronic breadcrumbs" that future opposition-researchers can data-mine and hopefully use against Rohrabacher and the GOP in future elections.