Top all-time · #2412
Roy Spencer
Personal blog · drroyspencer.comsciencedata
Roy Spencer's personal blog at drroyspencer.com covers science and data. Since 2011, 32 different Hacker News readers have linked it 60 times, most often “95% of climate models agree: the observations must be wrong”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-02, and you can follow it by feed.
Rarely recommended · 5 of 40 sampled comments recommend it?
Why HN links it
HN commenters cite Roy Spencer's blog mostly for satellite temperature data (UAH) and as a counterpoint to climate-model projections and mainstream warming claims.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 40 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- /latest-global-temperatures/4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2019-11-13
- /wp-content/uploads/CMIP5-90-models-global-Tsfc-vs-obs-thru-2013.png2 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2014-02-15
- /2013/04/global-warming-slowdown-the-view-from-space/2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2015-06-24
- /2014/02/time-to-push-back-against-the-global-warming-nazis/2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2016-06-29
- 95% of climate models agree: the observations must be wrong2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2014-02-15
What Hacker News says?
Ok, I can guess your positions on the issues now ;) It’s not a “snarl” word. It’s an acronym which is used because the whole fully qualified set of words is too long. All four words are necessary to state what’s being discussed. Anything less is trying to deflect the debate. Working backwards, Warming: it’s a rare scientist that thinks the world isn’t warming. We are still coming out of the last ice age. Fifteen tho…
Comment linking /2022/01/uah-global-temperature-update-for-december-2021-0-21-deg-c/
on “New Year, New CEO”Submitted 95% of climate models agree: the observations must be wrong as a story · 111 points
HN discussionNot the most credible looking site, but the graphic seems well cited: http://www.drroyspencer.com/2013/04/global-warming-slowdown-...
Comment linking /2013/04/global-warming-slowdown-the-view-from-space/
on “What's Really Warming the World?”Submitted July 2019 Was Not the Warmest on Record as a story · 16 points
HN discussionHere's a good one: http://www.drroyspencer.com/2013/04/global-warming-slowdown-... 44 Climate Models all fighting to out-panic one another, not a single one guessing low enough to predict the actual values for 2012 (when it seems the dataset in question ended) ... and a seemingly more reputable one showing roughly the same thing: http://phys.org/news/2015-01-peer-reviewed-pocket-calculator...
Comment linking /2013/04/global-warming-slowdown-the-view-from-space/
on “What's Really Warming the World?”Submitted Record-breaking heat in UAH satellite data as a story · 5 points
HN discussionThis page discourages me. The universal premise on HN is that the forecasts are accurate and we need to do something drastic immediately. The forecasts assumed are actually just projections from computer models. The global atmospheric temperature, as measured by satellite, is not doing anything unusual. It continues its gradual increase. We are, after all, still coming out of the last ice age. Fifteen thousand years…
Comment linking /wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_March_2021_v6.jpg
on “World Now Likely to Hit Watershed 1.5 °C Rise in Next 5 Years”Submitted Aliens Cause Global Warming as a story · 2 points
HN discussionGood question! According to this article, the bottom of the emergency spillway is indeed bedrock: http://www.drroyspencer.com/2017/02/why-the-oroville-dam-won...
Comment linking /2017/02/why-the-oroville-dam-wont-fail/
on “Realtime Analysis of the Oroville Dam Disaster”Submitted Could Recent U.S. Warming Trends Be Largely Spurious? as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThere are no models from standard institutions that I'm aware of in which projected climate change destroys all multi-cellular life, that's exactly the kind of absurdly over the top claim the article is arguing against. Go look at long term temperature graphs over time and then look at current temperature trends as measured by satellites: https://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/ They show a slight wa…
Comment linking /latest-global-temperatures/
on “Apocalyptic Claims About Climate Change Are Wrong”Submitted 4,001 Days: The Major Hurricane Drought Continues as a story · 2 points
HN discussionNo, they are not. Models vs observations: https://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/CMIP5-90-mod... Even the modellers themselves admit this. When they felt a need to re-declare victory a few years ago in response to graphs like that one, even then, their argument was "if we re-calculate the original models with better data then they aren't so inaccurate anymore". It wasn't that the original predictions were c…
Comment linking /latest-global-temperatures/
on “White House is pushing ahead research to cool Earth by reflecting back sunlight”Submitted On the House Vote to Defund the IPCC as a story · 2 points
HN discussionYou can't see predictions come true by watching the news because, as climatologists love to say every time there's a cold snap, climate isn't weather. And they're right. Climatology is all about long term averages. Unfortunately whenever there's a fire or hot spell somewhere on Earth, they stay rather silent whilst the media and even their colleagues ignore this and use it to ramp up the fear factor yet again. For e…
Comment linking /wp-content/uploads/CMIP5-90-models-global-Tsfc-vs-obs-thru-2013.png
on “Carbon offsetting is just another form of greenwashing”Submitted Covid-19 Global Economic Downturn Not Affecting CO2 Rise: May 2020 Update as a story · 1 points
HN discussionOnly two? Isn't that kind of unambitious, given that "lots of people" doesn't even restrict it to specific classes of people? Oh well, have five names and I'll restrict it for you to published scientists who specialize in climate/atmospheric science. Nic Lewis, Roy Spencer, Judith Curry, William Happer, Richard Lindzen There are many more of course. Dr Spencer's page is a good introduction to some of the issues (but…
Comment linking /global-warming-101/
on “Carbon offsetting is just another form of greenwashing”Submitted Satellite based temperature of global level atmosphere as a story · 1 points
HN discussionHere's one - http://www.drroyspencer.com/2019/08/july-2019-was-not-the-wa...
Comment linking /2019/08/july-2019-was-not-the-warmest-on-record/
on “NOAA Data Confirms July Was Hottest Month Ever Recorded”Knowledge needs to be cheaper to verify than to produce. Otherwise it's simply not worthwhile to produce at all. Choosing to trust "authority" doesn't fix anything. One still has to be the smartest person in the world at determining who's right. If you show me a battery you say lasts longer, I can verify your claim quite easily. If it doesn't last longer, without knowing a single thing about batteries, I have every…
Comment linking /wp-content/uploads/ICCC13-DC-Spencer-25-July-2019-Tropical-LT-1536x864.jpg
on “Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts (2020)”Except that the actual global atmospheric warming is minimal, 0.14 C/decade. [0] The actual problem is climate change in the western part of the United States, coupled with higher population density, poor forest management, and poor power line maintenance. [0] https://www.drroyspencer.com/2021/08/uah-global-temperature-...
Comment linking /2021/08/uah-global-temperature-update-for-july-2021-0-20-deg-c/
on “Forest Service officials close all California national forests”It's an indication of what is happening in Scotland. Scotland would be very sensitive to small changes in the Gulf Stream, which are chaotic in nature. As far as the planet goes, the global troposphere's temperature has increased by only about 0.52C over the last forty years, as measured by satellite.[0] We are still coming out of both a major ice age, from 15,000 years ago, and a minor ice age, from 250 years ago,…
Comment linking /2022/10/uah-global-temperature-update-for-september-2022-0-24-deg-c/
on “Scotland ‘snow-free’ for fourth time in six years”I can only ask that you read some Stuff From The Other Side Of The Argument... http://www.drroyspencer.com/ is a good start on that. I'm already being downvoted on here - proof that there are a substantial number of HN users who have Made Up Their Minds on this, and simply do not want to even consider that they have been bamboozled by various interested parties. I realise that no one likes to either admit they've be…
Comment linking /
on “The impact of direct air carbon capture on climate change”Where do you get your 3-5C increase from? Observed temperatures over the last few decades have only increased by about 0.13C per decade. We have not seen a warmer year than 1998. Despite massive increases in CO2 as China and India have industrialized. UAH satellite temperature data: https://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/ 2004 article showing the prior 70 years featured unusually high sunspots: http…
Comment linking /latest-global-temperatures/
on “Don’t Call Me a Pessimist on Climate Change. I Am a Realist”>> Not sure how this would even be accomplished. Essentially an end to fossil-fuel combustion as far as is technologically feasible. A large-scale rollout of nuclear power, replacing literally everything, with enough capacity to cover the peaks. Large-scale electric vehicle rollout where feasible, large-scale synthetic-liquid fuel (derived from nuclear energy and atmospheric sources) rolled out where direct electric…
Comment linking /2013/01/waste-heat-as-a-contributor-to-observed-warming/
on “The High Sierra forest is dying, and you can't count the loss in dead trees”"it will now be common" Apparently you haven't been paying attention to all the failed predictions by alarmists over the past 3 decades including: The End of Snow (2000) https://www.climatedepot.com/2018/01/04/flashback-2000-snowf... The predictions of Glacier National Park being ice free by 2020: https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/08/us/glaciers-national-park-202... Not only is it extremely, extremely unlikely that 2C war…
Comment linking /2021/07/uah-global-temperature-update-for-june-2021-0-01-deg-c/
on “US-Canada heatwave 'virtually impossible' without warming”I think GISS is not trustworthy. Honestly, they engage in data tampering and manipulation and they're not honest about historical climate data and it's limitations (prior to satellite era). The margin of error for data prior to satellite era is higher than the observed warming in the 20th century. UAH is a good resource (University of Alabama-Huntsville in conjunction with NASA, albeit a different department than GI…
Comment linking /2020/01/uah-global-temperature-update-for-december-2019-0-56-deg-c/
on “Human body temperature has decreased in United States, study finds”Considering how strongly your sources disagree with the OP, I find it surprising that the opposing graphs are not all that far off from each other. The graph from the last article you linked to: http://skepticalscience.com//pics/ProjvsObs.png The graph from the OP: http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/CMIP5-90-mode... In both cases the actuals are at the low end of the predicted range. They disagree as to…
Comment linking /wp-content/uploads/CMIP5-90-models-global-Tsfc-vs-obs-thru-2013.png
on “95% of climate models agree: the observations must be wrong”I follow some websites casually, usually daily, to get an idea of what the numbers are showing me. It's just a ritual I go through in the mornings before going to work. When I want to see where we are temperature-wise, I go to http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/ for the latest satellite monthly temperatures. The What's Up with That? website (which is strongly biased towards the "denier" side of t…
Comment linking /latest-global-temperatures/
on “Ask HN: What are some good sources of climate data to analyze?”Exactly. https://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_...
Comment linking /wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_May_2022_v6.png
on “Hot or Not?”
