Talk:IPCC Fourth Assessment Report

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Former good article nomineeIPCC Fourth Assessment Report was a Natural sciences good articles nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There may be suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
July 22, 2007Good article nomineeNot listed

Not good job[edit]

Well people, there is no link to the actual ipcc report number 4. Many links to ipcc website are dead, I wonder why they are still being used, and why the paragraphs which they supposedly give reference to are still there...

It is indeed very weird that there is this concealing... But even more bizare is the fact wikipedia supports claims that cannot be referred to! IPCC report also mentions Himalayan melting, where is that part in the Wikipedia article?


Good Job People[edit]

I think this page is looking really good now. I'm looking into the politics aspect at the moment, if anyone has come across notable good links in their net travels could you please post them here so we can look at this important issue. Hypnosadist 17:12, 15 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I just came here to comment that you guys have done a wonderful job. The simple, short bulleted points make getting the point extremely easy. Keep up the good work! NinjaYaddaYaddaYadda 13:56, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
agreed. --Steve, Sm8900 (talk) 04:55, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Pielke[edit]

William, I don't think that Pielke's support for the IPCC report is irrelevant. (Indeed, I think that the fact that he agrees with the content of the report makes his subsequent denouncement of the politically charged and unscientific nature of the IPCC process all the more credible).

I do not think we need this second Pielke quote on the content of the report because:

1. We already have his original quote (issued in the context of the Landsea letter) expressing his positive assessment of the content of the report.

[Pielke] expressed his opinion that the report "maintain[s] consistency with the actual balance of opinion(s) in the community of relevant experts."

2. The second quote was issued in response to an accusation that Pielke is in disagreement with the content of the IPCC report. We (wisely) do not mention this accusation in our article since it proved unfounded. I don't see why we would need his response to the accusation in our article if we don't even discuss the accusation. (and I don't see how discussing either the accusation or his response would actually improve the article) 66.92.77.23 10:56, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Anon, I largely agree with you. But please mark your reverts as such (rv) William M. Connolley 11:10, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry about that, I consistently forget to label my changes (failure to mark rv being but a small part of that)66.92.77.23 12:24, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

ICC 4 Specifics Missing[edit]

The "summary" publications from IPCC 4 appear to lack even a single specific proposal to replace a carbon-emitting energy source with a nonemitting source, analyzed in terms of technology, capital, operating cost and environmental consequences. Does the ICCC publish any such specifics, or are they just continuing as policy wonks? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 151.199.21.56 (talk) 07:43, 5 May 2007 (UTC).[reply]

It's been quite a while, but nobody replied to this yet (maybe a case of not rising to the bait...) Anyway, this is not a fair criticism of the IPCC; it was not in their brief to spell out what technologies will be necessary or sufficient to respond to this challenge. Rather, their task is to review and sum up the scientific case for the existence of the problem. Yes, politicians and society have a responsibility to come up with those solutions, but you can't just suggest that the IPCC should not report the problem just because we all have not yet settled on all the solutions. Anyway, there is plenty of analysis of technology specifics, including costs and impact, in the Working Group III section on "mitigation." The full WGIII report is online at: http://www.mnp.nl/ipcc/pages_media/AR4-chapters.html with the relevant material on mitigation in this PDF file: http://www.mnp.nl/ipcc/pages_media/FAR4docs/final%20pdfs%20of%20chapters%20WGIII/IPCC%20WGIII_chapter%204_final.pdf Go to page 272 and following for their overview of renewable energy sources including hydroelectric, wind, solar, biomass, etc.Birdbrainscan 03:59, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Moved Criticism onto its own page[edit]

I moved the criticism of IPCC AR4 onto its own page for two reasons, as noted the article is already very lengthy, and also as noted there is some logic behind the page detailing what is in just AR4, not history, reaction, etc etc etc. I also think that some of the info from Scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming could be incorporated into the page and that poorly defined WP:BLP disaster waiting to happen page eventually deleted. Although I don't think it should be a list of guys criticizing (like SOtMSAoGW), but of concepts with various support quotes.--Theblog 16:47, 8 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I adjusted the language; "too optimistic" is not a proper English description of the criticism described. The initial criticism summary also misses a third common criticism. William M. Connolley reverted my edit with a confusing comment ("needs to reflect see-main"). Please discuss instead of simply reverting; let's follow wikipedia guidelines please. Mr Pete 20:31, 18 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Also, it goes against the Wikipedia POV fork policy to remove the criticisms to a separate page. Please restore the criticism to this page, where it belongs. "All facts and major Points of View on a certain subject are treated in one article." Mr Pete 21:05, 18 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Just for the record, I feel compelled to add that the modifier major is key. Per WP:WEIGHT, small minority views don't merit more than brief mention in the main article. In their own article, they can get covered in detail. Jim Butler(talk) 08:16, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Line by line references[edit]

I agree with whoever put up the need more references tag.

It would be nice if lines were referenced to page or at least chapter in some way. While many here are probably able to figure out where they can look up more regarding something like (just as an example of a random line): "Average Arctic temperatures increased at almost twice the global average rate in the past 100 years." most people would have no idea where to start to find that in the report. As the article is now, it is fairly worthless and unhelpful with finding main points, you might as well go straight to the SPM and go from there. I am not sure the best way to reference specific lines and still have the article look halfway decent though, maybe just grp, chpt, page or something like that. Or I suppose a direct link to the page, if available, although I don't think it is right now.--Theblog 04:51, 21 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

My thoughts are that the language makes it clear that the statements are coming from the SPM. It's available in PDF, and it's simple enough to do a search for text in quotes. The paraphrased items are somewhat harder to find, but I don't think it would look right to have a page # reference on every line. I'm not taking down the more references tag, but I don't agree with it. Mishlai 07:15, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Page references are important because the article paraphrases AR4 quite a bit. At Wikipedia:Citing_sources they offer a style guideline, "Page numbers must be included in a citation that accompanies a specific quotation from, or a paraphrase or reference to, a specific passage of a book or article." Also see Wikipedia:Verifiability. I think the best way to reference pages is with a linked reference number, because more than one AR4 document can be referenced for each Working Group. The section "Mitigation of Climate Change" shows use of this method. It will be handy to reference page numbers in the respective SPM, because paragraphs there have references to chapters in that Working Group's full report. Char Truth (talk) 04:29, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

GA Failed Nom[edit]

Hello there. The reason this article failed to make GA status is because when I was seeing if this article met the Quick Fail criteria, I noticed that the article was still tagged with to clean up/reference improving templates. According to the criteria if a GAC is tagged with the above templates it should be quick failed. I reccommend you address the issues that those template bring up. Then perhaps relist it for a GA nom status. Thanks, --Tλε Rαnδom Eδιτor (ταlκ) 00:53, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Use of the term POV in the article itself[edit]

The sentence "A third criticism is that lead authors tend to be biased in favor of their own circle's POV, to the neglect of alternative views." is poorly written. As someone has already argued in favor of keeping this sentence, I suggest that it either be improved to something like "A third criticism is that the lead authors tend to be biased to the neglect of alternative views." Although perfectly valid for policy and talk pages, the POV abbreviation is inappropriate for a Wikipedia article itself, unless it is relevant for the particular topic at hand, e.g., if an article on POV warrior existed (which I don't think it necessarily should). Also, the criticism itself should be sourced. Ben Hocking (talk|contribs) 22:38, 18 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't believe that there are 3 main crit. There are 2; the third is very much aminority and not "main" William M. Connolley 10:11, 19 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Lead authors[edit]

The Category:IPCC lead authors is used to identify the lead authors of the IPCC reports but is currently being considered for deletion at: Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2007 October 8. Should this come to pass, I was wondering whether this information should be held as a list on this article or could it fit on its own list page, rather like: List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming. Preferences? Ephebi 15:01, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Are there only 19 lead authors? Either way, a list makes sense—whether or not the category itself is deleted. Ben Hocking (talk|contribs) 15:06, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • There is one lead author per chapter, and several leads were retained from report to report, but a list page would need some work in order to collate and classify them. The CfD discussion is still open for comments and the deletion hasn't been decided yet. Ephebi 15:11, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
(EC) There's way more than 19 lead authors. I haven't counted but a good guess would be something like 150-200. Each chapter has a couple of Coordinating Lead Authors, a dozen or so Lead Authors, and a somewhat larger number of Contributing Authors. Raymond Arritt 15:14, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It is as Raymond said. I started categorizing those lead authors whom I found already had WP bios; at the category's talk page I've linked one PDF containing a list of the authors of one AR chapter. It would actually take a fair bit of digging simply to collate a list of all the authors, as they are mainly listed at the chapter level, and there have been 4 ARs.Birdbrainscan 03:39, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Additional image?[edit]

Hi editors, I suggest to add one more picture to the article. So far, there is only one, although the article is quite long. I would suggest to add this picture to the section "Factors that warm or cool the planet", because its informative and easy to grasp. Do you have any objections? --Splette :) How's my driving? 23:42, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The image needs to be edited at the Commons to add a description. It is important to describe associations with human activities or natural processes because the image does not show them. The IPCC figure the image is based on does show them on the graph. The IPCC description also clarifies that the only increase in natural forcing of any significance occurred in solar irradiance. Char Truth (talk) 19:47, 14 December 2007 (UTC) I am refering to Image:Radiative-forcings.svg. Char Truth (talk) 01:30, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

GHG concentration stabilization levels graph[edit]

I found the image "IPCC AR4 WGIII GHG concentration stabilization levels.png" and it's explanation to be quite confusing. Specifically, it is said to show "equilibrium global mean temperature change above preindustrial" but makes no indication to dates, either "preindustrial" or when this data is supposed to be predicting (is this a comparison from the past to now, or sometime in the future?). The section it is adjacent to in the article talks about climate change in the 21st century, but I feel that a hundred years is not specific, and this is not explicitly linked to the image itself. Also, and I may be nitpicking, the colouring I thought to be emotive. The progression from green to red to gray seems to add a pejorative interpretation of acceptable temperature increase without any justification. In conclusion, it seems to have been taken directly from the IPCC report, with no modification, and think it is confusing/misleading out of its context. If I'm not missing the point of the graph, could someone with good knowledge to the reports/subject clear the description up? ScyllaMutt (talk) 02:51, 21 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There are no times because this is equilibrium William M. Connolley (talk) 09:28, 21 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OK thanks, I understand that now. However the tag for the picture, and the x axis label say "stabilization" of GHG levels, but the description page for the picture says "equilibrium global mean temperature change above preindustrial". So, is the equilibrium with the GHG levels, the temp or both? And you say there are no times, but this is in the section of the article titled "Model-based projections for the future", so this is going to lead readers to think the graph *is* a prediction of the future. Was there no time qualification in the report it was taken from? ScyllaMutt (talk) 13:39, 21 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Equilibrium means, you increase the GHG levels (to a fixed level) and then wait until the temperature change stops. Its not a realistic prediction of future conditions, but a way of intercomparing the effect of a given GHG level William M. Connolley (talk) 14:41, 21 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Propaganda[edit]

God damn propaganda, i hope that some real science will be included in this article. --Striver - talk 23:05, 22 November 2007 (UTC)(i know. it's too long)(sorry about the incomvinince!)[reply]

Edit IPCC infobox / template[edit]

Does anyone know how to edit the IPCC infobox / template for inclusion of AR5 IPCC Fifth Assessment Report

--Theo Pardilla (talk) 14:14, 27 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ok i worked it out. It helps if you scroll the edit preview page down to where the included templates are listed. :-)
--Theo Pardilla (talk) 23:53, 2 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Updates[edit]

I just chopped out the updates section. I did this rather quickly, but it does not look like it belongs in the AR4 article to me William M. Connolley (talk) 10:01, 16 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The veracity of this report has been called into question...[edit]

I've taken out some stuff that was (a) wrong and (b) grossly WP:UNDUE [1].

  • Its only one ref
  • Its the WGII report
  • The comment is in a minor newspaper

This isn't even close to belonging in the lede William M. Connolley (talk) 11:34, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You have not taken out some stuff, you removed the lot.
  • There are two refs` newspaper and the bbc
  • it does not matter if it is in the wgII report, this is an addition to this article not another.
  • The comment is well sourced from both a newspaper and the bbc
There is no reason whatsoever for you to revert my edits to this article.
Especially as i had asked you to take your issues to talk before your last revert.
I am going to undo your revert, if you have an issue with it state those issues here before you revert again.
I point you to the following [[2]]
This part i believe is most important here.
Undoing another person's edit is known as reverting (or reversion). Reverting throws away proposed changes by the other editor (even those made in good faith and for well intentioned reasons), rather than improving upon them or working with the editor to resolve any differences of opinion. Therefore reverting is not to be undertaken without good reason.
Especially, reverting is not to be used as a way to "ignore" or "refute" an editor with whom one happens to disagree, or to fight battles or make a point. Misuse of reversion in these ways may lead to administrator warnings or blocking.
Show your Good reason before you revert my edit again please. mark nutley (talk) 12:00, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
You don't need to warn me about 3RR, I know all about it. If you did need to, you should use my talk page. Your edit suffers grossly from WP:UNDUE weight. Asserting, as you have, that the entire report is called into question by one missed reference is not even close to reasonable William M. Connolley (talk) 12:27, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The veracity of the report is called into question, I`m not to sure were you get one missed reference from, did you even look at the links provided?
This is an addition to the article, which is pertinent. You also perhaps should have read what i posted here
Reverting throws away proposed changes by the other editor (even those made in good faith and for well intentioned reasons), rather than improving upon them or working with the editor to resolve any differences of opinion. Therefore reverting is not to be undertaken without good reason
You ignored it. Once again you have no valid reason for your reversions other than your bias.
I shall rewrite what i have written so it does not make it appear the entire report is being called into question, is that sufficient? mark nutley (talk) 12:42, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know why you think repeating the revert page text is even slightly useful. You should re-write your text and post it her to talk, so it can be discussed, prior to trying to re-add it to the article William M. Connolley (talk) 12:50, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Sections of the veracity in this report have been called into question by both John Nielsen-Gammon The state climatologist for texasand Barry Lefer in an article in Houston Chronicle
This mistake was in a flawed report from the [[3]]
It was also pointed out on the BBC mark nutley (talk) 14:22, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Let me know if this is more suitable in your view :)
I agree with Mark, a newspaper as a source is totally legit. An editor's work, when well-sourced should not be deleted in wholesale scope. --Steve, Sm8900 (talk) 14:25, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Nope, still wrong. You say "Sections of the veracity in this report". Which report do you mean - there are many. And as far as I can see, only one section is questionned, not several William M. Connolley (talk) 16:37, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Kim sorry about the lack of indents, still learning here :) I see no indent icon on the toolbar though.
William. i have been giving this some more thought and i believe that if three non peer reviewed papers made it into the report which in turn lead to statements based of the entire report that
"Glaciers in the Himalayas are receding faster than in any other part of the world and, if the present rate continues, the likelihood of them disappearing by the year 2035 and perhaps sooner is very high if the Earth keeps warming at the current rate.
Then the veracity of the entire report must be called into question. mark nutley (talk) 17:29, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict)Its undue weight as before. "Sections" haven't been called into question, it is one paragraph in chapter 10 (of 20), section 6 subsection 2 in the WGII report which is one of three main reports of the AR4. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 17:34, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]


Then kim if i use what you wrote along with the links i already supplied then it will only take a minor edit to my origanal post, yes? mark nutley (talk) 17:47, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

One further thing. Should i also add this mistake made in the report?

Another obvious error here: it is “extra-polar” glaciers, i.e., those outside the polar regions, that cover approximately 500,000 square kilometers, not the Himalayan glaciers. All the central Asian glaciers, including those in the Himalayas, cover only about 100,000 km2. If they “retreat” to 100,000km2 that would be no loss at all. It’s clear that this whole presentation is hopelessly garbled and that these people know nothing about glaciers, or geography either for that matter.

Thank you mark nutley (talk) 19:07, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That is in the exact same paragraph - it appears that this particular paragraph has errors - but that still is a minute aspect of the WGII report. (in case you are wondering it is on page 493 2nd column roughly 2/3rds down) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 02:36, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

So it can be added with the addition of citing the paragraphs then? Or perhaps the good locusts edit below would be more suitable. mark nutley (talk) 10:01, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Use of Non-Peer Reviewed Sources and the Himalayan Glaciers[edit]

Here are a *few* of the sources that demonstrate how important this topic is: [4][5][6] [7][8][9].

There are many more. Here is the section that I wrote up to be included in the criticisms of the IPCC:

--- Use of Non-Peer-reviewed Literature and the Himalayan Glaciers

The IPCC's 4th report has been criticized by Professor J Graham Cogley for using three reports, by the World Wildlife Fund, UNESCO, and the magazine New Scientist, none of which were peer-reviewed, to make the case that the Himalayan glaciers would melt by the year 2035. When the original source was tracked down he found that they had misstated both the year and the effect - the original source, by a M. Kuhn, states that the year was actually 2350, and that the Himalayan glaciers would be intact at that time. IPCC lead author Murari Lal claims there was no mistake about the glacial melt, but admits they didn't use peer-reviewed papers - breaking an IPCC mandate. [1]

The IPCC's assessment of melting Himalayan glaciers has also been criticized as being "horribly wrong," according to John Shroder a Himalayan glacier specialist at the University of Nebraska. According to Shroder, the IPCC jumped to conclusions based on insufficient data. Additionally, Donald Alford, a hydrologist, asserts that his water study for the World Bank demonstrates that the Ganges River only gets 3-4% of its water from glacial sources - casting doubt on the claim that the river would dry up since its primary source of water comes from rainfall. [2] Finally, Michael Zemp, from the World Glacier Monitoring Service, has stated that the IPCC has caused "major confusion" on the subject, that, under IPCC rules they shouldn't have published their statements, and that he knows of no scientific references that would've confirmed their claims.[3] ---

I encourage anyone who reads this to appropriately add the section if you think more people would benefit from knowledge than from ignorance. TheGoodLocust (talk) 06:21, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, this is far better written than mine, do you mind if i copy and paste in it? mark nutley (talk) 11:07, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, you are welcome to do with it what you like. I put it up in the talk pages so people can look at it and use it - instead of having it constantly relegated to the "history" file so people can't look and improve upon it. TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:55, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I'll reply with exactly the same as on Talk:IPCC:
It is still WP:UNDUE, you are still focusing on one bad information from a report that contains several thousands of such. There is no doubt that it is wrong - but it is a factoid projected far beyond its prominence. It could be mentioned in the article on Retreat of glaciers since 1850 where it would be on-topic and due. But certainly not in its current form which is extremely one-sided. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 12:03, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
--Kim D. Petersen (talk) 12:49, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
It isn't undue, since that policy deals with viewpoints - this is a simple statement of facts. Additionally, even if it was a viewpoint, it has been covered in several news outlets and far more blogs - this is important. I know you like to keep in psuedo-criticisms of the IPCC, like how "hard" it is for the scientists, but this is a real criticism and has actual importance. I frankly find the [WP:OWN] and wikilawyering to be quite disgusting - this isn't an MMORPG and the goal isn't to "win." The goal is truth. TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:55, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
With regards to WP:UNDUE this is a viewpoint. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 23:06, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Misquote and misapply wikipolicy all you like - you are wrong, you know it, and you'll never admit it. TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:27, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
As for being "one-sided" I wrote it up for the criticism section and I included the one response from an IPCC author. Do you want me to make up a defense for them? I can only include the defense that they present. It isn't my fault if their defense is obviously inaccurate and ridiculous. TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:57, 24 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
wp:UNDUE Clearly states the following
Neutrality requires that the article should fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by a reliable source
Therefore the inclusion of the above proposed edits should be allowed given the following.
This is not actually a viewpoint. It is fact.
This is well sourced and pertinent to the article.
It is pertinent given the statements released based on this report by both the ipcc and nasa.


Thanks mark nutley (talk) 14:19, 25 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

A few other points, you say this error is small and only affects a small portion of the report.
However it`s inclusion will have affected far more than one section.
Bearing in mind the following.
These non peer reviewed reports which said glacier melt meant they would be down to 100k`s in 2035 ::would also have impacted on the following sections.
Sickness and crop failure due to lack of water in the affected regions.
Mass movement of people due to water shortages.
Increased flooding in low level areas and inland deltas due to glacial melt.

So as you see just one mistake can have a major impact on the overall report. I would appreciate any further reasons as to why you think think this well sourced addition should not be placed in the article? --mark nutley (talk) 16:53, 25 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've just noticed this and am reluctant to jump in - any proposal accompanied by accusations against other editors and calling them "disgusting" can, I think, be disregarded out of hand until there is an occasion for civil discussion on the matter. Although there is sufficient sourcing to verify that this matter is true, I see zero sourcing on the relevance and weight of the matter as being sufficiently important that it mentions an particular level of emphasis in the article. The list of blogs and editorials is not at all convincing - they are transparent advocacy pieces. It's pretty clear that this mistake in the report is an attack point by climate change deniers / skeptics, but the actual significance is just not there. However, it is not at all clear that, allowing for the mistake, scientists dispute the conclusion that the Himalayan glaciers are the subject of rapid retreat and will soon be greatly affected. In fact, there are a bunch of articles citing other facts (direct observations, other science) to say the overall conclusion is correct. It is telling that the reliable sources that describe its existence do not discuss the importance to the overall report and its conclusions, that they do not say directly that the report is flawed but simply say that a scientist claims it is, and also that they are scattered and far afield - not the most prominent or strongest. If the report has truly been called into question in a serious way one would expect a more robust body of sources on that. Conceivably, this could be worth a few words to a sentence in the article, but only if its importance could be better sourced. In the meanwhile, this is disputed content and as such should stay out until and unless there is consensus, which can only come through reasoned, respectful discussion. - Wikidemon (talk) 17:33, 26 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Who called who disgusting? I have not seen that.
The importance is not just in the inclusion on non peer reviewed material into the report (3 counts of that) but there is also the statement nasa made based on this section of the report which they had to retract.
The 2035 date given for glacial melt was widely reported in the msm as fact then it is importent that the fact it was so wrong should be in this article.
Not to have any mention of such a basic mistake in the report in contravention of the ipcc`s own guidelines most certainly merits mention here. --mark nutley (talk) 18:20, 26 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Wikidemon, glaciers have been retreating since the last ice age, but global warming advocates cry about glaciers in tropical regions, like Kilamanjaro, and act that this is proof of global warming. Some glaciers are retreating, and not just due to the end of the ice age, but also for other reasons that have nothing to do with "global warming," but instead due to a lack of precipitation and things like black carbon deposits (like in the Himalayas), which decrease the albedo and cause them to melt. I've seen many thing attributed to global warming (e.g. prostitution and coral reefs) which have far better explanations. But this doesn't matter, what matters is what they said, how they broke their own rules, and how amazing wrong they were. TheGoodLocust (talk) 21:35, 26 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
This mistake was still being cited by the ipcc on on third of november.
(Jean-Pascal van Ypersele IPCC Vice-chair, said at UNFCCC, Barcelona, on 3 November, 2009):
ImpactsGlacial retreat in the Himalaya
receding and thinningof Himalayan glaciers can be attributed primarily to the global warming; in addition, high population density near these glaciers and consequent deforestation and land-use changeshave adversely affected these glaciers
the total glacial area will likely shrink from the present 500,000 to 100,000 km2(or disappear entirely) by the year 2035
Bearing in mind if the himalayan glaciers melt to 100k`s2 then it actually no loss at all is that is their current estimated size :)
--mark nutley (talk) 07:18, 27 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I think I've invented a new diet! The IPCC diet, which predicts your future weight loss and even if you start and end at 200, the data can be homogenized and "value added" so we can get your "real weight." The IPCC could make a fortune!TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:14, 27 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Support inclusion of one sentence on the new controversy. Something along the lines of, "In January 2010, the IPCC conceded that its prediction that Himalayan glaciers would disappear by 2035 was "poorly substantiated".[references, of which there are many]. One sentence definitely does not violate undue in an article of this length. Cla68 (talk) 23:10, 21 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
We've got an entry on this in the Criticisms of AR4 article. I suggest we wait a month or so and see if this becomes very important. If it does we can incorporate a precis in this article. --TS 23:18, 21 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Indeed. All the fine folk who are talking so happily here really ought to go over there and read the text. Or should I take the deafening silence there as evidence that you're all totally happy with the text there? William M. Connolley (talk) 23:26, 21 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the reason I came here and gave an opinion is that I just read a short article on it written by AFP on page 2 of the Japan Times. The reason this should be mentioned in this article in addition to the criticism article is because the IPCC has actually acknowledged that the criticism in this instance was on the mark. Cla68 (talk) 23:27, 21 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
That would rather depend on which crit you meant. There is a large pile of wacko blogs and ill-informed newspaper articles that the IPCC has *not* agreed with William M. Connolley (talk) 23:29, 21 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As a gesture of good-will, which I'm sure will make everyone happy, I've added a link to Criticism_of_IPCC AR4#Projected_date_of_melting of_Himalayan_glaciers; use_of_2035_in_place_of_2350 William M. Connolley (talk) 23:33, 21 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

References

Article probation[edit]

Please note that, by a decision of the Wikipedia community, this article and others relating to climate change (broadly construed) has been placed under article probation. Editors making disruptive edits may be blocked temporarily from editing the encyclopedia, or subject to other administrative remedies, according to standards that may be higher than elsewhere on Wikipedia. Please see Wikipedia:General sanctions/Climate change probation for full information and to review the decision. -- ChrisO (talk) 19:38, 2 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

IPCC Assessment reports should use Wikipedia standards[edit]

When I heard about all the errors our papers have been finding lately in this report, particularly related to bad sourcing such as to the WWF or unpublished papers, etc., I keep thinking back to Wikipedia standards for reliable sources and other specific rules for references.

I think the IPCC should adopt Wikipedia standards. It would certainly improve their reports. What do you think? Alice Lyddel (talk) 16:39, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think that it's an entertainng thought, but not appropriate for discussion on talk pages which are about improving articles. A blog or two discussing the issue might be a better place for debating the idea. dave souza, talk 18:10, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia may wish to consider whether it should place a number of caveats on articles pertaining to the IPCC reports, "global warming", "climate change", etc. Prof. Jones was not some spectator, he was at the heart of AR4. [10] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.71.53.187 (talk) 04:43, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

NYT article on UN independent review board[edit]

I added a reference to the criticism section, for two reasons. The minor reason is that there was a tag noting it had no references. The major reason is that the announcement of a review panel by the UN itself, it a major item. While the article addressed some of the specific criticisms, so some might argue belongs in the criticism article itself, the main point of this article is the review panel, not the underlying criticisms, each of which has been documented or could be documented in the criticism article itself. As an alternative, this item could be noted in the Criticism article as well, but as this section should serve as an overview of the main issues, I felt it belonged here.--SPhilbrickT 20:50, 28 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

WGII links aren't working[edit]

The WGII links aren't working. While footnote 16 does work, it is now a discussion of plans for the fifth assessment, not a summary of the fourth. Footnotes 17 and 18, presumably to the actual reports, are not working. I briefly poked around, thinking it would be easy to find, and I suspect it is, but I failed. Can someone else take a look for good links? Thanks.--SPhilbrickT 21:56, 28 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The link in Reference 1 is also not working for me - http://www.mnp.nl/ipcc/pages_media/ar4.html Hilmar (talk) 18:28, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
This article seems to have been written when the first reports were released, so, yeah, a bunch of links were broken. I have have brought in canonical IPCC references and revised most of the citations. There are some citations where I question what is beng cited (independently of whether the link works), but someone else should come back and sort that out. And all the none IPCC citations/references I leave to the original editors. _ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 19:40, 17 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

All links broken[edit]

Could someone fix links please? All links are broken, and the only pdfs I could find online seem to be different version, as page numbers don't match. If you have some free time to find correct links and make sure page numbers match, it would be awesome, thanks. (also applies to other articles on global warming) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.173.120.104 (talk) 23:41, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

radiative forcing diagram[edit]

The diagram used across wikipedia is incorrect. It shows NO2 having a significant radiative forcing. It should read N2O. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.0.119.241 (talk) 12:05, 17 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Canonical IPCC citations[edit]

See Talk:IPCC Fourth Assessment Report/citation for updated citation forms and data.

~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:14, 6 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

As discussed at Talk:Global warming#Proposed IPCC citation, I have worked out (and hopefully debugged! but feel free to check) a set of canonical citations (references, actually), with working links, for the principal IPCC documents as demonstated below. If there are no objections I will upgrade the existing citations in this article to this format. - J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:38, 6 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • IPCC AR4 WG1 (2007), Solomon, S.; Qin, D.; Manning, M.; Chen, Z.; Marquis, M.; Averyt, K.B.; Tignor, M.; and Miller, H.L. (ed.), Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis, Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0-521-88009-1{{citation}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: editors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) (pb: 978-0-521-70596-7)

Sample citation:

Section 10.3.1: Time-Evolving Global Change, p. 762, in IPCC AR4 WG3 ...
- J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:39, 11 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]


Because about a third of the citations (references) in this article are to one work (AR4 WG3) I propose converting to {{Harv}}. This will be a big improvement, will reduce the work of correcting the references (and particularly the broken links), and consequently make me more willing to do it. I do not propose to search out every missing reference, and will freely tag more serious omissions. - J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:17, 14 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Problems[edit]

Mostly done with the IPCC citation updates, but some fundamental problems remain with the sources (and writing) of this article. E.g.: references to reports that "will be released in ... 2007", use of draft reports, lack of specific page (or section) numbers, incomplete citations, a reference to the Third AR, etc. I have tagged some of these, but the article really needs to be reviewed, and somewhat rewritten. _ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:35, 17 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

SRES scenarios[edit]

Judith: a small quibble with your edit here. Strictly speaking, the section is not about "the various" scenarios, but specifically the SRES secenarios. I gather your objection is to using an acronym in the header; I don't what to say about that except that using an acronym seems (to me) to be clearer, more concise, and efficient. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 19:03, 15 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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