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Brown Bag Snippets and Possible Discussion Topics. Distributional graphics of geographic/spatial data Traditional and geographic box plots (Willmott et al., 2007) Histograms, percentile plots et cetera A few issues in mapping global climate and climatic change Map projections
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Brown Bag Snippets and Possible Discussion Topics • Distributional graphics of geographic/spatial data • Traditional and geographic box plots (Willmott et al., 2007) • Histograms, percentile plots et cetera • A few issues in mapping global climate and climatic change • Map projections • Analyze then project or project then analyze? • How reliable is the map? • Global climate change • In monthly air temperature • In monthly precipitation • In other variables? • Global warming: a few science issues • Is scientific skepticism being discouraged? • Is there peer and funding pressure to find worrisome changes? • Is uncertainty adequately assessed and reported? (e.g., what are the full effects of “global dimming”?) • Is climate science becoming a little pseudo-science-ish? • Are good climate marketers getting more money than good climate scientists (consider the many “big science” infomercials in EOS and BAMS) ? • In situ observations are increasingly “owned” and not often shared. Does this hamper scientific verification? • The academic life and scholarly pursuits • Peer review (of articles and grant proposals) • Are the worst and best papers most-often rejected? • Interesting data + canned analysis = article publication • Do we need an appeal system? • Post-doc purgatory • Computer programming • Sustainable development • Is the quality-of-life-bar set too low? • How many people can and should the planet support?
Traditional and geographic box plots1 1Willmott C.J., S.M. Robeson and K. Matsuura, 2007. Geographic box plots. Physical Geography, 28(4), 331-344.
Traditional and geographic box plots of estimated human population density (persons/km2) in the U.S. in 2000
Five-year (2001-2005) average air temperature over the Arctic land surface Locations of 2,060 GHCN (V.2) and GSOD stations north of 40o at each of which a five-year average T was estimated DEM-assisted interpolation of five-year average T
Traditional and geographic box plots of five-year average air temperature over the Arctic land surface
Pop Quiz. What’s wrong with this map? GISS average air-temperature anomalies (oC) for 2001-2005 compared to the base period 1951-1980. Gray areas indicate a lack of station data within 1200km • The map projection is not equal area • The observation sites (e.g., station locations) are not indicated • Estimated accuracy and precision are not indicated • The spatial interpolator is probably planar based, when it should be spherically based (note that several iso-anomaly lines cross the north and south poles and do not match at the dateline)
And a few always manage to slip through Cort and Jim, ~1975