
Japanese Priests Collected Almost Seven Centuries of Climate Data - miraj
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/japanese-priests-collected-almost-seven-centuries-climate-data-180958929/?no-ist
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daveguy
The published article/data:

[http://www.nature.com/articles/srep25061](http://www.nature.com/articles/srep25061)
(not pay-walled)

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6stringmerc
It's the contrarian / rhetorical game-playing nature inside me, but other than
being really surprised and impressed at the science and data, I wondered how
certain, um, "interests" might try to discredit the information. I mean, I
don't think there's a valid path. Maybe some comically bad ones, which would
be entertaining in some ways.

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nkurz
OK, I'll bite. Did you look at the paper? I greatly appreciate that the
article linked it. Check out Figure 1. It's the basis for their claim that
"the trend in the freeze date in the earlier time period (1443–1683) was 0.19
days per decade and increased to 4.6 days per decade in the more recent time
period (1923–2014; Fig. 1A)." The fit for the the recent period looks
extremely suspect. The slope they fit is an artifact of considering the "did
not freeze" dates as equivalent to Day 62. Change the day, and you get a
different slope. Why did they choose 62? Because that was the latest that the
lake ever was observed to freeze. Thus the precision of the exact slope
conveys nothing other than "did not freeze" was more common over than last few
decades than earlier.

OK, so probably the lake has been less likely to freeze in recent decades
because the climate is warmer, caused by increased CO2 emissions over the last
century. Or is there anything else that could change the lake's likelihood of
freezing? There is that mention of "hot springs". Luckily, as mentioned in the
linked National Geographic article, "It turns out that local factors, such as
changes in land use, human population growth and even the installation of a
floodgate and development of hot springs on Lake Suwa, had little influence on
the patterns of change in ice freezing dates for the lake or ice break-up
dates for the Torne River."

The river in Finland is even luckier. From the paper: "Torne is one of the
largest unregulated rivers in Scandinavia, but is influenced by several local
anthropogenic factors including urban development, bridge construction,
hydropower development on a tributary of Torne, and demolition of constructed
dams. For example, the population of central Tornio has increased from 1000
inhabitants in 1880 to 10,000 in 200919. In addition, several bridges were
constructed including the railway bridge in 1910 and a highway bridge in the
1930s and 1970s. Three small hydroelectric power stations have been developed
on one of Torne’s tributary rivers (Tengelionjoki) in 1954 (2.5 MW), 1955 (0.5
MW), and 1987 (10.5 MW). In the 20th century, 162 log-driving dams were
constructed on Torne, but later demolished in the 1970s that may have sped up
the runoff. Despite the number of anthropogenic factors on Torne, the human
influence on Torne is small relative to the size of the river and no
statistically significant consequences of local anthropogenic activities on
ice breakup dates in Torne are apparent."[1]

Good thing these have no "statistically significant consequences", although it
might be worth noting that "not statistically significant" absolutely does not
mean "statistically non-significant". And it also doesn't consider that
cloudiness and coal dust changing the albedo of the snow may have greater
effect on the timing of spring melt than air temperature.

Anyway, that's probably the angle I'd take in discrediting this paper. Well,
that and asking how the analysis would look if they didn't throw away all the
250 years of data in the middle. What's that? Well, for Lake Suwa, "We
eliminated all data from 1682–1923 from the analyses to reduce the uncertainty
in dates of ice freeze". What uncertainty? "Unfortunately, there are missing
data in the midyears of the time series (1505–1515) and more importantly, data
from 1682–83 to 1922–23 are considered unreliable for analysis ice cover
freeze dates". I see. You had a couple years that were considered unreliable,
so you did the obvious thing by throwing away all 250 years between those
dates. I know it's probably just coincidence, and for all we know the case for
catastrophic climate change would be even stronger if the unreliable data was
included, but still, that seems odd.

For the record, I'm strongly environmentalist, believe that protecting the
earth is more important than building the economy, believe that humans are
affecting the climate, believe that the world is currently warming, and really
hate bad science. And although I've only glanced at it, I'm pretty confident
in saying that this is bad science.

[1] For an interesting contrast, where hydroelectric projects appear to have a
large effect on climate, "People of a Feather" is a recent documentary
centered around the effect of dams in Northern Canada on ice formation in
Hudson Bay: [http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/film/people-of-a-
feather...](http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/film/people-of-a-feather-life-
on-thin-ice/article4101149/)

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ktRolster
_Well, that and asking how the analysis would look if they didn 't throw away
all the 250 years of data in the middle._

Fortunately they did present the full data in the paper (top graph is Japan,
bottom Europe): [http://www.nature.com/article-
assets/npg/srep/2016/160426/sr...](http://www.nature.com/article-
assets/npg/srep/2016/160426/srep25061/images_hires/w926/srep25061-f1.jpg)

Even though they omitted it while drawing the trend lines.

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nkurz
Yes, they graph the data. What I was asking for was an analysis that includes
that data. My guess is that it would produce a much flatter (although still
increasing) line, and that it would be much harder (although still possible)
to assert that the modern rate of change is dramatically higher.

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gkya
The Japanese are the gods of commitment. I recall reading the self-mummifying
priests, and other stuff that I don't recall, and boy, thats cool and scary. 7
centuries of continuous recording of the same event.

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jordache
do you trust their historical accounts? I mean if they're willing to white
wash their WWII atrocities, to save face, why wouldn't they similarly
exaggerate positives in their history?

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2muchcoffeeman
Lying about WWII I could understand.

Lying about a freezing lake? What do the monks gain by falsifying those
records?

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duaneb
> What do the monks gain by falsifying those records?

Depends on their motives. Depicting the world as chaotic or orderly can allow
you to manipulate people's fears and hopes.

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JustinM83
Exactly. Motives and intention matters. Read the freaking article, Duane. They
were recording the data to forecast the harvest and rainfall for the coming
year. It had nothing to do with whatever tinfoil hat motives you have flying
around in your head.

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duaneb
I was not seriously suggesting the monks were manipulating the numbers;
however, the lack of obvious motive does not imply an absolute lack of motive.
It seems a little silly to attach any certainty to historical records without
understanding the context, which may or may not be possible.

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overcast
Alright, now this is some cool science.

