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Comment by fleitz | Hacker News Reader

I understand the math, they have a bunch of simulations that produce wildly different results, they average these and make predictions based on a number of models running a number of simulations. The predictions have so far yet to have come true. (Although temp is rising, it's not to the degree predicted by the average of the models, despite there being more CO2 than the models were given input for, obviously the average of models are inaccurate. )

I believe it's not happening to the degree the IPCC said it was in 1992 which is why in the 2000s they observed a warming 'hiatus'. This is why people talk about consensus rather than data, or falsifications of the null hypothesis.

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What were the predictions in 1992 and what level of confidence was assigned to them (the IPCC reports are very careful to assign confidence levels)? Also, there have been many generations of reports since then; why focus on 1992, 25 years ago? As far as I know, their predictions have been pretty good - though not perfectly accurate, of course.

There is so much nonsense posted about climate science; it would be great if someone could back up claims, perhaps by citing the IPCC reports or some serious analysis of them (i.e., in a prominent journal).

1992 because it's the first report.

Here's a decent summary: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming_hiatus

'climate is classically averaged over 30-year periods.[5]'

'Publicity has surrounded claims of a global warming hiatus during the period 1998–2013. The exceptionally warm El Niño year of 1998 was an outlier from the continuing temperature trend, and so subsequent annual temperatures gave the appearance of a hiatus: by January 2006, it appeared to some that global warming had stopped or paused.[2] A 2009 study showed that decades without warming were not exceptional,[6] and in 2011 a study showed that if allowances were made for known variability, the rising temperature trend continued unabated.'

Essentially in 5 years we'll have enough data to confirm / deny the 1992 predictions, currently it's an unproven theory because of a lack of forward data. We're essentially using consensus as a proxy for a falsification of the null hypo

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