Betting

UAH December Winnings!

40 Comments

Despite the challenge of having to place a bet when the baseline shifted, two bettors managed to guess the exact value of the UAH anomaly posted by Roy Spencer this month: 0.18C. Good going KÃ¥re and Ed. (Jon P’s guess of 0.185 wasn’t bad either!)

Normally, I’d like to report how this month compared to last month, last year, show a plot of the annual average over time, and so on. However, the UAH page itself has not been updated. Since the change in baseline will affect the annual cycle a bit, I’m going to defer showing graphs until after the UAH page updates. In the meantime, I can mention that Roy Spence reports:

WHO WINS THE RACE FOR WARMEST YEAR?
As far as the race for warmest year goes, 1998 (+0.424 deg. C) barely edged out 2010 (+0.411 deg. C), but the difference (0.01 deg. C) is nowhere near statistically significant. So feel free to use or misuse those statistics to your heart’s content.

So, this is not a record. That is: the value of 0. 411C is not the highest value as recorded in the data set. It is exceeded by 0.424C, which is the recorded value for 1998. It happens that RSS and UAH data sets both continue to show 1998 as warmer than 2010. It was pretty close though!

Now for the important stuff: How did your bets go relative to other peoples? Here’s the table:

Winnings in Quatloos for UAH TTL December, 2010 Predictions.
Rank Name Prediction (C) Bet Won
Gross Net
— Observed 0.180 (C)
1 KÃ¥re Kristiansen 0.18 4 61.567 57.567
2 EdS 0.18 5 61.567 56.567
3 Jon P 0.185 5 49.254 44.254
4 Antón 0.17 3 23.642 20.642
5 Greg Meurer 0.193 5 31.523 26.523
6 Kevin Johnstone 0.165 4 20.174 16.174
7 Freezedried 0.196 4 16.14 12.14
8 Jim Cole 0.2 4 12.912 8.912
9 sd 0.2 3 7.747 4.747
10 Dr. Shooshmon 0.203 5 2.474 -2.526
11 George Tobin 0.151 3 0 -3
12 Jim T 0.15 3 0 -3
13 hunter 0.15 3 0 -3
14 Richard 0.15 4 0 -4
15 Cassanders 0.213 5 0 -5
16 MikeP 0.141 4 0 -4
17 TimTheToolMan 0.22 5 0 -5
18 MAX_OK 0.22 1 0 -1
19 Peter 0.22 5 0 -5
20 Troy_CA 0.14 4 0 -4
21 Robert Leyland 0.221 4 0 -4
22 Vlasta 0.221 5 0 -5
23 anna v 0.23 2 0 -2
24 pete m 0.232 5 0 -5
25 YFNWG 0.233 3 0 -3
26 Pieter 0.123 4 0 -4
27 ivp0 0.24 5 0 -5
28 Niels A Nielsen 0.242 5 0 -5
29 Zer0th 0.245 5 0 -5
30 claw in ga 0.111 2 0 -2
31 MarcH 0.25 5 0 -5
32 pdjakow 0.25 5 0 -5
33 Pino 0.11 5 0 -5
34 Diego Cruz 0.251 5 0 -5
35 hempster 0.1 5 0 -5
36 Anthony Violi 0.26 5 0 -5
37 Troy_CA 0.26 4 0 -4
38 Andrew_KY 0.1 2 0 -2
39 EddieO 0.261 5 0 -5
40 Layman Lurker 0.27 5 0 -5
41 Owen 0.08 3 0 -3
42 Hal 0.281 5 0 -5
43 Pavel Panenka 0.283 3 0 -3
44 enSKog 0.283 3 0 -3
45 NyqOnly 0.29 5 0 -5
46 Boris 0.297 5 0 -5
47 Jarmo 0.298 3 0 -3
48 Les Johnson 0.305 5 0 -5
49 Lance 0.314 4 0 -4
50 sHx 0.315 5 0 -5
51 Don B 0.32 4 0 -4
52 Tim W. 0.32 5 0 -5
53 TroubleWithTribbles 0.32 5 0 -5
54 SteveF 0.032 4 0 -4
55 Harry 0.34 2 0 -2
56 Arfur Bryant 0.34 3 0 -3
57 Magnus 0.34 5 0 -5
58 MikeN 0.34 4 0 -4
59 Niels A Nielsen 0.02 5 0 -5
60 GrantB 0.341 2 0 -2
61 Oslo 0 3 0 -3
62 Iamnothuman so says my wife 0 5 0 -5
63 harrywr2 0 5 0 -5
64 Larry Goldberg 0.36 2 0 -2
65 Mark 0.36 1 0 -1
66 Hoi Polloi 0.383 2 0 -2
67 Neven 0.388 3 0 -3
68 Tim Cohn 0.4 2 0 -2
69 John Norris 0.41 5 0 -5
70 Earle Williams 0.42 5 0 -5
71 David Gould 0.42 5 0 -5
72 feabqtcqy 0.425 1 0 -1
73 denny 0.55 4 0 -4
74 Olram -0.3 4 0 -4
75 john n 2.5 4 0 -4

The net winnings for each member of the ensemble will be added to their accounts.

I notice feabqtcqy the “adding enabled ‘bot” continues his streak of losing. I can’t help but wondering if Oslo, Iamnothuman so says my wife and harrywr2 really meant to bet the anomaly would be 0C. But unlike other months when all the ‘bots bet 0, this month, guessing 0C was not nuts!

40 thoughts on “UAH December Winnings!”

  2. Spencer has updated; the new baseline is about 0.1°C higher than the old one (Nov 2010: old 0.38, new 0.273).

  3. Owen (Comment#64635)
    You seem to forget that according to IPCC 2010 should have been at least 0.3°C higher than 1998. It is not, and 2011 will be cooler.
    So there was no warming since 1998, and you just have to live with that. But you can hope that Lucia’s record of 2012 (or 2013) will become reality.

  4. Hmm, it had me betting twice, rather than replacing the first bet with the second. I changed it from 0.26 to 0.14 when I learned about the change in baseline, but now I just look like a cheater :/

  6. I could have been in the money again if I had heard about the baseline change.
    my bet .281
    – .107
    = 0.174

    With the new baseline, I think 0 could win next month

  8. Troy– I need to make a note and actually fix that issue. It’s supposed to only show your final bet.

    Hal– Yes. The baseline change was part of the game this month. I suspect lots of people forgot about that.

  10. Alexej Buergin (Comment#64638)
    “So there was no warming since 1998, and you just have to live with that. But you can hope that Lucia’s record of 2012 (or 2013) will become reality.”

    Alexej,

    I don’t hope anything. If I did, I would hope that the sensitivity to CO2 forcing is far smaller than any IPCC estimates.

  11. I should also point out that we are in the midst of the deepest La Nina since ca. 1975, a La Nina that is expected to bottom out this month. Yet, we have temps still above UAH baseline. I think Lucia is correct in predicting that the next El Nino will break records.

  12. What’s your basis for this?

    I should also point out that we are in the midst of the deepest La Nina since ca. 1975,

    NOAA’s most recent ONI is -1.4. The ONI hit -1.4 in 2008. So by ONI it isn’t even the lowest since 2008.

    ONI hit -1.7 in 1989, -1.6 in both 1999 and 2000. So, unless La Nina depeens, it’s tied for lowest since 2000. Not very dramatic.

    a La Nina that is expected to bottom out this month.

    Citation? NOAA posts projections by many groups. Quite a few show predictions for the three month DJF average as lower than the Nov value. All show JFM higher than DJF– but that doesn’t necessarily mean they expect February have a higher ONI than January. Their summary says they expect La Nina to persist through at least spring 2011.

    Mind you, I’m not saying it won’t bottom out– but where are you getting your basis for saying this one is the strongest since 1975 or that someone expects it to bottom out this month (i.e. January).

    For most recent weekly forecast visit: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf

  13. La Niña conditions remain firmly in place across the tropical Pacific, though the majority of long-range models surveyed by the Bureau suggest this event may be near its peak. With a gradual decline likely, it is expected that the current La Niña event will persist through the first quarter of 2011.
    .
    BOM ENSO Wrap-up (next update tomorrow)

    I don’t know about the relative strength of the current La Niña.

  15. ummmm…. is the globe gonna start boiling any time soon cuz It’s freezing here in Texas
    .
    You might get served in 2012 or 2013. If you can’t wait for that I’d suggest you move to South Australia for a good bush barbecue.

  16. Neven, that “might” word sounds so IPCC… I wanna see some global warming, it’s cold here I’m having to contribute huge amounts of GHG’s into the atmosphere to survive

  18. I grew up in Cali, so it’s surfer… and farting stinks up the place, not warm it up… or did you forget that between bong-loads?

  23. It is lovely to be on top, knowing that skill is overrated.
    Luck is all that you need to “predict” the weather.

  24. Too bad I was offline during holidays and failed to notice the baseline change.

    However, if I deduct the 0.107 from my original bet, I get 0.191. Not too bad 🙂

  25. > I notice feabqtcqy the “adding enabled ‘bot” continues his streak of losing.

    Arrgh. I couldn’t make heads or tails of the baseline shift when I placed my bet, and never went back to revise it. Per Jarmo, if I deduct 0.107 from my bet, I get 0.318. About what I “meant” — I still don’t understand why December’s anomaly was so low compared to the rest of 2010, or how it is that so many others (but not me) figured out that December would be so low.

  26. lucia (Comment#64650)
    January 3rd, 2011 at 9:47 pm
    What’s your basis for this?

    With regard to the strength of the current La Nina, I was using the MEI: http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/people/klaus.wolter/MEI/ –
    the MEI does show the lowest score since 1976 or so.

    With regard to the current La Nina reaching its minimum (al la MEI) (or maximum, depending on how you look at it), see:

    That advisory alert of December 9, 2010 states “Consistent with nearly all ENSO forecast models (Fig. 6), La Niña is expected to peak during November-January and to continue into the Northern Hemisphere spring 2011.

  27. Can I make a post facto adjustment to the number that represents my guess?

    This is a smart way to do it. It obviously works in Climate Science… why not in Quatloo Wagering? 😛

    So, I’d like to adjust my guess +.08. Hand over the Quatloos. lol

    Andrew

  29. Owen– Ok. Yeah,by MEI it looks like the strongest since 1975. (BTW: We also had disagreements about whether the recent El Nino was ‘very strong’ or not with some people going by MEI, some by ONI and then people arguing about what ‘very strong’ actually meant.) NOAA happens to pick ONI for their weekly reports.

    The weekly forecast dated Jan 2 shows fresher models (run in Dec) than the Monthly Dec. 9 forecast. The former were run in Dec, the later in Nov.

    I don’t know how this will change the wording in the Jan Monthly forecast document, but (skimming) I don’t see words suggesting nearly all the models show La Nina peaking in Nov-Jan in the newer document, and that specific sentence wouldn’t apply to the newer graph. I’ll cut and paste to show the graphs.

  31. Neven, I’m sure you hippies think of that song as lighting up your dope, but it really means something else.
    ivp0, I’ll have to find one of those fashion wet-suits for really old guys

  32. ENSO is not the only thing affecting global temperature. The AMO index for 2010 was the third highest in the 155 year record. Second highest, barely, was 1998. In terms of overall strength, I suggest looking at the difference between the minimum temperature immediately before the peak and the temperature of the peak. For UAH global anomaly that would be April 1997 at -0.21 and February 1998 at 0.76 for a ΔT of 0.97 C and January 2008 at -0.20 to March 2010 at 0.66 for a ΔT of 0.86 C.

  33. Is there a file at UAH which has the monthly Lower Trop temp anomalies with the new 30-year base period, going back to 1979?

  35. I strongly object to losing all my 4 Quatloos despite being a mere 0.03C off the mark.
    I should have got some percentage of my Quatloos.
    What is a basis for awarding quatloos?

  36. Lucia, now that 2010 betting is finished, are you going to follow the lead of the PGA and announce the Leading Money Winners, and Player of the Year? 🙂

  38. Jon P– There is an algorithm for pay out…. 🙂
    Richard– The pay outs are by rank only. Bets were placed late this month, so some of the winners may have checked channel 5 and done lots of calculations.

    DonB– Yes. I’ll add to the code to do that tomorrow. Promise. 🙂

  39. Lucia,

    Is that why somone who bets 4 and someone who bets 5 receive the same pay out with the same answer? So you are not a bookie 😉

  40. The payout is computed based on rank. In a tie, the person who bets first is gets a better rank. The amount won is a function of the amount remaining in the pool and a couple of factors. But one of those is how much is bet. It is an odd coincidence that the #2 and #1 betters happened to win the exact same amount. I chuckled when I saw that. 🙂

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