Originally posted by Teallaura
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If you didn't look at the years below, could you spot the hiatus?
If your answer is no, then your eyeballs are as good as the statistics, which indicate there was no statistically significant slowdown in warming in the early 2000s.
But, if you know the dates, you can see that there was a relatively slow period in the early 2000s, and similar periods around 1980 and 1990. And it's worth looking at these in more detail, because they can tell us something about what drives short-term variability in climate. In the case of the early 2000s, it was clearly driven by an extended run of La Niñas.
All that said, the people who were prone to doubt climate change made a big deal about the "hiatus" at the time, because it looked like it justified their beliefs. And some scientists tried to respond to that by figuring out why there was a period of slower warming. And other said "it's clearly La Niña, don't waste your time on this". So, it was a bit controversial at the time, including within the scientific community. Bit ironic considering it's largely been forgotten since.
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