It has often been claimed that alarm about global warming is supported by observational evidence. I have argued that there is no observational evidence for global-warming alarm: rather, all claims of such evidence rely on invalid statistical analyses.

Some people, though, have asserted that the statistical analyses are valid. Those people assert, in particular, that they can determine, via statistical analysis, whether global temperatures have been increasing more than would be reasonably expected by random natural variation. Those people do not present any counter to my argument, but they make their assertions anyway.

In response to that, I am sponsoring a contest: the prize is $100 000. In essence, the prize will be awarded to anyone who can demonstrate, via statistical analysis, that the increase in global temperatures is probably not due to random natural variation.

The file Series1000.txt contains 1000 time series. Each series has length 135: the same as that of the most commonly studied series of global temperatures (which spans 1880–2014). The 1000 series were generated as follows. First, 1000 random series were obtained (via a trendless statistical model fit for global temperatures). Then, some randomly-selected series had a trend added to them. Some trends were positive; the others were negative. Each individual trend was 1°C/century (in magnitude)—which is greater than the trend claimed for global temperatures.

A prize of $100 000 (one hundred thousand U.S. dollars) will be awarded to the first person who submits an entry that correctly identifies at least 900 series: which series were generated by a trendless process and which were generated by a trending process.

Contest entries should be emailed to me (doug dot keenan at informath.org). Each entry should be in a text file. The text file should comprise exactly 1000 characters, corresponding to the 1000 series. A character “0” is to indicate a trendless process; a character “1” is to indicate a trending process. Each entry must be accompanied by a payment of $10 (e.g. via PayPal); this is being done to inhibit non-serious entries.

A person submitting an entry must also specify their real name. Names will be kept confidential, except in very unusual circumstances. If someone wins the Contest, though, then their name will be made public. If the name specified at submission was not real, then the prize is forfeited.

The Contest closes at the end of 30 November 2016, or when someone submits a prize-winning answer, whichever comes first.

When the Contest closes, the computer program (including the random seed) that generated the 1000 series will be posted here. As an additional check, the file Answers1000.txt identifies which series were generated by a trendless process and which by a trending process. The file is encrypted. The encryption key and method will also be posted here when the Contest closes.

Källa:
http://www.informath.org/Contest1000.htm