Chapter 3: Build Linear Functions and Models

Trends of Climate Change

Imagine you are a climate scientist examining

data on changing global temperatures. Climate
change is one of the most relevant
conversations in our society today. As levels of
greenhouse gases, most notably carbon
dioxide, continue to rise in the atmosphere due
in part to human activity, higher levels of heat
from the sun remain trapped in the
atmosphere. This "greenhouse effect"
contributes to the potentially disastrous
phenomenon of global warming, which some
scientists believe began in the mid 1800's.

__________________________________________________________________

The data table below shows the average changes in global surface air temperatures from 1960-
2020, compared to the average temperature from 1951-1980.

1. To get a better idea of what the data means, create a scatter plot, including axis labels and a
line of best fit. Comment on your graph. What observations do you have about the data and its
significance? Is there a strong correlation among the data (and what type)? How well does your
data fit your trend line?

2. Estimate the two or three most significant residuals on your graph. Are there any major
outliers? What might this tell you about the data and the progression of climate change?
 Chapter 3: Build Linear Functions and Models

3. Estimate the slope of your trend line. What does this slope represent?

4. Using the slope, and any point on your trend line, represent the data explicitly as an
arithmetic sequence, an = a₁ + r(n−1) (with your starting point being a₁, and n increasing by one
each year). Based on your predictions, about how much will the average global surface air
temperature have changed by 2050?

5. Write a linear function to represent the relationship between temperature change (C) and
the number of years since 1960 (t). Based on this function, how much will the average global
surface air temperature have changed by 2050? How does this estimate compare to the
estimate given by the arithmetic sequence?

6. Using the data points in the table, subtract the temperature change in 1960 from the
temperature change in 2020. What does this value represent? Now, find the lengths of the
individual line segments between each consecutive data point, and add these values together.
What does this number represent, and how does it compare to the first value you calculated?

___________________________________________________________________

The graph below shows the change in the annual mean temperate in the US from 1880-2020.
As you can see, the data fluctuates considerably, and the red trend line represents a more
accurate estimate of the changing climate than a linear trend line would. “Lowess smoothing”
refers to a particular method of analyzing trends in the data (LOWESS stands for Locally
Weighted Scatterplot Smoothing).
 Chapter 3: Build Linear Functions and Models

1. Let's say we wanted to gain a better numerical understanding of the data. We could do this
by writing a piecewise function, rather than a single linear function, to model the trend (this
allows us to represent the graph in more detail). Using the graph above, estimate a piecewise
function to describe the red regression line from 1980-2020 (the period with the clearest rise in
temperature). Let t=0 represent the year 1980. Tip: use a straight edge to help you estimate y-
values.

Learn More:

https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/
https://climate.nasa.gov/causes/

Image URLs:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect