The Mystery of Global Warming's Missing Heat

NPR, of all places, has this:

Some 3,000 scientific robots that are plying the ocean have sent home a puzzling message. These diving instruments suggest that the oceans have not warmed up at all over the past four or five years. That could mean global warming has taken a breather. Or it could mean scientists aren't quite understanding what their robots are telling them.

Ooh, Ooh! Mr Kotter, Mr Kotter! I can answer that one: They're telling you you're wrong.

"There has been a very slight cooling, but not anything really significant," Willis [scientist, JPL] says. So the buildup of heat on Earth may be on a brief hiatus. "Global warming doesn't mean every year will be warmer than the last. And it may be that we are in a period of less rapid warming."

So "very slight cooling" = "less rapid warming"?

"I suspect that we'll able to put this together with a little bit more perspective and further analysis," Trenberth says. "But what this does is highlight some of the issues and send people back to the drawing board."

I'll translate: "We have to keep reworking the theory until we can make it reach the desired conclusion again."

h/t: Tim Blair