c9107e3b3249ad55fef4b030f594aaaabb343fe0
From one year to the next, the global temperature fluctuates up and down around an average temperature. If we compare the fluctuations of land surface temperatures to the fluctuations of the ocean surface temperatures, we see that the land temperature fluctuates more than the ocean. Why? We might expect that the oceans are slower to respond to changes than the land. This is certainly part of the story but we can do an experiment to test how important this is.
In our experiment, we take a global climate model and we specify the ocean surface temperatures; we make them vary up and down each year and see how the land responds. The results show that the land varies *more* than the ocean temperatures. The ocean variability - which we have input into the model - is being amplified over the land. Interesting! But lets pull it apart a bit more.