Monday
Oct112010
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill HSI hits big time
Oct 11, 2010 Climate: HSI The Hockey Stick Illusion seems to have hit the (comparatively) big time, spending most of yesterday between around the 5-600 mark on the Amazon chart in the USA. The root cause seems to have been Hal Lewis's resignation letter which was picked up by Instapundit, among others.
It's currently at number 532.
Update on Oct 11, 2010 by
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill
Now at 407!!
Update on Oct 11, 2010 by
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill
363!!
Update on Oct 11, 2010 by
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill
Number 14 in books "Movers and Shakers".
Reader Comments (106)
Word is getting out there! Thanks to your excellent book, those among the public that simply want to hear the truth (or at the very least, the other side of the story), can do so in a well presented medium. Something they probably won't get from the MSM in most places, especially here in the US. Your efforts are bearing good fruit!
As a layman with no scientific qualifications it is great to see scientists such as Hal Lewis and Judith Curry see your book the HSI in the same way as oneself.
In my lifetime I have been disappointed by the lack of integrity in almost every profession but I always had an admiration for science for its pursuit of truth and discovery. If it manages to restore its tenets, it can ride out the disservice done to it by climatologists with an agenda other than the truth. Science should be free to follow whatever the data shows.
PS If your remarkable book becomes the tipping point ( as I think it will) that restores that integrity to climate science. I will have to make the pilgrimage to Scotland to shake your hand and that hand to sign my copy.
Congratulations. Not only is it well deserved, but it will serve to reinforce the substance of Professor Lewis' resignation letter, as well as educate people on the true parlous state of climate science.
Its also nice to think that, in this case at least, there'll be decent return on the effort put in.
9.56am - now at 428!
Fame and fortune await...perhaps!
Well done your Grace! I still haven't managed to get myself a copy yet - I'm not sure if it would arrive in Thailand. I'll try later though. I did say I'd get a copy for my home town library in Aberfeldy and also one for the school. I will do that over the next couple of days.
Should there be links to the Amazon pages on the blog's main page?
(Also, if the ISBNs (both 13 and 10) were on the Reviews page, then the page would show up for people googling them.)
Hal Lewis's resignation letter has been published whole by Delingpole on his Telegraph blog. As of now - 10:42am Monday [UK time] - there are 1754 responses. Mainstream media?
Congratulations. Well deserved.
This is the first time that I have gone on a blog and the only reason is to say congratulations to your grace. what a magnificent book. I bought the book when back in the UK and now I am back in China. I am making sure the book gets around as many of my friends as possible
I believe that global warming will start to morph into something else now - biodiversity, acidification of the oceans etc.etc. There are people with a mindset who just seem to hate humanity - and western prosperity. It has nothing to do with science and everything to do with ideology.
Its interesting to note that on Amazon the book reviewers who give it un point have , as far as I can see, never read the book. One person just tells people to read tamino's blog on Real Climate. Sad really
Please delete if I am off topic or anything
Congratulations. And not before time has your wonderful book begun to be appreciated in Northern America. My copy, bought from Amazon UK on 15th February 2010, is carefully protected in a bubble mailer envelope. As Messenger says, "fame and fortune awaits". The fame is already there. I wish you good fortune and other awards which I am sure will follow.
A devoted acolyte.
The last sentence of the HSI, with regard to 'what we, as ordinary citizens, can do in the face of the powerful, relentless forces of corrupted science, to set things right', is:
'Awareness, however, is the essential first step.'
The good news from the US surely means that a lot more people will enjoy a mighty stride of such a step.
All we need now is FGS* Bob Ward to chip in to boost it even further... well done...
O/T
Andrew Marr and Bloggers
The moats around their ivory towers are getting wider and deeper...
*Fellow of the Geological Society... also...
#381 at noon. Thermal runaway like an output stage with OC28's.
Some good videos on Professor Tim Ball interviewed in Australia
http://australianconservative.com/2010/10/michael-coren-with-dr-tim-ball/
5 ten minute videos..
OT, but have you seen the latest piece by Fred Pearce at http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=11078&page=0
It is mostly reasonable until right at the end when he says:
"But it in no way undermines the case that we are already observing ample evidence that the world is on the threshold of profound and potentially catastrophic warming. And it in no way undermines the urgent need to do something to halt the forces behind the warming."
I would love to see greater uncertainty projections where negative feedbacks are assumed and the uncertainty range goes negative. But I'm not going to hold my breath.
Pearce is another person who talks about "ample evidence", but never cites that evidence. Just like RS, DECC, the IPCC, .....
Jiminy Cricket- ....FGS* Bob Ward ...
*Fellow of the Geological Society... also...
I also have unfinished theses on GUTs, dark matter and why soil and climatic conditions produced an exceptional Coonawarra Shiraz in 1984.
Some good videos on Professor Tim Ball interviewed in Australia.
He come across VERY well, genial reasonable, witha generous and open-minded host.
http://australianconservative.com/2010/10/michael-coren-with-dr-tim-ball/
5 ten minute videos..
These are VERY good, especially part 3......
Hollywood film rights? I can see Sean Connery - climate auditor - in the lead role.
I detect a Hockey Stick rise in the Amazon chart for HSI.
Could it be a mere illusion?
Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #381 in Books
Dear Bishop
O/T, but unless I have missed it here, you have modestly failed to tell the world that next Monday, 18th October you are going to speak on the Climategate Inquiries at the Energy Institute, 61, New Cavendish Street, London W1G 7AR. The talk begins at 18.00 and doors are open at 17.30. I understand that entry is free on a first come, first served basis.
The EI has put the following message on its website: "In the interests of balance the EI London & Home Counties branch would like to provide the opportunity of anyone involved in the CRU Inquiries to respond to Andrew Montford. The branch would also be happy to consider a variety of ways of achieving a balance and would appreciate approaches by telephone or email. Offers of one or more additional speakers are welcome as would be offers to join a panel to respond to questions and be involved in discussion after the talk(s)."
Should be interesting.
Copied from a dead thread from a dead thread:
HSI becomes all time best seller on Amazon
Huge groundswell of opinion in USA for The Bishop to run for president
The Bishop wins by a landslide!
USA recolonised (hehe that wasnt in the manifesto)
Creating climate graphs shaped like hockey sticks becomes a capital offence.
Famous US climatologist is hung, drawn and quartered, electrocuted and then given a lethal injection (just to make sure).
Climate debate ends and CO2 is voted the worlds favourite gas!
You are probably already doing this Bish, but why not bring out a new edition of HSI with your report on the climategate inquiries added?
"Some good videos on Professor Tim Ball interviewed in Australia.
He come across VERY well, genial reasonable, witha generous and open-minded host."
http://australianconservative.com/2010/10/michael-coren-with-dr-tim-ball/
Michael Coren is on Channel CTS in Canada (he recently did an excellent interview with Lord Monckton). This was aired on Canadian television. I saw it a couple of days ago and have been putting links up everywhere I could think of. It is, indeed, excellent!
@Dung
HSI has been pretty bullet proof, I would be more inclined to either
wait, the HSI is building up mass as it
or
bring out a different book entirely (... from the author of the HSI...)
Pre and post Climategate are different worlds. My worry would be spoiling a focused book, with additons that will make the book open to successful attack.
Well you may well be right Jiminy, my thoughts were that the book does include Climategate in the title even though there is only a rushed chapter on that at the end. The superb report from the Bish would quite nicely flesh out that story and "complete the book".
Phillip Bratby, I agree that Pearce’s article seems fair, except for the line about “we are already observing ample evidence that the world is on the threshold of profound and potentially catastrophic warming”. What is this evidence?
Judging by the feedback I have received, the most controversial statement that I made at The Guardian debate was, by far, this: “I have not looked at all of the scientific evidence, but I have looked at a substantial amount of it, and none of it stands up to scrutiny; I can't find anything”. Many people were harshly critical of this. New Scientist agreed to send me some piece of evidence, for study; and I told some other journalists that I would get back to them, after doing the study for NS. NS, however, reneged on the agreement (despite my e-mailing and phoning them).
Jo Nova had a blog post earlier this year entitled “Is there any evidence?” She, too, could not find any evidence, and neither could any of the commenters there.
Your Eminence, perhaps this would be worth asking in a blog post? The question might be slightly refined: “Is there any empirical evidence for potentially-catastrophic anthropogenic global warming?” It would be useful to see if someone can come up with something specific and concrete.
Peter S - I think you've got something there!
Re DJK
Personally I think your most 'controversial' statement was that the wrong policies will kill people. But that's been overlooked to that Al can keep buying beach property, Franny can import out of season blueberries, and Oxburgh can enjoy his retirement.
One possible sequel to HSI might be a book following the money, and how that influences the policy and debate.
not banned yet - it's a pity Gene Hackman isn't a few years younger... he would have made an excellent McIntyre... and the resemblance is remarkable!
How do you find the position on the Amazon chart - I can only see the first 100?
Turbotubbs
It's on the book's own page, in the product details section.
Go go Bishop!
Do you get to see details of copies sold? From Private Eye's book section, it's sometimes depressing to see how few people buy books, so kind of curious how many copies sold it takes to get this kind of sales velocity. Think I'll keep my 1st edition safe :)
Hi Andrew
Have you thought about asking Anthony Watts for a link on the Watts Up website:
Just below, ClimateGate: The Crutape letters...
As Watts UP is keeping the Hal Lewis story up as first post..
HalLews refer to: "Montford's book.."
But the casual/new reader or journalist, will have no idea that Hal Lewis is reffering of course to...
"The Hockey Stick Illusion" A W Montford..
I've tried to put a tip onto Watts up pointing this out.. But they seem oblivious about spreading this good pr further...
HAL LEWIS, refers to it in his resignation letter……..
Hal Lewis: “Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.) ”
Verily, a Hockey Stick curve in the making for HSI.
Can we graph the unprecedented interest in HSI?
If the Scottish media and the SNP government weren't so obsessed with the windmills and global warming constantly being promoted by their secret advisers (WWF, FoE, Greenpeace - we know you attend top level meetings) they might take note that somebody in Scotland is achieving world wide fame. Normally you couldn't hold them back.
Mac, to create a graph like that you'd have to find an appropriate proxy for book sales, perhaps the number of bristlecone pines felled for pulp?
Would you like to fly in my beautiful balloon,
Warble, warble,
Way up in the sky in my beautiful balloon,
Warble.........
I do not normally take two bites at the cherry but I was annoyed when Prof Alastair McIntosh of Strathclyde U took a swipe at HSI in Scottish Review of Books without seemingly reading it. He is engaged in a blog debate at the website BANC about global warming for the next few weeks. It is a good opportunity to put to him the question about where is the evidence and would liven the debate up.
Peter S - more good thinking! Maybe we can persuade the Bishop to put a "cast list suggestions thread up" .... :-)
It's been on my Amazon wish list since it was published but today I finally cracked and ordered, although I'm sure it will do nothing more than raise my blood pressure even further.
I suggest Malcolm McDowell as Phil Jones, and Jason Alexander as Mike Mann.
Michael Crawford might make a better Phil Jones - but Jason Alexander as Mike Mann is inspired. He could play Gavin too and save a bit on the casting budget.
Does this mean that we have reached a tipping point? Is runaway reprinting now inevitable?
Think of the trees, people, all that carbon being, er, sequestered - hang on, that can't be right...
The pen is mightier than the Mann.
Does anyone have Anthony Watts email address......
Hal Lewis RESIGNED (at least partly) because of his words Montford's book...
Yet Watts UP does NOT have a link to "The Hockey stick Illusion" on the front page of the website....
Hal Lewis:
“Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (MONTFORD's book organizes the facts very well.) ”
Dung,
We didn't like being a colony the first time. Maybe some other place?
j ferguson
All in jest sir, I would not wish to change the USA in anyway (except maybe get you a new president ^.^)
Hi Andrew,
I hope you're interested in politics, because at this rate we might just nominate you as an electoral candidate and make you an MP - whether you like it or not. Then you can show all your new colleagues the meaning of 'evidence based'.
Regards,
Dave
Peter S and Peter B - do you do this for a living??! :-)