Saturday
Apr242010
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill A nice review
Apr 24, 2010 Books Climate: HSI Bret Swanson, who is the head of a company called Entropy Economics, has written a very nice review of the Hockey Stick Illusion.
Apr 24, 2010 Books Climate: HSI
Reader Comments (19)
I posted a comment at Bret Swanson's site. Hopefully, every little helps with sales.
Ha ha “Potemkin” charts haven’t seen that one used in years. Nice review.
A most excellent review. Sounds like The Da Vinci Code.
I read the reviews on Amazon (US). There were 14 five stars and 3 one stars. Pretty polarized. If I wanted to read one "AGW is real" book and one "AGW is a scam or at least unsubstantiated" book, what would people recommend? Do any middle ground books exist?
Mike,
I don't think you will find any in-between opinions on catastrophic global warming. This is one of those things for which you have to analyze the information and make up you own mind. That process should entail research into the scientific method and information surrounding the issue. Sadly, your decision may also depend on you political affiliation.
CAGW advocates are many times extreme envrionmentalists who are on the same political path with socialists, communists, and others who want to cripple capitalism. This is because eliminating the dominant cause of human caused carbon emissions will decimate the economies of the civilized world, and that seems to be their primary goal.
Slightly OT Andrew. Very pleased to see at CA that Judith Curry is going to review your book here and list questions that RC should answer. High expectations of the former but not much of the latter!
Mike - I asked Lord Monckton for his recommended books for the layman (before Hockey Stick Illusion was released) and this is what he replied:
Heaven and Earth, by Ian Plimer;
The Climate Caper, by Garth Paltridge;
Chill, by Peter Taylor;
The Real Global Warming Disaster, by Christopher Booker
Not a "middle ground" list, but one you might consider.
It is interesting that the three negative "reviews" on Amazon US were not reviews of the book. The first, by Judy Earl didn't even go into the book -- she attacked the Publisher
If you might have any doubts about this collection of, uh, science, you might do well to check out the publisher. A (renowned) science publisher? Any chance this work was peer reviewed by experts in the field? You be the judge:
"Stacey International welcomes unsolicited proposals, particularly those which may build on certain core areas of our list.
The second by Max Rockbin (amusing name) claimed that:
By the time you read this, the premise of this book will have been debunked by all credible sources.
Newer data has only reinforced the premise of "the hockey stick" graph.
And the third, David Lewis, said: I wonder how "they" got the leaders of every national science academy in the world to buy into the big hoax? How was it that the President of the National Academy of Sciences in the US, and the leaders of the similarly prestigious organizations in every developed country in the world all signed the Joint Academies Statement warning civilization that it must move to a low carbon society as quickly as possible?
I wonder if any of them read the book, or even actually saw a copy?
Trolls.
Bob had it nailed in his comments above.
Garry -- Perhaps Judith Curry could try to write a "middle ground" book.
A well deserved review. I trust that you are now accumulating evidence for your sequel Hockey Stick Illusion 2. I suspect that the land based temperature records are as dubious as the tree ring data.
Mike, middle ground books are pretty rare. You might try "Climate Confusion" by Roy Spencer, who (broadly speaking) accepts AGW but not catastrophic AGW. It's pretty basic, but that can be a good thing.
It does deserve, and will, win prizes.
I have just finished your book sir, a truly wonderful insight, for which I thank you. I have emailed all the prospective parliamentary candidates in my constituency to ask if they have read the book. The pretext being that any potential legislator's due diligence on AGW would benefit from your insight. I have not received any replies.
On an OT subject, if allowed, would you like to exert your wonderful analytical skills on the following, it has my feeble mind in a spin: -
“Dinosaurs died from sudden temperature drop 'not comet strike', scientists claim”
“The drop in temperature is thought to have occurred because high levels of CO2 were in the atmosphere which caused global temperatures to rise and polar ice to melt – a phenomenon currently predicted for Earth.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/dinosaurs/7624014/Dinosaurs-died-from-sudden-temperature-drop-not-comet-strike-scientists-claim.html
greensand,
Might I suggest you go one step further. Ask if they will accept a copy and if so, send one. Then, a generous period of time later, contact them and see what they think about it - or encourage them to get round to reading it.
greensand,
Thank you for your OT comment. May I add, that by 65 million years ago, the end of Cretaceous period and the beginning of the Cenozoic, no ice caps existed, north or south. The 'present' ice caps started 40 million years ago with the growth of an ice sheet in Antarctica - 30 million years ago in Arctic.
April 24, 2010 Taras
greensand,
Thank you for your OT comment. May I add, that by 65 million years ago, the end of Cretaceous period and the beginning of the Cenozoic, no ice caps existed, north or south. The 'present' ice caps started 40 million years ago with the growth of an an ice sheet in Antarctica - 30 million years ago in Arctic.
April 24, 2010 Taras
24 April: Daily Mail: BBC lectures us incessantly on climate change. So why did their bosses make 68,000 domestic flights in two years?
Deputy Director General Mark Byford took plane to Manchester for the Open golf... three hours by train
Director General Mark Thompson flew to Newcastle for Tory drinks party... and Glasgow for concert
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1268613/Every-night-BBC-lectures-climate-change-So-did-bosses-make-68-000-domestic-flights-years.html
I just checked and the book is presently out-of-stock on Amazon, USA....hope that's GOOD news! [but not for me]
[BH adds: try the Book Depository - free shipping to the US]
There are ten copies of the book available for AUD$22.80 each on ebay Australia from Aphrohead Bookstore which posts worldwide from the UK.
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Hockey-Stick-Illusion-Climategate-and-Corrupti-/250607985302
I enjoyed George Gilder's phrase "factitious data", even if it was a typo!