Sunday
Mar272011
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Lawson jousts with Beddington
Mar 27, 2011 Climate: Surface The Guardian carries a report about the correspondence between Nigel Lawson and Sir John Beddington over Lawson's book, An Appeal to Reason.
This is fascinating stuff and the whole article needs to be read.
Update on Mar 27, 2011 by
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill
The story was sourced from here, and from where the original correspondence can be seen. I would recommend reading it.
Reader Comments (18)
What is it about Mann Made Global Warming (tm) that makes otherwise highly intelligent people so rabidly stupid?
Regards
Mailman
A lovely headline on the article with some wonderful weasel quotes. Perhaps Your Grace could contact the Good Lord Lawson and we could hear his side of the story.
When the true story of the giant parasitical edifices built on a barely detectable short term warming trend finally emerges the Guardian and many of its "reporters" will be at the forefront in the dock.
source is also very relevant.. the European Climate Foundation funded - The Carbon Brief..
Supposedly an INDEPENDANT mediator between journalists a peer reviewed scientists.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/02/18/the-carbon-brief-the-european-rapid-response-team/
they of course are anything but independant, good to see the Guardian using anonymous sources for their stories, could be any oldactvist writing them, but do the Guardian care?
Beddington is another sad loss to the strange but well know pilot phenomena of 'press-on-itis' which is defined as =
Press-on-itis is really the result of a decision-making error that involves continuing toward the destination (objective) despite a lack of readiness of the air plane or crew and the availability of reasonable lower-risk alternatives. Press-on-itis often occurs when there is an unsuitable environment such as bad weather at the destination. The pilot may continue on despite warnings from ATC or other crew members.
Know I know many of us also suffer from this thought process problem usually when driving but to be locked in it for 10yrs+ like many greenish is very troubling !!
Sort of 'hide the malign'
With all the continuing playing of blinders, we are seriously going to need a dedicated Beddington side bar tab.
And as Phillip Bratby pointed out in comments on this revealing Climate Audit thread, mainly on the Oxburgh Inquiry, and which includes scathing comment by Judith Curry and others, what was Sir John knighted for anyway? Fellow benighted colleagues all have reasons for services rendered, why not Sir John?
http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/issues/59446/supplements/1
http://climateaudit.org/2010/07/01/oxburgh-and-the-jones-admission/
"Incorrect....misleading...anecdotal evidence...meaningless comparisons.."
Oh, sorry. I thought they were talking about 'An Inconvenient Truth'
I believe that we are all aware that the major global indexes record a rise of less then one degree absolute since 1880.
Are these indexes accurate and truely representative of the average global temperature?
If the answer to the first question is yes, then the second question follows:
What happened to the higher termperatures that were recorded in the 1930's?
The third question is - what adverse consequences on a net global basis have flown from this temperature increase?
The second last question being - is the cause or causes of this increase truely known beyound doubt?
Finally, assuming that you are tempted to provide the pat answer, that it is all down to wicked man's carbon dioxide emissions, please explain the established physical laws that link between CO2 and water vapour feedback and the evidence for your claim.
Bish! That was a cruel thing to do on a Sunday! Sending me to that link without a warning!
In the downloaded zip file there is one Word document (all the rest are pdf documents) which seems to be rehearsing all the favoured "refutations" to the skeptic viewpoint.
Anyone know who
Author: thorpej
Company: DIUS
relates to?
matthu, DIUS is (or rather was) the Department of Innovation, Universities and Skills.
Perhaps the Guardian would print the excellent article currently headlining the GWPF blog by Lord Turnbull (former Permanent Secretary, Environment Department,1994-98) as a balancing op-ed piece.
Lord Turnbull concludes his article with the following extract
'We need to acknowledge that there have always been fluctuations in out climate. Rather that writing natural forces out of the script we need to build them into the analysis.
We have witnessed a warming tend in the last 150 years but this warming has not followed a steady upward path. We are currently on a plateau. CO2 has probably, ceteris paribus, made a small positive contribution.
Our understanding of the effects of water vapour is still limited and not enough to justify the weight that is put upon it.
We need a more eclectic approach and certainly a more modest one.
In the words of President Klaus of the Czech Republic.
“To reduce the interpretation of all kinds of climate change and of global warming to one variable, CO2, and to a small proportion of that one variable – human induced CO2- is impossible to accept.”
From our politicians we need more rationality, less emotion and less religiosity; and end to alarmist propaganda and to attempts to frighten us and our children. Also we want them to pay more attention to the national interest and less to being global evangelists.
Finally we need from our scientists more humility, and a return to the tradition of scientific curiosity and challenge. We need more openness and transparency and an end to attempts to freeze out dissenting voices. There should be more recognition of what they do not know. And acceptance of the Really Inconvenient Truth - that our understanding of the natural world does not justify the certainty in which the AGW views are expressed.
Andrew Turnbull, March 2011
Lord Turnbull was Permanent Secretary, Environment Department,1994-98; Permanent Secretary to the Treasury 1998-2002, Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Home Civil Service 2002-05. He is now a Crossbench member of the House of Lords and a member of the GWPF's Board of Trustees.'
It's the usual back-and-forth. Is it only me that's getting a bit fed up with the endless tussle over the obvious?
Yes, temperatures have warmed over the last 150 years by about 0.7C. Yes, the last three decades were each on average warmer than the preceding one.
Now it's time to stop arguing about the bleeding obvious - it's warming - and start trying to zero in on the correct value for climate sensitivity to CO2.
If there is a warm bias in some/all records (surface temp; tropospheric temp; SST; OHC) and the role of black carbon in Arctic, Greenland and NH glacial melt has been under-estimated, then there is a good case that the observations may not support the consensus median estimate of +3C per doubling of pre-industrial levels of CO2.
That's where the argument needs to be.
We should praise Daniel Boffey. Just like at the BBC regarding some good news about wildlife at Chernobyl, it was impossible for the Guardian/Observer tribe to disseminate any information about Lord Lawson's arguments. So they had to resort to that old journalistic trick, dressing it all up as harsh criticism but leaving the good Lord ample space to make all his points abundantly clear.
{"It is clear from the scientific evidence … that the risks are real and, I believe, it is not going too far to say, potentially catastrophic in the absence of strong global action to reduce emissions."}
{I believe}
need there be more said?
Since 1880 - '90, global temperatures have increased sporadically, with intermissions, due first to deep-sea "magmatic episodes" worldwide, second to Earth's ongoing rebound from the planet's well-defined Little Ice Age (LIA) subsequent to the Medieval Warm.
Neither bathymetric volcanism nor a 500-year drop in solar-induced Holocene Interglacial temperatures have anything whatever to do with CO2, a benign trace-gas essential to plant life. Climate hysterics who assert the contrary deal not in facts but "mere opinion"-- and a foolish, mean-spirited, reactionary opinion it most certainly is.
All of this is all interesting, but the fact of the matter is that manmade global warming fails the test of history. It has been substantially warmer in times past and none of the terrible things they are predicting for today occurred then. Why then should we believe they will occur today? We shouldn't! If that is the case this is the biggest scam, the biggest waste of talent, the biggest waste of money we have ever experienced. This constant harping on gases holding heat is eyewash. Gases may get warmer when exposed to heat, but gases don't trap it. Water vapor clearly does, but that was not the basis for the warmer's logic and claims of scientific validity. Besides, water vapor occurs on its own and is not produced by mankind, so there was no way they could blame humanity for its appearance, and therefore water vapor was never part of the models used by the warmers. It's all eyewash....and expensive eyewash at that.
What is truly disgraceful is the conduct of so-called scientists. Official records indicate that a substantial number of scientists have observed scientific corruption and said nothing. Anthropogenic Climate Change has clearly exposed the level of corruption within the scientific community to the point that it can easily be stated; scientific integrity is an oxymoron.
Rich Kozlovich says (emphasis added):
And this:
Which indicate:
- a rabid anti-science bias
- no understanding of radiative physics
- no knowledge of GCMs, specifically the incorporation of water vapour
Your assault on the general integrity of scientists would carry more weight if you demonstrated some knowledge about the specific areas of science you choose to attack.