Sunday
Jul102011
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Old arguments
Jul 10, 2011 Books Climate: Sceptics A new book has been attracting a few reviews recently: James Powell's The Inquisition of Climate Science looks as though it's going to be another screed about how sceptics are all funded by big oil and are all creationists in their spare time (reviews here and here).
The repetition of this narrative is looking increasingly bizarre to me. As Judy Curry has noted, the sceptics who have been making all the running in recent years have all been completely divorced from any of the oil companies or Washington think tanks that are said to be behind the alleged conspiracy. The arguments we are hearing from Powell and his ilk seem to have moved on little in the last twenty years - they are irrelevant to the reality of the climate debate.
Reader Comments (44)
“A devastating, crushing blow against the deniers. I would not want to meet Powell in a dark alley."
Unlike Ben Santer who said:
It seems these warmists have a propensity for violence in dark alleys.
I notice the comments have been closed on the Science Progress review- I wonder why? Too much opposition turning up perhaps?
Its been a ling term problem with the AGW faithful , their simply unable to accept people can honestly and fairly have views on AGW that do not reflect the dogma. So they have to come up with 'conspiracy' with ideas that these people are stupid ,evil or psychological damaged. Oddly if you look at who is actual getting funding from fossil fuel companies , organizations like the CRU, IPCC pop up and its only running it through the 'that's different' filter' can the AGW faithfuls evil fossil fuel companies idea make the less than no sense it achieves.
Wasnt there some big hoohaa about one of the skeptic foundations having received $25million over the last ten years as being some kind of indicator of how well funded skeptics supposedly are? Funny how the cultists of Mann Made Global Warming (tm) totally ignore Greenpeace's own Mann Made Global Warming (tm) branch being funded to the same tune...in a single year back in 2008!
Besides...Im just waiting for my cheque to clear from BP! :)
Regards
Mailman
I like this quote:
I'm still waiting for the evidence that carbon dioxide does cause global warming. I can't get anyone to provide me with it. Anybody else found it yet?
Well, quite. It is crucial for the mental processes of Leftists in general, and hence the AGW faithful, to portray their enemies as uniformly evil (those that are not dismissed as cretinous).
It enables Leftists to avoid confronting their greatest secret, which is the darkness and rage which exists within themselves and which they are emotionally quite incapable of facing.
Banning comments on AGW-related articles or cutting them off early is becoming a prevalent tactic in the media -- it now appears to be standard practice in the Sydney Morning Herald website, for instance. Perhaps someone with time on their hands would like to investigate just how common this attempt to stifle opposing views has now become?
I attempted to read the review, but use of the D word twice in the first sentence activated my ''why bother' reflex.
Most markers of high school English papers would have thrown it back to the reviewer for rewriting at that point; 'childish, biased, rewrite' would have been the annotation in red ink.
As regards funding it's something we just have to accept Warmist say. It's one of the rules of the club you simply have to follow if you are a member.
Moonbat said much the same the other day on the Gruadian website while lamenting about why their message wasn't getting through (answer; all the funding the antis get to combat their 'truth telling').
Really, these are (mostly) intelligent people, so they must know the truth about the vastly unequal funding between pro and anti global warming camps. Therefore, you have to wonder if they are prepared to make misleading statements like this about something that is easily shown to be untrue, then what confidence you can have in their position on the arguable points.
It's an issue I've had a lot of success with around the dinner table, so I for one am glad they keep trotting it out...
Well as a "warmist" I do wish some other "warmists" would stop going on about who funds "sceptics". The whole issue is irrelevant - all scientists have to get their funding from somewhere. The discussion should be about the science itself.
from the second rreview:
"Powell deals effectively with “Climategate” — the controversy that ensued when unknown persons “hacked” into the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit computer system — and notes that six independent inquiries had found “not a single faked data point, not a single deleted e-mail, not a single article prevented from publication”."
Did any of the enquiries have these issues on their terms of reference? If this is as good as Powell gets, then it is not likely to be a very worthwhile book, is it? Out of curiosity, how is an enquiry supposed to establish the existence of a deleted email?
Someone on Keith Kloor's site pointed out that these debates are like games of chess: all the moves and counter moves are known and rehearsed by seasoned players and only work on newcomers and children.
A warmist plays the "big oil" move - then he's countered by the "glaciergate" gambit. So he tries to play the "granchildren" card or the "clean energy" card. And so on.
What is very clear is that debate has nothing to do with science. The fact that "climate scientists" are so deeply involved in the debating suggests that they have very weak science and they know it.
Just for comparison with how the hard sciences work: astronomers know exactly where all the planets will be next week, next year, next century. They predict each eclipse to the second. They don't feel the need for posturing and setting up bogus propaganda sites like "RealAstronomy.org" or "SkepticalStars.com"
Out of curiosity I visited James Powell's website http://inquisitionofclimatescience.org/
I was struck by the irony that on the cover of his new book, he uses the persecution of Galileo as an illustration of the trusty scientific genius battling against ignorance and prejudice.
Galileo's science had to overcome that well-known logical fallacy, an argumentum ad populum. The argument was that because most other scientists believed otherwise, they must be right and Galileo wrong.
On James Powell's website there's a link to "How we know global warming is true:
The Video", and guess what? The video opens with the same old argumentum ad populum - 97% of active climate scientists believe in man made global warming, so it must be true.
Who says Americans don't understand irony?
Perhaps Powell is just a slow writer. :o)
"...The whole issue is irrelevant - all scientists have to get their funding from somewhere."
It is not entirely irrelevant though, as I see this as one of the issues in the whole debate. A scientist just isn't going to give up their funding with a 'investigated the issue and nothing further to see..' kind of answer. One of the major things is that there is a large camp with a definitive "It isn't the sun" answer to recent warming. It might well not be the sun but I'm pretty sure the sun proponents aren't getting anywhere near as much funding as the CO2 proponents or the modellers. I'm not sure if sun researchers would even get funding from a major agency such as NERC or need to go elsewhere?
The review in the Irish Times is especially underwhelming. Did the environmental editor simply 'phone it in?' Or merely photocopy it? That how substantive it is.
First of all, I'm still waiting for all that compelling evidence for the EGE. Instead, we get more "Trust us, we're scientists"! Which simply isn't a recognized stance of real skeptics and scientists.
The author's career bears a certain interest for our purposes.
James Lowell Powell has published five or so books. He earned his PhD in geochemistry at MIT around 1960. He spent about 20 years teaching geology and rising up the academic ranks. He then spent two or so decades in academic administration at very prestigious institutions like Oberlin College where he taught, at Stanford University, and as president at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. He also spent some time teaching at the University of Southern California working the hydrology angle of his background, doing water policy work or teaching
He also shows a close association with the environmental left is various guises. One of his books is endorsed by a famous Marxist US historian. And this latest work is published by the University Press, with close ties to James Hansen's NASA GISS. (From looking at the table of contents, there s an attack on skeptical climatologist Pat Michaels. MORE here.) Sadly, one of his books is on scientific methods and earth history and geology. As far as I can tell, he hasn't applied a thing in this book from sound scientific methods.
But the take-home point is that he hasn't really worked in or taught the science geochemistry for some decades, preferring more political and wonky activities to science.
Now back to the review in the Irish Times: Powell "is no 'green fascist', as the deniers would claim." Perhaps, but then why has he been swimming in political and environmentally correct circles where green fascists are welcomed ever since Hansen made AGW an issue? Call me suspicions of personal bias unsoothed.
Powell trots out the persecution of consensus scientist as if they were as noble and upstanding as Galileo - except Galileo wasn't almost wholly funded by US federal taxation. Worse, the irony of "persecuting" an orthodox 'consensus' is apparently lost on the IT environmental editor. And please tell us, how AGW othodoxy 'persecuted'?
No doubt the Koch card is trotted out as "profit" is attacked as a weapon of the "most profitable company in the history of the world", funding the demonization. But But Big Oil is help aloft like garlic holding werewolves at bay! Unfortunately, in truth the only Fossil Fuel funded scientist is Pat Michaels, and he comes by it entirely honestly.
I smell wild conspiracy imprecations. The funding of Deniers fell since the late 1990s, he argues. "In 2008, ExxonMobil said it would 'discontinue contributions to several public policy research groups' because of their stance, but Powell maintains it still funds some." Anyone want to bet that the much great Oil funding of pro-AGW enviro-wacko outfits like the Sierra Club or Environmental Defense even get mentioned.
"Powell is scathing about the media’s role in seeking 'balance' in their reporting of climate change." Apparently, the ending of 'balance' stories by the Society of Environmental Journalists after a faux debate in 2007 (no Deniers were heard from) will also go unmentioned.
"Powell deals effectively with 'Climategate'...and notes that six independent inquiries had found 'not a single faked data point, not a single deleted e-mail, not a single article prevented from publication'." It seems the fact that US government investigation last winter yielded testimony that emails under FOIA remit were, in fact, deleted - never mind that only one investigation took evidence from Deniers this scandal revealed them under attack from Orthodoxy. as BH himself noted here, there IS a consensus from both Deniers and AGW scientists in these emails also showed that heretics and dissenters would be attacked, denied publications, and 'disappeared', to use a Stalinism.
I apologize for my sloppy proofing, but I must simply sign off now.
An improved understanding of man's place in Nature is the analogy which links this modern mess with Galileo's. The link is exemplified by the words 'anthropocentric' and 'anthropogenic'.
While Galileo's correction had much greater intellectual and scientific repercussions, this present correction will have much greater social consequences.
================
kim,
You make a very interesting point.
The AGW faithful are in effect putting humans at the center of the universe and are angry with skeptics for the same reasons that geo-centric Catholics were angry with Galileo for disrupting their faith that God had put Earth (and those created in His likeness) at the center of the universe.
Yes, h.
I should have said 'much greater social and economic consequences'. Plus, when I originally came up with this conceit, I underestimated the intellectual and scientific repercussions. As this rolling stone enlarges downhill, sweeping science and intellect bare in its path, I begin to wonder if those repercussions may dwarf those from the Galileo Affair.
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Powell's misconstrual of the analogy gets a big glass case in a prominent spot in my museum of ironies.
Possibly some special lighting, too.
=========================
The biggest problem with the alarmists is not that there are some people in the movement who are dishonst enough to tell such lies but that there is virtually nobody in the alarmist movement who has the honesty to dissociate themselves from such lies. By comparison sceptical sites are, properly, full of people discussing the nuances of the question.
This is the difference bwtween science and a totalitarian organisation.
I notice Science Progress is yet another division of Center for American Progress. They seem to be the main lefty organization on the web in the US. I've noticed over last 30 years these organizations are paranoid and produce lots of conspiracy theories like this: war to steal oil, racist tea party, koch bros, etc. I think it is fair to say they have become a cult and cannot understand other points of view.
"they are irrelevant to the reality of the climate debate" perhaps more than many realise.
If the observations continue to deviate from the CAGW projections in this decade, coupled with high energy prices this will force further reflection. It is tempting to imagine that the current rumpus with News International is a precursor.
Cover ups, people misleading Commons Select committees, investigations which were incompetently done, etc. - now that sounds familiar!
I think this is wishful thinking on Richard Betts' part, 11:37 AM, bordering on the naive:
'Well as a "warmist" I do wish some other "warmists" would stop going on about who funds "sceptics". The whole issue is irrelevant - all scientists have to get their funding from somewhere. The discussion should be about the science itself.'
First of all, the 'discussion' such as it is, seems to me to be almost entirely political, thanks in no small part to the machinations of those guiding the IPCC PR and the widespread adoption of the 'cause' by leftwing groups. Secondly, the scientific 'discussion' such as it is boils down to the programming of GCMs. On the observational side, there is little to discuss other than the obviously weak role of additional CO2 in the climate system so far, and the frequent failure of GCM projections to look at all plausible. If GCMS were not treated so seriously, it seems to me, there would be hardly any 'scientific' discussion at all - and climatology might happily revert to backwater status.
Would that it were the case that the discussion was a scientific one! If it were, we would not have had such lunacies as the Climate Change Act forced upon us, nor have the children in our schools being targetted to become 'little climate activists'.
Coming back to the politics, who thinks it odd that Robert Napier, fresh from turning the WWF away from the birds and the bees and into a fully-fledged and very successful political campaigning organisation, should seek to become the director of the UK Met Office? It is odd if you think the debate is about science. It is not odd at all if you think that the political side has overwhelmed the technical/scientific one.
A previous director, Sir John Houghton, seemed to see his mission as primarily a religious one, and he pursued it further after leaving the Met Office. This aspect is of course not made much of by activists in leftwing politics since it does not fit very comfortably in their 'narrative', but it may have been important for religious people, particularly in the United States, and they in turn do tend to engage in politics these days.
So coming back to funding. The left have used this as a barb for a long time. Their general worldview seems to be that anyone who opposes them is either suffering from 'messages not getting through', or is dreadfully corrupt. And of course those on the trail of corruption, naturally look for where the money has come from to bring about this otherwise inexplicable, to them, state of affairs. Who is deemed 'bad' at the moment by the left? Big Green? No! Big Coal? Big Oil? Oh yes! The case is thus all but proven to those poisoned by such mindlessness.
In my own view, there is yet to be made a remotely convincing scientific case for acute alarm about CO2. But a very powerful and influential political one has clearly been made. And some enthusiasts for it clearly wish to denigrate and despise any who stand in its way.
James Powell in 2008 published a book, Dead Pool, arguing the imminent death of Lake Powell. Alas for his thesis the last 5 years of inflow and a quick look at the historical data for Lake Powell indicates that he grievously over-reacted to what appears to be a cyclical feature of precipitation in the Colorado basin.
I look forward to seeing whether his new book is more circumspect in its pronouncements.
Apologies for going O/T but there is, I think, a much more significant green book out rather eclipsing this sorry piece of bile.
Barry Woods has a post in unthreaded about Mark Lynas's new book-Rational Environmentalist, linking to Lynas's speech at University College London, 6 July 2011.
I read that, and the credit Lynas extends to Barry for inspiration on the book title is gracious and welcome. I found Lynas's speech (linked there) most interesting. He is a devout believer, currently on a tormented journey on the road to Damascus- conflicted by rational realisation- its a very apposite book title. His speech is 90% standard guacamole green, cut with the 10% sharp citric acid of reason. Lynas is certainly on a journey. I hope he navigates the signposts well.
Thankyou, Pharos. I was toying with the idea of a warmist book to read, but really couldn't stomach the thought of Powell's book (particularly at over £ 15). I'll take Lynas instead.
minor correction - the book is - The God Species..
The title of Mark's lecture/speech/blog article was:
http://www.marklynas.org/2011/07/the-need-for-a-rational-environmentalism-speech-at-god-species-launch/#comments
Little does Mark realise that he is now 'linked' by h/t and via an occasional email, with a climate sceptic/denier that writes (occasionally) for that hot bed of denial Watts Up With That ;) !
I do hope both our Koch/Exxon cheques show up soon, because my overdraft is something painful..
maybe Mark could arrange for a big nuclear cheque to come my way (as he and George Monbiot have been suggested as being inthe pay of) ;) !
serioulsy though, whilst Mark clearly believes in a bad version of AGW, he thinks that the greens make no rational arguments for energy policy, ie Germeny closing down ALL nuclear is nuts.
I think Richard Betts tweeted the other day, for the environmentalist to reign back on the catstrophies,
ie What if we do get 2 degrees and nothing much comes of it. I'm far closer to someone like Richard Betts scientifically, yet he might think me some sort of anti-science denier because of all the bad press, us lukewarmers receive, and the climate scientists seem to live in a very insular bubble.
If the climate scientists talked to the sceptics/lukewarmers and less time with the lobby groups they might realise how political it has all become.
Barry Woods
Yes - that's why I'm talking to you guys now... :-)
And no I don't automatically assume you are "some sort of anti-science denier" - I don't think there is a neat box labelled "denier" which contains everyone who thinks dangerous anthropogenic climate change is unlikely, just as I do not think there is a neat box labelled "warmist" which contains everyone who thinks the likelihood is high enough to worry about. There is a very significant grey area in between the extremes, and if there's one thing I've learnt from reading this blog and others it's that there are wide ranges of opinion within each supposed "camp".
To respond to Rob B: you make a good point, although what I meant was that the funding source should be irrelevant to the strength of the scientific evidence - the evidence itself should stand or fall on its own merits. But yes it is a good point that the kind of scientific studies that come through may depend on what work can obtain funding. This is where the "purpose" of climate science still gets skewed, in my opinion. Most people seem to think that the only question that climate science should address is whether GHG emissions should be cut or not. However another issue of absolute critical importance is improving forecasts on seasonal to interannual timescales in order to inform planning for adaptation to changes / variations in climate - due to whatever cause (anthropogenic GHGs, the sun, or internal variability). Those funders who wish to improve that capability ought to be interested in furthering understanding of *all* aspects of the climate system and *all* drivers, human or natural. In this respect, GHGs just happen to be one thing which may help with predictability of future climates, irrespective of whether emissions should be cut or not. But there is indeed a worrying potential for emphasis to shift towards assessing the implications of climate change without checking whether we really understand the climate change itself - this could lead to an over-reliance on half-finished science and hence bad policy decisions in areas such as international development.
John Shade: thanks for your comments. Maybe it is wishful thinking - note I did actually say "wish" and "should"! I just think it's a real shame that it's very difficult to say something about how you think the Earth system works without getting dragged into a political debate. Such an important area of scientific endeavour ought to be able to proceed without the investigators having to worry about which "side" of a political battle they are supposed to be on.
(And BTW minor point, Robert Napier is chairman of our board, a different role to Chief Executive (which John Houghton used to be). Current CE is John Hirst. But I can assure you that *none* of these guys have ever tried to tell me what to think!)
Richard Betts,
You appear to be one of the climatocracy who will be able to walk back from the precipice of madness as the AGW movement falls apart.
Why are you able to do it, and how can others in the believer camp be brought back to the side of reason?
Richard
It looks like we must have crossed paths when we were at Reading, though being at the Hadley centre I guess you spent most of your time in Bracknell. Working with the models in the nineties though you are aware of the major limitations with them though. The main thing being that one of the worst things that GCM's can do is manage/conserve energy well. When I was modelling (just using the Reading SGCM) I think generally the models couldn't keep a reasonable 'correct' temperature and also were really bad at moving heat from the tropics to the poles - hence the need of a 'Flux Correction'. On top of that or the standard things like numerical instability in solving the equations in the model etc. I'm sure lots of the problems have been sorted but I'm pretty sure there must be some pretty flexible/arbitrary parameter in there to make the models 'realistic'
I'm not totally against modelling and think they are really useful tools in weather forecasting and also things like Paleoclimate research like that of my former supervisor. The key think is that modelling and observations and other anecdotal information should be combined to try and get a better understanding of how the world works.
I think using GCM's to try and model 'Climate Change' is a non-starter though. If you want to try and balance a radiative inbalanace of 3.7W for a doubling?? then getting clouds wrong by 1% which the models can't do at all is going to dwarf any kind of energy balance calculation, when as I said the models were terrible historically at doing that. And the nineties models were the basis of the AR3 report.
You must also be aware of how small the 'climate research' world is also. ie From Reading in the nineties we have Julia Slingo as chief researcher at the Met Office, Alan Thorpe as head of NERC and Brian Hoskins as chief Royal Society person and also now funded by Billionaire hedge fund manager Grantham. And on top of that many important IPCC contributors including yourself. It is a pretty small group of people for the amount of funding that goes into the area.
As I said I'm definitely not against research in the area at all. I'm in IT now, but a modelling PHD student we should be able to get on 3 years of a 10K grant, a laptop, access to servers and say 1/2 day of supervisor time a week and no real need of an office even - just come in a day a week for presentations/social etc. Should be able to do a PHD for 50K if you keep the computing budget down, most of it you should be able to run your laptop (overnight if necessary) Today that is way more power than I had in 1994. A lot of my work was porting the Reading SGCM from the Cray at RAL (Rutherford Appleton Labs) to the Convex at ULCC (with it's massive 1GB of RAM) which people would laugh at now, could probably run it on my phone. Never actually completed, maybe because I read to much usenet on the Cray ;-) though I think the 3 years postgrad experience has really helped me in my career.
I also think the funding issue will come to a head shortly as the British government does appear to be going down the bankruptcy route currently, in which case we won't be able to pay any of our public centre workers. I think the Met Office (along with the BBC) is a top candidate for privatisation and actually trying to make a profit selling it's weather forecasts. It has competition in this field and if this happens then I don't think it will take long to find out what the real 'core business' is and I don't think climate change will be a part of it - that can be done at a university if necessary.
To sum up my 'scepticism' about GCM's is both because I come from a Geophysics/Geology background and my interest was sparked by the obviously wrong 'Hockey Stick' even though out of the field a few years. I was further sparked by being bought the Magic Universe by Nigel Calder (excellent book) as a Christmas present to update me on my science and though not totally scpetical had several interesting articles pointing out the sun as a key source in the many changes to climate that we have had. Also we have now had continual life on Earth for over 1/2 billion years and even us mammals survived a 'catastrophic' meteorite impact 50+ million yerars ago which didn't seem to push us over a tipping point. I take the geological record to mean that the climate has a stable response to any changes which intuitively makes sense to me anyway. I don't understand the whole equilibrium temperature anyway - The sun heats the ground and the top 100m of the ocean every day and the night time tries to get rid of it my moving it up and towards the poles. In this process lots of energy is moved by evaporating surface water and condensing high in the troposphere (and radiate it away to space) Any extra heat it just seems will just speed up this process and increase feedbacks like clouds, so I really can't see any significant response to increased CO2.
One last question, has anyone run a GCM with a pure Nitrogen atmosphere (ie zero Geenhouse) and what surface temperature did it have (and what actual circulation existed - from the slight conduction/convection that would occur)
....I also like tallblokes argument about how could backscattered IR ever penetrate down into the Oceans. Surely it just heats/evaporates the top fraction of a millimetre and I can't see an obvious way for this to get mixed down. Can someone point be to a good explanation of how this heats gets mixed down??
In someway this reminds me of the accepted Thermohaline circulation that was accepted in say 1990 for what drove the ocean circulations, though I'm pretty sure that it is more accepted now that it is the wind the is the main driver of ocean currents.
@Richard Betts Jul 11, 2011 at 12:39 AM
I agree almost totally with everything you say. In your response to Rob B, you are actually stating exactly what I and just about every sceptic I know actually thinks. This is the tragedy of the current situation. It has become a bitter battle between those that think the “deniers” are anti-science and somehow evil and those that think the “warmists” are equally anti-science and equally evil. Yet, in actual fact, what we all really want is the same thing - the truth - the truth of the whole picture. Understanding the climate is as important a scientific undertaking as any other in the modern era. In a world where there are going to be more and more mouths to feed (at least until we can get to the point where education and gains in the eradication of poverty leads to a stable and then slowly reducing population) it’s going to be absolutely vital to provide the agricultural sector with as much accurate information as possible. Likewise for governments and planners to help them take appropriate adaptive measures (I really don’t believe any mitigation schemes have any hope of working) for any climate change we see (as you say, whatever it’s causes). But we seem to be running before we can walk and with a fixation on GHGs (primarily CO2) to boot. You state:
“But there is indeed a worrying potential for emphasis to shift towards assessing the implications of climate change without checking whether we really understand the climate change itself - this could lead to an over-reliance on half-finished science and hence bad policy decisions in areas such as international development.”
I agree with this apart from one thing. There is no longer a “worrying potential”. It’s already happened.
So how do we ensure that scientists can continue to get the funding needed for their research without being unnecessarily alarmist? I, for one, am perfectly happy to see that funding continue and even expand. I have no objection to some of the taxes I pay being used in this way. I’m sure I’m not alone amongst sceptics in such thinking. What I want in return from the scientists though, is total honesty. I don’t want to see “robust conclusions” shouted out in the SPM of the IPCC report and then the true uncertainties buried deep in WG1, which nobody walking the halls of power will ever read. When somebody makes over-reaching claims about the science, I want scientists to stand up and forcefully point out that over-reaching, even when the person making the claims is another scientist. When bad papers are published, for instance some of the paleo stuff, I want other scientists to stand up and say they are bad papers. If I, as a layperson with no scientific training, can see they are crap, then you, as scientists, can certainly see they are crap. It’s no longer enough for, what I believe to be, the vast majority of honest, hardworking scientists to just keep their heads down and not say anything. Whether it be fear of affecting their career, or not wishing to cause offence to other scientists, or even if it’s just not the done thing within academia, it’s not good enough. This “silence of the lambs” has to stop. The whole issue of climate science is far too important to mankind and it’s future to be allowed to continue in it’s present form, easily hijacked by various people, organisations and groups with various differing agendas. When a paper is published, it must be accompanied by a release of all the relevant data and code. Climate science may not like being audited by people such as Steve McIntyre, but hey, this is the age of information. Climate science (all science and all academia, come to that) has to grow up and get used to it. Even the journals are going to have to adapt if they want to survive. You want to be able to continue your work and still keep the respect of people like me Richard? Then start helping to put your own house in order. Because until good, honest scientists like you stand up to be counted, the bad apples will continue to rot the barrel. You obviously regret the politicisation of climate science as you make clear in your reply to John Shade. Unfortunately, now it’s there, it’s going to be very hard to get rid of it. A lot of it is of climate science’s own making, with several scientists on both sides of the divide making overtly political statements. Again, the cure has to come from within. Scientists such as yourself have to make it loud and clear that you want no part of the “drum-beating”. CAGW scepticism is on the rise (with good reason, in my view, but that‘s neither here nor there) and unless things change, we will only see an accelerated erosion of the trust in science in general and climate science in particular.
If climate science can sort itself out and, thereby, renew my trust in it, I promise I will then switch from lobbying my MP to pay less attention to it’s outpourings, to lobbying her to pay more attention to it’s outpourings and even increase it’s funding. All I want is the truth. I really don’t know what that truth is. What I do know for sure though, is it certainly isn’t the truth as told by climate science in it’s current state.
@lc
Well said. I agree with a lot of what you say.
But you raise an even wider point in my mind. Given the (supposed) importance of the problem that we face, is a purely academic-led scientific endeavour - with all the baggage of academic tradition, academic reward structures and all the academic pettiness that goes with it - the right way of organising ourselves to understand the problem and come to sensoble conclusions?
Are there other examples in history where *BIG* problems were solved just by writing papers and bitching about plagiarism and the propriety of letting others see your sums? If the world were threatened by a different bogeyman...a new virulent disease for example, would we content ourselves with a few papers in journals and a spat about whether the pathogen should be called the Jones nasty or the Smith nasty?
The more I think about it, the more it seems that a purely academic approach is completely inadequate to really get to the bottom of any climate problems. The raw scientific ability may exist in academe (though whether much has filtered into climatology seems pretty doubtful), but the structures and processes of academic discourse are totally inappropriate for this level of problem.
Am I alone in these heretical thoughts?
Hi Richard
I'm glad you like to hang out at Bishop Hill..
May I ask, did you read the climategate emails.. in context?
I'd recommend - Climategate - the Crutape Letters - (Mosher /Fuller)
I might be able to arrange a free copy, as I know the author/publisher, very few climate scientists have looked at them.
The sense I have is that the 'climate science' community in the UK completely circled the wagons..
Would you defend 'Hide the decline'?
Yet we had Sir Paul Nurse (President of the Royal Society' standing shoulder to shoulder with Phil Jones defending the indefensible on the BBC's flagship science program.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/02/03/has-the-bbc-has-broken-faith-with-the-general-public/
Only Professor Judith Curry, Paul Denniss and Professor Jonathan Jone have stood up and stated it was indefensible, to considerable silence from the community and a lot of abuse, from members of 'the team' and activists.
http://www.realclimategate.org/2011/02/hide-the-decline-2-pictures-for-2000-comments/
http://judithcurry.com/2011/02/22/hiding-the-decline/
http://judithcurry.com/2011/02/23/hiding-the-decline-part-ii/
http://judithcurry.com/2011/02/24/hiding-the-decline-part-iii/
Why hasn't the climate science community in the UK, INSISTED that Phil Jones shares his data, as any reputable scientist would be all to pleased to do (also journal policy)
Why did it take a non climate scientist (professor Jonathan Jones over 2 years, FOI, countless appeals to the Information Offier to obtain a ruling for CruTem to be released. UEA yet may still appeal it..
Many questions like that go unaswered, and the UK climate scientists ' total silence' publically on these issue does them no favours, ie 'the silence of the lambs' as Steve Mcintyre has suggested.
There was the Met Office round robin email, in support of 'climate science' in December 2009. Did anyone ofthose people know why they were supporting it, when I imagine NONE of them had read any of the emails, and understood the context with Climate Audit and the team. I have asked a number of climate scientists (Sir John Houighton, Bob Watson and others if they had read the emails. )
NO they said, just some sort of conspiracy, by vested oil interests to make climate scientists look bad. I was personally warned about Lord Lawson, Christopher Booker, using the tactic of the tobaco denial industry by Sir John Houghton.. Totaly ridiculous. (an old man fighting the battles of 15,20 years ago)
I have a good friend that is a climate scientist (working group 1, quite senior, also edited a summary for policymakers) yet they had not looked at any of the emails, (even though they included some 'boring' ones of their own)
The most odd thing. I asked Professor Arnell (Reading Walker institute) why did the scientists like him and AVOID, not correct the daft pronouncements of NGO's and environmentalists. ie Antartcia melting in our lifetime (Greenpeace) 300,000 deaths NOW, every single hurricane, tornado, flood, etc, due to man made climate change, 10:10 (Franny Armstrong) and others. Metres of sea level rise (ie Hansen -) Professor Arnell agreed that Hansen was alarmist.
His response bemused me - They don't want to appear to be advocates?!?!
I suggested that it is not advocacy to correct alarmist information from NGO's to politicians, but a scientists duty, my expectation is this is what they are FOR.
Many questions.. very few answers, not to put you on the spot publically.
If you like a private (confidential) chat email me here.
http://www.realclimategate.org/contact/
I have a number of articles for Watts Up that I'm working on, but have very littloe time at the moment.
(still waiting for that Exxon cheque - to give up the day job? ;) )
What if in ten years time, Co2 levels ae 405 ppm, temps are up a tiny bit, or still flat, or evn dropped slightly negative anomaly, and nothing much is happening, except continued growth in China, India, Indonesia, Africa in their emissions, etc.
Yet, I see the likes of alarmists like Franny Armstrong (300,000 deaths, 4 years to save the world, etc) getting tours of the Hadley Centre, etc.. how about the same accomodation to Bishop Hill
Latimer, from my long-ago memories of university life, I suspect that that particular environment is not one in which incredibly complex problems such as those associated with climate will be solved. Looking at the lessons learned from the history of science, the models for generating successful solutions to major problems lie more in the world of the gifted outsider such as Harrison, the 'village carpenter' who first solved the problem of measuring time accurately with a mechanical chronometer. Having marvelled at the beauty of the workmanship of Harrison and his son's early and very large chronometers in the Greenwich Museum, how any commentator can describe Harrison as a 'village carpenter' is beyond belief; his chronometers are so beautifully made, they truly qualify as Art. But not only are the chronometers gorgeous artifacts, finely and precisely made with the most primitive of manufacturing equipment, they display an almost-incredible series of intellectual leaps in solving the mechanical problems facing the Harrisons. These astounding works could not have even been conceived inside a university as they transcended anything universities then saw as as their province. And yet the Astronomer Royal of the day was so prejudiced by Harrison's social caste that the lordly Astronomer and the Royal Society could not see past that and remained opposed to the very idea of the Harrisons, in ways that are similar to some within the scientific community who maintain that, without the correct set of qualifications, the understanding of climate is impossible.
As more inventions of use to the world came from garden sheds than from universities, I suspect that many well-appointed university departments and research establishments which only employ scientists become self-defeating environments in which the dreams are swamped and eventually washed away by the petty stresses and demands of academic life.
Wow, thanks for all the responses - where to start....?
Quick one for the moment, while I have a few mins spare. Barry, I agree that the "300,000 deaths already due to climate change" is ill-founded, as you saw me say on Twitter yesterday to someone who was mentioning it again. I've said this in a report to the UK govt and they don't cite that "statistic" (not as far as I know anyway).
And on Franny's visit - this arose from me inviting her here when we last met in 2009 at the Copenhagen climate conference. She was on holiday in Devon and took the opportunity to take me up on my invitation. We actually had a full and frank discussion about which scenes in Age of Stupid made us uncomfortable scientifically (eg: flooded London - this implies that the Met Office and Environment Agency were wrong in our recent study which suggested no need to rush into upgrading the Thames Barrier just yet...). Although to be fair, some of the scenes were a reasonable reflection of published work, including mine (like the Amazon burning - the risk of this may well increase to some extent due to a combination of a drying climate and deforestation, although we are the first to recognise that the Hadley Centre model HadCM3 is an extreme outlier in the severity of climate change it projects for that region.)
And incidentally we do invite "sceptics" to visit! David Bellamy came and had a whole day of discussion. Other have also been.
Will try to respond further when I get time (may not be until tomorrow)
Latimer, there is much truth in what you say. But what’s the answer? We seem to be stuck between a rock and a hard place. If we take your virulent disease analogy for example, we can see that many existing problems, such as aids/hiv, cancer, heart disease, or even flu in it’s various forms, are already heavily researched by the private sector in the form of “Big Pharma”. Either by directly employing scientists in their own research centres, or by sponsoring the research by other academic institutions. However, the primary aim of “Big Pharma” is financial reward and whilst such commercial pressures can, and undoubtedly do, drive and speed up the research process and remove a lot of the unnecessary clutter, the results they achieve have to be checked and exhaustively examined to ensure their safety. This checking, obviously, slows the process down again, but I see no alternative. It’s interesting that, when it comes to things medical, our politicians are prepared to wait for this testing process to be completed before new drugs can come onto the market, even though people might be dying now, yet are quite happy to jump feet first into untried and untested solutions without even knowing for sure if there is a problem or not when it comes to the climate. It’s obvious to most of us, I think, that the somewhat archaic processes by which we allow our scientific endeavours to operate needs to change, but I really don’t know what the solution is.
thanks Richard..
The problem with Franny is that a board member of her 10:10 group WROTE the climate change act, and got made a labour peer for her work on climaye change (Franny seems to know Ed mIlliband) quite well.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/06/07/green-economic-thinking-revenge-not-economics/
There are no sceptics in this political green bubble.
There is also the 600,000 deaths report going around...
I actually got hold of it, and it is littered with 'climate justice' comments and the methodology was laughable.
I did a post on 150,000 deaths, are show how a WHO statement got turned into a definite number of deaths, by a thinktank close to the government. Ben Pile did the same years before me...
http://www.realclimategate.org/2010/12/lost-in-alarmism-150000-climate-change-deaths-a-year/
extract:
The executive summary of The Institute of Public Policy Research document – ‘Positive Energy’ -2007, has it’s second sentence, to frame the entire document with an urgent ‘climate change’ message:
Behind the stories, real people are allready being hit, with climate change now killing 150,ooo people a year (1)
The IPPR is a major ’progressive’, UK think tank that has adviced the UK Government over the last decade. Here it is reported as a proven fact – now killing – designed to give an explicit urgent message to governments and policy makers
I had to buy the report to find the reference, which was not included in the Executive Summary, (no politician usually gets beyond even the first couple of pages of an executive summary)
(1)World Health Organisation: Climate and Health – 2005 factsheet
I tracked this IPPR referenced factsheet down and this is presumably where the definite 150,000 ‘climate change’ deaths ‘facts’ for that report came from.
WHO: "Measurement of health effects from climate change can only be very approximate. Nevertheless, a WHO quantitative assessment, taking into account only a subset of the possible health impacts, concluded that the effects of the climate change that has occurred since the mid-1970s may have caused over 150,000 deaths in 2000. It also concluded that these impacts are likely to increase in the future."
The WHO factsheet also says 600,000 deaths annually due to natural extreme weather related events – of which 95% in poor countries. Thus the biggest killer is being poor, not ‘climate change’, yet the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change have even defined ‘climate change’ to only mean man made, excluding ALL natural climate forcings…
The authors of the report appear to have turned the very approximate information on man made climate change deaths in the WHO document(itself subject to criticism) into a fact. The authors, Simon Retallack (Head of Climate Change – IPPR, Tim Lawrence, (Post Graduate Researcher), Matthew Lockwood (Now Associate Director) have little in the way climate science scientific qualifications, they have the usual political career or lobby group favourite qulaifications of economics or philosophy and a surprisingly common geography background and careers of politics, media, NGO’s and environmental lobbying groups.
In no way does that (pro AGW WHO factsheet) support that statement of 150,000 deaths a year.
Yet this is the message that the politicians are hearing from the policy think tanks.
Hi Richard
None of those groups retweeted your tweet, that the claim of 300,000 deaths was suspect, to their followers. thus alarmism.
The IPPR Is a major left of centre think tank, that politicised and exaggerated those deaths, James Purnell is on the board o trustees now (next labour leader?) evidence this has been one of the major advisors to the previous government on all things policy.
"the sceptics who have been making all the running in recent years have all been completely divorced from any of the oil companies"
Really ? Surely your way of life is dependent on oil.
Isn't everyones Hengist.. do you have a point
Why not mention that I fill up my car at BP and have a Nectar card, for a Sourcewatch entry. Bit like the smear job you performed their for Sonja editor of Energy and Environment
Hengist
Why is that you are so keen to attack that you forget to make sense?
Most in the Western world object to the level of tax on all of our fuels and say so very clearly. Buying petrol or diesel on an oil company's retail forecourt is hardly an indication of the customer's cosy and profitable relationship with the oil company and nor is the fact that a significant portion of the moneys exchanged on said forecourt are taxes are an indication of a cosy and beneficial relationship between the government of the day and the motoring customer.
Untangling your ridiculous and senseless statements are particular unprofitable for most of us, but we feel impelled by decency, if nothing else, to help a fellow human being who is obviously struggling with reality.