Monday
Mar312014
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Curry in Scotland
Mar 31, 2014 Climate: Sceptics Climate: WG2 I was picking up one of the sprogs from after-school hockey and switched on the radio to find none other than Judy Curry being interviewed on Radio Scotland.
Interviewer Bill Whiteford pushed pretty hard, but not unreasonably so and the result was, I think, pretty informative for the listener. It was nice to hear things moving on from the consensus-versus-denier thing that has corrupted public debate on global warming for so long.
Audio is below.
Reader Comments (32)
Calm and balanced. Well done Judy who said she was not a good 'off the cuff' speaker.
Another fantastic effort by Judy.
That's exactly what it did. And even then Judy wasn't able to get in that on something like extreme events the consensus has moved strongly in the direction of no or little alarm. But she was excellent as ever on how small the number of 'facts' are in climate. Attempts to railroad consensus into advocacy of highly dubious policies is clearly way off beam. That came across very well.
"Judy's" Scotland's newest curry house :-)
She was pretty good.
"I don't take issue with the basic science" - I think that is a slip of the tongue. The basics of science here are largely absent.
"Silent group of scientists" - there is a tendency in promoting "the scientific method" that many scientists simply accept that the views of the experts is to be respected. I was in that camp myself several years ago until I began reading the junk these experts produce. To be sure there has been a lot of fine work done in and around Climate Science that has become lost. More embarrassed scientists working in and around this field need to find some courage to speak out.
Very calm and balanced comment.
What I think she said is that there a lot more to this climate business than just CO2.
And although the interviewer tried to position her as a denier she came across well in measured, thoughtful tones.
Well done Dr. Curry for some rational observations.
Bravo
As Judy represents sanity on WG2 John Kerry comes out with "Denial of the science is malpractice." I think that's intended to mean we can all be locked up in due course, as I discuss there.
Heh, there is a duty to believe; the derelicts don't so they damage. Actually, he's getting close to making a case that Holdren and other alarmists are liable; they knew, or should have known, that the science was not settled.
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Good stuff.
"Too much of the science is being filtered through a political agenda".
Too many people accept the basic premises and the framing in the climate debate without question. The framing elements are not derived or rooted in climate science or atmospheric physics but are to be found in historical evolution, ecologic modes of thinking and overpopulation politics arising in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Abrupt climate change is a genuine potential problem. But even here, it is not clear that 'we' can do something to change anything.
It's good to see that Dr. Currie is getting international exposure.
She's a very credible spokesperson for sanity and presents a stark contrast to the ad-hominem spouting alarmists.
Go Judith, go!
One of the best set of responses to the alarm meme I have heard. No matter how the interviewer tried to provoke, Dr. Curry brought the focus back to the reality without put down or argumentative reposts, but patiently and mindfully.
Bloody good stuff.....let's have some more!
Dr Curry is one of my favourite people, and is a potent weapon for sanity in the climate wars. As well as being an excellent scientist, she is an honest and good person with a lot of tolerance for the toddlers who throw food (and worse) around in the playpen at her blog.
Imagine if you were an uncommitted punter, and had a choice between Judy Curry's calm and rational demeanour or the always angry, paranoid and aggressive Michael Mann? No contest, I submit.
It's great that she's getting a higher media profile. Appearing confidently in the broadcast media is a skill, and she's a fast learner. Go Judy!
Pretty soon she will be placed into the raving denier camp. You can argue intellectually but the better you get at it the sooner the camp awaits.
Nice to hear Prof. Curry given the opportunity to speak. It shows progress, but I'm fearful that David Shaw may be half right. The forces ranged against reason in this debate are powerful, entrenched, highly motivated, politically organised and well-resourced.
The propaganda fightback by alarmists is in full swing. They've seen that public opinion is going against them. They are not going to give up without a hell of a fight.
Shaky start perhaps. But once she got going she was admirable. But I fear Gixxerboy is right. That said, even six months ago I strongly suspect Curry would never have been allowed near a microphone.
"They are not going to give up without a hell of a fight."
This probably misunderstands what is going on. We are in full fledged cognitive dissonance mode now. It is not warming, but the prophecies said it would. The gap is becoming increasingly obvious.
The immediate and first reaction is denial. So we find people now saying very loudly that the warming that has not happened is causing a rise in extreme weather events which has also not happened, and we hear increasing numbers saying that a non-existent fall in crop yields is due to the non-existent warming.
Expect this to get worse. The less it warms, the more the cries that it is really warming faster than ever before. The more vituperative the attacks on anyone who points out the problem.
Apocalyptic sects always have this problem, it has happened many times before and will again. At some point however it all falls off a cliff. Lenin did embark on the New Economic Policy. Most of the faithful did leave the cults described in 'When Prophecy Fails'. In the end.
Collapsing cults however can do immense collateral damage. Read the comments over on the Guardian - they seem to be getting more and more extreme, and the fury is mainly directed at those who disagree with catastrophism. This also is normal, its usual that those who dissent become seen as the real problem. Catastrophic cults are at bottom an outlet for tribal feelings. They have surprisingly little to the ostensible content.
So you have the paradox in the AGW movement that there is very little concern over exactly how to reduce emissions. But there is enormous concern over anyone who says we do not need to. What counts for the cult is agreement, not action.
Something similar is happening with turbines and alternative energy. It is not important whether they reduce emissions or affect climate. Support for them is a badge of membership.
I am sorry to be pessimistic about this, but its going to get worse and sillier before it gets better. We will read more and more calls for dissenters to be banned, prosecuted or incarcerated. Whether it will actually happen? Don't know. In extreme circumstances very strange people come to power, and their impulses when unrestrained are never benevolent. Circumstances may not get that extreme but you never know.
Meanwhile over on the Guardian we are reading veiled calls for mass extermination of excess population. The desire to exterminate is a universal feature of catastrophic cults. Fortunately it is rarely joined to the power to do it. But when it is....!
Apr 1, 2014 at 9:04 AM | michel
A great post, thank you. The phenomena you describe keep coming around time and again with monotonous regularity. Required reading for anyone interested in the climate debate should be Charles Mackay's, 'Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds.' This book is now over 170 years old but will never be out of date. Personally, I would make it compulsory reading for secondary school pupils but I can't see the Education Department approving of it.
Judy Curry was also interviewed briefly on Radio 5 yesterday morning. She made a similar impression of being rational, calm and authoritative. The interviewer was trying to badger her with all the alarmist headlines from the IPCC but she just held a steady course.
I thought it was very significant that the first interview on that topic was with someone like JC. That would not have happened a few months ago. True, they did speak to someone later who tried to reassure the faithfull that everything is still heading to hell in a handbasket.
michel:
Brilliantly put. As is the rest ...
But like many cults there are some purely symbolic actions that mean the world to them. Not that they have any rational chance of affecting the world for the better.
This is also extremely well-judged. The chances of well-off sceptics in the West becoming victims of a full-scale progrom remain lower than further actions that will deprive the poorest of their right to life, in their millions. Even as we read 'more calls for dissenters to be banned, prosecuted or incarcerated' - and vigorously oppose them - we should remember the many communities that have already paid the ultimate price for totalitarian green fantasies.
I don't want to be a party-pooper but Dr. Curry's (good) points were diluted (in my mind) by her hesitant delivery and copious use of "you know".
It seemed she wasn't comfortable thoughout the interview.
Don Keiller: you are right. One of the problems with the debate is that there are few on the sceptical side who are eloquent speakers; it appears that there are many on the alarmist side who are. As well as ensuring the more eloquent are more available for comment, I suspect that there is some training by the likes of Brownwar and Enemies of Earth in speaking to a microphone; part of that training will be to get the message out – don’t bother listening to the “other side” and trying to formulate an answer, just say your rant and move on. One of the faults of Judy Curry was that she listened to the question and then thought of an answer; such activity will cause pauses during times of word-searching – a big failing, there, is to fill that pause with a sound: “err… ummm… you know…” and repetition of words or phrases. A silent pause may actually give more drama to the answer or statement; however, keep the pause too long, and the interviewer might think you have said your piece. A hard juggling act as any who have been in front of a mic or camera will testify.
michel:
So you have the paradox in the AGW movement that there is very little concern over exactly how to reduce emissions. But there is enormous concern over anyone who says we do not need to. What counts for the cult is agreement, not action.
Excellent comment. This stuff goes back a long way.
The medieval church always reserved the nastiest punishments, not for the heretics (you can reason with them), but for the apostates: those that have rumbled the whole trick.
I'm happy to be called a global warming apostate.
So the BBC can occasionally do journalism!
May the Sasunnach Beeb could learn a thing?
Best interview performance I've heard by a scientest on the sceptical side of the debate.
I liked rationalising the discourse by mentioning how few facts there are in global warming and then highlighting the commical contrast of warming pre 1976 being unexplained but warming since 1976 (to 1998 - only 22 years) being explained.
Another helping of Curry at about 1.07-1.14, this one in Wales
Judy used to post regularly on the Climate Audit site, putting the side of the IPCC. Always impeccably polite and clear in her arguments. In those days it was inconceivable to most scientists that there could be any shenanigans in the scientific process. Then came Climategate. Judy, for the first time, saw what was going on behind the scenes at the IPCC, and the UEA and while not changing sides instantly, maybe she hasn't yet, began to accept the sceptical arguments that the uncertainties were massive and had been airbrushed out to the IPCC reports.
She is a lady of immense intellect, integrity, dignity and courage. Yet, the climate scientists have stood by while that litigious, mathematical manipulatorr, Michael Mann, has publicly insulted and slandered her. Not only the climate scientists, the NAS, RS, AGU and the APS have maintained an undignified silence in the face of this man's constant attack on scientists.
Makes you wonder.
Judy Curry came over very, very well. Reasonable, intelligent, well informed. A scientist behaving exactly as a scientist should when speaking in public - sticking to the science and not promoting public policy.
I think her best point is one that is also raised in the APS transcript of the climate science workshop (which she attended, along with Lindzen). She pointed out that there has been warming for one, two, three hundred years but the IPCC only has an explanation for warming since 1976. The IPCC has no explanation for the comparable warming from 1900 to 1940, for example. That is a point that needs repeating over and over again.
Fair play to the interviewer too.
She was also interviewed on Radio Wales - the BBC must have recommended her. I suppose the title "professor" means no greenie can accuse the Beeb of airing the views of the unqualified and demented. My personal opinion is that the move towards adaptation is welcome since it allows both sides to make a contribution, especially of the moderate luke-warmer persuasion which must include the majority of informed if not uninformed opinion.
Hope I'm not too late to observe that Richard Tol was on 5 Live on the popular national Drive Time programme at about 5:40 pm yesterday. Interviewer Peter Allen asked just a couple of questions, but generally let Richard have his say without interruption. He got a fair hearing and could have no complaints.
Perhaps there has been a change of climate at the BBC. Very welcome if so
Great comment, michel.
As I said above, Dr Curry is still learning about how to maximise her performance in the broadcast media. For many years, she did her stuff by other means. But, she is learning fast, being a very smart cookie indeed. In the longer term, she will be a formidable opponent to the rabid alarmists, as she is telegenic, calm, pleasant and very bright, with impeccable credentials.
I recall that seven or eight years ago, Professor Curry was fairly often at Climate Audit. Clearly a Warmer, she was still treated with respect and courtesy, even above the standards Steve insists on.
I suspect Judy has come a long way since those days. I am glad she was treated like a lady. The other side will turn on her quite violently sooner or later. No doubt the exquisite Johanna knows the feeling.
Marcel: spot on. Recently, reading the remarks of some of those on the other side, I found the word "Jonestown" coming to mind. Younger readers can, and perhaps should, troop round to the library and look it up.
Wow, no-one online has ever called me "the exquisite johanna" before, Jeff.
It's an exquisite compliment, and I shall treasure it.