Bishop Hill Mann at the Cabot
Sep 24, 2014 Climate: Mann As we waited in our seats for Michael Mann's lecture at the Cabot Institute to begin, I was struck by the sight of the great man alone at the side of the stage. He stood there for several minutes, ignored by everyone, as the last of the audience appeared and the Cabot Institute people, Lewandowsky among them, scurried about making final arrangements. I couldn't help but be reminded of Mark Steyn's comments about climatologists' stark failure to make any amici submissions to the DC court on Mann's behalf. The other day I also heard a story about a room full of paleo people rolling their eyes and groaning at the mere mention of his name. Somehow the Cabot Institute's abandonment of the honoured speaker at the side of the stage seemed to epitomise this growing isolation. Even the scientivists seemed to be abandoning him.
The lecture was, as expected, quite breathtakingly dull, at least as far as the content was concerned. We have all heard the lecture before - the locker room full of hockey sticks that show that he was right all along, the wicked republicans who dog his every step, the temperature data that stops at 2005; you know the routine. The delivery was largely very slick, and Mann appears to have had some coaching in this regard, because there were some amusing one-liners and some good comic timing. I don't remember him having this ability before.
But in terms of advancing the debate or getting at the truth, the occasion was a dead loss. I certainly went in to the lecture expecting that precisely nothing useful would come of it and I was not wrong. The Q&A session was a non-event, with a series of questions along the lines of 'tell us what we can do to save the planet Professor Mann'. Afterwards, several people suggested that the questions were planted, and I certainly thought that Lewandowsky, who was moderating the session, appeared to be looking for particular faces in the audience. The questions were all slick and free of the kind of waffle that usually characterise such contributions and it was also an extraordinary coincidence that one of the questions came from one of the organisers of last week's climate march. My money would therefore be on the whole thing being a charade.
As I said though, this was pretty much what I expected: Mann, like so many others on the green side of the climate debate, does not engage with anyone who might ask awkward questions. My reason for coming south was not to hear Mann but to meet Anthony Watts, and I'm therefore grateful to BH reader Caroline K for organising a get-together beforehand and laying on a great spread for us all. I'm not sure we achieved very much (organising sceptics is always akin to herding cats) but it was good to meet so many readers face to face. Before the lecture I also got to say hello to Leo Hickman for the first time and to say hi to others like Richard Betts and Warren Pearce. This was where the important work of the day was done.
;)
Reader Comments (86)
I saw over at WUWT that you and a few other sceptics along with Prof Betts and Edwards and others had dinner together.
Something I guess we will not be hearing about in the Guardian.
It's not surprising that Lew should plant questions. The fact that they were waffle free is a sure sign that the whole affair was a North Korean-style circle jerk.
And there was nothing about Mann's visit on the Guardian environment pages, or about Cook's, despite the fact that the Graun has practically handed over climate reporting to part-time journalist Nuccitelli, who is chief under-cook at SkepticalScience.
Cracks are appearing in the green edifice. Expect Lew Mann and Cook to be thrown under the juggernaut any time soon.
Charade indeed! The full lyrics to Pink Floyd's "Pigs (three different ones)" are now playing in my head. Very apt :-)
The Francis Fukuyama talk was better, although I did enjoy seeing the gaggle with you Bish...did I spot Delingpole as well?
I was there too, naively expecting sparks to fly in the Q&A but as Andrew says, the questioners were clearly preselected. The high point was certainly being able to say hello to the heroes of the enlightenment, Anthony, Andrew, Nick Lewis, David Holland and Josh. What a distinguished group of people!
'Lewandowsky, who was moderating the session'
A total lack of surprise and amazement here, that Mann could never deal with questions that where not selected beforehand . And it’s a further indication of why he in fact never want to go to court , where he could not pre-load the situation to suite himself is likely to go ‘bang’ thanks to his massive ego.
That Lewandowsky should engage in such practices merely reflects that his ‘abilities ‘ having little to do academia and much to do with his willingness to do what it takes to advice himself and his ideas . Bristol and the RS better really should hang their head in shame over the adoration they offered this BS artist, and frankly I hope it comes to bite them on the rear end.
But has much has it sounds good to think of Mann under a bus , lets remember that plenty of others enabled and encouraged him , while many played the three wise monkeys and others were more than happy to ride the gravy train that ‘the stick ‘ helped drive along, knowing it was worthless in the first place.
Leo of course is now complaining that AW did not raise his hand. Amazing fellows the two of them for very opposite reasons.
I've already reported and given initial reflections on the five days here, here, here, here and on WUWT but Andrew mentioning Hickman reminds me that Leo was the final person I took the initiative to greet last night before heading off to the pub with Barry and Richard Betts. I'd not met him before but Josh had told me something that I found of great interest that had arisen from a conversation he'd had with Leo the day before at the Royal Society.
I'm not trying to be a tease but I don't think it's right to say more publicly, except that I was extremely encouraged by Leo's response to the very brief discussion we had on the back of this chat with Josh. None of this was formally under Chatham House rulings but I think we need to give freedom to some of these folks to find their own way out of what is, in some areas, the darkness of strong green thinking. All the one-to-one encounters I had on Friday and Tuesday, including with Dr Lew and Cook, I found extremely encouraging. I believe that the meal and debate at Nic's on Sunday night was a key sign of the way forward for climateers everywhere. Gratitude to Anthony and Andrew, and to Caroline. It was good to be able to express appreciation again to Dellers, who gatecrashed our meeting at Caroline's with his Dad! Fun, productive, thought-provoking. Pity about the set-piece meeting :)
Looking forward to Josh's take on it.. :-)
I take it that Cook wasn't in uniform?
Nor did the Bish raise his hand - omnologos
Richard - I have met in my life enough splendid face-to-face people who later revealed themselves as scheming hypocritical quasi-insane, to be very, very skeptical of a smile's charm. Deeds not effete friendships are needed.
What's it all about, Mikey? Is it just for the power and the fame?
So you've got it, all that splendour; why do you look so lame?
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' I certainly thought that Lewandowsky, who was moderating the session, appeared to be looking for particular faces in the audience.'
He must have learnt something from the first lecture then as sceptic questions outnumbered warmist by about ten to one for Cook. One of my favourites was from Katabasis, who from first impressions walked straight in off a climate march (no insult intended), and the look on Lewandowsky's face after the attacking question was a peach.
Tragic figures at the heart of green darkness.
Thanks, Richard D.
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Omnologos: I know. I don't dispute that what you say is often true. It is probably true of my chat with Lew. (I'm a poet but do they know it?) I referred to this dichotomy in my second mini-report. You were the person in the pub I didn't name! I respect your view, as I do the view of Barry that for him Lew and Cook are not worth the effort. I went completely by instinct, having had a good yet disturbing discussion with the scientist and Mann-fan sitting next to me. The gulf is enormous. But for whatever reason last night I decided to greet not just Betts (easy) but Lew, Cook and Hickman. I'm really glad I did. Others must draw lines wherever they choose. These is the possibility of real violence breaking out on the back of the demonisation of climate dissidents, in my view. But treating people as human beings with faults, just as I have faults, seems a good starting place.
The queue for book signing didn't seem to be very long either...
ref Mann's ten feet of sea level rise due to western Antarctica graphics
carefully done, dind't say linked to CO2, did give a definite timescale. all implied..
Of course that collapse is all 'natural' has been 'collapsing' for hundreds of years, will continue to do so, the latest research says it may collapse in hundreds of years, but process to raise sea level to that height will be thousands..
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn25556-collapse-of-antarctic-glaciers-seems-to-be-unstoppable.html#.VCJ82410yUk
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-27381010
author of paper - "the link between CO2 levels and the loss of ice in West Antarctica “is pretty tenuous.”
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/05/26/researcher-has-a-problem-with-attributing-west-antarctic-ice-sheet-collapse-to-human-activity/
A misleading slick presentation aimed soley at an ignorant general public. (same style as Cook's)
Mann quotes - Sarah Palin getting Hide the decline wrong - patiently explaining not temperature declining, saying proxies did not match temperature and moved on. And the question about how do we know they matched temperature in the past - goes unsaid.. how do we know unprecedented, etc, etc
I would love to here Mann being confronted with Jonathan Jones on -Hide the Decline -
Prof Jonathan Jones:
"However, “hide the decline” is an entirely different matter. This is not a complicated technical matter on which reasonable people can disagree: it is a straightforward and blatant breach of the fundamental principles of honesty and self-criticism that lie at the heart of all true science.
The significance of the divergence problem is immediately obvious, and seeking to hide it is quite simply wrong. The recent public statements by supposed leaders of UK science, declaring that hiding the decline is standard scientific practice are on a par with declarations that black is white and up is down. I don’t know who they think they are speaking for, but they certainly aren’t speaking for me." - Jonathan Jones
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/02/25/currys-2000-comment-question-can-anyone-defend-%E2%80%9Chide-the-decline%E2%80%9D/
but this type of discussion will never happen.
an utterly misleading shallow lecture aimed at an ignorant public..
Did Caroline provide long spoons?
Pointman
So pretty non-event. However, you say that he seemed somewhat "ignored" by the orginisers but then suggest that the Q&A session was somehow "scripted". This is interesting, do you think it was a case of get the guy in and out as quickly as possible without any potential for Mannular dramatics or more toy throwing.
It was pannedmannonium I tell ye............
That bit about Palin is extremely slick but may backfire. It's an attempt to buttress the memes about Palin and Republican stupidity by showing how wrong she was about the meaning of 'Hide the Decline'.
Now I've long been amused that many of hoi polloi have misinterpreted this to think that temperature decline has been hidden. It's very powerful so long as temperature is not rising or is falling.
Mann's tactic is dangerous, however. It directs the attention straight to just exactly what was being hidden. If he's miscalculated about the ability of hoi polloi to discern the problem with his so hiding the decline, then it's an own goal.
He has a self-destructive streak. Probably a good thing, or that ego would be ruling the galaxy by now.
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I'm also a little curious whether his rationale about the hiding was written before or after Jean S's 'Black Tuesday' post at Climate Audit. It's hard to believe he hasn't read Jean's post, but you never know with this sort of solar scale chutzpah.
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In my humble opininon, the fact that the dinner at Nic. Lewis was held under the Chatham House rules tells me everything I need to know about the "warmers" who may not be as "warm" in private as they pretend to be in public, because they are not blind and can see the signs presented by "the pause" record sea ice, no warming of oceans, no acceleration of sea levels, no hot spot etc. etc.
They just cannot admit their failures in public, at least not yet. Reminds me of the meeting of 28 mostly "scientists" held by BBC under Chatham House rules where it was decided to ditch any reference to sceptic views. In the event there were only three real climate scientists, and all "hot warmists".
The lesson being:
After any similar lecture, immediately questions are invited - and without being selected to ask one, Q1 to be "Are any questions being planted?"
The response, or lack-of, will give a reasonable indication of the answer.
There's an easy solution, JP; we can warm the earth but not catastrophically, more likely beneficially. We can also easily destroy present civilization with misplaced fear and guilt.
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Omnologos I agree with you and of course you are correct, the dirty tricks that have originated from some of those names (I'm surprised they didn't get Gleick to lecture some ethics) cannot be forgiven or forgotten, if we're naive enough to enter into entente cordial with those people we deserve to lose the battle.
I agree with "Bloke down the pub" that Lewandowsky learnt from Friday evening and made sure the questions were filtered.
The Q&A was mostly from sceptics. People learnt that the "Cook et al. 97% scientific consensus" was on the most banal form of support for AGW, and it was from a broad range of academic disciplines. So the papers were not all authored by "scientists".
Did any sceptic questions get asked at all last night?
kim: yeah, the destruction comes from the opposite direction.
John Peter: In our get-together at Caroline K's Anthony Watts was at pains to distinguish between Sunday night and the BBC's notorious 28-gate meeting, in that he was going to post names of attendees and a photograph on the most viewed climate blog of all time less than two days later. This satisfies me that it was a completely different animal. Other people's mileage is bound to vary - otherwise we wouldn't be climate sceptics, would we? :)
My own view, as I've said already, is that we need to give space to people to change, especially in terms of challenging activists and politicos making claims about the science that are unfounded. Meetings under the Chatham House Rule are one way to give people that space. Not everyone will make radical changes but some I think will. Some will wait for others to take the lead and then will follow. Some will follow very late, then try to take credit for the new direction! Human nature won't finally be reformed in this age. But progress is possible and this seems to me the best way to achieve it.
Kevin: no sceptic questions at all. This is what goaded me to tap the person next to me on the shoulder, who was applauding Mann loudly, and ask if it bothered him that there were no questions from sceptics. He said no, it didn't. The questions from us on Friday had been very poor, he thought. Not a good start. But we still had a valuable discussion from there, as I recount elsewhere.
"My money would therefore be on the whole thing being a charade."
Then we have won. For when they know they perform a charade and try their hardest to pretend it is not, the biggest impact is on the morale of those who resort to such desperate measures.
I agree with Richard Drake. If you want to win the war, then you must allow people to come around guided by information and reason. If you want to win a battle but prolong the war, just try to score easy points. That does not mean taking the nonsense served up by Lewandowsky, Cook, Greg Laden et al lying down. Steyn's lawsuit, I hope, will do a lot to clear away the dross that stops full blown scientific debate, including Mann.
I have wondered if Mann's book and lecture travels are a precursor to an announcement 'The much respected Dr Mann is stepping down from active science to pursue his writing career and spend more time with his family'. Unless I've already missed the announcement that his employer has 'reluctantly' accepted his resignation.
JP +1 Unless, of course, behind closed doors, Nic, AW and all the others in the sceptic camp really fear that it is worse than we thought....
As Machiavelli said, if you must go to war, you must crush your enemy completely. Leave it half done, and you’ll have to fight it again a few years later. eg WWI & WWII, Gulf 1 & Gulf 2.
Probably not a fashionable view, but true nonetheless.
Pointman
Pointman -
I'm not a fan of the war metaphor. But even in that metaphor, one needn't/shouldn't destroy everything. Remove the destructive leaders, provide more productive goals for the majority.
Pointman: I happen to agree with you on the examples you give of real 20th century warfare. Ian Kershaw's The End shows how Nazi fanaticism led to utter destruction for Germany rather than a negotiated peace, as in any previous European war. They may have done all of us in Western Europe a favour. Likewise I was a supporter of Thatcher, not George HW Bush, in judging that once our troops were amassed in the Gulf we should forcibly remove Saddam and crush his forces. It may seem banal but cost was a key factor in this equation for me. I don't know for sure that such resolute action would have prevented the rise of Islamic State but I think it would. Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds would still have had their differences though.
But on the climate front it's not real warfare. What does it mean to 'leave it half done'? Leave Richard Betts with a salary at the Met Office continuing to develop those amazing General Circulation Models rather than closing the place down? Do we really have those kind of choices? Ike and Monty we're not.
Pointman
Gulf2 is now moving into Gulf3 as far as I can see.
There are many signs, including in the Climategate revelations, that Mann is not considered an asset in the academic climate establishment, but he may still be regarded as 'useful' for these folks in San Francisco holding a rally to mark the 'People's March' for climate: http://pjmedia.com/zombie/2014/09/23/climate-movement-drops-mask-admits-communist-agenda/ (hat-tip: WUWT).
Just take a look through those pictures, and weep at such sights in the 'land of the free'. This is a glimpse into the real drivers of climate alarm campaigning. Not dressed up by the 'sophisticates' of the Club of Rome. Not disguised by the 'pomp'[ousness] of the United Nations. You can see the appeal it has to 'community organisers' everywhere, including in and around the White House. This is what we are up against.
I really wanted to go to both this and the Cook event but Real Life prevented me in the end. It sounds like I didn't miss anything in terms of the presentations, but I really wanted to meet Anthony, the Bish etc. Perhaps another opportunity will arise...
'Before the lecture I also got to say hello to Leo Hickman '
Did he look at you as if has he wanted your head to exploded for holding ‘incorrect thoughts ‘ ?
Never let this promoter of the 10:10 splatter fest video forget his past.
Never? Do you apply that to anyone who once did something wrong? How does that work when applied to yourself? Do none of us ever get to move on from our past mistakes?
I forget Hickman's precise involvement four years ago but he didn't make the thing. Those that did are also, in my book, redeemable. Or we can opt for self-righteousness combined with complete lack of pragmatism. They will never change. They hold the levers of power. End of story. Stupid end of story.
Mann, went off the reservation years ago, having watched a few clips his body language and mood music does not inspire warmth, his arrogant manner leaves people cold and that's all he will receive in return. He has lost his faux air of invincibility, he no longer speaks to the green blob ex-cathedra - he is, even to the green loons - just a busted flush and a empty headed alarmist non entity.
Despite Barry O'Bummer and his clarion call, the world gives not a to88 about mm CO2 and the mythic idea of climate Armageddon.
In the foreseeable future, the only real battles to be fought are in Brussels and in the EU - specifically here in Britain - where Lord knows how, the green loons redoubt is holding up but only because the claque of eejits - LibLabia-CON party is still backing the alarmist propaganda..........
Though, in the forthcoming 2015 GE, the liberals will be obliterated, Miliband will be vanquished and Dave the green to88er will be out of a job, thus and GLORY BE!! the green mania will die the death. And only then we can start to reconstruct the ruination caused by headless chickens running energy policy and of 40 years diktat ex Brussels and tosspot sock puppetry of Green NGOs running/lobbying the EU.
Finally, beware of smiling assassins, many of these organizations and their apparats bear no love of humanity nor, can they ever be trusted.
Richard - I have met in my life enough splendid face-to-face people who later revealed themselves as scheming hypocritical quasi-insane, to be very, very skeptical of a smile's charm. Deeds not effete friendships are needed.
Sep 24, 2014 at 11:15 AM omnologos
A few times in my life I have met utterly charming people to be in whose company was simply delightful. Later, after observing them in operation, I concluded that they were psychopaths.
Sep 24, 2014 at 12:11 PM | Unregistered CommenterTim Spence
I agree. Betts always reminds me of the poor little child who is trying to come in from the cold to join the in crowd but doesn't have the life skills to do it.
I'm not very good at forgive and forget with people such as these. They know what they are doing and what they have done and have no regrets.
Richard Drake 'Those that did are also, in my book, redeemable. '
Leo acted has a willing enabler for them , they would never had made it in the first place , and remember is was not cheap job, if they had not known that it would get pushed in the national press for maximum coverage .The fact this blow up in their face does not change the actual intent behind it. While at CIF he was more than happy to play the school bully , like GM before him, to avoid having to answer difficulty questions and he still draws his pay-cheques for promoting at WWF the same mindless view on ‘the cause ‘ has the 10:10 team. Why call him a different type of leopard when his not even tried to change his spots ?
SandyS says:
I don't know about 2 or 3, Sandy, I'm more worried that it's closer to 1984.Richard Drake: Having enjoyed your comments immensely I have come to the conclusion that you are either a man of the cloth - or a Buddhist. My money is on the latter. :-)
I have no particular issue with most of the warmist characters, although some of them are definitely beyond the pale and outside of my list of people I'd like to know the sound of voice of.
As explained to Richard and others on Friday night, I do not feel comfortable with warmism in general because there is nothing beneath a through-and-through warmist. Whoever is truly convinced they are saving the planet or even the human race from utter destruction, cannot possibly have ethical qualms of any sort.
To save 7 billions, even 700 million dead can look justifiable.
The likes of Cook are (I hope) blissfully unaware of the true consequence of their militancy. They show slides the way Darwin Jr talked to scientific audiences about eugenics. We know how that ended - Adolf. They speak of a better future the way Engels realised that a better world would always be encumbered by past traditions. We know how that ended - Pol Pot.
And I am sure Darwin Jr was a caring, throughtful, honest man. Maybe Engels too :) - but there will be people who will try to pick up their seed of an idea and carry it to its logical consequences.
This is not a war. This is a siege against those who want to carry the light.
Interesting that the longest & most rhetorical "set-piece" question apparently came from Avaaz - the mysterious new climate movement that sprang from obscurity to organise the "Peoples Climate" marches.
I find Geoff's theory, on his blog - that Avaaz might be a CIA inspired operation quite convincing.
If this sounds like extreme Conspiracy Ideation (which of course has been diagnosed, in my case, by an eminent specialist) - read the Wikipedia page on Avaaz's founder Ricken Patel and come to your own conclusion.
This piece stood out for me:-
...he learnt how to bring rebel forces to the negotiation table, to monitor elections (covertly), to restore public faith in once corrupt political systems and to spot when foreign forces were being manipulated.” He returned to the US and volunteered for MoveOn.org, where he learned how to use online tools for activism.
Bear in mind too that we've seen previous instances of the Obama administration, the EU and the British Government all channelling resources into activist organisations - so that they can create the impression of public clamour for policies they want to adopt anyway.
Since Geoff posted, just before the climate marches, Obama has addressed the UN climate conference with the stirring words:-
Our citizens keep marching. We cannot pretend we do not hear them. We have to answer the call.
Hmmm
Did he pull off the AGU trick again?
re: amusing one-liners and some good comic
Anything new since this presentation?
"These is the possibility of real violence breaking out on the back of the demonisation of climate dissidents, in my view"
This has been my view for a long time. In fact, I'm surprised we haven't yet seen some pathetic John Hinckley type taking a potshot at a dastardly planet hater in order to win the heart of Angelina Jolie.