Bishop Hill The climatologist's privilege
Apr 22, 2015 BBC Climate: WG3 The BBC has infamously decided that climatologists should not be challenged on air. They are, in the corporation's considered view Science Personified; the very voice of truth. As if to emphasise the point, the Today programme this morning invited Sir Brian Hoskins on air to talk about climate change. Ostensibly this was to allow him to air his grievance that the election debate has largely eschewed consideration of the subject, but also gave him plenty of time to discuss his views on climate policy and what he sees as the need to prioritise climate over wealth creation. And all without a word of challenge from anyone.
The climatologist's privilege is creeping ever wider by the looks of it.
Audio below.
Bishop Hill
In Unthreaded, reader Harry Passfield notes that James Lovelock was invited onto Today last weekend to make the same point as Hoskins about the lack of climate change on the election agenda.
Reader Comments (74)
RR - you are thinking of Millikan's oil drop experiment. He wasn't incredibly wrong, but subsequent measurements were "adjusted" such that they didn't disagree too much, and slowly the real value was determined over time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_drop_experiment
Onbyaccident, since when have sceptics had access to models and/or data, to make anything up?
Hansen's projections on what was going to happen, were made up by Hansen
Mann's Hockey Stick was fabricated by Mann.
Since then climate modellers, and their models, have gone down hill. So has their accuracy and, reliability. It is only the costs that keep going up exponentionally, but that has been considered perfectly normal in climate science for about 30 years.
If you are living in a greenhouse, get out more, but do wrap up warm, as it may not be quite as warm, as you have been led to believe. If you live near the sea, you do not need a lifeboat. Trust me, I saw it about an hour ago, and it was in the same place. Yes, it does go up and down a bit, but that is perfectly normal. King Canute noted this even before the medieval period, and the warmth at that time, did not make a noteworty difference, apart from improved agriculture in places like Greenland. Unless of course the Vikings invented bio-degradable greenhouses.
The only people who need to panic about the lack of global warming, are the scientists, who have promised it. MacDonald's do not have that many vacancies.
steve ta if Hoskins is not sure where the world will be in 30 years, is he hoping to be nearer the sun, further away, or a straight swap with Venus or Mars?
Thanks, Steve ta.
Anyhoo… getting back to the first commenter: Gubulgaria, do you have answers for any of the questions I asked? If so, why do you not share them with us? Or do you just visit to make a drive-by pop at those with whom you disagree, and scarper, removing all risk of seeing alternative views?
steveta_uk
We've been in the last chance saloon a lot longer than 20 years! Steve Goddard regularly posts links to old and very old newspaper articles. Here is a sample.
1947 http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/2716276
1975 http://denisdutton.com/newsweek_coolingworld.pdf
1968 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=E4pUAAAAIBAJ&sjid=do8DAAAAIBAJ&pg=6676,7980610&hl=en
Right on Millikan though, people didn't think he could possibly have got it wrong. I think some of the data discarded by Millikan gave a value of the charge on the electron of one third of the value he eventually arrived at, This was one of the triggers for the theory of Quarks.
Tesco are hoping to rebuild credibility, by scrapping previous models, writing down assets and starting again. They have to rebuild trust though.
It seems that the scale of the falsified records and data was so large, that nobody knew the scale of the problem. Everybody was at it, purely to keep up, with everybody else's bonuses. Nobody will therefore be forced to take any responsibility. Everybody said that Nobody was upto something dodgy.
Likening climate science to Tesco's, would be unfair on Tesco's, who intend to make good on the lost and wasted money.
@BornbyAccident:
Non! The science has been defined by the policy. We are sick and tired of policy-based evidence. You don't need a degree in science to spot BS when you see it. Or idiot left-wing trolls who want to see the West reduced to Third-World status.Way back, the future was going to be carbon trading and renewables. The oil companies jumped into both, but carbon trading was too corrupt to thrive and they also withdrew from renewables. The future simply didn't happen on the imagined scale.
Global warming is no more important than any other tea/coffee/sugar/fat/meat is good/bad for you science story.,
BP shuts alternative energy HQ - 2009.
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2009/jun/28/bp-alternative-energy
Back on the original topic...
The BBC's attitude to climatologists today is the same as it's attitude to Anglican Bishops back in the 1950s.
They are experts in their own field. Their own field is more important and more moral than all others. Therefore they are not to be questioned, only revered.
This is just another example of how the new religion is being adopted by the metropolitan elites (who tend not to have studied science or theology).
13 Nov 2009 17:35 gubulgaria Grauniad
He then goes on to demand falsification criteria. There are plenty. If CO2 continues to increase, but the average global temperature drops over a twenty year period, that would be pretty conclusive. ....
So nearly there.
Martin A it would be unfair of sceptics to ask for justification for the falsification. Accusations of loaded questions seem to create some form of panic-swarm response.
What's new ? bbcToday provided a platform to a climate fundamentalist activist from a vested interest org (the Grantham institute funded by large Green Hedge Fund) and provided no proper challenging
Quel surprise ..the producers live in a fantasy universe we already know that
They publicised someone who has activist views, but keep a policy of banning anyone off who has contrary ones.
It breaks the BBC's charter as it is massive political bias (just before an election) , but the producers can't see that.
It's no different from airing only one side of any special interest eg. airing Scottish Independence activists and anti-abortionists but banning all unionist and pro-choice activists.
I can't find a transcript but they turned it into a news/propaganda story here here's the entire thing
"Climate change ignored by politicians, say experts
(scary frame setting power station photo)
A leading environmentalist has criticised the lack of attention given to climate change during the general election campaign.
James Lovelock told Radio 4's Today programme he was "shocked" at the lack of coverage so far.
His views were echoed by Professor Sir Brian Hoskins, who said there had been a "total lack" of vision on the issue.
Prof Hoskins said tackling climate change would be "key" to ensuring prosperity in the future.
Mr Lovelock, the creator of Gaia theory, told Today: "I'm shocked because it is a key thing that they should be talking about. In a way we are fiddling while Rome burns and we certainly could be looking at a lot of suffering and a lot of unpleasantness."
He said former Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, as a scientist, was the one politician who "fully understood the issue".
"She understood very well and got us thinking the right way", he said. "But there has been no politician since that has been able to do that."
Prof Hoskins, director of the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College London, said politicians had failed to adopt a long-term approach.
He told Today: "It seems that when we get to the discussions it all goes down to the lowest level of what's going to make someone happy for next five minutes and the politicians seem to think that's going to buy their votes."
The main political parties have failed to set out distinct visions on the issue, he added.
(wrong paraphrasing as he said "I think there are a lot of people out there who really want to say 'where are we going ?, where is that vision' ")
"I can't say that I can see any big difference in the statements they have been making just recently," he said.
"This is an incredibly important year for the world, setting the framework for where the world is going in the next 30 years. And yet we don't hear that."
( note how the article/presenter just said thankyou instead of challenging that final statement)
- It seems like an Earth Day party political broadcast, rather than proper journalism.
as others have pointed out , it is a a bit much for Hoskins/BBC to ban half the world from the airwaves and then complain "we don't hear enough about climate !"
- "Level of debate is like arguing who's buying the drinks on the Titanic" - exactly but it's the activists who are doing that whilst the skeptics are the ones looking at the big picture.
PS Twitter shows the public weren't interested in Hoskins point
He got 20 cheer leader tweets from media activists and that was it
as Bish tweeted
"Why does @BBCr4today keep inviting greens to gripe about election campaign ignoring climate?
Whose agenda? "
"Notional Pub Radio
Good old reliable #BBC @BBCr4today ... Giving plenty airtime to a climate change loony, but with absolutely no opposing view. #journalism?"
direct link- Lovelock's recorded interview
The news article was selectively edited : It doesn't contain anything about 'that models don't work' nor the the phrase "We shouldn't be wasting money on things like renewable energy, we should be preparing to adapt ..find out more about it and then adapt "
"But the science is a major input to the policy. Non?"
Non. Unless you believe that models can forecast the future state of the climate, the science has nothing to do with it. In fact if you read AR5 WG1 (not the SPM written by politicians and NGO activists) it is all a bit flat in scary terms.
So let me explain it to vous (not tu, I'm using the plural as "tu" used "nous" in a post) again.
The science says that CO2 will warm the atmosphere.
The sceptics say yes, but how much?
The paleoantology records say by not very much.
The sceptics say but what are the consequences of the temperature rising.
The scientists say there will be catastrophic sea rises, droughts and the world will become warmer and wetter on average with more droughts where it now dry and more rain where it is now rainy.
Then we have four freezing cold winters in the Northern Hemisphere.
The scientists say "this is what global warming looks like".
So you're either a scientist or pretending to be a scientist could you answer a few questions for me it may convert me to the cause (as you scientists call it in private).
1. According to AR5 humans are responsible for around 0.3C of the 0.85C rise in temperature since 1880. What caused the other 0.55C? (no "natural variations" arm waving please, just exact scientific reasons and data).
2. The CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by 120ppm since around 1800 what proportion of that increase has been caused by humans? (no "natural variations" arm waving please, just exact scientific reasons and data).
3. The glaciers have been retreating since 1800, what caused them to begin to retreat then? (no "natural variations" arm waving please, just exact scientific reasons and data).
4. Sea levels have been rising throughout the Holocene why didn't they stop when the world reached the perfect balance of 280ppm CO2 in the atmosphere.(no "natural variations" arm waving please, just exact scientific reasons and data).
5. If the earth reaches an average temperature 3C above today's average how long will it take the Antarctic (average temperature between -30C and -40C) and the Greenland ice sheets to melt sufficiently to cause a sea level rise of 2 metres. (no "natural variations" arm waving please, just exact scientific reasons and data).
I've a few more unexplained observations but I'll leave it there.
Finally, Sir Bob Hoskins works for the Grantham Institute (as does the very likeable Bob Ward) his boss is ultimately Jeremy Grantham an enthusiastic environmentalist. If the science of those doubting the calamitous forecasts is tainted if they take money from British Gas, why isn't Dr. Hoskins' science tainted by his association with an environmentalist?
geronimo
You're not actually expecting an answer to any of those questions, I take it! ☺
Though it would be nice.
Mike, one iives in espere as they say round your parts. I hope you noticed my excellent command of French! I have struggled with it for years, I went into a local pharmacy in Cognac and asked the pharmacist in perfectly pronounced and articulated French whether he had the alcohol test packs in yet. He responded to me in French, I stared blankly at him,and turned t my wife and said, "What did he say?" she gave me a look and replied, "He said your French has improved."
I love this "we" scientists stuff we get from Ken Khao and the other wannabes.
As far as I can see Hoskins is little more than a shill for Grantham, and took part in the (successful) ruse to persuade the politicians that the Royal Society had picked the CRU papers to be studied for bias/scientific malpractice, when it was, of course, the UEA that picked them.
Bishop Hill:
"OBA
The whole point of the post is that the chat was not about science, it was about policy! Climatologists have no special privileges in the policy arena."
If religious beliefs hold privileges in this country, including in the policy arena, I'm less than concerned about a few climatologists!
'Consensus enforcement', sums it up.
According to Gulliblegaria at the top, being sceptical about inherently biased government-funded climate 'science', disqualifies a person from commenting on what if any climate policies should be adopted.
Only those who are gullible enough to believe it - or dishonest enough to SAY they do - are allowed to comment, on the BBC or elsewhere.
OBA says to me
"...you are not defending traditional science! You are quite frankly at war with it as it is pointing policy in directions that you cannot tolerate"
We are not at war with the science since the real science is screaming that nothing much is happening;
no ocean warming down to 700m since accurate records began,
no global warming for 18 years,
Antarctica cooling instead of warming,
no tropi trop hotspot,
no stratospheric cooling since 1995,
models do not match the data because the model input declared natural variation to be in decline.
We already did the experiment and the hypothesis was disproven! CO2 is not a driver of global temperature - it is a minor feedback at most. there is nothing anywhere that indicates the hypothesis is even mildly correct.
Given these missing fingerprints, if this was really about the science it would have been settled long ago!
The real issue is with too many academics giving an opinion based on no more than pessimistic gut feeling, circular arguments, inadequate models and zero actual science. Witness Hoskins admitting there is no link between wild weather and CO2 in Britain - of course there isn't because it depends on the jetstream and he was reminded that the IPCC had said no events anywhere could be linked to warming, which in any event has been missing for 18 years - but nevertheless he feels the need to say we need to be suspicious anyway. You call this science? It seems to rational people that while scientists are still being paid to find this bogeyman they won't give up on it just yet.
As for the policy, none of us can tolerate it because the cure is worse than the putative disease. It's time you woke up and realised that!
And as said above, when the models go one way and reality goes another a traditional scientist should admit the paradigm needs looking at again. He would not declare that the models are still correct regardless! Post-modern science seems to be to just keep denying the truth that nature has made fools of you because nobody in media or politics really seems to care.
M Courtney
I was simply making the point that AGW is no longer a major political/ electoral issue and hasn't been for at least five years.
Geronimo
Mrs J relates totally to your wife's experience! My excuse is that I am functionally deaf in one ear and that most of my neighbours mutter. The exception is a lady who befriended us very soon after we arrived and speaks to me as if I were a five-year-old. Her I understand. But I also am improving, I'm told.
Meanwhile back on topic ...
Just before we leave French-
Some years ago we had a French market visiting the area, selling cheese, olives, real French bread etc, and real French people serving. I thought I'd try out my French and mustering the best accent I could I pointed at some cheese and said "Deux-cents cinquante grammes, s'il vous plait."
To which the girl serving replied: " It's no good saying that to me, I'm from Auchterarder"
esmiff, no offense was meant to you personally. You just happened to precede me directly.
My "Back on the original topic..." was aimed at everybody who had missed that the topic was the BBC breaking their charter.