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« More laughs from the Cabot Institute | Main | Great Evans above »
Monday
Sep282015

Wadhams fails

Peter Wadhams is something of a favourite at BH, his researches into the paranormal, his physics-free sea-ice predictions and his concerns about assassination having provided readers with much entertainment over the years. The last of these claims led to an official complaint to the Press Regulator, but it seems that Prof Wadhams' complaint has been no more successful than his doom-laden predictions about the Arctic (£).

A Cambridge professor who claimed that assassins may have murdered three British scientists investigating the impact of global warming has had a complaint against The Times dismissed by the press regulator.

Prof Wadhams is an advisor to Pope Francis.

 

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Reader Comments (54)

He's a Cambridge professor?????? Incredible!!!!

It seems the Pope takes advice from a bunch of loonies ... which makes Catholics like myself feel pretty pissed off about the Pope and his Vatican stooges with the exception of Australia's super intelligent Cardinal... Cardinal George Pell, brought in to the Vatican to sort out the mess with the Vatican's finances, and who is a climate realist and believer in natural climate variability.

Sep 29, 2015 at 9:03 AM | Unregistered CommenterMervyn

Brandon "There's an active segment there which doesn't even accept global warming is real."

Too true, and there's a segment, a big segment of the consensus public that think equally weird stuff. The BBC and the Guardian have published it. The difference is the consensus side has had trillions in funding, had years with almost no opposition and certainly in the UK, had almost universal support from government and the media. How can Brits still be so ignorant of the facts about climate?

I'm not stupid and I've been paying attention but I don't know where the facts stop and the speculation starts. I don’t know how much trust to put in the science because certain parts of it have been clearly mismanaged. When that mismanagement has been pointed out, instead of heartfelt apologies, I’ve seen dismissive aggression. I see exactly the same pattern that businesses got up to before society decided they needed regulating.

Anthony Watts, Andrew Montford and Steve McIntyre all started very reasonably. They asked sensible questions and were shot down or ignored or worse, accused of infamy. Is it any wonder that after a decade or so they are less inclined to play totally fair? Watts in particular hasn’t the time to weed out every nutter who posts at his site. He tries to curb the worst and frankly that’s top quality for the internet. ATTP does no better and some of the less known proponent site are vile. But the reason Watts et al now have some leverage is because of the number of people who support them. Newspapers start noticing. Influential people take what they need and use it.

If you want a calm discussion about what sceptics really need to see, then have that discussion with Watts, Montford and McIntyre. Ask the Bish to have a heavily moderated post. Don’t expect the rabble to be nice or even particularly sensible. They all have their own grievances and frustrations.

Sep 29, 2015 at 11:49 AM | Unregistered CommenterTinyCO2

TinyCO2:

Anthony Watts, Andrew Montford and Steve McIntyre all started very reasonably. They asked sensible questions and were shot down or ignored or worse, accused of infamy. Is it any wonder that after a decade or so they are less inclined to play totally fair? Watts in particular hasn’t the time to weed out every nutter who posts at his site. He tries to curb the worst and frankly that’s top quality for the internet.

Um... what? I wasn't referring to comments on his site. I was talking about head posts. He's literally run head posts which not only say the greenhouse effect isn't real, but claim to prove it isn't. This year.

If I were going to complain about his commenters, I'd talk about how some of them seem to feel it's okay to call for climate scientists to be murdered. I've seen multiple comments calling for that, including one just a few hours ago. But those are comments, and I'm more generous when it comes to those. Even if it is disturbing that a guy just said he'd be willing to murder people on that site. You know, because, that's creepy as ****.

If you want a calm discussion about what sceptics really need to see, then have that discussion with Watts, Montford and McIntyre. Ask the Bish to have a heavily moderated post. Don’t expect the rabble to be nice or even particularly sensible. They all have their own grievances and frustrations.

I've tried to have calm discussions with Anthony Watts before. It doesn't work. We got along fine until the first time I disagreed with him, and then, despite the disagreement being on a relatively minor issue, he flipped out and became ridiculously hostile. It only got worse when I said it was wrong of him to accuse the people at the NOAA of committing fraud. There, he got so unreasonable he actually denied having accused them of it, even pointing to the letter where he did so as though it proved he didn't.

I won't go any further with that topic save to say my experience is people on this "side" are every bit as tribalistic as the other. Calm discussions are possible, as long as I'm not disagreeing with them or people they like. And if you don't believe it, ask yourself why Richard Tol is embraced by the skeptic community. I can tell you, it's not because he embodies the ideals of skepticism.

(And before anyone says, no, that's not me holding a grudge. It's just me pointing out a perfect example of "skeptics" refusing to actually hold the ideals they claim to hold.)

Sep 30, 2015 at 2:27 PM | Registered CommenterBrandon Shollenberger

Brandon Shollenberger, they're tired. They're almost certainly getting it in the neck from their families and friends. running at cross purposes to the tide has no reward. Even if AGW was proved 100% false tomorrow, those in placed of power would still hold a grudge and Watts etc would still be on the outside.

Personally I don't read any of the articles by a certain set of regulars at WUWT but then I can't be bothered to run my own blog either.

Sep 30, 2015 at 3:55 PM | Unregistered CommenterTinyCO2

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