Tuesday
Oct122010
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Cowrin', timorous beasties
Oct 12, 2010 Climate: WG2 Climate: WG3 Greens Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie, O, what a panic's in thy breastie.
Big, bad Pielke Jnr is in town next month and has invited the Grantham Institute to debate some current global warming issues with him.
Unfortunately, the academic staff are apparently unavailable.
For the full ten days of Roger's visit.
You have to laugh...
Reader Comments (29)
I guess he could try the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College. They are more scientific and less political than at LSE.
Was none who would be foremost
To lead such dire attack:
But those behind cried ‘Forward!’
And those before cried ‘Back!'
Even Bob Ward is unavailable?
I'd understood that the debate is over, meant that the science was irrefutable.
Turns out that it actually stands for, don't debate.
Seems like good advice to me. Better, that we think them fools, than they prove it by opening their mouths. Maybe James Cameron would send an avatar, if Bob asks nicely.
What a bunch of intellectually challenged yellow bellies!
Reminds me of the joke about the redcoat army marching through a lonely Scottish glen when a kilted Highlander shouts abuse at them from the hillside.
I'll let you fill in the middle bits but the punchline is delivered by a battered and bloody soldier.
"Run for your lives. It's a trap. There's two of them!"
Re Messenger
There's a caveat from Pielke Jnr
(And it does indeed have to be a faculty member. I have debated Mr. Ward before and, not surprisingly, he was unprepared to actually debate. So I won't repeat that experience again.)
Which could backfire if Ward spins it as Pielke Jnr refusing to debate the Great Bob. But there's cartoon potential. Bob guarding the LSE bunker, wee tim'rous beasties cowering inside asking if it's safe to come out, has that nasty professor gone yet? etc etc
Hey! Cut them some slack: they are busy SAVING THE PLANET, for God's sake! If they were to stop and debate with EVERYONE that disagreed with them, well, then where would we all be? Going to hell in a handcart, that's where. These people are important with schedules an'all. Why can't you see that?
;-)
I was at a talk once given by a not-particularly-bright academic who as part of his talk claimed that he often spoke at debates, and could never find a 'denier' to take part. I very publicly stood up and volunteered to take part in any debate he wished, on his terms. Never got back to me. Funny that.
How could there be debate about a question that doesn't exist?
The only question that remains is exactly how fast we are all going to hell in a handcart and how many angels can dance upon the head of the carter's tiepin.
Its reminiscent of that silly man who had the mad idea that the Earth went round the Sun, when everyone knew - and the clever people had read the sacred texts as well - that this was impossible. Who ever heard of him again?....faded into a well-earned obscurity I'll bet. Just shows what happens when you don't follow the established scientific consensus. Never gets you anywhere.
... especially as WUWT lists Pielke Jr. amongst the "luke-warmers"! What are they afraid of?
Bob ward sounds like an ideal candidate for the "ALL MOUTH AND NO TROUSERS" award.
I hereby propose the gentleman, any seconders?
Oct 12, 2010 at 5:26 PM | Dreadnought
O/T When we were children my mother would recite poetry to us instead of reading stories, "How Horatius Kept The Bridge" by Lord Macaulay was one of my favourites.
Thanks for bringing back happy memories from 50 years ago (when it was colder than now).
Second pesadia's motion:)
Isn't this known as 'having a subsequent engagement'?
We should make a note of those ten days and find out where and what those people who were capable of carrying the mantle for Bob Ward etc. Were doing and saying.
Yes, that's the thing that strikes me; Pielke Jr is hardly an "evil denier" by any stretch of the imagination. If they're unwilling to even debate moderates it strongly supports the idea that they know full well that they haven't got an intellectual case to argue.
it is worth reading the whole poem and note; "the best laid schemes of mice and men gang aft a-gley
(end up in the mire) and lea'e us nought but grief and pain for promised joy"
Atomic Hairdryer
Thanks, I didn't read it carefully enough.
Well done Roger keep the pressure on !
Reminds me of this ... from Monty Python
"Brave sir Robin runs away..."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4SJ0xR2_bQ
A LONG article about an interview with Bob Ward, and what he gets upto at Jo Nova:
http://joannenova.com.au/2010/10/robin-williams-shreds-the-tenets-of-science/
Here are our tax dollars being for a character assassination (or three).
Bob Ward
The interview with Robert Ward is one long attack on anyone who speaks against the word of the paid-fraternity-of-climate-scientists. It’s known as Argument from Authority. It is apparently the core philosophy of how Williams reasons — by following the head sheep. Williams is so enamored with this fallacy, he thought a stone age remark by Schneider (below) was worth using – not just once on his program but twice, as if one call to the Pagan leaders of science wasn’t enough.
The language is vehement: Plimer is “Demonstrably false” and there’s “No room for a mistake”? No, no room at all if you ignore 4.3 million underwater volcanoes. Ward has a geology degree, how could he not realize we only monitor a few volcanoes on land (about 700 to get his USGS statistic), and those don’t produce much CO2 while the underwater variety do?
Ward practically calls Plimer a liar: “it amazes me that they believe that they can make these statements that can be shown to be false and yet continue to argue.” Yet it is Ward who promotes the falsities, and Williams who provides the uninterrupted megaphone.
Williams lets Ward get away with outrageous speculative smears: Ward claims Professor Bob Carter wrote one of the worst papers in Scientific History, why? Carter’s unforgiveable sin was to misreference a John Houghton quote.
It includes a quote in there that John Houghton has never said, he’s never written and never said, yet it is in this paper by Carter. So that was wrong
Williams knew, but chose not to point out that Houghton had said effectively the same line in a different publication. The details were, after all, in Carters response. Instead of saying: “unless we announce disasters, no one will listen” Houghton had said: ““If we want a good environmental policy in the future we’ll have to have a disaster””. What’s the difference?
From man to mouse in very short order....
http://www.cartoonsbyjosh.com/pielke-effect_scr.jpg
News just in. There are unconfirmed rumours that the Grantham Institute may be temporarily relocating for the duration of Professor Pielke Jnrs visit to London.
http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/5751/bunkerbob.jpg
My guess is that they are on a speed typing retreat (or learning how to cut-and-paste more effectively).
Perhaps Roger Jr. could take a trip to Grantham, Lincs and see if they are hiding there? Or would that be too obvious even for them?
O/T
Maybe BH's invite to the BBC has something to do with this.
BBC told to ensure balance on climate change
The problem is not the Grantham Institute, nor may I say Bob Ward, but with Pielke Jnr and the notion of academic respect.
We know GI is an alarmist organisation, we know full well too that Ward is just a GI paid knuckle-dragger. Pielke Jnr is upset because feels GI are being disrepectful. That can only be if Pielke Jnr holds a high opinion of GI and requires himself some acknowledgement from this organisation that he exists academically. More fool him.
Bob from Planet Ward responds: http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2010/10/grantham-institute-responds.html
Ah, so the Grantham Institution of Paraclimatology is heading en mass to Cancun for group therapy, and can't spare anyone to engage in debate. Nice work if you can get it (funded) I suppose.
Thanks Richard,
That really is an ungracious and snidy reply. Of course it is what we expect from FGS Bob Ward.
That is just being gratuitously unpleasant. Making an enemy just for the hell of it. He enjoyed that email you can tell. Even now he is probably congratulating himself on how clever it is. Maybe one day it will come back at him. Another rule of PR do not make unnecessary enemies. Do not make it personal.
In my world, if I was his boss...
From the comments on the original blog post:
"But who could predict it was staffed solely by invertebrates?"
LOL