Watts Up With That?

Of course the alarmists folks will denounce this as they did the last one, and there are bound to be a few unscrupulous types, such M.J. Murphy of Toronto who blogs as Big City Lib, who by his own admission, made false statements to get “weaseled onto the list” (his words). There are others who will do their best to crash the list so they can claim it is a sham, but there is one name on this list worth noting:

Freeman Dyson is one of the world’s most eminent physicists. You can read an essay about his views on climate change, posted here on WUWT a on 11/05/2007.

You can read all about the Oregon Petition Project here at the Financial Post.

I did not sign on to the Oregon list, but rather chose to add my name to the Manhattan Declaration this spring. I also signed the very first petition of this type, back in 1997 called the Leipzig Declaration.

If you want to add your name to the either the Manhattan Declaration or the OISM petition, you can still do so. Here are the links:

Manhattan Declaration via an an interactive PDF of the declaration, which includes a form ready for completing and submitting.

Oregon Petition Project via a mail in PDF form.

It will be interesting to see how the MSM and alarmist bloggers spin this one. I’m sure they’ll do their best to minimize it as being “irrelevant”. I believe at some point though, there will be recognition.

Nature of course will be the final arbiter of truth, such as what we see here in global temperatures from satellite and surface since 2002.

Graph from Joe D’Aleo at ICECAP – click for larger image

UPDATE: 5/21/08

Honor system abuser, BigCityLib, aka Michael J. Murphy of Toronto reports that he in fact did NOT make the list. By his own admission he lied about his background and falsified documents to try to have his name added, but apparently the petition screening process found his deception and denied his application.  But he says he’ll keep trying and encourages others to lie and falsify documents such as he has.

On an unrelated note, I orginally had 32,000 in the title because that is how the original email sent to me (third party, not OISM) had it. Upon further inspection I note the number is closer to 31,000 so I’ve edited the title to reflect that.

From the “we told you so” department:

Study says global warming not worsening hurricanes

WASHINGTON (AP) — Global warming isn’t to blame for the recent jump in hurricanes in the Atlantic, concludes a study by a prominent federal scientist whose position has shifted on the subject.

Not only that, warmer temperatures will actually reduce the number of hurricanes in the Atlantic and those making landfall, research meteorologist Tom Knutson reported in a study released Sunday.

In the past, Knutson has raised concerns about the effects of climate change on storms. His new paper has the potential to heat up a simmering debate among meteorologists about current and future effects of global warming in the Atlantic.

Ever since Hurricane Katrina in 2005, hurricanes have often been seen as a symbol of global warming’s wrath. Many climate change experts have tied the rise of hurricanes in recent years to global warming and hotter waters that fuel them.

Another group of experts, those who study hurricanes and who are more often skeptical about global warming, say there is no link. They attribute the recent increase to a natural multi-decade cycle.

What makes this study different is Knutson, a meteorologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s fluid dynamics lab in Princeton, N.J.

He has warned about the harmful effects of climate change and has even complained in the past about being censored by the Bush administration on past studies on the dangers of global warming.

He said his new study, based on a computer model, argues “against the notion that we’ve already seen a really dramatic increase in Atlantic hurricane activity resulting from greenhouse warming.”

The study, published online Sunday in the journal Nature Geoscience, predicts that by the end of the century the number of hurricanes in the Atlantic will fall by 18 percent.

The complete story is here.

This echoes what I reported on April 11th 2008 about Emanuel’s findings as well as what I reported on February 21st 2008 from Roger Pielke Jr. and Chris Landsea at the National Hurricane Center.

Three prominent researchers agree, two have reversed positions. This I think it is safe to declare the “Increased hurricanes to global warming link” as DEAD.

So two questions remain:

1) Will Al Gore issue a retraction or correction to his movie and claims of a GW to hurricane link?

2) Will the American Meteorological Society abandon their draft policy statement which links Hurricane Katrina and climate?

It would be irresponsible for either Gore or AMS not to acknowledge this sea change in the realization that there is no linkage between global warming and increased hurricane frequency.

Dr. Bill Gray must be a happy man today.