Wandering the climate desert in exile

A known, but sad fact.
Even so, it’s good that someone with courage and honesty can lay out the facts for the public to see.
There should be MORE of these pieces put forward.

I wrote the following e-mail to the head of the scientific body Nova quotes:
Dear Dr. Derocher,
I am an author at work on my second book on climate. I have read conflicting accounts of polar bear population changes in the last 50 years.
By and large, my understanding is the following:
Polar bear populations crashed, principally due to over-hunting, in the 1960s and early 1970s, by the end of which the global population had dwindled to something on the order of 5,000 bears.
Since that time strenuous efforts to reduce hunting and poaching have led to a five-fold increase in bear numbers.
If it is easy to set me straight about any of this, please do so!
Sincerely yours,
Harold Ambler
———————————————–
If/when the good doctor replies, I will make his thoughts known.

I will be attending a science conference in October at which will be a workshop on marine mammals and a melting Arctic. A decade ago I raised the notion that the global warming scare was exaggerated when placed in the context of history and was ridiculed. The issue is that during the Medieval Warm Period, the Arctic was probably near ice free for much of the summers. Where did the pagophilic mammals go? The worst case scenarios for warming and melting over the next 30-100 years still leaves the Arctic cooler than was reached at the climatic optimum of the MWP. The poster I’m presenting will graphically show the current era sea ice maximum, current era sea ice minimum, decadal sea ice maximum, and decadal sea ice minimum to show that it’s just not all that hot in the Arctic these days. I’m bracing for a tough time.

This is a deplorable situation.
But I am seeing more papers written where the basic data provided and the analysis written in the bulk of the paper is presenting a non-AGW point of view (but the abstract and the media spin is still written in a pro-AGW stance).
I’m assuming it is scientists trying to remain objective and maintain their reputations in the long-term while still getting invited to all the great global warming parties in the short-term. It seems to work right now in the current environment. Skip the abstracts, go to the paper and the data.

I read Joanna Nova’s article and it confirmed my belief that eventually this fight is not going to be won by arguing the science. In one of Christopher Booker’s recent Telegraph pieces a commenter, asked to provide evidence that man’s contribution to global warming was “not negligible”, replied:
“1. Mankind’s contribution to atmospheric CO2 has caused its concentration to rise by 38% since 1750.
2. Doubling of CO2 concentration causes (after several decades) a rise in global average temperatures of about 3C. ”
This was in spite of a series of postings which had effectively already repudiated both those arguments. Keep repeating the same old rubbish and with any luck the opposition will get fed up with beating its collective head on a brick wall and go off and do something more interesting (like watching paint dry, perhaps).
Like Stephen Wilde I have no qualification in climatology and in that I seem to be in the same boat as most of those who consider themselves qualified to pronounce on the subject including, it would appear, those who consider themselves expert on the subject of polar bears.
Meanwhile one of those who has actually gone out and got his hands dirty in the cause of polar bear research is sidelined and one is forced to ask:
What is the Polar Bear Specialist Group and what does it do?
Why does it have to have an angle on climate change?
Why (and this is the killer) is Dr Derocher so sold on the climate change scam that he cannot bring himself to say, “hey! if Mitch thinks it’s a bummer then maybe I’d better think again.”? Is that not what scientists do, or am I missing something?

Sure. Remember Stanley B. Goldenberg.
“It is a blatant lie put forth in the media that makes it seem there is only a fringe of scientists who don’t buy into anthropogenic global warming.”
How many scientists subscribe to anthropogenic global warming point of view? We all know that “the best” climate scientists have this point of view; however, I am curious to know what exactly makes these climate scientists so brilliant? What did they discover? What is their contribution to the scientific understanding of the world we live in?
I would rather say that there is the there is only a fringe of scientists who buy into anthropogenic global warming hypothesis. We all know the viewpoint of Freeman Dyson and Ivar Giaever – but most great minds are silent exactly for the reasons explained by Joanna Nova.
Anthropogenic global warming consensus is surely an illusion.

Hang on. A polar bear expert retires. No shock there, people retire all the time, like taxes and death, it’s a good deal more than likely to happen eventually…
When I retire do I think I’ll carry on just as I did before I retired? No. Why? Because I’ll have retired…
But, somehow, this chap (this polar bear expert) retiring becomes an example of some conspiracy to silence AGW sceptics??? Nope, sorry, that makes not an iota of sense.
Besides, this is all old news from months back, old news dusted off, re spun and handed down to a clearly willing audience in a new and more ‘I don’t believe it!’ form. Is it all there is?

So,what Derocher is saying is,Man-made climate change is the dominant religion, IT SUITS OUR AGENDA ;anybody intending to rock the boat must disembark.
Verily,I have the holy scriptures,the one true word that is the Summary For Policymakers and ye are the infidel.

“retirement” is it?
Peter Hearnden please read this letter sent to Mitchell Taylor:
Hi Mitch,
The world is a political place and for polar bears, more so now than ever before. I have no problem with dissenting views as long as they are supportable by logic, scientific reasoning, and the literature.
I do believe, as do many PBSG members, that for the sake of polar bear conservation, views that run counter to human induced climate change are extremely unhelpful. In this vein, your positions and statements in the Manhattan Declaration, the Frontier Institute, and the Science and Public Policy Institute are inconsistent with positions taken by the PBSG.
I too was not surprised by the members not endorsing an invitation. Nothing I heard had to do with your science on harvesting or your research on polar bears – it was the positions you’ve taken on global warming that brought opposition. Time will tell who is correct but the scientific literature is not on the side of those arguing against human induced climate change.
I look forward to having someone else chair the PBSG.
Best regards,
Andy (Derocher)

“So let it be written.” 🙂

Bravo Joanna Nova for a very comprehensive essay but “Exile for the Non-Believers” smacks of defeatism. What is required from the gallant minority that frequent this forum is a more positive attitude with more positive articles and slogans such as Steve Jobs’ Think Different that stole a march on Microsoft and took Apple and the ipod to number one in the world in digital music converting millions to believe in its product.
If science is on your side all you need is a sales department to demonstrate it.
http://iphonepartyzone.com/FilesUploaded/SimpleImageGalleryFiles/38/img_569.jpg

The AGW /CC issue really does separate the wheat from the chaff, and the men from the boys. It takes great courage, principle, conviction, and chutzpah to speak the truth, no matter the consequences.
Those who are simply riding along on the coattails of AGW ideology, simply because it is safe, convenient, and lucrative to do so will eventually pay the price, in one way or another.

And I’d add that I detect pushback by politicians and others who see how dangerous and corrosive of democracy allowing the United Nations to impose mandates on democratic governments is.
And therein lies the solution. Make politicians represent the people who elected them and vote them out if the don’t.
While exposing and debunking the false and misleading claims made in the name of climate science is fun, it’s a sideshow to resisting AGW in the political arena.

You can contact Dr Andy Derocher at
derocher [ at ] ualberta.ca
I feel sure that Dr Derocher has a more reasonable explanation for this story. Surely this kind of bullying must be completely untrue. I thought the days of bullying & censorship of scientists (like they did to Galileo) were over?

@Michael T (15:48:55)
Peter Hearden wrote: what’s so special of a retiring polar bear expert?
The facts that he did not retire but was forbidden to speak.

“As others have noted AGW is a socio-political phenomena. But we shouldn’t forget that the AGW phenomena was engineered by the United Nations.” Philip_B
Wait! Are you the Philip that tried to get me banned for my economic “insights”?
And I just though you were a narrowly focused scientist.
Now you seem more like a hyprocrite as you sound off with your pseudo-science sociology. Perhaps jealous too?

Back2Bat (16:21:35) :
Wait! Scientists can be bought or intimidated? Then they shouldn’t be worshiped as gods?
“Then what can I believe in?”
Back2back,
You can’t.
The only thing you can do is to ask questions and be skeptical, especially in regard to your Government.
Skeptic minds provide the safeguard for any society.
They are the “canaries in the coal mine” so to say.
If skeptics encounter massive opposition by a consensus (any consensus for that matter) and people get fired or attacked because they have opposing views, we know something is seriously wrong.
Therefore Skeptics (those who question) are the safeguards of freedom.
If they are silenced, freedom is silenced.

Frustrating that we have this being the situation. It also explains why a lot of academics and government researchers wait till they retire before “rocking the boat”; they no longer have to chant the mantra of AGW (or silently let others do so) for fear of maintaining the income they need to maintain a home and family. The concept of extortion comes immediately to mind. This is also probably a reason we no longer hear many voices of reason who USED TO speak out. It appears that many of what used to be our stalwart academic institutions have determined their quest is more for government and grants and other funding, and increasingly LITTLE attention is to be paid to what was once called “integrity.”
Incidentally, the National Academies Press has a video up on their website regarding the 3rd Edition of their book: “On Being a Scientist; a guide to responsible conduct in research.” Odd coincidence, also, that there is an article on page 29 of Popular Science, October 2009 on the issue of scientific data falsification, fabrication and modification. It reports that up to one third of some 11,000 scientists surveyed (anonymously, I assume) admitted to such things as failing to publish data that contradicted earlier findings.
I fear a day coming soon when the public no longer trusts scientists, at all.
Eugene Langschwager
Executive Director, Climate Science Coalition of America
http://www.climatescienceamerica.org

Sethi? Sethi who? Science is NOT, and never has been, for the weak and faint of heart. When a “scien-tester” buys into the BS of his contemporaries without expending a single erg of mental energy, he/she has already retired, compromised their integrity, etc, etc, ad nausea. Who would have thunk that a dumb, little, late 19th Century patent clerk would have amounted to anything in the 20th Century? Who would have imagined that some newborn kid floating on a tar covered reed basket would have survived and been remembered through the ages more so than all the rulers of the Upper and Lower Nile. For the patent clerks, or students, or PhD’s, who happen to come upon this material: If you do nothing else in your short little life, at least have the guts to stand on your own hind legs; success is not measured in dollars, yen, euros, rubbles, or the praise of idiots who kiss the hands and backsides of politicians, publishers, contemporaries.

Prior post appears to be MIA? Feedback on what I do next? Thanks. 🙂

Sometimes when the plane is going down it’s better to bail out.After this winter
I feel the AGW Ford Trimotor is going to leave a smoking hole in the desert..
-Or tundra,as it will…

There are some comments worth paying attention to in this thread. Specifically those to do with the societal aspects and consequences thereof. In some ways this entire subject of climate change is merely a skirmish in the never-ending battle for cultural/social supremacy. Merely carried on with new terms and technology. A mix of science and magic, not terribly different than that practiced by Himmler and company, or their various predecessors. And with the same predictable outcome.

“For the patent clerks, or students, or PhD’s, who happen to come upon this material: If you do nothing else in your short little life, at least have the guts to stand on your own hind legs; success is not measured in dollars, yen, euros, rubbles, or the praise of idiots who kiss the hands and backsides of politicians, publishers, contemporaries.” Pascvaks
Amen, amen, amen!
Besides, you probably will still eat and have a roof over your head. Any scientist who needs much more is not worth the brain God gave him, IMO.
Ah, but you need your precious and expensive equipment? Then fight big government! Then there will be enough PRIVATE resources to fund you!

Here is from an excellent paper published by a promising young Canadian scientist…
“This research was supported by grants from the
Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric
Sciences (CFCAS), the Natural Sciences and
Engineering Research Council (NSERC) and
Environment Canada.”
Indeed the CFCAS message is clear:
http://www.cfcas.org/Videos/PolesInPeril.html
So is the CMOS bias astoundingly likely based on Mann’s discredited hockey Stick 1,000years…:
http://www.cmos.ca/climatechangepos_e.pdf
Indeed, only political correctness rules from the mouth of CMOS president worthy of the worst Stalinian “public confessions” and self flagellation:
“1) Carbon offset funding
While flying into Halifax for our 2009 Congress in late May, I reflected on the CO2 emissions I was sending into the atmosphere. I have tried over the past year to cut my greenhouse gas imprint, but my increasing air travel undid this effort. For example, my travel to Halifax sent another ton or two of CO2 into the atmosphere…”
This kind of self depreciating hypocrisy would be laughable if the risk of seeing scientific research highjacked into advocacy of government funded scientism was not real: in such frame who would dare to present opposite results to the AGW dogma, knowing perfectly well theirs and their supervisor careers would be in jeopardy and their funding likely witheld?
Why would we see otherwise many research papers include the obligatory reference to anthropogenic global warming even if the results identify perfectly natural variations or natural events?
So it is little surprise the PhD candidate who posts on Globe and Mail forums under the handle Streamwise Vorticity is defending HIS funding, courtesy of taxpayers, by all means of political and union activism, draping himself in the shroud of science, authority and well understood anonymity -which I do respect btw.

“Stephen Wilde (13:56:31) :
That is what leaves the field wide open for experienced, enthusiastic and intelligent amateurs like me (I hope) and many other contributors to this site.”
Stephen, I agree with you completely.
This mania for mediocre, unquestioning, popular consensus goes right across the board in human affairs, from science, to politics, to religion, to finance, and presents an incredible opportunity to those few ‘eccentrics’ who want to work everything out for themselves and will only trust their own rational conclusions.
One of the more interesting places to observe the phenomenon is the investment industry, where you will frequently find the entire herd pursuing the utterly mediocre, and completely ignoring the real jewels.
Clever company promoters, who know how to initiate and lead such trends, exploit the phenomenon to the maximum. Like the irritatingly popular kid in class, who initiates or is the first to pick up on the latest craze.
But there are also phenomenal opportunities for the few with independent judgement, knowledge and analytical skills, who can quietly identify the genuine fundamental investments that are being overlooked and derided in the rush to follow the latest trend.
In the late 1990s, coming out of a long career in the mining industry, surrounded by engineers, accountants and other rational beings, into a second career as a stockbroker, I was amazed by this phenomenon. Outstanding investments that seemed like a no-brainer to any rational individual, were being scorned in favour of the latest fashionable nonsense.
For example, on two occasions I arranged presentations to a large broking firm by a friend of mine. This man was a former senior executive of a global mining company, who had secured a mineral deposit that contained a reasonable well-defined two million ounces of gold and a million tonnes of copper. He had this in a very small listed company that had a market capitalisation of just three million dollars, and needed interim funds to continue developing it. Each time I was told: “Forget it. We couldn’t risk our reputation. It’s not dotcom!” The investment was a no-brainer, but nobody would throw sixpence at it, not even in the mining land of Western Australia.
Four years later, his company had a market capitalisation of four billion dollars and was a phenomenal success, whilst the entire dotcom mania had subsided again into nothing. But at the time nobody was thinking for themselves. And I don’t think many of them ever do.
And if AGW were a company, run by a man called Al Gore, I wouldn’t put a cent into it. I’d be looking around for something small, real and genuine, run by somebody that I actually trusted, doing something that actually made sense.

David,
Good for you Dad to speak the truth. I have been privately warning people abut AGW nonsense for over 6 years. I honestly never took it seriously before that – perhaps because I already knew too much about atmospheric science to take any of the nonsense seriously.
It is indeed unfortunately quite risky to speak out publicly (which I avoid) even if you have taken a degree in Physics with graduate level courses in atmospheric physics (which I do). Knowing a thing or two about the science at hand is pretty much irrelevant as the “science is settled”. I have personal experience of people who have been extremely successful in promoting their careers by grandstanding on AGW science and the threat it poses – powerpoint presentations from PHD’s proclaiming the upcoming doom are a sure ticket to be invited to present at an important conference and obviously successful in demand “distinguished” speakers who make grand proclamations (where everyone nods there heads in agreement) often secure promotions.
The fact is, in my personal experience, nobody wants to hear the truth or if you speak the truth then you are a denier! It usually kills conversation and teh person looks at you as if you are a bit of weirdo (“the “science is settled” in their minds).

Here’s the original story of the banned polar bear expert: http://tinyurl.com/lruy8a. Yes, he had retired but was not invited to the meeting because of his thoughts. The thought police did not like him. Fascist scientists — that is a comforting thought, no?

It also explains why a lot of academics and government researchers wait till they retire before “rocking the boat”; they no longer have to chant the mantra of AGW (or silently let others do so) for fear of maintaining the income they need to maintain a home and family. The concept of extortion comes immediately to mind.
This is very true in my experience. It is true in academia at all levels from kindergarten (I have kids) to University (I have a kid there too) as well as in scientific or engineering type businesses everywhere (where I work). My experience is that the whole thing is far worse in Europe (where AGW, the environment as a whole and showing that you feel guilty about it all has become the ONLY accepted normal behaviour) than in North America. Disagreement is acceptable but only as long as it is NOT open and does not challenge the wisdom of authority.

All this is fascinating!
I recall being taught the orthodoxy that Henry VIIII was a ‘Bad King’ for ordering the dissolution of the Monasteries.
In retrospect, it was a doctrine of the ‘left-liberal’ (aka socialist) teaching profession, who were trying to instil the idea that state ownership or nationalisation was self-evidently a good thing and ought to be an article of faith.
Those Monasteries, Abbeys, etc, were in effect tax-funded institutions that were self-regulating, self-selecting, and whose ideology was beyond any rational argument. As such they became corrupt and merciless, and eventually offended against the human spirit … as do all such institutions and organisations in the end.
Nationally funded organisation, and particulary those that employ scientists and so should be temples of rationality, are not immune from this natural process of growth asn decay. They are meta-organisms after all.
And so, AGW-think is a sign of a deeper rot, like a brightly coloured fungus sprouting from the trunk of an ostensibly healthy tree.
And in time, are we to see a new ‘dissolution of the ministries’? We live in hope that it will be done as peacefully and painlessly as Henry VII’s great dissolution, where the material and human resources were recycled to great effect.
In summary, the power that binds the AGWers is now being directed to misanthropic ends. […. even simpler; the AGW movement has now been infiltrated by the devil and is doing evil] Supporters should now shun involvement, and find other collective enterprises that promise more philanthropic outcomes.

After reading the letter from Derocher above, I am reminded I am always fascinated by these accounts of people acknowledging that they are not specialists in a specific climate field but tell us that they are acting on the word of a good authority, and that things are very dire indeed.
Whenever you take the time to check the “good authority” and go to the source of the claims, you often find that the authority in question cannot in honesty support the level of catastrophism claimed, or sometimes even confirm if said claim is more than a weakly supported hypothesis. When faced with this, the authorities will then often mutter about how their caveats have been ignored or misinterpreted, but do nothing to correct the situation.
It strikes me that this behaviour acts as a perverse kind of “division of labour”, designed, not for any real productivity as Adam Smith would have had it, but for enabling a kind of deniability of responsibility, allowing the heightening effect of propaganda and easing the kind of political manoeuvring we see here.

This seems to be one part of a growing trend where you are pronounced as an expert and receive prizes despite having a track record of being abjectly wrong all the time.
Those economists who predicted a crash have been excluded from any recovery discussions and those who were flat wrong are expected to fix the mess they helped to perpetuate. Nobel prizes were won for the wrong-headed equations that were used in those Panglossian growth models.
Those who were proven right about the consequences of an attack on Iraq are still excluded from debate and those who were totally wrong are consulted about what to do now in Afghanistan.
Despite numerous (almost consensus) erroneous claims that oil would be 200 or 300 dollars a barrel from the peak oilers and traders, those very same people are still being asked for their opinions. Meanwhile oil discoveries are rising again counter to those numerous predictions from the “experts”. Peak oil is always 30 years away.
Erlich, Holdren and the other population and resource limit pessimists have won the most prestigious Science prizes simply because the prizegivers thought pessimistic fiction more intellectually appealing than reality.
Schneider didn’t lose face for being totally wrong about the coming ice age and neither did the Woods Hole oceanographers for being wrong about a new gulf-stream shift ice age. Both came from not actually seeming to know the basics of their own field. Neither have Emanuel or Hansen lost any kudos despite their predictions and the science based on them being out of step even with consensus opinion. Au contraire; both have won top prizes.
Clearly you can be a maverick as long you predict catastrophes. It just doesn’t matter if you are wrong. There’s a farmers saying that you should listen to the experts and then do exactly the opposite of what they recommend. Being skeptical of so-called experts is still the most sensible position in a growing number of fields where simplistic linear thinking is continually trumped by non-linear reality and where too many people pretend to know things with certainty based not in facts but beliefs.
And it’s not just science that is dumbed down. The most depressingly boring book will always win the top prize. Photographic competitions will continue to judge black and white entries more favorably. Art experts will continue to wax lyrically over paintings and sculptures that might have been produced by 3-year olds. Fashion designers will continue to be praised for hideous clothes. etc, etc. It’s not about reality any more; we are directed by pretensions. It’s about being in with the in crowd.

Larry Kirk 20:41:28
You sound like the sort of man to advise a chap what to do with his pathetically small savings. Er…. you don’t happen to give out tips, do you?

Opps. I posted a similar comment on her website. — John M Reynolds

JamesG (03:05:52) :
This seems to be one part of a growing trend where you are pronounced as an expert and receive prizes despite having a track record of being abjectly wrong all the time.
Those economists who predicted a crash have been excluded from any recovery discussions and those who were flat wrong are expected to fix the mess they helped to perpetuate. Nobel prizes were won for the wrong-headed equations that were used in those Panglossian growth models.

Taleb’s book, The Black Swan, describes Extremistan as that place where sensational success comes from luck alone. (He reads a bit like a grumpy old man, and would no doubt be grumpy about my summary, but there it is.)
Taleb describes areas in life where Extremistan dominate, like the success of a pop song, and areas where Mediocristan dominates, like the average height of a human.
Perhaps, the further we get from simple tangible physical objects, like rocks hurtling through space, or chemicals interacting in a test tube (the ones where science has been very good), the more we get into larger, complex, dynamic processes, the more we get into the social dynamics of science, and the more “the science” relies on consensus, the more a school of thought becomes a victim to accidental fame and success, ie. the more the rules of Extremistan govern the outcome.
In other worlds, the more people claim that AGW is correct due to consensus, the more it becomes likely that it is the product of accidental success.
(If simple falsifiability was available then the matter could be decided concretely and the situation would be more like Mediocristan. But when scientists start saying it is naive to expect a smoking gun, then the more we are heading towards Extremistan).
In Extremistan, two things which are of very similar quality, where perhaps one musical recording is only slightly better than another, leads to one of the two gaining the lion share of attention and the other fading into obscurity–and not necessarily even the slightly better one.
The lack of simple falsifiability, and the “weight” of consensus, is indicative of the situation being governed by the rules of Extremistan, where the winner is simply the one that got lucky, not necessarily the one that was right.
The internet however, can help people discover that which would have faded to obscurity. Remember that the AGW insiders would dismiss this blog as merely an accident of attention lavished on a lower quality idea, but that same accident of social attention could just as well be what led to AGW theory gaining the upper hand in the first place (or is that second, after ice ages of the 70s… which we are told never received widespread support… or as they say in Extremistan: “never got lucky”.)

Rob Phelan, Savethesharks and others on the sociology of groupthink:
All my professional life as an ecologist/biologist I have been plagued by a second degree in social anthropology – with a special interest in science, scientists as a ‘tribe’ and the linguistics of knowledge. Despite my appreciation that scientists could not hope to operate without group-think bias (from wider social, political, religious and financial pressures, as well as institutional prior-commitment and suppression of dissent), I still operated as a scientists active in policy formulation – believing strongly that with the right institutional safeguards science was an essential foundation for action.
In my work on ocean protection (as part of a global but small team that prepared the way for the Precautionary Approach to dealing with toxic wastes) I saw how such group-think operated at the highest levels within the UN system. The science was modified by the ideology and impervious to argument: the dogma was that any toxic material could be diluted and dispersed in the vast oceans, and if we got it wrong, we could always turn off the taps. New (in the mid-1980s) computer models of global circulation predicted the eventual concentrations and safe limits. Vast resources were devoted to these models – and very little to actually reviewing the evidence upon which they were based. A model constructed in 1980 could still be in use in 1990 (with add-ons), but its modellers completely out-of-touch with new data (the reality). Where big investements had been made (industrial processes disposal pathways and monitoring) there was clearly a vested interest in not-finding evidence that might contradict the model and in not highlighting avenues of inquiry that might lead in that direction – appropriate statistical checks on the reliability of monitoring were not made.
Only a handful of concerned scientists stood against the consensus science and policy – and they would have had no leverage at all (easily ignored) despite many peer-reviewed papers, without the support of firstly, Greenpeace International (through my work with that organisation, and then the more radical countries party to the UN ocean treatises (e.g. Germany, Denmark and Sweden).
Eventually we prevailed politically and got the laws changed. In the final year, I went before the key UN panel – GESAMP, Group of Experts on Scientific Aspects of Marine Pollution, with the intention of providing them a critique of their errors and suggestions for avoiding such in the future. The Panel refused to engage in detailed discussion and suggested the peer-reviewed literature was the appropriate place for such a critique (they were all competent scientists) and I knew they thought – fat-chance he has of that! Actually, the editor of the top journal in marine pollution had sat with me on a UK government commission – and he invited me to publish.
It took a year to properly prepare the paper – and cost about £20,000 in 1992 money. That’s what it really takes for a complex review paper properly and fully referenced and up-to-date.
The paper met a wall of silence – except, postcard after postcard came in from marine labs worldwide requesting a reprint – over 100. Mostly from junior scientists letting me know they were reading the paper.
After publishing that, I left the field – as an ecologist I had other fish to fry – we had won the battle. I hoped the UN would take note of the recommendations.
Ten years later, whilst leading on a government agency project to integrate renewable energy supplies into the British landscape (and community) – I came to look at the climate models (a development of the 1980s GCMs) – largely because I realised that you could not integrate renewable energy on the scale envisaged without enormous environmental damage. I began to find all the same errors and lack of safeguards I had challenged before –
group-think/suppression of dissenting voices/selective participants at meetings/false consensus building on the science/pressure on dissidents – including funding, ridicule, exclusion…………
and with one very disturbing difference – there were no powerful environmental campaign groups or dissenting governments to fund the critics!
I checked then to see the citation index of my paper:
P.Taylor (1993) The State of the Marine Environment ‘A critique of the work and the role of the Joint Group of Experts on Scientific Aspects of Marine Pollution (GESAMP).
Marine Pollution Bulletin 26, 3: 120-127.
It had only three citations! It had been completely ignored by the establishment it was aimed at reforming.
At first, the group-think ignores criticism. When it simply cannot, it attacks the critic. It ignores new data and chooses to believe the virtual reality of the model.
In my book ‘Chill’ I devote a chapter to this collective ‘delusion’. Then I look at the sociology of ‘collusion’ – the vested interest in not engaging with the dissenting voices, pretending either they do not exist, or where they do, they are cranks, mavericks, politically motivated….whatever necessary not to actually deal with the science.
My book is published by a small house. My normal publisher (of my contribution to ecology) Earthscane, declined on the grounds that it criticised the IPCC (whose work they also publish) and that my arguments should be first published in a peer-reviewed journal. As I pointed out – that takes time, and whereas I have a good reputation in marine protection, I am unknown in climate policy – and reviews of this nature are always invited from acknowledged experts. Its a slow process and I may yet get a paper together, despite no funding or institutional base.
Recently, it was suggested that I take up debate with George Monbiot, a prolific writer on the environment, and defender of the AGW orthodoxy – he had offered to debate Ian Plimer, but that foundered for some reason. I offered to take up the challenge after several people asked me to post on the Guardian blog.
Monbiot’s reply has been that he would debate my ‘novel’ ideas (they are, of course, not novel – but a critical review of the published papers and data – and lay bare the internal lack of consensus even within the IPCC on key aspects: cloud behaviour, ocean cycles, water vapour amplifiers, solar output and climate links etc) – but only after they were published in a respectable peer-reviewed journal!
Its avoidance, of course. Ian Plimer has no climate papers to his credit, but gained enough publicity so that he could not be ignored. I have yet to review his work – but Monbiot dismisses it as full of ‘schoolboy howlers’. He would not read my book, and I doubt he actually read Plimer’s. This is typical of the dogmatist – but it creates ripples throughout the science world, where those who might usefully contribute some critical awareness, are scared to enter the heated controversy. Monbiot then unwittingly contributes to the atmosphere of repression.
I drew his attention to the endorsement on Chill’s cover by Jackson Davis, whom I have had a long-term working relationship and enduring friendship – even though on climate issues, he has been a member of the UN framework convention on climate, and was the drafting author of the Kyoto Protocol – he says my book is a must-read for all on either side of the debate and that the questions must be answered before global warming can be taken as truth. That counts for nothing in the eyes of a non-expert like Monbiot, who is concerned to defend the monolith.
I am at a loss now to know what forums might exist to advance the current situation. Petitions and alternative conferences are simply ignored. Only the dubiously motivated Business-As-Usual brigade in the right-wing press take up the banner and usually in ways readily dismissed as biased. My motivation has been that a global cooling will render all the billions spent on mitigation completely useless – and the real focus on food, agriculture, water and the quality of life under a cooling scenario, is not addressed.

Peter Taylor:
“I am at a loss now to know what forums might exist to advance the current situation. Petitions and alternative conferences are simply ignored.”
Do not be too despondent, for to borrow words from Karl Marx, the AGW ideology contains within itself the seeds of its own destruction.
As authorities move ever forward into the abyss, as the rationing of energy is ratcheted ever more tightly, the sinews of society will snap one by one. First, the tax take will fall as unemployment climbs forcing governments to create ever more “green” jobs with the result that real purchasing power falls, leading to – a fall in tax take. Government will struggle to find recources to pay for welfare, education and infra structure. More and more of the services will fail, until the they turn finally to the architects of global misery – the AGW scientists themselves, and cut the support from under them. Facing their own anihalation, the world will discover that, suddenly, they admit that they were probably wrong.

At (15:47:53), King of Cool said “If science is on your side all you need is a sales department to demonstrate it.”
I couldn’t agree more. In a way, it is sad to even consider the need for a PR machine to distribute good science. However, the AGW community has not shown any restraint in selling their positions using whatever PR is available. Unfortunately for the skeptics, that includes most of the formerly mainstream media. While the media buzz, with few exceptions, is decidedly pro-AGW, we should not forget that there are many information outlets available that are not controlled by Big Media and I would argue that is where you will find most of the readers, anyway.
What we need are more people the prototypical American can-do attitude that looks for creative ways to bypass the roadblocks and achieve their goals (this is certainly not limited to those of us in the U.S.). There are more ways to distribute information and build influence now than we would have ever dreamed of even ten years ago, so if the message isn’t getting out, it is our fault. This blog site shows that there is significant interest in the skeptical point of view, and I’ll venture a bet that the influence of this site goes well beyond those who read it directly. I wouldn’t be surprised if talk around the water cooler at work is much more effective than anything printed in the New York Times or spewed on CNN.
When I graduated from engineering school 15-20 years, ago, we had been instructed to find creative ways to achieve our goals. We were taught that nothing was an impediment to progress…it was the engineer’s job to find ways around the roadblocks and make it work. I’ve seen a disturbing trend in the last 5 years or so, in that the new engineers we hire do not seem to have been given the same fire and determination. Honestly, a significant number of them appear to have the attitude that it probably won’t work, so why bother trying? Maybe it is a generational quirk but we need some leadership, both in the AGW discussion and in many other areas, to bypass the elites that seem bent on imposing their plan for this great nation.
There is hope, out there, though. The supposedly uneducated backwoods “hicks and hillbillies” get it. In all my years living in small farm towns, I’ve seen the local average Joe ignore much of what happens in Washington D.C. because regardless of how it swings left to right, the impact at the local level has generally been small. Having said that, I have never seen the level of “pitchfork” energy so high as it is now. Cap and Trade may unleash the slumbering giant, and unfortunately for the folks in charge, the giant is armed to the teeth (and getting more so every day). It is going to be an interesting couple of years coming up.

Phil, the ad hominem attack was perfected by your side decades ago. A little late to whine about its use now, don’t you think?

Thanks to Anthony for his marvelous work and for all the kind comments. Feedback is a powerful motivator.
For those feeling weary: it is bone-sapping if you have to wade through another full gloss Synthesis Report which uses out of date data, logical fallacies, and presents only half the truth, but we are getting somewhere. We don’t have to have the media on our side to slow this gravy train. We have word of mouth. We have the net. People trust those they know… and they are looking for the right way to explain why they are suspicious of the hard sell.
Thanks to everyone for spreading the word on web-sites and blogs, and at dinner parties or schools. We battle against major money and the most powerful institutions in the world (the banks), but we are shifting polls.
Stefan, like you I’m concerned for environmental groups. By advocating policies based on fashion and group-think, who will trust them in five years time? Real environmental problems go ignored.
As for the bigger issues about human cooperation at stake? What’s the point of cooperation” if people are cooperating to solve a non-problem? When this kind of operation “succeeds” hasn’t it just prevented people from working together to do something useful? (Like prevent malaria, or teach kids to reason.)
Jeremy said: “The key concern and aim, is consensus itself, not the technical correctness of any particular theory. ”
So if we are all in agreement that we can breathe underwater, then what matters is not that it works, but that we all do it together?
REPLY: Thanks Joanne, you should see the new UNEP Climate Change Science Compendium report (just a couple of stories up). Like the “Full Gloss Synthesis report” this one takes no prisoners when it comes to the absurd, using graphs from Wikipedia authors and images from WWF. – Anthony

Robert E. Phelan (14:43:47) :
Oh, well.
I am sorry the sarcasm was a little too subtle for me.
At least I feel better now.

Ron de Haan (12:58:15) :
Because the warmists lack the science, the so called “consensus” has become the last frontier.
They simply send out those who threaten the consensus.
What should worry us is the fact that these are practices that were common in socialist societies like the USSR, Nazi Germany and China.
It’s a strong indicator where we are heading
Too true. Over the last week I have had an email discussion with a person who I once counted as a friend. To set the stage, 3 years ago, we agreed not to discuss GW or CC because it disturbed the other party greatly, being a true believer. In the past week the individual sent me two pro-AGW emails (remember the agreement). The first I ignored, the second I responded to by providing an alternative view of the subject. The insults, invectives and ad hominem comments flowed from the other side while I read with fascination each response, not taking the bait, so to speak.
When the other party ended by stating that he would reserve the right to “correct” statements made by others where the science was faulty. I responded identically. My response garnered the statement “don’t bother if you’re just going to quote from the typical skeptic psycho-babble.
In essence those of us on the skeptic side are not allowed to speak since the few sceptics that are left are all paid by the oil companies anyway, so have no credibility.
Saddly, a friendship is broken, not likely to be rekindled. I hope this is not typical in the lives of others here.