Big day today folks. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists will move the hands on their famous “doomsday clock”.
Here’s my guess. Climate scientist Steven Schneider will be speaking. We know what he is all about. The Copenhagen Climate Conference failed in December and there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth. My prediction is that these alarmists will move the clock closer to midnight, citing the Copenhagen “failure” as pushing mankind closer to the brink of “climate disaster” or some such phrase.
Plus, we’ll get to watch them turn the hands of the clock live via webfeed. Such stunning visuals. Yawn. I’ll save you the suspense. In 2007 it was set to five minutes to midnight, to reflect the failure to solve problems posed by nuclear weapons. Today I’m guessing they’ll mention Copenhagen’s failure and list climate change as the next global threat and set it to 4 minutes to midnight. Or…maybe 3, if Steven Schneider scares them enough. UPDATE: my guess was wrong: they moved it back to 6 minutes see here
From the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists press release:
Hands of the “Doomsday Clock” to be moved in New York City and seen live on web for first time ever
8 January 2010
… News Advisory for January 14, 2010 …
Factors In Change to Include Nuclear Proliferation, Weapon Stockpile Shifts, and Climate Change; Bulletin of Atomic Scientists Will Open Event to World With Real-Time Streaming Web Broadcast.
NEW YORK CITY///NEWS ADVISORY///January 14, 2010///The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS) will move the minute hand of its famous “Doomsday Clock” at 10 a.m. EST/1500 GMT on January 14, 2010 in New York City. For the first time ever, the event will be opened up to the general public via a live Web feed at http://www.TurnBackTheClock.org.
The last time the Doomsday Clock minute hand moved was in January 2007, when the Clock’s minute hand was pushed forward by two minutes from seven to five minutes before midnight.
The precise time to be shown on the updated Doomsday Clock will not be announced until the live news conference in New York City takes place on January 14, 2010. Factors influencing the latest Doomsday Clock change include international negotiations on nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation, expansion of civilian nuclear power, the possibilities of nuclear terrorism, and climate change.
News event speakers will include:
- Lawrence Krauss, co-chair, BAS Board of Sponsors, foundation professor, School of Earth and Space Exploration and Physics departments, associate director, Beyond Center, co-director, Cosmology Initiative, and director, New Origins Initiative, Arizona State University.
- Stephen Schneider, member, BAS Science and Security Board, professor of environmental biology and global change, Stanford University, a co-director, Center for Environment Science and Policy of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and senior fellow, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment.
- Jayantha Dhanapala, member, BAS Board of Sponsors, president, Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, and chair, 1995 UN Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Conference;
- Pervez Hoodbhoy, member, BAS Board of Sponsors, professor of high energy physics, and head, Physics Department, Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan; and
- Kennette Benedict, executive director, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Founded in 1945 by University of Chicago scientists who had helped develop the first atomic weapons in the Manhattan Project, The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists subsequently created the Doomsday Clock in 1947 as way to convey both the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero). The decision to move the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock is made by the Bulletin’s Board of Directors in consultation with its Board of Sponsors, which includes 19 Nobel Laureates. The Clock has become a universally recognized indicator of the world’s vulnerability to catastrophe from nuclear weapons, climate change, and emerging technologies in the life sciences.
TO PARTICIPATE IN PERSON: Attend the live news event on January 14, 2010 at 10 a.m. EST, at the New York Academy of Sciences Building, at 7 World Trade Center, 250 Greenwich St, 40th floor, New York City. The event will be limited to credentialed members of the news media. For security reasons, all attendees must RSVP in advance by contacting Patrick Mitchell, (703) 276-3266, or pmitchell@hastingsgroup.com.
CAN’T PARTICIPATE IN PERSON?: Reporters outside of New York City who are unable to attend the live news event in person can watch and listen to the news conference via a live Webcast by registering by 945 a.m. EST on January 14, 2010 at http://www.TurnBackTheClock.org/media. A streaming audio replay of the news event will be available on the Web at http://www.thebulletin.org as of 6 p.m. EST/2300 GMT on January 14, 2010.
Yes, yes, yes. And it was set to two minutes to midnight over fifty years ago. Snore.
More alarmism just sets off the BS meter of the average person. Put it 1 minute to midnight and it would be better by far as people simply will not believe it.
Cheers
Michael
Why does factors for change not include planet-killing asteroid/meteorite impacts?
Silly me, of course that kind of source of real abrupt climate change is something that is completely outside human control excepting the theoretical idea that those nasty nukes might actually have some use beyond being an outrageously expensive insurance policy.
Set it to midnight and see what happens, or better yet 1 minute after, shows over folks, nothing to fear, move on and be happy….
As if.
sadly have to miss the webcast –
will be cleaning up the kittties littebox.
Right you kids. I’m going to count to five and then THAT’S IT ! One, two, three, four, four and a half, four and three quarters . . .
Who watches the watchmen ?
Weather vain
It can only get worse as Mexico approaches.
regards
I would guess that they will claim the Climate Change will reduce available resources and thus force wars over the limited strategic resources required for civilization.
So now we are expected to believe that an infinitesimal increase in CO2 air molecules poses as much of a threat to mankind as the tense nuclear standoff known as the Cuban missile crisis. As if.
The “Atomic Doomsday Clock” will surely become a bigger joke than the Nobel Peace Prize.
The extreme AGW alarmists are saying it’s already too late so the clock should now be past midnight. Might as well for all the good it will do. This is really laughable. How come such crackpots have so much say in our world affairs? It’s time to get rid of these loonies and let some real thinkers back in power. I won’t hold my breath though.
“I have lived long enough to have seen many doomsday scenarios painted by people who profited by doing so, but which never came to pass. This has made me a skeptic. Perhaps global warming is an example of the old fable about the boy who cried wolf, but this time the doomsayers are, alas, right. Maybe, but I can’t help noting that some of the prominent global warmers of today were global coolers of not so long ago. In particular, Steven Schneider, now at Stanford, previously at NCAR, about 30 years ago was sounding the alarm about an imminent ice age. The culprit then was particles belched into the atmosphere by human activities. No matter how the climate changes he can correctly say that he predicted it. No one in the atmospheric science community has been more successful at getting publicity. NCAR used to send my department clippings from newspaper and magazine articles in which NCAR researchers were named. We’d get thick wads of clippings, almost all of which were devoted to Schneider. Perhaps global warming is bad for the rest of us, but for Schneider and others it has been a godsend.”
Craig Bohren
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/aprilholladay/2006-08-07-global-warming-truth_x.htm?csp=34
I highly recommend Craig Bohren’s books ‘Clouds in a Glass of Beer’ and ‘What Light Through Yonder Window Breaks?’ for those laymen who want to understand a little bit about atmospheric physics.
“…Fifty days to save the world…” – or should that be a few minutes?
Doomsday clock! Silly buggers.
Is the Doomsday Clock set at Eastern Standard Time or Greenwich Mean Time, because I think it might be about 6 hours ahead.
Climate science has been reduced to meaningless ‘global temperature’ variations expressed in degrees or fractions of a degree C. It is totally useless in deciding future needs and demands of population of a particular region.
CET has most detailed and scrutinised temperature numbers so it could be considered as an acceptable working model:
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/CETt.htm
Let’s consider well documented and currently not disputed period from 1900 to 1950.
Between 1900 and 1925 winter temps went up while summer temps down by similar amount so net annual temp change was close to zero, for period 1925 to 1950 it case was precisely reversed, again total annual change close to zero.
Conclusion: energy consumption requirements, emissions etc due to climate change constant.
Not so, let’s look at the graph again:
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/CETt.htm
During initial period due to warmer winters 1900-1925 heating requirement would be much lower, and if aircon was available, due to cooler summers again energy requirement would be lower.
For subsequent period 1925-1950, winter temps went down and summers up both calling for higher energy consumption (again assuming aircon was available).
Ergo: Climate is cyclical, difficult to predict, impossible to modify.
Task of a climate scientist is to try to predict these REGIONAL rather than GLOBAL trends in climate change and consequently the energy requirements, and of governments to act accordingly through planning, building, transport etc. regulations, in order to limit energy consumption, thus protecting natural resources and reducing pollution.
In the UK (mainly CET area) we were told by the (world renown) Met office to expect ‘barbeque’ (hot) summer and milder than normal winter. As many of us are aware, both predictions were wrong !
What sort of society have we become that chooses to live in a perpertual state of fear. There is a medical term for that – phobia. There are many types, just take your pick. But in today’s mixed up world, they are made up of an ad hoc smorgsborg.
I hope they do set it to 1 minute to midnight, a move that will provoke doomsaying journalists into even more ridiculous hyperbole, with the likes of Moonbiot foaming at the mouth: “Worlds most eminent climate scientists move doomsday clock closer to midnight than ever before. Even during the Cuban missile crisis it was not . . . mankind has thrown away its last means of salvation . . . only draconian CO2 cuts . . . democracy itself is not longer sufficient. . . etc, etc.”
We live in a silly-assed society.
Well, the bell is already tolling, not for an approaching doomsday but for the AGW hypothesis and similar attempts to scaremonger for profit.
This shows that they are getting desperate as time and public sentiment coupled with spreading knowledge is turning against them. So now it is time to splash the headline – CATACLYSM IMMINENT – Scientists today warned of an unavoidable catastrophe due to man (n) made …..bla bla bla.
Of course the headline for when nothing materializes is already printed – INTERVENTION SAVES MANKIND – Disaster was narrowly averted by the timely intervention of dedicated teams of scientists and politicians who’s vision.. . bla bla bla
This is getting to the stage where even an Afghani goat herder can see through it.
Anthony, wouldn’t an engraved atomic doomsday clock make a lovely trophy to be awarded to the year’s most alarming AGW doomsday prediction. It could be named “The WUWT Award.”
Like Ew-3, I will be missing the live feed:
Unfortunately, I have a debilitating hangnail.
Who, precisely, is funding this event?
The silly Doomsday clock says less about the condition of our civilization than it does about the self-appointed doomsayers.
This doomsday clock isn’t gonna be much use to me ‘cos I haven’t worn a watch for 40 years…
But the end of the earth will on on TV – won’t it? And in the newspapers the following day? (Don’t say a word!)
The clock should be set to five past midnight, to show that, like all the other doomsday predictions, this one has expired.
http://www.2think.org/hundredsheep/skeptic/predictions.shtml
I’m happy that scientists are as individuals, interested in ethics, but they are primarily scientists. There’s a confusion when scientists, who’s work should rightly be confined and regulated by ethical issues, start to think of science as a means to impose ethics on the world. That seems to be part of what went wrong in climatology. “The science” was used to make an absolute case for imposing different lifestyles and morals on people.
Not only does it distort the pursuit of truth, but who is to say that these scientists’ ethical outlook is actually the correct one for the world at this time? They are, how shall we put it, “not in the field” of ethical, philosophical, and social, study of development.
Um if this clock was for nuclear destruction, shouldn’t it stay at that? Or did their pet headline maker die a natural death after years of fearmongering? Why not make a climate clock, and set the nuclear one back to quarter-to the hour?
Arguably nuclear war is just as likely now as 50 years ago with a lot more countries with ‘the bomb’ and ballistic missile technology, but now nobody gives two hoots about it. Terrorism attacks are just as likely as 10 years ago, but nowadays people just live with it. Note the undie bomber only got about 5 minutes of fame despite being caught red-handed trying to blow up an airliner. All fearmongering eventually fizzles out because people are resilient and get over their fears. It’s just impossible to keep people fearful for a long time if their fears fail to materialize, something the AGW people are quickly finding out. I bet more people are more scared of sharks than climate change.
Anthony,
This is off topic.
A paper by a hungarian physicist suggests CO2 emissions are irrelevant to Earth’s climate.
You may want to post on it some time if you haven’t already or have plans to do so in the near future.
Here is a link to an article on the paper from the Portland Civil Rights Examiner.
Interesting reading.
http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-7715-Portland-Civil-Rights-Examiner~y2010m1d12-Hungarian-Physicist-Dr-Ferenc-Miskolczi-proves-CO2-emissions-irrelevant-in-Earths-Climate
Why not just steal more from religious theocracies and say that judgement day is imminent and that all carbon sinners will burn for eternity in global warming hell?
[prohibited words, try again ~ ctm]
It’s Always the End of the World as We Know It
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/01/opinion/01dutton.html
Why We Love to be scared
http://www.livescience.com/health/061030_fear_factor.html
Going back to FEAR:
– Fear is a powerful emotion, given that people don’t know they are being manipulated. Fear becomes a powerful tool for governing and control
– Fear is the basis of the “green” movement. Fear is the tool of powerful people. When you see the use of FEAR, ask yourself why?
– Fear is the path to the dark side… fear leads to anger… anger leads to hate.. hate leads to suffering. – Yoda
I am more worried of the USA/Israel declaring war to Iran on baseless accusation than anything else.
Or like we saw this week in Haiti, maybe we should fear Mother Nature’s capacity of destroying years of human work and hardship in seconds.
“Plus, we’ll get to watch them turn the hands of the clock live via webfeed. Such stunning visuals. Yawn.”
Too true. What kind of inane crap is this? And haven’t these people (living and working in NYC all these years as they have, they would have ample opportunity I would assume) taken a lesson from all the other sandwhich-boarders out there who like to warn us about the End of the World?
Doomsday Clock.
1999. Y2K.
2012. Mayans.
…
Doomsday propaganda.
All this measures is their fear factor. So what? People go through cycles of fear all the time.
I’d rather see objective measures with no artificial scales or limits rather than a summarized metaphorical clock.
Do we really need someone soothsaying our doom for us?
I suppose our species is doomed to have soothsayers and mystics and other such unprovable nonsense till the end of time, well the end of our species that is. So we are doomed after all! [:)]
Just reading John Mueller’s ‘ Atomic Obsession’. In it he states that an editor of the Bulletin said that a purpose of the publication was ‘to preserve civilisation by scaring men into rationality’ (p26). Mueller points out that the clock had been perpetually hailing imminent catastrophe without result for over half a century (p92). Interestingly the Bulletin had a subscription campaign in 2006 using the slogan ‘Dispensing facts instead of fear for over sixty years’ (p56).
I’m intrigued that they should now add climate change to their brief – maybe the subscription campaign didn’t work.
You know how it goes: “Disaster strikes at 12!”
Then nothing happens, and so they move the clock hand back 5 minutes, and repeat the warning, but even louder.
And this process keeps repeating.
“Hands of the “Doomsday Clock” to be moved in New York City and seen live on web for first time ever”
I feel so lucky.
@PeterB “…the Bulletin said that a purpose of the publication was ‘to preserve civilisation by scaring men into rationality’”
Yes because fear activates the neocortex brain of reason, and not the older reptilian part associated with aggression, dominance, sex, rigidity, obsessiveness, compulsiveness, worship, submission, greed and fear….. oops.
Perhaps the clock is being moved because of the developments in Iran’s nuclear program.
Perhaps they’ll push back the hands, based on the new, super-duper conference on climate change to be held in Coshabamba, Bolivia, April 20-22. See,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jan/14/climate-talks-un-sidelined
This conference “…is expected to attract heads of state from the loose alliance of socialist “Alba” countries, including Venezuela and Cuba. Alba, the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America countries, was set up to provide an alternative to the US-led free trade area of the Americas.”
The last two paragraphs set out the goals of the attendees. AGW is truly a big umbrella for those who hate the US and/or capitalism – note that CO2 is no longer the culprit, capitalism is:
“The meeting, which is intended to cement ties between the seven Alba countries, is also expected to pursue the idea of an international court for environmental crimes, as well as the radical idea of “mother earth rights”. This would give all entities, from man to endangered animal species, an equal right to life.
“Our objective is to save humanity and not just half of humanity,” said Morales in a speech at Copenhagen. “We are here to save mother earth. Our objective is to reduce climate change to [under] 1C. [Above this] many islands will disappear and Africa will suffer a holocaust. The real cause of climate change is the capitalist system. If we want to save the earth then we must end that economic model.”
Stop the scare mongering with the use of your tax money.
I say, take the clock from the wall and run it over with a 100 ton roller.
I am very curious what John Coleman has to say today in his Climategate special 9 pm Pacific Time:
KUSI meteorologist, John Coleman, has an amazing story to tell of science gone bad, and new revelations as the “climategate” scandal comes to the United States.
Join us on Thursday, January 14th, at 9pm, Pacific Time, for the special report that will explode the global warming myth!
Set your DVR to record this broadcast and Anthony, can you provide a link to this broadcast?
http://www.kusi.com/weather/colemanscorner/81175327.html
The only clock I can hear ticking at the moment is the one that marks the end of ‘The Great CAGW Scam’. Every day more and more doubters come out of the woodwork and even the MSM are defying their paymasters.
Good example in today’s Daily Express “CLIMATE CHANGE IS NATURAL: 100 REASONS WHY”
http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/146138
Like watching maple syrup run up hill in January, while listening to the Jeopardy theme music. dumb dumb!… dumb dumb.. dumb dumb!… duuuuumb… dumb dumb… dumb dumb… duuummmmb! dumb dumb…
Put the clock to 1 minute past midnight and see if we’re still around. If so, then finally end the alarmism.
Stefan (02:12:32) : “There’s a confusion when scientists, who’s work should rightly be confined and regulated by ethical issues, start to think of science as a means to impose ethics on the world. That seems to be part of what went wrong in climatology. “The science” was used to make an absolute case for imposing different lifestyles and morals on people.”
I would say opinions, rather than ethics and morals, because they see AGW as real, first. Only in accepting that does it become a moral issue to them.
It’s a lot like the sceond-hand smoke “debate” was. The data, iirc, didn’t show any harm to nonsmokers, except perhaps over the long run (at the age where people start to drop dead anyway). That was used to justify the corruption of the concepts of private and public property, because it “protects people from a known harm”. It also further justifified assault on business, re-enforced the notion that corporations are usually unethical and out to get us.
Alarmists jump the gun, and that means they can’t be imposining morals because they are determining something before it is proven to be the right path. There’s no way to tell except through further study as to whether their actions were the right path or not. But given what human nature is, I don’t think these kinds of things will ever be avoidable. The thing that gets me is that once further study concludes the opposite, that there is little if anything to fear, policy doesn’t change. It tends to get worse, in fact, and extends the new meaning to areas where it was previously lacking (and lacking for good reason, but when fear and obligation team up…)
If they are so serious about this doomsday clock, why aren’t they displaying it on every TV channel all day to keep us up to date? Oh of course I forgot. It’s just a silly game.
5 mins to midnight? Great, time for a nightcap. Yawn…
Stephen H Schneider is a biologist by qualification.
Melvin and Joan Lane Professor for Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies
Professor, Department of Biology
Senior Fellow, Woods Institute for the Environment
Professor, by courtesy, Civil and Environmental Engineering.
At Stanford University, otherwise known as global warming central.
Stanford sent 65 Sixty Five !! delegates to COP15, presumably in the hope of securing more fat grants in addition to spreading the
wordalarm.One of Schneiders sidekicks is Chris Field. Google him.
Leif might be able to tell us more, his office is just across the road from the Woods Institute building on the Stanford campus.
Funny thing is, if we get one good-sized belch from the Sun heading in our direction, I don’t think they could run fast enough to update that clock in time.
The Threat of Nuclear Annihilation, indeed.
Let’s use the clock to play a giant game of ‘Twister’…
need more dots…
First article I read on this had “and climate change” appended to every line, almost as if it had been written in some bizarre verse-form.
When did they update the purpose of the clock to include “and climate change”?
Perhaps in the early 70s?
Oh, Brave New World, to have such nonsense in it!
(and climate change)
If the atomic doomsday clock is moving closer to midnight its surely due more to terrorism than anything else!
On a not unrelated theme in more than one sense, one of my favourite somgs – Iron Maiden’s Two Minutes to Midnight!
If the world keeps listening the way they have already, they soon might have to resort to a second hand.
The rest of us just sort out the world over a few drinks and forget it by next morning.
(click)
So, you add 1 degree C to the average temps of Barrow, Alaska, where the monthly average highs and lows are shown in the graph displayed in the following link (make sure you select “metric”), and that’s supposed to portend doom for some reason?
http://www.weather.com/outlook/events/sports/wxclimatology/monthly/graph/USAK0025?role=&from=month_bottomnav_sports
Adding 1 degree C on average to Barrow, Alaska, would increase the number of months where the average low was above freezing to exactly the number of months it has now (June’s average low would rise to 0, which still isn’t above freezing), so the net impact would still be nine months where the average low was below freezing, (the monthly average lows would be -28, -29, -28, -21, -8, 0, 2, 2, -1, -11, -20, -26 for the months of J, F, M, A, M, J, J, A, S, O, N, D respectively, when 1 degree C is added)
and the number of months where the average high was below freezing would still be eight (the average monthly highs would be-21, -22, -21, -13, -3, 5, 9, 8, 3, -6, -14, -20 for the months of J, F, M, A, M, J, J, A, S, O, N, D respectively, when 1 degree C is added).
And this is somehow supposed to melt all the continental polar ice? This is supposed to make in uninhabitable for, perhaps, polar bears? Or seals? Or people?
I seriously doubt it.
The stupidity of asserting a 1 degree C increase in overall world temps is catastrophic simply boggles the mind.
Correction:
“…so the net impact would still be nine months where the average low was AT OR below freezing…”
Geez, I didn’t know the Giant Clock O’ Doom was still around. Back in the Olden Days, the twits used to make a huge show of setting it to two minutes to midnight every time someone on either side of the fence rattled a saber — but they never showed them turning it back to 11:57PM (okay, 2357) *prior* to moving it forward to two minutes to midnight.
Kinda funny, but the “scientists” either frowned into the camera or smirked…
This is the real doomsday clock: click
Climategate quiz on utube.
@Bill Tuttle
“Geez, I didn’t know the Giant Clock O’ Doom was still around….”
And there, in a nutshell, you have the reason for this little phobia-fest……
Smokey (04:25:46) :
“This is the real doomsday clock: click”
Right on. I would also say LOL to that, but sadly our massive debt (to which these “scientists” contribute) is not a laughing matter…
It doesn’t seem to be a very accurate clock.
Italy has shrunk to a stub. Africa seems to have grown a new peninsular off Tunis, and the Straits of Gibraltar have also widened extensively.
It is hard to see, but I suspect that this is one of those maps with no Great Britain? And it is interesting to see Scandinavia not much longer than it is wide….
Smokey (04:25:46) :
This is the real doomsday clock:
Wow, personal credit card debt is falling fast!
This must be the doomsday clock for the serial apocalyptic doomsaying movement!
Or maybe I’m just naïve!
I understand that they have heavy security arrangement when they do this stunt!
No protest or serious questions allowed, of course!
The clock is all part of a FUD ( fear, uncertainty and doubt ) marketing tactic. Climate scientists and the greens have borrowed this tactic from the computer industry where it has been used successfully for the last 5 decades.
Say kids, what time is it? It’s howdy doomy time!
pwl: I suppose our species is doomed to have soothsayers and mystics and other such unprovable nonsense till the end of time, well the end of our species that is. So we are doomed after all! [:)]
Yep, we’re doomed if we do, and doomed if we don’t.
Thanks for the link to the real doomsday clock Smokey (I’ve added it to my favourites).
This does make a good point though. People aren’t scared of AGW – not really scared. The only time I’ve been scared in the way that alarmists want us to be, was in November 2008 at the brink of the banking collapse. That was a real threat, with real harsh consequences, and I was then, very anxious.
AGW scary? Nah!
The ‘Union of Concerned Scientists’ always bothered me.
Which part of the scientific process requires ‘concern’?
I am not an uncaring human, but science is supposed to
be coldly rational not irrational with ‘concern’.
Isn’t ‘concern’ just a fuzzier more acceptable way saying ’emotional’?
Doesn’t emotion DISqualify science?
What if we had:
‘The Union of Hysteric Scientists’?
‘The Union of Frightened Scientists’?
‘The Union of Angry Scientists’?
‘The Union of Depressed Scientists’?
‘The Union of Frightened Scientists’?
‘The Union of Frightened Scientists’?
The full (I assume) list of changes is at http://www.thebulletin.org/content/doomsday-clock/timeline . I subscribed for a few years in the late 1970. They didn’t talk about the weather or climate then, I guess they’re running out of topics (1).
The do publish some dissent, see http://books.google.com/books?id=ygwAAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA64#v=onepage&q=&f=false The link for that was on their home page, but I forgot and went back to search for it in search engines and, umm, struck out.
I can’t copy the scanned text here, but either skip the first several paragraphs or read the first sentence and be too annoyed at author William M Arkin to read the rest.
Happy new fear everyone.
I say we lock Schneider and types like him into the hotter-than-hell climate prison that Washington D.C. has become – they will fry in no time at all! See this chart…….
http://www.c3headlines.com/2010/01/leftist-big-govt-types-believe-human-co2-causes-warming-theyre-wrong-actually-its-big-govt-that-caus.html
I’ve fixed the clock. 🙂
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/files/2010/01/beertime.jpg
Against what has this clock been calibrated?
AGW is just another method to steal from Joe Citizen…..what a hoax.
Robuk (04:27:23) :
Climategate quiz on utube.
Class. Serious class. Many thanks, Gavin Atkins!
Great clock Tallbloke!! Bottoms up.
The only thing that frightens me for my children, & their children (assuming they will be permitted by the state to have any), is what they are proposing as a solution to a non-problem in the first place.
BTW & OT, (apologies). I said a while back now, they did it to smoking, now they’re going to do it for alcohol, they’ve already started big here in the UK. Met Office also in a mess after admitting they’ve ballsed it up, big time, no worries tho’ they’ll just carry on as usual tinkering away with Deep Thought. Piers Corbyn made his winter prediction/forecast on 28th Octoner 2009 of a cold winter in front of an audience at his Climate Fools Conference, in front of on Richard Black, enviro correspondent for the BBC, who rather sheepishly noted it down as someone in the audience added that the Met Office forecast a milder than usual winter. Where is Richard Black now I wonder?
Fear and Loathing, to quote a personal hero of mine, Fear and Loathing.
Dodgy Geezer (05:07:43) :
It doesn’t seem to be a very accurate clock.
Italy has shrunk to a stub. Africa seems to have grown a new peninsular off Tunis, and the Straits of Gibraltar have also widened extensively.
It is hard to see, but I suspect that this is one of those maps with no Great Britain? And it is interesting to see Scandinavia not much longer than it is wide….
They redecorated the face to bring it in line with the cover of Uncle Al’s New Book — the one depicting the world after that 20-meter rise in sea level that’s gonna happen in five — uhhhhh — ten — errrrr — twenty — ahhhhh — thirty years, yanno…
@Sandy…
You asked: “Who, precisely, is funding this event?”
That’s a good question. As far as I can tell there are no definitive answers, yet there are many intriguing clues. Below I’ve outlined the results of my investigation. All significant claims and/or data points are followed by a number [in brackets] which corresponds to a specific link at the bottom of this commentary. Anyone reading this is encouraged to verify the veracity of all claims, particularly [10].
We can begin by looking up the “whois” data on the official “turnbacktheclock.org” domain that is slated to host today’s doomsday event. The records show that the domain was registered by the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists on October 29, 2009. The registrar is hardly surprising but the date of registration is interesting because it tells us that this idea was hatched at least as early as a few months ago.
Next we examine the turnbacktheclock.org web site itself. It’s a standard brochureware placeholder site with no real content. It primarily functions to take us to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists web site. So we examine the web site at thebulletin.org and discover the following advisory: “Please direct all Doomsday Clock related media inquiries to Patrick Mitchell at (703) 276-3266 or pmitchell@hastingsgroup.com“[1].
The good news is that investigations of this nature become much less complex when we are suddenly faced with a seemingly arbitrary and out-of-place contact person. This invariably points to a high powered PR firm. Let’s see where it takes us…
The hastingsgroup.com web site is suspiciously blank and only displays the title “The Hastings Group – Re-launching soon!”[2]. According to the Web Archive, the hastingsgroup.com domain has displayed a blank web page and some variation of this message for at least the past 12 years[3]. However, a Google search for *any* page in the hastingsgroup.com domain reveals that there are at least 35 pages on the site that Google has indexed[4]. The most interesting page contains the following information: “EXXONMOBIL SHAREHOLDER RESOLUTIONS NEWS CONFERENCE FEATURING ROCKEFELLER FAMILY MEMBERS” with a link to a streaming broadcast hosted on the hastingsgroup.com. In addition, the following media contact is provided: “For further information, contact Patrick Mitchell at (703) 276-3266 or pmitchell@hastingsgroup.com“[5]. So we now know the name of our PR contact–Patrick Mitchell–and we also know that his PR firm handles a rather diverse portfolio of clients ranging from doomsday clocks to ExxonMobile shareholders.
Most of the other indexed pages are incomplete and many contain the following bizarre boiler plate text: “If the inverting-core acceptor deflects the complex chronotron-feedback analysis, try to provoke a coil-composition reflex and several quantum biosphere resonances, this will create a restricted isovolumic cochrane graviton-prediction, which ought to in fact dampen the polarizing maintenance-filament formulas…”[6].
The only available executive bio on the hastingsgroup.com site is for a Senior Partner called Scott Edward Stapf: “As a founder of The Hastings Group, Stapf has helped more than 100 clients define and then realize their Web and non-Web communications needs since 1990. Stapf is an advocate of the aggressive use of cutting-edge Web applications…as means by which to significantly advance the membership services, public relations and other communications objectives of nonprofit and for-profit organizations. Stapf is a former journalist and also served as the director of communications for two national trade associations.”[7]
A quick Google search on Stapf reveals that he was once an aggressive lobbyist for Big Tobacco companies. A 1986 Washington Post article stated that he “rarely misses a chance to compare the current assault on smoking with Prohibition, and he has a Tobacco Institute researcher combing the National Archives for old footage of prudish, Bible-thumping Prohibitionists (‘real loonies’, says the researcher).”[8] However, Stapf appears to have mellowed out in recent years. For example, another Google hit is a 2007 article from “Executive Travel Magazine” where Stapf shares certain “precious moments [that] he steals for himself” at high-end Washington, DC beauty salons. The article argues that beauty spas are no longer “froufrou” but are in-fact becoming more manly and “testosterone-charged” by offering certain “no-froufrou” services such as “hand treatments for computer/BlackBerry overuse.”[9]
Wow… okay. Let’s recap:
So far we’ve learned that the doomsday clock is presently being spun and promoted by a PR/lobbying firm that was founded by a high powered lobbyist named Scott Stapf. During the 1980s, Mr. Stapf was an aggressive pro-smoking lobbyist working on behalf of Big Tobacco firms where he (among other things) accused the American Lung Association of “academic goon squad tactics”. His current PR/lobbying firm, The Hastings Group, represents and promotes the interests of valued ExxonMobile shareholders as well as those of the Rockefeller family and other valued clientele. In his spare time, Mr. Stapf enjoys hanging out at five-star beauty salons where he likes to get “a massage, full facial, manicure, pedicure and [a] seven towel shave” in order to enhance his masculinity in a non-froufrou manner.
As Spock would say: “Fascinating! But where’s the money?”
Another Google hit reveals that Mr. Stapf’s name and firm (The Hastings Group) is suspiciously mentioned in a slick 2007 doomsday clock marketing brochure (A MUST SEE —> [10]) that is presently archived on a web site called agoodmanonline.com[10]. This site is owned by Andy Goodman whose bio states that: “In 2007, Al Gore selected Andy to train one thousand volunteers who are currently helping the former Vice President engage more Americans in the fight against global warming. In 2008, Andy co-founded The Goodman Center to offer online versions of his workshops and additional communications and marketing classes to nonprofits, foundations, government agencies and educational institutions across the U.S. and worldwide.” Another high level staffer at the organization is Terrence McNally, a Harvard graduate with extensive ties to left wing media outlets and personalities. Other staffers include Colin Rowan and Lori Matsumoto who together have connections with the Environmental Defense Fund, Al Gore, and Silicon Valley tech firms[11].
I suspect that The Goodman Center is simply a front group for larger left-wing activist organizations, Gore cronies, and left-leaning foundations who use the group to funnel money into things like the doomsday clock campaign. However, that’s just speculation. There is a wealth of information out there for anyone who is interested and wants to explore these connections further. At this point I’m tired and need a manicure.
1. http://www.thebulletin.org/content/about-us/purpose
2. http://www.hastingsgroup.com/
3. http://tinyurl.com/yayqrps
4. http://tinyurl.com/yg7dbbr
5. http://www.hastingsgroup.com/rockefellerfamily/
6. http://www.hastingsgroup.com/pr/index.cfm
7. http://tinyurl.com/yfaag3v
8. http://tinyurl.com/yas3tfx
9. http://tinyurl.com/yemtaaw
10. http://www.agoodmanonline.com/pdf/free_range_2007_04.pdf
11. http://www.agoodmanonline.com/about/index.html
There is something extremely distasteful about this childish expression of meaningless claptrap.
Consider Haiti, where, in the immediate aftermath of an apocalyptic earthquake, a young woman could be heard crying out in terror – “it’s the end of the world – the end of the world”, as the dust cloud rose over stricken Port Au Prince and the aftershocks exacerbated the real and present roll call of death.
And in a move that makes one proud to be British, Gordon Brown, whose well documented £1.5 billion largesse at Copenhagen, gifted to save the world from CO2, has sent on our behalf the princely sum of £6 million in aid to the people of Haiti.
Left wing compassion? Well, what do you think!
Isn’t it about time for Steven Schneider to switch back to Ice Age scare again?
People with fear mongering want folks to drink the coolaid and jump on the band wagon. Anxiety disorders are easy to nurture.
The agenda for the greenie weenies is to provoke massive fear and hold out their hand for massive money and then they will save the planet.
Should we load them up and have Branson fly them to a planet far away for a pilot project?
What can we say? People are stupid. yawn…..
They make a mockery of science, and scientists.
coniston (03:17:52) :
Perhaps the clock is being moved because of the developments in Iran’s nuclear program.
************************************************
I thought the world’s only remaining Atomic Scientists were Iranian, or North Korean.
Are they forecasting the end of the “Hollywood Science”, based on belief and not on experimental testing?
Perhaps it should be renamed the “End of Freedom Clock”.
Several tens of thousands of years ago a huge volcanic eruption devasted SE Asia and may have reduce the human population to as little as 10,000 (world wide). Let’s don’t forget that. Does that also fall under climate change?
Who owns this clock? Salvador Dali, I presume?
Bulletin of Atomic Scientists:
Rag for the “Union of Concerned Scientists”.
A rabidly anti-nuclear power group, headed (at one time) by a Henry Kendahl.
Kendahl does have a Nobel Prize in Physics, for his work in “Quarks”. Perhaps the SINGLE MOST political NP in the sciences. Awarded by the Lefty Loonies in Norway to BOLSTER his “credibility” as the head of the UCS.
It should be noted, however, that in the ’80’s a survey of 1800 people randomly choosen from the “Who’s Who of American Men and Women of Science”, showed not only 90% support for Nuclear Power, but also had ONE affirmative response indicating actual membership in the UCS. It was done by “Opinion” magazine. They said that statistically the implication was that less than 300 of the 180,000 people listed in the “Who’s Who” would be members of the UCS.
UCS claims 40,000 “qualified” members. Since they have steadfastly refused to provide a list of their membership, and since I’ve had some friends who have sent in the yearly fee, identified themselves as BOTH with science credentials and WITHOUT and been “accepted” as members, their claims of any merit for the membership are NUL and VOID.
They are purely a Leftist propaganda group.
Max
It would be interesting to know all the involved people. As this clock move it is closely related to the general scaring plan, so dig and find….
Just a reminder –
When the clock hits midnight, a new day begins.
This whole spectacle is irrelevant and nobody I know could care less.
Daniel H (06:09:22) : From your link #10:
No less a personage than Albert Einstein helped found the Board of Sponsors
That explains a lot!. his “theory” included. Wow!
I thought it was called the “Atomic Doomsday Clock” for a reason. What does “Atomic” have to do with “Climate”? Are we now going to further change Global Warming into “Atomic-Climate Change” ?
Doomsday, shmoomsday….
Let me guess the time keeper is East Anglia University …
We’re having a doomsday clock changing party – with lots of fireworks ready to let off.
The excitement is too much!
Wait, wait!, stop the presses!, here it is the “Science-Gate”:
Daniel H (06:09:22) :
1. http://www.thebulletin.org/content/about-us/purpose
2. http://www.hastingsgroup.com/
3. http://tinyurl.com/yayqrps
4. http://tinyurl.com/yg7dbbr
5. http://www.hastingsgroup.com/rockefellerfamily/
6. http://www.hastingsgroup.com/pr/index.cfm
7. http://tinyurl.com/yfaag3v
8. http://tinyurl.com/yas3tfx
9. http://tinyurl.com/yemtaaw
10. http://www.agoodmanonline.com/pdf/free_range_2007_04.pdf
11. http://www.agoodmanonline.com/about/index.html
They haven’t told anyone, but the clock has been going backwards since the ’60’s.
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/files/2010/01/beertime.jpg
If the world does not end 4 minutes or 5 minutes after the clock is set. The hypothesis that this clock means anything will have been falsified and no one should pay any attention to it. After all it has been wrong for 62 years already.
Another example of issue creep.
It’s a STOPPED clock. Shows the right time twice a day.
Five to midnight
Five to midday……..oops.
john
“And finally,” said Max, quieting the audience down and putting on his solemn face, “finally I believe we have with us here tonight, a party of believers, very devout believers, from the Church of the Second Coming of the Great Prophet Zarquon.” There were about twenty of them, sitting right out on the edge of the floor, ascetically dressed, sipping mineral water nervously and staying apart from the festivities. They blinked resentfully as the spotlight was turned on them. “There they are,” said Max, “sitting there, patiently. He said he’d come again, and he’s kept you waiting a long time, so let’s hope he’s hurrying fellas, because he’s only got eight minutes left!””
tallbloke (03:31:26) :
Stanford sent 65 Sixty Five !! delegates to COP15 […]
Leif might be able to tell us more, his office is just across the road from the Woods Institute building on the Stanford campus.
They didn’t send me 🙁
I love caviar, so should have been qualified.
Cheers! I’ll drink to that!
/Mr Lynn
Doug in Seattle (06:57:12) :
Another example of issue creep.
Issued by creeps?
Leif Svalgaard (06:59:11) :
tallbloke (03:31:26) :
Stanford sent 65 Sixty Five !! delegates to COP15 […]
Leif might be able to tell us more, his office is just across the road from the Woods Institute building on the Stanford campus.
They didn’t send me 🙁
I love caviar, so should have been qualified.
Shame on them Leif. And they didn’t even bring you back a goody bag.
Mind you, the ‘bad apples’ would have turned the caviar sour anyway. 😉
Apparently the clock has moved back to 6 minutes to midnight…although we have to worry about the rapidly melting polar ice caps??
Hehe…
On the live broadcast he said a minute ago: “The doomsday clock is one of the worlds most famous symbols!”
Moved it back 1 minute–maybe they did watch Jokenhagen.
Once it goes past midnight it will be a whole new day. Looking forward to it, I might find my car keys.
These are Atomic Scientists not Climatologists, I have it on high authority (Real Climate) that this makes them unqualified to move the clock based on climate issues.
Michael Mann has his own version of the clock:
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/files/2010/01/manns-doomsday1.jpg
The dude who spent a lot of time during his 5 minute speech to talk about Climategate was funny. He said over and over again that Climategate has made the AGW-camps arguments even stronger!
From Daniel H links:
Bringing climate change into global governance
http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/features/bringing-climate-change-global-governance
a new high in farce?
or a new low in IQ.
everytime I think they reach the peak of stupid…they amaze me with a new effort
I don’t know why the administration doesn’t take advantage of situations like this? I hope for the benefit of all the citizens of the world that there is plenty of money in the stimulus package to totally revamp and technologically update our doomsday clock. As an American, I’m embarrassed that our doomsday clock isn’t at least digital. I’m sure doomsday clocks in Europe and Japan are much more sophisticated and highly advanced! Why shouldn’t we know the EXACT time before doomsday? It’s important, especially for schoolchildren to know if we have 5 seconds or only 4.99987 seconds left! I feel this is an important project for our country. We could even power the new clock with solar or wind energy! Think of how many jobs in China we could create!!
cop15 helped, they moved it back!
Britain on course for coldest January for 37 years
January is on course to be the coldest for 37 years after temperatures in the first week of the month averaged minus 2.1 degrees (28F).
Today I’m guessing they’ll mention Copenhagen’s failure and list climate change as the next global threat and set it to 4 minutes to midnight. Or…maybe 3,
It exact time would of course be relative to the velocity of the observer.
I really don’t see the relationship between time warps/space and climate change. As they can’t develop any arguments that aren’t open to straightforward refutation, they are reduced to red herrings.
I don’t think the MAYAN calendar deals with planetary destruction; but perhaps a spiritual and truthful awakening (which is happening more and more), or it deals with our entry into another part of our galaxy.
Who knows? If the earth’s axis really moves like we’ve never experienced–if this is possible–then we’ll see and have to deal with the consequences of living on a planet in a solar system, in a galaxy, in a universe, in a…
Can someone explain to me why the media keep turning up to, and reporting on, these non-events?
john
” Dodgy Geezer (04:47:08) :
@Bill Tuttle
“Geez, I didn’t know the Giant Clock O’ Doom was still around….”
And there, in a nutshell, you have the reason for this little phobia-fest……”
I was working in the Hanford area as a contract pilot in the 1970’s-early 80’s.
Knew a lot of DOD folks,mainly scientists and engineers.One fellow I knew WW2 vet- spent most of his time in the Navy in the cockpit of an SBD-5 divebomber, busting Japanese Capitol ships.He was on the USS Enterprise in Tokyo bay. He held that
the UOCS is made up of::”Mostly academics who, never have had anyone try to kill them,who think that if America disarms,there will be no more war.-That is why I call it the :Crock of Doom.” What happens when Iran gets the Bomb? Are they “Concerned” enough to move that hand to three minutes? Or is the source of funding
more important?
Who’s the guy sitting next to Krauss?
P Wilson (07:42:08) :
I really don’t see the relationship between time warps/space and climate change.
Don’t you see it? Dig into the links given by David H, above.
“World governance” among these relationships.
I believe the University failed to reset the clock to standard time. Phew! Dodged a bullet there!
The Mayan calendar does NOT predict any apocalypse. It simply ends. Period. I really can’t believe people think there is anything to this…
*yawns loudly*
… did somebody say something about a clock… ?
*smacks lips*
… I need a cup of coffee…
*rubs eyes*
*yawn*
… oh nevermind…
… back to sleep I go…
… wake me when it’s over
So CO2 has finally reached status of a WMD?
I am scared to death. How ridiculous this is.
Mod: Understand snip, last was too too.
_______________
This “Atomic Doomsday Clock” show has the same significance as the One and Only Groundhog Day celebration held in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. I think the folks in Pennsylvania have a far better and more entertaining farce.
My God, that doomsday presentation was the most boring live meeting I’ve sat through since my workplace threw a two hour seminar on the impact of Sarbanes-Oxley on our programming documentation standards.
If those “Atomic Scientists” were smart they would have invited the Governator in full T2 attire along with Nancy Pelosi (as Sarah Connor) to rave about SkyNet and the end of the world. Now that would have been stimulating!
Such doom and gloom…
Rejoice humankind, the hand of fate was actually moved 1 minute further away from the apocalypse, due to Obama being in the White House and being such a nice guy so people don’t hate us anymore (quite as much).
Except the Malthusians. They still hate us all.
The maddening search for plausible excuses to “intervene anthropogenically” to save the Climate from catastrophic warming moves the clock forward.
Progressively escalating the level of alarm has led to the proliferation of proposed ‘cures’ worse than the disease.
Think about it.
Environmentally destructive measures are tendered to save the planet.
Sucking out the C02 that is a building block of life.
Blowing volcanoes that can cause “nuclear winter” conditions and fallout.
Injecting S02 or sulphur compounds to block sunlight causes acid rain that fouls ecosystems.
Shutting down the modern energy system that is needed to adapt to colder climactic conditions.
This movement is building an eco-weapon and creating the paranoia to deploy/employ it.
EWMD=Eco Weapon of Mass Destruction
I’d always wondered what an atomic clock looked like. I have to say it’s something of a disappointment.
“And now,” cried Max from the centre of the stage, “the moment you’ve all been waiting for!” He flung his arms into the air. Behind him, the band went into a frenzy of percussion and rolling synthochords. Max had argued with them about this but they had claimed it was in their contract that that’s what they would do. His agent would have to sort it out.
“The skies begin to boil!” he cried. “Nature collapses into the screaming void! In twenty seconds’ time, the Universe itself will be at an end! See where the light of infinity bursts in upon us!”
The hideous fury of destruction blazed about them – and at that moment a still small trumpet sounded as from an infinite distance. Max’s eyes swiveled round to glare at the band. None of them seemed to be playing a trumpet. Suddenly a wisp of smoke was swirling and shimmering on the stage next to him. The trumpet was joined by more trumpets. Over five hundred times Max had done this show, and nothing like this had ever happened before. He drew back in alarm from the swirling smoke, and as he did so, a figure slowly materialized inside, the figure of an ancient man, bearded, robed and wreathed in light. In his eyes were stars and on his brow a golden crown.
“What’s this?” whispered Max, wild-eyed, “what’s happening?”
At the back of the Restaurant the stony-faced party from the Church of the Second Coming of the Great Prophet Zarquon leapt ecstatically to their feet chanting and crying.
Max blinked in amazement. He threw up his arms to the audience.
“A big hand please, ladies and gentlemen,” he hollered, “for the Great Prophet Zarquon! He has come! Zarquon has come again!”
Thunderous applause broke out as Max strode across the stage and handed his microphone to the Prophet.
Zarquon coughed. He peered round at the assembled gathering. The stars in his eyes blinked uneasily. He handled the microphone with confusion.
“Er …” he said, “hello. Er, look, I’m sorry I’m a bit late. I’ve had the most ghastly time, all sorts of things cropping up at the last moment.”
He seemed nervous of the expectant awed hush. He cleared his throat.
“Er, how are we for time?” he said, “have I just got a min-”
And so the Universe ended.
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/doomsday-clock-moves-one-minute-away-from-midnight-81498342.html
This is the link: “it’s hopeychangemas!!” for the UOSC….
The website http://www.green-agenda.com is up at the moment, and the second quote is from Prof. Schneider:
“We need to get some broad based support,
to capture the public’s imagination…
So we have to offer up scary scenarios,
make simplified, dramatic statements
and make little mention of any doubts…
Each of us has to decide what the right balance
is between being effective and being honest.”
– Prof. Stephen Schneider,
Stanford Professor of Climatology,
lead author of many IPCC reports
But, to see the real political motivations, you have to scroll down about 40% to reach comments such as:
“The goal now is a socialist, redistributionist society,
which is nature’s proper steward and society’s only hope.”
– David Brower,
founder of Friends of the Earth
EcoChondria : Excessive Fear of the Climate. Leads to an inverted perception of climactic conditions where warming is bad and cooling is good. A powerful delusion wherein 20,000 years of instinct that tells us, from inherited experience, that the opposite is true, is overridden by hysterical imaginations.
Again .. the politics of fear
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
LOL, Janice! That’s been my favorite end-of-all-things story for a long time now!!!
Maybe Zarquon is Schneider’s future incarnation….
Jeff Alberts (07:58:32) :
The Mayan calendar does NOT predict any apocalypse. It simply ends. Period. I really can’t believe people think there is anything to this…
The Mayan calendar is cyclic. It doesn’t end, it just reaches the end of the long count and starts the next one. What is remarkable about the Mayan calendar is that it seems to be based on very long planetary motion cycles.
@ tallbloke –
That Manns-Doom-clock of yours is a gem!
Nearly fell of my perch, laughing.
Those guys’s goal is the following:
To equalize the economies of rich and poor nations, he proposed that funds from nations with trade surpluses would be confiscated by an international bank (or clearing house) and transferred to poorer nations whose goods had been exported at low prices
http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/features/bringing-climate-change-global-governance
Surprise! I just read they moved it a minute back, to 6 min to midnight! Yeah, Iran about to go nuclear, that’s an encouraging sign! But on the other hand, so much progress was made at COP15!
‘……The decision by the BAS Science and Security Board was made in consultation with the Bulletin’s Board of Sponsors, which includes 19 Nobel Laureates…..because…..’……industrialized and developing countries alike are pledging to limit climate-changing gas emissions that could render our planet nearly uninhabitable…….’
Are these Muppets (sorry, Nobel Laureates) completely unaware of Climategate……or is that the REAL reason they have moved the clock back?
Now, we know, thanks to “Climate Gate”, that beginning in 1945 their profound preocupation was really another: Global Governance. Now they propose a II Brenton Woods, etc,etc.
Interesting times we are living in, when mud idols tumble down, science “gods” knowingly or naively conspiring to control world finances.
” Logan (08:16:22) :
“The goal now is a socialist, redistributionist society,
which is nature’s proper steward and society’s only hope.”
– David Brower,
founder of Friends of the Earth”
”
I love this one. Remembering the pollution caused by the GDR’s lignite power plants and their stinking two-stroke motors (Trabant). Yeah, socialism will help… sure. Help you to an early grave.
JonesII (08:30:21) :
“Those guys’s goal is the following:
‘To equalize the economies of rich and poor nations,..'”
_________________
Purity is a rare phenomena in nature and in people. Science for the sake of science is a very expensive endeavor. Patrons with ulterior motives are required to make any progress in the arts or the sciences. The artist and the scientist are merely the human means to the political and/or financial ends. There is more of the political and financial in AGW than the scientific.
The whole thing is incredibly stupid.
It’s not as if they are up on any of the strategy, tactics, history, politics, or any of that boring old stuff.
I remember the mass die-ins in 1984 over the Euromissile crisis. It was 4 minutes until midnight then. (It’s not as if one in a hundred people who even heard about that actually understood even the most basic issues involved.)
Mayan Stonecarver to Mayan astrologer: “Hey, I got to 2012 and I ran outta room on this thing.”
Mayan astrologer: “Well, that’s gonna freak some people out in a few centuries.”
Who watches the watchmen ?
As Marvel Comics once put it, since (in the Marvel Universe) there is an infinity of realities, there are Watchers watching Watchers watching Watchers . . . (be vewy, vewy quiet — I’m watching wabbits).
Pascvaks (09:07:35) : And to our naive consciousness: Names go from Einstein to Schneider…
No less a personage than Albert Einstein helped found the Board of Sponsors
http://www.agoodmanonline.com/pdf/free_range_2007_04.pdf
Again WUWT has touched a most “sensitive corn” and it is revealing a common origin. Wow!
Got to buy more popcorn!
It’s the only stopped clock that is never right.
24 hours before all the MSM headlines WUWT debunked it for their readers. Thanks a lot!. The rest of the world will blindfully believe the tale and get scared about it.
“coniston (03:17:52) :
Perhaps the clock is being moved because of the developments in Iran’s nuclear program.”
Or North Korea’s, or Pakistan’s, or India’s.
It’ll be interesting to see which of the nuclear or the climate change elements score the most strongly………
I can’t wait, it’s too exciting!
Pascvaks (09:07:35) :
Science for the sake of science is a very expensive endeavor
When it is about fusion, black holes, entangled strings, phantom dark matter, unseen AH1N1 viruses and all thing they wanted us to believe in, but with time we’ll learn that it is not that expensive…
Some serious credentials on that committee: more than a dozen Nobel Laureates. If only we on the skeptical side could come up with just one.
Or even one scientific organization.
Unfortunately, we can’t so we’ll have to make do with right-wing think tanks like the Heartland Foundation, and eccentric old codgers like Chimp Monckton.
Hickory dickory dock.
John Hooper (10:00:12) :
Some serious credentials on that committee: more than a dozen Nobel Laureates
Credentials like Al “Baby”‘s?
tallbloke (07:23:27) :
Michael Mann’s version of the clock – LOL!!
But… wouldn’t it still show 4 minutes to 12 (it would ‘hide the decline’)?
Don’t feel bad. Apparently these are the same kind of guys who awarded Obama the Nobel Peace prize. SERIOUS HopenChange Kool-Aid drinkers. Who knew?
Their statement is in clear denial that – despite all the “talking”, and good intentions – no new agreements of any substance have been made in recent years. If anything, suicidal fundamentalists muslims are getting REALLY close to having the bomb, which would almost certainly result in the first nuclear attack in over 60 years. These guys are not living in the real world.
What I didn’t realize, though, is that global nuclear war now has a couple of anti-advancement sacred cows riding shogun with this silly “clock” thing (and it always WAS silly). I must be old fashioned, ’cause it used to be that the threat of all-out nuclear war was plenty enough to worry about, it it’s own right. I guess the climate guys aren’t alone with their alarmism.
From Daniel H 11th. link (Something to learn)
“Storytelling as Best Practice”
For thousands of years, human beings have relied on stories to capture and convey important information. Quite naturally, we have evolved into a species that is biologically and culturally oriented towards storytelling. Modern technology has given us shiny new tools with which to communicate – from PowerPoint to the Internet – and in our fervor to remain “cutting edge” we often ignore our natural inclinations in favor of pie charts and bar graphs, reams of data and mountains of text.
The fact remains: if your goal is to educate, persuade, or simply connect in a meaningful way with a particular audience, storytelling is the single most powerful communications tool available to you
Now you know where those stories end: At WUWT
Groundhog Day was better.
“They” will succeed in killing us but from laughing. All their paraphernalia has become a collosal joke. Just imagine: J.H. trains filled up with laughing to death sceptics!!
Roger Knights’ “Hickory dickory dock” just trashed that clock in a black hole!!!
(Roger Knights (10:11:02)
First thought: What happens at midnight? The Earth turns into a pumpkin?
Second thought: At midnight, just hit “snooze”. Presto! Another 10 minutes!
Third thought: How do I tie my work deadlines to this clock?
John Hooper (10:00:12) :
Some serious credentials on that committee: more than a dozen Nobel Laureates. If only we on the skeptical side could come up with just one.
How about the president of the World Federation of Scientists. Beats deadbeat fantasy film makers any day of the week.
Professor Antonino Zichichi
“IPCC models are incoherent and invalid from a scientific point of view”
http://uddebatt.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/ipcc-models-are-incoherent-and-invalid-from-a-scientific-point-of-view/
There’s no question the Nobel Prize is the highest honor you can get in Physics Chemistry, Medicine, Literature, Peace and Economics.
I’m afraid any attempt to denigrate the Peace Prize by using Al Gore as an illustration really only has the opposite effect of demonstrating how successfully he has delivered his message. There was barely any outcry over it, compared to say Obama or Arafat, who were much more controversial.
And once again, I draw attention to the fact that he has every government, every climate monitoring bureau, every scientific organization, every scientific journal and probably just about every Nobel Laureate on his team. And then of course, there’s NASA, who hire some pretty smart people I’m told.
So before we get smug and snide, who do we have again?
You would think on their own webpage, and their own announcement, they would get the address correct….turnBLACKtheclock??? It’s correct at the bottom, but the first mention and hyperlink is wrong….wonder if it was peer reviewed?
Good Lord, the Daily Mail (UK) headlines attribute the one minute reversal as being due to Obama! How stupid can you be?!
John Hooper (10:00:12) :
Aside from the fact that Monckton [that’s LORD Monckton to Hooper, who attacks him with baseless ad hominem name calling] has forgotten more honest science than Hooper will ever learn, it’s interesting that name calling is the best argument he’s got. It must really drive the Hoopers of the world nuts that Lord Monckton effortlessly rubbed Gavin Schmidt’s nose in the playground sand in their debate.
Hooper can spout his trolling nonsense here because he’s not censored. And speaking of chimps, when a scientific skeptic [the only honest kind of scientist, which eliminates everyone on the alarmist side] tries to post on wacko propaganda blogs like climateprogress, realclimate, tamino, etc., the honest folks get this response: click
I give Hooper three and a half Harrops for his baseless ad-hom name-calling. Come to think of it, maybe Hooper is Harrop.
So scientists move back time due to inactivity over climate change.
Lets have a bit more inactivity then and see if we can get to half past the hour, that might just coincide with the end of this cooling period.
Job sorted, cost zero, next problem.
Hooper: What makes a Nobel so special? Gore got one, so did choo-choo Pachauri and Obama for all their outstanding achievements. Seems the prize is rather tainted and is better off being filled with chocolate.
What the clock really represents:
The ratio of fabrication to truth.
They diluted thier own data so badly they forgot what was going on.
That is why thier winter forecast was inverted.
Cry if you will….it’s over buddy!…many a believer end receiving a kick back on their ….☺
Some serious credentials on that committee: more than a dozen Nobel Laureates. If only we on the skeptical side could come up with just one.
Or even one scientific organization.
Hmmm . . . I can’t recall even one “qualified” Nobel laureate or one scientific organization that thought we were not going to be out of nearly all important resources (including food) by the year 2000. Or that population would not have hit a J-curve. (It was all put paid by a man with a BS in physics and no formal economic or demographic training whatever.)
As for predicting the future, it appears obvious that we should carefully seek out the opinions of Nobel laureates and scientific organizations — and assume the opposite. At least if past experience has any meaning at all.
I am in wholehearted agreement with Nobel prize=clock=BS type comments.
Fear stoking.
They set the fire, they put fuel on it and now they’re desperately stoking it (piling on the fear) to keep it going.
If that doesn’t work they’ll put fuel on some other fire to take our minds off this one.
Meanwhile, the guys at the top rake in the cash and get to further their (globalist, unelected) agendas. Excellent for them!
I think they think they can just do whatever the hell they like. They think they can tell us out and out b*llsh*t lies and we’ll go along with it all.
And I think they’re going to try and stick to their lies.
“If those “Atomic Scientists” were smart they would have invited the Governator in full T2 attire along with Nancy Pelosi (as Sarah Connor) to rave about SkyNet and the end of the world. Now that would have been stimulating!”
Thank you SO much for that . . . now I can’t get the image of Nancy Pelosi in a tank top and tight jeans out of my mind. The goggles, they do nothing!!!
John Hooper (10:00:12) :… If only we on the skeptical side could come up with just one [nobbled laureate]. Unfortunately, we … have to make do with … eccentric old codgers like Chimp Monckton.
I object to your use of “we”. You do not speak for me. You don’t speak like a skeptic. That needs evidence. Evidence needs science quoted. Something that Monckton does superbly. It also needs encouragement to test evidence and believe nothing. Again, something that Monckton does superbly. Just watch him talking to the Norwegian warmist in Croakenhagen.
” Sean Peake (12:29:47) :
Hooper: What makes a Nobel so special? Gore got one, so did choo-choo Pachauri and Obama for all their outstanding achievements. Seems the prize is rather tainted and is better off being filled with chocolate.”
If there’s a more prestigious scientific award – let’s ignore the peace prize for arguments sake- what is it? We have to acknowledge the fire power on the other side is awesome. To pretend otherwise really is being a being a denialist.
But really, my point is, yes Al has all the firepower on his side, so who do we have that’s good enough to bring them over to our way of thinking?
Do we have any Nobel Laureates? Or if you’d prefer recipients of some other scientific prize you value more highly?
“Smokey (12:21:18) :
Aside from the fact that Moncktion [that’s LORD Monckton to anyone who attacks him with an ad hominem comment, because he’s a better man than Hooper] has forgotten more honest science than a Hooper will ever learn”
Okay so we have an eccentric lord, who’s doing a fine job of getting his head around a few of our stronger talking points. But really, we can’t kid ourselves, this is how he’s seen outside the tabloids:
http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/01/12/hamilton-viscount-monckton-of-benchleys-over-egged-cv/
We all love him. He’s our Michael Moore. But we need a whole string of people a heck of a lot more credible than Chris if we’re going to win over the broadsheet media to our way of thinking.
Whether your like or not.
“evanmjones (12:55:22) :
As for predicting the future, it appears obvious that we should carefully seek out the opinions of Nobel laureates and scientific organizations — and assume the opposite. At least if past experience has any meaning at all.”
No, we have to change their minds. Big difference.
Chris Monctkon isn’t going to do that any more than Michael Moore was going to convince Republican voters that George Bush was lying about WMDs.
John Hooper (13:11:58) It’s over buddy! and it’s your fate, you just believed them. Ok. they gave you some bucks to live, but believe me, they will abandon you, if you are lucky enough…ya know how maffia works. Is somebody knocking at your door already? ☺
Now, let’s see.
This clock goes forwards, then backwards, then stays still between presentations.
I always knew these wonks didn’t understand thermodynamics.
Church used to scare with HELL…now these guys are trying to scare us with a funny clock…..no words, they will kill us all by laughing!
They don’t even realize they have a pendulum hanging over their heads, and, believe me, they are indeed in a pit!
Like all alarmist theories, the setting of the clock is an arbitrary deal… whatever “seems right.” When the real D Day comes there won’t be enough warning to set anything.
No, we have to change their minds. Big difference.
True enough. But “recent events” (heh! heh!) have made it possible to look at both sides of the issue in public. That alone makes it possible for the arguments of either side to stand or fall on their merits.
Chris Monctkon isn’t going to do that any more than Michael Moore was going to convince Republican voters that George Bush was lying about WMDs.
Bush admitted he was wrong about WMDs, the first time I ever heard a president owning up to an error of that kind. But that’s beside the point.
Consider that Monckton has had a fair amount of hands-on formal debate on the subject. He has always swung the crowd in his direction, at least moreso than it was at start. That demonstrates his ability to convince the undecided, if not so much the heavily committed.
You may not cotton to his style, but that is not to say he is ineffective. Michael Moore, OTOH, plays mainly to his own crowd and does not appear able to convince those “in the middle”.
Oh happy day! We got an extra minute!! I am going to celebrate by setting off these fireworks with this big, shiny, red button!!!
“Lucy Skywalker (13:11:25) :
John Hooper (10:00:12) :… If only we on the skeptical side could come up with just one [nobbled laureate]. Unfortunately, we … have to make do with … eccentric old codgers like Chimp Monckton.
I object to your use of “we”. You do not speak for me. You don’t speak like a skeptic. That needs evidence. Evidence needs science quoted. ”
Oh I’m a skeptic alright. But I’m not just skeptical of the Global Warming lobby, I’m skeptical of the opportunistic witch trial assembling in these forums. Vis a vis the misleading piece on Australia’s Kevin Rudd yesterday.
Anthony knew fully well that story had very little to do either Kevin Rudd or Climate Change, but used at it as a political opportunity to “pile on.” I’m not defending Rudd’s position – I can’t stand the man – but this story was misleading and in my mind completely undermines Anthony’s integrity.
It reminded me of Baghdad Bob declaring victory as we watched US forces secure the airport. Sometimes you do better to say nothing at all.
Our only advantage in this debate is to hold the higher moral ground. Once we lose that, we lose it all. Google tobacco and climate denial and see how backing the wrong horse in the face of scientific opposition works out for your credibility.
If you blindly side with everything that opposes the so-called consensus just because you find it convenient, then you are no more scientific than the worst of the scaremongers.
So, forgive me for not toeing the line here. We might indeed turn out to be right in the long run, but right now our troops are weaker than theirs, particular at the front of house. It’s easy to understand why a team of Nobel Science Laureates might have more credibility than an eccentric English Lord with a BA in literature and a diploma in journalism.
And denying it only makes us look deluded.
“evanmjones (14:19:05) :
You may not cotton to his style, but that is not to say he is ineffective. Michael Moore, OTOH, plays mainly to his own crowd and does not appear able to convince those “in the middle”.”
Oh I do agree he can be effective. And I do think we’ll soon see governments fall for supporting AGW, just as we saw an enormous political backlash against those who supported the Iraq War. But in both cases the underlying issue will not go away.
The electoral majority can be sold any cock and bull if you keep it simple and emotive.
At the moment we seem to be floating the theory that there’s a massive conspiracy involving every scientific body in the world, that’s managed to either corrupt the scientific community at large or fool them somehow. A conspiracy that’s obvious to laypeople in these forums, but beyond the comprehension of Nobel Science Laureates.
We must not overestimate our progress in this campaign.
To John Hooper
The wonderful thing about science is that it explicitly does not use your logically facile argument of “appeal to authority”. Authority is central to subjective studies such as religion. However, a simple scientific experiment can bowl over an entire century’s worth of Nobel Laureates.
The results of the actual measurement of the Earth’s climate itself stands testament to the failure of the CO2 models, no matter how many Nobel Laureates may claim otherwise.
Salvador Dali Clock;
http://www.artknowledgenews.com/files2009b/Salvador_Dali_Clock.jpg
“Cadae (14:55:32) :
To John Hooper
The wonderful thing about science is that it explicitly does not use your logically facile argument of “appeal to authority”. Authority is central to subjective studies such as religion. However, a simple scientific experiment can bowl over an entire century’s worth of Nobel Laureates.
The results of the actual measurement of the Earth’s climate itself stands testament to the failure of the CO2 models, no matter how many Nobel Laureates may claim otherwise.”
That sounds very nice. But if we’re so quick to dismiss every scientific institution in the world, and all the science behind them, including the one that put man on the moon, why should anyone believe the small handful of lesser credentialed “scientists” we put forward?
The clock may be closer to midnight but most likely due to the US using NATO to ring fence Russia by getting bordering countries to join NATO, and siting ABM systems close to Russia. If Russia feels it is about to lose the ability to nuclear retaliation it may be forced in to a first strike.
Imagine if Canada and Mexico joined a Russian military alliance, and Russia sited ABMs in Canada and Venezuela! Remember the fuss over Cuba!
To me, usually if something is valid then it should also be valid if the situation is reversed.
Note that I am in no way supporting Russia, I am just someone concerned for my own skin!
Cadae (14:55:32) :
To John Hooper
The wonderful thing about science is that it explicitly does not use your logically facile argument of “appeal to authority”. Authority is central to subjective studies such as religion. However, a simple scientific experiment can bowl over an entire century’s worth of Nobel Laureates
Hey John Hooper, do you have any simple scientific experiment to prove your ideas?, you don´t and you know it. Believing it is not the positive method of science, you should revisit JA Marie Comte.
John Hooper (15:42:55) :
“Cadae (14:55:32)
That sounds very nice. But if we’re so quick to dismiss every scientific institution in the world, and all the science behind them, including the one that put man on the moon, why should anyone believe the small handful of lesser credentialed “scientists” we put forward?
Superb question, Mr Hooper!
I’ll attempt an answer but I’ll not be surprised when you shoot me down in flames. That won’t stop me trying though.
I think that ten, or so, years ago the case for AGW was very strong. The science and the data were very much in step. The politicians then came on board and, with their support, so did the money.
Not a bad thing, by itself, but it did skew the stage IMO.
Funding is Fun. If you’re getting it, of course. Otherwise it’s pants!
The Earth, and its climate so I’ve been informed, is v complex. I’ve also been told that Climate falls into a sub-category of complexity that can be predicted exactly to a Zip or Post code fifty years hence!
The data, continual warming following a temperature multiple-decadal slump, has recanted somewhat, recently.
My informants are Humans; not that different from those who jostle to the bar at any Scientific convention wanting a drink.
They pay in cash!
Freeman Dyson has serious credentials.
I notice John Hooper avoided addressing my point that we have the President of the World Federation of Scientists on our side. One of the most eminent physicists alive today.
Gore? Don’t make me laugh.
To put John Hooper’s appeals to authority in perspective, they’re like singing the praises of Bernie Madoff, who was Chairman of the Board of the NASD, gave enormous amounts of money to charity, and heavily funded the Democrat Party. Very impressive. What does it matter if he was a little dishonest? He still had all those credentials.
The same logic goes for the AGW “consensus.” What does it matter if Hooper’s authorities run away from any honest debate, or the fact that they’re given big bucks if they blame natural climate fluctuations on human activity?
Hooper says, “why should anyone believe the small handful of lesser credentialed “scientists”?
Indeed, why should we? There is no climatologist more eminent than the internationally esteemed Prof Richard Lindzen, who Chairs the Atmospheric Sciences department at M.I.T. By Hooper’s own brand of “logic,” Lindzen should have the final word over all of Hooper’s “lesser” credentialed “scientists.”
Posting lists of people and organizations who agree with him is simply a red herring argument, intended to distract from the fact that actual global temperatures are almost exactly where they were 30 years ago: click1, click2
And to distract from the fact that the IPCC models have no predictive value: click1, click2
And from the fact that the CRU routinely faked its data: click
And from the fact that comparing recent Decembers to all Decembers going back to 1928 shows about the same temperature parameters: click. Where’s the hokey stick?
And from the fact that temperature and CO2 trends continue to diverge, proving that CO2 has slight if any effect on the temperature: click1, click2
And that NASA, the CRU, satellite data, and the 3,300 ARGO deep sea buoys all show global cooling: click1, click2
Instead of listing only those who get very well paid to sell AGW [and who have already been trumped by a much larger list of skeptical scientists rejecting the AGW scare], it’s best to simply look at what’s happening in the real world: as the beneficial and harmless trace gas CO2 rises, the planet has been cooling.
It simply does not matter who believes in the CO2=CAGW conjecture, or what their credentials are. The Scientific Method requires that for any hypothesis to replace the current theory of natural climate variability, it must falsify, or explain reality better than natural variability. The CO2=CAGW hypothesis has failed to do that, despite many $billions expended in global warming studies.
Occam’s Razor requires that extraneous entities must be kept out of explanations: Never increase, beyond what is necessary, the number of entities required to explain anything. In other words, the KISS principle. Adding in a minor trace gas goes beyond what is necessary to explain natural climate fluctuations.
Appeals to authority are always used by the AGW crowd just as they were used against Albert Einstein, who responded to 100 letter signers who said his theory of relativity was wrong: ”To defeat relativity one did not need the word of 100 scientists, just one fact.”
AGW believers are big on appeals to authority, because they have no empirical evidence to support their beliefs. They use peer reviewed papers hand-waved through to journals by friendly referees, who strategize on ways to keep skeptical papers from being published. Those AGW studies then reference other studies by AGW believers, which in turn reference them back, in an endless circle of rent-seeking grant applications. And of course, they have their always-inaccurate computer models, which are no more “evidence” than their peer reviewed tree ring studies that claim to know the temperature to within a tiny fraction of a degree a thousand years ago.
The real world facts support the scientific skeptics. That’s why AGW believers use what they’ve got: appeals to authority.
John Hooper
The problem with stating that every scientific body in the world supports AGW is two-fold. First, as others have pointed out, science is not a democracy or a popularity contest. I would also add that the CRU e-mails have revealed just how few individuals are required to secure a stranglehold on these scientific institutions, and we need to keep the focus on their loathesome attempts to subvert the peer review process and gain control of the voices of the scientific community.
Second, the scientific method is well established and has a proven track record. The AGW hypothesis is based almost exclusively on modeling liberally spiced with cherry-picked records (Yamal, anyone?) with many inconvenient facts that simply have not been adequately addressed: the significant increase in global temps prior to large CO2 emissions in the 20th century, the MWP, a decade of stable global temps, 4+ years of stable sea levels, 2 consecutive years of increased minimum arctic sea ice extent, record (albeit a short one) antarctic sea ice extent, multi-decadal global polar bear population increases.
Your caution about not drinking the kool-aid is appropriate. I agree that we should leave off the discussion of the dangers of second hand smoke, autism-inducing vaccines, peak oil and whatever else and focus on the one issue at hand. AGW is not a proven quantity. The real science does not support it and until it does I do not accept it.
From their announcement, it seems that we gained a minute because we have a democrat for president. His diplomatic style, consisting of offering unclenched fists while apologizing for America’s wrongs, seems to have done the trick. I have no idea how that relates to Atomic or Climate science, however.
Sorry to get all political here, but the Doomsday Clock is nothing but political ballyhoo.
A Doomsday Clock cannot be reset, so this is a Doomsday Hysteria Meter.
tallbloke (07:23:27) :
Michael Mann has his own version of the clock:
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/files/2010/01/manns-doomsday1.jpg
>>>
Funny !
They rolled it back because WWT exposed them If WWT didn’t exist, they would have rolled it forward. Facts don’t matter to these people, the agenda does,
BBC: 14 January 2010
The end is nigh?
April E. Coggins (23:02:00) :
They rolled it back because WWT exposed them If WWT didn’t exist, they would have rolled it forward
That is true. WUWT now is by far more read that many “convenient” MSM and they realized that they were exposing the credibility (any left?) of their founding members and not only that but involving many of these past figures in present scandals as “Climate Gate”, and last but not least, inadvertedly whistleblowing the origins, ideology and history of a modern conspiracy for attaining the goal of a world government.
John Hooper (15:42:55) :
That sounds very nice. But if we’re so quick to dismiss every scientific institution in the world, and all the science behind them, including the one that put man on the moon, why should anyone believe the small handful of lesser credentialed “scientists” we put forward?
The NASA that put man on the moon is not today’s NASA, and GISS is only a small part of NASA.
Fear results in income. Witness churches, including the Environmentalism Faith. Witness the absolutely astounding marketing of Swine Flu vaccine.
Having once been responsible for programs assuring the flight readiness of some 600 nuclear armed cruise missiles, I was concerned about “what hast thou wrought.” I subscribed to the Bulletin for decades while Von Hippel was still alive. The Bulletin, though, was one of a host of venues used as justification by people who live in fear and I tired of the incessant Hegelian format.
As we can see, like the Millerites of the 19th Century and many 20th century prophets, Armageddon just isn’t rushing to happen…so people can’t just up and say “I told you so” (were they alive to do so after any one of the calamities they worship).
Even today, multi-millionaire morons like Danny Glover have the temerity to blame the Haitian horrors on our neglect to respond to the “One World Government” nearly foisted off on us by Obama and the other statists.
One of the great marketing specialists was a bit off on the rate suckers are born. It is far greater than one per minute.
Smokey
Tsk Tsk
Tallbloke
The trouble with the Appeal to Authority Fallacy defence is when such authorities are expert signatories validating your opponent’s argument. They’ve been hauled in specifically to do that job because they’re bodies we’d normally trust. We can’t judge the opponents’ argument ourselves because it’s beyond our expertise. We need to call on a third party we trust.
Meanwhile, our proponent’s arguments are roundly vilified, and distanced, by all authorities except for free enterprise groups, tabloid journalists and a smattering of scientists the general public has never heard of.
We have to ask our audience to ignore the respected authorities because of a massive conspiracy and believe us instead. And ignore any dodgy campaigns our sponsoring think tanks and scientists have been involved in previously, as they’re irrelevant.
And if our proponents can’t convince any of these authorities, why should our audience listen to us, and not the names they recognize and trust?
On top of that, our opponents’ argument is relatively consistent. Temperatures are trending upwards due to man made CO2. We must cut emissions.
Ours is all over place. We can’t even agree whether there’s a current warming trend, let alone what’s causing it. We seem to be grasping at whatever straws present themselves and believe it all on faith.
Take ClimateGate for example. We’re meant to believe it proves there’s been a massive conspiracy to show warming where none exists. Yet, most of the scientists allied to our position have already conceded warming has taken place and are concerned with other details of the theory.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming
Richard Lindzen, one of our best, is tarnished by his famous refusal to accept that smoking is connected to lung cancer. And he’s not alone there.
All I’m saying is I see a lot of crowing in these forums but out in the real world it’s still business as usual. Your energy bills will still be rising.
Your first mistake is using Wiki as a source.
John Hooper (10:08:25) : An uneducated man is very easily detected here. You are crystal clear to all of us.
John Hooper (10:08:25):
What’s all this talk about “we” and “ours”?? Who do you think you’re fooling?
You’re about as skeptical as the unemployed Phil Jones.
Go back to realclimate, or I’ll have to use this on you: click
Smokey, your spray should be called “Troll-B-Gone!”
“Smokey (12:03:33) :
What’s all this talk about “we” and “ours”?? Who do you think you’re fooling?
You’re about as skeptical as the unemployed Phil Jones.
Go back to realclimate, or I’ll have to use this on you: click”
I’m skeptical alright. Skeptical that you know what you’re talking about any more than the jackasses on the Real Climate forum. This whole subject is a circus of armchair experts name-calling and parroting sensational soundbytes.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, and the theory that there’s a world wide conspiracy that’s fooled every scientific establishment, university, government and journal is a pretty big pill to swallow. Even bigger than the theory of AGW itself.
You’ll need to work a lot harder than to call everyone who points this (obvious point) out to you is a troll. It’s the question that’s on every journalist’s mind.
“”” tallbloke (03:31:26) :
5 mins to midnight? Great, time for a nightcap. Yawn…
Stephen H Schneider is a biologist by qualification.
Melvin and Joan Lane Professor for Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies
Professor, Department of Biology
Senior Fellow, Woods Institute for the Environment
Professor, by courtesy, Civil and Environmental Engineering.
At Stanford University, otherwise known as global warming central. “””
Well supposedly Stephen Schneider is the father of “climate sensitivity”; which by declaration establishes for all time, that the earth’s temperature is a logarithmic function of the atmospheric CO2 abundance.
Unfortunately, there is no record of simultaneous temperature and CO2 abundance; for which this logarithmic relationship can be shown to exist.
Nor is there any Physical cause and effect relationship between CO2 abundance, and temperature; which theorizes such a logarithmic relationship. Evidently our entire history of actual measured temperature, and CO2 levels does not even yet reach 1/2 an octave of CO2 increase; yet even for theis restricted range, there is no logarithmic connection. The annual baseline CO2 per ML data, is monotonically increasing; but not so the mean temperature of the planet, which wanders aimlessly up and down.
This BAS bunch is about as credible as the Union of Concerned Scientists.
Total fruitcakes all of them. Do those BAS bunch need salvation from their self imposed guilt complex, at maybe having been involved in some way in the Manhattan Project ?
Hooper,
I gave you the benefit of the doubt, but your response has convinced me otherwise. Using your standards, no theory or hypothesis, which is what AGW truly is, could ever be challenged since the establishment, by definition, will always defend the status quo. As to the skeptics being all over the map, are you seriously suggesting that the AGW camp isn’t? What about the famed Mr. Hansen’s seaside office? Remember, Manhattan was supposed to be flooded by now. Tibetan glaciers completely melted by 2035? An ice free arctic by last year or was it the year before? All them poor poley bears is drowning too due to the ice free arctic. You know, the ones with the increasing census. What was that about extraordinary claims again? It’s not the skeptics that are making them.
And as to tainted organizations diluting the AGW skeptics’ message, how about Holdren’s malthusian past? Seriously, a White House science advisor that completely lost it in his 60’s, 70’s and 80’s predictions. How many americans were supposed to have starved by now? Seems to me that Lindzen’s foibles can’t get any worse than that. What was Al Gore’s electricity bill last month? How much carbon has he put into the atmosphere in the past year compared to the average american? How much money has Pachuri made off of his connections to TERI? What you fail to comprehend is that I don’t need a vast conspiracy, left-wing or otherwise, to be suspicious. Motivated self-interest, vanity, greed, and a massive egocentric investment in the outcome from a quite small group of people (look at the incestuousness of the peer group as pointed out by Wegman) amplified by a larger group that couldn’t care less about the message but see the value in twisting the hypothesis to their political agenda can do the job just fine thank-you-very-much.
So yes, stick to the AGW message and don’t confuse it with others, but don’t try to tell me with a straight face that the econuts of the world, and that includes central figures in the AGW hypothesis, aren’t just as fringy as the Ayn Rand fanatics.
Kary Mullis.
brc (02:18:09) :
Um if this clock was for nuclear destruction, shouldn’t it stay at that? Or did their pet headline maker die a natural death after years of fearmongering?
That’s funny, brc, I was just thinking the same thing as I came to your post. I was a member of BAS, or at least a suscriber, back when they had the nuclear clock. They’ve just chosen to continue their “business model” using another prop. We’ve never seen that one before, eh?
John Hooper (10:00:12) :
Some serious credentials on that committee: more than a dozen Nobel Laureates. If only we on the skeptical side could come up with just one.
Who cares? Linus Pauling won two Nobels in Physics, iirc, and he died defending mega doses of Vitamin C as a cancer preventative or cure, after it was tried in experiments and studies time and again and failed to do anything.
Around the same time there was a Japanese scientist who I think actually committed suicide after he’d done a study indicating Vit. C slowed cancer in rats but it couldn’t be reproduced. There wasn’t any mention that he’d faked anything in his study, it just couldn’t be verified. But now you get more and more money and fame for doing poor studies, not to mention the Nobels.
Me, I’m going to take the Bertrand Russell elixer of life. He got to where for a long time into his 90’s he was living off of seven double scotches, or something, twice a day.
Here’s another one (besides Kary Mullis): Ivar Giaever
The Hippy Dippy Doomsday Clock
http://factsnotfantasy.blogspot.com/2010/01/hippy-dippy-doomsday-clock.html
A good write-up today (Jan. 24, 2010) by statistician William M. Briggs over at Pyjamas Media:
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/good-nuclear-doomsday-clock-turned-back-bad-board-didnt-factor-in-iran/
It’s verrrrry interesting that there are a number of AGW promoters on the clock board.