Here’s the story/transcript from Spencer Michels, along with video that follows. I have not seen the piece that will be airing nationally yet, and I don’t know how much of me they use, but this just appeared on the PBS website.
One note: when they talk about “heat sync” they really meant to say heat sink. – Anthony
Conversation with global warming skeptic Anthony Watts – Climate Change Skeptic Says Global Warming Crowd Oversells Its Message
From PBS:
It was about 105 degrees in Chico, Calif., about three hours north of Sacramento, when we arrived at the offices of one of the nation’s most read climate skeptics. Actually, Anthony Watts calls himself a pragmatic skeptic when it comes to global warming. Watts is a former television meteorologist, who has been studying climate change for years. He doesn’t claim to be a scientist; he attended Purdue. He’s the author of a blog, Watts Up with That?, which he calls the world’s most viewed site on global warming. For a story I was working on for the PBS NewsHour, Watts was recommended by the Heartland Institute, a conservative, Chicago-based non-profit that is one of the leading groups that doubt that climate change — if it exists — is attributable to human activities.
Watts doesn’t come across as a true believer or a fanatic. For one thing, he has built a business that caters to television stations and individuals who want accurate weather information and need displays to show their viewers. He has developed an array of high tech devices to disseminate weather data and put it on screens. He has several TV stations around the country as clients.
But Watts’ reputation doesn’t come from his business — IntelliWeather — but rather from his outspoken views on climate change. He says he’s been gathering data for years, and he’s analyzed it along with some academics. He used to think somewhat along the same lines as Richard Muller, the University of California physicist who recently declared he was no longer a skeptic on climate change. Muller had analyzed two centuries worth of temperature data and decided his former skepticism was misplaced: yes, the earth has been warming, and the reason is that humans are producing carbon dioxide that is hastening the warming the planet.
Watts doesn’t buy Muller’s analysis, since, he believes, it is based on faulty data. The big problem, as Watts sees it, is that the stations where temperatures are gathered are too close to urban developments where heat is soaked up and distorts the readings. So it looks like the earth is warming though it may not be, he says.
Read a transcript below.
SPENCER MICHELS: So let’s start out with the basic idea that there’s this debate in this country over global warming. There’s some people who call it a complete hoax and there are some people who completely embrace it and so forth. Where do you stand in that spectrum?
ANTHONY WATTS: Well, I at one time was very much embracing the whole concept that we had a real problem, we had to do something about it. Back in 1988 James Hanson actually was the impetus for that for me in his presentation before Congress. But as I learned more and more about the issue, I discovered that maybe it’s not as bad as it’s made out to be. Some of it is hype, but there’s also some data that has not been explored and there’s been some investigations that need to be done that haven’t been done. And so now I’m in the camp of we have some global warming. No doubt about it, but it may not be as bad as we originally thought because there are other contributing factors.
SPENCER MICHELS: What’s the thing that bothers you the most about people who say there’s lots of global warming?
ANTHONY WATTS: They want to change policy. They want to apply taxes and these kinds of things may not be the actual solution for making a change to our society.
SPENCER MICHELS: What are you saying? That they’re biased essentially or motivated by something else? What?
ANTHONY WATTS: [T]here’s a term that was used to describe this. It’s called noble cause corruption. And actually I was a victim of that at one time, where you’re so fervent you’re in your belief that you have to do something. You’re saving the planet, you’re making a difference, you’re making things better that you’re so focused on this goal of fixing it or changing it that you kind of forget to look along the path to make sure that you haven’t missed some things.
I started looking into the idea that weather stations have been slowly encroached upon by urbanization and sighting issues over the last century. Meaning that our urbanization affected the temperature. And this was something that was very clear if you looked at the temperature records. But what wasn’t clear is how it affected the trend of temperatures. And so that’s been something that I’ve been investigating. Anyone who’s ever stood next to a building in the summertime at night, a brick building that’s been out in the summer sun, you stand next to it at night you can feel the heat radiating off of it. That’s a heat sync effect. And over the last 100 years our country, in fact the world, has changed. We’ve gone from having mostly a rural agrarian society to one that is more urban and city based and as a result the infrastructure has increased. We’ve got more freeways, you know more airports, we’ve got more buildings. Got more streets, all these things. Those are all heat syncs. During the day, solar insulation hits these objects and these surfaces and it stores heat in these objects. At night it releases that heat. Now if you are measuring temperature in a city that went from having uh maybe 10% of um, non-permeable surface to you know maybe 90% over 100 years, that’s a heat sync effect and that should show up in the record. The problem is, is that it’s been such a slow subtle change over the last 100 years. It’s not easy to detect and that’s been the challenge and that’s what I’ve been working on.
SPENCER MICHELS: Well in a way you’re saying that the records aren’t accurate, the data isn’t accurate.
ANTHONY WATTS: I’m saying that the data might be biased by these influences to a percentage. Yes, we have some global warming, it’s clear the temperature has gone up in the last 100 years. But what percentage of that is from carbon dioxide? And what percentage of that is from changes in the local and measurement environment?
SPENCER MICHELS: I want to go back to what we were talking about a little bit earlier, the idea that there is, there are people who are sort of invested in promoting the fact that there is global warming. There’s money involved and grants. Is that what you were saying? Maybe explain that.
ANTHONY WATTS: Well global warming had become essentially a business in its own right. There are NGOs, there are organizations, there are whole divisions of universities that have set up to study this, this factor, and so there’s lots of money involved and then so I think that there’s a tendency to want to keep that going and not really look at what might be different.
SPENCER MICHELS: Now Dr. Muller at the University of California Berkeley had similar concerns. Went back and looked at the data, took much more data than anybody else had, and concluded, well maybe there was some problems, but basically the conclusions were right. There is global warming and it comes from carbon dioxide which is meant, made by man. Do you buy that?
ANTHONY WATTS: Unfortunately he has not succeeded in terms of how science views, you know, a successful inquiry. His papers have not passed peer review. They had some problems. Some of the problems I identified, others have identified problems as well, for example, he goes much further back, back to about 1750 in terms of temperature. Well from my own studies, I know that temperature really wasn’t validated and homogenized where everything’s measured the same way until the weather bureau came into being about in 1890. Prior to that thermometers were hung in and exposed to the atmosphere all kinds of different ways. Some were hung under the shade of trees, some were on the north side of houses, some were out in the open in the sun, and so the temperature fluctuations that we got from those readings prior to 1890 was quite broad and I don’t believe that provided representative signal because the exposure’s all wrong. And Dr. Muller did not take any of that into account.
SPENCER MICHELS: His conclusion though is that basically global warming exists and that the scientists, no matter what the problems were, were pretty much right on.
ANTHONY WATTS: I agree with him that global warming exists. However, the ability to attribute the percentage of global warming to CO2 versus other man-made influences is still an open question.
SPENCER MICHELS: I want to ask you a little bit about attitudes towards this among the public. We talked to a public opinion specialist at Stanford who says there’s been 80 percent belief in global warming and man-made global warming consistently over at least the last 15 years in this country. Do you buy his theory?
ANTHONY WATTS: Well I look at a number of opinion polls. You’ll find a lot of them on my blog and that we’ve covered. And depending on how you ask the question we’ll sometimes give you a different answer. My view is, is that the view of global warming peaked about at the time that Al Gore came out with his movie, An Inconvenient Truth. But ever since then other factors have kicked in. Climate Gate for example. And it has become less of an issue, in fact you hardly see politicians talking about it anymore, or pushing it as an issue. What’s been happening now it’s just become a regulation issue. It’s gotten away from the political arena and into the bureaucratic regulation arena. And so people I believe based on the polls I’ve seen, aren’t quite as believing as they used to be. And I think the trend is downward.
SPENCER MICHELS: What do you think is the upshot of your attitude toward this? Should the Congress, should the American public say, you know nothing’s been proven yet. We should wait. Or should we go ahead with trying to solve what many people consider a really scary problem?
ANTHONY WATTS: Hmm…You mentioned a really scary problem and I think that’s part of the issues. Some people don’t respond well to scare tactics and there have been some scare tactics used by some of the proponents on the other side of the issue. And that’s where the overselling of it comes in. But this is a slow problem and it requires a slow solution I believe. For example, our infrastructure for electricity and so forth and highways didn’t happen in 5 years or 10 years. It happened over a century. We can’t just rip all that up or change it in the space off five, 10 or 15 years because it’ll be catastrophic to our economy. We need a slow change solution, one that is a solution that changes over time at about the same rate as climate change. More efficient technologies, new technologies, the use of more nuclear for example. There’s a nuclear type of a reactor that’s more safe called a, a liquid thorium reactor that China is jumping on right now. And we should be looking into things like that.
SPENCER MICHELS: Has this issue, I know you think it’s been oversold and scare tactics have been used. Do you think it’s become too politicized?
ANTHONY WATTS: Oh, it’s definitely become too politicized. In fact, some of the scientists who are the leaders in the issue have become for lack of a better word, political tools on the issue.
SPENCER MICHELS: One final question, do you consider yourself a skeptic when it comes to global warming?
ANTHONY WATTS: I would call myself a pragmatic skeptic. Yes, we need to make some changes on our energy technology but more efficient technology’s a good thing. For example, I have solar power on my own, you know, I have done energy reductions in my office and in my home to make things more efficient. So I think those are good things. Those are good messages that we should be embracing. But at the same time I think that some of the issues have been oversold, may have been oversold, because they allow for more regulation to take place. And so the people that like more regulation use global warming as a tool, as a means to an end. And so as a result, we might be getting more regulation and more taxes that really aren’t rooted in science, but more in politics.
==============================================================
This article appears online here
Related: I’ll be on the PBS Newshour tonight
UPDATE: If it caused this guy to be mad at PBS, then I feel like I’ve accomplished something. 😉
That would be “siting” issues.
damn fine job sir
Wow. Surprisingly fair.
WOW! I guess you are much more POLITE than I would be Anthony. I would have taken the questions and done the old “Rabbi’s arguement” method and answered a lot of them with questions themselves. On the order of, “Do you know that by asking this question with these words your are trying to “set up” the answer?”, “Can you recognize ‘loaded language’ in what you have just asked me?”, “Can you ask the same question without trying to bias the answer, or use loaded language?” and last, “Would you like some help to learn how to ask proper objective questions.”
I may also ask questions about the “conclusions” he attributed to Mueller, and point out that he (obviously) was not completely familiar with the work…and with the flaws and errors in it.
Might help to point out that despite the MEDIA’s protestations, Mueller never has been a AWG “skeptic” in any way, shape or form.
Just some thoughts about dealing with the MEDIA.
I know you were trying to be polite, but I would have commented on the claim that Dr. Muller stopped being a skeptic because of the results of his work. Quotes are available that show he was never a skeptic.
Nicely done, Anthony. Very professional. My only criticism is that you seem to have left out natural variability as a possible reason for the increase in temperatures that we’ve apparently experienced. The impression given that it results either from CO2 or UHI effects.
REPLY: Note this isn’t the entire interview, this is condensed. – Anthony
Well done Anthony; it seems they did do a pretty fair edit on it, assuming it was edited?
REPLY: It was condensed a bit, but I don’t see anything yet that was misrepresented by editing. The piece that airs tonight might be different though. – Anthony
What’s Stephen J Gould doing in your office?
Very good interview. And I agree, it’s surprising that they did not try to paint you as the leader of a bunch of crackpots.
good interview. and though we didn’t see the unedited version, the edited version seems quite fair.
I also think (though you may have said this in the unedited version), that Mueller’s position of ‘the scientists were largely correct on the temperature record’ is reasonable whereas his attribution of that warming to CO2 was a) outside his remit b) not provable from his work
Great, Anthony. Thanks for all of your time and effort over the years.
ANTHONY WATTS: I agree with him that global warming exists. However, the ability to attribute the percentage of global warming to CO2 versus other man-made influences is still an open question.
That the ‘good’ quote, no editing required.
A different answer might have included Natural Variability or Solar Activity or the past 15 years.
” attribute the percentage of global warming to CO2 versus other man-made influences”
It is one or the other, that is what you said.
In the end you said it is real and is caused by humans one way or another.
That is why people use lawyers in court.
Oh well, keep running for the football.
Stunner! I lost my bet.
If that’s what we’ll see on TV tonight, you got a fair shake, Anthony.
P.S. Thank you, thank you, thank you for the transcript. Both my hearing aids are due for a tuneup – starting to miss a lot again – and I have trouble with TV/Radio audio. I love it when I get a transcript.
P.P.S. Did I remember to say thank you? :o)
Ya know, you are an incredibly effective communicator Mr Watts. Sure, being a TV weatherman likely makes you somewhat more at ease in front of a camera than most, but you really have a sincerity about you that is infectious. You come across as very credible and trustworthy. That clearly comes from being comfortable in you skin and convinced of your reasoning. Heck, you convinced me years ago!
Thanks for doing the interview! You do us all a tremendous service sir.
Very well done, Anthony!
Although I thought it was amusing that throughout the transcript, whenever you said “heat sink” it was written as “heat sync” … This suggests that perhaps their background research might have been somewhat lacking.
In light of which, you did even better, IMHO.
REPLY: It may also be an artifact of an transcriptionist unfamiliar with science or of a speech to text recognition system – Anthony
You probably made the other interviewees look extreme with the sensible and pragmatic approach you used. Bravo and we’ll done!
I lived in Oakland for 22 years and regularly watched Spencer Michaels. I don’t think there is much danger that the story will be slanted or unduly biased toward the warmist side of the equation. He’s simply a damn good journalist. I never felt he was overtly political. His main goal was always to present as much pertinent and balanced information as the time would allow. He was lucky to have the PBS format to work in, since it gave him more time than most news outlets to develop a story.
But, you never know. The issue has become very “hot button.”
Ought to let PBS know that it’s heat sink, not sync.
Excellent. You avoid hostility or attacking anyone which would make you look like an extremist. You put forth your most treasured issue in a straightforward manner. At the beginning the questions seemed designed to provoke a passionate, self justified response. But you kept your cool. There are so many facets to the skeptic view that sometimes get manic trying to explain everything to people and I think that comes off wrong. In this case you stayed on target and delivered your message. Nice work.
Brilliant interview, well done.
Nice to meet the man behind the blog – you did a very commendable piece, thanks Anthony
I take all I said back, and stand corrected, except for the part where I said that PBS and NPR should be defunded.
You were treated fair, and I was wrong.
Another transcription mistake: Insolation, not “insulation.”
insulation —> insolation
Hey! I resemble that remark. Insult by semicolon indeed!
OF course, I am curious. Is that the clip they sent you, or is that the clip they broad cast?
REPLY: That’s the clip they posted on the PBS website – Anthony
PBS have just had a “lead in” on your peice. “A change of heart for a GLOBAL WARMING SKEPTIC” i.e. Richard Muller. I’m going to puke.
Excellent job! This is exactly what we need right now. The CAGW crowd need to keep themselves perceived as being in the “sphere of consensus” while painting us as being in the “sphere of deviance” (those that don’t even deserve to be heard) in order to keep the MSM in their pocket. Your voice (POV) even being aired is acknowledging the issue is (at least possibly) in the “sphere of legitimate debate” and especially with such a reasonable disposition being displayed should go a long way in providing skeptics with at least a piece of the donut. I take this as a major step forward. BRAVO!
http://brookstonbeerbulletin.com/the-donut-theory/
Very good job! I look forward to seeing this air and actually watching it.
philwynk says:
September 17, 2012 at 2:37 pm
“weather stations have been slowly encroached upon by urbanization and sighting issues over the last century”
That would be “siting” issues.
PBS transcript. Tell them but don’t mention sync.
Wow.
All this time I’ve been thinking you looked kinda like Willis Eschenbach.
People Never look like one expects them to…..
Great work, Anthony!
“He doesn’t claim to be a scientist; he attended Purdue.”
Ok, I’ve finally stopped laughing.
REPLY: It’s a famous engineering school, go Boilermakers – Anthony
Good job, Anthony, on representing the views of your blogging partners.
Agree. “Natural causes needed to be mentioned. Other than that, you Nailed It!! Your moderate tone was quite appealing. What you said no doubt rankled Mr. Michaels, who has been called off his usual beat of exalting school reform, but judging by the tenor of News Hour reporting over the years, this really is a watershed moment. It’s a program I’ve watched since it was the MacNeil Lehrer New Hour (20 years), and they have been on a virtual crusade for global warming for at least the last 6-8 years. This represents a shift – assuming they air it.
Thanks for all your efforts, and for this representation of reality .
“ANTHONY WATTS: I agree with him [Muller] that global warming exists. However, the ability to attribute the percentage of global warming to CO2 versus other man-made influences is still an open question.”
I think you did a great job overall Anthony, but this is where I’d have mentioned natural variation. This reply makes it sound like all the warming is down to humans, and we’re just arguing over which aspect of our activity is to blame. I know you had the way we do measurement in mind, but don’t forget mama nature.
Anyhow, very articulate, well measured, and you didn’t sound a bit like a rabid conspiracy theorist.
🙂
Anthony comes off very well. Great job Anthony.
Muller seemed “extreme”. Perhaps that explains your interviewers comment.
I’m impressed that they are apparently seeking ANY kind of detailed skeptic opinion. As I reported over at JunkScience on July 13th, the scorecard at that time was “PBS NewsHour global warming coverage: IPCC/NOAA Scientists -18; Skeptic Scientists – 0” http://junkscience.com/2012/07/13/pbs-newshour-global-warming-coverage-ipccnoaa-scientists-18-skeptic-scientists-0/
If we are to claim that reason is on our side then we must appear to be reasonable people. Really excellant.
Eugene WR Gallun
I am suprised, and I think it is a mistake, that you do not query the hundreds of thousands of millions of pounds/dollars/euros/other currencies that are being spent RIGHT NOW to counter CO2 emissions. Immunisation, housing, food, entrepeneurial help, loans. The world economy is teetering. There might be a duty to point out the waste currently happening with regards to anti-CO2 spending ?
I didn’t get this either – thought Purdue was a top-notch school for math, science and engineering. Is a Stanford association required for believability?
I’m impressed, Mr Watts – you were calm, reasonable, informed and erudite. Well done, sir; a marvelous ambassador for common sense and healthy climate skepticism. Looks like the TV folk didn’t even try ‘stitching you up’ (as we say here in Britain) – amazingly, you were even allowed to make your replied uninterrupted and the your interviewer even came across as quite a reasonable chap. Thanks for posting this video.
Anthony Watts= rational, measured
Richard Muller= irrational,alarmist
Wow. Love to see the reaction from the other side. Extreme vitriol in 3,..2,….
Very professional job Anthony!
Now for the constructive criticism.
You should have had your websites addresses plastered all over that room for people to see.
Well, perhaps at least on the monitor that was over your right shoulder the whole time 🙂
Cheers!
The PBS piece just aired here on the East coast and it was the usual mix of fact and misrepresentation of fact. The term “denier” was in the first couple of sentences. Mostly it dealt with the political aspects, rather than the veracity of the science. Anthony was more precise than Muller, who is not as careful when he speaks. Strange for a physicist to be sloppy, IMO. I wish the point that CO2 and sunspots both correlate to global temperature, but causation of temps by either or both still lacks definitive proof.
If this were Australia, you would have been portrayed as the Devil himself.
Well done!
well done anthony tho Gary’s comment that ‘denier’ was used up front on the aired version comes as no surprise.
as for CAGW being “oversold”, some new examples:
18 Sept: BigPondNews: Environments to ‘disappear’ – CSIRO
Australia’s environment will look very different in 2070 as a result of climate change, a new report by the CSIRO predicts…
Australia’s national science agency suggests the species-by-species approach will be more difficult to manage with a dramatic rise in the number of species vulnerable to extinction.
It could be a matter of ‘conserve the stage not the actors’.
‘Many of the environments our plants and animals currently exist in will disappear from the continent,’ lead researcher Dr Michael Dunlop said in a statement.
‘Our grandchildren are likely to experience landscapes that are very different to the ones we have known.’
http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2012/09/18/Environments_to_disappear_-_CSIRO_796106.html
18 Sept: News Ltd: Malcolm Holland: CSIRO study projects climate change effects across Australia
(OPENING PARA)CLIMATE change will alter the Australian landscape so dramatically and so quickly that our grandchildren could live in a very different country, according to a landmark CSIRO study…
(FINAL PARA) Wary of past criticism, the CSIRO says it is confident in the accuracy of the complex computer models it used.
http://www.news.com.au/national/csiro-study-projects-climate-change-effects-across-australia/story-fncynjr2-1226476054411
17 Sept: BusinessWeek: Brian K. Sullivan: August 330th Month Above 20th-Century Average Temperature
August 2012 was the fourth-warmest August globally since 1880 and the 330th consecutive month in which temperatures worldwide were above the 20th-century average, the U.S. National Climatic Data Center said.
The average temperature on land and over the ocean was 61.2 degrees Fahrenheit (16.2 Celsius), 1.1 degree above the century’s average, the agency said today…
The last time the global temperature was below the 20th century’s average was February 1985, and the last time there was a cooler-than-average August was 1976, said the agency, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. In the Arctic, the six smallest amounts of sea ice have been recorded in the past six years…
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-09-17/august-330th-month-above-20th-century-average-temperature
I read the transcript then watched (listened) to the interview EXCEPT when Anthony dismissively grimaced at the “scary” usage. I looked then. That was worth seeing.
Put up a like to the whole piece when you get a chance. I’m in Canada…..we still have black and white TV.
I know for a Fact that I was one of the first, if not The first, to comment at the PBS site. However they are still holding my (polite!) comment in moderation, while allowing the first comment to go to an alarmist. Meh.
REPLY: Get a screen cap – Anthony
fair editing, biased reporting: ESPECIALLY the claim that you represent a mere 3% of the “scientific community.” Crap.
Par for the course for the hopelessly Lefty PBS/NPR mouthpiece for commy gubmint.
Great Job Anthony!! Thanks for all your efforts. 🙂
Good work Anthony.
It will be educational to see how this is repackaged and delivered.
Tried downloading in case it gets disappeared, no success. 🙁
DaveE.
Excellent Anthony! I hope the finished product fairly reflects your views.
It wouldn’t happen on the BBC. You would have been clipped out of context, followed by acerbic, dismissive comments about you by Sir Paul Nurse. “Huh, only went to Purdue…” 🙂
Watch out for the next dirty alarmist campaign: “Forecast the facts” attempting to threaten TV stations who use your services. Sigh.
Congrats again.
Good work, Anthony.
Send the following email to Michael Getler, the PBS ombudsman.
Sir,
Thank you for showing the “Global Warming” segment on todays show. Although the show was mostly trying to be unbiased, it did have the “normal” biases in footage and lack of in-depth research. For instance, Dr. Richard Muller never was a sceptic as can be readily determined here:http://www.populartechnology.net/2012/06/truth-about-richard-muller.html
I think you could have done yourself a favour and emphasized more strongly that the “Best” paper never did pass peer review. You left the viewer with the distinct impression that it did, in fact, pass peer review. Finally could you please explain why the water vapor coming from a smokestack had to be included? I am surprised that no polar bear showed up. Therefore, you end up with a “C”.
Anthony:
Excellent! Well done. Thankyou.
Richard
Good. You came across very much yourself.
Luther Wu says:
September 17, 2012 at 3:35 pm
“He doesn’t claim to be a scientist; he attended Purdue.”
Ok, I’ve finally stopped laughing.
REPLY: It’s a famous engineering school, go Boilermakers – Anthony
________________
Yes!
I was laughing at the phrasing.
To this day, the most brilliant engineer/physicist I’ve ever worked with was a graduate of Purdue and a trusted and valued mentor of mine.
He was also an ornery practical joker.
He doesn’t claim to be a scientist; he attended Purdue.
Well I guess that’s that then, the matter is settled. Nothing to hear here folks, move along quietly now…
/sarc…
Very well done, sir.
Polite, concise and very well balanced. I still wish people would get it through their heads though that CO2 is not the global bogey man. We need it, we’re all carbon based life forms that thrive in elevated levels. Trying to completely wipe it out would be wiping out life itself. Or maybe that’s what the warmists are secretly trying to do 😉
Excellent job. When PBS starts showing segments like this, you know the writing in on the wall. The rats are jumping off the ship.
Just watched the clip – when they get around to the economic issues, don’t forget the carbon markets! They alone will produce a raft of PhDs in the not too distant future.
Muller: “Between 20 years from now and 50 years from now, we’ll be experiencing weather that’s warmer than anything Homo Sapiens has ever experienced”.
Richard Muller, your last little bit of credibility just fell over.
Watched it all the way up to where the moron quoted the ” 97% ” idiotic statement. On the bright side Anthony came off looking normal. Still heavily biased but is the best Skeptics have been expressed in something close to main stream media.
Well done Anthony, other than that, just about what was to be expected, including the bogus 97% of scientists figure they love to throw out.
Was was the map with the entire world orange or red and the claim that California has warmed five degrees?
Also they brought in the 97% consensus number. Might be worth politely pointing out to Spencer Michels the details behind that.
Ahhh those were the days.
[My bold]
Many skeptics have trodden a similar path of just wanting to find out more.
Something in the paint?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2007/07/14/the-stevenson-screen-paint-test/
Hugely impressed, worth it for the explaination of “Noble cause corruption” alone.
Cui Bono beat me to it, this kind of interview simply wouldn`t happen at the bbc and i can`t help but be impressed by the interviewer Spencer Michels.
I shall be watching far more pbs news here in the uk. Bye bye Monbiot, black et al, bye bye bbc…can i have my money back?
I just looked at the PBS News Hour website and Anthony’s interview is the only one of the fifteen there in the last six weeks there that was balanced. On the positive side Anthony’s interview is located at the top of the segment interviews and it was a very well done interview. All of the others are in the scary “climate-gone-wild” category of more destructive heat, hurricanes, droughts, agricultural disruption, the world will end unless we do something now (send your taxpayer checks to_____).
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/topic/climate-change/
Great interview Anthony. Nice to put a face, and voice to a name too!
You are so right to discuss thermometers being placed in heat sinks. As I have mentioned before, I can watch the temperature rise by 10 Celsius in a couple of hours in our Spanish backyard as the sun moves westward in the sky. The terracotta tiles will not allow bare feet to walk on them, they get far too hot. Back home in the North east of England, we rely on this phenonemen to have friends round and sit outside after a BBQ. The patio and south facing bricks of the house radiate the heat absorbed during the day to make the evening pleasant. Our first house had a north facing back garden and sitting out was a chilly experience! We very quickly wised up!
Its all about context. Wait for the full program – lets see how they set up this interview and how they characterize you and your responses in the rebuttal. Have seen to many media hatchet jobs on skeptics to trust that this will not be spun negatively.
Was Muller ever a skeptic?
Has the planet warmed? Yes.
Has extra co2 got something to do with it? Yes.
Has co2 caused most of the recent warming? I am still waiting for evidence and “we can’t think of anything else” is not evidence. Model runs is not evidence. Nothing unusual is going on when you look back over the Holocene. We have had quite a few warmer periods with lower co2.
But what about the Arctic? Show me that the gas co2 was the major cause of the following.
http://www.pnas.org/content/101/2/423.short
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1352231005002165
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0004698185901131
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2010.08.016
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2007AGUFMPP11A0203F
http://geology.geoscienceworld.org/cgi/content/abstract/21/3/227
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/06/16/historic-variation-in-arctic-ice-tony-b/
WOW! The transcript starts off with propaganda, “It was about 105 degrees in Chico, Calif…”. Leading like this was not an accident but a deliberate attempt to color the story. Most PBS viewers do not have a clue as to the normal temperature in Chico.
was typing and it disappeared…here I go again.
I believe that some of Watt’s words can be used to make the warmists’ arguments. Watts explains that urban encroachment has resulted in temperature increase. 1:45 to 3:08That statement, without context, serves the anti-industrial sentiments that fuel the GW philosophy. There was a clear edit break at 3:08. Later Watts explains that thermometers are affected by surroundings. A warmist could simply thank Anthony for making the case that human population migration into previously “empty” countryside has made the temperature increase. We know what Watts meant, that temperature sets from specific stations are in error since they are being irradiated by IR from structures. Please re listen from a warmists’ perspective. The editors fragmented the context of Anthony’s explanation.
I added a comment BTW…screen capped for good measure.
Well done Anthony!
Paul Westhaver says:
September 17, 2012 at 5:03 pm
Agreed, but after some thought about this, it will bring some of the curious to look a little deeper, and that is how many skeptics began. This was far more balanced than I expected. I think people will be drawn here because of Anthony and his reasonable demeanor.
Is it just me, or does Richard Muller seem like a prisoner under his daughter’s domineering presence?
To exacerbate the issues Paul Westhaver notes in the transcript, they have done a further hack job on these fragments. For example, in this transcript, when Anthony gives his opinion about Muller’s work, he says “His papers have not passed peer review. They have some problems”. Then he goes on describing what problems they were.
In the piece that actually aired they cut everything after the first period. Anthony came across as criticising Muller for publishing without peer review.
I think it a little sad that over the pbs website only 3 people have `
liked` it.
Honest go and have a look if you dont believe me.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/2012/09/why-the-global-warming-crowd-oversells-its-message.html
Richard Muller looked like a wounded (bandaid on his right forehead) agitated campaigner, jittery, strident, and a mad scientist speaking in extreme language. Has he lost his mind? Alien ships?
HERE IS THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM.
THIS is the not so well hidden agenda. Co2 was supposed to be the magic bullet for Warmists whether CAGW is a pile of horsesh!t or not.
Eg. the Maldives was sinking due to man-made co2 and now they are not sinking according the the Maldives government. Tourists can now safely fly in for their holidays in our new terminal. I feel like vomiting.
I hope PBS didn’t think they had a “gotcha” when they pointed out the temp in Chico was 105 deg F. I grew up in Chico and that was par for the course. I remember the day in the early ’70s (long before “global warming”) when the temp hit 121 deg F.
David, yes Anthony does come off as warm and affable. I just can’t decide if the words chosen by PBS, on balance, reflect what Anthony believes at a precise level. I’ll let Anthony be the judge of that. I see gerrymandering in a effort to imply that Anthony is waffling or fence sitting. Very clever those people at PBS…. diabolical actually.
Anthony,
You are a more patient man than I. I probably would have given them the sound bite they were looking for when the 97% thing was brought up. Sometimes the right person is in the lead and the others of us can just sit back in awe. Good job!
In the You Tube around time mark 7:30 or so there’s a discussion of “The Problem” and talk about it being a slow “Problem”. Dear sir, by agreeing that there is a problem slow or otherwise you are allowing the other side to set the agenda. You should have said there isn’t a problem, because there isn’t one!
People on the skeptical side of the issue need to realize that this isn’t a debate, it’s a political fight. The other side wants their guys in office and they want to tell you how to live your life.
Great job, Anthony. Once again you have earned our thanks!
Now if we can get the “secret SkS forum” on to refute you, we may be on our way to demonstrating who’s the “lunatic fringe” around here!
Richard Muller looked exactly as he always looks while giving lectures to students, so forget his looks. As a side note, most of his lectures are really great. But it has been noted for a while that the talents one needs for teaching and for research seldom occur in the same person. It is deeply disappointing to see him engage in a public debate on the side of nescience. The way he looks has nothing to do with it.
Anthony, YOU DA MAN, thank you, thankyou.
Well, it aired at 3:00. Well done, Anthony, although sadly they used very little of the stuff in the transcript above. The main impression I came away with is, you looked professional, and Mueller looked like the mad professor … I liked your explanation of the UHI.
All in all, well done. It being PBS, they just had to put in the “97% of the scientists” nonsense at the end, but you came off well.
Congratulations,
w.
Excellent interview – well done, Sir! ;-D
And they even know you’re a Boiler! Awesome.
While I’d have liked to have seen Mueller’s claim to past skepticism disputed, I think you went the better path by not attacking the individual, not accusing anyone of lying, and by sticking to the scientific argument.
Anyway, they mentioned WUWT. More people will come over. They will read various posts and follow various links and learn about the truth of Mueller (and all the rest of it) for themselves.
Well done, Anthony.
Some really angry people posting on the PBS webpage. They forgot to bring any links to support their incoherent blathering. I made several polite responses and am not holding my breath that they will pass moderation.
The alarmists are very unhappy in the comment section.
Forgive any apparent ignorance but would that be the same Purdue one Neil Armstrong went to?
Good enough for me……in whatever capacity one ‘attended’…
You were *wonderful*, Anthony! I’m jes’ bustin’ my buttons, could twist your ears and kiss you on the forehead.
You done soooo good!
I’m grateful for the wonderful smart and modest folk who continue as standard bearers for truth, science and reason. ….Lady in Red
The end of the beginning I think. Thank you Mr Watts for your accuracy, honour and integrity. No more can be asked (or given) than that.
Spencer Michels appears to be impressed mostly by the untrue Muller converted sceptic narrative. Following one’s instincts is quite natural, when there is little background to judge on scientific claims of both sides. Exposing the converted sceptic lie would have had the strongest effect, probably as well for the average listener in the audience.
“97% of the scientists” nonsense” – is there a study which gives the accurate % of scientists (climate scientists) PhD’s or whatever? Sure would like to be able to point to one.
Comment section in the PBS area is filled with the doomsday cultists running wild that PBS dare allow a non-state sponsored opinion be aired.
Very well done, Anthony. You gave it the dignity and clarity that should give pause to those who are so certain that doubters are nutcases. That alone was worth the appearance and you did it exquisitely.
Very good Anthony! You’re a good public speaker.
There’s just one however I would add. One point on UHI I wish you had driven home so that everyone reading or viewing your interview would have understood perfectly clearly. You mentioned the heat sink of structures and the release at nighttime but I bet anything that Spencer Michels and most viewing your interview on PBS tonight still will not understand that this UHI heat you mentioned only adds to the GLOBAL temperature at the same percentage as cities occupy on this globe, what, about 1/20th or 5%. So if cities are now registering one degree warmer that decades ago they only add to the GLOBAL temperature by about 0.05 degrees and you have been fooled by the raw data thinking it is global. Urban heat does not equate to global heat as measured by the thermometers in or about cities! I find almost every normal-day person misreads that fact subtle fact.
Well, that’s the only thing I wish you would have had a bit more time to drive home to America. Other than that… great interview Anthony.
All in all, I think you did a very professional job, Anthony, as did Spencer Michels, also. Full marks! The ultimate presentation was about as good as we could hope for.
Trying to grapple with these points is like wrestling with spaghetti.
That so many academics agree with human activity being a major factor in GCC … that’s evidence that they’re wrong? Hunh … a curious sort of logic. Almost as though you have an agenda.
Oh, no, wait, it’s them that have the agenda, evidence by the fact that … ummm … that they don’t agree with you?
balderdash
Not a single post or reply made it through moderation. Somebody get the defibrillator for freedom of speech.
bentrem,
Evidence, me boi. We needs scientific evidence. Not appeals to authority.
And yes, many academics have an unstated agenda.
bentrem says:
September 17, 2012 at 6:37 pm
I have an agenda. Honest, reproducible science. Got any?
Just watched the program segment … It was not the best (Muller the “former skeptic”, the 97% of scientists and all the usual tropes) … but it’s great that Anthony gets the last word … and the only “in depth” interview posted on-line.
Reasonable viewers may well conclude that in his “last words” of hyper-alarmism, Muller proves Anthony’s point 🙂
It didn’t make the broadcast but I loved this: “But this is a slow problem and it requires a slow solution I believe. For example, our infrastructure for electricity and so forth and highways didn’t happen in 5 years or 10 years. It happened over a century. We can’t just rip all that up or change it in the space off five, 10 or 15 years because it’ll be catastrophic to our economy. We need a slow change solution, one that is a solution that changes over time at about the same rate as climate change. More efficient technologies, new technologies, the use of more nuclear for example. There’s a nuclear type of a reactor that’s more safe called a, a liquid thorium reactor that China is jumping on right now. And we should be looking into things like that.”
A smart candidate would adopt this and make it his position on climate change. Are you listening Mitt?
Congrats Anthony. Very well done!
Joe Romm hates it but has a link to the video over at ThinkProgress!
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/09/17/863551/false-balance-lives-in-worst-climate-story-of-the-year-pbs-channels-fox-news/
Very good interview. Well done.
bentrem says:
September 17, 2012 at 6:37 pm:
“That so many academics agree with human activity being a major factor in GCC …”
=====================================================
No, most of them apparently disagree but will not open their mouth. I humbly allow me to refer to one of my previous comments on the issue: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/04/30/consensus-argument-proves-climate-science-is-political/#comment-972119 .
And, notice when the ACTUAL complete broadcast segment is seen, we get the true setup – settled science that’s protested by a tiny minority of skeptics who are manipulated by industry or politics to say what they say. Thus, should you the viewer trust what you feel about the hotter weather, or nasty skeptics who endorse some kind of big industry / anti-tax agenda. It’s a narrative that’s 20 years old: http://i40.tinypic.com/2retaj7.jpg
Michels repeated the bogus 97% of scientists figure & failed to include all Anthony’s comments on Muller’s “data”. PBS should IMO also have contacted Judith Curry by phone, further to balance on air talking heads.
This hatchet job reminded me yet again why I don’t watch PBS & why the “progressive” propagandists don’t merit taxpayer support.
Muller’s assertion that Homo sapiens will soon experience temperatures higher than our species has ever known will almost certainly be falsified. The last interglacial, the Eemian (MIS 5e), was much warmer than now. Does Muller really believe that hippos will once more swim in the Thames, that the raised beaches of Alaska will be swamped & that Scandinavia will again become an island?
Homo sapiens existed in the Eemian of Africa. If Neanderthals & Denisovans be subspecies of sapiens, as seems likely, then we also lived in Europe & Asia then as well.
I doubt that H. sapiens will soon enjoy temperatures even as high as earlier in the current interglacial, as during the Holocene Climatic Optimum, Minoan, Roman & Medieval Warm Periods.
“He doesn’t claim to be a scientist; he attended Purdue.”
I wonder if the folks at PBS realize how silly this sounds. I can’t imagine anyone with any knowledge of science oriented schools and engineering schools making this comment in this form.
“most of them apparently disagree but will not open their mouth” That there are so many academics arguing for human factors is evidence that they are in it for the money, and according to Greg House they they do not voice disagree is evidence that … that their biting their tongues.
So sad that this is typical of conservative thinking: attribute motive, then read minds … what next, consult a crystal ball?
We need good conservative thinking, not this self-congratulatory back-slapping jingoism.
bunkum
Anthony: Sorry old boy, but one BIG mistake on this was NOT insisting that you be given a copy of the complete interview. NO EDITS.
Remember, Michael (RIP) Jackson had this done, and Morrie Povavich, bless his heart, aired a counter to the ‘hatchet job’, after the ‘hatchet job’ was aired. I watched the ‘hatchet job’ and said, MJ is completely “insane”. I watched M.P.’s response, showing what had been edited in the “hatchet job” and concluded, MJ is exceptionally “eccentric” and has poor judgement, but he’s probably a lot less “guilty” of actual “criminal conduct with minors” than the media wants to give him credit for…and he has many more reasons for certain aspects of his “eccentricity” than anyone (in the media) would ever give him credit for or allow…
Again, the lesson is this, an archieved copy of the COMPLETE INTERVIEW is imperative. It should always be asked for.
I think the heat is just in sync with the dollars chasing it, sinking us all.
I saw the interview Anthony, and it seemed reasonably fair. However, you seemed to support the warming over the last century, but forgot to mention that it seems to have stopped warming about a decade ago.
One of the rare nights that I see the PBS news at my folks house and there is Anthony Watts! And PBS actually giving two views on global warming, this must be the first time in a long time, though the reporter did emphasize that “97 percent of scientists” believe in global warming with the implication that this AGW.
Note this comment:
“There’s just one however I would add. One point on UHI I wish you had driven home so that everyone reading or viewing your interview would have understood perfectly clearly. You mentioned the heat sink of structures and the release at nighttime but I bet anything that Spencer Michels and most viewing your interview on PBS tonight still will not understand that this UHI heat you mentioned only adds to the GLOBAL temperature at the same percentage as cities occupy on this globe, what, about 1/20th or 5%. So if cities are now registering one degree warmer that decades ago they only add to the GLOBAL temperature by about 0.05 degrees and you have been fooled by the raw data thinking it is global. Urban heat does not equate to global heat as measured by the thermometers in or about cities! I find almost every normal-day person misreads that fact subtle fact.”
THIS IS PURE BALDERDASH! The “weighing factors” are NEVER NEVER NEVER discussed, noted, nor given. (This aside from the idea that “average temperature” has any merit to begin with…I guess I’ll never be able to figure out how I measure an AVERAGE blood pressure in my body…and what meaning it would have.)
@David Ball says:
September 17, 2012 at 6:43 pm
Not a single post or reply made it through moderation. Somebody get the defibrillator for freedom of speech
100+ comments on this site to date made it.
Clarify your complaint please. Thanks.
bentrem says:
“We need good conservative thinking, not this self-congratulatory back-slapping jingoism.”
Actually, what we need is testable, measurable scientific evidence of AGW. But it seems to be in short supply. Completely missing, in fact.
If you have such evidence, by all means, post it here.
PS: When will PBS run a feature on alarmists who have become more skeptical? Even MSNBC, farthest downstream of the downstream media, interviewed James Lovelock of the Gaia Hypothesis & “breeding pairs of humans” in the high latitudes.
RoyFOMR says:
September 17, 2012 at 7:07 pm
I wrote 5 posts on the PBS website and have not seen one make it through moderation. I was updating from my post at
David Ball says:
September 17, 2012 at 6:01 pm
Clear enough?
@D Boehm says:
September 17, 2012 at 7:08 pm
bentrem says:
“We need good conservative thinking, not this self-congratulatory back-slapping jingoism.”
Actually, what we need is testable, measurable scientific evidence of AGW. But it seems to be in short supply. Completely missing, in fact.
If you have such evidence, by all means, post it here.
Great challenge there D Boehm but, sadly, will go unrecognised yet again!
I do believe that AGW is a finite possibillity it’s the big C that, too often, precedes it that I find politically motivated and thus disputable.
There’s plenty who’ll happily pontificate about how bad we, the Humans, are for wanting to be happy. I find that sad but clearly they don’t.
I find that alien but maybe I’m just an outlier!
Well done Anthony!
bentrem says:
September 17, 2012 at 7:00 pm:
“That there are so many academics arguing for human factors is evidence that they are in it for the money, and according to Greg House they they do not voice disagree is evidence that … that their biting their tongues. So sad that this is typical of conservative thinking: attribute motive, then read minds … what next, consult a crystal ball?”
=========================================================
You did not follow the link I gave you, did you? I draw my conclusions from the study where the claim about “97%” had been made. All you need is to look at the study carefully.
Anthony.
Well done, you made me proud, bearing in mind the interview was severely edited down from hours to minutes you did exactly what was required. I would love to hear the 2 hour interview that was edited out.
Kudos, well done Anthony! Given the expected bias, the best that could be expected was to give them no toe-hold. You gave them no toe-hold as you delivered the sane viewpoint. I haven’t seen the program yet (it’s on DVR record) but my reasonable expectation is the rest of the 55 minutes will feature wild-eyed CAGW crazies of various zoological description.
Jimbo says:
September 17, 2012 at 4:57 pm (Edit)
Was Muller ever a skeptic?
#########################
I dont know lets do a check list
Before his study
Distrusts Michael Mann: Anthony Yes; Muller yes
Believes the world is warmer: Anthony Yes; Muller yes
Questions the accuracy of the record: Anthony Yes; Muller Yes
Knows C02 warms the planet: Anthony Yes; Muller Yes.
Thought the Sun may play a large role: Anthony Yes; Muller Yes.
Thought Natural cycles May play a role: Anthony Yes; Muller Yes
So unless I’m missing something in the definition of “skeptic” it would appear that Anthony and Muller had some shared beliefs prior to the study. In fact, Muller is quite clear that his inspiration
for looking at the matter was Anthony’s work.
After the work.
Now that work is done. You may question the work, but this is clear. Muller set out to make a decision for himself, by looking at data for himself and abiding by what his study showed him.
Again, you might not like the answer, but he reported what he found and changed his mind accordingly. Does anyone expect him to hide his results? To keep looking until he finds an answer you like? or an answer that confirmed what he initially believed?.
I will say this. On the UHI work continues to try to find the effect in a scientifically defensible way. Folks who know the people working on the UHI problem might do well to hold their tongues. Rather cryptic I know.
Was hoping for a fair and balanced piece. What was I thinking. It had all the illusions of it, it had the potential, but oh no. …. They just had to bend it in all the right places, in all the right ways. They just could not do a fair and balanced piece.
The 97% just had to get thrown in there, as an obvious play, but the subtle inferences were not lost on this viewer. I hope many of the other commenters here also watched the PBS TV story and based their comments on what was actually aired.
Great job Anthony! The story definitely slants toward the position that climate change is a done deal and only your (misguided) following thinks otherwise.
Paul Coppin says:
September 17, 2012 at 4:26 pm
“He doesn’t claim to be a scientist; he attended Purdue.”
Well I guess that’s that then, the matter is settled. Nothing to hear here folks, move along quietly now…
/sarc…
————————————–
Funny, when I first read that Purdue comment I thought it was a compliment as in “although he is not a climate scientist he did attend Purdue”. The tone seemed polite. We are moving into a new world when a skeptic gets this kind of airtime. Congrats Anthony.
“I dont know lets do a (silly meaningless) check list”
Cause it wasn’t a serious one.
Congratulations Anthony from Oz! Hate to add a negative but one thing that grates about US media is that interviewers and interviewees imply that the US experience equates to the whole world. Eg does our minute piece of landmass in the south Pacific matter? Oh, actually just checked my geography, Oz is only a few sq. km smaller than the US.(If you hadn’t stolen California from Mexico we’d be larger.) No doubt you are aware that in the controversy over temp. records we (and NZ) have had problems extracting real records from BOMs. Cheers from sunny, and still above the high water mark, Sydney.
Anthony, you did a terrific job. Congratulations.
My favorite moment was when they called Judy Curry a “skeptic.” In the world of the “97%” apparently anyone to the right of Al Gore is a “skeptic.”
If you have the whole PBS episode it starts at 30 minutes into it. Oh look Collins is using a red and orange map to show how evil and hot things are. And yes they make a big point that Muller was a skeptic who converted something demonstrably not true. And they claim there is a vast belief in global warming and only a tiny percent who are skeptical.
Now Anthony’s segment comes across very well.
@Steve Mosher
Said in 2003:Let me be clear. My own reading of the literature and study of paleoclimate suggests strongly that carbon dioxide from burning of fossil fuels will prove to be the greatest pollutant of human history. It is likely to have severe and detrimental effects on global climate.”
Anthony No; Muller Yes
[David Ball says:
September 17, 2012 at 3:15 pm
PBS have just had a “lead in” on your peice. “A change of heart for a GLOBAL WARMING SKEPTIC” i.e. Richard Muller. I’m going to puke. ]
Yes, as Joe Prins noted above, we should write the PBS Ombudsman, THANKing them for actually allowing ‘skeptics’ a voice for once. AND NOTE that Muller was not a skeptic and there lead-in is grossly misleading to the public.
AND that there ’97 percent’ is out of sync with the facts.
http://www.pbs.org/ombudsman/feedback.html
Steven Mosher says:
September 17, 2012 at 7:37 pm
“Believes the world is warmer: Anthony Yes; Muller yes…Knows C02 warms the planet: Anthony Yes; Muller Yes.”
=======================================================
Very clever, Steven Mosher. “Knows”? Apparently no one has ever demonstrated experimentally that CO2 can warm the warmer surface. “Believes” would have been appropriate, but not “knows”. And that only provided you can read minds. People not always believe what they say.
Problem is, there is no “the temperature”. Some places are cooler than they were 100 years ago, some are about the same, others are warmer.
On the link someone gave above, Joe Romm has posted the link to the PBS Ombudsman and implored his groupies to write and complain. I am sure he will have much more effect on pbs than I will.
Especially with all of the Muller comparisons, the implicit theme the interviewer mostly successfully got across to the average audience was the standard black & white moronic binary thought fallacy.
Such was presented in totally different form than the Doran & Zimmerman 2009 study (the 97.4% “consensus” source trumpeted elsewhere) but with the same tactic:
Non-zero temperature rise occurred since the crippling cold of the Little Ice Age,* therefore the global warming movement is reasonable overall (despite how it in practice is based around common claims of multiple times greater temperature rise being incoming in the 21st century and of devastating net harm from CO2 rise).
* (That is aside from, of course, not mentioning the Little Ice Age by name or that looking at temperature trends from 1750 A.D. to now consists of looking at trends from within the LIA to now, since even knowing of the existence of the LIA would be unsuitable knowledge for the bulk of the general public).
While how Anthony Watts came across as illustrating one could disagree with magnitudes was good, there was too much vagueness unfortunately.
As a momentary fraction of what is not really conveyed to the audience, even if I illustrate by writing quickly as if in live time without internet access (avoiding looking up any numbers not already in memory):
Average global temperatures rose by around 0.6 to 0.7 degrees Celsius over the past century according to particularly publicized sources, although other data without the same questionable revisions and adjustments would place global temperatures now not more than around a third of a degree or less higher than they were in the late 1930s. That contrasts to the tens of degrees temperature change which occurs from short-term weather. A variation literally orders of magnitude smaller, superimposed upon other variations, is thus difficult to truly pick out and exactly determine. Such a tiny average temperature change is somewhat like moving tens of miles closer to the equator, something with positive as well as negative effects. (That is aside from up to tens of percent or more increase to water efficiency, reduced stomatal conductance, and huge benefit to plant growth which can occur if CO2 were to eventually hypothetically rise by hundreds of parts per million, influenced by limiting nutrients by locale but with a substantial percentage growth increase already seen). When past global warming in the 20th century has been a matter of only tenths of a degree (despite how such is used for arguments that the 21st century will have many times higher temperature change of several degrees or more), every few hundredths of a degree matters greatly for what fraction may be attributed to natural causes versus to human causes, especially in the context of how climate has been substantially warmer in the past than now, including during the Holocene Climate Optimum a few thousand years ago which had far more vegetation near the arctic as seen in buried remains.
I could go on, writing more and better but don’t really see the point. This is so reminiscent of what is wrong with PBS and other media, though, and why, despite the advantage of at least reality itself being on our side, the skeptic side doesn’t convince more people in the general public who do not invest many hours into research. Be one of a fraction of 1/1000th of the total population coming to WUWT to read article after article for a few months, and that is substantially educational, something which could change someone’s mind or be likely to spur further investigation. This interview, though, is not so much.
I’ll give an analogy on another topic:
What you would see in a media article on the dire dangers to future civilizations of long-lived radioisotopes in nuclear waste, which shape policies at the national level:
pages upon pages of writing but practically only qualitative, misleading overall
What you would never, ever, ever, ever see in such:
There are more than 100 trillion tons of thorium and decay products plus other natural radioisotopes in Earth’s crust, at nominally trace parts per million levels but adding up over its 30 million trillion ton mass. In comparison, for the thousands of tons or less of radioisotopes in human nuclear waste to be even relatively significant in radiation emissions depends on them differing by vast enough orders of magnitude in half-life (for the fraction of a radioisotope’s atoms decaying per unit of time is inversely proportional to half-life) and/or in distribution — like being concentrated in surface locations rather than being as much buried underground. According, for example, over a timeframe of thousands of years, after the most active short half-life radioisotopes decayed, burying U.S. nuclear waste would increase the radioactivity in the top kilometer of rock and soil in the United States by relatively next to nothing, by on the order of 1 part in 10 million over the cumulative amount of natural radioisotopes in such a volume.
I’m not really surprised here, but, still, it is saddening.
The interviewer slips in the false claim about a 80% belief in man-made global warming as one of the few relatively specific numbers in the interview, knowing such will sway the herd instincts of some in the audience to go with what they think is most believed by their peers.
Even when remembering off the top of my head as if without internet access, I know the portion of the U.S. public who believe global warming to be primarily manmade, when asked in a poll question whether it is primarily from natural causes or primarily manmade, is around half or less. (Also, as a Rasmussen poll illustrated, of those who do believe in it being primarily manmade, about half of them — about a quarter of the total public — believe it is likely to destroy human civilization, which highlights how it is presented in practice in the media for impressions given).
Anthony, you don’t seem very extreme to me. Well done. It likely breaks any stereotypical impressions some may have had towards you.
I have only seen the video linked in this post. PBS Newshour has not yet shown in my area as per their schedule.
But what I would really like to see would be the pissed off Anthony Watts facing down one or more of the “team” in a venue where you could really reply in a manner commensurate with their BS. You know, a bare knuckle intellectual fight where winner takes all.
I was relieved that you didn’t look like Mann, Black, Hansen, and the other look alike. LOL
That rant that you linked to reminds me of when ethanol was being pushed on NPR (subsidiary of PBS) as the miracle to get rid of air pollution. I wrote a letter to All Things Considered (an NPR program) pointing out that doing so would be reducing food production. I lived in Hawaii at the time and when my letter was read on the air they only mentioned my name and the city I was from. Three days later during dinner I received a phone call from someone in Massachusetts to curse me out for being so selfish. I never figured out how he got that but I do know (having done the research for a paper) that some of them believe that “mankind is a cancer on the face of the Earth” and that anything to rescue mother earth is OK.
Nice. And no probing questions about polar bears or exploding kittens.
Really well done Anthony! Any way to tell if WUWT gets a bounce from this?
Anthony, I felt you came across very well indeed. The editing was also sympathetic (no fast cuts to try and make you sound desperate), nor were there any attempts that I noticed to edit what you said into a rant. Reasonable, cogent and considered. Lovely :).
And as for caerbannog666: *really*??? Your mind is made up *before* you hear what’s said? What, exactly, are you afraid of? You cannot therefore complain about anybody dismissing *your* point of view… no matter how many times you may utter the wrods “science” or “peer reviewed”. Hoist by your own petard.
A very smooth, media-savvy performance which avoided all the mines in the field. Now let’s see how they cut it to make you evil.
Congratulations. Some know the science, but can’t talk to the public, and lots vice versa. You got it just right, and were perfectly right not to play the Rabbi/Jesuit and quibble about Muller’s scepticism. Nobody out there cares about the things that obsess us. You clearly understand that. And congratulations to PBS for its lesson in impartiality to our BBC.
Mosher said, “he reported what he found and changed his mind accordingly.”
This is completely false. This was his view BEFORE the BEST study.
All we can hope for now is that it does not get the usual biased, pro-warmist treatment and is presented clean and untouched. But I will not be holding my breath. PBS have been notorious for bending stories to their own political purview in the past. Great interview Anthony.
Very nice job. A reasoned argument and, in my humble opinion, highly persuasive. Well done!
You looked most reasonable.
Good job.
PS : It should be “heat sink” not “heat sync”, correct?
I agree with what grumpyoldmanuk says
Hummm, so from the data gathered from this blog,
I believe you have a 97% consensus approval rating on the video interview?
Somebody check my stat’s please, ,,,,and don’t extrapolate or smooth it 🙂
I think we can approve the message!
I read two or three sentences and then saw this: “Watts was recommended by the Heartland Institute, a conservative, Chicago-based non-profit that is one of the leading groups that doubt that climate change — if it exists — is attributable to human activities.”
See the pea. If climate change exists. We supposedly doubt that climate change exists. Very sophisticated. Like before climate didn’t change? I am sorry I am in my fiftties. We need some twenty-somethings to pick up the ball. I am so tired. I’ve spent a decade studying this chit. Arguing my points on many different forums, only to find that an hours work asking a question would be deleted. Even on Yahoo Answers. Dissapeared.
I started creating screencaps of my posts and gave up. Forgot about it. Found new material on WUWT.
I had hope I could get to the second sentence …..
EJ
Excellent Anthony.
You still give a rock solid presentation just as you always did on TV.
Kudos, kbray.
Excellent interview!
[snip – OK please just resubmit your comments – at your request the first one that was flagged has been removed -moderator]
You came across very well Anthony -genuine, reasonable and articulate.
Meanwhile, the leftosphere is getting all het up about your interview.
[…]
Yes, you read right, Anthony Watts -climate jihadi! …mmmm… The Daily Kos, seem very upset about one short video and are outraged that it was aired. It does kind of remind me of other ongoing events being reported in the news.
A common theme in the articles and their comments is withdrawal of finances from PBS.
It is curious how those that have long claimed that there is a massive fossil-fuel funded campaign, promoting skeptics and shaping public opinion, seem so taken aback by the appearance of one short interview of a skeptic on one media outlet. According to their theory, this should be a regular occurrence.
Interesting thing that that “tweet” from caerbannog666 mentioned his money will go to climatesciencedefensefund.org.
Maybe if he knew a couple of things, he’d reconsider:
1. This “fund” was created by Scott Mandia on September 12, 2011 – as a reply to Michael Mann’s mounting legal bills. So far, it appears that Mann is the only recipient of this “fund”.
2. From their site: “…With Scott Mandia and Joshua Wolfe as co-managers, and with the fiscal sponsorship of the non-profit Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund was founded…” When you go to PEER’s site, you see the following statement: “…LEGAL HELP – Every “peer” can count on legal counseling from attorneys specializing in whistleblower protections, First Amendment rights, and civil service laws … at no cost. PEER attorneys do not charge for their services…”
So Scott Mandia (aka Supermandia) created an organization (and is asking for donations) to help Mann – and that organization is getting fiscal sponsorship from PEER – which provides free legal help.
So exactly where DOES your money go, caerbannog666?
Just to reiterate my allegedly abusive comment, I said that Anthony’s experience in TV served him well, in that viewers dislike personal attacks and rhetoric. I also said that he was professional and measured in his approach (and noted that the clip described him as a ‘meterologist’ (sic).
Finally, I hoped that he would have more opportunities to use his skills and integrity on TV in the future.
At present, my comment above has been deleted and described as ‘abusive’. Has John Cook taken over moderation here?
In 2007 an article on the connection between diet, fat, and health issues appeared in the NY Times (believe it or not) discussing the failure of one Dr. C. Everett Koop. It states, ” The notion that fatty foods shorten your life began as a hypothesis based on dubious assumptions and data; when scientists tried to confirm it they failed repeatedly. The evidence against Häagen-Dazs was nothing like the evidence against Marlboros. It may seem bizarre that a surgeon general could go so wrong. After all, wasn’t it his job to express the scientific consensus? But that was the problem. Dr. Koop was expressing the consensus. He, like the architects of the federal “food pyramid” telling Americans what to eat (eliminate fats and eat more grains, aka carbs, and veggies), went wrong by listening to everyone else. He was caught in what social scientists call a cascade.”
Sound familiar anyone?? This has been happening in the medical field for years. This has been happening in Climate “Science” for years, as well. CAWG is a “band wagon disease” I recommend it for use in your arsenal to counter the consensus.
Find the article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/09/science/09tier.html?pagewanted=all&_moc.semityn.www or search the title, Diet and Fat: A Severe Case of Mistaken Consensus by John Tierney
Actually, I think I understand why the alarmists are really upset [see previous comment]. It is not so much that your views got aired. It is because you came across as “genuine, reasonable and articulate”. It shatters the crank, NASA-faked-the-moon-landings, conspiracy nut, stereotype of skeptics that they have been promoting.
Anthony, well done and thank you for representing us all. Even though we often disagree on the causes of warming or climate change, we all come to WUWT because we know a fair go is had by all.
I went to the PBS site and read the comments and sadly the usual attacks have appeared but there where a few positive ones too.
Keep up the good work.
Not bad at all – well done, sir. If it sounded like it reads, an agreeably measured and ‘non-hostile’ interview. In the old sports commentator’s phrase, “The boy done good”.
I’m another one who would have liked a bit more about natural variability, maybe a mention of the insignificance of the atmosphere compared with the oceans, but I guess there’s only so much time. To correct all the disinformation, you’d need a day-long programme at least.
I left a link yesterday on Tips and Notes to an interview that the Bishop mentioned on his site – Dr. Tamsin Edwards being interviewed by BBC Radio and steadfastly refusing to panic. Dare we hope that the worm is slowly beginning to turn, or that we’ll actually start seeing our taxes spent on real problems?
Heat synsc eh? We’ve gotta fix ’em real kwik.
Only fair to let PBS know what you think of them finally being a bit more balanced on the climate front. Send in your two cents:
http://www.pbs.org/ombudsman/feedback.html
Comment submitted:
Anthony Watts has legitimate concerns about the surface network and the adjustments which have been applied to the data, particularly in Africa and South America, where population change is not well measured and station history patchy.
Scientific evidence shows climates have always changed, sometimes much faster and by more than it is changing now. A 1 degree Kelvin change in 100 years is around 0.3% of Earth’s surface temperature. A change in cloud cover of less than 1% could cause that 1 Kelvin change, and cloud data is poor and difficult to collect. As a result there is no strong evidence that the late C20th warming was mostly human caused, if there was, there would be no ongoing need for further research or debate.
Considering the amount of taxpayer funds at stake, the energy question, and economic issues, an open public debate is essential, and all viewpoints should be heard and rationally considered.
Anthony Watts allows people from all sides to discuss the issues with lighter control than most, more partisan websites. He is doing a good job supporting freedom of speech and openness of debate. PBS is following his lead. Well done PBS.
That alleged “global warming” has never been global. This is a real dagger in the heart of AGW. Averaged value is not global. Second, it has no sense to say “world has warmed in the last 100 years”, since
a/ world has warmed, cooled and warmed back in the last 100 years
b/ only the post 1960 warming is allegedly human-caused, so mentioning “last 100 years” has no real merit. We can also say that worlds has warmed during the last 500 years or cooled during the last 8000 years.
wow
Actually, it is nice to meet you (kind of). I have never seen a video of you or heard you speak, so now I can attach a face and voice to the posts.
Unfortunately (or fortunately), I am of no consequence, so I doubt you will ever see me or hear me speak on national TV.
Congratulation Anthony on a job well done. Although I’m sure there are some things you wished you had said or said a little differently, it really doesn’t matter. No one will remember the exact details of what you said. However, they will remember your demeanor and intellectual clarity. It will impress people who have not made up there minds. That is the most important thing and that is what you did exceptionally well.
Bravo Anthony! You did very well in that interview, and you vocalized my thoughts on the issue very well, too.
Since when was Muller a skeptic? I have read interviews with him made about 10 years when he seemed to agree with everything the IPCC said (just like today).
I’d like to second Richard M. I thought you were very tempered in your whole manner and reasoned in your responses.
When looking for an atmospheric warming agent, one must look at potential to warm among the various suspects and rank them. Scientific integrity demands that one must seriously study the elephant in the room before accusing the mouse. Alarmists and lukewarmers alike fail in this most important step, as do solar enthusiasts. The natural intrinsic oceanic and atmospheric teleconnection holds the court, the floor, and the null hypothesis.
Thanks for mentioning Thorium reactors.
Rob Z says:
September 17, 2012 at 10:11 pm
Sound familiar anyone?? This has been happening in the medical field for years. This has been happening in Climate “Science” for years, as well. CAWG is a “band wagon disease” I recommend it for use in your arsenal to counter the consensus.
Find the article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/09/science/09tier.html?pagewanted=all&_moc.semityn.www or search the title, Diet and Fat: A Severe Case of Mistaken Consensus by John Tierney
Yes! This totally sounds very familiar! CAGW is equivalent to what I like to call the “cholesterol myth”.
Anthony, Ditto on mentioning Thorium reactors from me as well! Excellent presentation. Balanced and well spoken!
Thank you for all your hard work over the years ….MAGNIFICENT
Great job as always. i noticed that near the end of the segment, the PBS host used the old “97% of all scientists” garbage statement. Someone should challenge that and set them straight about it.
Well done. The voice of moderation.
Well played sir. A good straight bat.
No one. No one with a disposition toward forthright, reasoned dialogue could have come away from Anthony’s interview without a willingness to take another look at this issue.
Isn’t it remarkable to note – that a man’s integrity and wisdom – his character – is writ on his face and revealed in his measured tones? And one must also note the courage required to stand face-on into the prevailing wind while the baying of the forces assembled against you goes on and on while you speak your truth.
A noble deed. A noble man.
I saw Heat Sync open for Wild Cherry and Kool and The Gang back in ’81.
Anthony, I was with you all the way up until you responded to the question about regulations and changing our infrastructure. Your response made it sound like we should be changing our infrastructure slowly, a point I agree with, but it also sounded like you were saying this change should be done as a reaction to global warming. If that’s what you meant then I completely disagree. Given what we’ve seen of “global warming”, no response at all is needed.
I’ve been reading your Web site occassional on off for several years now.
I wanted to learm more about this issue regarding our climate from both sides.
What if the climate is changing due to man’s actions?
Your voice could make a huge difference in this polarized issue.
Man might not be able to stop the enivitable but you could help bridge the gap between the two groups.
Regards
Mario
Fantastic. Brilliantly Done! Mission accomplished. Ordinary folks or laypeople watching PBS should rightly conclude that skeptics are entirely reasonable and have justifiable concerns with the CAGW meme.
Those with vested interests (like Dr Muller) and countless other academic gravy train scoundrels will not change their tune no matter what you say. Only shifting public opinion can win the day, since it was NEVER about science in the first place. CAGW originated in academia as an orchestrated attempt at grabbing more of the public purse for research and a political agenda against big western industry (most academics can’t agree on very much at all but they all found common ground when it comes to big bad industry and that more research funding is a good thing).
Thanks for all your outstanding work over the years, Anthony, and congratulations for your measured comments on the PBS interview. Despite
somemany shrill objections not only to your remarks, but also to your very presence on PBS, many supporting comments are in evidence, as well. Kudos also to PBS for hosting the interview, and allowing the skeptical, supporting comments to pass moderation; many of these are excellent.My comment got published, good on PBS
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/2012/09/why-the-global-warming-crowd-oversells-its-message.html#comment-654336950
Anthony Watts has legitimate concerns about the surface network and the adjustments which have been applied to the data, particularly in Africa and South America, where population change is not well measured and station history patchy.
Scientific evidence shows climates have always changed, sometimes much faster and by more than it is changing now. A 1 degree Kelvin change in 100 years is around 0.3% of Earth’s surface temperature. A change in cloud cover of less than 1% could cause that 1 Kelvin change, and cloud data is poor and difficult to collect. As a result there is no strong evidence that the late C20th warming was mostly human caused, if there was, there would be no ongoing need for further research or debate.
Considering the amount of taxpayer funds at stake, the energy question, and economic issues, an open public debate is essential, and all viewpoints should be heard and rationally considered.
Anthony Watts allows people from all sides to discuss the issues with lighter control than most, more partisan websites. He is doing a good job supporting freedom of speech and openness of debate. PBS is following his lead. Well done PBS.
I loved this interview and coverage by PBS. Anthony Watts made the essential points needed for the public to see straight through the lies of AGW and its entire worldwide carbon scam industry to claim something that violates the laws of physics and simply cannot be true – and that is “man-made global warming.”
I looked for the typical reactionary responses after the PBS segment, and sure enough, one came from Tom Nelson, who I monitor on a regular basis on my blog so to stay abreast of the ideological backlash that emanates from AGW promoters.
And this is what I saw Nelson post recently ~
“On September 17, 2012, PBS Newshour provided an unchecked platform for Anthony Watts, a virulent climate change denier funded by the Heartland Institute. This is the kind of reporting we expect from Fox News, not PBS. Please join us in calling on the PBS ombudsman to immediately investigate how this segment came to be aired and recommend corrective action to make sure a journalistic abomination like this never happens again.
The Petition – Below is the petition we’ll send to PBS Ombudsman Michael Getler: “Immediately investigate the NewsHour segment featuring climate change denier and conspiracy theorist Anthony Watts for violations of PBS standards on accuracy, integrity, and transparency, and recommend corrective action to ensure that such reporting never again occurs on PBS.”
NOW, this is a TYPICAL response from AGW promoters; it’s industry and its rampant ideology.
They resist even the mere mention of anything which falls outside of their ideological control, as if the news media must always provide ‘an unchecked platform’ for “virulent climate change denier” like Anthony Watts.
Great interview Anthony.
I continue to say that our climate and weather comes from space – and that the cause of global warming is the SUN – and is not ‘man-made.’
That is the truth and facts do not cease to exist because some choose to ignore them.
Let’s keep the truth coming out – unchecked – and straight-up, since Mother Nature and her laws of physics do not require petitions to recommend “corrective action to ensure that such reporting never occurs again.”
Watts that was an excellent impersonation of Neville Chamberlain, you conceeded Czechoslovakia fromt the get go…………nice job what’s next a recreation of the Yalta conference. You’r going to be their favorite skeptic going forward like the New York Times could always rely on McCain to stab his fellow Republicans in the back.
REPLY: Either you live in a different world or you forgot the /sarc tag – Anthony
Moderation in the defense of liberty is no virtue………
1) Watts you said you agreed the planet has been heating up over the past 100yrs, but yet you failed to mention that CO2 only started to build up since the 1950’s.
2) Watts you failed to point out that all the non-peered reviewed climate models have all failed to predict that past 10 yrs on no warming which even the ardent AGW believers admit there has been none.
3) Watts you failed to point out how that “97% of all scientist agree with AGW” originated and what a sham it is.
4) Watts you failed to point out that there are alternate theories by serious scientist of what influences global temperatures, not least of which the SUN,
5) Watts you failed to point out all the bogus headlines of record temperatures we are now experiencing are as a result of arbitrary adjustment downward of temperature in the early century whose rationale has not been justified, made public nor peer reviewed as appropriate.
And these are just off the top of my head………..
REPLY: Thanks, I suggest you design a world class blog, gain the attention of the MSM and the haters at the same time, then proceed to show how its done. Go for it – Anthony
Don’t need to Learned all I know about AGW fraud mostly from the great blogs Climate Depot, Steve Mc’s and yours, besides the crud under your finger nails forgot more about climate and weather than I would ever hope to learn.
All the points I raised of course is old hat to you, me and everybody who has bothered to investigate AGW, but would of been a true revelation to the PBS crowd a truly potentially eye opening dose of truth to many. I just don’t understand your timidity and total minimalist route you took in answering the questions posed to you……….deer in the headlight comes to mind……by the way your blog is great and you have done heroic work in my book.
You miss the ball bearings in that cheesecake. “Going slow” is actually death for the CAGW regulators. The evidence and the hype-fatigue are both piling up in the public mind, so that it’s now or never for the panic pushers. If the Left lose the Administration and/or the Senate in the US in a couple of months, the rug will jerk out from under the lot of them.
Paul, do yourself a HUGE favour and install the Lazarus add-on. (Firefox, Chrome, Safari). It saves as you type, so you can recover any and all “disappeared” postings, even if they vanished mid-stream.
“Watts is a former television meteorologist, who has been studying climate change for years. He doesn’t claim to be a scientist; he attended Purdue. ”
Mr. Watts, if you do not “claim to be a scientist”, you should [as] meteorolgy is a science and one that probably carries more respect than climatology, since its predictions are subject to test, whereas those of climatologists will not be tested in their lifetimes..
“However, the ability to attribute the percentage of global warming to CO2 versus other man-made influences is still an open question.”
Can you recall whether you said this as one contigious answer, because on the end of “…global warming to CO2” we cut to the reverse noddy (presumably shot later) and the audio for “versus other man-made…” sounds ever so slightly from a different lapel mic position? 5.52
My first thought was that I anticipated you were going to mention natural variability as part of the attribution debate – as one or two other posters have mentioned.
…”But in the world of climate change, where most scientists and a much smaller group of skeptics”…
Isn’t it so comforting to hear that skeptics fall outside the set of scientists. That, dear people, is offensive! I for one refuse to accept their terms of engagement.
Anthony, YOU ARE THE MAN!!!!
NewsBusters: PBS Attacked for Allowing Global Warming Skeptic to Speak
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2012/09/19/pbs-under-attack-allowing-global-warming-skeptic-speak
I think it is rather simple. If you spread your thumb and forefinger apart at about 120 degrees, that represents the potential ‘Earthshine’ channel for radiating heat-energy from the Earth. If you place your other forefinger right in the middle of that, all the way in, this finger represents the narrow-band blocking effect of carbon-dioxide. I think that many people have gotten the impression that the effect is more like the flat of the hand.
Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ModtranRadiativeForcingDoubleCO2.png
BTW: Good reference to noble cause corruption!
Just imagine how many knotted knickers there would be if Anthony have been allowed to present the show himself.