Sigh, it is the same old tired hateful argument from Dessler about tobacco. On the plus side is shows how desperate they are to have to resort to this garbage. [Full disclosure- both of my parents died prematurely from tobacco related diseases. – Anthony]
Climate Change Prof on PBS ‘Frontline’ Tuesday | TAMU Times
http://tamutimes.tamu.edu/2012/10/22/climate-change-prof-on-pbs-frontline-tuesday/
Climate Change Prof on PBS ‘Frontline’ Tuesday PBS Frontline, the popular investigative TV show, will feature Texas A&M University climate scientist Andrew Dessler in a segment titled “A Climate of Doubt” at 9 p.m. Tuesday (Oct. 23) on KAMU-TV. Following the broadcast, it will also be available for viewing here.
The episode will center on the public perception of climate change and how that perception has changed since the 2008 elections to this year’s political joust. After being hotly discussed in 2008, climate change has since been less of a factor in the political arena, observers note.
“Four years ago, there was widespread acknowledgement and the argument was ‘how do we deal with this,’” Dessler said. “What the skeptics have done is made a huge effort to cast doubt on the science of climate change, much like tobacco companies’ efforts to cast doubt on the science connecting tobacco and lung cancer.”
Even though the argument is made that thousands of scientists dispute the science of climate change, there are few true experts on climate change worldwide that doubt its occurrence because the science is solid, Dessler noted.
“There is some legitimate uncertainty, of course,” Dessler said, “but that is whether the climate will warm four or eight degrees over the coming century –whether it will be bad, or catastrophic – not if it’s happening.”
Frontline will spotlight the organizations that have been the most influential anti-climate change voices and attempt to explain how they succeeded in shifting the public debate and opinion.
There is a wide array of reasons for opposing action on climate change, but by delaying the corrective process, the opposition is only making the situation worse, Dessler said.
“Every year you wait makes the degree of change worse, and makes altering the change more expensive,” Dessler said. “They are giving people an excuse to do nothing by inducing doubt.”
Less of a factor? It has become political death as it is now associated with taxes, fascism and phrenology.. All rolled into one.
Reality is against him, so Dessler has to cling to his cherished delusions and continue to read from the script.
“What the skeptics have done is made a huge effort to cast doubt on the science of climate change, much like tobacco companies’ efforts to cast doubt on the science connecting tobacco and lung cancer.” – strange I thought Climategate and poor climate modelling did most of the damage!
If they have to resort to something which pretends there is a parallel with tobacco, they really are quite disgraceful people. They make my skin creep.
Frontline is going to spotlight the CRU emails and the phoney investigations?, well that would be a first for them.
Somebody needs to inform Dressler that it stopped warming 16 years ago, based on HadCRUT4 “adjusted” temperature data. Without all those adjustments (e.g. TOBS, homogenization, interpolation), we’d probably be seeing a noticeable cooling trend.
Dressler’s alarmist predictions are based on faulty general-circulation models. And as we know, in the world of climatastrology, model projections always trump observational data.
When even the most blatant criminals hauled into court are entitled to being called only ‘alleged’, we need to be equally vigilant in calling AGW dogmas the accurate term ‘alleged’. Imagine how much more frantic the Warmistas will be if the world never gets warm at all!
“Every year you wait makes the degree of change worse, and makes altering the change more expensive,” Dessler said.
And the solution is to scrub the air of e-e-e-v-i-l CO2. What could go wrong with that? Oh…. wait….
Going by the quotes, it is not going to be a very compeling show to watch. I am already falling asleep with due to over propagandized speak.
Dessler is basically a barking dog whose job is to write papers that “debunk” Spencer’s papers. See http://wattsupwiththat.com/reference-pages/research-pages/the-spencer-braswell-dessler-papers/ for examples.
Many AGW alarmists seem obsessed with smoking and tobacco. Did many of them recently quit smoking? Or do they still smoke? Or what, then?
In any case the logic of their efforts as applied to the AGW issue would be along the lines of:
“Some of the people who disagree with us today were on the unpopular side of other issues in the past, therefore all of the people who disagree with us today must be wrong”
I’m not sure to what logical fallacy that corresponds.
Mr. Dessler! And the 4 or 8 degree rise in temps over this coming century is based on what evidence again? Oh ya, untested, crude climate models that do not meet the tenets of the scientific method. If you make climate predictions to the year 2100, the scientific method requires one to gather data to the year 2100 so that it may be properly analyzed. Where did you obtain your education Mr Dessler? If I were you, I would request a refund, because you obviously forgot the very basics. Your poor students at Texas A&M are getting short-changed.
Why is PBS giving these Alarmists a speaking platform?
Time to pull the funding of PBS
Another CAGW clone! Why do they all look alike?
Wasn’t Dessler the same guy saying Texas was in a permanent drought this year?
a terrible appetiser:
FRONTLINE | “A Climate of Doubt” Preview | PBS
22 Oct: PBS Press Release: HOW THE SKEPTICS CHANGED THE GAME ON CLIMATE CHANGE
FRONTLINE presents Climate of Doubt
Andrew Dessler, a climate scientist at Texas A&M, says, “I fully expect that after this program airs I’ll get another FOIA request for all of my emails with you. And you know, I’ll just deal with that. As a climate scientist, I think a lot about the future. It goes with the job. And I want to make sure that in 50 years or 100 years or 200 years, nobody could ever say we didn’t warn them.”
FRONTLINE also investigates the funding that powers the skeptic movement in the name of free market, anti-regulation, small government causes. Hockenberry finds that funding has shifted away from fossil fuel companies to more ideological, and less public, sources. According to Robert Brulle, a sociologist studying the funding patterns of these groups, “The major funders of the climate counter-movement are ideologically driven foundations that are very much concerned about conservative values and world views.”
Climate of Doubt is a FRONTLINE production with The Documentary Group. The producer and writer is Cathering Upin. The correspondent is John Hockenberry. The executive producer for The Documentary Group is Tom Yellin. The deputy executive producer of FRONTLINE is Raney Aronson-Rath. The executive producer of FRONTLINE is David Fanning…
Major funding for FRONTLINE is provided by The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Additional funding is provided by the Park Foundation and the FRONTLINE Journalism Fund…
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/environment/climate-of-doubt/press-release-19/
Notice Dessler and probably Frontline will never define what it is they claim is being denied or obscured by their claimed manufactured doubt.And by using this nebulous term, climate change, while implying CAGW they cause an increase in public cynicism.This man should do a fine job of shooting the feet of his team.Remember its all about the cause.
Arguments over the ‘science’ aside, what these guys all have in common is a complete lack of commitment to their own cause. They all advocate immediate action to avert some imagined manmade fossil-fuelled climate catastrophe yet they themselves carry on business as usual. Does Dessler own and drive a car? Does he live in a nice house with air con and electricity? Does he fly anywhere? Does he use fossil-fuelled public transport? Or has he decided to lead by example and give up his car and all the trappings of a modern lifestyle made possible by so-called ‘fossil fuels’ – especially oil in all its forms and off-shoot byproducts? Has he decided to do something himself in order to save the planet? No. Of course he hasn’t. He bitches about it instead. Dessler’s attitude is similar to Gore’s who wants everyone else to give up using fossil fuels and swallow the resultant hardships for the good of the planet, but he won’t do so himself. So until these guys lead by example and actually do what they believe is necessary to ‘save the planet’, I see them as charlatans and mountebanks who should be mocked and ridiculed. First, they need to come up with sound sicence that can’t be demolished in five minutes flat with a few inconvenient truths; and then they need to lead by example. They’ve failed miserably in both.
PBS makes clear this is to influence the election:
” October 4, 2012 – PBS announced today that the award-winning documentary series FRONTLINE has added two election-themed programs to its lineup in October, as part of the PBS Election 2012 programming initiative.”
Not too much doubt about which way they lean:
“Today, public opinion about the issue has cooled, and politicians either ignore the issue or loudly proclaim their skepticism of scientific evidence that human activity imperils the planet. Hockenberry goes inside the organizations that fight scientists, environmental groups and lawmakers, hoping to shift the direction of the climate debate and redefine the politics of global warming.”
So WUWT is a fight club?
De-fund the PBS bird brains.
Just gotta keep saying this – Al Gore’s family fortune comes from Tobacco. Perhaps he should look a little closer to home if he wants to find obfuscation.
As science does not support the extreme AGW paradigm it is necessary to attempt to attack the messengers.
The extreme AGW movement has a significant logical problem and a media message problem. Unaltered data and unbiased analysis does not support the extreme AGW paradigm. Lindzen and others, have unequivocally shown that the planet resists warming due to increased CO2 in the atmosphere by increasing cloud cover in the tropics thereby reflecting more sunlight off in to space, which is called negative feedback. If there is negative feedback as opposed to amplification (positive feedback) a doubling of atmospheric CO2 will result in less than 1C warming. The IPCC have stated that there goal is to limit the planet’s warming due to atmospheric CO2 increases to a doubing of atmospheric CO2 to 2C. Mission accomplished. A doubling of at atmospheric CO2 will result in less than 1C warming. 1C warming with most of the warming occuring at high latitudes will result in the biosphere expanding.
Trillions of deficit dollars are being advocated to be spent on the green scams to fight a problem that is not a problem.
http://www.johnstonanalytics.com/yahoo_site_admin/assets/docs/LindzenChoi2011.235213033.pdf
On the Observational Determination of Climate Sensitivity and Its Implications
Richard S. Lindzen1 and Yong-Sang Choi2
We estimate climate sensitivity from observations, using the deseasonalized fluctuations in sea surface temperatures (SSTs) and the concurrent fluctuations in the top-of-atmosphere (TOA) outgoing radiation from the ERBE (1985-1999) and CERES (2000- 2008) satellite instruments. Distinct periods of warming and cooling in the SSTs were used to evaluate feedbacks. An earlier study (Lindzen and Choi, 2009) was subject to significant criticisms. The present paper is an expansion of the earlier paper where the various criticisms are taken into account. The present analysis accounts for the 72 day precession period for the ERBE satellite in a more appropriate manner than in the earlier paper. We develop a method to distinguish noise in the outgoing radiation as well as radiation … …we show that including all CERES data (not just from the tropics) leads to results similar to what are obtained for the tropics alone – though with more noise. We again find that the outgoing radiation resulting from SST fluctuations exceeds the zerofeedback response thus implying negative feedback. In contrast to this, the calculated TOA outgoing radiation fluxes from 11 atmospheric models forced by the observed SST are less than the zerofeedback response, consistent with the positive feedbacks that characterize these models. ….
…The heart of the global warming issue is so-called greenhouse warming. This refers to the fact that the earth balances the heat received from the sun (mostly in the visible spectrum) by radiating in the infrared portion of the spectrum back to space. … ….However, warming from a doubling of CO2 would only be about 1C (based on simple calculations where the radiation altitude and the Planck temperature depend on wavelength in accordance with the attenuation coefficients of well mixed CO2 molecules; a doubling of any concentration in ppmv produces the same warming because of the logarithmic dependence of CO2’s absorption on the amount of CO2) (IPCC, 2007). This modest warming is much less than current climate models suggest for a doubling of CO2. Models predict warming of from 1.5C to 5C and even more for a doubling of CO2. Model predictions depend on the ‘feedback’ within models from the more important greenhouse substances, water vapor and clouds. Within all current climate models, water vapor increases with increasing temperature so as to further inhibit infrared cooling.
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/10/man-made-global-warming-disproved/
There is a wide array of reasons for opposing action on climate change, but by delaying the corrective process, the opposition is only making the situation worse, Dessler said.
Really? Just what might those reasons be Mr. Andrew Emory Dessler. Let me guess. Might one be a 8.1% unemployment rate? Oops, silly me, I forgot that – in one month – it mysteriously, magically dropped to a mere 7.8%. Could another, and allied, reason be 22 or 23 (who’s counting?) million people unemployed? Or, maybe the Federal Reserve’s announcement of a new round of Quantitative Easing? You know, the Fed’s purchase of 40 billion dollars, each and every month, in mortgage backed securities. Or, how about allied fears of inflation? Could an additional reason be GDP that has, over 4 wonderful years, barely broken 2.5% and last quarter juiced out at a sizzling 1.3%? Could another be trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see? Explain to me dear Mr. Dessler, could these be some of the array of reasons? Perhaps? Maybe? I can see from that picture of you, bright bespectacled eyes staring smartly up and into the future from your well fed face, that you know. We live in the down and dirty but you, you Mr. Dessler live in that rarefied atmosphere that allows you to ignore these pedestrian concerns and therefore possess a truly unbiased viewpoint. So tell me, could the aforementioned array of reasons be responsible for the newfound flippant attitude towards global…er…what?
My mother, a smoker, died of lung cancer. That was in 1980 and the Waxman Hearings were in 1994.
http://www.jeffreywigand.com/7ceos.php
The executives of the tobacco companies at least had an economic reason – their company’s survival – to make the sorts of statements they did. I was skeptical of their science while understanding (not approving of) what they were doing.
Now I am skeptical of “climate science” as defined by “Climate Change Prof.” Andrew Emory Dessler. I do not understand what he and others are doing. It isn’t science and it isn’t right/smart/helpful.
[snip – multiple blog policy violations -mod]
Goldie says:
October 22, 2012 at 7:52 pm
Just gotta keep saying this – Al Gore’s family fortune comes from Tobacco.
The above is almost as true as saying George Washington is famous for growing cotton. Unless you are trying for the big lie thing, truth is a better option. Why keep saying something that is so far from even a grain of truth? From lots of material to read, try this:
http://www.slate.com/articles/briefing/articles/2000/04/was_albert_gore_sr_a_crook.html
Dessler is a bully and a political hack, trying to recreate his days as climate science adviser to then-VP Gore. I am betting he had his furniture picked out for his nice office as Gore’s climate czar, if Gore had won the 2000 election.
Now he is stuck in a conservative A&M University where he can only glower in rage at the center of the energy world, Houston just over the horizon from College Station.
He knows he is bullshyting when he makes these sorts of bogus claims, but they make him feel better. Heck, it might even get him some nice attention from the co-eds.
“…there are few true experts on climate change worldwide that doubt its occurrence because the science is solid, Dessler noted.”
–
So there are few experts who make their living from hyping climate change who are willing to bite the hand that feeds them. Does that surprise anyone?
Dessler suffers from tobacco lawyer envy, as do most alarmists and Greens of all stripes. He needs to learn that in the case of tobacco most folks had some first hand experience of the harm.
Texas A & M….home of the presidential library no other university wanted.
Texas A & M….home of the needless “Texas State Climatologist”…aka….Weather Astrology.
Texas A & M….home of the warmist who would only debate Lindzen….IF NO VISUAL AIDS WERE ALLOWED AND NO MENTION OF THE STOLEN CLIMATEGATE EMAILS WAS ALLOWED. This same warmist then turned defense witness in the multiple Penn-Mann whitewashes.
Texas A & M….home of Happy Andy who has repeatedly denied a debate saying, “No body in Texas is qualified to debate me. The last time i wanted to debate we had to import somebody from Canada.”
Texas A & M….home of the Climatology Aggie Joke.
the irony is this is what the CAGW crowd are endorsing!
infochangeindia: Keya Acharya: Indian tobacco giant turns carbon philanthropist
The India Tobacco Company claims to have stepped into the carbon sinks business in order to benefit village communities. But who really profits?…
The fortunes of the poor village turned when three years ago it began growing eucalyptus trees for the multi-billion-dollar India Tobacco Company (ITC), whose paper division buys the logs for wood pulp…
With new interest in green projects among industrialised nations, ITC hopes to turn a new profit from the village tree projects. It plans to do this by collaborating with businesses abroad that are trying to meet international clean air obligations under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism, or CDM…
With other big names in the Indian corporate world, like Reliance, Tata, Birla and Ambuja also involved in CDM projects, India tops the world list of CDM ventures…
But Miguel Lovera, a plantation expert from the international Global Forest Coalition, is cautious about the benefits. He says that carbon sinks are not viable on small scales like in Basavaga because carbon content must be verified before it can be sold, and measuring carbon absorption in the trees is only cost-effective on a large scale.
Lovera also warns of soil degradation from projects like the one in Basavaga, because single-species, cloned trees are very hard on the land…
http://infochangeindia.org/corporate-responsibility/features/indian-tobacco-giant-turns-carbon-philanthropist.html
Scientists: Do you wonder why people don’t respect you as much as they used to?
I get around 1.4 deg C from 1880 to 2100 using gistemp and a linear extrapolation.
What universe is this guy from?
Imperial Tobacco: Our climate change strategy
Climate change opportunities
Climate change also presents a number of opportunities, such as making use of renewable energy tariffs and tax incentives that can help deliver return on investment for reducing energy consumption and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions…
Using our community investment process, we have already made several investments aimed at proving concepts for generating carbon offsets within our supply chain. We have provided guidance to our suppliers to show the potential for an additional income stream from carbon credits by enlarging the reforestation activities they are currently undertaking, in order to be self sufficient in wood for tobacco curing. The extra financial incentive from carbon credits may help encourage suppliers to increase the size of managed woodlots in tobacco-growing areas…
http://www.imperial-tobacco.com/index.asp?page=390
pat,
Hilarious.
Dessler said. “What the skeptics have done is made a huge effort to cast doubt on the science of climate change….”
Huge effort?
Without wishing to minimise the magnificent work Steve, Anthony and many others have done and continue to do, not sure if this is really a “huge effort.”
All we have to do is keep pointing out that the Emperor’s scrawny arse is still in full public view.
The real effort is just keeping up with the massive number of taxpayer-funded fraudulent and incompetent shroudwaving fantasies that the likes of Dessler keep on regurgitating.
I’m confused, are they talking about human induced climate change or natural climate change?
From the interview with Phil Jones in February of 2010, the fastest trend was 0.166 C/decade from 1975 to 1998. Nothing has happened so far this century, so even if this maximum trend kicked in right now and was maintained for the remaining 8.7 decades in this century, the total warming would be 8.7 x 0.166 = 1.44 C. So how does Dessler come up with four or eight degrees over the coming century? Not only was the higher rate never sustained over a long period of time as climate seems to go in cycles, but the effect of added CO2 is logarithmic. On what grounds should we believe him?
If “the consensus” (the ‘science’) was so incontrovertible and settled like they claim, we wouldn’t be able to cast doubt in the public’s minds as easy as we do. .
Dessler makes the case for this: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-10-22/guest-post-dysfunctional-dishonest-insane-and-intolerable , might be a bit foaming at the moth for some.
With pal-reviewed papers, 16 years of NO WARMING, inaccurate and invalidated models, CAGW temperature projections exceeding actual temperature anomalies by over 2 standard deviations, etc., of course the “logical” course of action is to comparing skeptics to holocaust deniers and lung cancer merchants….
There is now a high probability that 2013 will go La Nina, which, if it does happen, would lead to at least 18 years of NO WARMING! On top of that, PDO is going negative, Antarctic ice mass and size are going, ISO negative, the weakest solar cycle since 1715 starting in just 8 years, AMO peaked in 2011 and starts it slow slide to its cooling phase, and on and on.
CAGW supporters know these natural phenomenon are all conspiring (lol) against their invalidated theory. If a theory can’t be defended, then the next best thing is to attack the opposing view.
When will this farce end? The only “catastrophe” is that this failed CAGW theory has lasted as long as it has, and the $TRILLIONS that have been wasted to avoid a “problem” that doesn’t exist.
martinbrumby says:
October 22, 2012 at 10:19 pm
“All we have to do is keep pointing out that the Emperor’s scrawny arse is still in full public view”
———————————————————————————————————————-
And He`s displaying His hopeless inadequacies in other , even less appealing areas too (o:
Someone should check if Dessler obtained his PhD from a mail order University. I recall a certain Judge in Australia (who was jailed over contempt of court after signing a false “Statutory Declaration”) bought (I think for $US9000) a PhD from a “University” I think called South West Texas University.
Dessler sure knows nothing about heat transfer. There seems to be a lot of corruption in sport (around world and USA)- some of it at Universities. Is it possible there is corruption in other subject areas at Universities?
We must send Dessler the following URL link that shows the comparison of IPCC projections with observation, which show global mean temperature below projections if CO2 had been held constant at 2000 level.
http://bit.ly/SPzOHn
“Even though the argument is made that thousands of scientists dispute the science of climate change, there are few true experts on climate change worldwide that doubt its occurrence because
the science is solidtheir careers depend on it, Dessler noted.”There, fixed it for ya…
“What the skeptics have done is made a huge effort to cast doubt on the science of climate change, much like tobacco companies’ efforts to cast doubt on the science connecting tobacco and lung cancer.”
Yeah, because the tobacco companies fought for more transparent science, for facts that are available to everyone and can be verified, and for scientists to follow both the scientific method and federal laws … oh wait no they didn’t. The actions of Big Climate mirror the actions of Big Tobacco.
“Even though the argument is made that thousands of scientists dispute the science of climate change, there are few true experts on climate change worldwide that doubt its occurrence because the science is solid, Dessler noted.”
Quite laughable coming form Dr. Dessler, who’s own papers assessing climate sensitivity rely on using OLS to fit a straight line to a scatter plot of two uncontrolled variables.
The fundamental assumption of OLS regression is that one variable is a “controlled variable” which has negligible experimental error. Using it as he does WILL give the WRONG answer.
Just switch the axes the other way around and do the same OLS on the same data and it will be wrong in the other direction. Amazing.
These guys can’t even get the high school maths right yet wave around their PhD and Professorships to pretend to be authorities.
“cast doubt on the science”
Doubt is the heart of science. Or should I say the lungs of science?
“Now I am skeptical of “climate science” as defined by “Climate Change Prof.” Andrew Emory Dessler. I do not understand what he and others are doing. It isn’t science and it isn’t right/smart/helpful.”
Simple, he’s doing what the tobacco industry did. Misrepresenting science to ensure their own income. Talk the pot calling the kettle black.
“…there are few true experts on climate change worldwide that doubt its occurrence because the science is solid.”
What a horribly and intentionally misleading statement:
1. No one doubts climate change is occurring. The Earth’s climate has been changing for the last 4.6 billion years.
2. If you have any doubts related to climate change you can’t be an expert? Apparently so.
3. The science is solid? Dr. Dessler, please show us your empirical data. Your climate science is ~99% bluster and ~1% solid science.
GlynnMhor says:
October 22, 2012 at 6:53 pm
Many AGW alarmists seem obsessed with smoking and tobacco. Did many of them recently quit smoking? Or do they still smoke? Or what, then?
—–
I’m guessing that the allusions to “Big Oil” failed to have the reaction that they were hoping for, so it’s on to the next boogeyman.
Kiwisceptic
October 22, 2012 at 7:38 pm
has it right on the button!
“Arguments over the ‘science’ aside, what these guys all have in common is a complete lack of commitment to their own cause. They all advocate immediate action to avert some imagined manmade fossil-fuelled climate catastrophe yet they themselves carry on business as usual”.
CAGWers haven’t specified how much mammade CO2 production can be to maintain an equable climate. 90% of current production,? 50%? 0?. If it’s 0%, we’re headed back to a middle ages level of technology. Based on CAGWers BEHAVIOR- flying to conferences in Rio and Copenhagen, they behave as if we can maintain an equable balance with ZERO cutback in emissions.
Thanks to volcanic eruptions the earth has been spewing CO2 into the atmosphere for 4.6 billion years. This is counterbalanced by CO2 being removed from the atmosphere by various geological and biological processes, so the earth’s atmospheric CO2 never became as dense as Venus’. Thanks to Le Chatelier’s principle,, we have achieved a rough balance of CO2 entering and leaving the atmosphere. Based on common sense, Le Chatelier’s principle should continue to apply with additional man made CO2 entering the atmosphere. Ultimately, there should be a new atmospheric CO2 balance slightly higher than the previous “natural” balance, resulting in a miniscule overall warming.
Dessler… the same who had to have his paper redrafted?
“Andrew Emory Dessler is a climate scientist and Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Texas A&M University. His research subject areas are atmospheric chemistry, climate change and climate change policy. [and former Senior Policy Analyst for the Clinton administration]”
I’ve heard this guy speak. This guy is as partisan as they come.
PBS’ John Hockenberry is one of the producers and interviewers in this Frontline piece, so you know it’s going to be full-out alamism and CAGW apologia. I listened to Hockenberry’s daily show (“The Takeaway” Monday, Oct 23rd, podcast download link: http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/audio4.wnyc.org/takeaway/takeaway102212-climate.mp3 ) in which he prefaces the Frontline show, covered this issue with a “Real” balance of guest “experts”, from Bill McKibben, all the way to Coral Davenport of The National Journal.
Their overall conclusions as to why public unconcern over CAGW is growing? Evil conservative PACs and the Heartland Institute, funded by evil oil industry execs, is propagandizing, brainwashing and tricking the American public. That’s the number one reason as determined by this august panel, with Davenport laying much blame on the Citizens United Supreme Court ruling.
As for arguments we’d recognize here on WUWT, Hockenberry and guests make not a single mention of actual observations of global temperatures flattening for over a decade, scare stories not coming true, models failing, ClimateGate, nor about scientists misbehaving and being corrupted by the emotions intrinsic to political advocacy and saving the world, nor about scientific uncertainty or the vast complexities of these issues. No, it’s all just evil corporations, doing what we all know evil corporations do. I expect the Frontline piece to take these same tacks.
Here are some specific McKibben claims from the show
Oceans are 30% more acidic due to CAGW
70% of the U.S. was is a declared drought emergency this year due to CAGW
“We broke the Arctic this summer”
70% of Americans believe in warming but (evil) 527 groups are convincing politicians not to listen
50% increase in the price of grain (which grains? for how long? what are this year’s yields?)
He concedes that no “Smokey the Bear” or “Polly the Polar Bear” symbolism will arise in CAGW activism
Even those wanting to be the US President don’t want to discuss it.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/10/22/climate-totally-absent-from-all-presidential-debates/
So you want sceptics to remain silent about the 16 years of no warming? You want us to remain silent about the divergence between the IPCC projections and actual temperature observations? Will our silence validate CAGW? Of course not. If things continue this way temperature wise then someone on your side needs to raise their hand and speak the truth. I won’t hold my breath because most people on your side of the debate are dishonest and dishonorable and are just kept going by the FUNDING.
“…but by delaying the corrective process, the opposition is only making the situation worse, Dessler said.”
This is my favorite subject of this sort of missive. So, Mr. Dessler, of what “corrective process” are you speaking? What about the arm waving by (sorry I don’t recall specifically who) one of your alarmist compatriots who stated that even if we stopped burning all fossil fuels now, the warming would continue over the next 80 or 100 years to THE catastrophe? (arm wave, wave, wave) So what is the ultimate, logical conclusion that your “corrective process” arrives at? Seems to be:
The human race returns to a life of the pre-paleolithic period with no technology beyond our hands. We aren’t allowed to burn anything for warmth, cooking, etc. We aren’t allowed to “damage our biosphere” by any sort of building projects. Thus there would be a massive dying off of the human population and a “return” to the “natural balance”. Is that what you’re aiming for?
Sorry, none for me, thanks, I’m trying to quit… the idiocy, and rabid misanthropy.
… oh yeah, I forgot in my “corrective process” scenario the best part:
The Green Cabal that enforces these processes are by no means subject to the same rules, they get to live the life of technological luxury and abundance… of course that is until something breaks and there’s no one left to fix it for them.
“Four years ago, there was widespread acknowledgement and the argument was ‘how do we deal with this,’” Dessler said. “What the skeptics have done is made a huge effort to cast doubt on the science of climate change..”
I’ve been following the debate for 5 years now, and I noticed shadows of climate doubt began in the spring/summer of 2009. The real hit came with Climategate, no question. I would say that it was not the skeptics who cast doubt on the science of climate change, it was the emails of the climate scientists themselves who delivered the hardest blow.
Climate alarmism has never been the same after Climategate.
Someday the people responsible for Climategate will receive the Medal of Honour. Can’t wait.
P. Solar says:
October 23, 2012 at 4:41 am
The problem with A. E. D’s ensuring his own income is that being a professor implies that he has tenure at Texas A & M and likely can’t be removed from this well paid position. [Certain real crimes might do so.] Thus, one needs to look elsewhere to explain his position. And, actually, it is on his profile page at A & M.
He was invited to be a White House policy analyst and found there a profound lack of understanding among policymakers and lost his way in the labyrinth. He ends his university profile with the following:
Long ago, I spent most of my time working on the chemistry of the stratosphere. I haven’t worked on this subject since the late 1990s, and I realized the other day that I’ve forgotten just about everything I ever knew about it.
He should ask for a transfer to the sociology department.
You can confront somebody who denies the harmful effects of smoking with the overwhelming evidence. No need to say loads of scientists “believe” the result. Just compare and contrast the arguments for and against. If a climate scientist cannot do the same, then the analogy is illegitimate. If they could do the same then the analogy becomes superfluous.
Yeah tobacco tried to wriggle out of the scene because of pecuniary self interest. The difference with climate guild, Dr. Dessler, is pecuniary self interest is pretty largely on the side of the climate “force”; sceptics are fighting against destruction of civilization and economies based on little actual evidence:
1) Why is it necessary to be constantly adusting and readjusting the temperature record up if CAGW is on its way to give us 4 to 8C higher global average temps just around the corner. If you are expecting a storm surge, for example you don’t wade into the sea collecting cupfulls of water and measuring millimetres of sea rise. It will soon come up 10 feet or so.
2) Why shouldn’t sceptics advise that the temp hasn’t risen globally for 16 years.
3) Why, if you are all so comfortable with the theory at its 95% confidence levels, is the IPCC now hedging its bets and trimming down feedback numbers (a look at the confident predictions at 95% confidence level since 1995 and comparing with the actual observations, which themselves have been adjusted upward should give you an answer)
4) Why are CAGW folks now talking about uncertainties, and larger natural cycles and saying that it is a travesty that there has been no warming and Dr Gleick saying -no the science isn’t controvertible and yes there is uncertainty, but it is solid!!
5) Why have the usual crowd not been publishing much in the way of strident claims of the last 20 years. I think it may be because they know it won’t go over anymore.
6) Why are lawsuits being fought over releasing publically paid for data and constructions methodologies.
I’m afraid its not sceptic misinformationists but a wiser public that has not seen anything come to pass of this CAGW but highly suspicious misbehaviour of its proponents. I think a disinterested wager would be that there is a significant chance that we have peaked in warming and could be heading down into cooling – a helluva lot worse thing to deal with. What then of your 95 confidence levels, sensitivities and positive feedbacks.
If I have this straight tobacco funding and 1950s tobacco style disinformation has let to the decline in discussion about global warming. One prominent place where there has been a decline in discussion has been in presidential debates. So did the tobacco companies buy off Obama and Romney?
Just has Peter Gleick has said on the other thread, we hear Dessler say, “the science is solid”. In looking up the term “solid” on this scientific terms website, http://www.sciencedictionary.org/enviromental-science-terms/S, under “enviromental science”, the only things I find are “solid waste” and “solid waste management” . It seems appropriate in this case.
I only have these links to contribute . . . that may or may not be of use to anyone here . . .
New fungal meningitis case reported in Florida; 19 people now sickened by tainted drug
http://www.tampabay.com/news/health/new-fungal-meningitis-case-reported-in-florida-19-people-now-sickened-by/1257925
Recall of Contaminated Cigarettes Leaves Many Smokers Unfazed
http://www.nytimes.com/1995/06/02/us/recall-of-contaminated-cigarettes-leaves-many-smokers-unfazed.html
Tainted vaccine kills Uzbek, Kyrgyz livestock
http://www.universalnewswires.com/centralasia/viewstory.aspx?id=12856
So . . . you can understand the the polio situation in Africa today . . .
Sorry about your mom and dad Anthony . . . but, it would have been the same outcome if they had eaten “bad” food.
It is why I tend to repeat that old cliche: “In order for the honorable human to survive, is to never underestimate the criminal mind!’ and in some cases the ‘just plain mistakes’ of “man”.
You could definately “crowdsource” this topic, but I, for one, wouldn’t want to give the “bad guys” more ideas for their destructive anarchist agendas
Skeptics don’t need to cast doubt on the science, plant Earth is already doing that for us and that’s why we are winning based on observations. Clinging on to a failed theory is all people like this have and most don’t believe a word of it any more. The tobacco thing is alarmist nonsense like the flat earth spin and big oil. Many billions of dollars across the world have managed to find out nothing supporting CAGW, Yet skeptics generally on a shoe string budget can easily show the failings of the conjecture. That is why your alarmist side is losing and really should have lost ages ago, but stupid funding is still causing the clingers to carry on.
Alarmist have been winning over and over again for a very long time . . .
Armageddon has been about to happen every generation (at least once, and probably somewhere once every day) for thousands of years . It’s the favorite subject and practically the only subject for some religions.
Just take a look at all the survivalist (ads games, equipment, blogs) out there.
There are entire industries built around alarmist campaigns.
We have a military industrial complex, for the common defense.
We have the history, but not much balance, just pendulum swings.
We (huemans) just jailed six for not “warning of an earthquake”.
Italian seismologists ordered to prison for not warning of quake risk
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/10/italian-seismologists-sentenced-to-prison-for-not-predicting-deadly-earthquake.html
It is why I tend to repeat that old cliche: “In order for the honorable human to survive, he/she must never underestimate the criminal mind!’ and in some cases the ‘just plain mistakes’ of “man”.
As a sidebar, I have trouble trying to determine just “where” someones’ perspective is coming from, or leading to, on this site.
I’m a bit confused, I thought science is a tool but now I’m getting the impression that this climate scientist is a tool.