First, here is a letter from Harold Ambler which went ignored, he writes:
When I found a rather major error in a New York Times article about climate change, I took the trouble to write the editors. I did so via two channels. One of the two ways was sending a letter to the editorial page editors; the other was writing the Times‘ public editor. As I have not heard back from either, I have decided to publish my own letter below. I will add that it has been my experience that if I don’t hear back quickly from editors then I don’t hear back from them at all.
Dear Editor:
There is a tendency among those declaring the seriousness of global warming to equate small pieces of the climate puzzle, when those pieces support a narrative of disaster, with the whole picture, but this is neither good science nor good journalism.
In the Jan. 15 online edition Jada Smith falls prey to the temptation: ”With record-breaking global temperatures in 2012, severe droughts and several storms and hurricanes on the East Coast, some members of the American clergy are saying that human decisions that contribute to the extreme weather associated with climate change can no longer be left in the hands of politicians.”
The year 2012 was not a record-setting one for global temperatures. The United States, 1.5% of Earth’s surface, did experience record temperatures, and indeed clicking the first link for “global temperatures” brings one to another Times article about the American record.
The United States is a wonderful country, but it is not the world.
Harold AmblerEast Greenwich, RIp.s. The global temperature ranking for 2012 is available here:
Second, Ambler adds today:
Sunday, January 20, 11:43 a.m. EST, update: Andy Revkin kindly took the time to make sure the right set of eyes fell on a third letter I wrote, and the Times has fixed the piece and issued a formal correction. To Andy I offer my sincere thanks. With my book focusing in part on a century-long habit of promulgating climate fear at the Times it is gratifying to have the paper catch an accurate glimpse of its own reflection in the blogosphere mirror, if even for a moment. By the way, a screencap of the original article with the mistake is below (beneath that the original blog post can be found).
Read his entire post here: New York Times Sets Bar Just a Little Higher for Climate Misinformation
Here’s what the NYT eco-reporter, Jada F. Smith, added to the end of the story:
An earlier version of this post misstated the nature of a temperature record set in 2012. It was the hottest year ever in the United States, not in the world as a whole. (Global temperatures were the ninth or 10th hottest ever, depending on the basis of the measurements.)
Kudos to both Harold Ambler and Andrew Revkin for working to fix this bit of unwarranted alarmism. I have to laugh though, reading the article, because it clearly links climate alarmism and religion together. The photo that was widely distributed of the “pray in” march is hilariously iconic, worthy of some of the parades seen in San Francisco.
Leading the religious parade at the front is NASA GISS Dr. James Hansen, who’s “got the whole world in his hands“.
Carrying a beach ball-sized Earth, Hansen led the interfaith protesters the two blocks from the church to the White House. Others carried banners saying “God calls to us all: Heal the Earth.” The march along wet streets was silent but for a small troupe of Buddhist drummers.
“We have a dream that our president will understand the intergenerational injustice of human-made climate change,” Hansen said when they arrived. “That he will recognize our duty to be caretakers of creation, of the land, of the life on our planet. And that he will give these matters the priority that our young people deserve.”
Read more here: http://www.thestate.com/2013/01/15/2591369/climate-change-activists-turn.html#.UPwo3KxZO20#storylink=cpy
As Steve McIntyre once quipped, Hansen clearly has a “Jor-el” complex, and it seems to be worsening:
It’s as though Hansen, who grew up in the 1930s and 1940s, has a Jor-El complex: Jor-El being familiar to young boys of a certain age as Superman’s father who (per Wikipedia):
“was a highly respected scientist on the planet Krypton before its destruction. He foresaw the planet’s fate, but was unable to convince his colleagues in time to save their race. Jor-El was, however, able to save his infant son, Kal-El, sending him in a homemade rocketship to the planet Earth just moments before Krypton’s demise.
It is worthwhile to go back and review McIntyre’s essay from 2007:
Hansen and the “Destruction of Creation”
Maybe when things get ‘really desperate’ NASA’s Dr. James Hansen will send Scott “super” Mandia off in a rocket ship?
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My guess is, Jaded errr Jada Smith, has a good idea of the lifetime of an article, ie, how much time needs to pass, before a correction to a Deliberate error, will never be seen by the vast majority of readers.
I have a problem even saying “Global temperatures were the ninth or 10th hottest EVER,” since this site and others have noted that old fashioned mercury thermometers were hardly accurate and cannot be compared to today’s more accurate thermocouple thermometers.
I must say, Hansen has clearly slipped through the cracks. He’s loonier than a box of frogs. I say that in a nice way.
Would the German pronounciation of Jada be Yada?
John M says:
January 20, 2013 at 10:01 am
Would the German pronounciation of Jada be Yada?
—–
Yoda Think so….
(Must get the puns in where I can. Now, time to make some banana bread)
an environgelic movement
If you ever wonder why so many academics are on board the global warming/climate change train, look here:
http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2013/20130116_climategrants.html
I will go out on a limb and guess that skeptical professors got nothing from the government.
Jor-El, however, got the fate of his planet right!
Uh, perhaps they ought to correct the corrections “ninth or 10th hottest ever” to ninth or 10th hottest ever in the instrumental record which is but a snippet of time in the geological sense.
Could someone point me to the passage in the bible where God has called on me to heal the earth and/or implies I should stop burning coal oil and gas? I think I missed it.
Cheers
Since she is a political reporter, not an environmental reporter, I suspect the mistake was inadvertent. Also, if you click on the contact us link at the bottom of any page you will find a phone number for reporting errors which need corrections.
I thought Hansen had been quiet for a while. Sadly he hasn’t remained so!
They are all nuts
Thankfully we have six inches of snow outside which means that the BBC, Met Office and the other doom merchants shut up until it has thawed. For once the Met Office has got their forecast right. I wonder if they have removed 16 years of global warming from their computer models, because Hansen obviously hasn’t?
Hansen’s “We have a dream” speech:
“We have a dream that our president will understand the intergenerational injustice of human-made climate change,” Hansen said when they arrived. “That he will recognize our duty to be caretakers of creation, of the land, of the life on our planet. And that he will give these matters the priority that our young people deserve.”
Heh. I guess he fancies himself some sort of Martin Climate King. Megalomania anyone?
In the image above I see just behind Dr. James Hansen a banner that reads:
I also read in the news today the following.
How many UK MPs would keep their seats if they voted to stop burning coal, oil and gas? Would excess winter deaths increase? These nuts are really playing with fire and have no practical answers except
Oooops: …………except solar and wind power which can explode in high winds.
Stephen Abbott says:
January 20, 2013 at 9:53 am
======
“Ever” is a long time. The earth is 4.5 billion years old. That’s just slipshod journalism. That word shouldn’t be used. Ever.
Maybe some psychologist can comment on the significance of Hansen’s funky hat. Who is he trying to role play?
somebody in the big office at the NYT decided to disband the clique at the environmental desk
i wonder if suppressed memories of the nature of business and journalism are resurfacing soon enough to save it from bankruptcy.
I have taken the historical newspaper corrections data and have homogenized it using the scalpel technique. My results will soon be published in the journal Geoinformatics and Geostatistics Volume 2 Issue 2 (as soon as the check clears) in a paper titled “NYT — worst correction EVER!”.
There was a guy in an old movie playing with an inflatable Earth. Now what movie was it….
PS: Apparently there is only a 1 in 20 chance of snow during the Inauguration tomorrow. A shame, because it would have been fun to see Obama trying to ‘reconnect’ to his eco-fruitcake wing by mentioning global warming, while his teeth chattered and the snow fell on the assembled multitude.
Michael in Sydney says:
January 20, 2013 at 10:43 am
Could someone point me to the passage in the bible where God has called on me to heal the earth and/or implies I should stop burning coal oil and gas? I think I missed it.
————————————–
Michael in Sydney must be a Theologian.
“God blessed them and said to them, `Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.” Gen1:28, NIV
Of course, lots of folks far prefer the first 6 words … and then make things up after that.
@ur momisugly andrewmharding says:
“Thankfully we have six inches of snow outside which means that the BBC, Met Office and the other doom merchants shut up until it has thawed.”
Fool, you have six inches of global warming outside…
There are MANY problems with this statement. Not only was 2012 not the warmest, we have actually been having a very long period WITHOUT major storms on the East Coast and are generally in the longest period since the Civil War era without a major landfalling hurricane in the US. We are having a LACK of “extreme” weather. And clergy are now the authority on climate science? And if we can no longer leave the making of laws in the hands of politicians, who is being implied here that should make these decisions? The UN? Give me a break.