There is a bit of a row that has developed over the recent American Meteorological Society survey of its membership on cause of climate change that gave a surprising result of only 52% of survey respondents answering Yes: Mostly human. The Heartland Institute sent out an email advising its friends, members, and associates of the survey results, as show below, and the AMS is quite unhappy about that email.
On November 28th, AMS Executive Director Keith Seitter posted a rebuttal at the AMS web site titled Going to the source for accurate information. He writes:
A disturbing aspect of this e-mail is that it seems some effort was placed in making it appear to have been sent by AMS.
In addition to that statement, the authors of the paper reporting the results of the survey of AMS members have made a statement about Heartland’s email, which is noted in a post at the Climate Science Watch website titled Taylor distorts poll of meteorologists on climate change to reach opposite conclusion of study authors.
Heartland responded to the AMS with a blog post on their website “Somewhat Reasonable” with: AMS Survey Shows No Consensus on Global Warming. They cover some of the objections raised. Heartland director Joe Bast writes:
We chose to send this notice using an email address that was descriptive of the message – “AMS Survey [mailto:2013AMSsurvey@gmail.com]” – rather than an address with a Heartland domain to maximize the open rate, a common practice in email marketing. There was no attempt to deceive recipients about who sent the message: “This message was sent to [recipient] from Heartland Institute” and our address appear at the bottom of the message.
Dr. Judith Curry wrote about the affair:
At issue is whether the survey should be interpreted as a 52% consensus, or a 90% consensus. As per my post on this paper, 52% consensus(?), I provide a detailed interpretation of the results supporting the 52% consensus conclusion. Based upon their statement, the authors of the paper seem unaware of the nuances of what constitutes the IPCC consensus in terms of attribution. The key issue is how to interpret responses to the survey question related to climate or atmospheric science expertise and secondarily as to whether the members are publishing or not, which is discussed in my post 52% consensus(?).
In summary, Heartland’s interpretation is not a misrepresentation of the actual survey results, although the authors and the AMS are interpreting the results in a different way. A better survey might have avoided some of the ambiguity in the interpretation, but there seems to be no avoiding the fact that the survey showed that 48% of the AMS professional members do not think that most of the warming since 1850 is attributable to humans.
Dr. Curry doesn’t think the results were misrepresented in the Heartland email.
What I think is most upsetting to the AMS executive director and the authors of the survey paper aren’t so much the interpretation, but the way the email was delivered. Note in the image of the email above, its says From: “AMS Survey”. It also contained the logo of the AMS.
That fooled me, for about 5 seconds, into thinking that it was a communications from the AMS. But at the bottom of the email, the sender is quite clear:
My opinion is that Heartland boobed a bit here. They setup a mailing list called “AMS Survey” with the iContact mailing list service, and that would be destined to cause some confusion to recipients.
On the other hand, since the sender is clearly labeled at the bottom, you’d have to be a complete dolt to be permanently fooled into thinking this was an official AMS communications.
That email address combined with the use of the AMS logo, which was fair use for the purpose, pushed some buttons at AMS I think. I think the uproar comes from a couple people being initially misled for about 5 seconds, only to discover it was from Heartland and not the AMS. It is easy to become indignant about being misled, even if for only a few seconds.
The uproar by AMS executive director Setter might also have been accelerated by a thought that Heartland got access to the AMS member list, and that Heartland tried to pull one over on their membership. That isn’t likely, because the email I posted from Heartland via iContact came to a member’s email address that was not on file with the AMS. Even if Heartland had used the AMS mailing list, the AMS doesn’t have much of beef about it since they offer their membership mailing list for sale to 3rd parties.
Source: http://www.ametsoc.org/advertising/professionaldirectory.html
While I think that using the email address “AMS Survey” could have been an honest mistake when Heartland setup the email distribution list with iContact (Hmm, what shall I call it?) based on Bast’s description, it certainly didn’t set well with some people. A cursory review of the Heartland effort by anyone not so close to the issue might have prevented that problem by pointing out the sender address might be misinterpreted, the issue seized upon, and cause some uproar.
OTOH, that may have been exactly what Heartland was counting on, since uproars tend to bring far more eyes to the table than a simple mailer would. See the Streisand Effect. Heartland has been known for pushing the envelope in the past, such as with their disastrous blunder with the Unabomber billboard.
Whether it was an honest mistake, or pushing the envelope, one thing is for certain: far more people know about the 52% survey result now than they would have had the AMS not gone ballistic about it.
While we are on the subject of mailing lists, this survey and subsequent row has created a new discovery about it, and that will be the subject of a future post.
The Heartland has joined the media war begun by the eco-green alarmists. While I am not a supporter of an eye-for-an-eye, or using the weapons and tactics of your enemy (nerve gas in Syria, anyone?), the AMS and others are hypocritical here. Kettle calling the pot black and all that.
When only one in two agree, there is no consensus. It is not a question of asking the right question, as you’ll always get the same answer. Even the Lewandowsky survey had no consensus in the data: they achieved their 97% result by cherry-picking their respondents.
tit-for-tat I say.
Well, consensus is for fools, and there are lots of us.
=============
An interesting comment on the
AMSwebsite from a “Mike Smith”http://www.climatesciencewatch.org/2013/11/28/taylor-distorts-poll-of-meteorologists-on-climate-change/
I am a Fellow of the American Meteorological Society and a Certified Consulting Meteorologist. To the best of my memory I never had a chance to respond to this poll of the AMS membership.
That said, the fact that 70% of scientists say that humans affect the climate is utterly unsurprising. That has been known scientifically since Changnon’s METROMEX study in the early 70’s. The fact that 9 out of ten that publish on the subject of climate believe humans affect the climate is also utterly unsurprising.
For me, the money question was #6, “How worried are you about global warming?” Only 30% answered “very worried.” This would make 70% of the respondents “deniers” since that perjorative term seems to be applied to anyone who does not accept the “IPCC consensus” of catastrophic global warming. A statistically similar number (28%) is not worried or “not very worried” about global warming.
So, you can spin the results any way you want but this survey of a small number of AMS members doesn’t reveal any great concern about global warming.
Dana has as expected jumped in with both feet to this battle:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent
The Streisand effect.
I do not like that they used the AMS logo, but as noted, it was clear who sent it. So some would read it before seeing the logo at the bottom. Others would never get that far. But AMS escalated it when they decided to make a row about what is essentially a fact.
If the survey were properly worded, the result would have shown that only a very small percentage of scientists and engineers think that human activity is the primary cause of global warming.
Why?
Because a properly worded survey would define ‘primary cause’ as a cause that is supported by verifiable scientific evidence. If that were the criteria, probably far less than 5% of respondents would agree that there is empirical, testable evidence showing human activity as the primary cause.
The reason: there is NO verifiable, measurable scientific evidence showing that human CO2 emissions cause global warming; none at all.
Human CO2 emissions may cause some minor global warming. Maybe. But measurable evidence connecting human CO2 emissions to global warming is completely lacking. And lacking measurable evidence is hardly science — as the AMS should certainly know.
97% of the AMS think Heartland cheated.
I too received this mail. Initially I thought it was from the AMS and I think that’s a reasonable conclusion that anyone would be expected to jump to. However once I started reading it became clear that the AMS would never have sent the content and a quick check led me to the actual sender.
I was not overly concerned about it, however I can see that the AMS have every right to be upset about the manner of delivery and I don’t doubt for one moment that Heartland discussed and agreed to do things in this way.
It does not alter the facts and I remain unconcerned about this little piece of mischief making.
This is too much fun. I hope we have plenty of popcorn. I wonder how Babs feels about having her name attached to the concept of generating more news than if you had left it alone. If I had done a survey and come up with 97% agreement, I’d be suspicious because it is very difficult to get that kind of unanimity on any subject, let alone one with controversy.
If you want to have fun, do a survey of regular people and see how many feel the earth is larger than the sun. I predict greater than 60% will answer that the earth is larger than the sun. Consensus is a wonderful thing.
My sense:
The AMS folks who ran the survey started out incredribly biased and wanted both to prove nearly all their members agree with the position statement and to identify who didn’t and why so they could hone their in-house marketing message.
The conclusions in the paper read more like marketing than the dispassionate quest for truth that science aspires to (and rarely attains).
Heartland’s Email was spun with much the same effort and opposite intent.
Using the special “From:” line was not classy, but it probably got the message past a number of Email filters.
Using the AMS logo was okay, but the AMS lawyers could make a stink. (Hey, they can still use the APS logo once.)
The signature line was fine. While it wasn’t prominent, it does clearly show who sent the Email. People familiar with Heartland press releases likely figured it out by then anyway.
Bottom line: the AMS is annoyed that their blatant attempt to spin the story has been equalled. and faux outrage is about the best response they can invent.
Heartland could come up with a very level headed reply, it might even get read given that there’s now a Controversy. Unfortunately, that’s not how they work.
I read the AMS paper. There is simply no getting around the fact that it says just 52 percent of “all respondents” subscribe to the view that global warming is happening and its cause is “mostly human.” The Heartland Institute being maybe too clever by half doesn’t detract from that.
Better to shoot the messenger than address the message, it appears.
I’ll give the AMS some credit — they did actually publish the results. I’m surprised they didn’t “homogenize” the responses with proxy tree ring data, TOA adjustments, or some other kind of nonsense.
PLease. The big bad Heartland Institute used a clever ruse in order to get these people to open their email. Oh, the indignation! Total straw man I might add, as an attempt to deflect attention from that damning 52 percent denialist population in the AMS. I’ve long argued we should be fighting back with surveys of our own, Glad to see HI doing just that.
If there is a publicity storm going on, I’d like to see Heartland raise two issues and make them as public as possible:
1. There are a large number of AMS members who have stated that they were NOT surveyed, despite having their email address on record. Why?
2. Elections are anonymous voting processes. In a democracy this is sacrosanct because without it, fear of reprisal and/or other consequences skews the results. This was not an anonymous poll, and turn out was extremely light. Is AMS prepared to repeat the survey to ALL its members and allow them to respond in an ANONYMOUS fashion?
dbstealy nails it.
Have no pity or respect for the AMS. Their corrupt leaders tried to strong-arm their members by threatening to revoke their certifications if they didn’t tow the party line (Google Heidi Cullen, A.K.A. the Weather Bimbo), and for years they have repeatedly lied to the general public telling us over and over again that an overwhelming majority of meteorologists believe in CAGW. Now that their lies have come back and bitten them on the ass they’re complaining. Whaaa…
If they didn’t want the world to know what their members believed, they shouldn’t have asked.
Heartland’s email was lame.
“…the AMS surveyed its members via email and found 52% believe that global warming is happening…”
No they didn’t. They found that 52% of the 26% that responded believe that. That’s 13%, if
they surveyed all of the members – which they did not, though they said they did.
Why is Heartland repeating the warmist original authors’ mischaracterization of the results?
From the information we have, all we can conclude from this survey is that 87% of the AMA either don’t buy into ‘global warming’, or they don’t care enough about it to bother voicing their opinion about it.
When you’re focused on marching goose step correctly, it’s hard to hear those around you not in step.
Paging Dr. Peter H Gleick.
As with much of the CAGW “debaters”, a lot of huff an puff about an issue is a fog to try to obscure the real issue that is bothering the huffers and puffers: their membership survey showed to their shock, only about half believe humans are to blame and many more don’t think whatever warming there is serious. Anyway the cat’s out of the bag and I believe it a benefit to the AMS brass that they know that THEY are in the minority.
Same ‘disguised documents’, different decade. Probably many of you remember the big outrage about the initial circulation of Art Robinson’s Oregon Petition Project, where the hurt-feelings AGW crowd claimed the “petition and the documents included were all made to look like official papers from the prestigious National Academy of Science.” (e.g. this retelling: http://www.desmogblog.com/oregon-petition )
It’s an anti-intellectual narrative to push if you really think about it, the idea that highly intelligent scientists would be so dumb as to not be able to tell their rear end from a hole in the ground, when it comes to the Oregon Petition or Heartland material.
The inclusion of the AMS logo is sketchy.
The AMS response has clearly been affected by global warming – all that CO2 in the hot air emitted has intensified the response. We now have a superstorm in a teacup.
If Heartland was really smart they would have paid the $1,230 to rent the AMS email list, sent out their email and got a “thank-you for supporting AMS”. Then when things hit the fan it would have been funny.
I have never understood the assumption that if you have published a paper on some aspect of climate change, that your opinion on climate change is somehow more important. Someone may light the stage for a Broadway show, but it doesn’t mean their opinion of the performance is any more valuable than someone sitting in the audience. In fact, since their job depends on the success of the show, their opinion is far more likely to be biased inappropriately.
The warmests have been utterly consumed with the idea that any skeptic may have been given money at some point by anyone even remotely connected to ‘big oil’, but never wonder if the gravy train of AGW science has had any impact on scientists doing climate change research. Is big oil money more coercive than big government money? No. It is less so, because skeptics are not dependent on oil money to make a living, but many research scientists live and die by the federal and IPO grant money.
While the paper claims that those who have published on climate change have more authority, I would argue that those who have published on climate change have much more to lose if the AGW funding was cut due to the lack of a crisis. This survey seems to indicate that the AGW meme is supported by those AMS members who have a vested interest in the meme, and not supported nearly as much by those members who have no stake one way or another.
And that is extremely telling!
AMS would have complained no matter how Heartland did it. When somebody is gonna be upset and light their hair on fire no matter what you do, then you don’t have to worry about whether or not what you do will make them mad. Since that is always a foregone conclusion, do whatever suits yourself the best – in this case, trolling the AMS into making a bigger deal of this than Heartland could ever could have made of it themselves.
Heartland has as much creditability as Peter Gleick. Same people as SkS, just different sides of the issue. Science will win in the end. Skeptic’s by and large are classy….Why muddy ourselves with Heartland?
Would the result have been different if the Heartland logo were used? Of course not, this is smoke and mirrors and the AMS board whinging and wailing that their members are not stupid enough to believer the propaganda they are fed.
Jim Clarke says:
“I have never understood the assumption that if you have published a paper on some aspect of climate change, that your opinion on climate change is somehow more important.”
Err – did you really mean that, Jim Clarke??
The idea that someone expert in a field of the science in question’s opinion is somehow more important that the average man/woman on the street?
OK, then why do we teach people sciences? Why do we teach people anything?
So they become expert in that endeavour perhaps? So that they know more than most and that their opinion therefor carries more weight. Like your doctor knowing more about your illness than the next door neighbour. Who’d you prefer to consult?
You know, as someone quite well known in science once said “I have stood on the shoulders of giants”.
How could he stand on those shoulders if he was not conversant with what they had discovered? ergo been experts in their field and as such so was he.
In a sane world I would suggest that indeed people that publish papers on a subject (peer reviewed – by experts) do very much carry more weight than anyone else.
And I find the questioning of that assumption contrary to common sense and disturbingly bizarre to boot.
Blue Sky says:
December 2, 2013 at 2:29 pm
Heartland is a criminal orginisation? Do tell.
The inclusion of the AMS logo would only raised an eyebrow if it’s understood that the AMS would conduct an UN-BIASED survey. Since we all know that the AMS would ONLY CONDUCT A BIASED survey, we now know that chicanery is the name of the game, sooooo the logo thing is OK by the dodgy standards set by the AMS.
The fact that AMS is unhappy makes me happy. Funny how that works. Thank you, Heartland.
What do the 52% claim to be the evidence ?
Some number of these folks probably got annoyed when they realized that The Chronicles of Narnia was a Christian allegory.
My take on it is that it is very wrong. The Heartland Institute must be mortified …. that anyone would mistake them for the American Meteorological Society. ; > )
Seems like most climate scientists don’t believe in surveys.
I received the Heartland email on the AMS survey.
I was amused when I saw it was ‘signed’ at the bottom by Heartland Institute.
Even more amused now with the AMS response and the HI response to the AMS response.
The use of the AMS logo strongly links the survey results with skeptical memes, which I am sure was HI’s strategy. Not a bad strategy if PR is considered as suitable for publicizing skepticism.
Next week, when Lewandowsky is involved in several sessions at the AGU Fall Meeting in San Francisco, perhaps he will do an attack on HI with his usual ¢öñšpįråtaliźatîøñ [a new word] trick.
John
Just have to love Dana.
if you read down his replies to comments in the Guardian he seems to be saying, and I paraphrase obviously, that Weather Forecasters aren’t Climatologists therefore their views are moot as they aren’t Experts. Hence they have no credibility when talking about Climate.
Which raises the question : Why do the Alarmists view the backing of the AMS to have any value at all ?
Is it because a slim majority of the membership is credible and competent ?
Talk about kicking your Pals in the teeth !
The style of the email is unacceptably deceptive. Even after reading the email and who sent it and reading some of the controversy, I was still assuming the message was just a quote by Heartland of a statement by the AMS. I even think it was actually illegal for Heartland to do it. You can’t just impersonate another organization and use their logo in the style of a quote and then put a small disclaimer at the end. That doesn’t qualify as fair use. To see this more clearly, imagine if the text had been 100 pages instead of just one, so that many people would read a little but very few would get to the true author’s identity far at the end of the document.
I think Heartland would lose a lawsuit if pursued by AMS. Of course the damages would be small compared to the publicity value of such a suit. But considering the 97% consensus fraud perpetrated by alarmists for so long, one is tempted to consider turnabout to be fair play here.
Dana- “Interestingly, the strongest single factor in predicting meteorologists’ acceptance of human-caused global warming was their perception of the level of expert consensus on the subject. This result is consistent with previous research finding that people are more likely to accept this reality and support taking climate action if they’re aware of the expert climate consensus.”
So naturally we had to make them all more aware with that 97% Cookup and we’re always on the lookout for ways of getting and keeping converts.
TB;
In a sane world I would suggest that indeed people that publish papers on a subject (peer reviewed – by experts) do very much carry more weight than anyone else.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
In a sane world, people wouldn’t publish tree ring studies based 50% on a single tree.
In a sane world, people wouldn’t build compute algorithms that produce a hockey stick no matter the data.
In a sane world, people wouldn’t play “tricks” to “hide the decline”
In a sane world, the divergence problem would condemn tree ring data to the dust bin.
In a sane world, models that were clearly and obviously wrong for nearly two decades would not continue to be presented as evidence.
In a sane world, Al Gore wouldn’t fake his on air experiment not to mention his viewing stats.
In a sane world, we wouldn’t condemn with absolute certainty, hundreds of millions to poverty, hunger and disease for something that might happen and is only predicted by a single tree, a false algorithm, tricks to hide the decline, proxies that diverge from the temperature record for nearly half of it, computer models that keep getting it wrong and arrogant snobs with the carbon footprint of a small city faking experiments on TV.
We do not live in a sane world sir, and if one confines oneself to the climate science world, assumption of either malice or incompetence when reading any paper will serve you well. Not always, but with a regularity suggesting it is a good practice.
Mindbuilder says:
“I think Heartland would lose a lawsuit if pursued by AMS. ”
Where did you get your JD?
@ dbstealey says: December 2, 2013 at 4:55 pm
Same place I got mine! Cracker Jacks. 😉
The shorter Dana- How dare they mock us by Gleicking for a few seconds with an unpleasant truth when we control the message and besides what would Meteorologists know anyway!!
HI stirs the pot a bit and of course the vested interests at AMS protest. Keep up the good work HI
A skirmish on enemy territory, and they lost
Dbstealey says:
“If the survey were properly worded”
Exactly! I have been pretty sceptical of all surveys ever since I saw this episode 😉
TB says:
December 2, 2013 at 2:33 pm
“Err – did you really write that, mean that. Jim Clarke??”
Yes…I really did, but I was not talking about people on the street. I was talking about the membership of the AMS. This survey separates AMS members into those who do research on climate change and those who do not, and makes the assumption that those who do research on a specific part of climate change have more authority on the entire subject of climate change than other atmospheric scientists.
This is like saying that a medical doctor doing drug research for a major pharmaceutical company has more authority to discuss the use of all prescription medicines than doctors who don’t do clinical drug testing. Any normal person would think that a doctor working for big pharma would be a little suspect. But a scientist working for ‘big climate’ is depicted as an authority, having a more valuable opinion than other, equally educated atmospheric scientists with no financial stake.
Let’s take it one step further but on a similar vain. Would you rate the opinion of the medical doctor’s who produced research *(paid for by tobacco companies) that cigarette smoking did not cause cancer higher than other medical professionals? Certainly we could argue that they are doing the research so they must be more knowledgeable. But then we would be idiots, wouldn’t we?
You can sue a doctor for malpractice.
TB, Publishing a paper on something does not really mean that much. Many academics have to publish a minimum of 5 peer reviewed papers (typically in each five year period) in their fields at to attain/maintain tenure. I have read many of these papers, and some of them weren’t worth the paper they were printed on. The only reason they weren’t withdrawn is because it is nigh on impossible to get journals and authors to admit to even obvious errors.
What you wrote was a version of appeal to authority. When it comes to science, it does not matter the degrees possessed or titles granted, just the bloody tenacity of fact to support or disprove a theory. It matters not how smart the theorist or how elegant the theory, one contrary fact whether found by a PhD, a student, or the janitor is all it takes to end the theory’s usefulness.
TB;
100 credentialed, peer reviewed scientists once combined their efforts to discredit a single man’s work. His name was Albert Einstein. Their problem was that no matter how many of them there were,no matter how many peer reviewed papers they had between them, they were wrong.
I received the email too. I noticed it was from a gmail address, which I thought was odd, but the Outlook preview panel looked interesting so I fully opened it. It may have taken me a few seconds longer than Anthony, but I soon realized who had sent it and what it was. As this regarded a survey from an organization (AMS) that has exhibited AGW advocacy, my interest level trended below that necessary for further thought.
Anything beyond that, such as being miffed by whatever one might read into it beyond that, really boils down to reading into it more than you can read by reading it. All of it. That would be “spin”.
There seem to be several problems with such surveys/polls/etc. The first two concerns relate to the survey questions as to (a) how equivocal they may be, and (b) how easily they might be misinterpreted by survey participants. Given that this is a scientific society survey, might the results be tilted in favor of those that deign to reply? AGW advocates often appear to be more “vocal”, which is a perception, not a fact. This trend may be further affected if it is not an anonymous membership survey. Given recent NSA revelations, just how comfortable is anyone these days with their metadata regardless of how a survey is conducted?
In the end analysis, it doesn’t really matter. The sun has gone all quite on us at a half-precession old extreme interglacial. CO2 is going up. Temperatures, apparently even with UHI, seem to have flat-lined going on two decades now. The only thing that is of any interest here is whether or not we are going into a Maunder-style minimum or MIS-0*? A subsidiary question, if you are a rational hominid, might be why would you even consider taking such a supposedly potent GHG out of the late Holocene atmosphere?
*MIS-2 was the Last Glacial Maximum. MIS-1 is the Holocene, the present interglacial. MIS-0 would be the next glacial inception etc.
Any time you go the marketing route, dishonesty will rear its ugly head. It’s just the nature of the beast. Regardless of how much of a dolt one might have to be to be fooled by the email, Heartland shouldn’t have done it that way. Like the Unabomber billboard, they seem to be prone to some bad decisions. Don’t be marketers, be fact-presenters; there’s an enormous difference.
Note: The Unabomber billboard might have been factual, but was made into a marketing tool, serving no real purpose, that’s why it backfired.
“What I think is most upsetting to the AMS executive director and the authors…” is that the survey results reveal that most people do not agree with them. A hangable offence in any communist state worth its salt!
Jim Clarke says:
December 2, 2013 at 1:57 pm
+++++++++++
Great and cogent post Jim Clarke. Thank you for taking the time for such a thoughtful response. TB does not understand the words you wrote, and his diatribe proved as much. TB – here’s a hint, when you rebut something someone had written, it’s always a good idea to strip emotions and try to understand what they wrote. If you had done so, we’d not have to read your mostly thoughtless response.
TB said, 12/2 at 2:33 pm
“In a sane world I would suggest that indeed people that publish papers on a subject (peer reviewed – by experts) do very much carry more weight than anyone else.
And I find the questioning of that assumption contrary to common sense and disturbingly bizarre to boot.”
But, in Climate Science, the sane world was never consulted. Many known and well documented physical properties and behaviors of fluids in the atmosphere were never even considered by the carbo-phobic Malthusians chosen to become Climate Science PhDs.
That and the documented pal review and gate keeping within the ranks of the Climate Science community, suggest nothing bizarre about questioning their hypotheses or their conclusions, which seem to be mostly quoting each others’ conjections. Plus, their “the science is settled” proclamations strongly suggest they are trying to hide something.
.
Streisand effect
This was rich, boys, rich I tell you. Kudos H.I., it achieved the intended affect, I think (“wadded knickers” at AMS HQ).
.
TB says:
December 2, 2013 at 2:33 pm
“In a sane world I would suggest that indeed people that publish papers on a subject (peer reviewed – by experts) do very much carry more weight than anyone else.
“And I find the questioning of that assumption contrary to common sense and disturbingly bizarre to boot.”
TB, speaking of bizarre, take 52% of this:
https://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2012AM/finalprogram/abstract_212012.htm
or this:
http://business.uow.edu.au/sydney-bschool/content/groups/public/@web/@sci/@eesc/documents/doc/uow045009.pdf
Was that 52% or 52 Meters?
http://lin.irk.ru/pdf/6696.pdf
Pattern-recognition failure might be drug-related. Consult your doctor. Assuming you got to keep your doctor.
Period.
Note Michael E. Mann was (also) presiding………..
https://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2012AM/finalprogram/session_30943.htm
Stranger things have been known to happen……… 🙂
“If you’re in the con game and you don’t know who the mark is … you’re the mark.”
The cons have been had and they are hopping mad.
No lack of juveniles on either side, though IMO AMS side has cornered the market and is protesting the encroachment onto its territory.
I’m amazed the AMS conducted the survey and then announced the results, in any form. It would be like Stalin asking his people what they thought of their most recent shopping experience at the market.
It’s not astute on the part of politicians to let people express their opinions when a different result is wanted.
Wow. I’m going to start telling people 48% of certified meteorologists do not think the warming we’ve seen since 1850 is attributable to humans.
Is this another big crack in the CAGW PR monolith?
I can’t believe that nutcase Dana.
I am an engineer, and I can tell you that when we design a system we consult both the users of that system and the practitioners – the technicians that monitor and repair these systems day in day out. The hubris of suggesting that the scientists, know more about the intricacies of atmosphere than the practitioners – the meteorologists, is just flabberghasting.
The audacity !
Further he says that the finding that political view influences the statistics is evidence of the evil republicans distorting the debate, it seems to me that equally it’s evidence of the evil democracts supporting a false consensus pseudo-science. That argument obviously swings both ways.
Having said that I’ve had several run ins with the green misathropist activist nut that is Dana and can say without hesitation that he has no scientific understanding of climate, certainly no understanding of feedback, so nothing he says should surprise me.
It is always the message that counts, not the envelope.
It was my understanding that the initial survey results were even less enthusiastic about the “consensus”, and they subsequently revised the survey questions to get better results. A colleague of mine- a now former member of the AMS- was surveyed TWICE for this with slightly revised questions designed to get a better consensus result. In other words, they did the best they could, ha.
Since AMS sells their membership emails, someone(s) with money COULD canvass the membership with a properly worded survey.
WxMatt says:
December 3, 2013 at 4:47 am
It would be entertaining if they polled ex-AMS members. I suspect the results would not get published….
Would the AMS have complained about HI if the survey results were different?
Say for example the survey showed 100% of the members agreed with AGW. Would the AMS have complained if HI had sent the exact same email with different numbers?
Well, they did manage to stop Einstein from getting the Nobel for the Theory of Relativity in 1921, which he was originally cited for, and got it delayed until the Nobel Committee could come up with another reason to give him the award, in 1922: “For his services to Theoretical Physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect.”
Unfortunately, the story of this uproar is now behind The London Times paywall. I read it when it was free. Emotions were fierce because the other scientists claimed he stole Poincaré’s idea.
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1921/
davidmhoffer says:
December 2, 2013 at 12:07 pm
1. There are a large number of AMS members who have stated that they were NOT surveyed, despite having their email address on record. Why?
Interesting question with an obvious possible answer: Based upon previous surveys, they knew whom to survey, and whom not to survey, to get the intended results. If the following comment is in fact true, even that failed.
WxMatt says:
December 3, 2013 at 4:47 am
It was my understanding that the initial survey results were even less enthusiastic about the “consensus”, and they subsequently revised the survey questions to get better results. A colleague of mine- a now former member of the AMS- was surveyed TWICE for this with slightly revised questions designed to get a better consensus result.
When you consider the likely survey votes of the members who’ve quit the society over their treatment of this issue in the past, this is all somehow very encouraging. Maybe we really are winning?
I am not a member of the AMS or the AARP. But it seems to me that both are driven by agendas other than what one would think given their titles and are responding to entities that are political in nature
[snip – sorry, you don’t get to label people “denialists” here – mod]
Blue Sky says:December 2, 2013 at 2:29 pm
“Heartland has as much creditability as Peter Gleick.….Why muddy ourselves with Heartland?”
Your assertion is based on….. what, exactly? The NIPCC Reports are published through Heartland, Drs Soon, Idso, Carter, Singer and others associate with Heartland. Yes, the Kaczynski billboard was not the wisest thing to do, I chastised them over it myself, which they saw fit to have at their blog (http://ow.ly/rpbDS ), along with other pieces I wrote (e.g. http://ow.ly/iPn6u ). Do I have no credibility now because of the association?
Seems to me Heartland has been one of bigger bulwarks out there against the AGW crowd. Claim they ‘muddy’ the water, and you play straight into the hands of the Desmogblog bunch and their efforts to manufacture doubt about anything the skeptics say. That’s why Gore’s followers hammer on these little distractions, and why I thought the Kaczynski billboard showcased their one-trick pony tactic of making sure the public never focuses on the core problems.
[ TB says:
December 2, 2013 at 2:33 pm
Err – did you really mean that, Jim Clarke??
The idea that someone expert in a field of the science in question’s opinion is somehow more important that the average man/woman on the street? ]
Define expert.
IQ, # of papers, talks given at symposia, # of likes on facebook, $ research funding, Deans of Univeristies, etc…etc…etc…
I’ve dealt with a lot of “experts” with PhD’s in my years of academia, and have come to the conclusion that any ignorant clam can get a PhD, if they’re persistent.
Who U think is an expert is probably just one of the verbose 3% wannabees.
Oh, ok, I’ll use your euphemism instead, “skeptic.” My point was that the survey and Nuccitelli’s article actually go into the survey results, not just the 52% figure, which, if you are at all honest, completely mischaracterizes the survey results.
Among the figures conveniently missed by you and your cohorts at Heartland is that only 13% of survey respondents were climate scientists, which is the group from which the 97% consensus figure comes. The 93% figure from the AMS survey is pretty close.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/AMS-meteorologists-97-percent.html
“The AMS on the other hand is not comprised primarily of climate experts. Some of its members do climate research, but only 13 percent of survey participants described climate as their field of expertise. Among those respondents with climate expertise who have published their climate research, this survey found that 93 percent agreed that humans have contributed significantly to global warming over the past 150 years (78 percent said it’s mostly human-caused, 10 percent said it’s equally caused by humans and natural processes, and 5 percent said the precise degree of human causation is unclear, but that humans have contributed). Just 2 percent of AMS climate experts said global warming is mostly natural, 1 percent said global warming isn’t happening, and the remaining 4 percent were unsure about global warming or human causation.”
Also, Heartland’s construction of the subject email was obviously meant to deceive. You’d have to be blind to not see that. Deception has been Heartland’s stock in trade since it cut its teeth denying that smoking caused cancer. To associate yourself with them diminishes your own credibility.
My gut feeling is that there is not ONE meteorologist who believes in AGW sincerely anyway. I certainly have not met one who does and I know many meteorologists personally.
AMS has been “pushing the envelope” for a long time in support of the dubious AGW theory. The following is from their statement on climate change:
It turns out that nearly half their members don’t agree with these assertions and that therefore AMS is misrepresenting the views a large minority of their members. If that’s not “pushing the envelope,” I don’t know what is. What AMS doesn’t like is having the strong differences of opinion within their membership bruited about to the public.
Sort of like here in Texas, you have some who enter the beer store by the front door, others like to park in back of the store and do the secret knock to enter unknown by others.
The 52% are the back door types seems to some they do not want the 48% to be known at all.
If Gleick’s behaviour is seen to be acceptable, then what’es the problem? They warmers can’t have it both ways.
pottereaton says:
December 3, 2013 at 9:55 am
AMS has been “pushing the envelope” for a long time in support of the dubious AGW theory. The following is from their statement on climate change:
There is unequivocal evidence that Earth’s lower atmosphere, ocean, and land surface are warming; sea level is rising; and snow cover, mountain glaciers, and Arctic sea ice are shrinking.
===============================================================
To which we respond – “And your point is? This has all happened before, and it will all happen again. Live with it”.
I appreciate when some people make a little small talk upfront and tell on themselves. Far from being a waste of time, it can save a lot of it.
Heartland has never denied that smoking causes cancer. It questioned that second-hand smoke does so, especially outside the home. Certain warmist sites have (successfully) tried to deceive their readers into believing that Heartland made the first claim by using the word tobacco, assuming readers will read it as meaning “smoking.”
Meteorologists are the most credible scientists when it comes to climate change. They study the weather. It’s their expertise. Dana, Hansen, Schmidt, Mann et al have little credibility. They are not meteorologists. They are computer modelers engaged in political advocacy. (well, Dana doesn’t have any relevant expertise) That AMS is almost equally divided on AGW is far more significant than the “consensus” being promoted by those with well-known agenda.
Tough one for you to consider about smoking too Doug-
“A major environmental health problem
Air pollution is already known to increase risks for a wide range of diseases, such as respiratory and heart diseases. Studies indicate that in recent years exposure levels have increased significantly in some parts of the world, particularly in rapidly industrializing countries with large populations. The most recent data indicate that in 2010, 223 000 deaths from lung cancer worldwide resulted from air pollution.”
So just how do all the experts differentiate between deaths from smoking and those 223000 deaths from air pollution? Now that wouldn’t be a whole lot like trying to pin down Big Climate on just how much of their scary CO2 produces how much warming or recent lack thereof would it?
But maybe you don’t believe that statement I quoted then you feel free to set them straight-
http://www.iarc.fr/en/media-centre/iarcnews/pdf/pr221_E.pdf
Yeah I know it’s all that passive smoking and Heartless Heartland.
Hi Russell Cook,
I am embarrassed by some of the things Heartland has done. Their actions distract from the research they and myself support. In trying to convince friends and family about the climate, I no longer direct them to Heartland.
“What’s up’ is my Ace in the hole. I see Mr. Watts as someone not easily bought. But his tone seems to be hardening, catering to a partisan side. Maybe it’s the realities of running a go to web site. More likely it’s the result of being constantly attacked by losers in the debate.
As skeptics…we are making the points. No need to adopt the tactics of some those on the other side of the argument.
Blue Sky says:
December 4, 2013 at 3:18 pm
You are a demanding ally, Blue Sky. I’m afraid you will continue being disappointed in your friends.
“You are a demanding ally, Blue Sky. I’m afraid you will continue being disappointed in your friends’
Colorado Wellington says.
Colorado…Some of my friends may be knuckleheads. But love them nonetheless. Been making some progress on this issue!
Blue Sky says:
December 5, 2013 at 1:27 pm
… making some progress …
Good to hear, Blue, but I meant the friends that embarrass you. The partisan, hardening ones.