![UBristolCabot[1]](https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/ubristolcabot1.png)
This post was published while I am on an airplane headed back to California (isn’t technology wonderful?). I am very indebted to all of my good friends in the UK, and especially Nic Lewis, who arranged an extraordinary meeting while I was there. That one event will bear more fruit than any other part of the trip. The other meetings, such as the Mann and Cook meetings, were far less extraordinary, and mostly “heard it all before”. The Mann meeting was little more than an hour long dissertation on some out of date science plus a LOT of politics, complete with an “enemies list” of head-shot visuals, followed by what looked to be a prearranged Q&A sequence of 5 questions from the audience (with audience microphone privileges orchestrated from the stage by Stephan Lewandowsky who looked like a traffic cop pointing out who got to ask questions), followed by a book signing with a University police guard (I kid you not).
Readers in attendance are welcome to post their recollection and experiences here.
I’ve somehow lost my USB data cable for my phone, so I can’t get the photos off until I return home. It appears the Cabot Institute filmed the entire event, and when/if that video is available, I will advise. Again, my sincere thanks to the Cabot Institute for their assistance with my hearing impairment.
One thing that really stuck in my craw was that at the end of his lecture, Dr. Mann put up a photo of his daughter with a polar bear behind glass at a zoo, citing the usual “we must do this for the future and our children” meme and then commented that “this [photo] will probably be up on blogs within hours”.
No, Dr. Mann it won’t, at least not here, nor would it ever have been. While you may not have scruples about using that photo as a prop for public discourse in the first place, I most certainly do.
Josh was there and did a live-tooning of the event, and I expect he’ll have his new cartoon ready after colorization on Thursday. And, my sincere thanks to him for the lift from Bristol to Heathrow as well as for the “bangers and mash”, which was splendid. Richard Drake deserves my thanks for his tour assistance on my one day off, Monday, where I was able to stand on the prime meridian at Greenwich, something I wanted to do since primary school. Also thanks to Caroline K, for opening her home to a small horde of skeptics for a pre-Mann event meeting.
And last but not least, I thank the readers of WUWT, for enabling me to get there in the first place.
——————————————————————–
WUWT reader *Loudzoo* wrote in with these impressions, which I concur with.
Initial impressions of Mann’s lecture in Bristol on Tuesday 23rd September 2014
Having attended Professor Michael Mann’s lecture at Bristol University on Tuesday I thought I’d summarize some immediate views on the event.
On the slides presented:
I was astonished that Mann continues to use such old, inappropriate data. On his chart of climate model performance vs recorded temperature his data only went up to 2005 and he used land based thermometer readings – not the satellite record. Very weak given how widely available up-to-date data are. I suspect he did not want to highlight the current hiatus in positive annual mean temperature anomalies and divergence from climate models
He glossed merrily over the “established science” of the greenhouse effect. No comment on positive and negative feedbacks, transitory sensitivity, the role of evapotranspiration, water vapour, clouds, ozone etc. I guess that’s because nobody has good parameters for these variables . . . and they fatally undermine the paradigm of the “established science” being simple and uncontroversial.
He presented no proxy data before 1000 CE. Presumably the Roman Warm Period, let alone the Holocene Climatic Optimum would have undermined his argument.
He referenced all the normal claptrap on extreme weather, drought, heatwaves, flooding unprecedented sea level rise, arctic ice melt (no mention of the Antarctic – other than the west Antarctic ice shelf) but presented no data on this. He also inferred that climate change is loading the dice in favour of extreme weather but made no mention of land use, water management, agriculture etc. As a Geography graduate of Oxford University where I specialised in Climatology and Quaternary Environments I find this bizarre. On the basis of this presentation Prof Mann would not pass Geography degree finals examinations!
There was very little discussion on the hockey stick graph itself (what the proxies were, how there were selected, what statistical methods were used, how the proxies were calibrated etc.) The divergence problem in tree ring analysis was mentioned but was glossed over and used as an excuse for the “hide the decline” comment in the Climategate emails.
There was a huge emphasis on his battles with Republican politicians. This is all very well but not a contribution to the science of climate change. Quite frankly, as a Brit I didn’t pay much attention to this part of his presentation.
Where I did wake-up again was where he revealed his victim-complex when numerously subpoenaed for his email, and research notes. Having had a career in finance for the last 17 years I find it very strange that he thought this was unfair. The organisations (mostly governmental) funding research with huge socio-political implications should have access to emails and research notes. The regulators of the finance industry have access to the equivalent in the banking industry by law!
There were at least two slides involving pictures of polar bears floating on small icebergs. Whilst he did say that such appeals hadn’t helped the public realise how close to home the impacts of climate change might be – he still used them!
The Q&A session:
This was a joke! Unless I got confused Prof Stephan Lewandowsky was in charge of selecting which people could ask questions!! Surprisingly enough he managed to pick people who were entirely sympathetic: One regarding the inconsistency of the actions of Republican Christian Right vs their religious views as caretakers of God’s creation; one on how to deal with / debate climate sceptics and the final one was from a chap who works for Avaaz (who organised the ”peoples’” climate marches last weekend). As someone who has had to plant and harvest questions at presentations throughout my career – I can fairly say this was an amateur job. It was so obvious!
All of this was a shame if for no other reason that Rich Pancost (the Director of the Cabot Institute) who’d enthusiastically made the presentation introduction did seem genuinely keen for a discussion. Sadly that was never really on the agenda.
Some Concluding thoughts:
There was nothing new or controversial here – but alluding to Anthony’s report on the Cook Lecture it was very interesting to be in the room and see the Mann in the flesh. It has reinforced something I’ve had an emerging view on for some time. Whilst there may well be small pockets of collusion and conspiracy in the field of climatology this is not the reason why the “science” has been so abused. Furthermore, I’m sure the competition for research grants is fierce and that can play into the reinforcement of an incorrect scientific paradigm. But what I took away from this lecture more than anything else is that Mann genuinely believes he is right and that his work will save the world. It seems that this is far more powerful motive for him (and I suspect many of the front line academics, politicians and activists) to ignore the evidence against, the problems and the holes in his hypothesis / theory.
They genuinely believe the Earth needs saving and that they are the ones to do it irrespective of the cost. In human history this combination of beliefs has often been exceptionally dangerous to the public in general but in particular to the poorest and neediest.
As others may have said before the story of CAGW will one day be told in the same breath as the fables of The Emperor’s New Clothes, and of King Canute (even if the latter is commonly completely misrepresented!)
UPDATE: Bishop Hill has some thoughts http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2014/9/24/mann-at-the-cabot.html
The earth needs saving from those who wish to save the earth.
“The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule.” – H. L. Mencken
“Good intentions will always be pleaded for every assumption of authority. It is hardly too strong to say that the Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions. There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern. They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters.”
Daniel Webster
“Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government’s purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.”
Louis Brandeis, in Olmstead v. United States (1928).
“The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield, and government to gain ground.”
Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington, Paris, May 27, 1788
“It’s always the good men who do the most harm in the world.”
Henry Adams
“Beware of altruism. It is based on self-deception, the root of all evil. ”
Robert A. Heinlein
H.L. Mencken is a distant past relative of mine. While I always find it pleasant to see him quoted, I’ve read his examination of the Pyramids and it is sorely lacking in scientific rigor.
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.” ― C.S. Lewis
Dead on
‘Save the Earth Syndrome’ is becoming increasingly dangerous to the health of our planet.
If you have any doubt, just look at the people who have got it.
If they truly believe they are saving the planet, they are dumber and more filled with hubris than I thought. Hard to believe they could be so unaware of climate history. So hard in fact that I am still persuaded that they are aware of the hoax and their profit in pushing it against all empirical evidence.
They aren’t really taught history, climate or otherwise. TWC used to include the record highs and lows for the day in the Weather on the 8’s. Not anymore.
spot on!
Johan, you don’t know how true that is.
Just leave them. Their actions and Words are their political cause worst enemies?
We need saving. The earth will be fine.
That statement is more interesting than I think you comprehend.
It certainly has for 4.6Billion years.
“Mann genuinely believes he is right and that his work will save the world…”
Brings to mind the saying “the road to Hell is paved with good intentions”.
This conviction that he has to save the world is the guiding light for Mann and his kind. Other scientists put their fevor into the verity of their work and so try to establish themselves in the eyes of the scientific community. Saving the world is not their guiding light.
My feeling is a little different. Communist will say or do anything, and outright believe anything to gain control. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be ‘headshots’ of people that disagree with them or the nature of the rancor of this debate. If you can call it that. Since the science is settled.
Only communists? All communists?
A despot by any other name would still be as odious… a new economic order? What is that? That’s what they are advocating. We aren’t talking about dictators, kings, emperors , which is some cases be not bad. The guise of communists is to kill people, lots of people. Equality under communists is an illusion. Don’t wander away from the caravan in the desert.
Paraphrasing Mencken — the desire to save the world is most often a disguise for the desire to rule.
“I know that most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, can seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth, if it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they have delighted in explaining to colleagues, which they have proudly taught to others, and which they have woven, thread by thread, into the fabric of their lives.”
~Leo Tolstoy
A perfect description of people like Mann. To admit he was wrong and caused pain and suffering for millions of people (and even death) would destroy him psychologically.
” On the basis of this presentation Prof Mann would not pass Geography degree finals examinations!”
On the basis of his published papers, “Nobel Laureate” Mann would not pass physics degree final examinations!
Not my class for certain.
“They genuinely believe the Earth needs saving and that they are the ones to do it irrespective of the cost”.
“We are the ones we’ve been waiting for”…… Pres Obama
We are the ones we’ve been waiting for”…… Pres Obama
Too bad there was nobody there.
“The road to hell is paved with good intentions…”
And bad analysis. That’s the way I always heard it in engineering…
It’s paved with lots of things.
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I think what ‘loudzoo’ wrote is correct for Mann and also correct for even all the IPCC Bureau’s intellectual leadership; they believe that they are saving the earth from fossil fuels. I do not think, as the majority of skeptics appear to think, that their cause is at all based on political agendas but based on their self-styled savior mythology. They actually believe the mythology that they have created. Politics is merely considered by them as just one of the forceful means for their possible success at being the saviors. The scientists among them make their science conform to the savior mythology.
It is a mistake, in my view, to fundamentally base an intellectual strategy against them on their use of politics merely as a means to their savior fulfillment. That would be only a secondary or tertiary level intellectual strategy to use in intellectual arguing with them. The primary intellectual strategy should focus on exposing their mythology as mere mythology instead of being applied reasoning about the real world.
John
They actually believe the mythology that they have created. …
Be careful ! Aren’t you describing some personality disorder here?
Hey, perhaps people with certain predispositions gravitate towards certain professions.
Paul: “perhaps people with certain predispositions gravitate towards certain professions”
Nature/nurture. Be very careful with the genetic expansion of your idea it can lead to ostracism and unemployment.
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Johan,
Sorry that I can’t go with you on your intellectual journey into dialog on whether belief in mythology should be viewed as a mental disorder. Following is the reason I can’t journey with you down that intellectual road.
The comparative religious and comparative mythology studies like the works of Frazer (one of which is his ‘The Golden Bough’) and the works of Campbell (one of which is his ‘The Hero with a Thousand Faces’) show there is an intrinsic human story that appears to need telling for humans as humans; story telling that is needed even today.
They make a comprehensive study that places religion/myth as a special human story telling (especially Campbell) which teaches us about some basic need of humans for a very basic story about ourselves. But it is myth (story telling) and not applied reasoning about reality. Mann and the IPCC Bureau’s intellectual leaders are telling some self-created (and self-serving) myths, they provide in support adjusted applied reasoning about the real world to suit their myth. Are Mann’s and IPCC Bureau leadership’s myths like the ones in the above mentioned comparative studies? No, Mann’s myths are below even third rate comic book stuff and also likely so are the myths of the IPCC Bureau’s intellectual leadership. They need someone like George Lucas to write their myth for them.
John
I was once at a lecture given by Dr. Campbell. He was a brilliant, brilliant man.
I think you’re much too generous. I can agree with you that these guys’ belief in their self-created BS myth is not mental disorder in the technical sense. I further agree that humans apparently have an intrinsic need to explain the universe in the form of hero narratives. Keep in mind, however, that these guys are not bronze age nomads creating fairy tales because they’re 100% ignorant of how the world around them actually works.
The pseudo-scientific basis of their myth has already been falsified. Still they keep pushing it. They politicized it, and we have to deal with it on that level, like it or not.
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stan stendera,
I envy you. I never met him or saw him lecture live. His books and his videos were all very very interesting to me.
John
E.O Wilson Quotes
Science and religion are the two most powerful forces in the world. Having them at odds… is not productive.
People need a sacred narrative. They must have a sense of larger purpose, in one form or another, however intellectualized. They will find a way to keep ancestral spirits alive
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/07/10/climate-change-hysteria-and-the-madness-of-crowds/#comment-1683050
To better understand UNESCO, consider a quote from Sir Julian Huxley, brother of the famous Aldous Huxley. Julian Huxley was the founding director-general of UNESCO when he said the following:
“The general philosophy of UNESCO should be a scientific world humanism, global in extent… It can stress… the transfer of full sovereignty from separate nations to a world political organization… Political unification in some sort of world government will be required…to help the emergence of a single world culture.”
From its inception UNESCO has been openly hostile to American values, our Constitution, and our western culture. Why in the world should we send tax dollars to an organization that actively promotes values so contrary to those of most Americans?
But there’s more. Mr. Huxley goes on to state that perhaps eugenics, the so-called science of creating better people through genetic manipulation, is not so bad after all:
“Even though it is quite true that any radical eugenic policy will be for many years…politically impossible, it will be important for UNESCO to see that the eugenic problem is examined with the greatest care, and that the public mind is informed of the issues at stake so that much that is now unthinkable may at least become thinkable.”
http://ronpaulquotes.com/Texas_Straight_Talk/tst093002.html
Sir Julian Huxley (1887-1975)
He saw Humanism as a replacement ‘religion’, and as such represented an important strand in post-war humanist thought. In a speech given to a conference in 1965 he spoke of the need for “a religiously and socially effective system of humanism.” And in his book Religion Without Revelation, he wrote:
“What the sciences discover about the natural world and about the origins, nature and destiny of man is the truth for religion. There is no other kind of valid knowledge. This natural knowledge, organized and applied to human fulfilment, is the basis of the new and permanent religion.” The book ends with the concept of “transhumanism”– “man remaining man, but transcending himself by realizing new possibilities of and for his human nature”.
http://judithcurry.com/2013/08/31/open-thread-weekend-30/#comment-373005
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Michael Wassil,
As you appear to concur somewhat that there seems to some mythological elemental basis for their ideas and behaviors, then a strategy to use that weakness would be in order.
Calling, as I do, their climate focused position a mythology and a third rate comic book version of inane mythology isn’t generous . N’est ce pas.
Re Politics: Politics is still useful for them to achieve their mythos of themselves as saviors, I just think it is it is just a sometime expedient means for them to use in enforcing their mythology on others who reject it. That is why I think critics of Mann and his associates shouldn’t focus on politics as a primary strategy to use intellectually to counter them, but a secondary or lower strategy.
Finally, to this day in Western Europe, USA, Canada, in NZ/Australia, there mythologies held by large and significant populations that are even more naïve than Bronze Age myth. It just isn’t applied reasoning (science), it is a story telling that seems to satisfy the human condition in some way.
John
I really have a problem with your response:
Myth telling is not equivalent to science. At the least, science requires falsifiable predictions; religion is pure philosophy.
PhD scientists who don’t understand and honor this difference open themselves up to charges of creating an academic/scientific fraud. Conflating Mann’s behavior with religion is simply disingenuous.
I don’t know where the line is drawn for insanity is, but absolute denial appears to be down that path.
Mann can believe in whatever philosophy he wants, but he needs to do science by the scientific methodology…and the rest of us need to hold him accountable.
brent on September 24, 2014 at 5:53 pm
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brent,
That is an Interesting point on humanism and religion / myth. And I think that the 2500 yr plus intense and widespread dialog throughout the whole of Western civilization that was attempting to use applied reasoning to understand the nature of the human condition wasn’t an attempt at myth/ story-telling. Do you agree?
John
John Whitman September 24, 2014 at 6:21 pm
When I said you’re too generous, it was not about the myth. I suspect we both appreciate the power of myth and maybe sometime can discuss Campbell and Jung. People are only dissuaded of their myths when facts diverge so far they can no longer be denied or explained away. I think the CAGW myth has reached that point for many, due in part to start of the 18th year of the so-called ‘pause’. I think also in part due to the persistence of critical thinkers who refused to be cowed into silence by the shamans of CAGW.
I really don’t care whether or not these guys have a messianic complex to save the world from capitalism and impose a socialist/communist utopia. That was bound to fail even as it failed so totally in the 20th century. Their actions have discredited an entire branch of science and tarred most of the rest. I don’t think the full costs in treasure and energy pissed away chasing fairy dust will be calculated for decades to come, nor the true cost in human misery. Fortunately, the planet refused to cooperate long enough and whatever the real agenda was, it is failing and will fail totally. I hope soon.
The guys who started this knew from day one the data did not and could not support their claims. If they ever took a geology course they saw the graph of temperatures and CO2 over geologic time upon which every introductory course in geology expends at least one lecture. The evidence is getting conclusive they purposely set out to deceive and provide a ‘plausible science cover’ for a political agenda.
For that, they should not be cut any slack.
John
I think you’re only partly right here. They might believe they’re saving the earth, but the corruption of science is absolutely derived from what they perceive is necessary to carry out the political necessities of getting people to live the lifestyles that they wish to dictate. It started perhaps in the 60’s but the atmospheric threat was created in the early 70’s and it was absolutely to drive political agendas, mostly about population control.
That they have ended up being diagnosed with Noble Cause corruption is a very mild rebuke for an awfully corrupt agenda. The IPCC and others are the willingly paid “scientists” who simply showed up because they like the original cause, which is actually rooted in morality and self-indulgence/greed. We’re all taught these are not nice attributes, but free-market capitalism delivers lots of opportunity to wallow in it. The AGW killing the planet meme is a bit of self-flagellation in penance of that. You must control your urges and capitalism needs to be dismantled to save us all.
You might like to read this 1975 article on the Margaret Mead organized conference to start this atmospheric alarmist ball rolling. The usual suspects were all high profile attendees – John Holdren, Stephen Schneider, Paul Ehrlich, George Woodwell, James Lovelock etc. And all went on to very influential political positions.
These people were not interested in actual factual results; they were/are interested in the political outcome they wished to pursue. So you will not get anywhere with them in factual, scientific discussion – as they have a “cause” to pursue and you’re just kicking tires. The odd one will see the truth, but most already aren’t really interested. AGW is just a convenient horse to ride to political influence and power because they have a belief fervor.
You’ll only derail the momentum of this political outcome by electing a government that doesn’t see its future as hanging from this theory. And perhaps, some more years of cold weather, but they’ve already managed to twist cold weather from a warming earth, so lets just say they have more twists than a bag of snakes, and are equally hard to wrestle.
http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles%202007/GWHoaxBorn.pdf
Snakes is a good description, or it would be if snakes were not so useful and necessary.
mikegeo on September 24, 2014 at 11:16 am
@ John Whitman
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mikegeo,
I think the self-created and self-serving mythology of Mann and the IPCC Bureaus intellectual leaders is malevolent in its very core. Is it trying to displace benign / benevolent mythologies? Maybe or maybe not, but I think it is accomplishing that to some limited extent.
John
Then why the desire to demonize and silence any and all debate? They are communist and view the world as theirs to save but not from climatic disaster but from free will. They believe man is evil and needs to be controlled, the science is the excuse and the rational, the belief is in their own megalomaniac superiority of understanding and knowledge about nature and man and their own destiny to save man from himself and nature from man. They want us all to be prehistoric caveman that they nurture and sit and watch over like benevolent gods, no matter how many millions have to suffer and die to reach their goals.
– – – – – – –
Bod Boder,
An explanation could be that they want to enforce their myth on those who do not accept it. They do not have a benevolent myth, it prima fascia appears malevolent and distasteful. Perhaps they know it won’t stick in our culture without using a stick.
John
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Chip Javert,
I agree with the main thrust of your comment. I say I agree because I have been suggesting in my above comments that It appears that Mann holds a myth (story) and it has commanded his so called ‘science’.
John
John;
It is not mythology it is religion, it is center on the general goodness of everything non-man and the inherent evil that is man unchecked. Free will is their devil and returning man to his primitive state is their salvation and they see them selves as Messiahs humble and persecuted but undeterred because only they can see the truth and only they can tell the story.
Bob Boder on September 25, 2014 at 9:18 am
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The two are inherently bound to each other as Frazer and Campbell document. Myth forms into religion. Religion relies on myth.
John
Mythology is a set of stories or histories that give people a common reference, Religion is when man places himself in the middle of the Mythology.
“Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol or morphine or idealism.” —CG Jung
True, the scientists do not seem to be political but they are beholden to the politicians to get their work realized. They must work together and politicians of a certain type are clearly drawn to this issue.
Did he mention me?
That made my day. thx
If it is any consolation to you elmer, my kids know your song by heart, and I loved their surprised expression when they heard the original “Draggin’ the Line” single for the first time. They also love “Frozen Wasteland.”
It is always wonderful to give our children better music than we had to suffer through. (:
Thanks for the kind words, thinking about doing another one.
Frozen Wasteland isn’t M4GW’s best effort, but I fear it will play much better next January.
Split an extra cord this fall!
Love your work, Elmer, and encourage you to do more of your creative music 😉
I hope Mann can appreciate the fact that he was able to speak his mind freely without concern for his safety or fear of negative repercussions from a hostile press. For this is something that he would deny to people who do not agree with his (warped) world view…
Obviously Mann and Lewandowsky and Cook have left the realm of science for the realm of
activism because they all have inflated egos and, being mentally impaired, know they are not
capable of making their mark in science.
Dr. Mann’s biggest challenge will be getting his message of selfless service heard by the members of the Nobel committee.
“I was astonished that Mann continues to use such old, inappropriate data. On his chart of climate model performance vs recorded temperature his data only went up to 2005 and he used land based thermometer readings – not the satellite record. Very weak given how widely available up-to-date data are. I suspect he did not want to highlight the current hiatus in positive annual mean temperature anomalies and divergence from climate models”
“Astonished” is a good word to use here.
It is exceptionally telling that he can’t use current data to substantiate his claims and he feels he must use older, misleading information.
We’ve said it here many times before but the CAGW modus operandi is, when the data does not match the pre-conceived belief, the CAGW folks merely ignore the data.
Hell no, he was simply presenting the work that earned him the Nobel price.
I am not “astonished” at all. Have you not been reading WUWT, JoNova, CA, etc? “Nauseous” maybe, ….
I experienced the same at an AIChE section meeting with Trenbre(a) th up at CU-Boulder, who used such old data and didn’t seem to be aware of the so-called “divergence issue.” Very underwhelming.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.”
–- Upton Sinclair
“Cabot Institute @cabotinstitute
Our pledges @bgreencapital @Bristol2015UK: Carbon neutral campus by 2030; reduce transport footprint; education for sustainable development.”
“The Cabot Institute brings together world-class expertise, developing truly multidisciplinary research programmes to tackle the challenges of uncertain environmental change.”
“Jonathan Bamber appears on the Emmy Award winning Brian Lehrer Show to talk about sea level rise and the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.”
“University of Bristol commits to delivery and legacy of European Green Capital 2015. Image credit Klafubra.”
“Understand the fundamentals of climate change science and its links to policy and policymakers with our masters programme.”
What is being offered here is not education by any stretch of the imagination.
“Understand the fundamentals of climate change science and its links to policy and policymakers with our masters programme.”
Yes, it is their Master’s programme, they just don’t say who their masters are.
Who was the majority of the audience?
Academics, politicians, environmentalists?
Mencken says it all about people believing they need to save the world:
“The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false face for the urge to rule it.”
Sums this whole charade up nicely.. And by the way, here is why Mann ETAL wont look past 2005:
http://models.weatherbell.com/climate/cfsr_t2m_2005.png
which means he is either ignorant of this data or he knows it and choses not to show it which is deceptive given the downward turn in temps and the effect it has on stopping a trend in 2005.. 7 years, rather than 17 plus
can’t access the link
Yep – get a “forbidden” message trying to access that link
What I really find hard to understand is how this site (and other lukewarmer sites) pay ANY attention to this Mann. A complete F###. Not a real scientist by any measure.
People pay attention to him because he remains very influential and his hockey stick remains an icon.
Until we manage to definitively demolish it he will remain so
Tonyb
Anyone influenced by this second class mind is truly pathetic, and worthy of pity.
Here’s why we pay attention to him and his ilk:
(1) He may not be a real scientist (we agree on that), but politicians use his material to justify annual spending of hundreds of billions of tax dollars (if published reports are accurate). Doesn’t take too long to be talking trillions…
(2) These guys want to tax much more so they can spend more.
(3) Due to lack of energy, hundreds of millions of people either die of starvation or are horribly malnourished.
(4) These guys don’t want to save you – they want to control you.
It’s not a complete list, but it’s a good reason to pay attention and defeat this crowd.
Perhaps what was deserved, even needed, what the audience laughing long and hard every time Manniacal strayed from current clean science.
At exactly 21:00 minutes into this very interesting video the narrator drops a bomb shell of self-evident truth.
The earth knows nothing and for sure man kind is not a thing of importance to the earth.
Then this Mann creature is only 1/400 billionth of less than zeor to the earth and his lies the number is infininty and beyond.
First we must know ourselves.
No people do so much harm as those who go about doing good. -Mandell Creighton
The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it. – H.L. Mencken
Given the whackos out there (I am talking pedophiles, not alarmists), who in their right mind uses their child as a stage prop?
Every politician who ever ran for election…oops, you qualified your statement with “…in their right mind…”.
Ok, no one in their right mind.
Adolf -itler also worked so hard to make the world a better place. Fanatics are dangerous.
Having Lewandowsky involved in something that purports to be a scientific presentation pretty much says everything that needs to be said.
“His [Mann’s] data only went up to 2005…”
You’re [fooling] me.
For someone that claims to be a climate warrior (as evidenced by the title of his book), Mann displays an enormous amount of cowardice.
Moderator: The image posted by Joe Bastardi is giving an Access Forbidden error at the WeatherBell site. Perhaps you can let him know?
[nothing we can do about it, all users would need an account -mod]
Thanks, it helps to see just how far these chaps have strayed from science and science process into orchestrated political science. It also helps to understand that the pseudo science models were crafted to begin with and not some shoddy research effort that is being vigorously defended afterward. It was designed to be bad all along, up to and including the blaming and finger pointing today. Does Penn State know it really has at least two funded Political Science Departments operating on its campus?
Resourceguy says, “Thanks, it helps to see just how far these chaps have strayed from science and science process into orchestrated political science.”
And now they are taking up theology as well:
(Said the Boomer Mythmakers, who are twisting science to fit their environmentalism, and supplanting education with Sustainability activism.)
And now, must we also suffer their erudite, eye-crossingly selective and manipulative interpretations of Scriptures? I have even seen the systematic greening and reinvention of other peoples’ beliefs as well, and the use of Natives by foreign NGOs to claim they represent local people in opposing electricity generation and modern agriculture.
Zeke, I know that Boomers is a statement of denigration, but could you find a description that doesn’t lump me in with the GW Mythmakers?
/One of the first Boomers.
Mike H,
Believe it or not, I am actually trying to help the Baby Boomers, if that is possible, to recognize the paradigms which they have developed for the past five decades.
The Anthropocene Age Paradigm, with its “tipping points” (including AGW), is the full embodiment of the Boomer generation’s philosophies and attitudes. To illustrate my meaning, their views on the following subjects are now considered unassailable and scientifically incontrovertible:
1. overpopulation
2. organic-only agriculture
3. Vegetarianism
4. Veganism, and the desirability destroying the widespread use of domesticated animals such as beef and dairy cattle, chickens, etc.
5. hatred of oil, personal transportation, and electricity as “materialistic consumerism”
6. atheism and animosity towards Christianity, particularly enforced in educational settings
7. powerful anti-US sentiments, and close alignments with foreign interests and ideologies.
8. incurring great national debt in order to provide programs – this time in trillions.
9. all economic activity and use of chemicals or metals is considered to be harmful to the environment, and studies or “research” always confirm this paradigm
10. hatred of mass production, which has made the most items affordable to the most people.
11. animus towards economic freedom
12. disdain for the middle class, and contempt for marriage and having children
13. returning the land to nature Inre: the Wildness Project
14. drug use and sexual debauchery is not only portrayed as equal to, but in many cases, replacing, the classic individual liberties – freedom of speech, conscience, and freedom of association (esp. in commercial activity) (Comes in under the rubric of “Human Rights”)
15. the harmful effects of narcotics (including pot) on the brain and central nervous system, and on schools and local communities, are repressed and swept under the rug studiously.
The fact that these priorities are now being used as an excuse for forced participation in the World Empire (the “UN”) is something which, for some reason, I think it would helpful for the Boomers to recognize. So that is my definition of the Boomers. If you can help me improve this list of unchallengable Boomer beliefs, I would be grateful. I acknowledge that all Boomers do not hold all of these beliefs all of the time, but I have found they do expect society and science to conform to their preferences on several, or many, of them.
By the way, since the routine denigration of others for their beliefs and practices (“religious”) is considered fair game, then let’s be even handed and include the Boomer Fundamentalists in the mix.
Zeke,
I would expand #5 to include all fossil fuels. Anything that has made life easier, better, healthier, or made for longer life is, or will be targeted. Natural gas gets a pass for now. But if coal and oil were banned, is there any doubt NatGas would be next?
Add: tribalism. Divide and conquer. Obama is the master.
Vaccinations. Good for people, therfore, sow suspicion and distrust.
Global warming. We know all about that hoax here.
The list is long. Try to simmer it down to a common thread that everyone can relate to… for what good it will do.
I have no doubt the old KGB [new FSB; same players] is behind a very long term, detailed plan to undermine and destroy everything that has made America strong. It is working. In a History class a few years ago we watched a 1930’s newsreel of the Depression. There was a big mob waving signs that said: SMASH THE BOY SCOUTS!!
I asked the prof why they would protest the scouts? He claimed he didn’t know. But I do.
The Boy Scouts are moral. They are an extremely strong moral force in society. It’s true. Our boy was an Eagle Scout. He was hired by Siemens at $120K/yr. No degree, and he’s not even 30. The guy who hired him told him later that the deciding factor among several dozen applicants, almost all with degrees, was his Eagle Scout achievement. So a big international company puts a lot of emphasis on morality. Thus: Smash the Boy Scouts.
A moral society is a strong society. So the Soviets targeted morality. Look at the way things are now. Morality is ridiculed throughout the media, 24/7/365. Listen to the words in rap music. You’re a virgin? You dope. Dweeb. You’re not ‘in’. You’re stupid. No one wants you around. Etc. Imagine the pressure on kids. In Oakland, near where I live, girls no more than 11–12 are on offer. Lots and lots of them. If/when they have kids, the gov’t pays for everything. They don’t need Dad around. Most couldn’t identify Dad.
Barring a miracle, it’s over, Zeke. The cycle must complete. There will be a consolidation, and eventually one world gov’t. It will loot the productive and buy support, until it has total power, then eventually, far down the road, there will be a king again. Not in name, but in fact. In the worst of all possible worlds, there will be a committee instead. Even Marx warned against an unaccountable bureaucracy.
Humanity is based on the headman concept. It’s in our genes. When Caesar was crossing the Alps and they came upon a dirt poor village, one of his lieutenants jokingly said, Caesar, how would you like to be the headman here?
Caesar replied: Better headman here than second man in Rome.
There will be a king eventually. Diocletian will probably be the template. Feudalism works. It worked for more than a thousand years. How long has democracy been around?
It is very depressing. But the handwriting is on the wall. The old Soviets were/are experts at understanding human nature and motivations. They make very long term plans. Those plans are working — and now Obama fell into their laps like a plum; an unexpected surprise. Obama moved up their timetable by a generation.
Everything is on track. The UN has no army, but they own the media; that’s better. An army might be defeated. Their PR is accepted by the mindless masses. In reality, they are thoroughly corrupt criminals. But that doesn’t matter. They are amassing power, step by step. The old Soviets learned in 1949 – 50 that the UN was the future. They made long term plans to demoralize the West. It is working to perfection. Not much could stop it now. Only a miracle — and I don’t believe in miracles.
It’s over. Democracy was a flash in the pan. The Enlightenment was nice, but it’s over. It’s over.
DBStealey, I read your post several times. There is a lot of depth and detail to what you are saying, and I thank you. I believe in marriage love, the innocence, happiness, and instruction of children, just recompense, sobriety, and His Love. Once these are removed from society, it is nothing but an empty shell. And an empty shell cannot persist for long. Soon, even the few public restraints on personal behavior there are, are removed from society and hell releases on earth. Why is that so hard to understand, knowing what happened under Stalin and Mao, etc.?
It is like the parable of the empty, cleaned room.
“When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes, he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with this wicked generation.” Matt 12
Whoa!
I haven’t been so touched by such moving vocals since Dr. Hook sang “Ah, that’s beautiful” after the guitar solo on “Cover of the Rolling Stone”.
Posted at Bishop Hill after the fact…..
KNR has it right.
The ‘talk’ was a stream of self-delusion peppered with ad-homs, slander, appeals to authority, groupthink and lies. There were worse broaches of our trust but I swore to be gentle 🙂
By the last slide I didn’t even believe him when he said (I paraphrase) “I love my daughter and fear for her future… ”
The audience was full of – well, those types of people who revel in eschatology and laying the blame for their being born, well fed, educated (to a point), the availability of hospitals, transport, central heating, their iphones and laptops on the eeeEEevil 1%.
The mess was gate-kept by Satan himself. As was, Anthony told me, the cook shindig on Friday last.
So, with lew-paper choosing who would be graced with ‘questioning’ the bald one it should be no surprise that not a single difficult bump appeared to divert him from the old straight track.
I nearly got one in but the guy with the mic homed in on an Avaaz junkie whose oleaginous sycophancy dripped with abasement and fear-for-the-future and floated two diaphanous whimsies into mann’s grateful lap.
Still, I didn’t go for the thrill of baiting the deluded and their congregation. I attended to know mine enemy. I met AW and that is enough. The Bishop was there but in a rush to get to a watering-hole which, being pressed for time, I had to forego – drat.. I think I laid eyes on Myles Allen also.
I guess there were 20+ skeptics present, some of whom had questions, none of whom were asked to voice the same.
Oh, yeah, I was going to ask; Why, out of the dozens of excuses for the halt in GW was Anthropogenic CO2 never found innocent of the crimes it is accused of and the models’ output never dismissed? More in hopes of forcing (see what I did there) just one of the faithful present to study the subject beyond twitter and facebook than momentarily disconcerting the now proven (to my satisfaction) delusional mouthpiece for all the greenwashed yolks we labour under.
Still, you can’t win ’em all.
This sceptic dies and goes to heaven. As he is wandering around he hears a few preachers claiming great powers
He stops to listen to one.
‘I will save the planet. My children, the polar bears, the ice, sea levels. I will defeat Steyn, get a nobbly prize and prove that ‘one tree to rule them all’ is fact not fiction. I will invent a new method of statistical analysis that will boggle the minds of all sceptics.’
the sceptic is awestruck ‘ wow. he must be THE mikey Mann’
‘No’ says a passing angel.
‘Thats God. he just imagines he is Mikey Mann’
Reminds me of the definition of a fanatic:
“Someone who does what God would do were God in possession of all the facts.”
The Q&A was has expected and it gives further proof that Mann will do all he can to avoid court where he could not load the basis in his favour in such a way. Which is shame has seeing him go bang in a big way and then have to deal with the legal consequences would be fun to see.
But it’s not just ‘saving the planet ‘ that drives them , both professional and personally the reality is they have done very well out of their work for ‘the cause’ they gone from the minors, struggling to get any notice or funding , to the majors with honours and cash a plenty to go with it . Moreover, doing this without actual doing any science worth a dam. So it not just ‘belief’ that drives them but knowledge that without AGW they would not even get back to the minors but end up like the guy propping up a bar in some run down third rate inn, boring everyone about how they used to be ‘big men ‘ that had the presidents ear has they down their third beer of the day at 10:00 am .
After the Cook lecture I was very much looking forward to this. My train was delayed so ended up running across Bristol and in the rush left my pen in the hotel so couldn’t take any notes and forgot to grab some sandwiches so by the end felt too hungry and demoralised to face trying to ask a question or going straight to the pub. By the time I’d got back to my room and had some food very much regretted not having made the effort to join the pub meeting.
I commented near the end of the Cook talk thread saying I was disappointed by the lack of information but it was still an interesting event I enjoyed. The Mann lecture was disappointing for me, again, nothing new. At several points I thought great, he might address some of the things I was hoping to hear more about; he briefly mentioned the decline but I was hoping to hear more about his understanding of or justification for ‘hiding the decline’. He showed a graph of temperatures measured and modelled so I was hoping to learn more about that and the pause from his perspective, but I think his graph was too out of date to fully show the current pause. The Q&A at the end seemed rather short and was lacking in useful questions, by which I mean even if you’re a firm believer I think you should be asking questions to make sure you understand and can spread the message accurately, so the questions should be similar whether they come from a sceptic or a believer.
I’m bemused why so many seem to so readily accept it. I’d like to think many years in engineering have taught me to see through the presentation style to the real, or lack of, answer. It’s like someone tells a joke and everyone laughs, you don’t get it and ask someone to explain it but they can’t, it was the way the joke was presented and some people laughing that made everyone else think it was funny and laugh too. Is that a similar reason why so many people believe the CO2 AGW theory? Does the lack of scientific questions from others confirm that thought – I’m used to asking lots of questions to make sure I can understand something, but it feels in the climate issue that to ask such questions is not welcome. Such things add to my scepticism. Is it also, as Mann pointed out near the end a great fear of the outcome like tipping points, that makes people think well, even if it’s wrong we can’t afford not to at least take it seriously in case it is right. As a group it’s easier to take the risk of being wrong; shared blame, on your own the risks to you of being wrong are far greater. But I strongly believe we must not let such worries distort the science, it must remain objective, if it is wrong we may fail to recognise an equally serious different climate disaster unfolding or be decades behind in our longrange forecasting abilities at huge cost to us all.
Mann started by saying it was simple chemistry we have understood for a very long time. Maybe he is right, maybe it is that simple, I think we could all go down the lab and confirm the relevant chemical/physical/thermodynamic processes including radiation emission and absorption for gases with total agreement. But how do we build that into a model of the real world, it seems to me it gets surprisingly complex. I read the realclimate type explanations, I’m usually left thinking why did they do it that way, I think I would have gone about it a different way. I read alternative explanations by other professors, physicists etc who get a totally different answer. My eyes glaze over, it seems to me it is so complex it could be totally random whether any of them could pass peer review or not (before the consensus) or represent reality. And that’s before you even think about feedbacks.
He showed a graph of temperatures measured and modelled. Am I supposed to beconvinced? I don’t know, maybe I am supposed to be, but there is so much I don’t know about what I am looking at, particularly the modelled results, and of course it would be better if this was right up to date. Sounds like the APS earlier this year had lots of similar questions, has there been any answers yet to their questions, what’s happening with that?
I think he mentioned the GWPF was funded by big oil, but I was losing interest by this stage so may have misunderstood. If he did I have no idea if he was right but wanted to thoroughly question him to understand his justification for this. If where the money comes makes a difference, presumably that cuts both ways.
He mentioned extreme weather events. The summer of 2003 in the UK: I remember that year, from my recollection it was blue skies with hardly a cloud in sight week after week, that’s why it was so hot, I don’t think the CO2 theory predicted the cloudless skies did it? I think he forgot to mention any of the cold snaps worldwide. He also mentioned the winter 2013/14 in UK, I remember that well, one storm after another with strong winds and heavy rain, but they said that was down to the jet stream behaving differently, Julia Slingo blamed the winter weather on CO2 but didn’t Mat Collins ( a modeller) say the models don’t say anything about Jetstream behaviour. How many of those other events Mann mentioned were due to changes in the Jetstream behaviour?
I am not saying the CO2 theory is wrong, neither am I saying it is right, I do not know enough, but alarm bells keep ringing. I want to find out more, but it seems virtually impossible to be able to do the necessary digging, whoever you are. I can’t believe the rest of the scientific community did not react more to the lack of archiving or providing on request the relevant data and methods for verification. In engineering we have lots of ways in which we are audited including fully independent audits, I’m not seeing anything similar in climate, other than peer review, meetings, etc which are not fully independent, or is there? Face to face meetings with climate scientists seems a good way forward, Q&A sessions like these talks are totally inadequate. I was pleased to read of the Bath meeting, wish I could go to a meeting like that.
For me the Cook event was well worth going to, I didn’t feel the same about the Mann lecture (not meant as a criticism of anyone), I had to go otherwise I’d regret not going and at least I can say I am making an effort to listen to what they have to say.
“Mann genuinely believes he is right and that his work will save the world”
I have to respectfully disagree, why would he spend so much effort cooking the books if he thought it was real?
Who knows what his true motivation is but scientific excellence is definitely not it.
When you are in the “right”, every action you take you consider noble. Put another way, you can do no wrong when you are in right. This by the way is not a very scientific or rational approach, it is though what commonly happens in religion and politics.
Elmer,
You ask, “I have to respectfully disagree, why would he spend so much effort cooking the books if he thought it was real?”
For the sake of argument; if one believes they are right, then naturally the books need some cooking so they agree with what “everybody knows” to be right.
But actually, I’m inclined to agree with your take, since his presentation is frozen in time at 2005. However, I’m willing to change my opinion if his next presentation is updated to the latest data, including the satellite data.
I tend to think that he believes in the goals the (broken) hockey stick is levering into place. Or he’s just so full of himself (that “pride” thing) that he can’t bear the thought that he was wrong.
All the lawsuits point to the latter. Those paying for the lawsuits points to the former. Or maybe he’s just their useful idiot? That would point to the latter. For me, the jury is still out.
But I don’t think the pseudo Q&A session was done the way it was because of Cook’s Q&A. It was likely a precondition of him even agreeing to have one at all.
And honesty isn’t his forte, either. He’s so full of himself I’m surprised he doesn’t weigh 2,000 lbs.
This is what is happening in climate science right now.
There is quite a bit of new information, shedding light on global climate, natural cycles and related items.
One side is anxious to take the path that is leading us into uncharted territory regarding our understanding in this rapidly evolving field.
One side wants to continue with a theory, data and understanding from 2 decades ago, rejecting the new information, even using old data.
Ironically, the scientists giving greatest weight to the latest observations and knowledge are being called “Deniers” by the side that wants our understanding to remain where it was in the 1990’s.
Clearly, advancement in climate science can’t be the objective, if they are rejecting new research/understanding.
Mike Maguire on September 24, 2014 at 1:15 pm
– – – – – – – – –
Good job contrasting seemingly stagnant dogma versus evolved/evolving understanding in climate focused science. Thanks.
John
“I was astonished that Mann continues to use such old, inappropriate data. “
– Why? It would be more astonishing if Mann showed character and integrity.
“Dr. Mann put up a photo of his daughter with a polar bear behind glass at a zoo, citing the usual “we must do this for the future and our children””
– Well it would have been better if he put up slides of starving children in third world counties caused by proposed “save the plant” energy policies. I guess he wasn’t up for it.
“He referenced all the normal claptrap on extreme weather, drought, heatwaves, flooding unprecedented sea level rise, arctic ice … but presented no data on this.”
– Data? Who needs data when you can just make stuff up and get grants.
“…pictures of polar bears floating on small icebergs.”
– An OMG moment, just plain idiocy. There is zero scientific evidence of polar bear populations diminishing, Note to Mann, random pictures of polar bears floating on small icebergs does not qualify as scientific evidence.
“The Q&A session: This was a joke!”
– I know like Mann has become.
“Mann genuinely believes he is right and that his work will save the world.”
– Great, but instead of being a scientist maybe he should become an evangelical and save the world through Jesus.
Jesus wouldn’t put up with such a disciple. Honest!
“As others may have said before the story of CAGW will one day be told in the same breath as the fables of The Emperor’s New Clothes, and of King Canute (even if the latter is commonly completely misrepresented!)”
I predict a fierce fight for the ownership of the “climate crises” in the future, between the historians of science and the historians of religion.
I predict that the historians of hoaxes and frauds will own them in the end. Lysenko, Rachel Carson, and Mann can feature in succeeding chapters of the book that’s needed to be published for a long time.
I would like to think you’re right, and that this whole sorry business will get a thorough and accurate airing in the future, but I’m not so sure.
From the beginning of the 20th century right through to 1989, academics, writers, journalists and artists in west showed an astonishing degree of sympathy for state socialism. They called it scientific, rational, inevitable, just, and humane. Intellectuals in the west largely enabled, or in many cases directly caused, the death of 100 million people and enslaved billions. Where have they been called to account?
Mona Charen wrote a book called “Useful Idiots” which does tell the story, but by and large the left-wing historians of today have whited out the disasters caused by the left-wing historians of yesterday. It is not at all clear to me that tomorrow’s historians will do a better job with the global warming debacle.
Post after post you are dead on
After studying the history of dictatorial personalities (e.g., Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini), I have come to a conclusion about the progression of the love for power:
First: egomania (“I am the most important thing in the world.”), which becomes sociopathy
Second: megalomania (“I am the world.”)
Third: solipsism (“Whatever I think, is the world.”), which ordinarily is considered insanity
Solipsistic thinkers, like Michael Mann, live for the potential to make their dreams come true. Actually, for them, the dreams have come true. It is just that they insist on making it true for others. And, in order to make it true, they cut up people’s lives as carelessly as they would cut up scrap paper.
Adolf Hitler started out as a student with a dream of being an architect and gloriously re-shaping the city of Linz, where he grew up. His success was long in coming and covered a lot of territory…
Cut Mann any slack and he will fashion a noose from it, around your neck.
“Her intentions are good,” she said.
“And her information is bad,” Kenner said. “A prescription for disaster.”
‘State of Fear’, Michael Crichton.
Perfect.
Whilst I might criticise M Mann’s comment assuming his photo’s might be up on blogs within hours (it shows that doesn’t know that people would not do this) ie we are all ‘evil’.
I won’t criticise him for mentioning his daughter, as I do see that as genuine, as I believe M Mann sincerely believes everything he said (how ever impossible some may find that to believe.. After all I mentioned my daughter in an article here,
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/06/27/the-science-was-settled-enough-from-the-book-culture-and-climate-changenarratives/
as I would hope Mann or others would not question my sincerity, and most people would think vice versa (though of course they have every right to say I’m wrong about things – explaining why would be nice to go with that) we may be stuck with everyone believes they are doing the right thing, but think others ideas are so nuts – therefore their must be some ulterior motive, trap. Or we can try and work towards and build more meetings like this:
WUWT: An extraordinary meeting of climate sceptics and climate scientist in Bath
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/09/23/an-extraordinary-meeting-of-climate-skeptics-and-climate-scientists-in-bath/
it wasn’t that extraordinary to me, as I have met and know a number of the scientists there quite well.. trust takes time and effort, however.
I agree Barry.
Overall, though, it was remarkable how the appearance of the Mann star over Bristol became a sign, not least because of Anthony’s decision to come ‘on a whim’, of major developments in so many ways. History in the making. Even those of us with minor walk-on parts can get a thrill from that.
Sounds like a cracking good time was had by all in Bristol.
Anthony should be starting to consider an overseas trip next year – partially funded by us, of course.
I suggest Australia for his next visit – it is, after all, just an island, and it might be completely covered by sea water if he waits too long before visiting . Maybe that lunatic university there will hold a conference of some sort next year he can attend.
As I understand it, we only need cover the cost of the absolute basic essentials, meaning plane tickets there and back; the price of lodging; and beer. I think that’s it. I might have the essentials listed in the wrong order of importance.
Anthony should get a trip every year on us, as a big thank you for fighting the good fight
I too was deeply dismayed at the Mann presentation. Narcissist is the only way I can describe his demeanour. When he realises that his talk coincided with the publication of a PNAS paper that says recent California weather is _not_ due to CAGW his head may explode. As for question time, this was a very low point in the history of the Cabot institute. I did not applaud but I noted the presence of many sycophants who did.
Thank you to all skeptics who attended. It takes courage to walk into the maw and take notes. I’d like to think that Anthony’s presence caused many undergarments in that room to twist, even just a little.
Judging by what has been written about the presentation, it is no wonder debate is avoided at all cost.
Any of the WUWT regular commenters would mop the floor with him.
Anthony says:
I was able to stand on the prime meridian at Greenwich
What time was that? ☺
He was in Greenwich. So it must have been Tea time.
Is Michael Mann Al Gore’s “twin” as in the Schwartzenegger/de Vito movie Twins?
His own hockey stick turns into an alarm diffusing bowl when the math is corrected, so the idea that he is a true believer in bad math sounds like an oxymoron. I
vote for good acting and criminal sociopathy over sincerity, thus.
I was surprised that Dr Mann did not speak about a revelation he made for John Cook’s “Consensus Project“, published earlier this month.
Backing for this claim would have been a major boost for Ban Ki Moon’s climate talks, and even got Dr Mann on the front page of the Guardian. Strange that he should pass up this opportunity.
Robert A. Heinlein described the deep desire of some to regulate others pretty well in “The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress”:
“Must be a yearning deep in human heart to stop other people from doing as they please. Rules, laws–always for other fellow. A murky part of us, something we had before we came down out of trees, and failed to shuck when we stood up. Because not one of those people said: “Please pass this so that I won’t be able to do something I know I should stop.” Nyet, tovarishchee, was always something they hated to see neighbors doing. Stop them “for their own good”–not because speaker claimed to be harmed by it.”
On a related note, National Review and CEI filed their replies in the anti-SLAPP appeal. Both are quite good. CEI mentions the published hockey stick graph Mann claims he had nothing to do with, even though he’s credited and it’s listed on his CV. NR has a lucid discussion of the difference between an opinion and a specific factual allegation.
======================================================================
Doesn’t Mann know that when John 3:16 says that “God so loved the world” it’s not talking a Ma’ Gaea.
God sent Jesus Christ to save Man, not the whales.
But even if a Christian’s responsiblity is to be a “caretaker of God’s creation”, how would adopting what Mann and the rest of the CAGW meme espouses be being a responsible caretaker of anything?
I’d almost like to hear Mann’s answer but chugging a bottle of IPeCaC would probably produce the same results.
(IPeCaC © Monckton of Brenchley)
Given the enormous, unnecessary suffering that people in the 3rd world have, and will, go through as a result of being denied cheap, abundant energy by the CAGW movement, it’s pretty doubtful that Jesus Christ approves of it.
CAGW puts the earth above mankind, puts animals at the same level (and sometimes ahead of) mankind, and considers some portions of humanity as of less value/importance less than others. That isn’t Christian in the least. It actually can be described as fundamentally evil.
Zeke September 24, 2014 at 4:04 pm
Mike H,
Believe it or not, I am actually trying to help the Baby Boomers, if that is possible, to recognize the paradigms which they have developed for the past five decades.
The Anthropocene Age Paradigm, with its “tipping points” (including AGW), is the full embodiment of the Boomer generation’s philosophies and attitudes. To illustrate my meaning, their views on the following subjects are now considered unassailable and scientifically incontrovertible…
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Zeke
Bovine excrement.
Just a guess, but I’d bet the majority of non-troll readers on this site are, too.
(and, oh yea, I’m a boomer, if that’s important).
I’m a Boomer and am embarrassed that my generation is largely behind the farce of manmade global warming.
ooops – should have read: the majority of non-troll readers on this site are Boomers, too.
Jeez – that’s an embarrassing mistake.
Interesting Anthony’s comment on the data and calculations by academic scientists.
For forty-five years I have been working in international development under contract with companies, governments and international organizations. Every contract I have ever signed contains clauses concerning ownership and dissemination of information, data and findings.
The Asian Development Bank for example is very specific about what must be held in their archives: the spreadsheet used to calculate the costs and financing plan on which the loan amount and the government counterpart funding are based and the supporting engineering estimates. The figures prepared by consultants must be agreed by government representatives from the relevant ministries and by the bilateral and international funding agencies. Consultants mostly work under contract to governments and are responsible to the host government rather than to the Asian Development Bank or to the World Bank etc.
By contrast, in climate science, recipients of public money for research operate under the belief that the nations of the world should implement measures costing trillions of dollars on the say-so of 50 or so senior climatologists. To me it is both mind-boggling and morally repugnant that a recipient of public research money would say that he has exclusive proprietary rights to the data and program used for data processing.
We who work professionally in international development as engineers and financial specialists do not much welcome academics as colleagues. The level of self-discipline needed to work with data for projects on behalf of clients seems to be foreign to the way most academics work. This is a generalization that may be unfair to many academics. It is based on personal experience of studying and working at five universities and project work with academics from a dozen or so universities. Exceptions, would be research officers in university laboratories and those academics who actually teach research methods and insist on rigorous methods.
As for professionals working in government labs, the situation depends a lot on how the lab is administered. NASA accounts well for the data it collects and holds in its archives. I am not so impressed with some of the data products of the NOAA.
The Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia seems to operate as if they work in a different century or a different planet. Allegedly, the CRU wiped climate data from a hard drive because it became full instead of buying another drive. (My possibly overly-jaundiced view of the CRU and its data products arises also from having read in its entirety the Climategate README_HARRY file, written by the computer specialist who assembled the global data file.)
Data processing for final terrestrial climate products is quite variable. BOM in Australia has followed US practice in adjusting and homogenizing temperature data for the purpose of gridding. Ditto New Zealand. As a consequence of homogenization, historical terrestrial temperature data seems now to be so unrelated to the real world that I suspect an academic scientist must have designed the methodology for use by other academics.
For the Q&A session to be fixed the way it was reflects badly on the reputation of Bristol University, Lewandowsky should be ashamed.
Should, buthe has no shame, and that approach has been highly profitable for him so why change ?
Prof Mann showed slides of extreme weather events as the result of global warming, including one of our wet winter of 2014, this is what our Met Office has to say;
“As yet, there is no definitive answer on the possible contribution of climate change to the
recent storminess, rainfall amounts and the consequent flooding. This is in part due to the
highly variable nature of UK weather and climate.”
Perhaps he should delete the slide from his presentations; after all he is a scientist and would not like to be accused of propagating falsehoods?
I was hoping to ask him about how he determined scientifically if extreme events were linked to climate change, but apparently they were running out of time after only 4 questions, curiously only questions that supported AGW. My own plots on control charts suggest that the UK weather is just that. They are on my website, any observations welcome.
It was nice to see some of the famous names in the Skeptic world in person.
much is being made that were not many sceptics willing to ask questions. someone on twitter makes this point.
Sean Inglis @mrsean2k
@BarryJWoods Why *would* skeptics refrain from questioning climate science’s most litigious man, moderated by its least ethical defender?
Sean Inglis @mrsean2k
@BarryJWoods it’s a total mystery
OldGifford,
That goes to the heart of Mann’s charlatanism. He claims, without a shred of evidence, that extreme weather events are caused by human activity. That is not only anti-science; if there were any evidence for that, it would have been the source of dozens, if not hundreds of peer reviewed papers.
Mann does the same thing when he claims that human activity is the cause of global warming. That has always been his central premise. But where is the evidence? Where are the measurements??
There is zero evidence for that assertion. There are zero measurements. If something is scientific, then there must be verifiable, testable measurements quantifying it. Science is nothing without measurements. But with AGW, there are none. It is no more than an evidence-free conjecture. An opinion. A belief.
In fact, that is all that AGW is. If I am wrong, then someone needs to post measurements quantifying the specific extent of human-caused global warming. It is accepted that there has been about 0.7ºC of global warming over the past 150 years or so, from all sources. Of that amount, how much is due to human activity? THAT is the central question in the entire debate.
But no one has ever produced any testable, verifiable measurements of the extent of AGW. They say, “Half”. Or “Most”. But they never produce testable measurements showing how many tenths, or hundreths of a degree of that 0.7º warming were produced by human emissions. Do they?
No, they don’t. No one has produced any such verifiable, testable measurements. Everything is always a conjecture; an opinion. They are happy to post endless charts showing global warming to tenths and hundreths of a degree. But they have never measured the human contribution specifically. It is always simply assumed that human activity is the cause of global warming. Why does anyone put up with that evidence-free presumption?
I really wish the hosts of this meeting had done just one thing:
The University should have insisted that questions would be entertained without being scripted. Everything Mann does is carefully controlled. No neutral person was permitted to call on questioners. Instead, the odious partisan Lewandowsky was Mann’s hand-picked stooge. This was no more than a Kabuki play. A dog and pony show.
Of course, Mann would not have agreed to attend if he could not completely control all events, including every question from what was preposterously called the ‘public’. That was a deceptive con, nothing more. Every question was scripted, to enable Mann the Charlatan to paint exactly the picture he wanted. The man has no honesty. Everything he does is a self-serving charade.
What transpired is not science, and it is not education. That was pure propaganda, and Bristol Uni should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves for being part of that charade. If Mann cannot answer questions about his specialty, then he deserves any embarassment that comes his way. This should have been for the benefit of the public. It was not. Instead, it only benefitted that deceptive, game-playing climate charlatan. The public was spoon-fed Mann’s propaganda.
Even if a university or similar venue has to insist on a neutral moderator at the last minute, they must do so. Allowing Lewandowski to select what were obviously vetted questions goes against everything that free and open discussion stands for. They played a mendacious game on people, nothing more.
This charade was disgusting. If this is what the ‘climate’ debate has come to, then it is rank propaganda. Anyone with the slightest influence with, or connection to Bristol U should make their objections publicly known. And any future dog and pony show like this should cause widespread insistence that a neutral moderator must run things. If Mann withdraws because he refuses to go where he cannot completely control everything from start to finish, then fine. Simply put out a press release showing exactly what happened, and let Mann try to explain. Playing along with him is just craven cowardice. The university sponsors should be ashamed.
I was there and I pretty much agree. It was interesting the see and hear Dr Mann speak but it was largely a book promotion exercise. I don’t think I learned anything new other than how scary some Republican politicians are.
I was astonished to see Lewandowsky acting as Mann’s point man. During the Q & A session he was very interesting to watch. One guy in the front row (presumeably a sceptic) had his hand in the air before anyone else. Lewandowsky stood directly in front of him about five feet away and scrupulously ignored him! He managed to avoid eye contact for the entire Q & A session while pretending to be giving serious consideration to who to select next before pointing out the next questioner to the lady with the microphone. Embarrassing to watch!
Hi Tony
That was me hoping to ask how extreme events could be proved to be the result of global warming, unfortunately I had asked a slightly off message question at the previous lecture so I was obviously not one of the people to be selected. Sorry I couldn’t make it to the pub afterwards.
Cheers, OldGifford
It is becoming ever more evident that sceptic blogs are becoming ever more sympathetic toward the more “moderate” membres of the scientific community who are taking ever larger sums of tax payer’s money, providing ever more support to government tax laws but are “joining” more and more often with the sceptics in a meaningless face à face communication exercise.
The worst of it that you are convinced that these people are “really” nice and that you have had some meaningful success. Well, I’ve got news for you. You are being used. Your sense of fairness, justice and generally “nice person” attitudes are being used to lull you back to sleep.
– – – – – – – – – –
Stephen Richards,
Yes, I am having a little nagging feeling in agreement with your concern, but . . . .
. . . but , suggesting and promoting one-on-one and face-to-face personalized interaction with those whom we have extremely radical differing intellectual arguments on climate focused science is not sympathetic nor compromising intellectually. It is a way to discuss better and reach people where other forms of dialog have so far been insufficient and ranting.
Nice doesn’t mean anything intellectually. But being nice / civil in any discussion allows for much fuller expansion of the points in discussion versus being insulting or abusive.
I do not see humanizing the radical intellectual antagonists in climate focused science discussions as making a skeptical argument weakened nor does it imply skeptic’s lack of fortitude or lack of integrity.
John
Just a few points.
• Polar bears survived an ‘ice-free’ Arctic during the Holocene Hypsithermal between 9,000 to 5,000 years ago.
• In 2008 a radio collard polar bear was clocked making a continuous swim of 687 km over 9 days.
• Polar bears survived the Medieval Warm Period which lasted a couple of hundred years.
• I have been assured by a polar bear expert that spring conditions are what really matter to polar bears
Following my experience of the lecture/sermon in Bristol on Tuesday I came away bitterly disappointed. I thought I was going to hear an argument on the science of climate change. There was no argument.
Having had some time to think about my experience, the NHS I think can sum it up far better than any words I could express.
“Schizophrenia is a long-term mental health condition that causes a range of different psychological symptoms, including:
• hallucinations – hearing or seeing things that do not exist
• delusions – unusual beliefs not based on reality which often contradict the evidence
• muddled thoughts based on the hallucinations or delusions
• changes in behaviour
Doctors often describe schizophrenia as a psychotic illness. This means sometimes a person may not be able to distinguish their own thoughts and ideas from reality.”
http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/Schizophrenia/Pages/Introduction.aspx
Mann is utterly destructive to actual, scientifically based, environmentalism. What a disgrace.
Was the Q&A session fixed? I was at both the Cook and Mann events (gave my overall impressions earlier on both threads). That thought did run through my mind when the Mann session seemed to end so quickly. Do we know for sure, e.g. was anyone aware of any collection of questions before the event, or has Mann or Lewandowsky or those asking the questions confirmed or denied it? Presumably if they are honest scientists they should tell us. If it was rigged I think they would have a duty as scientists to tell us otherwise it would be unscientific or misrepresenting the expectations of Q&A.
My subjective impression watching Lewandowsky during the Cook Q&A was that he was selecting people for an ‘interesting discussion’. However, if 20 hands go up and we only have time for 5 questions then any selection could seem biased. I think the last question for Cook was whether he normally got this many sceptical questions, I think he said no but he was pleased and wanted lots more, perhaps he was well prepared with all the necessary responses and genuinely seeking the opportunity to use all those responses and dispel all sceptical arguments.
It would be interesting, with the help of WUWT, if we could do a little research and estimate for each lecture how many sceptics hands went up and if the recordings of the lectures are released we could estimate how many hands in total went up. If we get, say for both Q&A’s 10 readers confirm they tried to ask a sceptic question and we estimate a total of 15 hands we know at least 2/3 were sceptic questions, possibly more so the probability it was rigged was at least xx%. Or maybe it will be 12 confirmed sceptics hands out of 15 at Cook and 2 out of 30 at Mann in which case much less likely it was rigged in that way. I did not attempt to ask any questions at either Q&A.
If we could do that and the data appears to show I high likelihood of rigging the Q&A’s perhaps we could ask the Cabot institute if they were aware of it and what their opinion or policy would be.
Hi there,
I have not attended the seminar, so my judgement relies on the way it was presented here, but I am very reminded of the natives in Feynmans cargo cult .. if Mann and Co just mimicked a scientific discussion after the talk and basically avoided it, you can call it by the name: It’s Anti-Science!
Cheers, LoN