The Whitehouse-White House inquisition
Sen. Whitehouse says reaction to intimidation is “overheated” – but he ignores Tides Foundation abuses
Guest essay by Paul Driessen
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse recently had a Huff-Po tantrum. The Rhode Island Democrat was miffed that people criticized him and equally liberal Senate colleagues Barbara Boxer (CA) and Ed Markey (MA) for attacking skeptics of dangerous manmade climate change like Spanish Inquisition tormentors.
He says the skeptic community’s “overheated” response mischaracterized their motives and muddled their important messages: Global warming is the most serious threat we face today. Financial incentives can affect behavior, which is why the public and Congress need to know who funded the skeptics’ research. And companies that produce harmful products want to foment uncertainty about well-established health and safety risks: fossil fuel interests and climate chaos skeptics are just like the tobacco industry.
These senators are abusing their power of office to threaten and silence honest scientists, and destroy their funding, reputations and careers. It’s pure Saul Alinsky, as practiced by Greenpeace, Harry Reid and the other White House: “In a fight almost anything goes. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” And the vilified scientists and their friends are just supposed to take it, the senators seem to think.
In reality, the only thing overheated is Mr. Whitehouse’s temper – and the increasingly preposterous rhetoric about an overheating planet. Climate change is altering our music. A 0.1 degree Celsius change in ocean temperatures has caused whales to migrate a month earlier than 30 years ago. Warming oceans will mean the end of fish and chips! Lord knows what other “disasters” await – all because of fossil fuels.
The absurdity of this fraudulent fear mongering and its total irrelevance to our daily lives explains why Americans consistently put climate change at the bottom of every list of concerns. The very idea that governments can decree an idyllic climate is equally crazy; that has happened only once in human history.
No wonder Mr. Obama is repackaging the climate issue under the equally false and ridiculous mantras of “ocean acidification,” and “carbon pollution” causing allergies and asthma. Our oceans are not becoming acidic. It’s not “carbon” – it’s carbon dioxide, the miracle molecule that makes all life on Earth possible. And neither CO2 nor planetary warming has anything to do with allergies or asthma.
Climate science was supposed to examine the effects that humans might be having on Earth’s climate. But anti-fossil fuel activists turned it into the notion that only humans affect the climate – and that the powerful natural forces that caused countless, sometimes devastating climate fluctuations in the past no longer play a role. Climatology was also supposed to be about the scientific method:
Pose a hypothesis to explain how nature works. Test the hypothesis and its predictions against real-world evidence and observations. If the premise is valid, the evidence will back it up. If the data and evidence are out of synch with the carbon dioxide/greenhouse gas thesis, come up with another hypothesis.
By now, it’s obvious that the “dangerous manmade global warming” thesis, and computer models based on it, do not explain what is happening in the real world. The planet stopped warming 18 years ago, despite rising fossil fuel use and CO2 emissions. The models don’t work; their predictions are completely out of whack with reality. Instead of more hurricanes, no Category 3-5 has hit the USA since late 2005.
So the alarmists changed their mantra to “climate change” and “weather disruption.” But this is bogus: it tries to blame every change and event on fossil fuels. The thesis can never be proven or disproven, which means it’s a religious tract, not a scientific analysis. Alarmists don’t have a leg to stand on scientifically.
That’s why they refuse to debate the science; why they vilify climate crisis skeptics. It’s why Democrats became so frustrated with Dr. Judith Curry’s expert testimony at a recent House Science Committee hearing that they left the room. They couldn’t stand it when she said the “central issue” is the extent to which recent (and future) planetary warming or other climate changes are driven by manmade greenhouse gas emissions, “versus natural climate variability caused by variations from the sun, volcanic eruptions, and large-scale ocean circulations.” And they really couldn’t tolerate her noting that President Obama’s pledge to slash U.S. emissions by 28% will reduce warming by just 0.03 degrees Celsius by 2100.
Climate change and extreme weather risks are real, but carbon dioxide doesn’t cause them today any more than throughout history. Aside from Pleistocene-style ice ages, we can adapt or respond to events – including storms, droughts, heat waves and extreme cold – if we have affordable, reliable energy, strong economies and modern technologies. The real threats to jobs, health, welfare and lives come from anti-fossil fuel policies imposed on the pretense that they will stabilize weather and climate. Forecasting future climate changes will be equally impossible if we remain fixated on carbon dioxide, and ignore the solar, ocean circulation, cosmic ray and other powerful natural forces that actually affect Earth’s climate.
Senator Whitehouse’s suggestion that climate chaos skeptics should be tarred and feathered with tobacco industry apologists is despicable demagoguery. So are his comments about funding realist research.
The skeptics’ funding was never secret. It was always an open book, available to anyone who cared to look. But since he brought up the money issue, let’s look at a few aspects that he studiously ignores.
Alarmist research is all about carbon dioxide, greenhouse gases and fossil fuels – precisely because financial incentives can and do affect behavior. Alarmists get a thousand times more money than skeptics. Climate Crisis, Inc. received hundreds of billions of dollars in government, industry, foundation and other money during the past couple decades. The US government alone spent over $186 billion in tax dollars on climate, “clean energy” and renewable energy projects from 2009 through 2014. Applicants know they won’t get grants if their theses and conclusions do not support climate alarmism and regulatory agendas.
Billions more went to government agencies that coordinate these programs and develop anti-hydrocarbon regulations. These bureaucrats don’t merely search health and scientific files to cherry-pick papers that support their agenda. They deliberately hunt only for supportive documents (many of which they pay for) and actively ignore, suppress and vilify research that focuses on (or even just discusses) natural forces.
Then the EPA and other agencies pay the American Lung Association, scientific advisory committees and other activists millions of dollars a year to rubberstamp their regulatory decisions. Even more destructive of our scientific method and political process, countless millions are also being funneled to climate chaos researchers and Big Green pressure groups via secretive foundations, laundered through front groups from Russian oil interests, and employed to further enrich billionaires like Warren Buffett.
The scandalous system has turned hardcore environmentalism into a $13.4-billion-per-year operation and represents an unbelievable abuse of our hard-earned tax dollars and the tax-exempt status of numerous foundations and activist groups. Cooperate and get rich; resist, and get the Whitehouse inquisition.
As a result, instead of science, we get opinion, propaganda, spin, pseudo-science and outright fraud – all designed to advance a anti-fossil fuel, pro-renewable energy agenda, that kills jobs and economic growth, endangers human health and welfare, and puts radical regulators and pressure groups in control of our lives, livelihoods and living standards. It also further corrupts our political system.
These Big Green companies, foundations, pressure groups and government unions give our politicians millions of dollars in campaign cash and in-kind help, to keep them in office and the gravy train on track.
The League of Conservation Voters collected $90 million in foundation grants 2000-2013; the LCV Education Fund pocketed $71 million more. The LCV, Sierra Club, NRDC, SEIU, AFSCME, Kleiner Perkins and allied groups are all big Whitehouse (and Obama White House) campaign donors.
Do Senators Whitehouse, Boxer and Markey plan to investigate those financial incentives and abuses?
Concerned citizens should ponder all of this on Earth Day, April 22 – and the next time they vote.
Paul Driessen is senior policy analyst for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.CFACT.org), coauthor of Cracking Big Green: Saving the world from the Save-the-Earth money machine, and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power – Black death, Climate Hype Exposed and Miracle Molecule: Carbon dioxide.
The only evidence supporting CG is “adjusted temperatures”, hearsay and belief. There is no evidence whatsoever for AGW, 18 years and 4 months of a pause that was not predicted by the models, which in turn come nowhere near interpreting reality. I strongly object to being described with the same word as those that denied the h0L0c@ust!
Yesterday this covered http://www.invisibleserfscollar.com/meaningful-learning-or-internalized-hammer-and-sickle-style-habits-of-mind-and-behaviors/ the lineage of pushing ideas that are not factually true so that people will believe them anyway and act accordingly. The Soviets called it a new kind of rationality in the 50s.
It is, unfortunately, fully embodied in the new Common Core integration of English Language Arts into science classes and how the Frameworks for the Next Generation Science Standards force the actual classroom implementation and assessments.
We are about to have a K-12 system globally and not just the US where few will know much accurate science information. No need to burn books when you lock up the mind in advance to simply disregard non-approved themes and concepts.
Mindless rant imo.
ECB~ agreed that Common Core is mindless. Or did you mean something else?
Robin,
+1
+1
—
+3
Max-we are back to what Isabel Paterson dealt with back in the 40s. Ideologies do not want a world where they cannot force via political power for 2+2 to equal 5 if it is politically useful.
Arguing about the facts in a world that has officially proclaimed that facts do not matter has to be understood as that. we can only stem the poison if we look where it is most venomous. Especially if that source is largely out of sight or hiding behind normal words with special, non-ddictionary meanings designed to deceive.
Professor Procrustes bashes in faces
And finds the brains fit all his cases.
==========================
Hi Robin,
To be clear, I am in complete agreement with your first post.
I was +1-ing you, Common Core-style.
(I can’t tell from your second if you got that; if you did … great!)
🙂
“Concerned citizens should ponder all of this on Earth Day, April 22 – and the next time they vote.”
I certainly will be thinking of this at the ballot box. For years I have been disturbed by the extreme views of the tea party, but that now pales in comparison to the fear (and loathing) that I feel for these climate zealots. It is getting downright scary. I think the term “climate nazi” is an accurate term for parts of this movement. Rational people of the world, be afraid, of where this is heading. Much as I disagree with the extreme right, it seems a far less dangerous view than climate extremism has become. Circumstances make for strange alliances. Moderate voters of the USA, I ask you to please do your part at the ballot box to remove these zealots from public offices, so that integrity can be restored to science, and to ward off, dare I say it, a potential holocaust in the making.
I was curious if you could elaborate on your idea of the extreme right and what they are or stand for? I realize tea party groups are all local and comprised of many different types of people, but my general impression of them is that they are for a smaller federal government and favor a return to following the constitution.
Some people confuse what the terms right and left mean, so I’m just asking for some clarification on your understanding.
Thanks
Glenn999, let me rephrase my statement above. Instead of “extreme views of tea party”, a better phrase may be “extreme views of extreme right”. In my mind these are one and the same, but to others they may not be. My mantra is “moderation in all things”, and extreme views on either side of the aisle are a turn off for me. My values are honesty, honor, and compassion in that order. In years past I have viewed the build-up of wealth in the top 1% at the expense of the rest of us as the greater of the many evils out there, and thus I have tended to side with the left. Things have changed for me now. I am not happy with ACH or immigration policies. But above all, what I said above about the climate extremists, I view as the greatest threat to our liberties and strength as a nation that I have seen in my lifetime.
Anthony– Have you ever done a cost-benefit analysis on the costs of addressing climate change vs the cost of not, and applying those to the probability that you are right. Or are you sure you are right?
Lneraho
The question has been raised many times – and ignored EVERY time.
At best, the propagandist Big Government industry claims in each report that “confidence is increased” (that CAGW is present, is man-caused, and we will be face a disastrous future (sometime in the future) unless immediate disastrous countermeasures are taken now that guaranntee harm for the next 100 years). However, each time their “confidence has increased” their predictions have been further and further from the measured temperatures.
So far, the Big Government/Big Finance climate industry Enron-invented-carbon-futures-trading-scheme-trillions has refused to specify the probability of:
– a -1 C deg to 0.0 degree cooling the 100 years, (Harmful to all)
– a 0 deg to 1.0 degree increase, (Beneficial to all.)
– a 1.0 degree to 2.0 degree warming, (beneficial to all)
– a 2.0 degree to 3.0 degree warming, (beneficial to all)
– a 3.0 degree to 4.0 degree warming, (beneficial to most, neutral to the rest)
– a 4.0 degree or greater warming, (minor harm to some, neutral to some, beneficial to most.)
The “insurance” policy they are “selling” is the equal to a demand by the government that you pay 25,000.00 dollars for fire insurance every year on a 100,000.00 house that they refuse to let you live in in case in catches fire if you built it near a forest.
Their “solution” (carbon restriction, artificially high energy prices) is deadly and deliberately harmful to millions of innocents. And benefits no one but the climate industry and Big Government/Big Ecology interests.
Thank you, but you didn’t answer the question. Please answer specifically the probability that one side of the debate is right vs the other. I think you are exaggerating the cost of insurance by using words, not % of GDP, or capital required so your “economic” analysis isn’t helping. My house is over $4mm so i’m bit more willing to pay more for insurance but certainly not if I don’t have to.
How much would you be willing to bet that a horse that has never finished in the money and has a broken leg will win The Kentucky Derby? (And, win or lose, your bookie makes a BIG profit.)
We’re not talking about “probabilities”. We’re talking about guesses and gambles.
The “guesses” are the Climate Models.
The “gamble” they want us to take is not worth it … unless you’re a “bookie”.
Can’t speak for A., but obviously you have not done such a cost-benefit analysis.
The cost of “addressing climate change” as you put it, or more precisely, the cost of preventing any climate change, man-man or otherwise (how would we tell the difference?) are enormous, in all terms of money, capital, resources, and not least of which — freedom. The human race can not exist as we have known it for at least the past 300 years.
The “cost of not” is better stated as the cost of adaption to a changing climate, whether it be driven by man, sun, volcanos, orbital eccentricity, asteroids, or cosmic rays. The cost of adaption and insurance is one of individual choice and one we have been practicing ever since life crawled out of the slime.
One thing is for sure. When it comes to adapting to change, I’ll take my chances with the climate and work to prevent the necessary exponentially increasing tyranny to “address climate change.”
I have not done the analysis at all, which is why i am coming to this site.
My estimate of the global investment required to achieve zero net CO2 emissions is ~$150 trillion. That does not include the additional operating costs of the zero CO2 infrastructure. In addition, we get global veganism; and, probably a global commune.
Definitely not my idea of a good time.
firetoice2014,
On the way to global veganism, there will likely be global cannibalism.
There are going to be at least 19 dead bodies for every one that manages to live. Such will be the necessary rapid decline in human population.
Agreed — it won’t be a good time.
Here is an analysis of climate cost benefit analysis that states that they are all flawed. My thought is that even Weitzman’s analysis is flawed because he seems to assume disaster will occur when global temperature increases by 6 deg C and then he goes on to say that this increase will definitely occur if we continue to have human emissions of GHGs at the present level.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2009/01/29/203621/martin-weitzman-climate-cost-benefit-analysis-fat-tail/
In the first place much of climate science is flawed IMO since there are often predictions of large and/or rapid increases in global temperature with no real evidence of it. Temperature has been remarkably stable over the past several decades in spite of a steady increase in atmospheric CO2. Predictions of catastrophe in spite of no evidence of any temperature issues, much less that CO2 is the cause of temperature rise is a Chicken Little scenario. There is no logic in this “we are doomed” propaganda.
With only a modest temperature rise (2 deg C) over the next 80 years or so, most analysis indicates that the planet will do very well. If this is what actually happens, we have already spent way too much on “climate change” efforts. Violent natural weather events can be costly and dangerous. All evidence to date shows that fewer people are dying and insurance companies tell us there are no large increases in insurance claims due to even what some of us might call extreme natural weather events. In fact recent data indicates a drop in claim costs. All the data shows that there is a cyclical pattern to “extreme” weather and over the past 120 years there is peak and valley pattern that indicates that there is nothing new about recent “extreme” weather.
Spending limited amounts of money on preparing for nature’s bad behavior is probably warranted. However, using the precautionary principle is much like using a crystal ball to try to find answers. It is likely to continue to drain our coffers with no good result. In fact we certainly cannot be prepared for an unknown future it we all become poor from senseless policy decisions.
@ Stephen Rasey, Meat is a very inefficient method of feeding the human species. It’s the food equivalent of doing the school run with an SUV. If first-world people did reduce their rather excessive meat intake they would be healthier and would help the environment by reducing the need for intensive farming methods. Note that I’m not advocating veganism, which is going to a silly extreme.
but if the change is mostly natural, the efforts made to reduce GHG will be misspent. The effort/money should have been directed at adapting to the changing climate rather than trying to prevent it. That is build dikes and seawalls rather than solar panels and windmills.
I’m not Anthony, but have you thought about this – currently there are NO cheap, reliable energy sources other than fossil fuels and nuclear energy. None! So unless you enjoy the thought of millions of people living and dying under absolutely miserable conditions, the benefits of fossil fuels far outweigh any costs of not addressing climate change. With fossil fuels and nuclear energy, we can heat our homes and workplaces when it gets cold, and cool them when it gets hot – without fossil fuels and nuclear energy we cannot. In other words, we have a much better chance of adapting to a changing climate (and the climate IS going to change, whether we want it to or not) with fossil fuels and nuclear energy than we do without them.
Well said. We have what we have, we can get no energy from chimeras, even if they would exist.
Jayhd,
Exactly right.
The same folks lie about the availability of green energy to replace our need for fossil fuels. The US government alone spends $20+billion per year on renewable energy and other worthless ventures associated with climate change. What has been the results? NADA!
For those who are afraid of climate change, they should relocate to the Equator so they do not have to experience the extremes between Winter and Summer.
A fellow by the name of Bjørn Lomborg does a lot of work on the costs, either way. Even though he accepts the IPCC position on AGW, the greenies still hate him. In any event, Lomborg does get an article here, from time to time.
As far as making sure you are right:
The alarmist crowd made the CAGW assertion, it is up to them to prove the assertion. So far, it seems that proving the assertion is turning out to be far more difficult than making it. Imagine basing public policy on unproven assertions.
Thanks. I still don’t see any numbers. The cost of water is rising here in the west, and I believe solar has crossed fossil costs, or will by 2016 so still not hearing any specifics for decision making.If there is no absolute answer than there should be a probability assessment just like what Sheldon A does on his tables vs his shopping malls
Lnerho “I believe solar has crossed fossil costs,” No.
Lneraho, you want numbers? Try these number on for size:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/03/23/an-update-on-my-solar-power-project-results-show-why-i-got-solar-power-for-my-home-hint-climate-change-is-not-a-reason/
The government regulated utilities certainly CAN make solar relatively cheaper than fossil generated electricity — by jacking up the rates of non-solar power to extortionist levels. A little competition and freedom is the cheaper solution.
Solar is still more expensive than fossil fuels, & has gotten more so with the drop in crude oil price.
The cost of water is rising because that’s what the politicians want it to do.
The only reason why solar is cost competitive with fossil fuels is because govt pays about 3/4ths the cost of solar. Regardless, you aren’t paying for the cost of your utility to have to have an equal amount of fossil fuel power running in the background on the off chance that a cloud passes over your solar field.
Lneraho,
I have in the past supposed, that at some level, there is broad recognition here that economic estimates aren’t reliable. Both sides of the debate tend to argue: stay with what we know, myself included — CO2 in the neighbourhood of 280-350 ppmv comfortably fits our current infrastructure whereas sustained levels at 400 ppmv and beyond is basically unprecedented in millions of years of known history. To me, that all but moots doing a net present value CBA out to 2100. I think it better to do a near-term policy assessment, implement it, and see how it goes. Tweak as necessary.
A common opposing argument is similar, but nowhere near equivalent in terms of risk assessment: we’ll figure it out as we go and adapt.
As others have pointed out, solar likely isn’t cheaper than fossil fuels in terms of levelized system costs once subsidies and incentives are factored out. I have a standard opener for that discussion:
http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/aeo/pdf/electricity_generation.pdf
47.90 geothermal
66.30 conventional combined cycle natural gas
80.30 wind (onshore)
84.50 hydro
95.60 conventional coal
96.10 advanced nuclear
130.00 solar PV
Figures are estimated total levelized cost without subsidies in $/MWh (2008 dollars) for new installations deployed in 2019.
External costs from putative environmental impacts are not included, which is what so much of this fracas is about. Even then, I’ve never once posted that list and not had someone tell me the figures are simply make-believe. No alternative citations, just flat out assertion that those numbers are wrong and that I must be an emotionally motivated idiot to believe them uncritically … even though I don’t. I find it rather bizarre myself. But here I perhaps digress too far from more salient points.
I’ve been looking at interesting charts such as these lately:
http://static.cdn-seekingalpha.com/uploads/2015/4/16/32586395-14292122806214602-Simple-Investment-Ideas.png
http://www.therazor.org/images/fossil_fuels_price_comparison.PNG
One chart with cost per unit power would be best, but one can make some useful inferences just looking at the relative shapes of the curves on the way to doing further research.
Lneraho,
You can thank in part the mandated government release billions of gallons of water in California to supposedly save a few delta smelt. This has been a long standing issue for years and farmers have been complaining. Apparently the state has more in fish tanks than are in the streams?
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ashoka/2015/04/15/why-does-california-let-billions-of-gallons-of-fresh-water-flow-straight-into-the-ocean/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ashoka/2015/04/15/why-does-california-let-billions-of-gallons-of-fresh-water-flow-straight-into-the-ocean/
Have you looked at this presentation: http://topher.com.au/50-to-1-video-project/ ? It was done not that long ago and should address some of your questions.
The accepted cost of climate change mitigation is stated as 3% to 5% of world GDP. For the sake of argument, lets say there are no cost overruns on the mitigation projects. The United States (where I live)
is on the hook for a higher percentage since so many other countries are not participating (China, India etc.).
Lets assume 5% of GDP.
This simply means that in the US, existing energy, materials and services will be replaced with identical low CO2 versions at the cost of 5% of GDP. The cost is a result of new processes being less efficient than the old processes.
Do you remember 2008-2010? What happened to GDP during the financial crisis?
http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG/countries/1W?display=graph
Hundreds of thousands of people were collecting unemployment checks instead of creating products and services. They were being paid to do nothing. That drag on the economy is still evident today in our labor participation rate. http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000
What our administration wants to sign up for is a permanent 2008-2010 condition.
What should be the barrier of proof required to accept such an economic impact? Should the going in assumption be that we are going to accept the economic penalty unless skeptics can prove the disaster won’t happen?
Doesn’t that answer a different question? A gradual shift toward diversified power sources increase strength (don’t forget the crisis was caused by a concentration of finance toward housing and real estate development). But the drought in California is “suddenly” hurting a lot people, which is real. Now you could argue that it doesn’t have anything to do with AGW but you could also be wrong. Correct?
Look at the history of droughts in that region and it is plainly obvious that it has been wetter than historical averages. Droughts in the west are the norm, not an aberration.
People living in a state where much of the native vegetation is sagebrush and cacti are complaining when 36 million of them cannot put new water in their swimming pool every few months, and keep their lawns well watered, because those dang farmers are wasting all the water growing food!
The entire SW has a history of drought, most last 100 years or more. Since this drought is small by historical standards, why do you assume that CO2 has anything to do with it.
A shift to diversified power sources only increases strength when those power sources are reliable. Wind and solar aren’t. There addition causes power to be more expensive and less reliable over all.
As there has been no increase in historic drought flux, then there is NO reason to think CO2 has ANY affect on droughts.
According to the IPCC up to 2C of warming will be beneficial.
According to all the science, a doubling of CO2 will result in 0.5 to 1.5C of warming (with the bulk of the papers coming in under 1.0C).
Cost benefit analysis.
There is no cost to increasing CO2 and quite a bit of benefit. So there is no reason to do anything to stop it.
There is no way to do a cost-benefit analysis based on speculation.
No one knows how to “adjust” climate. No one.
Google Bjorn Lomborg. He believes man-made CO2 emissions are actually causing global warming, but the the cost benefit analysis shows that our present approach to combating is neither effective nor economic.
The first video of the 50 to 1 project explains it fairly well for a 10 min video.Also the full length interviews are well worth watching. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zw5Lda06iK0
Lord Monckton did an excellent comparison of mitigation costs in his post a few days ago here http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/04/09/how-to-convince-a-climate-skeptic-hes-wrong/. In that post he uses a set price tag in the UK for electric vehicle rebates offered by the federal government but I have also seen several other such articles by additional climate scientists from around the world, all you need do is google for it and I am sure they will show up. I thank you Lneraho for beginning your investigations into the realities of the climate change topic and I look forward to you embracing the skeptic mindset, as I did several years ago, after you have sufficiently researched the topic.
Lneraho,
You make the same false assumption as the IPCC continues to make with AR5. You assume CO2, and in particular the man-made component of CO2, is the principle climate control knob.
The evidence is now clear. It is not. It is time to move a new paradigm, one that says natural climate variability:
– is the dominant force in our climate,
– it will do whatever it is going to do, regardless of our efforts to reduce human CO2,
– requires the bulk of expenditures be put into infrastructure resilience and prepare for both warming and cooling climates.
So the Climate cost benefit ratio approaches infinity as benefit is near zero of human carbon emissions reductions. That’s is not to say there is not a benefit to reducing fossil fuel use and relying more on long-term solutions like nuclear power. Clearly there are huge benefits to going nuclear and using petroleum for things other than energy (plastics, lubricants, fertilizer feedstocks).
I don’t think you can go to Beijing and argue that nature is running it’s course and is doing what it’s doing. And while that isn’t true climate, it sure feels like that when you’re their (cue the fake sunset…). Sao Paulo would be another clear case of AGW/man made climate change.
Beijing is the result of China being too cheap to add in emission control equipment that is standard in the West.
No, Sao Paulo would not be a good example of AGW.
I think what Lneraho is asking is if we are not 100% certain whether a baby in utero is a life or just a blob of matter, we should err on the side of caution and not abort it, lest we later find it was a life and we murdered millions.
However I do believe the reply below addresses the question. if the climate is warming due to man it will be mostly beneficial to mankind (up to a point). If he is correct then the appropriate cost-benefit equation is completely different than what you seem to believe it is.
If the drought in Calif is causally related to GW, and Calif produces half of the countries fresh vegetables, nuts and almost all of it’s wine then it’s not mostly beneficial. It’s a catastrophe.
Leland, California has a history of droughts They come and they go.
Why is the cause of this drought different.from all the droughts that have come before?
Why do assume that any weather that differs from last year must be caused by CO2?
There have been no temperature increases for the last 18+ years. The drought started last year.
How is the drought related to CO2?
Ask this question of Lord Monckton since he has done it and has covered the matter numerous times.
@Lneraho
Climate changes. It always has. Please explain in scientific detail why climate must be prevented from continuing to change. If capable of doing so, please continue be explaining in scientific detail how climate can be stopped from changing. At that point, please provide the cost of achieving this allegedly feasible forever-unchanging climate.
It’s interesting couching climate science in terms of probability. You’d think Las Vegas odds makers would chime in on this, but I guess there is no money in it for them.
There is not two sides to the debate, the affirmative claim is that human caused CO2 will cause catastrophic climate change, they have to prove it, which they have not done so. Skeptics merely point this out, they do not claim to know what future centuries of weather will be.
Regionally there has always been catastrophic weather events and there will continue to be. If you are concerned about catastrophic weather in your region, look at the weather history in your area and then make a decision as to stay or move. I wouldn’t use climate science as a determinate aspect in any part of my life. Many prominent global warming proponents have bought expensive water front property. They do not seem to be worried about global warming in any practical way.
Thought you might appreciate this link from Forbes:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/larrybell/2011/08/23/the-alarming-cost-of-climate-change-hysteria/
Personally I am of the opinion that driving the US and the developed worlds economy into the toilet is the end goal when one considers that the developing nations are not stopping anytime soon (2030 for China if you believe them). Somewhere along the line a positive became a negative. The question is why?
Just remember, it has always been intentional.
Give the public some fun:
Take one of the most ridiculous claims after the other, connected with name and face.
Then publish it widely. In a way that people still in decades, and at the poll, will remember and chuckle about “that guy who said it would … “
Whitehouse recently said that he took his kids skiing at Yawgoo Valley, but we can soon see all the slopes to be gone due to global warming.
The slopes will be gone??? Are the mountains melting?
There are hardly any ‘slopes’ there in the first place. The parking lot is at 117ft and the highest lift goes to an astonishing altitude of 299ft.
http://www.onthesnow.com/rhode-island/yawgoo-valley/historical-snowfall.html?&y=2008&q=snow
If a politician is talking, he’s lying. Yawgoo has had more snowfall in the past two years than the previous five combined.
yes but by may the slopes will be totally clear – all due to annual global warming (ie spring)
of course that was meant to be the month of May
You quote Dr. Curry as follows:
‘They couldn’t stand it when she said the “central issue” is the extent to which recent (and future) planetary warming or other climate changes are driven by manmade greenhouse gas emissions, “versus natural climate variability caused by variations from the sun, volcanic eruptions, and large-scale ocean circulations.”’
I guess that she needs to speak this way in order to be heard. However, skeptics should not suggest that “natural variability” is a set of causes that constitute an alternative explanation to manmade CO2 as an explanation of warming. Natural variability in climate is the subject matter of climate science. In present form, it consists of all our data sets and the range of data in each set. As such, it reveals that climate science is in its infancy. Climate scientists have a lot more data to collect. Think centuries rather than decades.
For example, we have some idea about what happens in various regions of the Pacific during La Ninas and El Ninos. However, there are many more natural regularities that must be described before we can claim a reasonable scientific understanding of ENSO phenomena. Once these unknown natural regularities are discovered, climate scientists will be able to make reasonably good predictions about ENSO phenomena. At present, as Bob Tisdale often explains, our knowledge of ENSO permits no prediction whatsoever. To claim, for example, that we know what causes the hot spot off the Pacific northwest of North America is to abandon science altogether.
When climate scientists become genuine scientists, each and every grant request will refer to some hypothesis to the effect that some specific natural regularity has been discovered and will describe how that natural regularity is to be investigated empirically. These genuine scientists will be undertaking the scientific task of collecting new data and organizing both old and new data. If their hypothesis proves to be confirmed then they will have added to our understanding of natural variability in climate.
Isn’t “natural variability” just a wrapper for “the null hypothesis”? The hypothesis at issue is that man’s activities cause global warming. The null hypothesis, that man’s activities do not cause global warming, therefore is tantamount to the hypothesis that global warming has natural, and not manmade, causes. In this sense, saying, “We can attribute it to natural variability” just means “the null hypothesis hasn’t been ruled out.” It doesn’t mean that the natural causes of global warming have been rigorously worked out by mature climate science.
Or maybe I’m missing something here.
I have no problem with what you have said. But for the benefit of those somewhat unfamiliar with science, it is imperative to mention the data and the pressing need of climate science to get to work collecting data. Natural Variability is what Mother Nature can do on Her own without help from human invention. If Mother has done it in the past then the null hypothesis is that She can do it. So the null hypothesis cannot be ruled out.
What I am trying to do is explain how data collection fits into the larger context of a growing climate science. In my humble opinion, the glaring flaw in contemporary climate science is the lack of interest in data collection.
You are possibly missing three things. 1. Attribution. 2. Model parameterization to hindcast 1975-2005. 3. Model falsification by the pause. Without high model ECS, the alarmist future case fails. 1 and 2 caused 3. Inverted null hypothesis is a weak argument, since the GHG effect is established radiative physics. The questions are how much compared to nature in the complex real climatemwith feedbacks (attribution), and so what (model TCR and ECS).
The central doctrine of ‘Climate Central’, the IPCC is summed up in the 2007 AR4 summary statement:
“Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations”.
The fifth report (AR5 2014) only increases the degree of certainty from 90% – 95%(?).
That is not an hypothesis it’s a conjecture, a speculation, a guess.
The entire CAGW edifice is constructed on that flimsy foundation.
Theo,
I confess confusion regarding your comment, “However, skeptics should not suggest that, ‘natural variability,’ is a set of causes that constitute an alternative explanation to manmade CO2 as an explanation of warming.”
You follow the topic, and are well aware that the variation in atmospheric carbon dioxide and temperature over the past few decades are an order of magnitude less than well documented historical variations, which, necessarily, have arisen from natural, rather than anthropogenic forcing. The separation of the anthropogenic contribution has not been reliably achieved to my knowledge, and I suspect that was the intent of Prof. Curry’s comment.
Could you elucidate?
EdA,
Dr. Curry mentions “variations from the sun, volcanic eruptions, and large-scale ocean circulations.”’ That is a specific set of causes and, frankly, no one knows what impact they have on global climate. We lack the scientific understanding to make rigorously formulated predictions based on the present circumstances in the Pacific, the North Atlantic, and so on.
Genuine climate scientists would be formulating hypotheses and using them as a guide in collecting data on the AMO, for example, so that we can discover the important underlying natural regularities that make up the AMO and, thereby, achieving the ability to make predictions about the AMO. That sort of work is the scientific work that absolutely must be done if we are to make any advances in climate science. Alarmist climate scientists are not interested in science.
Judith Curry’s Stadium Wave provides a framework for exactly this kind of work.
Theo
@ Theo… do you know that around a year prior to Dr Curry and her partner coming out with the Stadium Wave concept that I had made several comments here at WUWT stating that I had seen a wave function that moved through the regions of the Northern Hemisphere as I studied different regional graphs? The thought never gained any traction, and I never spoke of what I saw since then. I just filed it away for later. I have always had this curious way of making my way to the heart of disparate subjects, even with limited directions as a guide.
goldminor April 21, 2015 at 10:44 pm
I know the feeling. I was touting natural variability years ago. Now it is all the rage. I thank God that it is.
The earth’s surface is 70% water, yet exploration of underwater volcanic contribution to climate change is ignored-if climate actually exists, which has yet to be proven.
“President Obama’s pledge to slash U.S. emissions by 28% will reduce THEORETICAL warming by just 0.03 degrees Celsius by 2100.”
Agreed Manfred. That original statement, without the context of an implied or explicit TCR, was difficult to accept without the “theoretical” modifier.
Interesting. Now tell me this, if you can’t define natural variability without centuries of study, how do you distinguish manmade effects from something you don’t know at all? Or am I misunderstanding something that I think you said versus what you think you said?
Rely on the null hypothesis. If Mother Nature has produced, say, high temperatures that equal the highs of 1998, which she did in the Thirties, then what we know is that Mother has that power – all on her own with no assistance from humans. The null hypothesis cannot be rejected.
“Lord knows what other “disasters” await ”
You forgot mutant Rabbits that can broaden their occupied bioclimatic niche through trait plasticity.
Dont forget more and faster spiders!!
“Dont forget more and faster spiders!!”
And they will grow bigger too. It’s worse than we thought…
I hope we don’t end up with velocirabbits because that would be terrible. Well, also awesome, but mostly terrible. Mostly.
If we could train them to only feed on Liberals, they could be quite useful if we turned a few dozen loose in each of our respective nations’ capitals. Maybe since Vegans/vegetarians tend to be of the Leftist persuasion, they might taste better to Velocirabbits.
Yeah, those darn liberals. If they hadn’t gotten their way in the 70s (and subsequently) on emissions and water cleanliness standards, we could live in an earthly paradise similar to that enjoyed by mainland Chinese!
Chris~ hey, yeah! Wasn’t it nice of NIXON AND THE REPUBLICANS to pass all that legislation?
It might be time to refer these politicians to the Constitution of the USA, particularly that bit about the right to free speech.
For Libtardz, free speech is only permissable if it is speech they agree with.
I think the best way is to point out how the GREENS all drive in cars, use electricity, heat their homes, fly on jets, like everyone else, they do nothing very green except to talk about it. Like that preacher who preached morality but then was caught with a hooker, Falwell was his name?
The preacher was Jimmy Swaggart not Falwell. But he went on TV and asked forgiveness for his sins and misbehavior. The GREENS never do so they are lower than Jimmy S.
Ahhh, but according to a PH mag interview with that hooker, Swaggart never actually connected with her, but only did selfies with a vertical view.
“Climate change and extreme weather risks are real, but carbon dioxide doesn’t cause them today any more than throughout history. Aside from Pleistocene-style ice ages, we can adapt or respond to events – including storms, droughts, heat waves and extreme cold – if we have affordable, reliable energy, strong economies and modern technologies. The real threats to jobs, health, welfare and lives come from anti-fossil fuel policies imposed on the pretense that they will stabilize weather and climate. Forecasting future climate changes will be equally impossible if we remain fixated on carbon dioxide, and ignore the solar, ocean circulation, cosmic ray and other powerful natural forces that actually affect Earth’s climate.”
An excellent summary of the current state of the debate, by Paul Driessen!
In related news, we have this highly ironic story today:
Bonfire of Insanities: Solar Panels Start Fire at Green Party-Run Hove Town Hall
http://www.breitbart.com/london/2015/04/21/bonfire-of-insanity-solar-panels-start-fire-at-green-party-run-hove-town-hall/
Ya gotta love it….
A solar panel did not start the fire. A faulty electrical connection did.
Was it a faulty electrical connection to a solar panel?
How’s that pinhead you’re dancing on?
Billy – Calling it a fire started by a solar panel is on the pinhead. Electrical fires due to faulty connections happen a lot, completely unrelated to solar panels.
Actually no. Electrical fires caused by bad connections are much worse with solar panels because they produce DC rather than AC.
IN the US there is a new standard to provide active monitoring for arc faulting with the ability to automatically disconnect the faulty string.
There was a more serious side to this story , one which affects many householders in the UK ( but which of course they will never hear from the BBC): the panels running DC current represent a possible fire hazard and according to the local fire service:
“Firefighters need to consider the additional roof loading of the array, especially when the purlins/rafters etc. are fire-damaged or water-laden. They also need to consider the fact that DC string cables may be running down through the property from a system that, during daylight hours, is producing voltages anywhere between 400VDC to 1000VDC, and currents between 1A and 10A, depending on the nature of the installation and the irradiance present.”
“Furthermore, solar PV modules are manufactured to include a number of potentially hazardous chemicals and materials which may be released as a side-effect of the fire damage. All of these considerations, and more, can lead to the fire service deciding that the level of risk and uncertainty is too high to justify dealing with the property fire at all – resulting in some instances where properties have been literally left to burn out.”
They are talking I assume about more industrial size panels but this should be taken into account by UK house holders who have seen a massive phone led campaign to persuade them to install roof panels , which then become , in some cases, the property , not of the householder , but the utility , for a specific period of time .
We are frequently coldcalled by the salespeople , but at no time has the fire hazard been mentioned. It will not take long for the insurance industry to wake up to the possibility or necessity of increasing premiums on houses with roof mounted solar panels.
It may be that I am exaggerating the risks, and if someone from the industry wishes to contradict me , please feel free . I have several times almost been talked into such a contract , despite my dislike of “renewables” on the massive, hill covering, scale and I would like to be reassured with verifiable statistics .
There are issues with roof mounted solar panels that need to be addressed at installation including the understanding that it is a second source of electrical energy feeding your service which should be installed with all appropriate isolation and safety devices. Panels can also interfere with normal firefighting. Don’t have them installed by a fly-by-night door-to-door solar panel contractor.
Brian, the point was that the lines from the solar panel are still energized, even if the power has been properly disconnected at the breaker. There has to be some form of active disconnect inside the panels that can be activated by arcing or by a command from the outside.
Even with an active disconnect, be careful getting water on those panels if the sun is up.
Great irony!
And “In contrast to the power used by conventional mains electrical equipment, the power that PV systems generate is DC (direct current) and parts of the system cannot be switched off. DC installations have a continuous current, making them more hazardous (volt for volt) than normal AC (alternating current) electrical installations.”
Firemen can only enter the building at night!
So Mark – out of 60,000 or so electrical fires a year the US how many have been associated with PV?
Democrats love the smell of hypocrisy in the morning it smells like……hypocrisy.
no. Democrats love the smell of hypocrisy because it comes from the incineration of other people’s money.
John Boles,
Jimmy Swaggart was the evangelist caught with a hooker, not Jerry Falwell.
Too bad we can’t tie in a politician’s remuneration with accuracy.
No need to despair Sheldon. In this new century of touchy savages, there is always room for comedians.
The Chinese Infrastructure development bank is about to provide Pakistan with a $46 billion loan to develop its infrastructure, including a cross-country highway and railroad line, as well as developing a sizeable coal deposit. The coal deposit allegedly yields the energy equivalent of Saudi Arabian oil reserves:
http://www.wsj.com/articles/china-to-unveil-billions-of-dollars-in-pakistan-investment-1429214705 (for a general summary)
http://www.samaa.tv/economy/19-Apr-2015/china-s-cooperation-to-expedite-thar-coal-project
(additional details on coal project)
In terms of mitigation of AGW, this looks appears to be a game changer and is likely to make US and European Union efforts at mitigating AGW moot. Future loans by China will only exacerbate the issue. Even one prominent UN climate official has declared coal should continue to play a part in generating energy. Coal is still king. Senator Whithuuse and friends need to remember that.
Numerous consequences exist to this game changer. First, as younger scientists would put it, AGW campaigns are “so yesterday.’ In fact, it may be fair to say that the interpretations of James Hansen, Al Gore, the Kyoto treaty. The UN-IPCC, and much of what is taught in universities on AGW, and the collective policies of Senator Whitehouse, his colleagues, and President Obama could be considered 20th century thinking in the 21st century. Second, what is needed is data driven climate science and much of what has come out recently indicates the AGW problem is less serious than the alarmists would have us think. Third, all scholarly/professional societies should revise any and all its science policy statements on this issue in lieu of these new realities.
That’s just for openers. The impact of this and future infrastructure loans will be large and US public officials need to face up to this new reality.
The best way for CAGW to die is to ignore it. The Chinese are putting their money into action to allow just that. Good on them. Unless China has a plan to embargo western companies, I expect US companies to bid on those infrastructure projects.
Nope. Everything is being built by Chinese companies according to Xinhua. Their money, their rules. Since China has been putting up one ultrasupercritical coal unit (about 1000 MW, 45% efficient) every 3 weeks for the past three years, they probably would have been the low cost bidder anyway. Boiler technology ‘borrowed’ from a JV with MHI; steam turbogenerator technology ‘borrowed’ from a Siemens JV. Essay Clean Coal has more details.
Yes, and the new reality includes a re-estimation of climate sensitivity given the “pause”; very small temperature variation under increasing atmospheric CO2.
We see that Democrats don’t care if Iran gets nukes. They don’t care if ISIS butchers people. They don’t care if Russia expands into Ukraine and the Baltic states. SO . . .
“Global warming is the most serious threat we face today.”
They may be telling the truth, as they see it.
+10
Paul Driessen,
Personally I wish they’d knock it off. It does make for some amusingly ironic backlash in the form of the above faux-innocent indignance, however.
lol. And claiming to be a mind reader isn’t equally absurd, if not more so? Ok, two can play that game: who are you trying to scare with your sweeping allegations of fraud?
An argument from personal incredulity, citing a movie about Camelot as some sort of support. Just … wow.
At least I was able to get to the 5th graf this time before relegating this piece to the round file — an improvement of sorts I suppose.
Did you ever stop to think where we would be by now if it weren’t for the puny band of skeptics that have caused all this ‘trouble’. Is it your opinion that it is justified and moral that the might of the Whitehouse Synod, the governors, world bodies, every university, Senate bulldogs, multimillion dollar ad campaigns… should rail against the 3% of dissenting taxpayers who not only don’t buy into the CO2 hysteria but appear to offer effective scientific and economic reasons why? We must indeed be effective to brought so much anger chilling threats down upon us. I guess the “diversity” bandwagon is full. Incidentally, I’ve come to accept Cook’s 97% finding even if his methodology was a joke. The numbers have been corroborated by the even tinier wing of skeptics that were open dissenters in the former USSR, China and Burma. Brandon, we are doing you a service that hopefully will continue to allow you to have whatever opinions you want. Like saving the Nile crocodile, we will continue to do so while the crocs try to bite our heads off.
Gary Pearse,
Constantly. However I don’t see why my idle speculations about a history which didn’t happen should carry any objective weight in this conversation.
It’s my opinion that your loaded question is all but unanswerable. Let’s try this. Legally, that’s how things get done in a constitutional representative democracy. Turning it into a moral question is interesting, but surely you don’t expect that to achieve any sort of objective resolution? Tut. I shouldn’t put thoughts in your head. Here’s a properly open-ended question: Who defines what is moral and what isn’t?
Good grief man, it’s not like many on your side aren’t teeth-bared sabre-rattlers in their own right. How many years since MBH98 has it been? How often is Mann still pilloried for Upsidedown Tiljanders when his name is mentioned? Or even when it isn’t?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/04/11/new-rust-based-climate-proxy-even-easier-for-michal-mann-to-use-upside-down/
Seriously? Crap like the headline of that article is one reason why I’ve stated here on this thread, and previously, that Democrats going on fishing expeditions in the “skeptic” camp are ill-advised — it perpetuates a precedent of science by FOIA and litigation which I don’t see serving anyone’s interests in the long run. Not just on climate research: across the board.
(chuckle) I’d say it’s “conditional”. I’ll also note you’re on somewhat dubious footing — I don’t see a very well defined threshold between staunch vocal opposition to policy and intolerant hate speech. I tend to want to err on the side of permittivity when it comes to freedom to air one’s opinions. This often puts me at odds with the politically correct crowd who cry foul at race-baiting dogwhistles and the like, but have their own bottomless bucket of arguably equal intolerance for mouth-breathing knuckle-dragging Jebus-freaks living in the “flyover states” … which is where I was raised.
I’m beyond tired of talking about that paper. Suffice it to say it’s a social sciences study, and arguing about the most robust methods in soft sciences is tantamount to discussing which breed of dog produces the best-smelling manure. Hyperbole on my part of course, but you get the point.
I hadn’t read that comment when I made my “somewhat dubious footing” comment above. Just as well, I’m going to leave it. Know this about me: I do myself the service of preserving my own freedom of speech. Constantly. And like you, I see that my humble efforts are for your benefit as well.
That said, I make a very clear distinction between verbal opposition to policy and actual opposition to law once policy is in place.
That prior sentence was very carefully worded, please read it carefully.
Heh, the Piltdown Mann’s main pilloring is still in the future. He will be long remembered, maybe even longer than Hansen.
==================
Kim,
Ah, so the serious smackdown is on Hiatus … but just you wait until things really heat up! Fitting. Very fitting.
Reading polls is the equivalent to reading minds?
Fascinating how your mind “works”.
He didn’t cite any poll data. Fascinating how your mind fills in the gaps.
He didn’t need to cite any poll data, the polls have been widely publicized.
Speaking of reading minds, why do you insist on trying?
BTW, if I declare that Obama was elected in 2012, do I need to provide a link to the election returns?
Brandon,has a hard time realizing that there are many people who do not agree with him.
MarkW,
Citations? We don’t need no steeenking citations!
Speak for yourself. Now show me a poll that specifically asks its respondents, “Agree or disagree: The absurdity of this fraudulent fear mongering and its total irrelevance to our daily lives is why I don’t believe that AGW is real” and we’ll have ourselves a discussion.
Of course not, don’t be silly. But if you declare that Obama was elected in 2012 because people thought he was handsome, I’d want to see that question in the list of things specifically asked.
sunsettommy,
Brandon,has a hard time realizing that there are many people who do not agree with him.
No, I simply understand the difference between knowing someone shares a differing opinion from me and why. Remedial Engrish time: who, what, where, when, why. Learn them. Love them. Use them properly.
That is all.
That is ah how sweet you ah.
=========
Tommy seems a tough love kinda’ guy. I’m happy to oblige him by returning the favour.
Interesting question. There are studies that indicate there is innate sense of fairness, empathy, and compassion in mammals. To me this indicates there is no “who” involved, it is evolution that is the basis for morality.
The who and what comes into play when those innate qualities translate into laws enforced by an authority. In that case it is a situational; it is matter of whomever has the most and biggest guns or the best lobbyists and marketing/public relation firms. In Iraq and Afghanistan it is the former and in Washington DC the latter.
Then there is the tribal aspect. A dirty player is only a dirty player if he plays on the other team, on my team he is unselfish, hard-nosed and tough. Climate science today often is indistinguishable from politics (something Eisenhower warned about) and so by definition discussing objective morality is problematic due to the tribal nature of politics. Regardless, both sides will argue the “morality” of their side with the electorate the moral arbiters.
However this issue is beyond that. The issue here is about purposely excluding qualified participants from the discussion. That goes goes against our most basic innate sense of fairness and is to the core immoral and against the best interests of the species.
Alx,
I’m glad you think so … it’s one of my pet interests.
Indeed. The way I learned it in college biology is the distinction between selfish and altruistic behaviours (this was well prior to Dawkins’ “The Selfish Gene” was published). Then and since, I’ve read some cautionary notes about the tendency to anthropomorphize observed behaviour, particularly in the “lower” orders of the animal kingdom. Primates though, particularly chimpanzee species, exhibit all sorts of human-like ethical behaviour, as well as a sense of self vs. other not seen in other species which do behave altruistically.
One example I kind of remember from school — though I forget the species … it was some large terrestrial mammal, Cape Buffalo perhaps? — it was observed that a childless female will forego mating opportunities, but nurse and raise the offspring of her sister. IIRC the particular hitch was that some females will do this even if the biological mother is not dead or incapacitated. The question posed to us was, “Why?” Nobody could think of a sensible answer, but the “best” explanation offered by the prof. was that a niece or nephew shares 1/4 of its genome with an aunt or uncle. Hence, “altruism” in that species may be largely explained by Dawinesque Selfish Gene theory.
(chuckle) Not long ago I had a long-running … battle … online with a guy on the subject of morality. He would ask, “Do you consider it moral to do X?” And I would say, “It depends.” He would then launch an avalanche of invective at me about how my “moral flexibility” was indistinguishable from amorality. Of course when I did give a yes/no response to his question which he didn’t agree with, he took a pound of flesh for the fact that only someone wholly immoral could agree that doing “X” is morally defensible.
Yes. Annoying isn’t it.
Effectively no different from any major policy issue which is also quite contentious, especially when the ideological lines have been so starkly drawn.
Well sure, I’m hard-pressed to argue against the proposition that it’s a component. And since Dr. Curry’s House Committee hearing is specifically mentioned in the head post, it’s certainly topical: http://science.house.gov/hearing/full-committee-hearing-president-s-un-climate-pledge-scientifically-justified-or-new-tax
Only 1/4 testimonies presented were supportive of Obama’s UN climate pledge. You can bet that if the Democrats controlled the House, that ratio would have been 3/4.
Here’s a quote which doesn’t mince words:
“When you vote, you are exercising political authority, you’re using force. And force, my friends, is violence. The supreme authority from which all other authorities are derived.” ― Robert A. Heinlein, Starship Troopers
Sure, innately unfair to pretty much anyone who isn’t a sociopath. However, I’m hard pressed to argue that it’s inaccurate. Indeed, I think it’s not just objectively true; but also, given our present nature as a species, it simply cannot be any other way.
Another abuse is the EPA ‘sue and settle’ method to bypass the normal rulemaking process. This is where the EPA ‘allegedly’ colludes with friendly environmental groups for the groups to sue the EPA over ‘pick an issue’. Suit is duly filed in federal court, the EPA and the environmental group come to a ‘settlement’ that is rubber stamped by the court. Now the EPA can push through rules much more quickly because they have a court imposed deadline, via the settlement, to implement the new rule. This allows them to bypass some of the procedural ‘roadblocks’ (you know public notice, comment and response, economic impact, etc.) and fast track regulations.
I heard they also pay the Environmental lawyers huge sums of money. Does anyone know whether this is true?
Just the gay ones.
I’d be pretty happy if I was getting that kind of money for no real work.
By default: any lawyer is paid huge sums of money.
What I meant to say was that the government has to pay the EPA lawyers to settle the suit.
The fundamental equation of Climate Science:
Science + Politics = BS
Science is a search for the truth.
Politics is about deception – the search for spin and lies.
Climate Science made a Faustian bargain.
dead on accurate, sadly so though.
I like the Australian Government solution. “Financial incentives can affect behavior, which is why the public and Congress need to know who funded the skeptics’ research”- Paul Driessen has identified the classic psychological transference of Whitehouse who accuses sceptics of precisely what is the problem with government/big climate funding. Abbott’s government funded a “chair” in Western Australia U for Bjorn Lomborg to be a new centre of gravity for Climate Science thinking. I think foundations and those who have the cash to do so should fund some more “chairs” for bringing objectivity to climate science. Universities ultimately don’t care where the money comes from and, as the White-house inquisition points out, it could be an effective way to bring this mad age of endarkenment to an end – pay for it.
An interesting idea. In the U.S., the Democrats get a little over 50% of popular vote, and a little over 95% of academia vote. We need to address this asymmetry – soon.
Great article.
The hundreds of billions of dollars wasted on a non-problem could have been spent on humane worth-while projects like medical research for the cure of cancer, or other life threatening diseases. These despicable mental degenerates like Senator Whitehouse should be held accountable for the future death and suffering of those whose lives could have been saved or prolonged. Instead, the policies of Whitehouse are contributing to untold suffering of humankind
Global warming [alarmism] is the most serious threat we face today.
There, fixed.
Global warming [alarmism] is the most serious threat we face today.
There, fixed.
Hmm. Alarmism will pass. Alarms sans fire eventually die down. Perhaps we will profit from the lesson. It had to be really expensive, you know, or it wouldn’t be a lesson, and we’d have to go through something even more ruinous down the road. Consider it a high-tuition education (with repressive dorm rules).
Talking actual threat, China is the most serious threat and grandest opportunity we face today. Insisting that the bulk of their rural population die before the age of 50 in the dark is perhaps not the best pathway to opportunity. Or peace, for that matter. Just sayin’.
That’s pretty close to what I think, which is why I am on this site all the time. I do believe that there is a greater threat–the Overpopulation Lie, a half-truth that justifies many deadly things. AGW alarmism causes death by starvation, by economy-wrecking, and by making individual temperature mitigations (home heating &AC) more expensive. Many “greens” celebrate mass human death. This lie I think is a contributing meme to the fact-insensitive adherence to Church of Global Warming dogma.
@ladylifegrows,
Can you provide examples of ‘many “greens” celebrate mass human death”?
To be fair, I am sure that nearly all greens are well motivated. But they have been exposed to only one side of the argument. They have been heartily discouraged from serious discussion with those with whom they disagree. Those on their side have told them that our motivations are venal and our knowledge either lacking or corrupted.
And the same in reverse applies to regrettably many on our side, too. How on the green hills of earth are we supposed to tap the knowledge of experts with whom we disagree if we are making inappropriate puns out of their names? Whichever side you are on: You need the other side.
Science is impeded if civil interaction cannot occur. Politics is the delicate art of applied polarization. As soon as politics comes in the door, science flies out the window.
Nice timing of the essay on the day before the so-called ‘Earth Day’.
John
I thought it was the day before Vladimir Lenin’s birthday.
“Alarmists get a thousand times more money than skeptics.”
And most of it is taxpayer-funded from governments in western countries. This is not mentioned enough (or very often, not at all).
Thanks, Paul Driessen. You really put some common sense into this debate.
I fear global cooling more than global warming, but I fear energy poverty even more.
And, with a small CO2 climate sensitivity, there is no chance for even China to affect world climate.
More Big Government Good, Big Oil Bad, Four Legs Good, Two Legs Bad twaddle.
In science the acid test is whether the model fits the data.
The normal way to refute a scientific theory is to show that the model does not fit the data.
What happens when skeptics produce articles that challenge then global warming/climate change establishment. If they were scientifically unsound they would be challenged. If they can’t find anything wrong, they resort to ad hominem attacks or guilt by association. Big Oil = 2 legs, 2 legs bad.
I think they got mad ,because they want a power grab,but scientists such as Dr. Curry thinks they have no need to to do it:
“That’s why they refuse to debate the science; why they vilify climate crisis skeptics. It’s why Democrats became so frustrated with Dr. Judith Curry’s expert testimony at a recent House Science Committee hearing that they left the room. They couldn’t stand it when she said the “central issue” is the extent to which recent (and future) planetary warming or other climate changes are driven by manmade greenhouse gas emissions, “versus natural climate variability caused by variations from the sun, volcanic eruptions, and large-scale ocean circulations.” And they really couldn’t tolerate her noting that President Obama’s pledge to slash U.S. emissions by 28% will reduce warming by just 0.03 degrees Celsius by 2100.”
Take away their basis and they show their true colors with their tantrums.
***check the “pretty please” begging faces of this bunch of bureaucrats!
18 April: World Bank: Mobilizing the Billions and Trillions for Climate Finance
***PHOTO CAPTION: The leaders of the IMF, World Bank Group, and United Nations welcomed ministers from 42 countries for the climate ministerial.
Over the next 15 years, the global economy will require an estimated $89 trillion in infrastructure investments across cities, energy, and land-use systems, and $4.1 trillion in incremental investment for the low-carbon transition to keep within the internationally agreed limit of a 2 degree Celsius temperature rise…
In addition, developed countries are working to meet a commitment made in 2010 to mobilize $100 billion a year from public and private sources by 2020 for climate mitigation and adaptation in developing countries…
Carbon pricing and fossil fuels
Putting a price on carbon and phasing out fossil fuel subsidies are two ways governments can free up and increase public funds…
The magnitude of the finance challenges ahead and the discussions made clear the need to build on one another’s work and set targets, said World Bank Group Vice President and Special Envoy for Climate Change Rachel Kyte. “One thing that came through very clear is that you have to know where you’re going. You have to have clear goals and targets at the national level,” Kyte said.
***Shifting the world to a cleaner trajectory will require nothing short of economic transformation.
http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2015/04/18/raising-trillions-for-climate-finance
The west ebbs, the east surges;
What of the poor devils with prosperous urges?
=======================
There once was a climatologist,
A CAGW apologist.
So he entered the squabble,
Created a model,
And thus he became an astrologist.
“should be tarred and feathered with tobacco industry apologists”
I always thought that the AGW gambit matched much of what the Tobacco Institute did with statistics. The effort to “torture the data” would be criminal in most other cases.
I agree, In both cases the the offending parties clearly exhibited confirmation bias and refused to considered any alternative theories. Big Green is very much like Big Tobacco.
Fish and chips
The absurdity of this fraudulent fear mongering and its total irrelevance to our daily lives explains why Americans consistently put climate change at the bottom of every list of concerns.
Besides, the blighters are after our burgers.
Fish and chips without the fish I personally would consider of highest priority, but have no illusions that that would happen or that a carbon tax would ensure fish in my fish and chips.
And neither CO2 nor planetary warming has anything to do with allergies or asthma.
Kids need to roll in the mud more. We are turning ourselves into a culture of bubble babies.
Yes and also get them off the epidemic of prescribed drugs because they do not want to sit still in class or have endless bounds of energy or are moody. I am sure some kids need that kind of help, but it seems to have become a panacea for treating all kids who do not fit in or are victims of poor parenting.
They deliberately hunt only for supportive documents (many of which they pay for) and actively ignore, suppress and vilify research that focuses on (or even just discusses) natural forces.
Not to worry. We will not be addressing natural forces in our study. We will be dealing strictly with anthropogenic effect on sensor data. No man could possibly have the slightest objection to that.
#B^)
[SNIP waaaayyy waaaay waaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyy off topic – and it has no place here – Anthony]
I hope you just overlooked the /sarc tag.
Why do you hide the TRUTH Anthony ?.
[??? .mod]
Mod I tried to paint a picture, How microwaves (not the oven) are bad for the environment with links that people could follow. People above were making reference to tobacco and I believe this is the 21st century cover-up responsible for the spike in cancers especially in the young. I started of with this vid
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z99_SzoXZdY I guess I shouldn’t have made the links to man made microwaves and climate disruption . Check with Anthony for added details .
Don’t scientists have kids and grandkids. I suppose money today is more important then health in the future.
There is more than one side to this. The health of 1.2 billion — today — without electricity is at issue. Not a lot of people die of cancer at age 60 when (adult) life expectancy is under 50.
Furthermore, undeveloped countries, on the whole, destroy the environment with unimaginable ferocity.
I’d just as soon our grandkids not be witness to the horrific human and ecological results of impeding development.
It’s time for Sheldon to stop yelling fire in a crowded theater. Somebody’s going to get hurt. I don’t care how many grad students he recruits to generate theses supporting his lunatic claims. Enough.
Snarling Dolphin , You have ever reason to snarl when this takes place
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2319611/Navy-sonar-did-cause-mass-dolphin-deaths-say-scientists-blame-war-games-exercise-Cornish-coast-strandings.html
Several comments earlier in this string show a fundamental misunderstanding of the economics of alternative energy sources and mistakenly claim that solar and wind power cost little or no more than fossil fuel or nuclear power. Because wind and solar are intermittent, they must have conventional power running as backup at almost all times in any installation of serious size (or in the case where there are multiple small installations that link to the grid). In other words, a 100 megawatt solar installation has a cost comprised of (a) building the 100 megawatt solar installation, (b) building the 100 megawatt gas or coal-fired backup plant behind it, and (c) the fuel need to run that fossil fuel plant and keep full power instantly available (fossil fuel power plants cannot be turned “on” or “off” at a moment’s notice). Furthermore, solar and wind power do not necessarily arrive at times when their power has any value to users (e.g. wind power at 4 a.m. on hot summer days). As a result of these and other factors (e.g., vastly expanding transmission lines to remote generating locations, energy losses in transmission from those locations), these technologies are far more expensive than nuclear and fossil fuel power and always will be. Any estimates based on “levelized cost of energy” (LCOE) are inherently incomplete and flawed because they do not include the cost of backup or discount for the valueless output. LCOE as a tool is worse than useless for intermittent power.
This is only a crude summary; a full description of all these issues and a set of comparisons taking them into account has been created by Charles Frank of the Brookings Institution in his 2014 report “The Net Benefits of Low and No-carbon Electricity Technologies.” He reaches his conclusions regarding the negative net benefits and high costs of wind and solar despite despite assuming that there is a positive benefit from reducing carbon emissions of $50 a ton, a speculative figure that is commonly used by opponents of fossil fuels, and one that arbitrarily assumes modest warming will be harmful rather than beneficial. Frank’s analysis is by far the best overall summary around, and a fine piece of work. He is no “skeptic,” just an honest analyst of electric power costs. His paper is quite readable by a lay audience and can be found at: http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2014/05/low-carbon-electricity-technologies-frank
A summary is at Frank’s blog at http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/planetpolicy/posts/2014/05/20-low-carbon-wind-solar-power-frank
This is a paper to “spread the word” on, as it conclusively rebuts all claims that wind and solar are anywhere near economically competitive with conventional sources, or ever could be. It has been studiously ignored by the alternative energy proponents, as it destroys their favorite cause. Notice that this is not a matter of climate science, but of energy economics. There is no “consensus” to rebut or fret about–just good studies versus bad studies.
I’ve looked at several reviews of Frank’s paper and the best one argues that some of his calculations understate the cost disadvantage of wind and solar (see https://www.masterresource.org/hawkins-kent/b-rookings-wind-solar-fail/).
Mr Driessen, you neglected to mention that all the Republicans had left the hearing when Judith Curry spoke too.
She spoke to an empty room? Someone must have been there.
The only reference to ‘a recent House Science Committee hearing’ where ‘Democrats left the room’ and where Judith Curry spoke is for the Nov 17, 2010 hearing in which Brian Baird, the Democratic Chair, apologizes at the beginning of the Panel III discussion, which included Ms Curry, for the lack of any Republican or Democrats being on the panel as they all had other work scheduled. So there were no Republicans at the meeting either, only the Democratic Chairman Mr Baird was there when Ms Curry spoke.
Thanks. Makes sense.
Climate Science is like a religion, either you are a member or you are not, the evidence one way or another is irrelevant.
Once again thanks to Judith Curry to at least getting the evidence out there and risk the attentions of global warming lynch mobs.
Just realized in today’ PC world gone wild the term “lynch” is associated with racism. While lynching someone simply for being black is immoral and deplorable, “lynch mobs” also refers to mob rule where regardless of race blood thirsty vigilantes murderously take the law into their own hands by-passing rules of evidence and due process. I use lynch mob metaphorically in the latter form.
Climate Science, like all Science is based in known facts so its not at all ‘like a religion’, which is based on a belief system. I’m not sue what your 3rd paragraph has to do with Mr Driessen’s non mention of the fact that all the Republican Committee members were not in attendance either.
I dunno, LMT. I’ve seen some awfully religious-sounding comments crossing the lines in both directions. Worse flavor than the politics, if you ask me. (But the effect of politicization in all this has been terrible for the science.)
Science in itself is not political (or religious) in any sense; it is a body of physical knowledge about the known universe. Its whether you choose to believe that science or not believe it that has made it politicized.
Refusal to document alterations of records, refusal to debate on the record, and ostracism of disbelievers? The worst of institutional religion, with political leaders piling on suggesting death or persecution of dissidents. Vile, disgusting. You should be deeply ashamed of defending it.
I’m sorry, folks, but I couldn’t resist…..
It’s just too funny to pass up this opportunity to post Monty Python’s Spanish Inquisition skit:
Nobody expected that.
“
This would be comedic if it were not coming from a leader of the worlds largest economic and military super power.
How these buffoons get elected is one of those mysteries (like what happens after death) that I suspect will never have a satisfactory answer.
He and his own “Death to America” policies and buddies are the most serious threat.
The only thing that hasn’t been blamed on climate change is premature ejaculation.
Although I hear it is coming.;)
it already came
Arf.
Ever watched him cup his crotch with laced fingers during the anthem?
No-body expects the Spanish Inquisition just as no-one expects to see ghosts or UFOs. The reason is the same – none of the three non-expected things in fact exist, or existed.
The politically expedient tale of the Inquisition in Catholic Spain largely originated in Protestant England. There was deep hostility and intermittent war between these two states. Thus the picture of torture and brutality was almost completely a fictitious exaggeration. Anyone familiar with our British media will understand this. They are a quirky and sometimes likeable bunch but they do like to make stuff up (along with always awarding competition prizes to their colleagues). In those days torture was routine in all countries in Europe and the Spanish Church Inquisition actually used it much less than the prevailing norm. Here are more details on this popular, useful (in a twisted sort of way) but totally fictitious myth of the Spanish Inquisition:
http://www.strangenotions.com/spanish-inquisition/
Charles the Second and others objected to the practice of the judges being paid from the victims’ assets.
===========
It’s quite ironic that people who complain about lack of accuracy in regard to something they know about quite a lot (Climate) are themselves willing to continue to refer to the Spanish Inquisition in terms which show that they are just not keeping up with the latest research on the subject. (Cue for all the usual suspects to start making all sorts of exaggerated claims about what actually took place during the Spanish Inquisition.) For the record, yes, some people were put to death – but the numbers have been totally exaggerated, firstly by Protestants and then by atheists, for their own propaganda purposes. Yes, torture was sometimes used, but not on the scale suggested by the myth. What is also the case is that many people preferred to be tried by the Inquisition courts than by the civil courts. Maybe that hoary old line about, Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition should be replaced by, Everybody fully expects the Myth of the Spanish Inquisition.
Yes, poor ‘ol Tomás de Torquemada has obviously been a victim of the same kind of bad press that afflicts the Islamist fanatics today. They are just both so misunderstood and what matters most is that we keep things in the proper “perspective”, right? No need to go off the deep end in analyzing the terrorist tactics of fanatics, just give us the raw numbers of the terrorized that we can more easily massage away in sophist blather and pablum! And no, the terrorist tactics of the Inquisition were never intended to apply to large numbers of people, just to terrorize the population at large into submission and silence. By that measure the current Klimate Inquisition certainly seems a good analogy to your hero Torquemada’s reign of terror, although (so far as I know) no one has been subjected to actual physical torture. Yet.
The clamor from the Klimate Kultists for blood and punishment is a reality, however, and their intent is the same as Torquemadas – To force those who disagree with them to live in terror and to either recant their heresies or at least to keep their mouths shut for fear of what might happen. All in the service of a pseudo religious doctrine that does nothing more than protect those in POWER from having to answer to anyone.
Yes, by all means, lets keep things in their proper “mythological” perspective.
Whitehouse is a fanatic. He is very similar to those self-declared progressives of the late 19th and eary 20th centuries who demanded (and sadly got) laws to enorce the science of eugenics. Pushing back against him and his fellow fanatics is completely called for
If climate change is real, which region of the many regions on earth, classified by the Köppen classification has changed?
Can anyone demonstratively reveal one region on earth where the climate has gone from say polar to tropical?
You-all might find this interesting:
“The move by the central government to freeze Greenpeace India’s bank accounts and block sources of funds, is a blatant violation of the constitutional rights to freedom of expression and association”
http://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2015/apr/22/government-greenpeace-india-open-letter
“Freedom of speech does not apply to misinformation and propaganda.”
http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/campaigns/global-warming-and-energy/exxon-secrets/faq/
The BRICs are getting tired of this imported madness from the West, and they’re beginning to figure out that pretending to go along with the madness still won’t get them the expected reparations.
=================
Haven’t seen a single instance of validated skeptic funding. The Smithsonian driblet for Dr. Soon, e.g., was a) blinded (not known to him), b) tiny 1.2 million over a decade timespan and c) charged 40% admin overhead off the top by the Smithsonian. Compare to the above!
For some time, following Feynman, I have been taking flak for asserting the information theory proposition that science proves nothing, but can disprove. Negative results and projection tests are far more informative than positive; in a pass-fail, a pass only asserts “consistent with”, allowing the hypothesis to continue in the ranks of known and unknown possibles, whereas a fail truncates an entire branch of the tree, including the proposed guess. The final (contingent) conclusion or assertion is the one that never failed, and it is still open to new challenge at any time (that takes into account the same previous results and options). It is not “proven”; that is a logic term (2+2=4), not scientific.
What the Puck
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D, Rl), the guy who blamed last May’s Oklahoma tornado on Republicans, is at it again. According to CMS News, he and other Democrats summoned sports executives from the NFL, NHL, and NBA to demand they report what “work these organizations are doing to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.” Afterwards, Whitehouse held an epic wacko press conference: “Stadiums, the palaces of sport… are at risk from the storm, climate, sea-level-rise effects of climate change,” he ranted. “Without cold enough water for frozen ponds, the kind of hockey that you play out of doors with your friends gets a little bit harder to achieve.” Even worse, he said, “I took my kids skiing at Yawgoo Valley ski slopes in Rhode Island … But we can expect all the [area] ski slopes gone.”
Edit: … source not known to him
… can disprove a clear hypothesis.
Edit 2: … substantive skeptic funding,
… taking flak on another site, deep-dyed Groupthink Green …