There’s an article in the New York Times pushing a something called “the five stages of climate grief” done by a professor at the University of Montana. This got me to thinking about the regular disaster forecasting that we see published in the media about what will happen due to climate change.
We’ve seen this sort of angst broadcast before, and it occurred to me that through history, a lot of “predictions of certainty” with roots in scientifically based forecasts have not come true. That being the case, here is the list I’ve compiled of famous quotes and consensus from “experts”.
Top Ten Science based predictions that didn’t come true:
10. “The earth’s crust does not move”– 19th through early 20th century accepted geological science. See Plate Tectonics
9. “The bomb will never go off. I speak as an expert in explosives.” — Admiral William Leahy, U.S. Atomic Bomb Project
8. “That virus is a pussycat.” — Dr. Peter Duesberg, molecular-biology professor at U.C. Berkeley, on HIV, 1988
7. “I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.” — Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943
6. “Radio has no future. Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible. X-rays will prove to be a hoax.” — William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, British scientist, 1899.
5. “There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable. It would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will.” — Albert Einstein, 1932
4. “Space travel is bunk.” — Sir Harold Spencer Jones, Astronomer Royal of the UK, 1957 (two weeks later Sputnik orbited the Earth).
3. “If I had thought about it, I wouldn’t have done the experiment. The literature was full of examples that said you can’t do this.” — Spencer Silver on the work that led to the unique adhesives for 3-M “Post-It” Notepads.
2. “Stomach ulcers are caused by stress” — accepted medical diagnosis, until Dr. Marshall proved that H. pylori caused gastric inflammation by deliberately infecting himself with the bacterium.
1. “Telltale signs are everywhere —from the unexpected persistence and thickness of pack ice in the waters around Iceland to the southward migration of a warmth-loving creature like the armadillo from the Midwest. Since the 1940s the mean global temperature has dropped about 2.7° F.” — Climatologist George J. Kukla of Columbia University in Time Magazine’s June 24th, 1975 article Another Ice Age?
So the next time you hear about worldwide crop failure, rising sea levels, species extinction, or “climate grief” you might want to remember that just being an expert, or even having a consensus of experts, doesn’t necessarily mean that a claim is true.
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5 computers? lol Funny…
ps before anybody offers a smarmy remark that the barrier was broken before the 1950s, he was in college in the early 1950s…the textbook was published well before Yeager made his famous flight…
I wasn’t going to coment but it seems that when we look at ourselves we often find that at some time we have overstated our beliefs. Personaly I find Anthony’s 10 very interesting having lived through one or two of them. by the way roads starting your measurement at the low of a cool peroid to use to prove global warming is decietful. why not start at the 1934 warm peroid to do your comparison. By using a very as you acuse others of doing cherry picked time frame you give grave doubt to your whole position.
Bill
Many that are so gullible as to not see the political push of all this nonsense are forgetting an inconvenient truth. The Truth is that all this political garbage about manmade global warming has caused great harm to everyone and mostly the poor. One of you actually had the stupidity of saying that “If we chose to believe in AGW we have lost nothing even if it is false, and we lose everything if it is true.” To the morons who suggested this, are you not paying attention? Considering our need for energy independence (remember $100 oil that does nothing but line the pockets of other extremists), we are facing a time when all the environmental extremist activities of the past are coming home to roost. Thanks to these environmental extremist who have hide in the guise of science, we haven’t kept up with the need for more Oil Drilling, Coal Power plants, or nuclear power. These extremist are even so stupid as to attack our damns which, next to nuclear power, is the cleanest form of energy we produce. It is obviouse that nothing will satisfy these extremist, and even if they come up with a good idea themselves, give them a few years and they will be against that also.
So in summary, anyone who doesn’t see environmental extremism as the bigger threat is either gullible or just too biased to see the forest for the trees!
I disagree with your claims that you believe that global warming is not happening. I’m no scientist and I’m sure you aren’t either. (I don’t regularly read this blog, it was just something that caught my eye on the wordpress site). I live with two “skeptics”, so its not like I haven’t heard all the arguments. Fact of the matter is: what bad can come from doing your part for the environment? Lets just say, for sh*ts and giggles that climate change is real…if each of us uses a little less electricity, recycles, tries to use less fuel, etc., there is nothing bad that can come out of it. Most of the simple life changes that you and I can make are good for our wallets, health, and well being. Whats the harm in it?
REPLY: Joyce, I’m not sure who you were addressing, so I’ll take the lead as moderator.
First, thank you for visiting. Second, no one here denies that it is happening. However the MAGNITUDE of and the CAUSE is the debate. Sure some personal life changes, not a problem. I support such conservation measures. It is when government starts mandating such changes without facts based in evidence that such mandates can actually have an effect is what gets us all in trouble. –Anthony
This should remind us of the importance of observations made by capable naturalists over time. Biological systems are fine-tuned to perturbations occurring at scales that make microsite variability meaningless.
Changing distribution ranges, both in elevation and latitude, the timing of migratory behavior, and local extinctions are all the data needed to see things are moving fast.
Then throw in sinking railroads in the permafrost, anxious Inuits and Tuvians, and regional/global agricultural crises/opportunities (we’re biological too), and the situation seems evident.
Thermometers…we don’t need no stinkin’ thermometers!
Jd
REPLY: Hmm, care to revise that John? It doesn’t fit with previous statements you’ve made to me. Maybe you really don’t mean that we should throw out the metric for measurement of our atmospheric temperature? And microsite variability does it fact get recorded by such thermometers. See my post on moves related to San Francisco’s official climate station for an illustrated proof.
The most idiotic of the forecast was made by an executive of EMI. Groups with guitars are out of fashion. He said this to Brian Epstein.
Roads, I am rude, too bad. Second, I didn’t like to an article at all. Just an image. But I’m glad to see you aren’t a solar change denier.
environmentalchristian, appreciate the rationalism, at least. I would like to correct you on one point. No one seriously thinks it isn’t warmer now than say a hundred or so years ago, that I know of. No one really thinks there isn’t any global warming. We are not denying any recent warming. Only the amount and the causes.
What thousands of scientists padraic2112? If your talking about the oft quoted 2500, no one to my knowledge has actually seen the list of names. After all, if a skeptic produces a list, people pick it apart and find as many sociologists and economists as they can. But a quick analysis of the IPCC finds many “unqualified” people. And as we have seen, just becuase people devote their “lives” to something doesn’t mean they’ve got it right. We’ve been obsessing over global warming for all of Twenty years. I know your going to say “the theory has been worked out for hundreds of years” and yet we still don’t even have a ballpark estimate of the effect of aerosols, which would be necessary to determine how much warming is due to CO2. The simple “all” explanation is flaw becuase: Some global warming should be due to solar activity, and less warming may have happened than the CO2 alone would suggest. It could be better, it could be worse:
http://www.sciencebits.com/files/pictures/climate/IPCC-Forcings.png
(Not an “article” an image)
Note also: “Level of Scientific Understanding” for most forcings is “Low” to “Very Low”. How does that correspond to 90% certainty?
Jeff, GISS says 2nd warmest on record. RSS says 9th. Get over that.
On fitting the models to history, which I believe Roads brought up. If you make assumptions about certain effects, and they happen to reproduce history, does that mean they are right? How do models vary from 1.5 to 4 in their climate sensitivities and all match history? Because the value for aerosols was chosen, not derived from first principles, to fit.
On June 8th. 2004, the planet Venus made a transit of the sun. Nasa measured the drop in TSI with the SORCE satellite caused by the passage of Venus’ tiny shadow over the Earth.
Turns out it dropped the TSI from 1361.2 (wpm-2) to 1359.8 (wpm-2) or 1.4 wpm-2 overall.
Recall that AWG is postulated on GHG forcing the climate by 4 wpm-2.
So Venus’ shade temporarily erased 25% of the claimed effect of co2 greenhouse effect.
From the vantage point of Earth, Venus is a tiny dot, only 46 arc seconds at maximum apparition. Only 0.1% of the solar face was eclipsed.
So what sounds more appealing to our climate change believing guests?
A world wide drastic cutback in co2, with all the inherent uses, driving cooking, heating, forbidden to the general public, massive layoffs of working people, subsistence farming, climate police enforcing the dictates of world government, economies ruined, all excess tax monies spent toward dropping the world temperature by half a degree,
or
installing a satellite up in orbit so that it always casts a shadow on the Earth, sized specificly to removing 4 (wpm-2) TSI ?
The Kyoto has cost a little over 500 billion dollars so far. A satellite would would cost a few billion maybe.
You choose.
Science is nothing but of discovering new things.
Sometimes it can be very wrongly interpreted.
One must have humility as a scientist,
not aggressiveness of intellect and to portray himself a semigod!
The other day I read this article by this young dude.
About People who deny existence of God.
He had something similar resonating on scientists who think they know-it-all!
It can be read here: People who deny existence of God!
[…] Categories: science Tags: fun, predictions, science Anthony Watts has created a top 10 list of science predictions that have gone wrong. I heard some of those before…. but some were […]
Also, since the subject is science-based predicitons; perhaps the biggest problem is that people tend to think it’s either anthropogenic, or a natural cycle.
Yes, the earth climate obviously cycles and the sun has a lot to do with it; and yes, there’s every reason to expect CO2 increases affect the earth’s climate. Yes, CO2 levels have cycled the past as well.
Nothing new under the sun…or is there? Think twice, this combination of factors has never before occurred in the history of the earth. 350 million years of carbon have never before been kicked into the atmosphere before. We’re like a bunch of smoldering volcanos that won’t quit; and that’s not to mention all the other things (deforestation, land-cover conversion, soot deposits, etc.). These are brand new conditions…it’s a brave new world folks!
Nothing in nature happens in isolation. It’s not one or the other…and what should be more of concern is the great possibility that it’s actually going to be more than just the two combined. That’s the way complex natural phenomena tend to occur.
Being a scientist, what frightens me is the tendancy to see so many people to form such strong opinions and take such marked sides with so little information. And as indicated by Anthony’s good work, we can’t even get the thermometers right?
If there is hope, perhaps it’s in the realization that scientists often act like arguing children, and mother nature won’t take sides.
jD
I’m not sure you understand what science actually is. The comments of individuals which are later proven to be mistaken does nothing to logically support your arguments. Every time we advance our knowledge, through science, many people are proven wrong. Science is by definition, self-correcting. No true scientist will ever claim 100% certainty.
To read some of the 1.2 million academic article written in the last three decades, check this link
Perhaps some reading about the scientific method would help.
Sure I’ll revise.
I didn’t mean to demean the metric of measurement. I’m just saying we’d all benefit if all broadened our views.
The Sierra Madre quote was just an attempt at humor.
I always look forward to seeing your Blogg Anthony. Work by folks like you stimulates discussions like these.
Thanks!
I hardly would put question god’s existence on the same level as either side of the global warming debate, Dr.Zhivago.
Make of that statement what you will, but its just ambiguous enough to work.
papertiger, ever think of making a blog about that idea?
The cheap, easy solution to global warming: The satellite space mirror!
You could make huge money off it. At least until it got hit by an asteroid or something and either shattered or turned around and reflected light back at us. Didn’t you watch the whole Futurama episode?
“Then throw in sinking railroads in the permafrost, anxious Inuits and Tuvians, and regional/global agricultural crises/opportunities (we’re biological too), and the situation seems evident.”
Can you say…PDO?
http://jisao.washington.edu/pdo/PDO.latest
http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b370/gatemaster99/pdo2.png
In about 1976, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation switched phase suddenly. In case your wondering, this is AFTER taking out any “global warming” signal in the data. this phase shift meant that instead of mostly La Ninas, we would have mostly El Ninos. El Ninos mean warm Alaskan winters.
http://home.earthlink.net/~ponderthemaunderg/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/multivariateenso.jpg
http://home.earthlink.net/~ponderthemaunderg/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/ensorelationships.jpg
Alaskan temperatures haven’t seen the steady rise associated with greenhouse gases:
http://www.climate-skeptic.com/images/2008/01/10/temp_dep4906f.jpg
They jumped, wait for it in 1976. Coincidence? Absolutely not.
joyce
Noone is arguing about doing our part for the environment. What we are against are extemists who use the environment for politcal power. They inturn ruin sciense and actually set us back. There is “ZERO” scientific evidence of AGW. While we can measure “Forcing” for various properties of compounds such as CO2, there is simply no way to calculate all the other forcing when it comes to our climate, that includes warming itself.
Facts:
1. AGW is not proven nor is it truely even rational. (It is still politically driven just as when it started)
2. CO2 is not a pollutant no matter what some political environmental court may tell us.
3. Al Gore’s move has been repremanded by a British court as too be exagerated (extremist) yet it is force feed to our kids. (How is that for harm?)
4. Environmental extremism has caused us to not only fall behind in our need for energy independence, but it is has helped to line the pockets of other extremist groups.
5. Many third world countries have millions of children dieing because they are not afforded the same opportunities that these extremist environmentalist themselves enjoy such running water and electricity.
Don’t be fooled. Todays environmentalist are not only wrong, they are dangerous…
I followed that 5-stages link. How very condescending!
“I probably should have added “the population bomb” of the 70’s/80’s to the list. Remember that one?”
Gosh, yes. Paul Ehrlich, 1968. They sold it in my middle school cafeteria.
Too Many People
Too Little Food
A Dying Planet
. . .
Writing Letters
Organizing Action Groups
Positive Reinforcement
Proselytizing Friends and Associates
What if I’m Wrong (2 pages, refs. Pascal’s Wager. Sheesh!)
Yes. I remember that one.
messagero, all these scientists seemed a hundred percent sure. “Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible.” Lord Kelvin was often wrong, a victim of the limit understand available to him, and yet he always seemed so sure. Would you interpret that statement as something other than 100% certainty? And what about the “scientists” who are 90% sure that there is catastrophic man-made global warming, when It seems to be quite easy to show that you can’t be sure how much it has warmed already? Anthony understands science perfectly well. He understands that science self corrects, and he is attempting to be part of what could prove to be a major self correction. Someday, even his enemies will admit that Anthony raised good points, and that they would have been better to accept them and work from them, rather than act as though they don’t matter.
My take on this is simple: we’ll never know for sure whether human activities are at the root of climate change, nor settle whether disastrous change is at hand. By the time we do know, it would be too late to stop it. Therefore, the smart thing to do is to start modifying our activities and try to reduce our impact “just in case” it turns out that what we are hearing is true.
I just wish that people would stop being so dogmatic about it. Implying that people who disagree are ignorant or even stupid. Name-calling. Trying to stampede gullible youngsters into panicked reactions. Sounds just like a bunch of politicians. Can we at least agree to treat one another with respect?
Anthony wrote:
“So the next time you hear about worldwide crop failure, rising sea levels, species extinction, or “climate grief” you might want to remember that just being an expert, or even having a consensus of experts, doesn’t necessarily mean that a claim is true.”
Sure, but nearly all your examples- with the exception perhaps of the stomach ulcers and the fixity of the earth’s crust- are of individual scientists giving their private opinions, and not representative of the scientific consensus as a whole. One of them- the Duesberg HIV quote- was given by a crackpot who to this day thinks that HIV doesn’t cause AIDS.
REPLY: Ok, fair enough, I could just as easily modify the list to include these:
“The ‘sound barrier’ can’t be broken”
Eugenics – nuff said
The Population Bomb
Mutated frogs – “a sign of our polluted environment – the indicator of trouble” turned out to be a parasite called Ribeiroia
This article in Scientific American says it pretty well. The science went nutty at first, mostly driven by environmental fear, then it “self corrected”.
Ah, the precautionary principle! Trouble is, you assume that the benefits (avoided consequences) out weigh the costs (expense of doing something about it). Do they? I don’t know. But their are costs. And hypothetically, if we are to do anything meaningful, we must screw over developing countries. But I will agree to respect yours any other’s opinions, never fear. I am not trying to be dogmatic.
Roads:
(You, too Cdr. Stan, SIR!)
Ice loss (from NASA)
“Nghiem said the rapid decline in winter perennial ice the past two years was caused by unusual winds. “Unusual atmospheric conditions set up wind patterns that compressed the sea ice, loaded it into the Transpolar Drift Stream and then sped its flow out of the Arctic,” he said. When that sea ice reached lower latitudes, it rapidly melted in the warmer waters. ”
http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/lookingatearth/quikscat-20071001.html
Occams Edge: Doc Ock no longer applies when you make the observations and, dang! Is IS zebras! Whoda thunk?
Same goes for the surface station measurements. It seemed like a regular mustang stampede–until the Rev, here (Mr. Watts, thus proudly christened–by his detractors) got the bright idea actually to observe the stations.
What did he see (and photograph)? A Zambia of zebras! Dang! Not isloated cherry-picks but over 6 out of 7 with 1-degree C+ warming violations, with over 2 out of 3 with 2-degree C+ warming violations, and 1 in 7 with 5-degree [sic] C+ warming violations!
Srike two for Doc Ock!
I do not “disbelieve science”. Science IS my religion (I have no other).
Science is self-correcting provided its methods are adhered to. Science consists of the continual testing of theories and continual changing of theories based on repeatable, falsifiable observations and experimentation.
” I can see from the above comments that it has people thinking and talking, and that’s the only way science will ever get it right. Science is not about having all the answers at the beginning – science is (as one commenter noted above) about applying the scientific method. ”
Right on!
I may disagree with your conclusions, but scientific method is the Tao. Ain’t no other “way” that’s gonna help us.
“2007: Second warmest year on record. Get over it bozo.”
Not so fast, Mr. Green Jeans. You will no doubt recall that in Jan. 2007, 2006 was “the second warmest year ever”. Until it wasn’t.
Debate ON.
“Lights=0”, OUT!
As I see it with all the problems due to measurement, modeling, and verification, it (AGW) sums up to this:
Garbage In, Gospel Out
Cheers