This article from the Sydney Morning herald came with the message from Bruce saying: “a brick through the AGW window in Australia”. After reading it, and seeing that it is based on a book Heaven and Earth soon to be released by prominent Australian geologist Dr. Ian Plimer, I’ll have to agree. But as usually happens, he’ll probably be labeled a “denier” or an “advocate” as Gavin calls them, and ignored. Still, it is worth reading, since the journalist that has written it seems to question his own past writings. – Anthony
Beware the climate of conformity
Paul Sheehan Sydney Morning Herald
April 13, 2009
What I am about to write questions much of what I have written in this space, in numerous columns, over the past five years. Perhaps what I have written can withstand this questioning. Perhaps not. The greater question is, am I – and you – capable of questioning our own orthodoxies and intellectual habits? Let’s see.
The subject of this column is not small. It is a book entitled Heaven And Earth, which will be published tomorrow. It has been written by one of Australia’s foremost Earth scientists, Professor Ian Plimer. He is a confronting sort of individual, polite but gruff, courteous but combative. He can write extremely well, and Heaven And Earth is a brilliantly argued book by someone not intimidated by hostile majorities or intellectual fashions.
The book’s 500 pages and 230,000 words and 2311 footnotes are the product of 40 years’ research and a depth and breadth of scholarship. As Plimer writes: “An understanding of climate requires an amalgamation of astronomy, solar physics, geology, geochronology, geochemistry, sedimentology, tectonics, palaeontology, palaeoecology, glaciology, climatology, meteorology, oceanography, ecology, archaeology and history.”
The most important point to remember about Plimer is that he is Australia’s most eminent geologist. As such, he thinks about time very differently from most of us. He takes the long, long view. He looks at climate over geological, archaeological, historical and modern time. He writes: “Past climate changes, sea-level changes and catastrophes are written in stone.”
Much of what we have read about climate change, he argues, is rubbish, especially the computer modelling on which much current scientific opinion is based, which he describes as “primitive”. Errors and distortions in computer modelling will be exposed in time. (As if on cue, the United Nations’ peak scientific body on climate change was obliged to make an embarrassing admission last week that some of its computers models were wrong.)
Plimer does not dispute the dramatic flux of climate change – and this column is not about Australia’s water debate – but he fundamentally disputes most of the assumptions and projections being made about the current causes, mostly led by atmospheric scientists, who have a different perspective on time. “It is little wonder that catastrophist views of the future of the planet fall on fertile pastures. The history of time shows us that depopulation, social disruption, extinctions, disease and catastrophic droughts take place in cold times … and life blossoms and economies boom in warm times. Planet Earth is dynamic. It always changes and evolves. It is currently in an ice age.”
If we look at the last 6 million years, the Earth was warmer than it is now for 3 million years. The ice caps of the Arctic, Antarctica and Greenland are geologically unusual. Polar ice has only been present for less than 20 per cent of geological time. What follows is an intense compression of the book’s 500 pages and all their provocative arguments and conclusions:
Is dangerous warming occurring? No.
Is the temperature range observed in the 20th century outside the range of normal variability? No.
The Earth’s climate is driven by the receipt and redistribution of solar energy. Despite this crucial relationship, the sun tends to be brushed aside as the most important driver of climate. Calculations on supercomputers are primitive compared with the complex dynamism of the Earth’s climate and ignore the crucial relationship between climate and solar energy.
“To reduce modern climate change to one variable, CO2, or a small proportion of one variable – human-induced CO2 – is not science. To try to predict the future based on just one variable (CO2) in extraordinarily complex natural systems is folly. Yet when astronomers have the temerity to show that climate is driven by solar activities rather than CO2 emissions, they are dismissed as dinosaurs undertaking the methods of old-fashioned science.”
Over time, the history of CO2 content in the atmosphere has been far higher than at present for most of time. Atmospheric CO2 follows temperature rise. It does not create a temperature rise. CO2 is not a pollutant. Global warming and a high CO2 content bring prosperity and longer life.
The hypothesis that human activity can create global warming is extraordinary because it is contrary to validated knowledge from solar physics, astronomy, history, archaeology and geology. “But evidence no longer matters. And any contrary work published in peer-reviewed journals is just ignored. We are told that the science on human-induced global warming is settled. Yet the claim by some scientists that the threat of human-induced global warming is 90 per cent certain (or even 99 per cent) is a figure of speech. It has no mathematical or evidential basis.”
Observations in nature differ markedly from the results generated by nearly two dozen computer-generated climate models. These climate models exaggerate the effects of human CO2 emissions into the atmosphere because few of the natural variables are considered. Natural systems are far more complex than computer models.
The setting up by the UN of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 1988 gave an opportunity to make global warming the main theme of environmental groups. “The IPCC process is related to environmental activism, politics and opportunism. It is unrelated to science. Current zeal around human-induced climate change is comparable to the certainty professed by Creationists or religious fundamentalists.”
Ian Plimer is not some isolated gadfly. He is a prize-winning scientist and professor. The back cover of Heaven And Earth carries a glowing endorsement from the President of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Klaus, who now holds the rotating presidency of the European Union. Numerous rigorous scientists have joined Plimer in dissenting from the prevailing orthodoxy.
Heaven And Earth is an evidence-based attack on conformity and orthodoxy, including my own, and a reminder to respect informed dissent and beware of ideology subverting evidence.
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Just Want Truth… (16:33:20) :
This man is yet more prestigious name in science that is speaking up!
Clearly the tide is turning in the scientific world. It’s turning slow as the Queen Mary, but it’s turning. And all the yelling from the environmentalists and politicians can’t stop it.
BYW, has there been any converts to the alarmists side? I haven’t heard of any names in a long time who have changed over to the alarmists side.
There is David Attenborough, does he count? He’s more media than science though. It is interesting for someone to claim to be skeptical of AGW at one point to become a patron of the Optimum Population Trust.
“I was sceptical about climate change. I was cautious about crying wolf. I am always cautious about crying wolf. I think conservationists have to be careful in saying things are catastrophic when, in fact, they are less than catastrophic.”
http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0524-24.htm
” The broadcaster Sir David Attenborough has become a patron of a group seeking to cut the growth in human population.
On joining the Optimum Population Trust, Sir David said growth in human numbers was “frightening”.
Sir David has been increasingly vocal about the need to reduce the number of people on Earth to protect wildlife.
The Trust, which accuses governments and green groups of observing a taboo on the topic, say they are delighted to have Sir David as a patron.
Fraught area
Sir David, one of the BBC’s longest-standing presenters, has been making documentaries on the natural world and conservation for more than half a century.
In a statement issued by the Optimum Population Trust he is quoted as saying: “I’ve never seen a problem that wouldn’t be easier to solve with fewer people, or harder, and ultimately impossible, with more.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7996230.stm
That last statement is a beauty.
Steve Schapel (16:45:05) :
You know what’s the best thing about this? It’s that Paul Sheehan has demonstrated himself to be a man of quality and a man of integrity. He has
provided an example of how to handle being provided with information that does not support his beliefs. This is unlike so many AGW alarmists who, presented with increasing evidence over recent years that CO2 is not a significant factor in dangerous climate change, have responded with increasing irrationality. It is tremendously heartening to see someone being willing to open their minds to another point of view, and report it so clearly and professionally.
Steve, agree %100. Mr Sheehan has allowed an honest scepticism to overlay earlier thoughts. Yes, he may be proven to be wrong with his re-considerations, but he has been honest and that is laudable and very, very brave.
Mr S. you may have been premature with your doubts but you are one sound bloke!
If the question of Climate change had been about the science. Then the Hypothesis of Anthropogenic Global Warming would have been wrapped up and falsified over a decade ago…… However, AGW has nothing to do with Science….. AGW is purely a vehicle for a political ideology involving strange ideas of Environmentalism and Socialism.
The fact that AGW has become so entrenched is a sign that our Bureaucracy is out of control and serves itself, rather than the citizens that bureaucracy is meant to serve…..
I think it is serious. I look at the example of a man like Al Gore…. and I shudder.
There is a rising aristocracy of elites who think of themselves as the Vanguard of a new enlightenment….. They are dangerous.
History shows similar examples, some very recent. Lenin, Stalin, Mussolini, Hitler, Pol Pot, Mao Tse Tung…… will Al Gore, Barack Obama, Kevin Rudd, be the next names in infamy? Will tens of millions die because of their policies? Will hundreds of millions be oppressed, Just like the Ukrainian farmers in Stalin’s collectivisation of the 30′ or the Chinese millions in the Great Leap Forward?
Time will tell. However, as a reminder. In Australia recently, we had nearly 200 people burn to death because of land clearing laws that prohibited them from making their farms, houses and towns bushfire resistant. The old rural practices where discouraged and the farmers replaced with ecotourism and unknowing greenies living among the trees…… Who burned to death because of ideology.
I am heartened by people like Dr Ian Plimer. They are a bulwark against this flood of ignorance and deception.
This looks like the turning point for the Australians love for AGW. BTW will anyone pursue Steiger’s Nature paper for withdrawal or recant LOL?
Although the author makes it sound like Prof. Plimer is unique among geoscientists, he’s not, In fact, as a geoscientist, I don’t know of a single geoscientist that wouldn’t basically concur with Plimer & for the same reasons. We are taught the long perspective from day 1 & climate processes & geologic processes (especially tectonic & sedimentalogical processes) are absolutely intertwined. Our ability to be successful in our profession demands that we understand these relationships. What is most bewildering to most of us is that this is even an issue – that anyone would think one variable (GHGs) controls the whole climate system really just leaves a geoscientist speechless.
Re: idlex (15:34:44) :
That’s a rather graceful way for someone to concede they might have been wrong in the past. I somehow or other think that rather a lot of people will be looking for similar words very soon.
I think it would be helpful to write up some procedure, to give our green friends the language to concede the reality about the AGW movement in as painless a way possible.
We could all do without rubbing their noses in the boo boo.
Chad,
Hansen has made it clear that CO2 is the driving factor of AGW.
Dissembling by asserting the IPCC is not saying that is simply not realistic.
Neither the IPCC or Hansen are pushing for radical changes in land use to achieve their goal of managing the climate. They are seeking to control CO2 emitted by human enterprises.
A better defense of Hansen and the IPCC would be to explain away the tremendous failure their models have experienced irt heat content of the largest part of the Earth- its oceans.
O/T – Just wanted to point out that at nearly 12 million hits, Anthony and his wonderful team have not only thrown the biggest brick through the AGW window, they are demolishing the house. It is coming down around their ears, folks.
Steve Schapel (16:45:05) :
You know what’s the best thing about this? It’s that Paul Sheehan has demonstrated himself to be a man of quality and a man of integrity. He has
provided an example of how to handle being provided with information that does not support his beliefs. This is unlike so many AGW alarmists who, presented with increasing evidence over recent years that CO2 is not a significant factor in dangerous climate change, have responded with increasing irrationality. It is tremendously heartening to see someone being willing to open their minds to another point of view, and report it so clearly and professionally.
Steve – It’s a question of methodology. As Follows…
[1] The Rational person uses “Evidence Based Reasoning” – When the evidence changes, the reasoned position will also shift in accordance to the evidence. In this method, Evidence is the primary source an imput into the reasoning process. Validating the evidence is a core activity to ensure that the reasoning process has something substantive to work with.
[2] The Irrational person uses “Belief based Reasoning” – This process puts the cart before the horse and only searches for “evidence” to confirm the belief system. Contrary evidence will be ignored, devalued or actively hidden, or destroyed.
Hence, the AGW Alarmists become more irrational as the evidence mounts that there core beliefs are not comming true. They have to spend increasing amounts of energy and time, ignoring, devaluing, hiding and (when they can) destroying the contrary evidence.
The massive snowfalls of the last NH winter has done much to dent the spell of the AGW Alarmists. So much snow when the world is meant to be warming is too hard to deny.
Papertiger – agreed.
No one wins from making it harder for people to come to an honest assessment of the evidence for/against AGW.
One comment:“Atmospheric CO2 follows temperature rise. It does not create a temperature rise.” “This is classic school-boy error. Please direct him to Lindzen and Roy Spencer who will correct him.”
My thought: No need to go to Lindzen and Spencer, just check out your bottle of pop. Put it in the frig and CO2 stays in there. Put it in the oven and you have an explosion! Just simple science.
“Central characteristics of a scientific attitude are scepticism and a preparedness to revise one’s own views when they are shown to be mistaken. Science requires liberty; it cannot march to a non-scientific agenda, whether political or theological, without soon going wrong.”
(Grayling, A.C. 2007, Towards the Light. London: Bloomsbury)
“I’ve never seen a problem that wouldn’t be easier to solve with fewer people, or harder, and ultimately impossible, with more.”
What about the problem of Fascist aggression in WWII?
I’ll will be ordering a copy of the book through my local bookstore. I was very pleased that they keep copies of “The Chilling Stars” mixed in with all the global warming books.
(Although, I will check to see if its available here at the weather shop on the sidebar first. : )
Lets face it, on a geological timescales nothing that we are likely to experience is all that extraordinary. Extinctions of most of life on Earth have occurred before, including events where 90% of all species disappeared. Even the extinction of the human race, or all mammals would not be particularly special or lamentable, give a perspective employing geological timescales.
Yep, as a geoscientist myself with graduate courses in atmospheric physics I can’t believe that any intelligent scientifically trained person would swallow the AGW malarky. When I was taught all this stuff, I was also taught a good deal of humility – there is an a awful lot we still don’t know or understand.
Those who play with their PC joysticks and make dire predictions are very likely deluding themselves and everyone else; creating amass hysteria when there is no basis for the confident “end of the world” predictions being rolled out.
Mike Bryant (18:23:23) :
“I’ve never seen a problem that wouldn’t be easier to solve with fewer people, or harder, and ultimately impossible, with more.”
What about the problem of Fascist aggression in WWII?
I’m gob-smacked, – what an excellent refutation.
BYW, has there been any converts to the alarmists side? I haven’t heard of any names in a long time who have changed over to the alarmists side.
No, the public has by and large had it’s fill of being told they are going to broil & drown when in fact they are feeling the increasing effects of Deep Solar Minimum. The cold turns out to be cumulative in thier memory.
Give it another year. You won’t be hearing too much about eco groups attacking power stations, you’ll be hearing about angry mobs wanting to get thier hands on the alarmists.
The stone-cold quiet of today’s sun will in 1 years time result in an even icier winter.
“Lets face it, on a geological timescales nothing that we are likely to experience is all that extraordinary. Extinctions of most of life on Earth have occurred before, including events where 90% of all species disappeared. Even the extinction of the human race, or all mammals would not be particularly special or lamentable, give a perspective employing geological timescales.”
Well I’ve been watching the Discovery Channel and other cable channels so I now realize that there are many many things out there that can kill us all alot quicker than AGW, like killer asteroids, tornadoes, hurricanes, firestorms, lightning, meteors, comets, tsunamis, falling spacejunk, China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Jihadists, pirates, giant volcanoes, rabid dogs, bats and rabbits, bigfoot, chupacabras, ice-slinging windmills, soot, aerosols, sharks, supernovas, killer bees, stingrays, plastic bottles, bags and other packaging, our drinking water and the pitbull next door. This is only a very preliminary list.
After carefully considering these threats it seems that there is only one sane response… PARTY TIME!!!
Thanks Graeme, but the question is a laydown. Think about a few problems like raking the leaves out of the backyard for instance. I can’t think of any large problems that do not diminish with the addition of willing workers.
He means this error:
http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=204
Mr. Hansen, there is something on your face. Have you been eating eggs?
O/T Not that anyone is interested but the weather in the State of Washington is running true to form with the expectations given a cold PDO. It is not pleasant but it is interesting with low temps, rain, hail, snow, and sunny with clouds. If you don’t like the weather you are getting – wait five minutes.
Re Graeme Rodaughan (15:38:02) :
“…Love those comments above pointing out the similarities between the AGW Movement and fundamentalist religious belief (of any persuasion), and the appeal to evidence over conformity to Orthodoxy…”
Moderators – I think a response to the stereotype that is alluded to here should be allowed as it is often repeated on this site and probably disappoints some of your otherwise ardent supporters.
The stereotype that I refer to is that the overall thought process of a religious fundamentalist and a global warming alarmist are similar. It then follows from this arguement that either AGW alarmists are just like religious kooks (fundamentalist is being deliberately defined in a negative sense above) and can be discounted/discredited, or that those with fundamentalist religious beliefs are unable/unwilling to embrace science and the scientific method and are just like AGW alarmist kooks and can also be discounted/discredited. If this isn’t an ad hominem attack I don’t know what is.
Fundamentalism has many definitions and subtle differences within philosophical/theological thought. I would consider myself an Evangelical Christian of the low church tradition (Anglican), however depending on the standpoint of the viewer, it would not be surprising to me to find they considered me a fundamentalist.
This however does not stop me from understanding the misrepresentation and ideology that is AGW. I will suggest that the majority of Christians I have contact with on a personal level are not convinced by the theory of AGW but would say they have reasonable doubts as to mankind’s role and impact in climate change as set forth by the IPCC.
It is simply wrong to say or imply that a belief in a set of basic religious principles disqualifies me or others from the ability to embrace, understand or discuss the scientific method and specifically its abuse in the promotion of the theory of AGW.
Kind Regards
Michael
Everyone I speak to knows that AGW is a crock of snip, and yet the drumbeat from the researchers feeding at the public trough continues.
Recent headlines from Physorg.com.
Biosphere 2 experiment shows how fast heat could kill drought-stressed trees
Experts say cap and trade not enough
Faced with global warming, can wilderness remain natural?
Obama looking at cooling air to fight warming
Climate change to spur rapid shifts in wildfire hotspots
Ma and Pa solutions to global warming
Warming brings more birds north in winter
Desert damage: the dark side of solar power?
All of these articles since April 8th…
Stop already, the people of the world are onto you…
I agree with Michael about the comparison of warmists to religionists. Ninety percent of the American people believe in God, and I think it would be wrong to alienate those people. The science stands by itself without denigrating those who believe in a supreme being. These comparisons ultimately hurt the cause of science and freedom.