Reprinted here by request from Harold Ambler – Anthony
What follows is an open letter to the Salon writer Peter Dizikes, who recently published an article about a new book by NASA scientist Gavin Schmidt on climate change.
The water level of Lake Powell, like that of all reservoirs in the American West, has fluctuated since the day it was dammed.
Dear Mr. Dizikes:
I recently saw your overview of Gavin Schmidt’s new book as well as your interview with him on Salon.
I was surprised to see that you consider the effects of manmade global warming to be “oddly invisible.” Having studied the subject for a couple of years now, while performing my own research, it has been my observation that newspapers, magazines, and television news sources show images of supposed manmade climate change on a daily basis. Such images include: floods, polar bears, glacial calving, etc. If anything, images of global warming might be said to saturate western media.
As with so many other products generated by the AGW industry, Schmidt’s book Climate Change: Picturing the Science is part of an ongoing effort to frighten the credulous. Its messages include: weather will kill you, our moment on Earth is unique, climate did not used to change.
Had you wanted to fulfill the responsibilities of an objective and hard-hitting journalist, you might have asked Schmidt about the image of Lake Powell on his book’s cover book. Now, of course, we are all told never to judge a book by its cover – but this is a visual book that demands to be judged on visual terms. There are a lot of people, unfortunately, who don’t know enough about the facts to perform this kind of analysis themselves. Failing to do so for them is a pity.
Were you aware, may I ask, of the controversial nature of the damming of the Colorado River that led to Lake Powell? Environmentalists were and are appalled by this particular dam. It has changed an important piece of the American natural landscape. But, like all manmade dams on Earth, it has changing water levels. Dammed lakes in the American west are particularly prone to fluctuating water levels, within single years, year to year, and on the decadal level. Water use varies as well, although it can be counted on to slowly increase. Using an image of lowered water level on Lake Powell, which is a reservoir, sitting in a desert, to indicate anything about climate change is perverse. I would even go to far as to call it anti-science.
The assumption that industrial production of co2 has altered precipitation patterns is exactly that, an assumption. Further, what you are going to find, in the next decade, is that global temperatures are going to remain flat (as they have since 1998) and/or start to decline. What you are also going to find is that science writers in the American media establishment are going to peel off, one by one, from the AGW heterodoxy.
Group-think has affected many societies negatively, and it has not disappeared during our own time. The fact that neither Mr. Schmidt’s editor, nor his publisher, nor you, nor the photographer, nor Mr. Schmidt himself would stop to reflect on the oddity of this cover is enough to give one pause.
Sincerely yours,
Harold Ambler
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The answer to the question in this thread’s title is probably “Yes”. I can’t be certain because I haven’t seen the book, though I visited the website in an attempt to check it out.
What predisposes me to believe that it is anti-science is the observation that, in the mountains of alarmist imagery and verbiage, there is never any good that can come of climate change; it is always catastrophic and especially so for the oppressed and exploited peoples of the Earth.
Even if you know nothing of “The Science”, this is a highly improbable scenario, as we know.
The question that intrigues me is the degree to which the authors of this stuff believe their own hyperbole and to what extent it is a conscious decision to manipulate their audience’s emotional response; I believe certain space scientists are on record as saying, to paraphrase, “it takes manure to grow a garden”.
Doesn’t anyone in the climate community read the book “Reconstructing Large-scale Climate Patterns from Tree-Ring Data” by Harold Fritts? It’s from the University of Arizona Press, published in 1991. There are some great charts in there going back to 1600. I read it years ago, but as I remember, the latter part of the twentieth century looked like a real departure from normal. The recent drought years are far from abnormal, from what I remember.
A great response to this piece of Schmidt !
Are the cliffs in that picture of Lake Powell limestone? If so, maybe the implication we should take from the picture is that any CO2 that makes it into the atmosphere is predisposed to be sequestered as carbonate rock. Once it gets locked up as limestone it’s there until it weathers out. Judging by the amount of limestone we see in the world around us, it’s fair to conclude that any CO2 that happens to make it into the atmosphere is strongly inclined to be removed – permanently.
There’s a reason there is so little CO2 in the atmosphere. The biological world is starving for more. The faster we put CO2 into the atmosphere the faster it gets gobbled up. It looks to me like the picture of the cliffs at Lake Powell is a picture of thousands upon thousands of layered years in which CO2 has been continually and inexorably pulled out of the atmosphere.
Oliver Ramsay,
“The question that intrigues me is the degree to which the authors of this stuff believe their own hyperbole and to what extent it is a conscious decision to manipulate their audience’s emotional response;”
I wouldn’t rule out coercion of the authors at this point, either.
But that’s just me speculating.
Andrew
Highlander (12:53:47) :
Anthony,
You’re gonna love this!
The following was from 1997 — in the case you may have missed it:
http://www.lubbockonline.com/news/092897/study.htm
No one ever claimed the Lubbock AJ was a paragon of journalistic wonderment. Of course, where is there good journalism these days? Oh yeah, on the blogosphere, where good people like Anthony, Michelle Malkin and the like have taken up the mantle. Long time lurker, seldom poster due to inability to add much to the conversation. Great site, great commenters, keep up the work!
@ur momisugly Barry Foster
But more than that, he constantly allows “Deniers” with all its connotations as acceptable. I drew the conclusion that realclimate is an odd place, with odd perceptions, and run by an odd person.
RealClimate censors posts it will accept only a certain amount of contrary opinions and generally when Dr Schmidt and the others can pitch in. It also seems to be engaged in mutual masturbation?
It advertises itself as part of The Guardian Environment network yet at least the Guardian refrains from crass censorship.
The front cover of Dr Schmidt’s book is only relevant in so far as these so called scientists will do anything to gain publicity for ideas that are so bereft of value that if their ideas were not affecting our lives they would be ignored.
Hmmm ……
Climate Science for Dummies – An Illustrated Guide
You too can be fashionably chic without knowing a thing about mathematics or science or mental discipline.
This is from memory…But i think the majority of those rocks are sandstones and shale. I don’t think the Kaibab or Redwall Limestones are exposed there.
I think there are some great outcrops of the Navajo Sandstone it the Glen Canyon area…The Navajo Sandstone (Upper Glen Canyon group) is an aeolian sandstone; it was deposited in a vast Jurassic desert in massive sand dunes.
So…Dr. Schmidt must be right…“climate did not used to change”…Since there was a desert sitting there back in the Jurassic…And there’s still a desert sitting there…;-))
The most odd thing about climate change is that all the “sceptical experts” seem to lack any evidence of expertise. Anyone want to provide a list of papers and climate training undertaken by Ambler?
If I was Gavin I would have put a dead tree on the cover – http://www.pnas.org/content/106/17/7063.full
Is the book peer-reviewed?
Reply: As a repeating theme, that’s kinda funny. ~ charles the moderator
I know this is off topic, just thought WUWT readers might find this interesting……………..
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/sciencenews/5438844/Scientists-faking-results-and-omitting-unwanted-findings-in-research.html
The alarmists have often resorted to visual hyperbole. Here is one of my favorites:
http://climatesanity.wordpress.com/2007/10/01/warmer-oceans-stronger-hurricanes-trenberth-scientific-american-july-2007/
the links did not work on my previous comment.
Best Regards,
ClimateSanity
dhogaza (11:18:42) :
What were the very low levels in the 60s due to?
This all reminds me of the twisting and turning regarding Great Lakes water levels. Haven’t heard too much about those lately, have we?
BTW, non-peer-reviewed is OK as long as it’s “authoritative”?
But then again Adam from Kansas the OZ BOM is going along with El Nino:
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/
But not a forgone conclusion I believe.
Excellent letter. Excellent. Good job Harold!
Dead on. Completely encapsulates the media perspective (or lack thereof)….
dhogaza (11:18:42) :
You are not that stupid, [snip] nor are most of us here. Get some integrity.
dhogaza (11:15:56) :
We’ll have to take word for it as most of us stopped reading picture books a looong time ago. I’m still recovering from seeing Ben Santers attempt at a Nobel prize wining documentary.
“Further, what you are going to find, in the next decade, is that global temperatures are going to remain flat (as they have since 1998) and/or start to decline. What you are also going to find is that science writers in the American media establishment are going to peel off, one by one, from the AGW heterodoxy.”
I’m bothered by this, not only because it’s likely that the reader will dismiss the email after reading that part. But also because you are not differentiating yourself too much from the people you are indicting. Climate alarmism is based off of poor assumptions; what are your statements above based upon? Probably something very similar.
Good letter – heartily support the comments re: journalism.
dhogaza (11:18:42) : as others have noted that article does not have enough information to support your claim of its “authority”. Where are the graphs to present day of inflow and outflow? From elsewhere I recall graphs showing major rises in water consumption and I think this year was above average for snowfall which becomes inflow to the system.
This book, Climate Change-Picturing the Science could be followed up with a second book by anagrmming the title of the first book,
Anti-Science, The Peer-Clutching Magic
Frank K. (12:04:08) :
“Ah yes. The book. Schmidt uses his time at GISS to write coffee-table books, and even gets the government to advertise them:”
I looked at it on google books review. Schmidt has not written the book whatsoever. He coauthored only a short introduction and contributed one essay of 20 pages on prognosis of future climate. All book consists of essays of various people on various topics, often having little to do with climate science, including Oreske’s comical essay on so called “consensus of climate scientists”. Book is a joke. I hoped to see Schmidt’s book, and to see his arguments, but this is huge disappointment. Usual, uninformed fear-mongering with wild exaggerations, theoretical assumptions not supported with anything except guessing and pure propaganda.
Compare that pathetic level of scientific rigour with say Michaels’s or Spencer’s popular books on climate change and you shall see why nobody believes alarmists anymore.
In response to some of the comments above:
The extended release from Lake Powell in 2008 lowered the lake about 3 feet.
Looking at the input and output chart at:
http://lakepowell.water-data.com/index2.php
It seems that above average inputs occur during El Nino years and lower than average inputs occur during La Nina years. It also looks like they try to release a little over 10,000 feet per second regardless of Lake level. Since all the water goes through the turbines the electrical generation is fairly constant and so the claim that the lake has been lowered to accommodate California’s energy problem, looks doubtful.
The average electrical energy generated is between 400 and 500 megawatts. About the same as Hoover Dam, downstream.
Inflows have been increasing since 2003 and the lake has been rising since 2005.
The very low levels in the 1960s were due to the fact that the dam had been completed in 1962 or 1963 and it took about 20 years to completely fill. See the linked chart above.
If La Nina’s predominate over the coming years, as some predict, then it looks like Lake Powell will recede once again.
Richard Hanson
MartinGAtkins (15:40:34) :
That video was very painful.
I’m so glad, when the plane states were
black with buffalo, we wiped them out
before they destroyed the Earth with “The
Power of Poop.”