Related to our story on the US Chamber of Commerce challenging the EPA on CO2, we asked this question:
Do you support the idea of putting “global warming” on trial with the EPA?
After getting over 2200 responses over two days, I’ve closed the poll. Here are the results:
D. King (14:39:59) :
“What if we lose?”
Public EPA hearings are just the start. Chances are that the EPA will dodge the request and the court cases will begin. Eventually this will probably work its way to the Supreme Court. Taking the long view of things, we can’t lose, the facts are on our side. It is just a matter of time before the truth becomes widely evident. The Chamber’s efforts will likely contribute towards this goal.
Dr A Burns (14:19:02) : There is no doubt that AGW is a blatant scam. What is most interesting, is why has this nonsense been promoted so strongly ?…
REPLY: It is not a “blatant scam” as there is full truth to the fact that CO2 does cause a warming effect. However the magnitude and cause/effects looks to be overhyped and oversold. – Anthony
I’ve often wondered about the extraordinary combination of events that caused climate science to become so badly derailed: (a) 30 years’ warming just as folk were beginning to think global resources and sustainability, and the energy of scientifically-illiterate dictatorship started to surface through the UN; (b) the rise in atmospheric CO2, possibly largely due to the slow warming oceans’ recovery from the Little Ice Age, just as computer-wargames-fixated myopic nerds appeared who were blind to the effervescent power of warming oceans and the evidence of history and archaeology; (c) the rise in our emissions of CO2 – which could be entirely coincidental; (d) the known facts of CO2 as a GHG, alongside ignorance of how CO2 actually behaves in our atmosphere and what feedbacks it triggers, if any.
Now here’s a real bit of light fun, very OT, but I feel it uses the same kind of discernment of multiple factors that belongs to real real climate science: I would expect realclimatescientists to be fooled a lot longer than WUWT readers.
“It is not a “blatant scam” as there is full truth to the fact that CO2 does cause a warming effect. However the magnitude and cause/effects looks to be overhyped and oversold. – Anthony”
…and we need to understand natural factors a LOT better …and my impression is that, due to iron-fisted conventions, that could take decades ….or even centuries since the iron-fisted conventions are so deeply-ingrained.
We can’t certainly wait for the peer review process to get to the bottom of this. A public trial of the science might activate the process, however, not that long ago in humanity’s history, science has been put to trial and the judges (Chruch!) ignored the real science to protect their agenda. Gallilleo was condemned and we all know today that he was right.
The Church of Gore will make sure that History will repeat itself and condemn a whole bunch a good scientists in the process.
I’m all for this trial IF our side can get access to code and data from their side as well as time to go through it.
And speaking of being censored, the last 3 or 4 posts I posted at climateprogress were deleted.
Lucy Skywalker (15:33:22
Now here’s a real bit of light fun, very OT, but I feel it uses the same kind of discernment of multiple factors that belongs to real real climate science: I would expect realclimatescientists to be fooled a lot longer than WUWT readers.
That one is pretty easy, but then, there are four nines in my birth date, so I’m quite familiar with the interesting numerical properties of the magic nine.
REPLY: It is not a “blatant scam” as there is full truth to the fact that CO2 does cause a warming effect. However the magnitude and cause/effects looks to be overhyped and oversold. – Anthony
The best and most “blatant scams” often have some elements of truth in them.
Example: WWII British fighter pilots ate lots of carrots to help them see in the dark. Of course, carrots are good for you as they contain Vitamin A and it will probably have some small benefit to your eyesight (the grain of truth). However RADAR is what allowed the allies to spot german aircraft at night.
Nevetheless, reportedly some people believed the scam and indeed ate lots of carrots (not that anyone will admit to this embarasssing scenario)
If the AGW scam goes the way of most scams then Gore, the BBC, David Suzuki, IPCC and a whole load of their disciples may end up eating humble pie (not that any of them will admit to it).
As the late Reid Bryson, often referred to as the ‘father of climatology’, stated::
“Global Warming is Cheesy Science”
“And how much [heat] is absorbed by carbon dioxide? Eight hundredths of one percent. One one-thousandth as important as water vapor. You can go outside and spit and have the same effect as doubling carbon dioxide.”
What does that describe if not a scam?
I’m thinking of renting my church building for just such a “AWG on Trial” exercise. I go to a congregational church and we have a policy of renting the facility out for “Town Hall” type meetings (part of the New England/Congregational heritage.)
I’m debating…January 15th or January 22?
Dr. Joe
Minneapolis
Minnesota
REPLY: Dr. Joe, consider giving a movie premier instead:
http://noteviljustwrong.com/make-history/host-your-own-premiere
– Anthony
As Solzhenitsyn wrote: “When in history something Soviet withstood against full information?”
The same is valid for AGW.
Lucy Skywalker:
Lucy, given the presence of water in all 3 phases in the atmosphere, oceans and ice caps, convection etc I’m with you.
Co2 is an infrared absorbing gas in a few bands. It is utterly critical to life on this planet that it be present in the atmosphere over a wide band of concentrations.
With all the other possible confounding factors in the Earth atmospher/ocean/surface system, vastly complicated and buffered by biology I think that’s all that can be said. What real effect it may have on the vague and artificial notion of “global average surface temperature” has not been demonstrated at all, let alone the effect of any increase due to human activity.
A veritable mountain has been made out of a molehill.
In light of several of the comments above, I’m reposting a comment I made at the tail end of the prior thread on this topic:
Cases involving legal decisions about matters of science are routine. (E.g., about dangers of various medicines, the validity of patents, etc.) Saying that science shouldn’t be decided by the courts is a non-starter–they’re already involved. Eliminating the courts would not eliminate non-scientific rulings on the topic, it would just shift non-scientific decision-making by default to the legislature and/or the executive agencies. And they make their decisions based on testimony given to them, similar to what goes on in a trial.
Second, a legal decision would not foreclose scientific research and publication on the topic. IOW, the judiciary wouldn’t be intruding into science or shutting it up. There’s no analogy to the Galileo situation.
Third, there’s no need for a “trial” to be a legally binding trial. What the CoC seems to be calling for, or anyway ought to be calling for, is a more elaborate form of a “hearing,” one that merely mimics the features of a trial in order to enable a fairer and fuller consideration of the evidence. In particular these features are: a neutral (non-agency) judge/overseer, cross-examination of scientists, and document “discovery.”
Fourth, there’s no need for the judge to be the detailed examiner of the evidence. In patent cases brought before the International Trade Commission, for instance, there are professional panels of examiners who hear the arguments and then make a recommendation to the judge. This format could be adopted here, with the panels being made up of distinguished retired scientists from various disciplines.
Fifth, there’s no need for the judge to be a scientific illiterate, if the “trial” format is merely an ad hoc device to enable a more disinterested and detailed examination of the evidence and arguments. He/she could be a scientist with some legal training, or real-time legal backup by an aide. And the judge needn’t be a single individual, but could be a multi-member group, like an appeals court.
Sixth, the “decision” handed down needn’t be black/white, but instead could be couched in probabilistic terms (shades of gray). Or, better, the trial could be set up to have multiple outcomes, with the third outcome being, “Given the costs involved, and the irrevocable nature of a treaty commitment to such spending, would it be wise to wait two (say) years while additional skeptical research is funded and additional scrutiny is performed on the current consensus?” If Yes is the answer—which seems as though it would be a nice face-saving outcome—that’s great.
If No is the outcome, that wouldn’t be a loss for the skeptical side, because if the trial were not held, No would be the outcome from Congress or the EPA anyway. Long-term a No would be a Win for skepticism because, if the world fails to warm over the next decades, Establishment science and Establishment political structures and procedures would lose legitimacy, and more decentralized scientific and political organizational structures would gain in contrast.
(For instance, I think it would be good if there were seven funding agencies in place of the NSF, whose budgets would rise and fall depending on the importance of the research they had funded. This would encourage more funding of far-out ideas, such as DARPA does. DARPA’s research provides much more bang for the buck than the NSF’s.)
Seventh, in addition to making an overall AGW ruling (Yes, No, or Delay), the judges and examiners could make lots of sub-rulings, or anyway offer tentative opinions, on the 101 contested claims in this dispute, listing them in order from strongest to weakest. Or they could instead, or in addition, point out areas where the evidence needs to be re-examined or firmed up or made congruent with some other line of evidence.
Eighth, the risk of getting a biased judge or panel of judges could be reduced by splitting the trial into different sub-trials on disputed topic-areas, with separate judge-panels and examiner-panels for each. (In addition, each side could be allowed to appoint one of the judges to the panel, to ensure that its arguments got a hearing during judicial head-scratching conferences.) For instance, there could be one topic-panel for sea level rise, one for positive/negative CO2 feedbacks, one for solar effects, one for glaciers, etc. There could be as many as 20 of these. This would greatly speed things up and add to the depth of the examinations.
Ninth, regardless of the outcome, it would be a great contribution to future disputants to have all the arguments and citations and evidence put “on the record” in a centralized location, and to have lots of “myths” debunked or at least crippled during cross-examination. Cross-examination and formal “debates” by disputants (which should be part of these procedures) would force both sides to confront each others’ best points, instead of talking past each other. The issues involved would thereby be sharpened and clarified. This alone justifies this format.
Mike Abbott (14:49:03) : Tamino
Tamino Who?
Gavin Who?
RealWhat?
This trial could be what John Coleman and Monckton (and maybe a million others) are looking for.
Lucy Skywalker (15:33:22) : real bit of light fun,
Right 4 of 7 times. But I scrolled up and down, rolled the mouse around, and waited…. 3 of the times. hehehe
Jeff Id (14:45:16) :
Yep…. To my mind Climate is driven by natural forces. While all anthropogenic effects are insignificant to global climate and barely measurable against the background of that natural variation. As it stands, observation bares that out.
It is the politically driven catastrophism that I object to and the bad science that infuriates me.
The politics of this have caused people much misery and the loss of their livelihoods….. It is time a court ruled on these catastrophic claims of AGW.
Lucy Skywalker (15:33:22) :
This thing is starting to freak me out Lucy! WTF!!!
If I look for the gift only, with no delays, and advance, it’s always right.
Re: William (14:16:58) :
I would support a trial and not because I believe the outcome would have any meaning, but because the American trial system has this thing called discovery, It is a wonderful thing and it could result in all the players having to lay their cards on the table. No hidden data, no hidden methods, no hidden communications between the people involved. Everything (or nearly everything)would have to be disclosed. You might find out why some papers picked 3 PC’s instead of 5 or 7. Or how the confidence intervals where calculated on others. Or even some of the exchanges between IPCC chapter authors.
A trial would be productive simply because of what it would reveal.
in the previous darwin trial , science lost..
What
Jeff Id (14:45:16) :
said.
Regards,
Steamboat Jack
Shifty, loud, and impatient. Ominat be he.
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REPLY: It is not a “blatant scam” as there is full truth to the fact that CO2 does cause a warming effect. However the magnitude and cause/effects looks to be overhyped and oversold. – Anthony
Spoken like a scientist/climatologist, certainly NOT like an engineer.
The principal difference between science and engineering (or what used to be called “applied science”) is the COST and BENEFIT components.
[Had an engineering prof who had 30+ patents and had been a Ford VP. He used to say that engineering was doing for 50 cents what any jackass could do for $5. (Parenthetically, he also added that “the Mercedes-Benz is what the jackass does with $5.)]
In engineering terms the facts that (a) the effect of anthro CO2 is minimal (b) in any case, CO2 effects are exponential and plateauing and (c) “solutions” are horribly expensive with non-existent positive effects but VERY high costs, taken together mean that AGW is a SCAM, pure and simple.
Executive Summary of AGW “solutions”: high first cost, high maintenance costs, low efficiencies, severe negative impact on economic growth and quality of life, AND minimal (essentially unmeasureable) impact on “warming”. Yet for SOME reason (oh, yeah, because of some maniupulated computer models), we MUST CAP CARBON NOW.
Please enlighten me; how is this NOT a blatant scam?
er, Onimat. Actually, I like Omni Not, best.
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Hasthe globe been “generally warming over the last 200 to 20 years”?
After recent posts and comment here, I’m not so sure. The sources of most of the temperature data are measuring stations of dubious accuracy, as Anthony has shown for the USA, erring on the warm side. Over the rest of the world the stations are equally problematic, and have gradually migrated to warmer zones, per E.M. Smith’s revealing study:
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2009/08/17/thermometer-years-by-latitude-warm-globe/
Is there a meaningful measure of ‘global’ temperature at all, for any period since the last ice age?
Not only is the sky not falling, it may not even be warming.
/Mr Lynn
Lucy Skywalker (15:33:22) :
Now here’s a real bit of light fun, very OT, but I feel it uses the same kind of discernment of multiple factors that belongs to real real climate science: I would expect realclimatescientists to be fooled a lot longer than WUWT readers.
BTW, it doesn’t just work for double digit numbers, it’s true for any integer value no matter how large.