Guest post by John Coleman – KUSI-TV, Weather Channel Founder
December 7, 2009
David and Goliath
The 21st century Goliath is Global Warming. It is a powerful six-legged monster. In no order of strength, those legs are:
(1) The big money climate change scientists and their powerful institutions from governmental centers to Universities,
(2) The United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change which is a Geneva-based, highly funded bureaucracy controlled by one-world government political activists,
(3) Environmentalists who seek to use threats of climate chaos to stop the use of fossil fuels and return to a simpler, more “natural”, primitive lifestyle,
(4) Government at all levels whose political leaders find dealing with global warming is their opportunity to save us all from disaster cementing their status and success,
(5) The media populated by people who love to warn us of impending disaster and give us the advice we need to cope, who believe in Al Gore and his political party and who know that “the sky is falling” is the best headline of them all,
(6) Al Gore, who uses his status as a successful former Senator and Vice President to provide a platform to promote his message of doom and gloom, a message he learned in his only college science class and must have truly believed for many years but should see now is only an empty threat.
The total financial resources and power structure behind Goliath are staggering.
Goliath now occupies Copenhagen. For the 15th time, Goliath is meeting to publicize his long list of threatened consequences if do not head his demands. The ice will melt, the coasts and islands will flood displacing millions and killing tens of thousands; the polar bears and eventually thousands of other species will die as habitats are destroyed; hurricanes will become superstorms wrecking havoc on the coastal cities killing tens of thousands; heat waves will kill more hundreds of thousands as they grip the planet; drought and heat will destroy our agriculture starving untold millions more. He tells us this is because of our carbon footprints left by our burning of fossil fuels emitting exhaust of carbon dioxide.
Fifteen thousand “delegates” are attending Goliath’s conference coming by hundreds of private jet aircraft, riding in over a thousand limos, occupying every hotel room for miles around and all living on expense accounts paid by taxpayers and stock holders. They are making speeches, politicking one another and most importantly negotiating how much the people of each of their nations will reduce their carbon footprints in coming years, having a major impact on all our lifestyles.
Meanwhile, here at home The Environmental Protection Administration, part of Goliath’s government leg, just classified carbon dioxide as a pollutant that is an endangerment to our lives. And the US Congress is working with the President on legislation known as Cap and trade that will make all of us pay taxes for our carbon footprints.
Goliath is a rich and very powerful monster. He thrives on carbon dioxide.
David is tiny and weak. He is composed of:
30 thousand scientists who sign a petition but only a few hundred of whom have the specialized education, skill and positions to do unfunded or underfunded research that debunks the carbon dioxide greenhouse claims of Goliath,
A handful of struggling policy institutes that strive to stage events to educate the public and media about the global warming myth,
The internet, a resource that is open to all on both sides to communicate and educate and organize and protest as best the skeptics can, There skeptics have established websites and blogs and posted videos, some serious and some as clever as animated musical parodies,
Talk radio with a hundred solid talk hosts who cover all aspects of the folly of global warming and reach several million people,
And a small cadre of elected officials from one or two Senators to a hand-full of members of the House of Representatives, to the President of Czech Republic and a small collection of other office holders who understand the science and are brave enough to join a minority group.
We are outmanned, poor by comparison and somewhat leaderless and disorganized.
How can David win this battle? The rocks he throws are small and his rock pile is small. Time is short before the consequences of increased government control, a scaled back and altered lifestyle and, most of all, establishment of bad science as a controlling instrument.
David has one great strength, however: Truth.
There is no significant man-made global warming, there has not been any in the past and there is no reason to fear any in the future. Carbon dioxide is a natural trace gas in the atmosphere with very limited greenhouse impact on temperatures and naturally produced CO2 greatly exceeds the CO2 produced by burning fossil fuels. There is no tipping point when the impact of CO2 sets in to cause an increased impact because of “forcing.” The bad science behind the global warming myth is based on a hypothesis that has failed.
Superman fought for “truth, justice and the American way.”
So is David. But he is no Superman. The battle goes on.
John Coleman
http://www.kusi.com/weather/colemanscorner
[ Smokey (02:55:05) :
alleagra:
“One way to start winning the battle is to create a single well-publicized authoritative website that acts as a to provide rebuttals for the latest scare story from the AGW crowd.”
You’re reading it. And for the more technically inclined, there’s ClimateAudit. ]
Don’t mean to be offensive but I think that’s complacent. WUWT is fantastic but it doesn’t hit the spot for non-climate buffs. The site required would have to be organised to provide readily accessible rebuttals.
The guy in the street (we could all benefit) needs headings like glaciers, sea levels, ocean acidification, physics of CO2, positive climate feedback, climate models, polar melting, alleged effects on fauna and flora and disease patterns, temperature records, the works on the MWP, need for proof of positive feedback from initial CO2 heating effect, and so on. That is not what WUWT is about.
For example suppose Joe sees the interview with John Christy and Gavin Schmidt on CNN.
“Christy doesn’t seem to have a good answer to the ‘isn’t the arctic melting and aren’t glaciers disappearing?’ question. Hmm, looks like there is a problem there. So, what are the facts about polar melting and glaciers across the world? I look on WUWT. Type ‘glaciers’ in the search box and get interesting stuff but am none the wiser overall. Not much I can take back to my AGW friend I’m trying to convince. I could research it futher but heck let’s leave it, I must get on . ..maybe Schmidt and the other AGW people are right after all.”
Latest shot from the AGW in the UK press is
“Copenhagen climate summit: ocean acidification an ‘underwater time-bomb’”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/copenhagen-climate-change-confe/6777099/Copenhagen-climate-summit-ocean-acidification-an-underwater-time-bomb.html
So where do I get the other side of the story on that in five minutes?
Big project? Probably but if the AGW people win then we’ll all pay big time and not just economically. Most of us understand what’s at stake here.
So which 21st century Jew has the chutzpah to ‘throw a shoe’, Iraqi style, at the big untamed beast, eh?
PS ( Smokey (02:55:05) 🙂
Another headline says
‘More than 1,700 scientists have agreed to sign a statement defending the “professional integrity” of global warming research. They were responding to a round-robin request from the Met Office, which has spent four days collecting signatures.’
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6951029.ece
Only big guns will resist this sort of thing which deeply impresses Mr & Mrs Joe PUblic.
TimesOnline:
Copenhagen sceptics have a slogan: ‘The world isn’t getting warmer, it’s going mad’
@CodeTech
“The phrase calling the AGW monster a carbon consumer is a humorous catchphrase.
I am truly in awe of your humor impairment.”
It wasn’t very funny. Did not me go “hahaha”.
I am a scpetic, but I won’t need rallying speeches, or someone trying to make fun of the other. I actually only want temperature graphs. That will be enough. Same goes for “climategate”. This goes on and on and on. I’d say: extract the stuff needed for proper temperature reconstructions, present a case and leave it that that.
Roy Spencer suggested to make a model with a 0.5 K climate sensitivity, have it run predictions and see if the actual data falsifies that. That, rather then “funny” articles is what is needed.
I do not care if the so called scientists at East Anglia are hounded- it is obvious from the contents of the e-mails that they hounded others and deserve everything they get. As a believer in the scientific method, they are clearly a disgrace and I am quite happy to publicly say so.
As far as David and Goliath go, here is the wonderful David Bellamy. A true scientist and environmentalist. Wonderful stuff. His integrity shines through the ignorant comments from the idiot TV interviewers:
The BBC are beyond disgust for banning him.
alleagra (02:37:50) :
One way to start winning the battle is to create a single well-publicized authoritative website that acts as a to provide rebuttals for the latest scare story from the AGW crowd. It needs to provide solid information designed for an intelligent layman with links to peer-reviewed papers and data sites (on topics such as:-
1. Is the Arctic really warming beyond natural variability?
2. What about the Antarctic? Is there evidence of warming there?
2. Is there really a danger of the oceans becoming acidified?
3. Are the glaciers really disappearing? How many glaciers are there, how many are melting?: Give me the complete picture on this!
4. The truth on sea levels? Are the Maldives really sinking?
5. What about the Cartaret Islands. Monbiot tells me they’re sinking as well.
5. AGW doesn’t work without positive feedback so what’s the evidence on that?
6. What’s all this about species extinction due to global warming?
7. How many thermometers are used to build a global temperature estimate?
8. Full coverage of the global temperature data sets.
9. We’re told sketics are funded by big oil? What are the facts about funding for skeptics (touch of humour here!) and AGW?
10. etc., etc.,
WUWT readers will mostly be able to arrive at informed opinions on these subjects but the ordinary intelligent Joe in the street has no idea where to turn to make a decision.
In spite of CRUgate, make no mistake, the AGW people winning the battle and only a focused strategy will prevent an aconomic catastrophe.
SOUNDS LIKE YOU HAVE A BUSINESS PLAN THERE.
AL GORE HAS A VC FUND YOU COULD APPROACH!!
No disrespect to Anthony and this wonderful site, but I have to agree with “alleagra”. There are so many sources of information now that it’s becoming very difficult to remember where I read a particular article. For instance: Every day I hear that we have just had the ten warmest years on record, but would like to be able to counter this statement.
We really need a central repository of basic facts with links to other, more detailed, information. I see that “Global Warming Myths.com” has been registered, and is for sale ($999). Someone has seen an opportunity!!
I have spent many hours reading all the articles on here, and the hundreds of replies most of them get, but the “average man or woman in the street” simply wouldn’t bother.
Anyone I can contact to do a radio interview with a South African radio station?
I wrote in to our national broadcaster (SABC) after they aired a brush-off of the UEA emails by someone from the IPCC, and asked them to cover both sides of the story (it was the first that I had heard about this on air here).
Anyway, I received an email from a producer of the (news) show, expressing interest in hearing the other side. Is there anyone who can be contacted by telephone for a radio interview who could speak with some authority on the UEA documents, and on the general skeptic position (or rebutting the process in Copenhagen)?
My email address is atkins@itrend.co.za and my phone number is +27 31 261 8000 (Durban, South Africa, GMT +2:00). If anyone qualified could volunteer, or put me in touch with someone who could do this, then I would be delighted to get the information to the producers of the show.
And then there is always this problem — We surround them.
Have you guys heard of common purpose? They train the leaders of corporations, governments etc to’lead beyond authority’. By recruiting members in influential positions they have in effect an inside man who is capable of driving the agenda of common purpose rather than the organisation the individual belongs to. It seems to me that these are the same tactics employed by the warmists.
You are fighting an invisible enemy who answers to no one.
John in NZ (00:54:12) :
“Lastly, scientists will not be trusted as much in the future.”
This is a good thing. We do not need to trust scientists. Scientists do not need our trust.
Real scientists publish all their data and methods for everyone to see, check and replicate. We wouldn’t be in this mess if we were less trusting to “scientists” like M. Mann and P. Jones.
Andrew.
I’ve put together a comprehensive collection of John Coleman videos. They are excellent as they are very informative. John is very clear in his explanations.
http://pathstoknowledge.net/2009/12/10/as-goes-the-sun-so-goes-the-earth-the-sun-is-daddy
How anyone can study the leaked (or hacked) Hadley documents together with major media coverage of the CRU scandal and then conclude John Coleman’s assessment is fundamentally wrong is simply beyond me.
CH
“Geneva-based, highly funded bureaucracy controlled by one-world government political activists,”
Who are these people anyway? I find it hard to believe that say, Britain would want to have Uganda have say in its doings. I mean, sheesh, there are even some US states that I would like to see leave the Union… Given the break up of the Soviet Union and others, I hardly think that the trend is headed in that direction. Tin foil hats all around please
To hit Goliath where he is vulnerable:
1. Respond with science whenever the media allow this after a false or hysterical report.
2. Make it clear to any politician who might expect your support that you demand rejection of the carbon-dioxide scam.
3. Tell any academic institution that might expect your support that, first, the institution must send you its public disavowal of the carbon-dioxide scam.
4. Tell any supplier you can choose (bank, grocer, insurer, airline, etc.) that you view any promotion of the carbon-dioxide scam as evidence of corporate incompetence, and any attempt to coerce your behavior will push your business elsewhere.
E.M.Smith (00:49:25)
God must be a comedian to taunt Al Gore this way. I heard, back to back on the radio, Al Gore giving a rant about the UEA leak being unimportant because all you had to do was open your window and look at the hottest decade ever
Apart of an excelent economist you are a good humorist, that´s funny. For the fun to be total let us assume that natural cycles also affect (I do believe so) human endeavours; if this is so there was a change back in the past called the “Maunder Minumum” which correlated then with political changes, sponsored by the ancestors of these same peoples, that went from the many independence revolutions to the disappearance of monarchies all over the world, well, then: What if now it comes the next “turn of the screw” and this time the other way around, following the development of an evolving spiral, which would bring all things to a state similar, and not necessarily the same, as before?….
Like in the cinderella tale!…at the right time it would be back to be as it used to be…☺
Just food for thought. In 1910 the carbon foot print for each person in US the average farmer/farmhand could feed 5 people. In 1950 that had increased to around 10 people. Now in the early 2000s that has increased to nearly 250 and may have surpassed this number. Where modern methods are used the amount of agricultural land use has been reduced a great amount returning the land to the natural state. This all uses carbon. If the wishes of the great green machine comes true look for great loss of life due to famine. Look for more of the slash and burn type of agriculture as more land will be needed to produce crops due to the inability to properly maintain the fields such that they will produce to today’s levels.
When this happens there will be chaos. And then what happens if the world takes a drastic down turn in temperatures. The very infrastructure that could have produced the fuels that can maintain livable conditions will have been either abandoned or destroyed. The future of “climate change ” as seen today by the great leaders gathering in Copenhagen appears to be grim in the long term.
Just Google to see the growth of productivity in the time of the last half of the past century. Perhaps a larger carbon foot print isn’t so bad for the world, It sure has been a time of great abundance.
Bill Derryberry
From Jo Novas blogsite:
“Political Fallout
Dr. Maciej Nowicki , past president of COP14, who made the opening speech of the COP15 conference in Copenhagen has just resigned (i.e. just been sacked) as environment minister by the Polish Government, who now apparently believe that global warming is a hoax. Poland is heavily dependent on coal for its economy. ”
Dissent will not be tolerated.
“Information is the oxygen of the modern age. It seeps through the walls topped by barbed wire, it wafts across the electrified borders. … The Goliath of totalitarianism will be brought down by the David of the microchip.” – Ronald Reagan, June 1989
Unfortunately the truth often takes decades to come out; DDT is but one example
I agree with everything he said except for this;
“Al Gore, who uses his status as a successful former Senator and Vice President…”
I question the use of the word successful.
As a fellow San Diegan, I thank my lucky stars for John Coleman – for his solid and brave resistance to the AGW hoax and for his accurate, entertaining and educational weathercasts here in San Diego.
Keep hurling those stones John, they are hitting their mark and Goliath is weakening.
“Goliath” serves no more useful purpose than does “denier”.
In the debate about climate change, there is a need more more dispassionate discussion and less hyperbole.
Mr. Coleman observes correctly that government-funded science is an oxymoron. In order to obtain a government grant, one must file a proposal, in which proposal one must specify the results one will obtain with the research. Then proposals are (apparently) evaluated based upon the desirability of the results, rather than upon the accuracy of the research. This is my personal impression on the government grant system.
Such research is not science. Since the 17th Century, science has been the growth of falsifiable hypotheses. Remember that Galileo attempted to falsify the geocentric theory of the Greeks. His attempt was not rejected on its merits; his Dialogue on the Two Chief World Systems was rejected for heresy.
Unfortunately for Galileo a falsification directly perceptible to unaided human senses (now known as the Foucault Pendulum) had not yet been discovered.
The AGW hypothesis is not falsifiable. It has not been falsifiable from its beginnings. The original objections to AGW were 1) refusal to publish the computer code and 2) refusal to release the original source data. I have followed this story since 2003 and these two issues were present at the start. The release of the zipped files from the CRU is a side issue. The blunt fact is that the AGW hypothesis has not been independently replicated.
How, then, are discoveries made? Pasteur said that chance favors the prepared mind. Look to the history of science. Consider Dr. Semmelweis. Look to Michelson and Morley. Think about continental drift — that got a very warm reception! Consider Pasteur himself, and the spontaneous generation of life. New hypotheses are usually met with rejection, derision, and outright denial.
Semmelweis requested volunteers and record-keeping. His requests were denied, and he was driven out of medicine. The babies kept dying, until other doctors finally tried his proposal.
Pasteur published his methods and invited all comers to replicate them.
In each instance the relevant paradigm gave a good fight before it was finally altered. Personal attacks, invective, vituperative denunciation, you all know the story.
AGW will be shown false. Independent correlation of long-term records will remain a hotly-disputed issue for decades to come; temperature, rainfall, cloud cover, concentrations of methane et al in the atmosphere, concentrations of dust in the atmosphere, the correlation between solar flux and cosmic ray incidence on the atmosphere, and other contributory factors are difficult (if not impossible) to tease apart.
See one of my favorite gag books, Motel of the Mysteries, for details.
AGW IS NOT SCIENCE.