We recently had a story about the UK Met Office putting out a petition amongst scientists (even non-climatologists) to prop up the image of the CRU. Some scientists said they felt “pressured” to sign.
This story explains how they might feel that way.
WUWT reader Norris Hall commented on this thread: Americans belief of global warming sinking – below 50% for the first time in 2 years
… it is possible that this is just a big conspiracy by climate scientist around the world to boost their cause and make themselves more important. Though I find it hard to believe that thousands of scientists…all agreed to promote bogus science …Pretty hard to do without being discovered.
To which Paul Vaughan responded as follows:
Actually not so hard.
Personal anecdote:
Last spring when I was shopping around for a new source of funding, after having my funding slashed to zero 15 days after going public with a finding about natural climate variations, I kept running into funding application instructions of the following variety:
Successful candidates will:
1) Demonstrate AGW.
2) Demonstrate the catastrophic consequences of AGW.
3) Explore policy implications stemming from 1 & 2.
Follow the money — perhaps a conspiracy is unnecessary where a carrot will suffice.
Opposing toxic pollution is not synonymous with supporting AGW.
From Planet Gore: This confirms the stories that I’ve been hearing over the last few years.
New maxim: The Carrot Train
h/t to Planet Gore, who got it from Bishop Hill, who got it from comments here on WUWT
Sometimes there’s so much happening on WUWT, it is impossible to take it all in.
Thanks guys!
Mike (08:57:35) : “…just go to http://www.nsf.gov click on “funding” then “recent funding” or “find funding.”
Thanks, Mike. Did that. Of course, it’s not necessary or prudent to put out blatant calls for prejudiced research. Every scientist and Copenhagen whore by now knows what she has to include in her pitch. Perhaps a better thing to look for is where is the money actually going. There’s a nice form to search for active awards by text terms here:
http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/progSearch.do?SearchType=progSearch&page=2&QueryText=climate+change&ProgOrganization=&ProgOfficer=&ProgEleCode=&BooleanElement=true&ProgRefCode=&BooleanRef=true&ProgProgram=&ProgFoaCode=&RestrictActive=on&Search=Search#results
Have some fun. Here’s what I found:
(searching active awards only):
happy ending: 2
acidification: 93 (just for reference)
methane: 216
global warming: 666 (hmm…)
around the world: 739
take it all: 830
interactive: 1385
robust: 1882
research: 2000 (= apparently anything over 2K)
climate change: 2000 (or more, apparently)
As the Romans used to say, “Scientia fuerat.”
Thirty-five years ago, the funding application for climate science looked something like this:
Successful candidates will:
1) Demonstrate AGC.
2) Demonstrate the catastrophic consequences of AGC.
3) Explore policy implications stemming from 1 & 2.
So, being an unwilling co-conspirator absolves all the scientists who helped the heads of the conspiracy who concocted the whole scheme over the decades of the 80s, 90s and into the 00s?
The mere fact that they scammed the system in order to get funding and in the process gave skewed results means they are part and parcels of the whole endeavor. Their greed allowed a continuation of a publicly funded scam.
Too funny
http://www.examiner.com/x-9111-SF-Environmental-Policy-Examiner~y2009m12d11-Global-warming-loyalty-oaths-and-Climategates-smoking-gun
“However we have a winner in the Dim Bulb category for stupidest reaction to Climategate, the UK’s Met Office. One week after doing an absolutely brilliant thing–announcing they will essentially rebuild the temperature records to eliminate doubt that the Climategate scientists had corrupted or lost it, they throw away all their brownie points by circulating a petition supporting the global warming position and asking scientists to sign it.
They decided to repeat the behaviour they criticize in skeptics, by gathering signatures from people who are not climate scientists and using them to pad the total number of those ‘on board.’ But, as one scientist remarked, “The Met Office is a major employer of scientists and has long had a policy of only appointing and working with those who subscribe to their views on man-made global warming.” This effectively turns the exercise into the equivalent of Joseph McCarthy’s loyalty oaths.
The even more important story of yesterday, however, was Climategate’s bete noire, Steve McIntyre, who published a post on his weblog Climate Audit. For more than two weeks we have heard the establishment scientists saying that the leaked emails were take out of context. Unfortunately for them, putting them in context makes it even worse, as McIntyre shows with one series that should have district attorneys dusting off the definition of RICO statutes. The emails show collusion to place inaccurate and incomplete data into public evidence for policy makers charged with enacting appropriate legislation to evaluate and deal with climate change.”
Stephen Levitt of Freakonomics fame loves talking about exactly this subject – i.e. how human behaviour changes when incentives are introduced:
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/
Interestingly Levitt wrote about the leaked emails 10 days ago with his usual insight:
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/01/the-global-warming-email-weve-all-been-waiting-for/
Hardly a surprise he says, because this kind of behaviour goes on all the time when conventional group think is challenged. As we all know, people don’t like having their understanding of the nature of things challenged.
Personally I love reading Levitt’s work, because even if he is wrong, he challenges the “conventional logic.” It is this underlying skepticism that is crucial to scientific progress.
Tom Fuller wrote: I think that they had an informal conspiracy going to pump each others’ careers up, peer review each others’ papers, and slam any skeptics or lukewarmers who wandered within punching range – and later, after they realised how badly they had acted, they conspired to evade the Freedom of Information Act.
I tended to agree with him. But after reading this, I am convinced there was indeed a formal conspiracy by Mann, Briffa, Jones, Folland, Karl to use a “trick” as in deception, ruse, swindle, (not clever technique), to do away with the Medieval Warm Period.
That Mann says ” I don’t think that doubt is scientifically justified, and I’d hate to be the one to have to give it fodder! “ either displays monumental ignorance or monumental contempt (or both), for science and the scientific method, and in no way takes away from the evidence that this was in fact a fraud.
There is enough evidence in Steve M’s analysis above for a criminal complaint to be lodged against the conspirators.
Oops retrieve my post please
I don’t believe one needs a conspiracy to arrive at the scientific fraud we are seeing. We don’t even need interest in funding – though that doesn’t hurt. All that is required is a noble motive: saving us from ourselves. The CRU emails show the climatologists there believing they were engaged in something bigger than science – they were the good shepherds, bringing us out of our darkness.
See “Climategate: The good shepherds”:
http://vulgarmorality.wordpress.com/2009/12/06/climategate-the-good-shepherds/
This is depressing. I see some comments above appealing to the moral courage of free men and women as a way out of this. I don’t see how this is possible. We, humans, are an evil species and we have gotten more evil over the millenia. We all live on a crooked planet because we are all crooked, to one extent or another. How can we trust another?
Certainly, we have our charm and our sex appeal, enough so that the Gods of old took an interest in us despite our ugly bitchy side. However, unless we seek and find a wiser, more ethical and more powerful authority, we are screwed.
Correction:
In the article above, I am incorrectly quoted as follows:
“This confirms the stories that I’ve been hearing over the last few years.”
These words, which have been attributed to me, are not mine.
The closing sentence should read as follows:
“Opposing toxic pollution is not synonymous with supporting AGW.”
Best Regards,
Paul Vaughan.
REPLY: Missing indent – that line was from the planet Gore Post, fixed and made clearer, thanks for pointing it out. -A
Mapou, the truth will prevail. Of that I have no doubt. There is a reckoning coming and we will expose the corrupt politicians/false prophets, and correct the commingling of science with politics.
What surprises me, though, is how so many scientists, who MUST know the play is over, are still aboard a sinking ship of shame. (sorry for excess alliteration)
I sometimes wonder if “has increased public awareness of the dangers of global warming” might be a line-item in the periodic performance reviews of some news media personalities.
I would like to know how else the deck is getting stacked.
Is it possible to get a degree in “climate science” without joining the AGW bandwagon? If so, can this be done at the “prestigious” institutions where said degree would be most beneficial for a career in climate science?
With all these high priests gathered and claiming only other climate scientists can possibly understand their holy words, are they keeping skeptics, or should I say those with an open mind who believe science is never “settled,” out of the field to increase their “consensus”?
Mapou,
I think if you hang around for a bit (my apologies if you’re a regular and I didn’t recognize the name) that most of us here are not opposed to conservation and proper treatment of the earth. Mr. Watts, while a skeptic, probably has a smaller carbon footprint than either of us. Imagine, for a moment, if we took a fraction – any fraction be it a 1/10th to 1/100th – of what is being contemplated in Copenhagen or the various Cap and Trade bills and put it to what we verifiably know is affecting our planet – land use, “real” pollution
We probably aren’t so different
vigilantfish (08:37:04) :
Form more information on this initiative:
http://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/Professors-Professeurs/RPP-PP/IRIACC-IRIACC-eng.asp
When I clicked on this website, however, the link was no longer active
This seems to be it:
http://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/Professors-Professeurs/RPP-PP/IRIACC-IRIACC_eng.asp
Note the underscore, rather than the hyphen!
When the UN is involved, follow the money!
Please read this incredible story and find out how the loss of 1.700 jobs in Europe benefit the Chairman of the IPCC.
How crooked and corrupt is the web called AGW!
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/12/when_the_uns_involved_follow_t.html
I found out who is funding these grants!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQv2-JCpKMk&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0]
vulgarmorality (15:19:24) : I don’t believe one needs a conspiracy to arrive at the scientific fraud we are seeing. We don’t even need interest in funding – though that doesn’t hurt. All that is required is a noble motive: saving us from ourselves.
vulgarmorality maybe one doesn’t, but what is the evidence? We have the self perpetuating interest in funding and thus interest in proving a hypothesis rather than being dispassionate about it as science demands.
And we have evidence of a conspiracy, at least among a small coterie of very influential scientists, manipulating their evidence, as I have pointed out above.
You belief may or maynot be true, it certainly seems to be a favourite with you, your hobby horse so to speak, which you keep plugging away at, but it doesnt match the evidence.
I think the noble motive is probaly why the myth has gained so much popularity with the general public, rather than the driving force of the scientists involved, who are far more pragmatic people.
My posts keep getting swallowed for some reason…
Early in this thread there were many who expressed doubt in the claim that research money was being purposely manipulated to reward pro-AGW studies. The doubters were demanding proof by way of online .pdf’s. Are the doubters satisfied? I could be wrong, but I don’t think any of them have returned to acknowledge the many posts that link to exactly what they were demanding.
I’ve noticed, in the comments, several links to funding applications that seem to encourage work confirming AGW or encourage work that assumes AGW.
Perhaps a post entitled “How Funding Biases Climate Science” is in order. The linked applications could be shown as examples.
I think that is far more powerful than the anectode conveyed in this post.
Would it be possible (in these current times) to win a grant for determining the CO2 emissions of insects? Or polar bears? Or migrating birds? Or any non-human source of CO2?
Paul Vaughan “Opposing toxic pollution is not synonymous with supporting AGW.”
Well said, Paul. Whenever you speak, I listen.
This….THIS distinction….is purposely masked by the AGW religion.
[They] purposely confuse pollution…with the myth of CAGW…to attempt to stop pollution!
That is their big, fat, stupid error.
Most reasonable minds will come around to that error.
There are TWO separate arguments here.
One of them stands: Homo Sapiens has to do something about its pollution.
The other one founders…completely: Homo Sapiens, around for a blip in the geologic scale, is affecting a climate that has been around for 4.55 billion years before.
Preposterous.
We think we are evolved. But the current climate in Science, and crystallized in Copenhagen….shows just how far we have to go as a species.
Message to the Gavin Schmidts of the world:
As a taxpayer-funded public servant, we are watching you. We will be holding you accountable. And you’d better stick to Science [and you are not] or you will be tried for malfeasance.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
I found this great website WUWT and the DVD “The Great Global Warming Swindle (DVD)” on junkscience.com. The DVD, after first exploring some of the real science that exists about climate over the long haul, explores several ideas that built the Global warming scare to what it is. One big driver is “follow the money” researchers getting grants for AGW research, actual “journalism degrees” in environmental journalism, and of course if it bleeds it leads. One of the founders of Greenpeace, who is no longer a member, stated that once people started recycling, and cleaning up rivers etc…, those organizations needed to drum up scares to keep the money coming in. It was pointed out that after the shortfalls of communism were exposed by the fall of the Soviet Union, the supporters of communism switched their energies to finding other ways to kill capitalism.
Not a complete cloak and dagger conspiracy, but different groups using “Global warming” to further their own interests. With a willing press and Hollywood to keep repeating the lies of AGW, and with most of the general population not seeking other sources of information, this is how we ended up where we are. Hopefully the facts will save us, before the entire cap and trade laws are passed, and our technology advancements and way of life are ruined.
Stefan, I have often wondered the very same. My father (67yrs old), is a very well educated engineer, graduated with honors from MIT. And yet, he is completely and utterly blind to any skepticism of the AGW hypothesis. He has drank the AGW cool-aid and absolutely refuses to acknowledge anything (empirical data or otherwise) that contradicts the hypothesis. For the life of me, I cannot understand his utter blindness. He enjoyed a very fruitful career of 35+ yrs. working that entire career as a member of a research think tank for the DOE. Throughout my entire life I have only known him to be skeptical of everything, everything until now, everything until the AGW hypothesis. I just don’t get it.