Omaha.com reports on the school board that made this decision here. This book has been around since 2007. Since she’s married to Seinfeld producer Larry David, so it fits right in with the rest of the Seinfeld saga. For example, did you know NASA GISS is over “Monks restaurant” from the show? No, really.
An SPPI report on David’s book in 2007 said:
On page 18 of Laurie David’s new children’s global warming book, there is a glaring scientific error. David tells children:
Deep down in the Antarctic ice are atmosphere samples from the past, trapped in tiny air bubbles. These bubbles, formed when snowflakes fell on the ice, are the key to figuring out two things about climate history: what temperatures were in the past and which greenhouse gases were present in the atmosphere at that time. The more the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the higher the temperature climbed. The less carbon dioxide, the more the temperature fell. You can see this relationship for yourself by looking at the graph:
David adds:
What makes this graph so amazing is that by connecting rising CO2 to rising temperature scientists have discovered the link between greenhouse-gas pollution and global warming.
What really makes their graph “amazing” is that it’s dead wrong.
In order to contrive a visual representation for their false central claim that CO2 controls temperature change, David and co-author Cambria Gordon present unsuspecting children with an altered temperature and CO2 graph that falsely reverses the relationship found in the scientific literature.
The actual temperature curve in the chart was switched with the actual CO2 curve. That is, the authors mislabelled the blue curve as temperature and mislabelled the red curve as CO2 concentration. The real data show that the red curve represents the temperature changes over geological time, followed (lagged) by changes in CO2 concentrations represented by the blue curve. Thus, children tracing the properly labelled curves from right to left (from past to present) can easily see the real, science-based relationship (particularly clear in the interval between 500,000 and 150,000 years ago).
The David-Gordon manipulation is critical because the central premise of the book argues that CO2 drives temperature, yet the ice core data clearly reveal temperature increases generally precede increasing CO2 by several hundred to a few thousand years. This fact may have been too inconvenient for David, who instead presented young readers with an astoundingly irresponsible falsehood. Parents and teachers of these children should be concerned.
More here in the SPPI report
============================================
From Omaha.com:
By Joe Dejka
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
Millard Public Schools will stop using a children’s book about global warming — but only until the district can obtain copies with a factual error corrected.
A review committee, convened after parents complained, concluded that author Laurie David’s book, “The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming,” contained “a major factual error” in a graphic about rising temperatures and carbon dioxide levels.
Mark Feldhausen, associate superintendent for educational services, this week sent a letter to parents who complained, including the wife of U.S. Rep. Lee Terry of Nebraska, outlining the committee’s findings.
…
Three parents, including Robyn Terry, complained to the district. The Terrys’ 12-year-old son attended Beadle Middle School last year. Mrs. Terry said that the materials used in his class portrayed global warming as fact when scientists disagree.
In the video, DiCaprio attributes global warming to mankind’s “destructive addiction” to oil. He says “big corporations” and politicians gained too much money and power “on our addiction,” making them “dangerously resistant to change.”
…
Corrected versions will continue to be used in Millard’s sixth-grade language arts curriculum, he wrote.
However, the district will cease to use a companion video about global warming, narrated by actor Leonardo DiCaprio, he wrote.
The committee found the video “without merit” and recommended that it not be used.
More here.
h/t to Dr. Leif Svalgaard
What is 800 years +\- among friends?
Laurie David….. isn’t that Al Gores…..uuuummmmm….squeeze? Global warming sure makes strange bedfellows. Thats keeping the money in the family!
Nebraska, the heartland. May it spread to the rest of the land!
this graph goes from present (left) to right (past). That seems opposite the direction I’ve generally seen these time-line graphs presented, and opposite the direction that children usually deal with for time-lines.
all part and parcel of the AGW hoards.
I greet this news with great joy.
Of course you know that Laurie David was being boinked by algore.
Green Gang propagandists pushing this cynically manipulated garbage on schoolkids may find to their surprise that Fourth Graders are not as stoopid as they’d like to think. The time will come when these ex-victims react to Laurie David and the fatuous poseur DiCaprio by redacting anything and everything related to their smarmy scam. Like innoculated survivors of rabies or smallpox, kids in maturity will have witnessed Climate Hysterics at first-hand and so become immune.
Isn’t it enough that my 4551 sq. ft. beach house is totally green? And I’m a movie star. So, shut up you little people.
What’s really nice right now is to watch the critical sides to folk’s brains light up and find voice. That this scare overwhelmed and corrupted science for so long is depressing, but to now watching folks say hang on a minute, you science-communicators can’t just lie about this and that…this is, well, redeeming of ones faith in society, in humanity.
Yesterday I got through security check (“We are really sorry we have to do this sir”) to this insiders Dealing with Denialism talk. I was not surprising to find no mention of any of the (“well funded and highly organised”) sceptics, nor of any their arguments, nor the scandals (nope, it was like climategate never happened) in what was a condescending and logically sloppy whitewash of all the issues.
But what was surprising about this seminar was question time. About half the questioners clearly wanted to discuss the sceptical concerns, and two of them actually asked that they not be ignored, and dismissed, but that they be discussed by the AGW authorities as represented on this stage.
I had to remind myself that these folks asking the questions (by their own declaration) were all working in departments infused by AGW funding. Our $16 Million Dollar Grant-Man, the presenter, was clearly caught of guard and fumbled his responses, so that the MC (confessed director of an offset company) tried to help out. These were precious Louis XIV moments.
In the court of enviromental science they have had it so easy for so long. Sure, there was a noticeble shift in the message, no doubt worked out at this closed door conference. But still they seem like its only just hitting them the nature and the power of what they are dealing with. The truth will out, and it might just be the likes of the Millard Public Schools council who will be doing the out-ing.
Sometimes it’s difficult to know who’s the boinker, and who’s the boinkee.He does seem to have a habit of not understanding the details of things, butgoes along for the ride anyway if there appears to be some tangible benefit.Maybe he hasn’t been getting much understanding at home recently. ☺
/dr.bill
Larry David was a writer of “Seinfeld”, but the really funny episodes were by Spike Ferensten, Seinfeld, and others. David’s episodes usually focused on high school bathroom humor, condoms, orgasms or tampons, and at times were embarrassing to Seinfeld. The series finale was a David “gem”, for example, and a huge disappointment to everyone at the time.
Witness the lame, slow, provincial, very New York Yiddish humor depicted on the HBO series by David – “Curb Your Enthusiasm”, that could not even make the networks “standards”. A really excruciating show to watch. The narcissistic David tried to show that he was the creative force behind “Seinfeld”, but showed his true mettle with “Enthusiasm”.
Irregardless, the Davids’ positions promoting CAGW shows how much they know.
There’s only one word for that CO2 graph: Fraud.
Laurie denies accusations of her affair with Al.
Look at the CO2 vs. temperature graph in the rejected material:
It unwittingly shows CO2 lagging temperatures throughout the last 650,000 years. Temperature rises, then CO2 rises. temperatures drop, then CO2 drops.
You couldn’t possibly make a better case for CO2 being a consequence and not the cause of global temperature change. Thank you Laurie David; you seem to be a secret AGW skeptic.:-)
[REPLY – No, it just looks that way because the timescale is “backwards”: it goes from present to past ->. The problem is that the lines were mislabeled. ~ Evan]
It’s normal to lie to children in order to get them to do all manner of things. Some even go on to establish whole careers based around lies in an effort to get other people to do all manner of things. Hey, it worked on them… why wouldn’t it work on you?
I suppose that this is a ‘teachable moment’ – review finds the errors – eventually. Hence it is better not to game the peer-review system.
…I wonder if this particular work will be cited in the next IPCC report(?)
The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming
Hmmm … isn’t that the one with the subtitle
The Comedy of Errors ? ((Sorry Bill))
And as for a possible Gore/Laurie David connection, the most relevant comment I’ve seen is “please don’t let there be a sex tape, please don’t let there be a sex tape”.
Back on topic – good to see people scrutinizing the Warmist propaganda being mindlessly foisted off upon the children. Probably the most despicable tactic in the whole bag of alarmist tricks, following the advice given by Lenin – “Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted. Give us the child for 8 years and it will be a Bolshevik forever.”
I wonder how they got Fred Flintstone and his cavemen friends to stop spewing CO2 back 120,000 years ago so the temperatures would go down? Worked pretty well it seems. Earth had a real long ice age. Maybe Betty and Wilma wrote a cavekids book….
Still claims that increasing CO2 causes increasing temperatures.
Absolutely no science papers explaining HOW!
Outside my window, right now, June 19 2010 at 05:50 GMT there is peasoup fog!
Visibility is less than 50 meters. Humidity is over 90%. Temperature is 10C.
Water vapour, H2O, is a more effective “greenhouse gas” than CO2.
Why is it so cold for this time of year? There is no wind.
It should be possible to observe any small temperature increase.
Only as the sun rises and diffused radiation penetrates to the ground will
temperature increase slowly until fog dissipates and then we will rapidly
get a temperature rise to normal. “Greenhouse gasses” are a fraud!
I get very angry about these stupid claims.
We have now graphically witnessed fudge-factors for deflating and inflating values; the splicing of unrelated data; and now the transposition of cause and effect. What other tricks are up their sleeves?
OK. How about this one then! 6 degrees of seperation and conclusive proof AGW is all a Hollywood hoax! But first a quote… “Some days I find things by accident. Today, researching for something else online, serendipity paid me a visit.” A. Watts Oct 21 2009.
Seinfeld (produced by)………Larry David (ex-married to)…….Laurie David (produced An Inconvenient Truth and shagged)……..Al Gore (shagged John Q. Public and took advice from)…….James Hansen (shagged John Q. and works above)…….Toms Restaurant (AKA Monks Resaurant, a set locale from)…….Seinfeld.
Voila…. 6 degrees. It just took a little time to figure out just who was ultimately getting shagged!
Have a happy weekend all!
Am I being too pedantic in wondering how this mangled sentence ever passed the editors of an educational book?
They always have these little inconvenient “errors”…… On the face of it, one could suppose the whole Hypothesis of AGW is in error then? 🙂
Destructive addiction to oil, eh? Where do I sign up for a disability check? I’m a victim!
One complaint at a time, one teacher at a time, one school at a time, one district at a time. T-minus one year & two months for me, and I’m in the game. I’m going to be one of these parents. I refuse to let my kids be subjected to this garbage.
Given the growing numbers of children being presented for treatment with stress and anxiety problems related to fears generated by their nearly constant exposure to CAGW propaganda, perhaps rather than trying to get the green loons at EPA, the kleptocrats in Congress, and Obama’s collectivist mafia to recognize the weaknesses of CAGW science, it would be more productive to launch child abuse complaints against every school district that still features this terrorizing propaganda. I believe that the vast majority of states now have laws that mandate that any allegation of child abuse be investigated. Undoubtedly many jurisdictions would be entirely dismissive of such complaints, but if only a small minority would take them somewhat seriously, it could create a fairly massive groundswell of indignation, given the very large number of school districts nationally.
One would think that the article on the Omaha World-Herald web site could of at least mentioned what the major factual error was.
Yes, that is FRAUD. Because Callion et.al. in “Science” has been known for a long time. Callion et.al. is from 2003, me thinks.
Here;
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/299/5613/1728
there’s an oil leak in the Gulf. it’s been like 58 days now. ummm, ya, it’s still happening
i guess it’s just part of life now
ok, back to the topic
As soon as I saw that graph, I knew it had been around somewhere before, I thought Jonova, but after going through her site, it wasn’t. Has it been in here at some stage? I remember it because the blue and red lines had been mislablelled in the original as well, from 2009 iirc.
Well, the original was correct, but the adjusted/corrected/smoothed published version was as above.
And I haven’t the time available at the moment to go though all the files.
I am always reminded of Feynman’s role in picking science books to be used in CA. His wife could always tell when he was reviewing them by the large volume of profanity being emitted from his study.
Won’t any smart kids question the graph and ask “what caused the co2 rises in the past teacher?” What would the teacher say then? :o)
Callion et.al. in Science magazine was back in 2003.
Telling us CO2 lags temperature in Vostok ice cores by approx 800 years.
Here;
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/reprint/299/5613/1728.pdf
So they’ve had a long time fixing it. But didnt.
What does it tell us? What is the motivation?
Money, me thinks.
Well, if their graph is correct then we should expect to see sharply-rising temperatures in about, er… 800 years time 😉
After a teaching career of 37 years , mostly in the social sciences, it gave me the greatest pleasure to purge the department of all the CAGW material that had been foisted on us over the years. The lot went into a skip bin. My colleagues cheered. None of us taught it anyway.
The book rates an “F” for sure.
And the kids could probably see that if you use the red line to show temps, then there have been times in the past that have had higher temps.
Or if you use the blue line to show the CO2, then there have been times in the past when CO2 has been higher than today.
So it doesn’t matter if the red or blue represents temps or CO2 – current values are NOT the highest they’ve been in a million years.
And, looking at the chart, if the blue line represents the CO2 levels, how do they explain that MASSIVE rise of CO2 150,000 years ago (from near zero to max), especially if the CO2 is because of “greenhouse-gas pollution”?
Also, the question should come up about SCALE. For AGW to work, they have to use the doubling of CO2 as it’s centerpiece. This chart lacks the resolution necessary to prove that.
The ONLY thing they found wrong with the chart was a reversing of the labels? Wow.
The withdrawal, albeit perhaps temporary, of this shoddy book, and the rejection of the DeCaprio video are both good news.
I suspect that such misleading materials have deeply penetrated various curricula in schools throughout the world. I have recently started blogging on this to encourage more investigation and sharing of information. I hope in particular to help publicise and promote links to rebuttals such as the SPPI report which you mention.
http://climatelessons.blogspot.com/
This is crying out for someone to write a spoof episode of ‘Seinfeld’.
This may interest some of you:
[snip]
Reply Please post your link on the relevant NASA solar flares thread. RT-Mod
Peter says:
June 19, 2010 at 1:11 am
Well, if their graph is correct then we should expect to see sharply-rising temperatures in about, er… 800 years time 😉
Or maybe the current rise in CO2 is just the lagged response to the elevated temps of the Medieval Climate Optimum.
I have been aware for decades that all sorts of advocacy groups push their dishonest messages in schools. In 1981, while inspecting possible supplemental High School text books available for our school to purchase I discovered a text book for 14-17 yr olds, published by the publishing arm o f one of the top two universities in the UK for a very strident international civil rights organisation. The book stated categorically that the New Zealand government both imprisoned and tortured political dissidents. Neither statement is factual and is quite laughable to anyone who lived in NZ for any length of time. This discovery made me much more critical of the content of whatever supplementary text books were marketed to every school I subsequently taught in. The schools market is huge and advocacy groups are expert at capitalising on it..
Al Goracle………..tried this one……..same old ****, Lord Almighty it is so sad, the trouble is these dolts have no clue about geology, climate, geological history or time or process/science/integrity/ but then why allow mere facts to get in the way of the ‘narrative’?
Change the record lads.
Willie Soon of Harvard spotted this error in David’s book as soon as it was published. He notified the publisher and the response was to call in a consultant and basically do nothing. Buried somewhere in this great interview with Soon is his account of the whole frustrating incident:
http://www.itsrainmakingtime.com/_recent/climate_part2.html
The publisher and the author knew about this gross error in the book from shortly after its release date.
There should be criminal charges brought against this author. It seems like outright fraud. Anyone looking into this? I’m not a lawer, so i don’t know what laws have been broken, but if none have – then we need to change the law!
When you have to lie to make your point, then your point is a lie. Or is that too complicated for some of you Warmers?
I tell you unequivocally, regardless of forcings and logic reversals and whatever tripe scientist you want to quote, CO2 is NOT the planet’s temperature driver; never has been, never will be. Own up to the fact you’ve been duped, lied to, and follow liars like Al Gore. And if you still like Gore and believe what he says, you have a major, major problem. Recant.
The End of CAGW.
PS. Isn’t there something else you Warmers can sink you teeth into, such as environmental issues that clean up real pollution (not the CO2 kind, btw), or teaching logic and the scientific method at all levels of school, or just loving thy neighbor as thyself? (What a novel concept!) Just think of what could have been done with all the $billions that have been wasted on the biggest scientific lie of human history. It should make your head spin; it does mine! (Even Spain is coming to its senses.) But in the final analysis, I am not your enemy; rather, someone who wishes to see truth reign supreme, unless, of course, I’m forced into submission and am robbed through taxation based on a lie.
Hot (not globally) from the presses:
http://www.torontosun.com/entertainment/celebrities/2010/06/16/14406891-wenn-story.html
Laurie David “denies” affair with Al Gore……does that mean that she is a “denier”?
So she is a denier?
bubbagyro says:
June 18, 2010 at 8:36 pm
Irregardless, the Davids’ positions promoting CAGW shows how much they know.
Irregardless?
That isn’t even a word.
No. It isn’t.
Steve in SC says:
June 18, 2010 at 7:45 pm
“I greet this news with great joy.
Of course you know that Laurie David was being boinked by algore.”
I would not care to know what was said in their pillow talk. However, Pachy might want transcripts for his next AGW/romance novel.
Is it just me, or are the 2 versions of the graphs in the SPPI report (i.e. the original fraudulent graph, and the corrected one) the wrong way round? As far as I can see when reading the PDF, the apparently original graph shows temperature preceding CO2 changes, and the so-called ‘corrected chart’ has temperature following CO2 – the complete antithesis of the message.
If the graph with the temperature-CO2-mixup serves as proof of the causation of temperature by CO2, then it follows that after correcting the error it becomes proof of the reverse causation.
“Dave, UK says:
June 19, 2010 at 6:16 am
Is it just me, ”
The time direction is also reversed. Often used in this way by geophysics; present is the point on the left.
If their curriculum is now short of suitable material, then Jo Nova’s excellent little book should be ideal to fill that gap. It is very communicative, with short, clear concise explanations of the essential points, and plenty of superbly illustrative cartoons. It would be ideal for children, if only there were a suitable edition written in more sensitive & perhaps less ‘un-equivocal’ language.
I’d commend it to anyone trying to cut through the confusion & get to grips with the essentials if this rather emotive subject.
Aside from the reversal of labels, this graph is trash and shows nothing since it has no scale and clearly has suppressed zeros. Are the variations parts/billion, a few percent, or factors of 10? This sort of thing fosters lack of appreciation of the magnitude of effects that permeates public analysis of science. Kids deserve better. Quantitative pornography would do better service.
An interesting conclusion for the corrected graph would be that, when the temperature gets too high, mother earth releases CO2 that drops the temperature. CO2 actually cools things down!
I have a couple of charts showing the correct message (although I do have the charts going the wrong way as well – from present to past – it is just easier if you are doing lots of charts and if you have dual Y-axis (tempC and CO2 ppm) Excel cannot do Time from past to present with both datasets).
CO2 only explains about 30% of the temperature changes in the ice ages at 3.0C per doubling – 70% to 85% of the temperature change is caused by something else. The scale used for CO2 should match 3.0C per doubling not 10C per doubling like Al Gore’s chart in the Inconvenient Truth uses.
CO2 also lags behind temperature by 800 to 2000 years over the entire time period available of 800,000 years (although there are a few very short periods of time where the lag is smaller).
CO2 also has conflicting trends given this lag. Sometimes temperatures are going up while CO2 is going down and sometimes CO2 is going up and temperatures are going down.
If one is going to show these charts to kids and to a world-wide audience and win an Oscar and a Nobel Prize, they should be done properly and not provide a misleading picture.
http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/2127/last3iceages.png
http://img260.imageshack.us/img260/8371/transitioniceageco2.png
@ DirkH:
Thanks for the explanation (the time direction runs right-to left). I feel like a complete numpty now! Seems a bit counter-intuitive to present graphs in this way, but hey, I’m no geophysicist!
“Climate temperature” (right Y-axis label) shoulda been a dead giveaway regarding authors’ competence. Is anyone reviewing those things at all?
so glad that i missed getting crap like this crammed down my throat.
It would be funny if she said, “I did not have sexual relations with that man, Mr. Gore.”
Not all students are dumb . . .
A student at Eagle Rock Junior High won first prize at the Greater Idaho Falls Science Fair, April 26. He was attempting to show how conditioned we have become to alarmists practicing junk science and spreading fear of everything in our environment. In his project he urged people to sign a petition demanding strict control or total elimination of the chemical “dihydrogen monoxide.”
And for plenty of good reasons, since:
1. it can cause excessive sweating and vomiting
2. it is a major component in acid rain
3. it can cause severe burns in its gaseous state
4. accidental inhalation can kill you
5. it contributes to erosion
6. it decreases effectiveness of automobile brakes
7. it has been found in tumors of terminal cancer patients
He asked 50 people if they supported a ban of the chemical.
* Forty-three (43) said yes,
* six (6) were undecided,
* and only one (1) knew that the chemical was water.
The title of his prize winning project was, “How Gullible Are We?”
He feels the conclusion is obvious.
There isn’t any reasonable explanation for how an error like that can happen accidentally.
“stevengoddard says:
June 19, 2010 at 8:45 am
There isn’t any reasonable explanation for how an error like that can happen accidentally.”
But there is also no reasonable explanation as to what made them think they could get away with it. My guess is: some guy doing the layouting of the book didn’t know which was which and assigned the colors in a way that made sense with the text. Somebody reviewed his design and thought that that’s the way it has to be – otherwise the conclusion would not follow. And so it went…
I’m still keeping a keen watch to catch those polar bears foraging through my garbage in Halifax, Ms. David. Oh, by the way, Halifax is further south than Portland, Oregon. Just sayin’, is all. 😎
and they whine that they are misunderstood and need better PR………..
When you have to resort to lying, making up data, manipulating data, God that list could go on a few pages………
and get caught, over and over
Pat Heuvel says:
June 19, 2010 at 5:36 am
Thanks for the correction…you are right. I am ashamed of my weak grammar skill set.
BTW, are you ADHD, easily distracted, and having a difficult time focusing on main issues? Just asking*.
*Is this an incomplete sentence?
C’mon, it was just a “trick” used in constructing that graph and we all know that “trick” just means a tool used by climate scientists.
From: Pat Heuvel on June 19, 2010 at 5:36 am
See Wikipedia.
That there just ain’t so. 🙂
DirkH @9 re: Steven @8:45
Years ago a meteorology text book was published in which someone decided all the temperatures should be reported using the other scale (I’ve forgotten which way the conversion went.) The copy-person at the publisher must have been given a formula and the directions to apply it to all the numbers in the book that had the little circular thingy after it. He/she/they did just that. Including all the maps and references to latitude. I can interpret this as an explanation but not reasonable and also not fraud. It did produce an interesting set of maps!
(I have a copy of this book packed away among hundreds of others in scores of boxes and if big oil or some other benefactor will send a check of sufficient value I could maybe find it in a week or so.)
Remember people, the thing about Gore and David isn’t true at all, unless it is published in a peer-reviewed journal.
This piece about Laurie David is clearly not peer-reviewed.
Clearly further fact-checking was needed. Hey, I remember the 2000 election, I saw at least one Bush/Gore debate. My impression: Wow, Disney has sure come along with those animatronics. Noticeable lag time between prompt and response though…
How certain are we that the error was not, in fact, deliberate? I wouldn’t trust these clowns any farther than I could throw Gore.
Note: I know people who have had hernias and I’m not about to get one due to trying to lift a really, really, really tubby person.
Just to pick nits, the Davids divorced like a year or two ago, so that’s Larry David’s ex-wife.
So she wasn’t cheating on Larry David when she, allegedly, was gored by Gore.
From the Amazon page
http://www.amazon.com/Down-Earth-Guide-Global-Warming/dp/0439024943
i get the impression that Laurie David is the frontperson (“About the Author” shows only her picture and name) and Cambria Gordon was the (ghost)writer. Cambria Gordon also writes childrens books and scripts alone:
http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/contributor.jsp?id=10360
Probably neither of them had the slightest idea about what that grah with those 2 axises and two wiggly lines meant. Oh, just give it some nice colors.
————
I can’t believe they didn’t consult Gavin Schmitdt upstairs before publishing. Or did they? :o)
From the Amazon reviews at:
http://www.amazon.com/Down-Earth-Guide-Global-Warming/product-reviews/0439024943/ref=dp_db_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1
about the corrections to later editions of the book:
J.S. Green [2007]:
“[…]
Scholastic is planning to issue a revised version with an updated chart, but there will be no revision to the text of the book, which references and explains the chart. I don’t know that most kids will notice that the chart does not support the argument, but an important subject like this should be accurate in all details.
[…]”
If that is correct that means you end up with a corrected graph but the textual description will no longer match what the graph says. Which makes the whole thing confusing and inconsistent; and at least one smart pupil per classroom will spot it. A whole lotta fun for the teachers to find their way out of that mess i would say.
Yes, of course the Science and Public Policy Institute, one of the most vehement anti-global warming “groups”, would come out against any book about AGW. Is not the Lord Monkton 3rd Viscount of Brenchley and former Science Advisor to Margaret Thatcher a charter member?
REPLY: So are you interested in accuracy in the education of our children or do you just want to play anonymous rant-o-matic? Sheesh. SPPI was right. The school board is right to pull the book, and your foaming won’t change that. Take a time out. – Anthony
GeoFlynx,
You are misrepresenting the situation.
SPPI has never taken the position that there is no AGW. On the contrary, SPPI regularly points out that human activity may raise the temperature as much as 1°C [over half of that has already occurred]. Such an increase would be hugely beneficial for the biosphere, and poses no threat.
And how can anyone be “anti global warming”? The planet has been naturally warming since the end of the LIA. We already know that, so why go on an anti-Monckton rant? Does he really derange you folks that much?
Dave Wendt says:
June 18, 2010 at 10:50 pm
Given the growing numbers of children being presented for treatment with stress and anxiety problems related to fears generated by their nearly constant exposure to CAGW propaganda, perhaps rather than trying to get the green loons at EPA, the kleptocrats in Congress, and Obama’s collectivist mafia to recognize the weaknesses of CAGW science, it would be more productive to launch child abuse complaints against every school district that still features this terrorizing propaganda…..
______________________________________________________________________
All it takes is a really smart lawyer and a grand jury. Citizens in the USA really need to find out what their rights and duties are.
“The primary function of a jury is not, as many think, to dispense punishment to fellow citizens accused of breaking various laws, but rather to protect fellow citizens from tyrannical abuses of power by government….” http://fija.org/
Grand Jury
“The U.S. Attorneys Manual states that prosecutors “must recognize that the grand jury is an independent body, whose functions include not only the investigation of crime and the initiation of criminal prosecution but also the protection of the citizenry from unfounded criminal charges” (USAM, Section 9-11.010). The Manual recognizes that targets of investigations have the right and can “request or demand the opportunity to tell the grand jury their side of the story” (USAM, Section 9-11.152).
The Supreme Court states that the independent grand jury’s purpose is not only to investigate possible criminal conduct, but to act as a “protector of citizens against arbitrary and oppressive governmental action,” and to perform its functions, the independent grand jury “deliberates in secret and may determine alone the course of
its inquiry” (United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S. 338 (1974)). An independent grand jury is to “stand between the prosecutor and the accused,” and to determine whether a charge is legitimate, or is “dictated by malice or personal ill will” (Hale v. Henkel, 201 U.S. 43 (1906)). The grand jury is to protect citizens against “hasty, malicious and oppressive persecution” and to insure that prosecutions are not “dictated by an intimidating power or by malice and personal ill will” (Wood v. Georgia, 370 U.S. 375 (1962)). The independent grand jury is described as “a body with powers of investigation and inquisition, the scope of whose inquiries is not to be limited narrowly by questions of propriety or forecasts of the probable result of the investigation” Branzburg v. Hayes, 408 U.S. 665 (1972)). “Without thorough and effective investigation, the grand jury would be unable either to ferret out crimes deserving of prosecution, or to screen out charges not warranting prosecution.” (U.S. v. Sells Engineering, 463 U.S. 418 (1983))….” http://www.fija.org/docs/JG_on_the_grand_jury.pdf
“GeoFlynx says:
June 19, 2010 at 4:15 pm
Yes, of course the Science and Public Policy Institute, one of the most vehement anti-global warming “groups”, would come out against any book about AGW.”
Your solution? Don’t correct the error and hope the kids won’t notice?
For a specific description of Viscount Moncton’s position, see here.
I think they just used some smoothing function that artificially distorts the time axis of both Temperature and CO2 (they didn’t switch them, they just artificially smoothed them). Smooth CO2 over 25,000 years (or 1000 datapoints) and you could get a chart like the book has shown above. (That is part of the reason I don’t like smoothing any data unless it is too variable to see properly).
There is really no time period in the 800,000 years of data where CO2 leads temperature. Zoom-in to any period and CO2 always changes after Temperatures.
http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/5052/last800k.png
For example, here is a Zoom-in on the Interglacial at 335,000 years ago where the chart from the book seems to show a 20,000 year lead-in period for CO2 before Temperatures increase. Nope, there is the usual 800 year lag for when CO2 rises after Temperatures start increasing.
http://img576.imageshack.us/img576/3559/interglacial335k.png
The above is just one example of the utter crap fed to our kids today. Textbooks that cost the earth are riddled with errors. I could not find the website I was actually looking for that had some absolutely hilarious examples, but I did run across this:
None Dare Call It Education
As usual it is a mix of truth and religion, but it does document some of the problems in our education system
“….official state Outcome-Based Education guidelines instruct teachers to encourage children to guess at words and meanings from pictures printed with the stories rather than teaching them to sound out words phonetically.
…”new-new math” books tell students that math isn’t too important anymore because computers do the work and then instructs them to “guess and check” until they get right” answers.
Chapter 1 also gives the details on how when Massachusetts started testing incoming teachers in 1998…
…56% of the college graduates being tested for teaching jobs flunked. To help more pass, the State Board of Education lowered the “passing grade” for the eighth-grade level test. The governor was outraged. He expressed concerns that “perhaps thousands of teachers in the classroom today are not meeting the standards.” Similar alarming reports are documented from other states…..”
Talk about “It is worse than we thought!”
A big problem today is in most families both parents have to work to make ends meet so Mom is not as available to closely supervise her children’s education. I can certainly remember my Mom raising Cain about various problems but that does not seem to happen as much now.
Gail Combs,
I just ran across this. Figured it might be right up your alley.☺
‘The Children’s Book of American Birds’, dedicated to Alexander Worple.
H/t Plum
==============================
Di Caprio? What does he have to do with this? Sure he’s a good and well paid actor but has he any science qualification? Or does his good looks beef up the argument? It’s a bit like saying I think I may have a serious medical problem. Now, who should I consult? Robert Redford or my doctor. When they bring in the celebrities, you know the argument is running pretty weak (no pun intended).
I am sorry, but the curves are actually not mislabeled. The biggest error is, in fact, that the current level of CO2 in the atmosphere is not visible. It would show up as a vertical red bar reaching the top of the chart on its far left side.
Anders L. says: June 21, 2010 at 5:42 am
I am sorry, but the curves are actually not mislabeled. The biggest error is, in fact, that the current level of CO2 in the atmosphere is not visible. It would show up as a vertical red bar reaching the top of the chart on its far left side.
Apparently you haven’t seen the original graph from the literature, indicating that CO2 levels were higher in the past. So, who’s the real denier here.
GeoFlynx says:
June 19, 2010 at 4:15 pm
Yes, of course the Science and Public Policy Institute, one of the most vehement anti-global warming “groups”, would come out against any book about AGW. Is not the Lord Monkton 3rd Viscount of Brenchley and former Science Advisor to Margaret Thatcher a charter member?
REPLY: So are you interested in accuracy in the education of our children or do you just want to play anonymous rant-o-matic? Sheesh. SPPI was right. The school board is right to pull the book, and your foaming won’t change that. Take a time out. – Anthony
GeoFlynx – Yes, It looks like children in Omaha won’t be learning about “Cross Correlation” anytime soon thanks to the good works of the SPPI. Leads and Lags aside, the correlation is obvious and is the larger point being made. As to our children’s education, I find the prospect of intellectual censorship by private interests chilling.
GeoFlynx says:
June 21, 2010 at 8:57 am
“I find the prospect of intellectual censorship by private interests chilling.”
Now, are you implying that the (deliberate?) misrepresentation of factual data is an intellectually protected educational tool?
Maybe you should consider that the truly chilling prospect is public education indoctrinating our children to believe what is ‘correct’ as opposed to following the facts where they lead.
Your side is sick. Your logic is as sick as your science.
This was pulled from the school because of a factual error. One which is quite clear and obvious to the world. To refer to that as intellectual censorship is very disgusting.
Now, go sit in timeout.
Wow. I’m really surprised that the WUWT crowd has still not gotten past the 800 year lag. This is really basic stuff folks.
Many of us are aware that the warmists have come up with a way of explaining it away, but we’re unconvinced.