You know you must be having an impact when protesters show up and counter meetings are being scheduled. I use the word “denialism” because the flyer I was shown from CSIRO contained that word several times, but does not appear in their official PR.
Steve Mosher had some commentary on it a few days ago here
From The Age and ABC via Australian Climate Madness I find that while I’m doing my tour in Australia, CSIRO organized a meeting that is designed to combat the sort of inconvenient discussions I’m having. Fortunately, I’ve been given the whole slide show and can share it here. For example, see how CSIRO views “sceptics”:
Here’s the view of “engaged” people:
Simon of ACM writes:
Note that they’re not meeting to hang their heads in shame and discuss the shonky science, fudged data, blocking of FOI requests or intimidation of sceptical climate journals, which is all par for the course. No, this is all about communication – it’s just that they’re not getting their message across properly, obviously. The science is just fine, the public are just too stupid to understand:
REPRESENTATIVES of scientific organisations including the CSIRO and Bureau of Meteorology will meet today to discuss better communication of the science behind man-made climate change, in the wake of crumbling political and public consensus on global warming.
The conference in Sydney, organised by the Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies (FASTS), is part of a long-term bid to develop a ”national communication charter” for major scientific organisations and universities to better spruik the evidence of climate change.
The conference will hear an address from Australia’s chief scientist, Penny Sackett Representatives of the CSIRO, Bureau of Meteorology, Australian Academy of Science and Department of Climate Change, among others, will attend.
More here at ACM.
Here’s the slides shows in two parts:
DSE Analysis of the climate change debate Melbourne June 2010 (Part 1)
DSE Analysis of the climate change debate Melbourne June 2010 (Part 2)
“The science is just fine, the public are just too stupid to understand”.
I don’t think the enlightened folk at this conference will be able to pick taxpayer pockets any time soon. I am relishing the irony of their denial of political (and fiscal!) reality.
I know a great way to allow skeptics to reach the level of “engaged”: A debate. Oh wait that won’t work cos the skeptics win those debates.
http://sppiblog.org/news/climate-consensus-or-con-the-oxford-union-debate
Guess just stick with the tried and trusted methods of pseudo-science (models with no adjustable parameters) and of course homogenization!
Anthony tours Australia giving lectures that seek to counter the arguments AGW scepticism deniers like me would put forward. That’s fair enough, it’s a free country.
So, what’s soooo wrong with other people giving lectures with other pov’s?
I just love the way these scientists, trying to improve communication, put up four graphs all with different time series!! 0-2000, c1980-2010, 1975-2010 and 1860-2010. We known that correlation doesn’t equal causation, even if they think it does, but they can’t even show us the correlation.
Nothing wrong with people giving lectures on their own dime, Peter… government funding political propaganda with taxpayer monies is a whole different matter though.
Luke says:
June 19, 2010 at 8:56 pm “But do the sceptics ever ask to make a presentation to CSIRO or the Bureau of Meteorology. Nope – the rule is never engage where serious questions will be asked.”
WRONG. I asked David Jones, Head of Climate Change at BoM a couple of times to co-author a paper and he rejected, saying he already spent too much time writing papers.
Now, Luke, be a good lad and apologise.
(Unless you state that you do not regard me as a ‘sceptic’.)
In australia 36 turned out for the watts lecture in noosa last night ,
Carter and Archibald also gave talks , they did seem to contradict each other a bit ,
Not warming
Warming but it is the sun
did allow good questions and was all quite jovial,
For info, relevant to this thread, the Royal Society of Edinburgh has launched an inquiry “Facing Up to Climate Change”, which my understanding is really about “why don’t the public get it?”.
From http://www.royalsoced.org.uk/enquiries/climate_change/index.htm
The remit of the group will be:
1. To engage in deliberative dialogue with individuals, industries and public authorities to help develop and respond to proposed Government climate change policies;
2. To identify barriers to change and to recommend measures for current and future policies in these areas and the timescales on which action might need to be developed.
This kind of plan comes from a fundamental failure to really understand the subject matter. No, not climate science, people. The statistics are derived from market research type polls and are largely useless.
Few populations have been more brainwashed on climate change than the Brits. The BBC and large parts of our media, drill AGW into us at every available moment. It’s a theory that fits well into our mea culpa society and it sits along nicely with our guilt about everything from slavery to BP. And yet, CO2 reduction remains something that should be done by someone else.
Ask any group of people and most will know about the basic AGW message. They could list some of the suggested CO2 reduction techniques that are supposed to make a difference. Is that knowledge? No. Is it successful? Nooooooo.
There is a significant group who claim ignorance of AGW but for many of them it’s an excuse for not doing anything. It’s like asking a fat person if they know that chips are fattening, some will be tempted to feign surprise.
Engaged people in the UK probably add up to a few thousand. People who ‘know’ enough to be actually concerned and do something effective about their carbon footprint. Admittedly a lot more ‘know’ enough to worry about CO2 emissions but haven’t quite done anything significant about it yet.
Among those number are MPs and celebs (including Prince Charles) who would argue, quite strongly, that they are doing a great deal to reduce CO2 emissions. To which I say *&@ur momisugly!%**. Clearly anyone who decides to install windmills hasn’t asked the basic question ‘will these monstrosities actually make a difference to our CO2 output’. These people are very good at wasting other people’s money on vanity projects that sound good but are pointless or downright terrible. They don’t seem to be as good at cutting their air travel back. But of course I’m forgetting, that travel is ‘necessary’. Hah!
Actually I’m not being fair. The UK governments are doing something that will eventually reduce our CO2 permanently, they’re turning us into a third world country and that will have the desired effect because poor people don’t have enough money to have big CO2 footprints. Note, the recession has had a bigger impact on our emissions than any concert, TV ad, scary movie or political speech.
So is knowledge the best way to change the situation? Absolutely yes. I want everyone in the UK (and elsewhere) to start taking an interest in climate science. I want them to start saying ‘is that it, is that the best the scientists can come up with?’ I want them demanding much better standards of science and accountability. I want them to know that true or not, AGW is the most important issue of our times because it’s going to bankrupt or fry us. If CAGW theory is true, I want people to be able to truly understand the science so that they actually make a difference. If it’s not true I want us to stop piddling money down the drain and ditch TEOTWAWKI predictions.
Of course, that’s not what CSIRO have in mind at all. What they mean is more brainwashing. More money down the drain. Why pursue a policy that has already failed in the UK? Because it’s not their money they’re spending, it’s not their lives that they intend to change. It’s time we asked the big hitters in the AGW machine to start putting their carbon where their mouths are. It’s time they led by example. So come on CSIRO, what’s your carbon footprint and what are you going to do to cut it 80%? And no, outsourcing it to China doesn’t count.
Well Amino – if the sceptics are serious they can ask to make a presentation to the establishment. Have they?
Interesting perspective at Ove’s site. Despite the low Sun, the satellite temperature trend seems to still be going up. Anthony didn’t seem to have that in his slides?
http://www.climateshifts.org/?p=5505
Nobody a bit nervous?
Villabolo says:
“At this rate, which doubles every 7 years, the loss will EXPONENTIATE to over a 1,000 fold in 70 years.”
How do you know that this is what is going to happen over the next 70 years?
This statement smells like the very worst kind of climate alarmism – extrapolating a very short term trend-line out over a long period, without any kind of scientific basis for the extrapolation.
I could perform similar unscientific extrapolations of the global temperature record and show that in 100 years we will all be toast, or all be deep frozen, depending on which short term trend I choose to use.
I know of no scientific papers which claim that the Greenland ice sheet will disappear at the rate you are claiming – even the ones containing the “scary stories”.
If you are a believer in AGW, you would do your cause well not to make ridiculous claims…
I’m an Aussie who has engaged by email the CSIRO and the BoM over the misleading Climate Change information that has been presented to, and frightened unnecessarily, our younger generation of children and adult citizens especially over near future sea levels. These organisations have responded to me in agreement, with the CSIRO forcefully carrying the Federal Governments position . It is a pity as I used to respect their work achievements in major heavy industries ,but they are now political not scientific in their reports.! Given that Dr. David Jones apparently once worked at the CRU Hadley Centre, I was not taken back by the BoM replies.
As a person who has lived long enough to become a sceptic I recognise the goals that these people wish to achieve, but I believe that they are not adopting the best method of reversing the increasing use of energy from carbon sources. Just as GST, or VAT in some countries, was required to raise government revenue to fund NECESSARY services to the population, I would rather the CSIRO be less political about the climate issue and encourage the Federal Government to increase the GST .
If they all believe their climate projections, why are they not promoting nuclear power now. The UK Telegraph had an article recently “Energy gap means nuclear power is a must.” I recommend it to you along with the previous article from the same source “Does money grow in wind farms?”
Lea has argued [June 19, 2010 at 10:03 pm ] that CSIRO do not receive their scientific instruction from Gore; personally, given the standard of their recent reports, I wish they would. On tour with Anthony David Stockwell has analysed the accuracy of recent reports by CSIRO and found unequivocally that these reports are contradicted by their own data; for instance statements that rainfall has declined and droughts are going to more frequent are both wrong; rainfall patterns have altered but consistent with landuse patterns not AGW. So to with temperature; the trends are not all up and statements about record temperatures are demonstrably wrong.
Given that the CSIRO ‘science’ is so tainted these first hand reports of the education sessions being run by the CSIRO are disturbing:
““Sceptic evicted from Vic Public servants meeting on brainwashing techniques
Two climate sceptics Colin Ely and Alan Barron attended a Vic public servants meeting on Climate Brainwashing techniques conducted by the CSIRO
Here are their accounts plus that of an un named attendee (so he does not get sacked)
Colin Elys account: The Department of Sustainability and Environment were sponsoring a lecture today by the CSIRO’s Paul Holper, entitled, Dealing with Climate change Denialism.
As a former Victorian Public Servant and a member of the Climate Sceptics Party, I thought I would attend and listen to what was said and, hopefully ask a few pertinent questions.
I attended this morning and actually was the first to arrive and just walked in and sat down and waited for the lecture to attend. A short time later a Public Servant came down and said it was a government function and asked me to leave. I replied that I believed the Treasury Theatre was a ‘public place’ and that you can’t be guilty of trespassing in a public place. He advised that he was going to call ’security’, I replied that if that was what he thought was needed, then go right ahead, and I sat down again and waited for the lecture to begin.
A short time later two members of the Victoria Police Protective Security Group arrived and asked me to go outside with them. They advised me that it was a Victorian Government ‘private’ function. I replied that I believed it was a ‘public place’ and therefore I wasn’t trespassing . They advised that that wasn’t correct and if I tried to re-enter they would arrest me, (I would hasten to add that at all times these two officers treated me in a professional and respectful manner)
I therefore said that I understood them and would stay outside the theatre and, as is my democratic right under the Westminster System of Democracy, would stand outside and ‘politely’ abuse the attenders of the lecture. They advised me that I couldn’t do that in the Treasury Reserve either. So there I was, standing outside the entrance, being ‘guarded’ by two of ‘Victoria’s Finest’!
Later Alan Barron and I asked if we could hand out flyers to attenders after they left, they told us that we couldn’t do that either, so we bid them good day and left.
Alan Barrons story
I told the security people I was a federal public servant and a Victorian taxpayer and would like to attend the lecture. I was curtly told in order to gain entrance, one must have pre-registered and have one’s Victorian public service identity card on their person. If you had no ID and your name was not on the list, that was the end of the discussion. The meeting was for only registered public servants only – capis! I felt like Winston Smith, shades of 1984!
I got talking to fellow sceptic – Colin – who was standing not far from the entrance. He said he had gained entrance and had just become seated when the security guys came up and said they needed to check his details. Seeing as his name was not on the list, he was told that it is an offence to `trespass on government property’ and then promptly frog marched him out of the theatrette.
Alan says “If the government thinks climate change is such an important issue, why not throw the issue open for public discussion and debate? This nonsense about presenting only one side of the debate and holding meetings to warn people of the dangers of alleged `climate change denialism’ smacks of arrogance and manipulation as well as being patronising and condescending.”
Someone who attended the forum had this to report
Chris Mitchell introduced the presentation. He is a Ministerial Advisor to the Minister for Climate Change on Adaption.
Chris acknowleged the traditional owners of the land on which we met (and said how they guided Australia through climate change in times before European invasion).
Chris declared that he has a ‘day job’ as a director of an ASX listed carbon offset company.
Paul Holper then went through the graphs of CO2 levels over time, temperature over time, talked about Cape Grim. He said “more heat trapping gasses means more heat is trapped”, and talked about correlation, but not about causation.
Paul has worked at CSIRO for the last 20 years, and commented how predictions of 20 years ago have come true, and how current predictions are now much worse.
Paul then quoted a “European Journal of Health” (or something like that) and an article that analysed “Denialism” in the health area. He said there were 5 main characteristics used by denialists, including:
– Believe there is a conspiracy
– Pull out their own fake experts
– provide selective evidence
– misrepresent things and use logical fallacies
Paul then talked about an (unnamed) US scientist who denied Ozone was causing a problem, was a passive smoking sceptic, and is now a anthropogenic global warming sceptic.
He showed slides by John Gardener at CSIRO (Social scientist) who classified people into one of four groups – Sceptics (know but don’t think it is a problem) (5%), “Disengaged (don’t know don’t care)” (15%), “Engaged” (know and care) (35%) and “concerned uninformed” (45%). This was charted on an x/y graph with x being concern and y being knowledge.
Paul recommended not treating Climate Change as a green issue, as that puts people off.
Paul suggested that CSIRO had put out “Fact Sheets” and FAQs to counter all of the sceptical arguments.
He then went through tips on how to communicate the problem of cilmate change effectively:
– Be Clear; Impartial; relevant
– Be Objective
– Be Practical
– Message must resonate
– Avoid doom and gloom
– Avoid impenetrable language
– Use different media
– Provide info for different levels of understanding
– reiterate over time
– be positive
He also mentioned Graeme Pearman (his boss in CSIRO) standing up in a room 10 years ago saying “If anyone can disprove what we’re saying here, I’ll give you people, money, resources, what ever, to disprove this science”. No one has taken up that offer.
There was no heated exchange, although the microphone lady was a lot quicker to take the microphone back from people who asked sceptical questions that from people who asked “the right” questions.””
Villabolo,
And now that you’ve got me on to the subject of the Greenland ice sheet…
Let’s take a look at some of the historical record relating to the Greenland ice sheet. There are published studies showing that in some parts of Greenland, that are currently buried under substantial depths of ice, there were forests growing within the last half million years or so – this has been shown by means of cores drilled through the ice and into the earth below. This means, of course, that there was no ice in those locations at the time.
Other studies show that previous interglacial periods in the last 800,000 years were somewhat warmer than the one we are in currently – estimated at ~2C warmer in some cases. There is also evidence that in these interglacials the sea level was many meters higher than at present, implying that there was less ice locked up in ice-caps.
This is significant in the current AGW debate in showing that the natural climate is much more variable than many in the AGW camp would have us believe – and that none of the recent changes in the global climate are anything out of the ordinary in terms of climate history.
Anthony
This is what we have to put up with in Australia, scientists with absolutely closed minds to any suggestion that their government gravy train approved climate science could ever be wrong.
Unfortunately Australia has a long recorded history of extremely varied and fickle climate and political interference, indifference as well to proper funding, to the point that weather and its inevitable variations across the country have become a political football, where the scientists have been encouraged to use media, for biased promotion and alarm to get equipment, computers and a voice in the political door.
Don’t take my word for it, just read the “Weather Watchers” 100 years of the BUREAU of METEOROLOGY the OFFICIAL and approved record written by David Day. Inside the front and rear covers is an interesting graphic of the 1900 to 2005 year by year representation of the varied nature of the Australian Climate. Each years graphic shows where in Australia the (Rainfall) effect was felt in the following three gradings Blue, “Amongst the wettest one third of historical observations”, White, “Amongst the middle one third of historical observations” and red “Amongst the driest one third of historical observations” and that graphic variability is the reasons that the ordinary Australian has always been susceptible to political influence in the “weather” or climate field. The Main stream Media here has always had a finger in the pie and used the “climate” as a means to an end. I’d love someone to show the CSIRO and the BOM those graphic images THEY approved, for they do show the inconsistency in the present representation of our climate. The CSIRO, the Government and the BOM are carefully misrepresenting where they think they can get away with and of course biased to convince us that CAGW is “Real Science”.
I think if you can get a copy of that book Anthony it will explain a lot about the political reality of what we are dealing with, the machinations within those official BOM history pages will show you how ingrained the political/science/media”force” has built the awe of “any” science in the minds of ordinary Australians to the point where the arrogance of the inner group of scientists has lead them to be the political sheep in the pen of CAGW “science” to the point they cannot lose face and stand to lose either the research dollars or the public kudos that they once commanded.
I just thank you and the other sceptical scientists’ who are willing to spend the time and effort to expose their activities and agenda.
Please keep up the good work for all our sakes and the return to excellence in climate science.
PS that book is also an interesting look at the historical problems in recording our temperature records, the known danger of errors in modelling, jumping to conclusions ahead of the science, the political need to encourage English immigration by toning down the harshness of our climate, and the history of flim flam weather casting, distrust of alternatives, and head in the sand scientists among other things.
The taxpayers of Australia should ask for a refund of the money spent on that propaganda show.
It would be interesting to find out the methodology of the alleged survey and to see if a survey was actually performed.
Cohenite – having seen Stockwell’s presentation I’m sure he wouldn’t be game to present the same seminar to CSIRO. You have no test of a rebuttal in a serious environment. It’s easy just to repeat Sherrington’s assurance about his “neutrality”. His talk indicates he’s very much a campaigner. Let’s not as we say down under “beat around the bush”.
BTW is any of the Stockwell’s stuff published anywhere except E&E? Of course not.
And I’m sorry – I missed Geoff’s request for an apology. You want me to apologise that David Jones declined to co-author a paper with you? I am sorry as I have I missed something? What has that to do with the Watt’s tour personally and formally informing the establishment where they have gone wrong. Surely in the national interest?
This notion that the public is simply not understanding the alarmist message due to some communication failure is amusing [particularly from a psychological perspective].
The public is fatigued by the endless parade of MSM doom & gloom (whether it be about war, climate, economics, or whatever) but this doesn’t mean the public will easily fall for repackaged “feel good” misinformation.
What the alarmists appear to not understand:
1) People don’t want to hear that they need to remain vigilantly alarmed for the rest of their lives.
2) Knowledgeable non-alarmists aren’t necessarily saying it’s all natural cycles; rather we are saying we should make an effort to understand the complex couplings in the climate system (instead of pretending they are fully understood at present [an absolutely ridiculous notion]).
3) Conflation of CO2 concentrations with global temperature relies on untenable assumptions.
I would advise alarmists to be practical – i.e. focus objectively on #2.
I sternly advise left-leaning politicians to move WELL away from conflating social issues with climate science. You folks are SO far off base. You are UNDERMINING something so fundamental as BALANCE in our society. Climate computer fantasies [based on untenable assumptions] are absolutely NOT the route to a fair & just society. You’re playing straight into the hands of the radical right by hitching your horse to the wrong wagon. In order to look sensible, focus on #2 and treat justice & fairness as COMPLETELY UNRELATED concerns. If you want to do something nice for the environment, you have my FULL support, but make sure it is actually something that is good for the environment. Don’t confuse climate computer fantasies with the needs of the natural environment in reality. I can suggest opposing toxic pollution and advocating parks & natural forests.
One final piece of advice for alarmist junkies:
Get off the computer fantasies and take an interest in nature.
Luke says: June 20, 2010 at 12:59 am
Despite the low Sun, the satellite temperature trend seems to still be going up.
Mean Amsterdam May temp last 15 years, – 13.3 degs.
Mean Amsterdam May temp for 2010, – 9 degs.
Same is happening for June.
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/EHAM/1997/5/20/MonthlyHistory.html?req_city=NA&req_state=NA&req_statename=NA
Rule No1 of AGW – the warming only ever happens where nobody lives.
.
I can find faults with almost every slide in Holper’s presentation. It is a package filled with lies, ambiguity and a lack of acceptance of alternative scientific hypotheses.
Basically it is rubbish which is all too commonly being propogated by CSIRO these days.
Feet2theFire says:
June 19, 2010 at 6:40 pm
Excellent comment!!!
Been through this with politicians myself and get quoted “We fully endorse the IPCC report”.
Gail Combs says:
June 19, 2010 at 6:54 pm
Love it!
TinyCo2 says:
June 20, 2010 at 12:52 am
Good comment!
cohenite says:
June 20, 2010 at 1:37 am
Thank you, very informative.
It makes me sick to my stomach how OUR money is spent, by politicians, government bureaucrats and now CSIRO scientists(?)
Paul Vaughan says:
June 20, 2010 at 3:15 am
Good comment!
Trying to lock in deals on carbon taxes and carbon capture technology before the bottom totally collapses is the goal.
Yes, the old climate “science” snake oil does seem to be losing its luster among the populace. Time to repackage it, and completely re-tool the marketing campaign, to give it a brand new image, with more positivity, using simpler language, and with more awareness of the target audience in mind. Remember to give people simple, easy things they can do like changing light bulbs and recycling, so they will feel engaged and positive about the outcome. Use all forms of media available, and get out there and sell, sell, sell.
Yeah, that’ll work.