Closing out dissent
By Professor Bob Carter August 1, 2010, originally published at Quadrant Online, portions republished here with permission.
The phenomena of disinvitation and the brotherhood of silence
Scientists who venture to make independent statements in public about environmental myths soon come to learn about two post-modern-science tactics used to suppress their views – namely, disinvitation and the application of a brotherhood of silence. How these tactics work is explained in this article.
The modus operandi
A member of the organising committee for one or another conference comes to one of my talks, or chances to meet a friend who has attended. Enthusiasm thereby arises for me to speak at the conference that is being planned. 
Prompted by the member, the conference committee approves an invitation, which I accept. Later, the Council or governing body of the society in question gets to “rubber stamp” the conference program and someone says: “Bob Carter as a plenary speaker! You must be joking”. The disinvitation follows, sometimes well after the talk has been written and travel booked.
In a variation on this, earlier this year I was invited by our ABC to contribute an opinion piece about climate change to their online blog site, The Drum. The piece was duly written and tendered, only to be declined.
Similarly, strong control has long been exercised by public broadcasters ABC and SBS against the appearance of independent scientists on their TV and radio news and current affairs programs. I first encountered this in 2007, when I participated in a broadcast discussion about Martin Durkin’s epoch-making documentary film, The Great Global Warming Swindle. Before the broadcast I had the astonishing experience of being successively invited, disinvited, prevaricated with and then finally invited to participate again, as competing interests inside the ABC battled, as they obviously saw it, to control the outcome of the panel discussion.
I have generally viewed these and similar experiences over the years as amusing irritations that go with the territory of scientific independence. But the matter starts to become offensive, and indeed sinister, when it transpires that scientists from CSIRO, and other IPCC-linked research groups in Australia, have been behind particular disinvitations; or, even more commonly, have refused to participate in public debate on climate change.
The same self-appointed guardians of the sanctity of IPCC climate propaganda also strive ceaselessly to prevent invitations from being issued in the first place. For example, when it was suggested to a Sydney metropolitan university that I might give a talk on the campus, their Distinguished (sic) Professor of Sustainability responded that:
he would not be interested in allowing anyone to present a point of view which did not support the fact that human-generated carbon dioxide has caused global warming.
Que?
Engineers Australia (Sydney)
On July 8th this year, at the invitation of the Chairman of the Electrical & ITE Branch, Engineers Australia Sydney, I delivered a lecture on climate change in Chatswood to an attentive audience of about 55 practicing engineers, retired engineers and engineering students.
EA (Sydney) run a series of about 22 such lectures every year for the continuing professional development of their members. The intent is to impart knowledge to the engineering fraternity on current subjects of interest, and lecturers are generally recognized as leaders in the field of the subject that they present.
When controversial topics are involved, the institute attempts to attract speakers who will illustrate different aspects of the debate, as indeed they did on this occasion. For the lecture that I delivered was intended to be one of a pair, in which the other speaker would explain the reasons behind the federal government’s preference for using United Nations (IPCC) advice as the basis for Australian climate policy.
Significantly, CSIRO were asked, and declined, to provide such a speaker, thereby exemplifying the brotherhood of silence, i.e. the long-held ban that all IPCC-linked research groups strive to inflict upon independent scientists by refusing to debate with them as equals on a public platform. Earlier this year, CSIRO chairperson Megan Clarke boasted that her organisation had 40 persons involved in advising the IPCC, yet not one of them was available to talk to Australia’s major engineering professional institute? Pull the other one, Megan.
Well, if CSIRO is not prepared to explain the basis for government’s science policy then there’s always the universities, so a Director of the Climate Change Research Centre at another Sydney metropolitan university was approached to participate as the second speaker. He too declined on the grounds that the envisaged two-lecture format was “flawed”, adding:
You would not have an “anti-gravity” person debate gravity and since there honestly is no debate in this space in SCIENCE the offer I made a little while ago of offering a full day to detail the science to your members stand(s).
Your society risks falling into the trap of the media in believing there is debate and that is sad, misleading and unfortunate.
This stance was supported by an experienced NSW power engineer who wrote to EA at about the same time to malign my professional standing, and who included, for good measure, a gratuitous remark about the well-regarded London publisher of my recent book on climate change, viz.:
It appears that Bob Carter is representative of the group of the relatively little-published 2% group of scientists who generally are not mainly working in real climate science (Bob Carter is a geologist not a climate scientist, and is published in You-tube and popular magazines, not peer-reviewed journals), who oppose the real climate science consensus. This appears to be correct based on your notice of the meeting and his website. In this case he does not deserve equal time to the 98% of scientists regularly published on climate change in peer-reviewed journals. There is no counter consensus! I question the wisdom of giving this man the Engineers Australia podium.
Furthermore, Stacey International is a publisher of popular works and has no specific scientific credibility.
These examples both involve the citation of private letters. Other engineers blatantly attain the same ends of denigration or censorship in full public gaze. For example, ANU’s Tony Kevin wrote recently in an invited address in Canberra to the Australian Council of Engineering Deans:
I am not going to dwell on climate change denialism. The science is in. Climate crisis denialism should simply be condemned as a socially disruptive cognitive disorder. It seduces people who are psychologically unwilling to admit limits to economic growth. Denialists cling to the arrogant “mechanical philosophy” of mankind’s infinite right and capacity to exploit and transcend his natural environment. Or, they suffer from a kind of morally indifferent, fatalistic nihilism.
Like other cognitive disorders that have in the past caused great suffering to humanity, climate denialism is impervious to observed facts. As the climate crisis worsens, denialism perversely flourishes even more, confusing the community and eroding public support for sound risk-averse policies.
Needless to say, all these statements, both the private and the public, are a confused farrago of mostly ad hominem nonsense. It is disturbing, to say the least, that organisations and persons who would be quick to claim professional status consider that it is their current duty to disparage, or to refuse to debate with, or to muzzle scientists whose views on climate change they apparently disagree with.
Disturbing too is the fact that for at least the last twenty years the practitioners of environmentalism and climate alarm have made it their business to exert special influence on our younger citizens. Many parents have shared the experience of being horrified by the imbalance of information that their children from time to time come home from school with about iconic environmental issues. The indoctrination continues, of course, at university, and through into the junior workforce.
An exemplary case follows next of the way in which the views of young Australians are manipulated.
…
Conclusions
The scientific behaviour described in this article is pathological, for the essence of scientific methodology is the free sharing of data, and the unfettered and unprejudiced discussion of those data. Issuing statements of “consensus” or “authority” is antithetical to good science, and especially so in circumstances where the originating organisations have been established with political intent, have acted to restrict public debate or have a financial conflict of interest. Those familiar with the global warming issue will know that (IPCC) authority rules, despite it being well known that some IPCC practitioners of warming alarmism have flouted correct scientific procedures since the 1990s. And, anyway, a science truth is so not because the IPCC, the Royal Society or the Minister for Science asserts it to be so, but because it is based upon a hypothesis that has survived repeated testing by many independent scientists.
The behaviour is not just pathological. It is also part of a much wider pattern of science degradation that has developed since the 1980s. The change has been caused in part by the insistence of politicians that taxpayers’ money must be used in support of scientific research that is “useful” or “in the national interest”. Such superficial diktats are attractive to bureaucrats and businessmen, but they have proved to be a recipe for turning scientists from experts in problem solution into experts in (insoluble) problem creation. Given the persistence of such attitudes, Australia will never see the Tasmanian forests, the Murray-Darling River or the Great Barrier Reef “saved”, and nor will we ever be free from the ogre of human-caused climate change.
…. more
read the rest of this article at Quadrant Online here
Professor Bob Carter is a stratigrapher and marine geologist at James Cook University (Queensland) and the University of Adelaide (South Australia). I had the honor of being accompanied by him and having him chair several of the events on the tour.
His new book in the Stacey International Independent Thinkers series is Climate: the Counter Consensus, which summarises the scientific and sociological and policy aspects of the global warming debate.
Available here:
thanks for this Bob. Your lecture here was particularly informative (and amusing)
Alas, one gets the definite feeling that the hardcore of the AGW tribe would like to treat leading skeptics the way the old Soviet Union treated many leading dissidents –by sending them off to mental hospitals.
That’s all they know to do when their “education” agenda fails –if someone refuses to be educated to the revealed truth, they must have a mental health disease.
FriendXecusion is the new word for ”un-friend” and ”de-friend” in all social sites.
Its no longer cool to unfriend, friendXecution is IN!
Nothing new there:
1672 – First confrontation between Hooke and Newton. Newton had written a paper on his demonstration of white light being a composite of other colours. It was presented to the Royal Society but Newton was met with a strong rebuff by Hooke.
1673 – Newton threatened to leave the Royal Society. After much gushing of admiration, respect, etc. on Oldenburg’s (Secretary of the Royal Society) part, as well as an offer to wave dues to the Society, Newton changed his mind.
1675 – Dispute between Hooke and the Dutch scientist Huygens concerning the invention of the balance-spring watch.
1676 – Thomas Shadwell’s successful play, The Virtuoso, satirising The Royal Society and, so Hooke felt, himself.
1684 – Major confrontation between Hooke and Newton. It concerned Newton’s Principia, and the involvement Hooke had in it. Newton claimed Hooke had none, but a closer look at the events prior to the Principia’s publication, leave little doubt that Hooke was indeed involved. The Principia was published, without recognition to Hooke.
“Tony Kevin wrote recently in an invited address in Canberra to the Australian Council of Engineering Deans:
Climate crisis denialism should simply be condemned as a socially disruptive cognitive disorder. It seduces people who are psychologically unwilling to admit limits to economic growth. Denialists cling to the arrogant “mechanical philosophy” of mankind’s infinite right and capacity to exploit and transcend his natural environment.”
No science here only a religious like philosophical argument that mankind is evil and always will be.
Casting a mental illness diagnosis on another is an attempt to take power over them and their mind.
If we toss a good number of files on patients in front of a dozen Psychiatrists, only 20% will agree on a diagnosis. How do warming alarmists claim to have diagnostic tools for human mental illness? They can’t even get weather forcasts correct.
Very revealing. Although I am not surprised that “the brotherhood” are unwilling to join in any sort of analytical discussion of their beliefs in AGW/CC. They have seen what happens when even ordinary folks, with little or no scientific knowledge, look at the “science” they hold to. Like most religions, little is left once you peel away the superstition and bullying.
Bob’s comments about talking to engineering groups made me think that might make for an “end run” around the “brotherhood.”
I like to define science as the process of learning the rules of how the universe works, and engineering as the process of applying those rules as tools to make new systems. Scientists follow interesting veins of knowledge, Engineers are goal oriented – a civil engineer designing a bridge juggles material lifetimes, safety issues, cost, and schedules to produce something that will be used for decades.
“The phenomena of disinvitation and the brotherhood of silence” have no place in that process, though competition between engineering projects and firms can become rather ugly. (Ultimately those firms tend to lose their way to upstarts focused on the results.)
So, engineers in general are much more interested in information they can use. Climate-wise, civil engineers designing national infrstructure, should be quite itnerested in where the climate is heading and their gatherings could be great places for discussions as planned at the EA gathering Bob spoke at. If the engineering community gets exposed to both sides of the story or even just the skeptics’ side, they could carry on and build the systems we need and leave the scientists to play their silly games.
I’m sure the EA talk with just Bob went fine – a talk of his with geology comments that that were very similar to brothers (also a geologist) provided a lot of direction in my first serious essay on climate at http://wermenh.com/climate/science.html . Bob was in my “short list” of people I really wanted to meet at the ICCC conference in Chicago.
BTW, I heard Heidi Cullen (then at the Weather Channel) comment that geologists were the hardest group to convince of the dangers of global warming. The reason was clear to me – they know what conditions the Earth has endured in the past and a little bit of adaptation for the worst outlook is minor compared to the next super volcano eruption, asteroid impact, or continent moving a few thousand miles.
Welcome to modern science, where dissent is quashed and the hard questions are never funded. What happened to real thought, and risk, in science?
Isn’t it a wonderful state that those trained in the same disciplines can declare themselves “climate scientists” while denigrating another of the same discipline as not a climate scientist. This apparent double standard by definition should eliminate the authoritative declaration of the “climate scientist” Who is the denier the one willing to debate and test the hypothesis or the one that refuses debate on the grounds that there is no debate.
Is it any wonder that the people are losing faith in the scientific community as a whole and climate science in particular. This essay is a statement concerning the sad state of the scientific community today.
Bill Derryberry
Excellent article.
Thanks Bob.
Two more freezing winters and we will uncork the champagne.
Bravo, Bob. Keep up the good fight. Although the “scientist’s” minds are closed, polls show that regular people have real doubts about the issue of anthropogenic global warming. As well they should when the supercilious ass quoted in your article states: “…Climate crisis denialism should simply be condemned as a socially disruptive cognitive disorder. It seduces people who are psychologically unwilling to admit limits to economic growth….” They can see where this claptrap leads.
Again, thanks for the enlightening article.
It is true that Stacey International is not widely recognised as a scientific publisher.
It is also true that its Independent Minds series includes some first-rate titles (yes, I’ve read all of them) and that Professor Carter’s “Climate: the Counter Consensus” is one of the best. It’s a first-rate overview of the case against AGW theory – no wonder the unscrupulous feel the need to keep him isolated.
climate denialism impervious to OBSERVED FACTS, strange there was I thinking the same thing about warmists!
Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand why the “warmists” are doing these things.
It has been my experience that those holding advanced degrees are easier to con than your average red neck. The reason is the majority of the intellectual’s knowledge is “received”. They are taught that brilliant minds (like theirs) have come to a consensus and the knowledge imparted is the same as their work. The modern body of knowledge is too vast to learn on your own through experiment. Therefore this receiving of knowledge is necessary. Unfortunately for the small minds, to question becomes a personal assault on the foundation of everything they believe.
The average red neck has to make it in the real world…..
End the public funding of science. It has done tremendous harm to mix politics and science. We are headed down the path of Lysenko.
Monty
This article rings true for me. I could easily substitute “Tim Ball ” for ” Bob Carter” . It is scary the similarity of these experiences. Thankfully, it seems that the public is starting to realize the implications of the alarmist agenda. FYI, it is not to “save the earth”, although many useful idiots have fallen for the ruse. The ivory towers and the politicians seem to have lost touch with what the average person has to deal with daily. The draconian policies shoved down the throats of regular folks will not end well for the perpetrators. The media is still spewing “2010 hottest year on record” crap. Is this the result of a concerted push back by those tarnished by climategate? They still have the MSM’s ear and are using it for a full court press. Different story on the internet as the skeptics continue to lay waste to the weak warmist “science”.
Every day they keep proving that the science is not settled.
After over five decades, they still can’t nail it.
…and are scared to death to debate it
When Bob spoke some years ago at Aust. National Uni., it first opened my eyes to the controversy – and the shameful behaviour of my heckling academic colleagues from Earth Sciences. I admired his coolness under fire, but since realize he must already have been accustomed to that.
Because of this BLOG, we now know how the “power brokers” work. Don’t “abandon all hope”, things are actually much better than in the past. Examples follow:
1) The Catholic Church would ostracize, excommunicate, and if that didn’t work: home arrest and finally burning at the stake. The science was “the Earth rotates about the Sun”.
2) Starting in 1890, a proposal was put forward that the Earth was not static, but had plate tectonics, and the plates moved, and South America was once part of Africa. A Japanese person restated this in ~1928. When the “old guard scientists” died off due to old age, guess what, the continents were on plates and the plates actually moved –YEAR -> WikiAnswers says ”
The theory of plate tectonics was accepted after the discovery of sea floor spreading.”
(no reference to a year). The actual year is now listed with other information to say that (my comment) ‘it was actually 1906’.
WikiAnswers says”
Theory that oceanic crust forms along submarine mountain zones, known collectively as the oceanic ridge system, and spreads out laterally away from them. This idea, proposed by U.S. geophysicist Harry H. Hess (1906 – 1969) in 1960, was pivotal in the development of the theory of plate tectonics.
Trust me: if you were a PhD student between 1890 and 1960 in geology, your chance of publishing a paper about the “plates” would have been NULL.
So the new Church is the Liberal Media, and we are in good shape: we are only being ostracized and excommunicated.
Maybe the voters in the next election will prevent “house arrest”.
DocWat says:
August 1, 2010 at 7:11 am
Someone help me here… WHY??
There is an answer to your question. Keep looking for it and you will find out why this is happing. It’s ugly and will rock your world. The answer is there for you and many who read this WUWT know what it is.
This Tony Kevin character really takes the cake. In two paragraphs he manages to subtly equate skeptics with Holocaust deniers, suggest that they suffer from not just a mental illness, but a “socially disruptive cognitive disorder” and/or being moraly indifferent nihilists.
I call it the 2nd fastest gun in the west syndrome. When the fastest gun in the west shows up in town, #2 suddenly can’t find his gun and claims that gun fighting is something only the deranged take part in. A posse should be organized to put #1 away where he can’t harm anyone. He’s got a cognitive disorder and is socially disruptive.
They won’t debate because it exposes how many holes there are in the data, let alone simple facts like CO2 is logarithmic, meaning is is subject to the law of diminishing returns. Most of what increased CO2 is ever going to do, it is already doing, and adding more will not change much. I have yet to see an alarmist credibly refute that fact alone.
DocWat says:
“August 1, 2010 at 7:11 am
Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand why the “warmists” are doing these things.”
And Tony Kevin responds..” It seduces people who are psychologically unwilling to admit limits to economic growth.”
So it really is all about control. Just another crisis that must be dealt with immediately before we can understand it but they will control it.
You would not have an “anti-gravity” person debate gravity
Why not? The gravity side would make the other side look stupid. If the global warming scientists are right as gravity they would make the other side look stupid too.
So let them come up with these silly reasons to not debate. Hiding makes them look dubious. And I say thanks to them for that! 🙂
DocWat says:
August 1, 2010 at 7:11 am
Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand why the “warmists” are doing these things.
They don’t understand either. With the exception of a few nihilist profiteers, it’s mostly unconscious. Personal unconscious of the “Suppress the moral ambiguities because I have to feed my family” type and collective unconscious that has common ground with what can heuristically be described as regression into a tribal or deficient magical state of mind.
Read Jung and Jean Gebser (who don’t agree on a lot of things BTW), it will take forever, but it will eventually come together as applicable. Start here if you like:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:bpa16XmDiyUJ:www.gebser.org/publications/pdf/introphiljgebser.pdf+Jean+Gebser&cd=4&hl=en&ct=clnk
Moderators – feel free to snip this if too off topic.
The real irony of all the nonsense such as “the debate is over” the refusal to debate in a public forum, the ostracizing of people like Drs. Bob Carter and Judith Curry, etc. is that it is not working. The public are a lot smarter than the intellectuals believe. They have particularly sensitive noses for bull—t when they know the action recommended on the bull will be ineffecgtive but is going to cost them money, jobs and possibly much more. Poll after poll rank climate change dead last as a problem to devote resources to at this time and the numbers who think its even a problem that might ever need to be fixed are declining as well. Its time the intellectuals emerge from the bubble and start dealing with the real world both scientifically and politically.
Ric Werme says:
August 1, 2010 at 6:39 am
“Bob’s comments about talking to engineering groups made me think that might make for an “end run” around the “brotherhood.”
I am afraid that you can forget the UK as a potential zone for executing “end runs”.
The Great and the Good who run the engineering institutions in the UK seem to be convinced that enthusiasticly supporting AGW is a wonderful way of getting their hands into the money box.
There is no way that these organisations are going to provide a platform for a contrary viewpoint which implies that money should not spent on projects which are justified by depending upon the dodgy outpourings from the IPCC.
Follow the money.
The problem is that having cloned themselves the modern body of “armists” are now cloning clones and building in all the misconceptions as “fact”. A similar situation exists in branches of archaeology – despite proof that certain dates in Egyptology may be wildly inaccurate (They are based on the assumption that none of Egypts “Kings” ascended the throne until the last one died, when in fact, they not only did, but actually reigned simultaneously!) and refuse to revise it – because Prof XYZ said this is how it was in 18XX and everything written since is based on that!
I do hope someone will soon take these so-called scientists to court for defamation soon, that letter is pretty close to the wire I’d say. Remember, they cannot prevent you from dragging out all their dirty linen in a court and airing it in public. If it is evidence germain to the case you have the right to make them explain it and say why they have said or done what they did in order to prove that your view is wrong and they have not defamed you…
Might be worth taking it on just to get this stuff aired where the press can’t ignore it. Just think of it, a scientist suing another for defamation over the interpretation of AGW – the press could not ignore it, or fail to print the aruments raised. Besides, in court you cannot “defame” if you say what you mean and think about this conspiracy to prevent the publication of the counter argument.
Same thing happened to Stephen McIntyre this year. He was invited to speak at the WorldDendro 2010 in Rovaniemi, Finland. Later the invitation was withdrawn.
DocWat says:
August 1, 2010 at 7:11 am
Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand why the “warmists” are doing these things.
The same reason an entire nation (or at least the majority of its population) surrendered all reason to a fascist leader in the 1930s. There was nothing special about the German people in the 1930s – it could have happened anywhere, given the right circumstances. Now as then, people need a cause to believe in and to fight for, and it fills them with a tremendous sense of self-importance to be a part of a crusade to save civilisation from the evils of “undesirables” (as then) or Mankind (as now). Stalin called them “useful idiots.” I’m sure our own leaders today must have similar thoughts.
I read Tony Kevin’s remarks twice and was very impressed, in that I don’t understand how he can apply psychology to prove his case on climate. If the science is in he should be chomping at the bit to allow review and debate and thoroughly stomp and humiliate and dis credit all opposition. I say this because if the science is in as he says then all other research results are a fraud and should be exposed. He would want to do this in public to show the results of his hard work and science and to prove his argument to other scientists and the public. That is what I got from his remarks. If the science is in then why does he have a job. My interest here is that I do not want to be taxed and restricted on the pretense of a science that may not be settled at all and certainly not proven.
DocWat asks, “Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand why the “warmists” are doing these things?”
A surrender to political ideology and the flow of money at the expense of scientific honesty. And, throw in a dash of Alinsky to flavor their ridicule of the honest truth-seekers.
DocWat,
Re: why warmists would do these things…
Many climate scientists have been captured by a political/religious ideology.
Others are in it for the money.
You can observe the first of these in Tony Kevin’s comments.
Mr kevin cites an “unwillingness to admit to limits of economic growth”, and then refers to skeptics as “morally” indifferent. At the center of warmist philosophy is a sense of guilt over consumption, and the belief that judgement or reckoning for this consumption surely follows. The most fanatical within this philosophy advocate the destruction of industrialized society in favor of a Utopia of “harmony” with the planet.
It seems to be an inability to cope with an ever more mechanized and impersonal society. Strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, this philosophy walks hand in hand with collectivist ideologies of communal living, governmentally imposed extreme frugality, and wealth redistribution. It is reminiscent of totalitarian governments or cults that ultimately resulted in genocide, often via starvation, or collective suicide. This is why you will note some of us referring to warmists as having “drunk the koolaid”.
If they get enough power, the warming cult is as deadly as it can be.
“I don’t want to talk about it; so don’t try and confuse me with the facts, my mind is made up.”
Such is the mantra of the warmists.
I am sure what Bob Carter has written is true, but I still have difficulty believing it. It seems to suggest that a lot of very bright people are completely devoid of any common sense. Whether AGW is right or wrong, in the end the experimental data will decide. The politics is such that there is little hope of there being any reductions of CO2 emission in the near future. So we are going to do the experiment to see what happens to the earth as we add more and more CO2 to the atmosphere.
I came across an interesting quote from Richard Feynman, a recipient of the Noble Prize for Physics. I wish I had though of it myself. “Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts”. Think about it. It has an awful lot of truth in it.
davidmhoffer says:
August 1, 2010 at 8:04 am
“I call it the 2nd fastest gun in the west syndrome.”
Kevin. Big dum dum Kevin. He’s the 142nd fastest gun, (Bang!) in the west.
If their science were robust, they wouldn’t need to play such games. So obviously their science can’t be robust, and they must know it, otherwise they would not fear a dissenting voice. Also, ANU’s Tony Kevin should be widely published; nothing spells out moral bankrupcy better than calling your opponent mentally ill.
Bob, i’ve seen one of your talks on Youtube, keep up the good work! Best wishes from Germany.
I was so disappointed not to be able to see or hear Anthony Bob or Ian Plimers talks, their blogs books and interviews are simply brilliant.
none of the hype, just facts, which is what I thought true science was about.
having had emails to R Williams at ABC questioning his Biased and unethical, (according to the ABCs own mandate) supression of the opposing view and fair airtime for rebuttals and presentation of that case, and his inane replies to go to his petAGW sites, that oddly( or not!) accept NO non warming comment or opinions.
I now see how poor our national Broadcasters governance is.
I also am ashamed to have placed any trust in them at all, along with the CSIRO, who have also proven corrupted.
funny Ian Plimers book for kids won an ABC science award was used in schools etc yet suddenly he is also persona non grata and all mention of the awards etc are missing?
I dont deny we have polluted and been careless of our planet, but not to the extent they would have us panic madly over. a couple of good Volcanic eruption per year overshadows anything we puny humans can do.
weird also that for many decades if anyone at all wanted info on Past climate temp habitats plants oceans etc they asked the geologists, and were more than happy to accept their in depth and painstaking research, now? they decry it?
AGW will go down in Infamy as a truly embarrasing and shaeful time in our history, Lysenko ism indeed.
Bob , and Ian, make me so glad to be an aussie who doesnt accept, but questions.
the rest of the fools and followers make me sooo very very ashamed.
Thanks for that Bob. Australian farmers have been treated that way for about 20 years now. Take it from me…………..you get used to it !!!!!!!!!
Climate “denial” is now a mental disorder
How odd that, in March 2009, none of our media “global warming” groupies should have bothered to report what was billed to be “the largest ever demonstration for civil disobedience over climate change”. There was talk of hundreds of thousands of protesters converging on Washington to hear Jim Hansen, the scientist who talks of coal-fired power stations as “factories of death,” call (yet again) for all coal plants to be closed. Perhaps the lack of coverage was due to the fact that, before Hansen arrived to address a forlorn group of several hundred followers, Washington was blanketed in nearly a foot of snow.
It was another bad week for the liars. The Met Office, which has been one of the chief pushers of the global warming scare for 20 years, had to admit that this has been “Britain’s coldest winter for 31 years”, despite its prediction last September that the winter would be “milder than average”. This didn’t, of course, stop it predicting that 2010 will be one of “the top-five warmest years on record”, and last week it trumpeted that “fact” and a lot more, besides.
US climate skeptics such as those on the Watts Up With That? website, for whom the predictions of the UK Met Office have become a regular source of amusement, recalled its forecast that 2007 would be “the warmest year on record globally”, just before global temperatures dived by nearly 1ºC, canceling out the entire net warming of the past 100 years.
Ever-wilder wax the beleaguered liars in their rhetoric. Our science minister in 2009, Lord Drayson, said he was “shocked” to find how many of the captains of industry he meets are “climate deniers”. This was the same Lord Drayson who, as our defence procurement minister, assured Parliament in 2006 that Snatch Land Rovers afforded “the level of protection we need”. The continuing death toll of soldiers in these unprotected vehicles is a scandal.
Even Drayson is outbid, however, by the “global warming” groupies in The Guardian, who now suggest that people like Christopher Booker should no longer be compared to “Holocaust deniers” but consigned to even more outer darkness by branding them as climate “Creationists”, the dirtiest word they know. Meanwhile, at the University of the West of England in Bristol, a conference of “eco-psychologists”, led by a professor, solemnly explored the notion that “climate change denial” should be classified as a form of “mental disorder”.
Keep asking the one question that drives them nuts: if the earth is warming, why is global ice constant?
DocWat says:
“August 1, 2010 at 7:11 am
Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand why the “warmists” are doing these things.”>>
There is no single answer to that question. Researchers who have made careers out of alarmism aren’t going to abandon their careers and grants, and they will undermine anyone else who tries to discredit them. Politicians with an agenda support research grants that can advance their agenda, and they too undermine their detractors. Then there are those who just simply believe that a world in which there are rich and poor is just wrong, and the only solution is to make everyone equal (meaning equally poor). I don’t think there is an organized conspiracy as some suggest, but the issue serves lot of different interests.
At end of day however, stifling debate while claiming the moral high ground is an admission that they cannot win the debate. If they could, they would be showing up in droves to make a name for themselves. Instead they have cast themselves as modern day shamans. As the only ones who can communicate with the gods, their opinion cannot be disputed on basis of facts.
Chief; “Volcano dangerous. Move clan to plains”
Shaman; “Gods angry. If move to plains will send fire. Stay at volcano. Bring virgins to appease gods.”
tim c says:
August 1, 2010 at 8:06 am
“[…]And Tony Kevin responds..” It seduces people who are psychologically unwilling to admit limits to economic growth.””
I love this Tony Kevin guy because he’s so reliably wrong. Sorry, i can’t “admit” limits to economic growth, simply because economic growth is not proportional to emissions, whether it’s CO2 or anything else. That surely makes me a potential patient in his worldview. But last time i checked we don’t measure economic growth in tons of CO2 emitted but in currency units.
For fans, this seems to be his website:
http://www.tonykevin.com.au/
“It’s not about the cause. It’s about the cure!” That’s like treating syphilis with mercury. Sure it cured, by killing the subject and not the disease. Society is clean again! The discoverer of H. pylori was forced to give himself an ulcer before the “scientific consensus” was forced to reconsider.
DocWat, as noted in the above article, it’s about taxpayer money given to universities. They have been tainted. It’s about a financial scheme for trading “carbon offsets”, similar to the mortgage scheme that caused our current global recession.
An overlooked statement from Hollywood.
I too noticed the “fatalistic nihilism” comment.
Perhaps it is true environmentalism has become the new religeon.
I also find it interesting that the ones who most boldy profess Darwin’s theories, when it comes to religeon, are also likely to resist them when it comes to society.
Ah yes … must not rain on their parade … ignorance is bliss
>>DocWat says: August 1, 2010 at 7:11 am
>>Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand
>>why the “warmists” are doing these things.
No, the REAL puzzle, is why are they doing this across the majority of the world. We have always had one or two looney nations – but an entire planet?
.
DocWat
“Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand why the “warmists” are doing these things.”
Per Pink Floyd – And did we tell you the name of the game, boy,
We call it Riding the Gravy Train.
It’s about the money
To paraphrase a phrase of sorts:
When all is said and done, a scientist, tinker, tailor, sailor, spy is such for what s/he actually did, not what s/he said, or what anyone at her/his funeral said s/he did. Few of the billions of us are remembered for long. Indeed, most of us can justly brag that we did not come to be remembered. We are here to teach and learn, all else is noise and dust.
geo says:
August 1, 2010 at 6:08 am
Alas, one gets the definite feeling that the hardcore of the AGW tribe would like to treat leading skeptics the way the old Soviet Union treated many leading dissidents –by sending them off to mental hospitals.
____________________________________________________
Unfortunately it was not only the old Soviet Union who has done this. Ezra Pound was also “jailed” in this manner.
Ezra Pound was a political prisoner for thirteen and a half years at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, Washington, D.C. (a Federal institution for the insane). His release was accomplished largely through the efforts of Mr. Mullins.
Darn, I can not find the comment I was looking for. The gist of it was, a US community health care nurse caution people not to talk to their health care practitioners about any conspiracy theories such as 9 -11, global warming… or they could easily find themselves in a psychiatric hospital as did the elderly couple in the article. Is this true? I have no idea but at this point I do not trust government at all.
I found these again they may or may not be true, however those locked up in this way would not have access to computers or the “outside” now would they?
Steiner Ranch Elementary student Mark was assigned to ‘detention’ during recess as punishment, after being sent to the principal’s office and made to sit in the hall, all for looking up information on a ‘9/11 cover up.’ …Mark’s father said the school approached him about a complete assessment of his son’s psychological make-up.
————–
I was wrongly diagnosed as delusional by the psychiatric staff of Ward 7 at Northland Base Hospital in Whangarei and held against my will for 11 days in mid-2006, because I maintained the attacks of 9/11 were orchestrated by criminal elements inside the US Administration… Clare Swinney – New Zealand
And one of the comments:
Doug Soderstrom, Ph.D. // August 29, 2009 at 3:12 +00:00Aug | Reply
Having been a psychologist for nearly thirty years now I am not at all surprised to find that such a thing has occurred. The United States government has routinely used (or should I say misused) psychologists to do their “dirty work,”….
https://clareswinney.wordpress.com/incarcerated-in-a-psychiatric-ward-because-i-said-911-was-an-inside-job/#comment-523
There is a “Doug Soderstrom, Ph.D.” psychologist in the USA
Same one? who knows.
Bob Carter’s experience seem to be wide spread. On 16th Dec. 2009 the Climate Congress in Copenhagen, March 10-12, 2009, wrote: “I am pleased to inform you that your paper entitled:
“Did the West-Spitsbergen-Current entailed the two decades long Arctic Warming 90 years ago?” has been accepted for Oral Presentation.” By end of Jan.2010 the presentation was schedule: 10 March 17:15 – 17:30. A short time later the Organiser wrote: “Due to scheduling error and the lack of time, I am writing to inform you that your paper …..(Title)…had to accepted for poster presentation instead of oral”.
Air Vent and WUWT posted the paper on 4th November 2009. In PDF 1-MB at: http://www.arctic-warming.com/_FIN_Feb2010_WEB_CC_Arctic1919.pdf
But it came worst. Few month later Willy Soon contacted me and asked with regard to my just published book (http://www.arctic-heats-up.com/), whether I would be willing to join his session at the AGU Fall Meeting in San Francisco: “U06: Diverse Views from Galileo’s Window: Researching Factors and Processes of Climate Change in the Age of Anthropogenic CO2”. I agreed, submitted an abstract in time (end of August), became AGU member, paid conference fee, purchased flight tickets, made hotel booking. Few weeks later AGU cancelled the U06 session and offered Lindzen and Steinhilber oral presentations, and Soon, Scafetta and Willson were made chairs of the GEC Monday morning poster session. The rest were transferred to poster sessions.
A number of complains by Willi Soon and other U06 applicants followed suit. One of them wrote to the AGU President (excerpt):
“___………the decision to cancel U06 appears to be (and will appear as such to many) a censoring of the topic by AGU, in line with its position statement (which a few courageous scientists, more proactive than me, have denounced in EOS forums). I find this exceedingly damaging to AGU, makes me regret very much the significant donation I had made to AGU just a few weeks ago, and even makes me feel like withdrawing from the Fall meeting (I am not even talking about the refunding issue, which has been well illustrated to be unfair and rather ridiculous by Dr. E… in his email dated September 30), and even from AGU which for me would be heartbreaking.
___I believe this withdrawal will tarnish the image of AGU. It would take a negligible effort for AGU (in comparison with the risks for its image and values to be accused of censoring, even if nor completely true…) to reinstate the session which has a size, contributors and topics fully worth a small session. By the way, I am worried about the arguments (in C….’s email notably) arguing (following AGU bylaws and practice?) that the scientific program committee decides a topic is interesting and worth a session based on numbers of abstracts submitted and people attending. This is absolutely contrary to the idea of incorporating some amount of risk and foresight. It makes AGU a follower of current fashion not an organization seeking new avenues of research. It would have made AGU miss every single major discovery or innovation, to start with plate tectonics. I claim that my knowledge and practice of science committees over now more than 35 years allow me to say that this session has scientific merit.”
Willi Soon & David Legates critic at:
http://www.heartland.org/full/26365/Galileo_Silenced_Again_.html
This, I think, is probably the most depressing thing I’ve read regarding climate science. And, no surprise, it appears to be the sole domain of the alarmists.
The next election cycle is beginning to sound very important.
“1684 – Major confrontation between Hooke and Newton. It concerned Newton’s Principia, and the involvement Hooke had in it. Newton claimed Hooke had none, but a closer look at the events prior to the Principia’s publication, leave little doubt that Hooke was indeed involved. The Principia was published, without recognition to Hooke.”
Funny footnote to this, from the introduction to the Principia by Newton:
“If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants”
This was a nasty comment aimed at Robert Hooke who was a short hunchback.
Although no iron law, there is much to the saying ‘You can’t
have your cake and eat it’. When some scientist decides to cross
the line to blatant advocacy and deliberate disinformation, what would
the point of trying to meet him in debate? The scientific community
doesn’t need that: there is enough interesting and differing point of views
within. Who wants to be dragged back to pre-Arrhenian times? And when you
invite a sceptic, does he come alone or with some right-wing think
behind him in the same package? Rhetoric question.
Wouldn’t the title, “The phenomena of defamation and the brotherhood of silence,” be more accurate? While I don’t know how defamation law works in Australia, under the law of most U.S. states, Professor Carter’s article lays out a prima facie defamation claim. If Carter wants to draw the AGW mafia into head-to-head public debate, why not file a defamation lawsuit against one or two of the most high profile AGW thugs? It is likely that enough of the offending behavior has taken place in the United States to create the necessary jurisdictional nexus.
Added ”Climate – The Counter Consensus” to my Amazon.com cart; 4 when I order next batch of books from that usual source. Thank you Anthony for pointer making that easy; and kudos to Bob Carter for his efforts and significant contribution to the cause of real science (as compared to the politically-correct variant).
If the Pranksters Above initiate a sharp cooling trend and pull the rug out from under these self-important do-gooding warmists and their gatekeepers, funders, activist-backers, and media-enablers, they will twist slowly in the wind for decades. They won’t be able to wiggle out of their position now: The Pranksters have “set the hook” in them with the recent warm blip, causing them to reiterate their commitment to “Gawdsaker” alarmism.
Climate change — bring it on.
What is as old as antiquity is new again:
“(“The debate is over,” as some people like to say.) ”
…-
“Most disturbing in Gnostic doctrine, as the sample-texts cited above attest, is the prominence of unanimity as the supremely desirable state, with silence validated as preferable to volubility in so-called error. (“The debate is over,” as some people like to say.) I have suggested that this unanimity represents the resurgence in Gnosticism of sacrificial thinking since its practical function is to sustain in-group solidarity by identifying the slightest hint of dissent so as to make it eligible for expulsion.”
“Gnosticism from a Non-Voegelinian Perspective, Part II”
http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/4452
Ergo,
“The phenomena of disinvitation and the brotherhood of silence”
“Closing out dissent”
DocWat says:
August 1, 2010 at 7:11 am
Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand why the “warmists” are doing these things.
_______________________________________________
“Global Governance” is the goal and Global Warming is the instrument. Socialist activists have been lead to believe this is the way to a world wide “utopia” The powerful are planning a “shearing of the sheep and perhaps a “culling” of the herd.
In both cases you get a government by the elite:
“What unites the many different forms of Socialism.. is the conception that socialism (or a reasonable facsimile thereof) must be handed down to the grateful masses in one form or another, by a ruling elite which is not subject to their control…” marxists.org
Read these:
Obama’s Chief Science Adviser, John Holden wrote up the plan in his 1973 book “Human Ecology: Problems and Solutions,”
“A massive campaign [read global warming] must be launched to restore a high-quality environment in North America and to de-develop the United States….“The need for de-development presents our economists with a major challenge [Agenda 21].. They must design a stable, low-consumption economy in which there is a much more equitable distribution of wealth than the present one. Redistribution of wealth both within and among nations is absolutely essential, if a decent life is to be provided for every human being.””
Global Warming and Environmental concerns were first introduced as a big issue in 1972 by oil mogul Maure Strong who chaired the First Earth Summit. He has been a big player in the game through out.
This Climategate e-mail shows the Global Governance/Agenda 21/IPCC connections Sustainable Development (B1)
Here is who Ged Davis is (Shell Oil executive with IPCC connection)
Here is the context and history:
In Maurice Strong’s 1972 First Earth Summit speech, Strong warned urgently about global warming
The de-development plan is UN Division for Sustainable Development – full text of Agenda 21
UN REFORM – Restructuring for Global Governance (Maurice Strong again)
Our Global Neighborhood – Report of the Commission on Global Governance: a summary analysis
a lot of research and links about Agenda 21 in the USA
EASY MONEY:
Carbon Credit derivative market:woman who invented credit default swaps the key architects carbon derivatives
It is not the first time “easy money” has been very bad for the little guy:
“….These days, corporations seem to exist for the investment bankers…. In fact, investment banks are replacing the publicly held industrial corporations as the largest and most powerful economic institutions in America…. THERE ARE SIGNS THAT A VICIOUS spiral has begun, as each corporate player seeks to improve its standard of living at the expense of another’s. Corporate raiders transfer to themselves, and other shareholders, part of the income of employees by forcing the latter to agree to lower wages. January 29, 1989 New York Times: LEVERAGED BUYOUTS: AMERICAN PAYS THE PRICE
PS: The recent whitewashes will further discredit establishment science and mainstream politics, once dioxidism is discredited and delaminates.
Well, Bob, you certainly state the case rather well: The opposition can’t stand close scrutiny!
When has that not ever been the case?
It’s rather interesting that the ‘true believers’ must seek to silence anyone who dares question their received knowledge.
Hand in there, as I’m sure when the truth of matters finally hits the fan, the students are going to need someone to help them pick up the pieces!
I salute you!
It really doesn’t matter whether skeptics could provide irrefutable proof, a slam dunk scientific “mother of all papers”, together with a letter from God, because it has never been solely about the “science”. Tony Kevin has told us here “…unwilling to admit limits to economic growth.” I believe that within this phrase lies the real strategy behind the entire bogus mass manipulating charade. Whether there exists some “world order plan” the masses can never comprehend – I don’t know, but it really pi$$e$ me off that we have to be lied to and manipulated against our will.
Eric Dailey asks “Why”? I think it’s pretty obvious: Money and academic politics.
On the money side, millions if not billions of grant dollars (and related fraud claims under, at least, the U.S. False Claims Act) hang in the balance for the AGW mafia. They’ve taken millions in government funds by, in essence, lying on grant applications that the Professor Carters of the world are crackpots. If Carter ever gets a chance to prove their lies, their house of cards comes crashing down.
On the academic politics side, Henry Kissinger is said to have said, “University politics are vicious precisely because the stakes are so small.” In this controversy, a large group of mentally and emotionally small academics had a “corner” on credibility on a subject of enormous importance — or so they imagined — to the world. Academic nirvana.
But when AGW skeptics story finally broke into the open, they lost their academic monopoly and some, like Phil Jones, have lost more. As their grasp on professional recognition begins to slip away, they are willing to do almost anything to hang on to it. At this point, having gone “all in” by sacrificing their scientific skepticism and fully committing themselves to what they now know is a hoax, their only logical play is to discourage debate by defaming and ostracizing their academic opponents.
This, I think, is probably the most depressing thing I’ve read regarding climate science. And, no surprise, it appears to be the sole domain of the alarmists. The consequence is, climate science is a fraud. I know Steve M doesn’t like to see that word, but how else do you describe a process where perhaps half or more of what can be known is pre-disqualified because it doesn’t support the desired outcome?
The next election cycle is beginning to sound very important.
Keep going Professor Bob Carter! I am impressed by the courage of those with independent views who continue to say loudly and clearly where they think the truth lies. I read ‘Climate: the Counter Consensus’ and it describes in detail and very clearly and convincingly how this AGW lunacy came about.
Prof Carter points out that ‘The world has the IPCC, for at least a little longer. It also has innumerable national greenhouse offices, ministries of climate change, state greenhouse offices, specialist climate change sections within government departments, bureaus of meteorology, national and internationals science organizations with climate alarmist views, and an untold number of other climate change research groups, organizations and lobbyists. What it does not seem to have is measurable human-caused climate change.’
All those employees cling to the faith because their livelihood depends on it, and they will do their best to shut up Prof Carter for as long as possible.
Sadly I think this phenomenon is not limited to the AGW debate. A similar form of scientific intolerance is evident in the field of evolutionary theory where any scientist that is open to the possibility of intelligent design is in danger of dismissal and ridicule. Ben Stein’s recent film ‘Expelled – No Intelligence Allowed’ explores this worrying trend in some depth.
hide the decline says:
August 1, 2010 at 9:08 am
Thanks for that Bob. Australian farmers have been treated that way for about 20 years now. Take it from me…………..you get used to it !!!!!!!!!
_______________________________________________________-
There are STILL some Australian farmers left??? I thought all of you had been strangled in government red tape!
There are many answers and most are ugly but truth heals.
Know the Biblical David? After he’d killed the giant Goliath, with no armour and only a sling and five small stones, the people shouted he was better than King Saul. As a result, Saul tried to kill him and for several years David was in hiding and on the run. During this time he wrote his
blogspsalms.It is a sad tale, but is anyone really surprised? For many, on both sides, this is an ideological war not a scientific debate. It is clear to me that many of the CAGW advocates have a specific economic agenda. The late Steven Schneider was a no growth guy from early on. His (and Randi Londer) 1984 book, The Coevolution of Climate & Life, published by the Sierra Club and inspired by Paul Ehrlich, is an interesting, well written, comprehensive and overall very good summary of climate science at the time. However, it is written with a clear agenda that needs to be recognized and factored into his policy prescriptions. Do his values distort how he reports the actual science? Essentially his arguments over-emphasize our impact on climate as opposed to other physical factors. More importantly the argument is made as if there is no reasonable alternative assumptions and a form of moral absolutism emerges. The net result is a refusal to debate.
dp says:
August 1, 2010 at 10:18 am
This, I think, is probably the most depressing thing I’ve read regarding climate science. And, no surprise, it appears to be the sole domain of the alarmists.
The next election cycle is beginning to sound very important.
__________________________________________________________________
The next election cycle is very important. It may very well be the cycle that determines whether we have free countries or “Global Governance” by an over-arching international body of “elite” answerable to no one but themselves.
The European Union is the template. It started as a trade organization and now is a law making body with no real representation by those it governs.
The human race suffers from a collective weakness. The prophesy of doom excites us. It engages our attention. In other respects we may be pretty close to the rational overall, but pending doom irresistibly rivets us. Our propensity in this regard is almost certainly primeval – we are hardwired to pay heed to the lookout’s call of danger.
This weakness has been exploited by the high priests since time immemorial. The high priest declares and the herd believes. The skeptic should not be surprised by his lonely position nor detracted from his course. Skeptics have always been lonely and always will be, for once the herd accepts what he says, then he is a skeptic no longer. It is not the physically brave but the skeptic who has it in his power to save the next batch of maidens from the fire.
Well, it’s a fair cop.
I am definitely unwilling to admit limits to economic growth.
I also believe that mankind has the capacity to exploit and transcend his natural environment.
(And I remain impervious to observed facts until such time as CRU deigns to release them.)
It sounds like blacklisting to me. So, what do they call it these days?
If the debate is over and the science is in, why do the scientists need to engage in more research, why do their models need refining? Whilst the logic escapes me I realise that the true warmist scientist needs to boost their funding and their egos.
Maybe it should be noted that the AGW research complex, NGO agitation and the renewable energy complex were amongst the fastest-growing industries in the western world over the last 30 years… and right now we have this huge wave of American foundationism where Bill Gates and Warren Buffet try to convince every billionaire to give half his money to a foundation (which usually happen to try to save the world from, amongst other things, AGW). So much for “no growth”.
The “la la la I’m not listing to you” clan, in a rare moment of climate clarity!
http://tinyurl.com/2ancqdk
Henry chance says:
August 1, 2010 at 6:17 am
Henry, you’re making too much of this.
Don’t you remember in elementary school how you used to call kids you disagreed with “stupid”? I do. And I was called stupid as well.
So what?
These people are just calling others names.
Whenever someone fears you enough to take notice, they will attack you; they don’t like you.
I would simply conclude comments of this nature reveal a fear of the skeptic community. The AGW crowd is very concerned about the cooling now underway.
Going to be a lot of unemployed climate researchers in a few years.
Gail Combs @ 10:49 in response to DocWat
Anyone interested in this issue should read:
UN Infects Science with Cancer of Global Warming
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/EDBLICKRANT.pdf
ANU’s Tony Kevin wrote recently in an invited address in Canberra to the Australian Council of Engineering Deans:
“Like other cognitive disorders that have in the past caused great suffering to humanity, climate denialism is impervious to observed facts. As the climate crisis worsens, denialism perversely flourishes even more, confusing the community and eroding public support for sound risk-averse policies.”
As a person who barely escaped a lifetime imprisonment in the Soviet “mental hospital” for political dissidents, I find Mr. Kevin’s talk about “cognitive disorder” to be an offense of the worst possible kind. It is highly disturbing that such totalitarian freaks are living among us, and are given the preferential treatment by our elected officials and Academia. What a plague.
Brad says: [6:47 am] “Welcome to modern science, where dissent is quashed and the hard questions are never funded. What happened to real thought, and risk, in science?”
It’s a wonder anyone is going into science these days. Fortunately, there are institutions of higher learning that are actively recruiting young minds and training them to take part in today’s postmodern science. You may not have heard of the Jones School of Technology, but here’s one of their recruitment videos:
http://www.daveandthomas.net/2009/07/15/be-a-ho-velvet-jones-school-of-technology/
So we are beneath the status of an inferior race. We can’t even ride in the back seats on the gravy train.
I find it funny that they are afraid to present in front of engineers. The risk of technical questions runs high. Engineers aren’t swayed by superstition.
EPA director Lisa Jackson wouldn’t speak to engineers. She runs on intuition and they run on measurements.
Bob,
There’s a lot of us down under who think you’re a fantastic and most informative speaker and we appreciate the great work you are doing.
Tony Kevin wrote:
It seduces people who are psychologically unwilling to admit limits to economic growth. Denialists cling to the arrogant “mechanical philosophy” of mankind’s infinite right and capacity to exploit and transcend his natural environment.
He has it backwards.
The Alarmists are clinging to their belief that “It’s all down hill from here”, attempting to prove the necessity of failure and death.
… attempting to justify their own inadequacy.
It is neither true nor necessary.
We are all of us inadequate, yet somehow we manage to muddle through and get the job done. Accept it, get over it, stop worrying about it.
Just don’t try to force others into failure to justify your own perceived failure.
When I was three, the girl next door and I fell into a shallow pond together. The water was shallow enough that we could easily stand in it. She didn’t want to get wet, so she tried to climb on top of me. In attempting to avoid the minor indignity, she nearly killed me.
I often hear ‘environmentalists’ saying that “A lot of us are going to have to die”.
Wouldn’t it be better to just admit that you don’t understand how we muddle through?
John F. Hultquist says:
August 1, 2010 at 1:18 pm
Gail Combs @ 10:49 in response to DocWat
Anyone interested in this issue should read:
UN Infects Science with Cancer of Global Warming
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/EDBLICKRANT.pdf
______________________________________
Thanks a good summary. However I try to use primary sources in addition if I can. Unfortunately they are long and the meaty stuff is often hidden in ambiguous language that only bites you AFTER it becomes law… Obamacare comes to mind.
Quote:
You would not have an “anti-gravity” person debate gravity and since there honestly is no debate in this space in SCIENCE the offer I made a little while ago of offering a full day to detail the science to your members stand(s).
UnQuote:
Actually. there is no force of Gravity! (LOL) Its a pseudo force due to curvature of space time (at least according to Einstein), just as there really isn’t any centra-fugal force. We can assume that the
“Director of the Climate Change Research Centre at another Sydney metropolitan university” has never heard of Einstein, or else he wouldn’t have picked an example of another piece of flawed science which is now NOT the consensus.
There are still probably differences of opinion on gravity!
ROTFLMAO
Hmm, be interesting to see if “Climate Denialism” gets a guernsey in the currently being written DSMV – the bible for mental health practitioners to be able to diagnose any behaviour as a component of some disorder or another. Sad thing is, I wouldn’t be in the least bit surprised if it does appear in there, the psychology lobby for AGW is really strong.
Gail Combs – I really enjoy your comments . However , I believe that Ezra Pound was institutionalized at the behest of a number of his influential friends so that he would avoid being tried for treason .
Mikael Pihlström says:
August 1, 2010 at 10:25 am
Think you got us all figured out do you ? That is soooo cute. 8^D
Bob, that ABC program featuring you and Durkin was one of the most unintentionally funny programs I have ever seen. ABC science (and PC) czar Robin Williams sat through this deplorable lapse into real debate looking like a bear that has just sat on a porcupine. The ABC tried to get Durkin dismissed because he had previously done a program on the, er, populist topic of breast implants – this from an ABC which is notorious for bad taste. The only query I had about Durkin is that he relied entirely on solar effects on temperature. Doubtlessly they are important but they do not seem to be central to the rise from 1977-1998. The Pacific Decadal Oscillation however might cause or contribute to this.
…..”ANU’s Tony Kevin wrote recently…..
“It seduces people who are psychologically unwilling to admit limits to economic growth.”
================
Ummmm.., doesn’t a University rely on economic growth.
Is not, a University education a seduction in itself.
Could, “psychologically unwilling” not also be called, street smart, real world educated, tired of being mislead , and concerned an agenda (disguised as a theory), is being forced upon us.
“Denialism”, a word you seem to like, is what you are preaching.
Mikael Pihlström says:
“When some scientist decides to cross the line to blatant advocacy and deliberate disinformation, what would the point of trying to meet him in debate?”
Since that statement describes Michael Mann perfectly, I’ll help Mikael with the answer: The point of meeting Mann in a debate would be to show the world how reprehensible, dishonest, conniving and incompetent he is. Naturally Mann runs and hides out from debates.
I would pay-per-view to watch Lord Monckton give Michael Mann the same kind of spanking he gave to Timmy Lambert, and to Monckton’s equally hapless and inept opponents at Oxford.
It is crystal clear that the real reason the alarmist clique won’t debate [more than once, anyway] is because their CAGW conjecture is based on pseudo-science instead of on the scientific method. That makes their claims akin to being based on Scientology rather than on science.
Alexander Feht says:
August 1, 2010 at 1:42 pm
“[…] be an offense of the worst possible kind. It is highly disturbing that such totalitarian freaks are living among us, and are given the preferential treatment by our elected officials and Academia. What a plague.”
Tony Kevin boasts on his website that he became a member of the Green Party; so he might soon become elected himself. And from that position, he might want to do something about this mental disorder of skepticism that has befallen so many of his countrymen 😉
But usually, Greens in government don’t actively pursue things like that. They’re already happy when they can hike the taxes. We here in Germany got an “Ökosteuer” or “Eco tax” when they were part of the government, a tax slapped on to fuel. Of course, the government after that (ATM the greens are not in the government) didn’t remove the tax…
The repeated assertion by the alarmist community that CAGW skeptics are owed no consideration because they lack the proper publishing credentials has always reminded me of the old joke about the youth that murdered both his parents and then argued to the judge that he deserved leniency because he was now an orphan
Jul 27, 2010 · US industrial titan General Electric has agreed to pay over 23 million dollars to settle allegations that it bribed Iraqi officials.
We are facing criminals and corruption.
The use of punitive psychiatry against dissidents was common in the Soviet Union, and an occasional abuse still occurs, according to —
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punitive_psychiatry_in_the_Soviet_Union
Zhores Medvedev wrote “The Rise and Fall of T. D. Lysenko”, and was briefly detained in a psychiatric hospital.
Looks like a number of WUWT readers suffer from ‘sluggish schizophrenia’….
http://www.green-agenda.com/ is up at this time, and has some cognitive therapy.
Thank you Mr Tony Kevin for your diagnosis that I’m suffering from a form of mental illness because I have long held the view that the certainty expressed by so many about the Science of climate was more about hubristic hypotheses by alarmist advocates who got off by scaring the living daylights out the vulnerable.
You know, kids and old grannies and the easily swayed. Politicians, Guardian readers and Kevins.
You’re a Kevin, aren’t you Tony, so why can’t you help me and those other unfortunates who also suffer this dread disease of denialism?
We need men of action TK. Men, who laugh in the face of deadly peril, men who cry to the
Gods to do their da*ndest, in short mate, we need you!
You, and your band of heroes, can drag us up from the swamp of scepticism, the dung of denialism maybe even lead us from the Hell of Heresy.
Engage with the sweet talking anti-science serpents that have so seduced us with their incantatiotions. Slay the many-headed beast that
seeks to condemn us to endless generations of plenty.
Debate them, joust with them, let them lie screaming for mercy on the the field of combat as the sharp tip of your adamantine logic lays at their throats.
We, the deranged, are now numbered by the million. Alas the contagion is rampant and unquenchable.
Act soon my brave Shining Knight otherwise the butchers bill will be incalcuable.
Aliter, stop being a total twit!
P Walker says:
August 1, 2010 at 2:59 pm
Gail Combs – I really enjoy your comments . However , I believe that Ezra Pound was institutionalized at the behest of a number of his influential friends so that he would avoid being tried for treason .
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Also so the US government could save face. Pound was one of the USA’s most famous literary figures. He was released after 12 years In 1958.
From the same sourcesource you have:
“In response to the Goldstein case [convicted, 2000], the New York legislature enacted and “outpatient commitment” statute — known as” Kendra’s Law” — which authorizes courts to force mentally ill people living in the community to take medication. ”
Like Alexander Feht, I do not trust governments at all and for good reason.
I do not like the increasing use of “mentally ill” when referring to skeptics. It is just another short step to having people like Anthony or others picked up for evaluation and neatly tucked away without recourse to trial. After all WUWT is now banned in some school systems while PETA seminars are welcomed with open arms.
Nature will dis-invitate them all but suddenly and unpolitely. Buy more popcorn!
The next turn of the screw is already screeching among the planets.
Logan says:
August 1, 2010 at 4:36 pm
The use of punitive psychiatry against dissidents was common in the Soviet Union
Where is it now?
This is what green jobs look like.
http://www.duluthshippingnews.com/trains/wind-turbine-train-2-departs-duluth/
“The second and last of two trains that carried wind turbine parts originally loaded onto two ships in Denmark and discharged at Duluth left the Port Terminal today (June 22, 2010).”
===============
Yes, the port is working, the railroad is working, but it is still taxpayer money being squandered.
When was the last time a “green” project, begged for money?
Why beg, when you can hardly spend the money being thrown at you.
u.k.(us) says:
August 1, 2010 at 5:13 pm
This is what green jobs look like.
http://www.duluthshippingnews.com/trains/wind-turbine-train-2-departs-duluth/
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BTW, I like the site, am afraid it might now get overloaded?
It sounds like Professor Carter is dealing with a pack of prepubescent girls intent on shunning those who aren’t wearing the latest fashion.
Prof. Carter’s paper gives a new meaning to the term “Political Science”.
Historians will look back on this period and be dismayed. How on earth did this happen? The Oz election is in full swing and nobody is talking about Bob’s Plan B, a rational and commonsense view of climate change.
Jennifer Marohasy’s ‘Least worst climate policy?’ is worth a read.
http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/doomed-planet/2010/08/least-worst-climate-policy
“Trust me: if you were a PhD student between 1890 and 1960 in geology, your chance of publishing a paper about the “plates” would have been NULL.”
Continental Drift was certainly accepted in Victoria University, Wellington in 1960. “Plate Tectonics” is merely a name change.
I subscribe to a popular “Scientist” magazine and am astounded to see that in the latest issue they have an editorial bemouning the fact that a leading “alarmist” scientist has been unfairly attacked by “ruthless climate sceptics, drowning them in freedom of information requests and subjecting them to viscious personal attacks”. Having read much of the Climategate email material – my assesment is that the attacks were fully justified. Not necessarily because of the personal attacks that were made on “climate sceptic scientists” but most significantly because of the obvious manipulation of the “peer review” process. This is a massive fraud and in any other sphere of human endeavour would be a criminal offense.
On a number of occasions I have written comments in on-line fora asking questions of the alarmists – on at least two of these my posts have been moderated out and not published… no bad language, no personal attack, just questions! This is to me evidence that a concerted campaign of suppression is occuring in the media as well as in the scientific press.
Keep up the good work Bob!
The Bankers and other money men can see a way of foisting derivitives substitutes on us via “Carbon Trading” schemes and the like. You don’t think mere science is going to be allowed to stop the sharpies with the nasty haircuts from stealing a few billion from the rest of us, do you?
The CAGW gravy train has already it the buffers. The current screaming we hear from the media will not be able to resurrect the bleeding mess. The few survivors will have a difficult time ahead as government research money is quietly withdrawn.
Things are a good deal worse than what Bob suggests, but I disagree with his assertion that the politics are “disturbing”. Being disturbed is counterproductive.
The following caught my attention:
“[…] It seduces people who are psychologically unwilling to admit limits to economic growth. Denialists cling to the arrogant “mechanical philosophy” of mankind’s infinite right and capacity to exploit and transcend his natural environment. Or, they suffer from a kind of morally indifferent, fatalistic nihilism. […]”
Such severe misunderstanding underscores the need for a richer vocabulary to better differentiate the variety of viewpoints.
I advocate “nonalarmist” for hardcore environmentalists (like myself) who are fighting the politics that have made a train wreck of true environmental causes via erroneous conflation with anthropogenic climate fantasy.
Kudos to Carter for the integrity to uphold the scientific method, and the guts to do so against the climate alarmists entrenched moneyed interests.
—
As a physician, I find it altogether remarkable that Tony Kevin – an engineer, it seems? – should feel qualified to make a (remote) diagnosis of “socially disruptive cognitive disorder.”
Isn’t that the practice of medicine without a license?
And if Mr. Kevin is a doctor, isn’t such remote diagnosis a violation of professional ethics and of prevailing standard of care, and thus malpractice?
Could it even be possible that the person to whom Mr. Kevin addressed his communication could take him seriously, or grant credence to any of Mr. Kevin’s assertions?
The account provided by Dr. Carter draws to my mind the impression of encounters I’ve had with the advocates of “creation science” and the same “Nurmee!-Nurmee!-Nurmee!-I’m-not-listening!” responses ever and always to be gotten from these cement-headed specimens.
Could it be that the warmists are destined to join the devotees of L. Ron Hubbard in open and complete recourse to a quest for recognition as a religion?
—
To those who ask “why” the AGW proponents don’t play fair: they were turned into Socialists in college. Socialism in it’s modern form IS indistinguishable from a religion.
Now here is where I take this to place you folks probably haven’t been yet.
Socialism isn’t an economic system nor a governance system, it is 100% pure piracy and if successful, slavery. The stated goals of Socialism are 100% pure BS camouflage, never listen to what they say, watch what they do. The leaders of Socialist movements are NOT ideologues, they are pirates. The REAL goal of Socialism is the control of an entire nations wealth by one man. The “sharing the wealth” or “redistribution of wealth” is simply paying the troops, in this case for their votes.
The “scientists” plying the AGW trade have obvious motive for their intransigence, federal funding. The left is highly experienced at wielding the stick along with the carrot to get their ends the means to succeed. The politically naive scientists get hookered & schnookered by their Socialist indoctrination they received in Academia instead of a complete education. Money talks & deniers walk. There has been billions handed out to those willing to play along with AGW and career ending moments for those unwilling. Classic carrot & stick. Watching the dishonesty in What WAS science is disheartening, then I remember the Edison & Tesla AC/DC media blitz of dishonesty by Edison. In this case though the stakes are the survival of western civilization.
Alexander Feht says:
August 1, 2010 at 1:42 pm
“[…] be an offense of the worst possible kind. It is highly disturbing that such totalitarian freaks are living among us, and are given the preferential treatment by our elected officials and Academia. What a plague.”
This is in effect what the Norwegian Foreign Minister said too. About sceptics.
I agree with Alexander about that kind of people.
Thanks once again to Prof. Carter for his clear-headededness; when the Tim Flannery’s of the world are grabbing headllines, he and Jo Nova and a few others are always there to remind us that pockets of sanity do exist down under.
That said, I would offer a couple of minor corrections:
The scientific behaviour described in this article is pathological. “Scientific” & “Pathological” are 100% mutually exclusive terms; I suggest you strike “scientific.”
.
. . . they have proved to be a recipe for turning scientists from experts in problem solution into experts in (insoluble) problem creation. I suggest that “problem definition” or similar would be better in the present context. If the architect Le Corbusier was right when he wrote that “The well-stated problem finds its own solution”, then the converse must be equally true: A mis-stated or poorly stated problem can never be solved. The Climate Cabal has almost the entire world chasing its tale and wasting obscene amounts of resources over a problem that has never been clearly stated, if it even exists.
The are hopeful signs, however, and Prof Carter touched on one: The ratcheting up both of hysterical propaganda and smear tactics are clear signs of desperation; the Cabal & its flacks know only too well that their gravy train is about to run off the rails.
OTOH, it was really depressing to read a professional engineer resort to liberal arts psycho-drivel. I hope he’s an anomaly, and that the one sector of society that seemed immune to moral preening hasn’t been infected.
Rivenburg says:
August 2, 2010 at 11:30 am
To those who ask “why” the AGW proponents don’t play fair: they were turned into Socialists in college. Socialism in it’s modern form IS indistinguishable from a religion….
_________________________________________________________________
I consider it a form of feudalism. With the elite as the new aristocracy and the rest of us serfs who are not even considered “human”
“What unites the many different forms of Socialism.. is the conception that socialism (or a reasonable facsimile thereof) must be handed down to the grateful masses in one form or another, by a ruling elite which is not subject to their control…” http://search.marxists.org/archive/draper/1966/twosouls/0-2souls.htm
The land policy: United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat I) – Vancouver, May 31 – June 11, 1976. Agenda Item 10, The Preamble states::
“Land…cannot be treated as an ordinary asset, controlled by individuals and subject to the pressures and inefficiencies of the market. Private land ownership is also a principal instrument of accumulation and concentration of wealth and therefore contributes to social injustice; if unchecked, it may become a major obstacle in the planning and implementation of development schemes. The provision of decent dwellings and healthy conditions for the people can only be achieved if land is used in the interests of society as a whole. Public control of land use is therefore indispensable….” http://www.sovereignty.net/p/land/unproprts.htm
Maurice Strong and the Commission on Global Governance:
* “…countries are having to accept that in certain fields, sovereignty has to be exercised collectively, particularly in respect of the global commons.”
But the really chilling quote is from Obama’s Chief Science Adviser, John Holden.’In their 1973 book “Human Ecology: Problems and Solutions,” Holdren and co-authors Paul and Anne Ehrlich wrote:
“The fetus, given the opportunity to develop properly before birth, and given the essential early socializing experiences and sufficient nourishing food during the crucial early years after birth, will ultimately develop into a human being“
That means you are not human unless given the essential early socializing experiences therefore they do not even recognize babies as human until AFTER they have been indoctrinated or dissenters as human at all!
“Either you have a right to own property, or you are property.” – E. Wayne Hage, March 1992
Sean says:
August 1, 2010 at 8:22 am
The real irony of all the nonsense such as “the debate is over” the refusal to debate in a public forum, the ostracizing of people like Drs. Bob Carter and Judith Curry, etc. is that it is not working. The public are a lot smarter than the intellectuals believe. They have particularly sensitive noses for bull—t when they know the action recommended on the bull will be ineffecgtive but is going to cost them money, jobs and possibly much more. Poll after poll rank climate change dead last as a problem to devote resources to at this time and the numbers who think its even a problem that might ever need to be fixed are declining as well. Its time the intellectuals emerge from the bubble and start dealing with the real world both scientifically and politically.
Intellectuals dealing with the real world? Surely you jest.
Ralph says:
August 1, 2010 at 9:58 am
>>DocWat says: August 1, 2010 at 7:11 am
>>Someone help me here… WHY?? I just do not understand
>>why the “warmists” are doing these things.
No, the REAL puzzle, is why are they doing this across the majority of the world. We have always had one or two looney nations – but an entire planet?
Now we have a global media that can spread the virus in seconds. This didn’t exist in the past and the lack of a vectoring mechanism limited the effects of cultural contagion.
Dishman says:
August 1, 2010 at 2:30 pm
Tony Kevin wrote:
It seduces people who are psychologically unwilling to admit limits to economic growth. Denialists cling to the arrogant “mechanical philosophy” of mankind’s infinite right and capacity to exploit and transcend his natural environment.
He has it backwards.
The Alarmists are clinging to their belief that “It’s all down hill from here”, attempting to prove the necessity of failure and death.
… attempting to justify their own inadequacy.
It is neither true nor necessary.
We are all of us inadequate, yet somehow we manage to muddle through and get the job done. Accept it, get over it, stop worrying about it.
Just don’t try to force others into failure to justify your own perceived failure.
When I was three, the girl next door and I fell into a shallow pond together. The water was shallow enough that we could easily stand in it. She didn’t want to get wet, so she tried to climb on top of me. In attempting to avoid the minor indignity, she nearly killed me.
I often hear ‘environmentalists’ saying that “A lot of us are going to have to die”.
Wouldn’t it be better to just admit that you don’t understand how we muddle through?
Thanks Dishman, I get the same sense.
A pessimistic nihilism pervades the AGW movement. There seems to be a total inability to see humans as genuinely capable of innovation and creativity. This I think stems from a total ignorance and distrust of genuine science and technology and an total inability to actually participate in innovative and creative acts.
Girma says:
“Two more freezing winters and we will uncork the champagne.”
Nothing expresses the dominant worldview on this site more succinctly than this. Just two lucrative ski seasons, and all this noise about ACC will fade into memory.
He’s balls-up wrong, of course, just as the dominant views in both the majority and minority camps are almost certainly wrong. I think the “deniers” are more wrong than the “alarmists” — a stance that will certainly earn me opprobrium and ridicule on this particular forum. But I cannot entirely accept the “consensus” thinking, either. Those fellows seem to lack any sense of planetary time.
As a rational, scientifically trained person, I cannot believe that the dramatic decline in glacial and polar ice is coincidental to the release of hundreds of billions of tons of previously fossilised carbon into the atmosphere, which we treat more or less like an open sewer. While it is possible that the warming phenomenon is related to solar output or some other natural variable, that appears extremely unlikely, given the sheer rapidity of the process.
With apologies to those who adhere to a literal belief in the geological timescape defined by St. Thomas Aquinas, the energy contained in all those hydrocarbons we’ve use was accumulated over hundreds of millions of years. We’ve burned through it in a relative instant. It’s counter-intuitive and absurd to believe that such an extraordinary process could unfold without significant changes to global climate (although I can see why it would be comforting to cling to the idea that it could).
On the other hand, predicting what those changes will be — especially on a time scale of anything less then a century or four — is a fool’s errand, unless we accept from the get-go that the uncertainties involved can never be substantively extinguished.
But we *can* be rather sure about is the principle of inertia. There are any number of factors mitigating *toward* climate stability, and factoring against climate change, as evidence by the age, size and strength of the prevailing climatic systems. Two years is utterly meaningless. So is 20.
The industrial revolution is rather older than that. I do believe that most of the changes we are seeing are indeed anthropogenic, but may have more to do with cumulative emissions from before 1970 — or 1910 — than they do with emissions since 2000. Those would seem like to make themselves felt much later in the century.
So I’m inclined to believe those who talk about practical irreversibility, catastrophic warming, tipping points and the like. I think it’s obvious now, but none of us is likely to see an extinction level event. Our great-grandchildren might, and their great-grandchildren almost certainly will. It may well occur even if we were able to scrub every post-industrial ppm of CO2 out of the atmosphere over the next fortnight — there will be consequences, and there’s probably not a damn thing we can do about it.
So fire away. Call me an “alarmist” or whatever the epithet du jour is. But don’t accuse me of “suppressing” you or your worldview. I’m happy to listen to what you have to say. In your tireless campaign to poke holes in the climate change “consensus,” you compel people to hone to the facts (even if it appears many of you choose to ignore those that make you uncomfortable — the rigidly true fact that different atmospheric compositions trap heat at different rates, for example).
So I respect your views, I respect your rights to air them, and I respect your right to accuse me of being a brainless sheep. And I really couldn’t care less whether some of you are corporate PR people or not.
But if you *really* believe we could have consumed so much energy so rapidly in terrestrial context without meaningful long-term consequences, I believe you’re a damned fool.
Richard Latker says:
“But if you *really* believe we could have consumed so much energy so rapidly in terrestrial context without meaningful long-term consequences, I believe you’re a damned fool.”
Show us your ‘long term consequences’ of climate catastrophe [because minor changes are insignificant, and don’t matter]. Use empirical evidence; models don’t count.
What?! You don’t have any real world, testable, reproducible evidence for CAGW?? Then your bogus claim of being “a rational, scientifically trained person” is as risible as circus clowns driving a miniature car and claiming to be competent drivers.
The verifiable fact that the current climate is well within the parameters of natural variability falsifies your emotional panic. Nothing unusual is occurring. Nothing! But despite that fact, you are simply another True Believer in the bogus catastrophic AGW scare, thoroughly frightened of the black cat under your bed — but of course, there is no cat there. And there never was.
Richard Latker says:
August 3, 2010 at 4:45 am
Nothing expresses the dominant worldview on this site more succinctly than this. Just two lucrative ski seasons, and all this noise about ACC will fade into memory.[–snip rest–]
Your post reminds me of the argument that using solar power is in essence ‘taking’ energy from the Sun, and it will eventually have consequence.
Were we —the rest of us— to take YOU are your word, then all of humanity would be sent to the death chambers, if only that humanity is using a source of energy.
Well, what about all of the other creatures here on this planet?
Do not THEY use energy too?
Do not THEY use the Earth as a toilet as well?
Yet here YOU are pointing fingers at the rest of US whilst YOU play the hypocrisy game.
Get this straight: When YOU point a finger at someone else, you actually end up pointing THREE MORE fingers right back at yourself!
899 says:
“Your post reminds me of the argument that using solar power is in essence ‘taking’ energy from the Sun, and it will eventually have consequence.”
It shouldn’t because that statement makes no sense. The point was that the solar energy was stored and accumulated in large quantities and over an extremely long period of time. We’re then burning through all that concentrated (now as chemical) energy in an extremely short period of time.
“899 says:
August 3, 2010 at 5:53 am
Richard Latker says:
August 3, 2010 at 4:45 am
Nothing expresses the dominant worldview on this site more succinctly than this. Just two lucrative ski seasons, and all this noise about ACC will fade into memory.[–snip rest–]
“Were we —the rest of us— to take YOU are your word, then all of humanity would be sent to the death chambers, if only that humanity is using a source of energy.”
Uh, what?
“Well, what about all of the other creatures here on this planet?”
There’s no comparison. In biomass per joule, our energy use is orders of magnitude higher than any other animal. That’s nice — our access to such high levels of directable energy lies at the heart of the human experience — but to expect that it does not have consequences is absurd.
Have to keep this brief. My lengthy reply to Smokey didn’t post. While I’m pleased to engage intellectual adversaries, the playing field has to be level, and I’m not going to waste time writing without an assurance that the result will appear.
The rules said something about bulk editing — by keyword? If so, I’m not sure how to play by the rules.
Bob, you and Ian Plimer would have to be my favourite fellow Australians these days. I can’t tell you how much I admire your courage in standing up to “Our ABC” and the CSIRO for starters. Consider this, though, your work has probably already had a very influential effect in informing our parliamentarians. They wouldn’t admit this of course otherwise they would get pilloried by the mainstream media (of which 0.00001% would have any training in science or could consider scientific issues with an open mind).
Apologies to Lawrence Solomon for not knowing before about his 2009 article on “disinvitation”, which I have just stumbled across. See:
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2009/02/27/lawrence-solomon-the-art-of-the-green-disinvite.aspx
As we all already knew, and this earlier article reinforces, the phenomenon started long ago, and is both persistent and worldwide.
Bob