UPDATE5: (Saturday 10/16/10) It has been a week, and I think this piece has been well distributed, so I’m putting it in regular queue now and it will gradually scroll off the page.
UPDATE4: (Friday 10/15/10) APS member Roger Cohen comments here on Andy Revkin’s Dot Earth op/ed.
UPDATE3: (Friday 10/15/10) Andrew Revkin, after a week (I sent him this story last Friday) of digging around to get just the right rebuttal, responds here at Dot Earth.
UPDATE2: (Wednesday 10/13/10) This just in…click for the story.
APS responds! – Deconstructing the APS response to Dr. Hal Lewis resignation
UPDATE: (Saturday 10/9/10) Since this came in late Friday, many of our weekday WUWT readers might not see this important story, so I’m sticking it to the top for a couple of days. New stories will appear just below this one, please scroll down to see them. – Anthony
(Originally posted on 10/8/10 ) We’ve previously covered the APS here, when I wrote:
While Copenhagen and its excesses rage, a quiet revolution is starting.
Indeed, not so quiet now. It looks like it is getting ugly inside with the public airing of the resignation of a very prominent member who writes:
I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.
…
In the interim the ClimateGate scandal broke into the news, and the machinations of the principal alarmists were revealed to the world. It was a fraud on a scale I have never seen, and I lack the words to describe its enormity. Effect on the APS position: none. None at all. This is not science; other forces are at work.- Hal Lewis
Below is his resignation letter made public today, via the GWPF.
This is an important moment in science history. I would describe it as a letter on the scale of Martin Luther, nailing his 95 theses to the Wittenburg church door. It is worthy of repeating this letter in entirety on every blog that discusses science.
What I would really like to see though, is this public resignation letter given the same editorial space as Michael Mann in today’s Washington Post.
Readers, we can do this. Here’s the place at WaPo to ask for it. For anyone writing to the WaPo, the national@washpost.com, is the national news editorial desk. The Post’s Ombudsman, Andrew Alexander, is the readers’ representative within the newspaper. E-mail him at ombudsman@washpost.com or call 202-334-7582.
Spread the word on other blogs. Let’s see if they have enough integrity to provide a counterpoint. – Anthony
======================================
Sent: Friday, 08 October 2010 17:19 Hal Lewis
From: Hal Lewis, University of California, Santa Barbara
To: Curtis G. Callan, Jr., Princeton University, President of the American Physical Society
6 October 2010
Dear Curt:
When I first joined the American Physical Society sixty-seven years ago it was much smaller, much gentler, and as yet uncorrupted by the money flood (a threat against which Dwight Eisenhower warned a half-century ago).
Indeed, the choice of physics as a profession was then a guarantor of a life of poverty and abstinence—it was World War II that changed all that. The prospect of worldly gain drove few physicists. As recently as thirty-five years ago, when I chaired the first APS study of a contentious social/scientific issue, The Reactor Safety Study, though there were zealots aplenty on the outside there was no hint of inordinate pressure on us as physicists. We were therefore able to produce what I believe was and is an honest appraisal of the situation at that time. We were further enabled by the presence of an oversight committee consisting of Pief Panofsky, Vicki Weisskopf, and Hans Bethe, all towering physicists beyond reproach. I was proud of what we did in a charged atmosphere. In the end the oversight committee, in its report to the APS President, noted the complete independence in which we did the job, and predicted that the report would be attacked from both sides. What greater tribute could there be?
How different it is now. The giants no longer walk the earth, and the money flood has become the raison d’être of much physics research, the vital sustenance of much more, and it provides the support for untold numbers of professional jobs. For reasons that will soon become clear my former pride at being an APS Fellow all these years has been turned into shame, and I am forced, with no pleasure at all, to offer you my resignation from the Society.
It is of course, the global warming scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist. Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.) I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.
So what has the APS, as an organization, done in the face of this challenge? It has accepted the corruption as the norm, and gone along with it. For example:
1. About a year ago a few of us sent an e-mail on the subject to a fraction of the membership. APS ignored the issues, but the then President immediately launched a hostile investigation of where we got the e-mail addresses. In its better days, APS used to encourage discussion of important issues, and indeed the Constitution cites that as its principal purpose. No more. Everything that has been done in the last year has been designed to silence debate
2. The appallingly tendentious APS statement on Climate Change was apparently written in a hurry by a few people over lunch, and is certainly not representative of the talents of APS members as I have long known them. So a few of us petitioned the Council to reconsider it. One of the outstanding marks of (in)distinction in the Statement was the poison word incontrovertible, which describes few items in physics, certainly not this one. In response APS appointed a secret committee that never met, never troubled to speak to any skeptics, yet endorsed the Statement in its entirety. (They did admit that the tone was a bit strong, but amazingly kept the poison word incontrovertible to describe the evidence, a position supported by no one.) In the end, the Council kept the original statement, word for word, but approved a far longer “explanatory” screed, admitting that there were uncertainties, but brushing them aside to give blanket approval to the original. The original Statement, which still stands as the APS position, also contains what I consider pompous and asinine advice to all world governments, as if the APS were master of the universe. It is not, and I am embarrassed that our leaders seem to think it is. This is not fun and games, these are serious matters involving vast fractions of our national substance, and the reputation of the Society as a scientific society is at stake.
3. In the interim the ClimateGate scandal broke into the news, and the machinations of the principal alarmists were revealed to the world. It was a fraud on a scale I have never seen, and I lack the words to describe its enormity. Effect on the APS position: none. None at all. This is not science; other forces are at work.
4. So a few of us tried to bring science into the act (that is, after all, the alleged and historic purpose of APS), and collected the necessary 200+ signatures to bring to the Council a proposal for a Topical Group on Climate Science, thinking that open discussion of the scientific issues, in the best tradition of physics, would be beneficial to all, and also a contribution to the nation. I might note that it was not easy to collect the signatures, since you denied us the use of the APS membership list. We conformed in every way with the requirements of the APS Constitution, and described in great detail what we had in mind—simply to bring the subject into the open.
5. To our amazement, Constitution be damned, you declined to accept our petition, but instead used your own control of the mailing list to run a poll on the members’ interest in a TG on Climate and the Environment. You did ask the members if they would sign a petition to form a TG on your yet-to-be-defined subject, but provided no petition, and got lots of affirmative responses. (If you had asked about sex you would have gotten more expressions of interest.) There was of course no such petition or proposal, and you have now dropped the Environment part, so the whole matter is moot. (Any lawyer will tell you that you cannot collect signatures on a vague petition, and then fill in whatever you like.) The entire purpose of this exercise was to avoid your constitutional responsibility to take our petition to the Council.
6. As of now you have formed still another secret and stacked committee to organize your own TG, simply ignoring our lawful petition.
APS management has gamed the problem from the beginning, to suppress serious conversation about the merits of the climate change claims. Do you wonder that I have lost confidence in the organization?
I do feel the need to add one note, and this is conjecture, since it is always risky to discuss other people’s motives. This scheming at APS HQ is so bizarre that there cannot be a simple explanation for it. Some have held that the physicists of today are not as smart as they used to be, but I don’t think that is an issue. I think it is the money, exactly what Eisenhower warned about a half-century ago. There are indeed trillions of dollars involved, to say nothing of the fame and glory (and frequent trips to exotic islands) that go with being a member of the club. Your own Physics Department (of which you are chairman) would lose millions a year if the global warming bubble burst. When Penn State absolved Mike Mann of wrongdoing, and the University of East Anglia did the same for Phil Jones, they cannot have been unaware of the financial penalty for doing otherwise. As the old saying goes, you don’t have to be a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing. Since I am no philosopher, I’m not going to explore at just which point enlightened self-interest crosses the line into corruption, but a careful reading of the ClimateGate releases makes it clear that this is not an academic question.
I want no part of it, so please accept my resignation. APS no longer represents me, but I hope we are still friends.
Hal
==========================================================
Harold Lewis is Emeritus Professor of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, former Chairman; Former member Defense Science Board, chmn of Technology panel; Chairman DSB study on Nuclear Winter; Former member Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards; Former member, President’s Nuclear Safety Oversight Committee; Chairman APS study on Nuclear Reactor Safety Chairman Risk Assessment Review Group; Co-founder and former Chairman of JASON; Former member USAF Scientific Advisory Board; Served in US Navy in WW II; books: Technological Risk (about, surprise, technological risk) and Why Flip a Coin (about decision making)
Richard Feynman also resigned from honors. Hal Lewis is in good company:
@Daniel Kozub
“Appeal to authority is vastly underrated. I’m an EE (Specifically DSP) who happened to double major in general physics. I guess this gives me a better background then most to get at this stuff. My conclusions; Atmospheric Physics is Fing hard! It makes my head spin.
Did you ever read “The real holes in Climate Science” in Nature awhile back? If not, go read it, no subscription required. I remember thinking when reading through said article “Wow! This is an intimidating field”. Of course I have to basically just take the word of the experts, I don’t know enough to make an informed decision. What’s the alternative, pretend I know? Unsatisfactory.
I dunno, maybe the emperor really doesn’t have any clothes, but I doubt you, me, or any of the other commentators here, or over at Realclimate, know one way or the other. Regardless of the certainty espoused in the comments.
As for the rest; This is just a rehash of the initial value vs. boundary value problem. I do agree with you “incontrovertible fact” should be a phrase not mentioned.”
Okay Starchaser, since you are an electrical engineer with a degree in physics, I will attempt to put my argument into terms that you can understand.
When you have results of a test that are unexpected and unexplained, do you:
A. Determine whether your equipment is working properly.
B. Convince yourself or others that the results are normal and within specifications.
C. Adjust the data so that it fits within your expectations and specifications.
Assuming that we do not have any computers or software that are self-aware and that a random number generator is never random, is it ever possible for a computer model to output a result that isn’t exactly what was programmed in to it? (Assuming no mechanical, electronic, or other errors.)
How will we know if any or all of the climate models are accurate at predicting the future?
Please ask yourself how you would know if the emperor had any clothes. Tell me if you’d like.
I have not read the Nature article that you referenced. But I have bookmarked it and will read it as soon as I am done with this post. Thank you.
It took me years to wrap my head around atmospheric physics. I’ve only recently considered myself to be knowledgeable enough to discuss hydrology. I’m currently researching entropy, which I find myself lacking-in at the professional level. If you care enough to read and comment on science blogs, you have the ability to edjucate yourself enough to make a decision with which you are satisfied.
“Standing on the shoulders of geniuses” is what has allowed the scientific community to get where we are today. But that would no longer be possible if we are not sure of their footing. That is not an appeal to authority. The dark ages broke that chain, and science had to start from scratch.
“@Daniel Kozub
“A non-falsifiable hypothesis is not science.”
It’s been a long time since problems complex to interest the PhD guys have simple analytic solutions.”
My post is getting long, so I’ll answer this breifly and without comment:
Astronomy, agricultural science, drug discovery, chemistry, physiology, particle physics, metrology, etc…
Thanks to Prof Lewis.
Yes, we can defund climate nonsense perhaps in January. But it may be 2012 before the CAGW Medusa will be slain.
A personnell change at NOAA and GISS could do it, and this puss filled boil can finally be lanced. I hope that Issa and others know and plan this.
Jeff T says:
October 8, 2010 at 7:07 pm
Hal Lewis misused the APS address list when he sent unsolicited e-mail to thousands of APS members, including me. I asked him to remove me from his list. I then wrote to the APS President and thanked her for handling the issue in a professional manner. Councilors received a “barrage of e-mail”, with a significant majority opposing changes to the APS statement on climate change. When the APS Council voted on the motion to change the statement, no one favored it. Even the councilor who submitted the motion opposed it. Read the report here . Hal clearly feels strongly about this issue, but the majority of APS members disagree.
**************************************
Jeff – that is the whole point. Scientific truth is not decided by majority vote.
All the best.
Simply having one person resign, however important they may be, will have little effect, it will simply be hushed up and sink into deliberate obscurity. Instead, here is what SHOULD be done:
Fists, contact all those people on the 200 meber list who wanted the petition, have them contact all their physician friends, who contact all theirs, etc. In short, either get the APS mailing list or make your own. Then they all write a lettet telling the APS to shape up or they will ALL resign, en mass. They will not shape up, of course, so you all resign en mass and then form the American Physicians Society or some such, with a logo as similar as possible to the old APS. They won’t like that, they may even want to take legal action, you want this, it brings in publicity to how they broke the old APU’s constitution and allows you to pull out even more members away from the old APS, and may allow legal action of your own. Your new society can even copy the old ones constitution (and should, deliberatly and with publicity), with a new provision, “we mean it this time”, and penalties for breaking it.
Meanwhile, if they broke the APU’s constitution, see if that can be used to throw them out of office, or dissolve the APU, or is grounds for a legal suit (against the APS or individuals in it) since you sent them membership dues and that means they have certain legal obligations. If you want tactics, see how the liberals have been doing it for years, repeat their tactics back at them. For instance, have they or do they resort to name calling when all this goes down, sue them for slander, do they lie about you, libel, etc. Meanwhile, if the old APS wants to do ANYTHING, find some reason you can bring before a friendly judge to bring an injunction to stop it, thats the way the envoronmentalists do it. Are there obvious, or even not so obvious conflicts of interest with some members recieving money to express certain views or to make it look like the old APS supports certain views, see if that is grounds for leagal action, harrassing legal action (the environmentalist tactic), removal from APS office, publicise it, organize boycotts of any company involved, protests, etc. Picket in front of any APS meeting, the picketers including former members (publicise this, put it on the picket sdigns) and as many like minded people can join as you can get (contact the Tea Party folks, mention the “cap and trade” tax), get students involved, they love this sort of thing.
In short, it’s time to do to them what they have been doing to us for years, and it’s past time expecting them to listen to reason or fight fair. It’s time to turn opposition to AGW into a movement. If we do not, we will first lose freedoms, then our economies, then in the collpase that follows, possibly our lives. Or do you really think the world can support 6+ billion people today with a tech base similar to 1850?
Michael Mann in today’s Washington Post.
How does the Hockey Stick hold up to science?
Just as an aside on the broader side of this – I think this Mann piece does seem to expose a weakness in Western judicial systems that allow accused persons and their defense lawyers to go to the papers and plead their case. If the prosecution were to do the same thing it would be considered prejudicial to prospects of a fair trial, as the newspaper reports may (so it is claimed by defense lawyers) influence potential jurors. I just don’t see why, when the defense does it, it isn’t considered equally prejudicial to the prospects of a fair trial too. Isn’t that what Mann is trying to do here, influence public opinion in his favor prior to the Virginian court action?
I’ve done my bit already.
Google for “American Physical Society” scam
and click on anything about Hal Lewis. Most of the first few pages of results are about him. The APS and other “science” organsations need to be taught a lesson.
Jeff T says:
October 8, 2010 at 7:07 pm
Hal Lewis misused the APS address list when he sent unsolicited e-mail to thousands of APS members, including me. I asked him to remove me from his list. I then wrote to the APS President and thanked her for handling the issue in a professional manner. Councilors received a “barrage of e-mail”, with a significant majority opposing changes to the APS statement on climate change. When the APS Council voted on the motion to change the statement, no one favored it. Even the councilor who submitted the motion opposed it. Read the report here . Hal clearly feels strongly about this issue, but the majority of APS members disagree.
Thanks for the link. I found in there that the people agreeing with the present APS statement were running two to one for it. This of course means that there are a lot more than 200 people against the statement.
Let us suppose that this was a genuine blind poll with all the checks of impartiality. In a genuine poll of physicist members an extra question should have been imperative:
Are you in any direct way getting funding from supporting AGW theory and practice?
I would suspect that the yes to this question would be running two to one too, i.e. the people supporting the statement were the people whose livelihood hung on the statement.
I met Prof Hal Lewis at a conference in, I think it was 1976. I will never forget the talk he gave after dinner one evening. He spoke for an hour without any notes and was truly inspiring; the room was packed and all there were enthralled. A scientist of honour and integrity. He is one of the last survivors of the great physicists of the second half of the 20th century.
His words of wisdom should be widely disseminated.
How true that is. I was going to study physics 40 years ago. Many of the TOWERING giants of the Manhattan Project and before were still alive. Who does physics have now? And what have they accomplished? Nothing of importance. I am over 60, and we were told in the 1950s that fusion was going to provide us with limitless power, made from hydrogen. We are still waiting.
I would only recommend that the leaders of the 200 should have – still can – go talk to lawyers and try to get a court order that the leadership abide by the society’s constitution. Their constitution is a legal document, after all. It’s purpose should be written so as to lay out responsibilities and rights, plus limitations on abuses of powers. The leadership can only abuse its powers if the lay members let themselves get pushed around.
Hal Lewis: (on the global warming scam) “It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist.”
Thank you, Hal Lewis. Shame on those who continue to promote it; although I can certainly appreciate the fear of many in letting go of the tiger’s tail.
The IPCC’s predicted high CO2-AGW is meaningless because it seems to depends on a cooling ‘cloud albedo effect’ correction derived via a semi-empirical relationship between cloud optical depth and albedo dating from 1980. It makes a false assumption about what happens in thick clouds: ‘reflection’ from the surfaced of water droplets, e.g.: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/Aerosols/
There’s no such physics yet no-one has apparently picked up this serious error. The reality is that if you pollute thick clouds, the albedo may decrease substantially, another form of AGW meaning you have to rein back on the CO2 effect.
I have still to make up my mind whether this, the biggest scientific mistake in History, is a scam dating from about 2003 when the ‘cloud albedo effect’, the last ditch hope of the high feedback models, could not be proved experimentally but to be kept in AR4.
People here are arguing that the APS Council took a poll.
That is not the same thing as having a Topic Group, where things get presented and hashed out.
I watched the video of a debate on AGW with Michael Crichton and Richard Linzen on the anti-AGW side. A vote was taken beforehand. A vote was taken after the debate. I can’t recall the exact numbers, but the anti-AGW side won over an additional 20% or so to their side.
I’ve heard – but cannot confirm – that such debates always come out with the anti- side winning over people.
A Topic Group would possibly have people change their minds. A poll does not present anything except answers to pre-packaged questions – questions which can be stacked.
Those who point out that many of the physicists’ careers are wrapped around – that sounds correct, but we may never know.
The Manhattan Project saved a lot of lives in WWII, but since then Big Science (driven by money) has distorted science. Especially physics, IMHO. Physicists since then haven’t done squat compared to the 65 years before that.
Oakden Wolf says:
October 8, 2010 at 10:00 pm
Even if you discount the effects of CO2 on global temperatures, such things as ocean acidification and the influence of black soot aerosols ought to be reasons to move toward cleaner fossil-fuel technologies and reliable, high-yield alternative energy sources.
You seem to be one step before the Hodja principle. Hodja is a wise judge/fool, as the case required, in stories told in the Anatolian tradition of Asia minor.
This is the pertinent story:
Early one morning Hodja started beating his wife.
A concerned villager tried to intervene: “Hodja effendi, why are you beating her, what has she done to deserve a beating”?
Hodja replied: “I do not know, but for sure, she does.”
It is a step before ” Kill them all, God will sort out the guilty and innocent”.
In other words what you are advocating is not the scientific method: trial, error, remeasurement etc, but politics: all means are useful to achieve the ends.
“Having first determined the question according to his will, man then resorts to experience, and bending her to conformity with his placets, leads her about like a captive in a procession.” Francis Bacon.
Mr. Lewis is in very good company on this one.
Dr Lewis is due a lot of respect. Michael Mann, on the other hand…
“My fellow scientists and I must be ready to stand up to blatant abuse from politicians who seek to mislead and distract the public.”
And the public must stand up to blatant abuse from scientists who mislead and distract from the truth.
“They are hurting American science.”
No, Michael Mann, you and your ilk are hurting American science.
“And their failure to accept the reality of climate change will hurt our children and grandchildren, too.”
And when warmist arguments fail you begin to wail – think of the cheeeeeeldren.
Pathetic!
This is your beef? Well I can see how this would be troubling. That incorrigible young tyke, how devious!
You tattled? The lady teacher came to your rescue? Did she bring in grief counselors and tell you everything will be ok! 😉 Naturally the appearance of an email arriving at your (Taxpayer funded?) computer which contains contrarian heresy was simply too painful to ignore. It couldn’t be discarded like Viagra or Nigerian spam? Or perhaps your institution filters the spam ahead of time which made the arrival of this email even more unsettling, arriving in your inbox all by its lonesome, beckoning you to ‘click me’.
Just what the heck is unsolicited e-mail anyway? [anything that deviates from
ChurchAGW dogma group-think?]. I mean, any email sent to a list is by definition unsolicited! Any email not sent as a reply is unsolicited! How exactly does one solicit email? You can certainly solicit an email reply. (Yeah, I know you said misused the APS address list, but that still does not explain the use of the term unsolicited if you really think about it).Seriously, I think Hal Lewis did exactly the right thing here. He made some squishy little APS members face their true demons: unsolicited emails containing world-view shattering thoughts. For this alone he should get a Nobel.
The reformation begins!
“Even if you discount the effects of CO2 on global temperatures, such things as ocean acidification and the influence of black soot aerosols ought to be reasons to move toward cleaner fossil-fuel technologies and reliable, high-yield alternative energy sources.”
Yes, but CARBON-Mongering will do absolutelly nothing to us move toward that. In fact it will muddy the waters and move us away from that goal. Science is stalled and thrown back for years by dogma and suppression.
Following my last comment – after multiple attempts at emailing the Washington Post I give up. Each attempt (using various email links on the WP site) either results in a “delivery failure” or the latest attempt resulted in “I am out of the office until 10/18/2010.”
Anyone else had any success?
T. Goodwin: The core of AGW science is a bunch of computer nerds who know no science, have produced none, yet have managed to convince government agencies that they should be funded.
Who are you to claim that the climate researchers know no science? You spew your conspiracy theories on climate science, when 97% of climate scientists support the research on climate change. Are 97% of climate scientists on an elaborate conspiracy?
Of course, I will never find out because I am not worthy for your reply.
As always there are lots of comments phrased to imply or embrace the concepts of “conspiracy”, “fraud” and “tax-payers cash” being paid to Mann and others. I think Mann is a Charalatan but his actions are not about conspiracy or fraud per se, they are about patronage. All of the researchers involved such as Mann, Jones etc rely on patronage from the state and others (remember they have created consortia which also provide funding). By over-selling their research and theories they can continue to enjoy patronage. Anyone who challenges the competence of their hypothesis is endangering their patronage. It also endangers the patronage that supports their institutions hence CRU and Mann’s university exonerate them in superficial investigations. This is all human nature and would be relatively benign (lots of mediocre scientists work in superficial or irrelevent research areas) if it weren’t for the actions taken by governments and large organisations. It is in the latter category that the potential for fraud is created, rather like Enron. When governments create a financial framework (subsidies) that artificially favours certain actions then the opportunity for fraud becomes significant. Like shining arc lights on solar panels because the subsidies make it pay!
Hal Lewis is a formidable man. He has this rare and somewhat outdated quality called integrity. Just read the Oral History Transcript of an interview prepared by Dr. Finn Aaserud in Santa Barbara, CA 6 July 1986 at the Niels Bohr Library & Archives site to see what I mean. His character reminds me of the late Richard Feynman. Honest, curious, matter-of-fact like, enjoying his life tremendously. A physicist.
I watched the video of a debate on AGW with Michael Crichton and Richard Linzen on the anti-AGW side. A vote was taken beforehand. A vote was taken after the debate. I can’t recall the exact numbers, but the anti-AGW side won over an additional 20% or so to their side.
— feet2thefire @ur momisugly October 9, 2010 at 12:37 am
Yes, that was a humdinger! Before the debate the audience polled 57% to 30% for Global Warming; after: 42% to 46%. (Undecideds made up the rest.) See http://intelligencesquaredus.org/index.php/past-debates/global-warming-is-not-a-crisis/ .
Gavin Schmidt was on the losing side. There was some real heartburn over at RealClimate afterward.
Of course, when you’ve got big guns like Lindzen and Crichton it’s understandable, but Schmidt & Co. hurt themselves with their arrogant attitudes.
Amusingly, they cited the poor reception Continental Drift Theory received initially as though that story — one in which the underdog triumphs against consensus — favored the Global Warming side.
The Global Warming side would have been better off had the debate not taken place.
Recently I googled for public debates on AGW. It’s true — usually the AGW side loses, then makes excuses. Their strategy these days is to pretend it’s like scientists debating anti-evolutionists, and that the proper defense is to refuse to debate, even back out of debates as James Cameron did a few weeks ago.
The problem, though, is that they need votes from ordinary citizens in order to pursue the mega-expensive global warming agenda. Like it or not (and they definitely don’t) they must convince voters to get on board, so bills like cap-and-trade can pass.
But after ten years of flat temperatures plus the recent climate scandals and worldwide economic meltdown, ordinary people have turned against global warming.
There is no getting them back without some effort, but if the AGW people won’t debate openly and can’t twist arms politically, there’s not much they can do except PR campaigns (“No Pressure”) and fake debate on their blogs, and hope that the weather turns hot and nasty for the next several years.
“Your own Physics Department (of which you are chairman) would lose millions a year if the global warming bubble burst.”
IF?????????????