UPDATE! See this new press release: AGU backs away from “climate rapid response team” citing faulty reporting
Gosh. A “Climate rapid response team” from Minnesota? What will they be armed with? Wits and a hockey stick? So far that hasn’t worked out too well. From the Chicago Tribune:
Climate scientists plan campaign against global-warming skeptics
The American Geophysical Union plans to announce Monday that 700 researchers have agreed to speak out on the issue. The effort is a pushback against congressional conservatives who have vowed to kill regulations on greenhouse gas emissions.
Faced with rising political attacks, hundreds of climate scientists are joining a broad campaign to push back against congressional conservatives who have threatened prominent researchers with investigations and vowed to kill regulations to rein in man-made greenhouse gas emissions.
The still-evolving efforts reveal a shift among climate scientists, many of whom have traditionally stayed out of politics and avoided the news media. Many now say they are willing to go toe-to-toe with their critics, some of whom gained new power after the Republicans won control of the House in last Tuesday’s election.
On Monday, the American Geophysical Union, the country’s largest association of climate scientists, plans to announce that 700 climate scientists have agreed to speak out as experts on questions about global warming and the role of man-made air pollution.
Some are prepared to go before what they consider potentially hostile audiences on conservative talk-radio and television shows.
John Abraham of St. Thomas University in Minnesota, who last May wrote a widely disseminated response to climate-change skeptics, is pulling together a “Climate Rapid Response Team,” which so far has more than three dozen leading scientists to defend the consensus on global warming in the scientific community. Some are also pulling together a handbook on the human causes of climate change, which they plan to start sending to U.S. high schools as early as this fall.
“This group feels strongly that science and politics can’t be divorced and that we need to take bold measures to not only communicate science but also to aggressively engage the denialists and politicians who attack climate science and its scientists,” said Scott Mandia, professor of physical sciences at Suffolk County Community College in New York.
“We are taking the fight to them because we are … tired of taking the hits. The notion that truth will prevail is not working. The truth has been out there for the past two decades, and nothing has changed.”
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Heh, that last sentence pretty well sums it up. Read the whole article here.
I find the phrase “climate rapid response team” a bit of an oxymoron. Given the speed of climate change, did they mean “weather response team”? 😉
Well it looks like I and many of my associates be traveling more. When these guys come to your town, demand some equal time to present the skeptic side of the story.
h/t to WUWT Reader “Craig” in tips and notes.
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John P. Abraham
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Associate Professor Email: jpabraham@stthomas.edu Phone: 651-962-5766 Toll Free: (800) 328-6819, Ext. 651-962-5766 Mail OSS101 2115 Summit Ave. St. Paul, MN 55105 Office Location: OSS 107 |
Good to see Kevin Trenberth is listed as one of the scientist. Maybe we can get a rapid response on the missing heat.
Graeme says:
November 7, 2010 at 5:32 pm
Lol!
BTW, there have been a couple of questioning over the past few months about whether an”Associate Professor” is actually a professor.
An “Associate” professor IS a professor, usually with tenure.
Even an Assistant Professor is a professor. Very often only the head of division is ever a Full Professor.
So what science are they going to discuss. Certainly there will be no actual science discussed. If they discussed the actual science they would be skeptics….
John Kehr
The Inconvenient Skeptic
Well the 10:10 approach was considered a bit over the top. Why not try a handbook, and a crack team of Climatologists who will swarm in and “educate” the heathens unceasingly with The Absolute Scientific Truth until they recant their primitive unscientific beliefs?
No one expects the Climate Inquisition!
Theo Goodwin says: “This is the worst nightmare of the pro-AGW-AGCD establishment. Having a group flying the establishment flag and taking part in public debate on AGW-AGCD can only lead to the revelation that the emperor wears no clothes.”
They’ll be armed with a low-carbon-footprint Ditto duplicator copy of a script to read. There will be no debate.
“The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded. Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.” –Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1961
700 “climate scientists” vs. 1 Lord Monckton
Bets?
walt man says:
November 7, 2010 at 5:18 pm
Which part of sending out pamphlets to high schools indicated discussion?
Sounds a lot like Gores don’t talk to the old folks, they don’t understand to me.
DaveE.
These guys are probably concerned with the sound of investigative feet pounding down their hallowed halls.
They do have much to lose: face, funds, reputations and positions and in a couple of instances, thier freedom.
They might be described as “desperately cool, calm and collected with very high levels of anxiety”.
Climate Rapid Action Party anyone?
The problem with their consensus nonsense is …see Sunday Nov. 7th at http://www.dilbert.com/fast/
This Abrahams guy has form:
http://joannenova.com.au/2010/07/abraham-surrenders-to-monckton-uni-of-st-thomas-endorses-untruths/#more-9427
so there response to having the science scrutinised is a propaganda campaign?
walt man – at 5:18- Well they seem to promise just what you have been asking for – discussion. Therefore why so much bad feeling?
Walt, do you think there will be an opportunity for discussion on the impropriety of the following plan?
“Some are also pulling together a handbook on the human causes of climate change, which they plan to start sending to U.S. high schools as early as this fall.”
Sounds like these folks do understand how to care and nuture a religion..
I predict Marc Morano’s stock is going to go up. After Marc’s first TV debate at the onset of Climatgate where he king of flubbed it, I sent him a piece of advice in an email. He needed to get his talking points in order and and stick to his own pre-prepared talking points agenda. Marc has come a long way in the past year. Marc is now a firecracker, and everything that comes out of his mouth is fact. I love hearing this guy talk.
evanmjones says:
November 7, 2010 at 6:27 pm
Yes – I do find the US system confusing.
In Australia we have tutors, then 3 levels of Lecturer I, II, III, Senior Lecturer, Associate Professor (formally Principal Lecturer), and finally Professor.
Thanks Phil’sDad – I had a good laugh at your post 🙂 🙂
Scott Mandia should might as well retire his physical science professorship and switch over to politics and activism.
I always thought his posts on here had spin …and here he goes again….this time… saying science and politics are inextricably linked together…and that they will “aggressively engage” the “denialists”.
Nice job, Scott. sarc/off
Bring it on.
We “denialists” are waiting for you.
Chris
Norfolk, VA , USA
Meet it? That is defense. You don’t win by playing defense, which cedes the advantage of choice to the opponent. As General George S. Patton, Jr. said:
“I don’t want to get any messages saying, “I am holding my position.” We are not holding a Xxxxxxxxx thing. Let the Germans do that. We are advancing constantly and we are not interested in holding onto anything, except the enemy’s xxxxx. We are going to twist his xxxxx and kick the living xxxx out of him all of the time. Our basic plan of operation is to advance and to keep on advancing regardless of whether we have to go over, under, or through the enemy. We are going to go through him like xxxx through a goose; like xxxx through a tin horn!”
Take the research grants back and give them to real scientists who will respect the scientific method, the law, and the right of the public to participate in Science and its proper funding. Take the leadership positions and professional societies back, and/or replace them with uncorrupted organizations dedicated to the scientific method and honest representation of their memberships. Replace the corrupt peer reviews and corrupt scientific journals. Make it safe for uncorrupted scientists to practice honest science without fear for their academic and commercial careers. Drive Lysenkoism and post-normal science back into the dustbin of history where they belong. Chase the climate religion out of the schools. Never give up. Never stand idle. Never quit.
Even more PR. Typical response.
Instead of scientific measurement.
They could just prove it for once instead of engaging in yet another PR campaign (which is what this scientific field is 100% about – not evidence but PR).
There really should be congressional investigations and the funds should be cut-off until someone shows some actual evidence.
“This has nothing to do with science and everything to do with propaganda to keep funding.” pat says: November 7, 2010 at 3:58 pm
I agree with you Pat. And what is a climate scientist anyway? A geochemist, a sedimentologist, a glaciologist, an atmospheric physicist, geophsicist, astronomist, paleontologist, oceanologist etc.
Probably none of these, more likely a mathematical modeller and as Pat suggests public funded greedy, pompus, we-know-it-all scientists and scientific groups.
By the way, I declare I am a Geologist/Geophysicist (Geoscientist) not funded by public money (and you probably know what that means). So I guess I’m biased, although I know a little bit about paleoclimate.
walt man says:
November 7, 2010 at 5:18 pm
Well they seem to promise just what you have been asking for – discussion.
Therefore why so much bad feeling?
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Not sure that it is so much a bad feeling but rather a hefty dose of skepticism about what John Abraham is saying because historically the climate science Team have shut down nearly all attempts by skeptics to enter debate or engage them at any level. This has been shown on WUWT and Climate Audit countless times in previous posts.
The question is; why does John Abraham and his 700 or 36 or whatever number of scientists he thinks supports him suddenly feel the need to aggressively speak out as experts on Global Warming?
The answer may be; He/they are concerned that the billions of dollars currently funding them to try and prove a link between CO2 and global warming will be usefully channelled into productive areas of scientific research that will show benefits to us all.
The more they fight this the more obvious it is they are not scientists, that they are not right, and that the public deserves a *large* refund.
Threatening their funding is a less strategic approach than coaxing them into figuring out natural variations. The goal can be to make sure funding is used sensibly. We need more climate research, not less. That can be made very clear. These folks need to stop playing with computer fantasies (based on untenable assumptions) and get back to finishing the job of exploring the data. They have fallen victim to Simpson’s Paradox and this is crucial. Threatening the funding will not elicit the most adaptive response for our society & civilization. This is not about revenge. This is about understanding nature. Putting aside the left/right hyperpartisan nonsense and being practical is the way to go here. This is a teachable moment. It’s a chance to get them to realize they actually can figure out nature within a reasonable time frame. Just put the carrot on the stick to ease them into the task. These are bright folks and we can get them working for society.
It wouldn’t want to find itself in a room full of readers of alarmists’ own Scientific American. That pretty bodice could get somewhat spotty!
http://www.surveymonkey.com/sr.aspx?sm=ONSUsVTBSpkC_2f2cTnptR6w_2fehN0orSbxLH1gIA03DqU_3d