Bishop Hill has yet another amusing entry on the post facto revisionism going on over at the oxymorinically named Skeptical Science blog run by John Cook. Add to that, Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. also has an entry where he says he’s given up trying to have a dialog on science with that very website.
While this may be humorous, maybe even satisfying to some, it really illustrates the sad polarization that we have today over climate science. The polarization is so intense, that it almost precludes any rational communications.
Of course we skeptics can argue that we’ve been treated badly, and we’d be right. AGW proponents tend to argue that we are simply too stupid to communicate with, and that they have the moral high ground, and thus the means justify the ends. Here for example is a response to a commenter by Grant Foster, aka Tamino:
Espen | November 4, 2010 at 4:45 pm
I’m not sure why you need to be so rude, and I should probably leave and never come back … [edit]
[Response: I’m not sure why you need to be so stupid. Please leave and never come back.]
In some cases, like above, we can’t even get a word in. Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. seems to have the same problem over at Skeptical Science, he writes:
I have been commenting for the last several days on Skeptical Science in their post
SkS Responses to Pielke Sr. Questions
While there have a few constructive interactions, many of the comments are not only not constructive, but demeaning. I also spend considerable time repeating myself in answering their questions. I am disappointed as I was hoping that Skeptical Science was a weblog where a diversity of views can be discussed constructively. However, the moderators on that weblog failed to adequately police the comments.
After reading myself at SkS how grubbily Dr. Pielke has been treated in the dialog there, is it any wonder he’s chosen not to try anymore?
At Bishop Hill, he’s pointing out a timeline regarding Cook’s revisionism of posts and moderator response to posts. Again we see the same sort of problems.
But, hasn’t it always been that way since the very beginning of the issue? The combination of perceived moral high ground mixed with the educated liberal mindset, combined with a dash of anonymity, in my opinion, leads AGW proponents to revert to tribal mannerisms in dealing with others whom they perceive as inferior in intellect and creed.
On the plus side, this very behavior, which seems to be omnipresent in AGW proponent circles, (though skeptics have a few bad examples too) is part of the reason why skeptics are winning the war of public opinion.
Reading both of these posts is instructive:
http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2011/9/21/the-cook-timeline.html
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Note to commenters, on some other blogs the Skeptical Science website is referred to as SS.com with the obvious violations of Godwins Law immediately applied. Such responses will be snipped here in this thread should they occur. We don’t need to demonize our opponents, as they are doing a fine job all by themselves through their own words an actions.
Quoting myself again
However, things are rarely that simple. I’d like to add this page to the Heartland wiki. But hey, I hear shrill voices already rubbishing any such link. However, if my wiki URL were developed and devoted to simply refuting Cook’s debunks, that narrowing of focus might work. But one then would have to consider, does one allow warmists to contribute? A really difficult question. Wikis are not the same as blogs. My personal feeling is that since warmists already have Wikipedia, RealClimate, Cook and even WUWT, they don’t need to divert our limited resources, trolling our own wiki – which we only need because we’re allowed no mileage on any of the official climate info resources.
“Skeptical Scientist” is not “oxymorinically [sic] named” or tautology; it is “doublespeak”. It deliberately disguises the nature of the site.
mhklein
As for who treats the other side with more respect; well, I suggest a simple experiment that might reveal the truth. Simply post the same message (names changed as appropriate) on different boards and record responses.
Since I started the (“They-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named”) analogy, I will avoid mentioning it here (and I still believe certain analogies are a tool of irony, not of demonization).
Anyway there is one important bit you’re missing, Anthony. It’s not just perceived moral high ground mixed with the educated liberal mindset, combined with a dash of anonymity: there is also a strong war-like mentality, since the Cooks and dana1981s and taminos of the world are literally (in their view) protecting the planet against us evil skeptics.
When one believes to be at war, a war for survival no less, then there is little time for niceties and considerations about the feelings of fellow human beings. And just as well, the first casualty of war is truth and that’s why there isn’t much of it alive at Skeptical Science, or RealClimate, or Tamino, etc etc.
a bt of good news, on the line of “it’s an ill wind….”
the economic collapse that’s underway across Europe and the US (see what happened to stocks over the last 2 days?) is going to finally cut the legs out from under all legislative proposals to implement the AGW dogma. No one can afford to play around with that nonsense anymore, all the free money is gone.
And as all the shining promises of free money that drew con artists like the Solyndra gang fade away, the support for AGW will fade as well, until only a hard core of out of touch academic idealogues are left defending it.
In the real world, where ideas have to be profitable to survive, the entire Green Project is dead.
and it ain’t comin’ back.
JoeH says:
September 22, 2011 at 1:40 pm
Very well said.
The comments are not the major issue with skepticalscience. It is the analysis. It picks from the peer-reviewed data to give the most alarmist spin, often ignoring the more rounded, more recent and less alarmist articles or data. (a pattern familiar to those who have read the Hockey Stick Illusion)
On Antarctic ice melt, this is certainly the case. SkS relies on a single author – Velicogna (two papers 2006 & 2009) – to substantiate the claim that the Antarctic pack ice is not just melting, it is accelerating. The 2009 paper looked at only six years of data. Yet less than two months ago there was published a paper that looked at a much longer period, looked at various studies (including Velicogna) and at different ways of estimating. It concluded that there may be some ice loss, but no acceleration. Anthony Watts summarises this paper quite nicely at http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/07/27/antarctic-ice-%E2%80%93-more-accurate-estimates/
Watts’s article also links to the original article. Do not take the word of a (slightly) manic beancounter. Do the comparison and you will find that the SkS is anything but sceptical and far from scientific.
I would suggest that this is not an isolated incident either. I have found at least two more. Perhaps others could have a delve?
http://manicbeancounter.wordpress.com/2011/09/22/antarctic-ice-melt-at-the-dogmatic-%E2%80%9Cskeptical-science%E2%80%9D/
Apologies for replying to myself… but as further evidence of this, everyone, I offer what a commenter at BH reminded me of. The fact that Godwin’s law’s misuse is pure political correctness run amok. No one on this site would blink an eye if I made an analogy to Lysenko or Stalin policies w.r.t. Skeptical Science, but make a single allusion to a certain regime west of there and everyone loses their hair. It’s nonsensical newspeak and it should stop.
wws says:
September 22, 2011 at 3:13 pm
“In the real world, where ideas have to be profitable to survive, the entire Green Project is dead.
and it ain’t comin’ back.”
But we are left with the power companies charging a premium price for their GREED energy agenda. All those actions to place energy sources off limits still stand, and the cost was simply passed along to us… as planned.
I’ve proudly been banned by Treehugger at least 10 times now. THey tried banning my IP but that isn’t fixed then they banned my email domain so I just got a new webmail account.
Lucy Skywalker,
Looks like you’ve done some great work in getting that set up. It is exhausting just to look at the list. I’m not sure I can offer much help, but certainly want to pass on my encouragement.
Look at it from their perspective. The faint stirring with the Commodore 64, then the awakening with DOS and Windows 3.1 through Windows 98 and now their robust XP output but still the deniers and skeptics didn’t get it. Now that they’ve run Mr Squiggles through everything from, iTunes, Android and Windows7 Professional with the same results, why can’t you trogs still get it? Are you obtuse, beneath contempt or just plain obstreporous? You all need to appreciate that delicately nuanced intellectual dilemma for them now. It’s not easy being up there in the commanding heights of climatology looking down on it all.
oxymoronically named ??
No. It is perfectly named.
All science should be sceptical (or skeptical)
The website in question just does not live up to its name
This was one of my top-priority items in my “Notes from Skull Island.” It’s an indication of our side’s disorganization and lack of funding that it hasn’t been done. Won’t someone give her a grant?!?! Big Oil? Baby Oil? Anybody?
Maybe it could be posted on the Forbes site?
Here is a sample of an interaction I encountered on Skeptical Science on the thread titled (2010 – 2011: Earth’s most extreme weather since 1816?)
Norman at 13:35 PM on 8 July, 2011
DB @ur momisugly 283
“Until you can mount a position of substance based on sound analysis and rooted in physical processes, which you have not yet demonstrated to date, others would be well advised to ignore your contrarian efforts to further derail this thread.”
You are an excellent moderator and I do understand your reasoning. Perhaps many climate scientists are of the thinking that Global warming will lead to more severe weather events in the future (intensity, duration and return frequency) and my view, without any formal training in climatology or having the knowledge of all the mathematics and equations used in climate models, must be supported by ample evidence before anyone should take the time to consider it.
My argument is that Global warming (as it is currently taking place, Poles are warming faster than Equator) would decrease the temperature gradient and lead to actually less severe weather patterns in the future. Tom Curtis and post 292 also seems to express this conclusion. Some Climate models may be predicting and increase in severe weather because of Global warming.
I will attempt with more data to demonstrate why I feel my view is valid and at least should be considered and that experts in the field are stating the same things I have been. If I do not satisfy your request for sound analysis rooted in physical processes then I believe it is time for me to discontinue posting until I can update my knowledge. I will not be performing the math on this post as others have already accomplished this. I will include some quotes that do support my view and see how it goes from there.
Rather than use my own mind with its limited knowledge and resources on the topic I will let the experts do the talking
I think this is a good web site for learning. They are hard on skeptics of AGW alarmism but they do engage in exchange of ideas. They do make an individual work for their position. I am not sure that Dr. Roger Pielke Sr should have quit posting. I found the interaction thought provoking.
Jeremy,
Re: Godwin’s Law… In climate debates, there’s Smokey’s Law: Labeling an opponent a Denier, Denialist or Contrarian automatically loses you the debate.☺
People use those pejoratives when they lack the facts they need to win a debate.
Smokey says:
September 22, 2011 at 7:02 pm
Jeremy,
Re: Godwin’s Law… In climate debates, there’s Smokey’s Law: Labeling an opponent a Denier, Denialist or Contrarian automatically loses you the debate.☺
People use those pejoratives when they lack the facts they need to win a debate.
================================================================
Yes, and they are very useful tools to express a thought or perspective to an audience. On the rare occasions I feel argumentative, and wish to express a skeptical thought, those are the ones I seek out. When I wish to learn something from an alarmist, I seek out the ones who don’t use disconnected pejoratives……… few that they may be.
@ur momisugly Jeremy, 100% correct on the use of Godwin’s law. If parallels exist, then one shouldn’t feel uneasy about showing such parallels. Godwin has done a great disservice in that one can’t freely discuss socialist fascism without fear of someone attempting to apply this universal gag order.
Norman,
Your belief that global warming reduces the temperature gradient between the equator and the poles is easily verified using the raw data from HADCRUT3, GISSTEMPv2 etc. I had no trouble doing this with my very limited statistical skills and an Excel spreadsheet.
Your contention that a reduced temperature gradient will tend to reduce the incidence of severe weather is supported by scientists and historians. The historians in particular have their ducks in a row so let me recommend a documentary on the “History Channel” called “Little Ice Age–Big Chill”. Here is a link to a 5 minute preview:
http://www.minnesotansforglobalwarming.com/m4gw/2010/09/little-ice-age—big-chill.html
You can download the entire 90 minutes if you are don’t mind using Pirate Bay.
Lucy Skywalker,
Thanks for providing that link to your debunking of John Cook’s denier topics on SkS.
Lubos Motl did a fairly detailed demolition 18 months ago:
http://motls.blogspot.com/2010/03/john-cook-skeptical-science.html
Is it a perjorative to call it as it stands? If another group silences debate, stifles discussion, and berates and marginalizes those who disagree, is it wrong to call them narrow-minded activists? Is it wrong to draw parallels between behavior of present day people and other large movements in history who did the same thing with very bad results?
I agree with what you say, people who resort to calling people names are often low on facts and losing an argument. Some day that lone group calling others names might just be correct in the labels used and the perspective espoused. Why silence when you can listen/examine and choose the best argument? Let those who would incorrectly apply harmful labels do so and lose the debate with their actions, not with the cultural manipulation of prior restraint and newspeak.
I was on another board referring to Skeptical Science with the two letters. I thought nothing of it and wasn’t even thinking of WW2 when using it, it was just convenient, like referring to papers as MM-year etc. Someone else decided it was offensive when it was convenient for them to stop discussion and shut down debate. It worked. Unfortunately in our PC world, when one person is offended, somehow we’re all supposed to be.
Einstein pokes his tongue out and laughs from the grave at those who say ‘the science is settled’-
http://www.news.com.au/technology/sci-tech/particles-seen-to-travel-faster-than-light/story-fn5fsgyc-1226144226826
Ted says:
September 22, 2011 at 10:01 am
The most egregious recent example of course is Ross McKitrick’s description of Wolfgang Wagner as a “groveling, terrified coward”. Setting quite the example for your students there, Ross. Did he ever apologize?
###
Objectively speaking I think the most egregious recent example is probably the commenters
at “in it for the gold” who labelled me as ‘evil’ and a sociopath.
Yes I believe in AGW. but I had the temerity to suggest that our obligations to this generation of poor people might outweigh our obligations to people not born yet.
evil. sociopath. moshpit.
And those guys are on my side (science wise)
So which is worse? teddy? Personally, I think we ought to police our own side and take the high road
Mosh check your email – Anthony
Mosh
Whilst I disagree with the notion of AGW (especially with a ‘C’ in front of it) there are two aspects of it that ought to give us ALL pause for thought.
The first is that cheap energy has been a key building block of (mostly) Western prosperity for several centuries. On the way it has helped make us what we are -democratic, wealthy, healthy and with access to clean water and good housing. Personally I think it immoral to try to prevent other parts of the world to achieve what we have done by forcing them to use an unproven economic model based on non fossil fuel use.
Equally importantly is the sheer futility of trying to change our climate. I tackled this in my article ‘the futility of carbon reduction’ and subsequent work-and correspondance with leading climate change scientists-demonstrates just how little we can affect global temperatures and the vast sums needed to attempt to do so.
I think our moral obligation lies with the need to develop-although in a more sustainable way than previously. However the reality of cheap renewables as an alternative to fossil fuels lies a generation or more in the future, and in the meantime we need to secure our (cheap and plentiful)energy supplies for the sake of the living rather than for the sake of the as yet unborn, who can not concern themselves with a still unproven carbon theory.
tonyb
While Ted is contemplating the horrible thing that Ross said about Wagner, I’ll suggest a little trip to see the real evil
Here is what you find said about me
“Moshpit’s been sidling up to RC lately doing his unctious passive-aggressive routine on their thread about the Spencer – Dessler papers.
It’s almost as if he’s forgotten what a vile entity he is.
It’s rather like if you were sitting on a park bench and a pool of black slime, fizzing with AIDS, cholera and necrotising halitosis oozed over to you, tapped you on the ankle and said it wanted to be your fwend. And anyway you made it the way it is.”
Nice. Huh? Basically I went on to RC and noted that Steig and I agreed about something and said that was a good thing.
Unlike most of you here I believe in AGW. But Im critical of individual scientists and bits and pieces of the science. I dont like data hiding.
For that I am branded a vile Aids infested creature. the usual suspects are there.
http://metaclimate.org/2011/09/06/the-eternal-return-or-the-unbearable-wrongness-of-spencer-and-braswell/#comment-5962
Elsewhere, kim linked to a back-of-envelope calculation of how much CO2 reduction was necessary to cut global temps by 1°C, taking the AGW models and claims at their word.
It comes to about 1,767,000 million metric tons.
Which dwarfs the entire annual output of the US by several orders of magnitude. In other words, it’s a fools’ errand.
Handy number for detonating pompous Precautionary Principle piffle on SkS and RC, etc.