This is quite something. Sixteen scientists, including such names as Richard Lindzen, William Kininmonth, Wil Happer, and Nir Shaviv, plus engineer Burt Rutan, and Apollo 17 astronaut Dr. Harrison Schmidt, among others, write what amounts to a heretical treatise to the Wall Street Journal, expressing their view that the global warming is oversold, has stalled in the last decade, and that the search for meaningful warming has led to co-opting weather patterns in the blame game. Oh, and a history lesson on Lysenkoism as it relates to today’s warming-science-funding-complex. I can hear Joe Romm’s head exploding all the way out here in California.
Excerpts:
No Need to Panic About Global Warming
There’s no compelling scientific argument for drastic action to ‘decarbonize’ the world’s economy.
Editor’s Note: The following has been signed by the 16 scientists listed at the end of the article:
…
Perhaps the most inconvenient fact is the lack of global warming for well over 10 years now. This is known to the warming establishment, as one can see from the 2009 “Climategate” email of climate scientist Kevin Trenberth: “The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t.” But the warming is only missing if one believes computer models where so-called feedbacks involving water vapor and clouds greatly amplify the small effect of CO2.
The lack of warming for more than a decade—indeed, the smaller-than-predicted warming over the 22 years since the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) began issuing projections—suggests that computer models have greatly exaggerated how much warming additional CO2 can cause. Faced with this embarrassment, those promoting alarm have shifted their drumbeat from warming to weather extremes, to enable anything unusual that happens in our chaotic climate to be ascribed to CO2.
…
Although the number of publicly dissenting scientists is growing, many young scientists furtively say that while they also have serious doubts about the global-warming message, they are afraid to speak up for fear of not being promoted—or worse. They have good reason to worry. In 2003, Dr. Chris de Freitas, the editor of the journal Climate Research, dared to publish a peer-reviewed article with the politically incorrect (but factually correct) conclusion that the recent warming is not unusual in the context of climate changes over the past thousand years. The international warming establishment quickly mounted a determined campaign to have Dr. de Freitas removed from his editorial job and fired from his university position. Fortunately, Dr. de Freitas was able to keep his university job.
This is not the way science is supposed to work, but we have seen it before—for example, in the frightening period when Trofim Lysenko hijacked biology in the Soviet Union. Soviet biologists who revealed that they believed in genes, which Lysenko maintained were a bourgeois fiction, were fired from their jobs. Many were sent to the gulag and some were condemned to death.
Why is there so much passion about global warming, and why has the issue become so vexing that the American Physical Society, from which Dr. Giaever resigned a few months ago, refused the seemingly reasonable request by many of its members to remove the word “incontrovertible” from its description of a scientific issue? There are several reasons, but a good place to start is the old question “cui bono?” Or the modern update, “Follow the money.”
Alarmism over climate is of great benefit to many, providing government funding for academic research and a reason for government bureaucracies to grow. Alarmism also offers an excuse for governments to raise taxes, taxpayer-funded subsidies for businesses that understand how to work the political system, and a lure for big donations to charitable foundations promising to save the planet. Lysenko and his team lived very well, and they fiercely defended their dogma and the privileges it brought them.
…
Signed by:
Claude Allegre, former director of the Institute for the Study of the Earth, University of Paris; J. Scott Armstrong, cofounder of the Journal of Forecasting and the International Journal of Forecasting; Jan Breslow, head of the Laboratory of Biochemical Genetics and Metabolism, Rockefeller University; Roger Cohen, fellow, American Physical Society; Edward David, member, National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences; William Happer, professor of physics, Princeton; Michael Kelly, professor of technology, University of Cambridge, U.K.; William Kininmonth, former head of climate research at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology; Richard Lindzen, professor of atmospheric sciences, MIT; James McGrath, professor of chemistry, Virginia Technical University; Rodney Nichols, former president and CEO of the New York Academy of Sciences; Burt Rutan, aerospace engineer, designer of Voyager and SpaceShipOne; Harrison H. Schmitt, Apollo 17 astronaut and former U.S. senator; Nir Shaviv, professor of astrophysics, Hebrew University, Jerusalem; Henk Tennekes, former director, Royal Dutch Meteorological Service; Antonio Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists, Geneva.
Full letter is online here at the Wall Street Journal
R. Gates says:
January 27, 2012 at 6:54 am
You see it as all politics because you’re trying to kill the messenger rather than listen to the message.
But that’s what you do all the time, R. Gates. What a dispicable (yet laughable) retort you’ve written here, and it only more clearly illuminates the position you always take for your fond “Team” who are the biggest fakes and frauds I’ve ever run across. (Oh yes, please worship Mann, Jones, Trenberth, the IPCC and all their ilk if you like, but they’re disgusting, little money-grubbing people; I’d never EVER call them “scientists”!)
Indeed, I’ve coined the term “climsci” as applicable to you and yours–the term is short for part “climate” and part “scientist”, but not truly either of those so it’s shortened to “climsci”–it is YOUR TEAM that are the real charlatans–they don’t believe in or practice real science and they’re not that interested in the climate as long as their funding gravy train keeps rolling along.
But more to the point, R. Gates–You’ve made a number of allegations on these threads at WUWT and I have repeatedly asked you question after question regarding your information and you have never once replied to my questions. NOT ONCE! You ignore all such inquiries, and inquirying minds demand to know! All you do is continue to spew artfully phrased, Alinsky-like retorts and objections that often carry soft threats and alarmism. YOU are no scientist; YOU are no truth-teller; and YOU are disgusting in your participation here, sir.
For example, you say:
Is that what someone with SCIENCE on their side would say? No–and I know that for a fact. What you’re doing is letting your brainwashed feelings rise to the surface for everybody to see since this weakens your cause and is embarassing to YOU and I tell you:
Your comments are laughable because it is “The Team” promoting “The Cause” that does this–not us! Your comments are full of all sorts of lames excuses, misdirects, and invectives. But keep them up, because thinking people want to hear what excuses your fraudulent side will keep coming up with. They get a kick out of seeing someone so stubborn they can’t see what’s truly happening–and it simply confirms what most people now know, which is we’ve spent and wasted literally $Billions on cult science just because those at the top could rig the system. And rig it they did! And anybody that digs into what the UN represent and how the IPCC goes about their business are sickened with the obfuscation of fact and reliance on politics–pure putrid politics, R.
As before, I don’t expect you to reply to any of this, which only confirms my suspicions that you’re not into dialogue at all but also it underscores that I’m correct in my excoriating assessment of you and yours, R. Gates.
(It must be dreadful being on “The Team” or one of its acolytes right about now. THAT you can post on your wall and recite daily, R. Gates. YOU remember it in 20 years, my friend.)
“Michael Vaughmit says:
January 27, 2012 at 7:32 am”
A bit better than 6, sorry no 1 tree, YAD061.
“Philhippos says:
January 27, 2012 at 6:10 am”
Bogus! The CSIRO are well and truely in the incestuous bed of AGW believers.
Michael Vaughmit says:
January 27, 2012 at 7:32 am
No, it is their message that does. Were it just one truthful scientist, that would be sufficient. Or are you one who continually goes with the fad populace, regardless of how wrong they are?
R Gates “but rather, is an indication of how poorly the models can capture the natural variability of the climate. “. Clearly R Gates is a “hockeystick” believer and has forgotten about previous warm periods such as a thousand years ago. My betting is that there is as good a chance of global cooling over the next 20-30 years as warming. I am amazed that first GISS and now HadCrut (V4) can get away with making adjustments depressing earlier and hiking recent temperatures in order to show AGW. Adjustments to global sea levels and claims that severe weather is increasing. Moving out the yardstick for temperature standstill as having any importance from 10 to now 17 years (Santer) and probably longer as required whereas Ramsdorff and company can show that the standstill is not really a standstill but caused by this and that which has only manifested itself recently. It reallly beggars belief and as a simple bystander I just cannot understand how the totality of it can be allowed to continue.
Fred Hillson says:
January 27, 2012 at 6:42 am
“So does that mean that inversely a climatologist is qualified to design the Voyager Mars Probe? I think not.”
Neither do I.
[Paul Westhaver says:
January 27, 2012 at 1:10 am
“I was never for it in the first place.. it was those crack-pots at the IPCC. ”]
I say that already, only I’d add: it was those crackpots and R. Gates.
The WSJ has been bifurcated in its coverage of AGW and alternate energy – but that’s changing. The editorial page has been consistently opposed to AGW theory and wasteful “green” energy boondoggles – they are point-man on debunking ethanol. Meanwhile the rest of the paper ran nonsense articles and special sections on “the future of energy, yadayada” all of it acquiescing to the inevitability, if not the truth, of AGW and cap and trade. But – last year they quit. If the WSJ runs “energy” features its about natural gas and fracking and oil production. And a couple nice pieces about federal obstructionism on the development of domestic energy – Even a piece on the hopeless economics of wind energy recently. Anyway – no surprise the editorial page is still strong on refuting any substance or consequence to AGW. Now you can get real news on tempuratures and energy from the rest of the paper too. I hope it lasts.
R. Gates says:
“That anyone who would call themselves a scientist would sign their names to this kind of declaration is such a shame. This is not science, but politics.”
I am truly staggered at the hypocrisy of this statement.
I mean climate “scientists” would never sign a political statement would they? Just like they would not attempt to “hide the decline”, or append real temperature data to reconstructed-just like Mann did with his “Hockey-Stick”.
A small note. James McGrath’s university affiliation is incorrect. There is no such place as “Virginia Technical University”. It should have been Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University often called Virginia Tech.
More interestingly, McGrath has received funding from petroleum interests, so I am surprised they included him. As the rap song says, he it not a climate scientist.
Coach Springer says:
January 27, 2012 at 7:12 am
Harrison Schmitt has previously spoken out too.
**********
Yes, all of Geologist Schmitt’s peer-reviewed papers on climate-science that he has published in respected scientific journals are so convincing. Plus he’s been to the moon- how much more of an expert on climate science can one be?
Edward David is a former science advisor to Nixon and Executive Director
Bell Telephone Laboratories. Probably a bright guy. Not a scientist however. Not politically independent. You guys are gonna need to better.
R Gates: I paraphrase: The models are not wrong, they are just not right.
I guess that covers what you really wanted to say.
As to there being only 16 signatories: perhaps they just wanted to put a hex on the ‘science’.
(I’ll go now….)
R. Gates says:
“That anyone who would call themselves a scientist would sign their names to this kind of declaration is such a shame. This is not science, but politics.”
I’d say “LOL” but everyone knows that when someone writes that the last thing they’re doing is actually laughing. LML would be more accurate, as in “losing my lunch.” Are you serious? Your side isn’t engaging in politics? Not trying to influence policy? What do you suppose the IPCC is? Do you even think before you write?
As to the letter, I say bravo. But must add, we need more of this stuff. We’ve been quiet for far too long. 13 years with no warming. The time is right. Let’s bring the fight to them with everything we have.
R. Gates says:
January 27, 2012 at 6:54 am
This is not science, but politics.
It took you long enough to call the kettle black. Once again, R., you have outdone yourself. Why aren’t you on a ship to Antarctica? Oh….right. Silly me.
and, I might add, R., nice hijack.
The major proponents of AGW have always had a down on the Wall
Street Journal , considering it’s access to history with corporate
America a source of corruption to reporting “news” in an unbiased fashion.
Expect to see blasts from the directors of various NGOs writing letters to
both the WSJ and New York Times to complain about the decision to give
voice (and column space) to a tiny, unrepresentative segment of their world
of science.
Other venues will receive snarky remarks as to how the WSJ caters to Big
Oil, Big Coal, Big Nuclear, and Big (insert name here) by promoting more
confusion among the populace on climate topics.
We can also expect to see a letter or maybe a bunch of letters to the WSJ
from Ben Santer, Jim Hansen, Ray Bradley, Wigley, Cook, Trenbert, and
Mann with a call to arms to their sympathetic fellow followers in academia
and government to drown out the deniers.
Most of these advocates will have to be careful in what they say, since many
of them had large roles or at least made cameo appearances in the emails
from/to Mike Mann currently involved in the Virginia courts. Should those
emails ever escape into public circulation, a whole lot of folks will have to
spend their time explaining why what they’ve said publically (and signed off
on in various letters and petitions) appears to be so very different from what
they were saying among themselves.
If Mike Mann can call deniers “liars”, then what epithet can we assign to
his personal type of liar ?
Will the letter from the WSJ 16 spark a trend in open discussion of the
“science” ? One can only hope.
Considering the tunnel vision and single mindset of the global warming crowd and the fetish for and fear of carbon, if there were a climate disaster in the making no matter the cause, the global warming crowd could not possibly know it.
And the fact they have to resort to unsavory tactics to ward off opposition in scientific argument proves their single focus on carbon is without merit and they know it otherwise they would welcome review and argument to their research.
The sixteen who signed are proof that while numbers matter in science the only numbers that matter where support is concerned are those who are right and have the courage and integrity to say so without fear of opposition.
Fred Hillson: “Yes, all of Geologist Schmitt’s peer-reviewed papers on climate-science that he has published in respected scientific journals are so convincing. Plus he’s been to the moon- how much more of an expert on climate science can one be?”
So you cannot dispute what they SAID and must, instead, attack the speakers.
Since I kind of pooched my post above, perhaps it’s understandable no one took on board the main point: The letter is addressed to politicians and “candidates for office”. That is, it is specifically intended to provide a basic toolkit and cover for those who might consider rejecting the AGW political orthodoxy. Thus the lack of “hard science” content, and thus the limited number of names. Note, e.g., the (alphabetically arranged) last name: Antonio Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists, Geneva.
Here’s what the previous post should have looked like:
P.S. Re above.
I suggest therefore forwarding the original letter to any and all politicians you have any contact with or interest in. That’s who it’s for.
polistra says:
January 27, 2012 at 3:38 am
Doesn’t matter how many heretics speak. They’re still heretics who must be burned, not heard. … Academics and bureaucrats do not comprehend facts,they only respond to social status. Academics and bureaucrats will not change their minds until their High Priests recant. Their High Priests will never recant. …. They are beyond salvation. …The only thing that will change the actions of the bureaucrats is complete bankruptcy …
Verily polistra, thou speakest a mouthful. Well said.
Douglas
R. Gates says:
January 27, 2012 at 6:54 am
In its “State of the Climate in 2008” report, the NOAA said about climate computer models
“The simulations rule out (at the 95% level) zero trends for intervals of 15 yr or more, suggesting that an observed absence of warming of this duration is needed to create a discrepancy with the expected present-day warming rate.”
The translation is that a flat trend in global temperatures for 15 years is all that is required to say the models are incorrect. We are now approaching a 15 year trend (since 1998 El Nino) of flat global temperatures and thus also approaching the disqualification of the current global climate models.
So saying that natural climate variability is hiding the background trend of rising temperature is a defense of the models that cannot be sustained for much longer. And your suggestion that these scientists produce models to refute the present models is just absurd. Come on, R. Gates, your partisanship is showing through your cloak of alleged rationality. Where is is the R. Gates that once claimed to be 25% (if I recall correctly) skeptical?
TomB says:
January 27, 2012 at 6:41 am
“I’ve learned much by reading this blog. I’m not necessarily fond of distilling arguments down to bumper sticker size, but the most telling statement about AGW I’ve read here goes something like: “AGW is about taking the money from poor people in rich countries and transferring it to the Swiss bank accounts of the rich people in poor countries.” That really is it in a nutshell.”
That is one part of it. The other part is taking money from one’s political adversaries (and everyone else) here in the US and giving it to one’s political allies in return for campaign contributions.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/27/sixteen-prominent-scientists-publish-a-letter-in-wsj-saying-theres-no-need-to-panic-about-global-warming/#comment-877034
they threw me off off at sceptical science’
because they did not want to believe me
so what do you think,
http://www.letterdash.com/HenryP/more-carbon-dioxide-is-ok-ok