My response to Markey’s nosy letter would have been far less wordy. Two words would probably have been sufficient. The Heartland media release from today is below.
The Heartland Institute Responds to Rep. Markey Letter on ‘Fakegate’
MARCH 15, 2012 – The Heartland Institute today sent a letter to Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA), responding to Markey’s February 24 request for confirmation of the authenticity of stolen and forged documents distributed by Pacific Institute President Peter Gleick.
The scandal is known as “Fakegate” because one of the documents, supposedly describing Heartland’s “climate strategy,” was not written by anyone associated with The Heartland Institute and does not reflect Heartland’s work on environmental policy. Gleick has claimed he received the memo “in the mail” from an anonymous source.
In his reply to Rep. Markey, Heartland Institute President Joseph Bast writes, “Your letter repeats several false statements that appeared in the fake memo and have been circulated widely in the press. We thank you for this opportunity to set the record straight about our position on climate change.”
For more information on this scandal, visit Fakegate.org and Heartland.org. Media questions and requests for interviews may be directed to Tammy Nash at tnash@heartland.org and 312/377-4000 or Jim Lakely at jlakely@heartland.org.
The Heartland Institute is a 28-year-old national nonprofit organization with offices in Chicago, Illinois and Washington, DC. Its mission is to discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems. For more information, visit our Web site or call 312/377-4000.
March 15, 2012
Hon. Edward J. Markey
Ranking Democratic Member
U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Natural Resources
Washington, DC 20515
Dear Rep. Markey:
In reply to the three questions posed in your letter to me of February 24, 2012:
(A) Documents 1-7 in the list you provided appear to be copies of confidential documents produced by The Heartland Institute and stolen by the Pacific Institute’s Peter Gleick. The eighth document in your list, titled “2012 Heartland Climate Strategy,” is not an authentic Heartland document or draft document. Peter Gleick claimed to have received this memo from an anonymous source, then falsely represented it as having come from The Heartland Institute.
(B) The inaccuracies of the eighth document are documented in the attached memo, titled “ An Analysis of the Forged ‘Heartland Climate Strategy’ Memo,” which was posted on The Heartland Institute’s Web site on February 27. I am not aware of any “different authentic” documents that match your description.
(C) Documents 1-7 in your list have not been revised by Heartland staff since they were stolen by Peter Gleick. Document 8, the fake memo, is not an authentic Heartland document or draft document, therefore I do not know whether or not it has been changed. I suggest you ask the Pacific Institute if they know.
Your letter repeats several false statements that appeared in the fake memo and have been circulated widely in the press. We thank you for this opportunity to set the record straight about our position on climate change.
The stolen documents show The Heartland Institute addresses a wide range of topics, including school reform, health care policy, tax and budget issues, telecommunications, and insurance. Nearly all the funds we receive from our corporate donors are earmarked for research and education on those subjects, and not climate change.
The fake memo erroneously claimed that we received $200,000 from the Charles Koch Foundation to support our work on climate policy. In fact, that foundation gave only $25,000 – less than 1/2 of 1 percent of our budget – and the gift was earmarked for health care reform. The Charles Koch Foundation has publicly stated the correct amount and the project for which it was earmarked.
Similarly, the fake memo erroneously states that Heartland intends to fund its climate policy work “especially from corporations whose interests are threatened by climate policies.” In fact, Heartland gets very little funding from fossil fuel companies for its climate policy activities and does not intend to focus its fund raising efforts on fossil fuel companies.
The fake memo also states that Heartland’s K-12 education project aims at “dissuading teachers from teaching science.” This is absolutely untrue. Our goal is for teachers to teach more science, not less. Our K-12 education project is accurately described in one of the Heartland documents (No. 2 on your list) as follows:
[begin excerpt]
H.Global Warming Curriculum for K-12 Schools
Many people lament the absence of educational material suitable for K-12 students on global warming that isn’t alarmist or overtly political. Heartland has tried to make material available to teachers, but has had only limited success. Principals and teachers are heavily biased toward the alarmist perspective. Moreover, material for classroom use must be carefully written to meet curriculum guidelines, and the amount of time teachers have for supplemental material is steadily shrinking due to the spread of standardized tests in K-12 education.
Dr. David Wojick has presented Heartland a proposal to produce a global warming curriculum for K-12 schools that appears to have great potential for success. Dr. Wojick is a consultant with the Office of Scientific and Technical Information at the U.S. Department of Energy in the area of information and communication science. He has a Ph.D. in the philosophy of science and mathematical logic from the University of Pittsburgh and a B.S. in civil engineering from Carnegie Tech. He has been on the faculty of Carnegie Mellon and the staffs of the U.S. Office of Naval Research and the Naval Research Lab.
Dr. Wojick has conducted extensive research on environmental and science education for the Department of Energy. In the course of this research, he has identified what subjects and concepts teachers must teach, and in what order (year by year), in order to harmonize with national test requirements. He has contacts at virtually all the national organizations involved in producing, certifying, and promoting science curricula.
Dr. Wojick proposes to begin work on “modules” for grades 10-12 on climate change (“whether humans are changing the climate is a major scientific controversy”), climate models (“models are used to explore various hypotheses about how climate works. Their reliability is controversial”), and air pollution (“whether CO2 is a pollutant is controversial. It is the global food supply and natural emissions are 20 times higher than human emissions”).
Wojick would produce modules for Grades 7-9 on environmental impact (“environmental impact is often difficult to determine. For example there is a major controversy over whether or not humans are changing the weather”), for Grade 6 on water resources and weather systems, and so on.
[end excerpt]
As this description makes clear, we seek to improve rather than undermine the teaching of science in K-12 schools. Dr. Wojick is highly qualified to conduct this project. The fact that this project is not a secret or in any way covert is shown by the fact that it is described in our latest membership newsletter, which is posted prominently on our Web site.
Is an effort to create a curriculum that “isn’t alarmist or overtly political” the same thing as “denialism” or being “anti-climate”? I hope the answer is obvious to you. The magnitude of a human effect on climate is not settled science. Scientists who point this out are not “deniers,” they are in the mainstream of the scientific community.
The fake memo further states that Heartland thinks “it is important to keep opposing voices out” of publications such as Forbes.com. Once again, the truth is just the opposite. Heartland spokespersons debate other experts at fora all across the country and Heartland invites persons who disagree with it to speak at its own events.
Finally, your repeated claim that the documents were “leaked” is incorrect. As noted above, Peter Gleick has admitted to obtaining documents 1-7 under false pretenses. No one at Heartland “leaked” these documents to the press. We continue to ask that the stolen documents, along with the forged document and commentary based on it, be removed from Web sites and that retractions be issued.
In conclusion, we appreciate your interest in our work and the opportunity to clarify our programs and positions.
Sincerely,
Joseph L. Bast
President
Rock on, Mr. Bast!
Afraid I’d have told the esteemed gentleman from Massachusetts to politely go pound sand … no offense meant.
He will probably not even read it.
I’m having a lot of fun imagining exactly what those two words might be. 🙂
“We refer you to the reply given in the case of Arkell v. Pressdram” would have been my choice.
An effective and sensible rejoinder. It is good that it has been made public so that there can be no misunderstandings, deliberate or otherwise.
Ed Markey is a Dinosaur, and Undead.
Ask him about Boston based UPC/First Wind (“the Enron guys”).
If nothing else, the “Fakegate” affair, the dim politician from MA, and Heartland’s polite and factual response to Markeys knee-jerk reaction prove the dependence of catastrophic anthropogenic global warming alarmists (CAGWA) of government funding from dim, left wing politicians. If government grants were based on objective and fair evaluations, the CAWA croud would dissapear in one funding cycle.
Markey is a Leftwing moron who’ll never be in the majority again– so he’s a powerless leftwing moron. That said Mr. Bast played the DC game properly.
Another “unintended consequence” by Gleick–had he just left them alone, millions of Americans would have remained in the dark regarding Heartland.
Now Heartland and its mission is being discussed across the country and around the world.
Thank you, Mr. Gleick, thank you! May your next escapade into the illegal and insane be so beneficial and do so much good.
Mr. Bast ever so politely hand Markey his head after unwedging it for him. Too bad Markey will not appreciate it.
Several thumbs up for Mr. Bast.
My response to Markey’s nosy letter would have been far less wordy. Two words would probably have been sufficient.
Activate brain?
Mr. Markey’s tunnel vision will not allow him to see anything except CO2 caused global warming.
Ed, ‘Mr.’ Jones says: March 15, 2012 at 3:30 pm
An undead dinosaur? Put Teddy back on the ballot in Massachusetts and I predict a landslide. Undead or not, they love their dinosaurs.
Yep – he’ll probably not even read it and the usual suspects in the media will ignore it, more’s the pity because it actually reflects very well on Heartland.
Mr Bast. You have no competition with a moron like Markey he couldn’t debate himself out of a wet paper bag, he is deftly afraid of Sen Inhofe. Markley challenged then backed down from a climate debate much like his buddy Al (No debate) Gore. Sen Inhofe has indicted any time and any place but the chicken Loser-crat Markley knows a climate warmer dragon slayer hides behind the quite exterior of Sen Inhofe.
Rep. Markey has the brain the size of a pea. The noble and better looking Sloth has more neurons firing than this fossil. He has done more to damage the economy with his stupidity and lack of forethought. Pray we won’t see him or his other pea brain comrade Cap and trade Waxman after the next election.
Foxtrot, Oscar ?
Heartland are still defending. Better to spend their time identifying which carbon scammers markey is in the bath with and how much he charges because they never work for free.
Markey is a dolt of exceptional degree.
Frankly, it would never occur to Markey that is is his demonstrable gullibility and ego which makes him such an easy mark (heh,heh) for the climate con.
@JennOates
“I’m having a lot of fun imagining exactly what those two words might be. :)”
I’m sure that may of the readers here are doing the same, so here’s the challenge: Everyone gets two words and seven letters. On your honor, report the number of combinations you think of that would be considered appropriate responses (e.g., up yours). Total is on your honor because the mods would have a snip-fest with actual lists! 🙂
P.S. You should probably list your total only as a footnote to a legit thread response, lest it become a string of numbers.
Markey is the CAGWA dolt who said on live on CNN in 2009, “The last nine years have been amongst the top ten warmest in the history of the planet.”
Like Waxman, Markey is a bully and a thug. Other than truckling to extortion, dignifying this malignant dolt’s unpaid interns’ bumbling exercise in hothouse propaganda has no upside. As AW says, two words would have sufficed to make the point.
Do these CAGW zealots ever get tired of being wrong?
As General Anthony McAuliffe said, “NUTS!”
A good opportunity for Heartland to ‘speak truth to power’! I should say they did well to take this opportunity!
p.s. I am sure you would have done the same, Anthony: your courteousness and reasonable attitude in the face of provocation are well known!
Personally, I’m glad the two-word approach, however tempting, was cast aside. With all the gutter and potty-mouth AdHom issuing from the AGW side, we need always to be recognizant of the self-immolation that goes hand in hand with all the nastiness. Can the shrill, folks. Let Mann and Markey, Hansen & the Gristoids, all of them, let them shoot themselves in the foot.
Gail Combs says:
March 15, 2012 at 3:41 pm
Mr. Bast ever so politely hand Markey his head after unwedging it for him. Too bad Markey will not appreciate it.
Several thumbs up for Mr. Bast.
_________________
I just hope he washed his hands, thoroughly, after handling said head.
Anthony, would those two words begin with BS, as in bottom sediment in a tank of sh@T?
Jenn Oates says:
March 15, 2012 at 3:25 pm
I’m having a lot of fun imagining exactly what those two words might be. 🙂
———————————-
An activity involving sex and travel
I’ll say it again…..because they keep proving that it’s true
As less and less people believe in global warming…..we will be left with the lowest common denominator
I wonder if Mr. Markey will now send tough guy Ben Santer to “beat the crap” out of Mr. Bast.
I look forward to the day when the all the clowns — Hansen, Mann, Trenberth, Santer, Jones, Karl, Schmidt and now Gleick are brought to justice.
This is all very interesting to those of us that are following but I fear that the story is already over and the alarmists have moved on without feeling the slightest dent in their credibility.
I can’t speak for Heartland’s intentions down the road ( despite asking twice ) but for me the battle is lost because it would appear that Peter Gleick has not had an official complaint of criminal activity laid against him with an official body. If he had you would have expected him to at the very least have been helping a police or federal department with their enquiries.
HI may feel that suing Gleick further down the line might gain them something ( though I expect by then any personal funds will be well squirrelled away behind the Pacific Institute’s doors. ) but for me without an arrest and quick action, the horse has already bolted.
As I said in a previous post I wanted to help with the legal fund if I could get some assurances that Gleick would be pursued to the full extent of the law. I could not get those assurances and for me, suing him civilly a couple of years down the line will do nothing to expose the lies of the alarmist camp and at worst just ruin Gleick academically. ( though that’s also unlikely )
btw. I’m having issues posting with the email I have always used here.
Now I am told ‘that email is associated with a wordpress account, please log in to use it )
I do have a wordpress account that i’ve never used so I eventually managed to track down and reset my password. I logged in ( another traumatic event not entirely obvious where to do that ) and when I try to post the comment it does nothing.
I’ve never had this issue before using my gmail address and have been forced to use an email address I use for more personal communication.
Alas Markey has as much sense as the dead fish served in his family seasonal fish restaurant.
Joe, a binder well played.
2 words: Fake off!
What is going to cause Heartlend headaches are the comments in their budget proposal about people who were fired and let go
“was retained in 2011 to help identify major potential donors. His efforts didn’t produce any receipts, so his agreement ended at the end of October, he was unpaid in November, we then agreed to a two-month agreement”
was reduced to part-time and then volunteer status as fundraising for the Center failed to reach expectations. He will be restored to part-time or full-time status only if funds are raised. He retains his title.
was let go in late 2011 due to chronic truancy.
Whatever
Geoff says:
March 15, 2012 at 3:22 pm
He will probably not even read it.
_______________
You are correct. Members of congress have a staff for all matters mundane. Markey is just the public face collecting a paycheck. Petty little tyrant antics are a prerogative of his position.
The ol’ boy seems to be piling up a record of signing off on dubious ill-informed documents. He should take care of that; it can have serious consequences!
Yeah, I was trying to determine if the second word was “you” or “off”.
This is a good response, and pretty much says what I’ve said: not LESS science, and that particular line immediately showed the document was fake. Only an alarmist believes that skeptics are “anti-science”. As we here know, it is the alarmists who are destroying the ideals and reputation of Science.
Star Trek, the old series, is more Science oriented than the cAGW alarmists could ever aspire to be.
Markey Mark and the Flunky Bunch
how impressive. by all means stop whatever good you might be able to accomplish in order to write reasonable letters to the unreasonable. futility has such a future.
so glad you’ve got funding for explaining yourselves to those who understand how they pull your strings and you jump – and while you do so, you are harmless and impotent in any effort against them.
call me when you’ve got some stuff from discovery proceedings, i.e., when you start pulling your own strings and stop being a puppet of a markey. how impressive
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the BLOOD of PATRIOTS, and TYRANTS.”
Thomas Jefferson
Great…So Heartland is not ““dissuading teachers from teaching science.” They are instead just promoting a curriculum put together by David Wojick that includes such gems as the statement that “Natural emissions [of CO2] are 20 times higher than human emissions”.
And, the Discovery Institute is not trying to dissuade teachers from teaching science either. They just want to explain how there is controversy regarding the origin of species and so on and so forth.
I think that hardly anybody in the scientific community will be convinced that teaching Wojick’s curriculum is significantly different from “dissuading teachers from teaching science”. In fact, it was a bit of an understatement in that it should have said “Persuading teachers to teach nonsense.”
Should it be “You fake” oor “Fake you.”
Zootcadillac I wouldn’t worry the legal system moves amazingly slow. This means round two will be anywhere from 2 – 9 months after the first action. This will be followed by additional rounds etc.
While I may not be entirely agreed with zootcadillac about the reasons, I am strongly of the belief that Gleick needs to face legal consequences for his actions. I realize that it’s not entirely in Heartland’s control if a criminal case is brought, but whether a civil case is brought is. He (and NCSE and Pacific Insitute if applicable) needs to be put on notice to preserve evidence in his/their possession, as soon as possible.
From my point of view, Gleick needs to be punished for his bad actions.
Looking at it from Heartland’s point of view, I would say that they need to protect their reputation.
At the moment however, neither of these things seem to be happening, and instead laudatory articles about Gleick, and articles stemming from the fake memo, seem to be spreading at an ever increasing rate.
The discussion on the blogs, while an amusing diversion, is becoming a dead-end – piling on more evidence of Gleick’s fault is preaching to the choir.
Mr Bast has done the correct and very gentlemanly thing. A great pity that Markey is probably not bright enough to smell the excrement that
foot[he] put his foot in with his silly demand of Mr Bast.Like many politicians anywhere in the world, but not all, Markey seems to open his mouth only to change feet.
I am embarrassed to admit that I live in the district that the execrable Ed Malarkey represents. This is but the latest in a long series of egregious nonsense promulgated by this miscreant, who has held onto his safe congressional seat for more than two decades now. Would that we could find a worthy opponent—even a Democrat with half a brain would be an improvement!
/Mr Lynn
Sorry mods – second line should read ‘put his foot in’
A touch too much sun at mid day!
[Fixed. But don’t make it an expectation… -ModE]
Dave says:
March 15, 2012 at 3:26 pm
Choice, Dave. Thanks.
Joel Shore says:
March 15, 2012 at 6:08 pm
‘They are instead just promoting a curriculum put together by David Wojick that includes such gems as the statement that “Natural emissions [of CO2] are 20 times higher than human emissions”.’
Unforgivable, given that the actual number is more like 30 times (on an annual basis).
Over the years, I have gradually come to an understanding that most everything political, or intended to otherwise persuade, is almost without fail exactly what it is not. I have been known to describe this as the Theory of Inverse Reality. For grins, starting with “I did not have sexual relations with that woman”, I began keeping an ad-hoc notes file of such utterances, which were inevitably refuted by such things as “the dress”. Within just a few short years I ceased doing so, because the TIR had essentially been proven, with exceptional regard to politicians.
It is tragic fun to just watch and not bother to record them anymore, for one thing there are just too many instances and not enough time these days to document them all.
One can just hear Alice:
“If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because
everything would be what it isn’t. And contrarywise, what is, it wouldn’t be. And what it wouldn’t
be, it would. You see?” —in Wonderland
Such is the status of evolution of the genus Homo near the end of the Holocene.
Fun facts, from:
http://www.chicagojournal.com/News/02-15-2012/Changing_our_corrupt_city's_course
“Since 1976, Chicago and its suburbs in the federal court system’s Northern District of Illinois lead all other districts in the country with 1,485 federal convictions of corrupt public officials and businessmen.”
“For instance, of the last seven Illinois governors, four have been convicted of corruption — getting a secret deal on race track stock, manipulating savings and loans, selling driver licenses to unqualified drivers who killed children in car wrecks, and negotiating to sell a U.S. Senate seat. Chicago City Hall qualifies as an equally famous crime scene. Since 1973, 31 Chicago aldermen have been convicted and gone to jail.”
———-
Now we have, Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA) trying to transfer the blame.
Note to Mr. Markey: you have no idea, how far out of your depth you are.
Well at least Blago is headed to prison. There is some justice out there even if an iron curtain has descended over science and basic error evaluation of climate models and forecasts.
Perhpas Markey can explain why Gleick has not been charged with identity theft.
Thomas Jefferson says:
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the BLOOD of PATRIOTS, and TYRANTS.”
The more tyrant blood the better.
Just a thought,
For those who want justice and want it now. It’s interesting to me the measured requests, responses and demands given by Heartland from the outset. Like there is a metronome beating in the background to a slow soothing tempo. While the blogs championing AGW continue to have their party at Heartland’s expense, they’ve been asked politely to stop. Why, even the federal government has latched on to the idea that it is Heartland’s job to prove the authenticity of the documents and “defend” the ones they consider genuine but stolen.
I picture a very shrewd legal team in the back room, just biding time and adding up the points for the defense. When a critical mass is reached, the plan they have will be plain to all of us.
I have a hunch the net is very fine mesh and extremely large.
I’ve got to get some more popcorn!
Mike
As uttered by a former Canadian Prime minister the tow words are ‘Fuddle Duddle”. Today only persons of a certain age are able to translate thenm.
Pearls before swine
Heartland should have referred Markley to the FBI. Given the current “stonewalling” of Congress by the US DOJ, of which the FBI is a part, I would expect that Rep. Markley would have to wait till the next non-Democratic President comes along till they respond.
If Jefferson lived today he would be indicted for inciting violence.
Excellent reply to Markey by Joseph Bast.
Markey has provided Heartland Institute yet another golden opportunity to show the public what they are about on an even greater scale. Exposure and an opportunity to allow public scrutiny as to their views and policies will only promote Heartland Institute in the long run. I had personally never heard of them but now have a lot or respect for their operations.
Gleick, being the fool that he is, would appear to be his own worst enemy. But actually those that try to justify his actions are. This whole sordid affair has shed a lot of light on the green agenda and the liberal line of thought associated with it. Astonishing!
A lot can be revealed of a group by those that they worship and defend. So Gleick, please stay in the spotlight as with Gore, Mann, etc. The closet door is open and we want to see who all is in there and what you have been doing in the closet. I bet there is a lot of soiled laundry in there.
Those two words?
Get Foxtrot?
REPLY: No. “butt out” was what I was thinking – Anthony
Excellent letter. Better than Markey deserved. It is so well done that he may not even notice the way he ends up revealed as a partisan fool.
Typical Left political ploy. Make the charge, wide coverage followed by the silence of the crickets. A further annoyance is the amount of effort required to respond to such inquiries.
Bart says:
March 15, 2012 at 6:47 pm
Dave says:
March 15, 2012 at 3:26 pm
Choice, Dave. Thanks.
Joel Shore says:
March 15, 2012 at 6:08 pm
‘They are instead just promoting a curriculum put together by David Wojick that includes such gems as the statement that “Natural emissions [of CO2] are 20 times higher than human emissions”.’
Unforgivable, given that the actual number is more like 30 times (on an annual basis).
Shore. Suggest you engage what little brain you have, along with rabbet, before blogging where people are well above the level of your usual commenters. You could try this page below for a starter. It will help you both to understand the significance of your stupidity.
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=9288#comments_top
Official US DoEnergy report. CO² emitted by human activity 23100 tonne. Natural CO² 770,000 tonne. That is man made is 3% annually of all emmissions. 33.3 times the natural.
The problem for you trolls is your arrogance. You assume that everyone is as stupid as yourselves.
( Sorry, it’s not my be polite to trolls day today. Try again tomorrow)
Markey may not take much notice of Bast’s clear, courteous and apposite letter, but plenty of others will. Heartland may benefit from the publicity.
I picture a very shrewd legal team in the back room, just biding time and adding up the points for the defense. When a critical mass is reached, the plan they have will be plain to all of us.
I have a hunch the net is very fine mesh and extremely large.
I’ve got to get some more popcorn!
Mike
I suggest you buy some raw pop so that you have some on hand just in case the story breaks suddenly. It takes up far less space than the cooked variety.
Nicely put. A cool and clear-headed response to the BS-er, and well done Mr. Bast. Next problem, getting the facts deployed into the public’s minds, ‘cos you know the MSM aren’t going to splash this all over the page/screen.
boodlebug: +1
Joel Shore says:
March 15, 2012 at 6:08 pm
That’s right Joel we can’t have the truth tought in science classes that would be just wrong.
sarc off/
Good letter, one thing though….
“Gleick has claimed he received the memo “in the mail” from an anonymous source.”
Has he ever explicitly claimed he received the fake memo “in the mail”? He very heavily implied that, but didn’t explicitly say it.
@joel Shore,
Do you disagree with the statement about natural vs. man-made CO2? The IPCC shows that natural emissions are closer to 30 times more than human emissions.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_ynOO15XuGnc/SiScFwJLYVI/AAAAAAAABW0/nK8bD_W0dXY/s1600/carbon_cycle.jpg
“such gems as the statement that “Natural emissions [of CO2] are 20 times higher than human emissions””
They’re not?
Do you have any idea how much more biomass is in non-human organisms compared to human?
Sorry Joel Shore but your statement makes it sound like the paradigm is more important than the truth, therefore the truth will never convince you and you have gone from a scientific system to a belief system giving support to those (like me) that think that climate “science” has now evolved into a full blown cult of Gaia religious offshoot.
Joel Shore says:
March 15, 2012 at 6:08 pm
Great…So Heartland is not ““dissuading teachers from teaching science.” They are instead just promoting a curriculum put together by David Wojick that includes such gems as the statement that “Natural emissions [of CO2] are 20 times higher than human emissions”.
===============================================
Typical pendantic Shore comment, with an almost Gleick like insinuation of motive with the only evidence being Shore’s own words. Shore is insinuating that Heartland is, by telling the truth about the CO2 cycle and mankinds emissions relative to natural one’s, attempting to teach that human emissions are not the prime reason for the recent increase in CO2 from 280 to 390 PPM. However he has provided no evidence that this is so. Perhaps he should write his own version of a Heartland document, mail it to himself, and release it to the media.
P/S/ Joel, in my sons class room the kids (10th grade) presented their science projects. Four of them were about the satanic gas CO2. Not one of the kids understood ANY of the benefits of CO2, and not one of these kids realised that those benefits are KNOWN, whereas their hypothetical unrealised predictions of impending doom, were being falsified by the earth itself.
Just how stupid is Joel Shore? Sheer arrogance makes him post like a moron.
For those who want justice and want it now. It’s interesting to me the measured requests, responses and demands given by Heartland from the outset. Like there is a metronome beating in the background to a slow soothing tempo. When a critical mass is reached, the plan they have will be plain to all of us.
Here’s hoping you’re right – but from what I’ve seen so far, there are never any serious repercussions for people like Gleick and those who support them.
01100110 01110101 01100011 01101011 00100000 01101111 01100110 01100110
the most appropriate response
Anthony,
the news is that Heartland confirms the authenticity of the other seven documents, so let’s talk about it. I found in the document titled “Fundraising Plan” (p.19) this:
Because of Watts’ past work exposing flaws in the current network of temperature stations (work that The Heartland Institute supported and promoted),[…]”
What kind of support did you receive from Heartland, please could you clarify?
“Heartland has agreed to help Anthony raise $88,000 for the project in 2011. The Anonymous Donor has already pledged $44,000. We’ll seek to raise the balance.”
Will you receive the second rate of $44,000 this year?
REPLY: Dear Mr. “Fuchs”,
Heartland paid for publishing my surfacestations work in this color book in 2009. Note they are clearly listed on the inside cover.
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/surfacestationsreport_spring09.pdf
This book resulted in the Federal Government General Accounting Office conducting an investigation, and agreeing with my premise, that the network needed work and was out of spec. Here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/09/30/gao-report-on-the-poor-quality-of-the-us-climate-monitoring-network/
I published a peer reviewed paper on the findings, where the Heartland document is referenced:
Link to the paper (final print quality), Fall et al 2011 here http://surfacestations.org/Fall_etal_2011/fall_etal_media_resource_may08.pdf and here http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/r-367.pdf
Fall et all 2011 supplementary information here http://surfacestations.org/fall_etal_2011.htm
As for the second funding part this year, I don’t know. The idea was to solicit for phase 2 of the project when it is up and running, late June or July. I’m working on it now, gathering the code, database elements and hardware platforms to make it happen. We’ll see how it is received once phase1 is online this summer. It will be free to the public.
Now I have a Question for you:
You’ve posted here as Alexander, Alexander Fuchs, Capo, and now “Andreas Fuchs” – do you have multiple personality disorder or are you being purposely devious?
– Anthony Watts
Anthony,
thanks for your response.
I thought that a honest question deserves a real name, which is my true first name. I’ve posted very seldom here and didn’t take into regard it could be a matter of confusion. If I was wrong, I beg your pardon, next time I will stick to Capo.
There was much of talk about the strategy memo and I wondered why you gave no thoughts to the other documents which provided some information about you. I’ve waited for several weeks but nothing happened. Now that Heartland confirmed the authenticity it’s the right time to discuss the contents of the real Heartland documents.
We don’t need to discuss if Dr. Wojick is dissuading teachers from teaching science. But we should discuss this:
Dr. Wojick proposes to begin work on “modules” for grades 10-12 on climate change (“whether humans are changing the climate is a major scientific controversy”), climate models (“models are used to explore various hypotheses about how climate works. Their reliability is controversial”), and air pollution (“whether CO2 is a pollutant is controversial. It is the global food supply and natural emissions are 20 times higher than human emissions”).
Is it really controversial, that CO2 is a greenhouse gas und more CO2 leads to more warming? Of course not, it’s a fact.
Did you realize that Heartland published the letter to Markey and the E-mail exchange between Heartland and Gleick not at heartland.org, but in your blog? Did you realize that you acted just that way Heartland wanted you to do? I missed some critical distance and remembered $88,000 all the time.
REPLY: Hmmm, are you mentally ill? Sure seems like it with the multiple personalities, mind control suggestions, and all the worry about conspiracy etc.
Do your homework before you spout off like that again: http://heartland.org/press-releases/2012/03/15/heartland-institute-responds-rep-markey-letter-fakegate
The fact is though that the CO2 warming response is logarithmic, not linear, and the disaster scenarios fomenting by the warmy worriers depends on feedback mechanisms, which so far don’t seem to be happening and there are a number of credible studies showing this.
And if Al Gore can push his flawed AIT film in schools, why is it so terrible to show this other side? I’ll tell you why, because the AGW movement is rife with noble cause corruption, and they can’t win on the merits of facts so far.
Pick a persona and stick with it. Andreas Fuchs is the one we’ll pass through from now on, all the other fakes will get deleted. – Anthony
Go procreate?
Dave says: March 15, 2012 at 3:26 pm
“We refer you to the reply given in the case of Arkell v. Pressdram” would have been my choice.
For anyone wondering at the reference, a legal discussion of it can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_Eye#Litigation
Mind that children are escorted from the area of the screen…
Veritas says:
(and similar things from Bart, Stephen Richards, PaulID, David A, and Venter)
What I disagree with is doing accounting by looking at only one side of the ledger. It is like trying to figure out how your bank balance will change by looking only at your deposits and none of your withdrawals.
The point about the natural emissions into the atmosphere is that they are more than matched by natural absorptions from the atmosphere. In fact, the only reason why the current concentration in the atmosphere is not more like 500 ppm than 390 ppm is that about half of our emissions rapidly segregate into the land biosphere and ocean mix layer.
So, a statement that natural emissions are 20 or 30 times larger than human emissions without any context, like noting that these are not net numbers and explaining that the rise in CO2 levels in the atmosphere is thus attributable to our emissions, is basically lying to…or actively deceiving…the students. It is not science…It is political propaganda masquerading as science.
Capo (Andreas) says:
March 16, 2012 at 12:36 pm
“Dr. Wojick proposes to begin work on “modules” for grades 10-12 on climate change (“whether humans are changing the climate is a major scientific controversy”), climate models (“models are used to explore various hypotheses about how climate works. Their reliability is controversial”), and air pollution (“whether CO2 is a pollutant is controversial. It is the global food supply and natural emissions are 20 times higher than human emissions”).
Is it really controversial, that CO2 is a greenhouse gas und more CO2 leads to more warming? Of course not, it’s a fact.
==================================================
Capo, pointing out that the “models” claim of impending doom from CO2 emissions is based on a hypothetical postive feedback, which the observations show is likely negative, and that the benefits of CO2 are KNOWN, while the harm is unrealsied conjecture, is not the same thing as saying increasing CO2 has zero affect on the climate. BTW, over thirty thousand scientist with over 11,000 PHDs agree withwhat I just pointed out, but this is not taught in the schools. How come you think our kids should only be taught clearly wrong and unscientific A.I.T. B.S.?
Anthony,
“The fact is though that the CO2 warming response is logarithmic, not linear,…
Yes, of course. Did I tell something different??
“Do your homework before you spout off like that again: http://heartland.org/press-releases/2012/03/15/heartland-institute-responds-rep-markey-letter-fakegate“
You’ll be surprised, but that’s the website where I started. I was disappointed, because I’ve found no link to the letter to Markey and no comment about the auhtenticity of the 7 documents over there. Did I miss s.th.?
“Hmmm, are you mentally ill?”
Hmm, I feel some bad vibrations. Time to say good bye.
Best regards
Andreas
I wish that were true. Unfortunately, what little leaks by the lid the MSM is keeping on this is still way under the radar of people that aren’t actively looking for it.
David A says:
Because that number represents only a tiny fraction of the total number of scientists and most of those scientists did not have expertise in climate science…or anything particularly close to it. (Besides the fact that said petition is now about 15 years old.) And, in actual fact, none of the major scientific societies, be they professional societies in the relevant fields or the National Academy of Sciences (or any of the analogous societies in other nations) agree with your point of view.
If we get 30,000 people who claim to be scientists to say that they agree with intelligent design rather than evolution, do we have to teach that in the schools too?
Joel Shore says:
March 16, 2012 at 1:25 pm
Veritas says:
Do you disagree with the statement about natural vs. man-made CO2? The IPCC shows that natural emissions are closer to 30 times more than human emissions.
and similar things from Bart, Stephen Richards, PaulID, David A, and Venter)
————————-
What I disagree with is doing accounting by looking at only one side of the ledger. It is like trying to figure out how your bank balance will change by looking only at your deposits and none of your withdrawals.
The point about the natural emissions into the atmosphere is that they are more than matched by natural absorptions from the atmosphere. In fact, the only reason why the current concentration in the atmosphere is not more like 500 ppm than 390 ppm is that about half of our emissions rapidly segregate into the land biosphere and ocean mix layer.
So, a statement that natural emissions are 20 or 30 times larger than human emissions without any context, like noting that these are not net numbers and explaining that the rise in CO2 levels in the atmosphere is thus attributable to our emissions, is basically lying to…or actively deceiving…the students. It is not science…It is political propaganda masquerading as science.”
=========================================
Well Joel, you proved my point exactly that you are being Gleick like in ASSUMING you know that the intended Heartland for schools was to simply explain away CO2 as being inconsequential because it is a small percentage of the total emissions. Like Gleick, you take a part of a statement, and assume the rest. As I stated, why don;t you just mail yourself a fake Heartland document stating what you think they intend to teach, and give that to the media as from Heartland. hat they were really pointing out is in the context of my comment to Cato, ”
Capo, pointing out that the “models” claim of impending doom from CO2 emissions is based on a hypothetical postive feedback, which the observations show is likely negative, and that the benefits of CO2 are KNOWN, while the harm is unrealsied conjecture, is not the same thing as saying increasing CO2 has zero affect on the climate. BTW, over thirty thousand scientist with over 11,000 PHDs agree with hat I just pointed out, but this is not taught in the schools. How come you think our kids should only be taught clearly wrong and unscientific A.I.T. B.S.?
Perhaps you wish to answer my question at the end.
Leave a Reply
David A says:
It is a reasonably safe assumption given:
(1) I have seen David Wojick’s comments on WUWT.
(2) It would be rather strange for Bast to give a few-sentence summary of what Wojick was proposing to teach in his letter to Markey in which he presented it in the worst possible light…and that the next sentence that Bast left out, it was explained how, nonetheless, one also has to consider the absorptions of CO2 from the atmosphere and once one considers this, we find that the significant post-industrial CO2 rise that has and will occur is due to our emissions. I rather imagine it more likely that the full curriculum will be display less fidelity to the currently-accepted science than how Bast has chosen to portray it with selected quotes.
I have already responded to this in a post you might not how seen yet. As for the last sentence, I believe in teaching students the best science as we understand it. Here is the language that I settled upon in a worksheet for college students in my introductory physics course in which I had the students look at the radiative balance of the Earth and, in particular, calculate the amount the temperature would have to rise “all else being equal” to offset a 4 W/m^2 increase in forcing due to a doubling of CO2 levels in the atmosphere: [The answer being ~1.1 deg C.]
> You’ll be surprised, but that’s the website where I started. I was disappointed, because I’ve found no link to the letter to Markey and no comment about the auhtenticity of the 7 documents over there. Did I miss s.th.?
You did.
Go Heartland.org, click environment, then click “News Releases”. The very first item is:
Heartland Institute Responds to Rep. Markey Letter on ‘Fakegate’
Joseph Bast
– Environment, – Law
– March 15, 2012
MARCH 15, 2012 – The Heartland Institute today sent a letter to Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA),…
I am sure there are other paths to the news release from Heartland’s home page.
Or you could go fakegate.org which Is Heartland’s dedicated site to the Gleick affair, and the very first item, at the top of the page, in large letters, partly red, mostly bold says:
UPDATE: March 15
Heartland Institute Responds to Rep. Markey
Letter on ‘Fakegate’
Read the press release and response here.
So yes you did miss it. I don’t think you even looked. Or if you did look, it doesn’t reflect well on your powers of observation since you didn’t look in either of the obvious places to look for a news release on this topic.
You also cite this paragraph:
Dr. Wojick proposes to begin work on “modules” for grades 10-12 on climate change (“whether humans are changing the climate is a major scientific controversy”), climate models (“models are used to explore various hypotheses about how climate works. Their reliability is controversial”), and air pollution (“whether CO2 is a pollutant is controversial. It is the global food supply and natural emissions are 20 times higher than human emissions”).
And then respond:
> Is it really controversial, that CO2 is a greenhouse gas und more CO2 leads to more warming? Of course not, it’s a fact.
There’s a non sequitur there, or two in fact.
There’s nothing in the paragraph your cite which claims that CO2 isn’t a greenhouse gas, or that more CO2 wouldn’t cause warming.
The only phrase that even comes close to what you claim it’s questioning is ““whether CO2 is a pollutant is controversial” – but that phrase doesn’t say the Wojick is disputing that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, etc. It just says that he is allowing questioning of whether it should be classified as a pollutant.
A pollutant is not the same thing as a greenhouse gas, and vice-versa. You are eliding two categories (greenhouse gas and pollutants) as if these 2 different categories are coterminous – but clearly they are not.
To give an example:
Mercury released from industrial processes is a pretty nasty pollutant, but I’m not aware of anybody claiming it’s a greenhouse gas.
Conversely, water vapor is a greenhouse gas, but I’m not aware of anybody seriously stating it’s a pollutant.
So to summarize on this point: You’re reading words into the quote that aren’t there. Which is quite an interesting divergence from the earlier point, where you were unable to read things that were there.
David,
“Capo, pointing out that the “models” claim of impending doom from CO2 emissions is based on a hypothetical postive feedback, which the observations show is likely negative,”
Please, David, be fair. “Doom” is a word I would never use, it’s not a scientific category.
“How come you think our kids should only be taught clearly wrong and unscientific A.I.T. B.S.?”
I don’t recommend anything with regard to US-schools. But I’m a science teacher in Germany, (sorry for my bad English) so I think about what I would teach my classes in climate physics (“would”, because climate physics is not part of our school curriculum in physics in Nordrhein-Westfalen,).
Teaching science means teaching settled science here. For example, a teacher of biology never would mention intelligent design. I teach Einstein’s theory of relativity, regardless of some people raising doubt about it. Maybe it’s wrong, who knows, but it’s the best theory explaining gravity, space and time.
If I would show a film about climate science which contains claims of sea level rise of 5m or more until 2100 or using words like “doom”, I would have a problem and some hard work to elaborate what science really says. It seems, Heartland thinks, if pupils would see a second film showing the other extreme, it’s balanced and ok. Wrong, I would have two problems instead of one.
Now take a look to Heartland’s words about Wojick’s moduls:
“(“whether humans are changing the climate is a major scientific controversy”
Sorry, but CO2 is a greenhouse gas and more CO2 means more warming. There’s broad consensus, I could quote also skeptic scientists like Spencer or Lindzen. The amount of this further warming is controversial, I agree. Pupils should get acquainted with uncertainties, so what’s wrong with teaching, that the expected warming for 2xCO2 is likely between +2 and 4.5°C? It’s right, there are some studies indicating lower values (so let’s hope for good luck;-) and some, indicating higher values (uups).
Next claim:
“models are used to explore various hypotheses about how climate works. Their reliability is controversial”
I admit I don’t know what “explore various hypotheses” should mean in the context of GCMs. But that models are not reality and that models are only useful within their limits is a important thing all pupils should know about every part of science.
Last point:
“whether CO2 is a pollutant is controversial. It is the global food supply and natural emissions are 20 times higher than human emissions”
Sorry, but that’s really amusing. If CO2 is a pollutant is a non-scientific question nobody would ask or answer in german schools. CO2 is a greenhouse gas, that’s enough for climate science and schools. I wondered why in the USA this question is hotly debated and had to learn, it’s because if EPA claims CO2 to be a pollutant, EPA could regulate it. Right? So this question is only important for the politcal discussion in the USA, I’m obliged by law to keep politics out of school.
It’s really sad to see how climate science got politicized espacially in the USA, where it seems to be part of the political battle between left and right. From my german perspective it’s hard to understand the US climate debate, but it’s the US debate which is most important for the world. So I try to understand by reading US newspapers, skeptic blogs, the Heartland documents and made the mistake to raise some questions here.
Best regards
Andreas
(“Capo” was a joke, there was some discussion about “climate capos” at Keith Kloor’s excellent blog, I couldn’t resist to adopt it)
Joel Shore says:
March 16, 2012 at 2:27 pm
David A says:
Well Joel, you proved my point exactly that you are being Gleick like in ASSUMING you know that the intended Heartland curriculum for schools was to simply explain away CO2 as being inconsequential because it is a small percentage of the total emissions.
————————————————————-
Joel shore says, It is a reasonably safe assumption given:
(1) I have seen David Wojick’s comments on WUWT.
—————————————————————————-
My response to Joel’s (1) First of all I am glad you admit it was an assumption, and since you provided no evidence, on WUWT or anywhere else, of David Wojick saying that “since natural emissions of CO2 are twenty times man kinds emissions, they, human emissions, can have zero affect of any kind on climate”; then your assumption remains without evidence and you have only succeeded AGAIN in demonstrating a Gleick like interpretation of the words used.
Joel Shore then gives his 2nd reason…
“(2) It would be rather strange for Bast to give a few-sentence summary of what Wojick was proposing to teach in his letter to Markey in which he presented it in the worst possible light…and that the next sentence that Bast left out, it was explained how, nonetheless, one also has to consider the absorptions of CO2 from the atmosphere and once one considers this, we find that the significant post-industrial CO2 rise that has and will occur is due to our emissions. I rather imagine it more likely that the full curriculum will be display less fidelity to the currently-accepted science than how Bast has chosen to portray it with selected quotes.”
———————————————-
My response to Joel’s comment number (2) explaining his admitted ASSumptions. First of all Joel you know perfectly well that no “few-sentence summary” of a proposed curriculum can do any science course on CAGW justice. Your next sentence is a logical fallacy, where your …”for Bast to give a few-sentence summary of what Wojick was proposing to teach in his letter to Markey, in which he presented it in the worst possible light”, as you are the one assuming the worst possible light, and you have already admitted this “worst possible light” is an assumption, therefore you are not logically allowed to assume that Bast meant what your assumption is. You then go on to explain that it is not logical in your view that Bast meant by this that the CO2 rise is caused by human emissions, even though they are so small. Well, now you have created a straw man, as no one claimed he was illustrating that. Let us go back to what he actually wrote… “Dr. Wojick proposes to begin work on “modules” for grades 10-12 on climate change (“whether humans are changing the climate is a major scientific controversy”), climate models (“models are used to explore various hypotheses about how climate works. Their reliability is controversial”), and air pollution (“whether CO2 is a pollutant is controversial. It is the global food supply and natural emissions are 20 times higher than human emissions”).
So Joel, I see this as saying that the “models” claim of impending doom from CO2 emissions is based on a hypothetical positive feedback, which the observations show is likely negative, and that the benefits of CO2, of which annual human contributions are only 5%, are KNOWN, while the harm is un-realized conjecture. This not the same thing as saying increasing CO2 has zero affect on the climate. Now Joel, my interpretation is far more in context of what is written, where as your “worst possible light” ASSumption is a Gleick like attempt to make the Heartland program appear “anti-science”.
I will respond shortly to your other comments.
Bast is too polite (Honourable and Sincerely).
The problem of course is with voters who elect such incompetents as Markey – he cannot even look for himself and think.
Andreas Fuchs says:
“…so what’s wrong with teaching, that the expected warming for 2xCO2 is likely between +2 and 4.5°C?”
What is wrong with it is that the planet is telling a different story. Who should we believe? You, or Planet Earth?. You’re teaching the IPCC’s pseudo-science. Your numbers are much higher than what empirical observations show.
Furthermore, there is no change in the temperature trend line over the past 350 years, which includes both pre- and post-industrial revolution CO2 levels. The natural warming since the LIA has remained within very clear parameters. Therefore, any warming from the rise in CO2 is too insignificant to measure. You cannot even see it.
When real world obsevations falsify your models, why do you continue to believe the models? The models are wrong, as you can clearly see. The rise in CO2 has not caused any acceleration in temperatures. In fact, global temperatures are declining.
Admit it, you’re not really a science teacher, are you? How could you be, when you disregard the scientific method, the null hypothesis, and real world evidence?
Dear Moderators, this is my third attempt to post this, Please delet two of them if they all go through, but they appear not to be going to moderation.
Joel Shore previously responded to this comment of mine…
David A says…“Capo, pointing out that the “models” claim of impending doom from CO2 emissions is based on a hypothetical positive feedback, which the observations show is likely negative, and that the benefits of CO2 are KNOWN, while the harm is unrealized conjecture, is not the same thing as saying increasing CO2 has zero affect on the climate. BTW, over thirty thousand scientist with over 11,000 PHDs agree with hat I just pointed out, but this is not taught in the schools. How come you think our kids should only be taught clearly wrong and unscientific A.I.T. B.S.?
I then invited Joel Shore to also answer my last question. What follows is his answer. Before reading it please observe that he never answers the question at all, but instead takes off on a litany of what he would like to see taught.
———————————————————————————–
Joel Shore answers…
I have already responded to this in a post you might not how seen yet. As for the last sentence, I believe in teaching students the best science as we understand it. Here is the language that I settled upon in a worksheet for college students in my introductory physics course in which I had the students look at the radiative balance of the Earth and, in particular, calculate the amount the temperature would have to rise “all else being equal” to offset a 4 W/m^2 increase in forcing due to a doubling of CO2 levels in the atmosphere: [The answer being ~1.1 deg C.]
[In reality, all else will not be equal! As CO2 levels rise, more water vapor evaporates into the atmosphere. Water vapor is itself a strong “greenhouse gas” so this can lead to significant further warming. This is what is called a “positive feedback” because it magnifies the warming. Another positive feedback occurs when warming causes ice and snow to melt so that less sunlight is reflected back out into space and hence more gets absorbed, causing further warming. Finally, clouds may also change in ways that are difficult to predict and this can affect both the absorption of solar and emission of terrestrial radiation. Thus, the determination of the expected rise in temperature due to a doubling of CO2 levels is a very difficult problem! The best current estimates are that the temperature rise would be about 2 – 4.5deg C, although lower or higher values cannot be definitely excluded.]
———————————————————————————————
My response…
Now notice how Joel refuses to discuss the point that currently our children are learning about CAGW “science” from the unmitigated propaganda ravings of a politician. Joel will not condemn this, just as he defends Mannian science and Hansen’s ravings. Instead he goes off on an IPCC perspective of the science of CAGW as his ideal course, having nothing to do with my question. However, let me point out the IPCC view of CAGW science is well known to be deeply flawed by non peer reviewed water-mellon literature, as well as the fact that the IPCC ignores a great deal of skeptical peer reviewed literature.
The bottom line concerning the feedback debate is as I have pointed out. The positive feedbacks rest their veracity on computer models, where as the negative feedback rest their assertions on observations. Joel, in his course out line, ASSumes that the least understood cloud and water feedback are positive.
Joel , you know there are many unanswered questions concerning clouds and even W/V itself.
Does the presence of low level clouds over oceans heat or cool the planet? What about the convective clouds over the oceans?
The latest results from ERBE indicate that in the global mean, clouds reduce the radiative heating of the planet. This cooling is a function of season and ranges from approximately -13 to -21 Wm-2. While these values may seem small, they should be compared with the 4 Wm-2 heating predicted by a doubling of carbon dioxide concentration. So does additional W/V produce more low clouds?
Water vapor and clouds have a far larger effect on the SWR entering the ocean then CO2 has on the residence time of LWIR in the atmosphere. A CO2 induced LWIR atmospheric warming primarily increases evaporation at the ocean surface, which increases water vapor and clouds, which reduce SWR entering the oceans. This increase in evaporation is far more then the “models” predicted. SCIENCE July 7 2007 read Wentz et al, CO2 operates on a well known small percentage of the LWR in the atmosphere riding on the shoulders of water vapor. Water vapor and clouds effect a much larger portion of the TSI then CO2, and effect it not only at the LW spectrum in the atmosphere, but where it matters the most, at the SW spectrum entering the oceans. How much does W/V affect TSI at the surface? A solar spectrum chart shows that about 98% of that energy lies between about 250 nm in the UV and 4.0 microns; with the remaining as 1% left over at each end. Such graphs often have superimposed on them the actual ground level (air Mass once) spectrum; that shows the amounts of that energy taken out by primarily O2, O3, and H2O, in the case of H2O which absorbs in the visible and near IR perhaps 20% of the total solar energy is capture by water VAPOR (clear sky) clouds are an additional loss over and above that. As we do not know the residence time of SWR enetering the oceans we do not know the accumulative affect of this reduction at the surface. We do not know the amount of cloud cover created. We do not know solar affects on cloud formation. Joel’s assumption of postive affect is only based on the IPCC version of CAGW science.
Next I will respond to Joel’s last feedback.
[REPLY: All three were stuck in the spam folder. A little patience is usually all that is required. -REP]
Smokey,
and who are you? Give me a guess:
You are white, male and conservative. If right, think about it: Is physics dependend on racial and gender issues? But what about political preferences?
I won’t discuss your arguments, but I will tell you another story:
My pupils get within the topic “nuclear energy” the task to do some research how many victims were caused by Chernobyl 1986. They always present numbers in the range from some hundred to some 100,000. What should they learn? Media literacy, how to find reliable sources, Greenpeace or nuclear industry are no reliable sources. Sorry, but you failed – F.
PS:
You are right, I’m not a teacher. I’m Lukas Podolski, a great football player, playing for the world’s most famous club 1.FC Köln. And believe me, it’s called football, not soccer 😉
REPLY: OKaaaay, now you are Lukas Podolski? Like I said, you seem to have a multiple personality disorder. And that racial and gender stuff? Stop digging man! – Anthony
Smokey: There has been a principle in most Western Democracies that scientific issues used to inform public policy are decided by what the scientific community, as communicated through their organizations like the National Academy of Sciences in the U.S., say the science is, not what some ideologues like yourself say it is. This has generally been pretty bipartisan, up to the recent abandonment of it by ever larger segments of the ever-more extreme and anti-science Republican Party.
Your post is a good illustration of why this principle has proven useful as you illustrate the sort of poor use of scientific arguments that ideologues such as yourself engage in.
Just to point a few of the obvious ones (I’m sure others could find additional problems):
(1) Your “empirical observations” that claim to show that the warming is best fit by assuming a climate sensitivity of about 1.6 instead of 3.2 C actually show that the transient climate response is best fit by a value of 1.6 C, which is well within the range of numbers that the climate models used in the IPCC report have for their transient climate response. Furthermore, the whole method makes the poor assumption that CO2 is the only significant forcing when it is actually known that there are other significant forcings, including the aerosol forcing which is poorly enough constrained that it makes estimating the equilibrium climate sensitivity from the instrumental temperature record alone basically a fool’s errand.
(2) Saying that warming from the LIA is an explanation for the warming is no explanation at all. Who is to say that we would warm naturally from the LIA at some rate of 0.6 or 0.7 C per century and how long should that continue? If it continued for a thousand years, a very small time on the geological scale, the warming would exceed the warming from the last ice age until now. In fact, our best understanding of the climate system is that there is no natural reason for warming over the last ~50 years (e.g., given what we know about solar forcing and volcanic forcing plus the magnitude of any purely internal variability).
(3) You seriously think that showing 3 years of temperature data says anything relevant about temperature trends?!?
Joel Shore says:
March 16, 2012 at 1:43 pm
David A says:
BTW, over thirty thousand scientist with over 11,000 PHDs agree withwhat I just pointed out, but this is not taught in the schools.
Because that number represents only a tiny fraction of the total number of scientists and most of those scientists did not have expertise in climate science…or anything particularly close to it. (Besides the fact that said petition is now about 15 years old.) And, in actual fact, none of the major scientific societies, be they professional societies in the relevant fields or the National Academy of Sciences (or any of the analogous societies in other nations) agree with your point of view.
If we get 30,000 people who claim to be scientists to say that they agree with intelligent design rather than evolution, do we have to teach that in the schools too?
———————————————————————————
Joel, I think you failed logic 101. First of all the Oregon petition has far more qualified scientist then the environmental CAGW scientist, who mostly are environmental studies graduates, who decide that CAGW causes frogs to be bigger, or smaller, or a thousand other studies which take computer model projections of extreme warming and SL rise, and then predict disaster, hoping for more GOVT grants. Next it is apparent that real scientist study the science before forming an opinion, and furthermore CAGW is a relatively new science, with proponents, like Mann and Hansen, who are not “climate scientist. Also your comment about the world’s total number of scientist is silly. There also is no known survey of all the scientist, so your comment is not cogent. Additionally the original survey has continued to grow, so as it ages, it only grows stronger. Also it is well recognised that the scientific “societies” have ever become more “post normal” that is they are more political CAGW advocates, then scientific, while thousand of private scientist around the world withdraw their membeships. Your last sentance is a total fail. It was indeed thirty thousand plus scientist with over ten thosand PHD’s, not just “people”, and, as they did not ask for religion to be taught as science, your comment is not logical or cogent.
Andreas Fuchs says:
“You are white, male and conservative. If right, think about it: Is physics dependend on racial and gender issues? But what about political preferences?”
You are turning a science discussion into a discussion about race, gender and politics? There are plenty of Left leaning commenters here who reject the demonization of “carbon”. Scientific truth trumps politics, gender and race. Only those who believe in the CO2=CAGW narrative believe that politics, race and gender matter. It’s just a form of Post-Normal Science. Which is to say, pseudo-science.
The fact is that the planet is falsifying the UN/IPCC’s numbers. The fact is that the planet has been warming along the same trend line since the LIA. The fact is that CO2 makes no measurable difference to that trend line, whether CO2 is low or high. The fact is that the climate null hypothesis has never been falsified. The fact is that CO2 is harmless, and beneficial to the biosphere. More is better.
Those are real world, verifiable facts that I will be happy to discuss. But when the conversation turns to gender, racial and political topics, the conclusion is clear: because there is no measurable, testable evidence showing catastrophic AGW, or runaway global warming, or climate disruption, or any of the other doomsday scenarios that the alarmist crowd uses to scare the public, the only thing left is to derail the discussion with racial, political and gender comments.
Empirical evidence shows that scientific skeptics are on the correct side in this debate. Climate alarmists have no credible evidence supporting their repeatedly falsified conjectures. So they use models, which are validated by other models, in a circular climate pal review system – as the Climategate emails repeatedly demonstrate.
My advice is to teach your students the rigorous scientific method. As Prof Richard Feynman said, if your theory disagrees with observation, it is wrong. The IPCC’s numbers – and yours – disagree with observation.
David A says:
“Joel, I think you failed logic 101.”
That’s because Joel Shore is a heavily politicized scientist. He is far from being objective, constantly labeling those he disagrees with as “ideologues”. That shows you exactly where he’s coming from: politics, not science. And although IANAR, Joel paints that entire political Party with his “anti-science” brush. But critical thinking isn’t Joel Shore’s strong suit, and as I’ve often pointed out, if it were not for psychological projection the alarmist crowd wouldn’t have much to say. So who is the real ‘ideologue’?
Joel Shore’s argument is the usual argumentum ad ignorantium fallacy: since he can’t think of what else could cause the planet’s natural emergence from the LIA, Joel assumes that CO2 must be the cause. But that is easy to debunk: the long term rising trend line from the LIA is the same, both before and after the runup of CO2 from ≈280 ppmv to ≈392 ppmv. There is no acceleration of the warming trend. Therefore, any effect from CO2 is too small to measure. CO2 is at most a bit player.
Shore’s next argument is that if the current warming trend from the LIA continued for “a thousand years”, we would all cook. Well, that’s true. But trees don’t grow to the moon, and warming cycles end. Joel sums it up with his preposterous statement that “there is no natural reason for warming over the last ~50 years”. How would Joel Shore know that?? The same warming trends have happened repeatedly. So now this time it’s different? Ha. As if. Joel is just squirming around trying to avoid the null hypothesis. But there’s no wiggle room.
Joel needs to run along now, back to Pseudo-Skeptical Pseudo-Science or Tamina, for some new talking points. The ones he posts here are just too easy to deconstruct. Even by an ‘ideologue’☺.
Joel Shore says:
March 16, 2012 at 5:34 pm
Why? Because the Republican party (among others) demand to see the results–like those from Mikey Mann? Or is it Eric Holder who’s giving you a thrill up your leg?
We’re after truth here, Mr. Shore. If you can’t see that then you can’t see. (By the way, whenever somebody injects what you’ve just said into the discussion, practically everybody knows you’ve lost the argument. Saul Alinsky would be proud–of you!)
And if you’re relying on organizations like the National Academy of Sciences to tell you what to believe, then you were completely brainwashed at university (and indoctrinated with poly-sci, to boot). I suggest you request a full tuition refund.
Andreas Fuchs says:
Andreas, if you think science depends on political preferences or racial and gender issues, you are like Joel Shore and should ALSO request a full tuition refund from your alma mater.
(Andreas must think gravity, mathematics, physics, the speed of light, etc. etc. all depend on the color of your skin or whether you’re male, female, or have a particular political persuasion. The notion is laughable!)
Smokey says:
March 16, 2012 at 6:44 pm
================================
Yes I agree. It is curious how he forgets the null hypothesis, then states, “…Furthermore, the whole method makes the poor assumption that CO2 is the only significant forcing when it is actually known that there are other significant forcings, including the aerosol forcing which is poorly enough constrained that it makes estimating the equilibrium climate sensitivity from the instrumental temperature record alone basically a fool’s errand…”
Besides the warmist, who ever said that “CO2 is the only significant forcing”? Of course there are other factors, the vast majority of which are natural, as well as responsibile for previous climate changes and are in fact the factors which form the null hypothesis. Joel howver, being somewhat of an educated troll, can only point to another human factor, one which was added as an as-hoc patch for the failed CAGW proposition. It is curious how he confesses ignorance to the real affect of aerosols.
Finally Joel ends with …”You seriously think that showing 3 years of temperature data says anything relevant about temperature trends?!?” Your first chart statted in 1871, another chart referred to 350 years, and your last chart could have easily showed 14 years of declining T, or 17 years of no significant trend, warming or cooling. As per typical “Shore”, he chose one aspect of a much longer post, and raised a pedantic point about it.
Andreas Fuchs says:
March 16, 2012 at 3:46 pm
David says
“Capo, pointing out that the “models” claim of impending doom from CO2 emissions is based on a hypothetical postive feedback, which the observations show is likely negative,”
Please, David, be fair. “Doom” is a word I would never use, it’s not a scientific category.
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I never said you stated “doom,” or “catestrophic”. In fact what you say is not relevant. However what the models say is relevant as they are used to form public policy. And they, the models, are used to put the “C” in CAGW. You cannot use computer models, which are falsified via observations, to determine public policy in some Orwelllian post normal world, and then later try to separate the science which has already been destroyed from politics. Your next comment once again does exactly that.
I said…
“How come you think our kids should only be taught clearly wrong and unscientific A.I.T. B.S.?”
You say…
I don’t recommend anything with regard to US-schools. But I’m a science teacher in Germany, (sorry for my bad English) so I think about what I would teach my classes in climate physics (“would”, because climate physics is not part of our school curriculum in physics in Nordrhein-Westfalen,).
Teaching science means teaching settled science here. For example, a teacher of biology never would mention intelligent design. I teach Einstein’s theory of relativity, regardless of some people raising doubt about it. Maybe it’s wrong, who knows, but it’s the best theory explaining gravity, space and time.” ( My intial perspective on this thus far irrelevant comment is that “settled science” is, in and of itself, not a scientific term, at any rate you continue….)
“If I would show a film about climate science which contains claims of sea level rise of 5m or more until 2100 or using words like “doom”, I would have a problem and some hard work to elaborate what science really says. It seems, Heartland thinks, if pupils would see a second film showing the other extreme, it’s balanced and ok. Wrong, I would have two problems instead of one.”
(Andreas, I am sorry, but your statement here is beyond parody. Where did you get the idea that Heartland wished to have students think that the oceans are going to lower by 5m this century? Heartland is talking about the need for dozens of peer reviewed scientific papers which present a skeptical view of CAGW to be also taught in classrooms. Papers by well qualified PHD scientists. Papers which show that the atmosphere, land and oceans are not warming as expected by the CAGW meme; papers which indicate a stronger connection to solar influence affecting albedo, cloud formation and ocean absorbtion of solar insolation then previousely understood, and that these affects are in fact negative to warming. Also not taught are peer reviewed papers which show gaping flaws in the past climate proxy reconstructions, and in recent continental T trends like the Steig paper on an antarctica. Also not taught are undeniable revelations which show disengenuious unscientific mendacious behaviour of the “team” of CAGW scientist. I could quote from among peer reviewed literature, papers by Lindzen, Pielke, Christy, Spencer, Eschenbach, Scafetta, Myhre, Akasofu, Douglass, McIntyre and many others, all of whom have robustly challenged the dogma of a few cloistered warmists. These are not “big oil shills” as some try to claim, nor are they nutters. They are all eminent climate scientists who are showing that observations do not support the hypothesis that CO2 is significantly warming the planet, a hypothesis that is predicated on the false premise that historical climate has remained fixed for millennia, which is in contradiction of overwhelming evidence that temperatures were warmer than today a thousand years ago. I could point to 100 more papers that show that the medieval warm period was real, global, and warmer than today – a mountain of evidence against the warmists broken hockey stick. Additionally these scientist are unafraid to reveal their methodology and data, unlike many deacons high in the AGW hierarchy. The fact that climate alarmists reject the Scientific Method means that they are political advocates first, and mendacious scientists second.
Teaching the above is not the opposite of Gore’s AIT. Your comment is rejected as grossly uninformed at best. Your claim that “mainstream” scientists have reached a consensus is also completely wrong. For one example, more than 31,000 U.S. scientists have already signed the OISM Petition, which states:
The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind.
There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.
Dr Frederick Seitz, past President of the National Academy of Sciences, wrote the petition’s cover letter. You can not get more ‘mainstream’ than Dr Seitz. Yet many alarmist, such as our own Joel Shore, futilely attempt to marginalize the tens of thousands of scientists who signed that statement. Compare that number with the fewer than a hundred political appointees who put together the UN/IPCC’s Assessment Reports, and you will begin to understand that there is no “scientific“ consensus.
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Now you continue…
Now take a look to Heartland’s words about Wojick’s moduls:
“(“whether humans are changing the climate is a major scientific controversy”
Sorry, but CO2 is a greenhouse gas and more CO2 means more warming. There’s broad consensus, I could quote also skeptic scientists like Spencer or Lindzen. The amount of this further warming is controversial, I agree. Pupils should get acquainted with uncertainties, so what’s wrong with teaching, that the expected warming for 2xCO2 is likely between +2 and 4.5°C? It’s right, there are some studies indicating lower values (so let’s hope for good luck;-) and some, indicating higher values (uups).
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Smokey, as well as my comments to Joel Shore well answered your misconceptions here. There are numerous peer reviewed papers which show a lower sensitivity, and furthermore the observations support and inform these paers, wheras the observations discredit the IPCC papers and propaganda.
You continue…”Next claim:
“models are used to explore various hypotheses about how climate works. Their reliability is controversial”
I admit I don’t know what “explore various hypotheses” should mean in the context of GCMs. But that models are not reality and that models are only useful within their limits is a important thing all pupils should know about every part of science.
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Andreas, OK, so you agree. Is this not particularly true when the models fail to match real world observations? Good luck with your efforts at understanding skeptical scientist and lay citizens in the US. I hope you admit that your comments are well answered.
RockyRoad says:
No…It is because the Republican Party is increasingly demanding ideological purity at the expense of science and fact. That is why Republicans like Sherwood Boehlert (former Chair of the House Committee on Science & Technology before he retired from Congress), who subscribe to the basic Republican principles but don’t put iheir ideology before fact and science, have found themselves to be increasingly at odds with the rest of the party.
The sort of mass abandonment of scientific principles and organizations in favor of “science” produced by a few pet scientists and promoted by ideological think-tanks is exactly the danger that I am talking about. You are essentially using the same sort of arguments that some on the Left used in the post-modernist movement to promote the idea that the scientific process has been corrupted by the biases of the scientists / society. Fortunately, such nonsense never really caught on in any serious way that threatened to derail public policy, as it now has on the Right.
And, I am not just relying on the NAS. I am relying on the fact that I know enough about the science to know why most of the attacks on the accepted science are wrong. However, the notion that the public policy community is supposed to decide that the best science is that promoted by right-wing think-tanks like Heartland rather than by the NAS is scary indeed!
Joel Shore says:
March 16, 2012 at 1:25 pm
“What I disagree with is doing accounting by looking at only one side of the ledger. It is like trying to figure out how your bank balance will change by looking only at your deposits and none of your withdrawals”.
Similarly, omitting the information is presenting only a partial ledger. When the input flux from nature is so much larger than the human component, it does not take a lot of variation in the natural part to overwhelm the human component.
“The point about the natural emissions into the atmosphere is that they are more than matched by natural absorptions from the atmosphere. In fact, the only reason why the current concentration in the atmosphere is not more like 500 ppm than 390 ppm is that about half of our emissions rapidly segregate into the land biosphere and ocean mix layer.”
This, again, is only a partial accounting. We do not actually know how rapidly those emissions are ultimately sequestered. We do not actually have all the input sources well quantified, and the errors do not have to be large to overwhelm the human component.
Bottom line: you accuse (though without actual proof) Heartland of presenting only partial facts, but you actually only want to present partial information yourself.
“No…It is because the Republican Party is increasingly demanding ideological purity at the expense of science and fact.”
A purely political statement. The Democrats are at least as guilty of doing the same in kind. The increasingly dominant Left campaigns against GM foods. The increasingly dominant Left believes wind and solar power can replace the energy produced by fossil fuels. The increasingly dominant Left thinks AGW is a slam dunk. They are, in a nutshell (an appropriate metaphor if there ever was one) scientifically illiterate.
Joel Shore,
“However, the notion that the public policy community is supposed to decide that the best science is that promoted by right-wing think-tanks like Heartland rather than by the NAS is scary indeed!”
I don’t know where such a notion exists, other than in the fevered imaginations of your own head. Heartland has asked only to promote debate. This is something they have shouted for over and over again. They have begged to host platforms where believers in AGW can debate sceptics. They – and all sceptics – want to see a free market (no pun intended) of scientific ideas, each competing to win support. Not by political fiat, as you imply, but by the merits of their ideas. But those on the other side of the debate see no sense in that.
I don’t blame them. Why should they enter into a free market of ideas? Everytime they have blundered into scientific debates they have lost, so why continue? Why put their hegemony at risk? They already command the fealty of the MSM, politicians, and those “politicaly correct” thinkers who man the committees of what were once august scientific bodies.
Vince Causey says:
This is the same sort of nonsense one always hears from the losers of the scientific debate in the scientific literature: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expelled:_No_Intelligence_Allowed All such people think that the scientific societies have been stacked against them and they would all prefer to have a public debate where they are judged by people who can’t tell when they are being deceived.
There is a reason why the U.S. government and other Western Democracies have decided to rely on non-partisan scientific sources of scientific judgement like the National Academy of Sciences rather than having science become a political football. And, there is a reason why the enemies of science, like Heartland, want to do what they are doing. That is why it was so natural for an organizations like NCSE, which was dedicated to fighting against attempts to water down the teaching of evolution and to put creation science (“intelligent design”) into schools, to also now take on the issue of climate change.
Bart says:
I don’t think being against GM foods have become a virtual litmus test for politicians in the Democratic Party in the way that climate change seems to have become that for the Republican Party, at least at a national level.
Bart: As for your views on CO2, we’ve been around on this many times before. Your views on the subject are rather extreme even within the “AGW skeptic” community and are completely off-the-map within the scientific community.
David A says:
Are you serious!?! Here is Seitz’s bio: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Seitz In his later years, Seitz was quite an extremist. And, here http://bobpark.physics.umd.edu/WN03/wn080803.html is a description of Seitz and his cover letter and all of the shenanigans regarding the Oregon Petition from Robert Park (who is addressing an audience mainly of fellow physicists in his “What’s New” column):
Robert Park truly is “mainstream” in the sense that he actually attacks people on the Right AND the Left when they attack science. E.g., he regularly criticized on liberal Sen. Tom Harkin for creating the NIH’s Alternative Medicine.
David A says:
Completely nonsense. The science of the water vapor feedback is quite well understood and verified now. Clouds are uncertain…but the evidence that the net feedbacks are positive rests on a lot more than just computer models. There are a variety of analyses using evidence from studying paleoclimate (particularly the Last Glacial Maximum), the Mt Pinatubo eruption, the 20th century temperature record, the strength of the seasonal cycle, and the modern satellite record that all support such a positive feedback. The analyses that the feedbacks are negative come from basically two sources: Roy Spencer and Richard Lindzen. Lindzen and Choi’s first paper was so bad that even Spencer criticized it pretty heavily; the new version has not yet gotten analyzed in detail by scientists in the field (as far as I know) but you are banking a lot on one paper by someone whose track record in this particular field is not too good to believe that it will fare much better.
The case for negative feedbacks relies on essentially elevating the most recent analyses by Spencer ahd Lindzen’s (that the scientific community has not yet had the time to respond to) above all of the other work in the field, which given both their track records on fooling themselves in favor of the conclusions that they desire, is something you would only do if you, like them, really want the result to turn out a certain way.
That the net effect of clouds is cooling has been known for many years and is not the same thing as saying that the feedback is negative, since it is difficult to predict how clouds will respond…high and (even to a greater degree) low clouds.
I’m not sure where you are going with the rest of your talk about water vapor and all. The full radiative effects of water vapor on both shortwave and longwave radiation are well-understood, which is why you don’t find anyone debating this basic radiative physics in the scientific literature.
And, yes, clouds remain a large uncertainty and that is acknowledged and should be. However, the notion that clouds miraculously save us from significant warming is one that has very little support and lots of evidence going against it in the scientific literature.
In the end, this is all about people wanting to elevate the small amount of science that supports what they want to believe for ideological reasons and ignore the large amount of science that contradicts it. And, to do so, in the light of all of the respected scientific authorities disagreeing with them, they have to create fanciful stories about how the scientific authorities have all been corrupted and so on and so forth.
It is the same thing that we have seen whenever science runs up against strongly-held ideological or religious beliefs and/or powerful economic interests. We’ve seen it in the fight over evolution, we’ve seen it in the fight over the dangers of tobacco (and CFCs and …) and we are seeing it again here.
David A says:
I chose several aspects of Smokey’s post to take issue with. Smokey’s MO is just to throw a bunch of nonsense out and hope that a little sticks. The fact that he used a plot that had only three years of data to illustrate the temperature trend should alone be enough to disqualify him as any sort of trustworthy authority. However, I also pointed out several other problems with several of the other plots & statements in his post.
Joel Shore says:
March 17, 2012 at 1:53 pm
‘Bart: As for your views on CO2, we’ve been around on this many times before. Your views on the subject are rather extreme even within the “AGW skeptic” community and are completely off-the-map within the scientific community.’
Meaning you don’t understand what I have said. Actually, my views are based on pretty standard knowledge in scientific circles outside the very insulated and primitive mainstream Climate Science community, where they are determined to reinvent the wheel, and are doing a very poor job of it.
It’s nice that you find comfort in the safety of the herd. From what I have seen, were I you, I would do the same.
Joel Shore says:
March 17, 2012 at 1:53 pm
“I don’t think being against GM foods have become a virtual litmus test for politicians in the Democratic Party in the way that climate change seems to have become that for the Republican Party, at least at a national level.”
A) How many of the remaining contenders for the Republican nomination for President counts himself a “climate change” skeptic?
B) How many of the Democrat nominees believes we can replace fossil fuels with algae generated bio-fuel? How many billions has he thrown away on “Green” energy ventures to date?
Here is a hint: B is much less than A.
Oops. B is much greater than A on a percentage basis.Please don’t make some childish taunt in reply (which is about the abysmal level of debate generally expected from your side). I changed A and B before posting, but forgot to update the hint.
Bart,
What I have said is:
This is evidenced by the fact that of the 4 candidates left in the race, two are hard-core climate change skeptics and the other two once seemed to accept the scientific consensus and the need to take action but seem to have found it necessary to modify their position, at least for the Republican primaries. What they would say in the general election or do if / once elected is anybody’s guess.
Only Huntsman seemed to be brave enough to suggest that Republicans would do best to accept the scientific community’s opinion on such a scientific issue and he is no longer in the race. As I have said, I believe that there was a time in the past when there was generally pretty bi-partisan acceptance that the National Academy of Sciences should be relied on for scientific opinions more than the candidates own personal views of the science. Even George W Bush felt it necessary to at least pretend to listen to NAS’s views on the subject.
As for “green energy”, like every major technological change, the change in how we produce energy will involve technologies that succeed and technologies that fail.
A) There is undeniably greater diversity of opinion, and therefore a healthier approach to addressing complex scientific issues, in the Republican Party than in the Democratic Party
B) The ones who are skeptics are more closely following the scientific method, since there genuinely is not sufficient, even preponderant, evidence to conclude that humans are responsible, in whole or in part, for any of the recent swings in global climate
C) Regarding the NAS: sorry, you do not get to appoint an omnipotent authority to whom the public must abdicate any capacity for rational thought and accept whatsoever they decree, no matter how flimsy the basis. This is America. If you do not like our system of rights and freedoms, nobody will stop you from moving somewhere more congenial to your outlook.
D) “Green energy” is a joke. Nothing is going to supplant fossil fuels as our dominant source of energy in my lifetime or in yours. Anyone who believes solar and wind power will is scientifically incompetent.
Thanks for admitting Joel Shore, that you are against the free market of ideas.
Joel Shore says:
“… ideologues like yourself…”
Ever look in the mirror, Joel? You are by far the biggest ideologue posting here.
If it were not for psychological projection you wouldn’t have much to say.
. . .
David A says:
March 16, 2012 at 10:59 pm [ … ]
Joel Shore is cherry-picking one particular chart out of several that I posted above [March 16, 2012 at 4:40 pm]. If Joel Shore would look at all the charts, he would see that nothing unusual is occurring, thus the global warming scare that he is always pushing is falsified. Instead, Shore deviously cherry-picks one chart and argues with that strawman, ignoring the big picture.
Joel Shore also regularly cites the now discredited APS, from which the esteemed Dr. Hal Lewis resigned. Dr. Lewis objected to the corruption of the APS by a very small clique that presumes to speak for the entire membership, and which refuses to allow the entire membership to respond to a range of neutral poll questions. The APS is losing membership as a result. But they do not really care, because the insider clique has made the APS a propaganda source for people like Joel Shore to point to in his endless appeals to authority. Joel Shore supports the APS’ corruption because it fits his narrative. Now the APS is in trouble, because it is descending into Langmuir’s pathological science:
The APS, like the global warming scare in general, is currently at #6. And neither the APS nor Joel Shore can put Humpty Dumpty back together again. The ultimate Authority — planet earth — is falsifying catastrophic AGW. As for mere AGW: it is to insignificant to worry about. We could do with a little more warmth — and lots more CO2.
Bart,
What people have the right to do in a free society and what they should do are sometimes two different things. Indeed, people have the right to ignore scientific bodies and just turn science into an ideological football. Heck, they even have the right to turn to Shamans for advice on issues instead of scientists. That still does not mean that it is the approach that those of us who believe in science-based policy will endorse.
Joel Shore says:
March 18, 2012 at 1:44 pm
“That still does not mean that it is the approach that those of us who believe in science-based policy will endorse.”
Get over yourself, Joel. You’re not on the side of “science” here. You are on the side of conformity and religious non-thought dressed up in the guise of science.
Really. Once again Joel Shore falls back on his ‘ideology’ crutch. He’s a Cult follower with a thin veneer of science, always blaming skeptics for his own personal faults.
There is nothing unusual happening with the planet’s temperature. What we are observing is natural variability, and all the hand-waving in the world won’t change that fact. If human activity has any effect — still a big “if” — it is minuscule, and not worth worrying about.
The belief in climate disruption is being falsified by the planet, so the true motivation behind the scare comes out: ideology. But that ideology is entirely on the part of the alarmist crowd. Scientific skeptics are just saying, “Show me.” The fact that the hand-wavers have no evidence to support their beliefs is enough to convince most folks that CAGW, and even AGW, is a baseless scare.