UPDATE: 5/30 8:45AM After we pointed it out Romm has now snipped the ugly part of the comment seen in the screencap below, it only took him five days to notice it with our help. The original post in entirety is preserved here http://www.webcitation.org/682NzGF0b – Anthony
UPDATE2: 5/30 3PM Reuters has issued a correction, removing the 2050 reference and replacing it with (towards the end of this century) See http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/05/30/co2-iea-idUKL5E8GO6B520120530
UPDATE3: 5/30 4:3oPM In response to being called out, Romm issued one of his usual jihads, insinuating with the help of Eli Rabett aka Dr. Joshua Halpern that everybody else is stupid but him, and that we really will all roast. He trots out his favorite predictive Wheel-of-Climate! again.
It’s a laugh riot. But Romm didn’t start questioning the story until AFTER other people started to question it, and he passed it on with no caveats in the original post, archived here. He did make a note in comments saying “I meant to post that 2050 is obviously a mistake by the reporter.” but never actually did make any caveat in the main body of the post until he found himself embarrassed by it all. He also deleted (5 days later after we pointed it out ) the ugly commentary about death wishes for “coal/oil people” (see below).
The level of noise today is telling, much like the “voodoo science” claims of Pachauri. – Anthony
This is sad. Joe Romm promotes another overt fabrication, and some poor kid writes in despair, hoping all the “oil/coal people” here die “a horrible death, preferably caused by climate disasters”. If that were sent to somebody at ANU, it would by the Appell/Stokes rule, be declared a “death threat”. Since it’s on Romm’s site, the poster gets sympathy and counseling instead of admonishment. See below.
First, Romm’s reporting of an overt fabrication of 11°F temperature rise by 2050 by Fatih Birol.
The claim of 11°F comes from this Reuters news article . It cites Fatih Birol, the chief economist of the IEA, who says:
“When I look at this data, the trend is perfectly in line with a temperature increase of 6 degrees Celsius (by 2050), which would have devastating consequences for the planet,” Fatih Birol, IEA’s chief economist told Reuters.
Of course 6°C =11°F, and given the climate sensitivity figures bandied around by the IPCC, there doesn’t seem any way these numbers can pencil out.
Hans von Storch writes on Die Klimazwiebel that this is “pure alarmism”:
A forth interesting issue is that climate science has become irrelevant; it shows up in passing, when “limit devastating climate effects like crop failure and melting glaciers” is mentioned, and the quote “the trend is perfectly in line with a temperature increase of 6 degrees Celsius (by 2050)” is made.This is a pretty bold prediction, given that we have so far less than 1 degree warming since pre-industrial times, so that the warming must be more than 5 degrees/38 years, i.e., about 0.7-0.8 deg/decade. I consider this pure alarmism, which is related to the timing, and a misuse of scientific analysis for creating some unsustainable short term drama for the Bonn-negotiations.
I wonder if this 6-degrees claim is really from IEA, or just an addition by Fatih Birol, because is no not mentioned in the IEA’s announcement.
Even Joshua Halpern, aka “Eli Rabbet”, says in comments the claim by Birol makes no sense:
Not having a BS detector that works on himself, Romm runs with it, embellishing it with this bit of propaganda:
As Birol said of 11°F warming late last year, “Even School Children Know This Will Have Catastrophic Implications for All of Us.” If only school children ran the country.
And following his rant, we get this comment first up from a school age child:
And not one person in the thread following that comment, not Halpern, nor even Romm himself, says anything about the death wish, or even suggests to the poor kid that saying such things are unacceptable. There’s agreement in the silence. There’s no significant disagreement with the feelings of doom espoused either. It is really depressing for the lack of reality based discussion.
I have to wonder though, if this kid has ever driven or ridden in a car, or used electricity made from coal. Maybe he/she thinks such things are powered by the grace of the green energy fairy.
If the situation were reversed, Romm, Appell, Halpern, and the whole cast of haters would be all over it as yet another example of how terrible skeptics are.
Their double standard behavior is disturbing. Romm should be ashamed of himself, but he won’t be, because he’s paid a six figure salary to promote this garbage.
Brian, I often refer my students to WUWT and other sane climate sites; did so today, in fact. My colleagues as well, but I don’t think they actually read any of it because they continue to blather on about glaciers melting, oceans rising, and climate warming. It makes me want to retire on my minuscule pension and eat ramen the rest of my life. 🙂
It must be hell to wake up on the Internet to discover you are a 17 year old nutter. Sounds like he has been abandoned by responsible adults all 17 of those years.
It’s a PR mans wet dream.
He’ll keep promoting it saying look even school children understand.
If there is a hell though the kid might want to look at Dante’s inferno and the Seventh circle onwards, I am unsure if ignorence counts in hell though, it certainly does in a court of law.
Birol is not completely out there. In Australia, the dominant scientific body, the CSIRO, has predicted “up to” 6 degrees C by 2070 for Australia. A similar figure was quoted by the Prime Minister Julia Gillard as justification for the new carbon tax, which comes in in a few weeks.
While Birol’s prediction exceeds this, it is well within the same ballpark. As far as I know, no mainstream media (apart from the sceptical minority) questioned the CSIRO’s claim, so Birol may well expect to get away with it.
Sorry should read – ‘it certainly doesn’t in a court of law.’
Birol is an economist. Don’t bother about their predictions; no-one, including themselves, expects them to be right. Their “use” is in explaining what went wrong afterwards. Noted by Winston Churchill in the 1950’s and still valid.
And don’t worry about the kid. Just explain that AGW is just like the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy – an adult fable to disguise where the money comes from.
It’s deffo propaganda, IMHO – as already said, likely a 40-something about to lose his funding! Of course, the warmista will take such comments here as a sign that us skeptics are all insensitive uncaring morons…..and will miss /ignore the fact that the UNTRUE alarmism has at least, in part, created such issues with our kids…….
Seriously though, it’s no different to Agony Aunt columns in ‘Spotty Teen Weekly’, anyone who finds the need to write about such problems to a public forum is a bit sad (IMHO), but hardly likely to require suicide watch, maybe just needs some ‘attention’. If genuine, the kid needs friends and possible counselling, but also needs to resit school and learn some of the questioning skills everyone should have to enable them to work through such thoughts.
The trouble is that few people are aware of history these days, even less so of historical climate. In this article carried here a few months ago I followed the gently warming trend from the first decades of the 17th century, after first identifying the dates of the decline seen in the previous half century.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/11/01/a-short-anthology-of-changing-climate/
A warming from the time of Shakespeare clearly predates the co2 scare, and of course we can trace the changes in climate –sometimes warm sometimes cool-back many thousands of years. Sadly I would bet that the 17 year old has never been taught about our ever changing climate and I suspect his knowledge of history doesn’t extend to beyond his short life.
tonyb
If 17, his girlfriend has probably dumped him because he’s a AGW fanatic, and he’s depressed.
The counseling should be for Romm and Birol for peddling this drivel.
If indeed a 17 year old wrote that, how sad that the climate war has come to this.
Further down the page (response 6 from “Dr Peter Carter”), I spotted this little gem:-
We are ending almost all life and yet only a handful of people are calling for the acknowledgement of the dire planetary emergency we are all in.
Make no mistake this 7C by 2100, due to current investment in more of the very worst polluting fossil fuels, is a real commitment being made today and its much worse than 7C.
It is a full long term commitment of about 12C due to the ocean heat lag.
At 3C all crops in all regions have declined below baseline yields (IPCC NRC UK Met Office). At 4C 75% of species are committed to extinction (IPCC). At 7C the planet is uninhabitable if there are any humans left.
The solution is a global demand that all fossil fuel subsidies (direct and indirect) totalling well over $1 trillion be forthwith stopped and the direct subsidies transferred to the clean zero carbon industry.
I don’t know if anyone is keeping the score but I think I’m correct that 12C is the most extravagant claim so far.
Mind you, and following on ferd berple’s post above, 2 days ago in my back garden in rural Wiltshire, the temperature difference from night to day was 21C. That was in around 12 hours so I guess I’ve vapourised already.
I’m with a couple of commenters upthread. This comment sounds more like it was written by a 40 year old trying to sound like a 17 year old and doing a lousy job. Really typical of alarmist crowd to throw in references to big oil and big coal, as if people running all the cars and machinery are innocent of any involvement. It isn’t the oil companies that burn the oil young man, they just dig it out of the ground. And it isn’t the car companies what build those wonderful driving machines either, Its the people who drive the cars that are bruning the oil!!
On the other hand, this kid could be real, and if so,he needs help. The truth is that kids are coming out of the school system these days with certain things taken for granted. The earth is round, the earth orbits the sun, and global warming is destroying the planet.
The AGW messages are in fact delivered as if factual science, and that is what most students grow up believing given that they are immersed in that story line and given no contrary opinion within their curriculum.
Fortunatey when they go outside, a quick glance at the horizon show rhat the eartth isa actually flat as any fool can see, and the sun circle the earth which also becomes obvious with very little observation. They;ll figure cimate out when it doen’t get hot after all on their own.
2050 makes no sense, but 2100 or a bit later does. The 2050 was inserted by Reuters based on a misunderstanding and was never uttered by Birol. Birol, and the IEA have often said in public that
and similar language is in the World Energy Report. The 6C is supported by work at MIT, although there the median is 5.2 C
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/climate-change-1002.html
http://globalchange.mit.edu/research/publications/1989
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/roulette-0519.html
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/2009JCLI2863.1
When the little prat has not shrivelled up by 2050 he/she will wish it had spent more time on its studies and less time on climate sites. No sympathy from me. I was working not whining at 17.
I think even the Team would be embarrassed by Fatih Birol’s ridiculous claim. We have to remember this guy is an economist from an NGO – in other words, his grasp of what happens in the real world of science is tenuous at best. He has learned that scary climate stories help ensure long term career prospects, especially in the shadowy world of those organisations which do not have to bear responsibility for either their deeds or words.
And let’s not forget ‘climate science’, as it is practiced today, bear little or no resemblance to real science.
An Evening with Michael Crichton
November 15, 2005
About 50 people died in Chernobyl, what I’d been led to believe about Chernobyl was not merely wrong. It was astonishingly wrong. At the time of the disaster the predicted deaths was 2,000 immediate. The New York Post thought there would be 16,000. The Canadian Broadcasting Company in ’91 thought there would be that many, and you see the BBC and The New York Times in 2002 predicting at the low end 15,000 deaths. Their estimates were 15,000 to 30,000 deaths.
The most troubling of all, according to the UN report, was that the largest public health problem created by the accident was the damaging psychological impact due to a lack of accurate information.
This was manifesting as—they said—negative self-assessments of health, belief in a shortened life expectancy, lack of initiative and dependency on assistance from the state. In other words, the greatest damage to the people of Chernobyl was caused by bad information. These people weren’t blighted by radiation so much as by terrifying, but false, information.
Same old same old.
http://independent.org/events/transcript.asp?eventID=111
BrianH: good on you for mentioning the Chiefio! I love that guy’s stuff.
At 17, the mind, in particular the male mind, hasn’t fully matured. I used to be scared of the Daleks on Dr. Who, but even though I knew it was Sci-Fi, I was only 6 then.
@Jame Sexton
You know, its funny…. I’m afraid for our future …. maybe even more than the 17 y/o….. but, for very different reasons. How does one raise a child to respect their elders and follow instruction from authority when there’s a bunch of raving lunatics attacking their young intellect?”
I fully agree. However this is all part of the Socialist Manifesto, or Agenda 21 as it is better known. In it, it talks openly of removing the faith of children in their parents, & teaching them to look to the state for knowledge & salvation – nice people hey? They talk openly of de-educating people & children as they will consume more if they are educated to too high a level! Of course “they” in the New World Order Global Big Guvment, like their counter parts in the PDREU, will have the benefits of private education in one of the many Global schools, as are the offsrping of EU workers (fat cat bureaucrats) in the at least 14 European schools dotted around, all paid for by the hard-pressed (& ever increasingly so) taxpayer, at around $25,000 a year!!!! After all there have to be some people to eat the beluga cavia & drink the Moet & Chandon, otherwise it will all go to waste! 😉
You can put in a bid on what the temperature will be in 2014 and 2019, and make other bets, on Intrade. (They hold your money until the issue is resolved or you sell your bet–it works like a futures market.) Here’s the link: https://www.intrade.com/v4/markets/?eventClassId=20
IEA is running their own forecasts, not IPPCs. And I think these forecasts say that we’re heading for +6C (above “pre industrial levels”, which they of course take as LIA temperatures…), but not by 2050, but as a long term equilibrium. That’s also IMHO rubbish – but still far less scary than +6C in 38 years.
There are three reasons why I object so strongly against the AGW scare: 1) It will, if the warming doesn’t happen or is benign, destroy public confidence in science. 2) The alarmism causes actions that do more harm than good (e.g. promotion of biofuels) and 3) It takes away our children’s hope for a good future (which they have all reason to have!)
It could be worse. He could be out getting involved with gangs, shootin up, commiting crimes and vile acts, mixing with crack ho’s. But that’s enough about Romm, it’s the 17 year old I am concerened about
If this person is really seventeen, I fear for his future. Likely his science knowledge and logic are no better than his English, which is dreadful. Why does he think the punctuation manufacturers make so many apostrophes? He’s supposed to use them for contractions and possessives, so unused oversupply doesn’t rot the supply-and-demand equilibrium. Unfortunately, far too many teenagers write as this one does, aping someone physically merged with his cellphone or other electronic pacifier; to become fully human, he may have to have such instruments surgically removed.
Friends:
Several posts have made the point that is summarised well by davidmhoffer when he says at May 30, 2012 at 1:38 am:
The Copenhagen IPCC Conference was held in December 2009. Its Opening Ceremony included a video that showed a child being attacked by effects of global warming.
Importantly, in the lead-up to that event, the UK government ran an advertisement which showed a cartoon of a child suffering suggested effects of global warming. In a presentation at York University I said of that advertisement:
BBC Radio interviewed me (live on air) about my views as people were leaving for the Copenhagen Conference. The interviewer said I had “claimed global warming is child abuse”. I replied saying, “No, I said that advert. is child abuse.” The interviewer replied, “But the advertisement was about global warming” and stopped the subject.
Clearly, at least some ‘warmers’ consider harmful indoctrination of children to be proper conduct.
Richard