Guest post by Russell Cook
Lewandowsky et. al’s faulty methodology is just one of the paper’s problems; like many other ‘skeptic’ motivation analyses, its central premise is unproven and relies on a SINGLE highly questionable source.
Experts like Steve McIntyre pore over the manner in which the Lewandowsky paper’s survey was conducted. But there is another basic problem with this paper and others essentially similar to it, where a collective analysis proposes to explain why anyone would deny the settled science of global warming. Such papers operate under a false premise, namely that analysis is needed because the science is settled and skeptic scientists – who arguably are the only people qualified in this issue to offer science assessment opposition that might be valid – are corrupt.
No need to go any farther into the Lewandowsky paper than its first page to see this, where it says in the top paragraph that “More than 90% of climate scientists agree that the global climate is changing largely due to human CO2 emissions”, followed with a statement in the second paragraph that researchers “in history and sociology frequently cite the ‘manufacture of doubt’ by vested interests and political groups….”
This latter reference is in regard to the so-called ‘lies’ that skeptic scientists are said to be spreading via associations with right-wing think tanks. Immediately following each statement are citations from people who’ve made basically the same statements over many years: IPCC scientist Stephen Schneider and researchers William Freudenburg, Aaron McCright, Riley Dunlap, Chris Mooney, and Naomi Oreskes. A less evident but still troubling glimpse into this overall problem is the citation on pg 4 of Max Boykoff in regard to “the scientific consensus on climate change is often misrepresented in the media” and on pg 5 of Myanna Lahsen in support of the assertion that there is are “notions of a conspiracy among [skeptic] scientists.”
The core problem is the premise that skeptic scientists should be ignored because they are corrupt. The question is, who do these people rely on to prove this accusation? Rummage through any of the above individuals’ variety of writings and presentations, and a disturbing single source ultimately emerges:
- William R. Freudenburg, AAAS 2010 Annual Meeting, February 22, 2010, Organizer: Riley E. Dunlap, Discussants: Stephen H. Schneider, Naomi Oreskes, Speakers: Myanna Lahsen, Maxwell T. Boykoff, William R. Freudenburg,Understanding Climate-Change Skepticism: Its Sources and Strategies“(transcript here): “The Heartland Institute is one of the right-wing think-tanks that Riley [Dunlap] talked about, asking ‘can 19,000 scientists be wrong?’ Number one, that’s a very loose definition of ‘scientists’ that they use. And number two, a journalist Ross Gelbspan almost 15 years ago started saying ‘they sure can be’. What we’ve got here is a persistent and well funded campaign of denial.” (Note: At the above AAAS presentation, Naomi Oreskes said “the US coal industry launched a half million-dollar campaign … to challenge the scientific evidence regarding global warming….The number one point of this strategy was to reposition global warming as theory, not fact.”)
- Naomi Oreskes, 2007 PowerPoint Presentation “You Can Argue with the Facts: The Denial of Global Warming”, “Reposition global warming as theory not fact”, Ross Gelbspan, Boiling Point, 51-52
- Chris Mooney, “The Republican War on Science” 2007 book: “…climatologist Patrick Michaels, a recipient of substantial energy industry funding” … End note 62 “Michaels’s industry ties are documented in Gelbspan, The Heat is On”
- Chris Mooney, “Is Climate Denial Corporate Driven, or Ideological?” Desmogblog, 1/19/11: “Recently, I’ve been reading some research by Riley Dunlap, a sociologist at Oklahoma State University who collaborates frequently with Aaron McCright, another sociologist at Michigan State. Together, they’ve done penetrating work on the right wing resistance to climate change science in the US…” (Note: Joe Romm stated in 2008, “Ross Gelbspan, whose defining books Boiling Point and The Heat is On were a big part of the inspiration for starting the DeSmogBlog…”)
- Riley E. Dunlap and Aaron M. McCright, Pg 144 Chapter 10, Organized Climate Change Denial 2011 book: “The blows have been struck by a well-funded, highly complex, and relatively coordinated ‘denial machine’ (Begley 2007)” (Note, this is the Sharon Begley Newsweek article in which she quoted without citation, “….the Information Council on the Environment. ICE’s game plan called for enlisting greenhouse doubters to “reposition global warming as theory rather than fact” ”)
- And; Dunlap / McCright, Pg 148: ” …the fossil fuels industry pioneered the charge against climate science and policy making. (Begley 2007; Gelbspan 1997; Goodell 2007)” (Note, the latter is Jeff Goodell’s book “Big Coal: The Dirty Secret Behind America’s Energy” in which he said, “Western Fuels was one of the key backers of the Information Council on the Environment, a front group whose explicit purpose, according to Gelbspan, was to “reposition global warming as theory rather than fact”)
- Jules Boykoff and Maxwell Boykoff, FAIR, November/December 2004 “Journalistic Balance as Global Warming Bias”: “In terms of the global warming story, “balance” may allow skeptics—many of them funded by carbon-based industry interests—to be frequently consulted and quoted in news reports on climate change. Ross Gelbspan … charges in his books The Heat Is On and Boiling Point that a failed application of the ethical standard of balanced reporting on issues of fact has contributed to inadequate U.S. press coverage of global warming”
- Jules Boykoff and Maxwell Boykoff, “Balance as Bias: Global Warming and the U.S. Prestige Press’ ”: …a small group of influential spokespeople and scientists emerged in the news to refute these [IPCC] findings (Gelbspan, 1998; Leggett, 2001; Schneider, 2001)” (Note, the Leggett citation is of Greenpeace’s Jeremy Leggett’s 2001 book “The carbon war: global warming and the end of the oil era” in which his acknowledgements section says, “to Ross Gelbspan for editorial assistance and for deploying his skills as an investigative journalist…” and where he says on pg 162, “Ross Gelbspan, a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist… had been researching the carbon club’s dissidents for more than three years.”)
- Myanna Lahsen, “Chapter 5, The Detection and Attribution of Conspiracies: The Controversy Over Chapter 8” 1999, Pg 116: “Oil and coal companies have spent millions of dollars to hire public relations groups to orchestrate such efforts as well as aggressive media campaigns seeking to undermine public concern about global warming (Gelbspan 1995; 1997). An early example of such campaigns was the Information Council for the Environment (ICE)”
- Stephen Schneider (& Richard Wolfson), “Chapter 1, Understanding Climate Science”, 2002 PDF file, pdf’s pg 41, “A concerted effort by a handful of climate ‘contrarians’ or ‘greenhouse skeptics’—scientists who do not share the views of most climate scientists—has kept the ‘debate’ on global warming very much in public view.22” … End note 22 “Gelbspan, R., 2000: The Heat Is On”
- And; pdf’s pg 46: “The amplified influence of these “greenhouse skeptics,” and their close ties to the fossil-fuel industry, are well documented by journalist Ross Gelbspan in his book The Heat Is On.”
- Stephen Schneider, “Laboratory earth: the planetary gamble we can’t afford to lose” January 1997, pg 160: “For an exposé of a number of prime “contrarians” and their supporters, see R. Gelbspan, Dec. 1995. The heat is on. Harpers 35. Gelbspan is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist.” (Note: Gelbspan never won a Pulitzer)
I could go on at length, and readers here are likely to find other connections I’ve missed, along with related problems which would take multiple articles to describe, such as the Boykoff situation I wrote about last June. But my point is the unmistakeable thread throughout all of this. It is eerily too easy to spot Ross Gelbspan’s associations with practically any given person who claims skeptic scientists are corrupt.
And Gelbspan, as I’ve pointed out earlier, has never proven he has any evidence to support his accusation that skeptic scientists are paid to manufacture doubt about man-caused global warming.
It certainly appears that what we have instead is around two decades of efforts by enviro-activists to manufacture doubt about the credibility of the skeptics. So, how many more attempts to smear skeptics can be thrown on this pile before the whole thing collapses?
Russell Cook’s collection of writings on this issue can be seen at “The ’96-to-present smear of skeptic scientists.” You may also follow him at Twitter via @questionAGW
[Duplicated text removed. Robt]
The alarmists themselves are the biggest conspiracy theorists on the planet !
Anyone that disagrees with them is being paid by big oil even me.
This is exactly how the media fact-checkers work in America. Often the source is a blog or column. The fact-checkers don’t even seem to try to verify the fact-checks themselves, but just pass on what they read elsewhere.
The obvious connection is:
At an AAAAAAAAAAS convention, they all acted like…
End of discussion.
The good thing about these warmists is that by constant repetition of transparent lies they teach the rest of us to recognize chicanery. The bad thing is that we also learn that lying is acceptable.
I decided the whole thing was too Lewdicrous to comment on seriously, so here’s my take.
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2012/09/11/lewd-lew-and-aggie-w-a-failed-romance/
It is not just that warmistas believe in conspiracies in the form of the “oil-funded denial machine” (when ironically there is proof of conspiracy in the Climategate emails) but that they are gullible. For example, not batting an eye about 100 feet of sea level rise when it is currently rising by mm, or claiming that ice sheets the size of the USA can “slide” into the ocean, or that shutting down all power plants is somehow a feasible option (Hansen), or that wind power does not destabilize the grid, or that we are currently experiencing massive climate disruption when the data say “no trend” or……just willing to believe anything at all that fits the doom meme.
Can someone ask Mr Lewandowsky (or whatever his name is);
Had the UN / IPCC, M. Mann, J. Hansen et all, and your own Govt. NOT started campaigning or mentioning anything about cAGW / Climate Change, would you yourself have noticed any difference in the Earths climate today?
I’m more interested in the motivations behind the manufacture of fear, than the manufacture of doubt. I think I know the answer, control.
A study in mass psychological projection. We (unconsciously or otherwise) know we’re corrupt, so we’ll accuse anyone objecting to us of corruption.
The really disturbing aspect of this saga is not Lewandowsky’s foul deed. That’s to be expected from the warmist camp. It’s the fact that it has started to gain traction. It’s penetrated the outer ring of the main stream media and been reported in the Blaze, at Huffington Post, and on MSNBC’s website. Mann, Gleick, and Lewandowsky can spew any nonsense they want because academia and the media cloak them in credibility, truth be damned. Look at the lunacy of the “97% of all climate scientists agree” meme. It’s obvious rubbish and accepted, ironclad fact for thousands around the globe.
I was reminded of the fact yesterday while watching the twitter storm over Mitt Romney’s “my family owned slaves” comment. What, you say? A news satire site used a fake Romney quote in a humorous story and bingo! thousands of tweets go out touting it as real. The problem is that you can’t convince the ones condemning Romney that the quote is fake! How do you get around the two separate realities that have developed?
http://twitchy.com/2012/09/09/left-falls-for-fake-romney-quote-i-can-relate-to-black-people-my-ancestors-once-owned-slaves/
I think the single biggest problem is Lewandowsky assumes the Theory of Global Warming to be an absolute truth while the IPCC itself say only that it is probable – Supposedly 90% or so. So therefore so-called denial of the science can’t be a conspiracy since there is a finite probability of it being Correct. That it there is a 10% Chance that the 75/77 scientists that agreed to the consensus of Global warming are wrong. Thus it is perfectly reasonable to accept the possibility of them being simply wrong – no conspiracy to do anything required.
Personally I don’t see any conspiracy, just some racketeering and profit making on the climate change Grant Money racket. Inducements to deliver a predetermined outcome in order to deceive the investor. Classic organised crime stuff.
Why haven’t the emails from Climategate been analyzed for insight as to the myriad psychological disorders revealed there?
… More than 90% of climate scientists agree that the global climate is changing largely due to human CO2 emissions …
Funny, this. This means that 10% of climate scientists do NOT agree. So the skeptics agree with the 10%: this group, minority that it is, still has the respect of the other climate scientists, does it not? Or do the warmists believe that 10% of climate scientists also believe that NASA faked the moon landing?
Who are the nuts? The ones who disagree, or just the ones who agree with those who disagree?
There is so little thinking-through in the climate dispute. A university education does not a thinking man make, just one who knows stuff.
Most unfortunately, the Globe and Mail is providing uncritical publicity for Lewandowsky: Social Studies.
Anyone know Michael Kesterton personally–it would be good to set him straight.
AlecM says:
September 11, 2012 at 4:33 am
“In reality very little CO2 IR can be emitted from the earth’s surface because as with all other GHGs, identical wavelength thermal radiation from the lower atmosphere turns it off, a well-established principle of radiant heat transfer. If not true, there could never be radiative equilibrium – think about it [it’s called Prevost Exchange]”
See also Kirchhoff’s Law of Thermal Radiation. Recently I pointed a warmist to an old WUWT post by Tom Vonk about that. He refused to read it, saying “WUWT has never changed the science.” I told him Kirchhoff ain’t a WUWT contributor – he’s dead!
Lots of fun with these folks. They actively REFUSE to process information.
Mike Mangan says:
September 11, 2012 at 7:28 am
“The really disturbing aspect of this saga is not Lewandowsky’s foul deed. That’s to be expected from the warmist camp. It’s the fact that it has started to gain traction. It’s penetrated the outer ring of the main stream media and been reported in the Blaze, at Huffington Post, and on MSNBC’s website. ”
What’s so tragic about that? HuffPo and MSNBC are for the clinically insane anyway and make no qualms about it. Let them make asses out of themselves, it’s what they do.
“identical wavelength thermal radiation from the lower atmosphere turns it off”
Oh dear – it’s a shame when the CAGW nutters who are so convinced about the conspiracy theories being pushed on WUWT are given evidence that there really are conspiracy nutters pushing theories on WUWT,
Russell Cook,
Your strategy to expose in detail one of LEW’s false premises is an important task. Also, I think it is just one of LEW’s several premise problems.
I was happy to see your focus on premises this morning after I decided yesterday to try to do a blog that looks at argument premises in the climate science arguments.
Coincidence!
John
Spending on manipulating public opinion: There is a PR firm in Vancouver. I heard the lady in charge interviewed by the CBC one morning, asking about her receiving American funding to oppose the proposed oil pipeline to the BC coast from Alberta. She admitted they received 3.8m dollars (foreign funding as far as we are concerned) to run a campaign opposing the pipeline by ramping up local opposition and riling the natives. The spend rate averages $17,000 a week. They also have local money from various activist organisations trying to undermine or stop various things with a phalanx of compliant local sheeple in tow.
That is Canadian operatives accepting foreign money to meddle in Canada’s internal evergy affairs provided by who-knows-? in the US to harm the Canadian oil industry. The amount involved in this tiny example is 8 times the amount referred to above as the ‘oil industry’ trying to steer global warming conversations, is it not? Imagine how much is spent in the US to meddle in big projects, especially now that the drillers are coining it looking for new shale gas.
It seems there is no bottom to the pit of money available to the groups that are trying to promote natural gas as the ‘low carbon’ alternative to ‘fossil fuel’ and kill or cripple coal and oil production. Kind of a strange way to make a country energy independent. No doubt Big Solar and Big Wind are behind the scenes sopping up the subsidies as fast as they can be arranged.
Any assumption based on “Who pays you?” is flawed. Corporations support causes for their own strategic and tax reasons, which rarely connect with what the activists think they’re trying to accomplish. If BP or RJReynolds supports a foundation, it doesn’t mean that the foundation works for oil or works for tobacco.
My admittedly informal study of Rhetoric – the classical art of getting people to accept a proposition as true regardless of its actual veracity, also known as the art of selling freezers to Eskimos – has taught me many things. The primary tools of rhetoric are also known among logicians as the “Fallacies of Informal Logic”.
Often those practicing Rhetoric will resort to ad hominem attacks (casting doubt on the integrity of the opponent rather than directly confronting the issue at hand), and one I call the “Old Switcheroo” (also called “the pot calling the kettle black”) wherein the opponent is openly (and usually falsely) accused of some nefarious action while the complainant is secretly performing that same action.
Look at how much money the ‘carbon industries’ are pouring into the environmental movement in a naive attempt to buy goodwill.
Interview with Michael Mann, ABC Australia 15/03/2012
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2012/s3454652.htm
Rule #1. If you believe electricity generated by coal is cleaner than electricity generated by shale gas you are a member of a cult and need deprogramming.
My Utilites have spent a lot of money promoting the “green agenda”….And I thought THEY were Big Oil. I suspect the boogie man is green.
Does anyone have figures on how much the conventional energy producers are spending on green programs?
A new book
http://www.amazon.com/Science-Left-Behind-Feel-Good-Anti-Scientific/dp/1610391640/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_nC?ie=UTF8&colid=1LIX5K3G75CXZ&coliid=I1X6UBC8NB94CM
focuses on antiscientific beliefs common among environmentalists and “progressives.”
A proper survey relating attitudes toward science in general and attitudes concerning CAGW would include items about the nutritional virtues of organic crops, the supposed dangers of genetically modified “Frankenfood,” the alleged link between thiomersal in vaccines and autism, and the purported need to suppress nuclear power plants.