The amount of hate directed at me today due to my appearance on PBS yesterday has been, in climate parlance, “unprecedented”. Most of the objections were not with what I said, but rather that I was allowed to speak at all. Apparently my mere presence in the broadcast has caused such a firestorm of complaints to PBS that they had to put up an apology piece. It is truly bizarre behavior on display. Even more bizarre is the fact that after 230 comments, my comment requesting a couple of simple spelling corrections still has not been approved nor acted upon. This is what my browser shows me today, note the yellow highlight:
Admittedly, I misspelled typographical in my haste to notify them of problems in their own article, but I never expected them to flat out ignore it. Here’s my screencap from yesterday; shortly after the article went up when there were only two comments besides mine:
My request was for them to fix errors that likely resulted in transcription, either by a human transcriptionist unfamiliar with the science, or speech to text software that made the wrong word choice.
My requested corrections were:
heat sync ===> should be ===> heat sink
and
sighting issues ===> should be ===> siting issues
another that I didn’t mention that should be fixed is:
solar insulation ===> should be ===> solar insolation
But I guess they were too busy responding to threats to cancel donations, angry and sometimes hateful comments, and writing appeasement articles to sooth the fan base to worry about such trivialities.
For the record, here is what I sent to PBS Correspondent Spencer Michels today:
From: Anthony
Date: Tuesday, September 18, 2012 9:48 AM
To: smichels@xxxxxx.xxx
Subject: Thank you
Hello Spencer,
Overall I’m pleased with the results of your work yesterday, and while some people have emotions ranging from quibbles to outrage about it, I’m appreciative, as are many, that you fought to have me included.
Most of the complaints I’ve seen haven’t much to do with the content of what I said but mostly over the fact that I was allowed to speak at all.
When my new paper is published, I’ll include you on the release list. After going through our second round of review, I’m confident that our results will hold up, and that there is a bias in the surface temperature record, creating an increased temperature trend due to station siting issues.
Thank you again for your fair representation.
Best Regards,
Anthony Watts
I’ll have more to say on this episode later. Right now I’m just reeling from the hate sent my way for daring to express an opinion at the invitation of PBS.
Here’s an example from the “Forecast the Facts” paid political organization who bullies TV weathercasters into saying what they want:
“On September 17, 2012, PBS Newshour provided an unchecked platform for Anthony Watts, a virulent climate change denier funded by the Heartland Institute. This is the kind of reporting we expect from Fox News, not PBS. Please join us in calling on the PBS ombudsman to immediately investigate how this segment came to be aired and recommend corrective action to make sure a journalistic abomination like this never happens again.
The Petition – Below is the petition we’ll send to PBS Ombudsman Michael Getler: “Immediately investigate the NewsHour segment featuring climate change denier and conspiracy theorist Anthony Watts for violations of PBS standards on accuracy, integrity, and transparency, and recommend corrective action to ensure that such reporting never again occurs on PBS.”
“…featuring climate change denier and conspiracy theorist Anthony Watts”
Gosh, I suppose they didn’t read this part of the interview:
SPENCER MICHELS: His conclusion though is that basically global warming exists and that the scientists, no matter what the problems were, were pretty much right on.
ANTHONY WATTS: I agree with him that global warming exists. However, the ability to attribute the percentage of global warming to CO2 versus other man-made influences is still an open question.
or this:
ANTHONY WATTS: I’m saying that the data might be biased by these influences to a percentage. Yes, we have some global warming, it’s clear the temperature has gone up in the last 100 years. But what percentage of that is from carbon dioxide? And what percentage of that is from changes in the local and measurement environment?
What am I denying?
Comment submited to the ‘apology post’ at PBS
It looks like the new Anthony Watts et al paper will pass peer review, so I suggest everyone calms down and awaits the outcome. There are some important findings in it, and if verified by the peer reviewers, there will be important issues to discuss regarding the extent of the warming indicated by the temperature record as it is currently adjusted.
You don’t need to be a scientist to be able to conduct statistical studies and make logical deductions from the results. What is important is the correct treatment of input data.
I thank PBS for their continued commitment to the fair and balanced reportage of issues of importance in the public interest.
unbelievable nonsense and intimidation!!!
The Left can live with dissent in “permitted” areas. Fox News, talk radio, the blogs. But they have worked REAL hard to keep it out of the “respectable” domain. That’s the key for them. That’s what’s required to protect the narrative, to quarantine opposing ideas. PBS violated the quarantine and there’s hell to pay.
Well as a donor/supporter of PBS, I am outraged that they are apologizing for letting you have your say in this debate. If it helps, I will be one voice in on their site saying BRAVO for having the spherical fortitude (balls) to have you on their (overly liberally biased) program. And always, thank YOU for the work you do…it is so very greatly appreciated.
Not a denier, but a heretic. Well done Anthony. The true believers need to hear from more heretics so that they come to recognize our existence. The vehemence of their response is simply proportional to the level of threat to their belief system. When the linch pin argument of the AGW caused by CO2 crowd is “we can’t find (think of) anything else that would explain it”, any alternative explanation is an immediate threat. Thanks for suffering the slings and arrows.
Ha! You must be doing something right to get the worked up. They must be having nightmares about green grants being removed, especially in this time of budget cuts…
Wow oh Wow, this is what happens when [you] don’t preach to the choir. It’s almost like the Huffington Post let you write an article (same people). This is what you (we) are up against. The vitriol – wow!
Religious fanaticism causes outrageous responses over trivial issues when offence is detected.
We regularly see outrageous claims from the true believers in the pro global warming crowd that suggest religious like zeal. Insults and threats when all that is being proposed is that maybe there is an error in the “consensus science” and we ought to look at it.
In Australia we saw a similar outpouring of hate over the “Innocence of Muslims” video – though what responsibility Australia has in any part of that other than accept political refugees from Muslim countries I do not know.
These people then showed their hatred of anything that challenges their orthodoxy by marching down our streets calling for beheadings of blasphemers.
Only slightly more extreme than the AGW cheer squad – some only wanted blasphemers tattoed while Singer titillated herself with the delicious prospect of blasphemers being gassed, not with CO2 mind you – that is too harmless – but with carbon monoxide which binds strongly to haemoglobin thus denying the brain, in fact your whole metabolism, oxygen – the prime reason why you should not smoke – perhaps she’s had a few too many non-fatal doses herself.
All of this fanaticism without being to actually demonstrate even the fundamentals of the theory.
I cannot believe CO2 can have a “powerful greenhouse gas backradiative effect” if it has a thermal conductivity about half of normal air without any phase change (thus latent heat) properties at ambient temperatures.
How do they get it to stop radiating while they conduct the thermal conductivity experiment – now that is a miracle of science.
If this belief is simply wrong – and it could be as I’m simply working on reason here with a few basic facts – please someone explain to me – I really want to know if I am wrong on this.
Re: outrage at PBS
Lewandowsky, for all his failings, does have a piece which expresses the sentiments of all these aggrieved Alarmists:
Lew says it is “utterly inconceivable” he could be wrong on climate science:
http://permaculturenews.org/2010/03/12/climate-debate-opinion-vs-evidence/
(h/t Hilary Ostov)
Ofc Lew is talking about what he thinks the “science” says about climate…. And we know how reliable Lew is as a reporter of facts and evidence.
One hundred percent of climate scientists agree that there has been no significant warming in the last 15 years as CO2 levels rise. (Ah, what’s the use? It is PBS, emphasis on the BS, after all.) I watched it live. The eye-rolling axioms planted into the narrative – the 97%, Muller ‘the former sceptic’ and the like – nearly cost me a television screen via a projectile. Thanks for standing up Anthony.
Anthony, well done. That small dose of simple truths and genuine science has caused a lot of childish grown up people to push their pretending to a point where the holes must be starting to show. It must be really difficult for them to type comments with clenched fists while simultaneously screaming “Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!…!
It may seem a thankless and unending task, but you are doing a good job. Thank you and take care.
[snip – even though irony/satire, not appropriate here – mod]
And when PBS calls for their fundraiser, let them know how you really feel 🙂
corrective action perhaps in a warm gulag ?
the danger here is not the hysterical musings of the warming swarm necessarily, but more to the damage their utter disregard of science to aid in the attempts at truth in any future progression on the climate science concern. In perhaps more layman terminology, this abolition of any information indicating doubt on hard-earned religious zealotry does a dis-service to mankind by the simple act of fueling our skeptic nation to impulse any new evidence presented for discourse and research regarding the planets climate said temperature increase.
Hate and hysteria are two of the cornerstones of alarmist philosophy, while data manipulation and grant addiction are the other two.
Calling the alarmists’ bluff in admitting to AGW – quite rightly commenting that no one knows its magnitude or its real cause (CO2 possibly, partly, or not at all) – but firmly denying CAGW, causes consternation among those who believe in bad science.
The fact that you have the usual rent-a-mob organisations up against you simply demonstrates that you have right on your side.
Well done, Anthony.
Well !
You have to understand the desperation among the fanatic left who is the group using the vocabulary ala Cook Romm and Greenpeace activists. For them it was a game changer when they former only had their ideology mantras to try to get power and influence. Now with the IPCC a dream came [true] and they kidnapped “science” to fit with their ideas. Of course they try anything and goes as far they possibly can to shut people up who dont trust the science or prove the CAGW science to be wrong. Because to them that`s the same thing as to show their hole ideology wrong. You have to understand the stakes at play for them its do or die when they made the connection between their ideology and climate science! Their McArthyist behavior is in desperation but also very close and expected from people who dont appreciate or trust a free world with a free people and a their free market . They`ve put everything on the line with CAGW. They dont care about science at all¨they need it for is to get attention and to dress up and lend legitimacy to get power! without it their NOTHING …. again!
Thats all folks!
PBS played fair by Anthony as far as I can see given that it is clear this was originally intended to be a story about Muller celebrating his supposed defection. As there seem to be some people at PBS who still believe in eithical journalism, perhaps the nature of the reaction to this story may be causing them to have a bit of a rethink.
From Anthony they get a reasonable, rational and quite sane interview. From the other side they get a mindless screaming howl of outrage that he was allowed to speak at all, bilious hate mail, and a demand to pull him from the air. Perhaps some of them might start to see the nature of the beast we are up against.
Take heart Anthony, this really couldn’t be going any better. It’s like the 10:10 video. Normal people will happen upon the clip, see the calm rational interview and then see the comments. The normal people will quickly conclude the silence dissent nuts are nuts. Then if they’re at all interested in the issue they’ll start looking into it for themselves and most of the time another skeptic will be born. Between WUWT, JoNova, CA, HI, etc. etc. the information required to cast doubt (to put it lightly) on the whole CAGW meme is so much easier to find than it used to be. Really, this is a huge step in the right direction. I predict (project) that by the end of 2015 the CAGW nuts will be being publically laughed at like the 12/21/12 nuts are being laughed at now. Perhaps we should beat the rush and just start laughing at the poor misguided souls now.
What you’re denying is that you see criminal conspiracy, and that it’s being generated by government employees and other beneficiaries of fantasy warming apocalypse church,
of the unmitigated falsification of paperwork
to obtain government funding.
The reaction of the AGW alarmists is not surprising. Anyone who dares question the The Church of Global Warming theology will be excoriated and verbally burned at the stake. AGW skeptics and climate realists are viewed as apostates by the priesthood of climate change. How dare we, blasphemers all of us, question the Holy Scripture of CO2-induced global warming.
It’s obvious from the level of vitriol and hatred aimed at Anthony and others who question the prophesy of runaway global warming that we are not dealing with a rational group of people who are interested in dispassionate and deliberative scientific inquiry. There appear to be more than a few book burners among the keepers of the AGW faith.
Anthony is a potential job creator – that is, at the NewsHour anyway, where it appears the avalanche of comments has overwhelmed their comment moderators. Though they’ve approved a few of my jousts with other commenters at Hari Sreenivasan’s apology blog ( http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/2012/09/keeping-climate-stories-in-context.html ), they’ve yet to approve the very FIRST comment I wrote at that one, which asked some really blunt questions about Hari’s assertion that “… PBS NewsHour has long covered the scientific research and analysis surrounding climate change” http://i48.tinypic.com/5ufmvm.jpg
Just wanted to point out that they’ve only covered half the issue, but apparently we will have to wait for the backlogged interns there to get around to that particular one and Anthony’s at the Michels transcript page, ….
Meanwhile, Dr Judith Curry gets faster service than Anthony does when it comes to correcting her remarks: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/science/july-dec12/climatechange_09-17.html#comment-654352735
“Hate'” is out there, no matter what the subject. Human nature is not perfect. (Thank you, Adam.) All we can do is speak what’s true as we see it and be willing to accept genuine correction. Those who are offened by it will lash out. We might be surprised by it but it is to be expected. The larger the audience, the more adverse reactions we can expect. But how much value should we place in the opinion of willful idiots, even when those idiots come from unexpected quarters?
I once told a Hare Krishna about Jesus Christ. He sucker punched me. I didn’t expect that from someone who was preaching “peace”. His punch didn’t change the Truth of what I said.
I know those topics aren’t quite on the same level but, just stay honest and honorable. From what I’ve seen here, you’te good at that.
If they are going to investigate, I would like to know why PBS runs so much British Programming and propaganda. What is up with that?
Thanks Anthony for your work.
Sadly, bet they are really frothing!
I so love their true colors shining
bright for all to see
what they really preach…
who they prove to be.