From her blog –
Centering this show on the faux conversion of Richard Muller set this story down a certain path that turned out to be unfortunate.
…
IMO, Watts handled himself very well in the on-air interview and also in the extended written interview. Nothing that he said was unreasonable. It is rather bizarre that on this particular show, I came across as the ‘denier’ and Watts as the ‘lukewarmer.’
The outrage over Watts seems to be not so much what he said, as over his being given any airtime at all. On a program discussing climate science, is Watts the appropriate spokesperson? I would say not. However, on a program discussing the public debate over climate science, Watts should be front and center. His blog WUWT has far and away the largest traffic of any climate blog in the world (as per Alexa). As such, Watts is a figure of central importance in the public debate on climate change.
==============================================================
Thank you, Dr. Curry. Read the entire essay on her blog.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Please excuse the late night typos in my above comment. By the way, Richard Feynman defines Anthony as a “scientist”
“Science is the belief in the ignorance of the experts” – Richard Feynman
OT, but mentioned above. Joanne Nova’s site is alive and well, changing support software.
“On a program discussing climate science, is Watts the appropriate spokesperson?”
As Professor Curry should know, all science is based on facts. Where, as in climate science, much of the data on which the facts are based is suspect, who can be a more appropriate spokesperson than the man who has led the way in questionnung that data? If the data is wrong then the science can never be right.
As “Jason Nesmith” (Tim Allen) said to the alien bad guy in “Galaxy Quest”:
“You don’t have to be a great actor to recognize a bad one. And you’re SWEATING!”
They’re sweating.
David quotes:
“Science is the belief in the ignorance of the experts” – Richard Feynman
So what is the technical term for the ignorance of ignorami?
“So what is the technical term for the ignorance of ignorami?”
Belief.
John Brookes says:
September 23, 2012 at 6:04 am
David quotes:
“Science is the belief in the ignorance of the experts” – Richard Feynman
So what is the technical term for the ignorance of ignorami?
==================================================
Climate Science ?
I just recall some of the history of Galileo and his telescope. It went something like this, ‘love your new invention, very interesting, you have no authority to speak on this subject, now to jail “monastery” you go’ . . . “and the beat goes on . . . and the beat goes on”!
It doesn’t take an advanced degree in any field of science to understand the scientific method and recognize climate science isn’t following it. One doesn’t have to be an expert on Karl Popper to know Post-Normal Science isn’t science, but advocacy by highly biased technocrats. It doesn’t take too much world-experience to know that when climate scientists focus on the PR campaigns instead of the science, something is wrong with the science.
I write software for a living, and sometimes teach computer programming classes at the college level. A second-year junior college student programmer can recognize the poor quality of the published climate model computer code. If I worked on a team using the same quality control methods and source control methods as used by the climate modelers, we would all be fired.
I’m not a climate scientist, but I’m from Missouri and recognize cow flop and pig excrement when I see it or smell it.
daybyday;
I can certainitly see you are angry and I might agree with your underlying premis somewhat if not reading the whole article, but certainly not your method of sharing your thoughts–Dr. Curry deserves respect as any of us do… and I hate to see you stoop to the level of the PBS drone (ah, audiance….) and the fact that she “appears” to talk down to us is not the point. The point is how we respond to each other.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Lest anyone believe that the invective I have hurled at Judith Curry is based on simply her recent comments above, I would urge you to read her comments on this blog just after ClimateGate1:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/27/an-open-letter-from-dr-judith-curry-on-climate-science/
Her follow up comments, in which, even after a direct request from Anthony she continued to use the word d*nier:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/02/24/on-the-credibility-of-climate-research-part-ii-towards-rebuilding-trust/
….and the stinging rebuke from Willis Eschenbach that followed:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/02/25/judith-i-love-ya-but-youre-way-wrong/
It “appears” that talking down her nose to the great unwashed is a repeat offense of hers. She has become a little more polished in the manner in which she does so, but that is what she does. She’s broken with the pack and donned sheep’s clothing, but she’s still a wolf. She’s dropped the use of the word d*nier in more recent times, attempted to stake out a middle ground in the debate, even done some good in many ways. But underneath…. she’s no sheep, she’s just a wolf who is trying a kinder, gentler method of herding us where she wants us to go with nary a thought that we may have minds of our own and that our opinions on the matter may have merit because we’re not “scientists” and she is.
She’s staked out a middle ground in the debate, but frankly, Muller’s conversion is no more faux than hers.
I agree with the above comment questioning Judith’s assumption that 50% of Arctic ice decline is related to CO2 AGW. In what way Judith? Air temp increase or oceanic SST increase?
You have two routes of investigation, both of which must be completed, and then a huge caveat:
1). What would be the anthropogenic CO2 mechanism for increasing air and SST and how much energy is then available from just the anthropogenic CO2 increase in warming the air and SST? Is it enough energy to cause warmer SST’s and/or warmer Arctic air temps? Then coming from the other way, have the changes in Arctic weather parameters (IE air temps measured where the ice has melted and SST changes measured where the ice has melted) match what you have calculated (temp increase, water vapor increase, etc)? Or are you suggestion anthropogenic CO2 has changed the weather systems (IE pressure systems) in the Arctic? If so, how did it do that?
2). Before you answer the anthropogenic CO2 question, you must rule out intrinsic, natural ENSO and other oceanic/atmospheric teleconnection causes. If these causes can account for the warming (using the same thorough investigations), and I think they can by looking at Bob Tisdale’s work, you have at best a tie. Which requires you to accept the null hypothesis, not your 50% WAG.
Caveat: But even then, if you believe the anthropogenic CO2-related changes are real, they are still buried in the overall noise. Therefore you cannot say that CO2 is causing any of it. Why? You know as well as the rest of us that CO2 changes in temperature (air or SST) cannot be extracted from natural noise variability. The changes are too small and the signal you seek is no different from natural noise and trends.
What part of my argument is not entirely logical?
From Wayne2 on September 22, 2012 at 7:21 pm:
For me, it seems a “the company you keep” issue. Like the few times I’ve gone to read something over at Lucia’s, people were trying to be oh-so logical and scientific, while talking smack about Anthony and Willis and WUWT and other guest posters and commenters here…
It was like stopping by someone’s house, and there are all these people who just hang out there, and some are drinking, and some smoking weed, some snorting stuff. Over in the corner there are people shooting up while the others are ostensibly ignoring them. But everyone is debating philosophy and politics therefore it’s serious discussion. And there’s Lucia, a “lukewarmer”, who will defend her visitors’ freedom of choice, they’re not hurting anyone… And while she’ll partake herself some times, just “a little warmth”, she’s not like the others, she doesn’t have a problem, she’s being open minded and will decide for herself if something is good or bad…
And too many people are just too polite to tell her how badly the stench clings to her.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Muller a physicist, not a climate scientist? Why have him on then?
Fascinating. Exposes the media in a poor light. Similarities in this here http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/ryan-holiday/honoring-a-reporters-obli_b_1693338.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false#sb=3334559,b=facebook
Well of course my little ditty above about “Climate Scientists” needing to first be Physicists, was tongue in cheek. To point out that applying the mathematics of statistiscs, to essentially random noise masquerading as data, and detrending this and running average that; aka “Throwing away much of the data”, is NOT science; you can apply the same numerical methods to the numbers in your phone book, and extract about the same amount of information.
Everybody is statistics happy. Baseball players have to keep records of how many times they drop the ball. Football players; well those who play the American game of “please don’t kick the football” ; when they drop the ball, everything stops, so they all stand around and talk about it, and who should get credit for dropping it.
That’s why we have records. Keep the daily temperature outside the back door for a hundred years, and you’ll find on average you get 3.65 new all time high unprecedented daily records each year; and the same for never before happened, lows.
But Dr Judith Curry is starting to sound like a professional in training. Remember, that professionals have a “practice”, not a job, and they practice on their clients, and never give a money back guarantee.
Well there’s one other characteristic of “professionals” that I never mentioned before. Professionals protect their monopoly, by getting laws passed to prohibit anyone not in the club from practising their gig as well.
So Dr Curry would decide who is a scientist, or a climate scientist and who is not. Who are engineers; only those with State approved professional licences, or those who do actual engineering, and design things that work.
Many of the best engineers I’ve encounterd in nearly 51 years in industry, did not have any University degree; maybe they had some military service backgound, and worked as technicians fixing things that broke. Some of those technicians have gone on to become among the best engineers I have ever encountered; well because they knew from experience, how to make things work, rather than study books, that told them how things are supposed to work; often written by academics, who never ever had to make anything work. Note, that does NOT mean that all academics, are that way. Some of them change peoples lives with their diligence and patience. I know a few who changed mine.
Anthony’s community organizing project to run down all the different models of Weber grills, out there making weather, and contributing their part to the runaway warming catastrophe, we have been promised; is classic science at its best.
Lacking a budget to build the world’s largest weather and climate reporting station; he devised a way, to catalog the mottley collection of bric-a-brac, that passes for the official weather network, and uncovered a pattern of random deviations from approved design and environment; and recruited his international army of fellow tinkerers to get some really important knowledge about the total inadequacy of the network that tells us the sky is falling.
And having an actual weather reporting background anyway, he was well qualified to see the errors in the existing network.
How dare “professor” Curry from her ivory tower, imply that isn’t science.
Science starts with the data; and if the data is crap, then so is the follow on; and the “approved scientists” are simply embarrassed, that a weather geek, showed what a load of malarkey they have been peddling as accurate weather data.
Did Spencer Michels set out to have an on screen sacrifice ? Who knows; I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt; but he should have had more gumption than to be cowed by the wolves who are shivering in their moth eaten sheepskins.
george e smith says:
September 23, 2012 at 10:22 am
kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
September 23, 2012 at 9:17 am
Pamela Gray says:
September 23, 2012 at 8:50 am
davidmhoffer says:
September 23, 2012 at 8:23 am
All excellent posts.
Berényi Péter says: September 23, 2012 at 12:19 am
At this point in history “climate science” (a.k.a. “climatology”) itself is at stake. One should decide whether it has gone completely astray and falls into the same category of human endeavor as “astrology” or “homeopathy”, in which case genuine experts are the least qualified to deliver judgement, in spite of the fact these fields have their own educational institutions and peer reviewed journals.
—————————————————–
Oohhh, I like that. How’s this for a new sound bite: “The difference between astrology and climate science is that astrologers don’t use taxpayer’s money to redraw the star charts”
Berényi Péter says: September 23, 2012 at 12:19 am
“At this point in history “climate science” (a.k.a. “climatology”) itself is at stake.”
“Climate science” and climatology are not the same thing. I do get your meaning, however.
It is necessary to understand the distinction. Climate scientists would prefer that you were unaware of the difference.
I’m with David on this (recursively follow the path from there). I have always found JC to be a bit disingenuous and rather condescending. The fact that she is even willing to stand up to the establishment in any manner is good, but there has always been this “I know, you don’t” attitude to anyone outside of the circle.
@george e smith: I recently had a Facebook argument (er, discussion) with some of the people I went to school with regarding people referring to themselves as “engineer” without a degree. Legally speaking, none one of the posters in that thread (including me, with a PhD) is allowed to title himself “engineer,” simply because none of us has a PE license. My argument resembled yours (which is rather anti-elitist in nature): what you do has little to do with what, if any, degree you have. It is sad that society has gotten to the point that authority means so much, and is typically based solely on educational background. By their own logic (those I was debating), I should be right simply because I had the most authority (the biggest degree)… sigh. For the record, I thank the many “engineers” I worked with in my early career, those that did not not have a degree, but Harris Corporation still saw fit to title them as such. They knew their stuff.
Mark
Having recently spend time trying to understand the Lewandowsky paper, I do not find the response to Anthony Watt’s appearance on PBS bizarre at all. Climate Science requires belief in the science. This blog threatens people’s most deeply held beliefs, causing huge insecurity.
The more conventional philosophy of science developed over centuries, and culminating in Sir Karl Popper was that scientists should have belief in the scientific method, That means making their theories vulnerable to falsification, and rejoicing if their greatest achievements are overturned. On this basis, the best theories are those that still stand, despite their vulnerability.
A pertinent example for me was last week. Lewandowsky criticized the use of pivot tables in analyzing his paper “NASA faked the moon landing|Therefore (Climate) Science is a Hoax”, claiming it was just noise, whereas you needed proper statistical analysis to understand the true relationships. The noise just consisted of minor details like on 10/1145 people supported the CYMoon theory, or 75% of the responses were from alarmists. Most telling of all was his posting of the SkS graphic on the “skeptics” view of temperature trends. He was basically saying “I do not want to know what your views are”.
Steve McIntyre, in two follow up posts, has fundamentally undermined Lewandowsky’s claim that his heavyweight statistical analysis is valid. However, as the main user of pivot tables, see if my claims are analyzing noise, or a low-level sense-check, that indicates that things are fundamentally wrong with the paper. Then consider if this is a defense of Popperian science, or scientistic belief.
http://manicbeancounter.com/2012/09/01/lewandowsky-et-al-2012-motivated-rejection-of-science-part-3-data-analysis-of-the-conspiracy-theory-element/
http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/lewandowskySEM.html
John Brookes says:
September 23, 2012 at 6:04 am
I am curious if you think it is ok that JoNova’s site is being attacked like it is?
I am also curious as to how many attacks like this that WUWT? has sustained?
Pretty much sums it all up. Dr. Curry, if you’re reading this, please go back and read Mr. Smith’s comment in its entirety, and let’s have a response. I assume it will take the form of an apology.
/Mr Lynn
“On a program discussing climate science, is Watts the appropriate spokesperson? I would say not.”
I’ll join the others here who think Curry is dead wrong with that statement. Climate science, as practiced by the likes of Mann, Jones, Trenberth, Hansen and company is so far from real science that one does not have to have a PhD or even a MS to point out all the data errors, data manipulation and in some cases falsification currently being done by “climate scientists”. Frankly, Professor Curry should hang her head in shame if she is considered a climate scientist. In my book, climate scientists are a lower order of life than lawyers, and we all know how low they are.
As usual, Judith being sensible.