Post by Brandon Shollenberger
Rhetoric in climate change debates has never been highbrow. There’s lots of name calling, gotcha games and other petty behavior. Still, there’s something about suggesting people you dislike should die that turns most people off. That’s why I was somewhat surprised when I read a blog post by Greg Laden which has this hypothetical situation:
Ann Coulter, Bill O’Reilly, and Rush Limbaugh are in a boat. They are in the middle of a deep, cold lake. If the boat sinks they will die of hypothermia and their corpses will sink to the bottom. There is a device in the boat that will sink it instantly, or alternatively, propel the boat to the safety of the shoreline where there are three martinis waiting for them, but it all depends on all three of them correctly answering a question…The question is, “Is global warming real, human caused, and important, yes or no.”
You’ll note Laden doesn’t actually suggest anyone should die. He makes it into a game, suggesting they “Agree or Die.” And it is still just a hypothetical situation. It’s not pleasant, but it’s not horribly horrible either.
Naturally, Peter Gleick couldn’t live with such a tame statement, chiming in to say:
Very nice, Greg. Thanks.
And the Coulter, O’Reilly, Limbaugh situation seems like a win-win no matter what they answer. (btw, check the spelling on Coulter.)
That’s right. Peter Gleick thinks three people dying would be a “win.” The only other winning option to him is for them to agree with him. He is, quite literally, suggesting it would be good if people who don’t agree with him died of hypothermia.
Having found the link to Greg Laden’s post in Peter Gleick’s Twitter feed, I naturally responded to him there. Having nothing but contempt for Gleick, my Twitter response was not kind:
@PeterGleick It was nice to see you say it’d be good if people you dislike died. You really are insane!
Gleick’s response was… interesting:
@Corpus_no_Logos I guess you didn’t bother to read Laden’s piece. No one dies.
Of course nobody died in the piece. I was talking about what Gleick said, not what Greg Laden said. After completely missing the point, he promptly blocked me.
This is progress. Remember, Michael Mann recently said in his AGU presentation:
And to me, probably the best indication of the fact that there is, we are making progress is the heated rhetoric, the violent heated rhetoric, that we are now seeing from climate change deniers. It’s become far more outlandish, far more violent than anything we’ve seen in the past. And to me, that’s the signature of a dying campaign.
I’d say Agree or Die is pretty heated rhetoric. That means Peter Gleick is making progress for us!
Related articles
- Peter H. Gleick, ‘genius’ (wattsupwiththat.com)
- Self admitted cyber thief Peter Gleick is still on the IOP board that approved the Cook 97% consensus paper (wattsupwiththat.com)
- Fish Gotta Swim, Birds Gotta Fly, and Peter Gleick Gotta Lie (fakegate.org)
- Watch Michael Mann’s self aggrandizing AGU presentation (wattsupwiththat.com)
- The MAD MEN of Climate-Change Alarmism (wattsupwiththat.com)
Really? Laden and Gleick smugly pontificate based on their beliefs, and it gets blown out of all proportion? Who *really* cares? Only the few devoted who actually read the drivel they spout… ignore them. They’re irrelevant.
As for the Mann, his gibbering is that of someone hoping that the more he repeats a meme, the more likely it is to come true. Let him. Reality will simply continue to bite him on the arse, and eventually render him as ineffectual and insignificant as Paris Hilton.
DaveF @ur momisugly 1:45am:
My first thought too, although I felt a bit bad for thinking it.
I was going to say beware of an over-reaction to this. Then I thought this is parallel to calling sceptics ‘deniers’, with the clear implication of what that means. Do the warming lobby actually equate climate denial with holocaust denial? It’s pretty tasteless to say the least, as is Gleick’s response. I would beware of reading any more into it than that.
If the boat did sink, do you think it would find Trenberth’s missing heat?
There was a liar named Gleick
Who let out a terrible shreick
When he discovered he was wrong
And it wouldn’t be long
Before he and his crew were up sh*t creick.
pokerguy says:
July 18, 2013 at 4:59 am
“Anthony, in my opinion you do yourself and your credibility no good at all by engaging in this nonsense. Truthfully, all parties concerned are behaving like 12 year olds.”
Hey, it’s the best “Climate Science” they got.
“Ann Coulter, Bill O’Reilly, and Rush Limbaugh are in a boat.”
Intelligent clear thinking individuals would first think to have survival suits; further frustating the likes of psychopathic narcissists.
Russ R. says:
July 18, 2013 at 6:19 am
“Can someone clarify something for me?
Does the correct pronunciation of “Gleick” rhyme with “peek”, “peck”, “pick” or “pike”?
Just curious… plus it’s important for the limerick writers.”
Looks like a name with Germanic origin; we would spell it “Glike” here in Germany.
DirkH says:
July 18, 2013 at 7:17 am
“Looks like a name with Germanic origin; we would spell it “Glike” here in Germany.”
…ah, pronounce, that is…
@DirkH – you can spell it that way too. He is not worth the trouble of a spell check.
Thomas says:
July 18, 2013 at 12:47 am
“Let’s also remember that Ann Coulter, Bill O’Reilly, and Rush Limbaugh aren’t the most moderate of people. How many have they wished dead during their careers? ”
_____________________________________________________________________________
The answer to you question I believe is zero. If you know of an instance where either one of them has wish someone other than a terrorist or a convicted murderer would die please provide the date and other pertinent information about such a statement, otherwise stop asking rhetorical questions.
While not the main point the question is, as Mona Lisa Vito would put it, a bs question.
Peter Ward largely nailed it, although I’ll add that science really isn’t equipped to answer questions like “is it important?”
As for the main point, I don’t think Gleick literally wants those three dead, but even as a joke, it is boorish and disgusting. (A joke about generic telephone salesmen or lawyers is fundamentally different than a joke about specific people).
Gleick has earned, and deserved contempt. Nothing more, but nothing less.
elmer says:
July 18, 2013 at 5:33 am
“Let’s say you died and are at the Pearly Gates and St. Peter is there checking people in. He says in order to get into heaven you must correctly answer this one question. Is the earth 4.5 billion years old or 6,000? How would you answer?”
Well,Elmer, it says in the book that one day of God is like a thousand years; that rules out the 6,000 year answer. BTW a day and a night of Brahma are about 9 billion years IIRC….
Bruce, it scans better if amended:
There was a liar named Gleick
who let out a terrible shreick
when he found he was wrong
and it wouldn’t be long
ere he led his crew right up sh*t creick.
I really worry about Gleick and Crew,maybe all the pretense is making them unbalanced in the mind
The old saying about stones and glass houses applies in this case. There is a fair amount of snide comments made by skeptics here, and those are the ones not snipped by moderators. While this latest Twitter-twaddle does nothing to raise my opinion of Peter Gleick, I really doubt anyone in the warmist camp will disown him on account of it. They’ve already accepted (if not endorsed) his fraud and likely forgery; why would they be upset at a tasteless joke?
Effort expended in piling on Gleick would be better directed elsewhere.
“Winston Smith loved Big Brother”.
The AGW extremists would cause Orwell to be very very afraid.
It was three questions, not one. BTW, what was the correct answer?
Thomas says:
July 18, 2013 at 12:47 am
“Let’s also remember that Ann Coulter, Bill O’Reilly, and Rush Limbaugh aren’t the most moderate of people. How many have they wished dead during their careers? ”
=============
Ah, striking out for ‘moral equivalence’ are we? Does it make the Glieck and Landen less morally wrong if the people they are wishing dead participated in equally wrong moral behavior (not that I have knowledge if they did or didn’t)? I would have to say no, it doesn’t make it less aborrent.
What an idiotic series of questions. Is climate change real? Of course it is, climate has always changed. Is it human caused? Are they supposing that climate was static before mankind appeared? The real question is how much of any change is due to man’s influence, and whether the resulting change is good or bad. So far it’s looking pretty minimal. Is it important? Only to the funding and egos of climate scientists.
OK, if you’re going to identify specific individuals in a hypothetical way to wish them ill, at least make it funny. There are many variations on the three people in a boat/plane story which can be used to skewer anyone you want. The Greg Laden post is all build up and no punch line.
Gleick’s comment is just stupid. If in the hypothetical situation Coulter, O’Reilly and Limbaugh all answered the questions “correctly” it would mean nothing as the answers were obtained under duress.
John says:
July 18, 2013 at 3:29 am
However, I do not think the analogy is about finding the answer to the question. It’s about if you they care what the correct answer is. He’s saying Ann Coulter, Bill O’Reilly, and Rush Limbaugh are not interested in finding the correct answer only finding the “answers” they want.
——————————————————————————————————————————————-
My take is that much like the warmists, these three are so radical because it makes them lots of money and/or Fox management requires it (for money also). Fox and these three, by design, appeal to a special group that is entertained by and willing to spend large sums, including buying their books, to hear and read what they have to say. As to if they believe what they say or it’s mostly an act, one might look at Coulter’s boyfriend as one example. When large sums of money are involved it’s amazing what people will do to prostrate themselves with little regard as to how it affects others.
The Will to Live says that they should say, “Yes,” to the question. As the answer was under duress, it says nothing about their real thinking and just because they are forced to agree does mean that they really agree; and does not change the fact that the real answer is clearly “NO.”
It is important to call out those who first think it, then say it, then eventually will act it. We discipline children, else they continue behavior. Just as the 10:10 videos (as recalled above) were atrocities of intentional goals. Recall the early days of Hitler in the mid 1930’s, folks pretty much ignored the goings on until it was too late. History repeats.
Woah. I submitted this post not 12 hours ago. I didn’t even know it had gone up, much less that there had been this many responses. Let me try to catch up. I’ve noticed a couple comments in a similar vein, and I’ll group them together.
Thomas:
John:
Both of these comments dispute that Greg Laden’s metaphor was, “Agree or Die.” Both suggest it was actually, “Get the answer correct or die.” What both ignore is Laden defines “correct” as, “The answer I like.” Claiming:
Is really just claiming, “My view is right so you have no basis for disagreeing.” It’s a classic logical fallacy known as begging the question. You say you’re right then you use that to “prove” you’re right.
A fair-minded individual would accept that different people can look at “the best availably [sic] science” and disagree.
Natalie Solent:
So do I. I also think the comment James Delingpole made about Michael Mann, referenced by Mann in the quote in this post, was a joke. That’s why I drew the parallel. So when you say:
I hope you realize that’s what I was trying to do. I may not have succeeded due to lack of writing skills or some such, but it hardly seems fair to call me “oversensitive and too quick to take offence” when I tried to do exactly what you said I should do.
pokerguy:
Given this is a post I wrote, I think you should at least include me in your criticism. Regardless, could you clarify what you mean when you say I’m “engaging in this nonsense”? What “nonsense” am I engaging in?
I mocked a guy for calling the deaths of people he dislikes a “win.” I pointed out an interesting parallel where Michael Mann criticized behavior almost identical to behavior Peter Gleick engaged in. I then showed how Mann’s position would suggest Gleick’s behavior indicates skeptics are winning the public debate.
What exactly is bad about that? Should I have kept silent and ignored the fact Peter Gleick suggested the deaths of his opponents would be a good thing, or is there some aspect of how I presented the issue that bothers you?
Kashua:
elftone:
If Peter Gleick had been fired and/or shunned by the community after the fiasco with the Heartland Institute, I’d agree. If he wasn’t invited to speak at the AGU, I’d agree. If he wasn’t, by far and large, accepted into the scientific community, I’d agree.
But the reality is Peter Gleick is more accepted in the scientific community than nearly all skeptics. He can get more media attention than nearly any skeptic. As long as that’s true, it is worth calling him out on his nonsense.
Besides, if Michael Mann is going to use a certain type behavior to make a point, why shouldn’t I use it to paint him as a hypocrite? He is one, and he deserves to be labeled as one.