Guest essay by Brandon Shollenberger
It’s nothing but laundering lies. The authors don’t come out and directly say anything untrue, but they intentionally create and promote misunderstandings to inflate the importance of their work.
It’s rampant dishonesty hiding behind a fig leaf of deniability. This is how I recently described Cook et al’s PR campaign for their recent paper.
I didn’t intend to follow up on this comment, but this morning I saw a quote from Dana Nuccitelli that was impossible to resist:
We were always careful to say that while the survey involved 12,000 abstracts, the 97 percent consensus was among the ~4,000 abstracts that took a position on the cause of global warming (plus the roughly 1,400 of 2,100 self-rated papers taking a position). And we were careful to point out that the consensus was that ‘humans are causing global warming.
Nuccitelli says he and his co-authors always used a particular phrasing when describing their results. I must admit, that is true. They’ve always managed to say “humans cause global warming” with the implicit qualifier of “some” (that they knew nobody would pay attention to). It’s obvious they knew the limitations of their results and didn’t want to be accused of lying. So when someone said:
Ninety-seven percent of scientists agree: #climate change is real, man-made and dangerous. Read more: http://OFA.BO/gJsdFp
They obviously knew this wasn’t supported by their work. So what did they do? Did they correct it? No. They promoted it. Time, and time again, they promoted this tweet despite knowing it was a grossly inaccurate description of their work. How could they be careful to always describe their results accurately then promote gross inaccuracies about their results? Simple. They aren’t lying if they aren’t the ones saying it.
That’s it. That’s their strategy. They say things like, “Humans cause global warming” knowing most people won’t realize they’re meaning “some amount of global warming.” When someone misunderstands them, they promote that misunderstanding. They then tell us they “were careful” not to say untrue things themselves. For example, from the same link as the tweet from “Barack Obama”:
Ninety-seven percent of scientists say global warming is mainly man-made but a wide public belief that experts are divided is making it harder to gain support for policies to curb climate change, an international study showed on Thursday.
The important thing to realize is they did this very carefully. They intentionally used wording that could be easily misunderstood then promoted misunderstandings that arose from it. In other words, they laundered lies.
As a note, the piece Nuccitelli’s quote comes from has a great deal that’s wrong about it, including the fact the author completely misrepresented my communication with him. Try to ignore that for now. Cook et al’s rampant dishonesty is far more important.
Anyone who is not a specialist in a particular scientific field tends to accept consensus as a short-cut. The alternative is to do a lot of hard work to become an expert oneself. For example, I accept some of the wilder deductions of quantum mechanics if most physicists agree they are correct. But in that case, as soon as a proposition is falsified by experiment, the consensus can change pretty quickly. Luckily, few political decisions are made on the basis of the current predictions of string theory.
We know that consensus is not science, but we have also seen that a lot of influential people up to and including world leaders think that it is.
That makes the 97% lie very important.
So how about doing the survey again, openly asking a fair and neutral question this time and then publishing the result without manipulation?
They are not liars. They firmly believe in this delusion and they mistake belief for fact. A weird footprint is absolute proof of an alien invasion and so on.
Not so long ago, I heard someone claiming creationism has scientific merit. This person was not lying. He is simply and profoundly confused as to what constitutes knowledge and what constitutes belief.
Txomin, I don’t see a way one can claim they are not dishonest. They intentionally use specific wording in order not to give untrue answers. That shows they are fully aware other, more exaggerated, claims wouldn’t be supported by their data. Despite this, Cook et al promote those exaggerated claims without doing anything to correct them.
They knowingly promote claims they wouldn’t make themselves because the claims are false. No amount of spin can stop that from being dishonest.
When you look at Cook’s introduction, rather than the abstract, he actually says
“We examined a large sample of the scientific literature on global CC, published over a 21 year period, in order to determine the level of scientific consensus that human activity is very likely causing most of the current GW (anthropogenic global warming, or AGW).”
And co-author, Mark Richardson, is quoted as saying
“We want our scientists to answer questions for us, and there are lots of exciting questions in climate science. One of them is: are we causing global warming? We found over 4000 studies written by 10 000 scientists that stated a position on this, and 97 per cent said that recent warming is mostly man made.”
These are both outright lies.
http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2013/07/12/watch-the-pea/
What percentage of scientists during the 15th and 16th century “knew” the Earth was the center of the universe?
So how many papers support the notion of dangerous human caused global warming DAGW or CAGW, which is the supposed reason for all the climate policies that are imposed or planned that are costing trillions?
0%, 1%? Anybody knows?
Makes a big difference!
It seems like there would be a simple strategy for debunking the 97% statistic, offer a number of opinions in a range of sample statements to the authors of the misleading statistic and ask which ones of them fall in or out of the consensus. Then take the same sentences and ask those who have heard it but are not on the inside the same question. When the categorizations mismatch horribly go back to the authors and ask what they are going to do about the misinterpretation of their work. If the authors lie and put the demarcation point to match popular perceptions, you get them a different way.
It doesn’t take a genius to build the list.
1. all global warming is caused by humans
2. most global warming is caused by humans
3. about half of global warming is caused by humans
4. a minority of global warming is caused by humans
5. a small minority of global warming is caused by humans
6. a miniscule amount of global warming is caused by humans
7. an unmeasurably small amount of global warming is caused by humans
8. no global warming is caused by humans
How many of the statements would the authors put into their list? How many would outsiders put in their list? You could probably fund the survey with a kickstarter in no time flat.
@Brandon Shollenberger
Writing (and speaking) defensively is a common tactic we all use when we don’t want our arguments to be misconstrued by others. This does not constitute lying. In regards to allowing/encouraging others to go beyond what’s stated, it’s also common practice and a legitimate (political) strategy.
Nonetheless, it is fair for you and I to disagree. In my opinion, they are fools, not liars. And, while they are manipulative, I would charge them with doing so in an infantile way before a devious one.
Brandon and Txomin… remember George Costanza… “It’s not a lie….. if YOU believe it”
Txomin,
This is in a published paper where they are supposed to not have logical/definitional errors. If it says one thing in the abstract and Intro.
to the paper and then their actual analysis does not reflect what they said
it does, this is a problem. It’s either extreme stupidity or dishonesty. If you are
so intent on creating propaganda that you no longer recognize the truth or that you are bending it, I’m not sure which of the two categories above apply. Perhaps it’s stup-onesty. Saying something in a twitter or verbally you might be right, but in any longer document or when you are called out on it and then you continue to prevaricate, I can’t condone it.
Why all this serious analysing of an obviously purely propagandistic attempt at giving the old 97% number a new foundation, after its original one turned out to be 72 of 76 guys answering 3 wishy washy questions that even a skeptic would answer with yes.
Nuccitelli, Cook and all their collaborators have already shown themselves to be dishonest tools just by starting that idiotic endeavour. No person with a brain takes them seriously. Not even the warmists who pretend to; even they are not stupid enough to not see what was done.
Warmism might have started out of sheer incompetence but anyone who is still on that side now knows himself what a liar he has become.
You have been tricked. Here are a few smoking guns.
Global Warming changed to Climate Change.
Climate Change changed to Extreme Weather (no evidence provided of trends).
Hot surface temperature went deep sea diving.
Antarctica sea ice grown blamed on Ozone then on warm water.
IPCC temperature projections and divergence explained away (don’t believe your lying eyes)
They are lying. They know it. It’s not about co2 it’s about de-industrializing the world and restricting energy to restrict population growth in developing countries.
Here are some quotes at http://www.green-agenda.com/
Here is just one climate scientist in a candid moment.
Don’t be fooled again. These climate scientists know full well what is going on but won’t admit it. They are behaving like politicians and activists.
Jimbo says:
July 29, 2013 at 7:12 am
“Dr. Phil Jones – CRU emails – 7th May, 2009
‘Bottom line: the ‘no upward trend’ has to continue for a total of 15 years before we get worried.’ ”
Best part is the “Before we get worried.”
I thought the reason for worry was the increase in temperature; not the lack of warming.
Nutticelli: “… the ~4,000 abstracts that took a position on the cause of global warming”
So they openly regard it as a “cause” not a scientific issue.
So their survey apparently shows that 97% of scientists take a position on a cause. That may be nearer to the truth than they intended.
The Cook/Nutticlotti paper is scientific fraud. I have given the journal that published their nonsense the opportunity to publish a response correcting the errors. For the true “consensus” their own data file shows is that just 0.3% of all 11,944 papers endorsed the standard definition of the climate consensus – that more than half the warming since 1950 is anthropogenic. The devices the authors used to get from 0.3% to 97.1% were intended, by deception, to deceive, and hence to perpetuate the large losses inflicted on general taxpayers by the mad climate policies of most Western governments. We shall see whether the journal publishes my comment setting the facts straight. If not, another case for Mr. Plod the Policeman.
Brandon Shollenberger says:
July 29, 2013 at 1:28 am
Very good catch. I think he is dumb and this proves it 😉
Me thinking he is dumb does not move him out of the ‘dishonest’ segment of my Venn diagram 8)
To Caleb:
Dictators seldom come with their pathologies fully displayed.
No, they come laden with promises and concern for the people.
Dictators make the claim that the public have been duped or
coerced by the past regime, and they (the dictator) are here to
make things right. Only later do the dictators show their true,
pathological nature.
Who knows? Over the long years, out of the many, many dictators
the human race has endured, some may even have started out
by believing their own hype. But when they put their theories
into practice, the people do NOT react as theory says the people
are supposed to react. So the dictator shoots a few more people,
and tinkers with the machinery of government some more. After
a time, the dictator fears to give up power, because he has too
much blood on his hands.
Paul Homewood, thanks your comment. I had never seen that quote from Mark Richardson before. I’ve read dozens of comments from the authors, and so far, that’s the only time I’ve seen one say Cook et al’s results show the consensus is “recent warming is mostly man made.”
Txomin, I’m afraid your response doesn’t answer anything. You discussed two different things that didn’t cover the situation I described. That’s unfortunate as I almost never accuse people of lying, but in this case, I believe it is impossible to avoid.
That really is a condemnation of the poor quality and shocking lack of professionalism amongst Obama’s advisor’s that they didn’t look into the veracity of that highly suspicious 97% quote before they passed it onto him.
Let’s hope the military advice he gets is of a higher standard.
Is the bulk of the population really gullible enough to think that 97% of scientists ever agree about anything ?
Clearly some people are. Obama for one, several journalists and newspaper editors and maybe a handful more.
Nutticelli and co are deliberately misleading people as they seek to achieve their aims, in some fields one could go to jail for that. Surely it is time that those laws were extended to include areas such as climate science.
It is not unusual to charge fools with malice, but it is just an excuse to be able criminalize their behavior.
Txomin, Brandon’s complaint against you is valid. You are going to have to put up or shut up.
@Moncton
I am still quoting your essay. May the (police) force be with you.
From the link:
“Experts in Australia, the United States, Britain and Canada studied 4,000 summaries of peer-reviewed papers in journals giving a view about climate change since the early 1990s and found that 97 percent said it was mainly caused by humans.”
“Another co-author, Dana Nuccitelli of Skeptical Science, said she was encouraging scientists to stress the consensus “at every opportunity, particularly in media interviews”
“Global average surface temperatures have risen by 0.8 degree Celsius (1.4F) since the Industrial Revolution.”
———————————————
First, “Experts in Australia, the United States, Britain and Canada”
The article doesn’t mention anybody’s field of expertise.
Would that be “data manipulation”?
Dana’s a Sheila? Who knew?
or
Is the media ridiculing our boy Scooter?
I believe the industrial revolution ended sometime around 1840 or so….
The temp went up (?) 0.8 ° C in 170 years and that’s a problem?
Sensitivity is therefore 0.8/170 x 100 = 0.47 ° / century.
Run, hurry up and get “Scooter” Chicken Little…We need to get the word out. /sarc
And this is coming out of the LIA.
What happened to 8.0 ° C in less than 85 years?
Sheesh! “What a moroon…What an ignoramatus.” h/t to Bugs Bunny.
They must have another motive but, I just can’t believe they are that coordinated.
Ya gotta wonder.
They’ve got the money.
They’ve got Big Business.
They’ve got the scientists.
They’ve got the politicians.
plus
They’ve got the media….
And they still can’t get it done.
I guess the only thing they’re missing is the truth.
cn
The full quote should be promoted loudly: “97% of scientists agree: Humans cause a little bit of global warming.” The truth shall set us free.