'Skeptical Science' Says Concerns About Dangerous Global Warming are Unimportant

Guest essay by Brandon Shollenberger

We can pack up our bags and go home.  The global warming debate is, except maybe as an academic curiosity.  I know this to be true because Skeptical Science says so.  And if they say so, it must be true.

Don’t believe me?  I understand.  It’s hard to believe.  But it’s true.  You may remember a post I wrote a couple days ago.  In it, I called Skeptical Science dishonest for repeatedly promoting a tweet from (not quite) Barack Obama that said:

Ninety-seven percent of scientists agree: #climate change is real, man-made and dangerous. Read more: http://OFA.BO/gJsdFp

As Cook et al’s study said absolutely nothing about whether or not climate change is dangerous.  Barry Woods followed up on this point at Skeptical Science in a few comments.  That’s when the Skeptical Science crowd said concerns about dangerous global warming are unimportant.

“Sphaerica”, who I believe is a moderator, said:

So your particular nit is that the paper’s authors didn’t correct the President of the United States (or, rather, those who manage his twitter feed) for the exact wording of a tweet?

An official moderator’s response from PW, whose initials I don’t recognize, says:

[PW] Cease the back-n-forth on this silly nitpick of a single tweet. Return to the topic and further nonsense about a single tweet will be deleted.

“Dikran Marsupial”, a major player at SkS, says:

Life is too short for pedantry and nit-picking, especially if it is only a means to avoid acceptance of what the TCP does actually show, i.e. that there is a broad consensus amongst scientists working on climate-related science that the majority of climate change is anthropogenic.

Let’s not focus on the fact Dikran Marsupial misrepresents Cook et al’s results.  Let’s not focus on the fact nobody corrects him about him.  Let’s not focus on the fact that is almost exactly the behavior described in my previous post.

Let’s just focus on the fact Skeptical Science tells us it doesn’t matter whether or not Cook et al’s work proves there is a consensus that global warming is dangerous.  They say that issue is a just a nit – an unimportant detail.  They say there is no relevant difference between a paper saying, “Global warming is mad-made” and saying, “Global warming is man-made and dangerous.”

That settles it.  They don’t care.  Why should we?