Uh, oh. It's models all the way down

Collective noun:
“A model of scientists”
“A consensus of scientists”
“A conference of scientists”
“A paper of scientists”

Just read the comments at Judith Curry’s site
http://judithcurry.com/2013/09/17/consensus-denialism/
Some common sense, but also some rather disturbing nonsense from the warmist camp – like watching a slow motion car crash with real-live crash test dummies.
Some of these people actually claim to believe in the following falsehoods:
– excessively high ECS (climate sensitivity to CO2) used in climate models;
– existing climate models accurately hindcast the past;
– existing climate models can accurately forecast the future.
They are apparently unaware or ignore the fact that the climate models use fabricated aerosol data to enable their hind-casting, thus enabling the use of high ECS values. Repeating, the aerosol data is fabricated, literally from thin air, to force-fit the models to hindcast. Then the models are claimed to be credible, and are used to forecast catastrophic global warming as atmospheric CO2 increases.
Problem is, despite increasing atmospheric CO2, Earth has not warmed in about 17 years!
But don’t worry, they say, the heat is hiding; stuck in the deep oceans (or somewhere else that the Sun don’t shine).
Jesus wept!
Regards, Allan

Friends:
I posted the following on Judith Curry’s blog at
http://judithcurry.com/2013/09/17/consensus-denialism/#comment-382615
Richard
====================
By far most cogent – and the best – post in this thread is by Wijnand at September 18, 2013 at 9:32 am.
The problem is not that the climate models need to be improved. No model is perfect and no model is intended to be perfect.
The real problem is that the climate models are being misused
The GCMs and energy balance models are useful heuristic tools. Understandings of climate can be tested by building models from those understandings and then comparing the model outputs to behaviours of the observed climate.
But using those heuristic tools as indicators of future climate is a hubristic misuse of the models: it assumes the models are built from adequately complete and accurate understandings of climate.
But the true purpose of the models is to determine if those understandings are – or are not – adequately complete and accurate.
And the models will be improved by amendment or addition to understandings of climate as they are discovered.
As Wijnand suggests, people should be sacked if they misuse the models for the casting of runes to predict the future,
Richard

More collective nouns
“a conspiracy of climate scientists”
“an independence of climate skeptics”
“a scoundrel of warmists”
“an imbecility of alarmists”

Paul Vaughan:
You end your ad hom. attack on Judith Curry at September 21, 2013 at 12:42 pm saying

She may have some useful role to play, but she’s not qualified to lead.

I have not noticed her attempting to “lead”. However, were she trying to do that, and assuming she is not “qualified” to do that, then your comment leads to an obvious question: viz,
Who do you suggest is “qualified to lead”, you?
Richard

THE SAD STORY OF CLIMATE-BASH
(apologies to Ogden Nash)
I don’t know very much at all
‘bout Judith or her history.
I’m just so tired of all attacks,
so utterly devoid of facts,
except the valid chops and hacks
at warmists’ dark conspiracy.
The Climategaters’ criminal acts
Should cause them all to get the ax,
They all deserve their forty whacks
and jail terms to the very max
For lies and fraud and mystery.

Paul Vaughan says: September 21, 2013 at 10:59 pm
Curry’s narrative implicitly asserts violation of at least 1 of the following laws:
a) conservation of angular momentum.
b) large numbers.
Each individual can take personal responsibility for understanding.
__________________
Paul, perhaps I am shirking your definition of “personal responsibility”, but you are too hostile and too difficult to understand.
You started by saying: “internal” = Total BS
The you said (except)
“This is a trust issue. It’s very specific. Framing as “internal” is strictly unacceptable (including on ethical grounds).
Collegiality can be very flexible, but it cannot extend that far. I strongly recommend simply dropping the single egregiously offensive word.”
Then you cite three sets of data tables and say:
“I try to be collegial, but there are limits.
Yesterday Curry made this total BS claim in a failed attempt to differentiate herself from the IPCC:
“my reasoning is weighted heavily in favor of observational evidence”
As I read those words, the sheer darkness of her ignorance &/or deception sunk in to sobering new depths. That’s the 2nd darkest comment I’ve ever seen written in the solar / climate discussion.”
So you have a technical disagreement in climate science. Join the club – many of us have differing opinions – some of us may be correct, but many of us will be wrong. However, to condemn Judith in your terms seems excessive and bizarre, especially in the context of the current acrimonious climate debate.
Viewed in context, your comments defocus the debate, and tend to trivialize the deceitful, disgraceful and even criminal behaviour of the leaders of the warmist camp, and I suggest that Judith is NOT one of them. I suggest that the leaders are well-identified in the Climategate emails, and I previously wrote about them as follows:
“The response of the global warmist gang was thuggish and imbecilic – they deliberately ignored all criticism, declared “the science is settled”, intimidated the editors of climate journals, and viciously attacked scientists who honestly pointed out the obvious flaws of their catastrophic global warming hypothesis. Global warming acolytes sent death threats to climate skeptics, and some skeptics were victims of actual violence. The global warmist gang is akin to a “cargo cult” religion – they have clearly failed to pursue an honest, objective quest for scientific truth.
At a minimum, the warmist gang have systematically misled the people and their governments, damaged or destroyed the academic careers of their betters, and squandered over a trillion dollars of scarce global resources.”
I hope you can see the difference, and will moderate your comments.
I read some of Judith’s recent stuff and thought it was OK. Did I agree with everything she said? I don’t recall and I don’t care – it was close enough.
Don’t know much about her history,
Don’t know ‘bout her climatology,
But Judy, Judy, Judy, Judy
You’re OK by me.