Walt Cunningham, on video, follows.
There are few people on Earth as carefully vetted, as rigorously trained and as highly respected as America’s Apollo astronauts. They risked their lives in advance of science on behalf of all mankind.
CFACT organized an all day global warming conference at Warsaw’s Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University, together with some fantastic partners from Poland and Germany, which ran parallel to the UN’s COP 19. CFACT provided headsets for simultaneous translation for the more than 250 Poles who attended with our international delegation to the global warming summit.
Colonel Walt Cunningham was lunar module pilot on Apollo VII, the first manned Apollo flight to space. Colonel Cunningham explains why America’s space pioneers are shocked and dismayed by today’s politicization of science to serve the global warming agenda. They call for the elimination of bias from scientific inquiry and a return to the rigorous application of the scientific method.
We need a lot more efforts like this. Where are the physicists? Surely Feynman would have stepped up to counter the junk science in proportion to the need for defense of the scientific method. Is everyone else hiding in fear with their grants?
He is a truly interesting man, and has accomplished what the vast majority can only dream of. His credible and reasoned voice is one worth listening to.
It’s got to have something to do with Cunningham’s lack of fear of alienating the NASA bosses during Apollo 7, something that costed him the Moon.
And he denies the moon landings? I guess in Lewandowsky’s mind he does.
Resourceguy, 8:57am. Indeed. I like to think Feynman would have wiped the floor with the extrapolation and hyperbole of those promoting alarm about CO2. They have disgraced science as a discipline which at one time seemed to be in large part above political manipulation and motivation. Those days may be over for good thanks to these past 3 decades or so of self-serving alarmism. But please note that physicists have stepped forward to condemn these excesses. You will find several listed here for example: http://opinion.financialpost.com/2012/11/29/open-climate-letter-to-un-secretary-general-current-scientific-knowledge-does-not-substantiate-ban-ki-moon-assertions-on-weather-and-climate-say-125-scientists/
I am in agreement with his presentation. I would add that I was persuaded back in the 1980s by the early “science”, where the rise in CO2 was asserted to be causing a rise in temperature(A Scientific American article). I never checked the data myself until nearly 20 years later after someone challenged me.(I trusted “scientists” to keep me informed) I was astonished to find that I had never heard that the more accurate ice core analysis had disproved that early assertion. Why not? Ditto the missing hot spot, and ditto on the nearly identical temperature swings back over the last 100 years.
Eventually, I had to accept that the media were not playing fair and reporting the full story. Why? I still don’t get that part of the picture. Politics? Admittedly, it took hundreds of hours of reading to arrive at the conclusion that I was wrong. Maybe the media people simply do not have the spare time, or perhaps training, to do the homework needed to understand where we are at. The current nearly 17 years without warming should be easy to understand though. Why is that not reported on the front pages?
It is not just Cunningham, Harrison Schmitt and Buzz Aldrin, among many others, are also skeptics.
The key message from that speech is that the fight must be on the public perception- and political spheres.
Ed-B,
Why you ask? Money on one end, acceptance to fear on the other. Acceptance by a peer group/fear of being seen as an outcast… “Everyone KNOWS that it’s getting warmer, and the cause is Co2…what’s WRONG with you?”
Politicians like Gore, Obama, almost all of congress…are untouchable, especially with a compliant media. And they don’t care about the science. They care about securing their voter base. Just like Republicans bang the “God” drum, the Democrats bang the “Climate” drum, because it’s what their base believes in.
I have a friend who is a science teacher for 7th grade in Massachusetts. She won’t even turn the page on the possibility that SCIENCE has not been done, and that SCIENCE is not settled. She’s a firm believer in science by consensus, and even if she did doubt it, she won’t go against the beliefs of her peers, her superiors, and most parents. So even on that level, it still comes down to job security, even though she’s not directly involved in or supported by the Great Grant Gravy Train.
This will go on as long as we vote for and draw from the same pool of intellectually dishonest sources to fill and maintain seats in Congress, or UNTIL there is some unambiguous major blockbuster finding that is absolutely irrefutable. And the scope of “Climate Change” is so vast, that being able to put it to rest with a single event is impossible, I think.
My friends not only believe in this nonsense, they WANT it to be “true”…it’s the great tragedy, the “cause”, the thing that if all the mean and greedy people in the world would just go away, then it would all be ok.
And the next generation appears to be even dumber. In high school science, we should be give students an assignment to analyze the so-called science behind global warming. I’d bet that 98% would come back with nothing but media headlines in support of their forgone conclusion.
Jim From Main
So unlike Mann, who risked his lies on behalf of Mann. (Sorry, Mods, I’m freakin’ fuming at the comparison!)
We may be winning the war on authentic science but part of the reason we are losing the war in other realms is that we are playing the other sides game.
We battle them over their unproven theory of catastrophic human caused global warming/climate change. Global temperatures are important to measure and the physics of the atmosphere is extraordinarily important to understand. We battle over this and their global climate models and unfounded claims regarded extreme weather/climate. The EPA has ruled that CO2 is pollution.
That game is rigged. The politicians/government and media can say anything they want and make it sound convincing. Some of us atmospheric scientists were even convinced in the 1990’s before we dug deeper because key aspects of the propaganda did not ring true in our heads.
This battle is important but the front where the evidence is overwhelmingly one sided and is MUCH more important to whether our planets temperature will rise 1.5 degrees or 2.5 degrees this century(sort of absurd when you think about it) and most importantly, is a key undisputed law of science is PHOTOSYNTHESIS.
Thanks to the key role played by CO2(that everyone who had high school biology understands clearly) our earth is getting greener and greener and greener. The biosphere is booming. Vegetative health has never been better(as measured in the last 100 years). Crop yields and world food production is exploding upwards.
Since all animals eats plants or something that ate plants, there is nothing that is more important than food to feed creatures on this planet.
Clearly the plant world loves this atmospheric fertilizer. Because if benefits root mass the most, it allows plants to grow on less water and be more drought tolerant, conserving water-less irrigation and fertilizer needed for crops.
Even if the alarmist worst case scenario were in the ballpark, the benefits to our world to plants and massive increases in world food production everywhere, far outweigh stronger hurricanes and rising oceans.
We battle over whether hurricanes will actually be stronger and take a hit every time a Haiyan or Sandy develop. Or there is a tornado outbreak in November.
The public only hears the exaggerated facts and doesn’t think, “gee, 2013 had the least amount of tornadoes ever, so what if some of them happened in November”.
PHOTOSYNTHESIS. Notice the other side never touches on that topic. It their kryptonite!
As an Apollo astronaut Colonel Walt Cunningham has certainly assumed substantial risks over the course of his life, but one risk he has never assumed is that of being a laughingstock in front of a large number of people. So in that particular respect I think Michael Mann certainly has him beat.
I must, however, disagree with Mr. Cunningham’s use of a chart on piracy and global warming to draw his conclusion that correlation is not the same as causation. Of course it depends upon what one’s definition of piracy is, but I suspect that the correlation between piracy and global temperatures is indeed the same as causation. The only difference it’s more fashionable (although certainly less visually interesting) to have a shirt, and tie, and microphone these days than it is to have a sabre, peg leg, and skull and crossbones (although the tropical locations for the meetings has not changed).
In closing I’d like to say that Colonel Walt Cunningham and all our astronauts have demonstrated a rare combination of bravery, technical expertise, and daring. We are the better for them.
philjourdan says:
November 25, 2013 at 9:23 am
And he denies the moon landings? I guess in Lewandowsky’s mind he does.
_________________________________________
LOL…Good point but it gets worse: http://www.livescience.com/19643-nasa-astronauts-letter-global-warming.html
I apologize for grammatical and other slips on the previous response. Trying to monitor the updated weather model guidance and trade natural gas while typing.
But remember, we got it straight from Oprah – the only reason anyone would ever oppose Obama’s policies is because they are Racist!!!, and Obama supports the Global Warming agenda, so….
Courage, rationality and intelligence are rare commodities. Walter Cunningham has an abundance of all three plus a clear eye and a sharp mind. He’s the kind of man politicians fear and loathe and avoid debating at all cost.
J. Swift says…”Courage, rationality and intelligence are rare commodities. Walter Cunningham has an abundance of all three plus a clear eye and a sharp mind. He’s the kind of man politicians fear and loathe and avoid debating at all cost.”
Sorry but I see a very different man here. I clearly don’t have the same sense of patriotism as do the US readers. I just see a sad old man fumbling around reciting hackneyed old sayings.
Interesting, I once made the graph that pops up at 11:49. I’ve seen it at many places since. happy to see my child alive. I also happen to know that since then, a new chronology EDC-3 brought the two in much closer. But I’m not sure if that was that honest real data or futch factors.
Simon
November 25, 2013 at 11:09 am
says:
‘I just see a sad old man fumbling around reciting hackneyed old sayings.’
Are you sure you’re not mistaking Walter Cunningham for James Hansen? Or Thomas Wigley? Or Maurice Strong? Or Pachauri? Or Lonnie Thompson? Now I don’t doubt you’re not mistaking Walter Cunningham for Michael Mann, Kevin Trenberth, or Lewandewsky since they’re just young men fumbling around reciting hackneyed old sayings.
This is a central point I think. Most of the ‘warming’ comes from computer models and fudged data that has been “adjusted”. CO2 has not been demonstrated to be dangerous to us in any way, but has been shown to be absolutely necessary to life on this planet. It boggles the mind that the fraudsters were able to convince so many of the blatant falsehood that CO2 is dangerous to us.
The main reason that the meme of catastrophic global warming is so persistent, despite plenty of evidence to the contrary, is that it is a billion $ fundraiser for big green organizations, a newsworthy scary story for the media, a great excuse for governments to raise taxes (even for political stripes that don’t want to tax, it means vilification if they don’t at least pay lip service), a cash cow for climate scientists and an opportunity for banking interests to make money carbon trading, in other words, a perfect storm of converging interests.
Biggest movers and deceivers in this group of special interests are the Big Green organizations. Big Green is a multi-billion dollar group of operations. They love the cash flow from this big scary story. It maintains their Trotskyite adventures (e.g. Greenpeace plowing the seas in the Arctic Sunrise) and keeps their 6-figure executive salaries well supplied. As the Scottish Skeptic shows they are clearly willing to resort to threats of physical harm to maintain this flow of filthy lucre. How soon will it be before they actually resort to violence against individuals if they haven’t already?
Leonard Weinstein says:
November 25, 2013 at 9:59 am
> It is not just Cunningham, Harrison Schmitt and Buzz Aldrin, among many others, are also skeptics.
See http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/05/22/nasa-astronauts-announce-second-letter-to-nasa-at-heartland-conference/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/07/03/apollo-moonwalker-dr-buzz-aldrin-cites-climate-skepticism/
Simon …….. Troll much?
“For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.” Rogers Report
Our freedom to doubt was born out of a struggle against authority in the early days of science. It was a very deep and strong struggle: permit us to question — to doubt — to not be sure. I think that it is important that we do not forget this struggle and thus perhaps lose what we have gained. Richard Feynman, Value of Science
Does the former NASA astronaut and CAGW secptic, Walt Cunningham, accept that the moon landings took place? / sarcy question
TomR,Worc,MA,USA says:
November 25, 2013 at 12:09 pm
Simon …….. Troll much?
Every chance that he gets.
Mike Maguire says:
November 25, 2013 at 10:36 am
…My friends not only believe in this nonsense, they WANT it to be “true”…it’s the great tragedy, the “cause”, the thing that if all the mean and greedy people in the world would just go away, then it would all be ok.
>>>>>>>>
Alas Mike, I see the same thing. I had a friend from college that I tried to convince AGW was not happening. When I caught him actually trying to lie to me (our conversation was via email, so I had the proof), I gave up. If an old friend is willing to lie for his cult, then I probably can’t help him.
Dear(est) Simon;
I will take that “sad old man fumbling around” any day to your stable of plain men fumbling around. At least my “old man” has done something significant with his life. This “old man” has been to the moon and back. And knows what science actually is. What have your “men” done? And since they know little of actual science, enough said.
I’m just making the point that it is sad to see a man who once was a hero resorting to arguments that are old and tired.
Pretty much every genuine sceptic accepts the role C02 has played in the observed warming. I think you will find Anthony Watts, Chris Monckton, Judith Curry, Fred Singer (the list goes on), all acknowledge that part of the warming is due to our increasing the level of C02 in the atmosphere. They just don’t accept it is going to be a major problem for our future.
When you see clips like this that essentially deny any influence man has had on the planet you just have to scratch your head and wonder how they got past the man at the door. Genuine sceptics must cringe with embarrassment when they hear statements like “it’s just a trace gas.”
This clip will do nothing to convince any thinking person that Colonel Cunningham has anything to offer the debate on AGW. There are many informed well written articles/talks that appear on this site… but this was not one of them.
Simon says..
” resorting to arguments that are old and tired. ”
Funny, thats the exact expression I thought of when reading your comments. Nothing but personal attacks. Cunningham, by contrast, provided empirical data to support his position.
Simon:
“Pretty much every genuine sceptic accepts the role C02 has played in the observed warming. I think you will find Anthony Watts, Chris Monckton, Judith Curry, Fred Singer (the list goes on), all acknowledge that part of the warming is due to our increasing the level of C02 in the atmosphere.”
I think they have to do this to be allowed to continue their publication (and indeed their life) by the powers that be. If they dared to speak the full truth, namely that nothing that man can possibly achieve will permanently and thoroughly alter this planet, let alone destroy it, we might too soon read little more about them than their obituaries.
Ed_B
Actually, I attacked his talk…. not him personally.
@Simon – “Actually, I attacked his talk…. not him personally.”
And you are a liar: “I just see a sad old man fumbling around reciting hackneyed old sayings.”
The only sad old man reciting hackneyed old sayings is you. You cannot even get your facts straight.
Mr. Cunningham, if you read here, thank you very much for a fine talk. You carry the message well. I can call and write senators and representatives in both my state and Washington but in the end it take persons like you with some weight and history behind your name to really make a difference. Thanks again for stepping forward.
– – – – – – –
As I read the CFACT report and listened to the video of Cunningham, I wondered if, of the rational virtues that a man can practice to have intellectual integrity as a scientist, is there one virtue that all others depend on?
I keep coming back the virtue of intellectual / mental independence as the key virtue. The goal to struggle against bias has independence as a starting virtue.
Viva the independence of the intellect!
John
No criticism of Colonel Cunningham, but the introduction pushed the American hero a bit much for an international audience. The stress should have been on “hero” and “physicist”.
Sadly, it gets so much worse:
“Gov. Terry Branstad said the Environmental Protection Agency has “embarked in a war on corn” with its proposal of lowering the current Renewable Fuel Standard at an event on Friday at the Lincolnway Energy plant in Nevada.
The message of “Don’t Mess with the RFS” was made loud and clear Friday by citizens and politicians from all over Iowa at the rally, which was put together by the state and the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association.”
We have a Juggernaut of money and self-interest wedded to CAGW one way or another. Another example is the light bulb ban continues apace with 40 and 60 watt incandescent bulbs forbidden in Jan.
It is clever, I guess, to get the corporate self-interest and big-government self-interest and the academic self-interest on the same side. Having done that the science becomes an afterthought. So even if Al Gore isn’t exactly correct, it all worked out in the end…’cleaner’ air, less pollution, and a healthier future. There…don’t you feel better already?
http://www.newtondailynews.com/2013/11/24/state-politicians-epa-has-embarked-on-war-against-corn/auqc0ro/
” Simon says:November 25, 2013 at 3:24 pm
Genuine sceptics must cringe with embarrassment when they hear statements like “it’s just a trace gas.”
No I don’t cringe at all. It is a factual statement. What do you call something measured in parts per million? Nitrogen = 78%, oxygen = 21% and ALL trace gases combined = 1%
That is just plain wrong. The planet needs CO2, for without it there would be no carbon based life forms on it. Even a low level of CO2 such as 100 ppm would not be enough to sustain animal life on the planet let alone long term plant life survival. At pre-industrial levels of CO2 , most of the warming effect of CO2 has already taken place.
As discussed many times on WUWT, CO2 levels have a logarithmic effect on temperatures. What skeptics assert is that this logarithmic effect means that ADDITIONAL quantities of CO2 above pre-industrial levels will not have bad consequences. My scientific research on the subject informs me that raising the level of CO2 in the atmosphere to 1000 ppm would be of enormous net benefit to the planet.
TRM
Look at it this way. Approx 1% of our atmosphere is greenhouse gases. That 1% raises the average temp of the earth by about 18C. C02 is a dominant GHG. Now increase the level of this gas by about 1/3.
It is not rocket science to appreciate it is going to have an affect. As I said real sceptics actually get this… They just don’t think it will have a catastrophic impact.
garymount
The statement of mine is accurate. It is not “plain wrong” as you say. All of the people I have listed acknowledge the role of C02 in the warming that has happened.
Simon says..
“I just see a sad old man fumbling around reciting hackneyed old sayings.”
Sad, old, man, fumbling, reciting, hackneyed, old, sayings?
Talk about a mean spirited, weasely worded bit of bad mouthing!
Could you pack any more slipperiness into one sentence!
I keep seeing this tactic:
1. Argument by ridicule
2. Argument from authority (If inverted here!)
3. Followed up by the fallacy fallacy.
In this case it is ridicule, then argument from fallacy with a followup post appealing to authority.
“Genuine sceptic” ? Who selects them? Presumably the authorities!
The very heart of the debate resides in the, admittedly complex, relationship between atmospheric components. Given that Co2 is a trace gas, in very truth and compared with that GHG elephant in the room H20, no genuine sceptic should be embarrassed to state that fact, despite modellers labelling one as ‘radiative forcing’ and the other as ‘feedback’.
If the very heart of the matter is “embarrassing” then debate has ended and slander begun.
Scott Wilmot Bennett
I don’t think my comments were mean spirited. I really do think it sad that a man who has led such a cutting edge life should give a speech that is so full of decade old obsolete arguments. They may have state of the art in 2003 but they are not in 2013. We (people on both sides of the debate) are well past denying the affect of C02.
Simon says:
November 25, 2013 at 7:35 pm
“…Approx 1% of our atmosphere is greenhouse gases. That 1% raises the average temp of the earth by about 18C.”
>>>>>>
WRONG
“C02 is a dominant GHG.”
>>>>>>>>>
WRONG
You are plain wrong a second time. Half of the warming that has taken place happened before humans put much CO2 into the atmosphere, in other words, was natural. In the second half of the last century the same amount of warming took place as the natural warming. It isn’t scientific to just claim that the post WWII warming was man made or partially man made even though there is the same amount of warming that was natural in the first half. The best that we can say right now is that we just plainly do not know.
And, there has been no global warming for the most recent 17 years. Scientifically, one has to conclude that we just don’t know. We will know if we allow the experiment to continue and keep putting CO2 into the atmosphere. It would be a tragedy if we stopped emitting CO2 and thereby not allowing our future children to discover the truth.
Simon, wake up. Over the last 17 years, more than a third of the total amount of CO2 ever produced by man was emitted. During that time : ZERO – diddly squat – zilch warming. Open your eyes.
garymount
“We will know if we allow the experiment to continue and keep putting CO2 into the atmosphere. It would be a tragedy if we stopped emitting CO2 and thereby not allowing our future children to discover the truth.”
I can’t believe you just wrote that……
François GM
“Simon, wake up. Over the last 17 years, more than a third of the total amount of CO2 ever produced by man was emitted. During that time : ZERO – diddly squat – zilch warming. Open your eyes.”
Mmm… I’m assuming you are not including the oceans?
@Simon – Prove it.
Shows us the data (not models) that show the oceans warming at an unprecedented rate.
Oprah attended (and still attends?) Rev. Wright’s church, like Obama.
Simon, your claims that the argument is over ring so hollow. Up until the Scripps floats were deployed the “science” on the Atlantic conveyor was “settled”.
Despite their best efforts, there is no atmospheric hot spot, unless you have found it in the last week or two. Surface temps, including the oceans, show no significant heating. The claim is the the extra heat bypassed the atmosphere, bypassed the surface, and ended up a couple of thousand ft deep in the ocean, where by the way, the temperature record is obviously a bit sketchy prior to the Scripps deep water floats.
I am not aware of any energy transfer mechanism that can accomplish this. This just doesn’t pass the “smell test”. Please grace us with how you believe this happens?
Secondarily, every time some severe event happens, your side screams “SEE? SEE? IT IS BECAUSE OF THE OUT OF CONTROL HEATING!!!!” Further analysis almost always shows that the local conditions did not involve increased heat above normal. SS Sandy is a perfect example of this. The cred of your side is gone.
Finally there are so many alternative causalities(Solar brightening, cloud cover, etc…) and your side never even allows them to make a small contribution. It is all CO2 is the only cause so it must be controlled by destroying our economy for the sake of mother earth. This further erodes the cred of your side. At this point, the honest thinking person looks at both sides and sees a bunch of grant dependent old men like Michael Mann et. al. making up over simplified models with random unjustified forcings that, over time. have all been miserable failures, and the very reasoned conclusion is that “climate science” appears to be an oxy-moron with quite a bit of emphasis on moron.
A well reasoned, clear explanation would be greatly appreciated.
Dave H-O
See you had me interested till you went to the economy. And that’s when your claims started to “ring so hollow.”
I think Simon is being duplicitous. I sort of agreed with a kernel of his original post, namely that Cunningham didn’t offer any of the most recent evidence refuting AGW,(although the demeaning language did make me think it was more than that).
His responses to other comments however, blew his cover, that he isn’t merely saddened to see Cunningham fumble, or fail to offer cutting edge refutations. He writes: “Look at it this way. Approx 1% of our atmosphere is greenhouse gases. That 1% raises the average temp of the earth by about 18C. C02 is a dominant GHG. Now increase the level of this gas by about 1/3.”
This is the “red scarf” trick. Greenhouse gases may make up 1% of the atmosphere, but the statement that we are raising this by 1/3 is a lie. Only the co2 element is rising by 1/3, and that represents currently only 0.04% of the atmosphere.
So he is dissembling here, whilst failing to recognise the importance of what Cunningham is saying, that the prevailing climate hypothesis before the “scare”, was built upon solar, oceanic and orbital influences, and that in order to challenge this, new evidence, new observations must be offered that falsify the previous position, and that most importantly, they have failed to do this.
This may be “obsolete” in Simon’s mind, but it is something that is absolutely fundamental in bringing the argument back down to Earth, and in winning the media campaign.
It is interesting to look at why sceptics are loosing the media battle as Col Cunningham suggests, why the media swallow everything the alarmists put out.
I think the answer can be glimpsed in the movie “Day after tomorrow.” There is a scene, just as the sky is falling, when the politician turns to a scientist and asks half rhetorically, half accusatory “Why didn’t you tell us about this.” The scientists spits back, “We kept telling you, but you took no notice.”
The scene works because it plays to the mental picture the audience has of the world. Scientists are the unadulterated purveyors of science, which is objective, honest and truth, while the politicians are self serving or serving of big business and money. The scientists were proved right and the politicians were manifestly and demonstrably wrong.
So if you take the battle to the media you are effectively replacing the politician in the scene with somebody else, probably of weak and feeble repute, and saying “Your science is wrong. . .”
I ask you, who are the public or media going to believe?
Simon says:
November 25, 2013 at 3:24 pm
Pretty much every genuine sceptic accepts the role C02 has played in the observed warming. I think you will find Anthony Watts, Chris Monckton, Judith Curry, Fred Singer (the list goes on), all acknowledge that part of the warming is due to our increasing the level of C02 in the atmosphere. They just don’t accept it is going to be a major problem for our future.
When you see clips like this that essentially deny any influence man has had on the planet you just have to scratch your head and wonder how they got past the man at the door. Genuine sceptics must cringe with embarrassment when they hear statements like “it’s just a trace gas.”
Simon says:
November 25, 2013 at 7:35 pm
TRM
Look at it this way. Approx 1% of our atmosphere is greenhouse gases. That 1% raises the average temp of the earth by about 18C. C02 is a dominant GHG. Now increase the level of this gas by about 1/3.
It is not rocket science to appreciate it is going to have an affect. As I said real sceptics actually get this… They just don’t think it will have a catastrophic impact.
Actually the claim is it raises the temperature around 33°C, from -18°C to 15°C.
Well, then, show exactly how that trace gas carbon dioxide raises temperatures – it has never been shown.
But note well, that -18°C figure is for the Earth without any atmosphere at all – not for the Earth without ‘greenhouse gases’, that is the first fib in this claim.
Without water vapour the temperature of the Earth would be 67°C, which means, the most abundant ‘greenhouse gas’ lowers the Earth’s temperature by 52°C to 15°C.
The Earth would not be colder without greenhouse gases, it would be considerably hotter. Think deserts.
To continue claiming that “warming is due to our increasing the level of C02 in the atmosphere” is not a sceptical position, it is a belief contrary to the empirically well known physics of the natural world around us.
What is clearly seen in this is that persons unknown have misappropriated that -18°C figure and taken out the Water Cycle, claims built on this deceit are not science and hence all we get is unsubstantiated claims; repetition of a lie does not make it true.
@John Whitman
“As I read the CFACT report and listened to the video of Cunningham, I wondered if, of the rational virtues that a man can practice to have intellectual integrity as a scientist, is there one virtue that all others depend on?”
Honesty is the foundation of all virtues. All the scores of human virtue circumambulate this mighty standard, the Upright Pillar. Without honesty all efforts eventually fail. As for CAGW, this too shall pass.
Simon is just a warmist TROLL.
In Britain in the 19th century nice middle-class Simons joined the clergy while their smarter brothers became engineers, scientists, capitalists.
In the 21st century confounded, even by something so simple as the workings of an internal combustion engine, Simon feels confused, technologically lost at sea and so, being too liberal and socially sophisticated for the Church of England, opted for the Church of Green.
Never good at math or physics Simon opted for a soft arts degree, reads the Guardian and works for the BBC. He loves his kids and really believes the world is ending because of the combined evils of capitalism, consumption and carbon dioxide.
He lives in the countryside but doesn’t much like the smell of cow dung and he would hate to live next door to the ‘socially inferior’ mechanic who nevertheless knows how Simon’s car engine works (and most annoyingly) is clever enough to fix it when it goes wrong.
How am I doing Simon?
– – – – – – – – –
Crispin in Waterloo but really in Ulaanbaatar,
Nice to receive your thoughts in reply.
I can see a scientist honestly supporting a consensus without the will to question it. That does not make him dishonest, but to me it does make him lack independence.
Or perhaps it is neither independence nor honesty as the key virtue scientists need to understand reality; namely, the key virtue for science. I could also argue that it is integrity that is the central fundamental virtue for scientists to use to achieve validated understanding of reality. Integrity as in a consistent integration of status, thoughts and public actions over applicable time periods.
Or perhaps all such virtues being equally weighted should be considered as well.
John
PERSONAl NOTE => I am curious about you being in Ulaanbaatar. Why?
Don’t know where this one percent has come from regarding greenhouse gases. One percent of gases refer to the rest that are not nitrogen and oxygen (99%) These are not all greenhouse gases and water vapor the largest percentage in the atmosphere of any greenhouse gas is not included here. Water vapor varies between 0% desert and 4% tropics and is on it’s own greater than one percent overall in the atmosphere. (2%)
Significant warming of the ocean can only occur by increasing solar radiation penetrating it because LWR increasing a fraction of a percent would take thousands of years to do anything like the same thing. Which will warm up 100m water first? Retaining energy a bit longer down to 5 nm surface water on a 24 hour period or warming 100m water over 12 hours? One is solar energy and the other LWR from CO2. I laugh at the people that think the 5nm surface one is the culprit.
J. Swift
“In Britain in the 19th century nice middle-class Simons joined the clergy while their smarter brothers became engineers, scientists, capitalists.
In the 21st century confounded, even by something so simple as the workings of an internal combustion engine, Simon feels confused, technologically lost at sea and so, being too liberal and socially sophisticated for the Church of England, opted for the Church of Green.
Never good at math or physics Simon opted for a soft arts degree, reads the Guardian and works for the BBC. He loves his kids and really believes the world is ending because of the combined evils of capitalism, consumption and carbon dioxide.
He lives in the countryside but doesn’t much like the smell of cow dung and he would hate to live next door to the ‘socially inferior’ mechanic who nevertheless knows how Simon’s car engine works (and most annoyingly) is clever enough to fix it when it goes wrong.
How am I doing Simon?”
In all honesty pretty badly. If you want a summary that is accurate. I am politically neutral. Have voted for both sides. I don’t have an arts degree. I fix my own cars. I live in town and like to believe I give everyone a fair chance irrespective of whether they are a mechanic or a doctor. I am practical. Maybe this stuff says more about you?
More importantly….I think extremists on both sides of this debate need to be held to account. This talk was boring and of no value to anyone except the non thinkers. You could drive a truck through the points he made.
The only reason “global warming/climate change” is being pushed so hard is because it helps empower the socialist agenda. Here is another aspect of that that I hadn’t thought of, the push to make people live in higher density housing. It is big in California of course:
http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/do-single-family-homes-threaten-planet
Simon,
Dang! Apparently I was about to have you explain where you found the atmospheric hot spot, how energy transfers directly from outside the atmosphere through the atmosphere, through the surface of the ocean to the deep ocean via some CO2 mechanism, and an explanation of how your sides scientists still have cred even though their predictions fail at a ridiculous rate.
And then I went and proactively answered one of the biggest arguments that your side constantly throw out there. That argument is “What can reducing CO2 hurt?”
Now all that information that those of us willing to look at both sides are missing out on all of your clarifications that the Mann’s, Gore’s, and Hansen’s of the world don’t seem to be able to articulate.
Sitting here in deep emotional regret…
Our local greenies demonstrated recently in Armidale NSW., no cars more trains????????????
They are just scared aren’t they and politically motivated. Then we had a tornado hit near where we lived and destroyed one old house, luckily the elderly woman was unhurt. Trees were uprooted etc., screaming climate change etc. However, would you believe the Bureau of Meteorology recorded 364 tornadoes to hit the Australian mainland since European colonisation, and that tornadoes were not exactly a rare event! Cyclones of course are a different matter up Norther as it is a monsoon region.