By Garth Paltridge
Global temperatures have not risen for 17 years. The pause now threatens to expose how much scientists sold their souls for cash and fame, warns emeritus professor Garth Paltridge, former chief research scientist with the CSIRO Division of Atmospheric Research.
Climate Change’s Inherent Uncertainties
…there has been no significant warming over the most recent fifteen or so years…
In the light of all this, we have at least to consider the possibility that the scientific establishment behind the global warming issue has been drawn into the trap of seriously overstating the climate problem … in its effort to promote the cause. It is a particularly nasty trap in the context of science, because it risks destroying, perhaps for centuries to come, the unique and hard-won reputation for honesty which is the basis of society’s respect for scientific endeavour…
The trap was set in the late 1970s or thereabouts when the environmental movement first realised that doing something about global warming would play to quite a number of its social agendas. At much the same time, it became accepted wisdom around the corridors of power that government-funded scientists (that is, most scientists) should be required to obtain a goodly fraction of their funds and salaries from external sources—external anyway to their own particular organisation.
The scientists in environmental research laboratories, since they are not normally linked to any particular private industry, were forced to seek funds from other government departments. In turn this forced them to accept the need for advocacy and for the manipulation of public opinion. For that sort of activity, an arm’s-length association with the environmental movement would be a union made in heaven…
The trap was partially sprung in climate research when a number of the relevant scientists began to enjoy the advocacy business. The enjoyment was based on a considerable increase in funding and employment opportunity. The increase was not so much on the hard-science side of things but rather in the emerging fringe institutes and organisations devoted, at least in part, to selling the message of climatic doom. A new and rewarding research lifestyle emerged which involved the giving of advice to all types and levels of government, the broadcasting of unchallengeable opinion to the general public, and easy justification for attendance at international conferences—this last in some luxury by normal scientific experience, and at a frequency previously unheard of…
The trap was fully sprung when many of the world’s major national academies of science (such as the … Australian Academy of Science) persuaded themselves to issue reports giving support to the conclusions of the IPCC. The reports were touted as national assessments that were supposedly independent of the IPCC and of each other, but of necessity were compiled with the assistance of, and in some cases at the behest of, many of the scientists involved in the IPCC international machinations. In effect, the academies, which are the most prestigious of the institutions of science, formally nailed their colours to the mast of the politically correct.
Since that time three or four years ago, there has been no comfortable way for the scientific community to raise the spectre of serious uncertainty about the forecasts of climatic disaster… It can no longer escape prime responsibility if it should turn out in the end that doing something in the name of mitigation of global warming is the costliest scientific mistake ever visited on humanity.
Full story here at: Quadrant Online
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Science is great, science is wonderful but people such as Al Gore or anyone else who subscribes to the GW lie should be expelled by the scientific community. GW is based on lies and falsified data. This entire GW debate almost makes me want to vomit, I am so sick of the lies. Oh, and TWC needs to refrain from naming winter storms. Idiots…
Either they were lying when telling us that the science was settled or they weren’t very scientific about it. Either way all science is worse for it.
Science will be fine, thank you very much. Scientists who practice non-replicable “science” will not fare quite as well, despite what a few bristle-cone pines have to say.
I am constantly amazed that the professional working in climate ‘science’ cannot meet the standards in their published work which are consider the norm of a student handing in a essay .
While the author has a good point , for I guess that some who support ‘the cause ‘ in reality have little faith in the scientific validity of it. But know that having gone all in they have little choice but double down or lose the lot .
The hear no evil , see no evil , say no evil approach of the scientific establishment when to comes poor academic practice and worse personal approach of the IPCC and ‘the Team’ could end up costing is all a great deal .
But if science in general becomes to the public a untrusted joke because of AGW , it really only has itself to blame.
Science. The seeking of knowledge.
Has no reputation to lose.
Only the hubris of its proponents.
In the future this period of global warming alarmism will be compared to Lysenkoism. Many reputations will be in ruins. Hailing Dr. Homer Hansen.
Gareth?
This well thought out article is an excellent response to the article that J.Curry referred to yesterday, “The Death of Expertise”. Laymen are not stupid. They understand how the world works. The pressure to conform, temptation to “sell their souls”, etc. Experts who assume they should be given the final word in their area of expertise underestimate the sophistication of laymen. In fact, as Curry notes, independent researchers can make valuable contributions to science.
RISKS?
!!!
While it is important to remember the names and faces of the scientists at the heart of the CAGW swindle, I believe the mainstream/consensus media must also be held to account. The large number of so-called journalists who would happily grill any wavering politician are little more than bobble-headed admirers when encountering a climate scientist. And those same media outlets are crying the blues now that fewer people want to listen to their drivel.
Amen. I think the reputation of all science will be harmed, particularly academic science. Sadly, I think the hit to reputation is deserved. I think more academic science is done badly than we’d care to believe, especially in the handling of statistics and inference.
There is science and there is ‘climate science’.
The standards and ethics of the latter has brought the former into disrepute.
The 17 year hiatus/pause/whatever has demonstrated the current temperature cycle is no different from the many tens of thousands of other similar cycles seen throughout geological history.
The waste of money in the climate cause is truly incredible and what has it achieved apart from rising energy bills and ugly blots on the landscape?
I would like to send this essay to my Member of Parliament. Is that permitted?
He is a Financial Secretary (or some such fairly influential post) and is very numerate. He has a clear line to the Chancellor of the Exchequer and would be worth “cultivating”.
All this will not only harm science, but also the environment.
Took many years to build the environmental consciousness some, or most, of the people in the Western world and some other developed countries now have. Recycling, garbage segregation, curb emissions, etc… As soon as the myth is debunked, I am afraid what will happen.
I am afraid a lot of people will just shun whatever the correct environmental approach is. Many people might start seeing the truly good for the environment approaches as another worthless thing. It might all become in their minds either a lie or something that is an exaggeration.
Credibility to good things will now be trashed. There are so many negative things that might come out of this scam that mother nature should be able to sue everybody involved in this down to a couple generations.
In a few hundred years historians will look back and, as the 80’s are known for the fashion trends, the last two decades after 2000 will be known for the gullibility and exaggerated fears of the unaccountable. Ignorance and scares.
Far too late. What reputation? Science is dead, having accepted money to spew continuous propaganda since the ’80s, or, at the very best, failed to rise up and point out the fallacies published in Nature and Science and similar jourinals. Academia’s reputation is bit lower. Journalism is lowest of all, having maintained an inexplicable silence for the same period. People of integrity are few, these days, it would seem. ¿Why is that, I wonder. What happened?
The scientific establishment has long ago lost its credibility over the CAGW fiasco. It won’t be getting it back for a long, long time.
“rising energy bills and ugly blots on the landscape”
An example is Wolfe Island by Kingston Ont. Canada. What was beautiful has become ugly due to the many wind mills on the island. The power is very expensive, and intermittent.
dfbaskwill says:
January 26, 2014 at 8:20 am
Science will be fine, thank you very much. Scientists who practice non-replicable “science” will not fare quite as well, despite what a few bristle-cone pines have to say.
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Sorry, can’t agree. Science shouldn’t be “fine”. Too many formerly respected scientists and scientific institutions have colluded in untold damage to economies and people. Too many scientists who didn’t really know the subject bad-mouthed people who knew the subject far better but had the temerity to question the “consensus”.
I doubt that I’m alone in now questioning the motives and honesty of any scientist in any field proposing anything of any significance.
A root and branch cleansing of climate “science” is necessary, both for the future of the field but as an example to others. The rest of science should be humbled and so scared by the treatment handed out to climate wrongdoers that they wouldn’t dare be anything but scrupulous themselves.
And the honest but silent ones will only have themselves to blame. If only, when CAGW became such a powerful controversy, they had examined it for themselves or at least not acquiesced in the demonizing of those who were brave enough to remain sceptical, then science as a whole wouldn’t have become tarred with the same brush as the charlatans.
“…Risks Destroying The Reputation Of Science” When entire science academies worked to obscure the revelations of Climategate, I do believe that that ship of fools has already sailed.
@Gareth>The trap was set in the late 1970s or thereabouts ….
There is even an earlier precedent, where scientific research was similarly distorted to assist a political agenda. In the 1930’s the Soviet Union promoted Lysenko’s disastrous Lamarckian genetic theories. Those who disagreed with Lysenko’s theory were imprisoned or killed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trofim_Lysenko
Today climate activists have achieved international control over scientific research on a scale that dwarfs Lysenkoism, impeding or stamping out any research that contradicts the “consensus” theory.
😐
While I agree with the central premise of the author’s essay, I would argue that private industry is also responsible to a considerable degree in regard to the corruption of climate science. Once the enormous amounts of money at stake became visible to the captains of industry, they set about diverting as much as they could of it into their own pockets. Adept at it, they themselves became cheer leaders for bad science because it was good for business.
Carbon credits – one more commodity for the financial industry to set up a market for and skim a percentage off the top.
Oil and Gas – they pumped the meme because it improved their competitiveness versus coal
Windmill and solar manufacturers – subsidies created entire manufacturing sectors that otherwise would have been insignificant
Power generation – they were gleefully “forced” to accept “green” power into their grids, enabling them to obtain permission from regulators to raise prices accordingly, substantially increasing revenue.
I could go on, the list of beneficiaries in the private sector is exceedingly long. Once those industries had their noses in the trough right next to the public sector scientists, the whole thing veered off into lunacy with politicians being tugged toward rank stupidity in terms of economic policy by enviro loons, science loons and industry loons alike.
Costliest scientific mistake ever doesn’t begin to quantify the magnitude of the problem.
dfbaskwill says:
January 26, 2014 at 8:20 am
Science will be fine, thank you very much. Scientists who practice non-replicable “science” will not fare quite as well, despite what a few bristle-cone pines have to say.
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You beat me to it. Just seems to take a long time for the reputation of scientists to decline.
Eisenhower warned about this fifty years ago in his farewell address. Unfortunately, most people just read the part about the military-industrial complex and stop there, rather than continue on to the warnings about the links between government and the ‘scientific-technological elite’.
The only solution is to cut all taxpayer funding of science, completely; let scientists do something useful that people are willing to pay for, or nothing at all. We won’t lose much, as most of the taxpayers’ money goes on generating dubious studies that are soon contradicted by other dubious studies.
Really? The loss of scientific credibility began with man-made global warming? Funny, I remember some pretty bad science in the Silent Spring, the ozone hole, acid rain, ethanol, solar energy, electric cars and the environmental list goes on. Not to mention all the hullabaloo over string theory, dark matter, dark energy and the Higgs boson. The science of economics is in complete tatters. Computer science has seen some huge disasters, a lot of them in big business, not just government. Medicine has seen some huge blunders (Eggs are bad for you! Or was it the bacon included in the test?). I think there’s more self promotion going on today than science. I wouldn’t trust a statement from a scientist further than I could spit it.
If this is the way it is going to go then there will be ‘blood on the floor’.
The cost of the entire farrago has been eye watering.
Meanwhile, some of us are just trying to work out how the climate system really works.
Motivated only by curiosity and our love of the natural world.