The royal prince in waiting of Britain labels climate skeptics as “headless chickens”.
From The Telegraph:
Prince Charles has criticised climate change deniers, describing them as the “headless chicken brigade” during an awards ceremony recognising a leading young green entrepreneur.
Charles, who has campaigned for years to reduce global warming, also spoke out against “the barrage of sheer intimidation” from powerful anti-climate change groups during the event held at Buckingham Palace last night.
The mark of a true leader is bringing people with diverse views and backgrounds together, clearly with this recent pronouncement, Prince Charles clearly has failed as a leader.
I’ll point out a few things the prince who may be king should know, but doesn’t, or chooses not to.
1. Rational climate skeptics don’t doubt that some portion of the proposed greenhouse effect is real, it’s just that nobody (and that includes many scientists) seems to be able to agree upon how much. The few who actually deny the Greenhouse effect exists, such as the “Slayers” aka “Principia Scientific” only represent the views of a fringe.
2. Item 1 then leads to arguments about climate sensitivity, values are literally “all over the map”:
3. The global climate isn’t responding as it was predicted by government scientists, the trend over the last 12 years is basically flat:
Compare that to climate sensitivity predictions, which center around .2°C
The three graphs above are from Michaels and Knappenberger in this post.
4. The response of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is nearing saturation, which may explain why there is little warming over the last 12 years:
Figure 4 is from this WUWT post: Sensitivity Training: Determining the Correct Climate Sensitivity
5. While rational climate skeptics point out reality based factual inconsistencies with warming projections, the global warming movement has been hijacked by emotional activists, such as Bill McKibben and Al Gore, who use emotional pleas and invective to motivate people. You won’t see them ever show the graphs above because they don’t deal in facts, only emotional appeals.
6. By making an emotional label about climate skeptics, instead of dealing with facts, Prince Charles demonstrates that’s he’s no different than Bill McKibben and Al Gore. Given recent opinion polls, he’s basically called about half of his potential subjects “the headless chicken brigade”, yet it is he who seems to be centered on the emotionalism and randomness more suited to that label.
Perhaps there is a reason the Queen has held on so long.
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As a Brit living in London, II actually find this man rather vile
How likely is it that a “King Charles” would use the Crown’s seldom exercised authority to implement a green agenda?
( I suppose I’m asking those who are familiar with British politics.)
richardscourtney says:
February 3, 2014 at 12:53 pm
I’m currently sitting in a library, and logged onto the web, but my readings do not fully support your assertions.
For example, read Benjamin Freedman, or F. William Engdahl concerning the origins of WWI, or Fromkin’s A Peace to End All Peace.
Freedman:
I agree that this is straying a bit off-topic, but that is one of the risks/benefits of lively minds engaged in debate, or as the esteemed Adlai E. Stevenson put it:
I have nothing to add about Prince Charles, except that I find the very idea of royalty to be one of the lower achievements of our species.
Sic semper evello mortem tyrannis
Gunga Din:
Thankyou for your correcting my serious typo. I tend to ‘see’ what I intended to write and not what I wrote when checking my own typing.
You ask
The Crown’s Authority is used all the time as I explained to you earlier.
Nobody can know how Charles would use it. As can be inferred from my explanation for you of the role of the monarch, our monarch is similar to your Constitution. Hence, in effect our Constitution alters when the monarch changes.
The monarch can choose his own advisors and Charles seems likely to appoint Jonathon Porritt as one of them. That would encourage him to adopt an extreme position on ‘green’ issues.
However, there are severe constraints on his adopting any extreme position on anything.
His upbringing is the greatest constraint on his adopting any extreme position. From birth he has been raised to be King. When he puts on the Crown then he adopts his role of total service and his training from birth ‘should’ take over.
Then life could be made difficult for him by the Establishment. This has high risk and would not be adopted lightly.
In the ultimate he could be pressured to abdicate if he were to pursue too extreme a personal agenda. This happened to his great uncle, Edward VIII. However, the ‘lever’ to oust him was to make him choose between marriage and the Crown (I commend you to view the film ‘The King’s Speech’ (2010) if you have not seen it). I cannot see any such ‘lever’ to apply to Charles, but I am sure MI5 must know a few. And it has such tremendous risk that it would only be used if there was a perceived threat to the existence of the nation (as was the case with Edward VIII in 1936)
And that is the closest approximation to an answer which can be given. Sorry.
.
Richard
Steve P:
Your post at February 3, 2014 at 2:24 pm is VERY off-topic and my post provided “facts” on WW2, not WW1.
Find somewhere else and someone else to debate your views of distant history.
Richard
Thank you, Richard. It sounds like “tradition” and possible pressure might keep him in check.
(I did see “The King’s Speech”. A remarkable man. May your nation have more like him.)
richardscourtney says:
February 3, 2014 at 11:17 am
Secondly, I have followed all of this thread and I have seen no claims that Charles is “the enemy”. Several people have claimed he is a deluded fool and in a way he is: the search for meaning in his present life makes him susceptible to foolish ‘guidance’ by a titled, rich and nearby extremist like Porritt.
Not so deluded after all…
“The Royal Family have secured a lucrative deal that will earn them tens of millions of pounds from the massive expansion of offshore windfarms.
“They will net up to £37.5 million extra income every year from the drive for green energy because the seabed within Britain’s territorial waters is owned by the Crown Estate.
“Under new measures announced by Chancellor George Osborne last week, the Royals will soon get 15 per cent of the profits from the Estate’s £6 billion property portfolio, rather than the existing Civil List arrangement.
“Experts predict the growth in offshore windfarms could be worth up to £250 million a year to the Crown Estate. There are already 436 turbines in operation around the UK’s 7,700-mile coastline – but within a decade that number is set to reach nearly 7,000.
“Prince Charles is a vociferous campaigner for renewable energy sources such as these, but is opposed to turbines being erected on land – particularly near his own homes.”
continued on:
https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2010/10/24/queens-38m-a-year-offshore-windfarm-windfall-because-she-owns-the-seabed/
Some have made a good case accusing the Queen of treason against the people, the charge levelled against Charles I…
http://www.britsattheirbest.com/freedom/f_british_constitution.htm
Richard
Thanks for your reply. I didn’t know about the Porrit thing,
There is definitely the making of a really good conspiracy theory here if we weave a few threads together,
1. As you say Porrit “owns” Charles. This could be part of a bigger conspiracy theory that the Establishment owns conservation. As the Telegraph put it “it could, I suppose, only happen in Britain. For much of the Nineties, three of Britain’s bolshiest environmental pressure groups were led by a baronet, a hereditary peer and a prince of the realm. Prince Philip Mountbatten, Duke of Edinburgh, Earl of Merioneth and Baron of Greenwich was the international head of the World Wide Fund for Nature (aka the World Wildlife Fund). Peter Robert Henry Mond, 4th Baron Melchett, ran Greenpeace in Britain. And the director of Friends of the Earth was one the Hon Sir Jonathon Espie Porritt Bt.”
2. The Royals are seeking to enrich themselves by getting wind farms built-off shore where they get 15% of the profits. While looking like champions of the countryside AND fighting CAGW they are really rebuilding their coffers for their cunning plan….
3. They get the current government (all part of the Establishment, note) to cancel the Civil List that is controlled by parliament and instead put in a “Sovereign Support Grant” that is independent (and boosted by wind farm revenues). This means that they no longer have to operate cautiously as they are set free with their own financial resources.
4. They get their friends in Hollywood to produce films that show what good people they are (e.g. the Kings Speech) so people tend to trust them. The Royal Baby coverage is also part of the re-launch package orchestrated by their friends in the UK media.
5. Then, at some point in the future, they start to take over and implement their agenda.
If anyone has got the requisite green ink or swivel eyes then please could they write this up (maybe as a book?) and put in the public domain.
Thanks
PS the other one to watch is that Bill Gates fellow. He’s up to something too….
Jon Leach:
This thread is growing old but should you be “coming back to this site, after a while”:
Richard Courtney may be right that it would take a book to refute what you wrote. I will not try but I have a few thoughts. You start with:
Huh? The only way you could say that is if you did not read what’s written on these pages, or if it didn’t matter to you because you are a troll not really interested in the discussion. If I give you the benefit of doubt I must assume that you read just a little bit but your urge to tell us what you think prevented you from reading any further. Anyone who spends any meaningful amount of time following the arguments at this site knows that there are deep and passionate disagreements even among the regular posters. You do not know it.
I am sorry to say I know a few people who start their arguments with such arrogant statements.
I find them really tiresome and avoid them as much as possible. If you try to influence anyone’s thinking you don’t start by insulting their intelligence and motivation. You and Prince Charles could benefit from a Dale Carnegie course.
And finally: You seem to believe that you have profound insights into the heart and mind of Prince Charles. I have no clue if you are right but if so you did not do him any favors by telling the world about it.
One gets the distinct sense that Her Majesty the Queen is performing her duty as a true Steward of the generations, rather than acting like one ( to paraphrase your words). Prince Charles, on the other hand, is acting more like you did in your comment: imprudently, condescendingly and self-righteously.
God save the Queen. And God save us all if even more people with the attitudes exhibited by you and Prince Charles get in a position of power over us.
I should like to point out that SOME FLUNKY writes those speeches, and they probably hardly even register in the brain of His Royal Highness. He is SENT to give the speech which is written for him to say, and is merely a Puppet of “The Establishment” (err whatever that is anyhoo), Prince Charles is just an Ad Hoc Performer, who can be called upon a moments notice to spout some drivel or other on behalf of whoever the British Civil Service Mandarins decide, and that’s it really in a nutshell.
Ian Skelly, Long Standing Malthusian Sustainability Freak from the BBC
is one such Speechwriter and filmmaker, who fills the Prince’s Head with
all this drivel and poppycock. Skelly has made plenty cash from projects
that he has involved the Prince with, and has even managed to finagle
the Prince to be Patron of his “Arts” Charity, to further “Philosophy” among
the underprivileged of the World.
Skelly I am calling you out – STOP IT NOW !!!!!!
Just my opinion, and nobody else’s (unless you know different)
See the full swish Ian Skelly Website and ask : –
“is this a man to advise the future King of England?”
Click My Name Please to see ….
—– Ach Tongue !
jon leach:
re your post at February 4, 2014 at 4:40 am.
I have not said, suggested or implied any consp1racy. Any implication that I have is wrong, is untrue, and is possibly malign.
Richard
Ach Tongue:
At February 4, 2014 at 11:34 am you assert
Rubbish!
Most of the speeches by Prince Charles will be written – in whole or in part – by a speech writer. That is true of most speeches by most public figures everywhere.
People – including the civil service – will commend subjects for speeches to Prince Charles. That is reasonable because we have Free Speech.
He cannot be “SENT to give the speech” and the heir to the throne is not – and cannot be – a “puppet” of anybody although his actions are constrained by the monarch.
He decides what speeches to make and approves what will be in those speeches using advice from his advisors whom he chooses.
Richard
RichardCourtney
You are quite right nothing you have said implied there was a conspiracy and i did not intend to malign you. I apologise for giving that impression.
I suppose (this may have been trolling, or an experiment in how conspiracy theories gain supporters, or probably both) but having scanned some (out of 300+) of the replies here, i perceived that the Hive Mind on this thread could be formulating a Conspiracy Theory. By making it explicit I wanted to see if anyone in the Hive would bite.
It would appear no one.
What does this mean?
People don’t perceive a conspiracy? There is no conspiracy? People who like conspiracy theories don’t like it when they are ribbed? Post NSA people are more careful?
jon leach says:
February 5, 2014 at 6:02 am
Ah, serious research. I’m sorry I got you wrong in my original post.
Steady. Don’t give up. Carry on. It’s all about methodology. Asking the right questions. There must be a paper in it.
Lewandowsky, Leach, Cook et al 2014.
Thanks for the re-rib – touche!
I kinda remember the Lewandowsky Incident but it (and he) does not appear to be notable enough to be found on Wikipedia much (although he/it is all over WUWT so maybe i should have said “touchy!” not “touche!”)
But thanks for the stimulation… Lewandosky does appear on Wikipedia on a page called “Debunking” (a rather dodgy page to my eye). This linked across to a thing called “WikiProject : Scepticism”. It turns out there is a long tradition of ribbing people about their “conspiracy theory” tendencies including this piece from 1998 on (i think) quantum physics called the Crackpot Index.
Have a look (its just for fun) but possibly bear in mind the published works of James Delingpole as you tot up the marks, especially towards the end of the list …
“The Crackpot Index
John Baez
A simple method for rating potentially revolutionary contributions to physics:
A -5 point starting credit.
1 point for every statement that is widely agreed on to be false.
2 points for every statement that is clearly vacuous.
3 points for every statement that is logically inconsistent.
5 points for each such statement that is adhered to despite careful correction.
5 points for using a thought experiment that contradicts the results of a widely accepted real experiment.
5 points for each word in all capital letters (except for those with defective keyboards).
5 points for each mention of “Einstien”, “Hawkins” or “Feynmann”.
10 points for each claim that quantum mechanics is fundamentally misguided (without good evidence).
10 points for pointing out that you have gone to school, as if this were evidence of sanity.
10 points for beginning the description of your theory by saying how long you have been working on it. (10 more for emphasizing that you worked on your own.)
10 points for mailing your theory to someone you don’t know personally and asking them not to tell anyone else about it, for fear that your ideas will be stolen.
10 points for offering prize money to anyone who proves and/or finds any flaws in your theory.
10 points for each new term you invent and use without properly defining it.
10 points for each statement along the lines of “I’m not good at math, but my theory is conceptually right, so all I need is for someone to express it in terms of equations”.
10 points for arguing that a current well-established theory is “only a theory”, as if this were somehow a point against it.
10 points for arguing that while a current well-established theory predicts phenomena correctly, it doesn’t explain “why” they occur, or fails to provide a “mechanism”.
10 points for each favorable comparison of yourself to Einstein, or claim that special or general relativity are fundamentally misguided (without good evidence).
10 points for claiming that your work is on the cutting edge of a “paradigm shift”.
20 points for emailing me and complaining about the crackpot index. (E.g., saying that it “suppresses original thinkers” or saying that I misspelled “Einstein” in item 8.)
20 points for suggesting that you deserve a Nobel prize.
20 points for each favorable comparison of yourself to Newton or claim that classical mechanics is fundamentally misguided (without good evidence).
20 points for every use of science fiction works or myths as if they were fact.
20 points for defending yourself by bringing up (real or imagined) ridicule accorded to your past theories.
20 points for naming something after yourself. (E.g., talking about the “The Evans Field Equation” when your name happens to be Evans.)
20 points for talking about how great your theory is, but never actually explaining it.
20 points for each use of the phrase “hidebound reactionary”.
20 points for each use of the phrase “self-appointed defender of the orthodoxy”.
30 points for suggesting that a famous figure secretly disbelieved in a theory which he or she publicly supported. (E.g., that Feynman was a closet opponent of special relativity, as deduced by reading between the lines in his freshman physics textbooks.)
30 points for suggesting that Einstein, in his later years, was groping his way towards the ideas you now advocate.
30 points for claiming that your theories were developed by an extraterrestrial civilization (without good evidence).
30 points for allusions to a delay in your work while you spent time in an asylum, or references to the psychiatrist who tried to talk you out of your theory.
40 points for comparing those who argue against your ideas to Nazis, stormtroopers, or brownshirts.
40 points for claiming that the “scientific establishment” is engaged in a “conspiracy” to prevent your work from gaining its well-deserved fame, or suchlike.
40 points for comparing yourself to Galileo, suggesting that a modern-day Inquisition is hard at work on your case, and so on.
40 points for claiming that when your theory is finally appreciated, present-day science will be seen for the sham it truly is. (30 more points for fantasizing about show trials in which scientists who mocked your theories will be forced to recant.)
50 points for claiming you have a revolutionary theory but giving no concrete testable predictions.
© 1998 John Baez
baez@math.removethis.ucr.andthis.edu“
I love the “climate change deniers” thing that the watermelon crowd trots out ad nauseam. I know of not a single soul who would deny that climate changes, although some seem to think that somehow it shouldn’t, and that we should impoverish millions or billions of people in a Quixotic effort to try to prevent it from doing so.
One might argue that “Planet of the Apes” was a metaphor, but I see it as more as an asymptote of civilization’s current sad trajectory, where even science (save, mercifully, for the Queen of the Sciences) has succumbed to venality and crass materialism on the path to a more generalized and profound retrogression.
It is, however, always darkest before the dawn, and the Second Renaissance is at hand.