Guest essay by By Christopher Monckton of Brenchley
The Guardian, one of the fastest-collapsing “legacy” news media in Britain, is bleeding circulation more rapidly than almost any other national newspaper. One reason, perhaps, is that on the question of the climate it has long ceased to be even remotely credible.
A recent piece by Ketan Joshi on a Guardian blog trots out, yet again, the notion of “an already well-established scientific consensus on the influence of human activity on climate change”. Inevitably, there is a link to the discredited Cook et al. paper pretending there is a “97% consensus” to the effect that most of the global warming since 1950 was manmade. Unaccountably, there is no link to the subsequent paper by Legates et al. (2013), who showed that Cook et al. had themselves marked only 0.5% of the 11,944 abstracts they examined as explicitly endorsing the “consensus” as they had defined it.
The good news (regarded by Mr Joshi as bad news, of course) is that “The most recent survey of public views on anthropogenic global warming, the CSIRO’s fourth annual survey of Australian attitudes to climate change, show 39% of Australians reject a human role in global warming, a further 8% think the climate isn’t changing at all, and 6% can’t say either way.”
Take-home message: notwithstanding decades of relentless propaganda, more than half of those surveyed have not been taken in by the imagined (and imaginary) “97% consensus”.
More good news: “When asked to rank 16 social issues in terms of importance, climate change came third last. You’d be hard pressed to find any other form of scientific denialism [that hate-speech word again] with such a significant impact on the priorities of Australians.”
Mr Joshi continues with a graphic by Cook, whom he entertainingly describes as a “climate science communication expert”, purporting to show that while the public think 55% of scientists agree on global warming the true consensus is 97%.
Appealing to consensus is not a very grown-up way to conduct a scientific argument. It is the logical fallacy of the argumentum ad populum. But it is enough to fool your average “legacy” news journo, an incurably lazy beast at the best of times, into thinking that the Party Line just might – notwithstanding the volcano of real-world evidence – be right after all.
Trouble is, graphics like that of Cook are effective ways of conveying falsehoods as though they were truths. Well, it’s time to do it back to Them by using graphics as effective ways of dispelling Their falsehoods and illustrating the truths of science. I’m compiling a book of graphs and other images, impeccably sourced and accurately presented, that display the truth in a manner that cannot be dismissed or denied.
Here is an accurate graphic on the “consensus”, as determined from the data file eventually released by Cook et al.:
There seems to be something shoddy about popularizing the truth via colorful graphics rather than relying on the obscure, fuzzy charts that are the norm in most scientific journals. Yet if They colorize Their lies, we must popularize the objective scientific truth by making it visible to those who cannot read equations.
Mr Joshi maunders on: “Cook terms this the ‘consensus gap’. It’s precisely the outcome we’d expect from a systematic effort to distance public opinion from the outcomes of science. It’s likely this gap has been forced open by the efforts of conservative media commentators producing a relentless output of doubt.”
It’s also what one would expect given a growing awareness among all but the invincibly ignorant that my graphic is true. The “consensus” is now known to be 0.5%, not 97%.
Readers of WUWT are invited to join in the fun. Let me know, via comments, which your favorite graphs or other visual images are. I’ll include the best ones in the book.
Footnote. The Eschenbach Rule applies. If you want to take issue with what I have said here, don’t be a climate Nazi (© Roy Spencer, MMXIV). Please cite me accurately rather than rewording what I have said to suit the Reichspropagandaamt.
David L. Hagen says:
February 26, 2014 at 12:14 pm
Re: “don’t be a climate Nazi (© Roy Spencer, MMXIV)”
Please correct. Roy Spencer actually posted: Time to push back against the global warming Nazis
Too many of us for too long have ignored the repulsive, extremist nature of the comparison. It’s time to push back.
I’m now going to start calling these people “global warming Nazis”.
Yeah, but he may have chosen “global warming Nazis” because
Climate Change Nazi and Climate Disruption Nazi was already used.
>>> invincibly ignorant <<<
Good God man, you have a gift!
How about one of these?
http://media3.picsearch.com/is?_FTDphTFgmaWMly6lMm8lem9XqENhL2-yZmwUMyxDcg&height=341
http://media1.picsearch.com/is?ZDUthKW69UlSAyQmNzmzLbknZ2rcTd6jztWefvF7eO0&height=260
(Of course you’d have to rename it the “Clitanic”.)
I would like to see graphs that show surface temps from around 1990 and the newer versions. Concentrating on Medieval warming period and others showing the pre and post updated version like GISS for example.
I am not sure if the one that show high CO.2 and ice ages (Dr. Moore just mentioned this in his testimony the other day) would be effective, but I would think so.
How about a skeptical version of the “step” gif used at skeptical science. Showing how the 1910-1940 increase is eerily similar to the warming from 1975 to 2000.
Good luck!
Ed, ‘Mr’ Jones says:
February 26, 2014 at 12:33 pm
>>> invincibly ignorant <<<
Good God man, you have a gift!
————————————————
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invincible_ignorance_(Catholic_theology)
Michael Moon says:
“Zimmerman was a grad student, actually did the entire thing herself as classwork for Doran.”
Actually Zimmerman did it as a thesis in partial fulfillment for a Masters degree. Doran was her graduate adviser.
http://vufind.carli.illinois.edu/vf-uic/Record/uic_2145399
I have long said that the only way to shut them up, is to use their tactics against them. Either they will pipe down, or they’ll change their tactics because “their” tactics are now “our” tactics. If graphics catch low information readers, then we should use them. Same style, same font etc-with just a little difference so people can tell the difference and with the TRUTH on them. Subconsciously people WILL start to register that just because it’s in a red circle or uses a “professional” looking image doesn’t mean it’s true. It’s the WHOLE REASON Cook changed his current course of study from “science” to communications. He’s studying social sciences and how to “influence” people subtlety with propaganda. Scarey little man that he is.
So I’m all for it Lord M! Give me all their best graphics with the truth in them. I can’t wait to post them in response every time one of their fallacies get’s posted somewhere.
I was always fond of the “green bars” chart published By Lawrence Solomon in the Financial Post, depicting how rare it is to be living in such a confortable clime and how soon much colder temperatures may soon prevail. Reported by WUWT over four years ago:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/01/inbetweeners-enjoy-the-warmth-while-it-lasts/
dbstealey says:
February 26, 2014 at 12:11 pm
mpcraig,
Re: your ‘interesting graphics’, there is a problem with that.
__________________________________________________________
I guess I should have put “interesting” in quotes because I’m well aware of the problems with those graphs.
The first and most obvious is that the Oregon Petition statement doesn’t indicate that it “disagrees with human-induced climate change”. That’s a blatant misrepresentation of the actual statement of which the main point is:
“There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.”
I had interpreted that Monckton also was going to include a section on ridiculous or distorting pictures as well. That’s what I meant by “interesting”.
Too many words on the 99.5% graphic. It will be confused with Cook’s by the minimally-informed. You must keep it simple.
John Who
Global warming fascist
By “Global warming Nazi”, Roy Spencer was is pointing out that global warming extremists/alarmists are imposing their beliefs on all others by dictatorial authoritarian methods. The Nazis were the worst example.
An equivalent characterization is: “Global warming fascist”
See the definition of facism:
See usage:
Global warming fascist.
Eco-Facists
Eco-facism
Climate facism
Climate Facist
Denier or “scientific denialism” (whatever they mean by that), it’s clearly just a projection of guilt now.
@ur momisugly mpcraig
How many scientists have said in writing that they haven’t seen credible evidence suggesting the North American Wood Ape exists?
KenW
The bar graph you would like to see would need to be plotted on logarithmic paper to make the 64 papers even visible, as the two values are three orders of magnitude different. And then we would be accused of cooking the numbers (pun intended) by plotting on a logarithmic scale rather than actual values.
So….45% of Brits are getting their all their climate info from watching Fox News.
Who knew?
cn
My favourite graph is at http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcet/ – not only does it come from the longest temperature record in the world, it shows the current cooling, and it shows a lot of warming and cooling periods in the past.
Thanks, Christopher.
The CSIRO’s survey report is the public view, as opposed to the argument that there is consensus amongst scientists. The alarmists will argue that the public are stupid and ignorant, or have been swayed by denialists. They will still argue that the scientists all agree that AGW will be catastrophic, therefore we must [insert ideologically inspired policy agenda].
The problem is that in trying to frame the consensus statement there is an innate inability, or sometimes wilful refusal, to quantify. When we say “97% scientists agree X”, then we need to be very clear what X is. Cook et al were testing “explicit or implicit endorsement of human-caused global warming”, and because this is unquantified this could mean humans cause a trivial amount of warming, or humans have caused dangerous warming. Of course to alarmists it means “AGW is catastrophic”. Because there is no clarity around what scientists are supposed to be agreeing on, the consensus statement is meaningless.
And Legates et al demonstrates how it is possible to interpret that lack of quantification to suggest that scientists agree on the opposite viewpoint to the alarmist view.
On images of consensus, I rather like (A HREF=”http://sppiblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/sheep1.jpg”> this one.
http://sppiblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/sheep1.jpg
Lao Tzu in Art of War would never respond to chants from the enemy because its just playing their game with their narrative adopting their framing. e.g the denier word. So i despair when people respond to them using the word nazi etc because it means they have framed the debate so one is always being reactionary and without the initiative.
The same with statistics. People have a distrust of them anyway.
In war you identify where people are weak and hit with speed and surprise. Where is the co2 deathstar camp weak?
1. Their predictions are based on unverified models that cannot model historical climate so why even look at their predictions and place huge billion dollar tax money bets on them? Ask people why they promote predictions from unverified models that cannot model historical known climate?
2. Their use of world averages. World averages hide a lot of regional sins and give the impression their data is valid globally [global is a key word for them]. e.g world temp av and world sea level rise av [tide gauges show drops of -6mm in cases]
3.taxes can micro manage climate
there are more but space is limited
the munch scream kinda sums the ‘a co2 deathstar is coming to kill us’ mindset up imo and if you want to live in a munch scream the fast decaying magnetic shield would give u more to scream about than warming. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scream
mwhite says: February 26, 2014 at 11:31 am
Name 97 of them??
Close. More like
you gotta name 32 warmists for every skeptic I name.
Anthony Watts says: February 26, 2014 at 11:40 am
See: http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/weareskeptics.jpg
Like you three hoplites are worried about getting stabbed by icicles. Sure.
Here’s my favorite graph, poster child for improving the “raw” USHCN data.
http://www.rockyhigh66.org/stuff/olney_raw_anim.gif
97% R 95% certain it COULD be and 0% R certain it WILL be and 31 years of nothing beyond COULD BE proves it won’t be a cataclysmic climate blame crisis. Deny that!
if you have the funds just make a measured documentary with a richard curtis style dismantling of An Inconvenient Truth. u might even get a nobel prize lol
An Inconvenient Truth says it ‘ ultimately shows us that global warming is no longer a political issue but rather, the biggest moral challenge facing our civilization today’. So they not even selling science but politics and morality?
what has politics and morality to do with predictions from unvalidated models that cannot model past history? I would get psychologists in to comment on what type of personality bases politics and morality upon fictions and myths of ‘co2 deathstars coming to kill us all’?
it would probably fit the official criteria for a cult?
basically you are trying to talk down severe anxiety/hysterical people who are/have been convinced the end of the world is coming [which is childish].
its not easy to know what to do. but one can identify what NOT to do. one needs the skills of a psychologist.to reassure and stablise them in a comfort zone.These are highly stressed out people with no sense of humour so making them laugh [at themselves] is a good way because they know deep down there are flaws and contradictions in their calculations but they are just too terrified to admit it..
an airplane! type comedy film on climate science would work.
as long as they think you are ‘the enemy’ they won’t fight among themselves [which they will]
I saw a great cartoon years ago on a different topic, but still a taxation issue, that could possibly be adapted.
Two panels. The first one shows how many cars and houses (for example) Al Gore has now. The next panel shows 2/3 of them gone. The caption reads, “This is how many he will have left if we implement de-carbonization of the economy. How many will you have left?
From the title, I thought this would be pictures of mother Nature’s graphic pushback. (All the snow and cold)