You just have to laugh. After being taken to task yesterday on the removal of IPCC language that was done purely to bolster his own lame argument about how preventing global warming is the “cheap” option, Dana Nuccitelli responds to the challenge from Dr. Richard Tol in comments at the Guardian article with the patented Dana-dodge™. As Tol notes,
Dana does not quite know how to handle this http://t.co/XfRmZhiY2X
— Richard Tol (@RichardTol) April 23, 2014
Here is how Dana handles Tol’s charge about removal of the IPCC language, it’s hilarious!
Heh.
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Richard Tol (@RichardTol) says:
April 23, 2014 at 10:24 am
“For the record, I am no fan of Anthony Watts.”
We differ on many things. I prefer Ozric Tentacles.
Must make for a long day at the Uni going against the grain like you are. I know a little about personal attacks (most skeptics do). True academic freedom is showing what your research has revealed to you, and not being stoned in the courtyard for it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereolab
Very sad about Mary Hansen.
At least Dana is a climate scientist. He is, right?
psheraton says:
April 23, 2014 at 1:19 pm
“Dana Nuccitelli TV Interview on Typhoon Haiyan”
The VOICE! and… Al Jazeera! Hahaha!
Why people get so wound up about this “journalist” HAHAHAHAH! is beyond me?
he’s like some walking around with big fake nose on and then asking why people are laughing at him…so much!! why do you the Guardian hired him? to be a factual journalist HAHAHAHA (sorry about that) or to be advocate for their beliefs?
Dana can get put of his depth when standing on a pavement after a light rain shower .
Best ignore and let him and his friends indulge in the circle w**k they so much enjoy.
We are already spending 0.5% of GDP per year on green energy/climate change (which is a dead-weight loss) and it has not changed the CO2 emissions trajectory one iota.
Ah, but with it we have purchased a most invaluable commodity:
The knowledge that it is a dead-weight loss.
And that is a lesson (writ large) that may prove many times more valuable in the years to come — provided always that we choose to learn it. As Reagan once remarked, in a different context, “Don’t just do something. Stand there!”
And I laughed to myself at the men and the ladies
Who never conceived those billion-dollar babies
Dana is part of the “Cult”, blinded by the “revelation”, fantasizing about “saving the world”
The issue is 2.0% GDP growth per year is a nice sustainable rate which keeps unemployment steady/very slightly declining. Throw a -0.5% dead-weight loss into the mix and now you are going backwards. Unemployment is slightly rising, standard of living is slightly declining and social program spending is rising.
Manageable perhaps, but not progress in the traditional sense. If you are one of the countries spending more than the average -0.5% of GDP, you are then sliding faster down the hole.
If you are China, well, -0.5% on top of 8.0% GDP is not as much of a problem. But you are still not getting to First World status at the rate you wanted.
Okay, now you have to bump up the dead-weight loss to 3.0% or 4.0% of GDP per year to reach the targets the global warming theory/the IPCC/the greens want you to get to. 0.5% did nothing, but 3.0% or 4.0% might be a good start.
Now, the economy is permanently going backwards at a really bad rate. Your unemployment is reaching +50% for young people (as is now common in much of Europe). The last thing any country needs is a bunch of unemployed young men.
In the long-long-run, the decline in standard of living and the resulting unrest and the extent of unemployed young men results in an implosion of the country’s economy. The Greens are happy that some stupid target was met, but the castle walls are falling down and there is limited cave space and firewood to keep warm.
Sounds like a good strategy when the status-quo strategy was not resulting in any warming in any event. Shoot yourself in the chest first on the off chance that someone else will have shot you in the foot in some robbery or something. Can’t be in the convenience store when you are already in the hospital/intensive care.
The Grauniad is a trust fund kid. About a billion in endowments.
http://www.cjr.org/the_audit/the_trust-fund_newspaper.php?page=all
It could continue to lose money at the present rate for ever.
Bob Kutz says:
April 23, 2014 at 11:21 am
He has three very real problems with regard to his understanding and communication on climate change issues;
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
perhaps he needs more instruction from one John C(r)ook; Research fellow in climate communication at University of Queensland.
It’s worth returning to the comments and read the rest of the exchange between Dana and me (most of which took place after Anthony’s post). Dana doesn’t know his arse from his elbow. I don’t think he knew he was (mis)citing my work against me.
Bill Illis says:
April 23, 2014 at 11:32 am
We are already spending 0.5% of GDP per year on green energy/climate change (which is a dead-weight loss) and it has not changed the CO2 emissions trajectory one iota.
=================================================================
Bill, that is money spent from the budget. Europe is doing the same, or more so. Australia, ditto. Now comes the real hurt. These policies have cost jobs and dramatically increased the cost of ENERGY; the life blood of EVERY economy. This is far worse, and costs far more. (Trillions I venture.) Inexpensive energy is available, and the only real hope of pulling the economies of this world out of our self indulgent, expediency principle, ego driven power hungry deficits.
The back of the envelope margin of error in such studies must be very large. If we were currently at 280 PPM CO2, we would likely have about 12 to 15% less food!. (Was that considered in the economic projections?
To get to our current food supply (is we were in a 280 PPM world) we would likely need about15% more land, and more water. If we instantly dropped to 280 ppm , WWIII would break out within months. Is this in the economic calculations?.
Can some share a summary of how the IPCC calculates the harm from CO2?
I hope they do not take the ensemble model mean of all the models, which universally run way to warm compared to the observations, and from this wrong modeled basis, extrapolate more modeled what if scenarios, predicting more droughts, floods, hurricanes, extreme storms, sea level rise, ocean acidification, etc; all of which are observably not happening. I hope that is not what the IPCC did. If so, my back of the envelope calculations tells me their what if, models all they way down story, is not fit for human consumption.
Bob Kutz says:
April 23, 2014 at 11:21 am
I’ve had exchanges with Nuticello (sic) before.
He has three very real problems with regard to his understanding and communication on climate change issues;
1) He actually isn’t very bright. Its not that he doesn’t try to understand. He simply isn’t capable. Some very complicated issues go right over his head. He isn’t capable of arguing the point because he doesn’t even understand it. Witness the above. He is clueless as to what you mean. Or, in the parlance common here; a liberal arts major.
2) He has absolute certainty with regard to the truth of the matter. Or, as you and I would call it; blind faith. There is no question in his mind. So you, in arguing against him, are either evil or stupid. Which is it? Yes, this is how his brain works. He isn’t concerned with your argument and to the extent he engages you at all, he’s just trying to work out if you are just too stupid to get it or actually evil incarnate.
3) He has no ethical concerns about lying, slandering, editing comments and stories on his website or just plain name calling when he is clearly in over his head. You see, he is in the right, so anything he does, which others may see as unethical or evil, is justified by his correct position on CAGW. Noble cause corruption as I’ve heard it referred to here.
This makes him a proper candidate to ignore. On every level. Don’t visit his site, don’t comment on stories he is involved with and most of all stop posting any news of or stories about him.
In short, if you ignore him he will go away.
He will never admit he’s wrong and he will always resort to slander and lies when cornered. Eventually he may figure out that he’s in the wrong but he still won’t admit to it. Instead he will pretend like he never cared about the CAGW issue and figure out some other cause to assuage his ego and make himself feel less dense.
I’ve dealt with his type before.
……………………..
Sadly Bob – in my own small way – so have I.
Your analysis and description of those with blind faith in AGW is absolutely spot on.
Dana Nuccitelli is now seen as a joke by pretty much everyone.
I loved Bob Kutz description of 3 problems with Nuccitello (dim, blind faith and willing to lie for the cause). They apply perfected to many of his fellow travelers one of whom in particular comes to mind. Unfortunately I do not think they will go away just because you ignore them. So we can’t ignore them, can’t debate with them, and if we attack them we come across as angry and abusers of the intellectually meek. We must just keep putting the facts out there in a polite way.
But why do they get so much media coverage?
To cut to the chase, what was the reason for substituting the numbers with an ellipsis? There were no space constraints, this was a guardian opinion piece not a tweet.
Don’t be too hard on Dana, he’s merely living up to his reputation of being a Prattie Laureate.
http://thepointman.wordpress.com/2013/12/20/climate-prat-of-2013-we-have-a-winnah/
Pointman
Nuccitelli states:
“According to Hope’s model, the economically optimal peak atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration is around 500 ppm, with a peak global surface warming of about 3°C above pre-industrial temperatures (about 2°C warmer than present). ”
But as we see in the post above by Lord Monckton, according to St. Svante Arrhenius a doubling of CO2 produces a temperature increase of +1.6C. So an increase to 500ppm CO2 raises temperature by +2.0C but an increase to 800ppm only increases temperature by +1.6C.
Interesting. This means that an increase from 500ppm to 800ppm means an decrease of temperature of -0.4C.
Seems to me the sooner we get over the hump of 500ppm CO2 and get on the downslope the better.
On the Guardian Nucci-Tol exchange:
DanaNuccitelli RichardSJTol
24 April 2014 3:32pm
” “Carbon dioxide is not pollution. Your lungs are full of it.”
Oh come now, let’s not get into ridiculous non sequiturs. Carbon dioxide is pollution according to US law and the US Supreme Court, and hence it’s regulated as such.”
Well; maybe show this to the leftist foot soldiers, the ex “Question Authority” crowd.
Bob Kutz says:
He will never admit he’s wrong and he will always resort to slander and lies when cornered…
I’ve dealt with his type before.
We all have. The alarmist clique has lost the scientific argument decisively. But rather than man-up, they lash out with ad hominem slander.
Nuccitelli doesn’t seem to understand what a really despicable person he is.
Richard Tol (@RichardTol) says:
Nice work. I enjoyed reading it. 🙂
re: Bob Kutz says April 23, 2014 at 11:21 am
I’ve had exchanges with Nuticello (sic) before.
He has three very real problems with regard to his understanding and communication on climate change issues;
1) He actually isn’t very bright. Its not that he doesn’t try to understand. He simply isn’t capable.
Looking at his picture, he may be have been afflicted congenitally by Microcephaly*; we should maybe cut his some slack? (IOW, he may actually be retarded, possessing reduced maental capacity owing to circumstances beyond his control.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microcephaly
.
*Possibly caused by Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, Down Syndrome or PKU (Phenylketonuria) according to these guys http://www.healthline.com/symptom/microcephaly
I should have added above: “… as an alternative to a full-fledged exhibition of the Dunning-Kruger effect.”
.