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The Weather Channel pushes back against John Coleman
168 Comments
October 30, 2014 6:47 am
Recently, The Weather Channel’s Carl Parker suggested he might dress as Big Bird to mock Mitt Romney:
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/jeffrey-meyer/2014/10/27/why-weather-channel-mocking-mitt-romney
I suggested that someone dress as John Coleman (old man in suit and tie holding a big sign “CAGW = BS”
and post a picture of it to TWC’s photo page just to mock them. Any volunteer’s? I would but I don’t have the hair for it.
October 30, 2014 7:36 am
There are cracks in the wall: http://www.manilatimes.net/climate-alarmism-fosters-energy-poverty/137472/ . I wish we had more reporters like him, with nerve. I believe that this reporter will need some help.
October 30, 2014 7:39 am
Watch how easy it is to identify a biased source that states only 1 side. They state:
“Humans are also changing the climate on a more localized level. The replacement of vegetation by buildings and roads is causing temperature increases through what’s known as the urban heat island effect. In addition, land use changes are affecting impacts from weather phenomena. For example, urbanization and deforestation can cause an increased tendency for flash floods and mudslides from heavy rain. Deforestation also produces a climate change “feedback” by depleting a source which absorbs carbon dioxide”
No denying this fact above. But what about the conclusive evidence that shows the complete opposite with regards to humans increasing CO2? Our planet’s booming biosphere, vegetative health and increases in plant productivity, as well as record crop yields and food production……………….all because of increasing CO2?
How about the big contribution this is making to evapotranspiriation that is causing an increase in low level moisture and evidence of this causing a negative feedback by increasing low clouds and rains?(OK, on that last one, I wouldn’t expect them to actually get that reality)
Guess that doesn’t count if the intent is to prove your point and need to ignore the scientific method in order to do it.
October 30, 2014 7:44 am
If a place like the Weather Channel is so certain about their position, they should be willing to ‘put their money where their mouth is’. Why not sponsor a debate between three “deniers” (Spencer, Cristy, Evans come to mind), and three of their own? They could publicize it, webcast it, live broadcast it, etc.
Does anyone know how to throw down the gauntlet to them?
I don’t think that work means what you think it means.
Macroevolution is an even bigger example of groupthink and an aging, tottering paradigm ready to collapse than is CAGW. Even the Darwinists are jumping ship: http://www.evolutionnews.org/2014/04/lynn_margulis_e084871.html
“It reads like the arguments of Intelligent Design.
Disclaimer: I don’t believe in Darwinism (or Creationism either).
But ‘ID’, IMHO, offers the only plausible explanations for the “evolution” of the human brain, and the general observation that species seem to “improve” over time.
What “natural selection” process favored the development of our primate brains into integrated social systems, capable of building interplanetary spaceships? Did this ‘evolve’ naturally, to escape some particularly ferocious species of carnivores? Then why not evolve to climb a tree faster or higher? But the predators might follow, so the optimal solution might be to evolve “backwards”, eventually becoming some kind of low-IQ, mammalian roach that could slither under a rock.
Darwinism claims that lower forms of life can evolve to higher forms in a series of steps over time. But can higher forms of life evolve back into “primordial slime”?
No, the development of evolution always seems to be “forward”, towards some goal or destiny. Whereas bees have been destined to live in hives, naked mole-rats must live underground, like bees, in hive-like colonies. Humanoid life, OTOH, seems to be destined to swarm from their planetary cocoons and to spread throughout the neighboring cosmos.
It seems to me that “design laws” exist (that we haven’t discovered scientifically, yet) that explain and predict what forms and behaviors living creatures can have. In the same sense that there are “laws” which explain and predict what forms and functions molecules can have.
How else could you (easily) explain how flowers can mimic the forms of insects and birds (and vice versa). How is it possible for ants to cooperate socially to build an arch (from both sides simultaneously)? To create these engines “by chance” would require thousands of genetic parameters to be permuted and then selected and tuned in an impossibly short time, even over millions of years. If the “intelligent designs” already exist somehow (waving my hands), then only a handful of selection parameters might be required.
I think these so-called Intelligent Design laws will eventually be discovered by scientific discovery, along with the discovery of the Life Principle itself, which will explain consciousness and that motivating “spirit” (operating system kernel), which “lives” within all of us creatures, great and small, driving us to achieve our “evolutionary” goals.
But I digress, sorry for the OT remarks.
Well, Johanus, you sure do digress!
Perhaps we can redeem your relevance standing with an observation that the schism between John Coleman and the Weather Channel is an excellent example of “backwards” evolution.
This cannot, of course, by definition, be primordial slime that it reverts to but it might be subsequent, sententious slime and my guess is that further mutations will occur, out of phase with CO2 partial pressure variation.
“… John Coleman and the Weather Channel is an excellent example of “backwards” evolution.”
I am disappointed. You have it backwards. Coleman was the _founder_ of WC, which actually reported the weather when he ran it. So it had to have evolved into slime _after_ he left.
I’m surprised that you didn’t claim that the reason humanoids must evolve to the level of making rocket ships was for the reason of evacuating from planets enhanced with man-made CO2.
[But only warmists will leave. Bon voyage!]
Johanus,
You type faster than you think!
If your grasp of English were better, you would understand that “primordial” means “existing since the beginning”. THAT’s why it is “by definition” not an appropriate term.
John Coleman was primordial.
The Weather Channel is slime.
Now, do you get it?
Btw, theory of evolution doesn’t involve an intention on the part of an organism.
October 30, 2014 8:06 am
There is so much that is wrong with their position statement.
Are human activities causing it?
> How about are man-made greenhouse gases responsible for MOST of it?
The climate of the earth is indeed warming,
Global warming has been on a standstill for 18 years and counting.
Impacts can already be seen, especially in the Arctic, with melting glaciers, thawing permafrost, and rapid retreat and thinning of sea ice, all of which are affecting human populations as well as animals and vegetation. There and elsewhere, rising sea level is increasing coastal vulnerability.
Almost every single one of these observations has been made between 1880 to 1940. A time of less than 350ppm of co2.
There is evidence in recent years of a direct linkage between the larger-scale warming and shorter-term phenomena such as heat waves and precipitation extremes.
That’s called the weather and not the climate. Where is this computer simulated evidence??? Why don’t the Weather Channel call themselves ‘THE CLIMATE CHANNEL’?
October 30, 2014 8:42 am
….and rapid retreat and thinning of sea ice,….
Shhhhh, just don’t mention Antarctica. The Arctic appears to have had a temporary reprieve from it terminal, death spiral decline.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/plots/icecover/icecover_current_new.png
October 30, 2014 8:54 am
The climate of the earth is indeed warming, with an increase of approximately 1 – 1 1/2 degrees Fahrenheit in the past century, more than half of that occurring since the 1970s.
Funny how carefully and studiously they just ignored the past 18 years, a time-period when CO2 levels are higher than ever. Do they even believe the lies they are telling?
October 30, 2014 8:56 am
Delingpole unpacks the TWC position statement:
http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/10/30/Weather-Channel-comes-out-for-junk-science-scaremongering-and-global-warming
October 30, 2014 9:05 am
Actually, this statement makes the warmist position in a reasonable and clear manner. And I would certainly agree that it is a reason to continue investigating the Climate and collecting data. I’d even go so far as to agree to the spending of a few billions building experimental energy production like wind and solar farms, or to promote energy conservation. But as a reason to gut our energy infrastructure Or crippling our economy it’s simply to little.
Delingpole says it best.
………that hasn’t stopped Coleman’s old home the Weather Channel issuing a bizarre “position statement” in response.
It’s bizarre because you would expect that the point of a “position statement” would be to spell out the facts – whereas this one just muddies the water with exaggerations, half-truths and straw men……..
The position statement sound like something a 16 year old Kool Aid drinker would parrot out.
I don’t understand what you mean. Everything in that statement was factually true, as far as we can discern. Certainly the interpretation of those facts are open for debate. I personally seriously doubt that Global Warming is a danger or even mostly man made. But I understand why warmists would believe it is. As to whether they believe it or are just milking it, that’s really not mine to say.
Investigating the climate should be impartial, don’t you think? Yet the whole IPCC is constrained to look only at one side – human caused climate change, as is mandated in their charter. This is the whole problem.
And that is exactly the problem with the statement “this makes the warmist position in a reasonable and clear manner,” because all it is doing is presenting evidence for their position and ignoring evidence against, of which there is a great deal. And it’s worse because the “evidence” they purport to present doesn’t even hold up to scrutiny.
The IPCC is a construct of the rent-seeking UN.
This group of useless folks spend their (well paid but meaningless) lives in search of justifications for a global tax…thus the IPCC is created to market the “sky is falling” side of what thus far has been a reasonably effective effort to scare the hell out of millions of people. The very last thing the UN crowd wants is a fair & balanced analysis of the (accurate) data.
Nobody even tallies up the human misery due to this foolishness.
October 30, 2014 9:27 am
These heat mongers do not understand that ice caps were melting on Mars and other Planets at the same time Earth’s was melting. They talk of melting Artic Ice and show you the Western section, heated from beneath by volcanic activity. They hide the old (verified) news accounts of warm weather the Artic in the 1930’s :
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/03/16/you-ask-i-provide-november-2nd-1922-arctic-ocean-getting-warm-seals-vanish-and-icebergs-melt/
They need you to believe that the Arctic has never been as warm as it is now. That is how researchers get grants-who’s going to pay for “old news”.
The name change from global Warming to Climate Change should have caused the average intelligent being to ask why. The Climate Change group shouts it’s changed, because it is a better reflection of what is actually occurring-I say Bull. They changed the name when they found no warming. The Earth is very old, but they would have you believe that 100 years is enough to get the “big picture”-liars! You do not want to go back to periods of time when temperatures were much warmer than they are now.
Early on, they told us the warm would melt all ice caps, cancel Christmas, and leave children to wonder what snow used to look like-rubbish- But wait, the Climate Change group has some fancy dance steps and are now in “change mode-again”. They tell us the warm is causing the cold and Arctic ice growth and the cold could last for 30 or more years (too late-already predicted by solar scientist). They even have begun to post stories that show they know about other influences on weather:
http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-blogs/climatechange/ocean-conveyor-impact-on-clima/36421863.
This, in response to the little effect Carbon Monoxide has on climate, which they will toss to the background in future years. This reminds me of the witchcraft era when if placed in lake you were a witch if you drowned. If you did not drown, you were a witch that could not die. No matter what the future weather be it colder or warmer-it’s all do to climate change. In a way, they are correct, however natural forces cause global climate changes; humans do not cause it.
When they write, “Humans are also changing the climate on a more localized level. The replacement of vegetation by buildings and roads is causing temperature increases through what’s known as the urban heat island effect’, they forget that many of the
October 30, 2014 9:30 am
‘This is also the conclusion drawn, nearly unanimously, by climate scientists.’
Firstly given that even if 100% of catholic priests said god existed despite their ‘expertise ‘ that still does not make it automatically true and secondly the reality is this claim has ‘NO FOUNDATION ‘ as we simple do not know how many ‘ climate scientists’ there are , in fact we don’t even have a shared definition of what makes a ‘climate scientists’ in the first place , given its a term used for railway engineers and failed politicians.
The only thing that backs this claim is poor research, and if your making such great claims I think its more than fair to ask for very good standard of evidenced expected within science, which was not just poor in pratice but highly biased in nature and even that in no way established what all or even most ‘climate scientists.’ think on the subject . From day one this claim has failed both on mathematical and logical terms.
October 30, 2014 9:47 am
Good to see John Coleman on The Kelly File providing a refreshing non-alarmist viewpoint in CAGW. It leaves me thinking though that there is a hole in Fox News’ programming today that needs to be filled.
With nearly every MSM news outlet today toeing the climate alarmist party line (TWC obviously included), I believe it would behoove the Fox News Channel (FNC) to bring in one or two scientists from the skeptics community to host a weekly half-hour or hour-long program. On the show, the scientist-hosts would present all of the scientific evidence which pokes holes in and falsifies this CAGW nonsense. The material would need to be presented in an easy-to-understand format that the average Joe can comprehend (which should not be hard I would think). From my following of WUWT, it seems to me that there is enough going on in the climate camp today to provide the necessary material to fill a weekly half-hour or hour-long show on a regular basis.
FNC is the obvious choice for this program since it is the only MSM outlet without a leftist bias that isn’t toeing the CAGW party line. The program would obviously ruffle the feathers of the CAGW camp, and it would be good to see it happen. If the CAGW propaganda campaign is to be exposed for what it is today, this is something which is sorely needed.
John Coleman might be a good choice for the show although he is getting on in his years now. He most likely is in need of and deserving of well-earned retirement. It would probably be best if he only contributed to the programming material in the background–if he played a role in the program at all. There are any number of other skeptical scientists out there who might do well as the host or hosts of this program in lieu of Mr. Coleman.
I plan of writing to FNC via email and suggest this very thing to them. I would like to suggest and ask that other followers/readers here at WUWT do the same. Climate change is enough of a hot button issue today to conclude that this program is something that is needed if the light at the end of this dark CAGW tunnel is to be seen approaching at a healthy and satisfying speed.
…..this idea is not to suggest that Anthony is not doing a commendable job of disseminating the contrary and falsify evidence to shoot down CAGW. He most certainly is doing so. The program on FNC is meant to be a supplement to Anthony’s blog and to assist him in beating down this climate fraudulence.
Recent polls show that conservative and self-named Republican folks (maybe the core of Fox News types) don’t think “climate change” is an important issue. The other group (progressives and Democrats) do think it is, but they do not constitute a big part of the audience of FNC.
Likely a climate show would hurt ratings. Don’t see them going there.
October 30, 2014 10:13 am
Three main questions, which are unfortunately along the lines of “When did you stop beating our wife?”
1. “Is global warming a reality?”
BAD question. The question is, “The earth has been warming and cooling since it’s inception, how can we determine what cycle are we in now?
2. Are human activities causing it?
BAD question. The question is, “How do we determine all of the major factors that affect climate? Human activity may or may not be an important factor.”
3. What are the prospects for the future?
BAD question. The question is, “Who is stupid enough to predict weather centuries into the future especially not knowing the answer to question 2.
In any investigative matter, the questions are more important than the answers. Ask a doo-doo question, you’ll get a doo-doo answer. Ask the right question and you’ll get a good, meaningful answer. For climate science articles like this, the answers are the only important thing. Like a guilty criminal they do not want good questions.
The Weather Channel posted this yesterday, no doubt to counter TWC founder John Coleman’s recent Open Letter and appearance on Fox’s Kelly File (several comments make the connection):
Global Warming: The Weather Channel Position Statement
Introduction
The scientific issue of global warming can be broken down into three main questions: Is global warming a reality? Are human activities causing it? What are the prospects for the future?
Warming: Fact or Fiction?
The climate of the earth is indeed warming, with an increase of approximately 1 – 1 1/2 degrees Fahrenheit in the past century, more than half of that occurring since the 1970s. The warming has taken place as averaged globally and annually; significant regional and seasonal variations exist.
Impacts can already be seen, especially in the Arctic, with melting glaciers, thawing permafrost, and rapid retreat and thinning of sea ice, all of which are affecting human populations as well as animals and vegetation. There and elsewhere, rising sea level is increasing coastal vulnerability.
There is evidence in recent years of a direct linkage between the larger-scale warming and shorter-term phenomena such as heat waves and precipitation extremes. The jury is out on exactly what effects global warming is having or will have upon tropical cyclones or tornadoes.
Human Influence
To what extent the current warming is due to human activity is complicated because large and sometimes sudden climate changes have occurred throughout our planet’s history — most of them before humans could possibly have been a factor. Furthermore, the sun/atmosphere/land/ocean “climate system” is extraordinarily complex, and natural variability on time scales from seconds to decades and beyond is always occurring.
However, it is known that burning of fossil fuels injects additional carbon dioxide and other so-called greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. This in turn increases the naturally occurring “greenhouse effect,” a process in which our atmosphere keeps the earth’s surface much warmer than it would otherwise be.
More than a century’s worth of detailed climate observations shows a sharp increase in both carbon dioxide and temperature. These observations, together with computer model simulations and historical climate reconstructions from ice cores, ocean sediments and tree rings all provide strong evidence that the majority of the warming over the past century is a result of human activities. This is also the conclusion drawn, nearly unanimously, by climate scientists.
Humans are also changing the climate on a more localized level. The replacement of vegetation by buildings and roads is causing temperature increases through what’s known as the urban heat island effect. In addition, land use changes are affecting impacts from weather phenomena. For example, urbanization and deforestation can cause an increased tendency for flash floods and mudslides from heavy rain. Deforestation also produces a climate change “feedback” by depleting a source which absorbs carbon dioxide.
more…
http://www.weather.com/news/science/environment/global-warming-weather-channel-position-statement-20141029
h/t to WUWT reader Pat.