Academics discover civlity –
Guest essay by Eric Worrall
A study into why skeptics are not persuaded by the apocalyptic predictions of broken climate models has concluded that the solution is better communication.
According to the Toronto Star;
““When talking to skeptics it is probably important to focus on aspects that both skeptics and believers have in common rather than the differences between them,” said Ana-Maria Bliuc, a behavioural social scientist at Australia’s Monash University and one of the authors of the study.
As an example, the focus could be on “things like cleaner air, low power consumption, improved public transport, better waste management, efficient agriculture, reforestation … (they) are all in public interest, regardless of position on climate change,” she said.
Improving communication between the two sides of this big divide could be an effective pathway to reaching consensus, said Bliuc.
According to the study abstract;
“Of the climate science papers that take a position on the issue, 97% agree that climate change is caused by humans, but less than half of the US population shares this belief. This misalignment between scientific and public views has been attributed to a range of factors, including political attitudes, socio-economic status, moral values, levels of scientific understanding, and failure of scientific communication. The public is divided between climate change ‘believers’ (whose views align with those of the scientific community) and ‘sceptics’ (whose views are in disagreement with those of the scientific community). We propose that this division is best explained as a socio-political conflict between these opposing groups. Here we demonstrate that US believers and sceptics have distinct social identities, beliefs and emotional reactions that systematically predict their support for action to advance their respective positions.
The key implication is that the divisions between sceptics and believers are unlikely to be overcome solely through communication and education strategies, and that interventions that increase angry opposition to action on climate change are especially problematic. Thus, strategies for building support for mitigation policies should go beyond attempts to improve the public’s understanding of science, to include approaches that transform intergroup relations.”
http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/nclimate2507.pdf
This isn’t the first time researchers have blamed “communication” for climate skepticism.
Given that the abstract bases its rather imprecisely defined assumption of climate consensus on the heavily discredited Cook study http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/12/19/97-articles-refuting-the-97-consensus-on-global-warming/ , I suspect there may be problems other than communication which need to be addressed, before a common understanding can be achieved.
It took researchers tax payer funded money to figure out what “How to Win Friends and Influence People” by Dale Carnegie could’ve told you? Or any business/self improvement/relationship/EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE book could’ve told you?
Holy crap.
SAB: Carnegie’s book should be required reading in schools. The most memorable quote I took from it,and which guided me in my professional life when dealing with others, was:
Don’t know if this is in Carnegie’s book, but another effective way to communicate is:
Praise in public, admonish in private.
A key reason that academics are academics is that they are devoid of people skills.
“Climate Science” academics are also devoid of science skills, too.
Great book. I try to re-read it once a year.
+1 to that. I reread that book each year too. Talk about a classic in human communication and relationships.
“””””…..Improving communication between the two sides of this big divide could be an effective pathway to reaching consensus, said Bliuc……”””””
So just who is interested in reaching “consensus” ??
We know what Dame Margaret Thatcher thought about “Consensus.”
Spot on final paragraph. What is this “scientific community”?
The ‘scientific community’ = people we pay via grant cheques to tell us to mend our ways or we’re all doomed.
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icouldnthelpit,
That was an uncalled for insult to serial killers.
icouldnthelpit & stormy223, good work, seems you both totally missed the point of the study.
well, if you actually took the time to read the unibomber’s manifesto, as well as that the work of that other sociopath, al gore, you would see the similarities….
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icouldnthelpit,
Well met. stormy223’s comment had me in stitches. If we must sling jibes, it does help if there’s some amount of class and wit to them.
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It’s the “climate science community” (aka trough-feeders) who sling the term “denier”.
If there’s balance needed, direct it that way.
(You’d think as much money as they confiscate they’d be a bit more appreciative.)
I can see that they wanted to nullify some brainwashing but it was a poor effort. They were not calling the scientific community serial killers because sceptics are a part of the the scientific community. This is why your rant, icouldn’thelpit, was so stupid as well.
Remember what preceded that. Academics who were IPCC authors and strayed from the party line with respect to non-scientific conclusions, were being written about as being like holocaust deniers and not simply ‘deniers of the science’ (which was completely off the mark).
And here I was, stars in my eyes, always wanting to be an”Author”. (Glad I decided to grow grapes instead, much more beneficial to humanity).
icouldnthelpit, this can be a trying lot.
Unpicking the top paragraph of the abstract, the “scientific community” in question are the authors of the 97% of papers on climate science that took a position on whether or not climate change is caused by humans.
Does anyone have an estimate of what proportion of the rest of the science world agree with their position?
A lot less than 97%.
I work with a lot of people who analyze massive amounts of data, primarily in the areas of telecommunications and consumer behavior. Among the top 10 most skilled that I know it’s 4 that would be on Al Gore’s crap list, 2 luke warmers 3 who would rather use his brain cells for other things, and one who believes AGW is highly plausible, but backs down pretty quickly when you ask him why. FYI, they all have PhD’s or have advanced degrees in math or statistics. I count myself in the group and my PhD is in Applied Statistics and Information Theory, with a whole lot of structural modelling. I’m proud that Al Gore would believe that I’m on the payroll of the Koch Brothers
We have an estimate of peer-reviewed papers — 99.9%+.
Studies by Dr James Powell, appointed twice to the US ScIence Board, by Presidents Reagan and Bush, and Dr Naomi Oreskes of Harvard, find 4 out of 10,000 and 28 out of 25000 peer reviewed papers dispute AGW. Those 0.04% to 0.1% — Galileos, I’m sure –must be hiding out somewhere. We’re not hearing much from them.
So, please tell me Mr Mark from the Midwest.
..
As you go about analyzing all that telecom and customer data……what does it say about global warming? I’m betting not much of anything right?
What is this “scientific community”?
=> *Takes a deep breath*
It’s a collective of pseudo-intellectual activists with scientific or academic credentials. They thrive on being taxpayer funded parasites through their tenure and live in their academic or govt-based ivory towers.
They don’t have any real people skills. They gladly ignore academic honesty/integrity and scientific method in order to push a political agenda; where they end up being the financial beneficiaries of taxpayer funded committees, organisations, and Govt subsidies.
They have no problem in destroying the public reputation of science as they politicise it and use it as a tool to push their agenda. (Its a tool to generate numbers to support their propaganda).
They will come up with their own vocabulary, re-define existing words, as well as nonsensical ideas to sound smart. Regular masturbation and group circle-jerking of their ego is necessary to re-charge their weak self-esteem. This is why they regularly have those Climate Change conferences in lavish places that are often involving the privileged and economic elite.
They often lean to the political Left and are an infection to most colleges and universities in Western countries like USA, Canada, Australia, UK, etc.
Anyone who doesn’t follow their narrative are to be censored, silenced, bullied, and removed from their academic position. Mainly because they cannot argue the merits of their agendas and it would cause people to question them. (They cannot handle open debate as it would reveal their true intentions, nor can they handle the very idea that anyone could oppose them).
The believe themselves as “all knowing” and know what’s good for all. They see the general public as “stupid” or “ignorant” through their pseudo-intellectual world view.
…Since they don’t produce anything tangible or useful to society, they will come up with all sorts of nonsensical studies and ideas to position themselves in a way where they are the problem solvers.
ie: Look for OR create problems when there is none, in order to promote themselves and their ideas as the solutions to those problems…Often, you’ll see them form their own Climate Change or green companies or Govt depts (like Australian Govt’s “Climate Commission”) in order to acquire taxpayer money through subsidies and “studies”. They are also found in the eco-side of United Nations circles.
In the area of Climate Change, you’ll often find them telling you that you should “feel” and “believe” in them. Its all about expressing their feelings and blindly believing them like some sort of cult.
Right now, they are losing the argument. Public support for them is waning. So they must come up with all sorts of nonsense to continue their taxpayer-funded existence and are often assisted by those in the mainstream news media. eg: “Today is the hottest day in a decade!”
The news media know they can shape public opinion. By repeatedly saying a day is the “hottest day on record”, they want to make such thinking as the new norm.
Everything about this “scientific community” is politics, social justice, and Left-wing oriented activism. (Where Govt is the arbitor of a “Carbon Tax” or “Emissions Trading Scheme” that re-distributes money from middle class to eco-companies and organisations they just happen to be involved with…Follow the money trail and see for yourselves!)
You can tell they are becoming desperate as they throw more tantrums and spew out nonsensical rhetoric in public or online. (Jump the shark)…Ironically, it drives the public further away from them as they no longer make any ounce of common sense.
If the public become aware of what is really going on, they will demand taxpayer funding be pulled. Their income stream will dry up. This is why they must keep this charade going indefinitely.
Have they looked at the idea people don’t like to be lied to and told not to think for themselves, as those who know will tell them what is good for them and what to think.
James Bull
Based on the newspaper article and abstract the study fails to understand WHY they use the term deniers. It is an attempt to shut down the debate about the evidence so far. It is an attempt to smear and embarrass. They don’t want you to look at the evidence. Let’s look at the article some more.
Let’s look at some facts and you tell me who is the repeller of facts?
IPCC Temperature Projections
http://www.energyadvocate.com/gc1.jpg
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.anomaly.antarctic.png
http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/images/nhland_season1.png
Here are some more failures from the IPCC
Jimbo, I expect that sort of thing from the IPCC and I would be shocked if they ever decided to publish fair and honest reports on anything. What really bothers me is that any person involved in climatology will get in deep, deep trouble if he does not bow before the current orthodoxy. It is as bad as the Roman Church of the middle ages. (maybe worse)
markstoval, they want people to believe there is a consensus because of the sheer volume of papers. There are billions of Dollars available in the USA each year for
global warming‘climate change’ research. Sceptics who apply are very unlikely to get approved unless they add “but that doesn’t mean we should not reduce our co2 emissions. Dangerous……”Both did eventually appear in the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, but what this shows you is a certain mindset. Gatekeeping. Trying to get editors fired et al. Dreaming of punching people in dark alleys. Why should I give you my data when all you want to do is find something wrong with it. We must get rid of the Medieval Warm Period. Why the [1930s] uptick and all that……..
Ridicule, smear, marginalize and ultimately and silence dissent is the point of using the term “denier.”
I think a study should be done to see how susceptible to peer pressure people who use the term “climate change denier” are. I believe we will find they engage in group think, are highly suggestible and really like to fit in.
Where are our usual pair of alarmists? Where are any of them? They never explain what a denier is denying. It’s just a label that takes the place of thinking; it’s laziness. And it demonizes millions of people who simply don’t agree with the current media narrative. They also use it because they lack credible facts.
No wonder they hide out from public debates in a neutral forum. Whenever people like Mann and his gang debated, they lost. Now it’s all internet and media propaganda. They’re even losing that debate.
@James Bull
Please forgive the presumption, but I’d like to build on your comment, James.
The article, quoted in the above post, is yet another in the hive’s long and incessant line of such urgent, little, “communication strategy” brainstorms that, true-to-form weds some perfunctory, two-bit pop-psychology to a full-throated call for a double-down on the hive’s same-old, shop-worn, flim-flam stratagems. So what else is new? And, as usual, the article’s basic pitch, stripped of its academic, orotund humbug, is one of gulling the rubes, closing-the-deal, and soft-soaping the rip-off. Indeed, the whole mentality, on display in the above the article, is indistinguishable from that exhibited by freak-show carnival-barkers; the sort of oleaginous, low-rent psychopaths, who gravitate to the planet’s seediest, used-car lots; clip-joint femme fatales; and Nigerian e-mail scammers.
And, of course, the article’s thrust conforms to one of the hoariest of the hive’s con-job templates: the doltish, hoi-polloi “skeptics” suffer from a false-consciousness, derived from, in the instant case, “distinct social identities, beliefs, and emotional reactions” (I just love it when the ivory-tower B. S.-artists roll out trite, party-line crapola, like this, I really do!), and it’s the duty of the shock-troop, “good-comrades”, serving in the revolution’s vanguard-cadres to sweet-talk (or else!) their wary-prey and, by fair means or foul, win them over to the hive’s sulfurous, gulag-friendly, group-think green-orthodoxies. Again, so what else is new?
I mean, like, all this dreary, mind-numbing, going-through-the-motions pretense that the hive just needs the right jingle, catchy-slogan, snappy-zinger, PR-stunt, or, in the instant case, just a little-extra, goofy-dork, back-slapping bonhomie in order to sink its agit-prop gaff is not only maddeningly wrong-headed, but frustrating to the max, as well, given that there is, indeed, an alternative “communication strategy” that will work–sure-fire guaranteed to ensnare the most “dug-in” of the skeptics.
So what is this “communication strategy” that can’t fail, you ask? Well, it’s…it’s…(better be sitting down for this one!)…it’s LEADERSHIP!!!! And the most important component of a “LEADERSHIP!!!”-based “communications strategy” is for those most vocal about the perils of demon-carbon; those most outspoken about the need to save the kids, and more importantly, the polar bears; and those who are trend-setters and public role-models–like, for example, all those eco-committed royals, movie-idols, big-cheese politicians, and money-bag jet-setters–to, one and all, PRACTICE WHAT THEY PREACH!!!TO LEAD FROM THE FRONT AND BY INSPIRING, PERSONAL EXAMPLE IN MATTERS OF CARBON-REDUCTION!!!
So, hive-bozos, exercise “LEADERSHIP” and you’ll realize your thrill-cull, dystopian Commissar dreams. On the other hand, if you just want to ride your little, brazen-hypocrite, carbon-piggie eco-scam for all the troughs, gravy-trains, and CO2-spew eco-confabs (which could easily be held as zero-carbon video-conferences) that you can squeeze out of the deal, then that’s a choice, too. But remember, if you keep on the path of in-your-face, two-faced carbon-piggery then you’ll never get to be a Philosopher King who gets to boss everyone around, and who makes mummy proud, and who settles scores with all those former grade-school classmates of yours who used to call you a “nasty, little, geek-ball creep-out”. Think about it.
Brilliant! +10. The CAGW carny barkers were thoroughly beaten over the head by this especially talented use of a thesaurus.
mike, I like your razor-edge and dissecting prose — an art form. Prb’ly lost on the trolls tho.
In the west one test of leadership quality is that they stop and ask “why” when you say “I wouldn’t do that.” More over, when you tell them “I won’t do that!” they have no reason to fire you for not doing what they tell you without inquiring further first. Once they have crashed the one-ton through the top of the septic tank, well, after all, you did warn them. Their complete disinterest lead to the current contretemps in which they will have to re-hire you at a higher wage just to help them get the truck out of the excrement they parked it in.
““When talking to skeptics it is probably important to focus on aspects that both skeptics and believers have in common rather than the differences between them,” said Ana-Maria Bliuc, a behavioural social scientist at Australia’s Monash University and one of the authors of the study.
As an example, the focus could be on “things like cleaner air, low power consumption, improved public transport, better waste management, efficient agriculture, reforestation … (they) are all in public interest, regardless of position on climate change,” she said.
—————–
Translation: “”When talking to skeptics about anthropogenic CO2-induced climate change, it’s best to change the subject …..
+10
That sounds about right to me.
As to “ceaner air”, I’d argue that CO2 has nothing to do with cleaner air. As to low power consumption, medievals had drastically lower power consumption than us, and they were drastically poorer than us. The more power we have access to, the wealthier and more comfortable we are.
We don’t even have the things in common that Ana-Maria Bliuc SAID we have in common.
The EPA strategy in a nutshell. Shut down energy production from coal by confusing CO2 with air pollution. Promote the advantages of clean air, while failing to mention that the actual reduction in warming by shutting down coal will be less than can be measured, let alone felt by any plant or animal on earth.
While completely ignoring the effect of billions of dollars of increased costs on the economy, as well as the trillions of dollars of sunk costs due to US government promoted investment in coal to help make the US energy independent following the Arab oil embargo of 1973; which revealed the ability of oil producing countries to bring the US economy to its knees in a few short weeks.
Now, completely ignoring the strategic advantages the US has with the worlds largest coal reserves, the EPA is marching ahead to tie one hand behind the US’s back, while at the same time the US is facing an increasingly hostile Arab world, with radical Islam and civil war on the rise in many oil producing nations.
All the while the US political leadership is blind to the risk, ignoring the rising tide of radicalism that gave rise to 911 and is transforming the US into a police state, with reduced “Liberty and Justice for All”. Instead, Global Warming remains firmly in place in the US academic, political and military leadership as the “greatest threat”. A country built on freedom, defeated from within by fear.
Global warming did not cause 70,000 abandoned buildings in Detroit. Global warming did not cause the economic meltdown of companies “too big to fail”. Global warming did not cause quantitative easing and the growth of the US public debt to $55,000 per man, woman and child.
It is the growth of the debt that is unsustainable. Spending money you don’t have to solve imaginary problems, while ignoring real problems today. Over time this will bring down the US as surely as it brought down mighty Rome 16 centuries before. Global warming will not be the cause, but fear of global warming will most certainly play a key role.
Ferd, (et al), I can’t help but see coal and wood being black market commodities in the future for the desperate bourgeois to heat their dwellings above what the government allowed maximum energy ration will allow. If this is a fallacy on my part please inform me.
There are many of my friends and neighbors who burn wood and under the right conditions create a smoke haze at low altitude, which locally affects our rural air quality in cold weather much more than the 1 gigawatt scrubber equipped generating station, which I can see the 500 foot stack of from my property. It makes no sense to me to return to thousands of low chimneys and shutting down a cleaner and more efficient method of providing energy from a single emissions source that it engineered to cause the least possible pollution. On a summer afternoon you can’t even make out a plume from this (continuous base load) generating plant.
Over at Revkin’s Dot Earth, I’ve been pointing out just how poorly the IPCC’s FAR Business as Usual predictions (from 1990) have fared compared to actual temperature records.
Of course, the “denier” epithet flies. But these shameless fools are denying both the IPCC’s predictions as well as the lack of sufficiently steep temperature time slope in the record.
One commenter pointed to a “Skeptical Science” .gif which purports to demonstrate how the IPCC got it right while “denier predictions” were wrong.
Funny thing, there are several misrepresentations on the SkS graphic:
http://mobile.nytimes.com/comments/blogs/dotearth/2015/01/21/how-warmest-ever-headlines-and-debates-can-obscure-what-matters-about-climate-change/
http://www.skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=72
Some problems:
1) IPCC FAR “best estimate” prediction was 0.3 deg. C / decade, whereas the dark red line shows 0.2 deg. C / decade (which was the lower bound).
2) line for TAR (2001 prediction / scenario) orange color, starts in 1990 (instead of 2001).
3) line for AR4 prediction (2007) green color, starts in 2000 (instead of 2007).
4) satellite data is shunned, as is HADCRUT3 (probably because profile is even flatter than the adjusted data sets displayed.
In short, a poster child for misrepresentation, hypocrisy and denial.
Kurt in Switzerland
I’ve noticed that your comment keeps being pushed to the last position while 2 other comments with later time stamps have moved ahead of it. It’s an odd behavior. Anyone know a reason for it?
Maybe the position is bookmarked as you begin to write a comment, while the timestamp is punched in when you hit the Post Comment button.
Could it be using Swiss time internally, even though the posted time is displayed as USA Pacific time?
I noticed this too. Don’t know why it is happening
TOBS adjustment
It’s caused by Global Warming. GW messes up time.
Louis, they might have been in moderation thus posted before the comments you saw.
I’d trust the Swiss timekeeping.
They are masters of delusion.They are trying to convince themselves the 97% figure is correct when we know that it is less than1% in the true figures.
They are also good at beating up scares that the media love to sell papers. Except for politicians who want the carbon tax/ trading rights and the media, the majority of people have worked out it is a scam.
We have a retired politician here that said recently, it might take a while but eventually the people will work you out. That is what they have done with CAGW.
Which is a shame because and awful lot of good science has been done on climate but it will take decades to sift out the politics.
“Here we demonstrate that US believers and sceptics have distinct social identities, beliefs and emotional reactions that systematically predict their support for action to advance their respective positions.”
We’re not capable of independent rational analysis of trumped up statistics of inconsistent quality data. We need to be spoken to as creatures bound by the predictable limits of our “social identity”.
Stereotypes – that’s what we are. …… Uuummmm – they can speak for themselves.
“Here we demonstrate that US believers and sceptics have distinct social identities, beliefs and emotional reactions that systematically predict their support for action to advance their respective positions.”
The only support for action I can think of to advance one’s position in the actual sciences, like palaeontology , or astronomy, is more funding for fieldwork to get better data, which hopefully will support one’s position. Telling people how to live their lives is purely political, and has nothing whatsoever to do with science.
A new study from the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology is careful to use the term “skeptic” instead of harsher names, but it will still piss you off. I don’t know about you, but I would rather they call me vile names than have them throw such shoddy science in my face. This study makes the ridiculous claims that climate model simulations actually agree with observations and that “Climatologists have been fairly correct with their predictions.” For your amusement, I’ve included the summary, below, followed by a couple of key sentences from their report:
Summary: Skeptics who still doubt anthropogenic climate change have now been stripped of one of their last-ditch arguments: It is true that there has been a warming hiatus and that the surface of Earth has warmed up much less rapidly since the turn of the millennium than all the relevant climate models had predicted. However, the gap between the calculated and measured warming is not due to systematic errors of the models, as the skeptics had suspected, but because there are always random fluctuations in Earth’s climate, according to a comprehensive statistical analysis.
… The 114 model calculations withstood the comparison. Particularly as an ensemble, they reflect reality quite well: “On the whole, the simulated trends agree with the observations,” says Jochem Marotzke.
… The community of climatologists will greet this finding with relief, but perhaps also with some disappointment. It is now clear that it is not possible to make model predictions more accurate by tweaking them — randomness does not respond to tweaking.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/02/150202114636.htm
I now live only for the day when someone comes up with a new figure for “global average temperature” to replace the 15.7 degrees or whatever it was supposed to be until the oceans made themselves players in the global warming game.
There are science publications who are happy to take on papers talking about denial.
Red herring time. Of course climate change is real – the climate has always changed and caused terrible casualties during the Little Ice Age and wonderful crops during the Medieval time. The warming ‘anthropogenic’ part ’caused’ by greenhouse gases is mild according to observations so far and co2 fertilization has been beneficial so why curb them? They say I can’t understand, the problem is they can’t understand me.
They understand you just fine. Trouble is, if you are correct, they’re out of a job, and they are exposed as incompetent or, even worse, a liar. Thus they cannot allow you to be correct. Therefore they mis-characterize your stated position into something they can attack and maybe even disprove.
On the whole the gap between the simulated trends and reality has increased year on year. They do not agree. And if ‘Randomness’ can cancel all your predictions – then surely ‘randomness’ could also have produced the ‘warming’ you were so worried about?
So the 114 model calculations performed well as an “ensemble”. I wonder if the predictions of 114 kindergartners would have been closer to reality than the averages of those models.
Sorry, when you define ‘sceptics’ as those whose views are in disagreement with those of the scientific community, it is just another insult to the large number of scientists that are skeptical of various aspects of climate change “theory” one degree or another. Maybe not as insideous of a comment as calling one a “denier,” but certainly calling a scientist, basically, a non-scientist is only slightly more civil.
Has there been a study done to see if their is a correlation between scientific belief in climate change and climate change funding?
I would expect that 97% of scientists that receive government funding for climate change studies believe strongly in climate change. the more funding received, the greater the belief.
While those scientists that have not received funding for climate change will tend to be more skeptical.
The same will be true for corporations, charities, NGO’s, the UN and the public. Since the public receives no funding for climate change, and must pay all the costs, they will be the most skeptical of all.
It isn’t your political belief or communications that drives the belief or skepticism, it is your pocket book. If you stand to benefit economically from a belief in climate change, you will believe in climate change. If you stand to lose economically from a belief in climate change, you are not going to believe in climate change. Rather, you are going to ask for reliable proof before you part with your hard earned cash.
+1
Yes, ferd, exactly right. As writer Upton [what a hoity-toity name, eh?☺] Sinclair wrote:
It is difficult to make a man understand something when his livelihood depends on not understanding it.
That’s the principle at play here. Their opinions are bought and paid for. It is the same with the IPCC and all the professional societies. They were either created and financed to push a narrative, or they have been co-opted by activists on their boards.
That is really very easy to do, as Prof Richard Lindzen writes [see Sec. 2]. Lindzen names names, too, and I very much doubt if any of those named would even disagree. They’re true believers, not scientists.
Official ‘science’ is no longer interested in finding answers. Rather, they are interested in a particular agenda, a position for which they are well compensated.
Ferd says – “Since the public receives no funding for climate change, and must pay all the costs, they will be the most skeptical of all.”
I disagree. Think of all the tax rebates for solar panel’s & electric cars. That is gaining those who ‘Play-the-Game’ with increased property values and lower bills at the expense of the non players
I think this is probably the starkest contrast I’ve ever seen between the concept of “Book Smarts” and “Street Smarts,” and street smarts are the smarts that are truly critical to success. It’s why I said “hell no” to grad school. This is a bunch of academics attempting to intellectualize and categorize people who they won’t even open themselves to start a relationship with, versus a street smart person who knows full well that insulting someone isn’t the best way to get to an agreement.
That aside, I find it funny, that the one person who actually got it right as to why Climate Activists/Scientists are having so much of a problem getting people to believe in them, is a satirist. Maybe they should read this highly pertinent quote…
Science’s Biggest Fail
And then afterwards read a book on basic human relationships and communication, which you can pick up for the cost of a coffee…
That’s the trouble with intellectuals” They have no common sense.
As I often say: Common sense; its not as common as you might think…
It should be called uncommon sense!
Historically there is a see-saw relationship between empiricists and theorists. In the last century, especially following Einstein’s theorizing, the status of mathematical and philosophical models as a means of doing science has increased many fold at the direct expense of acquiring new, real-world knowledge. Francis Bacon’s New Organon and the advocacy of the experimental method 400 years ago were a direct attack on the dominant scholasticism and dogmatism of the time, the faith that “pure thought” could reveal “truth.” The reward for adhering to the party line then was survival – as in not being prosecuted for heresy by Catholic or Protestant religious courts. Bacon’s decline in fortune immediately followed the assumption of the British throne by James the First, a rabid Protestant. It took something like another 50 years to finally establish the Royal Society. History, the mistakes we have already made.
What they have in abundance is communist sense.
The reason that there is less support for climate extremism in the US, Canada and Australia (compared to continental Europe) is that these countries have large mining, oil and gas industries, operated by tens of thousands of engineers, physicists and geologists, whose jobs depend on the application of rigorous science. There are also plenty of other experts in science, medicine, and economics who can give rigorous critiques of reports such as that by Stern. These countries, as does the UK, also have a culture of defiance of autocratic governments, and authority is generally questioned. These are not nations of the meek and subservient. When these experts look at the CO2 hypothesis, they simply see weak science, and high opportunity costs in unnecessary emission reductions. So they speak out against the policies pushed by climate change extremists and all the vested interests.
We don’t want better communication of weak science – we want better science and honest politicians.
MAGB,
One is far more likely to happen than the other. Reversing Citizens United would be a good start. Publicly funded national elections would be my end goal. But not only are the foxes watching the henhouse, they’ve all but taken up residence.
Really, Honest politicians ? No, who’d a thunk it. :))
Publicly funded elections are likely to end up like publicly funded science.
As soon as you remove the market and turn the allocation of resources over to political decision making you have introduced the mechanism for corruption. Friends receive the benefits of the decisions, while enemies are punished. This corruption introduces waste into the system, which eventually cannot be sustained in a competitive world, and the economic and political system fails.
That would institutionalize the problem in perpetuity, not fix it.
Sometimes works in my experience. The sticking point usually comes down to how to get that done. We’re a ways off from it happening due to free market forces alone, so some form of gummint intervention would be required to swim against the medium-term tide of economics. In a more perfect world, my order of preference would be loan guarantees, tax credits, subsidies, mandates/regulation. Better to balance the tax credits and subsidies with bumping taxes elsewhere than debt financing them — which is how I feel about the Federal budget in general.
If the wheels haven’t already fallen off the conversation, that last part pretty much the point where it goes south. Where it tends to derail before that point is over concerns for displaced fossil fuel workers, usu. coal miners. Doesn’t help when I point out that the first year of the 2008-09 financial crisis put more people out of work than there are coal miners in the US by a factor of over 300, no gummint intervention required. Or that W. Va coal miners were already losing jobs due to the market-led move to more and more natural gas (which is a good trade in my book) well before the War on Coal got started in earnest.
Sometimes it sinks in when I tell folks that coal power prematurely ends the lives of 30-60,000 people in the US, especially when I say that my preferred trade is coal to nuclear because the expected risk of death for a one to one replacement would be about 100 per year. And would likely create more job$ than it displaces from the construction work alone.
But then we’re back to talking about how to fund building the plants. We didn’t used to have this problem. TVA anyone? The Interstate highway system?
Ayup, I sometimes get tempted to use the d-word. As in forgetting the history of what worked to build this country to begin with. It’s very frustrating.
I’m not sure the free market has been given a chance, in the case of nuclear power.
I’d love to know how much of the cost of a nuclear plant is all the red tape and super redundant safety systems – and how price competitive nuclear power would be without all that government interference.
Obviously you wouldn’t want a Fukushima style plant to be built without safety systems, but in principle you could eliminate the need for most of the elaborate safety precautions, by using more advanced nuclear reactor designs, by moving to passive safe nuclear technology.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_nuclear_safety
However, it is crazy difficult enough to get a conventional nuclear plant approved. Can you imagine trying to convince a herd of bureaucrats to sign off on a new inherently safe nuclear design, which doesn’t incorporate all the standard safety features?
Haven’t got any figures for you, Eric, but I’m sure you’re right that the reactor is a relatively small part of it, and the great bulk of the cost is in the safety setups. However, most people would probably line up behind the idea that you can’t have too much safety where nuclear is concerned, as they don’t have an unemotional handle on risk analysis. Probably the biggest overload in these costs is the vast decommissioning cost that the builders are obliged to include.
UK Govt is going to pay a multi-billion dollar overprice for a couple of new nuclear stations (to be built by a French government owned utility because UK destroyed its own capabilities years ago) as no operator is going to take this on without a fantastical bribe.
It’s a great shame really that environmentalists invariably include anti-nuclear clause in their religion – nuclear ought to be their greatest logical ally.
Eric and mothcatcher,
Easiest source I can think of is the Wiki article on US energy costs, they break down the US DOE estimates for total levelized system cost by technology on a per unit power basis. IIRC, next-gen fission plants come in comparable to current gen coal, and less than advanced coal. Rigged numbers? Good chance. GE would love to sell more reactor licenses.
I do think a big problem is NRC red tape, and will go so far as to allege that the green lobby had no small or accidental influence in its presently byzantine nature. That prolonged, staunched opposition serves as a never ending source of driving me to distraction.
“I tell folks that coal power prematurely ends the lives of 30-60,000 people in the US …”.
==============================
I’ll bet they’re amazed.
The EPA estimates President Obama’s Climate Action Plan to cut ‘carbon pollution’ from power plants will lead to avoiding 2,700 to 6,600 premature deaths in 2030.
http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/fact-sheet-clean-power-plan-overview
And even that EPA estimate is based on linear projections of extremely weak evidence – now where have we seen that before?
A little thought experiment in EPA logic
A filthy drain next to a water pump leads to disease and 10 people a month are dying.
Hosing down the drain reduces the problem with only 5 people a month dying
Improving sewerage and the drain design leads to 0 deaths
How many deaths will keeping the drain totally sterile save?
EPA would answer another 5 _and_ as a side effect it will prevent any use of the drain as it would then not be sterile. So that reduces the risk of 5 more people dying and moves the dirty users away to another country. If you argue against this EPA position you are told you are risking the lives of 10 people.
That logic is being used above. There are now no provable deaths from ‘pollution from coal’ we are in the improved sewerage and drain design state from the thought experiment. But because the linear ad absurdum argument is dressed up in large numbers and questionable statistics nobody appears to notice its absurdity.
Chris Hanley,
That’s the non-alarmist estimate. See, Obama does listen. I didn’t read the details of the plan, but unless it calls for 100% coal power replacement with nuclear, the absolute figures aren’t directly comparable. You have to break it down on a risk per unit power basis for it to make any sense. I wouldn’t expect a political document to do the proper stats, which is why I went to the primary literature when I first looked into it. Here’s a secondary source which does a decent job of it: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2012/06/10/energys-deathprint-a-price-always-paid/
Ian W,
Epidemiology is tricky stuff, no proof will ever be forthcoming. But you have to be pretty thick to think the shit that comes from burning coal is good for you.
Brandon Gates, the problem with the ‘lets stop polluting for reasons we can agree on…’ is that it’s a good idea, but the credibility of warmist side is threadbare to non-existent. So before you can even start the obvious charlatans have to go, the warmists need to actually admit they were wrong and have maligned the people who were right, and the lying, spin and exaggeration need to be reigned in hard. Otherwise you could say in perfect truth ‘ there is a ten ton truck coming, step left to save your life’ and no-one is going to believe you. They’ll assume you’re lying and have an ulterior motive. And much needed honesty check is not going to happen while vested interests in politics and science remain in control. So the best thing you could do is help get rid of the rotten apples. The next best thing that the warmists could do is lead by example. Don’t fly to Davos. Volunteer to pay an extra 20% carbon tax. Put that windfarm in your back yard etc.
davefreer,
Credibility is a subjective determination, but I’ll be the first to admit the planet hasn’t been helping its own case for the past two decades. Not a team player this orb of ours.
Basically the way I’m reading the first part of your statement is that if we agree with your position you’ll believe us. That’s normally a conversation ender, but I’m feeling stubborn today.
97% of the climate debate is politics. Which is about normal for any high-profile disputed science. I don’t believe what any politician says about anything by default, and typically I find that the truth (so far as I can suss it out) is found in what they don’t say. That credibility gap is never going to diminish.
That, and the truck is an awfully long way off in terms of what most of us think of in terms of planning horizons.
Something else which isn’t going to happen any time soon, and not just in climatology. Big agra, big pharma, medical science in general all have vested interests in influencing policy decisions and the ten ton truck loads of cash to buy it. Yet we don’t do so bad in my view.
In a perfect world where all were wholly logical and made decisions based only on what’s written in the primary literature, that argument wouldn’t rate mention. The very influential don’t have time to ride a bicycle to Davos, and the very rich don’t have the greatest track record when it comes to behaving in a manner consistent with what most of us would consider … fair. Not the right word, best I can do at the moment. Point is, you may be right about the optics but I frankly doubt it would make much difference.
To me this paper may be an interesting read because I like sociology papers. They’re easy on my brain, and I think people are fascinating. I think the authors mean well, certainly the absract makes all the correct noises about how to have a more functional debate.
But.
IMO, like it or not [1], politics is going to be the vehicle of getting more than just token mitigation done any time within the next decade. IF by then. I have a few sharp things to say about why i think it hasn’t happened already, running along the lines of poor political strategy and overly-ideological wishful thinking.
——————
[1] For the record, I don’t like it.
Without taking a position on finances, competition keeps them at check. AGW research has no such thing.
I’m convinced that leading by example makes a difference.
@ Brandon Gates
Let’s see now, Gates, your position is that leading by example wouldn’t make much difference. Can we take that to mean that you are prepared, then, to just tough out the “optics” and quietly tolerate the brazen-hypocrite, trough-sucking eco-romps, the hive so generously provides its sell-out tools with a gravy-train in the fight? Somehow, I think so. But I could be wrong. Never ceases to amaze me, Gates, how the hive insists that countries like England and Australia cut their inconsequential carbon “pollution” as an inspiration to other nations, but when it’s proposed that the big-shot, CO2-spewing hive-hoggies, themselves, set the reduced-carbon example for us hoi-polloi, suddenly the hive goes into a “denier” mode about the value of leading from the front. I mean, like, let me ask you, Gates, just why is that it’s B. S., all the time, with you lefties?
But let me pursue matters, here, a bit further. So if the make-a-greenwashed-buck rich and powerful won’t set a Gaia-friendly personal-example, Gates, then why don’t eco-zealots, like you, turn the full force of the hive’s agit-prop resources on them–call ’em out, fatwa-their-ass, disinvest in their enterprises, make fun of them on late-nite shows, ban them from speaking on college campuses, etc. You know, that sort of stuff. Or would that be too much like biting the hand that feeds you?
As you can well imagine, Gates, like you, I too am so very, very concerned (even more than I am concerned about the polar bears, if you can believe it) that the hive’s nomenklatura don’t have “the time to ride a bicyle to Davos”? Is that it, Gates? Your hive-masters are too “time-conscious” to give up the obscene carbon-footprints they abusively stomp on Gaia as they flit about from one opulent gab-fest to another in their private jets, limos, and yachts, right? But I can see your point, Gates about the need for our considerable betters to save-time. Hence my modest proposal:
DON’T GO TO DAVOS AT ALL!!! Rather, video-conference the affair. And all the virtual “attendees” will thereby save all that precious travel-time getting there and back. I mean, like, it’s just as easy to put on your black robes and chant “Hail, SATAN!!!” at a computer-screen, in the privacy of your own home, as it is at Davos, right? And anticipating your principal objection, before you even lodge it, Gates, I propose that at the end of the video-conference, all the big-cheese attendees “drop-trou” and press their ample buttocks up against their camera, so that the flunky-grade attendees (anyone you know, Gates?) can all get “selfies” of themselves obsequiously making-out with the successive, big-shot rumps appearing on their computer screen. So you see, Gates, everyone comes out a winner, with my modest proposal. And think of the time saved, Gates!
Brandon Gates, credibility is only subjective if all it has is faith. Otherwise it’s a case of ‘I told you x would happen and it did. I told you this was the warmest year ever, and when you checked the figures, you did not find out that I’d left out the error bars, fudged figures, employed dodgy statistics, and straight left out new findings that didn’t agree with my statement and there was still only 38% chance I was telling the truth. Credibility is enhanced when someone admits they were wrong and accepts responsibility for that. If the ‘orb’ hasn’t been helping its own case’… then it’s not the orb’s case, it’s what think it ought to be, and it has proved you wrong. The environment does provably benefit, at a local scale, for reducing certain forms of pollution. Unfortunately hitching that wagon to CAGW -which the planet hasn’t ‘helped’ with, sadly discredits that.
The first part of my statement simply means that people who are known to have fudged and fiddled data, peddled porkies – Lewadonsky for instance need to be rejected. ‘admit they were wrong’ – the warmists said ‘with 97% certainty’ that global temperature today would be x, that global ice would be severely down, and that the Arctic would be ice free, and children would not know snow. All of these are confirmed as wrong in the real world. So yes, the skeptic position is reality. Do you believe your eyes? Then you you have to agree with the skeptics. No, actually you can’t just change the figures until they agree with your model.
And yes, vested business interests will also attempt to manipulate matters. On balance (and I say this having had to look for funding as a research scientist long, long ago. It’s one reason I got out) that’s not actually where the vast bulk of the money comes from, and it is severely questioned. Government and NGO money are very often just as vested, and yet rarely questioned. Far more typical than science being corrupted by industry, is politics being corrupted by industry, and government then adjusting funding to science.
As for my second part: The rich and powerful are as subject to society mirror as the rest of us. They also are role models for many. You don’t have to ride a bicycle to Davos. You can teleconference, which cheaper, quicker and far less polluting. I think it is a sensible call from the warmists side to get their rich and influential to start actually leading by doing what they want they want others to do.
@ Brandon Gates
Up above, I left a comment that contained a “SATAN” crack. My reference to the “Archfiend” was intended as an edgy-humor zinger, so absurdly over-the-top that it could be taken for nothing more than some goofy, heavy-handed ribbing, good for a laugh–just maybe–in my “regular-guy” circles. Unfortunately, as I re-read the comment, I judged that my comment was not only a “dud”, but way out-of-line, as well. Therefore, I extend to you, Brandon, my sincere apologies. Of course, if there’s the slightest doubt in anyone’s mind, I have no reason, whatsoever, to think that Brandon Gates is a Satanist. On the contrary. Again, my earnest regrets, in this manner.
mike,
@February 3, 2015 at 4:06 pm
Heh, you know I completely missed that comment in my first pass, and didn’t read your apology for it until after I’d written all the below. Which I accept in the spirit that it is given. Had I read it, I may have changed the tone of my response below, especially my final rejoinder. Which I’m going to leave unedited … I was going to say it somewhere to someone here anyway.
@February 3, 2015 at 1:15 pm
Near enough to zero so as the residual is less than a rounding error. Yes. Not a damn bit of difference in power to persuade. I could be very wrong, but that is a correct restatement of my opinion on the matter.
I don’t see that I have much of a choice. I can’t force Al Gore to move into a median-sized home, become a vegan, and reduce his carbon footprint to negative-something. Nor can I force the opposition to not make a big deal out of his evident unwillingness to do it. So yeah, I pretty much have to grit my teeth and lump it. Hell, I’m not about to give up eating dead cow either. One might say that my stumping for geothermal and nuclear power — and roundly criticizing enviros who still stupidly oppose the latter — is just me tilting at different windmills by way of assuaging my guilt. I don’t know. I’m not a perfectly altruistic and benevolent human by any means. As such I don’t expect anyone else to be, including my opposition. I attempt to formulate my AGW opinions and advocacy within the realm of my understanding of social and economic realities, which is much poorer than my understanding of the relevant science.
The thing about partisan bullshit is that “nobody” thinks their own stinks. The stench from all sides is probably one reason political “science” eludes my more comprehensive understanding.
I’ve long held a dark suspicion that many nominal run-of-the-mill AGW believers don’t buy into the most dire CAGW scenarios even though they talk that game in public. Some public opinion polls suggest my suspicions are correct, yes? So I think it’s quite possible that climate is just another chip in political gamesmanship. A mark of one’s tribe. A way calling the other side a pack of blithering idiots and feeling good about oneself for knowing the Truth of how things Really Work.
It’s also possible I project here, and that CAGW will be every bit as catastrophic as the expert skyfallers predict. I do, out of necessity, frequently remind myself that playing a know-it-all on the Innert00bs does not mean I actually know everything.
I have a standard speech about polar bears, which is they’re not cute and fuzzy, and will eat your liver while you’re still alive and screaming given the chance. Some humans are the same way, figuratively speaking, and being sentient are therefore evil for it. My concerns for the environment are to keep it in such a state that it is capable of supporting our species in the style to which we’ve become accustomed. Even the ones I think are evil. And yes, even the private jets. My sense of egalitarianism doesn’t run toward economics the way it does on the fringe left.
Well you know, every corporate jet bought on the shareholders’ dime is justified the same way: we use it to make more money for you. “Everyone” really knows it’s just another perq. Don’t “they”?
Since we’re speculating on each others’ real feelings here: you sound a tad jealous. Tsk.
Now you’re getting it. Always good to know one’s place in the pecking order.
I don’t suppose it would make any difference if the gathering spot was Butt(e), MT, which is about as unglamorous a place as I’ve ever been. [1] No, of course not.
You know as well as I do that 100% teleconferences would not be at all the same. Yes, cheaper and less resource-intensive. But then you get what you pay for. As I see it, you simply fundamentally disagree with what is being bought with your money. I get that. So just say it. There’s no need to appeal to hypocrisy to hold an opinion that the core of your being staunchly disagrees with pretty much the entire environmentalist agenda in all its incarnations, so much so that you’ll take even a pragmatic moderate like me to task even when he makes some small attempt to reach across the aisle and hunt for a little common ground.
Which I very much am. I think building nuclear power plants and digging more geothermal wells in a big way would be an economic boon. This is something all sides should be able to agree upon even if the underlying motiviations for doing it may be wildly different for some people. The end result is what should matter, which in my view is overall cleaner power at an easily competitive market rate and practically zero GHG emissions.
The main sacrifice is that by agreeing on something and working toward it together, we’d have that much less to bitch about … which as I see it may be a fatal flaw of my own modest proposal. Were I hell-bent on forming generalized opinions about whole groups based on the anecdotal misbehavior of a loudly outspoken few, I’d rewrite Anthony’s headline to read:
Shock study results: Saying anything at all to climate skeptics they disagree with, no matter how politely, just pisses them off.
As it stands, my already well-established prejudices have been rather reinforced by this thread. Must be time to engage in some public liberal guilt-driven handwringing to assuage my self-loathing and vainly attempt to hide my own duplicity. Amirite?
I’m right.
——————
[1] No knock on Buttians intended, or indeed on Montanans in general, who are as solidly good folk as I’ve ever known and who on the whole live in a fantastically beautiful landscape. I miss it and them. /wistfulness
davefreer,
No, all that is required for subjectivity is belief which is intrinsically human as we lack omniscience. If you or I choose different beliefs about some reality which is difficult to determine objectively, we will necessarily think the other person lacks credibility just by virtue of being out of touch with our own personal subjective perception of fact.
When facts are difficult to determine, I look to how they’re argued for cues on credibility. Sucks, because even the most elegant, logically consistent argument can be dead wrong. And I don’t like being even marginally wrong.
You assume something about what I think ought to be which I don’t. To be fair, if the surface (and lower troposphere) temperature records had continued the trajectory of the 80s and 90s, I and a lot of other AGW believers might still be overly fixated on that yardstick to the exclusion of the estimated bazillions of joules accumulating unabated in the ocean depths. In retrospect, even the surface record shows that 40 year hiatuses in GHG-influenced upward trends are the norm, not the exception. That our present emphasis on oceans looks ad hoc is understandable. That doesn’t mean it’s wrong, and personally I don’t think it is.
That my own perceived clarity now is a post hoc revision to former beliefs is to be expected. If we knew most everything beforehand, we wouldn’t need science. I can’t wait to find out what else I’m wrong about. I can wait to try and explain it to people like you who imply that admissions of wrongness must also include adopting their own position as the only possible alternative.
I agree with that more than you might think. The reasons are probably different. When AGW first appeard on my radar in earnest in the mid-90s I wasn’t skeptical, I was dubious. My concerns at the time were bourne out of the energy crisis of the ’70s and the recently ended Gulf War I. Even before the war I was of the mind that it was a bad idea to be opposing nuclear power. All my readings indicated that converting corn to ethanol was a non-starter. A hydrogen economy sounded nice, but knowing hydrogen’s propensity to form high-energy covalent bonds with carbon I knew that it was just another perpetual-motion machine in waiting, with the added difficulty of transport and storage in high enough energy density so as to be convenient as present liquid fuels derived from petroleum. I could think of a thousand better reasons to push for workable alternative energy solutions that didn’t rely on appealing to avoidance some highly uncertain far-off future calamity. Plenty of reasons to do it for concerns in the here and now. My mind on those things has not much changed since then. It’s the source of much angst.
OTOH, I’m mindful that no policy proposal however framed will please anyone and everyone. In that sense your argument rings hollow to me. I simply don’t believe that any amount of concession to your point of view would budge your beliefs. So why bother. I think that’s very much part of the political calculus. It might make some beneficial difference to change that tone, but then I also know when such rhetoric is invoked it’s main purpose is to rally the already converted.
I think you know this, and that is one thing which makes it an attractive argument for you to use.
Yes, but I shouldn’t trust them implicitly so I don’t.
That’s a false dichotomy. Which “skeptics” for starters? You’re not a monolithic lot any more than we warmies are:
1) Do I subscribe to the lukewarmist camp which typically takes the big-three temperature records as reasonably representative of reality, but invokes some as-yet coherently specified mechanism for warming above and beyond what they claim is a less-than-IPCC-approved sensitivity to CO2’s influence?
2) Do I go full-on sky dragon slayer and believe that back radiation violates the 2nd law of thermodynamics?
3) Do I invoke motivated meddling with all climate data and say that The Pause lives on only because the skeptics are now watching them like a hawk?
4) Do I claim that the MWP and LIA were both far more extreme than the likes of Mann would have us believe, yet simultaneously hold forth that feedback gain must be 0.1 or less because that’s how a process engineer would design it?
5) Mix and match all the above as-needed even though many of them are not mutually compatible with each other?
So it’s to be option 3 then. Well here’s a problem with that one: why don’t the damn models agree with the adjusted temperatures more convincingly?
Not having long experience as an insider (I have some, my college years when I worked in a clinical/research lab) I can’t in good faith categorically disagree with you. I stand on what I lead with: I look around and observe that, warts and all, publicly funded science generally works. Maybe privately funded research would work better. I don’t know, I don’t have that comparative perspective. Mostly I trust science in general over pretty much all else because of the quality of arguments I understand when reading the primary literature. And having been raised by a research scientist (biology).
I don’t have any additional, novel ways to rebut that argument than what I’ve already written to Mike above. But I’ll try again: it’s not going to happen. You know this. You know that I know this. You know that I don’t want to cop to it but I have to or be a liar.
Which is a rhetorical tactic, evidently based on some political or other value-system animus you feel toward the likes of Al Gore, George Soros and the rest of the high-rolling fat-cat carbon taxation promoters. None of which speaks to the physical reality of the planet, whatever it is. Which I think is stupidly short-sighted because the planet doesn’t give a flying leap about our opinions of it or each other. The only f***ing way to figure that out is to research it. And discuss the research on the merits (or lack) of its arguments and findings, not our opinions of what an egotistically arrogant, thin-skinned self-serving hypocritical asshole the lead author is.
At 10:04 PM on 3 February, Brandon Gates had posited that:
Not quite.
Say rather that when I match my tentative conclusions about an aspect of reality – a diagnosis in a clinical case, for example – against contrary conclusions advanced by someone else, if I judge the evidence considered and the reasoning engendered by the other guy to be inferior to what I’ve observed and reasoned and matched against known criteria, then I’m going to stick with my conclusions. The other guy is going to have to convince me that he’s got a better “take” on the situation, and thereby change my judgement.
That’s certainly possible. Y’see, I admit in all situations to the possibility that I might be wrong. Because my “subjectivity” – my “belief” about something happening in objective reality – isn’t really “subjectivity” at all, but rather a conjecture predicated on best information available, always amenable to additional, better information when presented.
However, I don’t much care if the guy against whom I’m matching diagnoses is a highly-credentialed and much-published “authority” with all sorts of goodies in his vitae. I’ve seen such high muckety-mucks screw the pooch in flaming glory when it gets down to matters of real-world patient care, and arrogance is a toxic influence among such prominenti. I want to hear the reasons why he holds his opinion, and I must judge for myself whether or not his consideration of the matter at hand is of greater validity than my own.
What is there of real “subjectivity” in requiring lucid explanation before accepting conclusions which run contrary to one’s own interpretations of the facts in hand?
@ Brandon Gates
Thank you for your very thought-provoking reply. Many good points on which we both agree, for what my “agreement” might be worth. And let me add that I like comments that have a forthright mean-streak to them (liver-eating–that’s a good one! You might want to Goggle “liver eating Johnson”, Brandon, and acquaint yourself with an improbable, but colorful gent who gave a unique twist to the saying “eating crow”). Likewise, I have a “soft spot”–again, for what that might be worth–for comments where the author indulges in a little, good-fun and funny, self-deprecating humor. So in short, your comment was a “good-read”.
Coupla picky-picky points:
-Contrary to your speculation, I am not jealous, in the slightest, of my betters’ jet-set life-style. Take the Davos gab-fest, for example Keeping with the “Johnson” theme that seems to be developing in this comment, I’ll paraphrase Samuel Johnson–air-travel for me is like being in jail with the chance of ending one’s days at the impact point of a wild, 30,000 ft plunge. Thanks, but no thanks. Living out of a suitcase in a hotel–however swanky–is also, for moi, like being in a low-security jail with the chance of dying of boredom. Again, I’ll pass on that pleasure. And, finally, the prospect of hob-nobbing with a klatch of tipsy, world-class, shot-caller psychopaths, and their pursuing, drunken horde of ambitious whippersnappers, all jostlin’ to ace out the competition and land a career-enhancing, lip-smacking smooch on some big-shot strutting-rump, is not my idea of a quality-time amusement. Home sweet home, is my style.
-Appreciate, Brandon, that the video-conferencing experience is not the same experience one finds in a “real-deal”, wild-and-crazy, grab-ass, press-the-flesh, party-time eco-confab. But if demon-carbon is such an existential menace that the hive-masters are seeking the coercive powers of the state to, directly or indirectly, deprive me of my babe-magnet monster-truck that goes VROOOOM!!! VROOOOM!!! and replace it with an electrified, weenie-bait, dork-mobile that goes huuuummm!, then CO2 is also enough of problem that my betters need to the video-conference their little B. S. gab-fests, as well.
Now I know, Brandon, that you are as solicitous of my gas-guzzler mode of transportation as you are of our betters’ private-jet, jet-set life-style. My only point is that if hive’s nomenklatura are comin’ after my little carbon-spew toys, then I’ll do my level best, such as it is, to come after theirs.
-Any broad hints that I might have dropped to the effect that I find my eco-betters to be a bunch of brazen-hypocrite assholes, is not a disguise for some other point of view or a pretext for anything else. You’re erroneously projecting your own multi-layered, refined sophistication onto poor, simple, coolie-trash moi, I’m afraid, Brandon.
Finally, I thank you, Brandon, for accepting my apology in the spirit in which it was given.
–
@ Brandon Gates.
Jeez, Gates!–what are you doin’, guy? I mean, like, you go toe-to-toe on this blog, deliverin’ some pretty darn good, stand-up comments, on the one hand, and then, the next thing you know, you’re over at HotWhopper, all sniffles, and complainin’ that the “Whutter” big-boys are being mean to you. C’mon, dude, you’re better than that. You don’t need HotWhopper’s pants-suit pants to hide behind. And yes, carbon bigfoot’s comment is idiotic (which strongly suggests he’s a “crusher-crew”, provocateur hive-plant, of course). Regardless, Gates, you need to stay in the ring and tear “footsie” a new one. Isn’t that the way to do it, Gates?…Huh?…huh?…Yeah, buddy, Gates, that’s the spirit!
Hey, Gates!, check out ATTP’s latest blog post “Hostilities”. In that inimitable, wishy-washy, thinking-out-loud, quasi-mumbling “style” of his, the tri-polar Anders-wotts-ATTP makes some good points that apply equally to both the lefty, trough-seeker hive-tools, on the one side of the climate “debate”, and the lovers of freedom and ethical science on the other. All relevant to our little chit-chat here, too.
mike,
If I’m to take a shellacking, I’m ever so much more likely to realize I deserve it when done with plain-speaking accompanied by some colorful wit. I try to give the same, and appreciate your appreciation [1] on all fronts.
I have Liver-Eating Johnson in the to-read queue.
I see now that I have misjudged your perspective on things so It’s my turn to apologize. I really hate it when others make wrong assumptions about the sum total of where I’m coming from solely because I use a particularly common talking point or three.
[cackle] Ok, I totally believe you. I’ve done a fair amount of travel for work, as in living out of a suitcase for months on end weekends at home. The key to survival is finding a good hotel, which for me is all about staff. As in, by the end of it everyone is on a first-name basis, every third drink is on the house, and the fourth [2] one is shared. A new hotel every week would be a drag. I’d hate it. I never will like commercial air travel, so I don’t begrudge many true jet-setters their Gulfstream IV. A BBJ, now that’s excess. I don’t know what Al Gore flies around in, guessing he uses one of the services when he does, hopefully he chooses a Citation or something like it. Who knows. I really couldn’t care less about such trivia.
In ’75 my grandpa bought 48 acres of walnut trees in Central California. With that package came a couple of old junkers. One was a sedan of some sort, which was beyond all hope of rescue. We used it to solar heat water in 1-gallon plastic milk jugs for bathing. The other one was a 1951 Ford F-1 pickup. The original motor was shot, but everything else was good honest bombproof American sheet metal and castings from back when steel came out of Cleveland or Pittsburgh and even Ford knew how to build a proper truck. He and Dad went out and got us a pre-embargo small-block 289 from a totaled Mustang [3] and dropped that sucker under the sexy long hood. The sound. Oh the sound. And before regular gasoline became a shadow of its former self, the smell.
When I got old enough, it became my ride. I insisted on it. My buddies loved it too because see, there was nothing cherry about it. It literally looked like we’d pulled it off the set of Sanford and Son and let it go to even further rot. But Pops kept it running like a top (I didn’t get that gene) and it still knew how to move even by the time it was my turn to try and destroy it. One time some jerkoff in a spanking new ’88 Z-71 pulled up next to me at a light, started leering at me and my friend sitting on the passenger side of the barely upholstered and NOT original bench.
“Watch this shit,” I said.
Light turns green and I laid the biggest patch ever right across the intersection. I’d like to tell you that we were going 60 by the time we crossed it, but I can’t … the speedo never did work on that thing. Corbs there next to me with his ass now pinned to the back of the cab was howling with laughter in a way I wish I could describe, because that laugh apparently describes how far into his lap that fancy Chevy-shover’s jaw dropped while he was sucking on my tire smoke trying to catch up. Best sleeper ever.
The Kentucky girls across the river (I’m Californian by birth, a Buckeye by tradition) really liked that old truck too. God bless ’em. Those were some good times.
I drive a 4-banger Accord these days, dammitall, and NO I don’t want to take your dead-and-liquefied dinosaur sucking “pickup” vehicle away from you because how in the hell else am I going to live vicariously through you and remain guilt free?
Of that I’m sure. Carbon-neutral spew toys really could be a lot of fun, we just have to gather our collective wits and make that happen. In a perfect world, we’d cough up the bux to figure out how to turn algae into oil. That done, I’d go right out and buy what I was born to drive — a beat to hell 4×4 something with a large displacement V-8 in it and lotsa room in back for extracurriculars. But I’m going to be dead and in the hot place before that happens, which pretty much constantly pisses me off.
la la la la la …. The evil thing about projection is that you don’t know you’re doing it. There’s no settling this particular argument objectively with a clear winner, so I say we’re both batshit crazy.
No worries. I don’t get all that bent by such things. What turns my crank more is when the response is full of pedestrian “you’re an idiot” type stuff and not much else. I thank you for a pointy, sharp, but humorous and interesting rebuttal.
————
[1] If you know the script for the play, “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot” you will appreciate it that Satan has essentially the same line.
[2] Who am I kidding. The sixth one.
[3] Lotsa narrow curvy roads in those parts, and as I now realize in retrospect, a lot of dumb hicks driving them. 😀
mike,
This is why I hate the “tone” conversation whenever it comes up and I bite hard on it.
Of course not. But it is nice venture into friendly territory from time to time and let my hair down all the way.
Consider the possibility that I wanted to see how others here would respond to him.
Was just there saying ever more charitable things about WUWT. Not to be missed! You may even figure out what I’m actually pissed off about if you uncross your eyes long enough to read straight.
Tucci78,
I agree.
I couldn’t have written it better myself.
Ah.
Yup. I’ve had a hospital do its level best to kill me.
Consistent with my earlier statement that belief is a choice.
Speaking from the perspective of the most extreme form of philosophical skepticism, our own rational “objectivity” is just a little lie we tell ourselves since constantly facing the cold hard possibility that we know nothing about anything is too cognitively unsettling. “Facts” are simply the things we’ve decided to accept as reality to quell the dissonance.
At 11:01 on 4 February, Brandon Gates had commented:
Nah, that’s not even something I can accept “philosophically” – more precisely, rhetorically.
While I’ll admit that perception is intrinsically flawed (susceptible to misinterpretation), the phenomena apprehended by our perceptions are what they are, regardless of subjective differences of appreciation and interpretation, and there is no “little lie we tell ourselves” in that IF we’re willing to keep Cromwellian with our subjective individual and collective selves (“I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken.” [Letter to the general assembly of the Church of Scotland, 3 August 1650]).
The essence of scientific thought – much mistaken by those outside the “hard” sciences – is the fact that we’re perfectly willing to vest calculated confidence in our conclusions while at the same time admitting (always!) the possibility that we might not have it exactly right, and therefore always keeping open to refinements of information and even the prospects of radical contravention.
The real scientist is always humble in the presence of objective reality. There’s nothing “cognitively unsettling” about that, and we don’t give a greasy goddam about “the dissonance.”
But don’t expect real scientists to daven in the direction of credentialed authority when those fellas show unwillingness to make their reasoning pikestaff-plain. We’re all too aware of how the errors creep in, and the fact that such reputation-bearing critters are perhaps even more susceptible than the ruck when it comes to “noble cause” corruption.
Show us a “consensus” and we’ll come at with wrecking bars and high explosives. Heck, it’s our job.
@ Brandon Gates
Yr: “You may actually find out what I’m pissed off about if you uncross your eyes long enough to read straight.”
You know, Brandon, I owe you one, anyway, so I’m doin’ the right thing here and heartily acceptin’ your reprimand–especially after I checked my bathroom mirror, after your last, and, sure enough!, my eyes are crossed! I mean, like, you pose a real challenge to my otherwise unremitting hostility to all things hive-bozo.
And having been a “lefty” once myself, it is walk-down-memory-lane to bump into a “good comrade” with a genuine good heart, again, after all these years (and here I thought the hive purged your type long ago)–I’ve always been a sucker for the left’s “noble language”, and it was with some disillusionment and pain that I was forced to admit that all those beautiful words were (some notable and inspiring individual exceptions, aside) just humbug-cant, employed as a agit-prop tool, by the hive-masters who count, to deceive useful-fool, “dumb kid” idealists (you know, like, that classic Bolshie bait-and-switch cull-booger: “Land to the peasants”, followed by the suppression of the Tambov Rebellion).
Genuinely enjoyed the exchange and intend to follow your comments across the blogosphere much as I do those of Latimer Alder and a few others. Please keep ’em comin’!
mike,
Happy to help you self-diagnose the issues with your eyesight. I find myself almost believing that you were once upon a time a sanctimonious Prius-driving own-flatus smelling libruhl pinko Commie. Why, I bet you even used to have at least one gay and one black friend. Mine’s a two-fer, he’s BOTH! I’m nothing if not efficient, chalk it up to my German ancestry. When I quit religion, I went through a very nasty and angry atheist phase until a notorious Usenet troll ruthlessly hacked my “logic” to bits and converted me to agnosticism. It was pretty rough, he didn’t use any lube for the cranio-rectalectomy portion of the procedure. I have some faint hope that one day I too will do the impossible: radically change someone’s mind on the Innert00bs. I’m nowhere near as smart as that guy, nor do I have his brass — which is ironic because he’s a eunuch — so I have less than faint hope I’ll dislodge you from your presently-chosen tribe of knuckle-dragging gasoline-huffing mouth-breathers.
It’s just as well. My worn-to-tatters, triple-highlighted and dog-eared copy of “Being a Liberal for Dummies” stresses that the only way to make everyone into carbon-copies of diversity and thereby achieve world domination where everyone is equal except those who aren’t is to actually fool ourselves into believing that we’re NOT culture warriors just the same as the humble huddled masses on the opiated right. Try as I might, I just can’t hypnotize myself into giving up my true inner malevolence on this matter — when I should call something doubleplus ungood like the manual says I find myself instead calling a spade a spade like honest people are supposed to. Being ever dutiful, I suppose I should stop playing the heretic and wish you a pleasant evening cruising Main in your overly-compensatory planet-killilng p-wagon. Get some for me, and send photos because in the meanwhile, I’ll be doing boring stuff like reading some Latimer Alder in hopes of figuring out the reference. Cheers.
Brandon Gates writes “I went through a very nasty and angry atheist phase until a notorious Usenet troll ruthlessly hacked my logic to bits and converted me to agnosticism.”
Those were the good times; self-moderated arguments where you would write what was on your mind without fear of moderators (at least in the alt groups) and each person could block whoever he wished. Freedom of speech combined with freedom to not listen.
Anyway, who was that particular Usenet troll?
Tucci78,
Then it shall remain my own food for thought.
Oh. Well I wager Cromwell would not have so flatly rejected my philosophical argument.
Even hard scientists screw that up. As Planck observed: A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.
Odd statement. One major function of peer-review is to ferret out instances where the research team wasn’t able to willingly suspend disbelief in their own hypothesis.
I expect Real Scientists to deal in quantifiable specifics, not unsubstantiated broad-sweeping assertions.
That doesn’t gel for me. When any sort of corruption is operative, the “errors” don’t “creep in”, they’re deliberately introduced.
Real Scientists attack consensus with original research, data, and clearly stated explanitory causal mechanisms. In the meantime, those of us who don’t pretend to be something they’re not stick to what the majority of experts say, else we’d find ourselves tempted to believe every hair-brained crank theory published in some backwater journal — or even more desperately on a personal blog — solely on the basis that if it doesn’t look like groupthink it must be right.
Which is my approach to ALL science, not just climate-related stuff. Special pleadings are not my style.
B. Gates says:
Real Scientists attack consensus with original research, data, and…&etc.
Real scientists don’t give a damn about “consensus”. A consensus isn’t science.
But the alarmist crowd cares a whole lot about the consensus, for the simple reason that they mistakenly believe they constitute the the climate consensus. They don’t.
The true ‘consensus’ is heavily on the side of scientific skeptics. That has been shown beyond any doubt. In fact, what is called the “consensus” in the climate world is a bunch of fabricated nonsense. I can prove it:
Post the names of all the scientists and engineers you can find who contradict the idea that CO2 is harmless, and that it is a net benefit to the biosphere. I will bury you in names showing you where the real consensus is. The true consensus is on the side of skeptics.
The “consensus” argument is made because the alarmist crowd does not have convincing facts. So they fall back on anti-science arguments like ‘consensus’, and ad hominem arguments, and logical fallacies like the Appeal to Authority.
The public is coming around, too. Just a couple of years ago, there were always lots of concerned comments under media articles, about possible runaway global warming. But no more. Now it’s easily 90% ridicule. And when the public turns on you, you’re toast.
At 9:42 PM on 4 February, dbstealey writes:
Ah, but a “consensus” – a prevailing and effectively unquestioned orthodoxy – tends with some reliability to be a presumptive indicator of error and therefore demarcates an area of inquiry where investigatory effort might well pay off.
Heck, what better sign can there be that there’s something worth examination than observation that the dullards, the dimwits, the timorous, the “established,” the fat and the lazy receive the prevailing hypotheses as Holy Writ in spite of contravening evidence?
Ya gotta have some kinda trail markers to pique your curiosity and show you where to go poking in your nose.
Let us praise “consensus,” therefore. It guides us in the placement of the demolition charges necessary to blast our way past entrenched stupidity.
dbstealey,
Brandon says “I’m loving the 90% ridicule stat, that was a nice touch. Has that figure been peer-reviewed by chance?”
Indeed it has. The peers are here.
More than one consensus exists; each with its command and control (C2) mechanisms, peers and publishing houses. It is (IMO) arrogance to suppose only one set of peers can exist; a belief you reveal by failing to identify which peers you mean by your statement.
Thanx, Brandon. I’ll add you to my short list of nitpickers.
You might be right, maybe logic isn’t my strong point. I disagree, but then that’s a minor dispute. It’s merely your opinion, and I can’t recall anyone else ever saying that. They prefer to call me other names.
Here is my strong point: I watch what Planet Earth is doing. I pay attention to what the planet is telling us. And you know what? She is very clearly saying that skeptics are right, and alarmists are wrong.
Anyone who still believes in MMGW after eighteen [or ten, or 13, or whatever] years of no global warming — while CO2 keeps steadily rising — must either re-visit their original conjecture and try to figure where they went wrong, or they are living in their own make-believe world.
The alarmist meme is being deconstructed as we watch. Either those folks will be honest and admit that they were off-base, or they will argue incessantly. The former are honest, the latter are not.
It really is as simple as that.
Tucci78,
That’s a good point about consensus. It is somewhat related to the first step in the hierarchy: Conjecture, Hypothesis, Theory, Law. Some of them made a conjecture early on, and there may have been a slight consensus at that time. But most scientists watch the ongoing experiment that Planet Earth is doing, and the honest ones reject the original conjecture.
The alarmist crowd’s problem is that, although they claim consensus, it is a verifiably false claim. Many times I’ve challenged them to post a list of scientist by name who dispute the statement that CO2 is harmless, and that it is beneficial to the biosphere.
But no one has ever met that challenge, for the simple reason that there really are very few on the warmist side who will dare to put their names to that. They would not dare to contradict those points because lots of public ridicule would result. Instead, they are just happy to feed at the trough, keeping the MMGW scare alive and making a fat ‘n’ easy living at it.
So the “consensus” is solidly on the side of scientific skeptics. And you know what? It’s getting more lopsided. Every year that passes with no global warming builds the skeptical consensus.
At 9:39 AM on 5 February, after giving indication that he’s familiar with Dr. Jeff Glassman’s delightful essay “Conjecture, Hypothesis, Theory, Law: The Basis of Rational Argument” (December 2007), dbstealey goes on to observe:
While I expect that there may be pleasure to basking in the utterly unfamiliar warm fuzzies of majoritarian association (I’ve been calling this craptacular CO2-demonizing damnfoolishness a great blivet of uncomposted transnational progressive dung since 1981), my objective has never been the attainment of cuddly togetherness with the kinds of people botched enough to have been suckered by such weapons-grade bogosity in the first place. I just want them tattooed all over “Null & Void,” permanently blacklisted throughout governments, industries, and the academy, and laid open to civil proceedings seeking compensatory and punitive damages. Let the plaintiff’s bar be unleashed upon them, their heirs and assigns.
dbstealey,
That would be quintuple counting, but if you must I am honored.
I’ve pointed out what I think the specific flaws of your arguments are. They remain unchallenged with your appeal to my opinion.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-MW_NJp28Udc/VNS3EAEqpOI/AAAAAAAAAUs/hjhuLZFkdoM/s1600/hadcrut4%2Bhiatuses.png
Michael 2,
It’s still out there in all its glory. I dip in every so often, but it’s been over 6 months since my last venture.
Kadaitcha Man. Also suspected to be Teh Ghod Troll, Chinahand and one other sock that escapes me. A true master of the art. Think Kibo, but vulgar, very good at math and logic, and … well I think … 10 times as hilarious.
Gates,
Thanx for the chart. Are you claiming some or all of that global warming is man-made?
dbstealey,
Purpose of that plot is to point out that up to 40-year AGW hiatuses have precedent. Conversely, 40-year warming skyrocketuses are also in evidence.
As for attribution, clearly I believe that CO2 has been the main driver for the positive delta-T from beginning to end of that time series. No, I’m not forgetting about the Sun:
http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/itsi_wls_ann.png
The 40-ish year cycles in the temperature record line up with AMO quite well:
http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/iamo_hadsst.png
And with PDO:
http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/ipdo_hadsst3.png
IPO has some interesting things to say:
http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/ieof_pac_hadisst1_4_01.png
Conclusion: extrapolating the future from a 20 year least-squares linear regression is a Bad Idea because quite clearly one stands about a 50% chance of getting a very wrong answer. Which renders your argument above …
Anyone who still believes in MMGW after eighteen [or ten, or 13, or whatever] years of no global warming — while CO2 keeps steadily rising — must either re-visit their original conjecture and try to figure where they went wrong, or they are living in their own make-believe world.
… a tad naive. If not wilfully ignorant. Not very skeptical, regardless. In my opinion, of course.
Was there a point to your psychobabble? What scientific study confirms your 30-60K kill supposition? The American Lung Association propaganda funded by EPA?
NIH for the first estimate and WHO for the second. It doesn’t really matter which TLA did the research when it’s gummint funded. I do keep this favorable write-up in Forbes bookmarked in the off chance that makes any difference: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2012/06/10/energys-deathprint-a-price-always-paid/
How did the government’s “War on Drugs” or “War on Poverty” turn out? Aside from giving the US the highest rate of incarceration in the world? Did we win these wars?
Every solution leads to new problems. The “War on Coal” is a new problem waiting to happen. The problems it will cause will be revealed at the worst possible moment. Murphy’s Law.
ferdberple,
Shitty. The War on Drugs advocates apparently learned nothing from the Prohibition era, not even after it created the exact same problems … because by George they’re STILL stumping for it. The way to end poverty is to put people to work, not on a dole with a weekly requirement to send in “evidence” that one is looking for work. My view of the New Deal is that people went to work on the public dime, out of which we got lasting and beneficial infrastructure. They got the sastifaction of being paid to produce something useful. It’s blindingly obvious to me that’s the proper way to handle downturns in an inherently boom-bust business cycle.
That reads like apathy and wishful thinking to me. Climate aside, the world is changing economically and my view is that we are increasingly lagging in our ability to compete. Whether you like it or not, the whole world, including the US, sees the writing on the wall wrt fossil fuels and is taking appropriate steps to reduce their dependence on it. That’s a market opportunity. Your luddite-like view of intentional directed change is not the sort of attitude which lends itself to capitalizing on it. I think that’s stupidly short-sighted.
Gates says:
… the world is changing economically and my view is that we are increasingly lagging in our ability to compete. Whether you like it or not, the whole world, including the US, sees the writing on the wall wrt fossil fuels and is taking appropriate steps to reduce their dependence on it. That’s a market opportunity. Your luddite-like view of intentional directed change is not the sort of attitude which…
Sometimes Gates makes less sense than others. What are we “competing” at? A race to the bottom? There is nothing that helps poor folks more than cheap fossil fuels. Gates calls people who want the poor to get wealthier “Luddites”.
That is typically muddled thinking from leftists. They don’t really want to help the people who need it most. They are the true Luddites. No wonder the world is going to hell in a handbasket. Too many crazy people wanting ‘solutions’ like windmills, when cheap fossil fuesl are the answer.
I wonder: does Gates ever consider what the poor would vote for?
No, I don’t really wonder. Gates and his type do not want to give them that choice.
dbstealey,
Money, power, prestige and suitable mating partners. Some things never change.
I cannot fault that argument.
Yeah, because I’m planning on building my nuclear power plants with slave labor. Good one.
Raising the minimum wage is a popular one. Good thing that isn’t a direct vote, or we’d all be poor.
Brandon Gates writes “Raising the minimum wage is a popular one. Good thing that isn’t a direct vote, or we’d all be poor.”
Exactly. If everyone’s wage was at least a million dollars an hour, a hamburger would cost a million dollars.
Just move the decimal point.
Oh, but inflation already does that.
Recommended reading: The “iron law of wages”.
It isn’t the numbers that matter; it is what you can buy with the numbers you’ve got — and if everyone has the same numbers, you cannot buy any more with your new wage than you could with your old wage.
Michael2,
Thanks. If it were not for endless strawman & elenchi arguments, Gates’ comments would be shortened by about 90%. His strawman over Gates calls people who want the poor to get wealthier “Luddites” is a case in point. The poor aren’t voting for nukes. They want cheap energy, and the cheapest energy is fossil fuel energy.
Also, I like Gates’ reference to “causal mechanisms”. Let’s have the main causal mechanism for global warming. Be prepared to support your belief.
Michael 2,
And as it does they lose their purchasing power, effectively rendering minimum wage earners poorer. Pols looking to court the votes of that income bracket — and those ideologically sensitive to their needs — will at some point lobby to raise the wage floor. It’s only sensible to raise minimum wage by about as much as the inflation rate since the last hike as significantly much more than that begins to create inflation (or possibly causes unemployment) in and of itself which defeats the purpose. As you rightfully point out.
dbstealey,
Those who have construction skills, or are willing to learn them, might want to think about that a little harder.
http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/aeo/pdf/electricity_generation.pdf
The hands-down winner for generating electricity is geothermal, followed by natural gas. Conventional coal and advanced nuclear are comparable. On-shore wind and hydro are in between. I’m proposing replacing coal with nuclear. I’d rather see natural gas used more for vehicles than in power plants. You may disagree with these estimates, but I believe them to be reasonable. As such, I do not believe I am advocating for taking cheap energy away from the poor when I call for a coal to nuclear replacement program.
Oh. Right. Geothermal.
Pie in the sky, as poor folks die.
dbstealey, I repeat: “I’m proposing replacing coal with nuclear.” You’re talking about pie in the sky. Why oh why do you lie?
@Gates:
I never lie. I may make an occasional error. But I never lie. I am not an alarmist.
dbstealey,
Then you’re a better man than me. I’ve told worse fibs than, “No honey, that dress doesn’t make you look like a hog.”
What once worked in this country, perhaps? May I remind you it cost more and took longer to build the Visitor’s Center at Hoover Dam than it took to build the damn dam. And the dam was built on time and on budget.
Obama’s failed “shovel ready jobs” initiatives and his admissions about “shovel ready” not being real should be enough to start you rethinking.
The government that you seem to credit for past successes is now the largest obstacle to current and future success.
more soylent green!
I did not know that.
My kneejerk reaction is to not believe that. Well both statements actually. But that’s beside the point.
That the Obama administration has not lived up to promise? That he’s not a very competent leader? That the Democratic party has done almost everything it possibly could over the tenure of his administration to ensure that he would become the victim of his own unpreparedness to lead? Did I miss something?
No need to answer that last one, I’m sure I did.
It’s not the same government. Not even remotely.
As an example, the focus could be on “things like cleaner air, low power consumption, improved public transport, better waste management, efficient agriculture, reforestation … (they) are all in public interest, regardless of position on climate change,” she said …
===================================
I see no public interest in the power consumption of individuals or businesses.
I’d start with foreign policy. See also Ben Franklin, “A penny saved is a penny earned.” Oil is good for a lot of things that don’t have anything to do with internal combustion engines. Would be nice to keep some of the stuff around for those uses.
I know from personal experience that if you remove the oil from an internal combustion engine it won’t run for very long. It is always good to remember that the stone age didn’t end because we ran out of rocks.
Matt, nicely said and good for an excellent chuckle to boot. I do see emerging new energy tech as an investment opportunity. We could use the work. They Keynesian economics I think I understand speak very loudly to me on this topic. We could use the work.
Oh dear, I’m repeating myself. Must be quitting time.
Agreed, it’s good for lots more than just burning in an engine. That said, the solution would be to make it ourselves.
And don’t you dare say that we can’t; yes, we can.
1) We know how it starts (oceanic algae)
2) We know the T-P regime that creates it
3) We know how to capture it (think ‘permeable trap’)
4) We know how to transport it, refine it, and deliver it to market
Once the stuff Nature made for us runs out, we’ll probably get into high gear making our own.
Mark Hladik,
Knowledge of how to do it is probably not the biggest problem. The plausibly viable processes you describe will probably work and eventually yes, we’ll need to to them. But that will require R&D. As yet unknown lead times. Retrofitting industrial infrastructure. Which all takes time and money.
And energy. If we haven’t found a viable alternative energy solution to the petroleum’s other uses we’re attempting to replace across the board, all bets are off.
Set aside CO2 for a moment. We’re going to have to deal with this anyway at some point. The normal course of action is that a resource becomes scarce and therefore expensive. Replacement alternatives are sought which are more abundant, therefore less expensive. The nature of fossil fuel reserves is that, left to market forces alone, the transition has a good chance of being a smooth one. But not guaranteed. We’ve experienced price shocks in the past which were not pleasant. Remember the time Nixon got into a pissing contest with OPEC because we didn’t let the Syrians and Egyptians celebrate Yom Kippur by stomping Israel’s guts out? How much of our collective soul do you think we sold getting out of that bind? Much much more ass-kissing later we’re on reasonably good terms with, oh, the Saudis, but you can’t honestly tell me you like any of those bastards having us by the balls. Can you? How hard do you think they’re going to squeeze when even their stuff starts running low and China, who holds already our purse-strings quite handily in their own right, outbids us?
I’ve got a million of these little reasons which have diddly-squat to do with classic left-leaning liberal environmentalism to begin easing the hell out of the oil business ahead of the curve via the exact sort of knowledge-based innovation you’re appealing to. It would require spending money to do it, but again, we’ll need to do it eventually anyway. This is a time value of money problem, and my argument is that investments early on are worth far more in the future than if the same investment is made later on down the line under potentially more dire, and therefore riskier, straits. So, front-load the risk proactively where it stands more of a chance for a bigger long-term return. And other benefits like the immediate creation of more jobs. The list of good is at least as long as the litany of next years’ 10-K driven complaints that it would be a Bad Idea to mess with the success of what we’re already doing.
Well, Mr. Gates, we seem to be in agreement. Being able to produce and (eventually) make our own synthetic version of the stuff we pull out of the ground is not a bad idea.
Do note that I did not indicate that it would be inexpensive, nor do I believe that we have the technical know-how to do it today. I would hazard a guess that we differ on the best way to go about this eventual transfer from natural petroleum to synthetic petroleum (I would have the free market do it). I also suspect that by the time we are making this eventual transition, we will no longer be using half of each produced barrel of petroleum as an engine fuel.
As for dependence upon foreign sources, we also tend to agree there. I favor the use of our domestic resources, or what we can buy from friendly governments (think Canada). The more petro-dollars we withhold from the mid-East, the better.
It was in the 1950’s that we began learning how to do hydraulic fracturing (so-called ‘fracking’). The fact that the eco-loons suddenly found out about it within the past few years, just shows their lack of a sense of history. We can, and should, move to all forms of energy independence. Cliched as it is, “drill, baby, DRILL” worked. A very wise man once told me, ‘never argue with success’.
You indicate to ‘set aside CO2 for a moment’. I feel no compunction to set it aside. Unlike you, I understand that CO2 does NOT control the temperature of the Earth, and it is a vital plant nutrient. CO2 is good for the environment. I look at some four billion years of Earth history, and know that we have no way of destroying this rock. The Earth has withstood far more than “we” are doing to it, and yet, we are here to discuss what we discuss.
May you live long, and prosper, in good health, Mr. Gates.
Mark H.
At 6:11 AM on 4 February, Mark Hladik comments:
And here again I am reminded of a science column published by Isaac Asimov in the December 1970 edition of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, titled “The Thalassogens,” in which he discussed planetary astronomy and the fact that on the “junior giants” furthest out in our solar system (Uranus and Neptune), the oceans are made from the very common compound methane (CH4), which is liquid in the prevalent temperature ranges, just as dihydrogen monoxide (H2O) is the solvent of life and copious in occurrence on our own rocky little orb.
Then again, there’s our knowledge of how the planets had aggregated from the detritus “left over” when old Sol had gathered itself into fusion-kindling massiveness, and that the residual planetesimals wandering around the rims of the various planetary gravity wells include a helluva lot of carbonaceous chondrite, indicating that much massive motes of organic matter had come swarming in to add themselves to the proto-Earth long, long before the first microorganisms began to match purines and pyrimidines in the game of genetics.
So how much of those petrochemical fuels and feedstocks are really “fossil” products (i.e., formerly living stuff) and actually abiotic compounds contaminated just a wee little bit by opportunistic microbial infections to leave markers of life therein? Coal is most certainly plant life gone petrified, for we find easily identified fossils therein, but liquid petroleum? Natural gas?
Carbon and hydrogen are so common in our solar system that methane – natural gas, from which it’s known that petroleum fractions like Diesel and gasoline can be efficiently synthesized – form the oceans on planets a bit further out than our own. And oxygen … well, that’s free in our atmosphere courtesy of photosynthesis; broccoli does more than just sit there under melted cheese as a side dish, eh?
I love hearing the alarmists maunder about “peak oil” when the indications rumble underfoot – literally – to intimate that there ain’t peak nothin’ on our planet or otherwise in our solar system yet, and won’t be for some many sundry centuries.
Science fiction fans contend that mundanes are a drag on the human race, but we have at least some hypothetical need for them as breeding stock.
I’ll go with that.
Mark H,
Yes, we do seem to be in general agreement. Our differences are in timing and methods. My setting aside CO2 comment appears to be the main sticking point. In my experience, that’s the one constant point of contention. I’m of the mind that any “bipartisan” emissions mitigation program will only succeed with more up front carrots than sticks. Which will require no small amount of horse trading.
You’ve obviously missed my standard speech about not being able to destroy the planet, which is fine. Basically, that’s not how I approach the argument, and in point of fact, not how most serious climatologists I know of look at it, so I get a little tetchy whenever someone frames the problem in those terms.
Good health to you too, Mr. Hladik.
Thanks; apologies for what I have, or did, miss. I do believe that an honest assessment will indicate that the climate-catastrophe crowd tends to promote the idea of planetary (or just ecological) destruction. If nothing else, it is a standard ‘get-out-the-vote’ technique.
My take is that the climate will continue to change, since that is its norm. I do not prognosticate which direction it will take, but it will change.
Thanks for the stimulating conversation!
Mark H.
the only public interest in the power consumption of the individual is the artificially high cost due to the funding of already failed so called renewable energy schemes. eg the RET in australia subsidising solar pv panels on rich peoples houses while the poor who cant afford the base cost, they rent or whatever, pay for it through the increased electricity prices in general.
there is NO doubt that the provider charges the costs of the RET scheme, they show it clearly in their ledgers, and the government show clearly how much they require the providers to pay them for the RET scheme.
i am sure there will be some money going to research, but it is not through the funding of solar,wind etc. all the subsidising does is STOP research. they have a clear path to government funds to manufacture and no competition to innovate.
This article misses the point. The last thing that the global warming activists want to do is improve the general populations understanding of science. That would be the biggest threat to the gravy chain. They prefer the trust us where the Tax man/ Lawyer/ Climate Scientist line. They never try and explain the science they try and push the fear. They don’t want to fix the relationships and promote reasoned discussion because if they did the public would soon understand that the fear is overblown
It was a Labour politician in , I think Harold Wilson’s Cabinet of the ’60s, who said, referring to public involvement in policy , “at the end of the day , it really is the man in Whitehall who knows best “.
Apart from adding “woman” to the “man in Whitehall” , nothing has changed in the past 50 years .
Ignorant plebs we are and will remain so to the end of time in the eyes of the inhabitants of the Palace of Westminster.
And they’re mostly right, Mike. Ignorant plebs we all. But that’s what is so wonderful about the market. It knows even better than we do what we actually want. A wise hand on the tiller is necessary, sure – I’m not a great fan of anarchy – but the guy who is sure he knows better than us is dangerous, and especially dangerous when we elect him
Um, why not try: “Republicans are skeptics, and Democrats are believers.” Lol. That has got to take an Einstein to figure that out, and a $700,000 grant to study it for 19 months.
“Republicans are skeptics, democrats are believers”. No not completely true. I definitely don’t fit in the Republican base of supporters, but I’m as big a “denier” as they come.
Then the camps should be divided into “thinker” and “non-thinker”. Politics is often a sad substitution for thinking.
Rocky Road,
So are labels like ‘denialist’, ‘contrarian’, etc. Reading some of the inane commentary in the media, it is easy to see that the writer is taking the easy way out by just sitting back and typing “deniers” every time he should be giving a reasoned answer.
There have been so many left of center commenters here over the years who have written what wickedwenchfan wrote above, that climate skepticism cannot be a political label — although many in that arena keep trying to make it political. Across the political spectrum, people are either thinkers or they aren’t. Thinking people who aren’t paid to think that AGW is a problem all seem to come to the same conclusion.
The abstract starts by stating the discredited 97 percent nonsense, which immediately pisses me off. No communication between parties is possible when one side continues to spew lies and disinformation, no matter how much it has been shown to be false.
Exactly. By regurgitating the 97% twaddle the authors merely demonstrate that they don’t even realise the depth of the abyss separating them from skeptics.
97% of scientists that receive funding for Climate Change (TM) believe strongly in climate change. Remove the funding and you remove the belief.
So long as the Democratic Party in the US has Climate Change (TM) as a major political plank, and so long as voters elect Democrats, the funding for Climate Change (TM) will continue, as will the belief.
If the US had instead spent $100 billion on studies to prove that Climate Change (TM) was not a problem, 97% of the scientific reports would show just that. Science delivers what it is paid to deliver and will continue to do so, so long as scientists have mouths to feed and mortgages to pay.
The percentage of scientific reports does not demonstrate the science is correct. Instead it demonstrates what type of scientific reports pay the best.
I have the same pissed off reaction, but I think of the 97% nonsense as stupidityrather than deliberate lying.
Seems I recall seeing a survey on global climate change that 100% of self-discribed climate deniers agreed with the statements that only 97% of the warmists agreed with! All that really tells us is the survey was so bad that no conclusions could be made from it!
It’s really easy! Stop torturing the data and stop lying to me. Call me anything you like, it’s the truth I’m after and given the considerable journey of discovery I have been on I can tell when I’m being bull-shitted!
Keep up the good work Anthony’s!
So in other words stop treating the idiots like idiots and maybe they’ll give up their idiotic resistance to our perfectly proven theory of AGW!
Sorry guys were not idiots and just because you share your Chardonnay with us doesn’t mean we will ever agree that down is up.
Starting the abstract off with the 97-percent meme sets the stage for the author’s mindset – that they’re right, and the 50-percenters, composed of socio-political boors, are so wrong. And they go on to suggest the truth will prevail if only it’s communicated properly. If recent actions are a clue, proper communication is a mix of censorship and suppression of facts that go counter to their “truth”, with a touch of Saul Alinsky’s Rule 12: Destroy the Individual “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” Students are taught what to believe, not why to believe it, and contradictory information that might confuse their belief is glossed over or flat out removed from the classroom. I’ve seen all these tactics in action, close up.
The Warmers’ approach to discussing the pros, cons, and evidence reminds me of this encounter between the Klingon Commander Kor and the Federation’s own Captain Kirk:
KOR: You’ve been asking for war!
KIRK: You’re the ones who issued the ultimatum to withdraw from the disputed areas!
KOR: They are not disputed! They’re clearly ours.
And Klingons aren’t known as particularly good communicators.
“This misalignment between scientific and public views has been attributed to a range of factors, including political attitudes, socio-economic status, moral values, levels of scientific understanding, and failure of scientific communication.”
But not the actual primary cause: anti-science propaganda.
“We propose that this division is best explained as a socio-political conflict between these opposing groups. Here we demonstrate that US believers and sceptics have distinct social identities, beliefs and emotional reactions that systematically predict their support for action to advance their respective positions.”
It explains why some people swallow the propaganda and some don’t. But nowhere is there any evidence that “civility” will improve that.
Depressing to see the old canard “97% agree that climate change is caused by humans” prominently wheeled out again. The message still hasn’t got through to them that the thing that makes us sceptical is the observation that 0% of those papers actually show us hard evidence that climate change is caused by humans – no matter how much they “agree”.
When I got to “…97% agree that climate change is caused by humans…” I bailed on reading the article…
That stopped me cold… better communications my foot.
Whatever the rest of the piece says (I’ll read it,) the author now has diminished credibility. If she can’t be bothered to find out the truth of such things, then how can her conclusions be taken seriously?
It’s really easy to persuade a sceptic … and if any government had given me the money to publish the results of the survey … they would know how to persuade sceptics.
And it certainly, most definitely isn’t better communication.
Exactly. “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth”.
Pay me big $$ to believe in Climate Change and I too will believe, just so long as the funding continues. The more you pay me, the more I will believe. Pay me hundreds of millions like Big Al to believe, I’m going to believe big time.
However, turn around and tell me I’m going to have to pay. I’m going to be down right skeptical. I’m not going to give up my hard earned cash unless I get rock solid evidence that this isn’t some sort of scam to take money out of my pockets and place it in someone else’s pockets, with the skim going to pay off compliant scientists, politicians and news services to keep the scam going as long as possible.
Because in the end, he who pays the piper calls the tune. It is the public paying the piper, not the scientists or politicians. So, it should be the public calling the tune. We are the ones that dictate how high we want the scientists and politicians to jump when dancing to our jig.
Scientists have absolutely no business telling the public to be less skeptical. If they are paid by governments to produce climate change reports then they have a conflict of interests and need to spell out clearly that they have a conflict.
Of the climate science papers that take a position on the issue, 97% agree that climate change is caused by humans, WRONG , and one way to improve communications with others is not to lie . In reality they consider a ‘select’ of papers not all ‘climate science papers that take a position on the issue,’ When your opening line is BS then starting form a poor position on how to improve communications to others.
Hello climate alarmists, if you wish to communicate with myself, the following rules apply:
1/ Stop lying to me.
2/ Give me the whole story, IE: stop lying to me by omission.
3/ Leave my religion alone, attempting to insult me by attacking my personal moral and ethical beliefs is never a good place to start, especially reading some of the unethical, immoral things you better than me so called scientists have and are doing.
4/ Stop lying to me. Oh did I repeat myself? Have you thought that might be because you did not listen to me the first time and continue to lie to me because you see the end justifies the lies?
5/ Talk to me like a reasonable person, do not talk down to me purely because you THINK I am not as smart as you think you are.
6/ And because you do not listen, STOP LYING TO US!!!!! Is that clear enough for you now?
Try these steps and we might begin to be able to move forward.
+1
At 12:54 AM on 3 February, Neil began his post:
…after which nothing else matters, because if they can’t lie to you, what is there left for them to say?
Except, of course, to call you a “denier.”
With the demise of the Soviet Empire, might we re-task the term “refusenik?”
I mean, the “climate change” hysterics are reliably (almost uniformly) left-“Progressive” mouthpieces or their sputniki, no?
Doesn’t piss me off to be called a “denier”. I do find lots of people getting irate with me, however, when I tell them my position.
wickedwenchfan,
After you ask them what they think you’re denying, ask a couple more questions:
• What fraction of the air is CO2? [0.00004 – .04%]
• How many years has it been since there was global warming? [At least ten, more likely 18]
There are lots more, but I’ve found that the majority of people cannot answer the first [if you ask for a guess, I’ve gotten answers like, “25%?”]. And hardly anyone is aware of the second answer.
Most people learn their ‘science’ from the media. They may still argue with you. But it will make them start to think about what you told them.
dbstealey, I also suspect that many don’t know that sea levels have generally been rising for thousands of years. Maybe you can add that to your questions. I can’t recall the number of times I’ve read words to the effect of “But sea levels are rising!” Do bears sh!t in the woods is my answer, then I go onto explain that it’s about acceleration or not. PS they also say but the ice caps / glaciers are melting. I point out post LIA.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/pubs/ipcc2007/fig68.jpg
They get hostile? Do you tell them that at this point, anyone using the term “denier” is either a lying propagandist or a complete know- nothing dumbass?
It works every time (and then you don’t have to listen to any more of their screed.)
I and the Minnesotans are proud deniers:
The “science community” stands no chance at all with me until I see that they have started being honest and open with all data and viewpoints as science should be.
There is hardly any field of endeavor where I have not seen massive coverups and cheating. Besides that is the punishment of anyone who would challenge the “consensus”. That, my friends, is not science.
I bet we could get a riotous 500 comment thread going on almost any topic from medical science for example. Is the CDC open and honest?
If you want to persuade someone do:
* Not insult their intelligence by parroting debunked papers
* Not insult them personally by calling them names – always a sign that you have an extremely weak case
* Show real evidence for what you are claiming
These are three very simple steps but the Gruber academics who author this paper proceed to break those three rules. Disappointingly, but unsurprisingly, Nature publishes these papers insulting the intelligence of many of their reducing readership
The failure of leading climate scientists to engage in open debate on the subject clearly demonstrates to me that they know their science will not stand up to public scrutiny.
Just the other day I saw a broadcast where Gavin Schmidt of GISS appeared on TV, but refused to debate another guest on the program. This does nothing to encourage me that he is being scientifically honest.
I would never vote for any politician that refused to publicly debate his opponents. I sure as shooting am not going to blindly trust a scientist that refuses to publicly debate the issues. If he is a better scientists than debater, he should not be in a position of authority, as head of a publicly funded organization.
If you are unwilling to engage in public debate, then you don’t belong in a position of authority to promote policies that affect the public, funded from the public purse.
The points of agreement being suggested are ones I commonly hear as though they are what Climate Change is all about, but these are nothing to do with Climate Change of the IPCC. Since when did clean air, sustainable production practices etc have anything to do with IPCC political views of CAGW or Climate Change or Global Climate Disruption or whatever else is the current catch phrase?
@neil
…apply:
1/ Stop lying to me.
2/ Give me the whole story, IE: stop lying to me by omission.
3/ Leave my religion alone, attempting to insult me by attacking my personal moral and ethical beliefs is never a good place to start, especially reading some of the unethical, immoral things you better than me so called scientists have and are doing.
4/ Stop lying to me. …
Actually, stopping threatening to cut my head off would be a better start!
But note that their problem is; if they don’t lie to us, they have no case at all…
I promise mate, if I ever became a muslim, I would not threaten to chop any of your body parts from any other. Sound good?
Sometime between 1950 and 1960, our planet switched off all its natural climate cycles and became reliant on made made ones caused by CO2.
It is perfectly logical that all raw temperature data need to be constantly homogenised/manipulated/tortured.
Climate research is underfunded and needs more money.
The ice caps are catastrophically melting.
The polar bears are dying off.
The much quoted 97% figure is real and accurate.
Anyone can see that sea levels are rising at an alarming rate.
Climate can easily be fixed, without any fluctuations, at little cost to our economies.
Wind and solar power are cheap and reliable and the way of the future.
Climate scientists always uphold the highest standards of statistics and science.
The results from climate models are obviously right because they are very sophisticated and are run on super computers.
The geological record is full of examples of CAGW, such as is happening now.
Tropical storm Sandy and the recent ice blizzard in New England are proof of man made climate change.
Only the most honourable of politicians believe in man made climate change.
Current temperatures are the highest ever, especially in this Holocene interglacial period.
The recent 15-18 year pause in global temperatures is easily explained by man made climate change theory.
It is self-evident all the above are complete nonsense, but these are the core beliefs of the alarmist community and why I, as a scientist, am a sceptic.
The most recent and often repeated talking point from the climate fearosphere: “the recent announcement that 2014 was the hottest year ever, makes a lie of the claim that there was a multi- year pause in rising temperatures”.
The reason why communications is a problem is because it’s hard to convince people if you don’t have actual evidence.
This made me very angry. I am one of the non scientific dumb arse public. “You know”,the kind of person called upon to sit on juries and make up our minds about the veracity of opposing arguments. Ana-Maria Bliuc et al are patronising in the extreme to both, the likes of myself and many learned skeptical scientists.
The use of that stupid 97% reveals their closed minds. i suspect, btw that skepticism among scientists is actually higher than among the dumb arse public.(which i understand exceeds 50%). I for one am not swayed by pseudo expressions of reconciliation.
I don’t understand … John Cook is a Research Fellow in Climate Change Communication according to the UQ web site, and even won a prize in 2011 for his efforts:
http://www.uq.edu.au/news/article/2011/09/top-honour-uq%E2%80%99s-eureka-prize-winners
With brilliance like that on the AGW side, how could the public be so misguided? Heck he was one of the most “talked about” paper writers recently:
http://www.uq.edu.au/news/article/2014/01/uq-climate-change-paper-has-whole-world-talking
Shame he was pipped by a paper on Sodoku. I guess that shows how much Climate Change rates anymore… I like how the Global Change Institute link is broken. Good communication guys!
“This isn’t the first time researchers have blamed “communication” for climate scepticism”
It isn’t communication that is the problem, it is the communication of the truth that is the problem with all AGW scientists. The moment they and the media give a platform to an alternative viewpoint then their so called communication problems will be resolved, which of course they know will be against their own twisted and self serving view point.
A commenter above opined that the loss of jobs and increase of unemployment in the US had nothing to do with “the gummint.” As one who got out of real estate when Dodd and Frank and the rest of the Democrat establishment in government eased all of the qualification rules for buying real estate, I disagree strongly with that statement. The “recession” started because, from the late 1980s or early 1990s on, banks were forced, in many cases against their better judgment, to lend money to people who no longer had to prove they could pay it back. People could then buy property much more expensive than they could afford, thus also sending prices skyrocketing and making appraisal an “I can out-value you” sort of business. (These are generalizations, of course; exceptional, careful people still existed, but the new laws no longer supported their caution.) Since I had over a decade in the real estate business, including teaching courses such as real estate financing, I could foresee to some extent what had to happen. Inevitably, buyers who had not had to qualify rigorously for their loans (and had no savings cushion) would lose their jobs or have a medical crisis or for some other reason suddenly would incur expenses that made continued payment on their house impossible, thus leading to default and foreclosure. The real estate collapse was as inevitable as it was unforeseen by Dodd, Frank, and the whole set of debt enablers who sat by and watched as homes were lost, lenders went under as bad debts flooded their portfolios, and suddenly other sectors of the economy (cars, etc.) underwent quick transitions from prosperity to penury. The government had everything to do with that collapse. It could happen again; certainly the current administration is doing everything it can to exacerbate the situation.
Is civlity a accidental or deliberate typo as exists in dozens of places on webpages?
latest CSIRO on sea temp http://www.climateinstitute.org.au/articles/media-releases/report-shows-how-climate-change-is-and-will-be-slugging-australia.html
These studies make me laugh. They have the feel of early observations done on foreign animals and cultures where the researcher never left home. I wonder if the lack of real engagement is because they fear if they talk to us directly they might be in danger of going native? Do you think they’ve got a poster on the wall that states ‘start an intervention if you catch me saying “actually sceptics have a point”‘.
They want people to believe their side.
The only people I’ve read about reversing their position on CAGW were alarmists coming to their senses.
I’ve never read one case of a skeptic falling for the CAGW meme and switching support for alarmist’s BS.
Not one thinking person has considered and started supporting the IPCC position.
This isn’t the first time researchers have blamed “communication” for climate skepticism.
… there may be problems other than communication which need to be addressed, before a common understanding can be achieved.
There aren’t any communication problems, the message has been received.
I know what they’ve said:
I hear them when they blame storms on Global Warming
I hear them when they say the planet needs to be saved
I hear them when they say we are reaching a tipping point.
I know they think the polar bears are nearing extinction.
I’ve heard the meter or more end of the century predictions for rise in sea level.
I just don’t believe them, because 27 years after Dr. James Hansen’s testimony before congress none of it is coming true.
It’s not even close to coming true.
Dr. James Hansen – the boy that cried wolf.
Ah, the progressive way. Let’s focus on messaging not on actual truth And then we can get our way to empose crushing taxes and end capitalism. Fascism with a smile.
The disconnect comes from a different definition of what a fact is.
For example, Jimbo gives many examples of what sceptics consider to be “facts”. They are observations, testable statements about observations and all related to the physical world. In short, sceptics are empiricists. Our facts are untidy and not necessarily systematic. They just are what we find.
Our opponents use “facts” that are ideal. They are valorised not by observation but by neatness. Their origin isn’t observation of the physical world but rather the social structure. “97% of X says Y so we believe Y as X is authoritative”. The fact that Y keeps not happening is irrelevant to the authority of X.
The current computer climate models are the best we have. They don’t reflect reality (confirmed by IPCC AR5 box 9.2) but they are the best we have so they must be correct enough. The experts who made them are the best experts we have – evaluate the sources – the best must be more right than everyone else..
When we sceptics are accused of denying the science they mean we don’t accept the authority of the experts. When we accuse them of pseudoscience we mean they don’t accept that their hypotheses don’t reflect what actually happens.
Neither side cares what the other thinks as neither side respects the others definition of a fact.
M Courtney, all of us here would entirely agree with you. Since this morning, I have read all 106 comments on this post. Like many here, I have thought long and hard about this ‘divide’ between Skeptic and Warmist.
Despite the article’s claim that “misalignment” (quote) is due to “political attitudes, socio-economic status, moral values, levels of scientific understanding, and failure of scientific communication.”, the conflict between our ‘Rationalist’ community is mostly caused by the opposition’s ‘Sophist’ indoctrinated mindset. The claims made by CAGW proponents rely mostly on clever factual distortion to create sensational ‘evidence’ and quibbling arguments that all appear fundamentally unsound. That is what a ‘Sophist’ does. In contrast, we ‘Rationalists’ rely on reason rather than intuition to justify our beliefs or actions based on observations and, above all, what we can see Mother Nature is up to by simply looking outside our windows.
Because of the CAGW deceit, the ‘firm stance’ now taken by both sides of the argument is intensified by SIX main factors – and not just political attitudes, socio-economic status, moral values, levels of scientific understanding, and failure of scientific communication as observed above. The real factors are:
1. DEBATE. Historically, debate has always been discouraged by the CAGW Sophists to the point of avoiding any opportunity for rational discussion. They have dug their heels in so hard that it is little wonder that their opposition turns to rebellion.
2. FINANCIAL GAIN. From the evidence, the Sophist mindset is invariably driven by money, greed, protection of already heavily vested interests and to preserve grant funding (such as Ana-Maria Bliuc, the behavioural social scientist at Australia’s Monash University as cited in the above article). This ultimately causes us Rationalists to question the level of corruption and conspiracy within the CAGW meme.
3. MELODRAMA. The melodramatic messages and exaggeration used by the apocalyptic Sophists to captivate their largely gullible audience has, for them, been a success. Those who are hungry for ‘juicy’ news, ‘ravishing’ revelations and ‘fabulous’ facts become totally absorbed. The result (for example) is that the gullible conform unquestioningly when headlines shout “CO2 reaches 400ppm” because it means, to them, an incredibly massive amount of gas up there in the sky – when in fact it’s minuscule.
4. BALANCED INFORMATION & HYPOCRISY. This is all about playing on a level playing field. From the evidence, the Sophist has never (and will never) provide all the information needed for society to form a balanced opinion. We are urged to ‘reduce our use of fossil fuels to combat climate change caused by human produced greenhouse gases, chiefly Carbon Di-Oxide ’, yet we are not told (for example) to ‘refrain from human cremations’, ‘reduce any process that involves fermentation’ and that ‘bricks and cement manufacture must come to an end’. By default, the deliberate obfuscations of ‘the whole picture’ by the Sophist community has created friction between both sides. A good example of unbalanced information is the recent ‘Warmest Year Evah’ proclamation – which completely ignores all historical evidence (even as far back as before primates inhabited our planet).
5. DRACONIAN MEASURES. To combat CAGW, the introduction of a rigorous code of laws and policies seem unfair, often severe and sometimes even cruel. Renewable subsidies linked to feed-in tariffs is a case in point – whereby those who are unable to afford to ‘invest’ in 16 x solar panels bolted on to the roof of their homes, are financially penalised by increased utility bills to offset the subsidies awarded to the wealthy homeowners who can.
6. LOGIC, COMMON SENSE & LIES. Many of the claims (or excuses) made by the CAGW Sophist are preposterous – they lack scientific knowledge, law and plainly just don’t add up. One excellent example is the figures for the amount of anthropogenic CO2 versus naturally occurring CO2 with many proponents (incl. Hot Whopper’s Sou) claiming that 400ppm (current levels) less 260ppm (pre-industrial levels) = 140ppm is caused by man! Another example is that radiated atmospheric heat can penetrate (and completely ignore) a layer of freezing cold water and hide in the deep ocean.
So, the reasons why us ‘skeptics’ have become dissident, and a nemesis to the ‘warmists’ party line is due to the CAGW proponents clever factual distortion to create sensational ‘evidence’, the blocking of debate, corruption and conspiracy for financial gain, melodrama, unbalanced information, hypocrisy, draconian policies and an unreasonable line of logic and reason.
There I’ve said it. Sorry, sometimes I get very opinionated when I am told what I should be doing differently to ‘solve’ a non-existent man-made ‘problem’ and to help ‘save’ the planet from catastrophe. Right, I’m off now to shovel the snow from our front path.
Very good analysis, GeeJam. What do we do about the problem?
Thank you dbstealey – yet, I do not have a solution. As a child, my maroon school uniform was reason enough to get beaten-up by pupils from another local school whose uniform happened to be green. This example of adolescent immaturity was stopped by the Head teachers of both schools. With our climate conflict – maybe a neutral ‘third party’ in authority should step in and say ‘enough is enough’. That ‘third party’ at the moment is Mother Nature.
Definition of an Expert: ‘X’ is the unknown quantity, and ‘spurt’ is a drip under pressure.
This study fails completely to understand that skepticism is an integral part of the science instead of separated and in opposition to the science. Until non scientists realize that, there will be little progress.
Wrong place but thought it could for a chuckle-
https://www.picotech.com/library/application-note/improving-the-accuracy-of-temperature-measurements
“Figure 1 shows sensors at three different heights record the temperatures in one of Pico Technology’s storerooms. The sensor readings differ by at least 1°C so clearly, no matter how accurate the individual sensors, we will never be able to measure room temperature to 1°C accuracy”
oh my, good for a chuckle.
Well, I guess if you can’t question the science, you have to question something else.
I have no issue in ‘warmists’ promoting sensible construction policies, like not building houses that leak heat like a sieve. Nothing to do with global warming that, it’s just common sense. I tend to focus on the misery of the human beings inside a badly built house rather than carbon dioxide levels, after all, since if global warming were going to rid us of the problem imminently, then I wouldn’t need to focus on it, would I?!
This article suggests that ‘warmists’ are actually politicians not scientists, looking for communication strategies to dupe the ‘skeptics’ rather than actually confronting the scientific issues at hand.
Perhaps if a deal were struck to link 3rd world aid to the abandonment of the ‘global warming’ guff you might get places quicker??!!
I wasn’t even a skeptic when the use of the term completely pissed me off. I was sitting on the fence basically thinking that the jury seemed to be out on ‘man made global warming’, not taking that much interest in the whole thing (having a life and all). Then, on a televised presentation, I saw a nobel laureate professor at Melbourne University (Australia) , Peter Doherty (a microbiologist I gather), effectively call another Melbourne U professor, Ian Plimer (a geologist) a “denier” via an overhead slide listing vaccination, flouride and the Holocaust as matters “denied” by scientific perverts and then added ‘global warming’ / ‘climate change’ to the list in a deliberate and calculates smear.
I was utterly appalled at the sheer arrogance, the viciousness and the cowardice of the incident that it quite destroyed any respect or faith I might have had for the AGW argument and its prosecutors. Sitting behind the hired assassin was none other than Professor David Karoly also of Melbourne U, of IPCC infamy and co author of the Gergis et al hockey schtick cartoon purporting to evidence a southern hemisphere version of Mann et al’s fraud. Karoly was sitting there po faced but you know he was inwardly smirking at the job being done on Professor Plimer.
Even “experts” have to watch their credibility as witnesses. You can be a nobel laureate and talk through your sphincter, have blind prejudices, be comnpletely arrogant, form alliances with scumbags and start to believe that you are above scrutiny.
PS I absolutely agree with UK Marcus and that same bon mot was given to me and 400 other freshman engineers in our first lecture just to circumcise our potential arrogance then and there.
“Shock study results: Calling climate skeptics ‘deniers’ just pisses them off”
Read Feynman’s book “What Do You Care What Other People Think?” and maybe like me you won’t be pissed off.
I am not one for saying “I told you so.” But believe me when the time comes, I am going to enjoy doing just that, at least where global warming is concerned.
“What Do You Care What Other People Think?”
Failing to care what other people think is unwise. It is the hallmark of autism and Asperger’s syndrome to not care what other people think, as a result of which most employment opportunities are somewhat stunted.
Perhaps this book refers to appropriate responses to what other people think.
“the book’s title is taken from a question she often put to him when he seemed preoccupied with his colleagues’ opinions about his work.”
Well yes. Scientists are seldom employed by scientists, computer programmers seldom employed by computer programmers. So what your employer and colleagues think is quite important. They could easily form an alliance against you and truth is not much of a shield. Documentation, on the other hand, is a pretty good thing to have from time to time.
And this is why academics usually fair very, VERY poorly in the real world anywhere outside of Academia. Think Sheldon from the Big Bang theory. Do you think when we watch that show that we’re laughing with him?
Street Smarts >>> Book Smarts every single time for the Win.
Stop calling a beneficial gas pollution.
and stop calling CO2 “carbon.”
This always drove me nuts cuz I work with carbon fiber. I used to work as a science teacher for two years (was and still am a climate skeptic, I committed my apostasy long before that), and I had a little girl ask me if her breathing was a crime and if she was going to get taxed for breathing.
I had teaching moment about the carbon cycle, photosynthesis, logic, rationality, common sense, and the concept of being REASONABLE.
At 1:22 PM on 3 February, SABicyclist had recounted:
Hm? Whenever I’ve been asked that question by a young person (and they do ask about such taxation; who’da thunk?), my response has tended to start with:
“Why, of course the progtard bastids would do that to you if they think they can get away with it. But they’ll only tax you for exhaling, so just take deep breaths and try to keep your respiratory rate down.”
Reductio ad absurdum. And when it comes to discussing the preposterous AGW bogosity, it’s all absurd.
I’m waiting for those leftwing ‘viro fascisti to pick up their noise about methane, whereupon they’ll require all within their respective jurisdictions to wear monitors that keep track of flatulence.
Yes, and yes.
“…things like cleaner air, low power consumption, improved public transport, better waste management, efficient agriculture, reforestation…”
Let’s take a crack at this:
a) cleaner air; Well yes, we all want clean air. Didn’t the green lobby win this one back in the 1980s. Generaly, NA has very clean air, so while I care about this, it isn’t an ongoing pressing issue here.
b) low power consumption:; I care only insomuch as it saves me money on my monthly bills, and our power grid can handle the current and future predicted demand.
c) improved public transport; I live in Western Canada. Our population is so spread out, public transport is generaly not effective, and very cost inefective. Really, it is very low on my priority list. i would be more concerned about available parking donwtown.
d) better wast managment; We seem to have fairly good wast managment that is reasonably cost effective. I am not concerned.
e) efficient agriculture; Isn’t this an issue of economics for the farming community. Why would I, as a city person, care about efficient agriculture? Seems kind of silly. I wouldn’t want farmers trying to influence my industy for some preceived nobel cause, why would I try to interfear with theirs
f) reforestation; Well isn’t this a fun one. More atmospheric CO2 = more forest. As for our forests in NA, again, our government now has responsible policies to insure we keep our forests healthy. This issue was again won by the green lobby back in the 1980 (or earlyer?)
A) None of them have anything to do with the scientific ~theory~ that one more molecule of CO2 in 20,000 will cause or is causing catastrophic global warming. B) None of them have anything to do with assessing whether or not being warmer is good or bad.
Conclusion: Every issue they bring up here is simply subterfuge designed to drag you away from discussing actual science in regard to AGW. They do NOT want to discuss science, their theory has already lost so much credibility that these points of diversion comprise the only comfortable refuge they have left. Give them no quarter.
Well yes, you are correct to address the ‘Ignoratio elenchi’ falacy (aka red herring). By even engaging in disscussion of these issues, you are allowing them to get away from the point (i.e. the don’t have the science to back them up). I was just addressing the points, and how they are kind of moot.
The Toronto Star is known locally as the Red Star.
Academics and government. I recall an article written by a German philosopher sometimes during the Kaiser’s time stating that university professors are tools of the government whose main task is to promote that government. Looks like only the time, place and characters change.
I also read an article from the 1980’s, by a former academician that came to the conclusion that used car salesmen are more trustworthy than “professors”.
Ah, yes.
The conflict between skeptical realists – who look to observations of objectively verifiable reality for judgement criteria – and the “believers,” who take this preposterously bogus anthropogenic climate global change premise on faith.
Jeez, no wonder the Bishop of Rome has judged it appropriate for the Holy See to weigh in on this issue. It’s a matter of religious belief, not valid scientific examination of phenomena in the physical universe.
Has no one else reading here picked up on this?
“Has no one else reading here picked up on this?”
I suspect everyone did; it’s just so obvious it doesn’t really need commentary. When the pope gets on board you know it is social rather than science (it could be both of course, but the pope is interested in social).
Somewhere in this porrige is science. It’s a bit like “nail soup” (*). Everyone with a social agenda is leveraging “global warming” to offer their own cure-all.
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Soup
“When the pope gets on board you know it is social …”
Don’t be so certain. Look up the history of the Big Bang theory (no, not the television show) and Georges Le Maitre’s biography (e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Lema%C3%AEtre) – and note the collar in the image. Or maybe you’re right, but where does that leave physics?
“Calling climate skeptics ‘deniers’ just pisses them off”
Well Duh!
I’m always denying stuff, last night I woke the wife up by snoring and denied I’d been drinking Sam Adams before I came to bed, I also denied eating all the cookies last week and that bit of chocolate my wife had saved a couple of days ago, I also occasionally deny having a sneaky cigarette.
I just don’t understand how the climate alarmists I exchange views with always know I’m a compulsive denier – but they do.
Funny that this study, while pointing out the obvious, hits on my next biggest pet peeve.
“As an example, the focus could be on “things like cleaner air, low power consumption, improved public transport, better waste management, efficient agriculture, reforestation … (they) are all in public interest, regardless of position on climate change,” she said.”
How exactly are any solutions to AGW supposed to accomplish any of the above? I would argue that putting up tons of windmills and solar panels is likely to contribute to deforestation and habitat destruction not help the environment. Improved public transit ignores the inconvenient fact that in North America, depending on whether you are in Canada or the US, between 77% and 80% of freight travels by truck so removing cars from the road doesn’t even begin to address any issue there. We could go on.
In short if AGW doesn’t trivialize or make an environmental issue worse, it does nothing to help it. This head in the clouds idea that by addressing AGW we can fix every other environmental issue is BS.
Al: “…between 77% and 80% of freight travels by truck so removing cars from the road doesn’t even begin to address any issue…”
Actually, more like 90% of all freight has been on a truck at one time or another in its journey from point A to point B and then on to point C and so on.
However, if cars were removed from all roads, the truckers in general would be very happy campers.
I’ll add to your list of Climate Change policies that are done in the name of “stopping climate change.” This stuff that just enrages me to no end.
– Cutting down Southeastern USA forests to make pellet fuel for European biofuel electric generation plants
– Spending money on solar panels and CFL bulbs instead of clean water and sanitation for poor people.
– Subsidizing massive amounts of solar and wind, but building massive amounts of lignite coal stations cause solar and wind can’t do base power load or power on demand, and the energy spikes are so bad that even nuclear can’t handle it (Germany’s Energiewende disaster)
– Cutting down tropical rain forests to grow palm oil trees for biofuel
– Cutting down rain forest to grow soy, sugarcane, and corn for biofuels
– Should we get started on the consequences of raising energy prices on the poor, and then what the poor will do to forests and natural resources to survive?
– I already had my rant about the UN IPCC policies and the massive number of people those same policies starved to death in the “What do you fear about Climate Change” post. That’s seven years of criminal policy man. The IPCC is gonna pay for that.
The list goes on and on regarding the bad policies that the UN IPCC “recommends” and then gets pushed on us. Considering how bad the results are from those policies from just the last seven years, shoot, I say shoot the turkey at the heart, which is the science. The whole thing is just awful, from the science to the disastrous socio-economic policy.
And of course on top of that, the Climate activists/alarmist finally figure out one of those basic rules of human communication, which is, “don’t insult the person you’re trying to get to agree with you.” Which of course they had to spend tax dollars and resources to research, tabulate and say, “Hey look, we just discovered the Golden Rule!” Which is something you can get from religious texts, philosphical texts, business books on sales, relationship books on how to treat friends and partners, emotional intelligence books, seminars on better relationships and communications…
It just makes me do a face palm when I see the Climate Activist’s/Alarmists sheer incompetence, disconnectedness, contempt, and arrogance flowing like a busted fire hydrant on a hot day in NYC…
At 12:51 PM on 3 February, SABicyclist had commented:
I’ll believe that when The New York Post (’cause the New York Times sure as hell ain’t gonna report it) begins relating as news items multiple episodes in which IPCC bureaucrats begin showing up at hospital Emergency Departments with legs broken by baseball bats and briskly-swung lengths of rebar, with concussions, cerebral hematomas, scalp lacerations, rib fractures, and the results of sundry other acts of personal retribution conferred upon them in recognition of their works.
And the rank-and-file N.Y.P.D. simply shrug.
“What could I tell ya? My partner’s grandmother froze to death in her apartment last winter. These U.N. bastids shouldn’t expect something in return?”
I don’t accept the proposition that consensus is necessary. Especially on anthropogenically induced climate for non-climate reasons. But, did someone just admit no consensus?
Its clear to me that Brandon Gates is an intellectual moron and should be banned from this scientific website. Anthony– comments should be limited to no more than two with one defense of lunacy.
No, let him speak. I think, he’s incredible.
He’s like the 97% in miniature. Anyone can see that if the “consensus” was real they wouldn’t need to fake a survey and make up numbers. 97% is a great red sign for anyone who’s ever bought cat food or washing-up liquid.
And Brandon Gates is also incredible.
carbon bigfoot,
I’ve notice that B. Gates’ arguments have devolved from his original alarmist position to now, where he says that his position is to ‘leave the planet better off than I found it’ [paraphrasing]. He has been forced into that position by readers here, who use solid facts and evidence to counter anything he posts that isn’t supportable.
First, the planet doesn’t care. At all. People care, and his implication is that he cares more than skeptics. But I don’t know any scientific skeptics who are not just as concerned about the evironment as the most rabid climate alarmist. Our proposed solutions are different, that’s all.
Next, the alarmist crowd’s solutions never, ever consider any cost/benefit equation. Damn the cost, let’s do it! That’s their attitude. It’s an easy way to wreck an economy, with no gain.
Finally, they have yet to demonstrate that CO2 — the original reason for the climate scare — does anything like what they predicted. In fact, after millions of reader comments just here alone, there is no credible evidence showing that the rise in CO2 is anything but harmless, and beneficial to the biosphere.
Gates can convince me he is right. All he has to do is falsify that last sentence. Show us either global harm due to the added CO2, or show that it is not a net benefit to the biosphere. Either one will do. But if he cannot post any such evidence, then he loses the debate, and it really is as simple as that.
dbstealey, maybe your excellently articulated rebuttal to BG should also apply to SHF (who, as yet, remains silent in the midst of all the thought provoking and passionate replies posted here).
dbstealey,
lol, no, it’s just common courtesy. Or at least common in terms of my largely conservative Midwestern upbringing.
We agree.
No, my implication is that “skeptics” do a lousy job reading my damn mind, and should probably stick to arguments with some reasonable basis in demonstrable fact rather than rambling on and on about the private motivations of some random dude on the Internet whose opinions they don’t agree with.
I agree with that too.
You always say never. Which makes you always wrong.
I await your forthcoming detailed cost benefit analysis with bated breath.
My crystal ball is broken. As such, my acutal position is that I don’t know with any great certainty what the future impacts will be down to the penny. But you knew that already, because I’ve written it many times.
Reminds me of Obama declaring that the only reason why people didn’t love Obamacare was that it hadn’t been explained to them properly.
I have long since ceased being a denier or skeptic.
I am a full blown climate infidel!!!!!
I’m not a denier, I’m a defier!
(Or hot-air heretic.)
I’ve always preferred “dissident.”
Where does a heretic and apostate end up in this equation? Cuz that’s what I am…
We denote AGW Catastrophists, “Warmists” who wouldn’t know a fact from a fiddle-fern, anosognotic “deviants” with all that that implies [cf: Dunning-Kruger Syndrome, 1914]. Those too stupid to know they’re stupid see groundhog shadows everywhere.
I will show the Climate Liars no civility. They are the ones who have lied, cheated, conned and scammed. They have shown themselves to be sociopaths that have and will continue to do anything underhanded to advance their agenda. They want civility? I suggest the first step is they stop lying. But I doubt they ever will. Unless they lie, their ‘science’ falls apart.
This is always the left’s go-to after-failure mode; the message isn’t the problem it’s how it’s presented or to whom it’s presented.
Democrats do this all the time when they lose big across the board. We mainly hear about it because the Press is their wholly owned subsidiary and thus every word they say is transmitted as if gospel.
It’s as if there’s only one church and we all get the newsletter whether we are members or not because all the mailmen are members.
they could start by stopping the “deniers” and even the “skeptics” labels.
Since when in real science has been being skeptical about results from new theories or discoveries a bad thing?
Science is about challenging our current knowledge of how the universe works.
It’s not a poll.
I guess we sceptics are the ones who are really deficient in the ability to communicate effectively! They start off as a given the truth of the “97%” and then puzzle the stark contrast with American public views. I note the abandonment of the discipline psychology and adoption of the oxymoron behavioral (social) scientist (misbehavioral scientists is what we are more burdened with, though). A real scientist (I hope) would wonder if there is a remote chance that the cartoonist/behavioral scientists that ‘Cooked’ the 97 myth could be off at least 10% or so. This post normal muscling in on the territory of “science” by witch doctors also must be having a debasing effect on science as a whole. I guess since scientists are less moved by real data these days (“Oh I dunno, it does seem a little low. What would we get if we chopped 0.5C off the 1930s and added it on to the 1990s? No data has been actually lost and the average for the century is the same!”), I guess it is what we should expect.
I remember after Sputnik (a kindly name meaning “traveling companion” sort of like ‘earth’s friend’) went up, the stock of engineers went up even higher. Everybody wanted to be an engineer (yours truly succumbed to the idea), but then it spread into unlikely territory. “Our dish detergent has been “engineered” to be soft on your sweetheart’s hands and a terror on dirty dishes!” No more of the early agricultural days ads “The old gray mare sh*t on the wall, Ma washed it off with Oxydol”
Before the heavy clanking persona of engineering got this airy lift, the world of adulation belonged to scientists. Einstein had died only two years before Sputnik and all sorts of wonderful sciency things had happened in the first half of the 20th Century. Now engineers had taken the stage and soon the oxymoron “rocket science” was born. Wow, this unabashed theft from engineering by mighty scientists was a huge boost! You do know that there are no ‘rocket scientists’ right?
Magnanimous engineers let them have this bone and went on to develop the electronic revolution -is this why scientists have been delving into quixotic windmills and other passe engineering museum items? Strangely, the term to describe the subverting machinations of the ‘new order’ progressive types, “social engineering”, was coined. Immediately I harkened back to the engineered dish soap days. I guess this was another accolade to the inventors of the wheel. Probably “behavioral engineers” will be the next evolution and the globes’ biggest employer.
Or in simple terms, engineers build things and scientists study things. But a scientist cannot study a thing that does not yet exist, hence “rocket engineers” makes sense but “rocket scientists” not so much, why study a thing after you have built it?
…an effective pathway to reaching consensus, said Bliuc
So, Biluc is occupied with reaching consensus, rather than engaging in scientific inquiry. I think He should consider that engaging in scientific inquiry might be better. It is more likely to uncover the truth. Moreover, since the truth can be very compelling when uncovered, it might even serve as “an effective pathway to reaching consensus.” Traditionally, science has uncovered truths and this has resulted in a reaching of consensus. To aim for consensus has so often resulted in concealing the truth, that I’m surprised anyone associated with science would still be preoccupied with it. Not only that, the consensus reached is usually unstable when it conceals the truth, because the truth will out. So, aiming at consensus is frequently self-defeating.
So, I recommend that Biluc reconsider his stance.
Good point. Why is there a need to reach consensus unless the consensus is right?
Surely the aim should be to determine how we evaluate the truth of the matter?
If we can agree that then the consensus could be reached just by following the agree method.
Otherwise we’ll end up with an unfortunate compromise.
“Why is there a need to reach consensus unless the consensus is right?”
The correctness of consensus is irrelevant. What is important is the well-ordered nature of the herd. Where it is going is also irrelevant; the predators will follow the herd where ever it goes as the herd wanders the Serengeti as its members wait to be eaten; trying each to stay in the middle of the herd so as not to be eaten today.
They are right communication is the problem. Stop communicating model fantasy and start communicating real life reality and there won’t be a problem. But then the shrill, crazy, vitriolic narrative would die and we can’t have that. Funny I’ve never heard “deniers” calling for Alarmists to be jailed but maybe I’ve missed something. How typical is this tripe? The extremist nut jobs are portraying themselves as the adults needing to communicate bettet to irrational children. Sounds like an Obama administration sound bite. Hilarious.
“As an example, the focus could be on “things like cleaner air, low power consumption, improved public transport, better waste management, efficient agriculture, reforestation … ”
That’s exactly what society should be discussing and working towards but I somehow can’t shake the feeling that someone the solution to these would be carbon tax and wealth distribution outside my nation’s borders.
*somehow the solution…
Not only does the paper cite the should-be retracted Cook 2013 paper but they are not aware that CAGW skeptics tend to have higher understanding of the science.
I fell foul of this a few years back – tried to engage regarding things that I had in common – maybe better insulation as a starting point, since that would be useful in both a warming and a cooling world. Oh the vitriol – they don’t want to find common ground with us they despise is because we disagree with their view of the world. We are either mentally ill, or just inherently evil.
That big 97% consensus porky again, how about improving communications by not using outright lies in the warmist narrative.
Here we demonstrate that US believers and sceptics have distinct social identities, beliefs and emotional reactions that systematically predict their support for action to advance their respective positions.
Yeah, it’s called IQ and a propensity for critical examination of ideas.
A “critical examination of ideas”? Agreed.
“IQ”? No.
An education in the Arts makes one susceptible to over ‘respect for the academy’ but doesn’t make you stupid, per se.
The “experts” are pushing global warming in exactly the same way they pushed eugenics, and for exactly the same reasons.
The “experts” are pushing global warming in exactly the same way they pushed eugenics, and for exactly the same reasons.
Improving communication between the two sides of this big divide could be an effective pathway to reaching consensus, said Bliuc.
I thought there already was a ‘consensus’. Are they admitting that there really isn’t?
The study for how they communicate has already been done and posted before on WUWT
The art of convincing skeptics
http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htiw/articles/20130826.aspx
They just haven’t tried hard enough.
She starts out with a lie (97%…) and immediately destroys her credibility. Next article!
Thanks to Eric Worrall for posting this.
I think the main strategy of climate change cause supporters from now until the conclusion of UNFCCC’s COP 21 in Paris this December will be consistent with what the study by Bliuc claims to show. The main strategy of climate change cause supporters for the rest of this year will be something like this (the following are my words-JW): ‘Climate change may have broadly assessed scientific faults in public discourse, but it doesn’t matter if climate change is not really much concern because we should go ahead to accept policies based on it anyway as an important precedent necessary to limit man’s increasing dominance of nature here on earth.’
The answer to that kind of strategy by climate change cause supporters is that kind of fundamental anti-wealth politico-economic theory is not based on correct applied reasoning.
John
“Academics discover civility”
JK! (Just kidding)
Every used car salesman worth his road salt knows about the ‘assumptive close.’ That is, if a prospect so much as looks at a particular jalopy, assume the close — assume that the prospect wants that POS, and move on to the next step. “Can I help you arrange financing, or do you prefer to pay in cash?”
That’s what infuriates me about being called a denier; it assumes that the concept of AGW even exists. To buy into it is to give the cretins a major victory.
They can keep their jalopy.
We skeptics need a guide as well, so….
When talking to Warmists it is probably important to focus on aspects that both skeptics and believers have in common rather than the differences between them.
As an example, the focus could be on things like an improved economy, which always leads to a higher ability to focus on environmental issues, improved transportation infrastructure, reforestation, which are all in public interest, regardless of position on climate change. No one wants to be like North Korea, or China.
Also, it is best not to give them too many facts or too much science, as this will only confuse and anger them. Remember, they are like children, and depend on mommy and daddy figures, whom they dub “the experts” to do their thinking for them.
Bruce, funny you mention that. I had a long-time good friend who devolved into a rabid Warmist. Hanging out with him became a nightmare because Mr. Doom and Gloom brought it up ALL THE TIME. One day I suggested that maybe we should discuss ways to improve the economy, for the reasons you mention, and he become WORSE! Then I was not only a denier, I was a money-grubbing denier.
Warmists like him are anti-people; they want the earth’s population reduced to some imagined carrying capacity of 500 million. (That is, they want 13 out of 14 people to die.)
Warmists are socialists; they want all commerce to cease, to aid in getting rid of the 13 out of 14 souls.
Trying to talk to them about the economy is a waste of one’s precious seconds.
I sent this note to the Toronto Sun; raulakh@thestar.ca
Dear Raveena,
Regarding your article “Different tack needed for climate change skeptics, study says”.
I think that first sentence should read “Simply explaining the science behind man-made climate change will probably not help convert true believers”.
Essentially this Australian study say’s when talking to a cAGW skeptic don’t call them foul names then switch the subject, wow just wow.
Also, That big 97% science consensus porky again, how about improving communications by not using outright lies in the warmist (cAGW) narrative.
That should be the Toronto Star
Thanks, Anthony.
“I suspect there may be problems other than communication which need to be addressed”. Yes,there are the problems of trying to deceive us, wasting our money in low-density expensive energy sources, and more.
…..and mainly pissed off because science and science process is being victimized again and again.
“As an example, the focus could be on “things like cleaner air, low power consumption, improved public transport, better waste management, efficient agriculture, reforestation”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2613905/Lunacy-town-turned-green-A-ban-bacon-butties-Traffic-calming-sheep-Transgender-toilets-Sounds-like-send-In-fact-real-story-Britains-loopiest-party-took-Brighton.html
Just don’t ask the Greens to do it.
Great link mwhite to the green lunacy. Had not seen this news report before. Brilliant.
(I take it you’ve also read Green Party 2010 election manifesto for it’s entertainment value – especially their environment policies starting on page 33.)
As a test, here’s a graphic example of the small amount of man-made CO2 in contrast to the rest of the atmosphere.
This picture downloadloading thing is new to me, so the image may not show.
This is further evidence that social scientists have lost all connection to hard science concepts like model forecast error evaluation. It has become a fire-and-forget press release and tenure advancement world, also called tabloid science. You’re either in on the game or a bystander. It could well be called the Great Non Validation Era. Or like any speculative bubble, it looked unstoppable until it burst from general erosion of confidence in the scam.
Someone starts on me,
A. I’m still more worried global cooling for the next few decades, then we can discuss Ice millenia,
B. You’re a Piltdown lover
C. What was your most advanced science class in HS ?
Reblogged this on Public Secrets and commented:
I don’t why it should, just because CBS’ Scott Pelley used the term in a deliberate comparison to Holocaust deniers. How sensitive does one have to be to be upset by that? /sarc
““As an example, the focus could be on “things like cleaner air, low power consumption, improved public transport, better waste management, efficient agriculture, reforestation … (they) are all in public interest, regardless of position on climate change,” she said.”
NOT unless you define what you mean!
**Cleaner Air: If you’re going to say that CO2 is a polutant, then no that’s not in the pblic interest.
**Low Power Consumption: If you mean that Americans should consume less energy that the 1990 level (or some lower number), then I’d suggest that, since energy consumption correlates with standard of living, this is not in the public interest.
**Improved Public Transport: If you mean more government sponsored mass transit, then no, that’s not in the public interest.
**Better Waste Management: If you mean Carbon Capture and Storage, then no that’s not in the public interest.
**Efficient Agriculture: If you mean eliminating beef and other animal food because they are “inefficient” sources of calories for people, then no it’s not in the public interest.
**Reforestation: If you mean stop harvesting trees for human use (or just about any other meaning I can think of), then no it’s not in the public interest.
It’s NOT OK to come up with vague terms which might sound inoffensive, trying to get people to go along with unspoken assumptions. Be specific on what you mean by your terms, or stop wasting my time!
Simply put, the disconnect is between those who are persuaded by Logic (the ‘deniers’) and those who are persuaded by Rhetoric (the ‘warmists’).
Unfortunately, Logic and Rhetoric appear to be fundamentally imcompatible.
Like the Aristotelian versus the Copernican universe models, their respective adherents are unlikely to be persuaded of their opponents’ merits.
We may have to wait for the gullible side to die off and be replaced with people who were exposed to the facts from an early age, who then may decide for themselves.
Well, if they are looking to see what I want to see, I want them to give historical perspective. For example, if a hurricane hits and they blame it on Global Warming, I want them to say why when many more hurricanes hit the same area in the 1600s ,1700, 1800s, 1900s, etc. why those occurrences were not global warming hurricanes.
It doesn’t piss me off. It just lets me know that the only science the speaker/writer could handle, was science of the political variety.
After I got done reading this I couldn’t help but think that the same logic can go both ways. If the person writing the article had been more educated about how discredited the 97% consensus is then perhaps they would begin to understand why skeptics don’t have faith in this magical “scientific community”.
I am all for bettering society. I don’t mind projects that improve public transit or reduce pollution or so on. I just fundamentally disagree that CO2 is a pollutant in the first place and I staunchly disagree with ruining our economy to implement any of these ideas. Especially when the reasoning behind doing so has been proven time and again to be wrong.
Just one educated American’s position.
Fatuous?
Well, considering the word ‘denier’ was specifically used to draw a parallel between Holocaust deniers and skeptic/realists, it DOES piss me off. Now pretending like they want to be ‘civil’ pisses me off all over again. And through it all, never does it occur to them once – after parroting every AGW company line – the slightest possibility that they might be wrong.
My reading of the entire issue is simply this – they have been pushing this BS for over a quarter of a century – all based on some kind of ‘Butterfly Effect Apocalypse’ – spent billions upon billions over it – sold some VERY powerful and important interests on it – staked the credibility of the US Government, Academia, almost the entire News and Entertainment media, the entire Democratic Party – AND the reputation of science itself. They all put their weight behind it and got a complete donut.
And so now, they’re changing their story. What they claimed would happen has not happened, and now their changing their story.
That by itself should be enough.
There is no communication problem on climate focused topics.
The communications from the climate change cause supporters are accurate statements of the cause’s ‘science’, message and position. Those independently participating in the open marketplace of ideas (outside of the cause’s supporters) have understood clearly the cause’s communications of its ‘science’, message and position. That is why the cause has been assessed as untrustworthy by those participating in the independent marketplace of ideas.
John
I’ve been living in the same place (Pacific northwest) for most of my 64 years, and if global warming has occurred (oops…the climate has changed), I couldn’t prove it. The high tide marks haven’t moved. I think public disconcern is related to this fact: that most of us have lived long enough to see if it is occurring and haven’t noticed any differences beyond weather. I mean, all you have to do is go outside your door and look around…
One thing I like to do is to broaden my understanding of things by taking free on-line courses. An organization called EdX is teaching a free course on Climate Denialism. The course description is priceless.
In public discussions, climate change is a highly controversial topic. However, in the scientific community, there is little controversy with 97% of climate scientists concluding humans are causing global warming.
Why the gap between the public and scientists?
What are the psychological and social drivers of the rejection of the scientific consensus?
How has climate denial influenced public perceptions and attitudes towards climate change?
This course examines the science of climate science denial.
With every myth we debunk, you’ll learn the critical thinking needed to identify the fallacies associated with the myth. Finally, armed with all this knowledge, you’ll learn the psychology of misinformation. This will equip you to effectively respond to climate misinformation and debunk myths.
https://www.edx.org/course/making-sense-climate-science-denial-uqx-denial101x#.VNFF1v54r6o
Should I take it?
Take it! Report back, and tell us if it’s worthwhile. Maybe you can point out plenty of their misinformation, since you’re a WUWT reader. You will certainly have more real facts.
Cook is one of the course staff. Hence, no doubt, the familiar “97%” assertion. Other suspects on the staff are Cowtan. Way, Mandia, Nuttycelli… basically a real rogues’ gallery of True Believers (TM). I wouldn’t bother with it myself as I wouldn’t be able to keep my lunch down.
I live in a village on the shore of Lake Chapala in central Mexico. There is a large expat community, that swells in winter, made up of Canadian and Americans. The latter seems to me to be Democrats heavily oriented towards alarmism. As a skeptic, I have learn to avoid a discussion of the new religion. The largest segment of the population is Mexican. Climate change is not in their vocabulary. Feeding their families is a day to day concern. They are the have-nots that the Davos crowd want to reduce their expectations.
Closer to Mexico City there is a wonderful city called Guanajuato. There they have a museum exhibiting the instruments of torture used during the Inquisition…about 100. From the hate mail and threats any journalist who dares to question, including we WUWT devotees, receive. I suspect they would rub their hands with glee at the prospect of convincing us how wrong we are.
Thanks, Anthony and all of you for keeping the discussion going. DavidAjijic
Today there was an interview about this paper in the German pro-alarmist radio channel DLF. Here you find a German translation of it (the English original version is not available unluckily). But maybe some wuwt readers will understand it nevertheless or may use an internet-translator-program:
http://www.deutschlandfunk.de/klimawandel-und-gruppendynamik-es-ist-ein-konflikt-in-den.676.de.html?dram:article_id=310585
Though this interview is not without some alarmist bias, it sounds more or less agreeable since it shows a clear call for a more respectful and constructive sort of discussion between both sides.
So let’s hope the sick eco-taliban who would like to butcher climate-realists in ISIS-style (see e.g. that disgusting GUARDIAN text by Dana Nuccitelli and its ugly comments of last week) get the message and chill down their primitive bloodlust…
Sceptics ask questions. Communication breaks down immediately because the scientists making assertions that the sceptics want answers to don’t provide answers. It’s pretty simple. And introducing things like lower power consumption and cleaner air are red herrings that divert attention away from the unanswered questions which makes me all the more suspicious.
Golden rule of Marxism – it is never the message it is just that the people don’t understand the message.
A common understanding is not possible.
“Calling climate skeptics ‘deniers’ just pisses them off”
Who knew? Groundbreaking research dollars well spent /sarc
The paper by Bliuc et al is simply awful, so I wrote a blog post about it. What’s worst about it IMHO is that it enhances polarisation on the issue.
In summary, we have a biased paper promoting political activism, exacerbating division and with a main conclusion that has already been stated many times in the literature. How did this rubbish get published? Oh, it’s in Nature.
‘misalignment
between scientific and
public views’
read
‘misalignment
between wishfull scientific and
real scientific + public views’
Regards – Hans
Call me a “Denier”, it does not offend me. I am proud of it, and here is why:
Herman Mellville Letter to Nathaniel Hawthorne, [April 16?] 1851
the earth goes through natural cycles. there is nothing sinister like climate change – get over it!
Look at it from the bright side: even sociologists talk about “believers”. They therefore recognize it for what it is: a religion.
I can’t understand why any skeptic would be pissed off. davidrussell22 said this about me in relation to the feedback of co2 on the release of latent heat from the snow that is currently falling
“you a hopeless doofus and ignoramus,…. totally unfixable. I hope you don’t vote. I pray you don’t breed. ”
I should get on my knees and pray that the almighty church of CAGW forgives me.. I’ll do that as soon as the Great Lakes freeze over. Kind of an oxymoron, counter intuitive? Why, Great Lakes freezing over proves CAGW. (sarcasm)
dbstealey,
Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden were insiders too.
I already have several times, those who don’t hold the “consensus” view of AGW.
Still waiting for that IPCC-beating contrarian GCM with not a CO2 subroutine in sight.
Wildfires are caused by lightning all the time. By your “logic”, there’s no need to ever invoke arson as a cause.
You’re wrong. Here’s an arguably alarming brochure about ice melt: http://apps.unep.org/publications/pmtdocuments/-Planet%20in%20Peril_%20Atlas%20of%20Current%20Threats%20to%20People%20and%20the%20Environment-2006667.pdf
I’d say the temperature plots over the past 420 kyrs from Petit et al. (1999) on the 3rd and 4th pages of the document are anything but static-looking.
Sound more like your way of thinking in false dichotomies than anything. But I don’t speak for all warmies, so who knows. I know that I don’t think of it that way. I’m a whole system kind of thinker.
One wonders how he can be so confident if the computer projections are so highly uncertain, but then illogical nonsense is something I have difficulty understanding in general.
Reblogged this on Globalcooler's Weblog and commented:
Yup! They are 100% correct but I didn’t need a study to tell me that.