Hint: He did his homework, then took himself to the other side of the debate.
Guest essay by David Siegel
My name is David Siegel. I’m not a climate expert; I’m a writer. Early in 2015, I became interested in climate science and decided to spend the better part of this year trying to learn what I could. It didn’t take long before it was clear that there isn’t likely going to be any catastrophic warming this century. What was clear is that skeptics are losing this battle, and I want to tell you why.
For thirty years, James Hansen and Al Gore have been building their PR machine along with David Fenton, the wizard of nonprofit PR. They understand that the messenger is more important than the message. People don’t easily change their minds. People get their opinions from “experts” and brand names like NASA, MIT, Harvard, TIME, The Daily Show, etc. Fenton knows the game is about credibility and repetition, not science. As long as we are trying to convince people with the facts, we will lose.
So I did my homework and wrote a 9,000-word essay aimed at liberals who have a voice, who have access to media, and who might take 30 minutes to educate themselves.
I submitted my piece to every liberal publication, from the LA Times to the Atlantic Monthly to National Geographic to Huffington Post and many more. They all turned it down. Now I’m launching it myself and hope you will read it and help spread the word.
I ask you to help get the word out through social media, links, and the press, to the liberal audience I’m going after. Links really help. If you can help reach Bill Gates, Jeff Skoll, Jon Stewart, George Clooney, and other influential liberals, I hope to help them understand that the science is not settled. I think this is the best way to tip the scales back to reasonable, impactful environmentalism. If you can help move it on Reddit, Voat, Quora, NewsVine, etc., I would appreciate that.
I’m going to ask people to leave comments here, rather than on my page, because I can’t manage the comment spam there. I will, however, read the comments here and will respond if I can.
My work is aimed at your liberal friends; please send them to read it.
Excerpt:
What is your position on the climate-change debate? What would it take to change your mind?
If the answer is It would take a ton of evidence to change my mind, because my understanding is that the science is settled, and we need to get going on this important issue, that’s what I thought, too. This is my story.
More than thirty years ago, I became vegan because I believed it was healthier (it’s not), and I’ve stayed vegan because I believe it’s better for the environment (it is). I haven’t owned a car in ten years. I love animals; I’ll gladly fly halfway around the world to take photos of them in their natural habitats. I’m a Democrat: I think governments play a key role in preserving our environment for the future in the most cost-effective way possible.Over the years, I built a set of assumptions: that Al Gore was right about global warming, that he was the David going up against the industrial Goliath. In 1993, I even wrote a book about it.
Recently, a friend challenged those assumptions. At first, I was annoyed, because I thought the science really was settled. As I started to look at the data and read about climate science, I was surprised, then shocked. As I learned more, I changed my mind. I now think there probably is no climate crisis and that the focus on CO2 takes funding and attention from critical environmental problems. I’ll start by making ten short statements that should challenge your assumptions and then back them up with an essay.
1 Weather is not climate. There are no studies showing a conclusive link between global warming and increased frequency or intensity of storms, droughts, floods, cold or heat waves.
2 Natural variation in weather and climate is tremendous. Most of what people call “global warming” is natural.
3 There is tremendous uncertainty as to how the climate really works. Climate models are not yet skillful; predictions are unresolved.
4 New research shows that fluctuations in energy from the sun correlate very strongly with changes in earth’s temperature, at both long and short time scales.
5 CO2 has very little to do with it. All the decarbonization we can do isn’t going to change the climate much.
6 There is no such thing as “carbon pollution.” Carbon dioxide is coming out of your nose right now; it is not a poisonous gas. CO2 concentrations in previous eras have been many times higher than they are today.
7 Sea level will probably continue to rise, naturally and slowly. Researchers have found no link between CO2 and sea level.
8 The Arctic experiences natural variation as well, with some years warmer earlier than others. Polar bear numbers are up, not down. They have more to do with hunting permits than CO2*.
9 No one has shown any damage to reef or marine systems. Additional man-made CO2 will not likely harm oceans, reef systems, or marine life. Fish are mostly threatened by people who eat them.
10 The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and others are pursuing a political agenda and a PR campaign, not scientific inquiry. There’s a tremendous amount of trickery going on under the surface*.
Could this possibly be right? Is it heresy, or critical thinking — or both? If I’ve upset or confused you, let me guide you through my journey
You’ll find it at: www.climatecurious.com.
David:
As you correctly indicate, ultimately AGW is a PR war. PR wars are usually won by who has the best, most publicized soundbites.
Sending out a 9,000 word essay doesn’t sound like a successful PR recipe: few sources will publish such a lengthy treatise, and even fewer people will read it.
I DO believe that this is about facts (i.e. the Science) — which is consistent with your belief that citizens are swayed by credibility. The problem is that although Science is almost universally held in high regard, almost no one actually understands what “Science” actually is. Self-serving agenda promoters are well aware of this dichotomy, and have gone to great lengths to exploit it. This problem needs to be addressed.
Feel free to contact me to discuss further at “aaprjohn at northnet dot org”.
John Droz, jr. physicist
CAGW belief is a mass delusion that outdoes previous popular delusions.
“Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one.”
Martin A:
You say
I beg to differ. Each generation thinks its situation is unprecedented.
CAGW belief is the existing mass delusion and it matches previous mass delusions.
Eugenics was the greatest mass delusion a century ago, and eugenics was then more widely accepted than CAGW is today.
Richard
Actually Richard, I see many aspects of Eugenics inherent in the actions and proposed solutions put forward by the Alarmed Ones.
The poor and especially the poor coloured persons of this planet are their targets or victims.
North American Progressives all claim they are the only hope of help for they selected client/victim group.
Where they have held regional power for decades, the people they claim to help, are never better off.
CAGW is Eugenics reborn and run by bureaucracy.
John Robertson:
I very strongly agree with you.
Richard
Fascinating how both of your examples were embraced enthusiastically by members of the political left.
MarkW:
You say
Yes, that is strange when they were both initiated by and were both most strongly promoted by the political right. The obvious explanation is probably the correct one; viz. both eugenics and the AGW-scare were bandwagons that people joined for a variety of reasons.
A coincidence of interests is very powerful.
Richard
CAGW is merely the nasty little sister of macro-evolution / abiogenesis. Macro-evolution / abiogenesis is the looniest science myth of all time. And, it is propagated and protected by a bigger, meaner, more illiberal mafia than CAGW.
Reblogged this on gottadobetterthanthis and commented:
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Worthwhile.
http://www.businessagilityworkshop.com/david/
Can’t at the moment, but I will read his essay soon. ( https://medium.com/@pullnews/what-i-learned-about-climate-change-the-science-is-not-settled-1e3ae4712ace )
He says skeptics are losing. Perhaps at the moment, but not for long. Most people don’t buy it. Soon the prominent and powerful will realize that nature doesn’t work that way, and they will stop talking about it too. They will drop it as soon as they cannot make money or wield influence with it. The more honest will drop it even sooner.
Sadly, global warming alarmism will still be pushed and still cause real problems decades from now after all of the science has moved on. It is a religious dogma now, and true-believers will remain.
If you haven’t found out already, Mr. Siegel, you’re about to find out just how tolerant and liberal your “liberal” friends and colleagues are.
Since 2009’s “Climategate” and up until just recently the other side was complaining that their message wasn’t getting out. That seems to have changed. It is as if some sort of high command has passed the word on down to get back on message AND to viciously go after the opposition.
The recent RICO episode and the French firing of a top weather man are two examples.
Seems to me some serious cognitive dissonance here. Siegel says:
“As long as we are trying to convince people with the facts, we will lose.”
And then wants people to read his 9,000 word essay of facts to the contrary of what they believe.
Money trumps the common conversation, pro or con doesn’t matter, every time. As long as there is grant money, researchers will milk it. And universities are on board with milking money. We will have to wait on Mother Nature to decide this debate. And in the meanwhile, experience pernicious human folly foisted on us. How do I know? It has happened many times, up to the recent past. Scientists, through the addiction of grant money, have been mistaken about a lot of things, but those mistakes nonetheless, enter into mainstream decisions until the money dries up. Case closed.
The problem is that the legal systems put in place to fight the “problem” remain long after the politicians have lost interest in it.
CFCs are still banned.
You correctly state that climate change hyperbole is largely an emotional appeal and that citing facts is a losing proposition. Then you go on to cite facts (links).
I might also note that the same people who embrace “the settled science” claim are the same ones who’d support an Orwellian one world socialist regime. So explaining that the ‘carbon scheme’ is just part of a political power grab agenda won’t change their thinking either.
Finally, pointing out the hypocrisy and cognitive dissonance of Leftwing thinking has never caused them to question their beliefs. It is more akin to a religion based on faith rather than reason.
All that said, I have no idea (sort of annihilation) how remedy the threat these people pose.
Instead of calling the public ignorant try explaining the situation to them from their own dictionary. Not the Scientific, Legal, Medical or any of the other guild dictionaries. Speak the same language, you might find comprehension.
Mike Henderson:
Use of the vernacular is supportive of applications of the equivocation fallacy as terms in the vernacular are polysemic. The literature of global warming climatology is plagued by misleading applications of this fallacy. Thus, the vernacular should not be used without disambiguation.
Terry Oldberg, I don’t know why you think I’m a troll but your smart-assed answer hasn’t done you a bit of good. The warmunists are fighting for the support of the unwashed masses and doing a better job than you ever will.
Now I’ll get the hell out of here so you aren’t inconvenienced by my trolling.
Mike Henderson:
The record refutes your claim that I called you a troll. I note that responding to my comment you failed to address the issue that was raised by it. Was stating this false claim a diversionary tactic?
David Seigel,
In your post you wrote this: “… I became vegan because I believed it was healthier (it’s not), and I’ve stayed vegan because I believe it’s better for the environment (it is).”
In all due respect (I’m serious) sir, I’d like to disagree with your statement that being a vegan is better for the environment. There is a fascinating TED presentation by Allan Savoy on ‘How To Fight Desertification And Reverse Climate Change.’ I believe it was linked to at this site by Anthony Watts in a post sometime in the past. In his presentation Allan Savoy demonstrates how the cultivation of grazing animals (cattle, sheep, and others) can actually turn desertified lands into abundant grasslands. For people in these regions animal protein is almost the only source of food they have. Such grazing animals mimic nature and can actually improve the environment. The presentation is an eye opening watch.
Tom, the name is Allan Savory, not Allan Savoy.
Send this post and an executive summary of your essay to every declared Presidential candidate, and as well to all candidates for Congressional seats.
Let’s see how many are willing to stand up to the Alarmists and call for and end to the ‘climate’ gravy train, to the wasted money on ‘renewable-energy’ subsidies, and to the EPA’s war on CO2 and coal (not to mention to the EPA itself).
Cutting the ‘climate’ crap out of the Federal budget will take the wind out of the Alarmists’ sails. It won’t stop them from proselytizing and complaining about the coming Apocalypse, but it will mean they’ll have to paddle mightily to stay afloat.
So far I think Senator Cruz is the only Presidential candidate to come down on the side of real science.
/Mr Lynn
Good for you. I could have written this exact article– because it perfectly mirrors my own process of discovery on the climate issue (and how I shifted from being a believer to a doubter.)
It’s a lonely place for me here in New York City, being a “skeptic.” It would be great for me to be part of the popular view, but I can’t put the genie back in the bottle, so to speak. I can’t throw facts out the window and go back to believing/supporting the CO2-warming hypothesis.
Your article is very accurate, and well-shaped. Personally, I always add a point on CO2’s limited heat-trapping function– that it rapidly and exponentially fades as a greenhouse gas. In our atmosphere, CO2 is basically saturated at this point for heat-trapping function. (And when I explain this to people, they do pause for a split second before falling back on all the usual arguments. But at least it gets through to them, for a moment.)
The Marxist’s main enemy is our prevailing society. Their goal is to bring this prevailing society down in a bloody revolution, and usher in communism as the form of government across the globe; no more nations.
The Marxists almost single-handedly built the social sciences. This includes the work done to understand persuasion, attitude formation, media, and so on.
Knowing the skeleton of how each and any of us come to hold ideas and how we change our minds about things, they have progressed to use these tools on us.
Hence, emphases on things like repetition, reputation, ostracism/embarrassment, and virtue: be on the virtuous side, not the side of those evil polluting self-centered capitalists.
They know how to get individuals into positions in academia, in education, and in organized religion. They know the mechanisms of getting institutions to take stands and make policy positions. All little-by-little, all gradual.
And, they have known how to do this without the long-term campaign being so obviously engineered.
They have been successful by using us, the fundamental bones, the fabric, of our society, and using that knowledge against us.
Go look at ANY social science, and go see who the “pioneers” are. Then, look until you find the connection to Marxism generally, if not the Frankfurt School directly.
weber, comte, durkheim, dewey, fromm, etc.
That is how the scam has worked, and why it has been played.
Sadly for progressives almost all of their pet projects (from the Great Society to Socialism to Quantative Easing to ObamaCare to et. al.) fail when you make the switch from “feel good” to critical thinking.
Well said OK S. I particularly like the phraseology “switch from feel good to critical thinking.” Mind if I borrow your summation?
Mr Siegel, you say the messenger is more important than the message. In that case your part on who to trust and who not to trust should appear close to the top. I’m confused as to how you got started on this journey and you got to a point of trusting sources that are deniers funded by the fossil fuel industry, at least in the view of the audience you are trying to reach.
On top of that, there are many errors in the document. Does Judy Curry describe herself as a skeptic? RealClimate does allow reader comments. I think William Connolley’s suspension ended a long time ago.
Seriously? The first source cited in point 1. is the NOAA website:
“It is premature to conclude that human activities–and particularly greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming–have already had a detectable impact on Atlantic hurricane or global tropical cyclone activity.”
What BIg Oil money are they getting? Is the NOAA not a trusted source?
And as most people here already know, RealClimate only allows comments that agree with their position. I know I’ve tried. The only time I had a post escape moderation there, was after ClimateGate, when Gavin was in PR mode trying save face. Skeptical Science is even worse. In their own words they admitted the censor and delete posts.
The person who did the edit on Wikipedia has last name Mann…
http://i1039.photobucket.com/albums/a475/Knownuthing/Climate%20evolution_zpsz6vstmdx.png
What we know about climate. What we know about where we are.
Feel free to use it to promote skepticism. Simple messages. Simple images.
Thank you, Mr Siegel, for publishing the story of your path to understanding climate change. I hope that it goes a long way in bringing others to a better understanding of the issue. Well done!
I applaud your honesty and willingness to change when the facts go against your belief. It is a very hard thing to do.
PS. To any vegan/veggie, make sure you get B12 and EPA/DHA. They are essential for health and are missing from vegan (and most veggie) diets.
I have said it before on this blog and I will say it again. This is simple Sales 101. People buy on emotion and what’s in it for them. Very few buy on facts. As long as the skeptic side relies on facts, even thought they are correct, they will lose the war. Remember the old saying,” You don’t sell the steak, you sell the sizzle”.
So, how do we touch the emotions of the low information population? That, my friends, is the correct question. Answers?
Renewbles double electricity costs. See California.
Renewables without adequate fossil fired backup cause blackouts. See, soon, UK.
Renewables are not commerically viable without massive wasteful subsidies. See US, UK.
India and China won’t play along. See COP21.
Ristvan,
You will need to rephrase the first two to get through to the low information people.
1) Electricity from coal will cost you half as much as wind and solar power. You will pay only $xxxx (whatever the going rate is) instead of $yyyyy.
2) You will have to put up with times without power, called blackouts, if there is no electricity produced by coal available. You might miss your favorite reality show.
The other two address facts:
3) Not sure if these people care because they do not perceive subsidies as money out of their own pocket. It’s OK if it is other people’s money.
4) These people don’t care what India and China do, climate is only secondary speak when sitting around a bunch of people trying to sound intelligent. Again they don’t really care unless they see it as something that will take money out of their pocket now.
Ristvan and all to save 0.01 degree Celsius.
U.S. House Science Committee – July 9, 2015
CHAIRMAN LAMAR SMITH: “On the Clean Power Plan, former Obama Administration Assistant Secretary Charles McConnell said at best it will reduce global temperature by only one one-hundredth of a degree Celsius. At the same time it’s going to increase the cost of electricity. That’s going to hurt the lowest income Americans the most. How do you justify such an expensive, burdensome, onerous rule that’s really not going to do much good and isn’t this all pain and no gain.
ADMINISTRATOR GINA MCCARTHY: “No sir, I don’t agree with you. If you look at the RIA we did, the Regulatory Impact Analysis you would see it’s enormously beneficial.
CHAIRMAN SMITH: “Do you consider one one-hundredth of a degree to be enormously beneficial?”
ADMINISTRATOR MCCARTHY: “The value of this rule is not measured in that way. It is measured in showing strong domestic action which can actually trigger global action to address what’s a necessary action to protect…”
CHAIRMAN SMITH: “Do you disagree with my one one-hundredth of a degree figure? Do you disagree with the one one-hundredth of a degree?”
ADMINISTRATOR MCCARTHY: “I’m not disagreeing that this action in and of itself will not make all the difference we need to address climate action, but what I’m saying is that if we don’t take action domestically we will never get started and we’ll never…”
Read more: http://www.climatedepot.com/2015/07/15/epa-chief-admits-obama-regs-have-no-measurable-climate-impact-one-one-hundredth-of-a-degree-epa-chief-mccarthy-defends-regs-as-enormously-beneficial-symbolic-impact/#ixzz3jxPsOENF
How about asking them “Which do you prefer; truth or lies”?
They can’t handle the truth.
Just what do you think we have been doing while you were happily going along with the status quo?? Every skeptic here has a similar story to tell, but has been slugging it out for years.
My question is: WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG TO JOIN THE PARTY and how much damage did you do before you opened your eyes? The information and data have been around for years. You have a lot of enemy flac to endure before your commitment is convincing.
Welcome to the front line. GK
Follow the money. It determines the direction. Change the money’s direction and you change society’s direction.
Wouldn’t it be nice if congress passed a law stating that BOTH sides of a scientific argument MUST recieve EQUAL funding !!!!
receive …oops !!
Since this is a political argument, the politicians will never vote for equality, unless they are on the low side of the equation.
In many arguments, there are more than two sides.
Václav Havel words and warning are thus shown to be true yet again. Havel was a playwright, essayist and a poet. He was also the last President of Czechoslovakia before it was broken up into the Czeck Republic and Slovaka.
Václav Havel: The Power of the Powerless (the social and spiritual consequences of socialism)
“The principle involved here is that the center of power is identical with the center of truth.” Havel warns that socialist regimes create and enforce their own truth to maintain power. As time goes on, this truth diverges from factual truth and it increasingly forces those who support and depend upon the power of the regime to corrupt themselves to sustain the artificial truth.
In the end, people not only lie to each other, but they start to lie to themselves.
see:
http://www.vaclavhavel.cz/showtrans.php?cat=clanky&val=72_aj_clanky.html&typ=HTML
Kudos and congratulations. My path is similar – I saw Al Gore’s movie and got “terrified.” as a result I started digging into the research and skeptic sites (like WUWT) but the more I dug, the more I saw that there was so much research and information contesting the CO2/Global Warming meme that I had to revisit my thinking and ultimately changed my mind about the death, doom, and destruction that was and has been promised to occur as a result of manmade greenhouse gases by proponents and acolytes.
As has been mentioned above, you may become a pariah among your (former) friends who are staunch believers of the Catastrophic Global Warming/Climate Change dogma. I lost two friends who despite being highly educated and intelligent individuals, took it personally and were offended by my challenging their belief system. Perhaps I was mistaken in my appraisal of them.
“So I did my homework and wrote a 9,000-word essay aimed at liberals who have a voice, who have access to media, and who might take 30 minutes to educate themselves.
I submitted my piece to every liberal publication, from the LA Times to the Atlantic Monthly to National Geographic to Huffington Post and many more. They all turned it down. Now I’m launching it myself and hope you will read it and help spread the word.”
It will have more effect as your manifesto of resignation from polite society and especially your ex-peers. You are now their enemy. You are a “dissident'” and will be treated as such. You can love truth or love your friends, but if your friends hate the truth they will hate you.
Where is research that shows the optimum climate for our biosphere? The first question must be: where is our current climate and trend in relation to this finding.
Strangely, nobody seems interested in this vital comparison. Not so strangely, the solutions that are frequently demanded in the most urgent voice, all converge on a socialist worldview: statism, bigger government, higher taxes, less personal liberty, even fewer people. That bigger picture tells me all that I need to know about “climate science”.
I would guess that the “optimum” climate would be the one that has dominated this planet’s history. And that would be one that is substantially warmer than the one we have today.
I believe it’s a fair statement to say that for the majority of its 4.5 billion years of existence, the Earth has been a COLD planet, even frozen solid at times.
You don’t have to be a scientist to understand that humanity can exist under conditions much warmer than the present. But another ice age will cause most plant life to disappear and agricultural practice to fail… Will we still possess the ingenuity to survive? Or will resourcefulness have been selected out of our gene pool, leaving our species to starve like deer in an endless winter?