Guest opinion by Christopher Monckton of Brenchley
University College, London, one of the constituent colleges of what was once a respectable and serious academic institution, has declared open, vicious war on academic freedom. In doing so, it has forfeited the right to be taken seriously as a seat of learning.
Last month Professor John Butterworth, the useless bureaucrat in charge of the College’s department of Physics and Astronomy, learned – no doubt via the coven of paid hacks who routinely menace vice-chancellors and heads of department at any university at which those of us who ask questions about “settled” science are scheduled to speak – that one of his faculty, Profess Athem Alsabti, had booked a lecture theatre for a conference on the forbidden topic of climate change on 8-9 September.
Did Professor Butterworth react as the Vice-Chancellor of Louisiana State University had reacted a couple of years ago when the Professor of Economics there had invited me to give a lecture to his faculty on mitigation economics, whereupon he, the Dean of his Faculty and the Vice-Chancellor had been subjected to weeks of threatening letters and phone calls from this poisonous, over-funded PR machine?
The Vice-Chancellor, after receiving one nasty threat too many, called in the Professor of Economics and said, “The last time I looked, this university was committed to academic freedom. The lecture is to go ahead. No doubt those on campus who disagree with Lord Monckton will feel free to attend his lecture and raise questions. That is how science advances. We hear both sides. We are proud to do so. Come one, come all!”
When I arrived down south to give my lecture, the Professor of Economics, hopping nervously from one foot to the other, said he had had the worst few weeks of his academic career. Yet he was delighted that his university was still one of the few that heard both sides of an academic discussion and not just the currently fashionable dogma. He was proud of his Vice-Chancellor, and rightly so.
The true-believers and freedom-haters, as they increasingly do, simply stayed away. None dared to turn up and ask what they hoped might be difficult questions. They now know they are in the wrong scientifically and still more in the wrong economically. Instead, those who came (it was a packed house) wanted to learn, and there were several intelligent and constructive questions after my lecture. Everyone had a good time.
Did Professor Butterworth stand up to the totalitarian bullies when they tried to do to his university what they had tried to do to Louisiana State and countless others? Um, no. This is what – to his eternal shame – he wrote to his distinguished academic colleague Professor Alsabti:
“It has been brought to my attention that you have booked a room at University College, London, for an external conference in September for a rather fringe group discussing aspects of climate science.
“If this event were to go ahead at UCL, it would generate a great deal of strong feeling, indeed it already has, as members of the UCL community are expressing concern to me that we are giving a platform to speakers who deny anthropogenic climate change while flying in the face of accepted scientific methods. I am sure you have no desire to bring UCL into disrepute, or to cause dissension in the UCL community, and I would encourage you to think about moving the event to a different venue, not on UCL premises.”
The same day, Professor Alsabti, who felt menaced and degraded by this shameless and unprincipled bullying and harassment on the part of a senior academic who should have known better, canceled the booking.
Now, who are the members of this “rather fringe group” that might have caused the “UCL community” to go into the corner, turn its back to the room, suck its thumb and blub?
They include not only Professor Alsabti but also Professor Nils-Axel Mörner, who has published more refereed papers on sea-level rise than Professor Butterworth has had hot dinners; Professor Ole Humlum of the University of Oslo, who publishes a widely-circulated monthly data update on global temperatures and related matters; Professor Jan-Erik Solheim of Norway; members of the Swedish Polar Institute, of the Asociacion Rural de Paraguay; of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, of the U.S. Geological Survey; of the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration; the former president of the Italian National Research Council; the Professor of Paleobotany at the Sapienza University, Rome; a world-leading physicist from the François Rabelais University in Tours; an analytical expert from the Laboratoire Analyse at the University of Paris; the brother of the leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition in the House of Commons; dozens of doctors of science; and a sprinkling of IPCC expert reviewers, including your humble servant.
If this is a “rather fringe group”, then the academic mainstream must – as many of us have long suspected – have been reduced to a thin, dreich, terrified, narrow, narrow-minded, insignificant trickle, confined deep within the gloomy and inspissate canyon of its own no doubt profitable but increasingly discredited prejudice.
Will Professor Butterworth ever pay heed to the inexorably-growing evidence that the world is warming at a rate many times below the central estimate predicted with “substantial confidence” by IPCC in 1990? That temperature feedbacks are net-negative? That the CO2 radiative forcing has been overestimated? That the Sun has something to do with the climate, while CO2 has little to do with it? That sea level is barely rising? That global ice loss is barely significant? That hurricanes hardly ever happen? That droughts are declining? That the cost of mitigation today is orders of magnitude greater than that of adaptation the day after tomorrow? That tens if not hundreds of millions have died because the billions of dollars that could and should have been spent on building coal-fired power stations to give them life-saving electricity have instead been squandered on lavish taxpayer subsidies to ineffectual, muddle-minded, academic profiteers of doom, and to the installation of over-priced 13th-century solutions to an overstated 21st-century non-problem?
For as long as places like University College, London, are allowed to gobble up taxpayers’ largesse unsupervised and unscrutinized, they will continue to think it acceptable to bully and harass innocent colleagues. Professor Butterworth owes Professor Alsabti an abject apology.
Well, the London Climate Conference is going ahead notwithstanding Professor Butterworth’s intolerant and menacing attempt to stop us. It will begin at 9.00 am sharp on 8 September and 9 September 2016. Come to the Conway Hall, 25 Red Lion Square, London WC1R 4RL. This will be the most high-powered academic conference on the climate question ever to have been held in Britain, and arguably in Europe too.
Will you hear some things you are likely to disagree with? Almost certainly. Though my own presentations will be concerned strictly with mainstream science, as will nearly all of the presentations by the distinguished contributors to the conference, there will of course be some ideas that are not yet accepted, for they are too new.
How much more valuable is our open-minded approach than that of a recent climate conference that I attended in the Mathematics Department at Cambridge University, my alma mater? Nothing but regurgitated pap from IPCC. None of those present, except the handful of skeptics who got in, raised any of the scientific questions that would have been raised by active, enquiring minds in my day at the university.
Fortunately, I had the opportunity of giving a blackboard seminar on the mathematics of climate sensitivity to two of the world’s foremost mathematical logicians the following day. One found the seminar “extremely interesting”. The other, as I was reaching for the duster to wipe off the equations with which I had covered the blackboard, said, “No, no: please leave them. I want to think about this, and I want the president of the faculty to see it.”
Despite all that the totalitarians have tried to do, there are still some open minds in powerful academic positions. It is they, not the likes of the forgettable Professor Butterworth, who will carry the torch of truth to coming generations, whether the current establishment likes it or not.
The more of you come to the conference, the more you will send a clear message to academe that the money is about to run out. I have already written to the Universities Funding Council and to the official scrutineering body for universities to invite them to investigate this serious incident of professional misconduct, and to invite them to remove the Provost of the college for failing to reply to correspondence from us. No doubt he was too embarrassed.
They will do nothing, of course. But in the end, if we keep the pressure up, as the ever-widening discrepancy between prediction and observation becomes impossible to conceal, they will eventually realize that money spent on making global warming go away is money entirely wasted, and they will find something else to waste it on.
It will be an excellent conference. Be there or be square!
The conference volume of extended abstracts is available at:
Update: Link expired, here is a direct download link: london-conference-volume (PDF)
Note: While I carry this story on WUWT for informational purposes, that should in no way imply that I endorse the topics of the conference itself or the speakers – Anthony Watts
UPDATE: Professor Butterworth has penned a response here: https://lifeandphysics.wordpress.com/2016/08/05/for-the-record/
Hi Christopher,
I have written a post supporting your article at http://peacelegacy.org/articles/another-shameless-betrayal-science-time-university-college-london .
My key point: a comparison of the courage of ordinary police doing their jobs under threat of sniper fire and possible death, against the cowardice of an academic who can’t even risk a bit of criticism.
Who accredits them and where are they In the cycle?
“…they will eventually realize that money spent on making global warming go away is money entirely wasted…”
I beg to differ. They will do what politicos do, which is to note the drop in temperature that stares us in the blank solar face then declare that the policies worked, that the temperature is starting to ‘rise at a reduced rate’ and that the expenditures must continue for another one hundred years to ensure a complete remission of sins.
++++++++++
What would have been a far better response from the College is what Columbia University did when it was challenged (strongly) over giving the then Iranian President Ahmadinejad a platform to speak at their institution. Not so well known is that when younger, he was a leader in a government sponsored secret society formed solely to commit the genocidal extermination of Iran’s largest religious minority – something he may have omitted from his CV – you know how it is when you are applying to be president.
Even in that case, when that intolerant (and by all reports vicious in the prosecution of his responsibilities to exterminate elements of the Iranian population) president of the day was invited to speak, the event was allowed on the grounds that Columbia had a right to hold the event and people had a right to attend and put questions to him. The protests were effective in that the introduction to the speaker was scathing and set the scene for what was considered to be a pretty good attempt at balance. While the introduction mentioned his denial of a former genocide, it made no mention of his personal involvement in assisting and for a while managing the ongoing genocide that government is still conducting, even today, 2016, against Iran’s largest religious minority. For the record, there were 4700 instances of hate speech published by the government-controlled media in 2014 against that minority group (the latest year for which I have a firm figure).
Now, if the venerable Columbia University can host a speech by Ahmadinejad I think the venerable University College London can host a group of scientists talking about the climate, climate science and the details of how the physical world actually works. I note that the event was accepted (the hall was booked) and the demand was to cancel the booking. The booking was therefore legitimate.
For the record, I note that the reasons given by Prof Butterworth for requesting that the venue be changed easily qualify as hate speech according to current understanding in Waterloo under the laws of Ontario and both at the Universities of Laurier and Waterloo. The scale starts at micro-aggressions, then aggressions, hate speech and hate crimes. At the universities sanctions can be applied for the first two. The other two can involve the police and criminal charges. The Waterloo Regional Police Service has a dedicated hate crimes investigator.
The nature of the letter also qualifies for an investigation on a an attempt at ‘othering’ which is a process that usually precedes a genocide (Rwanda 1990’s, Iran now, the former Yugoslavia etc). This involves defining the ‘other’ as less than fully human and therefore not deserving of normal rights, privileges and equality under the law. The intolerance appears based on the attitude, to be institutional, systematic, coordinated and directed by authority. The request, nay demand, from Butterworth shows an extreme intolerance for an entire group of scientists he clearly defined in a manner linked to their thoughts, beliefs and professional opinions. He calls for sanctions to be applied against them as a group on the basis of what he thinks they think. It demonstrates an appalling level of prejudice (whether in ignorance or not) and in my view constitutes the exercise of real authority against a group he feels are guilty of a ‘thought crime’.
Hate speech expressed from a position of authority is treated more seriously than hate speech per se. Butterworth has demanded, with menaces plainly given in writing, that a junior implement an action based on intolerance for an opinion which he (Butterworth) does not hold.
That the demand was successful defines it as undermining the integrity of the College as an institution of higher learning. The College will have to discipline him to restore it.
Crispin
Member, Hate Speech Committee
Interfaith Grand River http://www.igr.org
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
What a bunch of pseudo legal nonsense. Not to mention that you didn’t even get your own website address right….
“Now, if the venerable Columbia University can host a speech by Ahmadinejad I think the venerable University College London can host a group of scientists talking about the climate, climate science and the details of how the physical world actually works.”
What on earth gave you that radical idea?
Behead those who insult the Climatariat!
This is part of a bigger problem, pressure groups. Loud mouth militant advocacy groups are chipping away at society.
For the record, I don’t think it was “the coven of paid hacks” who made Jon Butterworth aware of this meeting; I think the origin was actually a tweet from me which then made others at UCL aware of the meeting, and they then spoke with Jon Butterworth.
Christopher Monckton’s description of things is also not strictly correct. With all due respect to Athem Alsabti, he is actually a Visiting Research Fellow at UCL Observatory, which means he isn’t really one of the faculty, and isn’t a Professor at UCL (although he appears to have been a Professor at his previous institution). Also, as far as I can tell, his research has no obvious connection to the topic of the meeting.
If UCL were preventing a faculty member whose research aligned with the topic of the meeting from organising and holding it at UCL, that would indeed – IMO – be an infringement of academic freedom and would reflect very poorly on UCL. However, objecting to a Visiting Research Fellow, whose research appears to have no connection with the topic of the meeting, from doing so is – IMO – not and does not.
Even if people disagree (which, of course, is allowed) it would be good if the author of this post could at least get the basic facts straight.
“it would be good if the author of this post could at least get the basic facts straight.”
Good luck with that.
well thank heavens you were there, to right that terrible wrong
Yeah, because after all who really cares about the truth. It’s the feeling, and pulling with the team that really matters.
…and Then There’s Physics: Perhaps you would further clarify what impropriety is implicit in a visiting fellow staging an open conference, rally or debate for skeptics to mull the topic, versus such a forum set up by a full professor of physics or university speaker’s committee. Regardless of one’s point of view on AGW, uncertainties should be debated, and according to the IPCC there are still uncertainties about CO2 sensitivities and Earth’s behavior as a “greenhouse”. I don’t think you can get around this. Granting such freedom of speech to a dissenting opinion is a sign of your confidence in your position, your largess. Denying it is a sign of weakness.
No doubt your department chair has a right to preclude some presenters, perhaps because space is not available, or their views are morally reprehensible to the humankind, or who, because they lack a pulse, would simply not be a good speaker (a view, by the way, intelligent audiences might be capable of determining for themselves). What interests do you have in discouraging such debate? His qualifications, you say? Your link presents Dr. Alsabti as a distinguished Astrophysicist, fully credentialed, and eminently capable of addressing his topic with panache. I do not see one laurel that might give him an edge: “World’s Sexiest Astrophysicist”. But then that title is currently assigned to pop-cult-figure and global warming hobbyist, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, who currently resides in the U.S., and who vents his human-caused global warming opinions at colleges and universities in multiple countries. If he wanted to speak to the physics department at the University College London, your department chair would give him a pass and a personal introduction. And he should.
I’m not against “science popularizers”, nor should you be. Your professors have this bug, or they are boring pedants. Other than the Guardian, people don’t seem to object to the lurid frame of Hawking’s “Think Like a Genius” series. It has an obvious, strange appeal that is deserved. Give any prof kudos for trying to engage the public on the poplular level, and let them live with the consequences of their success or failure.
Bill,
I don’t quite get what you’re asking. Maybe you can clarify?
ATTP Clarification:
“…a tweet from me which then made others at UCL aware of the meeting.”
What is clear is that you are bragging about some of the wrong things. Hard to do that from an anonymous profile. Why don’t you step out of the shadows?
Bill,
I’m not anonymous, just pseudonymous. Read the comments below. I wasn’t actually bragging, I was simply clarifying where I think the information came from. Also my tweet simply highlighted the existence of the meeting; the rest happened without any input from me.
And Then There’s Physics uses a curious excuse for turning away the climate conference from UCL. Well, now we have confirmation that he intolerantly opposes academic freedom. That is characteristically repellent. UCL has gravely damaged its reputation. Forgive me for not understanding that a Fellow of the UCL Observatory is debarred from exercising academic freedom at UCL.
Technically, I was presenting an argument as to why this doesn’t really qualify as an Academic Freedom issue. You, of course, are free to disagree, but might want to consider the irony of regarding what I’ve said as repellant and intolerant, while accusing me of opposing academic freedom.
And Then There’s Physics seems too prejudiced to understand how serious is the threat to academic freedom posed by the unspeakable Butterworth and his ilk, and he smugly lays claim to having induced Butterworth to write his freedom-menacing email. Shame on him.
I think “Butterworth and his ilk” – as you so charmingly put it – are perfectly aware of when Academic Freedom applies and when it does not. As far as I can tell, your meeting is still taking place. You’re simply holding it somewhere else; your freedom has certainly not be impinged in the slightest. You might have to pay a little more to hold it, but that probably means you’re paying the right price, rather than being subsidised by an organisation to which you have little formal affiliation.
You also appear to have some trouble interpreting what others have said. I was certainly not laying claim to having induced Butterworth to take action. I was simply pointing out that it probably wasn’t “paid hacks” who made him aware of the meeting (as you suggested) but a tweet from me that highlighted it taking place. Others took it from there.
FWFW, Prof. Butterworth published the whole email here https://lifeandphysics.wordpress.com/2016/08/05/for-the-record/
It is very clear that the visiting research fellow was no more than asked to move the meeting elsewhere and definitely wasn’t banned from holding the meeting at UCL, from the last paragraph:
“I am sure you have no desire to bring UCL into disrepute, or to cause dissension in the UCL community, and I would encourage you to think about moving the event to a different venue, not on UCL premises. If it is going to proceed as planned I must insist that the website and other publicity is amended to make clear that the event has no connection to UCL or this department in particular, and that you are not a UCL Professor.”
Note that as this was obviously sent before the meeting was moved, “If it is going to proceed as planned” can only mean “If it is going to proceed as planned at UCL” as that was the planned venue at that time.
Full text of the email:
“Dear Prof [redacted]
Although you have been an honorary research associate with the department since before I became head, I don’t believe we have ever met, which is a shame. I understand you have made contributions to outreach at the observatory on occasion, for which thanks.
It has been brought to my attention that you have booked a room at UCL for an external conference in September for a rather fringe group discussing aspects of climate science. This is apparently an area well beyond your expertise as an astronomer, and this group is also one which many scientists at UCL have had negative interactions. The publicity gives the impression that you are a professor of astronomy at UCL, which is inaccurate, and some of the publicity could be interpreted as implying that UCL, and the department of Physics & Astronomy in particular, are hosting the event, rather than it being an external event booked by you in a personal capacity.
If this event were to go ahead at UCL, it would generate a great deal of strong feeling, indeed it already has, as members of the UCL community are expressing concern to me that we are giving a platform to speakers who deny anthropogenic climate change while flying in the face of accepted scientific methods. I am sure you have no desire to bring UCL into disrepute, or to cause dissension in the UCL community, and I would encourage you to think about moving the event to a different venue, not on UCL premises. If it is going to proceed as planned I must insist that the website and other publicity is amended to make clear that the event has no connection to UCL or this department in particular, and that you are not a UCL Professor.
Best wishes,
Jon”
https://lifeandphysics.wordpress.com/2016/08/05/for-the-record/
also this, from the response from Butterworth (link in post above):
“After receiving this, the person concerned expressed frustration at the impression given by the meeting publicity, and decided to cancel the room booking. I understand the meeting was successfully rebooked at Conway Hall, which seems like a decent solution to me. As you can see in the full letter, the meeting wasn’t in any sense banned.
Free speech and debate are good things, though the quality that I’ve experienced during this episode hasn’t much impressed me. As far as I’m concerned, people are welcome to have meetings like this to their hearts’ content, so long as they don’t appropriate spurious endorsement from the place in which they have booked a room.
I have since met the honorary research fellow concerned, and while mildly embarrassed by the whole episode (which is why I haven’t mentioned his name here, though it’s easy to find it if you really care), he did not seem at all upset or intimidated, and we had a friendly and interesting discussion about his scientific work and other matters.
Bit of a storm in a teacup, really, I think, though I’m sure James Delingpole was glad of the opportunity to deploy the Eng. Lit. skills of which he seems so proud.”
I think this sentence gets to the heart of the matter:
“As far as I’m concerned, people are welcome to have meetings like this to their hearts’ content, so long as they don’t appropriate spurious endorsement from the place in which they have booked a room.”
I think the reason Monckton is so upset about this is because he wanted to be able to talk about the conference “held at the prestigious (insert name of institution here)”, and now it’s just at a hall somewhere.
Wow. This is what I call parsing it finely. ATTP has the Best Sophistry of the Week award nailed down for this week. (And you haven’t actually shown that the phrase “coven of paid hacks” was an incorrect designation.)
Ken Rice is the epitome of the mindset expressed in Hamlet Act III, Scene II, 210-219.
There’s really a very simple way to get around all of this.
Every HEI must have some kind of legal contract with every student, which includes some kind of statement that:
‘Every Higher Education Institution is an Institution of Education, a discipline which involves seeking the truth through subjecting hypotheses of truth to disputatious argument. As a consequence of that, there will inevitably be times when viewpoints are expressed which are neither popular nor agreeable to many listeners. Our HEI exists with the United Kingdom, one of whose cornerstones is the right to free speech. As a result, any student wishing to study here must sign a declaration that they respect the right to free speech and that, as a result of that, they may protest about someone being invited to speak, they may refuse to attend any speech given by someone whose views they disagree with and they may express views strongly disagreeing with such people. What they may not do, however, is to deny to others, whose views they disagree with, the right to free speech, nor may they challenge the concept that the way to win arguments is to engage, not to repress.
In other words, by signing up to becoming a student of this institution, every student agrees to be adult-like in behaviour.’
I recall, Lord Monckton, when you came to speak at the University of Notre Dame in Fremantle. Pressure was brought to bear on the vice chancellor. But to her credit, the speech went on with protesters wallowing in their ignorance outside. Thank you for brining this to our attention. Thank you for fighting the good fight.
That was an interesting meeting. The Mayor of Fremantle issued a press statement saying I was wrong about the climate. He came to hear my lecture and ended up agreeing wth me. There are still open minds around, to the totalitarians’ exasperation.
Monckton of Brenchley: “The Mayor of Fremantle issued a press statement saying I was wrong about the climate. He came to hear my lecture and ended up agreeing wth me.”
Hm, is that so? Do you have any proof, because he certainly doesn’t seem to agree with you now!
“…Turnbull should focus on what the overwhelming majority of Australians agree on (which is ironically largely what Turnbull previously stood for) including more stronger action on climate change…”
6 July 2016
http://www.watoday.com.au/comment/malcolm-turnbulls-downfall-was-that-he-wasnt-allowed-to-lead-20160705-gpyrmc.html
“I was proud to have my name (on behalf of the City of Fremantle) added to a group of mayors that have called for divestment from fossil fuels and a shift in finance will support transition to 100% renewable energy at the Paris climate talks.”
7 Dec 2015
https://cofremantle.wordpress.com/2015/12/07/fremantle-joins-global-call-for-fossil-fuel-divestment-at-paris-talks/
“A group of Mayors (including Fremantle Mayor Brad Pettitt ) around the world issued a letter today calling on other cities to divest from fossil fuels in order to support the transition away from fossil fuels and towards renewable energy.”
4 Dec 2015
http://350.org/press-release/cop21-mayors-call-for-divestment-at-cities-for-climate-conference/
Oh, I know – he was forced to change under pressure from the Liberal/Marxist/UN conspiracy?
An observation. Providing disclaimers may apply to the topic at hand, but if not done with every topic (pro or con), then the contra implication is that when they are not provided, the topic and/or author is endorsed.
Of course these “scientific methods” do not include The Scientific Method.
This is a disgrace.
I particularly liked, tossed into the mix of highly qualified academics, the phrase “the brother of the leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition in the House of Commons”
It makes that wild-haired individual with the wild ideas sound almost like a mainstream politician, illustrating that it’s not what you say, but how you say it, that’s important.
..So you prefer people like Prince Phillip ?
Printed in The American Almanac, August 25, 1997.
His Royal Virus
Reported by Deutsche Press Agentur (DPA), August, 1988.
In the event that I am reincarnated, I would like to return as a deadly virus, in order to contribute something to solve overpopulation.
Prince Philip, in his Forward to…. “If I Were an Animal” ; United Kingdom, Robin Clark Ltd., 1986.
“I just wonder what it would be like to be reincarnated in an animal whose species had been so reduced in numbers than it was in danger of extinction. What would be its feelings toward the human species whose population explosion had denied it somewhere to exist…. I must confess that I am tempted to ask for reincarnation as a particularly deadly virus.”
So, Richard Barraclough, are you and your family willing to be one of the “Surplus Population” that needs to be “culled” “…today ??
What a weird response to a slightly tongue-in-cheek comment about referring to Piers Corbyn in a roundabout semi-political way.
I’d be inclined to respond to someone who seems to think it’s appropriate to suggest than my family and I should be culled, but your ramblings are so incoherent that it’s impossible to know where to begin.
Mods – is this sort of vilification and veiled threat tolerated on this blog nowadays? I presume the laws on hate speech apply?
You sound unbelievably weird.
I think you should get some professional counselling
In his essay, Lord Monckton raises “the climate sensitivity” as an issue. He seems to feel that the magnitude of “the climate sensitivity” is an apt topic for discussion at a scientific conference. I disagree, for the argument that there is “the climate sensitivity” can be shown to be an application of the reification fallacy. Thus, “the climate sensitivity” is an illogical concept.
In this case the abstract object is a version of the Earth that possesses the equilibrium surface air temperature as a feature. The concrete Earth on which we live does not possess this feature.
For avoidance of application of the reification fallacy one must distinguish between an abstract and a concrete objecs in making an argument. In the book entitled “The Enigma of Probability and Physics” the physicist Lazar Mayants provides details on how to do so.
Mr Oldberg is unfamiliar with the concept of climate sensitivity.
As are you
Monckton of Brenchley
Your claim that I am “unfamiliar with the concept of climate sensitivity” is an application of the proof by assertion fallacy. Under this fallacy, the conclusion of an argument is true regardless of contradictions.
The evidence that Mr Oldberg is unfamiliar with the concept of climate sensitivity lies in his assertion that climate sensitivity is not a fit subject for a scientific conference. He is plainly ignorant of the debate among scientists about how much warming our sins of emission may cause. Since there is a debate among scientists about climate sensitivity, and since it is a scientific question, it is self-evidently a fit subject for a scientific conference, which is why so many conferences are devoted to it, whether Mr Oldberg likes it or not.
Science works by observation, measurement, testing of hypotheses and calculation, again whether Mr Oldberg likes it or not. If he disagrees that the determination of climate sensitivity is not of scientific interest, no doubt he will do us the courtesy of staying away. There are plenty of lavishly-funded conferences of true-believers where he will perhaps be much more at home with his waffle about the “deification” fallacy.
Correction: the fallacy is “reification” not “deification.”
Deification, schmeification. The iPad spell checker changed it. But Mr Oldberg is talking his usual tedious nonsense. He needs to read a good textbook of climatological,physics (Murry Salby’s is excellent).
Is it possible that Mr. Oldberg is referring to the colloquial use of “climate sensitivity” as being the equilibrium temperature change in response to the doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere, whereas the basic definition refers to the equilibrium temperature change in response to changes in all radiative forcings?
The latter is certainly worth a whole conference, whereas the former is only worth a discussion as to whether it exists outside laboratory conditions and, if it does, whether it is exists in isolation or as part of a cohort with other, possibly more important forcings.
Monckton of brenchley is dancing around the issue of rei fixation.
Solomon Green
Which of the two definitions that you cite is immaterial to the issue raised by me.
Nothing drives the Warmistas into a greater Fury than having someone even vaguely suggest that there could be another explanation for all the unexplained facts. Their censorship of ideas is a sure sign the Warmistas have no good arguments to put.
Well said. The arguments of the Warmistas are exclusively bad (illogical) ones. For balance it should be admitted that some of the arguments of the skeptics are also bad ones. Global warming climatology has yet to develop a mechanism for distinguishing the bad arguments from the good ones. For this field of study peer review does not work as it is supposed to do.
Another unsurprising snark-filled rant by the self-anointed inventor of cures for AIDS and the common cold, “Lord” Monckton, whose credentials in Journalism and the classics lead a few gullible non scientists to nod in agreement while he claims that he, the eminent Monckton (denied a lordship by the real House of Lords) can explain why hundreds of PhD Researchers around the world are wrong, and he is right, that we have nothing to fear from an impotent Greenhouse Effect, in Spite of what the data shows.
It seems Charlatans will always find their market.
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly flow the days
Sunrise/sunset issues are almost traditional in depictions of the London River, Turner’s ‘Fighting Temeraire’ is an example. She is being towed up to Rotherhithe to be broken up but the sun is setting behind her. The illustration at the top of this post shows sunset at Tower Bridge, it includes the silhouette of the Tower (north bank) and cleverly avoids the hideous Tower Hotel.
Say not the struggle nought availeth,
The labour and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,
And as things have been they remain.
If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
It may be, in yon smoke concealed,
Your comrades chase e’en now the fliers,
And, but for you, possess the field.
For while the tired waves, vainly breaking
Seem here no painful inch to gain,
Far back through creeks and inlets making,
Comes silent, flooding in, the main.
And not by eastern windows only,
When daylight comes, comes in the light,
In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly,
But westward, look, the land is bright.
The response by the good professor is to quote
http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-whats-warming-the-world/
It would be good for this group of scientists to discuss this graph as it constitutes the ‘answer’ that
is being relied upon to stop their meeting.
This site could address this graph as part of a radio series or podcast.
What I find perplexing is the behavior of these people. Have these people learned nothing from the history of science? when this comes down, the public activists in the media, will claim ignorance and will blame the more publically facing people. Then the likes of Gore and his celebrity cronies will simply blame the scientists. It is the likes of Butterworth that will be asked, given he is a scientists, what scientific acumen did he bring to the subject? They day this comes down will be a great day, when another group of sophists will refuted. The question to be asked is then, can a scientist be a sophist? The answer should always be no.
…and Then There’s Physics (AKA Ken Rice) is at it again!
What is the difference between a fellow, research fellow and a visiting research fellow at UCL?
Does it impact on their research undertaken?
Can you really say that someone who gets grants/expenses/email account/desk space etc is not a ‘proper researcher’? if so, why would UCL and most other universities grant the title and benefits to visiting research fellows?
I note that although Dr Athem Alsabti only has a PhD in Astrophysics from Manchester University, he is the lead editor of “Handbook of Supernovae” which will be the starting point for any astrophysical research in the future. His details from the publisher: “Born in Iraq in 1945, Dr. Alsabti moved to the UK on a scholarship to the University of Manchester. He obtained his BSc in Mathematical Physics in 1967, his MSc in 1968 (Astrophysics, Supernovae) and his PhD in 1970 (“Investigating very faint nebulosities associated with non-thermal galactic radio sources”). He now works at University College London, in the Department of Physics and Astronomy. Dr. Alsabti’s research interests are in the origin and evolution of supernovae and interstellar matter. Dr. Alsabti was also a Professor of Physics at Baghdad University and founded the Baghdad Planetarium and Iraqi National Observatory.
He has been an active member of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) since 1973, and is a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS). In the IAU, he is a member of the Advanced Development Projects Group. Dr. Alsabti is also a member of the World Space Observatory Committee, and a consultant to the Cornwall Observatory and Planetarium Project. “
I think Dr Alsabti CV is a little bit better than that of ‘Ken Rice’ AKA …and Then There’s Physics
No, and I didn’t.
Possibly, but it’s not relevant to the point being made.
Dr Alsabti looks at least as well qualified on this topic as the Astronomer Royal and former President of Royal Society.
“Can you really say that someone who gets grants/expenses/email account/desk space etc is…”
I think you may have the wrong idea about visiting research fellows. I didn’t find anything for the observatory at UCL, but from a different department it appears that the visiting research fellow pays the university fees for deskspace, email account etc. rather than being paid expenses:
“Upon approval of your application with the Institute, you will be conferred Affiliate Academic status by UCL. The fee for 2016/17 is £4,770 per annum, pro-rata. This is for access to UCL and Institute facilities, such as the library, photocopying, use of space and other resources. Regrettably there are no funding schemes currently available. ”
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/americas/fellowships/visiting-fellows
I’m not sure a visiting research fellow would be eligible for research council funding.
Release of the raw data which has been publicly funded across the globe would allow crowd analysis. The geniuses with statistics, models and code did not join the climatology department.
@-Stuart M
“Release of the raw data which has been publicly funded across the globe would allow crowd analysis.”
Unfortunately some governments regard the raw data as a commercial product despite the public funding, or a national security issue.
However most of the raw data on surface temperature is here –
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v2
It sounds like Professor Jobsworth has scored an Own Goal. His intervention has given publicity and airtime that might not have occurred had it let things progress unremarked.
Sad
“New dawn of truth”.
In the end here is only one enduring truth, and that is physical reality. This truth is outside the human mind. It is more of an experience, an encounter.
Truth as a concept in the human mind is fluid and changes all the time. Also scientific theories do change. Science may be the best effort to grasp physical reality, but science by its very nature can only produce “hard evidence” by strictly limiting itself to well defined phenomena and well-defined and independently reproducible methods. That means in practical terms science can only tell us that much when we look at all the phenomena that are important in our life that define the “truth of our existence” – whether we understand that existential truth or not. For most of these phenomena science does not give an answer and cannot by its very nature.
So I think the concept of “truth” is too broad and fluid to be a central topic for a scientific conference. I do guess it is chosen as a topic because the conference will try to steer science back to focus on physical reality.
Science creates a body of knowledge that gives partial insight into the phenomena in our lives, and also this body of knowledge and the insights are in the abstract realm, they are basically ideas, mental constructs. So by the definition of truth given at the start of this comment this knowledge cannot be truth itself. At best it can give useful insight and tools in dealing with some aspects of physical reality. Let us hope this conference will help in that respect.
For the record…
Anthony, as you have chosen to give Monckton space on your front page to publish his attack on Butterworth, how about an article with Butterworth’s response? If this issue is indeed newsworthy, then surely the actual text of the email, not just Monckton’s edited version, and Butterworth’s response are just as important to understanding the issue as Moncton’s initial attack, and should be given equal prominence.
What say you?
I say that if Butterwirth wants to pen a response, Ill run it. However just because you say you want something, means nothing to me since you exist here only to attack yourself.
He’s already penned a response.
To be fair, my last comment may be unfair, because I was assuming that Anthony had already read Butterworths reply, as the reply and link appear above in the comments, and he may not have when he posted his reply to me.
That’s exactly right. The moderation panel does not show all comments on the thread, and with typically 800-1200 comments per day, I have better things to do than try to figure out such twists.
I’m posted a link to Butterworth’s reply in the head post.
No further whining.
Further to my last comment: I suppose that as the article hasn’t disappeared off the front page yet, that an update to the article with Butterworth’s response would also be fair.
@dikranmarsupial August 5, 2016 at 7:56 am
However, when I search UCL, I find reference to :-
“Annex 4 – Visiting Research Fellows Subsistence Payments”
Whereby visiting research fellows can claim expenses under certain conditions……
and: Complete a Visiting Research Fellow Subsistence Form (excel).
and: Complete a Foreign Bank Visiting Research Fellow Subsistence Form (excel)
However, the visiting fellow is usually paid by their ‘own’ institution unless the host has grants on offer.
I do not know a single Fellow, visiting or direct who ‘pays their own way’…..
@Steve Richards
In this case I don’t think that there is an “own” institution, and Prof. Butterworth’s account for the record confirms that he was unpaid. My interpretation of what little information is available is that it is an honorary appointment made because he is a “good egg” (in the sense that he does a fair bit of outreach and engagement activities and organization work for the research community) rather than for research output or grant getting. I suspect if there were any “bench fees” that they were probably waived in this case.
Prof. Butterworths account also gives the full email, which shows that he was not actually prevented from booking the room at UCL, just asked to move it elsewhere. The only instruction was to remove the spurious association with UCL from the advertising material, which seems pretty reasonable to me.
@dikranmarsupial: I am referring to the visiting research fellow – Dr Athem Alsabti, who I assume Ken is referring to.
Prof Butterworth is the full time head of department, and paid accordingly.
I was also referring to Alsabti as the one that was unpaid (I think he may be retired, it is not uncommon for academic to continue some of their activities in emeritus or honorary positions), and that was confirmed by Butterworth’s account (which is well worth reading and comparing with the partial quotes from the email given in the article above).