Guest post by David Middleton
Environmentalists have put out a new ad campaign attacking President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for “encouraging debate” among scientists about the “degree and extent” of global warming.
“He believes debate should be encouraged about the truth of climate science,” says a recent ad attacking Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt funded by the political arm of the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).
[…]
“Scientists continue to disagree about the degree and extent of global warming and its connection to the actions of mankind. That debate should be encouraged — in classrooms, public forums, and the halls of Congress,” Pruitt and Strange wrote.
[…]
Apparently, encouraging scientific debate is not something environmentalists want when it comes to climate science.
EDF, an environmental group, goes on to claim “applying Pruitt’s radical views of federalism to the EPA would gut the agency’s long-standing bipartisan mandate to ensure basic protections for clean air and clean water nationwide.”
EDF says they’ve never opposed a candidate for EPA, but says Pruitt is “so dangerous” they felt compelled to publicly oppose him.
[…]
Democrats have labeled Pruitt a “climate denier” who will do the bidding of “Big Oil,” and some are plotting to, at the very least, make a public spectacle out of his confirmation hearings.
“The EPA is in charge of clean air for America. We must not have a professional climate denier in charge. This is an emergency,” Hawaii Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz recently tweeted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHnX9Uex9H8
Talk about chutzpah!!!
“He believes debate should be encouraged about the truth of climate science…”
In 40 years (counting college) as a geoscientist, I don’t think I’ve ever heard the phrase, “the truth of geology.” Science without debate isn’t science. Science with sacrosanct truths to be protected from debate is religion. In geology, debate is always encouraged. Most geoscientists are taught to embrace Chamberlin’s Method of Multiple Working Hypotheses. The prevailing theory about the formation of granite as an intrusive igneous rock doesn’t require protection from the granitization theory that granite can form as a metamorphic rock.
Based on the two recent surveys of the American Meteorological Society (Maibach et al., 2012 and 2016), it appears to me that atmospheric scientists are also open to debate…
The 2012 survey found that 52% of survey respondents thought that humans were the primary drivers of global warming over the previous 150 years, a bare majority. The 2016 survey focused on the most recent 50 years and it only found a 67% majority that humans were the primary drivers of climate change over the most recent 50 years. While a solid majority, it is far short of a “consensus.” More revealing was the widespread disagreement about whether or not recent climate changes have been beneficial or harmful and the degree to which future climate changes can be averted…
Based on Maibach et al., 2012 and 2016, it appears to me that a great deal of debate “about the degree and extent of global warming and its connection to the actions of mankind” remains to be had.
What could possibly be motivating the EDF and other environmental activist groups to try to stifle this debate? [Yes… This is a rhetorical question.]
References
[1] Maibach E, Stenhouse N, Cobb S, Ban R, Bleistein A, et al. (2012) American Meteorological Society Member Survey on Global Warming: Preliminary Findings. Fairfax, VA: Center for Climate Change Communication.
[2] Maibach, E., Perkins, D., Francis, Z., Myers, T., Englbom, A., et al. (2016) A 2016 National Survey of American Meteorological Society Member Views on Climate Change: Initial Findings. George Mason University, Fairfax, VA: Center for Climate Change Communication.
[3] Featured Image
Doesn’t matter, Pruitt will be confirmed, and will be more aggressive and effective against egregious and substantively meaningful violations of the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts simply because he’s smarter, better equipped, as an attorney, and less beholden to any dogma. He also the kind of guy who would fire anyone, on the spot, who decided that a probing around an old silver mine with a big backhoe is a smart thing to do.
What has “climate denial” got to do with clean air? That is exactly problem at the EPA. There is nothing unclean about CO2. Trump and all his team want clean air and clean water as does just about everyone who has expressed an opinion here.
If the EPA spent less time screwing around and playing climate politics with “carbon”. maybe residents of Flint would have clean water instead of lead poisoned children.
Good science demands constant debate until there are no more questions. Climate science is far from settled and demands constant debate. If that is not allowed to happen then the subject is climate politics, not climate science.
Note those associated with EDF, (EDF website), and follow the money.
+100
EDF/Environmental Defense Fund, U.S., Oct.5, 2015
ICF International Report
“EDF partnered with the Pembina Institute, Canada’s leading clean energy think tank, on the development of the project and dissemination of the ICF report.”
http://www.edf.org/media/report-canadian-oil-and-gas-operators-have-ample-opportunity-reduce-methane-emissions
ICF International & EPA
One article on this:
WashingtonExec, Feb.5, 2014
‘ICF International Wins $5.9 Million Contract With U.S. EPA’
http://www.washingtonexec.com/2014/02/icf-international-wins-5-9-million-contract-u-s-epa
More on this topic online
The Street
ICF International Inc. (ICFI)
View: Latest News, including awarded contracts.
http://www.thestreet.com/quote/icfi.html
2016 Alberta Climate Summit, Calgary, Sept.20, 2016
Supported by: Consul General of the United States – Calgary
http://www.pembina.org/event/2016-alberta-climate-summit
The diplomatic but still constructive approach is to insist on the debate and then win the debate with real science (which the warmists seriously refuse to do), which opens the door for undoing all of the messes that have been perpetrated in so many areas of our government, economy and people.
That is what the warmists are so scared about and why the steadfastly refuse to debate. They would almost certainly lose any debate.
It seems like the temperatures on the earth’s surface have gone up every single decade for over half a century and have not pulled back to any significant extent as one would expect if we primarily had natural variations. Of course, within a natural variation swing you can find any small group of years doing most anything (well, recently, except going down to a significant degree).
The US NAS accepted the basic AGW (or that warming would soon enough be primarily due to man) in the late 70s even before all the recent warming we’ve seen since then. It is based on fundamental physics and both simple models as well as complex heat equations applied with our strongest scientific tools (eg, the computer) although there are obviously uncertainties of one type or other.
Something that is so widely accepted by major scientific bodies and has been for a while despite that the current “pull back” of natural variability hardly pulled back like it did in the mid 20th century or earlier centuries is why an organization like EDF thinks it’s foolish and detrimental to social and environmental entities to debate such basics. If scientists want to debate that is fine, but studies continue to show that the experts in the field who support AGW vastly outnumber those who don’t. EDF wants scientists to debate as necessary but not governments with the scientific experts who largely agree we should curtail CO2 emissions.
This discussion is also focusing on a scene lasting near 1 second out of a total almost minute commercial.
Look, CO2 is great but so is water. If we were in a locked room that was filling up with H2O for how long should we debate about the merits of H2O for example? Maybe only a few of the people in the room would die early, but it’s expected the quality of life of most would suffer extra in all that new water.
Jose_X,
“It seems like the temperatures on the earth’s surface have gone up every single decade for over half a century and have not pulled back to any significant extent as one would expect if we primarily had natural variations.”
‘Seems’ is the operative word. It this idea arising from the repetitive rhetoric coming from the warmist side, or do you physically notice that it’s warmer today than its been in the past? If you claim the later, you’re obviously lying since the accumulated change over the last century doesn’t even pass the threshold of human detection.
There are are many periodic influences at work with periods spanning a day to 100’s of thousands of years, many of which whose origins and/or mechanisms are unknown. If you see a mostly linear temperature trend between 7 AM and 8 AM, is it legitimate to continue this trend indefinitely, or is there the expectation that the apparently linear trend will flatten out and then reverse? What about warming during the spring or cooling during the fall. Are these trends expected to continue indefinitely? Consider an influence whose period is hundreds of years (Maunder for example) a few decades is not enough time to extrapolate a linear trend because we know from history that this natural variability will flatten out and reverse.
There’s little doubt that CO2 has some effect (and I’m among the 97% that thinks so). The debate is about how big this effect is and the IPCC’s claimed effect is demonstrably too high by about a factor of 3 to 4 and the only support they have for this absurdly high effect is political, not scientific.
I understand that we might not get enormous (ancient earth) ocean rises until we get serious ocean volume warming, which may not happen until we lose the polar ice. Although maybe that is not necessary.
BTW, Curry’s paper out a couple years ago got on the lower end of the averages for climate sensitivity (vs IPCC report) but that paper apparently used some values biased low. The work done in the 70s is still holding up pretty well.
Anyone have guess on when internal variability will pull our temps back down to 20th century average? Predictions of “next couple of years” continue to fail. And a wave doesn’t just return to it’s average value but pulls below it about as much as it pulled above. Are people here really thinking that is going to happen? What decade? Don’t let Hansen be so much more accurate than the best scientists here. Temps have gone up a lot since his predictions. The difference of late with the trend of the early/mid 20th century is that this time it went up higher in half the time and hasn’t much pulled back… yet. But, it does look a lot like natural variability is riding the coat-tails of steady CO2 based climb.
A debate could be won by AGW skeptics if they would make a long-term prediction on temp that would not fall off the map within a few years. Now is the chance since climate model average temp values are still running a bit hot and it’s about time natural variability pull the damn temps down.
2 standards? Alarmists have no accurate long term prediction on temperatures. That is because, as the skeptics have said, we do not know all the factors that influence it yet.
The wise man is the man who knows that he knows not. The fool knows it all.
The year-to-year season return is like clockwork .. sort of. But the decades based rises we’ve seen of late is not following the best “cyclical” patterns we can discern. We are over-due for the 20th century average or close to it to match prior centuries.
Evidence I see suggests the climate scientists are closer to their predictions than those who have been saying for a long time that they are off by, eg, “a factor of 3 or 4” or more.
Basic/simplified physics suggests our oceans could rise a lot (by human metrics) if they warm up a little. Science of our past suggests ocean have risen significantly at various times. How much will we push it this time around? That’s what I wonder. As long as we don’t pull back down significantly (wave-ish), it seems there is more truth to the professional climate scientists’ claims than to the amateurs’ claims.
The next step is to annihilate the climate insanity at the UN. It is nothing more than a $$ shakedown racket by third world cesspools, aimed at America and our friends.
I don’t think that will happen… US recent history is full of corporate entities trying to get away with polluting and poisoning people…
This relaxation is basically telling them its OK, they can get away with it.
No, it’s about telling them that they only have real science to worry about. Not the fantasies made up by EPA – PM2.5, for instance.
Just keep telling yourself.
Everyone is out to get me.
Everyone is out to get me.
Only government can save me.
Only government can save me.
More lies, professional trollboy?
Have you apologised to Dr. Crockford for attempting to trash her professional reputation yet, you unpleasant little creature?
We haven’t had real pollution in this country after the 1980s. Since then, it has been regulation aimed at increasing government control at the expense of personal freedom. The regulation went into hyper-drive during the Obama era. Hopefully we can rectify the situation. If President Trump keeps going the way he has since taking office, we will be in great shape in the not too distant future. But to cement the deregulation in place will require legislation. Congress will think twice about throwing the country back into depression at the request of another Obama type buffoon.
Yea, like that gold mine in Colorado.
Hivemind said: “No, it’s about telling them that they only have real science to worry about. Not the fantasies made up by EPA – PM2.5, for instance.”
Right, the “fantasies” that cause increased rates of lung cancer and respiratory problems. What is your proof that PM2.5 does not cause problems?
From a research paper: “After twenty years of epidemiological studies, scientists have revealed a significant correlation between fine particle pollutants and respiratory morbidity and mortality.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4740125/
So Pruitt is promoting the same view as that declared by Obama’s former Undersecretary for Science – Steve Koonin. And yet nobody complained when Koonin held these views. Or maybe they did.
Either way – as Koonin explained – declaring that the science is settled is a disservice to science.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/09/20/a-former-white-house-science-advisor-speaks-out-about-settled-science/
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/12/08/study-the-climate-uncertainty-monster-limits-geoengineering-schemes/comment-page-1/#comment-2366107
Bryan said:
“I believe that the single largest potential threat to this planet, WRT changing climate, is the lack of televised public debate and the stonewalling of liberals on the subject of open debate.”
Yes Brian, but your so-called “liberals” are typically leftist extremists, and they see no problem with lying to achieve their goals – this is their history – “the end justifies the means”.
I have an education in engineering and the earth sciences, and so have a basic understanding of Earth’s geological history. I therefore suspected that alleged “dangerous manmade global warming” hypothesis was false when I first heard about it in the early 1980’s. A few years of research confirmed that suspicion – alleged CAGW is a false crisis.
Then, when I heard the popular mantra “The science is settled!” being repeated ad nauseum by uneducated imbeciles, I knew that we were being propagandized by leftist fraudsters.
This “refusal-to-debate” ploy is part of the larger leftist-warmist scam – to “shout down” their opposition when the warmist case actually has NO scientific credibility. That lack of credibility is proved by the warmists’ perfect negative predictive track record.
When you see this type of misconduct, think “deliberate fraud” and you will almost always be correct.
Best, Allan
Post Script:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/10/29/scientists-plead-with-greenpeace-for-blind-dying-children/#comment-2329917
Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace, wrote this article circa 1994. It still rings true today.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Greenpeace was taken over by Marxists of many different stripes: Trotskyites, Leninists, Harpo’s, Groucho’s… and evolved into the watermelon outfit it is today.
The Rise of Eco-Extremism
http://www.ecosense.me/index.php/key-environmental-issues/10-key-environmental-issues/208-key-environmental-issues-4
Patrick Moore was a member of a Canadian organisation opposed to nuclear testing.
He left as that org joined Greenpeace: he never espoused any views shared by Greenpeace except opposition to nuclear testing.
you misrepresent him…
Griff,
You’re an idi*t. If you’re going to call Patrick Moore a liar, why don’t you have the courage to do it to his face?
The usual nonsense from Griff.
Patrick Moore is my email friend and I hereby disprove Griff’s falsehoods with Patrick’s article written in 1994.
Patrick and I have discussed this article, and we both think he “nailed it”.
Read the full article to understand the Watermelon takeover of the environmental movement.
Regards, Allan
Dr. Patrick Moore on
The Rise of Eco-Extremism (1994)
http://ecosense.me/2012/12/30/key-environmental-issues-4/
[excerpts]
I wrote this little polemic in 1994 after many years of fussing and fuming about the changes that had come over my beloved Greenpeace. In retrospect it seems a little harsh but it gets the point across. The essay was published in this form in Leadership Quarterly, 5(3/4), 1994
More than twenty years ago I was one of a dozen or so activists who founded Greenpeace in the basement of the Unitarian Church in Vancouver. The Vietnam war was raging and nuclear holocaust seemed closer every day. We linked peace, ecology, and a talent for media communications and went on to build the world’s largest environmental activist organization. By 1986 Greenpeace was established in 26 countries and had an income of over $100 million per year.
…
The Rise of Eco-Extremism
Two profound events triggered the split between those advocating a pragmatic or “liberal” approach to ecology and the new “zero-tolerance” attitude of the extremists. The first event, mentioned previously, was the widespread adoption of the environmental agenda by the mainstream of business and government. This left environmentalists with the choice of either being drawn into collaboration with their former “enemies” or of taking ever more extreme positions. Many environmentalists chose the latter route. They rejected the concept of “sustainable development” and took a strong “anti-development” stance.
Surprisingly enough the second event that caused the environmental movement to veer to the left was the fall of the Berlin Wall. Suddenly the international peace movement had a lot less to do. Pro-Soviet groups in the West were discredited. Many of their members moved into the environmental movement bringing with them their eco-Marxism and pro-Sandinista sentiments.
**************************************************
Is there any lie that Griff won’t repeat ad nauseum?
“If you’re going to call Patrick Moore a liar…”
Grifter calls everybody who criticises the true religion of AGW that he is paid to protect a liar, the more professionally qualified the more viciously he attacks them.
One of these days he’ll go too far and end up in court.
They’re afraid of debate. Carefully handled, that could be a huge PR disaster for the alarmists.
Exactly! A simple response would be that it is not for politicians or environmentalists to tell science when debate is complete.
There are far too many stupid people involved in the argument. There really is no argument because AGW is a freaking figment of the imagination of those who wish to suck more from the government trough and hard working Americans who just want to live and raise their families.
What we need more than argument and debate is DIALOGUE. Talk back and forth respectfully and determine where there is agreement and where there is disagreement Then try to analyze why there is disagreement about specific points.
Using this approach, I handled 405 environmental compliance cases in my career and came up with 405 win/win scenarios where all parties ended up happy and on the same wavelength. By all parties, I mean compliance officers, EPA, attorneys, pollution control manufacturers, company CEO’s, and on site technicians and engineers.
In some cases, EPA guidance documents were issued based on the outcome of these types of dialogues.
Rich
Yes dialogue would be nice.
I represent a non-skeptic viewpoint and would value debate, rather than people denouncing me as some kind of paid agent or merely contradicting me (I want the full ten shilling argument)
Griff,
For some reason, this doesn’t seem to be the case.
You will agrue one side of the debate or post some information, then 8 – 10 regulars will post responces to your arguements (some fairly rudely and others very informatively) pointing out various perceived flaws in your arguements.
After which you seldom respond to their replies. Not that anyone has that ammount of time but…
Although I am not calling you one, your actions do resemble those of a posting troll.
For some reason Griff seems to believe that dialogue involves repeating the same disproven lie over and over again. Then whine that nobody will answer him despite the fact that dozens of people already have.
“I represent a non-skeptic viewpoint”
Another lie.
In fact, you are paid to represent vested interests in the renewable energy industry by attacking anyone who appears to threaten their interests and derail any debate on the subject.
Car, remember, a “non-skeptic” is a non-scientist. He just admitted he is a religious on the issue.
“What are they hiding?”
The fact that they are on the wrong side, but to admit so has ramifications so dire to their political beliefs, they can’t accept the truth, so they deny that there’s a debate.
not just that , whole careers have been built on the back of AGW , massive amounts of funding has gone into it and this has meant some third rate ‘scientists’ , such as Mann , have got first rate life styles , whole university departments depend on this cash flow and at least on generation has learnt that to ‘get on ‘ only the right view on AGW will help .
They will have to go in because they have no other choice than to go bust . its not just a question of dogma and its never been just about the ‘science’ there is some very human self serving interest at work .
Stolen. Will make a great sig line on emails and a shutdown argument. Thanks
Truths that EDF does not want debated include:
1. Except for a new rapidly warming 2015-16 El Nino blip, no warming this century.
2. Attribution problem causes parameterized models to run hot.
3. Observational ECS about half of modeled, suggesting no future problems.
4. No acceleration in SLR, and no SLR tipping points.
5. Polar bears thriving since hunting was curtailed; they do not depend on late summer ice.
6. Greening from CO2 fertilization.
7. No increase in extremes; both Texas and California droughts have broken.
8. Renewables are not viable without continued subsidies and preferences.
9. Renewables are intermittent so need grid backup.
10. Renewables provide no grid inertia so are destabilizing.
11. China and India won’t play along with the voluntary Paris foolishness, so US won’t, either.
12. Biofuels are an environmental disaster; clearcutting SE hardwood forests for Drax woodchips, threatening Indonesian orangutans with extinction for palm oil plantations.
13. Unconstitutional EPA over reach in both CPP and WOTUS.
14. Mike’s Nature trick and other warmunist academic misconduct.
…
Trump won because flyover country has had it with EDF and the like; they can no longer stifle the debate using Bengtssom/Pielke/Merchants of Doubt tactics
Let’s someone expand that list to 50 items and post it on some governmental website. (It could be incomplete at first.)
A good list, Rud, thank you.
Dr. Sallie Baliunas, Dr. Tim Patterson and I published made many similar points in 2002 in our written debate with the warmist Pembina Institute, on the now-defunct Kyoto Accord. See the eight points in our Rebuttal at http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/KyotoAPEGA2002REV1.pdf
Note that the points we made in 2002 have now all occurred in those states that fully adopted the Kyoto Accord, whereas none of the global warming alarmists’ scary climate predictions have materialized. The warmists have a perfectly negative predictive track record, a testament to their scientific dishonesty and incompetence.
Any calls now by the warmists for an honest debate are disingenuous. They rejected honest debate for decades, falsely claiming “the science is settled” and viciously attacking those who did not agree with their alarmist nonsense. It is unlikely that you will get an honest debate from the average warmist, for whom global warming mania is a deeply-held religious belief that has nothing in common with the scientific method.
Now that Trump has been elected they are panicking, because the truth will finally be exposed for all to see. The warmists should now prepare themselves for Civil RICO lawsuits and criminal prosecutions, for creating the most expensive “scientific” scam of all time.
Ristvan,
Excellent list. Since I worked as an Engineer on numerous biofuel projects, I would say that “Biofuels are currently not viable regardless of subsidies, PERIOD. Liquid transportation fuels from renewables are probably many decades away if possible at all. It also puzzles me to think that electricity from “renewables” will ever be sufficient and cost effective for Electric Vehicles not to mention the cost of a distribution system like we have for gasoline or diesel powered transportation energy. Also apparently advocates of Hydrogen powered cars seem to be oblivious to the fact that virtually all Hydrogen comes from Natural Gas or Oil, mostly NG
They probably assume “hydrogen powered” means “runs on water”. Never mind that separating the H2 from the O requires an electric current, and consumes more energy than burning the resulting hydrogen would produce.
German hydrogen pilots are based on ‘power to gas’ – using renewable energy when demand is less than local renewable production. (Yes, that does happen).
Griff illustrates the problem beautifully. “Yes, that does happen”. The problem I refer to is a poor understanding of huge, complex industrial plants such as a hydrogen plant. First, such plants are expensive to build, staff and maintain. “does happen” implies what % of capacity utilized. Griff does not say; it would be interesting to learn his expectation. Second, such plants do much – several more muches – better when run at a steady pace. Waiting for the sun to shine, heating up a huge amount of steel to operating temperature, oops, sun has set, letting it cool down, is a recipe for operating and maintenance costs multiples of those for a plant run at a steady rate.
These sorts of realities are exactly what needs open and transparent debate. Not the IR behaviour of individual molecules, which is well understood.
Good points by Rud, catcracking and Bruce. All or almost all renewables require huge life-of-project subsidies and are clearly uneconomic.
Renewable energy technologies have caused enormous harm through clear-cutting of rainforests (palm oil and sugar cane ethanol), excessive drawdown of the vital Ogallala aquifer (corn ethanol and biodiesel), destabilization of the electrical grid (wind power), increase in food costs (corn ethanol and other biofuels), and increase in energy costs (~all renewables).
There may be occasional exceptions such as geothermal, which is limited to very few locations worldwide.
Despite overwhelming evidence, some governments like Ontario and Alberta in Canada still believe that green energy will actually work. It has not and it will not. The socialist government of Alberta is depending on grid-scale electrical storage to solve the intermittency problem of wind power, despite the fact that a practical, economic “super-battery” does not exist in Alberta.
It may be possible to salvage some value from this enormously expensive green energy debacle, or for future technological innovations to improve the economics, but as of today these technologies are costly failures.
Alternatively, there may be another costly exercise required to dismantle and clean up the remains of these green energy debacles, which were never green and produced little useful energy.
“3. Observational ECS about half of modeled, suggesting no future problems.”
You cannot look for the CO2 signal in the satellite data by including the warming from the El Ninos.
El Ninos are NOTHING to do with CO2.
There has, in fact, been essentially NO WARMING in the satellite data outside the 1998 El Nino step.
It looks like the 21015/16 El Nino will be nothing but a transient blip.. already down to pre El Nino zero trend level in RSS
The fact that there has been NO WARMING apart from those El Ninos, shows that ECS is basically ZERO
Unwise making claims about what futur data will be before it is in. Why are you so sure that this El Nino will not produce something like the step you say there was last time?
Also, if you wish to say that it is only El Ninos which cause rises and no one understands the cause of El Ninos you are wrong to assume that this is unrelated to AGW. Not saying it is , just pointing out your invalid assumptions. Maybe OHC accumulates the warming and then, once in a while burps it out as a strong El Nino, resulting in your ‘steps’.
I see no merit in just making stuff up and stating it as a factual certitude. That is what the AGW have been doing for decades and what this site is opposing.
Andy deserves a defense, here:
1. He said, It looks like the 2015/16 El Nino will be … a transient blip
2. Re: “Why are you so sure” — one reason Andy is not off-base in his blip assertion is Bob Tisdale’s fine analysis of El Ninos; he says that the 2015/16 El Nino was weaker than that of 1997/98.
3. Greg! Is that really YOU? To assert AGW has nothing to do with El Ninos is simply to assert the prima facie case, the null case, that natural variation, as evidenced by thousands of years of observations, is the driver of El Ninos. The ocean, the tradewinds, and all the other powerful atmospheric and earth phenomena that we have observed, are, given that there is yet no evidence proving AGW exists as a controlling driver (and, in the past 20 years, there is anti-correlation evidence against AGW), VERY LIKELY to be the sole drivers of ENSO.
4. That you could say Andy was “just making stuff up” really makes me think either you are not really “Greg” or you, Greg, were not yourself when you wrote that.
5. That Andy took the time to strong refute the lukewarmist conjecture of “ECS about half of modeled” was a very reasonable thing to do. “ECS about half” was asserted as fact. It isn’t a fact. It is an assumption.
“El Ninos you are wrong to assume that this is unrelated to AGW”
What a load of utter and complete rubbish
El Ninos existed well before any possible anthropogenic cause.
It is up to YOU to prove that they ARE an AGW linked climate event.. good luck with that !!!
The only one “making stuff up” is the idiot saying that El Ninos are, or could be, related to AGW.
And yes it does “LOOK LIKE” the 2015/16 will be nothing but a transient… GET OVER IT !!
” Maybe OHC accumulates the warming and then”
roflmoa
Make it up as you go along, !!! 🙂
to be fair China will play along , because they have to do no more than think about something , sometime in the future and then perhaps say something. While their industrial competitors tie themselves in knots . They be mad not to go along with it . And the same is true for Indian with the extra of the chance of getting their on ‘climate guilt ‘ cash . so why would they not sign up to that ?
China is the world leader in wind and solar deployment, which they paid for – not some fictitious UN fund.
How refreshingly scientific.
Just one correction: anthropogenic global warming or, more correctly, catastrophic anthropogenic global warming.
@ Brian Schatz — Get a grip, fella. Pruitt is talking about CO2, not air pollution.
No, no, lol, there’s no “emergency.” CO2 is not as the enviroprofiteers want people to believe, “dangerous.”
CO2 is plant food.
a quick point = there is no such thing as “clean air” in nature, dust, pollen millions of tiny things are always in the air……..
Roy Spencer summed it up this way…
http://i90.photobucket.com/albums/k247/dhm1353/dhm1353035/Spencer_ECI_zps16948f96.png
Mr. Middleton,
Your Roy Spencer cite is a good one in itself, but it does not support the point I was making. Schatz is condemning Pruitt over CO2 pseudo-pollution. Spencer was talking about genuine pollution such as coal dust particulates.
In other words, if that graph you presented were about CO2 “pollution,” there would be nothing but this:
http://www.codecogs.com/users/22109/square.jpg
That is, there is NO cost that is justified for CO2 “Pollution” Reduction.
You make many fine points in the numerous articles you have written, Mr. Middleton, but, you could really use someone to proofread your articles for logic and probative discernment.
With gratitude for your many efforts to try to get the truth out,
Janice
Ms. Moore,
I was replying to Bill Taylor’s comment with the Roy Spencer cartoon.
I wholeheartedly agree with you about CO2 and clean air.
PS… If I have any gaps in “logic and probative discernment,” please point them out… I can’t stand making logical errors… 😉
I beg your pardon, Mr. Middleton. My mistake.
No harm, no foul… But seriously, please don’t hesitate to point out logical inconsistencies in my posts. There’s no point in making mistakes, if I can’t learn from them… 🙂
They really have gone off the reservation. So now we are supposed to believe without facts. Their religion is betraying them.
the low ratings for the 2016 NFL season can be blamed on: a) lack of beer; b) too many commercials;
c) not enough solar panels; d) players showing a lack of respect to the fans; e) Hillary Clinton”s amazing
Moo Moo outfits.
Actually many of the problems come from the fact that Nielsen made a major change in method for the national sample, and much of the data for geography, outside of the major media markets is “filled-in” using a model. The problems also exist, but to a lesser extent, for the NCAA, and MLB.
Imagine that, a model that doesn’t predict very well.
More likely it was the stupid Thursday football.
I’ve always thought the most effective weapon the true believers and pretend true believers have is the 97 percent consensus lie….framed so that the public believes the agreement has to do with cause, extent, and sign (very harmful).
i’ve yet to see this effectively countered, especially under the lights during congressional hearings. Every time some moron congressman uses it, we seem to be left flat footed.
I agree. It is such an obvious point to counter, and one that is used at every turn. It is our great failing that we do not, at this late stage have an effective counter.
The 97% consensus is always thrown out as a rhetorical grenade, throw a grenade right back.
Shout them down.
97% of Government scientists agree on three things: If the Global Warming issue goes away –
1) Their Jobs go away.
2) Their Careers go away.
3) Their Pensions go away.
“Any Questions?”
And you own them.
{Note here that the “Govt. Scientist” does not have to be strictly true, because the 97% claim is not at all true. Also it is impossible for them to argue that the 97% *does not* exist in the ranks of “Govt. Scientists”}
TonyL,
I agree, it seems obvious to me that the nominees, at least, are more restrained (trained) than I to avoid getting slammed by the media if they correct every lie from the Dem Senators. It could affect their nomination which is the goal. Shame Senator Cruze is not there to destroy their claims including the faux 97%.
Another way of dealing with the 97% hand grenade is to mention that 97% of priests believe in God, because priests are self-selected from those who believe in God in the first place. Similarly, those who describe themselves as climate scientists almost certainly do so because they were fervent CAGW believers to begin with. When did you first hear the term ‘climate scientist’? Probably not before the 1st IPCC report in 1990.
its not even government scientists, the 97% claim is BS all the way down . that even skeptics give it a value sadly show how ‘good ‘ a job Cook and his friends did .
Years from now this will be one of classic items of ‘research’ when the question get asked how did such poor methodology and lack of academic rigor get missed by so many and become so powerful . I just hope Cook is around to see this and get to know he is used as example of poor research practice and the saying ‘A lie can travel halfway around the world before the truth can get its boots on ‘ remains valid .
When someone claims 97 percent of scientists agree humans have caused most of the post-1950 warming, your reply should be: No, it’s not 97 percent, the number is closer to one percent.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/03/cooks-97-consensus-disproven-by-a-new-paper-showing-major-math-errors/
“0.3% climate consensus, not 97.1%”
PRESS RELEASE – September 3rd, 2013
A major peer-reviewed paper by four senior researchers has exposed grave errors in an earlier paper in a new and unknown journal that had claimed a 97.1% scientific consensus that Man had caused at least half the 0.7 Cº global warming since 1950.
A tweet in President Obama’s name had assumed that the earlier, flawed paper, by John Cook and others, showed 97% endorsement of the notion that climate change is dangerous:
“Ninety-seven percent of scientists agree: #climate change is real, man-made and dangerous.” [Emphasis added]
The new paper by the leading climatologist Dr David Legates and his colleagues, published in the respected Science and Education journal, now in its 21st year of publication, reveals that Cook had not considered whether scientists and their published papers had said climate change was “dangerous”.
The consensus Cook considered was the standard definition: that Man had caused most post-1950 warming. Even on this weaker definition the true consensus among published scientific papers is now demonstrated to be not 97.1%, as Cook had claimed, but only 0.3%.
Only 41 out of the 11,944 published climate papers Cook examined explicitly stated that Man caused most of the warming since 1950.”
end excerpt
but the scientific evidence persists…
The actual observed temp and sea ice and ocean PH levels persist.
And even with US scientists gagged to prevent political embarrassment, the truth will out
Griff,
“but the scientific evidence persists…”
What scientific evidence? The ‘evidence’ you cite are changes to metrics that have been changing since long before man stepped on the planet and whose magnitude of change is nothing unprecedented. There’s absolutely NO scientific evidence that CO2 emissions are the cause, it’s pure speculation based on apparent correlation. In fact, the scientific method, which is what used to be how science advances, falsifies a high sensitivity in many ways as it supports a low sensitivity in many more. What’s the matter, doesn’t the scientific method matter any more? Decades of nudging by the IPCC, a complicit media and a politically biased education system has blinded you to reality, of course, that was the goal in the first place …
“but the scientific evidence persists…”
Another lie.
Apologise to Dr. Crockford, you slimy little propagandist.
I agree, Pokerguy — For some reason, nearly every time a science realist has the microphone, they just let that one slide. It’s not that they don’t have ample ammunition available (cited below is only a small sample of such ammo):
It appears from a comment (RichieP: “Bravo, Mr. Steyn, a tour de force. The final flourish of the 97% consensus in your peroration was genius.”) on the thread containing this comment:
that Mark Steyn did try.
Doran and Kendall Zimmerman, 2009 was particularly disingenuous…
Did you see the following video discussed in the MSM?
Sen. Cruz Questions Sierra Club President Aaron Mair on Climate Change
mr mair is clueless.
Talk about obfuscation! I can’t remember anyone in the hot seat squirming so much in a long time. Mr Mair’s reliance in an offsider shows he wasn’t ready to do anything other than regurgitate the usual nonsense. He must have known how bad it looked but he took one for the team anyway! The Farce is strong in that one.
John, yes I have seen it several times before and enjoy it every time I watch it again. Cruze is brilliant, understands Science better than any Senator and methodically destroys anyone who lacks an understanding of the subject. Obviously he was my first choice for Presidential candidate given his knowledge and skill in explaining an issue.
i wrote my first response at the beginning i now amend it mr mair is either utterly stupid or a LIAR….there NEVER was any 97% of the worlds scientists saying what he repeated several times = he is LYING about that very reality…….science is NOT done by consensus and there NEVER was the consensus he claims.
Re: Aaron Mair, and
Even mr Mair must have realized that he and his ‘performance’ didn’t look all that good on that video. So shortly thereafter he uploaded his own video reply. Which he reads from a script …
I can’t say that this makes him look that much better.
The main refutation of the 97% is that it is only for warming, not danger or urgency. The poor quality of the studies is actually an interesting story with lurid details about the Skeptical Science crew photoshopping themselves as nazis. People should send their congressmen a copy of Brandon Shollenberger’s ebook and maybe even demand congressional hearings.
https://www.amazon.com/Climate-Wars-How-Consensus-Enforced-ebook/dp/B01CEZLAM0/ref=cm_cr-mr-title
Completely agree.
The failure I see every time is skeptics attack the metric and not the man. The Clinton’s for all their failures knew this well — attack the messenger and this undermines the message.
This 97% meme should always be responded to by asking the person who presents it, are you familiar with the author? Here is his picture? You seem to be a strong supporter of this man’s work. Are you familiar with his credentials? Oh, you didn’t know he was a cartoonist? Did know he has impersonated credible scientists on blogs and articles.
So you want the members of this hearing to believe a statistic presented by a Nazi dressing, cartoonist who steals the identities of reputable scientists. Perhaps you should qualify your sources better.
ftop_t
“The failure I see every time is skeptics attack the metric and not the man.”
Yes, skeptics hold the moral high ground. The warmists, just like religious fanatics, see this as a weakness and exploit it at every opportunity. In the same way, both delude themselves into thinking that they hold the moral high ground and use that as an excuse for their behavior.
My standard reply to that canard is that 97% of astrologers believe in astrology.
Oh, Griff,
What do you know about “scientific evidence?” All you know is that “climate scientists,” who cloak themselves in Science, all say that there is Scientific Evidence, so it must be true. Do you know anything about science? Do you know the difference between a dipole moment and an induced dipole moment, and why it matters to Scientific Evidence? Did you pass high school physics? You cannot win an argument by quoting men you think know more than you do…
Debate is what the extremists have been shutting down for years. In thier echo chamber it sounds okay in a commercial. Let them rage. Continue the good work.
What kind of science says that it cannot even be debated or questioned?
Scientology… 😉
good one, i never understood how any thinking person could follow l ron hubbard
+1
If you can follow Frank Herbert, you can probably follow L. Ron Hubbard… Although after reading all 7 or 8 Dune books, I was so exhausted, I haven’t read Sci-Fi since… LOL!
Frank only wrote 5 Dune books. His son Brian and Kevin Anderson wrote the rest. They did not do a bad job either. Almost as good as the father.
Yes David, the Dune books were tedious to say the least.
Writers of “science fiction” were often very good at short stories. As such, they remained poor. Full length novels provided a means to lift themselves out of poverty. Hubbard just went a step or two beyond with “Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health” (1950).
Then:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L._Ron_Hubbard#From_Dianetics_to_Scientology
The last 4 or 5 Dune books were not written by Frank Herbert, they were written by his son and a co writer that wrote them from notes and files Frank Herbert left behind in his estate. As far as I remember they were part of the original notes to write the first three books. I read only one or two of them and as others have said pretty tedious reading, didn’t read the last ones.
While I loved the Dune series, I don’t believe in the religion of Muad’Dib. David, if science fiction has become to dull, try some historical science fiction, maybe some Neal Stephenson.
Anyone who uses the phrase ‘the science is settled’ is self-evidently not a scientist. Science is never settled.
Science consists of a series of hypotheses about how the universe works, and those hypotheses owe their legitimacy to, and only to, the fact that they agree with the observed data. All it takes to nullify any hypothesis is a single observation which does not agree with that hypothesis.
There are so many physical observations that do not agree with the AGW hypothesis that, had it been any other subject, AGW would now be sharing shelf space with phlogiston theory and the geocentric universe. All of which goes to show that AGW is not science, it is a religion.
But of course, religions are not open to debate …
Most of those 36% of people that “think” that the effects in their area have been primarily harmful, don’t have weather records, vegetative health measures, crop yields/food production or other important metrics to measure the real effects.
They do have plenty of interpretations from the media and other sources about extreme weather events being “unprecedented”……and their memories.
I will note, with an anecdotal, local observation on peoples memories of the weather. Not only can’t they remember events that happened before they were born but their memories are not always good with regards to events from decades ago…….and this is just with regards to the one, isolated location where they were living at that time.
Fact is, the past 4 decades have featured the best weather/climate, growing and living conditions for most life on this planet in the last 1,000 years.
I should add that there has been an increase in heavy rain events globally and on local scales that can be substantively backed up with weather records. This has contributed to more flooding events.
On the heavier rains. Precipitable water amounts have increased along with a slightly warmer atmosphere and oceans. Just like a bigger sponge will hold more moisture and yield more water when it is squeezed after becoming saturated, so does the slightly warmer atmosphere.
Last Summer, I did a study for our local region, Evansville Indiana:
Evansville IN Spring March-May
Top 10 Wettest
Rank Precipitation (inches) Year
1 25.48 2008-wettest ever for any season
2 25.01 2011-2nd wettest ever for any season
3 24.34 1996
4 23.46 1983
5 22.42 1927
6 22.10 1935
7 21.63 1995
8 21.45 1961
9 20.48 2002
10 19.74 1897
*6 of the top 10 wettest ever have occurred since 1983
*The top 4 wettest have occurred since 1983
*The 2 wettest Springs since 1897 were in the past 10 years and these were also the 2 wettest seasons ever.
We are not alone:
http://www.climatecentral.org/news/across-us-heaviest-downpours-on-the-rise-18989
As Roger Pielke wrote a few weeks ago, the primary anthropogenic driver behind the (measurable, but relatively small) precipitation shifts is Land-Use and Land-Cover Changes.
There has been a shift in precipitation in the northeast and drier southwest. This shift has occurred mostly due to land-use changes.
The statistics of hydrological extrema and the conclusions that can be drawn from them have long been of interest “–as a tool for estimating design–“. You can start here with Papalexiou and Koutsouiannis.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2012WR012557/full
You keep posting that exact same pro-AGW (that is what the bottom line is with the “increasing rain event” assertion) junk (not your rainfall measuring which is admirable, your conclusions), Mike Maguire. And I’m going to keep posting this:
This is actually evidence of negative feedback (enhanced convection) and fits perfectly with Dr. William Gray’s predictions.
You will never believe this no matter how much compelling evidence there is and will go find a source that seems to contradict the compelling evidence.
Meteorology 101 tells us that a warmer atmosphere and oceans allow the atmosphere to hold more moisture…..and in fact, observations indicate that just that has happened.
Precipital water amounts have increased, along with heavier rains. Not just in heavy downpours but in high end, stalled out synoptic level/larger scale and time framed events.
I have been observing and analyzing the weather daily for a living for 35 years and there is not a shred of doubt in my mind on this. Believe what you want and find a small minority of links/sources to suggest otherwise but again the real world and authentic meteorological principles tell us a different story.
This is the one element of an increase in extreme weather that rings solidly true.
The last comment was for Janice. I will add that our mission should not be to find evidence which contradicts AGW or win a battle but to start with a mind that doesn’t know anything except what has/is happening using empirical data. We naturally gravitate towards finding interpretations that spin a story or narrative so that it lines up favorably to our beliefs but that is not the scientific method.
I love how you present the subject of “debate in science” by using data that contradicts utterly the “97%” narrative.
Mr. Middleton,
While your main point about debate is a good one, you undermine your argument by citing the Maibach study. Your citing the 67% “solid majority” (though with the modifier that it is not a “consensus”) does far more to support the AGWers than to support your own case. You would be better served to leave such junk out. At best, it is unhelpful. At worst, it greatly weakens your argument.
And, yes, this Maibach survey IS of dubious probative value:
Anthony Watts, Meteorologist
(https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/03/25/new-ams-survey-busts-the-97-climate-consenus-claim/ )
Think strategically when presenting an argument. When presenting evidence helpful to your opponents, ask yourself not, “is this helpful to my case” but, rather, “is this far more helpful than damaging to my case.” The answer in this case, is “no.”
Sincerely,
Janice Moore
Ms. Moore,
The notion that humans might be the primary driver of climate change over the last 50 years isn’t a particularly troubling concept and it is certainly possible. I’m not endorsing Maibach’s conclusions and I agree with Anthony’s opinion of the survey. I’m just stating what his survey results were and pointing out that they fall far short of a 97% consensus.
Personally, I think humans are responsible for 25% to 33% of the warming over the last 150 years. We may very well be responsible for more than half of the warming over the past 50 years. I just don’t think this number can be quantified or that the natural and human influences can be differentiated. The point is that the warming and our effect on it is fairly insignificant, in the context of the natural variability of Earth’s climate throughout the Holocene.
The problem is that the notion that humans could be responsible for most of the climate change over the past 50 years has been transmogrified into this…
http://debunkhouse.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/wpid-screenshot_2013-09-29-06-26-53.png
There is a genuine scientific consensus that “climate change is real” and there endeth the consensus.
Your skepticism pretty much parallels mine. I understand the greenhouse effect but the IPCC’s conclusion than man is responsible for all recent warming is simply not believable. We’ve been through a clear warming period, which has happened many times before but which probably was enhanced somewhat by additional CO2.
The statements by idealogues on both sides, to the effect that either all or none of the temperature increase is due to anthropogenic influences, are simply not believable since there is no observational evidence that either statement is true. The null hypothesis would appear to rebut both positions.
Agw mavens claim the climate models prove warming, but evidence so far indicates that the models’ projections, particularly the upper end, are not to be believed. Climate models are a useful predictive tool, but they’ve been way oversold as their uncertainties have been grossly underplayed. I hate to denigrate the work of the scientists who designed and executed these models, but so many of the assumptions are poorly understood and thus model output has to be discounted.
What we need is about 20 years to watch the physical evidence and refine the models. My son (who’s a scientist) says I’m consigning him to a disastrous future, and lots of young people feel this way. My answer is that the cost to comply with the alarmist view is simply too high given the doubts about the science. For the immediate future, we should take common sense steps to wean ourselves off fossil fuels through efficiency and alternative energy.
If in 15 years or so it’s proven that I’m wrong, then we can ramp up the efforts to decarbonize, and by then we’ll know a lot more about the science anyway.
David Middleton, unless you are a cynical pusher of an enviroprofiteer scheme such as electric/hybrid car batteries, you are clearly ignorant of the implications of:
.
It should trouble ANY-one who cares about their personal liberties.
Human control of climate is the bald, unsupported, justification of tyrants to control human behavior.
I find it difficult to believe that your logic could fail you so completely. I wonder what “follow the money” would tell us about David Middleton and lukewarmism….
Bottom line: the notion that humans drive climate change has no evidence for it making even a prima facie case. The burden of proof still rests firmly on the AGWers. It has NEVER shifted. Natural variation/the null hypothesis has never been disproven.
Your assertion that “climate change is real” is a LIE (you may not be lying, you may be mindlessly repeating it, but it is, per se, a lie). “Climate change” is used almost exclusively in modern useage to mean “human-caused climate change.” There is, as per the above-cited NUMEROUS articles disproving the 97% consensus among genuine scientists, NO genuine scientific consensus on that point.
Dave Middleton — you are either:
1. Naive to the point of silliness; or
2. A cunning, slippery-tongued, prevaricator whose main goal is to PROMOTE AGW.
You’ve fooled some of the folks on this thread.
You do not fool me. Not anymore.
Janice, it seems David is just admitting to being open-minded. ” humans might be”. There is no proof they’re not. They may not be, but why not leave room for some uncertainty until there is a little more solid evidence one way or the other.
Ms. Moore,
I’m a petroleum geologist/geophysicist, a member of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, Society of Exploration Geophysicosts and Houston Geological Society. Politically, I am a right-wing libertarian (think Milton Freidman). My observations, analyses of the data and scientific literature has led me to being a mild lukewarmer.
The notion that humans have played some role in the climate changes that have been observed over the past 150 years doesn’t logically lead to this:
The problem is that the science has been bastardized to create a false existential crisis which can only be solved through surrendering our individual liberties and forking over trillions of dollars to worthless government bureaucrats.
I concur with the 25% to 33% number. Though I would point out that there a number of things that humans have done to increase the temperature, not just through increases in CO2.
Janice, what’s wrong with believing that human’s might be responsible for the bulk of the extremely mild 0.7C warming over the last 150 years. And as such we might cause a few more tenths of a degree of warming over the next 100 years.
A degree or two of warming is entirely beneficial.
MarkW: “Janice, what’s wrong with believing that human’s might be responsible for the bulk of the extremely mild 0.7C warming ”
Janice can probably answer for herself, but let me put two cents in. What’s wrong with this is “believe”. What’s wrong with letting someone believe the earth is the center of the universe or that the earth is flat? Believing something means that you are internalizing it based on FAITH.
All the work with temperature data trying to derive a made up global temperature requires that you believe, i.e. take on faith, the final answer is something realistic and has meaning. If you believe the GCM’s are an answer then you do so based on faith since they can’t and don’t agree with any empirical measurements.
Science is providing mathematical proof of how something works and being able to derive a final solution through that math. It took me a lot of education before I was able to understand and use Maxwell’s equations. This is the kind of proof I would require before I would “believe” that we have a solution to just what CO2 means to the temperature of the globe. Correlation just won’t do it. The people standing on a dock had tons of correlation every time they watched a ship disappear. They were still wrong.
It all makes perfect sense; you see the “debate” of the eternal truth of CAGW has been over for a long time. I know this because that unalterable truth was revealed to all of us by Saint A. Gore.
So, if the debate is over it’s just a waste of time for more debate
sarc/
“Environmentalists have put out a new ad campaign”
attacking Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt
for “encouraging debate” among scientists about the “degree and extent” of global warming.
Where can we see that ad ?
It was in the Daily Caller article…
I added the YouTube video to the post.
I’m not sure which advertisement the Daily Caller is referring to. One advertisement says,
https://www.edf.org/media/scott-pruitt-deeply-troubling-choice-epa-administrator-edf
Daily Caller does not directly reference the EDF ad. Instead they referenced a shortened version by “The Harry ReadMe” File. After a search, I was able to find the legit advertisement from the EDF. The climate statement is at 2:32 into the video –> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzCbL82neLs
Yes, they criticize him for believing that “Debate should be encouraged about the truth of climate science.”
If the debate actually happens, the next hurdle will be to get the MSM to cover it fairly, or maybe even to cover it at all.
Forget about fair coverage. the MSM has *never* given fair hearing to even the lukewarmer side, never mind the sceptics.
The MSM threw down the gauntlet. In a move that surprised and shocked *only* the MSM, the Trump administration picked up the gauntlet and joined the battle.
The fear mongering nature of CAGW is a club with which to beat the MSM like a drum.
The MSM is still convinced that having the IRS persecute conservative groups was a good idea, it just didn’t go far enough.
I bet the MSM would cover a climate change debate that took place in the U.S. Senate, as part of a formal rejection of the Paris Climate Change Agreement.
The only way the MSM would cover that would be to airbrush little Hitler mustaches on the faces of everyone who dared speaking against it, and then shrieking nonstop about how that proved that the US was the new 4th Reich.
don’t think that I’m kidding.
CAGW is dead. Pass the word.
The rest of the world disagrees with that statement. The Fortune 1000 disagrees with that statement.
All Pruitt answers to questions about CO2 should be expressed in terms of CO2 as a percent of the atmosphere.
Earth’s Atmosphere Expressed in PPM:
Nitrogen: +/- 780,840 PPM
Oxygen: +/- 209,420 PPM
Argon: +/- 9,337 PPM
Carbon Di-Oxide: +/- 400 PPM
A) Natural CO2: Annual Flux: +/- 96.775% of 400 PPM
B) Man-Made CO2: Annual Flux: 3.335% of 400 PPM
Trace Gases: <3.0 PPM
Or something along these lines……..
(Sigh.)
Thing is that the 97% of naturally exuded CO2 is merely exchanged back and forth between the three great sinks (“land-sea-air”). The 3% we add each year accumulates. That is why CO2 is up by ~40% over the last century-plus. That is why oceanic CO2 (down to biota level) is up by ~10% since 1850.
Now I don’t think this is much of a concern, given the overall. Probably a net benefit. But that’s another question entirely.
The “man only puts out 3% of CO2” does not refute CAGW. I think plenty of other stuff does — but not that.
“The ‘man only puts out 3% of CO2’ statement provides essential context.
That chart about the impacts of climate change needs another category — “The impacts of climate change in my area have been exclusively negligible with expected annual random variation dominating the climate.”
Green heads are on fire. Trump removes barriers to oil pipelines stopped by Obama in the name of climate change.
In his last two years Obama did things seemingly just to piss off rednecks. (renaming mountains, currency pics) Trump is daily putting a boot in the Left’s butt and seems to be enjoying it.
On what planet do these dimwits live on that have seen climate change cause harm to their area over the past 50 years? How many of them were even 50 years old?
This is the classic “shooting themselves in the foot”. It looks like they bought the advertising assuming they’d have something worth saying … and so went with it despite the fact it only begs the question: if someone like Cern can question something as certain as the speed of light “why shouldn’t we discuss something that has failed so obviously to fit any predictions like climate”?
They never wanted nor encouraged debate. Top down government doesn’t debate. The left is crazy and shrill and this is just more of the same crazy, shrill crap they always spew.
CAGW is so last Admin…
If there is no debate, and everything is so settled, I wonder why Mr. Gore felt compelled to bring out his inconvenient truth, part 2?
Good luck coming up with a title… The Phantom Menace has already been used… 🙂
Is the EDF so far gone that they actually believe that the public will be offended by anyone who is encouraging debate?
For decades liberals have been telling us how talking/debate is good. Now they want us to believe that for this one thing, it is bad.
You keep saying liberals, as if no conservatives believe that AGW is real – that is not correct. The issue is not about whether debate is good or bad. It is that the cost of doing nothing increases over time. AGW believers feel there is sufficient proof to take action, and that taking no action and debating for another 5, 10 or 20 years will result in a far worse future.
There is no real “cost of doing nothing” and the cost of doing something is about $44 trillion, which will yield no tangible benefits…
When 90% of warmists are left to far left, I have no trouble talking about liberals believing in AGW.
AGW’ers are so convinced of their position that they are OK with outlawing all disagreement with them.
Totalitarians are always the same.
David, why should the leftists care? It’s not like they are going to be spending their own money.
Pruitt should take the green blob at their own game and simply skip the debate. Once Trump starts rolling out his new ‘reality-based’ climate policies they’ll be begging him to engage in precisely the debate they have spent the past decade obstructing.
Roll out new evidence, corrected previously adjusted temperature data and give the straightest, bluntest answers that the blob deserves. They’ll be furious and it’ll be marvellous.
Although this post is about EDF wanting to stop scientific debate I think the surveys used need a comment.
AMS and other specialty groups, and all of us, have been exposed to the overwhelming barrage of AGW, CAGW, climate change, climate weirding, rising seas, melting ice, dying Polar Bears, and on and on.
Here is the list:
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/globalwarming2.html
Whenever someone investigates one of the climate-caused dangers used as a headline in the New York Times or on the BBC or any such places, the issue fades away. One only has to look at Willis E’s “First Climate Refugees” series, Jim Steele’s posts, or Susan Crockford’s reports on polar bear science, to realize this.
Then there are the promotions of fancy new energy sources that only work because of massive wealth transfers; see posts by Euan Mearns and Roger Andrews on the Energy Matters blog. Paul Homewood also shows the folly of these unreliable energy sources.
Surveys are not good at establishing the truth about “climate science.”
And that is the truth.
No, no no. We must not debate. We must not consider other views. Double plus ungood!
Settled Science = Our minds are already made up. Please do not confuse the issue with facts.
Anyone who desperately wants to shut down a debate is afraid of losing the debate.
Pardon my asking, but why a poll only of meteorologists on global warming? They represent only one tiny slice of those scientists who study climate change, and meteorology is primarily focused on short term weather process analysis and prediction, not long term (as in historical, let along archaeological, let alone geological, let alone astrophysical) timeframes and processes).
That’s like taking a poll of athletic shoe manufacturers to assess the development of the game of American football. They have a perspective to share, but certainly not a holistic perspective.
Me – it seems that the historians, archaeologists, geologists, and astrophysicists have a much more meaningful perspective on earthian climate variation than, well, weathermen and weatherwomen.
Just sayin’.
Why poll anyone on a science issue, one person can find the truth while hundreds flounder.
Atmospheric scientists are the most relevant scientists to ongoing climate change.
About 60-70% of geoscientists reject the so-called consensus.
Excuse me please, but IF “the agency’s long-standing bipartisan mandate to ensure basic protections for clean air and clean water nationwide.” is correct, then why is a change to eliminating the Faux concept of AGW have AGW Alarmists claiming that it somehow means that we are going to suddenly have “Dirty Air and Dirty Water”? CO2 emissions do not pollute water and at 400 ppm CO2 does not qualify as an atmospheric poison. CO2 at trace gas levels is insignificant in terms of any “greenhouse effect”. In fact, for CO2 to have any meaningful “greenhouse effect”, CO2 levels would have to approach levels that would be toxic to oxygen breathing lifeforms.
It’s because Trump favors continuing the use of coal.
“Science without debate isn’t science. Science with sacrosanct truths to be protected from debate is religion. In geology, debate is always encouraged. ”
Bullshit. Geologists don’t “encourage” debate with Young Earth Creationists who think the Earth is only 10,000 years old. It’s an established, consensus truth in geology and it would be a disservice to the public to pretend that there is any intellectually respectable debate in the field involving the YEC position. Scientists only “debate” open questions of scientific merit, and they don’t generally do it in classrooms and “the Halls of Congress”, they do it in scientific forums like journals and workshops.
Similarly, climate scientists don’t debate congressional idiots on whether snow in winter disproves global warming. The people on this blog whining about “debate” are using the same anti-science tactics as creationists. “Is climate sensitivity closer to 2.5 or 3.5 degrees C” is a question open to scientific debate. “Is global warming a hoax” is not.
Spoken with the total condescension that defines you. Also evident is the typical mischaracterization and false equivalencies, presumptions, and rationalization. So engrained, I frankly doubt you’re even able to see it.
Joel Snider said “Also evident is the typical mischaracterization and false equivalencies, presumptions, and rationalization.”
Specifically why is it a false equivalence? There are scientists who believe the Earth’s age is much younger. Does that mean that those who believe the Earth is 4B years old are obligated to spend time engaging with those scientists? Or that any policy based on the 4B year assumption should be put on hold until 100% of scientists agree? The exact same thing is true of the anti vax movement. Should mandatory vaccine programs be put on hold until all scientists researching in this area are in complete agreement?
Scientific journals are interested in findings and review articles, not debates. Most warmists have shied away from participating in the Dutch government’s Climate Dialog site for scientific-level debating among PhDs.
This is an echo chamber josh. Where someone posts a half-baked idea or a media tidbit click-bait piece or a confected, semi-truth that escaped from some other echo chamber and the denizens here latch onto it because it confirms their bias. It is then ratcheted it up, going back and forth and round and round until its spun up into something resembling candy floss. Then, this new and improved ‘truth’ can be referred back to and shouted repeatedly and anything that conflicts with it is then of course fake or corrupted – always intentionally. Occasionally the new truth breaks free and migrates to back other echo chambers for further ratcheting and citing.
There are a few here who try and curtail this echo-chamber tendency, but they are just herding cats.
McClod either tell me the name of the law of thermodynamics for solving the temperature of some air, or gas,
or you’re a lying, posturing, posing fake, too stupid to even figure out if anyone’s figures are right, wrong, or indifferent.
Since you’re not a scientist – I know you’re not, because you believe there is a GHE – your only answer is to go find someone who believes in your religion, who DOES know, and have them tell you the answer.
But none of them know either, which is why banning working scientists from commenting on their fraud sites is their version of debate.
You’re an ignorant hick. Either explain what work you’ve done, in the fields of atmospheric chemistry and radiation, or you’re another sh** For brains who believed the latest Federal Gov’t chemistry scam.
The one before it was that Man makes the Ozone hole,
the one before that is that pot is like heroin.
You on the other hand are just an incompetent dope who never worked measuring anything in atmospheric chemistry or radiation, in your life.
Like always, the leftist trolls want to have their own definitions of words.
Any site that allows you, Chris, Phil, Griff, Nick, and others to post freely cannot be seriously called an echo chamber.
@Josh,
I don’t have any problems politely debating YEC’s… One of the themes in Historical Geology is to learn about how the science evolved from Creationism & Catastrophism, to the geosynclinal theory to plate tectonics. Nor do I have problems debating Peak Oilers and Abiogenic oil aficionados. The AAPG actually encourages such debate.
The age of the Earth is not a “truth.”
Climate sensitivity (TCR, the one that matters) is closer to 1.35 that it is to 2.5 or 3.5.
True, I think I still have a AAPG issue from my uncle with article(s) with the evidence against plate tectonics. I recall real data.
@ David Middleton
“The age of the Earth is not a “truth.” ”
Why are you putting “truth” in quotes? The age of the Earth is a scientific fact, we know it is true to the best of our ability to determine reality. It has error bars of course, but they exclude YEC beliefs as laughably unreasonable. There is no debate within geology on this statement. Now, you personally may get into disputes with YECs in the hopes of educating them. That itself is a contentious strategy because it is used by science deniers to legitimize themselves in the public eye. But it is disingenuous to say that geologists encourage the debate or that they haven’t established truths. If you’ve actually engaged with YECs then you know that their strategy is practically identical to the complaints above with the goal of “debating” both sides in classrooms and public forums. The purpose is to create the impression of legitimate disagreement when none exists among reasonable people.
Please don’t throw red herrings at me, I picked climate sensitivity as a simple example of a scientific question where there is ongoing work to better improve the uncertainties, yet where some answers are clearly wrong and no longer subject to scientific debate. I used “climate sensitivity” in the standard sense of equilibrium temperature change in response to CO2 doubling, the number is around 3 C. Transient Climate Response is a different number and it is immaterial to the point I made whether you think it is “the one that matters”, they both characterize the reaction of the climate to CO2 changes. Incidentally, the IPCC puts it around 2 C. https://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch9s9-6-2-3.html
The most amazing thing, Josh, is that with all the Hype that Mankind is destroying the Planet, not even ONE purveyor of AGW Mythology has EVER attempted to QUANTIFY the amount of CO2 produced by burning fossil fuels that supposedly results in the rise in Atmospheric CO2 levels, against the amount of Naturally occurring CO2 generation from Plants, Volcanic activity, or the release of CO2 from the oceans as the temperature rises! All are known phenomena and yet AGW mythologists continue to believe that the major, if not ONLY contributor to atmospheric CO2 is the burning of Fossil Fuels.
not even ONE purveyor of AGW Mythology has EVER attempted to QUANTIFY the amount of CO2 produced by burning fossil fuels that supposedly results in the rise in Atmospheric CO2 levels, against the amount of Naturally occurring CO2 generation from Plants, Volcanic activity, or the release of CO2 from the oceans as the temperature rises!
Sure they have (if I understand you correctly). Any garden-variety CO2 cycle map does that. And anthropogenic CO2 has a clearly identifiable marker, so that can be reasonably estimated, as well. Outgassing is also considered and quantified.
yet AGW mythologists continue to believe that the major, if not ONLY contributor to atmospheric CO2 is the burning of Fossil Fuels.
And so do just about all of the skeptics within the scientific community, too. It’s us (plus the relatively minor contribution from vulcanism, which is more than offset by calcification.)
I am a severe skeptic, but I think you are barking up the wrong tree, here.
Debate implies having verifiable facts on your side.
Something which the young earth creationists don’t have.
PS: The science has shown that climate sensitivity is at the most 0.5C. More likely 0.2C.
“Debate implies having verifiable facts on your side.”
“The science has shown that climate sensitivity is at the most 0.5C. More likely 0.2C.”
Oy. Surface temps have already increased more than 0.5C and CO2 has less than doubled in the same time frame. c.f.- http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/every/plot/gistemp/every/plot/rss/every/plot/uah5/every
“Surface temps have already increased more than 0.5C and CO2 has less than doubled in the same time frame.”
Write out 1,000 times “CORRELATION DOES NOT IMPLY CAUSATION”.
You really haven’t a clue, have you?
It seems that control of the message is slipping away. For the control freaks, that’s a potential brain embolism.
please correct me if i am wrong but didnt that 97% figure come from a search of papers done by some woman Naomi O. and all she did is search the papers for phrases and found that 97% had the phrase man made global warming or AGW or other such wording, the paper could be saying there is NO “man made global warming” but by using the phrase that became part of the 97%???? again please correct any error i have made.
It was John Cook and friends.
Go here:
http://joannenova.com.au/2016/05/john-cook-wins-award-as-friend-of-planet/
Search for the word ” updated ” — there are 3, but relate to the same thing.
This is just one of many sources. Another: on WUWT
TY but i still think there was another study done by her before cook….hers was in dec. 2004
Anderegg was a similar abstract opinion review. I think Oreskes did a similar abstract opinion review. Doran & Kendall-Zimmerman came up with a 97% consensus through a highly cherry-picked survey, which asked:
I would answer risen to #1 and my answer to #2 would depend on the meaning of “human activity is a significant contributing factor.” The survey never asked about greenhouse gases or if human activity was the primary driver of recent climate change.
There was never any “debate” about global warming.
Their massive deception(s) about CO2 in the “atmosphere” and their endless spoutings of “save the planet” are about to come crashing down. They have been FOUND OUT and they all need to be SHUT OUT and shut out very quickly.
It has always been doom, gloom and OPM snout-troughing (other peoples’ money) enabled, created and perpetuated by ignorant but devious, clever, greedy people such as Al-baby and many others (the list is very long).
This recent, short video hits the nail on the head.
https://youtu.be/nLuBgZ1bgoY
gee josh….whatcha scared of?
The Climate Liar’s go-to Big Lie: is to equate real pollution, which can affect air quality with harmless, and actually beneficial CO2. They do it using the old bait-and-switch tactic, hoping people won’t notice.
Pruitt believes that debates about conclusions based on “evidence” such as tree rings and present internet search results (rather the adjustments to past tables of LOTI etc.) should be encouraged!!! Heresy!!!!
How dare he want those directing billions of dollars in their desired direction have “their feet put to the fire”!
We have always been at war with Oceana. There is no debate.
Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated.
[…]
“Scientists continue to disagree about the degree and extent of global warming and its connection to the actions of mankind. That debate should be encouraged — in classrooms, public forums, and the halls of Congress,” Pruitt and Strange wrote.
[…]
Apparently, encouraging scientific debate is not something environmentalists want when it comes to climate science.
EDF, an environmental group, goes on to claim “applying Pruitt’s radical views of federalism to the EPA would gut the agency’s long-standing bipartisan mandate.
_____________________________________________
– that CAGW myth has build up and escalated over 40 years,
– equal money +wealth was stocked up over same time,
– nonetheless there’s no need to elongate the retreats.
“Environmentalists have put out a new ad campaign attacking President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for “encouraging debate” among scientists about the “degree and extent” of global warming.”
Environmentalists should also put out an ad campaign attacking United Nations Climate Panel IPCC then:
“The equilibrium climate sensitivity quantifies the response of the climate system to constant radiative forcing on multi-century time scales. It is defined as the change in global mean surface temperature at equilibrium that is caused by a doubling of the atmospheric CO2 concentration. Equilibrium climate sensitivity is likely in the range 1.5°C to 4.5°C (high confidence), extremely unlikely less than 1°C (high confidence), and very unlikely greater than 6°C (medium confidence)( Note 16 ).”
Note 16 “No best estimate for equilibrium climate sensitivity can now be given because of a lack of agreement on values across assessed lines of evidence and studies.” IPCC; WGI ; AR5; Summary for policymakers; Page 16
The Political arm of the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), appears to be environmental fundamentalists.
there is no “equilibrium” in our atmosphere in the REAL WORLD, because the factors at play constantly CHANGE which means the point of equilibrium also constantly changes, the system does seek to find that balance but never can because again the moment you get close to it CHANGES happen moving the target.
Debate works both ways. Trump administration has prohibited scientists from both the USDA and the EPA from sharing information with the public. Now substitute USDA and EPA for University Sceptics. Nasty eh?
Gareth, could you provide a link or several to substantiate your allegations? That would be helpful. I’m not aware of any such assertions but would be interested in seeing what you’ve got.
Thanks in advance.
What Trump has actually done is to silence public statements, temporarily, from those agencies, so that the White House and the agencies can get on the same page on statements relating to facts and policy. Officials at some agencies have made statements challenging the President’s statements (such as national park officials challenging him on global warming), and you can’t have that in government.
Doesn’t mean that you or I agree with either position. It means that if you disagree with the President, you keep your mouth shut or you’re history.
scraft1 says: “you keep your mouth shut or you’re history” except that there are laws in place protecting whistle blowers.
“It means that if you disagree with the President, you keep your mouth shut or you’re history.”
The hypocrisy is deep here. I’ve seen many posts on WUWT decrying universities for taking any actions against AGW skeptics, but it’s ok for the President to do so?
Chris – It’s not the same thing. A university doesn’t have an official policy on such matters. It’s mission is the free exchange of ideas and all opinions should be protected. In government which will have an official view on matters of policy (like climate change), it’s important that everyone speak with one voice. Someone in that government can disagree but they can’t do it publicly if they want to keep their job.
I’m not defending Trump on the merits of climate change, but he does have the right to control the message of his administration on a matter of public policy. The same does not apply in a university.
Martin, whistleblower laws only protect those who are exposing illegal activities or activities that might harm the public.
“Martin, whistleblower laws only protect those who are exposing illegal activities or activities that might harm the public.”
And in this case, Trump is the whistleblower.
One constant with trolls is that they take a small fact, then lie about it.
Making stuff up again, Phillips?
Mr. Middleton,
“Science with sacrosanct truths to be protected from debate is religion.”
It does not seem to me to be so, in general. Religions, generally, invite debate about the things held to be “truth” within them . . it’s how the religion spreads. Not gonna get many converts if you insist those “truths” must not be “debated”. I think you’re speaking of the way some who “idolize” science imagine religions to be . . a sort of caricature.
And, to me science IS a form a religion, with a great many “truths” that must be accepted to even conduct science, and all sorts of rituals that must be adhered to, and so on. It’s just the tendency for science propagandists to bash other religions that even obscures this, to me, rather obvious truth, I believe.
Yes… I was referring to those who “idolize” science. The sort of people who insist that the evolution of species is a fact, rather than a scientific theory, a very sound scientific theory. My intent was not to characterize religion in a negative context.
No… Science, when properly applied, is not a form of religion. It is a process to systematically explain observations of the natural world.
“No… Science, when properly applied, is not a form of religion.”
No debate about that “truth” allowed, to your mind, sir? Curious . .
“It is a process to systematically explain observations of the natural world.”
Processes explain nothing, people do. I’m speaking of what science is in relation to people (like you and I), not what those words mean in mass media label-land . .
And assumes that human observations of the natural world are reliable enough to warrant explaining. That is, for all intents and purposes, a belief.
And, the vast majority of the “truths” required to be believed in order to do science, are believed through faith, not direct personal observation. Science is a faith based religion, therefore, even if many scientists have never thought this stuff through.
My belief in God is based on little more than faith. I see evidence for God in many things, like math and dogs. However, I can’t empirically or even statistically test God’s existence in this world.
When I drill a well, I am relying on countless scientific theories, which have been empirically tested, demonstrated to have predictive value and, in most cases, proven to the point that they have been classified as laws. Faith and belief play no role in any of that. The only place for faith and belief in the process, is my faith and belief in the people involved in that process. I have to believe that everyone did or will do their jobs competently… From the people who shot & processed the seismic data, logged the offset wells, to the engineers who designed and will drill the well. I also have to have confidence in my own interpretation of the data when I generated the prospect. However, I don’t have to have faith in Snell’s Law, the Zoeppritz equations or the rest of the math and science which I used, directly or indirectly, to generate the prospect.
David,
“When I drill a well, I am relying on countless scientific theories, which have been empirically tested, demonstrated to have predictive value and, in most cases, proven to the point that they have been classified as laws.”
I’m sure you believe such testing has occurred (as I do), but that means we are believing by faith, not direct personal experience (empirical evidence). The facilitation of that faith is what all the “rituals” are for, of course.
“Faith and belief play no role in any of that.”
Huh????
“The only place for faith and belief in the process, is my faith and belief in the people involved in that process. I have to believe that everyone did or will do their jobs competently…”
That’s what I’m talking about. That’s belief by faith. There’s no real choice with science . . we can’t possibly test everything for ourselves, so me must have faith in what others have directly experienced and reported to us. (Or not, and that’s one place/realm where skepticism is called for, of course).
I’m not disparaging science, the “experimental philosophy” as Mr. Newton called it, I’m just trying to get folks to think this stuff through. Faith has been disparaged, for no good reason, it seems to me, and I’m trying to undo that BS, to the minuscule extent I can . .
Any faith based system would react in the same way , its fear because they known the only way their faith can stand is by not being challenged in the first place.
Oddly for self claimed ‘settled science’ they do seem put a great deal of effort and employ epic scales of smoke and mirrors into avoid any form of what for most sciences is standard thing , that is critical review .
I disagree with what’s being said here about “faith-based systems”. All monotheistic religions are dogmatic about there being a one, true God. There’s no debate about it. They may use an apologetics argument in an attempt to rationalize certain truths, but if you don’t believe you aren’t really a member of that religion. It’s a matter of faith – there are some things that just aren’t subject to rational explanation.
And religions spread due to the power of their story, not because of debate. Christianity spread like wildfire through Europe and British Isles because of their message of sacrifice and forgiveness. The pagan gods, with their message of fear and revenge, simply could not survive in the face of this message.
The same can be said of Judaism and Islam, with their compelling narratives that swept away polytheistic practices.
scraft,
“It’s a matter of faith – there are some things that just aren’t subject to rational explanation.”
Faith means confidence, not irrational belief. It means belief in things one cannot directly observe . . like your faith in subatomic particles. That faith requires rational explanation, as do a great many other things we believe in but cannot directly observe . .
“Christianity spread like wildfire through Europe and British Isles because of their message of sacrifice and forgiveness.”
If one assumes the relevant God does not exist, then sure, some such story qualities would seem to be the cause . . but not if that God does exist. Then, He could have informed many people that He does, and of the truth in the Story, and thereby caused that wildfire to spread. (That’s what happened to me (as I saw/experienced it), I was not won over by the message of sacrifice and forgiveness. I needed more . . )
knr,
“Any faith based system would react in the same way , its fear because they known the only way their faith can stand is by not being challenged in the first place.”
If they actually had faith in God (Abrahamic), they would have no such fear. You’re speaking of faithless people, who “known the only way their faith can stand is by not being challenged in the first place”. Faith means confidence . . so by definition your conjecture/explanation (spoken as if fact) is somewhat . . nonsensical.
I welcome the debate. The more debates we have, the more debates we will win. The science simply isn’t there. Here is how a Criminal Case would go down, and it wouldn’t be pretty:
Climate “Science” on Trial; The Smoking Gun Files
https://co2islife.wordpress.com/2017/01/17/climate-science-on-trial-the-smoking-gun-files/
Just How Much Does 1 Degree C Cost?
https://co2islife.wordpress.com/2017/01/25/just-how-much-does-1-degree-c-cost/
Have a look at this lovely Wikipedia page…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_denial
As anyone sensible would not know climate changes… Straw man.
The Wiki page reads like it was written by the SkepSciBots.
If you think most of us sciences believe humanity is the only contributor to CO2 you’re as drunk as you sound.
Evan Jones January 24, 2017 at 6:51 pm
And so do just about all of the skeptics within the scientific community, too. It’s us (plus the relatively minor contribution from vulcanism, which is more than offset by calcification.)
I am a severe skeptic, but I think you are barking up the wrong tree, here.
Science with sacrosanct truths to be protected from debate is religion.
No, it’s not. Religion is subject to debate as well. This claim is an all too common insult to religion, made by those who understand religion only superficially.
I was referring to those who “idolize” science. The sort of people who insist that the evolution of species is a fact, rather than a scientific theory, a very sound scientific theory. My intent was not to characterize religion in a negative context.
I am sure that no one on this blog would disagree on clean air initiatives, aka Beijing. The real issue is, that we are still waiting for NASA and also the CSIRO here in Oz, to show solid evidence of AGW. I can understand why some Obama funded environmentalists now feel threatened with the appointment of the new head of the EPA as “the science is settled” and accepted without evidence. We stay tuned for more fun times in the good old USA.
New (honest) AGW motto: “The debate is cancelled.”
Reblogged this on Climatism and commented:
You know “global warming” aka “climate change” has become an ideological and religious con, scam, fraud when you are unable to discuss and debate the “science” behind the theory.
“Science” is scepticism. Shutting down debate merely proves that observed reality does not match the catastrophic hypothesis. And the alarmists are running scared. The use of the term “denier” is the classic example of the con collapsing under its own weak and contradictory science.
By all rights, if I were a progressive scientist, and had earned my family’s bread (way more bread than the average family) for the last 30 years in a network of deception, manipulation and corruption …… and was faced with incineration by John Q. Public over the quality of my work ….. and didn’t have an honest bone in my body …. I’d swear there was no need for debate as well.
Stop mis representing reality and EPA work
[sure, when the EPA stops trampling citizens -mod]