Guest post by David Siegel
How do we measure success in helping people understand the climate issue? I don’t think we can measure it by unique visits to WUWT or various videos that many of us know well. But they simply attract the same audience over and over. I think the only way to measure success is by somehow measuring minds changed. This is a quick announcement of a new video I recently released, my philosophy on how to change minds, and a request from the community to help me with some data science.
My name is David Siegel. In 1991, I wrote a book explaining how the greenhouse effect worked and how we have to cut back on CO2 emissions or suffer dire consequences. Then, in about 2014, a partner at a green fund told me “the science is settled.” That prompted me to revisit the subject, and I was surprised to find that the data didn’t support the “common wisdom” that I had believed for so long. So I started reading papers, blogs, and web sites like WUWT.
In 2016, I published an essay called Climate Curious, which, thanks to WUWT readers, has now had about 300,000 views. Last year, I published Global Warming for Dummies.
My goal is to change minds. I don’t think preaching to the choir is useful. I don’t think being smug and using sarcasm helps anyone. In my Open letter to the Heartland Institute, I said they are probably causing liberals to raise even more money, because they look down on “liberals” and make fun of “alarmists.” They keep declaring victory, only to see another billionaire double-down on his commitment to reducing CO2 emissions.
How old are you? Very few young people discuss or debate about climate change. They simply believe what they are told. They don’t want to learn anything from 60-year-olds. When presented with the facts, their reply is “Okay Boomer.” Investors are now looking at “sustainability scorecards” that force CEOs to publish their carbon-neutral plans for the future. I’ve been speaking with people in the oil and airline industries, and they actually believe that they have to put themselves out of business for the sake of the planet.
I don’t think Bill Gates, Barack Obama, Mike Bloomberg, Hans Rosling, Steven Pinker, Tyler Cowen, Richard Branson, Jeff Skoll, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, and other prominent thinkers are idiots. I respect these people. I don’t think we should make fun of them. That just causes them to dig in deeper and raise more money. How can we have a reasonable conversation with people who believe what we don’t?
I want to see a world where the scientific method comes first. I don’t think our science should change when a new president is elected. I don’t support liberals, conservatives, libertarians, or religious groups, because I think their platform comes first, before science. Can there not be any liberals who are skeptical of climate alarmist claims? Should we take religious skeptics seriously? I would like to see a world where people consider each subject simply on the merits of the available evidence, not on what everyone else believes.
I recently released a video showing just the data on climate claims. I tried to put it into a format digestible for young people, and I’ve heard from a few young people that it opened their minds. I hope you’ll watch and share it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJWnMA3-sQs
I have a request. In my video, I say it would be great if we had a graph of average US historical temperature using only the uncontaminated level 1 and 2 stations from Anthony Watts’ Surfacesations.org project going back to 1900. Does anyone know if that graph exists? I can’t find it. If not, does anyone want to work on creating it with me?
If I could reach one person, it would be Bill Gates, who is writing a book on climate right now. I would ask him to support a public effort of adversarial collaboration to bring alarmists and skeptics together to debate and find solutions together, and to hold journalists accountable for reporting the results accurately.
We convert skeptics one at a time, usually after they turn 60, while alarmists enroll millions each year through text books, television, scary images, scientific journals, and massive public-relations campaigns.
I think the only way for us to measure success is how many minds we change. We can’t do it forcefully or by calling names. If we truly want to change minds, we should be willing to start with our own.
www.climatecurious.com
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**I have a request. In my video, I say it would be great if we had a graph of average US historical temperature using only the uncontaminated level 1 and 2 stations from Anthony Watts’ Surfacesations.org project going back to 1900. Does anyone know if that graph exists? I can’t find it. If not, does anyone want to work on creating it with me?**
Tony Heller has done some of this already on
https://realclimatescience.com/
Sorry heller doesnt know how to do a spatial average.
he averages temperatures which will give the wrong answer
Mr. Siegel,
“does anyone want to work on creating it with me?”
Please view my website to this point.
http://theearthintime.com
I have the ~1-billion-record TMAX/TMIN adjusted GHDN as well as the USHCN dataset parsed into a powerful DBMS. I’m searching for a collaborator. I’m also searching for the missing 400+ US station data and a copy of USHCN saved out prior to 1989.
Send me an email if so inclined. [my screen name at the website URL]
~ windlord-sun
Should science change when Presidents change? No. But here is what NEEDS to change BACK to sanity. A demand for transparency in ALL science accepted and adopted by the EPA. And then a REVERSAL of the “endangerment finding” when that science is discovered to be dubious. Yes … we need an absolute return to the scientific method.
And stop calling things “science” … that aren’t really science … but just statistical manipulation.
“I have a request. In my video, I say it would be great if we had a graph of average US historical temperature using only the uncontaminated level 1 and 2 stations from Anthony Watts’ Surfacesations.org project going back to 1900. Does anyone know if that graph exists? I can’t find it. If not, does anyone want to work on creating it with me?”
Thats Funny.
1. A video does not allow you to look at data. It allows you to look at a graphic that PURPORTS
to be made from data. The graphic is NOT the data. It is pixels on a the screen.
2. Video prevents people from easily checking the data themselves.
3. the graph you seek does not exist. It was never made.
4. The ORIGINAL classification of CRN 1 and 2 has been replaced with a NEW classification in
2012. That data has never been shared.
5. The Analysis of the NEW classification was taken down after 1 day in July of 2012 because of a simple
to fix data error made by Steve Mcintyre: he used the wrong file.
6. An updated analysis ( a simple file change) has never been published, and the data behind the
paper posted in 2012 is still being “worked” on.
pretty sure this won’t change your mind
A graphic can make data easier to understand but can also be very misleading. A graphic can only use available data which should be of the same type. This largely restricts time frames.
If all the available relevant data is not represented on the graph it is easy to mislead by simply picking data points that agree with your premise. That may even have the appearance of honesty by using data that is consistent as to source, such as only temperature on July 17, or only specific locations as long as the overall result supports your premise.
Start and end points are also easily manipulated.
That does not even consider the possibility of corrupted data, manipulated data, or the resolution of data.
Don’t let me get stated on averaging.
I know this leaves me open to a caustic comment by you, Steven but I think I am actually agreeing with you.
Rick
All of your concerns about graphical data are equally applicable to tabular data!
Exactly, one needs to be very critical before accepting a conclusion.
The point is to make it EASIER for people to be skeptics.
share your data
Well Steve, funny that you cannot produce it. Or maybe you do not want to as it will be too inconvenient for AGW.
Since I asked for the data back in 2012 and was denied, kinda hard to make a chart of hidden data.
1. I would need a LIST OF THE CRN 1&2 stations.
2. I asked for this PUBLICALLY in July of 2012
denied
“A video does not allow you to look at data. It allows you to look at a graphic that PURPORTS”
Of all the stupid things steve has written over the years, this has got to be the dumbest.
Of course a video doesn’t present the raw data. In exactly the same way a paper doesn’t present the raw data.
In both cases they provide links to the raw data or a least inform the people where they go to get it.
Links?
Well I watched the video. I tried to read the link on the first graph
https://youtu.be/bJWnMA3-sQs?t=137
its obscured by the you tube controls
Other people who do this put the LINKS in the video description
see potholer videos for how its done.
Mosher
You remarked, “The graphic is NOT the data.” au contraire! One can do a one-to-one mapping of the ‘pixels’ with the original tabular data; they are equivalent, only displayed differently. Why do people go to so much trouble to plot an equation or tabular data? It is because the graphic tells us things about the underlying tabular data that is difficult or impossible to comprehend from the numbers alone. There may be a tradeoff of less precision in the graphic, but even that may be advantageous when trying to understand what the tabular data represent in the way of changes in the physical phenomenon. One doesn’t lose sight of the forest because of the trees.
There was a time in my career (when I was still a college student) when I worked in the Data Processing and Analysis group for the Agena Satellite program at Lockheed Missiles and Space Company. We received analog records of the sensors during launch of the rockets. That was our “data.” We then had to translate the hard-copy analog traces to numbers that could be used as input to a digital computer. Not all “data” comes in the form of tables!
“Mosher
You remarked, “The graphic is NOT the data.” au contraire! One can do a one-to-one mapping of the ‘pixels’ with the original tabular data; they are equivalent, only displayed differently. ”
only if you have the data. That’s the point
Look we could have done this with CRU, but we wanted the actual data used.
Not reverse engineering the chart
The need to convert people one at time works both ways. While we are on religious analogies many have likened AGW to a religion. Indeed the analogy is apt. Just like any other religion the level of commitment varies. The vast majority are ambivalent. Like a any religion the measure of conversion is how much they are willing to sacrifice. Many will give lip service because it costs them almost nothing and they get praise for it. Virtue signalling is a human weakness.
Nonetheless, in this case we find no willingness for people to really give up their alleged sins. Sins to the AGW religion being their fossil fuel enriched life styles and keeping their hard earned money, and keeping their God given rights as individuals. They need to be converted one at time.
Thus we find the clergy of AGW wanting the enforcement powers of the state, and the ability to control markets to force the people into compliance.
I don’t think changing minds is the goal we need to pursue. What we need to do is push the minds that are on the fence towards the more reasonable assumption.
I believe most people do not fear or fully believe global warming is a threat. It is just easier to be agreeable. That explains the resistance of old people who are much less agreeable.
It seems there are only a few very radical, very psychotic individuals actually are strongly convinced. Of course they are very noisy and very emotional and hard to ignore. Many more probably profess a belief that they do not strongly hold to avoid conflict or for personal advantage.
If you try to bring up the subject in any gathering most people will gravitate away from you or make every effort to change the subject. They have doubts but do not want others to know of them. The subject is only discussed when it is obvious everyone is in agreement.
We do not need to ridicule the idea of catastrophic climate change nor should we. We should be quick to ridicule those noisy individuals who pretend to more knowledge and superior morality.
Years ago Bill Gates told the congress his company was non political, very strange comment considering that is what people told the Nazis. The congress then had him behind closed doors, when he came out he was supporting liberal causes.
Just a guess but perhaps it is not a belief in climate change as described by the proponents but self interest which we all have to survive that is driving the wealthy.
An old saying may apply: If you’ve got them by the balls hearts and minds will follow.
The real issue is this, up until just recently the physical, and monetary costs to “Fight Climate Change” has been nothing but cheap platitudes, and virtue signaling. When the costs start to rise and the quality of life suffers then the reaction will be swift. Ask a millennial when they will give up their phone to save the planet, and the fright within their eyes will show the answer. Ask when they will stop traveling, stop having reliable energy, give up a climate controlled house, live in an 8×8 box next to their work, have only food available locally using 19th century farming, lose out on food stored in refrigeration, and they will balk big time.
It is all fun and games till the rubber hits the road, and reality sets in.
The article is at least honest, almost from the start.
People talking loudly about increasing other people’s “understanding” usually mean no such thing. What they usually mean is how can they get you to agree with them. They assume their understanding is complete enough, but that yours needs a bit of reeducation to bring it up to their expectations.
One of the biggest jokes is that website for academic pseuds calling it self “The Conversation”. Once again, it is no such thing. It is a monologue. A screed. Your comments are welcome as long as they toe the line. Opposing views will often get roundly criticized here at WUWT, but Anthony allows plenty of room for dissension.
Kind of ironic that Heartland Institute is being cited for doing it wrong despite it’s honest debates successfully changing minds. To the “wrong” conclusion, apparently.
An admirable goal, but I personally think the missing element in self-serving profit.
The climate panicmongering movement is a huge revenue generator for any number of NGOs, scientists, government organizations, the UN etc.
The movement is further used by entertainers and politicians for their own purposes.
There is no such dynamic on the “realist” side; even the supposed funding by fossil fuel companies is a tiny drop in the bucket compared to the climate panicmongers.
Because of this, I don’t believe that the facts will matter in the short or medium term. What will matter is that the outlandish claims made by the panicmongers continue to fail.
I’m not giving up the fight nor am I advocating anyone else do so, but I am saying that it is important to be realistic in understanding the balance of forces (and money).
Follow The $$ …
I agree with what you just posted … and ask this:
Does anyone have a link to an investigation of the actual? An objective, comprehensive list of all the funders, fundees, and $funds pouring into ‘climate science’?
Especially, NOAA, which is “UN,” but doesn’t the US taxpayer fund the UN?
I wish we had a link that piles on the numbers for this.
Excellent presentation.
It doesn’t work to screech at people, “You’re wrong!
Mixing real questions with rhetorical questions may help to open people’s minds. Such as:
Do you really want to pay more for electricity for dubious benefits?
Do you want to give up cars and return to ox carts?
Do you want farmers to give up tractors and return to mules? To picking cotton by hand? Do you want your unmarried sister to give up her fancy job and operate a wooden spinning wheel in a dusty attic?
Do you know that’s where the word “spinster” comes from?
I’m a firm believer that a week of trudging behind mules, dodging turds, and chopping cotton with hand tools would disabuse most city slickers of the wickedness of internal combustion engines.
Do you know of a past climate that was better than this one?
Disclaimer: “Camelot” was a show tune. There was no such climate, so it can’t be an answer.
In the real world was the big ice age better than now? How about the little ice age?
David Siegel’s idea of collaborative debate (or ‘adversarial collaboration’, as he calls it), might have some value, if concerned people on both sides of an issue could ever agree on any set of rules for an informed debate, and how to summarize ‘who won’, any conclusions reached — ‘adversarial teams’ approach anyone? Beyond that, I’m a bit puzzled by his bad review of skeptics at the Heartland Institute, or his bad impression of skeptics generally.
As some sort of analogy, say we look at human caused Global Warming theory as a kind of secular religion, or belief system. To the extent that such theory has captured the globalist political stage, with all the adherents of globalism funding it, believing in it, etc, I wonder if we could then compare the current situation to the world situation back in the year 1500 ? At that time, as far as Western Europe was concerned, I’m sure the Roman Catholic Church was the closest thing we could imagine to a “globalist’ institution; it was everybody’s Christian church, and therefore everybody’s approved belief system, throughout Western Europe, anyway.
Now, if I set up this ‘past history scenario’ like this, I’m sure that all you history buffs have some idea what comes next! Just as a very quick reference, say, I can easily go to ‘ Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninety-five_Theses ‘, where it describes the reformer Martin Luther’s famous year 1517 publication, of ’95 thesis’. This was an extended argument against the Church’s sale of indulgences (which I understand were usually aimed at persons afraid of landing in Purgatory in the afterlife, and were seeking a ticket out of that — for some reason they usually weren’t so afraid that God would send them all the way to Hell, or so I’ve been told).
One quotation from the Wikipedia article:
“(Luther) argued that indulgences led Christians to avoid true repentance and sorrow for sin, believing that they could forgo it by purchasing an indulgence”
So, anyway, you see how that goes, Luther was offering arguments to undermine, even ridicule, the prevailing, powerful hold that the Church’s promotion of ‘afterlife insurance’ had on the public imagination!
One thing to notice here, is that, while Western society is, on paper at least, more secular today than it was back then, the Catholic/Protestant schism still remains to this day! As far as I know, no one ever figured out a way to debate things to a correct conclusion, to everyone’s satisfaction, not by a long way — no, not for religion’s sake, nor for any other politically sensitive sphere of interest really!
Now, I have to say, I myself find it hard to tell just how entrenched the belief in the ‘sciency-ness’ of gloom and doom Global Warming really is! If the globalists ever really give up on this, maybe it is Globalism itself that will roll on forever into the future? The point I would make, is that if the nature of moneyed belief systems is such that you can never really defeat it, then how much deeper and more entrenched would the old ways have become, if Martin Luther and others had never come along to heckle those old ways? To me, it almost sounds like David Siegel is giving skepticism itself a bad review? This is not very helpful, Mr.Siegel! Maybe you should start a movie review website instead?
If I’m perhaps taking a bit of a sharp tone there, one reason is that I myself am just shy of 60 years old, and I’ve been a bit of a skeptic for a long time now, and *more* than a bit of a skeptic for the last few years. I certainly don’t feel, as Mr. Siegel seems to think, that any really skeptical or ‘critical in tone’ arguments can only convince people who are over 60 years old! Siegel actually says this, and I quote him, here,
“We convert skeptics one at a time, usually after they turn 60, while alarmists enroll millions each year through text books, television, scary images, scientific journals, and massive public-relations campaigns.”
So they’ve got more money and a scarily influential hold on society, doesn’t that make it even *more* important to point out all the errors of their ways, to intelligent persons of all ages? I think, for instance, of the hold that a self promoting dreamer like Elon Musk has on some people. If we can’t heckle him and point out awkward realities with schemes such as ‘plug in’ trucks, what have we got?
Good old Mom (nature) is the best at changing minds. Look at how all the doom and gloom promoters of the “new ice age” faded away as the earth started warming in the 80’s. many of those jumped onto the new band wagon, promoting dome and gloom about a warming world, along with a couple of generations of young people educated to believe what they are Told to think, as opposed to actually how to think. As the globe swings back into a natural cooling cycle (please not the next big glacial advance just yet), the warming hysteria will slowly fade away, probably with the cooling hysteria dusted off and brought forward once again.
Seems it is a necessary part of the human experience to have the crap scared out of them over and over again, facing yet another unknown, but sort of believable boogieman ment to keep them in line and under control.
Here’s the problem in a typical article-
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/great-barrier-reef-bleaching-concerns-after-hottest-month-of-sea-temperatures-on-record/ar-BB11c4SC
If you’ve been indoctrinated by the climate changers you’ll read that emotionally but if you’ve been brought up with the scientific method you’ll read it rationally and recognise something completely the opposite knowing that coral bleaching only really entered the scientific consciousness with large take-up of scuba diving in the late 70s and early 80s and some history of the GBR-
https://dailygalaxy.com//?s=great+barrier+reef
It’s always emotion vs reason so you’re coming at it from polar opposite perspectives. The only thing that will turn it around will be the failure of the climate changers’ prescriptions most notably with adding unreliables to power grids and attempts to electrify transport on top of that. That’s when e-motion simply wont cut it.
I think you should concentrate on the Early Twentieth Century Warming (ETCW) period if you want to dispel the CAGW (Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming) claims.
The period from 1910 to 1940 warmed at the same magnitude and reached the same high temperature level as the period beginning in 1980 to the present day. In other words, it was just as warm in the period around the decade of the 1930’s as it is today, all over the world. In fact, in the United States, Hansen said 1934 was the warmest year, warmer than 1998 by 0.5C, which makes it 0.4C warmer than 2016, the so-called “hottest year evah!”
The UN IPCC (the official promoters of human-caused climate change) said that the warmth of the 1930’s was mostly caused by natural variation (Mother Nature). In other words, the 1930’s warmth reached those heights with CO2 being an insignificant factor at that time.
So if Mother Nature can raise the temperatures to a level equal to today’s warmth without the help of CO2 in the 1930’s, then why should we assume that the current warmth, which is no warmer than the 1930’s, is caused by CO2?
Answer: We shouldn’t assume that CO2 is the cause of current warming when past warming was equal to today’s warming without the benefit of 415ppm of CO2. We should assume that Mother Nature has caused these changes of today, just as She did in the past, until proven otherwise.
This ought to be a very easy case to make. All you have to do is show the person you want to convince an unmodified, Tmax chart of any region on Earth and it will be easy for them to see that it was just as warm in the recent past as it is today, and that means we are not experiencing unprecedented warmth today, as the alarmists claim, and that means that CAGW is dead, dead, dead.
Here’s a US unmodified Tmax surface temperature chart. As you can easily see, the 1930’s were warmer than today, and the US is currently in a temperature downtrend not in an uptrend of unprecedented magnitude, as the alarmists claim.
The Modern-era Hockey Stick charts are the Big Lie (see below), and the only thing alarmists have to show people to back up their claim of unprecedented warming, and the unmodified Tmax charts from all around the world show that the Hockey Stick is a fraud perpetrated on the people of the world.
Here’s the US chart. You don’t have to use the US chart, any unmodified Tmax chart from around the world will show this same basic temperature profile: That it was just as warm in the recent past as it is today. We are not experiencing unprecedented warming. CAGW is not going to happen.
Just show your students the unmodified, Tmax charts from their region and ask them why is it that all the unmodified Tmax charts show one particular temperature profile, i.e., the 1930’s were just as warm as today, while the fraudulent Hockey Stick chart shows a completely different profile where temperatures have been getting hotter and hotter for decade after decade and we are now experiencing the hottest temperatures in human history.
The only problem with that is it is all a Big Lie. The Data Manipulators changed the Tmax temperature profile into the fraudulent Hockey Stick profile in order to conform to the amount of CO2 going into the atmosphere. They made it look like as the CO2 levels go higher, the temperatures go higher. But it’s all a Big Lie.
Here’s a comparions between the unmodified US temperature chart and the fraudulent Hockey Stick chart.
All the unmodified, Tmax charts around the world resemble the US temperature profile (the one on the left), where it was just as warm in the 1930’s as it is today. NONE of the unmodified, Tmax charts from around the world resemble the fraudulent Hockey Stick chart.
The Hockey Stick chart is the only ammunition the alarmist have. It’s the only thing they can point to. Destroy the credibilty of the Hockey Stick chart and you destroy CAGW.
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/hansen_07/
Hi Tom. I have never seen that Hansen page. I laughed out loud just now.
However, let me one-up you:
The point you are making comes alive even with the currently-posted, altered data in both GHCN and USHCN. Like this:
http://theearthintime.com
The GHCN-CONUS version is similar. Both show the 35-year period of 1920s 1930s 1940s hotter than the 1975-2012 era. With both GHCN-CONSU and USHCN, the “altered” datapoint count is in the millions. Hansen should have said to himself, “Hmmm. No warming in US, but the world is burning up. There must be something fishy about the world data.” Instead he constructed a miracle of an anomaly. At least he could have added, “This proves once and for all that the United States of America is exceptional!”
Didn’t you love Hansen’s lame excuse for why the fraudulent Hockey Stick doesn’t resemble the U.S. surface temperature chart!
Yes, all the unmodified surface temperature charts from around the world have the same temperature profile as the Hansen 1999 chart, yet the Data Manipulators take all these unmodified charts from around the world and produce a global temperature chart profile that looks completely different from the unmodified (actual temperature readings) charts.
If *all* the regional surface temperature charts show a similar, specific temperature profile, then *that* is the global temperature profile
The bogus, bastardized, fraudulent Hockey Stick chart is the equivalent of starting out with a circle (original data) and ending up with a square (a bastardized computer simulation).
David Siegel
I was a convert from climate alarmism when I recognising something was badly wrong somewhere. That was several years ago. WUWT was principle in that as I made skepticalscience my first port of call, naturally. I found the ‘atmosphere’ on that site aggressive, asking a simple question would provoke an attack with sneering ‘experts’ dealing with queries as though they were challenges. I also found the site unnaturally complete; everything had a neatly packaged answer, no room for doubt, you either accepted their version of science or you are a denier.
Whilst searching for information I stumbled on WUWT and, whilst fearing the worst (It’s a ‘denier’ site after all) I cautiously began asking questions. Now, I’m not a scientist, nor particularly well educated, in fact I’m a mathematical dunce however, my questions were answered politely and helpfully. It didn’t matter what camp I belonged to, I was never asked, the highly educated and tolerant folks here helped me to think through the subject of climate change myself. They didn’t preach, or condemn, they recognised my limitations, made allowances and treated me as nothing more, or less than I am.
It’s taken me longer than most to grasp various concepts but I’m getting the hang of it, sans the mathematics.
What has struck me forceably though, is that there a lot more of ‘me’ out there than there are educated, knowledgeable individuals, and this is extremely important. The scientific arguments have been raging for decades now on the subject of climate change with no sign of agreement. Yet the march to a ‘green future’ somehow progresses.
Our politicians are in thrall to the green community despite them being in a tiny minority. For example, in the UK we have one solitary Green Member of Parliament (MP). So how does it work that our current, and previous Prime Minister (Boris Johnson and Theresa May respectively) have bought into the hysteria hook line and sinker when it is clear no one in parliament believes in CC.
Why would they authorise £5bn being spent to refurbish Westminster Palace (which houses parliament) whilst it’s located on the banks of the River Thames, mere feet from it’s high water mark? If sea level is the problem, it’s not convincing that our government utterly ignores it.
The long and the short of it is that whilst there are possibly less than 10% of the western world who are scientists, everyone (in the Democratic west) has a single vote each irrespective of their qualifications.
Whilst the sceptic community has been squabbling over the science, the alarmists have captivated the 90% voting public who simply don’t understand science.
To be quite brutal about it, sceptics need to stop obsessing about the science and get into the real world.
Votes are what count. Nothing else. One of the sad realities of life.
You can do all the science you want, but until you appeal to the 90% of tabloid readers, you are on a hiding to nothing.
“Whilst the sceptic community has been squabbling over the science, the alarmists have captivated the 90% voting public who simply don’t understand science.”
The alarmists have some secret weapons: They own the Leftwing Media. And they have a lot of leftwing billionaires spending large sums of money promoting the human-caused climate change cause.
Not only do they own the media, they own the schools as well.
I had much the same journey in 2005. The epiphany came when I did my yearly dinner with my former professors who had first told me about the respiration caused by man made sources in the 80s at college.
The retired biology professors wanted to talk about CO2 in the context of the ice ages and key problems in the paleobotanical record including about why C4 grasses had evolved and why agriculture began. They had come of age when played tectonics was a fringe idea and were thus open to solving other key problems in earth science.
I was shocked to hear them say the key question was now about how much CO2 we should target as a global level. They quoted 700 ppm or more. They said the Earth was on a long term trend to become like Mars. Cold and dead. It was Heresy to my ears. Then they ran me through the data from the clean weather stations they knew about. Then sent to to wattsup.
From:
In my Open letter to the Heartland Institute, I said they are probably causing liberals to raise even more money, because they look down on “liberals” and make fun of “alarmists.”
To:
We convert skeptics one at a time, usually after they turn 60, while alarmists enroll millions each year . . .
And concluding with:
I think the only way for us to measure success is how many minds we change. We can’t do it forcefully or by calling names. If we truly want to change minds, we should be willing to start with our own.
Well there’s nothing like opening with a contradiction to convince the thinking man you have something valuable to say.
You, put this last. I would put it first.
Interesting.
Apparently we skeptics force people and call them names.
It’s a given you haven’t visited many skeptic websites and compared them to alarmist websites.
Instead, you assume many gross assumptions and hold them in your belief system.
Which brings up huge questions.
A) Do you have any clue how many visitors WUWT gets every day!?
B) “many of us know well”: You lost me. I have no clue what videos you are referring to.
C) “attract the same audience over and over.”; so much for “unique visits”, now all of us WUWT visitors are the same audience repeating our visits…
Gross assumption after gross assumption. I get the impression you have not doe detailed homework. Instead, you for ‘Logical Fallacy’ assumptions that form you belief system.
There it is. As hinted in the first sentences and throughout the article; this is really all about you, not us skeptics.
Most of the science has been done repeatedly.
Tens of thousands can make the same claim; more if you include the other skeptical websites.
“My goal is to change minds. I don’t think preaching to the choir is useful. I don’t think being smug and using sarcasm helps anyone.”
“…They keep declaring victory, only to see another billionaire double-down on his commitment to reducing CO2 emissions.”
There it is agai, skeptics are smug and sarcastic. None of the skeptics ever explain the science in detail or provide solid science.
Then we declare victory…
Comments later on the billionaire(s).
Both of my sons and their extensive group of friends are skeptics.
All it took was asking for the science. They themselves figured out that alarmists are belief and propaganda.
My Father was a chemist. i.e. Lead chemist for a major company. One day, he read James Hansen’s book and started ranting about CO₂ dangers.
That caused a several month discussion where I presented him access to databases, science explanations, CO₂’s limited radiation emission/absorption spectrum and then finally, all of lunatic Hansen’s predictions of doom and timelines.
I knew I couldn’t lead off with Hansen’s doom predictions because I knew he’d ignore the whole discussion then. After getting him the science and finishing with doom predictions; well that incensed my Father no end.
In the real world, chemists, well researchers of all stripes, have to produce value for their work.
My Father knew exactly how much each of his research teams spent for their accomplishments.
Liars, braggarts and laggards were fired. He was a firm believer in the “If you can’t do, teach” and sent many wastrels towards the teaching world.
When my Father passed away, he was a firm skeptic without any worry for elevating CO₂.
And the flip side of that coin is you don’t respect skeptics? That skeptics make fun of rich alarmists?
&ell, why shouldn’t we? Billionaires waste more money than I will ever earn; and they waste that money of the silliest vanities.
I do wonder why you accept Bill Gates building a huge house at sea level?
Not that any of the billionaires you mention are any sort of experts on climate or weather.
Odd, You don’t mention or use the concept of “scientific method” anywhere else…
Istead, you have personal opinions that you’ve shoved skeptics into and condescendingly treat skeptics according to your beliefs.
The assumption here is that you are referring to President Trump.
Which of the Presidents prior to President Trump do you believe had any concept or use for the scientific method?
People who make to President type leadership positions tend to be bosses who decide issues on ten seconds worth of information, then refuse to revisit the question…
Exactly what science from which President do you want America to accept? At least the Kennedy’s expected scientists to solidly prove their claims. Otherwise, America would never have made it to the moon.
All right you hate us all.
I was liberal and democrat until Obama. During Obama’s abuse of justice and presidency I leaned Conservative. President Trump now has my backing as both Conservative and Republican.
I never bought into the CO₂ global warming nonsense. All I had to request was the exact science and research proving CO₂ molecule not only heats up 9,996 atmospheric molecules and unstated massive amounts of surface matter.
It can’t be done. Not on the scale alarmists believe.
As an ex-programmer of models, I knew darn well that models do not “predict” squat. People predict! Usually, people predict based upon what they want.
Decrying a person’s religion?
So, you immediate dismiss Galileo, Da Vinci, Darwin and tens of thousands of researchers who practice religions?
Plus, you immediately dismiss anything a religious observant scientist because you believe they do not adhere to the scientific method?
That is known as bigotry. All of the intolerance is yours.
More all about you. Odd that you believe you are so convincing.
“I have a request. In my video, I say it would be great if we had a graph of average US historical temperature using only the uncontaminated level 1 and 2 stations from Anthony Watts’ Surfacesations.org project going back to 1900.”
There is that operative ignorance again.
Besides wanting others to do the work you imagine is necessary, you display ignorance about what exactly you are requesting.
When someone doesn’t really understand what they are requesting, I think of Dilbert comics and his “What color do you want that database to be?” question.
A) Level 1 and Level 2 stations are ranked by their installation according to installation and site requirements.
Not because they are the best sites for a representative temperature!
Which is why so many official temperature stations are installed at airports where tens of acres of tarmac couple with jet engines play havoc with temperatures.
James Hansen went on a massive temperature station purge. Reducing the amount of temperature stations from many thousands to just over a thousand.
Hansen’s rationale appears to target those stations at higher latitudes, or higher altitudes, or very rural stations in favor of urban and airport locations.
James Hanse also initiated the adjustment of temperature records and using thermometers/thermistors up to 1,200 kilometers away for that adjustment.
You should check Steve Moshers web site, Joe D’aleo’s articles or “Wood for Trees”.
“We convert skeptics one at a time, usually after they turn 60, while alarmists enroll millions each year through text books, television, scary images, scientific journals, and massive public-relations campaigns.”
“convert skeptics one at a time”? I fail to understand your aside question here. Is that convert to skeptic or from skeptic?
Generally, when someone “converts” to skeptic, it is because they’ve been following the scientific method and discovered the utter lack of argument for alarmism.
Not because they believed a skeptic over an alarmist.
“alarmists enroll millions each year through text books, television, scary images, scientific journals, and massive public-relations campaigns.”; brings us back to those billionaires mentioned earlier.
Quite a few of those billionaires purchased or built their own propaganda machines.
Bezos, Murdoch & Sons, and other billionaires purchased news outlets, ruined their hard earned reputations for thoroughness and honesty and converted them to propaganda machines.
And you, Dave Siegel, expect us unfunded to somehow compete against these propaganda machines, how? Exactly!?
As every advertising or news official can explain; money buys advertising and some portion of the population accepts that advertising/propaganda as gospel, simply because without obvious truth, lies win, always.
Again, you infer that skeptics are forceful and call others names?
Tens of thousands visit WUWT frequently. Few call others by names.
Unless, you refer to the unteachable trolls who are not here to learn, but to obstruct and distract?
You need to open your mind and stop projecting your personal opinions and accusations at us skeptics
As of today, 120,366 people have viewed or downloaded my peer-reviewed and published Propagation of Error and the Reliability of Global Air Temperature Projections.
So far 1933 tweets from 1157 users have reached about 2,569,526 people.
The paper shows that climate model air temperature projections are totally unreliable.
It shows beyond any rational doubt that an anthropogenic air temperature signal cannot have been, nor presently can be, evidenced in climate observables.
In other words, it shows the IPCC literally does not know, and has never known, what it’s talking about.
All the money misdirected by governments
all the money absconded by tax troughers,
all the anguish,
all the accusations,
all the excess winter fuel poverty deaths,
all … all … has been for nothing.
________________________ F O R N O T H I N G ____________________
“In other words, it shows the IPCC literally does not know, and has never known, what it’s talking about.”
It amazing how far along this CAGW fraud has gone. It demonstrates the power and influence of the Media/Propaganda combination.
Although, if you go by the polls, the Media CAGW propaganda effort seems to affect the elites and the political classes more than the general population. For the general population, Human-caused climate change is about the last thing on their list of possible problems.
Many thumbs way up, Pat!
Can anyone tell me a reference to a mainstream source of ACTUAL temperatures displayed in the media. What I am trying to find is one with the anomaly displayed on the same scale to show it in context as a threat level. The use of anomalies may be justified for a scientific audience but it is the trickery of a low charlatan when dealing with a non specialist audience as they have no idea of the significance or otherwise of the claimed man made changes compared to the level of random input change that exists regardless of emissions.
The null hypothesis in this debate is that because the earth has swung in and out of ice ages for millenia, natural forces control climate, and recent changes in CO2 are irrelevant. The many natural factors were listed by the dozen in Ian Plimer’s 2009 book “Heaven and Earth: Global Warming, the Missing Science”.
To clearly establish that CO2 is relevant, climate scientists have to prove a cause-and-effect relationship relating one factor amongst many, in a complex, chaotic system. The criteria were debated when tobacco and lung cancer was a big issue in the 1950s. The seminal paper at that time was by Bradford Hill https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4291332/
Even a cursory reading of these sources leads to the conclusion that the null hypothesis still stands.