John, your video on the end of alarmism has left out one important point, and that is the effect of money on paradigms. Whereas the replacement of the geocentric concept of the universe by the heliocentric concept 500 years ago did not affect most people, the downfall of the anthropogenic climate change paradigm could involve huge amounts of money and possible financial ruin for many. If terms such as global warming and climate change had never come into common use, I doubt that industries such as wind/solar energy and electric vehicles would exist today. Considering that these industries must be worth trillions of dollars worldwide by now, anyone attempting to change the paradigm justifying them is going to be met with the equivalent of "nice little paradigm you've got here, pity if something happened to it, know what I mean?"
The climate change paradigm is probably going to be propped up by politicians for many years yet. After all, if you were a nation's leader, how would you like to have to say "you know all those trillions we spent on renewable energy? Well, is was all a mistake. Sorry about that,"
That point occurred to me, too. Since the politicians and corporate media don't pay much attention to the scientists anyway - just think of the constant claims in the press and advertising about how much worst 'extreme weather' has become - I think the subsidies for wind farms, solar panels, and EV's might well continue even without papers from academia. So even if government funding for climate change research declined, there are still lots of activist non-profits to keep giving hacks money to write absurd papers. Finally, academia still believes in Marxism, which has a remarkably consistent record of failure, so I think we can expect it to continue to support AGW even no reputable scientist writes papers about it.
In other words, I think the AGW industrial complex will continue on merrily even without scientists.
From Joseph Goebbels diary, “The essence of propaganda consists of winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never again escape from it”
One thing I think about with Mann’s graph is the huge size of the error bars, why they become narrower toward the right in more modern times and then why temperature date is used instead of tree ring data in current times. There are other issues I’ve seen discussed as well but no need to go into that here. I spent a career working with geoscientists and everyday I saw discussions and differences of opinion between scientists regarding the same data sets. Interpretation is very personal and very much subject to the eyes, experience and mindset of the beholder and in some cases, motivation. I’ve also seen the same thing in the medical field, interpretations of data sets, in my case CT scans. Some scientists and practitioners are more in tune with the data they see than others. Remote sensing requiring interpretation of data is not an exact science, neither is hubris.
John, intriguing video, as it offers a new perspective on the whole climate alarm issue. It offers a charitable view of at least some scientists / informed observers who honestly believe that too much human produced CO2 is a danger to be combatted. I'd offer Roger Pielke Jr as an example. He would be an interesting subject for you to interview, or perhaps debate.
Other commenters rightly point out the huge amounts of money, reputation and power at stake that will make it slow and painful to change course. We need to remember that global warming is mainly a Western country concern. There is a massive compelling counterforce to hasten a return to reality in the form primarily of the West's biggest enemies, Islam and China, who blithely ignore climate alarmism and harness cheap abundant reliable energy sources to further their ambitions of dominance.
I recall Dr Tim Ball remarking “ Mann’s thesis was first offered to the University of Virginia, who rejected it”
That note restored my faith in American academia. Sadly Tim is no longer here to elaborate, although I think he finally prevailed against Mann in that contentious legal action. Science in court is ludicrous.
"What historians will definitely wonder about in future centuries is how deeply flawed logic, obscured by shrewd and unrelenting propaganda, actually enabled a coalition of powerful special interests to convince nearly everyone in the world that CO2 from human industry was a dangerous, planet-destroying toxin. It will be remembered as the greatest mass delusion in the history of the world - that CO2, the life of plants, was considered for a time to be a deadly poison." ~ Richard Lindzen
Richard Siegmund Lindzen is an American atmospheric physicist known for his work in the dynamics of the middle atmosphere, atmospheric tides, and ozone photochemistry. He has published more than 200 scientific papers and books. From 1983 until his retirement in 2013, he was
Professor of Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was a lead author of Chapter 7, "Physical Climate Processes and Feedbacks," of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Third Assessment Report on climate change. He has criticized the scientific consensus about climate change and what he has called "climate alarmism."
The reason that science in courty is ludicrous is that the Legal Profession regards what an expert says as being evidence, whereas the Engineering Profession regards what an expert says as being merely opinion – otherwise known as testimony – unless it is based on verifiable physical evidence. The Shell v. Milieudefensie et al. case is a good illustration of this, as there never has been any physical evidence that rising atmospheric concentrations of CO2, or of methane, cause any significant global warming – let alone “dangerous global warming”. Many other Court judgements have been flawed because of the Legal Profession’s, including the Judiciary’s, failure to grasp these important facts. Many people also don’t know that correlation is never evidence of causation. Secondary school statistics students most certainly should know.
I have written a critical review of the UN IPCC report 'What is Climate Change'. It exposes their intense bias and propaganda. Please confirm that it is OK to upload my report as a PDF here in these comments. I need to distribute the report to as many as possible.
How right you are. I have written a critical review (50+ pages) on the UN IPCC document 'What is 'Climate Change'. I just had to spend the time and energy to do so since I was angered by the bias and propaganda which is so obvious in their document. I will attempt to upload my report here within the next day or so. Watch this space.
John, your video on the end of alarmism has left out one important point, and that is the effect of money on paradigms. Whereas the replacement of the geocentric concept of the universe by the heliocentric concept 500 years ago did not affect most people, the downfall of the anthropogenic climate change paradigm could involve huge amounts of money and possible financial ruin for many. If terms such as global warming and climate change had never come into common use, I doubt that industries such as wind/solar energy and electric vehicles would exist today. Considering that these industries must be worth trillions of dollars worldwide by now, anyone attempting to change the paradigm justifying them is going to be met with the equivalent of "nice little paradigm you've got here, pity if something happened to it, know what I mean?"
The climate change paradigm is probably going to be propped up by politicians for many years yet. After all, if you were a nation's leader, how would you like to have to say "you know all those trillions we spent on renewable energy? Well, is was all a mistake. Sorry about that,"
That point occurred to me, too. Since the politicians and corporate media don't pay much attention to the scientists anyway - just think of the constant claims in the press and advertising about how much worst 'extreme weather' has become - I think the subsidies for wind farms, solar panels, and EV's might well continue even without papers from academia. So even if government funding for climate change research declined, there are still lots of activist non-profits to keep giving hacks money to write absurd papers. Finally, academia still believes in Marxism, which has a remarkably consistent record of failure, so I think we can expect it to continue to support AGW even no reputable scientist writes papers about it.
In other words, I think the AGW industrial complex will continue on merrily even without scientists.
From Joseph Goebbels diary, “The essence of propaganda consists of winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never again escape from it”
One thing I think about with Mann’s graph is the huge size of the error bars, why they become narrower toward the right in more modern times and then why temperature date is used instead of tree ring data in current times. There are other issues I’ve seen discussed as well but no need to go into that here. I spent a career working with geoscientists and everyday I saw discussions and differences of opinion between scientists regarding the same data sets. Interpretation is very personal and very much subject to the eyes, experience and mindset of the beholder and in some cases, motivation. I’ve also seen the same thing in the medical field, interpretations of data sets, in my case CT scans. Some scientists and practitioners are more in tune with the data they see than others. Remote sensing requiring interpretation of data is not an exact science, neither is hubris.
John, intriguing video, as it offers a new perspective on the whole climate alarm issue. It offers a charitable view of at least some scientists / informed observers who honestly believe that too much human produced CO2 is a danger to be combatted. I'd offer Roger Pielke Jr as an example. He would be an interesting subject for you to interview, or perhaps debate.
Other commenters rightly point out the huge amounts of money, reputation and power at stake that will make it slow and painful to change course. We need to remember that global warming is mainly a Western country concern. There is a massive compelling counterforce to hasten a return to reality in the form primarily of the West's biggest enemies, Islam and China, who blithely ignore climate alarmism and harness cheap abundant reliable energy sources to further their ambitions of dominance.
I recall Dr Tim Ball remarking “ Mann’s thesis was first offered to the University of Virginia, who rejected it”
That note restored my faith in American academia. Sadly Tim is no longer here to elaborate, although I think he finally prevailed against Mann in that contentious legal action. Science in court is ludicrous.
"What historians will definitely wonder about in future centuries is how deeply flawed logic, obscured by shrewd and unrelenting propaganda, actually enabled a coalition of powerful special interests to convince nearly everyone in the world that CO2 from human industry was a dangerous, planet-destroying toxin. It will be remembered as the greatest mass delusion in the history of the world - that CO2, the life of plants, was considered for a time to be a deadly poison." ~ Richard Lindzen
Richard Siegmund Lindzen is an American atmospheric physicist known for his work in the dynamics of the middle atmosphere, atmospheric tides, and ozone photochemistry. He has published more than 200 scientific papers and books. From 1983 until his retirement in 2013, he was
Professor of Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was a lead author of Chapter 7, "Physical Climate Processes and Feedbacks," of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Third Assessment Report on climate change. He has criticized the scientific consensus about climate change and what he has called "climate alarmism."
The reason that science in courty is ludicrous is that the Legal Profession regards what an expert says as being evidence, whereas the Engineering Profession regards what an expert says as being merely opinion – otherwise known as testimony – unless it is based on verifiable physical evidence. The Shell v. Milieudefensie et al. case is a good illustration of this, as there never has been any physical evidence that rising atmospheric concentrations of CO2, or of methane, cause any significant global warming – let alone “dangerous global warming”. Many other Court judgements have been flawed because of the Legal Profession’s, including the Judiciary’s, failure to grasp these important facts. Many people also don’t know that correlation is never evidence of causation. Secondary school statistics students most certainly should know.
A superb summation by Peter J. Morgan.
I have written a critical review of the UN IPCC report 'What is Climate Change'. It exposes their intense bias and propaganda. Please confirm that it is OK to upload my report as a PDF here in these comments. I need to distribute the report to as many as possible.
How right you are. I have written a critical review (50+ pages) on the UN IPCC document 'What is 'Climate Change'. I just had to spend the time and energy to do so since I was angered by the bias and propaganda which is so obvious in their document. I will attempt to upload my report here within the next day or so. Watch this space.