Climate-gate
- Thread starter Photizo
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You're missing the point. "This episode" clearly shows they've yet to prove global warming IS happening--and more importantly, that it is happening due to human activity. Indeed, it has NOT been ALLOWED to be 'proven'!
Clearly, the facts of "this episode" are inconvenient truths for the individuals responsible for this melt down.
I count three, and that's about right -- so long as each thread is kept on a focused discussion. This topic does raise multiple issues, after all. My two bits on the nature of these discussions and where they should be discussed:
- What this issue says about the science of AGW.
Does this issue cast that science in doubt to some extent, or is the science rock-solid? This subtopic should be discussed in this thread in the Earth Science forum.
- What this issue says about scientific method.
Does this issue cast science in general in doubt to some extent, or is it just a case of boys-will-be-boys? This subtopic should be discussed in this thread in the Science & Society forum.
- What this issue says about what happens when politics and science collude/collide.
Are scientists just a bunch of "useful idiots" whose statements are great if they further some political agenda, but can be ignored when the science says the political agenda is BS? Can science be bought? Discussions such as these belong in this thread in the World Events forum.
Who calls it 'global warming' apart from Climate Change deniers?
For the sake of discussion, I'm going to assume we are both on the same page with respect to your use of "it"...I know of two individuals off the top of my head...spidergoat, earlier in the thread, referred to "it" as 'global warming' as did (unbeknownst to her) a glaciologist I was listening to (not more than 10 min ago) during a radio program discussing the impact of the melt down.
Who calls those who are skeptical concerning global warming "Climate change deniers" apart from hypocrites with an agenda?
Like you said in another thread: "It's not whether it exists or not, but whether the massed faithful try and oppress the rest of us into acting like they do by enshrining their personal beliefs in law." Doing THAT apart from allowing honest use of the scientific method is what most people have a hard time accepting.
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The IPCC, for one. http://www.google.com/search?q=global+warming+site:ipcc.ch
The CRU at the University of East Anglia, for another. http://www.google.com/search?q=global+warming+site:www.uea.ac.uk/env
NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, for yet another. http://www.google.com/search?q=global+warming+site:giss.nasa.gov
The term global warming, and in particular the term Anthropogenic Global Warming was coined by those who think humans the driving cause behind climate change. Where did you get the idea that "deniers" (a term of derision also coined by the true believers) are the ones who coined the term global warming?
Another article:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/dec/03/researcher-says-nasa-hiding-climate-data/
Again, be sure to read subsequent comments posted by readers.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/dec/03/researcher-says-nasa-hiding-climate-data/
Again, be sure to read subsequent comments posted by readers.
No because that one institution is not responsible for all the data supporting global warming. They don't own the idea. If anything it shows that the full picture is more complex.
Please, moderators:
Lock this thread or at least put it in pseudoscience where it rightfully belongs.
The debate is over. The consensus is in.
The IPCC says man-made climate change is real, and we need to do something about it FAST! Why question the IPCC? Our FUTURE is at stake! The world our children will have to deal with is at stake! Allowing "debate" will only further muddy the water on this very real issue which needs to be addressed NOW! We CANNOT wait to appease these naysayers. Action must be taken before it is too late.
These emails that were STOLEN and HACKED (this so called Climategate) prove absolutely nothing. If the CRU had said some questionable things, who cares?
This is just further stalling on the part of Big Energy and their unscientific minions (most of whom are probably from the USA) on the eve of the historic Copenhagen summit. This is their last ditch effort to derail real sensible action at cutting carbon emissions and saving our planet.
As the temperatures (and waters) continue to rise, so will the oil companies' profits. They DO NOT CARE about US! They can afford to relocate to higher ground, leaving the rest of us normal, hardworking people to drown in the mess they've caused.
PLEASE! MODERATORS! IF YOU HAVE ANY SHRED OF DECENCY LEFT!
Lock this thread. I guarantee, almost all of the global warming DENIERS are far right kooks who listen to RUSH LIMBAUGH and HANNITY or Glen Beck. These people had there say with the Iraq war and their evil Bush. It is time to silence them once and for all with real climate change HOPE! Why should we trust them?
And why give them equal time to say anything that gives the whole "I don't believe in global warming" crap any credibility? They have had their chance to say what they want, and obviously the public isn't buying it. Why else would the major scientific journals refuse to print their trash??? Because they have NO scientific credibility whatsoever. They lost that long ago.
Questioning climate change, in my opinion, and I'm sure many agree, is on par with saying NAMBLA has a great plan for our children.
If you care about the integrity of science and want to help your fellow man, then CLOSE THIS THREAD! PERMANENTLY! Our lives and our futures depends on it!
Lock this thread or at least put it in pseudoscience where it rightfully belongs.
The debate is over. The consensus is in.
The IPCC says man-made climate change is real, and we need to do something about it FAST! Why question the IPCC? Our FUTURE is at stake! The world our children will have to deal with is at stake! Allowing "debate" will only further muddy the water on this very real issue which needs to be addressed NOW! We CANNOT wait to appease these naysayers. Action must be taken before it is too late.
These emails that were STOLEN and HACKED (this so called Climategate) prove absolutely nothing. If the CRU had said some questionable things, who cares?
This is just further stalling on the part of Big Energy and their unscientific minions (most of whom are probably from the USA) on the eve of the historic Copenhagen summit. This is their last ditch effort to derail real sensible action at cutting carbon emissions and saving our planet.
As the temperatures (and waters) continue to rise, so will the oil companies' profits. They DO NOT CARE about US! They can afford to relocate to higher ground, leaving the rest of us normal, hardworking people to drown in the mess they've caused.
PLEASE! MODERATORS! IF YOU HAVE ANY SHRED OF DECENCY LEFT!
Lock this thread. I guarantee, almost all of the global warming DENIERS are far right kooks who listen to RUSH LIMBAUGH and HANNITY or Glen Beck. These people had there say with the Iraq war and their evil Bush. It is time to silence them once and for all with real climate change HOPE! Why should we trust them?
And why give them equal time to say anything that gives the whole "I don't believe in global warming" crap any credibility? They have had their chance to say what they want, and obviously the public isn't buying it. Why else would the major scientific journals refuse to print their trash??? Because they have NO scientific credibility whatsoever. They lost that long ago.
Questioning climate change, in my opinion, and I'm sure many agree, is on par with saying NAMBLA has a great plan for our children.
If you care about the integrity of science and want to help your fellow man, then CLOSE THIS THREAD! PERMANENTLY! Our lives and our futures depends on it!
The term "climate change" was apparently a suggestion of Frank Luntz , for the purpose of discrediting the idea in the public mind.phlogiston said:
wiki said:
Scientists picked up on it, and other honest and responsible people, because it does seem more accurate and reasonable to those naive in the ways of media manipulation. The problem is that in the transition from scientific discussion to political
The damage done by the people in the Fox media camp has been devastating, including particularly to the communication between science and the larger political society.
If people are unhappy about making public policy and incurring the costs of action based on the best evidence or argument and judgment therefrom, in situations lacking the possibility of certain proof or demonstration, then science plays a strange and unstable role in the decisions of representative government.
Oh please.
No it is not. The consensus is rigged. Not by conspiracy, as some right wing loons suggest. All it took was hubris and groupthink.
The IPCC themselves are talking about a small rise in sea level in the next 100 years. Alarmists such as you are the ones who are putting humanity at peril -- and the environment.
We humans are causing harm to the environment, but most of that harm arises from how we manage (mismanage) the land and the seas. Potentially bankrupting the world's economies to solve a minor problem is going to make this mismanagement worse. Spending money on a solving this minor problem will necessarily reduce the funds available for the more serious problem, and may reduce that funding availability by a whole lot.
He is being sarcastic - or so he thinks. We need a term for "strawman sarcasm".DH said:
It's an odd form of groupthink, that flourishes without isolation and without filtering of input, in a climate of open discussion and constant reference to physical correction.DH said:
Every once in a while, we might take a break from arguing about the global warming alarmism and recall, just for reference, the poor quality of the arguments against the alarmist scenarios.
Oh. I guess you're on to my game. Sheeet.
Explain "strawman sarcasm" please. I'm excited about this development!
In other news, I've heard through the decrepit vine that Gore has cancelled his speaking engagement at Kobenhavn. All those people who payed $1200... they only wanted to rub elbows with the elite. Maybe next year?
More news:
http://mrc.org/press/releases/2009/20091204124643.aspx
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-brief...to-investigate-climategate-is-unconscionable-
http://politiken.dk/newsinenglish/article851820.ece
The first article notes the silence on the part of the major news networks. Thank God for the internet...thank God for Al Gore--who is inextricably linked both to the 'story', and its means of dissemination to the masses.
http://mrc.org/press/releases/2009/20091204124643.aspx
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-brief...to-investigate-climategate-is-unconscionable-
http://politiken.dk/newsinenglish/article851820.ece
The first article notes the silence on the part of the major news networks. Thank God for the internet...thank God for Al Gore--who is inextricably linked both to the 'story', and its means of dissemination to the masses.
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http://mrc.org/press/releases/2009/20091204124643.aspx
Oh, WTF?!? They haven't heard about it?
Big Media is under heavy (but not complete) control by vested interests. Very often the most interesting news stories get rather poor, biased treatment, if they are addressed at all.
I know the BBC knew about it a full five weeks before the emails became generally known. To my knowledge there hasn't been any substantial reporting in the UK by BBC.
http://politiken.dk/newsinenglish/article851820.ece
Oh, WTF?!? They haven't heard about it?
Big Media is under heavy (but not complete) control by vested interests. Very often the most interesting news stories get rather poor, biased treatment, if they are addressed at all.
I know the BBC knew about it a full five weeks before the emails became generally known. To my knowledge there hasn't been any substantial reporting in the UK by BBC.
http://politiken.dk/newsinenglish/article851820.ece
I've been thinking about this issue for a while, and this quote sort of spurred me to post something:
That's hardly the way that science works. The debate is never over, and consensuses (consensi?) are often wrong, especially scientific consensuses.
I can give several examples in the history of science where the consensus has been wrong, but I'm sure you've heard it all before...
The thing that's more interesting to me is that this ``consensus'' sets major policy decisions, for the good or bad. Clearly, the science isn't settled now, and it will be a long time before it is. Even predictions made based on this science are suspect, at best---for example, the climate simulations on computer don't take into account the presence of water vapor in the atmosphere. Water vapor is a greenhouse gas, too, and there is a LOT of water vapor in the atmosphere. It is currently not known how the presence of water vapor effects the climate predictions, so people guess.
I will give one concrete example. If you, as a layperson, ask me if the higgs boson exists, I will say, with great certainty, yes. Of course, I don't know if the higgs exists or not---it is possible, however unlikely, that the higgs doesn't exist. Now, the statement that the higgs exists is partly based on the evidence---there aren't any convincing theories that don't have some type of higgs boson. However, if the higgs isn't discovered, and you confront me with that, I will say something along the lines of ``Well, we were wrong, and this is why...''
I wonder, how much of this is going on in the field of climate science? On the one hand, it is very hard to separate personal biases from scientific data. For example, Milikan in his famous oil drop experiment, is known to have disregarded data which didn't support his conclusion. Likewise, Eddington's famous confirmation of the GR prediction that light bends in a gravity field was probably fudged as well. Of course, both of these conclusions were later confirmed by other experiments, so the fudging happened to work out. So if a climate science has some data that doesn't seem to support his bias, it seems likely that he might disregard it altogether, and look for other data.
Of course, on the other hand, scientists are having to relate their conclusions to non-scientists. It is very difficult job to do, because science never really proves anything---the best we can do is set limits. But this statement isn't good enough for popular audiences, who want ``scientific proof'' of something. So it is also quite easy for scientists to overstate the results of their research.
I will give one final example: in the 1980s and 1990s, string theorists claimed to be on the verge of a ``theory of everything''. But 20 years later, the state of string theory is much less secure. At one time, scientists thought that the equations of string theory uniquely predicted our universe, but today most of us will tell you that that just simply isn't the case. String theory itself has changed, and so our conclusions are different now. Were string theorists wrong in the 1980s to say that we were on the verge of understanding Nature at it's most fundamental level? No---that was a prediction that turned out to be wrong.
The current status of climate science, I would be willing to bet, is very similar. Scientists, when talking to the public, will say ``We know for sure that...'', but when talking among themselves, they may be much more reluctant to make the same statements. There are a variety of reasons: sometimes we're lazy and don't want to deal with questions, sometimes there's money at stake (funding), and sometimes we don't understand all the science completely. For example, it's easier for me to say ``The higgs definitely exists'' than to explain the other theories that people work on. I believe that the higgs exists, because I've looked at the data and have made a judgment. But that judgment carries with it an inherent bias. I think this is the culture which was revealed with the emails.
The problem with this is that, as DH rightly points out, the economic ramifications are quite severe.
That's hardly the way that science works. The debate is never over, and consensuses (consensi?) are often wrong, especially scientific consensuses.
I can give several examples in the history of science where the consensus has been wrong, but I'm sure you've heard it all before...
The thing that's more interesting to me is that this ``consensus'' sets major policy decisions, for the good or bad. Clearly, the science isn't settled now, and it will be a long time before it is. Even predictions made based on this science are suspect, at best---for example, the climate simulations on computer don't take into account the presence of water vapor in the atmosphere. Water vapor is a greenhouse gas, too, and there is a LOT of water vapor in the atmosphere. It is currently not known how the presence of water vapor effects the climate predictions, so people guess.
I will give one concrete example. If you, as a layperson, ask me if the higgs boson exists, I will say, with great certainty, yes. Of course, I don't know if the higgs exists or not---it is possible, however unlikely, that the higgs doesn't exist. Now, the statement that the higgs exists is partly based on the evidence---there aren't any convincing theories that don't have some type of higgs boson. However, if the higgs isn't discovered, and you confront me with that, I will say something along the lines of ``Well, we were wrong, and this is why...''
I wonder, how much of this is going on in the field of climate science? On the one hand, it is very hard to separate personal biases from scientific data. For example, Milikan in his famous oil drop experiment, is known to have disregarded data which didn't support his conclusion. Likewise, Eddington's famous confirmation of the GR prediction that light bends in a gravity field was probably fudged as well. Of course, both of these conclusions were later confirmed by other experiments, so the fudging happened to work out. So if a climate science has some data that doesn't seem to support his bias, it seems likely that he might disregard it altogether, and look for other data.
Of course, on the other hand, scientists are having to relate their conclusions to non-scientists. It is very difficult job to do, because science never really proves anything---the best we can do is set limits. But this statement isn't good enough for popular audiences, who want ``scientific proof'' of something. So it is also quite easy for scientists to overstate the results of their research.
I will give one final example: in the 1980s and 1990s, string theorists claimed to be on the verge of a ``theory of everything''. But 20 years later, the state of string theory is much less secure. At one time, scientists thought that the equations of string theory uniquely predicted our universe, but today most of us will tell you that that just simply isn't the case. String theory itself has changed, and so our conclusions are different now. Were string theorists wrong in the 1980s to say that we were on the verge of understanding Nature at it's most fundamental level? No---that was a prediction that turned out to be wrong.
The current status of climate science, I would be willing to bet, is very similar. Scientists, when talking to the public, will say ``We know for sure that...'', but when talking among themselves, they may be much more reluctant to make the same statements. There are a variety of reasons: sometimes we're lazy and don't want to deal with questions, sometimes there's money at stake (funding), and sometimes we don't understand all the science completely. For example, it's easier for me to say ``The higgs definitely exists'' than to explain the other theories that people work on. I believe that the higgs exists, because I've looked at the data and have made a judgment. But that judgment carries with it an inherent bias. I think this is the culture which was revealed with the emails.
The problem with this is that, as DH rightly points out, the economic ramifications are quite severe.
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