Comments on: Do most scientists really believe in global warming?

By: Rod

Rod — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 11:53:05 +0000

(Comment deleted)
MODERATOR
BNC no longer posts or discusses denialist positions on the scientific consensus of AGW/CC. Solutions to the problem are now the focus of this blog and that includes population. You will find several posts, on that subject, on BNC.

By: Kelly

Kelly — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 19:29:56 +0000

Look, stop trying to give some HUGE explaination and explain word by word trying to sound smart. ITS SIMPLE. The world is changing and its our fault and you may say oh thats normal but you should watch the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth’ and make those ‘bright’ scientist see that WE ARE causing global warming. You are utterly stupid if you dont think the world is warmer. In Miami today its going to feel like 100 degrees F , and its not summer yet, open your darn eyes.

By: pete

pete — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 18:30:52 +0000

It seems that people have a God complex. The world is not going to end in 2012, the rapture is not coming in your lifetime, and we are not going to destroy the world. The thought that we “will”……. unless people start doing something about it justs seems like something to talk about…. not anything substantial. It seems that people always think their generation is “IT”. “IT’S” the one where everything happens, or they have the control. People are always talking about how everything is going to happen in the next 20 years or 50 years or whatever. I’m sure every generation of people thought that the end of the world was going to come in their lifetime. But it didn’t.

It’s very difficult to believe proponents of global warming when there are so many varying opinions. I believe that if global warming were certain truth….then we wouldn’t have so many arguments about whether it existed- we would have moved onto the argument of what to do about it.

Besides, what with all the other “real” problems that plague our society (such as divorce and splitting of family, materialism, etc…) maybe we shouldn’t get too worked up about it. I mean, if our ability to make relationships lasts relies on how much time we spend on the cellphone or on social networking sites, who cares about “green”. It isn’t really saving anybody. What’s the point of preserving something if that something “stinks” to high hell. The only reason I’m talking about our social agendas (out of all the other problems in the world) is because I was noticing how people just try to tear each other down so much in these blogs.

By: David B. Benson

David B. Benson — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 01:10:41 +0000

Jane, on January 15th, 2010 at 3.51 — However, there is no evidence whatsoever for your belief.

But don’t let that stop you, please.

By: Jane

Jane — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 17:21:32 +0000

This is what I believe; “Science is being influenced and misused by politics.”

By: Barry Brook

Barry Brook — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 13:14:14 +0000

*shakes head* I didn’t write the article, “Chase”, George Marshall did.

By: Chase

Chase — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 12:56:34 +0000

Barry, I disagree with you 100%. You are projecting, imagining or creating an image of insecurities onto these scientists in order to support your definitive view that global warming exists and will lead us to eventual catastrophy. If conclusions are to be drawn based on expert opinions then the opinions of experts are to be listened to very carefully. You completely lost credibility with me when you wrote…..scientist Hulmes argues”‘the language of catastrophe is not the language of science’ and that it ‘hides a cascade of value-laden assumptions which do not emerge from empirical or theoretical science’….your reply…”However, even as a non scientist, it is clear to me that this is not true.”

Exactly why is this statement not true. What exactly are the details, scientific or otherwise that disproves this. What are the value-laden assumptions that Hulmes referred to in making his points? You dared not elaborate because your point of view is based on your need to convince others that Glimate Change is a certain event that will lead to Catastrophy and will oppose anything that chatises that view and water it down. I believe your article here should be called “Barry’s inconvient BS” as it wasted my time.

By: BFJ Cricklewood

BFJ Cricklewood — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 06:53:38 +0000

As I keep telling you… [Ed: As I keep telling you, enough already on this belaboured and discredited point]

By: Geoff Russell

Geoff Russell — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 21:33:04 +0000

I’m a little more patient with conspiracy theorists than Barry, but I’m out of patience also … bye bye BFJ.

By: Geoff Russell

Geoff Russell — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 21:30:51 +0000

(#27) The tobacco companies spent bucket loads on buying lackeys to confuse matters but there is only so far you can bend results without looking silly. The replications of Mann’s work (not really replications because they generally used different approaches) had different funding bodies in different countries. The substantive agreement in results really would have taken a large international conspiracy. Probably organised by the same people who hide all the extraterrestrial corpses who fall from the sky.

By: Barry Brook

Barry Brook — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 14:53:54 +0000

Since AGW gives the state a reason to advance its interests, its paid lackeys who advance the AGW idea, are in the same category as the paid lackeys of tobacco companies who told us there was no cancer link in smoking.

BJFC: Now you’re just getting hysterical. Enough already. Stick to the science or stick to the silence. I’ve been ohhh so patient. This is your last warning…

By: BFJ Cricklewood

BFJ Cricklewood — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 14:13:45 +0000

(#26) This understandable hope that science is objective, collapses under conditions of single-source funding, political or otherwise. Since AGW gives the state a reason to advance its interests, its paid lackeys who advance the AGW idea, are in the same category as the paid lackeys of tobacco companies who told us there was no cancer link in smoking.
In both cases it’s not a question of telling individuals in advance what conclusions to come up with, but rather the overall process by which scientists are selected for purchase in the first place, on the basis of their outlook and approach. How much weight you attach to those defenders of Mann, should take into account that they were bought by the same institution that bought Mann in the first place.
As regards THAT’S JUST THE WAY IT IS, facts do not speak for themselves. There remains the issue of the selection of facts, particularly the possible omission of inconvenient ones.

By: Geoff Russell

Geoff Russell — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 11:18:56 +0000

(#25) You missed the point of the Lincoln quote. The substantive agreement of so many scientist can’t be bought or engineered. Think about what happened after the 1998 Mann hockey stick. Skeptics raised issues. These issues weren’t summarily dismissed, but a bunch of teams “repeated” the work in a bunch of different ways, — different proxies, different stats methods, etc. and all got much the same thing. By the 2007 IPCC report their were 11 such replications. That agreemnet wasn’t a result of funding sources, it occurred for the same reason that if 20 people measure the probability distribution of heights in a population of people, they all find the same distribution (with slightly different parameters), because THAT’S JUST THE WAY IT IS.

By: BFJ Cricklewood

BFJ Cricklewood — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 10:02:35 +0000

(#24) : Yes, the very existence of sceptics does support your Lincoln point. Note, though, that what has actually been bought in this particular case, is : virtually all professional climatology people, for all of the time. This, I am saying, results in a (heavy) bias in findings; I am not suggesting this provides a 100% compliance or unanimity. I agree there will probably still always be at least a few dissidents in the fold at any one time. The crucial difference in your meat example above, is that not all the researchers had the same source of funds or agenda.

By: Geoff Russell

Geoff Russell — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 04:17:48 +0000

(#23) “political bias in political funding”. I guess that explains why all those researchers in Australia and the US (for example) over the past decade have found results in keeping with the climate change denialist views
of the Governments paying all their research bills … oops … that didn’t happen did it, I wonder why not?

Governments and industry can influence many researchers from time to time in various ways, and they can buy smart advertisers and spin doctors ad libitum, but they have never, globally, been able to dictate research findings.

P.S. Hell, even Meat and Livestock Australia (and the rest of the global meat industry) can’t dictate global research results. Despite blanket advertising about the benefits of red meat and even serious undue influence with NHMRC official documents, MLA haven’t made the slightest dent in the findings of the global research community who have been painstakingly crossing all the i’s and dotting the t’s about exactly how red meat causes bowel cancer.

Apologies to Abe Lincoln: you can buy all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you can’t buy all the people all of the time.

By: BFJ Cricklewood

BFJ Cricklewood — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 17:24:50 +0000

Barry:
There is no need to posit conspiracy to see the political bias inherent in political funding. You just need to be realistic about what effect holding the climatology purse strings would tend to have, particularly as regards conclusions relating to the state’s role.

By: Barry Brook

Barry Brook — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 11:44:02 +0000

BJF Cricklewood, re: systematic bias of alarmism due to state funding — quit with the stupid conspiracy theories. If you’ve not got something sensible to contribute here, then lurk, or go vent your delusions elsewhere. If you wish to contribute constructively, like most people on these boards (whether I happen to agree with them or not), then you are welcome.

Regarding your comment: “It seems to me it is this : if pipeline heat is significant, so is AGW; and if it isn’t, nor is AGW”

We’ve had +0.74C global warming in the last 100 years and about 90 ppm CO2 rise. That’s +0.0082C/ppm. A doubling of CO2 on pre-industrial by mid-century would be +280ppm. Based on no further acceleration of temperature rise and nothing in the pipeline, this would imply a warming of +2.3C. So your statement is patently false, even if there was no aerosol masking or ocean inertia.

By: BFJ Cricklewood

BFJ Cricklewood — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 08:23:14 +0000

this is just a test ( a Preview button would be nice )

By: BFJ Cricklewood

BFJ Cricklewood — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 08:18:57 +0000

One major reason scientists would tend to believe in global warming, is that science is almost entirely state-funded, and global warming provides a golden reason to expand the role of the state.
Even with the best will in the world, the state’s vested interests will out, and the climatologists and peer-reviewers on its payroll can be expected to show a systemic bias in favour of alarmism over open-mindedness, driven by the state’s selection criteria for its grants. The net effect is that only one side of the debate gets real funding.

Another reinforcing bias is that scientists whose pitch is on behalf of an urgent and serious problem they says needs solving, can be expected to get more money than those who come along with less scary issues.

By: Sasparilla

Sasparilla — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 21:48:39 +0000

Fabulous article. Thank you Barry for putting this up.