There is science, and then there are dickheads

Written By: - Date published: 9:19 am, January 17th, 2014 - 153 comments
Categories: climate change, global warming, rodney hide, science - Tags:

Over the last three centuries science has established a pretty robust technique for overturning consensus and examining the weirder areas of science. You have to publish in peer reviewed journals with something testable or observed so that other smart people will attempt to tear your specific ideas to pieces. Waving an untestable vague idea of cause and effect around based on wordplay is something that is better left to politicians and other con artists.

As astronomer Phil Plait said at Slate a few days ago…

Huh. Here’s the thing: If you listen to Fox News, or right-wing radio, or read the denier blogs, you’d have to think climate scientists were complete idiots to miss how fake global warming is. Yet despite this incredibly obvious hoax, no one ever publishes evidence exposing it. Mind you, scientists are a contrary lot. If there were solid evidence that global warming didn’t exist, or that CO2 emissions weren’t the culprit, there would be papers in the journals about it. Lots of them.

I base this on my own experience with contrary data in astronomy. In 1998, two teams of researchers found evidence that the expansion of the Universe was not slowing down, as expected, but actually speeding up. This idea is as crazy as holding a ball in your hand, letting go, and having it fall up, accelerating wildly into the sky. Yet those papers got published. They inspired lively discussion (to say the least) and motivated further observations. Careful, meticulous work was done to eliminate errors and confounding factors, until it became very clear that we were seeing an overturning of the previous paradigm. It took years, but now astronomers accept that the Universal expansion is accelerating and that dark energy is the culprit.

Mind you, dark energy is far, far weirder than anything climate change deniers have come up with, yet it became mainstream science in a decade or so. Deniers have been bloviating for longer than that, yet their claims are rejected overwhelmingly by climate scientists. Why? Because they’re wrong.

That was my experience of science as well.  From doing a science degree and from the various people I know who’ve worked in science and engineering I’ve known over the years, people in science love to argue (boy do they like to argue). They are bull-headed enough to push through almost every obstacle if they think that their completely over the top idea is right (and most of them have a few weird ideas).

But they know they have to have a theory about the mechanism with ideas about how to observe it and/or they have observed evidence.  That is what peer-reviewed journals with equally bull-headed, opinionated, and knowledgeable smart people reviewing articles are looking for.

Merely ineffectually clutching your balls and waving a vague theory in the air like Rodney Hide did last week or such luminaries of logical thinking like Donald Trump did a week earlier isn’t “skepticism”. It is  just some dickheads who are too lazy to read the peer reviewed papers and who are seeking to increase their penis size by the column inches that equally lazy media editors are willing to give them. Gareth Morgan had a more mundane description of this phenomenon that is worth reading.

The more interesting question is why the media give numpties like Hide and Trump airtime when they are so clearly just playing Dumbass? As mentioned, 97% of scientists who work in this area agree that man-made climate change is real. Yet in some supposed quest for ‘balance’ the media continues to give half the airtime to the 3% of scientists that disagree. The result is that climate change sceptics are getting far more column inches than they deserve. This only serves to bolster the egos of the uninformed like Hide that can’t be bothered to read the research for themselves. But is this also a commentary on the poor state of media?

As with the recent Bob Jones suicide article that had to be pulled, there certainly is a need for our media to exercise greater quality control if its own relevance isn’t to suffer.

 As Phil Plait points out above, some pretty weird ideas go from being viewed as being completely crazy to being the accepted consensus in a field within a decade. In this age of fast and rapid communications I can’t think of a testable idea that has not apart from a few ideas that have proved to be bloody hard to test for. For instance that was the case with the Higgs boson which took more than 40 years. But with our increased population and its consequent increased population of scientists now probably exceeds the entire population of scientists in history prior to 1950, ideas are torn apart and tested like never before.

Untestable was also the case for the theory of human generated greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and oceans causing climate change. I first ran across this as a theory back in 1979 when I started doing an Earth Sciences degree. At that point it’d been around as a untestable idea for most of a century. That was mainly because to prove it one way or another required the types of long-period observations of air and water temperatures from across the whole world that we simply didn’t have. Climate changes the weather patterns gradually. Fluctuations in day-to-day weather are far more extreme than anything that can be seen in climate patterns in anything less than a decade (something that Rodney Hides dick-waving managed to forget).

In 1979 the World Meteorological Organisation held its first climate conference  (WCC-1) to evaluate the theory and its impacts. In the decades since, the introduction of satellites for weather observation and global communications, plus a deliberate focus on testing the theory have shifted the basis. It isn’t a theory and this is reflected in the peer-reviewed papers.

Getting back to Phil’s article again..

In 2012, National Science Board member James Lawrence Powell investigated peer-reviewed literature published about climate change and found that out of 13,950 articles, 13,926 supported the reality of global warming. Despite a lot ofsound and fury from the denial machine, deniers have not really been able to come up with a coherent argument against a consensus. The same is true for a somewhat different study that showed a 97 percent consensus among climate scientists supporting both the reality of global warming and the fact that human emissions are behind it.

Powell recently finished another such investigation, this time looking at peer-reviewed articles published between November 2012 and December 2013. Out of 2,258 articles (with 9,136 authors), how many do you think explicitly rejected human-driven global warming? Go on, guess!

One. Yes, one.

What that means in science terms is that are no credible testable or even vaguely credible theories out there that contradict the theory that humans are inducing climate change in their own planet. It doesn’t mean that there aren’t extreme arguments in the scientific community about how fast it is happening and where it is happening. The general conservative scientific consensus as expressed by the IPCC and WMO is that it is happening fast.

It just means that unlike the wishful dick-waving world of Rodney Hide and his band of great ape followers performing their ancient instincts, no-one with any knowledge doubts that it happening.

153 comments on “There is science, and then there are dickheads ”

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  1. karol 1
    17 January 2014 at 9:49 am

    It’s also curious that the likes of Hide and Trump would be so prepared to ignore the weight of peer reviewed evidence rather than look for solutions to the way humans are damaging the planet. It’s so self-serving in the short term and self -defeating in the long run – not doing anything for the people and other beings of the future.

    • Colonial Viper 1.1
      17 January 2014 at 1:07 pm

      Having said similar before, I think that Hide and Trump may genuinely be fooled by the hundreds of millions of dollars helping to fuel massive denier camp spin.

      Many at the senior level of government, senior levels of firms like BP and ExxonMobil, an the various high level PR and corporate entities who are part of the denier machine – they absolutely know the truth about climate change yet are willingly sacrificing the rest of us (and themselves) to deny it or delay action.

      Whether you wish to view this them as sociopathic, demonic, or merely self-serving, it will likely bring about the end of global civilisation as we know it within the next 50 or so years. Global energy depletion mixed in with 4-5 deg C temperature rises mean no other outcome is possible other than rapid reductions in human population.

  2. Paul 2
    17 January 2014 at 10:01 am

    Great title.
    Must remember to use it whenever the deniers/flatearthers turn up..
    It saves so much wasted time trying to explain what evidence and science is.

    • lprent 2.1
      17 January 2014 at 10:40 am

      After a decade explaining the subject to people who aren’t interested in evidence (like dickwaver Rodney), I find it simpler not to. It is a reaction rather than that I have never tried.

      • JonL 2.1.1
        17 January 2014 at 1:36 pm

        I’m getting the same way, as are several mates – you get sick of batting your head against a brick wall – you get to a stage of “can’t be bothered to be shouted down again”

  3. vto 3
    17 January 2014 at 10:09 am

    How can global warming not exist… the Waitemata Harbour has risen over 100mm since 1910.

    Ignore at your peril

  4. Yoza 4
    17 January 2014 at 10:11 am

    Nevermind right-wing outlets denying the deluge of evidence warning of the impending disaster, more pressure needs to be applied to mainstream outlets to take the problem more seriously – when was the last time National Radio committed significant resources to publicizing the issue.

    The real problem with climate change, other than the alarming rate at which it is increasing, is its threat to the commercial imperative. As long as attending to the causes of anthropogenic global warming threatens the short to medium profit margins of corporations governments will continue with lip service while acting in the interests of big business.

    The activity governments seem most obsessed with pursuing is that of ratcheting up their respective domestic security apparatus. There seems to be an official acceptance of the very real threat global warming presents to humanity and that threat will mean a form of martial law for the majority to protect the status and privilege of the well heeled few.

  5. Morrissey 5
    17 January 2014 at 10:19 am

    The likes of Hide and Trump and Screaming Lord Monckton have been given virtual carte blanche to rampage over our public airwaves. Perhaps the most spectacular example of this occurred on an infamous Prime TV “special debate” about Global Warming in 2008. Two polite scientists were continually shouted into silence by NewstalkZB fruitcake Leighton Smith, who did nearly all of the talking (actually it was nearly all ranting) for the entire hour. His offsider was the rogue Waikato University Willem de Lange, who Smith shushed and took over every time he began to speak. [1] The Pythonian travesty was refereed with utter ineptness by an unhappy looking Eric Young, from the Sports department—obviously no one with any journalistic credentials wanted anything to do with it. [2]

    And it’s not just fish-out-of-water sports jocks like Eric Young who seem incapable of challenging the science-deniers. Hosts you’d assume would be smarter, like National Radio’s Kathryn Ryan, seem bewildered and helpless in the face of the aggressive tactics of the denialists….
    http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-24102013/#comment-715845

    [1] It was the most hapless performance by a bearded New Zealand man until poor old “Sir” Peter Jackson was forced to accompany Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens in a televised attack on New Zealand film and screen workers in 2010.

    [2] It was the worst display of refereeing, or more precisely, non-refereeing that would be seen in this country until the final of the 2011 Rugby World Cup.

  6. You_Fool 6
    17 January 2014 at 10:52 am

    But apparently according to Fox/Hide/Dick wavers all those scientists (or thousandeers as Jon Stewart called them) are making up data and patting each others backs so they can continue to get money from the lucrative climate change industry.

    Didn’t you know that climate change is caused by sun-spots, that it was hotter in roman times, or what ever ancient times are being referenced this week, and that the temperature hasn’t increased for 10 years! Also 1979 was an unusually cold year (apparently) and so the base line is wrong. If you choose some other arbitrary date and use arbitrary and made up numbers you get a different result!

    Don’t you know anything?

  7. Paul Campbell 7
    17 January 2014 at 11:15 am

    I think the thing to remember is that the scientists who make names for themselves the ones who get the Nobels, the professorships, the big grants, are the ones who do overturn the dominant paradigms and replace them with better science that eventually everyone comes to agree with.

    If there was real evidence against climate change out there we would see people tripping over each other to be that person who published that key paper that everyone cites because it would make their career

  9. captain hook 9
    17 January 2014 at 11:52 am

    there is knowledge and opinion but here in New Zealand the idiotes and disseminators of rubbish get more acknowledgement than the purveyors of truth.
    You see the supply of truth is is everywhere but the demand is for infantilism and cheap empty distractions.
    You know.
    Like leaf blowers and hardly davidsons so you can make enough noise to drown everything else out.
    thats the kiwi way.
    Mate!

  10. Tracey 10
    17 January 2014 at 11:59 am

    On this site a couple of weeks ago a denier posted that the two ships trapped in ice was evidence that climate warming was not happening. I came to this thread to see him grapple with the contradiction of Mt Cook shrinking due to loss of ice cap… can’t see him here yet.

    • enoch powell 10.1
      18 January 2014 at 2:04 pm

      Tracey rock doesn’t shrink ahhhh umm. It was only because they now have much more accurate measuring equipment GPS now than the 1800s. That is why they have revised it down by 30 meters for pharks sake please!!

      • Lloyd 10.1.1
        21 January 2014 at 1:07 pm

        The top of Mt Cook is ice. Ice melts and avalanches. Quite a lot fell off a few years ago.

        But don’t worry, the Seaward Kaikouras will be higher than the Southern Alps in a million years or so…..

        [lprent: enoch got banned yesterday for the classic flame troll trait of “reinterpretation” of what others were saying and then not dealing with the requests to link to where people had said what he claimed. Then the dipshit tried to lie to me by claiming victim status because those he’d lied about were insisting on clarification. FFS I can search all comments – now that is really stupid to be around here. ]

  11. Yoza 11
    17 January 2014 at 12:05 pm

    On the subject of Bjorn Lomborg, I would recommend The Lomborg Deception by Howard Friel. I’m only at the beginning, but it does seem to be shaping up as a comprehensive debunking of Lomborg’s ‘contribution’ to the study of humanity’s affect on the climate.

  12. Tracey 12
    17 January 2014 at 12:11 pm

    From: Sammon, Bill
    To: 169 -SPECIAL REPORT; 036 -FOX.WHU; 054 -FNSunday; 030 -Root (FoxNews.Com); 050 -Senior Producers; 051 -Producers; 069 -Politics; 005 -Washington
    Cc: Clemente, Michael; Stack, John; Wallace, Jay; Smith, Sean
    Sent: Tue Dec 08 12:49:51 2009
    Subject: Given the controversy over the veracity of climate change data…

    …we should refrain from asserting that the planet has warmed (or cooled) in any given period without IMMEDIATELY pointing out that such theories are based upon data that critics have called into question. It is not our place as journalists to assert such notions as facts, especially as this debate intensifies.”

    Read more here

    It might be of interest that some of the climate chnage at human hands deniers here also don’t believe Key lies to them or misleads them in any way, or don’t care if they have more money in their pockets…. a direct correlation with Murdoch’s motivation in opposing CCAHH?

  13. Poission 13
    17 January 2014 at 12:17 pm

    Morgans assumption is inconsistent with theory, eg.

    We know the strong westerly winds that usually break up the sea ice are moving north as the climate warms, leaving more calm ocean for the sea ice to form on

    Theory (or at least the modeled behavior,and to some extent the observations) suggest the poleward expansion of the Hadley cell,and poleward migration of the westerly windbelt (and accompanying stormtracks).

    The arguments of southern sea ice persistent growth , do not necessarily falsify AGW,they do who ever falsify the CMIP5 models for the AR5 review as they show a decrease in SO sea ice.

    Current thinking is they are underestimating natural variability ie that expansions and contraction occur over longer time periods and also that O3 depletion and recovery are also players.

  14. Shona 14
    17 January 2014 at 12:26 pm

    Lprent Fucking Great!!! I am using the internet to give myself entertainment during my breaks from renovating this summer( aka turd polishing DIY is a pain!) Hides’ ignorant drivel in his weekly column had the steam hissing out my ears . Your title has made my day! Links filed quotes duly memorized. Keep up the good work.
    As we are having a cool unpredictable summer at the northern end of the country the older conservative professional members of our whanau are finally listening to us younger(50’s) lunatic, greenie leftie family members because even they have noticed things ain’t what they used to be summer weather wise. I never thought it would take until I was nearing retirement for the reality of climate change to penetrate the minds of the masses.

  15. Tracey 15
    17 January 2014 at 12:28 pm

    Rodney Hide versus Kennedy Graham…

    http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/kennedy-graham-response-to-rodney-hide

    Some of the righties on here state than when anyone calls them names it’s cos they have no argument and have lost… does that means Hide lost this one?

    Rodney’s said this

    ” Future historians may point to this one ironic event as the trigger that finally ended the public fear of global warming. The Australasian Antarctic Expedition was stuck fast over Christmas and New Year in Antarctic sea ice. In summer. The ice beat back three ice-breakers.

    How can this be? Isn’t global warming melting the ice and flooding the coast? ” Jan 4 2013

    I think he hasn’t commented on Mt Cook because his head must have exploded because using his logic, which includes ignoring scientists, he must be adamant that Mt Cook must have shrunk because of global warming, …

    “The readings confirm new aerial photography-based calculations performed by Otago National School of Surveying researcher Dr Pascal Sirguey and Masters student Sebastian Vivero.

    Dr Sirguey, the project leader for the research, said the discrepancy between the old height – estimated from aerial photography immediately following a massive rock-ice collapse in December 1991 – and the new height can be explained by a two-decades-long reshaping process affecting the remnant of the originally thick ice cap.

    “By carefully studying photos taken after the collapse, it appears that there was still a relatively thick ice cap, which was most likely out of balance with the new shape of the summit ridge,” he said.

    “As a result the ice cap has been subject to erosion over the past 20 years. While the effects of climate change may spring to mind as an explanation, it is probably a case of a simple change in the geomorphology of the mountain.”

  16. Tracey 16
    17 January 2014 at 12:31 pm

    “Researchers rushed to point out that despite the short-term cold, winters have been getting warmer, on average (and that Australia is currently in the grips of a brutal heat wave). But the weather-related denial of global warming is a pernicious pattern that troubles climate scientists: When the weather is hot, the public believes more in climate change. When it’s cold, people shrug off their concerns.

    “It’s striking that society has spent so much time and effort educating people about this issue, yet people’s beliefs can shift so easily,” said Lisa Zaval, a graduate student in psychology at Columbia University in New York. [8 Ways Global Warming is Already Changing the World]

    The root of the problem

    Zaval is the lead author of a new study that delves into why the weather so easily sways people’s climate beliefs. It turns out that when making decisions, people tend to lean on the most accessible information available — even when that information is not particularly accurate or relevant.

    According to an April 2013 poll by Gallup, 58 percent of Americans worry a fair or great deal about climate change, and 57 percent say they believe climate change is caused by human activities. But 41 percent say that the scientific and media message about climate change is largely exaggerated.

    But belief shifts with the seasons. In June 2013, after a cold winter in the United States, 63 percent of Americans believed in global warming, according to a survey by the National Surveys on Energy and Environment (NSEE). In the fall before that brutal winter, 67 percent believed.
    – See more at: http://www.livescience.com/42526-weather-influences-climate-change-belief.html#sthash.L4sCbG9a.dpuf

    Trump and Hide are examples of why we have to forget this BS that people who are in the public eye and have money are intelligent and know stuff.

    They might know how to make money… although Trump’s record at that is chequered, but don’t credit them with intelligence as a result.

  17. Ross 17
    17 January 2014 at 12:46 pm

    “If you listen to Fox News, or right-wing radio, or read the denier blogs, you’d have to think climate scientists were complete idiots to miss how fake global warming is. Yet despite this incredibly obvious hoax, no one ever publishes evidence exposing it.”

    A straw man. Scientists agree and disagree all the time. There’s nothing unusual about that. There’s no need to get hysterical.

    The issue is that if billions are spent on alleviating the effects of climate change, where does the money come from? More importantly, is spending vast sums of money the best use of money? That seems dubious.

    The biggest environmental problem facing the world is air pollution…how much money should we devote to rectifying this problem, and where does the money come from?

    “Today’s policies to combat climate change cost much more than the benefits they produce. Unfortunately, bad political choices often make these policies even less cost-effective.”

    http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/bj-rn-lomborg-on-how-political-choices-make-bad-climate-change-policies-even-worse

    [lprent: As this was a diversionary topic not addressing anything in the post. It has been pushed to the end of the day so it doesn’t clutter the debate with irrelevancies. Stick to the topic or I will start banning. You have OpenMike to raise topics of your own. ]

    • karol 17.1
      17 January 2014 at 9:58 am

      It looks to me, from that article, that the problem is not so much the choices of poltiicians, but of big business. Those schemes are all allong the lines of assuming there’s a technological solution that will enable us to use as much energy-dependent equipment as we do now, by merelt replacing all energy output from fossil fuel technologies to renewables.

      The article mentions that muh cuts to CO2 emissions in the west is made by offshoring to China. But the interesting thing there is how much China (state led) is investing in renewable energy.

    • Pasupial 17.2
      17 January 2014 at 9:58 am

      Ross

      I might agree: “The biggest environmental problem facing the world is air pollution”, if by that you refer to the incessant production of CO2, CH4, and other atmospheric releases of greenhouse gases.

      “Scientists agree and disagree all the time. There’s nothing unusual about that.” However, in the case of antropogenic climate change, it is; scientists backed up by thousands of reputable studies, versus shills funded by oil companies using PR techniques honed by the tobacco lobby.

    • Richard Christie 17.3
      17 January 2014 at 10:00 am

      “If you listen to Fox News, or right-wing radio, or read the denier blogs, you’d have to think climate scientists were complete idiots to miss how fake global warming is. Yet despite this incredibly obvious hoax, no one ever publishes evidence exposing it.”

      A straw man.

      No, not a straw man argument, simply an observation and reasonable conclusion.
      Learn what a straw man argument is before before claiming you’ve discovered one.

      Scientists agree and disagree all the time. There’s nothing unusual about that. There’s no need to get hysterical.

      Did you actually read the post or not?

      (…link to political opinion of well known climate science contrarian)

      Lomborg huh, big fail.
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lomborg

      • Paul 17.3.1
        17 January 2014 at 10:12 am

        In support of your statement that Lomborg is a big fail.

        http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Copenhagen_Consensus

        The Copenhagen Consensus is an effort by controversial Danish public figure Bjorn Lomborg to develop a prioritized list of solutions to the world’s great challenges, such as diseases, malnutrition, sanitation, and climate. It has been criticized on the grounds that the process has been put to “dishonest uses” to bolster Lomborg’s attacks on the Kyoto agreement[1] – “the way he dwells on the climate change rather on the topics that he sees as more important serves to belittle the importance of climate change rather than finding solutions to the other problems”[2] , and that its framing – only looking five years out – biases the outcome “in such a way [as] to ignore long term strategic decision in favor [of] short term fixes (so-called ‘fire extinguishing’).”[2]

      • Ross 17.3.2
        17 January 2014 at 2:44 pm

        Thanks for the link, Richard.

        “In a 2010 interview with the New Statesman, Lomborg summarized his position on climate change: ‘Global warming is real – it is man-made and it is an important problem. But it is not the end of the world.'”

        So, Lomborg agrees that warming is real, man-made and an important problem. Not exactly sure what the problem is…unless you disagree with him.

    • One Anonymous Knucklehead 17.4
      17 January 2014 at 10:06 am

      Lomborg failed at the science so now he’s a political consultant? Oh, and by a staggering coincidence, he’s “skeptical” of the need to address AGW. This is your credible source?

      Did you read the Committee on Scientific Dishonesty’s verdict on his book?

      1. Fabrication of data;
      2. Selective discarding of unwanted results (selective citation);
      3. Deliberately misleading use of statistical methods;
      4. Distorted interpretation of conclusions;
      5. Plagiarism;
      6. Deliberate misinterpretation of others’ results.

      How ironic that allegations of dishonesty against a denier should be proven so conclusively.

      Thirty years of “skepticism”, no evidence, investigation after investigation, no evidence.

      Feeble.

      • Ross 17.4.1
        17 January 2014 at 2:49 pm

        Hmmm not sure why you quoted the DCSD’s verdict and missed the fact that it’s decision was subsequently overturned. Quite a glaring omission. Besides, you miss the point: Lomborg has acknowledged that climate change is man-made and is a problem.

    • lprent 17.5
      17 January 2014 at 10:35 am

      Scientists agree and disagree all the time.

      I said that in the post – several times – I guess you are one of the dick waving fools who doesn’t read posts?

      They disagree. They don’t act like the morons like Rodney Hide or on Fox who try to deny a problem because they find it conflicts with their view of the world rather than based on any testable theory.

      You’ll note that I didn’t look at the political issues – so I guess that is why you diverted to it. Shoving you comment to the end of the discussion.

      The biggest environmental problem facing the world is air pollution…how much money should we devote to rectifying this problem, and where does the money come from?

      Not emitting the air pollution (ie greenhouse gases) would be a good start. A simple technique to do that would be to tax materials causing it as close to the source as possible. Use the taxes raised to rectify the last couple of centuries of existing irreversible (in the next few thousand years) damage.

      • Anne 17.5.1
        17 January 2014 at 11:43 am

        There’s an extremist climate change denier who is putting his hat in the ring for Epsom – John Boscawen. Mentioned last evening but worthy of further discussion on this site. Given his obsessive attitude towards CC, he will be like a dog with a very large bone if he’s allowed to re-enter parliament. I understand he has/had a close association with the bogus outfit that took NIWA to court in an attempt to discredit NZ climate scientists. Don’t be surprised if he made significant financial contributions that enabled the NZ Climate Science Education Trust to proceed with the court hearing. He buys his influence and as such is dangerous. Here’s a clip from yesterday’s Checkpoint.

        http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/2582545

        Obvious he has been approached. Not by Steven Joyce this time but someone else on behalf of National. That means we are going to see a repeat performance in Epsom where the ACT candidate gets the nod.

    • You_Fool 17.6
      17 January 2014 at 10:55 am

      lprent: unfortunately it appears that now Ross’ comment stays at the top of the comment feed, which gives him more air than his ramblings deserve

    • Sigmund 17.7
      17 January 2014 at 12:27 pm

      [deleted]

      [lprent: The post was about people who denied that climate change was happening at all. Ross didn’t address that at all. If you want to write your own post about your own topic, then find somewhere else to do it that is not one of my posts. Banned for two weeks for terminal stupidity. ]

      • Tracey 17.7.1
        17 January 2014 at 12:34 pm

        There is some irony in your use of “Finite resources” because folks like Hide either believe they will last forever or don’t give a shit. Neither is particularly erudite.

        When a politician who has had so much influence over NZ in the last few years doesn’t get the difference between the weather and climate change…

    • Draco T Bastard 17.8
      17 January 2014 at 5:10 pm

      The issue is that if billions are spent on alleviating the effects of climate change, where does the money come from?

      The same place it’s always come from – the printing presses.

      More importantly, is spending vast sums of money the best use of money?

      Well, it’s certainly better than sticking it under the mattress.

      That seems dubious.

      The only thing that seems dubious is your ability to think.

  18. Colonial Viper 18
    17 January 2014 at 1:00 pm

    The scientific examples in the post of the expanding universe and the higgs boson are important for another reason.

    Their discovery may indeed have overturned (or confirmed) long held scientific paradigms…but they were also allowable because it was science which did not threaten the power elite, did not threaten patriarchal systems of privilege, did not threaten systems of corporate profit.

    • blue leopard (Get Lost GCSB Bill) 18.1
      17 January 2014 at 1:41 pm

      Yes, it appears that the standards of what is ‘acceptable’ research have changed since Higgs time.

      The following are excerpts from this link: https://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=6459

      Peter Higgs: “Today I wouldn’t get an academic job. It’s as simple as that”

      “He doubts a similar breakthrough could be achieved in today’s academic culture, because of the expectations on academics to collaborate and keep churning out papers. He said: “It’s difficult to imagine how I would ever have enough peace and quiet in the present sort of climate to do what I did in 1964.”

      “The work Higgs did in 1964 was on a rather unpopular topic….The 1960s however was a time of a great expansion in the number of university positions, so people like Higgs could make a career despite working on unpopular topics.”

      “In the UK today, things seem to be getting even worse, with strong pressures from the government to only fund work likely to have an immediate economic payoff. ”

      End of quoted material

      It appears the only thing those people with capital value is profit. They will invest in things that make ‘money on their money’ – regardless of how this affects our society – and those with capital don’t value knowledge, learning, jobs, or consequently, a positive future.

      • Colonial Viper 18.1.1
        17 January 2014 at 1:59 pm

        In other words, the creativity, imagination and discovery required for a humane and sustainable civilisation is being deliberately throttled and foreclosed.

        The decline of any empire always brings about insane, self destructive, reality denying behaviour.

        • blue leopard (Get Lost GCSB Bill) 18.1.1.1
          17 January 2014 at 2:06 pm

          Precise summary there CV
          This situation we find ourselves witnessing (& part of) really sucks 🙁

          I hope enough people are ‘getting’ what is going on so that we turn this situation around into something a whole lot more positive and sustainable.

          • Colonial Viper 18.1.1.1.1
            17 January 2014 at 3:00 pm

            If you are feeling disillusioned, it’s worthwhile asking how you came to be illusioned in the first place 😉

            We share ideas and build stronger networks within our circle of friends family and local community. We talk about these issues to build awareness and consensus that what is being done to us is not right.

            And we realise that doing something as simple as sharing the latest ideas about state surveillance, non GMO diets and good democratic governance may one day, not too far away, be considered revolutionary talk.

            • blue leopard (Get Lost GCSB Bill) 18.1.1.1.1.1
              17 January 2014 at 6:51 pm

              There has been very little opportunity in my life for any grand illusions (delusions) about our society- so, no – not disillusioned – it was pretty clear to me from very early on that idiocy has a habit of becoming the status quo (Cold War and Nuclear weapon proliferation were very much on the agenda in my formative years – shortly followed by an ‘economic system’ that no longer viewed people or ensuring a livelihood for all as important factors to be considered) – hence my use of the term ‘sucks’ :- 4. Vulgar Slang: To be disgustingly disagreeable or offensive

              ….although some of the other definitions ‘fit’ too: ‘drawing in by creating a partial vacuum’ i.e. Fooling people by creating a vacuum of opportunities so that they will agree to anything

              Now, is actually the most promising time, in my opinion, as far as the likelihood of actual positive change occurring, finally the type of issues and concerns commonly talked about in the social circles of my formative years are getting onto the main agenda, and this is due to the very mechanisms that you mention.

              …Noting how long this process has taken I do get impatient …I guess I have to remind myself that ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day’ (I acknowledge a certain irony to using that particular phrase!) – thanks CV

  19. Steve Wrathall 19
    17 January 2014 at 1:37 pm

    “Waving an untestable vague idea of cause and effect around based on wordplay…” You mean like “climate change is real”? If you claim that this slogan is testable them please state which real-world observation would falsify it.
    Meanwhile back in the real world Antarctic ice is at a record high for this time of year
    http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/antarctic.sea.ice.interactive.html

    • lprent 19.1
      17 January 2014 at 1:52 pm

      Ah a typical moron with a wordplay problem… Hears “global warming” and can’t think past the second word.

      Warming in one region will typically cause colder changes in other areas until the climate system reaches a steady state. Typically in a time of change that stability will take hundreds or even thousands of years to happen.

      As has been pointed out many times before, having carved off ice floes in the water rather than on glaciers isn’t exactly a good thing. In fact it is exactly what you’d expect to happen if there was increased warming in a polar region. You do understand that ice in ‘warmer’ (even a degree or so) water will cause a transition called “melting’ right?

      For instance the Pine Island Glacier in West Antarctica is a very disturbing sign.
      http://www.antarctica.ac.uk/about_bas/news/news_story.php?id=2468

      I’d expect to see more ice further away from land as the Antarctic continent warms. There will be more cold air getting further away from land. More calving from glaciers.

      In exactly the same way that I’d expect a increased probability of cold blasts in areas adjacent to the Arctic like northern Europe and Northern America, as more heat in the arctic allows cool air masses to move further south than they usually do.

      But why am I bothering to explain to someone using his dick as a brain?

      • Steve Wrathall 19.1.1
        17 January 2014 at 4:33 pm

        So whether sea ice is increasing or reducing, it supports the alarmist CAGW hypothesis.
        I repeat “please state which real-world observation would FALSIFY it (CAGW)”. Otherwise you’re simply in the realm of religion, where every concievible observation supports your view.

        • McFlock 19.1.1.1
          17 January 2014 at 4:54 pm

          Global sea ice increasing at the same time as global glacier mass increasing, over a sustained period might be a start.

          I.e. more frozen H2Oin the world.

        • Macro 19.1.1.2
          17 January 2014 at 5:16 pm

          Steve you really are a simplistic fool..

          One observation – no matter how “real world” is of itself sufficient to falsify anything.

          Many observations contrary to expectations might suggest a theory is insufficient, but in the case of increasing Antarctic sea ice – that is not only expected, but supports AGW. Disappearing sea ice in Arctic waters is also expected and also supports AGW. They are two entirely different situations and physical conditions. Your simplistic analysis just compounds your ignorance.

          • Steve Wrathall 19.1.1.2.1
            17 January 2014 at 6:01 pm

            Actually most scientific theories could indeed be falsified by one inconvenient fact.

            • Naturesong 19.1.1.2.1.1
              17 January 2014 at 6:05 pm

              I don’t think you actually understand what science is;
              A) It is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe.
              B) The body of knowledge that results from A.

              By definition facts are not an inconvenience to science, they are a prerequisite.

            • Macro 19.1.1.2.1.2
              17 January 2014 at 8:26 pm

              Actually there you would be quite wrong. An inconvenient fact indicates that the science is not completely understood, but not in the way you think.

            • McFlock 19.1.1.2.1.3
              17 January 2014 at 8:39 pm

              which scientific theory do you think could be falsified by a single inconvenient fact?

              • Macro …
                17 January 2014 at 11:13 pm

                The bohr atom and rutherfords gold leaf bombardment are a case in point. The fact that the alpha particles passed through and did not bounce back indicated that the concept of a pudding atom may not be correct. It didn’t at that point falsify the theory ,rather it led to a modification of the atomic theory, to account for the new evidence.

              • Steve Wrathall …
                18 January 2014 at 8:13 am

                The theory that all swans are white, by one black swan

                • Naturesong …
                  18 January 2014 at 8:38 am

                  Thats not a theory, its a hypothesis

                  Which you have just tested. This is a good thing because it adds to your knowledge about the colour of swans.

                  • Macro …
                    18 January 2014 at 10:09 am

                    Yes the exception – proves (tests) the rule!

                    One would have thought that on completing a Bachelors in Science Steve would have gained some insight into the scientific method – but obviously not.

                    • Naturesong …
                      18 January 2014 at 10:21 am

                      I notice he also doesn’t understand *occams razor below, confusing it with **Russell’s teapot. Which he then applies incorrectly.

                      *principle of parsimony (the hypothesis with fewer assumptions is likely the correct one)
                      **philosophic burden of proof lies upon a person making scientifically unfalsifiable claims rather than shifting the burden of proof to others

                    • Macro …
                      18 January 2014 at 10:29 am

                      Yes I was about to expand on Occam’s razor as well.

                      But I fear Steve is a lost cause… and I have a beach to sun on.. 🙂

        • Tracey 19.1.1.3
          17 January 2014 at 5:51 pm

          once a paradigm or hypothesis is put forward, surely there is some onus on the contrarian to provide a credible, researched counter hypothesis. Aren’t you suggesting there is a GOD if an atheist can’t prove there isn’t?

          • Steve Wrathall 19.1.1.3.1
            18 January 2014 at 8:18 am

            The counter hypothesis is that natural causes are sufficient to explain observable climate variation. Occam’s razor says the burden of proof is on those offering the superfluous extra explanatory variable (AGHGs) as to why thier extra variable is needed, when there is no evidence that observed climatic conditions are outside expected natural variation.

            • Colonial Viper 19.1.1.3.1.1
              18 January 2014 at 10:45 am

              9 of the hottest years on record have occurred since 1998 mate. Open your eyes or you’ll be a cooked goose.

              • Steve Wrathall …
                18 January 2014 at 2:55 pm

                Yes, entirely consistent with a world that has been gently warming since we started accurate temp measurements at the end of the little ice age.

        • lprent 19.1.1.4
          17 January 2014 at 6:42 pm

          please state which real-world observation would FALSIFY it (CAGW)

          Sea ice is made up of several components. One part is calving from glaciers, the other major part is the formation of ice from seawater during winter. The formation of the latter only matters in that it constrains the calving (apart from that it is a function of weather). Seasonal sea ice has a limited volume. This effect was demonstrated in the Antarctic peninsula where the average summer temps grew by about a degree C per decade for 5 decades, the summer sea ice dropped to little and the glacier calving massively increased.

          The test would be the *end of summer* extent of sea ice (ie not calved) in Antarctica. If it was increasing over a decade then it would be a good indicator that temperatures in the global fridge were falling.

    • Paul 19.2
      17 January 2014 at 5:38 pm

      “There is science, and then there are dickheads.”

  20. Tracey 20
    17 January 2014 at 1:45 pm

    Weather and climate change are different

    • Paul 20.1
      17 January 2014 at 5:41 pm

      Either too advanced for SW or he takes every word he reads on some deranged right wing blog at their word.
      Doubt he’s ever bothered to look at the Science without looking through the filters of a Monkton or other nut bar.

  21. Natwest 21
    17 January 2014 at 2:15 pm

    So, if the science is settled and we are experiencing man made “Climate Change” and us deniers all have “dicks as brains”.

    Can you please explain to this dickhead who or what was responsible for the climate change that occurred say 2.5 million years ago before man inhabited the earth – you know, the decades of Ice Age, followed by years of warming.

    Or isn’t that classified as “Climate Change”for the purposes of this settled science?

      • Natwest 21.1.1
        17 January 2014 at 3:04 pm

        thanks for the amazing idea – yes and the scientists blame CO2, but how was “man” responsible for this if they were not present.

        After all you so firmly believe it’s all “man’s” nasty polluting and the rise in CO2 that is causing “Climate Change”currently.

        Me thinks you are all bunch of gullible leemings, you’ll believe and follow any idea if it is written.

        The old saying – if you say/print it often enough (even untruths) people will ultimately believe it.

        • wtl 21.1.1.1
          17 January 2014 at 3:18 pm

          Let’s say a car crashes because its brakes don’t work. The police investigate the crash and find that the brakes were intentionally sabotaged. I suppose you would be jumping up and down and saying, “That can’t be true, the brakes must have failed due to wear and tear, because there have been crashes in the past that were due to brakes failing but sabotage wasn’t involved!”

        • Tracey 21.1.1.2
          17 January 2014 at 5:46 pm

          Do you consider it is possible that man’s actions, particularly since industrialization could adverse affect the environment, ecosystem and/or climate?

        • Tracey 21.1.1.3
          17 January 2014 at 5:49 pm

          “Me thinks you are all bunch of gullible leemings (sic), you’ll believe and follow any idea if it is written.

          The old saying – if you say/print it often enough (even untruths) people will ultimately believe it.”

          Thank you for so succinctly explaining why we still have a National Government.

        • One Anonymous Knucklehead 21.1.1.4
          18 January 2014 at 8:29 am

          Natwest, where did you get the idea that the last age ended because of anything we did?

          The evidence that the recent rise in CO2 is anthropogenic is the change in the atmospheric carbon isotope ratio.

          Blithering about subjects you clearly have not researched just makes you look ignorant, foolish, and credulous.

          If you had any self-respect, you’d be angry with the people who fed you this bunch of horse-shit, that has caused you to make such a spectacle of yourself, and angry at yourself for believing them.

          If on the other hand you’re doing it deliberately, how does it feel, doing Wormtongue’s job?

  22. ropata 22
    17 January 2014 at 2:46 pm

    Credentials in an age of Blogging illustrates how any idiot with a computer can get more traction than actual experts in a specialist field.

    BTW lprent, your figure of 97% agreement in the academic community is incorrect; it’s more like 99.9%

  23. captain hook 23
    17 January 2014 at 3:31 pm

    the funny thing about the climate change deniers is that they are all theologasters, child smackers and love science when it comes to nuclear weapons and teevee so they can see their mugs on the big screen.
    figure that out.

  24. Tracey 24
    17 January 2014 at 5:53 pm

    Natwest

    “Me thinks you are all bunch of gullible leemings (sic), you’ll believe and follow any idea if it is written.

    The old saying – if you say/print it often enough (even untruths) people will ultimately believe it.”

    Thank you for so succinctly explaining why we still have a National Government.

  25. aerobubble 25
    17 January 2014 at 7:08 pm

    Profits are up, the executives vanity hits new highs. In government a politician wants a photo opportunity for re-election, and so calls up the executives to get some of that success rub off.
    They get together, and decide they are the king makers, and so they demand that universities
    should open up to profit, ignoring that the initial boost to profits came from the universities.
    A closed community, hidden and so capable of thinking revolutionary thoughts, now is to
    track with the general profits of society and politics. Conservatism invades the bastion of progressives.

    Worse. The better the profits from the universities the more justified the policy of profits.

    And it works, but it works due to the infusion of cheap high density fuels, and state fiscal relaxation,
    into the world economy. The results, not a noted economist called the banking collapse.

    And now the money is tight, the first programs to go to the wall? those that create profits, or those
    that do core science and revolutionary thinking? And where is science now done? Online wading through information overload and inaccuracy.

  26. Corokia 26
    17 January 2014 at 7:09 pm

    Another example of the MSM pretending that the climate change issue is still being debated, the ODT editorial today on extreme weather events “For while governments and scientists the world over may argue about the whys and wherefores”. Arguing, really? Only one peer reviewed paper opposing the consensus. The ODT is misleading its readers (no suprise there sadly)

  27. Murray Olsen 27
    17 January 2014 at 8:32 pm

    There is only one proven way that I know of for scientists to make a lot of money and keep working in science these days. That is promising to build a quantum computer, the research for this being largely funded by the US military, intelligence services, and the Australian government. It is relatively common for physicists working on this to be paid far more than others within the same institutions. Despite all the bullshit by Hide, Monckton and co, climate scientists don’t tend to get any special treatment.

  28. Flip 28
    17 January 2014 at 9:50 pm

    + number of Hiroshima atomic bombs of heat since 1979 our climate has accumulated

    A book that was recommended to me is Merchants of Doubt http://www.merchantsofdoubt.org/index.html

    Tells how these denial manipulators work.

  29. RedLogix 29
    17 January 2014 at 10:08 pm

    Just to add my little tuppence – by pure coincidence I happen to know four people who work directly in the climate/earth science area. Many long years ago I myself worked five years for a geophysics institution. (Not as a scientist I must hasten to add.)

    The thing is that all working scientists are approached from time to time by amateurs and nutters who imagine that they’ve overturned the conventional wisdom in the subject – and can be quite obsessive about it. Almost always they are wrong because lacking a broad and basic understanding of the topic they have selectively latched onto a subset of incomplete ideas that has led them down a time-wasting dead-end.

    Occasionally one of them will come up with an original or interesting idea, so it’s best to treat them with polite disdain, because however unlikely, they may prove worth listening to. With time most fade off into well-deserved obscurity because they obdurately refuse to learn anything.

    But the case of climate change dickheads is interesting. Twenty years ago climate change science was an uncontroversial field. It was then relatively undeveloped and there remained a great deal more work to be done – but the basics were pretty much agreed upon. And of course it attracted the usual gamut of ill-informed amateurs, obsessives and nutters, but instead of fading away since they have only gained attention and prominence.

    The reason for this is simple. The usual tactic from the scientists of treating them with polite disdain, waiting for them to get bored and go away hasn’t worked. Instead it has been the corporates and it’s paid media who have given them the oxygen and attention they needed. The problem is not the Steve Wrathall’s and Rodney Hide’s of this world – it is the people who have deep vested interests, the big corporate carbon burners whose immense wealth has kept this so called controversy alive.

    And of course the idiots have been a very useful smokescreen for the money to hide behind.

    Oh and just for the record – the real professional scientists privately regard people like Rodney Hide with utter and absolute contempt. And not because these deniers are wrong – but because of their complete intellectual dishonesty. In the world of real scientists being wrong is forgive-able; but refusing to learn from your mistakes is not.

  30. Conquestored 30
    18 January 2014 at 1:01 am

    http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/17/science/earth/un-says-lag-in-confronting-climate-woes-will-be-costly.html?hp&_r=0 I don’t really think it matters anymore. The people that are in charge are sociopaths.

    • Colonial Viper 30.1
      18 January 2014 at 10:53 am

      Given that the melting of the Arctic are the feverish death throes of the planet, but politicians and corporates from US, Canada, Russia, Europe etc. simply see it as an opportunity to drill for yet more oil, gas and money…yes it looks like we are fucked.

      Our global civilisation has transformed into an insane death loving institution under our watch.

  31. enoch powell 31
    18 January 2014 at 9:05 am

    I believe there is a lot of conjecture over climate change and rightly so. Its become fashionable science that isnt evidence based. Al Gores video still streams in our schools with at least 25 factual errors in it

    • Paul 31.1
      18 January 2014 at 1:34 pm

      ‘There is science, and then there are dickheads.’
      This comment shows where you choose to place yourself.

    • Draco T Bastard 31.2
      18 January 2014 at 2:30 pm

      I believe there is a lot of conjecture over climate change and rightly so.

      Your belief is wrong. The majority of climatologists agree that there is climate change and that humans are influencing it and that that influence is not good for continued life on this planet.

  32. enoch powell 32
    18 January 2014 at 9:33 am

    Not so sure about this
    What that means in science terms is that are no credible testable or even vaguely credible theories out there that contradict the theory that humans are inducing climate change in their own planet. It doesn’t mean that there aren’t extreme arguments in the scientific community about how fast it is happening and where it is happening. The general conservative scientific consensus as expressed by the IPCC and WMO is that it is happening fast.

    How about this
    http://judithcurry.com/2012/06/22/science-held-hostage-in-climate-debate/

    • Lloyd 32.1
      21 January 2014 at 9:22 pm

      The New Zealand yacht Tokimata sailed the Northwest passage amongst a bunch of other vessels during the northern summer of 2012. I seem to recollect more vessels in total did the Northwest passage that year than ever before. The route was BUSY. This would appear to be a better demonstration that the climate of the Arctic is changing than one ship getting stuck for a week in ice off Antarctica.

      Check out:

      http://www.sailblogs.com/member/tokimata2012/?show=contents&p=1

      NZ sailors need to learn a new law of the sea – sail gives way to polar bears.

  33. captain hook 33
    18 January 2014 at 10:47 am

    I see some posters say there is no climate change because of one incident where a ship filled with dickheads was trapped in the ice in summer. Thats just an isolated incident in the whole scheme of things.
    The number that counts is the number of frost days in winter which are on a steady decline.
    This is important because many crop seeds need a frost to ‘scarify’ the seed case and allow proper germination.
    When this fails or moves south then sayonara baby!

  34. newsense 34
    18 January 2014 at 12:58 pm

    just a thought- I wonder if any of the people, countries or companies to be severly affected by climate change could sue outlets such as Fox and others that have created doubt over the science by unbalanced reporting.

  35. enoch powell 35
    18 January 2014 at 1:13 pm

    Remember when Jimmy Spitall said wouldn’t it be a great come back from here?When oracle was eight races down and everyone went yeaa right!!

    Well what would you say if Al Gore with Global warming has actually created the worlds largest Ponzi scheme for personal gain. Knowing how the left usually detest people who are mega rich that wouldn’t sit to well would it?
    http://www.examiner.com/article/al-gore-pushes-global-warming-for-personal-profit

    • One Anonymous Knucklehead 35.1
      18 January 2014 at 2:19 pm

      Al Gore is rich, therefore CO2 isn’t opaque to certain frequencies of electro-magnetic radiation?\

      That makes so much sense; it’s all becoming clear now: you’re trying to give everyone the impression that you’re an idiot. It’s working too.

    • Lloyd 35.2
      21 January 2014 at 9:27 pm

      Explain the high temperatures in Australia this week then.

  36. enoch powell 36
    18 January 2014 at 1:24 pm

    One thing I have always struggled with the climate change debate is that if man made emissions are around 0.06% compared with natural emissions from the sea or peat marshes etc.. If we make an impact on that 0.06% how will that have an impact on the Natural emissions of 99.4%?

    http://www.examiner.com/article/man-made-co2-has-minimal-effect-on-climate-change-claim-global-warming-skeptics

    • Pascal's bookie 36.1
      18 January 2014 at 1:50 pm

      If you have always struggled with this concept, then I’m not sure we’d be able to help. It’s not that difficult for most humans to understand it.

      Have you considered that you might be a bit of an outlier on the can-do-thinking scale?

    • One Anonymous Knucklehead 36.2
      18 January 2014 at 2:01 pm

      Funny, you don’t seem to be able to quote any peer-reviewed articles. Just these political opinion pieces. Obviously you think they’re relevant in some way. Why? Are you scientifically illiterate or something?

    • Draco T Bastard 36.3
      18 January 2014 at 2:19 pm

      This may educate you as to why human GHG emissions have more effect than natural ones.

  37. Grumpy 37
    18 January 2014 at 4:16 pm

    Here’s someone a lot harder to discredit……….
    http://www.storyleak.com/mit-professor-climate-change/

    • One Anonymous Knucklehead 37.1
      18 January 2014 at 4:28 pm

      Really?

      Who told you that? How’s the Iris Hypothesis holding up? 😆

    • enoch powell 37.2
      18 January 2014 at 4:33 pm

      Grumpy
      Just stating what we all know. I don’t think that knucklehead will like the fact though that you have added more light on the subject. We just aren’t meant to say or know these things we are all meant to be mushrooms and accept the compost being given to us every day. Just as an aside is it true that the Antarctic Ice is thicker than it has been in 30 years. Well I will be buggered that just isn’t written into the script

      • One Anonymous Knucklehead 37.2.1
        18 January 2014 at 4:40 pm

        Grumpy said Richard “Exxon” Lindzen is hard to discredit. It took me less than two minutes to find one of his discredited hypotheses in the relevant field: the Iris Hypothesis simply didn’t match real world observations.

        I mean, it’s not my fault you keep putting up these zombie arguments.

        PS: By the way, Enoch, educational?

        • enoch powell 37.2.1.1
          18 January 2014 at 4:52 pm

          There is 20% more Ice than last year and its 30 cm thicker oh no that dispels the penguin extinction theory. Where will they get their funding money from now

          http://neven1.typepad.com/blog/volume-and-concentration/

          • One Anonymous Knucklehead 37.2.1.1.1
            18 January 2014 at 5:04 pm

            Minor detail. Are you talking about the Antarctic or the Arctic, because they’re in different hemispheres, and you blither about one while citing figures for the other.

            Personally I don’t think you have very much credibility. A basic error like that would embarrass a primary school student.

          • Draco T Bastard 37.2.1.1.2
            18 January 2014 at 5:20 pm

            There is 20% more Ice than last year and its 30 cm thicker

            Where? In your fridge?

            Five basic Antarctic facts for climate change sceptics

            • Poission 37.2.1.1.2.1
              18 January 2014 at 6:42 pm

              The IPCC review clearly identifies that there are issues with southern sea ice,and little understanding of the reasons for the persistent increase.

              It is very likely that the annual Antarctic sea ice extent increased
              at a rate of between 1.2 and 1.8% per decade between 1979 and 2012.

              There is low confidence in the scientific understanding of the observed increase in Antarctic sea ice extent since 1979, due to the incomplete and competing scientific explanations for the causes of change and low confidence in estimates of internal variability.

              (AR5 Chapter 10)

              • Draco T Bastard …
                18 January 2014 at 7:18 pm

                Yes, it said that in the article I linked to. The article I linked to also mentioned the massive loss of continental ice from Antarctica.

          • tricledrown 37.2.1.1.3
            19 January 2014 at 10:02 pm

            enoch their are now 1,000s of scientists working on the antartic all saying that humans are causing global warming not one says the opposite.
            including our own govt report that cost $32 million.

        • Grumpy 37.2.1.2
          18 January 2014 at 6:31 pm

          Man, the whole IPCC hypothesis didn’t match real world observations……..,

          • One Anonymous Knucklehead 37.2.1.2.1
            19 January 2014 at 7:09 am

            Grumpy, the IPCC doesn’t propose hypotheses, it collates and summarises existing research. Surely if you’re going to trot off a glib one-line retort you should at least try to reflect reality in some way.

        • Grumpy 37.2.1.3
          18 January 2014 at 6:37 pm

          You mean this guy?
          http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lindzen
          Lead author for IPCC Report………..I can see how you would want to try and discredit him. Seems to be a real expert, not just one of the “consensus” fringe.
          That 97% is starting to look very weak……

          • Draco T Bastard 37.2.1.3.1
            18 January 2014 at 7:15 pm

            That 97% is starting to look very weak…

            One person out of several thousand doesn’t do much to alter the 97% consensus.

            You logic, as per normal, fails.

            • Macro 37.2.1.3.1.1
              18 January 2014 at 10:50 pm

              Yeah – the 97% is very dodgy – more like 99.99%

              • jaymam …
                18 January 2014 at 11:33 pm

                Sure the 97% is very dodgy, they asked 10,257 earth scientists and only 77 chose to answer .
                75 agreed with the survey. That’s 0.73%.

                • Draco T Bastard …
                  19 January 2014 at 3:04 am

                  And you’re talking out your arse again.

                  Examining those 4000 papers, the study authors determined that 97.1 percent of them endorsed the consensus that humans are causing global warming. And here’s where they did the clever bit: They contacted 8500 authors of the papers in question and asked them to self-rate those papers. They got responses from 1200 authors (a nice fraction), and, using the same criteria as the study, it turns out 97.2 percent of the authors endorse the consensus.

                  • One Anonymous Knucklehead …
                    19 January 2014 at 7:16 am

                    Just to rub it in, that means Jaymam’s drivel is out by one entire order of magnitude.

                    Embarrassing much?

                    We need better deniers.

                    • One Anonymous Knucklehead …
                      19 January 2014 at 7:25 am

                      …in fact that should be two orders…my bad maths…embarrassing much 🙂

                    • jaymam …
                      19 January 2014 at 5:19 pm

                      75 people out of 10,257 people equals 0.73%. Nothing wrong with my maths.

                      http://www.c3headlines.com/2008/12/97percent-equals-75-anonymous-climate-scientists.html

                      First, it was the claim that 2,500 IPCC-related scientists agreed with the 2007 IPCC report. Soon afer it was discovered that the actual number of scientists who actually agreed with the report contents was only 25.

                      Next, when the 2,500 shrunk to 25, a couple of University of Illinois researchers conjured up a 2-minute online, anonymous survey that they hoped would deliver some big numbers to crow about. They solicited 10,257 earth scientists and only 77 chose to answer the online survey (yes, only 77). 75 of those “climate scientists” agreed with the survey’s two questions (yes, only 2 questions).

                      Voila, the infamous and widely publicized “97%” of climate scientists (75 divided by 77) who thought man was the cause of global warming turned out to be a numeric joke.

                      [lprent: Your link is to a conservative website that references the claim to itself. I went down 5 layers of links in that post and never made it out of conservative climate change denier sites from the National Post to wankers each spinning it a different way. What I didn’t find anywhere was an analysis of what they were talking about. It was an assertion without a basis.

                      The only mention of the basis for the claim of “25” was a vague reference that there were 25 people who wrote a letter to congress. Huh? Somehow it went from the number of earth scientists internationally working on the IPCC AR4 to a letter by a few US scientists to a US legislative body? This appears to have been the basis of this claim and there is exactly zero correspondence between the two.

                      That doesn’t just not qualify as “proof”, it just makes me ask if you really that much of a gullible dickhead? You certainly appear to use your dick as a thinking organ when it comes to “logic” on anything related to climate change. But it just wasted me 20 minutes looking at how morons quote morons without ever bothering to check what they were quoting.

                      Now let me make this statement. You have made this claim repeatedly. Been asked to verify it. You never have and you simply repeat it rather than discussing it. This has been a common trait of yours recently. It also makes you a troll – a stupid repetitive one that doesn’t check the basis of what you have been saying and doesn’t discuss it.

                      If I see you raise this or any other topic again without qualifying it with exact information about how others can verify it – then you will be banned permanently with no chance of an amnesty. You are now on a prove everything that you say basis in the same way that Jenny was before she got banned. ]

                    • One Anonymous Knucklehead …
                      19 January 2014 at 6:02 pm

                      If there’s no consensus why do all the Royal Academies of Science concur?

                      You think “Climate Conservative Consumer” is a credible source, do you? Sad. Have you made the slightest attempt to falsify their drivel? No. You just swallowed it whole, and now here you are behaving like a credulous parrot.

                      Polly wanna cracker?

                      PS: I see Lprent has called you out for your bullshit. Don’t worry, it will be easy for you to verify your claims, won’t it, because they’re so truthy 😆 what a dupe.

            • One Anonymous Knucklehead 37.2.1.3.1.2
              19 January 2014 at 7:10 am

              …and his maths.

  38. Tracey 38
    23 January 2014 at 10:11 am

    Yikes. I wonder how many of the folks on this thread who adamantly deny climate change and consider it a money making hoax by Al Gore, believe that John Key has never lied while our Prime Minister?

  39. Mike S 39
    26 January 2014 at 9:29 pm

    Just got shown the following link

    http://www.principia-scientific.org/breaking-new-climate-data-rigging-scandal-rocks-us-government.html

    Can anyone explain all this adjustment stuff in plain english?

    • McFlock 39.1
      26 January 2014 at 10:33 pm

      Chap claims to have uncovered massive error in US temperature records, thus debunking global warming. Supports claim with graphs that suggest government bureau changed methodology when moving from “version one” to “version two”.

      Basically, V2 seems to do much more in the way of filling in incomplete data and detecting undocumented changes in data collection. But the chap doesn’t say exactly what he thinks the problem is – funny, because the data (not shitty little graphs on different scales) is publicly available. Maybe he should have looked at it for longer than an evening before declaring shenanigans.

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  • Tenancy rules changes to improve rental market
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