…
Richard Black from the BBC won’t name me or link to me. Is he scared of sending people my way? Afraid my arguments are too compelling? He claims the evidence for man-made global warming is overwhelming, and he’s wondering why more women aren’t skeptics, so surely he would help his readers if he directed them to the two Australian bloggers he specifically refers to: Jennifer Marohasy and myself.
In fact, across the entire sceptical landscape, as far as I can see, the female contingent numbers one UK columnist, a couple of Australian bloggers, UK academic Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen and US counterpart Sallie Baliunas…
But thanks for the backhanded endorsement, Richard, I’m delighted to find out you read my blog and I can tell you exactly why women don’t leap to announce they are skeptics. All you had to do was email me to ask…
Why are virtually all climate “skeptics” men?
Because the bullying means that anyone who speaks out, faces outright hostility. Climate hazing means women keep a low profile.
It starts with names: “denier”, “delayer”, “contrarian”, “industry shill”, “inactivist”, “do-nothing”, or “conspiracy theorist”. None of which are meant as compliments. It moves on to attacks on their mental health, and motivations. Or it just boils down to a patronising put-down: “Perhaps skeptics suffered unhappy childhoods?”
The climate change “debate” from alarmists is based on bluff and bluster, it’s about hazing people, not about evidence. Smear, slander and intimidation are not just rife, they are industrial — coming from funded blog sites, prime ministers, and vice presidential staff. (Here’s an example of someone who tried to intimidate me, and threaten my career a year ago.)
Since men are more likely to take risks, is anyone surprised that most women choose to stay on the sidelines of this vitriolic fracas?
Speaking your mind on this topic is a high risk venture — commentators risk their reputations and status — and it’s an aggressive environment, where everything they say, or have ever said on any topic, will be subject to hostile scrutiny. Skeptical players need a very thick skin. On the other hand, unskeptical commentators get lauded just for saying “me too”.
Leonardo di Caprio talked about Global Warming and Oprah compared him to Noah. Really.
A commentator oozed: “The Titanic star is taking these things seriously. He even mentioned figures…”
Imagine that. He had figures… ?
Someone skeptical could present figures, graphs, documented evidence, and peer reviewed papers and all they get in reward is a harsh interrogation about where their funding came from.
Those who claim there is an alarming crisis can be aggressively rude. I get anonymous emails claiming they “know” I’m funded by Exxon (I’m not), telling me I believe smoking doesn’t give you cancer, snidely demanding to know my credentials (as if it matters), and inventing reasons why I write what I write. They make up lies about me. They never apologize. When I politely show they are wrong and explain the science, strangely they never say thanks for the free tutorial.
Paid attack sites like DeSmogblog are set up with funded public relations experts to smear any skeptic who speaks out. They are so desperate to find something, anything, they smear me for working for the government 15 years ago in a science communication job that happened to be sponsored by Shell. At the time I was also a member of the Greens political party, but they don’t mention that.
If there was a debate with good manners and less mud-slinging, we’d see more women speak up. But that’s just it. If there was a polite debate on equal terms, with an independent, curious journalist who hadn’t already made up his or her mind, it would be all over for the scare campaign.
Black is circling blindfolded around the answer himself. He acknowledges what we skeptics say:
One – promulgated by many skeptics themselves – speaks to a rigorous, analytical deconstruction of a deeply-flawed scientific edifice that is maintained by a self-interested cabal of tax-hungry politicians and careerist scientists.
Then he posits a do-it-yourself psychoanalytic view:
The other is that climate skepticism has psychological roots; that it stems from a deep-seated inability or unwillingness to accept the overwhelming evidence that humanity has built with coal and lubricated with oil its own handcart whose destination board reads “climate hell”.
And the only evidence he has for this is from a guy he met once:
As one ex-scientist and now climate action advocate put it to me rather caustically a while back: “I’ve been debating the science with them for years, but recently I realized we shouldn’t be talking about the science but about something unpleasant that happened in their childhood”.
Then he tells us that the evidence from the EU opinion polls tells him that women are skeptics in roughly equal numbers, so the only question then is not about the skepticism, but about the “prominence”. In other words, women do “get it” but don’t want to be targets.
Black notes that it’s unusual:
It’s worth mentioning that in more than a decade of reporting on environmental issues, I’ve never come across a gender divide like it.
But doesn’t appear to realize that the thing that make climate “science” different to every other science is the hazing. Note that Black, like other uninvestigative journalists, assumes that there is “overwhelming evidence”. I challenge Black to name and explain one paper with empirical evidence that carbon dioxide leads to major warming (meaning more than 1.5 degrees C). There’s plenty of evidence that carbon causes minor warming, and there are plenty of “simulations” that claim to show major warming. But a simulation of the climate can only ever give us simulations of evidence. We need evidence from the real climate, not the fake ones. But there is nothing empirical. The lack of empirical evidence does not in and of itself prove that carbon can’t have a major role, but it proves that Black is wrong and that there is not overwhelming evidence.
Not many women want to be thrown into that Lions Den.
Most of the “blog war” is a testosterone driven point-scoring game. It’s not about figuring out whether the planet will warm, it’s about winning points in a mental rugby match where there are few gentlemen. Women prefer to achieve their aims through other mechanisms than a stand-up fight.
If you want printed copies of The Skeptics Handbooks to point at with friends, or to strategically give away, you can order them here for: Australian deliveries, and here for International Deliveries.
BBC = Biased Broadcasting Corporation, Browns Broadcasting Corporation etc…
10
Well said.
10
Here in the UK, someone else has picked up on the similarities between the current ‘Global Warming’ hysteria and earlier manifestations reported in Charles Mackay’s famous book: “Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds”; Mackay’s book published in 1841 documented waves of religious and financial hysteria which have swept entire societies in the psat including: The Crusades and The European Witch Mania – as well as waves of financial speculation hsyteria such as The South Sea Bubble, the Amsterdan ‘Tulipomania’, the Mississippi Company etc.
Please see excellent, thought-provoking article “ Beyond Debate” by philosopher Martin Cohen from this week’s Times Higher Education Supplement at the link below:
Cohen explores the Science – or lack of it – and the psychological and social patterns which are emerging: suppression of debate, labelling sceptics as ‘deniers’ – moves to suppress acadmic dissent – and shows how these mirror previous episodes in earlier times.
It is a very good, well considered article which repays the reading.
I attach it as a WORD file for easier reading. Unfortunately the online version of THES does not provide the images and graphics that go with the article.
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=409454&c=2
10
Here in the UK, someone else has picked up on the similarities between the current ‘Global Warming’ hysteria and earlier manifestations reported in Charles Mackay’s famous book: “Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds”; Mackay’s book published in 1841 documented waves of religious and financial hysteria which have swept entire societies in the psat including: The Crusades and The European Witch Mania – as well as waves of financial speculation hsyteria such as The South Sea Bubble, the Amsterdan ‘Tulipomania’, the Mississippi Company etc.
Please see excellent, thought-provoking article “ Beyond Debate” by philosopher Martin Cohen from this week’s Times Higher Education Supplement at the link below:
Cohen explores the Science – or lack of it – and the psychological and social patterns which are emerging: suppression of debate, labelling sceptics as ‘deniers’ – moves to suppress acadmic dissent – and shows how these mirror previous episodes in earlier times.
It is a very good, well considered article which repays the reading.
I attach it as a WORD file for easier reading. Unfortunately the online version of THES does not provide the images and graphics that go with the article.
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=409454&c=2
10
Bullies will bully whoever they can.
Speaking for myself, I see women more willing than (some) men to use reason for addressing bullydom – whenever possible, that judgment left to the individual.
My own approach has been, to deal with it, which may not always apply reason, the end objective to stop bullying or it will almost certainly continue
10
I am getting on in years, bought up listening to the chimes of Big Ben and the sonorous authoritative voices of the BBC News – and believing innocently in the objectivity and reliability of what the BBC said, over whatever any “other” sides might say.
Perhaps in hindsight, that was always carefully crafted propaganda, honed to a fine art during WWII, but it was never blatant, and to my knowledge was rarely if ever caught out.
Not so today.
This new generation of BBC managers and reporters have totally lost the plot, and openly and righteously abuse their influence to peddle predetermined viewpoints rather than to report events and information objectively and with insight into the always elusive truth. And not just on climate matters.
Sadly, the BBC is now discredited for me, and for most I know. It offers an excellent service technically, but it now resembles a Meals on Wheels service that delivers servings of cheap sausage and mash in a Rolls Royce.
Now you can’t even rely on them for news about the weather.
10
I haven’t had any bullies stop by on my posts on climate change — not the normal post topic for me, except the 5 out 6 posts I’ve done since the release of the CRU documents. However, I have a couple of people trying to change my mind in the comments, with the usual “burden of evidence” and “precautionary principle” nonsense. So far, it’s been pretty civil, but I’ve modified the comment guidelines in anticipation of worse to come.
10
Worth noting that the most popular climate skeptic blog in Sweden, http://www.theclimatescam.se, is run by a woman, Maggie Thauersköld Crusell. She is also, via connections to a small paper, a journalist covering Copenhagen, and has writter reports from there. And she is blogging in a “climate duel” organised by the big newspaper Aftonbladet. A really active girl!
–Ahrvid
10
Another one, a Canadian:
http://nofrakkingconsensus.blogspot.com/
10
As they say here in the states – “You go girl!”
I particularly like the fact that you offer artwork to go with your good humor.
10
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Jason , Dave Rag. Dave Rag said: Why more skeptic men than women on #climate change? Because anyone who speaks out faces outright hostility http://bit.ly/6rinwI #Climategate […]
10
Well say Jo.
You deserve recognition for what you have stood up against, AND for what you have achieved.
AND, thank you for your valued advice to me on several occasions – my apologies for not following it better.
Maggie in Sweden is also a heroin.
Climat change refuters have all been bullied, and in the near future it is going to become more verherment,
cornered rats are always at their most dangerous.
BUT, this is not reason to let them off the hook, these “people” need exposing for what they are, what they have been doing, what they wanted to achieve.
ALL of their actions were not about good science in any way whatsoever.
The Russians have re-entered the climate science discussions,
AT LONG LAST..
http://www.examiner.com/x-9111-SF-Environmental-Policy-Examiner~y2009m12d16-The-Russians-say-that-global-warming-isnt-happening-there?cid=examiner-email
The game has now changed, for ever.
Here are a couple of “people” who have bullied me for years now,
http://www.scottishwebcamslive.com/boards/viewtopic.php?f=22&p=165442
I’m going to continue in this thread for a long time….
Their time is up, whether they admit it or not.
20
you go girl !
20
Jennifer Maroshy has moved on she is no longer blogging in the same sense that she was so the blog now consists of one long thread where a small group argue to no avail about everything. There is a particularly nasty abusive troll there called Luke. This person seems to have nothing else to do but abuse others on this blog, for him it is about winning the argument for some imagined audience. I think either he is a fanatic with nothing else to do or this is part of his work. I think it is the money. As to male and female if you are running a blog trolls need to be got rid of and whether you are male or female does not matter. The blogger has the power, the people who flood the blog abusing others should be shut out. I would note what they are doing and estimate how much of the replies they represent and shut them out on that basis. Why Jennifer did not do that beats me. You can be subtle with wordpress and show the text to the originator (so I have read) but no one else.
20
Derek, I think you meant to write heroine
A hero nonetheless, uncelebrated
20
Derek it is not clear who the “Bullies” are could you explain more clearly?
10
[…] Biased BS (BBC) Black […]
10
I agree with MikO concerning Jennifer Marahosey’ blog. Her blog carried useful and interesting articles but there was virtually no chance for any climate-related subject to be developed by contributors because of Luke’s behaviour. I suppose Jennifer was in a bind. To censor him would draw ‘warmer’ wrath when I am sure Jennifer endeavoured to maintain a fair and balanced stance, so readers had to suffer his vituperation. Jennifer had a band of supporters who contained Luke to some extent, but inevitably all discussion ended in the gutter. My (unsubstantiated) impression was that Jennifer might have withdrawn from the field because of Luke’s efforts, that he had driven away her audience.
Bloggers like McIntyre and Watts have developed an effective zero-tolerance reputation. I particularly like Jo’s system of snipping when the “Dislike” vote becomes too large. It is a good way for us readers to express our opinion of obnoxious trolls without having to pile on a defence with wasted words.
10
Jo, it’s to your credit that you’ve come over from the dark side and are prepared to argue against Green ideology in a public forum like a blog.
As for the absence of women from the debate, that cuts both ways. Correct me if I’m wrong, but most of those named in the CRU emails have been men – it could be argued that women weren’t prepared to engage in the shoddy manipulation of climate data in order to score the hefty grants.
10
Can anyone explain to me how a gas, CO2, that is 50% heavier than air can end up high enough in the atmosphere to cause a problem when it is usually found lying in sewers asphyxiating workers who don’t wear breathing masks and why canaries were taken down into mines.
10
Richard Black f the beeb is a true warmist believer. He has seen the evidence, but he cannot say what it is except that it is overwhelming. Of course none of the environmental correspondents at the beeb have any scientific qualifications.
I posted this on his blog about his sexist article:
“Reading the comments here and people’s attitude to paying taxes to solve this non-existent problem of climate change, I am led back to further thoughts about Richard’s ridiculous article yesterday about sceptics.
It seems to me there are two types of people in the world.
There are those whose livelihoods depend on them producing something that other people are prepared to buy. If they are producing something useless, then they are out of a job. On the whole these people are sceptics.
Then there are those who are paid for doing something regardless of whether anyone wants it. This group of people includes politicians, civil servants, BBC employees, etc. They get paid regardless of what they do and regardless of whether anyone wants what they produce. These people can afford to go along with the flow (the consensus) because they get paid regardless. In fact they might lose their jobs if they don’t accept the consensus said to exist by their ultimate bosses, the politicians. It doesn’t matter to them whether AGW is a scam. They can afford not to be sceptical; or conversely, they can’t afford to be sceptical. I bet Richard’s career would come to an end if he declared he was a sceptic.
So I think this hypothesis is much more realistic then Richard’s. Anybody got any evidence one way or the other?
My evidence is my own circumstance and that of fellow sceptics that I know. None of us get paid by the taxpayer. We have to earn a living by producing something that somebody else is prepared to pay for and we don’t like seeing some scrounging politicians wanting to take more and more of it away from us.”
10
Thanks Brian, I really do have problems with not being able to edit “afterwards” – it is the way I am used to posting. – ho hum.
I obviously meant Well said Jo as well. Oooops.
MikeO, the bullies are Labrat and Iain Inglis, they are both stauch climate modelling supporters from CPDN,
that is where I was “born” – I asked questions…
Arborman is a light wieght – idiot follower.
10
This quote keeps seeming to be the most relevant comment I can post :
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin quoted in Max Eastman : Reflections on the Failure of Socialism
10
Keep up the good work. I suspect many women (terrible generalisation I know) instinctively feel that this is a lot of hot air which men are getting very excited about but are, in reality ,doing nothing ( a bit like footie and cricket).If there were the threat to civilisation, they correctly reason that something would be done very quickly indeed. If you receive real threats then I’m sure my daughter, a Sydney police detective, will be of immediate assistance. (True but meant as a joke)
10
The latest from auntie ABC. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/12/18/2775284.htm
10
Joanna writes: “There’s plenty of evidence that carbon causes minor warming”
What evidence? Please provide a paper with empirical evidence (no models, no simulations) that demonstrates your claim, or please provide a retraction immediately.
10
The intimidation attempts by the AGW KoolAid Club are not limited to women. One of the forums I belong to is at ….
http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/open-discussion/what-do-we-think-about-climate-change-21390-new-post.html
There is hundreds of pages of comments and quite a large volume of information there. Oddly enough the main alarmist posters are non boat owners. They are also the most obnoxious, elitist, mean spirited folks I have ever run into and my past experience includes 25 years of political involvement so I certainly don’t have a thin skin. What is remarkable is the lockstep similarity in the attempts to stifle dissent, and insult or intimidate those that insist that the science surrounding climate change be a quest first for truth. I have learned a great deal from this site and yours Jo. Keep up the good work and don’t let the ——es get you down!
10
Kate McMillan runs the excellent Small Dead Animals blog in Canada which covers a lot of AGW scam topics.
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com
10
Peter B #20. Well I think ALL warm gases (ie. air) rises. Thats the whole point. There’s no permanent “Glass – House” to trap a select one or another. It rises, dissipates its energy (mainoy convection at lower levels as airs pretty thin at altitude to come in contact with other particels often) until cool enough to for the condensables to rain or follow thie density (or should that be destiny? ha!). Sure a few isolated weather events like inversions can keep them low, but convection and heat still flows from hot bodies to cooler ones (never the other way round).
10
It’s true that most of the prominent AGW skeptic websites are run by men, and that many of the prominent skeptics are men. However, the same holds true for the AGW promoters. Nearly everyone implicated in the CRU scandal is a male. This may indicate something about the role of women who are engaged in, or interested in, this type of science.
Joanne may be correct about women wanting to avoid ‘hazing’. Could it be that women are also more inclined to be ‘team players’ who would rather agree with authority than oppose it? I hope that isn’t true, but I’m afraid that it might be.
I have suggested elsewhere that all scientific papers that result from research that has recieved any amount of public compensation should be required to be posted in full on the Internet, along with a professional and a public forum that would allow universal peer review and public scrutiny. This would guarantee transparency, honesty, and accountability, as well as facilitating science education. I suspect that it would even encourage people to participate in the discussion who might otherwise fear ‘hazing’ for their unorthodox opinions.
10
Copenhagen Treaty is about Financial, not Climate control
If the aim was really climate control via CO2, then why would carbon sequestration be banned and why would the draft treaty exclude CO2 savings form Nuclear and Hydro electric power.
GDP is proportional to Co2 emissions. A 50% reduction in CO2 will cause a 50% reduction in GDP. This will not happen, instead the world will be force to buy fraudulent Enron-style “Carbon permits” to meet their targets.
Australia is planning to pay Indonesia to not log their forests in order to meet its targets. However there are two problems with this first, a mature forest does not reduce carbon – old trees die and rot, releasing the carbon. Secondly, most logging in Indonesia is illegal – the government there will not stop it, no matter how much we pay them.
10
@Rod:
Speaking of lies and propaganda from the BBC, here’s the BBC reporting the collapse of WTC7 on 9/11/2001, twenty-three minutes before that unexpected collapse occured. WTC7, still standing, can be plainly seen over live BBC reporter Jane Standley’s left shoulder after Standley and the BBC London studio has announced WTC7’s collapse.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mxFRigYD3s
WTC7 was never hit by a plane, was not expected to collapse, and its collapse looks exactly like a controlled demolition. Global Warming, the bogus ‘War on Terrorism’, and the financial crisis are three ways that the ruling elite are misleading the public.
10
A great post. An important subject, skillfully addressed. Sensitivity and emotion are as important as confidence and assertiveness. Sadly, the dominance of the latter creates a world where the former is derided or silenced; a dangerously unbalanced planet.
10
Very True Mate.
10
I sent a response off to Joanna by e-mail but I’ll post here as well. I’m a female, vociferous skeptic of AGW and post frequently on any website discussing climate change. Look for the username ‘andersm’ and that’s me.
Richard Black’s mention of a male/female split is him musing and is irrelevant to the AGW period. As I told Joanna in my e-mail, it’s about as relevant as what kind of house a skeptic lives in.
I suspect Black is trying to scare politicians by creating the impression there’s a gender gap and they’ll lose the female vote if they don’t support AGW. I say ignore Black and don’t snap at the bait.
Marlene Anderson
Professional Engineer
AGW Skeptic
And female (not that it’s important)
10
Hmm. Playing the gender card? You surprise me Jo.
10
Derek I have read their comments there they seem like a genuine opposition but no doubt you know them better than I. Questions I have asked on blogs of the trolls are: When was it in the past that climate was not changing? At what global temperature does climate change stop? Explain how a power station which generates 1 Giga Watt 24/7 can be built from solar or wind? Ask those and it causes unreasoned vile abuse but never an answer.
As a skeptic (about everything not just climate) I am used to being an outsider. I did not decide to be a skeptic I just am. Most want to go along with the others, I find I can’t. That is a lonely place to be and maybe there are less women than men who can accept it. Without women organised religion would collapse it is they who keep it going. I am a member of a Skeptics society in it I feel alone since they are more concerned with side issues of the paranormal and quack medicine than political manipulation.
10
Mike – lucky day for you I’ll answer them all:
1) never
2) well you could set a reasonable limit looking at the geological history. Ranges from a lot lot colder to a fair bit hotter.
3) With a whole lot of backup (and I mean A LOT!) (see Andasol is it Molten Salt Storage photovoltaic trough thing in Spain for a downscaled example)… of course will be horrendously expensive and hopefully we just use nuclear.
10
You said it.
Anyway… who do you think does all the email and phone call lobbying to all the politicians, radio stations, journalists etc… whilst the men are all pontificating either way!?
A woman simply knows how to go about it.
ps: Jo, can you do a story on The Real Face of Copenhagen: Peter Spencer, the Aussie Farmer who is now on his 27th day of Hunger Strike over the Eco-Fascist Agenda 21 doctrine Rudd and previous govts have implement, around the LULUCF. Kevin Rudd must be questioned on this! He will have Spencers blood on his hand if he dies.
Radio Interview with Peter and his Barrister
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQUEmV7Fv58
Peter’s Support Website
http://agmates.ning.com/group/peterspencerhungerstrike
Peter’s original BLOG from 2005 where his first post explains his plight
http://web.archive.org/web/20051124044926/http://peterspencer.id.au/
10
Just in case JoNova and JenMarohasy were feeling lonely being the leading ladies of skepticism, here’s some girls from the Sacramento Tea Party.
The “No Peas” lady – can you see the teabag fringe on her hat?
The “stop the Ecoterrorists” ladies – gotta love the direct approach. AB32 is Arnold Schwarzeneggar’s Anti-Global Warming Act.
10
I only just discovered Jo’s blog a few months ago. How I missed it the last 4 years is a question for the ages – it went straight to the top of my blog roll:
Jo, your primers are the best concise, non-technical climate intros I’ve found. I’m sure you’ll be happy to know that in the few months I’ve been passing them around, you’ve already turned several herd-warmers into luke-warmers and in one case, into a full-on Denier (verbal ju-jitsu, mates – source considered, take that diss and wear it proudly). In a better world, you, and not Gas-Bag Gore would have gotten The Swedish Prize.
In the U.S. we say “You go, Girl!” – how about “Good on you, Girl” for down-under?
Finally to female skeptics, It’s sadly true that most of the climate blogosphere is dominated by competitive, agressive males & their fixation on point-scoring, wh. is another reason why I lurk here often, and at Climate Audit where Steve McIntyre runs a very tight, mostly polite ship. And, I’m proud to say that here in Colorado we have the Pielke’s Sr. & Jr., who also somehow manage to keep their blogs & personal writings even-tempered & professional in the face of ignoratti mud-slinging.
I’m prone to irritable sarcasm, wh. is the main reason I prefer to lurk & learn.
Lastly, you missed mentioning the brilliant Lucia Liljegren and her blog “The Blackboard” wh. rivals Climate Audit & The Air Vent for in-depth technical analyses. The only problem w/ Lucia’s blog is that her peculiar combination of patience and competitiveness sometimes derails large segments of discussion threads into semantic wrangling, sometimes over a single word. But you can train yourself to spot and skim over those, wh. is absolutely worth the effort.
I’ve rambled enough; just wanted to finally say thanks for the excellent blog.
Back to lurk-land for me.
10
Here’s another one I cop15’ed from Tom Nelson.
Snow globe from Copenhagen.
It doesn’t have anything to do with the topic. It’s just too good not to share is all.
10
I am another female sceptic, who comments and blogs wherever I can. I am also saddened by the lack of effort by friends who also think its a crock of sh*t, but are too busy? to bother lobbying or reading and getting informed. and yes the abusive blokey side of it deters them too!
I point out its their food bills and housekeeping that will be hard hit, but apathy has set in I fear:-(
I do what I can.
10
mmmmmmmmmm let me see. A male POMMY journalist versus an Aussie chick?
I’ll back the Aussie chick anyday everyday, no hessitation.
10
Over lunch one of my colleagues said they had heard that someone has proposed a Carbon tax that is indexed to global temperature. While the science it still doesn’t make sense from the point of view that carbon makes very little difference to global temperature, I’d be more prepared to take my chance that there is further cooling and I get a tax return.
Mind you I bet the details don’t allow for a tax return (unless it is so cold that Hell freezes over).
Has anybody seen this proposal in writing.
10
Sure Cyber.
That’s the tax proposed by Ross McKitrick.
Here’s a write up.
I don’t trust the people who are reading the thermometer.
10
I read an article earlier this week on the subject of the geodynamo that powers the earth’s magnetic field. The article says that the latent heat of crystallisation released by the slow (over geological time) cooling of the earth’s core is gradually flowing to the surface. This is an enormous amount of heat energy but do climate “scientists” account for it in their “models”?. No, they do not.
10
“Over lunch one of my colleagues said they had heard that someone has proposed a Carbon tax that is indexed to global temperature.”
That would be Ross McKtrick’s “T3” tax – direct tax on carbon based on the sat. T3 channel (IIRC, that’s the mid-troposhpere temperature). He did actually propose that it be capable of going negative, but anyway, the point was that as temps increased, the tax increased, and it was thus a “self limiting” type of tax in that more warming means greater incentive to decarbonise, and greater speed in warming means it happens sooner. If things were suddenly “worse than we thought”, it would take care of it all automatically for us. Of course, none of the alarmists seem terribly interested in it.
If you want more information, you can search ClimateAudit for it – sorry, I don’t have a link direct to it.
10
The enemy doesn’t like Lisa Murkowski because she is getting knee deep in the battle. From her seat in the Senate Lisa is trying to block the EPA co2 endangerment finding.
The hippy website I linked to has an empty comment section.
Feel free to say hi, or maybe give an encouraging word on Lisa’s behalf.
See Mr. Black, woman, skeptic, powerful, elected representative of the only Arctic state.
His worst nightmare, pretty much.
10
If we assume for the moment that the globe is warming, then assume that such warming will have catastrophic consequences, and further assume that the sole or primary cause of that warming is the high level of atmospheric CO2 caused by mankind burning oxidizing fuels, then we have a serious physical problem.
There are a lot of if’s and maybe’s in that scenario, but if it is a problem then it is undeniably a physical problem.
Whenever I see a political or financial solution proposed for a physical problem my BS meter goes off-scale. A physical problem requires a physical solution, not a complex punitive taxation regime that yields $billions to investment bankers and traders. In lieu of cap and trade, let’s just have the cap.
The quantity of fossil fuel extracted in any given country in any year is known to a level of accuracy far exceeding that of measured global temperatures, because it involves money.
Take the value for say, 2008, and set that as a cap for that country, reducing by say 1% pa. until the desired reduction of 20%, 40% or 8o% is achieved. That’s easy to monitor and police. There is no massive immediate losses of jobs, revenue or profit, just a steady decrease in the amount of CO2 producing, life destroying carbon fuel available to be burnt.
Too easy? Well, it would solve the supposed problem, but there’s no money changing hands so it’s hard to make a quick buck out of it. That means it will never get up.
10
Mr. Black is experiencing a pommy leftist’s wet dream: paid by the governnment to ramble on inconsequentially about gender and climate. Wanker heaven.
I imagine that a conservative and female skeptic, dressed as Emma Peel and brandishing a riding crop, might well figure in his nocturnal imaginings. Perhaps he doesn’t want the reality of a Nova or Marohasy intruding on his fantasies.
10
to amicus curiae: since you say that you’re female, I recommend the name amica curiae.
10
[…] For the bewildered BBC journalist who was complaining or gloating (not sure which) about the absence of prominent female climate skeptics: here’s your triple whammy: female, skeptic and Australian. […]
10
Nearing the end of COP15 and xmas upon us, it might be worthwhile summarising the Global Warming saga.
I happen to like analogies, so here goes.
Since 1988, the tallest multi story (pun) structure in mans history has been under construction, commissioned by the Universal Nationhood Corp. (UNc) The architectural firm Pachauri Hansen Jones and Co. in conjunction with the engineering (pun) firm Mann Briffa Santer and Partners have been in charge of this modern miracle.
Well over 4000 consultants and tradesmen have been working busily constructing this multi story building, said to be the greenest ever.
However, many onlooking architects and engineers have been critical of this building, accusing the builders of using shoddy materials, suspect engineering techniques and criticising the cost over runs. Indeed, many amateur architecture wags have questioned the need for such a “monstrosity” as some have dubbed it.
Since the first turning of the sod in 1988, numerous consultants and tradesmen have resigned from their positions saying they were not happy with the way their work had been incorporated into the building. Some have even accused the principal architects and engineers of fraud. Many other consultants and tradesmen, though continuing to work at the site, have expressed private reservations about the project but have refused to speak out or have their names revealed for fear of losing lucrative contracts.
The efforts to sell the vast floor space available have been nothing short of breathtaking. Some of the best in the world have been co-opted with huge incentives running into the millions. Al Gore, salesman of the year 2007 and voted most liked salesman by the public in 2009 has been at the forefront since the beginning of construction, aided by the creations of Click Trick Monbiot advertising agency.
A bombshell hit the project when email communications and design papers were leaked from the head office of the project partners. These papers reveal nepotism, the use of inferior materials, adjustments to the original plans to save costs, the use of threats to silence critics of the project and the vast amounts of money involved, to name a few.
Now, the average mum and dad living in the shadows of this tall structure may well ask why is it still being built?
A close examination shows the hundreds of billions of dollars involved, not just during the construction stage, but also in the selling of the floor space provided by such a vast building. Indeed many have already paid very very large deposits in the hope of occupying the best floors. Not to mention the thousands of people, all of whom the poorest of the poor, having been evicted and their homes demolished to make way for this project.
No one is game enough to pull out now.
Having researched all the evidence, there is no doubt in this correspondent’s mind that this structure will come tumbling down in due course. I just hope not too many are hurt when the inevitable happens, and that the protagonists involved are brought to justice.
Baa Humbug
10
“But doesn’t appear to realize that the thing that make climate “science” different to every other science is the hazing.”
Yes, it’s very distressing, even to me, and I’m your fairly typical red-blooded male who has often resorted to plain-speaking on the blogosphere.
My personal view is that we should all just try to get along. And the best role model for getting along must be President Obama, who takes pains to empathise with both sides of an issue, and who speaks movingly of healing the divisions.
Given the divisiveness of global climate change, I am certainly hoping Obama will descend upon Copenhagen and confer some soothing balm. They certainly need it.
As for women and climate change, I wonder whether we should push them into pretending an interest they don’t really share. In my experience, women don’t much like science, with its cold abstractions, and much prefer romantic dinners by soft candle-light, when they’re not gently raising children and working for world peace. Face it, people. Fermat and femininity just don’t mix.
10
Marlene;
Well said. Being a professional engineer I am not surprised by your statement. Keep up the good work.
10
Re Richard Black says…Re skeptics
“So we go down their list… Bjorn Lomborg, Viscount Monckton, former TV presenter David Bellamy, British National Party leader Nick Griffin, Freakonomics authors Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner, Lord Lawson, social anthropologist Benny Peiser, geologist Ian Plimer, US Senator James Inhofe, Czech President Vaclav Klaus… all men.
Gee….
Let me return the favour.
Re AGW stooges.
So we go down their list… Obama, Al Gore, Michael Mann, Phil Jones, Keith Briffa, John Holdren, David Suzuki, Gordon Brown, Tony Blair, Prince Charles, Michael Moore, Tim Flannery, Gerd Leipold, George Monbiot, Ugo Chavez, Robert Mugabe, Larry Page, Sergay Brin, George Soros, Richard Branson…and that ultimate drop kick…Bono.
Pretty much a gang of useless yobs & slobs.
So here’s the Million dollar question Jo…
Would any intelligent self respecting woman want to be caught anywhere near one of these losers..?
Aqua Fyre
10
Self limiting, only if the presumption that CO2 is a significant controller of global temperatures, and human consumption of fossil fuels is the main driver of CO2 in the atmosphere.
The other problem is how to get any government to abide by a past promise to lower taxes. The well demonstrated fact is they have no honour and don’t do what they say they will do. I’ll give a real world example as evidence — the Sydney Harbour Bridge, paid off more than a decade ago by tolls but regardless of that a toll remains. The official story is “the toll is for maintenance” as explained here:
http://www.sydney.com.au/bridge.html
A bit of basic maths shows the tolls pull in a whole lot more than the maintenance expense and please note that the Sydney Harbour Tunnel also has a toll (they carefully don’t mention the combined revenue and collection statistics). It goes without saying that we could pay for the bridge ten times over and still be paying a toll.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/dont-we-own-the-bridge-yet/story-e6frezz0-1111118564200
Oh and they also collect money from the “Bridge Climb” tourist attraction.
In other words, the initial seemingly reasonable justification for this tax is long gone, but the rent collection from the public for a public asset continues at whatever price the market can stand.
I could just as easily mention federal income tax in the USA, which was originally a special measure, strictly for the needs of fighting a war (first step was the US Civil War, then later it was established forever during WWI, then increased during WWII). These days income tax is just seen as a right of government without the slightest attempt at justification.
I’m sure many similar examples exist. This is fundamentally a problem of trust — the people making these nice sounding proposals just cannot be trusted. Stopping it before it starts is the only way to stop it at all.
10
Keep belting them with facts Jo…. In the end it can do them no harm, except for a bruised ego that is:-)
10
Oh Shut up u stupid bint
10
one Day the people who don’t / didn’t believe in climate change will be laughed as in the same way as the people who still believe the word is flat.
10
OT but interesting in view of the SMH euphoria.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/science/nature/8420016.stm
Let’s hope that they were premature, hmm.
10
But that’s what scares us and makes the fairer sex so much fun 🙂
Well said though. Personally I think Black’s article is very poor. If anything, it perhaps just highlights the lack of women in some fields of science and engineering. One thing the CRU mails show is a ‘robust’ style of debate (Santer in particular) and agenda’s set by ego and testosterone rather than good’ol fashioned basic science. Black presumably didn’t notice that the contacts in the CRU mails include very few women. To me, they also show a lot of academic bullying, which may be why women are discouraged.
10
Chels #60 #61
I don’t recall anybody on this blog not believing climate changes. What we don’t believe is that CO2 is responsible for the supposed warming of the globe.
What makes us angry and laugh at the same time is the gathering of politicians hammering out “deals” whilst ARROGANTLY believing they can “adjust” the planets climate by half of one degree, like it was a thermostat or something (the current impasse whether 1.5c or 2c should be the limit). All the while splashing around billions upon billions of dollars, taken from you and me.
I work 7 days per week at mo to make ends meet, to see these frauds and crooks making deals to take my hard earned away from me AND WORSE STILL promising to give it to genocidal criminals like MUGABE and other despots instead of arresting them on the spot MAKES ME FRIGGING ANGRY.
They behave the way they do because brain dead lemmings LIKE YOU who can’t think for themselves, who accept any BS uttered in their direction GIVE OXYGEN to these megalomaniacs.
Are you not ashamed, embarrassed or even a little angry that whilst these Richard Craniums are strutting the world stage splashing billions around THERE ARE MILLIONS OF CHILDREN DYING OF STARVATION AND DISEASE?
Many other urgent problems of the world have been cast into the dustbin, waiting for the end of these carpetbagging sessions of the last 12 years or so.
So when in the next 3-5 years, it is realised that the globe is actually cooling, what will you do? (put it down to a lapse in judgement and keep going with your merry life I suspect)
Shame on you
10
Agree that global warming is another extroadinary delusion. First, you had the internet bubble, then the real estate bubble and now this madness. The world has gotten crazier since Charles McKay wrote his book in the 19th Century.
10
Dear Joanne
I picked up your site from a post on the unbiased Richard Blacks site? He is so unbiased that he cleared out my previous posts by not allowing my screen name?
So I was reluctantly forced to change it to ManmadeupGW.
The BBC are now a defacto campaigning organisation which of course is against their charter.
I once was in correspondance with Richard Black and the other unbiased guy Roger Harrabin. Robert Carter said trying to pin them down was like sticking jelly to a wall with drawing pins.
The leaked emails demonstrate what a lot of us have known for a long time, they cannot do anything ethically?
10
Sorry I mean’t to say your article is brilliant.
Have a Merry Christmas and prosperous New Year.
10
[…] why are most climate “skeptics” men? JoNova has the answer. And, it isn’t […]
10
I see the art of wit and repartee is not dead
10
The CRU states that it has signed confidentiality agreements with other countries and that they are prevented from releasing most of their raw data. Could someone please provide a link to those documents? Although the information may be subject to a confidentiality agreement the agreements themselves should not be.
10
At the risk of looking like I’m trying to promote my own blog here…
Occurred to me that a lot of people, on both sides of the AGW debate (using the term in the loosest sense of the word), are probably too young (and I wish I were!) to remember the global cooling scare of the ’70s.
So last night I dug around a tad, and put together An icy blast from the past….
I think some will find some rather stark parallels quite interesting.
10
Jo, you describe the hazing accurately. I have received many ad hominem criticisms, including being publicly alleged to be in the employ of Exxon (no entity pays me anything), called a “denier”, had my work misrepresented, etc.
Recently a journalist contacted me for an interview, and I was astounded by how much background work he had done: contacting the university that I went to, phoning people whose work I had written about years ago, etc. The journalist had apparently spent two days researching me, trying to dig up dirt, to write a hit piece.
In the end, I think that I convinced him that I am just working to bring higher quality to research, and I have no agenda on global warming per se. (My having exposed frauds in other fields helped.) So far, at least, no story has appeared. It was an unnerving experience though.
Your remark “It’s not about figuring out whether the planet will warm, it’s about winning points in a mental rugby match where there are few gentlemen” is certainly correct, but I (a man) do not find it intrinsically enjoyable. The corruption is deep and widespread, the injustice is serious and far reaching, and something needs to be done.
I am glad you are here.
10
Douglas J Keenan:
You had the courage to expose the corruption of members of the team. You were bound to be a target for the movers and shakers of the corrupt and the dirt diggers.
10
After Messrs. Jones and Mann threatened a boycott of publications and reviews, half the editorial board of Climate Research resigned. People who didn’t toe Messrs. Wigley, Mann and Jones’s line began to experience increasing difficulty in publishing their results.
This happened to me and to the University of Alabama’s Roy Spencer, who also hypothesized that global warming is likely to be modest. Others surely stopped trying, tiring of summary rejections of good work by editors scared of the mob. Sallie Baliunas, for example, has disappeared from the scientific scene.
This is from Pat Michaels, no stranger to being black listed and bullied.
Above in the comment 14 it’s implied that Jennifer gave up her blog on a sort of voluntary basis, or that she just couldn’t stand dealing with the revolving stable of CISRO employees collectively known as “Luke”, assigned to disrupt her blog.
Neither is the case.
She was starved out. The climatechangers attacked her employment until it drove her off the blog scene.
This is the type of bullying we all face.
Being blackballed and ostrasized for political purposes to support organized governmental criminality.
Now we here of Sallie Baliunas pushed out of science altogether.
I read today the climate cretins at Rueters claim that women and children will be hit hardest by climate change.
That’s half right.
Look at the returns for Sallie Baliunas;
Wikipedia – hit piece
Desmogblog – hit piece
Exxonsecrets – hit piece
sourcewatch – hit piece
historycommons – hit piece
Desmogblog – (two entries)
Spinprofiles – hit piece
This is the first page on a woman who was the Staff Astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and Deputy Director of the Mount Wilson Institute, served as Senior Scientist at the George C. Marshall Institute in Washington, DC, chaired the Institute’s Science Advisory Board, was also Visiting Professor at Brigham Young University, Adjunct Professor at Tennessee State University, past contributing editor to the World Climate Report, with awards include the Newton Lacey Pierce Prize by the American Astronomical Society, the Petr Beckmann Award for Scientific Freedom, the Bok Prize from Harvard University, and named as one of America’s outstanding women scientists by Discover magazine in 1991.
How can this be allowed to happen? Is climate science to be ruled by Sharia law?
IMHO the treatment of Jennifer and Sallie Baliunas by the thugs of climate is a national embarassment for Australia and the United States respectively.
10
Just maybe the reason there are few female climate skeptics — if indeed that is the case — is that women are smarter than men.
More specifically, maybe they are less prone to having opinions about things which they don’t know much about. The physics of climate change is really quite simple for anyone with a first degree in the subject, but apparently not simple enough for the likes of Sara Palin. Why do unqualified people even have opinions about things they don’t understand? For anyone interested, here is the physics in a nutshell.
All bodies not at absolute zero emit electromagnetic radiation. The hotter they are, the more energy is radiated, and also the higher the frequency of the radiation. Actually, there is a spectrum of radiation at all wavelengths, but the peak of this frequency curve moves towards higher frequences as temperature rises. This is determined by Planck’s Law which you can look up on wikipedia etc. (I think this was known well before Planck, whose contribution was to explain a contradiction which is outside my scope here by quantizing the theory.) This is why the hotter part of a gas flame is the blue part.
The sun is hot (I hope nobody will be skeptical about this) and therefore emits a lot of energy and at high freqencies (visible and ultraviolet light). The earth is cooler and emits its energy at lower (infrared) frequencies, which is why it doesn’t glow in the dark.
In the long term, the heat falling on the earth from the sun must match that being radiated from the Earth so that it is in equilibrium. That is, the earth would warm up to a temperature at which this equilibrium was met. It is possible to calculate what that temperature would be without any atmosphere and the answer is that it would be far too cold for life as we know it. The reason we are here today is because of greenhouse gases (“GHG”) like carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. These are transparent to high frequencies but less so to low frequencies, so they allow in more energy from the sun than they let out from the earth’s infrared radiation. (This is entirely analogous to the way a greenhouse works. Do skeptics believe in greenhouses, I wonder? Do skeptics have an alternative explanation of why the earth is not a lot colder than it is?)
All this has been known since John Tyndall demonstrated it in the 1850’s. Of course, equilibrium will be re-established, but at a higher temperature. In Tyndall’s time the concentration of GHG was about 280 ppm of CO2 equivalent and the temperature was stable. More to the point, it was about what it has been throughout human history.
The absorption of radiation by GHG is dependent upon whether a particular photon hits a GHG molecule, so at these relatively small concentrations the absorption rate is proportional to the concentration. So, an increase in the concentration of GHG will increase the absorption and therefore the equilibrium temperature of the earth’s surface. Currently the concentration is over 380 ppm and rising fast.
So we know that the temperature of the earth’s surface depends (among other things, some of which we understand better than others) on the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. We also know that trees and other plants absorb carbon dioxide and that burning anything with carbon in it produces carbon dioxide. (I presume the truth of this does not need further elaboration.)
Man’s activities – cutting down trees and burning fossil fuels – therefore contribute to the concentration of GHG in the atmosphere and hence to the earth’s temperature.
That’s all you need to understand. (There are a few widespread red herrings used by the skeptics, which are easily demolished but I have gone on long enough.) I would like to close by pointing out that this science is not new; as noted, it dates to the 1850’s. And the impending problem of global warming was first brought to the attention of a US President (LBJ) in 1965, I think by NASA. I was surprised to read, btw, that George H.W. Bush warned about global warming in 1989. So, if there is a global conspiracy as some suggest, it has been a widely based and long lived one.
10
Tony, check out Beer’s Law (it’s a law, not a theory). The absorbtion of radiation by a gas decreases logarithmically with it’s concentration. There is no linear relation.
10
MikeO – Here is a link to the forum I mentioned earlier, CPDN.
https://climateprediction.net/board/index.php
I’ll try to find the specific thread that jumped to imnd to me ealrier regarding Paul Durkin’s documentary.
Apologies I can not find it at present, that forum has been updated since I last visited. That said most of the names remain “familiar”..
10
T Welsh #75
Firstly a greenhouse works the way it does ONLY because it stops the circulation of air, nothing to do with the way our atmospheric system works.
Secondly, Tyndall used the analogy of a DAM WALL to describe the atmospheric greenhouse effect. He was discredited for that long ago.
Thirdly, you said…”It is possible to calculate what that temperature would be without any atmosphere and the answer is that it would be far too cold for life as we know it. The reason we are here today is because of greenhouse gases (“GHG”) like carbon dioxide in the atmosphere…….Do skeptics have an alternative explanation of why the earth is not a lot colder than it is?)”.
So where are the oceans in your calculations Tony? The reason why we are here today is because of the oceans. Water vapour plays a far greater role. Mars atmosphere is 5% of that of earth, BUT 95% CO2, so it has much higher volume of CO2, but gets much colder. It’s temperature range is huge compared to earths BECAUSE IT HAS NO OCEANS.
If the Physics of atmosphere was as simple as you say, why are scientists still debating it vigourously, even after 200 years?
You need to read up some more, I have to rush off to work, I’ll provide some references for you and others later.
By the way, THERE IS NO GREENHOUSE EFFECT. Earths atmosphere and a vegetable growing cubicle are two entirely different things.
10
right on. physicist (geophysicist specialty) here. I SO don’t want to deal with no-nothing whackjobs. Of course I know this is a farce, a scam, another attempt (#2trillion?) in the course of mankind to grab the power and the goods of your fellows. Besides, so few of these a**holes can actually read, much less understand the science. If they could, they would have been overwhelmed by the evidence already presented by my fellow scientists (for which I both honor and thank them) elsewhere. The fact that they are TOTALLY unconcerned with reality definitely makes me duck for cover. We are talking the criminals here, and I’m physically smaller (tho a whole lot smarter). It is a bottom line. Smarter is good up to the point where the goons bash your barins out. We are at that point. There is that much money involved.
10
I may be a relative new comer to the blog scene, and don’t mean to compare myself to Jo or Jennifer, but don’t forget me. I have two undergraduate qualifications in health science and am most of the way through a graduate entry medical degree, and I am also female and a skeptic, commenting on climate alarmism in my professional sphere. (Additionally, the entrance exam for graduate-entry medicine requires the equivalent level of knowledge of an undergrad science degree.)
I have noticed the paucity of female skeptics in the past, and blogged about it here. (Caution, this is a light hearted post and discusses, among other things, a solar powered bra. There ARE actually some more medical related posts at this blog.)
Keep up the good work Jo.
10
Oh, I guess I probably don’t count due to enforced anonymity. Sorry. I’m going to come out after I get my degree…which I won’t get if I write anything skeptical on my public health exam.
10
MattB you disappoint me. What happened to the abusive disparaging comments about my intellect and parenthood? Obviously you are not a disciple of the eco religion you are just not abusive enough!
My answers
1. Climate Change did not exist about 4 billion years ago.
2. There is insufficient data so it is not known 2 or 3 degrees more might be a good thing.
3. Take wind we need 500 at 2Mw each but duty cycle is 20% so 2500. Then a battery with a capacity of about 20 Gw/hrs. Probably you could get one at Aldi.
So try it ask a zealot today my bet is you will get only abuse.
10
Thanks, Colin (#76). At last a real debate! You are correct to cite Beer’s law, but remember I said for low values of concentration it would be proportional. I was wrong on this; I should have said that it was roughly linear, which is true for small enough values of the concentration. Will investigate this some more, but the fact is it is monotonic increasing. (btw, whether a theory is called a law is much a matter of fashion and doesn’t signify much to me. We have Newton’s laws of motion, which we now know are approximations, while we have the theory of relatively, which is true as far as we know. The last set of laws to be so named are probably the laws of thermodynamics.)
As for Baa Humgug (why don’t you people use your real names?), it is hard to know where to start. To say that greenhouses work only because they shield plants from the wind is just nonsense. If it were true, we would not use glass to build them, and probably wouldn’t give them roofs.
Kind of surprised that you mention water vapor, which is itself a GHG, as the reason the earth is so warm. Yet you don’t believe in the GHG effect. Contradiction here?
As for scientists vigorously debating this, there are few enough of those. Doctors can also be found to deny the effect of smoking on lung cancer. Don’t ask me why, but I suspect money comes into it. However you have settled the so-called debate with the revelation that “THERE IS NO GREENHOUSE EFFECT.” If it’s in all-caps I suppose it must be true!
10
I saw this headline yesterday and two things came to mind.
First, Black must have immediately went to his most authoritative source for his information; his navel. I could have named twice as many skeptical women and I’m only a lurker. Second, it’s generally part of the liberal tactics to subtly infer that it’s an “old white guy” cabal that just doesn’t understand the brave new world of “multi-culturalism”. And yet look at their list of players; Jones, Mann, Hansen, Schneider, Holdren, Wigley, Karl, etc.(all other old white guys). And to put the cherry on top, if you are a skeptic, it must be a childhood trauma, i.e., you’re a pervert.
Black shows not only a lack of insight and intellectual curiosity but a total lack of critical thinking.
10
JoNova could be quite correct about the subject. Men may have all the intelligence in the world, but they lack the wisdom to avoid confrontation. We, in fact, are proud of that trait – so there you go.
However, I would like to point out that the Geosciences are undersubscribed by women. I just left a meeting of ten of same and exactly ten percent were of the female gender. We are the folks who studied the history of the Earth and know that today’s climate is a flash in the pan of wild variations in conditions over the long term. Any scientist should be a skeptic. But, Geoscientists are destined to be among the most skeptical of Anthropogenic Global Warming, and they are disproportionally of the male gender.
10
T Welsh #83
“To say that greenhouses work only because they shield plants from the wind is just nonsense”.
I cant find where I said that. No circulation of air is just that, glass enclosure stops the warm air rising and hence cool air replacing it.
This “greenhouse” was debated at length on this blog previously, Lionel Griffith made especially good points. Try comments under the article “Confused? You might be a Psychologist”
Also, if inclined, download this paper by Gerhard Gerlich
here
Whats in a name? Why do you have a problem with screen names? If I told you my name was John Smith would it make any difference to the debate? or would you demand a birth certificate?
RE: oceans. My comment related to your comment..”So we know that the temperature of the earth’s surface depends (among other things, some of which we understand better than others) on the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere”.
I gave an example using mars, so it’s not just WV but the heat from the oceans themselves.
Your patronising tone in your piece #75 and #83 leaves alot to be desired.
10
Tony Welsh says All bodies not at absolute zero emit electromagnetic radiation. The hotter they are, the more energy is radiated, and also the higher the frequency of the radiation. in one breathe.
Then in the next,
These (carbon dioxide) are transparent to high frequencies but less so to low frequencies
It follows that the “warmer” a co2 molecule becomes/the higher the frequency, the less effect/more transparent to outward bound infrared energy it becomes (Warmer being a relative term when talking about individual molecules. More accurately we could say an individual co2 molecule becomes more mobile, thus more likely to impact on a stray oxygen molecule, losing that added energy almost immediately from the power transfer of the impact.)
Another reason the world isn’t heating up, or in other words a negative feedback.
Man’s activities therefore meaningfully contribute to the earth’s temperature, the same way Obama’s promise that some other US President, 20 years down the road, will contribute millions of dollars in tax money, to dictators like Robert Mugabe, is an “unprecedented breakthrough” at Copenhagen.
But please countinue spinning up strawman. It amuses me.
The rest of your argument was pretty much, “girls are too smart to talk about things that are over their head, like the weather”, and “Sarah Palin doesn’t know her place/shooting off her pie hole”.
I’m paraphrasing.
You want to stand by that Tony?
10
Tony Welsh Posted:
Your talking tripe.
The fact that you even use the word “equilibrium” tells me you haven’t the first clue about how the atmosphere behaves. The atmosphere is Dynamic. There is no such thing as a climate that is in equilibrium. Nevertheless, let me say this. The word ‘equilibirum’ betrays your AGW Greenies perspective. I bet you also believe humans once lived “in HARMONY with Nature” ? Notice how closely those two words carry the same ideological baggage ?
What of it? Haven’t you noticed that global temparatures have been in decline for over a decade now ?
Your heroes, Jones, Briffa, Wigley & Mann, know this. That’s what the leaked emails show, And that’s why they were so desperate to “Hide the decline”.
And while I am at it, allow me to point out another fundamental error.
Even if we accept the Tyndall figure, the fact is Co2 levels rise is caused by rising temperature, not the other way around. I don’t know how many times this scientific fact has to be banged into your head. Co2 rise has a lag time of about 800 years over global atmospheric temperature rise. That is why Mann et~al were so determined to argue the Middle Ages Warming Period didn’t exist or was merely limited to a few spots around Europe.
Spoken like a true Commissar from the Ministry of Truth.
What we need to understand & want to know, is everything. That’s the basis of science mate; not the Socialist inspired Junkscience you want to spoon feed to the world.
Your lot destroy raw data, hide the temperature decline, falsify data, block FOI requests, threaten skeptical scientists and stack peer review committees & you have the nerve to suggest skeptics are using red herrings ?
You really must stop reading baseless blog material.
Aqua Fyre
10
PS:
And before you say another thing more Tony, take a look at this link.
It is an article by L. C. Gerhard.
Who is he…?
A scientist who has been a reviewer with the IPCC.
Aqua Fyre
10
http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2009/dec/16/fact-based-climate-debate/
10
I think I was too hasty in conceding to Colin yesterday (#76). On reflection, I think I was right the first time. Look up Beer’s law on Wikipedia and one finds “This implies that the absorbance becomes linear with the concentration …” which is what one would expect. Look up details if you’re interested.
On the other hand, I found one website which agrees with Baa Humbug (#86) about how agreenhouse works. (As well as others which agreed with me.) The article is here http://www.gi.alaska.edu/ScienceForum/ASF8/817.html. However the article went out of its way to say that the atmospheric greenhouse effect does work the way I said, so the worst one can conclude is that the greenhouse effect is badly named!
Cannot possibly answer all the other comments, but I think papertiger ($87) misunderstands the mechanism. I don’t think the temperature of CO2 changes its absorption characteristics. Nor does the CO2 get much hotter, because it too radiates heat depending upon its temperature. (This is indeed negative feedback, but not one that does us any good.) It radiates heat in all directions, so half comes back to earth.
10
The old radiant heat dodge.
This of course is the reason Olympic torch has a relay. See because one person couldn’t carry that hot thing very far, with the flame radiating down on their arm like that.
Tony, you are fun.
10
Tony (#91)
I’ve been searching for a reference to clarify the argument. This one is about high school level and includes graphs, equations and references. It concludes this statement:
“The net effect of all these processes is that doubling carbon dioxide would not double the amount of global warming. In fact, the effect of carbon dioxide is roughly logarithmic. Each time carbon dioxide (or some other greenhouse gas) is doubled, the increase in temperature is the same as the previous increase. The reason for this is that, eventually, all the longwave radiation that can be absorbed has already been absorbed. It would be analogous to closing more and more shades over the windows of your house on a sunny day — it soon reaches the point where doubling the number of shades can’t make it any darker.”
But to show that I can be gracious in victory 😉 I also include this quote:
“As an aside, the term “greenhouse effect” is actually a misnomer. In greenhouses, most of the warming that is observed is not caused by carbon dioxide, or by absorption of infrared radiation by the glass as many people think, but by reduction in convection.”
Have a look at http://brneurosci.org/co2.html
10
Roy,
Can’t you see? You’re standing right in the middle of the answer – the internet. The cAGW issue is a classic of the problem of objective understanding at the popular level. I find that I can convince individuals that this is a fraud, but I have a very strong sense that I haven’t managed to convince many people to the degree that they would be confident in taking on a strident supporter of cAGW in direct argument. The internet dramatically changes that. Someone like you can directly appeal to someone like me, without hoping that your message survives the Chinese whispers of a sequence of a hundred exchanges. And you can give someone a link to pass on to others in cases where the argument itself is rapidly eroded.
So if you want to do something concrete work towards maintaining the integrity of the internet as an open source for everyone. This is a fairly simple Yes/No matter so that if you can persuade someone on the Yes case they are likely to remain persuaded. No tricky stuff like “You seem to accept the UAH data whereas the consensus is that the GISS data is superior”.
10
Thanks, Colin. The article you quote seems at odds with the wikipedia entry for Beer’s law. But I think it is right. From climate change courses I have been on, they do talk in logarithmic terms. So, I guess it comes down to where we are on the curve. The article you cite says we are already at the point of diminishing returns where most of the low frequency radiation is already being absorbed and additional GHG makes little difference. But what you think is “little difference” is relative.
I think the logarithmic relationship is taken into account by the models. The link you cite says that the current level of GHG is responsible for raising the temperature by 33 degrees C above what it otherwise would be. I assume that means at the current level of 380 ppm, though it is not clear to me that the earth has fully adjusted to that level. Some climate scientists think we should aim at no more than 450 ppm, about 18%. Nobody is suggesting that this will raise temperatures by 18% of 33, i.e. 9 degrees C. Rather the estimate is about 2 degrees C. (And again, this includes some remaining adjustment of temperature to the current concentration.) So, I think the logarithmic relatinship is taken into account.
As for the garden variety greenhouse, I am prepared to concede that “most of the warming” is due to lack of convection.
10
Papertiger, you’re kidding me, right? Are you saying you don’t believe in electromagnetic radiation?
10
Tony #95
Regards temp increase in relation to CO2 increase, pls try this article here It makes sense to me.
10
Tony
Either this is true
“I don’t think the temperature of CO2 changes its absorption characteristics.”
OR this is true
“Nor does the CO2 get much hotter, because it too radiates heat depending upon its temperature.“,
but not both.
10
Women are only more intelligent than men when they are Believers. When they are Apostates they should just stick to baking delicious vegetarian treats for their eco life partners. Thats just common sense.
10
Is it bullying or or greed? Nobody gets grant money for contradicting this cluster **** of “science.” There are some women willing to stick their necks out. I need to find one who is!
10
Absorption and radiation are not symmetric. For example, you have a black body radiation spectrum but never is there a matching absorption spectrum of the same shape as black body radiation.
10
Thank you, Tel. You beat me to it. It took me a while — and some re-learning of the physics — to realize why papertiger even thought there was a contradiction between those two statements. I think he is referring to Kirchoff’s law, which says that the absorbance equals the emissivity. Both of these are dimensionless constants (for a given wavelength) between 0 and 1. But whereas the absorbance leads directly to the amount of light absorbed, independent of temperature, the emissivity defines the emissions at each wavelength _relative to that of an idealized black body_.
So there is no contradiction. btw, Papertiger, I still don’t understand the point in your posting about the Olympic torch.
10
Perhaps I should have added in my last post, that black body radiation does of course vary with temperature, according to Planck’s law.
10
Tony Welsh:
December 22nd, 2009 at 1:05 am
Perhaps I should have added in my last post, that black body radiation does of course vary with temperature, according to Planck’s law.
Which is a bit of an “issue” when a planet (object) in (a vacuum)space can only loose heat by radiation.
Nothing does not conduct or convect heat. (Please see your vacuum flask)
Unfortunately nothing has no temperature either, so,
space is not cold, it has no temperature (temperature “neutral” if you prefer)..
Our planet is not insulated from cold space by the greenhouse effect,
it merely radiates heat into space according to it’s remperature,
as described by the Planck law / curves (which move down in wavelength with the objects temperature).
Yes an object in space will cool to a very low temperature, but that does not mean space is cold.
That is a totally different thing that there is no evidence for whatsoever.
Space being supposedly “cold” is a very basic misconception
needed to “show” there is a greenhouse effect in the first place..
10
Derek, before you pontificate any more I think you should read a short overview of what the greenhouse effect actually is. You could start with my posting #75. The temperature of space has nothing to do with it.
10
Tony,
before you try to change the question, answer my points first.
Space is NOT cold.
Things can get cold in it, but that is a different matter.
Don’t pontificate “mate”, answer my points.
After that, or before you type anything preferably, remember photons move at “about” 216,000 kilometres per second…….
10
Derek, you have not asked any question as far as I can see — you seem to know everything — and nor have I.
I would like to help you but I cannot answer your points until I know what they are. Insofar as the temperature of empty space has any meaning, I would say it was in fact absolute zero, according to the zeroth law which effectively defines temperature. (If a vacuum is put in thermal contact with a solid object at absolute zero, no heat flows either way. That is the definition of equal temperatures.)
Looked at another way, being cold is just an absence of heat. Empty space certainly has an absence of heat. And suppose there is just one molecule in a cubic yard of space? Does that molecule have a temperature? There is no such thing as a perfect vacuum. How perfect does it have to be before it ceases to have a temperature? (OK, now I have asked questions, but they are rhetorical.)
But in any case, the temperature of space does not figure in any explanation of climate change I have ever seen or heard. And neither does the speed of light. (It’s actually 300,000 kph btw, not 216,000.) Not sure why you raised that.
10
Sorry, I obviously meant 300,000 kps (not kph) in my last post.
10
Elderly men may also be bullied by AGW fanatics, James Randi was forced to recant earlier words and to accept the necessity of bowing to superior scientific consensus.
10
I had never heard of James Randi but on his own site he describes himself as a “magician” with a “rudimental knowledge of the facts about planet earth.” It is hard to see why anyone would care enough about what he thinks to bully him.
In his paper on AGW he accepts that the earth is kept warm by greenhouse gases but goes on to say:
“The limit of the influence of CO2 is dictated, not by the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, but by the amount of solar radiation reflected back from the Earth. Once all the infrared rays have been “captured” by the greenhouse gases there is no additional increase in carbon dioxide.”
That makes no sense at all. He seems to confuse reflection with emission. The problem is not radiation “reflected back from the earth” but radiation “emitted by the earth.” His last sentence suggests that he thinks radiation creates carbon dioxide, but I suspect what he meant to say is that there will be no more absorption beyond the point when all the infrared coming from the sun is absorbed. This seems to be the crux of his sceptism, yet it is totally false. I think the mistake follows from his confusion between reflection and emission already mentioned. There is relatively little infrared in the radiation from the sun, and what there is would tend to be filtered out by the GHG on the way in. But the amount of infrared radiation emitted from the earth is not limited by the spectrum of the sun’s radiation, and in fact will go up as the earth heats up.
There are valid arguments in the AGW debate, but we would be well served to get rid of ill-informed arguments like this, and if that is called “bullying” so be it. (Would you say a Geography department was “bullying” if it refused to hire a professor who believed the earth to be flat?)
In any case, there has been plenty of bullying on the other side. Until recently we had an Administration which would have loved to fund research to show that AGW does not exist, and did in fact attempt to muzzle its own employees. Not to mention pressure from lobbyists for the Oil, Power, Auto, and Aircraft/Airlime industries. Fortunately these business interests have finally been forced by the weight of evidence to accept that AGW is real.
10
I have no doubt he would be the first to say that what he does is illusion, not magic, but Randi has some good scores on recognising human credulity and bias (that is how a stage magician operates).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Alpha
Note what happens when funding is allocated to scientists for the purpose of finding a particular outcome — they find it! This was a research lab at a well known university, plenty of PhD’s around supervising, a roomfull of scientists, test equipment, and they even got a tip-off that one of the guys was a fake:
Even though the AGW subject matter is completely different, the methodology and dismissal of anything that doesn’t fit their world-view are remarkably similar.
10
Thanks, Tel. Randi seems to have done some good work, though I am struggling to understand the difference between a fake psychic and a real one!
But on the AGW issue I feel he is unqualified, for example because he does not understand the difference between the reflection of radiation and the emission of radiation. It seems that if one is going to take a position against a proposition — especially one as widely accepted as AGW — one should at least know what that proposition is. (I was admonished for saying “that’s all you need to know” about my brief summary of the AGW case, but I did not mean that it had to be accepted, only that it had to be understood before one could meaningfully disagree with it.)
One should also be conversant with the relevant basic physics principles like Planck’s, law which has stood up to the test of time for over a century. Yet, on this blog we have heard from people who think AGW is something to do with the temperature of space or the speed of light. One posting seemed to imply that the writer did not believe that electromagnetic radiation even exists! IMHO these people are simply not qualified to have an opinion on the matter. If these are the kind of people who are being “bullied,” I approve, but I still think there has over the years been more money seeking to prove AGW is a hoax than that is true.
10
James Randi is the founder of the James Randi Educational Foundation which sponsors The One Million Dollar Paranormal Challenge offering a prize of US $1,000,000 to anyone who can demonstrate evidence of any paranormal, supernatural or occult power or event, under test conditions agreed to by both parties. He is a father-figure of sorts to sceptics around the world, including the Australian Skeptics. The point is that arch-sceptics on sceptical blogs are calling Randi a Denialist and insinuating that he might be senile because he expressed properly consistent, sceptical doubts about AGW.
I should hope that any geographer would accept that the earth is an oblate spheroid, as (I expect) would any geography department; but a more appropriate hypothetical situation would be whether a Classics department should care about a prospective professor’s believing in a particular theory about the shape of the world. If a Classics department, or Mathematics department or Computer Science department told prospective staff that they had to repudiate their silly flat-earth beliefs publicly in order to be hired, I should indeed call that bullying.
(I do wish, by the way, that people would stop insisting that everyone before Columbus believed that the world was flat. Many of those who argued against the funding of Columbus’ expedition also accepted the notion of a spherical earth but disagreed with Columbus over his incorrect assessment on the distance between Spain and the Indies, and thought that Columbus would not be able to reach the Indies by travelling west and would surely run out of provisions ere that could happen—and they were right. Eratosthenes measured the circumference of the globe with remarkable accuracy in the time of Ptolemy II: this rather suggests that Eratosthenes, and all those who reported his measurements, realised that the world is not flat. In fact, most observant people in ancient times noticed the curvature of the horizon and other evidence against a flatearth theory.)
Tee hee, I mean, really?
10
Re Flat earth, Bernard of Clairveaux gave sermons to the peasantry in the twelth century referring to the globe of the world without any need to explain it to them. It may not have been high on their list of priorities, but the populace at large knew the earth was roughly spherical.
Incidentally I believe Pliny the Eldar mentioned that sailors were the first to realise, as they noticed they could see mountains far off in the distance before they could see the coast. I think it was Pliny, maybe it was Strabo?
10
Tony Walsh wrote –
” But in any case, the temperature of space does not figure in any explanation of climate change I have ever seen or heard. And neither does the speed of light. (It’s actually 300,000 kph btw, not 216,000.) Not sure why you raised that. ”
And therein lies your problem in trying to understand climate science.
1) Our planet RADIATES heat according to it’s temperature in space. Which IS temperature “neutral”.
2) Photons move at what speed…….?
Sometime after considering these “small” issues Tony you may well ask yourself,
” WHY have I also NEVER seen the “speed” of the greenhouse (supposed) effect mentioned in CONsensus climate science. ”
Please excuse my liberty in adding “(supposed)” and “CONsensus” to your thoughts above…
Happy Xmas to all.
yours,
Derek.
10
Deadman:
“…in the time of Ptolemy II”
Commenting:
You should mention the time frame ~1153 AD. While we’re at it:
Aristotle (384-322 BC) also proposed a spherical earth on geometric grounds, but backed up his assertion with physical evidence (described in his On the Heavens of 350BC[4.1])
Persons living in southern lands see southern constellations higher above the horizon than those living in northern lands.
The shadow of the Earth on the Moon during a lunar eclipse is round.
The fact that objects fall to Earth towards its center means that if it were constructed of small bits of matter originally, these parts would naturally settle into a spherical shape.
source: http://www.astronomy.ohio-state.edu/~pogge/Ast161/Unit2/measearth.html
10
Obscure cultural point: many readers will not realize that Joanne’s illustration at the top of this page must be of a rugby league, rugby union or Australian rules football team. In fact, it can’t be rugby union, because they are gentlemen in that sport. Surely it should be a hockey team (meaning ice hockey)?
10
Tony Welsh:
You assert:
Wonderful! I have been studying AGW thr three decades (yes, 30 years), and I have published both popular and peer reviewed papers on the subject. But I have never found or been given any evidence of any kind for the existence of AGW. But you say there is cogent evidence for AGW.
So, please tell me the “evidence … that AGW is real”. I realy want to know it.
Richard
10
Graham White said “hysteria and earlier manifestations reported in Charles Mackay’s famous book: “Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds”; Mackay’s book published in 1841 documented waves of religious and financial hysteria which have swept entire societies in the psat including: The Crusades and The European Witch Mania – as well as waves of financial speculation hsyteria such as The South Sea Bubble, the Amsterdan ‘Tulipomania’, the Mississippi Company etc.”
Certainly is true.
When you begin reading this book, which can be downloaded in pdf format, you will just be sick. I promise you, even the first account had me shaking my head in disgust because it IS happening. Just thinking about it makes me shake my head :). It is TRULY a MUST read. If you want REAL history, or even an analysis of our masses throughout history by an independent, you must search for it via many sources and most will NOT be found in KEVIN JENNINGS reading material.
READ the book listed above, or just peruse it. It is quite a read.
10
I truly enjoy this blog.
10
I admire the fortitude and integrity of those men-and women like Jo, who are willing to stand up to the power brokers pulling the strings of so many scientific ‘Pinocchio’s’ that have sadly sold out their integrity for profit.
So many decent sceptics cope with humiliation, are sidelined by the ‘bought’ scientific community, ignored by the uneducated media, have meagre funding, and are simply standing up for the rights we once supposed were integral to our democracy.
If this manufactured ‘disaster’ is as important as to be a threat to our survival, then we the people deserve and should demand a thorough debate and investigation. Not a Gore spin-fest.
10
Tim, democracy may mean that we all get a vote on what to do about it, but surely it does not mean that everyone’s opinion on the technical questions of fact have equal weight. One might as well say we should draw lots to see who should plan the next expedition to the moon or do the next heart transplant. Not that one has to be much of an expert to understand the climate change argument. Which bit of the argument do you not agree with? Do you deny Planck’s law? Do you deny that the earth is cooler than the sun and so its radiation spectrum has relatively more lower frequencies? Do you deny that greenhouse gases absorb more of that lower-frequency radiation compared to the higher-frequency radiation from the sun? Do you deny that the concentration of greenhouse gases is increasing? Do you deny that burning carbon produces CO2? And while I am at it, what are your qualifications for this denial?
The premise of this whole thread is questionable anyway, since it is surely the skeptics who are the bullies. How else would you describe Sarah Palin’s antics? And the powers that be have so far prevented any action being taken, and the press, who you call uneducated but I suspect are more educated than yourself, feel bullied into giving equal weight to the skeptics.
As for needing more debate, this has been discussed for over 150 years now, and quite intensely for the past 30 or so. Time to act!
10