I am annoyed with Ian for coming up with a brilliant book title, and I can’t steal it. All the same, I am looking forward to reading it. You can order the book now for its release in November.
Actually, the serious point here is that I am getting reports from parents of students at environmental “science” courses at university level and at high schools, who are not allowed to question their masters without a payback. This is the perfect thread for those discussions of how our education system is being influenced by activists. — Jo
how to get expelled from school $29.95
A guide to climate change for pupils, parents and punters
Ian Plimer
Foreword by Václav Klaus, President of the Czech Republic
RELEASED DATE: November 2011
PRE-ORDER TODAY AND HAVE YOUR COPY PERSONALLY SIGNED BY IAN PLIMER
Are pupils, parents and the public being fed political propaganda on climate change? Now is your chance to find out. Professor Plimer gives 101 simple questions with answers for you to ask teachers, activists, journalists and politicians. The climate industry adjusts the temperature record and withholds raw data, computer codes and information from scrutiny. Computer predictions of a scary future don’t agree with measurements. Past natural climate changes have been larger and more rapid than the worst case predictions yet humans adapted. Is human-induced global warming the biggest financial and scientific scam in history? If it is, we will pay dearly.
About the author
PROFESSOR IAN PLIMER (The University of Adelaide) is Australia’s best-known geologist. He is also Emeritus Professor of Earth Sciences at The University of Melbourne where he was Professor and Head of Earth Sciences (1991-2005) after serving at The University of Newcastle (1985-1991) as Professor and Head of Geology. He was on the staff of the University of New England, The University of New South Wales and Macquarie University. He has published more than 120 scientific papers on geology. This is his eighth book written for the general public, the best known of which are Telling lies for God (Random House), Milos-Geologic History (Koan), A Short History of Planet Earth (ABC Books) and his best-selling Heaven+Earth (Connor Court).
He won the Leopold von Buch Plakette (German Geological Society), Clarke Medal (Royal Society of NSW), Sir Willis Connolly Medal (Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy), was elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering and was elected Honorary Fellow of the Geological Society of London. In 1995, he was Australian Humanist of the Year and later was awarded the Centenary Medal. He was Managing Editor of Mineralium Deposita, president of the SGA, president of IAGOD, president of the Australian Geoscience Council and sat on the Earth Sciences Committee of the Australian Research Council for many years. He won the Eureka Prize for the promotion of science, the Eureka Prize for A Short History of Planet Earth and the Michael Daley Prize (now a Eureka Prize) for science broadcasting. He is an advisor to governments and corporations and a regular broadcaster.
Table of Contents
1. HUMAN-INDUCED CLIMATE CHANGE: WHY I AM SCEPTICAL
A short history of planet Earth
What warming?
Follow the money
Corruption, fraud and porky pies
Snow, ice, floods and cyclones
Fellow travellers
2. SCIENCE
The process of science
Evolution of scientific ideas
Models, predictions and adaptation
Anti science
3. CARBON DIOXIDE, WATER AND ICE
Planetary degassing and carbon dioxide
An innocent trace gas
Another innocent trace gas
Water and ice
Sea level
4. TEMPERATURE
How do we measure global temperature?
Urban effect
Adjusting of measurements
Hottest year on record
5. HOW TO GET EXPELLED FROM SCHOOL
Background
Is climate change normal?
One hundred and one questions.
A guide for teachers, parents and punters
$29.95
ISBN: 978-1-921421-80-8
Paperback, (250 pages approx)
Hi Joanne,
Sorry I could not come and see Lord Monckton – I was really sick that day and not near my phone. Just happened to be up at 0115 and saw your new post and thought I should be first with a comment.
I wish Jakey was at school to cause problems with Ian’s questions
30
You could, most unfortunately, write the same book with regards to far too many topics ‘taught’ at schools today. Even mathematics, I’m not kidding. Beyond ridiculous.
The book on ‘How to not get expelled from school’ would be much, much shorter. I believe that the Ministry of Truth is working on it.
20
The book seems to be a follow up to the 10:10 commercials. While reports of blowing up children so far have not turned up, reports of reprisals against students who question the mantra have.
10
If you, like me, are not in Australia, but you want to buy a copy, I suggest you wait until the legislation around the carbon tax pricing mechanisms goes through.
Once that has happened, and the international financial markets have assessed the impacts, you will get a much more favourable exchange rate.
You might look at setting up a transaction in Bahraini Dinar – they are already worth more than the Australian Dollar, and the real costs of the carbon tax flows through, the differential on your investment will almost certainly improve.
There is a rumour that Australian politicians are busily buying up Kazakhstan Tenge. I can’t confirm that, but since we do know that they are seriously into [ahem] natural gas, it is plausible. Perhaps Adam Smith knows?
10
Phil Jordan: #3
Phil, I think you might be intending to say that, “the book seems to
be a follow up to thedemonstrate the thinking behind the 10:10 commercials”? Please tell me I am not wrong!A follow up is usually written by the same author, or group of authors, and I don’t think you mean to imply that Professor Plimmer was involved in the earlier fiasco.
10
I said last weekend that my twelve year old daughter does not require the book as she’s doing a good job without it.
That does not preclude buying ten copies and distributing them throughout the school to do my bit for education. It would be the right thing to do?
10
As the latest invasion of Teenage Ninja Watermelons on Jo’s blog illustrates, what is being taught in school today is not HOW to think, but WHAT to think.
If taught only what to think—without first being supplied the cognitive tools to rationally inquiry into the foundations of how one knows something—the results is a zombie generation driven by emotive imagery, moral puffery and idols rather than boring old hard evidence derived from the hard yakka of gathering observational and experimental data. So much more exciting to watch as-seen-on-Tee-Vee and then nod passively at computer models built to confirm one’s favourite moral assumptions.
In the final outcome, the tautological feedback of one’s self-righteous piety becomes so powerfully delusional that even public fantasies of murdering heretical school children en masse seems, well, like jolly fair dinkum promotional humour for the cause.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfnddMpzPsM&feature=player_embedded
Ha. Ha. And the Greens who made this TV commercial would call us uncivil extremists?
And they laugh when we say that we are afraid that, if they could, the Greens would take away our right to free expression?
Ha. Ha. Ha.
10
No zombie spoilers here today? But, of course, the APS doesn’t pay weekend overtime without a special form …
10
Children are an important tool for the alarmists and their use of children has been vile:
http://theclimatescepticsparty.blogspot.com/2011/09/kids.html
10
Education is what you must aquire without any interference from your schooling
Mark Twain 1835-1910
10
wes george @ 7
The Greens are insane – that video was sick!
10
JN: “You can order the book now for it’s release in November.”
It’s not an expulsion offence, but “it’s” is short for “it is” or maybe “it has.” The possessive pronoun doesn’t have the apostrophe.
Back to school.
REPLY: Ta. Fixed. “it’s” is a compulsive reflex. JN
10
Hey Kevin,
When the 10:10ers got called out on that one, their response officially was along the lines of “some people don’t have a sense of humor”…
If that got to you – checkout this one from Build a bear workshop for the younger kids. Yes Kids, Christmas is cancelled due to global warming:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7I-AhVkXlb4
10
Rereke Whakaaro #5
Post in haste, repent in leisure. I meant the book was merely exposing the thinking of the 10:10 commercials. It was not a “step 2” as Plimer was clearly showing where skepticism was being vilified.
Sorry for the ambiguity.
10
Don’t be silly Jo, why would you want to change the way environmental science is taught.
My daughter & her best friend both did B Sc/B Ed courses at a large southern Queensland university.
The friend was somehow shuttled into environmental science, something about a problem with physics lecturers I believe. She found it brilliant.
The math never got near the year 12 math B & C she had done, which made it easy, [although most of the students had trouble with it], & the rest of it only required regurgitating the course notes, in a rather gushy style, to achieve distinctions.
She found everything could be achieved in a couple of hours a week, enabling her to hold down a full time job through out the course.
By the end of the years she was all ready earning more than the teachers salary she had planned, & had a nice bit of paper to hang on the wall.
What more could you ever ask of our tertiary sector, really.
10
Hasbeen @ 14
That is so wrong.
Not your assessment, but the fact that it takes place.
I wonder how the friend would do if she had to work retail. I am not so much amazed as disgusted at H.S. graduates here that cannot spell properly, are unable to compose a paper to the standards they should be able to upon entering college (I’m 47 and back in school to finish a degree I began years ago so I notice these things), or do basic math.
Case in point, I go to a store and buy an item where the total comes up as $7.68
I hand the person at the register $10.18
I expect $2.50 in return
Nine times out of ten I get an absolutely blank look as they have already entered in what they thought I would give them ($10.00) and the register has calculated the change for them. Oh crap, I have to come along and make them do math.
But the look of utter confusion is priceless.
10
Kevin and Madjak,
We ain’t seen nothing yet!
When you really become so delusional that believe that you’re a hero living in a sci-fi where the Planet is Dying and only you possess the true knowledge of how to Save The Planet, then no sacrifice is too great and any ignorant bogan or uncivil denier who tries to thwart your heroic effect to save the planet must be dealt a king hit quickly so you can get on with saving the planet. Naturally, this might mean a few innocent children get blown to smithereens and a few white lies must be planted in the data and the media. And, of course, democracy and free speech become huge impediments to Saving The Planet because civil liberties allow other arguments and policies the light of day. Power must be seized if the ignorant masses can’t be fooled into granting it directly!
The Greens are like any fanatical religious or political group. Their high moral mission grants them the right to violate your rights precisely because they’re on a mission to SAVE THE PLANET NOW!
http://www.rense.com/general70/massdeath.htm
Our grandparent learned a hard lesson in the middle of last century that we would do well to recall–The face of true evil isn’t frightening or fearsome or even romantic like a horde of Vikings storming an Irish monastery. No, the face of pure evil is utterly banal, it will appear on your ABC nightly as a talking head for years calmly reassuring you with its utterly banal voice before the terrors begins, and by then it will be far far too late.
10
I believe more disclosure on the author would be prudent before the gaggle of Googling gotcha gremlins get out of bed.
Ian Plimer is also a director of one of those nasty mining companies that dig stuff up. Heaven forbid!
Ian is also a very active member of ANDEV. This organisation’s objective is to develop northern regions of Australia to draw international investment to ensure the prosperity of Australians after the mining boom has expired…and it will, earlier than silly sausages like Swan predicts.
A carbon tax will go a long way to not only hobble this type of development but ensure that Australia’s GDP growth is restricted.
Have yet to see any serious analysis of the effect on big ticket infrastructure projects. Wonder why?
10
Although a good speaker and seems a nice bloke, Ian Plimer shoddy researcher, with multitudes of mistakes in Heaven + Earth. Lots of scientist have taken the time to show where Plimer got it wrong, eg:
http://www.complex.org.au/tiki-download_file.php?fileId=91
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/ian-plimer-heaven-and-earth/story-e6frg8no-1225710387147
A shame that the intellect he brought to bear against the creationist nonsense has been distorted by his vested interests in mining.
http://www.readfearn.com/2011/05/the-mining-legends-who-supported-moncktons-climate-denial/
———
REPLY: Mat – Plimer wrote a massive tome with 2200 references, and just because someone found typo’s or inexplicable, or non-referenced points does not nullify the other 2000 refs. The intellect he brought to bear remains the same one. No one has found evidence that feedbacks are positive, the models are right, and that Plimer’s main message was wrong. — JN
10
@4
WTF!? The reason Australia’s exchange rate has been so high is because of the booming demand for our natural resources such as coal and iron ore.
But at any rate, when the ETS bills do pass I will be closely monitoring the exchange rate. I predict that you will be proven completely wrong.
10
“How to get expelled from school (or university, or a research job, or a government department…).”
Love the elephants on the cover, btw. Especially the skeptical one. Caption: “Huh? Why are y’all going that way? There’s a cliff around that corner!”
It looks like a clear and comprehensive resource for any independent thinker at school, and complements “The Skeptic’s Handbook”.
10
I’ve noted a worrying trend with childhood education, and luckily I have someone I can refer to here.
Our Grand daughter attends one of two quite large Catholic High Schools here in Rockhampton, and she is in Grade 8 (aged 13), and she visits quite often, and during those after School visits, I gently ask her how school went for the day, and what she did. Her perception is probably thinking I’m being polite, because thinking as a 13 year old, she can’t imagine why anyone would be interested in School, after the school day has finished.
When her Mum, our daughter, is with her, she is often shuffled off here into my room with the gentle hint that perhaps ‘Poppy’ might help with her homework.
I ask her gently about what new things she has learned in Science, but again, they are at early stages so far, so it’s still the basics, and while some of the stuff is more than what I was taught at her age in the 60’s, those basics are still just the basics.
However, I had a recent occasion to help her with her Maths homework. She has started Algebra, and is up to the transposition of formula stage to resolve those equations.
Coming from the electrical trade, a large part of our early trade training was Electrical Technology, two of the longer ‘phases’ we learned, and these two subjects are intensely Mathematics based, and as is the case with the electrical trade, there are a lot of sometimes quite complex equations that need resolution for one value or another, so transposition of formulae is something we had to do a lot of in those subjects, and that also included complex Geometry, and Trig as well.
So here my grand daughter was with transposition of algebraic formulae for her homework, a list of 25 questions, all requiring resolution, and here was one place I actually could help her.
She had to write out each step along the way, and I just watched her do the first one, having ‘nutted it out’ in my head.
As she wrote down each step, I was astonished to see she was doing it in a really round about way. She came to the desired result OK, but with about two or three extra steps.
Without wanting to seem too pushy, I asked her if she might watch while I did the next one, just to show her an easier way to get there, a less complex way also.
She watched and actually could see the point I was making, so I asked her to try it with the next one, and she replied that she had to do it the way that the teacher told her to do, and to show each of those steps.
Again, not wanting to seem pushy, I mentioned that she could still show the steps for the easier resolution, but she was insistent that it had to be done the way the teacher showed.
This perplexed me somewhat, so she did it her way and I did them my way. She got some of them wrong, but that’s part of the thing I suppose.
I asked her if there was a way in advance she might know which of the ones were incorrect, gently prodding her with the ones she got wrong, and she told me that the answers were in the back of the book. What impressed me most was that at no stage was she tempted to cheat, again a good sign, well for me anyway.
When she had finished, I asked her why she would not just use the easier way to do the work, my perception being that the teacher would still she that she arrived at the correct answer, and still showed each step.
My grand daughter than told me that if it wasn’t done the exact way that the teacher taught it and showed them, she would be marked wrong anyway, as the perception would be that she just looked the answer up in the back of the book.
I know that this hasn’t been related to the actual topic here of the Plimer book, but this seems to me to be a strange trend in teaching, that students who do find an alternate way of working out a problem are in fact actively discouraged from doing just that, and it seems that there is a trend towards ‘groupthink’ in all of this.
I know I’ve rambled on again, but it seems to me that Education is somehow become rigidly structured to conform with a set of values that discourage the individual from even considering an alternative point of looking at the same problem.
Tony.
10
This is a classic example of being taught what to know rather than empowering young people to think through and find solutions to problems themselves. The result is important, probably more so than the route taken to obtain the result. Indeed, it is entirely possible that a new method or formula might be developed. Education needs to support and engender learning.
10
Try another argument. Ross Garnaut has been on the board of mining companies and was the chairman of one.
10
Tony, maybe you should ask her about what she has done in English, such as when it is and isn’t appropriate to capitalise words?
10
Adam @ 23
Perhaps you could enlighten us on the meaning of the word Pedant. Thats with a capital ‘p’ too, if you get my drift.
10
Not only the right thing to do, Scaper @ 6, but also in the national interest.
Going forward!
10
Sorry… I omitted the apostrophe on “that’s”. Is my font OK.
10
“Is my font OK?” Sorry I omitted the question mark………….Doh! I lost the argument.
10
I commend you for admitting defeat on this occasion.
10
Hey Doctor Smith,
it doesn’t worry me whatsoever that you look down and laugh at my level of education from your lofty perch with a Doctorate and all.
I was just wondering how this reflects with the comment from some guy called Adam Smith, where he said at Comment 149 in the Jensen Post:
As I said earlier Doctor, you need to look in the mirror.
10
Which Gillard is destroying with the carbon tax! Congratulations! You may be learning (or just stumbled onto an economic reality).
10
I teach Certificate courses to people on unemployment benefit.
In a course last week I asked how much a person would earn if they sold twenty items at $5 each every business day for four weeks. It was part of an example, not a test.
My astonishment was not so much at the demands to use a calculator or failure to solve the problem, as at the shock-horror response to being asked to do such a computation at all.
I recall a bumper-sticker that said “If you can read this thank a teacher”. I wondered who I should thank if I couldn’t.
I have been a tertiary academic.
Our education system is a disgrace.
10
I didn’t laugh. I just thought you were capitalising words unnecessarily in a post designed to criticise the people teaching your grand daughter.
Have you considered that they want her to show all the process of working out the problems for reason? Could it be that they are going to do more complicated algebraic procedures in a later part of the class when showing the workings will make the more complex concepts easier to understand?
Rather than assuming you know the best way to do something, sometimes it pays to consider alternate reasons for why the teacher is taking a particular methodological approach.
20
Hi Phil,
The average cost increase for a tonne of coal under the Emissions Trading scheme is $1.80.
This is in an environment where the price Australia gets for coal has doubled in the last decade. We are now getting over $300 a tonne for metallurgical coal.
Oh, and I don’t think you should lecture Australia on its economy when our unemployment rate is 5.3% and our economy grew last quarter by 1.2%, and our debt to GDP ratio is 7%, compared to about 85% for the U.S.
10
Which we sell to other countries so they can increase their carbon output while we destroy our economy with this misguided thing called the carbon tax which is based on data that they choose to give us,and is slanted in their favour. Heaven forbid that we get both sides of the story to engage in a rational debate on the subject.
10
My daughter was expelled from a Steiner school. In a Steiner school you get the same teacher for all years and my daughter was so frustrated she called her teacher a f**kwit. They hauled her up before a board who asked her to apologise so she promptly asked them if they wanted her to lie?
She then moved to the local public school and all her grades went up 🙂
10
Mate, metallurgical coal is for making steel!
The ETS won’t “destroy the economy” at all, and remember, the market approach is much cheaper than the tax and spend alternative being proposed by the Coalition.
10
Why did you send here to one of those?
10
Thanks, Professor Ian Plimer, for having the courage to challenge “Big Brother.”
And thanks, President Václav Klaus, for writing the foreward.
We live in a dangerous time with most world leaders and their political power aligned with a scientific falsehood.
Public confidence in their leadership increases daily, and they are like rats trapped on a sinking ship with no escape.
Statesmanship is desperately needed to resolve the standoff without more damage to society.
See: “Deep roots of the Climategate scandal”
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10640850/20110722_Climategate_Roots.pdf
With kind regards,
Oliver K. Manuel
Former NASA Principal
Investigator for Apollo
Research Career Summary
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10640850/Summary_of_Career.pdf
10
Gee!
More fool me! (again, I suppose)
Here’s me thinking that a child’s education was something that parents had a say in.
Perhaps the good Doctor might give us his list of approved schools.
My nephew was troubled child at the State School he attended, and a Psychiatrist advised his Mother that perhaps he might do better at a Steiner School.
He moved to a Steiner School, (on the Gold Coast) and after 4 years there, he became a much better, and more rounded student and child as well in his everyday life, and, at the end of his Primary education he moved back to a local State High school, from Steiner, back into the State education system.
His 5 years in High School went very well. He had no problems at all, both academically, and as a person, and in fact, academically, he improved out of (visible) sight.
Now he is a (much better) adjusted adult, all round than what he obviously would have been, had he not spent those 4 years at that Steiner School, with the one teacher from Grades 4 through 7.
I’m not saying this is indicative for all Steiner Schools, but on this occasion, it proved to be a good result, even though his Mother, (my Sister) was at first reticent to send him there, having heard so much bad news about them.
Tony.
10
Michael Petterson, you are assuming that those countries buying our coal are burning our coal. Do you really think that we would, as the world’s largest exporter and one of the world’s largest producers, allow this commodity to be burnt in such quantities? Or in any quantity at all? And that we would be seduced by a price of $300? Are you not aware of the enormous contradictions? Do you think Tony Windsor would sell his acreage to a coal miner if he felt this could be the result?
And even if they do burn 75% of our enormous coal production – which I refuse to believe of a nation committed to a low carbon economy – the burning will not occur in our atmosphere. If the Chinese burn our coal, they will be burning it into the Chinese atmosphere. The Koreans will be be burning it into a Korean atmosphere.
Silly Chinese. Silly Koreans. We know better.
10
Here we go.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/breaking-news/imf-world-bank-eye-carbon-tax-on-fuels/story-e6frg90f-1226145207324
10
“Armed Troops Burn Down Homes, Kill Children To Evict Ugandans In Name Of Global Warming”
This article can be found at
http://www.minnesotansforglobalwarming.com/m4gw/
So this is where the NZ government and soon (they hope) the AU government is also going to spend our tax dollars for?
10
Winston @ 24
You hit the nail on the head – Pedant! Possibly OCPD is in play!
10
Scaper @41
$250,000,000,000 Would be a nice chunk of change. Very tempting. With that sort of money they could bail out some more banks and some financial monkeys who don’t deserve to be in business.
You know, the same people who have been waiting oh so patiently for a global ETS. I’ll bet they just can’t waitto get some Consolidated Carbon Swaps going!
Don’t worry, its all everyone elses money. It won’t affect you that much.
yet. It will though.
10
Interesting, scaper. The article mentions $250 billion in 2020, and a focus on “how funds to fight climate change can be mobilised”. It does not mention who controls the revenues. A detail for later, perhaps.
Ah well. To paraphrase the words of a certain meteorology clerk: One dollar lost is a waste, one billion is a statistic.
10
Sounds like a reasonable idea. Considering that from what i have heard, many of the economic problems of places like Greece can be pretty much traced back to a widely entrenched culture of tax avoidance it would be a good way to raise revenue. Also, sounds a lot like the kind of excise that we already pay.
10
Catamon is right in saying that the proposed tax sounds a lot like the the kind of excise we already pay. Why would we pay a second time, to international institutions notorious for back-handing, skimming, scamming, shell-gaming, book-cooking and trough-swilling?
10
Catamon,
Do you mean to imply that a large number of the greek public servants are tax avoiders?
You know the numbers. At last recollection I believe there were more than 1 million public servants for a country of 11 million. Really productive distribution of the countries effort there I’m sure.
Sounds a bit like the growth in the number of public servants here in Australia in recent years, or at least movement heading in that direction eh!
You know, captains in the greek coast guard collecting their salary for over 20 years and not reporting for duty once.
Sure, it’s only the big boys responsible for the greek tragedy. You just keep spinning those lines there comrade, hardly anyone falls for those spin lines other than you.
10
JK,
RE: Ugandans being massacred in the name of carbon trading:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/armed-troops-burn-down-homes-kill-children-to-evict-ugandans-in-name-of-global-warming.html
If true, well, hey, as one commenter here posted the other day:
“Only a few thousand people died”
So we really want to contribute to schemes that provide incentives to encourage this sort of thing.
Well, in australias case, according to many polls, no we don’t.
Not that the wishes of the people here matter a damn to the Regime we have in power currently.
10
If only Plimer had credibility instead of openly lying.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/dec/16/ian-plimer-versus-george-monbiot
10
He wasn’t lying – he was being attacked by Monbiot and Jones (Both non scientists)- he kept pointing to his book that they claimed they’d read – his book has a whole chapter on volcanoes and especially undersea volcanoes. If you want to find the truth regarding volcanoes read this link.
http://carbon-budget.geologist-1011.net/
10
Madjak @ 49
The Ugandan article here may be related and of interest to you.
http://undertheradarmedia.wordpress.com/
10
janama says, “next”…well done. I bet most proponents would not even have heard of the Gakkel Ridge, funny that.
Meanwhile, back at the global manipulation ranch…
Stick and watermelon comes to mind,
10
Blimey, I saw that debate and thought that Plimer performed poorly and was evasive to the point of dishonesty.
The worst of it were his claims concerning CO2 and vulcanism. It’s one point, but scarcely minor. I dislike spin and evasiveness wherever I encounter it. Plimer should have looked everyone in the eye and admitted fault or uncertainty. He didn’t. His evasions would have been worthwhile as separate points, but an evasion is an evasion.
Monbiot is scarcely sane, but scarcely stupid. He is snobbish, neurotic, unstable and a misanthrope. But not stupid.
Plimer disappointed greatly on that occasion. Of course, if anyone has more background on the vulcanism issue and his handling of it, I’d be interested to hear. I haven’t read his book, I’ve only seen that unhappy debate. I suspect there’s much value in Plimer’s work, but I felt I needed to say this.
Error can be grave, but spin is a very pestilence.
10
Janama, while I was making my last comment, you were making yours. It seems there’s much I may have missed, or I may have been swayed too easily by an expert ABC-style raid. I guess I should have been alerted by those two words: “Tony Jones”. Pity the Speccy didn’t run the debate!
Truth is, I don’t know much about vulcanism at all, and undersea vulcanism seems full of science that isn’t “settled”. The amount and variability of CO2 from volcanoes is surely a big point, as is the amount of CO2 from massive hot-burns in Australian forests. I’ve often wondered about these things, and about the casual vagueness of certain CAGW proponents, especially over the fire issue.
I’m off into the paddocks and bamboo before the rain, but hope to give more attention to this issue later.
Live and learn.
10
Yes – I thought Plimer appeared evasive as you say mosomoso, but please remember, Plimer is an academic out of water on TV, Monbiot and Jones are professional journalists/tv hosts.
10
Back on topic, always taught my daughter to be observant and to question everything. Gets me in the Principal’s office quite often. A running joke now, we are taking bets on how long before another flare up and visit to his office.
Taught her Roman numerals when she was six. Pointed out the mistake on the standard Roman numeral clock faces. Check out one of these clocks and see if you can pick it up.
Another one of her observations, ‘pagan’ being the base word in ‘propaganda’. Says it all!
10
PhilJourdan: #14
Well, it is not like I never make errors when I type. It is an occupational hazard of thinking faster than you can type.
I just didn’t want anybody else to think you had gone over to the dark side. 😉
Typing (talking) about thinking faster than you can type, have you ever noticed how trolls on this site rarely make mistakes in their English? They must type awfully fast, or they must think awfully slow. I wonder which it is?
10
Adam Smith @ 23
Wrong – again. Tony used “Algebra” in exactly the same context as you used “English” in this sentence – “Tony, maybe you should ask her about what she has done in English, such as when it is and isn’t appropriate to capitalise words?”. He was referring to the school subject of “Algebra” which should have been capitalised. Still, it is typical of you choosing an irrelevant point to argue on and then conveniently ignore the core issue being discussed.
10
scaper,
I always thought it like that so people would not mix up the 4 and the 6, but that doesn’t explain the 9 and 11.
My favourite SF author Isaac Asimov had I theory I seem to recall that in the early days, The Romans used IIII because IV had something to do with Jupiter.
Could be wrong.
Maybe the earliest clock used for a reference was done that way, and all were just copied from that.
Tony.
10
wes george: #17
OK, let’s assume, for a moment, that Eric Pianka is correct.
When the population size of any organism gets to be too big for its environment, the population collapses, and all that survive are the fittest amongst the population, and they live to start the cycle again. This is known as natural selection.
At 6.5 billion, is the population collapsing? No. Will it collapse at some future size? Possibly. Will that totally wipe out humanity? No, because the fittest will survive. Will Eric Planka, and other Greens be members of the fittest? Unlikely, because they spend all their time in conclave, plotting how to bring down civilisation. Ergo, being a Green is not a survival trait.
And this is the problem. The Greens have followed the above logic, and have decided that only those who control all of the resources, only those in power, might be able to survive. And this is why they spend all their time in conclave, plotting how to bring down civilisation. It is a circular argument.
10
Their God Jupiter that is.
Tony.
10
Tony, an interesting explanation worthy of more research. I never noticed the variation of the rule until a six year old raised it.
10
janama @ 51:
Excuse me? George Monbiot has a Masters degree in zoology from Oxford!
10
Wrong. Let’s see what Tony actually wrote:
The subject is Maths, the topic is algebra.
Your assertion that what I wrote is wrong is itself wrong.
10
Mr. A Smith @ 36:
How many lies can one pack into a single sentence? If you’re the hilariously styled Adam Smith—Get it? Adam Smith! ROFTL!—a whole lot…
Lie 1— To start with it’s a tax. A tax on CO2 which won’t effect the Earth’s climate. You can call it FREE BEER SATURDAY!, but in the end its still just a onerous tax which cannot hope to achieve its goal of altering the Earth’s climate.
*
Lie 2— A carbon dioxide tax might not “destroy the economy” directly but that’s exactly what its vocal proponents originally designed it to do.
The whole idea is to so burden the Australian way of life with a tax on an invisible and harmlessly natural gas we exhale with every breath that today’s economy is destroyed. You gotta break some eggs to make an omelette, right?
Bob Brown says he wants to shut down ALL coal mining. The Greens want to destroy a whole lot of industries from timber, to mining, to irrigation farming, to live exports, to our fisheries.
It’s Green party policy to Demolish the Australian Economy. And that’s a good thing, because, modern market economics is destroying the planet according to the Greens. Once the old carbon pollution economy is destroyed we can all get green jobs weaving baskets, candle-making or pursue exciting careers in the emerging mud hut construction industry.
*
Lie 3—A “market approach” to carbon dioxide emissions is to disband the Ministry of Climate Change and allow the free market to determine which technological innovations in energy production are most practicable for supplying for our energy needs of the future. Government bureaucracy can not order invention and creativity served up on a plate. Technological evolution is accelerated by a healthy free economy of ideas and capital, it is stymied by technocratic authoritarians demanding compliance to onerous regulatory codes and higher taxes.
Obviously, government controls, carbon taxes, wealth appropriation and redistribution to party cronies and subsidies to economically unsustainable energy sources, such as solar and wind power, is NOT “the market approach” but the “command economy approach” so utterly discredited last century in dozens of national experiments from Greece to the old Soviet Union.
*
Lie 4—The Coalition is the opposition out of power watching from the sidelines. Their approach to ” carbon pollution” (Ha, I love to say CARBON POLLUTION 😉 ) is to avoid being the first to, well, point out the bloody emperor has NO clothes. Carbon Pollution? Uh, yeah, we’ll plant more trees, OK?
After all, in the climate of political oppression and cultural derision instituted by this government and government funded media and elite institutions what politician really wants to be the first step forward to denounce the whole Climate Change Scam as the Scientific Fraud of the Century? OK, Barnaby Joyce and Dr. Dennis Jensen have done as much. But the opposition leadership feels it needs to be more circumspect while Green media demagoguery remains febrile and brutally hostile.
The price of the Coalition’s real policy is ZERO because their REAL policy once an election is called will be to “dismantle the whole climate change gravy train” rather than “destroy the economy”, including disbanding the Ministry of Climate Change, should they win the votes to do so.
*
The fifth and most important lie in that single sentence, is the pretension of the author that he’s sincere and honestly presenting a fair dinkum argument rather then practicing deception and obfuscation. Five lies in a single sentence, nice rhetoric, dude, but you’re not fooling anyone.
10
fair enough – my mistake.
10
Adam Smith: #19
I have finally read down to your opening remark of the day – it is depressing. You are suddenly an expert in global financial markets? Do tell, on what basis do you use the expletive? Do you know why the Australian dollar is devaluing at an annualised rate that is 9% more than the official figures put out by the Department of the Treasury? And if you don’t know, how can you possibly assert that the ETS (your abbreviation, not Gillards) will be fiscally neutral.
I notice your English is immaculate, and in fact you are finding fault with the English of others. Perhaps you can type awfully fast? But like most precocious adolescents, of any age, you are not having conversations, you are standing in the centre of the metaphorical room, and just shouting at the crowd.
If you want to have conversations, and make your point in a series of amicable exchanges, then I suggest you refer back to the comment you are responding to. It is the way that civilised people conduct themselves.
10
It’s actually an Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) on a range of greenhouse gases including carbon dioxide.
1) It isn’t a tax (see above) 2) Even if it was a tax it would be erroneous to call it a “carbon dioxide tax” because it covers other greenhouse gases that aren’t carbon dioxide, for example, methane (CH4).
Whether or not something is harmful depends on where it is. Ozone is invisible and natural, and actually extremely important as it blocks out most U.V. radiation from entering the atmosphere. But ozone at ground level is an extremely dangerous gas that can make it hard for humans to breath. So calling something “harmless” and “natural” without providing a context is frankly just rhetoric.
But I do give you points for not doing a Tony Abbott and calling carbon dioxide “weightless”.
You won’t get low emissions innovation without a carbon price. Without a carbon price it makes more economic sense for business as usual to continue on. With a carbon price investors are more likely to support low emissions technologies because that is what will be most profitable in the medium and longer term.
If you don’t support that approach, then you are implicitly supporting the alternative which is socialism. Politicians and bureaucrats in Canberra picking and choosing which technologies to support. It is that process that will require thousands of pages of regulations, dozens of bureaucrats to determine what complies with the regulations, and then an enforcement organisation to make sure the businesses continue to comply with the regulations.
As Dr Andrew Leigh said in parliament this week. The Coalition’s scheme may work, but you’d need a bureaucracy that would make Vladimir Lenin blush in order to operate and enforce it.
This is frankly dishonest and misleading. The Coalition’s climate change policy is based on the goal of cutting carbon emissions by 5% on 2000 levels by 2020. They agree with the government on that point, but their method of achieving that goal is tax and spend socialism which will ultimately require raising taxes, cutting other spending, or a combination of both.
If you don’t think the Coalition believes any of this stuff, why is it that they have a climate change policy document on their webpage here?
http://www.liberal.org.au/~/media/Files/Policies%20and%20Media/Environment/The%20Coalitions%20Direct%20Action%20Plan%20Policy%20Web.ashx
I draw your attention to page 14 which states:
Now sure, they used the word “penalty” instead of fee, charge, levy, or tax, but it is pretty clear that that is simply politician speak for introducing a charge of some sort to reduce emissions.
Oh OK, so you’re saying the Coalition is a pack of liars who are just misleading the Australian people.
That doesn’t exactly make them worth voting for, and anyone that does vote for them is asking to be lied to and mislead. If they are willing to lie over this policy, what else will they lie about? Will they bring back WorkChoices? Will they increase the GST? Will they increase income taxes? If we can’t trust them on this issue, what can they be trusted on?
10
Certainly not. But what I do know is that the assertion that the passage of the ETS will have any effect on the exchange rate is just laughable. I mean it was announced on July 7th. From that point on passage of the policy has been more likely than not, so it has already been factored in to the exchange rate since then.
The exchange rate fell 5 cents or so this week due to revelations that Europe and the U.S. (BUT NOT AUSTRALIA!) may slip back into recession, but it is still close to parity, and about 25% higher than the long term average which I believe is 75 cents.
So there you go, you are basically making a specious argument which involves completely ignoring what is actually going on in the currency markets, so I felt that I should offer an alternative view.
What on earth are you talking about? The dollar is currently valued well above its long term average.
Well it actually won’t be, it will cost the budget $4 billion over the first three years. Yes that’s right, the government will be spending more than it raises from the sale of pollution permits, but I concede this FACT doesn’t exactly support the argument that the ETS is simply a revenue measure.
I can type fast, but I don’t consider myself a good writer.
I’m contributing to a blog actually.
WOW, thanks for your advice, I’ll take it on board.
But what I’ll also do is closely monitor the exchange rate after the ETS bills pass in November.
10
Could you elaborate on what area (specialty) of Zoology that led to the obtaining of his Masters Degree?
10
Um, no. Why should I do your research for you?
The implication of the post I responded to was that Monbiot didn’t have scientific expertise, but this is clearly wrong.
10
Rereke @ 61,
Good point.
Reminds me of the terrifying story of Pol Pot’s victorious entry into Phnom Penh in April of 1975 at the head of the Khmer Rouge army.
The school teachers, civil servants and intellectual classes lined the parade route and showered his army and officers with flowers and cheers. Many had tears of happiness streaming down their faces. It was glorious! The literate classes were sure that now a new socialist utopian egalitarian state would begin and their ideological loyalty to the socialist cause would be rewarded by the new Dictatorship of the Proletariate.
Instead, almost to a person, the intellectual class of Cambodia was first denounced and rounded up, then tortured, then executed and those that did survive by pretending to be illiterate peasants mostly died of starvation and disease as slaves on government managed farms.
To imagine that nothing so horrible could ever happen again is to be a Green intellectual in Australia fantasising about tattooing deniers, licensing newspapers and bloggers and limiting property rights to pursue a zero-growth economy…
10
influenced by
activistsglobalists.Its worse in the USA.
10
What degree level did Monbiot reach? You commented it was a Masters Degree – in what area of Zoology?
There is no information available on this Masters Degree in Zoology for Mr. George Monbiot!
Please confirm you statement. Also you responded to Monbiot being a non-scientist – NOT
10
Wes George: #75
I was there. I nearly didn’t get out.
People come, people go, and the names and the motivations of the people change, but stupid ideas just keep on going around and around. You are right to compare the fervency of the Khmer Rouge with the Khmer Vert.
You know, it might be good for Adam Smith to spend a year in North Korea (a nice vacation location for those wishing to get away from this nasty industrialised world). It might open his idealistic eyes, just a smidgeon.
10
Actually it isn’t. I’ve brought you up on this numerous times. Pm Gillard is on record as saying that’s it’s a carbon tax transitioning into a ETS in 3 years. I can link to the relevant Press Broadcast if you keep bringing this up.
And to make the tax/ETS work we are going to need a bureacracy of the same size to make it work,as they are already having troubles with carbon credit scammers,that collect the credits,then vacate the country taking the money with them. What’s to stop this happening on a wide-spread scale?
10
Mr Smith said:
Who what now? Which debt are you referring to? Certainly not public debt or external debt:
http://www.usdebtclock.org/world-debt-clock.html
Reference please. Oh and still waiting for your Jensen reference.
If you continue posting unsubstantiated and blatantly incorrect statistics your credibility will get worse than it already is. But then trolls don’t care about credibility do they? So what are you? A genuine debater or a garden variety troll?
10
Michael Petterson:-
And I believe there is already in existence a not so small army of these pinheads. They are currently sharpening their pencils and practising their “silly walks” for when this lunacy takes effect.
10
Bulldust:
I think he earned the sobriquet of “bullartist” a l-o-o-o-n-n-n-g tme ago.
10
PS> I fing it rather interesting that Adam Smith would take it upon him/herself to be the grammar police when misusing English his/herself:
I would never admonish someone for accidental mispellings, I read the sentence in context and try to interpret what the poster is saying rather than being an obtuse pedant.
I shall assume you meant “her”, but then I am generous that way. Wouldn’t it be nice if you reciprocated that generosity of spirit rather than polluting the board with noise simply to distract from the topics being discussed. Again this is trollish behaviour as defined here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_%28Internet%29
Once again, I reference pertinent points. A good example to follow Mr Smith.
10
Mark – using my name in vain … I am quite distressed 😉
10
Further to a point raised earlier, a familiar ballpark figure for CO2 emissions from bushfires in Oz is one third of Australia’s total emissions. I’ve heard this figure quoted most recently by Barry Cohen, but I decided to dig around in The Guardian, which has a very busy environment section, and is much favoured by the alarmist left. The reason I did not fossick around a local source is that Australian alarmists have been cultivating a discreet indifference on this issue, for obvious reasons.
According to the Guardian, the thirty percent plus figure is true for recent severe fire years, though not an average. Nonetheless, the Guardian sees our fire emissions as carbon catastrophe. Having lived through some big burns, I know that they are certainly catastrophic and, moreover, exotic: there is nothing “natural” about them.
People have odd beliefs about bushland. Some think it might be made “pristine” if one could only restore it to a theoretical “original” state before white clearing and the aboriginal fire-stick. Others believe that a laissez-faire abandonment of retired forestry compartments, hobby-farm regrowth, and rubbishy Bob Carr National Parks will result in a eventual natural “balance”.
The ignorance is almost as scary as the big-burns, when they inevitably do occur.
Most people who live in the bush and experience fire know that careful management is possible and necessary, but the amount of work and money involved is enormous and ongoing.
The real test for CAGW proponents will be what interest they take in this issue as a CAGW issue. So far, it’s been the odd squeak or outright dismissiveness.
Can’t we see they’ve got bigger fish to fry?
10
Peter D at 31. The full wording on the bumper sticker was: If you can read this thank a teacher. If you can read it in English thank a soldier.
10
You can call it FREE BEER NIGHT, it’s still a tax.
385 ppm CO2 in the atmosphere is not harmful. To try to make is sound like it might be without providing any evidence is obfuscation and dishonest.
And you lose points for smearing the opposition leader as ignorant. How many times has Gillard mouthed the propaganda term “carbon pollution?” How many times have you laughed at her for that? Hypocrite.
You can not demand creative invention from the safe end of a barrel of a gun any more than a moralising, self-righteous polity can command the weather through legislation in parliament. As Dr. Jensen noted automobiles weren’t perfected because we taxed horse and buggies.
Innovation and with it cultural and technological evolution have never been controlled, directed or commanded by any government bureaucracy. Ever. You simply don’t understand complex systems, evolution, economics or even how a small child creates a picture with a crayon. All these things are based upon the liberty to think freely and happily without a boss, a bureaucrat, a solider or a dour mother prodding one from behind to create faster or on schedule.
Orwellian inversion of the truth. Pretending that a command economy based on taxing the very foundation of our energy economy and thus every human activity on the continent then redistributing that wealth to Green favourites while spending billions on imaginary financial transactions from overseas isn’t the most egregious form of tyranny possible is either mendacious beyond belief or nuts.
You don’t understand politics either? Let’s make a bet. When the election comes whatever politics the Coalition is playing out in the wilderness today will be long replaced and forgotten.
Oh, more hypocrisy? The ETS isn’t a tax, it’s the wonders of free market economics! But we sure can smell a Coalition tax no matter what they call it. Hey, Adam. If you don’t support the Coalition’s penalty does that mean you support higher taxes? LOL.
I’m saying the Coalition is a pack of pollies trying to survive in an age of utter political insanity and unjust persecution of any one who dares point out the emperor is bloody naked. Their policy is that, hey, maybe the emperor’s new clothes are just rather sheer.
Yes, this is what Gillard wants to talk about too. Let’s talk about anything but the Green/Labour insane clown posse who are destroying our nation.
It’s all Tony’s fault.
Pink Bats? Tony’s a liar too! Malaysia plan? Tony wants the boats to come! Thompson fraud? Tony should apologise to sex workers! Carbon Tax? Tony’s fear campaign. The economy? Work choices, work choices, work choice. Whoo hoo!
10
Well gee, it was a Masters degree. Could it be possible that it was a Masters level degree?
You sure are quick at searching Oxford’s archives.
10
What a weak as piss argument. Well it isn’t even an argument. I am not a socialist, I was for a few months when I was about 12, to say I some how need to go to North Korea to be educated simply demonstrates that you ultimately have no argument, and you instead think people who disagree with you should be sent away somewhere.
Well sorry mate, but I’m not going anywhere. Australia is the best country on Earth.
10
Wrong, she says it has the effect of a tax, but it is actually an ETS.
Read and learn:
http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/this-is-not-a-bloody-carbon-tax/#item6711
Absolutely and completely wrong! The reason you have a market price is so consumers and businesses deliberately or accidentally shift investment to lower emissions tech. The market decides where investment goes based on what is being bought and sold (and what isn’t being bought and sold).
I am not disputing that there is some need for public servants, but it would be an order of magnitude less than a direct action socialist scheme. The GST required the hiring of something like an extra 600 officials at the tax office and ACCC.
10
Are you sure? The Victorian bushfires resulted in about 2% of our emissions for that year.
10
385 ppm CO2 in the atmosphere may be harmful. To try to make is sound like it isn’t without providing any evidence is obfuscation and dishonest.
Sorry mate, but Abbott’s repeated assertion that CO2 is weightless demonstrates that he is way out of his depth in any scientific debate. I don’t mind you saying that Gillard isn’t a scientific genius, but to set aside Abbott’s howlers as if they don’t matter is just intellectually dishonest.
What? Who suggested using military force to promote innovation. It’s only a carbon price mate, stop over reacting.
What an idiotic argument. There are significant pollution controls put on cars to make them more efficient. There’s also safety standards to reduce the chance of death in case of collisions. Cars are actually pretty heavily regulated.
What a load of simplistic nonsense. Of course technological innovation has been guided by regulation. Mobile phones could be cheaper if it wasn’t for regulating saying they should only emit a certain amount of radiation for example. Governments have funded a huge amount of scientific research for drugs, or crops that have better yields. It is absurd to say that governments have never had a role in any of these things.
WOW, now you’ve fallen way off the deep end. None of this relates to the Emissions Trading Scheme or the Opposition’s socialist direct action climate change policy.
It is, however, a pretty simplistic explanation of what liberty means and pastes together a range of unrelated issues (how exactly doe the ETS stop people from thinking freely?) Oh, and most people do work for a boss of some sort, I have no idea how the ETS is meant to solve that.
This doesn’t explain why the Coalition is proposing socialism in response to climate change.
No I don’t support the coalition’s policy because it would just waste billions and billions of dollars each year. I support the ETS because it will acheive carbon abatement at the lowest possible cost.
You left out the bit about you enjoying being lied to.
10
Adam Smith, I’m not sure of total emissions from Australian bushfires, nor do I trust The Guardian or anyone’s “settled science” figures. I know that emissions from bushfire are very substantial, and I suspect that proponents of CAGW have an interest in minimising the issue – for the time being.
Also, don’t block-quote me or I won’t respond in future. Probably this will be no loss to you, but there you have it.
No need to ask my reasons: I’ve explained too many times. This last instance of cut-paste is actually legitimate enough, but usually it’s a debating stunt…and I’m over it. So many of your “responses” to so many quotes have no relation to the words quoted.
I’m not saying it’s wrong to block-quote. I’m saying it’s wrong for you to block-quote.
10
Adam Smith: #70
Exchange rate with whom? You are referring to a nominal internal value for the Australian dollar against a packet of currencies. If you like, it is Australia’s position on the scoreboard. It is a short-term position, in July, the effects were a long way off, the affect of the announcement will not become apparent until days, or even hours before it kicks in. And it is, and will be volatile. As you, yourself point out, “The exchange rate fell 5 cents or so this week due to revelations that Europe and the U.S. (BUT NOT AUSTRALIA!) may slip back into recession”. Hello! Things that happen outside of Australia, but in some way related to trade with Australia, can affect the exchange rate. Who would have thought?
So the Australian dollar is currently worth 25% more than 75 cents. I would be interested if you could explain this situation.
And I thank you for doing so. But I will correct you on one small point. You refer, quite correctly, to “the currency markets”, plural. Do you know which markets they are? How can Australia have an exchange rate, singular, when there are markets, plural?
The Australian dollar is valued relative to what?
Three years is a long time in politics and economics, and an extremely long time in international finance. Three years with the Australian dollar devaluing at 9% per annum, compounding.
Ah! I see. Metaphor is not your strong point either, is it.
Thank you. I am sure your fans will appreciate it.
Yes do that, for what it is worth, but remember it is only an internal representation of what traders have been paying for Australian Dollars over the course of a day. It is a relative measure, not an absolute value. It is only useful for analysing trends. So you should also look at commodity prices for imported and exported foodstuffs. The real value of the Australian dollar is measured by how much of an import you can buy for a dollar, and how many dollars you get for a given amount of an export. And by that measure, the value of the Australian dollar is currently decreasing in value by around 9% per annum.
10
Well apparently there is significant uncertainty in estimating carbon emissions from bushfires. There are a lot of variables based on exactly what type of plants and trees has burned, so usually the estimates are a broad range. If you see someone saying with certainty what the emissions from a bushfire are, they’re probably lying.
OK whatever.
OK, I get it, you don’t like being block quoted.
10
Adam, Adam, Adam,
You said it was a Masters Degree – in what? (Usually awarded as a result of examination & research)
Please answer the simple question – your statement is clear – please back it up!
Monbiots Masters Degree specialised in what area of Zoology?
10
The Australian Dollar has always been a more volatile currency than the currencies of other developed nations. This wouldn’t be anything new.
Oh dear. Where did I imply that the value of the AUD$ isn’t in part caused by international factors?
No, it is worth 25 cents more, which is 1/3 more than the long term average. Sorry if this caused confusion.
You’re just saying nothing now. You can trade Australian dollars for other currencies on various markets.
The most common trade for companies is to buy US Dollars.
Relative to everything. US dollars, the Pound, the Euro. You name it, the Little Aussie Battler is going off.
I like them if they are good, but I get bored easily.
O RLY?
How exactly will the ETS effect the price of imported food?
Answer: It won’t.
Completely wrong. The last time the Australian dollar had the purchasing power it has now was in the 1970s before the currency was floated.
10
Mosomoso: #83
I had a weekend to kill in Sydney, so I decided to take a minibus tour of the Hunter Valley. This was shortly after the large bush fires went through the region, so the outlook was a bit bleak.
Part way through the trip, the driver of the minibus stopped, and took us off the road into an area of badly burnt trees, and pointed down to thousands of small saplings that were growing out of the debris.
Apparently, according to him, a lot of the trees in Australia need fire for the seeds of the next generation to germinate. Also, the Aborigines used fire to drive kangaroos, and other animals into traps, where they could be captured for food.
Thus, fire is a natural part of the Australian ecology. I found it fascinating. If you want to reduce CO2 output into the atmosphere, you have to prevent the bush fires. But if you want to preserve the ecology, you need to allow the fires to occur. Isn’t that delightful?
10
Monbiot’s motto is:
That is dumb.
The Smit group think can quibble about the minutiea of the non-existent difference between a CO2 Tax and an ETS; such things occupy the bureacratic sensibility; but the real point is that a carbon dioxide TAX and an ETS will have equivalent effects on the punters; part of that effect will be a drastic reduction in GDP as found by economic modellers, Frontier Economic Modelling:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/ets-to-shrink-regional-growth/story-e6frg6nf-1225691476399
That $2 Trillion reduction in GDP is for an ETS designed to reduce CO2 emissions by 5%, exactly what the TAX is designed to do; the ALP know this, they are liars, they don’t care about the Australian economy, they don’t care about Australia, and the Smith committee defends them.
About what you’d expect from someone who gratutiously claims a reference when he knows someone else introduced it first.
10
In case any other readers of this blog want to block-quote me, please feel free. In fact, I’m sure you will feel free. I don’t mind being block-quoted in the least. Most would understand that a remark directed squarely at one individual applies to that individual alone. There again, most would actually read my words if they had just gone to the trouble of cutting, pasting and quoting those very words. Reason for some people to stay off that b-quote button.
This has been a great thread for me, by the way. Janama’s vulcanism link will have to wait for after the footy, but it looks interesting.
10
No, this is actually wrong. If you do patch burning you can then reduce the total amount of carbon put into the air when a big bushfire occurs. Part of the Clean Energy bills include a carbon farming initiative where Aboriginal people will be paid for maintaining land in ways that reduces carbon emissions.
10
OK no problem.
10
Have we all had enough of the Smith pollution here yet? I haven’t seen a single sensible thing from it.
10
That modelling doesn’t say GDP will be reduced.
Oh, and that’s modelling for the CPRS, not the Clean Energy package.
Yes there will be a modest effect on economic growth due to reducing carbon emissions.
But the market mechanism is actually the lowest cost way to acheive it. The alternative would cost at least double, and probably triple or quadruple.
Who pays for that? Yes that’s right, tax payers.
Mate, I introduced it on another thread. There’s no need to be misleading.
10
Mate, just stick to the issues rather than attacking the person.
10
Smith,
“Don’t let facts get in the way of a true story” Your moto!
Monbiot only has an undergraduate degree in Science (Zoology) – this does not make him a scientist.
Yet this thread is about truth in “Education” something that you seem to have tenuous links to.
And earlier you have the gall to correct people on the English language!
Question 2 for this evening about truth, Smith – where are the figures for you quote “The Victorian bushfires resulted in about 2% of our emissions for that year”?
10
Smith at 94
“If you see someone saying with certainty what the emissions from a bushfire are, they’re probably lying.”
Smith at 89
“The Victorian bushfires resulted in about 2% of our emissions for that year.”
I agree for the first time, in your words – “You are lying Smith”
Truth is important in any discussion – “there’s no need to be misleading.” (Your words again)
10
Smith,
“There are a lot of variables based on exactly what type of plants and trees has burned, so usually the estimates are a broad range.”
Trees are plants – you must not delve into science too deeply Smith, you tend to show your lack of knowledge clearly.
P.S. Your grammer in this sentence also is shocking Smith!
10
Rereke Whakaaro.
So many of our native species need fire, and native animals are adapted to feeding after fire.
However, if you read the impressions of Australia’s early European visitors, the bush was fairly clear under big canopies. Tench, Dawes and the adventurous types on the First Fleet moved through the bush with much more ease than we could move now. There would have been less wind, due to the the canopy. The aborigines burnt frequently and craftily wherever it was possible to do so.
It was just as well, because the summers in Sydney in the early 1790s were well documented by Dawes and others and they were shockers, with midsummer nor’westers killing birds in flight.
The problem is with the intensity of the burns. Most of us who live in the bush believe in frequent selective burning, rather than neglect followed by huge koala-killing conflagrations. A friend of mine is an older Dungutti and a National Parks officer. He wants to burn and burn frequently, and claims to remember the timing and technique of his aboriginal forbears. He is appalled by the huge fuel levels and neglect resulting from present policy. Of course, he appreciates that resources are scant.
Well, that’s making a very long story short, but, you are, of course, quite right. Some areas may not need or be benefited by burning, but most of our fairly mature bushland needs regular burns and good fire trails. Under the best fire regimes, weather extremes and criminals will still cause disasters in Oz, but few of us doubt that progress can and should be made.
Much controversy about the details, but that’s a general picture. Of course, fire is a very different thing in the tallow-wood forests of mid-coast of NSW to what it is in the crown fire regions of the south. A new fire regime would be a nuisance in many ways. A bit like going to the dentist. And I’m sure I’m at least partially wrong in my ideas, since the bush is full of surprises and evolutions.
No settled science!
10
Is this going to have as many mistakes as his previous book?
10
Name some JC; you, not quoting from a game-show quality list prepared by some 3rd rate academic living out Warhol’s dictum.
10
This really points out some of the fascinating contradictions that seem to underpin much of the opposition to the Govts Carbon Price legislation, and to me, points out in particular the way that many of the most vocal and dedicated opposers of it have been effectively drafted in by the Lib/Nats as highly visible foot soldiers in a conflict that is about who holds executive Govt, not Carbon Price.
I mean, both parties have the same target for Carbon Dioxide Emission Reduction. The ALP is actually in a position NOW to enact legislation to get to that target or better. So, those who think AGW is not a problem / a conspiracy are frantic in their opposition. One of the MAIN justifications for that opposition is that the 2010 election win was based on a lie, so we need a new election NOW.
On current polling if they got their wish then Abbott and his Lib/Nats would hold executive Govt. If they enacted their current platform (the one they would be elected on) then they would have to get on with their Direct Action (hoot name isn’t it??) plan.
Which is exactly what most of the people calling for an election NOW don’t want because they either disagree that AGW is a problem or consider it to be some kind of conspiracy.
Of course these people could all vote for independents of the same mind as themselves at an election, but under our system (which wont change any time soon if at all) their preferences will most likely wind up with one of the major parties, so ultimately they WILL have to chose between one of the major parties to form a Govt.
And they have to choose between a party who they believe have lied to them, and a party that they hope (and can reasonably expect to be, with Abbott up front) is lying to them??
I wonder how Alan Jones, his loyal followers, and not a few on this blog reconcile this in their heads??
People are fascinating aren’t they??
10
Adam Smith: #95
In response to my comments at #92 (since you still do not show the courtesy to quote a reference)
That is true. But that in itself, demonstrates that the Australian Dollar is vulnerable to external influences – financial changes in the world that are outside of Australia’s control. And right now, if you care to read the international news, there is a lot of financial volatility in the world. To risk another metaphor, this is not a good time for Australia to sail into the storm, in a row-boat.
Because until you made the statement I referred to, you were quoting internal economic indicators, not international trade indicators.
It is not me that is confused. At first you say, “[Australia] is still close to parity, and about 25% higher than the long term average which I believe is 75 cents.” Now a dollar, is worth a dollar. But according to what you wrote it is worth 75 cents except when it is worth 25% (19 cents) more, giving 94 cents. I was having a little fun – my bad.
Of course you can, so you cannot talk about the exchange rate (singular) because each market will have its own rate of exchange for Australian dollars depending on a whole lot of factors, including the perceived strength and longevity of the government. Consider what might happen to the exchange rates (plural) if the current Government implodes (it would only take the loss of an ALP seat to the Coalition in a single by-election).
Now we are getting somewhere. The Australian dollar is valued against the US Dollar. That’s it. Other currencies are also valued against the US Dollar, and the cross rate between currencies is calculated on that basis. But what happens if the US dollar is volatile? What does that do to the value of the Australian dollar? What does that do to the cross-rate between the Australian Dollar and the Pound?
Nope, only relative to the US Dollar.
By impacting the value of the Australian Dollar, relative to Australia’s trading partners (via the US Dollar, that does not have, and is unlikely to get, an equivalent impost). Answer: It will. Reality trumps modelling every time.
Nope, I don’t accept that statement. It is propaganda. Purchasing power relative to what, exactly? Has there been no inflation in the last forty years? Has inflation been evenly spread across all commodity types? Are people even buying the same things in the same way today as they were in the 1970’s? The statement sounds fine, and it probably looks good as a headline in a glossy magazine, but it doesn’t mean a thing because it is a false comparision.
10
#1 – Increase cost, decrease demand. There are very few rules in economics (being a social science), but the primary one is the law of supply and demand. Ever heard of rare earth elements? Right now, China has a virtual monopoly on them. Why? are they only found in China? No, they are found world wide. They are just difficult to extract. And China did it cheaper than anyone else, so they became the sole supplier based upon PRICE. Now china is getting persnickety, and jacking up the price. And guess what? Rare Earth extraction plants are opening up in America!! Shazaam! So what does that tell you? Jack up the price and the demand for YOUR coal goes away. People will find it cheaper elsewhere. You do not live in a vacuum.
#2 – I am not lecturing Australia on economics. I am lecturing YOU. And if I was in charge of the US and responsible for this disaster, you would have a point. But given that I am totally opposed to this administrations actions, and I have said so, along with proposing real solutions that will work, I am very well qualified to lecture YOU on economics. Sorry if that puts a bee in your bonnet.
10
The danger now is that world leaders and leaders of science have aligned themselves with two scientific falsehoods for four decades:
a.) Anthropogenic climate change, and
b.) The Bilderberg model of the Sun.
Having failed at repeated efforts to “whitewash” Climategate, their only avenues of escape are:
c.) Admit past deceit and risk retaliation, or
d.) Impose more restrictions on communications.
The world is in desperate need of statesmanship to resolve the situation in a way that will restore:
e.) Integrity to science, and
f.) People’s control over government.
With kind regards,
Oliver K. Manuel
10
And that has to do with the price of rice in china? Having a graduate degree in one field makes you an expert in all areas? Damn! I can now pontificate on everything!
10
Jo,
My grandson is in real trouble when he hits school!
🙂
I have been recording how the LAWS of science, relativity and gravity can change by changing the speed of the planets rotation.
Also showing the evidence of how this planet started as under a massive amount of water and where the current theories failed.
The sun influences the planets rotation and we are NOT in inertia.
10
Well I admit I don’t know how things work at Oxford. But a Masters degree in Australia is a post-graduate degree.
10
Smith,
You don’t understand – what Masters Degree? What part of the question don’t you understand.
Also need your data source in reference to “the 2% bushfire emissions total in Victoria” statement? (Or is this possibly made up also?)
10
Here’s a question. Someone earlier lambasted Abbot for saying CO2 is weightless. But how exactly does one weigh CO2? For example, if I had a very large box, let’s say 100 cubic kilometers in size enclosing a vacuum, it would indeed weigh something. If I now fill it with CO2, ie 100 cubic kilometers of CO2, how much more would this box weigh? This is a serious question – I have no idea how one weighs a gas.
10
Adam Smith = confusing Troll.
.
Oliver M, people will never get control back until the globalist banksters fall on their own sword.
10
I don’t know what your point is. While China continues to buy Australia’s iron ore and / or coal, the value of the dollar will remain above its long term trend rate of US$0.75.
And I was right to do so because local factors play a role as well. For example, whenever the RBA either puts interest rates up, or even just threatens to do so, the dollar jumps by a U.S. cent or more because it means international investors get more interest if they put money in Australian banks.
Perceived strength and longevity of the government? Really? Currency traders have more important things to worry about than who is or isn’t in government in Australia. The fact is Australia hasn’t had a recession for 20 years. We have had 20 consecutive years of growth, even though in that time Government has been held almost perfectly evenly by each major party.
Well what has happened this year is that the value of the U.S. dollar has declined a lot as economic growth has been slow and as the U.S. fed printed a lot of money. This has helped send the AUD$ through the roof.
Well this is a load of nothing. The exchange rate isn’t that important to the price of food.
10
Phil, China now produces more steel than the rest of the world combined. To do that they need a lot of metallurgical coal and iron ore. Australia has the highest quality irone ore and metallurgical coal in the world. If you really think that China is going to stop buying Australia’s metallurgical coal because the cost is going to go up by $1.80 a tonne then you are in dreamland. It is China that has bid up the value of Australia’s coal and irone ore by absurd amounts over the last decade, they aren’t going to stop buying because the price has increased another 0.3%. In fact that uber moron Donald Trump was out here from your fine country over the weekend, and he suggest that we increase our prices for exports to China even more, which I guess he means by a tax of some sort.
Cheer up Phil, your country doesn’t have a disaster that couldn’t be fixed by increasing taxes on the top few percent, and just letting the Bush tax cuts expire from people on twice average weekly incomes. If you do those two things your budget would be balanced in half a dozen years or so.
Even that bit where they knocked off Osama bin Laden?
10
Dave
http://tinyurl.com/3cwkj5x
10
..Hes been DEAD for 10+ years!!!
10
Smith,
“This is the perfect thread for those discussions of how our education system is being influenced by activists” – this relates directly to you Smith – your sad grasp of the truth on numerous occasions – and refusal in almost all instances to answer polite requests of information regarding your statements. Especially obvious in your obsession with wealth, as opposed to your lack of concern of the environment.
All of your comments when considering your obvious deviations from fact, are now taken with a grain of salt!
Please answer the questions asked of you truthfully!
10
Well it seems that your definition of “the truth” is me agreeing with everything you write, even if it is abject nonsense.
I don’t understand why wealth and the environment should be mutually exclusive. We should be able to use the planet sustainably so that future generations have the benefits of resources that we have had.
10
Smith
1. What Masters Degree? Proof Please.
2. Data source on CO2 emissions from Victorian Bushfires?
Just answer simple questions please Smith?
10
Adam @120
Strawman alert! I never said “stop buying”. Nor does the law of supply and demand dictate that a price increase results in the total killing of the market (it can, like all extremes, come to pass). If you read what I SAID, they DECREASE their buying. China has a huge coal industry, and while second best is not the best, it becomes the best when the price of the best becomes uneconomical (a real word – look it up). Keep pumping up the price and you will find the market for your precious coal evaporates.
Cheer up Phil, your country doesn’t have a disaster that couldn’t be fixed by increasing taxes on the top few percent, and just letting the Bush tax cuts expire from people on twice average weekly incomes. If you do those two things your budget would be balanced in half a dozen years or so.
Even that bit where they knocked off Osama bin Laden?
10
STRAW MAN ALERT! We are talking about an increase of less than 0.5% when the price for metallurgical coal has roughly doubled over the last decade.
Maybe not, but Clinton increased taxes in his first term, yet he – unlike George W Bush – presided over a massive expansion of the U.S. economy. In fact it expanded so much that he managed to balance the budget.
Bush on the other hand funded tax cuts using debt, which is simply economic lunacy.
Well that sounds a lot like the politicians need to increase taxes to fund their extra expenditure. You know, things like the Medicare prescription drug benefit that the Republican controlled congress funded using debt.
Oh OK, so there are some things the Obama administration has done that you do approve of.
10
Adam @128
Adam, you do not know what a strawman is, do you? We are talking about arbitrary price increases (one supplier raises prices for no reason other than they want to). I never stated the percent, and the percent does not matter. .5% is neglible, unless you are talking a billion dollars (then it is a hefty $50m). Learn the terms before you try to use them. otherwise you come off sounding ignorant.
Which blew up in Bush’s face – the dot com bubble? The “balancing” was achieved on paper gains that evaporated with the bust. LEARN ECONOMICS. And besides, it was not the tax increase that lead to the decrease in deficits, it was the Gingrich lead congress in confrontation with Clinton! Please learn! It is painful having to explain simple economics to you!
No point in refuting this as this is just a demonstration of your ignorance on the subject. Econ 101 will do you good.
No, they need to stop spending! You are economically challenged! Government money robs from the economy! If you want a dead economy like the old USSR, follow Adam’s advice! He will make sure everyone is poor!
on the economy? No.
10
Sorry Phil, but you simply aren’t considering what has gone on in the market for metallurgical coal and iron ore. China’s demand for Australian resources is so strong that what happens to the Chinese economy is now more important to Australia than what happens to the U.S. economy. The demand from China, along with the government’s stimulus package stopped Australia going into recession during the global financial crisis. Just have a think about that for a second. 10 million people ended up unemployed in the U.S., but Australia’s economy only had one negative quarter, Unemployment rose by about 1%, but it is now back down to 5.3%.
You’re basically ignoring the dramatic price rises for Australian resources over the last decade and now are trying to pretend that a price increase of not even half a percent is going to suddenly stop China buying from Australia. This is just silly. China’s economy is growing at close to 10% a year, and that means enormous demand for iron ore to make the steel to build the buildings that people from rural areas move into when they go to the cities to find work.
No, Clinton actually did balance the budget. By the time he left tax revenues were bringing in more money than spending.
Whereas under Bush the opposite was true. He was spending far more than the revenues coming in, partly because he passed an unfunded tax cut.
So Bush tax cuts using debt, but you don’t see this worth defending. Well that makes sense, I guess you just can’t admit that his entire economic policy over 8 years was simply a disaster.
Sorry Phil, but you’re in no position to lecture me or any other Australians. Australia is a country that hasn’t had a recession for 20 years. Australia got through both the dot com bubble in the late 1990s (which lead to the Asian financial crisis) and the Global Financial Crisis without going into recession.
Australia has faster economic growth than the U.S. We have dramatically lower unemployment, we haven’t had a bank fail since the late 1990s, our government debt is about 10 times lower, we have higher wages growth (i.e. we actually have real wages growth, the U.S. has gone backwards for a decade), we also have longer life expectancy. If you put together income taxes and health care costs, Australians pay less than Americans yet all Australians are covered by Medicare.
So, in summary Phil, Australians have a far better economy than America, and thus Australians shouldn’t be lectured about economics when your country is simply spending too much and not taxing enough to balance the books. You should start by closing all those loopholes for fossil fuel companies.
10
Is it just me, that when I see the name “Adam Smith” I automatically Scroll the Troll, or do others do this as well?
10
Just stick to the issues mate. There’s no need to revert to abuse.
10
Adam Smith @ 120
First….once again you have totally derailed the thread topic.
Second…..your statement in 120 regarding the US….
Obviously your supposed degree isn’t in economics or even accounting as what you propose is simply impossible.
FY 2009 Federal spending totaled 3.5177 Trillion dollars.
FY 2009 Federal Revenues totaled 2.105 Trillion dollars.
In case you can’t figure that out that’s a 1.4127 Trillion dollar discrepancy. if you taxed the top 10% (approximately 14 million) the amount to make up the annual deficit, each one (when divided evenly…in order to make the point..individual numbers will vary greatly) would pay an additional $100,000. This is on top of the taxes they already pay. The top 10% are wage earners earning $100,000+ a year.
10
Back to topic……
Teaching in the US leaves something to be desired also. Several years ago while my daughter was in year 4 (4th grade in the US) her class was asked about their parents’ occupations and where they worked. My now ex-husband was working in Madagascar yet when my daughter said so to the teacher she was told that there was no such place. Of course my daughter pointed this “mythical place” out on the world map. 😉 Needless to say that wasn’t one of my daughter’s better years in school with regards to teachers.
10
Smith argues that the Clean Energy Bills provides an ETS.
This must be because he doesn’t understand the explanatory memoranda issued with the bills, nor the bills.
The bills establish, amongst the turgid swill of enabling authorities and regulators who will be able to do as they please; a price on “carbon”.
Table 1 of the memorandum on THE CLEAN ENERGY BILL 2011 makes it quite clear that it is not an Emissions Trading Scheme. It permits SOME trading in CREDIBLE markets under market prices, but not for the whole amount, and it REGULATES the price of the units traded between a floor of $15 and a ceiling $20 above the market rate.
Reading further into the 300+page memo, under Architecture:
Under Mechanisms:
(my emphasis)
But I don’t expect Smith to understand that document.
Functional literacy used to be taught and tested as “reading comprehension” when I went to school. But that was when students could fail subjects and be told that they were wrong when they were wrong; instead of being pushed onto the next year where they become progressively less able to assimilate new subject matter because it’s more and more distant from their ability/motivation to grasp. They then become disruptive in class.
Adam Smith is being disruptive. He regards my identification of his functional illiteracy as an insult. Suck it up; Princess. I don’t practice political correctness. I call it like I see it. And I guarantee that there are lots of people who also see your gibbering here as a demonstration of your being unable to understand reasonably-complex ideas presented in writing.
If you don’t want people to see you like that, then fix the problem. It’s not easy. Because it requires you to be diligent, careful, read lots and ask others to examine your interpretation of what you have read; and be able to accept when you’ve been wrong so that you can look at yourself and try to identify why you got it wrong.
If you reckon that you’re up to it, then compare the Bill with the associated memorandum. Identify any divergence or omission in the memorandum and how the proposed laws can be abused by emitters, authorities and regulators. Comment on the Constitutional conflicts and collisions with common law, not identified in the Bill.
You have 18 hours (1000UTC on Sunday the 25th of September, 2011), which pro-rata, is about the same time that the Gillard government gave to allow comments on the legislation to an Inquiry.
Remember, ignorance of the law is no defence when you break it. So you must understand the Bill before it becomes law.
10
TonyFromOz at 21 & 39
What you’re trying to do with the mental shortcuts in the algebra is get the kid expelled.
Hahah, but seriously…
The theme of this math example is not peculiar to some education travesty, it is a theme at work throughout society though perhaps you’ve forgotten about it since you have passed through it already.
You have to show you can follow the rules before you’re permitted to break the rules.
Driving, dating, sports, and math homework. Easy to think of examples in all of those.
As for having a say in how your kids are educated, well it’s a nice thought and helping them with their homework is one way to do it. Just remember that when you send kids to school you’re basically outsourcing their upbringing for a while. Can’t have it both ways, and since few people have the time and the government mandates it too, just accept that some years they get a stupid teacher and some decades the curriculum sucks. It’s like THE CLIMATE, IT ALWAYS CHANGES.
HOORAY, TOPIC BACK TO CAGW. How’s that dogleg, 3 feet from the pin.
10
Hannah Arendt, from A Reply to Critics (Reflections on Little Rock) – Dissent Magazine, Winter 1959
The idea that one can change the world by educating the children in the spirit of the future has been one of the hallmarks of political utopias since antiquity. The trouble with this idea has always been the same: it can succeed only if the children are really separated from their parents and brought up in state institutions, or are indoctrinated in school so that they will turn against their own parents. This is what happens in tyrannies.
10
Adam Smith: #120
In reply to my #111 (what part of making a reference do you not understand?)
Yes! We finally got there. But still Adam Smith doesn’t see it. Still the lightbulb doesn’t go on.
Adam, The United States is the financial engine of the world – as the Greens keep on telling us, we only have one planet, and we only have one global financial system. (Admittedly, China is vying for the privilege of running it, but that is a different discussion.)
I am going to simplify this for the sake of clarity:
History: The bursting of the property bubble hit the US banks hard. In fact the US, and by implication, the world economy ended up on the edge of a precipice (not my words; the words of the then Governor of the Federal Reserve). The Fed had to stabilise the dollar in order to avoid a 1930’s type depression, and they did that (and are still doing that) through “Quantitive Easing”, you may have heard the phrase before, but only recently, because the name has only been around for a short while.
Quantitative Easing is the Newspek for Devaluation, because although the mechanisms are different the result is the same – the dollar looses its value relative to the real world commodities it can purchase on the international market. And the US has done this twice (or three times, depending on how you are counting).
But other currencies, including the Australian dollar are pegged against the greenback, so their value also depreciates, so it costs Australia more, in real terms, to buy a bushel of rice (on average), than it did in previous years.
The rate at which this is happening is 9% per annum, which is why I asked you if you could explain why the Australian dollar was depreciating by that amount in the financial environment that the ALP is about to go and play in.
Financial reporting in Australia (and most other Western economies) is always relative to the US Dollar, so the volatility is hidden to the general public. In fact, on the face of things, Australia has been doing well compared to the US dollar.
But if you want to have a stable comparator for the value of the US dollar, you need only look at the price of Gold. At the time I write this, it is US$2127.48 per troy ounce (about US$68 per gram). That is AUS$1693.51/toz.
Here is a graph, showing its history: http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=gold+price
[link fixed] ED
Oh lookie – a hockeystick!
If you want to see the purchasing power of the Australian dollar, simply turn the graph upside down.
If you want the grown-up’s version, press the “log scale” button at the top-right.
Even though the US is no longer officially on the Gold Standard (there wasn’t, and isn’t, enough gold to cover the deficit) the value of the US Dollar is still notionally pegged to gold in an inverse relationship in the minds of financiers. When they get worried, the price of gold goes up, and boy, is it going up?
Long story, short: the ALP is playing domestic politics to raise a tax that will lower the domestic wealth within Australia relative to other countries (Australians will be relatively worse of than, say Indonesians), thus raising the other countries wealth relative to Australia.
It will do nothing to change the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, because any decrease in production in Australia will simply be picked up elsewhere. Yes, other countries might have to pay a bit more for coal and iron ore, than they do now, but they still have the same demand, and what Australia produces is demand driven. The only way that this will work is if Australia can increase the price of coal and ore, but still keep it below the price asked by other countries. That is a very narrow band, and taxation is a very blunt instrument, and it ain’t gonna work long term.
There are two reasons why the ALP might want to do this: 1. They are on an ideological bender; or 2. There is something in the water in Canberra that sends people do-lallie. Or it could be a combination of both. Hmm, perhaps I could apply for a research grant?
What there is not, is a sound economic basis for doing what they propose. It is purely ideology. And that is always dangerous, because of the law of unintended consequences – aka black swans.
10
Hmm, the image didn’t show …
The reference should be to: http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=gold+price
Sorry, you will have to cut and paste.
10
Adam Smith: #121
And where is the evidence (real evidence) that they knocked off Osama bin Laden? You shouldn’t believe all that you read in the newspapers and hear on television. It may surprise you to learn that a lot of it is pure spin.
10
Smith:
I see in all your blatant noise you have not addressed my requests for references. Some of the facts you mention are true, but when you wrong you don’t care to know about it do you Smith?
Please explain the Aussie debt issue you raised, and I am still waiting your Jensen reference from the last thread.
Don’t like being caught out do you?
10
PS> Smith – troll is not abuse when it is an accurate description. Your behaviour here of late is trollish – see my reference on the subject if you are unfamiliar with the term, but I suspect you know all too well what a troll is. I would admit that you are a good example in that you managed to inflame most of the readers here /huzah. Yes, it was an ironic cheer.
10
Another one of those green dreams they brainwash kids about at school is found to be a total fraud.
The Obama idiot thought this was simply wonderful when he promoted this delusional nonsense in 2010 and guaranteed it with $535 million security.
This has to be the joke of the century, not only is CAGW a total fraud but all the remedies are delusional and costly and corrupt as well. Just look at the fraud and corruption involved in carbon trading throughout the EC.
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/inside-dirt-on-clean-energy-schemes-they-dont-work-20110924-1kqph.html#ixzz1Ytz0j8Rz
10
“I’ll take that as a comment”.
10
RoyFOMR @ 141
No it is not just you, many of us skip anything he/she/they have written, and are beginning to skip anything written by others in response to anything he/she/they have written.
But then that is his/her/their goal. With enough of his/her/their spam the entire thread becomes one where there is no point in reading through the comments because the bulk of them are dealing with the Smith collective and must be skipped.
10
Millenarian apocalyptic mass movements that depend on fear and guilt to provide a constant stream of new recruits, money and power have to fight a constant rear-guard battle with history because their self-serving predictions of apocalypse never materialise.
That’s what Adam was sent here to do.
Modern eco-milenarians have been issuing dour predictions of doom in some form or another since the first 1972 Club of Rome report in which a “consensus” of nobel laureate scientists (sound familiar?) predicted mass global starvation by 1985. Peak oil and world war over the remaining oil supplies by 1980 and general global chaos leading to a new dark ages, the collapse of civilisation into warring city-states by the 1990’s.
How’d that work out? 🙂 After their massive Fail the First Club of Rome scientists and their media wags profusely apologised…
Just JOKING! Ha. Ha. They did nothing of the sort. Instead they doubled down on their original errors.
They issued The Second Club of Rome report repeating the same moralising sermon (this time a bit more self-righteously), only they moved the mass global starvation date forward to 1990. Peak oil to 1985 and the collapse of civilisation to 2000.
The eco-fearmongering model for the next 35 years was set!
Declare an eco-catastrophe imminent, capitalise on the fear generated to provide a cash flow, political power, grant money and moral kudos. Then when said catastrophe fails to materialise simply push the date forward and increase level of moral contempt for anyone who dares remember your forecast failure. Later, the Greenies added the technique of declaring that the apocalypse HAD indeed happened we just failed to notice because, Gee, aren’t people stupid? Greens, naturally, are always more intelligent and morally superior to normal people.
I was working for an environmental NGO as a propagandist in the 1980’s, so I remember clearly when fear of AGW first came on the scene—the predictions were that by 2011 we be in absolute global hell. +2 to 3c increase in global temperatures was the forecast for today. Collapse of civilisation, peak oil, disappeared ice caps, yadda, yadda…
How’d that work out? 😉 Every year the climate catastrophe and the collapse of civilisation gets pushed back a notch and the Greens demagogues and mass media fear mongers apologise for their crass exploitation of human gullibility. Just JOKING! No one ever apologises. Instead they pretend we all have the memory of gnats, notch up their moral outrage at “DENIALISTS” and make the next doomsday forecast a decade further into the future.
In 2008 Bob Brown said “We will have lost the Planet” if we don’t cut global C02 emission by 50% by 2020. I’ll bet he’s updated that forecast a bit, eh? In 2008, the ABC Four Corners announced that the North Pole could be ice free by 2010. Don’t hold your breath waiting for a correction.
Now, enter a new generation of gulible, semi-blind true believers with surgically implanted iPod nanos.
Nubes, like the hilariously-styled “Adam Smith,” pop up and pretend that the last decade of climate wars never occurred. When I noted that today’s level of atmospheric CO2 is not harmful. Adam declares, as if he was born yesterday, that we need to provide him evidence for that claim.
RTFB, Adam. Then get back to us.
And that’s how the Green apocalypse fearmongering industry works. Every day is a brand new day. Every day is Ground Hog Day, all over again. As if history never happened.
After all, history is not their friend.
10
George Orwell “1984” – Doublethink
Does this bear any relationship to a certain blogger?
“….The power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them….To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just as long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies – all this is indispensably necessary. Even in using the word doublethink it is necessary to exercise doublethink. For by using the word one admits that one is tampering with reality; by a fresh act of doublethink one erases this knowledge; and so on indefinitely, with the lie always one leap ahead of the truth….”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doublethink
10
Which is interesting to me, considering the calls for an election NOW that are so prevalent in this forum. George’s concepts are alive and well here.
10
—On the hilariously self-styled Adam Smith. (God, I kill myself laughing every time I think of a Watermelon donning Adam Smith as his nom de guerre. LOL)
I, for one, welcome Adam Smith’s and his comrades’ contributions to Jo’s blog. Yes, he’s annoyingly pedantic, climatologically clueless and transparently disingenuous. Yes, he’s here to the muddle the argument and to digress away from whatever Jo’s post topic is about.
But that’s what the kerfuffle of politics is about—struggling to make your point in a room crowded with opposing views. If your point can’t survive the test of opposition, then it’s simply not a point worth propagation. Furthermore, a position untested by the fire of opposition is always far weaker than one which has undergone vigorous scrutiny. It doesn’t matter that the scrutinisers are less than rational or honest, all the better, in fact. The world isn’t a fair or rational place.
If we want to have a proper debate in the comment section of this blog we have to have representatives of the Alarmist/Green/Socialist position. So when a highly motivated and rhetorically eloquent Alarmist decides to take up the call we should welcome the challenge, rather than condemn them for ruining our usual self-congratulatory back patting session.
I have long lamented the deplorable level of Alarmist representation in Jo’s comment section. Poor Johnny Brookes! He couldn’t talk his way out of a wet paper sack, much less defend the CAGW hypothesis. He and (what’s the other kid’s name?) never had the wit to properly state their case. I always felt like a bully bashing their grade school rhetoric to smithereens.
I doubt Adam will fair much better than Johnny and the kid, but he’s willing to write more than one liners and that’s a vast improvement. Gives us something to work with! An insight into the nature of Green delusions and deception. With Adam we have content to deconstruct and analyse. He’s the best that the Alarmists can throw at Jo Nova’s blog. The fact that he’s basically disingenuous simply reflects the only material he has to work with. The whole CAGW/Climate Change/Carbon tax scam is based upon lies. Please don’t insist that only a strictly HONEST voice represent the Alarmist cause. That’s an oxymoron.
We might even gain some insight into the socio- and psychopathology that has now so infected our polity, our intelligentsia and our elite education/research institutions. We are truly a nation on the verge of cultural insanity, and to tell the truth, we do not understand what is happening to us. Or why. It’s more complex than Gillard lied and the Greens are delusional. I believe they are just a symptom of a deeper cultural morbidity.
So welcome Adam to Jo’s blog and listen to him. Listen closely to the meaning he laces between his words. Read between the lines. Look into his motives, his needs, his hopes for our nation’s future. What makes these people tick? Because in the end these people are us, our children, our neighbours, our friends. We are all Australians. We’re in this together. And only together will we ever be able to find solutions to what ails us.
10
So Wes, you did a Muggeridge in reverse; from green to rationality; but of course its not that clear-cut; back in the’80’s there was a lot of corporate bastardry in respect of the environment and it is this legacy which gives the greens their teeth; once there was some justification but now the real misanthropy is revealed and most people have not seen the distinction.
The irony is the corporates are still bastards but now because they have swung around and kowtow to the rabids; how many corporate sponsors of green groups are there, and there are NO corporates out there taking a concerted opposition to AGW or considering the wider view. Greens act as to their nature but the real hypocrites are the corporates
10
Glad it’s not only me. It’s not his stand on things is in conflict with my own, more like being in a group discussion and one person in the group talks over the top of all others, the stronger the argument against him the louder and quicker he talks, while scarcely taking a breath.
10
Wes @ 149
Well said! It is the lies and deception that needs to be checked with this sort of behaviour. Smith has the opportunity to give facts – but resorts to contant lying in his (their) posts. The only method available is probably to check every single deception he gives. His lies are increasing daily. His knowledge of science is non existant!
On an earlier point – the bushfires in Victoria he said only accounted for 2% of CO2 emissions that year – see http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/13/carbonemissions-australia – I used his Monbiot (A Non-Scientist) favourite newspaper for confirmation as his leanings seem to tend this way.
His writing style is very similar to one of the authors of “The Climate Spectator” and would explain his vested interest in the CO2 Tax! The education system hopefully has not too many Smiths on the payroll!
10
Is that you, Mr Smith?
10
Wes, it seems as if all throughout history somebody was screaming that the sky is falling. At the beginning of the 5th century St. Jerome translated the bible from the oldest extant form into latin, the common language of the day in the mediterranean world. Since then, every generation has predicted the end of the world based upon apocalyptic literature such as Daniel and Revelation. Despite all the ominous prophecies of dour and imminent catastrophe, the world continues to spin on its axis.
I was watching a rerun of an episode from the original Star Trek, Space Seed. The plot was based on the Enterprise finding a derelict ship with passengers from Earth of the 1990’s. Ricardo Montalban and his band of genetically engineered followers were the supposed survivors of the eugenics war. Star Trek may have painted a picture of a better distant future but their short term “predictions” (WW3, eugenics war, etc.) were patently wrong and extremely pessimistic.
Next, I flipped the channel to an old rerun of “In Search Of” so eloquently narrated by Leonard Nimoy. The episode featured the late Steve Schneider trying to scare the hell out of everybody about the upcoming ice age.
Needless to say, I shut the TV off and went to sleep!
10
Wes George,
thank you for both Comments at 146 and 149.
I for one also like to see Doctor Smith on this Blog.
What it so starkly highlights is the difference between Blogs like this and others which have an opposing viewpoint to what is shown here.
Note how that no matter how many times Doctor Smith changes the intent of the Post, how many times he insufferably harps on about the same thing, his Comments are always put up on the board.
Try doing that at those other Blogs, and speak on them as an opposing voice, and try to do it as consistently as Doctor Smith does.
They would either (a) not be posted in the first place, or (b) they would be banned by the second or third Comment.
Some sites, the ABC typically have all Comments go through Moderation, and anything that the Moderator thinks speaks against their ‘meme’ just doesn’t get posted at all, hence giving the distinct impression that the ‘all fair and even handed’ ABC shows a broad cross section of Australian opinion, and while some relatively ‘tame’ comments may be posted sporadically, they all ‘seem’ to support the side that is not supported here.
Note specifically how Doctor Smith uses rapid fire block quoted replies, and does them at lightspeed, under the excuse of speed typing. This is actually an indicator of itself.
When given links to follow, he comes back with his rapid fire block quoted replies.
There is no way possible he could have gone to the link, read it digested it, understood it, and then formed his response.
It proves not that Doctor Smith can’t read, but that he reads what he wants to read, and because of that, anything we link to here for him to look at is in his mind, something that has come from the ‘opposing’ side, so it does not need to be looked at because he knows it goes against any point he may be trying to make.
Doctor Smith also believes, as shown so many times that Science means nothing unless it has the word ‘Political’ as its prefix, hence the selective way his replies are structured.
He has his job to do, and that is to drive away readers, not those of us who constantly frequent this Blog, but those readers who have come here the first time, or have visited a couple of times. Those readers see something that piques their interest, and they then want to stay and have a more in depth look around, to learn things they may not know. Those readers hardly ever leave Comments, but they come back later to continue looking around.
When they see Doctor Smith’s comment’s they just don’t bother. Doctor Smith has achieved the aim
he was set up to dothat of distracting those hidden readers away from somethinghis mastershe thinks is dangerous to their cause.So Doctor Smith, in your mind you think you may have done your job, but we know that very soon you’ll be gone.
Joanne’s Blog will still be here, we will still be here, readers will still come and ‘lurk’ without commenting.
You think in your one direction.
We love having you here because what it does show is not for us. It’s for those ‘lurkers’. What you do shows them the mentality behind your Political standpoint on this whole argument, and how ‘your side’ will do absolutely anything to support their political standpoint. Those readers see that.
I fully understand that you’ll come back here and block quote Wes George and probably even me too.
I know right now, Doctor Smith, that both Wes George and I have lost the debate you’re having in your mind, self satisfied with your victory, because I think Wes has a spelling mistake, and I
know for certainthink I used my capital letters inappropriately.You don’t even know humour when you see it Doctor. You’ve been had. You desperately need to look in the mirror.
Tony.
10
And mosomoso,
that Political Science mention in the earlier comment was in no way directed to you.
Did you notice that when it was mentioned in a humourous vein that earlier time, it went so far over Doctor Smith’s head.
He desperately needs a long intensive session of humour, say Road Runner cartoons, The Three Stooges, and the Python’s original Flying Circus series, and for Australian viewers, Aunty Jack.
Tony.
10
Yes Tony – I’ve given up posting on the Drum as my replies never get posted.
Gerard Henderson on The Insiders this morning pointed out that the US has no intention of implementing a Carbon tax or an ETS, Canada is the same and New Zealand has just backed off from it’s ETS to protect it’s farmers.
Looks like Australia is out on it’s own – thank you Julia- NOT!
10
Scraper @ 153
That was hilarious! I almost fell off my chair.
I laughed so hard I won’t need to do any stomach exercises for a week!
Thanks.
10
Unfortunately, Dr Smith embodies everything this thread is about -the groupthink mentality, the bastardisation of education by political ideologues, the imperviousness to rational thought of the “intelligensia” who believe being educated/indoctrinated makes you more perceptive and intelligent, the ostracising of anyone who thinks outside the square or shows a spark of ingenuity.
While trying valiantly to disrupt the thread with obfuscation and nit picking, we see a wasted intellect, a spoiler who uses his undoubted intelligence to defray argument that should enoble and enlighten. That he uses his undoubted education in such a negative way is disappointing, for all the money society has expended on fostering and nurturing his intelligence.
I have dedicated myself through medicine to improving the health of my patients, whom I care for greatly, and can say at the end of the week that several people were better off in their lives for my input. What satisfaction can an Adam Smith have at the end of his working week, when he realises that his intelligence has been prostituted in the cause of promoting a failed government and failed policies, that have long since lost sight of the purpose for which they were intended- to improve the lives of the people they serve?
10
So how many comments here are actually on topic? I thought the topic here was Plimer’s new book and how the education system is greenwashing its victims. Why have “Smith’s” off topic posts been allowed? Why feed the troll?
My old flight instructor asked me a couple of years ago about climate change as he knew I used to be a meteorologist. His sons were coming home from primary school filled with scare stories about the coming apocalypse. I told him it was garbage and why. He said thanks and would put his boys right. With any luck they’ll have less blind respect for authority as a result.
10
janama @157
It defies logic to keep the Carbon tax charade going, doesn’t it? Never be the first to do something (nobody likes to be the experimental guinea pig), and never be the last (this usually confers that other options have superceded),either. There is no greater sin in the Labor doctrine than to ever admit you were wrong.
10
Wes George:
I am in full agreement with Tony #155.
Well put and good analysis. I tip my hat to you.
This old attack dog is now going for a little lie-down in his kennel, in the knowledge that the back yard is well protected. 🙂
10
Tony, I’d forgotten that I had three years of Government in that degree that sleeps in some cupboard. My father had a big quid when we were young, plus I got a kind of bursary, so I’m not too guilty about hanging around uni for a few years. Trouble is, my father blew all his money, so I had to, in the deathless words of Carmen Lawrence, get real.
By the way, did any kids in your area get blinded in a Three Stooges incident? All those njuk-njuks are worrying me.
10
I just do the nyuk nyuk nyuks.
I don’t do the poking bit, in that sense.
Tony.
10
Well this contains a factual error. The U.S. Fed ended quantitative easing on June 30th.
Thanks for the info, but this isn’t relevant to the discussion of the ways the ETS is going to effect the value of the AUD$.
The Australian dollar IS NOT “pegged against the greenback”. Australia has had a floating exchange rate since December, 1983 when the Hawke Labor government realised that a fixed exchange rate was futile.
This is moronic nonsense. Australia’s purchasing power can’t go down when the AUD$ relative to US$ is about 1/3 over the long term average.
O RLY? You mean that part where Australia has spent the last few months with the Australian Dollar worth more than the US$? You are pretty good at stating the bleeding obvious.
The price of gold has little to do with the price of the AUD$ Australia’s currency is not fixed to the amount of gold the RBA has. The RBA can print money whenever it likes.
You left out the graph.
This has nothing to do with how the value of the AUD$ will change once the ETS is law. I propose to you that markets have already factored the passage of the ETS in, because it has been extremely likely to occur since July.
Indonesians? Indonesia is a developing country with GDP per capita of a few thousand dollars. Australia’s GDP per capita is in something like $35,000, which makes it amongst the highest in the world. This comparison is flat out laughable.
Well you didn’t bother backing up this statement with any references, so I guess it is just your opinion.
Australia has doubled its prices for coal and iron ore in the last decade, yet demand has not dropped. Demand for our resources is stronger now than when the prices for the commodities was half what it is today.
You’ve written a lot of words but you haven’t explained how the ETS will effect Australia’s exchange rate.
There are two reasons why the ALP might want to do this: 1. They are on an ideological bender; or 2. There is something in the water in Canberra that sends people do-lallie. Or it could be a combination of both. Hmm, perhaps I could apply for a research grant?
What there is not, is a sound economic basis for doing what they propose. It is purely ideology. And that is always dangerous, because of the law of unintended consequences – aka black swans.
10
I’m not an alarmist, Green or Socialist, but I appreciate you calling me eloquent.
10
Wrong. Usually the links turn out to be irrelevant to the discussion at hand, misleadingly presented, or simply something I have read before.
Excuse me? What about the link I gave you to Barry Brook’s site that you didn’t even reference? And yet when I invited you to present some evidence for your assertions, you just repeated the assertions instead of providing any evidence!
Wrong. This is just a baseless slur. I am very interested in science.
I don’t have a job to do at all. I just like contributing to discussions of interesting issues. Unfortunately it seems many here think that an ideal discussion is one where everyone agrees with everyone else. But I call this a cult or an echo chamber.
No one is under any obligation to read whatever I write, just as I’m not under any obligation to read what other people write.
I will? Do you mean you are going to make my mind up for me? Or are you suggesting that I will be banned from posting here?
And I’ll still post here for as long as I want to do it.
I don’t really have a side. I agree and disagree with certain policies of all political parties.
I do agree that I am good for this forum because I demonstrate that what many here think are good ideas are actually wrong. This is an importance service for people here who could fall into the mistaken belief that they are right about everything.
Well I can’t fault you here, you got that right.
Well at least you are self reflexively thinking about these mistakes so I don’t have to point them out to you.
Just stick to the issues rather than attacking the person mate.
10
Tony
I’m not interested in you forcing me to watch things. That’s not liberal or democratic.
10
Not only are you an alarmist Mr Smith but about the wrong things; the TAX, whether called a TAX or an ETS or CPRS will cause untold damage to the Australian economy and society; the link earlier to the Frontier Economic modelling is not a trifle but will have huge impacts on the economy; this point was expanded here:
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/113676.html
The point is that apart from economic shrinkage there will be power shortages; the money being shovelled into clean energy is money wasted by any standard as has been shown by the US experience:
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/inside-dirt-on-clean-energy-schemes-they-dont-work-20110924-1kqph.html#ixzz1Ytz0j8Rz
Even the idiotic Fairfax press is starting to wake up to this but not our Adam who, like his namesake, is just an innocent in the imagined garden of Eden.
10
Pseudologia fantastica is the reason for his behaviour.
In regards to education he states
“I am very interested in science”
But unfortunately has no knowledge in science at all.
10
Winston, thanks for your post at 159.
The sharpest arrow in my quiver is native rehabilitation. In my time I have rehabilitated riparian zones, assorted habitats and have rebalanced and enhanced eco-systems. Personally planted over half a million trees, not counting understorey plantings.
These days I just shake my head at so called ‘rehabilitation’ plantings. Bad species selection, planted at three metre spacings in lines, akin to plantation plantings. Effective action is to observe the natural flora and replicate such, observations would understand that different species grow in different locations, especially in hilly situations.
Someone here mentioned that fire is required for germination. True, but also fire plays an important part in nutrition replacement. Our unique native species are not the common pot plant variety that requires a standard N-P-K regimen to survive/thrive.
The amount of green tape required to ply my craft has more or less, come to a stage that I can not practise due to the ideological insanity of the powers that be, they have no understanding of the environment due to the academia that has been infected by the green malaise. This element is of the belief that preservation is paramount over enhancement which will in time, unchecked, deliver poor outcomes.
Another thorn in my side is being called an extremist, denier and environmental vandal by the elite because of my scepticism that don’t have an understanding of environmentalism, little lone lifted a manicured finger to perform field works but you get that from the urbane educated idiots that have never had the raw earth under their feet.
10
Adam
I agree you are good for this forum at times, provided you don’t saturate it with your opinions in carpet bombing style by talking over the top of everybody. It is, however, rather arrogant to suggest that because you say it, it must be so. Many times you have been persuasive but failed to convince. Even when you have contradicted yourself, you maintin the rage and we can all see that. I am a believer in the “collision of opposites’ being beneficial for truth, but that predicates on the idea that both parties are intersted in finding that truth. I am not always convinced that that is your purpose in being here.
10
Make a wish!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhJQp-q1Y1s
Sorry, couldn’t help it.
Tony.
10
OK, this is a big claim. I have one question.
When it turns out that the ETS simply raises prices a bit which many families will be completely compensated for through income tax cuts and increased pensions or family payments, and the economy keeps growing, more jobs are created, real wages continue increasing.
Will you admit that you were wrong? That’s my simple question. Are you willing to actually change your mind when the evidence is in, and say you were wrong? Your life went on, the major change was the cost of electricity went up 10%, but most other things hardly changed at all. Will you admit that you got it wrong?
There won’t be an “economic shrinkage”!
The ETS in its first year will raise $7.4 billion, most of which will be offset by income tax cuts and increased family payments and pensions. Over the first three years the ETS will actually cost the budget $4 billion (more money going out than coming in) because the government is starting the compensation payments early and there are other payments for the coal and steel industries to help them adjust.
Compare that to the GST which in its first year raised $24 billion! Yes there were income tax cuts and the abolition of the whole sale sales tax. But over all the GST actually raised more money than the taxes it cut. And now the GST this year will raise almost $49 billion, so the revenue has doubled in just 10 years.
Now if an ETS of $7.4 billion in one year is going to cause the economy to contract, why won’t the GST which is a tax on almost all consumption also cause the economy to contract, considering it is something like 6.5 times bigger?
This is completely irrelevant in so many ways! It is these sorts of direct government subsidies that we need to get away from for the very reason that it involves politicians picking and choosing programs and projects to fund.
This is a perfect example of the Coalition’s “Direct Action” policy which is based on an endless stream of billions and billions worth of subsidies.
The reason we need a carbon price is because IT ENDS THE NEED FOR SUBSIDIES. You set a price for carbon emissions and then business investment from THE PRIVATE SECTOR goes towards the most efficient (best value for money) emissions technologies and away from things that pollute and things that don’t work well. This ends the idiotic game of subsidisation that Australia has used over the last decade that has involved wasting an enormous amount of money. If you don’t believe me, read these reports. This one by the Productivity Commission:
http://www.pc.gov.au/projects/study/carbon-prices/report
And this one by the Grattan Institute, an NGO:
http://www.grattan.edu.au/pub_page/report_energy1.html
The ETS is the most efficient way to deal with this problem for the very reason that it is completely unlike subsidy programs that involve politicians picking winners.
So in a weird way thank you for bringing up this subsidy example, because it demonstrates why the Coalition’s policy will just throw money away and why a market mechanism will work.
10
The coalition’s direct action plan is junk because it is predicated on AGW; but the Green’s plan [sic] is far more potentially destructive; I have given you link after link about oversea’s experience with carbon Taxes and carbon trading schemes and subsidisation of and reliance on renewables; I have linked to the Fronteir modelling; this modelling was commisioned by the then NSW ALP government; a $2 trillion GDP shrinkage by 2050 is enormous but again the point is that there will be power shortages; that’s not me saying it, it is every expert from the AEMO down predicting that; no economy can function with power unreliability; your avoidance of this point makes the rest of your analysis worthless.
10
Well not just that, but the coalition’s plan would cost far more than the government’s plan. The best casescenario is that it would cost $35 billion straight out the pockets of tax payers from 2015 to 2020. That’s ten times more than they say it will cost.
The worst case scenario (by going on the least cost effective carbon abatement projects that have already been tried the federal and state governments) is that it would cost $100 billion from 2015 to 2020! And that’s just to acheive the 5% cut by 2000 levels by 2020!
You can read an independent analysis of the opposition’s policy here:
http://apo.org.au/research/real-cost-direct-action-analysis-coalitions-direct-action-plan
Oh of course, the Greens won’t be happy until the coal industry is shut down, which I don’t approve of at all.
The Frontier modelling is flawed because the NSW Liberals simply inserted their own assumptions into the plan, including completely ignoring the income tax cuts.
It is simply a partisan political document.
Rather than relying on idiotic partisan assumptions, why not go to the source by doing the hard yards of reading the actual Treasury modelling?
http://treasury.gov.au/carbonpricemodelling/content/default.asp
At least you can read the policy as it is, rather than as the the NSW government wants to pretending it is.
I mean isn’t that the intellectually honest thing to do to test ideas in a fair and balanced way?
10
You keep spouting the rubbish about an ETS without answering what multiple people have pointed out to you here. Here’s what your own Pm says:Last week, Ms Gillard announced a carbon tax would begin in July 2012.
The prime minister explained that a fixed-price period, for an interim three to five years, would effectively operate as a carbon tax.
“A carbon tax is where you fix price,” Ms Gillard said. If your OWN Pm said this,in a press conference,Why do you keep repeating the garbage that’s it’s a ETS,when it’s not? It’s not up to you to reinterpet what the PM says in your own words.
And secondly you didn’t answer my question about carbon credit scammers,that collect the credits,then vacate the country taking the money with them. What’s to stop this happening on a wide-spread scale? Look up the recent article by Ross Greenwood where he talks about a company called WELL BEING GREEN.The link is http://www.2gb.com/index2.php?option=com_newsmanager&task=view&id=10204 and explain just how the government can ignore that?
10
Adam
And that is different to Treasury modelling, how? We have all got to serve our political masters, and those that pay the piper call the tune. Isn’t that exactly what we are complaining about? There is no such thing as an objective, unbiased assessment of the merits of anything that any government proposes. Ever.
10
Because the Treasury models the government policy! All the ‘bad’ bits (where money is taken from companies) and the ‘good’ bits where money is handed out as tax cuts and increased family payments.
You are making the baseless assertion that if you just model the price of permits you have an accurate estimate of the whole policy. That’s just nonsense.
No that’s completely wrong. The Treasury won’t simply hand over advice that the Government wants to hear, because if things turn out wrong, the boffins will all be sacked.
But anyway, if you just want to propagate the conspiracy theory that we can’t trust any institutions of government, then there’s no point talking to you about anything related to public policy, because you’re response will just be “they’re wrong and / or corrupt”.
10
Scaper, it’s interesting how urban environmentalism is clashing consistently with on-the-ground conservation. The number of good ideas that don’t work, or only work for a while! The bush is a good place to keep your mind as well as your eyes wide open.
These days, I find myself intellectually in bed with unlikely partners. While the GetUp/Green elitists are holding their nostrils at the mere scent of humanity, it’s Martin Durkin and the Marxist crew at Spiked who are leading the charge against NIMBYISM and the anti-consumerist misanthropes. The rigid dogmatism and Big Lever intellectualism of the Marxists have become more typical of of a constantly re-branded and re-spun New Labor, who now preach market forces as their new dialectic, and aspire to no greater goal than to “bring certainty to business and the markets”. What is all that? Neo-Fabianism?
There’s a better expression for it: Programmed Bungling.
10
No, it is an emissions trading scheme starting on 1 July, 2012. During that period Companies can trade free permits but permits bought from the government can only be sold back to the government.
It may have a similar effect to a carbon tax, but it is actually a fixed price ETS that becomes a floating price from July 1, 2015.
The Australian pollution permits are not internationally tradeable. If someone wants to buy up a heap of Australian permits then never use them to offset pollution they will effectively bid up the price of permits, but they will be throwing money away.
When John Key spoke to parliament earlier this year he said he would be interested in an integration of the Australian and New Zealand ETSs, but I doubt that will happen for a decade or more.
10
Marxist in favour of consumerism? Now that would be something new.
10
Adam Smith,
There’s been a certain commenter, “Sid” turned up at the Bishop Hill blog using a similar intensive carpet bombing “tactic” to that which you employ here.
You wouldn’t know anything about that would you?
10
QED, my point exactly. Interesting that you think that Treasury boffins would lose their job if their modelling turned out to be erroneous years down the track when often that government has been and gone, and the modelling served it’s purpose of justifying a policy that a government wished to enact for its own gain. The public service are in the business of promoting government actions. If they hit upon the truth it is almost certainly by accident. I think Frontier economics boffins are much more likely to be mindful of their reputation than public servants who are really not accountable to the same degree as private concerns.
10
If an ETS is the most efficient way of reducing CO2 in the atmosphere why don’t we have a Cigarette Trading Scheme(CTS) or a Alcohol Trading Scheme.Why do we think that the best way to reduce their use is to impose a TAX.You could alot everyone 5 dozen beer each year on a cap and trade scheme:-)
If in a few years we are going to be buying most of our CO2 permits from overseas how does that help us develop a clean energy technology in this country.Also if most of the money from CO2 trading is going overseas are we going to have to find large sections of the compensation we will be paying to people and industry out of the budget.
Why do I think that the ETS will make the pink bats scheme look like just a small mistake
10
John @183
The thumbs down indicates you may be onto something there.
10
Like Cohenite @ 175 , I don’t think much of what I’ve read of the Coalition’s scheme
(besides the fact that its to solve a non existant problem).
But if we are to look at things from an economic point of view at least the Coalition’s scheme keeps all the expenditure / money in Australia and doesn’t require billions and billions to go overseas. That is, the money is wasted in Australia’s own back yard.
10
Tony from Oz, just a quick comment on the teaching of algebra. I’m sure that teachers have *always* demanded that you do algebra “their way”. For any individual problem, there will be a better way, but to avoid confusing those who are struggling, you just stick to the prescribed way of doing it.
The further you go in education, the more you’ll be able to do things your way, as long as it works.
10
Adam Smith,
Do you support Prof. Stephen Schneider’s statement? –
“So we have to offer up scary scenarios,
make simplified, dramatic statements
and make little mention of any doubts…
Each of us has to decide what the right balance
is between being effective and being honest.”
– Prof. Stephen Schneider,
Stanford Professor of Climatology,
lead author of many IPCC reports
http://www.green-agenda.com/
10
Adam @176,
I will say again, the Frontier modelling was done by the ALP NOT the Liberals; it is the ALP’s modelling which contradicts all the more savoury modelling done since in respect of the TAX; so the choice is stark: between the public, feel good modelling which the Federal government has released or there private modelling which was not supposed to see the light of day.
In any event the experience in other economies, from Spain to California, show that the likely affect of the TAX/ETS will be like the Frontier modelling, especially in respect of power cuts; which you have not commented on.
10
Adam Smith: #165
This is like throwing marshmallows at a mattress ..
In reply to my #138 (you really are a slow learner, aren’t you?)
Not correct, the Fed ended the second stimulus of quantitive easing around that date, but a gradual easing still continues.
Back at your comment #70 you said:
The exchange rate fell against what, exactly? And “parity” with what, exactly? And the long term average of a dollar is 75 cents? That is not logical unless it is pegged relative to another currency. And which currency might that be?
There is a difference between having one currency pegged against another as an enabler of trade, and in having a fixed exchange rate. You are obviously confused between the two.
And in 1983, Hawke took Australia off a fixed rate against the US Dollar, for exactly the same reason that Nixon took the US Dollar off the gold standard during the Vietnam War. They both ran out of real money backed by real resources and production capacity. Since then, both countries have been printing money, based on assets they do not have. It is called deficit financing, and is predicated on having a future economy that is capable of expanding to eventually pay off the debt. And yet, the current ALP/Green Government wants to see a reduction in the economy. Doesn’t that strike you as being incongruous?
You are confused between trade in goods and services, and financial dealing. The US$ is the de facto currency of international trade in the western world, since no currency today is linked to a finite commodity.
Here is a simple mind experiment: What is the real value of a US dollar?
The answer is, “About 0.04 of a cent”. This is so, because that is what it costs to print a dollar (the actual price may be incorrect, but you will get the point).
By convention, we pretend it is worth considerably more, since that helps trade.
So, a dollar is worth only what a trader thinks it is worth relative to what he/she is trading. If the government places an impost on the trade, that is seen as lowering the value of the thing being traded. It comes back to bite you in the bum, because the value of what is traded decreases in comparison. And that is a negative impact on the value of the dollar. It is a chaotic system.
So why doesn’t the RBA double the number of AUS$ in circulation and make us all rich?
Because to do so would halve the value of all of the dollars in circulation. Hello?
You didn’t read the next comment.
Nope. Because they will have been waiting for the detail, and they have only had a week to read and digest the contents and figure out what the likely outcome scenarios might be, and position their resources accordingly, and ensure that everybody involved is aware of all of the necessary changes in how they deal with Australia in the future.
What they will have done since July is assume the worst case scenario, and they will act according to that, until they have had time to properly adjust.
Of course it is. But that is irrelevant. What I said, if you read the passage carefully, is that domestic wealth within Australia … will be relatively worse of than, say Indonesia. The operative word here is “relatively”. Australians will be affected, Indonesians will not, the relative difference between them will change.
Well, this impost on carbon pollution is supposedly being introduced in response to Australia’s emissions, but nobody in the Government has explained how putting an impost on something will decrease the “carbon pollution” unless people stop buying the commodity that is causing said “carbon pollution”, but as you yourself have said, Australia produces the best in the world, so people will continue to buy – hence no reduction in carbon pollution – no reduction in CO2 in the atmosphere.
I don’t need to have opinions. I don’t want to have opinions, because they cloud judgement. I just comment on the opinions of others.
10
John Brookes: #188
Damn, I have been forced to give you a thumbs up.
10
Wrong. Your Own Pm said in numerous press conferences that it was a tax on carbon,which transitions into an ETS in 2015. Just who are you,to reinterept the words of the PM?
Again you fail to answer the question. If someone buys them up,cashes them in,the proceeds to leave,or transfer the cash to another country,what’s to stop them from doing this? If you actually lsiten to that clip I linked you’ve have seen that some compamies are already trying this and as a result several Australian companies have gone bankrupt,as a result of no help whatsoever from the government to stop this.
10
Adam Smith @ 182
Capitalism and communism are the two faces of the one coin.
karl Marx in his book Das Kapital wrote: “Lets compare and contrast. The difference between capitalism and communism is that in capitalism man exploits man and in communism it’s the other way round.”
10
Rereke from Comment 192,
Yeah,
me too.
I very rarely, if ever use that thumb thingy, but that was indeed a good comment from John.
As I mentioned above, of the 2 major Maths based subjects in the Air Force’s Electrical Trade Training, Electrical Technology 2 was one of the subjects that I had the ‘Course Responsibility’ for, and also one I taught quite often.
I often got comments that the method we used for transposition of formula was a lot simpler, and easier to understand that what was being taught in Schools across all of Australia. Those comments were more often from the young Apprentice Trainees, who were all straight from Secondary School to Trade Training.
Tony.
10
The sad fact is just this:
Failure of world leaders and leaders of the scientific community to acknowledge obvious wrong in the manipulation of climate data (Climategate) has gradually eroded confidence in world leaders and in the scientific community as the climate debate continues.
That sad state of affairs in reflected in comments today on the story in PhysOrg.com about the events of 911: “Were the Twin Towers felled by chemical blasts?”
http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-09-theory-collapse-twin-towers.html
As noted above, we are in desperate need of statesmanship to resolve the current dangerous situation and restore:
a.) Citizen control of government, and
b.) Integrity to government science.
With kind regards,
Oliver K. Manuel
10
Sorry mate, I can’t help you. I’d never heard of the “Bishop Hill blog”, but thanks for mentioning it, I’ll be sure to check it out. If I post there I’ll be sure to use the name “Adam Smith”, so you’ll be able to identify my posts.
10
Sorry mate, but you’re way off the mark. If the upper echelons of Treasury keep signing off on information that turns out to be wrong, there would be serious consequences. They won’t sign of on something they know will most likely turn out to be completely wrong.
This is just absurd. The public service is there to give frank and fearless advice which may or may not support government policy.
This is an empirical claim so I am sure you have evidence to back it up.
Frontier economics will only model what they are told to model, and if that involves a political party mischievously only giving them half of the story then that is what they will model.
I think it is hilarious that you attack the Treasury for modelling an entire policy, but you won’t attack Frontier economics for producing misleading modelling that simply ignores half of the government’s policy.
It seems like it is you that is pushing an agenda here.
10
Well there is potentially an interesting discussion to be had about the relative merits of a flat tax and an ETS.
But if you want to use your tobacco and alcohol analogies, they are subject to taxation to regulate consumption! There IS a price in the market for those goods which effects the amount of those products bought and sold.
Now a Coalition style ‘Direct Action’ approach to regulating tobacco products would involve removing all of the taxes, thus returning a pack of cigarettes to about $5, then everyone would be paid a hand out from the government to encourage them not to buy cigarettes. People could still buy cigarettes and smoke as much as they like and just pocket the hand out, and of course if cigarettes were $5 per pack you can expect badly addicted smokers to smoke even more, but that is how a direct action socialist idiocy policy would work. No tax on the product that you are trying to regulate, just hand outs (funded from other taxes) in the hope people won’t buy the product.
Well no, actually the Australian government will auction off permits. It will just auction off fewer each year as the cap is reduced.
Well yes the pink bats scheme is a good example of how inefficient Opposition style ‘Direct Action’ schemes can be. My rough calculation is that the pink bats scheme abated carbon emissions at a cost of about $97 per tonne. Which is nearly 4 times the initial $23 starting price of the ETS.
So again, the pink bats policy demonstrates how idiotic the coalition’s climate change policy really is.
10
What are you talking about? They stopped printing money on that date. What you wrote was factually inaccurate.
Dear oh dear! The Australian dollar IS NOT “pegged” to any other currency, and it hasn’t been since December 12, 1983 when it was floated!
The Australian dollar reached parity with the US$ earlier this year simply because currency traders valued them as the same. Then the Australian dollar went even higher (was valued more) than the US$ and now it has slipped back a bit.
Please, just stop embarrassing yourself.
What on earth are you going on about? Australia has neither. The Australian dolalr isn’t pegged against any other currency, nor does Australia have a fixed exchange rate.
The dollar was floated mate! The primary peg was actually to the British pound.
Completely wrong fantasy land nonsense.
What on earth are you talking about? Australia has a government debt to GDP ratio of 7% and on current projections will have no net debt in a decade.
1) There is no ALP/Green government as they are not in coalition
2) Find me ONE quote featuring anyone from labor saying they want “a reduction in the economy”.
Inflation.
That wasn’t my point, My point was that the RBA can print money, there is no idiotic gold standard.
The draft legislation has been available for over a month. It has been factored in mate, you are trying to knock out thin air.
Last financial year the Australian mining industry invested $47 billion into the Australian economy.
Guess what, next financial year they plan to invest $82 billion! And that is in full knowledge of both the ETS and the mining tax!
Read this:
http://www.blogotariat.com/node/223306
Big deal. The Australian economy still produces about 17 times more per capita than the Indonesia economy.
Well they have, you obviously just haven’t bothered to read the policy document, or the draft bills, or the Henry review, or the Productivity Commission report.
Wrong. For the first time the production of greenhouse gas emissions will be factored into the cost of goods and services, this will create an incentive for their reduction over time.
You can’t have things both ways. You can’t say the ETS will kill the Australian economy, but with no change to emissions.
This makes no sense. At the start of this thread you put forth the opinion that the ETS will effect the value of the AUD$, but you have presented absolutely no evidence supporting this erroneous claim.
10
OK list these “numerous occasions”, and it doesn’t count is she says “like” or “has the effect of”. Find occasions where she says “is a carbon tax”.
Err, what do you mean by “cashes them in”. The only way they can be “cashed in” is if they are used to offset a pollution liability.
Australian pollution permits CAN NOT BE TRADED IN OTHER COUNTRIES. There is nothing in the legislation that says they can. Now Australia may enable them to be traded with other countries at some point in the future, but that won’t be the case when the ETS starts.
The thing that stops them from doing this is the fact you have absolutely no idea how the scheme will work. Australian emissions permits can only be used IN AUSTRALIA. If someone wants to buy up a lot of them and never use them, they will be throwing money away AND bidding up the price of the permits.
You can’t take an Australian emissions permit and use it in another country!
10
Thank you for the history lesson, but the original quote was about consumerism, not communism.
I’m a bit surprised no one here has stood up to defend capitalism. I think it is a far better system than socialism (communism isn’t really an economic system, it is the theoretical utopian social structure that is meant to eventuate when socialism is properly implemented).
10
Meanwhile, back on the threads topic,
I just took my little sceptic to the zoo, and we all had a good time. Then in the shop I notice the following childrens book:
http://www.fishpond.com.au/Books/Weather-or-Not-Caren-Trafford/9780958187831?ref=314&affiliate_banner_id=1%22+target%3D%22_blan
Yep, it is as bad as it sounds. I left it on the shelf.
10
MadJak: #203
Well at least it has been remaindered.
Its been raining here, and I haven’t been able to play outside, so I had to resort to poking probes into our new resident troll. Good sport, but we got awfully off topic, my bad.
10
Adam Smith:
You have me belly laughing at this one … I doubt you have been in the service in the last couple decades if you truly believe this. I am in the service right now and can unreservedly tell you that the top two or three teirs in every agency are politically appointed people, either directly or indirectly. Frank and fearless advice… I shall bring this up with my colleagues on Monday, it shall provide much frivolity.
Anyway, back on point – you spew a lot of stats, but I am still waiting your references. Claims without references are baseless and therefore worthless in a debate.
You do not know what the Australian debt:GDP ratio is if your earlier post is any indication. Oh, and still awaiting your Jensen reference from the last thread.
But feel free to keep carpet bombing off-topic jibber jabber, and I shall keep compiling my list of your gross errors and baseless claims.
10
How about I direct you to Table 1 of the memorandum on THE CLEAN ENERGY BILL 2011 makes it quite clear that it is not an Emissions Trading Scheme. It permits SOME trading in CREDIBLE markets under market prices, but not for the whole amount, and it REGULATES the price of the units traded between a floor of $15 and a ceiling $20 above the market rate There will be two stages. For the first three years, the carbon price for each tonne of pollution will be fixed, and will operate like a carbon tax. Then, from 1 July 2015, the mechanism will shift to a ‘cap and trade’
Explain just how that’s an ETS,or are you claiming you know more than the offical BIll? Also there’s this clip saying that it will be a price on carbon for the first few years,NOT a ets. http://www.3aw.com.au/blogs/3aw-generic-blog/gillard-flipflops-on-carbon-tax/20110224-1b6nw.html
If you’d actually listen to the clip I linked,someone’s found a way to do something along those lines. They claimed they were offical carbon credit collectors,and went colledcting,then left the country with the money,driving several businesses bankrupt.How about you read the facts nect time before you answer?
10
Rereke,
I allways enjoy your posts. Informative, clear and demonstrable of wisdom. Whilst sometimes I don’t agree, you have my respect and attention.
Unlike sid, who I know glaze over and view as its own sinister form of non-sensical pollution.
10
Bulldust, the government debt/GDP ratio is a perfect example of economic group think. I’ve gone toe to toe on this issue with economists and yet to come away with a sound explaination. They refuse to break out of the box.
Now, the government earns roughly $340B in revenue so the GDP comparison means nothing unless all private debt is inclusive and that, sir, looks pretty gloomy and nothing to skite over.
Like the net debt figure too, Swan uses the assets in the Future Fund that in most part, can not be accessed until next decade to deflate the figure.
I noticed that the government borrowed over $2B last week. At this rate the $250B limit will be reached by April. My prediction for the deficit at the end of the income year is $53B. Could be worse if the indicators maintain the trends. Won’t even contemplate figures if the world economy crashes.
10
Oh, the interest on the Bonds and Treasury Notes is now near $10B per year…a nice little structural deficit built in for the future.
10
Scaper and Bulldust, you can blame socialist Abbott for the debt mess, and most other things. Let’s have an election and get that smart Gillard chick into his job.
10
Scraper:
Maybe he needed to borrow money to throw himself a big party for receiving the Euromoney gong … shame it doesn’t work like the Red Faces gong.
I agree with you that many of the economic statistics lobbed around are a tad slippery if they aren’t accompanied with an explanation of the data. This is why I prefer to deal with much “harder” stats myself, like production stats, values, royalties etc. Things we can measure almost directly and verify through third parties.
National accounts on the other hand … quite blurry stuff. I have been in video conferences with the ABS in which they ran through the quarterly state accounts … you’d be surprised how rubbery the numbers are, espeically quarterly data. Another issue is that the people collecting and compiling the stats are often far removed from the source of the data which leads to all kinds of misunderstandings. The number of times I had to explain why WA both imports and exports gold – just one item that seems to cause endless confusion over in Canberra.
This probably sounds familiar, given how much weight the GISS in New York gives to global temperature stations in far flung countries. Similar issue, different stats. Same principle though … the farther the analyst is physically removed from the source of the data, the more likely it is that analytical errors creep in.
10
We are in a World Economic depression! Not a drop An DEPRESSION! Not that Labor would even know what that was. The best treasurer in the world..who said he is ..the globalist stooge parasites at the UN?
10
The government’s Clean Energy Future advertising blitz is stuffed full of fawning interviews with wind and solar energy companies. It boasts about the new jobs they’ll create. But these jobs rely on government grants, or the carbon price, or mandatory renewable energy targets. They wouldn’t survive on their own. The market has already bet against them. Soon there will be $10 billion more to fund dozens of antipodean Solyndras.
And that money puts the lie to the claim that Gillard’s climate package is a ”market-based” solution to global warming. Not even the government believes so. Otherwise it would have eliminated the masses of climate programs that already exist. (According to the Commonwealth Auditor-General, there are 550 across the country.) Instead, they’d leave the tax to do the work of directing investment. They definitely wouldn’t be offering up even more subsidies.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/inside-dirt-on-clean-energy-schemes-they-dont-work-20110924-1kqph.html#ixzz1YxEiJ7u5
00
theRealUniverse @ 212
It gets worse – according to the writer: “Australia Will Be A “Colony” of China By 2020″
http://freedomfiles.blogspot.com/2011/06/few-weeks-ago-i-posted-snapshot-of-what.html
00
OK it’s been fun. I’m out. Someone email me when the mods here bother to stop off topic comments like Smith’s.
Bastard won’t even use his real name. Coward.
00
Neville @ 143
That’s a great article and just goes to show we should do 2 things about this Carbon tax.
1. We should look at all the alternatives before leaping.
2. We should be more careful who we give our money too like the damn Labor Party.
Say YES to an election now !!
00
mosomoso says:
Sadly there seems to be many in the public eye willing to act like this.
His misquoting of Charles F Keller, then blatant inability to acknowledge his mistake is the one that sticks clearly in my mind.
Given the analysis done on Plimer’s book by Professor Enting, I don’t expect this next book will contain much of value. For scientific facts, it’s always best to get it from peer-reviewed science rather than a book written for entertainment value.
00
Mike @ 215
I resent having to scroll over his posts.
Best if he was compressed to avoid his obvious attempt to take up space or maybe his comments could be automatically re routed to SkepoSci.
00
And how is this a bad thing? The Government is saying that international permits must be approved, e.g. they must comply with Kyoto accounting practices. If some busted arse country starts handing out permits, the Government won’t accept them as valid unless they adhere to the Kyoto accounting methods.
This is just a bait and switch on your part. Others criticise the scheme because they say it will be open to fraud. But when the government sets a benchmark of what counts as a valid international permit, apparently that is bad because it is “regulation”. You can’t have it both ways.
I’ll also point out at this point that the Opposition’s claims about abatement form soil carbon DO NOT comply with Kyoto accounting practices, which means if they count that as abatement, it is quite possible that it won’t count as part of a future agreement. So all that money would’ve been spent for absolutely nothing. In fact the Opposition is so dishonest on this issue that they would require a land mass of around 75% of Australia for their abatement to work:
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2011/s3179336.htm
Again, your criticism is what? By having a floor and a ceiling price, the cost of permits won’t fluctuate too much which creates more business certainty. Permits can’t go too high which wouldn’t allow a fair adjustment period, but they can’t go too low either so businesses can’t get away with doing nothing.
This is a perfectly reasonable approach that balances carrot and stick.
00
What are you on about? The world economy is growing but slowly. Australia’s economy is growing nicely given the world circumstances.
00
It gets worse MaryF @218- reading posts from sometimes respected respondents covering the off topic flows of consciousness from AS enough to know whether to scroll past or not. Nonetheless, less offensive overall than the Blimey stuff. As a libertarian I don’t quite know how to react- censorship offends.
I too saw Plimer on the subject of volcano emissions of CO2 and found the performance unconvincing. I suspect (entirely without any real evidence) that the spreading zone volcanoes emit far less CO2 than all other volcanoes, and are probably in the majority. However, Plimer is entitled to hold and express his views. He may or may not be in error. That doesn’t make him a liar.
00
Alas, Blimey, they tell me the Hockey Stick was peer-reviewed.
Plimer may have debated poorly, but he knows a Holocene when he sees one.
00
Tell me Adam, why didn’t the Euro’s greatest treasurer if he really had the smarts, simply abandon all the other expenditure on windmills, solar panels, propaganda advertising, climate change public servants, etc, etc and scoop up all the carbon credits for less than a dime on the CCX and be done with it? Isn’t that how it all works? We get to own the carbon credits and wave them around proudly at any nosy UN watermelon who wants to see them and Wayne can frame the account and hang it on the wall in his office. No nails, strictly stick on hooks thanks wally.
00
Adam Smith @ 219
The fact is no-one here gives a tinkers cuss about Kyoto agreement. The document is a waste of space and money and it should never have been so arrogantly signed.
Nice from a global unification perspective and totally utopian but unless we are all on the one channel it won’t make any difference.
The principle assumption for the Kyoto agreement is wrong and down right arrogant.
The basic fundamental for a Carbon tax is wrong and this negates all the subsequent debates.
Say YES to an election now !!
00
No.
00
Oh well, you’ll have to deal with it because once it gets the old Royal Assent, it will never be repealed.
00
Is “wilfully misleading” a better term?
How would you describe Plimer’s behaviour, when presented with the words in his book saying “In fact, satellites and radiosondes show that there is no global warming” and citing Keller as his reference. When you read Keller he says …
Plimer not only gets Keller message completely backwards, on national television he sidesteps answering the questions altogether. If I bought a science book I would be annoyed to find that the author either deliberately lied or was deliberately misleading. Worse is when they don’t have the courage to own up to their own mistakes.
More lies (you call it what you want) is all I expect to come from Plimer’s latest book.
00
O/T,
Something to try talking some sense to the deluded who think that centrally controlled and manipulated economics is working for anyone other than the rent seekers:
http://www.theage.com.au/business/buckle-up-for-apocalypse-dow-20110924-1kqsq.html
Remember the major loss of wealth in the great depression didn’t happen in the 1929 crash, it was 1932/1933.
00
Gnome @ 221
I think you’re being very generous to refer to it as ” off topic flows of consciousness “.
Agree that replies to that “consciousness” would be better if they didn’t address every point as they also take up lots of space..
The main benefit in dealing with his posts is that those replying sharpen their debating skills and are then equipped to help others understand the falsity of CAGW and AGW.
He could be seen as a useful tool for anti AGW skill sharpening.
Plimer’s TV persona is not that enticing, but this is about the SCIENCE and his book more than makes up for his so so TV presence.
Have looked at many of the so called “rebuttals” of the contents of Heaven and the crap that they come up with is embarrassing to them.
Many of the so called faults are typos or the like and show bad proof reading but the content of the book is unarguably brilliant in its depth and scope.
00
mosomoso:
“the Hockey Stick”? You say this like there is only one. The are multiple reconstructions of the past. If you are speaking of the IPCC chart.
http://www.ipcc.ch/graphics/ar4-wg1/jpg/fig-6-10.jpg
Then yes, the science in that was peer-reviewed. The cherry-picker will also be delighted that there is a slim chance that 1,000 years ago it was warmer than today. Although then you’re still left with explaining why that’s relevant to today’s forcings, and then maybe why you’re also arguing on the side of high climate sensitivity.
Debated poorly, acted poorly, conducted poor science.
Do you have a point with your Holocene remark?
00
Adam Smith believes in market based solutions but like Wayne’s World reckons we should shell out $23AUD/tonne for carbon credits instead of a cent or 2 US when our dollar reached $1.10 USD. Unfortunately Wayne has a heap of RECs in the Govt coffers he paid up to $40AUD for and had to force the power utilities to take them off his hands for the bleeding obvious. That’s the leftoid market based approach for you folks.
00
And just how can you back that stupid comment up? You have no idea what future government will do. Personally I think your just blowing smoke as usual. If it goes wrong,and I fully expect it to,it’ll be repealed in a hurry.
00
So by your logic,if the carbon tax is an ETS,we have an ets already and we are going to transition in 2015 into another ETS? Your logic fails to make any kind of common-sense. Also there’s too much stick in this deal and minimal to little carrot.
00
Interesting link. I’ll await the reviews of his next effort with interest to see if he’s learned anything.
00
What do you mean “we”? The Government SELLS emissions permits, tax payers don’t buy them.
If you don’t support the market mechanism then you’re implicitly supporting the Opposition’s tax and spend socialist nonsense policy.
The thinking skeptic should support the Government policy because it would waste far less than the Opposition’s ‘plan’.
00
It goes from a fixed price to a semi-floating price.
If this is a tax, find me another tax where liable parties buy permits that they can trade.
00
I was talking about the Hockey Stick they thought they’d get away with.
00
Hi Blimey @236
“”You say this like there is only one.””
Must agree with you .
There is more than one hockey stick.
My sister had one when she played for Novos.
00
Don’t be in such a hurry to save the polar bears.
That photo is purely documentary and is not ironic at all.
00
mosomoso says:
Please clarify which one you believe that was. As shown before, the IPCC report contains data from many sources and many different contributors.
You seem to believe one was wrong for some reason, but have yet to bring forth evidence to show why, nor what impact that has on today’s AGW theory.
You also failed to answer my previous question “Do you have a point with your Holocene remark?”.
00
Piffle! Until enough voters in marginals wake up to the UN/IPCC/CRU/etc overblown hype, they want a few more windmills and solar panels so Abbott offers them a sop on that score just like the Govt is but NO CARBON TAX which they also want voted down. Naturally when in Govt, facing Labor’s big black hole again, certain ‘priorities’ will need to be adjusted, starting with the Dept of Climate Change and the Great Global Gruesome Greasum. Think of it as direct action if you like Adam.
00
“”“Do you have a point with your Holocene remark?”.””
The answer is in Ian’s first book on page 189 just below the graph fig2.
00
Observa 241
They would only allow me to give you one tick so must post here.
Worth 3 ticks.
00
Wow, so you’re another in the “The Opposition only pretends to have a climate change policy but they’re lying” brigade. If they are lying about that, what else are they lying about? Are they lying when they say they won’t bring back WorkChoices? Are they lying when they say they won’t raise the GST? Are they lying when they say they won’t increase income taxes?
Are they telling the truth about anything?
00
MaryFJohnston:
Judging by your comments in every thread to date, I’m guessing you’re not even quite sure what the question is.
00
Gnome: #221
Mary F Johnston #229
I think I owe an apology to you and everybody else on this thread. I have been deliberately baiting our new troll in an attempt to find out how much he/she knows about the way things really work in the Westminster style of politics, and in international trade. In doing so, I have been adding to the clutter on the thread, (and telling my share of porkies), but could see no other way of finding out if he/she actually understood the issues, or was merely regurgitating material from elsewhere.
I have come to the conclusion that it is probably the latter. Everybody else should form their own conclusions.
00
Blimey, I think their most daring graphic bid was Figure 5 in WG1 Technical Summary B. Sadly, that was their wardrobe failure moment.
As for my not answering your question: “Do you have a point with your Holocene remark?”…please excuse the delay. Doing stuff.
Yes, I have a point. Just the obvious one.
00
You mean like this government lied about the Carbon Tax among other things?
It they lied about this matter,what else will they also lie to us about?
00
“”I think I owe an apology to you and everybody else on this thread.””
No apology needed.
00
Blimey 245
What was the question again?
00
Adam believes that wall to wall Labor Govts who couldn’t even cap and trade the Murray Darling Basin in our own backyard, can now roll out their ETS vision splendid globally with all it’s international jurisdictional problems and rorting to date and abracadabra! Nowhere has it reduced fossil fuel use one iota and even the Cap and Trade authors bagged it as suitable on such a scale and with obvious jurisdictional policing problems, but if it sucks everywhere locally then hallicinate globally folks and never spend just a penny or two when a great big stinking pile of your taxes will do. Plenty more where that came from according to these sheltered workshop specialists.
00
Heaven and Earth (get the pun, he’s a geologist): a Tour de Force by Ian Plimer.
00
I see chief misanthropist Andrew Glickson’s little mates, @blimey, @catamon and @adam smith, are doing their bit for the fundraising committee … all up late singing for their supper about Australia’s let’s-change-the-weather tax, which will guarantee their funding streams for the next two years at least (and maybe even longer if the booby traps are expensive to disarm). It must be so frustrating that no-one can prove their junk hypothesis; still it is remarkable that it has already been good for so much money for so many years. Hope they cover their tracks so they can stay out of jail. Night all.
00
mosomoso:
Any scientific reason, or just not your choice of colour?
Also this didn’t even come close to answering the question about the hockey stick. Please further this discussion by sticking to the topic rather than attempting to divert.
And that is? Take your time, there’s no rush, I’d rather you respond having given more thought than is currently occurring.
00
So how exactly does this guarantee me a funding stream?? Please let me know as i could do with the dosh??
00
No Michael it’s like this. If Julia nad Co of ‘we are all fiscal conservatives now’ fame are correct and the Budget is balanced, the luvvies can have a few of their precious windmills or solar panels PROVIDED they can offer the best bang for buck($/tonne) of plant fertiliser savings. That’s the deal.
At present Joe Hockey has said that all things considered with the state of the Budget, they’ll have to take the axe to the sheltered workshop for starters. He’s been quite open about that. It depends on the Gummint now as to how much cutting will need to be done, but returning to surplus as they promised is entirely in their hands now, assuming no more smash and grab taxes to weasel out of their promises.
00
Australia doesn’t actually use the westminster style system. It uses its own system that it has come up with through a written constitution and 110 years of experimentation.
The fact you think Australia’s system is westminster demonstrates you don’t know what you are talking about.
Smith you’re pushing your boat out too far with misinformation such as this one regarding the Westminster system. I will set the record straight, you will start showing some respect to other commentors, improve your holier than thou attitude or I will dissolve your parliament…permanently. Understand?
From Wikipidea of all places…
Under the prevailing Westminster system, the leader of the political party or coalition of parties that holds the support of a majority of the members in the House of Representatives is invited to form a government and is named Prime Minister. [mod oggi]
00
Michael?
Government revenue as a proportion of GDP is lower now than during the Howard government. It’s the Howard government that was the big taxers.
Joe Hockey has all talk. He says he is going to cut this and that but he actually hasn’t nominated anything.
Australia’s debt to GDP is incredibly low. We are doing very well.
Now you see this is what I mean. Observa isn’t debating whether the Oz debt to GDP is low or not. He is stating the fact that the government promised to bring the budget back to surplus by 2013. Unless you can demonstrate that the government DIDN’T PROMISE to bring the budget back to surplus, your reply is mischievous, irrelevant and is unacceptable.
I am warning you Adam, lift your game. [mod oggi]
00
Blimey,
Nope. The multiple block-quoting, faux-incomprehension, bossing and patronising will see this one out for you. Go check out all the obvious stuff from this site re Medieval Warming. Maybe read the Icelandic sagas.
00
And you’d trust the government’s word on this? Personally I wouldn’t trust them with anything right now.
And Mrs gillard has him beat hollow in that category with her assertions”This will be best for the Australian people” regardless of whether we want it or not,she goes ahead,all guns blazing.
If that’s the case,why has the government spent everything that was saved in Howard’s tems in office,and still has to ask for 2 budget increases in parliament?
Sounds like you are clutching at straws to explain this government’s dismal failure.
00
World’s best Cap and Trade advice for dummies.
00
No, the Government doesn’t calculate the accounts they are done by the Treasury and the Department of Finance.
And what has Joe Hockey done? Well about nothing. He did invent Hockeynomics, which is a branch of economics where things don’t add up.
1) Revenue to GDP is a measure of money the government gets relative to the size of the economy, it isn’t related to expenditure.
2) The government used a modest stimulus package to get us through the GFC, which worked because unlike every other developed country perhaps with the exception of South Korea, Australia didn’t go into recession.
You can see the revenue to GDP figures here. The Howard government was clearly a higher taxing goverment than Rudd and Gillard:
http://www.budget.gov.au/2011-12/content/overview/html/overview_48.htm
00
Again Mrs Gilard has him beat in that category.She invested Gillardnomics,which is to disregard all advice to the contary,never mind what the people of the country want and choose just they don’t want as a policy to implement,while ignoring everything that you don’t want to hear to the contary.
Which are still not trustable,as right now we have 4 diferent estimates for the Carbon tax,one done by the Treasury and 3 done by the states,which all of the state one contradict the Treasury one,and they still refuse to look at the other estimates. I can’t see myself trying anyone that’s that obsinate anytime soon.
And the Howard government left us with a surplus,while this one had spent all of said surplus and is now in the deficit numbers. This tax is just a blind attempt to “grasp at Straws” to get us back in the surplus,without any regard for what’s best for the country.
00
And don’t forget during the campaign when he did his bit for humor with the tasteless Paris Hilton jokes!! Certainly got a chuckle from Abbott and Robb at the time.
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-election/notsojolly-hockey-sticks-it-to-paris-swan-20100720-10id0.html
Thanks for that observa.
Which does have something to be said for it, although it may get us into the kind of command economy Direct Action type plan that the Coalition are promoting. Politically, a market based solution is going to be the easier sell i think.
00
TonyfromOz @ 155
Thank you for that insightful “tactical technique” appraisal. I am one of those “other” readers you alluded to, very rarely make a post because I feel I have a lot more to learn than contribute on these threads (very astute, articulate and knowledgeable people posting on here) – but you hit the nail on the head in terms of the intended effect on a raw newbie site visitor.
The saturation bombing became apparent quite early on, from about post #100 I got to the stage of flicking past any post with “Smith” in it, be it the poster name or a response to that poster, just happened to stop an extra couple of seconds at yours.
This is unfortunately a perfect example of where genuinely free speech is susceptible to the abuse of its very intent by a nefarious m.o. to proselytise a specific cause. I see not debate but thread saturation technique. Which, if it becomes untenable to the stage of requiring action will lead to predictable cries of “censorship” on certain other sites. Very smooth…
I hope that any people who are even remotely “BS detector equipped” will see through the tactic being used, as per your quote;
BTW, Madjak @ 228, re the financial “apocalypse dow” side of things, saw that linked elsewhere earlier today.
A few months ago there looked to be a possible (probably three way – ie world regions) “perfect storm” building in the next 6-12 months, in more recent times I suspect the time frame may have changed a little…but, say, a global windfarm stimulus package might fix it all, perhaps?
😉
00
I really enjoy reading the variety of comments and opinions on this site.
Even the comments from the likes of MattB, Blimey, Catamon etc. (mostly) provide a descent debate, but more recently the carpet bombing tactics of one Adam Smith is really starting to get annoying.
He obviously is entitled to an opinion (of which everyone is) but the constant argument and contradiction it is getting beyond a joke.
Adam, please say your piece on the subject at hand (in this case, Ian’s new book) and bugger off. It is obvious that you are a passionate Labor voter, but in case you haven’t noticed, a vast majority of us here would rather rub our privates with a cheese grater. Why not head over to Crikey and extol the virtues of the labor/greens and their toxic tax. (I KNOW you say it isn’t a tax, but if if looks and smells like dog shit, well, guess what champ, it probably is!)
On a previous thread I accused you of being a GetUp! troll. Prove me wrong.
PS. Are you the “AS” that regularly comments on Andrew Bolt’s blog??
00
On a previous thread I accused you of being a Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party troll. Prove me wrong.
00
mosomoso says:
You make several statements and fail to provide any evidence to support them. You fail to engage in the scientific argument. Did you learn to debate from Plimer? 😉
Unable to debate you once again try to divert to other topics without being very specific, nor very knowledgeable about my past with this site and those topics.
As I hinted at earlier (@230), the MWP might have been warmer. CO2Science, however, does not perform good analysis. The timeframe which they label as the MWP is moved about in order to capture the warm part of that data. For example:
Sicre-2008 notice that their label for the MWP sits over the AD 1000-1300 and avoids the lower temps in the 950-1000 period. Take that into account and the average temps are below CWP. Look at the smoothed red line (running average) and it sits below modern day temps for almost the entire MWP.
Paulsen-2003 – they have the MWP centered around AD1300. For the actual MWP, 950-1250 the average is well below todays temp (shown on the left). Although even if you did take their proposed relocation of the MWP, it still would be cooler than today.
That’s the problem with Nova relying on other bloggers for her science. Sometimes it’s so easy to spot the poor science that you’re left in the embarrassing position of trying to defend something that’s obviously wrong.
What choice will you make? Will you act like Plimer and try to divert once again, or can you man up and admit the error?
00
Funny, can’t seem to find that anywhere… also funny that you think its an insult….
Do you actually have a life away from this blog? You seem to be so obsessed with it.
00
Smithy@182
Marxists in favour of consumption? You clearly havent heard of Deng Xiaoping and the the economic policy of the Communst Party of China which has prevailed since 1978! Or the two decade long economic boom in the People Republic of China and the rising living standards in the PRC. You really are a useful idiot. As I said come in spinner.
00
226
Adam Smith quotes another:
“The basic fundamental for a Carbon tax is wrong and this negates all the subsequent debates.”
And replies with:
If this were true Adam wouldn’t be spending SO MUCH TIME trying to convince us that it is true. Adam is worried about something…….
00
Not so sure that’s very realistic. A lot will depend on how things go internationally over the next few months as to how the Govt goes about getting the budget into surplus. Its certainly a worthy plan. Hopefully the MRRT goes through as well by years end, and rather than having to engage in another Stimulus Package on 2012, the RBA cutting interest rates if needed (they have, by world standards, lots of room to move) will be enough to see us through a new downturn.
Funny, the obsession here with the ALP keeping promises regardless of the circumstances, but the concurrent hope that the Libs wont keep theirs (on Carbon Emission reduction) if they find themselves in power.
00
Blimey
Hockey Stick, Medieval Warming, Holocene…can’t see where I’m diverting. Just can’t. I can tell you’re not happy, of course.
Interesting graphs you’ve linked to there. Your comments on those graphs were quite interesting. Not the Hockey Stick, of course, and not what I was talking about. Diversion?
Like I said: just multiple block-quoting, faux-incomprehension, bossing and patronising. As for the chest-thumping and self-important bloviating of your last two paragraphs…we’ll just wish all that away and start again, shall we? A bit like the Hockey Stick.
00
Do you actually have a life away from this blog? You seem to be so obsessed with it.
00
I must admit I am nervously awaiting the passage of the passage of the Clean Energy bills.
I’m going to have a Royal Assent party after the bills pass the parliament.
00
mosomoso says:
Incapable of defending the arguments you put forward you instead repeat yourself and then try more vague diversionary tactics. Ironically you act just like Plimer.
00
I’m going to crack a very good bottle of wine and go lurking on a few blogs to watch the hysteria from the conservatives. May even drop in at Menzies House and post something Nyah, Nyah, Nyah Cori.
00
Looks like Pilmer has some competition.
http://www.amazon.com/Evidence-Based-Climate-Science-opposing-emissions/dp/0123859565/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1315507821&sr=8-1
Will be interesting to read the reviews over the next few weeks.
00
I think I’ll visit here just to reassure everyone that he sky won’t fall in.
00
The stupidity of making the ‘1000 big polluders pay’ is obviously the backpeddaling now to 500 or less and the handouts to make it palatable in the short run before the medium to long term consequences kick in. No doubt it’s been carefully downsized so as not to include nasty ‘big polluders’ like Brisbane City Council while ratepayers in the smaller metro and rural Councils get off scot free for so much longer before they eventually cop it.
Of course if the GW catastrophists were fair dinkum they could easily advocate a level plying field CO2E tax that was revenue neutral just like British Columbia is at present. That could easily garner support from climate realists who are witnessing the science becoming increasingly unsettled. But this ETS crap has nothing to do with addressing global warming but is all about Gillard playing Iron Lady and growing the evil empire so naturally they and their smash and grab taxing are to be opposed at all costs. Rudd called it right after Copenhagen but the watermelons simply refuse to accept it and are playing games with their current stance now. That being the case, it’s whatever it takes to get rid of them and their crooked union mates now.
00
Why would Brisbane City council have to pay? How many fossil fuel power stations or steel blast furnaces do they own?
If it is true that the ETS is simply a revenue measure, why is it that the ETS will cost the budget $4 billion over the first three years? If it is all about raising money, does it make sense that it has lead to more expenditure?
Adam, I draw your attention to the in-line comments I placed at your #257 and #258. Please read them. [mod oggi]
00
Adam, you need to give us a proper email. One you check daily. You also need to reply to the mods requests. They’ve been very patient.
Please email support AT joannenova.com.au with your correct email. Not the mailinator hidey fake one that you don’t look at. OK?
Thanks,
Jo
00
Is Václav Klaus the only politicians who understands the serious danger facing our formerly-free society today?
See video summary as “Big Brother” took control of science (1961-2011)
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10640850/Summary_of_Career.pdf
With kind regards,
Oliver K. Manuel
Former NASA Principal
Investigator for Apollo
00
Hey there Jonovians,
Since I got it working about 20 minutes ago, here is what the comments section looks like for me now.
I have the technology. 😉
I’ve never written an Add-On for Firefox before, so I had to reverse engineer and hack someone else’s plugin which did a similar thing, but it does seem to be working. I’ve called it the “JoNova Comment Snob” plugin. It only works in Firefox and it only works for this web site. It has a configurable list of author names to blacklist and the result is as seen in the above screenshot.
It’s not so much a “DIY censorship”, more of a “controlled ignorance” plugin. Once you’ve decided someone is worth ignoring you can do so without the web site completely censoring them. Unfortunately this would not help first-time visitors, and technology does not usually solve social problems.
[I’m quite touched Andrew, really. Thanks! Here is me worried about maintaining thread quality, but the thread is organic, and it is finding solutions I would never have thought of. Having said that, I’m not into “hiding” comments myself, but I’m bowled over by the compliment :-). For a few people who get drawn into flame wars, it might be just the thing :-)… JN]
00
Andrew McRae:
September 26th, 2011 at 2:45 am
Great Stuff!
After 45 years I have stopped watching the ABC news to get the same effect with the dictats of Fabian Barbie & Co.
00
Still awaiting your references on Australian debt:GDP and Jensen. Take a break from the obvious trolling to back up your statements please.
00
The “trollfestations” on the realist blogs seem to be obnoxiously rampant of late. I wonder whom the perpetrators think they’re fooling?! But I digress …
@wes george 146 wrote:
And now at least one environmental NGO is venturing into the realm of science-fiction. For details, pls see:
ET please call WWF
00
Andrew @ 284
Andrew you are a champ. You have done exactly what I have suggested (though by a different method) on another site in order to deal with “disruptive fluff.” That solution being: Allow the reader to choose whether or not they have to see anything to/from a particular commenter.
The site will still allow them to post so there is no censorship undertaken by the site owners that can be claimed elsewhere. Rather there is a filter that each individual reader can configure by their own criteria of what is and is not worth their time to read and/or respond to.
I do not like the idea of censorship, but I do recognize a few basic options of dealing with/providing for freedom of speech.
First, speech (or comments) intended to disrupt or otherwise hinder or damage the normal functioning of an establishment is not protected as far as I am aware (example you cannot yell “Fire!” in a crowded theater when there is not one, nor can you shout to customers of a restaurant that the cooks spit in the food unless you have proof). The owner of the establishment (in this case the owner and moderators of the blog) have the right to ask the disruptive person to leave. However in this case it would result in claims of censorship which is not the end result I suspect Jo would desire. Only she can answer that.
Second, if the disruptive party refuses to stop or leave of their own accord, the other parties involved can choose to leave rather than listen to the disruptive party. In this case they will miss out on things that they do want to read/hear/see which is also not a solution.
However, in the case of an electronic medium, filters can be provided so the individuals can choose for themselves to create an environment in which (for all practical purposes) the disruptive party has left.
No censorship by the “management” and no need for the other parties to have to leave to get away from the “noise”.
Nicely done.
00
Andrew @ 284
By the way, will this be available for download somewhere? The source code would be fine to if you want to release that.
00
Robert @16,
Making change has been a lost art for about 30 years. Yet my father taught me how to do it in less than 2 minutes when I was about 10 years old. As soon as cash registers became able to calculate the change the cause was lost.
But not everywhere…I remember walking into a deli for lunch and when I had eaten I took the check to the cash register and put it on the counter along with a $20 bill. There was a young looking girl behind the counter and I fully expected her to need the cash register to tell her what the change was. But no! She immediately counted out the right change into my hand without even looking at the register. I hope she didn’t notice that my jaw bounced off the floor.
00
@ Blimey
I clicked on your name and I saw your anti Nova site. You are such an embarrassment to your
bunglershandlers it is amazing. Every time an openminded person visits your pathetic excuse for a website they will wonder, “Who is Jo Nova?” and visit her site. Thanks for helping the cause! Do you get paid by “big oil” to embarrass your cause? I heard that the warmanistas were looking for someone even more of a joke than Al Gore. Maybe there is still time for you to put an application in?00
Thanks Eddy for pointing it out.
I see that the comments there are flowing in. Gee, by both of us clicking on the site must of doubled the hits! Watch out Jo, I think old Blimey might have a ‘thang’ for you.
00
Eddy thanks for the enormous belly-laughs this morning … that site is priceless. Here is the “About” section where the blogger deliberately stays anonymous (coward much?):
Source: http://itsnotnova.wordpress.com/about/
Blimey, I award you the unique Bulldust Troll of the Year Award, which unfortunately only gets you this link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=woySeSNBL3o
BTW good work edging out Adam Smith, but then your blindingly stupid comments clinched it over Smith’s carpet bombing exercise.
00
Uh, Oh. I see that poor Adam is slipping into troll mode.
Too bad, I was hoping for a rational debate.
Isn’t that always the way with self-righteous true believers? They all have special Kung Fu style for avoiding a real on topic debate. Why? Because the material they have to work with is so weak that it’s literally indefensible.
I know. I’ve seriously tried to mount an argument fro the CAGW hypothesis myself, just to see if it could be done. I could do it, but I would have to rely on key evidence that everyone KNOWS to be false (even if they won’t admit it) while ignoring evidence everyone knows to be TRUE.
The fact is that the only way to defend the carbon tax and the CAGW myth is to sink into some really dishonest techniques. And that’s not rational argument, it’s a con job.
Adam is obviously a smart guy. He’s obviously the very best that the Greens have to come at Jo Nova’s comment section with. And you can see the results. Even a clever bloke has to resort to pathetically transparent well, just god-awful obvious twisting and contouring until he’s tied himself into a huge off-topic knot. I get the feeling the poor guy is about to implode from the cognitive dissonance…
But what is really interesting is not Adam’s particular arguments, but the fact that Adam at some level in his conscious awareness must know that they are mostly false or totally irrelevant. I have a gut feeling that Adam really doesn’t believe a word that he’s typing.
Adam seems intelligent and well informed…Or maybe not. I noticed that Adam has never heard of Bishop Hill. Hmmm.
Early when I stated that today’s level of atmospheric CO2 is not harmful. He retorted by calling for evidence of for that statement. Hello? This reveals a couple of things about Adam.
1. He may not be familiar with much of the climate literature outside the narrow orthodoxy popularised in the mass media. Mostly imagery rather than evidence…pollies on melting bergs and that sort of thing. Nevertheless, the media message that we must SAVE THE PLANET NOW has deeply inspired his inner eco-warrior, even while leaving him less than well armed with hard facts.
2. He doesn’t know much about scientific method, because he asked me to prove the CO2 is NOT harmful (the null hypothesis) rather than understanding its up to him to defend the hypothesis that CO2 is dangerous. He inverted the burden of proof, something people with a science-based education never do (Tamino is an exception to the rule.)
So, Adam comes here informed by as-seen-on-Tee-Vee science facts and little science education but a really passionate belief based on misinformation and faith. Is it any surprise that he must resort to less than rational or honest commenting style to make his point?
00
What a Hoot
Doctor, Committee, Team Smith writes:
“I’ve loved the planet since I was young … fascinated at our journey through evolution ….. us … the third chimpanzee from the left,
The comment I liked best was the one about precautions to take in a CO2 rich environment.
I kid you not.
Adam’s own science backed by peer review vote says:
“”When in a high CO2 environment (it’s real green to use that word) always breathe through the left nostril while blocking the right with your thumb. This allows cooling of the inhaled gas and reduces diffusion of CO2 from lung to bloodstream during respiration”.
Wow. True science.
00
Wes,
Well said. After being sucked into adams sphere, I can only conclude a few things:
1) He is not here to learn, teach or even to try and pursuade
2) He uses a tactic I have seen before which goes along the following lines:
a) Say something bold and out there to get a bite. Keep doing it until you do.
b) When arguing, ignore points which shoot you down or requests for clarification
c) Be very careful not to expose your true intentions – unless you think it may help to get more bites
d) If trapped, do one of the following:
i) If just a snare, throw out something credible and embellished to side track the argument
ii) Nit pick about spelling or grammar
iii) if the other side has called you something, end the argument with “I’ve won”
e) Try to make yourself sound as though you are one of them with your name or the bluster about the ETS being capitalist, for example, just to try and convince the lurkers of supposed divisions. NB he slipped up here when talking about getting he high earners to pay etc etc.
f) Try destroying someones line of reasoning by denying he antecedant. There is no conversation or argument to be had if both parties cannot agree on the basics -i.e. “The sky is blue today” becomes “No it isn’t the clouds are white”
g) Stick to the letter of the forum rules.
By using these tactics, you can make it appear as though you can win a debate on anything on any topic -regardless of any knowledge inadequacies or learning disabilities you may have.
It doesn’t, however win you any friends or respect. A fundamental thing with any conflict (verbal or otherwise) is that your opponent mustbe aware that they have lost. In this case, it’s impossible to know you’ve lost the argument because adams objective is not to win the argument, its to destroy the community and diffuse comments.
The end result is that to to the outsider and to him it seems as though he has won, but to the opponent and to anyone inclined to actually read what is said, he hasn’t actually won anything, he’s just obfuscated without providing anything of value to anyone. This is what is so frustrating for people like me who have wasted time with him.
He hasn’t actually won any arguments as far as I can tell. He has just dragged the conversation into the abstract where he might have a point he wants to get across. He then makes the point and congratulates himself thinking he has won the argument.
In short, he is achieving his goal, which has nothing to do with the topic in hand. His goal is to grind down and destroy the community through incessant boredom.
There is no point in arguing with him. As soon as you do, he has taken a step to achieving his goal.
A part of me would like to see these tactics employed by someone on the warmist sites.
I don’t want to lower myself to that level though. I like contributing and learning.
00
Sorry at 295.
There was no name on the blogg site. Assumed it was team Smith.
Blimey, what a mess I’ve made.
00
Mary Johnston,
I’d say it doesn’t matter much who it is. The remarkably high standard of scientific understanding is just breathtaking. I wish I’d thought of that.
00
That’s another thing I have noticed about Doctor Smith.
In his smarmy condescending manner, he puts EVERYBODY down, while giving the impression that he (alone) remains even handed, but reading between the lines, it’s obvious that he’s sneering at every person who comments here.
Wes at Comment 294 makes a couple of points that can be expanded with reference to Doctor Smith:
and also this:
At every stage, HE asks US to provide proof, when all he need do is to go searching for it himself, like we already have done, and in most cases, those proofs lie here at this Blog. Then, even when proof is provided, he totally ignores it, and changes the subject back to his preferred ‘line of attack’.
Very early on in the piece, Smith found a way to introduce that he was in fact a Doctor, and again, reading between the lines, he subliminally suggests that because he is that Doctor, then he is ‘better’ than the ‘plebs’ who leave their Comments here.
While there was that subliminal suggestion of ‘commanding’ respect because he is after all, a Doctor, as he insisted, he then shows that he has no respect whatsoever for any other person at this Blog.
It matters not to him that, in a similar fashion that he is a Doctor, there are others at this Blog who have expertise in the disciplines of other areas.
At every chance, Doctor Smith turns any focus on that expertise away from what was mentioned, and back immediately to his favoured Political topic, sort of like ‘Hey look at me, look at me’.
In a similar manner that Joanne mentioned his ‘fake’ Email address, I think a lot of us here suspect that the screen name he uses ‘Adam Smith’ is also a fake, but hey, there’s no problem at all with that. We all use screen names.
This, of itself, works in Doctor Smith’s favour. He can say he’s a Doctor (to ‘command’ respect) but you see, he has no way of actually proving that, without revealing his true identity, and to do that, then it raises the issue that he can be contacted, and also it can then be ‘found out’ why he is doing what he is doing here, and who he is doing it for.
In the meantime, for all those readers who come here to ‘want to learn’ things so they can better understand for themselves what this whole thing is really about, well, those readers who invariably do not leave comments of any nature, gain an insight into what one side of the argument will do to ‘get their way’, that being to shout down everyone else, change the subject, ignore things they have no expertise of knowledge of, and then sneer at those who can show their own expertise on the matters they are asked about, while all the while distracting away from the subject onto their favoured political standpoint.
So, while Doctor Smith thinks he’s doing the right thing for the ’cause’ he’s been ‘hired’ to protect, in actual fact, he’s just crapping in his own nest, and the really good point about that is that he doesn’t even realise he’s doing just that.
Oh Doctor Smith, you need that shave.
Tony.
00
Eddy@291
What?
Jo Nova now has her own anti-Jo blog run by some roach who has nothing better to do than stalk Jo Nova?
ROFTL. Blimey? He’s one of the least capable commenters on this whole blog. No way Blimey deserves the Bulldust Troll of The Year Award! That’s like Wayne Swan getting an award for world’s best treasurer.
Blimey’s so slow witted he can’t even keep his anti-Jo blog properly updated.
Seriously, though. It’s one of blogging highest honours to have your own dedicated hate site manned by a fanatic follower cowering in a basement flat wallpapered with tinfoil, surrounded by empty pizza boxes and Mother’s power drink cans.
Andrew Bolt has one called https://twitter.com/#!/BoltIsACunt. It’s staffed by highly righteous Antiboltists who denounced the uncivil language used by the anti-carbon tax rioters who recently sacked then torched parliament last month. (as reported by Fran Kelly, Radio National)
Tim Blair, Anthony Watts and James Delingpole all have anti-sites too.
So, Blimey, get your bum in gear, son, and update yer antinovian blog! There’s a bloody planet out there to save!
00
Tony,
Re smith actually doing his side more damage. Thats totally correct. I am pro nuclear power, with provisions, but as soin as his callous condescending opinions on being pro nuclear came out, I was left thinking – with him being pro nuclear, it’ll never have a chance. I for one would be against any nuclear power programme which this guy was even in favour of -let alone one that he would be involved with.
Of course, that was before I figured out that he isn’t about content or debate. He is all about conducting a war of attrition on the community here. His mission is simple, and it has nothing to do with convincing anyone of anything. His mission is simply to diffuse this blog.
00
wes,
There havebeen a couple of others. I forget their names. I remember one that actually had two or three comments on a post.
Oh, thats right, they were all made by the owner of the blog, never mind.
00
Thanks Roy @ 298
00
Wes @ 300
That will probably make
him herit mad.Good on you
00
Henry Ergas has another solid column in the Australian exposing Labor’s lies, deception etc in trying to sell it’s co2 tax.
Unbelievably this idiot tax won’t change the climate or temp by a jot but could easily cripple the Aussie economy just when the world is heading towards uncertainty at best or another recession at worst.
I’ll ask again, “why does Labor hate us so much?”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/lies-deception-and-carbon-tax/story-fn7078da-1226146005701
00
The anti Jonova web site is remarkably evocative of another web site which achieved a brief moment of fame some time back.
Look up ” Verdant Hopes “.
It’s the story of an earnest young environmentalist who writes to one of the patrons of Australian Warming.
00
Re Blimey’s site- talk about an echo chamber (echo…echo…echo…..), the silence was utterly deafening!
00
24 Sept: Courier Mail: Queensland State Government admits electricity grid failing to cope with solar power systems
Energy Minister Stephen Robertson confirmed new applications for rooftop solar systems were being rejected in areas where Queensland’s high uptake threatened the safety and reliability of its network.
Thousands of homeowners hoping for promised power savings of up to $540 via a 1.5kW system are in limbo, with those wanting larger systems even being asked to pay more than $20,000 to help cover local upgrades…
Energex said the state’s electricity network since the 1950s had been designed to deliver power from the station to the home and the voltage now heading “the other way” was causing a huge dilemma…
Following advice from engineering experts, no more systems will be automatically approved when the penetration of solar photovoltaic systems hits 30 per cent in neighbourhoods…
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/solar-dream-caught-in-gridlock/story-e6freoof-1226144903889
23 Sept: Der Spiegel, Germany: German States Block Carbon Capture Law
The German government had hoped to push through a new law allowing the testing of underground greenhouse gas storage, in hopes of slowing climate change. But on Friday the country’s states blocked the plans by rejecting the proposed bill. Germany could now face action by the European Union…
The Bundesrat, which represents the 16 federal states, rejected a bill on Friday that had already been passed by the German parliament , the Bundestag, in August. The law would have allowed testing for carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology at former gas storage facilities. The federal government wanted to put the technology to the test until 2017 in two or three locations, with a maximum capacity of three million tons of CO2 a year…
The technology is considered a prerequisite for allowing coal-fired power stations to continue operating economically in Germany in the long run, as extra CO2 emission permits would otherwise have to be purchased on the open market.
The failure to pass the law in the Bundesrat means that Germany could now be subject to proceedings by the European Union, where CCS directive stipulates that the technology should have been made national law by June…
Energy giant Vattenfall has complained that the law is only valid until 2016, and that the liability provisions force the operator to take on too much risk. Even if the law is passed, therefore, the conditions needed for the test plant at Jänschwalde to be constructed, using EU funds worth hundreds of millions of euros, would almost certainly not be present.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,788110,00.html
00
Madjak,
You made some good points about Troll Kung fu.
As a veteran of flame wars going all the way back to the days of Usenet, I can tell you the one fatal mistake that all trolls make is that they underestimate the intelligence of the audience. Tony from Oz pointed this out. Trolls think they are cleverer than the readers and so don’t need to work very hard to make their point. Heck, people will believe anything, right? NOT. Guys like Adam have posted more than enough information that every reader here knows that he’s not sincere.
In the end, trolls do more to discredit themselves than anything we point out. This is because using Troll Kung Fu they avoid any sort of rational debate in which a decisive conclusion about who is right or wrong can be drawn by the readers. Ultimately, it becomes obvious that the troll is simply taking cheap shots and then running away to come back later to take another cheap shot in a wholly different direction. But the troll by not allowing any rational debate to unfold to a logical and fair dinkum conclusion shows that he CAN’T win a logical rational debate. The big bad troll is actually afraid of debate. The audience sees this and the troll’s effectiveness is negated.
The most effective ways to deal with trolls is to demand that they answer a simple straight forward on-topic question. Then watch them squirm then vanish.
For instance, in this thread Adam has been a fierce supporter of the Gillard government Carbon Tax, ETS, whatever…
Adam, will you please answer one question for us?
By how much will the earth’s temperature decline if the Government’s Carbon Tax bill is passed?
Now let’s all just sit back and insist that Adam answer this simple question, if he can.
00
MaryFJohnston
It is an unfortunate reality that the majority of CAGW believers & activists are driven aggressive self-righteousness. Rarely do real world observations creep into their thinking or influence their mindset i.e they NEVER LOOK BACK.
It is probably a good thing really. I suspect if one or two of the resident protagonists had a moment of nostalgic reflection & decided to look up their family trees, they would have to give it up pretty quickly as too many near relations are still up there.
00
@ 309.
Wes, he won’t.
several of us have pushed him for that answer and he will simply slither to another thread. It is a good question mind you, and every one casually reading by here should ask themselves the same thing.
You know the answer, I know the answer, most everyone else here knows the answer.
00
Pat at 308, re Qld solar, unbelievable- the Green
nightmaredream just gets better and better. Do they even know what they want, because they certainly don’t have a clue what they are doing. The people of Qld are living up to the bargain, but the Government planning falls short. How utterly unsurprising.………..bye bye sovreignty, hello European Court of Arbitration. Lets hope NATO send in the planes to strafe those Prussian Carbon terrorists who are failing to bury their “carbon pollution” appropriately. That’ll show ’em. Bastards! Sarc/
00
Then there’s the case of Doctor Smith’s sanguine vision for a Nuclear power future.
While at least some of us here agree that Nuclear Power should be an option, at least some of us have an idea that it is indeed many (many) years away, if at all.
As he has been so pedantic about the current legislation for almost three weeks now, I was wondering if Doctor Smith could point us all to any place in that plethora of Bills, and in fact, any other Legislation, either already passed, or in the foreseeable future, that makes ANY mention whatsoever of the word ‘Nuclear’.
Might he also be persuaded to tell us how his Greens Party colleagues might view the placing of the word ‘Nuclear’ in any of those Bills as an amendment as he suggested earlier.
Tony.
00
This is off topic and apoligies in advance for refering back to carpet bomber smith and his constant praise of pricing carbon to improve life for all us peons who are just too dumb to realise the dream.
I know many of you will be aware of this story, but if we need to buy credits oversees and this an example, count me out.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/22/world/africa/in-scramble-for-land-oxfam-says-ugandans-were-pushed-out.html?_r=3&scp=3&sq=uganda&st=cse
00
Pattoh
“”as too many near relations are still up there.””
Do you think they have polluders in their family backgrounds?
00
Neville in 305:
I posted the following comment at The Australian piece by Ergas:
My track record at The Australian is a tad hit and miss, so let’s see if that one gets up. Often they don’t post any responses to blogs.
00
Yeah well with so many progenitors still up swinging in the branches, it is not just leaves which are raining down. I suppose the technique of “polludion” delivery from on high could be considered as a debating strategy .
In this case though it is probably more nurture than nature.
00
Bob Malloy in Comment 314,
This is called ‘The Clean Development Mechanism’. It has arisen from the Kyoto Protocol, and is part of that Protocol.
What it effectively means is that a Country, or even an existing emitting entity, or even any large Company that wants credits as part of its investment plan that they can trade, well, they can all invest their money in those other 152 Developing Countries.
They do not get any ownership of anything that is invested in. All they get are International Credits which they can then use to (a) offset their own emissions, or (b) trade those Credits.
The upshot of this is that, say, a currently existing coal fired Power Plant operator in Australia can actually invest that Company’s money in the construction of a new technology coal fired power plant in those Developing Countries, and receive International Credits to offset some of their own emissions here in Australia, keeping in mind that those credits are valued at less than Australian credits.
That same coal fired plant making that ‘Developing Country’ investment in that new technology coal fired plant cannot in fact spend that same money here in Australia to upgrade their old technology coal fired plant to the new tech plant.
In fact, this CDM is being currently utilised by a UN subsidiary, The World Bank to provide money for the construction of coal fired power plants in those Developing Countries.
Rudd signed us up for this in 2007, as part of ratifying the Kyoto protocol.
Tony.
00
OK Gotcha @317
00
Winston –
i read the qld solar stuff in saturday’s courier mail while visiting a friend who had bought it. there were a number of articles, much more detail, etc., but can’t find it all online. if anyone has the paper and can scan it all and post here, i would be grateful, because it is scandalous.
00
320 Time’s up Doc.
It don’t work anymore.
00
I agree with you about nuclear Smithy; but you are wrong about the need for a carbon TAX to make nuclear viable; nuclear can compete with coal and beats the renewables hands down because they don’t work.
00
Good comment Bulldust, I hope it gets up.
Wes,Bolt pressed Flannery on this point and after much squirming he admitted that the entire world could cease co2 emissions today and the temp wouldn’t change for hundreds of years or perhaps a thousand years.
Btw the fairfax press asked a prof your question and he said by 2020 the difference would be minus 0.004C or four thousandths of a degree C, so the tax is a total fraud and a hoax.
Of course don’t expect stupid trolls who sometimes infest this site to understand these simple calculations.
This is probably the most easily explained and understood con and fraud in history, just simple primasry school sums. Also don’t expect the Oz treasury or stupid Labor pollies, or the CSIRO or the BOM etc, etc, to wake up and understand, it’s just beyond their comprehension.
00
So in a weird inverted way, you letting him do your thinking for you?
Hangon, inverted thinking, Hmmmmmm…are you sure your name isn’t really Pilmer?? 🙂
00
you know the class you have bumped into…….
00
You need to present evidence to back up your claims.
A low carbon price (e.g. $20 per tonne) makes nuclear cheaper than all proven baseload alternatives. Without a low carbon price, traditional coal remains cheaper.
00
pattoh, Robert, etc…
Okay well regarding my hack of the Comment Snob plugin, I have one or two little tweaks to make for the sake of user friendliness, then I guess I can put it on my webspace for download.
Of course it is very easy to dodge this filter, so it is useful for a short amount of time and if your attacker knows you’re using it then they change their tactics and the filter becomes pointless.
It is interesting we have had a whole morning of silence from the Doctor. Perhaps matters have been resolved by some other method and there may be no need for this plugin at all. We’ll see.
00
Well, speak of the devil.
00
Doctor Smith, now that’ your working day has started, and I wonder if your workplace knows you’re posting comments here, sort of making it handy to have a screen name doesn’t it.
While you’re trawling back through earlier comments to block quote, perhaps you might like to go back a bit further and address Joanne’s comment at 282.
Tony.
(Thanks for reminding him about post 282.But please let the Moderators handle him) CTS
00
Adam Smith: #327
September 26th, 2011 at 12:36 pm
I find that interesting and an attractive proposition. Do you have some hard data that backs up your statement Adam?
00
This kind of idiot reasoning still kicking around??
I thought it was a pretty simple concept that reducing emissions of CO2 is actually about limiting the projected rise in global temperatures (and so future consequences), not actually reducing temperatures in a short time frame.
I’m all for giving clear explanations at a level that the audience can understand. Its vitally needed in a democracy when everyone has a right to vote regardless on their level of education, intelligence, or ability to comprehend complex issues.
I’d expect this kind of kindergarten ignorance from someone like Alan Jones, Andrew Bolt. They are after impact and ratings and they had benefited mightily in terms of profile by tilling the fields of politically disconnected ignorance out there and adding their own particular brands of fertilizer. But for people who are posting on a supposedly science related blog to come out with this kind of silliness is just saddening.
Still, thats one of the interesting things about the blogoshpere. Take all types to make it work.
00
Yes this peer reviewed study that shows you need a low carbon price to make nuclear relatively cheaper than pulverised coal (the most efficient generation method from coal).
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S036054421000602X
One of the co-authors runs this webpage:
http://bravenewclimate.com/2010/11/28/nuclear-is-the-least-cost-low-carbon-baseload-power-source/
00
Tony, why do you have to make everything so personal?
The forum rules say we aren’t meant to talk about people’s motivations.
00
Ok then……
By how much of the projected rise in global temperature be offset if the Government’s Carbon Tax bill is passed?
Lets say by…….2020 and 2050. Degrees C please….
00
Out of the closet at 333.
00
Just half of 666….
00
Looking at Tony’s description of the Clean Development Mechanism gives me hope that the noughts are still with us. Lehman Brothers may be languishing in disgrace, comforted only by their Euromoney award, but the pre-2008 spirit lives on.
No wonder earnest intellectuals are an investment banker’s favourite vegetable.
00
I knew there was a reason.
I was a little puzzled why Doctor Smith gave us all such a free run on Sunday morning up until he came in just after Midday.
He was at Church!
Well done that man.
Tony.
00
@ 338, Wasn’t supposed to.
Neither do yours. You could be constructive if you actually answered questions. Mostly you spout propaganda and agenda driven rhetoric.
00
sorry Tony, there seems to be a number problem
00
Adam Smith: #332
September 26th, 2011 at 12:52 pm
Awww now c’mon Adam. You know by now it is rude to just point people to links without giving them some idea of what YOU UNDERSTAND from the link.
You stated that “A low carbon price (e.g. $20 per tonne) makes nuclear cheaper than all proven baseload alternatives.”
What I’m looking for is for YOU to tell me what effect $20 per tonne will have on current electricity prices and how that compares with the potential price of electricity from nuclear power generation.
thanx in advance
00
catamon@324,
Weird kind of attempt at defending it. Weird also coming from one of the only people around who keeps spinning labor party propoganda too.
His take no prisoners, “only a few thousand people died in chernobyl” and our “neighbours can shove it” statements should immediately exclude him from any involvement in the implementation of nuclear power. He would be a liability. His advocacy for forcing the situation to fast track a nuclear implementation is as dangerous as it is stupid.
Of course any debate on the matter involving his attitude would invariably mean nuclear power would never get off the drawing board anyways. Opponents would call him to account and all they would get would be some smarmy slithering. The pro nuclear perspective would never get a chance -especially if this klutz got involved. And that would be a real shame.
But hey there comrade catamon, you seem keen on repeating the insinuation that the greek tragedy is all the fault of those badarse tax avoiders.
I guess its much simpler just reading the party lines eh! After all, since when has this government made a mistake?
00
what Dickson should be saying is it is all a scam:
26 Sept: Sunshine Coast Daily: Rae Wilson: Uncertain future for solar energy
Opposition energy spokesman and Member for Buderim Steve Dickson said some solar system applications were being rejected to ensure the safety and reliability of the electricity network.
He said once solar power return reached 30% penetration, which refers to the capacity of transformers supplying a local zone which can include 50 homes, the transformers “shut down”.
Mr Dickson said he feared the government would need to spend up to a billion dollars to continue with a “major pillar of its carbon tax plan”…
Mr Dickson questioned what alternative green energy sources could be implemented if about 600 distribution transformer zones on the Sunshine and Gold coasts, and Brisbane Valley, had already reached saturation.
He said a study on the Sunshine Coast in 2004 – which involved a 40m high tower on Bald Knob – showed wind energy would not work and nuclear energy was avoided, especially after “everything that happened in Japan”…
http://www.sunshinecoastdaily.com.au/story/2011/09/26/solar-energy-faces-uncertain-future-from-its-own-s/
00
I repeat for Catamon and others that this is a fraud and a con.
If not then tell us by how much our emissions reduction will reduce the temp by 2020, 2030, 2050 and 2100?
If not zero then by how much? But just as importantly how will you achieve this?
Remember China, India etc ( developing world) will be increasing emissions for decades at an annual rate of 2%, while the developed world will nearly flatline at only 0.1%.
Therefore the developing world will outstrip the developed world by a ratio of 20 to 1, so please explain how we can make a difference?
This is simple maths, so what is it you don’t understand?
00
this is in addition to the Saturday Courier Mail stuff that i can’t find online:
26 Sept: Courier Mail: Shonky operators clouding solar scheme as Office of Fair Trading receives complaints
Tuck Thompson and Josh Robertson
COMPLAINTS about shonky solar power companies are rising as homeowners cry foul over bad contracts and half-finished work.
The Queensland Office of Fair Trading is receiving a complaint every business day from people who believe they have been ripped off, although there have been no prosecutions. There have been 75 complaints so far this year.
Most complaints relate to delays or failure to supply the product, incorrect installation, faulty components or misleading representations about the solar panel system’s performance.
Thirty-five companies, mostly based in the state, had been the subject of complaints in relation to solar panel systems, the OFT said. Of these, 12 were the subject of multiple complaints. It said it had not needed to “initiate any prosecution”, as the complaints had been “largely contractual disputes” between the trader and consumer…
Following an $850 million solar spending blowout, the Commonwealth next month is reducing by $1500 the subsidy for a typical home solar system, prompting high-pressure sales tactics on the part of some solar retailers ahead of the deadline.
Some solar contracts contain hidden charges, including extra hook-up and maintenance costs and warranties with questionable value…
Industry insiders said some of the worst offenders in the solar industry were previously involved in the Commonwealth’s failed Batts insulation scheme that resulted in widespread rorting as well as the deaths of some installers.
There has been an explosion in the number of solar installers, from 280 across Australia in 2007 to more than 3500 today, and a 17-fold jump in Queensland in the same period to 785…
Homeowners have vented anger at the quality of some solar systems, delivering less electricity than predicted, unprofessonal installations, and installers who disappeared, making their 10-year warranties worthless…
Homeowners also have discovered that electicity providers are knocking back some solar systems or their systems don’t pass inspection because they haven’t been installed to standard.
Consumers have attempted to protect themselves by turning to websites such as solarquotes.com.au, where the work of solar installers is discussed.
Website spokesman Finn Peacock said it appeared from the discussions there were dodgy contractors involved previously in insulation work who jumped into solar when the federal money dried up.
“Any time you have government throwing money around, you’ll get all sorts,” he said.
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/shonky-operators-clouding-sun-scheme/story-e6freoof-1226063002022
00
from earlier:
January 2011: Courier Mail: Electricians warn deadly shocks from solar panels possible for people taking refuge from floodwaters on roofs
FLOOD victims climbing onto their roofs to escape rising waters have been warned to stay away from any solar panels in order to prevent possibly fatal electric shocks.
Master Electricians Australia Chief Executive Malcolm Richards said solar panels would continue producing electricity during flood events even if Energex has cut off the power supply and even if the panels have been switched off at the switchboard.
“Home owners with roof-top solar panels must understand that those panels will continue to produce electricity,” he said.
“Home owners who are forced on to their rooftops to avoid flood water need to stay well clear of the panel and associated wiring.
“Because of the recent explosion in the number of homes with solar installations, this is not a problem people have ever dealt with before.”…
He said home owners who were forced to evacuate their homes should turn off the main power at the switchboard before they leave if they can do so safely….
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/electricians-warn-deadly-shocks-from-solar-panels-possible-for-people-taking-refuge-from-floodwaters-on-rooves/story-e6freoof-1225986307718
00
Any carbon price that puts greenhouse gases into the air more expensive, but does not effect the price of nuclear power.
Ergo, nuclear power becomes relatively cheaper after the imposition of a carbon price.
Once people realise that we can’t run our economy on solar and wind, we will shift to nuclear.
But that won’t happen without a carbon price because it will be cheaper to just stick with conventional coal.
Pretty basic stuff, but no one has yet explained how this series of assertions is wrong.
00
Rereke in 4,
I have had my eye on the Amazonian colored bead for a while now, also the Rhodesian Rhodes scholar could give you good value once the
taxETSwhatever it is called starts to bite.00
It’s true! The most comprehensive study of the health effects of Chernobyl was conducted by the World Health Organisation:
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs303/en/index.html
What are you talking about? You say you support nuclear power but are only opposing it because I support it! That is exactly the sort of rank hypocrisy which will stop people taking this issue seriously.
Well I don’t know exactly what you are talking about here, but yes the Greek economy would be better off if people paid tax and the government didn’t spend so much.
00
Team Adam @ 326
Even a lower carbon price (e.g. $0.01 per tonne) still leaves perpetual motion generators cheaper than all proven baseload alternatives.
Since neither nuclear power, nor perpetual motion generators, are available as viable, achievable options (for different reasons) in OZ today, then we are stuck with traditional coal.
.
So we are agreed. Even with a carbon
taxETScostimpostprice for the foreseeable future coal is the best available source for baseload power in OZ.PS – Stop bothering to stick “pulverised” in front of “coal”. It just makes you look foolish. Or do you really believe there are baseload power stations in OZ where big, sweaty men shovel lump coal into furnaces?
00
No idea. Don’t actually care if i cant put a precise figure on it. Its a global problem and Australia’s influence will be small in absolute temperature terms, but i don’t consider that an excuse for pulling the blanket up over our heads and hoping that the rest of the world will make it all ok.
From what i have read from many sources (and no, i’m not going to provide an extensive list of references, got other things to do) the IPCC temperature projections for business as usual are in the 2.5 – 10 degree range. If things go over 3 – 4 degrees we’ve got problems that may be very difficult to adapt to. Broadly, that’s the position that informs my response.
Its a global problem, and Australia should be part of a global solution. But every one waits until everyone else has made changes then nothing is ever going to be done about it. So, regardless of what the rest of the world does, we should get off our arses and do our bit. If we can make a difference in our spread out, energy intensive economy then i think it provides some guidance to other countries on whats possible and will make it more likely that more countries will take action.
If the economic modeling that the current Carbon Price bills are based on is in the ball park then that’s no problem. 0.7% affect on consumer prices is something i think we can tolerate, and that’s particularly obvious now given we have seen the much stronger effects of currency fluctuations on out economy lately. From the modeling, gross national income grows at 0.1% less out to 2050, and employment pretty much the same.
All up, its something i think needs to be done sooner or later, the economic pain will be less if we get a move on, and we’ll be shifting our economy to a more sustainable model.
That said, will now get some popcorn, and watch the fascinating politics around this unfold.
00
[]ED.
We could have a reactor operating by 2020 if we wanted to, and then a second reactor at the same plant operating by 2025.
No I think gas is, simply before we transition to nuclear.
We can’t lecture other countries about their carbon intensity when we are still using some of the least efficient power stations in the world, e.g. Hazelwood, Loy Yang and Playford B.
00
Adam Smith, is your real name Greg Combet ???
00
Thanks MV.
As I have explained previously, all the coal is crushed to almost powder before feeding it into the furnace at any coal fired plant.
Doctor Smith accentuates his lack of knowledge about any form of electrical power generation every time he tries to comment on it.
Tony.
00
Keep in mind that the alternative isn’t nothing. Without the ETS will will end up with a version of the Opposition’s ‘Direct Action’ socialist nonsense policy.
How much will that increase prices by? What taxes will be increased to fund it? How will those taxes effect economic growth? How will that slower economic growth reduce employment?
The Government has had guts to put its modelling on the table.
Surely the Opposition should do exactly the same.
But of course they won’t because it will simply reveal that tax and spend socialism will not fix this problem and will just cost the economy more, which means lower growth, fewer jobs, and higher taxes to pay for the cost.
00
Tony, you still haven’t presented any evidence to back up your assertion that nuclear is cheaper than electricity generation from fossil fuels.
00
Tonyfromz
I came across this vid with nyuk nyuk sounding laughter. It immediately brought to mind some of your posts.
Dad at Comedy barn – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4Y4keqTV6w
00
355:
two nonsense proposals with no third option?
00
Adam Smith: #348
September 26th, 2011 at
Hmmmm, it seems I’m not going to get a straight answer from you.
I’m going to give you the benefit of doubt and detail where I’m coming from. Maybe then you’ll give me a straight answer. If not, then I must assume that you don’t actually understand the subject matters you discuss but just repeat verbatim what you may have read elsewhere.
If it sounds good it must be right eh Adam?
Where I’m coming from…..
You stated that “A low carbon price (e.g. $20 per tonne) makes nuclear cheaper than all proven baseload alternatives.” I thought that was an attractive proposition to think about (coz I favour nuclear) so I put some thought into it.
You project yourself as an intelligent bloke who knows his subject matter, so I’d appreciate your help in evaluating my thoughts, viz..
* A tonne of coal (as used typically in power plants) produces about 1.83 tonnes of CO2.
* Therefore, a $20 per tonne price on CO2 is the equivalent of increasing a coal fired power plants cost of coal by $20*1.83 = $36.6 per tonne of coal
* Looking at the price movements of coal HERE from 1980 to 2011, and HERE from 2007 to 2011, we can see that the price of coal has increased from a fairly stable ~$35 per tonne to 2004 to about $145 today (and from about $78 in 2007 to $145 today)
* Can you explain to me how is it that you think an effective tax of $36.6 on coal will make nuclear “cheaper” when market forces have lifted the price of coal by a much larger margin without the need for tax intervention?
* Can you explain to me why we need a tax in view of the above?
00
No there isn’t.
I mean some people here have tried to get around this by saying the Coalition is actually lying and doesn’t believe its policy and won’t implement it.
Maybe that is correct. But if they are lying about that, what else are they lying about? Will they bring back WorkChoices, put up the GST and raises income taxes?
We simply don’t know.
00
Disclaimer
This post is intended for general consumption, this post is not directed at any one indivdual or small groups.
For the life of me i cannot understand how anyone could possibly support a nuclear energy policy in this country. I understand and possible support Tony’s position which simply states nuclear would be cheaper than coal but this does not take into consideration all the aspects of nuclear power.
One position i cannot and never will understand is the position taken by those that nuke power is the way to go whilst also stating their belief in a theory about the globe warming.
Does anyone here live in South Australia? Has anyone here driven up the bore fields road from Roxby Downs to Bopeche? If you have then you would have seen this great big pipeline that pumps the bejesus out of the great artesian basin. There are two pumping stations, now if you make past the electrified razor wire fences and somehow get past the dogs you could actually turn the pumps off.
Why all the security well because the greenies, you know the real greenies not the push bike riding, latte sipping morons that gave the greens the balance of power but the real ones have attacked these pumping stations over the years.
Why do they attack these stations? Well its quite simple the great artesian basin (GAB) is running dry in fact there is a semi tourist stop on the way to Williams Creek (on the Woomera rocket range side of the road heading towards Coober Pedy) called the old bubbler. This is where the GAB bursts through the surface and bubbles up to produce these really high mounds of dirt and at the top there is/was a large pool of water which used to support a large variarty of life.
Now many year sago the largest bubbler would rise about ten feet into the air and the whole area around it was like a swamp an oasis if you like, now days there is but a mere trickle, the swamp is gone the animals and birds are gone all due to Roxby Downs sucking all the water out of teh GAB. In fact Alice Springs water is becoming increasingly salty as the years wear on.
Why am i telling you all this? I am saying this because uranium production requires a lot of water so this is just the first step of environmental damage that uranium mining is causing this country, we could talk about the toxic tailings that leach into the ground and then into the GAB and of course we all know the by products are a problem to handle and then of course God forbid we have another fukushima.
So all in all i cannot understand why a green loving, AGW believing person could even contemplate such things………….
00
It will become relatively cheaper.
That’s the important thing the actual cost isn’t important it is what is cheaper relative to something else.
Coal power stations are effected by a carbon price but nuclear power stations aren’t.
That’s how even a low carbon price makes nuclear relatively cheaper.
People who support nuclear power should support the ETS.
00
Adam Smith @ 360
Well at least you don’t deny that they are both nonsense proposals. Thank you for your honesty.
00
Adam Smith, you have been asked the basically the same question by Wes George @ 309 and Heywood @ 334.
Your response …
00
Mate, Olympic Dam is about 5% of the S.A. economy.
It supports thousands of jobs and billions of dollars worth of exports (not just uranium but also copper) every year.
I don’t doubt that it uses a lot of water, but that is replenished each year during the wet season
00
Adam Smith @ 352
Yes, and we could probably put a man on the moon by 2020 if we wanted to.
And both are about as likely as perpetual motion generators given the current political attitude here in OZ.
But even if it were (politically) achievable, SE OZ starts hitting the energy poverty wall by the end of next year, even without the closure of Loy Yang or Hazelwood. What do you suggest AUssies do for the intervening eight years?
And, pray tell Team Adam, where do you intend getting the gas from?
I suggest you read the question carefully and do a little bit of REAL research before you answer.
00
read all and get angry:
26 Sept: Asian Correspondent: Gavin Atkins: Geodynamics: Why Australia
won’t make its Renewable Energy Target
The company that has led the charge to create geothermal energy in Australia is Geodynamics, and its profile has been greatly helped by its most famous shareholder, Professor Tim Flannery, the handsomely remunerated part-time Chair of the Climate Commission…
Despite the fact that Geodynamics has not yet generated a single watt of energy, it has now been given $100 million of taxpayers’ money. The Government, meanwhile, appears to be among the few believers that Geodynamics is a good investment. The share price has plummeted more than 80 per cent since the blow-out and is now trading at less than 20 cents per share…
http://asiancorrespondent.com/65743/the-story-of-geodynamics-why-australia-wont-make-its-renewable-energy-target/
00
To have any effect on the earth’s temperature we need China, India and the U.S. to cut their emissions.
They won’t do so until enough pressure is built up by other countries acting. We already have 1/3 of the world economy with an ETS, so there needs to be action by other developed countries too.
00
Because the Green loving, AWG believers Collective is a broad church?
Personally, i hate the idea of the extensive use of uranium fission. Hopefully developments as regards Thorium fuels and accelerator Driven Devices will make these a viable alternative, IF things like Solar Thermal / Geothermal aren’t able to take up the slack. Argument for down the track i reckon.
Underpinning any shift away from fossil fuels, for any reason (pollution / scarcity) though, is a price on Carbon Emissions into the environment. Get that fundamental thing in place and it will provide a subtle but powerful driver for change, which is what we dont have now.
00
Catamon @ 351.
Thank for your response. As I stated earlier @ 266, unlike some others on the site, you often provide reasonably good debating points.
I can understand you not wanting to put an exact figure on the offset because it is likely to be very small (funnily enough, with nothing done by 2020, around 0.0038 Deg C. offset by 2100.)
My problem with this legislation, is that it will be very hard to undo if the IPCC is wrong, and CO2 turns out to not be the menace that is being touted. You will probably disagree with this point but you cannot possibly say with 100% certainty that “the science is settled”.
lol. Me too. It will be fascinating to see just how big a win to the Coalition the next election will be.
00
Well you’re going to have to change the political attitude.
Dare I suggest a convoy for nuclear power? I’ll be happy to join you.
Australia.
00
Don’t forget me! My answer is basically the same.
00
Team Adam @ 365
So, the Central Australian Artesian Basin is replenished by water in the “wet season” in northern South Australia?
Is that about what you’re trying to say?
00
Actually doesn’t answer the question at all….
00
Doctor Smith,
with reference to Nuclear Power, refer to the question asked at my Comment 313.
Tony.
00
Jo,
You know i am trying my best here dont you?
Just out of interest Jo i lived in Alice Springs for 3 years and i know for a fact that they had to reposition the pumps several times because the water was increasingly getting saltier. You see the problem is that as the water level drops the salt content increases so you need to find deeper water. Of course when you get extra rain and Lake Ayre fills some of that may go into the GAB but it is not like it *flows* into the GAB it *infiltrates* the GAB through the lime stone bed rock.
As i said Jo it never ceases to amaze me how people can claim to be champions of the environment but yet fully support its destruction at the same time, i have come to the conclusion that these people are being dishonest for reasons not yet fully understood.
00
I was searching for info about Ian’s book and I came across this link to a few quizzes about global warming:
http://icecap.us/index.php/go/faqs-and-myths
Enjoy!
00
26 Sept: Bloomberg: Solyndra Meltdown May Hit Goldman’s Reputation: William D. Cohan
Also, one of the company’s major supporters was the George Kaiser Family Foundation; George Kaiser, a wealthy Oklahoma oil executive, was one of Obama’s bundlers of contributions during his successful 2008 presidential campaign. (A conservative website reported that, according to White House logs, Solyndra investors and management had made “no fewer than 20 trips” to the White House between March 2009 and April 2011).
Solyndra raised more than $650 million in equity financing and then received a $535 million loan guarantee from the U.S. Department of Energy in March 2009, soon after Obama took office. Then it got the actual loan of $527 million from the Treasury, which is pretty odd since, with the Energy Department guarantee, it should have been easy to get a loan from the private sector…
Some Wall Street bankers put the enterprise value of Solyndra at no more than that last $75 million, meaning taxpayers may never recover anything…
You would think that this kind of dicey situation would be one that a savvy Wall Street player like Goldman Sachs would know to avoid. Surely, you would think, Goldman would have some sort of internal credit committee that would put its foot down and insist that Goldman’s reputation was too important to be mixed up with a company with both an arrogant management team and a questionable business plan. (Solyndra’s advisers on the Treasury loan, including Goldman, split some $10 million in fees, according to someone with knowledge of the deal.)
You would also think the firm’s reputation police would put the kibosh on Solyndra, too. But Goldman, which Solyndra credited as the “exclusive financial adviser” on its Treasury loan application, kept the firm as a client through thick and thin.
According to a letter Joel Cannon, the chief executive officer of TenKsolar Inc., a Solyndra competitor, wrote to the Wall Street Journal, Solyndra failed not because of “cheap capital provided to Chinese solar companies by their government” making for stiff competition for the U.S. solar industry — as the company would have one believe — but because “its product cost was far too high and its performance far too low, and everyone who knew the solar business knew this.” Some Wall Street bankers who met the Solyndra management have told me that the flaws of management and the business plan were quickly apparent. Goldman apparently missed them.
But, surely, Goldman Sachs knew that Solyndra was a company, as Cannon pointed out, with a cost structure that made it difficult to finance? In 2008, soon after it was hired, Goldman tried to do a convertible debt offering for Solyndra. Yes, it was a tough time to raise any kind of financing for a relatively new company. Still, the reaction to the prospect of financing Solyndra from more than 100 investors Goldman contacted was a resounding no. Goldman axed the convert.
Goldman’s bankers also showed the deal to two of Goldman’s private equity funds — a distressed fund and a fund that buys control stakes in companies — and both these funds said no, too…
In December 2009, Solyndra filed an initial public offering to raise an unspecified amount of other people’s money to continue to finance its nonsensical business plan, including the build-out of its second production facility and to pay off the Argonaut loan. Goldman was the IPO’s lead underwriter; Morgan Stanley was the only other underwriter listed on the SEC filing, called an S-1…
Although, as an analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance wrote recently, “risky technologies like Solyndra’s will always be as likely to be a complete failure as they are to be a success,” there were plenty of warning signs before Solyndra’s ignominious end that might have persuaded Goldman to stay away. No doubt the firm now regrets its involvement.
But how and why it got involved will no doubt make for interesting reading in future FBI documents, congressional hearing transcripts and inspector general reports…
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-26/solyndra-meltdown-may-hit-goldman-s-reputation-william-d-cohan.html
00
Andrew McRae @ #284.
Brilliant. I too have felt this need for an effective noise filter, for applying by the reader.
I’m sure many others have as well.
While we admire JoNova’s tolerance as a publisher, not all of us have such unlimited patience-of-a-saint, as readers.
Now that would be welcome to see such a novel & effective feature built into a site, to allow selection in one’s own site settings, for everyone’s benefit..
( The idea seems not unlike call rejection based on nuisance caller’s number, in the telephone network).
Forum & Blogg developers, WordPress, Google et al. should take note, if they haven’t already.
Necessity is indeed the mother of invention.
Full marks to Andrew for sharing that with us.
00
Team Adam @ 371
I that case Team Adam, YOU had better get a “convey for gas” going.
ALL gas currently produced in OZ is already produced under contract of sale.
ALL gas to come from fields currently being developed is subject to already signed contracts.
An attempt was made last year in QLD to get legislation passed to force companies to set aside a percentage of proven finds for domestic concumption.
The Bligh LABOR government KILLED the legislation.
So I repeat – where are you going to get the gas from?
00
26 Sept: Shepparton News: VFF: carbon tax will cost
The Victorian Farmers Federation is concerned the carbon tax legislation introduced into Federal Parliament last week will cost farmers and impact sustainability.
VFF president Andrew Broad said comments made recently by Federal Agriculture Minister Senator Joe Ludwig showed naivety about the climate change legislation’s impacts.
‘‘Minister Ludwig’s statement that this legislation will ensure ‘a sustainable food supply for future generations’ is ridiculous,’’ Mr Broad said.
‘‘The minister is being naive if he believes a tax on production will ensure food supplies into the future. The carbon tax will cost farmers directly through electricity use, increased processors costs and increased transportation costs in 2014.’’
Mr Broad said industry research estimated that dairy farmers would receive $5000 to $7000 less income under the tax in its first year.
‘‘The minister has also claimed the carbon tax will secure a clean environment for farmers – a claim that also cannot be justified, since the carbon tax will not lower carbon emission levels from Australia as is the stated goal of the government’s policy,’’ he said.
‘‘We call on the federal minister to start considering the impacts to his portfolio’s industry, before it is too late.’’…
http://www.sheppnews.com.au/article.aspx?id=1239827
00
Doctor Smith, and how do you propose to do this?
In China and India, approximately 1 Billion people (in each Country) have either no access, or (very) limited access to any electrical power at the Residential level.
So, according to you, it’s OK then for us to have access to a constant and reliable source of electrical power, but you don’t want them to have what you already do have.
Doctor Smith, have you no compassion whatsoever?
Tony.
00
Team Adam @ 365
I have to go out now, but FYI the water being pumped out of the Central Australian Artesian Basin, is water that fell as rain in Papua New Guinea a couple of thousand years ago.
Epic fail Team Adam.
00
Absolutely Heywood, but my perspective is, is the science settled ENOUGH for public policy to be made on the basis of risk management??
I think it is, some think otherwise.
Maybe i’m wrong. Yeah i know, who’d believe it!! Does happen sometimes just not very often.
00
Doctor Smith, as I have asked you so many times, give us your timelines for the construction of those natural gas fired power plants.
Not once in three or four different Threads have you even attempted to answer this.
We all know that you have no idea.
Just say it. It doesn’t hurt.
Tony.
00
Adam Smith: #362
September 26th, 2011 at 2:35 pm
Oh I see, it will be RELATIVELY CHEAPER. Frigging genius you are Adam, a veritable Einstein.
You went from saying….“A low carbon price (e.g. $20 per tonne) makes nuclear cheaper than all proven baseload alternatives.” to “It will become relatively cheaper.
That’s the important thing the actual cost isn’t important it is what is cheaper relative to something else.”
Well then Einstein, why not make the carbon price $2, That would still make nuclear “RELATIVELY” cheaper wouldn’t it? Or we could make it $50, that would make nuclear “RELATIVELY” cheaper still.
Hey Einstein, here is a tip…Stop insulting the intelligence of others. The price of coal will rise by much more than $36 per tonne in the time frame any first nuclear plant could be built in Australia.
For you to believe a price on carbon is necessary, shows your lack of understanding and or blind faith in what others have said.
This is now the third time I tried to engage in a discussion with you. Each time you have been very disappointing and frankly, rather a lightweight not worthy of my (limited as it is) time.
I’ve noticed you’ve posted dozens of comments, all purporting to be informed and intelligent, but alas, just a lightweight, to be flicked off with one post, like flicking off a flake of dandruff from my shoulder.
If you were my student, you’d be such a disappointment. D+ for perseverence only.
00
an anti-capitalist rant, yet there are points we can all agree on, and the sooner we join forces and stop the commodification of CO2 the better:
24 Sept: Liam Flenady: Green capitalism: a dangerous fiction
In recent debates around solutions to the climate crisis, several ideas hold the largest share of government support and media coverage. These include: green consumerism, carbon offsetting, carbon taxes, carbon trading, geo-engineering and carbon capture and storage.
But do these “solutions” take, as their frame of reference, the full extent of the problem? Here are some reasons to be doubtful…
The phenomenon of “greenwashing” is now well known. But more important is that, despite the claims economists make about “consumer sovereignty” in the market, consumers do not determine production. Largely, it’s production that governs individual consumer behaviour…
The related “solution” of carbon offsetting is even more problematic. First of all, offsets allows high-emitting industries to carry on without making big changes to their production, precisely at the point when the world should be stopping all emissions.
Also, carbon offset companies can give no guarantee that their permits represent real emissions cuts…
In their recent book, What Every Environmentalist Needs to Know About Capitalism, Fred Magdoff and John Bellamy Foster point out that one of the most popular carbon offsets involves Chinese companies that are paid millions of dollars to destroy a gas called HFC-23.
The gas, which is about 1000 times worse for the climate than carbon dioxide, is used in refrigerators.
However, Magdoff and Foster said “there is evidence that some plants in China have been producing more refrigerant than they can sell in order to have more HFC-23 that they can be paid to destroy”.
In 2009, 59% of all offsets credited under Europe’s emissions trading scheme were based on destroying HFC-23.
A carbon tax is not necessarily something to oppose in principle. The one Australia is likely to receive in the near future is another matter: it will still see emissions rise for decades to come…
On the other hand, environmentalists should oppose carbon trading on principle. For instance, the European emissions trading has allowed Europe’s most polluting corporations to make billions of euros without cutting pollution.
Governments have used the existence of carbon trading schemes as an excuse to not fund renewable energy or other green measures directly…
Another common technological fix to climate change proposed is carbon capture and storage — the idea that carbon pollution from coal- and gas-fired power stations can be captured before it is released into the atmosphere.
It suffers from some of the same problems as geoengineering. Even its biggest supporters have no answer to the question of how to safety store the captured gases. After years of research and funding the technology is not commercially available, and may never be.
All of these market-based, green capitalist “solutions” are also marked by a logic of denial.
The logic of denial is not the same as outright climate change denial. It is found whenever the real extent of the climate crisis is forgotten or repressed in favour of easier responses that don’t drastically disrupt the capitalist system…
http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/48924
00
Catamon in 369
No i think you will find it is made up of millions of splinter groups, a greeny a real greeny wants to take care of the environment. Whereas an AGW believer cannot see past the theory and leaves a trail of unintended consequences behind them, a classic is the replacement of incandescent light bulbs with ones filled with mercury only later to discover the environmental damage this will cause.
As for the rest of your post i dont really see how the tax will give you what you want but then again we dont have a government of any kind that has the capacity to do such things.
The current government are going to ride the windmill solar panel bus until they run out of gas (the irony) but by then it will be too late and we will be as broke as Greece. They looked into building a food bowl in the north but in the end suggested the Abbo’s plant more trees to take advantage of the ETS.
While we dilly dather on crap Dubia built an island in the shape of a palm tree, Japan built an airport out of the ocean floor, China built the 3 gorges dam.
All we can muster is a ban on light bulbs and plastic bags, cash for clunkers and the sordid list of waste goes on, your beloved TAX/ETS will go nowhere, it will achieve nothing, coal and gas will be the norm for many years to come but it will just cost a lot more.
We could pipe water from Lake Argyle down to Roxby to save the GAB and green the desert in the process, we could fill ancient lake beds, bring ancient river systems back to life generate Hydro electricity along the way………………….but alas this will never happen because the greens will stop it.
00
Crakar24 at #361,
The ecosystem neither knows nor cares that its water went to a uranium refinery, it just wants water.
No sense in blaming the nuclear industry for the complete and total failure of the government (State and Federal) to create a regulatory environment in which all natural water resources (Murray and GAB) could be efficiently and sustainably exploited.
In the same way that the EM spectrum is monopolised by the government and then divided amongst government, scientific, industrial, licensed, and unlicensed amateur uses, so similarly could the total annual water flux be divided up. The government could reserve a fixed amount of annual flows for ecological sustainment with the remainder being available for purchase in a water market. Regional climate prediction would be enormously valuable here because when a huge dump is expected you can increase the amount reserved for the environment without market prices increasing. This gives a very practical and immediate benefit of climate research and modelling.
The electricity industry has been divided between sources, transmitters, and sinks, so similarly could the hydrological cycle be divided up. Farms along the river may have source, sink, and transmission components, which can be estimated through model extrapolations from automated measurements so should not be tooo difficult for farmers to accept. Loss due to evaporation isn’t loss, it’s part of the cycle, it’s meant to happen, and counts as the ecological reserve because it must allowed for if the volume of water flowing to the sea at Goolwa is to be sufficient to flush the mouth regularly. Having said that, wet decades and dry decades are both part of nature too and we shouldn’t get too precious about the state of the mouth or intermediate salinity if there hasn’t been a lot of rain and farmers want water.
Throw in a growing human population and there is a whole other sorry kettle of marlins to be solved here. Water management is a separate issue.
00
fortunately, the rest of the world is catching on to the scam:
24 Sept: The Hindu Businessline: India opposes counting carbon tax as climate change finance
Making an intervention at the G20 Finance Ministers’ meeting on September 23 at Washington, the Finance Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee said that measures like carbon tax and levy on CDM offsets violate the principle of UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) as the incidence falls entirely on developing countries.
There is a talk that developed countries could levy unilateral trade measures (UTM) such as carbon tax on goods and services imported from developing countries on environmental grounds. India has opposed any such move and has sought inclusion of UTM as an additional item for discussion at the upcoming climate talks in Durban in South Africa.
In his intervention, Mr Mukherjee also opposed inclusion of international levies on shipping and aviation emissions as revenue raising options until a mechanism for refund of the revenues collected from developing countries is instituted…
India has also said that the flow of finance leveraged by the international financial institutions (IFIs) or the multilateral development banks (MDBs) should be counted towards the overall target only if there is a net additional infusion of capital by the developed countries to the capital base of the MDBs/IFIs.
http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/industry-and-economy/economy/article2482394.ece
00
Madjak:
Add a rule that prohibits attempting to circumvent the rules.
00
catamon @369
“Down which track”???!? Which track and what time frame? “If things like…….” They won’t and can’t- that’s why you work it out in advance, whether or not they are capable of performing the task in providing baseload power requirements, rather than wait and see, then (when it’s a shambles) scratching around for a solution that might take a decade to get up and running. Do you honestly believe we should be stumbling around in the dark looking for a coulda, shoulda, woulda type of solution after the event as an appropriate way of approaching this “problem”, which you haven’t even demonstrated is catastrophic, significant or even problematic?
Also, the Chinese, the Indians and the USA couldn’t give a rat’s bum whether we have an ETS or not, we are in no position to lecture anybody about anything, a trivial backwater country of no consequence to anyone but ourselves. Like the bloke in the film playing bystander No2 trying to give acting advice to George Clooney.
00
Adam Smith,
you try very hard but like so many with a pet idea, you can’t see anything wrong with it and come up with some limp hand waving to deflect criticism. I refer you to this with regards to environmental impacts of moving water around…
This is absurd. Say that I pumped Sydney Harbour dry and blocked inflowing water from rivers and ocean and then let the water flow back after a month or so. No problem for the ecosystem as it is full just like before.
You show me the studies that support your claim so that I don’t have to get onto Web of Science and send you a long list of papers that show the opposite. Or save us both the trouble and admit this is wrong.
00
@Tony at 382
It’s called “contract and converge”. The developing world is allowed to temporarily increase it’s emissions while the developed world decreased its emissions. Eventually we all converge on the same per capita emissions level, which is consistent with the long term target.
And no, emissions per square km is not fair. For a start people make emissions, not patches of ground. Per capita emissions targets are the most logical approach.
00
@Baa Humbug I think it might be you that is clueless. A price of $2 per tonne would make coal power relatively cheap compared to nuclear (and nuclear therefore relatively expensive). Lifting the carbon price will increase the cost of coal power but not nuclear, thereby making nuclear relatively cheap.
00
BLVR,
Nothing could be further from the truth, countries in the Amazonian jungle will generate carbon credits due to the land they find themselves on, here in Oz we will need to buy credits as we use the land for agriculture.
Surely the Maldives by any measure must have higher emissions than us, the Maldives is tourist intensive and no real natural sinks to speak of, how do they compare to Oz?
00
Adam Smith again
hmm who would have thought there were so many listed endangered animals living on mound springs in the GAB that are threatened by changes in water flow due to anthropogenic water extraction. Adam Smith, you must already know this literature, and the literature on the changes in thermal convection and salinity variability (temporal and spatial). So since you know about it and have concluded that the wet season restores the basin and overcomes all the effects of human activity, then you are in conflict with peer reviewed science.
Would you like to tell us what evidence you have or what are the failings of the science? Is it a conspiracy?
00
me @397 … I found tiny font!
00
Far be it for me to support Mr Smith, maybe he got his information from the Qld Gov,
http://www.derm.qld.gov.au/factsheets/pdf/water/w68.pdf
However if artesian water is relaced on an annual basis maybe he can explain why pumps are needed where once it rose to the surface under it’s own pressure.
00
@Memoryvault at 380 Prove to me that ALL natural gas in OZ is contracted for sale. It may or may not be the case for the nascent CSG industry in QLD (this would be difficult to achieve as new fields are constantly being discovered) but don’t forget about Bass Strait, Timor Sea and North West Shelf (including Gorgon).
Ready when you are.
00
So Catamon@324,
It looks to me like you now have sid doing both your thinking and speaking now hen.
Pot.. kettle….
00
Adam, will you please answer one question for us?
By how much will the earth’s temperature decline if the Government’s ETS bill is passed?
00
catamon,
How much do you think the Earth’s temperature will decline if the government ETS bill is passed?
00
@Crakar my point is that people chose to cut down trees or plant crops etc. The ground is just what it is. What you are referring to is comparative advantage (or lack thereof). I don’t think you can realistically hope to adjust targets based on this, either technically or politically; every country will complain that they got a raw deal. The per capita model has far fewer drawbacks – although those countries with high per capita emissions will still find a way to complain about it.
00
and Wes found bold
00
Blvr: #395
September 26th, 2011 at 4:15 pm
Speaking of clueless, you need to read the whole discussion before butting in.
Or maybe you can answer on behalf of Adam Smith the question I posed at #359
Oh! and have a think about what “relatively cheaper” means. ANY amount of tax on coal would make ALL other forms of power generation RELATIVELY CHEAPER. Whether the amount is worth bothering about is another matter.
Again, read all the comments in relation to the discussion before butting in. That way, YOU may have a clue about what’s being discussed. Get it?
00
Hmm! blvr at comment 394
Perhaps you might like to explain this diagram to me then.
http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/ieo/images/figure_5-lg.jpg
That, er, does not look like temporarily to me.
And with respect to your usual Greens fall back of per capita emissions, see Comment 52 at Joanne’s Jensen Post below this one.
So, China with a population of 1.3 Billion, and India with a population of 1.15 Billion, with Australian population at 22 Million, and with almost 1 Billion people in both China and India (2 Billion in all) without electrical power at the residential level, then going by your equalisation of ‘per capita’ emissions, then I guess you mean that we should go back and join them with no electrical power. Have I got that part right?
Tony.
00
@wes that’s a strawman you’ve made. It’s like asking how much effect one person riding to work will have on climate. Passing this legislation will increase the likelihood of a global agreement to limit emissions. The economic impact will be minimal, as has been shown by Treasury modeling.
If Australia doesn’t act, it will give every other country an excuse not to act.
I know it sounds like Government propaganda but in this case it actually makes sense.
00
@332 Smithy wheels out AGAIN the Brooks paper which I introduced to another thread; Smithy uses this paper to justify his claim that nuclear would not happen without a carbon TAX on the fossils. Here is the paper:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S036054421000602X
Smithy doesn’t understand it; what the Brooks’ paper shows is that nuclear is the cheapest of all the renewables, by a long shot; this means 2 things; firstly if you believe in the AGW garbage then nuclear is the cheapest and the ONLY base load reliable alternative, YET Smithy’s green government is giving $10 billion to renewables and nothing to nuclear.
Secondly is nuclear cheaper then existing coal? This government review of the nuclear option says not quite [see slide 56]:
http://www.ansto.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0005/38975/Umpner_report_2006.pdf
However Brook’s paper assumes that new nuclear, FOAK, will be dearer then existing nuclear but assumes other renewables will get cheaper as technology developes; this is unreasonable and runs counter to the maturity of the nuclear base for further innovation, unlike renewables which have NO operating base to expand from!
00
MemoryVault @ 383
I’d heard somewhere it was even longer than that. Skeptic Mode activated.
According to “Groundwater dating by estimation of groundwater flow velocity and dissolved 4He accumulation rate calibrated by 36Cl in the Great Artesian Basin, Australia” :
The distance from Port Moresby to Lake Eyre is 2300km. Using the fastest possible speed (0.43+0.14) estimated above:
2300km * 1000m/km / 0.57m/y = 4My
Tourist operators tell the tourists that it takes “over 1 million years” for water to go from Qld to S.A.
Time to travel from Great Dividing Range to Lake Eyre: 1000km * 1000m/km / 0.57m/y = 1.9My
So in summary I have good news and bad news.
The bad news is that you were wrong by a factor of 1000.
The good news is you were still 1000 times more accurate than Adam Smith.
Scepticism can never remain wrong for long.
00
@Tony at 407
I think you are confusing kWh with tCO2e.
Countries are free to generate as much electricity as they like, even those with 1.3 billion people. To keep within their targets, they need to gradually reduce the greenhouse gas intensity of electricity production.
If we give everyone 40 yrs to do it, by 2050 we can be generating all we need at a fraction of the total emissions. But it gives developing nations a bit more time to get their act together.
BTW It doesn’t matter to me whether it’s solar panels, nuclear power stations or high altitude kites, as long as it’s low carbon. But there is plenty of things we can do before we need to head down that path (see energy efficiency, biosequestration, etc).
And for the record I oppose the MRET and its spawns including SRES etc. I also think most of the clean energy grant programs have been a complete waste of taxpayer’s money.
AND I think most of the Carbon Tax is poorly implemented (although almost certainly not the same parts that most people here dislike). But it’s the best of a bad situation, so I am supporting it.
00
@Tony Also, the chart you linked to is BAU (Business As Usual). Nobody would dispute it, including myself.
I am referring to target emissions – what countries need to do to hit the ppm target. That’s what contract and converge aims to achieve.
00
Just out of interest.
There is an area out there that most people will never see but it is an amazing sight. You can drive for about 50 K’s from Woomera and be surrounded by nothing but little rocks and then in the distance you can see some trees. When you get to this point you will see small trees growing (nothing more than 1 to 2 meters high) the interesting thing is that the trees begin to grow in a straight line in both directions as far as the eye can see.
Its like the trees suddenly have access to the water and it looks like they were planted in a straight line on purpose, of course this is a natural event but amazing none the less.
00
blvr @394
So you are suggesting we in Oz should be penalised financially for our responsible approach to human reproduction (living within the environmental capacity of the land we live in), whereas countries where people breed, or have bred in the past, with impugnity like rabbits are rewarded with virtual carbon credits due to this per capita approach. A perverse sort of logic that, IMO.
Just the same kind of perverse logic that makes you think its a great idea to export jobs to countries where factories emit more CO2 for the same item generated/manufactured (because it is a third world country and thats OK) and then exported back to the first country, producing more “carbon” in production and the transport to and from than would have occurred if said product had have been just made in the first world country in the first place. It’s a very strange, twisted, deluded world you live in if you think that is even remotely logical.
00
blvr,
How much will an Australian carbon tax contribute to the cooling of planet Earth?
Just answer what is simply the most pertinent and obvious question of the whole bloody debate.
00
Andrew, thanks for saving me the typing. I believe the flow rate could be up to a grand five metres per year from some recharge points, but the general concensus is an average of around one metre.
Either way, the pressure drop indicates we are extracting quicker than the replenishment.
00
@411 BTW
What a stupid thing to say; so it doesn’t matter to you whether it WORKS!? Why don’t you take your kite out and redo Franklin’s experiment; wear gumboots.
No; it’s the worst of a good situation.
What should happen is those electorates which vote Green and therefore support renewables should only be permitted to have power from renewables; we’ll see how moral the idiots are after they freeze and starve in the dark for a while.
00
@Baa Humbug at 359
I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt as well. It’s an interesting question but I think I might have the answer – but happy to be corrected as I am not 100% sure if it applies to all generators.
As much as commodity price increases might give generators pause for thought on how best to use their assets, I think most generators are vertically integrated, that is they mine their own coal.
This is unequivocally the case in Victoria, where the brown “coal” is so bad that they often spray dirt into their boilers, only realizing when the flame goes out. Victorian generators generally do not export their coal, because nobody wants it – although there is a group currently trying to make it exportable by drying it into briquettes.
I am less sure about the black coal generators, but suspect they have their own supplies.
The enormous profits that coal players are making is due to supply demand imbalance that affects the price of coal, not the production cost.
In lieu of a signal on the production cost, a carbon tax provides it.
00
@cohenite at 417
Yeah you’re onto me. I don’t care if it works. Happy?
I just said that there are better options than renewables right now.
Why don’t you say something of substance instead of trying to twist my words? You’re like a little terrier nipping at my heels with that one.
00
BulLiVer @ 400
In the early 2000’s Kwinana Power Station south of Perth WA was converted to gas to demonstrate the gubmint of the day’s commitment to “green”. AFTER spending millions on the conversion, the gubmint THEN went into the marketplace to negotiate the purchase of gas for it (such is the way gubmints work).
Sorry, said Woodside. None available. All is accounted for under contract. To this day Kwinana remains capable of running on gas, but continues to run on coal. Can’t buy the gas in anything like the quantities required, you see.
Around the same time, the QLD gubmint decided it needed to build some new power stations. Naturally, wanting to appear “green”, they wanted to opt for gas.
Sorry, said the suppliers on this side of the continent, none available. Most is accounted for under contract. That is why with the exception of Dalby all of the expansion since has been in coal.
Since then EVERY major new gas development has been initiated AFTER supply contracts have been negotiated. That’s HOW the developers secure the capital for development, and WHY such developments are announced with a headline like “New $16 billion gas deal signed”.
The $16 billion isn’t the cost of development, it’s the value of the contract to sell most of the gas for umpty-dum years after the field is developed.
Do you have any concept of the amount of gas that would be required to replace Loy Yang and Hazelwood?
Yes, the discovery and development of CSG could change a lot of that.
.
Which is why the greenies are hell-bent on stopping it happening.
00
Yeah coal.
00
@Winston @ 414 You’re not going to get anywhere with the “we’ve been responsible in the past” argument.
1. China has a 1 child policy. We have Costello asking people to have “one for the country”
2. The developed world has historically put the vast majority of GHG into the air.
Yeah, we’ve been real responsible, haven’t we?
It doesn’t matter how many people countries have in the future, it’s a baseline set in the past. In any case, the best you could hope for would be a slightly bigger slice of a rapidly diminishing pie.
00
Coal will be king in India and China for decades, most probably into next century.
India has recently secured a export stream of 60mtpa from the Galilee Basin. They will own the mines, railway, port loading facility and those lovely generators in India. Might as well invest in the ore carriers to complete the chain.
China is doing same. I wonder how much of that profit will remain in Australia? Not much, I should imagine. The joke’s on us!
00
Cohenite @421
Good comeback. Really.
00
Blvr,
You see, that’s the problem with your side of the argument. They have no concept whatsoever of how electrical power is (or in the case of China and India especially, how it isn’t) being generated.
Look at that chart again.
That in fact does indicate actual forward estimates for coal consumption.
The bulk of that is in China where they are bringing to the power delivery stage one large scale coal fired power plant every seven days, not to thumb their nose at the environment, but to bring their people up to a standard of living we already have with access to a constant and reliable supply of electrical power. That is part of their Industrialisation, and, as part of that the people are gaining access to that power as well.e in the Developed World, that access to electricity sees 38% of all power going to the Residential sector, while in China, barely 8% of people have access to ANY power at that Residential area.
That power will be coming from those new coal fired power plants, hence the burning of all that coal, and as you can see from that chart coal consumption in Asia is increasing, and almost exponentially, and with one ton of coal being burned producing on average 2.86 tons of CO2, then the CO2 emissions are by no means ‘temporarily’ increasing as you so eloquently put it.
There is no CO2 free way of bringing large scale power to all those people that does not include large scale coal fired power, and on that basis.
India hasn’t even started yet.
In the Developed World, we ‘may’ be able to lower our emissions by what will amount to a tiny level only. For China also to move in that same direction means that almost one billion people will still be living to a standard we would not even countenance here in Australia.
Until your side of this argument actually understand electrical power generation, you guys are just floundering in the dark, and if you get your way, we’ll all be floundering in the dark, literally.
You take ‘Colonialism’ to a whole different level.
Tony.
00
Not a lot, but i also think that’s irrelevant. It will likely contribute to lesser peak temperatures in the future, and will have ramifications as far as whether or not global actions to reduce carbon emissions occur.
That’s why i support it as public policy.
Its actually simply the most utterly irrelevant question in the whole bloody debate, but appeals to people who miss the point due to its simplicity.
00
@Memoryvault @420
I think you’re picking some isolated examples. I grant you that WA is in rough shape but it’s something that Gorgon should improve.
There are plenty of new gas fired plants being built (eg Tallawarra). They don’t seem to have problems finding gas suppliers. It may be an issue for existing plant looking for new supply.
And yes, I do have a concept of how much gas would be required for those plants.
00
per capita CO2 emission changes since 1990:
Australia—+12%
China— +205%
India—+100%
S. Korea— +109%
Indonesia— +126%
Brazil— + 51%
Thailand— +115%
Taiwan— +77%
How many of these countries are considering an ETS carbon tax besides Australia? ZERO.
Will Australia’s Climate Wowsers any change other countrys’ minds by the example of our noble sacrifice? NO.
Why? Because in general they understand that fear of “carbon pollution” is a western psychological problem caused by domestic ideologues trying to scare their populations into conceding more control of the economy to the government.
Plus they are fully aware of this little fact:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BQpciw8suk&feature=player_embedded
So the Chinese, Indians, Brazilians, etc, nod and wink at each other. They know the ETS has only the most tenuous relationship with the weather. It’s all about some insane Realpolitik game Western mandarin are playing out. The only question for the developing world is how to milk the ETS gravy train to their advantage.
* * *
About 25,000 million tons of CO2 was emitted by non-ETS countries in 2010. Only about 4050 million tons of CO2 was emitted by countries with an ETS or considering an ETS.
Australia emitted about 400 million tons of CO2 in 2010 out of the global emission total of about 29,000 million tons.
Oh, and the oceans natural hold about 38,000,000 million TONS of CO2, while atmosphere has another 720,000 million TONS in it naturally without any assistance from humans.
“…in the last 100 years it is said that CO2 increased from 270 to 388 parts per million. This is an increase of 0.000118 or 0.0118%.” Depending on who you ask, says Jeff Id
So, with these numbers in mind…
How much will an Australian carbon tax contribute to the cooling of planet Earth?
Anyone?
00
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/mining-energy/chevron-to-approve-massive-wheatstone-lng-project/story-e6frg9df-1226146816234
Yup, a carbon price coming in will kill investment, that’s for sure.
00
If any of this CO2 alarmism were well-founded, and believed to be so, those nukes were built and activated yesterday. No transitions, no gas, no solar, no whirlygigs, and, certainly, no Geothermia.
It is the toying and parade-ground antics that convince me we are not in a war, and those rallying the troops half-know that there is no enemy. They cannot afford the loss of face that would come with a stand-down, so they may as well make some money and exchange medals and decorations.
In a true climate emergency, those nukes were built and activated yesterday.
00
@Tony at 425
Ok last one then off to bed.
Firstly, I assure you that I do understand power generation.
You ignore the fact that we have 40 years to get to -80%. I’m not saying it’s straightforward but I believe it’s unnecessarily pessimistic to assume that we can only reduce emissions by a trivial amount over that time
frame.
Like it or not, wind turbines do reduce emissions, and China is huge in this area.
Like it or not, solar panels do reduce emissions and per kWh costs have already dropped to retail grid price parity in some areas.
Nuclear is always an option
Solar boosted combined cycle is an option.
Renewables working over a smart grid to use the storage available in battery electric vehicles is an option.
Some available today, some soo , some further off but all eminently doable by 2050.
In the meantime, energy efficiency, biosequestration and other options.
This is not something to throw your hands up in the air about.
00
mosomoso @ 430
Spot on.
We would also probably stop exporting around 100 gigatonnes of CO2 a year in the form of coal, and we’d probably ban the production and sale of carbonated beverages as well, amongst a lot of other things.
Can you imagine ANY Australian government trying to ban beer and coke to “save the environment”?
00
blvr blathers:
That’s not true.
The vast amount of GHG in the atmosphere was already there long before humans added any.
Our contribution is at most about 100 parts per million of CO2 into the atmosphere in the last 200 years. That’s less than a third of the total and less than 0.02% change in the atmosphere as a whole. And the oceans contain a cycling reservoir of CO2 which is more than 10 times as large as the atmospheric total, all of which is totally natural.
And, by an order of many, many magnitudes the most important “greenhouse gas” is Water. Humans have not altered the atmospheric hydrological cycle at all.
Perhaps your lack of a basic grasp on the facts contributes to your support for a carbon tax? What you should be supporting is a tax against “hydrogen pollution.”
SAVE THE PLANET NOW!
00
Regarding this infamous Brook report….
Firstly we ignore the estimates from EIA since they lie about oil so probably can’t be trusted with other numbers.
Then the most relevant sources of LCOE in (2009 US$/MWh) are:
___________|_Coal__NatGas___NukeFOAK__NukeEst_
ANSTO said |_ 32 ___ 34 ______ 53 ______ 37
MIT said __|_ 64 ___ 67 ______ 87 ______ 68
We are doing a relative comparison so we should normalise values by some common and stable option.
I normalise by ANSTO’s natural gas LCOE:
___________|_Coal__NatGas___NukeFOAK__NukeEst_
ANSTO said |_ 94% ___100%______155%______108%
MIT said __|_188%___ 197%______256%______200%
**Sources and methodologies**
It would appear that in Australia we can do everything for half the price of international estimates. With our environmental regulations and high wages this is the opposite of what I would expect. Anyone got any suggestions?
But what needs to be explained is how the Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation has concluded that a country with no history of a nuclear industry can supply electricity from a First-Of-A-Kind nuke plant at only 50% more than the price of natural gas when it costs 25% more than gas to do the same thing in countries which have a 50 year track record in nuclear power.
How did they reach the conclusion that coal in Australia has the same price ratio as other sources found in international studies when, unlike many other countries, we’ve got plenty of local coal which is relatively cheap?
This seems strange. Is this just because intuition is a poor guide to the costs when none of us have any intuition about it? Anyone got any suggestions?
**Relative costs**
FOAK means a totally new design. We aren’t going to use a totally new design, we’d use a cheap Hyundai or Mitsubishi built reactor. It is not clear to me if the cost of a different fuel refinery cycle is included in the FOAK figure. So take out some new design cost and add in a bit of new refinery cost and you may be looking at a figure closer to the Established cost than the FOAK cost.
This would mean that for coal versus nuclear you guys are bickering over a difference of between 1.0 and 0.5c/kWh. Yeah.
Do you really want to have an argument over so little?
Could we not conclude based on this data that coal and nuclear are already so close in LCOE that other factors will be more influential in future provision?
**Unfortunate Omissions**
“FOAK costs were not reported for other technologies in the studies we assessed.”
Well most solar thermal installations today are still first of a kind, so costs will go either up or down depending on how much innovation is needed to actually achieve decent results.
All constructive evidential comments are welcome. 🙂
00
mosomoso,
and just to add to this,
And all the coal fired power plants would have been closed down yesterday as well.
Tony.
00
Adam, you have ignored all requests to respond to commenters, to moderators, and now to me. We can’t email you off the thread because you haven’t provided your real email account, and sadly, we can’t let the blog comments become the adam-this-and-that-show (it’s boring us to tears). We are awaiting your responses to us.
00
Blvr@ 422
This comment shows you just can’t reason with them.
China’s one child policy dates from when? Their population reached what level before they were forced into this approach? 1.4 billion?
Australia actually needs to increase it’s birth rate for future economic stability due to B/boomer population bubble- apparently we are expected to enact a one child policy to follow China according to blvr’s twisted logic because we are irresponsible to increase our birthrate?
“Historically” means since 1945, it stands to reason that proportionately the most advanced economies will have a head start on emissions over such a short time scale- ask me again in 50 years and I bet it’s a whole lot different.
Our lack of overpopulation is one aspect of sound environmental management, why deny that just to try to make an inane comparison between apples and oranges? And the air quality in Australia, compared to Shanghai? or even compared to 1970 Australia?
The more shrill and desperate they sound, the less convincing they become to impartial observers. I must admit they are enough to drive anyone to alcoholism, such is their stubborn persistence with nonsensical lines of reasoning that go in ever concentric circles to nowhere. They have no idea how this can all play out, yet apparently the onus of proof is upon us to disprove their approach, when there are no details given as to how it will be enacted. Maybe, just maybe, thats why we can’t completely refute them to their satisfaction, because they can’t even give a scanty outline as to how the practical application of their approach are to be achieved. They’re so thick, they do my head in.
00
I asked the “Bolt Question”—
How much do you think the Earth’s temperature will decline if the government ETS bill is passed?
Catamon answered:
Well, thank you for the reply.
Catamon claims the carbon tax’s effect on climate is utterly irrelevant!
There you have it, folks!
A tax designed to reduce our carbon dioxide emissions in order to help reduce the global temperature and its most rabid supporters admit they aren’t the slightest bit interested in measuring the effectiveness of their policy in achieving a reduction in global warming.
One has to wonder exactly what the motivates supporters of the Carbon Tax?
Oh! Hang on…
Adam @333
Oh. How convenient.
Catamon admits that it’s “utterly irrelevant” how much the carbon tax will help reduce global temperatures but it would be improper to question then just what REALLY motivates people who support the carbon tax?
If you blokes don’t care about the effectiveness of the carbon tax in reducing climate change, why do you support it?
And pluuuuze don’t dare give us a moralising and heroic white feather sermon about our noble duty sacrifice our economy as an example to the superpowers, China, India and the USA, who look to us for leadership before they do, like, whatever they think best for their 4 billion combined citizens.
That’s just another delusion.
00
Btw,
I’m still waiting for a real, science-based answer (please provide link to supporting evidence) from the trolls:
How much do you think the Earth’s temperature will decline if the government ETS bill is passed?
Yawn!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9peZ5WOtL0&feature=related
00
Off topic. The noose to tightening around Thomson, AMEX has the records to prove if he is above board.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/union-boss-kathy-jackson-steps-up-pursuit-of-craig-thomson/story-fn59niix-1226146150368
00
It was with a wry smile, I saw that the recent results from the CLOUD experiment at CERN gave results that vindicated Ian Plimer in ‘Heaven and Earth’, in the chapter on The Sun, which includes Galactic Cosmic Rays and Solar radiation effects on earth’s climate.
My only criticism of Ian Plimer’s H&E is the quantity of references and links, without which the context of his arguments can lack substance. And like any links on the ‘net can become invalid.
After reading 391 posts here, including Mr Smith’s government apologies for policy, I cannot find any indication of the UN Green Climate Fund,that creams off 10% of any carbon tax or ETS coughed up by the “Big Polluters” and that gets paid into an overseas fund. Thanks to the current government’s policies we have had Mt Combet sign up to this at Cancun COP16, and with a carbon tax document in his hot little hands, it will be ratified at Durban COP17 in Dec 2011. Now if the carbon tax is estimated at $7billion, it will ONLY amount to a piddly $700million in the first year, and increasing in successive years. But it is funds leaving the country for no return, derived from us “Developed
nations.”
The UN wants to have an incoming amount of $100billion per year by 2020.
Yes there is penalties if we renege. That is why this carbon tax should not go through, or if unfortunately it does, gets repealed before it comes into force.
The Coalition’s Direct Action Plan, does not get us into the same trap, but does give a route to avoid trade sanctions by our trading partners, who have carbon mitigation schemes.
And something I don’t see any reference to here, or just about anywhere else, is the Russian scientific community. Their consensus seems to be “It’s the Sun, stupid”, and the importance of Galactic Cosmic Rays in the scheme of things, and also changes in solar E-UV, solar illumination, size of the sun and orbital position of the sun, echo that.
There is also Russian solar instrumentation on the International Space station. (Solar Limbograph, measures solar radiation and size)
And for those windmill enthusiasts, a nice interactive toy for your Bookmark. From the Australian Energy Marketing Operator.
http://windfarmperformance.info/
You can turn on/off each windfarm, to see what each and every area is producing today. Compare with electricity demand – watch the scaling differences on the graphs.
Looking at Woolnorth in NW Tasmania, with it’s 140 MegaWatt, has only cost ~16 endangered Tasmanian Wedgetail eagles this year.
00
Wes George @ 439
The only response you are going to get is either irrelevant noise or the background sound of crickets chirping …
Joanne Nova @ 436
I suggest having an open “catch-all” thread and getting the moderators to move off-topic comments to that thread. As it fills up, you create a new one and so on. In this way no-one is censored, but those of us that want to actually discuss the issue at hand can do so without wading through the noise created by those who have nothing relevant or substantial to contribute.
00
wes george says:
Two can play that game.
How much will the climate change if the planet continues to emit greenhouse gases?
And to keep on topic, please provide from Plimer’s book to support your case.
00
And the dunce of the day cap goes tooooo……Blimey!
No, two can’t play that game. It’s for the proponents of a hypothesis to to come up with the proof. Not the other way round.
(SNIPPED) CTS
00
More personal insult. No evidence to support your claims. Same old story.
The IPCC report has the theory. Go read it then tell us which part is wrong. 😉
00
JeffT:
I guess it is with utmost surprise that you would read the CERN scientist say …
How’s your wry smile now?
00
wes george says:
I’m not good at geography, remind me where Delhi is again?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-15056512
00
Gosh, Blimey@443. Mark is spot on.
I don’t usually don’t compliment trolls, but dude, that’s the most bloody ignorant comment in a 447-comment thread full of stupid comments. You deserve an achievement award, mate.
Maybe, the Bulldust Most Ignorant Comment of the Thread Award?
Wow. I’m gobsmacked. That’s a very revealing question. Let’s assume “the planet” you’re referring to is known to the locals as Earth?
I guess we should start with the fact that our local parliament isn’t actually in charge of “the planet,” and so can no more order the biosphere to lower CO2 levels than it can command the seas to recede or banish drought from the land. Otherwise, I’m sure Menzies or Keating would have got on it long ago. Heck, why not pass a law that says it must rain 100 cm per year in the Red Centre? Talk about the lucky country.
Besides, the primary GHG is harmful “hydrogen pollution”, also know as hydrogen dioxide, a dangerous and suffocating substance with many orders of magnitude more warming magic than carbon. It’s very hard to control, however, because the planet’s oceans are made of 99.999% of hydrogen pollution, thus emissions will continue to warm the planet for many millions of years in the future.
Such is life.
00
More idiocy from blimey. You can’t upturn decades of scientific principles just because you don’t like it.
I repeat: It’s for the proponents of a hypothesis to to come up with the proof. Not the other way round.
And no, the IPCC does not have the “theory”. Their so-called “theories” have no predictive capacity worth discussing.
Now go and look up the difference between hypothesis and theory. Then, get lost.
.
00
wes george says:
Er, yes, sorry to have confused you. Or are you being pedantic and wanting me to rephrase the question as …
… does that help you understand.
00
Mark:
And yet the temperature increase seen over the past 150 fits better with a theory that includes GHGs.
Your alternate theory is …. ???? …. (I expect more insults instead of reasoned science).
Kisses to you!!
00
I saw that when it was first reported. Interesting science though. Kinda knew that the
anti-Carbonista counter revolutionary cells would gravitate towards it without reading the whole thing.
00
Basically India speaks for the entire developing world when they say that billions of the world poor want exactly what we have and no less.
Fair enough!
There is no way they are going to tie a ridiculously delusional ETS anchor to their economy. And nor should they because—and this is shocking news to the Malhusian Greens—the world’s prosperity is NOT a zero sum game…as long as technology keeps evolving at an accelerating pace there is no reason why Indians can’t have a parallel standard of living as Australians by the middle of the century.
Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/environment/why-should-we-suffer-asks-india-20090526-bm43.html#ixzz1Z3jmjsdy
00
Adam @130
No, we are talking economic realities. I am sorry you fail to comprehend the subject after so many posts, but you seem bound and determined to ignore the subject and create strawmen. I offered the example of rare earths. In simple point of fact, NOTHING is irreplaceable, and to assume so is the fast road to disaster. You seem to be stuck in a mindset of a monopsony, and that will lead not to a greener Australia, but simply a poorer one. You can pontificate on your social justice and your nobel endeavors until your heart is brimming with self your satisfied smugness, but none of that is going to change the law of supply and demand. And no edict, even from the Queen herself, will do that either.
00
Adam @130
Wrong again. I am not lecturing any other Australians. But I am lecturing you and trying to cure your ignorance.
#1 – regardless of the last recession in Australia, you are not responsible for the economy, so your ignorance of it is a danger to kill it.
#2 – Given your lack of knowledge on economics, and your propensity to pontificate on it, I not only CAN lecture you, but perhaps educate those willing to learn. I cannot make YOU learn however.
#3 – I live in the US, and since that is my place of residence, we have freedom of speech. No one, not you, nor the Queen, can tell me what I can and cannot say. That you would even hint at such a thing indicates that you clearly do not know what you are talking about.
00
Adam @165
Adam, please stop discussing subjects you refuse to learn about. You are contradicting yourself in the same post. The Aussie dollar can indeed go down even if the exchange rate with the USD is up – it just means you are not tanking AS BAD as the USD. And since you maintain that the Aussie dollar is not pegged to the USD, your second statement makes no sense (I guess you learned debating from John Kerry where you were for the Aussie dollar being pegged, before you were against it).
00
How about first showing evidence that the climate is changing because of anthropogenic CO2 emission?
Oh, and please don’t cite falsified evidence like the hockey stick…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BQpciw8suk&feature=player_embedded
I know, I know it’s hard to do. I can’t find any solid evidence of catastrophically accelerating climate change either.
Try to remember that climate change is a tautology because the climate is by definition always changing. The fact that the climate—by definition— is always changing does not imply that humans have anything to do with it, because, duh, the very definition of climate is change…
Soooooo…what you really mean to say is that the climate is changing at a CATASTROPHIC RATE. Therefore, we need to sacrifice our economy to SAVE THE PLANET NOW.
Only compared to recent history, say the last 2,000 years, modern climate is, uh, not changing very fast at all. Much more rapid shifts into and out of the MWP and LIA are highly suspected of occurring. Go back to the early Holocene and climate shifts of 1, 2, even 4c a bloody decade seemed to have occurred, which makes the modern climate change rate of 0.7c a century look pretty darn tame.
Fact is, the Earth’s climate has NOT changed much at all in recent decades, yet CO2 emissions rise yearly. Thems the facts, dude.
Go figure, Einstein.
Now answer my question:
How much will an Australian Carbon Tax slow global warming?
00
@wes george.
How about you follow my advice and read even a little of the IPCC report.
hahaha youtube science. ok, now follow the link from your youtube science to the website of the presenter in your video …
http://www.berkeleyearth.org/resources.php
… and read their initial findings …
http://www.berkeleyearth.org/Resources/Muller_Testimony_31_March_2011 .. they find …
Try to remember to read the IPCC report. In it they estimate, using peer-reviewed science, the known forces and the impact they have on our climate. There is no other theory that can explain the increase in temperatures whilst solar and aerosol changes work to cool the planet.
Gosh, do you even listen to your own videos? @2:56 listen to how reliable proxy data is. Now you wish to use that proxy data to tell me that the past has changed much more rapidly!! HAHAHAHAHA!! What’s worse, is that if you were right, that’s an argument for high climate sensitivity, something Nova doesn’t approve of.
But you’d still need to tell us why you think the forces of previous warming/cooling are applicable to the warming we currently see.
The past 30-35 years we see a rapid increase in temperatures – the explanations for WMP & LIA simply don’t fit with what we see today, whilst the well known radiative forcing of GHG does.
Facts don’t seem to agree with you . dude. and niether did your youtube scientist.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1970/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1970/trend/plot/gistemp/from:1970/plot/gistemp/from:1970/trend/plot/uah/from:1970/plot/uah/from:1970/trend/plot/rss/from:1970/plot/rss/from:1970/trend
More than if you go on pretending the problem doesn’t exist.
00
Oh no, no, no. You should know better than to use such a misleading and deceptive comparison as debt versus GDP, Adam Smith, assuming that is your real name.
See shorten-stupid-swanning-around-on-debt for a better explanation than i can give, but really, comparing government debt to Australia’s collective GDP is as disingenious as it is dishonest. The government’s income for 2009/10 was $292.8 billion, with expenses being $339.2 billion, or 16% debt for one year – a year that wasn’t during the GFC! With government debt now at upwards of $150 billion, and revenue upwards of $300 billion, debt is closer to 50% of revenue for 2011/12. GDP is the total volume of transactions in the economy, not simply the the country’s total production. Like Swannie, hoping no one will notice is rather lame. If anything, you’ve merely highlighted the phenomenal debt the yanks have. For fun with debt, see http://usdebt.kleptocracy.us/ for the true magnitude of us debt.
00
Blimey,
To answer your question “How much will the climate change if human based activity continues to emit greenhouse gases?” … zero. Yes zero. The climate (defined as the long term average temperature) of the Earth is determined fundamentally by the distance from the Sun as shown by this simple analysis. Now, before you go off into your radiative energy hypothesis, let me take you into another physics lesson where the whole greenhouse gas idea is shown to be a massive fail of science. Human activity is affecting 3% of 0.04% (that works out to be 0.0012% in case you need help with the maths) of the atmosphere, and you think that is going to change the climate in any measurable way because some computer models say so? Let this very concise debunking of the climate models by someone who uses computer models to do very real things show you the error of your ways.
See, that is how you answer a direct question, with direct answers, supported by data and analysis.
00
Truthseeker says:
You should know I don’t rate web-blogger science sites at all high.
On the one hand peer-reviewed science published in journals by scientists dedicating their lives to specialist fields.
vs
Some guy on the internet that can figure out how to blog and thinks he has overturned more than a hundred years of science.
Geee … now if I were deciding the future direction of the country on a topic that concerns the future of mankind and pretty much all life on this planet, which one to listen to. Call me crazy, but I think I’ll stick with the well-educated scientists.
00
I have all the IPCC reports in my office and have been reading them since you were in grade school, son. The fact is that the IPCC is an advocacy group with an agenda. Their reports are not the word of God.
Soooo, it’s hahaha it’s stupid youtube science, but then you say, hey it’s brilliant work because Muller is a Berkley scientist who’s lukewarm on CAGW? Duh, I thought you might be impressed by a link to someone who wasn’t a confirmed skeptic. But alas, you can only hear selectively the part that confirms your bias, rather then the main point.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BQpciw8suk&feature=player_embedded
Gosh, you’re a sad sack, Blimey. Recite the Bible to me chapter and verse, please. But your rant is pure unenlightened ignorance. You’ve got the curiosity of a gnat. You’re not interested in how nature really works. You seem to be unable to evaluate the science for yourself and so rely entirely upon pedigrees and certifications rather than rational inquiry into the fundamental issues. You’ve stopped learning a long time ago and you don’t do your homework. Hell, science to you is complete, not that you know what that science says. You think there is nothing left to learn about the climate, not that you know the most basic facts about the climate… Just point to your IPPC bible and grunt. Pathetic.
You got it ass backwards. You need to tell us why the forces of previous warming and cooling period are INAPPLICABLE to modern warming! The way science works is that the supporters of a hypothesis have to show that it is a useful explanation. Somehow you think that we have to prove the CAGW hypothesis wrong. In fact, all we have to do is ask hard questions about the CAGW hypothesis and if you can’t answer them, well, it’s back to the drawing board.
So you tell us why the forces of previous warming and cooling no longer apply to modern climate? If you can’t. Epic fail, dude.
A 0.7c rate of increase per century is not a rapid or catastrophic increase in temperature at all especially since some portion of the warming is a natural bounce back from the Little Ice Age which began to naturally end about 1850… Much more rapid natural warming and cooling has occurred many times in the past. I believe that some AGW does exist but the mild rate of modern warming it produces is hardly catastrophic and doesn’t call for an onerous global economic reordering.
You simply have not made the case for CATASTROPHIC global warming demanding radical and immediate action on our part to do anything at all. Until you can do so, your just a sad troll with an impaired sense of curiosity and apparently little knowledge of scientific method.
00
Hey Wes, just to chime in from the states I can tell you this (as if you didn’t already know) anyone who tried feeding you the “we must set an example for the rest of the world” spiel that thinks we here in the US are going to follow Australia if they implement the ETS is seriously deluded.
Our politicians may attempt it for their own reasons. Not because Australia did it, but because they are greedy, self serving bastards that put themselves first and the country, well it may be in their list of priorities somewhere.
As far as the general population, we are watching Gillard as an example of what NOT to do. At the moment we can’t decide who the bigger poser is her or Obama. Neither one has a bit of sense or actual concern for their nation.
Just curious, can she function without a teleprompter? If so then she at least has that on Obama.
00
Thanks wes. Just got in on the tail end of that…erm, discussion, and felt like I learned something.
About the thread topic, (remember that, anyone? “…the perfect thread for those discussions of how our education system is being influenced by activists…”).
At high school, my daughter was shown Al Gore’s ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ by a well-meaning teacher who was minding the class at end of term. She bit her tongue and said nothing. Naturally, there was no attempt by the school to present an alternative view, for as any warmist will tell you with a deadpan expression, there are no credible dissenting views.
At uni, attempting to escape the CO2-fixated evangelicals in Earth Science, she enrolled in Psychology, where the lecture-hall echoed to the fulminations of a bespectacled bearded don using the lectern like a pulpit and decrying the transgressions of climate change deniers. And this in one of the top eight universities in the nation, no less. Perhaps she should have applied to a religion-based university to escape the proselytizing in the secular ones. I have heard a rumour that the Catholic Notre Dame University openly entertains both sides of a scientific argument. A novel and brave approach considering the times.
Sadly, there is no escape from rogue greenhouse advocates in many places of learning. Is it because they want our children – hearts and minds, or merely because they are so taken by their own righteous cause that they need to vent? Ian Plimer, thanks again for presenting the facts in a way which will help parents and students deal with climate pseudo-science, fear- and guilt-mongering whenever we are subjected to it.
00
What a tool, (SNIPPED) CTS you are. Every consensus was created only by the shattering of an old consensus. As an example, the “consensus” believed that the world was flat. If there is reincarnation and karma you probably prosecuted Galileo in one of your your past lives and are being punished by the gods by being reincarnated as… Blimey! Some guy that thinks he can blog and overturn 100 years of science? Are you referring to the guy who overturned over 100 years of “science” by proving that h. pylori causes ulcers and not stress?
Thank God you are not running anything. I wouldn’t trust you with a safety pin let alone a country! You know, when I was a child my mother would tell me, “If Johnny jumped off a bridge are you going to?” You suffer from herd mentality and base your belief in CAGW on an appeal to authority. There is a
Blimeysucker born every minute and there is someone there to take him. What a maroon!Stick with the scientist? That was the same mindset that fueled the Eugenics movement. People who blindly believe and fearlessly follow tend to live on hope and die of despair.
Quit being a rube and get a life!
00
And blimey still doesn’t know the difference between a theory and a hypothesis. He still doesn’t know that that a model can be created to prove anthing that the modeller wants.
To state that nothing else but CO2 can explain a mere 0.7 degrees warming in 130 years is nothing more or less than an admission of ignorance. Stay in your abyss of ignorance if you wish, with all the other witch-burners and virgin-slayers.
00
Eddy @ 465 – I was going to destroy Blimey’s silly response, but I could not do it better than you have done. Bravo!
Blimey @ 461 – I answered the question you asked and you have responded with an attack on the person providing the analysis (“Some guy on the internet …”) and have not addressed the science in any way. Thank you for making my argument for me.
00
Well I am grumpy that Adam Smith has not replied to my comments in 393 and 397, as I just can’t stand rhetoric and not facts being used to back up ideological claims (even if I share the ideology or opinion). Adam Smith is not the only poster who holds a position and refuses to accept any criticism of it. Blind ideology makes someone like Adam promote nuclear energy (he makes valid arguments for this) but unable to take any criticism of it. Yes it has an environmental impact- everything does in some way- but admitting this does not necessarily invalidate nuclear energy as an energy source. Admitting to the weaker parts a position one holds is a very grown up thing to do.
I am also amazed that this thread is approaching 500 posts on a book that almost none of the posters have seen.
00
Having a quick scan trough the posts i noticed one question repeatedly asked but never answered, the question was:
The short answer to this question is nil,nada, zilch, zero, nothing, not a thing, not one iota, нула, صفر, 零, nula, nulové, een nul, nolla, un zéro, eine Null, нулю, un cero, um zero, 제로, एक शून्य, uno zero.
The long answer to this question is based on the supposition that the rest the developed world WILL follow our (and NZ)lead and act at some time in the future halting any theoretical warming from AGW, IF the developed world does not follow our lead then refer to the short answer.
The “get out of jail” card often used by supporters of the ETS is that even if the developed world do not follow our lead we will be better off any way hence the governments naming convention “the green energy future”.
ETS supporters can distract their opponents from the blindingly obvious fact that no one will follow us on the path to economic destruction by claiming the production of ergotrons via low carbon energy sources is a viable option.
If you corner them on this point and they sneak past you they will begin to make wild claims about windymills and sheets of glass some have even resorted to claiming the production of electrickery via pseudo controlled nuclear reactions is a good thing. The hypocrisy shown should set alarm bells ringing in all those who listen.
So in the end we have a long and short answer, the only that applies here is teh short one.
00
Gee Aye @ 468 – Excellent comment and shows real maturity in terms of debating issues. As to the thread, most of us are commenting on the issues raised, not so much about the book itself. This is not a book club doing book reviews – different set of skills required.
00
“”I am also amazed that this thread is approaching 500 posts on a book that almost none of the posters have seen.””
Well we all know how good “Heaven” was so this is going to deal with Newer material like Corruption.
00
468
Very, very, very grown up.
Mature even.
But maybe I’m in error.
Maybe it’s still patronizing, just a teeny little bit ??
00
Mary… perhaps a bit
00
Oksanna@464 points us back on topic:
Andrew Bolt has posted a real homework assignment from grade 6 somewhere in Australia…it’s worth a look.
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/how_to_build_an_ark_for_the_flood_to_come/
00
Wes, i enrolled my son in a private school (best investment i ever made), his teacher showed him the Al Gore movie. At the end of the film the class was asked if there was any questions. My son asked is it true that in the UK a judge found many scientific errors with the film and these errors are to be divulged before watching.
His teacher replied thats true and i am only showing this film because i have to, if you dont want to believe what Gore says then you dont have to.
Education 1
Indoctrination uno zero
00
Anyone missing Smith yet?
00
If there’s one thing, at least that ‘red thumb’ won’t take such a hiding.
Nyuk nyuk nyuk!
Tony
00
That’s not without the IPCC tendency to doctor their report. There was a huge stink today when some of the scientists that did the last report discovered that the IPCC has taken out some of their report,and added some of it’s own as was originally written didn’t agree with IPCC policies.
00
wes george says:
Bullshit you have otherwise you wouldn’t be asking the questions that you do.
Did they also melt the northern sea ice with their giant frikken laser beam?
Nutter!
No, it’s HAHAHA to someone who likes to get their science off youtube instead of from peer-reviewed research.
It’s a double HAHAHHAHAHA when that same YOUTUBE science clip is used to debunk his dumb “it’s always changed this rapidly” idea.
It’s a triple HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA when Muller’s own research confirms the warming is occurring, you know the warming you guys don’t wish to admit is happening.
Posting the same thing as before does not contribute to the debate.
There’s much to learn, especially in the field of feedbacks. Pretending, as you do, that there’s a magical force that “bounces” climate from the LIA instead of recognising the well understood ability for GHG to capture and reemit longwave radiation is not helpful to the debate.
I thought you said you read the IPCC report? It appears not so I call “bullshit” once more.
The forces do apply, the amount of forcing they generate is not sufficient to explain the increase in surface temps.
Eh? What force was causing the warming to make it “bounce”, go flat for 50 years, then soar to even greater heights?
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1850/to:1900/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1850/to:1900/trend
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1900/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1900/trend
And yet to try and convince me of this you rely on the proxy data that got rubbished in YOUR OWN YOUTUBE SCIENCE VIDEO CLIP.
Says the guy citing webpages and youtube instead of peer-reviewed research. LOL
00
eddy says:
What a lovely way to debate.
I might be a bit hasty, but I expect they guy that did that actually did research rather than blog about it.
00
Crakar24 @ 476
“”Anyone missing Smith yet?””
He’s been reincarnated and is still pumping out replies cut and pasted to give that ” Blue Purple Block” style.
Might be a good wallpaper colour.
00
Blimey @479 –
BS? That is your reasoned response? What next? “Your mother wears combat boots?”
What has that got to do with them being an advocacy group? Are you saying that Greenpeace cannot be an advocacy group because they do not melt the Polar ice cap? Is logic in your dictionary?
It is painful to see someone truly lose it as you have. However, whether it is warming or not is not the issue. Until the null hypothesis is disproven, all you can say is the climate varies. Did you disprove the null hypothesis? Are you rational enough to even try?
Again a non-sequitur. His response does not mean he did not read it, it means he questions it. Clearly you have a reading comprehension problem.
00
PhilJourdan says:
No, I am saying there is a lot of physical evidence to show that the planet is warming. You’d be a nutter to think the IPCC are simply making this up.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Holocene_Temperature_Variations.png
For the past 8-10 thousand years the climate’s temperature has been in a slow decline, as expected from Milankovitch forcing.
Now it’s not.
Null hypothesise that!
00
Blimey @483
For someone who claims to know what the IPCC report says, the above statement speaks volumes of ignorance. Supposedly, the IPCC only compiled data, they did not draw (or were not supposed to) conclusions. They were supposed to use only Peer reviewed papers, instead using thousands of advocacy pieces instead. The IPCC promoted agenda in direct confrontation to their charter. Whether you believe in AGW or not, the preceding statement is not in doubt.
And the question is not whether the planet is warming. Please find me a single soul who says the planet has not warmed in the last 10k years. Anyone. You are trying a bait and switch, by changing the question of the debate. It will not work, because we are not mindless bots that have been sent out by algore to convert the world to a new religion. What you have to do is:
First – Disprove the null hypothesis
Second – prove the alternative hypothesis – that man is causing the change (even for the last 10k years).
You may begin when ready.
#1 – I will simply assume you misspoke when you said “in decline” since 10k years ago we were in an ice age. We are not now. ice does not form in warm temperatures.
#2 – I am sorry you have such contempt for science. This is not my rule. This is a basic scientific tenet. It is the foundation for science. Do you even know what the null hypothesis is? based upon your statements above, I would say you clearly do not. But perhaps, as we all tend to do at times, you “posted in haste, and are repenting in leisure”?
You clearly are losing it. Even your link shows the error of your statement
00
For clarity, please state what you think this is.
00
Hey, Blimey,
You know what? Let’s waltz this thread through 500 comments.
OK, everything you just said. I didn’t read it. But you apparently haven’t finished grade 10. So I know it was sophomoric.
Just answer one question (yeah, I know you can’t) with a single number and a supporting link.
BY HOW MUCH WILL AN AUSTRALIAN CARBON TAX SLOW GLOBAL WARMING?
00
Robert:
September 27th, 2011 at 3:09 am
So true. I suppose only someone who has never travelled much out the their shire could imagine that the US (pop. 307 million), India (pop 1.4 billion) and China (pop 1.6 billion) look to Australia (population 22 million) for moral or political authority on anything other than the best way to toss a bowl of prawns on the barbie.
That said, the only real question is by how much is the Australian carbon tax going to restrain global warming? We’ve asked this question a dozen times on this thread and the Carbon Tax supporters here all seem to agree in both their replies and non-replies: ZERO.
So, what in the hell is the multi-billion dollar carbon tax for if not to slow global warming?
Well, besides the delusion of self-righteous patriotic duty to be a global leader in bashing your economy. It seems as if there is this almost spiritual appeal of economic self-flagellating. A kind of group karma purification ritual for past imagined sins against Gaia. Like a saying sorry ritual, but far more expensive… We shred multi-billions dollars of our nation’s wealth and we’ll all feel better. Even the most committed Alarmist knows it will have zero effect on the climate, but it’s really the care of the soul we are attended to here.
So much for all the peer-reviewed science crapola. In the end, the carbon tax comes down nothing more than a superstitious purification ritual, although I suppose that some one some where hopes to get very rich and powerful might also be a driving force. Maybe we should follow the money?
Let’s hope that Gaia is pleased by our humble sacrifice.
00
@wes george, I suggest you start reading because I already answered this question.
00
No you didn’t. You made up a lame excuse. Epic Fail. The answer is in the form of a number with a link to a citation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dWSDCjlaoc
So I’m giving you another chance, trollboy.
00
Or it could be that he just has a more mature, considered perspective on you question and considers it irrelevant to any discussion on Carbon Pollution and Response to same??
00
You’ll be pleased to know She is Wes!! We got the vibe strongly at the Collective meeting last night. That’s how she speaks to us you know.
00
Yes, Gaia is pleased.
But do you know what time it is?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ML1OZCHixR0&feature=related
00
Blimey @485 –
I have already asked you several times to state it. Why are you trying a bait and switch now? Since you maintain it has been disproven, you should have no problem stating what was disproven.
Or do you not know what it is?
00
Past my bed time anyway.
But in that home vid you linked to, which ones you??
00
I’m the bone tossed into the sky.
00
and so are you.
00
Where we shall land, nobody knows.
00
Really, i had you picked as the tosser??
00
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwoaT5KL860
00
500 comments, Jo Nova’s blog rocks!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yb_juTPQJUc
00
Catamon 491,
Really? I thought you would use an ouja board like everyone else.
00
What a lovely way to debate? You’re kidding, right? You wouldn’t make a pimple on a debater’s ass! You are a hypocrite who uses terms he does not even comprehend (null hypothesis) and, based upon your performance, never took a course in logic or rhetoric! How else can anyone explain your clueless comments?
Allow me to illustrate how, when it comes to the science, you could not find your ass with both hands!
As usual, you reveal the depth of your ignorance.
An article from a propaganda artist? Most unimpressive! Then again, at least you didn’t cite any non peer reviewed literature from the IPCC. You are always harping on about peer reviewed literature and yet 30% of the IPCC report is not peer reviewed.
You post a link and we are supposed to be convinced? What about Enting’s critique? Again, you demonstrate an inability to form a cogent thought or articulate a reasoned argument based upon your analysis of Enting’s critique. Why? Because you lack the intelligence and acumen to do so! Typical troll.
A bit hasty? You should have written “I don’t think before I post”. How do you know if the guy blogged? You are so ignorant it is mind boggling! Are you so obtuse that you missed the point completely? Let me explain it to you simply so that you might possibly grasp the point I made: The consensus was shattered. Science is never done by consensus. Even a simpleton could get that but not you, Blimey! Here is a question to occupy your time, is or is not virtually all the advances in science made by dispelling and overturning a long held consensus? Yes or no?
Wow, more imbecilic drivel! Another vague unsubstantiated statement! We came out of the LIA 150 years ago and temperatures have yet to rise to levels seen prior to its advent. The LIA was preceded by the MWP, a time when temps were higher and yet CO2 levels were lower. A theory that includes GHG’s? Can you show me any statement from a recognized, reputable skeptic who states that CO2 does not have an impact on climate?
You are so intellectually lazy you couldn’t even google null hypothesis.
However, you can google to commit plagiarism! You imbedded two links from Sicre and Paulsen which, when I clicked on them, took me to abstracts for their papers. You also made the following comment
And from http://www.skepticalscience.com/Common-graphical-tricks-and-the-Medieval-Warm-Period.html
Give credit where it is due. Next time, at least use quotation marks!
Wow! Blimey writes, “Bullshit you have otherwise you wouldn’t be asking the questions that you do.” and “I thought you said you read the IPCC report? It appears not so I call “bullshit” once more.”
Go see the wizard of Oz and get a real brain! I don’t like your link to the anti Nova site. I want you to get “Everlast” tattooed on your forehead backwards. That way, when you look into the mirror it will remind you that every time I see you making a fool of yourself on this site I am going to use you as an intellectual punching bag!
00
Eddy Aruda @ 502 – Don’t sugar it up for him! Tell Blimey what you really think!
Blimey is now officially just a bug-splat on the windscreen of the logic bus …
00
wes george:
Yes I answered your question in post 458. You’ve gone on in this and other threads asking the same old question over and over again.
And yet it’s you posting the same question over and over again in multiple threads even after it’s been answered. How ironic that you call me the troll.
00
PhilJourdan: says:
No, you have asked me to disprove the null hypothesis but you never clearly defined what you thought this meant. There are many Null Hypothesis so you will need to define what you are actually talking about first.
Asking someone to disprove the null hypothesis is like asking someone to “quantify it”. You need to know what the “it” is first.
00
eddy says:
You’re off to your usual start.
More than that, an article showing how Plimer got things completely backward when compared to the person he was citing.
Please let me know which great overturning of science was performed and published in a web-blog rather than using proper scientific research.
And what was the cause of the LIA and the cause of the return and how is that force operating today? Question you can’t answer, the science can’t explain how natural changes that caused the LIA are operating today. The climate changes for a reason, you ignore GHG forcing and wish so much for it to be something else … but you just can’t name it. You wish for some “magical force” to replace the known GHG forcings.
Again you say this as if there was NO doubt. Real scientists don’t, hence why there is much uncertainty about proxy temperature data.
http://www.ipcc.ch/graphics/ar4-wg1/jpg/fig-6-10.jpg
… but keep on wishing!!
You’ll need to find me a reputable skeptic first rather than you usual web-blogger youtube scientist variety.
Gee, google will tell me what PhilJourdan was thinking. I knew the search engine was good, but that good?
Embedding links is not plagiarism.
Or you can demonstrate a lack of lateral thinking. Perhaps that poster is me, perhaps that person “plagiarised” it from somewhere else.
If you have a whirlpool account (its free), the FIRST place this was written is here.
But please do feel free to avoid debating the point that CO2Science produces crap analysis.
I don’t feel the need when it’s something I wrote.
And you finish the way you started. More insults – zero evidence.
00
Blimey @ 504 – I read your comment and no you did not answer the question.
Blimey @ 505 – Avoiding the question – yet again.
Blimey @ 506 – No information that you present relates to the question at hand. A picture of a graph is about as useful as a picture of a $10 note.
00
Blimey @505
Again with the lies. Look at post 484. You will see I asked a direct question which you mocked but did not answer. Why? Are you afraid of the answer? Why lie when the truth is in black and white?
No, it is basic science. But the last part of your statement is the telling part. You clearly do not know what it is. And therefore have no idea what you are talking about.
00
Truthseeker says:
I quoted the question, I posted an answer. Just because it isn’t one you wanted doesn’t make it any less of an answer.
To those with no skills for understanding what the graph shows, then yes I agree. Do you have a problem understanding what it represents? Do you know what the different shaded areas mean?
00
PhilJourdan says:
I will continue to ask clarify what YOU mean by null hypothesis in this instance. Yes I do know what the term means, but each “null hypothesis” is different depending on what you are wishing to study.
So stop repeating yourself and define what you mean IN THIS INSTANCE.
btw: in 484 you say “#1 – I will simply assume you misspoke when you said “in decline” since 10k years ago we were in an ice age. We are not now. ice does not form in warm temperatures.” Looking at the evidence, ( http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Holocene_Temperature_Variations.png ) we were out of the ice age. And if you look at my post, I actually said that from between 8 and 10 thousand years ago which was well after the end of the ice age.
00
You are an inveterate LIAR, Blimey! When you plagiarize you may have “typed it” but you still plagiarized the skeptical science website. The next time you do that all you have to do is highlight the text and then hold down the command and C keys while pressing enter!
You are condemned by your own words. Your imbedded links took me to the abstracts which did not contain what you typed. What you typed was contained on a different page on the site. I became suspicious when it appeared you were actually able to write with intelligence and style. When I cut and pasted a portion of the text it took me to this page http://www.skepticalscience.com/Common-graphical-tricks-and-the-Medieval-Warm-Period.html
You are pathetic. I have come to the conclusion that Jo allows you to post because you do an excellent job of discrediting and embarrassing the pro CAGW team. Unfortunately, your credibility has been thoroughly impeached by your plagiarizing and the lying about it.
This is what you posted
Do you really think that the viewers can’t click on the links? Are you the deluded?
You have been exposed for what you truly are, a lonely troll who can’t find a bridge to sleep under.
Let us see how you try to wiggle out of this one? Thanks for allowing me to intellectually pummel you in front of God and the whole world! Doing the community a service while relieving a little stress. Truly, a win, win situation!
Try doing a little research instead of ripping off hack propaganda sites. Then TRY to form an intelligent argument after you have researched the source material from the article you linked to. Or, are you too busy plagiarizing to do so?
As long as that anti nova site is up I will continue to tear you a new one! Got that?
As usual, you cannot even answer a simple question. Your answer is absurd, bizarre and undecipherable. Let me explain the basic concept of debate. You are the proponent and it is your job to prove your case. I do not need to put forward a counter theory. All I have to do is show that your argument is wrong, something you have already done for me. Since you are so big on “peer reviewed literature”, why are you not asking for it instead of “web blog” proof? I cited two examples that stumped you so you reply with your usual churlish tripe!
How lame! I don’t have to “name it”, you do as the burden of proof is on you. Just because we don’t know everything about the climate system doesn’t prove the CAGW hypothesis. You argument is illogical and fallacious, Argumentum ad ignorantiam (argument to ignorance). You argue that since we do not know all the variables and forcings you are right about CAGW. Why am I not surprised?
True, I did state that you imbedded two links but your statement is deceptive, dishonest and is a lie by omission as well as a straw man. I never wrote that imbedding links was plagiarism and you omitted the fact the you are a plagiarist for not giving credit to the author(s) you stole from. See the prima facia case I just laid out and try real, real hard to comprehend or better yet just keep digging that hole you are in!
You need somebody to explain a term you used? Quit being lazy and try and learn something for a change. I must admit you are quite adept at avoiding tough questions.
Intellectually speaking, you truly are the CAGW doormat that various commenters use to wipe the bottom of their shoes on.
00
@ Bimey
At #268 you imbedded two links to the same page. http://pages.science-skeptical.de/MWP/Sicre-2008.html The comments you imbedded the links in came from this page http://www.skepticalscience.com/Common-graphical-tricks-and-the-Medieval-Warm-Period.html. You plagiarized from the second link and imbedded the first link twice. There was no way for a reader to know that the comments you made were made by someone else. Then, you lied about it when I called you out on it.
So, Blimey, are you going to apologize to everyone for plagiarizing and then lying about it? I bet you’re breathing hard and sweating profusely in that ever shrinking little corner that you have painted yourself into?
00
Eddy Aruda says:
Gee, all that effort Eddy. Your foot is so far down your throat it must poking out your ass by now. 😉
I did write the comment and I have no intention of “citing” my own words. I’ll repeat them where and whenever I see fit.
The proof. I wrote a special message for you using the same login I always do.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/news.php?p=2&t=84&&n=1034#64111
Ahh, the foot still in your mouth I see. No need to look at the website, you can read Plimer’s book, read the paper he cited. The quotes I list above are from them, not from the website.
I understand you are frustrated Eddy.
Your inability to understand is not always someone else’s fault. 😉
The science cited by the IPCC report calculates the following forcings.
http://www.ipcc.ch/graphics/ar4-wg1/jpg/fig-2-23.jpg
You wish to remove the GHG component for no other reason than “I don’t like it” and replace it with “Something – but we don’t know what”.
00
As usual, you lie by omission and tell have truths. Here is the actual exchange
One more time, here is the question:
And this is not an answer but an evading question!
Since you claim to be here to discuss the science start answering the questions put to you or run the risk of being banned. Your answers are always evasive, vague and typical of a troll.
So, you are wining about me on skeptical science? What a sniveling little wimp! “Mommy, he made me look bad, boo hoo!”
I can’t wait to get to Australia!
00
Eddy Aruda:
See post 506, then try to further the debate rather than repeat yourself. My point is that whilst there are many revolutions in science, I’m not about to rely on some guy on the internet and his web page rather than experts in their field.
Like you evade answering the criticism of CO2Science’s MWP problems or like you avoid (or are incapable of) answering what GHG replacement is forcing temperatures upwards.
Yes it was fun to voice how you avoid the debate and instead simply repeat personal insults or make empty threats. It was also fun to show how you were wrong when you went off half cocked about citing my own words.
00
Blimet @510
You are not bill Clinton, nor is this an fawning media. The null hypothesis is a basic scientific principal. As such, it is simplicity itself and does not require legalese to understand or write. If you do not know what it is, admit it. I will be happy to explain it to you. However, your evasive tactics indicate you have no idea what it is, so you have no idea what you are talking about.
ignorance is bliss. It is the same in all instances. 0 does not change meaning when talking about goose eggs or feathers.
Doubling down on stupid does not advance a point. 10k years ago, the last great ice age ended. You may think that god (or algore) turns on a switch and the world is warm. It did not happen that way. The change has been gradual and steady over the last 10k years. It was not warmer 10k years ago than it is today. Not even Phil Jones maintains that idiocy.
00
Yoe are such a piss poor excuse for troll. As the exchange belew proves, I asked you a question and you responded with a question and not an answer. You are so ignorant that you couldn’t even punctuate it with a question mark.
A bit hasty? You … [edit: more whining removed] … Blimey! Here is a question to occupy your time, is or is not virtually all the advances in science made by dispelling and overturning a long held consensus? Yes or no?
Please let me know which great overturning of science was performed and published in a web-blog rather than using proper scientific research.
NOW ANSWER THE QUESTION AND QUIT EVADING!!!
I have already explained to you that the burden of proof is on you as the proponent. Are you too stupid to grasp such an elementary concept? Perhaps that would explain why you NEVER answer the tough questions put to you.
Btw, it is the sun, you dim bulb!
Wow! You are such a hypocrite! Any human being who reads your comments will see that you are an insincere, dishonest, despicable, ignorant troll who never answers the tough questions. Care to show me ONE intelligent, sincere comment you have ever made on this site? Just one? You are so filled with self loathing that you have nothing better to do than embarrass your side of the debate and reveal to all and sundry what an absolute waste of skin you are. Keep up the volunteer work. You had better hope that your controllers at skepticalscience don’t see the crap you write as they would be so embarrassed that they would take your troll union card away from you.
If I went off wrong on the quote all you had to do was tell me that you also post as Brendon. You are too small for that. Being the mental pigmy that you are you just kept droning on. You are here for “fun” and not to debate the science. If you were your comments would have been polite from the beginning. How sad you choose to live an ignominious life. Actually, you have no life and the fact that I am reminding you of it really upsets you.
00
Funny, the list sounds just like some of the ‘curly’ questions that creationist handouts tell their kiddies to throw at their underqualified science teachers. How far Plimer has come, from fighting the creotards, to emulating their tactics.
00
This book is written for people who would rather live in the fantasy land of [snip: you are welcome to post your opinions/ideas, but do so in a courteous way. Read the blog rules. Mod oggi] and not believe the last 3 decades of scientific research and raft of data from NASA, NOAA, BOM, CSIRO, IPCC and many thousands of scientists.
But hey who knows, maybe all of the scientists and leading academic institutions are wrong about the science and Ian Plimer, who is a director of 4 mining companies and part of an neoliberalist think tank is right?
All it takes is 30 minutes on google to find out that Plimer has been thoroughly debunked, as has Monkton. You people are just too lazy to use google.com/scholar or would rather live in ignorance of this serious problem that will affect future generations.
00
If Australian conservatives think the whole thing is a big hoax, why the hell are you supporting Tony Abbott’s direct action which is MORE EXPENSIVE than Gillard’s market based solution?
Abbott’s direct action, where the government sets up a department to process requests for compensation from big polluters for their costs for reducing emissions, puts the cost burden directly on the tax payer. Most scientists have already it’s less effective in abating emissions, many Australian economists and treasury have it’s more expensive (http://news.anu.edu.au/?p=9601). Are you so partisan that this utter joke of a policy somehow is a winner?
There comes a point when partisanship just makes you a flapping moron. When the Liberal party supports a Gough Whitlam-esque direct interventionist policy instead of a market based solution (market based ETS, a solution which John Howard, Malcolm Turnbull and Brendan Nelson were in favour of), you know things are upside down.
00
I wonder if this one will receive a “glowing” review like his previous work..
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/ian-plimer-heaven-and-earth/story-e6frg8no-1225710387147
Why doesn’t he publish his findings in a peer reviewed journal and proves the climate change scientists wrong? Because he isn’t about science, he is about staying at the fringe, cherry picking data and making disingenuous arguments for partisan conservatives without the willpower or desire to actually do any research into his claims.
00
Professor Plimey is one of the normal people in this world who do not believe the garbage that the Australian and world public are being fed. We live on the outskirts of Perth in Western Australia where we are constantly bombarded with advertisements about climate change, drought, floods and fire. In fact we received a better rainfall than in previous years, we used our air conditioning less as cool breezes come in as they did 50 years ago and we have beautiful bright blue skies and clean fresh air. How much carbon is supposed to be in the air and is it being measured on a very regular basis. Australia has just been lumbered with a carbon tax so when will this just to be trading something as acommodity, ie carbon trading. Incompetent Governments can put fear into children’s minds by simply telling them everything is going to die. That is a fact – trees die and a one grows in it’s place, people die for many different reasons but generally everything on earth regenerates and will continue to do so for thousands of years without the help of man. Nature is a wonderful healer.
00
Jim from Brisbane
One of the most poisonous people around is Michael Ashley, an astronomy professor from New South Wales. His technique (as with most of the warmist fanatics) is to discredit a book with several hundred pages and several thousand references on the basis of a single excerpt.
Ian Plimer had said that CO2 measurements were not particularly accurate. Ashley claimed that PRECISION MEASUREMENTS WERE OBTAINED FROM MAUNA LOA OBSERVATORY IN HAWAII AND THAT THESE WERE PRECISE.
In fact Ian Plimer was perfectly correct. There is so much undersea volcanic activity around Hawaai that 80% of the measurements have to be discarded as “outliers”.
00
All very interesting, entertaining, informative stuff. I have one question (for now) Where can I get a copy of the book in England?
00
What a difference a day made. Amazon now have, and are sending me, post haste, a copy of the book
00