John Cook wins award as Friend of Planet for feeding fallacies to school children

The Sydney Morning Herald lauds the Queensland Academic who won an award and busted four myths. The fake expert tosses out non-sequitur red herrings and strawmen, ignores some of the largest forces of nature in the solar system, trashes the scientific method. Give him a Nobel eh? John Cook still doesn’t appear to know about the most relevant surveys in his chosen field.

This week, the American National Center for Science Education gave Mr Cook its annual Friend of the Planet award, for outstanding work to advance the centre’s goals.

Evidently the centre’s goals include teaching kids that science is a form of opinion polling. Nah — who am I kidding, the primary goal is training kids to pay their science tax, to salute officials in lab coats, and prostrate themselves before Big-Gov, which after all, controls the weather.  Whatever else happens at schools, children must never ever question Big-Government Science. (That might lead them to question big-government grants!).

____________________

Lets unpack the mythical myth-busting

John Cook starts with a myth that isn’t a myth, and which isn’t science either:

MYTH BUSTED: There’s no scientific consensus on climate change

Despite getting a full time salary at UQ, Cook-the-consensus expert hasn’t done his reading and doesn’t know that almost half  of meteorologists are skeptics,  two-thirds of geoscientists and engineers are skeptics, and most readers of skeptical blogs (see the comments) have hard science degrees. The number of hard science degrees in the world would outnumber the number of “climate scientists” 100 to 1, or maybe a thousand to one. Ergo, the scientific world at large is skeptical of the small group in the new immature, unproven branchlet called “climate science” which so far hasn’t produced a moon shot, built any planes, or eradicated small pox. Climate science collectively fails to predict droughts, El Ninos, and barbeque summers, and fails to do it all over the world.

Cook qualifies the grandiose false statement in his next sentence. But he never corrects the headline message, indeed his whole career is built on the misunderstanding that four score climate scientists are “The Scientific Community” and represent a scientific consensus.

“The reality is that there’s 97 per cent agreement among climate scientists that human are causing global warming.

Does accuracy matter? Only as long as John can keep repeating misinformation most of the time.

But he hints that he is aware that scientists exist. So what does he call the thousands of science trained people who find minerals, build bridges and cure diseases — they’re “fake experts”:

The technique that is often used to cast doubt on this figure is to use fake experts, use people who have the impression of scientific expertise but don’t actually publish peer-reviewed research.

Methinks the best definition of a false expert is a psychologist telling us that he knows how much the world will warm because he’s done an opinion poll but never published a climate science paper.

The real fake expert is a man calling himself a science communicator when he doesn’t know what science is. Scientists don’t vote on the laws of physics. It’s about observations, Mr Cook. UPDATED: And speaking of observations, that 97% study he did, which he tried to hide the data for,  only shows a 0.3% consensus if we assess the abstracts by the definitions Cook set. Richard Tol took it and ERL apart.

“the Cook et al paper used an unrepresentative sample, can’t be replicated, and leaves out many useful papers. The study was done by biased observers who disagreed with each other a third of the time, and disagree with the authors of those papers nearly two-thirds of the time. About 75% of the papers in the study were irrelevant in the first place, with nothing to say about the subject matter. Technically, we could call them  “padding”. Cook himself has admitted data quality is low. “

____________________

MYTH BUSTED: Climate has changed in the past. What’s happening now must be natural as well

Cook uses a strawman fallacy to pretend there is a non-sequitur. The fake expert uses a fake fallacy…

This argument uses a logical fallacy known as a non sequitur, or jumping to conclusions.

“Just imagine if you walked into a room and you found a dead body with a knife sticking out of it’s back and you argued ‘well, humans have been dying of natural natural causes for thousands of years, so therefore, this person must have died of natural causes as well.’

Except that the leading skeptics don’t say that. They point to the millions of years when it’s been hotter, wetter, colder and higher in CO2 to show that the correlation is pathetic and only a Dunderhead C-grade Scientitwit would pretend that CO2 drove the climate when there are millions of counter examples to show the theory was wrong.

The main limpid thrust of Climate Scientists Inc is to declare that nothing else could have caused the latest warming. Yet their climate models can’t explain any of the other past warm blips that are a lot like this one.

____________________

MYTH BUSTED: The sun is causing global warming

“But the fact here is that over the last 30 years of global warming, sun and climate have been going in opposite directions.

The Sun couldn’t possibly change temperatures on Earth through changes in the solar wind, the spectrum or the magnetic field. And yet, with an 11 year delay there is this odd correlation for the last 200 years. Meh. Must be nothing.

Solar model, Climate change, 2016. TSI, Sunspots, global temperatures

Changes in Sunlight correlate with changes in Earths temperature 11 years later.

One day when climate scientists realize that the sun is more than just a ball of light, they will add other solar factors to their models, and years after that they might have models that can predict something.

____________________

MYTH BUSTED: Global warming stopped about two decades ago

“The fact here is that over the last few decades our planet has been building up heat at a rate of four atomic bombs per second.

“They’ll just cherry-pick small periods of a temperature record and say ‘hey look, over a very small period, temperature isn’t going up very much’ but it’s ignoring the bigger picture and it’s ignoring looking at our climate system as a whole, all the heat building up in our system.”

Cook”debunks” the myth with a lame red-herring, and converts pathetically small degrees Celsius into an irrelevant big scary number of joules. Suddenly global warming is global jouling — should we pay billions to stop these extra joules? Given that the sun is dumping 500 times as many atomic bombs on us every second — maybe not. A real scientist might wonder if we can even measure this tiny sliver of “extra joules”. We have one thermometer per 250,000 cubic kilometers of ocean and we’re looking for changes of a hundreth of a degree. Dear John, the error bars laugh at your 4 atomic bombs and The Sun just blows them away.)

Hiroshima bombs, Atomic bombs, Climate change, 2016. Skepticalscience.com.

To sum up myth 4, Cook resorts to a non-sequiteur, cherrypicked factoid that is a red herring, inconsequential, and probably doesn’t exist.

Those who can’t explain the pause, can’t explain the cause*.

Poor Jorge Branco, writer at the Sydney Morning Herald wasn’t trained to ask hard questions, didn’t do any research and produced exactly the kind of journalism we’ve come to expect from Fairfax — gullible soaking agitprop. Yawn.

*h/t The Hockeyschtick moniker – a great line.

9.6 out of 10 based on 78 ratings

179 comments to John Cook wins award as Friend of Planet for feeding fallacies to school children

  • #

    “The reality is that there’s 97 per cent agreement among climate scientists that human are causing global warming”

    Even I agree that there is some effect. The trillion dollar question is how much and based on my interactions with Cook, he is absolutely clueless.

    393

    • #
      el gordo

      ‘Even I agree that there is some effect.’

      Really, where are your positive feedbacks?

      120

      • #
        Mike

        “should we pay billions to stop these extra joules? Given that the sun is dumping 500 times as many atomic bombs on us every second”

        Just let the banks print trillions as an investment in their future instead of investing it here……….

        “Russia Hints At Nuclear War After US Deploys Ballistic Missile Shield”

        From: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-05-12/russia-hints-nuclear-war-after-us-deploys-european-anti-ballistic-missile-shield

        All those alleged tax payer dollars at work…

        101

      • #

        El gordo,

        The concept of positive feedback as developed by Bode, applied to the climate system by Hansen and Schlesinger and subsequently canonized by the IPCC does not apply to the climate system. Bode’s model measures input and feedback to determine how much output to deliver from an infinite source, while the climate system consumes its input and feedback to produce its output. The fact that they missed this basic COE constraint is why the consensus thinks it’s reasonable that 3.7 W/m^2 of incremental forcing can increase the surface emissions by more than 16 W/m^2 to affect a 3C temperature rise. All the extra power to support this is coming from the implicit power supply they fail to acknowledge because in their tiny minds, they think this power comes from amplifying the feedback.

        How GHG’s make the surface warmer is the same as how clouds do except that GHG’s are narrow band emitters and absorbers, while the water in clouds is a broad band emitter and absorber. Both slow down the release of photons emitted by the surface by intercepting them on the way out, temporarily storing that energy in the atmosphere ultimately to emit that energy out into space or return it to the surface. It’s this return path that adds to the post albedo input from the Sun to make the surface warmer than it would be otherwise and some of this return path comes from GHG’s, although the incremental effect from additional CO2 is relatively small and far smaller than the propaganda pushed by Cook.

        102

        • #
          el gordo

          We could debate this until the cows come home, its an academic exercise.

          More importantly AGW should make the coldest air masses warm the most, while the equatorial region would warm less. Its also of significance that if you put CO2 into a dry air mass you will get warming, but in a wet space there is no change.

          Anyway, Antarctica is getting colder.

          131

          • #

            It’s more than just an academic exercise, the “feedback fubar” I described is the keystone of CAGW science. Demonstrating that COE precludes any amount of positive feedback from causing even the low end of the claimed warming will cause the entire house of CAGW cards to collapse under its own heat.

            90

            • #
              el gordo

              Yeah well I prefer the frontal attack, the largest and driest desert in the world is getting colder.

              Are all the CO2 molecules huddled in the mid latitudes?

              80

              • #

                Citing local weather changes doesn’t work for the warmists, so I don’t think it will help the skeptics cause either. There are only a finite number of joules available, so when one location is transiently warmer than usual, another is necessarily cooler. Luckily, the long term, planet wide averages must still obey the laws of physics and since the variability cancels out, determining how these averages are affected by change is a much easier task.

                41

              • #
                Craig Thomas

                NASA says Antarctica is warming, El Gordo,
                http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view.php?id=36736

                I suppose you have some blogsite somewhere that you find to be a more reliable source than NASA?

                122

              • #
              • #
                Rereke Whakaaro

                NASA says Antartica is warming by at the rate of 0.12 degrees C per decade.

                Let me see, that equates to an average temperature change of 1.2 degree C per century

                Quick: Everybody Panic! No wait, don’t panic. This is based, “on the analysis of weather station and satellite data”.

                So the figure of less than the thickness of a mark on the thermometer, is actually derived from multiple sources, using algorithms that are not published, or if they are, are not referenced in the NASA gallery of pretty pictures.

                For a guy who doesn’t do humour, you are really very funny, you know?

                190

              • #
                el gordo

                ‘Citing local weather changes doesn’t work for the warmists, so I don’t think it will help the skeptics cause either.’

                Splitting hairs over sensitivity won’t win them over, but a graph might.

                http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/graphs/antarctic/Antarctic-ice-balance-A.gif

                Changes in local weather caused by natural forces would be of great interest to the brain washed masses.

                40

              • #
                AndyG55

                Not just RSS, but UAH.

                One run by a scentist, one run by other scientists that although being warmista, have yet to bend to massive data alteration.

                http://s19.postimg.org/426syuecz/UAH_So_Pol_March.png

                No warming in the southern ex-trops this century either..

                http://s19.postimg.org/6i8mcowfn/UAH_So_Extropical.png

                Yes.. some warming in the NH.. but there is NO GLOBAL WARMING !

                121

              • #
                AndyG55

                “I suppose you have some blogsite somewhere that you find to be a more reliable source than NASA?”

                Basically anywhere !!!

                131

              • #
                AndyG55

                And furthermore… NO WARMING in ANY of the reliable USA data sets since USCRN was set up in 2005. (USCRN even bought the rampant USHCN under control)

                http://s19.postimg.org/ps2geu8qb/USCRN_et_al.png

                91

              • #
                AndyG55

                In fact, the ONLY places there is a plotted warming trend (apart from El Nino spikes) this century, seems to be places where there is very little data and it has to be fabricated or otherwise “adjusted”.

                111

              • #
                James Bradley

                Craig,

                NASA writes *CSIRO climate research crucial because aerolsols are now the most important climate change factor.

                *Brent Holben, the project scientist in charge of NASA’s Aerosol Robotic Network.

                I thought it was supposed to be CO2, but hey soem say aerosols some say aresols…

                80

              • #
                AndyG55

                “*CSIRO climate research crucial because aerosols are now the most important climate change factor.”

                See, even NASA knows that there is a cooling period coming.

                81

              • #
                Raven

                I suppose you have some blogsite somewhere that you find to be a more reliable source than NASA?

                Well, given NASA happily link to John Cook’s consensus paper, you’d have to wonder how reliable they might be, eh? I mean . . did they even read it?
                Did they read any other paper they link to?

                Just think. How has it come to this.
                These people were once revered for putting a man on the moon.

                70

              • #

                El gordo,

                Splitting hairs over sensitivity won’t win them over, but a graph might.

                I don’t think that even a graph of real data will change minds. This one here unambiguously shows how the claimed sensitivity of 0.8C per W/m^2 arose from a linearization error and that the planet’s behavior from space, relative to the surface temperature, is so close to that of an ideal gray body that to consider the planet anything else is futile, moreover; the measured data is exactly what the SB law would predict for a gray body planet.

                http://www.palisad.com/co2/tp/fig1.png

                BTW the difference between the measured sensitivity of between 0.2 and 0.3 C per W/m^2 and the claimed sensitivity between 0.4 and 1.2C per W/m^2 is far from splitting hairs when the claimed sensitivity is on average more than 3x higher than measured. This is equivalent to someone claiming that the acceleration of gravity at the surface is closer to 30 m/sec^2 rather than the 9.8 m/sec^2 we measure. Don’t you think that this is a big enough difference to be extremely important?

                The problem is that climate science is so incredibly broken it defies comprehension and even many skeptics don’t understand that the LTE climate averages must trivially obey basic physical laws like COE and SB. Nobody who believes the CAGW narrative can accept that ostensibly intelligent scientists can be so incredibly wrong about something so important and with such far reaching consequences.

                The reason its so broken is due to compounding assumptions that have never passed the muster of adequate peer review, yet have become canonized by the IPCC.

                50

              • #
                el gordo

                CO2isnotevil

                On the ground the ordinary people I know won’t accept the ‘gray body’ theory and the MSM wouldn’t run it.

                ‘I don’t think that even a graph of real data will change minds.’

                Nevertheless we must continue to find a way through the fog in our different ways, after all the debate covers politics, commerce, law and science.

                Good luck with trying to convince the Klimatariat they got it wrong, I’ll continue my effort in persuading the common folk.

                10

    • #
      Bulldust

      Notwithstanding that opinion polls in science are meaningless, and ignoring that 97% of all relevant scientists would not support the hard CAGW hypothesis (the only one that warrants worry if true), it would not be difficult to explain a commonality of research opinion in any case, and it has nothing to do with science. Billion in funding is alike a massive magnet to which all the obedient climate science filings align. Presto! 97% Science not so much.

      As an economist I tend to follow the money and assume humans are malleable when under its influence. Some aren’t, of course, but they are the exception.

      131

      • #
        Mike

        Yep, “follow the money”.

        The moronicity of it all is that adherents of anthropomorphic (a climate in mans own image.) climate science are not concerned with things like deforestation, loss of biodiversity, accelerating extinction of species which includes microscopic creatures deemed not furry or cuddly enough to study and so on.

        The “exception” indeed.

        51

        • #
          Craig Thomas

          The day John Cook is discovered publishing something with as many mistakes as Richard Tol has been caught out for, is the day you might want to come back to criticising Tol.
          Check out just how …er…”unreliable” Tol is,
          http://www.desmogblog.com/2015/08/03/richard-tol-s-gremlins-continue-undermine-his-work

          325

          • #
            Bulldust

            Oh wow DeSmog … Richard Tol must be devastated.

            Once you come back with a web site that isn’t a professional smear site I will take notice. Way to lose any credibility.

            230

          • #
            RB.

            Many alarmists do not play a long with claims that every extreme climate event is due to AGW and stress that the real effects are yet to be felt.

            Somehow, with food crops increasing, tornadoes and hurricanes/cyclones decreasing, no evidence of change in rainfall around the globe and less than a degree of warming since the invention of the air conditioner, AGW is shown to have a negative effect on economies. You would have to be more than a little suspicious.

            110

          • #
            James Bradley

            Craig,

            He was.

            There are 11,994 mistakes in his consensus research.

            90

          • #
            Raven

            The day John Cook is discovered publishing something . .

            How is John Cook going to publish anything of note?
            He’s not a scientist . . he’s a cartoonist for heavens sake.

            70

      • #
        Rereke Whakaaro

        … humans are malleable when under its [billions in funding] influence. Some aren’t, of course, but they are the exception.

        I would hazard a guess, that the exception you mention would be the 3% of climate scientists, who do not have a share in the billions of dollars in funding. Presumably that is how the 97% figure is arrived at? It is the best concensus that money can buy.

        140

        • #
          Craig Thomas

          Got any facts to back up that ridiculous thesis?

          I thought not.

          220

          • #
            Rereke Whakaaro

            It’s called humour, Craig. In fact it was a cynicism, which is a creative form of humour, that is probably too advanced for you.

            It was made in response to the comment by Bulldust.

            I didn’t intend you to see the joke, let alone “get” the joke. You just inadvertently walked into it. I do not feel responsible for your discombobulation as a result.

            220

          • #
            Bulldust

            Andy Pitman used to list the millions upon millions he alone got in climate-related funding. Now that web page is nowhere to be found. Funny that. Must hide all that tasty lucre…

            100

          • #
            AndyG55

            Poor Craig.. You get seriously blistered every time you come here.

            Mainly because you never have anything to back up your childish rants.

            Are you a psychopathic masochist?

            111

  • #
    Yonniestone

    john Cook the Belle Gibson of climate science.

    282

    • #
      sophocles

      Careful Yonniestone, you might give him ideas.

      70

      • #
        Yonniestone

        Well he cured me of listening to d!#kheads.

        90

        • #
          Rereke Whakaaro

          Dirk Heads and the Scumbags were a pop group in the days of grunge. Imagine you being a fan?

          60

          • #
            Glen Michel

            Let us not forget the Fourskins. An old favourite 3 piece blues cover band called “Free Beer” . Pubs put out the board announcing ……..you guessed it!

            10

  • #
    graphicconception

    The Cook et al 97% survey shows that only 0.5% of the papers’ abstracts claim that man is mainly responsible. According to Legates et al this number drops to 0.3% when you double-check the abstracts. http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs11191-013-9647-9#/page-1

    Cook’s real skill, therefore, is managing to turn a 0.3% result into a 97% claim. Climate science at its best I would say. No wonder he got an award!

    The data is here. http://www.skepticalscience.com/tcp.php?t=home
    Look at the “First and second ratings by our team” then count up the number where the “Endorsement” level is 1.

    The rating system is explained in the “Supplementary Material”.
    (No, I don’t know why some reports numbers appear more than once!)

    332

    • #

      Good point. I get bored repeating the errors, but I updated the post with links. Thanks for poking me.

      UPDATED: And speaking of observations, that 97% study he did, which he tried to hide the data for, only shows a 0.3% consensus if we assess the abstracts by the definitions Cook set. Richard Tol took it and ERL apart.

      “the Cook et al paper used an unrepresentative sample, can’t be replicated, and leaves out many useful papers. The study was done by biased observers who disagreed with each other a third of the time, and disagree with the authors of those papers nearly two-thirds of the time. About 75% of the papers in the study were irrelevant in the first place, with nothing to say about the subject matter. Technically, we could call them “padding”. Cook himself has admitted data quality is low. “

      201

      • #
        Craig Thomas

        No, Tol got taken apart by each and every one of the researchers whose work he misrepresented.

        And unlike them, Tol has a history of publishing stuff riddled with errors – his 6 PCC complaints were rejected on the basis the criticism of his work was correct.

        122

        • #
          AndyG55

          WRONG.. Criticism was not correct….

          just not what the “journals” and the AGW propheteers wanted to have published.

          151

        • #
          Graeme No.3

          Craig:

          The essence of a professional fool is to have some relationship with the truth, but disguise it as nonsense. That way the message gets through. Merely mouthing obvious nonsense got medieval fools struck with thrown objects, knucklebones, stools, small dwarfs etc.
          I think you will either have to give up, or remain an amateur fool.

          140

        • #
          Mark D.

          I’ll wager that “Craig Thomass” will not return after this series of counters. He is an opportunist and his opportunity Left the building.

          30

  • #
    Fuel Filter

    Mebbie he went to school in some Deep Blue state here in the U.S. whose school districts are wedded to “Common Core”. (U.S. readers will understand this all too well. For all others Google may be your friend as long as you include words like “opponent” or “opposition” in your search parameters.)

    131

    • #
      David Maddison

      I am well aware of common core – a deliberate dumbing down of the US education system. Of course, the same thing is happening here in Oz.

      120

  • #
    ghl

    “Just imagine if you walked into a room and you found a dead body with a knife sticking out of it’s back and you argued ‘well, humans have been dying of natural natural causes for thousands of years, so therefore, this person must have died of natural causes as well.’
    The knife is evidence, without it we have:
    “Just imagine if you walked into a room and you found a dead body and you argued ‘well, humans have been dying of natural causes for thousands of years, but this person must have been stabbed”
    What is your evidence Mr Cook?

    222

    • #
      spangled drongo

      Yes, GHL, he blatantly invents his evidence like he invented his 97%.

      192

    • #
      PeterPetrum

      That is very clever, GHL. That really draws a comparison with the fact that the Warmists ignore the evidence of the recorded data.

      121

  • #
    Turtle of WA

    I loathe Cook’s ‘Skeptical Science’ blog. The very name is a con. The site is set up to make it seem that he has an answer to everything, to every objection.

    I like the way you take to it point by point Jo.

    A warmy friend who no longer speaks to me sent me a link to it years ago. This person was happy to be part of a climate protest, but was insulted that I tried to engage in an argument on the matter. Everything I said was apparently a ‘rant’.

    Don’t think, don’t argue, just believe. That’s the message.

    272

  • #
    AndyG55

    The problem is that “Global” warming is not “Global”.

    What we see is an increase in night-time temperatures, mostly in the Northern Hemisphere, towards the Pole. We do not see a matching rise in summer temperatures, nor do we see a rise in Southern Hemisphere temperatures.

    This pattern of warming CANNOT be due to CO2, because we are told that CO2 is WELL MIXED globally. The warming should be global as a result, but it is not global. This represents one of many failed predictions of the CO2 theory of Global Warming.

    In Science, when a theory gets a prediction wrong, that is PROOF, not simply evidence, but PROOF that the theory is wrong.

    The CO2 thought-bubble of Global Warming predicts that the warming will be Global. However, the observed warming is not global, it is concentrated in night-time temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere. This is not and was not predicted by the CO2 thought-bubble, which is conclusive proof that the thought-bubble is wrong.

    If humans are the cause, and this is a big if, because we have no idea what caused the Little Ice Age, nor why things are warming up since the LIA

    I have shown that in the satellite data, (the only data that hasn’t undergone massive “adjustments™”), the ONLY warming is from El Nino events.

    And we all know that El Nino events have nothing to do with CO2 and are actually ocean COOLING events.

    The oceans have just had a major cooling event, and the recharge from the sun will not be as quick as it has been over the last 80 or so years of strong solar cycles.

    With the delays that David Evans is trying to identify, I think we will see a significant cooling over the next couple of decades which should really rub egg into the face of twerps like John Cook.

    353

    • #
      KinkyKeith

      After reading and being bombarded through the media by gushing commentators that state the current warmer mantra it’s good to read something sensible and real.

      The present hype about “renewables” doing so well that they will replace coal fired power soon is very disturbing.

      Propaganda will never lead to the replacement of traditional power generation but it will sure suck in a lot of voters.

      The counter to propaganda is dissemination of the truth of science.

      191

      • #
        Yonniestone

        I can see many Cassandra’s in the near future lamenting over the unnecessary deaths due to colder winters and the disappearance of reliable power sources that would have prevented them, unless our evil ideals prevail.

        160

      • #
        Manfred

        ‘The counter to propaganda is dissemination of the truth of science’ … and revealing the propaganda lies whoever, wherever, whenever.

        Facebook, Microsoft aim to shift the nation to green energy

        Coming to a place near you: “Facebook, Microsoft and environmental groups started a national effort Thursday to drive utilities to make purchasing renewable energy easier, which they say is surprisingly difficult in most states. The Renewable Energy Buyers Alliance, or REBA, was created to lead the effort as a federation of groups, and primarily big technology companies, seek to make renewable energy more available in all states.”

        A look at the Renewable Energy Buyers Alliance Agenda of the 2016 RENEWABLE ENERGY BUYERS
        ALLIANCE SUMMIT, highlights the players – the sponsors include the WWF.

        Little wonder then that Facebook feel compelled to kontrol the information – no surprises really, all expectations predictably fulfilled:

        Facebook workers routinely suppressed news stories of interest to conservative readers from the social network’s influential “trending” news section, according to a former journalist who worked on the project.”

        It will be equally unsurprising to watch the Panama Papers reveal the Green ‘interests’ – if only the Fourth Estate could be relied upon not be be got at by same interests?

        90

    • #
      sophocles

      we have no idea what caused the Little Ice Age,

      Quite the contrary, there are lots of ideas about the cause of the Little Ice Age, and lots of indicators for possible reasons for those causes, but, so far, no incontrovertible evidence.

      80

    • #
      Graeme No.3

      Andy:
      The increase in minimum temperatures but not maximum ones as a sign of warming is not new. Reid Bryson pointed this out in the 1960’s based on records kept at several US Army forts in the west of the USA in 1840-1880. And the rise in CO2? Negligible.**
      Having said that the last time I bothered looking at the NASA figures they had no increase in the minimum temperature form 1880 to 1964. Given the undoubted warming in that time, glacier retreat, arctic ice melting, record temperatures, tree lines heading north in Canada & Russia, opening of Alpine passes etc. it seems that the first (roughly) 50 ppm of CO2 does nothing but the next 25ppm. causes rapid warming, followed by a pause while its gets its breath back.

      ** my spell checker kept insisting on negligee! But that means something easily seen through.

      30

  • #
    FIN

    and doesn’t know that almost half of meteorologists are skeptics, two-thirds of geoscientists and engineers are skeptics, and most readers of skeptical blogs

    Dont forget that 60% of hairdressers, 62% of beauticians and and a whopping 75% of Thai bar girls are skeptical of climate science too.

    (You want this stupid comment posted,why?) CTS

    026

    • #
      FIN

      Dear Moderator, I would have thought it was pretty obvious.
      Oh, I forgot, 82% of the boys down at the pub think it’s crap too.

      023

    • #

      No CTS, this is perfect. This is the best FIN can do, and he can’t tell the difference between a hairdresser and a meteorologist.

      FIN-the-anonymous is programmed to do scorn and derision. All hail his Gods of Climate Science, for they hath achieved so little but know so much!

      No offense intended to hairdressers.

      261

    • #
      AndyG55

      wow, That’s a lot of people.

      no wonder the whole farce is coming slowly to an end.

      121

    • #
      Mike

      It is not actually a stupid comment. It is that there are many who are not qualified who are doing a vastly better job of observing that talking about the weather is not going to prevent the worsening environmental mess that has nothing to do with or not caused by the climate.

      Namely, the rate of extinction, deforestation, land degradation, and so on.

      With respect to those aforementioned few areas of environmental holocaust, talking about the climate is merely a diversion.

      Climate change needs to be exposed as not being a suitable form of environmentalism to address present environmental catastrophe//

      41

    • #
      PeterPetrum

      Actually Fin, if your “data” was factual, it would just demonstrate that the man (or woman) in the street is a great deal smarter than your warmist team. The average person after 20 years of no temperature trend in Australia, is becoming tired of the continual scare tactics and just does not notice them any more?

      140

      • #
        FIN

        after 20 years of no temperature trend

        I think you best look at the data again Peter. Seems you’ve missed something.

        But we are bored that you don’t research or link to substantiate your comments. Life on Earth depends on it, what eh, so can’t you do a few minutes of effort to produce a real argument? – Jo

        120

        • #
          Rereke Whakaaro

          I think Peter left a key word out.

          I suspect he meant to write, “The average person, after 20 years of no perceptable temperature trend …”

          Humans cannot physiologically detect temperature changes or trends measured in hundredths, or even tenths of a degree C. That is what we are talking about FIN, isn’t it? A number that is true from a technical perspective, but is meaningless on the scale of human existance.

          I breed Angus cattle as a hobby, and I know bovine excrement when I see it.

          90

        • #
          AndyG55

          There is, in fact, NO WARMING in the satellite record except for El Nino events.

          Once you realise this, you have to accept that CO2 has absolutely NOTHING to do with the tiny amount of NATURAL warming since the Little Ice Age.

          Don’t believe me??

          Then look at the satellite record before the 19998 El Nino..

          http://s19.postimg.org/f3dhdpmlv/UAH_before_El_nino.png

          And then between the end of that El Nino in 2001, and the start of the current one at the beginning of 2015.

          http://s19.postimg.org/nmwvbguyb/UAH_after_El_nino.png

          See, NO WARMING in either period, maybe even some cooling in the second period.

          That means that there is NO CO2 WARMING SIGNAL at all in the whole 37+ years of the satellite data.

          60

        • #
          AndyG55

          “after 20 years of no temperature trend in Australia”

          Which is absolutely TRUE.

          As usual….. FACTS and DATA are not your friend, Fin !!!

          http://s19.postimg.org/gqalfdnlf/Australia_1996_now.png

          50

    • #
      M Conroy

      In my experience, FIN, the only people who have absolute unwavering faith in the Catastrophic Global Warming scene, or even just plain old Terrible Global Warming, are the same college kids who must be given “trigger” warnings when such unpleasantness as studying for exams, tidying the room and paying the rent come up.

      Then there are those who have nothing better to do than panic all day, every day, over overly-imagined nightmares and phantasms. The ones who see chemicals in the clouds.

      Added in, of course, are those scientists who need the money to pay for the educations of these children, a few greedy goats, and more than a few power-hungry momma- and poppa- wanna-bees. You know, the type who know best, and must make certain the rest of us know they know best?

      Most of the people I know actually don’t give a rat’s. They have jobs to do, bills to pay, families to raise, pets to walk, laundry and dishes to wash. Toenails to clip. You know, lives.

      80

  • #
    Manfred

    Tragic, ignorant and excruciatingly myopic as The Fourth Estate unfailing demonstrate their negligence and intellectual low wattage yet again. The concluding train wreck that is printed journalism is very fortunately close to the final buffers. Then the likes of Jorge Branco at the Sydney Morning Herald may have to chose between flipping burgers and starting his own blog, or better, just retiring to Latte-ville on his substantial pay out.

    Of course they’d give Cook an award for dumbing down – it’s standard practice for cultural marxists and vital to The Cause. Nevertheless, one unintended consequence may be that many of the next generation of bred slacktivists will realise that they will face the difficult task of late personal development and a desperate need to reinvent themselves as scientists.

    Cook may not realise it yet, but he’s grooming the assassin cadre that will repudiate the Green Establishment.

    152

    • #
      Mike

      “that will repudiate the Green Establishment.”

      The-Carbon-Green-Establishment. A form of environmentalism that is grooming people into thinking that environmentalism is not about saving forests and so on.

      20

      • #
        Mike

        The first way to identify an assasin is to name it.

        It is amazingly counterproductive to allow it to masquerade as the real thing.

        Maybe you can think of a better name than Carbon Green, and frankly “warmist” is not good enough.

        20

      • #
        ROM

        Mike @ #9.1

        The-Carbon-Green-Establishment. A form of environmentalism that is grooming people into thinking that environmentalism is not about saving forests and so on.

        An interesting comment Mike and one which is right in line with some commentary and opinion articles I have been reading on the greens and environmentalists of the last couple of months particularly that coming out of Europe where the heart and driver of the greens and environmentalism is based.

        There is a major split brewing in the environmental / green movement as the “greenpeaces” and hard left “environmentalist” movement are now clearly showing that the concern for the environment is just a front and a show piece to further their grandiose designs on a power grab at some level, preferably as high up the global power ladder as possible.

        examples; Battle Over Fracking Triggers Green Civil War

        30

  • #
    gnome

    I’ve decided to review the existence of John Cook using warmist methods. Since mankind has been on the planet in its current form for tens of thousands of years and Cook is only about 40, statistically he doesn’t even exist yet and can be totally ignored.

    The model is clear. No cherry picking dates of birth or other statistical sophistry will convince me otherwise.

    191

  • #
    handjive

    Facts.

    The fact here is that over the last few decades our planet has been building up heat at a rate of four atomic bombs per second.” – John Cook

    The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment, and it is a travesty that we can’t…. Our observing system is inadequate.” – Kevin Trenberth

    Facts are meaningless. They can be used to prove anything.” – Homer Simpson

    And that’s a fact.

    171

    • #
      el gordo

      In a new paper Mann admits there is a pause.

      ‘We conclude that the internal variability of the North Pacific, which played a critical role in the slowdown, does not appear to have been predictable using statistical forecast methods.’

      Michael Mann et al (WUWT)

      140

    • #
      handjive

      Fact or Fiction?

      2013: In some ways Kevin Trenberth personifies that consensus.

      He’s been part of the IPCC since its early days in the 1990s and is outspoken in defense of the science.

      That includes the current plateau in global temperature.

      Trenberth says, in fact, the planet has continued to warm during this time — but the heat has been flowing into the oceans, which have a vast capacity to absorb it.

      Some goes into the deep oceans where it can stay for centuries.

      2014, NASA: Lack of ocean heat puzzles Nasa

      Washington – The deep ocean may not be hiding heat after all, raising new questions about why global warming appears to have slowed in recent years, said the US space agency on Monday.

      Scientists have noticed that while greenhouse gases have continued to mount in the first part of the 21st century, global average surface air temperatures have stopped rising along with them, said Nasa.

      Some studies have suggested that heat is being absorbed temporarily by the deep seas, and that this so-called global warming hiatus is a temporary trend.

      But latest data from satellite and direct ocean temperature measurements from 2005 to 2013 “found the ocean abyss below 1 995m has not warmed measurably,” Nasa said in a statement.

      160

  • #
    pat

    Cook is not alone!

    9 May: National Center for Science Education (NCSE): Friend of Darwin and Friend of the Planet awards for 2016
    NCSE is also pleased to announce the winners of the Friend of the Planet award for 2016: Katharine Hayhoe of Texas Tech University; Dana Nuccitelli and John P. Abraham, who contribute the Climate Consensus – the 97% column to the Guardian; and Skeptical Science, a website devoted to explaining climate change science and rebutting global warming misinformation created and maintained by John Cook of the University of Queensland.
    “All of the Friends of the Planet for 2016 shine as climate communicators, in different but complementary ways,” Reid explained. “Katharine Hayhoe excels at building connections between science and society and Dana Nuccitelli and John Abraham have consistently provided timely commentary on the latest developments. And Skeptical Science is simply unrivaled as a vast, up-to-date, and in-depth source of accurate and accessible information on climate change science.”…
    Previous recipients of the Friend of the Planet Award include Michael Mann, Naomi Oreskes, and the Alliance for Climate Education.
    http://ncse.com/news/2016/05/friend-darwin-friend-planet-awards-2016-0017058

    11 May Guardian: Guardian contributors win Friend of the Planet award
    Environmental writers John P Abraham and Dana Nuccitelli have won the National Center for Science Education (NCSE)’s Friend of the Planet award.
    Abraham and Nuccitelli were honoured for their contributions to the Guardian’s Climate Consensus – 97% blog and Skeptical Science’s website…
    http://www.theguardian.com/gnm-press-office/2016/may/10/guardian-contributors-win-friend-of-the-planet-award

    previous recipients of the Friend of the Planet Award include Michael Mann, Naomi Oreskes, and the Alliance for Climate Education – NCSE website

    Directors includes: Benjamin D. Santer — Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
    Supporters includes: James Hansen, Bill McKibben, Bill Nye, James Randi, Neil deGrasse Tyson, etc… – Wikipedia: National Center for Science Education

    110

    • #
      AndyG55

      Seems they get these “Friends of the planet” awards from a little wooden outhouse.

      Recycled paper, of course.

      191

    • #
      Glen Michel

      An early morning emetic.Jeez is nothing sacred anymore.

      10

      • #
        AndyG55

        “An early morning emetic.”

        Then use the outhouse, not the inside one…

        .. for everyone’s sake…..PLEASE !!!

        10

  • #
    Albert

    I read from NASA that the other planets were also warming when Earth was warming
    I’ve seen no extreme of weather/climate worse than that which has visited anywhere on Earth in the past 2 centuries
    Al Gore made 2 false predictions of ”ice free” Arctic
    https://opentheword.org/2014/09/01/the-arctic-melt-myth-seven-years-ago-al-gore-predicted-the-arctic-would-be-ice-free-he-was-wrong/
    Al Gore, Nobel Prize winner, said ”the interior of the Earth is several millions of degrees” he was dead wrong
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14kNtnJgXXM

    80

  • #
    stan stendera

    I really would like to comment about Mr. Cook. Unfortunately if I did so Jo would ban me from ever commenting at her wonderful site. She might even block my URI from viewing her site. She might even send out a special force team to “neutralize” me. Enough, I’ll shut up.

    70

    • #
      stan stendera

      Seriously, I object to the skeptic web sites not calling a spade a spade and calling out the warmists for what they are: (self snip). I have had this same argument with Anthony at WUWT.

      80

  • #
    Rod Stuart

    With friends like Cook the planet does not require any enemies.

    80

  • #
    PeterPetrum

    The reality is that there’s 97 per cent agreement among climate scientists that human are causing global warming.”

    The reality is that there’s 97 per cent agreement among some climate scientists that human are causing global warming.

    There – fixed it

    110

    • #
      ICT558

      The reality is that there’s 97 per cent agreement among some climate scientists that some human are is causing global warming.

      There – fixed it, I think.

      20

      • #
        Mark D.

        There is 97% agreement amongst them that receive funding, that they should continue to be funded…….

        There, it is fixed permanently.

        10

  • #
    Ruairi

    The ‘climate-change-science-from-hell’,
    Which has warmists under a spell,
    To believe their false creed,
    Has a compelling need,
    To initiate children as well.

    151

  • #
    pat

    no doubt a candidate for a Nobel!

    12 May: ClimateChangeNews: Ed King: Erik Solheim: Meet the man tasked with protecting Planet Earth
    Incoming UNEP chief will use ***experience mediating Sri Lanka peace process to build broad coalition committed to greener economy
    “I want to inspire. If people are inspired they will work hard and well.”…
    In Steiner’s time, UNEP’s tent has expanded, notably drawing in executives from HSBC and other banks to try and push for a new, sustainable financial system.
    Under Solheim we can expect that to expand further…
    “People with a proper knowledge of the finance system, banking and insurance are more likely to advise us best on how we change the markets so we can see a rapid greening of the economy,” he says…
    He expects climate and development sectors, so often seen as separate entities, to steadily converge as work implementing the 17 Sustainable Development Goals begins.
    That will anger those who see climate finance as a form of reparations to poorer nations suffering from the high carbon lifestyles of the West, but on this Solheim is clear: they must converge.
    “There’s an unbelievable separation, one tribe doing climate and one doing development. We need to bring it together – there can be no difference,” he says.
    “Every single cent spent by OECD nations on climate – except Luxembourg – is from ODA [overseas development aid]. There is no way you can separate them in reality.”…
    http://www.climatechangenews.com/2016/05/12/erik-solheim-meet-the-man-tasked-with-protecting-planet-earth/

    may his new position also end in ***”utter failure”:

    Wikipedia: Erik Solheim is a Norwegian politician for the Socialist Left Party (SV). He was appointed Minister of International Development in 2005 and also Minister of the Environment in 2007, and sat in both offices until 2012. Solheim was leader of the Socialist Youth from 1977 to 1981, party secretary from 1981 to 1985, and member of the Parliament of Norway from 1989 to 2001. He was party leader from 1987 to 1997. Until being appointed minister, he worked as a diplomat and a participant in the Norwegian delegation that unsuccessfully attempted to resolve the Sri Lankan Civil War before the outbreak of Eelam War IV…
    His attempts of peacemaking was in the end unsuccessful, with the Asian Tribune concluding that “his handling relationship with Sri Lanka” was an ***”utter failure”…
    In May 2016, it was announced that Solheim was appointed Executive Director of the United Nations’ Environment Programme (UNEP). He will take over from Achim Steiner.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Solheim

    40

  • #
    pat

    btw Solheim also helped set up the failed UN market-based programme REDD, which even CAGW believers at REDD-Monitor called out (WITH LINKS):

    Feb 2016: REDD-Monitor: Chris Lang: REDD is dead. What’s next?
    A new paper in Conservation Biology starts with the following sentence: “Increasingly, one hears furtive whispers in the halls of conservation: ‘REDD+ is dead; it’s time to cut our losses and move on.’”
    The paper builds on a 2013 editorial in Conservation Biology that identifies REDD as a conservation “fad”. The authors of the editorial, Kent Radford (previously Vice President of Conservation Strategies at the Wildlife Conservation Society), Christine Padoch and Terry Sunderland (both at CIFOR), define fads as “approaches that are embraced enthusiastically and then abandoned”…
    The carbon market isn’t paying for REDD
    While there are many REDD pilot projects around the world, only a handful of these receive payment through voluntary carbon markets. Most of the money comes from multilateral and bilateral aid agencies, including the World Bank, the UN-REDD programme, and the Norwegian government…
    The authors write that the REDD mechanism’s “original promise to generate a global market in carbon credits is already effectively finished”…
    http://www.redd-monitor.org/2016/02/04/redd-is-dead-whats-next/

    Champion of the Earth, no less:

    OECD: Erik Solheim cites as one of his most important achievements his role in establishing the UN REDD, the global coalition to conserve the world rain forests. He has received several awards for his work on climate and the environment, including UNEP’s “Champion of the Earth” award.
    http://www.oecd.org/dac/dacchaireriksolheim.htm

    20

  • #
    Egor TheOne

    John (cooker of the books) Cook , from the University of Marxism , ceo of Septic Science and Visionary of Climate BS .

    The only just reward he is without question well deserved of is : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straitjacket#mediaviewer/File:Straitjacket-rear.jpg (His NWO Uniform)

    And compare notes with the other climate visionaries such as Tim (full of Dud predictions)Flannery !

    51

  • #
    Egor TheOne

    Maybe John Cook BS ( as in full of ) can explain this find > http://www.climatechangedispatch.com/scientist-reveals-inconvenient-truth-to-alarmists.html

    How many Hiroshima bombs this time Mr BSer ?

    60

    • #
      TdeF

      Excellent article. You have to love this observation “one broadly recognized universal tip for those seeking government funding. All proposals with any real prospects for success should somehow link climate change with human activities rather than to natural causes. Even better, those human influences should intone dangerous consequences.”

      70

    • #

      Shouldn’t that be John, the Cook, BS, using a ‘biblical’ term to suit his agenda.

      30

  • #
    TdeF

    The Cook paper is silly enough, claiming that 97% of those who express an opinion agree with his opinion but that the 60% who do not express an opinion are in agreement too?

    “Of note is the large proportion of abstracts that state no position on AGW. This result is expected in consensus situations where scientists ‘…generally focus their discussions on questions that are still disputed or unanswered rather than on matters about which everyone agrees’

    Again his amazing logic and another admission of failure
    “the fundamental science of AGW is no longer controversial among the publishing science community.. This is supported by the fact that more than half of the self-rated endorsement papers did not express a position on AGW in their abstracts.”

    He also argues scientific reticence, ELSD ‘erring on the side of least drama’ held back support for his argument. However if the ‘science’ is no longer controversional, why is there reticence to express an opinion. If anything, the 4 papers which dare disagree are the ones risking their jobs as ‘the science’ is settled, according to Cook. However in Cook’s view of science opinion is everything.

    I would rather stick with Galileo agains the Cook model of manufactured consensus

    “I believe that good philosophers fly alone, like eagles, and not in flocks like starlings. It is true that because eagles are rare birds they are little seen and less heard, while birds that fly like starlings fill the sky with shrieks and cries, and wherever they settle foul the earth beneath them.”

    120

    • #
      AndyG55

      ““I believe that good philosophers fly alone, like eagles, and not in flocks like starlings. It is true that because eagles are rare birds they are little seen and less heard, while birds that fly like starlings fill the sky with shrieks and cries, and wherever they settle foul the earth beneath them.””

      The bold section is an incredibly accurate description the average CAGW alarmista.

      111

      • #
        Mike

        Lord Kelvin:

        “I can state flatly that heavier than air flying machines are impossible.”

        30

      • #
        Annie

        I’ve often thought of starlings as the ‘spivs’ of the bird world! Actually, close up, they have some lovely colours in their feathers and they can be very entertaining to watch.

        10

        • #
          michael hart

          Yes, they do indeed have an unrecognised beauty. And the flocking/swarming swirls they display have a wonderful mathematical elegance (except when they fly overhead).

          00

    • #
      Yonniestone

      97% of women agree Yonniestone is alluring.

      60% don’t realise the above. Y Stone et al 2016.

      60

      • #
        Rereke Whakaaro

        That is because they don’t know you, the way that we do, Yonnie.

        60

      • #
        AndyG55

        “97% of women agree Yonniestone is alluring”

        And 3% of men……

        ….. that makes 100% of the population. 😉

        40

  • #
    dean

    Off topic, but can anyone show me the link which shows the AEMO 30 minute generation by energy source type.

    Some people have shown how much of the total electricity generation comes from renewables and I cannot seem to find it on the website.

    Thanks

    30

  • #
    pat

    i see Cook more as an enabler, like ABC, which has 3 writers for the follwing but devotes more space to the pro-wind side, & describes one protesting farmer as being “disappointed” when he is, in fact, “gutted”:

    11 May: ABC Central West: Controversial 77-turbine central tablelands Crudine Ridge Wind Farm approved by NSW Government
    by Gavin Coote, Sally Bryant and Lauren Millar
    Plans for a wind farm on the New South Wales central tablelands have been given the green light despite vocal opposition from nearby residents.
    The Department of Planning received 120 submissions, many of them raising concerns about traffic, safety and noise issues.
    Several residents told a commission hearing at Pyramul in February that the project had caused deep divisions (LINK) within the community.
    The commission said while the wind farm would create some noise, it was confident the conditions being imposed on the project would allay concerns…
    Sheep-breeding family ‘gutted’ by decision
    Sallys Flat farmer Andrew Hundy said he was disappointed by the announcement the development had been approved.
    “Frankly, I’m gutted,” Mr Hundy said.
    “I thought there was a chance it would be rejected, and I’m not very happy with this decision.”…
    “My parents were offered two turbines for a total of $20,000 a year. We declined that because we found how it was going to affect us,” he said…
    ‘Biggest thing that’s happened in my lifetime’: farmer
    Brendan Cole lives near Sallys Flat and is set to host up to seven turbines….
    Coal mining plays a major role in the Mudgee region’s economy, but Mr Cole said the Crudine Ridge project would be a catalyst for more renewable energy developments…
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-05-11/crudine-ridge-wind-farm-approved-nsw-government/7405518

    12 May: TheWeekUK: Neart na Gaoithe wind farm failure brings scrutiny on subsidy schemes
    Delays in getting a verdict cause UK government body to scupper Holyrood-approved project
    The Low Carbon Contracts Company (LCCC) pulled the subsidies after a 26 March deadline to invest £200m into the £2bn development was missed.
    This in turn occurred because a judge delayed a verdict on a judicial review launched by the RSPB challenging the plans over an apparent threat to the gannets at the nearby Bass Rock colony, the largest in the world…
    http://www.theweek.co.uk/72565/neart-na-gaoithe-wind-farm-failure-brings-scrutiny-on-subsidy-schemes

    UK Telegraph: Birds scupper £2bn offshore wind farm

    Financial Times: Scottish wind farm project faces collapse after subsidy U-turn

    60

    • #
      David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz

      Thanks Pat,
      I’d missed the report on Crudine and it’s a local issue for me, even though it’s about 50 kms away.
      Cheers,
      Dave B

      20

  • #
    pat

    more news you won’t find on ABC, despite all their platforms and taxpayer dollars:

    12 May: WSJ: Peg Brickley: TerraForm Global’s Bondholders Issue Default Warning to Company
    Lenders worried over delayed financial statements; fallout from SunEdison bankruptcy
    Fallout from the troubles of bankrupt solar power developer SunEdison Inc. is starting to hit its publicly traded corporate spinoff, TerraForm Global Inc., in the form of pressure from lenders over delayed financial reports.
    An owner of alternative energy projects developed by SunEdison, TerraForm Global has said it’s solvent but unable to file audited financial statements on time…
    On Wednesday, a subset of bondholders that invested in a $760.4 million issue of debt gave notice they want to see the books, too. Failure to deliver audited financials on time opened the door to a notice to TerraForm Global Operating LLC that it has 90 days to deliver the audited financials, or the company may be in default…
    SunEdison owns about 35% of each of the TerraForm companies.
    http://www.wsj.com/articles/terraform-globals-bondholders-issue-default-warning-to-company-1463081214

    12 May: Reuters: SunEdison CFO asked to leave
    Bankrupt solar company SunEdison Inc terminated the employment of Chief Financial Officer Brian Wuebbels and said it would delay filing its 10-Q report for the quarter ended March 31…

    12 May: Reuters: Spain’s cash-strapped Abengoa plunges into loss in Q1
    Abengoa, which expanded into wind and solar power by taking on huge debts in recent years, reported a loss of 340 million euros ($387 million), compared to a profit of 31 million euros for the same period last year.
    Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) fell 85 percent to 48 million euros on sales that had more than halved…
    The work force stood at nearly 18,000 people at end-March, down 29 percent from the year ago period and reflecting the massive job losses inflicted at the company as it struggles to cut costs.
    http://www.reuters.com/article/abengoa-results-idUSL5N1897R5

    70

  • #
    pat

    12 May: Newsday: Mark Harrington: SolarCity acknowledges receiving subpoena in federal probe
    SolarCity, whose state-funded “gigafactory” is the plum of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s Buffalo Billion initiative, acknowledged Thursday it had received a subpoena from the U.S. Attorney’s office investigating improper lobbying and undisclosed conflicts in state contracts…
    On April 29, Cuomo’s office received a subpoena from Southern District U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara as part of a probe of state construction projects, including the Buffalo Billion…
    In a financial filing this week, SolarCity laid out the considerable task it has before it in meeting milestones to avoid tens of millions of dollars in payments if it fails to start production on schedule and employ the thousands of workers to whom it has committed.
    Under the unusual arrangement, the state is investing $750 million to build and equip the facility, which SolarCity will lease back at $2 a year for the next 10 years. The state will own the plant, while SolarCity and the state will buy the equipment…READ ON
    http://www.newsday.com/news/region-state/solar-company-acknowledges-receiving-subpoena-in-federal-probe-1.11793411

    12 May: Radio Canada International: Marc Montgomery: Canada faces billion dollars in lawsuits under Free Trade rules
    An American wind-power company is suing Canada for $475 million dollars. Another wind-power company based in Ontario is also suing for $500 million.
    The claims are under segments of the North American Free Trade Agreement and stem from a decision in 2011 to place a moratorium on wind turbines placed in the Great Lakes.
    Windstream Energy of the U.S. filed claim saying the Ontario decision “wrongfully frustrated its ability to obtain benefits of a 2010 contract with the Ontario Power Authority”. The claim says the decision violates several articles under the NAFTA agreement under the Chapter 11 section regarding investor protection.
    This stems from a plan to place at least 100 more wind turbines in the St Lawrence off Wolfe Island, near Kingston.
    Originally filed in 2012, the case is now being heard in Toronto by a three member panel of investment treaty law experts from Finland, Spain and the United States.
    Ontario-based Trillium Power Wind Corporation is also suing in regard to its plan to place turbines near Windstream’s site and in connection with the same temporary ban, now in its fifth year. It originally claimed $2.5 billion in losses, but that claim was mostly dismissed although one part was allowed to continue with one allegation, “malfeasance in public office”.
    In creating the moratorium, Ontario said it needed more time to study the environmental impact of the turbines.
    However documents obtained by the American company seem to indicate that Ontario wanted to place a five kilometer exclusion zone along the shoreline for aesthetic reasons and was seeking environmental justification…
    http://www.rcinet.ca/en/2016/05/12/canada-faces-billion-dollars-in-lawsuits-under-free-trade-rules/

    30

  • #
    pattoh

    I read somewhere that Hitler was on the cover of Time Magazine in 1938.

    60

  • #
    ren

    The magnetic field protects against ionizing radiation. Current changes (during low solar activity) are favorable to Europe – the field strengthens and unfavorable to America – the field is weakening.
    http://geomag.bgs.ac.uk/research/modelling/IGRF.html
    Visible is the large increase in the Indian Ocean, where the ionization is weakest.
    https://i2.wp.com/sol.spacenvironment.net/raps_ops/current_files/rtimg/cutoff.gif
    This is evident also in the area of ozone and has an impact on the polar vortex.
    https://i1.wp.com/www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat_a_f/gif_files/gfs_t30_sh_f00.png

    20

  • #

    Jo,

    I would go further and say climate science has ceased to be a science at all. If science only has to do one thing, it’s to add to human knowledge. Even the general public knows that. But they never seem to stop to ask: when is the last time we learned anything from climate science? I make this point in more detail here, using medical research as a point of contrast:

    ‘[In the last few decades], medical science has given us the completed Human Genome Project, the first cancer-preventative vaccine (for HPV), HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors [‘statins’], an awareness of the therapeutic and prognostic significance of omega-3 fatty acid levels, stem-cell therapies for adrenoleukodystrophy and other conditions, functional MRI, self-expanding stents made of nitinol and next-generation materials, minimally-invasive robotic surgery, the bio-informatics revolution, lifesaving genetically-engineered drugs like tissue plasminogen activator, gene-targeted therapies like Herceptin and Gleevec (for breast cancer, chronic myeloid leukemia and GIST), the multi-lumen tubing which is now a mainstay on high-dependency wards, highly active anti-retroviral therapy [HAART] and the once-a-day HIV pill that can slow down and even arrest progression to AIDS, entire families of antidepressants and noötropics…’

    The only good clisci examples in the comments thread were provided by Willard, years after the post first went up, but they’re all old, vague and/or meteorological (not climatological).

    90

  • #
    Geoffrey Williams

    Branco and Cook! I ask you is this the best that The Sydney Morning Herald can cobble together to convince us that dangerous man made climate change is real.
    Cooks arguments are false, pathetic and as this website has shown many times easily debunked.
    It amazes me that so many people believe the climate rubbish published by the SMH!
    GeoffW

    60

    • #
      Another Ian

      GW

      Doesn’t the SMH have a declining circulation?

      Does this indicate believers of a different kind?

      50

      • #
        PeterPetrum

        Ian, the Sydney Morning Harald is closing down, only having a weekend edition in hard copy, and going “digital” only. Nuff said.

        40

        • #
          Another Ian

          Peter

          So the printing plant will be sort of like coal fired electricity to renewables?

          00

  • #

    In his defence, John Cook literally doesn’t know the difference between science and religion.

    140

    • #
      TdeF

      “When he’s not busy teaching Australians about the difference between science and religion and how there actually isn’t one, John runs the SkepticalScience website.”

      How’s that for self awareness? In respect of his own views, for once John Cook is right.

      30

  • #

    Jo,

    your pie chart could also be titled Why Climate Believalists Have No Credibility—a nice rejoinder to this despicable graph, only difference being: yours uses data, not consensus.

    80

  • #
    Gary in Erko

    Why does he keep calling attention to his follies. Does he really possible believe that junk?

    30

  • #
    Craig Thomas

    Weirdly, what Richard Tol actually says is,
    “There is no doubt in my mind that the literature on climate change overwhelmingly supports the hypothesis that climate change is caused by humans. I have very little reason to doubt that the consensus is indeed correct”

    Oops.

    213

    • #
      AndyG55

      Poor Craig.. has Tol on his mind..

      It must cost you a lot !

      70

      • #
        Graeme No.3

        Andy:

        A question. Have you noticed we only get 1 or occasionally 2 trolls on each post? Do they have a roster – it’s Friday, your turn to go and get beaten up on JoNova? And there is only a limited number who ever appear. Does this indicate that they are really a tiny minority, about 3% or less of the population?

        50

        • #
          ROM

          I picked on what seemed to be the troll roster trick back a couple of months ago.

          Only a couple of trolls each time and then only for a couple of Jo’s posts before they disappear / retire usually somewhat frazzled and another lot of a couple of tired old repeat trolls turn up to just do their skateboard on thin ice troll tricks all over again for another couple of Jo’s posts.

          Even my pet, palsied red thumbed Lurch along with its occasional side kick Lurchalotta seems to have gone on a somewhat intermittent compassionate leave recently !!

          61

    • #
      RB.

      You’ll find the great denier Lomborg isn’t much of a denier either. Association with holocaust deniers is the punishment for going off script.

      10

    • #
      David Smith

      So, when even a warmist (such as Tol) thinks John Cook’s 97% paper is rubbish it really must be a load of twaddle.

      50

  • #
    Craig Thomas

    https://www.realskeptic.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/consensus4.pdf?ed99de

    Meanwhile, apart from confirming what every sensible person knows (the consensus on current climate change is almost universal” Tol’s criticisms of Cook were shot down in flames by the same scientists whose research he…er….”misunderstood:
    https://www.realskeptic.com/2015/09/21/scientists-respond-to-tols-misrepresentation-of-their-consensus-research/

    ““You can’t just divide the number of affirmative statements by all papers in the sample, if many papers didn’t actually stake out any position on the question at hand. The latter should logically be excluded, unless you want to argue that of all biology papers, only 0.5% take an affirmative position on evolution, hence there is low consensus on evolution.””

    Richard Tol, once again, is revealed as a poor choice of source for opinions on climate science.

    220

    • #
      AndyG55

      ROFLMAO !!!

      Oh dear.. are you seriously using Nutty and the Ork as references?

      Neither is ANY sort of scientist in the real world.

      Tell them to use less pressure on the next brain-washing…. you have precious little left to wash.

      180

    • #
      TdeF

      It is interesting how true believers have segued Man made CO2 driven Global Warming to the feared Climate Change.
      No one can agree or disagree with Climate Change. It is a phrase and undeniably, Climates Change.
      Given that the temperature has not changed at all in twenty years, it is very wise to stay away from claims of Global Warming.

      110

    • #
      ROM

      Craig Thomas @ # 34

      (the consensus on current climate change is almost universal”

      Ahh! Finally, a correct conclusion for our Craig.

      Yep Climate change is not almost universal!

      IT IS UNIVERSAL!

      CLIMATE CHANGE HAS ALWAYS BEEN UNIVERSAL since this planet formed some 4.7 billion years ago

      CLIMATE CHANGE is why were are here today.

      The endlessly changing global climate and local climates which are still changing today will always continue to change in ways that might never be accurately predicted even far into the future, forced life right from the very earliest assembly of self reproducing protein like molecular structures and then to the prion type reproducing organisms through to the viruses and then to bacteria and then to life forms that have evolved over the last 850 million years into us and the living world with all its multitudinous life forms around us.
      Life forms that are now being estimated as new species of bacteria are constantly being discovered at possibly a trillion different species on this planet.

      Life was driven to change and to adapt and to evolve by an ever changing, ever evolving climate which forced Life to adapt and selected the life forms that could and did adapt to fit in with the new conditions created by Climate Change

      And those that could not adapt or adapt fast enough to the ever evolving, ever changing, sometimes extreme climate changes as occurred with at least four out of the five major extinction events that have occurred over the last half billion years on this planet.

      So Craig Thomas, you are almost correct but not quite in your quote that climate change is almost universal!

      Climate Change IS UNIVERSAL.
      It always has been UNIVERSAL
      It will always be UNIVERSAL as long as this planet exists.

      Your problem is that it is simply not the Universal Climate Change that your wet dreams are made of.

      101

    • #

      Craig, what part of “climate scientists are not all scientists” do you find hard to get?

      Yes there is consensus among certified climate scientists, but there is no consensus among scientists in general. In other words, climate scientists have utterly failed to convince all the scientists around them (including meteorologists) that they ought to worry a lot about CO2.

      Since even I agree that there is a consensus (unscientific and meaningless as it is) among climate scientists, you are once again tossing in a red herring, a non point, as if it mattered.

      My points remain unchallenged. A consensus is profoundly unscientific — observations matter, not surveys. And Cooks misrepresentation of the consensus of climate scientists as being really a consensus among scientists-at-large is as dishonest as ever.

      More pathetically, it appears Cooks study doesn’t even manage to find a “consensus” among climate scientists — surely an achievement in grand failure when there is probably a consensus there.

      The layers of irrelevant, misbegotten fallacies abound…

      130

      • #
        Mark D.

        Joanne, Craig is obviously a snappy dresser. Please cut him some slack for that reason only since there is little else he has to rely on.

        01

  • #
    martin

    QUESTION;
    The sun looks like it peaked somewhere around the years 2000
    When I look at other websites, it looks like the Sun peaked around 1955.
    Why are the charts different

    40

    • #
      el gordo

      ‘Analysing sunspot numbers as an indicator of solar activity shows a peak in the 1950s and the 1980s.’

      – See more at: http://www.thegwpf.com/is-it-the-sun-stupid/#sthash.JXoZMvRq.dpuf

      40

    • #

      Martin, if you follow the link on the graph to David Evans work — the solar influence peaks about 11 years after the TSI peak. The lag of one solar cycle has been independently found in several other studies. The line is not solar activity directly but one produced from a model working with solar, volcanic, and CO2 data. The solar model correctly hindcasts a pause and when David corrected the current basic climate model it explains why the hot spot is missing.

      TSI appears to be the leading indicator of a solar influence which may be spectral changes, solar wind, or solar magnetic effects that are most powerful in the cycle after TSI peaks.

      40

      • #
        martin

        Sorry, still confused. I understand the 11 year delay idea, and it makes sense.
        I was talking about charts that show 1955 as the TSI peak, and other charts like yours that looks like TSI kept rising until the 1980’s, thirty years later.
        Are their different methods of measuring T.S.I.?
        I enjoy your site, and its where I started learning more about AGW three years ago. Back then I assumed it must be true because….well gee, everyone said so….how could it be wrong? Your clarity of each topic is the best.
        Thanks much.

        00

  • #
    RB.

    “Just imagine if you walked into a room and you found a dead body with a knife sticking out of it’s back and you argued ‘well, humans have been dying of natural natural causes for thousands of years, so therefore, this person must have died of natural causes as well.’

    Reminds me of a news report from long ago of the body of a teenage boy being found bound to cement bricks in a river. Police hadn’t yet ruled out suicide.

    Cook would have read some brochures from blueboard salesmen, misrepresented them and told everyone that there was 97% agreement from building experts that deaths from cement bricks would double by 2100 if action wasn’t taken now to get the number of bricks back to 350.

    40

    • #
      RB.

      Just in case someone like Craig Thomas asks for evidence or others are wondering whether my memory might be a little suss, here is a recent news report discussing that still unsolved death.

      30

    • #
      Tim Hammond

      I hope the “it’s” isn’t in the actual information provided to chidlren,

      It’s also simply idiotic – the point about what sceptics say is that there is no knife, just the dead body. At which point, it is obvious that the assumption should be natural causes, not a knife.

      10

      • #
        RB.

        A better analogy might be the butter knife found at the scene was homogenised to be a six inch dagger.

        10

  • #
    TdeF

    John Cook is Climate Communication Fellow at the University of Queensland. On their web site..

    “John is currently completing a PhD in cognitive psychology, researching how people think about climate change”

    “A physics graduate from the University of Queensland who majored in solar physics in his postgraduate honours year”. Really? So what’s he doing in Cognitive Psychology?

    The $10,000 New South Wales Government Eureka Prize for Advancement of Climate Change Knowledge is awarded to an Australian individual, group or organisation for communication that motivates action to reduce the impacts of climate change

    So it is a prize for the greatest alarmist in the country. It is not a science prize as such. Australian of the Year is similar. Also awarded to footballers.

    30

  • #
    ROM

    I would suggest that John Cook and Skeptical Science will be remembered long after all the other warmist and skeptic sites have ceased to exist.

    Now that should set the warmist climate clangers hearts all a’ flutter coming from a dyed in the wool skeptic of long standing.

    John Cook and his Skeptical Science site will quite possibly figure quite prominently in a number of future text books on the Principles of Science alongside of Lysenkoism and Lamarkism.
    Skeptical Science will be used as an example of science gone badly wrong alongside of the Miasma theory of disease spreading through bad air, of the Flat Earth hypothesis, of the Spontaneous Generation of life from inanimate matter, of the Classical Elements that made up everything, ie; fire, earth and water, of combustion being due to Phlogiston in the combustible substance, of Phrenology which was the cause of much suffering during its heyday [ as is climate catastrophe alarmism today ], or the Geocentric universe where everything revolved around the Earth and so many more “consensus” driven scientific beliefs of those past times.

    We might well laugh now at the ignorance displayed by those ancients and the not so ancient, in fact not even ancients, but the reality is that today, despite all of our self congratulatory and our loudly self proclaimed advanced scientific knowledge of the world around us, we have precisely the same type of so called but in reality , non existent “consensus” about another so called scientific hypothesis now designated as Climate change [ whatever that actually means ?? ] that has never been proven, that is derived purely from a lot of mathematical models with huge fudge factors and numerous parameters which, like the chicken entrails and monkey bones of the times of the past, relies on vast amounts of mumbo jumbo designed to mislead any enquirer and which must as a matter of urgency again as with the old sooth sayers of those ancient times past, needs to be very well lubricated with lots of gold so as to keep the Gods happy and the sooth sayers and chicken entrails diviners/ climate modellers in generously funded and salubrious and well padded comfort.

    And we think and we kid ourselves that we have truly advanced in science far beyond those old time ancients and those ancient divinities whose interpreters of their God’s will were the all powerful “consensus” controlling scientists of their day.

    And for those skeptics of old who were not believing or who failed to kowtow to those scribes and diviners of their Gods will, well then dismissal and reduction of rank and casting out and even beheading and death was to be their promised lot.

    And rather naively stupidly and ignorantly some of those who try to enforce the Climate change “consensus” today believe they are much more tolerant and educated and understanding than those ancients!
    Human nature hasn’t changed much over the thousands of years past nor has the way in which a “consensus” as dreamed up by a few elite to uphold their power and authority is administered and enforced today by that arrogant and intolerant power grasping scientific and political elite in climate science.

    71

  • #
    pat

    13 May: TheConversation: John Cook: The things people ask about the scientific consensus on climate change
    Here is an edited selection of some of the questions posed by Reddit readers and our answers…
    Q: What’s the general reasoning of the other 3%?
    A: Interesting question. It is important and diagnostic that there is no coherent theme among the reasoning of the other 3%. Some say “there is no warming”, others blame the sun, cosmic rays or the oceans.
    Those opinions are typically mutually contradictory or incoherent: Stephan Lewandowsky has written elsewhere about a few of the contradictions…
    Q: It could be argued that climate scientists may be predisposed to seeing climate change as more serious, because they want more funding. What’s your perspective on that?
    A: Any climate scientist who could convincingly argue that climate change is not a threat would:
    1.be famous
    2.get a Nobel prize
    3.plus a squintillion dollars in funding
    4.a dinner date with the Queen
    5.lifelong gratitude of billions of people.
    So if there is any incentive, it’s for a scientist to show that climate change is not a threat…ETC
    https://theconversation.com/the-things-people-ask-about-the-scientific-consensus-on-climate-change-59243

    10

  • #
    pat

    Frisby gets the third degree from Readfearn!

    12 May: Guardian: Graham Readfearn: Why is climate champion Richard Branson allowing deniers on a Virgin podcast?
    Despite more than 90% of experts agreeing on the science, listeners hear incorrect and ridiculous claims from James Delingpole – all ‘in the interest of balance’
    Aside from the facial hair and the petrol-guzzling international airline, one thing Virgin founder Sir Richard Branson is known for is his passion for fighting climate change…
    So with this in mind, some listeners might find it odd to hear on the latest official Virgin podcast that human-caused climate change is not a fact agreed upon by every credible science academy on the planet, but is instead “essentially a bankrupt theory.”
    These were the words of James Delingpole, the British polemicist, climate science denialist and guest of Dominic Frisby, the writer, comedian and Virgin podcast host…
    In a long response to questions, Frisby said he had invited Delingpole after some listeners asked for a guest “to air the other side of the debate.”…
    I asked Frisby if it was incumbent for a host of a podcast bearing the Virgin brand to “avail themselves of a few facts” when discussing a crucial issue (and one on which Virgin itself is vocal).
    “The problem with availing myself of facts is that this argument is now so politicised it is difficult to know what is fact and what is dogma,” said Frisby…READ ON
    http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/12/why-is-climate-champion-richard-branson-allowing-deniers-on-a-virgin-podcast

    Virgin Podcast – James Delingpole
    https://www.virgin.com/entrepreneur/virgin-podcast-james-delingpole

    20

    • #
      Annie

      It’s news to me that an airline would be ‘petrol guzzling’! For its aircraft, anyway. Another Grauniad stuff-up?

      10

  • #
    pat

    more signs of academic decline:

    12 May: WaPo: Chris Mooney: The vicious cycle that makes people afraid to talk about climate change
    If you want to understand why it is that on a planet wracked by climate change, people still don’t talk much about climate change, then this may be the key: They’re people.
    Or, more specifically, they’re evolved social mammals who are acutely attuned to how they are perceived by the other evolved social mammals around them — and reasonably so, because those perceptions greatly influence their own lives.
    Such is the upshot of new research on why people “self-silence” when it comes to climate change, just published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology by Nathaniel Geiger and Janet Swim of Penn State University. In a nutshell, Geiger and Swim find that people are often afraid to talk about climate change with their peers because they wrongly think those peers are more doubtful about climate change than they actually are. This incorrect perception — which the authors dub “pluralistic ignorance” — then makes people fear that others will think they’re less competent, and thus, view them with less respect, if they bring up the subject or talk about it…READ ON
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/05/12/the-vicious-cycle-that-makes-people-afraid-to-talk-about-climate-change/?postshare=6251463085945689&tid=ss_tw

    Swim in good company!

    Aug 2015: Penn State: Pre-packaged doubt: A problem for action on climate change
    Free screening of ‘Merchants of Doubt’ to be held Sept. 9
    The panel discussion will feature Michael E. Mann, director of Penn State’s Earth Systems Science Center; ***Janet Swim, chair of the American Psychological Association’s Taskforce on Climate Change…etc
    “’Merchants of Doubt’ illustrates a variety of psychological strategies used to undermine actions to address climate change,” said Swim. “These include cognitive strategies to manufacture doubt about the scientific certainty behind our understanding of human-caused climate change and affective strategies to foster ‘motivated reasoning’ and encourage groups to view the science through a political lens and view solutions as a threat to core individualistic values.
    “The film illustrates how these strategies were purposefully initiated by those vested in opposing climate change action and to confuse the public and redirect the government and the public away from solutions that threaten fossil fuel companies.”…
    Michael Mann, author of “The Hockey Stick and Climate Wars,” is a Penn State scientist who found himself at the center of attacks funded by the fossil fuel industry, their front groups and attack dogs. His iconic “hockey stick” graph showed the unprecedented nature of human-caused climate change. The merchants of doubt made him a target…
    http://news.psu.edu/story/367618/2015/08/31/arts-and-entertainment/pre-packaged-doubt-problem-action-climate-change

    Swim is an old pro at this:

    Is There an Ecological Unconscious?
    New York Times-28 Jan. 2010
    Last August, the American Psychological Association released a 230-page report titled “Interface Between Psychology and Global Climate Change.” …
    “We must look at the reasons people are not acting,” Janet Swim, a Penn State psychologist and the chairwoman of the task force (who wrote the document), said, “in order to understand how to get people to act.”…

    but apparently still failing to convince the rest of us.

    20

  • #
    Roy Hogue

    If Obama can be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize before he accomplishes peace anywhere (and he still hasn’t done it), then why be surprised if John Cook is given a prize for feeding nonsense to school kids. Non achievement is the new achievement standard since the political left decided it was easier to imagine what the truth is than to go out and look to see what it really is.

    60

  • #
    Roy Hogue

    Friend of the planet? Are you sure they didn’t say fiend of the planet? 😉

    50

  • #
    John West

    If 97% of cryptozoologists agreed that there’s a large bipedal ape living in the North American wilderness it wouldn’t be scientific consensus. A scientific consensus is when the specialists convince the rest of us, not that they’ve convinced themselves. A climate science consensus is as far away from a scientific consensus as a cryptozoology consensus.

    [Not that the 97% is actually anything more than fiction anyway]

    40

  • #
    AndyG55

    OT.. Speaking of scammers.

    Gore admits that “climate change” is a great business opportunity..

    NO wonder the blood-sucker keeps pushing the anti-science garbage..

    https://eos.org/articles/gore-upbeat-climate-stabilizing-question-soon

    20

  • #
    pat

    surely it will be the Nobel next for Naomi!

    14 May: SMH: Josephine Tovey: Naomi Klein to be awarded 2016 Sydney Peace Prize
    Naomi Klein is not someone you might think of foremost as a peacenik, per se.
    The iconoclastic author, perhaps the most prominent leftist thinker of her generation, has been a dogged proponent of other political crusades during her career – from the anti-globalisation movement virtually defined by her 2000 manifesto No Logo, to Occupy Wall Street, and later and most prominently, the climate-change activism of her 2014 tome This Changes Everything, which made a forceful case for not only why climate change was an urgent crisis, but why systemic change to global capitalism is the only solution.
    But six months from now, Klein will travel to Australia to be named the recipient of the 2016 Sydney Peace Prize.
    The Sydney Peace Foundation, which is located within the University of Sydney and receives support from the City of Sydney, chose Klein, the jury said, for “exposing the structural causes and responsibility for the climate crisis, for inspiring us to stand up locally, nationally and internationally to demand a new agenda for sharing the planet that respects human rights and equality”…
    http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/naomi-klein-to-be-awarded-2016-sydney-peace-prize-20160512-gotj37.html

    00

  • #
    Angry

    Ahh John Cook, or is that John [snip]

    ED

    00

  • #
    David Driscoll

    Why quote a heartland story and not go to the source re meteorologists (let alone quote the most recent evidence)?

    Fact check your first statement and you fail

    http://blog.ametsoc.org/news/new-survey-shows-ams-members-positions-on-climate-change/

    Wonder what will happen when I follow the other claims?

    00

    • #

      So there is a new survey. Thanks for that. Why the hostility?

      Check all the claims here, be my guest. The figure I quote on the 2014 survey was correct.

      I havent studied the new version, it appears the questions/options are slightly different, but I see Eric Holthaus was still shocked that there are so many skeptics in meteorology.

      Amazing really, the science is settled, and it’s incredibly obvious, yet climate scientists still can’t seem to convince a lot of the meteorologists despite multimillion dollar campaigns, and pointed dedicated and customized campaigns targeting meteorologists?

      Indeed, given the intimidation by some groups, and the simplicity of just saying “Yes” to the standard line pushed, it is amazing so many disagree:

      Forecast the Facts now plans to target weather broadcasters who air their skepticism about climate science on the air.

      ” At some point, he said, AMS should consider certifying only meteorologists who are not vocal climate deniers.

      “A certification that allows someone to parrot complete falsehoods on air,” he said, “seems like a truly empty designation.”

      10