UPDATE: Richard Muller, the man running BEST (Berkley Earth Surface Temperatures) pretends to have been a skeptic who “converted” to believing in man-made global warming. But this was a fake narrative, easily shown by his past quotes. Many major newspapers ran with his propaganda, but now are trying to cover up their failure as “fact checkers”. They did not even do the most basic of investigations. And let’s not forgot that virtually none of them (or Muller either) point out his daughter profits from consulting on “Green” projects.
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It appears skeptics are getting to the Fairfax press (finally!)
The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age both ran with Muller’s claims of being a converted skeptic who found the world was warming (and the preposterous leap that “therefore” we were to blame).
“I saw past the Hot Air on Climate“ is gone (The SMH and The Age return a 404 error).
The SMH even arranged triumphant artwork, the article was given a big splash. But hello, hello, those articles are disappearing down the memory hole. Presumably neither newspaper is proud of having been fooled by Muller — the articles were so quickly blown away when skeptics pointed out that Muller was a fake skeptic, and that his results were highly dubious (special achievement award to Anthony Watts). It can’t help that the other BEST co-founder turned out to have had a career consulting about carbon footprints and green schemes.
If there were hundreds of comments under those articles, they are all gone too.
The original story is still at Berkley Blogs. The story appeared on The New York Times.
Hat tip to reader Hereward Fenton who edits Truth news for the tip-off and the photo above.
“Call me a converted skeptic. Three years ago I identified problems in previous climate studies that, in my mind, threw doubt on the very existence of global warming. Last year, following an intensive research effort involving a dozen scientists, I concluded that global warming was real and that the prior estimates of the rate of warming were correct. I’m now going a step further: Humans are almost entirely the cause.” (From the disappeared article.)
If the SMH and Age have been burnt by the Muller experience, that’s an excellent development. All they had to do was check with skeptics before they ran the story and we would have told them that Muller was never a skeptic, and his results depended on thermometers near fermenting sewage vats and square kilometers of tarmac.
That’s three wins for skeptics this week in the Fairfax press
For the first time I was interviewed, David’s article was accepted, and now the alarmist agitprop has vanished. (No I’m not pleased that they are trying to rewrite history, or that Muller has in a tiny way been retrospectively silenced, but I’m pleased the “disappearance” implies somebody realized that publishing without questioning it was a mistake.)
Right now, possibly, there are editors and writers at Fairfax who realize maybe they’ve been duped: the unwitting victims of monopoly science, where only one side of the story was investigated. There are reasons their subscriptions are falling and skeptic bloggers are winning awards. There’s two decades of news stories that they have not covered.
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UPDATE: Gee Aye has found an App copy on the SMH site. It’s not clear whether this is a new copy, or was always there (for “apps”). The fact that all the news copies of the page went 404 for the network of Fairfax major dailies is just plain odd. It’s easy to imagine an accident taking down one copy, but not all the separate newspapers. Though, we’ve discovered all the comments across all the papers are linked into one file. (Yes if you comment on The Age your comment is posted on the SMH, Canberra times and Brisbane times too and visa versa.) We’re those comments too hot? Was this an accident? The pages have not been restored, as we might expect, nor is there a “moved here” note. Who knows? — Jo
Yes, the worm is turning but a lot more work needs to be done to put the scam out with the garbage.
The warmists are foolish to believe that when the scam is exposed they won’t face the courts…the science needs cleaning up as to coin a phrase, “it is the right thing to do”.
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The article hasn’t disappeared at all ,here’s the link from SMH.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/climate-results-convert-sceptic-let-the-evidence-change-our-minds-20120730-23769.html
Like AGW the reality doesn’t match the contrarian rhetoric.
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[The devil is in the detail David. This is not the article. See Jo’s comment at #13.1 – Mod]
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And here it is at The Age
http://www.theage.com.au/environment/climate-change/climate-results-convert-sceptic-let-the-evidence-change-our-minds-20120730-23769.html
AGW isn’t going anywhere, it’s here, it’s real and it’s caused by us.
Time to act not evade the truth.
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Sorry David – wrong article! See Jo’s comment at #13.1 – Mod
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Ah David… you didn’t read either of the articles you linked (or the original article) at all did you? Nor, it seems, did you bother to read all the comments here before you spouted off.
If you did, you would have noted (as Jo’s mods have pointed out has already been posted in comment #13.1) the following differences:
1) the articles you link were written by Leo Hinkman, whereas the original article Jo is talking about was written by Robert Muller himself.
2) the opening paragraphs of the article you link are ENTIRELY DIFFERENT to the opening paragraphs of Robert Muller’s article.
Feel like a bit of a shill David?
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The Fairfax ‘conversion’ … The Muller ‘error’ … lol
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Could the Press be learning a thing or to, about what the free (to choose) world likes to read, from the World’s Best WebLogs, (Watts, JoNova, etc) ?
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The story was removed from nearly all of Fairfax’s online editions before 11am Tuesday. I doubt that Fairfax’s action was a reaction to skeptics pointing out that the skeptical Muller was a straw man posture, more likely it was the public criticism by Michael Mann.
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Ya think so?! So which “public criticism” do you suppose might have … uh … done the “trick”?!
Mann the self-aggrandizer recognizing a kindred spirit via his Facebook comment:
Or Mann according to the Guardian‘s Leo Hickman:
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When McIntyre and McKitrick criticised Mann’s ‘hockey stick’ in November 2003, Muller published an article agreeing with the criticism- which chuffed Dr Mann (significantly).
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You’re correct Hilary. Mann is so all over the shop that even Fairfax would have difficulty working out what he’s on about.
Nevertheless, I’ve no idea why they’ve taken it down. Perhaps at ~ $0.50 per share they haven’t got enough dosh to pay their ISP.
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But it is nice to see them starting to eat their own. Part of the reason this subject has not been open for more neutral debate is because the “experts” have protected their turf through their “Expert Cartel”. A little more bickering and the cartel falls apart.
Well I can hope……
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No, I don’t think Mann would have had much influence in them removing their propaganda, his criticism is not that public and is obscure…. No, the biggest reason would have been finding out that his daughter is a Green believer and so is the good professor when you bother to check.
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J.H.,
I’m not sure why they pulled it, but I would be surprised if it was because of Michael Mann. Though great supporters of the Global Warming lobby (and actually part of it), I suspect that Fairfax writers would be fairly ignorant of Mann’s Hockey Stick and where he fits into the warming apostleship. I submit that they are mostly just righteous believers, nodding their heads and muttering ‘Amen’ in the pews.
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I am not so sure that Fauxfacts have seen the errors of their, judging by this gem from today’s SMH, Aug 4, from the pen of one of their own “useful idiots”, Mike Carlton.
Priceless!
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Hi Leo,but it is a start,maybe they are just starting to see the errors of their way?At least something is getting printed by them.Looks like the sky is falling headlines aren’t working,so they may be trying to print facts?No,I’m being silly.Aren’t I?
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I think, Billy, that Fairfax has burnt its bridges. It has been a key player influencing Australian public opinion and government policy to accept the necessity of revolutionary social and economic changes, supposedly to avoid an unprecedented climate change catastrophe.
The principal ‘error of their way’ is not to recognise that the catastrophe is one based not on theory supported by evidence, but on a valid scientific viewpoint supported only by questionable modelling from a relatively new field of science- one dangerously dependent on wider societal acceptance of the viewpoint.
But it also goes to the role of journalism in a free society. The media does not help people make informed decisions by making the decisions on their behalf, nor by promoting a political agenda.
The press in particular does not fulfill its obligation to the truth by being so much more than an honest observer.
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…give me hope Joanne-ah (x3)
till the morning come…
Have had that song in my head since reading yesterday’s JoNova posting – sorry to pass it on but, you know, a problem shared…
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I am struggling to keep up.
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You and David deserve hearty congratulations Jo.
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Yes. To win any online debates on these subjects at the moment all that is required is a link to this site.
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It could also be a case of mission accomplished. If it is a known green-left warrior journo or editor (and hey it is the Age), could be quite deliberate – smash & grab, hit & run so to speak.
Let’s face it it’s a dirty war. If it were clean they would have lost by now.
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I am waiting for the warmistas to shout that Gina Rhinehart is behind the article removal. If not, it had to be Twiggy or Palmer… /frothfroth
Maybe the Boss wrote a song about it…
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Oh, Very well said Bulldust! Suberbly topical and succint.
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Perhaps Finkelstein took away the MSM’s right of free speech?
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Here’s something that probably deserves the 404 treatment … Redfearn is off on another rant, spouting the D word at every turn:
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/4169648.html
My response in relation to someone trying to make sensible comments (copied here because it will probably get “modded”):
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I had to add another:
Dang Redfearn can get my temperature up … he is way beyond feral. On what basis does the ABC think he is worth all the virtual column inches they bestow on him?
Time to work it off in the gym…
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Another instance of attempted Gergiscide?
(The killing of a story after publication because it throws a bad light on the deified.)
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The Black Hole of News Worthiness.
All articles are placed in main line news often. Once it is semi-archived – it is moved to various topic locations. Anyone who understands the Internet and how a web site is constructed should know this. Jo should know this as well.
It is found here: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/climate-results-convert-sceptic-let-the-evidence-change-our-minds-20120730-23769.html
To those who think it has been removed – that is a bad baseless assumption.
Keeping the Watts paper alive:
You want to keep the Watts up Paper alive. Your time is fast running out.
Watts assertions are being shown to be very old ho hum assertions and calculations. Rather old UHI inputs of the past and lack of homogenisation verses highly questionable raw data to draw any conclusive evidence. From hence forth it will be very difficult now to gain traction and credibility.
Even Steve McIntyre has questioned the first release of Watts and had very little input into the paper. Far more work has to done then submit the overly ambitious work. See Climate Audit for commentary on this by Steve McIntyre.
As I said it was premature of Watts to release it. From a science perspective if it gets past peer review, it will aid in better accuracy without the requirement for overly complex homogenisation processes and algorithms.
All aside: It is counter productive to prove anything from RAW data. For example in some cases (not well known by skeptics), many US sites are now read in the earlier parts of the morning. This tends toward a cooling bias. Many rural sites are biased to a cooling homogenisation as well.
Nothing has been proven as the bottom line. Sorry folks the world is not getting cooling neither at worst case is the decade warming rate as low as presented by Watts. Sorry – more work has to done as is the case with all papers of any worth. More has to be done.
Ross J.
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Ross — No. It’s not the same article. Even if it was, articles are not moved regularly – that would destroy the incoming links. I can’t see why a newspaper would ever do that if they didn’t have too, it would reduce it’s google rank among other things. As for Watts. My point still stands. His results are far more common sense obvious than BEST. Thermometers will not give accurate readings near exhaust vents or asphalt. With no support from the government he is serving the citizens better than any of the so-called public servants are. — Jo
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It could be page view based page pruning – in other words they only ‘hang onto’ those pages which generate the most traffic. To a certain extent this makes good sense, as a news site turns over a high rate of new pages – so if you don’t prune you will progressively incur higher and higher crawling costs from robots. Also the lookup and infrastructure costs to ‘keep’ available all the old stuff will keep climbing if you do not prune.
Although the pruning would usually come in around the 6 month to a year mark – anything earlier than that is likely a deliberate deletion I’d say…
I’d put my money on a proactive attempt to distance given the election around the corner and the likely ‘scorched earth’ result for the ALP, given their own polls results.. Time to get all friendly and cuddly with the next government in waiting..
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almost all the articles I access months or even years after I first find them are still at the exact same address, and unchanged. Hardly the case here. Could it be an innocent rejiggering? Maybe.
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By the way, am i the only one that cringes when reading that raw data has to be massaged to be useful? As someone who has spent several courses of my Masters studying statistics and modelling-related classes, I do my level best to insure that I deal with data that is as close to the source as possible. Last thing I want is “homogenised” data or data that has been subjected to extreme and unusual torture with a mysterious algorithm.
If you have to contort the data so to get your hypotthesis up, then you need a better hypothesis…
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The problem with “homogenised” data is that a statitical analysis of them will be biased by the
blenderhomogenisation. Homogenisation make assumptions about the structure and therefore the probabilistic distribution of the data. i.e. the data are almost certainly going to fit the assumptions.Not the was to find anything other than what you want to find.
Doesn’t take a Master’s degree to figure it out, I hope. Just an understanding of some fundamentals of statistics. I’m no more enamoured with statistics than as other tool in my Engineering toolbox but I don’t need to ask questions like this one answered by the venerable William M. Briggs.
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For what it is worth, Watts is doing a second draft of his paper after having incorporated the comments and criticisms of his first draft. It will be posted in a couple of days.
This is a real first a “Crowd Sourced” paper from the beginning with over 600 people contributing data to the end when an entire blog is invited to do the editing and “Blog-review”
Watts and Donna Laframboise are making history with the use of a large group of volunteers over large areas doing research via the internet.
Hats off to both of them and to you and Dave Evans.
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Hi Mr. Smith errr James.
You say…`Watts assertions are being shown to be very old ho hum assertions and calculations`
Would that be the same old hu hum assertions as Mann, Hansen and Gore…
I didn`t even mention Flannery !!!
You really are living in a parallel universe Jamesus Ignorantus….
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Jo is much too polite in her reply to Ross, so I’m going to weigh in.
The silly old coot Ross says…
That’s the wrong article you old sod. Get your facts straight and get a bib before spouting your dribble.
The article you linked to starts with the paragraph…
The missing article is an op-ed by Muller and it starts with the paragraph..
Do you get it now? All you had to do was click and read the links Jo provided in her post. You obviously didn’t but felt the need to comment anyway.
Speaking of “a bad baseless assumption”, you made one of those yourself you old git.
Go wipe that dribble off your chin and take your meds. I’m sick of reading the crap you post.
Surely there are limits to how long residents are allowed to use the internet at the old folks home. LET SOME OTHER OLD COOT USE THE INTERNET ROSS, they may want to check out some new crosswords or knitting tips or something.
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nice one Baa
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I would really love to see your sources for your allegations in regards to McIntyre and Watts. Indeed, as I read the story of the Watts paper, he credited McIntyre with assisting him with the statistics of the most meaty parts. That hardly indicates that McIntyre “had very little input into the paper” or that “Even Steve McIntyre has questioned the first release of Watts”
While I am a regular reader of both WUWT and Climate Audit, I fully admit I do not read every comment, or every article. So your assistance with your accusations by sourcing them would be appreciated.
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We’ve been asking Ross for sources for the better part of a year now. My favorite Ross source is “articles that have crossed my desk”. When he does link things, they often don’t demonstrate what he claims (as the claim of the Muller article still being on the Herald’s site above).
As wes george tried to explain to him some time ago:
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BobC – I appreciate the heads up. As I have not read every article, I was thinking I had missed a few (and I definitely do not read all the comments).
I hate being wrong more than I love being right.
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Don’t we all.
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You just don’t seem to “get it” Ross. The fools trying to attack Watts’ paper are stupidly using TOB adjustment as their main line of attack. This is just dragging Tom Karls pet rat TOBy squeaking into the sunlight. NOAA has been adjusting for TOB without using individual station metadata. If warmists had half a brain they would not be highlighting TOB issues. They would be keeping very, very quiet in the hope no one found out about Karls little rat.
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Ross lamented:
Ross enthused:
Blurry is the new clarity!
Are you sure you do not have a stupid horse for a pet?
Actually, do you find people bringing you carrots and putting saddles over you with any regularity?
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“Are you sure you do not have a stupid horse for a pet?”
I think they are both in the Central Coast area of NSW. might be wrong though…
although, how one region could have 2 such dopey donkeys, hard to believe, just unlucky I guess.
The matched stupidity of the posts from this pair may point to a possible close link ?
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Please do not malign donkeys. At least they have the sense to stomp a wolf into a bloody mess when they see one.
“Activists” do not have even that amount of brain power.
The socialist Wolf in a Sheepskin has now been prominently displayed when they hung the Fabian stained glass window in the London School of Economics (LSE). (The guy in the photo is Tony Blair, former Prime Minster of the UK and Former Chair of the Fabian Society)
The two guys depicted in the window as bashing the world with hammers are cofounders of the Fabian Society Webb, founder of LSE and George Bernard Shaw, a rather nasty individual going by the linked quotes who designed the window. All this is available on the internet.
Heck even WIKI has a link to the 1911 cartoon “Dee-Lighted!” by Robert Minor.
Despite all the evidence available the “Activists” continue to look like THIS.
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What school of statistical analysis teaches this. Homogenised data is better than raw data. You just have to think about this for a nanosecond to realise the fallacy in that.
If the raw data is questionable, DO NOT homogenise it, DISCARD IT.
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Hi Ross,
You say…
You do realise that the objective was to get a review of a draft paper as is described by Anthony Watts here
As Anthony Watts says…
A crowd sourced review is being used to improve the content of the paper, which once revised into a final form, will be submitted for publication.
This contradicts your idea that it was premature to release it.
Cheers ExWarmist
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Exwarmist
Yes I read Anthony’s replies with great interest. Thanks.
Ross J.
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Any comment about how you got the Muller article and the Hinkman article mixed up enough to claim that they were the same article Rosscoe?
Or are you going to pretend that never happened too?
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Ross James,
Re the Watts paper.
You are rehashing things you don’t understand.
Using raw data. How shocking. No ‘credible’ climate scientist would ever do that. (endsarc)
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I don’t think that warmists understand that the majority of data that is being used, no matter how well sited the weather station, was never collected for the purpose it is being used. In that sense most, if not all, weather station data should be treated as secondary data.
But has anyone set up a site that is collecting wet and dry bulb temperature, rainfall, sunlight and CO2 concentration concurrently? I suspect not.
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Yes a truer word never spoken, there is a reason why most stations are sited at airports its because pilots need to know what the weather is doing in that area. When built they did not care about climate change and all the reasons why we suddenly needed temps measured with an accuarcy of 3 decimal places.
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Anyone who understands the internet understands the importance of canonical links and the importance of incoming links, which happens mostly when an article is first published.
Given your statement, Ross, it’s clear who doesn’t understand the internet and how websites are constructed. I’ll give you a hint – it’s the person sitting in front of your keyboard.
Trust me on this one, don’t bring a rubber knife to a gunfight on this particular topic. The article has been memory-holed. Your linked article has a different ID to the one that has disappeared.
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Congratulations Jo and David.
But I am sceptical and quote “this is not the beginning of the end, but at least the end of the beginning”.
The war will go on, with the warmists getting more desperate, hence the current thoughts of Finkelstein.
Perhaps we should deal with that threat by saying “bring it on, and once the Government changes then we will be the ones deciding what is acceptable”.
And with the mainstream media realising that they can publish sceptical views without the sky falling, the more the criticism will bite home with the general voting public. Next you will hear a sound of running feet as the rats leave the sinking ship. Who knows Muller may convert!
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Is it now time to see a piece in the MSM about how a committed Greenie catastrophist tried to dupe the Press by posing as a former skeptic and blitzing the Press with their claims of conversion , but was undone by two of the World’s Best WebLogs (JoNova & WattsUp) ?
Forgive me, but if it was the IPCC wot done it, it would be ‘ConversionGate’.
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The worldwide Press duped by Strawman, with a flawed methodology.
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This version is still(?) up at the Age, reporting Jo’s comments on the story.
Climate change sceptics unwarmed by scientist’s reassessment of cold facts
Has Ben Cubby been learning about journalism, from Joanne ?
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I have postulated that a skeptic could probably scam the believers by posing as a Believer/Alarmist. It seems that skeptics know the arguments of both sides very well and could probably convince a bunch of them that they are for real. After a couple of years of keeping up the charade they could “drop the bomb” and say they have “converted” and cite some proper research to support their reason for becoming a skeptic.
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You seem to be making a mountain out of a molehill. Maybe you lost one SMH/Age article that reported Muller’s conversion, but here is one that is still live…
Climate results convert sceptic: ‘let the evidence change our minds’
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/climate-results-convert-sceptic-let-the-evidence-change-our-minds-20120730-23769.html#ixzz22NFX1JW7
The fact this article is online makes nonsense of your claim that anyone at SMH/Age regards Muller as a false sceptic. It’s clear they they’re happy to report that he —
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Seems the wheels are also falling off Watts’ counter effort. What a shame he didn’t tell his “co-author” that they were going to be co-authors. And now they are left cleaning up the mess of dodgy statistics and dubious claims.
Any true skeptic won’t be jumping on the Watts bandwagon until he releases his data on how he has graded his station sitings in full. Otherwise we don’t know how he has come up with his results. Just as with Muller, we should be skeptical.
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Wheels have fallen off? how TOBs? and as the paper has not been submitted yet it will be up to the co-authors when the paper is submitted if they want their name on it.
Abit like Judith Curry saying to BEST take my name of that piece of cr@p.
A good try but no gold star stogy, still waiting for the PR site RC to give you your cut-and-paste answer?
Oh and this time Mr Watts has decided not to hand out all the data to any Tom, Dick and harry until the paper is released so that he does not get the same as last time some moron called Muller running around giving out PR releases that he had solved the CAGW debate.
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Who are u Stogy??
Got a degree in Railway Engineering by any chance?
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I think you missed it. Steve Mac dangled the TOB bait and the warmists walked right into the trap. That a huge portion of the warming trend in USHCN is a result of adjustments is an undeniable fact. Now Watts et al. have caused the warmists to focus attention on Tom Karls TOB fudge factor. Hook, line and sinker.
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Auto-troll canned response – I have seen the same phrasing elsewhere, but with different actors and subject matter.
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Maybe the Communists have got what they wanted – a command economy, so there’s not as much impetus in the instrument used to get it in anymore?
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Communism, would be telling the thermometers what to think.
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So, what’s the guts with this?
If true, I think the alarmist side have had an exceptionally bad week. May long it continue.
I haven’t seen anything in the MSM yet. Mind you, haven’t seen anything about Anthony’s story either. Or Climategate II, or the Tim Ball case…….
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There was a “short conversation” starting at #35 on the Elizabeth Muller thread.
You will, the journos are just awaiting the sanctioned press release.
(You don’t still believe that they actually write their own articles, do you?)
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I guess they do not include Fox as MSM – Fox ran a story on Monday on both papers (Mullers and Watts).
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This sounds really exciting, FijiDave. Sounds to me like the tide is really turning.
I know there’s a few who don’t dare believe it yet (which is perfectly understandable) but every journey starts with the first step. This looks promising to me.
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Oi! Where did my post go?
[Had to pull out ma post hole digger. Yours was swimmin wid da spams. mod oggi]
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Jo, your site has turned septic on links.
I was commenting on the news that NIWA have got a problem, and the fact that it doesn’t appear to have been covered by the MSM yet. Just google New Zealand skeptics of man-made global warming score historic legal victory for details.
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The one about the NIWA case in NZ.
Hope it’s kosher.
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It’s not just the temperature data which have been exaggerated by NOAA etc., the models have also been tweaked, apparently to scare the proles and support demagogues like Gore.
They create 94.5 W/m^2 IR offset by exaggerated cloud albedo. As the 5-fold increase of absorbed IR exaggerates evaporation from the oceans, most ‘positive feedback’ by the water cycle is probably imaginary.
The problem comes from Meteorology which imagines single pyrgeometers measure ‘Downwelling IR’, a confusion with the temperature radiation field. Yet the manufacturers warn that to measure net IR, which does thermodynamic work, you need two instruments back to back.
The assumption that the Earth’s emissivity is black body is baseless as is the similar assumption for ‘back radiation’ from the lower atmosphere. Correct the IR physics and the assumed 238.5 W/m^2 DOWN IR at TOA vanishes. Also, because CO2 is in IR self-absorption mode by ~200 ppmV, long optical path, it appears there can be no CO2-AGW.
My view, is that no climate model with these mistakes can predict climate: the hind-casting gives the illusion they can. I am amazed this state of affairs is allowed to continue.
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Muller is one confused cookie – he wants to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds at the same time. From the breathtaking scientific work he summarised as per Jo’s Berkley Blogs link above:”Our result is based simply on the close agreement between the shape of the observed temperature rise and the known greenhouse gas increase” to “It’s a scientist’s duty to be properly skeptical. I still find that much, if not most, of what is attributed to climate change is speculative, exaggerated or just plain wrong. I’ve analyzed some of the most alarmist claims, and my skepticism about them hasn’t changed. Hurricane Katrina cannot be attributed to global warming. The number of hurricanes hitting the United States has been going down, not up; likewise for intense tornadoes. Polar bears aren’t dying from receding ice, and the Himalayan glaciers aren’t going to melt by 2035. And it’s possible that we are currently no warmer than we were a thousand years ago, during the “Medieval Warm Period” or “Medieval Optimum,” an interval of warm conditions known from historical records and indirect evidence like tree rings. And the recent warm spell in the United States happens to be more than offset by cooling elsewhere in the world, so its link to “global” warming is weaker than tenuous.”
One almost feels sorry for poor John Brooks and Co.who have these choices. Do we attack or defend Muller’s contradictive nonsense or just cherrypick the bits that suit us or stay silent? Decisions, decisions!!Aaaargh the agony!
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My apologies if someone has already posted the link to the editorial in yesterday’s Australian.
The Australian has previously used the term consensus as they stated their support for trading as the best option to reduce (carbon dioxide) ‘pollution’.
I’ve maintained for a while that The Australian was trying to back away from a previously overt believer stance.
Is this evidence of that tipping point we’ve heard so much about?
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/blessed-are-they-who-repent/story-e6frg71x-1226439798459
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Shouldn’t the title read “failies” instead of “dailies”? NEVER let the TRUTH get in the way of a GOOD STORY,just a thought Cheers
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The Age ran the Muller story as the main editorial piece in their print edition yesterday. Unfortunately for them, it’s a little harder to pull a story once it has left the printer. Until I saw David’s article this morning, I had been planning to have a go at the Age over their appallingly selective reporting of the facts – it stretches the imagination to think that The Age would be unaware of Watts’ paper which undermines the foundations of Muller’s work. I might now sit back and see if balanced reporting prevails.
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Could it have something to with the Fairfax share price?
Sell a subscription to every Jo site visitor and fairfax would almost have a viable business.
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True words spoken in jest? If they go behind a paywall I certainly wouldn’t bother to subscribe if they don’t at least pretend to present opposing views. (Comments in “The Australian” now are pretty one-sided, and usually not worth reading. Imagine how much worse it would be in the SMH or Age.)
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All they had to do ‘was check with the sceptics.’
Hmm, drop the preposition and yer tell it how it is in the SMH and The Age at media-gatekeepers.com
As in, ‘check those evil sceptics,’ never, ever let’em have an equal break.
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Congrats Jo , David and Anthony , Once in a blue moon the MSM wake up .
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Hi mobilly,
long time no hear
cheers
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Take some credit Jo. I’m pretty sure your piece blowing the Muller family’s skeptic credibility had to have some impact. I just think it was gutless the editors shamelessly removed the article quietly rather than admitted the world had been duped.
I think readers would have forgiven them if they had explained they had picked the story up from overseas and it was only after more detailed follow up research that they discovered the Mullers and the BEST team had made fools of the world. The editors could have then considered if the Mullers were prepared to lie about their skepticism, what else would they be prepared to do?
Then they may have discovered that the BEST paper had been rejected for Peer Review publication by the Journal of Geophysical Research which is why Muller decided to release the paper publicly without it being peer reviewed. Ross McKitrick’s explanation of why he has now decided to breach the confidentiality of the peer review process as a reviewer of the BEST paper, and his reviews of the BEST papers can be seen at his blog site here: http://www.rossmckitrick.com/
00
Just a thought: is this all fair dinkum way to treat us, readers?
Shouldn’t someone complain about this, somewhere? When Alan Jones says something they consider un-truth, next day there is a complaint, and he has to fight it. By ‘disppearing’ the article both newspapers basically admitted they were wrong. Can they publish something one day, withdraw it the next – without a single word? No ‘we are sorry’, no ‘we were wrong’, no ‘we apologise’, no ‘please ignore’? None of it, just pull it back and pretend it never existed? Sure this is not a way to run a newspaper? What about those comments people wrote – isn’t it insulting to them just ‘disappear’ their opinions?
Federal Government is, allegedly, trying to impose ‘higher standards’; shouldn’t this be one of the issues to look at?
Someone cleverer than I am – what’s your opinion?
00
Tipped to Bolt – see if he says anything!
00
Hate to say it but the war for an honest debate on climate change is lost.
Because a couple of articles have been removed from the Internet means NOTHING.
What stream of funding was disrupted as a result? What changes to tax laws were made?
What politicians and scientists were charges with fraud? We are all wasting intellectual and emotional energy by continuing this charade. We know it’s all BS, They know it’s all BS, We keep getting poorer. They keep getting richer. We lose. They win. (at least in the physical world).
As much fun as exposing the lie of climate change there are many other interesting and true conspiracies to investigate in science and politics alike.
00
Exposing other “interesting and true conspiracies” may be fun if you have nothing better to do. Also “the lie of climate change” on the purely scientific level is in the same category.
It is the national economy destroying nature of the political solution the present Australian government has implemented in response to “the lie of climate change” and its potentially far reaching negative consequences for Australia’s future that makes this a uniquely vital issue worth being involved in.
00
Sonny,
We have been involved in a silent Economic World War since 1946.
It started over the division of the spoils of war between East and West, as governments sought to get as much reparation from the fire-sale of Germany, as they could.
It has manifested itself as the Cold War; the Rise (and now fall) of the EU, as a counter balance to the US; the emergence of China, in replacing Europe as the counter balance; and the reengineering of The Russian Federation, which will slowly and economically try to reacquire as much of Eastern European markets as it can.
The Economic World War has seen the emergence of propaganda, applied to the environmental and political awareness of young people, used as a weapon (see footnote 1). The style of propaganda is similar to that practised in the Soviet Union and, more importantly East Germany.
The series of environmental concerns – some based on fact, but most based on the precautionary principle – are propaganda battles as part of the much larger war.
The difference now, between the Global Warming/Climate Change battle, and other similar battles (Ozone Hole – which is still there, but forgotten about), is that some scientists have now figured out how to financially profit from it, (much in the way that industrialists, on all sides, profited from the previous World Wars) and are anxious to keep it going for as long as possible. This is why this particular battlefield is in the blogosphere, and it is all about the science.
But, it is only one battle, and whether we win or lose, the result will not have much difference regarding the much bigger economic war that is going on around the world.
Footnote 1: Adam Smith had all the attributes of a typical attack drone, which is why I responded.
00
One more point. There can be only one reason why the article was withdrawn.
“they” realized that it was not an effective enough piece of propaganda (partly due to real journalists like Jo equipping punters with real information about the deception and conflict of interest behind Muller and BEST). This was being conveyed in comments and the editors must have realized that the article was effectively working against the propaganda initiative). In this sense it is a victory for skeptics. What amazes me is that the MSM are only know cottoning on to the idea that the public has reached absolute saturation of this CAGW BS
00
Incorrect.
Its more likely some form of glitch..
Seriously..they dont care about science..its the narrative that is important.
I have tried to “help” journalists from The Age when they have made blatant mistakes(regarding $CAGW$ )..
I resorted to the Press Council of Australia etc.
Bad move.
The Press Council staff member tried to argue with me on science points..on subjects he had zero knowledge about..then he decided which complaints he would forward(without my consent) to The Age.
He later claimed that I had given him permission too throw out most of my own corrections(huh)but he had now lost my email.
The Age replied with an argument that was so poorly thought out and ridiculous, which did not address anything i wrote, that I was actually embarassed for them. 🙂
They begrudgingly admitted one mistake through gritted teeth and after several months did a correction on a web page so deep that no one would ever find it.
As far as I can tell, journalists now days do not care about facts, and are as scientifically illiterate as some of our resident $CAGW$ trolls here..
And most dont seem to be able use a search engine for checking anything..)
00
Sweet news! Looks like more than one person in publishing is waking up. I’m thrilled with this. There’ll be more poking around to find the truth now. Those blinkers have been whipped off.
Watch. I reckon this will scare the alarmists into even more ridiculous claims to try and win back monopoly of the press. Could be a bit of a circus over the next few weeks and, hopefully, the MSM will dump them forever into a black hole (you know, the one caused by global warming). 🙂
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Is it this article?
http://newsstore.fairfax.com.au/apps/viewDocument.ac;jsessionid=46784510917A54AAB79FAF2048657279?sy=nstore&pb=all_ffx&dt=selectRange&dr=1month&so=relevance&sf=text&sf=headline&rc=10&rm=200&sp=brs&cls=348&clsPage=1&docID=SMH120731SG6D01FABK7
weird place to end up.
—————————————————————–
It is indeed. Thanks for tracking it down – Mod
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Thanks Gee Aye. I’ve added an update at the top. It’s all the more mysterious. The original pages on all four dailies are still 404 – but yes, that App news server is going. Did they forget to delete that, or was it some error that took down all the news items on separate news servers?
I now know the comments are linked from those pages. I don’t know if that page had comments, and it’s been disappeared from Tues – Friday. Who knows?
00
the site I found is not linked to anything as far as I can tell. They’ve filed it away but if they want to hide involvement then keeping it on a publicly accessible site plus allowing various (minor) publications to run it does not fit well with a hypothesis that their is a well coordinated attempt to suppress the article. But not everyone is well coordinated.
00
.
The article is still in full at The Land (Fairfax Paper)!
And comments are there from 31/7/12 till 02/8/12!
It’s also on Optuszoo How I saw past the hot air on climate
So no matter how hard Fairfax try to delete this it will be in the data banks for many a year!
The amazing thing is that it is still on The Land – a Fairfax Media Company – maybe not enough
leftLEFT there to check who’s who!00
The article might not be the only thing to be disappeared.
Private ALP polling shows that the party would lose ALL seats in Queensland, Tasmania, WA and both NT seats.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/internal-polls-tip-wipeout-for-alp/story-e6frg6nf-1226441806884
Hot tip! Shares in Bowater-Scott and Kimberley Clark. Kleenex and the like will be in big demand come the election.
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Evidence everyone?
Steve McIntyre
Posted Jul 28, 2012 at 11:09 PM | Permalink | Reply
I’ve had dinner at Muller’s house and we’re on very friendly terms. I wish people wouldn’t get so wound up.
Steve McIntyre
Posted Jul 29, 2012 at 3:27 PM | Permalink | Reply
Not at all. I had no idea at the time of the post that Anthony planned to announce this weekend or with such fanfare. Mosher and I talked about it and both assigned about a 20% to Anthony’s announcement being something to do with the surface stations project.
I helped with the statistics at the finish line, which Anthony was grateful for.
Steve McIntyre
Posted Jul 29, 2012 at 10:27 PM | Permalink | Reply
Mosher didnt know either. We were talking about it that afternoon on Skype and trying to guess.
________________________
As for the MULLER article allegations: you would assume that the article in the paper as ALLEGED was entire REMOVAL and hint of it.
If Steve McIntyre does not find Muller an embarrassment what about Jo and this over the top castigation of the man. You are simply reading too much into a removal of a simple headline news online. More conspiracy fodder for wingnuted brains. Yea have your fun. But I see no profit whatsoever in blatant character assassination. If it is one thing I’ve learnt – taking it too far is counter productive. Of course it is satirical. Of course justify it.
The Australian Newspaper does this all the time. Embarrassing Muller to satisfy the doubters mind for an easy rest for their weary non-thinking heads.
Snip – off topic -FLY
_____
For All:
I strongly suggest rather then attacking characters of those who disagree with you thoroughly check and look for refutations of Anthony’s work. It is not my place here to link to studies already out that highlight the difficulties with Watts paper already. As I said: There is a huge amount of confusion about how homogenisation CORRECTS RAW data.
It is all so premature and immature of everyone here to put up what you call an outstanding paper that has not even been reviewed and is still going through major corrections and improvements. As I said – this does not overturn a single iota of present science. All it highlights is that – better instrumentation methodology requires less homogenisation – that is all there is in it.
If you seriously want me to present links then allow MY posts with GRAPHICS clearly highlighting errors here. And stop the nonsensical pretence of non-censorship and hobbling dissent of opinion.
A Video expose on MWP period highlighting deliberate FRAUDULENT graphing and interpretation to audiences in the US was lkinked. You guys and this site require good science, and refutation with graphics and video that clearly (without doubt) highlights the misrepresentation* that can exist on all sides.
Do not EVER tell me I do not post evidence ever. I do on countless occasions. And if not censored will continue to do.
Disclaimer on misrepresentation:
That statement does implicate everyone. I am not referring to everyone here. I have not implied that of Watts. I have not implied that of Jo
Ross J.
[Ross – There is obviously a history to your commenting here, but please remember that you are a guest, and at least while I am on watch, you will be expected to be polite -Fly]
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One question Ross James.
Do you or do you not accept that 80% of weather states in the USA do not meet the standards set down by the very people that produce temperature data?
Yes or no?
00
Yes Ross James, you should be permitted to post freely the spam you come up with. NOT!
Maybe try posting one or two paragraphs instead of puking a gallon of bile each time.
Oh, and calling the rest of us “wingnutted brains” is certain to make Jo and moderators think you are a reasonable troll.
00
Ross Quotes:
I find this interesting. I’ve met and communicated with quite a few skeptics over the years. I’d be willing to have dinner with any of them and likely enjoy the time spent. I think most skeptics would accept a dinner invite from a warmist. I do not believe that Mann or Hansen would feel the same way or even accept such an invite from a skeptic.
I guess the difference is that skeptics are busy enjoying life and Warmists are living in fear. It’s much more fun being with the former.
10
I guess Mr James is at the anger stage at the moment after years of being lied to, don’t worry acceptance that the C in CAGW is not going to happen will comes soon.
00
So you are now conceding you lied there Ross? Specifically, you stated:
.
You have not shown any questioning. You have shown that McIntyre was brought into the process to assist. In other words, you have proven yourself wrong.
You make false accusations against the paper of Watts, and then provide no evidence to back up your lies.
IN short, you failed to provide even a scintilla of evidence to back up your claim. But you tried to slip one past when called upon to provide evidence of your assertions. You lied.
I was fully aware of the time line, having read the Climate Audit and WUWT blogs. Repeating it does not buttress your points – it merely demonstrates your lack of integrity and facts.
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Let me be very clear about where others are at with this Watts article:
Pielke, Sr., after initially praising it as a “game changer”, is now backing away from a Watts complete endorsement with disclaimers, requirements and improvements:
From his website:
“To make sure everyone clearly recognizes my involvement…I provided Anthony suggested text and references for his article [I am not a co-author of the Watts et al paper]…
and:
“There has been discussion as to whether the Time of Observation Bias (TOB)* could affect the conclusions reached in Watts et al (2012). This is a valid concern. Thus the ‘Game Changing’ finding of whether the trends are actually different for well- and poorly-sited locations is tentative until it is shown whether or not TOB alters the conclusions.”
_________
* This greatly affects outcomes in temperature readings. For example if we do not have appropriate times of observation for those stations for temperature readings then cooling biases can creep. As well, extreme heat radiative flux affecting temperatures during certain times of the day. Homogenisation is the challenge then. Not RAW data which can be corrupted.
_______
Ross J.
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Ross, you clearly don’t understand homogenization or TOB.
McIntyre says there is a paper on Watts work and TOB due in a few days. I await it with great interest, because they may have gone back to the paper records and got the real Time of Observation recorded for every day.
It is scandalous that no one has ever done this. Instead relying on Karl’s method of estimating TOB.
Only in climate science is an estimating method deemed more important than the actual data.
00
Ross James says:
That is perhaps the most inane (insane) quote for a while now.
00
Mark D,
I think what Ross was trying to say was that the raw data can be corrupted from Friday arvo BBQ or the red eye from Melbourne to Perth and everything in between therefore it is a challenge to homogenise the data.
With that in mind i am surprised that Ross views Watts et al so sceptically afterall Watts et al has made great attempts (in fact they are the only ones to even make an attempt) at removing the bias in the raw data due to siting issues which is exactly what he percieves as to be the problem.
So then one must ask way is Ross so hostile towards the Watts et al paper?
00
I think Ross James just plays with skeptics’ minds for entertainment as much as anything else. It’s possible he believes what he says but my feeling is that he uses the whole climate debate for his own amusement. You know, like stamping on an ants nest just to watch the ants scurrying around frantically.
That’s not to say he isn’t quite serious on another level entirely.
There are many pseudo-intellectuals in the ranks of the Left who regard themselves as superior to conservatives in some kind of humanist/moralist way. I think the supremely supercilious Tony Jones of the ABC’s Q&A exemplifies this type very well in that he clearly sees opinions from the Right as mildly amusing and almost beneath his dignity to discuss – but for the sake of the show, he tolerates their airing on television.
On a different level, I believe there are others of the Left who are all together more sinister. They are politically amoral, in the sense that they don’t see themselves as morally superior, or indeed morally anything at all. Unlike Jones, who is little more than a hapless drone swept up in the socialist cause and enjoying his own false sense of self-importance, these others have no moral imperative at all.
In the same way that true-believer agents of the Soviet system were unconcerned about morality, I think there is a certain echelon in the Global Warming alarmist camp consisting of people with the same mindset. They have a political goal to achieve and will simply do whatever is required to achieve it.
The behaviour of our own Prime Minister in introducing the world’s most punitive tax on carbon dioxide, among other destructive pieces of legislation, makes me think of her in the same terms. I don’t believe she’s serving our interests or even the interests of her own political party. So whose interests is she serving?
I know what this must sound like to some of you reading it but I have been driven to it by my attempts to make sense of this whole climate war business. We’re witness to an extremely big event in human history. We’re dangerously close to finally handing over our freedom to ‘Big Socialism’ – in fact a kind of worldwide totalitarianism Stalin could only dream about.
Ross James may be aware of this much bigger picture or he may just be another drone like Tony Jones. I’m not sure which. Either way it’s apparent he’s happy to plant inaccurate ‘facts’ and provocative pro-warmist opinions at this website, then just sit back and enjoy the show.
Maybe we shouldn’t encourage him(?).
If, as some of you say, we sceptics are winning the climate war on the internet, I would suggest we don’t drop our guard for a moment. The Left sees Global Warming as easily the best ‘blunt instrument’ they have ever had to cudgel the rest of us into submission. They will NOT relinquish it lightly.
And as for our much-lauded internet victories, has anyone noticed how keen our present socialist government is to introduce what will actually amount to a state-controlled internet .. in the form of the NBN?
00
It’s now looking like Watts will have to make very substantial revisions to the paper before he can even submit this for peer review – particularly given that his “co-authors” are also raising serious questions about the methodology.
It’s a pity that he felt the need to rush it out to counter the BEST analysis.
00
Watts may have to make some correction but I don’t want to be hasty. At least his paper may pass peer review unlike Muller whose BEST paper was rejected!
00
twice rejected!
The other thing is that almost every paper, especially ones dealing with large amounts of data and data massaging, go through huge revisions often with the help of many who don’t end up on the author list (see the acknowledgments). This is what is happening here. Watts has opened up the process to scrutiny.
I don’t know why he did it this way or care particularly (amazing how many blog words written about the motives and not the substance) but this could go on for months before a workable version – if one can be made workable – gets submitted. I can tell you from experience the version submitted will be unrecognisable compared with the one he put out the other day.
00
GA,
You need to read more
he did it this way because Muller set the precident, he has only done what Muller has already done.
I know you did not read the review comments on Mullers paper that i posted, you did not read them because you cannot handle the truth.
You can lead a horticulture but you cannot make her think.
00
Craker… are you addressing what I wrote or what you wished I wrote?
I agree Muller has released a bunch of unpublished analysis and conclusions. I wonder what his early drafts looked like? I read the comments on Muller’s work before I saw your post so, it is true, I moved on from your post rather than reading it again.
Since you’ve engaged here with me, why do you think these two unpublished papers have received so much bloggery? The last 8 or 10 posts by Jo pretty much exemplify the interest of the rest of the commentariate on this topic.
Maybe I’ve been in science too long but this is like going to a conference where opposing sides give talks with hints at soon to be released important data. Everyone gets distracted by this at the time but months later watered-down incremental paper are all that are released.
00
What is it with you people? Do you begin to have a conversation then half way through lose track and then start rambling about something else?
You did not know why Watts posted his study when he did and nor did you care (why would you not care about a critical aspect of the debate is lost on me) anyway i told you why (even though you did not care).
Stodgy claimed major changes where needed, Eddy claimed he was wrong, you then claimed all papers like this needed major revision in the past thereby defending Stodgy and refuting Eddis’s claims.
Why do i bother………………
00
ummm…
OK if you say so. Seems to me that Eddie agreed with Stogy about the possibility of change. I’ve also since agreed with him about Muller’s paper after you brought it up.
And no, I have no idea why you bother. You seem to have problems interpreting pretty straight forward comments.
And no I still don’t care because, until both papers have sorted themselves out they are just inprep manuscripts.
00
Linked within this link
AW explains it all.
00
That depends on how you define “serious” , when I read what Steve McIntyre wrote, he was complaining that Anthony wanted him to do his review faster than he would normally like, then he went on to say it was useful research. Christy seems to be positive and although Roger Pielke Sr has offered some advice and suggestions, he is not, and never was, an author.
Anthony is also using crowd-sourcing in the blogosphere as an informal review process. There are lots of Scientists and Engineers out there, with useful contributions to make, and to get them involved means that the paper must have some veracity.
I think your comment may be a little premature.
00
Pre-mature article?
It certainly was one. As I said from the beginning it was full of mistakes.
Being a true skeptic requires a certain amount of doubt on any findings. Not the avalanche of claims of total refutation centring on personalised attacks on Muller and his findings. Yes I call that hypocritical of the Internet blogsphere from the opposing side. The way this is being handled is appalling. The refutation of the ENTIRE AGW SCIENCE in the context of CLIMATE SENSITIVITY IS COMPLETELY BOGUS and without any foundation based on this article still being developed by Anthony. The findings will be adjusted upward on temperatures (per decade). Far too many statistical assumptions were made.
Anthony Watts in his own writing claims the eminent BEST release forced his hand early. I clearly posted that the eminent BEST release was the provocation for Anthony’s actions on his site. I was correct and so was Truthseeker. It turns out a little too much theatre was involved plus signs of being over wrought and in panic mode.
Anthony writes:
About a week ago I learned Muller was going to release and do the media blitz, thought he’d be at EPW Senate hearing on August 1st too. (turns out he was passed over, John Christy will be there though.). IPCC deadline coming up too. Added anxiety.
Tried to get stats guy to the stars Matt Briggs onboard early last week (he was on list of original authors) to help with significance tests, last big hurdle. Most graphs and analysis was done.
Turns out Briggs was on vacation camping, no fault of his, it is summer…so I figured only way I was going to get this done was to shut down WUWT and stay home from short vacation with wife and kids in Yellowstone. They went on with grandparents and I went on authoring blitz with Evan and with Dr. Pielke Sr. helping edits. Christy provided support too and I helped him craft his EPW section on this.
So made announcement Friday. Figured on Sunday at noon so WUWT could provide peer review, and dumped my plane tickets in trash. Admittedly I was a bit overwrought when I wrote it. I’m truly sorry if anyone was mislead. Dialed it back. Went on crash self taught stats diet…not my thing, but capable of learning. and being a broadcaster, deadline pressure is a huge motivator. You learn to get it done. On-air waits for nobody. Careers die when you miss deadlines.
____________
Ross J.
00
No Ross, I was saying that Stogy’s comment was premature. I didn’t say anything about the article. That must have been the voices in your head that said that.
And if you had read slightly higher up, you would have noticed that I also wrote, “Anthony is also using crowd-sourcing in the blogosphere as an informal review process.”
Now, I know you are a bit old and decrepit, as am I. But you should really try to keep the old grey-matter fit and active by keeping up with what the young people are doing. Did you know that they actually publish their own books on the internet? And they do all of the process – everything – including the writing, editing and publishing and distribution – without any paper. Fancy that!
And that is what Anthony Watts has done, the clever man. See Ross he has an active mind, he thinks about things, and he sees the way the world is evolving.
And I’ll let you into a secret. Once all the people on his blog site (and a few on this one too) have found all of the typographical errors, and misspellings, and such, and some really smart people have checked the Maths and Stats, and all of that stuff that you and I find difficult, Ross, then he will submit it for the official peer review, and those peer reviewers will not be able to find fault with it because everything will have already been checked from here to Sunday.
Isn’t that cleaver?
Time for a lie down, I think Ross.
00
Rereke Whakaaro
You obviously do not know my background. I was and still am in part a Systems Analyst and Software Engineer. I have been at the computer game for over 35 years now. I have seen migration from procedural to oop programming to the rise of Java script to .Net and Android OS programming APIs. I also know how to read statistical information.
One thing I learnt when you code. You move from instability of code through to the stable BETA stage. I am yet to see any proof whatsoever that the article in question is even at stable stage.
Yet folk here have the audacity to blindly accept the article with all its faults without questioning and thinking. They assume this trashes global warming and the calculated sensitivity.
I refuse to be drawn into these character AD Homs which some want to draw me into. (Baa Humbug had his day of sunshine). I also am at odds with you over anything good that can come out of public auditing. You see at end of the day unless the standards from the public arena are up to standards of science of the related and relevant fields, it is unwise to place resounding credibility on any outcome.
Let me tell you my dear fellow: This whole claim of weak inter-decade calcs on the warming was spectacular in being incorrect. I have it on a very good word that the Watts article WILL indeed be revised UPWARD for the decade warming trends.
Bad Thermometers:
Many have been asking how on earth can we trust thermometers when they are incorrect. The answer can be found by the diligent mind and enquiry by reading the following article and not be taken in by hype about incorrect thermometers. The only thing here if your convinced there is a global Marxist conspiracy toward Global Governance you will not trust anything. That is not genuine enquiry.
BOM and homogenisation process and how it works: http://cawcr.gov.au/publications/technicalreports/CTR_049.pdf
Global Governance Conspiracy is a constant theme from many posts.
This actually heralds from fundamentalist sectors of Christian based eschatology. It was rife in World War II with Mussolini being the beast of the anti-christ as a best seller book title. It has been with us and become a phenomena at the turn of the last century. Folk are looking in the wrong place. They are placing blame on the wrong crowd. As we enter the 2100 – our world will be vastly different. In just 88 years from now – the science that warned you will be finally settled.
_________
Ross J.
00
Ross,
The United Nations would be disparaging of you referring to their decades of hard work as a “global governance conspiracy”. It’s not a conspiracy if the information is readily available.. Read “Agenda 21” available on the UN’s website.
00
Ross :
“This is me” — “Systems Analyst and Software Engineer”
BUT NOT REALLY QUALIFIED TO COMMENT ON GLOBAL WARMING.
00
Well Ross, you are quite correct, I did not know your background. But there again, you do not know mine, and are therefore as guilty as me, for jumping to conclusions.
I too have a background in information management and information systems, with some electronic engineering for good measure. In my time I have worked as a researcher, modeller, and analyst for the military, for IBM, and for various other Government Agencies. So I reckon I can spot a good modelling system when I see one.
But I don’t see one in Climate Science, or at least not one with any sensible predictive ability. Sure, the models can produce reasonable three-day forecasts, but beyond that, the signal gets subsumed into the noise created by all of the factors they don’t understand, or haven’t even recognised yet. And please don’t try to tell me that they have every factor identified and all of the relationships defined. Because if you did that, I would have to call you a liar.
One thing I learnt when you code, is that it is good thing to do structured design walkthroughs, before you start coding, and structured code walkthroughs early in the coding process. That way you can avoid many of the logic errors and performance constraints. I don’t know what you would call that, but we knew it as an Alpha Review. In iterative development, you then code the framework, test it, and some functionality, and test that, and so on until you are finished coding. That, to us, was Beta testing. You then move performance, capacity, et al testing to stress the system, and so forth.
I think that that Anthony Watts is at the Alpha Review stage, because he is using the expertise that is available in the blogosphere to give him informal critique. Some comments will be useful, some will not, that will be for him to decide. But it is an interesting approach and experiment, and from our coding experiences, Ross, we know that the final result will be more robust because of it, do we not?
Of course some folk will blindly accept the article, as it is, with all its faults without questioning and thinking. Some folks may believe the horoscope, as well. But that is not important. The important thing is that Anthony is gathering information from as wide an experience base as he can.
I don’t think anybody here disagrees that the climate changes, and that we get periods where it gets warmer, and some where it gets cooler, and that the overall general trend is upwards for the period we can measure. A lot of people here do disagree that these changes to the climate are, or will be catastrophic, at least in any meaningful time frame. The fact that the models show otherwise is more likely to be caused by software problems and erroneous data than the underlying physics. Because Anthony’s paper is based on observations and analysis that is independent of the models, it will give everybody a good insight into just how robust the models are, how much reliance should be placed on their predictive ability, and what else needs to be done to them to improve their overall performance and accuracy.
From my view point, I can only see positive impacts from this. I cannot understand why some people are up in arms about it.
[
AndrewAnthony typos fixed] ED00
Raruckicky;
that’s ANTHONY Watts. Not Andrew.
OK, Rokarukum?
00
One question Ross James.
Do you or do you not accept that 80% of weather stations in the USA do not meet the standards set down by the very people that produce temperature data?
Yes or no?
Yes or no Ross……..yes or no.
00
Do you think he has fallen asleep again?
00
Hi Ross,
I responded to you up thread here perhaps you missed it.
It goes to the topic.
00
“Imminent”, undoubtedly, “eminent”, hardly.
00
Premature article? The only thing premature Ross is you and that seems like a personal problem for you and your significant other to deal with! Muller is trumpeting his paper as if it is the word of God and yet it was rejected for publication after peer review. You know, Ross, the same peer review process that you hold so dear and cherish?
Can you name them without doing your usual cut, paste and regurgitate?
If you are a true skeptic why do you defend Muller when he has been rejected for publication? Again, you drone on and on about peer review and yet you are a hypocrite for promoting a hack who has been castigated by his fellow true believers for his embarrassing paper!
Are you delusional or are trying to avoid a nervous break down as your fantasy world crumbles around you? Cite evidence that Watts is wrong without posting a link and basically responding with “what he said”. You can form a nuanced, cogent thought, can’t you?
A biased interpretation from a CAGW useful idiot incapable of independent thought.Your analysis is based on false assumptions: Muller had a viable paper and Watts had ulterior motives. Did it ever occur to you that Watts was tired of seeing Muller promote a paper which had been rejected by his peers and was an embarrassment to the hokey team? Perhaps he was tired of seeing the media fall all over themselves reporting a story that agreed with their preconceived notions and biases? Perhaps Watts just rose to the challenge and said to himself, “If it is going to be it is up to me!” Since you can’t prove he had a sinister motive, other than telling a truth you didn’t want to know about, you should not comment further on the matter and continue to embarrass yourself!
So, Ross, Watts made a “deadline” and I am proud of him for doing so, aren’t you? Now, Ross, tell us what is wrong with the paper and what the errors are?
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Stogy, totally agree.
Watts may well have intended to have this paper reviewed over the internet but to rush it out because of Muller’s op/ed looks bad. Better to have had more friendly critics like Mosher and Zeke play the devil’s advocate roll before it hits the big bad world.
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If I am not mistaken, there seems to be a history of Watts being shafted by Muller in the past, when they worked together on some project or other. I am not sure of the details, but that might be another reason why there was a rush to get something in the public domain, just in case.
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Muller used–and misrepresented–Watts’ contributions to some of his original BEST paper in front of Congress, without notifying him or getting his consent.
A petty dirtbag of a man.
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From the department of “seven signs of the apocolypse”
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/08/02/alarmist-fact-checking-street-lights-dont-melt-at-115f/
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“There are reasons their subscriptions are falling and skeptic bloggers are winning awards. There’s two decades of news stories that they have not covered.”
This is the case for most print news, and not just in respect of the AGW scam. Newspapers in the English speaking world seem, by and large, to have become mostly mouthpieces for governments and the bankers. Far too many of them uncritically parroted the official lines on Iraq, Afghanistan, and the other US/Israel wars. They still parrot too many official lines for us to trust them now.
Absurdly, we now feel that we are more likely to get the whole, unbiased, truth from some foil-hatted troglodyte hunched over his computer. He may be nuts, but he isn’t run by Goldman-Sachs.
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jo, wondering if u have discovered whether or not david’s Fairfax piece was in any print edition.
meanwhile, following the money:
GLOBAL INVESTOR SURVEY ON CLIMATE CHANGE
ANNUAL REPORT ON ACTIONS AND PROGRESS 2011
The Investor Network on Climate Risk (INCR) supports 100 institutional investors with assets exceeding $10 trillion in addressing the financial risks and opportunities associated with climate change and related sustainability issues…
This report provides the results of the second global survey of investment practices coordinated by the three investor networks on climate change – the IIGCC, based in Europe, INCR, based in North America and the Australia/New Zealand IGCC. The report provides an overview of the leading investment practices around the world on climate change and analyses the drivers for those practices…
http://www.igcc.org.au/Resources/Documents/Global%20investor%20survey%20on%20climate%20change.pdf
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It apparently was in The Age print edition, but not in the SMH. We thought the editor was based at the SMH, but evidently she was at The Age. C
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Bob Carter 01/08 @ 11.08pm, re Ross’ sources – ‘articles that have crossed my desk.’ As in paper darts thrown across a room?
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From post 38.1
Just making sure that when Ross returns he gets his chance to answer the question.
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The new regime as applied by Watts MAY knock at more thermometers. 80% as you say. This is a very questionable statistic at present. I would prefer to direct your attention away from the thermometers for the moment and suggest you carefully read homogenisation processes and how they work. The BOM site has a good PDF on this very subject.
Cite the process:
Very few century-scale temperature station series are totally free of such influences, and thus careful homogenisation is required in order to produce a homogeneous data set. Whilst sitespecific inhomogeneities have only a marginal impact on observed temperature trends at the global scale because they tend to cancel each other out when averaged across large numbers of stations (Jones and Wigley, 2010), they can have a much more substantial effect on outcomes at the local and regional scale, including national data sets where those are based on a relatively small number of stations.
http://www.homogenisation.org – which has included a comprehensive benchmarking assessment of methods for detecting inhomogeneities at the monthly or annual timescale (Venema et al., 2012)
From the web site:
1. Homogenisation improves climate data and does not cause artificial trends. Because the test was blind and because of the realism of the data, this can now be stated with confidence.
2. Modern algorithms, which are designed to also work with an inhomogeneous reference, are clearly better than traditional ones. It needed a realistic benchmark dataset with surrogate climate networks to see this difference clearly.
3. Two new software packages containing some of the methods recommended by HOME are now avalible. The code has been produced by Olivier Mestre, École Nationale de la Météorologie, Météo France, Tolouse”. HOMER (for monthly data) and HOM/SPLIDHOM (for daily data)
___
I am looking on forward to Anthony’s updates. Quoting the first draft causes me not to draw conclusions too quickly. Hold your fire in other words. You are maybe basing this on the draft by Anthony – it’s far too early. Are they correct, wrong or over estimated? One man – just one man thinks otherwise. That is his challenge to prove the metal of his assertions against an incredible body of evidence (otherwise also backed warming trends by Satellites). The trends as a consequence of CORRECTIVE homogenisation are all so wrong is one hell of a assertion.
As I said earlier – you fire ALL your bullets at once – you will run out when you strike counter fire.
_______
Ross J.
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Ross James said:
How nice to be reassured that the data relevant to these plots linked below, have been improved by the Doctor (of data), James Hansen of NASA GISS:
http://www.real-science.com/reconstruction-unadjusted-temperatures
http://www.real-science.com/smoking-gun-giss
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Anthony Watts does say in his paper that the reason he has published on line is so that he can receive feedback quickly before incorporating any criticisms and corrections if necessary before peer review.
However I wouldn’t use Skeptical Science as a source for any decent scientific critique of a climate science paper when they were all too ready to accept Muller’s BEST paper and his claims of having once been a skeptic hook line and sinker here: http://www.skepticalscience.com/news.php?n=1559
Their name ‘Skeptical Science’ is hardly appropriate!
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‘SkepticalScience’ attempts to depict everything “skeptical” as unscientific, and defends the consensus loudly. It also alters and edits readers’ comments without their assent, etc. It is a sleazeball site.
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So, any ol’ corrections, whether correct or not, would be OK, and leave the trends etc. unaffected? If not, then the specifics of the corrections DO matter.
Which is it?
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Antarctica once had palm trees!!1!1ZOMGZ
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/national/14436184/antarctica-had-rainforests-50m-years-ago/
Yes, CO2 levels were once higher and the planet warmer, and guess what? The continents move around a bit as well… hands up if this is news to anyone.
The article warns that within a few hundred years of fossil fuel burning we could be back in the same climate state!
Once again … hands up anyone that doesn’t think electricity generation technology will be radically different in 50 to 100 years, let alone a few hundred years form now. Fossil fuels may well be an interesting historical curiousity by then … probably will be … but who knows? Certainly not someone sifting through Antarctic mud samples…
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What was the latitude of the trees. What were the species?
Is watching the olympics and a late glass of red wine an excuse for not checking?
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See Late Ecocene 40ma or Late Cretaceous 80ma!
Even koalas might well have been living and thriving in Antarctica 50 million years ago! Angiosperms were well established by this time (and I doubt koalas fed on palm trees) even though some species of sago and phoenix pre-date 100 million years!
Don’t forget – Fossils of a Eucalyptus species have been found from 51.9 million years ago in Argentina , which increases the logic of Antartic, South America and Australia all being connected some 50 million years ago!
Koalas, Gum trees and koalas lived in Antartica 50 million years ago. The latitide of error is up to science to determine!
Maybe the SMH could run an investigation on the above.
Good question Gee Aye!
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The Leo Hickman piece is still up at The Age at least, and the Editorial from that day is still available, which quotes Muller’s piece.
It is certainly odd that the original articles have gone, but perhaps it is something to do with hosting articles from the NY Times? Something to do with their paywall? I’m speculating wildly at this point, but it doesn’t look like Fairfax have suddenly changed their minds and now think that climate change is a communist/Elders of Zion plot or something.
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Since this thread has moved all over the place, this won’t seem off topic. I am re-reading James Delingpole’s Book ‘Watermelons: The Green Movement’s True Colors‘ which I only skim read when I first down loaded it onto my Kindle last year. It is largely about the whole Climate Change scam but I had to laugh at his start to Chapter Four which if Jo Nova read I’m sure she shared his pain!
IN THE PAY OF BIG KOCH
Carter Roberts, President and CEO, WWF Inc Total Compensation (2009) $455,147
Frances Beinecke, President, Natural Resource Defense Council, Total Compensation (2009) $432,742
Fred Krupp, President, Environment Defense Fund, Total Compensation (2009) $423,359
James Delingpole, Blogger, Daily Telegraph, Total Compensation (2010) less than $24,000
Waxing lyrical and quite humorously about his critic’s imagined millions that he earns from the fossil fuel industry James Delingpole then goes on to write more wistfully, (which I am sure Jo Nova and David Evans can relate to):
“The more prosaic truth about Climategate is that it has been the biggest financial disaster of my career. Instead of being able to write on any number of different subjects for diverse newspapers as I used to in my money-earning days, I now spend huge chunks of my time trawling round the internet, boning up on science papers, keeping up with the latest climate research and finding new material for my Telegraph blog.
Yes it’s nice having a popular blog, I suppose. But unfortunately blogs don’t pay. Ask Jo Nova, ask Richard North, ask Bishop Hill, ask Steve McIntyre, ask Anthony Watts, ask Donna Laframboise. Most of them can barely raise enough money to pay their running costs, let alone make a modest living out of it.
There may be all sorts of reasons why we’re involved in climate skepticism – love, duty, fun, the challenge, masochism – but the money most definitely isn’t one of them.
If you want to make a living, then you should definitely choose to be a warmist rather than a skeptic. In Warmism, there are grants, salaries and jobs galore.In skepticism, even now that the tide of opinion is beginning to turn, there is little but the modest satisfaction of knowing you are right.
Before Climategate I wrote articles about cooking, mens fashion, books, TV, rock music, drugs, politics, cars, motorbikes, popular culture. I did film reviews, interviews and restaurant criticism. I went down coal mines, I dived with great white sharks, I got to hang with Jimmy Page and Robert Plant at the Sunset Marquee in Hollywood. I travelled to Tirana, to the Skeleton Coast, from the souks of Essaouira to the brothels of Accra.”
Delingpole goes on in this vein at some length describing an idyllic journalists life pre-Climategate.
“Not any more though. Today, tomorrow, next week, next month and – oh God I hope not but quite possibly – next year, I am and will be, Mister Climate Change Skeptic.”
“Normally in journalism acquiring a specialty is helpful and financially rewarding. Once you’ve established yourself as an expert, your knowledge base and contacts book and reputation earn you a string of lucrative commissions.
With climate skepticism, unfortunately, these rules don’t apply. You can be as fluent on sunspots and negative feedbacks and isostatic rebounds as a motoring specialist is on torque,….but it will make sod all difference to your ability to get a paid commission.
The reason is that in Britain – and the same rules apply from Australia to the US – almost all the coverage given to AGW in mainstream media (MSM) is written from a warmist perspective. This is true even of my own blog-hosting newspaper the Daily-Telegraph. It employs an Environment Editor and an Environment Correspondent, both of whom (unlike me) are on full salaries; both of whom are committed warmists; both of whom get to publish stories on the subject in print (as opposed to a mere blog) six days a week.
Even if I had a really juicy climate story, there are very few publications that would pay me for it. They are limited to the Daily Mail and the Mail On Sunday, though they don’t run skeptical stuff that often and competition when they do is stiff, the Express and Sunday Express, and Spectator.”
“Can you see now, from a journalists perspective, why climate change skepticism would be the last route you’d want to take if you really were in it for the money? The ratio of time spent on research to number of paid articles is about as lousy as it gets. It’s a journalists nightmare. It’s a journalists bank manager’s nightmare. Above all – just ask my wife – it’s a journalist’s spouse’s nightmare.”
So next time you hear or read the claims of big oil or fossil fuel industry funding climate skepticism from the likes of the very well paid (from the public purse) Tim Flannery, Will Steffan, Clive Hamilton, Stephan Lewandowsky, Wayne Swan, Julia Gillard, Bob Brown, Christine Milne, BOM, CSIRO and the rest, think about Delingpole or closer to home Jo Nova barely covering costs and perhaps drop something in the tip jar if you can afford it.
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If I had a dollar for every time a skeptic told me “I used to belive in climate change but then I had a good look at the numbers” I’d be a rich man. Of course they are lying for the most part.
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Perhaps you are right. Maybe some warmists converted to sceptics not based on detailed investigation into the science but rather as a result of a good intuition unfettered by msm ‘programming’. How one comes to the truth is not important. The truth is the truth.
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Actually I doubt they were ever not skeptics.
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Matt B said:
Matt, I know a lot of sceptics and have heard their reasons. I don’t believe that you would become a rich man or even close. In other words, I don’t believe your statement. Now if I had a dollar for every falsehood I have received from warmists, I might not become rich but I would be able to buy something nice. You would have just made a dollar contribution to that worthy charity.
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So, Matt, how do you explain the changing polls? The majority use to believe in CAGW and now they do not. Maybe the numbers changed once those who were held incommunicado or were perhaps hunkered down in a cave (until they got tired of the granola and flaxseed diet) surfaced to express their opinion? It certainly couldn’t be warmists realizing that they were wrong and converting to skepticism, could it, Matty B?
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Won’t be too long now. We’ll see AGW alarmists in courts all over the world and [justice done]. I hope that includes any politician if they don’t admit they got it wrong and continue to spew out lies.
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[comment snipped – off topic and no supporting reference – Mod]
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lol no wonder you don’t think AGW is fair dinkum. Are you having dinner with elvis?
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MattB said
If the Greens had their way, that would be dinner with an Islamic Elvis by candle light. Elvis would have been hiding in the closet all this time.
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Hey mod,
I note that you removed the claim “wild conspiracy” from your snip note.
As for supporting evidence try these:
architects an engineers for 911 truth.
http://www.ae911truth.org/
Pilots for 911 truth
http://pilotsfor911truth.org/
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Really into conspiracy theories aren’t you Sonny.
The parallels between this 9/11 conspiracy and the evolution conspiracy
(which you have previously pushed) have one big factor in common :
You.
The other thing they have in common is that they are both creatures of the World Wide Web and exist only within that space.
KK
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Actually they have nothing in common.
Climate Change being a scam is also considered a conspiracy outside Of a select group Of forums such as Jo Nova. But please by all means continue to believe that 9/11 was the work of 19 Muslim hijackers. (some of which are still alive?) equipped with box cutters directed by Usama Bin Laden operating out of a cave. Hilarious!
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Scientists can talk all they want about what they believe helps drive climate change, be it the PDO or Co2 or whatever else. These factors may indeed contribute to weather changes. But the fact is, regarding long term climate change, nobody has put forward a more convincing theory as has Henrik Svensmark and this cosmic ray theory, which is supported by both empirical evidence and experimentation. It makes sense and it clearly matches past climate change. Furthermore, over a short time period, the satellite data for the last 30 years confirms Svesmark’s theory.
Dr Jasper Kirkby’s CLOUD experiment at CERN also confirms a key element of Svensmark’s theory about clouds.
I urge everyone to watch the following Danish documentary (it’s in English). It relegates the claim that carbon dioxide is a key driver of climate change children’s fairy tale status.
Please… watch this documentary. It explains Svensmark’s theory and the remarkable journey he took to get his paper published.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANMTPF1blpQ
Further still, Henrik Svensmark’s latest published paper entitled “Evidence of nearby supernovae affecting life on Earth” shows how the variable frequency of stellar explosions not far from our planet has ruled over the changing fortunes of living things throughout the past half billion years.
I will go so far as to say that within 10 years, Svensmark’s theory will be the officially accepted theory on climate change. It is the only credible theory in existence that makes complete sense. It is all explained in the documentary by Svensmark and various expert climatologists.
Please… just watch the documentary and judge for yourself.
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Lots of speculation about the reasons for the disappearance of the said article.
I draw your attention to the fact that the disappeared article is an OP-ED by Muller himself
I wouldn’t be surprised if Muller himself asked the publishers to withdraw HIS op-ed due to the ferocity of the responses since publishing. He has been EXPOSED AS A LIAR.
The Fairfax papers – being the gutless bastards that they are – immediately removed the piece to help out a fellow alarmist.
The NY Times said “nah, too late”.
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There is an interesting piece on the latest interview of Muller at The Carbon Brief. Apparantly a transcript will be posted soon.
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This quote from the article is attributed to Muller:
Indeed, due to BEST and studies that went before it, Muller says that the question of whether urban heating skews warming data is no longer a legitimate quibble with data that shows warming.
On that basis I would say the debate isn’t about whether or not Muller was or was not a climate skeptic. It should be about whether he denies the existence of the urban heat island effect (UHI) and it’s impact on temperature stations.
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I was onto it on Tuesday,
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/07/blockbuster-anthony-watts-squewers-muller-best-and-the-surface-record-all-in-one-paper/#comment-1097778
Good to see it’s been given the prominence it deserves.
BUT, this isn’t good enough. Obviously they learnt something which motivated them to pull the article, now where have they reported THAT detail to their readers? They have not given a fair and balanced coverage of this topic.
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I think it says it all when even a supposed sceptic – crossing over to the other side – makes the news.
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Jo I like the link to The dear old Manne on The Monthly almost as much as I like to be cited in a post-publication pre-amble.
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sorry I spoke in code… the link at the top is to the Manne article and not to “Apps” as I think you meant. Maybe you were mid authoring the next post?
cheers.
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Patience, patience, please. There are mobs of investment dollars, many dollars, to be moved to safer havens before the MSM come out with the fuller story, the more complete story.
How would you feel if, like many unionists who followed Pacific Hydro & similar, your pension scheme, yes your pension scheme, was facing losses. Losses. Not perhaps, but almost certainly. Then you see that about half of the Fed Lab Govt is former union bosses with many skills (but few in any depth) and then you note that politicians have always, always leaned rather heavily on the press. The press.
Bill Kelty, Kelty, used to talk with repetition for emphasis, emphasis, so I’m trying his style. If you remember whom he was.
Was.
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No, I don’t remember WHO he was. -1
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Ross James – I would call your attention to this comment:
Steve McIntyre:
Strike 2. I would hate to have to rely on your coding.
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Dear Joanna Nova and bloggers, can you please enlighten me: has it become possible and correct in the Australian version of English to use the verb “disappear” in the title of this blog by Joanna Nova as a transitive verb? I know that this is the case with the verb “to stop”. On my visits down under I have travelled to Brisbane on a train that was busy “stopping all stations”. Initially I then wondered: do these stations need stopping, or are they on a permanent stand-still, after all?
—-
Point taken. 🙂 I won’t argue the technical details – I’d lose. But I’ll argue people know what I mean. Fair? — Jo
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Yes, it has!
The paper was “disappeared”, offed, whacked, hit, terminated and killed by the opposing group (the Warmanista family of the green mafia).
Jo’s use of “disappear” is a shining and witty example of a true word smith taking a little license! 🙂
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Oops, word smith should be wordsmith!
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C.W. Schoneveld said:
It is an unusual usage but I think a clever and a useful one. It very succinctly and eloquently conveys a meaning that would otherwise be less so.
Taking liberties with words isn’t always beneficial and can represent devolution rather than evolution. Some examples that grate with me, are the writing of “it’s” with an apostrophe, when not as an abbreviation of “it is”, using “infer” when meaning “imply” and incorrectly substituting “myself” for “me”.
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Quite correct usage according to my battered COD (Concise English Dictionary), of 1976
disappear v. 1. v.i. Cease to be visible, vanish, pass from sight or existence. 2. v.t. Cause to disappear.
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ugh, sorry, not concentrating, Concise Oxford Dictionary.
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The BBC article Ex-sceptic says climate change is down to humans has also “disappeared”.
OK, not disappeared, but the article was published on 30th July and stayed on the “Science and Environment” page for all of 1 day, before being relegated (I pointed out to them that the anonymous article was unbalanced and the Watts press release countered the Muller press release). They grudgingly added the final paragraph without showing an update.
Other articles have been on the “Science and Environment” page for weeks.
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It seems to me that not all of those who replied to my query about “disappear” are familiar with the grammatical term “transitive”; it means that the verb in question can be used with a direct object. Would it now be correct in Australia to say: “Oh, dear, he disappeared my wallet!”? where wallet is the grammatical object of the sentence. I am sure that in British English this is not possible.
@ Sean:The fight against “it’s” as a genitive or possessive pronoun is now almost lost, I am afraid. In the nineties it was the most frequent correction I made in student papers at Queensland University (as guest lecturer from Holland).
@ Mango: you correctly wrote “has disappeared.” Joanna would write “was disappeared”.
@ Myrrh: interestingly, in my C.O.D.of 1956 it firmly says “v.i”.(verbum intransitivum); and the addition “cause to disappear” (which does admit of the use of an object!) is not yet there! But I still doubt that it is used that way in England.
Sorry for all this. Back to climate change!
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I don’t think Joanna would use “was disappeared” in this context, but I think you pedantry is misplaced and irrelevant to this discussion.
We all know what Joanna means, but if you do have a contribution to make on “The Disappeared”, we will be happy to listen.
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@Mango
Sorry to be pedantic:
“I think you pedantry” should be “your pedantry“
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C.W. Schoneveld wrote:
I don’t think it would be used that way with the wallet because it seems to be used to denote the suppression of what is inconvenient, as in, “Stalin disappeared his political opponents” and “Mann disappeared the Medieval Warming Period”. The first time I saw used this way, I paused but decided I liked it and could see in it evolution rather than devolution.
But
it isit’s so easy. I reckon that one day grammar won’t be taught. It will be replaced by, ‘English Solutions’.OMG! I just did a Google search. “English Solutions” is already happening.
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Such “its/it’s” corrections should be made with a large rubber stamp, saying the following:
His, hers, its
He’s, she’s, it’s
>:/
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I agree it’s annoying. A wrongly placed apostrophe can change the meaning of the word or sentence. Apostrophes’ are important. :¬)
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Ha, ha. They mean noun possessive, or abbreviation. Yours is neither.
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How I saw past the hot air on climate
RICHARD MULLER 31 Jul, 2012 08:08 AM
article is still up at http://www.queanbeyanage.com.au/news/national/national/general/how-i-saw-past-the-hot-air-on-climate/2639971.aspx
Found capture on Wayback machine, though not yet on permanent record at http://liveweb.archive.org/http://www.queanbeyanage.com.au/news/national/national/general/how-i-saw-past-the-hot-air-on-climate/2639971.aspx
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Muller can never see past the bubble of opaque hot air in which his head is permanently embedded.
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American physicist Richard Muller is one climate sceptic who has recently changed his mind after reviewing the evidence.
Their ABC is at it again: <a href=”http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-08-15/phillips-climate-sceptic-reborn-a-believer/4199130″>Climate sceptic reborn a believer
Re-born might have been appropriate if Muller had ever been a sceptic. He wasn’t.
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