Weekend Unthreaded

For roving ideas…

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147 comments to Weekend Unthreaded

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    Paul Vaughan

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    The Bidecadal Oscillation

    Is it caused by the solar Hale Cycle as suggested by Tim Channon or is it caused by the velocity of the sun with respect to the solar system barycenter as suggested by Nicola Scafetta?

    http://s18.postimg.org/74uty1eix/Bidecadal_SST_Sun_Velocity_Hale_Cycle.png
    • Velocity of Sun with respect to Solar System Barycenter (SSB)
    • Solar Hale Cycle rotated 1/4 cycle
    • Bidecadal Sea Surface Temperature (SST)

    …Or is it caused by something closer to home?
    New:

    http://s9.postimg.org/3ufpdksrj/Bidecadal_ERSSTv3b2_Osculating_EMn_SSB.png
    • Bidecadal ERSSTv3b2 (°C)
    • Absolute Deviation of Osculating Length of Earth-Moon Year with respect to Solar System Barycenter (days)
    (There’s a connection with Earth’s Chandler wobble — details forthcoming.)

    Your Vote Please:
    • Hale (Channon)?
    • Sun Velocity w.r.t. SSB (Scafetta)?
    …or maybe something closer to home??

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      Paul Vaughan

      _
      Supplementary — for those reviewing the cases previously made:

      • Figure 8 p.468 [pdf p.16] (8a=bidecadal; 8b=decadal):

      Scafetta, Nicola (2013). Solar and planetary oscillation control on climate change: hindcast, forecast and a comparison with the CMIP5 GCMs. Energy & Environment 24(3&4), 455-496.
      http://people.duke.edu/~ns2002/pdf/Scafetta_EE_2013.pdf

      • Figure 8 ( http://tallbloke.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/image-130.png )

      Channon, Tim (2013). Met Office Hadcrut 4: solar linkage.
      http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2013/01/24/met-office-hadcrut-4-solar-linkage/


      New insights on Scafetta’s 8b (decadal): forthcoming.

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      Andrew McRae

      I think I’m allowed to answer “none of the above”.
      The Earth-Moon year one seemed the most plausible of the three on the surface. However the graphs for all three of those candidates have sections where the effect precedes the alleged cause. SSB: 1900 and 1910. Hale Cycle: 1982 and 2000. Earth-Moon: 1880 and 1940, and the proportionality is a bit weird considering smaller causes sometimes lead to larger effects.
      As none of those time series are from data where there is any possibility of a dating error, the timing can’t be “fixed” that way.
      If there is some other phenomena causing those temperatures to turn too early maybe it could be filtered out, like removing the effect of ENSO index perhaps?

      No easy day in Climate Science, eh?

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        Paul Vaughan

        Andrew,

        Your comments have been useful & constructive, engaging me in a careful review of my parallel exploration of (a) the “decadal” (9.07 year lunisolar) cycle and (b) stratospheric aerosol optical depth.

        I’ll share insights when Tallbloke runs a bidecadal workshop at the Talkshop (sometime relatively soon).

        At this stage I’m not ready to say anything that might bias others’ commentary on the solar magnetic Hale cycle, but I’ll be clear about this:

        Certainly to within +/- ENSO, Sun_SSB-speed phase-coherence with ~20 year SST can safely be considered tight — and this statement extends to the new metric I’ve introduced, which is controlled by the same celestial factors.

        There’s plenty more to report when Tallbloke runs the workshop.

        Moving Forward:
        I’m planning application of spatiotemporal wavelets to explore the spatial evolution of decadal & bidecadal climate oscillations in time. In concept, this is simple, but algorithm development & implementation will be formidably obstructed by my lack of free time.

        I appreciate your polite interest.
        Thank you.

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    Paul Vaughan

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    When will the solar cycle next accelerate hard??

    Note that with hard acceleration there can be formidable temperature drop. (I want my government to take this seriously.)

    http://s12.postimg.org/uhmponsnx/SCD_T_CO2_Mann09.png
    • Blues: Mann2009 Temperatures with CO2 removed
    • Oranges: Solar Cycle Deceleration accounts for half a degree Celsius

    Uncle SAM‘s Tip for leading students:

    Try replacing CO2 with Sunspot Integral:

    http://s13.postimg.org/4bpybuo8n/Sun_Wind_Pressure.png
    • Global Wind
    • Global Sea Level Pressure
    • Sunspot Integral

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      KinkyKeith

      Hi Paul,

      Lot of stuff there; most of us probably aren’t familiar with the referenced material so it is a bit hard to comment one way or the other.

      Regardless , one thing is certain from a pure science and engineering point of analysis; CO2 didn’t do it and couldn’t do it!

      The other mechanisms which your posts allude to seem to be associated with orbital mechanics which seems to be headed in the right direction.

      KK

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    Carbon500

    On a local basis, I write letters objecting to planning permission for the erection of wind turbines over here in the UK as proposals to desecrate our heritage arise.
    I also like to tackle those wedded to the belief in dangerous man-made global warming, usually via the occasional newspaper readers letters columns. I quote real-world figures (as visitors to this site know!) and then challenge those who believe in the supposed threat that we face to show me exactly where the dangerous warming is manifesting itself.
    My wife thinks that I include too many figures, and yes, it’s an interesting point.
    The warming believers have a very well-oiled propaganda machine. How can the opposing points of view be effectively communicated without using too much temperature data?

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      NielsZoo

      Excellent question and I’ve wondered about that myself. In the “real” world I design imaging systems and sometimes my clients are extremely savvy technically and sometimes they are not. This is not a joke, but I regularly have to explain that light travels in a straight line. What I’ve found is sometimes a good analogy to everyday situations works better than numbers. Once you get the concept across then you can start with the numbers.

      I always thought the fictional CO2 heat amplification was like blowing into the oven just before closing the door and expecting that extra CO2 to make it hotter without turning the temp dial ’cause the so called “back radiation” would bounce extra heat back towards your turkey pot pie. If you can make it accurate, unique and memorable you’ve got a better chance. I wish I was better at it.

      The problem I find when trying to do this with CAGW is many times the warmist camp uses your analogy as a point of ridicule and shoves you off message that way… especially if the analogy gets the point across accurately. It has to be logical, easy to understand, accurate and most of all memorable. If someone can’t remember the concept the next time the Climateers push another round of pseudoscience out, it doesn’t do any good. That’s why people like Jo are so important to getting the truth out. They can communicate complex ideas to real people.

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      Cheerful Chap

      I’ve found the only way to have the conversation with warmists is to tell the story of how I moved from “green believer” to sceptic (for me it was “read me harry” that convinced me – I’m a programmer and the story in that file was enough to make me start questioning, and as we all know once you start pulling on a loose thread the whole warming story falls apart).

      I’ve found that quoting data at people doesn’t help – they’re not interested in the data because most of them can’t understand it. Even quite intellectual people don’t really have the maths to understand it and aren’t interested in talking about data. They’ve bought into a belief system and trying to tackle that belief system head-on is almost impossible; the belief is based on emotion not facts or analysis. It comes down to “do I believe The Scientists or this guy?” because they won’t/can’t do the analysis themselves.

      In terms of writing letters to newspapers, I’m not sure. Specific questions might help, rather than broad assertions based on data. If you can point out a loose thread so that a single reader starts pulling on it then you’ve done your job 🙂

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        Peter C

        as we all know once you start pulling on a loose thread the whole warming story falls apart)… If you can point out a loose thread so that a single reader starts pulling on it then you’ve done your job 🙂

        Excellent thought Cheerful,

        The starting point might be different for all of us, depending on our interests etc. I am not a computer person, so I was not likely to read “Harry read me”.

        For me the interesting problem is whether CO2 can actually trap heat. The issue is not fully resolved yet. However the Greenhouse Theory fails all predictive empirical tests that have been proposed so far.

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          Peter C

          Red Thumb,

          Can you propose a test that the Greenhouse Theory gets right?

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          KinkyKeith

          Hi Peter.

          Certainly CO2 can trap heat but there are many other issues which make that a little bit irrelevant in terms of Global warming.

          What is never stated by warmist scientists is that this heat is almost immediately dispersed into the surrounding atmosphere where it is dissipated by several well known mechanisms and unfortunately a lot of this heat is lost to the earth.

          Loss of heat is the big problem; not overheating.

          http://joannenova.com.au/2014/09/eqypt-went-from-wetter-to-drier-three-times-in-predynastic-times/#comment-1561542

          Quantifying the problem:

          http://joannenova.com.au/2014/09/weekend-unthreaded-48/#comment-1565504

          KK

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            Peter C

            Hi KK,

            It may have been you who put me onto the Vacuum flask as an example of a heat trapping device. It is also an interesting piece of experimental apparatus, capable of reproducible results.

            At this stage all I can say is that both CO2 (99% pure) and Air have almost identical conductive properties

            Perhaps more soon.

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              KinkyKeith

              Hi Peter

              Conductivity is not the issue in my comment.

              The point is that water and CO2 specifically take up more “energy” and become “hot”.

              They cannot remain hotter than the surrounding gas molecules N2 and H2 etc for more than an instant and the entire gas parcel rapidly achieves a new equilibrium.

              I rarely discuss vacuum flasks so probably wasn’t me.

              KK.

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        Carbon500

        Thank you everyone for your interesting comments on how a bit of simple but effective propaganda to counter the man-made global warming scaremongers could be generated.
        I’ve been thinking quite a bit about it since my post, and here’s my suggestion for a slogan. The explanation and thinking behind it comes afterwards. Here it is:

        9.56 degrees. What warming?

        Hopefully you’re already curious!
        Here’s the background. Cyclist Francesco Moser broke the world hour record on the track in the 1980s. This record means having to pedal around a velodrome for one hour alone, and to go as far as you can. Moser was the first man to crack 50 kilometres, with 51.151 his final figure for the attempt. He now runs a wine making business, and sells his product as vino 51.151. The images are on the internet. There’s a big picture of him in his office taken during the record.
        His advertising relies heavily on this easily remembered figure, and even non-cyclists might be curious as to why the wine’s so named.
        So – why 9.56? This figure is also from a record. It’s the temperature you see on the Central England Temperature record (CET) in 1900, and also in 2013. A simple, solitary value which should provoke curiosity, and a bit of thought.
        A temperature that’s the same, over a century on.
        Of course there have been ups and downs in between – but – it’s never reached eleven degrees, not at any time since 1659, and we’re talking about an effective slogan here, not a scientific treatise on a billboard.
        Maybe an advertising agency should be brought in – the people who really know how to sell a concept or product.
        In the propaganda stakes, Al Gore stole the proverbial march on everybody, and it’s time to fight back with information based on the real world.

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          Carbon500,
          It is a good idea to focus on a single figure that people can latch onto, but I am not sure a statistic on warming from a tiny area of the planet will carry much weight outside of Britain.
          From the alarmist point of view the “four Hiroshima bombs a second of excess heat since 1998” was a good figure. It relates to a global issue and gives the impression of a catastrophic problem that is already happening. Restated, it would take 570 years to heat the oceans by one degree. From that you can develop depth. For instance how the sparse are the temperature measurements. The Argo floats each cover an area the size of Bulgaria or Pennsylvania, and spend most of their time measuring the top 1000 meters. Their a volume of sea equivalent to Lake Windermere would have its temperature taken on average once every 3500 years. The next 2000 metres less than once every 10000 years. Below that the phrase “not in a million years” is going to be not far out.

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            Carbon500

            Manicbeancounter: I enjoyed your thoughts on bringing reality to the ‘Hiroshima bomb’
            propaganda, and the Argo float measurements. On the subject of the CET, there is the thinking that it’s a good proxy for the Northern hemisphere. I always joke that if you want to avoid the catastrophe, come to Britain while the planet melts!
            As you infer, the ideal propaganda weapon isn’t out there – yet. That’s I increasingly think that a good and sympathetic advertising agency should be hired.

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      How can the opposing points of view be effectively communicated without using too much temperature data?

      There are no easy answers. Start quoting one set of figures and an “expert scientist” will counter with some other figures, call you a denier and say you know nothing.

      An alternative approach is to compare climate “experts” with experts in other fields. Hundreds of expert scientists, over nearly three decades, should have gained a track record in predictions through their understanding of the climate system, and learnt from their mistakes. The public relations aspect should now be in emphasising their scientific achievements in predictions and the increasing quality of their work. The PR should not be in banal statements, saying how much they all agree, and denigrating the opposition.

      Try an analogy. Suppose someone claims, after years of study, to have a developed a scientific system for predicting the winners of horse races. How would you distinguish between that person being a true expert or just a gambling addict, whose system is just a sophisticated way of denying their problem? This I explore here.

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    For roving ideas…

    If you happen to see mine, tell it to come back home as I’m in need of one.

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      Rereke Whakaaro

      One passed through my head a few moments ago. That may have been yours – it looked pretty good to me, but I was not quick enough to catch it. Sorry.

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    It turns out that the US, UK, Australia, Finland, Canada, most of Asia are coordinating changes to K-12 education through an entity called GELP–Global Education Leaders Programme. http://www.invisibleserfscollar.com/openly-admitting-global-coordination-to-impose-behavioral-programming-using-education-and-the-law/ goes through the 2012 Helsinki Conference and what the real vision is.

    It’s not something that would be on anyone’s radar screen unless we are told about it. Once we become aware, all the nonsensical changes begin to fall into place.

    So Heads Up. Plus the Co-Director of GELP is a professor at the University of Melbourne. Australia is deeply implicated in all this at GELP is the direct connection to what is known in the US as the Common Core and here as Core Skills. Common vision that builds on what is raised in my book Credentialed to Destroy: How and Why Education Became a Weapon.

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      The Backslider

      Total crap SPAM.

      Thank you.

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        KinkyKeith

        So you wont buy the book?

        KK

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        You think I am SPAM?

        You think it is fun to know why academics is being wiped out in a coordinated manner in K-12 all over the world everywhere that has a tradition of reverencing the individual instead of the collective?

        If you are a parent wondering why everything is suddenly positive psychology in the classroom, mindfulness training, systems theory that treats physical systems and social systems the same, and substituting concepts for facts, you would want to know that someone, somewhere knew what was going on.

        Education is the way to create a generation that will simply believe in Global Warming and the need for wholesale behavioral changes as a result. People like Jo or Anthony Watts cannot talk science when perceptions from an ealy age prevent an ability to hear an actual scientific argument because it’s not visual.

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          The Backslider

          Like I said, what you spruik is total crap.

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            Seriously Backslider, that is simply not true.

            You seem to be determined to prevent Jo’s readers from obtaining accurate information or recognizing the documentable global coordination.

            Are you on Tony MacKay’s staff?

            A graduate student in social psychology?

            It’s 3 in the morning in Australia on a work night, which suggests you are posting from a vastly different time zone. I admit to being both an American and a lawyer who specializes in tracking what is really going on and what the history is.

            You are simply making false assertions with no back up. Much like the typical Climate Change model these days.

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          KinkyKeith

          Hi Robin

          No it’s not spam, except in the sense that you never bothered to summarize it for us.

          You have done that now.

          I agree with you that we don’t want people, similar to those who promote the Global Warming Mess, to be the deciders on how we, our children and grandchildren will be taught to think and behave.

          KK

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            Thanks KK.

            Should be a good summary of book on amazon. In Australia only available as an e-book, but hard copy elsewhere.

            I was mostly concerned with getting GELP onto the Australian horizon because I do know how all this overlaps with the science. Book really explains constructivism, which ultimately is about using classroom techniques and lack of declarative factual knowledge to change perceptions.

            Tony MacKay though not only heads up GELP but also ATC21S, the global 21st century skills push. UNESCO, the OECD, and the World Bank are all partners along with Pearson, Microsoft, Cisco, and Intel.

            When Jo’s readers confront a situation in K-12 that makes no sense I want them to remember that there is a pesky American lawyer who truly does get it and will immediately recognize the who, what, why, and ultimate end game.

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              KinkyKeith

              Hi again Robin,

              The comment:

              “Book really explains constructivism, which ultimately is about using classroom techniques and lack of declarative factual knowledge to change perceptions”.

              The perception:

              The comment is very similar in form and content to the type of stuff that exists in our education system at the moment.

              As such it may cause concern in that it replaces one lot of jargon with another.

              KK

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    TobiasN

    I just read about a 2016 cruise which plans to sail from Alaska to NY in the Arctic.

    And is fully booked.

    You know, because all the ice will be melted by then. 🙂

    On August 16, 2016, Crystal Cruises’ Crystal Serenity (not built for ice nor is it ice classed) will become by far the largest cruise ship (80,000+ gross ton) to traverse the Northwest Passage (where less than 10% of the waters are marine navigation charted – CRYSTAL SERENITY 20+ foot deep draft – ouch!), a historically ice-bound terrain between Anchorage, Alaska, and New York that goes through the northern Canada archipelago. The cruise is sold out, but the company is still taking stand-by signups starting at about $20,700 for the 32-day voyage.

    The Northwest Passage still isn’t tamed, and this won’t be a trip for those who want a quick-and-convenient cruise. Extra time was built in to account for possible delays. A second vessel with a helicopter pad and towing ability will accompany Serenity to break through ice? (not an icebreaker – WTHO?) or help with evacuation if need be. (Where are you going to put 1000 passengers?)

    I guess it’s possible the cruise company cynically just wants to hold on the ticket money for two years, when they will cancel.

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      Hat Rack

      1000 passengers @ $20,700 is $20,700,000. Invest that @ 2.5% is a $517,500 return/year for 2 years = $1,035,000. Return monies to passengers when trip has to be cancelled. No-one injured or killed and a fool and his money are re-united. I like it.

      Coming soon – your chance to buy tickets to Mars. 100% money back guarantee. Rocket leaves 1st April, 2017. Send me the money!

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    Yonniestone

    For anyone interested in Sci-Fi with a good discussion of science or anything in between (besides here of course) I happened across Armed and Dangerous while researching the ideas of Error Cascades and their implications in our world.

    Question is how much of our existence is determined by deliberate actions vs random occurrence? I have theorized that our perceived world is one giant error cascade staring with a chance collision of particles.

    Any takers for a light Sunday conversation?

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      The Backslider

      starting with a chance collision of particles.

      Where did the particles come from?

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        Glen Michel

        In the beginning……….

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        Yonniestone

        Sorry for the late reply, had to attend a minor emergency.
        I was going to start after the formation of elements life etc…as before that is just too open to infinite ideas, my thoughts were that as we can observe in a chemical reaction there is a definite physical response to what could be interpreted as an occurrence as a result of conflicting properties, this can simply be seen as an occurrence brought about by an chance error of mixing elements that cascades in a flow on effect we perceive as growth.
        The molecular process of a flower growing and a volcano exploding are very much the same at the basic molecular level, maybe a basic plan or blueprint exists at a subatomic level for all physical things we perceive?

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          The Backslider

          The problem is that it all falls down when you calculate probability – the numbers are simply too big!

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          Joe

          Yonnie, some philosophical musings – I think you have to look at where our ‘perception’ fits into the equation. I think it is fair to say that reality in its entirety is all merely a ‘perception’ and in your case it is your perception. Perhaps nobody else is even perceiving this reality, only you. When you shuffle off your mortal perceptive coils, will reality still be there? Others have passed away and you have seen the reality continue but you have not passed away and reality is your own perception -totally. It is a bit like the fridge door and the light. If you close your eyes and all the flowers and the volcanoes disappear, can you imagine them for what they really are (or might be) – chaotic ‘clouds’ of particles moving around in a largely random fashion all much the same as one another – no beauty – no awe – just chaos? Have you ever read ‘Flatland’ by E.A. Abbott?

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    handjive

    Did I mention floods?

    The BoM, June 11, 2014:
    The hot, dry skies will then track to heat-wracked Australia, where 2013 was already its hottest year on record and El Niño is threatening to turn the temperature up even further.
    Andrew Watkins, manager of climate prediction services at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, said: “El Niño is one of the largest influences on Australia’s climate.

    It’s why historically Australia has had one of the most variable climates on the planet.”
    Watkins said El Niño increases the chances of low rainfall in the country’s southern and most populous half and tends to deliver hotter years and higher extreme temperatures.

    With a 90% chance of the global weather phenomenon striking this year, impacts both devastating and beneficial will be felt from India to Peru

    India is expected to be the first to suffer, with weaker monsoon rains undermining the nation’s fragile food supply,
    followed by further scorching droughts in Australia and collapsing fisheries off South America.

    http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jun/11/-sp-el-nino-weather-2014

    The reality for some:

    12 Sept. 2014, ABC:
    “Rescuers are racing to help communities hit by landslides in Indian Kashmir while thousands remain stranded, homeless and hungry in the city of Srinagar, most of which was submerged by the region’s worst flooding in 50 years.”
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-12/landslides-add-to-misery-in-flood-hit-kashmir/5741070

    9 Sept, 2014:
    Kashmir floods: Death toll rises to more than 400 in India and Pakistan
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-09/kashmir-floods-death-toll-rises/5732018
    . . .
    Another successful El Niño climate prediction from the home of carbon(sic) induced madness, the BoM.

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    This is what the living mud reef looks like at low tide

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      Link didn’t work again darn it, here: https://pindanpost.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/dsc00603.jpg Low tide at Cable Beach, Broome

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        Peter C

        Hello Tom,

        I was in Broome last month and went scouting for Dinosaur footprints at Cape Gantheaume. Fascinating thing is that the dinosaur footprints I saw this time are not the same as those I saw 20 years ago. The older footprints have been eroded away (some people at the time thought that they had been stolen by fossil hunters – not sure about that. I think the waves might have broken the rock). New footprints exposed now.
        I wish that I had thought to contact you. My friends in Broome are all ardent and pathetic Greens!

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          I know what you mean Peter, because of work with environmental rehabilitation and landscaping, I am often thought to be an ardent Green, but then when they see my sensible side, they ‘run for the trees’. Wont even listen as I am an ‘evil denier’.
          As for the dinosaur footprints, all the best ones are at James Price Point where Woodside stupidly wanted to build a port. There were many better sites, but Barnett and Co were too pigheaded to see it.
          My latest fun is annoying the anti-frakkers, though I have deleted a few on Facebook that are beyond redemption and are haters instead. Hehe …
          The dinosaur footprints at Price’s Point are probably a thousand foot thick, the sandstone gets changed by the passing cyclones every year, so it makes excellent continual research. Seventeen new species have been found. When sea levels drop in the coming ice age, fantastic possibilities loom.

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    scaper...

    I thought the descriptor in relation to Muslim men and goats was a term of abuse. Apparently it is true. Viewed a video this morning but won’t bring it here.

    If you don’t believe it Google ‘Israeli drone captures Hamas Forces Having Sex With Goats’

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    Yonniestone

    Here’s Marc Morano and Ezra Levant (Canada’s Sun News) trying to understand what the US Secretary of State John Kerry is trying to say about Global Warming and religion.

    I don’t know why or how a man like this is in such a position in the world but after this I hope to never see him employed in any position of authority anywhere ever again.

    This guy has exposed a real life example of the perception of power, people who are insulted by his appeal to stupidity should be asking why then apply reasoning to that question, it has to be one of the first steps in learning to think for yourself surely?

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      handjive

      How can anyone take the Australian government seriously as it “raises the terror alert”, when it has policies to fight Doomsday Global Warming as John Kerry sees it?

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    Bulldust

    If you want to torture yourself, here’s a TED talk by Oreskes (very small room and audience) about scientific method:

    https://www.ted.com/talks/naomi_oreskes_why_we_should_believe_in_science?language=en

    It starts off OK talking about the scientific method as we know it, but then attempts to disqualify it because of some of the fallacies scientists fall for in practice. Her reasoning is that because some scientists do it wrongly, the method is ineffective … Clearly the audience is in the presence of a great mind.

    The talk culminates by reasoning that we should move on from worrying about the scientific method and place our faith in authority. Not any authority, of course, but the authority of the self-appointed, or is that anointed, few.

    Quite the tour de farce.

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      Geoff Sherrington

      Straw Many intro by Oreskes, linking Science & faith. In the ideal world, these are apart like oil and water. A place for each, but never mixed.

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        LevelGaze

        Science and religion.

        About 20+ years ago Phillip Adams interviewed Fr George Coyne, director of the Vatican Observatory in Arizona. In these days Adams was worth listening to on Radio National here in Australia.

        Anyway Adams asked the Jesuit astrophysicist if his religious beliefs somehow clashed with his scientific researches. Coyne’s answer was simple and direct – Science is one thing, faith is another. They are so qualitatively separate that they can never intersect with or influence one another. I thought that an excellent and sincere answer, it’s a pity the interview no longer seems to be on the internet.

        The theoretical physicist and ordained Anglican priest John Polkinghorne has, I believe, expressed similar sentiments.

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          LevelGaze

          Uh, I have to correct myself here.
          I had never actually read Polkinghorne (although I have one of his books) and checked his bio after I posted the above. He’s quite more mystical than Coyne (who isn’t, at all) so please disregard my last paragraph.

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      Glen Michel

      And therefore answers the question why left-wing greens are in thrall to Oreskes.Socialist intellectual guff! Never disagree these lot.You will be assimilated.

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    Peter C

    Putting Climate Theories to the test

    Calculations of the Earth Energy Budget using temporal averaging and spatial averaging ( ie neglecting day and night and zonal climate conditions), suggest that the Earth surface temperature should be about -18C. Observations indicate an average surface temperature of about 15C. The Greehouse Theory largely derives from this discrepancy of 33C. We are told that the Earth surface temperature would be 33C colder if there were no Greenhouse Gases to trap outgoing radiation. I have never seen a calculation which actually derives the 33C from the Greenhouse Theory.

    An alternative theory is that gravitational heating is responsible from the observed surface temperature. In this theory the effective radiation surface of the Earth is at a place called Top of Atmosphere, which in effect is about 18,000ft where the actual temperature is about -18C. This apparently also accords with observations of the Earth’s temperature as seen from space, which I am told is about -18C.

    So the Gravitational Theory is off to a good start because it begins with actual measured parameters, not calculations. But what about further tests.

    Ross McCleod at Principia Scientific International has written a short piece in which he applies the Ideal Gas Law to planetary atmospheres at reported by NASA. The result is a stunning success for the Gravitational Theory, which correctly predcts the atmospheric temperature of every planet (with an atmosphere), in our solar system,
    http://www.principia-scientific.org/the-ideal-gas-law-the-planets-and-the-fraud-of-climate-science.html

    By comparison the the Greenhouse Theory fails every test.
    For example: the highest temperatures recorded in Australia occur in dry areas during drought years. The Greenhouse Theory predicts that increased water (the principal Greenhouse Gas), should be associate with increased temperatures, whereas the revese is the case.

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    Lewis P Buckingham

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-09/greenhouse-gas-levels-in-atmosphere-hit-high-in-2013/5731716
    I logged this ABC news broadcast on Tips And Notes on the brother site Watts Up With That.
    Having only just started regularly reading your site I was pleased to see that you are following the ABC ‘news’ on climate and weather.
    The fact that old stories are deleted is a blow against us as a Nation because it filters out reports that allow us to know our history, rather than a remake of our history.
    In that sense it destroys our narrative and the Nations soul.
    The above ‘news’ came abruptly on ABC classical, another doom laden prediction.
    There has been no corresponding rebuttal on ABC classical FM,which is also on digital and streamed.
    Its also National.
    A first step would be to stop ‘news’ altogether on classical FM and leave it to the general broadcast channels.
    The ABC is replete with ‘news’. My reaction increasingly is to listen to 2MBS FM, but the ABC has such good classical material it would be a pity not to hear it.
    Its best listened to without news.
    Their ‘news’ is a little like hearing a bus pass as you listen to a symphony.
    I would like you to set up a tips and notes section that allows us, the general scientific public, to let others know what is in the ‘news’ sphere, particularly our own Australian media.The focus would be special interest in the public broadcasters, paid by us,bound to give dispassionate balanced reporting, by charter.

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      ianl8888

      Their ‘news’ is a little like hearing a bus pass as you listen to a symphony

      Worse than that – an entire fleet of heavy diesel trucks with unbaffled exhausts. It is so intrusive in the middle of classical music broadcasts that my car radio has the ABC and MBS push-buttons programmed side-by-side for instantaneous changeover

      Unhappily, MBS-FM has taken to re-broadcasting BBC “news” on the hour … AAARRRGGGHHH !!

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    You could let off a grenade at the upcoming Australian Skeptics National Convention without hurting a single actual skeptic. (But don’t do it.) One star of the New Class love-in, Peta Ashworth, really caught my eye with her career aspirations. She’s supposed to be “a leading researcher in understanding public perception to climate change” (sic). Now I know management-speak and academese are hardly new, but you have to worry about the intentions and motives of someone who describes her activities as:

    “…establishing a social license to operate, understanding and modelling social systems, motivating positive behaviour change and exploring pathways to connect people and policy.”

    I keep getting the sense that many of our Green Betters and New Class leaders are skeptics only in the way that the Khmer Rouge were skeptics.

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      Tim

      We used to call it PR.

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      Geoff Sherrington

      Robert,
      It is disappointing that the speakers selected for this Skeptics conference are conformists, not sceptics in the sense we know.

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      diogenese2

      “establishing a social licence, understanding and modelling social systems, motivating positive behaviour change and exploring pathways to connect people and policy”.

      Can anyone tell me what this says in English? As you may have noticed I am fluent in Bollox, but my powers of translation are completely inadequate to meet this challenge.

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        NielsZoo

        <sarc>Well it’s clear that your knuckle dragging sub intellectual education precludes you from understanding the socioscientific complexities of her mesocentric field of dynamic caliglacialos inculcation.</sarc>

        I think it means she’s getting paid with our tax money to find better ways to lie about what the government is going to do to us in the name of climate change… but that’s just a guess.

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    pat

    ***dubious statement re US and Europe, but nonetheless a dose of reality:

    13 Sept: Helsinki Times: Power plants to emit hundreds of billions of tons of carbon dioxide into atmosphere over coming decades
    In a recent study, two American researchers calculated that the existing power plants will emit 300 billion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere during their lifetimes. And that is without any new power plants being built.
    The researchers from the University of California and Princeton University slam previous measurements for only factoring in the level of the current emissions. They based their calculations on the idea that emissions are linked to capital investments. Once an investment has been made and a power station built, the calculations must take into account the volume of carbon dioxide the power plant will emit during its whole life cycle, which the researchers estimated to be around 40 years…
    The overall volume of carbon dioxide, 300 billion tons, produced by all the existing power plants, considerably exceeds the global emission limit, set to maintain the global warming below two degrees.
    “To meet the climate goals, the number of power plants we close down must exceed the number of plants we build,” says principal investigator Steven Davis from the University of California.
    However, the last decade saw a higher number of new power stations being built than any other period in the history, while the number of old ones being closed down has been lagging behind…
    ***Things are looking up in the United States and Europe but China, India, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Iran have recently invested in new fossil fuel power stations.
    The study was published in the journal Environmental Research Letters
    http://www.helsinkitimes.fi/themes/themes/science-and-technology/11972-power-plants-to-emit-hundreds-of-billions-of-tons-of-carbon-dioxide-into-atmosphere-over-coming-decades.html

    Revkin solicits lots of feedback, tho most have to admit fossil fuels will reign long into the future:

    28 th: NYT Dot Earth: Andrew C. Revkin: Accounting for the Expanding Carbon Shadow From Coal-Burning Plants
    Steven Davis of the University of California, Irvine, and Robert Socolow of Princeton (best known for his work dividing the climate challenge into carbon “wedges”) have written “Commitment accounting of CO2 emissions,” a valuable new paper in Environmental Research Letters showing the value of shifting from tracking annual emissions of carbon dioxide from power plants to weighing the full amount of carbon dioxide that such plants, burning coal or gas, could emit during their time in service.
    http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/08/28/accounting-for-the-expanding-carbon-shadow-from-coal-burning-plants/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0

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      Since the weight of the earth’s atmosphere is 5,500,000,000,000,000 tonnes I don’t think 300,000,000,000 matters a hoot. And not all of the emitted CO2 would remain in the atmosphere.

      Besides, within 50 years fusion will be going into full-scale production – I wonder what the Left will resort to then to run their anti-industrial, anti-wealth, anti-happiness hate driven agenda. And don’t think another 50 years of ‘intellectual evolution’ will mean no more leftists. There will always be people who see themselves as victims and therefore want to take revenge on society. My guess is they’ll have to resort to a campaign against ‘thermal pollution’.

      Also, the internal combustion engine in cars will have been replaced with ultra capacitors powering electric motors.

      From a technology standpoint, the world will be an even more wondrous place in the future. Sadly, people will remain largely unchanged.

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    pat

    on the other hand, two ladies – Klein & Goldenberg – who refuse to face reality, even as they belatedly report on the hypocrisy of faux CAGW icons like Branson, Bloomberg & Gates:

    13 Sept: Guardian: Naomi Klein: Naomi Klein: the hypocrisy behind the big business climate change battle
    (This is an edited extract from This Changes Everything: Capitalism v The Climate, by Naomi Klein, published next week by Allen Lane at £20.)
    I denied climate change for longer than I care to admit…
    I told myself the science was too complicated and the environmentalists were dealing with it. And I continued to behave as if there was nothing wrong with the shiny card in my wallet attesting to my “elite” frequent-flyer status.
    A great many of us engage in this kind of denial. We look for a split second and then we look away…
    We deny because we fear that letting in the full reality of this crisis will change everything…
    For many mainstream greens, (Richard) Branson seemed a dream come true: a media darling out to show the world that fossil fuel-intensive companies can lead the way to a green future, using profit as the most potent tool.
    Bill Gates and former mayor of New York Michael Bloomberg have also used their philanthropy aggressively to shape climate solutions, the latter with large donations to green groups such as the Environmental Defense Fund, and with the supposedly enlightened climate policies he introduced as mayor. But while talking a good game about carbon bubbles and stranded assets, Bloomberg has made no discernible attempt to manage his own vast wealth in a manner that reflects these concerns. In fact, he helped set up Willett Advisors, a firm specialising in oil and gas assets, for both his personal and philanthropic holdings. Those gas assets may well have risen in value as a result of his environmental giving – what with, for example, EDF championing natural gas as a replacement for coal. Perhaps there is no connection between his philanthropic priorities and his decision to entrust his fortune to the oil and gas sector. But these investment choices raise uncomfortable questions about his status as a climate hero…
    Gates has a similar firewall between mouth and money. Though he professes great concern about climate change, the Gates Foundation had at least $1.2bn invested in oil giants BP and ExxonMobil as of December 2013, and those are only the start of his fossil fuel holdings…
    Almost a decade after Branson’s epiphany, it seems a good time to check in on the “win-win” crusade. Let’s start with his “firm commitment” to spending $3bn over a decade developing a miracle fuel…
    If he is to fulfil his $3bn pledge by 2016, by this point at least $2bn should have been spent. He’s not even close…
    His original “pledge” he now refers to as a “gesture”…
    Given these explanations for falling short, it is worth looking at some of the things for which Branson did manage to find money. In 2007, a year after seeing the climate light, he launched domestic airline Virgin America. From 40 flights a day to five destinations in its first year, it reached 177 flights a day to 23 destinations in 2013. At the same time, passengers on Virgin’s Australian airlines increased from 15 million in 2007 to 19 million in 2012. In 2009, Branson launched a new long-haul airline, Virgin Australia; in April 2013 came Little Red, a British domestic airline.
    So this is what he has done since his climate change pledge: gone on a procurement spree that has seen his airlines’ greenhouse gas emissions soar by around 40%. And it’s not just planes: Branson has unveiled Virgin Racing to compete in Formula One, (he claimed he had entered the sport only because he saw opportunities to make it greener, but quickly lost interest) and invested heavily in Virgin Galactic, his dream of launching commercial flights into space, for $250,000 per passenger…
    So, was Branson’s reinvention as a guilt-ridden planet-wrecker volunteering to solve the climate crisis little more than a cynical ploy?…
    http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/13/greenwashing-sticky-business-naomi-klein

    14 Sept: Guardian: Suzanne Goldenberg: Richard Branson failed to deliver on $3bn climate change pledge
    New book by Naomi Klein claims that Virgin founder gave less than a tenth of cash promised to develop low carbon fuel
    http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/13/richard-branson-failed-climate-change-pledge

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    pat

    another dose of reality, especially for those responding to Revkin that wind can play a part in poor countries!

    13 Sept: WUWT: Offshore Wind power: Even Germany Can’t get it Right
    http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/09/13/offshore-wind-power-even-germany-cant-get-it-right/

    12 Sept: AP: Rare September snow causes damage to trees and power outages in some areas
    A late summer snowstorm dropped up to 20 inches of snow in parts of Wyoming.
    The rare September snow on Wednesday and Thursday damaged trees and caused power outages in some areas of northern Wyoming.
    While the heaviest snow fell in the Big Horn Mountains, the town of Buffalo received as much as 10 inches.
    The 3 to 5 inches that fell in Cody is the earliest recorded snowfall there since 1915, when records started being kept. The previous earliest recorded snowfall in Cody was Sept. 12, 1970…
    http://trib.com/news/local/casper/up-to-inches-of-snow-falls-in-wyoming/article_5ed4db8e-6af9-5617-a53c-5fc87c36711b.html

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    Has anyone else noticed that in the lead up to the preliminary climate conference to lock in thinking for the UNFCCC conference (COP21) in Paris next year that the WMO has asked for weather reports from Countries for 2050. Can you believe that?

    There’s quite a few of them now, and I’ll just link to the main page at the You Tube site where some of them are, but as you click on the links to the videos, others also appear down the right side.

    What a farce this is.

    Ban Ki-moon also gets to say his bit at the end of each video.

    Also, has anyone noticed how the weather reports on each of the TV news programs have begun to mention temperatures soaring to the high 20’s and the concentration on some that are even as high as the mid 30’s. What was once normal temperatures for these areas for this time of year has suddenly become off the scale high temperatures. What will they be saying when Summer finally arrives, and normal daily highs will somehow be cast as extreme.

    Now, even I know that weather people on these TV channels are just reading it off the autocue, but someone writing the text is adding this new style into their reporting.

    Brainwashing the general public is becoming the new norm I guess.

    Link to You Tube Page of weather reports from 2050

    Tony.

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      Peter C

      I would like to see weather reports ( predictions) for 2016. Then we might get a chance to compare reports with reality. 2050 safe enough. I will likely be dead by them

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      Graeme No.3

      The “forecasts” aren’t all for the same time of year, some using a summer date so they can push up the expected temperature.

      Since they’ve been wrong for the past 18 years I won’t worry about what the say. By 2050 not only will AGW gone but so will all the culprits. I’d back Peter C in calling for them to make predictions within a short time, so they can be checked.

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      Tel

      The land beyond stupid.

      I went down the list, comments are disabled, comments are disabled, etc. etc.

      I can imagine the sort of comments on this buffoonery. Actually, find pretty much any news article on Global Warming with comments still enabled and about 60% of the comments are just laughing at what modern climate science has become. Obviously the IPCC knows this, but they don’t care either.

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    Neville

    The AGW theory says that co2 causes more water vapour and is therefore a positive feedback. But a new paper finds that water vapour in the troposphere is not controlled by our increased co2 emissions but by other natural processes.

    http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com.au/2014/09/new-paper-finds-water-vapor-in.html

    The 2014 Zahn et al study also finds that water vapour acts as a negative feedback and cooling , not a positive feedback and more warming. As I’ve said before time will tell.

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      The Backslider

      A while back the NOAA also reported that atmospheric water vapor had diminished, contrary to AGW/CO2 theory.

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      Peter C

      Spot on Neville,
      Water causes cooling! Zahn et al have finally come up,with the correct answer after 40 years of muddle by Climate Scientists!

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    The Backslider

    What is the percentage for human CO2 emissions against total CO2 emissions?

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    Peter C

    About 5% according to New Scientist
    http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11638-climate-myths-human-co2-emissions-are-too-tiny-to-matter.html#.VBUTCWthiSM
    23.5Gtons human vs 440Gtons natural.

    I hasten to add that I do not read New Scientist and that I disagree with their analysis about humans causing the rise in CO2 levels.

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      The Backslider

      Thank you Peter.

      For my purposes numbers generally accepted by warmists are good.

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        KinkyKeith

        Any “new” CO2 entering the atmosphere is accepted as being taken care of, if that is really necessary, by natural sequestration(plant growth increase, microbiological growth increase etc) within seven years; some research indicates as little as 4 years.

        This means there is always a lag but as you indicate from your question, natural origin CO2 is only a very small proportion of total AND CO2 (total) is only a very small proportion of active “greenhouse” gases of which water is the dominant by a ratio of 95% water to 5% CO2.

        This means that active GHGases are Water 95% to Natural Origin CO2 at about 3% and dead last human Origin CO2 0.15 %

        Big deal.

        Wrt the CO2 is dangerous meme somebody has their priorities all mixed up IF the issue is science.

        If the issue is politics and access to the national treasury they are quite OK.

        KK

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      Perhaps it was once 3% and then it was homogenised to 5%.

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    Sceptical Sam

    Well, it’s finally happened.

    Stupid environmental laws have resulted in the alleged murder of an “environmental officer” of the NSW Public Service by a farmer who allegedly shot him dead after being fined for clearing trees on his freehold land.

    http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/police-to-allege-glen-turner-gunned-down-while-inspecting-an-unrelated-site-in-croppa-creek-20140804-10089f.html

    Of course this is not the first time that tragedy has struck as a result of Big Green environmental stupidity.

    In 2004, in Victoria, the Sheahan family was fined $30,000 all up and ordered to pay legal costs to their local Shire Council of $20,000 for illegally clearing trees off their property because they were a fire hazard. Subsequently, the Black Saturday bushfires that started in Victoria on 7 February 2009, ravished all that was in front of them – except the Sheahan’s place. This fire was the State’s deadliest and most devastating bushfire since Capt. David Collins first settled Port Phillip Bay on 10 October 1803. It took 119 lives and destroyed 1242 homes.

    http://www.smh.com.au/national/fined-for-illegal-clearing-family-now-feel-vindicated-20090212-85bd.html

    These sorts of incursions by Big Green and their fellow travellers have increasingly removed Australians’ freedoms that good men and women died to protect in two devastating world wars.

    Even in Western Australia we have seen the way government drove the Thompson’s out of the State and out of Australia with its use of environmental laws. More recently, as Jo has pointed out below, we have the case of Maxwell Sulc who believed “that his land is his land, and that he should be able to manage it without asking permission from anyone. Those ‘management plans’ sound innocent, but as other farmers (like Matt and Janet Thompson and Sid Livesey) have found out, the management plan is an insidious form of creeping fascism.”

    http://joannenova.com.au/2013/01/in-australia-if-you-try-to-clear-a-firebreak-on-your-land-you-could-go-to-gaol/

    Bushfires in Australia are a frightening and devastating phenomenon. They are made worse by green tape, bloody-minded bureaucracy and green-left, more-righteous-than-thou, politicians.

    Cold burns reduce bushfire incidence and ferocity. Cold burns are essential. Australian Aboriginals burnt the country as part of their land-management practices. In most Australian states the annual targets for burning by the authorities are rarely met. Nor has anybody from such an authority ever been held fully accountable for the devastation and death that has resulted from their failure to do what they have been paid to do.

    Here are a few random shots of the Canberra fires:

    https://www.google.com.au/search?q=photos+canberra+bushfires&biw=1920&bih=934&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=ySgVVLCFGM6KuATgvYLQDQ&ved=0CB8QsAQ

    And here’s a few of the Victorian 2009 fires:

    https://www.google.com.au/search?q=victorian+bushfires+2009&biw=1920&bih=934&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=BisVVN2wKdXm8AXD4oHoBw&sqi=2&ved=0CEEQsAQ

    Green policy caused these fires to happen.

    Two things:

    If governments want to get into bed with the green anti-development lobby and stop land clearance let them purchase the properties outright and turn them into nature parks at the tax-payers’ expense – not at the expense of the individual farmer or land-owner

    Cold burns save lives and property. If the authorities do not do the burns that meet their targets, then individual landowners must be able to do so without facing the blinkered stupidity of the green fascist bureaucrats.

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    Gary in Erko

    In Australia, through mass exposure via TV we’ve become familiar with the names of towns and counties in USA. How is the reverse going? Reading this and related blogs you yanks are now hearing about places such as Wagga Wagga, Narrandera, Mezinkabuggerit, and Whooimbawallawee.
    PS – If you can’t find them all it’s not your map that’s faulty.

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    Peter C

    I love the Double names like Wagga Wagga. People shorten then:eg ,to Wagga.

    I was dismayed a few years ago when Wallan Wallan got changed to Wallan.

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      Yonniestone

      I’ve worked in Pura Pura and Vite Vite central Vic, the locals there say everything twice like ‘hello, hello’

      This could also be due to the second head repeating what the first one says!

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        Gary in Erko

        Gumly Gumly on the outskirts of Wagga Wagga. Vite Vite only a few miles from Pura Pura.
        I wonder if they all hang around in pairs, hang around in pairs.

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      the Griss

      I’ve been to Woy-Woy often, driven through Bruk-Bruk.

      Had cheese in Tilba-Tilba, and braved Grong-Grong.

      I sure there are probably a lot more, often based on aboriginal words.

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      Wagga Wagga, a city so great, they named it twice.

      I was there four times for trade training, and then teaching the trade, with the RAAF.

      During my last stay there as a teacher technical trades instructor, I saw what would have to be categorised as the single best Tee shirt I have ever seen. It just had text on the front, which said the following:

      London, New York, Paris, Rome, Wagga Wagga.

      They are the most fiercely loyal people to their city I have ever come across.

      The name is based from the Aboriginal language, and most of those have no facility for the plural. In the English language, they just add the apostrophe S for a number of the same thing to pluralise it, but the aborigines do not have that facility, so they just say the word twice.

      Wagga Wagga is at the Southern end of the great Wiradjuri Nation, so Wagga Wagga is Wiradjuri language from the people of three rivers, the Murrumbidgee, (or in Wiradjuri, Murrumbidjeri) The Lachlan River (Kalari) and the MacQuarie. (Wambool) Wiradjuri lands extend as far North as Tamworth, probably making them one of the largest tribal lands in Australia.

      So, to name just a few in that area:

      Wagga Wagga – place of crow, place of crow, or place of many crows.

      Gumly Gumly (or sometimes Gumleigh Gumleigh) – place of frog, place of frog, or place of many frogs.

      Grong Grong – place of hot place of hot, or a very hot place, also meaning a very poor camping spot, and being so hot, no wonder.

      Walla Walla – place of rock place of rock, or place of many rocks.

      In a similar fashion, there is a city in Washington State (U.S.A.) called Walla Walla, named for the Walla Walla people, the people of many Rivers, which bears a striking similarity to the Australian Wiradjuri people, the people of Three Rivers.

      I played Grade Cricket for 25 years, and while at Wagga Wagga on my last teaching tour, I was coach of the 2 teams we had, and we played in the second division structure, which included outlying country towns, mainly on the Marrar Narrandera line, which included the towns of Marrar, Coolamon, Ganmain, Matong, Grong Grong, and Narrandera.

      Grong Grong (place of hot place of hot) was without fraction of a doubt the hottest place I have ever been on a cricket field. Mid to late January on a hot Saturday afternoon, and it was 45C, (113F) measured at the Pub. Dry heat so nowhere near as bad as 35C in high humidity. After the game, that first Schooner never even hit the sides.

      That line has those 6 towns along that one stretch of road. Marrar has the Marrar Hotel, Coolamon has the Coolamon Hotel and the Royal Hotel. Ganmain has the Ganmain Hotel and the Royal Hotel. Matong has The Farmer’s Home Hotel. Grong Grong has the Royal Hotel, and there is a Royal Hotel in Narrandera. There are also numerous Royal Hotels in the surrounding areas, all named in 1956 during the Royal Visit to open the Olympic Games, when the Queen visited Australia, and travelled down the newly named Olympic Way, and then turned right at Narrandera, and travelled down that road. The renamed a hotel in each town in her honour.

      ‘Aint History grand, eh!

      Tony.

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        Len

        When I did the Indonesian Course at Kapooka in the 1970s, the Indonesians say Truk Truk when they want to indicate many trucks.

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        James Bradley

        Tony,

        I had a wrecking yard on Kooringal Rd down there from ’81 to ’88. Learnt to fly out at Forest Hill. Had a back seat ride in Trappet’s P51 and met a few good blokes from the training school, in particular a Flight Sergeant from Werribee who wore his Larry Lodge Enterprises Tee shirt off duty when we went to the gym at the Leagues Club.

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    the Griss

    and of course, using just one of the names is usually a real no-no. !! 🙂

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      Sceptical Sam

      Then of course it’d not only the double-bangers that get chopped but the singles also cop it a fair bit too.

      For example Wollongong becomes “the Gong”.

      Brisbane becomes “Brissy”.

      Alice Springs becomes “the Alice” etc.

      And presumably Eskinville becomes Erko, Erko?

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    pat

    14 Sept: Australian: Letter to the Editor: Heading for ice age
    from Bob Carter, Townsville, Qld.
    GRAHAM Lloyd has reported on the Bureau of Meteorology’s capitulation to scientific criticism that it should publish an accounting of the corrections it makes to temperature records (“Bureau warms to transparency over adjusted records”, 12/9). Corrections which, furthermore, act to reinforce the bureau’s dedication to a prognosis of future dangerous global warming, by turning cooling temperature trends into warming ones — a practice also known to occur in the US, Britain and New Zealand…
    Is it unreasonable to be surprised that none of your writers, much less the government, has noticed that leading solar astrophysicists, such as Habibullo Abdussamatov from Pulkovo Observatory in St Petersburg, have for years been commenting on the declining activity of the sun?
    These scientists are projecting a significant cooling over the next three decades, and perhaps even the occurrence of another little ice age.
    Obsessed as they are with a gentle global warming trend that stopped late last century, should the expected solar cooling eventuate, policy makers will rue the day they failed to heed the advice of independent scientists on climate change issues.
    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/letters/poor-project-management-the-cause-of-subs-debacle/story-fn558imw-1227056963829?nk=532d5f9a5d5cf1e35c7e7d6de17a1421

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    pat

    read it all:

    14 Sept: UK Daily Mail: The scandal of UK’s death-trap wind turbines: A turbine built for 115mph winds felled in 50mph gusts. Dozens more affected by cost-cutting. Why residents living in their shadow demand to know – are they safe?
    Health and Safety Executive release reports on collapsed wind turbines
    Causes were manufacturing faults and basic installation mistakes
    Campaigners believe the risk of turbines collapsing will continue to grow
    By Simon Trump for The Mail on Sunday
    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2754679/The-scandal-UKs-death-trap-wind-turbines-A-turbine-built-115mph-winds-felled-50mph-gusts-Dozens-affected-cost-cutting-Why-residents-living-shadow-demanding-answers.html

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    pat

    BBC’s Harrabin at The Guardian. i’m no fan of current state of nuclear technology but, for those who are in favour, there are multiple links in the article:

    12 Sept: Guardian: Roger Harrabin: Friends of the Earth’s shift on nuclear should be celebrated, not denied
    The green group’s opposition is now less ideological and more functional, and that’s a sign of maturity
    But Friends of the Earth have revealed (LINK) that their old ideological opposition to nuclear has crumbled, to be replaced by a new pragmatic opposition based on cost and build time…
    The group denies that its position has shifted – but to me this looks a huge and significant shift – and especially controversial if you work for the UK nuclear industry and have been told for decades that your operations are a clear and present danger to the public.
    The new position was expressed in an interview with Friends of the Earth’s campaigns director Craig Bennett on Radio 4’s Today Programme on Wednesday. (LINK)
    When the presenter asked him to explain the group’s opposition to nuclear power stations he got this reply: “The biggest risk of nuclear power is that it takes far too long to build, it’s far too costly, and distorts the national grid by creating an old model of centralised power generation.”
    I sat up in bed…
    Friends of the Earth’s shift was signalled in a little-reported policy paper last year which included an independent assessment (LINK) that coal and maybe even gas generation presented more health risks than nuclear. I have not heard the shift so strikingly articulated before this week…
    http://www.theguardian.com/environment/blog/2014/sep/12/friends-of-the-earths-shift-on-nuclear-should-be-celebrated-not-denied

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    PeterPetrum

    Looks Locke the GWPF web sites (both of them) are off the air. Anyone else having problems accessing them or is it just me. May have been attacked, as both are down?

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    Richard Ilfeld

    A Spectacular example of the blindness that is CAGW.

    California is a big state. It is mostly desert. 100 years ago the desert
    was tamed with a series of dams and aquaducts. California became the garden of the US, and a very populous and prosperous state. It is also liberal.

    California is now in a serious drought. The solutions are expensive. DeSal. Water pipes from Canada. Maybe something exotic, like towing an
    iceberg to northern California and establishing a shoreline reservoir.

    Losing agricultural, then population is more expensive. Can drill wells, but the aquafir is so stressed that this is a very short term solution.

    Concerned progressives are on the case right? Actually no. Driven, supposedly by saving carbon emissions from cars, the are gung ho spending billions (far more that a good water infrastructure would cost) to build am bullet train.

    You probably didn’t get the news in OZ that in downtown LA a 100 year old pipe burst, wasting millions of gallons and doing lots of damage. Or that we pump a lot of fresh water into the ocean to save an arguably important 3″ fish.

    Not to mention not exploiting the energy resources in this well endowed stat to help solve the problems.

    Gaia must be thrilled, but the traditional population is out-migrating.

    You folks in Oz appreciate the rigors of a desert. California pols are slow learners.

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    This story says prime minister Tony Abbott has a positive approach to Aboriginal politics:

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/australiaandthepacific/australia/11095328/Australian-PM-moves-to-Aboriginal-community-for-one-week.html

    It also says Arnhem Land has the world’s oldest culture – maybe 40,000 years old. Cool.

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    pat

    15 Sept: Guardian Editorial: The Guardian view on the unchanging message from climate scientists
    When the science is so rigorous, politics must be equally vigorous…
    Climate scientists have just established what did not make a vast chunk of Antarctic ice shelf break off 12 years ago and start floating northwards. They report in the journal Science that they can rule out instability in the bedrock on which the Larsen-B sheet was grounded. That leaves “surface warming” as the most likely explanation: in other words, it could have been climate change as a consequence of increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide that made the 3,250 square kilometres of ice up to 200 metres thick break off from the rest of Antarctica.This was pretty much the conclusion that many people jumped to at the time, but scientists needed to explore other possible causes, and this cautious confirmation of climate change tells the world something about scientific rigour: only once the sea floor was exposed could researchers, in a series of cruises, make seismic measurements and take samples of the mud below. Scientists have to make certain, and while they take time to make certain, politicians may take time to decide how to react, and then how much to react…
    Climate change is on the way, with attendant extremes of heat and windstorm, drought and flood, and of course threats to global food security…
    The message from climate science has not changed in the last 25 years. Every week, new research adds to the urgency. The science is rigorous, the political response must be vigorous.​
    http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/14/guardian-view-unchanging-message-climate-scientists

    15 Sept: Australian: Rick Morton: Record expansion sees Antarctic sea ice confound climate scientists
    ANTARCTIC sea ice has expan­ded to its greatest coverage since records began in 1978, continuing to confound climate scien­tists and proving even more hazardous than usual for shipping in the Southern Ocean…
    The Australian understands the growing ice mass will pose a significant challenge to shipping in the coming Antarctic summer, even to resupply missions conducted by the Aurora Australia.
    Last year, scientists were trapped in sea ice for more than a week aboard Russian research vessel Akademik Shokalskiy…
    The Aurora Australis is due to leave Hobart on October 22 to resupply scientists at the Davis research station. A spokeswoman for the Australian Antarctic Division said the season was yet to begin and she did not have any comment about “potential impacts on the Aurora resupply”.
    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/climate/record-expansion-sees-antarctic-sea-ice-confound-climate-scientists/story-e6frg6xf-1227058298989

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    pat

    9 Sept: NoTricksZone: P. Gosselin: German Scientists Ridicule New York Climate Conference As Major World Leaders Decline To Show Up
    Imagine there’s a climate conference, but no one goes
    By Sebastian Lüning and Fritz Vahrenholt
    (Translated, edited by P Gosselin)
    Dear Mr General Secretary: If you really wish to cut back on CO2 emissions, then you should NOT jet around the globe in your UN jet to supposedly see climate change with your own eyes…
    http://notrickszone.com/2014/09/09/german-scientists-ridicule-new-york-climate-conference-as-major-world-leaders-decline-to-show-up/

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    Annie

    I see you topped the 250,0000 overnight Jo. Well done on everything you do. The world needs more like you! Annie

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    StefanL

    Climate influenced by space flow turbulence ?

    A new paper from Prof Reginald Cahill of Flinders University claims that the sun’s behaviour and the earth’s climate are both influenced by “galactic space flow turbulence”.

    (Note: This is not a traditionally peer-reviewed paper and and Cahill’s ‘Process Physics’ theory of dynamical 3-space is not accepted by the mainstream physics community, but it’s plausible and is backed by some experimental evidence.)

    Cahill claims to have detected fluctuations in dynamical 3-space (not the same as Einstein’s gravity waves) and that these fluctuations:
    (a) pump energy into both the sun and the earth, driving solar sunspot numbers and earth sea surface temperature deviations;
    (b) precede solar flares (but not CMEs) by 6 days.

    Cahill also predicts a cooling (or at least no warming) of the Earth for the next 20-30 years.

    I know all this is speculative and outside the mainstream, but it indicates that climate science may have been missing a key physical process until now.

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    Climate science: Ripe for satire.

    Renewable Target: 20% Of Australia’s Electricity To Be Powered By Burning Scientific Reports

    Got to love it when satirists unwittingly burn their fingers because they haven’t fathomed the depths.

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      Thanks Bernd.

      I’m coming in here not to comment on this, umm, satire, but to add some explanation to the coal fired power generation process.

      Take this link to the schematic diagram for the Bayswater power plant. Mid screen, the schematic starts, and this is the front end.

      See in the middle there, is a smallish grey thing under the title Step 1. That’s the coal bunker. At the bottom is the pulverising mill, where the coal is crushed from its, well, lumps, by passing it through rollers or balls. The coal is converted to powder, of a finer consistency than facial talcum powder. Into that pulversiing mill is also fed hot air, at 650 degrees F.

      This hot mix of powder then goes to a burner where it is further mixed with more superheated air, and this mix is then forced into the furnace via injectors, and the process is …. similar to …. the fuel injection in your car.

      The principle here is that in this manner, the coal burns as efficiently as a gas.

      A typical single large unit, like at Bayswater (which has 4 units) will burn one ton of coal every 12 or 13 seconds.

      Now it’s easy to say ….. one ton of coal ….. so how much is that one ton of coal.

      Stand up. Take a pace and a half, around four feet. That is one side of a square, four feet by four feet. However tall you are now constitutes the volume of that cube, around 4 feet by 4 feet by 5 foot 9 inches, say around 70 cubic feet.

      That ….. is one ton of coal.

      That goes through this process every ….. 12 or 13 SECONDS.

      They’ve been using this form of the process, gradually further refined over the years since around 1918, the end of World War One.

      In Germany now, they have further refined this process for their new USC brown coal plants to dry the moisture content from the brown coal even further to rival buen percentages from traditional black coal fired plants.

      Tony.

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      KinkyKeith

      That’s a beauty Bernd.

      KK

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    James Bradley

    Boy these ABC Global Warmers just beat the sh#t don’t they.

    Last night on ABC Weather – Record Antarctic sea ice caused by climate change due to increased winds melting Antarctic glaciers as a result of reduction in ozone?????

    Say what the f#ck – global warming now causes increased sea ice and the hole in the ozone layer is reducing because of less ozone causing increased winds.

    That sure is some f#cked up Sh#t right there.

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    Safetyguy66

    Interesting story from the AUS today.

    Interesting for 2 reasons, firstly the obvious. Secondly, “Rick Morten Social Affairs Reporter”? Was the science writer busy?

    Or is it as I suspect an unintended but brilliantly indicative presentation of the topic in the forum it deserves….. water cooler gossip, that’s about the high point of pro AGW climate science really. Maybe the AUS is on to something.

    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/climate/record-expansion-sees-antarctic-sea-ice-confound-climate-scientists/story-e6frg6xf-1227058298989

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    pat

    for me, this interactive ***”dashboard” is a flop. can’t work it out at all! it doesn’t really matter, given the introduction, but someone else may be able to figure it out. i get the wildfire section plus a portion of the sea level rise bit, and that’s it:

    15 Sept: Guardian: Interactive: Your contribution to climate change: see your impact on the Earth’s vital signs
    As California suffers its worst drought in recent history, flooding has driven thousands from their homes in India and Pakistan, and Pacific islanders watch the ocean slowly invade their shores.
    While it’s impossible to say exactly which events are caused by climate change, it’s clearer than ever that the health of our planet affects us all – and that our collective actions, likewise, have an ‘unequivocal’ impact on the Earth…
    We’ve collected a few key indicators of the Earth’s health – its vital signs – into this ***dashboard. View up-to-date snapshots of the effects your country and the human race are having on our environment…
    http://www.theguardian.com/vital-signs/ng-interactive/2014/sep/15/climate-change-earth-environment-vital-signs-waste-wildfires-interactive

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    pat

    LOL:

    15 Sept: BusinessSpectator: Harper joins Abbott in bailing on climate summit
    Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper won’t be among the 125 heads of state attending the UN Climate Summit in New York this month…
    Harper joins President Xi Jinping of China, Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India and Prime Minister Tony Abbott of Australia in choosing to skip the summit…
    Christiana Figueres: “I would not recommend we read too much into the person who is going to be speaking for the Chinese and India governments,” … “The fact is that they had fully intended to be represented at the top level and for reasons that have nothing to do with the climate summit at the at the last minute they are not able to be there.”…
    (Originally published by Climate Progress)
    http://www.businessspectator.com.au/article/2014/9/15/policy-politics/harper-joins-abbott-bailing-climate-summit

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    pat

    14 Sept: The Tyee, Canada: Nick Fillmore: Here Comes Another Corporatized Climate Summit
    UN meeting again corroded by big business influence. Is it time to change tactics?
    The United Nations will host dozens of governments, corporations and non-governmental organizations during a one-day Climate Summit 2014 in New York on Sept. 23, but unfortunately, according to scientists and environmentalists, the meeting will deal mainly with only one limited way of fighting climate change: carbon pricing..
    Corporate participation in the summit is organized by the UN Global Compact, a powerful business lobby group that looks out for the interests of corporations across a number of UN program areas. The Compact is loaded with the most powerful corporations from around the globe, companies such as Coca-Cola and Cisco from the U.S., Siemens from Germany, CEMEX from Mexico, Banco do Brasil, Sinopec from China, etc…
    One of the few moments of real heart-felt compassion will come when a 25-year-old poet, journalist and climate-change activist from the Marshall Islands delivers the keynote opening address. Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner will say she became inspired to fight climate change when she witnessed the raging ocean destroying her city’s main graveyard on her island of 71,000.
    “I was inspired by the concept that the ocean is almost eating, or swallowing our dead in a sense,” she said in an interview with a U.S. donor…
    Secondly, critics such as activist Naomi Klein are highly critical of carbon pricing programs because they can be manipulated…
    While the UN will welcome powerful corporations in New York, it will strictly control the participation of non-governmental organizations. NGOs were not permitted to decide among themselves who will be allowed into the summit. Instead, the UN selected four civil society speakers and 34 additional civil society attendees from the 544 nominated groups…
    http://www.thetyee.ca/Opinion/2014/09/15/Another-Corporate-Climate-Summit/

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      Carbon500

      Pat: Re. the quote you posted which sums it all up:
      ‘One of the few moments of real heart-felt compassion will come when a 25-year-old poet, journalist and climate-change activist from the Marshall Islands delivers the keynote opening address. Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner will say she became inspired to fight climate change when she witnessed the raging ocean destroying her city’s main graveyard on her island of 71,000.’
      So this is due to mankind’s influence due to burning fossil fuels! How gullible can people be?

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    pat

    no Merkel, Abe or Putin either!

    7 Sept: RightSideNews: An Economist’s Bad Climate Advice
    The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is the driving force behind the global warming hoax. It is holding a climate change summit on September 23.
    Guess who won’t be attending? Chinese president Xi Jinping, India’s prime minister, Narenda Modi, and for good measure, Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel. Others whose leaders will not be attending include Canada, Japan, and Russia…
    http://www.rightsidenews.com/2014090734810/editorial/us-opinion-and-editorial/an-economist-s-bad-climate-advice.html

    from a Benny Peiser article, this would appear to confirm Merkel’s non-attendance:

    The Green Party has criticised Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, for cancelling her attendance at the UN Climate Summit on 23 September in New York and accused her of giving preference to lobby interests. “Instead of fighting for global climate protection on the international stage, she rather goes to speak to the lobby group of German industry which is not known to be a haven of climate change activism,” said the party’s parliamentary deputy Oliver Krischer.—Die Welt, 15 August 2014

    some details:

    UN Climate Summit
    http://www.un.org/climatechange/summit/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Speakers-List-Cover-11-September.pdf

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    pat

    Graeme No.3 –

    sorry, didn’t see your mention of Merkel before posting a link about her.

    difficult to see how ABC/Fairfax/Guardian can attack our PM, given the number of major no-shows!

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    CC Squid

    This was posted on the GWPF web site.. If it is true the the EU is following the OZie lead.

    CCNet 15/09/14

    EU Dismantles Climate Commission Amid Economic Struggles

    Climate Agenda – The Biggest Loser Of The New EU Commission

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