Forty years of trust in science drops after pandemic

By Jo Nova

The brand-name of science is being trashed

Trust in science continues to fall. The disillusionment with the Covid response has spread to science in general. Anthony Fauci said “trust the science” then showed us how untrustworthy science was. SARS-2 definitely wasn’t a lab-leak, except it probably was; the vaccine was 95% effective, except everyone caught covid, and the data was world’s best practice but the FDA fought tooth and nail to stop us seeing it until 2076.

These results are terrible: despite respondents being surrounded by hi-tech cars, phones, food and gadgets which were all impossible without science, only 57% of people now think science has has a “mostly positive” effect.  That’s 43% of the population who now think science hurts us as much as it helps (or is even worse).

The good name of science, created by two generations with antibiotics, satellites, and the moon-landing,  has been exploited by name-calling parasites.

Pew research released this in November, calling it just “a decline”:

What Pew didn’t say was that these sort of surveys have been going on for years and this was the biggest fall in forty years.

A similar survey set by the National Science Foundation has been running since 1979, and year after year, found that between 68% and 79% of Americans used to think the benefits of science outweighed the negatives.

It’s been remarkably consistent for four decades but we’re in new territory now.

Here are those older results:

Polls, USA,

(Click to enlarge and see the caption.)
The terms “experts” and “consensus” won’t work like they used too.
Contrast this with  the news just released by Nature with the headline “trust in scientists is high”, but watch the pea.  They don’t compare it to the past, report a trend, or give it any context at all. It’s just a mindless number, 3.62, (but it’s high mom!)

People around the world have high levels of trust in scientists, and most want researchers to get more involved in policymaking, finds a global survey with more than 70,000 participants. But trust levels are influenced by political orientation and differ among nations, according to the study, which was described in a preprint posted online last month1.

Respondents were asked to indicate how much they agreed with a dozen statements about the integrity, competency, benevolence and openness of scientists, on a scale of 1 to 5. A higher score indicated higher trust.  Across all participants, the average trust score was moderately high, at 3.62…

Even the psychologist they interview can only bring himself to say “fairly high”.

Nature make sure to tell us trust is ” linked to political orientation”. They blame it mostly on political leaders. It’s as if the voters are just the sheep being led astray, not the ones throwing tomatoes at the politicians who are slow to figure it out.

It is the end of an era.

REFERENCES

Public assessment of benefits and harms of scientific research: 1979–2018

National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, National Science Foundation, Survey of Public Attitudes Toward and Understanding of Science and Technology (1979–2001); University of Michigan, Survey of Consumer Attitudes (2004); NORC at the University of Chicago, General Social Survey (2006–18). Science and Engineering Indicators

 

 

9.7 out of 10 based on 79 ratings

164 comments to Forty years of trust in science drops after pandemic

  • #
    David Maddison

    Two of the most damaging things ever done to science and the scientific method were (and are) the Left promoting the lies that “scientific fact is established by consensus” and that there is such a thing as “settled science”.

    In 1931, a publication titled “One Hundred Authors Against Einstein” was released. When questioned about this widespread criticism of relativity, Einstein responded by suggesting that defeating relativity required not the support of numerous scientists, but rather just one compelling fact.

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    • #
      Penguinite

      One word comes immediately to mind “BOM”. Global warming is surely next to covid in the disinformation stakes

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    • #
      CO2 Lover

      “I looked for the science and could not find it – I looked for the money and found the science”

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      • #
        Dave of Gold Coast, Qld.

        As often quoted most “science” is really about money, power and control. How many times have we listened to people during Covid tell us masks were needed, the vaccines were safe, lockdowns stopped infections? All now proven lies. Then we have had more than 50 years of predictions and prophesies on “climate change” that have failed BUT never a word of apology from the fraudsters. Here in Oz we are fed lies by governments, BoM and so called professionals about the weather. They cannot even predict the week’s weather with any accuracy many times. Everywhere I look from Cairns to Hobart everything looks lush and normal.

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        • #
          Graeme No.3

          Week??? From recent South Australian forecasts I would think the measured time is in hours.
          But I remember the late Alf Gard in the 70’s having a serve of them when he was marooned in the Commentator’s box at Cheltenham racecourse on a predicted “sunny day”.
          This after the third race had to be abandoned because of very heavy rain.

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        • #
          Adellad

          Enjoy your nice lush eastern extremities. Here in southern SA the last rain was January 25th. After 3 wet months and a lot of growth, the bushfire potential is now truly scary – just horrible. No rain in prospect either, quite possibly for another 6 weeks the way the pressure patterns look. So much for bloody Hunga Tonga.

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      • #
        GlenM

        OT. I’m informed that the tropospheric hotspot has been found by researchers at UNSW. They have re- evaluated radiosonde data. Yeah yeah..

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  • #
    David Maddison

    Most of the distrust in science relates to publicly (taxpayer) funded science or science that involves government policy such as the government-forced adoption of experimental covid vaccines and government-granted exemption from liability. Government funding of “science” that “proves” anthropogenic global warming is another.

    Eisenhower in his farewell speech said:

    “Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity.”

    “We must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.”

    He was warning about the emerging scientific establishment which were then replacing independent, privately-funded scientists.

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    • #
      John

      I put that down to two things
      (a) poor communication from the government about what it was doing and why it was doing it
      (b) governments making a difficult choice between an imperfect vaccine, developed in a huge rush, or having no medical protection at all against covid.

      How many more people would have died without the vaccine? It’s an impossible question to answer. Data from China, Italy, Spain, France, Belgium etc. suggested “a lot”. In some of those countries hospitals were overloaded, so there was a risk of people with other conditions dying not because they had covid but because they couldn’t get treatment for whatever condition they had.

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      • #
        David of Cooyal in Oz

        IVM. HCQ. Zinc. Vitamin D. Zero?

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        • #
          David of Cooyal in Oz

          My “Zero?” above should have been “Zero!” because, if there had been no “vaccine” there’d have been no need for the Emergency Use Authorisation and that in turn would mean there was no need for the nasties to ban IVM and/or HCQ. That they have been proven safe and effective over decades had already been noticed and applied, successfully, and the knowledge would have continued to spread widely. And COVID would have gone down the rabbit hole of history as a mild irritant.

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      • #
        David Maddison

        John, an effective and safe treatment, HCQ, taken according to appropriate protocols such as with Zn, was already available and known to be effective (Dr Zelenko) and was banned even before any “vaccines” were put on the market. How do you explain that? Also Ivermectin when taken according to appropriate protocols as David mentioned above was also effective and safe but banned.

        And we also know that people with extremely common Vitamin D deficiency were much more susceptible to severe covid and had a higher mortality from covid than those who were sufficient. And yet not a word was said about correcting Vitamin D deficiency. Why?

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      • #
        pcourtney

        Mr. John: Poor communications??!! Did you try putting it down to poor decisions (to lie to us) by gov’t? When, in Feb ’20, Fauci decided to lie about the origin of covid, many folks like myself realized he was lying long before it was disclosed. Did you miss it? When that was disclosed, “poor communications” was not viable. Fauci and Collins communicated that lie all too effectively. Passing this lie off as “poor communications” is covering up for the lie, do you realize that is what you’re doing?

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      • #
        Ronin

        John, you are so far off base, about your point B, it wasn’t that there wasn’t a suitable treatment,it was that our govts wouldn’t allow any alternatives, now that was a big fail.

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      • #
        bobn

        More would have surcvived without the poison vacines.

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      • #
        Matt Cox

        (b) governments making a difficult choice between an imperfect vaccine…

        They should never have made the choice at all. They should have allowed the sovereign citizens of this nation to decide for themselves, rather than pushing mandates. Poor communication is not an excuse for fascism.

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      • #
        wal1957

        Calling the vaccine “imperfect” is being much too kind.
        The governments…”we are here to help”, mandated that you had to be vaxxed or risk losing your job.
        Governments of all stripes and colours went along with this as did so-called “experts” because “trust the science” and “we are the experts”.
        They all failed and we will never know how badly because governments/experts/advisors will not allow us to know.

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      • #
        Daniel

        John the vaccine was and is that dangerous they have changed the method of counting excess mortality in the United Kingdom to hide the problem.

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      • #
        Steve of Cornubia

        “How many more people would have died without the vaccine?”

        Far fewer people died from Covid than the sheeple believe. Many incidences of false reporting were uncovered, including deaths from falls and heart attacks that were logged as Covid deaths. Just about every old person who died in that period was classified as a Covid death, no matter what actually killed them. Then there are the numerous accounts of death from mistreatment in hospitals – the infamous respirators and toxic medicines that were applied even when the patient involved was old and frail, with lungs made of tissue paper.

        Allowing for all this fudging of data, the vast majority of deaths were among the frail elderly and those weakened by serious chronic disease.

        In America (and perhaps elsewhere) Covid deaths were inflated by a cruel funding structure that gave extra funding to hospital (a) when a patient tested positive for Covid, even if they were admitted with heart failure and (b) extra extra funding if they put ‘Covid’ on the death certificate.

        Of course, if the deaths piled up high enough, Big Phrama would be able to get emergency use approval for their new, untested ‘vaccine’. So long as there were no alternative treatments of course …

        In light of all this, I take all talk of mass Covid deaths with a whole bag of salt.

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      • #
        Jon Rattin

        John, I’ve often heard people try and justify the rapid vaccine (I prefer the descriptor of “gene based therapy) rollout by saying “well we had to do something”. Using those hastily constructed and poorly tested “vaccines” was like praising a fireman for using water to try and put out a grease fire. “Oh, at least he tried to put out the fire, it’s unfortunate that using water made the blaze worse but give that little trooper ten-out-of-ten for trying”!

        I won’t speculate on how many Covid deaths may have been prevented by said “vaccines” or whether they contrarily exacerbated transmissions and deaths. I’ve rounded off numbers but I encourage you to check facts after reading the following real world data (mostly from worldometers.info) and make your own conclusions.

        So, in late 2021, before l knew this blog existed, I remarked that Nigeria seemed to have a low death rate for Covid 19 compared to Australia (I recall Nigeria’s population being around 211 million at that time, it’s now around 227 million). So, as of 9/11/21, Covid deaths for the respective countries were:

        Australia: 1,841
        Nigeria: 2,906

        Fast forward to today, the numbers from the same website…

        Australia: 24,259
        Nigeria: 3,155

        Obviously this is just a general indication, there are so many variables to consider. So I’ll be blunt- most low economic African countries that historically used ivermectin to treat River Blindness have a low Covid 19 mortality rate. Take a look and form your own conclusions, then ask why most journalists won’t even look at the pattern. Then do a web search and ask why Covid hasn’t seriously affected the majority of African nations? I expect you will see that search results bring up articles published years ago…no one has done a deep dive on the issue

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      • #
        Ed Zuiderwijk

        John makes the logical mistake of assuming that without vaccin we could have done nothing.

        20

    • #
      CO2 Lover

      The Peter Principle and Science

      The Peter Principle is an observation that the tendency in most organizational hierarchies, such as that of a corporation or goverment department, is for every employee to rise in the hierarchy through promotion until they reach a level of respective incompetence.

      The Peter Principle also applies to large “scientific” bodies such as the CSIRO and BOM.

      Young scientists might start their careers as dedicated to the scientific method but they observe who gets promoted and who does not.

      If they do get promoted they rise up through the organisational heirarchy until they reach their level of incompetence.

      Applying the scientific method to this observation arrived at this conclusion

      In 1969, the psychologist Laurence J. Peter made a observation about how organizations promote its members: “The members of an organization climb the hierarchy until the level of maximum incompetence”. The first computational study on this principle suggests that promoting members randomly is the safest strategy

      https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0378437121002958#

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  • #
    Gerry, England

    One of the other downtrends in science is the decline in novel scientific discoveries since the end of the war. I would suggest that this is linked to the surge in government funded science as well as all the leftie-fascist billionaires and their trusts funding junk research. Both of these have brought group science where individual ideas suffer from consensus thinking. Science used to be driven by individuals or a pair working together. Think of Edison, Marconi, Watson-Watt, RJ Mitchell, Barnes Wallace etc.

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    • #
      John

      I think you are alluding to “policy-oriented” funding by governments.

      No longer is there much funding for the “let’s investigate this” type of research. Now it’s “align your research submission to government policy if you want funding”. The follow-up to the second is “if you want funding in future, your paper must find what the government would like you to find”.

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    • #
      Steve

      Gerry. I disagree – to an extent – much good research has been carried out, in the past, by government and publicly funded bodies. Off the top of my head, most of the names you mention were actually publicly funded. Most big pharma patented medicines for example were originally developed with public money and then sold off to the private sector to manufacture. What’s gone wrong is that nowadays most research is being driven and funded by the private sector and that includes government research. In a word research has been corrupted by the money driven private sector.

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      • #
        Steve of Cornubia

        Nope. Spend a few years inside a government-funded research institution and you will see that the whole enterprise is driven 90% by government policy, albeit only leftist policy. Any work done for private companies is window dressing.

        The other primary function of government-funded research, whether in organisations like the CSIRO or our universities, is to ‘collaborate’ with scientists overseas, in the process of which IP thus generated or incorporated (so that includes our background IP) is ‘transferred’ overseas. Just walk the corridors and labs, you will see dozens of ‘visiting researchers’, wandering freely.

        On a wholly unconnected topic, did you all notice recently that China’s high tech R&D and high tech capabilities have grown staggeringly high?

        When I visited a couple of research institutions in China I wasn’t allowed anywhere without a ‘guide’.

        40

        • #
          Steve

          My key phrase is ‘in the past’, ie. The 50s thru to 70s. Other than that, we are in agreement.
          Also, when I worked in the USA, chinese technical visitors weren’t allowed anywhere without a guide either ! This is also fairly standard practice in Europe IMO.

          10

          • #
            Steve of Cornubia

            As you say, ‘visitors’ are usually chaperoned, but when they are actually working on a collaborative project, they assume pretty much all the freedoms that a member of staff has.

            Sort-of relevant here …

            Back in the ’70s I worked for a company that made mass spectrometers, building the analysers (quadrupole) in the clean room. One day, one of the sales engineers came into the assembly room with an analyser he had taken with him to a sales conference, where he met with some Russian prospective buyers. Everything went well and then the very friendly Russians, who said they wanted to buy ten instruments, invited him out for lunch. Several hours and a few wines later, they all headed back whereupon the Russians lost interest and cleared off. When he looked at the analyser, he realised it had been tampered with. The analyser, being a clean-room assembled piece of kit, was inside a vacuum chamber, so he handed it to us for inspection etc. When I slid it out of its chamber, it came out as just a pile of components. It had been COMPLETELY disassembled, presumably for reverse-engineering purposes. We never received that order.

            10

      • #
        Ed Zuiderwijk

        Corruption because of the source of money is easier to avoid than that because of the political climate. You can always try to find money elsewhere. Not so easy with politics.

        For example, you want to investigate if there is a biological component to criminality. Not that much of a fanciful idea since criminality is akin to predator behaviour. You want to do this research at your university. You will be vilified and lose your job.

        10

    • #
      CO2 Lover

      See my post at #2.2

      00

  • #
    Robber

    What is a scientist in today’s world?
    A scientist is a person who researches to advance knowledge in an area of the natural sciences.
    A scientist is someone who systematically gathers and uses research and evidence, to make hypotheses and test them, to gain and share understanding and knowledge.
    However all scientists are united by their relentless curiosity and systematic approach to assuaging it.
    Is Harvard Sacrificing Science for Wokeness?

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    • #
      Lawrie

      Robber. We always thought that science was “pure” until along came the climate scientists. There were isolated instances of fraud in the past but they were called out by other scientists. Piltdown man comes to mind but the climate clowns took bad science to a new level. They purposely took out historical events as in the Hockey Stick and used only those trees that that proved their theory rather than all the trees. Keith Briffa was part of this subterfuge but I suspect he desperately wanted not to be. The problem was that non scientists were on a mission to stop the use of coal and gas in the West to allow China to prosper. Those same people controlled the media so it was easy to promote poor science and denigrate good scientists. They got away with it so effectively they used the same system to hijack the medical fraternity during Covid. As more people learnt through personal experience that both lots of scientists were manifestly wrong they also doubted other scientists and their pronouncements. Scientists have only themselves to blame for the lack of trust because unlike in earlier times few will call out bad science. A few brave souls do exist and they pay a price but a bigger price is coming for those who failed to stand up.

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  • #
    John+in+NZ

    I still trust science. But what they have been calling science isn’t science.

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    • #
      Gee Aye

      Well said. This is the nub of it. And how do people come to hear about science that isn’t science? It is not from scientists.

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    • #
      CO2 Lover

      I still trust science. But what they have been calling science isn’t science.

      Newspeak words are classified by three distinct classes: the A, B, and C vocabularies.

      Distribution of the C vocabulary is limited, because the Party does not want citizens to know more than a select few ways of life or techniques of production. Hence, the Oldspeak word science has no equivalent term in Newspeak; instead, these words are simply treated as specific technical words for speaking of technical fields

      George Orwell – 1984

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  • #
    Honk R Smith

    Their is damage caused by the actions of governments during ‘Pandemic’ slowly being revealed.

    A toll is accumulating.

    Prompting no less than the UK GOV to change its toll counting methods.
    https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/excess-mortality-within-england-post-pandemic-method/changes-to-ohids-reporting-of-excess-mortality-in-england

    Let us hope the only loss we assess at the end of this is ‘trust’.

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    • #
      David Maddison

      Yes, simply redefine the way you count the covid-vaccine-induced excess deaths and just like magic, the problem goes away.

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    • #
      MrGrimNasty

      I posted that the other day, Dr Campbell has done a video now.

      https://youtu.be/NoOgDwhWXYk

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    • #
      Robert Swan

      … the UK GOV to change its toll counting methods

      Yeah, I took a brief look into this yesterday. At this page the ONS describes the changes, but points 2 and 3 of their description seem pretty dodgy to me:

        2. Fit a statistical model to the number of deaths in previous periods in each age-sex-geography stratum.
        3. Use the model to predict the number of deaths in the reference period in each age-sex-geography stratum.

      The “improvement” appears to be that we get death rates for age and sex bands (for those who believe sex is a thing), but fitting a model to *deaths* in each band means that you expect any trends in the number of deaths to continue, regardless of what the not-yet-dead population is doing. If you see 32 then 34 then 36, the model’s expected deaths for the next period will be 38. But what really matters is how this relates to the population of the group. If the baseline populations were 3200, 3400, 3600, you’re seeing a fixed death rate of 1%. But if the baseline population was 3200 throughout, you really have a rising death rate, but in both cases the model says “all good”.

      Seems pretty balmy. I may have misunderstood that page, or maybe they worded it badly, or maybe they came up with this way so the results of scary input would be reassuring output.

      Bottom line: computation is cheap in this day and age. How about ONS continue issuing expected deaths statistics using the old method, and give the “improved” method a new title and table of its own? Like proper scientists calibrating old and new thermometers side-by-side…

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      • #
        Steve

        Sounds like what they are saying is fudge the data to fit their model.
        You don’t need a model to ‘predict’ the number of deaths because you actually have the data for the number of dead people. The question is: are the actual number of dead people in a period, in excess of the actual numer of dead people in a similar past period.
        The ONS has been corrupted. Excess deaths are up, fact.

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        • #
          Robert Swan

          Steve,

          You don’t need a model to ‘predict’ the number of deaths …

          Correct, but you *do* need a model for the number of *expected* deaths to compare with the real deaths. The usual model has been to get the average proportion of the whole population that has died in May (or whatever) over some group of years. They could have just done this with age and sex stratification added, but instead have come up with this business of ignoring the living population and projecting the trend in deaths.

          Kooky, but great for hiding an incline.

          30

        • #
          Steve of Cornubia

          If my very brief reading is correct, they will cease to compare excess mortality today, with the period pre-Covid, but will instead compare today’s deaths with those during the preceding five years, constantly adjusted. This will of course flatten any increase and slowly leave behind the good old days before the dodgy ‘vaccines’ were rolled out.

          I might be wrong though because I’m utterly exhausted at present.

          00

          • #
            Steve

            Yes. What they are doing is reclassifying current excess deaths as something entirely normal. Nothing to see here, all normal, move on.

            20

      • #
        Leo G

        Seems pretty balmy.

        Statistical models of expected deaths using stratified multiple demographic, trend, seasonal and calendar effects implies a massive reduction in sample size in each fully stratified population with horrible effects on statistical significance.
        The Hockeystick effect?

        40

  • #
    David Maddison

    Another issue is “scientific” journals.

    The mainstream ones won’t publish anything that doesn’t conform to the Official Narrative, especially with regard to “climate change” (sic) or covid, no matter how well supported the paper is by objective fact and analysis.

    That relates to my first point (comment #1) about “consensus” and “settled science”.

    It’s very difficult to promote any idea not in accordance with the Official Narrative.

    And that also relates to my comment #2 about the takeover by the taxpayer-funded “scientific establishment” who themselves won’t question the Official Narrative in case they are defunded and unpersoned.

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    • #
      CO2 Lover

      The New Scientist being a classic example

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      • #
        John Sheldrick

        More like the Nude Scientist. The Emperor has no clothes .

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      • #
        Graeme No.3

        Earlier was Nature, founded to espouse Natural Selection (as per Darwin) as a means of Evolution of Species.
        Those who debated the matter, even those who had mentioned Evolution publically 12 years before Darwin, were not allowed access.

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  • #
    Penguinite

    So-called science has stopped us from using the abundance of coal and gas hidden beneath the surface of this great brown land in favour of windmills and solar panels that now blight it. Spooner in today’s The Australian is dead right again!

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    • #
      PeterPetrum

      Spooner is not the best cartoonist the Oz employs (Johanas Leak is) but todays cartoon does sum it up quite well.

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      • #
        Neville

        So Penguinite or Peter can you please tell us about the Spooner cartoon?

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        • #
          Graeme No.3

          A couple sitting on a bench on a hill with wind turbines across their view along with transmission lines.
          One saying with wind & solar too expensive and unreliable, nuclear may be our only option.
          Under the hill is a very large COAL sign.

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          • #
            Neville

            Thanks Graeme 3 and I thought and hoped it might be non PC and sensible.
            Nuclear is OK but just imagine the fights and BS and fraud we’d have to put up with until the next election?
            But coal is great and no more TOXIC W & S and those soul destroying thousands of klms transmission lines and the entire TOXIC W & S renewals every 15 to 20 years. YUK.

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          • #
            PeterPetrum

            Thanks G3, you get there before me!

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  • #
    Neville

    I still trust Science or proper data and evidence, but of course that can sometimes change over time.
    But I wouldn’t trust some of their so called celebrated Scientists at all and some of their so called Scientific institutions are now a delusional WOKE fantasy.
    Eisenhower was correct and Dr Richard Lindzen also agreed that throwing money at some concocted so called climate change research has led to some disastrous results and beliefs over the last 30 years.

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  • #
    another ian

    IMO “Climategate” started the trend, “Pandemicgate” accelerated it

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  • #
    John Hultquist

    I’m very selective. Many government agencies (Fauci being one) use their positions to promote an agenda. Thus, “their science” automatically arrives with near Zero credibility. Likewise, anything from the UN.
    Another Zero goes to all pages regarding “climate” posted on Wikipeedia.

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    • #
      Neville

      J H I mostly agree with you about Wiki’s climate data, but they do state that Eemian SLs were 6 to 9 metres higher than our Holocene SLs in 2024.
      And that agrees with the Co2 Coalition Scientist’s Eemian SL data as well.

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      • #
        Graeme No.3

        Neville:
        Did they point out that higher SLs were due to higher temperatures melting Greenland and Antarctic ice?
        Probably not, since the CO2 was much lower than today.

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        • #
          Neville

          Well Graeme 3 they know and we know that’s their problem.
          IOW none of their delusional nonsense can alter the fact about 280 ppm during the Eemian and 420 + ppm today.
          So their delusional fantasies about co2 increases don’t make any sense at all.

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          • #
            Ross

            Haha, Neville. You nearly launched into my favourite Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn quote -“We know that they are lying, they know that they are lying, they even know that we know they are lying, we also know that they know we know they are lying too, they of course know that we certainly know they know we know they are lying too as well, but they are still lying. In our country, the lie has become not just moral category, but the pillar industry of this country.” This was relevant to the Soviet Union under Stalin etc, but it pretty well applies to a lot of Western countries these days.

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    • #
      Steve of Cornubia

      That’s a characteristic of modern leftists, no matter where they work. They are simply unable or unwilling to separate their politics from their official role and responsibilities. They see whatever authority they have – even if it’s curating a museum collection – as an opportunity to further the cause. It’s the Long Slow March at work and reveals why all our previously apolitical organisations are now mouthpieces and enforcers for the left, including the media and the courts.

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  • #
    David Maddison

    Another thing that has caused the corruption of science by the Left is the adoption of woke Post Modernism ideology by fake science practioners.

    Unlike actual science which is analytic, rational, objective and based on a testable hypothesis or theory; Post Modernism rejects rationality, objectivity and objective reality (truth). “Truth” is whatever you think it is. (That’s why you always hear Leftists use expressions like “my truth”, not “the truth”.)

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  • #
    Ross

    In the words of that great Australian Castrol motor oil advertisement from the 1980’s- oils ain’t oils. Or, in this case “ science ain’t science “ any more. Nearly all the science disciplines have been bastardized by the likes of Maurice Strong, Al Gore, Michael Mann, Deborah Birx/ Fauci for political gains. Plus many others. Even Australian state premiers and CHO’s during the COVID bollocks would quote “ the science”, without any true understanding of the science process.

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    • #
      CO2 Lover

      Also remember “the drink you have when you’re not having a drink”

      The BOM is an example of “Claytons Science”.

      The product has not been advertised on television since the 1980s, yet the name has entered into Australian and New Zealand vernacular. It stands for an ersatz or dummy thing, or something that is obviously ineffective.

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  • #
    Neville

    The greatest stupidity over the last 100 years is the UN allowing an uneducated, ignorant girl to make a speech about her delusional fears about so called climate change.
    And for a while so many so called world leaders praised her fantasies and threw away the Scientific data and worshipped Gaia instead.
    How could they have been so delusional and yet the UN Sec General still seems to ignore the data about SLR and his global boiling etc?

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    David Maddison

    Yet another issue of the corruption of science is the fraudulent alteration or misrepresentation of evidence.

    We see Australia’s very own BoM alter historical temperature records by the irrepoducible (and therefore unscientific) process of “homogenisation” to create warming when none existed. And on top of that, they simply deleted the parts of the record they didn’t like, everything before 1910. In addition they did not do proper side by side comparisons when they changed from mercury thermometry to digital. It appears that change also resulted in an apparent warming.

    Tony Heller has shown how NASA and NOAA also alter historical temperature data.

    There was no shortage of fraud and misrepresentation with respect to covid efficacy and safety either.

    It relates to my point above about Post Modernist infiltration of science and the infusion of the belief that there is no such thing as objective truth.

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    • #
      John McLean

      No. The Bureau describes its method in details in published papers that you can access via the ACORN-SAT web pages. I’m sure that the details of the methods used by NASA and NOAA are also described – probably the Menne & Williams method.

      The output of any adjustment is an estimate and the big question is whether the estimates are accurate or flawed. It’s impossible to know with any certainty. Simple statistical analysis of the data won’t tell you because the variation will look pretty normal for temperatures.

      There are however identifiable flaws and questionable assumptions in the methods, two of which are UHI effects and the unequal exposure of weather stations to various weather conditions (e.g. less exposed to winds from some direction). Assuming that the estimates are accurate is a serious problem.

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      • #
        David Maddison

        John, where does the BoM state how another person, not from the BoM, can reproduce their “homogenisation” methodology?

        I’m not aware of it being published anywhere. And others have looked as well such as Jo, and Jennifer Marohasy.

        If it’s not published and it’s not reproducible by independent scientists (or anyone else), then it’s not science.

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        • #
          Robert Swan

          David Maddison,
          As one of the good books says:

          It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard.”

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      • #
        Gee Aye

        Here is some science for you. Even on site measurement using a thermometer is an estimate. Every temperature measuring instrument, whether electronic or alcohol in a tube, is measuring a proxy for temperature that is calibrated against a standard.

        29

        • #
          David Maddison

          If the measurement technique and technology is changed, the new method needs to be validated and any bias compared to the old method established.

          Also, explain the homogenisation methodology of the BoM and how an independent investigator can reproduce BoM’s results.

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          • #
            Gee Aye

            Wow. You know about cross checking instruments. Well done.

            What do you mean reproduce? If you just want to do the calculations using BOM’s data and methods, see John’s comment. The methods are published.

            If you are creating an independent verifiable data set to compare with BOM you’ll need a network of stations and a lot of money.

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            • #
              Adellad

              ?
              BoM have done precisely that in at least two variations:
              1. Homogenisation
              2. The simultaneous use of mercury and electronic recording at the same station – but of course the dual data is not being made available to Marohasy “in the public interest.”
              The use of sarcasm is inadvisable when one writes derisory cant.

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            • #
              robert rosicka

              Gee Aye when BOM was pushed in senate estimates by Gerard Rennick on the exact formula used for homogenisation they refused to give a straight answer and kept stalling him or giving non answers . The video has been played here many times .

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            • #
              Tel

              The methods are published.

              Utter rubbish.

              Skeptics have been asking for years to see a worked example of how Darwin managed to warm up so much and there’s been no response. Besides that, the BOM admitted there’s no way to reliably reproduce their own homogenization results, and the topic has been covered many times.

              https://joannenova.com.au/2015/06/if-it-cant-be-replicated-it-isnt-science-bom-admits-temperature-adjustments-are-secret/

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          • #
            Ronin

            Would that also apply to the introduction of smaller Stevenson Screens.

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        • #
          Leo G

          Every temperature measuring instrument, whether electronic or alcohol in a tube, is measuring a proxy for temperature that is calibrated against a standard.

          Direct instrumental measurements of temperature are regarded as empirical not as proxies.
          The key issues with instrumental measurement of air temperature involve observational error and uncertainty.

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          • #
            Gee Aye

            A moot point and you are confusing your terms.

            Empirical’s definition is not exact (see wiki) but one thing is certain is that it does not exclude proxies. The proxy being measured in an old fashioned thermometer is the height of the liquid which is calibrated for temperature by an external instrument prior to writing the temperatures on the side. It is an estimate and when read directly is indeed considered empirical (note that I never wrote otherwise, hence moot).

            As for observational error and uncertainty, what is your point? Of course it is important to also estimate error.

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      • #
        Ross

        John, virtually no-one who contributes to this blog argues against global warming and that that trend probably started in the mid 19th century. Also, don’t argue against a short rapid increase for a period of about 20 years from 1980. That’s climate realism. What a lot of people get angry with the BOM about is there total belief in AGW without referencing other possibilities. Also, more pertinently that there have been past warm periods in Australian history equal to more recent decades and that eg. 1890’s is supported by excellent meteorological data.

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    another ian

    FWIW

    “Secret CDC Report: Covid Shots Killed Half Million Children & Young Adults”

    https://slaynews.com/news/secret-cdc-report-covid-shots-killed-half-million-children-young-adults/

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      John

      There’s no evidence that the excess deaths that you refer to were caused by covid. The article merely makes the assumption.
      – excess compared to what average?
      – how has the population changed over time (more people would logically mean more deaths)?
      – what was the proximal cause of those deaths? (I don’t care if covid appears on their death certificate because the WHO instructed countries to include it even if it wasn’t the proximal cause if the person had tested positive for covid in the last 4 weeks, and note that some tests can’t distinguish between real covid and a covid vaccination.)

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      • #
        Mike Jonas

        It’s always fair to raise questions like that, but only if they apply to all sides not just one. And BTW it was “covid shots” not “covid”. Where were you when they said the coronavirus “vaccinations” were safe? Or, for that matter, where were you when they changed the definition of “vaccine”?

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        Kalm Keith

        Blah, blah, blah.

        Or conversely,

        Halb, halb, halb.

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        MP

        Your right it is lacking, but we have our own ABS and our world in data for comparison.

        The first link is Corona Extra stats by Month/year.
        Note the year of the worst pandemic in the history of man, a total of…
        2020 906 (up until the vaxx mandates a total of 912 persons had passed. It took 4 months after the vax mandate to overtake the previous 12 months
        2021 1355. (it was one a month until June) July 13 souls, August 98, Sept 316 and up and up.
        2022 (the year of safe and effective)10,301. This is COVID deaths alone.
        2023 4525

        2020/21 Covid was the 38th leading cause of death, (trips and falls 2022 it finished 3rd.

        https://www.abs.gov.au/articles/covid-19-mortality-australia-deaths-registered-until-31-january-2024

        In 2023, there were 166,957 deaths that occurred by 30 November and were registered by 31 January 2024. This is 15,114 deaths (10.0%) more than the baseline average, but 8,294 (4.7%) less than in 2022.
        Between March and May there were a similar number of deaths in 2023 as there were in 2022.
        Between June and September there has been substantially fewer deaths in 2023 compared to the same period in 2022.
        In November 2023 there were 14,629 deaths, comparable to the 14,700 deaths in November 2022 but 12.1% more than the baseline average.
        12,902 of the deaths occurring in November 2023 were doctor certified and 1,727 were coroner referred.
        The age-standardised death rate (SDR) for November was 40.2 deaths per 100,000 people, comparable to the baseline average (40.4) but below the rate for 2022 (41.6).

        https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/health/causes-death/provisional-mortality-statistics/latest-release

        All Cause ourworldindata. Based on 2015-19 average https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/excess-mortality-p-scores-average-baseline?time=earliest..2023-09-24&showSelectionOnlyInTable=1&country=~AUS

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    • #
      John Sheldrick

      I went to see my GP at a Medical Centre in the Sydney CBD yesterday . I had to wear a mask. Lol

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      • #
        Steve

        John. Nothing personal meant, but from my point of view, which may be wrong, why would you place your health matters in the hands of someone who believes in masking ? It brings into question their competence.

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        Adellad

        In early 2021 at the height of the insanity, I refused to wear a mask and when I saw my GP he had to come out to the car park. I guess he didn’t “have to” but he did. It bemused people at the bakery etc.

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  • #
    CO2 Lover

    The word “Science” comes from the Latin word “Scientia”, that means knowing something. It observes and understands phenomena that take place around us.

    While computers can assist in the analysis of data, computer models by themselves should not be considered to be science .

    “Gargabe In – Garbage out (GIGO)” is the first rule of computer modelling.

    How often do we here our political leaders say “Our policy is supported by modelling”?

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    • #
      David Maddison

      Garbage out (GIGO)” is the first rule of computer modelling.

      That used to be taught, back in the day.

      And they also used to teach that models had to be validated against real world data before they could be used for predictive purposes.

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      • #
        Steve

        David. The fact is that with all models it doesn’t matter how accurate they are with modeling past and existing data once you use them for predictive purposes, the results are just a, possibly accurate, guess.
        As financial experts always tell us, past performance is no indicator of future performance.

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        yarpos

        In my young IT life I worked for an oil company. My boss was reviewing a very favourable financial model of a proposed IT project one day, and conclusion was that the company should cease oil exploration, production, refining and retailing and stick to implementing IT projects as there appeared to be more money in it. Funnily enough years later they tried to make a business out of their IT arm and failed miserably.

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  • #
    David Maddison

    Inappropriate use of “science” to promote public terror campaigns.

    2003 SARS
    2005 Bird flu
    2014 Ebola
    2016 Zika
    2019 Measles
    2020 Covid
    2021 Monkeypox

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    • #
      Adellad

      Don’t forget AIDS around 1987 (? not sure) and the ludicrous images of the Grim Reaper at a bowling alley hurling a bowl at a frightened 10yo blonde girl. All done for political purposes.

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    GlenM

    A former associate recently underwent surgery and subsequently caught COVID – after 7 administrations of vaccine. A firm believer in the “science”, I think he may be having doubts now.

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  • #
    Neville

    I think that Willis Eschenbach’s “Where’s the emergency” article is well worth the time to check on their so called dangerous CC lunacy and the Co2 Coalition Scientist’s site seems to agree with his data and evidence.
    He regularly updates this article and he challenges other so called Scientists to prove him wrong.
    Prof Dessler couldn’t dispute the data but still threatened to stop him posting at his site a few months ago.
    The only thing that Willis hasn’t posted about ( I think) is their so called HOT SPOT and this is well covered in detail by Dr Christy and Dr Spencer and over many decades.
    Of course Jo Nova has also posted on the fabled HOT SPOT and just about every other topic that Willis has referred to in the link below.

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/25/wheres-the-emergency/

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    TdeF

    I put a lot of the scepticism/distrust in scientists down to the corruption of science by universities. This cycle started a long time ago. Say in Manchester when the local community needed engineers and started a Mechanics Institute. This became a technical college, which became a polytechnic, which became university. And in one documentary with 40% of its graduates in philosophy the local community started a Mechanics Institute. This process was repeated across the Empire.

    The consequent explosive growth of universities has reached the point where the Australian government is promising at least 50% of all adults will get a university degree. Why? Where then do we get carpenters, bricklayers, electricians, plumbers, farmers, shop assistants, salesmen, businessmen, taxi drivers if every school becomes a TAFE becomes a university? And then who is going to teach necessary skills if no one has them? How do you learn carpentry from a book or trial and error. Or engine fitting? Or farming?

    At present as manufacturing in Australia dies completely because of ridiculous energy prices, we have nearly lost all welders, boilermakers, fabricators, sheet metal people. Everything is now automated or imported and we cannot fix anything. Which is fine because we can sell more coal and iron ore and just import everything? So says all of Canberra in which everything is disposable. In electronics, Australia has never even made a transistor.

    And many people do not want to study from books for more years. For them these years are totally wasted. And for society, these people have to be supported while in many cases they achieve nothing. They want to get on with their lives! There is such a thing as aptitude, a vocation, a calling. Now they have to go to university. And they are not temperamentally suited to city life, multi story buildings, endless commuting or have the ability to self manage or supervise their own time at home. And how do people learn from each other if everyone is at home looking at the internet. What can you learn at home? And people learn on the job.

    The extreme academic view of life precludes learning practical skills and is often a waste of their critical years. There are real and difficult skills to learn and they need to be learned early. On the other hand the shortage of electricians and plumbers and mechanics and skilled tradesman is making those still in the trade richer than doctors.

    My point is that universities have grown beyond their useful size and are now a greedy money churning industry, not an elite institution for the suited and talented and interested. So having created many more university places than we need or want, the government is going to expand them, partly by taxing the prestigious and desirable and expensive old universities, stealing their money and giving it to less desirable places. It’s communism in academia. Everyone will be made equal. Just as in communism everyone but the party will be made equally poor.

    Science has been corrupted in many more ways. I have written on the corruption and vending of PhDs in anything at all, but the idea that Flim Flannery or Al Gore are the leading Climate Scientists is appalling. Or that Al Gore deserved any part of Alfred Nobel’s Peace Prize. “Since 1901, the Nobel Prize has been awarded in the fields of physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and peace”. So Gore is a scientist and the most effective peace maker in the world. Both are utterly wrong.

    And how many Climate Scientists actually have any qualifications in physics or chemistry? Or derivative and dependent sciences like biology, microbiology, geology, engineering etc. I do not count English (Flannery & Gore) or Politics (Gore) as science qualifications. Nor do I really think mechanical engineering, a difficult and demanding area, is an appropriate basis for the analysis of the chemistry and physics of ocean, atmosphere and incident solar energy.

    So if we allow sciences to be corrupted, for a PhD to be a simple commercial purchase, for everything to be called science, we may as well give the Nobel Peace Prize to the world’s most famous Climate Scientist. Currently Al Gore. Scion of a tobacco family who went to Harvard on a football scholarship.

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      CO2 Lover

      In my day it was a priviage to attend university and I had to obtain a scholarship to attend (two in fact).

      Then Gough Whitlam got elected and made university attendence “free” (aka paid for by taxpayers).

      It has been all downhill every since.

      I am all for defunding universities and getting back to the scholarship model.

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      • #
        TdeF

        Yes, I was in that group and paid for everything on scholarships. It was how it worked. Almost everyone at university was on a Commonwealth scholarship even at school, so it was an easy thing for Whitlam to make it all free.

        But the explosion of universities in the 1990s from technical schools not only caused an explosion in courses and graduates, it starved and even deskilled some important practical professions and left a lot of trainees doing three years or more of scholastic studies when they needed to be learning on the job. Many were just lost in the system.

        It was always amusing that allegedly bankrupt career criminal Alan Bond started his own University. And after jail his own Bank in England. Universities were obviously opportunistic big business. And clearly James Cook University has a focus on the Great Barrier Reef and its imminent demise without billions in R&D. The idea that there was nothing wrong with the reef was clearly a well kept essential secret.

        But there are many professions which really require practical skills and practical experience which can only be learned on the job. And it deprived young people of income they wanted, a life they wanted and independence they wanted and years which would have been more far productive in an apprenticeship.

        In my father’s year, you left school at Proficiency (Year 9) and went into an apprenticeship to learn skills and a trade.

        Intermediate (Year 10) was a step up. And Leaving was supposed to be leaving.

        Matriculation was in fact the entry to university, but that was pushed back to the school and effectively the entrance exam. Often far too hard for most, even harder than University itself. There was still a real Matriculation book which you were supposed to sign to confirm your entry to University and I was finally able to sign it in my third year. It had lost its purpose.

        So University was a often self defeating goal for many talented people where those battling against reason or interest to get into medicine set the bar far too high. And I never understood why doctors needed the highest scores in mathematics. And I still don’t. Most doctors would have been much better served even today with business studies as they end up in businesses with no skills at all. I knew many students who simply walked out of medicine with nothing. And science PhDs who then went into medicine to get a job. Vocational guidance simply did not exist.

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          TdeF

          Actually I think the remnant view of the Labor party was that degrees were associated with a rich elite, even if that was not the case. But it was a meritocracy, something hated today. Paul Keating was particularly sensitive to only having a high school education.

          So they destroyed the system, even of apprenticeships, the foundation of the Labor party. But at what cost to people who have no guidance in their lives, who wasted years studying things they will never use and lost those foundation years completely. Science has suffered as well as everything is now a science, all tertiary educations is degrees based and everyone draws graphs, like economists.

          It does not make people smarter, but it can make people think they are, especially economists like Chris Bowen and would be scientists like Flim Flannery.

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          CO2 Lover

          Almost everyone at university was on a Commonwealth scholarship

          I also had a BHP scholarship which provided real work experience between university semesters plus I got paid annual leave even though I was doing a full time engineering course. I was able to buy a new car Honda Civic while still a student!

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          • #
            TdeF

            That was good work. As the first at university, I was still learning the ropes. That has been a life story.

            Life is the one game where learning the rules is the game.

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            • #
              TdeF

              And there is a new class of Albanese/Shorten/Andrews politician where you do not ever get a job but go straight into the communist party on an escalator to political power without ever having to earn a living. A job where you only have to master the party machinery and find yourself in charge of millions of people with no real idea what it’s all about except political power.

              There was a time when the Prime Minister of Australia was a train driver from Bathurst, Ben Chifley. No longer.

              And you no longer have to study hard science to be a Climate Scientist. Any degree at all would do. Say English as with Flim Flannery or Al Gore.

              It’s not that real scientists are not respected, but that millions of people now call themselves scientists when they are pushing a religion, Climate Scientology.

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              • #
                CO2 Lover

                So true.

                However, most moral and intelligent people would put politics at the bottom of their list of career ambitions. Selling your soul rarely works out well.

                Explains why so many lawyers end up in politics!

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    • #
      another ian

      From an ancient Reader’s Digest –

      “When everyone in USA has a PhD butt the last plumber he’s going to make a fortune”

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      • #
        TdeF

        We used to laugh about meaningless US PhDs. Now it is Australia too. And businessmen buy Honorary PhDs.

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        • #
          David Maddison

          Even the school droput Greta Thunberg got an “honorary” doctorate (of theology).

          I’m not sure if she’s meant to be a theologian or scientist since she is promoted as a climate expert.

          And if a theologian, what entity does she worship? Perhaps the mother and wife of Uranus, Gaia?

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      melbourne+resident

      Yes TdeF when I went to university in the UK – having struggled to get sufficiently high passes in A levels of Chemistry, physics and biology and a raft of O level subjects including geography and geology as well as the three Rs, I was one of only 4% of the population and the first in my family (ever) to get there. I valued the Geology education and degree and my chemistry and zoology passes as it set me up for a good productive job as a Mining Geologist in Africa. I subsequently morphed into an Engineering Geologist after studying for 2 more years at Imperial College then Environmental Engineer as the world changed. I simply believe that pushing degrees onto such a large part of the population devalues those degrees and also undervalues TAFE/Tech College diplomas which very much have their benefits as my daughter found out. Now to have any value – you need at least an Msc and/or Phd. I find that new graduates today are no better than secondary school educated technicians in my day. They certainly are often hopeless at writing technical reports and often have little knowledge outside of their major. The result are people who think they understand science but really dont. I meet them all the time in the EPA, DEECA and others.

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    CO2 Lover

    “greatest scientific fraud of the century”,

    The “greatest scientific fraud of the century”, attributed to an Indian geologist, was in the spotlight once again recently in an article published in the scientific journal, Nature. The findings of Vishwa Jit Gupta of the department of geology at Punjab University in Chandigarh, which contributed to the scientific database on the Himalaya, had been proved fraudulent by Australian geologist John A Talent in 1989. It was discovered that Gupta had presented findings stolen from laboratories in different parts of the world and had ascribed fossils to non-existent rock structures. He is said to have warped concepts in marine geology that have been used in textbooks and may take decades to correct.

    https://www.downtoearth.org.in/news/the-fraud-of-the-century-29430

    I am sure that there must be many other scientific frauds that could take this title.

    Any suggestions?

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    • #
      John Sheldrick

      Obviously Peer Reviwed by his Mum.

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    • #
      TdeF

      Yes, obviously. The entire Climate disaster is based on one and only one essential proposition. That the 50% increase in CO2 since 1750 is man made. And it’s not true.

      But it’s hardly a fraud as no one proved it was true. The only argument ever presented is coincidence. Promoters just move on to stories about the extra CO2 rapidly heating the planet, sea level rise, dead penguins, tipping points, hot spot, end of civilization. And strangely these arguments even keep the scientists involved, without realising they have just been conned.

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  • #

    To question ‘the science’ is out,
    Being ‘settled’ it won’t allow doubt,
    The orthodox creed,
    Of the elite climate breed,
    And to its tenets are very devout.

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    • #
      CO2 Lover

      James A. Tweedie: Rocket Science

      An Ivy-League graduate student designed
      A project. His Summary Abstract outlined
      Statistical research on “Mortality –
      Its Long-Term Effects On Humanity.”
      The rubrics said nothing would be left to chance,
      And soon it was funded by government grants.

      The money was spent on a series of polls
      And interviews under the strictest controls
      In places like Rio, Las Vegas, Jakarta,
      Tahiti, Manhattan, and Puerto Vallarta.
      The grant funding covered the cost of the trips.
      The student paid nothing, except for the tips.

      His schedule required him to stop off in Rome,
      Geneva, and Paris before flying home.
      His peer-reviewed paper brought praise and acclaim.
      The Nobel Committee considered his name.
      His thesis was simple, his proof was air-tight.
      His facts beyond question, so . . . what did he write?

      His research concluded, and helped clarify,
      That one out of every one person will die.

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  • #
    yarpos

    I heard this syndrome is called the Mann-Jones effect. Not sure why though.

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    • #
      Ross

      I’m sure you’re being facetious there yarpos! 🙂 The Mann-Jones effect for me is the collusion between Phil Jones and Michael Mann depicted by their Climategate emails wanting to distort past data to produce a larger warming trend. For me, when Climategate happened, I thought that’s the end of the AGW theory and all the crazy policies. Nup, on it went and has now upgraded its stupidity into Net Zero.

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  • #
    Cynic

    Coupla things stand out.

    The absolute sham of “Peer Reviewed” as per Peter Ridd.
    The “Sell Out” by Climate Experts by saying anything, even outright lying, as long as money was attached, as per everyone.
    Although Gore and Kerry aren’t “Scientists” in the true sense of the word, they do lie for money. Oh boy! Do they lie!

    I don’t know enough about the Wuhan Virus to give an opinion, but lotsa people who do know enough, give their unflattering opinions of the Scientists involved.

    Perhaps today’s subject of Science, as a whole, depends too much on big capital investment.
    And I guess that’s the only way now, as serious Science costs serious money.

    A case I know a little about is Amateur Radio, of, say, 60 years ago.
    Enthusiasts would tinker and experiment because it didn’t cost them much, just a lot of time.
    Many ideas were added to by others, and, in fact, some startling progress was made with radio communications.
    Who could do that now? Only well funded labs with big budgets.

    People like Westinghouse, Edison, Tesla, Marconi, did their research with their own money, (until they had something to sell.)

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    Ronin

    Modelling… Find the politically correct answer, then find the right model and tune it to give the right output.

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    Neville

    So let’s quote brief one liners to challenge their delusional, dangerous CC?

    Human life exp below 32 years up to 1900 ( that’s the last 300,000 years) but about 73 years today and about 1.6 billion in 1900 and 8 + billion today. THINK.

    Huge drop of 98% in deaths from extreme weather events since 1920 and under 2 billion population then and over 8 billion today.

    Little change in SLs at Fort Denison NSW since 1914, compared to 2024. See Bolt’s Fitzhenry interview using BOM data.

    Dutch SL study finds more sq klms of global coastal land today than 30 years ago.

    A big drop in deaths from fires and burns globally over the last hundred years and since 2000. See OWI Data.

    Cooling in the Antarctic peninsula since 1998. And coldest recorded temp ever has been set in Antarctica within the last 10 years. See 2023 Zwang study and 2016 BAS Turner study.

    Also no warming in Antarctica since 1950 according to Nature study. And no measurable Antarctic warming according to UAH V 6 over the last 45 years.

    And 87% of Coral islands are growing in size or stable according to the NZ Kench studies over the last 30 years.

    All countries enjoy much higher food availability and intake over the last 74 years although global population has increased by an extra 5.5 billion. See OWI Data.

    Most girls have equal educational opportunities to boys today and this is also true in a lot more Muslim countries as well.

    Global GDP per capita income is much higher today or since 1800 or 1900 or 1950 or 2000.

    I could go on but Humans have come a long way since the 200,000 hunter gatherers during the last warmer Eemian interglacial or perhaps 200 + million about 2000 years ago.

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    • #
      TdeF

      The problem with facts, the inconvenient truth, is that it goes against received opinion and consensus Climate Science. It is a tenet of Climate Science that reality will not interfere with Climate Change. When Scandinavia this winter has a record cold winter or the killer cold in Mongolia, that is absolute proof of Climate Change.

      Anything which is not precisely average is so Climate Change. All change is Climate Change. Which is why there has been since 2020 a real push back from Global Warming, which is becoming untenable. In fact the next Ice Age will be absolute proof of Climate Change. Caused of course by carbon dioxide. And abated only by carbon credits bought from people who do not believe in Climate change.

      They just have to invent a CO2 based explanation for the cold.

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      CO2 Lover

      Facts have never mattered in religions – the Climate Cult does not break this rule.

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  • #
    TdeF

    Scientific modelling?

    The BOM can take a bow here. Hundreds of real climate scientists and computer budgets and models and they backed El Nino for predicting the Australian summer. It is a major phenomenon they cannot predict. Forget the super computers and atmospheric models, this is an ocean phenomenon which so dominates Pacific weather that it is irresistible and certain. So they threw the models out the window. And they were as wrong as it was possible to be wrong.

    This was a devastating ‘seat of the pants’ reliance on unpredictable El Nino. And they lucked out when they had a 50% chance of being right. Summer is always hotter. But the country has been drenched in rain which should not have existed.

    So of course people, especially farmers don’t trust scientists, when a dedicated purely scientific public service organization which says it can accurately predict the medium term weather costs its customers billions because their certain prediction of summer was completely wrong.

    And the same farmers around the world are really under siege along with their tractors, trains, fertilizer, energy and even what they grow under serious commercial threat from the same ‘expert scientists’ with the same wrong models.

    Science has become the tool of the oppressors, the UN/WHO/EU/Greens/Progressives. And it’s wrong science, but who loses their plum jobs? This disgraceful wrong prediction of the dryest summer in years should see a review of all of Climate Science. But it won’t happen. The error was probably just rapid local Climate Change. Like current Mongolia where two million animals have frozen to death in -35C due to the unpredicted effects of Global Warming.

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      Steve

      Some problems are just too difficult to solve. For example.
      1. Coronaviruses. The Common Cold Research Unit (CCRU) near Salisbury in the UK undertook research into the common cold between 1946 and 1989, 43 years. The work isolated Human coronaviruses, which are responsible for about 10% of common colds. no cure for the common cold has been found.
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Cold_Unit
      2. Climate. Despite spending Billions on Supercomputers and Space Monitoring ‘we’ are unable to understand or accurately predict the weather. Just one Volcano (Krakatoa, Hunga Tonga) can totally disrupt and negate Computer Models; As can other tectonic activity, Solar Flares, Sunspot activity, Asteroids and other Astronomical phenomena.
      Changeability is the norm for our climate. We are unable to predict it or control it, we can only adapt or die.
      3. Nuclear Fusion. Despite spending Billions, or more, on research over more than 70 years, viable nuclear fusion always remains 10 to 25 years in the future. To reach a stage where a reactor could operate 24/7/365 is hampered by the ability to harness and control the plasma fields, positive power efficiency and the materials to support continous running at very high temperates.
      Clean, unlimited power generated from Nuclear Fusion remains an expensive dream.
      4. Colonising our solar system. Space travel has not advanced from the early days of glorified fireworks. Relatively simple calculations on the amount of fuel, food, air, timescales needed illustrates the futility of human based space travel. Apart from PR what is the actual point of putting a person on the Moon, for example ?
      We are an Earth based lifeform, get used to it and enjoy science fiction for what it is – fiction.
      There are so many problems we could solve, poverty for example, why waste time on expensive, unsolvable problems ?

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    Neville

    Dr Pielke jnr finds more BS and fraud from the IPCC, the PNAS, Grinsted et al, USNCA etc.
    They altered the normal apples to apples study to add more oranges and bananas to make hurricanes appear more dangerous and expensive etc.
    AGAIN just UNBELIEVABLE but TRUE. Yet we’re expected to trust these mickey mouse studies?

    https://rogerpielkejr.substack.com/p/apples-oranges-and-normalized-hurricane

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    melbourne+resident

    You dont have to look far for the wetter and warmer world in 2023. HTHH – ie Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha-Pei – the biggest volcanic eruption on earth since Krakatoa, but because it was below sea level off Tonga – except for a few broken internet cables – no-one really noticed. however, it increased global atmospheric moisture by 10% and as readers of this blog should know – water vapour is a far stronger greenhouse gas than CO2. That would explain the much warmer year as evidenced by the UAH satellites (which I trust more than BoM) and also that it was wetter. There are bigger things than El Nino and La Nina. You dont have to look for human emissions to explain it. The real test will be in the next couple of years when things should cool off again.

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      melbourne+resident

      L Milan et al : Abstract: Following the 15 January 2022 Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai eruption, several trace gases measured by the Aura Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) displayed anomalous stratospheric values. Trajectories and radiance simulations confirm that the H2O, SO2, and HCl enhancements were injected by the eruption. In comparison with those from previous eruptions, the SO2 and HCl mass injections were unexceptional, although they reached higher altitudes. In contrast, the H2O injection was unprecedented in both magnitude (far exceeding any previous values in the 17-year MLS record) and altitude (penetrating into the mesosphere). We estimate the mass of H2O injected into the stratosphere to be 146 ± 5 Tg, or ∼10% of the stratospheric burden. It may take several years for the H2O plume to dissipate. This eruption could impact climate not through surface cooling due to sulfate aerosols, but rather through surface warming due to the radiative forcing from the excess stratospheric H2O.

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        ExWarmist

        Hi MR, do you have a link for that…

        I’m pursuing a little personal hypothesis that Hunga-Tonga is the primary cause of a wet, cool, summer in Victoria based on dumping vast amounts of water into the atmosphere.

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          David Maddison

          a wet, cool, summer in Victoria

          And yet we got scary stories like the following BS.

          https://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/scary-warning-about-planetwarming-el-nino/news-story/331a30b5a80295273f5eaec2441f4267

          Scary warning about planet-warming El Nino

          El Nino — the sibling of the dreaded La Nina — has arrived and experts warn it will likely make 2024 the “hottest year in history”.

          Chloe Whelan June 10, 2023

          ….

          https://olinqua.com/is-healthcare-ready-for-the-hottest-summer-ever/

          Is healthcare ready for the hottest summer ever?
          Olinqua Update

          August 21, 2023

          For Australia, 2024 is predicted to be the hottest summer ever on record — and ours is a country already known for its warm weather.

          What’s to come are daytime temperatures above 40 degrees, followed by evenings that leave us sweltering or relying on expensive air conditioning as we try to sleep through 25 and even 30-degree nights.

          As a country known for its beaches, perhaps some regions are more prepared than others, but the fact is, weather like this triggers significant problems, especially for our healthcare system.

          Globally, heatwaves lead to more ambulance call outs, emergency room visits, and tragically, deaths of some of our most vulnerable people also increase — people who can’t manage the skyrocketing costs of cooling their home, or those who don’t have the technology to do it.

          ….

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          melbourne+resident

          Mr Ex – the result is not cool summers (although that could occur locally) – no the additional water vapour in the atmosphere has a warming effect as Water Vapour is a far more important greenhouse gas than CO2 and part of global warming theory is that the “heating” provided by CO2 would lead to additional warming by the extra water vapour put into the atmosphere. Volcanos usually put lots of dust particles into the atmosphere that has a cooling effect for a couple of years (see Mt Pinatubo), but in this case because it was below sea level the particulates were minimal but massive amounts of water vapour were sent right up into the mesosphere.

          The link to the best article on it is: https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1029/2022GL099381
          Which is the Geophysical Research letters article by L Millan et al.

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    ExWarmist

    It strikes me that the modern corporate-state scientist pursuing a goal-seeking study to ‘prove’ the approved corporate-state narrative in any field of endeavour is operating within an identical framework with someone engaging in Stolen Valour.

    I.e.

    [A] “Great scientists of the past have eradicated small pox, saved us from energy poverty, revealed the secrets of the subatomic world, and shown us the great expanse of the universe. So when I tell you that human induced climate change is an imminent catastrophe that can only be solved by you taking your 7th mRNA covid vaccine booster you must acknowledge that I am the Science and just trust me….”

    Compare with…

    [B] “See this scar on my elbow (caused by falling out of the bath while drunk and cutting open a flap of skin on a broken tile…) I got that down in the Da Nang province in Iraq where the VC outnumbered ISIS by 10 to 1 and my platoon was caught in a cross-fire. I was the sole survivor, and the only person left alive who can tell the truth about how I single-handedly attacked three machine-gun nests and a whole posse of suicide bombers with nothing other than my trusty K-Bar combat knife and my Colt 45. The US gave me a purple heart, the Brits gave me a VC, and the French kissed my proverbial. You know this is unquestionable. Who are you to doubt a vet. You, just gotta trust me…”

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    still interested

    https://news.rebekahbarnett.com.au/p/just-in-australian-senate-finally

    Persistence paid off yesterday for Senator Ralph Babet, of the United Australia Party, as the Senate voted in favour of his fourth motion calling for further inquiry into the causes of Australia’s excess deaths.

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    Another Delcon

    Trust the science , The science is settled , The ” vaccines ” are safe & effective , You must comply with ” Health advice ” , And so on .
    Well …….
    Today the high court in Queensland just ruled that the vaccine mandates were illegal ( reported on Sky news ) .
    Those of us with some curiosity knew before the first jab was delivered in Australia that the ” vaccines ” had not been through anything like reasonable testing and so there was no way that the government or any ” health official ” could say they were safe .
    In fact it didn’t take me long to find out that the mRNA technology had a reputation for being too dangerous to consider use in humans .
    I knew that .
    It was well documented .
    It would be easy for senior health officials to find out ( as if they didn’t already know ! ) .
    There was never any proof that the jabs were effective . We now know that people with 3 or more jabs are more likely to catch Covid ( and a heap of other things ) than those with no jabs !
    Australia is signatory to all sorts of international conventions that should make it illegal to force or coerce someone to take a medication ( except under very restricted circumstances ) especially an experimental one . And yet that was exactly what they did .
    Were the police and courts used to bring the criminals to justice ?
    No – they were doing the bidding of the criminals !
    Those officials did something that was illegal & known to be illegal and so they are criminals who abused their power and authority !
    Not vaccines
    Not safe
    not effective
    not legal
    Now we need a proper non-corrupt Royal Commission to identify all of the culprits guilty of forcing mandates , using coercion , lying , gas-lighting and so on .
    I was one of the over 40 thousand people who signed a petition asking for just that .
    Trust ” The Science ” ?
    NO
    Question everything !

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      Kalm Keith

      We urgently need to study some history and think about what it tells us.

      What did Watt Tyler and his community do to remedy their loss of freedom?

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        Kalm Keith

        And yes, they paid dearly for confronting the elites of that period and that shows that getting out of the current mess is not going to be easy or nice.

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    As we all know, Science comes from a Greek word meaning. It doesn’t mean progress, it doesn’t mean experimentation. It doesn’t mean proper testing of that knowledge. Indeed, it doesn’t even require the knowledge is real knowledge.

    Scepticism also comes from a Greek word, meaning inquiry. That does mean testing, it does relate directly to the “null hypothesis” … which is a sceptical view of the world. It does relate in progress and overturning the “knowledge” or “science” that was once thought to be true and after due scepticism is not.

    The big difference, is that science is the status quo … and the top of “science” never want to overturn the status quo that got them their positions of power. Scepticism is a revolutionary idea, that the status quo can be challenged and that scepticism is the right thing to do and that change=progress is good.

    The two are related by a simple formula: Science = the integral of Sceptism over time.

    Science not only rightly deserves to be challenged by Scepticism, it would not exist, and the progress would not have happened, if previous “status quo” science positions had not been challenged by the sceptics.

    Down with Science … long live the sceptic revolution!

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    Tel

    There’s nothing wrong with science … it works perfectly fine.

    There’s a big problem with the current people calling themselves scientists … who mostly don’t understand much about doing science. They do know how to put on a white coat, carry a clipboard and fool a few of the viewers at home. Often technology can substitute for science, at least temporarily.

    The deeper problem was explained by DJ 900 Foot Jesus – Truth is out of style.

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    Iris

    What people have lost faith in is ROCKEFELLER medicine. The medical industry has been hijacked and monetized by patent profiteers for a century now. Health encompasses more than just a pill/jab, one-size-fits-all solution to everything.

    DISSOLVING ILLUSIONS ABOUT VACCINE SAFETY – INTERVIEW WITH SUSANNE HUMPHRIES

    Funny how the rise of medical tyranny includes the re-emergence of medical experimentation. Everyone should know who Magnus Hirschfeld was, a Jewish German surgeon who performed sex operations on people back in the 1920-30s. Tavistock, Psychological Research, & Social Engineering

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    Zigmaster

    Governments overuse of the term trust the science across a wide range of subjects has probably been the main reason for the fall. Government and trust just don’t go together and government includes government bureaucracies. In fact organisations and societies like CSIRO , BOM and Medical societies have been infiltrated by activists who often hold the same views as the left and politics has been moving to the left. The failure to make most science available for scrutiny has diminished trust especially when journalists who investigate ‘ the science ‘and turn up with garbage. The classic one for me was the release of the comparison of nuclear and renewables in terms of cost which excludes all the transmission and backup required . The obvious manipulation of data occurs almost every day and whilst sceptics have been aware of this for years the rest of society are starting to catch up. Covid helped accelerate that trend but so has the increased fanaticism of climate alarmists. The term global boiling meant the globalists are starting to sound desperate and very unscientific.There is a general awakening seen in such figures such as a nuclear poll that showed over 50% of Aussies support nuclear including 65% of young people. This is the first time I have seen a chink in the indoctrination that has been so prominent in the formation of the younger generation views. It’s not quite something to celebrate in the sense it’s where it is because the young are so anxious about climate change not because they realise the world isn’t warming as predicted. But it is a start and may be the beginning of the end for the climate cabal especially big renewables . The farmer protests around the world are also another encouraging development.

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    Chris

    The examples you provide are mostly Engineering. They have fundamentally different stimuli, support and goals.

    Engineering is advancing, science is declining. Sharply.

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