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How many scientists does it take to prove the debate is not over? More than 30,000 scientists have signed The Petition Project. More than 9,000 of them have PhDs (not that that proves anything about carbon, but it does prove something about the myth of “consensus”). The petition’s wording is unequivocal:
“There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.” Source: www.petitionproject.org
The Petition Project is funded by donations from individuals and run by volunteers. It receives no money from industry or companies. In late 2007, The Petition Project re-did the petition to verify names again.
AGW says: Everyone knows the petition is bogus and filled with duplicate and fake names.
Skeptics say: Name 10 fakes.
8.8 out of 10 based on 13 ratings […]
What has The Australian got against a destitute farmer? Compare their coverage of one farmers protest with other hunger strikers:
When a sex offender protesting his innocence went on a hunger strike, it only took 6 days for The Australian to write about it. Taiwan’s former president went on a hunger strike which was reported as it ended after 5 days. Serial killer Ivan Milat only had to wait a couple of days to make the Australian with a hunger strike that only lasted for five days all up, and its conclusion was noteworthy too.* When three Australian Tamils went on a hunger strike they made headlines after 3 days, and also here. Some Sri Lankan asylum seekers agreed to end their hunger strike after 2 days and the story was covered sympathetically.
This is not to detract from the seriousness of some of the above claimants. But compare the reportage about Peter Spencer who started his hunger strike on November 23, 2009. For 25 days there was not even a short note to alert other farmers or landholders that there was a hunger strike underway by an Australian citizen, on Australian soil.
It was Day 26, before […]
UPDATE 3: Extra events in Perth and Sydney due to demand – see this latest post.! You must pre register to avoid disappointment for the Sydney final event on Friday. (download PDF!) The email to use is: ‘[email protected]’ OR FAX: (02) 4861 2029
There is no one quite like Christopher Monckton, with his background in Latin classics, journalism, work for the Thatcher government, and dogged persistence to analyze the numbers. Last year he spoke in New York, Washington, Copenhagen, and across Canada (and that’s just the ones I know of, off the top of my head). Monckton is a gem of a man, and this is a rare opportunity to see him in action. He’s been storming the world for years now, a constant thorn in Al Gore’s side. Monckton challenged Gore to debate in March 2007. Al Gore claims “he want’s to convince the world”, but he’s had almost three years and still can’t find a single day to explain the “overwhelming” evidence on TV with Monckton present.
Ian Plimer, Professor of Mining Geology at The University of Adelaide, has made a huge impact around the globe with his book Heaven and Earth which has gone into its […]
For the last five years the carbon market has been doubling year after year. But in 2009, the exponential growth trajectory paused. Point Carbon issued a report this week estimating that the world wide market in carbon trading in 2009 totalled around $136 billion dollars, which is not much higher than the 2008 figure. After years of living in a rapacious bubble, prices are about 60% below the peaks of 2008, carbon traders are starting to peel out into other commodities, and the sails are looking decidedly flat on the Maxi Yacht known as Carbon-Credits Inc.
The size of the market in gigatons of carbon grew nearly 70% over 2008, but the falling prices meant the same amount of money churned through the system and the total dollars were very similar year on year.
How times have changed. Back in May 2009, emissions traders were feeling confident that a US market for emissions would be approved. Not surprisingly, the low carbon prices and the non-event of Copenhagen mean that carbon traders are becoming frustrated. Some are even expanding into… markets that are based on real commodities like oil, gas, gold and steel. [Reuters]
10 out […]
We would hope that The Australian would stand up for … Australians. Instead our National masthead is not investigating the claims of an Australian farmer against our government, they’re not interviewing constitutional law experts, they’re interviewing his brother.
Peter Spencer is on Day 47 of a hunger strike and trying to get compensation for all farmers whose land was effectively expropriated. Journalist, Paul Maley could have investigated the veracity of the $10 billion dollar claim, but instead he tries to assess Peter’s mental health and personal finances. While these might be a relevant part of the big picture, the big-picture itself is missing.
“Family Financial dispute helped send hunger striker Peter Spencer Up Pole”
The Australian sub-heading is: “SERIOUS doubts have emerged about the case of Peter Spencer”,… but the serious doubts amount to a 40 year old story, and the fact that Peter owes money to his family, rather than to the banks. Serious? Not on the scale of billion dollar carbon commitments.
10 out of 10 based on 3 ratings […]
James Loring in Tasmania has had a great idea to support Peter Spencer. He took something known as “flagging tape”, added a scarecrow, and a slow moving sheep and created this message for the world to see.
10 out of 10 based on 3 ratings […]
What’s interesting is that finally–after 45 days without food–Peter Spencer is starting to get some serious national attention. Today Tonight is a prime time “current affairs” show and this cover was fairly sympathetic. The British Financial Times has also run a story, both of these were serious enough to actually interview Peter Spencer. Finally it seems there is some investigation. A few new facts have been filled in, and also a very strong theme linking his actions to the Kyoto agreement.
The saddest point is that Peter Spencer has been trying to get some attention for at least three years, and probably over a decade. He wrote The War On Farmers in January 2006 and it lays it all out. He was already facing foreclosure in 2006.
The farm consists of about 14,000 acres, about 60 per cent of which was cleared before World War II. When I bought it in the 1980s, I had been working overseas to earn the money to buy the place. Unfortunately, I was unable to farm it for some time so extensive regrowth occurred. When I returned to Australia to begin to farm, I found that various laws to preserve native vegetation had been […]
Meet other skeptics and celebrate!
With the ongoing battle for logic and reason, it’s easy to forget that saving Australia from an ETS, and slowing the train-wreck in Copenhagen were major successes. Even though the battle to save Peter Spencer is still very much on our minds, it’s time to celebrate.
It’s not often humanity collectively “misses a bullet…”
I’m happy to post contacts in different cities around the world to help connect people who live near each other. If you are willing to be a central point coordinator for your region and to post some contact details please use the thread below to organize events in your area. I’ll update this post with any events or contacts that are generated. Even if it’s just Friday afternoon drinks after work. There is strength in numbers.
See below for: Germany, France, and Australia
10 out of 10 based on 2 ratings […]
Watch the whitewash– so white it’s Green. The Peter Spencer story has finally broken into the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. Two “journalists” paired up to put together almost identical stories as a joint effort, and do their best to add doubt and smear to every part of the Spencer story. It’s a text book case in PR. These two journalists might make passable press secretaries for a Labor government. (Which is a well worn career path).
The big-picture situation, where farmers are asking for $10 billion in compensation for land that was stolen from them, was turned into a story about how the Coalition might be split by a guy on a hunger-strike over land-clearing laws. In reality Peter Spencer could drive one heck of a wedge into the Labor Party, who paint themselves as “helping the little guy” and simultaneously claim they are good economic managers. The Labor government can’t find $10 billion easily anymore, but less than a year ago they gave out $42 billion fairly randomly as a supposedly “clever” economic policy and another $43 billion to get into the broadband business.
Here’s how these major dailies “carried” the story: The Age’s […]
Over 300 people have rallied in support of Peter Spencer outside Parliament House today, and the ABC* have covered it (at least on their website).
Nationals Senator Barnaby Joyce also addressed the crowd, calling for a Royal Commission into vegetation laws. He says the state laws have robbed farmers across Australia of their assets.
“It might have been legally possible but it was totally unjust,” he said.
Senator Joyce says Mr Spencer should cease his hunger strike but the fight for justice should continue.
“This is obscene,” he said. “The Government became the thief of an asset and when the Government becomes a thief of an asset – when the individual is divested of an asset without payment – there is a word for that and unfortunately without being too dramatic the word is communism.”
Some of the protesting farmers are now travelling to Mr Spencer’s property to offer their support.
Unmentioned on the ABC story was that there are allegations that the interstate chartered buses for this event were targeted by Road Traffic Authority (RTA) inspectors. Bus inspections were suddenly arranged, which can take up to […]
NEWS: PROTEST IN CANBERRA Mon 4th (see below)
It’s Day 43 without food, and Peter Spencer grows weaker. For those who don’t know, Peter Spencer’s farm has been stolen from him by our government through Native Vegetation Legislation — which locked up 80 – 90% of his entire farm but paid him no compensation. The regrowth on his farm holds “carbon credits” of supposed value to the Commonwealth, yet Peter has been obliged by law to pay the rates on that land-that-holds-these-carbon-credits, and the mortgage for the right to do nothing with this land that really belongs to the Commonwealth. Is this not an extortionate tax?
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has declined all requests to meet Peter.
In a grand failure of journalism, our largest dailies apparently think angry tweeting travelers is more important than that a $10 billion dollars crime, and a life in the balance.
Peter Spencer tried ingenious means to work within the rules. But he has been driven into bankruptcy. The 200 days he spent in court, with all costs associated with just trying to have his case heard, added to the burden. (200 days!) After there was no other route left open to […]
There’s obviously a desire to debate and discuss religious leanings. It’s not science. But if it helps some people grow their climatic world view or it reaches a new audience it has a use — perhaps just as a form of mental-tennis. Though even the most illogical recalcitrant commentors sometimes bring out brilliant replies (and there are a few, especially far down). Like minded comments from other threads will be moved here as it is off-topic on every other post on this site. This whole topic breaks basic rules of logic and reason. But in the interests of free speech and to declutter other important threads, this is home to those comments that do not belong elsewhere.
10 out of 10 based on 2 ratings
UPDATE, 2022. This post, this question has been out for over twelve years, and yet still remains as valid as ever. — Jo
The all important question that rises above and before ALL other questions is the one of evidence.
Is there any evidence that carbon dioxide causes major warming?
In science, “evidence” has a very specific meaning and for a very good reason. In a court of law or a game of football, the label “evidence” can be plastered all over the place. If 500 footballers signed a petition to change a rule, that would be “evidence” the rule needed changing. But if 5 billion people signed a petition to make it rain in Mumbai on Thursday, that’s a waste of paper.
9.3 out of 10 based on 53 ratings […]
UPDATE: The newer edition has been released here.
Here’s a Spectacular Poster of ClimateGate Covering 3 Decades
You have to see this to believe it. Look up close and admire the detail while you despair at how long science has been going off the rails. To better appreciate the past and what was exposed by the CRU emails, the Timeline chart consolidates and chronologically organizes the information uncovered and published about the CRU emails by many researchers along with some related contextual events. That the chart exists at all is yet another example of how skilled experts are flocking in to the skeptics’ position and dedicating hours of time pro bono because they are passionately motivated to fight against those who try to deceive us.
Click on the image to see it enlarged, but download the full PDF to see the detail.
Download The PDF (788k)
Mohib Ebrahim has created this amazing document. I’ve produced a permanent Home page for this beautiful poster that will host the latest updates as a PDF. There are also printable versions in A4, A3, A2, […]
Thanks to Dr. Mensur Omerbashich for translating the Handbook into the common languages* of most of the Balkans: Bosnian and Serbo-Croatian. Mensur is a theoretical geophysicist from USA with PhD from Canada, who also is a certified court interpreter in Bosnia.
Send this link to your friends in the former Yugoslav republics. This translation will be understandable to Bosnians, Croatians, Serbians, Montenegrins, including most of Slovenians, Macedonians and Kosovars. Around 25-30 million people.
Mensur suggested that ideally someone could volunteer to do localizations into Croatian proper, or Serbian proper.
There is a larger 5Mb version for better printing here.
* I use the term “common language” loosely. There is so little agreement about it, I gather there is not even a proper name of this “language”. It’s more a overlapping common collection of several languages, sometimes referred to just as BCS or Bosnian/Serbo-Croatian. (Correct me if I’m wrong).
10 out of 10 based on 3 ratings
A funny thing happened this week. Humanity did a low-orbit bypass of a totalitarian world government, and pulled away, but only a few noticed the near miss.
Christopher Monckton has already spoken about the draft treaty with it’s message of setting up a new form of global governance, but without any mention of voting. He spoke again yesterday to Alex Jones and pointed out that in a sense Copenhagen succeeded, despite what everyone is saying. After all, it was never really about saving the environment was it? It was about setting up a world government, and they got the odd $30 billion dollars. Not bad for a failure.
10 out of 10 based on 2 ratings […]
Source: Satirical Press In breakthrough news today, The United Nations announced they had found The Global Thermostat to control the Earth’s temperature.
With 45,000 people searching for the controls in Copenhagen at the Bella Convention Center, commentators were shocked when it turned up instead in a closet in the basement of the World Meterological Organization (WMO) headquarters in Geneva.
“It’s a landmark day for human-kind” said Rajendra Pachuri, Chairman of the IPCC.
Barack Obama stood for a standing ovation that lasted 23 minutes and said: “It gives us all hope”.
Kevin Rudd, Prime Minister of Australia: “We wouldn’t have found this without Obama’s magic touch. Obama rolled up his sleeves in Copenhagen, and the ancient Sumerian map fell out of his shirt.”
10 out of 10 based on 3 ratings […]
Disaster averted
There has been no breakthrough at Copenhagen.
Barak Obama has spoken, and the crowd was disappointed. He was visibly angry.
China and India have walked out. The West did not offer enough.
The departure of Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was a major snub for the Western congregation, and guarantees that nothing binding or significant will arise out of Copenhagen. The walkout was exactly what they vowed to do in to the strategic plan they announced a few weeks ago.
The draft treaty has become the Copenhagen Accord, and deadlines have been dropped or postponed.
10 out of 10 based on 3 ratings […]
… Richard Black from the BBC won’t name me or link to me. Is he scared of sending people my way? Afraid my arguments are too compelling? He claims the evidence for man-made global warming is overwhelming, and he’s wondering why more women aren’t skeptics, so surely he would help his readers if he directed them to the two Australian bloggers he specifically refers to: Jennifer Marohasy and myself.
In fact, across the entire sceptical landscape, as far as I can see, the female contingent numbers one UK columnist, a couple of Australian bloggers, UK academic Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen and US counterpart Sallie Baliunas…
But thanks for the backhanded endorsement, Richard, I’m delighted to find out you read my blog and I can tell you exactly why women don’t leap to announce they are skeptics. All you had to do was email me to ask…
10 out of 10 based on 3 ratings […]
Skeptics are growing in number and becoming more confident. Yesterday, CFACT unfurled a banner on the Rainbow Warrior in Copenhagen.
Rather cheekily, global warming skeptics used GPS triangulation from Greenpeace’s own on-board camera photos to find the infamous boat, the Rainbow Warrior. Then the activists unfurled the banner.
7.8 out of 10 based on 4 ratings […]
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JoNova A science presenter, writer, speaker & former TV host; author of The Skeptic's Handbook (over 200,000 copies distributed & available in 15 languages).
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