McKitrick, McIntyre, and Herman 2010: It’s been a long time coming. A humdinger of a paper.
International Journal Of (Popular) Climatology
It’s a big step forward in the search for the hot-spot. (If the hot spot were a missing person, McKitrick et al have sighted a corpse.)
In 2006 the CCSP quietly admitted with graphs (in distant parts of various reports) that the models were predicting a hot spot that the radiosondes didn’t find (Karl et al 2006).
The models predicted a hot spot (left), the radiosondes couldn’t find anything like it.
Obviously this was a bit of a problem for the Scare Campaign. Much of the amplifying feedback created in the models also creates the hot-spot, so without any evidence that the hot-spot is occurring, there goes the disaster (and the urgent need for funding and junkets).
Douglass et al officially pointed out the glaring deficiency in 2007 by comparing tropospheric predictions from the models. They specifically used only models that had got the surface temperatures correct.
Santer et al replied in 2008 by discovering a lot of uncertainties, and stretching the error bars. Since the broad errors bars overlapped he could announce that the hot spot wasn’t really missing (even though he didn’t really find it either). He wrote this up in words effectively saying that the inconsistency in temperatures was not so inconsistent. (If the models can’t predict a very specific range and the radiosondes aren’t accurate to a very specific range, then they both agree!!) Many in the Big Scare Campaign got overly excited and declared that the hot spot was “found”.
Note that Santer et al did not limit themselves to the same model runs that Douglass et al used. While Douglass et al insisted on only using models that at least got the surface trend right, Santer did not. The McKitrick paper used the same archive of model simulations as the Santer paper.
McIntyre and McKitrick pointed out these key Santer results which used data up to 1999 were overturned with the use of data up to 2009. Somehow, despite all the excitement over Santer et al 2008, the IJOC decided updating it and contradicting it was “not interesting” and it took months to reach that banal conclusion. The editors also wouldn’t reveal exactly what the anonymous unpaid reviewers said and instead suggested a range of time-consuming changes and conditions that would have tied the paper up even longer. (The full story is on Climate Audit.)
So Ross McKitrick, Stephen McIntyre, and Chad Herman took their critical work to another journal (say “cheers” for competition.) And the IJOC have missed out on what looks to probably be a very cited paper. But they did successfully delay it for 18 months, past the crucial Copenhagen conference, allowing Santer et al to be cited elsewhere and at length. Perhaps the IJOC got what they wanted, but it seems that what they wanted is not a full debate and discussion about climate science. This is the sad joke of relying on “peer review”.
A big step forward in this paper is the use of econometric statistical analysis. As Wegman found, the top guns in climate science relied heavily on statistics, but didn’t rely heavily (or at all) on expert statisticians. McKitrick et al bought in some cutting edge tools from economics, and did the-not-too-complicated-step of including the most recent data.
The end result is that where Santer et al found the error bars could overlap, McKitrick found that the models overestimated temperatures by 200 and 400% in the lower and mid troposphere respectively.
The observations don’t match the predictions
David Stockwell sums up the importance of this new paper:
This represents a basic validation test of climate models over a 30 year period, a validation test which SHOULD be fundamental to any belief in the models, and their usefulness for projections of global warming in the future.
The results are shown in their figure:
… the differences between models and observations now exceed the 99% critical value. As shown in Table 1 and Section 3.3, the model trends are about twice as large as observations in the LT layer, and about four times as large in the MT layer.
…
But you can rest assured. The models, in important ways that were once claimed to be proof of “… a discernible human influence on global climate”, are now shown to be FUBAR. Wouldn’t it have been better if they had just done the validation tests and rejected the models before trying to rule the world with them?
As a final note, having produced a paper of such significance, it’s worth noting just how much Santer et al were keen to assist McIntyre and McKitrick in the interests of furthering science. There is nothing more important than understanding our climate, right?
Thanks to David Stockwell for finding some good quotes from McIntyre and McKitrick:
We requested this data from S08 lead author Santer, who categorically refused to provide it (see http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=4314.) Instead of supplying what would be at most 1 MB or so of monthly data collated by specialists as part of their research work, Santer directed us to the terabytes of archived PCMDI data and challenged us to reproduce their series from scratch. Apart from the pointless and potentially large time cost imposed by this refusal, the task of aggregating PCMDI data with which we are unfamiliar would create the risk of introducing irrelevant collation errors or mismatched averaging steps, leading to superfluous controversy should our results not replicate theirs.
Following this refusal by lead author Santer, we filed a Freedom of Information (FOI) Request to NOAA, applying to coauthors Karl, Free, Solomon and Lanzante. In response, all four denied having copies of any of the model time series used in Santer et al. (2008) and denied having copies of any email correspondence concerning these time series with any other coauthors of Santer et al. (2008). Two other coauthors stated by email that they did not have copies of the series. An FOI request to the U.S. Department of Energy is under consideration.
Santer declared that McIntyre’ FOIA requests were just a fishing expedition, and not real science.
Ross McKitrick has set himself up with a new blog documenting his great work.
REFERENCE
McKitrick, R., S. McIntyre, and C. Herman, (2010), Panel and multivariate methods for tests of trend equivalence in climate data series. Atmospheric Science Letters, 11: 270–277. DOI: 10.1002/asl.290. Data/code archive. [Discussion on JoNova] [PDF]
McKitrick, R., McIntyre, S., and Herman, C. (2011) Corrigendum to Panel and multivariate methods for tests of trend equivalence in climate data series, Atmospheric Science Letters, Vol. 11, Issue 4, 270–277. DOI: 10.1002/asl.360. [Abstract] [See McKitricks page on model testing].
Most of the apocalyptic sects facing with lack of apocalypse commit mass suicide. That could be encouraging but don’t glory. They will want us to commit the suicide along with them by cap-and-trade etc.
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I just love the FUBAR, the new found status of the whole AGW movement. The loudest protagonists like Gore, Rudd, Flannery are all competing for the exalted office of the GRAND FUBAR.
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As the great English American statistician George Box says, ‘all models are wrong, some models are useful’. These crude and clunking climate models are of course wrong, but they do not seem to have been useful for clarification, nor for elucidation, nor for prediction. It looks to me like they have been a major distraction, a vehicle for muddled thinking, and a political device ably exploited by the core team in and around the IPCC. Because of the invidious domination by the politically-driven, I suspect climate science would have been better off without such models, allowing the participants to concentrate on observation, theorising, and testing in the real world.
I look forward to reading this new paper.
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So, another nail in the CAGW coffin. I am not shocked by Santers conduct.
Why the proponents of the AGW hypothesis do not get suspicious when the scientist refuse to promulgate their raw data is beyond comprehension. Scientists who refuse to all their data to be examined in order to see if it can be falsified are not worthy of trust. All scientist should have a bumper studied on their cars which reads, “What would Karl Popper do?”
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All s/b allow
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Hmmm. As an old upper-air guy, I am not surprised. I have long maintained that upper-air runs, even before computers took over, were far more accurate that any other readily available weather observations. This is mainly because the runs were checked and cross checked by the sounding team as the run progressed.
It looks as though I was right.
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THE GREENS ARE EVIL – NOW THEY WANT TO REINTRODUCE DEATH DUTIES!!!
http://www.vecci.org.au/news/Pages/Greens_want_to_tax_death.aspx
ON NO ACCOUNT MUST “THE GREENS” BE ALLOWED TO HAVE ANY INFULENCE IN THE AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT AFTER THE ELECTION.
PUT “THE GREENS” LAST ON YOUR BALLOT PAPER!
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The models are wrong. The actors are wrong. Pretty well all the celebrities are wrong.
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Another “green” fantasy out by 400%
http://www.naturalnews.com/029421_biofuels_CO2.html
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Yet another dumb and expensive “green” idea.
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/
Don’t they just love getting their grubby green grapplers into the public purse.
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Sorry. Exact link is:
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2010/08/stupidity-is-catching.html
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4Eddy Aruda:
August 11th, 2010 at 6:00 am
So, another nail in the CAGW coffin. I am not shocked by Santers conduct.
If that coffin get’s are many more nails in it, the whole thing will be made of steel.
I have noticed that most rational people are backing away from CAGW.
The only ones still clinging to it are religious/political fundamentalists and they were never interested in the science anyway.
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The price of the Greens:-
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/the_price_of_the_greens/
The Master Builders Association tells me its 7500 members are scared. Hence this new ad campaign for the election:
Five consequences of Greens’ policies that all Australians need to consider on election day (http://www.thinkbeforeyouvote.com.au/) …
1 Housing affordability will reach crisis point
Availability of new land for housing will be restricted by Greens’ policies. Fewer new properties combined with higher business taxes will make homes more expensive.
2 Jobs will be lost
Greens’ policies will target construction, manufacturing and energy industries, making them less competitive. Job security for Australian workers will be put at risk.
3 Strikes and industrial thuggery will return
The Construction Industry watchdog, the ABCC, will be abolished. Building sites will be unprotected, exposed again to union bullies. Don’t let the Greens take Australia back there.
4 Construction of vital community infrastructure will be halted
New school, hospital, road and workplace projects will be delayed and blocked by the Greens’ proposed-planning policies. Our unique Australian lifestyle will suffer.
5 Economic recovery will be threatened
Greens’ policies affecting business, taxation, expenditure and industry will stifle the growth of the Australian economy. This will damage national prosperity and limit opportunities for our children.
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McKitrick’s paper will hopefully get wide coverage in the MSM , but I won’t hold my breath. A similar paper was done a few years ago but was based on the “first priciples” of forecasting
http://www.forecastingprinciples.com/files/WarmAudit31.pdf
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If the global warming debate were about science rather than narcissistic post-modern feel-good politics, this paper would stop the faddish alarmists dead in their tracks.
But it isn’t, so it won’t.
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wendy –
the building industry indeed needs to be concerned. abc is now pushing CAGW zealot, David Salt, who was on this week’s “bush telegraph” using the new catchword “biodiversity” to argue for cap and trade. on bush tele, he told the eager male interviewer (don’t recall who?) that every time a new city building is put up, it must be counteracted with some green development elsewhere in the city. i’m paraphrasing, but Salt seemed to be saying this is already happening or about to happen and it is an example of cap and trade working without an ETS. apart from builders, i can’t help feeling sorry for any farmers who used to listen to bush tele when it actually dealt with info useful to them:
10 Aug: ABC Bush Telegraph: Margot Foster: Australian target for 2010 International Year of Biodiversity missed
This has important implications for food security as narrowing the genetic pool increases our vulnerability at a time of climate change and forced adaptation.
In this report: David Salt is a science writer and conservation and ecology specialist based at the Australian National University in Canberra.
http://www.abc.net.au/rural/telegraph/content/2010/s2978780.htm
10 Aug: ABC: Sarina Locke: Australia’s biodiversity record not good, says writer
David Salt, who is a member of the think tank Australia 21 is raising the issue at a National Science Week seminar in Canberra on biodiversity and resilience…
“We’re losing options, and in a changing world, in a world under pressure especially with climate change, when our existing production systems fail we haven’t got anywhere to turn to.”…
http://www.abc.net.au/rural/regions/content/201008/2978283.htm?site=northtas
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Error in opening sentence:
“Its a big step forward”
“It’s a big step forward”
[Thanks! –JN]
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Shouldn’t that be “Out by 4,000,000 ppm” ?? 🙂
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It’s one thing to have inaccurate numbers, but what really hurts is when you make exactly the WRONG policies and laws on the basis of those numbers.
Poor science leads to poor policy.
Cheers,
Speedy
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Speedy @ 19:
The only problem I have with your last line is that it gives the implication that policymakers were actually waiting for scientific results rather than directing the outcomes.
As a former professorial colleague of mine said, often you do the work first and then seek the funding for the next piece of work. How much is the Government going to pay for work which has the “wrong results”?
I keep coming back to the work of Levitt (of Freakonomics fame) who argues economics from the point of view of peoples’ incentives. When the Government waves billions of dollars of grant money in front of scientists to find evidence of AGW, then that is exactly what they will find.
Some may think this a cynical view of the world, but it is realistic. That is what economists (the good ones) do… look at the positive economics (“that what is” not “that which ought to be”).
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Just as well Gore did not see McKitrick’s paper before this conference call — he would have ended up in intensive care !!
http://greenhellblog.com/2010/08/10/gore-concedes-on-climate-this-year/
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Bulldust @ 20
Yep. Call me an optimist, but I’ve always been a fan of policy based on evidence instead of evidence based on policy. Unfortunately the IPCC seem to make sure the evidence complies with the “consensus” policy.
You’re right. If we want to give our children a better world, then we need to have good science and for it to be applied in good policy. Good science, by the way, isn’t science with a loyalty to the highest bidder!
Cheers,
Speedy.
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Article states:
“The end result is that where Santer et al found the error bars could overlap, McKitrick found that the models overestimated temperatures by 200 and 400% in the lower and mid troposphere respectively.”
I think that should read “… McKitrick found that the models overestimated temperature trends by 200 and 400%”?
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Climate Models that were contradicted by real data.
But will be strongly resisted by certain AGW believers,since they are allergic to valid data.
They rather chose climate models that are unverified over verifiable conclusions that destroys the claims of such climate models.
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Can you blame the common man in the street for not trusting scientists hereafter?
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And when they are off by HUNDREDS of percent.They are not even close!
The models are clearly shown to be invalidated and therefore should be discarded.
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In my opinion.When they do that.Their science paper becomes worthless.
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Joanne. Your link labelled Wegner should be labelled Wegman.
MMH2010 is the best thing since indoor plumbing and sliced bread added together.
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It will be interesting to see how the MSM deal with this and still claim to be balanced. Everytime a sparrow farts there is a new headline about global warming, so something as important as this should cause a ripple. After all one would have thought they would like a feel-good story that calms alarm in the populace would be real news. No, I think the MSM have an infinite ability to ignore this. It isn’t until someone can offer them a counter scare that will sell even more papers, like “Ice Age coming, millions will die!” that will they abandon this one.
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The worst aspect of the crap science is that there is strong movement toward so called green energy and other carbon less innovations by investment houses and taxpayer funded organisations. Equally there are insurance companies who are now worried by predictions of catastrophes and altering premiums accordingly.
I think they should be warned against expending both shareholders and taxpayers funds without due diligence, including reading all the available science. I believe that in the future when such expenditure is found to be based on fraudulent science that there will be many possible lawsuits. Every opportunity should be taken to alert people to this real possibility. A magazine which excels at publishing calls for green technology and carbon abatement is Climate Spectator. It’s free and you do have to register. We need more anti AGW commenters. An example follows:http://www.climatespectator.com.au/commentary/green-deals-food-thought#comment-1035
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When climategate broke I said to my freind, $100 bet this CAGW would have been killed dead by the end of september.
Interestingly this whole science circus scare has had a deep social impact. The major one being the average person can easily see it now as propaganda.
Its too easy.
1. get data and tourture it to suit the consensus.
2. Scare people with modeled outcomes
3. Imply that without further funding the future will be put in jeopardy.
I don’t think I’m getting rich soon.
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The attitude shown here by some makes me sad….. I wholeheartedly agree that AGW is a crock, and that the ‘team’ have done the greatest dis-service to science since Piltdown man, but I remain a fervent environmentalist.
I do not want to return to the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s where industry could pollute without a care. I don’t want to see industrialists create huge slag heaps and waste spoils anywhere they want. I want fish to remain swimming in the river Mersey instead of it being an open sewer and waste disposal site. I want to see whales swimming freely in the Irish sea again. I want salmon and sea trout to stay swimming in the Thames, and I want to breathe fresh air instead of smog.
Make no bones about it, the environmental movement has been a great boon for our quality of life. You only have to look at Beijing where there has never been an environmental movement for proof of that. I don’t want to see huge f***** windmills destroying the once beautiful sea view from here on the Wirral peninsula and North Wales coast.
These people who promote AGW are not what I understood as scientists. Shit they wont even share data collected using tax payers money in case someone might find something wrong with it. They are ‘farming’ the grants to promote their own careers. Or they a fervent religious environmentalists who don’t look at the data or even science for that matter. The sort of people who released mink into the UK countryside because they were being kept in mink farms.. The mink of course did what they do best and ate everything they could kill reducing biodiversity still further and almost making ‘ratty’ from ‘Wind in the Willows’ extinct. Hell you in the land of Oz know all about introductions of alien species…
So my message is ..attack the science with science, go for the established scientists who promote a political agenda, go for the religious but don’t lump all environmentalists or even all environmental laws together just because they care or want to protect the environment.
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Mike,
The problem is that when it come to the environment , there is shortage of people with engineering and applied science background who can produce practical, simple andcost-effective solutions. Most enviornmentalists and enviornmental scientists are weak on maths, physics,chemistry and engineering; consequently many laws and rules are impractical.
The one piece of legislation which made sense was to install acid scrubbers on coal powered power stations but large amounts of gypsum were produced. However, most enviornmentalists lack the engineering skills for such projects.
Slag heaps occur because large amounts of coal, steel,cement, clay, bricks, concrete and various metals are need for an industrialised country. Even the neolithic people dug pits to obtain flints.
Most modern machines, include the magnets for wind powered turbines require rare earth elements which have to be dug up and refined.If we go back to using antlers for ploughing, then the population will have to revert to thatof 10,000 years ago.
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Not sure Jo has mentioned it, and at the risk of stealing her thunder /duck /weave (yes I am a gamer in my off hours), I see Jo and co have taken Kellie Tranter to task at the ABC:
http://www.australianminesatlas.gov.au/mapping/files/australian_energy_flows_2006-07.pdf
Have fun in there chaps. I think denialist has been mentioned 100 times in the replies already ROFL.
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Confused #32:
I believe you are missing something in translation. We all want our kids, grandkids etc. to grow up in the best of all possible worlds. There is a balancing act involved however. Living totally “au naturale” is not pretty. Life tends to be short, sharp and brutish.
From the time we are conceived in our mummy’s tummy, nature engages in an all-out assault to wipe us out with diseases. So be optimistic, a wealthy country can do far more to protect the environment than a poor one. There are no greater environmental vandals than those in poor socialist countries. It becomes a matter of “whatever it takes” to provide the economic growth needed to jobs for the people.
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Mark #34
Never said live “au naturale”….I like my familys future/car/television/WARMTH/food/clothes/ house and holidays abroad much toooooo much!
There just seems to be a “hang ’em all” attitude sometimes….am I alone here ?
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You do understand that when insurance companies increase premiums against potential catastrophes that never eventuate, they actually make more money. I doubt the shareholders are going to get too upset over that idea. Why should insurance companies do due diligence to avoid accidentally lining their own pockets?
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Egats you are so backward and old fashioned.
Hasn’t anyone told you that policy leads to science these days?
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I was saving this paper on my hard drive and, always looking for a concise title to name the file, I decided on “Hot Spot Not”. 🙂
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For an intriguing look at the Chinese view on CAGW, have a look at
http://libertygibbert.wordpress.com/2010/08/11/the-dragons-dissent/#comment-6629
Pointman
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Confused:
Glad to read that you enjoy the benefits of an enlightened and technologically advanced society.
Speaking for myself, I wouldn’t be bothered with the whole discussion about CC/AGW if there weren’t such ghastly consequences resulting from the “cure” as advocated by one side of the argument. They demand that everybody follow their dictates because it would make them feel good. So yes, the lines are drawn.
You should know that Jo tolerates far more from visiting “warmers” than their sites do from sceptics and we’ve certainly had our fill of late. Some come right out in our faces with insults etc. others are more insidious and disingenuous.
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Confused:
At #32 you say:
Yes, you are confused. I want those things, too, and I object to windfarms for more reasons than that they merely spoil the view (e.g. see http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/reprint/courtney_2006_lecture.pdf )
But “the environmental movement” has had no part in the improvements that you mention. People generate enivironmental improvements when they can afford to because it is preferable to live in a clean, pretty and pleasant environment. Poor people have much more important things (e.g. food) that they have to spend all they have to get.
Indeed, “the environmental movement” has pressed for environmentally damaging things like windfarms. (Windfarms cover the land in concrete for their turbines’ foundation and for roads to access them,but environmentalists who hang from trees to oppose roads for normal transportation campaign for construction of windfarms).
Imortantly, “the environmental movement” supports the global warming scare because the scare opposes use of fossil fuels although the scare has no supporting scientific evidence of any kind.
But the use of fossil fuels has done more to benefit human kind than anything else since the invention of agriculture.
Most of us would not be here if it were not for the use of fossil fuels because all human activity is enabled by energy supply and limited by material science.
Energy supply enables the growing of crops, the making of tools and their use to mine for minerals, and to build, and to provide goods, and to provide services.
Material Science limits what can be done with the energy. A steel plough share is better than a wooden one. Ability to etch silica permits the making of acceptably reliable computers. And so on.
People die without energy and the ability to use it. They die because they lack food, or housing, or clothing to protect from the elements, or heating to survive cold, or cooling to survive heat, or medical provisions, or transport to move goods and services from where they are produced to where they are needed.
And people who lack energy are poor so they die from pollution, too.
For example, traffic pollution has been dramatically reduced by adoption of fossil fuels. On average each day in 1855 more than 50 tons of horse excrement was removed from only one street, Oxford Street in London. The mess, smell, insects and disease were awful everywhere. By 1900 every ceiling of every room in Britain had sticky paper hanging from it to catch the flies. Old buildings still have scrapers by their doors to remove some of the pollution from shoes before entering
Affluence reduces pollution.
Rich people can afford sewers, toilets, clean drinking water and clean air. Poor people have more important things they must spend all they have to get. So, people with wealth can afford to reduce pollution but others cannot. Pollution in North America and Europe was greater in 1900 than in 2000 despite much larger populations in 2000. And the pollution now experienced every day by billions who do not have the wealth of Americans and Europeans includes cooking in a mud hut using wood and dung as fuel when they cannot afford a chimney.
The use of fossil fuels has provided that affluence for the developed world. The developing world needs the affluence provided by the development which is only possible at present by using fossil fuels.
We gained our wealth and our population by means of that use.
The energy supply increased immensely when the greater energy intensity in fossil fuels became available by use of the steam engine. Animal power, wind power and solar power were abandoned because the laws of physics do not allow them to provide as much energy as can be easily obtained from using fossil fuels.
The greater energy supply enabled more people to live and the human population exploded. Our population has now reached about 6.6 billion and it is still rising. All estimates are that the human population will peak at about 9 billion people near the middle of this century.
That additional more than 2 billion people in the next few decades needs additional energy supply to survive. The only methods to provide that additional energy supply at present are nuclear power and fossil fuels. And the use of nuclear power is limited because some activities are difficult to achieve by getting energy from the end of a wire.
If you doubt this then ask a farmer what his production would be if he had to replace his tractor with a horse or a Sinclair C5.
So, holding the use of fossil fuels at its present level would kill at least 2 billion people, mostly children. And reducing the use of fossil fuels would kill more millions, possibly billions.
That is not an opinion. It is not a prediction. It is not a projection. It is a certain and undeniable fact. Holding the use of fossil fuels at their present levels would kill billions of people, mostly children. Reducing the use of fossil fuels would kill more millions or billions.
Improving energy efficiency will not solve that because it has been known since the nineteenth century that improved energy efficiency increases energy use: as many subsequent studies have confirmed.
So, in a period of a few decades we have moved from the tried and tested climate policy that has stood the test of time since the Bronze Age, and we have replaced it with quasi-religious political madness which – if not stopped – will pale into insignificance the combined activities of Ghengis Khan, Adolf Hitler and Pol Pot.
And “the environmental movement” is responsible for this.
So, “the environmental movement” is a curse on humanity, and it needs to be opposed.
Richard
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O.T. I know but I had to have a chuckle at this
http://www.themercury.com.au/article/2010/08/11/165215_tasmania-news.html
The eco-bling (wind turbines)recently installed on the roof of the Marine Board building in Hobart (Tasmania)to much fanfare and mouthing of enviro-buzzwords last month have self destructed in winds described by the locals as “A bit breezy”
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Dear Jo Nova,
This was a terrific post – I had been trying to decode what the McKitrick et al paper meant over at CA, but couldn’t for the life of me do it. You have made it clear and simple. I hope this post gets linked to at all the major sceptic blogs, and offer you my heartfelt thanks for it. It’s an absolute classic.
[Shucks Michael. That’s high praise. This communicator is beaming. Ta! — JN]
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Steve – that is a shame. Most real scientists are reputable and honorable. The damage being done by the bad ones is unfortunately tainting all as you suggest.
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Richard #41
You missed my point almost entirely. I too want all the benefits of a modern society. I want my lights to go on at night and my central heating to provide me with warmth in the winter. However, I live within 30 miles of where it all began..modern industrial society that is. I saw the results of what a society without environmental laws looked like, slag heaps and spoil tips..rivers so polluted they were fenced off. These, thanks to the environmentalists are now largely a thing of the past, cleaned up largely by central government spending..not the original polluters note.
Unfettered industrialisation happened on my doorstep and is what the so called developing countries are now suffering from today. Do you think the Chinese people want smog ? Want their rivers polluted so they can’t drink the water. Of course not. Yet their state imposes it on them because of the rush for riches. The people of the Amazon basin suffer a similar fate because some people want the gold and don’t care about the indigenous peoples becoming contaminated with mercury. Do you think these industrialists want to pay for cleaning up the mess they make ?
It’s only because of environmentalists that clean air laws where enacted in this country. They campaigned against the over use of insecticides in the 60’s. Hell It’s only in the last 10 yrs that the common buzzard became relatively common again where I live. I’ve actually seen a Sparrowhawk again in my garden within the last 5 years. This was unthinkable here in the 60’s and 70’s.
It’s only because on evil environmentalists that there are any fish left in our local seas. They opposed unfettered capitalism, the rush for Affluence.
My point is not all ‘environmentalists’ are part of the one world government. (Me, I don’t even mind whaling, providing its carried out humanely and below the maximum sustained yield)
So, don’t throw out the ‘baby with the bathwater’ and nobody is all evil (except Gore that is:-)).
So, “the environmental movement” is NOTa curse on humanity, it needs to be embraced. Its been taken over by a bunch of touchy feely middle class hypocrites who want all the benefits but non of the responsibilities.
Oh and I want this for all nations, not just mine.
Mark #41 last word…..I am NOT A WARMIST….. 🙂
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[…] been raised to this comparison and why she believes they are not credible. For a further update see here. For more detailed information see […]
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Confused:
To be clear, I am not accusing you of being a “warmist”.
But I strongly disagree with you when you assert:
“Environmentalists” had nothing to do with it.
The first great environmental improvement was enacted when the ‘Great Stink’ made attendance at Parliament unpleasant so the politicians arranged for mains drainage and sewerage to be installed in Greater London. Other cities and towns wanted the same benefits so they copied the adoption of sewerage.
Then the health benefits of clean water became apparent so that was introduced.
The 1952 ‘Great Smog’ was so intolerable that the 1958 Clean Air Act was introduced.
Etc.
Environmentalists had no part in any of this. The pressure for a cleaner environment came from the populace and the politicians responded.
But two effects have interfered; viz.
political opportunism and environmentalism.
Politicians have made use of public desire for a cleaner environment to help them adopt policies that benefit them but actually harm the environment; e.g. the EU Large Combustion Plant Directive (LCPD).
So-called environmentalists have supported these activities by public advocacy, and politicians have given them immense amounts of money for that support.
And environmentalists have induced harmful stunts based on falsehoods; e.g. the Brent Spar incident and opposition to DDT.
Indeed, we have erradicated Smallpox and we could have erradicated malaria by now were it not for the environmentalist ban on the use of DDT.
And now environmentalists support the AGW scare that – as I explained at #41 – threatens to kill billions of people.
I repeat, the “environmental movement” is a curse on humanity.
Richard
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confused:
August 11th, 2010 at 6:46 pm ….
Don’t worry Confused….
What you have to understand is that the “environmentalists” like Greenpeace, WWF, etc… Didn’t save anything.
WE DID. They just stole the credit…..
It was companies that reduced pollution, by innovation as well as social conscience… Bosses and workers like clean environments too… Our political system empowers us…. Not Greenpeace. Greenpeace corrupts the democratic process. Their distorted advocacy with its exaggerations and lies, mutes our voice. Damages our democracy.
The banning of DDT was a human tragedy, not an environmental victory. Millions of Africans and Asians died because of the effects of malaria. It has since come to pass that DDT was never as damaging on the environment as it was made out to be…. People died, because science lied…. Environmental politics murdered them.
As for Whales… When you really think about it, it was Kerosene that saved the whales… Rockefeller saved the whales…. and provided more area for food in the process, because oil seed crops could be turned into food crops now that whale oil and seed oil was replaced by petroleum products… and eventually motor spirit fueled the engines of industry and agriculture for even bigger gains, that unshackled the human race from the tyranny of the environment…
The Socialist thrive on depression and catastrophe confused… Don’t take their word for anything…. question them. Question them rigorously…. you will find they will not answer, except with violence and hysteria.
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Confused;
The surest way to improve the environment is for a country to become rich. The environmental state of poor countries is bad — the poorer they are, the worse their environment, generally. (Also, the only proven way to reduce population growth is wealth.) This can be verified by travel in S. America.
Everyone wants a good environment. When a country is wealthy, they can afford it.
The stated goal of some “environmental” organizations’ leaders is to destroy industrial civilization and put us all in poverty, which is a state of Humanity they are willing to tolerate. (What they would like is for Humans to become extinct.) I’m not saying that people who donate to or join Greenpeace thinking they are supporting the environment want this — this is the motivation of the leaders.
The most environmentally friendly way to generate sufficient power to support a wealthy civilization is nuclear. (When people tell me that it’s unacceptably dangerous, I point out that that must be why France is a radioactive wasteland where no one can live.)
Nuclear energy was always safer (in terms of actual deaths caused) than any of the alternatives, and improvements in the technology make it much safer now. There is no need to store wastes for 100s of thousands of years — the technology to process them into short-lived radioactives (100s of years) has been known for at least 30 years. There is no need to transport wastes — the safest place to store them is where they are now, at the power plant sites, shielded and under guard.
(BTY: theoretical claims of high nuclear death rates are based on extrapolating high dose fatality rates to extremely small doses — a concept that has been falsified by every actual study done on it. The body easily repairs small amounts of radiation damage — else no one could live in Colorado. The “no safe dose” concept is akin to concluding that, because a large injury will cause you to bleed to death in minutes, a paper cut will cause you to bleed to death in a few months.)
I would not support any “environmental organization” that is against both the use of fossil fuels and nuclear power — they are really working to impoverish the world and that would result in great environmental degradation. (When people must choose between their lives and the environment, the environment always loses.)
As much as I dislike James Hansen’s activism based on junk science, I have to admit that he understands the power issue, and agree with his support for nuclear power as a way to maintain civilization.
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@ Confused
Just about everybody desires a clean environment to live in. Unfortunately, the environmentalists are nothing but hypocrites, the movement is nothing but a trojan horse and they have killed more people than Mao Ze Dong, Adolf Hitler and Joe Stalin combined!
They are hypocrites because the vast majority of the movement’s leaders live an unabashedly profligate lifestyle while they demand that their loyal minions and the rest of the world live a life akin to the stone age. More private land in the United States is owned by the greens than by anyone else. The often carve out parcels of land for the leadership to construct energy guzzling ecologically unfriendly mansions and estate. They then have the audacity to strangle legitimate growth in developed nations while also telling the developing world that globalization is evil and the peasant lifestyle is the way to go.
They do not care about the environment. It is only a means they exploit to control our lives and engage in promoting a green tyranny that would force us to live an “environmentally friendly” lifestyle. They want to reduce world population, prevent us from growing more food, limit our infrastructure and live a life void of freedom. They are nothing more than an unhappy group of misanthropes who suffer from herd mentality.
By waging war on development in general and science in particular they have managed to kill untold millions and forced many to live in unnecessary poverty and suffering. They are against chemicals that are safe such as DDT and other insecticides. They have killed millions by depriving them of DDT which would have eradicated malaria and other mosquito borne diseases. They have forced over a third of the worlds population to live a life that is unnecessarily short and brutish. They are willing to destroy the world economy and kill as many as is necessary to achieve their goal of a green utopia.
The environmentalists truly are the enemy of the human race.
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If you don’t drink the koolaid, you don’t want a clean planet. What a twist of truth.
I hired my first safety industrial hygiene employee in 1982 before alGore got on his donkey and rode into the cities to preech salvation of the planet.
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[…] help ramp up the U.S. climate numbers by “400%” as commented on by analyst, Jo Nova (more here). The Australian researcher provides an excellent summary to an important paper that removes all […]
10
Confused , Richard and others. I think I can relate to both sides of your debate and the following article helps explian it. Confused relates to the your guy in the article who joined Greenpeace with genuine ideals to make positive change but left when he got high enough to see what the guys at the top were really all about — these guys displaying what Richard and co have explained.
http://www.newsrealblog.com/2010/08/09/greenpeace-needs-to-bring-in-more-than-700000-a-day-just-to-keep-the-lights-on/
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Al Gore’s Communist Connection
http://www.aim.org/media-monitor/al-gores-communist-connection/
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Marxists and greenies
http://www.greenleft.org.au/2010/829/42652
Activist Left’s global agenda
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/politics/opinion/activist-lefts-global-agenda/story-e6frgd0x-1225831116134
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SUBJECT: Here come the green police
THIS IS WHAT WILL HAPPEN IN AUSTRALIA IF LABOR & THE GREENS ARE ELECTED!
BE VERY AFRAID!!
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/here_come_the_green_police/
Australian business bosses – and their customers – have been given a preview of their own future:
Thousands of British businesses will be liable for significant fines and charges (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/greenpolitics/taxandtheenvironment/7937911/Business-facing-a-wave-of-green-taxes.html) under a new government “green tax” scheme. From April 2011, firms will need to buy permits for each tonne of carbon dioxide emitted Photo: PA Companies that fail to register their energy use by next month will be hit with fines that could reach £45,000 under the little-known rules.
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Jo, Anthony & David well done at “OUR ABC”.
Bulldust, thanks for the tip.
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GILLARD’S GREAT LIE TO THE PEOPLE OF AUSTRALIA
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/no_gillard_did_not_save_200000_jobs_by_blowing_our_billions/
Don’t be fooled by the spin doctoring of labor!
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Richard @ 41
I couldn’t agree more. I was just musing on this fact this morning. I also believe that socialism generates waste. People who are given benefits do not care for the things they buy, so they tend to buy more stuff. I see the waste in the poorer neighbourhoods of our town where people buy poor quality goods (at the taxpayer’s expense) and then leave them outside to deteriorate.
I remember the Carbon Footprint calculator that premised that the greater your income, the greater would be your footprint. Utter tripe.
Mark @ 9
Per kilojoule output these alternative fuels generate more CO2 than hydrocarbons extracted from the ground. BUT the AGW supporters say that its OK because the plants they are derived from were grown in the current carbon cycle. The plants took CO2 out of the atmosphere last year rather than way back when the dinosaurs roamed the earth.
However, a cow that belches methane in the process of digesting grass that was grown in the current carbon cycle is an eco-terrorist. Yes! People cannot see the illogicality and inconsistency between these two things. And these seem to be enshrined in the Kyoto Protocol.
They have just made up rules that suit their agenda. And I assume that the agenda is that we should not eat meat so they have to vilify domestic livestock as much as possible.
10
The extreme greens are to environmentalism, what Al Qaeda is to Islam, or the IRA was to Catholics. Their real goals are nothing but power for themselves, they taint everything, and skew people’s perceptions as to the reality.
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Grant:
Thankyou for your post at #59. I agree with almost all of it, but I write to make one clarification.
I suspect you may be an American because you seem to confuse socialism with communism (i.e. a common confusion among Americans).
I am a left-wing socialist of the old-fashioned British kind.
This blog discusses climate science, AGW, CAGW and related issues. The politics associated with these issues is directly pertinent to our discussions, but political ideologies are not because persons of all political views are to be found among ‘warmers’ and among ‘climate realists’.
So, in my opinion, we hinder the ‘realist’ case by supposing that our position depends on, and/or is related to, and/or opposes any political ideology. Our position is independent of any political ideology (unless one wants to include environmentalism as a political ideology).
That said, I agree with you that communism encourages waste for the reason you state (but I would because communism and socialism are very different political ideologies).
Richard
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Grant:
The main driver as to your place on the socio-economic ladder, of a free and democratic nation, is your level of personal self-discipline.
The conundrum for socialists, and their desire for an idealised egalitarian society.
Has always been, no matter how much help you give to the majority of people on the bottom end of the ladder.
They never move up the ladder simply because they lack the necessary self-discipline to do so. Faced with that reality the only way for these people can keep society equal, is to attempt to tear down anyone who does move too far up the ladder.
Their opposition to red meat is a good example of this. Red meat is the food of the rich and powerful, traditionally reserved for soldiers and the aristocracy.
Wealthy western nations eat a lot of red meat, poorer developing nations can’t afford to. Therefore the consumption of red meat must be stopped.
The attack on energy consumption is the ultimate manifestation of this attitude.
The more abundant and cheaper that a nation’s energy is, the higher its standard of living is.
Instead of attempting to lift the living standards of poor nations by supplying them with cheap and abundant energy, their instinctive solution is to tear down the energy supply, and living standards of wealthy nations.
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I agree Richard – American’s always confuse the two terms. Reagan crucified socialism in the US which is why they refuse a national health system to our confusion and wonder.
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Richard @ 61.
I may be confusing socialism and communism. But that is probably because as a Kiwi I am so confused with our so called “social state” being some kind of socialist utopia that I don’t realise it is the embodiment of communism.
I personally reel from any system that takes away personal responsibility. It alarms me when I see CAGW believers who drive their V8s while preaching that we must change society to address the ills of CO2 emissions. They do not need to make any personal changes or take any individual action but we must change the whole of society. Sheeesh.
10
Yes, in the USA we do not see any real difference between communism and socialism. Here are the definitions for both words from the same dictionary, http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/
In fact, they are synonymous.
Again, mine is just an American’s perspective. Perhaps the definition is different in a dictionary of The Queens Dialect
From: http://www.dictionary.co.uk/browse.aspx?word=socialism
.
So, American Citizens see the two as very similar and even synonymous whereas Commonwealth Subjects see socialism as ” intermediate between capitalism and communism”.
Interesting.
10
Oh, and as you can see from the third entry for the first definition that it is the same as the second entry for the UK definition. Still, most people in the USA lump the two together.
10
Back onto AGW, here’s a piece in the Courier Mail today which makes me think victory!
Nothing special, just that there might be snow in the Darling Downs next few days…but read the comments. Typical comment: #34 “I hope the snow falls. As for global warming, mate I am still waiting for the Y2K bug.”
The green left may think it is the greatest moral challenge of our time but they’ve completely lost the rest of us plebs. Except the poor lonely warmist at #37, who starts “Dear Luddites…”.
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Eddy,
The reason most people in the USA lump the two together is our history of respect for individual rights. In any form of socialism or communism, the concept of respecting rights is inoperative. Need or claim of need is the driving concept of the organization of the collective.
If you have, those who have not are to have an undeniable a claim upon you, your life, and your property you produced by expending that life. Those who don’t produce are the one’s to receive the benefit of your productivity simply because they didn’t produce it. You are to have no choice in the matter. The collective is all and the individual is nothing.
There is no fundamental difference in principle between the various socialist-communist systems except who is to be sacrificed to whom, for what reason, how fast, and to what extent. They are ALL inherently evil at their core! This includes America’s so called welfare state.
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Eddy – my definition of a socialist state is where the government is responsible for essential services and private enterprise handled non essential services.
Essential services being.
1 – Power- energy.
2 – Transport and roads
3 – Health
4 – Communication.
5.- Education
we had a department of energy, transport and roads, health, communication and education.
It also provided a public owned Bank and Insurance company.
Private enterprise was encouraged to compete with government enterprise and they did – we had private medical insurance, private banks, private insurance companies, private schools and private transport/airlines and they kept the private companies honest.
Since those days governments has sold off the government services and we live in a fully capitalist state just like the US where corporations now run the country and the world.
I prefer the good old days.
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Tel @ 36.
My point is the unnecessary costs to consumers because of the AGW scare campaign. Sure insurance companies will make more and THEIR shareholders will be happy. As a result of these false predictions we have governments wanting to spend our dollars to buy coastal properties that would be swamped in catastrophic sea level rise. I would have thought that those who are responding to AGW scare campaigns have a duty of care to look at ALL the science not just the consensus science and to act accordingly. When a company looks at only part of the data/research and fails to consider contra research it will make mistakes and should be punished accordingly. If, after consideration of all the facts, they come down in favour of a particular plan of action they can be accused of poor judgement but not of dereliction of their duty of care.
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The once great CSIRO has degenerated into a LEFT WING POLITICAL GROUP!
ABSOLUTELY DESPICABLE!!
CSIRO and the green march through our institutions
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/csiro_and_the_green_march_through_our_institutions/
10
Jo mentions the Big Scare Campaign, and right on cue over at the ABC is serial warmist Stephan Lewandowsky with an article titled, “No Climate Change Alternatives” in which he puts forth all the usual scary messages:
since the 1970s, every decade has been hotter than the preceding one.
sea levels are rising at least as quickly as predicted by the IPCC.
a recent Nature study showed that the ocean’s phytoplankton has declined by 40% since the 1950s owing to climate change.
the Arctic ice is melting faster than even the most pessimistic forecasts had anticipated just a few years ago.
And 400 out of 442 glaciers being monitored worldwide are retreating at a rapid rate, thus eventually threatening the drinking water supplies of millions of people.
There is every probability that the drought in the Murray-Darling basin is linked to climate change.
My favorite is this one:
A recent peer-reviewed study showed that every extra degree temperature in a given year increases the likelihood of civil conflict in Africa by 50%. Scientists predict an additional human toll of 390,000 battle fatalities in Africa by 2030 because of climate change.
He then goes on with:
In one corner, there are the scientists of the world who overwhelmingly support the consensus that humans are responsible for climate change.
and in the other corner, there is the junk-science of some talking heads and media dolts whose conspiracy theories can be debunked in a few mouse clicks.
And of course the faithful over at the ABC are lapping up every word.
10
The right to buy and own property and for a rule of law to treat all citizens equally are the hallmarks of a civilized, democratic society no matter what it is called. Of course there is a continuum with Pol Pot type communistic regimes at one end and socialist states like the Scandinavian ones on the left side of the continuum and the US on the right; and while I don’t want to get into the relative virtues of socialism, or not, from the viewpoint of green ideology, individual rights such as property rights and equality before the law are anthema to them as I note here:
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2009/05/defining-the-greens-part-9/
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Here is a nice link which explains the current state of play in the West.
The green greens are just the well-meaning duped foot soldiers of the red greens in a much bigger plot.
cheers
10
Hope you found the link “cheers” But I like it so much here it is again
10
Doh – I just got up and realised the copy & paste didn’t stick. The ABC article by Jo & Co is here:
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2979736.htm
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THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF AUSTRALIA BACKS “THE GREENS” IN THE FEDERAL ELECTION.
IF THAT IS NOT A REASON TO NOT VOTE FOR “THE GREENS” THEN I DON’T KNOW WHAT IS!
WHAT’S NEXT – A TALIBAN CANDIDATE!
http://www.cpa.org.au/guardian/2010/1467/02-to-cpa-members.html
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[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by chemicallygreen, chemicallygreen. chemicallygreen said: http://bit.ly/c4V94n Surface Temperatures do not give all the answers. Cherry picking data equals bad science, 400% bad. #globalwarming […]
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Friends:
It seems that – for the second time – I made an attempt to prevent a divisive and irrelevant discussion here that has ‘back-fired’ and encouraged the discussion.
The purpose of my post at #61 was to present my view that was stated in its paragraph saying:
The important point is that
“Our position is independent of any political ideology”
Therefore,
why fall out among ourselves about politics?
Please do not: it harms our effectiveness.
Richard
P.S. Those who want to learn about socialism should not start by posting here, or by reading dictionaries, but – as a first step – they could try to Google for Tolpuddle Martyrs.
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thank you for your instruction on how I should behave myself on this site…………..NOT!
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For those confused with definitional variances,
Communism is socialism implemented at end of an AKG47
Socialism is communism implemented by specious reasoning.
Put simply, socialism is any political system based on an heirarchial system characterised by an elite prescribing how the rest ought to behave.
Capitalism is an inversion of this idea, and instead argues that individuals decided how they ought to behave, GIVEN the assumption that everyone else also has rights, and which recognition then prompts a thinking individual to modify their behaviour in society. In a socialist system in which individual rights are rejected, that respect for individual rights is absent.
Incidentally socialism is also the political system in which there is no private property and hence no rights of same; hence there cannot be a market economy in which individuals exchange goods and services, or private properties, and thus no need for an intermediary item of exchange, otherwise known as money, and from extrapolation, economic theory and hence economists.
I’m off supervising another drilling program near Port Hedland on Sunday (15th Aug) so happy bickering over political issues.
10
Find some gold Louis, it always comes in handy.
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[………….]
(the sound of me NOT putting my 2 cents in)
10
Blatantly plagiarised, but these models are 100% correct…ahem…back to the thread topic?
SOCIALISM
You have 2 cows.
You give one to your neighbour.
COMMUNISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and gives you some milk.
FASCISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and sells you some milk.
NAZISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and shoots you.
BUREAUCRATISM (aka CARBON TRADING)
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other, and then throws the milk away…
TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM
You have two cows.
You sell one and buy a bull.
Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows.
You sell them and retire on the income.
SURREALISM (aka A.G.WARMISM?)
You have two giraffes.
The government requires you to take harmonica lessons.
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Cohenite @ 82
Brilliant suggestion.
Working on it.
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Back to topic, if the models ARE that wrong, then we are not dealing with a scientific based analysis, but one on primarily, politically, based one.
So what has science to do with it?
Nothing.
So why the continued op-eds from John Quiggen etc in the AFR about this?
Because being the chattering class, JW, can’t help but re-inforce it’s delusions.
10
“why the continued op-eds from John Quiggen etc in the AFR about this?”
Because the AFR is an especialy dysfunctional patch of the extraordinarily inept Fairfax group. The strong suspicion is that, with the possible exception of his mother, Quiggers’ only other reader is the unfortunate sub-editor who must process his copy. The editor in chief certainly does not read his own paper, though doubtless he tries. Once past Peter Reuhl, slumber descends in a grey mist of sonorous headlnes, 24-hour-old reporting, and typographic errors (at least half-a-dozen howlers per edition can be relied upon to brighten toast and tea). Reason suggests very few members of the investor class, the newspaper’s purported target, have much time for a grant-fattened sprouter of the academic left’s conventional wisdom. Given that he is much more likely to repel readers than attract them, Quiggers makes the perect Fairfax columnist.
About an hour ago, Google News just happened to bring word of the latest readership figures across Australia.
The AFR continues to lead the downward charge, having just shed another 14.7% year-on-year.
The Silly Moaning Imperilled and its southern sister are down by similarly horrific numbers.
If Fairfax was a reasonably normal company, there would be a good deal of thinking about what the group is doing wrong, how it might be rectified, and which few editors did not need pink slips. As it isn’t, those same editors can probably expect pay raises and even more freedom to direct the news, hire columnists, and emphasise values designed to alienate an even greater section of their potential readerships.
Don’t worry about Quiggers. Yes, there is a dill behind that breakfast-catcher on his chin, but like Fairfax, and with Fairfax, he will be gone for good, and gone very soon.
10
Janama:
At #80 you say:
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In a series of studies in 2005 and 2006, researchers at the University of Michigan found that when misinformed people were exposed to corrected facts, they rarely changed their minds. The facts back fired. These people often became even more strongly set in their biased beliefs.
e.g. During the Bush era, the participants who self-identified as conservative believed the misinformation on WMD & taxes even more strongly after being given the correction.
Those who believe something about the world are more likely to passively accept as truth any information which confirms beliefs, & to actively dismiss information which doesn’t. This is known as “motivated reasoning.”
Whether or not the consistent information is accurate, they might accept it as fact, as confirmation of beliefs. This makes some more confident in beliefs, & even less likely to entertain facts which contradict them.
Facts, they found, were not the cure for misinformation. Like an antibiotic, facts could actually make misinformation even stronger & more entrenched.
The problem is that sometimes the things some people are convinced they know are objectively, provably false. And even in the presence of the correct information, such people react very, very differently than the merely uninformed. Instead of changing their minds to reflect the correct information, they entrench themselves even deeper. The general idea is that the more insecure the person is the more it becomes absolutely threatening to admit they’re wrong. The phenomenon — known as “backfire” — is “a natural defense mechanism to avoid cognitive dissonance”.
But researchers are working on it. One avenue may involve self-esteem. Researchers worked on one study in which they showed that when people who tended to be rigid in their beliefs were given a self-affirmation exercise they were more likely to consider new information than were people who had not. In other words, if they feel more confident & better about themselves, they’ll listen — and if they feel insecure or threatened, they won’t.
This would also explain why demagogues benefit from keeping a goodly portion of a susceptible population agitated. The more threatened environmentally conformist people feel, the less likely they are to listen to dissenting opinions, & the more easily controlled they are.
10
For some reason, only part of my post at #88 appeared.
The remainder was as follows:
But I gave no “instruction” to anybody: I stated an opinion and made a request that an off-topic subject should not be debated.
Thereason for my request is clearly demonstrated by Louis at #81. He says:
This assertion is so wrong as to be laughable and it is grossly offensive to socialists so it invites unneeded disagreement.
Can you not see how such unneeded disagreements distract from our effectiveness in promoting good science and, therefore, in opposing CAGW scaremongering.
Richard
10
re:
For an intriguing look at the Chinese view on CAGW, have a look at
http://libertygibbert.wordpress.com/2010/08/11/the-dragons-dissent/#comment-6629
Hey! Listen up!! This link is more than slightly significant. This Chinese author has ripped the lid off the western agenda for what he calls this low carbon plot. This has GREAT potential to be as important as Climatgate. FOLLOW ALL OF THE LINKS TO THE ACTUAL PAPER
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Mia Nony:
This is very true you never change someone’s mind by threatening, insulting, or browbeating them.
The best method is to quietly set the facts in front of them and allow them to work it out by themselves.
Most leadership courses emphasise, that if you you make a mistake or are wrong about something admit it, and admit it quickly. The quicker you admit to a mistake, the quicker it can be corrected and the less impact it has on your credibility.
10
[…] a new Coal fired power plant, their plans must include mitigation of CO2 emissions to address the global warming fraud. Via the EPA: The Clean Air Act requires states to develop EPA-approved implementation plans that […]
10
As for empirical evidence? take note of WUWT, most of it is adjusted to suit!. Follow the money, the solution to this settled science that CO2 will kill us? destroy all industry in the west and ship it wholesale to China and India where there is no regulation but runaway pollution. I guess there must be a little known gas law that says CO2 is only lethal in the northern hemisphere, also if the high preist really believed his speil would he have purchased a 8 million dollar beachfront home?
10
I have a conundrum for you. Everywhere I go I see that AGW is a referendum on one’s political stance and allegiances, left wingers believe in it and right wingers deny it.
But the problem is I am a left winger. I know far too much history to be anything else. You do know, do you not, that laissez faire capitalists worked their employeees to death during the horrors of the Industrial Revolution? After all 16 hour work days six days a week will do that to a person, and the literature is full of reformers witnessing the slow deaths of these poor wretches.
And it was right wingers that resisted such amenities as municipal rubbish collection (My source is Ralston Saul’s book “Voltaire’s Bastards”.
After all the Right wingers were those who sat on the right hand of the french king, (hence the term)and they were quite happy exploiting the peasants even though eventually popular wrath exploded and aristocrats were massacred in the terror. But of course maggots only notice the meat they are gorging on, not the effect they are having the body politic.
Without left wing policy i would be dead of old age at 51, if I had survived infancy at all, and an illiterate who died of exhaustion in some factory somewhere, or was killed by machinery when no safety regulations were deemed relevant. After all my universtity education was free as was my prinary schooling. All these things the Right Wing opposed. And what can be more socialist than health and safety? God forbid that the saw I cut wood on as a wood worker should have a guard on it!!
So. I am not going to renounce my left wing views, certainly not for you.
But I am also a skeptic as regards Human Caused Global Warming
A question remains, then: am I to renounce my skepticism regarding anthropogenic global warming for the sake of the purity of your theory?
Or is this a question of science and history whereby these two show me that temperatures were higher during the medieval warm period, and the hockey stick is a fraud.
And maybe political allegiance is irrelevant?
Name calling leftists will solve nothing.
It IS about the science is it?
Or am I mistaken?
Is being a left winger and a Climate Skeptic as big a contradiction in terms as a male feminist sympathizer is in the eyes of a lesbian separatist feminist?
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[…] help ramp up the U.S. climate numbers by “400%” as commented on by analyst, Jo Nova (more here). The Australian researcher provides an excellent summary to an important paper that removes all […]
10
Steve @ 95. Have a read of Richard Courtney’s comments above.He is a socialist but there are not many on here or any other blog who argue so strongly and intelligently against AGW.
It is just a generalisation that says those for AGW are left wing etc. Just as it is generalising to say those against AGW are against all so called green initiatives or ideas.
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SUBJECT: Wong caught out again
Only a day after being caught out misleading the public on the amount of water that has been returned to the Murray, Senator Penny Wong has again been caught not knowing the details of her own portfolio or misleading the public about them.
This morning on ABC24 Minister Wong was asked:
INTERVIEWER: Labor’s delayed spending of $200 million on water projects because it’s still catching up with infrastructure projects on the Murray-Darling Basin. How many more delays are there going to be?
WONG: I’m not sure what the 200 million is that you’re referring to, ah, we have rolled out a substantial number of programs and projects since we came to government ….
Minister Wong was either not being truthful in her response or she is unaware of developments in her own portfolio.
Yesterday, Labor revealed that it is engaging in more accounting tricks. In relation to investments to replumb the Murray-Darling Basin it stated that:
… there are delays in the roll out of certain projects in some States. To meet this new timetable the funding profile for these projects will be adjusted so that $200 million of funding will be moved from 2012-13 and 2013-14 to 2014-15 and 2015-16.
This will better meet the new expected timing of these projects. The changes represent a timing delay for about 5 per cent of the total program spending and will improve the underlying cash balance over forward estimates by $200 million.
http://www.alp.org.au/federal-government/news/updated-net-budget-impact-of-election-policies-(15/
Minister Wong may want to check the Australian Labor Party’s website more regularly.
Labor’s record on the Murray-Darling Basin is one of delay and inaction. In nearly three years in power:
· Labor has not fixed the Menindee Lakes despite it being at the top of a list of projects it listed at the 2007 election
· Labor took 18 months to establish the Murray-Darling Basin Authority and now blames it for delays in the Basin Plan
· Labor has spent only $300 million of a $5.8 billion fund to replumb the Basin and save water for farmers and the environment
Labor is now flagging more delays in these investments to prop up its wasteful and reckless spending, its desperate sandbagging of marginal seats and its runaway debt.
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Steve @95, you don’t need to abandon your political comfort zone. You need to work doubly hard within that left group to convince them of the real AGW story.
I have much more to say in regards to why you imagine that the left is the savior of humans and the right is opposed to that. (but we aren’t supposed to go there).
I’ll leave off with this thought for you: In the USA it was the radicals (left) of the day, that created the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Today it seems the right is better at protecting the sentiments of those works. Libertarians (the rightful heirs of those documents) are considered to be left yet the Democrats and Republicans both hate them because Libertarians despise big government. Unfortunately Libertarians will probably never have any real political power BECAUSE of this fact. Big government yields big dividends to politicians. Big government = money, money = power, power = politics, politicians = big government.
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@ Mark D re post 95
I never said that the left is the saviour of humans. The right is pure rapine and plunder: history is full of this. but the left is captive to two powerful delusions: that man is good and that man is perfectable. THe only aspect of human nature the left can appeal to is self righteousness; and the self righteous can only go against his innate nature of greed for so long, hence the liberal democratic experiment, being against human nature, will not last much longer and is failing even now.
You think man is good? You can show me the Mona Lisa or a Beethoven sonata or symphony, but I wil show you Auschwitz or, if you think we have learned anything since then, I will show you Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo
Besides the declaration of independance and associated documents said all men were created equal, but women were denied the vote and they were slave owners who framed these documents. I call such a stinking sham. They resented paying taxes to the British Crown only so they could tax the workers themselves and keep it. Read Gore Vidal and Howard Zinn on these matters
Man is evil, his systems are either manifestly evil or naively self righteous and idealistic (ie hypocrisy). There is no salvation in any human activity and that includes politics of any kind.
That you think that in a materialistic universe there can be meaningfully be said to be anything that OUGHT to be or OUGHT NOT to be is another question. If there is no purpose or meaning to life intrinsic to life itself then there is no pattern to it whereby it OUGHT to be adhered to or whereby deviuatin from this pattern of plan OUGHT NOT.
You can offer no reason by truth OUGHT to be believed, for there is nothing but molecules stretched over emptiness emerging from nothingness and due to return thereto eventually.
So dont think I am impressed by your moral arguments for anything if you are a modern materialist secularist. You have no basis for any of them. Anything less than pure nihilism from a philosophic materialst is lazy thinking
AS for your claim of my need to work doubly hard to persuade my leftist friends as to the falsity of AGW, why is this?
They have the evidence before them. If they reject it what is that to me?
Am I to have total contempt for their freedom of thought and become some kind of ranting fundamentalist as regards climate science just because what we believe is true?
If you think so that is the rationale behind every pogrom, witch hunt and Inquisition. Truth is not our licence, and i am suspcious of fundamentalist type bigotry which thinks that truth is our license to harrass and coerce
I note with irony that the Copenhagen Accords failed not because of the sober and rational study of the evidence, but because governments which believed in Global Warming were nevertheless too lazy and greedy to act on their own professed beliefs.
This is why AGW fanaticism will fail, not because of the evidence against it, but because of laziness and greed among those who believe it.
Oh yes, the net result of science is that man can kill more of his fellows more efficiently than ever before, because when knowledge which is power is given to the beast which is man he corrupts even further.
So there is no salvation in science either
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This email appeared in our mailbox this morning. Horrifying.
Too bad MSU is involved.
===========================================================================
US Government in Massive New Global Warming Scandal – NOAA Disgraced
Written by John O’Sullivan, special to Climate Change Fraud | 09 August 2010
600°F in Egg Harbor, WI? Yikes!UPDATE 8-10-2010: It would appear CoastWatch has removed the original image. Never fear, it’s shown here on the right. Please see author’s addendum at end of article.
Global warming data apparently cooked by U.S. government-funded body shows astounding temperature fraud with increases averaging 10 to 15 degrees Fahrenheit.
The tax-payer funded National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has become mired in fresh global warming data scandal involving numbers for the Great Lakes region that substantially ramp up averages.
A beleaguered federal agency appears to be implicated in the most blatant and extreme case of climate data fraud yet seen. Official records have been confirmed as evidence that a handful of temperature records for the Great Lakes region have been hiked up by literally hundreds of degrees to substantially inflate the average temperature range for the northeastern United States.
The web pages at the center of this latest climate storm were created by NOAA in partnership with Michigan State University.
Disgraced Administration Mired in Another Climategate-style Data Fix
Someone under the pseudonym ‘Sportsmen’ anonymously tipped off skeptic blog, Climatechangefraud.com. Independent analysts affirm the web pages as genuine.
In his email the faceless whistleblower explains that what precipitated the scoop was “a rather dubious report in the media that the Great Lakes temperatures have risen 10 to 15 degrees, I found it was downright laughable.” (Just a few examples of media hysteria here and here and here and here)
He continues, “ Prior to this report I would frequent the ‘Coastal Watch’ temperature maps for northern Lake Michigan. When this report came out it dawned on me that the numbers didn’t match what I had been reading on the Coastal Watch temperature page.”
Under a scheme called ‘Sea Grant’ NOAA collaborates with national universities to compile an official federal temperature record. In this instance, the partnersip is with Michigan University’s ‘Coastal Watch.’
Together the two institutions show temperature maps for northern Lake Michigan registering an absurd 430 degrees Fahrenheit -yes, you read it right –that’s four hundred and thirty degrees-and this is by no means the highest temperature recorded on the charts.
In the heated debate about Earth’s ever-changing climate you certainly don’t need to be scientist to figure out that the Great Lakes would have boiled away at a mere 212 degrees so something has seriously gone awry inside this well-funded program.
In addition to its civilian employees, NOAA research and operations are supported by 300 uniformed service members who make up the NOAA Commissioned Officer Corps. But don’t bet on anyone being court-marshalled over this latest global warming fiasco.
Paid for entirely from federal taxes, the shamed public body’s key responsibilities include warning of dangerous weather and protection of ocean and coastal resources, and conducts research to improve understanding and stewardship of the environment.
Michigan State University Also Complicit in Fraud?
The worst evidence of hyper-inflated global warming data is on a web page entitled, ‘Michigan State University Remote Sensing & GIS Research and Outreach Services.’
While another web page identifies that Michigan State University’s ‘Coastal Watch’ site is officially connected to NOAA thus implicating both institutions in a climate data conspiracy. At the bottom of the web page mention is made of ‘Sea Grant’ that is described as a “unique partnership of public and private sectors that combines research, education and technology transfer for public service.“
The legend further boasts that such data is shared across “ a national network of universities meeting the changing environmental and economic needs of Americans in coastal ocean and Great Lakes regions.”
NOAA Makes it White Hot in Wisconsin
But our intrepid anonymous whistleblower wasn’t done yet. He pointed out that Egg Harbor, Wisconsin, really got cooking this July 4th around 9:59AM, according to NOAA and Coast Watch. It was there, at the bottom left row of the temperature data points, that the records reveal on that day a phenomenally furnace-like 600 degrees Fahrenheit. (Click here if CoastWatch link does not work or disappears)
Egg Harbor by Royalbroil
Further analysis of the web pages shows that the incredibly wide temperature swings were occurring in remarkably short 10-hour periods-and sometimes in less than 5 hours. Strangely, none of the 250 citizens of the 78 families living in the village appeared to notice this apocalyptic heatwave during their holiday festivities.
Hidden Data Spike Hikes Heating Averages
But our sharp-eyed stranger comments, “ As I understand it, the current available Gif data maps are several for the latest dates, but the archives have less dates to choose from. It’s possible that in the past these numbers were incorrect but in the archive system you do not see the numbers that could have been in gross error.”
So it may reasonably be inferred climate fraudsters had a perfect opportunity here to fraudulently apply overcooked and overlooked data so that America’s Joe Public would be none the wiser that a few climate numbers vastly ramped up the national temperature averages.
Laughably, NOAA publishes a caveat at the bottom right corner of their web page warning about their data is “Not to be used for navigation purposes!”
The current head of NOAA is Dr. Jane Lubchenco, nominated by President Barack Obama and confirmed by the United States Senate on March 19, 2009 and is the first woman to serve as NOAA administrator. On her appointment Lubchenco declared that science would guide the agency and that she expects it to play a role in developing a green economy. You can say that again!
Readers now interested in doing their own detective work may wish to peruse the further data found here and here
to further ascertain whether climate doomsayers have rigged more ‘real world’ temperatures in a shabby scheme to win support for green energy tax hikes. If you find anything be sure to drop Lubchenco a line here.
Author’s Addendum:
Of major concern here is whether the false data has been fed into climate models ascertaining the broader temperature averages for the entire United States. The alleged response from NOAA as shown in the comments below this article, indicates evasiveness by Chuck Pistis, NOAA Program Coordinator, in answering the question. Why so?
I also applied due diligence and asked internationally renowned climatologist, Dr. Timothy Ball to take a look at the numbers. Here is what Dr. Ball observed:
“I have read your article and believe it is a very valid observation of the data as reported. At best the entire incident indicates gross incompetence, at worst it indicates a deliberate attempt to create a temperature record that suits the political message of the day.”
Moreover, I have written to NOAA but am still awaiting their reply. I specifically asked whether this extravagantly false data was fed into climate models to help ramp up the U.S. climate numbers by “400%” as commented on by analyst, Jo Nova (more here). The Australian researcher provides an excellent summary to an important paper that removes all doubt that climate models are utterly flawed. As Dr. Ball points out—perhaps we know why.
John O’Sullivan is a legal analyst, author and journalist. As an accredited academic, John taught and lectured for over twenty years at schools and colleges in the east of England before moving to the United States. As an analytical commentator, O’Sullivan has published over 100 major articles worldwide.
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I had a good laugh — I haven’t seen or heard FUBAR since my Army days. The way it went was, “…Up Beyond All Recognition.” That describes the current state of climate modeling right down to the last line of code.
Only 400% wrong? Let’s definitely depend on the models to make life changing policy.
Long live McIntyre and McKitrick!
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[…] help ramp up the U.S. climate numbers by “400%” as commented on by analyst, Jo Nova (more here). The Australian researcher provides an excellent summary to an important paper that removes all […]
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[…] help ramp up the U.S. climate numbers by “400%” as commented on by analyst, Jo Nova (more here). The Australian researcher provides an excellent summary to an important paper that removes all […]
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[…] Jo Nova: The models are wrong (but only by 400%) […]
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[…] 55. NEW! Model gate http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=da&sl=da&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.videnskab.dk%2Fcomposite-4862.htm and http://joannenova.com.au/2010/08/the-models-are-wrong-but-only-by-400/ […]
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[…] […]
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Steve Meikle @ 100: I just now realize that I never responded to your post (100)
All I can come up with is wow. Are you getting help for your hopelessness and deep depression?
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[…] 2 – The mythical hotspot that would be the signature of the enhanced Greenhouse Effect due to increased levels of CO2 hasn’t been found – see here and here. […]
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