Newman says The Party is Over for the IPCC

Another sign the debate is shifting, and probably in an irreversible way. Like a ratchet, the truth is slowly advancing, but once revealed, there is no going back.

The debate is gaining nuance: instead of scientists and deniers, there the public starts to see the argument is about shades of grey. The real debate has never been about whether greenhouse gases were real, instead it’s about how much global warming will happen. The cheating tactic of pretending the conflict was about something that nearly everyone agrees upon is like a ticking bomb for alarmists. The fuse has been lit. They will pay for their deception eventually.

Maurice Newman, chairman of the Prime Minister’s Business Advisory Council, is following up on his extraordinary front page article in The Australian. He is influential and was Chairman of the ABC, and of the board of the Australian Stock Exchange, and was Chancellor of Macquarie University until 2008.

Maurice Newman in The Australian today:

GIVEN the low-grade attacks on me following my piece “Crowds go cold on climate cost” (The Australian, Dec 31) readers of Fairfax publications and The Guardian may be shocked to hear I believe in climate change. I also accept carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas. The trouble is, I cannot reconcile the claims of dangerous human CO2 emissions with the observed record.

Newman is someone from outside science, telling scientists what science is, and he’s right:

The climate consensus of the 70s, like the period since the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was established in 1988, was dominated by politics, not science. I was reminded of how deeply political awareness has infected today’s academies when I received an apology from a respected climate scientist who corrected his own public cheap shot at me. He said, “I attempt to be politically even-handed … I try to steer a middle course as a scientist.”

Really? Surely science is not about neutrality? It is about evidence and conclusions which fall where they will. So when an internationally acclaimed climatologist like Roy Spencer from the University of Alabama at Huntsville dispassionately analyses climate models covering 33 years and concludes that both the surface and satellite observations produce linear temperature trends that are below 87 of the 90 models used in the comparison, he does not politically neutralise his findings. They are empirical fact.

Newman talks of the massive turnaround in the renewables subsidies that is currently underway – of how Europe is pulling back. Then puts a fine point on what caused the waste. Sloppy science and sloppy journalism. As I keep saying “The Media Is the Problem”. In Australia Andrew Bolt led the way, then The Australian, now there are tiny hints that some in Fairfax see a crack in the facade.

What we now see is the unravelling of years of shoddy science and sloppy journalism. If it wasn’t for independent Murdoch newspapers around the world, the mainstream media would be almost completely captured by the IPCC establishment. That is certainly true in Australia. For six or seven years we were bullied into accepting that the IPCC’s assessment reports were the climate science bible. Its chairman, Rajendra Pachauri, told us the IPCC relied solely on peer-reviewed literature. Then Murdoch papers alerted us to scientific scandals and Donna Laframboise, in her book The Delinquent Teenager, astonished us with her extraordinary revelation that of 18,000 references in the IPCC’s AR4 report, one-third were not peer reviewed. Some were Greenpeace press releases, others student papers and working papers from a conference. In some chapters, the majority of references were not peer reviewed. Many lead authors were inexperienced, or linked to advocate groups like WWF and Greenpeace. Why are we not surprised?

We’re at the point where all the past cheating tactics (like bullying, namecalling and dodging debates) are starting to backfire badly. Coming sometime is the steep fall of public opinion on “climate change” down over the Continental Shelf of Abject Derision into the Trenches of Urban Mythology.

In the meantime, childish personal attacks on those who point out flaws in IPCC reasoning and advice only increase scepticism. They are no substitute for empirical evidence and are well into diminishing returns. The party’s over.

The Australian

 

h/t to Brice Bosnich and Don Aitken. AND Frankly Skeptical in yesterdays thread. Thanks!

9.2 out of 10 based on 172 ratings

189 comments to Newman says The Party is Over for the IPCC

  • #
    scaper...

    Hence, the warmists are now the deniers. Oh, how I’m laughing at the fools!

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    • #
      Chistery

      Well, I never quite understood how the warmists came off calling skeptics “flat-earthers” Flat-earthers were the consensus. Flat-earthers based their case on belief rather than empirical evidence. Flat-earthers were ultimately wrong. And then there is POTUS Obama:

      “We don’t have time for a meeting of the flat-Earth society,” Obama said. “Sticking your head in the sand might make you feel safer, but it’s not going to protect you from the coming storm.”

      Indeed, Mr President.

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      • #
        Safetyguy66

        Precisely!

        That is exactly the issue I have with people comparing Darwin to warmists. The consensus was creationism not evolution. Darwin was in essence a skeptic of the greatest consensus based, scientific falsehood in human history. For warmists to claim Darwin as one of their own is just another sad indictment on their knowledge of history.

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        • #
          Greg Cavanagh

          I think you’d find that creationism was the official government/church sanctioned accepted belief. I don’t believe it would have been accepted completely by the general population. Plus other cultures had completely different ideas about the afterlife, and therefore the cycle of life. For example, India and China are two populous nations with completely alternate theories on life, the universe, and everything.

          It bothers me no end to constantly here that everybody accepted that the world was flat. This is a false modern belief, it has never been true throughout history.

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          • #
            Safetyguy66

            Hey Greg good points. I was also under the impression that “flat earth” was more of a turn of phrase than an actual existent belief of any particular time period, however my source for that belief is an episode of QI and I have not done any research.

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      • #
        Graeme No.3

        The President of the Flat Earth Society came out in favour of AGW / Climate Change in the last few months.

        Opinions are divided about whether he was serious or showing that Flat Earthers weren’t the most stupid ones around.

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      • #
        RichardLH

        I think a better analogy/train of thought is

        ‘flat earther’/’tangent to the curve’/’linear trend’

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      • #
        Bananabender

        The ancient Greeks knew the Earth was spherical. They even calculated the diameter with reasonable accuracy. The widespread belief in a Flat Earth is a total myth.

        00

    • #
      Prompete

      For some time now I have been asking warmista how can DENY the science? How is it that the preeminent temperature recording organisations, AND the IPCC (jenuflect here) are stating the mean average temperature is in stacis, despite the increase in CO2? Who precisely is the denialist?

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  • #

    Well it may be over for the IPCC but please don’t tell Channel 10. They are advertising a “The Project” segment with Dr. Andrew Rocheford tonight dealing with the inevitable unlivable future of our cities. Why? Well it’s going to be too hot and dry you unbelievers. The show hasn’t aired but I bet that there will be no Bob Carter or such to give a less alarmist view. Channel 10 is in the same league as Fairfax and their ABC. However the previous post tells us that maybe Fairfax is needing to adjust it’s position by publishing Tom Switzer’s piece. Their ABC however will never change no matter what real world data indicates. Apparently the true lefty can never be converted regardless of reality. Indeed they simply dig in or change their name. Lee Riannon for example went from being a Stalinist communist to a watermelon Green. Same philosophy different uniform.

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    • #
      William

      I shall avoid the Project tonight – my wife gets annoyed when I yell at the TV. The problem with the Project crew is that they think they are smarter and funnier than they actually are. But yes Lawrie, there will be no Bob Carter as Charlie Pickering refuses to countenance any view other than the warmist view that he so passionately holds dear.

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    • #
      Safetyguy66

      Well again they need to get their stories straight. Milne has been touting a hotter, wetter world for some time now. This diaspora of projected outcomes ranging from extreme droughts to unending rain doesn’t seem to raise any alarm bells for believers.

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    • #
      Mortis

      Green is the new Red

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        • #
          Bob Malloy

          United Nations climate chief Christiana Figueres said that democracy is a poor political system for fighting global warming. Communist China, she says, is the best model.

          And I laughed, and I laughed And I Lau………

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          • #
            PhilJourdan

            The wedge is developing. The greens and alarmists have always been on the same page. United for totalitarianism, and the extinction of man. But now the alarmists want to destroy the environment to save the world. The greens are going to love that! Remember the stench the Germans had to clean up in East Germany? How about Chernobyl?

            Reds do not care for the environment. There is no power there. So are the greens really green?

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  • #
    Bewitch

    When the town’s folk heard the boy cry wolf for the last time, they laughed whilst on the other side of the hill, the wolf who was real this time, ate him.
    There are many real environment issues which we should pay attention to. None of these relate to carbon dioxide and climate.
    The lobbyists who have repeatedly in the past and continue to cry wolf over an imagined climate catastrophe and every other issue they choose to adopt into their cause (often without supporting justification), will ultimately be responsible for a real environmental calamity someday because we will have stopped listening.
    Scientists are likely to be ranked with used car sales people, journalists and politicians at the bottom of the ladder when it comes to community perceptions of ethics and honesty. Many will lament the introduction of political correctness into the scientific profession.

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    • #

      agreed. Keep posting!

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    • #
      Safetyguy66

      Michael Chrichton maintained this is the main attraction of AGW to global administrative environmentalists. Its a problem they can bleat over and ask for money to fix, however the outcomes of the proposed solutions are as immeasurable as the problem itself, that’s the beauty of it.

      You will never see the same level of concern for a problem like pollution of China’s rivers, or deforestation in Indonesia because the outcome of those efforts to combat it can be measured. Thus entirely defeating the purpose of scamming the money in the first place.

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    • #
      Popeye

      “Scientists are likely to be ranked with used car sales people, journalists and politicians at the bottom of the ladder when it comes to community perceptions of ethics and honesty”

      Don’t forget LAWYERS!!

      Cheers,

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      • #
        Peter Miller

        Popeye

        Please remember there is a world of difference between the ethics and practices of real scientists and climate scientists.

        If the latter behaved like the former, there would be no CAGW, no attempt to geld the western world’s economies and no expenditure of almost $1.0 billion per day to achieve absolutely nothing.

        Sadly, there might also be no Jo Nova blog.

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      • #
        Tim

        Popeye. Please don’t denigrate lawyers. Their only problem is that 99% of them give the others a bad name.

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    • #
      william2

      Lawyers = Majority of Politicians, of all persuasions, Popeye.
      I wonder how long Maurice Newman will be allowed to keep his job ?

      00

    • #
      Geoffrey Cousens

      The potential of this[well described]problem will be irreparable damage to the future credibility of both scientists and politicians.If genuine danger is at hand,knowone will believe it.

      10

  • #

    I don’t think it is a co-incidence that Tony Abbott appointed Maurice Newman to the position of senior advisor nor is it a co-incidence that Mr. Newman has been creating an awareness, through the pages of the Australian, among the general public. His references to the dodgy science, crap journalism and subsidies are surely harbingers of a great shift in policy right at the top of Australian politics. Newman is signalling that dodgy Australian scientists are under the pump and that maybe they could start saving their own bacon by fessing up to the great fraud. He is telling the renewable industry that the days of subsidies and unquestioned building approvals are over. With Abbott’s statement about an enquiry into turbine caused health problems the writing is on the wall not only for the wind industry but also the research mob that gave it a clean bill of health despite findings from overseas. We have a government that is dealing in facts rather than emotions and that has to be a good thing.

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    • #
      scaper...

      Well, Abbott did say he would approach issues methodically. Good to see people here are realising a pattern. More to come out this year that will put a spring in our steps.

      I suspect the people who got a subsidised solar array on their roofs might be a bit pissed. Oh well…they can disconnect from the grid if they don’t like it!

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    • #
      Safetyguy66

      The pendulum swings.

      What the greens and warmistas are yet to fully appreciate is, it also swings back.

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    • #
      Ted O'Brien.

      Judging by the recent/current media hysteria you would think we had never seen a hot summer before.

      Locally we had our highest temp on record on 3rd January. That record dates from 1991. No mention of earlier records, which, of course, were recorded on more primitive systems.

      Methinks the hysteria is driven by the fear that the Abbott government is about to derail their gravy train.

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      • #

        You mean “never been hot in summer before”, don’t you?

        So far, without even looking at the data, it’s been a cool summer in Perth. Hot days have been wildly exaggerated. A new location of the “Perth” weather station is reaping record hot days. BoM pretends that it’s a continuous record.

        BoM incorrectly announces “heat waves” that don’t meant WMO definitions of heat wave (5 consecutive days at 5⁰C above average for the region) and perhaps not even CSIRO’s (3 consecutive days at the 95th percentile maximum or above). The media propagates the error. Pure churnalism.

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      • #
        Leigh

        Jo’s been on the case as well but I can’t find it.
        Its in here some where.
        This’ll give you a lead in.
        Get rid of the heat waves of yesteryear and every year is a potential “record” heat wave year.
        http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/07/04/the-australian-bureau-of-meteorology-gets-it-wrong/
        A hell of a of a lot of people thanks to JoNova,Bolt, Watts and so few others now understand the global warming fraud.
        But unlike them few realize the depth of the fraud.
        Till the politicians get the message that we do “get”it.
        Nothing much will change in the way massive amounts of taxpayer funds are trandsfered into the fraudsters pockets.
        Here’s another one that “slipped” through unchallenged.
        Again lowering the defination to suit the global warming “consensus”.
        Prior to decimalisation the definition of a heatwave was three consecutive days with a maximum above 100 degrees F. 100 Degrees F = 37.8 degrees C,
        Some where in the fraud this defination was quietly changed to three days above 35. Conversely, 35 degrees C = only 95 degrees F.
        It explains the “the more frequent” line that’s trotted out in relation to heat waves.
        The majority of “heat waves today” would not have even got a mention in yesteryear.
        Again, how many were aware of that little “trick”?

        30

  • #

    The poor darlings will have to draw their belts in real tight until the rise of the next scare. There will be a new scare, but not for at least a couple of years.

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    • #
      AndyG55

      I suspect that they will still seek to find tendrils from this one for quite a while.

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    • #
      Darkstar

      The poor darlings will have to draw their belts in real tight until the rise of the next scare. There will be a new scare, but not for at least a couple of years

      It’s water – and actually, they already started planting its roots a couple years ago

      http://drtimball.com/2013/water-is-replacing-climate-as-the-next-false-un-environmental-resource-scare/

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      • #
        john robertson

        But guaranteed to blow up in their face, so easy to mock.
        Ban DiHydrogen Monoxide.
        Or invite any concerned soul to demonstrate how water can be destroyed.(This is part of the meme, water is being destroyed.)
        Whats even dumber than a carbon based life form seeking to ban carbon?
        A water sack, moaning and whining about the water shortage of a planet 70% covered by water.
        Sunlight being the ultimate desalinization plant.

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      • #
        AndyG55

        “water-is-replacing-climate-as-the-next-false-un-environmental-resource-scare”

        hmmm… this could be fun..

        I’m a water engineer. 🙂

        Now, how to get on the right band-wagon! 😉

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    • #
      Geoffrey Cousens

      I think[yes, also H2O]that oxygen will be the next scare.Regulating the consumption of it could be just as costly as CO2.

      00

      • #
        AndyG55

        Sorry, but the next scare will definitely be something to do with NITROGEN

        Nitrogen, with carbon and oxygen, are the major building blocks of all life on Earth.

        Amino acids etc .

        It is also the most prevalent gas in the atmosphere, ….

        so is the obvious target.

        02

        • #
          Geoffrey Cousens

          No Andy,the left don’t like burning things,it leads to progress.Nitrogen is benign,its not going to turn vicious on you.Oxygen has endless possibilities.

          00

          • #
            AndyG55

            “Nitrogen is benign”

            So is CO2, but that hasn’t stopped them !! 🙂

            Well both are highly beneficial,, but the AGW bletheren will never admit that.

            00

        • #
          AndyG55

          oh look, 2 red thumbs.. have I hit on an alarmist secret, perhaps 😉

          00

  • #
    Safetyguy66

    Clearly the retaliation memo went out to ABC staffers last night.

    The morning news show was replete with assertions about the “record run of +40 days” in 3 states. Whoever it was reading out the newspaper headlines said “we are a curious little country, we are the last country in the world who doesn’t just accept AGW is real, in the rest of the world this debate is over”

    I texted to ask where this guy (ABC regular whos name is too insignificant to remember) was when we were discussing the ship stuck in the ice, but we all know the answer to that.

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    • #
      dlb

      His name is Eric Campbell an ABC foreign correspondent. He is lucky to be alive after a bomb blast in Iraq some years back. I used to enjoy his reporting, sadly my estimation of him has dropped after this morning. Very ignorant comments by a journalist who should know better.

      Perhaps almost as dumb as the journalistic team on ABCs “The Drum” this afternoon who took great delight in not having the foggiest idea on what wet bulb temperatures were. They giggled away like school kids hearing something with sexual connotations. Now I wonder if Bernie or Dr Karl would know?

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      • #
        Safetyguy66

        Yeah I saw that too. I did a whole unit on Heat Stress in my OHS Grad. Dip. so not only was I familiar with the term I have done the calculations(poorly). It was a pretty typical display of childish behavior from that team.

        10

        • #

          From what I’ve seen, the calculations for “heat stress” are full of fudge factors. Without those fudge factors, one would think that boilermakers working in confined spaces at 80⁰C (and more) with little ventilation because of shielding gases, would ever survive. And yet they did and still do. Apparently, being paid lots of money helps them. (FWIW: It wouldn’t help me.)

          When I studied Mech.Eng. there was an “intro” to airconditioning, determining operating requirements, heat pump energy calculations, comfort level, … A few things “stuck” well enough to be recalled 30+ years later, even if seldom-used.

          00

          • #

            Apologies. Premature posting.

            What I was going to say was that workers (and others) subjected to stress could carry “stress meters” that continually monitor their ability to dispose of excess body heat; on an individual basis, taking into account actual conditions and the body’s individual response to the conditions. There will still be fudge factors, but they don’t have to be so arbitrary and conservative.

            00

  • #
    mmxx

    Maurice Newman’s opening position (in your bolded paragraph above, Jo) is one that I and I know many others concur with.

    For more than 15 years, the observed and measured parameters just have not borne out what the climate modellers and activists have been relentlessly building into dire predictions for global climate.

    Hardly ever used wind farms for sale will soon be flooding the market. Their alternative energy worth has been grossly overestimated by eco-idealists.

    Just what alternative use is there for a used wind farm?

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    • #
      crakar24

      Mobile phone towers
      Micro wave links
      Massive sun dials
      Symbols of stupidity

      Thats all i got

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    • #
      Graeme No.3

      Mine it for the rare earths.

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    • #
      Bewitch

      As with all these green technologies, there are horses and there are courses. Many a remote location within Australia and on our surrounding island territories rely on diesel fueled electricity generation. These are all candidates for solar photo voltaics, wind or pocket hydro, where viable, that could supplement their existing generation capacity. Diesel generation (or indeed gas turbines for that matter) can be rapidly switched when these alternative systems come on or fall off stream. So these are all win-win outcomes for remote communities not on the grid.
      Further more, High Voltage power transmission suffers from energy losses due to heat and emf. Placing these systems, especially wind towers, along the length of the existing transmission network will top up these losses and hence reduce the energy inputs from the base load generation plants feeding the grid. A better visual outcome and a more efficient use of resources in my view.
      Just sayin..

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        • #
          AndyG55

          Yep, probably a good place for solar, with diesel or gas backup.

          Wind, not sure.. do they have much bird life up there ?

          The STUPIDITY of anyone thinking either solar or wind could ever replace solid, reliable coal and gas in a normal urban situation, really amazes me.

          Non-thinking jackasses!

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      • #
        cohenite

        Mini nukes are the way to go; even the Guardian endorses them!

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        • #
          AndyG55

          That’s a suggestion.. drop a mini-nuke on the Guardian, and the ABC.

          Then let the place get back to normality and common sense.

          (For anyone who takes this as a threat, its not.. I don’t have any mini-nukes) 🙂

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      • #
        Popeye

        In the days when many farms had no access to 240V electricity in Australia (my family farm was near Lock in SA) we had windmills which served two purposes.

        1 – pump bore water up from artesian bores for the sheep (and the pet cows).
        2 – charging batteries (32VDC)for lighting power only.

        We used to REALLY cop heaps if we left a light on in those days.

        What’s old is new again (as with many things).

        Cheers,

        90

      • #
        Fred Allen

        Bewitch: yes, there are some applicable niche operations for solar and wind generation, but most are best served by these systems charging batteries that then deliver a constant and steady, albeit short term, power supply. As a result, the energy supply is highly valued (expensive) and is used with highly adaptable and flexible demand. Similarly to Popcorn, I grew up with only roof-tank sourced water supplies. It’s similar in concept. Even in times of plenty, users are frugal because the long term lifestyle demands it. In droughts, rationing occurs.
        Diesel generation to a lesser extent, but gas turbines are best started and left running. These systems experience most wear and tear on start up and shutdown. The systems are sized on the basis of expected peak demand plus a little in reserve. Additionally, if they are used to backup or supplement wind and solar generation, they have to be running in advance of any reduction in wind or solar generation. It’s too late to turn them on when wind and solar supply diminish as with clouds or changes in wind speed. The traditional generation systems need to be running. And if the traditional systems are already running and generating electricity, what use is there for solar and wind generation on a shared grid?

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      • #
        Lawrie Ayres

        King Island in Bass Straight have a hybrid generation system. It utilises solar with sun tracking, wind and diesel. I did inquire about birds and bats but either they didn’t know or didn’t want to say. The straight islands have a great deal of wind from the southern ocean but less reliable sunshine.

        10

    • #
      Greebo

      Well, if they’re so worried about warming, perhaps they could feed power back into the things, turn ’em into fans, and cool the place down with a nice breeze. Might even attract small business, in the shape of gliding or ballooning clubs.

      Maybe attach gondolas to the blades and sell rides… wait, I think Melbourne tried that…

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    • #
      Kevin Lohse

      Remove the windmill blades and adapt the nacelles as nesting sites for raptors and bats to replenish the populations destroyed by operational windfarms?

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    • #
      Captain Dave

      Power them with nuke or fossil and cool off the countryside.

      00

  • #
    Rodzki

    Wait for the next counterattack from the bedwetters – there will be one. It will be increasing in shrillness and venom. It’s just the next phase of a ideological movement approaching its death throes.

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    • #
      Andrew

      My prediction: given their short attention span, the next enviro catastrophe will be windmills. I expect we’ll see WWF wailing that wind farms kill X million endangered birds and harm human health, calling for me to donate to the campaign to ban them.

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  • #
    aandbfields

    If CAGW is dying out, then it’s Back to Ocean Acidification I guess – ho hum

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  • #
    pat

    just posted Newman’s piece at WUWT, saying the CAGW debate has gone up a notch or two in Australia with this second Newman piece. didn’t realise Jo had begun this new thread.

    meanwhile, sky weather channel has gone from all-day programming titled “Torrid Heat” yesterday, to “Dangerous Weather” all day today, yet almost the all of Australia is experiencing totally normal weather, or even lower temps, like Darwin yesterday at 25.7 max, or Perth where it’s 24 degrees today according to the latest temp i’ve seen.

    so much still to clean up in the MSM, i’m afraid.

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    • #
      crakar24

      Saw the Watts comment Pat thought it was you well done.

      By the way i have been watching the Adelaide temps on the BOM site and something weird is happening.

      Adelaide peaked at 43.7 at 2:08
      Ade airport peaked at 42.3 at 12:43

      since then Ade has slowly dropped to 42.7 whilst the airport dropped to 36.7 and is now back up to 40.2. Must be a jet on the piano keys waiting for take off clearance.

      It is not possible to get these temp fluctuations naturally but rest assured it is HQ data.

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      • #
        • #

          I looked at the (dry bulb) temperatures AND the dew point temperatures and I’m not surprised that temperature rocket up so quickly as there is very little moisture in the air to store the additional heat due to heating by surface insolation.

          I mentioned the other day (oh… hang on. That was 2 years ago this from the day before yesterday) that just 10 grams of water in less than a cubic metre of air can make a difference of over 20⁰C to observed “temperature”.

          The thermodynamic response is however non-linear and multivariate because the cooler air removes heat more effectively from the surface, producing stronger natural, surface convection when it’s moist. The ‘heat engine” is more efficient, in line with Le Chatelier’s Principle. But because it’s cooled more easily by the surface convection, the surface directly radiates less heat to space than in dry air. The moist air doesn’t warm as much but stores more of the heat from the sun.

          The “result” is most evident once the sun goes down. Without the few grams of water per cubic metres of air, the night cools quickly towards the lower dewpoint.

          BTW: I note that wind directions were all over the place, even over short periods. As the station captures only one wind direction, I cannot say if that is due to external effects or due to marginal, hot-air, turbulent instability. You can see that in deserts in the form of “willy-willy” and similiar phenomena.

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        cohenite

        Haha, that’s great Craker. No wait, the BOM is where we get our official climate and weather data!

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      Safetyguy66

      Yeah I remember seeing Dennis Lillee pounding them out at the WACA in the 70s and doing it in 40+ but back then it was just called summer.

      http://youtu.be/NSkVzdsR4L8

      Ah those were indeed the days….

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  • #
    Sunray

    This is a very encouraging occurrence.

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  • #
    Frankly Skeptical

    h/t to Brice Bosnich and Don Aitken.

    Sure but it was already announced by Frankly Sceptical and others in the previous thread starting at 5.30am this morning.!;)To keep up to date watch and read the comments on Jonova’s web site (lol)

    Best regards Jo.



    Will fix Frankly! h/t to you too. Sorry. – Jo

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  • #
    Flat Earther

    I have heard wind turbines described as green crucifixes, and these should be retained for posterity as a religious icon for the climate change congregation.

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  • #
    Catamon

    [If it wasn’t for independent Murdoch newspapers around the world, the mainstream media would be almost completely captured by the IPCC establishment.]

    Yup, even better than the hilarity when OP’s here opine about media, the Australian now gets into seriously immodest self parody. Definitely, this one from Newman is a comment to be etched into the appropriate stone somewhere. 🙂

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    • #
      crakar24

      some things never change even though they should

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    • #
      AndyG55

      “is a comment to be etched into the appropriate stone somewhere”

      The gravestone the AGW scam.

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    • #
      AndyG55

      oh, and another little meaningless, trite, vacuous comment from the fur-brained one. !

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    • #
      Sean McHugh

      So why do you think it’s a bad thing for the public are of informed of things that are withheld by the MSM? Things like Climategate, the sea ice growing in the South Pole for 30 years, Tuvalu and the Maldives not sinking, the 15 year suspension of warming that’s contrary to all the models. Why should NO ONE make the public aware of that? How about the false plight of the polar bears, Tim Flannery’s very costly prediction failures, the inadequacy and huge expense of wind and solar power? How about the almost zero-difference that Labor’s carbon tax and emission targets would make to world temperature? Should the public NOT be made aware of such things, Catamon? If not, why not?

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    • #
      llew Jones

      Don’t think we’ll need to go looking for an appropriate stone somewhere.

      Given Newman’s status and his place in the present government’s plans, look for it to be firmly etched into the nation’s economy and consciousness.

      Cunning devil that Abbott. What was that Tony about using coal as far as the eye can see or something like that?

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    John Of Cloverdale WA

    I see among some of the reader comments in the Australian that Spencer is attacked, not on his work, but, because of his personal beliefs, and therefore, I presume, could not be trusted. I suppose, under that premise, we can ignore the work of Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Kepler, Planck, Faraday, etc…..
    It is frustrating that the left media are all the same when their ideology is threatened.

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      • #

        good god what appalling ignorance.

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        and I should add that I want to shout at most of the commentors, “Stop pretending that you understand evolution”. This is an advertisement for my blockbuster annual blog post as to linked in my name.

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          some appalling grammar/ proof reading by me

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          Winston

          And so Gee Aye,

          What makes you think YOU understand evolution?

          There has been a conspicuous lack of evidence to confirm you as any arbiter of the ignorance of others. Quite the opposite actually. You have an unblemished record of providing nothing but snide comments about others’ opinion, but little in the way of detail as to what you actually know or believe about any subject, and precisely what knowledge you have. It may be extensive, or it may be so much hot air.

          So, enlighten us by offering an erudite and enlightened opinion about evolution as you understand it, detailing how others specifically misunderstand it, and how you would enlighten the masses in the error of their ways. Dazzle me.

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          • #

            I could dazzle you, as those in Spencer’s comments section dazzler each other using 5 sentences of glib rhetoric and unsupported claims and pure ignorance to knock down Natural Selection, but I don’t and wont do that.

            What you are asking for requires pages of text and thankfully a great many more erudite people than me have already written those pages. Millions of them in fact including from Darwin to Fisher to Wright to Mayr to White to Lewontin to Maynard Smith and any one of dozens of text book writers.

            Is there a reason I should spend time and effort dazzling you in particular?

            15

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              Winston

              It would be nice for us to know whether you actually have the knowledge to back up your assertions, rather than merely claiming unspecified other “commentators”, “don’t understand” evolutionary theory in unspecified ways, and have made unspecified statements you don’t agree with (perhaps rightly) for unspecified reasons. I am therefore unclear from your post what it is you actually believe evolutionary theory to encompass, what it explains and what it doesn’t, what provisos and riders you would place upon the theory, and how others are showing “appalling ignorance” or a lack of understanding with respect to it.

              Otherwise, it is just aimless sniping without anything to back it up. Since you seem (almost pathologically) unprepared to offer an opinion regarding what you believe with respect to CAGW, and have yet to offer what you believe regarding evolutionary theory, how can anyone actually determine objectively whether your comment actually has any meaning or not?

              Obviously, Roy Spencer with a christian belief system is more likely to have a propensity to disagree with certain fundamental assertions of evolutionary theory and no doubt shapes his opinion there. That is his prerogative, and he is entitled to his opinion, whether right or wrong. I’m more interested in his opinion regarding climate and atmospheric physics since this is his area of expertise, and I couldn’t care less whether he believes in ghosts, water divining, iridology, naturopathy or any other faith based belief system. And as we have seen, the Christian faithful are well represented on BOTH sides of the CAGW debate.

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                I can see my posts annoy you but they are what they are and I wont be badgered into committing my time. Grab a higher university text on evolutionary biology and there you’ll find what I understand to be evolution. Grab Futuyma or Ridley Stearns and Hoekstra and throw in a good evolutionary genetics book like Hartl and Clark or Graur and Li.

                I agree regarding assessing Spencer’s analysis of climate on its merits. It is a problem for him though that in this post, in particular when engaging with evolution denying commenters, that he either ignores, is in denial of or is unaware of the 1000s of publications that present data that confirm the theory of natural selection as an explanation for observed evolution. If that is part of his character, how does he conduct objective research in other areas?

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                crakar24

                GA, let us assume that Spencer and yourself do not agree on the origins of man also let us agree that neither Spencer nor yourself are full bottle on the origins of man topic.

                However based purely on the point that Spencer has differing views to you about this subject everything else the man has to say can be dismissed.

                You are no better than Virus boy or all the other morons that have graced this site.

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              • #

                Craker you wrote at 11.09am

                However based purely on the point that Spencer has differing views to you about this subject everything else the man has to say can be dismissed.

                and I wrote at 11.00am

                I agree regarding assessing Spencer’s analysis of climate on its merits.

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                crakar24

                Yes GA but you forgot to cut and paste the extra bits where you said

                I agree regarding assessing Spencer’s analysis of climate on its merits. It is a problem for him though that in this post, in particular when engaging with evolution denying commenters, that he either ignores, is in denial of or is unaware of the 1000s of publications that present data that confirm the theory of natural selection as an explanation for observed evolution. If that is part of his character, how does he conduct objective research in other areas?

                ——————————————————————————–

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                Do you disagree that it is a problem? My opinion (observation), which is backed up by the fact that critics use it against him is that it is a problem. This has happened and I consider this a problem. I can observe this while still maintaining this:

                I agree regarding assessing Spencer’s analysis of climate on its merits.

                can you show me where, ever, I have written anything that shows this

                However based purely on the point that Spencer has differing views to you about this subject everything else the man has to say can be dismissed.

                Show me where I have dismissed his views.

                12

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                crakar24

                Ah yes i had forgotten what it is like to follow you down the rabbit hole where logic is suspended.

                Show me where I have dismissed his views.

                You state…………..If that is part of his character (ie he believes in a creator and refuses to accept evidence which you yourself accept) how does he conduct objective research in other areas?

                Now granted for an idiot like yourself the statement above does not implicitly state you have dismissed his views however for those of us that have a far greater and far more superior grasp of langauge and comprehension skills this is exactly what you are saying.

                As usually you will now fall strangely quiet and suddenly reappear elsewhere.

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              • #

                You state…………..If that is part of his character (ie he believes in a creator and refuses to accept evidence which you yourself accept) how does he conduct objective research in other areas?

                incorrect

                You ask…………..If that is part of his character (ie he believes in a creator and refuses to accept evidence which you yourself accept) how does he conduct objective research in other areas?

                correct.

                I did not make a statement.

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                crakar24

                Oh i get it, when you typed the words

                I agree regarding assessing Spencer’s analysis of climate on its merits. It is a problem for him though that in this post, in particular when engaging with evolution denying commenters, that he either ignores, is in denial of or is unaware of the 1000s of publications that present data that confirm the theory of natural selection as an explanation for observed evolution. If that is part of his character, how does he conduct objective research in other areas?

                You were not actually questioning his ability to hold an objective view in his area of expertise you were just asking the question “how does he conduct objective…….”

                I have the answer for you GA he can do it because he is a far, far better person than you.

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              • #
                crakar24

                What? I fail to see the relevance of the question but if you have to ask such a question then i suggest you have also answered it.

                30

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                PhilJourdan

                @Gee Aye

                1000s of publications that present data that confirm

                Not a single one confirms it. If even a single one did confirm it, it would be a fact, not a theory.

                However I am sure there are 1000s of publications that SUPPORT it.

                So whose religion is interfering with their science?

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                philip, I think you are confusing “hypothesis” with “theory” and I am unsure of what you define as fact. Evolution like gravity is the observation. Gravitational theory describes the observation of gravity as does natural selection (a theory) describe the observation of evolution. Scientists and lay people got this concept and prior to Darwin were trying to find a way to explain the observation. Please don’t start a double talk argument from ignorance or incredulity in order to confuse. I won’t buy into it and just refer you back to this post.

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                and Phil… stop pretending that you understand evolution and scientific method.

                01

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                PhilJourdan

                @gee Aye – first, get the name right. You can call me Phil, or Phillip. Note the spelling.

                Second. I know the difference between an hypothesis, theory and fact.

                Hypotheses are testable suppositions. Theories are hypothesis that have never been proven wrong even with repeated testing. And facts are things that have been proven correct. If you do not know the difference, I suggest you bone up on science 101.

                And I pretend nothing. I at least know the scientific method. You are still trying to discern the difference between theory and hypothesis.

                Evolution is a theory. It is not a fact. It has never been proven correct. But as a theory it has never been proven incorrect either.

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    Dave Broad

    There is still a long way to go yet. Watch the warmists ramp up the hand wringing, constant fallacious arguments & green agitprop.

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    Hitler did not rise to power when the Eugenics craze was at its peak

    Hitler rose to power when the Eugenics craze was waning in influence – when people were increasingly rejected Eugenics oriented candidates and policies at the ballot box.

    In their fear and desperation, the Eugenics fanatics turned to the one politician they thought they could trust – a politician who had been an ardent fan of the movement for decades, a politician who was determined to rebuild Germany on scientific principles, a man who had the motive and opportunity to create a showcase which the Eugenics movement could parade before an increasingly skeptical world.

    So they poured their remaining power, money and influence into bankrupt Weimar Germany, providing Hitler with a bottomless political campaign budget, and full access to what remained of their global influence.

    People didn’t join the NAZI party because they hated Jews, they joined the NAZI party because they wanted to eat regularly. And Hitler’s success and international influence – in the end, it was difficult not to listen to their benefactor, the one politician who seemed to have all the answers. And it was nice to believe that their current predicament was someone elses fault.

    http://www.michaelcrichton.net/essay-stateoffear-whypoliticizedscienceisdangerous.html

    Fanatics are like cornered rats – they are at their most dangerous when they think they have nothing to lose.

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    Mike Spilligan

    Turney and his “Spirit of Mawson” people will find the world has moved on quite a bit when they get back.

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      scaper...

      Wait till they get the bill for their jaunt on the ice!

      Oh, and the creditors don’t accept carbon credits as payment.

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      James (Aus.)

      Speaking of whom, I notice the Aurora Australis has just left Casey Station en route to Hobart.

      Let’s hope there are enough Tasmanians who feel like generously sharing some of their salad fruits with Turney as steps onto the wharf.

      Australia’s Antarctic Disgrace.

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        scaper...

        A waste of good food.

        Only in Tasmania, one can cop a double head butt from the one person simultaneously.

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        Greebo

        the Aurora Australis has just left Casey Station en route to Hobart.

        Meanwhile, the neudobnaya pravda, sorry, the Akademik Shokalskiy, has arrived in New Zealand. Turney and his cohorts could have simply stayed aboard. Save him a lot of face, and everyone else a lot of money…. What would Mawson have done?

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    Tim

    The Guardian now even recognises that carbon trading is infested with greed and dead in the water. But wait – there’s more – they’re promoting new solutions … (a Carbon Tax is one of the ‘options’.)

    Would that be mandatory and administered globally? Now that would be a nice little earner.

    http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/blog/why-are-carbon-markets-failing

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    Truthseeker

    I also accept carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas.

    Which is why the debate went for as long as it did. The fundamental flaw in the alarmist argument was that it went against known, verifiable physics. The argument dealt with questions of degrees (yes it works on a number of levels) rather than invalidating the whole structure which is built on very loose sand.

    The trouble is, I cannot reconcile the claims of dangerous human CO2 emissions with the observed record.

    Maybe because the previous statement is wrong … just maybe …

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    pat

    something for Mr. Newman to advise the Govt to cancel, which involves taxpayer money, the ABC & a bunch of CAGW zealots:

    Apidae Development Innovations: The A2C2 (Action Against Climate Change)
    project is a collaboration between PACMAS and the Pacific-Australia Climate
    Change Science and Adaptation Planning (PACCSAP) Program and aims to
    showcase “voices of youth” to raise awareness about local climate change
    solutions. It is a partnership between the Australian Broadcasting
    Corporation through the Australian Aid-funded PACMAS, the Australian
    Government Department of the Environment, and implemented by Apidae
    Development Innovations.
    http://apidae.com.au/A2C2/

    Apidae Development Innovations – Who We Are
    Joelle Auffray, Founder
    Adam Bumpus, Advisor
    Angus Harvey, Advisor
    http://apidae.com.au/who-we-are/

    2011: Facebook: MakePovertyHistory Media Release: Australians Challenge
    Politicians to Keep their Promise
    “At present, Australia’s aid spend is roughly equal to one cup of coffee a
    week for every Australian” said Rev. Tim Costello, Co-Chair of Make Poverty
    History and CEO of World Vision Australia…
    For comment contact:
    Joelle Auffray
    Campaign Coordinator
    MAKE POVERTY HISTORY
    https://www.facebook.com/notes/make-poverty-history/australians-challenge-politicians-to-keep-their-promise/261079663927823

    The Conversation: Adam Bumpus
    Assistant Professor at University of Melbourne
    Adam is an Assistant Professor in Geography and the Environment at the
    University of Melbourne, and is the initiator and international lead on the
    Carbon Governance Project workshop series. His work focuses on international
    climate finance, low carbon development, connectivity and innovation, with a
    strong focus on the links between international climate change policy on
    climate finance and its local effects in developing countries. Previously he
    was a Research Fellow at the ISIS research centre at the Sauder School of
    Business, University of British Columbia (UBC), and held Visiting Scholar
    positions at both the University of California, Santa Cruz and at UBC’s Liu
    Institute for Global Issues. Adam completed a doctorate at the University of
    Oxford’s Environmental Change Institute in 2009, where he researched the
    social and environmental implications of international carbon offsets. In
    addition to academic work, he is also the founder and CEO of The Climate
    Consultancy, which assists companies, governments and intergovernmental
    agencies in progressive approaches to carbon management and low carbon
    development and a member of the start up social enterprise, Greeenstar…
    http://theconversation.com/profiles/adam-bumpus-10846/profile_bio

    Uni of Melbourne: Carbon Tax experts available for comment
    Technology: Dr. Adam Bumpus
    http://newsroom.melbourne.edu/news/n-836

    LinkedIn: Angus Harvey, Environmental Consultant
    Past:
    Production Manager at Global Policy
    Senior Research Officer at LSE Global Governance
    Project Manager at Sustainable RIO
    He is a 2013 Fellow at the Centre for Sustainability Leadership in Melbourne, and has published a number of books and research articles on environment and sustainability, including Climate Governance: Science, Economics, Politics and Ethics, a book that Dr Rachendra Pachauri (Chairman of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) described as a “must-read for anyone interested in climate policy.” …
    Designed an online media showcase for the A2C2 (Action Against Climate Change) project, a PACMAS initiative showcasing ‘voices of youth’ to raise awareness about local climate change solutions in Samoa, Vanuatu, Tuvalu and Kiribati…
    http://www.linkedin.com/in/gussa

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    pat

    of course, the govt funds these things & the propaganda flows, much to everyone’s annoyance!

    Sept 2013: Radio Australia (ABC): Empowering Samoan youth on climate change
    Samoan youth in Apia are getting ready to speak out about climate change.
    Speaker: Joelle Auffray, A2C2 or Action Against Climate Change, Apidae.
    http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/international/radio/program/pacific-beat/empowering-samoan-youth-on-climate-change/1184263

    August 2013: PINA (Pacific Islands News): Samoan youth get ready to “speak
    out” about climate change
    Stories about ducks and a turtle, cyclones and floods are being shared with
    Samoan high school students at a training workshop in Apia, for the A2C2
    project (Action Against Climate Change).
    For the 30 students from three schools who are attending the workshop, it is
    the start of a three-month journey to create media products such as mini
    TV-documentaries, radio programs or newspaper stories, about climate change
    and its impacts on Samoa…
    A2C2 is a collaboration between Apidae Development Innovations, AusAID and
    the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), and funded by the Australian
    Government Department of Industry, Innovation, Climate Change, Science,
    Research and Tertiary Education…
    http://www.pina.com.fj/?p=pacnews&m=read&o=1158035902521fe9c1107a4d27942e

    March 2013: ABC: Pacific warriors campaign against climate change
    Young people from 14 Pacific Island nations have called for action against climate
    change as part of the 350.org Pacific Warrior Day of Action
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-03-04/pacific-warriors-climate-change-action/4550898

    BOM: Pacific-Australia Climate Change Science and Adaptation Planning
    Program
    Small islands around the world are facing serious and immediate challenges
    from climate change.
    Many people living in the Pacific islands and East Timor report their
    climate is changing. Climate variability and change present challenges for
    economic activities, such as agriculture and tourism, as well as individual
    livelihoods and ecosystems…
    The PACCSAP is actively engaging with 15 partner countries and regional
    stakeholders to build their capacity to effectively apply the results and to
    build the climate science knowledge base…
    http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/pacific/index-pacific.shtml

    5 Dec: TheJet: Pacific youth share their stories in new climate change media
    Twenty-two pieces of compelling, youth-driven media were launched
    internationally today as part of the Australian Aid-funded PACMAS initiative
    A2C2 (Action Against Climate Change). These media pieces include TV, radio,
    online and print stories on climate change science and solutions. The
    productions are now being disseminated through a new website
    (www.apidae.com.au/A2C2/) dedicated to sharing the ‘voice of Pacific youth’
    on climate change…
    http://thejetnewspaper.com/2013/12/05/pacific-youth-share-their-stories-in-new-climate-change-media/

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    A C of Adelaide

    I thought the Spirit of Mawson event was the best thing that happed at Christmas since 0 AD, but Tony Thomas’ article in Quadrant takes humour to an all new level.

    The irony

    Who would believe that people taken in by one scam would become serial dupes?

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    handjive

    Here is a GREAT CATCH from John Ray @Greenie Watch.
    .
    That “100 months” prophecy

    “In early January 2006 the BBC held a sort of Old Fashioned Revival Hour in which top BBC people got together with top Greenie fanatics and helped prop up one-another’s belief that Global Warming was the One True Faith. You can read about it here.

    One little excerpt from the report of what went on there fascinated me:

    “Andrew Simms of the New Economics Foundation, who argued there were only 100 months left to save the planet

    100 months is 8 years and 4 months and if we count forward from then we arrive at April 2014.
    We’re nearly there!
    But the planet looks much the same as it did in 2006 so it looks like Simms is yet another Warmist false prophet.

    But the planet may have a reprieve.
    In August 2008 Simms said we still had 100 months at that time! I wonder what refined calculations went into that revision?

    Warmists are such clowns. Perhaps we should not berate them too heavily. Laughing at them is a bit like laughing at the disabled. Their mental fixations certainly disable their reasoning powers (if any)”
    .

    Great catch, JR.
    Mark it in your books folks.

    The party ends in April!
    (my bold & emphasis. Links to quote @GreenieWatch)

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      mmxx

      I just went to mark my calendar as the end of time for the Earth and humankind. I wanted to cancel my subscriptions for everything to finish before then.

      The preferred date in early April 2014 was 1 April.

      My smart calendar told me to stop fooling around as that is April Fools’ Day.

      The 100 month prophesy could have been an attempted BBC sleeper computer virus, maybe?

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    ROM

    Over my 75 years of watching people and life go by I have become somewhat of a believer in the “Pendulum Principle.”
    Now you won’t find much mention at all of the Pendulum Principle on the internet but there is the odd mention and they mostly describe the way I think of it

    To quote one of those examples ;

    The pendulum swings, and it almost always swings back. It rarely swings all the way back to its original starting point, but tends to come to rest someplace in a new, healthier middle.

    It is my way of describing the great swings from sometimes extreme positions or attitudes to counter and opposite positions or attitudes that occurs so regularly in history, both past and present.

    I have also used another very ordinary everyday life experience to describe the rise and fall of organisations, of empires and of financial, media and business empires.

    When you see a business organisation or a socially based highly discretionary, propaganda laden quasi political movement or a political empire or any other similar organisation that seems unstoppable in their rise in power and influence, like a very grandiose but aging building that domimnates the skyline, go looking in the basement for the “white ants”, those hidden factors, at least hidden while the climb in power and influence and wealth is underway, that will already be busy undermining the entire grandiose structure, mostly in ways that few will ever immediately recognise.

    And those “white ants”, whatever form they may take, as they steadily undermine the very structure and foundations of those empires will almost invariably lead to the collapse of the whole rotten grandiose structure and it’s ultimate abandonment except for a few diehards who are left to cling on to their dreams.

    The whole Catastrophic Global Warming / climate change / etc movement and the grossly corrupted so called climate science and it’s practitioners are now reaching the extreme [ ist ] end of the swing of that Great Pendulum.

    And as that Great Pendulum of human affairs is rapidly slowing before it begins or perhaps has already begun the great swing back to the opposite side with all the consequences that spells out for the believers in the CAGW meme, the corrupted and ethics free individuals whom used it to push their own personal, political and social agenda’s and their hordes of “running dogs” as the communist called them, who have abandoned any pretense at honesty and integrity in their science along with most of the MSM and politics as well, who have leapt upon the CAGW band wagon in their own highly ambitious, self aggrandizing quest to enhance their own personal prospects for advancement and influence and power in the community.

    All will be marked, some very savagely indeed in some way as that pendulum swings back into the opposite side and those who were spat upon and discriminated against, the “Deniers” of the past purely because they believed in and despite all the CAGW zealots filth that was thrown at them, stuck to their ethics, their principles and maintained their personnel honesty and integrity, they will be the ones who will become honored and respected and trusted and believed by the populace, the politicals and the world of non climate science.

    When those who stayed true to science and themselves start to get the upper hand in power and influence there will be a time of great reckoning for all those so called climate scientists and climate researchers and the media and politicians and their running dogs in the quasi green environmental organisations and in the media, politics and commerce.

    No doubt in some quiet backwaters and hidden science enclaves, lists of the worst of those CAGW zealots and those who produced and promoted totally fabricated and grossly corrupted science and what was lyingly passed of as peer reviewed climate science are already appearing on some of those lists.

    Donna Laframboise [ No Frakking Consensus blog ] in her research into the AR4 has already identified a whole range of green activists and activists climate scientists who produced non peer reviewed and claimed but unproven climate science based only on unsubstantiated hypothesis which were presented by the IPCC activist scientists as unchallengeable peer reviewed climate science that upheld all the worst fears of an anthopogenically created catastrophic global warming.

    Climate science and those practitioners of corrupted science and climate science agenda’s will become the pariahs of the science world as will many a well lettered graduate of radical green left wing environmental and climate science courses who assumed they would get well connected jobs and positions which they had anticipated would establish them on the public gravy train for life.
    Life will become hard indeed as few will by then want to employ somebody who has only graduated in a vapourious subject like “Environmental management” as I warned one young green zealot not that long ago.

    Judith Curry [ Climate Etc ] has already had in a number of posts on what the probable collapse of the global warming faith and climate warming science will mean for science generally.
    And the consensus of opinion was that it had every chance of being disastrous as the public and thereby the politicals also lose faith and confidence that science is prepared and will provide the facts as they are known and without prejudice or bias. or attempting advocacy.

    Science will survive. It is an irreplaceable part of our civilisation and it’s advancement but if Science itself does not clean out it’s own Augean Stables then society and the politicals will do the job for Science and Science as we know it today will be transformed into something much, much smaller and lose most of it’s prestige and most of it’s influence for the next couple of generations.

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      ROM… you sure write a lot of words in your posts. I assume that the pendulum rest somewhere that is comfortable and acceptable to you as you are right. Just as your substantiation for everything you write is right. Let’s just look at the evidence you’ve provided for your various assertions and homilies in the last post. Comfortingly it is about the same as in your other posts.

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      Sonny

      Thanks for the great insights! 😉

      20

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    Bananabender

    Newman is someone from outside science, telling scientists what science is, and he’s right:

    Let’s be honest. The entry scores to university science courses have been laughably low for the past 20 years. The result is that we now have a lot of hardworking but not very bright people in academia. They wouldn’t know what real science was if it bit them on the bum.

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      Sonny

      Yup, and guess who works the least and parties the most out of any faculty on campus?
      The science faculty.

      10

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    Gordon Cheyne

    The scam is alive and well, as the US Navy seeks more money to protect the ice-free arctic sea lanes:
    “US navigates Arctic security as ice cap melts”
    THE US faces a bill of tens of billions of dollars if it is to protect lucrative shipping lanes through the Arctic that are forecast to open up for the first time when channels of the polar ice cap thaw in the next 12 years.”
    see The Australian and the Times.

    20

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      kindletot

      Can you really blame them? The Navy’s budget is being slashed to pay for AGW-type subsidies and other vote-buying schemes. When it is raining soup, don’t argue the meteorological basis of the phenomena, grab a bucket!
      (of course it is unethical. It is politics!)

      20

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  • #
    Geoff Sherrington

    Here’s an exercise for those inclined.
    At this URL you will find a spread sheet with Melbourne Regional and a few nearby urban weather stations, reporting monthly Tmax since start year 2005 to end 2013.
    Then there is a dissection of daily Tmax for year 2013.
    Have a look at comparisons from site to site and tell me how we can discern changes of 0.1 deg C in global temperatures, when stations close together are not so close in data.
    Tell us why the stations diverge over time. Is it UHI? Is it buildings affecting wind patterns? Is it adjustments to data?
    The data are from the BoM website with a half dozen outliers removed.

    http://www.geoffstuff.com/MELB%20FIDDLING.xlsx

    30

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    Peter C

    instead of scientists and deniers, there the public starts to see the argument is about shades of grey. The real debate has never been about whether greenhouse gases were real, instead it’s about how much global warming will happen.

    Well the pendulum is swinging but who knows where it will end up.

    Three days ago on 12 Jan Dr Ira Glickstein wrote a guest post at Watts up with That, titled “Global Warming is Real but not a Big Deal”. It has attracted about 250 comments so far, which is a lot for a single post on that blog. The great majority of the comments reject the Greenhouse Gas Effect Theory, which Dr Glickstein had so patiently explained.

    These deniers (as they sometimes labelled themselves) are not Trolls. They were not making a co ordinated response. Some gave reasons for rejecting the Greenhouse Gas Effect Theory.

    So the pendulum probably will not swing to the middle. The real debate might just be starting.

    30

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      AndyG55

      I assure you that the Greenhouse Gas HYPOTHESIS has lots of detractors.

      Mostly these people come from energy transfer or high level physics backgrounds.

      20

  • #
    janama

    Here’s an interesting file for you to ponder,

    Matt Ridley and Freeman Dyson on fracking.

    20

  • #
    Mark Hladik

    Totally O/T, but needs wide distribution:

    Prominent (U. S.) radio talk show host makes this assertion about capitalism vs. socialism:

    “In capitalism, the rich get powerful; in socialism, the powerful get rich.”

    Regards to all,

    Mark H.

    40

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      Rereke Whakaaro

      Mark,

      That is an old quote – from around the early 1930’s.

      But then, it wasn’t Capitalism, it was Fascism. And that actually makes much more sense, because in both systems the people without the power end up being equally suppressed and downtrodden.

      Nobody wants a downtrodden underclass in Capitalism. Capitalism needs consumers to survive, and the more they consume the better Capitalism thrives.

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        Mark Hladik

        Thanks Rereke,

        I was unaware of the previous use of it; I shall endeavor to advise the ‘prominent talk-show host’ that his insight is actually old wisdom.

        Totally agree with your last sentence. As we say on this side of the Big Pond, “You da MAN!!!!!”

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    janama

    we have a reply:

    “So, Mr Newman, I am prepared to put $10,000 on the line that the Earth’s average surface air temperature in a three-year average (2013-15 compared with 2033-35) will be warmer 20 years from now.

    Ten thousand dollars is a lot of money to me, but since I am about 99 per cent sure that the Earth is warming due to anthropogenic causes, it seems a deal too good to pass up.”

    Brian Schmidt is a distinguished professor, Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow and astrophysicist at the Australian National University’s Research School of Astronomy & Astrophysics (Mount Stromlo Observatory). He is a joint winner of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics

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    janama

    The Nobel Prize in Physics 2011 was divided, one half awarded to Saul Perlmutter, the other half jointly to Brian P. Schmidt and Adam G. Riess “for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the Universe through observations of distant supernovae”.

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    janama

    I tried to make a reply but The Australian wouldn’t accept my comment for some reason despite my being a fully paid up subscriber.

    So here it is:

    Brian, I do hope you are right because a warmer world is a better world, food crops thrive, the biomass expands as the deserts shrink, extreme weather and droughts are reduced and fewer people die from the cold.

    Unfortunately the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) indicates we are in for a negative cycle which historically means cooling. I find it hard to understand how the oceans have suddenly decided to take up the heat since there’s no evidence in the 3000 Argo Buoys that the heat has passed through the top 2 km of the oceans as the ocean temperatures have remained steady since they were released back in 2003 and The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) says the long wave radiation to space has been increasing. Even the IPCC offers no empirical evidence for their ocean heat theory.

    The Nobel Prize in Physics 2011 was divided, one half awarded to Saul Perlmutter, the other half jointly to Brian P. Schmidt and Adam G. Riess “for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the Universe through observations of distant supernovae”.

    Personally I wish you’d offered to bare your a*** in Martin Place at lunchtime as it would be much more fun than a simple anonymous money transfer.

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      AndyG55

      “Personally I wish you’d offered to bare your a*** in Martin Place at lunchtime as it would be much more fun than a simple anonymous money transfer.”

      ummm.. do remember that this guy will be nearly 70 when the bet matures, and Lindzen will be mid 90’s.

      Be careful what you wish for ! 🙂

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    Mortis

    CAGW = Y2K

    My new bumper sticker

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      Joe V.

      Y2K was a significant invocation of the precautionary principle. It wasn’t so much based on how much could go wrong, but that in the things that could go wrong the consequences could be unpredictable, but in the meantime there was stuff that could be done to have a tangible effect in reducing the possibility of these things going wrong in the first place. Whereas action on Global Warming is just so much pi$$ing in the wind.

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    Stonyground

    Having followed the global warming debate for quite a long time now, I tend to be a bit cautious about deciding that the game is up for CAGW. There have been lots of times when I have thought that surely the bubble must be about to burst, and yet here we are, still battling on. Sometimes I wonder if it will happen in my lifetime. At other times I look forward to seeing those who screamed the ‘D’ word the loudest squirm when it becomes irrefutable that the deniers were right all along. There is of course a delicious irony in the fact that the alarmists are moving inexorably towards a state of denial themselves as, one by one, the doomsday predictions fail to come true.

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    PhilJourdan

    In the meantime, childish personal attacks on those who point out flaws in IPCC reasoning and advice only increase scepticism

    Their inability to believe they can be wrong is a direct cause of their derision, and their eventual undoing.

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    • #
      manalive

      Yeah, one big fat straw man, a Nobel Laureate in Physics isn’t capable of forming a rational argument, it seems.

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    davey street

    There’s a piece in the Oz newspaper today from an eminent Professor of Astrophysics at ANU offerring a bet of $10,000 with Newman that the earth will be warmer in 2033. I wrote back to the Oz suggesting this amount should be altered to $250,000 if this astrophysicist is serious about his bet as opposed to running a pr media stunt. I pointed out that $10,000 was probably a couple of weeks pay from ANU for such an exalted “distinguished professor, Australian research Council Laureate fellow and astrophysicist at the ANU’s blah blah blah and a joint winner of a Nobel prize. What has astrophysics got to do with anthropogenic climate change I as a mere mortal dare to ask of Mr Brian Schmidt, who claims global warming should be measured by oceanic temperature measurement and not air temperatures. It seems the warmists and those creationists being handed huge amounts of public monies for alternative forms of energy will get anyone in on the act to keep the funds flowing.

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    Simon

    The collective group-think on this website is astonishing. Are you guys aware that out of 2258 peer-reviewed articles published between November 2012 and December 2013 only one explicitly rejected human-driven global warming? http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/01/14/climate_change_another_study_shows_they_don_t_publish_actual_papers.html

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      Joe V.

      Sure there has been warming and there may be some more on the way, after this present hiatus of now going on 17 years, and yes man has probably contributed somewhat to what has occurred in the last century, but there it isn’t going to be catastrophic and there is sod all we could do about it if it was, as the CO2 it the atmosphere continues to rise unabated despite all the money making schemes politicians can dream up. So sit back & enjoy the sunshine and deal with the problems that do arise as and when and if they do. Action on Global Warming is so much pi$$ing in the proverbial, at best.

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        crosspatch

        Well, according to Trainbreath there really has been no hiatus. The heat has been sneaking (La Ninja style) into the Hadley Heat Hidey Hole and as soon as the sun returns to normal, it is going to suddenly spring out (El Ninjo style) and boil the oceans away and roast us alive on our sun decks.

        So it is of absolutely vital importance that you empty your bank account immediately and send it all to various third world despots and anyone making windmill parts. It’s our only hope.

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          crakar24

          When the sun returns to normal? maybe this is normal for the sun for the next 100 or so Kyrs?

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            AndyG55

            According to this paper, during the last half of last century, when there may have been a small amount of warming, the sun was actually in a “Grand Maximum” phase, very NOT normal.

            Now Sol seems to have dropped to a much quieter, possibly below normal, phase.

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              crakar24

              Well Andy here is the latest theory on what is going on.

              As we all know whether the sun is in a grand maximum or indeed a grand minimum not much changes well TSI at least so the age old argument is “The changes in TSI are not great enough to create the change in temps so it must be CO2” remember we are talking about 0.8C over 120 years or so.

              However we do know that every time the sun is in either of these two states it gets really hot or really cold in the places where we actually have thermometers ie the NTH hemisphere and those rare places in the Sth hemisphere for proxy data.

              So what is it about the sun that causes these changes? It turns out that there is one really big change in the sun and that is the amount of UV radiation. As we know UV strikes the atmosphere and interacts with Ozone thus causing the stratosphere to warm, maxima = more UV = warmer stratosphere opposite for minima.

              The temp of the stratosphere controls the position of the jet stream in both hemispheres, maxima pushes jet stream more north (NTh H) and more south (sth H), minima has opposite effect. The jet stream dictates the boundary of the Ferrell and polar cells.

              So when in grand minima like maunder/sporer/wolf and modern (has it been named yet) UV levels drop, stratosphere cools, jet stream moves south allowing the polar cell to drop lower over Europe and push up northerly towards Australia/NZ etc.

              We can see this happening now with teh freezing conditions in Europe, Antarctic sea ice broke summer sea ice extent last year and is on track to break it again this year. Arctic had plenty of summer sea ice last year etc, etc.

              Now imagine if this is the “normal” state of the sun and we get this type of weather in Nth H for say 1000 years would it look just like an ice age?

              Cheers

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                AndyG55

                There is also the issue that more energetic SW radiation, slightly higher frequencies, WILL penetrate further into the ocean surface. Even a small change in frequency distribution of SW radiation during a solar maximum could cause a sufficient change in energy absorption.

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                crakar24

                I am not sure what you mean, the IR that leaves the surface bounces around for a while etc cannot penatrate beyong one micron or so, if you mean visable light then that does not change much from min to max not enough to make a difference, we are talking about two different things really.

                The UV theory i suppose will have some effect on temps as the stratosphere is cooler but not by much i dont think its greatest effect is shifting the jet streams so if 99% of your thermometers are in an area which can cool and warm not throughan increase or decrease in heat (global) but merely through redistrubution then it will appear as a heating.

                If you are fixated with the idea that AGW will cause warming and you see the temp go up then it is AGW, when the temp goes down the heat is missing.

                How can AGW cause cold records and hot records at the same time……..it cant but redistrubution can.

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                crosspatch

                I am more a fan of Svensmark’s hypothesis. Increased solar magnetic field and solar wind acts to sweep the inner solar system of Galactic cosmic rays (GCR). When the sun is weaker, these highly energetic particles penetrate in greater numbers into the inner solar system as shown by various neutron count sensors around the world. These particles apparently impact the atmosphere almost like a cue ball impacting a rack of billiards creating a shower of sub-particles that act as cloud nuclei. All it takes is a 1% change in clouds to account for enough global albedo change to effect the observed temperature change tracking with solar activity.

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                AndyG55

                http://ies.jrc.ec.europa.eu/uploads/fileadmin/Documentation/Reports/Global_Vegetation_Monitoring/EUR_2006-2007/EUR_22217_EN.pdf

                There are definite difference in the penetration of UV and visible light in sea water (see figure 1.1.1) If the there is a change in balance increasing say 300nm wavelength in preference to 400nm wavelength, the penetration can be nearly an order of magnitude bigger.

                Furthermore, if there is organic matter in the penetration layer. eg algae, energy is absorbed and held in the oceans.

                I suspect that the changes in UV output from the sun can actually have a major effect on ocean heating.

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                AndyG55

                Another paper that gives some clues to the possible effects of changes of UV radiative frequency.

                http://www.int-res.com/articles/meps/144/m144p109.pdf

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                AndyG55

                ps , Steve McIntyre is also interested in this ignored aspect. http://climateaudit.org/2005/05/22/penetrating-radiation/

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      AndyG55

      “2258 peer-reviewed articles published between November 2012 and December 2013 only one explicitly rejected ”

      And you talk about us having collective group-think…

      Seriously ???????????

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      AndyG55

      And Simon, is there even ONE of these papers that explicitly proves AGW ?

      Or do all those that do actually mention it, just accept it, like good little pseudo-scientific lemmings?

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      bobl

      Why would you reject anything if the acceptancebofny I ur next grant depended on acknowledging it for example, I have two proposed projects.

      Forecasting human disease load
      or
      Forecasting human disease load factoring in human caused climate change

      Which one is gonna get funded?

      Decided?

      Now consider, both of these are Exactly the same work….

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      PhilJourdan

      You do realize that in CGI, the team said they would not allow any papers that do not conform to their meme to be published, correct?

      And I am surprised that a single paper claimed humans have NO effect on the climate. Even snails have an effect. The magnitude is the issue.

      Use that thing on your shoulder for something more than a hat rack.

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      Geoffrey Cousens

      Simple Simon ,its called the “snouts in trough”phenomenon.

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    crosspatch

    The IPCC are already worried. There is currently a motion making its way up through the various committees of the UN to change its name to the Incontrovertible Panel on Climate Change in an effort to stem the damage.

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      crakar24

      How about Ineffectual PCC, or Incompetent, Incorrigible, Inept, Independant (my comic side showing through), Intrepid (again my comic side), or better still the International Plutocratic Cash Collectors?

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    macha

    This is probably slightly off the current thread, but am I right in assuming this article is claimed models have “proven” CO2 no-longer lags behind temperature?

    http://scienceofdoom.com/2014/01/16/ghosts-of-climates-past-twelve-gcm-v-ice-age-termination/

    hmmm. I guess its nice to read about more non-CO2, non-manmade factors being included in the models to support historical global temperature reconstructions. Soon am I to see inclusion of solar, clouds, planetary postion, etc. etc.

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    Graeme No.3

    macha:
    that is what they are trying to prove.
    NOTE: it is all models and even there own side is questioning those models.

    The idea is that the end of the ice age comes when the Milankovitch cycle causes increased sunshine at 65ºN. That has always been accepted by many, but the problem is that the ice records show the temperature rise before the CO2 rise (standard science as it needs heat to warm oceans to release CO2) and that doesn’t suit the CO2 causes warming mob. So they’ve come up with the idea that the southern hemisphere heats first releasing CO2 which heats the northern hemisphere, thus saving AlGore’s face.

    Quite how increased sunlight on the northern hemisphere (and less on the southern) causes warming down south I don’t know. Possibly it involves a mobile tropospheric hot spot or perhaps release of stored heat from the ocean depths (it being well known in THE SCIENCE that an up-welling of water at 1.5ºC will cause the air temperature to jump to 20 or 30 degrees).

    The other objection I have is that if you look at the ice cores and the end of the interglacials, the temperature drops well before the CO2 does. Around 1900 years before. If you move the CO2 rise 800 years earlier in the cycle, then the gap at the end becomes closer to 3000 years.

    So their ideas seem to be CO2 will get it up but can’t keep it up. Bang goes that money making idea.

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    bobl

    (it being well known in THE SCIENCE that an up-welling of water at 1.5ºC will cause the air temperature to jump to 20 or 30 degrees)

    You really should put a /sarc tag on such statements, lest you find it touted in the MSM or their ABC as fact

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    macha

    Graham No 3.
    Yes, indeedy. I have been following this for some years and have read heaps on the info you refer to.
    I should have put the /sarc. into my comments, because my intended point was that it appears the ice core (etal) “data” showing the ~800yr lag is being challenged by “remodelling” other factors so teh lag dissappears. Hence ammo against the anti-CAGW crowd. (and yes, I am one of those anti-CAGW crowd).

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    Geoffrey Cousens

    As these wretches[agw crowd]are forced to recant litigation will surely follow.Companies have been made to retool,insurance companies a a long list of genuine complainants will clutter up civil and criminal courts for years to come.

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    Mardler

    Far from its days being numbered, the IPCC goes from strength to strength. See yesterday’s further “it’s worse than we thought” announcement.

    Three CAGW meme is spreading and growing stronger despite very mild economic policy changes by a handful of governments.

    Only the deluded claim that the warmists are losing: they’re not, they’ve already won!

    (I post as along term, disappointed, CAGW sceptic who believes that we need another approach.)

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