I was invited to be on the Murnaghan programme on Sky News this morning – which I always find a great deal more intelligent than the Andrew Marr alternative on the BBC. I declined because I did not want to get up and get a 7.30am train from Ramsgate on a Sunday morning. I had a meeting until 11.30pm last night planning a conference on human rights in Balochistan [I still tend to say Baluchistan], and I have a newly crowned tooth that seems not to want to settle down. But I am still worried by my own lack of energy, which is uncharacteristic. Is this old age?
I also have some serious work to do on my Burnes book, and next week I shall be staying in London to be in the British Library reading room for every second of its opening hours. So there may be a bit of a posting hiatus. I have in mind a short post on an important subject on which I suspect that 99% of my readership – including the regular dissident commenters – will strongly disagree with me.
This is a peculiarly introspective post, perhaps because my tooth is hurting, but I seem to have this curmudgeonly spirit which wishes to react to the huge popularity of this blog by posting something genuinely held but unpopular; a genuine view but one I don’t normally trumpet. The base thought seems to be “You wouldn’t like me if you really knew me”.
Similarly when I wrote Murder in Samarkand I was being hailed as a hero by quite a lot of people for my refusal to go along with the whole neo-con disaster of illegal wars, extraordinary rendition and severe attacks on civil liberties, sacrificing my fast track diplomatic career as a result. My reaction to putative hero worship was to publish in Murder in Samarkand not just the political facts, but an exposure of my own worst and most unpleasant behaviour in my private life.
I am in a very poor position to judge, but I believe the result rather by accident turned out artistically compelling, if you don’t want to read the book you can get a good idea of that by clicking on David Tennant in the top right of this blog and listening to him playing me in David Hare’s radio adaptation.
Anyway, that’s enough musing. You won’t like my next post, whenever it comes. Promise.
The earth would not be very hard to nuture, it cleans and renews itself habitually. But about a billion of us are clearly pressing the limits.
Most of the rest are hungry or destitute in our wake.
Regarding ocean “acidification”. No such thing. The measurement of ocean pH has much in common with the accurate study of ice extent at the poles and the “hole” in the ozone layer. How so? People got into a lather about all these things through measuring things over a short period of time and assuming a long term trend from what they saw. If you’ve not studied something for long and in detail you don’t know what’s natural. Measure sunlight from 3pm to midnight in winter and you’d be convinced it would be pitch dark for eternity very soon (assuming no knowledge of the daylight cycle). In the case of pH it has become clear that it can vary naturally by quite a degree over periods of months, both up and down. Studies of pH in areas where it has dropped have shown it to rise back to where it was. But still the CO2 in the atmosphere continues to rise and the temperature remains stable and ocean pH carries on as before. It has also become clear that there are areas of remarkably low pH within which the flora and fauna refuse to adhere to the nightmare scenario beloved of the green alarmists.
Something for the AGW adherents to ponder. Part of the massive amount of money spent on global warming was on buoys to measure ocean temperature over a wide area and satellites to measure global temperature more accurately than the sparsely distributed and ill-sited ground thermometers. These two systems were confidently expected to detect the heat predicted by the computer models beloved of the AGW propagandists. Guess what, neither has found the heat. Not even close.To quote one climate scientist it’s a “travesty” . If you don’t know his name you have probably not been following this subject closely enough.
I really find it hard to believe people are still arguing over this, when the evidence simply doesn’t exist ( no, melting glaciers don’t count…) . Physicists, chemists and engineers laugh and shake their heads at what passes for climate science in some quarters.
Remember, just because a media source is accurate on one subject it doesn’t mean it is accurate on anything else. Or even the same subject the following day.
J, you refer to the co-author of the “cartoon” as we, slayers see it 😉
Someone has been paying attention. An IPCC lead author no less. Too many clues…
I see the idiocy on display from the usual “denial” suspects in the climate debate hasn’t let up.
Keep it up guys. I’m sure you are helping convince the open-minded that global warming is real. Not your average number of gullible idiots on this forum you see. Best try elsewhere
Remember, just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get me…
We know there’s heavy and well funded bias coming from the burn it, burn it! lobby. That is thoroughly documented, and it is unthinkable that it would not be so. I’d be surprised if the IPCC could continue as an entirely unbiased body in such an atmosphere, with propaganda experts from uncountable corporations etc. poised to strike if they make the slightest slip in language or procedure.
Why, oh why oh why would the IPCC be in bed with the governments, who usually make their bed with the big corporations? The governments invented “Weapons of Mass Destruction” so they could invade Iraq on behalf of the Burn it! Burn it! corporations and prevent losing their control of the oil fields.
But the deniers in this thread want me to think that the governments set up the IPCC as a sort of sideline so they could make money on windmills, too, in complete opposition to all those powerful Burn it! Burn it! corporations and their lobbists!
But I was not born yesterday, and I remember when the scientific community struggled to make their warnings about CO2 heard, against all the opposition and ridicule that the corporations, including the media, could throw at them.
Do you deniers not remember the slurs against the environmentalists?
Water vapor is by far the most abundant greenhouse gas in the atmosphere. Methane is also a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. But you cannot tax water vapor, and methane is produced by termites and deep-sea microbes.
Not including respiration, human contribution to atmospheric carbon dioxide is 0.28% of total atmospheric carbon dioxide. Volcanoes produce far more carbon dioxide than humans ever have, or ever could.
Experiments with enhanced CO2 in greenhouses confirm that as CO2 levels rise, plants will grow larger, absorb more CO2, driving levels back down again.
But even if CO2 were the sole cause of global warming, so-called carbon credits don’t solve the problem, they are essentially a license to pollute. They are bought from those who have too many, and resold to those who need more. Polluters simply buy the license, and pass the cost on to consumers. The pollution has continued; the only real change is that goods and services cost more than they did before. Small companies are pushed out of the market as they can’t comply with ever increasing legislation. Big companies are “too big to fail” (read sue) – or they just pay the fine and keep on polluting.
In the US, Enron’s Ken Lay assisted Al Gore in setting up the structure for the trading of carbon credits. Al Gore and his investors stand to make billions of dollars from the trading of carbon credits to the world by doing exactly what Ken Lay did to California with electricity.
Al Gore and his fellow investors have spent an estimated $150 million to “sell” anthropogenic global warming.
An Inconvenient Verdict for Al Gore
One day before Friday’s announcement that he was a co-winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, a British High Court judge ruled that Gore’s global warming film, “An Inconvenient Truth,” while “broadly accurate,” contained nine significant errors ..
http://abcnews.go.com/US/TenWays/story?id=3719791&page=1
The data just doesn’t support the wild, alarmist claims – even Phil Jones did eventually admit on the record that there has been no warming since 1995.
Clark – how about $64bn in 2007?
May 8 2008
World carbon trading value doubles
A sharp rise in the number of transactions in the emissions trading market brought the value of trades to about $64bn last year, says the World Bank in an annual review –
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/94e2baa2-1c8f-11dd-8bfc-000077b07658,dwp_uuid=3c093daa-edc1-11db-8584-000b5df10621,Authorised=false.html?_i_location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ft.com%2Fcms%2Fs%2F0%2F94e2baa2-1c8f-11dd-8bfc-000077b07658%2Cdwp_uuid%3D3c093daa-edc1-11db-8584-000b5df10621.html&_i_referer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ft.com%2Findepth%2Fcarbontrading#axzz27FGEpZlb (firewall)
But ..
Monday 10 September 2012
Global carbon trading system has ‘essentially collapsed’
The UN clean development mechanism, designed to give poor countries access to green technologies, is in dire need of rescue
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/sep/10/global-carbon-trading-system
Clark – how about $64bn in 2007?
.. the rest is trapped in moderation.
The Guardian, Wednesday 9 July 2008
Pollution: Value of global carbon trading is already nearly double last year’s figure at £30bn
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jul/09/carbonemissions.carboncapturestorage
“We need to get some broad based support, to capture the public’s imagination… So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements and make little mention of any doubts… Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest.” – Prof. Stephen Schneider, Stanford Professor of Climatology, lead author of many IPCC reports
“We’ve got to ride this global warming issue. Even if the theory of global warming is wrong, we will be doing the right thing in terms of economic and environmental policy.” – Timothy Wirth, President of the UN Foundation
“No matter if the science of global warming is all phony… climate change provides the greatest opportunity to bring about justice and equality in the world.” – Christine Stewart, former Canadian Minister of the Environment
“The data doesn’t matter. We’re not basing our recommendations on the data. We’re basing them on the climate models.” – Prof. Chris Folland, Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research
“The models are convenient fictions that provide something very useful.” – Dr David Frame, climate modeler, Oxford University
“I believe it is appropriate to have an ‘over-representation’ of the facts on how dangerous it is, as a predicate for opening up the audience.” – Al Gore, Climate Change activist
“The only way to get our society to truly change is to frighten people with the possibility of a catastrophe.” – emeritus professor Daniel Botkin
“The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity. It is also our greatest opportunity to lift Global Consciousness to a higher level.” – Al Gore, Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech
“We are on the verge of a global transformation. All we need is the right major crisis…” – David Rockefeller, Club of Rome executive member
“It doesn’t matter what is true, it only matters what people believe is true.” – Paul Watson, co-founder of Greenpeace
Yes, the structure of carbon credits was warped by Burn it! lobbying when the structure was being negotiated; are you surprised? And a system that could have worked turned into a money making scheme. That’s why this was started:
http://www.sandbag.org.uk/notquite/
“Limits to growth”, I’m afraid. In the real world, outside greenhouses, plants are limited by numerous factors. Whichever they run short of first limits their growth. No amount of CO2 will increase plant biomass continually, because one plant chokes off its neighbour’s light or uses up its water or nitrogen.
Well good on Gore for finding an economic manipulation that could reduce the burning. I would guess that it is flawed, and has been progressively warped by the Burn it! lobby, but at least he had a go, and maybe launched an idea which, if subjected to continual monitoring and improvement, could do some good. But you lot are doing your best to sabotage that.
But why are you deniers so upset anyway? All these measures have comprehensively failed to reduce carbon emissions anyway. They’ve all been progressively de-toothed, until all that is left of them is money making schemes. Rejoice! The people on whose behalf you’re arguing are raking it in.
Zoologist, you’ve elucidated the financial motives rather well and without mentioning the UN/governmental grants or goodness only knows how much the geo-engineering is costing in financial terms alone (though I fear there is a much higher price to pay in the health of all species, fauna and flora).
Do you really believe there is a greenhouse effect?
Have you read any of Joseph Postma’s papers?
If not, they are well worth the effort – Copernicus Meets The Greenhouse Effect is the shorter, simplified version of his earlier, The Model Atmosphere…, here reproduced with civilised, scientific discussion at Tallbloke’s Talkshop:
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2012/04/04/joseph-postma/
Zoologist at 23 Sep, 12:59 am, that’s not an argument, that’s a load of sound bites created by taking some sentences out of context. I suppose you’ve been through them to ensure that all those speakers were really proposing the sort of deception you project.
Goodnight all.
Ah, Tallbloke. Trust you to remember that when it’s time for me to get to bed. Te-he, what a load of ideologically motivated rubbish is to be found at Tallbloke’s. I have first hand experience.
Here. Refuting the irrefutable. I particularly like the idiot who makes up what the axes on graphs represent to suit his prejudice. The moderator got me for pointing out his utter idiocy.
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2011/12/31/clark-energy-resources-and-the-future/
Thanks to Vronsky for projected energy usage. Cancer grows ’til it kills.
It was truly an eye-opener having people argue to me that the atmosphere would maintain the planetary surface temperature roughly constant even if we effectively turned this planet into a star by technological means. Truly memorable, that one.
Te-he.
Goodnight.
I’d forgotten what a good article I’d written. Deniers, for your consideration until I can return to the keyboard; do you suppose we can manage graph 2 or graph 3 by business as usual with fossil fuels?
And Scouse Billy, you still haven’t explained the significance of this:
Big business is on both sides of the argument. They make profit either way.
If TPTB really wanted to control oil usage they would limit oil extraction at source. And perhaps stop waging aggressive war.
For what its worth, I care about the planet. I care that it is being desecrated by big business, corrupt government and the so called military industral complex. I cared enough to investigate in depth and I was shocked to find the lack of evidence. I read the books recommended above. I changed my mind.
I resent being called a liar. I do have a degree in ZooPhysiology and I did consider a career in ecological science. I saw first hand how grants are obtained and academics are controlled. I was also asked falsify results in analysis of statistical data, which I refused. So I left to work as a graduate in “big pharma”. That didn’t last long either – I also like animals and people. My eyes were opened to the realities of “commercial” science.
I am now a self employed programmer. I have no connection to “big oil” or any other unwholesome agenda. Implying so really doesn’t strengthen your argument – I’m just not the monster you are trying to make me out to be.
Left / Right politics has nothing to do with anything. I voted Labour all my life until Blair invaded Iraq. I am now a political athiest as well as a religious one.
I campaign on green/animal issues and I’m antiwar. I am also willing to bet that my “carbon footprint” is smaller than all of yours. I live extremely frugally – by choice. So, before you acuse, I’m not defending an extravagant jet-setting personal lifestyle either.
Scouse Billy knows what’s what. Try reading his contributions for once. Just because you don’t understand what he writes it doesn’t mean he’s the one at fault – he is so far ahead he is out of sight. And J and Chris and a few others are brave enough to stand against the tide of abuse.
Just like with Israel, the tide is turning. The lie is unsustainable.
Clark: “we effectively turned this planet into a star by technological means”.
With “nooks” possibly, but with Carbon Dioxide??
For every credibility gap there is a gullibility fill.
Save the World – stop breathing!
Clark: I wouldn’t expect too much from Scouse Billy, he doesn’t “do” direct responses. Rather, he’ll recycle some hogwash he heard from various other useful idiots and plant that on us. That’s the only sort of recycling he understands.
Chris’ utter refusal or inability to take one step backwards is illustrative. I thought at first he was a convinced “sceptic” – some people are, denial is not just a river in Egypt, it’s a necessary life skill. But this is playing to a script. Never admit anything, just discuss it a bit more. Introduce new elements, make it look to anyone just joining the conversation or skimming it that a genuine debate is being played out. And when those refuting an obvious untruth get tired, worn or bored with what frankly is a non-item (in this example, a bogus petition) and stop responding, bring it out again as if afresh.
The people who’ve already won the argument numerous times will hardly be bothered to refute it yet again. So newcomers – hopefully! – will consider that maybe this is a valid point. Same with other “big lie” elements – such as claiming the oceans are not becoming more acidic. The world is not becoming warmer, if anything it’s cooling. It’s all just cyclical, nothing to worry about. It’s a hoax to make Al Gore rich (there’s some cheek trying to run that past anyone outside America). Ice caps are growing, not melting. And so on.
Chris fastened onto my passing reference to “religious nutters” or somesuch, and made play about my “dangerous” way of thinking. That’s fine if you don’t want to discuss the point at hand – a good distraction. Get the conversation onto religion or another side-track instead. Again – illustrative.
*
As with the “9/11” thread, we have a few people who are absolutely in possession of the complete truth, and do lots of eye-rolling and sighing at the astonishing inability of the rest of us to see what they’d have as the bleedin’ obvious. It’s just so clear cut. But when it becomes obvious that it is not, there is no hesitation or pause to reconsider from the True Believers.
The nothing to see here, move along crowd makes no mistakes at all. No admission there might be a point here, or something worthy of further consideration. They’re long on pumping references (despite most being irrelevant or BS anyway – see BS, sorry SB (Scouse Billy) for that). Not long on direct replies. And admitting to one single error, perhaps just promoting what turns out to be a bogus reference? Never.
Zoologist: Are you SB’s sock-puppet by any chance? Your unbelievably gushing praise for his vacuous, irrelevant splutterings of half-understood pseudo-science and dodgy references hardly rise to this level of rich acclaim! It’s not that we don’t understand what he writes – you cheeky toad – it’s that his simple twaddle is just as bad as your own. That’s why I don’t even bother looking at his voluminous reproductions of propaganda any more.
SB does not ever respond to replies to his own posts. Neither do you. Chris will argue that the world is still flat, and here’s over 6 million people – all of them world renowned planetary topologists – who can confirm it. You say that’s just a census of Ireland? Nonsense. You’ve sampled them, and found everyone in your sample to be either a RoI child, priest, peat-gatherer, pub landlord, or a ruined property developer? Hah, that just shows your bias.
*
I’m interested in this subject – you, and J, and SB etc. are pushing an agenda. But not in a very sophisticated fashion, I hate to break it to you.
If the warmists believe that the ‘acidification’ of the sea due to CO2 is a detriment to coral formation and microcrustations, of the sort that form chalklands:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_England_Chalk_Formation
Then I’m not sitting on a 1 mile deep chalk seam. Because the Cretaceous period is named after its chalk forming attributes, and as Scouse Billy rightly points out, that CO2 levels were estimated at 6 times that of pre-industrial levels [or 4.25 times present levels] during the Cretaceous period:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cretaceous
Glenn, I just explained, I have no agenda, just the human one.
I too am interested in this subject.i too have studied this subject. My conclusions are different to yours.
No conspiracy necessary.
For me it’s not personal. If you have links to papers that provide plausible evidence of a causative link between atmospheric CO2 and global warming then I’m interested to read them. Until I see overwhelming evidence supporting this claim I remain unconvinced. As to the whole “green house effect” theory, I am not an expert. But friends in physics lead me to question the validity of the concept as a whole. I await the results of the cloud experiments at CERN as these may well provide a breakthrough.
As for CO2 alone, for me, not proven. If anything I think could be beneficial – greater crop yields and longer growing seasons.
I honestly think you are being mislead. But only time will tell.
Hey Zoologist: OK, let’s start here:
http://climate.nasa.gov
Then try this:
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate-change
And so on. If you’re really adventurous, take a look at this commie, partisan website and follow it through, see how often climate comes into their work: http://www.noaa.gov/
*
Hats off for your attempting to reframe the discussion, as if the burden of proof were upon me to demonstrate my outlandish opinions. You are in that group, remember, who say they don’t agree with the science accepted by the consensus in the field. Don’t try standing back and make me run around, while you roll your eyes and just don’t accept anything as convincing enough.
What am I being “mislead” into (“but only time will tell! Heehee!”) exactly? Not wanting to import more oil? Wanting a sustainable, pollution reduced way of life? Wanting decent mass transit? WTF…lipping heck am I being “mislead” into, my dear, more enlightened fellow?
Zoologist, good comment at 23 Sep, 2:23. You wrote “I resent being called a liar”. I think we just experienced serendipity. I wrote “…proposing the sort of deception you project”. I meant that you happened to be projecting other parties’ dishonesty, not that you were intentionally lying yourself. Tell me honestly, did you extract all those quotes from their original sources yourself? Or did you happen to find that list somewhere?
You wrote “Big business is on both sides of the argument. They make profit either way.” Yes, which is why all the economic arguments against “The Alarmists” are pointless. “Why just the Alarmists?”, ask the Deniers. Well, Alarmists like me are the underdog. No, seriously. Back in the ’70s there were NO subsidies for renewables, NO carbon credit trading, and raising environmental concerns guaranteed corporate media scorn. And the Burn it! brigade still wield far greater power, or we wouldn’t have the warships of 25 nations currently massing near Iran. Trying to make reduction profitable is a deliberate strategy, and it’s never been tried in all human history.
Serendipity, also, that Scouse Billy reminded me about my article at Tallbloke’s. None of us is an expert in the highly complex field of climate study. But what is the point of arguing for the side that advocates accelerating at top speed towards a cliff?
Keep the issues separate. I resent being accused of dishonesty, too, so when my arguments are called “misanthropic”, and I’m accused of denying a decent level of energy usage to the people of poorer countries, I point to graph 3 in my article. The answer to this problem lies in redistribution of energy wealth, not in giving free reign to the Burn it! lobby.
A poll of LibDem party members is giving Clegg -2%
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/ios-exclusive-liberal-democrat-members-lose-faith-in-their-leader-8165988.html
Scouse Billy 22 Sep, 2012 – 8:56 pm
“Chris/Clark, the Oregon Petition has been doing the rounds for a few years.
Whatever its true provenance and nobody’s too clear on this, it has always been cited to rebut the idea that there is a consensus in climate science.”
Billy, the petition’s provenance is very clear. It is sponsored by a republican running for congress on pro corporate ticket, a scientist who previously made a mint defending the tobacco industry and a man who developed the hydrogen bomb whilst opposing nuclear arms treaties. The signatories are not respected scientists. The web site has a link profile benefiting from blogroll links across many dubious blogs with a very consistent anchor text use – yet another sure sign that it is propaganda.
It’s provenance is only in question to those who are too partial to admit the obvious.
So I’m pushing an agenda? My only aim is to help de-programme people. I have no financial interest or political affiliations, beyond my taxes being used to subsidise uneconomic technologies based on a flawed theory and annoyance at being hoodwinked. Note, I say theory because the CO2 business hasn’t progressed to being a scientific law due to the flimsiness of the evidence. “Consensus” climate science is nearer to social science than physics. When a leading scientist says we used to have someone in the department who could do a trend line in Excel, but he’s left now you despair! It reminds me a lot of the new graduates I see these days.
I was once of the belief that greens & environmentalists were always the good guys and was sympathetic, though never an activist or even member of any organisations. Now I am very much sceptical of much greenery in a healthy “show me your working” kind of way. Many people in green organisations are the ones pushing an agenda, just not quite what you think, though very much in an end justifies the means kind of way. If you think you’ll learn anything from Wikipedia, look up the history of William Connolley’s activities editing that site. It’s a lesson to bear in mind when looking at other subjects there.
I would agree with Clark that I’ve seen things on Tallbloke’s site that have raised my eyebrows. However, the economic impact of this pales into insignificance compared to the nonsense that is actually being taught to people in schools and universities on climate change. Why is an unproven theory being rammed into young brains?
If Craig’s post is on climate change, based on the hand waving and appeals to authority shown to date, I think he’s right in the reception he’d receive. I’m disappointed, but not surprised. I thought posters here might be open to a dissenting viewpoint, but apparently not. I’ve seen it elsewhere where people have prided themselves on their scepticism of the establishment, jump on people who question the establishment view on climate change. You could say they were in denial ;-).
PS
Using the word deniers is uncool & inflammatory. Rightly or wrongly it riles some people, unless you are referring to stockings.
Scouse Billy 22 Sep, 2012 – 8:56 pm
“Chris/Clark, the Oregon Petition … it has always been cited to rebut the idea that there is a consensus in climate science.”
Exactly. That such a transparent piece of propaganda is still repeatedly quoted as ‘evidence’ surely reveals the lack of true argument from the denial lobby.
Gosh you are at it, hammer and tongs.
Sunflowers reminder of the greatest impact mankind can create, over a small period of time, is close to fruition.
We have the canny ability to kick over the bucket when we least need it.
So what impact has world war 2 created on our environment? If anybody had any concerns for the environment, that would be a cause to dispense with.
Thank you Sunflower
22 Sep, 2012 – 9:21 pm
Steve Pieczenik: “World War III starts 25 September 2012″