This web site will be a response to wattsupwiththat.com, an anti-science web site operated by amateur climatology critic Anthony Watts and his associates. We consider his web site a prominent and monotonous source of misinformation and misrepresentation of the science and physical evidence that relates to the human contribution toward Climate Change, also called Anthropogenic Global Warming or “AGW”.
The extraordinary volume of reflexively supportive comments at “Watts Up With That?” drown out any intelligent responses except to the most diligent and open-minded readers. This wall of noise, combined with Anthony and his associate’s willingness to block or destructively edit criticism and on occasion subtly threaten critics means that their biased and deceptive posts may appear unchallenged and hence possibly correct. This is rarely true.
We intend to briefly comment on posts made at wattsupwiththat.com, identifying their repetition, irrelevance or factually disproved basis. There’s no way we can keep up with Anthony’s output though. Anthony and his Team are all about volume… And maybe, now and then, we’ll find ourselves saying “Hey, they’re right about that bit!”
Looking for factual information and discussion of Anthropogenic Global Warming? The sample of web sites to the right in our “blogroll”, mostly created by the vast decades-long Communist conspiracy of working climate scientists, is a good starting point.
Who are “we”? We are me. To make the creepy rock-pokers work harder I’ll stick to just a first name; Ben. I earned a B.Sc. in Geology in the Eighties at a leading Canadian university. I started an Earth Sciences Master’s degree shortly afterward, but for economic reasons have spent my working life mainly in the Information Technology field as both a programmer and a systems administrator. Politically I believe that governments represent the collective interests of their citizens and should act to both protect and enable them. This is a “librul” perspective.
A quick note about comments: We welcome comments, but we will also moderate them and often add in-line responses. If your comment is not concise, rational and relevant or is redundant or repetitious it will not appear. Want to compose a blast about the algore world gubmint or the lyin’ scientific elite? Your remarks will undoubtably bob happily in the crowded but warm waters of the Watts Up With That? web site.
Wott's Up With That? 
This is an important website. Documenting Watts’ disinformation is a challenge because of the sheer volume of it. And the inanity of the comments over there is enough to keep me away. Yet I believe that it is important for this record to be maintained; Watts would be ignorable if not for his pernicious influence.
So thanks.
I hope you have plenty of free time! I had a brief stab at something similar a while back, but the pressure of career and family meant it had to lapse.
That, and the descent of WUWT into self-parody – witness todays ‘Yeah we know the headline is balony but we liked it so we posted it anyway’
Shame the Science Blog of the Year got pulled, I’d like to see a head to head between yourselves and Denial Depot ;-)
Watch out for copyright – you know what he’s like.
good luck.
Phil Clarke
http://ketchupwiththat.blogspot.com/
Curiously, I did recently get an e-mail with the subject line of “Trademark status of wotsupwiththat blog” from someone with apparent libertarian leanings…
I’m sure lots of us would be game for nominating and voting up WUWT here: The Locus Awards.
(I’m naaaasty…!)
[Interesting thought, but I’m afraid that winning would require Anthony to be good at it. His talent brings to mind the lame fantasies of pulp fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard. However he may have enough fans to game to voting… – Ben]
Good luck! Two thoughts. One, is there any way of crowdsourcing this a bit, or are you planning to do it all alone? Related, see my comment pasted below from deepclimate, wondered what you thought. A one-stop visual “WUWT falsehoodometer”, with a column left open for Watt’s to acknowledge and retract…? Don’t know much about wordpress, but found –
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-table/
Pasted comment:
Two examples leap to mind, alongside this stuff: WUWT posting the Daily Mail “u-turn by Prof Jones” story (though he was careful not to actually endorse that story, I note) and this bit of genius that Tamino took apart, where Watts had a guest who, unknowingly it seems, because they were so incompetent, took GISS data and turned it upside down.
So: Watt’s story, following by “shows no understanding of the difference between ’significant’ and ’statistical significance’ (maybe with a link to some stats 101 site). Or, “shown to produce completely false results” etc.
One would hope, all these being in one place, Watts might eventually feel the need to address his errors.
I just feel like there needs to be some central, easily viewable list of all the corrections we’re waiting for. We could even be sensible people and avoid putting the word “GATE” after each one in block capitals.
Good luck with your project – it IS needed and saved to Faves/bookmarked!
I can’t help though recalling a droll comment elsewhere, where someone inquired if there was a site that catalogued all of Watt’s stupidities, someone replied “His own”.
Many a true word etc.
Thanks, people! I do feel a bit like the dog who finally “caught” a car. Now what do I do? :-)
We’ll see how it proceeds. I just can’t let Anthony’s whoppers slide past unchallenged.
I’m a practicing environmental scientist with over 25 years of work dedicated to anthropogenic methane mitigation, including awards from the British government. [Funny how so many denialists claim advanced scientific backgrounds but don’t identify themselves. – Ben]
As a regular reader and commentator to WUWT, I think you mischaracterize the readership. Many of us are like-minded scientists who are quite nauseated with the shoddy science foisted upon the public by the climate change community. [And the daily “shoddy science” foisted on us by WUWT is just fine, eh? – Ben]
Try reading the comments, or even understanding them. There is some deep analysis [LOL – Ben] that goes on in between the jokes about Pachauri etc. BTW, that dude is one huge joke!! Good luck with that.
It really is great to see you warmists out in the open, if you jerks had shared your info in the beginning then we wouldn’t have this situation. [What part of “Here’s 95% of the raw data, you have to ask the people who own it for the last few bits.” don’t you understand? – Ben]
Lets face it man made global warming/climate change whatever you choose to call it isn’t the problem you liars make it out to be.
Run away warming… if only that were true, keep up the propaganda as its fools like you who are frogmarching the rest of us into slavery [Ah, the secret commie world gubmint meme! Thanks for the chuckle. – Ben]
“if you jerks had shared your info in the beginning then we wouldn’t have this situation.”
Indeed – we could have had more incisive analyses of the data like this one at WUWT, where as tamino shows they (seemingly unwittingly) managed, though some incredibly convoluted number torture, to turn the data upside down without realising. Pretty much no-one, Watts included, noticed.
Micheal Tobis links to a great story where the writer sees each dataset falling one by one –
“Two down, two to go.”
The credibility of each utterly destroyed by analyses of a quality on a par with the above, no doubt.
Seriously – they turned the data *upside down*… BY MISTAKE. And you’re here complaining about warmists??? I… I don’t know where to start.
Ummm
A poor start to begin by criticising others for hiding behind pseudonyms when the main contributor here is just ‘Ben’.
[Lame. WUWT “sleuths” have discovered my full name, which wasn’t being intentionally concealed. – Ben]
@Ben
Who is ‘we’?? There may be things to criticise in Anthony Watts’ work, but being scared to identify himself is not one of them. How do we (the potentail readership) know that you are not just funded by ‘Big Carbon Trading’ or anyone else with a vested interest in AGW theory?
[“Who is ‘we’?” You need to work on your internet skillz. One man, one blog, total investment $15. Income… less than $15. – Ben]
@ben
OK – you’ve convinced me enough that you have no intention of being straightforward or answer any direct questions.
Only a true believer would not answer the ‘who are you’ question by criticising my internet skills rather than by simply saying who ‘we’ are. You just reduce your credibility each time you do that. And starting with zero, you are already into negative territory. Not great for a startup blog on Day One.
I shan’t bother to read your blog in future.
[“Confirmation bias”. Look into it. – Ben]
Congratulations on your new blog. A dedicated debunker of Watts’ weaselry is certainly welcome.
Pissing off your potential readership before you’ve even started does not bode well for the future of this venture.
And you’ll soon get tired of writing the sarky self-congratulatory remarks about how clever you are.
I predict a short and inglorious life.
[You seem to be upset that your world-view is being challenged. I wonder if your prediction will prove as ill-founded as so many of Anthony Watts’. – Ben]
Wow, I couldn’t let this one slide! This is EXACTLY what I see when I visit WUWT! Talk about the pot calling the kettle black!
There’s a reason that real climate scientists rarely post at WUWT. Its because no matter what they do or say, Anthony makes sure only Anthony gets the last word, and the last word is always spun to paint the scientist in a negative light. I see no reason for Ben to behave differently.
If you believe WUWT is truly fair to all posters, then you are living in a fantasy world.
Pete
Ben, why set up a blog that sounds so similar? Is it a way to get people directed here by mistake.
[No, I’m not trying to siphon off Anthony’s rightful hits. I seriously doubt that anyone will arrive here by accident! – Ben]
Where were you before the email leak?
[Various aspersions about gravy trains, religion, “not sharing data”, glaciers not melting, etc. You’ve crossed into the territory of not being concise, rational or relevant and are redundant and repetitious. Your further comments will be deleted unless truly on topic. – Ben]
Stirling English said:
…which spookily is pretty much my estimation of WFTWT, which would have no doubt crashed and burned without the support of its political science eminence gris who sees it fullfilling a role.
Say, be sure to check with Tony the TV weathercaster how that surface sites project is going next time you’re over there.
@chek
Umm…eminence grise…with an e…the noun and adjective need to agree in gender.
Strange that WUWT seems to be getting a lot more traffic than this venture…….
[So grammatical nit-picking replaces logical argument and hit-counts define integrity? This informs your comments rather well. Please start being relevant or don’t waste our time – Ben]
A stunning victory for the french grammar gendarmerie there, Stirling.
But for Don Wattsote de la Butte’s tilting at surface stations quest …. not so much.
Ooo, another WUWT idea: a brief survey of some of highlight climate papers over the past two or three years, placing them either side of a line representing IPCC predictions. Does the paper say things are likely worse or better than IPCC findings? Now, which ones did WUWT report? I’m imagining a beautifully clear example of cherry-picking emerging.
p.s. I’ve sort of started playing with the idea of recording WUWT’s most clear falsehoods and misrepresentations in table form –
http://www.coveredinbees.org/truthchecker
Bit rubbish at the minute. Anyone got any other WUWT factoids they know can be shown to be obviously wrong? Also, I don’t suppose there’s any record of WUWT correcting any?
Hi Ben, what are your views with regards to the reply given to the Parliamentary committee by Phil Jones when asked about not sharing the data?
His reply was that it wasn’t the done thing in Climate Science.
Isn’t this the opposite of what goes on in outer disciplines, do you think he has been totally honest in his work and dealings with others?
[I don’t think Dr. Jones’ words were well-chosen, but I think his point stands up. As has been explained many times and in many places, Dr. Jones did not have the right to distribute the entire raw data set (one day this fact will sink in and we can all move on). Knowledgeable researchers want to reproduce results independently so they can understand it in greater depth and either improve it or reveal true flaws. It’s nit-picking ignoramuses that demand everything laid out for their malicious inspection. – Ben ]
Nit-picking ignoramuses?
Have any of you ever worked in anything approaching a serious commercial programming environment? One working on safety-critical stuff? With audit trails and signoffs and nit-picking ignoramuses going through every line of code piece by piece. Just in case the aeroplane falls out of the sky or the nuclear power plant goes critical or the entire worldwide banking authorisation system crashes? [Nice strawman. Climate modeling code is not “safety-critical” in the engineering sense of the word and you know it. It is research code that relies on an enormous volume of historical data from a wide range of sources. Any prediction “failure” simply means a correction and reset – Ben]
These things only continue to work by a systems of checks and balances. Code testers assume that the programmers are lying incompetent bastards…and do their bet to break the code. Only once two or three independent groups (ie. not just peer-review ‘mates’) have tested it to as near destruction as is possible does that code get put into production. With about a zillion signoffs. [Strip away the hostile characterization and what you describe is still basically ‘peer review’. Again, any failure simply means correction and reset. – Ben]
And yet you guys are happy to assume that one or two people working on their own with no programming background, no experience of best practice, and probably no formal training, just magically get it right first time……. [Any basis for this innuendo? Or are you just flailing about. – Ben]
And then all anyone who dares to question it ‘nit-picking ignoramuses’?
[The “expert” computer science critiques I’ve seen have all been based on sample code fragments that were never actually used, even on commented-out code! Pathetic. The rest of your comment has been deleted as off-topic. If you have anything relevant to say please do so on an appropriate post, not here. – Ben]
[This is the wrong place for an extended discussion of programming in climatology, especially as you seem to have drawn your conclusions from limited information. Take it up when the proper context arrives. – Ben]
[Deleted]
[Sorry anonymous internet creep from London England, posting my irrelevant personal information might make you feel like a god of the intertubes but you’re still just an anonymous internet creep – Ben]
Regarding Jones’ climate gate e-mails…
What were the e-mails that Jones told his co-conspirators to delete?
These were regarding IPCC AR4. What was so damaging that he had them, and instructed others to delete.
This was never brought up in the so called investigations of the CRU and Jones.
There was no computer forensics to try and recover the deleted e-mails from back-up tapes.
What was in there?
[Um, why was the moon landing faked? Who really shot President Kennedy? Where is President Obama’s true birth certificate? What could possibly have been “hidden” that would magically disprove the abundant and trivially verifiable evidence of Anthropogenic Global Warming. You are clinging to a pointless conspiracy theory. – Ben]
He’s gathering the pro-DDT, anti-evolution, malaria myth audience now: Indur Goklany, DDT and Malaria
[Poor Anthony’s really thrashing around, isn’t he? – Ben]
“[Funny how so many denialists claim advanced scientific backgrounds but don’t identify themselves. – Ben]”
Who are we? Who is Ben?
Ben claims a scientific background, but is afraid of identifying himself.
Ben I thought this site was
for[about – Ben] mindless drivel, isn’t that why you set it up?[Fixed it for you. The rest deleted. Why do you think you and I are having a conversation? Time for you to return to aimlessly wandering the intertubes. – Ben]
Hi Ben
I’m just about to give the site a plug somewhere, and would be grateful if you could confirm something, pretty please. Do you counter every Watts Up? posting or just most of them?
Continued congrats on your heroic efforts!
[Well, every WUWT post is the goal, but Anthony’s logorrhea is hard to keep up with – Ben]
http://www.buffalobeast.com/?p=3721
Scroll down to see Watts and his picture.
[I saw that! It seems to capture something about the man, doesn’t it? – Ben]
hi ben,
this is a great site. has anyone already recommended renaming it to “What’s Up With Watts?” If you could contact me shortly, i’d like to privately send you some information.
all the best
p.
Ben,
Is there a reason that you did not comment on a guest post (Jan 10) by David Middleton titled, “Ocean Acidification: Chicken Little of the Sea Strikes Again”?
[I simply haven’t caught up. Did he finally prove that Global Warming is really a Communist hoax? – Ben]
This website is based on Watts not believing in climate change. Watts does believe in climate change. He just does not think that C02 is the major reason. Your whole basis for attacking him is not even true.
[Riiiiiiiight. I’ve been making it ALL up for the past year. Anthony will profess to believe anything that will help keep people like yourself confused. “Climate change” will always be because of something ill-defined and innocuous in Anthony’s arguments. – Ben]
Ben,
Good luck with the site. One channel I recommend taking some time to look over is the Youtube account potholer54. He not only debunks popular Climate ‘skeptics’ claims (most noteably that of ‘Lord’ Monkton’s), but also cites his evidence to actually publish science literature, so the viewer can actually go investigate what the scientists have actually being saying.
[He’s good! It’s easy to point out denialist flaws, but a big effort to produce a video of it… – Ben]
I have looked at potholer54 vids on youtube, his tomne of voice is enoiugh to convince me it is nothing but propganda, even without the half truths, lies self contradiction and lack of logic evident in his vids. I have argued with him long and hard on youtube and driven him into impossible corners on many occasions.
The fact is that even the IPCC is becoming sceptical about CO2s ability to damage ther planet. So get over it, time to move on, the science has, why cant you?
[You object to Peter Hadfield’s tone of voice (sorry, “tomne”)? You think you’ve repeatedly argued him into corners? You’re delusional. Give me one link to a scientific, or even rhetorical, victory over Peter. By the way, your bullshit assertion that science has moved on comes across as a plea to stop rubbing your face in the facts. – Ben]
Whats funny is “Ben” thinks he can criticize on real climatologist and meteorologist findings and stuff that they work in all the time, when all he does is criticize people about their stories or findings and he shows nothing whatsoever to back up that they are wrong. Your in IT and your going to tell me about whats true and not true about the pure complexity of earths climate!? Where’s your credibility? Why should people read what you write?
[How sweet! Baby’s first troll. – Ben]
I’ve noticed an increase in ‘damage control’ from catastrophic ‘warmists’ lately, no doubt in response to the debate not going their way. This site is another lame case in point and has fail written all over it.
-> [ insert infantile come back from baby Ben here ]
[Yawn. Self-delusion and wish-fulfillment. Why do you crave our attention? – Ben]
Actually sirtes like this need to be supported I say this a a climate skeptic LOL
[From the way you write, I believe you – Ben]
What a popular site this is, looks like you get about two comments a year!
[Did something get under your skin? – Ben]
Thanks for your site. Anthony needs a little spotlight attention now and then. Here, in his home town of Chico, he has pretty much become ancient history. He created enough chaos while on our local school board that many folks began calling him ‘Mister Huff and Puff’. He has a history of sexual harassment while employed at the local television station (I’ll gladly testify under oath to that) and is generally abusive to anyone who does not instantly kiss his ass. Someday, like the witch in Wizard of Oz, maybe he will just melt away.
[Interesting insights into Anthony! Seems he’s been a ill-considered truculent reactionary for a long time. I predict Anthony will take one of two paths; he’ll either finally be unable to deny his shameful posturing and will slink away, or he’ll stop flogging the “climate scientists are liars and hate our freedoms” dead horse and will start flogging a new one. – Ben]
This page links to WUWT without a NoFollow tag. This way you tell Google that WUWT is a popular page and should be ranked high, I could imagine that that is not your intention. For more information see my last post.
There is a similar link on
https://wottsupwiththat.com/category/self-promotion/
There could be more.
[Good point… – Ben]
LOL. You guys realize the IPCC reverted to the “denier” stance in regards to relating “extreme weather” to waring? I wonder if you realize that the IPCC failed to explain why temps are not rising currently? They offhandedly listed a few natural factors that they ay explain it, except if you weigght those factors as the IPCC does then none of them changed even close to enough to over power co2s claimed effect. I wonder if you realize the IPCC claims to understand co2s role entirely while admitting low levels of understanding and consensus for ALL other factors? I wonder if you realize if you believe the IPCC 100% that we shouldnt expect dangers for about 70 years? If we go by one of the several recent papers giving a low climate sensitivity we have multiples of that. Was it disinfo when watts used DATA to show that much of the warming only happens on sites that the data has to be adjusted because of siting issues? Meanwhile our oceans are in trouble NOW, not in 70 years when according to the IPCC dangers would outweigh benefits. You guys realize there is nothing unprecedented or alarming about current climate right? We do indeed have climate denier but they are not the skeptics of Cagw. When you have to ignore so much data to assert we have danger, and when it doesnt materialize you move the goalposts you should be back at the drawing board not on a bully pulpit claiming the science is settled. LOL.
[I think you need to work on your critical thinking skills. For example, yes it was “disinfo when watts used DATA to show that much of the warming only happens on sites that the data has to be adjusted because of siting issues”. https://wottsupwiththat.com/2011/05/11/the-long-awaited-surfacestations-paper/. – Ben]
Dear oh dear, you really have to humillilate yourselves this much? You are playing into the hands of the sceptics with a site like this, it is too reactionary, too much ‘doth protest too much’. If you have the facts on your side your argument will stand up on its own, if not it will fall, as it should. Playing propaganda like this is just making you look weak.
[Thanks for the laugh! – Ben]
Ya know, I would like to supply an analogy of why this website is foolish. I have constantly argued politics with my brother since I was a kid. He is conservative, and I am middle of the road toward the liberal side. Whatever we discussed at the typical Thanksgiving dinner, we both tried to win the other guy over. My brother and I were both in debate when we were in high school.
So, I have read both sides of the AGW argument for years now. BOTH sides. Because you can’t win if you don’t know what the other side is thinking or doing.
Whether or not the skeptics are correct. And whether or not the Artic did not become ice free last year as Al Gore predicted. And whether or not the polar bear population is at an all time high. And whether or not the Antarctic is astonishingly massive this year. It doesn’t matter. No body is gonna win this argument. Period. This transition of getting colder or hotter has not affected me in my lifetime and it won’t. I am 60 now, and in ten years I won’t even give a crap about it anyway because of my one-way ticket out of here. If the oceans swamp Florida, I say, who cares? We all have plenty of time to move to higher ground.
I have better things to do than to listen to Al Gore spew, or Anthony Watts counter. I just want to have some more fun before I croak. And I stopped arguing with my brother about politics. Neither of us ever gave in. Instead, I talk about my kids. It’s more fun. So whatever you pay monthly to keep this website going, it is a waste of money. Same with Joe Romm. A waste.
[So tell me if I’ve got this right: You’re too stupid to tell the difference between dishonest obstructionist debating tactics and the consensus of trained scientists, even though you were “in debate in high school”. You also don’t give a shit what happens anyway because you’ll be dead soon-ish, but you can still have fun talking about your little tykes (just keep those merry thoughts carefully focussed on the olden days). And anyone who doesn’t have at least a couple of rental properties above the flood-line deserves what they get. Oh, I know why you are contemplating you own mortal demise! You’ve got terminal smugness. – Ben]
[Now this is funny: Mike commented, posing as Rational Man Sickened By All The Shouting (just ignore the twitching eye and his thumb inching onto the scales of science. Also, AlGore). But he’s back and has dropped the pretense. – Ben]
Really Mr. Unidentified Ben? What kind of response was that?! Do you have to resort to cussing at me? i.e. “give a shit”. If you are from a science background, maybe you should reading BOTH sides of the debate without having to look at Anthony Watts web site. There is the Cryosphere data from the University of Illinois which show arctic and Antarctic ice concentration and extent (this is not Mr. Watts data, it is satellite data. There is Stephen McIntyre who has presented papa after paper and calculations etc. There are hundreds and hundreds of papers on both sides of the issue.. But you need to look at Everything out there before you call Mr. Watts some kind of dishonest obstructionist . He posts his references, which can be looked at and decided upon.
You come off as some sort of angry person. Why? Angry at someone presenting a point of his own scientific view. There is not just Mr. Watts out there challenging Al Gore and all the fear mongers. STUDY !
Me, I live at 3000 ft. above sea level.
But I did notice when I was in Hawaii this past year, that the beaches are all the same there. No apparent change in the past 40 years since I went there. The tidal gauge data is all the same too. Hmmmm.
…and unless you want to be taken seriously (and your low website volume gives you away), publish your last name and credentials, otherwise you are merely hiding because you are afraid people will truly debate you.
By the way, I am a scientist and engineer, semi-retired. I helped create the beginnings of the Internet at the University of Illinois in 1978 with lots of scientists working on the Illiac, Plato system, and our 8 buildings of computers. If you are doing IT today, and typing on your computer or tablet, you have our team from back then to thank for your ability to post stupid crap on a stupid website of yours.
[Sorry, McIntyre published a trivial paper that, by force of necessity, has been trumpeted by dishonest obstructionists like Watts as overturning all of climate science (i.e. “The Hockey Stick”) when it did no such thing. By the Cryosphere data did you mean this? Doesn’t really support you. Also, there are NOT “hundreds and hundreds of papers on both sides”; denialists like Anthony have only made-to-order “think tank” fiction to wave around while foaming at the mouth. This has been widely discussed in recent months to much impotent denialist fury. If you think those are “references”, you’re fooling yourself. Anthony’s attempts to swaddle himself in the cloth of science have proven entertainingly farcical. But I do love the inference that YOU invented the internet, not that commie Al Gore. You go, Mike!
P.S. If you’re going to do a proper denialist Gish Gallop you really need to throw in some conspiracy references and work the socialism angle a little harder. Look into Christopher Monckton. – Ben]
Just to let you know. Darpa and Xerox did the work for the internet in conjunction with the University of Illinois and other universities, military money, etc. Al gore did a stud in the 1990s by visiting France and their “MiniTel” which allowed people in France to access their bank accounts and do stock trades and text-based pron (yes, without graphics, if you can believe it.) he came back regarding the information “super highway”, then, like with Climate Change and the “Inconvenient Truth”, turned it around for fame. HE did NOT create the internet. The internet was a means for the “web” to have multiple paths to get information through. Same with things like GPS mapping which was a tool of the military to make sure they could locate any target on Earth.
You are such an un-educated idiot. Look up Illiac, Hal in 2001 a Space Odessey (Hal computer icon from U of I in Stanley Kubrick’s film way back when). Geez. YoOu are such an uneducated person. [You’re seriously referencing a S/F movie? It was wonderful, but not exactly academically definitive… – Ben] Ther ARE hundreds of papers refuting global warming due to CO2. WHY ARE YOU SOOOOOO ANGRY ? …and uneducated.?
[Name two credible papers “refuting global warming due to CO2”. I mean it. Pick carefully. By the way no-one seriously thinks Al Gore invented the internet. I was mocking you, in my “SOOOOOO ANGRY” and uneducated way. Your repeated accusation that I’m ANGRY and uneducated is puzzling though when your own comments are a torrent of misspellings and almost random punctuation. You’re virtually slapping the “kick me” sign on your own back. FYI, Gore did put some early political muscle behind DARPA’s damage resistant point-to-point military communication concept back in the late 80’s, it just happened to become a great way to share cat videos or spread confusion about sound environmental science. – Ben]
I have read Watts blog and listened to many who praise him like a god. I have come to the realization that he caters to the weak minded of those around us, many are uneducated, similar to some of the posts here.
Watts is easily refuted but his rhetoric is to do personal attacks, again similar to some of the posts here, and threaten people who disagree.
It is like 80% of the people who agree with him have no science or science background to understand his lies and misinformation. The are puppets and nothing more.
Good luck and keep it up.
Dear Ladies and Gentlemen,
I am a student at the Institute of Mass Communication and Media Research (IPMZ) University of Zurich. As part of my Master’s thesis, I am conducting a survey on how climate change bloggers’ perceive themselves and their role in the climate change debate.
If you blog about climate change, I would like to ask you to participate in my survey. Your contribution will help us to gain valuable insights into the field of climate change blogging.
Link to the survey: http://ww2.unipark.de/uc/landolt_Universit__t_Z__rich/64cf/
The questionnaire will take about 7 minutes to fill out.
There are no right or wrong answers. I am interested in your personal opinion.
The study does not serve any commercial purpose. The data provided is solely for the purpose of scientific analysis and is evaluated anonymously.
The questionnaire can be filled out in English and German.
Please feel free to contact me if there are further questions or comments.
Angela Landolt B.A.
The perversity of Google is such that with so many websites focused on WUWT, it’s like ancient days when “all roads lead to Rome”. On Google there really is no such thing as bad press and many roads lead to WUWT.
[At least the observant traveller will notice the detour signs! – Ben]
“Politically I believe that governments represent the collective interests of their citizens and should act to both protect and enable them.”
If I agreed that such a thing as collective interest existed I would agree with you. I’ve seen it in Iceland; small nation, entire population quarter million, nearly homogenous in culture and genotype after 1300 years or so of relative isolation. Their collective interest is “survive winter”. That is why socialism is found in all subarctic nations but also pretty much only in subarctic nations because a non-collective interest exists in essentially all human beings; and that is self-interest which will dominate when survival is not threatened.
A hive survives winter, a solitary bee will not. But take away winter and suddenly the solitary bee can keep his foraging for himself. Defense is still an issue so small colonies work well; they are called wasps.
Predators (eagles, for instance) tend to be solitary.
Humans are all of the above; omnivores and adaptable.
PS I’m also in information technology as a sysadmin and programmer, good old “C” and before that assembly language. When the compilers became good enough, and then better at writing assembly language than I could by hand, I just use C for little utility programs.
The implication is that I understand logic, at least Boolean logic in a multi-state universe. Most people seem to be binary in their thinking; to oppose one thing is assumed to be endorsement of something else, possibly true in the case only two choices exist. That is what I see wrong with all this “denier” argumentation trying to set the threshold of when exactly you go from being a member of the Consensus to suddenly a Denier along a single axis with only two values; and for some that threshold is very “pure”. I see a multi-dimensional surface; with anxiety (level of concern) on the vertical axis and agreement with the Consensus on the horizontal axis (and other axes!) I supposes I am a lukewarmer not really challenging the Consensus (I am not equipped to do so) while not being more concerned about it as compared to dozens of other dangers more immediate (winter is coming, pandemics, world war 3, terrorists, asteroids, petty murderers in the neighborhood). Yet I am interested in it.
[Interesting perspective. I agree that the issue is not binary, but I am focused here on the extreme hardcore “denialist” like Watts. – Ben]
I’ve been trying to throw a little light into Watts’ insane world for a couple of years. Now censored.
Regarding Watts’ future, I expect that with each nail in the denialist coffin his site will steadily lurch further to the (even more lunatic) fringes. The guy has a pretty low humility quotient so I don’t expect embarrassment will dilute his delusion. That doesn’t mean his site will lose popularity; a large portion of the populace is scientifically illiterate and since his is the most prominent, an increasingly desperate misinformation machine will ensure a ready supply of propaganda for him to echo.
[Yes, he falls into the category of a malicious Dunning–Kruger intellect. And as talk radio shows us, there’s always an audience for ignorant personal attacks. Still, I feel it’s important to call him out on his bullshit when I can. – Ben]