Author Archives: Ben

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About Ben

I trained as a sedimentary geologist at a Canadian University, but have worked in the I.T. field as a programmer and manager for many years.

Another tornado outbreak expected

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“Another tornado outbreak expected” (May 25th, 2011). Extreme weather events have nothing to do with climate change, right Anthony Watts? Well, maybe not individual events, but 2011 has been a bit… unusual. Anthony blandly natters on about tornado ratings and historical examples. More people have died in past extreme tornadoes. Nothing to see here folks, move along!

April tornado frequency. Not a hockey stick! From Open Mind.

I guess “the deadliest single tornado to strike the U.S. since modern tornado recordkeeping began in 1950″ last Sunday in Joplin, Mo. is just an example of howpeople will “adapt” to (hell, embrace) warmer climates. 116 dead and counting. The dogmatic denialist rejection of risk and refusal to take responsibility for their obstructionism is why I work to expose their dishonesty and amorality.

People adapting to climate change? Photo of Joplin, Mo. by Aaron Fuhrman.

Tornado season update

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“Tornado season update“ (May 23rd, 2011). Extreme weather events have nothing to do with climate change, right Anthony Watts? Well, maybe not individual events, but 2011 has been a bit… unusual. Anthony blandly natters on about tornado ratings and historical examples. More people have died in past extreme tornadoes. Nothing to see here folks, move along!

April tornado frequency. Not a hockey stick! From Open Mind.

I guess “the deadliest single tornado to strike the U.S. since modern tornado recordkeeping began in 1950” last Sunday in Joplin, Mo. is just an example of how people will “adapt” to (hell, embrace) warmer climates. 116 dead and counting. The dogmatic denialist rejection of risk and refusal to take responsibility for their obstructionism is why I work to expose their dishonesty and amorality.

People adapting to climate change? Photo of Joplin, Mo. by Aaron Fuhrman.

UVA to supply Mann emails/documents but you can’t look (yet)

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“UVA to supply Mann emails/documents but you can’t look (yet)“ (May 25th, 2011). Anthony Watts’s friends at scientific cornerstone the American Tradition Institute have won their Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) legal battle against Dr. Mann and the University of Virginia! They’re going to get everything Dr. Mann, or anyone that even knew him, ever wrote while at the University of Virginia! It will be full of instructions on how to fake global warming evidence! Also Anthony now knows what in camera means.

Chris Horner from the Competitive Enterprise Institute (American Tradition Institute is just one of many sock-puppets) gloats about his FOIA demands:

“In short, the University was forced to part ways from supporting the PFAW/ACLU/AAAS/AAUP demands [damn commie libruls all of them!] and Mann’s interests, and start working to make itself look less bad to a court.” and “we get it all“. (emphasis mine)

Actually, no. But I suppose this is as close to scientific victory as the denialists will ever get.

The material in question is sealed and the only documents that will be unsealed is the fraction that is confirmed to contain correspondence relevant to specific research supported by public grant money. The unrelated material that Horner wanted to sweep up and snoop through will presumably remain excluded.

Chris Horner’s maneuverings are a partisan continuation of the frankly outrageous legal assault on Dr. Mann by the Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, built on the flimsy excuse that state funds may have somehow been misused. The University of Virginia’s position on these sweeping FOIA demands has always been that correspondence not directly connected to a legitimate FOIA would not be provided.

Funny how denialists and libertarians consider anything to do with themselves inviolably private but anything to do with their targets unquestionably public domain. People who receive work for government are apparently right-less slaves.

When this tactic first came up many denialists were uncomfortable with the invasion of privacy aspects, but they seem fine with it now. Steve McIntyre, the Great Auditor, was against it, but now he’s for it. Even Anthony himself was once merely tepid on this tactic. I guess principle is failing to overrule expediency.

Five years of “An Inconvenient Truth”

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Five years of “An Inconvenient Truth” (May 24th, 2011). Anthony Watts wears his fingers down to tiny nubs hammering out Yet-Another-Criticism-of-An_Inconvenient_Truth, this time a true opus:

Executive Summary: Science Fiction

After-all Julia A. Seymour of the Business and Media Institute (staff of four) says so. And if you can’t trust an organization “devoted solely to analyzing and exposing the anti-free enterprise culture of the media“ then who can you trust? No-one, that’s who.

Denialist fixation with Al Gore and his documentary film has been both obsessive and compulsive since the first screening of the Oscar-winning documentary, and five years on it’s still “inconvenient”. Denialists have leveled every insinuation and nit-pick they can, but it still stands unbowed. As a rational person though I have to say “so what?” Even if it was proven beyond a doubt that it was filmed on the same soundstage as the Apollo Moon Landings, the abundant evidence and knowledge that supports scientific concern over Global Warming will remain. An Inconvenient Truth is simply a popular presentation of that concern.

So what do we find in 5 Years After: Networks Celebrate Al Gore’s ‘Inconvenient Truth,’ Ignore Scientific Flaws, Criticism? A sullen regurgitation of denialist attempts to undermine a popular documentary and teach them scientists a thing or two. Empty-headed gum-flapping. Here’s a few highlights:

  • Personal attacks on Al “Apocalypse Al” Gore as a “movie star”, etc.
  • Allegations that Gore predicted 20 ft sea-level rise by 2010 (he didn’t).
  • Climate Depot’s “lengthy list of more than 1,000 scientists who dissent in some way from those claims” (classic fake survey).
  • The claim that Gore’s “mentor” oceanographer Roger Revelle had “second thoughts” about CO2 and climate change late in life (misrepresenting a dead man. Read his own words).
  • Accusations that the media buried a High Court of London ruling that there were “nine significant errors” in AIT (but primarily ruled that it was clear that the film was substantially founded upon scientific research and fact).
  • Climategate!
  • A pitch for next month’s Heartland Institute conference on “Restoring the Scientific Method.”

Scientific American’s interview with Dr. Richard Muller

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“Scientific American’s interview with Dr. Richard Muller“ (May 23, 2011). Anthony Watts has long resented Scientific American’s general scientific rationality. Just a few months ago they labelled his blog as a “well-known climate denier site” after-all. However, as we have seen across the popular press, the pretense of “balance” sometimes enables sloppy reporting of controversial topics to allow anti-scientific positions to gather support. Popular support fpr the disproven claim that the MMR vaccine triggers autism offers an excellent example.

Here we find Anthony practically wriggling like a puppy over his mention in Michael Lemonick’s lazy Sci Am interview of physicist Dr. Richard Muller about climate change science.

Both Steve McIntyre and I are mentioned prominently in the article, and once again Dr. Muller thanks us for our contributions to the debate.

Joe Romm at Climate Progress covers the Scientific American article at length, exposing Muller’s statements for their lack of both knowledge and integrity.

The otherwise inactive Dr. Muller injected himself into the Global Warming debate when he started the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) project. Denialists licked their chops at the thought of a temperature reconstruction that appeared impartial but came from a politically aligned source, but howled of betrayal when Dr. Muller’s first analysis reluctantly confirmed the existing science.

Still, Dr. Muller enthusiastically embraces the irrelevant nitpicking of citizen-scientists such as Steve McIntyre (contradicted in Scientific American itself back in 2009 “Novel Analysis Confirms Climate ‘Hockey Stick’ Graph“) and freely libels both long-standing climate experts such as Dr. Michael Mann and commentators such as Al Gore. Muller acknowledges the existence of “denialists” but fails to name any so it’s hard to know just how crazy you have to be for Muller to step back. You’re safe, Anthony!

NCDC cites “controversy” with the UAH temperature record, and the search for a “true climate signal”

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NCDC cites “controversy” with the UAH temperature record, and the search for a “true climate signal” (May 13, 2011). Anthony Watts still thinks the NCDC is after him because of their “ghost authored attack on me and the surfacestations project” back in 2009. I guess it’s easier for him than admitting that their scientific evaluation of his claims found no support whatsoever for his bellowed accusations.

Even the paper that poor Anthony was recently involved with came to the same conclusion, although much more quietly and with a healthy dose of self-congratulation. There was, and is, no warming bias in the US average temperature record. There is no warming bias associated with urbanization of temperature recording station locations. The warming trends are real and the product of human environmental impacts.

What reminded the thin-skinned Anthony of this past insult? A new article by NCDC scientists titled Tropospheric temperature trends: history of an ongoing controversy (full pdf here). They conclude:

The state of the observational and model science has progressed considerably since 1990. The uncertainty of both models and observations is currently wide enough, and the agreement in trends close enough, to support a finding of no fundamental discrepancy between the observations and model estimates throughout the tropospheric column.

Anthony tries to make hay of the bland ‘admission’ that researchers need to “calibrate the data and unambiguously extract the true climate signal from the inevitable nonclimatic influences inherent in the routine observations.” What? “Inevitable nonclimatic influences?” The use of these words mean that Anthony’s accusations were right all along!!!!

Not. It’s quite bold-faced of Anthony to claim that climate scientists have, until now, discounted “noise and uncertainty”. In fact this has been a core concern for decades. He also throws in a snide reference to “observational uncertainty” to insinuate yet again that climate scientists are manipulating the temperature record for their own purposes.

Noise. Something Anthony’s quite familiar with generating in order to obscure facts.

Cold homes and energy poverty

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“Cold homes and energy poverty” (May 17, 2011). Anthony Watts is annoyed that an editorial in the British Medical Journal, The health impacts of cold homes and fuel poverty, accepts “hook line and sinker the ridiculous recent claim of Super exponential accelerating CO2 growth” and even dares to reference it. Except, not really; the editorial quote makes no mention of “super exponential” and that research is only referred to in passing. Of course the fundamental point that CO2 levels are rising quickly is something that only an idiot (Hi Anthony!) would dispute.

See? Not accelerating! Much. From Skeptical Science.

Here’s the naughty paragraph (most evil bit in my italics):

The world community is struggling to curb greenhouse gas emissions. The concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide is not merely continuing to rise when it should be starting to fall, but its rise is accelerating.8 The essence of the problem is our apparent unwillingness—as people, populations, and politicians—to put moral obligations above short term economic interests. So, when measures are identified that have negligible net cost and that will bring benefits on many fronts, including reducing health inequalities, they should be enthusiastically and promptly embraced and implemented.

So the editorial is really about how increasing the thermal efficiency of British homes, especially older rural housing stock, can keep them warmer in the winter and offer wide-ranging benefits to society. “Living in cold conditions is a risk to health.”

Isn’t that kind of, sort of, a bit like, nearly the same as the denialist meme that warmer is always better? You missed one Anthony.

New Aussie skeptic movement

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“New Aussie skeptic movement“ (May 16, 2011). Anthony Watts promotes the comical Galileo Movement, founded by Australian “retirees Case Smit and John Smeed”.

Although once “they simply accepted politicians’ claims of global warming”, they were so “incensed” to discover that “climate claims by some scientists and politicians contradict observed facts” that they felt they had to “[risk] their personal finances” and bring Lord Monckton, “famous for explaining the scientific data, the statistics and the UN bureaucracy’s political fabrication of global warming alarm”, to tour Australia. Their background page is a sea of ad hominem claims, straw-men arguments and libertarian paranoia.

The purpose of “Case’s and John’s apolitical public campaign”?

  • Protect freedom – personal choice [the hell with everyone else] and national sovereignty [because no country’s climate is related to another’s];
  • Protect the environment [by doing nothing];
  • Protect science and restore scientific integrity [two words – Lord. Monckton.];
  • Protect our economic security [by impeding rational preparation for climate impacts on same];
  • Protect people’s emotional health by ending Government and activists’ constant destructive bombardment of fear and guilt on our kids and communities [instead bombarding them with right-wing conspiracy theories].

Famous climate denialist. From Wikipedia.

Why invoke Galileo Galilei? Well, apparently he “stood up publicly… to ensure [that] objective science replaced superstition, ideology, ignorance and state control.” Just like them, bravely espousing the radical new idea that CO2 has no climate consequences! Except of course that they are really defending an old idea that has been progressively replaced by new knowledge (gosh, CO2 increases do have climate consequences). Um guys, this analogy makes you the Catholic Church not the courageous scientist... You’re resisting change in your own short-sighted self-interest.

Sometimes the jokes just write themselves.

Get a load of the Galileo Movement’s collection of “independent advisers”, which apparently “includes diverse opinions”. It’s a Who’s Who of denialists and their apologists: Professor Tim Ball, Warwick Hughes, Professor Fred Singer, Professor Dick Lindzen, Professor Bill Kininmonth, Professor Bob Carter, Professor Ian Plimer, David Archibald, Professor Peter Ridd, Professor Garth Paltridge, Dr Vincent Gray, Dr Jennifer Marohasy, Jo Nova, Des Moore, John Nicol, David Flint, Andrew Bolt, John McLean, David Evans and Viscount Monckton. Don’t forget to include Alan Jones, whose “innate[?] expertise straddles the fields of politics, sport and the media.”

2011-08-15 Update: Scientific American has take notice of these bozos, posting Why Carbon Dioxide is a Greenhouse Gas.

In making a case against CO2 as a greenhouse gas, the Galileo Movement relies on irrelevant facts while omitting pertinent ones.

Time Travel and Causation in the Climate Debate

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“Time Travel and Causation in the Climate Debate“  (May 16, 2011). Anthony Watts posts Craig Loehle’s petty irritation with the IPCC.

In the climate change debate, by contrast to physics, the force of GHGs and human evil is so great that it transcends time. Bad things happen BEFORE their cause. It is simply amazing.

He’s annoyed with the IPCC AR4 Report’s attribution chapter, in a general sort of way. Why doesn’t it restrict itself to the post-1950 era when man-made greenhouse gases (maybe) started to (maybe) influence climate? How dare they talk about glaciers in the 1850’s (um, see Skeptical Science), or that “impacts claimed by the IPCC to be likely in the distant future are claimed to be already evident.” After-all, changes predicted by the distant future must only happen in the distant future. All at once (or were they supposed to be a perfectly linear transition over time? I can never keep the story straight).

See, everything's fine! From Skeptical Science.

I guess he’s simply too worked-up to bother providing references or quotations for the IPCC’s implied scientific transgressions. It would help though.

Craig’s main peeve is that “Climate change will cause bad things, and climate change is happening. Therefore, if bad things happen it is due to climate change” is circular reasoning. Those lazy alarmists! QED, if that’s the way you choose to tell it. Strangely he has no problem with the denialist corollary that all climate change is natural, except in retrospect (Oops, too late).

Pat Frank: The New Science of Climate Change

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“Pat Frank: The New Science of Climate Change“ (May 14, 2011). Anthony Watts’ blog buddy “John A” wants us to read chemistry PhD Pat Frank’s May 6th post on Jeff Id’s blog (ah, “social networking”). It proves that Global Warming is all just fiddling by them dang lyin’ climate scientists. They adjusted the early 20th century surface temperatures upwards to create the appearance of a late-century warming trend! What sneaks.

This increase in rate wasn’t due to an accelerating late 20th century trend. It’s mostly due to modifications of the 1880-1920 record.

Wait, haven’t the denialists been claiming that early instrument records were adjusted downwards to maximize apparent warming? Could it be that they’re adjusting in both directions at once? It staggers the mind.

Pat Frank’s rigorous scientific technique is to scan the published graphics and convert them to numerical values. How this is supposed to inspire confidence in his conclusions remains unknown because Frank offers no discussion of the reasons for changing the data selection that produced the plots. I suppose that would take both knowledge of the details as well as scientific insight.

His accusation is that the earliest instrument data was ‘adjusted upwards’ by GISS  from earlier presentations to fraudulently lower the slope of early century warming and make post-1975 AGW warming look comparatively steeper. So Frank adjusts the values in the direction that suits him by cherry-picking some starting points (What’s special about 1950? Nothing.), adds in some x-axis squashing for more visual minimization, and declares victory. Now that’s post-normal.

This all boils down to more accusations of “Post-Normal Science”, which denialists like to sling about when ever climate scientists refine their theories or improve historical analyses. Any change in “the record” is malicious don’t you know.

I wonder why Frank doesn’t discuss Total Solar Irradiance, which was increasing during the early part of the century and level later in the century when all the Global Warming happened? After-all he does make a half-hearted stab at blaming the warming on “solar variation”.