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.

Garbage: Another environmental claim proven to be hyped

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“Garbage: Another environmental claim proven to be hyped“. Anthony Watts finds an Oregon State University press release that says the Pacific Ocean’s “Great Garbage Patch” isn’t the size of Texas after-all.

From the press release:

“There is no doubt that the amount of plastic in the world’s oceans is troubling, but this kind of exaggeration undermines the credibility of scientists,” White said. “We have data that allow us to make reasonable estimates; we don’t need the hyperbole. Given the observed concentration of plastic in the North Pacific, it is simply inaccurate to state that plastic outweighs plankton, or that we have observed an exponential increase in plastic.”

This, of course, proves that environmentalists are liars and that there is no Global Warming. But what about the disgruntled claim that “mainstream” scientists always cover up for each other and make the data fit the desired result? I guess Assistant Professor of Oceanography Angelicque White is the only honest scientist out there.

MetOffGate – the questions begin

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“MetOffGate – the questions begin“. A press release from the right-wing think tank Global Warming Policy Foundation! Thanks Anthony, and thanks for the collection of right-wing UK papers singing the same song. Thus disproving Global Warming.

Benny Peiser of the Foundation sez (italics mine):

Not only is the lack of Government preparedness a cause for concern, but we wonder whether there may be another reason for keeping the cold warning under wraps, a motive that the Met Office and the Cabinet Office may have shared: Not to undermine the then forthcoming UN Climate Change Conference in Cancun.

Nothing like a good conspiracy theory. Here’s the first question: how long have you lads been off your meds?

Yes, Virginia, you do have to produce those ‘Global Warming’ documents

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“Yes, Virginia, you do have to produce those ‘Global Warming’ documents“. Anthony Watts the citizen-scientist provides a sneering headline to his reprint of a partisan Washington Examiner op-ed.

Right-wing “think tank” the American Tradition Institute says that Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli’s legal campaign against climate scientist Dr. Michael Mann, who worked at the University of Virginia from 1999 t0 2005, is somehow principled and that the University of Virginia is somehow wasting taxpayer’s money by resisting Cuccinelli’s groundless legal actions.

Cuccinelli have been widely condemned over this in the press and by academic and legal bodies. We covered the fall-out from “Kook’s” first kick at this cat back in October. In a nutshell, Kook is not engaged in an effort to prove that Mann defrauded Virginia taxpayers, and has not demonstrated any reason to believe that the University has information relevant to such an accustion. He just wants to root around and see if he can find anything that can be twisted into an accusation after the fact. It is the near definition of a witch-hunt.

Funny how libertarians rail against government oppression unless they manage to grasp the levers of power. Anthony’s readers salivate over the persecution righteous smiting of Dr. Mann by Tea Party supporter “Kook” Cuccinelli, but they’ll return to howling about their own persecution soon enough.

There’s a useful timeline at the Union of Concerned Scientists, and the Washington Post has a recent report on this.

Demented thinking: Copenhagen didn’t work – but taxes will

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“Demented thinking: Copenhagen didn’t work – but taxes will“. Climate economist William Nordhaus says in the January 2011 issue of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists that carbon taxes are the best approach to achieve significant emissions reductions. Anthony Watts says “no way! Taxes are always bad!” and then posts the press release. Thus disproving Global Warming. Anthony’s readers supply the elaborate economic and political insights.

From the press release:

[William Nordhaus] says that it is necessary to raise the price of carbon to implement carbon policies so that they will have an impact on everyday human decisions, and on decision makers at every level in every nation and sector. At present, incentives and levels of involvement vary, and where some countries have implemented strong emission control measures, they only cover a limited part of national emissions. – Eureka Alert Press Release, Jan 5, 2011.

I really don’t know what the best political solution is for reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, but I’m willing to try anything that seems effective.

Funny, Anthony didn’t draw attention to this article from the same issue – Global warming: How skepticism became denial. Here’s the abstract:

The conversation on global warming started in 1896, when a physical chemist estimated that the mean global temperature would rise several degrees if the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was doubled. The topic eventually became one of the most passionate in the history of science. The author points out that climate experts were initially strongly skeptical of the theory of global warming; it took a variety of evidence to gradually convince them that warming due to human emissions was likely. The public, however, was guided away from this conclusion by a professional public relations effort, motivated by industrial and ideological concerns. Deniers of the scientific consensus avoided normal scientific discourse and resorted to ad hominem attacks that cast doubt on the entire scientific community—while disrupting the lives of some researchers. The author points out that scientists have failed to mount a concerted public relations campaign to defend their position. When trust is lost, he asserts, a determined effort is needed to restore it.

Union of Concerned Scientists – Unwarranted Concern about the Northeast US

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“Union of Concerned Scientists – Unwarranted Concern about the Northeast US“. A guest post by Alan Cheetham of Appinsys (an unskeptical version of Skeptical Science, with an interest in portraits of Mohammed). Did you know that the Union of Concerned Scientists, who are just washed-out librul anti-nuke gravy-train types, has been exaggerating climate change in the Northeastern USA? (Nothing to say about the rest of the world?)

[Across the globe, and] “here in the Northeast, the climate is changing. Records show that spring is arriving earlier, summers are growing hotter, and winters are becoming warmer and less snowy. These changes are consistent with global warming, an urgent phenomenon driven by heat-trapping emissions from human activities.” – 2006, from climatechoices.org

“In fact”, there has been no trend in temperature change there in a hundred years, and sometimes the “record” was, like, years ago!

Cheat-sheet:

  • When denialists like Anthony Watts and Alan Cheetham want to present the illusion of a recent cooling period, they will reduce the number of years of temperature data until they can.
  • When denialists like Anthony and Alan want to hide recent (post 1975) AGW warming, they increase the number of years they present.
  • Denialists like Anthony and Alan will always cherry-pick a convenient location and claim that it disproves a global trend.
  • Denialists like Anthony and Alan will always fixate on an outlier if it suits their argument, the wilder the better.

Unfortunately for Anthony, in this case the “trick” is in plain sight. In all “flat” temperature graphs the trend from 1975 onwards is a rising one. Here’s an example, the “summer” temperature trend:

Alan Cheetham's "flat" temperature trend — of just the northeast USA because nothing else exists — with post-1975 trend indicated.

I guess we should listen to the Union of Unconcerned Scientists.

On “Trap-Speed”, ACC and the SNR

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On “Trap-Speed”, ACC and the SNR. Anthony Watts gives us a guest post by William McClenney, a geologist and “environmental consultant”. He tells us, at tiresome length, that things have happened quickly in the past so who cares if they happen again? So what if they caused civilizations to collapse? We R smart now.

Skeptical or constipated?

Is there a signal in McClenney’s noise? I don’t think it’s worth the effort to find out. Arrogant geologists love to invoke poorly characterized ancient events to dismiss anything happening in the modern world. Whatever.

Sea Ice News #33

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“Sea Ice News #33“. Anthony Watts tells us that the ice is coming back. Global Warming is over! Too bad the trends haven’t actually changed. Still, keep talking about it. If you really want Sea Ice News, go to the National Snow and Ice Data Center and ignore Anthony’s spin.

Figure 3. Monthly December ice extent for 1979 to 2010 shows a decline of 3.5% per decade. Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center.

Also, why are “residents of Baffin Island in the Canadian Arctic asking what happened to the sea ice cover this year”? (Climate Central) As NSIDC director and senior scientist Mark Serreze says, “These are areas which should’ve frozen over in late November and they’re still marine at this point, which is very unusual.”

The sun is still in a slump – still not conforming to NOAA “consensus” forecasts

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“The sun is still in a slump – still not conforming to NOAA “consensus” forecasts“. Sunspot counts are staying low, confounding predictions for Solar Cycle 24. So is the Ap geomagnetic index. Does this mean that scientists are money-wasting idiots who can’t get anything right Anthony?

ISES Solar Cycle, January 4, 2011.

Question: if a declining solar magnetic field, “a phenomenon that in the 17th century coincided with a prolonged period of cooling on Earth” (Science Now, Sep.t 14, 2010) means that the natural solar influence should be a cooling one, why is the global temperature rising? Is it possible that there’s some kind of… unnatural influence at work?

I wonder if when solar geomagnetic activity rises again we’ll see that instead of counteracting the… uh, unnatural influence it begins amplifying it.

Are huge northeast snow storms due to global warming?

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“Are huge northeast snow storms due to global warming?“ Dr. Richard Keen, a buddy of denialist economist Roger Pielke, Jr., guest posts on Anthony Watts’ blog. Did you know that Philadelphia’s weather patterns are proof that lots of snow really does mean colder weather? Take that, Jay Lawrimore of NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center! And of course one useful city is always a refutation of what’s happening over the entire planet.

Now Richard knows you nasty warmists are going to accuse him, again, of cherry-picking a convenient example. So he reminds readers that he chose Philadelphia because he grew up there. That totally lets him off the hook.

Hurricanes and global warming – still no connection

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“Hurricanes and global warming – still no connection“. Yep, the tripling of loss-relevant weather events over the past 30 years is just coincidence to Anthony Watts. After-all, denialist economist Roger Pielke Jr. can explain it all away with just the merest jiggering of his arbitrary cost analysis! It will be decades before these storms get really destructive, if you ignore sea-level rise. Thus disproving Global Warming.

Funny, Roger sang a different tune back in 2006 when he said “Clearly, since 1970, climate change has shaped the disaster loss record.”

Anthony’s typically trivial contribution is to mutter about photoshopping in magazine articles and on book covers, and link to his own “definitive” past coverage of the subject. If you want to step back from the hurricane strawman, Skeptical Science says:

“It is unclear whether global warming is increasing hurricane frequency out there but there is increasing evidence that warming increases hurricane intensity”.

Anthony and Roger’s scientific nemesis Joe Romm (in the sense that Joe is a scientist) at Climate Progress says,

So one thing you can safely say about a hurricane damage analysis study: Its conclusions should not be generalized into broader conclusions about the impact of climate change on extreme weather.

So, what’s the deal? Just more denialist smoke.