Category Archives: Misdirection

Is It Time To Stop The Insanity Of Wasting Time and Money On More Climate Models?

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“Is It Time To Stop The Insanity Of Wasting Time and Money On More Climate Models?” (2015-09-14). Wait a second. Hasn’t the only faintly credible denialist argument been that all the climate modelling and climate projections are too preliminary? We should keep waiting, twiddling our thumbs, until perfect data and projections are in hand? Then, presumably, the denialists will swing into righteous eco-warrior action. No, for Dr. Tim Ball it’s now about wasteful funding. Apparently ignorance is again bliss.

I still flick a bored eye over to Anthony Watts’ clown convention every now and then, and this post made me laugh enough to spend a moment scrolling through the “science.”

Today Anthony has loaned his dunce’s pulpit to Sky Dragon kook Dr. Tim Ball so he can mutter that climate projections aren’t as precise as he requires, that there aren’t enough “stations”, and that if you copy and paste carefully enough even the IPCC can be made to admit that the data is awful. Shut the whole thing down!

Hard to put much credence in Dr. Ball’s “career as a climatologist” (actually he’s a retired geographer and semi-pro Letter to the Editor writer) when he’s still trying to sell the out-of-context “hide the decline” source code quote from 2009. That dog won’t hunt. Also, does he really think that climatologists are trying to forecast climate? Ball seems to have a very rudimentary notion of how his alleged profession gathers climate data, or how it is used. Most of his gotcha quotes stop just before the actual meaning is explained, but this can possibly be put down to a short attention span.

Hell, Dr. Ball seems to have even forgotten that “stations” aren’t the only way we gather climate data. Maybe he should dust off those National Geographic magazines and look for articles about “satellites.” They’re brill. They go everywhere!

Actually, Dr. Ball seems to hold Australian garden-variety denialist and conspiracy enthusiast (ask her about the Rothschilds) Joanne Nova in high esteem, so perhaps he’s hidden an admission of poor judgement amongst his contemptuous bluster.

The IPCC weighs in on the Mann Nobel dilemma, and throws him under the bus

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“The IPCC weighs in on the Mann Nobel dilemma, and throws him under the bus” (2012-11-02). The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change swats a semantic mosquito and Anthony Watts, as he gets squished like the bug he is, declares victory.

So did Dr. Michael Mann win the Nobel Peace Prize or just help?

Apparently it’s way more important to argue about semantics, comma placement, etc. and use that for personal attacks than it is to discuss climate change science. Honest scientific discussion is a topic of last resort at WUWT, repeatedly chosen “Best Science Blog”, by weblogawards.org. (Funny how in every possible 2012 category denialist bloggers “won”. Like every fraudulent accolade Anthony claims, they aren’t worth the pixels they’re printed on.)

  • Did the IPCC receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for their scientific work on Climate Change? Yes. They shared it with crypto-communist Al Gore.
  • Did the IPCC thank key contributors for their work, which resulted in the IPCC receiving the Nobel Peace Prize? Yes.
  • Was Dr. Mann one of those contributors? Yes.
  • Did Dr. Mann, in fit of alleged ego, fabricate his own Nobel Peace Prize certificate? No.
  • Do Anthony and his denialist buddies care? No.

Heartland Institute Responds to Pacific Institute’s Reinstatement of Gleick – cites Federal criminal prosecution

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“Heartland Institute Responds to Pacific Institute’s Reinstatement of Gleick – cites Federal criminal prosecution“ (2012-06-07). Anthony Watts loves the thrill of leaping to a conclusion. Here, he regurgitates a Heartland Institute press release muttering sourly about the Pacific Institute’s announcement that they had reinstated Dr. Peter Gleick after investigating his “stealing” Heartland Fakegate documents. Documents that were so sensitive that staff e-mailed them to pretty much anyone that asked.

The Heartland Institute also mutters that they wish the Feds would charge Dr. Gleick with… something. In other words, “just you wait until your father gets home!”

But what really gets under the Anthony and Heartland’s skin is that “the Pacific Institute has refused to identify who conducted its investigation” This is total conspiracy stuff! There. Was. No. Investigation. You can put money on that, pal.

Anthony adds an admission a few hours later:

Note: shortly before I received this statement from Heartland, I got an email identifying the investigating organization.

So Anthony knew the Heartland statement was inaccurate and still he chose to post it uncorrected.

Way more satisfying to slap your mouth to the megaphone and start bellowing, isn’t it Anthony?

Paging David Appell and Nick Stokes again: time to fess up and apologize

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“Paging David Appell and Nick Stokes again: time to fess up and apologize” (2012-05-28). Those “alarmists” are always exaggerating, as Anthony Watts loves to imply remind us. Even about things as mundane as so-called death-threats!

I mean, it’s not as if they’ve had to escape from the trunk of a kidnapper’s car, is it? Or that they were threatened with having their children “brutally gang-raped”. (What, that one’s true? Never mind.) And as anyone who’s up-to-date knows “You will be chased down the street with burning stakes and hung from your f*** neck, until you are dead, dead, dead!” is what all the cool kids say when they’re chillin’. Heck even (apparently actual) scientist Judith Curry thinks saying that “AGW fraudsters” should be dealt with thus – “Knock them down. Kick them until they quit moving. Check for breathing. Repeat.” – is simply a cute turn of phrase.

So when Rupert Murdock’s The Australian declares “no death threats in emails [to climate scientists]” because an Australian’s freedom of information request for a specific institution, specific short period of time, and specific small number of individuals doesn’t turn up much, when that pretty much settles the question for Anthony. Forget all the stuff that happens outside that tiny slice of space/time! Doesn’t count.

This means that Anthony can justify swaggering across the internet spouting self-serving nonsense like this about comments deploring aggression and threats towards climate scientists by the aforementioned David Appell and Nick Stokes amongst others:

They can be men, apologize for their errant and childish behavior towards me and other skeptics on this matter, and move on. I’ll be happy to accept their sincere apologies posted here or on their own blogs and put the matter behind us. Ball’s in your court fellas.

By the way Anthony’s completely unable to control any of the vicious stream of denialist comments that his readers, without his explicit encouragement, make. It takes all his effort just to censor his critics! No time left over at all for that other stuff, which is purely for theatrical effect anyway.

As always, Anthony offers himself as exemplar. He get’s angry e-mails, but he’s strong enough to laugh them off. Man up, warmists, Anthony-style! He’d never overreact to the purely hypothetical situation of angry people trying to confront climate scientists at their offices or wave hangman’s nooses at conferences.

Oh, wait. He did overreact, didn’t he? When little Anna Haynes showed up (uninvited!!!!) at his offices seeking to speak with him, he freaked. But that, of course, is different.

One thing for sure, Anthony won’t mention the ABC News program Media Watch’s investigation into the coverage of threats against climate scientists. Nothing gets in the way of bluster like a factual dissection.

But what the emails don’t prove is what The Australian splashed on its front page on May the third… “Climate scientists’ claims of email death threats go up in smoke”

He’ll stick with the pull-quote from Rupert Murdock’s The Australian, thank you.

Update from the comments: Vicious denialist threats are pretty much routine and they are explained away by people like Anthony Watts, who do everything in they can to encourage them.

Stanford claims farmers “dodged impacts of global warming” in the USA, but you have to find it first.

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“Stanford claims farmers “dodged impacts of global warming” in the USA, but you have to find it first.“ (May 6, 2011). When Anthony Watts does his own posting you can be sure that it will be short and dishonest. Here Anthony disputes a Stanford University report on the impact of global warming on US crop production, which states:

Global warming is likely already taking a toll on world wheat and corn production, according to a new study led by Stanford University researchers. But the United States, Canada and northern Mexico have largely escaped the trend.

Anthony rebuttal is to slap together charts of US corn yield and US temperature to “prove” that noisy regional weather data shows no global warming. He also alludes to the comical “CO2 is essential for life” argument.

Yep, US corn yields are going up. It’s gotta mean something! Anthony grudgingly allows that “some of the gains seen below are likely the result of improved seed lines”, but the honest first approximation is that all of corn yield gains are “likely the result of improved seed lines”. After-all he’s pretty sure that there hasn’t been any change in the climate, isn’t he? Sez Anthony:

What global warming? The last two years of annual mean temperature for the USA (2009, 2010) is about the same as it was in 1980 and 1981, and lower than many years since.

So Anthony’s entire argument is to compare two years of the US annual mean temperature, 1980 and 1981, against the two most recent years and declare that since they are “about the same” this proves that there’s no global warming? Dude, you’re a frickin’ cherry-pickin’ idiot.

Anthony’s lame “we’ve seen exactly this before” deception is only faintly plausible if he deliberately removes the default trend line from his chart. We can fix that though (replicate it here, but ignore Anthony’s advice to exclude the trend line):

Anthony Watts took care to remove the trend from his version of this chart.

As usual Anthony’s also using several levels of cherry-picking to gin-up his “What global warming?” climate claim aside from the two-year comparison windows. The US Corn Belt is not the same geographic area as the continental US, so he’s not demonstrating anything at all about the Corn Belt climate. Likewise, the continental US represents only a fraction of the global record.

The Stanford article also mentions an US trend towards anomalously cooler summers, which coupled with the unequivocal rise in annual average temperature implies warmer winters. US agriculture has been partly insulated from global warming by keeping the growing season temperatures within the crop’s tolerance zone. Why didn’t Anthony address that? Hmmm.

Oh noes! Sea level rising three times faster than expected (again)

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“Oh noes! Sea level rising three times faster than expected (again)“. (May 2, 2011) Anthony Watts tells us that a Danish newspaper article about sea-level rise is another crazy warmist exaggeration. How can expected sea-level rise suddenly be three times higher than earlier predictions? Also, the article photo has a funny-looking foreigner wearing a beret in it. Chuckle with superiority and don’t think about it too much I guess.

The Danish newspaper article (Anthony apparently follows Azerbaijan news closely, as that’s what he links to) says:

Sea levels were estimated to rise between 0.9 and 1.6 metres by the year 2100 according to the findings by the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP), cited by Danish daily Politiken, DPA reported.

These are not new numbers. When a newspaper covers this topic these estimates will be present as even Anthony’s 2009 Google search screen capture shows. The IPCC 2007 Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) estimate of 0.3m to 0.9m has long been considered too cautious. Perhaps Anthony thinks that newspapers should only write about something once? He’s free to repeat his misinformation ad nauseam though I guess, because he digs straight in and sticks to a favorite theme.

Anthony’s rebuttal is to talk about the rate of current sea-level rise (what, it’s rising? Oops) while pretending to disprove predicted sea-level rise by 2100. Just one of the many dull-witted misdirections he’s been performing for years. Unfortunately it only works for heads already bouncing up and down in agreement.

Anthony turns to his sea-level citizen-scientist, Willis Eschenbach, for what passes for confirmation (yes, my eyes roll too when I see that name). OMG it’s true, sea-level rise probably isn’t accelerating at the moment! In fact if you cross your eyes and decide that two years is a meaningful period of time, you can even pretend it’s sort of slowing down. Global warming, which wasn’t happening, is over! Stock up on blankets and woolly socks!

A plot of sea-level rise anomaly, not sea-level.

Of course sea-level is still, you know, rising.

Johns Hopkins succumbs to heat wave mania

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“Johns Hopkins succumbs to heat wave mania“. (May 3, 2011) “Climate Change Analysis Predicts Increased Fatalities from Heat Waves”, published in Environmental Health Perspectives on May 1st, 2011, is about heat-waves and the impact of global warming on morbidity. Anthony Watts stumbles across their press release and incorrectly decides they’re talking about record high temperatures. Nope.

Anthony, heat-wave morbidity is linked to multiple days of high nighttime temperatures, something that actually has an association with global warming, and humidity, not record highs. You’re not on the same page, buddy. (Are you ever?)

Anthony seems to think that denialist meteorologist Joe D’Aleo’s 2009 analysis, and the stagnant Hall of [false] Record blog (where the 2012 elections will aways be “getting closer”), have the definitive scientific answer. People only die from cold! Also, a weird blurred-together “statewide” record temperatures chart doesn’t seem to support global warming. Anthony loves mashed together out-of-context data if he can use it to advantage, but what dim-wit actually thinks that rising temperatures can’t happen without lock-step new daily temperature records? There’s something about straight lines that captivates denialists.

In the Joe D’Aleo links to we find the assertion that Anthony seems to like: “The claim that warming increases morbidity rates is also a myth.” Oops, Wikipedia says “in the United States, the loss of human life in hot spells in summer exceeds that caused by all other weather events combined, including lightning, rain, floods, hurricanes and tornadoes.”

Himalayan Sherpas as climate proxy

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“Himalayan Sherpas as climate proxy“. (May 1, 2011) Anthony Watts reposts a “Bishop Hill” (Andrew Montford’s pseudonym) blog item mocking researchers for asking Himalayan Sherpas about changes in their environment (Biology Letters, April 2011). Anthony ‘piles on’ with a link to a twenty year-old anthropology book.

As reported by Richard Black of the BBC, apparently only about half of the villagers questioned reported that summers were starting earlier than they did ten years ago. This means the other half couldn’t be bribed to lie by the corrupt researchers I guess.

Their top line conclusions are that villagers are noticing signals suggestive of climate change.

Warmer weather, drying water sources, the advance of summer and the monsoon, new insect pests, earlier flowering of plants… all consistent with the basic idea of a warming world.

Anecdotal evidence is a favorite denialists talking point, but only when it goes their way. They like to report one person recalling that the beach height is exactly the same as when they were kid, but not when 250 people report about when flowers bloomed. Just a few days ago Anthony and his teammates were touting an opinion poll.

Selective as always, Anthony tells us about an imprecise research method but fails to mention that ways of successfully using it exist. Weak “remembered data” is better than a lack of data. Social anthropologists and social scientists live in that sphere and know how to use it with caution.

Why windmills won’t wash

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“Why windmills won’t wash“. British motor-mouth buffoon Viscount Monckton of Brenchley (not a guest at William and Kate’s recent wedding) guest-posts a stream-of-consciousness conversation with himself on Anthony Watts’ blog. The apparent subject is a primary school wind turbine and its implications for mitigating global warming (which, of course, isn’t happening, but would be natural if it was happening). Apparently “the warming the Birmingham Bat-Batterer [one of Monckton’s varying pet names for his chosen scapegoat wind turbine] will forestall over the next 20 years will be rather less than 0.0000000000007 Celsius.”

If one backyard wind turbine won’t stop, say, at least half of the global warming why do anything? Seems sensible.

Also, since the lonely little 33-foot high Midlands primary school wind turbine only generated 209 kilowatt-hours of electricity in its first year, the Thanet Wind Farm, consisting of one hundred 3 MW wind turbines, will be useless too. All you need to do is take a hostile economic evaluation from a denialist buddy (in this case the Daily Telegraph’s reliable Christopher Booker) and give it an extra “twist”.

Monckton spews out great swaths of bogus economics gobbledygook in his arguments here and refers to “smidgens” and “tads” when trying to obscure his assumptions. He’s learning to avoid those concrete details that keep tripping him up and stick to the cocktail party clowning that he’s actually quite good at. The estimable Viscount finishes his ‘calculations’ thus:

So there you have it. After the biggest and most expensive propaganda campaign in human history, leading to the biggest tax increase in human history, trying to stop “global warming” that isn’t happening anyway and won’t happen at anything like the predicted rate is the least cost-effective use of taxpayers’ money in human history, bar none – and that’s saying something.

Now that’s what I call climate science! Like most denialists for Monckton, after all the verbal dancing, it boils down to taxes.

World Opinion on global warming: not so hot

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“World opinion on global warming: not so hot“. Anthony Watts tells us that a Gallup poll result means that we don’t have to worry about global warming! Whew, saved by public ignorance.

It turns out that if ordinary folks don’t notice climate changes then they didn’t happen. Here are the global poll results that Anthony thinks prove there is no global warming (evidence be damned).

The question was “Temperature rise is a part of global warming or climate change. Do you think rising temperatures are”:

  • Result of human activity – 35% (54% of Canadians believe this, but only 34% of Americans)
  • Result of natural causes – 14%
  • “Both” (i.e. some human causes) – 13%
  • Don’t know/refused – 2%
  • Not aware of global warming – 36%

Anthony Watts prefers not to dwell on the fact that of the “aware” respondents, 48% think human activity is contributing to global warming and 14% don’t. Instead he invokes the ‘noble savages’ argument that more primitive people are more aware of their environment (which is weather, not climate…) and the “not aware” respondents here are keenly insightful.

Also, people in the western world are poisoned by the mainstream media.

Tell us Anthony, how are people supposed to notice a less than 1°C rise over several decades amidst a variety of much larger daily, seasonal, and locale changes?

This poll was about awareness of human activities as a factor, not whether people think temperatures are rising. Anthony has tried to spin both the question and the answers. Nice try.