John Rennie's 7 Answers to Climate Contrarian Nonsense

[BenBurch]

http://www.scientificamerican.com/p...=john-rennies-seven-answers-to-clima-09-12-03

On the eve of the United Nations Global Warming Conference in Copenhagen and in the wake of the hacked climate researchers' e-mails, former Scientific American Editor in Chief John Rennie discusses his ScientificAmerican.com article "7 Answers to Climate Contrarian Nonsense," available at http://bit.ly/8bg9Fx

 

[Eyeron]

Devil's Advocate: "Sorry, doesn't exist.

LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA L!

Damned cultists."

 

[Hallo Alfie]

Meh

Biologist

You can't have it both ways Ben.
You discredit skeptics on the basis of their qualifications, then proffer up the opinions of others who lack the very credentials you state are the only important ones.

 

[Trakar]

Meh

Biologist

You can't have it both ways Ben.
You discredit skeptics on the basis of their qualifications, then proffer up the opinions of others who lack the very credentials you state are the only important ones.

Who are you talking about?
The article in question cites the work of climatologists, physicists, and the leading relevent scientific organizations on the planet.

http://www.aip.org/history/climate/simple.htm#L_M018

http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/hazards/gas/index.php

http://cdiac.ornl.gov/ftp/trends/co2/lawdome.smoothed.yr20%3E,

http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg1/ar4-wg1-faqs.pdf

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v392/n6678/full/392779a0.html

http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11676&page=R1

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/globalwarming/medieval.html

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2008/pr20081216.html

http://www.ajc.com/news/nation-world/ap-impact-statisticians-reject-174088.html?printArticle=y

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7191/full/nature06921.html

http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg1/ar4-wg1-chapter2.pdf


http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v460/n7253/full/460332a.html

http://www.aip.org/history/climate/simple.htm#L_M018>.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=carbon-dioxide-and-climate

http://www.nature.com/news/2009/091120/full/news.2009.1101.html

http://data.giss.nasa.gov/modelforce/

And many more...

 

[Hallo Alfie]

Who are you talking about?
The article in question cites the work of climatologists, physicists, and the leading relevent scientific organizations on the planet.

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2008/pr20081216.html

And many more...

Fair enough ................................ perhaps....................... I was talking about Rennie and missed (still can't find actually) the references.

But just to pull one of these citations out of your list (UK Met Office).

This is their latest (below).
If they have no confidence in their own data, how does that reflect on this report?

The Met Office plans to re-examine 160 years of temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by leaked e-mails.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6945445.ece

 

[athon]

Fair enough ................................ perhaps....................... I was talking about Rennie and missed (still can't find actually) the references.

But just to pull one of these citations out of your list (UK Met Office).

This is their latest (below).
If they have no confidence in their own data, how does that reflect on this report?

The Met Office plans to re-examine 160 years of temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by leaked e-mails.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6945445.ece

Makes perfect sense to me. Anti-AGW figures would happily suggest people should dismiss their data with a wave of the hand by simply stating it includes East Anglia's CTU figures. Seems a damned if they do and damned if they don't moment.

Scientifically speaking, it's admirable that they're doubling checking. If anything, it'll go some way to reducing the critics who wish to flippantly dismiss their conclusions.

Athon

 

[Hallo Alfie]

Makes perfect sense to me. Anti-AGW figures would happily suggest people should dismiss their data with a wave of the hand by simply stating it includes East Anglia's CTU figures. Seems a damned if they do and damned if they don't moment.

Scientifically speaking, it's admirable that they're doubling checking. If anything, it'll go some way to reducing the critics who wish to flippantly dismiss their conclusions.

Athon

I absolutely agree and I do not for a minute suggest that all data is tained or otherwise. But it seems a potentially questionable practice to proffer up work as absolute evidence for AGW if the 'owners' of the data are investigating the veracity of their own information.

 

[athon]

I absolutely agree and I do not for a minute suggest that all data is tained or otherwise. But it seems a potentially questionable practice to proffer up work as absolute evidence for AGW if the 'owners' of the data are investigating the veracity of their own information.

To be frank, I think it's less to allay their own concerns and more of a publicity move. You're suggesting they should have reports available for the public that reflect their conclusions without CTU's figures. Obviously this isn't the case. They can be as confident as they like in their own data, and be certain that the data viewed as tainted by the public is of no consequence - without something concrete to hold up in front of the public, there is wiggle room for the doubters.

Maybe they should have had this already. Knowing how research organisations work, I'm not surprised that they don't have this sitting at hand readily available.

Athon

 

[Matthew Best]

If they have no confidence in their own data, how does that reflect on this report?

The Met Office plans to re-examine 160 years of temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by leaked e-mails.

The statement does not say that the Met Office has no confidence in their own data.

 

[Hallo Alfie]

To be frank, I think it's less to allay their own concerns and more of a publicity move. You're suggesting they should have reports available for the public that reflect their conclusions without CTU's figures. Obviously this isn't the case. They can be as confident as they like in their own data, and be certain that the data viewed as tainted by the public is of no consequence - without something concrete to hold up in front of the public, there is wiggle room for the doubters.

Maybe they should have had this already. Knowing how research organisations work, I'm not surprised that they don't have this sitting at hand readily available.

Athon

You may well be right about the "publicity move", whilst still being totally confident in their data. And it would make sense on that basis too to do their reviews.
The point remains however that they are doing them (for whatever reason) and have said that the reason is because

"public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by leaked e-mails."

I assume that the people at the Met are not complete fools and have a vague idea as to what they are doing. They would also have known presumably, how any decisions they make, statements they make and/or position they take would be received.
Given same, they must have considered this prior to making this statement and they used their words quite deliberately.

Whether we like it or not, that is their publicly stated position. It is now open to be used by people and organisations as they will, regardless of where they are in the spectrum on the topic.

Regards
AAA

 

[athon]

I assume that the people at the Met are not complete fools and have a vague idea as to what they are doing. They would also have known presumably, how any decisions they make, statements they make and/or position they take would be received.
Given same, they must have considered this prior to making this statement and they used their words quite deliberately.

Oh, I don't doubt that. However, I'm not sure how else they might have worded it without having somebody jumping on it as evidence for something.

We've got a similar situation here with a certain major research organisation. From an official position, they cannot make public statements on government policies. This is far from an easy organisational policy to maintain, given it's hard to know where to draw the line. One of the organisation's scientists was recently prevented from publishing an evaluation on the economics of the government's climate change policy. He cries foul, and has since quit, and the organisation now looks like a shill for the Labor government. Yet if they allowed it, they'd most certainly be openly ignoring their own rules on commenting directly on government policy.

For research organisations, knowing how to present to the public is often far from simple, especially when the public isn't a homogenous force. In the Met's case, it's all well and good to say how they should have done it. Yet without knowing the rest of the story (as many who comment negatively on the situation I outlined above) it's hard to form a good opinion on what they should do.

Athon

 

[Hallo Alfie]

Oh, I don't doubt that. However, I'm not sure how else they might have worded it without having somebody jumping on it as evidence for something.

We've got a similar situation here with a certain major research organisation. From an official position, they cannot make public statements on government policies. This is far from an easy organisational policy to maintain, given it's hard to know where to draw the line. One of the organisation's scientists was recently prevented from publishing an evaluation on the economics of the government's climate change policy. He cries foul, and has since quit, and the organisation now looks like a shill for the Labor government. Yet if they allowed it, they'd most certainly be openly ignoring their own rules on commenting directly on government policy.

For research organisations, knowing how to present to the public is often far from simple, especially when the public isn't a homogenous force. In the Met's case, it's all well and good to say how they should have done it. Yet without knowing the rest of the story (as many who comment negatively on the situation I outlined above) it's hard to form a good opinion on what they should do.

Athon

Gotcha, makes some sense.

And that's just it. We don't know the rest of the story.

Cheers.

 

[Trakar]

Fair enough ................................ perhaps....................... I was talking about Rennie and missed (still can't find actually) the references.

But just to pull one of these citations out of your list (UK Met Office).

This is their latest (below).
If they have no confidence in their own data, how does that reflect on this report?

The Met Office plans to re-examine 160 years of temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by leaked e-mails.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6945445.ece

Can you reference this MET statement from the MET?

Regardless, neither the asserted "shattered public confidence," due to illegally hacked and released emails that have little or nothing to due with the actual climate science or data. Nor any claimed plans to re-examine their temperature data necessarily equate to the Met itself having no confidence in their data. In fact the article you reference states:

The Met Office is confident that its analysis will eventually be shown to be correct. However, it says it wants to create a new and fully open method of analysing temperature data.

 

[Trakar]

I absolutely agree and I do not for a minute suggest that all data is tained or otherwise. But it seems a potentially questionable practice to proffer up work as absolute evidence for AGW if the 'owners' of the data are investigating the veracity of their own information.

The Met doesn't own the data, again per your referenced article:

... the chief executive of the Met Office has written to national meteorological offices in 188 countries asking their permission to release the raw data that they collected from their weather stations.

 

[Wudang]

"public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by leaked e-mails."

I assume that the people at the Met are not complete fools and have a vague idea as to what they are doing.
<...snip...>
Whether we like it or not, that is their publicly stated position. It is now open to be used by people and organisations as they will, regardless of where they are in the spectrum on the topic.

I draw your attention to the first 2 words of the quote. "public confidence". They have repeatedly said that the data sets all agree on AGW whether or not they include the data in question. The science is not in question.

 

[Trakar]

You may well be right about the "publicity move", whilst still being totally confident in their data. And it would make sense on that basis too to do their reviews.
The point remains however that they are doing them (for whatever reason) and have said that the reason is because

"public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by leaked e-mails."

I assume that the people at the Met are not complete fools and have a vague idea as to what they are doing. They would also have known presumably, how any decisions they make, statements they make and/or position they take would be received.
Given same, they must have considered this prior to making this statement and they used their words quite deliberately.

Whether we like it or not, that is their publicly stated position.

Actually, I have yet to see an official Met statement that reflects any of this articles points, merely the article you linked and a few hundred conservative political sources repeating the article without any link to a Met press release or statement.

On the Met site itself there is only:

Climate science statement
A joint statement from the Met Office, Natural Environment Research Council and the Royal Society on climate change issues. (24 November 2009)

Release of global-average temperature data
The Met Office announces plans to release station temperature records. (5 December 2009) ---Which dates to the same day as the Times article and contains some similar information, but if this is the source of the Times article they spin and cherry pick worse than anyone here!

Tackling temperature rise
A new map highlights the importance of limiting mean global temperature rise to no more than 2 °C. (7 December 2009)

If you find the Met version of the Times article (and it isn't what I listed above), please link to it.

 

[macdoc]

AA speculated

And that's just it. We don't know the rest of the story.

What story would that be??
That it's not warming and we're not responsible???....

May I refer to an area that HADCru doesn't cover
http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/reportcard/

and perhaps you could explain these OBSERVATIONS to dear reader.

Do you keep your eye on the main chance..
....namely what IS occurring on our planet and why

rather than immaterial nonsense from denidiot sources and purloined material from working scientists.
it changes the the reality of AGW not one iota.