Bishop Hill Not so Goot
Jun 6, 2011 Climate: Sceptics Climate: other Aynsley Kellow posted these remarks in the comments on the posting on Goot's paper on the climate consensus. I thought they were important enough to bring upstairs as a header post.
I found it difficult to read this piece, especially because the matter of how many climate scientists can dance in agreement on the head of a pin is irrelevant to any argument about climate science. Since Galileo, the fallacy of argumentum ad populum has been well established, and it is rather surprising that Murray would be engaged to explore whether the fallacy holds in this particular case.
What worried me more was that Murray both cites me and gets it horribly wrong. In the middle of a titanic sentence of 159 woards, Murray included the following parenthetical remark (on p6):
'(Bray and von Storch 2007, fig. 30; badly misrepresented by Kellow 2007, 73, a defender of Peiser)'
I found this a surprising remark, because Hans von Storch was kind enough to write to me to tell me that my book was accurate in the elements with which he was familiar. How then had I 'badly misrepresented' fig. 30 in Bray and von Storch, 2007?
The answer is that it would have been extremely difficult for me to have misrepresented anything in Bray and von Storch, 2007, because that manuscript was received for publication in May 2007, when my book was already in press.
In fact, I quoted Dennis Bray as he was quoted in the Sunday Telegraph, on 1 May 2005 — fully two years before the submisison by he and Hans von Storch of the paper to which Murray Goot refers. The Sunday Telegraph states:
'Prof Dennis Bray, of the GKSS National Research Centre in Geesthacht, Germany, submitted results from an international study showing that fewer than one in 10 climate scientists believed that climate change is principally caused by human activity.'
My book on p73 states:
'Science published a correction by Oreskes (Oreskes,2005), but it refused to publish a letter from Dr Benny Peiser which showed that her numbers could not be replicated, and another from Dr Dennis Bray reporting a survey ofclimate scientists showing that fewer than one in ten considered that climate change was principally caused by human activity. Dr Bray told the UK paper the Sunday Telegraph that Science had informed him his paper ‘didn’t fit with what they were intending to publish.'
The issue was Oreskes mis-stating her methodology, stating in her paper that she searched for 'clmate change' rather than the search term she actually used: 'global climate change'. I stated in my book:
'But a search of the ISI database using ‘climate change’ produced 12000 papers, and Oreskes was forced to admit after science journalist David Appell (the owner of the blog where Mann had first mounted his defence) challenged her on his website (within 12 days of publication) that she had used the three keywords ‘global climate change’, which reduced the return by an order of magnitude.'
Note who nailed Oreskes on the deceit: David Appell was no friend of climate sceptics.
I have been seriously misrepresented by Murray Goot, and I think he owes me an apology.
Reader Comments (129)
"I have been seriously misrepresented by Murray Goot, and I think he owes me an apology"
Well, perhaps he (Goot) will do so eventually, but I expect not until the MSM has thoroughly propagandized his misrepresentation
Spatial teleconnections have been robustly established in Climate Science. Perhaps there are temporal ones well.
I am unsurprised that Goot has 'misspoken' plus got the chronology of the publishing badly wrong with regard to Aynsley Kellow's statements. Anyone who is still banging the 'we have more believers than you' drum has seriously drifted away from scientific reality. Einstein's 'it only takes one' dictum still holds as true as it ever did. Goot is obviously confusing the scientific method with the political method..
"Goot is obviously confusing the scientific method with the political method.."
Is that not his aim?
"Einstein's 'it only takes one' dictum still holds as true as it ever did."
Jun 6, 2011 at 9:33 AM | Alexander K
Sadly that one has to be correct for the maxim to be effective. As there is no convincing evidence that AGW is not the correct theory, then we're still waiting on that one.
And as there has been no effective falsification, despite powerful commercial interests trying incredibly hard to do so, then we assume it is the correct working theory, and that means we need to act, and react, now.
It's not a hard concept for most, I never really understand why you lot can't master it. I think it comes down to bias confirmation again, and how willing you all are to accept that 'one', whereas in reality, it's not there.
"no convincing evidence that AGW is not the correct theory"
How about some convincing evidence that it is?
Zed - next time you appear at Truro magistrates' court for speeding and are unable to provide any evidence that you weren't, can we assume you'll be happy with a conviction?
Oh dear. A null hypothesis reverser in our midst. Sir Ronald would not be pleased.
ZBD - I know glaciers are only a proxy for climate - but Jakobshaven does suggest that the warming we have seen since the end of the LIA has little if anything to do with anthropological CO2 emissions -
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4139/4753025383_5c34f3dd93_b.jpg
Goodness, Zebedee, you can be irritating! You never answer legitimate questions I or anyone else ask you, but you pop up and blithely spout contrarian nonsense. One of my grandfathers was a wealthy and well-educated snob who felt that universal education would be a pointless exercise as individual literacy and numeracy would, in the end, be seen by the literate and numerate as intelligence. Sadly, you are proving him to be right.
And I still await your further thoughts on the groups of succesful adults who freely use and accept others using nicknames. I also await your thoughts on why no commercial shipping lines use sailing ships.
How many mathematicians does it take to prove a theorem?
Alexander
"a pointless exercise"
Or, as G&S pointed out some time ago, once everybody's somebody, nobody's anybody. :-)
ZDB - I'm interested to understand what sort of evidence you think would provide 'effective falsification' of AGW as a theory. Which predictions of the AGW theory would imply the demise of the theory if observational evidence did not match those predictions?
Yours, Mike.
The scientific method isn't a hard concept for most, I never really understand why ZDB can't master it.
You won't get answers from ZDB, who is simply an ignorant troll. The likes of Mann and Jones have rather less excuse.
And as there has been no effective falsification, despite powerful commercial interests trying incredibly hard to do so, then we assume it is the correct working theory, and that means we need to act, and react, now.
The proper answer to irrational statements like this is that we must prioritize our responses. Global warming is a serious issue, but so is global cooling and loss of crop production. An asteroid hit is perhaps a more immediate danger as is a catastrophic volcanic eruption. A plague of some new virulent bacteria or virus is more likely to cause widespread harm than is global warming. The ever present danger of overpopulation is certainly a greater threat than CO2. We simply cannot afford to spend an inordinate amount of resources on this global warming issue when there are other, far more serious an imminent threats awaiting our attention.
Oh, I'd say there is falsification, plenty of it. But ZDB probably means, that the (latest) future predictions haven't been falsified yet.
"Oh, I'd say there is falsification, plenty of it. But ZDB probably means, that the (latest) future predictions haven't been falsified yet."
Jun 6, 2011 at 2:15 PM | Jonas N
You've effectively falsified AGW? Congratulations! Fame, fortune, international thanks and a certain Nobel prize await you. Did you do all the work yourself or are you part of a team. Where can we see the work? Where are you published? This is tremendously exciting. Details please.
ZDB also does this BNP style thing of embedding a lie in the middle of some other lie hoping it will then slip past as somehow conceded.
In the above it's the claim that there "powerful commercial interests trying incredibly hard" to discredit AGW.
If we set our minds to it I would think the commentariat here could identify a billion dollars a year of CAGW alarmist funding in about 5 minutes, I would think. How much counter-CAGW funding is there, Zed? These "powerful commercial interests" - can you name and substantiate say, ten, spending £10 million a year each in total?
If not, you must concede that you're simply a shrill, lying buffoon.
Or will you hide behind telling us what we really ought to be posting about?
Typical manipulative hysterical response from you.
Meet X incredibly restrictive and onerous criteria to a very specific question I have asked, otherwise you are wrong.
If you really aren't aware of commercial funding to deny climate change, then you're living in a dream world. That said, most of your postings do suggest that you are only very loosely acquainted with normalcy or reality, so perhaps you are.
Re: ZDB
I'm familiar with many theories such as Newtons theory of gravity:
Every point mass in the universe attracts every other point mass with a force that is directly proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them.
and other theories that are represented by equations such as Einstein's mass-energy equivalence (E=mc²), but I'm not familiar with AGW theory. Can you point me to where it is actually written down (and hence would have the possibility of being falsified)?
I am aware that there are a whole multitude of AGW theories which have a warming over the next century of anything ranging from 1C to 10C (or even more) and that have characteristics that directly contradict each other, but I was not aware that somebody had actually written down an "official" AGW theory together with the impacts you could expect (and that lack of would therefore falsify the theory). The IPCC report isn't what I'm looking for since that is simply a report about multiple different theories.
@Jun 6, 2011 at 2:18 PM | Zed'sDeadHead
I doubt that Jonas N would claim much personal credit for that. But the Climate Keeps on Doin' What a Climate's Gotta Do.
And that certainly is nothing like a silly little Hyperthermalist troll's pet hypothesis "scenario" suggests.
Falsification? 100% failsified and many times over.
The Nobel prizes will, no doubt, continue to go to such scientific luminaries as Gore, Pachauri and Obama.
And the total lack of evidence that human CO2 emissions are causing any harm persists.
Despite the billions of pounds which have been stolen from taxpayers, diverted from the world's poor and poured down this particular alarmist drain.
"Falsification? 100% failsified and many times over."
Jun 6, 2011 at 2:41 PM | Martin Brumby
Fantastic news! So, put your money where your mouth is and say where we can see effective falsification of AGW then.
ZDB
Please answer Mike Edwards question:
Martin Brumby? Jonas N? You both seem to have gone very quiet....
Can't be that you can't actually refute AGW theory could it?
Well. There's a surprise.
@Jun 6, 2011 at 2:54 PM | Zed'sDeadHead
I'm sorry if my comment was too intellectually challenging for you to follow.
Just look at the climate and CO2 data. No, not the cherry picked, homogenised stuff. No, not the tendentious Computer models.
The actual data.
Yes, CO2 levels increase, Some small contribution from mankind, perhaps.
No, no significant increase in global temperatures for 15 years.
cAGW? Falsified.
Next week, when you've managed to get your dead head round this we can look at some of the other threads in your amusing tapestry. Ocean acidification? Falsified. Rising sea level? Falsified. Species extinction? Falsified. Kilimanjaro snow loss? Falsified. Cyclone activity? Falsified.
"An asteroid hit is perhaps a more immediate danger as is a catastrophic volcanic eruption."
Or a Carrington event. Or the onset of global cooling...
Terry
"I'm not familiar with AGW theory"
Nor me. I think he means the AGW hypothesis.
"Zed'sDeadHead........
when you've managed to get your dead head round...."
Jun 6, 2011 at 3:15 PM | Martin Brumby
What a deeply abusive and unpleasant individual. And the actual evidence for falsification from Martin Brumby is.......
Nothing. Nada. Zilcheroonie. Martin has in no way indicated work which effetively falsifies AGW.
Proving that not only does he not have the first idea what he's talking about, but that when he talks about falsification of AGW, he's not telling the truth either.
Shame on you for behaving like that.
All, we've known for some time the whenever ZDB turns up, we get nothing but mindless drivel and above, so why bother to respond at all? It really damages the signal-to-noise ratio of this blog, and while I'm against censoring as some blogs to (RC anyone?) I'm not at all against ignoring the trolls.
ZBD - see my comment at Jun 6, 2011 at 11:23 AM and apply it to CAGW. Is the null hypothesis in a potentially beneficial drug test - "the drug has no effect" and the results are tested against the null. Or is the null - "the drug has an effect" and the results tested against that? Your answer please.
You're not the sharpest knife in the drawer, are you? And a null hypothesis denier to boot.
@Jun 6, 2011 at 3:22 PM | Zed'sDeadHead
Pleasantness, like respect is something you earn.
And continually trolling on here with the most pathetic comments and then pretending indignation when called out certainly won't earn either.
Still no answer to Mike Edwards' question, I see, Zed.
How long do we have to wait?
Zed, you are living proof that my grandfather was right; because you can read and write, you are labouring under the mistaken idea that you are intelligent. Your 'contributions' here are no more intelligent than those of a small boy who sits on his front fence and pokes out his tongue at passing pedestrians.
And you have not bothered to answer my simple questions; you probably never will.
Stop feeding the troll, you are being taken for a ride. Ignore her and she will go away for a drink.
Zed
Falsification of CAGW.
Declining rate of rise in sea levels.
No increases in frequency of intensity of tropical storms
Ditto tornadoes
No lower tropospheric hot spot.
No loss of any atolls to any rise in sea level
Anything else you'd like anyone on here to add? You've also failed to answer the question from Mike Edwards at 1.33pm.
Please do so, then we can see what it will take for you to accept that the CAGW hypothesis to be falsified.
Zed et al:
The scientificaly-defensible answer to the question you ask, indeed the question of whether AGW is (or could become) a significant problem:
"Can't be determined from the data available"
I hope there are some actual climate scientists working on that problem. The self-appointed political "scientist"-activists who appear to be in charge certainly aren't.
Cheers -- Pete Tillman
Consulting Geologist, Arizona and New Mexico (USA)
Re: ZDB
I will use your own logic.
ZedsDeadBed? You seem to be very quiet about answering Mike Edwards question....
Can't be that you will only believe that CAGW is falsified when hell freezes over could it?
GrantB
Do not confuse a bludgeon with a knife. Particularly when it comes to trolls who are known for using them to bash everything in sight -- especially logical discourse.
Isn't the argumentum ad populum precisely what Bishop Hill reports Benny Peiser delivering at the Spectator debate?
"...literacy and numeracy would, in the end, be seen by the literate and numerate as intelligence..." --Alexander K.
"A large section of the intelligentsia seems wholly devoid of intelligence."--Gilbert K. Chesterton"
There are many very intelligent commenters here, and I don't intend any insult to them, or to the British as a class, but having observed the recent performances of UK government, academia, media, and Parliament, as well as their counterparts in Germany, I simply must ask: is it possible that the German gas at Ypres and the British gas at Loos contained some sort of horrible mutagenic compound?
http://www.openmarket.org/2008/10/31/fighting-global-warming-amidst-a-snowstorm/
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2011/6/3/that-german-report.html
Hengist
Are you unable to distinguish between a scientist using an appeal to authority to justify some assertion that cannot otherwise be justified, and someone making the point that all the scientific debate in the world is useless if the public does not believe the scientists and will not act on their advice?
Zed
Is it usual to use the word 'normalcy' in your localcy, the ancient municipalcy of Truro? Fowler, who usually observes neutralcy and avoids being prescriptive, says the word is commonly received with contempt. It is not a matter of legalcy, let alone moralcy, but rather of tonalcy. For my part, I feel its use reveals a lazy mentalcy.
I realise (and they realiize) that other nationalcies have different usages, but in realcy 'normalcy' is a badly formed word.
Three main types of people support this AGW nonsense.
1. Those ideologically bent towards population/resource control via less democratic global governance, (Lying for a just cause).
2. The morally bankrupt who know a cash cow and know how to milk it dry.
3. Those naturally drawn to alarmism who actually believe this Scientific obfuscation without questioning it.
ZDB's a no 3. (Better than a no 2).
Can we please be more accurate in referring to AGW and specifically CAGW? It is NOT a theory. Jeff Glassman covers the issue well in his 2007 Crossfit article, referenced at WUWT:
"3. A theory is a hypothesis with at least one nontrivial validating datum. Candidates:
• Relativity.
• Big Bang cosmology.
• Evolution."
AGW would, at best, once have been a hypothesis:
"2. A hypothesis is a model based on all data in its specified domain, with no counterexample, and incorporating a novel prediction yet to be validated by facts. Candidates:
• “Mental aging can be delayed by applying the ‘use it or lose it’ dictum.”
• “The red shift of light is a Doppler shift.”
However, there are now significant 'counterexamples' based on the same data as the AGW model (and CAGW has so many limitations let's put that aside for the moment).
Perhaps the clearest, simplest and most direct is:
1. CO2 levels have continued to rise steadily, in line with long-term, trends, until the present day
2. No statistically significant warming has been recorded since 1998.
No model of the AGW hypothesis predicted this.
The counterexample is that CO2 can rise significantly with no accompanying rise in warming, USING THE SAME DATA. (And we all know the limitations of the data. attempts to skew it, etc.) This counterexample is reinforced by proxy reconstructions showing significant past divergence between changes in CO2 and temperature.
Unfortunately for AGW/CAGW 'believers', they pushed the argument beyond that of 'conjecture', which, according to Glassman's definition, is:
"1. A conjecture is an incomplete model, or an analogy to another domain. Here are some examples of candidates for the designation:
• “Ephedrine enhances fitness.”
• “The cosmological red shift is cause by light losing energy as it travels through space.” (This is the “tired light conjecture.”)
• “The laws of physics are constant in time and space throughout the universe.” (This one is known in geology as “uniformitarianism.”)
• “Species evolve to superior states.”
• “A carcinogen to one species will necessarily be carcinogenic to another.”
Taking AGW to the level of hypothesis left it vulnerable to refutation by counterexample. Counterexample exists, therefore the AGW hypothesis (excuse the shorthand but we all know the background - CO2/Feedbacks etc) is false.
Referring to AGW as a theory grants it a status it simply does not merit. It was once a conjecture, then raised to the level of hypothesis. Extreme and effective politicization ensured a huge crusade on the basis of this hypothesis before it could be raised to the level of a theory (let alone a 'Law' -"a theory that has received validation in all possible ramifications, and to known levels of accuracy," according to Glassman. Candidates include gravity).
But, like many a hypothesis, it has been falsified. Start again.
It is not a theory.
Your Grace..pardon me for stumbling around..but I found a quote on
http://www.skepticalscience.com/naomi-oreskes-consensus-on-global-warming.htm
This supposedly has Benny Peiser backing away from some of his claims.
Then I found this
http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transcripts/ep38peiser.pdf
So..if I am correct..Oreskes made a mistake..a major mistake with different search terms.
How is that possible.??
Yet the MSM forgets that and concentrates on Peiser mistake..
And Peiser made a mistake with his selection of papers.
Is that about right.
Re-Dreadnought..very funny stuff.. :)
thanks
Mike
Bear in mind, Gixxerboy, the Warmista will, without a doubt, redefine the terms theory, hypothesis, and conjecture to fit their agenda. This behavior is true of all totalitarian advances on the people. The vast majority oof the population are not educated (nor intelligent) enough to understand why there should be a distinction allowing a blurring of the lines tto the point such terms can be used interchangeably, and eventually, the farce will have achieved its pinnacle of "law." Note that there are only 18 known physical laws yet, without any bona-fide falsifiable statements (except the ones already proven false,) CAGW iis already cited as "scientific fact" by the media, politicians, and scientists alike.
Mark
Three main types of people support this AGW nonsense.
1. Those ideologically bent towards population/resource control via less democratic global governance, (Lying for a just cause).
Like NASA?
2. The morally bankrupt who know a cash cow and know how to milk it dry.
You mean...NASA?
3. Those naturally drawn to alarmism who actually believe this Scientific obfuscation without questioning it.
You are talking about NASA, right?
Hmm, something of a hard sell.
Most people are prepared to believe NASA when they claim to have made it to the moon. You can write it off as an argument ad populam as much as you want but once people look at the NASA website for themselves...well...it does sound more than a little flakey to dismiss NASA's claims without sounding exactly like moon landing deniers.
You could accuse NASA of lying about climate change because of money but...that's one of the excuses that the moon landing deniers use too. They even wrote a book about it called "We Never Went to the Moon: America's Thirty Billion Dollar Swindle By Bill Kaysing".
What about people who support AGW because that's what every single scientific community on the planet says is happening? Is there a good reason to ignore them all without sounding like you are just denying everything?
If there is no consensus, then why did the climate denier community feel the need to create a fake list of scientists just like creationists do?
If there is no consensus, then how come the same tiny group of elderly names keep being recycled again and again on FOX and in the media to show that there are some scientists out there that disagree that AGW is happening?
(You know the ones. We all do. They are not getting any younger and there are no new faces.)
You wouldn't be Zed's brother by any chance, would you, Cedric? Same "clever" assertions; same pointless arguments; same self-opinionated twaddle.
For which you are notorious on other web sites and not even consistent.