Bishop Hill What is the Gaelic for "integrity"?
Mar 17, 2014 Climate: Sceptics GWPF Benny Peiser emails to tell me that there is a bit of a kerfuffle over the Irish Sea. Benny has been invited to appear on a TV show called 'Prime Time', opposite Professor John Sweeney, a geographer at the National University of Ireland who doubles as the President of An Taisce, the Irish National Trust.
However, it seems that Professor Sweeney is not sufficiently confident in the strength of his case to want to argue it in public, and An Taisce has issued the following press release.
Prime Time invited John Sweeney, Ireland’s leading Climate Scientist, onto the Panel and some members of An Taisce into the audience for next Tuesday’s show on ‘Climate Change’. We looked forward to contributing to the debate on how we should deal with the serious problems that ‘Climate Change’ will present to our children and grandchildren.
However, we have since learnt that Prime Time will be flying a ‘Climate Denier’ in from the UK for the night. We suppose that they have the idea that a ‘Punch and Judy’ show between opposing members of the panel will make ‘Good Television’, one which will certainly generate much heat but very little light.
John Sweeney has decided not to participate and An Taisce has decided to boycott this Prime Time show.
An Taisce is asking the Director General and the Programme’s Producers to explain if they understand ‘Climate Science’ and the difference between scientific balance and journalistic balance. Is Prime Time fulfilling its ‘Public Service Broadcasting’ remit? We are sure that it would be possible to find some expert that does not agree that smoking causes cancer but would RTE put them on a panel to discuss lung cancer?
The scientific debate on the validity of climate change has ended with the realisation that for the sake of future generations global warming must be restricted to 2oC.
Public deserves a debate that discusses how to achieve this and:
- Enables an honest discussion of Climate Change policy choices within the accepted bounds of peer-reviewed science.
- Encourages a national discussion on fair and independent annual Green House Gas (GHG) budgets and binding National and International targets
- Emphasises that Ireland must play its part in actually achieving real change.
The general public is largely unaware of the threats to their future and their children’s futures. For the public to have an honest picture of the nature of the climate change risks they face and an involvement in how they are tackled, the debate must move on to problem solving.
As to Benny's credentials as a "climate denier", readers might care to peruse this paper authored by Benny ahead of the meeting of sceptic scientists with Royal Society fellows last year. Item 1 reads:
The greenhouse effect is real and CO2 is a greenhouse gas.
Another day, another scientivist called out. Having thus established that Professor Sweeney and An Taisce are happy to release scurrilous and false press releases readers can draw their conclusions accordingly.
Is An Taisce, by any chance, the Gaelic for "No Integrity"?
Reader Comments (110)
I see from Prof Sweeney's list of publications that his expertise is more in the effect of climate change on potato crops than atmospheric physics. You could see why he might be nervous about appearing opposite Benny.
Is anyone surprised that a climate alarmist is frightened of having a public debate? It is pathetic to see grown people behave like spoilt brats.
John Sweeney - geographer - seen as Ireland’s leading Climate Scientist
Rajendra Pachauri - railway engineer - seen as a climate expert my the MSM
"An Taisce is asking the Director General and the Programme’s Producers to explain if they understand ‘Climate Science’ and the difference between scientific balance and journalistic balance. " What a joke and quite disgraceful!
Obviously they do not understand the word balance.
Busy little bee, isn't he?
No mention of "intellectual cowardice" in this lot though. I used to reckon the Irish had more guts — or is there some sort of edict from IPCC that its drones aren't allowed to consort with the great unwashed?
PS Sorry of Sir Mark objects to the phrase "intellectual cowardice". Perhaps he has a better description for someone who hasn't got enough courage of his convictions to stand up in public and defend them.
The press release says he's Ireland's leading climate scientist! That must be an insult to the rest of the climate scientists they have.
The link doesn't work for me ;(
http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2014/3/17/The%20greenhouse%20effect%20is%20real%20and%20CO2%20is%20a%20greenhouse%20gas
He also claims that he shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. Is there nothing this so-called "leading climate scientist" can't do, apart from debate that is?
The link to Benny Peiser's paper doesn't seem to work, and can't locate it via Google. Could you check please? Thanks.
I don't understand why he would pass up the chance to appear opposite Dr Peiser. With the science settled, and a 97% consensus behind him, surely it would be an easy win for the alarmists.
What do they have to fear?
This does seem to be the line they want to take these days:
This 'moving on' ploy is beloved by politicians who have been wrong-footed or who have been involved in some scandal or other. It seems to have been adopted by some climate activists purporting to speak for 'science'. I suppose they have done so for exactly the same reasons as their political chums.
"We are sure that it would be possible to find some expert that does not agree that smoking causes cancer but would RTE put them on a panel to discuss lung cancer?"
Strange. If the evidence is so startlingly clear you would imagine An Taisce to relish the chance to demolish the 'deniers' argument in front of a TV audience. What a huge PR coup for the Warmists!
I wonder why they wont...?
Bish writes:
Sorry, don't have time right now; but if I were to write a song parody about Sweeney's Dodge, the following would be the obvious choice of melody (and some of the lines):
Running Scared
;-)
I hope that Prime Time will respond by asking how they define "Climate Denier". It seems to me there could be a good program around their response. It would be great to see Peiser debate an empty chair about climate related issues. Search YouTube for Clint Eastwood empty chair to see such a debate.
Rod Lamberts, director of the Australian National Centre for Public Awareness of Science at the Australian National University, will be disappointed:
"“What we need now is to become comfortable with the idea that the ends will justify the means. We actually need more opinions, appearing more often and expressed more noisily than ever before.” (WUWT 15/03/2014)
-
A golden opportunity has gone begging!
"We are sure that it would be possible to find some expert that does not agree that smoking causes cancer but would RTE put them on a panel to discuss lung cancer?"
Of course Benny Peiser is not an expert on climate science or climate change. He's a sports psychologist (not that he's published many papers on this either!).
So "Ireland’s leading Climate Scientist" uses hate speech as a way of avoiding debate. One thinks far less of the terms "Ireland" and "Climate Scientist" as a result. Someone should tell the tourist office.
And most of his funded research listed since 2002 is for 'climate change'. Without that funding he would really have to "put on the poor mouth", wouldn't he?
One would think that debating someone who supposedly isn't a climate scientist would be a very easy thing to do...what with 97% of the worlds climate scientists behind you and all that.
Seems to me this is nothing short of a little intellectual dishonesty. Make no bones about it, the catastrophiliacs have deliberately been smearing anyone who dares question their religion as "non-scientists" just so they don't gave to debate them.
This geezer is doing it just as a troll a couple posts up is also doing it. Anything to avoid a debate!
Mailman
A sad story.
I regrettably could not make it as Prime Time clashes with my teaching obligations.
John Sweeney is academically not very strong, but he is an tUasal Athrú Aeráide (Mr Climate Change) in Irish media and policy. Sweeney is fairly green.
The editor of Prime Time, Donogh Diamond, is a proper journalist: He gives anyone a hard time.
Monty~ Whatever Benny's actual status, that just makes the alarmists' comments on this matter all the more nonsensical- they ought to figure they have a clear WIN. Instead they are running away as fast as they can.
Otter,
Please don't feed the troll.
Mailman
So Obama's 2 degree limit has been quoted again as fact. Oh dear, 1.95 degree C, good: 2.05 degree,C global disaster.
Otter....I was just pointing out the irony of all the posters here disparaging Sweeney's research record while at the same time uncritically accepting Benny Peiser as an 'expert'. Peiser has no credibility as a scientist at all as far as I can see, let alone as a 'climate scientist'. A brief look at Google Scholar suggests that he probably has an h-index of around 8 and very few papers in mainstream journals. Pretty poor. This wouldn't get him any sort of job at a university.
Yet to the uncritical 'skeptics' Peiser is seen as some sort of hero (see posters above). Shows how thin the skeptic case is!
This alone demonstrates their wretched ignorance. The 2C limit was explicitly made up by PIK director Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, as he publicly admitted in an interview with Der Spiegel.
This seems to be just the latest meme...having prevented all access to all media to everybody apart from the GWPF, fake calls to abandon "balance" are repeated every time the GWPF is invited to discuss anything anywhere. I doubt there will be mention of anything else at the upcoming Fox/Jones hypocritefest in London, for example.
However, the charade cannot continue forever - the green swines of this world are making themselves ever more irrelevant (see the fracking gas debate wrt Russia). Onanism just isn't sustainable.
If Sweeney was [looking] "forward to debate on how we should deal with the serious problems that ‘Climate Change’ will present" and An Taisce wanted "an honest discussion of Climate Change policy choices" then any discussion about the scientific strengths of Peiser's work is alien to the point.
OT but have you seen this in todays Independent. "Fracking is turning the US into a bigger oil producer than Saudi Arabia"
It’s a whole different world to 2008, when US oil production was at a historical low and Sarah Palin was drawing liberal ire declaring that “Drill, Baby Drill!” was the answer to all of America’s problems. Suddenly she seems to have been right.
Folks
An Taisce means 'The Store' .
Prof. John Sweeney is http://icarus.nuim.ie/people/sweeney-john
The only purpose of having a debate about the validity of climate science is to ignore the issue.
An Taisce is clearly firmly on message as an organisation. Don't admit there is anything to debate, smear by association with smoking etc.
Members of this organisation should be asking who is in charge of it, what their motivations are and what they have to do with its stated objectives, because it looks very like it has been hijacked by green activists for their own ends in an all too familiar pattern.
Having gone to a couple of Prof. Sweeney lecture. He didn't answer the questions posed , he would be no match against the likes of Benny Peiser. .
Prof Sweeney is always rolled out in the media as the expert on climate change here in Ireland!
I wonder if RTE have asked Professor Ray Bates of UCD. He is more balanced and more qualified to talk about climate change, they never have in the past).
Professor Ray Bates
Meteorology and Climate Centre,
School of Mathematical Sciences,
http://www.raybates.net/
Maybe they should just run the program and leave an empty seat to show how the greens can't face a debate.
John Sweeney: GREEN CHICKEN.
Reminds me of film director James Cameron who said it was time we 'called out these bonehead deniers' and agreed to a debate with Climate Depot's Marc Morano.
Some of Cameron's pals must have told him he was in for a kicking because he started backpedaling, demanding all sorts of restrictions. Morano agreed to them all and it was only when Morano was flying to the 'meeting' that Cameron pulled out, citing his reason as Morano wasn't as big a celebrity as he was!
James Cameron: CELEBRITY/CHICKEN/HYPOCRITE.
Skeptics can now handle both sides of the debate; there may be some great television in that idea.
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Here is what An Taisce is supposed to do. An Taisce: The Planning Acts provide for An Taisce and about 20 other prescribed bodies to be informed of all planning applications in areas of scenic beauty or high amenity significance; where architectural, archaeological or environmental issues need to be considered. Local authorities are required, in certain defined circumstances under the Planning & Development Regulations,[1] to consult An Taisce on development proposals. Therefore its range of expertise extends across Ireland's natural, built, and social heritage. It seeks to educate, inform, and lead public opinion on the environment; to advocate and influence policy; and manage heritage properties. It has recently taken a strong stand against the government and Royal Dutch Shell's plans to build an inland natural gas refinery in Erris (see Corrib gas project
ToC
Having just quickly reviewed Professor Sweeney's publication list, I cannot see how anyone can describe him as a "climate scientist". He does not appear to have published any research in this area. He appears to a Geographer who has published studies on the possible impacts of climate change in his field of Geography. He does not seem to publish in or have any expertise in atmospheric physics.
Richard Lindzen is a climate scientist. Fred Singer is a climate scientist. Judith Curry is a climate scientist.
Professor Sweeney is not a climate scientist. He's a Geographer.
Ah to be sure, be sure, it's the old Emerald Isle blarney that's talking here.
Sweeney really wants to be on his todd.
Just don't eat the pies........
thinkingscientist: He knows how to say "climate denier" to those guilty of thoughtcrimes though. That's what counts.
thinkingscientist said about Sweeney: " I cannot see how anyone can describe him as a "climate scientist". He does not appear to have published any research in this area".
Well, he's published in Nature Climate Change, International Journal of Climatology and Climatic Change on climate change science....which makes him a climate scientist in my book!
And Peiser? What's he published in 'climate science'? Nothing?
Steve Jones: "I don't understand why he would pass up the chance to appear opposite Dr Peiser. With the science settled, and a 97% consensus behind him, surely it would be an easy win for the alarmists."
Not to mention the fact that Sweeney was being allowed to add 'some members of An Taisce into the audience'
But the questions he needs to answer, given his complete conviction that we should now be in problem-solving mode - the science being settled - is, what steps will you take to keep the rise in temp below 2 Deg? And what will you do if it the temp falls by 2 Deg? Have you therefore invented a climate-control system?
Monty: Some of us feel that his contribution, like so many in climate impacts, is small potatoes.
(I've been dying to make that joke. But it's also true. The whole area of climate impacts is a joke. Apart from the excellent scholarship of Dr Richard Tol of course. Ahem. I refer the dedicated reader to Steve McIntyre's blistering review of AR4 WG2 at the GWPF in London a couple of years ago for more details.)
Things have got well out of hand when there are about 20 of these outfits who have a statutory right to be consulted.
There are far too many of them anyway, all fronts for green activism and with very limited membership which has a huge overlap. Creating them is just a tactic to get more representation for the same people.
I once asked the then face of Transform Scotland (back to the stone age) how many people he represented. "It's not a membership organisation", he replied. Yet they are quoted regularly in the Herald and elsewhere as if their opinions had special weight.
They should go ahead with the programme leaving an empty chair with Sweeney's name prominently displayed on it. Then explain at the start that he was too scared to turn up.
@NW...please note this only applies in..." be informed of all planning applications in areas of scenic beauty or high amenity significance; where architectural, archaeological or environmental issues need to be considered".
ToC
As Monty has pointed out a published Climate Scientist is unwilling to debate with a layman. It does make you wonder just how little confidence he (Sweeney) has in what he's saying.
Thanks for the heads-up Monty.
Richard Drake says about Sweeney: "Some of us feel that his contribution, like so many in climate impacts, is small potatoes".
Strange that he doesn't feel the same about Peiser's absolute lack of credibility! So much for being 'skeptical'.....
Sandy says: "As Monty has pointed out a published Climate Scientist is unwilling to debate with a layman. It does make you wonder just how little confidence he (Sweeney) has in what he's saying".
Yes. For precisely the same reason that a biologist or geologist wouldn't waste her/his time debating with a creationist; or a geographer with someone who thinks the earth is flat!
Thanks.
10:20 AM BrianJay
perhaps more pertinent is that the Yanquis are producing so much gas at present that the Venezuelans - who have more oil and gas than the Saudis btw - are feeling the pinch and are sponsoring prominent liar anti fracker Josh Fox in the USofA to make movies and more... The funding of prominent anti fracking campaigns needs exposure - there's going to be some unpleasantness under the stones...
Sweeny is a geographer who has jumped om the global warming climate change bandwagon mantra
Now he is running scarred as he knows he will be shown up for what he is on the Prime Time Programme
Monty: The 'small potatoes' was a joke but like the best jokes (not saying it is one) it's likely to be close to the mark, as I say with reference to Steve McIntyre's presentation in August 2012. Meanwhile your swipe at Benny Peiser doesn't ring true at all. Benny's a really intelligent guy. He first came onto my radar when he published a wonderful interview with Freeman Dyson in April 2007, covering not just that brilliant physicist's concerns about the holes in climate science but many other deep matters, like the discovery of HAR1, short for Human Accelerated Region 1. Interviewing Dyson doesn't put Benny at the same intellectual level as that giant of course. But interviewing him that well suggests he's no slouch either. And both men share the same concerns about climate science. So 'absolute lack of credibility' no. But I realise it's a convenient line to take because it avoids the need for Sweeney to debate him and let the Irish people be the judge of which man is talking baloney.
I hope the Bish will mark as spam all mentions of creationism - as the policy debate has zero to do with that.
The elephant in the alarmist room of course is that there is a 100% consensus that nothing Ireland will ever do will have any impact on the mitigation front. Probably even the EU is irrelevant, aside from empty and expensive gestures. This makes the whole society transformation dream a sad joke.
I guess that's scarier for a warmist than 100 papers about climate sensitivity, and makes the gwpf an existential threat to porcines and other assorted scarers.
Monty: "Yes. For precisely the same reason that a biologist or geologist wouldn't waste her/his time debating with a creationist; or a geographer with someone who thinks the earth is flat!"
So what is Paul Nurse doing arguing for CCS etc in the DT today? Is he qualified under the 'Monty dictum'?