two or three . net

When to Doubt a Scientific ‘Consensus’

Here's the abbreviated list from a good article from the American entitled When to Doubt a Scientific ‘Consensus’. You can also hear an interview with the author at ID the Future.

1. When different claims get bundled together.
2. When ad hominem attacks against dissenters predominate.
3. When scientists are pressured to toe the party line.
4. When publishing and peer review in the discipline is cliquish.
5. When dissenting opinions are excluded from the relevant peer-reviewed literature not because of weak evidence or bad arguments but as part of a strategy to marginalize dissent.
6. When the actual peer-reviewed literature is misrepresented.
7. When consensus is declared hurriedly or before it even exists.
8. When the subject matter seems, by its nature, to resist consensus.
9. When “scientists say” or “science says” is a common locution.
10. When it is being used to justify dramatic political or economic policies.
11. When the “consensus” is maintained by an army of water-carrying journalists who defend it with uncritical and partisan zeal, and seem intent on helping certain scientists with their messaging rather than reporting on the field as objectively as possible.
12. When we keep being told that there’s a scientific consensus.

Oregonians chant: "Al Gore's a liar!"

Perhaps the argument is over, the science is in - global warming is a hoax?   Not yet, but here's some footage you won't see on MSNBC - Oregonians unwelcoming Al Gore to Portland.  I hope people are waking up the the climate change hoax.

Oh, and don't miss Al Gore is a big fat lying weenie and wrong about climate change.

Al Gore is a big fat lying weenie and wrong about climate change

I couldn't think of a good title for this great illustration, found on iMaksim's blog.  So I went obnoxious - but also, it turns out that the infamous and debunked CO2/temperature graph from Al's movie was not only wrong, it may have been done ON PURPOSE (i.e. 'they lied.').  Happy Holidays.  I hope the health care bill fails.  Really, it's bad on so many levels, it will doom our economy and our healthcare.  It's lunacy.  Moonbattery.  Stupidity in hope's clothing.

Global Warming: Not Evil, Just Wrong

In less than a week, a new film critiquing the many mistakes of Al Gore's global warming alarm movie An Inconvenient Truth, will be released.  Not Evil, Just Wrong discusses the impact, not of global warming, but of global warming alarmism, and the shaky facts that this political abuse of science is causing.  Enjoy the trailer after the jump.

Even better, you can host a Not Evil, Just Wrong premier party next week by ordering a party kit from the link in the right column.  You can also read an interview with the filmmakers over at Big Hollywood - here's an interesting snippet:

“It’s a liberal, socialist film. It’s about poor people in Africa and America,” McAleer says. “We’re not interested in insulting anyone or winning political points,” McAleer continues. “I don’t care about your politics and I’m not going to demonize you.”

The dog ate my global warming data

Ever wonder how the whole global warming scare all came about?  As it turns out, the original data used to get us all alarmed is MISSING, and the scientists that first massaged it to 'prove' global warming don't have the original data anymore.  What a convenient loss of truth!

You can read the entire story in The Dog Ate Global Warming, written by Patrick J. Michaels, author of Climate of Extremes: Global Warming Science They Don't Want You to Know.  Here's a money quote from the article:

Now begins the fun. Warwick Hughes, an Australian scientist, wondered where that “+/–” came from, so he politely wrote Phil Jones in early 2005, asking for the original data. Jones’s response to a fellow scientist attempting to replicate his work was, “We have 25 years or so invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it?”

Reread that statement, for it is breathtaking in its anti-scientific thrust. In fact, the entire purpose of replication is to “try and find something wrong.” The ultimate objective of science is to do things so well that, indeed, nothing is wrong....

Roger Pielke Jr., an esteemed professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado, then requested the raw data from Jones. Jones responded:

Since the 1980s, we have merged the data we have received into existing series or begun new ones, so it is impossible to say if all stations within a particular country or if all of an individual record should be freely available. Data storage availability in the 1980s meant that we were not able to keep the multiple sources for some sites, only the station series after adjustment for homogeneity issues. We, therefore, do not hold the original raw data but only the value-added (i.e., quality controlled and homogenized) data.

Global Warming Alarmism is just one of the manufactured crises of modern day liberal politics.  What about the 4000 unborn children killed daily?  What about the fact that half of all black American pregnancies end in abortion?  Not a crisis?

Obama's Liberal Socialism - stupidity, fear, greed, or conspiracy of evil intellectuals?

The American Thinker has published a very interesting article entitled Barack Obama and the Strategy of Manufactured Crisis, in which the author examines what amounts to a liberal socialist conspiracy started by radical socialist Columbia University professors, Richard Andrew Cloward and Frances Fox Piven.

This strategy, now known as The Cloward-Piven Strategy, is what The American Thinker is accusing Obama of being a pawn of, and perhaps to some extent, a pawn that knows what he is doing. 

As the image to the right outlines, the links between Cloward and Piven, the many modern socialist thinkers, the founders and activities of corrupt organizations like Acorn, and Obama are too numerous to ignore.  This is not just some kookie conspiracy theory, this is how the power of ideas corrupts higher education and government, and can lead to a nation's downfall.

And to me, it in part explains why liberals can so enthusiastically buy into the social and scientific negligence of Global Warming Panic and the absurdity of the astronomical debt of Obamanomics.  It is an exercise in mass brainwashing, and like watching the Communist revolution all over again as if we never saw it happen before.

Evidence continues to support global non-warming

Just a short note to show that (a) the ice caps are not melting, (b) the media is lying and recycling and continuing to misrepresent global 'warming' photos, and (c) ocean temps other temp data show no change.  NO change. 

Basically, liberals need a cause that they can leverage to take our money for centralized government, and the environment is their trump card.  And they need causes to which they can devote themselves, so their eco-religion makes them totally sold on the Global Warming Panic.   I have a feeling that they should, but won't hide their faces in shame when they find out they've been duped like sheep.  Thanks for nothing, Al.

• Are the polar ice caps really melting due to global warming?
• Are the oceans warming?

Princeton Physicist testifies before the Senate - CO2 has little effect on warming

Wintery Knight Blog has an exclusive 11 page transcript of the official testimony of William Happer, the Cyrus Fogg Bracket Professor of Physics at Princeton University. This testimony was given on February 25, 2009 to the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, chaired by Democrat Barbara Boxer.

This is for you types who are certain that spending money and harming the economy is warranted because of the 'inconvenient truth' of man-made global warming via CO2. Your panic is unwarranted, anti-intellectual, and hurts society. 

Sure as death, taxes & snow at a global warming event

There seems to me to be a simple cure that can appease everyone in the global warming debate - schedule a global warming protest or event of some kind and watch the temperatures and snowflakes drop.

Last December, an NRO blogger posted an email announcing the Capitol Climate Action day in Washington DC scheduled for March 2. He introduced the announcement by joking, "Anyone want to bet on a snowstorm hitting D.C. on March 2, 2009?"

Well...

Can we afford carbon reduction goals? EU begins to doubt

It looks as if some on the EU are questioning whether or not their aggressive green goals are worth the expense, and the risk to the faltering economy.  Are they just being short sighted, or getting smart to the panic-politics behind global warming?   I hope it's the latter.

The financial meltdown has rendered its climate policy untenable and hugely unpopular among voters who are increasingly hostile to green and climate taxes. Overlooked by most media outlets, Germany, one of the EU's heavyweights, has also raised the alarm about the climate package's immense burden on its energy-intensive industries.

Global warming 'consensus' fragmenting

Update:  It seems that the statements of Monckton are not the official statement of the APS.  However, this does not mean that his statements about disagreement in the ranks is incorrect.

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The Acton Institute blog has a nice piece entitled Global Warming Consensus Alert: Flame On! (that's Gore Torch to the right, not an effigy ;).  It documents the recent controversy within the American Physical Society.

The American Physical Society, an organization representing nearly 50,000 physicists, has reversed its stance on climate change and is now proclaiming that many of its members disbelieve in human-induced global warming. The APS is also sponsoring public debate on the validity of global warming science. The leadership of the society had previously called the evidence for global warming “incontrovertible.”

70% of climate change due to El Nino/La Nina

At least that's what a NASA scientist told Congress Tuesday.

Environmentalism: wilderness, wasteland, or garden?

A recent book by E. Calvin Beisner entitled Where Garden Meets Wilderness: Evangelical Entry into the Environmental Debate gave me the idea for this post (you can hear Beisner talk on the environment here and here).

There are at least three possible views when it comes to how we view environmentalism - the leftist 'Wilderness' view, the rightist 'Wasteland' view, and the more balanced 'Garden' view.  The extremes are lack of concern for the environment, or virtual worship of the environment, while the Garden view is one possibility between the extremes.  Which camp do you lean towards?

Person Calvin Beisner

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Congressman Rohrabacher slams global warming alarmism (GWA)

On May 14 of this year, California Congressman Dana Rohrabacher gave a speech on the floor of the House on the problem of global warming - er, I mean, global warming ALARMISM.  He hit many of the points that critics of the "closed case" of global warming keep saying.  I hope people listen up instead of closing their minds to science out of panic and fear.  It's worth a read, but I've excerpted some good stuff below.

Global Climate Change: Probable, not human-caused, and good

Jay W. Richards, Director of Acton Media and a Research Fellow at the Acton Institute, recently gave an excellent lecture entitled Is it Hot In Here? What Should Christ ians Think About Global Warming?  It is well worth a listen, but I would like to quickly summarize.  He asked and answered five questions about GW:

1. Is the earth warming?
2. Are humans primarily responsible?
3. Is global warming bad or good?
4. Are the proposed corrective policies worth pursuing?
5. How do you know when you are resisting established science rather than political orthodoxy in science?

Global warming, political correctness, and wikipedia

Many of us rely on wikipedia as a quick and dirty source of information in a hurry.  And while some attack it as unreliable, it has shown to be fairly reliable in comparison with the Encyclopedia Britannica.

But on controversial subjects like global warming, DON'T expect wikipedia to be objective.  As Lawrence Solomon of the National Post reports, Wikipedia's zealots may be removing information that is not politically correct, or of the minority opinion.

For the last 18 months I have been profiling scientists who disagree with the UN panel's position. My Deniers series, which now runs to some 40 columns, describes many of the world's most prominent scientists. They include authors or reviewers for the UN panel (before they quit in disgust). They even include the scientist known as the father of scientific climatology, who is recognized as being the most cited climatologist in the world....

I then exercised the right to edit Wikipedia that we all have, corrected the Wikipedia entry, and advised Peiser that I had done so.  Peiser wrote back saying he couldn't see my corrections on the Wikipedia page. Had I neglected to save them after editing them, I wondered? I made the changes again, and this time confirmed that the changes had been saved. But then, in a twinkle, they were gone again! I made other changes. And others. They all disappeared shortly after they were made.

Cooking the global warming numbers

The Wall Street Journal has an interesting opinion piece today entitled Our Climate Numbers Are a Big Old Mess.  In it, the author talks about how the global temperature data has been manipulated to exaggerate global warming, by the IPCC and others.  Scientists or politicians?

My Two Cents #119 - Global Warming - or not

• Warmer planet can support glacial ice (UCSD) - New research challenges the generally accepted belief that substantial ice sheets could not have existed on Earth during past super-warm climate events. The study by researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego provides strong evidence that a glacial ice cap, about half the size of the modern day glacial ice sheet, existed 91 million years ago during a period of intense global warming.
• Global temperatures have plateaued (the Australian) - "Actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you'd expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years....The head of the IPCC has actually acknowledged it. He talks about the apparent plateau in temperatures so far this century. So he recognizes that in this century, over the past eight years, temperatures have plateaued ... This is not what you'd expect."

10 alarming facts about global warming

The Center for Research on Globalization has posted an article entitled Global Warming: A Convenient Lie, which gives a nice overview of the very real problems with the man-made CO2 global warming claims.  I've summarized below.

My Two Cents #118 - Global Warming

Some of these are old news (like from December 2007), but I've been collecting links by subject for link dumps like this one.  If there are updates on any of these issues, please post them!  Thanks.

• What if everyone believes in global warmism only because everyone believes in global warmism? (WSJ) - "What if the heads being counted to certify an alleged "consensus" arrived at their positions by counting heads? It may seem strange that scientists would participate in such a phenomenon. It shouldn't. Scientists are human; they do not wait for proof; many devote their professional lives to seeking evidence for hypotheses (especially well-funded hypotheses) they've chosen to believe. Less surprising is the readiness of many prominent journalists to embrace the role of enforcer of an orthodoxy simply because it is the orthodoxy. For them, a consensus apparently suffices as proof of itself."
• IPCC Falsifies Sea Level Data - (UK Telegraph)
• GM Chairman disses Global Warming - GM's Bob Lutz called global warming a "total crock of sh*t"?
• Weather Channel Founder Blasts Network; Claims It Is 'Telling Us What to Think' - "Coleman also told the audience his strategy for exposing what he called “the fraud of global warming.” He advocated suing those who sell carbon credits, which would force global warming alarmists to give a more honest account of the policies they propose."

Environmental Baptists

File Under "Don't All Christians/Baptists think alike" - Southern Baptist leaders find new "moral voice" on the environment and climate change.

Global Warming: threat, deception, or cloak for the antichrist?

Many evangelicals have joined the chorus in support of reducing greenhouse emissions, but I am still on the fence about global warming. Like Bill O'Reilly, think we should get off of fossil fuels for both environmental and economic/political reasons, but I have not bought into the Global Warming Panic (GWP).

As Aaron recently noted, this past year's hurricane season failed to meet the dire predictions of the GWP lobby - and while that may be too small a sample to be conclusive, it does show the speculative nature of the whole apocalyptic approach of the GWPers.

We've argued whether or not GW is a threat, or a hoax perpetrated by misinformed environmentalists.  But there's one more unusual perspective - that global warming, whether man-made or not, will be the worldwide catastrophe that unites the world in one cause, and under one world leader - the antichrist.

Experts: Wrong again; are they experts?

Exactly when can we start ignoring the "experts" and their perpetual wrong predictions? And does the wrong hurricane forcast, based on supposed global warming trends, bode poorly for climate change advocates?

Weather Channel Founder: Global Warming 'Greatest Scam in History'

This has been all over the blogosphere, but I had to mention it - John Coleman, founder of the Weather Channel, has written an article in which he calls the idea of man-made global warming 'a scam':

It is the greatest scam in history. I am amazed, appalled and highly offended by it. Global Warming; It is a SCAM. Some dastardly scientists with environmental and political motives manipulated long term scientific data to create in [sic] allusion of rapid global warming. Other scientists of the same environmental whacko type jumped into the circle to support and broaden the "research" to further enhance the totally slanted, bogus global warming claims.

You can read more quotes and analysis at The American Thinker.  You might also enjoy Australian research professor Bob Carter's four part lecture on the real coming threat - global cooling (Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4).

My Two Cents #105 - Science and Environment

Ive been down with the flu for the last five days, so haven't posted, and still too tired to think much.  So here's a link dump on some recent science and tech stuff.

• Why MOST modern published scientific studies are wrong - Robert Hotz of the Wall Street Journal's Science Journal discusses why most scientific studies are tainted by sloppy analysis and wrong conclusions (now you can see why Why I Trust Science in Principle, but not in Practice)

These flawed findings, for the most part, stem not from fraud or formal misconduct, but from more mundane misbehavior: miscalculation, poor study design or self-serving data analysis. "There is an increasing concern that in modern research, false findings may be the majority or even the vast majority of published research claims," Dr. Ioannidis said. "A new claim about a research finding is more likely to be false than true."

The hotter the field of research the more likely its published findings should be viewed skeptically, he determined. [good advice].

Hey Al, I thought you wanted scientific honesty?

Today's Chicago Sun-Times published a editorial critiquing global warming alarmism called Alarmist global warming claims melt under scientific scrutiny.  Rather than the all too typical shutting down of discussion that goes on, the author called for open debate, and asks Al Gore to lead the way.

Gore repeatedly asks that science and reason displace cynical political posturing as the central focus of public discourse.  If Gore really means what he writes, he has an opportunity to make a difference by leading by example on the issue of global warming.

A cooperative and productive discussion of global warming must be open and honest regarding the science. Global warming threats ought to be studied and mitigated, and they should not be deliberately exaggerated as a means of building support for a desired political position.... Gore can show sincerity in his plea for scientific honesty by publicly acknowledging where science has rebutted his claims.

Global Warming Politicians being Deceived by their Scientists?

If human-caused global warming turns out to be true, I will owe all of you GWPs (Global Warming Panickers) an apology.  But if you are wrong, you owe all of us who wasted time, government money, and aggravation, a huge apology.  Am I the victim of bad science from the right, like those on the left?  We'll have to suss it out.

Today's Courier Mail published an article entitled High price for load of hot air, discussing why even the IPCC statistics quoted to support CO2-based global warming do NOT support it, and the politicians who have been suckered in by the politicians of GW science (sometimes called "scientists") may well have a scandal on their hands - or they should have one.

The 7 steps to suppressing opponents' ideas

Today on Truths that Transform, Dr. Frank Wright, President and CEO of the National Religious Broadcasters, gave a simple and straightforward, if not simplistic speech about how truth is resisted and suppressed, or what he calls "the politics of opposition."  I've summarized below.

My peer group made me do it

I am glad that we are leaving the one-sided views of issues that demand a balanced view.  For example, we have long thought that criminals should be held entirely responsible for their behaviors.  Then we discovered that they may have biochemical reasons to act in anti-social matters.  So we became a little more understanding, and were better able to prevent some criminality via drugs or other preventative measures.

But in assessing the impact of, say, our genes (see My genes made me do it) on our behavior, we can swing all the way to the extreme where we excuse behaviors entirely, and in doing so, fail to assign any responsibility for a transgressor's actions to them.   Now, a recent article in New Scientist, entitled They made me do it, discusses a similar trend in crimes done within an influential peer group.

Global Warming Alarmism (GWA) is Junk Science

One of my favorite new discoveries is JunkScience.com, a fantastic site that debunks junk science presented by the media, personal injury lawyers, by social activists, governmental regulators, businesses, politicians, and individual scientists and citizens.  The site's owner has impressive credentials, and he takes on all sorts of junk science, including, what do you know, global warming alarmism.  Check out his many GW articles, including

• Climate Alarmists Abuse 'Children' (how the current waste of efforts on GWA is allowing 18,000 children to die of malnutrition daily - one of the consequences of the unscientific alarm of GWA)
• Beware the Eco-Industrial Complex (why GWA is big business, and where there's money, science can be manipulated)
• This "global warming" thing... what Watt is what? (very technical debunking of IPCC conclusions)
• Must-See Global Warming TV (link to BBC special The Global Warming Swindle)
• Can’t See the Warming for the Trees (new report showing that northern forests contribute significantly to global warming. Another example of how GW hysteria is outpacing science.)

And if you read those, you might want to also see Top Ten Junk Science Moments for 2006

Former New Scientist editor calls for challenge to GW orthodoxy

One of my favorite magazines is New Scientist.  Despite their pro-evolution and pro-global warming position, they digest and present what's going on in science very succinctly.  In the recent issue, they present a Guide to Climate Change which includes 26 "myths" around global warming (GW) which they attempt to debunk.  Of course, they are unashamedly on the non-skeptical side of this argument, and present some of the standard responses to skeptics like myself.

Interestingly, though, in An experiment that hints we are wrong on climate change, former EDITOR of New Scientist Nigel Calder recently called for skepticism, and bemoans the lack of it in the current debate.  He's also written a new book entitled The Chilling Stars: The New Theory of Climate Change.  I have excerpted his article below, adding my own headings.

Summary of Objections to Global Warming Panic

Here's my review of why stubborn global-warming critics still exist despite the "overwhelming scientific consensus."

Prominent Scientists Reverse Belief in Man-made Global Warming

This latest release from the US Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works is being picked up by all of us global warming panic doubters.  It's well worth a read.  As one blogger aptly put it

Whenever you have a movement that claims there can "be no argument," as Mr. Gore puts it, there should be a red flag waiving in your mind. Everything is debatable. If someone claims that it isn't, you can be sure that there is something to hide and an agenda to protect.

Global Warming on Mars and other Conundrums

A recent report shows that for the last three years, Mars has been warming, and coincidentally, at about the same rate that the Earth is warming.  This gives credence to the view that (a) man is not really causing the warming, and (b) it's natural.

Of course, some scientists are arguing that the mechanisms are different, but their claims are highly speculative.  Occam's razor SAYS...BING!  Global warming is NOT man made.

The BBC Global Warming documentary

The BBC documentary entitled The Great Global Warming Swindle is up on YouTube.

Paper or corn byproducts based plastic

Shoppers in San Francisco, the city whose officials have solved all the world's major problems, will soon have a simple question made a little more difficult.

The city council passed a ban on standard plastic bags used by grocery stores because they pollute the street and kill aquatic wildlife. In fact, I'm told the last person to ever get the death penalty in San Fran was a nasty plastic bag named Vinnie who took out three dolphins and a seagull before who was caught while blowing down the street.

My Two Cents (03/28)

• Book Review - America Alone: Very nice review of Mark Steyn's book on how we are civilization's last hope to keep the world from Islamization - Europe is succumbing due to it's multicultural subjectivity.  My favorite quote, which is on its way to becoming a classic:

You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours.

Global Warming Strategies

EO has an interesting take on Global Warming Strategies examining the political, scientific, and moral aspects of the global warming issue, and what combinations of solutions from each of these areas looks like.  Find out which of these you are:

• Hopeless Pessimist
• Act-Now Optimist
• Act-Later Optimist
• Do-Nothing Optimist
• Skeptical Optimist

Why the right opposes global warming

There are a mix of noble and ignoble reasons why conservatives oppose the global warming initiatives.  Of course, the ignoble one is that many are more concerned for short term economic prosperity and holding on to power and the status quo than long term environmental safety.  However, there are the more 'noble' reasons why conservatives oppose the modern panic over global warming:

• Unsubstantiated Claims of Certainty:  Conservatives [believe they] can smell pseudoscience and unsubstantiated claims built on faulty assumptions a mile away.  The same overreaching overconfidence that we see in the evolutionist camp plagues the environmentalists.  No matter how much they protest that their science is definitive, it is clearly incomplete.  They just haven't made their case well enough even if they are right.  They appear to be jumping the gun for ideological, rather than scientific reasons.

Hot or Not? Global Warming

Several recent news stories have brought attention to the global warming non-debate debate. Here are some of my favorites.

Thank you global warming

If global warming was to blame for last year's horrible hurricane season, does it get the credit for this year's abnormally mild season?

Or maybe human tragedy was exploited last year for a political agenda.

Who Killed the Electric Car?

A new documentary is coming out June 28 (NY and LA only) entitled Who Killed the Electric Car?  You want the answer?  The oil companies and GM!  Can you say "Hummer"?  This documentary should be a real eye opener in light of our current zeal for getting off foreign oil.   We had a workable chance, but it was squashed.  Click on the link for the trailer.

The Horror of Chernobyl

Last week, I posted on how politics skews the reporting of scientific research, citing the gap between the Chernobyl statistics of the U.N. and Greenpeace (4000 projected deaths, v. 90,000, resp.).  But wherever the true number of casualties and lives affected lies, there is no doubt that this was a serious wake-up call to all of us, especially poorly run communist or rogue nations that fail to take safety precautions and maintenance of these facilities seriously.

Today is the 20th anniversary of Chernobyl, and here is an amazing narrated picture show about it.  Be sure to hit PLAY after the intro to see the whole thing, or open up the menu. 

You MUST also visit Elena's motorbike ride through Chernobyl to see her pictorial essay of the area - amazing and sobering (click on "The map").

Unscientific Environmentalism is Religion

Today, Greenpeace released a report putting the Chernobyl death toll above 90,000.  However, as of September 2005, the UN Reported "less than 50" deaths as a direct result of the radiation, and their prediction for the total future number of deaths is is less than 4000.  So why this difference of opinion?  Spin.