Politics of Global Warming

[Tyger]

What follows is a post I have taken from another thread where Global Warming is discussed as a fact, not a debate. It is a post out-of-place on that thread, so I have brought it over here. It is a good example of either willful disregard for accuracy or plain-and-simple an uninformed stance.

Again, the Global Warming temperature rise is a global average - not a reflection of a single region's experience. The below graph is suggesting that the present global average temperature is somehow equivalent to whatever was going on in a particular region of the earth at a particular long-ago time - in this case, in Europe during the Middle Ages. The below graph, if we are to understand what @icculus is trying to say, is attempting to put on equivalent footing a regional event (from the past) with a global event (in the present). It's not an equivalent comparison - regional vs global. The graph is misleading.

In the end, all discussion of the science is fruitless (and is why I prefer not to go down that road) because most people are simply not schooled in either the science or the rigorous analysis demanded, as demonstrated above. Very poor reasoning can easily waylay an ignorant populace. It's not for nothing that there is a significant move in the US (successful in some states, like Wisconsin) to dismantle the university system. Oligarchy cannot be sustained with an educated and informed populace.

In the US our investigative reporting has been all but crushed in the mainstream media. Lo! the Internet arises and we have substantial investigative reporting happening via other avenues. It's not for nothing that there continues to be a serious attempt to 'privatize' the Internet in the US.

We are, indeed, living in interesting times.

 

[Tyger]

We need to be honest - that the 'debate' around Global Warming is rooted in issues far, far separate from anything remotely scientific. It's really an economic discussion. Yes, there is a conversation on-going in science about climate science and quantum physics and the big bang and consciousness and robotics. Yes. But what we see playing out on a chat site about paranormal activity, flying saucers and aliens (what delicious fun!) that dips into climate science and the warming of the planet is very far removed from anything remotely geeky. This a power struggle as old as the hills, with a profoundly philosophical base.

Fact is, it's not about jobs. Our future - at least in the US - is going to be an automated future. What we need are consumers - and lots and lots of them to make the wheels go round. @mike I might even say it's not about population growth. I am a keen proponent of the Basic Income Grant. It is so do-able it is scary that we have not done it yet in the US. Rather we are pouring our treasure into armaments - and exhausting ourselves into poverty as a nation as a result. (England did it during WWII). Far-flung empires never work - history is littered with over-extention and rapid decline. Who are we kidding?

Listen to Robert Reich: "Several of you have asked me why I post quotes from the 1830s, 1910s, 1930s, and 1960s and early 1970s. It’s because in those four periods Americans reasserted power over financial elites that threatened to usurp our economy and democracy.

"Unlike societies that have succumbed to fascism, communism, totalitarianism, and violent revolution when their people become frustrated and fearful, America reforms itself. That’s what we did in the 1830s when elites accrued unwarranted privileges, and we abolished property rights for voting, enabled small businesses to incorporate without legislation, and fought off a national bank; between 1901 and 1916 during the Progressive Era, when we established a progressive income tax, enacted pure food and drug laws, and split up the giant trusts; during the New Deal of the 1930s, when we created Social Security, unemployment insurance, a minimum wage, a 40-hour workweek, and required employers to negotiate with labor unions; and in the 1960s and early 1970s when we enacted Civil Rights, Voting Rights, Medicare and Medicaid, the Environmental Protection Act, and the Federal Election Campaign Act.

"Another wave of fundamental reform is on its way."
​

That is what I am choosing to believe we will succeed in doing here in the US - and I am working politically to have that happen - against a powerful head-wind. Climate Change is but one aspect - though a mightily important one defining our futures, as regions, nations and a world.

Robert Reich suggests the following book. I do, too.

Progress and Poverty by Henry George: "This classic work is an enquiry into the cause of industrial depressions and the persistence of poverty amid advancing wealth. Published in 1879, it was admired and advocated by great minds such as Albert Einstein, Winston Churchill, Leo Tolstoy and Sun Yat-sen in China. Henry George lived through a period of American history which witnessed the closing of the frontier, and he noticed the dramatic deterioration in the condition of labour once that happened. While land was freely available wages were high, once it was enclosed wages fell. Adam Smith appears not to have appreciated the full consequences of this, but he was writing before their full horror became evident in the form of landless peasants crowding into city slums, seeking work in "satanic mills" at minimum wages. Henry George, observing similar events in America (he was a journalist), saw the connection between land enclosure and poverty and unemployment. He also realized that the harmful effects could be rectified, without confiscating the land, through a change in the tax system and allowing market forces to work. This classic offers an alternative ethical and practical guide at a time when the collapse of the Marxist/Socialist experiment and the deep recession in the West leave many seeking fresh inspiration."​

In the US we have a push-pull of fuzzy thinking, if not downright fantasy, around the idea of Big Government. Many currently ascribe it to Ronald Reagan's impact but it goes back much, much further.

From a review: "Progress and Poverty is actually a tour-de-force assertion of the classical liberal position that the earth and its rent are common property. It thoroughly demonstrates, with clear and rigorous logic, what Marx realized far too late in his life -- that the monopoly of capital was not a natural phenoenon, but the result of the state-created monopoly of land, through titles that allow landlords to usurp community-created rents." [Replace current modes with 'land' and 'rents', etc.]

From a review: "George debunked several myths that are still propagated today, such as that population growth causes of poverty, that it is natural for capital to employ labor, that government control can effectively remedy poverty, and, most of all, that the economic dynamics governing capital can be blindly applied to land and natural resources." ​

This is the Fossil Fuel Lobby and the Internet in another guise. Always remember: Capital has no value without the power of labor. Denmark is getting it right. What is being 'fought' in the Climate Change issue (in the US) is multi-layered.

Again from Robert Reich: "One of the most insidious myths in modern America is that people are paid what they're 'worth' - so someone earning no more than today's minimum wage is worth no more than that, while a Wall Street mogul raking in billions must be worth it because that's what he's raking in. It's a meaningless tautology that prevents us from examining whether the market is organized correctly to pay people according to their real worth in society."
​

In fact, it is the multitudes of consumers - especially, in an automated society (which we are heading towards in the US) - that create wealth. It is the consumer who needs to be 'paid what they're worth'. The Basic Income Grant - and fasten your seat belts for the explosion of creativity that will ensue. (This is another fallacy - that those on the dole are indolent. In fact, the wealthy receive a 'Basic Income Grant' and then some in the form of their inheritance - and massive tax breaks here in the US. It is those who have their needs met who are the risk-takers. We now have studies confirming this. While the poor scrabble (and die early) - the wealthy take risks (and live long).

I recommend reading the Amazon reviews of Henry George's book. This one is a stand-out in that it 'explains' how to read the book.

"If ever there was a time when the world needed the wisdom of Henry George, it is now. His classic work, Progress and Poverty, should be required reading for anyone concerned with establishing social and economic justice in a world that seems increasingly characterized by greed.

"The Drake modernized edition makes George's unique insights accessible to those of us who struggle with the pull of conflicting demands on our time. Even so, I recommend an unorthodox approach to this book. The early chapters demand a level of concentration that might be unusual except in someone deeply committed to understanding the root cause of the growing gap between rich and poor. Therefore, start by getting your passions flowing. Read the "Publisher's Forward." Then flip to the afterword and be stirred by Agnes de Mille's answer to the question: "Who was Henry George?" Her writing is as beautiful as her dance. You may now be moved to tackle the economic theories of wages and distribution, but I suggest deferring for just a bit longer. Read the last half of the book first. Begin with Chapter 25, "The True Remedy." Once you've read through to the conclusion, the fire in your belly ought to be sufficient to carry you through the fine points of economic argument contained in the first twenty-four chapters. You won't be disappointed. As Bob Drake, Editor, notes in his preface, "Those who pick up this book are likely to share some concern about the problem of poverty; those who finish it may also find some cause for hope....It was, and still is, a plan for peace, prosperity, equality, and justice."​

 

[Tyger]

California is Withdrawing All Investment Funds from Coal Mining Companies ~ September 5, 2015
LINK: California is Withdrawing All Investment Funds from Coal Mining Companies

TEXT: "The California State Assembly passed a bill this week causing all state public employee pension funds to divest from coal, reported ThinkProgress. This bill is a huge blow to destructive coal companies that get rich from destroying the environment.

"In a landslide 43 to 27 vote, the state Assembly voted that the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) and California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) must remove all holdings from companies that receive at least 50 percent of its revenue from coal mining. Collectively, CalPERS and CalSTRS are responsible for $476 billion in assets. “Coal is losing value quickly and investing in coal is a losing proposition for our retirees; it’s a nuisance to public health; and it’s inconsistent with our values as a state on the forefront of efforts to address global climate change,” said California Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de León, who introduced the bill. “California’s utilities are phasing out coal, and it’s time our pension funds did the same.”

"The bill is now on its way to California Gov. Jerry Brown’s (D) desk, who is expected to sign it. Brown has been on the forefront of California’s fight for the environment. If consistent, small steps like this bill will eventually equal great strides in the fight against climate change."​

 

[Tyger]

Citibank warns about the cost of climate inaction
LINK: Citibank warns about the cost of climate inaction.

TEXT: "Taking action on climate change is vital to the survival of our species, and it's essential to the economic future of our nation's banks.

"According to a new report from Citibank, failure to act on global warming will cost $44 trillion dollars more than investing in low-carbon energy solutions. To create that report, called “Energy Darwinism,” researchers analyzed the likely cost of energy in the coming decades and the cost of the “negative effects” of our changing climate.

"Rather than focusing on the state of our environment or the impact on our survival, the report focused solely on the financial aspects of global warming.

"Jason Channell, Global Head of Alternative Energy and Cleantech Research at Citibank, said, “What we're trying to do is to take an objective view at the economics of the situation and actually look at what the costs of not acting are, if the scientists are right.” He added, “There is a cost to not doing this, and although there is a cost to acting, what we're trying to do is to actually weigh up the different costs here.”

"It doesn't matter whether you believe that humans cause global warming. But it does matter that our planet is changing and we had better get busy figuring out how to cover the cost of surviving those changes."​

 

[mike_thoth]

Does Citibank have a stake in the global warming (AGW) hypothesis? Yes. Investments. Banks are likely to make massive amounts of money when investing in solar and alternative energy systems. You cant rely on any other person out there to do your own thinking for you. It doesn't matter if every single business on Earth tells us that AGW is real, when people have an investment in something they will automatically support the business side of it, money & cash.

It is the same with Al Gore. The guy pushing publically for climate change policy who just happened to setup the Chicago carbon exchange, who was due to become the worlds first CO2 billionaire. It is just lucky I guess that his business falls in line with his climate beliefs because surely he wouldn't push for policy only to benefit him financially. But again Gore being a complete hypocrite, sold his TV company to Qatar, an oil exporter that has despicable human rights violations. Actually Al Gore lifestyle is a test case for the credibility of his gospel - and it fails. The tolerance of Al Gores lifestyle by the environmental leadership is a further test, and that test too the greens fail.

People also have to consider that predictions that have been made over the last 20 years, none of them have actually come true. CO2 does not collate with temperature over geological time, ice cores reveal the temp rise way before the CO2 FOLLOWS




I am currently reading "A Disgrace to the Profession" by Mark Steyn. Forgetting for the moment that he has been taken to court by the illustrious Michael E Mann for calling his Hockey Stick fraudulent in a blog post, his book is most revealing and is a must read for people on either side of this debate. The book is about scientists, climate scientists from both sides speaking about Michael Mann. The guy is not well liked, his reputation as a scientists is terrible and the fact he uses his influence on the AGW to bully journals and journalists, he attempts to get tenured professors fired for disagreeing with him. In fact, that man is such a coward, he will not speak, debate or appear on a radio or TV show unless every single person there agrees with him and thinks his hockey stick is wonderful.

He is a thin skinned bully who refuses to engage in any dialogue with anyone unless they treat him as a saint. This lines up very nicely with the wording of his court order against Steyn when he called himself a Nobel prize winner, when he is certainly not.

The weakness of his science and the way he has spliced and fixed his data sets is almost beyond belief, this one of the fundamental tenants of the AGW theory, the Hockey Stick that appeared in all of the recent IPCC reports, the graph that was sent out to each Canadian family to sell the global warming meme, the graph that was seen prominently in Al Gores An Inconvenient Truth which was rammed down the throats of all the school children in the united kingdom is based on the most flawed science I have ever seen. The question becomes, if the evidence is so strong, why the hell do they need to make it up?

Mark Steyn counter sued Michael E Mann for $30 Million. That way, when his flawed, junk science comes to the fore and he tries to settle out of court, Mark Steyn will stick up his two fingers and say, time for the court case. During that court case, Michael Mann's Hockey Stick will be torn apart, the science will be shown in a court of law to be utterly baseless. I cant wait for this day to come and when it does a mainstay of this climate change alarmism will have been destroyed, the rest of this utterly stupid hypothesis will be torn down and normality will hopefully reign.

Rant over.
Michael Harris

 

[mike_thoth]

I could not help but add this to my increasing list of predictions about this terrible ice loss. What we have below is a demonstration of how this bogus crisis spreads like a virus through the web. The link is below but I am going to put in the actual screenshots too.

The final screenshot is of Dr James Hansen, former head of the NASA Goddard Institute who has repeatedly made predictions so ludicrous that they have 0% chance of becoming reality in our physical universe. He has been wrong on every single prediction he ever made but although his predictions are posted at large newspapers of the day, his failures never seem to be published in those very same newspapers or websites. Its a bias of positive reporting and I have a list of other predictions this man has made, all of them insane.
This year has seen the shortest ice melt period in our records which will mean a rapid increase of ice build up in the next couple of years. At this current stage in 2015 there is more ice at our poles than any time since we started recording this data with satellites since 1979. This is not the profile of melting glaciers as so many arctic and Antarctic explorers have found over the last few years when their huge ships have become trapped in ice that was not supposed to be there according to the UN. Perhaps they need to leave their warm office in New York and actually travel to the places that they lie about each day.

Shortest Melt Season On Record In The Arctic? | Real Science

 

[Burnt State]

When we talk about ice melt and ice growth are we talking glaciers or are we talking water surface ice?

 

[icculus]

What follows is a post I have taken from another thread where Global Warming is discussed as a fact, not a debate. It is a post out-of-place on that thread, so I have brought it over here. It is a good example of either willful disregard for accuracy or plain-and-simple an uninformed stance.

Again, the Global Warming temperature rise is a global average - not a reflection of a single region's experience. The below graph is suggesting that the present global average temperature is somehow equivalent to whatever was going on in a particular region of the earth at a particular long-ago time - in this case, in Europe during the Middle Ages. The below graph, if we are to understand what @icculus is trying to say, is attempting to put on equivalent footing a regional event (from the past) with a global event (in the present). It's not an equivalent comparison - regional vs global. The graph is misleading.



In the end, all discussion of the science is fruitless (and is why I prefer not to go down that road) because most people are simply not schooled in either the science or the rigorous analysis demanded, as demonstrated above. Very poor reasoning can easily waylay an ignorant populace. It's not for nothing that there is a significant move in the US (successful in some states, like Wisconsin) to dismantle the university system. Oligarchy cannot be sustained with an educated and informed populace.

In the US our investigative reporting has been all but crushed in the mainstream media. Lo! the Internet arises and we have substantial investigative reporting happening via other avenues. It's not for nothing that there continues to be a serious attempt to 'privatize' the Internet in the US.

We are, indeed, living in interesting times.

Fair enough. As you pointed out I'm clearly not an expert in the climate system of the Earth, who is? However, those are some pretty enormous swings in temperature, and yes they are from Greenland, but there are others from around the world that directly correlate with these deltas. The thread you pulled these from was regarding having Randall Carlson on as a guest. Would love to see some debate on this subject when he appears.

 

[Tyger]

Fair enough. As you pointed out I'm clearly not an expert in the climate system of the Earth, who is? However, those are some pretty enormous swings in temperature, and yes they are from Greenland, but there are others from around the world that directly correlate with these deltas. The thread you pulled these from was regarding having Randall Carlson on as a guest. Would love to see some debate on this subject when he appears.

No, it was the 'What World Under Climate Change' thread. Just to be clear.

 

[Tyger]

@mike_thoth You are starting to flood this thread with posts focusing on the science - this is a thread about the politics, not the science. There are oodles of threads debating the science, one that even has 'politics' and 'science' in the title, such as -

LINK: The Science and Politics of Global Warming

But I don't think you are really interested in the conversation. Your posts are riddled with very ancient denier arguments. So old that you're even referencing Al Gore, and like in those long ago days, you are having a go at some ad hominems. Tiresome. Too old to bother. The world has moved on.

 

[Tyger]

When we talk about ice melt and ice growth are we talking glaciers or are we talking water surface ice?

This is not a thread debating the science. It's a thread dedicated to the politics of human-induced global warming, which has to do with the deniers as a phenomenon, nothing to do with the science, per se. Just saying. A thread can be easily swamped with the denier 'debate' stuff.

 

[mike_thoth]

I see people have told me about the science should not be debated on this thread and this is fair enough. I will need to stop posting links to this. Regarding the politics, what is this phrase "Climate Change Denier" actually used for? It is not scientific, its actually a very mean spirited phrase meant to link people like me to deniers of the holocaust. There is little use for the phrase at any level and for me what it does reveal is ignorance, ignorance of the methods, reasons and perspectives behind people like me, and what drives us. I see no reason whatever why reasonable, honest & friendly debate can not take place between people. I find it atrocious that on an issue where so much is at stake people cant simply shelve the anger and listen. Climate Denier is what the Scientist Michael E Mann calls anyone who disagrees with him. Even people on his side of the debate are called this by Mann on a regular basis. I am one of over 230,000 people who he has blocked on twitter. He like many of his followers and supporters does not wish to hear any dissenting voices, indeed Mann wont even speak on a radio show unless everyone in attendance is on his side and no one dare ask a question of him. Lets look at the politics of this. Where is the political support for this, is it on the side of alarm or the sceptical side? Considering the Paris deal at the end of the year the power is clearly on the side of alarm. What about financially, does the money come to sceptics or does it go in favour of alarm? The rough estimate is that $4billion a day is spent on climate change alarm. What about propaganda or TV? Is this on the side of alarm or scepticism? Consider all the movies in cinemas the overall left wing environmentalism of nearly all Hollywood finds it way on TV, almost all mainstream newspapers have bought and endorsed alarm from the very start, the London Guardian being the most left wing and most ardent environmental newspaper. So considering all of this, why is the public not convinced?

Well the reason I think is obvious. They are tired, tired of all the dire predictions that never seem to come true. They remember as I do that in the past a warm summer was, just that, a summer that was warm. If the winter was cold, like during the first years after my own birth, then that was what winter sometimes did, it was a slow climate change. Now we live in a world where predictions from whale migration patterns to any increase is stolen cars can now be attributed to man made climate chance. John Kerry claims that ISIS coming to power had something to do with Global warming & not the fact that this group had been trained in Jordan by US, French and UK commanders using money from Qatar? Money these days is spent on more and more science that is bought an paid for by government.

One of the major dangers I see in this political belief system that has grown out of all proportion is the funding of science by government sources. Dwight Eisenhower's much famed address to the nation is quoted often by people talking about the military industrial complex. But people should listen to the whole speech because he addresses this issue very well indeed. When you have a scientific elite that become totally dependant on government funding, bad things can and will happen. Now this is in 1961 but he had already understood the dangers of this system and the corruption to science itself. People tow the line and the scientists will ensure they get more funding by providing the answers the feed the system. If people here think this is how science in any country should be ran then fine, but currently in western nations only (2nd and 3rd world countries have bigger problems on their plate than trying to solve a non problem by stopping a trace gas) science itself guarantees renewal of funding each year by claiming the problem is "worst than we thought" and by doing Michael Mann levels of data manipulation and splicing to come up with more and more crazy stories using more and more outdated computer models. 30 years ago you couldn't get funding to study the affects of global warming on drug trafficking or weather redheads will die out. Today you can and that is scary.

 

[Burnt State]

What we call the science of climate change is in of itself a political event, as much as an economic event. Much of what we call reality has always been manipulated or ameliorated by variou$ belief sy$tems who have their own agendas. But rarely do I hear from those who believe that the planet itself is simply worth doing things for because it is a living thing that hosts us and recycles us?

 

[Tyger]

I see people have told me about the science should not be debated on this thread and this is fair enough. I will need to stop posting links to this.

Thank you. As stated, there are numerous threads for debate. Feel free to access them. There are people who would like to debate the science, or at least discuss it, as you can see from Burnt States's response to you. In fact it is always a pleasure to read a reasoned debate/conversation. The problem will always arise when posters insist on ascribing to someone a 'spokesperson' role for a particular 'side'. One knows one is on a slippery slope when that starts up.

Regarding the politics, what is this phrase "Climate Change Denier" actually used for?

I can only speak for myself - I lapsed into it as I saw it being used, referencing a particular activity taking place with the Fossil Fuel Industry, et al. We now have documentation reaching back to the early 1980's showing that oil executives knew about the damaging impacts of emissions. We also know that there were scientists and PR firms that ran with the Tobacco Industry (for the money) denying the carcinogenic aspects of cigarette smoking when they had the scientific evidence to the contrary. The very same individuals in the 1990's then went onto the payroll of big oil and began the disinformation campaign with the science of CO2. (An aside: what is interesting is to hear people say that they began to question the science of AGW in the 1990's, when the disinformation campaign was underway).

The 'deniers' (so-called) tend to have tell-tale earmarks: foremost is an ad hominem attack mode. (Take a look at all the old Climate Change 'debate' threads here on this chat site for a dose of the animus - the end-game seems to have been to shut down the conversation, actually, which was achieved on thread-after-thread). Al Gore remains the arch-enemy as do various other persons. (Who quotes Al Gore these days? Only 'deniers' - though Al Gore is perfectly acceptable to quote imo. Just pointing out the 'old news' the 'denier mode' is riddled with - old talking points endlessly repeated). All the old rationales of the disinformation campaign, plus the tired ad hominems, forever repeated, with no cutting-edge science of any calibre presented. Mainly 'deniers' just re-spin and re-hash the science of researchers in the field.

It is not scientific, its actually a very mean spirited phrase meant to link people like me to deniers of the holocaust.

I agree that if one is trying to have a sensible conversation, being labelled in that way is counter-productive. I for one know the insanity of that kind of discourse since when I first came on this chat site the fact that I talked about, or from, a 'spiritual perspective' had me painted with a 'demonic-religious-nut' brush. Seriously unpleasant. (One poster continues to jibe at me, in fact, with shout-outs. Pretty poor - so I know the problem). Just recently (on another site) I saw someone try to engage a conversation about some minor - but contentious - point and they got dumped on royally, painted as part a conspiracy theory cabal. So, yes, I see your point completely.

Where I would question your reasoning is that it is being used to connect with the Holocaust. Certainly not in my case. The general connotation of 'denier' these days (9/11, vaccines, contrails/chemtrails) is the suggestion that said person/people are denying 'the facts', and that can fall many ways. They - whoever 'they' are, whatever 'side' - are denying the facts, but with more of an edge - they are creating another baseline. It can be used by any 'side' to dismiss.

There is little use for the phrase at any level

As you can see it does have a use when confronting those who are parroting the disinformation, especially when the tired old ad hominems keep coming up again-and-again-and-again. When that starts to happen, dismissal is in order - yes. However, otherwise, it is a pointless accusation on a chat site where posters are anonymous. We really don't know each other's backgrounds. No reason to dismiss, so I take your point.

and for me what it does reveal is ignorance, ignorance of the methods, reasons and perspectives behind people like me, and what drives us.

Point taken, as long as you understand the frustration underlying the need to dismiss when the old canards start being hauled out and the ad hominems paraded for the gazillionth time.

I see no reason whatever why reasonable, honest & friendly debate can not take place between people. I find it atrocious that on an issue where so much is at stake people cant simply shelve the anger and listen.

Agree 100%.

Climate Denier is what the Scientist Michael E Mann calls anyone who disagrees with him. Even people on his side of the debate are called this by Mann on a regular basis.

Ah, so here we go. You make it about the man, not the science. Have you any inkling the level of abuse being directed at Climate Change researchers - some on a daily basis? Mann will not be silenced. Good for him. After what he's been put through maybe he's a bit touchy - maybe. Either way, not my concern, unless he is being injured in some way.

I am one of over 230,000 people who he has blocked on twitter.

Should we care? Since when is serious scientific debate going to occur on Twitter? Twitter?

The number tells me that there is a serious campaign against the man. Bad business.

He like many of his followers and supporters does not wish to hear any dissenting voices, indeed Mann won't even speak on a radio show unless everyone in attendance is on his side and no one dare ask a question of him. Lets look at the politics of this.

Interesting. Since this is not anything I am following, could you supply support for your contention?

Off the top of my head - having watched Climate Science researchers get ambushed on interview shows by all manner of non-science so that the show becomes an unravelling of the non-sense rather than the point on the table, I could see Mann being sensible about how he spends his time in an interview. JMO. But I still want verification that Mann is not willing to engage intelligent debate on-air. I think he is and has done. Would not blame him for being selective, however.

Where is the political support for this, is it on the side of alarm or the sceptical side?

For Mann calling the shots when he agrees to an interview? I'd say neither. You're phrasing the question in a curious fashion. No politics. Rather personal choice (if it is happening). It's Mann calling the shots when someone wants to interview him. It's his personal choice.

Considering the Paris deal at the end of the year the power is clearly on the side of alarm.

Alarm? You equate alarm with the science? Most of the world is having to deal with serious problems because of a rising global (average) temperature, rising sea levels (talk to the Dutch, for just one), earth's changing eco-systems, desertification - drought, acidification, it goes on. We need to deal with it. We have clear evidence - weighted heavily - that one action that will help is containing CO2 production (the West can do it's fair share in this area). Another is waste management and another is population control. Much of this is out of the West's control. China and Asia in general will have to ride the whirlwind on much of this. But whatever it is, it is effecting us all. Unrest in one region will impact everyone - as is very clear in the world-wide refugee problem.

how about financially, does the money come to sceptics or does it go in favour of alarm?

Again, 'unpacking' what you write: Alarm=Climate Science facts, and Skeptics=Status Quo

Well, we know that in the past and in the present, money is flowing from corporations to keep 'the skeptic' view alive (the status quo: business-as-usual). Massive amounts of money in the US is being funneled in bribery, pay-offs, and what have you, to keep the status quo in the US. Until we get a government that will face down the corporate money flow, most of the money is going towards 'the skeptic', or status quo.

If governments decide that the weight of the argument favors being proactive (please note that it is not about correctness) then the money flows to correcting the CO2 emissions, etc. This is happening in various states in the US - like California. Less so by the federal government, though this can change. Powerful monied interests are working to keep the status quo, what in your dialectic you are calling 'the skeptic'.

The rough estimate is that $4billion a day is spent on climate change alarm.

A very obtuse sentence. How can you spend money on 'alarm'? Do you mean the science? If you mean the economic shift, with another paradigm, it's called a re-invigoration of the economy with new home-grown industries.

However, what I should address first is what exactly constitutes 'climate change alarm'? The science facts? And where does the $4billion figure come from? Here we have the endless problem with these kinds of conversations: nothing is fact, nothing is supported. You are potentially repeating a figure you read - but where? I don't know. I'm sure $4billion is not spent on newspaper ads - so what is being bought and sold with that $4billion? Do you know?

What about propaganda on TV? Is this on the side of alarm or skepticism?

Here in the US the denier camp is pretty well entrenched, so I would say the skepticism camp 'propaganda' is ascendent. It is why so many people really do believe that Climate Change is bogus - the news media is plugging away in the denier camp.

Consider all the movies in cinemas the overall left wing environmentalism of nearly all Hollywood finds it way on TV, almost all mainstream newspapers have bought and endorsed alarm from the very start, the London Guardian being the most left wing and most ardent environmental newspaper. So considering all of this, why is the public not convinced?

The public is not convinced because the disinformation campaign is very comprehensive. FOX News alone has done more damage to the clear presentation of the science than any other entity, but it has company.

Here it is all in one fell swoop: there is no 'nearly all Hollywood' finding it's way on TV. Isn't happening, at least not in the US. Fact is 'Hollywood' is a surprising place - more Right Wingers than you are apparently aware - but it may be a generational divide. There are certainly Left Wingers who put their money into their politics, but I'm not sure one side or the other is dominant in 'Hollywood'.

Mainstream newspapers have not endorsed 'alarm' from the very start - what was the 'very start'? In fact, I am aware of positive reporting in major newspapers like The New York Times in just the last handful of years.

Answer to be continued.....

 

[Tyger]

[...] why is the public not convinced?Well the reason I think is obvious.

As stated, I think it is evidence that the disinformation being reported in a good portion of the mass media is effective.

But, you believe....

They are tired, tired of all the dire predictions that never seem to come true.

But the predictions are coming true. Right in front of us.

They remember as I do that in the past a warm summer was, just that, a summer that was warm. If the winter was cold, like during the first years after my own birth, then that was what winter sometimes did, it was a slow climate change.

No it was not. Here you betray that you don't understand the science. In what you have just said, you are talking about weather, not climate change.

Now we live in a world where predictions from whale migration patterns to any increase is stolen cars can now be attributed to man made climate chance.

You are talking nonsense.

John Kerry claims that ISIS coming to power had something to do with Global warming & not the fact that this group had been trained in Jordan by US, French and UK commanders using money from Qatar?

Please supply a quote for this. I am aware only that John Kerry has stated that global warming poses as great a threat to the world as does ISIS. He has said that climate change should be treated with the same immediacy as the threat from ISIS. Kerry equated Climate Change with ISIS - he did not posit a cause-and-effect.

Money these days is spent on more and more science that is bought an paid for by government.

Puzzling. Could you explain?

One of the major dangers I see in this political belief system that has grown out of all proportion is the funding of science by government sources.

What is 'this political belief system'? You're losing me. In the US, anyway, science is losing government funding. The US Space Program is a whisper of what it once was, for one example.

Few scientists will put up with being muzzled. The last time that happened at the federal level was under President George Bush in the early 00's. Scientists were actually forbidden to use the terms 'climate change' and 'global warming'. There was an uproar over it. Currently in the US we have the governor of Florida banning any environmentalist in the pay of Florida of talking about global warming or climate change under threat of losing their job. (This in a state that is experiencing flooding of it's streets under clear skies because of rising sea level).

Dwight Eisenhower's much famed address to the nation is quoted often by people talking about the military industrial complex. But people should listen to the whole speech because he addresses this issue very well indeed.

The dilemma is not science per se, but militarism and armaments conjoined with capitalism. That 'complex' is in place - hence the war-mongering. Hence why we are dealing with battle cries to invade far-flung locales. Profit.

When you have a scientific elite that become totally dependant on government funding, bad things can and will happen.

There is not a 'scientific elite' particularly dependent on (federal) government funding. Most research takes place at universities and research institutes that get funding and grants from a wide range of sources, some federal, some state, some private. Of course there are government owned research laboratories - like Livermore and Los Alamos. Those institutions may have proprietary rights over intellectual property, but they are very far from being places that stifle free inquiry. Quite the reverse.

Now this is in 1961 but he had already understood the dangers of this system and the corruption to science itself.

Science has not been corrupted by any US government. Science in the US - or anywhere, really - is usually it's own worst enemy when it comes to 'orthodoxy' in it's ranks. It's an on-going problem as old as the hills. No nefarious government needs to be involved. The US remains one of the most exciting places to do research, though other places are gaining a reputation, too.

People tow the line and the scientists will ensure they get more funding by providing the answers the feed the system. If people here think this is how science in any country should be ran then fine,

I have to disagree. What is usually at work are reputations and life times spent on one theory. For example, a serious adjustment in Cosmological science is taking place because of new information from space probes. No scientist is going to be credible who does not start grappling with the new information in an honest way.

but currently in western nations only (2nd and 3rd world countries have bigger problems on their plate than trying to solve a non problem by stopping a trace gas) science itself guarantees renewal of funding each year by claiming the problem is "worst than we thought" and by doing Michael Mann levels of data manipulation and splicing to come up with more and more crazy stories using more and more outdated computer models.

The 2nd and 3rd world countries have bigger problems precisely because of what the 1st world countries have been up to. That's a fact. Erratic weather, rising tides due to rising sea level producing flooding, changing monsoons, changing ecosystems changing farming regions, migration of animals/birds/insects - and it goes on.

The problem is 'worse than we thought' because the real-time planetary system is changing faster than the computer models predicted. Trust me on this: no one gets funding with a scare tactic. Funding comes with the demonstration of sound science. Only then does the grant come.

More and more outdated computer models? How does this work? If the climate scientists are absorbing so much money, how is it that their computer models are outdated? There is a disjunct in your reasoning on this point. Can't have it both ways.

30 years ago you couldn't get funding to study the affects of global warming on drug trafficking or weather redheads will die out. Today you can and that is scary.

Absurd statement. You expect to be taken seriously with a statement like that? I've taken a lot of time to answer one of your posts. You have made some good points but overall you have become incoherent.

 

[Tyger]

"You can sway a thousand men by appealing to their prejudices quicker than you can convince one man by logic."
~ Robert A. Heinlein

 

[mike_thoth]

Hi everyone, I am sorry if I am losing you, but ill try and pickup on a couple of my points.
Firstly if you do not know of or understand what I am saying about Ike farewell address then please listen to the WHOLE speech, an not just the part that deals with military industrial complex. Ike knew what he was talking about and it concerned him that one day we could arrive at a very vicious circle of government funding research that justifies large government. Consider, we are talking here about massive amounts of money are being offered to science to research this problem of global warming. Scientists are human beings, like us they must put bread on the table. They conclude in their papers that more money is needed to look into the problem. This is a fact & one of the reasons there has been so much crazy research being done in the name of this problem. It leads to whole departments in universities that become reliant on government funding, this is what Ike was concerned at because it is a self fulfilling loop.

 

[mike_thoth]

In relation to predictions, what predictions have come true, which dire predictions are we being forced to live with?

 

[mike_thoth]

For those out there with an open mind on this issue can I suggest you read this very informative piece;

The Climate Wars’ Damage to Science

Considering this is not a science forum this news story explains many aspects of my previous posts but in a much more clear way. It explains the so called consensus, it asks some very interesting questions of peer review relating especially to Michael Mann and his hockey stick (there was no peer review done by either the IPCC or Nature upon publication of his 1998/99 graphs and totally wrong way he spliced data sets and for large periods of his reconstructions he relied on only 1 or 2 trees because they had the right shape and then gave them a 390% increase in weighting to ensure he got the shape he needed on the published version). I would ask people give this article the time and read through it. It doesn't matter if you don't agree with the authors conclusion, it does not matter if you think a persons perspective is wrong. The point is you cannot cherry pick which articles you read because you disagree with the author, you must and should always open yourself to both sides and then make up your own mind. Please read the article.

 

[Tyger]

@mike_thoth It is clear you want to debate the science. I don't see why you don't find a debate thread for that. Puzzling.

You posted a fairly thick post that I spent time responding to, with questions asked. As has happened before with other 'denier' posters, you have ignored my response, ignored my questions, and proceeded with your 'side', with your own questions which you will pillory me for not answering (if you run true to form). It's a tired old routine - I've seen it in play too many times. (In this black-and-white world I would be called a 'warmist' ). That tells me that this is not about a real dialog. Okay. Nothing new and I move on. Not interested.

For the discerning, your linked article is a demonstration of the problem in the conversation. Do I have the time to parse the article for you? No. Again, I am not here to convince anyone. I am posting what interests me. Full stop.

P.S. I do want to thank you for posting, however. The article is a good example of the 'politics' in the conversation. I leave it for the discerning reader to suss out the old canards, the discrete ad hominem attacks against the same scientists, and the relentless assertions rather than factual reporting. It's a good exercise, if a tad time-consuming. Do one of these analysis and one will be pretty much able to identify the earmarks of the chatter being set in motion. My advice is to spend one's valuable time reading the actual science, and the dialog amongst scientists, rather than opinion pieces that posit contentions, and confabulate set-ups, that do not exist.