Good news! Sea levels aren't rising dangerously

Jolly Roger

Its taken its time, but gradually the general public seem to be waking up to the AGW scam.

Nice to hear of yet more physical evidence debunking the "climate change" myth.

EC

Excellent, James. This one is going to be fun!

Verity

"To many readers this may come as a surprise." Not this reader. And I suspect not to most of the readers of The Speccie, who have been on to the global warming conspirators for years.

se1man

Yes James, but hasn't it been a jolly mild last few weeks? Global warming, innit.

AAE

Time and Tide wait for no man! Empiricism Rules OK!

Bellevue

Yes, and if sea levels are rising why is it that the Maldives are building a new airport?
Keep up the good work, James. I just wish I could buy your book, Watermelons. They now tell me it wont be out until February. And bloody Amazon wont send it to me in France. I shall keep trying, however!

Austin Barry

These misguided King Cnut anagrams really are becoming a bore.

Perry, a Heartless Curmudgeon, - against the Global Warming Scam, Ridiculous O/S Aid, and the EUSSR

Good to have you writing here James, and thanks for your piece in Speccy last week.

All strength to you in your relentless pursuit of the Global-Warming (but-oh-so-well-funded) half-wits! And thick cloud cover and light breezes on all the politicos stupid - or bent - enough to go along with them.

Brownloather

Nice try James but even if the Oceans turned to dust Al Gore and all the other climate fascists would still argue that sea level was rising inexorably.

fox

Danish count? I assume the tofu munchers simply opt for a silent 'o'?

Axstane

Hardly a surprise but thank you for bringing this to our attention.

Simon Stephenson.

Good gracious, where have you been for the last 25 years, James? The world's moved on a long way from requiring persuasion to be predicated by empirical reality. How on earth do you think the mob's going to be kept in check unless they're fed a continuous loop of propaganda promising them paradise just round the corner if they do the "right" things, and hell and damnation if they don't?

Get your 21st Century Dictionary out and you'll see that reality is now defined as "whatever information is needed to be fed to the hoi polloi to discourage them from doing what's bad for them"

General Zod

I've been going to the Maldives in autumn for ten years now. There has been no change in sea level and the coral reefs have recovered magnificently from El Nino.

Kittler

A landmass can also rise or fall. Since being relieved of its weighty ice sheet, some 10,000 years ago, Scotland has been slowly rising out of the sea and more pleasingly England sinking.
Please don't all rush north, it's all very, very, gradual.

normanc

Of course, you're misinterpreting the data. The sea should be rising, due to global warming (see computer models). This is in incontrovertible fact that 99.87% of scientists agree with and if you'd only look at the peer reviewed literature you'd see this was the case.

The fact that this increase isn't measurable is due to the equal and opposite effect of climate change which, as the name implies, can mean anything depending on what the weather is outside.

To conclude, things are actually twice as bad we thought because it's actually falling and rising at the same time (and giving deniers a false impression that it's staying more or less the same but that's only cause they're too thick to read the data / listen to the self appointed experts).

Pot Head

I always find it ironic when climate skeptics use science to back up their arguments, considering the amount of science they have to ignore to reach their position.

Ian

Self-hating greens will never buy it.

lloydj

normanc: 99.87% of scientists once agreed the the world was flat!!!!!

daniel maris

Yes ,I read up on this subject area and came away pretty convinced that even if man-made global warming was a reality the effects on sea level were pretty minimal, a matter of a few cms in a 100 years (and when you realise that much of the Netherlands is several feet below sea level that is indeed minimal).

Given that lots of areas of land are in any case rising and that many coastal areas consist of marshland which can easily absorb 10 cms of increased sea level, one realises there has been scaremongering on a grand scale.

Today I heard a Radio 4 item which made clear that another scare story - catastrophic release of methane from permafrost - happening now and wouldn't for many decades or a century or more.

On the other hand, it's been a very warm autumn!

Jay

This should help ...

http://sealevel.colorado.edu/

Mark M

Pot Head: I always find it funny just how much manipulating of the data is required in order to make it fit with the AGW theory.

If only nature wasn't so stubborn and refused to abide by the rules we tell it. When we emit CO2, the world is meant to warm. Just what is it that mother nature doesn't get about that?

Ed

The man-made global warming industry will be livid at this reporting of their hoax.

How dare anyone interrupt the flow of tax money to crooked Solyndra type companies or centers of shameful deceit like East Anglia?

shockwaver

the average rise in sea level for the last 18,000 years is 7-mm/year.

as a reminder, the present aleutian islands were a land bridge from north america to asia way back then.

the current average is about 3-mm/year.

looks to me as if things have slowed.

Richard of Moscow

Oh, for heaven's sake, you deniers really are in denial.

The sea level is rising dangerously. You laypersons are naively referring to what we dismissively call "measurements," which are static, whereas in reality the sea level is dynamic - really, really dynamic - it rises and falls so much it makes me feel icky.

Same with with global warming.
You deniers are obsessed with temperature measurements, which actually wobble as much as sea levels, only slower (I'm over-simplifying tremendously, of course).

Look at the facts: of 99 climate scientists questioned, exactly 99.87% think that this year is on course to be the hottest since 2010. This is not mere "voodoo science" - it has all been peer-reviewed by Al Gore, Oxfam, and a toilet cleaner from Bangladesh.

Try studying the REAL climate - the one in the REAL computer models. We owe it to the polar bears - I'm sure none of you wants to see another drowned 'ursus maritimus'

Steven

But Barry O promised to reverse the rise of the oceans.....

Clear Memories

Anybody with an interest in the Climate Change debate should read 'The Delinquent Teenager'

The entire IPPC report, the Climate Change Bible, is based on flawed science, misleading data interpretation, obfuscation and downright lies.

Unlike the IPPC report, these statements are backed up with hard evidence and examples, and the reasons for the pseudo-science clearly explained.

I would advise politicians to read this report and start rapidly shifting their stances if they wish to survive (in some cases, survive might reasonably be interpreted as staying alive)

Lets be clear, in this case, the old adage "If you can't blind them with science, baffle them with bullshit" has never been more accurate.

Maddy1

What about the unknown and supressed danger of lowering "cloud levels". We are all in imminent danger of living in a permanent Culumonimbus digestas. The founder of the Cloud Appreciation Society is also on the run after letting his hot air out! We owe to our children to do something about cloud levels and permanent depression.

Sir Everard Digby

Al Gore claims sea levels will rise by 20 feet. However,if that did happen it would take a millenium to do so. And would it be a bad thing? It would move growing seasons North by c300 miles which would assist the world in feeding itself.

Sean Haffey

Golly. Here I am a Conservative and feeling somewhat in the minority.

You see, I am a sceptic. I'm a sceptic of the "warmistas" and a sceptic of the "deniers". And I think both sides on this vital debate do a pretty poor job of making their case

- a lot of pointless name-calling
- rubbishing others arguments and science without providing solid arguments.

I'll buy this week's Speccie and read the article with interest.

Heartless Curmudgeon

Or put it another way: 99.99% of Climate Change Scientists (mostly blokes) rise and fall in tune with ever changing and hard to predict patterns, - but invariably Government Funding.

I'm sure we could do much to overcome Global Warmists and their blathering pollution by cutting off yet more wasteful Government Funding and also thereby, losing a few politicos along the way.

Simples!

David

Good god. The comments in this thread, as well as the corporate sponsored bile from JD, really make me despair for humanity. Good thing everyone else thinks you're all mad and are already laughing at the 'science' you've published. Editorial standards have never been so low!

normanc

Sean Haffey, I imagine you are in the majority here, I certainly feel as you do. 'Denier' is a name thrown about by the pro-AGW lobby to try and make sceptics sound like flat earthers, or Holocaust deniers who shut their ears and eyes to the facts, stick their fingers in their ears and parrot 'nothing is changing'.

Most so-called deniers (in reality sceptics) who I've seen take the position along the lines of 'computer models are all good and fine but dealing with a system as complex as the climate we shouldn't be taking the models, and the feedback mechanisms contained in them (which are the real drivers of 'climate change' in these models), as infallible and base our whole economic and energy policies around them.'

Rather let's adopt the scientific method of accepting flaws, refining models, accepting we don't undertand any more than a small part of the systems we are trying to model and not be afraid to change tack as the evidence presents itself.

Instead we appear to have climate scientists moving the goalposts (more snow / less snow, climate change / global warming, more hurricanes / less hurricanes, earlier springs / later springs, etc.) every time a piece of inconvenient data comes along. The data is being manipulated to match the theories, rather than the old fashioned other way round.

Richard of Moscow

I sympathise with Sean Haffey, since the scientific community resembles the anti-Roman resistance movement in Life of Brian.

There are thos who say mankind does not affect the climate, where others say we do, but to an insignificant degree. Geo-engineers claim we can cheaply control the climate anyway, etc.
The reason for all the derision is that the politicians and media have opted to accept one view - that CO2 emissions are dangerously warming the planet, and only stupendous amounts of taxpayers' money can save us all - and this is a minority view, one not supported by credible scientific eveidence.
That is why they we are being lied to, and why some of us are angry, derisive, dismissive, or (like me) downright rude.

Hexhamgeezer

Sea levels arent rising cos Big O'Barmy told us on his election (oh glorious day!) that 'this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal'

He is obviously even better than he thought.
Is there a Nobel Prize for Planet Saving?

Simon Stephenson.

Sean Haffey : 8.40am and Richard of Moscow : 9.59am

Well written, gentlemen.

The climate change brouhaha, in my opinion, is merely a symptom of a worrying cultural decline. Adult society appears to have embraced the childish idea that the strength and quality of a case can be measured by how widely it is believed, and by the force with which any alternative is rejected. Surely we're sufficiently au fait with history to see what happens in societies which are driven by propaganda rather than reason?

Of course, the moment that commercial advertisers were given carte blanche to lie, deceive and misrepresent was when intellectually-governed society signed its own death warrant. Perhaps this ought to have been seen at the time?

Nick Stonier

Richard of Moscow
December 2nd, 2011 12:55am

Brilliant

Leonard of Quirm

Richard of Moscow gives it to you straight, chaps. Delingpole's yelps help no-one.

Maggie

Any lingering doubts I had about global warming were dispelled when Lord Stern, with the enthusiastic support of Gordon Brown, launched the Carbon Offset trade. Since then a load of half-witted men, some of them in charge of banks and pension funds, have been buying and selling fresh air.

john gerard

Richard of Moscow,

"Try studying the REAL climate - the one in the REAL computer models.".

Heh, heh. Yes, very good. Sums it all up, really...

Cassandra King

Post normal science, the fusion of politics and science pioneered by Lysenko and the USSR.

It does not matter what the actual facts are or what observed reality proves, you see in the CAGW fraud it doesnt matter if sea levels are not rising as forecast, or if they are in fact falling which they are. No, what matters is the publics perception of what COULD happen IF sea levels rose several meters, the scare is sufficient to enable a series of behavioural modification changes that would be supported instead of resisted, in effect you scare people in order to force them to accept social evolution as devised and enacted by a social elite.

In post normal science, the scare is the prime mover in social progress and therefore does not have to be real, the scare is of course false but the means are though to justify the ends. The art of social control by inducing fear/anger/hatred/uncertainty/guilt in the general population is an old one, it has been used many times, a frightened and guilty population can be very easily led and controlled and duped and conned and its what is happening right now to us, history repeats itself.

Leonard of Quirm

Sigh,

The conspiracy theorists are out in force again. There are very few conspiracies. Plenty of cockups though.

John Holland

Can we have some more articles by this Morner chap?
Something about his famous dowsing obsession, maybe, or his incredible discovery of the King Kong of the East?
The more I read about this man, the more I realise what a scientific collossus he really is.

John Holland

Oh sorry, I meant 'The Hong Kong of the Greeks' (that's Sweden, by the way)

Simon Stephenson.

Cassandra King : 4.05pm

Spot on.

John Holland

Richard of Moscow-

Thanks for putting everyone right on this one.

So it's REAL science we need. That's simple then.
Maybe we could dowse for it.

Or perhaps, the scores of politically motivated non-scientists on this sight howling against the politically-motivated, non-science of 'the enemy' is, by definition, a desperately unenlightening sight, psychologically bonding I'm sure, but scientifically null.

I mean, seriously, does anyone on this sight really imagine that this is a beacon of objective, politically neutral reason, any more than the average Gruaniad blog sight?

Please, get a grip, and be honest. It's just the usual big, easy, mutually back-slapping yahoo, irrevant to the actual complexities of the situation.

AlwaysIntegrity

This 'expert' is a psuedoscintist laughing stock amongst real scientists - and 97% of real climate scientists agree that man made global warming is both real and dangerous.

Presumably you have been influenced by the loony Republican right - what next - Evolution a fraud by mad evolutionary scientists

Are their any scientist editors on the staff - youv'e been had by a crackpot gentlemen.

If the ice on Greenland melts, and it has already started, sea levl will eventually rise by some 20 feet - it may take 150 years and I'm sure that we can relaocate london given that lead in time.

Of course 20ft in 150 years is not much but that is the nature of climate change effects - slow but sure.

Rod Liddle's Legal Advisor

The Spectator has become a bit of an intellectual cul de sac hasn't it?

As someone who is moderately sceptical about most things, I can't see why there should be a well- funded global warming conspiracy. Surely most of the money is in the hands of those who are pro status quo?

Santorum

Oh dear oh dear. The Speccie has ballsed up big time with this one. Morner is a discredited loon. And Fraser is getting a fearful humbling for allowing this article to go ahead. See Geo Monbiot's latest article for a comprehensive dismantling.

Always Integrity

So, let me see;

On one side we apparently have a world wide conspiracy of renown scientists who almost 100% agree that we have a really serious long term man made problem.

On the other side we have a gaggle of ‘proud to be ignorant’ angry people who would rather believe each other and professional lobbyists / bloggers paid for by the coal and gas industries.

Tough choice this …

when the tide goes out...

I'd love to know why Spectator readers are so keen to believe the most shoddy research ever published if it supports their viewpoint, but absolutely refuse to accept the most well-researched findings if they don't?

(But then I guess most of the posters above are simply industry-funded trolls...)

Steffan John

You really are going down the conspiracy nut-job route now aren't you? Just because you're entitled to your own opinions doesn't mean you're entitled to your own facts.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2011/dec/02/spectator-sea-level-claims

Steven Dobbs

James,

I couldn't agree more with you.

This whole AGW scam is nothing more that a disguised attempt at class warfare to tax the so called rich who are in effect the hardest working and most useful members of society.

Regards,

Steven

Simon Stephenson.

John Holland, AlwaysIntegrity, Santorum, when the tide goes out and Steffan John.

Amazing! Just like buses, you all five turned up together. If one were a conspiracy theorist one could easily believe that your almost simultaneous appearance on this thread was something that was externally organised rather than self-generated. Well done James Delingpole, I say, if he's got you lot so frit that you need to hunt in packs.

Anyway, the real point of the post is to observe that since all of you are suggesting that Morner is discredited, maybe you could go through your records of the capabilities and credibility of scientists and let us have a short list of those who are (a) reputable and (b) sceptical about the man-made warming brouhaha.

I appreciate you may have difficulty fulfilling this request, since it is perhaps your view that it is impossible to be both reputable and sceptical of AGW. If this is the case, maybe you'ld let us know, so that we'd know that according to you anyone not adhering to the warmist view must by definition be a nutcase.

Simon Stephenson.

Rod Liddle's Legal Advisor : 6.41pm

I'd say that only a small part of the warmist zealotry is about money. Most of it is just the most recent demonstration by a relatively small number of puritanical narcissists of how viscerally they hate the hoi polloi - especially those who think that human life is about more than being browneaten by the strictures of a bunch of hairshirted goons. These goons are, of course, far too few in number to carry any weight on their own, so they gather support from the weaker, more credulous members of society, by spreading fabricated scare stories about what's going to happen if we don't all go back to living in the middle-ages. Like zealots in other areas, they're remarkably successful, because aggressive confrontation with the opposition is the sum total of their lives - whereas the rest of us have far more important things to do with our time.

Simon Stephenson.

my post 10.51pm

browneaten = browbeaten. Sorry.

Simon Stephenson.

Steven Dobbs : 10.35pm

A bit late on parade aren't you? If you'ld been quicker opening your email from Warmist HQ's Troll Direction Centre, I could have included you in my 10.36 post.

Richard of Moscow

John Holland, I'm not sure why you addressed the post to me, since I did not suggest taking the 'dowser' any more seriously than one should take the CAGW BS merchants.
By the way, did you know this very site was once infested by someone with a user name very similar to your own, who was caught telling the demonstrable lie that the MWP was not as warm as the present day?

And yes, the geo-engineers are hardly disinterested parties, since their solutions rely on governments paying them to solve any warming, but at a couple of hundred million they are - at worst - far cheaper agenda-merchants than Al Gore and his ilk.

The CAGW mob, as "climatologists," are also not disinterested parties, for obvious reasons, and have no evidence, AND unfortunately have 'previous' as they are the educationally-subnormal geeks who gave us the 'global cooling' scare, and for the same reasons.

All I ask of the CAGW crowd is to ponder the Russian saying: no-one believes a liar, even when he's telling the truth. If CAGW IS real, you lot had better ease up on the lies.

Al

Ah did he use his divining rod to find water though? I'm very concerned - last time he tried there was too much interference. Also, Hong Kong - Greeks - Sweden: breaking news! Aka: your 'cover star' is a fraud and a sham. Shame really.

Edward McLaughlin

Thank God we have such momentous authorities as Pot Head and normanc to bring us back into line.

For a time it looked as though the, deniers would carry the day and the Palm developments of Dubai were not going to be swept beneath the briny.

Pete H

Pot Head, it is not up to the sceptics to prove anything, science works the opposite way round (or used to!).

The warmists have come up with theories based on models and it is up to them to prove they are correct. So far they have come up with jack sh/t in the way of empirical evidence to prove man made CO2 will cause catastrophic climate warming. They cannot even show the "Hotspot"!

John Holland

I've remembered why I stopped posting on this site; if the moderator doesn't like what one says, it just doesn't get put out, regardless of any putative language or legal issues.
Odd, for a site so keeen on crying 'PC censorship' at every opportunity.
Who'd've thunk it?

John Holland

Richard of Moscow-

No, I don't know why I addressed my response to you, either.

Maybe it's because of your elegantly rational debating technique- calling every scientist you think you disagree with a liar, with no references or facts to back this up, along with gems of intellectual debate like 'educationaly sub-normal geeks'.

I know you're not remotely interested, but do you have any evidence of your global cooling thing, something that proves wrong the boring old method of counting the scientific papers published in the 'seventies, which shows that over three quarters were about possible warming, and less than one quarter predicting this cooling that every Spectator reader remembers so fondly? Still, good to know you were all spending the 'seventies assiduously reading climateology papers. Or do you sort of remember something about an ice age in the Telegraph over breakfast one morning while listening to the latest platter from Shawadywady?

The point I tried to make before, but wasn't allowed to for some reason, is, if it is absolutely certain that all these educationally sub-normal geeks (and dear old Dave Atternborough) are lying for financial and political reasons, if it's been proved beyond doubt that they are frauds, why arn't you and your chums taking them to court?
Seriously, what's the problem? They are engaged in a massive criminal conspiracy, let's get these people into gaol.

Simon Stephenson.

John Holland : 10.25am

"I've remembered why I stopped posting on this site; if the moderator doesn't like what one says, it just doesn't get put out, regardless of any putative language or legal issues. Odd, for a site so keeen on crying 'PC censorship' at every opportunity. Who'd've thunk it?"

I think you'll find this is a fairly recent thing, and that it's connected to the number of words, rather than the content. I've had several years of having all my posts accepted, but in the last few weeks I've had a number which have been turned down seemingly automatically by the system - they've all been relatively long, and detailed posts, and none of them has contained links elsewhere.

Maybe David Blackburn could enlighten us as to what's happening?

Perhaps, unless a punchy accusation against the Spectator is just too much to resist, you might revisit the assertion that you had posts without hyperlinks censored further in the past?

Simon Stephenson.

John Holland : 10.54am

I see you've dragged out the old propagandist's tool - if your opponents can't prove that they're right then it can be assumed that they're wrong, but your side, paradoxically, has only to appeal to authority to make all its assertions unquestionably correct.

Simon Stephenson.

John Holland

My post of 10.36pm

Have you come up with anyone yet who you consider to be both a reputable scientist and an sceptic of the man-made global warming brouhaha? Or is it as I thought, that you determine the reputation of others according to how well their opinions fit in with your own prejudices?

Richard of Moscow

And if the software will permit me, I had better deal with his other attempt at a question:

“but do you have any evidence of your global cooling thing...?”

- I’ll provisionally translate ‘thing’ here as my reference to the fact that the 70s global cooling nonsense was from climatologists. It was covered extensively in many publications of the time, but in any case, your own ramblings also gave climatologists the ‘credit.'

You did add that around three quarters of papers from that decade ‘were about possible warming’ – (Genius! The temperature during an interglacial might POSSIBLY go up?) – Irrelevant to the discussion unless you can produce a similar amount of papers from your co-religionists in the 90s, in which they accurately predict the Global non-warming (and non-cooling) we’ve seen this century.

Or do you just want to say your religion is older than we thought? If so, I think the Zoroastrians and most others kick your backsides on that score.

Simon Stephenson.

Pete H : 9.46am

"Pot Head, it is not up to the sceptics to prove anything, science works the opposite way round (or used to!)."

I think you'll find that science still does work in a way the the burden of proof is on the asserter rather than the receiver. Not so, however, with politics, or with "science" that is corrupted to conform to a political objective. Here, the one and only aim is to win, and if carrying the burden of proof is an obstacle to winning, then the imperative is to jettison the scientific obligation in such a convoluted way as to camouflage the fact that the evidence is no longer of scientific quality. This, of course, is easy-peasy for modern propagandists.

Richard of Moscow

Maybe the link sabotaged part 1. Try again:
“…calling every scientist you think you disagree with a liar,”
- Which, of course, I didn’t.

“if it is absolutely certain that all these educationally sub-normal geeks (and dear old Dave Atternborough) are lying for financial and political reasons, if it's been proved beyond doubt that they are frauds, why arn't you and your chums taking them to court?”

- Did I say ALL? No, again, (I should’ve known ‘not disinterested’ would cause you problems) but I’ll answer your question nonetheless: it is because most people are not so intolerant as to want various politicians, eco-loon ‘scientists’ and tedious ‘entertainers’ (Attenborough, Brigstock et al) prosecuted and locked up just for spouting nonsense.

There is a broad consensus in favour of freedom of speech, except among your co-religionists who want people prosecuted as 'climate deniers'

“They are engaged in a massive criminal conspiracy,”

- In your dreams. No, just another bunch of pampered, immature little brats with a new religion, desperately seeking attention.

John Holland

Richard-

I'm trying very hard to understand your reply. It doesn't make a lot of sense.
Just to recap; what I pointed out was that, despite your repetition of the old canard that sciencists used to believe that the earth was about to enter an ice age, a simple study of published science papers (not news stories, since what newspapers print is their own business), shows that a small minority talked of cooling, and a great majority predicted warming. Thus, your attempt to prove the inconsistency of the science since the seventies is, simply, false.
Does it matter to you that a minority of papers in this period predicted cooling, or will you just use this nonsense anyway?
Do you think your constant use of the word 'religion' as a catch-all insult take the place of either evidence or rational argument?
Simon Stevenson-

You are dispalying some interesting logic here.
"...if your opponents can't prove they're right then it can be assumed they are wrong".
I take it you think this logic is wrong- and you would apply it to 'warmists'. They shouldn't need to 'prove' that they are right? Just, what, give them the benefit of the doubt? Or just give YOU the benefit of the doubt? How far do you apply this assertion that an opinion should be respected, regardless of its relationship to evidence?

"Have you come up with anyone yet....." etc.
So what you are saying here (correct me if I'm wrong) is that, as someone who you assume is a proponent of AGW (though in fact all I've done is question the logical consistancy of many of the posts here), my putative views are false unless I can name a senior scientist who disagrees with them.
I don't know how to answer that, as it seems more like something from Alice in Wonderland than a serious piece of rational argument.
Sorry.

John Holland

Richard-

"In your dreams."

But, really, if you were to take your statements seriously ( which, of course, you don't), the 'fact' that all the major scientific organisations in the world are pushing this AGW lie MUST involve a conserted (and criminally fraudulent) attempt to promote a knowingly false scientific idea, supported by knowingly false data.
That's not freedom of speech, that is, as I say, criminal conspiracy. These aren't "a few spoilt brats",either, depite your attempt to identify a ringleader as Marcus bloody Brigstock; they are the world's senior scientists. And they are liers.

It's very sanguine indeed of you to accept this global corruption as 'freedom of speech'. Unless, of course, you don't, really, believe it any more than I do.

John Holland

Richard of etc.-

You should read Georgian Republican Paul Broun Jn., and his calls for a Congressional Hearing to investigate the scientific establishment for being part of the New World Order Conspiracy(TM) to "destroy America".
Now there's a man who puts his money where his mouth is.

dannie_brooke

errr, actually INQUA have been trying to distance themselves from Mörner who still falsely represents himself in his former capacity. he's a bloody loon and con-man

Simon Stephenson.

John Holland : 8.31pm

1. Like most theists you apply a double-standard to judging the validity of evidence. Opponents are required to "prove" their assertions, yet those on your side merely have to make appeals to authority.

This is the standard in modern politics, but not in pure science.

2. It's a test to provide some evidence of whether your appeals to authority have some credibility, or if they are merely self-serving circular justifications. For example, if your sole criterion for judging someone as competent and reputable is "his beliefs and my beliefs are the same" then it is a false argument if you then claim that your faith is superior to others because all competent and reputable people support it.

3. The way to remove the automatic hostility of non-theists is to stop trying to present a possibility as a certainty, and do some hard graft to establish solid, precise and scientific reasons why the possibility is serious enough for us to pay some attention to it. We're never, ever going to be persuaded by a moral argument masquerading as a piece of sound logic by having a piece of "scientific" mumbo-jumbo attached to it.

Richard of Moscow

John Holland
December 3rd, 2011 8:31pm

“Richard-
I'm trying very hard to understand your reply.”

- That is an encouraging sign, certainly. Let’s see how you got on:

“... despite your repetition of the old canard that sciencists used to believe that the earth was about to enter an ice age,”

- No, very poor indeed. I did not mention any ice age.

You and your co-religionists just became far too excited over predictions on some computer models, just as a considerable number of leading banking organisations became far too excited at these fantastic new ‘low-risk, high-return’ AAA investments on sub-prime mortgages.

I repeat – no-one (I hope) wants you to go to prison. Just have a little holiday in reality - it's not that bad, I promise.

John Holland

Simon Stevenson-

"...do some hard graft etc.,etc..."

There is, as you know, a huge body of work by the leading scientific bodies, including the national scientific associations of 32 countries, behind these assertions of AGW.
Obviously, they could all well be one huge, steaming pile of dung, as you obviously think they are, and I'm sure you, of all people, have the expertise to know.
But to say that no-one's bothered to find evidence to back up the claims (dung, lies or true), is just not engaging with the situation.
I apologise if you've spent the last few years reading this enormous number of papers, testing their veracity,and have come to the reasoned conclusion that, in your personal scientific estimation, thay are, indeed, all, without exception, dung.
You have done us all a service.

John Holland

Hello Richard-
I'm learning a lot from you, it's interesting. I don't know if you and Steven are representative of Spectator readers- I hope so.

For example,I'm keen to know why you keep calling me religious. Based on what I've said on this site, what leads you to the conclusion that I am 'guilty' of religious thinking?
All I've done is to question the logic of some of your, and Simon S's, statements.
I've made no claims about anything to do with my personal beliefs, either regards the climate, or a Creator.
Are you being a little hysterical? Does it not remind you of the habit of shouting down critical thought with the smug term 'denier'?

And regarding your claim about scientists's warnings of cooling, I've enjoyed your various ways of evading having to back the statement up with any evidence. I'm sure you're right, merely that it fell from yout lips is sufficient proof of its truth.
But why is it "irrelevent" to say that a very small minority made this claim ( I can find ONE paper, 'Atmospheric CO2 and Aerosols- Effects of large increases on Global Climate (Rasool 1971)- which admittedly got a lot of press coverage at the time), while most said precisely the opposite?
What you seemed to say is that is that it doesn't matter whether your claim was plucked out of thin air or not, because I can't prove all subsequent papers to be correct. Or something. Wonderful.

Simon Stephenson.

John Holland : 12.46pm

You, personally, have said nothing whatsoever to challenge the assertion that your stance is primarily moralistic/political. Nor have you said anything to refute Cassandra King's warning (02/12 4.05pm) that the whole AGW scare is just the latest example of the fusion of politics and science.

John Holland

Simon S.-

And my 'stance' is what, exactly?
What assertions about either present or future conditions of the planet have I made here?

And why am I, alone, being asked for this proof of intellectual purity? Why not you?

Actually, now you mention it, this seems like a very good idea;
why don't we start with Delingpole- afterall, he's the one making a good living making very confident pronouncements about scientific issues, when he has no apparent training in, or knowledge of, the subject.
While we're waiting for him, you can set the ball rolling, since you've made some pretty confident pronouncements about the world's scientific organisations yourself.

I'll give it a try myself, when I've had a bit of a think;
looking foreward to your personal statement of proof of scientific purity, Steven!

Peter Hirsch

I live on the sea's edge. 15 years ago, the highest tides in November used to fill my garden on a regular basis. But not since. I do not believe the sea level is rising: falling, perhaps?

Simon Stephenson.

John Holland : 7.05pm

"And why am I, alone, being asked for this proof of intellectual purity? Why not you?"

You're not being asked for "proof" of anything. What you are being asked to accept is that the strength of priority which you assign to nature over humanity is a personal choice; one which is not shared by vast numbers of other human beings; and one which is built from moralism, not science. Most of us, however, while we both respect and wonder at nature, when push comes to shove we put humanity first. We see nothing wrong in overcoming the forces of nature in pursuit of our own wellbeing and happiness.

What we also see over time is a succession of campaigns by pro-nature, anti-human factions, using all the artifices of dishonest persuasion, in attempts to change the personal morality of people who are not currently so acutely anti-human.

So butt out, Mr Holland! Live your life in a hairshirt if you so choose, but let others also make the choices that you expect for yourself.

Chris Enkia

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2011/dec/02/spectator-sea-level-claims

Tee. Hee.

Woolf Barnato

Oh dear oh dear James, you've done it again. Not content with lapping up every word of the maverick Ian Plimer (whose scientific charades would have attracted your fury had he not come to the "right conclusion", because he did you accepted him - absurdly - uncritically), you have now latched on to this laughable idiot, who believes in dowsing, amongst other junk science ... It really does not help the cause. I am quite prepared to accept the holes in AGW theory, but at the same time am afraid the sceptics are even worse - substantially so in this case.

John Holland

Simon S-

I've given up trying to reply to you- whatever I right, they won't print it.
Maybe they'll allow this through just to be funny.

John Holland

Ha ha.

Remittance Man

People say study the REAL climate models in REAL computers. Fine. But here's a few facts about computer models of natural phenomena from someone who works with such things every day:

The most accurate of these models - geological models of orebodies - can be as close as 95% to the truth, but only under certain specific circumstances.

Circumstance one - the natural phenomenon being modelled is fixed.
Two - the data is collected from a large number of closely and regularly spaced intervals.
Three - the data used in one model is assayed in a limited number of labs all of which are expected to regularly pass quality control tests against test samples of known value.
Four - high accuracy is only possible within the cluster of data collected. Once you wander outside the data field all bets are off.

Now let's look at climate models and their use.

Firstly weather, climate or whatever is constantly in a state of flux, making the modelling much more difficult.
Next, weather stations are positioned unevenly around the globe and at nothing like the same density as would be required from exploration drilling.
Thirdly, I would suspect that the calibration and quality control regime imposed is far slacker than sen in the geological world.
Fourthly - going back further than a few decades a lot of the data used does not come from primary sources. Instead it derives from other models developed using variables such as tree rings, gas concentrations in bubbles trapped in ice.
Finally these far less reliable models are used to predict events that might happen in the future ie way outside the set of gathered data. This is the equivalent of saying I have a model of a gold deposit under London and this makes me certain I could start a gold mine just outside Chichester.

Quite frankly, if I took an investment proposal based on a model of this provenance to my bosses I would not just be fired, I'd probably be sectioned. But this is just what the climate change scientists have done. And our politicians have decided to invest way more than the cost of a gold mine based on just such a model.

Funnily enough, in my experience geologists are some of the scientists least likely to have bought into AGW and Climate Change.

Worry

It is surprising that such a relatively easy empirical study has not been performed at sites supposedly threatened by inundation. Why would one rely solely on theoretical models when one could practically stick a pole in the water and observe the results for a few years or decades?