Quotulatiousness

December 4, 2009

Don’t bother your pretty little heads about all this “science” stuff

Filed under: Environment, Humour, Science — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 08:20

The non-scientists among us (that’s you and you and you and . . .) should just take a pill, sit back, and stop trying to understand the science:

And history repeats itself with climate change. We tell you people of the imminent dangers from the earth warming, and what do you do? You mock us. You question our motives. People who can’t even convert Fahrenheit to Celsius try and tell us we did the science wrong. Now emails have leaked from the Climate Research Unit that apparently show that scientists were fixing the data and trying to suppress the scientific research of dissenters, and you people demand answers from us. I have one thing to say to that. How dare you!

You do not understand the first thing about climate research. Man-made global warming is settled science. Disaster is imminent. We know this. It is a fact. We don’t waste time on studies that say otherwise, the same way we don’t waste time on studies that assert that the earth is flat. We are very smart people, and when we say something is so, you should just accept it.

So you think what is in those emails is important? Well, what exactly do you know? Do you see the white lab coats we wear? That color symbolizes pure science. Were someone like you to wear one, within five minutes it would be stained with neon orange powdered cheese and wet with drool from you trying to comprehend the data sets people like me look at every day.

December 3, 2009

The hidden damage from Climategate

Filed under: Environment, Media, Politics, Science — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 12:13

Daniel Henninger correctly identifies the worst result of Climategate . . . not the still-ongoing debate about AGW, but the damage to science as a whole due to the unethical, unscientific, and (in some cases) illegal activities of the CRU:

Surely there must have been serious men and women in the hard sciences who at some point worried that their colleagues in the global warming movement were putting at risk the credibility of everyone in science. The nature of that risk has been twofold: First, that the claims of the climate scientists might buckle beneath the weight of their breathtaking complexity. Second, that the crudeness of modern politics, once in motion, would trample the traditions and culture of science to achieve its own policy goals. With the scandal at the East Anglia Climate Research Unit, both have happened at once.

I don’t think most scientists appreciate what has hit them. This isn’t only about the credibility of global warming. For years, global warming and its advocates have been the public face of hard science. Most people could not name three other subjects they would associate with the work of serious scientists. This was it. The public was told repeatedly that something called “the scientific community” had affirmed the science beneath this inquiry. A Nobel Prize was bestowed (on a politician).

Global warming enlisted the collective reputation of science. Because “science” said so, all the world was about to undertake a vast reordering of human behavior at almost unimaginable financial cost. Not every day does the work of scientists lead to galactic events simply called Kyoto or Copenhagen. At least not since the Manhattan Project.

The would-be green tyrants will recover from Climategate, but the rest of the scientific community will suffer for their sins. Malpractice and deliberate deceit in one area will continue to taint genuine scientists for years to come.

December 1, 2009

Most ringing endorsement Stephen Harper has ever received

Filed under: Cancon, Economics, Environment, Politics — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 13:33

I never knew Harper had it in him:

This country’s government is now behaving with all the sophistication of a chimpanzee’s tea party. So amazingly destructive has Canada become, and so insistent have my Canadian friends been that I weigh into this fight, that I’ve broken my self-imposed ban on flying and come to Toronto.

So here I am, watching the astonishing spectacle of a beautiful, cultured nation turning itself into a corrupt petro-state. Canada is slipping down the development ladder, retreating from a complex, diverse economy towards dependence on a single primary resource, which happens to be the dirtiest commodity known to man. The price of this transition is the brutalisation of the country, and a government campaign against multilateralism as savage as any waged by George Bush.

Until now I believed that the nation that has done most to sabotage a new climate change agreement was the United States. I was wrong. The real villain is Canada. Unless we can stop it, the harm done by Canada in December 2009 will outweigh a century of good works.

That’s George Monbiot, known to his enemies as “The Great Moonbat”, stumping for wavering Tory voters to rally to Harper’s side. I realize he doesn’t intend it to be read that way, but for Alberta, the tar sand project is their biggest economic project for this century, and any criticism is taken as an attack on their economic future.

“Global warming is like pornography for Big Government addicts”

Filed under: Environment, Media, Politics — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 08:36

The mainstream media is still doing a great job of ignoring or minimizing the potential impact of the CRU data leak. Doctor Zero contrasts the gullibility (or worse) of the political classes with the wariness of business people:

Few recent events have illustrated the ineptitude, and political agenda, of the mainstream media more dramatically than “Climagate.” The revelation of email correspondence from the Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglia, documenting various attempts to suppress data and manipulate scientific “consensus” with thuggish tactics, confirms what critics of the global-warming movement have always maintained: it has a lot more to do with money and politics than science. In fact, the global-warming movement is essentially the opposite of science — the manipulation and destruction of empirical data to support a theory whose accuracy was decided in advance.

[. . .]

An objective media would respond to this blockbuster news story with front-page headlines and “special report” television treatment. By now, the authors of the incriminating Climate Research Unit emails would be infamous around the world. Top operators of the global warming racket, such as Al Gore, would be hiding in their mansions, afraid to face the mob of angry reporters gathered outside. Liberals love to accuse big corporations of manufacturing crises and taking advantage of consumers with false product information and deceptive advertising. Here is the paramount example of those offenses, on a scale that would widen the eyes of the greatest titans of industry. If a private corporation had conducted a scam as vast, and as destructive to the prosperity of nations — and the aspirations of the working poor…

… but no private corporation could do anything like this, could they? The global warming scam is the kind of crime that only Big Government can mastermind.

Private industry makes plenty of mistakes, but the global warming scam is defined by its utter contempt for costs and benefits — the laws of gravity that hold businesses in orbit around the free market. The global warming cult maintains that no chances can be taken — we must ignore all reservations and contrary evidence, and proceed as if the worst possible outcomes are inevitable, unless we take drastic action. We have to take this action immediately — not even the slightest delay is acceptable. Members of the global warming cult provide constantly shifting dates for environmental doomsday, painting dire pictures of coastal cities becoming aquariums after the polar ice caps melt.

November 30, 2009

CRU’s fall from Mount Olympus

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Environment, Science — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:53

Andrew Orlowski finds the “shocked, shocked!” reactions to the Climate Research Unit’s systematic perversion of the scientific process to be a bit overdone:

Reading the Climategate archive is a bit like discovering that Professional Wrestling is rigged. You mean, it is? Really?

The archive — a carefully curated 160MB collection of source code, emails and other documents from the internal network of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia — provides grim confirmation for critics of climate science. But it also raises far more troubling questions.

Perhaps the real scandal is the dependence of media and politicians on their academics’ work — an ask-no-questions approach that saw them surrender much of their power, and ultimately authority. This doesn’t absolve the CRU crew of the charges, but might put it into a better context.

[. . .]

The allegations over the past week are fourfold: that climate scientists controlled the publishing process to discredit opposing views and further their own theory; they manipulated data to make recent temperature trends look anomalous; they withheld and destroyed data they should have released as good scientific practice, and they were generally beastly about people who criticised their work. (You’ll note that one of these is far less serious than the others.)

But why should this be a surprise?

Well, it’s quite understandable that the folks who’ve been pointing out the Emperor’s lack of clothing for the last few years are indulging in a fair bit of Schadenfreude . . . but it’s disturbing that the mainstream media are still trying to avoid discussing the issue as much as possible. This is close to a junk-science-based coup d’etat which would have had vast impact on the lives of most of the western world, and the media are still wandering away from the scene of the crime, saying, essentially “there’s nothing to see here, move along”.

Doctors urged to advise patients on reducing their carbon butt-print

Filed under: Britain, Bureaucracy, Environment, Health — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 09:20

The Climate and Health Council in Britain is urging GPs to provide their patients with information on how to reduce their carbon output:

The Council has been recently formed to study the health benefits of tackling climate change and promotes a range of ideas from reducing your carbon footprint by driving less and walking more to eating local, less processed food.

It wants to raise ‘health’ on the agenda of December’s UN Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen.

They believe that offering patients advice on how to lower their carbon footprint can be just as easy and achievable as helping them to stop smoking or eat a healthier diet.

Other proposals include for all developed nations to pay an extra five dollars a barrel on oil and a tax on airline tickets. This would go into a special fund to develop low-carbon alternatives to existing technologies, they say.

So, after waiting for however many weeks to get that precious 2.5 minutes of actual patient-doctor interaction, two minutes will now be composed (in a Freudian slip, I originally mistyped that as “composted”) of Climate-Puritan hectoring. That’ll do wonders for both the environment and for doctor/patient relations.

November 26, 2009

QotD: How AGW became the majority view

Filed under: Environment, Media, Quotations, Science — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:10

What the CRU’s hacked emails convincingly demonstrate is that climate scientists in the AGW camp have corrupted the peer-review process. In true Gramscian style they marched on the institutions — capturing the magazines (Science, Scientific American, Nature, etc), the seats of learning (Climate Research Institute; Hadley Centre), the NGO’s (Greenpeace, WWF, etc), the political bases (especially the EU), the newspapers (pretty much the whole of the MSM I’m ashamed, as a print journalist, to say) — and made sure that the only point of view deemed academically and intellectually acceptable was their one.

Neutral observers in this war sometimes ask how it can be that the vast majority of the world’s scientists seem to be in favour of AGW theory. “Peer-review” is why. Only a handful of scientists — 53 to be precise, not the much-touted 2,500 — were actually responsible for the doom-laden global-warming sections of the IPCC’s reports. They were all part of this cosy, self-selecting, peer-review cabal — and many of them, of course, are implicated in the Climategate emails.

Now peer-review is dead, so should be the IPCC, and Al Gore’s future as a carbon-trading billionaire. Will it happen? I shouldn’t hold your breath.

James Delingpole, “Climategate: what Gore’s useful idiot Ed Begley Jr doesn’t get about the ‘peer review’ process”, Telegraph.co.uk, 2009-11-26

November 25, 2009

Tonight on Iowahawk Geographic

Filed under: Environment, Humour, Science — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 12:19

This is a fascinating show on a topic of great public and scientific interest:

Narrator

This is the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom, home of one of the largest nesting populations of climate scientists in Europe.

Gentle ant’s-eye scene of idyllic campus lawn, strewn about with drunken mating undergraduates

Each year it attracts magnificent migratory flocks of graduate students, adjuncts and visiting faculty from across the northern hemisphere.

Shots of jumbo jets landing at Heathrow; herds of climate researchers busily milling at Duty Free shops, retrieving baggage, phoning for prearranged limo service

Within minutes of arriving on campus, the migratory researchers approach the entrance of the Climate Research Unit and perform the secret credential dance, fiercely displaying their prominent curriculum vitae. This signals to the security drone that they can be trusted with the sacred electronic lanyard badge that will grant them entrance to the hive’s inner sanctum.

During the upcoming research season, this hive alone will produce over 6 million metric tons of grant-sustaining climate data guano, but until recently little was known about the elusive genus of homo scientifica living inside. Where do they come from? What strange force draws them here year after year? In order to unravel the mystery, Iowahawk Geographic documentary filmmaker David Burge undertook a painstaking one-week project to finally capture the climate researchers in their native habitat.

November 21, 2009

Ah, those deniers are causing a ruckus again

Filed under: Environment, Media, Science — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 11:08

Don’t they realize that the science is settled, all the wiser heads are in agreement, and you can’t disturb their complacency with facts?

Elizabeth sent me a link to this round-up of MSM reporting by James Delingpole, telling me that I was behind the coverage:

Meanwhile, the Climategate scandal (and I do apologise for calling it that, but that’s how the internet works: you need obvious, instantly memorable, event-specific search terms) continues to set the Blogosphere ablaze.

For links to all the latest updates on this, I recommend Marc Morano’s invaluable Climate Depot site.

And if you want to read those potentially incriminating emails in full, go to An Elegant Chaos org where they have all been posted in searchable form.

Like the Telegraph’s MPs’ expenses scandal, this is the gift that goes on giving. It won’t, unfortunately, derail Copenhagen (too many vested interests involved) or cause any of our many political parties to start talking sense on “Climate change”. But what it does demonstrate is the growing level of public scepticism towards Al Gore’s Anthropogenic Global Warming theory. That’s why, for example, this story is the single most read item on today’s Telegraph website.

What it also demonstrates — as my dear chum Dan Hannan so frequently and rightly argues — is the growing power of the Blogosphere and the decreasing relevance of the Mainstream Media (MSM).

If it turns out that these documents and email messages are genuine, it will set back the Climate Change/Global Warming lobby quite a long ways . . . unfortunately, it will also taint a lot of other scientists who have not been involved in the mass PR campaign to push the CC agenda.

There’s also the chance that this is a sting operation designed to publicly discredit the skeptics — who have been so cunningly designated “deniers” by certain MSM outfits — by putting an irresistible temptation out there, with just enough “real” data to appear to discredit CC, and then to reveal that the most explosive and incriminating stuff is actually faked.

November 10, 2009

Your backyard: red in tooth and claw

Filed under: Environment — Tags: — Nicholas @ 08:53

Stephen Malaga looks at half-baked suggestions for suburban backyards:

Environmental groups’ view of the animal world sometimes resembles Disney’s Bambi, with owls and rabbits mingling peacefully and Man lurking as the only predator, aided by his evil servant the hunting dog. A good example is the National Wildlife Federation, which wants to reintroduce wild animals into the suburban and urban enclaves from which development has expelled them by encouraging homeowners to develop “healthy and sustainable wildlife habitats” on their properties. The NWF has even produced a television program — Backyard Habitat, shown on Animal Planet — in which experts advise homeowners in places like Chicago about how to attract animals with plants they can feed on, freshwater, and places of cover like high grasses. The show especially likes to visit families with small children, emphasizing that such habitats can teach kids about wild animals.

But somehow missing from the program is one of Nature’s basic principles: the idea that hunters and the hunted evolve together. My own New Jersey backyard, a rich feeding environment that draws small herbivores with its tasty plants, dense underbrush, and drinking sources, illustrates how a residential habitat gradually becomes a killing field — in our case, one where stray cats battle over hunting turf, predatory birds dive to scoop up breakfast, and my wife and I scramble to clean up carcasses before our daughter sees them.

October 23, 2009

Check your homework, says the dog

Filed under: Economics, Environment, Humour — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 12:12

Brenda and Robert Vale recently published Eat the Dog: The real guide to sustainable living, where they made the case that your pets are a greater environmental burden than a typical SUV. Cocoa the dog begs to differ, having checked their math:

Conclusion

0.61 hectares to feed the soulless Toyota Land Cruiser.

0.062 hectares to feed your best friend.

That’s 10 times as much for the Land Cruiser than for me. I could have sworn the professors said the dog required twice as much land as the Land Cruiser. They were only off by a factor of 20.

Bad professors, BAD. Don’t make me rub your nose in it.

October 16, 2009

Friday links of possible interest

Filed under: Britain, Football, Health, Humour, Religion, Technology — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:25

October 15, 2009

Nobel committee had reservations, was not unanimous

Filed under: Europe, Politics, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 09:14

Apparently, it’s not just the cranky centrists, paranoid rightists and lunatic libertarians who thought the Nobel Peace Prize award to Barack Obama was incorrect: so did a majority of the committee itself:

Three of the five members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee had objections to the Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to US President Barack Obama, the Norwegian tabloid Verdens Gang (VG) reported Thursday.

“VG has spoken to a number of sources who confirmed the impression that a majority of the Nobel committee, at first, had not decided to give the peace prize to Barack Obama,” the newspaper said.

October 14, 2009

IPCC to US: stop breathing

Filed under: Environment, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 07:50

Ace of Spades reports on the latest “modest suggestion” from those whacky folks at the IPCC:

The IPCC says that rich industrial countries must cut emissions 25 to 40 percent by 2020 (from 1990 levels) if the world is to have a fair chance of avoiding catastrophic climate change. By contrast, the WBGU study says the United States must cut emissions 100 percent by 2020—i.e., quit carbon entirely within ten years. Germany, Italy and other industrial nations must do the same by 2025 to 2030. China only has until 2035, and the world as a whole must be carbon-free by 2050. The study adds that big polluters can delay their day of reckoning by “buying” emissions rights from developing countries, a step the study estimates would extend some countries’ deadlines by a decade or so.

Emphasis mine.

October 13, 2009

Nobel committee defends award to Obama

Filed under: Football, Media — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 13:08

It’s still enough of a news item that members of the Nobel committee who awarded the Peace Prize to Barack Obama feel the need to defend their choice:

Members of the Norwegian committee that gave Barack Obama the Nobel Peace Prize are strongly defending their choice against a storm of criticism that the award was premature and a potential liability for the U.S. president.

Asked to comment on the uproar following Friday’s announcement, four members of the five-seat panel told The Associated Press that they had expected the decision to generate both surprise and criticism.

Three of them rejected the notion that Obama hadn’t accomplished anything to deserve the award, while the fourth declined to answer that question. A fifth member didn’t answer calls seeking comment.

Now that he’s bagged the Peace prize, there’s a grassroots effort underway to make Barack Obama a write-in candidate for the Heisman trophy:

From a reader:

I just went to this link and, in the “Type your nominee here!” field, entered “Barack Obama.” The winner of this Nissan-sponsored promotion will actually receive one official vote for the Heisman award as sort of the people’s choice.

You can actually go back and vote once each day between now and the Heisman award in December.

Update: I missed one of the best Fark.com headlines from last week — This Sunday, the Pope will canonize five new saints, including one from Hawaii. Wait, what? After only eight months in office?.

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