What happened to Day One?
If I find out, you’ll be the first to know.
Through the extreme generosity of one of us, I’m here in Las Vegas at Heartland’s 9th Annual Climate Conference. You too can be here, albeit virtually, by clicking here. I’m not speaking, just listening. See if you can spot me in today’s crowd. I’ll be in seersucker.
Awards
I got here at the fag end of the awards ceremony yesterday, so I might not have my details straight, but it appears one of our great friends won the coveted Handsomest Climate Skeptic 2014 prize. This came with a lifetime supply of bow ties.
Running total of funds gambled
$0.00. Stay tuned.
Who still believes?
For twenty-ish years a small bevvy of climatologists have told the world, “Just wait until next year!” And as each next year passed, and the end did not come, and neither did temperatures rise in cooperation with their models, the climatologists were heard to say, with increasing volume, “Just wait until next year!”
Bosh. If your theory repeatedly says a thing will happen which does not happen, then, brothers and sisters, your theory is wrong. This is fundamental.
And everybody knows it, including the fellows making the predictions. That means, excepting the True Believers for whom love of Theory trumps reality—environmentalists, scientists who search for “missing” global warming like northwoods boys who search for Bigfoot—and the genuinely ignorant and naive, nobody does still believe.
This goes double for certain politicians, who don’t give a damn one way or the other, except as the manufactured crisis can be spun to increase their grip. Our friend Lord Monckton walked us through years of UN documents as bureaucrats there tried, and from time to time succeeded, in increasing their livelihoods by labeling themselves as saviors. Pathetic, unscrupulous, evil.
More to come
The subheadline says it all. I’m already late.
Lucky you. Could you ask Dr. Roy Spencer if he would do a guest post here on the nexus between his evangelical faith and climate science?
Briggs, RE: “Bosh. If your theory repeatedly says a thing will happen which does not happen, then, brothers and sisters, your theory is wrong.”
YOU JUST DON’T GET IT, do you!?!?!
As the “Bad Astronomer” just explained:
“Global warming is real, and we’re starting to feel the physical effects now. It’s difficult to pin any one event on a warming world; it’s like playing craps with a pair of loaded die. That 12 you rolled may have been random, or it may have been because the dice are very slightly weighted. You have to throw a lot of rolls before the effects are seen with any certainty. ”
(From: http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/07/08/climate_change_a_threat_to_national_security.html — as that link explains, it’s actually worse…a bona fide military threat to national security!)
There’s a statement chock-full of statistical buzzwords & concepts (random, craps/rolling slightly weighted dice, and more…).
Some years ago (2008) Bret Stephens wrote , “Global Warming as Mass Neurosis”: http://www.nevilleawards.com/gw.shtml That assessment seems to remain valid.
ALSO, some years ago, Dr. Christy (I think it was) testified in court/Congress (along with James Hansen) about, in part, implementing the remedial (or as Brett Stephens might put it, penitent) carbon-footprint-reduction measures needed to same the planet…would yield a CO2 reduction that might [possibly not] be measurable. In that hearing, J. Hansen concurred with the impotent ineffectual result such carbon-reduction measures would have. Sorry I didn’t save a link…but that’s “out there” somewhere and is a compelling bit of testimony.
Since remedial measures really won’t/cannot work…and the alarmists know this (again, someone find that testimony transcript)…then what’s the hullaballoo all about, really?
It’s a canard for socialism — as Anthony Watts reported & compiled, earlier worries about pollution in general were ploys to impose socialism (“sacrifice democracy” for the greater good):
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/03/01/global-cooling-compilation/
and since “pollution” came & went with the hippies, many of the same people (now ex-hippies, but holding the same views & wearing urban camouflage [suits & such as would make Briggs proud] have been championing “Global Warming” (to “climate change,” etc.) for the same ultimate end.
It’s the end–socialism/communism–that’s the objective & an environmental crisis serves as the means to that end. Doesn’t matter if the facts don’t support the asserted necessary remedial action–mindless drones complying out of emotional reactivity is the tactic. Problem is (one problem anyway), is that naïve whackos (urban camouflaged ex-hippies who’ve never really grown up) who’ve bought into this game plan to achieve socialist/communist utopia don’t appreciate that their utopian visions are a grossly blurred rendition of what is always a hellish dystopia.
There are indicators that Global Warming hysteria is a behavioral issue (as Bret Stephens noted) — as one illustrative example, follow the Bad Astronomer over time or scroll back his reports on the subject. What one observes, consistently, is an into asserting that “Global Warming is real” (which, again, he does in the blog essay at the above link). That repetitive assertion of fact of some doctrinal tenet (that often is a matter of faith, or factually wrong) is a cult mind control tactic that is routinely adopted by the cult members. This repetition of a core cult principle as fact induces belief. Also note the histrionic & emotional appeals, deference to authority, etc. in lieu of actual objective analysis. All features of cults.
Read about it in Steve Hassan’s classic, “Combatting Cult Mind Control”: http://www.amazon.com/Combatting-Cult-Mind-Control-Best-selling/dp/0892813113
What one observes across the spectrum of Global Warming alarmism is a core group of “leaders” (e.g. James Hansen), a much larger group of disciples that have been hooked into belief that pontificate the doctrine in the now well-known ways of cults (e.g. the Bad Astronomer). Then there’s the masses that don’t know any better & “believe” because so many do it must be true.
Bret Stephens got it right; and Steve Hassan reveals in detail the tactics.
Factual analysis of the sort Briggs does will only persuade those on the fringes, those not indoctrinated into the belief system, or, the larger & real objective of inducing socialism. Again, avoiding environmental apocalypse is a recurring tactic preceding the hippies & continuing in various forms to the present as ploy to achieve socialism — no amount of logical refutation of the models, etc. will dissuade/persuade the core leaders (“high priests”) of the movement because its not facts they’re really about, they’re about achieving a larger & very different outcome.
Briggs:
Thanks for the interesting post. I hope you won’t be hurt when I point out that in climatology “predict” is a polysemic term rendering the conclusion of your argument improper.
The AGW zealots have to keep believing in climate change. They can’t admit they are wrong. It would be too embarrassing to admit failure. They are like the old communists who insist that communism would have been a great success if only the right people were in charge. There is nothing wrong with Marx’s theory.
Briggs, was that you at a table up front on the left for Monckton’s keynote?
Are you sure you’re allowed to gamble in Vegas, Briggs?
JMJ
Terri Oldberg says “in climatology ‘predict’ is a polysemic term” — which, in older traditions, used to be known as equivocation…
But perhaps I’m wrong: In what legitimate sense of ‘predict’ does what then happens not matter? 🙂
You don’t have to agree with me, but Monckton is pathetic, unscrupulous, evil, IMO. Lord?! My Goodness!
You don’t have to agree with me, but Monckton is pathetic, unscrupulous and evil, IMO. Lord?! My Goodness!
They win because, shut up . . .
http://www.natureworldnews.com/articles/7972/20140709/climate-change-skeptics-dumped-by-bbc-to-create-balance.htm
Insurance rates for coastal property is going through the roof around the world. You’d have to be an idiot to think the seas aren’t rising, and there’s really only one reason that happens. You’d also have to be an idiot to think the level of pollution humans are now emitting has no consequence. We saw the damage from the Industrial Revolution in the West, well, now the East if going through the same thing exponentially faster and greater.
Ignoring this, as I’m assuming the well-funded pseudo-counter-culture of deniers would have us do, strikes me as just plain stupid, short-sighted, selfish and nasty. It’s the ol’ “I got mine, it’s not on the coast, so go screw.” It’s as if they are pro-pollution. Nasty.
JMJ
JH:
C’mon, Monckton’s Monty Python/Pachuri parody was a hoot.
Gary, he is a hoot. 🙂
Sea level rise.
http://notrickszone.com/2014/07/09/comprehensive-eike-review-of-sea-level-rise-shows-topexposeidonjason-results-are-inflated-faulty/