A majority of scientists are skeptical about the global-warming crisis:
One interesting aspect of this new survey is the unmistakably alarmist bent of the survey takers. They frequently use terms such as “denier” to describe scientists who are skeptical of an asserted global warming crisis, and they refer to skeptical scientists as “speaking against climate science” rather than “speaking against asserted climate projections.” Accordingly, alarmists will have a hard time arguing the survey is biased or somehow connected to the ‘vast right-wing climate denial machine.’
Another interesting aspect of this new survey is that it reports on the beliefs of scientists themselves rather than bureaucrats who often publish alarmist statements without polling their member scientists. We now have meteorologists, geoscientists and engineers all reporting that they are skeptics of an asserted global warming crisis, yet the bureaucrats of these organizations frequently suck up to the media and suck up to government grant providers by trying to tell us the opposite of what their scientist members actually believe.
As Freeman Dyson has noted, skepticism is exactly the attitude that a true scientist takes.
[Late evening update]
From a comment:
I have added James Taylor to my list of people that I can’t trust a word they say. That article is a travesty, as are the ones he links to about meteorologist. How dare he say “only 36% of scientists” when the study studied geoscientists who work at Alberta petroleum? Pathetic. Or claim in the other links that “only a minority 30% is very worried about global warming”, ignoring that the study said an additional 42% are _somewhat_ worried. I’m not a big believer in AGW, but the man is obviously in the business of fooling people. You shouldn’t link him either.
Noted for future reference. But the point remains that a) the 97% number is bogus and b) the models are broken.
If you actually read the study, you find that it’s a survey of “professional experts in petroleum and related industries” who all happen to work in Alberta, Canada – home of the world’s largest oil shale reserves. The local professional organization surveyed their 40,000 members, and 1007 (2.5%) answered.
I suspect if I surveyed all the foxes found in hen-houses, I’d find that the foxes were skeptical about the problems to the farmers caused by eating chickens.
The study is a look into “professional resistance and defensive institutional work”, an elaboration on the Upton Sinclair line that “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”
To summarize it as giving insight into the views of climate scientists is hilariously wrong.
The mote in mine eye. Please explain to me why the opinions of “climate scientists” feeding off the AGW gravy train should be considered to be any more objective?
Bart – if a climate scientist can show global warming isn’t happening, they will not only still have a job but can get big money working for the oil industry or right-wing think tanks.
In any event, the survey respondents are most definitely not “scientists.” They are professional engineers who know no more than you or I do about climatology. Asking them their opinion about climate change is like asking professional baseball players their opinions on brain surgery.
“they will not only still have a job ”
You sure about that Chris? There have been cases of people losing their jobs for being skeptical of AGW and AGW alarmists routinely try and ruin people’s lives for speaking truth to power.
“Asking them their opinion about climate change is like asking professional baseball players their opinions on brain surgery.”
On the other hand, if the official “brain surgeons” were baseball players, their batting average would be .000. These are, after all, guys who are effectively advising amputation for a headache.
Chris is right — an AGW skeptic will have no trouble finding an appreciative audience. The fossil fuel industry dwarfs every other industry on Earth, and its economic and political power dwarfs any power mere egghead scientists could hope to wield.
“The fossil fuel industry dwarfs every other industry on Earth, and its economic and political power dwarfs any power mere egghead scientists could hope to wield.”
And, it is fully on the AGW bandwagon.
Money from the government and activist groups is more pure than other money rendering AGW advocates immune to corruption and other failings common to humans.
You could use this reasoning to discredit virtually all science, since virtually all scientists get money from the government or groups with some sort of agenda. Those scientists claiming that smoking causes cancer — they’re getting money from the NIH and the Cancer Society!
You could use this reasoning to discredit virtually all science, since virtually all scientists get money from the government or groups with some sort of agenda. Those scientists claiming that smoking causes cancer — they’re getting money from the NIH and the Cancer Society!
Yes, Jim, this is a genuine problem for cancer research just as it is for climatology. Once again, you don’t get it.
“You could use this reasoning to discredit virtually all science”
You can use it to dismiss anyone without addressing the content of their arguments. Which is why AGW alarmists always employ it.
It is a common attack from the left to accuse someone of being a paid stooge that needs to be dealt with.
There is a reason they do double blind studies in medical research.
AKA: Competent people.
Tobacco farmers are competent people, but they aren’t the people to ask about the health effects of smoking.
Yeah, funny.
But “Petroleum Engineer” is the title a majority of Chemical Engineers end up with once they leave school. And you clearly don’t know the first thing about the curricula for ChemE’s if you’re scoffing at their skills in comparison to the “Climate Scientists”.
Just as one point of many: I have yet to discover a climate scientist with a single class of Control Theory under their belts. ChemE’s of my acquaintance have all had a full year of it – as well as several spinoff or complementary classes. (Electrical engineers have even more, but the problems are focused on higher frequencies.) Control Theory is all about the understanding the differential equations that result when you pile a bunch of feedbacks into a system – like a changing gaseous mixture with uncertain temperature measurements, mass and heat transfers and changing loads (sun, currents, volcanos).
The underlying premise of CAGW requires a strong positive feedback. And you’re sitting there laughing at people who’ve been spending essentially the whole industrial revolution period figuring out how to detect feedbacks, how to measure them, how to distinguish one feedback from another, and then how to predict the resulting chaos.
Hint: Having a feedback like the sun and saying “We’ll pretend the feedback from that’s zero” is fracking moronic.
OK, climate believers. Please explain to me why I should have any non-zero level of confidence in the models?
Snarky answer: You wrote that the linked study shows that a majority of scientists are skeptical about the global-warming crisis, which indicates that you’ll believe anything. So why not believe in climate models?
Short answer: Because the alternative is nihilism.
Longer answer: Climate scientists are like any other sort of scientist, and their models are like the work done by other scientists. They could be wrong, and the systems of peer review and professional evaluation and competition that attempt to sort out good scientific work from bad could have failed (they have failed before, and will again). But there’s no more reason to think that’s happened in this case than in any other scientific field, so there’s no a priori reason to doubt climate science unless you doubt all scientific work.
How about Arctic sea ice?
From the link:
1) the second fastest July ice loss in the satellite record after 2007, and much higher than the 1981 to 2010 average
2) The monthly trend is ‑7.4% per decade relative to the 1981 to 2010 average (also ‑7.1% per decade relative to the old 1979 to 2000 baseline).
That fact alone should suggest some “non-zero level of confidence.”
That fact alone should suggest some “non-zero level of confidence.”
Why?
I have a model that says that all odd numbers are prime. Let’s see, three is prime, five is prime, seven is prime. Let’s try some higher ones. Twenty-three? Twenty nine?
Yup, confidence!
Well, yeah. That’s because it started July with the highest level in a decade. It only decreased like it did because of recent cyclone behavior, and we’re still set to end the summer melt season at a relative high.
Meanwhile, the Antarctic keeps piling it on. If this is Global Warming, I really am going to hate the inevitable cooling!
…there’s no more reason to think that’s happened in this case than in any other scientific field, so there’s no a priori reason to doubt climate science unless you doubt all scientific work.
Jim, the models aren’t working. Moreover, there are good scientific and mathematical reasons to think that it may not even be possible to confidently model climate. We understand that you don’t understand science or math well enough to understand why, but that fact does not discredit science in any way, though it may discredit peer review, which is highly overrated anyway.
the models aren’t working
Says you, but the experts in the field disagree. Experts aren’t always right, but that’s the way to bet.
there are good scientific and mathematical reasons to think that it may not even be possible to confidently model climate
Reasons that have been pondered at length by experts, who evidently remain unconvinced.
We understand that you don’t understand science or math
Resorting to ad hominem does not improve your argument.
that fact does not discredit science in any way
If it comes out that climate modeling is a fools errand, for reasons that are clear to you but that for decades escaped the understanding of the experts in the field, then I definitely think that would discredit our institutions of science.
Says you, but the experts in the field disagree.
Nonsense. There are many “experts in the field” who now think that the models aren’t working. And I await one of those “experts who disagree” (few of whom are actually competent mathematicians or computer programmers, based on the leaked server data from CRU) to explain to me how one reliably models non-linear phenomena.
to explain to me
Argument from personal incomprehension? Whether or not you understand how one reliably models non-linear phenomena has little bearing on whether it’s possible to do so.
Argument from personal incomprehension?
How can I fail to comprehend something that no one has ever even tried to explain? In fact, it is not possible to reliably model non-linear phenomena. That’s the fundamental basis of chaos theory.
In fact, it is not possible to reliably model non-linear phenomena. That’s the fundamental basis of chaos theory.
I hate to interrupt your beat down of Jim, but it is possible to reliably model non-linear phenomena. Predictions can diverge exponentially, but you can still come up with meaningful statistics about the phenomena.
I think rather the problem here is a combination of garbage in, garbage out and confirmation bias. First, I think most of the data used to build climate models, like paleoclimate climate proxies, has been poisoned. Inconvenient things like the Medieval Warm Period have been rubbed out. If you build a climate model to fit bad data (especially bad data tailored to fit a certain regime), what do you think your output is going to look like?
Now, consider that that researchers are rewarded for presenting a more alarming message. Thus, you get models based on bad data and warped to present a worse, but still credible message.
My take is that one can construct a useful model of climate. It won’t be ever be good enough to predict long term chaotic behavior. But a lot of parameters can be determined because they aren’t part of that chaotic behavior.
My take is that one can construct a useful model of climate. It won’t be ever be good enough to predict long term chaotic behavior. But a lot of parameters can be determined because they aren’t part of that chaotic behavior.
It may be possible in theory, but I think they’re a long way from understanding the interactions with sufficient confidence to do it any time soon, even with lots of runs on supercomputers. As I’ve said, it’s an interesting exercise, but nuts to base policy on it.
For instance, solving the cloud problem is a necessary (though insufficient) condition.
Says you.
Says Nature.
And then there’s this: “Climate Models Cannot Explain Global Warming Stagnation Over Past 15 Years: ’15 years, from 1998 -2012, is no longer consistent with model projections even at the 2% confidence level'”
But I’m sure you’ll have a peer-reviewed explanation for it.
Better check this link Gerrib:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/08/11/sea-ice-news-volume-4-3-2013-sea-ice-forecast-contest/#more-91493
The Danish Met Institute graphic puts a different slant on it. Why do you AGW True Believers always cherry pick your so called “evidence”?
Mike Borgelt – why can’t you scroll down to the second graph on your link which shows current sea ice below the (new, adjusted down) average? My link also notes that the pace of sea ice melt has slowed during the last half of July – see the lead paragraph.
Why is showing the first link that pops up in a Google search on “arctic sea ice” cherry-picking but going to a site that argues against AGW while running a contest which says Bear in mind that traditionally, forecasts in June and July have been too high isn’t cherry-picking?
Indeed, the models aren’t working.
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2013/ar5-trend-comparison/
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2013/von-storch-et-al-stagation-in-warming/#comment-118509
That said, I have added James Taylor to my list of people that I can’t trust a word they say. That article is a travesty, as are the ones he links to about meteorologist. How dare he say “only 36% of scientists” when the study studied geoscientists who work at Alberta petroleum? Pathetic. Or claim in the other links that “only a minority 30% is very worried about global warming”, ignoring that the study said an additional 42% are _somewhat_ worried. I’m not a big believer in AGW, but the man is obviously in the business of fooling people. You shouldn’t link him either.
Thanks for the update. I would like to see this kind of survey done properly; say to everyone in the AGU, _before_ they start issuing statements that claim to speak for all their membership. I personally think that a large majority would probably be AGW believers, but not 97%! Certainly not if you ask specific questions like, What is your best guess at Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity?
And, as usual, there is the problem that most AGU members aren’t competent to discuss the subject at all, any more than I am. What fraction of them have read and worked through all the papers on climate sensitivity, and what fraction are just taking someone’s word for it? Judith Curry is one that says she took people’s word for it for a while, decided not to around Climategate time, and began to realize that when she looked into things she didn’t agree with a lot of what she’d been accepting on faith.