Category Archives: Science And Society

Political Commentary, Science And Society

Suing NASA

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…over global warming. It would be nice to see Jim Hansen exposed in court for the fraud that he is.

Meanwhile, are we in for a mini ice age?

If Eyjafjallajokull induces an eruption of Katla, that event alone could force global temperatures down for 3 to 5 years. But there is much more at work here.

We have just exited the longest and deepest solar minimum in nearly 100 years. During this minimum, the Sun had the greatest number of spotless days (days where there were no sunspots on the face of the sun) since the early 1800s. The solar cycle is usually about 11 years from minimum to minimum — this past cycle 23 lasted 12.7 years. The long length of a solar cycle has been shown to have significant short term climate significance. Australian solar researcher Dr. David Archibald has shown that for every one year increase in the solar cycle length, there is a half-degree Celsius drop in the global temperature in the next cycle.

Using that relationship, we could expect a global temperature drop of one degree Fahrenheit by 2020. That alone would wipe out all of the warming of the last 150 years.

Better fire up those SUVs.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society

The True Scientists

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…win a debate at Oxford Union on climate change:

Lord Monckton, a former science advisor to Margaret Thatcher during her years as Prime Minister of the UK, concluded the case for the proposition. He drew immediate laughter and cheers when he described himself as “Christopher Walter, Third Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, scholar, philanthropist, wit, man about town, and former chairman of the Wines and Spirits Committee of this honourable Society”. At that point his cummerbund came undone. He held it up to the audience and said, “If I asked this House how long this cummerbund is, you might telephone around all the manufacturers and ask them how many cummerbunds they made, and how long each type of cummerbund was, and put the data into a computer model run by a zitty teenager eating too many doughnuts, and the computer would make an expensive guess. Or you could take a tape-measure and” – glaring at the opposition across the despatch-box – “measure it!” [cheers].

Lord Monckton said that real-world measurements, as opposed to models, showed that the warming effect of CO2 was a tiny fraction of the estimates peddled by the UN’s climate panel. He said that he would take his lead from Lord Lawson, however, in concentrating on the economics rather than the science. He glared at the opposition again and demanded whether, since they had declared themselves to be so worried about “global warming”, they would care to tell him – to two places of decimals and one standard deviation – the UN’s central estimate of the “global warming” that might result from a doubling of atmospheric CO2 concentration. The opposition were unable to reply. Lord Monckton told them the answer was 3.26 plus or minus 0.69 Kelvin or Celsius degrees. An Hon. Member interrupted: “And your reference is?” Lord Monckton replied: “IPCC, 2007, chapter 10, box 10.2.” [cheers]. He concluded that shutting down the entire global economy for a whole year, with all the death, destruction, disaster, disease and distress that that would cause, would forestall just 4.7 ln(390/388) = 0.024 Kelvin or Celsius degrees of “global warming”, so that total economic shutdown for 41 years would prevent just 1 K of warming. Adaptation as and if necessary would be orders of magnitude cheaper and more cost-effective.

Mr. Mike Mason, founder and managing director of “Climate Care”, concluded for the opposition. He said that the proposition were peculiar people, and that Lord Monckton was more peculiar than most, in that he was not a real Lord. Lord Monckton, on a point of order, told Mr. Mason that the proposition had avoided personalities and that if Mr. Mason were unable to argue other than ad hominem he should “get out”. [cheers] Mr. Mason then said that we had to prepare for climate risks [yes, in both directions, towards cooler as well as warmer]; and that there was a “scientific consensus” [but he offered no evidence for the existence of any such consensus, still less for the notion that science is done by consensus].

As usual, the opponents employed the logically flawed precautionary principle.

I think that the tide has really turned on this nonsense, at least over the Pond, if not quite hear yet. That may have to wait until November.

Speaking of which, there was an awful story on ABC Sunday night, where the focus was on death threats to climate scientists. Note that they make no mention of the threats against climate skeptics in the emails. And they set up a straw man, when they say there’s a “conspiracy” to foist a “hoax” on the world on the part of the scientists. Yes, some people have made such allegations, but that’s not the point. I’m willing to believe that most climate scientists are sincere in their beliefs. The problem is that they drink too much of their own bathwater, and suffer too much from confirmation bias. Not to mention that it’s difficult to get funded if you don’t hew to the party line. But that kind of story wouldn’t accomplish ABC’s purpose — to present the noble scientists trying to save us from ourselves as victims of conspiracy mongers.

Media Criticism, Science And Society, Social Commentary

Going Paleo

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Here’s an article on a retro diet.

My problem with this isn’t the diet per se (though I do like me them carbs) as the need for exercise. I read somewhere recently that there were huge health benefits to walking five miles a day. I can believe it, but who has the time? The only way I can imagine doing that is if I raised my desk and worked from a treadmill instead of a chair.

The thing that I find most irritating about the criticism (as well as in the health-care debate) is the declaration of life expectancy as a useful parameter. I don’t know what the life expectancy of paleolithic people was, but I’ll bet that diet was not a big factor in determining it. It’s important to understand that average life expectancy isn’t the age at which most people die. If it really was thirty, it was likely due to a) high infant mortality and b) a very violent lifestyle, in which the men were likely to be killed either hunting or fighting other humans, at a fairly young age. I suspect that if you manage to become an “elder” (i.e., someone in your thirties) you’d live a long time.

Business, Economics, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Technology and Society

From Verde To Merde

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A report on the Spanish green energy debacle:

As predicted was inevitable, today the Spanish newspaper La Gaceta runs with a full-page article fessing up to the truth about Spain’s “green jobs” boondoggle, which happens to be the one naively cited by President Obama no less than eight times as his model for the United States. It is now out there as a bust, a costly disaster that has come undone in Spain to the point that even the Socialists admit it, with the media now in full pursuit.

Breaking the Spanish government’s admission here at Pajamas Media probably didn’t hurt their interest in finally reporting on the leaked admission. Obama’s obvious hope of rushing into place his “fundamental transformation” of America into something more like Europe’s social democracies — where even the most basic freedoms have been moved from individuals and families to the state — before the house of cards collapsed has suffered what we can only hope proves to be its fatal blow. At least on this front.

La Gaceta boldly exposes the failure of the Spanish renewable policy and how Obama has been following it. The headline screams: “Spain admits that the green economy as sold to Obama is a disaster.”

It has lots of company with other administration policies in that regard.