United Nations Climate Change Copenhagen

[The PIT]

Talking to this girl who's friend is an enviromentally lawyer who advises companies how too work around regulations and keep throwing the rubbish into the air. Shes training to be a lawyer and can't undertstand how her friend can do this.

Most of it's is hot air too raise more taxes. Some good will come out of it if it does help to clean our act up.

What it needs is some clever bod to come up with a cheap powerful way of creating cheap clean renewable energy. Hopefully British so we can sell it too the world and start world domination.

[Gray-Wolf]

P.P. ,Your drive is near perfect (IMHO).

Loathe though I am to go here it is the Capitalist demon and the drug that is the first world's comfort (and whoa betide anyone who dare take this away from us!!) that is King here.

I do not believe that measures, that mean a damn, will be taken at Copouthagen.....too many votes at stake.

Calming words will be spoken and big promises to the developed world will be made.

Cheesy grins and back slapping at the end of things will happen (and be splashed across the worlds papers) but nowt, diddly squat, Zilch will become of it.

Sure folk will try and we all will give but we won't 'give up' our 'things' or our 'expectations' of this life.

Emissions will continue to rise, change will become more evident, grand words will again be spoken and millions will die needlessly.

Edited December 12, 2009 by Gray-Wolf

[Admiral_Bobski]

Not in as many words but here is a sample of what has been said in this thread...

"AGW being a total crock of ***?"

"But when the critics are all gone to the Gulag or the grave, then they realize, way too late, who is really pulling the strings and why."

"It,along with the whole AGW 'thing' is 100% scam."

"Greenpeace lost it's way many years ago, it's now nothing more than a eco-terrorist group."

and this is the message from one paragraph of a post a page back:

"socialist economics...brainwashed...socialists...Obama, the unrepentant socialist...high priest.."

Ok, not commies but just about everything else...and science? Well, where is it?

The science is over on the leaky integrator thread. Care to join us...?

CB

PS - The word is "skepticalness", Pete.

[La Bise]

Cheers Devonian, saves me the job of cut/paste...

I've had a glass or two of red so I better abstain posting anything else...

[PersianPaladin]

Minqi Li: No legally binding agreement the result of elites seeking short term profits first

http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=4582&updaterx=0000-00-00+00%3A00%3A00

[Roger J Smith]

My comments about the state of climate science are quite clearly aimed at that one branch of science, and even for that matter, that one branch of meteorology. I have no concerns about the scientific integrity of most meteorologists, they are not really involved in this to any great extent. But it's interesting to note that on the largest U.S. weather forums, a large number of AMS members are skeptics on global warming. Even in our own science, there are many more dissidents than the media or IPCC would like people to believe.

So John and others, my comments are not even remotely aimed at you or other practising meteorologists. Your comments about me being upset about not having my work accepted are very accurate though, but understandable. I have played by the rules, not sensationalizing my efforts like well-known alternate researchers have done, and I have found the atmospheric science establishment has not played by the rules. I have been challenged to publish theories and make forecasts; I have done both, the forecasts are widely accepted to be non-random, and many Net-weather members have gone out of their way to tell me that they can understand my general approach from what I've published here, and that they find the forecasts reasonably accurate. I've never claimed 100% accuracy but there is clearly substance to my work. The met establishment are obviously taking the approach that if I am sixty now, I will be dead soon enough, and they can outlive me. If that sounds harsh, then you tell me what they are really doing. And don't say "you haven't made your case," because that is the same sort of b.s. that forms the basis for the AGW scam.

The idea that the climate science establishment meets the generally high ethical and professional standards of many other sciences has now been disproven in the most public of ways. I want to repeat, this is not a knock at meteorology in the wider sense, although as the sort of adult supervisors of the more junior climate science, they should have been more proactive if only to preserve their own image in the wider scientific community.

I understand how these things work. Nobody has as much experience as I do in the arcane back halls and meeting chambers of climate science. I've been at this since 1975. It may make some peoples' arguments easier to dismiss me as a "crank" or whatever, but I don't accept that at all. I am a dissident scientist and my views on this subject are as likely to be relevant as any other views you could get from around the community. The truth of the matter is, many are afraid to say what they really think, so they have gone silent, or perhaps they think "well what harm can it do to cut back on greenhouse gas production?"

The harm it can do is not perhaps that obvious, but sinister, to have a widely enforced scientific doctrine based on known exaggerations, manipulations, and false assumptions. And that does not cover the economic harm that displacing vast resources into dead-end non-productive schemes will cause. This will be a precedent for all sorts of hare-brained schemes to follow, some of which could be even less related to real science, and possibly endanger the environment (things like crackpot schemes to deflect solar radiation reaching the earth, giant dams in the Bering Strait, all sorts of things that could prove to be positively dangerous).

Anyway, don't shoot the messenger. I am glad that I had the chance to give my opinions on this subject, the frustration for me is that I am not sure how any of this could be "proven" because the outcome could be any of the following (and others you could imagine:

(.a.) the process falters, nothing much is done, climate remains stable, people think it is a stroke of luck or a natural cooling offsetting the warming not averted

(.b.) the process succeeds, much is done to reduce greenhouse gas production, the climate warms anyway, people say it is because we acted too late, debating with those saying it was a natural cycle and our efforts were meaningless

(.c.) the process succeeds, the climate actually cools, the debate then turns into an acrimonious one in which the AGW lobby (or whatever replaces it) says thank God (or whatever deity is by then accepted) we acted while the skeptics say "you fools, now we face an ice age."

(.d.) some intermediate outcome, partial progress on the goals of Copenhagen, indecisive climate returns, more suspicions of data manipulation, the status quo outlasts this generation.

And meanwhile, not a shred of recognition for alternative research that tends to suggest more importance for natural variability than greenhouse gas forcing.

To change all of this would require a sort of "sea change" in opinion within meteorology, I would say the climate science establishment are already a lost cause, they will go to their graves no doubt remaining true believers in the AGW theories at full strength, but if the larger group of atmospheric scientists including all operational mets and non-AGW researchers put their foot down, perhaps we would see a shift in thinking back towards a more balanced approach, and more importantly, an end to the politicization and media spin doctoring tendencies of climate science.

Unless we happened to see a 3-5 year period of extreme cold, I am not optimistic that this will come to pass, but parts of it could see partial realization. By the way, the final irony is that my own research does not really shed any light on how strong AGW might be, except that it tends to suggest that the portion supposedly already behind us is over-estimated as it would naturally have warmed to some extent around 1987 to 2006. But there is nothing in this alternate research to say whether or not massive increases in greenhouse gases would warm the atmosphere or not. I tend to a conservative estimate of that warming because of my suspicion that the circulation is more responsive to external drivers and therefore the greenhouse gases have to work on a fixed circulation rather than having some opportunity to distort the circulation. This has always seemed to me to be the main weakness in the AGW theory, that large future temperature increases require that the circulation would shift during the process. This is why I have become a strong skeptic, more than the business about greenhouse gases not being able to warm at all, that part for which I have limited acceptance.

Hope this helps to clear the air -- as to the political side, I take certain positions mainly because I see a distorted playing field in all of our countries at this time, where the media are forcing conservative politicians to steer to the middle, thus robbing the electorate of a real choice. As this is partly a political decision whatever the science says, the people should have the right to hear all sides, and have all options available. If they freely choose something you or I don't like, that's democracy in action, but if we don't have a free choice and have something ill-advised imposed on us, by a U.N. elite who are answerable to nobody, then we face a severe erosion of our democratic rights.

[PersianPaladin]

Oh dear Lord Monckton, you are looking like a hypocrite now: -

http://rawstory.com/2009/12/climate-skeptic-hiv-camps/

[Roger J Smith]

I realize that because I live in Canada and you folks don't, some of my commentary and perspectives may seem strange.

As weather watchers yourselves, what do you think you would be feeling today if this was your current weather map?

http://www.weatheroffice.gc.ca/data/analysis/jac06_50.gif

Take a long look at that, and I'm sure you'll gain some idea (if you don't already see it) why Canadians are more skeptical than most about the AGW lobby and its rather hysterical pronouncements. This weather is generally a good 10-20 degrees below long-term averages for this time of year. I'm not cherry picking this data, it has been like this for weeks, and it was like this much of last winter.

Quite naturally, a lot of people are confused by the cognitive dissonance between the media, who ignore the skeptics here and bang on about the melting arctic ice and record warmth of recent years (God only knows where), and what they feel and see every day. The summer was no different, most parts of Canada had almost no warm weather this past summer, it was quite dismal.

There is only a certain amount of this that people can tolerate before they quite naturally assume that they are being conned. Now in Europe, there has probably been a more pronounced recent warming trend, but that too seems to be fading out. If the weather turns as anomalously cold in Europe this winter as it is in North America, then you might expect a similar stiffening of public opinion.

The fact is, the AGW lobby have oversold a slight warming influence and tried to represent it as being five to ten times as strong as it really is. Recent weather patterns around the world prove this. It has nothing to do with how I feel about my research, but in fact, the way this same community has treated my research is a sort of early warning sign that they can't be trusted -- especially not with things as important as global economic policy.

It's time for realism to return to climate science.

[Methuselah]

The science is over on the leaky integrator thread. Care to join us...?

CB

PS - The word is "skepticalness", Pete.

Thanks, CB...

I keep up-to-date with the LI every day - just reading and comprehending rather than posting...

BTW, it's not my fellow sceptics who annoy me; it's those whose thinking is reversed: i.e. AGW can't be happening, therefore it isn't! A kind of reasoning that seems to justify their collective obsession with underhand practices...I do wish that some genuine sceptics would appear on radio/TV...One doesn't need to deny all warming to question the extent of AGW, IMO. Hence, my interest in the LI...

[Devonian]

I realize that because I live in Canada and you folks don't, some of my commentary and perspectives may seem strange.

As weather watchers yourselves, what do you think you would be feeling today if this was your current weather map?

I'd say it was, as you say, weather! And I'd say AGW is AGlobalW not ACanadainW!

http://www.weatheroffice.gc.ca/data/analysis/jac06_50.gif

Take a long look at that, and I'm sure you'll gain some idea (if you don't already see it) why Canadians are more skeptical than most about the AGW lobby and its rather hysterical pronouncements. This weather is generally a good 10-20 degrees below long-term averages for this time of year. I'm not cherry picking this data, it has been like this for weeks, and it was like this much of last winter.

C'mon Roger Canada IS NO the globe, and weather is not climate.

Quite naturally, a lot of people are confused by the cognitive dissonance between the media, who ignore the skeptics here and bang on about the melting arctic ice and record warmth of recent years (God only knows where), and what they feel and see every day. The summer was no different, most parts of Canada had almost no warm weather this past summer, it was quite dismal.

There is only a certain amount of this that people can tolerate before they quite naturally assume that they are being conned. Now in Europe, there has probably been a more pronounced recent warming trend, but that too seems to be fading out. If the weather turns as anomalously cold in Europe this winter as it is in North America, then you might expect a similar stiffening of public opinion.

The fact is, the AGW lobby have oversold a slight warming influence and tried to represent it as being five to ten times as strong as it really is. Recent weather patterns around the world prove this. It has nothing to do with how I feel about my research, but in fact, the way this same community has treated my research is a sort of early warning sign that they can't be trusted -- especially not with things as important as global economic policy.

It's time for realism to return to climate science.

Science is not a popularity contest.

The science is over on the leaky integrator thread. Care to join us...?

CB

I'd not go as far as to say it's 'the' science, not yet, because, atm it's not shown. It is, thought, much more worth discussing that politics and a confusion of weather and climate.

Edited December 13, 2009 by Devonian

[SleepyJean]

I'd say it was, as you say, weather! And I'd say AGW is AGlobalW not ACanadainW!

http://www.weatherof...is/jac06_50.gif

C'mon Roger Canada IS NO the globe, and weather is not climate.

Science is not a popularity contest.

I think Roger was showing why people in Canada are more sceptical, because if we had weather like that I think we'd be sceptical too. I know a lot more people I know started to question global warming this year, after 18 inches of snow was dumped one night in February and then followed by the very-much-not-barbeque summer. People do not see climate, they see weather, which is only a microcosm, or expression, of climate.

That's the way I read what he said, anyway.

[Devonian]

I think Roger was showing why people in Canada are more sceptical, because if we had weather like that I think we'd be sceptical too. I know a lot more people I know started to question global warming this year, after 18 inches of snow was dumped one night in February and then followed by the very-much-not-barbeque summer. People do not see climate, they see weather, which is only a microcosm, or expression, of climate.

That's the way I read what he said, anyway.

So, people in Canada, are sceptical because they don't know the difference between weather and climate? So, it's a scepticism born of lack of knowledge? That's good? I don't see how people who don't (if they don't know the difference between weather and climate) can make a valued judgement on AGW?

Or is it good that science in Canada is, it seems, becoming a popularity contest? No it is not.

[Dartmoor_Matt]

So, people in Canada, are sceptical because they don't know the difference between weather and climate? So, it's a scepticism born of lack of knowledge? That's good? I don't see how people who don't (if they don't know the difference between weather and climate) can make a valued judgement on AGW?

Or is it good that science in Canada is, it seems, becoming a popularity contest? No it is not.

I think you are so far from the mark you probably can't see it any more.

Take our climate, reasonably temperate, not much variation year on year, season to season etc. If we saw a shift to much colder winters (10-20F) in your eyes do you not think that people would question AGW or even GW more and more? Surely you are not that naive.

Besides, weather is integral to a climate. Isn't that the point? We can supposedly expect 'more' bad weather as a result in a changing climate... but it doesn't work the other way?

[Devonian]

I think you are so far from the mark you probably can't see it any more.

Thanks.

Take our climate, reasonably temperate, not much variation year on year, season to season etc. If we saw a shift to much colder winters (10-20F) in your eyes do you not think that people would question AGW or even GW more and more? Surely you are not that naive.

Please don't call me naive else I might respond in kind

I really don't think we're going to see climate cool by 10-20F in winter short of something apocalyptic and unrelated to AGW. Surely you don't think AGW might cause 20F wintertime cooling?

Besides, weather is integral to a climate. Isn't that the point? We can supposedly expect 'more' bad weather as a result in a changing climate... but it doesn't work the other way?

We can expect the climate to change in line with AGW predictions if AGW is right.

Edited December 13, 2009 by Devonian

[Dartmoor_Matt]

Thanks.

Please don't call me naive else I might respond in kind

I really don't think we're going to see climate cool by 10-20F in winter short of something apocalyptic and unrelated to AGW. Surely you don't think AGW might cause 20F wintertime cooling?

We can expect the climate to change in line with AGW predictions if AGW is right.

Your welcome

I wasn't

Yet, this is what has happened this year and last in Canada...(and yes I know this isn't global - but there has been unusually cold conditions in USA and India as well)

My post was hypothetical. IF AGW is correct then no of course not, but the if is a very big if. At the moment.

[jethro]

Can we stay on topic please folks - United Nations Climate Change Conference.

[Solar Cycles]

Me too. And, I'm not really much of a 'lefty'!

I heard a 'sceptic' (in reality an outright denier!) babbling-on about 'subterfuge,' 'data-rigging,' 'the globe's been cooling for years,' blah blah blah, on the radio yesterday...When will these people start using facts to back-up their claims??

Will that apply to those who support AGW then also! After all it is just a theory!!

[Methuselah]

Will that apply to those who support AGW then also! After all it is just a theory!!

And, what is a theory? What is the intention behind a theory? Why are most of the world's leading politicians persuaded by that theory? Why are the world's most reputable scientists persuaded by that theory? IMO, because it attempts to give an explanation for the FACT that global temperatures have risen...That said, the LI might one-day provide an alternative explanation for that warming? But, merely jumping up and down crying foul is nothing more than denialist bluster!

IMO, denialists should be marginalized; as, unlike sceptics, they make no useful contribution to scientific endeavour???

[Admiral_Bobski]

PP - your Monckton article is a bit silly. If you look back on these boards to when Monckton first weighed in on the climate debate, the issue of his HIV proposal was brought up then. We discussed it - I shall go back at some point and see if I can find the thread in the archives. Monckton was asked "How do you stop the spread of AIDS?" His solution was impractical, unethical and perhaps immoral, but - crucially - it was absolutely correct: if you want to completely stop the spread of AIDS, the only solution is to quarantine the carriers.

This is not to say that I advocate the immediate quarantining of people who are HIV-positive - I'm strongly against it, because it infringes their basic right to freedom - but the point is that theoretically Monckton's suggestion is the only actual solution. What's so wrong with that? The article you linked to is nothing more than an attack on Monckton for a report he wrote over 20 years ago. Let he who is without sin....

Pete - I appreciate your position entirely. Indeed, I feel precisely the same way: deniers can go and join the climate catastrophists in a locked, darkened room. My comment about discussing the science on the LI thread was not directed at you but at Devonian. I should have made that more clear

Dev - the discussion on the LI thread is science. The fact that it is neither proved nor disproved is beside the point: it is a scientific discussion. You attack people for the lack of science in their arguments, but you don't get involved in scientific arguments. The LI thread gives everybody the opportunity to get involved.

CB

[Devonian]

PP - your Monckton article is a bit silly. If you look back on these boards to when Monckton first weighed in on the climate debate, the issue of his HIV proposal was brought up then. We discussed it - I shall go back at some point and see if I can find the thread in the archives. Monckton was asked "How do you stop the spread of AIDS?" His solution was impractical, unethical and perhaps immoral, but - crucially - it was absolutely correct: if you want to completely stop the spread of AIDS, the only solution is to quarantine the carriers.

This is not to say that I advocate the immediate quarantining of people who are HIV-positive - I'm strongly against it, because it infringes their basic right to freedom - but the point is that theoretically Monckton's suggestion is the only actual solution. What's so wrong with that? The article you linked to is nothing more than an attack on Monckton for a report he wrote over 20 years ago. Let he who is without sin....

Pete - I appreciate your position entirely. Indeed, I feel precisely the same way: deniers can go and join the climate catastrophists in a locked, darkened room. My comment about discussing the science on the LI thread was not directed at you but at Devonian. I should have made that more clear

Dev - the discussion on the LI thread is science. The fact that it is neither proved nor disproved is beside the point: it is a scientific discussion. You attack people for the lack of science in their arguments, but you don't get involved in scientific arguments. The LI thread gives everybody the opportunity to get involved.

CB

I think that's a bit unfair since I have participated and asked questions. I don't dismiss the LI I just think, as I said above, it's far from shown/proven/accepted so it's obviously not a 'is' but a 'could be'.

[laserguy]

I think that's a bit unfair since I have participated and asked questions. I don't dismiss the LI I just think, as I said above, it's far from shown/proven/accepted so it's obviously not a 'is' but a 'could be'.

Just like the whole CO2/AGW malarkey,then?

[Devonian]

Just like the whole CO2/AGW malarkey,then?

I'm not sure I'd equate the LI (which afaics, doesn't dismiss the role of CO2) with the whole body of atmosphere science which is the result of more than a century of test, observations and building on the shoulders of giants.

[Solar Cycles]

And, what is a theory? What is the intention behind a theory? Why are most of the world's leading politicians persuaded by that theory? Why are the world's most reputable scientists persuaded by that theory? IMO, because it attempts to give an explanation for the FACT that global temperatures have risen...That said, the LI might one-day provide an alternative explanation for that warming? But, merely jumping up and down crying foul is nothing more than denialist bluster!

IMO, denialists should be marginalized; as, unlike sceptics, they make no useful contribution to scientific endeavour???

So your saying I'm a denialist then?

[Methuselah]

So your saying I'm a denialist then?

Am I? What I said was: "...merely jumping up and down crying foul is nothing more than denialist bluster!"

But, you've already agreed that anthropogenic emissions have caused some of the warming. So, how can you be denying the warming?

Pete - I appreciate your position entirely. Indeed, I feel precisely the same way: deniers can go and join the climate catastrophists in a locked, darkened room.

CB

Agreed!

[VillagePlank]

The LI hypothesis is an interesting idea - but there is still such a long way to go; however, it is a discussion where one starts from an idea, and moves forward and tries to frame such an idea in a scientific manner. I urge people to take a quick peek, if they get the time, and make their own mind up about the validity of the process, and the hypothesis.

Edited December 13, 2009 by VillagePlank