Regarding the Forbes article, I'm with the author of The Guardian article on this: he is welcome to express his views, but no one is obliged to provide this person with a platform and lend credence to research claims that have been debunked far and wide.
Balance implies equal weight. But this then creates a false equivalence between an overwhelming scientific consensus and a lobby, heavily funded by vested interests, that exists simply to sow doubt to serve those interests. Yes, of course scientific consensus should be open to challenge – but with better science, not with spin and nonsense.
Fringe voices will protest about “free speech”. No one should prevent them from expressing their views, whether held cynically or misguidedly. However, no one is obliged to provide them with a platform, much less to appear alongside them to give the misleading impression that there is something substantive to debate. When there is an article on smoking, newspapers and broadcasters no longer include lobbyists claiming there are no links to cancer. When there’s a round-the-world yacht race we don’t hear flat-earthers given airtime: “This is madness; they’ll sail off the edge!”
Regarding The Epoch Times article, they are picking extreme views and trying to represent them as if they are mainstream among scientists (climate activists are of course more likely to be alarmist; however, their opinions don't mean a thing as to the veracity of the research data); it's not true. I have yet to see Michael Mann ever make any claims that the end of the world is near. In fact, I've seen him remonstrate people for being doomsdayers and he was one of the first I saw correcting the false claims of how bad the damage would be with the fires burning in the Amazon.
The Epoch Times looks like many of the conservative outlets that have gained followings in recent years.
But it isn’t.
Behind the scenes, the media outlet’s ownership and operation is closely tied to Falun Gong, a Chinese spiritual community with the stated goal of taking down China’s government.
Former practitioners of Falun Gong told NBC News that believers think the world is headed toward a judgment day, where those labeled “communists” will be sent to a kind of hell, and those sympathetic to the spiritual community will be spared.
“Even when discussing more fringe-y sites, conservative journalists tend to reference Gateway Pundit or Infowars,” Bauer said. “The Epoch Times doesn’t tend to come up.”
When you get compared to Infowars, your credibility is pretty much nil.
ramage, I didn't watch the climate debate. Honestly, at this point in the presidential race, I think it's a giant waste of time for candidates to even discuss the topic.
"Now, more than ever, the illusions of division threaten our very existence. We all know the truth: more connects us than separates us. But in times of crisis the wise build bridges, while the foolish build barriers. We must find a way to look after one another as if we were one single tribe.” -King T'Challa, Black Panther
The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it. ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is. ~Winston Churchill
Re: Bernie Sanders. The man is ridiculous, but on this I will say that his comments were taken and the meaning completely twisted. Providing birth control to women in third world countries is not an attempt to kill off brown and black babies, it's allowing women to control their own family planning, make a better life for themselves and their families, and help raise themselves out of poverty. But hey, at least Sanders brought it up, which is more ballsy than I can say for any of the other candidates.
As I've posted before
on another thread, even if we snapped 'a la Thanos' and instantly removed half the population, or attempted to force every couple to bear only one child, it would not solve our global population growth problem.
FNP, thanks for the article! I'll delve into that when my brain is more fresh.
"Now, more than ever, the illusions of division threaten our very existence. We all know the truth: more connects us than separates us. But in times of crisis the wise build bridges, while the foolish build barriers. We must find a way to look after one another as if we were one single tribe.” -King T'Challa, Black Panther
The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it. ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is. ~Winston Churchill
FNP wrote: Just found this report in my weekend science reading. PhD author, Peer reviewed, nationally recognized journal.
doi.org/10.3389/feart.2019.00223
More math than I want to or can wade thru. What he is saying is that the errors from long wave cloud forcing exceed the modeled tropospheric energy flux from green house gasses by a factor of +/- 144. Or put simply, the climate modelers temperature projections are trying the equivalent of measuring centimeters with a system calibrated in meters and that given the propagation of error in the models, it is not possible to detect a much smaller anthropogenic green house gas warming signal with their models. The present CIMP5 models are not fit for purpose.
The propagation of error in general circulation models is the reason the weather folks do not publish forecasts much beyond 7 days.
All but 1 of the global climate models run hot [the data do not agree with the theory [models] so I have to go with Dr. Richard Feynman Invalid consumer key/secret in configuration
So to your point #2. It appears that the impact of cloud cover might be far more important than CO2 as the cause of the warming we are seeing but until we understand the variable contribution of clouds in the energy budget, we will not be able to determine if CO2 is the principal warming cause to address.
The rest of the symptoms we worry about are due to warming. But without a provable proximate principle cause for warming, deciding on policy to control warming is politics, emotion based, or consensus based. None of them are science based processes.
Karl Popper is credited with something like “A million successful experiments cannot prove a theory correct, but one failed experiment can prove a theory wrong.” The models run hot compared to the data and apparently the error propagation in the models renders them unfit for the purpose of projecting climate warming or detecting a "CO2 warming signal" in the global climate temperature.
I remain undecided.
Nice post. I've always wondered how many other factors having to do with climate change get pushed aside and ignored if they don't jive with the scientists and activists who are deeply invested in being "right". I wish there was as much money invested in alternate climate change causes and factors out of our control as has been invested in the man-made (sorry, person-made) climate change. I as well am undecided because I honestly don't think this science is "settled" but rather just an excellent way to control populations and redistribute wealth. I'm always going to listen to all sides of anything I'm interested in, especially when people in power want to use these debates for personal gain.
Rick wrote: people in power want to use these debates for personal gain.
Calling B.S. on this one.
Al Gore is the poster child for this subject... did he not benefit and is he still pumping more carbon into the atmosphere than ten average families? Yes and yes.
Every candidate running for president on the left is using climate change to further their careers yet not one has a coherent plan based in reality.
"Californians have embraced rooftop solar panels more than anyone in the U.S., but many are learning the hard way the systems won’t keep the lights on during blackouts.
That’s because most panels are designed to supply power to the grid -- not directly to houses. During the heat of the day, solar systems can crank out more juice than a home can handle. Conversely, they don’t produce power at all at night. So systems are tied into the grid, and the vast majority aren’t working this week as PG&E Corp. cuts power to much of Northern California to prevent wildfires.
Most panels are designed to supply power to the grid — not directly to houses. During the heat of the day, solar systems can crank out more juice than a home can handle. Conversely, they don’t produce power at all at night. So systems are tied into the grid, and the vast majority aren’t working this week as PG&E Corp. cuts power to much of Northern California to prevent wildfires.
The only way for most solar panels to work during a blackout is pairing them with batteries."
Reminds me of the joke, "What did socialists use to provide light before candles. ELECTRICITY."
In the Democratic presidential debate last night, there were no questions about climate change. Why? The CNN moderators thought other topics were more important?
Thomas Sowell: There are no solutions, just trade-offs.
