Focus On The Hocus Pocus

 

 

The BBC Trust has confirmed why it is unfit for purpose having just published a review of its of its review of its science coverage:

Trust Conclusions on the Executive Report on Science impartiality Review Actions

 

When the BBC Trust is setting the BBC’s editorial policy on climate change and at the same time is the final arbiter on complaints should you wish to complain about the BBC’s climate change coverage it’s not hard to work out that you are not going to get an independent and impartial decision.

 

The Trust states that:In 2010 the Trust decided to review the accuracy and impartiality of BBC science coverage…….. The Trust commissioned an independent report from Steve Jones, Emeritus Professor of Genetics at University College London, together with content analysis from the Science Communication Group at Imperial College London.

Now Professor Steve Jones is far from independent being an ardent clmate change fanatic who owes his living to the BBC and so is unlikely to be impartial.
The BBC is busy brainwashing its staff to accept the line the wish to push:The coverage of science by the BBC continues to be a hotly debated issue.   The Trust notes that seminars continue to take place and that nearly 200 senior staff have attended workshops which set out that impartiality in science coverage does not simply lie in reflecting a wide range of views, but depends on the varying degree of prominence (due weight) such views should be given.
Just who runs those seminars?  They sound remarkably like the green ‘black propaganda’ seminars run by Harrabin and climate change campaigner Dr Joe Smith in their CMEP guise…with money from a climate change ‘communications’ group.Once again hardly impartial.Ironically the Trust says that:Audiences should be able to understand from the context and clarity of the BBC’s output what weight to give to critical voices...and yet the Trust itself is prescribing who and what is to be allowed on air….the only conclusion you can draw is that the BBC has decided no climate sceptics should be allowed any airtime at all.It goes on:

Judging the weight of scientific agreement correctly will mean that the BBC avoids the ‘false balance’ between fact and opinion identified by Professor Jones.

 

The trouble is the Sceptics aren’t just giving their ‘opinion’, their scepticism is based upon the science, or the lack of science.

For instance they proved that the infamous ‘Hockey Stick’ graph was wrong.   There is still no proof that CO2 is the driver of climate change.  There is no evidence to show that ‘extreme weather’ is caused, or even being generated, by climate change.  There is no evidence that the oceans are absorbing all the heat.  There is no science to show why global warming has paused for 17 years.

The ‘science’ proves absolutely nothing as of now…..which is why the climate change ‘communicators’ want to concentrate on ‘risk’…yes we can’t prove such and such but what if….?  We just can’t take the risk you know!

 

The Trust states that:

“This does not mean that critical opinion should be excluded. Nor does it mean that scientific research shouldn’t be properly scrutinised.”

 

Unfortunately it means precisely that…..Harrabin and Co are pushing one message and do not publish anything that goes against that message…the ‘inconvenient truth’.

The BBC is no longer a reliable and trustworthy reporter of the ‘science’, instead it has become nothing more than an organisation that has succumbed to political and green lobbyist pressure and compromised its own principles to sell the Public a line, it has become a PR outlet for the Greens.

 

That has become ever more important as other publications succumb to the green lobby pressure leaving people with few genuinely impartial and accurate sources of information.

 

Here is the Telegraph’s measured and knowledgeable comment:

BBC staff told to stop inviting cranks on to science programmes

 

The Daily Mail also seems to have surrendered its integrity and given in to either financial inducement or political pressure to change its tone when reporting climate.  Recently it has been far more ‘on message’ reporting events wihtout any hint of doubt or criticism.

 

 

 

 

n 2010 the Trust decided to review the accuracy and impartiality of BBC science
coverage. As the Trust noted at the time:
Scientific developments have the capacity to directly affect us all significantly.
Debates relating to everyth
ing from climate change to medical advances to DNA
technology feature prominently in our public discourse. And ethical, policy and
funding questions associated with science arouse strong emotions. As a
consequence they often strike at the core of sensitive
editorial issues. So it is vital
that the BBC’s audience enjoys science coverage of the very highest standards.
The Trust commissioned an independent report from Steve Jones, Emeritus Professor of
Genetics at University College London, together with cont
ent analysis from the Science

Communication Group at Imperial College London.

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111 Responses to Focus On The Hocus Pocus

  1. A Scientist says:

    Phew, I thought it was going to be all Islam all the time round here for a while. Anyway, homework for Alan.
    “For instance they proved that the infamous ‘Hockey Stick’ graph was wrong. ”
    Not so much or just misses the point entirely.
    http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/03/hockey-stick-is-broken/
    ” There is still no proof that CO2 is the driver of climate change.”
    Actually that’s interesting. So kudos to whoever thought it up and you c and p’d it off. But no.
    http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2008/10/what-is-the-evidence-that-co2/
    “There is no evidnece to show that ‘extreme weather’ is caused, or even being generated, by climate change. ” Oh but there increasingly is.
    http://www.skepticalscience.com/extreme-weather-global-warming.htm
    “There is no science to show why global warming has pasued for 17 years.” Ooof. The strawiest of straw persons.
    http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-not-slowing-its-speeding-up.html
    I’m guessing you’ll moan about the websites I’ve picked to refute your “arguments.” But they’re good on the science and written for a non-scientist like you to understand. Of course if you want to refute them just post links to the papers from reputable journals that disprove them. There’s a cash prize if you can http://io9.com/scientist-offers-10-000-to-anyone-who-can-disprove-cli-1595320736

       27 likes

    • chrisH says:

      To be frank Mr Scientist, I`m more bothered about the inexorable rise of Islam than whether wind turbines should be imposed or merely encouraged by a political elite.
      When the likes of Bob Carter get panned and Nigel Lawson get panned by your kind for not being “qualified”…maybe you care to tell me how Nick Stern, Ed Davey and Steve Jones get your approval.
      Let me guess-it`s because they say what you want to hear, for future funding for the likes of the UEA and other louche charlatans with an agenda.
      I myself have no problem with man having an effect on the weather…whenever did he not?
      But I don`t trust the “scientists” in the cause of Big Green who get well paid to puff their stuff, and throw the scientific method and standards to George Monbiot to regurgitate back to you.
      Islam, China and the worlds poor laugh at your Gaia-worship and perpetual bending of facts and models to your own well padded ends.
      Give us the facts-and who pays you to say them-and abuse or bent stats won`t do.
      Seems to me that the good people urge caution re the Chicken Licken agenda of the misanthopic Greens and their useful idiots in politics, media and uni…the venal, the double dealing and the liberal God haters seem to want the whole debate curtailed for fear of my finding out too much more.
      If Global Warming allows for a little MORE sunlight onto the debate…then it may yet be a good thing.
      Until then-don`t exclude others who are “not experts” from the debate…this pseudo science of “climate change” has no track record of truth or validation yet to work from, I`d have thought.
      My BSc is from the eighties…but I note bogus scientific presumptions and arrogance in the face of minor quibbling….so don`t trust the Green Lobby and their tendencies to eugenics…
      And when Huhne, Miliband and Davey are your political faces….I`ll trust Lawson any time.

         70 likes

    • johnnythefish says:

      Re your hockey stick link, which says:

      ‘The first order of business here is to correct the mischaracterization of this single paleoclimate study as the “foundation” of Global Warming theory. It is anything but! What is going on today is unique and is understood by study of today’s data and the best scientific theories the experts can come up with. Reconstructions of past temperatures are, well, they’re about the past. The study of the past can be very informative for scientists, but it is not explanatory of the present nor is it predictive of the future.’

      Ah, so that addresses Mann’s total obliteration of the Medieval Warm Period (warmist period in the last 1000 years) and The Little Ice Age (from which we are still recovering)?

      And the fact the hockey stick graph featured very prominently in the most scientific of all scientific reports on ‘climate science’ from the IPCC through, oh what was it – 3 iterations? – until it was thoroughly debunked? Not to mention being it being the very foundation of Gore’s brainwashing piece of fiction ‘An Inconvenient Truth’?

      You’re out of your depth, bud.

         48 likes

      • Andy S. says:

        Mann also refuses to publish his calculations and methodology whenever a request is made by other scientists who want to check his work. He is also one of the most litigious of the Man Made Global Warming alarmists. Not only bringing court cases but deliberately dragging them out in the hope his opponents run out of money to pay legal expenses. One has to wonder who is actually financing all this legal action as the salary of a university professor certainly wouldn’t stretch to pay high powered lawyers.

        By the way the hockey stick HAS been discredited as it was discovered Mann had input an algorithm into his computer programme that would create a hockey stick graph even if you used numbers from the telephone directory.

        The fact that Mann constantly, and adamantly, refuses to make his notes and calculations available to his peers for independent and unbiased oversight shows he has something to hide.

           33 likes

    • Span Ows says:

      “There’s a cash prize if you can http://io9.com/scientist-offers-10-000-to-anyone-who-can-disprove-cli-1595320736

      Disingenuous to say the least: nobody has, does or will WANT to disprove climate change because it has nothing to do with the current “argument”: NOBODY is denying climate change, can you understand that?

      I notice they don’t say 10,000 whatevers to anyone who can disprove the current nonsense claims of ACGW

         17 likes

    • Ken says:

      Thhe “skepticalscience.com” website is neither sceptical, nor scientific.

      The evidence is clear. The CAGW hypothesis is the basis of all the climate models, and based on this hypothesis, all of the projections of the amount of warming have been wrong. They all overstate the ECS. The scientific method ignores appeal to authority. The planet does not care how many people are paid a fortune to keep pushing the CAGW fraud. The evidence shows clearly that the CAGW hypothesis is scientifically falsified.

      The only people who still push this rubbish are those who have a financial or political interest in doing so, or those who trust them and have not looked at the evidence for themselves.

         5 likes

  2. MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

    “That has become ever more important as other publications succumb to the green lobby pressure leaving people with few genuinely impartial and accurate sources of information.”

    Well, it *might* be that the Mail and Telegraph have indeed succumbed to the power of an increasingly powerful Green lobby, and that they (led, perhaps, by the Illuminati) are seeking to lead the uninformed ‘sheeple’ to their own destruction.

    On the other hand, it might be that that you are in an ever-dwindling minority who resist all compelling evidence put in front of you, appealing instead to the authority of an increasingly discredited band of dilettantes who don’t know what they’re talking about.

    Now why might it be that almost everybody’s arguing against you? Is it because they’re all stupid? Or is there a conspiracy? Or – just conceivably – is it because you’re wrong?

       28 likes

    • The Christian Crusader says:

      And where did you carry out your postgraduate study might I ask?

         17 likes

      • A Bricklayer (BSc, MSc, PhD, DPhil, DFC DFM, GCE, BCG, CDM, VC, 25m Breast Stroke, KGB) says:

        UAE ?

           23 likes

      • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

        What’s that got to do with the price of tea in China? No doubt it’s because if I say Reading, UEA or Imperial you’ll dismiss me as a ‘shill’ for climate change ‘activists’ – those places being associated with respectable climate science, i.e., people who know stuff. Well, since you ask, it was Columbia.

           20 likes

        • Anybody Can Type Anything says:

          If you say so.
          Columbia NYNY- that left wing cess pit?

             14 likes

          • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

            Oh I’m sorry, should I have said the Midwestern College of Creationist Studies? Obviously Oxford and Cambridge are out. Are there any internationally renowned institutions of higher education that would pass muster, or would you prefer that I’d spent eight years at the University of Life and then written uninformed tripe on a blog?

               21 likes

            • Richard Pinder says:

              I once heard Rowan Atkinson say that Oxford, Cambridge and Hull are England’s top three Universities.
              But personally I would say it was Oxford, Cambridge and Manchester.

              But most departments of Astronomy in the western world outside of Britain are still relatively clean from the social parasites that dominate Climate science, even in Astronomy at Reading University.

              The Heartland Institute would be the place to go for any Journalists to learn about and contact the Astronomers who have the answers for Climate Change.

                 5 likes

    • TigerOC says:

      MSc & PhD if you are truely a scientist then your natural approach would be “show me the money”. A theory only becomes plausible when it can be reproduced.

      So also being a scientist I am sceptic because of many factors. When a scientist tells me; “The reasons are so complicated that you need to have the same qualifications as me to understand” and; “trust me I am an expert and everything I tell you is fact”. The last person in the World I would trust is the person uttering those words.
      So just some basics of science that make this theory just that a theory;
      a. The biggest contributor to our climate is our sun and yet we know very little about its effects and even less knowledge about its more finite patterns of behaviour.
      b. for man made CO2 to have an effect on global climate one needs to establish the baseline warming caused by factors other than CO2. Then you can confidently say that the calculated effect of CO2 produced by man is causing the climate effects.
      The reality is that there are so many variables having an effect on global climate and so little hard scientific evidence it is impossible for any scientist to draw any conclusions as to whether man is affecting climate.
      The temperature measurement records that we have are so small relative to the total time span since the last ice age that they become irrelevant.

      Lets look at the scientists themselves. They are supposedly specialists in climate. Yet despite their specialist claims they are still incapable of predicting weather for more than 24 hours. Yet the same scientists exhort us to believe that their predictions for the coming decades should be believed.

      My opinion; “show me the money”.

         45 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        Spot on, Tiger.

        Here’s a piece on solar radiation you might find interesting: (intro)

        ‘The reason for the cooling is the dramatic fall in solar radiation that started around 2004. Here is a graph of solar radiation since 1610, when sunspots were first recorded. The brown line is the solar radiation, and it peaks every 11 years or so because of the sunspot cycle. We put an 11-year smoother through it to give us the red line, which shows the trends in solar radiation.’

        http://joannenova.com.au/2014/06/big-news-viii-new-solar-model-predicts-imminent-global-cooling/

           23 likes

      • chrisH says:

        Excellent tiger…clearly you did English to a higher standard than me…I`m a mere BSc, with little but a respect for the gentleman amateur who thinks for himself, flows the evidence where it takes him…and not in the pay of the State or Big Green. (Oil and Pharma too, but why give the shillers any more rope than they need?).
        This scientific model lasted us quite a long time, but has been supplanted by the Spirit of the Beehive, Camp Groupthink an` all.
        Proof?…witness the defenestration of the very Father of their Scientific Earth Worship Cult…James Lovelock.
        The way they`ve all turned on HIM for telling us all where their quack science and bogus scare tactics lead us, is proof that they eat their own for money-especially when he`s the only creative talent in their field…in fact he GAVE them the bloody land to Occupy!
        His crime?…suggesting population control, more nuclear and despising the political ignoramuses and scientific whores of UEA, IPCC etc?
        All three are logical if you follow his line of thought-they dare not,, so twist in the wind until the Guardian or the BBC puts their warm wind up under the shroud of “true science”.
        Follow the money?-as good a way to dissect these Burke and Hare Alchemists of the Weather as any…

           17 likes

    • Andy S. says:

      Our “scientist” friend is anything but! A true scientist searches for the truth, whether it confirms his theory or otherwise. AGW scaremongers close their minds to facts that don’t conform to their “religion”. The fact they intimidate other scientists who don’t hold their beliefs suppress other theories and constantly refuse to debate with AGW sceptics proves they aren’t interested in the search for scientific truth. They aren’t scientists – they are advocates of an ideology.

         25 likes

      • Ken says:

        A true scientist posits a hypothesis, and then does everything they can to disprove it. So long as they cannot disprove it, it remains valid.

        There is no evidence whatsoever that climate scientists do this… And yes, I have looked at the scientific papers.

        The massive mistake they make is to put real data into a computer model and then treat the output of their model as still being real data and the modelling to be equivalent to experimentation.

        Clearly as over a hundred model based predictions have already failed to happen, and as the global temperature has completely failed to rise as model’s predicted, those models are rubbish, or more accurately, the CAGW hypothesis underpinning those models is wrong. Climate scientists do all they can to keep validating a falsified hypothesis. That is not science, but snake oil sales.

           3 likes

  3. In the real world says:

    Cooks paper on 97% scientific concensus has been proved to be a complete lie , and based on only 70 odd carefully selcted views . And with the Oregon petition having over 30,000 verified scientific signitures, the real facts are that over 98% of scientists who have voiced an opinion do not believe in AGM .
    But that still does not stop all of the Green lies claiming that they are right .

       36 likes

    • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

      Wow, you’re quite the master of debate, aren’t you? You manage to debunk an argument I didn’t make, following it up by citing a totally fictitious statistic.

      I didn’t quote the Cook paper precisely because it’s junk. Having disagreed with something I didn’t actually say, you then manage to top that – triumphantly – with this statement:

      “And with the Oregon petition having over 30,000 verified scientific signitures, the real facts are that over 98% of scientists who have voiced an opinion do not believe in AGM .”

      Er, excuse me? Where on earth does that 98% figure come from? The simple answer is that you made it up off the top of your head. It’s kinda difficult to square with the fact that the scientific academies of every developed nation have issued statements of one kind or another endorsing the international consensus on climate change. That’s an awkward fact to deal with. There are a few possible explanations for it, however: a) they’re all shills (as you might put it) for the international socialist conspiracy; b) they’ve been hoodwinked by the Green lobby (as the author of this post might put it); c) the world’s most eminent scientists emphatically disagree with the habitues of fringe blogs on the outer reaches of the interweb. Personally, not being a halfwit, I go with c).

         22 likes

      • Big Dick says:

        Bet you drive an SUV , have 3 overseas`s holiday`s a year, on long haul flights , shop in Waitrose , don`t own a bike , earn 100k , a year .etc etc . Yeah your alright Jack , don`t practice what you preach , but us lowlife scum can just make do with Skeggy as long as we cycle there. Yeah thought so !

           13 likes

        • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

          I don’t own a bike, because it got nicked. Apart from that, you’ve 100% wrong. I’ve never taken a long haul flight, even once. And you overestimate my salary by such a huge margin that I’m weeping into my Horlicks.

             14 likes

          • John Anderson says:

            If you studied at Columbia – how did you avoid any long-distance flight ? Did you swim to New York ?

               26 likes

            • Guest Who says:

              There’s a promising line of investigation here. Scientifically, too.
              The language used does not suggest one born or raised in the US.
              Until proven otherwise, at best an ‘if you say so’ by the good Doctor?

                 11 likes

              • Richard Pinder says:

                There hasn’t been any Atmospheric Physics either.

                   4 likes

                • A Scientist says:

                  I can’t work you out at all. But of course there is. Even a quick google will turn it up. Has Mensa lowered it’s entry requirements?

                     3 likes

      • Richard Pinder says:

        Political pressure on University Administrators from Governments at the run up to IPCC Global Warming political fests. People get pushed out if they successfully resist the political pressure.

        So, I hope the sceptics on this site realise that its not the fault of the scientists.

        Also,

        I suppose the reason is that by now, 98 percent of independent scientists would have been curious about the core basics of the science, and the percentage of Carbon Dioxide in the Atmosphere that is man-made.

        This would have lead them to the answers given by Tom Segalstad in 1997, which would have saved the world from needing the IPCC, and spending all that money trying to solve a problem that does not exist.

           7 likes

  4. In the real world says:

    Well, if we are talking about inventing things, saying that the scientific academies of every developed nation endorse the concensus on climate change is as big a load of bovine scatology as most people have ever heard .
    So I am not so sure about the halfwit bit.

       12 likes

    • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

      Telling that you have not troubled to defend your (utterly invented) 98% ‘statistic’.

      Perhaps you would care to enumerate the scientific academies of developed nations that have *not* endorsed the international consensus? It can’t be difficult, there are only 34 of them. I’d settle for a single dissenting statement from a national academy of science, since this would be enough to disprove my assertion.

         18 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        Since when was science about ‘consensus’?

        What happened to ‘nullius in verba’?

        And no climate model endorsed by the IPCC predicted the 17.5 years lack of warming. Not one. they were all wrong. They all assume temperatures rise with atmospheric CO2 increases.

        All. Totally. Wrong.

        Failed hypothesis.

        Bin it. If you’re a ‘scientist’, that is.

        http://www.climatedepot.com/2014/04/04/global-temperature-update-no-global-warming-at-all-for-17-years-8-months/

           33 likes

        • GCooper says:

          For ‘scientist’ read ‘scientivist;’.

          This is just desperate tosh being pumped out to obscure the fact that the predictions of the warmists have been proved wrong, again and again.

          A real scientist makes predictions and accepts that if they come true he is right and if not, he is wrong.

          A scientivist makes ‘la la la’ noises on blogs about the qualifications given to him by other scientivists for agreeing with them.

          Thank God they aren’t allowed to design bridges or anything that actually matters.

             30 likes

      • Richard Pinder says:

        ‘I’d settle for a single dissenting statement from a national academy of science, since this would be enough to disprove my assertion’

        A dissenting statement from an Administrator under political pressure on the run up to an IPCC Global Warming fest, would disprove an assertion.

        You cant be a Scientist, you must be an idiot.

        I would guess that all the Universities in the world have some scientists who could be labelled as more sceptical than the Administrators.

        Scientific facts come from individuals such as Einstein, Darwin and Svensmark.

        Only in authoritarian societies do academies, administrators or politicians take the credit for scientific discoveries, or rubbish science or scientists like Einstein.

           13 likes

        • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

          Well that’s a collector’s item. Being called an idiot by somebody whose sole claim to any sort of expertise is taking part in the Mensa Space Special Interest Group. Lots of astrophysicists in that group, are there? Or just a couple of wingnuts who’ve read the Ladybird Book of Planets?

             5 likes

          • David76 says:

            “Wingnuts” – that’s a bit of a give away to your ideology isn’t it.

               5 likes

          • Professor Haze says:

            hey Mr MSc & PhD

            youre not very clever are you, it shows from your posts, cos if u was clever, u would have got a first when u done your degree, which would have meant you didnt need to do a masters.

            Your degree must have been terrible, cos even if u got a 2:1 u could appeal

            so stop showing off thicko, your masters shows that youre one of the thicko types of scientist.

            Thanks very much

               1 likes

            • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

              “youre not very clever are you, it shows from your posts, cos if u was clever, u would have got a first when u done your degree, which would have meant you didnt need to do a masters.”

              Not *absolutely* au fait with the university system, are you?

              “so stop showing off thicko, your masters shows that youre one of the thicko types of scientist.”

              Thank you for this penetrating critique.

                 3 likes

              • Professor Haze says:

                oh im very much aware of how university works, im clever, thats why i didnt study science,

                you should have tried harder when you was doing your degree, but lets face it, your qualifications aint exactly rocket science are they thicko

                   2 likes

              • John Anderson says:

                You still have not explained how you have a Columbia NYC postgrad qualification but you have never flown long-haul. Sounds consistent with the mythology of Global Warming, though.

                   4 likes

      • Ken says:

        Chinese Academy of Sciences

           1 likes

  5. In the real world says:

    The 97% claim from Cooks original paper , which has been rehashed & still used by the AGM promoters , was based on a tiny number of replies , so the over 30,000 signitures in opposition on the Oregon petition make a figure of over 98% .

    But no doubt you will not believe it .And as a guess , you probably do not believe the Climategate E mails , or the 28 gate findings , or that the Antartic ice fields are at record levels ,or that Al Gores film was a load of lies , or the Hockey stick graph was totally lies .

       26 likes

    • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

      “The 97% claim from Cooks original paper , which has been rehashed & still used by the AGM promoters”

      And which you are obsessed with debunking, despite the fact that I have not cited it; indeed, have rejected as junk…

      “…was based on a tiny number of replies , so the over 30,000 signitures in opposition on the Oregon petition make a figure of over 98% .”

      ROFL!

      OK, so you have taken two separate studies, which used different metrics and sample sizes, which are both flawed in different ways, added together the numbers in some way you have not disclosed and come up with – oh, sorry, made up – the figure of 98%. That is absolutely priceless. And illustrates, better than I can, that you are utterly unqualified to take part in any meaningful conversation about scientific matters.

      “But no doubt you will not believe it .”

      With very good reason. Because anybody who thinks that is a meaningful argument is round the bend.

      “And as a guess , you probably do not believe the Climategate E mails”

      What, the ones that were investigated in half a dozen separate independent enquiries, all of which exonerated the scientists concerned?

      “or the 28 gate findings ,”

      The 28-gate episode was a joke. But the BBC wasn’t the first public body to undertake consultation on a scientific matter in a hopelessly incompetent fashion, and it won’t be the last. The fact that it presided over such an inept consultation doesn’t mean its editorial stance on this issue is necessarily wrong, however.

      “or that the Antartic ice fields are at record levels”

      If you mean the ‘Antarctic’, you are labouring under a massive confusion between *sea* ice and the *ice sheet*. Sea ice is at a recent record high. The ice sheet (the ancient bit) is in catastrophic decline. Local variation in sea ice (which fluctuates wildly) is of far less interest to climate scientists than ice sheet thickness (which doesn’t).

      “or that Al Gores film was a load of lies”

      It was a load of baloney, produced for the mass market by people who don’t know any science. Go ahead and argue with it if you like, I’m interested in scientific research, not crap propaganda from a failed politician.

      “or the Hockey stick graph was totally lies .”

      As A Scientist points out above, it’s a bit more complicated than that.

      Congratulations, that was the typical dreary litany of tired climate sceptic arguments. If you’ve got anything original or interesting to throw back at me you know where to find me.

         20 likes

      • GCooper says:

        Let me guess – in a darkened room, trying to work out why the sea isn’t rising and temperatures are stable?

           17 likes

      • Owen Morgan says:

        Now who is setting up’straw men?

        Of course, it would be easier to “find” you, if you didn’t hide behind your implausible nom-de-plume. Given the corruption in “climate science”, there is no sound reason for any rational individual to be remotely impressed by even “genuine” doctorates, since it is abundantly clear that original research is rarely rewarded in the climate field, whereas sycophantic parroting of the party line is a certain route to membership of the alarmist club.

           29 likes

        • Guest Who says:

          Interesting how the usual weekend warrior is absent thus far to join the tag team.
          It is possible his previous self-limiting stated derision for pseudonymous posters may be a factor?

             13 likes

      • John Anderson says:

        You are evading the central issue. The Warmists models predict increasing global temperature. There has been no increase for nearly 18 years. So – why aren’t the models wrong ? Why do the Warmists prefer projections from theoretical computer models to observed, actual measurements of global temperature ?

           27 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        ‘“or the 28 gate findings ,”

        The 28-gate episode was a joke. But the BBC wasn’t the first public body to undertake consultation on a scientific matter in a hopelessly incompetent fashion, and it won’t be the last. The fact that it presided over such an inept consultation doesn’t mean its editorial stance on this issue is necessarily wrong, however.

        An ‘inept consultation’? That it spent £300k of licence fee-payers money defending in a court action? You call the BBC lying through its teeth ‘inept’? Who are you, some kind of BBC spin doctor?

        Read and learn:

        ‘The main problem facing government and policymakers was convincing the public that concern about anthropogenic global warming was well founded, and not just another scare story that would soon be forgotten. The Climate Change Communications Working Group (DEFRA, EST, UKCIP, Env. Agency, DTI, Carbon Trust) was set up, and in February 2005 received a Short List of Recommendations from Futerra, an environmental PR consultancy, on the means of conveying the required message to the media and the public . In August 2006, the IPPR produced a thirty-page report entitled Warm Words: How are we telling the climate story and can we tell it better? which developed Futerra’s recommendations. This concluded that:

        Many of the existing approaches to climate change communications clearly seem unproductive. And it is not enough simply to produce yet more messages, based on rational argument and top-down persuasion, aimed at convincing people of the reality of climate change and urging them to act. Instead, we need to work in a more shrewd and contemporary way, using subtle techniques of engagement. To help address the chaotic nature of the climate change discourse in the UK today, interested agencies now need to treat the argument as having been won, at least for popular communications. This means simply behaving as if climate change exists and is real, and that individual actions are effective. The ‘facts’ need to be treated as being so taken-for-granted that they need not be spoken. (emphasis added)

        Essentially, the communication technique recommended to the government to use on the people was the sophisticated tactic: “bluff them”. The truth is not what matters. There’s apparently no need to explain the uncertainties, and no reason to treat the voters as grown ups. Don’t mention the evidence.

        That the BBC science-journalists weren’t appalled at the IPPR document and the in-house seminar held earlier the same year (see below) is testament to the feeble derelict state of university science and “journalism” training. Does no lecturer explain the core difference between a reporter and a copy-writer for an ad agency?’

        http://joannenova.com.au/2010/11/how-the-bbc-became-a-propaganda-arm-of-the-uk-government-and-wwf/

        And:

        ‘The important thing is not to let the scandal lie down and die – as the BBC and its chums at places like the Guardian no doubt hope it will. It can’t be said often enough: this is a scandal far more significant than either the Jimmy Savile affair or the Lord McAlpine fiasco. Why? Because those first two were (mostly) cock-ups whereas this one is definitely a cynical and deliberate conspiracy by an institutionally corrupt organisation which has got far too big for its boots.

        As Barry Woods notes at Watts Up With That, the scandal goes at least as far back as 2002 with this email (exposed in Climategate 2) by climate activist Mike Hulme.

        Did anyone hear Stott vs. Houghton on Today, radio 4 this morning? Woeful
        stuff really. This is one reason why Tyndall is sponsoring the Cambridge
        Media/Environment Programme to starve this type of reporting at source.

        Hulme is a slippery customer. In the aftermath of Climategate, he could often be heard on the radio posing as the voice of sweet reason and moderation. Privately, Hulme was one of the arch Post Modern Scientists (read Watermelons for more on this) who helped build the great global warming scam into the Frankenstein’s monster it is today. In that private email, he shows his true face. The Stott is Professor Philip Stott – one of the few scientists in the early days prepared publicly to speak out against AGW alarmism; the Houghton is Sir John Houghton, long one of Britain’s most shrill and influential alarmists. Hulme’s response to this unwelcome balance: to use money from his publicly-funded Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research to shut down the debate.

        Scandalously, he achieved this with one of the BBC’s own reporters – the climate activist Roger Harrabin. It was Harrabin – together with another green activist Joe Smith (see list of names above) – who ran the Cambridge Media/Environment Programme. This organised a series of seminars, including the one above, designed to make the BBC’s climate science coverage more aggressively alarmist. As we’ve seen since, these seminars were very effective and have given Harrabin and the rest of his alarmist colleagues (David Shukman, Richard Black etc) an awful lot of self-publicity and airtime.’

        http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100189491/28-gates-later-the-bbcs-nightmare-gets-worse-and-worse/

        It’s science, Roger, but not as we know it…..

        P.S. Are you Roger?

           25 likes

        • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

          “Who are you, some kind of BBC spin doctor?”

          Given that my only comment on the BBC has been to call them ‘inept’ and ‘hopelessly incompetent’, I’m not exactly doing a great job, am I?

          You make no comment on the science, merely cite an Australian blog and James Delingpole’s hilariously over-the-top blog post. Did you notice how he called it a ‘bigger scandal than Savile’ and yet the only media outlet that showed the slightest interest was – ahem – James Delingpole’s blog? No doubt that’s because everybody else is an establishment shill. Anyway, as you should have gathered by now, I’m not here to defend the BBC which (like most media outlets) is pretty clueless in its interrogation of data. But at least they have worked out that going with the weight of scientific opinion, and trusting the judgement of major institutions, is basically the right thing to do.

             19 likes

          • John Anderson says:

            You are still evading the central question – where has all the warming gone ? The warming so confidently predicted by all the climate models.

               26 likes

            • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

              World Meteorological Organization, Annual Report 2014:

              “The year 2013 tied with 2007 as the sixth warmest since global records began in 1850. Although the climate varies naturally from year to year, it is clear that the planet is experiencing an overall warming trend. Thirteen of the fourteen warmest years on record have all occurred in the twenty-first century, and each of the past three decades has been warmer than the last, culminating with 2001–2010 as the warmest decade on record. As highlighted by the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, this steady warming is caused by rising levels of anthropogenic greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.”

                 17 likes

              • John Anderson says:

                All that shows is a plateauing of global temperature. They have stopped INCREASING – for some 18 years now. So quit with the Jesuitical stats.

                   29 likes

                • A Scientist says:

                  Look. There’s a nice graph here (it moves!) that might help explain why you sound like an idiot who has little or no understanding of data analysis. http://www.skepticalscience.com/going-down-the-up-escalator-part-1.html (And unless you manage to claim the $10,000 prize for disproving climate change or publish in a real journal, I think we can safely dismiss your “contribution” based on your posts so far. )

                     14 likes

                  • Guest Who says:

                    Much as the weekend thread clogging is more entertaining when dealing in science (the obligatory name-calling rather snookering the gracious debate claims by some) the relevance to BBC performance seems to have long passed (though noting these exchanges are ongoing, allowing observers to assess arguments and decide for themselves. Not what the BBC has opted to allow, ironically).
                    “I think we can safely dismiss…”
                    What you think noted.
                    Now, who is this ‘we’?

                       9 likes

              • johnnythefish says:

                ‘World Meteorological Organization, Annual Report 2014…’

                Does Julia Slingo have anything to do with that? You know, the same Julia Slingo who said on the BBC recently last winter was the wettest on record, when her own organisation’s historical data says otherwise? Funny the BBC with all those wonderful investigative journalists at its disposal failed to correct her.

                   20 likes

            • The General says:

              I heard someone on the BBC the other night explaining that it was ‘hiding’ in the seas and would reveal itself probably in the next 20 years or so with devastating consequences.
              There was no way I could contact the program but if I were able I would have suggested to him we discover where it is and use it to heat our homes.

                 9 likes

          • johnnythefish says:

            So 28gate wasn’t a scandal? What was it then?

            And you only quote Delingpole (who, incidentally has a bloody good grasp of climate science and could argue you into throwing your toys out of the pram) – did you not read the first piece I quoted? Any comment?

               14 likes

            • A Scientist says:

              ” you only quote Delingpole (who, incidentally has a bloody good grasp of climate science) ”

              James Delingpole doesn’t actually have time or the expertise to read the science. I know this, because he said so on camera.

              I doubt he could argue his way out of a wet paper bag. That you respect his opinion speaks volumes about your own critical thinking abilities.

                 14 likes

              • chrisH says:

                The likes of James Delingpole, Melanie Phillips and Christopher Booker have been monstered by REAL scientists!
                Not the likes of me and you who aren`t as famous as Chris Packham or as media-valued like Paul Nurse for example.
                The likes of James and others have this dangerous thing called a little knowledge-learning on the hoof-and enough common sense to spot a “consensus” as being a conspiracy against the laity and lower orders.
                Tiger OCs post at the top of this blogroll has some pertinent points-give us some answers or websites to counter them,and we`ll check.
                We`re more Bellamy and Ball men here, so facts are sacred..OK?

                   6 likes

              • Richard Pinder says:

                I would say that James Delingpole, Melanie Phillips and Christopher Booker are proper Journalists who do not censor the science, scientists and scientific debate. As does the journalism of censorship at the BBC and all the other organisations that are dominated by the taxpayer funded public relations social parasites and environmental activist social parasites that constitute left-wing Journalists with arts and language qualifications.

                   10 likes

          • Richard Pinder says:

            The warming has been reflected by an increase in clouds, and I have read worse things about the BBC and its moronic 28 gate scam, in Mensa publications, than anything Delingpole has written.

            Delingpole is not a scientist, so its far worse than even he can contemplate.

               5 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        ‘“or that the Antartic ice fields are at record levels”

        If you mean the ‘Antarctic’, you are labouring under a massive confusion between *sea* ice and the *ice sheet*. Sea ice is at a recent record high. The ice sheet (the ancient bit) is in catastrophic decline. Local variation in sea ice (which fluctuates wildly) is of far less interest to climate scientists than ice sheet thickness (which doesn’t).’

        Read and learn:

        ‘The accumulation of kilometres of undisturbed ice in cores in Greenland and Antarctica (the same ones that are sometimes used to fuel ideas of global warming) show hundreds of thousands of years of accumulation with no melting or flow. Except around the edges, ice sheets flow at the base, and depend on geothermal heat, not the climate at the surface. It is impossible for the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets to ‘collapse’.

        In these days of alarmist warnings about climate warming, the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica have an important role. Many papers have described their melting at the present times, and dire predictions of many metres of sea level rise are common. Christoffersen and Hambrey published a typical paper on the Greenland ice sheet in Geology Today in May, 2006.

        Their model, unfortunately, includes neither the main form of the Greenland Ice Sheet, nor an understanding of how glaciers flow. They predict the behaviour of the Ice Sheet based on melting and accumulation rates at the present day, and the concept of an ice sheet sliding down an inclined plane on a base lubricated by meltwater, which is itself increasing because of global warming. The same misconception is present in textbooks such as The Great Ice Age (2000) by R.C.L. Wilson and others, popular magazines such as the June 2007 issue of National Geographic, and other scientific articles such as Bamber et al. (2007), which can be regarded as a typical modelling contribution. The idea of a glacier sliding downhill on a base lubricated by meltwater seemed a good idea when first presented by de Saussure in 1779, but a lot has been learned since then.’.

        http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/08/27/why-the-greenland-and-antarctic-ice-sheets-are-not-collapsing/

           13 likes

        • MSc and PhD (Atmospheric Physics), thanks very much says:

          *slow hand clap*

          Oh well done. A blog post from five years ago, cited as evidence. Brilliantly up to date.

          Since we’re bandying about recommended reading, why don’t you try one of these:

          Rignot et al, “Widespread, rapid grounding line retreat of Pine Island, Thwaites, Smith, and Kohler glaciers, West Antarctica” (May 2014)

          or

          McMillan et al, “Increased ice losses from Antarctica detected by CryoSat-2” (June 2014).

          Both from Geophysical Research Letters. But you may find them daringly recent and scholarly, given your preference for articles written by a blogger half a decade ago.

             19 likes

          • johnnythefish says:

            And the climate models you are still basing your ‘science’ on – how old are they?

            And how many of them predicted the flatlining of the last 18 years? A. Big. Fat. Zero.

               22 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        ‘“or the Hockey stick graph was totally lies .”

        As A Scientist points out above, it’s a bit more complicated than that.’

        No it’s not. It was lies. Total lies.

        See ‘totally wrong’ above.

           25 likes

        • A Scientist says:

          Can you do any better than “No it’s not. It was lies. Total lies.” ? That might just about be a useful argument debating the merits of Sonic vs Mario when you are 6, but for sophisticated analysis of the behavior of the world’s climate, not so much.

             13 likes

          • Guest Who says:

            Precedent is of course valuable in such things.
            Not sure your calling into question one line rejections as useful argument will serve others well in time to come.

               5 likes

          • johnnythefish says:

            The hockey stick by its very nature erased the Medieval Warming and the Little Ice Age to make temperatures of the last 1000 years look flat and thus recent warming look more dramatic.

            And keep up with the insults, they speak volumes.

               19 likes

  6. johnnythefish says:

    ‘“And as a guess , you probably do not believe the Climategate E mails”

    What, the ones that were investigated in half a dozen separate independent enquiries, all of which exonerated the scientists concerned?

    You’re out of your depth, pal. Read and learn:

    ‘As of 30 August 2010 all five had issued their reports. The overall impression that has been created is
    that the scientists and their work were vindicated. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
    Chair Rajendra Pachauri declared in a recent interview1 “the doubts raised have proved to be
    unfounded.” Considerable reliance is being placed upon the outcome of these investigations. As I will
    show, for the most part the inquiries were flawed, but where they actually functioned as proper inquiries,
    they upheld many criticisms. But a surprising number of issues were sidestepped or handled
    inadequately. The world still awaits a proper inquiry into climategate: one that is not stacked with global
    warming advocates, and one that is prepared to cross-examine evidence, interview critics as well as
    supporters of the CRU and other IPCC players, and follow the evidence where it clearly leads.’

    Click to access rmck_climategate.pdf

       21 likes

    • A Scientist says:

      So to paraphrase; “Waaaaaa. Waaaaaa. Waaaaaa. Not fair. You see if those stinky researchers don’t get their comeuppance. I know the trust. Marios IS better than Sonic *sniff*”

         14 likes

      • Guest Who says:

        Paraphrasing of course throws the spotlight on the competencies, accuracy and maturity of the one doing it too.
        This may not always serve well when parked next to the original to enable comparison.

           6 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        Scientist throws his toys out of pram.

        You’re a joke, pal.

           22 likes

        • johnnythefish says:

          Still waiting for your thoughts on McKitrick’s paper. But as you’ve probably not read it, judging by your non-scientific and very childish reply, let me help you with this tiny sample:

          ‘MP Graham Stringer of the House of Commons Inquiry was quoted in an article in the UK Register as
          follows.
          Stringer told us… that MPs had been misled by the University of East Anglia …MPs believed
          that Anglia had entrusted an examination of the science to a separate inquiry…Ron Oxburgh’s
          inquiry eventually produced a short report clearing the participants. He did not reassess the
          science, and now says it was never in his remit. “The science was not the subject of our study,”
          he confirmed in an email to Steve McIntyre of Climate Audit…. “The Oxburgh Report looks
          much more like a whitewash,” Graham Stringer told us.
          Commons Inquiry chair Phil Willis was quoted in the same article as follows:
          The former chair of the Science and Technology Committee, Phil Willis, now Lord Willis, said
          MPs had been amazed at the “sleight of hand”. “Oxburgh didn’t go as far as I expected.”………

          Had there been any attempt to cross-examine the CRU answers, they might have noted the following.
          a) The CRU papers they examined were not the ones that had been controversial as regards
          inappropriate methods, etc., and the list of papers appears to have originated with UEA itself, in
          consultation with the CRU but not its critics.
          b) The failure to archive and disclose data and methods is a common finding of all the CRU
          inquiries.
          c) There can be no distinction between the conduct of CRU scientists and the contents of IPCC
          reports: Phil Jones was Coordinating Lead Author of IPCC chapter 3 (surface temperatures), and
          Keith Briffa was Coordinating Lead Author of IPCC chapter 6 (paleoclimate). To the extent the
          IPCC Report contained oversimplifications and neglected to explain important uncertainties, the
          fault lies directly with CRU scientists themselves. By drawing an artificial distinction between
          CRU and IPCC in this matter, the Oxburgh panel (like the House of Commons Inquiry)
          apparently excused misleading presentations in reports to policymakers in cases where the
          scientists could show they disclosed the discrepancies and uncertainties somewhere else.
          d) The CRU answers might have been “convincing,” but they were not subject to examination by
          CRU critics. In the absence of any attempt to solicit counter-arguments the Oxburgh team’s
          acceptance of the CRU answers carries no weight.’

             9 likes

  7. Dazed & Confused says:

    Here’s yet another lie exposed from the ever ‘transparent” BBC..

    http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/07/04/BBC-Is-Most-Secretive-Organisation-According-To-Audit-Boss

       11 likes

  8. Max Roberts says:

    Lots of pretend scientists posting today. When I say pretend, I mean that they are so convinced of their infallibility that they are lost almost all understanding of the limitations of the ‘evidence’ that they continually recycle. But that is not a surprise these days, most people with scientific qualifications never really have to use their powers of reason, and for a typical ‘apprenticeship’ PhD, they never really needed them to begin with. Even those who remain active researchers are not necessarily the brightest of the bunch, not much more than jobbing civil servants churning out endless pointless papers that keep the journals bloated and their employers happy. Of course, the need to secure research funding from politicised sources will stop them from examining their assumptions and preconceptions too closely. Like all walks of life, there are good scientists and bad scientists, and so all qualifications should be taken with a pinch of salt. look at the quality of the logic and the arguments.

       17 likes

    • Richard Pinder says:

      I keep trying to say that the Scientists with the answers are all censored,

      Just think of this?

      What would happen to the multi-million pound Cancer Charity industry with all those thousands of scientist, if they actually found a cheap universal cure for Cancer.

      Its worse for Climate science because a problem does not even exist, and all the answers have been around since 2010.

      While for Cancer, I remember many years ago, a prominent cancer researcher was found dead in the Cotswold countryside in mysterious circumstances, and an elderly colleague was convinced he was killed because he had found a cure for Cancer.

         5 likes

  9. johnnythefish says:

    Yet another good piece here from Donna Laframboise on the IPCC:

    ‘The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is at an important inflection point. Next year Rajendra Pachauri, its appalling chairman, will finally exit the stage and a replacement will be selected.

    In a sane world, it would be obvious to everyone that this organization is rotten to the core. Many of its worst habits predate the current chairman, whose tenure began in 2002. The IPCC claims to be scientific, but is actually riddled with activism and politics (see here, here, here, here, here, here, and here).

    In other words, the appearance of scientific certainty is being used by the IPCC to sell philosophical and political ideas. That. Is. Wrong.

    Anyone who cares about scientific integrity should be horrified by this UN-created monster. Instead, foolish people insist that to be critical of the IPCC is to be anti-science.

    Today an important hearing is taking place in Washington, D.C. The US House of Representatives Committee on Science, Space, and Technology is examining the IPCC process. It is receiving written and oral testimony from four prominent IPCC experts, each of whom has had played some role in the IPCC process:
    •economist Richard Tol [written submission]
    •astrophysicist Michael Oppenheimer [written submission]
    •biologist Daniel Botkin [verbal testimony]
    •meteorologist Roger Pielke Sr. [written submission]

    There are plenty of disturbing and thought-provoking comments to be found in this material. Tol – who says he favours “reform of the IPCC rather than its abolition” – nevertheless observes that the IPCC often attracts scientists with political motivations rather than open-minded curiosity.

    He points out that people are rarely nominated to work on IPCC reports by “purely scientific” bodies. Instead, environment agencies run by bureaucrats with a vested interest in expanding their own budgets and prestige have a great deal of influence over who writes IPCC reports. The result, in Tol’s view, is an “alarmist bias” amongst IPCC personnel.’

    http://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2014/05/29/experts-condemn-the-ipcc-at-us-hearing/

    ‘A Scientist’ – feel free to comment.

       20 likes

    • A Scientist says:

      It’s not a paper is it? It’s a blog post. That’s not research. It’s a pile of words someone has thrown at the internet.
      Tell you what, I won’t insult your intelligence any more. Let’s start with the science and your big claim there’s been “no warming for 17 years”. Clearly you don’t trust anything I say about the research or any of the links I’ve posted here to refute this idea (to be fair they are also blog pots and summaries of the research and of course the usual suspects could be just spinning to keep those “lucrative” grants coming in – because that’s how science works /sarcasm)
      So here’s a paper on this very topic. No spin. It’s just the science. It’s recent (2013) and it explains clearly that the warming trend for 1997–2012 is around 0.11°C per decade. Possibly slightly more. That clearly contradicts your position. So read this and tell me where it is wrong. Refute it with data and science.
      And then I’ll be happy to engage in debate on a scientific level with you.
      Cowtan & Way (2013)
      http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/qj.2297/full
      Happy reading, “bud” !

         14 likes

      • Old Goat says:

        “A Scientist” smacks to me of AGW shill.

        Personally, I don’t believe a word of it, and I’m merely a lay-goat.

           15 likes

        • Andy S. says:

          You can always tell an AGW shill. They refuse to answer direct questions, insult the intelligence of opponents and when all else fails, turn to belittling and insulting those with alternative opinions.
          Like I said, our “Scientist” troll can’t abide scientific truth, doesn’t want it, doesn’t look for it. He’s made his mind up ad discarded his scientific curiosity. In other words he’s a warmist whore who has sold any scientific integrity to a political ideology. That is if he has any scientific qualifications at all, which I doubt very much.

             19 likes

      • GCooper says:

        Utter rot. Even the warmists’ High Priest accepts the ‘pause’ (in itself a logical fallacy – until it ends, how can you say it is a pause? Still, logic is rarely a warmist’s strong point, so I shan’t labour the point.

        Meanwhile:

        http://www.thegwpf.org/ipcc-head-pachauri-acknowledges-global-warming-standstill/

           12 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        You seem to be confusing investigative journalism and senate hearings with scientific papers. Is your climate mantra-mojo thingy stuck in send by any chance?

        Anyway, now it looks like you’ve recovered your toys and sit happily in your pram again, only too happy to oblige…..

        ‘The hiatus period of 17 years 10 months, or 214 months, is the farthest back one can go in the RSS satellite temperature record and still show a zero trend.

        Yet the length of the pause in global warming, significant though it now is, is of less importance than the ever-growing discrepancy between the temperature trends predicted by models and the far less exciting real-world temperature change that has been observed.

        The First Assessment Report predicted that global temperature would rise by 1.0 [0.7, 1.5] Cº to 2025, equivalent to 2.8 [1.9, 4.2] Cº per century. The executive summary asked, “How much confidence do we have in our predictions?” IPCC pointed out some uncertainties (clouds, oceans, etc.), but concluded:

        “Nevertheless, … we have substantial confidence that models can predict at least the broad-scale features of climate change. … There are similarities between results from the coupled models using simple representations of the ocean and those using more sophisticated descriptions, and our understanding of such differences as do occur gives us some confidence in the results.”

        That “substantial confidence” was substantial over-confidence. A quarter-century after 1990, the outturn to date – expressed as the least-squares linear-regression trend on the mean of the RSS and UAH monthly global mean surface temperature anomalies – is 0.34 Cº, equivalent to just 1.4 Cº/century, or exactly half of the central estimate in IPCC (1990) and well below even the least estimate (Fig. 2).’

        http://www.climatedepot.com/2014/07/03/global-temperature-standstill-lengthens-no-global-warming-for-17-years-10-months-since-sept-1996-214-months/

        And from the same article:

        ‘Key facts about global temperature
        •The RSS satellite dataset shows no global warming at all for 214 months from September 1996 to June 2014. That is 50.2% of the entire 426-month satellite record.
        •The fastest measured centennial warming rate was in Central England from 1663-1762, at 0.9 Cº/century – before the industrial revolution. It was not our fault.
        •The global warming trend since 1900 is equivalent to 0.8 Cº per century. This is well within natural variability and may not have much to do with us.
        •The fastest warming trend lasting ten years or more occurred over the 40 years from 1694-1733 in Central England. It was equivalent to 4.3 Cº per century.
        •Since 1950, when a human influence on global temperature first became theoretically possible, the global warming trend has been equivalent to 1.2 Cº per century.
        •The fastest warming rate lasting ten years or more since 1950 occurred over the 33 years from 1974 to 2006. It was equivalent to 2.0 Cº per century.
        •In 1990, the IPCC’s mid-range prediction of the near-term warming trend was equivalent to 2.8 Cº per century, higher by two-thirds than its current prediction.
        •The global warming trend since 1990, when the IPCC wrote its first report, is equivalent to 1.4 Cº per century – half of what the IPCC had then predicted.
        •In 2013 the IPCC’s new mid-range prediction of the near-term warming trend was for warming at a rate equivalent to only 1.7 Cº per century. Even that is exaggerated.
        •Though the IPCC has cut its near-term warming prediction, it has not cut its high-end business as usual centennial warming prediction of 4.8 Cº warming to 2100.
        •The IPCC’s predicted 4.8 Cº warming by 2100 is more than twice the greatest rate of warming lasting more than ten years that has been measured since 1950.
        •The IPCC’s 4.8 Cº-by-2100 prediction is almost four times the observed real-world warming trend since we might in theory have begun influencing it in 1950.
        •Since 1 January 2001, the dawn of the new millennium, the warming trend on the mean of 5 datasets is nil. No warming for 13 years 5 months.
        •Recent extreme weather cannot be blamed on global warming, because there has not been any global warming. It is as simple as that.’

        But ooops! here we go again on the lack of warming……..

        ‘Taking the least-squares linear-regression trend on Remote Sensing Systems’ satellite-based monthly global mean lower-troposphere temperature dataset, there has been no global warming – none at all – for 17 years 10 months. This is the longest continuous period without any warming in the global instrumental temperature record since the satellites first watched in 1979. It has endured for more than half the entire satellite temperature record. Yet the lengthening Pause coincides with a continuing, rapid increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration.’

        http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/07/03/rss-shows-no-global-warming-for-17-years-10-months/

        Oh heck, and here’s that Trenberth fella again, who’s finally decided he can explain the – ahem – lack of warming ([Trenberth in Climategate1, 2009] ‘The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t.‘)

        http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/05/22/kevin-trenberth-struggles-mightily-to-explain-the-lack-of-global-warming/

        Eh, this ‘settled science’, it’s a bugger in’t it?

        But, y’ know, you being a scientist an’ all, I thought you might be pleased that there are many of your colleagues out there who are giving you good news – y’ know, we’re not all going to fry in a man-made hell after all. Aren’t you pleased about that?

        Now take good care of those toys this time….

           10 likes

        • Richard Pinder says:

          The temperature measurers cannot tell you what the causes are, that’s the job of Atmospheric physicists and Solar scientists, but its worrying that there are reports of political pressure to change data sources from past data sources when it comes to temperature data.

          I know that there has been an increase in low cloud formation at the poles, which would increase polar temperatures by trapping heat input, while at the same time the Hadley centre wants to put more emphasis on polar temperatures, so as Piers Corbyn says, there must be some scientific fraud going on, keeping the global temperatures up on the Hadley data sets.

             5 likes

          • johnnythefish says:

            Comprehensive analysis here on ‘adjusted’ GISS temperatures:

            http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/07/03/giss-hockey-stick-adjustments/

            ‘◾Given how much the data has changed in the past 9 years, what might it be like 9 years from now? Can we trust it enough to make multi-billion dollar economic decisions based on it? I find it reminiscent of George Orwell’s “1984″ where;

            “Winston Smith works as a clerk in the Records Department of the Ministry of Truth, where his job is to rewrite historical documents so they match the constantly changing current party line.”

               5 likes

        • A Scientist says:

          You are genuinely fascinating. I posted a paper that met your “no warming in 17 years” allegation head on. I asked for you to read it and tell me where it might be wrong. You reply with a series of links to wattsup (not a real journal!) and some very, very familiar and wrong headed climate change canards. RSS data? Seriously. You can download it for yourself and see the warming effect.
          Look. One more time. You said there’s no warming. I gave you a link to a single paper that says there is. What is scientifically wrong with that paper in your view? It’s a simple question. But if you can’t answer it, well that raises bigger questions about your arguments in general.
          Once last time; Cowtan & Way (2013)
          http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/qj.2297/full What’s wrong with this paper, scientifically?

             3 likes

          • John Anderson says:

            Just google around, sunshine, you will find lots of criticism of that paper.

            The central criticism is that they INVENT temperature readings for the poles to pad the figures. In other words – it is based on speculation, not on real figures.

               4 likes

          • johnnythefish says:

            A load more ‘adjusted’ data – meaningless.

            Even the IPCC admits to the lack of warming and has lowered its forecast to some fine tune, although great pressure was brought by a number of countries’ politicians – including Germany – to omit this acknowledgement from it’s farcical ‘Summary for Policymakers’.

            But then 30% of the IPCC’s source material is non-peer reviewed. Some ‘science’, eh?

            One paper amongst thousands is proof of nothing, especially when quoted by a rabid warmist like yourself who sees nothing wrong with Mann’s ‘hockey stick’.

            So…. ‘nullius in verba’ – you never did answer that one (amongst a host of others).

            ‘A scientist’ who sees *slow hand clap* as an intelligent response. You’re a joke, pal.

               2 likes

      • John Anderson says:

        “A Scientist” must know that there are plenty of statistical arguments about the methods used in the Cowtan and Way paper published a few months ago. The paper is an attempt to explain away the lack of any warming in the time series that have been used for all previous forecasts.

        But even if the paper and its questionable approach were accepted as “valid” – the conclusions hardly point to any serious warming. 0.1 degrees C rise over a decade ! That is the figure triumphantly cited by “A Scientist” – that’s equivalent to 1.1 degrees over a centrury – BIG DEAL ! It is a mere fraction of what the IPCC has been “forecasting”.

        Yet the Warmist industry sees even this entirely moderate increase as justifying draconian economic measures that will damage our economies and will kill huge numbers of people.

        It is ridiculous for anyone calling himself “A Scientist” to cite one single paper, recently published and widely questioned, as rebuttal of the the observed global temperature. standstill for the past 18 years . Clutching at straws is the term, I think.

           8 likes

        • A Scientist says:

          You miss the point. It is indeed a single paper. And all I ask is one link to a paper that refutes its conclusions. In fact I’ll even take a well argued post that can raise a few doubts about it. So far, nothing. (Although it’s nice to see you accept the premise that there’s been “no warming” since ’98 is actually wrong. Tell your online friends)

             3 likes

          • John Anderson says:

            I do not accept the premise that there has been warming since 1998 – why should anyone accept that notion when there is only ONE paper that uses manipu;lated figures – invented figures for the poles – to reach the idea of a MINISCULE increase. That is the paper you are clinging to – clutching at straws, I’d say. All the actual recorded temperature data points to NIL increase.

            I stated before that the paper has been widely criticised and you are being devious in trying to deny this is the case. Just google it yourself, the criticisms are easy to find – you are not worth my time.

               5 likes

  10. James says:

    Does Steve Jones, Emeritus Professor of Genetics at University College London, owe his living to the BBC?

       12 likes

  11. CCE says:

    Hmm, thanks Mr (or Ms) Scientist. I am enlightened. I am not a scientist and don’t claim to understand the detail of the AGM case but I contend two things.
    1 – That the climate is naturally very variable over very short periods of time – through natural causes (I cite things like the colonisation of Greenland and its failure, Frost Fairs in London, el ninio, The year without a summer in 1815 -Tambora- the Dickensian winters, the fact that 9,000 years ago everything north of Oxford was under three miles of ice and a very long list of etc’s) and that extreme weather events have occurred consistently throughout human history.
    2 That climate change had been adopted as a ‘Trojan Horse’ issue to drive through a huge raft of policy initiatives, designed to deliver a specific vision of human development that if frankly inimical to human happiness. The Global Warming agenda has very little to do with climate at all and far more to do with a very strong desire to change human behaviour – because it is good for us. Frankly I couldn’t care less what humanity faces in 350 years time and I am damned if I want to live a life of vegan austerity, traveling nowhere and lighting my shared collective home with an 8w Mercury vapour lamp just to please a distant descendant.

    When I was a child I was told quite authoritatively that there would be no oil or petrol by the year 2000. It scared me and I worried about my future. It was green bullshit, alarmist nonsense just like the majority of stories about global warming.

    Remember all the crap on the BBC about the French rushing to buy English vineyards, the wettest drought on record (2010), “snow is a thing of the past”, the inclusion of a climate meme into every aspect of BBC output – all green bullshit.

       19 likes

  12. Wild says:

    You have to bear in mind that the Left contaminate every question – economics or sexual politics or climate change or racism or history or constitutional law or education or the news reporting – with their bullshit., obscuring the actual issues.

    The Left are not (and never have been) the slightest bit interested in what is the case, they are only interested in working through (and justifying) their hate filled messed up little heads.

    I think the welfare of future generations is (or at least should be) of great concern. Just do not expect a Leftist to contribute anything but lies and job creation schemes for their fellow Leftists.

    Asking the BBC to intelligently debate the issue of climate change is like asking a two year old or a Labour Shadow Cabinet minister where money comes from or point out Worcester on a map.

    The BBC are ideologically incapable of discussing this (or indeed any other) issue intelligently. What they are good at is reading from prompt sheets written by people with a political agenda and absolutely no interest in truth or human welfare.

       20 likes

  13. johnnythefish says:

    Are there any scientists out there who know what the signs of global cooling might be?

       1 likes

    • Arthur Penney says:

      Yes – the melting of the Antarctic sea ice would be a good first indication.

         1 likes

    • Richard Pinder says:

      An increase in low cloud albedo and general global cooling, mostly over the tropical pacific ocean where the sunshine’s most and were the Earths surface is at its darkest as it appears from space. Some say the mini-ice age has already started but I think the length of the Solar Cycle and average speed of plasma in the Sun correlations show a eleven year lag after 2007, so you should start to see cooling after 2018. But for more detail of what happens to weather trends, you should look at the Weatheraction website of Piers Corbyn.

         7 likes

  14. Richard Pinder says:

    ‘There is no science to show why global warming has paused for 17 years’

    No, that is where Alan is wrong.

    The length of a Solar cycle determines the average speed of plasma for each Solar Cycle, and therefore the average solar magnetic resistance to galactic cosmic ray induced low cloud albedo, which correlates with Climate Change now and in the past.

    The Svensmark theory explains low cloud albedo changes, and Piers Corbyn explains the Hale magnetic effects on weather and correlations with past weather events..

    This is the science, the scientists and the scientific debate being censored by the BBC.

    The science with answers for the core issues of Climate Change, (1) The calibration of Carbon Dioxide warming using the Unified Theory of Climate which solves the problem of explaining the temperatures in all parts of the atmospheres of all the planets in the Solar System, including the Earth and the carbon dioxide atmospheres of Venus and Mars. . And (2) The calibration of Solar radiation input on the Earth, and the reluctance to fund scientists who want to collect and collate data on satellite observations of cloud albedo changes.

    I think ‘A Scientist’ must be the ‘Richard Pinder’ doppelganger troll. As the above science is available on ‘Google Scholar’ or if he can get into Mensa, he could join the ‘Space Special Interest group’ and read about the science censored by the BBC and the article ‘BBC Censorship’

       10 likes

    • The General says:

      Sheer brilliance !!!!

         3 likes

      • Richard Pinder says:

        Thanks, but for some reason, the Richard Pinder doppelganger troll has never boasted about my scientific qualifications?

           5 likes

  15. Truthisouthethere says:

    Good god a sensible enlightening discussion on climate change.

       1 likes

  16. RJ says:

    What I understand from the above is:

    1) those people who are paid to say that human activity is causing catastrophic global warming say that human activity is causing catastrophic global warming.

    2) those people who aren’t paid to predict catastrophic warming are trying to understand the science, but are finding it slow going because their research is underfunded.

    3) genuine scientific research has identified a warm Roman period, followed by a cool Dark Ages period, followed by a warm Medieval period, followed by a cool Little Ice Age, followed by a warm Modern period – which rather suggests a natural oscillation.

    4) these changes in climate are probably linked to changes in the sun and perhaps changes in the oceans, but research is ongoing.

    5) in the meantime we don’t need to panic about global warming because there hasn’t been any warming for 17 years.

    6) perhaps we should begin to worry because the sun has gone quiet, Antarctic sea ice is at a record level (for the satellite era), Arctic sea ice is recovering, western governments are in alliance with the greens and BBC journalists wouldn’t recognise the truth if it bit them on the arse.

       8 likes

    • John Anderson says:

      All of that is true, and all of it is exactly contrary to the line the BBC continually peddles.

      And this is not the “natural” groupthink you get on other issues at the BBC, where the leftie slant is the common view. On global warming, the bias is much more determined, promoted from the centre through seminars etc to keep people “pure” in their thoughts and editorial decisions. It is all bordering on the sinister.

         6 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        ‘And this is not the “natural” groupthink you get on other issues at the BBC, where the leftie slant is the common view.’

        John, unless I’ve misunderstood you, I tend to disagree because AGW and its ‘mitigating actions’ is pretty well the most powerful leftist groupthink you could think of. The aim is a UN-developed world eco-socialist government from your most authoritarian socialist nightmares. Agenda 21 gives the drift, but the pronouncements of some of the more extremist zealots in the AGW fraternity over the years are truly scary – even Ian Fleming couldn’t have thought these characters up.

           3 likes

        • John Anderson says:

          You misunderstand me. I am saying that the BBC exhibits endless leftie groupthink on lots of topics – unconsciously. Like fish not knowing they are wet. Whereas on Global Warming it is much more deliberate, planned, coordinated..

             3 likes

          • johnnythefish says:

            I appreciate what you are saying but I don’t think it is any more planned than their consistent pro-EU, pro-mass immigration, pro-Labour stance. The only difference is that with AGW they are able use the ‘consensus’ and the ‘settled science’ as an excuse for their overwhelmingly biased coverage.

               1 likes