All climate change theories were not created equal

Super D says:

06:20am | 24/05/11

You’re right to single out Tim Flannery for criticism.  As a result of his scaremongering and inaccurate forecasts every major city in Australia has an expensive yet largely unnecessary desalination plant.  Flannery has probably led to the wasting of more public resources than any man in the nations history.  In short - whatever he’s selling I ain’t buying.

persephone says:

07:04am | 24/05/11

Erick

they’re not paid to predict disaster, they’re paid to look at the science.

And yes, Tim Flannery is a proponent - not an expert.

However, that said, no one could predict when the drought would end. If it had continued, our cities would be in dire straights right now. We were lucky there.

And you’re missing Tory’s point. Anyone can cherry pick arguments to suit their own agendas, but what needs to be looked at is the quality of the evidence.

That climate change is real and is anthropogenic is as real as any scientific theory gets - it’s up there with evolution, the most questioned but most robust of scientific theories. If you dismiss AGW, by rights you should have no truck with gravity, a far less proven theory.

Scientists might not be neutral but science is, and the evidence is. The evidence is what is driving acceptance of the theory.

SuperD

governments aren’t stupid enough or irresponsible enough (Oppositions may be) to invest billions of dollars on the say so of one populist scientist.

They have their own scientists who evaluate the evidence to predict likely futures and suggest possible actions.

That scientists evaluating the future in different states came to the same conclusion is an indication that there are real future threats to our water supplies.

Regardless of whether we go back into drought - and one year of good rainfall is absolutely no guarantee we won’t be in drought again next year or the year after - the long term predictions are that rainfall in Australia is decreasing.

Even if we don’t go back into drought, we know that the bushfires over the past few years will result in less run off, so in a year of even normal rainfall dams will be harder to fill.

When expert advice tells a government that there’s a problem, it is their responsibility to act.

Next you’ll be suggesting that, because it’s a wet year, we shouldn’t be putting into action the recommendations made after the bushfires - after all, it’s going to be years before we have another.

acotrel says:

07:32am | 24/05/11

@SuperD
’  As a result of his scaremongering and inaccurate forecasts every major city in Australia has an expensive yet largely unnecessary desalination plant.’

Is this a super exaggeration? Do I need to put a new steel roof on my house to protect it from more intense willy-willys like they had in the US last Sunday?

Kevin says:

07:40am | 24/05/11

@Super D
No, Victoria starting building a desal plant because before the rains came last year it had been going through a prolonged drought and its water supplies had dwindled to something like 25% capacity.

Liam says:

07:41am | 24/05/11

“But use common sense and logic to work out who’s talking from a position of knowledge”
Obviously not you Tory, and where do you get your evidence to discredit all the Climate change denialists/skeptics/Nazis whatever the left wants to call us?? from the internet I’d imagine. As erick put it, you pick out articles that suit your cause!
http://opinion.financialpost.com/2011/01/03/lawrence-solomon-97-cooked-stats/
Dont worry, your not the only one who does it. For every link I post you could post a counter argument.
I personnaly dont believe in climate change, nor do I deny it.
I just think there is not enough evidence to comfirm or deny it either way, or wether we are a major contributor or not, to think about taxing the population and impeding on our quality of life.
How many people 5 years ago predicted the La Nina weather pattern that hit the east coast from september to february this year???

wakeuppls says:

07:48am | 24/05/11

The tin-foil hat wearers were also predicting a catastrophic year last year following Hurricane Katrina in the US due to climate change. Then there were no hurricanes. No one really jumped on them for being scare-mongers but, did they?

p.s I wish “journalists” would quit pretending to know everything about the scientific community.

Mouse says:

07:56am | 24/05/11

But haven’t earth core samples shown that this “warming” has occured in fairly regular cycles over thousands of years previously?  But then I’m not a scientist so I wouldn’t know how to interpret scientific data would I? The Climate Commission’s report reached the same conclusions that every reputable organisation reaches when it reviews that latest science. Does that mean if you don’t agree you are disreputable? For every one that says YES, there are two that say NO, and visa versa. Just like statistics, you can get them to say whatever you want.

Better to squirm over a costed policy than an aspirational thought bubble hurriedly released because the co-Prime Minister said so. gillard’s carbon dioxide tax, on what (little) we know, is nothing more than Labor/Green wet dream. We don’t even know what it’ll cost because Bob Brown is still doing the sums.
Why is it that Labor can cost the Coalition policy down to the last cent but are unable to say what their policy will cost, who it will benefit and what the compensation will be? Why aren’t the media asking those questions?
Instead of focusing on the Coalition, why isn’t the question being asked about what effect Labor’s tax will have on the environment. Is it because there will be no effect and Labor/Greens know it but they still believe that taxing people is the best solution.

Is it any wonder that people are cynical. The truth is not being told by Labor and they are refusing to answer the hard questions that might embarrass them. They dont care as long as they get their big tax on carbon.
Economists? Aren’t they the “experts” who completely missed predicting the biggest gloibal financial crisis since 1929?
Why would anyone care what those clowns thought?

Joan says:

08:05am | 24/05/11

Mr Doomsday Gaia man Tim Flannery out and about yesterday, his message the world coming to an end unless we do something now…like Juliar big Carbon Tax on every thing , the same guy who predicted that major cities dams would dry up , rivers run dry and Arctic ice cap melt away. East coast Australias dams are full or near full, the Arctic ice cap is still there, rivers running… the grass is thick and lush, The drought has broken, the way it does in Australia. Mr Flannery`s name associated with any scientific paper gives the paper no credibilty at all, its contents will be suspect.  People are are laughing and deriding, ridiculing Flannery paper.  Juliar `s Gaia man a total flop in convincing Australians… Australia has stopped listening to Mr Flim Flam and Juliar…. Australians scammed once will not be done over again..

Phil says:

08:15am | 24/05/11

@persephone
And they will keep being paid to “look at the science” as long as what is found keeps them in a job with lots of government money to waste.

Richard says:

08:38am | 24/05/11

I’ve formed the view that AGW is “probably” bulltish, but I have come to this conclusion not just because there is so much conflicting data, but because the proponents of the hypothesis have utterly mismanaged the process of informing the world.  If you cook the books, then you invite scepticism.  If you continually cry that the sky is falling, then at some point people will stop listening.  Al Gore, Tim Flannery and others have a lot to answer for in this regard.

Jay-ded says:

08:39am | 24/05/11

Yes Persephone, climate change is real.  It has been real for millions of years.  Our “science” in this area is based purely on a couple of hundred years of intelligence gathering as opposed to the age of our planet.  2 hundred years of climate notations doesn’t constitute proof of the end of the world.

Margie says:

08:50am | 24/05/11

I have never read anything on Google re climate change.  But from my readings in publications & by noted experts, as well as my life experience of growing up in Qld.with cyclones, storms & droughts over 60 years and now seen the climate change back to what it was when i was growing up, I believe that it is a natural cycle. I know that it is..as do all thinking people with a bit of common sense.  “Global warming” is just another excuse for a tax.  The trouble with the Labor Party is that they have abnsolutely NO COMMON SENSE!!!!!

Catching up says:

08:54am | 24/05/11

persephone, you are correct, most cities, including those inland were running low on water towards the end of the drought.  Many would have been in dire trouble if the drought had last an extra year or two.

ZSRenn says:

08:55am | 24/05/11

I have a few questions.

Can anyone tell me why NASA spent billions of dollars putting temperature measuring satellites into space and then when the figures they were giving debunked the global warming theory dropped those figures from their calculations to revert to ground based figures?

Can anyone tell me why the NASA figures from 1990 when released showed different temperatures for the same years as when they released the figures in 2000?

Can anyone tell me why they rounded the figures they had in later years calculations up but in earlier years calculations rounded them down?

Why the government does not use the CSIRO figures for there calculation of Australia’s emissions in favor of those from treehugger.com?

Finally why are we still debating this when at the end of the day we will save only 0.073% of carbon emissions for the massive cost blow out to Australia?

Mayday says:

09:09am | 24/05/11

Persophone @ 7.04

“However, that said, no one could predict when the drought would end. “

Really?  The Bureau of Meteorology was putting out press releases regarding the La Nina well before the Sydney Desal Plant was built.

I think it was signed off by the NSW Government at least one year before the drought broke and the weather cycle changed as predicted.

So NSW Labor ignored the climate scientists when it suited and built and expensive and unnecessary DeSal Plant whereas Federa Labor keeps pushing the “climate science” down our throats!

persephone says:

09:12am | 24/05/11

Mouse

I’m sure you’ve got some really good evidence to back you up. Just as you had about Muslims.

Yes, climate change has happened in the past. That’s not news. We know that areas which once were glacial now aren’t, and that before the glaciers the same areas were quite warm. That’s a no brainer.

However, the climate never changed without a reason. A cycle has drivers. So when the climate changes, it’s quite reasonable to look for a cause.

Our climate is changing very very quickly. For climate to change as quickly as ours is, the cause should be very obvious - a real give away, like a meteor striking the earth, intense sun activity, massive volcanic eruptions….but we’re not seeing anything like that.

What we are seeing is high levels of CO2 and other gases emitted by human activity.

Given that the usual suspects aren’t at the scene, it’s common sense to look for another culprit.

Increased emissions due to man’s activities fits the frame. And no matter how much this is investigated and questioned, it remains the prime suspect.

There simply isn’t another contender.

You can’t accept that climate is changing without identifying a cause.

Phil

many climate scientists were looking at the science and arguing for it long before it was fashionable.

You’re right, they’ll keep arguing the science, because their job is to report on what their research demonstrates. And it all points to AGW being real and action being needed.

Richard

yerrsss, let’s not let the facts muck things up for you. Much better to shoot the messengers and then say you did it because their message wasn’t what you wanted to hear.

Jay ded

oh dear. Such an abysmal knowledge of the basis of the science sort of discredits you.

See what I wrote in reply to Mouse. And accept that we’re not using a couple of hundred years of recorded data, but are able to look back hundreds of thousands of years.

How do you know that the climate now is different to the climate thousands of years ago? Do you accept that the world was wetter and warmer in the Age of the Dinosaurs? Do you accept that Europe had an Ice Age?

Of course you do.

Do we have climate records going back millions of years to tell us this? Did man’s ancestor - then a small, vole like creature, I understand - faithfully jot down the day’s minimum and maximum temperatures and pass these down through the generations?

Obviously no.

So, equally obviously, we have ways of determing the climate of past eras - millions of years ago - without relying on written records.

persephone says:

09:19am | 24/05/11

Margie

natural cycles have drivers - the climate doesn’t change on a whim. For it to change, something has had to happen to make it change.

Scientists have identified the cause in this case.

Saying ‘the climate changes because it just does’ is a nonsense.

ZSRenn

Personally, I don’t care what the temperature in the upper atmosphere is. I live on the ground, so that’s the one I’m interested in.

Can’t find any reference to the changes in figures, would appreciate a link.

The Climate report released yesterday used information from CSIRO.

Because all responsible world citizens should be playing a part in tackling a world wide problem.

dovif says:

09:44am | 24/05/11

Persephone said

That climate change is real and is anthropogenic is as real as any scientific theory gets

That is completely incorrect. Scientist have a scientific theory about CO2 causing temparature to increase, they have tested the theory and most scientist agrees that there is a linkage.

That said, Scientist knows very little about the atmosphere, which is affected by the Sun, the Moon, other planet, Earth, the sea, solar wind, Human etc. Scientist can hardly predict the weather one day in advance, they cannot predict where typhoons, cyclones or tornado will hit.

Scientist actually knows very little about our atmosphere and it is very possible that future scientific advances might change what we know today

So to say that climate change is real and is anthropogenic is as real as any scientific theory gets, is in complete ignorance of all the facts

Kevin says:

10:00am | 24/05/11

@ Joan “East coast Australias dams are full or near full”.  Melbourne’s water catchments as at 23 May 2011 are at 54.1% of capacity.
@Mayday - during the last La Nina event in 1998-2000, the east coast experience below average annual rainfalls.

Maree says:

10:18am | 24/05/11

Amazing ! If the human effect on climate change was not a line up of political opinions, I believe no one would give rats arse or bother to comment. As usual the political trolls on both sides of politics predictably defend their political beliefs depending on what their favourite political party tells them. Take the political emotion out of the argument you wil find the climate change debate is somewhere in the middle ground.

Anthony says:

10:20am | 24/05/11

Well it is clear which side of the fence you sit on and your article is suitably skewed. You would be wrong when quoting the “worlds top scientists” as really when their works are read their are not many specialists in the field just a collection of nobodies working for either the UN or Governmental agencies, who have been caught out doctoring data to suit. Indeed the science is SO UNSURE the “global warming” tag has been changed to “climate change” just as an each way bet! What this is all about, is the systematic transfer of wealth on a global scale, which many may think would be a godsend for underdeveloped countries, until you find out exactly where that money is going. There is an agenda here that most don’t even consider, or know of, in fact just what the hell these journos think they are reporting on is so far removed from the truth they may as well be writing about coloured balloons at their daughters party.
Indeed Australia’s own “expert” Tim Flannery was not long ago outed for his comments on 2GB when he made the comment ” if every country in the world totally stopped carbon emissions you may not see even a 0.1% change in 1000 years” Now I am no scientist but I think this alone is just cause to sit back, take this to a national referendum or the polls and get it right and inline with the wishes of the Australian People!

RyaN says:

10:56am | 24/05/11

@Eric: I really don’t think Tory gets the irony of the fact that this cartoon is actually about lampooning the previous doom predictions of the very same Tim Flannery STILL being paid millions of taxpayer dollars to sell doom on us all lest we pay more money with no measurable result to that ever so trustworthy Juliar Gillard.
Tim Flannery has already cost Australia billions upon billions of dollars on useless desalination plants, excuse me if I find it hard to believe the man, please reference your cartoon Tory.

acotrel says:

11:11am | 24/05/11

@Anthony
‘their are not many specialists in the field just a collection of nobodies working for either the UN or Governmental ‘

And you’re a ‘somebody’?

Adam says:

11:11am | 24/05/11

@ Pers - “That climate change is real and is anthropogenic is as real as any scientific theory gets - it’s up there with evolution, the most questioned but most robust of scientific theories. If you dismiss AGW, by rights you should have no truck with gravity, a far less proven theory.”

Gravity can be empirically proven. AGW and evolution cannot. This is why they are just unproven theories (i.e. no empirical evidence to support them). They also share another similarity; climate change and evolution are natural processes that, according to their theory, are constantly changing over time. To pick an arbitrary point in time and try to freeze/regulate evolution is just as moronic as picking an arbitrary point in time and trying to stop/regulate the change of earth’s climate (particularly on the basis of an unproven theory that is not supported by empirical evidence). However, if you are going to use unproven theories that lack empirical evidence you may as pray to the sky fairy and ask them to stop/regulate climate change; at least it is cheaper than picking the unproven theory of AGW and implementing a very expensive carbon tax, all without empirical evidence to support what you are doing.

P.S. Is labor proposing a tax to regulate/prevent any change in human evolution on the basis of scaremongering? Any plans afoot to tell people if we don’t stop evolution with a wealth redistribution tax the results could be disastrous for all humandkind?

Adam says:

11:19am | 24/05/11

“Our climate is changing very very quickly. For climate to change as quickly as ours is, the cause should be very obvious - a real give away, like a meteor striking the earth, intense sun activity, massive volcanic eruptions….but we’re not seeing anything like that.
What we are seeing is high levels of CO2 and other gases emitted by human activity.”

Correlation doesn’t equal causation pers. Tsk tsk. I could say we have seen high levels of big mac sales over the period the climate has warmed. Just because there is a positive correlation does not mean the two are related in any way or that big mac sales are the cause of climate change.

Kevin says:

11:29am | 24/05/11

@RyaN
“Tim Flannery has already cost Australia billions upon billions of dollars on useless desalination plants”.
What nonsense.  See my first post above.

Anthony says:

11:46am | 24/05/11

@acotrel says: “and your a somebody” Read their credentials, then go to the anti climate change side and read the credentials of the scientists whom refute it. You see geologists there? Probably many, something lacking on the pro side, but hey if you want to walk the earth with your head in the sand, believe the ranting of the Spanish Inquisition like Juliar lead government be me my guest, no doubt you were watching the clock waiting for the end of the world as well!

marcus says:

12:02pm | 24/05/11

i just watched part of the climate change debate on sky news,  talk about scare mongering, my god apparently australia is responsible for around 5000 deaths in poor nations due to our carbon emmisions,  there is going to be a massive spike in suicde rates as the country warms up etc etc.  Funny though it cut out when direct action was brought up by an audience member.

persephone says:

12:14pm | 24/05/11

Actually, Adam, there’s far more controversy about gravity than there is about climate change.

Gravity only ‘works’ according to the ‘laws’ we understand in certain circumstances. There are alternate theories to explain the observed phenomena, some of which are getting serious consideration.

This is particularly true, I understand, when we’re talking about how gravity works (or doesn’t) outside of earth (lending credence to the old statement - ‘there is no gravity; the earth sucks’).

So my statement - that AGW is one of the best accepted of all scientific theories, up there with evolution - stands.

Given the level of scrutiny AGW has undergone, across a variety of scientific disciplines, that’s no small acheivement.

And I’m not saying correlation is causation - a very poor reading of my argument. I’m saying that the lack of usual suspects lead scientists to look at what was going on and to try and identify a cause.

Of course, initially they came up with several theories, but AGW is the only one to stand up to the testing, including being able to be used to make sound predictions.

Mouse says:

12:16pm | 24/05/11

Hi persephone, yes the Muslims in Mexico are fine thanks!
My post was more questioning than stating fact but of course you want to be a smarty and scream “where’s your proof?” Some proof you asked for then, it’s a bit of a read but does explain the core readings and cycles in easy to understand fashion. I’m not going to cherrypick, you can do that yourself, but this article is not politcally biased or financed, just pure science and data comparison.
http:/www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/ice_ages.html
You stated, “What we are seeing is high levels of CO2 and other gases emitted by human activity”  You are always calling for proof, where’s yours? Here is some contradicting data for your perusal.
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html
Believe it or not, as you will. I’m sorry perse, but I am just never going to be a “carbon tax for the good of the world” believer!

RyaN says:

12:39pm | 24/05/11

@Kevin: are you going to try and claim that Victoria is now in drought?
You AGW people are nuttier than I thought.

Bloggs says:

12:53pm | 24/05/11

persephone - you remain a fool who views short term issues as gospel truth for all seasons. Remember the predictions that London would never again see snow?  But they did.  How about that the drought stopping rains would never come back?  But then they did.

And you say ‘IF’ as if that word means the snow and rains are just an accident.

I will tell you that the World was ever thus.  It changes.  In my 60 years I have seen a few droughts and a few floods and nothing has changed.  They vary in intensity and damage they cause but they are there all the same.  Should you dare to look at history of droughts and floods for the last couple of hundred years you might actually see that this is the way it is. It’s called ‘nature’.  However you and so many others prefer to accept the hype and bullsh*t - how about you pay the tax, and my share too, because I don’t believe in the bullsh*t and don’t choose to pay.

Some self seeking non-scientist like Flannery bullsh*ts and you fools follow his idiotic lead.  He has no more qualification to say what he says than you and I.  It is all conjecture and opinion based upon whatever suits the day.  It isn’t google that tells most of us that this is some sort of stupid government prank. We have lived and do not see this year as any different than 20, 30, 40 or more years ago.

Tory and you both - and lots of others - ‘think’ that the climate warming people are correct.  Myself and others ‘think’ that it’s bullsh*t and that yes, the Australian Government IS stupid enough to spend squillions of dollars on bullsh*t because they do it all the time.

Although notably Australia is the only government dedicated to a carbon tax with no gain to be found.  No real goals set.  No benefits carefully articulated to describe exactly WHAT improvement will be made to the air we breathe and HOW those benefits will be measured.  Nothing… and yet in some insane way people who agree with them expect that a benefit is to be found. 
It’s a bit like the home insulation debacle.  Trust us, it’s not like it will kill you.  But the home insulation debacle did kill people didn’t it.  And still no-one is held t account for those deaths.  No one will be held to account for this rubbish either because this Government it all talk and no action and certainly no accountability. 
Australia’s government is the only government saying they are going to stop us burning coal to make electricity and make us burn gas because it will help the environment, whilst at the same time selling masses of tonnes of coal to India and China and anyone else with money. 

Or does only Australia pollute the atmosphere when they burn coal?  perhaps the government has knowledge the rest of us do not.  Perhaps they think that Chinese flames don’t make pollution - is that because their part of the world works to a different set of physics than our part of the world?

And bushfires…you say?  really?  Bushfires have been with this country since long before the white man arrived from Europe when the locals used it.  Bushfire, like the wind and the air and floods and drought and famine and plagues of bloody rats is a part of life

What a pity Flannery and his cohorts are a part of life.  This tax will spread wealth and no more. He is only serving to drain dollars from the pockets of those who work for it and put in a hard day at earning – to the pockets of the lazy and undeserving.  A fine Socialist he is, just like out fool PM and fool Green leader.

Kevin says:

01:06pm | 24/05/11

@RyaN
You stated “Tim Flannery has already cost Australia billions upon billions of dollars on useless desalination plants”.
As I pointed out in my first post, Victoria’s water catchments were down to something like 25% of capacity.  Without substantial rain, Melburnians were facing the prospect of running out of water or having to drink the mud at the bottom of the reservoirs.  The government would have been derelict in its duty if it hadn’t taken measures to ensure continuity of water supplies.  That is so regardless of whether or not you accept AGW.
The decision to build the desal plant had nothing to do with Tim Flannery.
I realise this doesn’t fit in with your narrative about TF being the devil incarnate.
You need to learn to read instead of imagining that people have written things which they haven’t.
And BTW, nowhere have I come out in support of AGW.  I have taken the trouble to point out where posters, including you, have come out with complete and utter nonsense.

persephone says:

01:22pm | 24/05/11

Mouse

OK, you get marks for making jokes at your own expense!

Bloggs

over ten years ago, when I first started hearing about climate change, I was a sceptic - which is always a good place to start.

I spent a lot of time exploring the subject and was fortunate enough to work with some climate scientists for a while, who swatted back all my curly questions with far more ease than I deal with them here!!

Far from being a Johnny Come Lately, I’ve been agitating for action on climate change for well over a decade. I’ve set up meetings between climate scientists and relevant Ministers, I’ve developed policy (and pushed it through various forums to have it implemented), I’ve arranged public forums, successfully worked at a local level to get action on climate change and delivered lectures at Universities on climate change impacts.

So I’m not following anyone’s lead here.

However, your statement that Australia is acting alone demonstrates that you are. You have accepted information without checking it.

That’s the sign of a blind follower.

Adam says:

01:30pm | 24/05/11

“Of course, initially they came up with several theories, but AGW is the only one to stand up to the testing, including being able to be used to make sound predictions”.

Are you forgetting all the unsound predictions they also made? All the dire predictions that never came to fruition and people screaming about how we act quickly (probably because they were terrified science would catch up with them and debunk their whole AGW fraud). My point still stands; if by your logic you are going rely on mere theories that lack empirical evidence to support your claims of AGW, then you can’t even discount the sky fairy or big macs as a cause of climate change. The application of such logic is what undermines your entire argument.

P.S. You didn’t answer my other question. Any plans to stop the natural process of evolution with a wealth redistribution tax in order to save mankind? Or would such a thing be equally as futile? Perhaps we could call those who are stupid enough to buy into such an idea and whose evolution stops “greenies”. I also note your comments on gravity. Any plans to make a wealth redistribution tax in order force gravity to behave the way we want rather than the way it does naturally?

Mark W says:

01:31pm | 24/05/11

It’s not about believing or not, it’s about scientific debate. Unfortunatly too many doomsday believers jumped on the global warming band wagon because there was a quid in it for them. And like the preachers from the old south if you dared to question them you’d have the wrath come down apon you. More people don’t believe the religion of global climate change than do. There is only merit in the science, not what the preachers are saying. There is also merit in the sceptics, remember when the scientific community condemed those who dared question them on the theory of evolution and that the earth was flat. With out sceptism thats where we would of stayed. Climate change is not the end of the world. However those who are making a quid out of it would like you to believe it is.

RyaN says:

02:34pm | 24/05/11

@Kevin: and I quote “STEVE BRACKS, VICTORIAN PREMIER: We will build one of the world’s biggest desalination plants. This is water for growth. Desalination provides a drought-proof supply in the face of climate change and low rainfall.” in response to Tim Flannery claiming we will never see proper rainfall in Australia again.

Kevin says:

03:26pm | 24/05/11

@RyaN
Fact: In 2007, Victoria had been in drought for 12 years, water reserves were at 30% and dropping, the population of Melb was growing at an unprecedented rate and the last La Nina event in 1998-2000 had produced rainfall at less than the annual rate.
What would you have done in 2007 if you had been Premier?  Prayed for rain?  Performed a rain dance?
If the record rainfalls in the last year hadn’t occurred, Melbourne would be in deep shit now and the government would have been rightfully condemned for having done nothing.
If my cat gets run over a week after getting neutered, you can say the money spent at the vet was wasted but you can’t say that, at the time, I was unwise to have the cat neutered.
Oh, and incidentally, the building of the desal plant was opposed by the Greens.

shane says:

03:30pm | 24/05/11

I have a leaky tap. Probably wasting lots of water. Was gonna get it fixed, but hey, why bother. My water usage isn’t gonna make a measurable difference to Sydney’s water levels.

persephone says:

03:36pm | 24/05/11

Ryan

so you insert a comment about Tim Flannery after a statement by Steve Bracks and say that that proves that Bracks was reacting to Flannery?

Let me tell you, he wasn’t.

Bracks’ comment - and the commitment to a desal plant - was made in the following context.

Wangaratta, which supposedly had a drought proof water supply, was quickly reduced to trucking in water - not because of drought, but because the managers of the reservoir it relied on for its water supply had released too much water in anticipation of rains which never came, effectively flushing a years’ supply of water down the river.

About the same time, Melbourne’s largest storage, the Thompson, looked as if it might have to be closed, as fires encroached on its catchment. If the fires had done this, the water would have been contaminated and unusable for a considerable time.

These events made the Bracks government realise that no responsible government could allow a city of any size to rely on one source of water, particularly a source of water which was rain dependant.

Thus they implemented - throughout the state - a series of supplementary water supplies for all cities, so that no city receives its water from one source alone.

Nothing to do with Flannery. Heaps to do with responsible forward planning, regardless of whether climate change was real or not.

Now, try and find a real quote - not a made up one - which demonstrates the correlation you’re trying to make.

RyaN says:

04:14pm | 24/05/11

@persephone: “Let me tell you, he wasn’t.” Oh really perse, you doing a Juliar Gillard on us there AGAIN huh, and just how do you know that?
Here let me embarass you with the entire transcript shall I. http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2007/s1970053.htm

Quite pathetic but the fact is this Flannery has blatantly cost all of us taxpayers BILLIONS of dollars and been embarrassingly proven wrong time and time again. He should be imprisoned for what he has done to taxpayers.

persephone says:

04:51pm | 24/05/11

Oh dear, Ryan, you really ARE thick as two short ones, aren’t you?

Two - or in this case, several - people being interviewed about the same subject and saying the same thing does not mean that the statements of one caused the actions of another.

If someone asks me what colour the sky is and I say ‘Blue’ and then asks someone else what colour the sky is and they say ‘Blue’ the second person is not saying “Blue’ because I said so.

I’m not at all embarrassed. Not only should you be, but I’d be booking a remedial course in basic comprehension if I were you.

Craig says:

04:54pm | 24/05/11

Erick obviously doesn’t live in Perth. If it wasn’t for desalination plants we’d be out of water already.

Kevin says:

04:59pm | 24/05/11

@RyaN
You continue to make stupid comments and you avoid answering my question:  “What would you have done if you were the Victorian Premier in 2007”?

Drunk Guy says:

05:14pm | 24/05/11

Persiphone says;
  “Far from being a Johnny Come Lately, I’ve been agitating for action on climate change for well over a decade. I’ve set up meetings between climate scientists and relevant Ministers, I’ve developed policy (and pushed it through various forums to have it implemented), I’ve arranged public forums, successfully worked at a local level to get action on climate change and delivered lectures at Universities on climate change impacts.”

With this being said, without evidence you’re just a blowhard with the most unscientific rationale I’ve ever encountered.

A close relative of ours is a metiorologist, and what he’s told us leaves us in no doubt that man and his lust for burning fossil fuels is having an effect on climate as a whole, a tiny effect.
He also tells us that rise and fall of CO2 is not a causitive of global warming, it’s more likely a symptom, deforrestation is more likely to be causitive.
I have little doubt that whilst we continue as a species to use fuels and to continue clearing, that our impact will escalate, however how is charging a tax on an emmission that is a naturally occuring part of life, calling it pollution, and creating a money trail going to do anything positive considering that as the tax impacts and our personal costs rise to the point where we are forced to reduce our footprint, the population is going to be continuing to increase and the country as a whole will have an increased one, but hardship and poverty will increase whilst those who can position themselves in the system will become the next lot of instant millionaires.
Why am I a skeptic about Carbon Tax? because in real terms Australia could do something real, we could increase our areas of forrests, decrease our mining and use emmissions trading to replace the income generated by mines, that would have a real effect on climate and not cause hardship for many of us.

I’m skeptical of a carbon tax because it’s really a tax on air not on pollution.

RyaN says:

05:22pm | 24/05/11

@persephone: what part of “the face of climate change and low rainfall” did you not understand. And you have the gall to call me thick.
Also what part of the preceding statement by Flannery did you not understand.
Look now I understand that you are embarrassed being caught lying again, however you know how you react to the abuse, guess you don’t practice what you preach huh!

RyaN says:

05:26pm | 24/05/11

@Kevin: ““What would you have done if you were the Victorian Premier in 2007”? ” well Kevin, firstly I wouldn’t have bought into the outright lies spouted by Flannery and wasted billions of taxpayer dollars on a massive white elephant.
Secondly I am not the Victorian Premier, he had plenty of options, building a wasteful desal plant was the worst of them.

persephone says:

05:56pm | 24/05/11

Ryan

to prove what you’re trying to prove, you need a statement by Tim Flannery along the lines of “I told the Victorian Premier that he should put in a desal plant as it was never going to rain again’ or the Premier saying, “After Tim Flannery told me….”

Otherwise you do not have the Premier acting because Flannery told him to. What you have is two people who agree on a course of action.

To give you another simple analogy: if I say to you, “Heavens! It looks like it’s going to rain!” and the next person we see has an open umbrella, it does not mean there is a connection between my statement and the other person’s action.

It was simply obvious to both of us what was going to happen and the course of action was thus clear.

So two people - or several - agreeing that a desal plant was needed for Victoria because there was a water shortage, does not mean that one followed the advice of the other.

It simply means that both the problem and the solution were obvious enough for more than one person to see them.

Drunk Guy

well, I know a guy who knew a guy who once talked to someone who knew a climate scientist and he said your guy’s talking rubbish.

So I win.

Honestly!!

Steve Putnam says:

08:32pm | 24/05/11

@Erick do yourself a favour and have a look at the before and after shots of the planets disappearing glaciers and tell me another plausible reason for their sudden exponential rates of shrinkage. As they provide 70% of the world’s fresh water it is a impending catastrophe the like of which humanity has never had to endure. Nobody waits until they are 100% certain that their house is going to burn down before they take out insurance. Don’t you think, to quote R Murdoch “the earth deserves the benefit of the doubt”?
You talk derisively of a “climate-change industry” as if all funding will cease once the climate change thesis is accepted, but you make no mention of the approximately 11,000 PhDs who had no qualms about taking Exxons $US10,000 to peddle some pseudo scientific clap-trap in defense of the denialist position. That’s “cherry picking” par excellence.

B says:

08:51pm | 24/05/11

I see insanity in the form of persephone is out again in force today.

Steve says:

03:38am | 25/05/11

@Erick

I see you crave some real debate. Like last week’s meeting at Cambridge. Both side were well represented. Those present included Phil Jones, John Mitchell, Henrik Svensmark, Ian Plimer and other notables. Google “downing cambridge climate conference” for a selection of write ups from both sides. See if you can find out which of the participants said “Observational evidence is not very useful” and “Our approach is not entirely empirical.”

Adam says:

09:05am | 25/05/11

@ Steve - I think your reading comprehension skills are below par. No one disputes climate change is occurring. They dispute it is caused by humans and so far there is no empirical evidence to support such a theory. More importantly, even if you could show some empirical evidence humans cause some warming effect, the amount would be minuscule when compared to the natural amount of change (i.e. changing our actions or putting in a wealth redistribution tax is not going to change the climate).

RyaN says:

09:52am | 25/05/11

@persephone: right, your spin is as pathetic as your attempt to back out of your abusive comments.
Lets see persephone, we are driving in a car (you are the driver) and I tell you that thousands of people are killed every year on the roads and if you don’t slow down you and I will certainly die in a horrible wreck and that is not a fate I wish to endure. Did I just tell you to slow down? no, just because I didn’t say it directly doesn’t mean I didn’t just use fear mongering, strong arm tactics to force you into it.
I am sure even one of those gullible minds you teach would have called BS on that last attempt to save face.

Chris says:

02:05pm | 26/05/11

Erick, honestly, your a fool. It is settled. If there is ANY industry which has the money and power to fund skepticism it’s the fossil fuel industry, it’s the rich oil and coal companies who have the money to “fund” science. Your a fool. Who IS the “climate-change industry”? There is none. There is only the fossil fuel industry and the emerging renewable, clean, green energy industries which are TRYING to off-set climate change. The INDUSTRY did not create the science, the science came first.

Chris says:

02:05pm | 26/05/11

Erick, honestly, your a fool. It is settled. If there is ANY industry which has the money and power to fund skepticism it’s the fossil fuel industry, it’s the rich oil and coal companies who have the money to “fund” science. Your a fool. Who IS the “climate-change industry”? There is none. There is only the fossil fuel industry and the emerging renewable, clean, green energy industries which are TRYING to off-set climate change. The INDUSTRY did not create the science, the science came first.

RyaN says:

04:47pm | 26/05/11

@Chris: I think you will find Al Gore invented Global Warming, he nearly invented the internet too.

Doug Cotton says:

06:00pm | 06/07/11

Kindly read my site http://earth-climate.com which is too detailed to repeat here.  It contains important information for all to read.

LeftRightOut says:

06:24am | 24/05/11

Pretty easy to get people to side with your theory, if any dissenters are treated like nutjobs.

Greg Livingston says:

07:14am | 24/05/11

Ask Mr Combet these simple questions.  I did. 
Where is CO2 measured?
What controls are used to differentiate Natural from Anthropogenic? How long have we been measuring CO2 in the atmosphere? 
What is the global benefit of Australia reducing by 5% by 2020? (1 grain of builders sand out of a 13 tonne tip truck per year by the way).

His answer: We as a government support the idea that climate change is occuring and the best way to address it is with a Carbon Trading Scheme.

acotrel says:

07:36am | 24/05/11

@SuperD I realise that most people live in a black and white world, but scientists are trained to handle uncertainties. It’s a major difference between them and engineers!

persephone says:

07:52am | 24/05/11

Greg

ask Combet all the simple questions you want - all you’ll do is convince him you’re a simpleton.

Seriously, when he’s weighing up the advice coming in from scientific experts against a handful of ignoramuses who demonstrate by their questions their lack of understanding of the basics, whose side do you think he’s going to come down on?

To give a game stab at your questions, whilst admitting - as Combet does -that I’m not a scientist—-

1. Depends what you’re measuring it for. If you’re looking at past events, you can capture in from trapped air in ice cores. If you’re looking at factory emissions, you can trap the emissions from the factory and measure that. If you’re measuring it in the air, step outside with a beaker.

2. Measurement and comparison. We know how many volcanoes there are, for example, and can work out what they emit. We can look at air trapped in ice cores centuries ago and compare it to now.

3. For several decades. However, we can determine CO2 concentrations failry accurately over thousands of years, using a variety of methods.

4. Which is why Australia is working towards a global solution - and if we get it, we’ll be cutting emissions by a lot more than 5%.

To be taken seriously in negotiations towards a serious figure, we have to show we’ve got skin in the game.

But yes, go ahead and flood Combet with emails. The science is settled. A few missives from nutjobs won’t change that.

iansand says:

08:45am | 24/05/11

Greg Livingstone - What do you mean “where”?  Are you suggesting there is such a thing as an area withe elevated CO2 somewhere on the Earth, and that that place is where measurements have been taken?

The first measurements of the relative concentration of gases in the atmosphere were made in the 1820s.  Since that time the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by about 30%.  Coincidentally, in that time a heck of a lot of fossil fuels have been burnt.  Burning fossil fuels produces CO2.  Where else do you think the increase may have come from?

Australia + UK + Europe + China (yes - China is taking steps to reduce emissions) + California + ... +  ...  Australia is one of the last holdouts of doubt.

nutjob says:

09:00am | 24/05/11

mmmm.  Without the rest of the world doing the same thing, it’s similar to a butterfly fart - it will have no effect on the “world” generation of CO2.

ZSRenn says:

09:00am | 24/05/11

@ pers If Combat is using true science why has he abandoned the figures from CSIRO to use those from treehugger.com in his calculations?

persephone says:

09:22am | 24/05/11

ZSRenn

I’m not aware that he did so - the report states that CSIRO helped put it together.

Please provide a link when you make statements like this; otherwise, for all we know, you could be just making stuff up.

jf says:

09:23am | 24/05/11

Greg Livingston says:07:14am | 24/05/11

“Ask Mr Combet these simple questions.  I did. 

His answer: We as a government support the idea that climate change is occuring and the best way to address it is with a Carbon Trading Scheme.”

Your follow up question should have been “why then, Mr Combet, do you own a beachfront holiday home”.

They questions as to how a lifelong public servant can afford a very expensive holiday home should probably be best left to be asked by the workers he purported to represent.

Super D says:

09:32am | 24/05/11

@iansand - exactly what steps is China taking to reduce its emissions?  I hope you’re not claiming that a reduction in emissions intensity is the same as a reduction in emissions because that would just be silliness of the highest order.

Greg L says:

11:39am | 24/05/11

@persephone,
I don’t regard myself as a simpleton, ignoramus nor nutjob.  This is however, exactly how I was treated by my own parliamentary representative upon asking simple questions.  I have 2 tertiary education qualifications in the fields of Science and Technology, Industry studies and Education and I am tired of being told by albeit well-meaning zealots that “the science is in”.  You need to be reminded that this is in your opinion, but not mine.  All who aren’t of the same accepting opinion are not necessarily deniers nor sceptics.  I read here that some are placing the acceptance of gravitational forces in the same class of argument when looking at scientific process. Very funny indeed and really it just makes the true sceptics and deniers more determined.
I do not discount the possibility, in fact probability,  that the worlds population and industries are contributing to atmospheric changes. To do so would be moronic. I do however have remaining doubts as to the actual measurable and repeatable factors which are about to doom us all to scorched earth and Hollywood style disasters.

It’s obvious that your mind is set and you are passionate about it, but resorting to name calling is a little less than dignified and does your cause no good.  I, on the other hand have an open mind and merely seek as much information as I can get in order to become a well advised and discerning individual. If Mr Combet has the answers to my simpleton’s questions, as he should being the Minister, why would he not gladly provide them to bring me on side?

MarK says:

11:58am | 24/05/11

“+ China (yes - China is taking steps to reduce emissions)”

This is a lie.

A lie in fact.

persephone says:

12:30pm | 24/05/11

Greg

it’s not a case of how you regard yourself - some people, after all, think they’re Jesus (as Dire Straits said, one of them must be wrong).

And one can get through numerous University degrees and still come out the other end a twit.

Your original post could be summarised as ‘what a smarty pants I am, asking these really hard questions’ when, in fact, it simply demonstrated the paucity of your knowledge and your lack of understanding of some of the simplest issues.

I call it how I see it; I’m not here to pander to your ego.

Go and get educated.

Amityville says:

01:14pm | 24/05/11

Hard to sake that denial thing when you get started isn’t it MarK?
Kind of like booze and other addictive substances.

The science is settled your refusal to admit it is called denial. or ignorance if you prefer.

China
Professor Garnaut says although China has not agreed to an emissions trading scheme, it has committed to more ambitious emissions cuts than Australia.

“If we are informed and honest we will acknowledge China is contributing to a strong global mitigation effort in a way that for the time being we are not,” he told a business luncheon in Melbourne.

“If we are informed and honest we will acknowledge that China is showing leadership.

“So far the Australian polity has preferred the comfort of ignorance.

“How many times have you heard the ignorant statement that Australia is justified in delaying action on climate change because China and the rest of the world are doing nothing?”

MarK says:

05:27pm | 24/05/11

“Amityville says:

01:14pm | 24/05/11

Hard to sake that denial thing when you get started isn’t it MarK?
Kind of like booze and other addictive substances.”

Oh I know Amity.

It was undoubtedly not meant as a slur by you but I am an alcoholic. I haven’t drunk in years now but still suffer psychological problems and have to spend time in mental hospitals regularly.

Tried suicide more than a few times and to my never ending embarrassment have not succeeded yet. Is there anything more pathetic than a substance dependent person that cannot even kill themselves?

i can’t even get that right.

I however have read the full Commissions Report. I have recanted. The science is settled.

It is irrefutable. This report was done for the betterment of all Australians by fiercely independent scientists that went in with no preconceived notions and studied the facts and reported responsibly.

We need to act Amity. I am on side.

Again it is undoubted that the coalitions plan is a plan to do nothing. We all know that. What a joke when faced with what is correctly a moral challenge that cannot be denied.

Thus action and hard action is required. We need to ensure Combet and Gillard push the carbon tax through as only a market based mechanism that takes us rapidly to a de-carbonised economy asap.

the only worry know is a start point of less than $40 will be a token and not enough. Compensation is also ridiculous we must change. The Greens ahve been saying $50-100 is a better START point.

I have to agree. We need to shock the system. We cannot stand idly by as our kids and grandkids are endangered. A midpoint between the Greens start figures seems to be fair.

$75 seems fair. I only hope this is enough. I urge Labor to consider seriously this start point given the gravity of the situation and then outline further measures to raise it annually while attacking the coal billionaire barons and ensuring they cannot open new mines and must reduce their production annually to. 10% per annum given we have a decade to act until we shut the industry down in 10 years. This will force the electricity providers to change.

Our kids and grandkids deserve it.

Do you agree?

B says:

09:17pm | 24/05/11

Persephone

Your arrogance is one of the reasons noone belieives the whole AGW tripe.  You wouldnt need to be so condesending if you had knowledge and actual facts on your side.  Which it is quite obvious you dont.

I actually happen to think that Greg’s question is valid.  So your saying if you ask me a question about something you dont know I can assume you dont know anything and are a simpleton?

“Seriously, when he’s weighing up the advice coming in from scientific experts against a handful of ignoramuses who demonstrate by their questions their lack of understanding of the basics, whose side do you think he’s going to come down on?”

I fail to see what BASICS you are referring to.  There are no BASICS in this debate because the science is not setledled.  No matter how many times you say it persephone, the science IS NOT SETTLED.  Get it??  Moronic individual.

B says:

09:21pm | 24/05/11

iansand

It is well known that there exists areas called “carbon sinks”  where carbon dioxide will congregate.

Carbon dioxide is a heavier gas than air.  It will sink.  So in theory, any low lying area will contain more carbon dioxide than the equivalent area 100 feet heigher in sea level.

Willie Mac says:

07:46am | 24/05/11

If you think your time is being wasted, don’t read the article. Then we don’t have to hear your whinging and everybody wins.

acotrel says:

08:04am | 24/05/11

@Left Right Out
‘Yet another pile of absolute tish from Tory, how does she stay employed? Even more curious, how on earth did she elevate herself to opinionista?’

She’s just a trouble maker trying to provoke THOUGHT !  No wonder you’re uncomfortable with her?

Joan says:

08:24am | 24/05/11

Give any scientific paper Mr Flim Flams stamp of approval and any credibility of the paper flushed down the gurgler quick smart.

sol says:

08:24am | 24/05/11

Yes! Who comes to the Punch to read opinion! What absolute tish!

N8 says:

08:43am | 24/05/11

I think that she exemplified her point beautifully about Google experts with the statement “they think the science is still up in the air. It’s not.” I have never met a scientist that is prepared to use language like this. Even the fundamentals like gravity are never referred to as settled. The only people who talk that way are the people playing politics whether it be to gain more funding, get more readers or grab more votes.

iansand says:

08:49am | 24/05/11

On the contrary, the link is entirely reasonable.  The defining characteristic of climate “sceptics” is that they are only sceptical about research that supports AGW.  For some reason they will not direct their sceptical blowtorch at the twaddle that comes out of the keyboards of other “sceptics” (or, more likely, they lack the intellectual armoury to do so).  They are not sceptics at all.  They are apostles.

Reg says:

09:01am | 24/05/11

Part of the problem is Tory thinks she’s intelligent (and therefore her opinion is correct) despite the glaringly obvious (people a lot smarter than her cannot agree on this issue… and she is not that bright).

Clearly a proper debate is needed, but that is not in this government’s interests.

It is a lot easier to brand them as being “deniers”.

This reminds me of Y2K with the amount of panic some sections are trying to drum up… remember that one?

How did that all turn out (I can’t remember because I was off my face that night)?

MarK says:

10:42am | 24/05/11

“The point is that everyone I see in here arguing against climate change being real uses flawed arguments, non-peer-reviewed studies, attacks on individuals or simplistic case studies such as “But it’s snowing!” - and that’s just not good enough. “

Show me where I have done this.

Also back up your seeming assertion that the peer review precess is inviolate and pure. It is one thing to demand peer review as a basis for acceptance but I charge you with proving the process was as is not corrupted.

Do I need to say please or is it all “settled” anyway?

Joel B1 says:

10:44am | 24/05/11

@ Tory “everyone I see in here arguing against climate change being real uses flawed arguments ... such as"but it’s snowing”“

But PM Gillard and Brown use the weather all the bloody time to say AGW is real and man-made. Why aren’t you criticising them?

Here’s what the IPCC head says “\But what happens in Queensland or for that matter the floods in the Mississippi River right now, whether there is a link between those and climate change is very difficult to establish. So I don’t think anyone can make a categorical statement on that.”

and

“Specific natural disasters such as Cyclone Yasi and the Brisbane floods could not be directly linked to man-made climate change”

So Tory why aren’t you having a go at PM Gillard? Or is that not allowed, only us sheep can be told we’re thick?

Bobster says:

11:28am | 24/05/11

Hehehe. That one cut a bit close to the bone MarK?

Why don’t you post up another link from Conservapedia to provie your point.

I think we need to coin a new term, no longer are you Climate Sceptics. Arise, Climate Truthers.

MarK says:

12:01pm | 24/05/11

No Bobster.

Tory is full of shit.

That is all.

Call me what you like it really doesn’t matter. It doesn’t change what is empirical and what is based of computer models.

You are free to answer the questions I posed to Tory and provide the proof required to make the assertions stand up.

Bobster says:

12:44pm | 24/05/11

Mate, the issue is you and your clan of truthers (I’m sticking with that one, I like it) refuse to acknowledge anything you disagree with but you’re happy to dredge up any garbage that backs you up with absolutely no effort to authenticate any of it

You are solidly in the camp of the truthers and birthers and you don’t deserve the word sceptic.

You can hide behind the “asking questions” joke all you want but it doesn’t change the fact that your position is purely ideological.

You don’t like the left and you see the left as driving the climate action issue (which is ridiculous because sober minds on both ends of the spectrum are happy to look at the evidence).

You are happy to sit in front of a computer, under an air-conditioner or heater, after using motorised transport to get to work and use the internet to claim that science is based on assumption and not fact.

If you can’t see the problem with that then you have no right to act like an indignant three-year-old when you’re told the grown-ups know better.

If John Howard was putting forward this plan you would love it and you would laud it as a wonderfully conservative approach, using market mechanisms to affect a social outcome.

LeftRightOut says:

12:52pm | 24/05/11

@Tory, indeed you are correct, no need to be rude - apologies for my early morning, pre-caffeine rant.
It doesn’t change the fact, that you yourself, fail to see the offence in your own utterances in relation to anyone who shows any sign of sceptical position in relation to AGW theory.

There are indeed contradictions in your piece, as pointed out above (you failed to address these contradictions). To link AGW sceptics to thruther crackpots, or intelligent design subscribers, is offensive - rude if you will.
Even if your only aim was to draw an analogy (do you also label sceptics as “deniers”?), the analogy is completely false. To suggest that being sceptical of the doomsday predictions we constantly hear from the same discredited sources, is the same as refuting the theory of evolution simply confirms my point, and criticism.

This is a complex issue, yes there are people on the sceptical side who have some silly views, but these are at least equally matched on the ProAGW side. You though, ignore or disregard the well doumented flaws on the Pro side, and lump any opposing view together as nutcases - and you complain about me being offensive!

You talk of peer review - yet, any critical analysis of the current peer review process as it relates to “climate science” shows that the whole process has been effectively hijacked. Do some reading about that, it is very interesting.

You’ll note I’ve not disagreed with the science, but I’m pretty sure which bunch you’d put me in - which, if correct, would confirm my point yet again

Your last paragraph highlights an overly simplistic approach.
“The point is that everyone I see in here arguing against climate change being real uses flawed arguments, non-peer-reviewed studies, attacks on individuals or simplistic case studies such as “But it’s snowing!” - and that’s just not good enough.”

Talk about not good enough. I’m only a part timer here, and I see a lot more than that - like plenty of “climate scientists”, you appear to suffer from confirmation bias.

Saint says:

08:23am | 24/05/11

Tim Flannery is a dinosaur expert, not a scientist.

Talented Rugby Player says:

08:24am | 24/05/11

Add to your list the very wrong predictions from Ove Hoegh-Guldberg (uni of Qld) since circa 1998 about the supposed deterioration of the Barrier Reef.  One his own colleagues disputes Ove Hoegh-Guldberg’s assessment.

acotrel says:

09:00am | 24/05/11

@Saint If Tim Flannery is a dinosaur expert, he’d know all about the Liberal Party and it’s supporters!

Bobster says:

01:07pm | 24/05/11

The Liberal Party doesn’t believe in dinosaurs. The fossils were put here to test our faith.

Kika says:

02:47pm | 24/05/11

Saint - Whats a Paeoleontologist then?

The Badger says:

03:20pm | 24/05/11

Kika
most likely it’s a misspelling of Palaeontologist.

Willie Mac says:

07:55am | 24/05/11

Can’t really blame them for the health care debacle when the states didn’t want to sign on, as is their right.

Who else do you trust to make any sort of achievement with reducing carbon emissions while looking out for ordinary citizens? The Greens? They don’t care about the average person. The Coalition? To borrow Abbott’s phrase, his direct action policy is absolute crap.

Bob Croser says:

08:50am | 24/05/11

Spot on, Against the Man - the fact is that your average punter is fed up with anything that Gillard wholeheartedly supports. A feeling of deja vu, a shrug of the shoulders and - “here we go again!” If her track record was even slightly better, the public might be more accepting of her whims.

Against the Man says:

12:44pm | 24/05/11

Willie, I agree you can’t blame Gillard for the States playing hard ball on health, but you can blame her for saying she has had a meeting and sorted it all out and everything is fine. That is a lie!

As for trusting a political party, gillard’s lie about no carbon tax clearly shows she isn’t making good ALP policy for Australia but bad Green’s policy for her own survival.

The Coalition are not perfect but they did a pretty good job for 11 years, Rudd didn’t last a term and Gillard has done nothing of value coming up to 1 year on the job.

acotrel says:

07:58am | 24/05/11

@WallyW We gave you your big TV and your computer.  What are you complaining about?

N8 says:

08:59am | 24/05/11

You are right about the intuition bit. The predicting the end of the world unless we act with massive cost now, the refusal to engage with questions or descent, the totalitarian “we the elite will save you the great unwashed from yourselves” style of conduct, it just all seems well….. Tory you just speak too much like Bob Brown and it sets my BS detector off.

WallyW says:

09:04am | 24/05/11

Actually only have one TV. A big old fat one! All you gave me and every other Australian was a wretched budget deficit that we’ll be paying off under the next Liberal government.

Aaron says:

10:30am | 24/05/11

Actually WallyW… In case you’ve been under a rock the last two months you will be paying it back under a Labor Govt. This is why people are so upset about the latest budget…

David C says:

11:22am | 24/05/11

OK we understand the globe has warmed and we are reasonably confident man has contributed to this warming. That is where “the science is settled” ends. There is still a huge amount of uncertainty in the future. Will there be effects , of course there will but there is no agreement that it will be all bad
this statement is a clasic

There’s some debate around the periphery – just how much of climate change is due to humans, for example, or exactly what the effects of climate change will be

that is not the periphery that is the core!!!!. If we dont know the future impacts how do we know the solution???
And there is also a large debate as to what is the major cause of climate change .. CO2 may be just 1 cause and it might actually be minor compared to deforestation, aerosols and water management
The carbon tax approach is flawed beacuse it is aimed at curbing consumption, (there are no efficient alternatives available now) this will affect those least likely to afford it.
Make the alternates cheaper

David C says:

11:35am | 24/05/11

Tory you ask what is a better way to understand climate change than science? There is another way and that is politics. With a large degree of uncertainty about the future then people claiming certainty are just playing politics

WallyW says:

11:47am | 24/05/11

Oooooooooh Tory big challenge - you pulled out the big one!!! How about philosophy to start with? Is science really such an objective and totally rational thing? Maybe scientists would understand their methodology and conclusions better if they got in touch with their subconscious defaults and assumptions. Maybe they wouldn’t hold themselves out as above question? Maybe they wouldn’t assume that humanity is the enemy of a pristine, utopian, balanced creation?

Bobster says:

11:52am | 24/05/11

WallyW,

Are you aware of the level of irony emissions created when you use a computer to claim science is simply a faith-based exercise?

Nafe says:

12:27pm | 24/05/11

Tory, What about investigating history and the normal climate cycles?

fml says:

02:16pm | 24/05/11

WallyWhere,

“Maybe they wouldn’t hold themselves out as above question?”

You certainly do not understand the nature of science.

Angry God of Townsville says:

04:45pm | 24/05/11

Tory, To use the science would be a good start, but none (and I mean none) of the datasets are accurate (thanks to the climate scientists modifying the data and subsequently loosing the originals), none of the computer models come close to replicating near date hypothesis let alone be accurate enough to trust 50 years into the future and none of the predictions of the climate scientists occur.

So as an intelligent individual I then look to the sceptical side of the discussion and note more diversified information that results in the reflection of current environmental conditions. That you compare those who have had a good look at the corruption of the data and the use of faulty models, the withholding of information (contrary to Freedom of information requirements) and still side against this position makes me wonder what it would require for a journalist start to look to see if there is something in the sceptical discussion instead of dismissing it out of hand.

You question my motives in being sceptical, I have a young family, work in a relatively unaffected industry and read extensively,. I have no financial advantage in stocks in related or affected industries nor career impacts. I am sceptical because the basics of the science do not adequately correlate in to the impacts stated. If they did, and if the models managed to provide a level of confidence then maybe I would be less doubtful.

But they do not, and if the data was able to be provided without the biases imposed by Jones, Hansen, Mann et.al then I would look to the science with confidence. This industry has failed to be a science for years, the more that their methods of operation are inspected the less confidence I have in its validity. As such, how can we base our economy on such inconsistent and invalid results.

Richard says:

08:24pm | 24/05/11

Tory, like it says in the bible, you judge a tree by its fruits. Likewise, you judge a scientific theory by the validity of its predictions.

Now that all of the famous predictions from climate alarmists have been categorically proved by time to be wrong, we can safely say that the science they use is invalid.

That’s not to say that climate change isn’t occurring, because it is. Its just that its happening much more slowly than the alarmists want us to believe. The the latest, most up-to-date and accurate science shows that our planet is rather good at maintaining homeostasis all on its own, and that due to negative feedbacks loops (instead of the positive feeback loops that the alarmists inexplicably decided to use in their projections, despite there being no good reason to do so) we have many decades of time up our sleeves to formulate an appropriate response to the problem of climate change.

By that time technology will have advanced exponentially. There is no need to destroy our economy with a carbon tax (and it will destroy our economy, I have proved this on the punch numerous times) when we have plenty of times to act. Don’t listen to the hysterical greens and their paid sycophants Tory, don’t be so gullible. As a senior journalist at News Ltd Tory, you ought to know better than that.

wakeuppls says:

07:53am | 24/05/11

Galileo was a heretic for heliocentricity in his time. These days you’re a social heretic for being skeptical.

persephone says:

09:29am | 24/05/11

And Galileo came to his conclusions based on the evidence, just as today’s climate scientists have.

The people who doubted him were those who had not looked at the evidence or who lacked the knowledge to understand it.

Sony B Goode says:

09:52am | 24/05/11

persephone you are so clutching at straw now that it’s quite comical.

Like all cause peddlers you have such a powerful self-righteousness and belief in your own world view that you will align yourself with anything that supports your own delusions.

I have posted numerous counterfactuals to “the settled science” which only the blind will refuse to see, why don’t you address those rather than keep harping on about your persecuted self-righteousness

wakeuppls says:

09:56am | 24/05/11

Like politicians? They regularly admit to being ignorant to the science.

Your name:Michael says:

11:08am | 24/05/11

Bullshit Persephone, the people that doubted Galileo were those that had vested interests in their own reputations as scientists and the governments of the time who had invested in the opinions of a very loud but ignorant section of the community that couldn’t accept that their universal view was INCORRECT.
Galileo found evidence that all the others had overlooked or plain refused to even look at because science was fraud before galileo.
Galileo was a denier of geocentrism, and a proponent of heliocentrism
the first Denier of humanity as the centre of everything.

You Persephone, would now have us believe that Galileo would have taken the current “science” at face value because the rest of the scientific community had supported the view at the time, Galileo would have done the opposite.

persephone says:

12:16pm | 24/05/11

Galileo would have made his judgements based on the evidence.

The evidence all points to AGW being real.

Therefore Galileo would have believed in AGW.

Get over it.

wakeuppls says:

12:51pm | 24/05/11

Galileo on principle would be a skeptic, as are all decent scientists, considering the evidence is no where near beyond doubt. Maybe you should get over the fact that buying a lie makes you gullible.

Michael says:

12:54pm | 24/05/11

Persephoney, you are a liar, the historical record shows that science at the time was all pointing at earth as the centre of the universe because thats what they all wanted everyone to believe, the church was the big stick that kept scientists lying, Galileo was treated then as you and AGW believers treat sceptics now, with contempt.

Galileo did base his conclusions on the evidence he found, not the accepted science of the time.

You have defeated your own arguement Perse’ better than i or anyone else could have :D

MarK says:

12:55pm | 24/05/11

Ahhh peresphone.

Knows what Galileo would have thought. Well that’s a clincher

persephone says:

01:26pm | 24/05/11

MarK

so a handful of posters here say they know what Galileo would be doing, and you single me out?

Just demonstrating your own bias.

MarK says:

01:45pm | 24/05/11

I truly apologise pers. On this issue you are 100% correct.

I have had an epiphany.

See my latest comments.

We must have a carbon tax now.

Bobster says:

02:55pm | 24/05/11

“Galileo on principle would be a skeptic,”

Which is why your rabble does not deserve the title sceptic.  There is a difference between being a sceptic and being a contrarian.

b says:

11:29pm | 24/05/11

persephone

Your propaganda lines are so old.  Noone is listening anymore!!!  Get Over It

acotrel says:

08:01am | 24/05/11

@Paul Mc Crager So climate change is a load of crap?  Who said that?  And why are you repeating the lie?

Deena says:

08:19am | 24/05/11

Tax will not save the planet, a progressive smart government will, unfortunately the Labor/Greens/Independents are not that smart government!

For those of you (a great majority) who will lose money with the slump in the housing price drop and who will be paying more for groceries in the next 6 months, please associate this great financial loss with the ALP government. Some might say this isn’t logical but than voting for a PM that back stabbed the previous PM and who could develop a policy to save her life doesn’t seem logical either.

fml says:

02:19pm | 24/05/11

Deena,

What will a progressive and smart government do? and how will they achieve this with out tax?

Climate God says:

08:05am | 24/05/11

Howard went to the 2007 election with a policy because AGW was at it’s political zenith and it would have been political suicide to not do so. The left and the electorates flirtation with the Greens as a result of being disenfranchised by both the Coalition and Labor almost guaranteed that.

Regardless, just a few questions as you seem to have the inside running into the governments rationale:

1. What part of climate change contributed to the bushfires in 2007 that you cite? Summer was it?
2. What decrease in temperature will result from a carbon tax in Australia?
3. What diplomatic and economic pressure is being put onto China, India, Brazil, Russia et al. to fall in line with our presumed correct global attitude?
4. And finally, if TIm Flannery (not an expert by your own admission) talks nonsense in a forest, but no-one is there to hear his dire incorrect predictions, should we all still reach for the tin foil hats?

Thanks in advance.

wakeuppls says:

08:05am | 24/05/11

Many things contribute to the cost of living, and a 1 in 50 year natural disaster is just one of those many.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_natural_disasters

The top 3 disasters by death toll were over 80 years ago. Do you think they were blaming climate change for those?

The Duke says:

08:56am | 24/05/11

Are you saying the fires and floods are a DIRECT result of AGW ???
Prove it ??
“Climate change” is a convenient broad sweeping prejudicial generalisation—As the predicitions of Nostradamus have been manipulated over the years to be relevent to current events—so to is climate “science”—you give the example of a botanist—so WTF is Tim Flannery’s excuse ???

MarK says:

09:39am | 24/05/11

“I wonder how the survivors of the 2007 fires or the floods in Queensland feel about rolling with the punches. I’m sure that they would rather have avoided the punches to begin with….or that they were not so hard. “

Was this in The Day After Tomorrow pers?

Talk about naive. How interesting you quote weather events to prove climate science.

persephone says:

09:49am | 24/05/11

Climate God

Yes, because responsible governments have to act when confronted with irrefutable evidence. Which is why Tony Abbott also has an action plan. In fact, it’s very hard to find a government or Opposition party which hasn’t.

If the science was shonky, some reputable government somewhere would call them on it.

1. Sorry, Black Saturday. Long period of extremely hot weather. Long period of drought with historically low rainfalls. Climate change thus definitely a contributor.

2. None. We’re trying to keep it to a global 2 degree rise. If you don’t understand that, you shouldn’t be talking about the issue, because your ignorance is inexcusable.

3. Heaps. Which is why they all feel the need to demonstrate that they’re doing something.

4. If every word which falls from TF’s mouth is shown to be incorrect, that doesn’t change the science one jot. Just as if if anything I say here is disproved, it doesn’t change the science either.

In both cases, we’re commentators, not researchers.

wakeupps

Fruit and vegies are up because of flood and cyclones, and we have a flood levy on top of that, so these rises in prices can be clearly linked to climate change.

I’m sure you’d rather they hadn’t gone up, just as I’m sure that people who endured the floods and cyclones wish they hadn’t been quite so severe.

And read your link again - two of the top three were in the last forty years.

The Duke

no, I’m not. I’m saying it was a contributing factor.

When scientists predict something - in this case, an increase in the frequency and severity of natural disasters - and what they predict happens, this is usually seen as demonstrating the strength of their theory.

So we would still have bushfires, cyclones, etc without global warming, but they would neither be as frequent or as severe.

Joel B1 says:

09:54am | 24/05/11

“SARAH CLARKE: Australia produces about 1.5 per cent of the world’s CO2. Should Australia be playing a leading role in this debate or are we by no means a leader; we’re being left behind?

RAJENDRA PACHAURI: Well I really wouldn’t know what to say about Australia. But all I can say is globally as a society we need to do much more”

If the head of the IPCC isn’t sure about Australia’s effect on global warming why is Tory so very, very sure?

He also expressed caution about “interpreting natural disasters as AGW”.
But that wouldn’t stop Gillard dribbling on about them would it?

(can’t the ref right now but it’s out there.)

wakeuppls says:

11:08am | 24/05/11

persephone
Actually, the top 3 from the list that matters (top 10 ever recorded) are all from China and are all from over 80 years ago. Further, if you compare population densities at the times of these disasters, you would also find that those that happened longer ago were worse in terms of casualties per capita.

You would make a good politician, misleading people like you just tried to do.

Vince says:

11:14am | 24/05/11

@Climate God - “Howard went to the 2007 election with a policy because AGW was at it’s political zenith and it would have been political suicide to not do so.”

Or, another way of of putting it, Howard was lying just so he could get re-elected. 

And Abbott is doing so as well. 

Let’s be honest here, in this forum.  Abbott won the leadership by one measly vote because he gave the wink wink to Nick Minchin et al that he didn’t actually support action on climate change and privately thinks the science is settled argument is “crap”.  They backed him over Hockey and Turnbull because of this issue.

Now, officially, Abbott actually supports action on climate change.  But you have rightly pointed out that his mentor Howard would gladly pretend to support it just to get elected and I think it’s pretty obvious to most of us that Abbott is doing the same.  He doesn’t really support the idea.  He’s just putting on a political act.  He will delay, stall etc. without really committing the country to action.

I say, if he doesn’t want to do anything about it, say so and let the chips fall where they may.  Be a man of principle.  It’s the least he can do if he intends to lead this country.

Nafe says:

12:46pm | 24/05/11

Perse, Sorry to say but the green religion has more to do with people being killed in bushfires than anyone else.

Bushfires have been occuring as an almost yearly event since this time of the Aboriginal only presence on this land.. Only recently have these cases costed more lived and more property (naturally there are exceptions like the Ash Wednesday fires but these were few and far between) because the greens thought it was a good idea to let people build next to forests and bushland and then outlaw the practise of backburning and creating a fire break.

It’s not global warming, its lack of commen sence by the green religion.

Nafe says:

12:51pm | 24/05/11

Vince,

I think your point actually is an implied point and no one actually believed Abbott is serious about tackeling Climate Change. I am a Liberal supporter and not just trying to stir the pot, but if anyone think Abbott is doing anything other than a token policy then thay are as deluded as those people thinking the science is actually settled.

persephone says:

02:28pm | 24/05/11

Nafe

That bushfires are more frequent and more severe than ever before is undoubted.

We have not only over two hundred years of direct observation to confirm this, we have the evidence of soil samples and the plants themselves - which are designed to cope with a longer fire cycle than we are experiencing at present - to confirm that fires are more frequent than they would be naturally.

But let’s put that down to a growth in population, meaning there is more likelihood that fires will be lit.

That doesn’t change the fact that the kind of conditions fires like - long stretches of hot dry weather - are occuring more frequently.

Interestingly (sadly) Black Saturday wasn’t the big killer. Nearly twice as many people died in the week before the fires due to the heat.

Even without the fires themselves, that week rates as one of the biggest natural disasters Victoria has experienced.

RyaN says:

02:52pm | 24/05/11

@persephone: “That bushfires are more frequent and more severe than ever before is undoubted. ” the IPCC chairman states “Frankly, it is difficult to take a season or two and come up with any conclusions on those on a scientific basis,” Dr Pachauri

So to claim the frequency of bushfires as a link to man made carbon dioxide is clearly unscientific.

Next I will ask you for the direct evidence please.

After that I will ask you to show the research that shows a human marker in global warming. If you cannot show the human marker yet claim that humans are causing it, clearly you are being unscientific because you have zero evidence to back up your statement.

David C says:

03:36pm | 24/05/11

there is no evidence of climate change in the disasters this year or last or even in any of the global disasters?
Just because a weather event occurs (that has occured before) does not mean its climate change

persephone says:

03:42pm | 24/05/11

wakeupp

no, two of the top three are from China, and two of the top three occurred within the last forty years.

So you’re wrong. Re read your link.

Ryan

given you’ve just made up a quote attributed to Bracks, I’m scarcely going to believe the Pachauri one without a link - for a start, i think the man can express himself more grammatically than that.

No one climate event can be attributed to climate change, correct. But we can say (safely) that the increase in frequency and intensity of such events are.

So we can’t say that Black Saturday wouldn’t have happened if it hadn’t been for climate change. But we can say that, in all likelihood, it wouldn’t have been as intense, and we wouldn’t have had similar fires in 2003 and 2006.

To accurately say ‘this climate event was solely due to climate change’ (something I never do) we would need a spare Earth.

wakeuppls says:

04:05pm | 24/05/11

persephone
Ok, you are quite obviously mentally incompetent, so I’ll copy paste the top 3 from the table.
1.  1,000,000–2,500,000*[1]  1931 China floods   China   July, November, 1931
2.  900,000–2,000,000[2]  1887 Yellow River flood   China   September, October, 1887
3.  830,000[3]  1556 Shaanxi earthquake   Shaanxi Province, China   January 23, 1556

I would appreciate someone else with a functional brain to confirm what I have just posted, again.

David C says:

04:06pm | 24/05/11

this is a relevant article .. take away

[T]here is no discernable evidence that the normalized data are being influenced by climate change due to the emission of greenhouse gases

http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/admin/publication_files/2010.41.pdf

RyaN says:

04:33pm | 24/05/11

@persephone: given you’ve just made up a quote attributed to Bracks” did I now, so now that I have posted the entire transcript does this mean you will apologise for this statement or should I just take it as yet another of your many, many exposed lies we have seen on these forums.

RyaN says:

04:36pm | 24/05/11

@persephone: oh and here is the link to the article I quoted Pachauri out of, oh that credibility of yours.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/summer-of-disaster-not-climate-change-rajendra-pachauri/story-fn59niix-1226057100026

RyaN says:

04:41pm | 24/05/11

@persephone: in order to say this statement “But we can say that, in all likelihood, it wouldn’t have been as intense, and we wouldn’t have had similar fires in 2003 and 2006.” you first need to show definitive proof of a human marker in climate change. There is $10k in it for you if you can.
Secondly in claiming a “likelihood” on intensity under the name of science is laughable at best.

persephone says:

05:03pm | 24/05/11

Ryan

well, that doesn’t do much for your credibility - he’s saying what I’m saying, which is that natural disasters will be more frequent and more intense. Read my reply to ‘The Duke’ above - says exactly what Pauchari said (and without reading his article - spooky, hey?)

And apologies - when I followed your link, I got the top ten disasters of the last century, which is below the table you refer to (top ten of all time). Hence the confusion.

As it didn’t particularly prove anything, it doesn’t matter.

However, interested that you trust figures on death tolls going back to 526 AD without question but refuse to accept the same kinds of evidence for global warming!

RyaN says:

05:32pm | 24/05/11

@persephone: but I will accept the direct irrefutable proof of a human marker in global warming, just show it to us all, and claim the 10 grand prize.

Fact is that there isn’t and that is such a travesty to you all because if it existed you would have no problem selling your religion, just point any non-believer to the actual evidence and there you go. No instead you want us to “believe” just like Harold Camping wanted us to “believe” that Saturday just past was rapture day, both as crazy as each other.

persephone says:

06:11pm | 24/05/11

Ryan

unlike you, I do not have the arrogance to think I know everything, or that if I don’t know something from my direct personal knowledge that it therefore cannot be true.

I look to experts to advise me on a whole raft of things - I don’t understand how my car works, for example, but I trust my mechanic to give me the correct advice. I don’t understand the workings of my body, so I trust my doctor to work out what’s wrong with me.

Now, I can imagine, being the independent free thinker that you are, that you don’t rely on someone who dropped out of school at fifteen to do an apprenticeship to tell you what’s wrong with your car. No, you’ve sat down and researched mechanics, and when your car’s sick, you know exactly what to do.

And I’m sure you don’t bother with doctors either. What would they know? Nup, in a medical emergency, you coolly assess your symptoms and use your extensive knowledge of medical proceedure to diagnose your problem and assess what actions you need to take. In an emergency, I’m sure you can whip out your own appendix.

The fact is that none of us know everything about everything. We rely on expert advice (you, the great knowledgeable one, excepted, of course - I’m talking of we lesser mortals).

So when there’s a problem, we ask an expert what’s going on. Hell, we might even ask two or three of them.

If we’re sensible, we assess their expertise - ask a few other people who’ve used the same mechanic if he’s any good, ask to see his trade certificates - and make a judgement as to the value of their advice based on that.

So, just as I trust my mechanic when it comes to my car, and my doctor when it comes to my health, I’m quite happy to rely on climate scientists to tell me what’s wrong with the climate and what we must do to fix it.

The science is settled. Silly little quibbles like yours won’t change that.

wakeuppls says:

06:27pm | 24/05/11

persephone
Actually, it proves that human CO2 emissions have little to do with natural disasters, as the worst natural disasters happened when CO2 emissions were but a fraction of what they are now, or even non existent.

persephone says:

06:54pm | 24/05/11

wakeuppls

no, it does not.

Really, if that’s what you think is ‘proof’ you are far far sillier than I previously thought (and that’s saying something).

We know that natural disasters have occurred before. Big ones. Ones where lots and lots of people died.

So that’s not news.

The prediction, under climate science, is that natural disasters will be more extreme (in two ways: severity of impact and ‘going from one extreme to another’ as in from drought to flood), and more frequent.

Your list doesn’t do anything to either prove or disprove that.

You’d previously pointed out that the ‘kill’ number isn’t necessarily an indicator of the severity of the disaster, but is influenced by factors such as population density - I would suggest the biggest natural disaster we know of is the meteorite which wiped out the dinosaurs, but it doesn’t score highly on the human kill rate.

So all your numbers show is that there have been big disasters in the past which have killed people.

They don’t prove anything about what’s happening at the present, or what may happen in the future.

RyaN says:

02:29pm | 25/05/11

@persephone: To use the analogy of the car.
My car won’t start in the morning, I take it to a mechanic, the mechanic tells me the back windscreen needs to be replaced since this is the reason why my car won’t start in the morning. I for one would certainly be questioning the validity of the mechanic’s assertion and request some actual proof.
I would be happy to accept the mechanic’s assertion with proof, however if he tells me I just have to “believe” him at the same time spouting on about a consensus amongst mechanics worldwide, (none of which he can name that don’t have a windscreen replacement business) then you would need to be a nutcase to just “believe” said mechanic just because he knows more than you, right ?

RyaN says:

02:33pm | 25/05/11

@persephone: “The science is settled. Silly little quibbles like yours won’t change that. ” and another thing that is a complete travesty is that this statement is nothing more than a barefaced LIE. If the science is settled then why can you not prove it?
What this statement is, is a political group bastardising science trying to bullshit people in being relieved of more of their hard earned cash lest they burn in a firey hell. Its not as though this angle hasn’t reaped in money hand over fist for other religions in the past.

Chrissy says:

11:40am | 24/05/11

A Direct Action Plan until there is a Global Agreement has merit. The Governments mantra of a Carbon Tax for Australia NOW or the earth is going to melt is FEAR/SCARE MONGERING.

Freeman says:

12:05pm | 24/05/11

not because we have a vested interest now. not because we don’t want to pay for it. Because we can see it’s not the best mechanism to reduce C02 or address sustainability. it just gives weight to the arguments of the more cynical who claim AGW is just an excuse to impose a tax or wealth re-distribution system.

Nafe says:

01:00pm | 24/05/11

Tory, You can blame the Labor Government for that. Most people are actually like JF, not sure but willing to give the benefit of the doubt if a good case is made.

labor on the other hand say ” Climate change is real, if you don’t believe in the carbon tax then your a denier”.

This does nothing for the debate and actually mixes up two seperate issues. Firstly, what Gillard needs to do it seperate the 2 issues and she may get some traction. Lets all discuss AGW and then she will quite easily get the consensus that AGW exists and most people will give the benefit of the doubt to some action rather than the wait and see approach,

Once that debate is done, which really shouldn’t take too long, she won’t have to contend with the “Deniers” etc and it will put Tony Abbott back in the spotlight to propose a real policy to tackle an issue that most people are giving the benefit of the doubt to.

Then There needs to be real discussion on options to tackle climate change, be it a CPRS, Carbon Tax, Direct Action,..... or even doing Nothing.

Put it all on the table with the good and bad points, costs for each and what each will benefit and when will the benefit be seen.

You see Tory, Abbott won the leadership due to his opposition to the CPRS, and his skeptisism of Climate change,. So if Gillard can seperate the debate and get a real concensus on people giving climate change the benefit of the doubt, it puts real heat on Abbott, and will most likely see him rolled for Turnbull and then action will then come.

At the moment, I’m in the i don’t know camp, and was favoring the maybe we should do something, but not sure on a carbon tax, but with Gillard branding all people who question the carbon tax as a denier, i have given up listening to her and now oppose her because of her arrogance.

Ginger says:

02:12pm | 24/05/11

Gillards attempt at labeling anyone who doesn’t agree with her “Carbon Tax” as a “Climate Change Denier”, is sounding very childish and arrogant, not to mention “Sloganish”. How can she get away with continually calling Abbott a “Denier”, when he says he accepts climate change and humans have a role in that. He also has a Direct Action policy to deal with it?  She may not like his solution of dealing with climate change, but a little of honesty in her negativity would go along way to helping her credidbility. Every time she labels him with her “Denier” slogan etc she’s just making a fool of herself. She sounds like a spoiled little brat.

Havara says:

10:59am | 24/05/11

Sorry DJ
I believe you had a typo in your post.
I’ll correct it for you.
I will always remain an idiot.

Catching up says:

09:01am | 24/05/11

Rosie, I agree with you.  The debate has been going on for well over a decade.

I do not believe that science is ever settled, it is always open to new interpretation.

When the greater majority of scientists have been coming up with the same results, which I believe for over 30 years, I am more than inclined to believe that we have a serious problem that needs to be addressed.

That leads to: -

Which question should we be asking?
What will it cost us or what is the price our descendants will pay.
Keep in mind, we have a choice, they do not.

jf says:

09:19am | 24/05/11

To be fair Sony, Tory only said that the science is settled in regards to climate change. She did not claim that the science was settled as to whether mankind is responsible.

Talented Rugby Player says:

09:38am | 24/05/11

Hey Nosworthy:

spell ‘sadest’ as ... saddest
‘Their are many good people should be .... There are many good people
spell ‘eather’ as .... ether
spell ‘reovolt’ as ... revolt

Overall - your spelling and grammar are about at the same level as the quality of your comments - rubbish!

Anubis says:

10:23am | 24/05/11

nossy - was this report peer reviewed or has it just been cobbled together by Flannery et-al and presented as a fait accompli ? Did he even bother to check the details. One of the most obvious statements is that the last decade has been the hottest on record. That has been proven to be crap to the stage where NASA had to revise their hottest years on record listing and it turns out the 1930’s were on average hotter than the past few decades. Talk about cut and pasting from old news. If they managed to cock-up that “little” detail then just how more of the report is a cock-up ?

nossy says:

12:14pm | 24/05/11

@Talented Rugby Player - pressure getting to you girlie !  hahahah And in your hopeless disjointed reply not 1 thing to counter my arguments - off you go back to drinks training girlie !  hhhahaahahha

Anubis says:

01:48pm | 24/05/11

nossy - have you actually read the report. It certainly appears to be ” a “Google” inspired mismash of ideas and theories” [to borrow your words] with a fair bit of alarmism and scare tactics thrown in to flesh it out. If they can cock-up even the simplest statement such as the last decade being the warmest on record (which it wasn’t - see my other reply to you) then just how much of it has been cocked-up just to present the scariest scenario they can ? Or is this just too hard for you that you feel the only thing you need to do is ridicule the poster Talented Rugby Player (though yes, his post was disjointed crap)

JT says:

11:20am | 24/05/11

Umm, no it didn’t. Harold Camping is an 81 year old who has preached his message via radio since 1961. The internet has just become another avenue for his lunacy, as it has for yours re: anthropogenic climate change.

Your name:Roland says:

12:57pm | 24/05/11

Your comment:Well said Geoff, but unfortunately the net has also given us the baby dance and planking to name a few stupid things.

MDG says:

12:14pm | 24/05/11

Prime Minister Cameron of Great Britain seems to disagree.

Seanr says:

10:47am | 24/05/11

If it is about climate change Tory, then what do you propose Australia can do that will have any effect on climate change?

Greg L says:

11:02am | 24/05/11

You are on the money there Matt!  Our minimal (read negligable) contribution will be approaching meaningless.  I’ve satisfied myself with my own maths.  That isn’t to say we shouldn’t try but the methodology being suggested by Julia, Wayne, Greg and crew is flawed to the extreme.

Big 1000 polluters will pay a Carbon Tax to a kitty and pass these costs on to consumers.  Don’t kid yourself that they won’t.
Consumers will pay inflated prices for goods and services but are compensated from the kitty.  Dollar for dollar? I doubt it.
Money has gone around in a circle but the energy consumption (CO2) remains unmoved. 
Introduce exemptions to essential industries and where are we?

But of course there will be management costs, evaluations to be done, scientists to pay off, some good old fashioned trumpet blowing and self praise.  Naturally some emergencies will arise in the budgets of future years and the kitty will be used out of necessity for other needs.

How’s our CO2 levels going? Oh.

Sony B Goode says:

11:05am | 24/05/11

Tory, climate change is part of a “cause” which includes restructuring prosperity.

The two can’t be separated. If it was only about science, we could all sit back and watch them sort it out over time. We don’t have that luxury because leftist in power, grab this as an opportunity to entrench more “progressive” prosperity destruction and redistribution, to everyone detriment.

The climate change argument needs to be peeled back to reveal the underlying cause so clarity can shed on proposed “solutions”.

This is the situation as it stand today:

Climate science is not settled.

Alternate theories are coming online. CERN’s CLOUD experiments being the most promising.

There are no base load renewables to replace coal

Taxing will not stop CO2 production

Even stoping all anthropogenic CO2 will not stop the climate from changing.

Liquid Fluorine Thorium Reactors are worthy of deeper investigation.

Yet climate change “believers” are quick to become sceptics when confronted with LFTR as a solution, again highlighting the cause over the science.

Matt says:

11:46am | 24/05/11

The problem is Tory, Gillard says that AGW is real, therefore we must tax carbon. The argument is painted as black and white, with no shades of gray. Ergo, you are either are a believer, or a skeptic. But I am more concerned about the outcomes put in place on the back of this faith, not so much why the earth is or isn’t warming.

A case in point is Gillard’s response to Barnaby Joyce. She seems to think that his questions (and they are legitimate questions) can be ignored because he is a “climate skeptic”, effectively calling anything other than the government line “false claims”.

Whether you believe it or not, the question marks over AGW have everything to do with the proposed responses by government, rather than people disbelieving that the climate changes over time.

No 1 Rosie says:

09:22am | 24/05/11

Hallelujah! Go Brenda! Well said!

Now they are jumping up and down because they feel have achieved something and things are going their way. Chris Bowen higher than anyone else. Self praise mind you!

They done a Tony Abbott 3 word slogan so they think - “Stop The Boats”

Bloggs says:

10:12pm | 24/05/11

I like you Brenda.  You speak like a true Australian.  I wish there were more of you.

Sony B Goode says:

09:25am | 24/05/11

Correlation is not causation; surely that is so basic to scientific understanding that it is only a trap for new players?

No one is questioning valid data, what we are questioning are the conclusions when there are clearly holes in the theory.

Remember it only took a single observation: black body radiation, to topple the entire order of existing classical mechanical physics and bring in quantum physics.

Markus says:

01:00pm | 24/05/11

Is this one available online? I wasn’t able to find it myself, and am thinking that surely even the Labor government would not release anything with a statement that idiotic.

Stephen says:

02:24pm | 24/05/11

Why is Mercury left off their list? Distance from the Sun: Mercury (very hot/very cold) no atmosphere. Venus (always hot) high CO2 atmosphere. Earth (temperate/comfortable) low CO2 atmosphere. Mars(cool/very cool) thin atmosphere. From that observation I would conclude the further away from the sun you get the colder the planet. I’m no scientist but that just jumps out at me.

Pete says:

06:22pm | 24/05/11

Yes, the full article is here http://climatecommission.gov.au/topics/the-critical-decade/ (click on ‘full report’). Page 14 under Greenhouse gas forcing.

Ausfire says:

10:47am | 24/05/11

Why are people so naive to think only within the circle?

What about solar activity, that interacts with the magnetosphere? This in turn interacts with core magma, ocean currents, global winds, and so on.

As for “... the very large differences in surface temperature among Earth, Venus and Mars can only be explained by the very different amounts of CO2 in their atmospheres” .... I’m left speechless.

Where did the scientists that stated that get their degree? What do they have a degree in? Interestingly, they left out Mercury, which has no atmosphere and still falls within the realm of that statement. What about Pluto which also has CO2 in its atmosphere? Why isn’t it warm? Surely, common sense and rational thought dictates that the distance from the Sun plays a huge part in that and has NOTHING to do with CO2 in the atmosphere.

eddie says:

01:44pm | 24/05/11

Did you have a look at that petition Erick, sorry, Anubis?
I cant believe anyone takes that seriously. I filled it out myself - gave myself a doctorate in intelegent design and a first class honors in creation science too.

Anubis says:

02:46pm | 24/05/11

Eddie - I will say it again (like I did yesterday). I am not EricK, have never met EricK, have never been EricK and have never alluded to being EricK.

No 1 Rosie says:

04:08pm | 24/05/11

Anubis that is The Badger! It is the duplicity game he plays when he has nothing to offer to the debate.

He is The Badger the Harass, Eddie, Expat, Mark, etc etc

The Badger says:

06:49pm | 24/05/11

Rosie/NO 1 Rosie/Joan/Anubis/AtM
Paranoid much?

persephone says:

01:29pm | 24/05/11

No, quite happy to wait for an election in 2013, and know that we’re going to one with a carbon price in place.

Matt says:

01:48pm | 24/05/11

How much per tonne in your opinion should the carbon tax start at, persephone? Given that climate change is such a dire threat to our nation and all.

persephone says:

02:33pm | 24/05/11

Happy to leave that one to the experts, Matt.

Anubis says:

03:22pm | 24/05/11

Lets see there Matt - the Market Forces in Europe have Carbon Credits trading at about the equivalent of $17 per tonne, India has a Carbon Tax of 5 rupees per tonne (local coal exempted), the US States that introduced a Carbon Price have set it at around $1.90 to $1.95 per tonne, the Greens want it to be between $50 & $100 per tonne, Gillard is leaning toward $30 per tonne and Abbott is guessing (from Treasury estimates) at around $27 per tonne.

Seeing that it is sock-puppet PM Joolya (controlled by real PM Bobby Brown) that is intending to implement it, on the advice of the Dinosaur expert Flannery and the Economist Rossy Gumnut, we will probably get a starting price of around $45 per tonne. That might be enough to fill in some of the holes in Jooolya’s budgets but remember, for the good of the world (and think of the children) the Carbon (Dioxide) Tax will increase every year.

Matt says:

03:27pm | 24/05/11

But persephone, you are a self-confessed expert:

“Far from being a Johnny Come Lately, I’ve been agitating for action on climate change for well over a decade. I’ve set up meetings between climate scientists and relevant Ministers, I’ve developed policy (and pushed it through various forums to have it implemented), I’ve arranged public forums, successfully worked at a local level to get action on climate change and delivered lectures at Universities on climate change impacts.”

So, again I ask you, what price should we be putting on carbon? Its a simple question. If you ave developed policy on climate change and lectured on it, surely you can answer that, can’t you?

persephone says:

03:46pm | 24/05/11

No, I’m an activist, not an expert, Matt.

All of those things I described were activities.

Matt says:

04:53pm | 24/05/11

Developing policy and giving university lectures are just activities? Okay then…

So, you can’t answer the question then? Strange that you’re so passionate about it, but won’t even opine on what price you would like to see.

If it is less than $50 (the Greens seem to think it should be much, MUCH more), will you be disappointed with Gillard (say if it is closer to $25)? Or will you be happy with whatever Gillard releases?

You’re a forward thinker, persephone! No Johnny Come Lately here! You develop policy on this stuff, and lecture at Universities about climate change. Surely you have an opinion on price? Or, perhaps you’re simply full of bullshit, and will agree with anything the government releases?

Drunk Guy says:

05:25pm | 24/05/11

persephone busted; there is no doubt you are not what you claim to be, and Matt has called you out, and guess what, no reply. . . . . . no surprise really , keyboard warriors from within one of the Parties are always like this.

Nice Job Matt, love your work.

persephone says:

05:42pm | 24/05/11

Indeed they are.

When I write policy, I don’t tell people what I want them to do - I translate what the experts say we should be doing into actions.

I haven’t consulted any experts on what the carbon price should be - I don’t deal with policy at that level - so I’m not qualified to say.

And my lectures are on the local impacts of climate change, so they’re certainly not telling people what to do.

At present, what I want to see is a structure put in place. The price isn’t really relevant, because it can (and will) be adjusted at need. Having the mechanism to impose the price is the important thing at present.

Matt says:

07:02pm | 24/05/11

And yet you’re so vocal about our need for a carbon tax, and how much better off everyone will be under the scheme. But whats this? You haven’t consulted experts on it? Shock horror! So you’re saying that everything you’ve written about this carbon tax is uninformed opinion? Because, lets face it, the actual price is a pretty big part of any carbon tax policy. Otherwise its like building a cage to trap a tiger without knowing how big a tiger is in the first place!

Well, at least you’ve admitted it I suppose.

Also, I thought you were a teacher? But now you “deal in policy” and when “writing policy”, you are translating “what the experts say we should be doing into actions”? Mind giving us an example of the type of policy you write? I’m fascinated, honestly. A link to the policy you’ve written on climate change would be great.

I also love your faith in this government! Way to go princess! Gillard would be proud. I’m sure they’ll knock it out of the park, like everything else they’ve done. What could possibly go wrong, eh?

persephone says:

08:12pm | 24/05/11

Sigh.

Sometimes they don’t make crayons big enough.

Matt, I have consulted experts on climate change.

However, experts on the science aren’t experts on the economics - they’d be the first to say so.

On carbon tax, I’m willing to go with experts such as Garnaut and Stern, who have outlined the kind of action that’s needed.

I don’t need to have a price in mind to know that action is needed and have some opinion as to what that action should be.

Eventually, the price will be determined by the market. In the short term, as I’ve said, the structure is the important thing to get in place, and the price is largely irrelevant (it’ll be largely revenue neutral, whatever it is).

Keep playing your little gotcha games, though - I’m sure they amuse you.

persephone says:

08:27pm | 24/05/11

And yes, Matt, I do write policy.

It’s great to belong to a party where an ordinary member can come up with policy ideas and see them implemented by government!

I corruptus says:

09:04pm | 24/05/11

@pers,as I thought and blogged a long time ago,Thanks Penny!

David C says:

09:39pm | 24/05/11

well if you are so involved in policy and consult experts then you would know the first rule of climate policy, give people a choice between economic growth and emission cuts and economic growth will win every time. ie China, India Russia etc.
But I guess that is why the current government is trying to ram their (failed) policy through.

persephone says:

10:12pm | 24/05/11

No, David, never heard that one before.

Must move in the wrong circles.

Funny, I didn’t think countries like Russia and China were really in to giving people choices.

Matt says:

11:00pm | 24/05/11

“Eventually, the price will be determined by the market.”

So, an artificially-imposed price will be determined by the market?

Riiiight.

I can only assume you haven’t written and developed any policy then, otherwise you could link to it. Can you name climate change experts that you consult with? Or is this all in your imagination?

“It’s great to belong to a party where an ordinary member can come up with policy ideas and see them implemented by government! “

Was the Pink Batts idea yours?? Genius!! Although I thought you said you weren’t a Labor hack? But then, Julia said we’d never have a carbon tax, either.

Pro-tip: don’t try and make yourself out to be an expert unless you can back it up. Sadly, it seems you cannot. Oh, sorry… They are only “activities” for you… And also, you already said that you are not an economic expert. What are you basing your assertions on again? Unless you’re saying you *are* an economic expert?

GG perse. Keep towing that party line!

persephone says:

06:49am | 25/05/11

Matt

I’m anonymous for a reason - linking to things I’ve done would be a bit of a giveaway, wouldn’t it?

Love the way you’re getting all excited over nothing. I don’t think many of here are experts - doesn’t stop us having opinions or arguing a case.

You can know a lot about an issue without being an expert in the field.

Anyway, I can only assume you’re getting so over excited over trivialities because you can’t argue the substance.

Otherwise your focus on who I am and what I do is inexplicable.

Anubis says:

10:59am | 24/05/11

Jim - unfortunately you won’t get any answers to these questions. The pro-AGW mob have been asked for a long time to answer these questions rationally and with reference and just refuse to. They generally sink in to personal attacks because, to answer these questions honestly and truthfully would highlight far too many Inconvenient Truths for them and blow their whole religion out of the water.

Bobster says:

06:52pm | 24/05/11

Shouldn’t you lot be out demanding birth certificates fromyour elected representatives?

engineer says:

12:30pm | 24/05/11

Because history disagrees.

We KNOW that certain geological events like volcanic eruptions put far more “greenhouse” gases into the atmosphere than humans.

We KNOW that there have been periods in history with MUCH higher temps and CO2 levels than now, and that the atmosphere never went into positive feedback, it always returned to the long term norm.

There is a strong case that CO2 rises as a result of temp increases rather than drives them. There is also a strong case that CO2 and methane can drive temperature rises. The problem here is it’s a very complex system so there are no easy answers.

The really big problem with climate analysis is it’s terribly complicated. Sometimes maths and physics yields nice simple answers that people can digest. This just doesn’t. I could write a whole series of books just scimming over the issues without even begining to propose answers. It’s an absolutely huge problem to contemplate. Just the atmospheric physics, which I barely grasp, is vast. Then you have to look at the proxy measures which help us understand the time before thermometers and direct measurement, then you start on oceanography (the ocean holds many many times the heat the air does and water vapor has a HUGE impact on tamospheric temps).

Just thinking about how big a problem it is is exhausting. It just isn’t simple.

The issue that arises from this is whether we as a community are willing to impose signifigant financial hardship on people by way of increased cost of living and job losses based on what may happen. Won’t hurt me, I’m well off, but I’m reluctant to put a working class family in the latrobe valley on the dole queue unless I’m sure. I’m reluctant to double your electricity bill when I’m not sure. And that is the crux of the objections. You want me to suffer a signifigant tax ? Convince me.

Andy W says:

01:34pm | 24/05/11

@engineer

“We KNOW that there have been periods in history with MUCH higher temps and CO2 levels than now”
And in those periods the climate was unsuitable for a species like humans.

“The really big problem with climate analysis is it’s terribly complicated”
Which makes me wonder why so many people choose to side with the view of a minority of scientists.

As for the policy reaction, I think I’ll wait until the Gov releases the details before I way up the merits of the policy, it can’t be any worse than the lemon of a policy the opposition wants to introduce.

Markus says:

02:28pm | 24/05/11

“Which makes me wonder why so many people choose to side with the view of a minority of scientists.”

And makes me wonder why so many people would blindly support government action that would bankrupt a country, and do absolutely nothing to prevent the climate from changing.

Hell, the EU have had an ETS in place for years now, yet the only reduction in carbon emissions came as a result of the GFC, not the stupid scheme.

engineer says:

04:52pm | 24/05/11

“And in those periods the climate was unsuitable for a species like humans”

I probably should have explained my point better. The predictions of catastrophy rely on positive feedback. During those periods positive feedback didn’t happen. I wasn’t making any comment about thier suitability for human habitation. The point is it’s been a lot hotter and the atmosphere has had a lot more CO2 than it does now without the system going beserk.

I would also like to point out the long term average for extreme weather and geological events is much higher than recent history. The 20th century, the only one most people remember, was extraordinarily calm. We can assume that the comming century will have more of these than we are used to if the system drifts back toward the long term average.

Unfortunately people don’t think long term well. Brisbane has a drought about every 50 years like the one we just had, and floods every 40 years like the ones we just had, but people forget which leads them open to the chicken little propoganda.

Make no mistake, there is a lot of money to be had from carbon pricing, and it won’t be flowing into your pocket nor mine.

Joel B1 says:

11:12am | 24/05/11

Yippee! In before “Won’t some-one think about the children?”

MDG says:

12:19pm | 24/05/11

Um, Freeman, one of the principles of anthropogenic global warming IS that human emissions are a cause.  That’s what “anthropogenic” means.

Freeman says:

01:11pm | 24/05/11

MDG

The principle is that pumping CO2 into the atmosphere could affect climate. Not many people dispute this. That principle does not necessarily take current human CO2 volume into account. it’s just an acknowledgment that if we pumped enough C02 into the atmosphere it could affect the climate.

Again I say that this is not a consensus that man is influencing the global temperature & it is the effect that mans small contribution to global C02 emissions is having on the climate that is not agreed on.

Andy W says:

12:11pm | 24/05/11

RyaN,
Prof John Christy holds the view that the increase in global temperature caused by AGW will only be in the range of 1-2 degrees and does not pose enough of a threat to warrant drastic action to reduce emissions.

He also admits that his view is one that is held by a minority of scientists.

RyaN says:

02:41pm | 24/05/11

@Andy W: and your point? Was he or was he not the lead atmospheric scientist for the IPCC? Did he or did he not win the NASA exception achievement scientific medal for co developing a satellite temperature record?
I would say this man knows a hell of a lot more about the climate than most of the AGW supposed “scientists” that don’t even have science degrees. Lets see, well you AGW guys have Al Gore who invented AGW (and also claims to have invented the internet) who is not a scientist, you have Tim Flannery who is spouting on claiming he knows the science and is not as scientist yet you name not one reputable actual scientist that will put their name to definitively stating that:
1. There is a human marker in global warming
2. That a carbon tax will achieve anything other than redistribution of wealth from everyone to Juliar Gillard.

What is clear is that the real scientists with actual science degrees and scientific practical experience do not agree with you AGW nut jobs.

Andy W says:

03:52pm | 24/05/11

My point is RyaN, the man you are talking about DOES agree with human induced global warming, he disagrees with the magnitude of the consequences.

He also says that the majority of his colleagues (who also have real science degrees) do not support his view.

RyaN says:

04:52pm | 24/05/11

@Andy W: if the statement you are referring to is the one from the wall street journal, would that be “I’m sure the majority (but not all) of my IPCC colleagues cringe when I say this, but I see neither the developing catastrophe nor the smoking gun proving that human activity is to blame for most of the warming we see.”
I fail to see how that statement would be from someone who believes humans are causing warming. Let me restate the pertinent part..  “but I see neither the developing catastrophe nor the smoking gun proving that human activity is to blame for most of the warming we see.”

Andy W says:

05:57pm | 24/05/11

“It is scientifically inconceivable that after changing forests into cities, turning millions of acres into farmland, putting massive quantities of soot and dust into the atmosphere and sending quantities of greenhouse gases into the air, that the natural course of climate change hasn’t been increased in the past century.’‘

John Christy 2003

RyaN says:

02:41pm | 25/05/11

@Andy W: 2003 you say, hmm I believe the statement I posted was from 2007, I guess the gradual unraveling of the hysteria around anthropogenic global warming changed his mind.
Here is one from 2009
“From my analysis, the actions being considered to ‘stop global warming’ will have an imperceptible impact on whatever the climate will do, while making energy more expensive, and thus have a negative impact on the economy as a whole. We have found that climate models and popular surface temperature data sets overstate the changes in the real atmosphere and that actual changes are not alarming.”

This scientific and very educated climate scientist clearly made some observations from 2003 to 2009 that changed his position quite substantially. One can only surmise that the proof was far different to the theory.

Kissandera says:

08:53am | 25/05/11

So we agreed with the ozone layer being a problem of potentially catastrophic proportions and acted, but the science wasn’t settled?

RyaN says:

12:37pm | 24/05/11

@Bob: how hypocritical is your post. You do realise that AGW has been used by just about every government as a political football, the Rudd - Gillard government being the worst.
The IPCC scientists have already refuted the approach taken by Gillard, what is clear is that the left just cannot under any circumstances divorce themselves from their political beliefs to the scientific fact that there is no human marker in global warming and that any carbon tax will have no impact whatsoever.
Gillard on the other hand cannot wait to get her grubby liar hands onto that carbon tax money so she can waste it like the $40 billion surplus left to them and the $150 billion in debt they have put us.
This carbon tax has nothing to do with global warming and everything to do with money.

St. Michael says:

12:33pm | 24/05/11

What, you mean our descendants asking how we managed to fool ourselves into the “truth” of AGW and then self-hobbled our own economies to deal with it?

Yeah, I can see lots of future descendants pondering that idea.  Although they’ll probably get the idea that AGW was only ever the province of fringe science; when you get to the obituaries of many prominent scientists 100 years from now, many will have their beliefs in AGW quietly excised—just as many prominent scientists’ biographies and histories also have their beliefs in eugenics quietly excised in the wake of WW2.

reg says:

12:49pm | 24/05/11

plain packaging on ciggerettes like carbon tax won’t make a bit of difference,  so why should Joyce and “Dr No” do anything different.  What a screwed up country this would be if we all blindly followed and never questioned this government.

fml says:

02:41pm | 24/05/11

are you referring to the lizard people?

Warwick says:

12:54pm | 24/05/11

Well done Mark.

But isn’t this an extra-ordinary duplicitous article. It poses as the voice of straight-as-die common sense but it contains a huge amount of sleight of hand and spin. I used to think it was ill-judged to label global warming promoters as “liers” but the more I read their crafty PR, the more I see that they are as dishonest as any bishop or any communist in the way that they lie, distort, spin, twist and use every one of the propagandist’s black arts.

No denunciation could possibly be too strong.

Mouse says:

02:01pm | 24/05/11

MarK, it’s like bashing you head against a wall, you cannot reason with the unreasonable! lol
“And then you have all sorts of links as ‘evidence’ that you are right and all the world’s top scientists are wrong.”
I love the fact that people always ask for the links you used to get your “evidence”, (or just the information you have used to form your own opinion!) then shoot it down in flames as biased or corrupt or unproven or uninformed or not credible, etc, etc, etc. The same people that demand the proof, always knowing all the answers, seem to do so without providing their links though! lol
I suppose none of these scientists are in the world’s top then…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming
Just aksing!

Joel B1 says:

12:46pm | 24/05/11

Well said, I’ll put my 1st class honours science degree against Torys’ BA anyday.

nossy says:

12:52pm | 24/05/11

@MarK - hey MarKy - why dont governments just bypass all this scientific research and just come to you direct fella ?  hahahahahah

Send Help Fast says:

12:53pm | 24/05/11

It is really sad to see a human being deteriorate right in front of your eyes.

Damon says:

01:44pm | 24/05/11

Gee Mark you even managed to weave muslims and boat people into your ‘theories” while simultaneously debunking arguments for AGW supported by a majority of the world’s leading scientists. You’ve certainly got me thinking…....

MarK says:

01:37pm | 24/05/11

Hi Geoff. You are the contributor Geoff I take it.

Well you were right and I was wrong.

I admit it.

I read the report form back to front.

The science is settled.

We must act now to prevent catastrophic social and economic damage.

How best can we bring pressure on the government to start the carbon tax well “north” of $40. The action has to happen now. We must make a difference especially given the lack of motivation on the nuclear front given the terrible destruction and pollution we have witnessed in Japan.

We need to move now. The science is settled. And as the commission found only a market based approach will benefit. We nned a carbon price sooner rather than later and much higher than the mooted $40 a tonne.

It doesn’t make sense to do anything else.

Jim says:

02:01pm | 24/05/11

I’ve never seen those questions answered in a straight forward manner, with data to back it up, and without any finger pointing or cries of “denier”. And the last decade is the hottest on record hey? Which record of selected years are you talking about? Is it relating to a specific area of the planet or mean global temps? What was the agreed-to method of data collection and analysis that allowed such an outlandish claim? I’m a scientist and I’m not at all impressed with how this whole AGW myth has been funded and hijacked by people who have no expertise in any scientific field.

We have economists, lawyers, politicians pushing the AGW fairy tale…we even had a music reviewer write a Punch piece after ‘attending a seminar or two’.

It’s no longer about the environment, regardless of which side ends up correct - it’s now about a government who lied to win power, who cannot handle an economy, and who can’t be trusted to do the right thing with the carbon tax money.

Anubis says:

02:13pm | 24/05/11

Geoff Russell - try to get it right lad. NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies who maintains the global temperature records have been forced to correct mistakes in their data record which now shows the 1930’s were the hottest. You may note that not much fanfare was made of this glaring mistake. Looking at the new top 10 years, it is hard to see any signs of global warming. The ranking, starting from the hottest year goes: 1934, 1998, 1921, 2006, 1931, 1999, 1953, 1990, 1938, 1939.

We are currently going through a natural part of the climate cycle. During the last dramatic shift around the 1400’s the temperatures were actually 4 to 6 degrees higher than they currently are - a period referred to as the Medieval Warm Period. This was followed by the mini-ice age was lasted until the 1800’s and saw the Thames River frozen and crops failing all over the world, and also produced the “Year without Summer”. We are currently still warming from this period of cold, which ended about two hundred years ago. If you look at the natural cycles (as shown in Antarctic Ice Cores) increases in Co2 in the atmosphere usually happen between 200 and 600 years after the commencement of a period of warming.  As far as the Flannery report goes - he produced exactly what Julia wanted BUT - it is a cut and paste job of many of the Doom and Gloom reports promoted by these professional warmists, with a good dash of their “sky is falling” predictions. Remember Flannery is the one who loudly proclaimed in 2001 that the Pacific Islands would be under water by 2010, Sydney and Perth would be dustbowls, the Drought will never end, Sydney waterfront property will be inundated by sea rises of up to 100 metres (apparently now, according to the AGW/CC brigade maximum sea rises will be no greater than a metre). How many times does Flannery have to discredit himself before it starts to sink in that he is an opportunistic goose that is chasing every dollar he can get by perpetuating this ? An example is the 400 million dollars that has been sunk into his central Australia alternative energy project which has produced .............. absolutely zero return, not one shaft completed, not 1 watt of power generated, but I’m pretty certain he still got his Director’s pay packet.

Anubis says:

02:44pm | 24/05/11

@Jim - well said. Summed the whole thing up nicely

David C says:

05:20pm | 24/05/11

why is “the last decade was the hottest on record ” supposed to be the argument clincher
If I say the stock market will go to 20,000 and you say it will go to 6000 (now 4800 or so) if it goes up 100 points in a week does that make either of us right??

St. Michael says:

06:13pm | 24/05/11

“On record” is the key qualifier and the key weakness in the debate.

Because we haven’t had records of the weather back for the full period human history.

MarK says:

01:33pm | 24/05/11

I agree fully Economist and I have recanted.

Action must be taken as you said.

The carbon price must be set high enough to change peoples behaviour. Having compensation is foolish in the extreme.

Sarah Hanson Young and Christine Milne have suggested $50-100 per tonne as a start point.

Having read the Climate Commissions excellent report with it’s balanced views and call for action I can see where these two ladies are coming from.

We must move there and quickly. We need to pressure Combet and Gillard who must be applauded for their poltical courage in taking on a new tax to start it at the top end. They must mean it when they start this process.

We have a decade to act before it too late. We must decarbonise. We must wean ourselves off coal.

The only effective way to do this is like a smoker.

Hit the problem head on and act.

I am beginning to lean towards a $75 price as a deterrent, a ban on new coal mines and a gradual 10% step reduction on an annual basis of our coal exports so in a decade they will be nil.

Action must be taken. The science is settled.

Glen says:

01:46pm | 24/05/11

Christ I am so sick of hearing about Peak Oil. Its been peaking since the 70s man! PICK A DATE ALREADY! Just like that old doomsday guy…

St. Michael says:

01:58pm | 24/05/11

Fair point that Google isn’t the answer, but mainstream science can be and has been guilty of hysterically pushing questionable but popular science as though it were fact in the past, and that questionable science can often be horribly misused.

Eugenics, for one - very popular in the scientific community, thought of as real back in the 20s and 30s, though you’d be hard-pressed to find a scientist of the time who’d be willing to admit he supported the idea now (most are dead, I grant you, but most also have their support for the concept excised from their biographies entirely).  The reason for the shirking away from it being simple: Hitler used it to justify Aryan superiority and it propelled Mengele’s experimentation on concentration camp prisoners.

AGW is questionable, or at least debatable, because it can’t be narrowed down to a single element capable of being tested under laboratory conditions.  Granted there are whole fields of science—geology, meteorology, evolution —which are similarly not capable of stringent lab testing and for which we have to rely on observational science and theorem, but AGW is being touted with greater certainty than the Theory of Relativity.

This is the reverse of how scientific thought normally works: a theorem should be accepted first, replicated second, and then become popular third.  AGW seems to have gone in the other direction: popular first, replictaed second, and accepted third.

Science isn’t meant to be democratic, especially when you’re casting for opinions across the entire scientific spectrum rather than within one discipline.  Stephen Hawking coming out nominally in support of climate change ( http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/hawking-warns-we-must-recognise-the-catastrophic-dangers-of-climate-change-432585.html ) is either misreading what he said at best or Hawking being irresponsible at worst: Hawking is a theoretical astrophysicist, not a climatologist, paleontologist, or geologist and waaaay outside his field of expertise.  It is like your electrician trying to say that the Frodo virus has infested your computer as a reason for why it keep crashing on you.

RyaN says:

02:49pm | 25/05/11

@MarK: no MarK that just doesn’t go far enough, shut down all coal fired power stations NOW, no burning of any fossil fuels starting right away, cars banned and carbon dioxide emissions including breathing should be taxed at $500 per tonne.
I mean we have to act now, this is an emergency and we must act, no pussy footing around.
I look forward to seeing Rudd walk home from wherever he is in the world right now.

RyaN says:

02:44pm | 25/05/11

@Shane From Melbourne: well it does give you the opportunity to put forward the definitive proof of a human marker in global warming but instead you wasted you time posting absolutely nothing.

Damon says:

01:57pm | 24/05/11

Hey Peter thanks for the science lesson. This is a certainly new argument; the fact that we are still breathing is certainly interesting and in some cases is certainly worthy of further analysis. I think you’ll find the 30% CO2 placed into the atmosphere in the last 100 years is the percentage of the total carbon dioxide ie. 30% of the roughly 0.04% CO2, not a proportion of our entire atmosphere. But lets not get into scientific debate, after all we’re not scientists are we….

Peter says:

07:01pm | 25/05/11

Damon thanks for the clarification, you are some what correct but what we here is this figure of 30%. The Correct Answer is 1% of the 0.001% of man-made CO2. As a decimal it is an insignificant 0.00001% of the air. That’s one, one-hundredth thousandth of the air. That is what all the fuss is about! That’s one CO2 molecule from Australia in every 9,000,000 molecules of air. It has absolutely no affect at all.

Glen says:

02:22pm | 24/05/11

I take exception to your UFO claim. Given the trillions of stars in the universe you actually believe, despite all the mathematical probabilities chained to the great and vast numbers of outer space, that there is NO likelihood of life on other worlds? Hmm who is the denier now. Mathematically UFOs are far more likely then global warming.

James says:

02:48pm | 24/05/11

Yes yes yes the drake equation but how come they only seem to visit the buck toothed, six fingered losers?  Explain that

RyaN says:

03:34pm | 24/05/11

@James: you mean like the ex lead atmospheric scientist for the IPCC Prof John Christy. I am guessing you have much stronger scientific credentials to show us, please enlighten us on yours.

Anubis says:

03:57pm | 24/05/11

James - that actually sounds like the Warmists you are describing. You forgot to add that if any one even dares to contradict them then they are howled down with screams of “Denialist”  Think outside the box James and look at a bit more than what is spoon fed to you by Aunty Jooolya and Uncle Bob.

St. Michael says:

04:10pm | 24/05/11

Woohoo, we got to UFOs!

“I take exception to your UFO claim. Given the trillions of stars in the universe you actually believe, despite all the mathematical probabilities chained to the great and vast numbers of outer space, that there is NO likelihood of life on other worlds?”

Life on other worlds =/= UFOs.  The Drake equation only postulates the existence of life, not sentient species, and Drake himself admits the equation does not solve the Fermi paradox, to wit, “If there’s sentient, starfaring life out there in the universe, how come there’s no tourists nor even their trash lying around?”

You can’t cite Drake’s Equation without applying the Great Filter to its results.

James says:

04:36pm | 24/05/11

No no I want an answer to my question why do UFOs fly have a billion light years across the universe only to end up on the front porch of Buck or Bo from Alabama, I mean if they were looking for intelligent life they must be seriously disappointed.  And why oh why would do they always seem to want to stick a probe up the backsides of these poor yokels

BigAngryRon says:

05:25pm | 24/05/11

Well of course there are no interplanetary tourists around, their planets had to limit their spaceship emissions to counteract their own warming and subsequently are just sitting around on their home planet in darkened rooms sipping cold tea. Actually, that could explain UFO crashes as well since they are obviously developed on planets where the inhabitants disregard safety advice (since they clearly don’t care about the emissions generated from such long journeys!) and must therefore have a tendency to also ignore their ‘fasten seatbelt’ signs leading to disaster. It all makes sense now,  I AM A GENIUS!

Glen says:

04:04pm | 24/05/11

“...(more than ten workers put together pay)...” - Oh boy do The Greens have something special planned for you mate! Ho ho fat cat! Call the NKVD!

Anubis says:

04:07pm | 24/05/11

No Greenifyoureallymeanit - 10% goes to supporting the IPCC in distributing money to poor countries to “help them” with Green initiatives, another percentage will have to go to a new bureaucratic department to administer it, more will go to supporting the unemployed and idle and the underpaid, compensation will be paid to some of the companies who are being levied with the tax, and maybe, just maybe some might go to initiatives to develop alternative energy sources (what sources is unknown because there currently is nothing that will provide baseload power except nuclear and the Green lobby won’t allow that). You will find that in future budgets there will be a dire need to redirect some (?) of this money back to general revenue and even before an ETS (artificially inflated prices to start with - like Telstra shares) is introduced the compensation will be wound back, or removed, and industry subsidies will stop. How else is Jooolya going to get into the surplus - the only election promise she seems determined to fulfill. never mind the 100 Billion dollars or more that she has hocked the country for.

Jass says:

11:06pm | 24/05/11

<<Somebody promise me that 100% of all carbon tax goes to worthwhile green ventures that can be monitored and dollars counted - then I’ll gladly take the inevitable price hikes in food and electricity etc.>>

Anubis has already given you a fair prediction of how this ‘carbon tax’ will be squandered - with precious little going into green ventures and, of course, no impact whatsoever on the climate - and your point is one that many of us are concerned about. If they called it a ‘pollution tax’ and guaranteed every penny went into creating clean energy then who would object?  It’s not just man-made global warming that’s on the nose, but the govt pushing it as a way of fattening the cats.

Dieter Moeckel says:

03:20pm | 24/05/11

Of course it’s not relevant. When I was at primary school the teacher held up a wooden 12 inch ruler and suggested that if the ruler represented a timeline of the world’s history, man occupied the little bit of the ruler that’s not really needed after the 12 inch mark - I don’t know if he intended the comment that man was in fact irrelevant to the history of the Earth. Been here for a whole 5 million years or so - if you choose modern man less the 100 000 years - a blip in history - won’t really matter if he’s not here after a few generation - Still I don’t want my grand children or their children to have to live in a world made uncomfortable by my greed. My generation has already lived in the best, most affluent time this world has ever experienced. Fee Education, cheap health and extraordinarily high standard of living, at least in the West.

Kika says:

02:56pm | 24/05/11

I agree. Population control is the elephant in the room. People don’t like hearing that because they think that creating people is ther biological right and not a privilege. Unfortunately the human female cycles every month and the male cycles his sperm every 3 days to boost the chances of conceiving. Yeah, this was good when we all died in our 20’s and 30’s…. but now we’ve pushed the limits of healh and science and live to our 80’s… population explosion.

To me it’s like looking at a sea monkey tank. The sea monkeys survive well when the conditions are right. They thrive on the conditions in their environment and many many sea monkeys are hatched. Eventually they exhaust their natural resources and die off. Unless humans do the same we will die off just as the dinosaurs did.

fml says:

03:21pm | 24/05/11

Are you two putting your hand up?

Peter says:

03:50pm | 24/05/11

No necessarly critical of all scientist or scientific research Kirsten - it is more a constructive criticism of the politics of Climate Change /Global Warming. There are many scientist who question (and not lightly) the interpretation of the limited available data and because they dare to question the populist view they are ostracised. If things are as serious as many would have us believe, why does Government not impose stricter codes on what industry is allowed to put into the atmosphere. We have Environmental Laws that dictate the amount and what type of emmissions is allowed from factors and cars, why can’t these be tighten? Just because I am an ordinary person it does not mean I cannot question the scientist interpretations just as we often seek a second medical opinion because not all Doctors are right all of the time are they!

James says:

02:46pm | 24/05/11

1st Class Honours in which science?  The science of tea leaf reading?

“Thirdly, playing the person not the idea is so very, very stupid, still you nutter alarmists do it every single time.”

Ha ha do you have altzheimers?  Do you realise how funny that statement is?

Where did you get your degree Bazzas online school for smartblokes.com.

I am allowed to big up someone when they nail an article about just how much of a conceited bubble people like you inhabit.

Woodsy says:

03:12pm | 24/05/11

Joel, your very comment was playing the man. Obviously your epic 1st Class Honours in Science didn’t cover the aspect of “irony”?

Joel B1 says:

04:06pm | 24/05/11

Thanks for your interest James.

My area of study was electropsychophysiology. More specifically ERPs or as you’d know them Event Related Potentials. In common use in this area are fascinating data averaging methods to get a signal from a whole lot of noise.

Hey! That’s just like analysing the climate what with seasonal, daily and pseudo-random effects in the data you want! Wow!

What did you study?

James says:

04:32pm | 24/05/11

How did I know you studied something completely off the plant like .. like whatever it is you said, crap I have never even heard of electro thingomaboby where did you study this exactly?

I studied physics (including thermodynamics, atmosphere ocean interaction and astrophysics (with lots of boring problems about solar output) all very useful in understanding climate science though) at Melbourne uni. I then did a masters in energy studies including subjects entirely dedicated to climate science.

Dude I have the qualifications to understand the science and I can tell you the debate is over, there is no doubt.  How exactly do you apply electrothingomabobby to study climate science?

Joel B1 says:

05:04pm | 24/05/11

James,

Data is data. And there are only so many ways to analyse it. And as I guess you’re aware, fudge it too. I did tute Stats for a year. But heck, 2 million dirty nappies later and I can’t add to 14 without using my toes.

“I can tell you the debate is over, there is no doubt”

No you’re wrong, there is always doubt, even if it’s not much.

AGW is so very big, so very life-changing that it’ll take a lot more than a visibly-relieved PM Gillard telling me I’m dumb and it’s real.

Not saying what Uni, it’s up there though.

James says:

05:46pm | 24/05/11

If you are effectively a data analyst as you say, I would like to know specifically what data you analysed to convince you that humans are not warming the globe through the emission of GHGs.  Because in all my time analysing climate data I have never seen such a data set, what am I missing?

There is no doubt about global warming theory because to cast doubt on global heating theory you would need to provide strong evidence, that evidence has never been produced.  There is a billion to one chance the someone might disprove global heating theory but so far there has been no credible attempt.

Why won’t you tell me which uni you went to?  If it is “up there” as you say what is the problem?  I still don’t understand how “tute stats” means you somehow have spotted something that thousands of the best scientists in the world (don’t count myself in this btw) have missed.

MarK says:

10:25pm | 24/05/11

James I am so happy to see someone with your qualifications come to the debate.

We need more like you to join in.

Now as you say the deabate is over. The science is settled and unless we act then we are doomed and have destined our kids and randkids to a fate worse than death.

this is a serious problem and one as educated as you must surely agree like the Commisioner that this decade is the decade of action.

Don’t you agree that we need to de-carbonise at a rapid rate. To delay os to deny. We have wasted ears and because of this the tax on that pollutant carbon must be high, hurt and must be without compensation.

Earth is like a patient that has suffered a terrible heart attack. It needs a shock to come back to life.

At least $75 a tonne would be a fair tax and begin to start to change our behaviour don’t you think? I really am looking forward to your input.

Steve says:

04:04am | 25/05/11

@James

If you think the debate is over, then you are not well informed. My guess is that you’ve understood that the AGW theory is plausible and broadly consistent with observational data and stopped there. You are evidently not aware of the alternative theories, nor of the significant difficulties with the AGW theory. You need to stop being lazy and get properly informed before trying to dazzle folk with your intelligence and knowledge.

persephone says:

07:07am | 25/05/11

Steve

well,  he’s up there with the majority of the world scientific community, who regard the debate as over.

In fact, in the scientific community, it was over a decade or so ago.

The ‘debate’ outside of the scientific community is run by people like Monckton, who either aren’t scientists or have their own (very obvious) agendas.

The fact that there’s a mere handful of them - I can only think of about half a dozen - who are the public face of ‘denialism’ compared to the mulitple thousands of actual genuine real scientists who can be trucked out to support the case for global warming, gives you an indication of the lack of support denialism actually has.

The media’s obsession with ‘balance’ and their misapplication of the term (it’s not balanced to give 1% - or even 10% - the same coverage as 99%) means that we have a very distorted veiw of the weight of the argument on each side.

If we received truly balanced coverage of the issue, we’d only see one ‘denialist’ article for every nine articles in favour.

Which gets back to why the same half dozen ‘denialists’ get trotted out all the time, and we get such a diverse array of voices on the other side….

James says:

12:01pm | 25/05/11

When I say the debate is over I mean it is over in the same way that the debate is over that smoking causes cancer. 

Put yourself in the shoes of a scientist, your standard of proof is higher than that required to convict someone for murder, your theory must be consistant with other scientific theories, it must be backed up with experimental results that are consistant with your theory, think of all of the millions of person hours that have been put into reserching climate science, the terrabytes of data that have been analysed, all of that effort all of that work which has been painstakingly undertaken proven, reproven tested examined etc etc.  And then someone with little or no qualification in science comes along and starts telling everyone its a load of crap and people start believing them, it would be enough to make the strongest climate scientist weep bitter tears of frustration.

The scientific debate is over, there is no credible challange to the position of the world’s scientific academies.  I have looked through “the climate science”, everything tallies with my scientific training I see no glaring error.

Given the science the only rational thing we can do is decarbonise the world’s economy ASAP, how we do that I think everyone is much less certain, but that is our clear task.

RyaN says:

02:17pm | 25/05/11

@James: “When I say the debate is over I mean it is over in the same way that the debate is over that smoking causes cancer.  ” awesome, show us the definitive proof of a human marker in global warming and claim your 10 grand right here http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/10k-for-the-first-person-to-prove-weve-caused-climate-change/
If you can’t, well that would make YOU the nutcase and the LIAR.

James says:

02:58pm | 25/05/11

@ RyaN, Ok make the cheque out to the IPCC as they have already done it.  Just becasue you are not capable of understanding that they have makes almost no difference.

I am making you the offer of $20,000 if you can prove that humans aren’t causing the global warming of the last 100 years, I’ll chuck in a free set of steak knives too heck I’ll throw in a pure silver kitchen sink (and why not).

I’m sure I would get a vacant stare if I tried to explain any number of proven theories to you.

Steve says:

11:49pm | 25/05/11

@James

Have you read Svensmark? The debate will not be over until his theory has been falsified. Have you noticed the many divergences between the predictions of models based on high CO2 sensitivity with observational data? The debate will not be over until those divergences have been resolved.

My guess is that, like most people, you’ve not bothered to read on the other side of the debate. There are good scientists and crackpots on both sides. Neither side has a monopoly on either. Don’t be lazy. Check out the best of both sides, and don’t rush to conclusions. There is too much that will still don’t know to have the confidence that you express.

James says:

11:53am | 26/05/11

Bloody hell did you not read the article, I suppose you want to keep the “debate” going until “all the results are in” i.e. the planet is irreversibly stuffed and most of us are dead, I guess that is what is required to get through to some people and at that point if any of you lot pipe up and say “err should we have done something about this” ( presuming I am still alive)  I throttle you to death.

RyaN says:

04:41pm | 26/05/11

@James: you are the ones trying to prove some fictional theory, its not up to us to disprove it as if it exists in the first place.
Anyway, how is this, “The medieval warm period”, I’ll have my $20k now please.

James says:

10:49am | 27/05/11

RyaN you can do a medieval folk dance and have your 20,000 etc when you show me the global average temperature i.e. not just northern hemisphere temp data confirming you so called medieval warm period.

I will also require the sea surface temperature data and solar incidence data, which is required to prove your claim, see how this works pal?  How does it feel when the shoe is on the other foot.

RyaN says:

11:47am | 27/05/11

@James: I do see how it works James, I know exactly how it works, I will do what you lot do and cherry pick data, skip entire warming periods and completely ignore satellite temperature data, “fudge the figures” and “hide the decline” to show a hockey stick graph.
The real tragedy with this whole thing is the bastardisation of real science by a bunch of self interested religious type nut jobs who claim a consensus yet cannot name one reputable scientist that will put his / her name to a definitive human marker in global warming.

James says:

01:17pm | 27/05/11

The fact you bring up the so called “medieval warm period” shows just how little you understand the scientific process, how biased you are and how totally unqualified you are to enter into a debate on the science of global warming.  Do you even have qualifications in science?

Let me break this down so you can understand:

How exactly can you get a GLOBAL average temperature for the “medieval warm period”, if you are not measuring temperature in the southern hemisphere and the oceans? How do you do that?  Have you got some new method of extrapolating data that is, as yet, unknown to science?

I suggest you back down before you look like more of a fool.

Steve says:

09:24am | 01/06/11

@James wrote “Bloody hell did you not read the article, I suppose you want to keep the “debate” going until “all the results are in” i.e. the planet is irreversibly stuffed and most of us are dead”

I note James that you have reverted to an argument that we should give the warming side of the debate the benefit of the doubt.

This is something that I have encountered repeatedly with warmists. They’ve done some reading, and have some information to hand, which they will readily quote in an attempt to establish that the science is settled. But when challenged about the problems with their “facts” or asked to respond to alternative scientific theories, they revert to non-scientific arguments.

If you want to participate here as a scientist, then stick to the science. Otherwise, your claim to scientific knowledge is no more valid than mine, and certainly not a basis on which we can settle the debate.

fml says:

03:22pm | 24/05/11

Those shifty east Antarctic commie bastards!

St. Michael says:

06:16pm | 24/05/11

It’s because the Nazis have all their hidden bases in the East Antarctic.  Didn’t you get the memo?

Matt says:

07:14pm | 24/05/11

Does the scientific method involve disregarding atmosphere temperatures because “Personally, I don’t care what the temperature in the upper atmosphere is. I live on the ground, so that’s the one I’m interested in.”?

So scientific!

Edward III says:

04:25pm | 24/05/11

Brilliant summary of the true situation.

Follow the money trail and scientists will tell you anything you pay them for as long as it a) prolongs their access to govt funding, b) gives them fame, hero status, amongst the green mouth breathers still stuck in a 1960’s time warp.

Damon says:

04:45pm | 24/05/11

Hahaha,  Harry, Edward III etc. you really make me laugh.

You’re right scientists are just a bunch of self serving minions, incapable of rational thought, doing the government’s bidding. I’m jusr so glad you guys were here to warn us. Now why don’t you boys grab a club, maybe give each other a wack and see if you can’t get either of those two brain cells firing and head on back to dark ages. Watch out though, stray to far and you might just walk off the edge of the world.

Damon says:

04:46pm | 24/05/11

Hahaha,  Harry, Edward III etc. you really make me laugh.

You’re right scientists are just a bunch of self serving minions, incapable of rational thought, doing the government’s bidding. I’m jusr so glad you guys were here to warn us. Now why don’t you boys grab a club, maybe give each other a wack and see if you can’t get either of those two brain cells firing and head on back to dark ages. Watch out though, stray to far and you might just walk off the edge of the world.

jim g says:

05:35pm | 24/05/11

Are you trying to tell us the Earth is flat AND being warmed/cooled/frozen/flooded/ by AGW?

It’s all about the money.  Grants over fact.  Consensus over Science.

Einstein would be spinning like a top in his grave at the depths science has plunged to make a fast buck from fear mongering.

Scranbag says:

05:06pm | 24/05/11

1975? Old chestnut, that.

Just time to show a contrasting summary, from wikipedia - usual wiki cautions apply - useful starting point,  if in doubt follow the links…

“Global cooling was a conjecture during the 1970s of imminent cooling of the Earth’s surface and atmosphere along with a posited commencement of glaciation. This hypothesis had mixed support in the scientific community, but gained temporary popular attention due to a combination of a slight downward trend of temperatures from the 1940s to the early 1970s and press reports that did not accurately reflect the scientific understanding of ice age cycles.

In contrast to the global cooling conjecture, the current scientific opinion on climate change is that the Earth has not durably cooled, but undergone global warming throughout the twentieth century.[1]

In the 1970s there was increasing awareness that estimates of global temperatures showed cooling since 1945. Of those scientific papers considering climate trends over the 21st century, only 10% inclined towards future cooling, while most papers predicted future warming.

The general public had little awareness of carbon dioxide’s effects on climate, but Science News in May 1959 forecast a 25% increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide in the 150 years from 1850 to 2000, with a consequent warming trend.[2] The actual increase in this period was 29%. Paul R. Ehrlich mentioned climate change from greenhouse gases in 1968.[3] By the time the idea of global cooling reached the public press in the mid-1970s temperatures had stopped falling, and there was concern in the climatological community about carbon dioxide’s warming effects.[4] In response to such reports, the World Meteorological Organization issued a warning in June 1976 that a very significant warming of global climate was probable.[5]

1 “Summary for Policymakers” (PDF). Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 2007-02-05. http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg1/ar4-wg1-spm.pdf. Retrieved 2007-02-02. 

2 “Science Past from the issue of May 9, 1959”. Science News: p. 30. May 9, 2009. http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/43155/title/Science_Past_from_the_issue_of_May_9,_1959. 
3 a b Erlich, Paul. “Paul Erhlich on climate change in 1968”. Backseat driving. http://backseatdriving.blogspot.com/2005_07_01_backseatdriving_archive.html#112148592454360291. Retrieved November 17, 2005. 
4 Schneider SH (November 1972). “Atmospheric particles and climate: can we evaluate the impact of mans activities?”. Quaternary Research 2 (3): 425–35. doi:10.1016/0033-5894(72)90068-3. [Precis Lay summary]. 
5 World’s temperature likely to rise; The Times; 22 June 1976; pg 9; col A
Gotta fly. Can’t keep “Her” waiting. Scranbag offline.

fml says:

05:08pm | 24/05/11

Your absolutely right, my weight is constantly changing, and my lung capacity as a 12 year old is the same as now, where i am a 30 year old smoker, yes they have a negative impact on my health but its continually going to change so im just going to continue to eat junk food and do nothing about it.

Cheers for the pep talk!

St. Michael says:

06:19pm | 24/05/11

Another significant element of the Vostok ice core samples (google it) is that they appear to suggest that CO2 emissions are the effect of a temperature rise, not the cause.  That is, the temperature goes up and then CO2 emissions rise as a result.  If that’s correct then the entire global warming industry is for naught, because they have effect before cause.

paul says:

10:00pm | 24/05/11

ohhh how sweet it is, treasurer Swan caught out in a LIE,  the apple doesn’t fall too far from the PM ; /

The Badger says:

06:47pm | 24/05/11

Anthropomorphic
–adjective
1. ascribing human form or attributes to a being or thing not human, especially to a deity.
2. resembling or made to resemble a human form: an anthropomorphic carving.

anthropogenic
–adjective
caused or produced by humans: anthropogenic air pollution.

I think I’ve hear enough. Are you saying that clouds look like humans to you?

Sony B Goode says:

11:28pm | 26/05/11

You can’t tax gamma rays. CERN is about as mainstream science as it gets.
Probably explains the governments urgency given the AGW orthodoxy is about to fall apart.

Jass says:

10:23pm | 24/05/11

<<It would have no affect whatsoever on the climate but it would totally destroy the economies of every country and dramatically lower everyone’s living standards>>

I doubt whether those who profit from the introduction of the ridiculous carbon tax will be suffering like the rest of us -  they will just continue guzzling up as many resources as their fat salaries and profits allow them to, for as long as they can get away with it.  It’s a monumental scam and will be exposed as such long before economies are ruined and lives are lost in a struggle for existence.

Barbara says:

02:13am | 25/05/11

When will you doomers get it right?  The debate isn’t whether Climate Change is happening, it’s whether humans are the main driver for it, or more specifically Carbon Dioxide.  Looking at the historical scientific data shows that the climate has always been changing.  It also shows that the earth has had CO2 levels eight times higher and temperatures six degrees higher than today.  It also shows historically that temperature rise leads CO2 rise by some 600 to 800 years.  None of which tipped this planet over the edge.

WayneT says:

01:33am | 25/05/11

Actually both Climate Change and Gravity are theory based.  Modern scientists have a comprehensive understanding of the effects of gravity.  In local space, they use Newton’s formulas to calculate planetary and satellite orbits and forces acting on space craft.  However, they use Einstein’s theory of General Relativity to explain how it works and to account for certain features not explained by Newton’s formula.  Scientists eventually found chinks in the armor of Newton’s Universal Law of Gravity, which led to General Relativity.  In recent years, scientists have observed phenomenon such as the expansion of the universe that neither Newton’s nor Einstein’s theory can fully explain.  Indeed, some scientists are looking for a new theory of gravity or a modification of wither Newton’s or Einstein’s existing theories. Thus, we continually strive to reconcile all known observations within the framework of current theories, fully aware that if known observations do not fit into our current understanding of gravity, we have no choice but to alter or abandon those theories.  Thus is also the case with Climate Change theory.  While we discover more and more about this dynamic system we still lack full understanding of the actual drivers.  So to say that humans drive climate change given the climate record to date is purely speculative and lacks any real world hard evidence apart from computer modelling (also theory based).

Cartain Jack says:

04:21pm | 25/05/11

I would actually throw you and see how that went before i jumped.

James says:

12:06pm | 25/05/11

Wow you are one rude bastard, Persphone takes the time to explain the science to you, is polite, showing you the upmost respect (something I sure as f*** will not be doing) and you have the arrogance to flap your smarmy lips like that, I can just feel sorry for anyone who has to spend time around you in person.

James says:

04:52pm | 26/05/11

No amount of petrol can drive a car in which the engine doesn’t work.

Scranbag says:

05:15pm | 26/05/11

In the first place, Obob did not give a source for his assertion. Anyone commenting thus has to do the work that he ought to have done in checking and justifying his own position, before they can answer.

It turns out that Obob is silently quoting Lord Monckton.

Firstly, then, the “facts”. Here’s a quote from Monckton:

“In fact, the rate of warming from 1975-2001, at 0.16 °C per decade, was the fastest rate to be sustained for more than a decade in the 160-year record, but exactly the same rate occurred from 1860-1880 and again from 1910-1940, when we could not possibly have had anything to do with it.” (Christopher Monckton)

Monckton failed to explain how he reached the conclusion that mankind
“could not possibly have had anything to do with it” despite the increase in man-made CO2 since 1800 or thereabouts. His claim is repeated in rather more equivocal terms elsewhere, such that what he actually meant is harder to define.

Being only an interested observer but with an inquiring mind, I can do no better than refer to this paper,  that directly addresses Monckton’s attempted criticisms: “Responses to Monckton of Brenchley’s article ‘A Non-Problem Spun into a Global Crisis’  ” by Dr Andrew Glikson
Earth and paleo-climate scientist, Institute of Climate Change, ANU

Glikson’s paper is comprehensive and dense.  Given that, here is one summary extract, directly relevant to Monckton’s quoted claim. From page 22 of the document:

“Look at Figure 9, portraying the mean global temperature proxy curves (IPCC-2007), showing most of the above is incorrect. Global warming since the 18th century has exceeded historical and Holocene temperatures. The last 10 years contain the warmest years recorded since instrumental measurements commenced (1998, 2002, 2007) (page 22)

If you want to tease it out further, try digesting the whole paper. It’s fascinating, and leaves Moncktonin tatters. See
http://www.scribd.com/doc/25813090/Responses-to-Monckton-of-Brenchley-10-1-10

Next, on Monckton himself.

Monckton is one of the least temperate AGW critics, best known for his stridency and overclaiming. He claims to have been Thatcher’s “principal science advisor” and to have been a Nobel Laureate.

It has been shown conclusively, and widely recorded in the public domain, that he was *neither*. 

He is in fact a mathematician, who was briefly a junior advisor on Thatcher’s scientific advisory panel.

He was also briefly an IPCC panel member, who falsely claimed the IPCC Nobel award as if it were a personal Laureate.

That claim was rejected out of hand by the Nobel people. Later he explained it away as a “joke”.

All this is freely on the public record, which Obob and others could easily check.  Too busy? Here’s a neat summary from a familiar source.
http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/lord-monckton-nobel-prize/
There are many other sound sources.

Lastly, on Glikson himself. Originally from a geological background, he is an Earth and Paleo-climate Scientist. Visiting Fellow at the Australian National University, Research School of Earth Science, the School of Archaeology and Anthropology, and the Planetary Science Institute, and a member of the ANU Climate Change Institute.

Glikson has published a range of articles on climate change, ranging from the academic (as above) to the readily accessible. His papers are characterised by the relevance, currency, and cool tone.

Recent Papers: http://novakeo.com/?cat=361
More accessible: Climate Myths
http://www.countercurrents.org/glikson300409.htm

Take your time reading and make your own assessment of Glikson v Monckton.

Stuff to do.

Sony B Goode says:

11:23pm | 26/05/11

Took my time, read it all slowly and it’s clear that Glikson suffers from confirmation bias. Something prevalent when one has a strong belief and seeks facts to confirm that belief.

From your link: http://www.countercurrents.org/glikson300409.htm

Glikson: “global warming results in greater variability, including: greater frequency and stronger amplitude … as is in fact happening around the world, including the recent Australian droughts, mega-bush fires and floods”

Well the ozone hole has been shown to be a good fit for the above, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=ozone-hole-may-have-cause-australian-floods

specifically it alters the El-Nino, La-Nina cycles, which Glikson goes on and on about. In other words Glikson shows no evidence that any changes are as a result of some climate change that can be attributed to CO2.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/332/6032/951.abstract
“observed patterns of subtropical precipitation change,... are very similar to those in our model integrations, where ozone depletion alone is prescribed”

Occams razor applies, no need to add co2 when existing models fit the data.

As a side note according to Glikson’s own data, it’s interesting to note that at the current rate of the rising of oceans, it will be a 100 year for them to rise 30cm, which is well within the variance of normal tidal events. It’s hard to understand what the urgency is about.

Nothing Glikson says provide any evidence of man-made warming. In fact when you have two sets of data, such as you point to, which contradict, it’s a safe bet to say the matter is inconclusive.

Correlation is not causation.

James says:

10:43am | 27/05/11

Ceeeripes man you have no idea what you are talking about, the causation was nailed 100 years ago when scientists discovered CO2 absorbed and emitted in the infrared part of the spectrum, so don’t come the raw prawn with me.

You sound daft pretending you can put the kibosh on the best scientists in the world, take a good hard look in the mirror, on second thoughts don’t to that you might get stuck there.

Scranbag says:

04:29pm | 29/05/11

In the spirit of constructive comment, I feel I ought to note that the Counter Currents link provided by me,(“Climate Myths”, where Glickson rebutted a string of Bolt’s myths) is now generating an IE8 *Unsafe* warning. The site displayed OK (no warning) when I looked at it first - and still displays fine, no warning, in Firefox.  Suggest caution.

James says:

04:26pm | 27/05/11

That’s right, keep talking to yourself mate, I’m sure you find yourself very smart.

Scranbag says:

02:33pm | 29/05/11

Arctic vs Antarctic Ozone
From experience on The Punch, its always wise to have a careful look at the other fellow’s claims, and the source if possible.

In this case, such a check reveals stark differences in the content, emphasis and conclusion of the actual WMO and NASA reports vs Obob’s Nature and Herald Sun references.

ANTARCTIC Ozone hole
In the case of the *Antarctic*, Obob was relying on a 2007 paper.
My remarks related to *2009* data already referred to, as published by NASA, which noted:
“Recent observations and several studies have shown that the size of the annual ozone hole has stabilized and the level of ozone-depleting substances has decreased by 4 percent since 2001”
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/2009_anta.html
Confirmed, then, for the Southern hemisphere: Ozone hole stabilised and on the right track.

ARCTIC Ozone hole
Obob’s source is talking about recent 2011 data for the *Arctic* ozone hole. This he seems to think is a telling blow. 

Not so. In fact the Arctic ozone layer behaves differently to the Antarctic ozone layer, and the occurence of a record Arctic low was in fact not unexpected, as the original report went on to explain:

“Observations from the ground and from balloons over the Arctic region as well as from satellites show that the Arctic region has suffered an ozone column loss of about 40% from the beginning of the winter to late March. The highest ozone loss previously recorded was about 30% over the entire winter.

In Antarctica the so-called ozone hole is an annually recurring winter/spring phenomenon due to the existence of extremely low temperatures in the stratosphere. In the Arctic the meteorological conditions vary much more from one year to the next and the temperatures are always warmer than over Antarctica. Hence, some Arctic winters experience almost no ozone loss, whereas cold stratospheric temperatures in the Arctic lasting beyond the polar night can occasionally lead to substantial ozone loss.

Even though this Arctic winter was warmer than average at ground level, it was colder in the stratosphere than for a normal Arctic winter.

Unprecedented but not unexpected
Although the degree of Arctic ozone destruction in 2011 is unprecedented, it is not unexpected. Ozone scientists have foreseen that significant Arctic ozone loss is possible in the case of a cold and stable Arctic stratospheric winter. Stratospheric ozone depletion occurs over the polar regions when temperatures drop below -78°C. At such low temperatures clouds form in the stratosphere. Chemical reactions that convert innocuous reservoir gases (e.g. hydrochloric acid) into active ozone depleting gases take place on the clouds particles. The result is rapid destruction of ozone if sunlight is present.

Ozone depleting substances such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and halons, once present in refrigerators, spray cans and fire extinguishers, have been phased out under the Montreal Protocol. Thanks to this international agreement, the ozone layer outside the polar regions is projected to recover to its pre1980 levels around 2030-2040 according to the WMO/UNEP Scientific Assessment of Ozone Depletion (see link below). In contrast, the springtime ozone layer over the Antarctic is expected to recover around 2045-60, and in the Arctic it will probably recover one or two decades earlier.”
http://www.wmo.int/pages/mediacentre/press_releases/pr_912_en.html

So. Arctic hole large but not unexpected. Both Arctic *and* Antarctic holes on track to recovery, at dates consistent with previous summaries posted by me.

Whether Obob assumed the two must behave in the same way, or whether he confused the Arctic with the Antarctic isn’t clear. 

What is clear is that like another poster, on thorium earlier in the week, Obob fell on a passing reference where the headline seemed to suit his assumptions. This he sought to pass off as conclusive, without actually taking in the meaning of the material - or checking the original source and whether it was current.

Unfortunately, both the original NASA 2009 Antarctic and WMO 2011 Arctic articles do the oppposite to his claims: both confirm the summaries I posted earlier.

Scranbag says:

09:50am | 29/05/11

Wilful spelling checker.
Not only pointless by demonstrable wrong
= Not only pointless but demonstrably wrong

Scranbag says:

10:03am | 29/05/11

The link parser has broken a couple of links in these posts. The links can be reached by cut&paste;, but not by click.

Simple link to the UK Committee on Climate Change:
http://www.theccc.org.uk/reports/fourth-carbon-budget

Obob says:

04:13pm | 30/05/11

While both are failures at predicting, there is one very important difference between Camping and Gore.

Camping asks for donations.
You decide.

Gore wants to pass laws to take your money.
Gore decides for you.

Obob says:

03:32pm | 30/05/11

… with Hansen a Jesus-as-God-incarnate, and Gore as a Paul/Moses/Mohammed character carrying the received Word to the flock.