Keith:
I read you everyday and I think you are doing a great job!
Keep up the good work.

Consider the source and rest assured.  It’s the old ‘stick ‘n stones’ thing, besides we all have bad hair months, it has something to do with the moon. (I’m told)

A neutral site, constructive and civil discussion! no wonder you attracted the ire of the critters that inhabit the bottom of the pond

There is a tendency on both sides of the Climate Wars to make things personal.  This may be inevitable:  AGW is itself the source of passion, and the issue also serves as a proxy (heh) for other beliefs, which usually go unstated.
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Blogging is also a very personal medium.
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When people (even smart people) write quickly and with emotion, they are going to make mistakes.  Even someone who bats 900 is going to accumulate a lot of errors, if they write a lot.  Which many climate-bloggers and commenters do.
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It’s an unpleasant experience to have to say, “I was wrong.”  Worse, when my error involved slamming an opponent.  I know s/he is still wrong overall, and it’s galling to contemplate giving away some of my credibility, for the sake of some hypothetical notion of fair play.  Thus the temptation to ignore the record and move along.  Or to double down, validating the prior criticism with new ones.
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It would be helpful if all parties could move away from the “Knaves or Fools” view of The Opposition.  Amazing and improbable though it seems, there are skeptics/warmists/denialists/alarmists/your-favorite-term-here-ists who are people of good faith, with reasonable perspectives.  At least in my experience in reading climate blogs over the past 9 months.
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Maybe the discussion could focus more upon issues:  technical, policy, normative.  Some of us don’t subscribe to the Warrior Model of saving the world from ( …).  Even those who do might benefit from reflecting on the likely effectiveness of the tactics that they are most comfortable in employing.

I have climate scientist friends, and they are anything but knaves or fools..

That said, they don’t seem to get, that their silence on the catastrophic CAGW annoucements, not supported by any evidence (artic ice death spiral, 20 foot se level rise, anything to do with Al Gore  of some lobby groups, activists and politicians, effectively endorses these pronouncements, especially as far as the media is concerned.

Dear Keith,
Yours has become my favourite in a long list of blogs I follow from both sides of the climate change science debate. Yours is the only one I know of presently where the moderator is truly neutral and interested in just listening to what people have to say. Of course you’ll be attacked, and from both sides no doubt, but for those frustrated AGW debate followers amongst us who genuinely just want the facts and the truth, you’re doing the world a great service.
Best, Alex

Wow, 5 separate climate bloggers dedicating entire thread to criticize c-a-s in detail? When reading between the lines, these complaints reveal a lot of sour grapes. I’ve personally discovered quite a few of the feeds I subscribe to from this manner of publicity.
Notice there was not one accusation of unfair moderation practices. I wonder if openly vowing to never participate or read this blog, has the effect they are hoping for. The amount of self-importance is amusing.

Keith, thanks for the apology.
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I have been a little worried about your efforts to provide neutral ground failing on account of the usual reason: the committed but wrong people outnumber the informed and have more time. By moderating lightly you risk becoming another Watts site, perhaps more policy oriented than science oriented, but still a haven for half baked and ill-informed speculation and bar broom bluster posing as reasoned discourse.
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And that’s the reason I came close to giving up on c-a-s a couple of weeks ago. Your rounding Gavin up saved you, bringing more informed people back. It will be a struggle to keep that up because of the strategic asymmetry. I disagree with Arthur’s boycott. Even though I am often exasperated and occasionally angry with you, I see useful things happening in these discussions that don’t seem to happen elsewhere.
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I look forward to the beer session.
 

I forgot to add:
Keith’s willingness to immediately admit when he’s been mistaken, increases his credibility, IMHO. When people react stubbornly by getting defensive, it tends to escalate minor issues out of proportion. I’ve learned from RL experience to just apologize when I’m mistaken. In the end, accountability effectively diffuses the situation. It makes life so much easier.
 

(Keith, this is this only insulting post I will ever write, so feel free to snip it but please don’t ban me, won’t happen again)
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While I essentially agree with people like Romm and Eli’s interpretation of climate science and what needs to be done, I dislike there writing nonetheless. There is nothing specific that I disagree with, so I think I can best relate my complex feelings with a dialogue from the 1998 film The Big Lebowski; where I will be playing the part of  Jeff Bridges character ‘the Dude’ and Romm/Eli will play the part of John Goodman’s character, Walter Sobchak:
Walter Sobchak: Am I Wrong?
The Dude: …you’re not wrong Walter, you’re just an asshole.

> Brin … wouldn’t he have mentioned it? Not a peep.
Brin hasn’t even deleted accumulating spam from his long-abandoned thread about you, not for weeks.
Signaling agreement with you by ignoring you?  We-e-e-ellll …. Could be, I suppose.  If you asked him, do you think he’d say?

#14, isaacschumann

I think you miss my point.  I believe Michael’s views are absolutely honest and legitimate…. for Micheal.   That does not mean that engaging Micheal is going to be a productive enterprise.  There is clear evidence that the reasoned and considered opinions of  thoughtful people (like Roger Pielke Jr, Lucia, Keith, and others) are 100% discounted by Michael.
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If you are looking for a means to advance the debate and reach some consensus, then engaging Michael seems to me to be simply futile.

Two things that I’ve noticed about the critics of your site, long before they turned their sights on you–first, they tend to coordinate their media pushes, or at least are very quick to take inspiration from each other, so it’s not a surprise that this came in battalions, not as single soldiers.
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Second, their obsessive search for details at the expense of the overall picture is evidence that you are broadly on the right track.
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Anyone who looks at Romm’s site can see he is pretty much as you described him (although he seems to have toned it down recently, and his site is still worth visiting for green energy updates). If anything, you were too kind to him.
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Michael Tobis in comments here expresses the fear that this will become a WUWT type of site. I doubt it very much, and his presence here is one reason why I doubt it. Haven’t seen his name too frequently in comments over there. I think he’s working the ref here…
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This still is the premiere weblog as far as a safe place to discuss things with members of opposing camps. That’s valuable to me, as both the Consensus Team and diehard skeptics are in camps I oppose.  Monckton’s effects are just as pernicious as Romm’s, after all–he just isn’t as ‘in your face’ about it–perhaps because the English are more polite, on average.

“That is good to hear, Judith, cause sometimes I wonder”¦”

Rest assured, you left your detractors in the dust sometime ago.  They only want to slow you down and pull you back.  There’s nothing wrong with Cas, and there’s certainly nothing wrong with what you’re doing.

When was the last time you took a break? (I’m new here and haven’t a clue;-)

Judith Curry #26,
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You are right, there is altogether too much personal hostility (too much asshole factor, as you say).  But I fear this is a result of the medium of communications… faceless and often anonymous electronic word transmissions.  People simply do not often interact this way in face-to-face conversation; if they did, it would often lead to physical confrontations.  In real life, people usually restrain their worst impulses.
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Most people who comment on blogs like this, (and many others) are obviously intelligent, honest, and well intentioned, so it is almost bizarre that there is so much personal hostility.  It is a big problem, but I don’t know how to solve it.

Pascvaks, #21:  “When was the last time you took a break? (I’m new here and haven’t a clue;-)”

Funny you should bring this up as I just called Keith earlier this morning to advise him to post to the wires that he is on an “official” break next week as enforced by moi. Other pursuits with profits are calling from the wild……
Cheers.

Tom, #38
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I second.

The problem the more political climate activists have with this site is – its moderator’s stated purpose.  The recent exchanges between Judith Curry and Gavin Smith being the best case in point.
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To them, Judith Curry, Steve McIntyre et al. have to be marginalized.  This is done at the activist sites by comments and moderation.  They deal with Climate Audit and Wattsupwiththat by demonizing them and convincing their faithful to ignore them.  Thus, there is no (in their mind) credible forum for skeptical heresy.
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Then along comes this blog and provides a forum for actual civil debate, culminating in a polite, professional discussion between Gavin and Judith on genuine issues of dispute.
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The problem with this? It suggests that there is actually something still to debate.  C-a-S provides a forum for the blasphemy of skeptics, which is bad enough, but it also has active participation by well known members of the consensus.  That participation lends credence to the belief that the science is not “settled,” in the way the activists believe.  This just cannot be allowed.
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You add that to the impending doom of their larger agenda politically, and you get the rage that you see now.  If the next election trends the way it appears to be headed, expect the rhetoric to get even worse.
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As a conservative, I must confess to a bit of guilty pleasure in watching this internecine warfare (“You’re stupid and evil because you disagree with me”), among people who share the same tactics in discussing others with whom they jointly disagree politically.  Tribalism is alive and well on the climate blogs, and the sub-tribes are just as combative as their larger counterparts.

barry :
“MT decides who is “˜wrong’ vs informed, it is almost religous”¦”
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The blogosphere is rife with commenters who have decided that *they* are well-informed enough about climate science to tell the conventionally trained experts that they are ‘doin it all rong’.    So?  People tend to believe (to over-believe, actually) that they are right in all walks of life.  Surely believing you’re right isn’t sufficient to make it true.   Are *you* well-informed enough to make a judgment call about what constitutes ‘well-informed’?  If you think so, how do you know you are?  What authority do you appeal to, in the end?
 

Keith
Our dear friend El, in advancing the Dilling paper lets a small secret out – he does not agree with Hale and Dilling on one crucial point.

“IEHO* permission from governments representative of a majority of people on the planet could legitimately take such action. In that manner, such a decision even though not unanimous, could be properly taken”.

By the above, Eli is informing us that even mitigation, (like ocean fertilization or CO2 capture) , stuff that he doesn’t support , if not undertaken, should not be for the reason that permission from the citizenry cannot be obtained.

Sounds familiar to me, now, where have we heard something like this before?

“Decisions about top-down versus bottom-up approaches for climate change policy go to the heart of our beliefs about the boundaries of public and private, the limits of state control, and the rational behavior of individuals…At the extreme, this could be characterized as a case of democracy versus benign dictatorship””…There is then nothing undemocratic about regulating people’s behavior…In either extreme of more deliberative or liberal democratic theory, there is no a priori reason that regulations aimed at engaging people in low carbon behavior could not constitute legitimate products of democratic decision making.”

Ockwell et al. Reorienting Climate change communication for effective Engagement? Mitigation: Forcing People to be Green or Fostering Grass-Roots. Science Communication 2009; 30; 305

Anyone wanting to poke their eyes out. http://scx.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/30/3/305

Moral: If you stand in the way of CO2 regulation (defined as policy “success”) , you are to be taken down.

Shub, perhaps oddly one of the things that first got me riled up after Climategate was the “RulesOfTheGame.pdf” document in the zip. An instruction manual on manipulation and coercion that truly raised my hackles. Some excerpts:
“Don’t create fear without agency
Fear can create apathy if individuals have no “˜agency’ to act upon the threat. Use fear with great caution.“


“Use transmitters and social learning
People learn through social interaction, and some people are better teachers and trendsetters than others. Targeting these people will ensure that messages seem more trustworthy and are transmitted more effectively.”


“Use emotions and visuals
Another classic marketing rule: changing behaviour by disseminating information doesn’t always work, but emotions and visuals usually do.”


Message sponsored by Defra, Carbon Trust, DTI, the Environment Agency, Energy Savings Trust and UK Climate Impacts Programme.
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No, I don’t like manipulation or coercion.

45

I would like to appeal to evidence not any  ‘authority’…

in a lot of areas, I think it is safe to say, we just don’t know, lots of questions, or some assumptions are beung proved incorrect, etc…

In the blogs it gets way to personal… because I guess of the nature of the medium.  Put all these people in a room, give them drinks and canapes, and you/I might be surprised how much ‘most’ of the  people have in common..

Post the guardian climategate meeting, it was a bit like that..

Tommorow,  a very well respected IPCC climate scientist, is helping me ‘manage’ my son’s 7th bithday party. She probably has a far better, closer understanding of the Hockey Stick’ IPCC process debate, than Judith Curry,  we totally disagree about, CAGW/AGW  politics.. yet we are good friends since our boy’s were babies..  How is that, just normal human civilised interaction.

Which is missing in blog land, when the dominant, 100% convinced – who want action/policy NOW, shout down potentially the middle ground (ie not CAGW, but AGW, or aGW?)

A few certain elements want 100% consensus, as anything else instills doubt, and they lose control of the political advocacy process that certain small groups have had..

In the UK, ALL political parties (and the EU) have signed up fully to the CAGW science is settled position. Today, I have tried several times just to get a comment, into the Guardians website, to say, you let Bob Ward attack – ‘The Hockey Stick Illusion’ (bishop Hill) – Judith suggested people read it to understand where Steven Mcintyre is coming from. 

YET, the Guardian will not allow even a coment on their website, suggesting a link to Andrew Montford, defending himself. Andrew being blocked from commenting as well..

This is a national newspaper that had the ear of government on CAGW policy, and was pushing them harder for the past 13 years.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/cif-green/2010/aug/19/climate-sceptics-mislead-public?showallcomments=true#end-of-comments

The general public, polls show are ‘sceptical’ of the alarmism, so much so that the old favourite ‘poster child’, wwf, greenpeace, Gore, etc, scares, are no longer working.  (polar bears, 9 metre sea level rises, tipping points, artic ice death spirals, etc,etc)

Oh yeah, Simon, there’s lots more, from where it came from. Climate scientists should be ashamed and outraged at all the propaganda that is being done, in their name.

I seem to be detecting the wildeyed feeling among some (the two ends of the Bell Curve?) that someone has abandoned them for the other side, and on the part of others on the other side that he has joined them.  I’m so sorry, I know I was gone for a few hours, could someone show be where that happened?  Who are we talking about?

Re: charge #2:  quote mining MT
Actually Arthur Smith does not accuse you of quote mining. He accuses you of twisting MT “words around to mean essentially the opposite of what  Tobis’ blog post actually says”.   Which is not at all the same thing.
I wouldn’t put it nearly that harshly but I do think you are guilty of poor reading comprehension in this case.
And in the same post calling Tobis  “one of the most relentless and over-the-top critic of Revkin and Pielke Jr” is just ridiculous.  (He is not even close to the same league as Eli or Romm).
Anyway I do think you are honest (although often wrong) which is why I’ve started reading this blog.
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DESIDERATA
Go placidly amid the noise and haste,
And remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly & clearly;
and listen to others,
even the dull & ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud & aggressive persons,
they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain & bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing future of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs;
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity & disenchantment
it is perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue & loneliness.
Beyond wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees & the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labours & aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery & broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.

Methinks Eli doth snark too much.  In the post he cited to on his own blog, he wrote ” IEHO permission from governments representative of a majority of people on the planet could legitimately take such action.”  arguably, the meaning of “representative” used as an adjective in this context could go either way.  But that doesn’t help, it is still a coercive prescription no matter how you look at it.
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Let’s assume that the intended meaning was “representative government” in the sense of democratic representation (and not a Friedmanesque pining for dictatorship).   Given that only roughly 46% of the world’s people live in liberal (in the classical sense) democracies, I wonder how we would go about getting a majority of the “representative governments” to impose their will on the non-representative governments (and their people)?
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This is a larger question I have long had about the anti-carbon movement in western democracies.  Even if we assume that politicians in the U.S. will become willing to commit political suicide and implement zero carbon policies in the near future, how do you get the non-free countries to go along in the real world?
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The Chinese Communist Party is not engaging in its own perestroika experiment because of its love for its subjects.  It is trying to avoid a repeat of Russia in the 90s, or more probably the fate of Ceaucescu in Romania.   The Chinese dictators (and increasingly Putin) already have all the power over their people that western greens can only dream of, but they are not willing to commit personal (or national) suicide by adopting economy killing “reforms” like zero carbon.
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Does anybody really think that the PR tactics used in the west will have any impact on the Chinese and Russians?  Send them extra copies of the AR4 and An Inconvenient Truth?  A billion hockey sticks?  How do you convince voters in the U.S. to commit economic harakiri when the rulers of the majority of the world’s population are telling you to take a hike?
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Does anybody on the climate activist side have an actual idea of how to go about what they recommend?  Or is it just trash the U.S. economy on principle, and hope for the best?

Keith:
Good luck with the other stuff.  I applaud your efforts to bring together different viewpoints.  I deplore those who seek to silence critics or those who give critics voice.

Heretic!
Having spent a few years on the climate blogs the fact is that there are two positions: the CAGW supporters and the rest.
Realistically, if you believe in CAGW the situation admits of no ambiguities, no uncertainties, no pauses until the science is in – such talk denies the “fundamentals” and leads to whichever version of CAGW megadeath you prefer. And, if, for a moment, you suggest there may be uncertainty, another side, a different interpretation of the data, then you are enabling the deniers. You, personally are damning the rest of mankind to heat death.
Over on the skeptics’ side the discourse is, by definition, more moderate and nuanced. After all, if the skeptics are right we have nothing to worry about. If they are half right there is very little to worry about and, if they are entirely wrong in the particulars but close in the effects CAGW will be unlikely. They can afford to relax because they perceive the stakes entirely differently.
The fragility of the CAGW position lies in the fact that the advocates of that position are also, by and large, advocates of the radical revision of the entire economic model upon which the world has been operating for centuries. Cap and Trade, Carbon Tax, rapid deindustrialization – all these require that we have nearly complete certainty about highly complex and contested matters of science and economics. If a single breach is made in the dam of CAGW certainty it matters a lot because policy makers will revert to their normal pattern of inertia.
For the skeptics, the gradual destruction of the CAGW model and the science which underlies it, is not at all urgent. The political inertia is already in place. Doing nothing is, politically, almost always more attractive than doing something unless a bunch of hysterics are able to hijack the middle class agenda. For a year or two, barely, that hysteria swept the West, now it is abating.
And now the CAGW proponents are realizing that the momentum has left their side. They will be shriller. And they will hate people who note the science rather than the agenda even more.
Because they are losing and they know it. They are losing scientifically and politically.
Expect more incoming but recognize that all the shots are desperate duds.
 

Lady in Red want us to to read something that purports to ‘compare/contrast CAGW/Islam’
I see no link, but I predict it’s to fresh poop indeed.
Btw, I notice only denialist tribals employ the acronym “CAGW”.   I don’t recall ever seeing it in scientific literature so far, or the IPCC summaries.   What’s going on here?Another coverup?
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I did ask a few times, here an on other blogs where Tom Fuller participates.  I can ask again:
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Is the “C” in CAGW scientifically defined?

Tom Fuller,
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Fair enough.  Now, is AGW scientifically defined?

CAGW is a term climate activists dislike because it eases communication about their position.  “Global warming” was changed to “climate change” because the original term was not having the desired effect.  (Kind of like how “liberal” became an insult in American politics, so everybody wants to be called progressive now.)  I would be willing to wager that the term has been poll tested at length.  Moreover, “CAGW” reminds people that both the warming, and the catastrophe, have been lacking for about a decade.   No wonder they want to get rid of it.
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The term itself is accurate as a description of the activist’s position though.  They apparently have no problem with the A and G.  It is the C and W that bother them.   But is it “change” that will melt the glaciers, turn the Amazon to savannah, melt the Arctic and Greenland, make the oceans rise, increase the number and severity of hurricanes, etc., etc., etc, or is it warming?  And if the predicted effects are not going to be catastrophes (or in Michael Tobis’ words, “megacatastrophe[s]“), who will agree to the massive economic changes the activists propose?
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He who controls the terms of the debate has already won.  The terms “hockey team” and “auditor” (coined by the activists) have already been turned against them.  CAGW is just effective shorthand for their own position.  It is certainly not as offensive as “denier” and “climate septic,” to name two other additions to the climate lexicon from the activists.  I see no reason to allow the activists to define the terms of the debate more than they already have.
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The little boy didn’t cry “animal population change.”  He cried “WOLF!!!”

Tom Fuller,
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Your definition seems good enough for me.  It suffices to show that AGW refers to a scientific hypothesis.  I’d like to see how the C could refer to a scientific hypothesis.
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The adjunction of the C to a scientific hypothesis is both troublesome and useful.  It is troublesome as CAGW might not be a scientific hypothesis anymore.  It is useful as we can try to question the scientific basis of CAGW, whereas it’s not really a scientific hypothesis anymore.  How catastrophic is “catastrophic” when it’s not scientific?
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***
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Speaking of “denial”, we can see that it is somehow well-defined psychological term:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial
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(Please note the relationship between the catastrophism meme and the process of minimisation.)
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We can disagree on the scientific basis of “denial”, but not because it’s undefined.  We know that denial is not a river in egypt, after all.
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Somehow, “denialism” is not so well received:
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denialism
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While I disapprove of both, a cursory reading of these two pages and the references therein should suffice to dismantles a usual argument relating denialism with historical revisionism.
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***
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That said, we should bear in mind some important things here:
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First, replying “but denier too” commits an obvious tu quoque.  That people use “denier” does not justify the use of “CAGW”.
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Second, we’re talking about terms that are losing their edge as they are entering into common usage.  “Drinking Kool Aid” is now part Internet slang, whence it was once upon a time quite offensive.   The Internet was first the land of people that were even ruder that today.
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Third, it’s easy to turn neutral epithets into slurs.  Notice to that effect the use of “activists” in GaryM’s last comment.
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It’s easy to tag a bunch of people.  It’s even easier to tag a bunch of hypothetical people. Relying on tagging can only be useful to frame minds, or to “define the terms”, as GaryM aptly describe.
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Trying to win a rational argument without the due dilligence to identify precisely what one is talking about is not that easy.
 

Willard, you seem to have forgotten how the term denier came into usage in the climate wars. Do you really need your memory refreshed? CAGW supporters (sorry–I’m working with that term until something better comes along, like hysterics, maybe) equated skeptics with those who denied the Holocaust killed 6 million Jews, gypsies and homosexuals.
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The name stuck. And spread. Then people started trying to justify it by equating it with the psychological phenomenon.
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But it was first used and expressly designed to equate skeptics with those who denied the WWII Holocaust occurred.
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And I don’t think skeptics will ever forget. Heck, I’m not a skeptic and I won’t forget.

George Monbiot writes about Green Madness:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/16/green-ivory-towers-farm-skyscrapers

“As a result, each of us exists in our own world of meaning, constantly at risk of being shattered by inconvenient facts. If we acknowledge them, they can destroy our sense of self. So, to ensure that we won’t be “overwhelmed by the uncertainty inherent in living in a world we can never truly know”, we shut them out by lying to ourselves”

exapnd it a bit, and this is why the CAGW delusion is so strong, ie the Gore, Greenpeace, wwf version of AGW (catastrophy)

Imagine what the usual suspect would say if a sceptic wrote this:

“But it pains me to report that I find myself at odds with other greens almost as often as I find myself fighting our common enemies. I’ve had bruising battles over a long series of miracle solutions supported by friends: liquid biofuels, hydrogen cars and planes, biochar plantations, solar electricity in the UK, scrappage payments, feed-in tariffs. But no green delusion is as crazy as the one I am about to explain. The idea itself might not interest you. But the insight it gives into the filtering techniques humans use is fascinating. So please bear with me while I spell out the latest madness.”

Full article and context in thge link above…

What is interesting, since the Guardain Climategate debate, George has not even written about the event he Chaired, and has been rather quieter, less strident(biodiversity, etc) this later article, especially.

Willard
To be in denial, or to to deny, requires that one see clear-cut evidence all around, but yet not accept it.
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Right now, those in ‘denial’ are the ones who see clear-cut evidence, in the pages of the IPCC reports and blogs, and cannot understand the rest need a higher standard of proof.
�
This situation is very well know in environmental circles – when scientific measurements detect an effect but cannot convince legislators and policymakers, let alone the general public, of its veracity because the ill-effect is so small and attribution is very shaky. The longest people have dealt with this problem is in the public health field – attribution can take decades to be done successfully sometimes. And sorry, whether everyone should run scared like headless chicken whenever they hear the word “health risk” is a matter of opinion still and life would become unbearable if it were otherwise.
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In global warming debates, this effect was named the ‘Giddens Paradox’, by (who else) Anthony Giddens. So pretty much a good number of people know the existence of this problem – whether AGW/GW/CAGW will follow a trajectory of one of the success stories (wherein the general population has finally become mindlessly afraid of the purported risk) is a different thing altogether. Whether it deserves to follow a success trajectory is another separate thing as well. We are not talking about these, let us remember, but about ‘denial’ being an expected, acceptable (in scientific terms) social-scale response.
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But apparently the global warming community wont somehow come to terms with it – as your position shows. I don’t know about you, but if you examine the mountains of voluminous crap that has appeared in the peer-reviewed psychology and social sciences literature, psychologizing away the issue and de-legitimizing its subjects instead of studying them – it is very clear who among the two camps, is in ‘denial’.

GaryM,
�
This last comment of yours shows evidence of what you dub catastrophic.  All you need now is to identify the “catastrophism”.  It’s not impossible to do.
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In that case, I believe that Tom Fuller will have been proven wrong and hope that this discussion will have answered Steven Sullivan’s question which started it.
�
I also note that instead of position, you ask people to raise hands.  Suppose that one person raises the hand.  Does that mean that this person will start to call him or herself a partisan of “catastrophism?”  (I’m simply pointing out the obvious: there are labels for oneself and labels for others.)
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As possible as it might be, you must somehow acknowledge that the C is derogatory.  Yes, but “denier” too, I know, I know.  Does that mean that you’re no better than those who use “denier”?

Shub,
�
Your definition seems to miss an important nuance.  Denial requires that a person refuses to see what for people all around that person is clear-cut evidence.  It would be interesting to have some example of a person that refuses the clear-cut evidence, a clear-cut evidence that the person still believes.
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Distracting oneself with the weakest evidence possible, as if there was no clear-cut evidence available, is clinical denial.

This is something of a pointless re-hash of the same question raised, explored and pretty much put to bed long ago, all within the CaS house. While I do see much derision in the exploration of predictions of catastrophe, but those examinations stand or fall on their own merits.
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The word “catastrophe” (or “catastrophic”, or similar) exists in the climate change vernacular regarding predicted consequences of anthropogenic contributions to climate change, and is succinctly summed up in the acronym CAGW. I just don’t see any point in challenging it or complaining about it. Use it or don’t use it, but complaining is concern trolling.

SimonH #87:
CAGW is a subset of AGW.
In other words CAGW describes the set of predicted consequences of AGW where the outcome is catastrophic.
Obviously there are many outcomes of AGW which can be predicted to not be catastrophic.  For example, the temperature only going up 1 degree C by 2100, instead of the 3 to 6 some predict.
Some – like Williard – find the CAGW label offensive.
I was merely acknowledging that.
But I do agree that the entire debate over labels is off topic.

Urgh.. I said “There is an argument for getting rid of the acronym “CAGW”, in that it serves to blur the distinction between [..]“ I meant that ridding the term would serve to blur…
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Must.. drink.. more.. coffee…

Er, Willard, what’d I say? Not that I haven’t provoked other people, but I honestly don’t see what I wrote that prompted this…

Shub,
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I just read this review of the Giddens’ book:
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=406101&c=1
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Here is the author’s description of the paradox:
> Since the dangers posed by global warming are not immediate or visible to most people, they ignore them; but waiting for them to become visible and immediate before taking serious action will be, by definition, too late. This is a political and not a technocratic problem, he argues, and those in the climate-change lobby who get impatient with politics are wrong. Even the best technocratic scheme has little chance of success unless a way is found to achieve it through politics.
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I must admit that I am no Giddens’ fan.  (At least, I still believe his take on constitutive rules was wrongheaded, but anyway.)  But I surmise that Giddens might be bloody well right about this paradox, or at least his conclusion about the paradox.  Thinking a bit more about the notion of “clear-cut evidence” made me think about this other idea, which bears some relatioship to this paradox.
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Your previous characterization of denial made it look like it was a case of blindsightedness.  That is, the person that denies was looking at the evidence but could not recognize it as evidence.   The question of what counts as blindsight is a complicated matter: let’s just use that as an analogy for what I refer as “looking, but not seeing”.
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The notion of denial I had in mind looked more like an inferential mishap.  A person can look at all the pieces of evidence available, but still could not make up his mind as to the propre inference to make.  This describes well the denial of addicted persons, or persons unwilling to adopt a healtier lifestyle for their heart condition, or whatnot.  So I would contend that it’s better to say that denial is a case of “seeing, but not connecting dots”.
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I believe that describing the climate wars as inferential differences renders more justice to every position, than simply talk about “evidence”.  Evidence has a clear connotation of “being obvious to the eye”, at least etymologically.  In fact, if we were talking about inference, we could even take the idea of judiciary evidence.  Judging is more complicated than seeing: everyone can see the same facts without reaching the same conclusion about them.
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So, to me, the problem is not the evidence, it’s the judgement rendered, once the evidence is taken into account.  (There is also the case of the evidence themselves, but it’s always related to the inferential steps involved.  Anyway.)
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This idea also renders justice to what Giddens dubs a “paradox”.  Waiting to “see” before acting amounts to not acknowledging the fact that the judgement is never so obvious (another interesting visual concept) as being “seen”.  My only criticism, for now, would be that I fail to see this as a paradox.
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In any case, this Giddens idea might have interesting repercussions in a related philosophical debate, the one about akrasia.  This debate is too complicated to be recalled here.

What I think GaryM misses is the need for some in this game to affix labels on others rather than accepting our self-characterizations.
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I am a liberal ‘lukewarmer’ Yank, married, no kids. But not a day goes by that I don’t get called a denier, in the pay of Heartland/CEI/Koch Bros. et al, with no thought for the future.
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The problem is that the same people who call me a denier get upset (not referring to you Willard) at being called alarmist, and now at CAGW.
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I have asked them what they would like to be called, and the answer is usually precious enough to inspire nausea–something like ‘sane’ or ‘correct’ or even ‘human.’ After which they happily go back to calling me a denier–or worse, depending on how far gone they are.

Tom Fuller,
I have no problem with self-characterizations, if they are accurate.   But the problem is not that CAGW activists object to a particular characterization, it is that they object to any characterization at all.  That is why you get the amorphous “sane,” “correct” or “human” in response to your question.  The purpose is to obscure their position.  There has been too much negative press lately about the admitted lack of warming recently, and bogus claims of catastrophic effects in particular.  CAGW just reminds the public of those inconvenient facts.
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You object to being insulted by false accusations.  To the contrary, what CAGW activists object to is being correctly labeled.   That is not the same thing at all.  CAGW is not a noun or an adjective, it is just shorthand for the consensus position, using their own choice of words.  It is neither insulting nor false.
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Anyone who objects to the term can easily say “I don’t expect  catastrophic results from AGW” (as, I believe, have Judith Curry, Keith Kloor and yourself); or I do not think the globe is warming; or I don’t think the warming is caused by man.  Any such person would be mislabeled if called a CAGW proponent.   Otherwise, the acronym fits.

Michael, it came into prominence about the time skeptics were equated with Nazi prison guards, etc. You can try and rewrite history all you want, but it just ain’t so.

Willard: “I will conclude this by noting the symmetry between denial and catastrophism.”
And also the possibility that both feed off each other, especially if these sorts of labels are primarily rhetorical strategies with, nevertheless, some basis in reality.
Not only that, but the positions often reverse, with AGW sceptics engaging in their own form of catastrophising about, for example, economic collapse and totalitarian one-world government, against which AGW believers exercise their own scepticism.
“Interestingly, this symmetry holds only for rhetorical strategies.”
Yes, and only for specific strategies. If AGW believers are also sceptics about some issues, and AGW sceptics are also believers about some issues, the labels “sceptic”, “denier”, “believer” etc are specific rather than general. If so, the terms are as much about jockeying for rhetorical advantage as they are about one’s opponent.
Presumably, this is why we choose the label for ourselves that we think can provide the best leverage for our case, and the label for our enemies that will cause most damage to their case.

Here is Johann Hari’s full quote:
> The climate-change deniers are rapidly ending up with as much intellectual credibility as creationists and Flat Earthers. Indeed, given that 25,000 people died in Europe in the 2003 heat wave caused by anthropogenic climate change, given that the genocide unfolding in Darfur has been exacerbated by the stresses of climate change, given that Bangladesh may disappear beneath the rising seas in the next century, they are nudging close to having the moral credibility of Holocaust deniers.
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While admitting that this a perfect instance of an ad odium, one can notice the long conditional excluded from Barry Woods’ quote.  There is a difference between saying that “if you say stupid things you are a fool” and simply “you are a fool”.
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Also note the scientific statement that is being the subject of contestation:
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> Nobody denies the natural greenhouse effect and nobody denies that humans have massively increased carbon emissions since the Industrial Revolution,” says Jenkins, “so why does anybody dispute this unnatural greenhouse effect, especially with all the evidence of its effects?
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Notice that in this quote the word “deny” is being used.  Does that mean that climatologist Geoff Jenkins is dissing in spite?
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Denying the unnatural greenhouse effect is not the same as denying some climatologic property of tree rings.  Paying due dilligence to what is being talked about is always a good idea.
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After all that has been said, one still has to wonder if “deny” entails “denial”, if “denial” entails “denier”.  These are important questions, if “denier” connotes the Holocaust.

Here is the Michael Tobis quote I was referring to immediately above, I couldn’t find it at first.
“As for the scope of the ethical risk, let us consider the possibility that the behavior of the Times and the Post this year increases the chance of an extreme event with a premature mortality of a billion people by a mere part per million, a per cent of a per cent of a per cent. The expected mortality from this is a thousand people. Is that morally equivalent to actually killing a thousand people? It’s not all that obvious to me that it isn’t. ”
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A genteel way of comparing denial (by the Times and Post no less) to murder.  Or maybe he only meant manslaughter?
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Oh, and I would plead guilty to being an alarmist about many of the “remedies” CAGW activists are seeking.  Zero carbon in the near future.  Massive energy tax incr3ases in the current economy.  Yes, I believe that they would very possibly have disasterous, one could say catastrophic, results on the economy on the scale being proposed.  So feel free to come up with an acronym.

Thanks for your reply to MT, Barry!
Maybe it wasn’t Michael, but I remember all the work I went to post links confirming the deliberate allusion to the Holocaust previously on this blog.  Various MSM op-ed journalists intended to compare CAGW skeptics to Holocaust deniers.
Here are some more links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denialism
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/02/09/no_change_in_political_climate/
http://www.seattlepi.com/connelly/323181_joel11.html
The 2nd and 3rd were written in 2007, as a label not only to marginalize skeptics, but to impugn their moral character. Interesting that more than one example promoting the lingo can be found from the same news source.
Now that this evidence has been presented, will MT discourage use of the term climate change denier? I don’t think I’ve seen him, personally use that term here, which I appreciate.

Barry Woods: “Yet the Guardian are still at it, they have said they would not use denier any more…”

Perhaps it might help if climate sceptic blogs could make some moves towards reciprocation and drop the likes of “true believer” and “green-shirt thugs”.

Interestingly, though, the use of Nazi allusions seems to have fallen away in recent weeks on sceptic blogs, so perhaps things are improving.

The rhetorical war is a good deal more important than people are prepared to admit. Yes, they’re just labels, but labels can be visible evidence of an underlying reality, in this case the public struggle over the science.

Here are the claims that the Monbiot article written on Monday 23 August 2010, which aims to provide “more evidence that climate science divides people on political lines”, and in particular, that “denial has nothing to do with science and everything to do with politics.”

In Australia:

> Abbott is no longer an outright denier, though he still insists, in the teeth of the facts, that the world has cooled since 1997.

> Senator Nick Minchin [same Australian party] maintains that “the whole climate change issue is a leftwing conspiracy to deindustrialise the western world”.

> A recent poll suggests that 38% of politicians in Abbott’s coalition believe man-made global warming is taking place, in comparison with 89% of Labor’s people.

Everywhere:

> At a senatorial hustings in New Hampshire last week, all six Republican candidates denied that man-made climate change is taking place.

> Václav Klaus, the ultra-neoliberal Czech president, asserts that “global warming is a false myth and every serious person and scientist says so”.

> The hard-right UK Independence party may soon be led by Lord Monckton, the craziest man in British politics, who claims that action on climate change is a conspiracy to create a communist world government.

We can see evidence that, for Monbiot, “deniers” refers to “rightwingers who claim climate change is a leftwing conspiracy”.  This expression refers, in this context, more to conspirationism than to historical negationnism.  And this expression more than connotes it: it tries to argue for it. 

Monbiot might be “still at it”, whatever that means, it should be noted that the what he tries to show that there are elected officials who try to gain political points by proclaiming that action on climate change is a leftist conspiracy.  So to say that he’s
�
> labbeling all sceptics/deniars as rightwingers!
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is simply false.

Barry Woods,
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Monbiot argues that rightwingers use denial as a political weapon.  Monbiot does not try to argue that all those who use denial are rightwingers.
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I am sure it’s possible to find leftists denying something.

I don’t use the D word much anymore, but its use among the usenet sci.environment crowd certainly predates the references noted above.
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Here is me discussing the word a dozen years ago.
 

Alas, laursaurus, I am more worried about climate change than I was a dozen years ago.
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I had expected that once the evidence piled up that politicians and the general public could manage to be more reasonable. Since this hasn’t worked out, indeed, quite the opposite in some countries, I am at something of a loss as to what to do about it.
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Barry Woods: “Bit of an asymetric war there”¦ a few climate blogs (obscure ones? ) Watts, Up, Climate audit, bishop hill, would not endorse that behaviour…”

The examples I gave were from Watts Up. From the same post: “socialist world government”, “cargo cult science”, “hoaxers and alarmists”, “astrologers”, “dictatorship”, “New World Order”, “The ILLUMINATI counterattack!”, “AGW religious believers”, “climate-change inquisitors”, “corrupted by money and fame”.

The abuse directed against climate scientists and warmers on sceptic blogs and elsewhere is neither accidental nor incidental.

“MOST of the abuse (at least UK/Europe?) comes from the pro camp, MSM journalists included…”

You clearly don’t read the likes of Booker or Monckton. And a claim that most of the abuse comes from the warming camp is based on little more than a general impression.

Keith,
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If we have to wait for alternatives to coal to be cheaper than alternatives (with no externalities priced in) then we’re pooched.
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there is simply no way that the gates approach will have any appreciable effect in the near term (which I suspect is what MT and many others are worried about).  The issue is not so much whether or not we need to substantially increase public R&D into alt energy.  Of course we do.  But to suggest that this alone is somehow sufficient by itself as a response to the threat of climate change is ridiculous.
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IMO he-who-must-not-be-named has it exactly right.  We need to deploy existing technologies now (wind, solar, etc.).  Economies of scale will bring the costs of many of these technologies down MUCH FASTER than the basic R&D that Gates et al seem to be pushing.  As a computer guy you would think that he would get this.
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So when Gates says in that NYT interview
“… the way capitalism works is that it systematically underfunds innovation …”
Is he suggesting we need more of the innovation we see in wartime and during revolutions?  Or something not yet tried?

Message from those:  “a majority … said they would not want to work with the unselfish colleague again. They frequently said, “the person is making me look bad” or is breaking the rules. Occasionally, they would suspect the person had ulterior motives….”

121

moncton is not abusive and just a journo, moncton is just moncton and a bit of a dstraction (he does seem to keep Deltoid, etc amused, so he is good for something )

In the UK we had the Prime Minister (Copenhagen time) calling sceptics, ‘ flat earther’ deniars’ and ‘anti-science’

The Minister of State for Climate and Energy, calling sceptics ‘climate sabatouers’ worringly close to terrorists.

I think any abuse, rhetoric or positions of authority, etc are rather asymetric.  ie much more on the ro CAGW side..

> In the UK we had the Prime Minister (Copenhagen time) calling sceptics, “˜ flat earther’ deniars’ and “˜anti-science’.
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This is a nice example to show how important it is to know what we’re talking about.  Let’s suppose that the source of this claim is this article from the Telegraph:
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/6729833/Gordon-Brown-climate-change-sceptics-are-flat-earthers.html
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We will suppose that the Telegraph is a good source to show the worse of what Brown can say and that this article is a good source for the worse that Brown said.
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Here is the actual Brown quote:
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> With only days to go before Copenhagen we mustn’t be distracted by the behind-the-times, anti-science, flat-earth climate sceptics. We know the science. We know what we must do.
We don’t know exactly who the “climate sceptics” are and what is the topic of their dissent.  Here is the headline:
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> People who doubt that human activity contributes to global warming are “flat-earthers” and “anti-science”, Gordon Brown has said.
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If Brown said that, that means that, for him, the skeptics he’s talking about are those who dissent at least from the A in the AGW hypothesis.
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Let’s see how the Telegraph interprets what “skeptics” denotes:
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> Climate sceptics around the world are using the crisis to argue that man made global warming is not proven and therefore there is no need for a deal to curb greenhouse gas emissions or pay to help poor countries adapt.
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Notice the last part of the sentence: “pay to help poor countries adapt.”  But let’s forget this coatracking for the moment.
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The paragraph that follows is a rare thing of beauty:
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> In the US, the controversy has prompted leading global warming sceptics in the Republican Party to call for hearings in Congress, in a bid to thwart Barack Obama’s plans for energy reform.
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So here we go again: the “leading global warming sceptics” that are identified as actors on the political scene were to be found, at the time of the writing of the article, “in the Republican Party”.  Let’s wonder why.
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And so we can see that The Telegraph is saying something that is not quite different from what Monbiot is saying.  The flavour has changed dramatically, though.

Brendan H,
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This list is interesting:
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> The examples I gave were from Watts Up. From the same post: “socialist world government”, “cargo cult science”, “hoaxers and alarmists”, “astrologers”, “dictatorship”, “New World Order”, “The ILLUMINATI counterattack!”, “AGW religious believers”, “climate-change inquisitors”, “corrupted by money and fame”.
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You might be interested in this search:
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http://www.google.com/search?q=eco-fascists%20site%3Ahttp%3A//wattsupwiththat.com
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Interestingly, if you try to search for “eco-fascist” using WTFIUT’s own search engine, you will not find any hit.
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In fact, if you do the same search as above but with adding “+monkton”, you find interesting quotes, which might puts into perspective Barry Woods’ claim that:
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> [M]oncton is not abusive.

> so you agree Brown said flat earth climate sceptics and anti science”¦. in exactly the context  said, as I can not interpret it any other way
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The most important thing to note is that people do not “say” words, they use words to make statements.  So Brown did use the words “anti-science” and “flat-earthers”.  And Brown did said something like “those who are skeptics about the human impact on climate change are anti-science and flat-earthers”.
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Second, that I agree or not with the fact that Brown said such or such is irrelevant.  What is relevant is hat the Telegraph reported that Brown did qualify “skeptics” as “anti-science”, and “flat-earthers”.  About this Telegraph report, I agree.  The link I provided is a good proof to that claim.
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So I agree that, if the Telegraph’s report is true, Brown called those who deny the human impact on climate change as flat-earthers and anti-science.  What I would not agree about is  that Brown told that everyone who is labelled as “skeptic” is a flat-earther and anti-science.
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To say that:
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> In the UK we had the Prime Minister (Copenhagen time) calling sceptics, “˜ flat earther’ deniars’ and “˜anti-science’
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without specifying what “skeptics” Brown was referring might be seen as a way to claim that Brown was against anyone who labels himself as a skeptic.  Interestingly, the label “skeptic” in the context of this very thread has NOT always the same meaning as the one Brown did take the effort to specify.
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So we see an instance of the emotional effect that underspecifying a label can do in a discussion.
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We should finally note that we did not find the “deniers” word in the article.  So referring to Brown’s PhD is intriguing.
�
�
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> [S]o why pretend the Telegraph is making them up, in some sort of context, other than his intention”¦..
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I am not pretending that the Telegraph is making things up.  I am simply pointing at the fact that the Telegraph, in its role of representing rightwing’s dissenting voice, is a sound source to find the worse that Brown could say.  I did not say that it would be impossible to find worse, simply that I trusted the Telegraph to do its best to portray Browne in its worse light possible, possible by the law, of course.
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This methodological precaution was helpful to limit ourselves to the study of one article.

Here are two sentences from Barry Woods:
�
> Nowhere did I claim that Monckton was not  (eloquently perhaps) I do think he is a distraction and an irrelevance.
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> moncton is not abusive and just a journo, moncton is just moncton and a bit of a dstraction (he does seem to keep Deltoid, etc amused, so he is good for something )
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It would be interesting to know how these two can be made compatible.

Willard,
OK, I find this kind of thing really a distraction but I will answer your question if you will answer the one I asked you above (106), which I will quote at the bottom of this comment.
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Here is the actual quote from Brown in the article you were discussing:  “”With only days to go before Copenhagen we mustn’t be distracted by the behind-the-times, anti-science, flat-earth climate sceptics. We know the science. We know what we must do.”   No qualification of the word “skeptics” there, and the full quote expressly references “what we must do,” implicitly including those who accept AGW but disagree on what we must do about it, within the meaning of skeptic.
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You wrote “So I agree that, if the Telegraph’s report is true, Brown called those who deny the human impact on climate change as flat-earthers and anti-science.”  This however is not a quote of what Brown actually said, but of the sub-headline of the article, which read “People who doubt that human activity contributes to global warming are ‘flat earthers’ and ‘anti-science’, Gordon Brown has said.”  But if you notice, only the individual terms are in quotation marks.
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So while I don’t much care about what he said, since you asked, I would say your interpretation was wrong.
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As to the Brown op ed, I called it that because it was published on the Independent’s “Commentators” page.  That is the word I see commonly used to describe opinion pieces submitted to newspapers that are not the product of the editorial board.  You go ahead and call it whatever you like.  I could not care less.
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So perhaps now you can answer the question I asked you earlier.
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Do you believe that the globe is warming due to anthropogenic causes, that will likely have catastrophic consequences in the not too distant future?
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Like Hannibal Lechter said:  “Quid pro quo, Clarice….”

Willard: “Interestingly, if you try to search for “eco-fascist” using WTFIUT’s own search engine, you will not find any hit.”

Funny that. And yet the site is so open and welcoming to all points of view.

http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2010/08/quote_mining_101.php

Scienceblogs.com is a misnomer for this site. The most popular blogs on that site are purely political(ultra Leftwing) or preaching the New Atheism by singling out Christianity with the most hate-filled, bile attacks imaginable. To be fair, many of the other blogs write about primarily science. But the religious and political rants are the most popular.
As you can see, this blogger has copied a conversation from this blog and inserted his personal critique.
What’s with these other blogs that they are sponging off the conversation here instead of creating their own content?

willard, with reference to Brown’s reported “anti-science” and “flat-earth” comment, this may prove helpful: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPpkMe8Z_Qc

And “climate agnostic?”  You don’t know whether there is climate or not?

> [D]on’t label me, but I support the consensus?  What a courageous position.
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Label me all you want, use all the ad hominems you want.  Maybe that’s all you have left?
�
What does supporting the consensus mean, exactly?
�
Even friends can point out when one is making a fool of oneself.
�
 

Willard,
I found this use of the term “climate agnostic,” which is simply incoherent.
“People who say human-induced climate change is a fact that demands urgent action are described as ‘believers’ or ‘climate evangelists,’ while those who reject the concept are ‘deniers,’ ‘skeptics’ or ‘atheists.’ Those in the middle who say they are unconvinced either way are ‘agnostics.’”  (This seems to be the common usage.)
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How can you be unconvinced “either way” when one of the two “extremes” is defined by being unconvinced by the “consensus science”?  Skeptics are skeptics because they are unconvinced by various of the consensus data, models and arguments.
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So a climate agnostic is one who is unconvinced by the scientists making the arguments, and also unconvinced by those who are unconvinced by those arguments?  Huh?  Some terms sound really great, until we actually look at what they are supposed to mean.

Keith,
To be clear if I were king I would:
1. implement a carbon tax or a cap.  the tax/cap would have two core features; start small but with long-term schedule attached that would gradually raise prices (so investors have some certainty about future prices).
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2. Engage likeminded nations at WTO to try and address leakage issues (border-tax adjustments being a last resort)
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3. Massively increase public R&D into clean energy technologies.
�
4.  Massively increase development aid with a special focus on climate related opportunities  (e.g. clean cooking stoves to reduce black carbon, biochar, bio-gas systems, etc).
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5. Gradually scale back domestic subsidies on fossil fuels.
�
6. Reform industrial agricultural policies.
�
7. Dismantle the military industrial complex.
�
8.  Institute a tobin tax.
�
9. Make beer tax deductible. 
�
�
�
�
 

SimonH,
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I like your distinction between hard and soft, the way that agnosticism is construed, and its relationship between scientific skepticism.   If skepticism is a scientific virtue, only the self-righteous calls himself a skeptic.
�
For now, I would point out two quibbles.
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The first that springs to mind is that the racing event is science itself.  As I see it, the scientific inquiry works more like a race than like a boxing match.  That AGW is the hypothesis to beat means not only that you are entitled to punch it, but you are forced to come with something as strong or even better.  You just can’t go around without any inference to the best explanation.  If we accept this, that spells doom to the falsificationist framework.  There are of course lots of things we could say about that, but I’ll stop now.
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The second is that my cut would stop at McIntyre and Curry.  Perhaps because I stopped paying attention to the first two.  What seems important to me is that the two names I am outlining represent to me persons that do some stylish work and communicate it in a way that does not outright contradict their objective.  They might be biased, they might have pet peeve, they might be obstinate, yet they relentlessly pursue some objectives that are worthy of attention.
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I am not sure how postnormal science, if that concept makes sense, will be eradicated.  I am afraid it’s here to stay, for better or for worse.  In fact, I am afraid that this was how science proceeded all along, for better or for worse: chances are that postnormal science predated the normal one anyway.
�
Science might never be what it should.   That’s why it may very well be a race where the rules get updated while running, ideally without too much impeding the running to the finish line.  Here again, there are many things to say, so we better stop here.
�
 

willard, not willis. I do apologise!

I don’t know if any of you outside of the UK will be able to get this BBC program on the internet.  It does sound interesting..

Unfortuanetly I heard a trailer, saying many are sceptical of climate change.. (used interchangeably  to mean man made climate change) thus, confusing the public, thinking people are sceptical to natural climate change.  Any evidence of an actual AGW element in the weather/climate yet to be shown.

ie most sceptics point out, PROVE, what is occuring, is anything other than natural variation and/or  long term natural trends.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00tj525

In a special Radio 4 series the BBC’s Environmental Analyst Roger Harrabin questions whether his own reporting – and that of others – has adequately told the whole story about global warming.
Roger Harrabin has reported on the climate for almost thirty years off and on, but last November while working on the “Climategate” emails story, he was prompted to look again at the basics of climate science.
He finds that the public under-estimate the degree of consensus among scientists that humans have already contributed towards the heating of the climate , and will almost certainly heat the climate more.
But he also finds that politicians and the media often fail to convey the huge uncertainty over the extent of future climate change. Whilst the great majority of scientists fear that computer models suggest we are facing potentially catastrophic warming, some climate scientists think the warming will be restricted to a tolerable 1C or 1.5C.
At this crucial moment in global climate policy making, Harrabin talks to seminal characters in the climate change debate including Tony Blair, Lord Lawson, Professor Bob Watson, former diplomat Sir Crispin Tickell and the influential blogger Steve McIntyre.  And he asks how political leaders make decisions on the basis of uncertain science.”

(post the Guardian Climategate debate, where, the 2 highlighed above attended, it should be interseting)

To clarify, I know that I’ve argued repeatedly that a GCM cannot make accurate long-term predictions because of the dramatic difference in scale of complexity between the climate entity and a model’s understanding of the climate’s entity – complexities that are insurmountably great. I guess I’ve always, mentally, prefaced my “GCMs cannot…” with “as yet..”, though. I have to let the idea of an ontic uncertainty soak in.

Simon you interpret me correctly.  There is epistemic uncertainty that can be resolved with further research, but there is also ontic uncertainty associated with chaos, etc. that is just there, we can’t do anything about it other than try to bound it in some way.

When the likes of JP Morgan Chase manhatten bank are ‘selling’ Climatecare Carbon Offset certificates… please excue my CAGW cynicism..  They bought ClimateCare in 2008, presumably as a growth profitable place to be…

http://www.jpmorganclimatecare.com/

I use that as an example, because the MD of climate care, was the person in the Oxford debate with Monckton..

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/05/24/lord-monckton-wins-global-warming-debate-at-oxford-union/

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

excuse my CAGW cynicism, and laughter at only fossil fuel companies supposedly have a vested interest.

“The climate debate resembles the God debate, if only because for Earth inhabitants, climate is a God-like concept, i.e. all-encompassing, causing almost everything, and very complex yet simple at the same time.”
Willard, thanks for understanding.
What the skeptics say, in continuity from where you leave off is: Modern alarmist climate science a la IPCC is a “product of a certain attitude” of problem solving as much as the the science itself represented within.

Willard,
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I wasn’t “heading” anywhere.  And the CAGW crowd have been doing a fine job of beating themselves.  My “hypothesis” is nothing of the kind.  It is a simple fact that those arguing for massive changes in the economy, zero carbon, cap and trade, etc., have failed in convincing voters to give them what they want.  Including me.
Enjoy your night.

This is off topic, probably belongs on the lead wheel weights thread, but I still find it hilarious.
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Under the headline
“EPA rejects attempt to regulate lead in bullets after NRA threats”
We get this:
“EPA was not and is not considering taking action on whether the lead content in hunting ammunition poses an undue threat to wildlife….”
Wouldn’t that depend on the accuracy of the hunter?

I’ll try to keep it short for tonight, it’s late:

/1.  I’m not sure the attitude between the “skeptics” and “CAGW camp” is that different.   There may be differences, but I would certainly bet there are similarities.  The main difference is about roles: one is consensual, the other is contrarian.  That shows very well in the ways each communicate.  There is no need for psychology to see that.  In fact, I wonder what is there to gain from psychology exactly, except that it’s the best way to lose one of the condition to have a rational debate.  Arguments from  psychologizing are seldom valid.

/2.  If CAGW proponents give up their alarmism, we would have no reason to have this “C” upfront the scientific hypothesis to beat.  So in a way I agree with you on that point.  But saying that we should give up alarmism is easier than done.   Alarmism and denial both escalate hand in hand, in a way that reminds an arms race.  And we should not forget that both tactics is actually used by the proponents of every positions.  See #173 above for an example of a skeptic armwaving economic alarmism.

/3.  That the “skeptics” can claim their happiness about entertaining no hypothesis whatsoever shows that this is not a scientific position.  Climate theory is there to explain climate.  If a “skeptic” don’t even try to explain climate, this “skeptic” certainly does not doing any kind of science, as far as I can tell.  Maybe it’s a new science: between the applied and pure science, the “auditing” sciences?

/4.  My advice about reading a bit about theology was simply an advice.  That we’re talking about God does not entail that the specialists in this field do not know how to debate.  On the contrary, I would say, considering their subject matter.  For what is worth, I might venture that a Jesuit might have many face palm moments, reading these threads.  Discussions about God can lead to very formal arguments.  Conversely, one can see many formal arguments using the existential proof as an example, for instance in knowledde theory and in epistemic logic.
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/5.  All being said for tonight, I will agree with you and GaryM.  “CAGW” proponents need to perfect their “selling” technique, at least for their own good.  However, it does not garantee that it will certainly convince anyone, as AGW is a matter of “connecting dots”, not “seeing”, as described earlier.  There might very well be an infinite path of resistance before convincing everyone of  connecting the dots.
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See for instance Barry Woods’ comment presuming there should be a PROOF.  Since it’s not logic, we might have to way a while before seeing a PROOF.
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Not that it matters much, really, as all it takes is a tipping point…

Tipping point is of course just a ‘convenient’ theory..�
Any evidence?

Or just an excuse, that because we are not observing the predicted ‘extreme’ effects yet, the ‘alarmists’ have to come up with some explantion it is because it is building, up to a tipping point… and it will suddenly change..

Whilst 20 years ago, Hansen predictions have been shown to be all over the place,as have the rolling predictions of the various GCM’s

Polar bears have been a poster child for a while, but the fact that they are in rude health is a bit of a problem..

There was a while ago, a computer model, predicting polar bear populations, which conveniently said whilst  polar  bear populations may continue to increase (ie what has been observed) at some point the populations will hit a ‘tipping point’ .  Many pointed out that polar bears quite happily adapt, so any assumptions of behaviour, programmed in may produce the tipping point, whilst the polar bear like other bears will just change their behviour (AGW or not)..

As there is plenty of evidence of polar bear adpation as a species whilst during much warmer periods.. 

But, of course much like the weather (hot, AGW, now cold AGW… What is normal any more)

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/05/25/modeling-the-polar-bear-tipping-point/

BBC: Polar bears face ‘tipping point’ due to climate change
http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8700000/8700472.stm

willard, I feel that climate alarmism is, today, perceived very differently by sceptics AND the general public from how those proponents of the alarmism perceive it. Particularly in the wake of recent events, namely the Pakistan floods, South American chill and Russian heatwave, the enthusiasm with which these events have been embraced by some alarmist quarters as markers of impending doom is of concern to sceptics. But it’s important to note that it is the gusto of the alarmist message, not the message itself, which is raising eyebrows.
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I really feel that climate alarmists have drastically worn their platform down by their own hand. It is difficult, now, to regard climate alarmism – by whichever name it prefers to pass – as anything more than raw climatic hypochondria.
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You need to appreciate the extent of weariness with which new pronouncements of imminent “death”, on the basis of a hiccup or a sneeze, are received when the news giver has allowed himself – by a concerted campaign of his own making – to become regarded as a hypochondriac. And between the media and the climate scientist, working on concert, this is increasingly the popular perception. Copenhagen was over-sold. It was, for so many advocacy scientists, regarded as “make or beak” – many of them referred to it as as much at the time, in fact – and so it has come to pass.

willard, nice way of framing it, but I’m pretty sure that neither you nor I think sceptics are at all interested in helping sell AGW. Sceptics, as the general populous, are on the receiving end of the sales pitch from climate scientists and journalists. There’s an established pattern from climate science of actively attempting to prevent sceptical views from getting on the inside track, from RC, journals, all the way to the IPCC.
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Time and again I hear sceptics groan when climate science reviews conclude that what is needed is better PR. Hard-selling climate catastrophe won’t work. If the lead up to Copenhagen taught anybody anything, surely it must be this? Climate science has had MSM’s ear for a long time. For many this was a relationship made in heaven.. the scientists got their alarming advocacy message to a wide audience and the MSM got its attention-grabbing headlines handed to them without having to work. Free money.
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Do you remember how EMI, Sony, HMV and the other music industry heads enjoyed years and years of screwing people out of money? They charged £8, then £10, then £15 for a CD.. a CD which everyone knew cost less than vinyl to produce and distribute, and which in the main was even free of production-cost, as people upgraded their vinyl collections to digital media, re-purchasing the same music in a new format. Do you remember how the people cursed, but bought in anyway? And how the music industry laughed, as it raked in the money.. knowing that the only way to access the format was to pour money into their coffers.
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They didn’t see the internet coming. They didn’t see the compressed MP3 format coming, either, with its near-CD quality sound and its ease of distribution. Sure, music theft was a crime, but who cared? They’d been cheated out of money for years and they knew it. The music industry could swing. And, by and large, that’s just what it’s done.
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The Blogosphere is, to MSM, what  the illegal MP3 download was to the music industry. Climategate didn’t happen in MSM, it happened in the blogosphere. MSM tried to dismiss it for quite some time, but it didn’t stem the flow. MSM found it no longer held the gatekeeper’s key. This was a revelation to MSM – an information revolution, right under their noses, and they never saw it coming.
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What the sceptic blogosphere has, and which MSM and climate science has lost, is the trust of the people. Half of the noise in the reaction to Climategate in the first few weeks after the story broke in the blogosphere was about the relative silence of MSM. That silence howled. Meanwhile, if you wanted to know what had happened, if you wanted to know who had done and said what, you had to hit the sceptical blogosphere. And as time passed, and as Copenhagen loomed, and as MSM sang ever louder from the AGW hymn sheet, trust shifted.
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And today MSM still sings from that hymn sheet, even though hardly anyone believes in that god any more. But the blogosphere still disseminates the hymns and decimates the alarmist stories.. and it will continue to do so while ever MSM promotes them.
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If EMI, Sony et al had never over-charged their captive audience for their CDs, there is a school of thought that illegal MP3 downloading would never have taken off like it did. If the climate scientists had not abused their MSM ear, and if the MSM had not run with the scare-story headlines, Climategate might never have had the impact that it did. People always react negatively to a hard sell, and once you’ve lost trust it’s nigh impossible to win it back.