So a historian that points out that bad weather that happened in 535 caused problems, then about 800 years later more bad weather caused problems and then surmises that bad weather another 800 years later ~2100 may cause problems has just as much claim to the NBP as Gore and the IPCC has, right?

That has as much, if not more, rationality behind it as “the long term weather is changing, and that can lead to war”.

Giving a NPP for entirely hypothetical future conflicts being allegedly averted is tripe regardless of who gets it. A NPP should by all rights go to someone who a) ended running conflict or b) demonstrably averted an imminent and quantifiable conflict of international proportions.

But that is true only to people who believe that a Nobel should mean something more than a fancy equivalent of Time’s “Person of the Year” award. People are well aware of the Nobel science prizes. Thus there is an assumption by association that the Peace prize, being a Nobel, is on par. Quite frankly it is not and has not been for at least a couple decades, arguably further back (i.e. Quakers over Ghandi 1947).

The criteria for “peace” is so broad that virtually anything can be attributed to a NBP. Essentially, this means that over the decades, any real value of prestige to the NBP has eroded year after year in effect becoming “we the committee would like to recognize [group,person,both] here but can’t do so in any of the other fields”. That, IMO, cheapens the awarding to those who actually worked undeniably to stop or prevent clear and decisive conflicts. Essentially, it becomes a political award as opposed to a recognition of direct action.

In the end the veracity of AGWH, EiB, or AIT, or even the IPCC is irrelevant, as stated essentially by the committee. The award is for preventing unnamed, hypothetical future conflicts that may never have come to pass with or without the IPCC or Gore. If the world as a whole does not manage to control the level of CO2 in the atmosphere (a la Kyoto), and we are not beset by these mythical future conflicts, no mention will be made of this in relation to the 2007 NPP.

If mankind finds ways to adapt as it always has, and prevent such conflicts, only if a singular group or person is attributed with it and that person is in agreement with the dominant world political space at the time will they be given an award for essentially, exactly what IPCC and Al Gore were just given one for.

/ba

Umm, I’m not a climate scientists, but there are zero or very few “anti-global warming” climate scientists. The “pro-global warming” phrase is about as informative as saying “pro-general relativity” physicists.

Besides, real “pro-global warming” scientists seem to be generally agreeing that his movie is mostly correct and to the point:

“For the most part, I think Gore gets the science right, just as he did in Earth in the Balance. The small errors don’t detract from Gore’s main point, which is that we in the United States have the technological and institutional ability to have a significant impact on the future trajectory of climate change.”

from: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/05/al-gores-movie/

Belizean: I’m not sure what you’re point is. Are you saying, GW type ideas are lies, or that not talking about it is lying? BTW, if you are from/in Belize, that country is going to get lots of flak from global warming effects.

Great Famine of 1315–1317

Extreme weather events of 535-536

Year Without a Summer

Scientists who complain about Gore’s presentation are like a doctor who only voices concern about a patient’s cholesterol intake after the first heart attack.

Yeah, it’s always better to tell outright lies to your patients to get them to do what you, as a superior and enlightened being, know what’s best for them.

Very well, I accept the premise that its not a science award so the burden of rigor is of a lesser standard. But I disagree with comparisons to other harder sciences. Yes there are a lot of random fluctuations in the experimental results of particle physics (lots of 1-2 sigma spikes all over the place), but there are also a lot of uncontrolled parameters in climate science as well (even the macroscopis descriptions). I mean grid spacing and parametrization in the gcms is probably a good example of this.

I realize its a hard subject, and people do the best they can, but somehow implying that there isn’t larger uncertainties in the consensus view relative to other science fields is disengenous.

Climate science with all its uncertainties is still far more accurate a science than the stuff politicians have to deal with.