For a time now a good friend
and I have been exchanging notes dealing with the ongoing climate
change debate. He supports the UN IPCC position that human activity is
at the heart of global warming. I take the opposite view. During the
course of our exchanges he provided me Dr. Michael E. Mann's book The Hockey Stick and The Climate Wars.
Dr. Mann is a central player on the global warming side of the debate.
My friend wanted me to read Mann's book since it represents his point
of view. This is my response to him slightly altered by the removal of
personal comments meant for him.
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I found Mann to be a bit too full of himself. His self defensive approach in laying out the book gave me a sense that he was not being completely forthright. He cited much scientific data that was hard for me to follow and consequently to challenge. Not being a scientist I wouldn't anyway. His self assured presentation was in my mind, however, far too overdone. His sarcasm bites. He seems intent on making sure the reader does not question anything he says - he is the expert so keep any doubts to yourself. His attitude seems to be "if he says it, it is so". That to me exposes his considerable arrogance and perhaps his own deep rooted doubts. This tone carried throughout the book.
He portrays himself as a
victim at the hands of those mean old "deniers". He routinely uses
demeaning terms when talking about his detractors but obviously feels
that it is okay for him to denigrate them. Many of those scientists
have just as many academic credentials as he. He was really upbeat
throughout Chapter 15 as he recited all the apparent vindications he and
his side have enjoyed. His attitude came across as "boy, did we
put those guys in their place". In short he seems to believe he is
always right while his detractors are not only wrong but dishonest and
incompetent to boot. Without doing extensive research I cannot
challenge the veracity of his claims in this chapter or for that matter
throughout the entire book. But I harbor doubts as to his
forthrightness. Not saying he is out-and-out lying just that given his
personality when dealing with himself and his cause he likely paints the
best possible picture and ignores the parts he does not like.
Another notable flaw in my
view is Mann's constant recitation of the "deniers" association with big
oil and their money. The implication being that their scientific
findings are clearly tainted - and they may well be. The obverse is
that "alarmist" findings are free of such contamination. That however
is false (more later). Note the findings at this link: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/05/19/the-well-funded-climate-business-follow-the-money/ Here is a short quote derived from a 2009 Climate Money study by Joanne Nova that reveals "that the federal Government has a near-monopoly on climate science funding." Another quote: "The
Congressional Research Service estimates that since 2008 the federal
government has spent nearly $70 billion on 'climate change
activities.'” The obvious question is why is the government
handing over so much of taxpayer's money to climate alarmists? The
government has an agenda and the alarmists scientists know that their
funds will slow to a trickle if they do not meet the
government's "alarmist" expectations.
- "how to restore 'climate change' as a top global priority after the fiasco of last year's Copenhagen summit"
- "how to continue to try to make global redistribution of wealth the real basis of that climate agenda, and widen
the discussion further to encompass the idea of 'global public goods'"
The full document can be found here: http://go-galt.org/climategate.html#CONCLUSIONS
In addition to above
thoughts I noted that an assumption the "alarmist" seem to make, and not
developed in the book, is that since the earth's slight warming trend
coincides with the onset of the industrial revolution human activity is
the most obvious cause. So it seems that their science starts with that
assumption. Is their scientific data conclusive or simply
coincidental? Scientific data supporting warming is quite possibly a
natural outcome of natural climate events outside man's control. Were
that the case maybe the warming trend just happened to align with the
onset of the industrial revolution. It may be but it could just as
easily not be. I certainly don't know but Mann does not really deal
with that potentiality...seems odd to me, it may be a convenient
oversight. To me that suggests that the alarmists' assumption that
man-made CO2 pollution is the cause or at least a major contributor to
global warming is neither provable nor unprovable. I have read many
accounts written by those he calls deniers that acknowledge human
activity is a contributor but the question alarmist don't want to answer
is "how much". They cannot recreate events that do so - their
conclusions are therefore inferential at best. They are certainly not
conclusive.
To my way of thinking
scientists too sure of themselves are to be viewed with skepticism. The
basis of that remark is derived from an interesting booklet entitled On Being A Scientist: Responsible Conduct in Research, National Academy Press, 1995.
Some time ago I was in the midst of researching an entirely different
subject when I ran across it. Here is a quote: "Scientific results are
inherently provisional. Scientists can never prove conclusively that
they have described some aspect of the natural or physical world with
complete accuracy. In that sense all scientific results must be treated
as susceptible to error." The on-line booklet can be found at: http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=4917&page=15. I
did note that in several places in his book and in the Epilogue Mann
alludes to this fact. His characterization of his work, however, seems
to vacate the point. His attitude suggests that there can be no doubt
that he and his like minded colleagues are right in their
determinations.
Another quote in this vein I found interesting (on yet another research effort) comes from the book The Limitations of Scientific Truth by Dr. Nigel Brush. Chapter 5 opens with this sentence: "The primary obstacle to harmonizing religious truth with scientific truth is that scientific truth is constantly changing. Addressing why scientific truth changes he writes that: "An answer can be found by examining the logical limitations of the modern scientific method." The chapter develops this point and ends with this question: "Indeed, if all scientific theories are equally unprovable, what distinguishes scientific truth from metaphysical truth...or even religious truth?"
To add to rationale that
supports my own man-made global warming skepticism I found a most
interesting article published in the 13 Dec 2014 edition of the Weekly Standard.
The article, written by Ethan Epstein, reports on his interaction
with Richard Lindzen, the Alfred P. Sloan emeritus professor of
meteorology at MIT. Lindzen is a climate change denier. Here is what
Epstein says of him: "Lindzen is no shrinking violet. A pioneering
climate scientist with decades at Harvard and MIT, Lindzen sees his
discipline as being deeply compromised by political pressure, data
fudging, out-and-out guesswork, and wholly unwarranted alarmism. In a
shot across the bow of what many insist is indisputable scientific
truth, Lindzen characterizes global warming as 'small and . . .
nothing to be alarmed about.'”
Here are a few more quotes I
found interesting. This one regards the UN IPCC Report. "'For one
thing, he says that the Summary for Policymakers is an inherently
problematic document. The IPCC report itself, weighing in at thousands
of pages, is 'not terrible. It’s not unbiased, but the bias [is] more or
less to limit your criticism of models,' he says. The Summary for
Policymakers, on the other hand—the only part of the report that the
media and the politicians pay any attention to—'rips out doubts to a
large extent. . . . [Furthermore], government representatives have the
final say on the summary.' Thus, while the full IPPC report
demonstrates a significant amount of doubt among scientists, the
essentially political Summary for Policymakers filters it out."
"If Lindzen is right about
this and global warming is nothing to worry about, why do so many
climate scientists, many with résumés just as impressive as his, preach
imminent doom? He says it mostly comes down to the money—to the
incentive structure of academic research funded by government grants.
Almost all funding for climate research comes from the government,
which, he says, makes scientists essentially vassals of the state. And
generating fear, Lindzen contends, is now the best way to ensure that
policymakers keep the spigot open."
"Lindzen also says that the 'consensus'—the oft-heard contention that 'virtually all' climate scientists believe in catastrophic, anthropogenic global warming—is overblown, primarily for structural reasons. 'When you have an issue that is somewhat bogus, the opposition is always scattered and without resources,' he explains. 'But the environmental movement is highly organized. There are hundreds of NGOs. To coordinate these hundreds, they quickly organized the Climate Action Network, the central body on climate. There would be, I think, actual meetings to tell them what the party line is for the year, and so on.' Skeptics, on the other hand, are more scattered across disciplines and continents. As such, they have a much harder time getting their message across."
"Lindzen,...can’t be dismissed. Nor, of course, is he the only skeptic with serious scientific credentials. Judith Curry, the chair of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at Georgia Tech, William Happer, professor of physics at Princeton, John Christy, a climate scientist honored by NASA, now at the University of Alabama, and the famed physicist Freeman Dyson are among dozens of scientists who have gone on record questioning various aspects of the IPCC’s line on climate change. Lindzen, for his part, has said that scientists have called him privately to thank him for the work he’s doing."
Here is the full Lindzen article: http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/what-catastrophe_773268.html?page=3
After I completed my above remarks I went on Amazon.com and scanned the reviews of the book rendered by others. Most supported Mann and his work. A large percentage did not provide substantive reasons justifying their support but did offer derogatory remarks directed towards his detractors. Most of those that obviously critiqued Mann's work provided cogent thoughts. A few did not. One reviewer, Dr. Stephen A. Short, provided this remark: "As a practicising earth scientist of 35 years with over 100 mainstream peer reviewed papers and book chapters I can say that there is strictly no need for conspiracy theories in a context where this new book by (Dr) Michael Mann of Hockey Stick fame is one [of] the worst pieces of devious, lying, dissembling re-writing of modern events I have read in a very long time."
Below are some other items which, in my mind, present credible counter-points to those presented by Mann and his fellow scientists.
George Burns
http://www.americanthinker.com/2014/01/how_leftists_account_for_climate_stability.html
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/367132/coercing-conformity-andrew-c-mccarthy
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