What do you think of climate change?

[Ender]

I have not studied the consensus papers.

Almost no one has. Everyone relies on what the media says about the papers rather than what the papers actually say.

However, I have faith in the scientific process, and 6 extensive surveys, done by different scientists

Scientific process? Scientists?

2. Methodology
This letter was conceived as a ‘citizen science’ project by volunteers contributing to the Skeptical Science website…

Again, truth and perception are quite different.

 

[HarryStotle]

Anyway, I have also looked into the Cook study, and it seems to me that the findings are often skewed or misrepresented by people with certain industry interests, and/or misinterpreted.

There are “certain industry interests” both ways, but the lion’s share of interest is towards alarmism. The amount of lucre pushing the climate change agenda is enormous compared to fossil fuels. Even BP and Exxon are heavily invested in alternatives to fossil fuels, with Exxon spending a billion a year on alternatives. Governments in western liberal countries are spending about $1 billion per day on promoting “sustainable energy” and alternative energy.

The “findings” are no longer skewed by certain fossil fuel interests, most energy companies are caving to the hype and have given up trying to fight liberal quasi-socialist governments, international NGOs, technology companies and the super-wealthy globalist elites who are pushing to erode national independence by undermining fossil fuels as clean energy sources.

The “findings” that disagree with the consensus are more typically from individual disillusioned scientists who have personally experienced how actual science has been co-opted by global politics and global elites, both of which have abused inordinate funding to skew the science in the direction of political narrative.

 

[HarryStotle]

judgment would be upon them unless they repented (for poor stewardship of creation)?!

Judgement may be upon those who wantonly destroy the improving welfare of billions of human beings in developing nations for the sake of global socialism and the amalgamation of power in the hands of a very tiny elite.

Good stewardship of the earth might entail increasing CO2 for the benefit of plants and to increase the global food supply.

The case against CO2 is based upon about 140 widely diverging climate models which agree with each other on very little, and are basically useless for predicting anything to come or accounting for what has already occurred.

Perhaps in ten years when the expected climate catastrophe has been proven to be one big fizzle, but the economic well-being of billions has been irreparably and seriously harmed, we might then consider how the promoters of the alarmism hoax ought to be brought to trial to face the consequences of their dishonesty?

Perhaps honesty and certainty today should be our primary concern, rather than jumping on the hoax bandwagon with nothing more than very crippled computer models and the say-so of possibly corrupt scientists with a vested interest.

I am all for complete transparency and the opportunity for both sides to present their best case with all data open to scrutiny. I am speaking to you Michael Mann.

I have made the suggestion before. If this is such a life and death issue, let’s assemble a proper “panel” with 10 of the best warming experts, 10 of the best skeptics, and 10 completely impartial scientists and experts capable of assessing both cases without bias.

That beats, by far, continual spouting by misinformed forum participants like us who lack access to all the data and lack the level of expertise to properly assess both sides.

My bet is that the warmists will be the ones who will refuse to take part. Shall we wonder why?

How about we promote this proper way to address the issue, or should we merely choose to continue being alarmed or cynical without much warrant either way, despite your claims of certainty?

 

[HarryStotle]

But you’ll never convince those whom have a political agenda than a actual scientific objective-- as we’ve seen.

And you will never convince those who have a political agenda that their agenda isn’t scientific.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/oct/20/susan-crockford-fired-after-finding-polar-bears-th/

University of Alberta executive resigning over controversial ads | Edmonton Journal

Fourteen Is the New Fifteen! - American Thinker

Top IPCC’s paleoclimatologist agrees that Mann’s hockey-stick papers were wrong – Climate Depot

R.I.P. Greenhouse Gas Theory: 1980-2018 | Principia Scientific Intl.

Bombshell Science Study Validates ‘Slaying’ of Greenhouse Gas Theory | Principia Scientific Intl.

 

[stavros388]

stavros388:

Anyway, I have also looked into the Cook study, and it seems to me that the findings are often skewed or misrepresented by people with certain industry interests, and/or misinterpreted.

The “findings” are no longer skewed by certain fossil fuel interests, most energy companies are caving to the hype and have given up trying to fight liberal quasi-socialist governments, international NGOs, technology companies and the super-wealthy globalist elites who are pushing to erode national independence by undermining fossil fuels as clean energy sources.

The “findings” that disagree with the consensus are more typically from individual disillusioned scientists who have personally experienced how actual science has been co-opted by global politics and global elites, both of which have abused inordinate funding to skew the science in the direction of political narrative.

The findings, if there are any, that are being presented by these “disillusioned” scientists as you call them, are not finding their way into the surveys. That means either a) there exists a worldwide conspiracy of a hysterically impossible scope, or b) there are very few findings that oppose the consensus view of anthropogenic climate change.

Additionally, there are MANY oil and gas funded pundits who are trying to create a controversy re: climate change. Look into Breitbart, the Heartland Institute, or Alberta’s own The Friends of Science, for just a couple factions trying to create public confusion (much as the tobacco industry’s merchants of doubt cast doubt on the relationship between smoking and disease years ago).

There is no real controversy among scientists. Do you trust the scientific enterprise? Do you defer to scientific expertise regarding oncology, geology, microbiology, immunity, etc? I bet you do. The same error correction mechanisms are in place with climate science.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

There are “certain industry interests” both ways, but the lion’s share of interest is towards alarmism. The amount of lucre pushing the climate change agenda is enormous compared to fossil fuels. Even BP and Exxon are heavily invested in alternatives to fossil fuels, with Exxon spending a billion a year on alternatives. Governments in western liberal countries are spending about $1 billion per day on promoting “sustainable energy” and alternative energy.

The governments and “western liberal countries” have no vested interest in promoting sustainable energy, other than their sincere belief that it is best for their people. On the other hand, fossil fuel companies have an obvious self-interest that is distinct from the interests of the people. And those interests are best served by suppressing information about global warming, just as the interests of the tobacco companies were best served by suppressing information about the dangers of tobacco. It is not valid to compare government efforts at sustainable energy with the advertising campaign of the fossil fuel companies.

As for fossil fuel companies investing in sustainable energy, that is a good thing, and it shows that even they realize that their old business model may not be sustainable in the long run. Also it is good for public relations, so that the people will not see them as “just a dirty greedy fossil fuel company.” Their embracing of sustainable energy is the best evidence yet that it is the way to go.

 

[HarryStotle]

HarryStotle:

There are “certain industry interests” both ways, but the lion’s share of interest is towards alarmism. The amount of lucre pushing the climate change agenda is enormous compared to fossil fuels. Even BP and Exxon are heavily invested in alternatives to fossil fuels, with Exxon spending a billion a year on alternatives. Governments in western liberal countries are spending about $1 billion per day on promoting “sustainable energy” and alternative energy.

The governments and “western liberal countries” have no vested interest in promoting sustainable energy, other than their sincere belief that it is best for their people. On the other hand, fossil fuel companies have an obvious self-interest that is distinct from the interests of the people. And those interests are best served by suppressing information about global warming, just as the interests of the tobacco companies were best served by suppressing information about the dangers of tobacco. It is not valid to compare government efforts at sustainable energy with the advertising campaign of the fossil fuel companies.

As for fossil fuel companies investing in sustainable energy, that is a good thing, and it shows that even they realize that their old business model may not be sustainable in the long run. Also it is good for public relations, so that the people will not see them as “just a dirty greedy fossil fuel company.” Their embracing of sustainable energy is the best evidence yet that it is the way to go.

You will have to explain why wind and solar, which are very unreliable and potentially disastrous means of providing energy in their present form, are the only go-to methods of “sustainable” energy permitted, while nuclear and hydro are being denounced. We will discover, soon enough, that the pedlars of “sustainable” energy are far more “in it” out of their own interest and to help themselves than to help humanity.

As for corporations “seeing the light,” I suppose companies like Kellogg’s, Target, Google, Apple, etc., promoting gender transition, gender fluidity, abortion, socialism, and all of the other hyped progressive causes are doing so out of genuine concern for the “interests of the people” rather than to appear to be “woke.”

All of these progressive causes, including climate change have nothing to do with reality, but with social change orchestrated by globalists to undermine the will of the people by manipulating what people imagine is good for them in a chaotic world through social media – owned and controlled by the most wealthy of the oligarchs.

We will speak again in 20 years – God willing – if we still have any individuated voices to speak with.

 

[Metis1]

I almost entirely only rely on peer-reviewed scientific sources, so putting out sources that are not of such I glance at but not take seriously. Believing in these “alternative science” sources and one may well believe in so much of the absurd. There’s a HUGE vested interest in keeping the status quo, and they will handily pay for “studies” and publications that are mere fabrications.

Again, even if one were to question the data, common sense should be persuasive even enough for a middle-school student who’s good in science, namely that we’re clearly in a period of global warming and this is largely because of higher levels of CO2 and methane gas, and we’ve known about their effects for well over a century now. Other hypotheses have been discounted as being major contributors.

 

[Ender]

So, what percent do you imagine actually fell in that category? (Hint: think single digits.)

I just found this chart of Cook’s survey results. The red wedge represents all those studies (abstracts) judged to explicitly endorse AGW and quantify man’s contribution as above 50%, which is pretty much what everyone understands the 97% figure to mean.

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

 

[Nelka]

I honestly don’t think anything of climate change.

 

[Metis1]

The studies thus far on CC have concluded what some of us have mentioned previously, thus the NAS, NASA, “Scientific American”, “National Geographic”, and even our own DoD here in the States are convinced that it is indeed happening and for the reasons previously mentioned. There simply is no longer any doubt about it.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

Regarding the pie chart of responses in the Cook survey, the first big red flag is the continued presence of the overwhelming and totally irrelevant “No Position” sector. The chart should be redrawn to leave it out.

The other point is that the chart draws attention to the small number of papers in the most explicit and quantifiable degree of support for AGW, as if that were the only statistic with any meaning. That would be a statistically invalid conclusion to draw. If one wishes to draw attention to the 0.54% of papers in this category, one must compare them with their counterparts, which would be 0.08%. Of these two comparable categories, 87% are for and 13% are against. No matter how one looks at the data, AGW is the consensus.

 

[Inquiry]

Actually, the big red flag to me was the Implicitly Endorses category. Implicitly endorses can refer to papers that assume it is happening, but don’t contribute to the argument of if it is happening or not. If that is going to be considered then it is important to include not just the papers that implicitly reject but also the papers that don’t say anything about AGW, implicitly or otherwise.

Now there are some that need to be stripped out of the 11,944. That would be papers that are tangential to the subject at best and papers where you would never expect any meaningful endorsement or rejection, implicit or otherwise. But even with that I think a large chunk of the No Position papers should still be counted.

In addition, those tangential papers would need to be stripped out of the endorse and reject categories as well. They were not. For instance a paper about pollen allergies and emergency room visits in Canada was included in the endorsement group.

With all that done, I expect the numbers would be much lower than 97% though still quite a bit higher than 10%

 

[LeafByNiggle]

I agree with most of that analysis, @Inquiry. The percentage you get depends on what threshold you use to include papers in the “accepts AGW” category. Short of actually coming out and asking a scientist for his opinion on the question, it is a tricky matter to infer that degree of support from what they write. Well, not if they explicitly answer the question in their paper. But as we have seen, very few papers are of that sort, either pro or con. I do agree that the threshold used to get 97% is probably unrealistically loose, and that the true figure is somewhat lower. But there is no evidence that it is “much” lower.

To take a less controversial example, suppose one were to set out to find the degree of support for the claim: “Acyclovir is a reasonably effective treatment for shingles.” But instead of going out and asking doctors this question, suppose we were to determine it by surveying the literature. But to make it more like the Cook survey, suppose we started with a search of abstracts in medical journals for the term “shingles.” We would get a lot of articles that said something about shingles, but did not mention acyclovir. Would that be a valid reason to conclude that support for acyclovir was weak? Of course not. Papers that did not take a position on acyclovir tell us nothing one way or the other. There is no reason to include them, unless they implicitly supported or rejected acyclovir, such as an article that said that famciclovir was the optimal treatment for shingles. That might count as implicitly rejecting acyclovir.

One may disagree on the exact degree of support for global warming, but there is no doubt that it is the consensus, and that should mean something.

 

[Inquiry]

I would say the question of AGW is slightly broader than that. Perhaps a better comparison would be one of the relation between cholesterol and heart disease. There are more permutations of why someone may be researching cholesterol or heart disease, and more options for implicit acceptance or rejection (or neither). I’m probably quibbling here.

To your point about where the consensus would actually be, I agree. I have seen that other studies that tried to find the consensus put it at somewhere between 50 and 80% so I’m inclined to believe even with adjustments Cook would fall somewhere in that range. A majority, though not a nigh unanimous one.

As for the meaningfulness of consensus I am of two minds. On the one hand I do see how it is a useful metric for laypeople to get a sense of the issue, especially when they do not have the time or access to read up on it. On the other hand the popularity of an idea means absolutely nothing in terms of the scientific method. This is a paper whose main goal is to convince people who don’t read papers so that they don’t have to read papers, and the very nature of that does not sit well with me.

 

[Ender]

The other point is that the chart draws attention to the small number of papers in the most explicit and quantifiable degree of support for AGW, as if that were the only statistic with any meaning.

I don’t care whether the “no opinion” papers are included or excluded. The three categories indicating support for AGW: (1) explicit, quantified, (2) explicit, not quantified, and (3) implicit were all smashed together into a “Supports AGW” category. 70% of the 97% were from this “implicit” category, while under 2% were in the “explicit, quantified” group…even though what the public thinks the survey showed is that 97% are in that first group. This is an absolutely bogus paper that does not show what people think it does.

 

[Ender]

Actually, the big red flag to me was the Implicitly Endorses category. Implicitly endorses can refer to papers that assume it is happening, but don’t contribute to the argument of if it is happening or not.

Here is the example given in the Cook study of a statement that would get a paper classified as “Implicitly Endorses”:

‘. . . carbon sequestration in soil is important for mitigating global climate change’

Understand that once a paper is in the “implicit” category it gets rolled up into the “Endorses AGW” group - which states the author believes that man is responsible for over 50% of the measured warming. That 70% (of the 97%) of the papers were in this implicit category ought to indicate just how ephemeral this study was.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

I don’t care whether the “no opinion” papers are included or excluded.

You say you do not care that “no opinion” is shown so prominently, but the makers of this chart knew exactly what they were doing, playing on the average person’s inability to properly process statistical information. It is meant to make the “support” category look as small as possible to non-statisticians. And if you don’t care that 67% of the papers in the first automatic sieve expressed no opinion, then why do you mention it every time you criticize the Cook survey? It seems that on some level you think it is important. Your other criticisms of the survey have much more validity to them, but it undercuts those more valid criticisms to combine them with this meaningless one. It is not that I find the Cook methodology so compelling. I just don’t like to see this appeal to a statistical misconception being used to make your point.

Here is the example given in the Cook study of a statement that would get a paper classified as “Implicitly Endorses”:

‘. . . carbon sequestration in soil is important for mitigating global climate change’

This seems to be a valid paper to include in the “implicit” category. The writer of that statement obviously thought that mitigating climate change is a desirable thing (otherwise why write about ways to do it?). Just as obvious is the implication that CO2 in the atmosphere is a significant contribution to climate change. The only thing that is missing from this statement is the fact that the higher levels of CO2 is largely caused by Man. But that is a fact that on which not even the opponents of climate change theory disagree.

Understand that once a paper is in the “implicit” category it gets rolled up into the “Endorses AGW” group - which states the author believes that man is responsible for over 50% of the measured warming. That 70% (of the 97%) of the papers were in this implicit category ought to indicate just how ephemeral this study was.

The grouping is indeed a valid criticism. But if one wishes, one can look beyond the grouping to the individual subtotals and draw their own conclusions from those. So if there is a criticism of the Cook survey, it would be in the way it was summarized, especially for popular consumption.

 

[phaster]

phaster:

judgment would be upon them unless they repented (for poor stewardship of creation)?!

Judgement may be upon those who wantonly destroy the improving welfare of billions of human beings in developing nations for the sake of global socialism and the amalgamation of power in the hands of a very tiny elite.

Good stewardship of the earth might entail increasing CO2 for the benefit of plants and to increase the global food supply.

appears you have a tendency to conflate facts and ideas!

What do you think of climate change? Social Justice

There is a difference between accepting a scientific conclusion as the most likely and accepting a governing proposal as the most prudent way to deal with it. FWIW perhaps everyone might to recheck “who,…” posted “what,…” point being, there exists a “confirmation bias” pattern of confusing posters AND conflating of what was said,… which seems to be a very strong indication of political bias WRT CC,… (akin to what happens to witness accounts in a court trial) http://www.psychological…

and seems you’re a text book example of a skeptic/denier that parrots the tribes talking points who has zero understanding of the basic science!!

What do you think of climate change? Social Justice

interesting the random trivia that I’ve leaned in the course of this thread,… anyway since you (and perhaps many others) don’t believe Snopes is credible, so what about a word from time magazine itself who categorically deny they published something deniers tout as fact!!! BTW if you re-read the post perhaps you’ll see the intended audience of my comment/humor was directed at another poster (who has a PhD) and seems to have grown tired of the same old arguments examples I have a PhD in chem…

I mention this because in the OP note I specifically mentioned a study that indicated “…there essentially zero understanding of the mechanisms that cause climate change in the public at large”

to illustrate this point yet again that you (like the public at large) seem to have little or no understanding of basic science, let’s consider

What Ballooning Carbon Emissions Will Do to Trees

…Every year, trees, shrubs, and every other kind of plant absorb 9 billion tons of CO2—one quarter of what we let loose from our tailpipes and smokestacks—and help slow the gas’s accumulation in the atmosphere. If not for the world’s photosynthesizers, the concentration of CO2 in the air, along with Earth’s temperature, would be rising much faster than it already is

…the amount of carbon dioxide absorbed by intact Amazon forest had declined by 30 percent between the 1990s and the 2000s

…a free-air carbon enrichment (FACE) experiment, in which an open-air plot is treated with extra CO2,… At first, trees grew faster. But they soon stagnated. The soil ran out of nitrogen and the trees couldn’t benefit from extra CO2.

www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/10/everything-but-the-carbon-sink/599965/

because various soils lack sufficient nitrogen and phosphorus,… again have to point out that too much of an essential gas (for life) as you (seem to believe) isn’t actually the truth

since you brought up the topic of global food security, looking at various crops we find major dislocations

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/10/25/658588158/5-major-crops-in-the-crosshairs-of-climate-change

considering your three posts that I’ve replied to, an apt metaphor might be “three strikes you’re out”

looking at the bigger picture, the yet unanswered and more important baseball metaphor is,… what inning is humanity in,… the fifth or the seventh???

given that I have tried to illustrate what is on the line using the parable of the vineyard owner,… let’s consider the story about st. peter and his repeated denial (when confronted w/ the truth)

When St. Peter Denied Christ

in this case, the denial is of various deleterious effects (which science is trying to tell people) caused by ever increasing CO2 levels

 

[phaster]

As for the meaningfulness of consensus I am of two minds. On the one hand I do see how it is a useful metric for laypeople to get a sense of the issue, especially when they do not have the time or access to read up on it. On the other hand the popularity of an idea means absolutely nothing in terms of the scientific method. This is a paper whose main goal is to convince people who don’t read papers so that they don’t have to read papers, and the very nature of that does not sit well with me.

IMHO why so many quote the statistic of 97% scientific consensus WRT CC,… simple explanation is because it is understandable by the american public who in general are not the sharpest tool in the shed

There is essentially zero understanding of most things that don’t have to do with Kardashians, Marvel Comics, Game of Thrones, Survivor, Housewives of various cities, Walking Dead, or The Bachelor in the public at large.

the fact of the matter is hard science scientist do know and understand what the problem is,… BUT the weak link is human nature because people and especially conservative american politicians do not want to rock the boat so to speak and give up their relatively cushy leadership position(s) in society

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

…the mechanisms that cause climate change is quite well understood using physics, math and chemistry,… and IMHO should be taught ASAP

the inconvenient fact of the matter is few people want to accept the inconvenient truth that our modern life style is the root cause of climate change

then there is the problem of climate change believers (high up on the food chain) being hypocrites