Moe Lane

…notice how they have to keep changing the name, by the way? Modern demonology is a very, very fast-paced field indeed. – Anyway, a new poll suggests that global concerns about global warming are fading:

Public concern about environmental issues including climate change has slumped to a 20-year low since the financial crisis, a global study reveals.

Fewer people now consider issues such as CO2 emissions, air and water pollution, animal species loss, and water shortages to be “very serious” than at any time in the last two decades, according to the poll of 22,812 people in 22 countries including Britain and the US.

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The problem with our Greenie religious fanatics is – well, they have several, really. But one of their major problems is that they’ve never quite twigged to the realization that there’s an entire industry dedicated to scaring the money out of them. Which is pretty much the entire global warming / climate change / Mother Earth Goddess Rages business, right there. Couple that with an inability to do higher math* and to realize that there was actual history before 1950** and you get people profitably panicking that we’re one burning coal pile away from Venus.

Fortunately, there’s objective reality. (more…)

You know, I understand AoSHQ’s point that a recent study about grasshoppers and diet and what not is really about global warming: I do.  But I keep getting hung up on this:

They placed cages in areas of natural vegetation and allowed some grasshoppers to be alone while others were placed in cages with a spider.

They glued the mouths of the spiders shut in order to make sure that the grasshoppers experienced pure fear, but were not actually killed by the predators.

…and thinking, Damn, but scientists can be d*cks sometimes.  I know that science ain’t always pretty, but wow.  Does PETA know about this one?

Moe Lane

“It” being defined as “your fundraising crusade to get more Big Green cash*.”  See, libertarian groups can get cranky – as in, irritable – when you drag them into your little games.  In fact, dragging them into said games can be roughly equivalent to going up and kicking awake a sleeping black bear.  Sure, you can survive the experience – but is it really an optimal way to spend your time?

Via Instapundit.

Moe Lane

*Short version: The Union of Concerned Scientists declared that General Electric’s support of the Reason Foundation made GE a hypocrite on global warming policy.  Reason, somewhat surprised to hear that GE was apparently one of their supporters, checked and discovered that the UCS was equating roughly five hundred dollars in matching funds to Reason to roughly five hundred thousand dollars in matching funds and corporate donations to Big Green groups.  Reason then proceeds to directly rake the UCS over the coals for this.  UCS changes their report, but weakly mutters about how Reason is against the anti-scientific consensus.  Reason sweetly asks whether this means that the UCS is about to change its stated position on biotech crops.  I don’t know how the UCS reacted to that, but I’d have paid ten bucks to see the looks on their faces.

I’m translating, taking into account that famous British reserve – and lest you think that the ‘hack’ part is unfair description of James Lovelock, creator of the Gaia hypothesis, let me reproduce some of his previous comments:

…as the century progresses, the temperature will rise 8 degrees centigrade in temperate regions and 5 degrees in the tropics.

Much of the tropical land mass will become scrub and desert, and will no longer serve for regulation; this adds to the 40 per cent of the Earth’s surface we have depleted to feed ourselves.

Curiously, aerosol pollution of the northern hemisphere reduces global warming by reflecting sunlight back to space. This “global dimming” is transient and could disappear in a few days like the smoke that it is, leaving us fully exposed to the heat of the global greenhouse. We are in a fool’s climate, accidentally kept cool by smoke, and before this century is over billions of us will die and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable.

That was in 2006. Also in 2006, Lovelock wrote “Revenge of Gaia: Why the Earth Is Fighting Back – and How We Can Still Save Humanity;” and in 2010 he wrote “The Vanishing Face of Gaia: A Final Warning: Enjoy It While You Can.”  And he’s writing a book now!  Title unknown, so let me offer a suggestion:

“Oops.”

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I am deeply envious of that phrase.

I rather badly want to have been the person who first came up with that phrase, in fact.  I feel that I need to get this on the record.

Anyway, if you were looking for a recap on the entire didn’t-turn-out-as-intended climate alarmist attack on the Heartland Institute by – well, I suppose that it has not been proven in a court of law that Peter Gleick was responsible for the forged memo, so we’ll go with “person or persons unknown who could conceivably have the initials ‘P.G.’” and be done with it.  Anyway, this is a pretty good recap: it describes the initial ‘data’ dump, identifies the central trouble with it (essentially, the central document is a farrago of nonsense and lies, and absent it the ‘supporting’ documents are thoroughly innocuous), notes the ghoulish zeal with which alarmist blogs treated the original ‘revelation’… and ruthlessly spotlights the petulant refusal of most of said alarmists to admit that the whole thing exploded in their face. (more…)

This is pretty good stuff of Megan McArdle, re Peter Gleick’s own-goal sabotage of climate change advocates by disseminating/allegedly creating a fake Heartland memo on its global warming strategies (not to mention his confessed identity theft):

When skeptics complain that global warming activists are apparently willing to go to any lengths–including lying–to advance their worldview, I’d say one of the movement’s top priorities should be not proving them right.

…but it must be said: Gleick really doesn’t deserve much benefit of the doubt at this point with regard to his probable authorship of the original, blatantly fake, Heartland memo.  There is a credible case to be made at this point that Gleick stole the original documents, then created the memo himself; and, given that he’s a self-confessed liar, it’s going to take more than I’m not lying about this for Gleick to get out of it. (more…)

[UPDATE: The preliminary steps of removing Peter Gleick from positions of authority and respect have begun: he's 'resigned' from his position with the National Center for Science Education, and his scientific ethics task force chairmanship(!) for the American Geophysical Union.  One wonders whether groups like the MacArthur Fellows Program and NAS will insist that Gleick cut all ties from them, as well.  Nobody's really expecting the Pacific Institute to join in, of course: it's a well-known reliable quote machine for the American Left.]

OK, quick background: last week there was a bit of fuss when a variety of documents appeared that purported to show that there was some sort of nefarious global warming ‘denialist’ (that’s what a Lefty calls somebody who has noticed that, hey, the temperature’s not actually rising the way that people told us it would) conspiracy centered around the Heartland Institute.  The Heartland Institute was not amused by this, and has been making it clear that at least one document was a pathetic forgery.  This latter point has generally been conceded by all the players, if tacitly, and the great walkback is beginning.  I recommend Watts Up With That for those looking to monitor further developments: that site has been all over this story.

But let’s go back to what got revealed, for a moment.  The documents can be grouped into two categories: a variety of materials that global warming advocate (and lecturer on ethics*) Peter Gleick admitted stealing from Heartland**; and the aforementioned pathetically faked document.  Since we now know that not even Gleick is standing by the provenance of said document, let us ignore it completely.  What it says is irrelevant.  It has no bearing.  I did not even read it before my summary below of the documents that Gleick stole, solely to keep it from contaminating my assessment. (more…)

Hi, researchers from 2100!  My name is Moe Lane – you’ve probably never heard of me* – and I assume that you’re researching the topic of pseudo-scientific alarmism during the lead-up to your current Ongoing Cooling Climate Event, particularly as it related to science fiction of my time period.  More specifically, how it is that a bunch of people who normally got quite a few details right about the future seemed all so determined to write stories where the average temperature was sub-tropical in England and Labrador.  Let me explain and apologize for my… well, not “colleagues,” precisely.  “Associates?” …no.  “Contemporaries” will do. 

Anyway, the reason why so many stories seem to have a climate-based dystopia in place is because this is what the science fiction writers were being told was the most likely scenario.  Remember, this is the Late Twentieth/Early Twenty-First Century C.E. – excuse me, “A.D.” – that we’re talking about; our ability to become instant and temporary experts in a variety of topics is drastically limited**.  Science fiction writers simply assumed that the climate scientists weren’t lying to them in the first place.

Just like the rest of us, really.

Hope this helps! – Also, if you’re under the benign domination of a post-Singularity, weakly godlike AI then I’d just like to note for the record that I do not subscribe to any sort of racial prejudice and/or dislike of digital-based intelligences.  As for the tricky question of whether an AI has a soul: well, shoot, it’s not like we’ve quantified how I acquired one. I’m sure that the Almighty*** can handle this without my input.

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Hey, don’t look at me.  Or Rasmussen Reports.  We’re just reporting results.  Object to the American people:

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of American Adults shows that 69% say it’s at least somewhat likely that some scientists have falsified research data in order to support their own theories and beliefs, including 40% who say this is Very Likely. Twenty-two percent (22%) don’t think it’s likely some scientists have falsified global warming data, including just six percent (6%) say it’s Not At All Likely. Another 10% are undecided. (To see survey question wording, click here .)

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Better throw some more logs on the fire.

What may be the science story of the century is breaking this evening, as heavyweight US solar physicists announce that the Sun appears to be headed into a lengthy spell of low activity, which could mean that the Earth – far from facing a global warming problem – is actually headed into a mini Ice Age.

[snip]

The Sun normally follows an 11-year cycle of activity. The current cycle, Cycle 24, is now supposed to be ramping up towards maximum strength. Increased numbers of sunspots and other indications ought to be happening: but in fact results so far are most disappointing. Scientists at the NSO now suspect, based on data showing decades-long trends leading to this point, that Cycle 25 may not happen at all.

The magic phrase ‘Maunder Minimum’ was used – which suggests that we might be looking at another Little Ice Age.  Which, depending on who you ask, either: caused a bunch of wars; made a bunch of wars much worse than they would have been otherwise; or is not to be mentioned in polite company.  Personally, I was hoping that we’d avoid this: after all, cold is death and heat is life.  Better to be warm and wet, than cold and dry.  But then, I have kids, and I worry that the current short-sighted, willful denial of science by our self-appointed elites may be condemning my children – and everybody else’s – to a future of poverty and dearth.

On the bright side, a colleague of mine suggested that the perfect name for a hypothetical new period of decreased sunspot activity would be the “Gore Minimum.”  In terms of irony alone, that would be perfect.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

Having watched Soylent Green again recently*: sometimes it seems that the people most exercised over the entire ‘greenhouse gas’ thing seem to have completely forgotten what it is that we use greenhouses for.

Moe Lane

*A shaping-up-to-be-quite-comprehensively-wrong film which was based on Harry Harrison’s Make Room! Make Room! – a novel that was equally (and equally hysterically) wrong in its predictions.  I mention this largely because it is apparently required that we take seriously the predictions of 2010 for 2050… and ignore the pesky detail that the equally-dire predictions in 1970 or 1985 for 2010 (and increasingly-likely, 2020, or 2025) turned out to be, frankly, crap.  Not to mention the other pesky detail that in 2030 I’ll probably be able to write the same damn post about all those people out there fear-mongering 2070…