# ClimateGate 2.0? Are you fucking kidding me? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 27, 2011, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243 "2011-11-27T15:39:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2011, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/1 "2011-11-27T15:39:17Z")
I’ll be frank here: the fact that anyone is giving this garbage a second look is simply offensive. Remember how, back a year or two ago, a bunch of emails were leaked that contained out-of-context sound bites that seemed to make it look like there was some serious manipulation and corruption going on in the scientific community? It was quite clearly and convincingly debunked by at least three reliable, independent sources, and was basically a parade example of the classic debate tactic of quote mining. It should’ve been quickly debunked, ignored and forgotten… But somehow wasn’t. Instead it blew up into this huge deal. Even now there are still people who bought into the “Climategate scandal” bullshit. It doesn’t help that outlets like The Daily Mail, Fox News, and the like never ran a correction, clarification, or retraction on the issue, unless I simply missed it. But seriously, this tactic has _got_ to stop working. Well, _here we go again_. > **[Climategate scientists DID collude with government officials to hide research...](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2066240/Second-leak-climate-emails-Political-giants-weigh-bias-scientists-bowing-financial-pressure-sponsors.html)** > > The second leak of Climategate emails not only reveals a systematic approach to concealing - or destroying - inconvenient data, but also that the government was deeply involved in the scandal. I’m going to throw down a few “damning” quotes from the article. 1. > [@](#): > > ‘Humphrey’, said to work at Defra, writes: ‘I cannot overstate the HUGE amount of political interest in the project as a message that the government can give on climate change to help them tell their story. > > 'They want their story to be a very strong one and don’t want to be made to look foolish.’ 1. > [@](#): > > One nervous scientist wrote: ‘The figure you sent is very deceptive.’ 1. > [@](#): > > The lead author of one of the reports, Jonathan Overpeck, wrote, ‘The trick may be to decide on the main message and use that to guide what’s included and what is left out.’ 1. > [@](#): > > ‘I also think the science is being manipulated to put a political spin on it which for all our sakes might not be too clever in the long run,’ wrote another. I’m not going to go back and contextualize every single quote in the article, but I will gladly go over those four. The problem with the first one becomes present even _without_ external context. No shit, the politicians want their stance to be strong. They’re putting their backing behind something controversial. This would be true whether or not the science is correct or not. Now, without the original context (which, by the way, the Daily Mail did not offer), we can’t be sure if they’re claiming that the politicians are putting pressure on them to massage the data, or if they just want to get it right. But let’s keep moving, maybe that can give us a clue… Quote two is completely ripped from its context. You could take a statement like this from almost any scientific discourse. Not only is it actually a rerun from the 2009 batch, but it’s also taken completely out of context – the number being discussed is not what the Mail makes it out to be. Here’s a little more context: [http://www.appinsys.com/globalwarming/GW\_5GH\_IPCC\_GHG.htm](http://www.appinsys.com/globalwarming/GW_5GH_IPCC_GHG.htm) > [@](#): > > The Figure you sent is very deceptive. As an example, historical runs with PCM look as though they match observations – but the match is a fluke. PCM has no indirect aerosol forcing and a low climate sensitivity – compensating errors. In my (perhaps too harsh) view, there have been a number of dishonest presentations of model results by individual authors and by IPCC.” Suddenly this looks a lot less damning and a lot more like a scientist is simply stating his disagreement with some part of the method used… _the way good scientific discourse works_. Quote 3 is almost ludicrously bad. The Daily Mail is essentially doing everything except just fabricating the quote out of whole cloth. You know why? Check out the very next sentence: “For the IPCC, we need to know what is relevant and useful for assessing recent and future climate change. Moreover, we have to have solid data – not inconclusive information.” So… They’re not cutting data that disagrees with them. They’re cutting out data which is less relevant for a presentation at a major conference. To those who take issue with this, feel free to see if the IPCC will grant speakers a time of _several weeks at a time_. Quote 4… Well, [here’s the context](http://foia2011.org/index.php?id=3016). Suddenly looks a lot less dishonest, huh? This whole article is just too dumb to let stand. To be fair, the Mail does offer itself _some_ breathing room further down the page, by claiming, > [@](#): > > It is not clear, though, whether they are new, or indeed whether they indicate any kind of conspiracy …But really? That’s not the point of the article. Reading it, you know where they’ve played their cards, and it’s not on the side of intellectual integrity by any stretch of the imagination. If your average Mail reader is willing to read the whole article (which is fairly long), then they get a paltry explanation of the other side of the issue. I’d take this apart further, but youtube user Potholer54 already [did a genius video on the topic](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OB2prBtVFo&feature=feedu), which I _strongly_ recommend, and I honestly can’t be fucked. But you know what? Let me do one more, from a different article… This time in the [Telegraph](http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100119495/climategate-2-0-the-not-nice-and-clueless-phil-jones/): > [@](#): > > One way to cover yourself and all those working in AR5 > would be to delete all emails at the end of the process. While I don’t really have much to complain about in the rest of the article (the man on blast seems to be fairly incompetent, tbh), I have a snappy response to this one bit: “Jeez, maybe it has to do with them getting leaked and then taken completely out of context and used to raise doubts over an incredibly crucial field of scientific research for no good reason?” ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2011, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/2 "2011-11-27T17:54:54Z")
There is a reason why they call that sorry example of a tabloid _The Daily Fail_. 🙂 BTW nice pit there _Budget Player Cadet_, I was not going to bother with starting a thread as this effort by the email robbers and enablers of the robbery are pathetic, a two year old turkey as RealClimate points out. > **[RealClimate: Two-year old turkey](https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/two-year-old-turkey/)** > > RealClimate: The blogosphere is abuzz with the appearance of a second tranche of the emails stolen from CRU just before thanksgiving in 2009. Our original commentary is still available of course (CRU Hack, CRU Hack: Context, etc.), and very little... One email that the Daily Fail missed commenting but that was part of the “new” release for Climategate II is here (even here they are wrong as this email batch comes from the same group that was stolen before.): Professor Ray Bradley wrote: > [@](#): > > the Mann/Jones GRL paper was truly pathetic and should never have been published. I don’t want to be associated with that 2000 year “reconstruction”. That old weasel Anthony Watts is using that and other out of context email clips to keep the “scandal” going, there is only one little problem with that one. As I have noticed many times before, many extreme conservatives have a problem dealing with timelines or the march of time itself. As a commentator on RealClimate noticed: > [@](#): > > Except your missing that Bradley said this in 2004, and later in 2008 was co-author of a paper on the subject with … who? Why, Mann. > > The 2008 paper, of course, is where their consensus in their views lies … unless the only fact that interests you is the fact that they at times disagree, their published co-operative work is what’s important. Science moving forward. Denialists looking back for any sign of any mistake or disagreement in the past, in order to ignore or lie about where science is at present and the trajectory of science moving forward. So yeah, as I remember the history of the hockey stick graph, Mann got some criticism from the National Academy for his early work around 2005, but the Academy mostly agreed that Mann was on the right track, what this “new” “scandal” has showed me is that it was really true that Mann took the criticisms of the academy into account, and he demonstrated that by joining forces with one of his critics, and showing with more data that he was still on the right track in 2008. It is no wonder that his papers from 2008 on are not attacked so much, the deniers just think that by concentrating on the past papers - that are not much relevant now as more up to date ones are available - that they will show that there was “something”. Well, it does, it shows how pathetic deniers like Watts are. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2011, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/3 "2011-11-27T18:30:18Z")
My advice for climate change awareness advocates: 1. Give up, and retract the term global warming. You are talking about a very small increase over a very long period and it really may not be correct because of the margin of error, and even if it is the real thesis isn’t that the world is getting warmer, it’s that mankind is changing the environment in ways that will adversely affect us all. 2. Use small examples that people can wrap their heads around, I.E. now that Manhattan is covered with dark concrete, it gets hotter in the summer and it stays hot after the sun goes down for the same reason your driveway gets too got to walk on, but the grass. Is just fine. Doing this to alarger and larger portion of the earth is dangerous. This is a much more powerful argument than saying overrall that things have gotten half a degree warmer over the last hundred years 1. Don’t call people “deniers.”. It makes you seem smug and overly sure of yourself and makes people want wo argue with you just to take you down a notch. Call them “skeptics” and appreciate their job of keeping you honest, even, and especially if they are not honest. 2. The separation between climate change and plain old environmentalism seems strained and artificial. Remove it. Too much garbage is the same as overfishing is the same as polluting the air. Mankind is making an impact and changing the planet and it affects everything and everyone that lives on the planet. 3. I think hybrids, and solar are really neat, too but the problem is that the rest of the world is industrializing and burning fuels in a much dirtier fashion and being even less responsible their waste than we are. A Prius is not going to help, and it is a dangerous Idea to consider that they do, because it lets somebody buy a Prius and think they’ve done something helpful, which they haven’t. 4. The cars really aren’t the problem. It’s the passenger miles. If Joe Dirt drives his Hummer 2 miles to work and 2 miles home every day while Earnie Enviro drives his Prius 45 Miles each each way, Joe is a an environmental hero compared to Earnie. The idea that we are all going to trade in our old shit for new shit and continue traveling all over the place in personal vehicles doesn’t cut it. The dirty little unstated secret is that activity and consumption are themselves unsustainable. It is not simply the way we are doing things, it is the amount of things we are doing. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2011, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/4 "2011-11-27T18:41:40Z")
I’m just holding out for Climate Gate Millenium Edition, set to come out in 3001. They should have it working right by then. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2011, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/5 "2011-11-27T18:56:14Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > My advice for climate change awareness advocates: > > 1. Give up, and retract the term global warming. You are talking about a very small increase over a very long period and it really may not be correct because of the margin of error, and even if it is the real thesis isn’t that the world is getting warmer, it’s that mankind is changing the environment in ways that will adversely affect us all. Nope, it is a term that does show the physical part of the issue. It is indeed the hardest one to deny, what the changes that would do to climate is harder to figure but not impossible as more than 60 years of research show. > [@Scylla](#): > > 1. Use small examples that people can wrap their heads around, I.E. now that Manhattan is covered with dark concrete, it gets hotter in the summer and it stays hot after the sun goes down for the same reason your driveway gets too got to walk on, but the grass. Is just fine. Doing this a larger and larger portion of the earth is dangerous. > > This is a much more powerful argument than saying overran that things have gotten half a degree warmer over the last hundred years The problem here is that this is the heat island effect, and it has been found to not be an important reason behind the warming. Far from it, this “powerful argument” is used to dismiss global warming at large. > [@Scylla](#): > > 1. Don’t call people “deniers.”. It makes you seem smug and overly sure of yourself and makes people want wo argue with you just to take you down a notch. Call them “skeptics” and appreciate their job of keeping you honest, even, and especially if they are not honest. That will not work here you ignoramus, deniers is an appropriate term when weasels like Anthony Watts continue to not only deny the science (Hello BEST), but also like in this recent case continue to reheat old baloney, as I even pointed out before skeptics do exist, and they are people like Muller from the BEST team. > [@Scylla](#): > > 1. The separation between climate change and plain old environmentalism seems strained and artificial. Remove it. Too much garbage is the same as overfishing is the same as polluting the air. Mankind is making an impact and changing the planet and it affects everything and everyone that lives on the planet. This is usually a misunderstanding or dumb meme coming from right wing sources. I can see some separation coming from some sources, but environmentalists on the whole are not separated from this issue as one of the most recognized environmentalist publication shows: > **[You searched for results - Grist](https://www.grist.org/search/results?q=global%2Bwarming&submit=go)** > [@Scylla](#): > > 1. I think hybrids, and solar are really neat, too but the problem is that the rest of the world is industrializing and burning fuels in a much dirtier fashion and being even less responsible their waste than we are. A Prius is not going to help, and it is a dangerous Idea to consider that they do, because it lets somebody buy a Prius and think they’ve done something helpful, which they haven’t. It does help, and this happens when more go for alternative energy sources, it has been pointed out many times that once deployment takes place even developing nations do take notice of what we need as they are also the ones that will manufacture the new technologies. > [@Scylla](#): > > 1. The cars really aren’t the problem. It’s the passenger miles. If Joe Dirt drives his Hummer 2 miles to work and 2 miles home every day while Earnie Enviro drives his Prius 45 Miles each each way, Joe is a an environmental hero compared to Earnie. The idea that we are all going to trade in our old shit for new shit and continue traveling all over the place in personal vehicles doesn’t cut it. The dirty little unstated secret is that activity and consumption are themselves unsustainable. It is not simply the way we are doing things, it is the amount of things we are doing. And here it is clear that you are into straw man territory, environmentalists do not exclude this item from the overall solution. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2011, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/6 "2011-11-27T19:30:24Z")
A well-reasoned post, **Scylla**. A few minor quibbles. The term “global warming” is what it is. We’ve already had enough trouble getting the concept accepted as plausible, changing the terminology will only confuse the ill-informed. “Skeptics” is a term that carries a kind of intellectual emotional baggage. There are people who reflexively admire the term, that like to think of themselves as hard-headed realists, etc. Many, many people like to be called “skeptics”, they think it is equivalent to “smart”. Which is quite frequently true, but people who are not particularly smart will latch on to the term and resist the changes in their thinking that all of this demands of us. Similarly with “denialist”. It will serve, even if it lacks grace. The skills of a scientist and the skills of a wordsmith are based on very different modes of thinking, and so it goes. As for the Prius, and solar panels, and all that. No doubt, we will go down some blind alleys, but we need the power of American ingenuity, and American ingenuity expects to be paid. If you cannot make your great idea into a viable product, there is scant opportunity for the kind of money needed, you end up relying on the generosity of the rich, those rare wealthy people who will throw money at what may very well be a crackpot notion. Or the salvation of our species. I would that it were otherwise, but it is not, and we haven’t enough time. Also, these are baby steps. Nureyev crawled, toddled, walked, and then danced. It isn’t sensible to expect a return on an investment like this within a time frame that a capitalist will find agreeable. We may have to lie a bit. And it is also true that the rest of the world will go merrily along shitting in our collective nest. There is but one answer: the Holy Green Grail, clean, harmless energy that is abundant, therefore cheap. We have to put the oil and coal companies out of business not by fiat, but by starvation. They will, of course, resist. They already are resisting, and they have huge hulking piles of money to do it with. We need a Tesla, an Einstein, a Eureka! moment. We need to be willing to invest in a hundred crackpot notions to find that one glimmer of solid gold. Its a tough case to sell. Boiled down, we need to produce mechanical/electrical energy without burning anything, and burning things is how we have been doing it ever since the first anthropoid who clubbed his neighbor with a thighbone. A daunting prospect. When I despair of it, I contemplate the moon, and how it has been improved with footprints. American footprints, I hasten to remind. I would like to replace the US motto with the SeaBee’s: The difficult we do at once, the impossible takes a little longer. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/7 "2011-11-28T01:09:53Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Nope, it is a term that does show the physical part of the issue. It is indeed the hardest one to deny, what the changes that would do to climate is harder to figure but not impossible as more than 60 years of research show. Patently untrue. It’s very easy to deny. First off, are all areas of the world getting warmer or, as Cecil says in his last column, are some getting warmer, and others getting cooler? Second, you are talking bout a small change over a long period of time, that requires many many observations fom many different oaks tht have to be collated normalized and interpreted. Less than 1 degree over a hundred years? Ridiculously easy to cat doubt on. There are so many different ways in which this figure could be lawned. Finally, 1 degree a century? Big fucking deal. > [@](#): > > The problem here is that this is the heat island effect, and it has been found to not be an important reason behind the warming. Far from it, this “powerful argument” is used to dismiss global warming at large. You are still talking global warming. Who gives a hit. I’m talking climate change. NYC’s limate has changed because of us. > [@](#): > > That will not work here you ignoramus, Works ine, dick weed. > [@](#): > > deniers is an appropriate term when weasels like Anthony Watts continue to not only deny the science (Hello BEST), but also like in this recent case continue to reheat old baloney, as I even pointed out before skeptics do exist, and they are people like Muller from the BEST team. . Fine, call them deniers. They can call you fanatics. > [@](#): > > This is usually a misunderstanding or dumb meme coming from right wing sources. I can see some separation coming from some sources, but environmentalists on the whole are not separated from this issue as one of the most recognized environmentalist publication shows: > > [http://www.grist.org/search/results?q=global+warming&submit=go](http://www.grist.org/search/results?q=global+warming&submit=go) I’m sure that’s true. I usually see them being referred to as seperate issues in public. [quote] It does help, and this happens when more go for alternative energy sources, it has been pointed out many times that once deployment takes place even developing nations do take notice of what we need as they are also the ones that will manufacture the new technologies. [quote] Again, bullshit. We don’t ease our burden on the earth by producing more of anything. [quoteAnd here it is clear that you are into straw man territory, environmentalists do not exclude this item from the overall solution.[/QUOTE] That doen’t Make it a strawman. Not excluding something as a solution is different from promoting it. Minimalism is not something I am hearing from the environmental crowd. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/8 "2011-11-28T01:46:13Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > Patently untrue. It’s very easy to deny. First off, are all areas of the world getting warmer or, as Cecil says in his last column, are some getting warmer, and others getting cooler? Second, you are talking bout a small change over a long period of time, that requires many many observations fom many different oaks tht have to be collated normalized and interpreted. Less than 1 degree over a hundred years? Ridiculously easy to cat doubt on. There are so many different ways in which this figure could be lawned. > > Finally, 1 degree a century? Big fucking deal. Big fucking Gish gallop, as the antidote for that one just needs to point at the first unfounded point, > **[Does cold weather disprove global warming?](https://skepticalscience.com/global-warming-cold-weather-intermediate.htm)** > > \Since the mid 1970s, global temperatures have been warming at around 0.2 degrees Celsius per decade. However, weather imposes its own dramatic ups and downs over the long term trend. We expect to see record cold temperatures even during global... > [@](#): > > What the science says… > > Since the mid 1970s, global temperatures have been warming at around 0.2 degrees Celsius per decade. However, weather imposes its own dramatic ups and downs over the long term trend. We expect to see record cold temperatures even during global warming. Nevertheless over the last decade, daily record high temperatures occurred twice as often as record lows. This tendency towards hotter days is expected to increase as global warming continues into the 21st Century. > [@Scylla](#): > > You are still talking global warming. Who gives a hit. I’m talking climate change. > NYC’s limate has changed because of us. Ah, I see the Republican propagandists did find a gullible person in you. > **[Global warming vs climate change](https://skepticalscience.com/climate-change-global-warming.htm)** > > \There have long been claims that some unspecificed > [@](#): > > There have long been claims that some unspecificed “they” has “changed the name from ‘global warming’ to ‘climate change’”. **In reality, the two terms mean different things, have both been used for decades, and the only individual to have specifically advocated changing the name in this fashion is a global warming ‘skeptic’.** > [@](#): > > So to sum up, although the terms are used interchangeably because they are causally related, ‘global warming’ and ‘climate change’ refer to different physical phenomena. The term ‘climate change’ has been used frequently in the scientific literature for many decades, and the usage of both terms has increased over the past 40 years. Moreover, since the planet continues to warm, there is no reason to change the terminology. Perhaps the only individual to advocate the change was Frank Luntz, a Republican political strategist and global warming skeptic, who used focus group results to determine that the term ‘climate change’ is less frightening to the general public than ‘global warming’. There is simply no factual basis whatsoever to the myth “they changed the name from global warming to climate change”. > [@Scylla](#): > > Works ine, dick weed. As the evidence shows, you are not even wrong, so it is even worse that being an ignoramus, you are proud of that state you are in. Fine with me. 🙂 > [@Scylla](#): > > Fine, call them deniers. They can call you fanatics. Who are they? As pointed out before many times in other threads, skeptics that do look at the evidence are getting convinced, and they only fret about how bad is going to get (Pat Michaels, Lomborg) there is no religion in this, only your projections as you are unable to see how gullible you are with the denier propaganda. > [@Scylla](#): > > I’m sure that’s true. I usually see them being referred to as seperate issues in public. What you are not capable of noticing is that mainstream media looks for the corporate well being first, it is important to keep the issues separate in the MSM so as to not make very important sponsors upset, and I can say that as I have looked at how media behaves on this subject and I look at what environmentalists actually say. And that takes us also to: > [@Scylla](#): > > That doen’t Make it a strawman. Not excluding something as a solution is different from promoting it. Minimalism is not something I am hearing from the environmental crowd. Once again, this does happens when you do not check at what environmentalists really do say, the MSM usually does get those news wrong. The reality is that we have to educate people on what to do, minimalism is recommended, **but not demanded** , unless you think environmentalists are looking for an iron fist government, (wouldn’t you know? many deniers like Lord Monckton use that lousy accusation too) the point as Lester Brown puts it in his Plan B book is that: > **[pb4book.pdf](https://wayback.archive-it.org/22906/20240418014450/https://www.earth-policy.org/images/uploads/book_files/pb4book.pdf)** > [@](#): > > Beyond these rather painless often healthily beneficial > lifestyle changes, we can also think about sacrifice. During > World War II the military draft asked millions of young men to > risk the ultimate sacrifice. But we do not need to sacrifice lives > as we battle to save civilization. We are called on only to be > politically active and to make lifestyle changes. During the early > part of World War II President Roosevelt frequently asked > Americans to adjust their lifestyles. What contributions can we > make today, in time, money, or reduced consumption, to help > save civilization? > > The choice is ours—yours and mine. We can stay with business > as usual and preside over an economy that continues to > destroy its natural support systems until it destroys itself, or we > can adopt Plan B and be the generation that changes direction, > moving the world onto a path of sustained progress. The choice > will be made by our generation, but it will affect life on earth > for all generations to come. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/9 "2011-11-28T01:55:10Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Nope, it is a term that does show the physical part of the issue. Wait, what? I thought, given your falsification criteria of choice, that it would be _ **completely** _ consistent with your climate-change prediction if the global average temperature gets no warmer – or even cools down a bit – in decades and even centuries yet to come. Possibly I’d misunderstood; what amount of warming are you currently predicting, on what timetable, such that anything less would constitute falsification? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/10 "2011-11-28T02:01:49Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > Wait, what? I thought, given your falsification criteria of choice, that it would be _ **completely** _ consistent with your climate-change prediction if the global average temperature gets no warmer – or even cools down a bit – in decades and even centuries yet to come. > > Possibly I’d misunderstood; what amount of warming are you currently predicting, on what timetable, such that anything less would constitute falsification? :rolleyes: As pointed before this is the physics part of the issue, as pointed out before, you need to falsify the many times already experimentally detected effects of CO2 in the atmosphere, good luck with that. Global warming is happening as even the skeptical BEST survey showed, what climate changes will take place in a world were a doubling or a tripling of CO2 in the atmosphere will take place is harder to predict, but climate researchers are now working to get more specific as climate change will not affect all the regions of the earth in the same way. ---
**Author:** ![Rhythmdvl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/85f322/32.png) [@Rhythmdvl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhythmdvl)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/11 "2011-11-28T02:02:05Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > Ridiculously easy to cat doubt on. There are so many different ways in which this figure could be lawned. Get your cat off my lawned. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/12 "2011-11-28T02:20:49Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > :rolleyes: > > As pointed before this is the physics part of the issue, as pointed out before, you need to falsify the many times already experimentally detected effects of CO2 in the atmosphere, good luck with that. God _ **damn** _ it, man, I was sticking up for you in that other thread because I thought you were making falsifiable predictions. A poster criticized you as tireless and loathsome for the way you advocate “a position that cannot be objectively demonstrated”; I wrote that, no, your position _ **can** _ be, because I thought your newly-moved goalpost involved the possibility of objective and demonstrable falsification. Another poster referred to your “persistent failure to respond to reasonable questions about his position”; I wrote that, no, you’re willing to respond to one given the better part of a month – because I thought you had, by reluctantly but eventually spelling out a falsifiable prediction about temperature. Was I wrong? When you refer to “global warming”, are you in fact only ever talking about stuff like CO2 in the atmosphere without ever actually making a falsifiable prediction about “global” amounts of “warming” in years or decades or centuries yet to come? > [@](#): > > what climate changes will take place in a world were a doubling or a tripling of CO2 in the atmosphere will take place is harder to predict, but climate researchers are now working to get more specific as climate change will not affect all the regions of the earth in the same way. I realize you say it’s “harder to predict”. I realize you say it “will not affect all the regions of the earth in the same way”. But surely, to be meaningful, a prediction about global warming would admit _ **some** _ kind of hypothetical falsification involving, y’know, warming that’s global? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/13 "2011-11-28T02:56:40Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > God _ **damn** _ it, man, I was sticking up for you in that other thread because I thought you were making falsifiable predictions. Then you are an idiot, the items discussed over here were the up to today temperature record and evidence already found, nothing much about predictions and I’m referring to the ones applied to specific regions, one can predict future averages of temperature, but what are the effects of that increase in specific locations of the planet is a tougher nut to crack, the future overall predictions on global temperature you looked for were already dealt with and it was acknowledged that it was unlikely to see them go your way. So pay attention, this is not the thread for that, this is about Climategate 2.0 and the ongoing denialist tripe published out there in places like the Daily Mail and Watts Up With That, this is not the place your year old JAQoffs. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/14 "2011-11-28T03:33:17Z")
Im thinking Gigo is to global warming as JDT was to foreskin. Both may be generally correct, yet… ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/15 "2011-11-28T03:45:28Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > Im thinking Gigo is to global warming as JDT was to foreskin. Both may be generally correct, yet… Feel free then to denounce me, I do know that JDT was banned for his stunts, so you are wishing for the same. It will not work just like your Gish gallops, so you should go back to adoring the foreskin of Frank Luntz. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/16 "2011-11-28T04:03:26Z")
For the ones who can see video, Climate Crocks already showed how this item of changing “global warming” to “climate change” was (and is, as \*\*Scylla \*\*shows by silly osmosis) a Republican talking point made by Frank Luntz than then mutated to be considered by deniers as a devious effort… made by the climate researchers! [![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/mqMunulJU7w/hqdefault.jpg "Global Warming? or Climate Change?") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqMunulJU7w) Well, climate researchers were not behind that change and it remains a silly idea to attempt to change it when both terms were and continue to be used. Scylla is not only wrong, but almost 10 years late to the “we should change the terms used” party. ---
**Author:** ![Rhythmdvl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/85f322/32.png) [@Rhythmdvl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhythmdvl)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/17 "2011-11-28T04:04:49Z")
Bwahahaha… here we go with falsifiability again! Weeeeeeeee! GIGO picks up the slack for those of us who are too [del]lazy[/del] busy to do such thorough refutations of hashed and rehashed faulty logic. I just wrapped up a three-year odyssey of a climate change policy project (no, really, this book makes Odysseus’ journey seem like he stopped off for milk and eggs on the way home) and at the moment the thought of slogging through the basic details of the science–or getting wrapped up in semantics–is about as attractive as a simile with no comparison. The funny thing is (or is it ironic? I can never remember the rules), I spend a lot of time on both sides of the issue. Scylla (and you thought the odyssey reference was happenstance) is right in that a lot of environmentalists and whatnot are ignorant about the subject and are pretty much broken clocks with regards to what side of the ‘issue’ they’re on (though suggesting there are two sides to the issue is akin to saying schools should teach both sides of evolution). So often find myself battle with other authors and collaborators about whether or not global warming/climate change is going to cause Godzilla to rise from the oceans. But aside from all that, the OP was pitting an ugly and blatant attempt to lie about climate researchers in an attempt to malignantly change the course of discussion. Even if you don’t accept anything about the state of the science, the transparent hack job should offend your sensibilities. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/18 "2011-11-28T04:35:07Z")
> [@Rhythmdvl](#): > > The funny thing is (or is it ironic? I can never remember the rules), I spend a lot of time on both sides of the issue. Scylla (and you thought the odyssey reference was happenstance) is right in that a lot of environmentalists and whatnot are ignorant about the subject and are pretty much broken clocks with regards to what side of the ‘issue’ they’re on (though suggesting there are two sides to the issue is akin to saying schools should teach both sides of evolution). So often find myself battle with other authors and collaborators about whether or not global warming/climate change is going to cause Godzilla to rise from the oceans. One clarification here, on previous discussions I also made the notice that indeed there are environmentalists like James Lovelock (of the Gaia hypothesis fame) that talk about real doom and gloom (It will get bad, but it will not be the end of the world as people like Lovelock does by claiming that billions of people will die), but experts environmentalists that are active in this issue also think that guys like Lovelock that are no longer in the loop are loopy. 🙂 Suffice to say, it is on popular media \* that guys like Lovelock are active and it is one of the big reasons why many would think that most environmentalists are like him. - Yes, the same popular media that claimed that most scientists predicted global cooling in the 70s when most scientists actually predicted that warming was coming. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/19 "2011-11-28T04:38:19Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > I’m referring to the ones applied to specific regions, one can predict future averages of temperature, but what are the effects of that increase in specific locations of the planet is a tougher nut to crack I know you think “one can predict future averages of temperature”; I’ve seen you do so, complete with falsifiability criteria. I don’t care whether you think it’s “a tougher nut to crack” for specific locations; either you can make falsifiable predictions about them or you can’t; if you can, they should be taken seriously; if you can’t, they shouldn’t. > [@](#): > > the future overall predictions on global temperature you looked for were already dealt with and it was acknowledged that it was unlikely to see them go your way. Are you referring to _ **your** _ future overall predictions on global temperature? Of course I acknowledge that it’s unlikely to see them get falsified; a lack of temperature increase, and even a temperature decrease, would be perfectly consistent with your “future overall predictions on global temperature”. > [@](#): > > So pay attention, this is not the thread for that, this is about Climategate 2.0 and the ongoing denialist tripe published out there in places like the Daily Mail and Watts Up With That I was referring to Scylla’s argument – made right here in this thread – that your side should _‘give up and retract the term global warming’_ because _‘the real thesis isn’t that the world is getting warmer’_. To the extent that your own “future overall predictions on global temperature” _ **don’t** _ happen to require warming – but are in, fact, consistent even with mild cooling – I agree with Scylla; supply a falsifiable claim that requires warming and I’d disagree with Scylla. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243/20 "2011-11-28T04:44:47Z")
Meh, more nonsensical arguments for argument sake, suffice to say (and this was already told many times before) even expert independent statisticians already looked at the data and told us that it is dishonest to claim that the world is not warming. > **[Statisticians reject global cooling](https://grist.org/article/statisticians-reject-global-cooling/)** > > A terrific story by the AP’s Seth Borenstein, “Statisticians reject global cooling,” not only debunks that myth — it will make your head spin once again on error-riddled Superfreakonomics (coauthored by Levitt). Have you heard that the world is now... Please notice that those independent experts also did it before the skeptical survey made by BEST confirmed that the earth is still warming. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climategate-2-0-are-you-fucking-kidding-me/604243.md?page=2)