The anthropogenic climate change theory is widely supported among the scientific establishment. The consensus is so strong, in fact, that it encompasses every creditable scientific body on the planet including (but not limited to): [ul]
[li] The European Academy of Sciences and Arts[/li][li] The International Council of Academies of Engineering and Technological Sciences[/li][li] The National Academy of Sciences[/li][li] The Royal Society of the United Kingdom[/li][li] The National Research Council[/li][li] The American Physical Society[/li][li] The American Geophysical Union [/ul][/li]
The list goes on, almost indefinitely.
It seems to me that relatively little attention is being paid by AGW advocates to the unstated corollary to the skeptics arguments. If AGW, being supported by 98% of climate scientists and enough peer reviewed studies to fill a library, is indeed false, then the only conclusion is that the scientific establishment is engaged in a co-ordinated conspiracy so enormous it would make any 9/11 Truth conspiracy seem like a street-corner 3 card monte con job in comparison. My questions are simply these: How is this hoax being maintained? Why was this conspiracy ever enacted in the first place? And why, if Climate Scientists are so dishonourable, have none ever stepped forward with conclusive proof that AGW is a hoax in order to cash in?
It seems to me that if climate skeptics can’t justify their conspiracy theory, their objections lose any weight they may have, and that intellectual honesty demands they side with the balance of evidence as the scientific community have done.
You do realize that there doesn’t have to be a conspiracy or any of that other whacky stuff for some small percentage of scientists to be skeptical (even leaving aside those who are in the pay of someone who WANTS to find AGW to be wrong, or just pick at it and muddy the waters)…right? Newtonian physics was the established and overwhelming theory for physics for centuries with a huge entrenched following in near lock step. It was STILL overturned, eventually, by that wild haired guy who’s name escapes me…you know, the one with the pipe who looked like the prototypical absent minded professor. I just can’t think of his name, but then I’m no Einstein…
Personally, I think the THEORY is sound based on how widely accepted it is. But it’s still a pretty new theory, and having people look at it skeptically and try and pick it apart or find flaws or problems is not a bad thing…in fact, it’s what you WANT. That’s, you know, how science works. Even the politically oriented skeptics have their place…look what they did for Evolutionary Theory.
Newtonian physics works just fine for virtually every engineering application, so to say it was overturned by Einstein is a bit of a stretch.
What we see in the global warming denial isn’t earnest scientific scrutiny. It’s a tiny minority of scientists sincerely questioning the theory drowned out by a chorus of nimrods shouting “It’s a HOAX! CLIMATEGATE!”
Einstein didn’t overturn Newtonian physics, he improved upon it. What the AGW skeptics are suggesting is that either (a) the earth is not warming, or (b) the earth is warming, but that carbon emissions have nothing to do with it. In either case they are arguing directly counter to the strong prevailing currents of established, peer-reviewed evidence. I find it difficult to understand how they could hold such a position without considering the bulk of evidence supporting AGW to be not just wrong, but fraudulent.
Besides, even assuming for the sake of argument that I’m posing a false dichotomy, all one need do is type the words “Global Warming Hoax” into Google to see that there are a great many people who do believe that there’s a conspiracy afoot. I think these people should be called upon to provide evidence for its existence, its inner workings, and the motivations of those allegedly involved.
I agree. However, the weight of evidence supporting evolutionary theory is so strong that any theory which supplanted it would necessarily be very similar to it. I feel that AGW is supported by enough evidence that would be a conceptual challenge for a skeptic to dismiss it out of hand without recourse to conspiracy theories. This is because virtually all the accepted available evidence points in pretty much the same direction. The latitude for honest disagreement doesn’t seem to be that wide. As with evolution, any evidence based opposition to AGW should lead dissenters to adopt theories which are, for the main, similar to it. That so many people reject AGW out of hand indicates that they think all the evidence in favour of it is suspect. Hence their vague intimations toward some kind of conspiracy within the scientific community. I think they should be prepared to answer questions on how this so-called conspiracy works.
I’m a skeptic about everything, including the heliocentric model, and the round Earth theory. But on the whole rather more skeptic about the theory of anthropogenic climate change than those other two theories.
Einstein used actual science to answer questions Classical Physics couldn’t answer. I would not compare that process to what we are seeing from the vast majority of climate skeptics. They are engaging in political maneuvering, not science.
I think a better area to focus on where “controversy” is good is on policies we take to address ACC. There is a legit debate about how good the models are at predicting the future, and what policies we should enact going forward.
The bulk of evidence is that the global temperature has failed to go up year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year; that doesn’t yet suffice to prove AGW wrong, but (a) every year that likewise goes by without a rise brings falsification closer, though (b) that in no way means the folks supporting AGW are doing anything wrong or fraudulent; they’re the first to point out that year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year went by without said rise in temperature, and that more such years would disprove it.
Wow, I had been thinking about posting this exact same OP for 2-3 days now. That’s kind of weird.
Anyway, to the OP’s list I would add NASA, NOAA, the Department of Defense and a bunch of Agriculture societies. Do sceptics think that Army scientists and engineers are in on the conspiracy? Or are they inept?
Let me try this approach. Can we agree that there is no single “temperature” of the earth? If you just examine the atmosphere and the water and ignore the crust, there is great variation in temperature throughout all the water and all the air around the planet. I don’t think anyone could disagree with that. So to come up with an average global temperature, the accuracy is limited to the number of measurements you can take. Obviously we don’t have thermometers located throughout all the air and water of the planet. So it is possible that for whatever reason, an odd year might pop up that is colder or warmer than the trendlines would suggest just because more heat happened to flow to places where you have sensors and away from those where you don’t, or vice versa. But looking at the trends of the measurements that we do have, the evidence is undeniable. NASA says
Can you find an outlier that supposedly refutes the long-term data? Sure. But that’s just due to the limitations of the data. But to look at the data we do have and see that the 10 warmest years on record have occurred in the past 12 years and conclude anything but the planet is indeed warming is stupid to the stupid power.
But that’s, like, the exact opposite of what you just now copy-and-pasted me saying: I’m saying that fourteen years without warming doesn’t supposedly refute the long-term data. I’m saying that – to guard against such an “outlier” possibility – the year-after-year-after-year-after-et-cetera thing isn’t yet enough to count as long-term data.
I’m saying we’d need yet more years to play out like the last fourteen years just did before the long-term data is supposedly refuted.
But I agree that fourteen years without warming isn’t yet enough to reach the opposite conclusion; you should know that, as you just quoted me agreeing that it’s not yet enough to reach the opposite conclusion. I’m not entirely sure why you’re replying to me in general, or so harshly in particular; am I disagreeing with any of the above?
Of course – with the caveat that, as you promptly go on to cite NASA talking in broad terms about the “warmest years,” it’s the least bad way to describe (a) what’s being predicted and thus (b) what may or may not come to pass. When you say you believe “global warming” is on the way, you mean – what, exactly? Would you describe it in terms that fit your “no single ‘temperature’ of the earth” phrasing, or would you express it rather differently?
It does not take a huge conspiracy. Science is advanced through peer reviewed academic articles at prestigious journals. If you are a referee at a prestigious journal you just have to publish all the pro global warming articles and refuse to publish anti-global warming articles. Scientists who are anti global warning lose support and maybe even jobs because their papers are not being published while those whose articles you have published have their careers advanced. Thus you have built a consensus, which is self reinforcing. After a few years all of the peer reviewed evidence supports your position and scientific societies, having assumed your good faith, support your position because it is the only one with evidence behind it. These scientists don’t have the ability to replicate the research in the articles they just have to assume what is published is better than what is not.
As to why this would happen reputation and money. Scientists are generally smart people with large egos. They spend years trying to prove one of their ideas correct. If they are right they are saving the planet and are heros. Thus they would not look kindly upon people who are saying don’t listen to that guy, he is wrong and has been wasting his time studying a problem that does not exist.
Secondly money, most academics are not as well compensated monetarily as those in the private sector with similar intelligence. If global warming is happening, then for many the implication is that huge amounts of money need to be spent trying to understand the problem and reverse it. Climate scientists are going to be the recipients of much of that money. This gives them incentive to play up global warming evidence and downplay evidence that does not support global warming. This does not take a conspiracy just people responding to incentives.
Whenever there are opposing paradigms in science, supporters of the dominant paradigm have always tried to discredit the opposing paradigm using whatever means they have. Usually the dominant paradigm is correct but when it is not correct the people who believe in it have always gone down fighting. So while the existence of a dominant paradigm is strong evidence strongly support that is the correct one. It should not be dispositive.
This is demonstrably false. There is even more money in denialism. If they were so interested in being well-compensated and truthy at the same time, more of them would simply move their research to the private arena paid for by “skeptics”, where they could engage in “honest” research and get well-paid at the same time.
Basically the question is whether the proper forum for a Global warming thread is General Questions or Great Debates.
Science threads generally wind up in GQ because science deals with facts and right or wrong answers. Even when the science is controversial such as super string theory, it is still discussed in a fact based environment. Even if disagreement all sides goals are the same, namely to come up with the right answer.
Politics on the other hand is clearly a GD topic. A question such as “Was the Iraq war a good idea”, or “what should the capital gains tax rate be” are not purely fact based but relies instead on interpretations of data.
Global warming should be a GQ question, but since it has political ramifications, it is treated by politicians and commentators like they treat most other political things they come across in their business as a subject that is open for debate.
Another property of GD type questions is that the answer to an individual question being right or wrong is less important than how it fits into a larger narrative. For example if ones primary worry is about whether Iran has nuclear weapons, one might be in favor of invading Iran. The argument in favor of invading Iran would be supported if it was the case that the Iraq war was a good idea. Therefor in order to serve the greater good it is necessary that the answer be that Iraq was a good idea, and any arguments or facts supporting that should be used, while any arguments or facts against it should be rejected for the greater good. So if one believes that the economic ramifications of curbing CO2 emissions would be catastrophic, then they might believe it is in everyone’s best interest that the answer comes back that global warming doesn’t exist. Whether this is actually true is of lesser importance, so long as it reaches the “correct” conclusion.
Your theory makes very little sense. You’re claiming that the reason no climate change deniers get published is because climate change is the consensus and that the reason climate change is the consensus is because climate change deniers can’t get published.
So back before there was any consensus on the issue, who made the decision that climate change would be the future consensus and that from now on only articles that supported that view would get published? And how did they get the word out to all the scientific journals that they were only supposed to accept articles that supported that side?
And you claim that egotistic scientists get big rewards for proving some new idea is right. Now that climate change is the consensus, wouldn’t that be an incentive for egotistic scientists to prove climate change is wrong?
As for money, I can see where there are businesses that put waste chemicals in the air and have a vested interest in saying there is no climate change. But who exactly is paying people to claim there is climate change? Who makes money from it? Nobody makes a profit out of not polluting.
If it’s just a racket, why wouldn’t the scientists use a real problem and ask for money to work on that? That way they wouldn’t have to worry about anyone exposing their lie.
There’s this weird belief that a lot of people have that scientists just want to be proven right, so they only look for confirming evidence of their own work. But quite the opposite is true - finding something that runs against accepted wisdom is how the big discoveries are made. Scientists like to be wrong, like it when something doesn’t go according to the prediction, because that means there’s something new to discover and learn. The idea that scientists just go with the flow and fail to examine counter-evidence to theories or models is completely backwards.
