My, my, now this is a bit of a surprise. Not a big one but a surprise nonetheless: A major group within the American Physical Society acknowledges substantial doubts about a global warming crisis, counter to the society’s earlier opinion that the science was all but irrefutable.
I pretty much saw this coming, I just expected it to take a bit longer. I’m quite sure there are plenty of people who will pooh-pooh this by declaring that physicists don’t have a right to any opinion on the matter either. After all, only scientists who draw their income from grants to study global warming are qualified to say whether we should be spending money to research and combat global warming. Anyone who does not get government grants to study the problem clearly does not understand the problem.
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Here’s another instance where an AGW scientist comes in from the cold.
Contrary to Asimov’s Foundation Trilogy, scientists suck at politics – which is as it should be IMO.
Global warming — the political issue, the public policy debate, the fund-raising mechanism — is total bullsh%t.
I love the environment, love the outdoors, don’t like big corporations (sorry), but I don’t even listen to these enviro activists and political lapdogs like Al Gore anymore.
Their chicken-little scaremongering has ruined their credibility in my eyes.
They absolutely do not want to help the "earth" or save it. They want to change political policy and the culture, and they are using the "earth" as a bludgeon to accomplish that end.
They are doing exactly what others on the left have accused President Bush of doing with respect to Iraq — exaggerating the risk of Saddam’s destructive capabilities and minimizing the costs of corrective action.
It is the same 2-step, we see over and over and over and over.
The earth is fine. Don’t sweat it. Do some push-ups, walk a few more blocks, rather than drive, and don’t litter. We’ll be ok.
Hankie B
Well put.
Note this update:
After publication of this story, the APS responded with a statement that its Physics and Society Forum is merely one unit within the APS, and its views do not reflect those of the Society at large.Â
The author of the paper in DailyTech, Lord Monckton, is a long time global warming skeptic. I believe it is good that these issues are being discussed in scientific forums. I think it is bad that we are getting these kinds of misleading press stories published. The lead sentenance is
The American Physical Society, an organization representing nearly 50,000 physicists, has reversed its stance on climate change and is now proclaiming that many of its members disbelieve in human-induced global warming.
At the very bottom of story is the update which basically says the lead sentance is totally incorrect.
I already acknowledged that up front, Mike, which is why I said it’s a major group within the society. The update, of course, is right on the money.
And, given that the AGW enthusiasts want us to spend, literally, trillions of dollars to combat this problem, at the expense of other things like clean water and malaria for the world’s poorest people, and demand massive shifts to our entire lifestyle, it strikes me as more than appropriate that this stuff be aired in public, in the political arena. Especially since so many of the scientists demanding these massive changes are almost entirely dependent economically on continued non-questioning of the value of their research and their massive public policy recommendations.
The update to the story should clear up any confusion. But now we know: the "overwhelming consensus of the scientific community" isn’t, and there is substantial reason for critics to have their doubts and to be heard. It is utterly vital that the general public know this. And it lowers the credibility significantly of any source which tries to claim that any so-called "deniers" are merely conspiracy theorists and pseudo-scientists.
Two weeks ago I filed a FOIA request with NASA for some of the Software Assurance documents on Hansen’s work. NASA hasn’t been able to find them.
That looks really sloppy. The code looks really sloppy. The procedures around the code look … even worse.
I’ll post more when I’ve got more information.
It does seem that most of the supporting evidence for global warming isn’t public at all. Hansen and others have been hiding their formulas and documentation and resist all efforts to shine light on the subject.
chad’s last blog post..Witch Hunt Against Scientists
Invalidating the consensus!
HB
 http://www.petitionproject.org/
The smoke of "scientific consensus" dissipates.
Last year one of the professors in my physics dept. was outraged that this letter (petition) came to our department. Interestingly enough, the petition was not circulated through the faculty.
This blog got me wondering if any of our profs were among the 31,000 signatures.Â
So, I e-mailed a couple of PhDs in the Chemistry Dept.Â
Not surprisingly, neither of them knew that Sietz’s letter of AGW conservancy existed.
Purposeful deception or not? Â
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