MNb wrote on 02/15/10 at 08:59:16:

Yep it was a very interesting read.

I disagree about Gore though. The problem is not the way he handled it (though he exaggerated quite a bit), as most of his claims were backed by science. The real problem is imo how the science was "made". In particular the way the IPCC worked in the last edition opened itself up to attacks even the Sun could make stick.
The way I see it there are three major problems with AGW which need to be adressed:
-I described this in earlier posts, the main problem is that the model is made to fit the data. When I suspect a causal correlation in historic records, I can make a model that can even make predictions which are quite decent. That's a problem with all these kinds of sciences and I think for now we have to live with that. Economists prior to 2006 also didnt predict the current situation (bar some of course, but they were usually conveniently ignored or had politically allied themselves with fringe groups making them unreliable per definition).
-The main flaw imo is that CO2 is taken as the main driver, without any other backing then that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. This leaves very little room for alternative explanations and even leads to ignoring other views and data. That is because CO2 is currently very high and that thus temperature must be rising. Anything contradicting either is marginalised. Eg There were eras when temperature was similar, but CO2 was hugely lower.
-The strong conclusions in the papers about AGW (also by the sceptic side). Iso of pointing to the (potential) problems the conclusions are as strongly worded as academics allow. This is a problem for two reasons:
  -Conclusions get attacked, but when they are so strongly worded, the attack tends to be viewed as personal (rightfully or not), leading to this kind of mess.
  -It gives the outside world a wrong view of the certainty of the conclusions. This tends to backfire when the research itself is under fire.

In short the whole AGW debate has been hijacked by BDG-fanatics (my apologies for the comparison) and some of the reactions here illustrate this quite well.

Willempie wrote on 02/11/10 at 19:07:21:


Jerome Ravetz nicely explains why I did not care to watch the Al Gore movie. Imo Gore did the climate case more harm than good from a political point of view.

The Hand wrote on 02/15/10 at 03:56:10:


Classic.  Get three sister newspapers to report the same story, and then say that's proof of something.  Unfortunately, the Times article admits that their own accusation "has not been peer reviewed" and does not take into account other data collected that points to Global Warming. 

With friends like these....

Now, who was going to apologise to whom?

As you said, I shouldn't hold my breath.

Taljechin set up a really one-sided poll and even at this thread, 5/9 voters suggested that global warming is a real threat.  I voted in the poll merely to see what the numbers were.  Probably the most telling statistic in the poll wasn't the skew, but the turn-out.  9 votes!

belaji wrote on 01/28/10 at 15:00:29:


belaji wrote on 01/30/10 at 13:54:02:


Oh dear....well why didn't you point out these articles before? Now the scales have fallen from my eyes. It is all so clear now.  We must get these articles to the IPCC and all the worlds's leading scientists at once! 

And again we see the phenomenon that people, being to lazy to read all options, just click the one on top : ))


PS
SF, you might want to add a poll to the elusive boson thread too ; )

Nature: carbon cycle feedback is 80% weaker than advertised

http://motls.blogspot.com/2010/01/nature-carbon-cycle-feedback-is-80.html

At least now you're linking to a climate-science blog by someone who (unlike the "wattsupwiththat" guy) appears to have a college degree -- in women's studies.