How come Fat Gore won't publicly debate global warming

[faceking]

Ever notice how much of the research is only trends over the last couple decades.


In my observations... professors and academics don't get grants and funding to study and report on "business as usual". Doomsday = $$$.

After all, these same folks were raking in the "grant money" studying the "upcoming Ice Age" in the 1970s.

 

[faceking]

Pretty funny Dennis Miller "global warming".

I actually like the final take on "we need to run out of oil, so ingenuity will kick in". Think about it... corporate America will be ready and armed to make a mint off of alternative fuels once (if) we run out of oil... unlike this visual of cars becalmed on American roadways because we've run out of oil.

YouTube - Dennis Miller on Global Warming




P.S. - get over it, that he's appearing on Fox News (at least it's obvious/open what Fox stands for, versus the guise of the major networks [posing as "unbiased" and blantantly liberal])

 

[SpeedoGuy]

In my observations... professors and academics don't get grants and funding to study and report on "business as usual". Doomsday = $$$.

I brought up this very topic to David Karoly, chair of the Oklahoma University meteorology department and a member of IPCC, at a dinner banquet in Norman last April. I directly questioned him about how he responded to claims that climatologists such as himself were scaremongers only interested in reaping research grant money while ignoring scientific integrity. In response, he said that he had sufficient funding for his projects long before Congress and other goverment bodies had come to him seeking information about the magnitude and impacts of climate change.

 

[Calboner]

When I tell strangers I'm a weather forecaster they almost always immediately launch into a littany of complaints about the TV weatherman's inaccuracy (despite the fact that people's memories of past events are highly selective). I rarely ever hear a lay person comment about the improvements that have come in short and medium term weather forecasting despite the fact they've improved remarkably. Human nature is to complain, I guess.

Yeah, but if it is a question of the psychic abilities of some charlatan who conveys messages from the dead, they will only notice the things that he gets right.

It's funny that none of the material that I have read so far about "confirmation bias" takes account of people's apparently peculiar attitude toward weather forecasting!

 

[faceking]

I brought up this very topic to David Karoly, chair of the Oklahoma University meteorology department and a member of IPCC, at a dinner banquet in Norman last April. I directly questioned him about how he responded to claims that climatologists such as himself were scaremongers only interested in reaping research grant money while ignoring scientific integrity. In response, he said that he had sufficient funding for his projects long before Congress and other goverment bodies had come to him seeking information about the magnitude and impacts of climate change.

Would you expect him to say "yes, I help with the hysteria, so I can keep my job."??? Yeah... the single check of $330,000 he got in '04 , much less funding from lord knows where... he's been doing fine...especially since he pumped out a paper entitled "A search for human influences on the thermal structure of the atmosphere".

Some of the IPCC is/was a sham. Reminds me of when the National Academy of Sciences came out with a report on global warming back in '01, holding a who's-who list of scientists on the cover of the report. Funny, as not one of those scientists actually wrote the report -- or even saw it before it was published. That report is still held as one of the penultimate doctrines of artificial global warming (i.e. man-made).

I don't disagree that there is human impact on the atmosphere... question is how slight/impactful is it really? I tend to believe this is beyond hysteria... let's see how the "scientific pendulum" swings in a decade or two (and yes we have time... Manhattan will not be underwater in 40whatever years).

I question the true intention and benefits of some of the leaders (i.e. academics [some of whom were practicing during the "Ice Age" scare, Gore, etc...). Gore reminds me of Jimmy Carter... just a hack who lost and seem bent on leaving some legacy. Thusly, when Carter got the Nobel Prize after the horror of Arafat winning it... I lost all respect for the Prize, ...Gore winning it was a lock. Wish Vegas was giving odds on it. Digressing.

 

[SpeedoGuy]

It's funny that none of the material that I have read so far about "confirmation bias" takes account of people's apparently peculiar attitude toward weather forecasting!

lol, Cal.

That's a predisposition I constantly grapple with. And my response is:

The more people understand about all the facets of weather forecasting, the less likely they are to criticize it.

To wit: I can usually tell the boneheads and dullards by the criticisms they offer up. I mean, there've been times when members of audiences who've attended my briefings literally shouldered their way up to me afterwards to exclaim: "You guys are always wrong. I always plan for the opposite of what meteorologists forecast."

My response:

"Well, then, you're still relying on my information as a forecast." :biggrin1:

 

[JustAsking]

Concerning climate modeling, the last few years of hurricane season prediction have not played out very successfully, even when "corrections" were made mid-season. While projecting hurricane tracks, for existing or spinning-up hurricanes, has gotten very accurate indeed, trying to take "one step out" from that -- predicting storm activity over a period of a few months -- has proven much more difficult to get right.

Given this very public "failure" of short-term climate modeling, perhaps it is not unreasonable to question the accuracy of much longer-term modeling over a much bigger domain with many more variables involved.

...Kev

Actually, I can see why you might think that, but I think if only *sounds* reasonable. It is a classic "appeal to ignorance" argument that has little scientific merit. An analogy might be saying that since we cannot cure the common cold, germ theory is bogus.

There is a world of difference between weather and climate. I am not surprised that hurricane frequency is very difficult to predict, whereas global warming is not difficult. The greenhouse affect from CO2 is a much simpler phenomenon than all the variables that go into predicting hurricane frequency in a given season.

 

[faceking]

There is a world of difference between weather and climate. I am not surprised that hurricane frequency is very difficult to predict, whereas global warming is not difficult. The greenhouse affect from CO2 is a much simpler phenomenon than all the variables that go into predicting hurricane frequency in a given season.

Very well put.

Greenhouse activity/climate (on a larger scale...e.g. decades and centuries) is tied to solar activity... plain and simple. What comprises that at a scientific level is quite complex indeed.

 

[Calboner]

That report is still held as one of the penultimate doctrines of artificial global warming (i.e. man-made).

Dude, you need to look up the word "penultimate." It doesn't mean "important" or anything like that: it means "second to last."

 

[Kevbo]

Actually, I can see why you might think that, but I think if only *sounds* reasonable. It is a classic "appeal to ignorance" argument that has little scientific merit. An analogy might be saying that since we cannot cure the common cold, germ theory is bogus.

There is a world of difference between weather and climate. I am not surprised that hurricane frequency is very difficult to predict, whereas global warming is not difficult. The greenhouse affect from CO2 is a much simpler phenomenon than all the variables that go into predicting hurricane frequency in a given season.

The greenhouse effect is easy enough to state, but the Earth is an enormously complex, self-correcting system for which radiative forcings are but one factor of many to consider. For example, a warmer atmosphere may (by many counts, will) cause more vegetation in regions not currently supporting significant vegetation. Vegetation removes CO2 from the atmosphere. How much increased vegetation will we see? Very difficult to say. How much CO2 will it be able to absorb? Doubly difficult to say. If it removes any substantial amount, it could "rebalance" the system (if, indeed, the system is out of balance) or otherwise affect the "trend" negatively. This is just one factor among dozens if not hundreds.

JA, if you're asserting that climate is easier to model and understand than weather -- easy enough that you seem confident enough in this that you think my previous argument doesn't hold -- then surely an informed and interested person in climate, such as say, Al Gore, should be able to debate it with polite dissenters, yes? He's been talking about it forever. I don't see how he would be, at this point, underqualified scientifically to get in the ring with somebody.

Kev

 

[JustAsking]

...JA, if you're asserting that climate is easier to model and understand than weather -- easy enough that you seem confident enough in this that you think my previous argument doesn't hold -- then surely an informed and interested person in climate, such as say, Al Gore, should be able to debate it with polite dissenters, yes? He's been talking about it forever. I don't see how he would be, at this point, underqualified scientifically to get in the ring with somebody.

Kev

Kev,
Al Gore is playing the role of scientific journalist and bringing the findings of the worldwide community of climatologists to the attention of the public. Al Gore did not invent the science that supports the AGW concern, and neither did he contribute to it in any way. Al Gore is a self-appointed messenger, but he did not originate the message himself.

Al Gore is doing what he has done for his entire career, which is to attempt to affect public policy based on the implications of science and technology. An example of previous work by Al Gore when he was a Senator is The High Performance Computing and Communications Act of 1991, where he took the initiative to advocate and popularize the idea that a public worldwide network of computers would be a boon to all areas of life. He created the bill and wrote articles in the popular press and spoke to congress to raise people's awareness of the implications of the technology and the value of funding it.

Later on, he lectured and spoke often about the value of an "Information Super Highway" when he was VP. His early advocacy led directly to the funding of the technologies that went into the present day Internet. And his later advocacy led to the public awareness and eventual public adoption of the Internet.

At the time, it might have been appropriate to debate Al Gore on his recommendations for funding high speed computer networks, but it would have been ridiculous to suggest that anyone should debate Al Gore on network design theory itself. Would you suggest that we should have debated Al Gore on the merits of Token Ring networks vs Ethernet networks, or the merits of the TCP/IP stack?

Al Gore was following in the footsteps of his father who, as a Senator, was instrumental in convincing congress to fund the development of a National Highway System in the 1950s. I wonder if at the time, people were calling for a debate with Al Gore Sr. over whether asphalt was better than cement for a highway? I don't think so.

Al Gore's role, then and now, is to advocate for changing public policy based on the findings of the technical or the scientific community. Al Gore did not invent the technology of networks nor did he invent the science of AGW.

Debating Al Gore on the science of AGW makes as much sense as debating any other journalist who reports on the the findings of the scientific community.

 

[Kevbo]

Kev,
Al Gore is playing the role of scientific journalist and bringing the findings of the worldwide community of climatologists to the attention of the public. Al Gore did not invent the science that supports the AGW concern, and neither did he contribute to it in any way. Al Gore is a self-appointed messenger, but he did not originate the message himself.

Al Gore is doing what he has done for his entire career, which is to attempt to affect public policy based on the implications of science and technology. An example of previous work by Al Gore when he was a Senator is The High Performance Computing and Communications Act of 1991, where he took the initiative to advocate and popularize the idea that a public worldwide network of computers would be a boon to all areas of life. He created the bill and wrote articles in the popular press and spoke to congress to raise people's awareness of the implications of the technology and the value of funding it.

Later on, he lectured and spoke often about the value of an "Information Super Highway" when he was VP. His early advocacy led directly to the funding of the technologies that went into the present day Internet. And his later advocacy led to the public awareness and eventual public adoption of the Internet.

At the time, it might have been appropriate to debate Al Gore on his recommendations for funding high speed computer networks, but it would have been ridiculous to suggest that anyone should debate Al Gore on network design theory itself. Would you suggest that we should have debated Al Gore on the merits of Token Ring networks vs Ethernet networks, or the merits of the TCP/IP stack?

Al Gore was following in the footsteps of his father who, as a Senator, was instrumental in convincing congress to fund the development of a National Highway System in the 1950s. I wonder if at the time, people were calling for a debate with Al Gore Sr. over whether asphalt was better than cement for a highway? I don't think so.

Al Gore's role, then and now, is to advocate for changing public policy based on the findings of the technical or the scientific community. Al Gore did not invent the technology of networks nor did he invent the science of AGW.

Debating Al Gore on the science of AGW makes as much sense as debating any other journalist who reports on the the findings of the scientific community.

Disagree with your characterization of Gore. He's not a "reporter". He's an evangelist. If he was a reporter he would've gotten his facts a bit straighter, for instance noting that there is a much better explanation for Mt. Kilimanjaro's ice loss than the global warming that he alludes to. He would've also presented common objections to global warming assertions, rather than snootily deriding them as he does with the "Little Ice Age" comment while showing the hockey-stick graph.

One major reason that Gore's feet should be held to the fire, and he should be there to respond, is that much of "An Inconvenient Truth"'s argument is anecdotal and damn selective. First example: he shows before/after pictures of glaciers and how they aren't there anymore. Implication: they melted due to global warming. Alternate explanation: they moved. Note the dates on his photos. Glaciers do move. Not quickly (hence the term "glacially"), but they do move. A much better graphic would be to show the trail of the glaciers as they've moved, and give estimated mass loss over the years. If the mass loss is above the expected value due to land deposition and historical rates of melting, then he might have a point. But as "stated" in "A.I.T.", his arguing technique stinks.

Second example: Antarctic ice shelf. He spends a fair amount of time in "A.I.T." deploring the loss of one side of the Antarctic ice shelf. It looks like a slam-dunk for his argument of global warming. But he doesn't mention at all that ice has been added to the other side of the Antarctic. A reporter would've made a fairer exposition of these facts.

I want to add something here, FWIW: I'm not a Republican or oil-company supporter, and I actually voted for Clinton/Gore in 1992. I do, however, work in the sciences, and I know the basic approaches one should take when making inductive and deductive scientific arguments. "A.I.T." does not pass the sniff test for me.

Kevin

 

[JustAsking]

Kev,
So let me get this straight. The glaciers are not melting at an alarming rate?

 

[SpeedoGuy]

Kev,
So let me get this straight. The glaciers are not melting at an alarming rate?

Worldwide Glacier Melting - United Nations Environment Programme

 

[faceking]

Kev,
So let me get this straight. The glaciers are not melting at an alarming rate?

No... they've melted faster before....

 

[faceking]

Worldwide Glacier Melting - United Nations Environment Programme

Terrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrible journalism: "Their average annual ice loss since the year 2000 was about 0.6 metre w.e., which is 1.6 times more than the average of the 1990s and three times the loss rate of the 1980s."

Yes, let's look at the last 3 decades, vs the last 300 years vs the last 3,000.

 

[dreamer20]

Kev,
Al Gore is playing the role of scientific journalist and bringing the findings of the worldwide community of climatologists to the attention of the public. Al Gore did not invent the science that supports the AGW concern, and neither did he contribute to it in any way. Al Gore is a self-appointed messenger, but he did not originate the message himself.

Debating Al Gore on the science of AGW makes as much sense as debating any other journalist who reports on the the findings of the scientific community.

Disagree with your characterization of Gore. He's not a "reporter". He's an evangelist. If he was a reporter he would've gotten his facts a bit straighter...

Kevin

As JA stated, the AIT film information, including any errant bits, was part and parcel of the message that "journalist" Gore gave to the public. Gore was neither the source of the info nor a scientist Kevbo. Reporters should verify their data, but they don't always do.

 

[SpeedoGuy]

Terrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrible journalism: "Their average annual ice loss since the year 2000 was about 0.6 metre w.e., which is 1.6 times more than the average of the 1990s and three times the loss rate of the 1980s."

What's journalism got to do with those figures? Are you going to dispute them?

Yes, let's look at the last 3 decades, vs the last 300 years vs the last 3,000.

Climate change happened in the past so humans can't have any effect on climate now.

 

[faceking]

As JA stated, the AIT film information, including any errant bits, was part and parcel of the message that "journalist" Gore gave to the public. Gore was neither the source of the info nor a scientist Kevbo. Reporters should verify their data, but they don't always do.

Yeah, but to get the accolades and fawning, when he isn't willing to be contested is a travesty.

The argument, of "well, at least he brought awareness"... bringing awareness to what amounts to a hangnail on the Earth's 3rd toe, and calling for cataclysm within 40 years, much less 400,... in turn costing businesses millions and millions, much less the practice of accepting what is very little known is a scary behavior for the species to take on. Talk about sheeple.

 

[faceking]

What's journalism got to do with those figures? Are you going to dispute them?



Climate change happened in the past so humans can't have any effect on climate now.

Humans have little impact, that has been proven... you just don't hear from that side of science.