Ooh Missus! Rap science - more swearing on Nick’s blog!

Before you all get shocked by the robust rap language in the video that this post is about (the second one below), you ought to first watch the LHC rap to get broken in gently to the sight of real scientists speaking out. In 2008, Kate McAlpine (A.K.A Alpinekat) released the Large Hadron Rap about the LHC at Cern, Switzerland. She is a science communicator (click for her website). Her rap music inspired video went viral and has had at least 6 million views so far.

Large Hadron Rap

 

Real climate scientists are a bit sick of the numbers of people in the media who talk disparagingly about climate science as if their views were worth anything (mostly, they’re not…). This video is a fun but serious rap by real working climate scientists from Australia. Here’s a link to an article about the making of the rap video

Be warned, the following video contains the “M-F bomb” - words that are often found in rap music - but get past that (or, if you’re too delicate, I’ve included the “clean” version afterwards – which seems a bit silly by comparison) and this is a shrewd comment on the huge numbers of people expressing opinions about subjects they don’t know enough about – such as those who pick up a few deceptive ideas from climate change denialist propaganda and think their “new understanding” gives their fond beliefs the edge over peer reviewed science. This is the Dunning-Kruger effect writ large. This particular manifestation of human stupidity just might be the death of many of us and untold future generations before the climate settles down again. Alarmism (I hear the deniers cry)? Why not? The potential of climate change is actually terrifying and it should scare people. Remember those multiple AGU (American Geophysical Union) delegates who have already made survival retreat plans? If you read that and don’t get alarmed, you’ve got more than one screw loose… Click for link to post.

The problem is the Dunning-Krugers then go on with such confidence in their own judgement that they pontificate about their ridiculously (and dangerously) warped understanding as if they had discovered some smoking gun holes in the science that the whole of science had somehow missed and this implausible idea seems to be unfortunately received rather well by too many people. No doubt some would like the smartest scientists to fall flat on their faces but, realistically, that’s not going to happen.

It’s all rather like those early stage X-Factor contestants who tell Simon Cowell that he’s a fool not to recognise their fantastic talent. This widespread misplaced confidence (A.K.A. unjustified arrogance) seems to be a bit of an epidemic these days. Unfortunately, most of these people can vote which is why the deceitful forces of denialism are trying so hard to spread their disinformation.

Favourite lines?

“Droppin’ facts all over this wax, while bitches are crying ‘bout a carbon tax”

“Denialists deny this in your dreams, coz climate change means greater extremes”

I'm a Climate Scientist (HUNGRY BEAST)

 

I'm A Climate Scientist - Extended Version - (CLEAN)

 

Why is this volcano good for the planet?

With the Icelandic volcano still making the news, no doubt we might hear people regurgitating the old denier lie that one volcano puts out far more CO2 than the whole of humanity does. Here's a very simple, yet striking, graphic that puts the situation into perspective.

This effect of this volcano on international aviation means it’s currently being carbon negative!

Graphic courtesy of informationisbeautiful.net

Rational scientist vs shouting moron Morano

This Youtube video clip of Professor Andrew Watson versus arch US motor-mouth denier Marc Morano, on a December 4, 2009 live broadcast of BBC’s Newsnight program, is worth watching for the last few seconds when the rational academic gets irritated. Do not for one second think that what Morano says is of any value whatsoever, although it must be said that the explanations offered by the academic aren't that great at clearing things up for the general audience. People familiar with the material, of course, can see the denier getting demolished. No-one ever said that great scientists were always great communicators...

Another boring economics/climate change rant

One of the denialist movement's widespread tactics these days is to claim that it would cost too much economically to do anything to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Subtle sceptic/deniers like Bjorn Lomborg say that it would make more sense economically to instead spend the money (that it would cost to mitigate emissions) on adapting to any changes that may happen.

They claim to believe that the results of any man-made climate change will be much less than the overwhelming majority scientific opinion predicts (even though both sides may be being over optimistic!). Real world measurements coming in show global warming speeding up, harder and faster than expected previously.

This subtle denier/inactivist "Lomborg" position does not admit in public that they are inviting us to effectively gamble with everybody’s future because they are so convinced that they are right, despite their beliefs being very far away from the best scientific opinion in the world. They may believe their position sincerely, or they may hold it because they believe that the industries and political ideologies that sponsor them are more important than our future.

Actually, the sceptic/denier position on the economic problems with greenhouse gas reductions is complete garbage. True, it will cost a lot to do but the costs of not doing it will be vastly larger.

Deniers/sceptics will never tell you that because they don’t want to believe it. Not believing it themselves makes them sound more convincing when they mislead people.

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What follows is a recent New York Times article which scuppers this denialist position and indeed predicts that the changeover to a green energy system will have positive economic benefits – about as far apart from the “convenient” economic doom and gloom consequences spread by deniers. It’s not “just” the assertions of greenies or scientists either, it’s the cream of academic economists’ thought.

Click for here for original article (you might need to register to read it)

A New York University School of Law survey found near unanimity among 144 top economists that global warming threatens the United States economy and that a cap-and-trade system of carbon regulation will spur energy efficiency and innovation.

“Outside academia the level of consensus among economists is unfortunately not common knowledge,” Richard Revesz, dean of the law school, said during a press conference on Wednesday. “The results are conclusive – there is broad agreement that reducing emissions is likely to have significant economic benefits.”

The law school’s Institute for Policy Integrity sent surveys to 289 economists who had published at least one article on climate change in a top-rated economics journal in the past 15 years. Half of those economists responded anonymously to a dozen questions that solicited their opinions on a range of issues, from the impact of climate change on particular industries to how the benefits of reduced greenhouse-gas emissions should be calculated.

The survey found that 84 percent of the economists agreed that climate change “presents a clear danger” to the United States and global economies – hitting agriculture the hardest – even though the severity of global warming remains unknown.

Only 5.6 percent disagreed with that statement, while 7.6 percent were neutral and 2.8 percent had no opinion.

Not surprisingly, the economists favored a market-based approach to limiting carbon emissions, with 80.6 percent supporting the auctioning of emissions allowances, while 9 percent believed the government should give them away.

Climate change legislation before Congress would initially distribute some free allowances to industry while increasing the number of auctioned permits over time. “Some of the answers we get were fairly consistent with what we expected, to the extent that they are consistent with general economic theory, which is likely to favor an auctioning system,” said J. Scott Holladay, an economics fellow at the institute and an author of the report.

Nearly all the economists – 94.3 percent – said the United States should agree to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions through an international climate treaty. Fifty-seven percent said the country should make such a commitment even without an agreement.

Seventy-three percent of the respondents agreed that the uncertainty surrounding the severity of climate change raises the economic value of implementing measures to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. Such measures would increase energy efficiency and promote innovation, according to 97 percent of the economists.

There was far less consensus on how to calculate the economic damage from each ton of carbon emitted, which the survey called the “social cost” of carbon dioxide. The economists’ estimates generally ranged from $20 to $100 a ton, though one calculated the cost at $10,000 and another at $10 million.

According to the report, some economists who responded to the survey felt it was it too focused on the United States, while others objected to the nature of the questions.

“Several respondents argued that the questions were too simple to accurately capture the complexity of climate change or that specific questions could not be answered,” wrote the report’s authors.

Crock of the week – CO2 lags behind temperature

Finally, Peter Sinclair nails probably the most deceptive and cynical piece of deliberately misleading BS that the professional denier/inactivist/sceptics use to fool the gullible.

It’s the argument based on the Vostok ice core records that clearly show that (in most cases) when the climate changed naturally, in the past, first the temperature started rising then, about 800 years later, the atmospheric CO2 levels went up.

The deniers ruthlessly use this cherry-picked piece of evidence along these lines – they claim that as CO2 always lagged temperature rise in the past, then the observed increase in CO2 we are seeing since the start of the industrial revolution must have been caused by a natural temperature change cycle that started before that and that the global warming we are measuring (that even the deniers no longer deny is happening) is just a continuation of this natural cycle. S. Fred Singer is probably the worst denier in this regard because he publishes books about it and other denier classic canards.

This “CO2 lags temperature” argument was ruthlessly misrepresented in “The Great Global Warming Swindle” by carefully deceptive editing – the scientist who was exploited by the producer has completely disavowed what the programme made him appear to say!

By the way, if you want to see a high quality version of this video, double click on the video and you will be taken to YouTube – click on the HQ button (bottom of the video, right hand side)

The global warming debate and propaganda

This video points out the sources of some of the misleading claims of the sceptics/deniers. It shows how often the process of "Chinese whispers" and simple, but uncorrected, mistakes has created mountains of deceptive misinformation out of molehills of "misunderstood" (I'm being kind here) information. This 18 minute video isn't as punchy as the "crock of the week" videos, but does contain a lot more analysis.

0. The Global Warming Debate - Introduction

View more presentations or Upload your own.

Crock of the week video – batten down the hatches!

 This video by Peter Sinclair counters a few misleading claims by the deniers/inactivists about rising seas and ice shelves. Ironically, some deniers are quoting figures from the latest AR4 IPCC report (Assessment  Report 4) to attack claims that sea level rise will probably be a big threat. As is often the case, it’s what the deniers don’t mention in their rhetoric that sharply illustrates their very shaky grasp on what is fair comment and genuine scepticism, as opposed to the black propaganda they so often seem to end up spouting. Are they stupid? Are they subtly greedier than Wall Street bankers? Are they evil? You decide…

Yet another in the "Crock of the Week" series

The "crock" video embedded below is about the "Oregon petition" which was supposedly signed by 32,000 “leading scientists”. It goes into some detail about the background of the initiators of the petition and their dubious values. It also touches upon the past links that some major deniers have to the tobacco industry’s previous long term denial (and deliberate deception about) the risks of smoking. It does not, however, mention probably the most misleading aspect of the petition, the whole text of which follows.

“We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December, [sic] 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind. There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.”

Firstly, even the re-circulated (in 2007) petition still uses this text which is clearly severely out of date. Secondly, the major deceit comes in the misrepresentation of what can be called scientific philosophy in order to fool the public. When they use the term "convincing scientific evidence" in this way it should be taken to mean there is no final and certain proof that man made emissions will definitely cause catastrophic heating and disruption of the climate. This is true!! What deceitful denialist propaganda like this fails to tell the suckers is that only by "running the experiment", and seeing what actually happens, can there be final proof of the theories. By the time the theories are scientifically proved, if we are then undergoing catastrophic disruption, it will be a bit late to do anything about it.

Another crock that the author is probably working on is the "it's just a fallible computer model" canard. Senator Ferguson loves this one. I'll get around to commenting on that in due course but the basic riposte to this argument is this: seeing as we do not have perfect knowledge of how climate systems alter with varying inputs, nor could we without hundreds of years, possibly thousands, of actual experimental science, the computer models we have, flawed as they may be, are our very best idea of what may happen.

When the best available peer-reviewed scientific prognostication method states that there will be a problem that will range from moderate to catastrophic, it should be basic risk/benefit analysis that we use to show us what to do. Are you feeling lucky, punks?

It is not simply that there is one model anyway - there are at least twenty and they all broadly agree. Even if they are all wrong, policy makers and people generally, and deniers in particular, have to take into account that they can be wrong either way when deciding what to do to mitigate the risk. The models and majority science may be wrong and global warming could turn out to be benign, even ultimately beneficial, compared with our current climate - or it could turn out to be the end of our civilisation and the prelude to one of those mass extinctions of species that happen when some major outside disturbance assaults the planetary systems, like an asteroid slamming in. It would be pretty stupid of the so-called intelligent human race to do that sort of destructive planetary engineering all by itself wouldn't it? Acts of God are one thing but how much dumber would be this “Act of Man”? Jared Diamond would be able to write a much more dramatic sequel to "Collapse”!

Another climate change denial "crock of the week"

Another climate change denial crock of the week video. This one demolishes a favourite denier theme - the so called urban heat island effect whereby the deniers claim that the measured heating up of the planet is actually caused by the temperature measuring devices having been placed in urban areas with concrete etc warming things up thus giving false data. This idea actually spawned a denier blog called "Wattsupwiththat".

Copenhagen climate conference, Wimberley and Ferguson

Deputy Wimberley sent an email to all States members which included this link to a 13th March Telegraph article.

Senator Sarah Ferguson then emailed all States Members with a link to a report on a conference of climate change deniers that took place recently (sponsored by a far-right US "think tank"). These are my thoughts following.

The answer to Sarah's highly irresponsible garbage is to ask the question - what happens if her sources are wrong or what happens if the IPCC predictions are wrong? Scientific hypotheses, conclusions and predictions are forever tentative until tested by reality. It is possible to do a risk analysis on the various outcomes. Firstly, we have to remember that the climate has massive inertia. Changing emissions now will take at least a couple of decades to have an effect. If we halted all emissions now, the climate would carry on changing from the historic emissions since the 90's.

If Sarah is correct and global warming will be negligible or beneficial in the future then there will be a lot of eggs on many faces in 20 years or so but the action we would have already taken by then would have put us well on the way to transitioning away from oil and towards renewable energy (inevitable at some point anyway) so in no way would it be wasted effort or investment. If the IPCC is correct, then we are in for a lot of trouble and any delay in reducing greenhouse gas emissions will be irresponsible. If both Sarah and the IPCC are wrong and the strongest "alarmists" like Hansen and Lovelock are correct, then delaying immediate strong action to severely reduce emissions will render the delayers criminally responsible for a Holocaust of unimaginable, unprecedented proportions and the probable destruction of human civilisation. Surely it's a no-brainer as to the sensible, prudent way to go?

The deniers make a lot of deceitful noise about the computer models being just models and that the predictions they make may well be wrong or well off. They are correct! The models' predictions can only be truly tested by running the experiment to see if the outcome matches the predictions. However, the denier assumption is that any putative errors in the models will come out in our favour which is just highly irresponsible and is wishful thinking! The laws of physics and philosophy state that the validity of such thinking absolutely cannot be proved in advance of us "running the experiment" - by which time it would be much too late if the result is dangerous. An analogous risk analysis would be rather like remembering Dirty Harry and the punk, neither of whom knew for certain whether Callahan had fired the last bullet or if his gun still had one bullet left...

"I know what you're thinking. "Did he fire six shots or only five?" Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement I kind of lost track myself. But being as this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?"

People like Sarah are hoping, without certain knowledge, that there are no bullets in the climate change gun. Remember what happened to the punk? He felt lucky (and died). Sarah has a right to her belief but she has no right to allow that pernicious and risky set of beliefs to spread and expose the rest of us to a possibly severe risk. Her duty is to keep her mouth shut and stop muddying the waters and poisoning the well.

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Re Sarah's link
http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/3822

All you really need to know about the deniers conference (that is the subject of the link) is the bottom line.
"Videos of all conference presentations, lecture notes, and slides are being incrementally posted on the web site of the conference's main sponsor, The Heartland Institute"

Heartland is a rabid US libertarian/ultra-republican think tank source of at least misleading info - at worst, black propaganda. Now that even the oil companies do not sponsor the very small number of denier scientists, there are very few havens left for these deniers to get funding.

Remember, the vast majority of research and published peer reviewed climate science backs up the IPCC statements *AS A MINIMUM*. Some go further, like Hansen.

A useful exercise is to imagine that there are only two equally good scientists - one's work suggests that the globe is heating up, that it is primarily caused by humans and will almost certainly be dangerous. The other's work acknowledges that the globe is heating, that humans are partially responsible but it won't be a problem or may be beneficial. This last position is that of Richard Lindzen, the most credible of the denier scientists bar none - just about all of the rest mentioned are not credible to real climate scientists. The "Brussels journal" link mentions "A second keynote speaker at the Climate Conference -- Richard Lindzen, the Sloan Professor of Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology"

N.B. Lindzen the denier conference's "second keynote speaker" said this (in 2006) "We are quite confident (1) that global mean temperature is about 0.5 °C higher than it was a century ago; (2) that atmospheric levels of CO2 have risen over the past two centuries; and (3) that CO2 is a greenhouse gas whose increase is likely to warm the earth (one of many, the most important being water vapor and clouds). But – and I cannot stress this enough – we are not in a position to confidently attribute past climate change to CO2 or to forecast what the climate will be in the future. [T]here has been no question whatsoever that CO2 is an infrared absorber (i.e., a greenhouse gas – albeit a minor one), and its increase should theoretically contribute to warming. Indeed, if all else were kept equal, the increase in CO2 should have led to somewhat more warming than has been observed."

OK, so we have our two opposed scientists who are nowhere near as far apart as the deniers would have you believe. As there is an absence of certainty in any scientific future prediction, we have to use the techniques of risk analysis to decide what to do. It's like the "Dirty Harry" quote above. If we're lucky, there won't be a problem. If we're unlucky, there will be a problem. If we're very unlucky, billions will die and human civilisation will be just about destroyed. Big "ifs". We have to choose wisely based upon an uncertain outcome that cannot be definitively predicted.

As I'm sure you realise, in reality, it's not simply one scientist versus another, as in my example, but an overwhelming number, whose work supports the IPCC conclusions, versus a very small minority of frequently marginal scientists, most of whom haven't published any research in this area in recent years themselves. Also many well known deniers are non-scientists who masquerade as scientists (such as Monckton) by fooling people with rhetoric dressed up to look like science.

Not many people now believe that our States are capable of making too many sensible decisions but if the rest of the States give the "Sarahs" any credence they could pursue an incalculably destructive course out of ignorance and arrogance and ongoing delusions of their own adequacy.