What the heck is happening?

An Avaaz campaign appears requesting signatures to continue the fight against climate change

What is that? How can a campaign against climate change be carried out? It is completely absurd.

Climate change is what has been happening in the atmosphere for 4.5 billion years. The weather, and concomitantly the climate, change incessantly. Geology is dedicated (among other things) to studying climate change. Personally it is what I have been doing now for 50 years.

How do you fight climate change? It is as absurd as starting a campaign to avoid the evolution of species or repeal the law of gravity.

Now, if what they are talking about is "global warming", it is something else. In this there may be controversy. And indeed there is. Many think, including institutional and academic officialism, that there is global warming and that it is promoted by "man" (they like to say "man" to refer to our species).

Others, including me, think that it is NOT sufficiently proven that there is global warming. Indeed, there are environmental effects of human action, Many and it will be necessary to avoid and fight against them (water pollution, air pollution and many others).

BUT THE GLOBAL WARMING IS NOT TESTED.

I don't like fighting an enemy that is NOT known if it exists.

(Remember: climate change does exist and always existed, but we do not know what type and at what speed it is happening)

Unfortunately, Donald Trump is (he said) an enemy of the measures taken to combat climate change.

Obviously he does not care if there is climate change or global warming or whatever, what matters is that a series of billionaire corporate projects that for various environmental reasons are not blocked.

But personally, I don't care what Donald Trump thinks or does, until proven otherwise we will have to continue investigating a few things that arouse many uncertainties:

1) What role do solar radiation variations play in climate changes (heating, cooling, rains, storms, etc.)?

2) What role does CO2 play, and in particular anthropogenic CO2 emissions in atmospheric dynamics?

3) What role does water vapor play in thermal balance and atmospheric dynamics?

3) What role do aerosols play in thermal balances and atmospheric dynamics?

4) What is the long-term trend of ocean levels?

5) What is the long-term trend of ocean temperature (and concomitantly, tropospheric and stratospheric temperatures)?

These questions have not been settled. At the official level, it is insisted on maintaining that everything is resolved and that there is scientific unanimity. But it's not like that. Neither is everything resolved nor is there scientific unanimity.

Therefore it is not appropriate to start any campaign.

Finally, I don't care what Donald Trump and his billionaire friends think about it.

Danilo Anton

Climate Change: An Expensive Hoax

Activists Live in a Neverland of Climate Prediction

For many, 2015 was the year the United Nations and governments around the world abandoned rational thought about climate change. Rather than focus on preparing for the very real problems of a continually changing climate, they concentrated instead on the politically correct, but scientifically impossible goal of “stopping climate change.” The whole lot of them seem to have been transported to Neverland.

Peter Pan author J. M. Barrie tells us that Neverlands are found in the minds of children. There, with the assistance of fairy dust, Peter Pan can fly and teach children to ignore their common sense and soar as well. Peter claims greatness, is able to feel danger when it is near, and can even imagine things into existence. There is almost nothing the hero of Neverland cannot do, provided he stays childlike and forgets everything he learned about the real world.

Reality for the UN and most politicians is now more determined by what Al Gore and other equally imaginative climate activists say than what real world science and observational evidence actually shows. December’s United Nations climate conference in Paris is a case in point.

Sounding more like an episode out of Barrie’s fairy tale than a serious meeting of world leaders, politicians pledged to prevent “global temperature” from rising more than two degrees Celsius. That we are as yet unable to meaningfully forecast climate decades in advance, let alone control it, didn’t matter. They simply ignored the fact that every climate prediction the UN has ever made has turned out to be wrong. Humankind has a global thermostat, they imagine.

Delegates believed that scientists have Peter Pan–like powers to sense climate danger decades in advance. They dream that today’s global climate models (GCM), simulations that utterly failed to forecast the current 18-year “pause” in warming, provide lawmakers with the “unequivocal” knowledge they need to enact trillion-dollar energy policies.

To back up their extraordinary claims, we are told that there is an “overwhelming consensus” of scientists who agree with the UN’s position. Thousands of well-qualified skeptics are simply imagined out of existence.

On December 7, the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) released the report “Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming.” Authored by climatologist Dr. Craig Idso of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change in Arizona, geologist Dr. Robert Carter, former head of the Department of Earth Sciences at James Cook University in Australia, and physicist Dr. S. Fred Singer, emeritus professor of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia and NIPCC founder, the new report totally refutes the claims of climate alarmists. For example, the NIPCC report states:

• “There is no survey or study showing “consensus” on the most important scientific issues in the climate change debate.”

• “Neither the rate nor the magnitude of the reported late-20th-century surface warming lay outside normal natural variability.”

• “No evidence exists that … [a future warming of 2°C] would be net harmful to the global environment or to human well-being.”

• “No close correlation exists between temperature variation over the past 150 years and human-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.”

• “GCMs systematically over-estimate the sensitivity of climate to CO2.”

• “Significant correlations exist between climate … and solar activity over the past few hundred years…Forward projections of solar cyclicity imply the next few decades may be marked by global cooling rather than warming, despite continuing CO2 emissions.”

• “Melting of Arctic sea ice and polar icecaps is not occurring at ‘unnatural’ rates.”

• “Sea-level rise is not accelerating.”

• “No convincing relationship has been established between warming over the past 100 years and increases in extreme weather events.”

The naïve crusade to stop the world’s climate from changing would be laughable were it not for the cost. The November 2015 report of the San Francisco-based Climate Policy Initiative shows that $395 billion was spent in 2014 on climate finance. Of this, only 6 percent went to adaptation, helping vulnerable people adapt to real climate change today. The rest of the over $1 billion a day was spent on mitigation, trying to affect events that may, or may not, someday happen. Opinion leaders from across the political spectrum are beginning to regard letting people suffer today so as to possibly help those yet to be born as immoral.

After drinking the poison Captain Hook had intended for Peter Pan, Tinker Bell survived only because children across the world clapped loudly to show their belief in fairies. Activists clearly believe that the climate scare will also survive as long as politicians keep clapping. Its time they stopped and let this, the most expensive hoax in the history of science, die.

Monday, January 4, 2016

by TOM HARRIS

Tom Harris is executive director of the International Climate Science Coalition. The NIPCC reports may be viewed at climatechangereconsidered.org.

Reproduced from:  https://www.independent.com/news/2016/jan/04/climate-change-expensive-hoax/

It is very cold because the world is warming up (?)

The global warming dogma is widely extended at the upper level of societies, academic elites, political and academic authorities. Many governments define their policies and decisiones based on this basic paradigm: the world is warming up and the main cause is the burning of mineral  fuels (or as they usually say "fossil" fuels). Because of this consumption of hydrocarbons CO2 in the air increases, and due to its "greenhouse effect" the atmosphere temperature augments. Because it has been expressed as a dogma (discordant opinions are not accepted. Even common sense extrene cold periods are interpreted as a result of global warming.  I don't agree that this is so. There are too many uncertainties as to promote this one-sided view of the world.

As an example I reproduce an article from CNN describing the situation in North America during a very extreme cold spell continent-wide.

'Coldest air in a generation' hits the Midwest. Officials warn of almost instant frostbite

Even for the hardiest, cold-tested Americans, the deep freeze sweeping over the Midwest will be brutal.

Officials warned of almost instant frostbite as temperatures in the region plunged below zero Wednesday. Some state offices are closed and postal workers won't deliver mail in 10 states. Thousands of flights have been canceled along with dozens of train services -- most of them in and out of Chicago.

As of Wednesday morning, roughly 224 million people -- that's more than 7 in 10 Americans -- were experiencing below-freezing conditions, and more than a fifth of the country was enduring below-zero temperatures.

It's only getting chillier. Meteorologists predict at least 40 record lows will be set in the Midwest and Northeast after sundown Wednesday, including in New York and Washington, which are expecting single-digit temperatures.

With at least five deaths linked to the extreme conditions this week, authorities are urging people to bundle up, stay inside and check up on the elderly and vulnerable in what experts are describing as "the coldest air in a generation."

Water vapor rises above St. Anthony Falls on the Mississippi River on Tuesday in Minneapolis.

Chicago will be below zero for days

While most of the Midwest will see frigid temperatures, Chicago will be "the epicenter of the extreme cold," CNN meteorologist Dave Hennen said.

Chicago could reach a record low temperature of 27 below zero by Thursday morning. Its daytime high Wednesday is forecast to be 15 below zero. Officials there are setting railroad tracks on fire because the extreme cold can cause defects.

"Chicago officially fell below zero prior to 6 p.m. (Tuesday) at O'Hare and it may not get back to zero until Thursday evening," National Weather Service in Chicago tweeted Tuesday night.

It'll be so cold, Chicago-area residents would be better off warming up in parts of Antarctica. The high temperature Wednesday in Priestley Glacier, Antarctica, will be 6 degrees Fahrenheit, with a low of 7 below zero.

Wednesday night could bring record temperatures in the city and region. Forecasts predict a low of negative 27, the lowest temperature on record in Chicago, and 35 to 40 below zero in northern Illinois, where the record is negative 36, set in 1999.

More than 3,300 flights involving US airports were canceled Tuesday and Wednesday, including more than 2,000 in and out of Chicago airports, according to FlightAware.com.

Amtrak also canceled all service to and from Chicago on Wednesday due to weather, including short-distance trains and long-distance overnight trains. It said it typically operates 55 trains daily to and from the Chicago hub.

Mail delivery will also be canceled in Michigan, Indiana, North Dakota, South Dakota, and parts of Illinois, Ohio, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa and Nebraska.

Play Video

Why Chicago train tracks are being set on fire 00:45

In Minnesota, frostbite can hit in minutes

Frigid temperatures are not the only concern. In Minnesota, blustery weather brought rare wind chills of negative 60. In Ponsford, the wind chill was negative 66, CNN meteorologist Michael Guy said.

"These are VERY DANGEROUS conditions and can lead to frostbite on exposed skin in as little as five minutes where wind chill values are below -50," the National Weather Service tweeted. "Best thing you can do is limit your time outside."

Hennen described it as the "coldest air in a generation." Temperatures will plunge to 20-40 degrees below zero between Tuesday and Thursday in the Upper Midwest, Hennen said.

In northern Minnesota, wind chills were forecast to drop to 65-70 degrees below zero, which would rival the coldest wind chill ever recorded in the state (71 below) in 1982.

Frost covers part of the face of a University of Minnesota student Tuesday.

Frostbite is an issue in central Iowa, too

In central Iowa, wind chills are also a major concern.

What to know about frostbite

The National Weather Service forecast dangerous wind chills of negative 45 degrees for Des Moines, minus 57 for Waterloo and negative 60 for Mason City into Wednesday night.

"This is the coldest air many of us will have ever experienced," it tweeted.

Wind chill refers to how cold people and animals feel when they're outdoors, according to the weather service. It's how much heat is lost from exposed skin while it's windy and cold. The faster the wind, the more heat is drawn from the body, which lowers the skin temperature and, ultimately, the internal body temperature.

Frostbite is caused by freezing of the skin and underlying tissues. It's most common on the fingers, toes, nose, ears, cheeks and chin. Severe cases can kill body tissue.

A worker shovels snow off the rail switches.

North Dakota residents told to avoid roads

In North Dakota, authorities issued a "no travel" advisory for the state's northeast region, warning motorists to stay off the road in those areas due to zero visibility from blowing snow. The region includes Grand Forks and its surroundings.

It’s so cold in the parts of the Midwest they can’t deliver beer.

The North Dakota Highway Patrol also issued a travel alert for southeast North Dakota due to blowing snow. Cities included in the travel alert are Fargo, Casselton and surrounding areas.

"A travel alert means conditions are such that motorists can still travel in these areas, but should be advised of changing conditions. Motorists are encouraged to wear seat belts, reduce speeds and drive according to the conditions," it said.

The wind chill at Grand Forks International Airport was 61 degrees below zero, the National Weather Service said. Extreme cold will continue through Thursday, with wind chills down into the negative 60s, according to the National Weather Service.

State offices closed in Michigan

In west Michigan, with wind chills between negative 20 and negative 40 expected Wednesday through Thursday morning, the National Weather Service warned residents that "these temperatures the next few days are nothing to mess with."

"We are not used to this. Take steps to prevent frostbite and hypothermia," it said.

All state offices will be closed Wednesday and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has declared a state of emergency.

"Such widespread, extreme conditions have not occurred in Michigan for many years. It's imperative that we are proactive with record-low temperatures being predicted by the National Weather Service," she said.

"Wind chills are predicted as low as 50 degrees below zero in many places, such as metro Detroit which is especially unaccustomed to these temps."

Sarah Allen clears her driveway and sidewalks with a snowblower in Flint, Michigan.

Upstate New York bracing for nastiness

There is already 11 inches of snow in part of western New York, and Gov. Andrew Cuomo said late Wednesday morning that forecasters were predicting totals of 24 inches by the time it stops falling. Rochester had about 8 inches, he said, and Syracuse had 9.

Upstate is the concern, the governor said, explaining the polar vortex will prove more complicated than other storms. Snow plows are already being transported from New York City and Long Island to northern parts of the state.

In Buffalo, officials have more than 50 plows ready to handle the snowfall, and they've laid more than 800 tons of salt on roads.

"We have lost lives in storms like this," he said, adding that the state is stepping up policing to ensure residents heed road advisories.

Play Video

Life-threatening cold grips much of the US 01:53

Deaths linked to brutal weather

As millions grapple with the frigid temperatures, at least five deaths have been linked to the extreme weather this week.

In Rochester, Minnesota, a man died Sunday outside the home where he was staying with a relative. He didn't have keys to the home and couldn't get in after being dropped off that morning. The single-digit temperatures that dipped below zero may have played a role in his death, police said.

In Illinois, a man died Monday in a crash involving a village plow truck and a pedestrian, Libertyville police said. The plow truck driver has been placed on paid administrative leave pending the results of an investigation. The same day, Ethan and Shawna Kiser were killed when their Saturn Vue spun sideways and into the path of a GMC Yukon in northern Indiana, authorities said. They were 22 and 21, respectively.

A 55-year-old man was found dead Tuesday in the detached garage of his Milwaukee home after he apparently collapsed while shoveling snow, the medical examiner's office said.

CNN's Eliott C. McLaughlin, Joe Sutton and Dave Alsup contributed to this report.

By Faith Karimi and Steve Almasy, CNN

January 30, 2019

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/01/30/weather/winter-weather-wednesday-wxc/index.html

Dogmas are not good for the advancement of science.

For some time, and as an impartial observer of some of the main scientific paradigms of the last decades, I tried to analyze these ideas in light of my experiences and knowledge.

As we all know, scientific knowledge is relative. What is accepted today as a great truth, tomorrow will be disproved by other "truths", and what is more forceful, by the actual data of reality.

A paradigm that prevailed in the last 25 years is that climate warming is occurring, and that the cause of it is human action through the combustion of hydrocarbons, which has been called (with an appellation at less doubtful) "fossil fuels".

It has logic. The need or greed, has led to use the available hydrocarbons in the crust (oil, coal, natural gas, etc.) to provide energy to industries, homes, cars, railways, ships and other technological means typical of globalized industrial societies .

Due to uncontrolled consumption enormous amounts of carbon dioxide are generated, that gradually accumulate in the atmosphere producing a greenhouse effect, which in turn increases the temperature,`producing a climate change, which, according to this "very logical" approach, is the fault of human beings ( or "man" if we use the dominant patriarchal terminology).

It is all very logical. However, reality is stubborn. The concrete data (raw, NOT modified) show that this reasoning fails in several aspects.

In the first place, as all geologists know, talking about climate change is equivalent to saying nothing. On Earth, climates have changed throughout their history. In different times and places there have been, hot, humid, arid, cold climates, glacial ages, etc. In successive geological periods there are numerous rock formations that bear witness to them. Therefore, talking about "climate change" is like saying nothing new.

Regarding the terminology also used, although to a lesser degree, there is talk of global warming, of melting of the Antarctic, of a rise in the level of the oceans, of tropicalization of temperate climates, of increase in the number of hurricanes and other analogous phenomena which would be (is stated) the result of this “warming” that is predicted.

On each of these phenomena there are contradictory data. To begin with, it is very difficult to demonstrate warming with traditional methods of measuring temperature (meteorological stations of heterogeneous distribution that tend to measure predominantly the influence of urban islands). The temperature of the oceans, has shown to have periodic variations, and in the last years NO generalized warming has been appreciated. Neither measurements of the satellites have been conclusive. The temperature of the lower atmosphere has not increased significantly.

As for CO2, it is noteworthy that the content of the atmosphere of this gas is very small, just 0.04%. Since plants (the sustenance of all life on the planet) require CO2 to carry out their metabolism, their increase, which currently is of the order of 0.0001% per year, has the main effect of helping the growth of plant ecosystems (such as jungles, meadows or algae formations).

Regarding C02 as a "greenhouse" gas, it does not seem to have any influence when compared to the greenhouse effect of water vapor (much more abundant and with more intense effect) and above all with the influence of variations in solar radiation (which is, absolutely, and almost entirely, the main source of atmospheric energy).

For these reasons, it is unlikely that the tiny increases in CO2 in the atmosphere can have an effect on the global temperature, and, on the contrary its main effects ARE POSITIVE, that is, the increase in the productivity of plant ecosystems.

Of course, this is not important for the global powers, who are not interested in scientific truth (of course, beyond their speeches). For them the data of reality are irrelevant.

This includes, of course, the academic authorities (who can not deviate from the paradigm under penalty of losing their grants or tenures), political leaders (who do not know much about the issue and try to accommodate their claims to what is expected of them from the point of view of convenience) and business leaders (who in general manage to extract profits from any prevailing paradigm, whatever it may be).

And on the other side there are the heretics. Those who analyze the facts of reality without prejudices or preconceptions. Fortunately,  in this globalized world there are many heretical scientists and individuals.

Of course, those who disagree with the absurd idea of ​​climate change do not have good press. They are criticized as unscientific, and of course, always criticizing them without taking the discussion to the grounds of the arguments.

In fact, what happens is that the heretics have (myself included) many doubts.

There is no certainty that global warming is taking place in the atmosphere (data are not conclusive), there is no certainty that the inlandsis of Antarctica and Greenland are melting. Rise of ocean levels are very slow (a couple of millimeters per year) and may be the result of geological inertia after recent geological deglaciation.

Things are NOT clear.

When there is uncertainty about the processes, hasty political (and economic) decisions can be double-edged swords.

It is not reasonable to dogmatize the arguments. Do not forget that to a large extent the scientific advances of humanity were the result of the ideas and discoveries of the great heretics. Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Lamark, Darwin and many others have allowed us to reach new milestones in human knowledge that can serve as illustrative examples.

Dogmas are not good for the advancement of science.
Danilo Anton

Global climate facts

Virtually all scientists agree that the Earth has warmed a small amount since the year 1000 or, if you choose, since 1850, when instrumented temperature records became reasonably accurate and distributed in key areas of the world. 
An increasing number believe that any warming is so small it is indistinguishable from the noise in the environmental data sets, and that the data have not been properly adjusted for such things as urban heat island effects (are the city temps warmer than the suburbs where you live? Has the city grown since 1850? 
have the runways increased near the temp gauge at your airport since 1920?), and instrument calibration. 
This is particularly true of the global data set, even though urbanization has caused regional increases in temperature that exceed those measured on a global scale, leading to urban heat islands as much as 12oC hotter than their surronundings. 
Most scientists agree that warming is better than cooling and many believe CO2 provides important enhancements for forests and agriculture, even while also believing we should not be fouling our nest.
Our site makes every effort to present the true science of climate change. When the news broke of the Arctic ice being at its 30 year low in 2007, the same source (U. of Illinois) reported the Antarctic at its record high, but this was not reported in the media. 
To show the imbalance, as one reads in the popular press, we have created a companion site that presents the evidence for global cooling, just as most newspapers and alarmists present only the science that supports warming. There are many reasons to be cautious about accepting CO2 as the causative agent if there really is warming. This is highlighted by 2 papers published in March 2008. Scafetta and West showed that up to 69% of observed warming is from the sun and Ramanthan and Carmichael show that soot has 60% of the warming power of CO2. They claim both factors are underappreciated by IPCC. Many scientists believe the temperature changes are more dependent on the sun than CO2, similar to the relationship in your home with your furnace. The soot may well explain much of the Arctic melting, as it has recentrly for Asian glaciers.
It is generally accepted that the Earth has been much warmer than today, for example, in the time of the dinosaurs (the mid-cretaceous period) when the CO2 was 2 to 4 times greater than today (NOAA). More recently, in the prior period between ice ages, just 125,000 years ago, the Earth also was much warmer than today and the sea level much higher - by about 13 to 20 feet (4 to 6 meters) (IPCC). The primary driver of the past climate shifts is believed to be orbital mechanics and solar variability, with some contribution from Earth geophysical processes, such as volcanic eruptions. It is also known that mankind's contribution to CO2 is just a small percent (3%) of the total amount and that the total is very small - there is 23.6 times more argon (0.00934) in the atmosphere than CO2 (0.000407. The Earth's ability to absorb CO2 has apparently been underestimated and the climate models need revision per the 31 December 2009 publication of work by Wolfgang Knorr that shows "No rise of atmospheric carbon dioxide fraction in the las 160 years"(a seminal study). Lastly, we know that the Earth's temperature and the level of CO2 rise and fall roughly together, but it is not clear (not proven) whether this is cause and effect by either variable. In a first attempt (Hadley-chart) to use a CO2 - based model to predict temperatures, the results are not impressive at all and are exactly opposite observations.
Source:
http://www.climatechangefacts.info/#Fact

Climate Change: An Expensive Hoax

Activists Live in a Neverland of Climate Prediction

For many, 2015 was the year the United Nations and governments around the world abandoned rational thought about climate change. Rather than focus on preparing for the very real problems of a continually changing climate, they concentrated instead on the politically correct, but scientifically impossible goal of “stopping climate change.” The whole lot of them seem to have been transported to Neverland.

Peter Pan author J. M. Barrie tells us that Neverlands are found in the minds of children. There, with the assistance of fairy dust, Peter Pan can fly and teach children to ignore their common sense and soar as well. Peter claims greatness, is able to feel danger when it is near, and can even imagine things into existence. There is almost nothing the hero of Neverland cannot do, provided he stays childlike and forgets everything he learned about the real world.

Reality for the UN and most politicians is now more determined by what Al Gore and other equally imaginative climate activists say than what real world science and observational evidence actually shows. December’s United Nations climate conference in Paris is a case in point.

Sounding more like an episode out of Barrie’s fairy tale than a serious meeting of world leaders, politicians pledged to prevent “global temperature” from rising more than two degrees Celsius. That we are as yet unable to meaningfully forecast climate decades in advance, let alone control it, didn’t matter. They simply ignored the fact that every climate prediction the UN has ever made has turned out to be wrong. Humankind has a global thermostat, they imagine.

Delegates believed that scientists have Peter Pan–like powers to sense climate danger decades in advance. They dream that today’s global climate models (GCM), simulations that utterly failed to forecast the current 18-year “pause” in warming, provide lawmakers with the “unequivocal” knowledge they need to enact trillion-dollar energy policies.

To back up their extraordinary claims, we are told that there is an “overwhelming consensus” of scientists who agree with the UN’s position. Thousands of well-qualified skeptics are simply imagined out of existence.

On December 7, the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) released the report “Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming.” Authored by climatologist Dr. Craig Idso of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change in Arizona, geologist Dr. Robert Carter, former head of the Department of Earth Sciences at James Cook University in Australia, and physicist Dr. S. Fred Singer, emeritus professor of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia and NIPCC founder, the new report totally refutes the claims of climate alarmists. For example, the NIPCC report states:

• “There is no survey or study showing “consensus” on the most important scientific issues in the climate change debate.”

• “Neither the rate nor the magnitude of the reported late-20th-century surface warming lay outside normal natural variability.”

• “No evidence exists that … [a future warming of 2°C] would be net harmful to the global environment or to human well-being.”

• “No close correlation exists between temperature variation over the past 150 years and human-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.”

• “GCMs systematically over-estimate the sensitivity of climate to CO2.”

• “Significant correlations exist between climate … and solar activity over the past few hundred years…Forward projections of solar cyclicity imply the next few decades may be marked by global cooling rather than warming, despite continuing CO2 emissions.”

• “Melting of Arctic sea ice and polar icecaps is not occurring at ‘unnatural’ rates.”

• “Sea-level rise is not accelerating.”

• “No convincing relationship has been established between warming over the past 100 years and increases in extreme weather events.”

The naïve crusade to stop the world’s climate from changing would be laughable were it not for the cost. The November 2015 report of the San Francisco-based Climate Policy Initiative shows that $395 billion was spent in 2014 on climate finance. Of this, only 6 percent went to adaptation, helping vulnerable people adapt to real climate change today. The rest of the over $1 billion a day was spent on mitigation, trying to affect events that may, or may not, someday happen. Opinion leaders from across the political spectrum are beginning to regard letting people suffer today so as to possibly help those yet to be born as immoral.

After drinking the poison Captain Hook had intended for Peter Pan, Tinker Bell survived only because children across the world clapped loudly to show their belief in fairies. Activists clearly believe that the climate scare will also survive as long as politicians keep clapping. Its time they stopped and let this, the most expensive hoax in the history of science, die.

Monday, January 4, 2016

by TOM HARRIS

Tom Harris is executive director of the International Climate Science Coalition. The NIPCC reports may be viewed at climatechangereconsidered.org.

Reproduced from:  https://www.independent.com/news/2016/jan/04/climate-change-expensive-hoax/

Global Warming, a Mass Mania

"Today's debate about global warming is essentially
a debate about freedom. The environmentalists would like
to mastermind each and every possible
(and impossible) aspect of our lives."

Throughout history episodic eruptions of mass manias have swept societies. These outbreaks embody the dissatisfactions, fears and hopes of their times while offering a shining path to a bright new future. They are characterised by a millenarian nature, wherein threat of punishment for past sins is accompanied by promise of salvation through a new faith.
The power of mass manias is reinforced by severe disapproval of any questioning of their certain truth.  Any doubt is seen not just as error needing correction but as conscious deliberate evil deserving expulsion or extermination. With adherents permitted only to support the established dogma, these movements tend to gather followers rapidly. But they also soon become afflicted with a growing disconnect from reality which they can neither acknowledge nor adjust for. 

As no believer dares express anything other than certainty, social manias tend to persist for some time after their disconnect with reality has become obvious to all. In the face of such recalcitrant reality, leaders are forced to become ever more extreme in their proclamations. This then often leads to a zenith of zealotry and disconnect just before increasingly obvious reality finally forces them to make some small admission of error. The spell is then broken and the faith collapses.
Global Warming is the mania of our times. While there is good scientific evidence that atmospheric carbon dioxide is increasing from the burning of fossil fuels, and that carbon dioxide does indeed absorb infa-red heat radiation of certain frequencies, it is purely speculation that this will cause a climate catastrophe.
As Mark Twain wrote over a century ago: “There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.”

In the current instance there is also abundant scientific evidence to indicate that: the amount of warming from increased carbon dioxide emissions has been greatly overestimated.

 Most of the uncertain fraction of a degree of warming that has occurred over the past century is attributable to measurement bias and natural variability.

Predictions of catastrophic consequences are entirely speculative and unlikely.

The net result of a projected doubling of atmospheric CO2 is most likely to be positive….

… If man made global warming is indeed real, and it helps to prevent another ice age, this would be the most fortunate thing that has happened to our species since we barely escaped extinction from an especially cold period during the last ice age some 75,000 years ago.

The ongoing political waffle over setting targets for differing percentages of emission reductions at various points decades in the future is about as useful as debating over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

The biggest problem we face in the forseeable future is not some unquantifiable risk of climate change at some unknown future time. It is the real and immanent one of producing enough fossil fuel to maintain the healthy economy necessary for the long costly process of developing energy alternatives and implementing them on an adequate scale. At best this will take decades and will require abundant supplies of fossil fuels to achieve.

The entire Global Warming scenario is predicated on continued undiminished consumption of (fossil?) fuel. How-ever, the inability of conventional energy supplies to meet increasing global demand is already confronting us. No matter how much oil may still exist somewhere underground, new discoveries are not keeping pace with depletion of known reserves and current demand is pushing the limits of production capacity. New discoveries are also increasingly found in deep water or remote locations where costs are high.
With or without GW, alternative sources of energy must ultimately be developed. How successful this will be is far from certain. Renewable energy is diffuse. The notion of a future economy powered by sunbeams and summer breezes is a happy fantasy. The future offered by renewable energy alone is one of considerable energy constraint and decreased affluence.
Cheap abundant energy from (fossil?) fuels is a vital element in virtually every product and service in our current economy. Without adequate supplies of affordable liquid hydrocarbon fuels for transportation and mobile machinery our existing economy cannot continue to function, nor will be able to even feed the population.
Our society doesn't run on hypotheticals. Aircraft, ships, trucks and heavy machinery are not going to be powered by batteries. Premature attempts to adopt immature, unproven technology fostered by ill-conceived subsidies and regulations entails a high risk of shortages and costly mistakes. The emerging bio-fuels and wind energy fiascos are already an example.
The economics of current renewable energy technologies is only even marginally viable because of subsidies and the availability of cheap abundant fossil fuel energy to implement and maintain them. Imagine the cost of metals, concrete, machinery, manufacturing transport and farming if all these things were also dependant on renewable energy.
Unfortunately, the academics, activists, politicians and bureaucrats leading the push for carbon dioxide taxation and use of renewable energy are non-producers who are woefully ignorant of both the economic reality of productive activity and the practical limits of technology. They are techno-economic-illiterates with a cargo cult understanding of production. Their prescriptions amount to a ritualistic belief that admitting sin (GW) and making an appropriate sacrifice (carbon dioxide taxes) will in some undefined (magical) way bring forth all the right changes, discoveries and implementations that are needed to effect a bright new world of clean endlessly renewable energy with minimal inconvenience to anyone.
The leading scientific prophets of this cult are overwhelmingly comprised of young researchers whose entire careers are based on climate alarmism. In contrast, the middleground, balanced (“sceptical”) scientists are overwhelmingly researchers with well established expertise in other fields. The alarmists repeatedly refer to a catechism of highly selective evidence to support their claims. The sceptics cite voluminous other evidence from their own varied fields which contradicts the alarmist's claims.
Even when alarmist evidence is conclusively discredited (e.g. the hockey stick graph), the climate alarmists continue to use it, and to dismiss all conflicting evidence no matter how sound or voluminous it may be. When their own claims fail, they revise the evidence, not their hypothesis. Recent examples of this have involved the current global cooling trend, the absence of a signature tropical tropospheric hot spot, Antarctic cooling, oceanic cooling, unchanged rates of sea level rise, etc. All these phenomena have been subjected to dubious data manipulation trying to make a silk purse to suit GW out of a sow's ear of empirical data which refuses to conform to their hopes.
GW has become just another faith based belief, immune to all conflicting reason and evidence. Although it maintains a claim to being based on science, it's relation to genuine, evidence based, logically consistent, refutable science is not unlike that of Scientology, with which it shares a number of commonalities.
The amazing thing about all this is that people who claim to be scientists are so willing to become so profoun-dly and righteously committed to a belief in something that, at best, is highly uncertain, and the reality of which will inevitably become apparent in the not too distant future. It appears that such persons somehow think that their own unshakable faith will determine that reality. It also seems clear that what they claim to fear so greatly is, perversely, what they actually so desperately hope for.
Where GW departs from ordinary academic disputes and becomes a dangerous fundamentalist mania is in the righteous and fervency of its proselytizers. This is apparent in the anger and abuse directed at any who dare question their pronouncements. It has gone so far as leading warmers comparing scepticism of GW with holocaust denial, suggesting that GW dissent be made a criminal offence and even advocating Nuremburg style public trials for offenders.
Recently Jonathan Manthorpe, a writer for the Vancouver Sun newspaper, wrote an article expressing quali-fied agreement with some of the arguments against GW raised by Ian Plimer in his book Heaven and Earth. In a follow up article, on 5 August 2009, Manthorpe reported that he had received around 100 e-mails about his Plimer piece. About two-thirds were from ordinary people who agreed with Plimer. Another healthy portion was from scientists who agreed with Plimer's overall contention about natural variabilities in climate on which humans have little or no influence. However, they disputed various specific claims and details made by him.
Manthorpe also noted that, “…the disturbing letters were from the scientist believers in man-man global warming.”
He then went on to say, “I have met a lot of unpleasant people in the course of my life, but I have never seen such a torrent of nasty, arrogant and downright stupid abuse as has been aimed at me this week by people who aggressively sign themselves "PhD" as though it were a mark of divine right that is beyond challenge or question.”
The recent but largely unreported trend ofglobal cooling has become increasingly hard for warmers to deny or explain away, and there is increasing evidence that various other core elements of the GW hypothesis are incorrect. In the face of failing claims and prophesies, the prophets of GW are becoming more and more strident and apocalyptic . The cooler it gets the shriller their cries of warning about warming become.
In addition to the true believers, GW has attracted a large contingent of self-interested fellow travellers. Politicians, bureaucrats, political activists and manifold financial interest have perceived advantages to be gained from climbing aboard the GW bandwagon. Large vested interests are now involved, and there is great pressure to lock in emission controls and subsidies before popular support weakens.
Despite all this, in the end the entire matter is only an empty irrelevant charade. The developing nations will not cease their development even if developed ones do. A modest increase in energy prices will not result in decreased emissions and large cost increases that will do so will result in recession and severe economic disruptions. This is not speculation. We have already had two clear instances. Any government which does not understand this will be replaced.
Australia's annual carbon dioxide emissions are only about 1.5 percent of the global total. This is barely equal to China's increase in emissions over 6 months. Whatever we do or don't do to reduce emissions will have negligible effect on the global total. In any event, estimates of natural uptake of CO2 over our land and EEZ area are greater than our emissions. By any reasonable accounting, we as a nation should be receiving carbon credits, not being forced to buy them.
The prospective Emissions Trading Scheme is set to become just another layer of bureaucracy loaded onto an already staggering productive sector, with negligible effect on emissions other than that resulting from economic decline. To verify the ineffectiveness of emissions trading one need only look at the result where it has been implemented in the EU or the global result of the Kyoto agreement. Since it was ratified global emissions have increased 18%. Those of signatory nations increased 21%. Those who did not sign up increased 10% and those for the U.S. grew by 6.6%.
Over the next few years economic recession will result in a much greater reduction in emissions than anything achievable from regulatory measures over the same period. Meanwhile, evidence is steadily accumulating that the amount and impacts of greenhouse warming have been greatly overestimated, and that a natural cooling cycle is now overriding any small increase in GH effect attributable to human emissions. There is no overwhelming urgency to hastily impose yet another ill conceived regulatory burden on the Australian economy, especially when it can least be afforded and any benefit is distant and uncertain.
In terms of climate, resources, geography population, politics, and development, Australia is better situated than any other nation to adapt to the difficult times ahead. This will, however, require making full and effective use of our natural advantages.
The most important thing government can do is not to deliver bailouts or handouts, but rather to get out of the way. Two highly effective things are eminently doable in this respect. The proliferation of unnecessary bureaucracy has become a major drain on, and impediment to, all productive activity. It requires serious pruning, and that which is retained must be made accountable for positive results. When management fails to perform it should be replaced.
The other is an initiative to ensure the reliability of ongoing energy supplies. The most certain and cost effective way of achieving this would be the implementation of an extended corporate tax exemption for earnings from energy production, and full immediate deduction against other income for investment in the sector.
The result would be an unprecedented boom in creative effort and investment in Australian energy. This would include an influx of foreign investment and skills. It is not unrealistic to expect that Australia could soon become the global leader in new energy, the Saudi Arabia of a post-petroleum world. Any loss to government revenue from such tax largesse could be expected to be made up many times over in increased revenues from payroll taxes and GST, plus the flow-on effect throughout the remainder of the economy.
The only real obstacle to success is our own ability to envision the potential and grasp the opportunity. This way forward presents a clear route down Easy Street. The route we are now taking involves a detour through Jonestown. Only experts using computer models could confuse these options and we have just seen what they did with the global economy. The choice is a no brainer.

Note of D.A.: I don’t agree with the expression “fossil fuels” and therefore I added a question mark after “fossil”.

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by Walter Starck
August 11, 2009

Walter Starck is one of Australia's most senior and experienced marine biologists, with a professional career of studying coral reef and marine fishery ecos

On Global Warming

Professor Ivar Giaever, 1973 Nobel Prizewinner for Physics 

“Giaever, a former professor at the School of Engineering and School of Science Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, received the 1973 physics Nobel for his work on quantum tunneling. Giaever delivered his remarks at the 65th Nobel Laureate Conference in Lindau, Germany, which drew 65 recipients of the prize. Giaever is also featured in the new documentary "Climate Hustle" released a couple of years sago..

Giaever was one of President Obama’s key scientific supporters in 2008  in an October 29, 2008 open letter. Giaever signed his name to the letter which read in part: “The country urgently needs a visionary leader…We are convinced that Senator Barack Obama is such a leader, and we urge you to join us in supporting him.”

But seven years after signing the letter, Giaever now mocks President Obama for warning that “no challenge poses a greater threat to future generations than climate change”. Giaever called it a “ridiculous statement.”

“That is what he said. That is a ridiculous statement,” Giaever explained.

“I say this to Obama: Excuse me, Mr. President, but you’re wrong. Dead wrong,” Giaever said.

“How can he say that? I think Obama is a clever person, but he gets bad advice. Global warming is all wet,” he added.

“Obama said last year that 2014 is hottest year ever. "But it's not true. It's not the hottest." Giaever noted. [Note: Other scientists have reversed themselves on climate change. 

The Nobel physicist questioned the basis for rising carbon dioxide fears.

“When you have a theory and the theory does not agree with the experiment then you have to cut out the theory. You were wrong with the theory,” Giaever explained.

Global Warming ‘a new religion’

Giaever said his climate research was eye opening. “I was horrified by what I found” after researching the issue in 2012, he noted.

“Global warming really has become a new religion. Because you cannot discuss it. It’s not proper. It is like the Catholic Church.”

Concern Over ‘Successful’ UN Climate Treaty

“I am worried very much about the [UN] conference in Paris in November. I really worry about that. Because the [2009 UN] conference was in Copenhagen and that almost became a disaster but nothing got decided. But now I think that the people who are alarmist are in a very strong position,” Giaever said.

“The facts are that in the last 100 years we have measured the temperatures it has gone up .8 degrees and everything in the world has gotten better. So how can they say it’s going to get worse when we have the evidence? We live longer, better health, and better everything. But if it goes up another .8 degrees we are going to die I guess,” he noted.

“I would say that the global warming is basically a non-problem. Just leave it alone and it will take care of itself. It is almost very hard for me to understand why almost every government in Europe — except for Polish government — is worried about global warming. It must be politics.”

“So far we have left the world in better shape than when we arrived, and this will continue with one exception — we have to stop wasting huge, I mean huge amounts of money on global warming. We have to do that or that may take us backwards. People think that is sustainable but it is not sustainable.

On Global Temperatures & CO2

Giaever noted that global temperatures have halted for the past 18 plus years. 

Giaever accused NASA and federal scientists of “fiddling” with temperatures.

“They can fiddle with the data. That is what NASA does.”

“You cannot believe the people — the alarmists — who say CO2 is a terrible thing. Its not true, its absolutely not true,” Giaever continued while showing a slide asking: ‘Do you believe CO2 is a major climate gas?’

From: http://www.climatedepot.com/2015/07/06/nobel-prize-winning-scientist-who-endorsed-obama-now-says-prez-is-ridiculous-dead-wrong-on-global-warming/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXxHfb66ZgM

Scientific dogmatism in the contemporary globalized society

D,A.

In contemporary societies there are some issues that although they generate uncertainty they were defined as absolutely proven. Disagreeing with these absolute assumptions is forbidden. To be politically correct you have to agree with what the popes of "science" and politics decide.

One example es observed in the discussions on climate change, allegedly caused by the consumption of "fossil fuels".
Whoever does not agree with this view is at risk of being declared "unfaithful".
The "climate change" dogma reads as follows: "climate change exists and (of course), the consumption of "fossil fuels" is to blame".
There is a lot of "original sin" in this view of the role humans play in the dynamics of the earth's atmosphere
It is claimed that 98% of scientists agree for climate change, and that "only ignorant people" can deny it. 
That is an easy way to demonstrate something you do not want to demonstrate. 
Supposedly there is a majority of scientists on one side of the question (not shown in any independent survey) and therefore they are right. Obviously science does not work like that.

In reality, no one disagrees with the notion that climate changes. 
It could not be otherwise.
 Climate had changed. Geology shows that climate change has been the rule in the Earth history.
What is not certain what type of climate change there is. 
We do not know if there is global warming or global cooling or none of them.
There are many scientists, hundreds of sites on the internet and dozens of videos on YouTube where many scientists express theirdoubts about these dogmatic statements.
The reaction of the bigots of the dogmatism of climate change facing global warming skepticism is of intolerance. 
Perhaps they don't want to lose their academic protagonism or their juicy artificial projects.