I was reading the evidence on the IPCC inqury and Peter Lilley made an excellent point worth repeating:
Q13 Mr Lilley: … The point I am trying to make is the point you make and particularly the points in the technical report are all good science, but what you entrust us, the policymakers, to know in the Summary for Policymakers is politicised. You think, “We won’t tell them that we have scaled down below the range given by the models”. Today the Chancellor is going to give the latest figures for GDP; if it were to emerge that the figures he was giving were not those given by the Treasury model but his expert judgment and he had not told us that, there would be trouble in Parliament.
Well said Peter! If any government body had misled parliament in the way the IPCC continues to misleed world governments, then there would be hell to pay. Ministers and/or civil servants would be forced to resign, the press would be furious. And for what? We all know that economic models are not exact. No one expects economic models to be better than approximations. In contrast “Science” (as in real science and not professors sitting in front a committee claiming to be scientists) claims to operate at a much higher standard.
It claims, but clearly in the area of climate it does not!
Instead, we have a group of public sector employees claiming their assertions are “science” who far from being scientific are in fact behaving in a way that makes most politicians look angelic.
Now, (yet again) these climate “scientists” have been caught out working not to the level of science, nor even to the standards of economics, but at a standard so appalling it would not be tolerated by any politician. Claiming to be “scientists”, getting public money to be “scientists” and then not behaving as “scientist” is totally dishonest. And when these people obtain public grants as “scientists” and they are not, such dishonesty must be fraud.
And these people are still employed?
If economists or politicians had lied about the origin of their figures and misled parliament in this way, the press, politicians and public would have torn them to shreds. If some minister had lied about the figures, if a civil servant, if anyone else had misled parliament there would be uproar. So, why aren’t these public servants, who say their standards are all the more higher than anyone else, not held to account for being worse than everyone else?
If the police mislead courts – we expect action. If doctors mislead patients – we expect action. If civil servants misled parliament – we expect action. For heaven’s sake if some lollypop lady fiddled her hours – we’d expect action.
But when this group, this group alone of public employees which has knowingly mislead not just our parliament but all world governments and when they have a clear personal financial benefit from grants because of this “problem” … when they mislead … what happens?
The politicians just let them get away with it – why?
It is a public scandal – all the more scandalous because I no longer believe anyone will ever be held to account for the serial dishonesty of climate academics or the IPCC.
[Committee name]
“But when this group, this group alone of public employees which has knowingly mislead not just our parliament but all world governments and when they have a clear personal financial benefit from grants because of this “problem” … when they mislead … what happens?
The politicians just let them get away with it – why?”
BECAUSE the politicians paid them to do it in the first place. Being “PC” is exactly THAT.
Politics and science, particularly the natural sciences HAVE TO BE separated. Government funded, ie, public funded, or UN, or EU funded, means produce what we can tax people for. Create the imaginary hobgoblin, maintain the imaginary hobgoblin, and make the imaginary hobgoblin provide the “solutions” the politicians want / need.
Science has to be funded but not directly from politics or politicians. THAT is the problem / cause.
ie,
The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed
(and hence clamorous to be led to safety)
by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
H. L. Mencken.
To which I would add –
The hobgoblins have to be imaginary so that
“they” can offer their solutions, not THE solutions.
Just consider what would happen IF a government funded scientist produced a paper that showed there is no greenhouse effect! That such an idea is physically impossible. Dead hobgoblin…. AGW would just vanish in an instant. All the computer models, all the IPCC “science”, the politically correct “consensus”, ALL, and so much more, ie, trust of authority, politics, bureaucracy, academia, etc, etc, etc. thrown in the bin as rubbish, based on, or done as support for what is, and long ago should have been, a disproven paradigm.
Thing is, we ARE going to find out what happens……..
The reason I’m so angry, is that this is a group who claim they should be trusted more than any other group because everything they do is based on “science”.
And then when challenged on the fact they misled parliament I would sum up their attitude as “you can’t prove we broke the law … therefore we are vindicated” (to use a climategate expression).
In other words, they will not recognise anyone has a right to criticise them – unless they can find the evidence and get the money to bring a court case against them. Even the worst possible commercial enterprise has far higher standards than that.
Given that many MPs went to jail for far less and certainly for doing far less harm, on a simple law of averages a lot of climate academics ought now to be doing time. Yet we haven’t even had a police investigation.
I don’t know what the syndrome is, but there seems to be a denial that anything could possibly be wrong with academics engaged in “science”. The closest analogy I can think of is that of the catholic church and paedophile priests. People just seemed to deny that priests could possibly do such things and then excused them if they were found out.
Likewise, in science, there’s complete denial that being dishonest is a criminal offence or being dishonest to obtain grant money is fraud. They really do seem to believe the law doesn’t apply to them and those in “authority” seem to be given an air of invincibility which allows them to do whatever they want and never get challenged.
Mike writes – “They really do seem to believe the law doesn’t apply to them and those in “authority” seem to be given an air of invincibility which allows them to do whatever they want and never get challenged.”
Yes, because of who funds them. They, the politicians, make the laws after all is said and done. The law (courts) only enforces the political will of the day, as the law can only follow what the politicians tell it is the law, AND, if necessary the politicians change the law when it suits…
Remember Greenpeace protesters vandalizing a power station / coal train, defended and “justified” in court by James Hansen in his “spare time”. The court HAS TO ACCEPT the “evidence” of the highest expert witness available to it……
I think you are right, but what about the expenses scandal of MPs?
I have more than a little suspicion the journalists who dug up this story knew and even endorsed their behaviour for many years before the MPs started investigating things like phone hacking and suddenly the MP’s expenses hit the news headlines.
This is why I can’t ever see “science” ever being held officially to account – because it is really just a cosy relationship between MPs and academics which it is in neither group’s interest to rock.
However, I’ll make a simple prediction: HISTORY WILL BE WRITTEN ON THE INTERNET. Your average jo bloggs internet user, will not read their history in some academic journal or some academic’s book (written using public-sector resources). Instead, most of the present day events will be documented by people like us on the internet.
And that history will not be at all kind to these politicians and academics who could never be held accountable.
Is NASA lying to us as well?
Another big oil conspiracy theorist?
The difference between your conspiracy theories and those of the moonlanders, is that the moon landers are just having fun whereas you actually believe your conspiracy theories.
It’s just that what NASA are saying seems to be pretty much the same as what the IPCC are saying. If the IPCC are lying then doesn’t that mean that NASA must be as well?
I’m not aware that NASA wrote a report on global warming in which they changed key data and did not inform policy makers of a very significant change which dramatically reduced the expected impact of CO2.
Policy makers have to base their decisions on the data and have to know when there has been a major change to that data as this would naturally lead to a policy change.
When it was such a significant figure, hiding that change from policy makers was clearly dishonest.
I must have missed that bit. When did that happen?
It’s at the top of the article: Lilley: “[you say it is] all good science, but what you entrust us, the policymakers, to know in the Summary for Policymakers is politicised. You think, “We won’t tell them that we have scaled down below the range given by the models … if it were to emerge that the figures he was giving were not those given by the Treasury model but his expert judgment and he had not told us that, there would be trouble in Parliament.”
Lilley draws an analogy between the behaviour of the IPCC and the treasury and rightly says that if the treasury behaved in the way the IPCC “there would be trouble in Parliament.”
However, the treasury uses economic models – the standard of “truth” is much lower because it is such a nebulous subject where it is hard to know what is true of false.
In contrast “science” is a subject which has a much higher standard and where assertions should be provable beyond reasonable doubt (or with suitable error bars).
Therefore the gap between what was expected and how they actually behaved is all the greater for the IPCC. Therefore the lack of any kind of repercussions is all the more serious.
Will J. Browne says:
February 6, 2014 at 1:44 pm
” Is NASA lying to us as well? ”
Errr, Gavin Schmidt, James Hansen, two rather prominent NASA employees..
Schmidt produced a global energy budget much like Trenberth’s (neither of which are science), he was also one of the main contributors to the Real Climate blog, and Hansen sold GH “theory” (unphysical and therefore imaginary) based AGW and climate modelling (GIGO) to the politicians in 1988, plus a load of other activities not compatible with his role as a scientist…
ie,
http://www.globalwarmingskeptics.info/thread-1189.html
Hansen got rid of Dr. Ferenc Miskolczi because he questioned GH ….
Yup, at least some at NASA were / are dishonestly involved. Government funded.
So NASA are in on this as well. It’s worse than I thought! What’s their motivatiion? Government grants?
What has science come to if scientists can’t use their models to tell us exactly what’s going to happen in the future without having to resort to their expert judgement!
There is a reply to that question in the enquiry report. You might have missed it.
If the treasury had stated in a report to government that it had made a projection using a model and it turned out that not only had it not used a model but that it had got that projection massively wrong and had tried to hide it.
Heads would roll.
If MPs had said that had provided expense receipts … which like science should be “beyond reasonable doubt” .. and it turned out that they had been using their “judgement” to estimate how much they had spent …. oh my goodness wouldn’t the press be up in arms about that?
Instead the test in climate “science” is not whether they are honest, or even if they are right … it’s whether or not they could be prosecuted for what they have done.
Because I’ve yet to see any evidence of any other standards being applied!
I think the standard they operate to is this: so long as no one has proof they broke the law, they can do whatever they like in climate “science”.
Q13 Mr Lilley: It does not, of course, because point 3 is outside the range given by the CMIP5 models, the bottom range of which is 0.48º. I think we can go on too long about this. The point I am trying to make is the point you make and particularly the points in the technical report are all good science, but what you entrust us, the policymakers, to know in the Summary for Policymakers is politicised. You think, “We won’t tell them that we have scaled down below the range given by the models”. Today the Chancellor is going to give the latest figures for GDP; if it were to emerge that the figures he was giving were not those given by the Treasury model but his expert judgment and he had not told us that, there would be trouble in Parliament.
Professor Allen: I don’t know the process whereby the Chancellor comes up with his numbers, but I am sure there is an enormous amount of expert judgment in running that Treasury model. The key point is there is an enormous amount of judgment in running climate models. There is nothing sacrosanct about ranges that come out of the CMIP5 ensemble. We rely on a whole range of lines of evidences, including observations and these models, to provide these projections and those are the projections that are elevated to the Summary for Policymakers.
Just to pick up on the notion, “You no longer rely on the models”, there are certain things for which I would never rely on these models and there are other things that I would. That is where the expert judgment comes in. You have to look at a model and ask yourself, “Is it appropriate to the question that I am asking with it?” If you wanted me to use one of these models to predict whether there is a white Christmas in 2030, it wouldn’t work, but that doesn’t mean that the model is useless for giving us the big picture estimates of what warming we should expect over the coming century. There is no mechanical process for taking a set of model results and turning a handle and getting a set of answers out, and I suspect there is not a mechanical process like that in the economy either.
Q14 Mr Lilley: You are certainly right there. I understand they revert to using the model estimates after 2035 or whatever it is, so there is no fudging in judgment. The model is assumed to be right in the longer-term future but wrong in the near-term future.
Professor Allen: No, the models are not assumed to be right. What happens is, in the longer term, the lines of evidence coincide sufficiently well that we are able to say there is no evidence for the models being either an overestimate or underestimate and the 5% to 95% model range—so most of the models—are assigned only as a likely outcome. You say the models are assumed to be right, but that is incorrect. Explicitly in the Summary for Policymakers we say there is a one in three chance of the real world lying outside that model range; whereas, if we just took the model range at face value, we would say that was only a one in 10 chance. In the longer term as well we are not just relying on the model ensemble. We are using it as one of the lines of evidence that is fed into the assessment.
Dr Stott: That is right, and that is also the point I was trying to make earlier. The overall assessment of the transient climate response between 1ºC to 2.5ºC, bringing in our information from the recent observations as well, is very consistent with the overall 5% to 95% range of the CMIP5 models, which is from 1.2ºC to 2.4ºC. You can see how there is consistency of evidence there.
It seems strange for a “sceptic” to present a question as a statement of fact without taking into consideration the answer to the question.
I wrote a post, discuccsing your dispute with CC, but which also quotes one of your comments above. You may be interested: http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2014/02/07/bloggers-behaving-badly/
This will probably be a drive-by because I don’t think there’s any chance of having an intelligent discussion here based on what I’ve read up until now. So I’ll make this rather brief and concentrate on just two points – neither the most important nor illustrative – but very easy to verify and understand.
“Instead, we have a group of public sector employees claiming their assertions are “science” …”
1) The IPCC reports are the product of thousands of scientists – most of whom volunteer their time.
2) Their individual employers run the gamut from government agencies to public universities to private universities to private research organizations and think tanks.
Perhaps this is just due to ignorance. In the United States (for instance) universities can be public or private. Many of the leading universities in the USA are private (Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Duke, MIT, Northwestern, etc.). Regardless, the assertion that the scientists that have contributed to the IPCC reports (or the scientific papers they cite) are all public sector employees is just factually wrong. No room for interpretation. No room for argument. Just wrong.
Not only aren’t they all public sector employees, even those that are employed by government agencies or universities *volunteer* their time to work on IPCC reports. There are only a handful that are actually employed to specifically work on IPCC matters. In 2011 WGI had nine staff, employed by the University of Bern, Switzerland. WGII had 16 staff employed by the Carnegie Institute for Science in Stanford, USA. WGIII had 20 staff members, employed by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany.
So, rather than “a group of public sector employees” it would be far more accurate to have written “a group of public/private volunteers.” Of course that would only serve the interest of being accurate and wouldn’t serve your polemic, but from my cursory reading of your blog it’s all about polemic and very little truth.
Have a good day.
Kevin, thanks for the comment.
By “public sector” one would have to include most NGOs who rely heavily on government grants and wind companies or other renewables who get most of their money by dictate of government – although they are really scientists.
The only person I’ve seen who has looked at the background seemed to say that they were all public sector.
As I said, I can see little possibility of a rational discussion. I chose the example because it was so easy to understand and so easily verifiable.
Instead of admitting an error you build another one: Public sector has a definition. Private sector has a definition. NGOs are, by definition, “non-government” — and anyone working for an NGO would surely be surprised to find out they are “public employees.” Ditto for employees of Stanford, Harvard, Columbia, Cornell, MIT or many other private American universities.
It is impossible to have a discussion with someone who refuses to admit he is wrong about such a simple matter of fact. Might as well try to hold a serious conversation with someone that believes the moon is made of cheese.
Kevin, “The public sector refers to the part of the economy concerned with providing basic government services.” NGOs given government grants are given that grant to carry our a government service.
If all you are complaining about is the definition, then please read it as “government funded” or “non-commercial funded”.
“If all you are complaining …”
Excuse me, I’m not ‘complaining’ – I’m pointing out an error in your analysis. Employees of NGOs, private foundations, and private universities are NOT public employees. Even scientists that are public employees are (overwhelmingly) VOLUNTEERING their time – i.e., not acting in a capacity as a public employee. Your characterization is simply incorrect.
I can excuse ignorance – we’re all ignorant on various subjects – but you’ve been given enough information to clear up any initial ignorance – and yet you still refuse to acknowledge your error. As I initially said, this is easily understood and easily verified – no need to rely upon anyone’s research but your own.
The world is full of people who cannot objectively mark their own beliefs to market, you obviously fall into this category.
As far as I can see you just don’t like the definition I use – that’s your problem not mine.
I have been trying to compile and explain the development steps (and why) of the modern greenhouse effect “theory”. Some may find it useful…
http://www.globalwarmingskeptics.info/thread-2250.html
I may make a video out of it yet. To date I still can not fathom how the GEBs are compiled logically speaking. When I do I will be able to finish the piece, and then make a video.
Derek, a vast improvement over the last one you showed me. To be honest, the last one made me cringe and think “how can I explain this to him without upsetting him” … this one made me think: “hang on a minute, I need to have a closure look at this”.
You’ve largely fixed the problem with the “4 arrow” models by showing that more complicated models exist. However, now that you say there is double counting of the back radiation – I found this difficult to follow. It’s not really your fault – it just needs the various figures defined.
However, you’ve now got far too many diagrams. If it were a written article, you could e.g. move most of the 4arrow models to an appendix.
However, I’m intrigued to know where you are taking this. I’ve been thinking for a while that we should try to provide more core material – not to “disprove” the other side, but just to make some of the more complex areas understandable (and maybe occasionally highlighting a few defects)
So, I’d be interested to see a video – just explaining the various models – and perhaps not even saying anything controversial until toward the end.
Thank you Mike, very constructive comments. My main objective was to try to show how the model has been developed in response to the criticisms it has received over the years. If I have shown a path from BBC bitesize to GEB, then I have achieved something worthwhile of itself.
I agree too many diagrams, I could appendix / list other examples of each model type. As such, I am thinking aloud with the piece at present.
I think it may be worth giving examples of the main criticisms of types 2 and 3, better than I have. I have already collected some of Alan Siddons extremely easy to understand diagrams in this respect. The more complex models being a response to the criticisms the simpler models could not answer. So, it is difficult not to include the criticisms along the way so to speak.
“Double accounting” is probably not the right term, but, type 3 does have the atmosphere radiating 240W/m2 down, before it is warmed by Tg. It is interesting that no one else has said hold on, model 3 atmosphere on average 30C? That has been said of course, the answer is this model is an energy flow / flux not temperature. Which is a rather large difference to type 2 that is not usually realized or explained. Well, not in a way I have sense of so far.
I suspect, but have not done the maths yet, that the GEBs use a very similar method. When I can explain that, then I think we have a logical pathway that shows they are all the same model, as it has been developed.
In the end though, ALL the model types have failed, they are ALL unphysical, that is inescapable. If I can get that across that is my aim.
“You’ve largely fixed the problem with the “4 arrow” models by showing that more complicated models exist.”
Errr, they are all four arrow models. The four arrows are plainly visible in the center of NASA 2013 GEB. Yes / No ?
I’m sorry, looking at diagrams where arrows just disappear into nothing makes me cringe. No decent scientist would never produce a diagram where the flows do not match up any more than an accountant would produce accounts where the books do not add up.
It’s quite simple – if the flows do not add up, there should be a net heating component at that point and if the amount of heating is not shown then the diagram is wrong.
But then if they had the mindset where things had to be right – they’d never have got anywhere in climatology.
So, personally, I would start by producing a scientific diagram where flows actually match up (or more may be needed as they do appear to have classes) based on all daft one that don’t and then I’d show how each one differ.
But … then if I were doing that, I’d expect to get paid, so I’d want to know why these academics aren’t doing that job.
There is an alternate definition of ‘public employee’?
LOL.
Mark your beliefs to market. Look objectively at yourself. Why is an alternate definition needed or justified? Who will understand that your definition is different from that used by the rest of the world?
Essentially, when we meet someone that resorts to redefining words to mean only what they want them to mean – and not what everyone else understands them to mean – we call that person crazy, lying, or self-deluded.
Thanks for the comment, but I can’t see any substantial point that needs a reply.
Mike writes –
“But … then if I were doing that, I’d expect to get paid, so I’d want to know why these academics aren’t doing that job.”
Because it is NOT science….
May be I have illustrated my point.
Just about to do some GEBs maths at GWS forum…
Mike writes –
“So, personally, I would start by producing a scientific diagram where flows actually match up (or more may be needed as they do appear to have classes) based on all daft one that don’t and then I’d show how each one differ.”
A thermodynamics approach? Joe Postma?
Not so much thermodynamics, as simply having diagrams where flows don’t sink or source from where they shouldn’t.
So, e.g. if heat goes into the atmosphere – then it must also exit by the same amount – unless you are trying to suggest the atmosphere is warming up, which is not what they are doing.
In model types 3 and 4 it is energy flow or fluxes not heat. Different thing as such. Yes, model 2 was all about heat, that was the big change from type 2 to types 3 and 4.
Yes, they are also supposed to be portraying a steady state, that is in fact, obviously not a steady state.
Reality is all about grey bodies and thermodynamics….. Not mathematical constructs, of unphysical assumptions, portrayed as a steady state, consisting of only black bodies, which IS what they ARE doing. ie, all versions of GH “theory” to date, whether they be heat or energy flow based.
Why is an alternate definition needed or justified? Who will understand that your definition is different from that used by the rest of the world?
“Thanks for the comment, but I can’t see any substantial point that needs a reply.
Have you redefined ‘substantial’ as well?