Climate change could potentially have a far larger impact on society than Y2K ever would. Even if us Y2K “experts” were wrong and we hadn’t adequately addressed the issue the worst that was likely to happen was a few program crashes with loss of some services but minimal impact on society.
Where the Y2K analogy works is that both experts (Y2K and climate scientists) were (are) calling for remedial action. If we had been ignored in the 1980s and 90s Y2K might have been very serious indeed. It was that remedial work over a decade or more that made it no longer a serious problem. I realise that the cost of the climate change remedial work will be orders of magnitude higher than for Y2K. But the potential cost of the outcome is also orders of magnitude higher for climate change. We have to decide if it is worth the risk – either way.

It's not clear to me just where Mark Curmudgeon is going, but I certainly blame the media, him included, for a large part of the climate confusion in the Australian community. Firstly, as others have pointed out, there are the rabid commentators like Bolt, Jones, Akerman, with zero climate credibility and a following apparently based on their sheer nastiness.

Secondly, there are the hostile but slightly better-informed journalists such as Lawson himself, who have been keeping up a steady pressure of disinformation, attempting to discredit the climate researchers who have been studying the subject for decades - notably in Australia, where climate is so important to our rural industries. (Remember for example Dr Graeme Pearman using QANTAS pilots to collect upper-air samples of CO2 - in the 1970s.)

And thirdly, there are the editors, who either think that controversy sells papers, or (wrongly but more honourably) seem to believe that "balance" means opposing each scientist with an equal and opposite denialist, despite any difference in the merits of their argument.

Media madness indeed.

Mark Lawson here.
rstuart and nicco - fellas, you've completely missed the point of the article. The confusion is there because the subject is confused, and the media simply reflects that. The media is not there to report a single viewpoint, whether its yours or a "consensus" of experts. There are those who would accord climate theory the same status as Newtonian mechanics, Relativity or Quantum Dynamics - that is, no room for arguement - which is absurd. The theory has no track record of any kind.

Sarian - another silly, abusive post with wild-eyed, invented nonsense, namely "It is a proven fact that companies such as Exxon are paying large dollars to any authors that manage to get articles published that refute global warming." This is straight out of green activist imaginations. Stop abusing and start debating.

Martin N - while I accept that you do have some expertise in IT, I also have distinct recollections of the Y2K "crisis" from the media's point of view - and it bears alarming similarities to climate change. But, in any case, you still have the problem of whether the opinion of experts is useful when dealing with an unproven forecasting system. This point has been measured and assessed several times in the past few decades. The Dan Gardner book I cite in the article refers to a large scale project where the forecasts of experts of all types are assessed against reality. Sorry, they are no better than laymen, and the results of those trials are always the same.
The question you need to ask your self is no what the experts say - its irrelevent - but what track record does the forecasting system have? For the climate models the answer is none, or highly questionable at best. So why are we paying any attention at all to these forecasts?

Mark,

I agree and evidence the psychological methods being used by proponents of AGW debate, some of these are mentioned in the following post and the full analysis has been discussed OLO previously.

Posted by spindoc, Sunday, 5 June 2011 9:16:10 AM

I hotly contest that the MSM are not at fault, unless you believe that both sides of the debate have received a full airing. But to show that we would need to see the media covering the thousands of papers critical of the data, methods, people and modeling that we now accept as settled science, consensus and peer reviewed proof. We know that none of this are either true or possible.

The MSM are part of the “advocacy block” with few exceptions. An entity relationship analysis clearly highlights the composition of the organic advocacy block which comprises informal political advocacy, media advocacy, academia, advocacy science, celebrity advocacy, public advocacy, commercial opportunist advocacy and NGO advocacy.

The media is fully aware of its role in this phenomenon, how can it not be when it publishes the very psychological methods to which you refer? The media has the potential to bring down the “house of carbon” in a matter of weeks and, collectively it knows this.

You can’t on the one hand say we recognize the psychological trickery, whilst on the other claim no fault in publishing it. Unless of course acknowledging that the media is also captive to that trickery.

I recently posted a summary of the research published by Armstrong/Green in relation to “Public Alarm Phenomena”, of which Y2K was one of 26 identified.

Posted by spindoc, Tuesday, 7 June 2011 11:10:26 AM

I have long suspected that the inevitable decay in the AGW phenomena will see many advocates seeking a bob each way or an exit plan and there is evidence of this happening, even amongst IPCC scientists. The media has been “had” along with many high profile advocates.

Everything that is needed to recognize the con is out there and I cannot accept that media professionals are unaware of it, that’s just impossible.

Mark Lawson/Curmudgeon
You may not have personally received funds from Exxon-Mobil to sprout your sceptical/denialist views but there is plenty of evidence that others have received funds from them.
As for forecasts, if a graph is going up and you know what the rate of increase is, you can make pretty good forecasts. The issue with climate science is, of course, that these graphs are not necessarily linear, so in one sense you're right. Arrival at a tipping point may make the graph change from its linear direction, for instance, once the Arctic region reaches a certain temperature, methane will be released from the tundra causing temperature to increase at an even faster rate and the temperature graph will curve upwards. But the uncertainty of these forecasts is no reason for complacency, indeed, the very opposite. We should be adopting the precautionary principle and acting to mitigate climate change as a matter of urgency.

Mark Lawson/Curmudgeon
Further to my previous post, I just came upon this:http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090610154453.htm
which shows that carbon emissions are linked to global warming in a simple linear relationship. That being the case, you can make forecasts.
But to back up what I also said about tipping points and the graph going non-linear, we can look to what happened 55.9 million years ago: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110607121525htm
This is about the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum where temperatures were five degrees warmer "initially triggered by an event such as the baking of organic-rich sediments by igneous activity that released the potent greenhouse gas, methane. This initial temperature increase warmed ocean bottom waters which allowed the break down of gas hydrates (clathrates), which are found under deep ocean sediments: this would have greatly amplified the initial warming by releasing even more vast volumes of methane." Methane is a potent greenhouse gas that oxidises in air to become carbon dioxide, a less potent but longer living greenhouse gas.
Whether we cause tundra methane or deep sea methane to be released, it will lead to runaway warming, and that we must avoid at all costs.