Geez you tie yourself up in knots trying to prove whatever you don't like is irrational Hume. Following the most likely interpretation of data is not irrational.

I would like to address one statement of yours because it's been niggling at me and you repeated the example it in your last post:
"For example, one of the common ploys I have seen over and over again in the so-called professional science is, faced with a data set in the shape of a cloud, to draw a regression line through it, trending *up*. The same degree of arbitrary licence could obviously produce a line trending down. It is nonsense to rest your case on the assertion that such facile and biased INTERPRETATIONS are “science”, and to ignore even considering the possibility that the interpretive discretion is being affected by *non*-scientific orthodoxy and vested interests. "

This is complete BS, as an example I would agree, but I don't see anything like this in the reviewed literature. They even have a well established method of statistics dealing with this sort of data interpretation and how confident one can be with any sort of 'trend line' drawn through it. I would like to see an actual example of what you are talking about here. That is, arbitrary trend lines in 'clouds' of data points. Please post some links, you state that this is a common occurrence, so it shouldn't be too difficult for you.

Steven, you put in a lot of work to give a backdrop to your criticism of Ian Plimer, who has done so much to expose the truth about AGW.

I saw the program where he was ambushed on the volcano question.

When assertions were made about glaciers, by the IPCC, it turned out, after investigation, that there was not sufficient known about glaciers to make the assertion that they were retreating. Many, in fact, are advancing, and there are thousands of which we know nothing.

When sufficient examination of volcanoes has been made, we will see whether Plimer is right. It is a minor point in any event. The main points, which no one in their criticism of Plimer has addressed, are that CO2 has not been shown to cause warming, and human emissions have not been shown to have any measurable effect on climate.

Harold Lewis was a respected member of the American Physical Society, which, like the Royal Society and other prestigious bodies, made statements about AGW which are not backed by science. In his resignation, from the APS, he said, of the current problem with science:

It is of course, the global warming scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist. Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.) I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.

We need to know why there is such support for dishonesty in the AGW camp, and why they accept the lead of the IPCC, its refusal to follow proper scientific procedures, and its constant dishonesty.

Steven Meyer

Re Plimer. In a book of thousands of facts some AGW proponents have disputed a small number of Plimer's assertions. The one you mention is about CO2 and volcanoes. Plimer, from memory, is making the point that over time, volcanoes have contributed far more CO2 than humans. Many 'experts' misinterpreted his statement as meaning CO2 per year at present.

It is obvious that volcanoes have put far more CO2 into the atmosphere over millions of years than humans have in the last 150 years. I think its clear some have misinterpreted this statement of Plimers and I think you have simply repeated their words.

No, it doesn't make me 'feel better' as you put it that some unnamed collaegues of his didn't like the book either. It would put my mind to rest though, if scientists dropped the idea of chasing funding by supporting current ideology and used dispassionate logic like they were required to in the past.

I provided you with a list of logical reasons why I doubt the validity and integrity of AGW science as you requested in your article.

Bugsy

“you tie yourself up in knots trying to prove whatever you don't like is irrational Hume.”

Ad hominem, evasion, mind-reading.

“Following the most likely interpretation of data is not irrational.”

That assumes that the most likely interpretation of data is that it shows warming. But that’s what’s in issue. So you’ve assumed what’s in issue, which is circular, which is fallacious, which is irrational.

So I’m not going to wade through a tide of evasions, ad hominem, and circular argument in order to continue the discussion, showing you rational refutations, and receiving only fallacies in reply.

The very fact that you rely on these invalid forms of argument, means you’ve lost the argument.

For us to have a rational discussion, you either need to concede what you can’t defend, or defend it.

Please admit that:
1. You just assumed what is in issue and that this is irrational and unscientific
2. Appeal to absent authority is a fallacy
3. Steven’s argument as to the distinction between professional/amateur involves that fallacy
4. A valid disproof by an amateur is no less a disproof for it being done by an amateur
5. Science does not supply value judgments
6. Even if there were no issue as to climate science, it would not provide justification for policy action on global warming
7. For policy action on global warming to be justified requires knowledge of the upsides and downsides and that government is incapable of such knowledge
8. Government is also incapable of taking into account all relevant values in deciding on policy action and is therefore incapable of justifying policy action.

When you’ve done what you should have done already to show that are not careless of the principles of reason, I’ll go to the trouble of looking up the later and subsidiary point about statistics that you are attempting to divert the discussion to.

No links, no surprise.

No rational argument, no surprise.

If you won't join issue on my earlier questions which go to the essence of the entire matter, and which don't require you to chase down anything but only answer, why should I be bothered chasing down your later query on a subsidiary point which of itself is not capable either of proving or disproving what you or I are contending for.

Thus Bugsy's argument only resolves to ad hominem, ho hum.