Indyvidual,

You just illustrated my point perfectly. I gave you multiple links to long-term survey data from AIMS, GBRMPA, CSIRO, and peer-reviewed coral studies. Instead of engaging with any of it, you waved it all away as “funding chasing” and went back to your anecdotes.

You’re not interested in evidence, only protecting a worldview and an identity.

The difference is this: your “real life observations” are a handful of fishing trips; the AIMS Long Term Monitoring Program is 30+ years of systematic surveys across hundreds of reef sites. If you want to claim the entire 2300km reef is being “hammered” primarily by recreational fishing, then the burden is on you to show data that scales beyond personal impressions.

Until you do, it’s anecdotes versus decades of measured evidence.
___

Mikko2,

Your “DOE report” isn’t the smoking gun you think it is. Within days of release, climate scientists - including some cited in it - accused the authors of misrepresenting their work and recycling claims that have already been debunked.

The US National Academies of Science are now preparing a formal rebuttal, because the report was so politically skewed it’s sparked emergency review.
That’s the difference between cherry-picked contrarian documents and the actual scientific consensus: the latter emerges from thousands of peer-reviewed studies across independent teams worldwide.

That’s why the world’s major academies and agencies - from NASA and NOAA to CSIRO and GBRMPA - line up on the same conclusion: rising greenhouse gases are the main driver of recent warming, and marine heatwaves are the primary stressor behind mass bleaching.
Renewables aren’t perfect, but pretending they’re worse than fossil fuels for ecosystems is fantasy.

Coral doesn’t bleach from solar panels, it bleaches when the ocean hits 30°C for weeks at a time.

Here we go again - from John D after he waves off the latest climate report from five highly experienced scientists not reliant on government funding, he adds: "Coral doesn’t bleach from solar panels, it bleaches when the ocean hits 30°C for weeks at a time."
But he neglects to add that they frequently recover or that higher water temperatures are more likely caused by deep sea vents and under sea volcanoes than from temperatures above the sea.
(Just try heating your winter bath water from a wall mounted radiant heater and keep the deodorant handy. It won't happen).
As for scientific studies, here is the actual detailed report as referenced in my original article from the very experienced Dr Peter Ridd, who has more than 100 published documents to his credit.
https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2023/09/Ridd-State-of-Coral-Reefs.pdf#:~:text=About%20the%20author,over%20100%20scientific%20publications.
And yes, it's "peer reviewed"

That’s not a peer-reviewed paper, Mikko2.

“Peer review” doesn’t mean “a few mates had a look and agreed with me.” It means a manuscript is submitted to a scholarly journal, handled by an editor, and assessed by independent, anonymous experts who can demand revisions or reject it outright. The end result carries a journal name, volume/issue, DOI, and documented methods/data so others can replicate or test the claims.

Ridd’s State of the Coral Reefs ticks none of those boxes.

It was published by the GWPF - a political lobby group. They like to boast their reports are “peer reviewed,” but what they really mean is in-house approval by sympathetic reviewers. That’s editorial endorsement, not scientific scrutiny. No editor, no referee reports, no DOI, no indexing in Scopus or Web of Science, no obligation to meet disciplinary standards.

Waving around “100 publications” doesn’t turn a think-tank pamphlet into peer-reviewed science. Past credentials don’t launder the fact that this particular piece was never subjected to the checks that separate science from advocacy. That’s an argument from authority, not evidence.

If you still insist it’s peer-reviewed, then produce the five basics every real paper has:

1. Journal name and publisher
2. Volume/issue/pages (or “in press” status)
3. DOI
4. Date of acceptance after peer review
5. Data/methods supplement

If you can’t, then it isn’t peer-reviewed. Full stop.

And while we’re at it... deep-sea vents? They exist, but they don’t explain the sustained rise in ocean heat content measured globally. Thousands of Argo floats and satellites show basin-wide warming. Volcanoes are local and episodic; they don’t drive a planetary trend. Hand-waving them as the “real” cause is about as serious as your bath-heater analogy.

So yes, by all means, treat the GWPF report as an opinion essay. But presenting it as peer-reviewed marine science is like presenting a party pamphlet as a PhD thesis. The difference isn’t semantic. It’s what separates science from spin.

How can you be writing entire articles on scientific matters and not know what peer review is?

JD I slipped "peer review in" to bait you and you took it hook line and sinker! You pontificate about peer review as being an absolute guarantee of authenticity when it can so easily be faked as an infamous piece on the sex life of dogs illustrated:
AI Overview
A hoax involving fabricated academic papers, including one on dog sex life, was successfully published in several journals. These papers, submitted by a group of academics, were accepted and published after passing through the peer-review process. The "New Real Peer Review" Twitter account highlighted the absurdity of the research, leading to media scrutiny and the eventual suspension of the project. The incident exposed weaknesses in the peer-review system and prompted criticism of journal editors and peer reviewers. One paper, for example, questioned whether dog humping could be considered rape, acknowledging the author's limitations in understanding canine behavior.
I'll back Peter Ridd's experience and knowledge of the GBR any day but enjoy your own delusions.

Well, it didn’t work very well then, Mikko2:

//JD I slipped "peer review in" to bait you...//

You've just admitted the report isn’t peer-reviewed, dodged the substance, and tried to spin it as a “gotcha.” That’s not debate, that’s bad faith.

No hook, no line, no sinker.

Hoax papers slipping through weak journals don’t erase the difference between science and a lobby pamphlet. They get exposed precisely because peer review leaves a paper trail. By your logic, because counterfeit money exists, we should treat Monopoly notes as legal tender.

And once again you retreat to Ridd’s “experience.” But science isn’t a priesthood where past credentials sanctify new claims. If his ideas hold up, he can publish them like everyone else. The fact that he doesn’t tells you more than his CV ever could.

All your “bait” did was confirm what I've said from the start.

JD, you've swallowed the woke bait and Ridd's article clearly explains the reality that climate catastrophists will never accept about the Great Barrier Reef's resilience and the clear fact it is not dying.
Some more reality:
. There is no climate emergency, as numerous independent scientists have frequently explained;
. We are not having the very warm winter which "experts" predicted before consistent heavy snow falls even as far north as the Granite Belt in recent weeks;
. We could do with some "global warming" to save on exorbitant power bills thanks to Labor's destructive, inefficient energy policies;
. If CO2 really was responsible for warming, we could also do with some more modern, efficient coal fired power stations such as China and India are constructing at a great rate;
. But of course we realise that the "experts" changed the name from global warming to "climate change" to cover all odds - too hot, too cold, too dry, too wet; too windy, no wind, naturally it's all down to "climate change" (for the gullible and those with their hands out for more $ billions in government funding).

Short-life unreliable "renewables" will help control climate and protect the Reef about as much as King Canute's sword stopped the tide when he commanded it not to rise. He actually realised that was not possible too and he did it to convince sycophant followers that he was just a man, not a god.
'Bye. Fire up the heaters.