Ho Hum: "...has anyone ever noticed that most of the so called "conservative" writers on this forum are affiliated either directly or indirectly with the IPA. I think Richard Castles is."

Kang: "Thanks Ho Hum - while reading the piece by "Melbourne writer" Richard Castles, I immediately wondered about his affiliations. IPA again, eh? aren't the mining companies big donors to IPA?"

Johnj: "Unwittingly, Richard Castles demonstrates exacly the kind of fundamentalism that the IPA is noted for."

Beautiful! Rumour to fact in two steps. Sorry to put an end to your Chinese Whispers, but I am not affiliated with the IPA.

Does this article debate whether climate change is real, or that it may/may not be anthropocentric? A serious appraisal of the Stern report or part of a right-wing echo chamber?

The first two paragraphs describe the perils of absolutism; the author then gracefully trips into the hole.

“Time and again we read that the debate is over, “climate change just is”, and denialists should get their heads out of the sand. “ There is general consensus among the overwhelming majority of scientists that there is a warming of the climate. The amount of anecdotal evidence alone is difficult to ignore (thanks Kang, and others); the article quoted by the author even confirms it. How many different interpretations of “temperature rise” are possible? Is the author saying there has been no change? Or that it has stopped? Or only that we haven’t agreed on the significance? Well, none of these. All we get is muddied water.

“Left-leaning environmentalists, schooled in cultural relativism” - 1…2….no, 3 red flags knitted into one phrase! Oh this article is beautifully crafted. How about just ‘environmentalists’? Are all environmentalists left-leaning? I didn’t realise a leftist bent went hand in hand with a concern for the grandkids.

Indeed, “a devastating lack of resistance to persuasion and unquestioning acceptance of authority” can be characterised as more a condition of the right. (The left simply lacks the moral clarity.)

DB, science is indeed objective. Many of its practitioners are not. It’s a tool, a technique, a methodology, and the only reason we now have a natural explanation for rainbows. ;)

And ulcers, of course.

It is true that “history is populated with figures who remained resistant to universally accepted truths and subsequently revolutionised our thinking.” Perhaps we should all view climate change with the same detached interest we give to stomach bugs.

Or perhaps we shouldn’t

cont…

“Denial, as a pop-psychological term, is bandied about too readily these days, especially when it relates to future uncertainties, not past occurrences” What’s the drought? A figment of my imagination? Not just in Australia either. Think Africa. Think England.

Matt, Nostradamus’ writings have as many interpretations as do the gospels. Interpret them at your peril. A ‘green’ - I assume you mean conservationist - just has to look out the window at the smog, the drought, the diminishing fish stocks, the salinity, the rising or toxic water table, the growing list of extinct species…and that’s just Australia. You get the point. Or maybe, when you look out your window, you see something else. The cost of doing business?

“Our most firmly established scientific theories undergo years of rigorous testing before they are welcomed into the category of accepted fact, and even then remain open to challenge. Yet reports such as Stern's are widely taken as gospel…”
umm, Richard, the Stern report was conducted by an economist and not at atmospheric scientist. The science on which it is based is not Stern’s, though it has been around for a while. Refute the economic predictions at your leisure.

Whether or not it provides a viable response to climate change, the scientific predictions will only tend to reinforce one’s predisposition. I’m usually loathe to attack the messenger but this analysis includes so much dross it’s impossible not to ponder its origins. Nigel Lawson, whom the author quotes, is merely a mouthpiece for a Thatcherite organisation that “champions economic liberalism and has played a global role in the dissemination of free market economics” - in short, a rightwing thinktank. The main source of the reference article is Peter Berger, a theologist who champions the Bush agenda.

So much for objectivity. Thanks for your effort, Richard.

I agree with bennie. So every climate change 'beleiver' is a left-leaning environmentalist/fundamentalist and the rest of us have the wool pulled over our eyes while we label anyone who disagrees with us a 'denialist'? Hmmmm... is the author trying to suggest the emergence of a climate-change cult? If he is, I think many of the people posting in this forum would agree with him. The thing is, climate-change isn't an ideology or a religion for people to buy into or deny, it is a fact or as close to a sure thing as you can get.(and no, I have not been brainwashed by scientists and world leaders).

If such questioning attitudes had prevailed over the recent Iraqi venture!

I guess the interests of those who wanted war would be ill served by scepticism better war patriotism terror laws and those who would lead, leading.

Why was not such scepticism operative? Because people have naturally inclined views reinforced by a Media at the service of those who would have war! (or something else)

A way out?

I may be wrong but Amory Lovins suggested and demonstrated that energy efficiency was profitable, that working with, rather than against natural forces was productive at lesser GHG cost. Check out what he demonstrates not that he is a lone just the one who first pushed t energy efficiency in recent times when such had been ignored.

Would this approach widely applied reduce base load needs to acceptable GHG costs, especially if one improved transport efficiency even subsidising the purchase of superior vehicles? Even perhaps teaching planners to make work and sleep areas near each other linked by a transit system and residents Media advised that experiencing holidays, nature football matches (or Cricket if that is your twist) etc can be done mostly via the electronic age. Even Cyber sex is fun I am told though anathema to Church and Right wing.

No we must have our leaders and show how big we are by trashing Iraq and the U.N.
Lucky we are not paedophiles or the media would be in the money, as it is, just international law. Media distorted to the ends of those who would rule.

After all the climate lobby has been more dishonest than any argument I see voiced here, honest only as the voice of vested interest using tried and tested ways of propaganda.

Please you mathematically inclined calculate the reduction of GHG if all building made energy neutral and transport made twice as efficient either by avoided use or use of energy efficient transport.

We may not need a fundamentalist or relative view of climate. Perhaps even find that missing cause of climate change so obvious to the informed or opinionated.

well said bennie.