A former CSIRO climate scientist, and now head of a new sustainability institute at Monash University, Graeme Pearman, said Professor Carter was not a credible source on climate change. "If he has any evidence that [global warming over the past 100 years] is a natural variability he should publish through the peer review process," Dr Pearman said. "That is what the rest of us have to do." He said he was letting the fossil fuel industry off the hook.

As far as I'm concerned, the challenge to Bob still stands and he has failed to do this, which makes his, and the previously commentator's triumphalism patently absurd. If he is so certain, why hasn't he published anything substantial in the relevant climate change journals, which is open to him as a serious scientist? The fact is, his expertise is in stratigraphy not climate change, which is more of a passion project for him, motivated most likely by his position as a research committee member for the Institute for Public Affairs. In that sense his description is misleading as it should reflect that he has an association with IPA, is retired from James Cook, and has expertise marine geology, not climate science.

And btw - shouldn't there anyway by some kind of quota for how many IPA articles are admitted per week, or is OnlineOpinion going act as a platform for every single talking point and release? No other think tank gets this royal treatment.

What an unseemly feeding frenzy from the 'business as usual' climate change demialists! I imagine they'll be even noisier when both global warming and Peak Oil start to really bite not too far into the future.

Well said pelican, countryboy and especially BBoy and rstuart.

Carter should indeed submit his scribblings about climate change to peer review. One wonders why he doesn't.

And why so many IPA articles (acknowledging, of course David Sukuki's much better article also published today)?

Bob Carter has a bit of a history of being a dissenter on the matter of climate change. That's fair enough, science always does well to have to confront politically-motivated flat-earthers... If only to show how many mistakes they can make as a result of their motivation.

http://timlambert.org/category/science/bobcarter/

I think there should be a "Lysenko Award", and Bob Carter should be the 2008 recipient.

Gee I'm gullible, I believed SusanP when she told me that OLO practices a balanced approach towards topical issues and then this load of tripe is published alongside an article presented by a real scientist who has been studying the environment for decades.

For shame OLO.

Country boy

Dont be so naive. They did it because thats the way it was set up by their political masters with the Framework Conventions rules.The fact that there is co2 induced AGW was a given,the same way Garnaut has to take it as a given even now. You might like to ask him why does he just accept it as given as well.

There is a myriad of examples throughout history where similar circumstances have arisen. I am not saying there is any moral equivalence at all, but Nazi Germany would be an evocative example.

If that can happen then this is a doddle.

Like I said, get onto a web site and find the audio for David Hendersons speech, then you will comprehend why it is the way it is.

If I can find I will put it up here in next 24 hours.

BTW competent people who understand systems theory would appreciate that a badly defined problem will induce poor solutions, which will almost certainly have un intended consequences.

bigmal: "There is a myriad of examples throughout history where similar circumstances have arisen. I am not saying there is any moral equivalence at all, but Nazi Germany would be an evocative example."

Oh goody - can I invoke Godwin's Law now? [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law ] I think that's a record... even for an IPA article ;)

Lev: "Lysenko Award" - I love it!