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The Forum > Article Comments > Countering a climate of scepticism > Comments

Countering a climate of scepticism : Comments

By Roger Jones, published 4/8/2008

The evidence and reviews support the case for global warming.

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Here we have one Roger Jones, a CSIRO principal research scientist putting up his holier than thou, pseudo-science arguments against what he calls "the denial community". Cripes, the CSIRO's reputation was once highly respected in the Australian community for many decades but that is certainly not the case anymore as all i see are these red flags.

Jones here just argues about his short term temperatures and these pious unseen models that cannot be challenged. At no stage has he proved beyond doubt that our human CO2 emissions are the culprit for a gentle natural warming in the Northern Hemisphere. In fact he has not even mentioned this all important basis of evidence. Is this just climateering using suggestion and innuendo? i.e. Take some limited knowledge, mix it with the prevailing thought matrix of the end is near, and voila! you have another scientist jumping to a conclusion that the facts are quite dispensable.

The will to look at broader, alternative views and do proper science is always going to be missing with likes of this Jones boy because in many ways, his livelihood and their organization’s budget depend on the hype. We all wondered where this naive, Federal Minister, Penny Wong, repeatedly came to say that 12 of the last 13 years are the hottest in history. Well let's just say history in these tiny holy minds would in fact be only 13 years at best. lol
Posted by Keiran, Monday, 4 August 2008 5:00:09 PM
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Good piece Roger Jones, it's sad to see OLO become a cesspool for right wingers, What's next anti-Aids and anti-evolution. By then it will be a short hop to racist and sexism. It’s always the same with conservative websites, the nutters always take over. Believe what you want to believe the rest of us will get on with it, what the saying reality has a leftwing bias.
Posted by Kenny, Monday, 4 August 2008 6:09:09 PM
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It seems to me that the whole debate has been hijacked by semantics, word games and ‘my scientist is hairier than yours.”

Start with the known symptoms
- melting artic,
-melting glaciers
-whole forests dying in Europe because of vehicle fumes,
-fauna ranges changing and the highest species dying out.
-Ocean acidification
-whole river systems collapsing
et sec.
How many more bell weather event do you want before you agree something bad is happening?
Given that
-Business is about PROFIT not social security, environment or world peace.
-tax doesn't work (eg tobacco, booze)
-Government are about people not business profits
-Business needs direction and clear guidelines
-No scientific theory or proposed long-term prognostication is without critics eg evolution has its unscientific critics 'intelligent design'.

Now chest beating aside, global climate Change sceptics....What is your alternative scientific explanation for these associated fact? Then what do you see is the LOGICAL OUTCOME of these factors? What is your scientifically peer reviewed facts backing your explanation? So far the latter is non existent, unscientific or not peer reviewed.
"She'll be right" isn't logically sustainable. At least we need action now, long term planning and Harm Minimumization strategies.
Tell everyone what DO YOU PROPOSE we DO? What if YOU'RE wrong?
One rule. No attacks just facts.
Posted by examinator, Monday, 4 August 2008 6:13:20 PM
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This is the saddest set of comments I've yet seen on OLO. It seems that the AGW debate has now descended into a series of set positions and proponents of one or the other position now hurl insults at each other. I'm not a scientist - History and English Literature are my majors and History is my real passion. So when I look at this debate, I'm inclined to these very tentative conclusions:
the outliers - either aggressive global warming or a new Ice Age are unlikely to be realised;some moderate warming or cooling is likely to occur;in either case, precipitate action which increases taxes - directly or in some disguise called an Emissions Trading Scheme - is unlikely to do anything constructive and will increase the size of government. We are 'nannied' enough without being panicked into giving government more reasons to intervene in our lives.
Posted by Senior Victorian, Monday, 4 August 2008 6:55:50 PM
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If you want to see what active climate scientist are saying, go and read the free abstracts in a peer-reviewed climate science journal such as "Climatic Change":

http://www.springerlink.com/content/100247/?Content+Status=Accepted

They have all (that I can see) accepted that climate change is happening, and that it is human-caused.

Now if you don't believe in the scientific method, that's your prerogative, but most people would have to agree that its has been very effective knowledge tool so far. There is no sign that I have seen that science is general falling into disrepair. Quite the contrary - the rate of scientific discover and validation is increasing at an astounding rate.

While it is true to say that science never "proves" (in the formal logic sense) anything, because everything is a theory, at this point it is almost as misleading to use that as a reason to stall action on climate change as it is to stop launching satellites because science can't "prove" that the earth isn't flat.

Another nice tool of science is Occam's razor - should you just believe what the vast majority of climate scientists are saying, or should you believe some elaborate theories about CSIRO and almost every member of the global climate scientist collective are colluding on an elaborate scam to screw governments out of money (because we all know being a scientist is the road to being a millionaire :-) ).

At this point, the deniers generally pull of one or more names of the handful of climate scientists who are sceptics. Or they mention a bunch of other "scientists" who turn out to be TV weathermen, computer programmers, or retired coal chemists. Or they point to blogs and website with deceptive names that pretend to be science organisations or big "institutions".

Don't be fooled: if you want a representative sample of authentic, relevant and well-informed scientific opinion, see for yourself in the peer-reviewed climate science journals.
Posted by Sams, Monday, 4 August 2008 8:04:02 PM
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A peer reviewed scientist stands with the weight of the scientific community, and makes considered statements using the available scientific evidence.

In response, a legion of unqualified commentators, lobbyists and irate cranks espouse their anti-global warming view.

Granted, a rare handful in the scientific community stand by them. I'd agree their voices are valid.

Though, the vast majority of the scientific establishment support global warming, and are willing to submit to the onerous process of getting peer-reviewed papers out there.

No doubt those opposing it would accuse this proper peer reviewing process as some kind of conspiratorial method to block their cause, when in actuality it's designed to weed out shoddy science.

Though that same conspiratorial mentality is required for all kinds of things, ranging from 9-11 conspiracy theorists right through to the Roswell loopiness.

I ain't a scientist, though I like to do a little of my own research and evaluation - and it's more along the lines of assessing who is credible and who isn't.

In this case, it's easy.
Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Monday, 4 August 2008 8:51:16 PM
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