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Post by marchesarosa on Jan 2, 2012 13:05:38 GMT 1
Video of the December 15, 2011 climate science hearing before the Canadian Senate Standing Committee on Energy, Environment and Natural Resources
Prof Ross McKitrick of Guelph University is the first "contrarian" climate expert to speak, followed by Prof Ian Clark, then Prof Jan Veizer, then Prof Tim Patterson. Questioning of the experts by the senators begins about 55 mins.
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Post by marchesarosa on Jan 2, 2012 13:38:47 GMT 1
Thanks, Canada, for leading the way to a rational debate.
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Post by nickrr on Jan 2, 2012 15:25:18 GMT 1
Yeah, right. Three geologists and an economist. Who better to advise on climate change!
There's a lot of rubbish in here but I'll just focus on one point made by the second speaker. He used the argument that during ice ages CO2 rise follows the temperature rise, therefore CO2 isn't acting as a greenhouse gas. This is one of those signature arguments that shows that the person using it is either ignorant or dishonest. This is a non-argument in relation to climate change. This phenomenon is well understood and quite consistent with current theories of climate change.
It's sad that such pathetic and irrelevant arguments can be presented at this level. From the parts I watched there was plenty more like this.
I can only assume that the Canadian government decided in advance what conclusion they wanted and chose the people to give evidence with this in mind. This presumably explains why they didn't have a climate scientist - too much danger of hearing the truth.
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Post by marchesarosa on Jan 3, 2012 9:36:19 GMT 1
The Canadian Senate apparently decided they had already heard enough of the "consensus" side of the so-called "science" of the IPCC and wanted to hear some alternative views, nickrr.
After all, as McKitrick stated, there is a lot of non-consensus work being done by academics of various disciplines in universities round the world. It is just not reported to the same extent as the "establishment" view, if I may describe it thus, in the mainstream media.
Contrarians are not the beleaguered minority some of you alarmist footsoldiers care to believe. And the study of climate, its impacts and our adaptation strategies is NOTHING if not multi-disciplinary. Perhaps the palaeodendroclimatologists could be pruned without being missed, but the economists and geologists, statisticians and solar physicists, oceanographers and atmospheric physicists? No way!
As another of the speakers stated, science is not a democracy, either. You are sounding ever more shrill, nickrr. What is wrong with open debate about opposing interpretations of the very limited observations we have to guide us? Only loons, these days, believe the science is settled. There is a sea-change in progress. Had you not noticed?
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Post by marchesarosa on Jan 3, 2012 16:14:05 GMT 1
Bertrand Russell in his 1928 Skeptical Essays, states:"There are matters about which those who have investigated them are agreed. There are other matters about which experts are not agreed. Even when experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. …. Nevertheless, the opinion of experts, when it is unanimous, must be accepted by non-experts as more likely to be right than the opposite opinion. The scepticism that I advocate amounts only to this: (1) that when the experts are agreed, the opposite opinion cannot be held to be certain; (2) that when they are not agreed, no opinion can be regarded as certain by a non-expert; and (3) that when they all hold that no sufficient grounds for a positive opinion exist, the ordinary man would do well to suspend his judgment."Judith Curry comment: Bertrand Russell’s statement to me defines rational skepticism. Political motivation for establishing a scientific consensus associated with a policy prescription, such as occurred in the context of the UNFCCC/IPCC, seems to me to provide grounds for non-experts to question the consensus. Put in this light, engaging in the climate blogosphere, challenging the consensus and demanding accountability is part of our individual attempts to draw our own intelligent conclusions and do so responsibly. It is interesting to see this perspective emerge from a catholibertarian. more here On the dangerous naivete of uncritical acceptance of scientific consensusjudithcurry.com/2012/01/02/on-the-dangerous-naivete-of-uncritical-acceptance-of-scientific-consensus/#more-6399
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Post by rsmith7 on Jan 3, 2012 17:04:22 GMT 1
Also you must entertain the possibility that "experts" are no such thing.
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Post by nickrr on Jan 3, 2012 20:03:42 GMT 1
There's nothing wrong with opposing interpretations if they are coherent contributions.
The problem with the arguments being put forward here is that they have been discredited years (if not decades) ago. This is stuff that any student of climate change 101 would laugh out of court and yet here they are being used to determine government policy.
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Post by nickrr on Jan 3, 2012 20:07:36 GMT 1
No problem with that.
However introducing arguments that anyone with even a passing acquaintance with the facts knows is rubbish is not rational, it's just dishonest.
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Post by nickrr on Jan 3, 2012 20:12:04 GMT 1
Of course, but when the majority of people who could be defined as experts in a field say the same thing the rational conclusion is that they are probably correct.
This conclusion is not by any means invalidated when you see a group of people who are patently not experts (e.g. a bunch of geologists pronouncing on climate change), particularly when they are clearly spouting nonsense.
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Post by rsmith7 on Jan 3, 2012 21:35:27 GMT 1
Of course, but when the majority of people who could be defined as experts in a field say the same thing the rational conclusion is that they are probably correct. This conclusion is not by any means invalidated when you see a group of people who are patently not experts (e.g. a bunch of geologists pronouncing on climate change), particularly when they are clearly spouting nonsense. Druids are "experts" on ley lines. The majority of druids agree on the existence and effects of ley lines. Doesn't stop it being a pile of shite. Ditto "climatology" and the catastrophe cult "experts".
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Post by marchesarosa on Jan 4, 2012 12:20:57 GMT 1
The dominant IPCC clique may call themselves "climatologists" but they are no more than CO2 cultists. The real study of climate is not being carried out by the likes of Trenberth, Hansen, Mann, Jones et al. These people are music hall turns. They keep a certain audience happy with grotesqueries and other types of "light" entertainment for which they are very well paid. SO well paid, in fact, that more sober quality acts are relatively disadvantaged. You get my drift, nickrr?
You saw appearing before the Canadian Senate Committee four eminent professors who were not the least shrill and who presented their facts in a clear way which distinguished between the natural warming experienced since the Little Ice Age and the over-hyped CO2 contribution. They also explained for the hard of understanding how the distortion of the UHI on the land surface measuring stations has been passed off as CO2 induced warming.
They put the alarmist record straight, that's all, and prepared a level playing field for debate. The IPCC clique will have to abandon their self-imposed purdah and come out in the open to publicly debate the facts with these REAL scientists or lose even more credibility.
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Post by nickrr on Jan 6, 2012 21:16:07 GMT 1
I presented you with a specific reason why they were talking nonsense. If you think that these statements were not nonsense then explain why. If all you can do is blather on with the usual meaningless insults then we'll know that you have no real arguments.
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Post by marchesarosa on Jan 7, 2012 12:46:36 GMT 1
It doesn't matter what MY arguments are, nickrr. It's the arguments of the climate "contrarian" professors you have to address. Try to rise above your preference for stalking someone you consider beneath contempt and address the observations which are totally at odds with the IPCC climate models. Try to abandon the comfort blanket of the argument from authority claim and explain to us what fraction of the 0.7 degrees C purported rise in the "global" temperature over the last century YOU are happy to attribute attribute to CO2 after taking into account natural variation and UHI ? while you are at it have a look at this brain teaser How to estimate AGW?radio4scienceboards.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=witter&action=display&thread=1274
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Post by nickrr on Jan 7, 2012 17:45:49 GMT 1
Wow, this is hard work. Try reading the posts you are replying to - that is exactly what I did. I gave you one of their arguments and it's a pathetic one (there were others on a similarly useless vein). The fact that one of the professors used this argument completely discredits him as a witness. It demonstrates that he is either ignorant or dishonest.
If you can't defend this argument (and your evasion suggests that you can't) I'll continue in the view that this "investigation" by the Canadian government is just a set up to give the answer they want.
They didn't provide any observations which are at odds with AGW, they just re-hashed a load of tired old arguments. If you think they provided any good arguments for why AGW isn't happening, please let us know what they are.
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Post by rsmith7 on Jan 7, 2012 17:56:52 GMT 1
Nick, I don't believe your dogged belief in CAGW is borne of stupidity therefore I detest your dishonesty. CAGW has been utterly, completely and comprehensively debunked. Why don't you have the character and integrity to argue your agenda (whatever it is) without relying on lies?
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