Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

interesting.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/harold-ambler/mr-gore-apology-accepted_b_154982.html

me personaly. i am not a doomsday "ZOMG IF WE DONT DO ANYTIHNG THE POLAR BAERS ARE GONNA DIE" kind of person.

i do however belive that we shoudl take care of the world we live on. we have come a long way from the factories of old bellowing out thick black smoke into the sky 24-7, but some of the crazy stuff on our plates now is... well, crazy.

there is some thought prvoking stuff in there.

any ways. let the maddness begin

What about the Man-Bear-Pig phenomenon?

Arguments like this make my brain hurt.

I'm TOTALLY SERIAL!

It always amuses me when some journalist stacks up his scientific knowledge and education against 99% of the world's climatologists, and WINS!

Yeah I loved all his "examples of the positive effects of climate change" at the start.
Great stuff altogether.

Kilkrazy wrote:It always amuses me when some journalist stacks up his scientific knowledge and education against 99% of the world's climatologists, and WINS!

YEAH! Because the only way to be right is to hold the majority opinion! Galileo, what a jagoff.

It also isn't 99% of the worlds climatologists. They may be in the majority but it isn't quite that one sided.

Then obviously the journalist must be right.

THAT'S LOGIC

Kilkrazy wrote:Then obviously the journalist must be right.

That's not what I said at all. What I did was point out that being in the minority doesn't make an argument wrong, and that being in the majority doesn't make one right, which is what your argument was.

Da Boss wrote:THAT'S LOGIC

You are correct. What Kilkrazy just did above is called a strawman argument.

I'm aware of what strawman tactics are about.

This guy is just plain wrong.

Why? Well, there's a lot of big words in this article, so I don't really know what's wrong with it per se, but nonetheless, I'm sure it's inaccurate.

Orkeosaurus wrote:This guy is just plain wrong.

Why? Well, there's a lot of big words in this article, so I don't really know what's wrong with it per se, but nonetheless, I'm sure it's inaccurate.

This is the correct answer.

I liked the follow up articles, especially the editorial reply :

When Ambler sent his post, I forwarded it to one of our associate blog editors to evaluate, not having read it. I get literally hundreds of posts a week submitted like this and obviously can't read them all -- which is why we have an editorial process in place. The associate blog editor published the post. It was an error in judgment. I would not have posted it. Although HuffPost welcomes a vigorous debate on many subjects, I am a firm believer that there are not two sides to every issue, and that on some issues the jury is no longer out. The climate crisis is one of these issues.

Orkeosaurus wrote:This guy is just plain wrong.

Why? Well, there's a lot of big words in this article, so I don't really know what's wrong with it per se, but nonetheless, I'm sure it's inaccurate.

You are a wise orky dinosaur indeed. If you sense a snow job, nine times out of ten it is (from anyone except me of course)

Ahtman wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:Then obviously the journalist must be right.

That's not what I said at all. What I did was point out that being in the minority doesn't make an argument wrong, and that being in the majority doesn't make one right, which is what your argument was.

Da Boss wrote:THAT'S LOGIC

You are correct. What Kilkrazy just did above is called a strawman argument.

My argument isn't that climate change is correct or not. It is that journalists can have no scientifically valid opinion on the topic, any more than they would on brain surgery, aircraft piloting or any other technical issue they do not have the education to understand.

Kilkrazy wrote:My argument isn't that climate change is correct or not. It is that journalists can have no scientifically valid opinion on the topic, any more than they would on brain surgery, aircraft piloting or any other technical issue they do not have the education to understand.

I don’t think a journalist cannot make a scientific argument, but their scientific argument should go through the same peer review process as any other scientific argument. At present scientific process goes on, with models being proposed and debated, and conclusions being reached, but this goes on away from the eyes of the mainstream. Meanwhile articles such as the one linked to by the OP don’t go through anywhere near the same level of review.

This is a serious problem, because it means that while the knowledge of experts on climate change continues to expand and develop each year, the public gets presented with a lot of junk. Some of it is junk because its politicised, ideological or just plain lying, some because it includes fundamental misunderstandings, but all stuff that would have been torn apart under peer review.

For instance, Mr Ambler makes the correct claim that global temperature is not constant. This is true. He then goes on to list times when global temperature was higher or lower than it presently is. He fails to note that past changes were gradual changes over decades and centuries, quite unlike the current change. He also fails to note the current rate is continuing to increase.

In his second point he muddles the long term, natural relationship between temperature and carbon dioxide (where carbon sinks become less common in hotter climates resulting in a slight long term increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere) with the relationship between directly pumping more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere through activities like burning fossil fuel. The inability to differentiate the two models… well, it wouldn’t pass review.

His argument that increased temperature leads to increased precipitation ignores his own claim earlier about the ‘fallacy’ of the term ‘climate change’. Yes, there is a self-regulating effect in which increased temperature will be somewhat mitigated, but meanwhile you have significantly different global weather patterns. We have a lot of infrastructure built that relies on certain assumptions about the weather. While these things can be accounted for, the cost of doing so is vastly greater than the cost of controlling emissions.

These types of articles really need to be vetted for accuracy before being published. Otherwise we’ll stay stuck in this stupid non-debate as unscientific articles (from both sides) continue to muddy a complicated issue.

I am particularly annoyed by journalistic sciencey preaching because the UK is currently in the grip of a developing measles epidemic thanks to the bad science journalism which caused the MMR vaccine scare.

I'll be honest, I'm no scientist and so cannot even begin to disprove or prove global warning, especially on an iterwebz forum!

However when it comes to a subject as complex as this (or on most matters for that matter) the very last people we should be paying attention to are journalists.

Firstly they have agendas. They may not be the writers own, it may be dependent on the ownership of the journals they write for, but there is usually some ulterior motive behind the majority of things they write. A business or political motive will driving their opinions far more than any quest for 'truth'.

Secondly they can write whatever they like with virtually no consequence. They do not have to be pragmatic or balanced and they can cherry pick their sources. They can do this freely because, unlike a politician or a scientist, a journalist will never have to put their money were their mouth is and back up their 'claims'.

The MMR scandal and its knock on effect, as mentioned by Killcrazy, is a prime example of immoral journalism being used to score cheap political points. The consequences are now becoming all too clear. Even worse I'm not aware of any paper apologising for the scaremongering or admitting they basically have blood on their hands.

If it sells papers, can be used to have a cheap crack at the government/opposition and panders to basic instincts of the readership who cares if its true or not!

On a personal note I'm strongly convinced something is happening. Photos clearly show bodies of water shrinking and ice caps melting. There's no denying that.

As to whether humankind is involved, well that's another matter. Like I said im no scientist so cannot prove it either way. But given the amount of pollution freely pumped out on a daily basis I don't see how there can't be some kind of effect on the world. Indeed it would seem to be naive in the extreme to suggest it's not causing some form of damage.

Science isn't perfect. It often takes time to come to conclusions, those conclusions change over time with the discovery of new evidence and there is often disagreement as to what conclusions are reached. Science doesn't claim to have all the answers (I still think religion has the monopoly on that) but on the balance of thing I'll take the general consensus of the scientific community over that of a journalist any day of the week!

Well said Lucius.

As to that, I am a scientist and that article was just garbage. As has been said, proper peer review would have ripped that article a new one.


There was a great one on the local news last night about a bunch of residents who didn't want a new type of recycling plant building near them - because they were worried about toxic pollution.
When the builders showed them the figures (1 year of operation would produce the same pollution as 4 days worth from the nearby road, whilst reducing landfill waste and producing enough electricity to power thousands of homes) the residents claimed they 'were not being told the whole story'.

What it basically amounted to was NIMBY. If it had been built anywhere else these people would not have batted an eyelid.


Responsible journalism, adequate science education and rational debate would stop all sorts of things like this from happening. But I'm not holding my breath...

Chimera_Calvin wrote:

Responsible journalism, adequate science education and rational debate would stop all sorts of things like this from happening. But I'm not holding my breath...

Which IS silly given the pollution in the.... ohh... .... I see.

The MMR thing really annoys me. From memory Mamzel Blair wasn't much help here really.

It's very, very wrong of me but I derive some sick, morbid satisfaction from the measels outbreak.
EAT YOUR DAMN CROW YOU SCUM!
Lazy journalists will be right after the politicians against the wall when the revolution comes.

Da Boss wrote:It's very, very wrong of me but I derive some sick, morbid satisfaction from the measels outbreak.
EAT YOUR DAMN CROW YOU SCUM!
... .

It's the poncy middle class parents, who were too clevair and sciencey to subject their little darlings to the supposed dangers of the vaccine, whose children are now suffering.

But it wasn't those childrens' fault they didn't get the vaccine.

I know it wasn't the kids fault. My satisfaction is entirely unfair and unworthy of me but it is there.
At the end of my degree I was interviewed by the external examiner to assess whether I'd earned my marks. He noted my bioethics component and put a question to me something like "what do you think of parents who don't get their children vaccinated?" my reply was that they should be forced to do it by the state unless their was a real medical reason not to. Otherwise you would end up with a viable disease susceptable pool in the population which would allow certain diseases a chance to reinfect and form new strains which the vaccinated population would be succeptable to.
Which is what happened here.
I really don't understand where the mania against vaccines comes from- they also blame them for autism spectrum disorders. In any case, I hope those parents feel bloody terrible about themselves, and the children are get through it okay.

The mania against vaccines, etc is in my opinion caused the general dumbing down of society coupled with 'democratisation' of opinion publishing, resentment against authority, and the growing culture of the citizen as customer.

See if you had a firm hand at the wheel this nonsense wouldn't take place.

Ming for President, er, Prime Minister!

Chimera_Calvin wrote:

Responsible journalism, adequate science education and rational debate would stop all sorts of things like this from happening. But I'm not holding my breath...

Interesting. I am a scientists in the field of Geology and I agree with the author of the article on Huffingtonpost. I admire your proposal for rational debate, but alas there seems to be an attempt to squash it. For anyone who thinks scientists don't have an agenda you are fooling yourself. For the most part a practicing researcher must constantly prove the value of their studies and this can lead to overestimating the worth of their research to others in order to secure funding. This is most commonly done through fear. Be afrad of X and only my research will stop it so give me the money.

Frazzled wrote:See if you had a firm hand at the wheel this nonsense wouldn't take place.

Ming for President, er, Prime Minister!

You joke but we came close to that



* Not really, the lib dems never stood a chance.

Darth: I'm sure Dakka has many scientists. The fact is, even though decent scientific training equips us all with the tools to analyse and think critically on subjects, and we may have a passing knowledge of the basics of many other disciplines, we don't have the specialist knowledge required to be able to speak with authority outside our narrow disciplines very often.
As a geologist, I would respect your opinion on things in that field, but I respect climatologists more on this one.
Also, I am 100% behind you on agendas behind research. I was a researcher, and the external pressure you come under in these situations is tremendous, especially where big funding is involved. I suffered a nervous breakdown last year over this sort of thing, and left formal research because of it. Essentially, they wanted me to do ecology to the sort of timeframe one does Bioinf or some lab based science. Ecology cannot be done that quickly, but I was pressured into trying, or dumbing down my science to get it done on time. I wouldn't compromise on the science, and my health, mental and physical, got compromised instead. Now the study won't get done, or it'll get done by someone who'll bow to pressure and more crap will be added to the rafts of bad papers out there.
It's made me very bitter and cynical about the scientific establishment, but I digress.

Frazzled wrote:See if you had a firm hand at the wheel this nonsense wouldn't take place.

Ming for President, er, Prime Minister!

Ooo, Max Von Sydow Ming - good choice!