I've supplied some references to sites discussing the dubious science presented in the programme, so lets go back to the roll call. I must admit that even I am shocked at what a bunch of rogues they really are: - Fred Singer http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=1 Exxon Secrets #1 Quote "In a February 2001 letter to the Washington Post, Singer denied receiving funding from the oil industry, except for consulting work some 20 years prior. SEPP, however, received multiple grants from ExxonMobil, including 1998 and 2000. In addition, Singer's current CV on the SEPP website states that he served as a consultant to several oil companies." He was the last one to speak on the programme, and the UK's Cheif Scientist should be after him for slander: Quote "There will still be people that believe that this is the end of the world. Particularly when you have for example the chief scientists of the UK telling people that by the end of the century the only habitable place on Earth will be the Antarctic. And it may ... humanity may survive thanks to some breeding couples that move to the Antarctic. It's hilarious (chuckle) it would be hilarious actually if it weren't so sad." Roll credits ..." Oh dear, Sir David King is the UK's Chief Scientist and he has never said any such thing. It was Professor James Lovelock who said it in 'The Revenge Of Gaia'. I'm sure they know the difference, lies but it sounded impressive, so they put it in the programme... - Patrick Michaels http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=4 Exxon Secrets #4: Quote "Dr. Patrick Michaels is possibly the most prolific and widely- Quoted climate change skeptic scientist. He has admitted receiving funding from various fossil fuel industry sources." and http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2006/08/climate_fraudit.php#more (enjoy the magic changing graph): Quote "The first approach is the one taken by Pat Michaels, who dishonestly erased scenarios B and C from Hansen's graph." From DeSmogBlog: Quote "Numerous media outlets reported that one of your professors, Dr. Patrick Michaels , has accepted upwards of $150,000 from coal interests and coal-burning electric utility companies for his advocacy against the overwhelming consenus on global warming." - Fred Seitz http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=6 Exxon Secrets #6 Quote "A June 2000 Business Week article referred to physicist Frederick Seitz as "the granddaddy of global-warming skeptics". Seitz was once a director and shareholder of a company that operated coal-fired power plants." Quote "n 1998, Seitz wrote and circulated a letter, asking scientists to sign a petition asking the Government to reject the Kyoto Protocol. Seitz signed the letter and identifed himself as a former president of the National Academy of Sciences. He also directed attention to a report by Dr. Arthur Robinson, which concluded that carbon dioxide posed no threat to climate. The report was not peer-reviewed, but was formatted to look like an NAS journal article. The NAS later issued a statement disassociating itself from the petition and the article." - Tim Ball (apparently not an emeritus professor) http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=1164 Exxon Secrets #1164: Quote "5 February, 2007 I am not alone in this journey against the prevalent myth. Several well-known names have also raised their voices. Michael Crichton, the scientist, writer and filmmaker is one of them. In his latest book, "State of Fear" he takes time to explain, often in surprising detail, the flawed science behind Global Warming and other imagined environmental crises."- but http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Michael_Crichton]Michael Crichton is "a Harvard Medical School graduate turned writer" who gave a leture "entitled "Aliens Cause Global Warming"", can't he find someone more reliable? http://www.desmogblog.com/channel-4-now-ashamed-of-its-experts Quote "In its promotional material, Channel 4 was advertising one of its experts, Dr. Tim Ball, as a ?Climatologist and Prof Emeritus of Geography at the University of Winnipeg.? In fact, Dr. Ball retired from a short, unspectacular academic career in 1995. He neither earned ? nor was he given ? the honour of an Emeritus professorship, and the University of Winnipeg has, on at least one previous occasion, specifically requested that he stop presenting himself as such. Far from being a working scientist or credible expert, Dr. Ball has associated himself in the last decade with a series of energy industry front groups (the Friends of Science, the Natural Resource Stewardship Project ) that fight against any policy that would address climate change. Even the Calgary Herald, the leading newspaper in the Canadian oil capital of Calgary, has said that Ball is ?viewed as a paid promoter of the agenda of the oil and gas industry rather than as a practicing scientist.?" Quote "But the locations that Channel 4 still mentions suggest that the other ?experts? will include at least a cross-section of other people who are known more for taking money from the energy industry than they are for scientific research." - Ian Clark http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=1280 Exxon Secrets #1280 and from http://www.desmogblog.com/national-post-heralds-another-denier]DeSmogBlog Quote "Dr. Fred Michel, part of a small group of Ottawa scientists (also including Tim Patterson and Ian Clark) acting on behalf of the energy-industry front group the Natural Resources Stewardship Project" ... http://tinyurl.com/2zdynf]Natural Resources Stewardship Project Quote "12 Oct 06, BREAKING UPDATE! NRSP exposed -- controlled by energy industry lobbyists"... - John Christy http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=903 Exxon Secrets #903 Quote "While he now acknowledges that global warming is real and the human contribution is significant" Quote "His findings have been widely disputed. " - Richard Lindzen http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=17 Exxon Secrets #17 Quote "Ross Gelbspan reported in 1995 that Lindzen "charges oil and coal interests $2,500 a day for his consulting services; his 1991 trip to testify before a Senate committee was paid for by Western Fuels, and a speech he wrote, entitled 'Global Warming: the Origin and Nature of Alleged Scientific Consensus,' was underwritten by OPEC."" - Roy Spencer http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=19 Exxon Secrets #19 Quote "17 April, 2006 "We are not saying that we don't believe that there can be significant global warming. As John [Christy] said, if you add CO2, something has to change. But things are changing all the time anyway. The big question is: So what? How much is it going to change, compared to other things? And what can you do about it?"" Quote "Tech Central Science Foundation or Tech Central Station" http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=112 ExxonSecrets: Quote "ExxonMobil gave the Foundation $95,000 in 2003 for "Climate Change Support." "and note http://tinyurl.com/35ee9v]Sponsors pull plug on Tech Central Station - Paul Reiter http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=421 Exxon Secrets #421 Quote "11 January, 2007 I am not a climatologist, nor an expert on sea level or polar ice. But I do know from talking to many scientists in many disciplines that this consensus is a mirage." and try http://tinyurl.com/298z8v]here. - Paul Driessen (author) http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=1038 Exxon Secrets #1038 Quote "Paul Driessen is the author of Eco-Imperialism: Green Power - Black Death (www.Eco-Imperialism.com) and director of the Economic Human Rights Project, a joint initiative of the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise and Congress of Racial Equality." ... http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=23 ExxonSecrets: Quote "Alan Gottlieb, a former tax felon, founded CDFE in 1974 along with two gun groups" Quote ""We are sick to death of environmentalism and so we will destroy it. We will not allow our right to own property and use nature's resources for the benefit of mankind to be stripped from us by a bunch of eco-facists."" Quote ""Facts don't really matter. In politics, perception is reality."" - Patrick Moore (co-founder of Greenpeace) http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Patrick_Moore SourceWatch Quote "In 2000 Moore went to the Brazilian Amazon rainforests for the filming of a documentary by Marc Morano for American Investigator, According to an interview in the New York Post, Moore dismissed concerns about the impacts of logging, mining and clearning for agriculture on the Amazonian rainforests. "All these save-the-forests arguments are based on bad science ... They are quite simply wrong. We found that the Amazon rainforest is more than 90 percent intact. We flew over it and met all the environmental authorities. We studied satellite pictures of the entire area," he said. "They are just about the healthiest forests in the world. This stuff about them vanishing at an alarming rate is a con based on bad science ... Anyone who has been in the jungle knows that if you want to live there, you'd better take a few machetes. Otherwise, it'll take it all back," he said. " - Piers Corbyn http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Piers_Corbyn SourceWatch Quote "He keeps the details of his methodology for making predictions a secret, and has been criticized for making unfounded claims about the power of his predictions, even after they turned out to be inaccurate." - Carl Wunsch (tricked to appear) http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/03/swindled/ Quote "Carl Wunsch (who was a surprise addition to the cast) was apparently misled into thinking this was going to be a balanced look at the issues (the producers have a history of doing this), but who found himself put into a very different context indeed."http://tinyurl.com/2ptgfy Quote "I've just received the following email from Carl Wunsch, whcih confirms that Martin Durkin has been true to type: ----- Original Message ----- From: "Carl Wunsch" To: Sent: Friday, March 09, 2007 2:31 PM Subject: Re: Just wanted to check something Dave, I've not seen it and the context was not at all what we had agreed on. Was billed as a balanced discussion of the threat of global warming As I began to see ads for the program, I realized I'd been duped. I'm wondering if there's some way I can get to see it. If you do register some kind of complaint, can you let me know what it says? Carl" - Nigel Calder (author) http://tinyurl.com/2nrwpv [Edited by: oD Forum Moderator. Shorter links provided.]

In regards to what is said about energy for the developing world the documentary is entirely on target. Whatever the credibility of the scientists interviewed, this is an obvious fact.

They suggested that we will only allow developing nations to use solar power ... what?

Thanks for your contributions guys. It is obvious that the arguments of scientists do not need to be countered as long as one can show they have a link to Exxon or some other corporate bad boy. This proves once again that this debate is very little about science and a lot about ideology. In such ideology 2+2=4 by Exxon is wrong while 2+2=5 by Greenpeace is correct. Well done! Hooray to Spanish inquisition! No justification needed just smear the infidels!

If anyone is going to show Martin Durkin's The Great Global Warming Swindle, then to maintain balance they should also show Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth. Perhaps Channel 4 should be required to show An Inconvenient Truth? Now that is a very good idea... Perhaps those who have not complained already will request just that. However, when showing either of them it would only be responsible to make the scientific basis clear. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Inconvenient_Truth quote "Gore's basic claimthat global warming is realis supported by current research. Gore's subsequent claimthat global warming is largely human-causedis also supported by current research. Gore presents specific data that supports the film's thesis, including:"(There is loads there...) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Global_Warming_Swindle quote "The documentary received a substantial amount of coverage in the British press, both before and after its broadcast. One scientist featured, Carl Wunsch said he had been "completely misrepresented" by the programme,[3][4] calling it "grossly distorted" and "as close to pure propaganda as anything since World War Two."[5] Wunsch was reported to be considering legal action, and a complaint to OFCOM, the UK broadcast regulator.[5] Filmmaker Durkin responded by saying, "Carl Wunsch was most certainly not "duped" into appearing in the film, as is perfectly clear from our correspondence with him. Nor are his comments taken out of context. His interview, as used in the programme, perfectly accurately represents what he said."[5] A critique by Sir John Houghton (former co-chair IPCC Scientific Assessment working group 1988-2002) assesses 9 of the main assertions by the programme and disagreed with most of them, and described the programme as "a mixture of truth, half truths and falsehood"[6] He accepted some statements in the film were factual, but challenged most." (no scientific basis section (yet?), the claims are there, and are the peole involved) An Inconvenient Truth is still on Amazon's top DVDs list. On amazon.co.uk number 7 (it's been out since December 26th)! On amazon.com number 8 (it's been out since November).

I suppose this is the politics topic. I've tried to discuss more of the science here: http://tinyurl.com/2wbrgk [Edited by: oD Forum Moderator. shorter link provided.]

I think people can make up their own mind on the subject. The film can now available on Google Video: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4520665474899458831 Or high quality Bit Torrent here: http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/03/great-global-warming-swindle.html

Dave, Have you actually seen the film? I see many smears in your reply but you are not actually addressing the film, rather the political affiliations of those involved. Play the argument, not the man, Dave. The only argument you put up is a pretty tired one. IPCC represents consensus of the world's top scientists and therefore... Well who created this consensus of the world's best scientists? You will find it was the IPCC's press release. UN is a political body and IPCC is a political body. There is not a single scientific paper out there that proves that CO2 is responsible for the current warming. There is no proof what so ever that the 20th century warming is anomalous. All models are computer programs that are simply as good as the assumptions that go into them. If one assumes that CO2 will warm up the Earth that is what the models will show. Yet we are asked to dramatically alter the course of human civilisation at it's finest time in history to avert a hypothetical disaster based on this weak science? No thanks. If you don't believe me just how weak the science is, have a look just how much we know about the various forcing of the climate. Have a look at this graph that appeared in the IPCC's latest Summary for Policymakers: http://www.ipcc.ch/present/graphics/2001syr/large/06.01.jpg Out of 12 forcing only one has a High level of scientific understanding. Only one! If you look at the uncertainty of say "Aerosol indirect effect" you can see that it is possible that it could be presently negating almost all of the CO2 forcing. Add sulphates, land use (albedo) and biomass burning and human impact on temperatures could be actually negative. We just don't know. This is how solid the science is.

Being a working researcher, I am the last person to resort to ad hominem arguments when it comes to science. Accusing me of this will not wash. Actually, I don't have to accuse you. You do a pretty good job to illustrate the point yourself. So? Just putting the label 'political' on something does not make it a terrible thing, or invalidate the science which these bodies summarise. No? GW is a multi-billion dollar industry. Lucrative careers have been made by many on the back of the GW doomsday cult. The issue goes away and plenty of people will be out of jobs and even disgraced. This is quite well illustrated by comparing reality vs. rethoric of the latest IPCC report. Despite 2007 report being less alarming than 2001 report, it is billed as the most alarming yet. The "impartiality" of IPCC was further illustrated when R.K. Pachauri, the IPCC chairman, told Reuters: "I hope this report will shock people, governments into taking more serious action as you really can't get a more authentic and a more credible piece of scientific work. So I hope this will be taken for what it's worth." This is the sort of stuff reminiscent of Colin Powell's performance in the UN prior to Iraq war. Perhaps you need to learn something about science before you make a claim like this, or at least be more careful with your language. If you are waiting for proof of something in this regard or in any science relating to complex systems you will wait forever. Wow Dave! Inspired stuff. There is no proof of doomsday, there can be no proof of doomsday, yet we must prepare for the doomsday. And why exactly? You are just reinforcing my point that the science is as weak as it comes. Not only have I read the summary, I've read much more than that. I wonder what puts you in a position of expertise that can trump all of this work? Do tell us... I noticed how you ignored my charge that out of 12 forcings mentioned in 2001 report only one has high level of scientific understanding. Only one! In 2007 report they separate various greenhouse gasses removed a couple of negative forcings. Hey presto: two out of nine have high level of understanding. Two out of nine! This is solid stuff. Would you trust a pilot that knew how to use only 22% of controls in the cockpit? We need to move a decisive move forward to cleaner, cleverer, more efficient, more widely-available, more customisable, more personal technologies. At last something we can both agree on, Dave. Still I want to do this for the right reasons, not because I am shit scared of the sky falling on my head, as the case is now. Bad science has already produced bad public hysteria and this cannot serve as the basis for sound polices. There is only one good way to do this: a broad international commitment on R&D into clean energy. But all we get are ambitious populist CO2 reduction targets that will not be met, higher taxes, increased calls for protectionism more government regulation, and general insistence that we use less, make do, mend and generally lower our inspirations. You may be sensible enough to yearn for the continuation of technological age, as I do, but majority of those that drive the GW agenda are neo-Malthusian fantasists whose massage is strongly anti-human and anti-progress. GW issue can damage the credibility of science and the UN more than any issue in the past. The global temperatures have been flat or declining since 1998. If this trend continues the same ignorant masses that are now demanding the war on gasses will turn against the UN and will never trust another scientist again. What do you think will happen in 10 years when disaster doesn't come? Or in 20 years when it will still be as distant as it is now? Don't you think there will be some questions? Don't you think people will want to know why scientists were telling us they were sure, while they didn't have much idea about 80% of climate forcings or why did they oversold this incomplete weak science as definitive proof? And trust me, this is exactly what is going to happen. People cannot be fed propaganda year after year and be expected to believe it.

> So? Just putting the label 'political' on > something does not make it a terrible thing, or > invalidate the science which these bodies > summarise. > > No? GW is a multi-billion dollar industry. Lucrative > careers have been made by many on the back of the GW > doomsday cult. The issue goes away and plenty of > people will be out of jobs and even disgraced. Look, this is not evidence of anything. It is just you reading into the fact that global warming has become, by necessity, a major topic of research, the idea that the research must have been created in order to create generate that funding. It doesn't matter if it was worth trillions, you still couldn't logically read back from this that the money was the reason for the scientific results. I do wonder how old you are. I say this because I remember a time not so long ago when scientists researching this area were regarded as a bit on the edge of things, when the media thought it was all a bit crazy and governments had absolutely no interest. The research was not created by campaigners or business people or states, but by honest scientific work, and it continues to be. Your cynicism about the motives of people involved is simply that and most of you other language - 'doomsday cult' etc. is simply rhetorical analogy and pretty worthless. The reason things have changed is because the scientific results have become more convincing. Of course the whole thing could still be shown to be partially or completely wrong by further research - that's science for you. But if, as you claim, you are truly someone who appreciates the benefits that science and technology have brought humanity you have to accept things you don't want to hear sometimes that science is telling you - assuming you don't have a god-like view of everything, which I am pretty sure you don't. Scientific results do not fit ideologies - that should tell you more about the dangers of ideology than science. > This > is quite well illustrated by comparing reality vs. > rethoric of the latest IPCC report. Despite 2007 > report being less alarming than 2001 report, it is > billed as the most alarming yet. This sounds like you've cut'n'pasted it from some website... > The "impartiality" of IPCC was further illustrated > when R.K. Pachauri, the IPCC chairman, told Reuters: > "I hope this report will shock people, governments > into taking more serious action as you really can't > get a more authentic and a more credible piece of > scientific work. So I hope this will be taken for > what it's worth." This is the sort of stuff > reminiscent of Colin Powell's performance in the UN > prior to Iraq war. ... as does this. But again, so what? The Chairman of the IPCC is confident of the credibility of the science in the report! Tell us something surprising next time, will ya? > There is no proof of > doomsday, there can be no proof of doomsday, yet we > must prepare for the doomsday. And why exactly? You > are just reinforcing my point that the science is as > weak as it comes. Easy with the Doomsday rhetoric there... that's hardly the language of credible argument. I thought you might just be overstating your case for effect, but you really don't understand science at all if you think proof will be forthcoming... what is your understanding of the nature of positive proof when it relates to complex systems? I'm interested if you think you have some alternative idea of the way that the entire basis of scientific research should work. Perhaps you should write to some major journals to tell them... > I noticed how you ignored my charge that out of 12 > forcings mentioned in 2001 report only one has high > level of scientific understanding. Only one! In 2007 > report they separate various greenhouse gasses > removed a couple of negative forcings. Hey presto: > two out of nine have high level of understanding. Two > out of nine! This is solid stuff. Would you trust a > pilot that knew how to use only 22% of controls in > the cockpit? That's just an analogy and like most arguments by analogy works by shifting attention away from the issue itself. This is a conservative statement of the state of knowledge. You'd expect that if you understood the way scientific research works. It is only big news if you don't. We always need more research... > At last something we can both agree on, Dave. Still I > want to do this for the right reasons, not because I > am shit scared of the sky falling on my head, as the > case is now. Don't be silly. See, this is the problem with your kinds fo arguments - you think there has to be one ideologically right reason for things to be done, i.e.: your own. > Bad science Again this is rhetoric and ignorance. If science produces results you don't like this doesn't make it 'bad'. > has already produced bad > public hysteria and this cannot serve as the basis > for sound polices. It's funny... see, I don't notice any public hysteria. I don't notice the public being that bothered at all actually. Not half bothered enough in fact. And certainly, of those people taking action, they seem to be doing it in a rather low-key fashion. The shrill responses seem to come rather from those who exaggerate and claim that there is 'hysteria'... And the whole point of the IPCC is to provide sound scientific bases for policy proposals and therefore avoid media hype and whatever the public may think. Of course the public may decide to vote one way or another in democracies and we just have to deal with that too. I don't notice any radical 'green' policies getting that many votes as it happens. > There is only one good way to do > this: a broad international commitment on R&D into > clean energy. That's essential of course, but you can't wait for this commitment to occur - private corporations, individual states are going to have to force this along. > But all we get are ambitious populist > CO2 reduction targets that will not be met, higher > taxes, increased calls for protectionism more > government regulation, and general insistence that we > use less, make do, mend and generally lower our > inspirations. I am struggling to see how you portray these as 'populist' - again, I wonder how old you are and how much you know of the history of the environmental movement and its general lack of acceptance until recently. The popularity, such as it is, is very recent and quite mainstream rather than radical in terms of ecological ideas. In addition, why do you associate what I presume you mean as aspirations, with 'more'. We're entering an age in which economic growth will depend less and less on creating more material things and more on symbolic and informational goods. It seems to me that you are still struggling with a rather nineteenth century idea of what constitutes human progress (like our friends the RCP). Progress consists of the progressive fufilment of a multitude of aspirations, not least of which are things like increasing peace, equity, and so on. Efficiency, which in economics has always been the other major goal, consists precisely of doing more with less. So that too is progress. It's quite bizarre that you manage to spin it as if it were a human duty to consume more... > but > majority of those that drive the GW agenda are > neo-Malthusian fantasists whose massage is strongly > anti-human and anti-progress. Oh, that's just so much crap. Again just cheap rhetoric and ideologically-driven posturing. You'd be much better off if you weren't so cynical and suspicious. You have no evidence for this statement, it's just a belief and one based on a very narrow idea of what constitutes progress and what it means to be human. > The global > temperatures have been flat or declining since 1998. Blimey, there's conclusive proof for you! Not... > If this trend continues the same ignorant masses that > are now demanding the war on gasses will turn against > the UN and will never trust another scientist again. No-one is demanding a war on gasses! And I am sorry, but the ignorant masses are certainly not. The mass of scientifically illiterate people are in my experience are not particularly interested in any of this... > What do you think will happen in 10 years when > disaster doesn't come? Or in 20 years when it will > still be as distant as it is now? Don't you think > there will be some questions? Don't you think people > will want to know why scientists were telling us they > were sure, while they didn't have much idea about 80% > of climate forcings or why did they oversold this > incomplete weak science as definitive proof? I am sure we will all be doomed then, doomed I tell you! For someone who is so much against the spreading of doom, you seem to be remarkably good at doing so when it suits you! It's interesting that you think things are distant... plenty of changes already are occuring and visibly so, even to the untrained eye. The thing is that human beings are quite self-delusional and will fit all sorts of things into an ideological pattern, the black-hole of belief eventually sucks rationality in. We get used very quickly to living with the unusual, the emergency - large ice-sheets crack, glaciers retreat etc. but is that 'normal' or not? People will walk past someone who falls over in the street, but that doesn't mean the person didn't fall over... I prefer to stick with evidence whether that tells me what I would like to hear or not. I will be very happy indeed if the evidence starts to demonstrate that anthropogenic climate change is not happening, or is not as bad as predicted etc. Who wouldn't be? I would hope that no credible researcher would be so ideologically committed to an idea that they were closed to the possibility of them being wrong. The main difference between you and me as far as I see it, is that I am happy to be wrong individually if that means greater collective knowledge and progress. I am not sure that you are prepared to be wrong. You seem awfully committed to the absolute certainty of your beliefs. And that I am afraid is probably where you problem with science lies, even whilst you claim to support it. >And > trust me, this is exactly what is going to happen. Why should I 'trust you'? You come on with no evidence, with no credibility, with a lot of rhetoric, attacking a body which has plenty of evidence and credibility, that you condemn precisely for their demand that we trust them and all you can offer ultimately is 'trust me instead'. Message was edited by: David Wood

Dave, Are you having a shit day or something? You sound hysterical. This is often a sign of intellectual weakness. You seem to be unable to respond to any of my arguments without making emotional appeals and repetitively questioning my credibility and my ideological deposition. Strangely when dealing with IPCC you say things like: "Scientific results do not fit ideologies - that should tell you more about the dangers of ideology than science." Yet when I ask absolutely fair dinkum question about IPCC's level of understanding of climate forcings (as stated in their own report), my ideology is all that matters. It is just you reading into the fact that global warming has become, by necessity, a major topic of research, the idea that the research must have been created in order to create generate that funding. Very interesting? Let's imagine for a second that it is proven that Sun is behind the current warming trend. Now, we can't do much about the Sun, can we? What do you think will happen to the funding for GW-related research and IPCC itself? They were something like 6000 people at the latest UN climate summit in Kenya. One of my mates works on greenhouse gas projects with the EPA. Would anyone spend money on researching say impact of GW on polar bears knowing full well that even if the impact is devastating, there is nothing us humans can do about it. I think not, do you? And therein lies the self-interest of climsi community to make not global warming but ANTHROPOGENIC GW the dominant hypothesis. Referring back to the same graph IPCC's level of understanding of the Sun's impact by IPCC's admission is LOW, yet they had enough balls to say they are ever more confident that the Sun has nothing to do with recent climate change. Easy with the Doomsday rhetoric there... that's hardly the language of credible argument. Sorry, Dave but such is the language of IPCC. "Climate change threatens billions" according to the latest IPCC report. I can see Armageddon coming on any minute now. Except I don't, it's always happening some place else like Tuvalu, Alaska or Antarctica. Again this is rhetoric and ignorance. If science produces results you don't like this doesn't make it 'bad'. Stop being a knobhead, Dave. The science is weak, because it is weak, not because I don't like it. I used to believe in GW until I decided to evaluate it critically. For most AGW proponents it is the article of faith and ideology. It also tends to attract the left-wing types in droves, as is perfectly taps into their middle-class guilt. You know: we kill the planet, we murder Africans, the terrorists want to kill us because we are so horrible, we are the cancer of the Planet. And so on. While we are on the subject of science, perhaps you know the answer to these; soon as you say it is so solid: Do we know the average temperature of the planet? What is it? Do we know what the ideal average temperature of the planet should be? Is planet?s temperature always stable or does it fluctuate? Did Earths climate change in the geological past? How do we know that even if we do all that scientists ask us to do the climate will not just change anyway? I don't notice the public being that bothered at all actually. Not half bothered enough in fact. That's because they are not half as gullible as the scientist would like them to be. They already survived the population time bomb, running out of all resources, Acid rain, Y2K, bird flu and so on. I would argue that public has a lot of common sense, while academia loves to flirt with fashionable theories. And the whole point of the IPCC is to provide sound scientific bases for policy proposals and therefore avoid media hype and whatever the public may think. Of course, of course, Dave. They are very shy: "I hope this report will shock people, governments into taking more serious action as you really can't get a more authentic and a more credible piece of scientific work.? As shy as they come. It seems to me that you are still struggling with a rather nineteenth century idea of what constitutes human progress (like our friends the RCP). Dave, I am not sure what you are getting on here but it seems that you have a rather poor understanding of how the world works. You may like art and books, others may like fast cars and easy women. Not everyone has the same idea. I like reading, my wife likes shopping. You like chess; I like beer and pork scratchings. The world is a complicated place, your idea of progress may not be your neighbour's idea, yet you see fit to comment on what you think the aspirations of the world should be. Who made you the spokesman for humanity? You love trees, I love wood chopping. You cannot legislate nor impose morality, Dave. I was born in the Soviet Union and know exactly where such delusions lead. It's quite bizarre that you manage to spin it as if it were a human duty to consume more... Did I actually say anything of the sort? Don't put words in my mouth please, Dave. It's interesting that you think things are distant... plenty of changes already are occuring and visibly so, even to the untrained eye. Dave, changes occur all the time, get used to it. Not all change is bad. More critically change, even a bad one is not in itself a proof that it is our fault. I am getting old and I will die one day. That is really bad, I don't like the idea, but I can't do much about it, can I? The proposition here is not that the climate is changing, this is hardly controversial, but that it is our fault through CO2 emissions. This is far from proven. You seem awfully committed to the absolute certainty of your beliefs. No true, Dave. All it would take is some solid evidence, not dubious CO2 climate correlations, not far from perfect climate models and not simplistic morality tales of bad humans polluting and killing the planet.

Oh Dave, such thin skin you have... Pity you run away from the rest of my post. I thought it was rather reasonable. Particularly since I pretty much overlooked the childish jibes about my age (maturity), evil ideology, not understanding the science, cutting and pasting, my primitive understanding of the world (it always seems to be only within the grasp of enlightened Left-wing types) and so on. To borrow a leaf from your own book, Dave: how old are you?

> but > majority of those that drive the GW agenda are > neo-Malthusian fantasists whose massage is strongly > anti-human and anti-progress. "Oh, that's just so much crap. Again just cheap rhetoric and ideologically-driven posturing. You'd be much better off if you weren't so cynical and suspicious. You have no evidence for this statement, it's just a belief and one based on a very narrow idea of what constitutes progress and what it means to be human." David Wood. Just much crap? Cheap rhetoric? Ideologically driven posturing? Think again... I would consider Sir David Attenborough to be a rather popular and mainstream commentator on GW - yet I still find his ideas perverse in the extremes . Or how about this bunch of misanthropic environmentalists ? According to these people, having a baby is only proof of a mental disorder - and besides, babies damage the environment, don't they? Ok, they may be a bit extreme, but not as extreme as some in the environmental movement. They all have something in common; they assume that the interests of people are far less important than the health of an inanimate object. How about the animal rights activist Jon Ablewhite who thought it was perfectly fine to dig up and interfere with the dead corpse of Gladys Hammond - for what? All in the name of the rights of guinea pigs who have no voice? Such eco-worriers have a degraded view of humanity. The proposition that there are too many people on the Earth is a stance made from the point of view of little in the way of hard evidence, yet we hear it all the time. From Jeffery Sachs' lecture entitled 'Bursting at the seams' , to Sir Nicholas Stern's review, which states that greater 'effort is required to encourage lower rates of population growth' . Long after Thomas Malthus ideas have been redundant and discredited, neo-Malthusians like Stern and Sachs are regurgitating the same old myths with next to nothing in the shape of real evidence to substantiate such claims. Indeed, the UK Secretary of State for the Environment, David Miliband, cannot stop himself from repeating the mantra that if 'the world were to have the same living standards as we have in the UK, then we'd need three planets to support us'. However, where is his evidence for that? From Miliband's perspective, Africans cannot be expected to live like us over here in the future - it stands to reason from this point of view that Africans need to drastically reduce its population size before any real progress can be made. When it comes to people and numbers, environmentalist can only imagine one type of arithmetic - minus. For them, inanimate objects have acquired far more importance than even life or death struggles like war. War, as a human problem is relegated to second place - trees, oceans, mountains and deserts have more intrinsic value. If this isn't a form of anti humanism, then I'm afraid it is you Mr Wood who is in denial.

I would be very interested to see how Iljay and others can spin this one. Actually the guys from www.climateaudit.org, the same bunch that destroyed the Hockey Stick, have already done a pretty good job on this one. So I am not going to bother. I particularly like: Climate scientists didn't bother checking the Hockey Stick, but they are showing great diligence in going through The Great Global Warming Swindle. The same scientists didn't speak out much about Al Gore's sci-fi project Inconvenient Truth when he exaggerated sea level rises by about a factor of 20 or failed to mention that ice core records show that temperatures increases first and CO2 levels follow. Carl Wunsch didn't complain that anything he said was misrepresented, he complained that the film doesn't match his stance on the GW issue. Big difference. Dave, if you want to get petty and talk about credibility of the film, be my guest. But I will just ask again, how in this light should we view UN's endorsement of the Hockey Stick graph without actually checking it. http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=1513#more-1513

Dave, realclimate.org was actually set up by Mann and Co. to defend the hockey stick. There is no question in anyone's mind about the objectivity of the site. The term "real climate scientists" comes from the Real Climate's own blurb. There are plenty of other "real climate scientists" that have different opinions. Take Richard Lindzen from MIT for example: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17997788/site/newsweek/ US National Academy of Sciences have looked into the Hockey Stick controversy and concluded that climate reconstructions are unreliable for the period before 1600. This means that it can only be claimed with certainty that the current decade is the hottest in 400 years. Not a difficult feat knowing that the Earth went through the Little Ice Age during the same period. Of course it should be warmer! Wegman report was even stronger in its criticism of Hockey Stick. The summary of the controversy is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockey_stick_controversy Quite tellingly, Hockey Stick graph is missing from the IPCC's 2007 report. Hans von Storch has recently published his critique of Hockey Stick in "Science" (you know, the "real science journal" "real scientists" read): http://blogs.nature.com/climatefeedback/2007/05/the_decay_of_the_hockey_stick.html