Apparently, the criticism that has discredited Mann’s “hockey stick” graph – a favorite reference of CAGW activists – is a concerted campaign by the fossil fuel industry and interests, not genuine scientific criticism of its serious scientific and statistical flaws. Who’s the conspiracy theorist now?
And apparently they also do IP address searches at RealClimate to sniff out undercover agents of the fossil fuel industry from among critical commenters on their blog.
Also, ad hominem attacks are prohibited by their comments policy; a standard, it appears, that doesn’t apply to the contributors and is selectively enforced on visitors.
Ironically, the very same post that the above paraphrased “hockey stick” comment follows amounts to a protestation of innocence against a charge that RealClimate is associated with one or more environmental organizations. The author of the post insists it is not so:
We wish to stress that although our domain is being hosted by Environmental Media Services, and our initial press release was organised for us by Fenton Communications, neither organization was in any way involved in the initial planning for RealClimate, and have never had any editorial or other control over content. Neither Fenton nor EMS has ever paid any contributor to RealClimate.org any money for any purpose at any time. Neither do they pay us expenses, buy our lunch or contract us to do research.
Let’s say I take him at his word that the contributors have not been paid for any reason and haven’t even had a lunch bought for them. Fenton Communications is a left-liberal public relations firm that has been orchestrating Cindy Sheehan’s anti-war campaign (not that I’m pro-war, I’m just saying…). Environmental Media Services is a left-liberal environmental orgnanization. Did Fenton handle RealClimate’s press release free of charge or did the contributors of RealClimate pool their funds from their government paychecks to pay for the service? Does RealClimate pay EMS for hosting their blog? The author of the post doesn’t say, but I would be surprised if the contributors of RealClimate paid for any of these services. If they didn’t pay for these services out of their own pockets, then RealClimate has received and continues to receive the equivalent, in terms of subsidized services, of financial support from left-liberal and environmental organizations. And if they did pay for these services, why deal exclusively with left-liberal and environmental organizations?
Now, I of course would be the first to say that these connections with left-liberal and environmental organizations are not by themselves enough to refute their substantive claims on climate change. Ad hominems make for faulty arguments. However, the hypocrisy and half-truths I have highlighted here do speak to overall character and intellectual honesty in particular. They profess to be pure, objective scientists while accusing their critics of being, almost universally, ignorant laymen, partisan hacks or enemies of science; but their biases are quite plain. I am here merely pointing out the hypocrisy. Their substantive claims must still be dealt with elsewhere, albeit with blinders off.
For more on and from Mann, see here.
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Geoffrey is an Aristotelian-Liberal political philosopher and an adjunct instructor for Buena Vista University. His work has appeared in the Journal of Libertarian Studies, the Journal of Value Inquiry, and Transformers and Philosophy. He lives in Edgewood, KY with his wife and two children.
Related posts:
- Global Warming & Funding (Non-)Issues
- Al Gore's Environmental Hypocrisy
- More Ad Hominem and Attempted Suppression of Dissent by CAGW Mindguards
Political Science PhD
{ 6 comments }
Damn right. Once real climate misquoted an article they cited (rather blatantly) and I corrected them. The editor responded with strawmen and totally ignored the fact that I took quotes right from the article that contradicted what he said.
An awful site supported by scientists who post on wikipedia: for morons by morons.
Surely the point is not where the funding comes from but how truthful it is. Exxon funds groups with the explicit aim of convincing the public there is still debate about whether the warming is natural or man made when there is no such debate! See:
http://www.logicalscience.com/consensus/consensus.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change
‘With the release of the revised statement by the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, no scientific bodies of national or international standing are known to reject the basic findings of human influence on recent climate.’
Or google ‘beyond the ivory tower’ by Naomi Oreskes for a scientfic paper on the consensus in the published papers.
Are the funders of realclimate opposed to the science – you offer no proof what so ever and trust me if they were denying the science I have almost no doubt you would be attacking them for that. You cant so you just hurl mud in the hope some will stick. Oh, and on the subject of their credibility:
The creation of RealClimate was noticed by both the prestigious academic journals Science and Nature.
In 2005, the editors of Scientific American recognized RealClimate with a Science and Technology Web Award
In 2006, Nature compiled a list of the 50 most popular blogs written by scientists, as measured by Technorati. RealClimate was number 3 on that list
Now, are you claiming these institutions are deluded when they support the site?
This is the biggest threat to life on the planet for 50 million years and you spend your time splitting hairs instead of throwing your effort behind tackling the problem!
Anonymous #2,
“This is the biggest threat to life on the planet for 50 million years and you spend your time splitting hairs instead of throwing your effort behind tackling the problem!”
LOL! That has yet to be established and is a separate issue from whether or how much global warming is caused by human beings.
1) The CAGW thesis has no solid scientific support. The jury is still out on how much global warming there will be and what its consequences will be. Indeed, the evidence seems to be piling up on the side of “not all that much” and almost certainly on the side of “not catastrophic.”
2) That human beings are a partial cause of global warming is seems possible to me, even very likely.
3) How much of it are we responsible for? I think the jury is still out on that one.
4) What we should do about it is a separate issue, although it the answer depends partly on the answers to 1-3, but the statist proposals of most environmentalists are almost certainly not the answer.
“Are the funders of realclimate opposed to the science – you offer no proof what so ever and trust me if they were denying the science I have almost no doubt you would be attacking them for that. You cant so you just hurl mud in the hope some will stick.”
I don’t care whether the funders of Real Climate oppose the “science” put forth by that organization and its many fellow travelers. I’m quite sure they agree with it. That’s why they’re funding it, after all. Why do I need to prove it? It has nothing to do with the point of my post. Perhaps you should read my post again.
And why would I attack them if they did oppose the “science” put forth by Real Climate? I would, of course, wonder why they were funding an organization they disagreed with. It would be odd. Finally, trust me on this one: I don’t trust you.
“You cant so you just hurl mud in the hope some will stick.”
Tit for tat, bub. Tit for tat.
“Surely the point is not where the funding comes from but how truthful it is.”
Indeed, and if you had read the last paragraph of my post you would have seen that I made just such an argument. That you make the same argument to me shows you didn’t read it. Moreover, I find it ironic that you make this argument and then proceed to ignore it in your very next sentence:
“Exxon funds groups with the explicit aim of convincing the public there is still debate about whether the warming is natural or man made when there is no such debate!”
Well now, it sure seems like you think source of funding does affect the truth-value of scientific claims! How very contradictory and hypocritical of you.
The evidence you cite in favor of an overwhelming consensus is unconvincing. For one thing, it fails to parse out the 4 issues I noted above. For another, an examination of actual scientists and their publications reveals far more dissenting from the CAGW alarmism than you let on.
Nice try, bub, but no cigar. And please spare me the banal, regurgitated talking points in the future. Unlike you and your friends at Real Climate, and as the last paragraph of my post shows, I understand that the kind of evidence about funding I presented in the post above does not by itself invalidate the scientific claims of those who receive the funding.
For those just tuning in, RealClimate.org controls the climate change pages on Wikipedia.org. It’s one of the reasons RealClimate.org continues to be considered by many as “unbiased and apolitical.” Obviously, that is not the case.
I love the response you quoted from the “objective, unbiased climatologists” at RealClimate.org. Gavin cleverly says, “Oh no, Fenton doesn’t even buy us lunch.” What’s revealing is what he doesn’t. Anybody wanna ask Gavin how much he got from the Tides Foundation?
Do the scientists Schmidt et al, whilst on the clock (taxpayer’s dime)…. make postings, read, operate, comment, participate in editorial conversations, oversee, tweak programming and formats…. or otherwise maintain RealClimate during work hours?
Prof. Plauche,
Your statements advocate science in a most uncontroversial way. Science is about doubt. Religion: faith. The propaganda hurled at you in response indicates misplaced faith. Witch trial mentalities even.
-Dan
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