NIHIL SUB SOLE NOVUM
A BRIEF AFTERWORD: AUGUST 2012
Is it Groundhog Day? Must be. For here’s a self-described ‘sceptic’ named Professor Richard Muller claiming his views have undergone a ‘total turnaround’ thanks to the ‘surprising’ results of his Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) project. Apparently – there’s no two ways about it – man-made global warming is real.
You may remember Prof. Muller saying similar things in the last chapter. And having his claims roundly debunked by scientists including one of his co-authors Professor Judith Curry. Now here he is nine months later in July 2012 trotting out much the same old stuff in the usual outlets – the New York Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, The Guardian, the BBC – for all the world as if his dubious thesis is new, exciting and incontestable.
‘What evidence will it take to convince climate sceptics?’ asks an exasperated Leo Hickman of The Guardian, running a scary-looking graph taken from BEST showing apparently dramatic late twentieth-century global warming.
Perhaps Hickman’s plea would be more persuasive if the ‘evidence’ he flaunts actually existed anywhere beyond the minds of Richard Muller and true believers such as Leo Hickman.
But it doesn’t. Repeating a lie over and over again doesn’t make that lie any more true – something various commentators felt compelled to point out in the wake of the latest Richard Muller non-story.
For a start, Muller was never a ‘sceptic’ – as the following quotes, collated by the Popular Technology blog, indicate:
‘If Al Gore reaches more people and convinces the world that global warming is real, even if he does it through exaggeration and distortion – which he does, but he’s very effective at it – then let him fly any plane he wants.’ Richard Muller, 2008
‘There is a consensus that global warming is real … it’s going to get much, much worse.’ Richard Muller, 2008
‘Let me be clear. My own reading of the literature and study of paleoclimate suggests strongly that carbon dioxide from burning of fossil fuels will prove to be the greatest pollutant of human history. It is likely to have severe and detrimental effects on global climate.’ Richard Muller, 2003
Then there was the problem with Muller’s paper itself. It had been submitted for publication in the Journal of Geophysical Research (JGR) but had failed to pass peer review. Rather than make the major revisions JGR’s peer reviewers deemed necessary before the paper was fit for publication, Muller decided to go ahead and release his findings in the media anyway.
‘In our papers we demonstrate that none of these potentially troublesome effects [including those related to urbanisation and land surface changes] unduly biased our conclusions,’ Muller claimed.
But in fact his papers had demonstrated no such thing. That was why they failed the peer review test. Because they weren’t scientifically credible.
What really drove a coach and horses through Muller’s argument, though, was the publication by Anthony Watts et al. of a paper on US surface station temperatures. The ones on which Muller had based his claims, it seemed, were unreliable to the point of uselessness.
Not only were the temperature readings wildly inaccurate (about 90 per cent of US weather stations produce corrupt data, usually as a result of the Urban Heat Island effect) but they had been skewed even further in the wrong direction by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the US government department responsible for America’s temperature data records. Instead of adjusting the raw temperature data downwards (in order to compensate for the warming effects of UHI), NOAA had mysteriously decided to adjust the temperatures upwards.
NOAA’s adjustments during the period 1979–2008 had exaggerated the extent of ‘global warming’ by 100 per cent. Or, to put it another way, half of the ‘global warming’ that supposedly happened in the US in the late twentieth century turns out – on closer scrutiny – to have been completely made up.
Somewhere out there, in a parallel universe, the story of Muller’s comeuppance, Watts’s scoop and NOAA’s dodgy, heavily politicised data-fiddling is on the front page of all the big newspapers and the lead item in every TV news story. And rightly so, you’d think, given that it all goes to show that ‘man-made global warming’, the biggest, most expensive scare story in history, is based on several massive lies.
Not in our one, though – and I’ve no need to tell you why.
After all, you’ve just read this book.
REFERENCES
Chapter One: Imagine
Page 1 ‘In searching for a new enemy to unite us…’– King, Alexander and Schneider, Bertrand (1991) The First Global Revolution: A Report by the Council of the Club of Rome, Pantheon Books, New York, 1991.
Page 3 ‘the case of Lee Bidgood Jr’ – see Lee Bidgood Jr’s letter at: http://www.newsweek.com/2009/11/06/letters-november-9–2009.html [Accessed 15 January 2011].
Page 4 ‘the Hockey Stick was – and to some extent still is – the central pillar’ – see Figure 1B at: http://www.grida.no/publications/other/ipcc_tar/?src=/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/figspm-1.htm [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 4 ‘That, at least, is how the IPCC’s Third Assessment Report (TAR) chose to interpret it’ – for the IPCC’s Third Assessment Report (TAR) see: http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/tar/ [Accessed 14 January 2011]. For the summary for policymakers see: http://www.grida.no/publications/other/ipcc_tar/?src=/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/005.htm [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 5 ‘Every household in Canada received a leaflet’ – McIntyre, Steve (2005). (climateaudit.org), ‘Revisiting the “stick”’, Financial Post, June 17.
Page 5 ‘As Andrew Montford, author of The Hockey Stick Illusion, explains’ – Montford, A. (2010). ‘Climate science after the ‘hockey stick’ affair’. Spiked Online, June 22. Available at: http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/debates/copenhagen_article/9056
Page 5 ‘Mann’s witheringly contemptuous posting at RealClimate’ – quoted in Montford, A., (2010), The Hockey Stick Illusion: Climategate and the Corruption of Science, (Turkey: Stacey International), p. 180.
Pages 6 ‘a letter to a Dutch science journalist, Marcel Crok’ – quoted in ibid., p. 183.
Page 8 ‘anatomised in books like Allan Bloom’s’ – Bloom, A., (1988), The Closing of the American Mind, (USA: Touchstone/Simon & Schuster).
Page 11 ‘Britain was groovy again. No less an authority than Vanity Fair told us so in its Cool Britannia edition’ – For instance see Kamp, D., (1997), ‘London Swings! Again!’, Vanity Fair, March. Available at: http://www.vanityfair.com/magazine/
archive/1997/03/london199703 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 13 ‘In its thirteen years in power, the New Labour government managed to create over 3,000 new offences’ – see Jenkins, S., (2009), ‘In its mania for jailing people, Britain has declared trivial offences crimes’, The Guardian, Comment is Free, 10 December. Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/10/conrad-black-labour-law-crime [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 13 ‘an Italian Marxist named Antonio Gramsci’ – for discussion of ‘culture war’ see ‘Why There is a Culture War’, http://www.hoover.org/publications/policy-review/article/7809
Page 14 ‘In his appendix to 1984’ – see Orwell, G., (2008), Nineteen Eighty-Four, (England: Penguin Group). For an excerpt see: http://www.newspeakdictionary.com/ns-prin.html [Accessed 15 January 2011].
Page 14 ‘As observed by Daniel Hannan’ – Hannan, D., (2001). ‘New World Order’, The Spectator, October 27. http://www.spectator.co.uk/politics/all/9430/part_3/new-word-order.thtml
Page 15 ‘As Christopher Booker and Richard North note in their excellent book Scared to Death’ – Booker, C. & North, R. (2007), Scared to Death, From BSE to Global Warming: Why Scares Are Costing Us The Earth (Wiltshire: Continuum).
Chapter Two: Climategate: How It Happened
Page 17 ‘By the late tenth to twelfth centuries most of the world’ – Lamb, H., H., (1982), Cl
imate, History and the Modern World (London: Routledge) p 162.
Page 17 ‘If you own any shares in alternative energy companies’ – Delingpole, J., (2009), ‘Climategate: the final nail in the coffin of “Anthropogenic Global Warming”?’, Telegraph Online Blogs, November 20. Available at: http://blogs. telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100017393/climategate-the-final-nail-in-the-coffin-of-anthropogenic-global-warming/ [Accessed 14 January 2011] References from original blog:
Page 17 ‘(Hat tip: Watts Up With That?)’ – Watts, A., (2009), ‘Breaking News Story: CRU has apparently been hacked – hundreds of files released’, Watts Up With That, November 19. Available at: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/19/breaking-news-story-hadley-cru-has-apparently-been-hacked-hundreds-of-files-released/#more-12937 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 18 ‘As Andrew Bolt puts it’ – Bolt, A., (2009), ‘Climate Gate: Warmist Conspiracy Exposed?’, Herald Sun, November 20. Available at: http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/
index.php/heraldsun/comments/hadley_hacked/ [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 18 ‘One of the alleged e-mails has a gentle gloat over the death in 2004 of John L. Daly’ – see Overington, C., (2009), ‘British Climate Expert ‘Cheered’ by Aussie’s Death’, News.com. Available at: http://www.news.com.au/features/environment/british-climate-expert-cheered-by-aussies-death/story-e6frflp0-1225801905609 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 18 ‘Manipulation of evidence’ – see: http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails. php?eid=154&filename=942777075.txt [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Note – Eastangliaemails.com is a comprehensive database of all the alleged emails from the University of East Anglia’s ‘Climate Research Unit’, covering the period March 1996 to November 2009.
Page 18 ‘Private doubts about whether the world really is heating up’ – see: http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=1048 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 19 ‘Suppression of evidence’ – see: http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=891 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 19 ‘Fantasies of violence against prominent Climate Sceptic scientists’ – see: http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=1045 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 19 ‘Attempts to disguise the inconvenient truth of the Medieval Warm Period (MWP)’ – see: http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=319 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 19 ‘And, perhaps most reprehensibly, a long series of communications discussing how best to squeeze dissenting scientists out of the peer review process.’ – see: http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=295 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 20 ‘In September – I wrote the story up here’ – Delingpole, J., (2009), ‘How the global warming industry is based on one MASSIVE lie’, Telegraph Online Blogs, September 29. Available at: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/
100011716/how-the-global-warming-industry-is-
based-on-one-massive-lie/ [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 20 ‘This matters because CRU, established in 1990 by the Met Office [sic]’ – This statement, written in original blog, was incorrect. The CRU was established in 1971 as part of the University of East Anglia School of Environmental Sciences. The Met Office’s Hadley Centre was established in 1990, and is based in Exeter.
Page 21 ‘My first glimpse of the story was at Anthony Watts’ website’ – ‘Breaking news story: CRU has apparently been hacked – hundreds of files released’ Watts, A. (2009), November 19. Available at: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/19/breaking-news-story-hadley-cru-has-apparently-been-hacked-hundreds-of-files-released/#more-12937 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 23 ‘I’d seen it happen to Daniel Hannan’ – Hannan, D., (2009) ‘Daniel Hannan MEP: The devalued Prime Minister of a devalued Government’, YouTube, March 24. Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=941W6Y4tBXs [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 23 ‘Here’s Elizabeth May, head of Canada’s Green Party’ – see Pearce, F., (2010), ‘How the ‘Climategate’ scandal is bogus and based on climate sceptics’ lies’, Guardian Online, February 1. Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/01/climate-emails-sceptics [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 24 ‘Here’s Professor Myles Allen of Oxford University.’ – Allen, M., (2009), ‘Science forgotten in climate emails fuss’, Guardian Online, 11 December. Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/11/science-climate-change-phil-jones [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 24 ‘Here’s Professor Kerry Emanuel of MIT’ – see Bishop Hill blog, March 22, 2010. Available at: http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2010/3/22/emmanuel-on-the-climategate-emails.html [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 24 ‘Here’s a RealClimate regular, Steve Easterbrook’ – Easterbrook, S., (2010), ‘Academic Culture from the Inside’, Hosted at: ClimateSight, March 25. Available at: http://climatesight.org/2010/03/25/academic-culture-from-the-inside-a-guest-post-by-steve-easterbrook/ [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 24 ‘Here is Fred Pearce, one of our foremost science journalists, writing in The Guardian’ – Pearce, F., (2010) ‘Climate emails cannot destroy proof that humans are warming the planet’, February 5. Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/
2010/feb/05/climate-change-hacked-emails
Page 25 ‘And here’s how Pearce continues’ – Pearce, F., (2010), ‘How the ‘Climategate’ scandal is bogus and based on climate sceptics’ lies’, Guardian Online, February 1. Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/01/climate-emails-sceptics [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 27 ‘This ‘you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours’ approach is most deliciously exemplified in an email exchange’ – see ‘13 years of Climategate emails show tawdry manipulation of science by a powerful cabal at the heart of the global warming campaign’, Poneke’s Weblog, 15 January 2010. Available at: http://poneke.wordpress.com/2010/01/15/gate/ [Accessed January 19, 2011]
Page 27–28 ‘Four months later, Mann decides that a sufficiently decent interval has elapsed for him to be able to ask Jones on-so-parenthetically’ – see: http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=975 [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 28 ‘For similar reasons, there’s little point dwelling on emails’ – see Overington, C., (2009), ‘British Climate Expert ‘Cheered’ by Aussie’s Death’, News.com. Available at: http://www.news.com.au/features/environment/british-climate-expert-cheered-by-aussies-death/story-e6frflp0-1225801905609 [Accessed 14 January 2011].
Page 28 ‘Or the one from October 9, 2009, where Ben Santer writes’ – see: http://assassinationscience.com/climategate
/1/FOIA/mail/1255100876.txt [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 30 ‘As Phil Jones himself puts it in one of his emails’ – see: http://assassinationscience. com/climategate/1/FOIA/mail/1256765544.txt [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 30 ‘The Medieval Warm Period (given very short shrift at Wikipedia, incidentally, for reasons not unconnected with Wikipedia’s extreme Warmist bias)’ – see: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole
/100020515/climategate-the-corruption-of-wikipedia/ [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 31 ‘Costella believes that what is essentially going on here is a breach of trust.’ – Costella, J., P., (2010), ‘Why Climategate is so Distressing to Scientists’, The Citizen Scientist. Available at: http://www.sas.org/tcs/weeklyIssues_2010/2010–03–05/feature3/index.html [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 32 ‘The one everyone has heard of, not least because it was turned into a catchy viral hit on YouTube by Minnesotans for Global Warming’ – see ‘Minnesotans for Global Warming Song (If We Had Some Global Warming)’, YouTube. Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJUFTm6cJXM [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 32 ‘Here’s the relevant passage – in an email from Phil Jones to Ray Bradley, Mike Mann, Malcolm Hughes, Keith Briffa and Tim Osborn’ – see: http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.ph
p?eid=154 [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 33 ‘Just so it’s not taken out of context, here is Briffa outlining the problem’ – see: http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=136 [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 35 ‘Here he outlines his scheme.’ – see: http://assassinationscience.com/climategate/1/
FOIA/mail/0938018124.txt [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 37 ‘read what the US National Academy of Sciences has to say’ – ‘On Being a Scientist: A Guide to Responsible Conduct in Research: Third Edition’ (2009), Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy (COSEPUP). Available at: http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=12192&page=8 [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 38 ‘Here, for example, is Tom Wigley’s suggestion of how to deal with them.’ – see: http://assassinationscience.com/climategate/
1/FOIA/mail/1061300885.txt [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 39 ‘discussing how best to blacken the name of the peer-review journal Climate Research’ – see: http://assassinationscience.com/climategate/
1/FOIA/mail/1051190249.txt [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 39 ‘Michael Mann has another idea.’ – see: http://assassinationscience.com/climategate/
1/FOIA/mail/1051202354.txt [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Page 40 ‘he dismisses another peer-reviewed journal Energy and Environment.’ – see: http://assassinationscience.com/climategate/
1/FOIA/mail/1196872660.txt [Accessed 19 January 2011].
Chapter Three: It’s Not About ‘The Science’
Page 41 ‘For generations, we have assumed that the efforts of mankind would leave the fundamental equilibrium of the world’s systems and atmosphere stable’ – the full transcript of Baroness Thatcher’s speech can be found at: http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/107346 [Accessed 15 January 2011].
Watermelons: How Environmentalists Are Killing the Planet, Destroying the Economy and Stealing Your Children's Future Page 28
