Hard News: Don't call it a consensus
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QU: "help! is this the denialators!!!"
ANS: "no."
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Denial industry because, after all, it is an industry. It's big bucks from big business. Look at all the foreign deniers brought to New Zealand over the years - most recently Nigel Lawson - all paid for by NZ Business, or the Business Roundtable or the like.
we can all decide to be climate change scientists, and pick and choose one piece of science and use it to validate our own view. But the IPCC has looked at ALL the latest peer reviewed science and come up with a conclusion that climate change is happening and that it's 90% certain caused by human activities.
If I was 90% certain the plane I was about to board would crash, then I'd be very unlikely to get on it.
Anyway, speaking of deniers, or whatever you want to call them there's a massive shindig of them gathering in New York next week, courtesy of the Heartland Institute (recipient of around US$800,000 from ExxonMobil since 1998).
Our very own Owen McShane and Vincent Gray are going. Given that they're speakers they'll get their hotels paid for and a nice fat $1000 fee from the Exxon-funded Heartland. They must feel terribly important. Start to speak out against global warming and whammo! you get to travel internationally and attend such auspicious occasions.
The scientists at Real Climate were invited, but turned it down.
The groups gathered in New York collectively represent literally millions from Exxon and other big oil, coal and gas companies. There are few, if any, of them who have published a peer reviewed paper on climate in the last 15 years.
Heartland's own money from Exxon has been tagged as being for its "climate change efforts'. And what efforts. Deny all climate science, trash the IPCC, Al Gore... the usual stuff. Oh, and they're also working hard on denying links between second hand smoke and cancer. Big tobacco pays well too.
Now Heartland says that none of the money it's spending on this conference is from Exxon but the Exxon money frees up money Heartland spends elsewhere so that's a fairly specious argument.
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...wipes out a century of warming
And here was me thinking that up until the end of 2k7 the denial business was emphatically denying that there was any real evidence for "a century of warming" at all.
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First!
How Web 1.0 of you, Graeme.
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Denailators - Chapter 13 of the State of the Environment anyone?
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I see russell is is in McCully's sights
Helen’s Little Helpers at TVNZ
Stung by Prime Ministerial claims that her Government’s minor poll setbacks are purely the result of a hostile right wing media, Helen’s little helpers at TVNZ have clearly decided on a bold initiative to win her affections. Left wing blogger, Labour Party mouth-piece and Judith Tizard campaign activist Russell Brown has been announced as the host of the new media programme on TVNZ’s new Channel 7.In order to make his intentions clear from the start, Brown thoughtfully posed alongside Labour MPs under a "Join Labour" banner at a recent Hero function. Check it out here: http://www.herodebate.org.nz
Our Prime Minister will be pleased indeed that her lackeys at the state broadcaster are coming to the party in election year.
It'll be up on Scoop soon no doubt. -
hmmmm... the people who opent he eyes of the denialators?
"denialadilators"?
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My dislike for McCully is intense and increasingly visceral. It's not like RB is replacing failed National Party candidate Paul Henry or anything....
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So let's go for a lighter note. I downloaded and watched The Brits, the British music awards, this week, and although most of the bits in between were crap, the stage performances were brilliantly produced. No more so than Rianna's collaboration with The Klaxons on that song. It looked and sounded huge, and it appears it may actually get a proper release.
I kicked it Old School and simply recorded it for later viewing. I also FFW thru the bits in between, stopping only for the live performances. I also stopped for Rianna's UMBRELLA ELLA ELLA (ha ha! there's no escaping that earworm now) but only to try and figure out how high her heels were, or whether she was actually wearing 10inch platforms under that dress.
I didn't pick up on the band (I was FFW) and merely presumed (once I'd dismissed the idea it was The Police __circa 'Syncronicity') that they were merely from Central Casting wearing some costumes left over from __Duran Duran's 'Wild Boys' video.
So they're actually a band are they? Have they released anything yet? -
"denialadilators"?
Why does that sound so rude?
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I think one of the problem with talking about concensus is that it is practically impossible to get scientists to _absolutely_ agree about anything.
A truer phrase has never been spoken - I work in an organisation full of scientists - getting them to even agree to a meeting time is like... well actually I haven't found anything which is as painful as trying to get scientists to agree so I'll leave it at that.
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note to self: edit rb's wiki. include "tool of the state, possible communist, homosexual sympathiser".
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so, Scott, when the IPCC agrees with "90% certainty" then it must be pretty robust, right?
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I'd be pretty pleased to have any word replace 'denier'. I'm old enough to think "nylon stockings" when I see the word 'denier'.
From memory I think the lower the number denier (pronounced to kind of rhyme with 'derriere'), the more sheer the stocking.
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I see russell is is in McCully's sights
Sigh ... it's presumably only just come to his attention, but I do the Hero Debate every year -- it's really good fun. Gay audiences laugh like drains when you tell 'em foul jokes. The fouler, the better. Although Stephen Gray out-fouls me every year, the bitch.
It is organised by Judith Tizard, as part of the wider Hero Festival, and some of the funds go to her campaign, but it also benefits the Cartier Bereavement Trust, a truly inspiring HIV-AIDS support organisation.
Karen Ritchie, the founder of the trust, is an amazing woman. I got teary-eyed when she spoke.
Apart from anything else, McCully's description of me as a "Judith Tizard campaign activist" is completely false, and I'm sure he knows it.
I've explained this several times before, including to NBR: in the mid-90s, I helped out a friend by joining the Auckland Central branch of the Labour Party. I went to about three meetings and helped with a pamphlet. I cancelled the membership years ago. That's it. Naturally, I'd rather not be photograohed in front of a party banner, but I'm not going to avoid a group hug. And neither will I be intimidated into not participating in a worthwhile event.
I really think this is extremely improper behaviour from McCully -- and a direct attack on my livelihood.
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possible communist, homosexual sympathiser".
Definitely not the former, absolutely the latter!
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It's alright Russell, you didn;t need to explain.
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merc,
McCully: the McCarthy denialator.
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It's alright Russell, you didn;t need to explain.
I kind of feel I do, if only to explain that I've explained it before. It's the only Labour Party event I even attend, let alone participate in.
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The photo McCully is referring to is here:
The best pic is of Buckwheat in her amazing dress. People burst into applause when she arrived.
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David Farrar has wasted no time putting that Hero photo up on his blog.
Stand by for the usual well-rehearsed outrage when he gets called on it. ("What, me ref?").
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It looked and sounded huge,
extensive use of baking tracks - watch the drummer. (here's one I baked earlier)
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Murray McCully always struck me as a failed Village People karaoke contestant peeved he didn't win as he had grown his moustache especially for the occasion.
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McCully as Minister of Broadcasting: "Are you now, or have you ever been, a distributor of pamphlets for Judith Tizard?" What an obnoxious little turd.
He almost lost East Coast Bays in 2002. Is it too much to dream that such an event might come to pass once more?
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I think one of the problem with talking about concensus is that it is practically impossible to get scientists to _absolutely_ agree about anything. It is in fact their job to question stuff and say "Maybe, but I'd really like to actually see the raw data on this".
Unfortunately this can also be a problem when trying to get scientists to talk to the media. You'll never get a scientist to call anything "safe" or "definite". There's no such thing as safe. There is always a risk even if it is 0.00001% likely to ever occur. But this refusal to label anything safe can lead to panic "Medicine/Food/Bicycle/Process type X is UNSAFE!!!!"
Absolutely. Science is about organised, systematic doubt, so naturally scientists hedge. They're never 100% certain, they always want more evidence, and they're always looking for holes in the theory to be examined. These are Good Things, and they're why science can produce exceptionally robust conclusions, such as those we see on anthropogenic climate change.
As for comparing climate change deniers to Holocaust Deniers, I think its entirely fair, as they display the same level of intellectual dishonesty and complete disregard for the facts.
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