The climate-change travesty by George F. Will

George F. Will weighs in on the Climategate scandal. Below I’ve provided some key text from his article.

A CRU e-mail says: "The fact is that we can't account for the lack of warming at the moment" -- this "moment" is in its second decade -- "and it is a travesty that we can't."

The travesty is the intellectual arrogance of the authors of climate-change models partially based on the problematic practice of reconstructing long-term prior climate changes. On such models we are supposed to wager trillions of dollars -- and substantially diminished freedom.

Some climate scientists compound their delusions of intellectual adequacy with messiah complexes. They seem to suppose themselves a small clerisy entrusted with the most urgent truth ever discovered. On it, and hence on them, the planet's fate depends. So some of them consider it virtuous to embroider facts, exaggerate certitudes, suppress inconvenient data, and manipulate the peer-review process to suppress scholarly dissent and, above all, to declare that the debate is over.

Consider the sociology of science, the push and pull of interests, incentives, appetites and passions. Governments' attempts to manipulate Earth's temperature now comprise one of the world's largest industries. Tens of billions of dollars are being dispensed, as by the U.S. Energy Department, which has suddenly become, in effect, a huge venture capital operation, speculating in green technologies. Political, commercial, academic and journalistic prestige and advancement can be contingent on not disrupting the (postulated) consensus that is propelling the gigantic and fabulously lucrative industry of combating global warming.

Climategate: Caught Green-Handed! By Christopher Monckton

Christopher Monckton of Brenchley provides a detailed analysis of how the folks at the Climate Research Unit manipulated and suppressed the climate data to make it appear the Earth has been warming. He shows lines of code from the program they used that adds in a “fudge factor” (that’s the term used in the code!) to correct for the pesky decline in world temperatures.

Monckton ends with an ironically appropriate quote from President Eisenhower’s farewell address.

Public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite ... The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present – and is gravely to be regarded.

As I mentioned in an earlier post Stephen Hicks identifies the philosophical premises behind this ugly marriage between science and government.

The lesson is not only about politics. The core lesson is about the corruption of philosophy (especially epistemology), which has enabled an entire generation of journalists, activists, and politicians to be intellectually disarmed by a group of frauds — or to become enablers in disarming those who would challenge the frauds. A postmodern philosophical culture indeed.

And, at the risk of being too presumptuous let me quote from a post I wrote two years ago.

So why do Gore and his followers persist in advocating that we are to blame? I think the following quote from the former Canadian Environment Minister Christine Stewart sheds light on their motive.

“No matter if the science is all phony, there are collateral environmental benefits…. Climate change [provides] the greatest chance to bring about justice and equality in the world.” Source: Calgary Herald, 14 December 1998.

It all comes down to a new way to make us (the U.S. in particular and the West in general) feel guilty for our material success in order to soften us for their solutions of taxing emissions, changing our life style and bringing us down to the level of countries that don’t suffer from these “problems,” thanks to their policies of punitive taxation, heavy regulation and government control (or strangling) of their economies.

Scientific fraud and politics - Stephen Hicks Post

Stephen Hicks has a good post on "Climategate" that gets to the philosophical core.

The lesson is not only about politics. The core lesson is about the corruption of philosophy (especially epistemology), which has enabled an entire generation of journalists, activists, and politicians to be intellectually disarmed by a group of frauds — or to become enablers in disarming those who would challenge the frauds. A postmodern philosophical culture indeed.

Charles Krauthammer : Kill the Bills. Do Health Reform Right - Townhall.com

Here is a good, brief analysis of the pending health care bill.

Charles Krauthammer : Kill the Bills. Do Health Reform Right - Townhall.com

Global Warming Fraud and the Future of Science

This article -- Global Warming Fraud and the Future of Science -- in the American Thinker nicely summarizes Climategate. Here is a key quote from it.

[S]cience had become entwined and infected with ideology to a point where its very nature was transformed. It was no longer science in the classic mold, boldly asking basic questions without fear or favor. It had become an ideological tool, carrying out only such research as met with the approval of political elites.

The great climate change science scandal - Times Online

For a good overview of the recent scandal dubbed "Climategate" check out the Times On Line.

The great climate change science scandal - Times Online

The Climate Engine

For a different explanation of climate change than the current gospel according to Al Gore and his supporters check out this long post describing the complex mechanisms of the earth’s atmosphere.

Below is a summary pulled from this post.

The warming mode:

1. There is a shift of the atmosphere from the poles towards mid and low latitudes under electromagnetic forcing of ionized air.

2. Weakening of the polar vortexes curtails the flow of ionized nitrogen into the upper stratosphere allowing the survival of oxygen ions and increased ozone formation.

3. Intermixing of ozone into the upper troposphere raises temperature in the ice cloud zone. Ice crystals evaporate.

4. More solar radiation reaches the surface which warms.

5. In the southern hemisphere 200hpa temperature rises much more than in the northern hemisphere exhibiting strong equinoctial maxima.

6. Peak anomalies in stratospheric temperature occur in September-October rather than March.

7. A southern spring deficit in ice cloud density promotes warming across all southern latitudes which promotes the El Nino pattern of sea surface temperature at the equator.

The Cooling Mode

1. Surface atmospheric pressure increases at the poles as the electromagnetic force in the ionosphere/thermosphere relaxes. This happens at solar minimum as the quantum of ionizing radiation falls to its lowest levels. It also tends to happen at solar maximum as the suns magnetic polarity reverses and magnetic fields emanating from the sun tend to be self cancelling. The manifestation in the Pacific Ocean is La Nina cooling.

2. Strengthening of the polar vortexes introduces ionized nitrogen into the stratosphere reducing the population of oxygen ions and ozone.

3. A loss of ozone in the ice cloud zone reduces temperature enhancing the formation of reflective ice crystals.

4. Less solar radiation reaches the surface which cools.

5. A generally low ozone level in the stratosphere results in high amplitude change in stratospheric temperature during the ENSO cycle. This is expressed in high amplitude variation in 20hpa temperature at the equator. At the surface the swing from El Nino warming to La Nina cooling is more violent and extreme.

6. Change is more extreme in the southern hemisphere where the polar vortex is generally cooler especially at the highest altitudes. In the cool mode stratospheric temperature exhibits a March maximum probably in line with enhancement of orbital rather than geomagnetic influences on stratospheric temperature. The earth is closest to the sun in January.

7. A cooler stratosphere and upper troposphere in southern spring promotes ice cloud formation reducing the flux of solar radiation to the surface establishing a La Nina dominant regime in the Pacific Ocean.