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Wry Heat - by Jonathan DuHamel

Why climate science is corrupt

by on Aug. 08, 2011, under Climate change

An article in Sunday’s Arizona Daily Star illustrates why climate science is corrupt. The story concerns computer modeling of climate, and scientists’ yearning for bigger, better, faster computers.

Within the story are these sentences:

Lawrence Buja, the director of the Climate Science and Application Program at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., said climate models had moved quickly from “Climate 1.0″ to “Climate 2.0.”

In Climate 1.0, the main issue was to prove that human-caused climate change was happening. “For that we needed models developed over 40 years,” he said. [emphasis added]

“To prove human-caused climate change was happening.” That’s the problem. True scientists would investigate and assess ALL the causes of climate change. The focus of the IPCC and other researchers trying to prove one politically-correct cause to the exclusion of all others resulted in data manipulation, cherry-picking, and attempted exclusion and suppression of contrary data and research papers.

Theories can be supported by evidence, but, no matter how widely they are held, they can never be proven, only disproven by that lone minority voice who just happens to provide the critical piece of evidence. “Climate 1.0″ was not a search for truth, but rather an attempt to provide a defense of one particular tenet of carbon-cult orthodoxy.

According to the story, “Climate 2.0″ will begin with the false conclusion of version one, and with new, more powerful computers, these “scientists” can make their mistakes even faster. Both truth and science will suffer.

 

See also:

The Assumed Authority a commentary on IPCC science and methods

A Basic Error in Climate Models

Climate Model Projections vs Real World Observations

How Mother Nature Fools Climate Scientists

IPCC and Peer Review

Carbon Dioxide and the Greenhouse Effect

Your Carbon Footprint doesn’t Matter

Natural Climate Cycles

Copyrighted by Jonathan DuHamel. Reprint is permitted provided that credit of authorship is provided and linked back to the source. Check the ARTICLE INDEX page for more posts on geology, natural history of the Sonoran desert, climate change, and energy. Also check the BOOK REVIEWS page. Comments that fail to conform with the Tucson Citizen commenting guidelines will be deleted.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 8th, 2011 at 8:05 am and is filed under Climate change. Tags for this post: , , . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  • metacomet

    Your crusade to advance a political agenda under the guise of scientific truth is getting a little long in the tooth.

    Wouldn’t be at all surprised to see you start promoting Creationism too.

    Might as well stay consistent with your anti-anthropomorphic climate change peers, and keep the bucks flowing to the fossil fuel profiteers.

    Do you get money direct from the Koch brothers for pushing this crap?

    If not, try reporting on something not connected with pushing an agenda that is wreaking havoc on our planet.

    • Jonathan DuHamel

      I receive no funding from the Koch brothers or any energy company. I write what I write because I think the scientific evidence supports that view. Commenters like you are quick to call names, but provide no physical evidence to counter my views. An no, I don’t support Creationism. I put that in the same class as the Carbon Cult.

      If you are tired of reading my views on climate and energy, then go to my Article Index page to see many stories on Geology and the Natural History of the Sonoran Desert.

      • joe salata

        See Andregg, Expert Credibility in Climate Change, Proceedings of the National Academies of Science, 10.1073; but then again, you don’t trust the scientists, so to no avail that 98% of published climate scientists support anthopogenic effects. You better hope that climate change is due to human effect; if not, there’s not much we can do about it, is there.

    • Richard H

      If you don’t like what you read here, why do you keep returning?  Could it be that inkling doubt and skepticism  drawing you out of your comfort zone of consensus and mediocrity?  My advice:  quit blindly following, start thinking for yourself.  The truth shall set you free. 

  • Renewable Guy

    I haven’t seen evidence of corruption in your article.

    carbon-cult orthodoxy?

    There are no carbon cults. This is just an imaginary straw man.

    http://www.grist.org/climate-skeptics/2011-08-02-stuff-white-people-like-denying-climate-change

    The desperation is on the part of the CWM (conservative white man) who is threatened by this very fundamental change in how our society will need to adapt to climate change and how we will need to change to eventually stop further exacerabation of our climate 

    Below is an easy to look at graphic with links to the science of the human finger print.

    http://www.skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=32

    This along with Richard Alley out of Penn State, it has taken scientists about 30 years to eliminate all the other possiblities other than humans.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attribution_of_recent_climate_change

    Attribution of recent climate change is the effort to scientifically ascertain mechanisms responsible for recent changes observed in the Earth‘s climate.

    From my conversations of about 5 years with different levels of denial, I have found that skeptics (deniers) don’t even read the science. They understand the denial much better than the science.

    If humans aren’t responsible, then it is up to the skeptics (deniers) to come up with the real reason why. The fossil fuel companies know that they are going to loose this game.

    How about you?

    • Richard H

      Renewable guy,Really over the top, especially  the part about conservative white guys. Now I really feel guilty; didn’t realize denial was culturally-related.  Oh, one thing, CWG’s tend to be better-educated than the general population,  and therefore more skeptical of  propaganda- fear tactics via environmental lefties.   By the way, in your next installment on AGW,  will you give us your sales pitch on the solar panels you bought with rebates paid for by your next-door neighbor?

    • Jonathan DuHamel

      It seems that “renewable guy” haunts other blogs also and that he is a worshiper of James, “killer coal trains” Hansen. Over at No tricks zone, the renewable guy is thoroughly debunked:
      http://notrickszone.com/2011/08/09/james-e-hansen-worshipper-gets-debunked/

  • http://none Jim Bodkins

    I dont believe you have ever been involved in science. Honest. (I have in a minor way).
     
    This comment – … prove that human-caused climate change was happening … means nothing more than answering the question … is human-caused climate change happening …
     
    But I understand. To a person with an agenda … you have an agenda … this would seem damning. But that would be your projection.
     
    I ask again, who funds your time?

    • Jonathan DuHamel

      Mr. Bodkins: Read the  About the Author page, that gives my scientific credentials.  As to your other question, I do this blog as a hobby without compensation.  The charge that I write what I write because I’m paid by the powers that be is an Ad Hominem argument and therefore invalid. That form of argument is the refuge of those who cannot find facts to refute my thesis. And yes, I have an agenda: to cut through the propaganda and present the physical evidence to put things in perspective.  I, unlike some others, don’t have to come up with scary scenarios of pretended problems to seek research money or justify new government programs and regulations.

      “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” – H. L. Mencken

      • http://none Jim Bodkins

        I did that long ago … Engineering.

        Your scary scenarios involve …

        “To prove human-caused climate change was happening.” That’s the problem. True scientists would investigate and assess ALL the causes of climate change. The focus of the IPCC and other researchers trying to prove one politically-correct cause to the exclusion of all others resulted in data manipulation, cherry-picking, and attempted exclusion and suppression of contrary data and research papers.

        … and …

        “And yes, I have an agenda: to cut through the propaganda and present the physical evidence to put things in perspective. ”

        … propaganda? Sounds scary to me.

        Any scientist that did what you are suggesting would not last in the peer reviewed world of science. You argue political correctness … they dont. What I have heard … on occasion … has been assertions that individuals with current or previous connections with energy concerns have submitted scientifically questionable papers which were later referenced by political activists to buttress positions.

        You do that. You quote questionable sources – often science writers not scientists – to refute work by members of the NSF. As an example JoNova. From that site …

        JoNova

        A freelance science presenter, writer, professional speaker & former TV host; author of The Skeptic’s Handbook (over 200,000 copies distributed & available in 15 languages).

        … by the way, a true scientist would study the physical universe with the purpose of a better understanding of nature.

  • Jonathan DuHamel

    Renewable Guy: If you don’t see any corruption, then you don’t understand the scientific method.
    Read the article “Your carbon footprint doesn’t matter” linked above. I use the IPCC’s own numbers to show that human carbon dioxide emissions are insignificant relative to the natural carbon cycle.

  • R James

    None of the climate models have predicted the lack of warming over the past 12 years. Because they can’t be substantiated with real data, they are either wrong, or it’s too early to judge them.
    What I find corrupt is when a scientist (eg Roy Spencer – Dr of meteorology) provides data that can help understand why the models are wrong, the modellers  dismiss the scientist as being wrong. Surely such reports should be embraced, investigated, and if warranted, the data tested in the models. It seems that there is no room for real data if it fails to match the alarmist agenda.
    It’s the same as the Hockey Stick was manipulated until the embarrassing Medieval Warm Period, and Little Ice Age disappeared.

  • R James

    Renewable Guy – You’re talking nonsense. It’s not up to skeptics to explain anything. Have you no idea of scientific process? One of the processes is to take the first half of data by time, and develop a model. Then see if it can predict the last half of data. None of the models show the lack of warming over the past 12 years.
    The scientific process allows for construction of a hypothesis, then test it against real data. In this case, continued temperature increase as CO2 increases, and a “hot spot” over the tropics. On both these tests, the hypothesis fails. The scientific process then requires a re-think of the hypothesis. It’s the responsibility of the creator of the hypothesis to prove it.
    To date, the scientific process does nothing to advance past hypothesis stage. Certainly not something to change world economics, at the cost of lives.

  • Amy S

    Your basis for this entire article does not seem to take into account that the Arizona Daily Star author is the one who used the term “to prove that human-caused climate change was happening.”  The scientists quoted in that article never used that phrasing.  In my experience as both a scientist and educator, it has always been important to emphasize that one cannot “prove” anything; scientific data can merely support or fail to support the hypothesis that is proposed. Could it not be possible that the author writing this article failed to see that nuance?

    You were quick to accuse the IPCC and other researchers of “data manipulation, cherry-picking, and attempted exclusion and suppression of contrary data and research papers” in order to prove a “politically-correct cause.” I certainly hope you don’t fail to see the similarity when it appears in your article as well.

    • Jonathan DuHamel

      You may be right that Lawrence Buja, himself, did not say those specific words. I can’t find a direct quote. However, the IPCC was focused on human induced climate change from the beginning. In Article 1 of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, climate change was defined as “a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over considerable time periods.”

      In the IPCC’s Third Assessment Report, 2001, they say specifically that their focus is on human-induced climate change.

      As for your second paragraph, those things were brought to light by the Climategate emails and other research.

  • tucsondon

    Way to wordy, Jonathon.  Why climate science is corrupt? One word would suffice; money. End of story.

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