[Gasification] CO2 aka more global warming

[Richard Haard]

>
Editorial in New Scientist on manipulative behavior of climate change  
skeptics.


Editorial: Climate change sceptics employ dubious tactics
06 October 2007
 From New Scientist Print Edition.
WE NEED climate change sceptics. Not because they are right - at  
least not on the big issue of human culpability in recent warming -  
but because they ask hard questions that lead to deeper knowledge.  
What we do not need from them is misrepresentation and cynical  
trashing of scientists' work.

Take the latest claims attributed to Fred Singer, arch-exponent of  
the idea that solar cycles explain everything about climate change,  
and economist Dennis Avery from the Hudson Institute, a think tank in  
Washington DC. They made headlines with their list of 500 scientists  
who they say have refuted "at least one element of current man-made  
global warming scares". The list, says Avery, "makes a mockery of  
recent claims that a scientific consensus blames humans as the  
primary cause of global temperature increases since 1850".

There is sleight of hand in here, and the words "at least one  
element" and "since 1850" leave plenty of wriggle room. Sadly, some  
members of the press have chosen to interpret the release as saying  
that 500 scientists are "doubtful" that present global warming is  
down to human activity.

Now some of the 500 are demanding that their names be removed from  
the list. Leading the field is Joanna Haigh of Imperial College  
London, an investigator of possible solar influences on climate via  
cosmic rays. She says: "I believe that changes in the sun influence  
climate, but I have never claimed that solar forcing is responsible  
for recent global warming. It is mendacious of them to include me in  
a list of those refuting human activity as the major cause." Another  
on the list, climatologist Michael Mann of Penn State University,  
adds: "This is a dishonest and cynical misrepresentation of my  
findings and views, and those of many of my colleagues."

Singer responded with a note saying: "I was not involved in this  
exercise - or consulted." Avery explained his interpretations,  
helpfully telling Haigh: "I carefully avoided saying that you agree  
with our interpretations."

Once research findings are published they, of course, become public  
property, available to be contested and reinterpreted by all. But  
researchers do have a right not to be blatantly misrepresented.  
Sadly, the spin doctors of climate scepticism have a history of  
mangling research and traducing the integrity of climate scientists.

Another absurd recent claim attributed to Singer is that "the widely  
touted 'consensus' of 2500 scientists on the UN Intergovernmental  
Panel on Climate Change is an illusion: most of the panelists have no  
scientific qualifications". This stuff is bad not only for science,  
but also for the sceptical cause. No one wants to silence sceptics:  
we need scepticism. We just wish they were better at it.

 From issue 2624 of New Scientist magazine, 06 October 2007, page 5