rigorously eschewing the unfortunate ad hominem arguments that too often characterize public “debate” about human-caused climate change

My title comes from a lying "letter of recommendation" for Soon, which says in part:

...Willie is scrupulous in attending to the basic scientific veracity of everything that he presents in public about scientific matters. He is careful not only in that regard, but also in the attention he pays to drawing reasonable and balanced conclusions, and in rigorously eschewing the unfortunate ad hominem arguments that too often characterize public “debate” about human-caused climate change.

The entire thing is a tissue of lies, but that one is particularly galling. My picture demonstrates that its a lie. The rest is lies too: "Willie is scrupulous in attending to the basic scientific veracity of everything that he presents in public about scientific matters" is a lie, as demonstrated by There is no land on an aqua-planet.

Enough of that bit; there's more in the Breitbart Kimosabe that's worth mocking. Its printing stuff from Two of Soon’s peers, an ill-defined concept, but yes I suppose they are his peers. One is Carter, one is Monkers. Try to play guess-who-wrote-each letter without reading the names; I was astonished by how well Carter manages to emulate Monkers usual tone.

From the outside it is very clear that... is a suspect start. The intent is clear: this is some neutral, outside observer rendering an impartial judgement. Which is, obviously, risible. As becomes clear when we continue ...the attack on Willie is... Yes, that's right, he's on first-name terms with Soon. So much for "from the outside". Just to make it even clearer, he continues with "a recent reference that I wrote for him". Yes, that's right: he's on such good terms with "Willie" that he writes references for him. This is just such... low-grade drivel for children. Its insulting; are there really people dumb enough to read Breitbart and not realise that its junk? And these are only the internal contradictions. If you add in the many clashes with reality, it gets worse.

Refs

* LINDZEN LIBEL SHOCK HORROR - RS.
* The Soon fallacy - Gavin at RC.
* A comment on "The crucifixion of Dr. Willie Soon" at Breitbart
* A Climate Crusader Melts, Exposing a Profitable Link to Harvard’s Name - Paul Basken, Chronicle of Higher Education
* Willie Soon saga
- ATTP
* Willie Soon Attacks Funders of Climate Denial for 'Lack of Courage' - BRENDAN MONTAGUE, DeSmog
* Retraction Watch June 2015.

Categories

More like this

Something of a classic, from Richard Telford. He's discussing Soon's Heartland presentation. Here's a screenshot: Soon is trying to point out the importance of the value of the solar insolation, which he believes needs to be heavily fiddled to make the GCMs come out right. To prove this, he's…
The following statement was issued this afternoon by the Smithsonian: Smithsonian Statement on Willie Soon, researcher at the Smithsonian Astrophysics Observatory. The Smithsonian is greatly concerned about the allegations surrounding Dr. Willie Soon’s failure to disclose funding sources for his…
The Willie Soon Story broke on Saturday night, having cloned off the front page of the Sunday New York Times into a few secondary sources. But we all saw it coming. Since then there has been quite a bit more written and there will be quite a bit more. The main thing I want to add to the…
The Willie Soon Controversy There’s been a lot of talk about the Willie Soon Controversy. Bottom line: Soon was an author on a paper that failed to disclose his extensive funding by the petroleum industry and its friends (over a million dollars to date, I believe) as required. I don’t have time to…

Is this where we have to wonder again whether you realize how nutty the discourse is here?

it looks like I may have finally cured myself of writing about the stupidities of the denialists and arguing with idiots.
It's a good thing you prefaced the above with it looks like :-)

[Yeah yeah I know. I'm kinda letting myself go on this Soon stuff, there's just too much fun. I presume you're not posting because you can't find a way to say anything politely? Meanwhile, tomorrow is lined up as the "Pachi resigns" post day, unless the Soonies do something even more outrageous -W]

By ...and Then Th… (not verified) on 24 Feb 2015 #permalink

I apologize for being off-topic, but... could we please make fun of Pat Frank and his latest post? http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/02/24/are-climate-modelers-scientists/

Plus, these gems from the comments:
"This is the best WUWT article I have read in a very long time"
"Brilliant piece! The “propagated error” point is a revelation to me. I have really learnt something here."
"Your work obviously belongs in a mathematical/statistical journal, not in “climate science”."

I scanned through the entire body of comments, and found a grand total of 1 that expressed skepticism in the idea that if there is an error in timestep 1, you can just keep adding onto it in every subsequent timestep to get your total error. (for one thing: by halving the timestep, one could instantly double the error*, thereby proving that climate models are even worse than we thought!)

*Well, maybe increase by square root of 2. I didn't actually pay attention to how he did his uncertainty propagation.

(I also wonder how he managed to find even 1 reviewer out of 10 who thought this wasn't a stinking pile of ...)

"are there really people dumb enough to read Breitbart and not realise that its junk?"

It's #501 in the USA apparently, &:

"Relative to the general internet population, people who did not go to college are greatly over-represented at this site."

"This is just such… low-grade drivel for children. Its insulting; are there really people dumb enough to read Breitbart and not realise that its junk?"

Read the comments under any of those Breitbart articles, and you know the answer. Then again, it likely was just a rhetorical question, wasn't it? :)

By Jan P Perlwitz (not verified) on 24 Feb 2015 #permalink

MMM, I took a gander at Pat Frank's poster from 2013's AGU:

http://meteo.lcd.lu/globalwarming/Frank/propagation_of_error_poster_AGU…

Holeeeeee crap is it bad. He uses a linear function that fits temperature change to a change in forcing, plugs into this a continuing, random sampling across the +/- 4W/m2 uncertainty from the cloud forcings for each timestep, and determines that the model results should be somewhere across a range of 30 degrees by the end of the century.

I don't think he understand what the cloud forcing uncertainty means. It's not a range that the cloud forcing can vary across from one timestep to the next.

You can't just randomly plug in some value for the cloud forcing into the models, and vary this at each timestep and get a sensible result. Essentially, he's treating the error as actually being +/- 4 W/m2 per year, as an uncertainty in the change in cloud forcing, such that the cloud forcing uncertainty propagates forward through time.

I can't even. He changed the units of the error without realizing it.

By Windchaser (not verified) on 24 Feb 2015 #permalink

Plus, that's not how you'd investigate error propagation in a model anyways. You don't fit the model to an equation, fit the uncertainty to a number, and then run that uncertainty through your fitted equation.

I mean, not unless you're pretty damn sure that there are no confounding factors in the model that would respond to the uncertainty you're introducing. E.g., the amount of outgoing radiation responds to a change in temperature from a change in cloud forcing, and mitigates the effects of that cloud forcing.

No, to investigate error propagation, you do precisely what the reviewers suggested: you run models across the range of the physical uncertainty in your models, and look at how the results vary. It's important, though, to co-vary multiple factors across their uncertainties, and in a physically realistic way.

By Windchaser (not verified) on 24 Feb 2015 #permalink

When you get around to writing about Pachauri, you can cheerfully criticize this. Because it isn't about Pachauri. It's about the sense of being above judgment that has afflicted the Consensus for a very long time. https://thelukewarmersway.wordpress.com/2015/02/24/the-peril-of-great-c…

[Doubtless you're delighted that I've now done so. Unaccountably though you haven't written to thank me for doing it, you've only whinged. That's totally unexpected -W]

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 24 Feb 2015 #permalink

Let him who is without Soon file the first nail.

Breitbart has banned me from commenting too.

[Admit it: if you weren't banned, you'd be insulted :-) -W]

MMM,

Please don't quote me on this (please don't go over there and say this person said such and such), as I'm not 100% sure (I'm like 99% sure, in IPCC lingo virtually certain).

It looks as if PF has a basic quadrature error propagation 'model' that appears to be a power law relationship.

Not even wrong.

I did this in a spreadsheet and obtained the power law relationship. PF is summing the variance errors then taking the square root, when he should put N in the denominator of the sum and then take the square root.

I think a simple thought experiment bares this out, take 40,000 apples (which I did via spreadsheet, mean = 1, sigma = 0.1, normal distribution), weigh each one, determine the sum weight, mean and sigma. Now starting from zero apples, chose one at random (I just used the same random sequence), add to scale, measure total weight, add next random apple, measure total weight, .... , add last apple, measure total weight.

The more apples you add the more accurate your estimates for projecting 40,000 apples become for estimation of the sum-mean-sigma. So it takes ~ 200 apples for the sum/average to reach 99% of true value, sigma takes significantly longer (srqt(1/N) gets in the way) at say ~200 (90%) and ~4,000 (99%).

Anyways, the errors propagate to the true values, the errors do not propagate to +/- infinity. D'oh! Earth goes BELOW absolute zero

PF has been doing these type of stuff for a very long time, see:
http://www.rabe.org/doubt-makers/

So now I'm wondering who the one in ten douche nozzle was. Also, consider that for each story told by one person, without full disclosure, the other ten people also get to tell their stories. We are missing those other ten stories.

Finally, PF does not understand NS type numerical models at all, you can't just add random stochastic errors to a deterministic model at each and every time step. Also, I think cloud forcing is an internal feedback and not an external forcing (someone correct me if I'm wrong). If not, then you would have to look at the total forcing (diurnal-seasonal-long term) not just one component that has ~zero mean and what appears to be a large standard error (again I could be wrong).

By Everett F Sargent (not verified) on 24 Feb 2015 #permalink

Now here's the funding issue we should be exploring: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/un-climate-chief-rajendra-pa…

"THE Indian head of the UN climate change panel, already under fire over errors in a key 2007 report, is raising eyebrows again after publishing a raunchy novel and accepting help in promoting it from BP and the head of India's biggest gas producer."

[Good to see you rigourously exploring ad-hom arguments: you fail the Carter test. But patience, glasshopper: Pachi comes -W]

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 24 Feb 2015 #permalink

.

By Everett F Sargent (not verified) on 25 Feb 2015 #permalink

There is a difference in intent and effect between Soon and Pachauri because of the different roles each has.

Soon publishes research as deliverables for his funders, the fossil fuel industry. There is a conflict of interest between the requirement by the funding source to conceal the funding and the requirement of the scientific research publishers to declare funding. The low opinion that is held by mainstream climate science of his work is not the result of his funding, or lack of transparency. That is based in the bias in his research towards finding a dominant role for solar effects. And the derogatory attacks he makes on other scientists and the mainstream science as shown in the photo above.
That pattern of behaviour is what casts doubt on the credibility of Soon's work.

Pachuari is a manager, put in charge of herding cats, or organising a comprehensive review from hundreds of scientists. He does NO research and has no scientific credibility to lose. That his personal life has elements some may regard as dubious does not indicate that would influence his managerial role. That he benefits from fossil fuel links as a writer of literary fiction has little bearing on his role in the IPCC

Casting doubt on the validity of the work done by the IPCC because of the personal sexual behaviour of the top management would be ridiculous. As far as I know nobody has suggested re-examining all the statements, decisions and actions of the IMF during the time D Strauss-Khan was at its head.
izen

Look, I don't agree with Soon's presumed thesis, or obsession, or whatever you want to call it.

But stories about his funding have been around for years. I find it curious that they crop up again just at the time that the head of the IPCC has to resign for sexual improprieties.

[And then you complain when people say you lot are full of conspiracies theories. You're sad because you have the bad luck to have Soon and Pachi at the same time, and everyone is more interested in Soon, despite Pachi being potentially a juicy sex-type scandal. Well, keep pushing it, you may get lucky -W]

I find it even more curious that bloggers such as our host and Eli Rabett need to spend four (and counting) posts rehashing this whole story while ignoring a much larger issue. Speaking of squirrels...

izen, DSK is an interesting case. Rumors of his behaviour also followed him for years. Nobody made a big deal of it until he was busted. Then it comes out that he was of such a repellent nature that he seems to be from the wrong century.

The IMF was smart enough to replace him with a female. I wish the IPCC had followed suit.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 25 Feb 2015 #permalink

I tried Pachi again. Another resignation.

By Steve Bloom (not verified) on 25 Feb 2015 #permalink

As reported, Pachauri's improprieties are on the mild side as these things go. But there's no doubt they would have been a distraction for the next six months, and we're already into the transition period anyway, so the resignation made sense even if there are no consequences in the end.

By Steve Bloom (not verified) on 25 Feb 2015 #permalink

Recently the NYT has been on a rising trend toward more aggressive climate change coverage. A year or two ago they might have left the Soon business alone. Change is good.

By Steve Bloom (not verified) on 25 Feb 2015 #permalink

Tom Fuller,
Actually I read your article. The last line a little ironic, maybe?

By ...and Then Th… (not verified) on 25 Feb 2015 #permalink

Soon is happy to call the IPCC "gangster science", but gets very upset when the IPCC "suggests" that Baliunas and Jastrow's work was "flawed".

These are “Very strong words” and a “matter of really amazing injustice”.

I guess internal consistency is not a useful skill when playing the climate sceptic.

By richard telford (not verified) on 25 Feb 2015 #permalink

I guess internal consistency is not a useful skill when playing the climate sceptic.
From what I've seen, it would almost seem that a lack of internal consistency is a requirement.

By ...and Then Th… (not verified) on 25 Feb 2015 #permalink

Everyone is more interested in Soon than Pachauri?

Google search results 'willie soon funding': 59,200
Google search results 'pachauri sexual harassment' 140,000

You should try visiting planet Earth occasionally. It's really nice here, even if we have a lot of 'Chinks.'

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 25 Feb 2015 #permalink

TF:

"soon scandal" give ...

31,000,000

just in case you think stupid google search results are meaningful and all ...

and a Google search for 'willie soon funding' gives me 510,000 now.

based on this rate of increase, i confidently predict that we'll be in a deadly ice age before the month is out, and that Al Gore will be a fat poohead who will be wrong and everyone will see i'm right.

(or maybe those numbers are only the vaguest reflection of reality, so comparison is pretty much meaningless.)

> [Doubtless you’re delighted that I’ve now done so. Unaccountably though you haven’t written to thank me for doing it, you’ve only whinged. That’s totally unexpected -W]

Why would I thank you for scratching your blogging itch? Should I thank you for joining Sierra Steve in starting the airbrushing of Pachauri out of existence? Good luck with that.

Sure, Connolley, thanks for writing a meaningless post full of bluster serving your tribe's political needs. You can now return to serving up ethnic insults.

[I do wonder why you're here (that isn't a hint that you shouldn't be here). You don't really want to say anything, and you don't want to read what I write -W]

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 26 Feb 2015 #permalink

I took a tour of Deniersville (as most of those sites have like a 100% complete list to choose from dontcha know) two (or so) days ago.

Like almost all sites appeared to have daily talk abouts wrt public enemy number two.

It was sort of like going to Steve 'Real Sciency' Godtard's site to read about public enemy number one.

By Everett F Sargent (not verified) on 26 Feb 2015 #permalink

I like your blog. I like Only In It For The Gold and Rabett Run and I give their owners a lot more stick than I've ever given you.

I just disagree with most of what I read here--but it keeps me young and thinking. Sometimes I even learn something.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 26 Feb 2015 #permalink

@ Tom

"Sure, Connolley, thanks for writing a meaningless post full of bluster serving your tribe’s political needs."

Really?

You just wrote a post saying the Soon issue was
"that he received funding from fossil fuel sources."
No mention of failing to disclose - the only reason he is being investigated.

Not to mention "Al Gore... private planes".

Matt,
You might enjoy Tom's recent "The perils of Great Causes" post which covers Peter Gleick and Al Gore and then ends with the classic

Oh for the days when we talked about science.

[I saw that. The mocking self-irony would be poetic, were it not unknowing -W]

By ...and Then Th… (not verified) on 28 Feb 2015 #permalink

I like poetry. I like self-knowledge. I even (in small doses) like 'mocking self-irony.

I also like talking about science.

And I don't get in a huff if someone misspells my name.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

And Then There's Something and Connolley, Tobis does that much better than you two. Go learn from the master before you try it. Your efforts look... clumsy.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

I also like talking about science.

Well, why don't you just do so, which was essentially my point. This whole debate seems to be full of people complaining that things would be so much better "if only.....", but these people never seem to consider that they could make it better if they started doing what they were complaining was not happening. This isn't rocket science.

And this too is remarkably ironic
And Then There’s Something and Connolley, Tobis does that much better than you two. Go learn from the master before you try it. Your efforts look… clumsy.

By ...and Then Th… (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

And Then There's... Physics... in theory. You have five or six comments here, none of which are about science. In fact it seems like your main focus here has been on me. Which I don't object to, but it seems a bit obsessive.

Do you ever write about the science?

[Can we have a bit less drivel, please? Its easy to go to ATTP's blog to discover that your question wasn't even worth asking. I hope you have things worth saying; so please stop saying the things that aren't worth saying -W]

Perhaps unintentional irony can work both ways.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

You have five or six comments here, none of which are about science. In fact it seems like your main focus here has been on me.
Well, I've made a single point - twice - about your post, so I'm not sure that qualifies as some kind of main focus. I'm also not the one who wrote a post with no science in it, and then ended with a wistful comment about how it would be so nice if we could get back to talking about science.

Do you ever write about the science?
Yes.

Perhaps unintentional irony can work both ways.
Possibly, but maybe you should look up the meaning of the word "irony".

My serious point - which I will repeat - is that this topic is full of people who seem to complain about the state of the debate, without ever actually doing something themselves to improve it. If you really think it would be so nice to get back to talking about science, why don't you do so? If the comment at the end of your post was simply a rhetorical device (as I suspect that it was) then carry on.

By ...and Then Th… (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

ATTP, I write about the science at 3000quads.com. I write about the politics at The Lukewarmer's Way. Just as you write about the science at your place of business, I do too.

This post was not about the science. My lament on my blog was that these incidents suck all the air out of the room for those (like me) who both enjoy conversations about science and who need such conversations.

I'm not a scientist. That's why I blog more frequently about WG2 and WG3 issues. But that doesn't mean I'm oblivious or uncaring about the science.

[Redacted. Please stop the trolling, or you'll go back on moderation -W]

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Tom Fuller - What motivates you to just make shit up?

" It still is unclear whether it was his [Al Gore's] arrest for pressuring a masseuse for sex or his sale of his television channel to a fossil fuel organization was the cause of his fall from grace ..."

Al Gore was never arrested for pressuring a masseuse for sex. An allegation was made, the police investigated it (twice), and found nothing to substantiate the allegation. The accuser BTW failed a polygraph and sold her story to the National Enquirer.

Of course the audience you were preaching to probably just laps those types of lies right up - I notice not a single one of them even attempted to correct you. So either they all believe it's true - or know better, but simply don't mind seeing defamatory statements being made.

When I read drivel like you wrote I'm always left wondering .... is the writer ignorant, stupid, insane or just plain evil? Care to enlighten us?

By Kevin ONeill (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Tom,
My lament on my blog was that these incidents suck all the air out of the room for those (like me) who both enjoy conversations about science and who need such conversations.
Given that these incidents have almost nothing to do with science, it's hard to see why they should influence your ability to have conversations about science. If you're going to let what politicians - and a few other individuals - do and say infuence your ability to have conversations about science, then you're going to continue to struggle to have such conversations.

By ...and Then Th… (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

ATTP,

I've often thought about just talking about the 'science' problem is there's just so much 'science' that I'll never be able to 'keep up' I certainly can read 'science' but to understand 'science' requires a lot of work. In other words there is never enough time to fully understand the 'science' as it covers such a wide range of fields and is continuously being updated through the peer review process.

I'm not the type of person to just accepts whatever the 'science' states, certainly not in one specific paper on the subject.

Briefly changing subjects.

The 1st line of debate in Deniersville (oops) is, of course, the ad hominem (see [Redacted - EFS] Brad and [Redacted - EFS] Tom and [Redacted - EFS] Shub, in these threads, for very fine examples of that).

By Everett F Sargent (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Hi Kevin

Thanks for pointing out the error! I've updated my post accordingly.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Gee, Mr. Sargent

I just browsed through this thread and didn't notice any ad hominems on my part. I tend to shy away from Latin as I think Monckton tries to dine out on it a bit much, but I think I understand the term. Perhaps you'd be kind enough to point out something I've missed.

I see our host mentioned it when I pointed out that Pachauri got funding from BP, but I don't always trust our host to be sincere or accurate. But if two of you see the same thing... by all means please point out where I indulged in the jousting tactic that is evidently reserved for members of the consensus.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Well, MMM, I just got done with a discussion with Pat Frank over at WUWT about that post you linked, and it was about as painful as you'd expect.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/02/24/are-climate-modelers-scientists/#…

I can't grok what goes on inside the mind of someone who thinks you should add a fixed error to an equation, timestep after timestep.

These kinds of arguments really drive home for me the intellectual vacuity of the skeptics' views. How many hundreds of comments are there on that post? And how many people actually bothered to look at Pat Frank's math and notice the blatant error?

"Skeptics", my a$$. They cheer for a violation of math so gross and unnatural that it'd currently be illegal in most states.

By Windchasers (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

I can’t grok what goes on inside the mind of someone who thinks you should add a fixed error to an equation, timestep after timestep.
Bear in mind that you are dealing with someone who concluded - after his paper was rejected by two different journals, based on the recommendations of 9 out of 10 reviewers - that everyone else was wrong.

I agree with your comment, though. How does anyone think that climate models should be propagating a +-4W/m^2 cloud forcing error annually?

By ...and Then Th… (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Well, one of them has now retracted the lie:

Posted on February 24, 2015
"Update and correction: Several readers have pointed out to me that Al Gore was not arrested regarding his encounter with the Oregon masseuse. I regret the error.
As a Lukewarmer I cheerfully accept the science ..."

By Hank Roberts (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Tom - a rather incomplete answer, no? How does one come to believe that a former Vice-President of the United States was arrested for sexual misconduct without it actually happening? And how long have you believed this?

Had Gore actually been arrested it would have been front page news all over the world. Since it never happened, what strange path led you to believe that it did? Or, as I asked earlier, what would motivate you to just make it up?

Did you read this somewhere? Are you deranged? Do you completely lack a BS detector?

How do you characterize your multiple instances of character assassination on Al Gore? Isn't each of those an ad hominem attack and worse - since they're actually libel? Have you gone back through all of your other posts and corrected those as well?

By Kevin ONeill (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

I think it's fair to say that Thomas Fuller is obsessed with Al Gore. And while he decries ad hominems, he sure seems to indulge in them a lot. Not just with Gore mind you, but here's the Gore 'arrest' lowlights.

Exhibit A (now redacted): " It still is unclear whether it was his [Gore's] arrest for pressuring a masseuse for sex encounter with a masseuse or his sale of his television channel to a fossil fuel organization ..." Current TV was sold to Al Jazeera. This also is a nutter meme, i.e., that Gore sold out to big oil. Al Jazeera is owned by the gov't of Qatar. Qatar has never been considered a part of 'big oil' - that role was reserved initially for the Seven Sisters and now consists of Chevron, Exxon, Shell, BP, and Total S.A. Neither does it seem logical to call the gov't of Qatar a 'fossil fuel organization'

Exhibit B: Al Gore got busted with a massage parlor lady ...." There are some other gems in here. I.e., Lewandowsky is a charlatan and Cook tried to cook the books. Sadly no links to #FreeTheTol300 :)

"Exhibit C:"Perhaps he [Pachauri] can join Al Gore in the Hall of Shame for climate opportunists, under the category of sex offender."

Exhibit D:"Al Gore and Peter Gleick are still being listened to with regards to climate change despite offenses which would disqualify them from public discourse in almost any other field." It seems this is another reference to the 'arrest' that never happened.

By Kevin ONeill (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Roberts, conflating an error with a lie does disservice to those who seek to improve.

ONeill, were I obsessed with Gore I would have been more familiar with the facts of the incident,

Gleick is a thief and forger, Cook did cook the books, Pachauri has been accused of sexual harassment and Lewandowsky is decidedly a charlatan. However, Al Gore did not get arrested.

[Redacted. Sigh. You're back on moderation. Really, you want to write this kind of stuff, you've got your own blog -W]

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

"Tom – a rather incomplete answer, no? How does one come to believe that a former Vice-President of the United States was arrested for sexual misconduct without it actually happening? And how long have you believed this?"

Actually a good deal of the daily goings on regarding celebrity shenanigans has passed me by. Until this very instant I had not regretted that at all. For instance, I was unaware that three masseuses had accused Gore of impropriety! Imagine that.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

O'Neill, you write: "Current TV was sold to Al Jazeera. This also is a nutter meme, i.e., that Gore sold out to big oil. Al Jazeera is owned by the gov’t of Qatar. Qatar has never been considered a part of ‘big oil’ – that role was reserved initially for the Seven Sisters and now consists of Chevron, Exxon, Shell, BP, and Total S.A. Neither does it seem logical to call the gov’t of Qatar a ‘fossil fuel organization’

Petroleum sales amount to 60% of Qatar's GDP. They may not participate in the group called the Seven Sisters, but they happen to have the world's highest per capita income, 25 billion barrels of oil reserves and the world's third largest natural gas reserves.

They nationalized their fossil fuel industry in the 70s--hence referring to Al Jazeera's purchase of Gore's network as coming from a fossil fuel organization is not wide of the mark.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

And speaking of obsession, O'Neill (and any others who care to participate), on the slight chance that Connolley wants his blog back, I'd like to invite you to migrate this discussion over to The Lukewarmer's Way at https://thelukewarmersway.wordpress.com/2015/02/24/the-peril-of-great-c…. O'Neill, I see you have already started the process. It's good to see you being so proactive.

However, if you prefer to continue the discussion here, that's fine with me for as long as our host allows.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

> conflating an error with a lie
Because rebunking a lie is just an error, eh?
Sorry. "Trust, but verify."

Even when it's so-o-o tempting to just rebunk what you read that you'd like to believe were true, that's not an error.

That's lying -- because you know better than to repost unchecked stories as though you knew something.

By Hank Roberts (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Mr. Roberts (why do I always flash on Henry Fonda when I use that appellation?), you speak with authority, however your revision of the definition of a lie kinda fails the smell test.

Gore was investigated three times for the Oregon massage incident and two other masseuses in different states stepped forward with allegations of similar improprieties. I mistakenly assumed that Gore was arrested and charges subsequently dropped.

I regret the error, but honest error it was.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Ah, I see our host has resumed his censorious habits, so I will at this point take my leave. As I wrote above, I'm happy to continue the conversation elsewhere.

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 01 Mar 2015 #permalink

Fuller, your "error" is the result of your willingness to accept any factoid that suits your beliefs and makes a good story. For example, I am certain you will never be able to provide any evidence that "Cook did cook the books", but it fits what you already believe to be true. Since you generally cannot prove a negative, you can also maintain your belief that "Cook did cook the books", because it is so much more easy to believe *that*, then to accept that the people you hang around with are wrong and contemptible human beings for making such false claims without evidence.

Marco (yawn)

https://thelukewarmersway.wordpress.com/2015/01/14/cooking-the-consensu…

“The ‘97% consensus’ article is poorly conceived, poorly designed and poorly executed. It obscures the complexities of the climate issue and it is a sign of the desperately poor level of public and policy debate in this country [UK] that the energy minister should cite it.”

– Mike Hulme, Ph.D. Professor of Climate Change, University of East Anglia (UEA)

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 02 Mar 2015 #permalink

Marco, (snore)

[If you're going to start like that, you need to stop and think whether the comment is even worth writing. If you're doing your best to give the impression that you're talking to idiots or dullards, then why are you talking to them at all? You should be thinking of going elsewhere and finding people to talk to who fit your intellectual level better. And, as before, that's not an instruction.

As for the rest - no, I'm not interested in yet another dull round of the Cook wars: spammed -W]

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 02 Mar 2015 #permalink

[Spammed. I'm sure you'll understand why -W]

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 02 Mar 2015 #permalink

I see that Tom Fuller has an alternative definition of what constitutes "cooking the books".

I also noticed Tom Fuller does not understand the basis of a consensus. I think Tom Fuller will agree there is a basic consensus in the medical world that HIV causes AIDS. You can easily find thousands of papers that express that consensus. If, however, you would count the number of papers that explicitly endores that consensus and *show* that HIV causes AIDS, it is actually a comparatively small number. This, however, does not take away there is a broad consensus. A paper that explicitly accepts that consensus, without quantifying it, is still a paper that shows there is a consensus.

Marco, bring your comment over to my blog if you want to discuss. Connolley censors. I don't dispute the existence of the consensus, as you well know. Cook cooked the books to make it 97% instead of the 81% from reputable surveys by Verheggen and earlier Von Storch.

Connolley, this is the science that your monkey wrench gang brings to the table. But discussing it is verboten? Yes, were I in your shoes I'd be ashamed of it too, but this is what you have on offer.

[No, its not talking about the science. I don't quite understand why you don't quite understand that. But, you're welcome to discuss it at your blog, of course.

BTW, don't forget, you flounced out in comment #62. For someone who flounced out, you're remarkably present. If you have any honour, you should at least be self-consistent -W]

By Tom Fuller (not verified) on 02 Mar 2015 #permalink

Tom, I have no intention to come to the blog of someone as nasty as you.

NYT: Climate Change Researcher Offers a Defense of His Practices.

In particular I enjoyed this statement by Joe Bast in defense of Soon:


“He’s a brilliant and courageous scientist devoted entirely to pursuing scientific knowledge,” the organization’s president, Joseph Bast, said this week in a statement. “His critics are all ethically challenged and mental midgets by comparison.”

By Lars Karlsson (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

> honest error

To quote our host from another topic:

"[Seems to fit the usual pattern. Spam out junk for the denialists, which they’ll happily keep repeating as gospel even after you’ve been forced to take it down -W]"

By Hank Roberts (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

I think I've got Tom Fuller's motivation worked out. He's all about the throw-down! He is free to make words mean just what he chooses them to mean, because the only question is who is to be master!

He has missed his calling. If he was a rapper, we'd all be Fuller'd.

OTOH, he could just be Humpty Dumpty.

By Mal Adapted (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

Note that Fuller's post at WUWT libelling Gore has not been corrected. Note that the other posts on Fuller's site that contain the same libel against Gore have not been corrected.

So apparently he's all about truth, ethics, and getting things right /sarc.

By Kevin ONeill (not verified) on 06 Mar 2015 #permalink