Saturday, October 9, 2010

"It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist."

Perhaps the single dumbest argument presented in support of Global Warming is that "the scientific consensus is that it's true".  Translation: all the cool kids do it.  Translation [2]: my scientist is red hot; your scientist ain't doodly-squat.  Oooooh kaaaay.

Of course it's as untrue as it is stupid. And so we get the "you're not qualified"/"we only look at peer-reviewed scientists" expulsion of the Heretics, as the Establishment desperately tries to keep control of the debate.

That's breaking down.  Hal Lewis is one of the Senior Statesmen of American Physics.  He's been a member of the American Physical Society for 67 years (!).  His bio lays out his bona fides:
Harold Lewis is Emeritus Professor of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, former Chairman; Former member Defense Science Board, chmn of Technology panel; Chairman DSB study on Nuclear Winter; Former member Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards; Former member, President’s Nuclear Safety Oversight Committee; Chairman APS study on Nuclear Reactor Safety Chairman Risk Assessment Review Group; Co-founder and former Chairman of JASON; Former member USAF Scientific Advisory Board; Served in US Navy in WW II; books: Technological Risk (about, surprise, technological risk) and Why Flip a Coin (about decision making)
Hal Lewis thinks that Global Warming is an anti-scientific, money-grabbing scam by scientists, and says so in a brutal resignation letter sent to the president of the APS:
It is of course, the global warming scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist. Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.) I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.
It is long, and detailed, and the most damning indictment of the scientific community that I've ever seen.  Coming from someone of his stature, it takes on the weight of Zola's J'accuse.  If the Academy is not entirely corrupt (a big "if", to be sure), this will be taught in History of Science classes twenty years from now, as Richard Feynman's O-Ring experiment in the Challenger Disaster investigation is.

This is a huge media story that our biased press is unlikely to print, so RTWT and pass this around to your friends and family.  Professor Lewis is pointed in calling out filthy lucre as the heart of the corruption, even accusing the APS president himself:
I do feel the need to add one note, and this is conjecture, since it is always risky to discuss other people’s motives. This scheming at APS HQ is so bizarre that there cannot be a simple explanation for it. Some have held that the physicists of today are not as smart as they used to be, but I don’t think that is an issue. I think it is the money, exactly what Eisenhower warned about a half-century ago. There are indeed trillions of dollars involved, to say nothing of the fame and glory (and frequent trips to exotic islands) that go with being a member of the club. Your own Physics Department (of which you are chairman) would lose millions a year if the global warming bubble burst. When Penn State absolved Mike Mann of wrongdoing, and the University of East Anglia did the same for Phil Jones, they cannot have been unaware of the financial penalty for doing otherwise. As the old saying goes, you don’t have to be a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing. Since I am no philosopher, I’m not going to explore at just which point enlightened self-interest crosses the line into corruption, but a careful reading of the ClimateGate releases makes it clear that this is not an academic question.
Emphasis mine.

As background on ClimateGate, you might want to look here:
For those of you who were, like me, trained as scientists, this scandal is infuriating.  For those of you who, like me, grew up liberal and care about the further impoverishment of the poor, this is infuriating.  RTWT, and pass it along.

6 comments:

Atom Smasher said...

I'm glad you're doing these essays, BP. I am almost always reduced to spittle-flinging incoherence whenever I try to compose something on the topic these days.

The best I can manage lately is a curt nod and a "I've been telling you that for 20 years" the few times it's come up in conversation. Of course, none of my friends, all smart folk, some trained in science as you and I, have ever even heard of ClimateGate. But they laugh at me when they ask why I no longer read Science, or Nature, or Discover, or the like.

Frustrating times.

Borepatch said...

Atom Smasher, you're welcome (and thanks for the kinds words).

If you want to hit your friends where they hurt - to get them to think - you might try the old "I've come to the conclusion that Global Warming is the new Intelligent Design." They won't like that at all, but it might get them to stop and think.

Once they stop and think, of course, there's no going back for them.

Jester said...

Greetings there, BP.

Your posts are a wealth of information out there for those that may not know where to look and poke about for information on a number of subjects, and if nothing else you keep finding additional things that I have not found yet, particularly on the whole global warming farce.

I was one of the naysayers for the past.. well 15 or so years this retardedness has been happening.

I find the whole idea that "we don't know one tenth of one percent of what is out there scientifically or otherwise" to be in sharp contrast with this supposed settled science on global warming.
Which Is now morphing in to climate change as a even more generic term.
I have read articles from the 70's where they were worried that we were entering a new ice age.
I find it interesting that while first world nations are eager to jump on board carbon tax sort of legislation, Commie countries, China in particular say... we don't believe in that crap but we will support your slitting your industrial wrists all the way to the bank.

I'm a student of the 80's and 90's.
Does anyone remember the acid rain scare stories from the 80's?

I got to read all about that. Sob stories about dead animals then.
Told that our cities and statues would crumble in to mush! Plant life would die! Rain would burn your skin if you touched it!

All of this was in school sanctioned reading, both provided by the state and federal government as well as the usual sources.
All of this has me convinced of only one thing.
Most of the scientific community is even more stupid than the politicians, and they are nearly interchangeable.

NotClauswitz said...

I copied a lot and re-blogged this.

Mr. P said...

MSM will try to keep this quiet just like last week's global warming scandal.

If you aren't familliar with the 10:10 dust up, see these videos.

While watching the first one, ask yourself if it's sincere or if it's a spoof.

I added the guy with gun to the misc playlist

Keep watching until you're sure, and then watch more.
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=7C79DEF1EE25E880

Anonymous said...

Acid rain, oh yes. I never bought AGW because I am old enough to remember the global cooling scare of the late 1970s. Clearly, the newer generation of scientists thinks they discovered fire - no need to know anything about the history of their own field.

That covers anyone under maybe 50 or so. The leaders of the movement don't have that excuse. Many of them are 50 or over, and ought to know the history.