A whimsical T-shirt logo says, “Just making it up as I go along.” It’s appropriate for those defending the indefensible hypothesis that human CO2 is causing warming or climate change. It’s the treadmill they ride by proving a theory rather than disproving it, as standard scientific method requires. You have to ‘explain’ facts that don’t fit the hypothesis.
As Huxley said,
The great tragedy of science – the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.
Global temperatures declined as CO2 levels increased, so they switched from global warming to climate change. It worked for a while until people learned climate change on a significant scale is normal. Cooling continues so they created a new explanation: it was sulphates from industrial activity, particularly China. This was used before to explain the cooling from 1940 to 1980. It failed then and now.
False cover for facts that don’t fit was used from the start. A little known but critical example was used in the computer models. Validation is the standard technique for testing a computer model. It is sometimes called hindsight forecasting, as the computer is run backward to recreate past conditions. In 2002, Vincent Gray, an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reviewer wrote that
No computer model has ever been validated.
He repeated the charge in 2009 testimony to the New Zealand Committee for Emissions Trading Scheme Review.
What they do is run the model backward adjusting or adding variables to make it fit with little or no regard to natural causes and mechanisms. As Gray notes,
As a result, computer models cannot make “predictions” they only provide “projections” which are based on the value of the assumptions made in their preparation. Also there is no evidence as to how accurate they might be.
Actually, the evidence is in; they’re consistently wrong. Even the lowest scenario increase is above what is actually happening.
The most famous fix was the “hockey stick” used to eliminate the troublesome Medieval Warm Period (MWP). It was clearly warmer than present temperatures, thus negating claims that 20th century temperatures were unprecedented. Professor Deming’s letter to Science explains.
With the publication of the article in Science [in 1995], I gained significant credibility in the community of scientists working on climate change. They thought I was one of them, someone who would pervert science in the service of social and political causes. So one of them let his guard down. A major person working in the area of climate change and global warming sent me an astonishing email that said, “We have to get rid of the Medieval Warm Period.”
It was achieved, and became a pivotal part of the evidence of human-caused global warming in the 2001 IPCC Report. They dismissed extensive historic evidence; science and numbers trumped history. Besides, few knew much about the MWP.
But a more troubling contradiction was the cooling from 1940 to 1980 as global temperatures declined while human CO2 production increased most. Many people remembered. Initially, they claimed the cooler period didn’t occur. It didn’t work, so they introduced sulphates into the model, and the cooling was explained. The problem is, sulphate levels continued to rise and don’t explain the cooling.
Now they’re using the sulphate explanation again. Even the lowest IPCC scenario projected temperature should increase. Two people associated with previous adjustments to the record, Benjamin Santer and James Hansen, are apparently the source of the claim that sulphates from China are offsetting CO2 warming. As before, it’s easily rejected by evidence. They conveniently ignore declining solar activity as they did in the 2001 and 2007 IPCC Reports. It also works in hindsight, explaining the temperature decline associated with the Dalton Minimum, as well as the Maunder Minimum and Little Ice Age.
Other attempts at dismissing awkward facts received less attention, because they’re only discussed among those who understand climate change. For example, there was the troublesome warm period known as the Holocene Optimum. They tried to argue that it was only summer warming. There is no way of knowing that. What we do know is that for a few thousand years, all indicators show a world at least 2°C warmer than today. How did the polar bear survive?
Leaked emails show people at the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) realized the need for fixes. Gavin Schmidt, a US government employee (NOAA), sets out the reasons and objectives in a leaked email on December 10, 2004. Those producing official IPCC science were being distracted by the facts. The RealClimate website was created to counterattack with a fix.
In order to be a little bit more pro-active, a group of us (see below) have recently got together to build a new ‘climate blog’ website: RealClimate.org which will be launched over the next few days … The idea is that we working climate scientists should have a place where we can mount a rapid response to supposedly ‘bombshell’ papers that are doing the rounds and give more context to climate related stories or events.
Code words for exclusivity include working climate scientists that are similar to using peer review as a false claim to credibility. The latter was possible because they effectively controlled climate science funding and the peer review process.
Years ago Richard Lindzen said consensus was reached about the Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) hypothesis before the research began. Proponents were committed to prove instead of disprove the hypothesis, as is the normal practice. Despite their efforts, evidence appeared showing it was wrong. Since their agenda was political, they worked to counteract and deflect or mislead. They made it up as they went along. They can’t get off the treadmill, but it’s speeding up and will shortly throw them off.
ShareThis
