Monthly Archives: March 2014

Wind Turbines through the ‘Gap of Dunloe’ – aagghh!!

On a recent trip to Kerry in Ireland I happened to stop at a beauty spot on the rim of the ‘Black Valley’. The place is called ‘Moll’s Gap’ the view across the ‘Black Valley’ is stunning, particularly on this rare occasion when there was sun and no rain! It was a walk down memory lane, across the valley I could see the ‘Gap of Dunloe’ where on my honeymoon, 35 years ago, I had travelled on horseback with my new bride (in driving rain and fog). The illusion of a pristine view was shattered when I spied 4 wind turbines through the ‘Gap’, on grabbing my binoculars my heart sank as I saw 3 more. What else is there to say. Clearly there is no view so pristine, no vista so pure that the Irish Government will not allow the wind turbine mafia despoil.

Gap op Dunloe s

 

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BBC Bars Climate Debate

In February 2014 Alasdair MacLeod – head of editorial standards and compliance for BBC Scotland, sent an e-mail to BBC producers and editors which said that “we should not run debates / discussions directly between scientists and sceptics.” You would think that the BBC would be a little more circumspect with its censoring of  scientific content after the debacle that was 28Gate. There has been a degree of controversy recently over the labelling of some Global Warming Alarmists as Environmental Nazis. Is it any wonder this epithet is being bandied around when senior executives of the British state run news service are acting like Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s Minister for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda and censor-in-chief of the German state run news and film service. But this is all in a good cause – Hang  on where have I heard that before ah yes “Propoganda, Certainly,  Good Propaganda for a good cause”. Guess who said that.

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There is one thing we can be certain of – nothing is certain

When I was studying physics at school as a late teenager I was told that outer-space was cold- very cold in fact it was as cold as it gets. And my physics text books told me that scientists knew that temperature and that temperature was -273 deg. Centigrade. Now to be strictly accurate that temperature is -273.15 deg. Celsius or is that -273.16 deg. (some confusion around freezing point of water and triple point of water). But then of course when I went to university I was told that even deepest darkest space was not at absolute zero it was a couple of degrees above absolute zero because of background microwave radiation. But then does space have a temperature at all. After all it is a near perfect vacuum – does a vacuum have a temperature? But one thing we can be sure of – nothing can be colder than absolute zero. At least on this one point all scientists are agreed – thank goodness the science (of absolute zero) is settled. There is a satisfying consensus, not 97% of scientists, not 98% of scientists but 100% of scientists agree. Phew, how comforting to be surrounded by people who agree with your point of view.

Oh darn – now some pesky meddling sceptic, denier scientists have come along and crashed the party. What’s this about quantum gases and sub absolute zero temperatures. Who let that lot in?

I shall finish on a famous, and very apt, quote by Albert Einstein:-

“No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.”

How the Global Warming Scare began

John Coleman is best know as founder of the Weather Channel in the US. He has a real knack for getting across the salient points of Global Warming scepticism. His latest 30 minute video is his best yet. He charts the history of the scare and (spoiler alert) details the change of heart of the scientist who started the whole thing in the first place. A very convincing argument.

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Global Warming not causing extreme weather says Sage of Omaha!

Sounds like a banner headline for a tabloid newspaper. What does Warren Buffett know about Climate Change and extreme weather? Well quite a lot it would appear. In fact he has made rather a lot of money from this knowledge. In an interview with CNBC Buffett states things very simply “I think that the public has the impression that because there has been so much talk about climate, that events of the last 10 years, from an insured standpoint on climate, have been unusual. The answer is, they haven’t.” Buffett goes on to say that insuring against hurricanes in the U.S. has been a profitable venture in recent years as only a few storms have actually made landfall. This utterly contradicts President Obama’s claims that extreme weather is on the increase and is caused by manmade global warming. If you were to ask me who is the man with his finger on the pulse, I would say it is the one that puts his money, and not the tax payer’s, where his mouth is.

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Occam’s Razor, the Null Hypothesis, and Anthropogenic Global Warming

A bit of a mouthful but the whole article makes excellent reading.

Here is the kernel of the piece which really makes you understand how unscientific the global warming alarmists methods are;

Consider the following tests:

(i) Over the last 16 years, global average temperature, as measured by both thermometers and satellite sensors, has displayed no statistically significant warming; over the same period, atmospheric carbon dioxide has increased by 10%.

Large increases in carbon dioxide have therefore not only failed to produce dangerous warming, but failed to produce any warming at all. Hypothesis fails.

(ii) During the 20th century, a global warming of between 0.4 deg 

C and 0.7 deg C occurred, at a maximum rate, in the early decades of the century, of about 1.7 deg C/century. In comparison, our best regional climate records show that over the last 10,000 years natural climate cycling has resulted in temperature highs up to at least 1.0 deg C warmer than today, at rates of warming up to 2.5 deg C/century.

In other words, both the rate and magnitude of 20th century warming falls well within the envelope of natural climate change. Hypothesis fails, twice.

(iii) If global temperature is controlled primarily by atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, then changes in carbon dioxide should precede parallel changes in temperature.

In fact, the opposite relationship applies at all time scales. Temperature change precedes carbon dioxide change by about 5 months during the annual seasonal cycle, and by about 700-1000 years during ice age climatic cycling. Hypothesis fails.

(iv) The IPCC’s computer general circulation models, which factor in the effect of increasing carbon dioxide, project that global warming should be occurring at a rate of +2.0 deg C/century.

In fact, no warming at all has occurred in either the atmosphere or the ocean for more than the last decade. The models are clearly faulty, and allocate too great a warming effect for the extra carbon dioxide (technically, they are said to overestimate the climate sensitivity). Hypothesis fails.

(v) The same computer models predict that a fingerprint of greenhouse-gas-induced warming will be the creation of an atmospheric hot spot at heights of 8-10 km in equatorial regions, and enhanced warming also near both poles.

Given that we already know that the models are faulty, it shouldn’t surprise us to discover that direct measurements by both weather balloon radiosondes and satellite sensors show the absence of surface warming in Antarctica, and a complete absence of the predicted low latitude atmospheric hot spot. Hypothesis fails, twice.

One of the 20th century’s greatest physicists, Richard Feynman, observed about science that:

In general we look for a new law by the following process. First we guess it. Then we compute the consequences of the guess to see what would be implied if this law that we guessed is right. Then we compare the result of the computation to nature, with experiment or experience; compare it directly with observation, to see if it works.

It’s that simple statement that is the key to science. It does not make any difference how beautiful your guess is. It does not make any difference how smart you are, who made the guess, or what his name is. If it disagrees with experiment it is wrong.”

None of the five tests above supports or agrees with the predictions implicit in the greenhouse hypothesis as stated above. Richard Feynman is correct to advise us that therefore the hypothesis is invalid, and that many times over.


Curiouser and Curiouser

A much quoted line from Alice in Wonderland but I think appropriate when applied to the following graph;

If what this graph is appearing to indicate is true – then the increase in temperature in the past 60 years has declined while the CO2 concentration has increased. This is counter to everything we have been told by the Green brigade.

The implications are so significant that I need to undertake some independent verification. Watch this space.

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One snow storm does not a ‘little ice age’ make, but…

It is important to remain vigilant in the world of scepticism – but we can still have a little fun. I love this article written by Mike Bastasch in “The Daily Caller” – “Top 5 ‘Snow Free and ‘Ice Free’ predictions”. This is not climate change – this is just cold weather. In the antipodes they are having record heat, that is ‘hot weather’. It happens. You would think the prophets of doom would get tired of being wrong.


“To Kill an Error”

I have just published a book entitled “To Kill an Error”. It is my attempt to popularise the sceptic view of Global warming. I have written it as a novel – a thriller (I like to think). There are any number of books around (I have read quite a few) that state a case for the sceptic point of view. They appeal to people like me with a knowledge of the subject. What I felt was missing was something that might appeal to the agnostic. In the factual books the subject matter can be very dry, I have wrapped the message up in a murder mystery that I hope stands alone but in addition gets across some of the darker side of the rush for Green Energy.

The title of the book is taken from a quote by Charles Darwin – “To kill an error is as good a service as, and sometimes even better than, the establishing of a new truth or fact.”

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“Professional” Climate Hysteria

“The average world temperature is about as useful as an average number in a telephone directory.” That statement is particularly apt when applied to the current weather patterns in North America and Western Australia. Record cold v.s. record heat. In both locations the Climate alarmists leap upon the extreme weather conditions as proof of the existence of Global Warming.

You don’t believe me? I quote the Bureau of Meteorology climate expert Neil Bennett in an article from “Perth Now”

“It’s climate change. It’s warming. It’s staring you in the face,”

“This is crazy. This is madness, what’s going on now.”

“The climate doesn’t change like this. This is really remarkable.”

“This is really, really unusual.”

Mr Bennett said the climate models for “30, 40 and 50 years ahead” were also all “pointing upwards”.

Now contrast this with an article from the Guardian Environment Network quote “Scientists said the deep freeze gripping the U.S. does not indicate a halt or reversal in global warming trends, either. In fact, it may be a counterintuitive example of global warming in action.”

So there you have it, heads I win, tails you lose. Any sort of variation in the weather proves the existence of man made global warming. The theory of man made global warming, on the basis of these latest pronouncements is un-falsifiable. Falsifiability is a basic tenet of the scientific method. Sir Karl Popper take[s] falsifiability as his criterion for demarcating science from non-science: if a theory is incompatible with possible empirical observations it is scientific; conversely, a theory which is compatible with all such observations…  is unscientific.

I rest my case.