Our problem is climate change is not our problem

"... it is hard to make people value the long-term future as much as the immediate future."

and other pearls of wisdom from the mind of Lord Rees of Ludlow, astrophysicist and Astronomer Royal, can be found here.

"Global warming poses a unique political challenge for two reasons. First, the effect is non-localised: the CO2 emissions from Britain have no more effect here than they do in Australia, and vice versa. That means any credible regime whereby the polluter pays has to be broadly international.

"Secondly, in politics, the urgent always trumps the important, and one has to accept that the consequences of climate change will be predominantly felt more than 50 years from now. It is not going to produce disasters in the next 10 or 20 years, so it is an investment in the interest of the next generation.

So, what do we tell our kids? "Sorry, but it was always going to be your problem anyway."?

Global Warning Climate Change Energy

How climate denial really works #2: 50% of news is spin

We learned in the first post that by just turning up in a media report, skeptical views gain enough credibility to influence audiences' views. But, how do they turn up in the first place?

Crikey has published their six month long investigation into how much news is pr spin, like that of climate deniers and skeptics:

Hard questions, because this is what came out in the wash: after analysing a five-day working week in the media, across 10 hard-copy papers, ACIJ and Crikey found that nearly 55% of stories analysed were driven by some form of public relations. The Daily Telegraph came out on top of the league ladder with 70% of stories analysed triggered by public relations. The Sydney Morning Herald gets the wooden spoon with (only) 42% PR-driven stories for that week.

So, the question is, do climate skeptical writers like Ackerman, Bolt, Devine, et al, do original research? Or do they get their stuff from PR outfits like WUWT, CEI Institute, The Heartland Institute, etc?

Global Warning Climate Change Energy

How climate denial really works

Desmogblog carries the results of Stanford study which shows how including a "skeptic" view to balance a climate science news report affects the audience.

Providing climate skeptics a voice in “balanced” mainstream media coverage skews public perception of the scientific consensus regarding climate change, leaving viewers less likely to understand the threat of climate disruption and less likely to support government actions to address global warming, according to the results of a Stanford University research effort.

That is, just by being in the same report, the fringe can be seen as more respectable.

Global Warning Climate Change Energy

China pings climate denial as extreme, Aussies agree

ABC - The Drum:

Current Poll Results

Do you agree with China's view that man-made climate change denial is an extreme stance and out of touch with mainstream thought?

Yes	73%
No	27%
3000 votes counted

That's pretty clear.

Global Warning Climate Change Energy

Deconstructing climate denial — #1. De cudgel

Forearmed is forewarned.

Argumentum ad baculum (Latin for argument to the cudgel or appeal to the stick), also known as appeal to force, is an argument where force, coercion, or the threat of force, is given as a justification for a conclusion. It is a specific case of the negative form of an argument to the consequences.

Mix with some argumentum ad hominem, and you get this thick paste:

“Mr. xxx, this is John Q. Public out here. Perhaps you don’t understand there’s no such thing as man-made global warming. I don’t care if you call it f!@%$#%@ing climate change, I don’t f!@%$#%@ing care what you call it. The same thing you communists tried in the 1970s. I’ve got a f!@%$#%@ing 75 articles from Newsweek Magazine stating we were making the earth freeze to death and we would have to melt the f!@%$#%@ing ice caps to save the earth. You, sir, and your colleagues, are progressive communists attempting to destroy America…Your f!@%$#%@ing agenda-driven, money-f!@%$#%@ing grabbing paws and understand there’s no such thing as global warming, you f!@%$#%@ing idiot and your f!@%$#%@ing colleagues.”

That free character assessment emailed to a colleague of climate scientist, Dr. Peter Gleick, is indicative of a claimed rampant cyber-bullying campaign that these scientists are subject to during their working day. On top of these in-box intrusions, work includes dealing with bandwidth-consuming FOI data requests responses, clearing up misrepresentations, IPCC 5AR preparation - and when there is spare time - doing what they signed-up for: climate research.

I can only think of one other lifesaving profession that has to put up with all that incoming? You could forgive our scientists if they chose to develop similar coping mechanisms.

Argumentum ad baculum takes this form:

Person L says accept argument A or event x will happen.

Event x is bad, dangerous, or threatening.

Therefore, argument A is a good argument.

Until the climate scientist accepts "there’s no such thing as man-made global warming" as true, they will be cyber-bullied.

Cyber-bullying includes being spammed with:

• the discrediting of their work — ("I don’t care if you call it f!@%$#%@ing climate change, I don’t f!@%$#%@ing care what you call it.")
• an incoherent babble attack of fossil-fuel funded talking-points taken from climate denier echo-chamber web-sites — ("The same thing you communists tried in the 1970s. I’ve got a f!@%$#%@ing 75 articles from Newsweek Magazine stating we were making the earth freeze to death and we would have to melt the f!@%$#%@ing ice caps to save the earth."), and
• common insults — ("You, sir, and your colleagues, are progressive communists attempting to destroy America…Your f!@%$#%@ing agenda-driven, money-f!@%$#%@ing grabbing paws..."), ( "...you f!@%$#%@ing idiot and your f!@%$#%@ing colleagues.”)

Therefore, "understand there’s no such thing as global warming"

Argumentum ad baculum is the second best argument against global warming . You can read Climate Progress give The best argument against global warming, here.

If you come across it in the wild: 1) identify it by name, and 2) dismiss it as a logical fallacy. Or, 1) identify it, and 2) take the threatening cudgel away (in this case, by hitting the talk to the firewall button).

Hat tip to Catchblue22's comment on CP's post.

Global Warning Climate Change Energy

Energy efficiency adds up to $700 million savings for Australian business

Far from being onerous on business, research by the Energy Efficiency Council demonstrates the potential for business to reap big savings by reducing emissions.

CLAIMS that even small greenhouse gas targets will hurt big industry have been undermined by a government report that found basic efficiency improvements could cut national emissions and save businesses more than $700 million.

An assessment of 199 large energy users found improving efficiency could stop at least 6.4 million tonnes of carbon dioxide from being emitted - a 1.1 per cent cut in the national carbon footprint each year.

The energy savings could run 1.4 million homes for a year and give the companies an extra $736 million.

An industry group, the Energy Efficiency Council, said if the biggest companies improved efficiency by 15 per cent, national emissions would fall by nearly 5 per cent, saving billions in energy costs.

Now imagine if they had a ETS to trade those savings as carbon credits? At $25 a tonne that would put $160 million into their coffers.

Global Warning Climate Change Energy

The 90% chance we cause observed global warming now sits at 95%

The 2007 IPCC Summary Report reported a 90% likelihood that mankind's signature was in the currently experienced global warming, leaving the chances that nature was causing the warming estimated at 10%.

Now a new study by scientists at Britain's Met Office Hadley Centre, the University of Edinburgh, Melbourne University and Victoria University in Canada estimates that there was a less than 5 per cent likelihood that natural variations in climate were responsible for the changes:

The study said that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had understated mankind's overall contribution to climate change. The IPCC had said in 2007 that there was no evidence of warming in the Antarctic. However, the panel said the latest observations showed that man-made emissions were having an impact on even the remotest continent.

The panel assessed more than 100 recent peer-reviewed scientific papers and found that the overwhelming majority had detected clear evidence of human influence on the climate.

Peter Stott, head of climate monitoring and attribution at the Met Office, who led the study, said: "This wealth of evidence we have now shows there is an increasingly remote possibility of climate change being dominated by natural factors rather than human factors."

This has to send a message to those who would seek to delay action... doesn't it?

Global Warning Climate Change Energy