Turning up the heat for Hansen

Posted by TonyN on 11/04/2011 at 8:00 am From the Archives 3 Responses »
Apr 112011

If there is one pivotal date in the evolving saga of climate change it is probably a day in early June 1988, when Jim Hansen made his notorious claim during a US Senate hearing that:

 

 “I’m 99% sure that human beings are contributing to climate change.”

 

Of course Hanson didn’t just fetch up in Washington on that very not day by chance, so it’s interesting to read an account of what happened from Timothy Wirth, the man who claims to have stage-managed the whole thing, quite literally.

 

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/hotpolitics/interviews/wirth.html

 

There are a lot of astonishing things about Wirht’s recollections, not least the way in which AGW alarmism dovetailed perfectly with an ongoing political scenario. Then there is the breathtakingly superficial and banal thinking that lies behind his narrative, and the oft forgotten fact that, although the US is portrayed as the villain that has retarded action on global warming, at the same time most of the pressure for action has originated from that country. Indeed it is arguable the forces that put climate change on the political map all those years ago, and has kept it there ever since have predominantly originated in America.  

 

Anyway, Wirth seems inordinately proud of his antics on the morning before Hansen’s performance, and oblivious of the fact that when you have to tamper with an air conditioning system in order to persuade people that the earth is warming, then your evidence is pretty threadbare. But that’s the way it seems to be when science and politics meet.

Climate Science in an age of innocence.

Posted by TonyN on 05/04/2011 at 8:00 am From the Archives 9 Responses »
Apr 052011

In 2005 – and the date is quite interesting – Hans von Storch conducted a long interview with one of the titans of climate science during its formative years after World War II. You might almost say that this was a time before climate science got silly, or even when it was still a respectable discipline.

The man in the spotlight is a Dane called Harry van Loon, a name that will probably mean little to readers of this blog as he suffers from the appalling handicap of not being very impressed by claims that Earth’s climate is now under the control of humanity and in no hurry to speak to the media.

You can find the whole thing here:

http://coast.gkss.de/staff/storch/Media/interviews/vanloon.pdf

Parts of the interview are rather technical, but don’t miss the following:

1)      Van Loon’s account of how studying the Vikings first got him interested in climate.

2)      An interesting qualification that he needed before he could start on a science degree in 1940s Denmark.

3)      Some very obliging South African meteorologists.

4)      Evidence that this was a time when climate researchers didn’t just sit in front of VDUs and torture data sets until they produce the right answer. As Harry says, in his heyday you had to do everything for yourself.

5)      In the last couple of pages he gives his views on anthropogenic climate change in a matter of fact way that should make a few people’s cheeks burn.

6)      Some familiar names crop up along the way

This interview was conducted two years before AR4 was published in 2007, and when Harry van Loon was approaching his eightieth birthday and retirement. By then I am sure he would have been seen by the new generation of IPCC orientated trend setters on the climate research scene as the kind of embarrassment that should be swept under the carpet along with Hubert Lamb.

Harry van Loon’s research record, and his obvious commitment to his calling, suggests otherwise.

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