This is a continuation of a remarkable thread that has now received 10,000 comments running to well over a million words. Unfortunately its size has become a problem and this is the reason for the move.
The history of the New Statesman thread goes back to December 2007 when Dr David Whitehouse wrote a very influential article for that publication posing the question Has Global Warming Stopped? Later, Mark Lynas, the magazine’s environment correspondent, wrote a furious reply, Has Global Warming Really Stopped?
By the time the New Statesman closed the blogs associated with these articles they had received just over 3000 comments, many from people who had become regular contributors to a wide-ranging discussion of the evidence for anthropogenic climate change, its implications for public policy and the economy. At that stage I provided a new home for the discussion at Harmless Sky.
Comments are now closed on the old thread. If you want to refer to comments there then it is easy to do so by left-clicking on the comment number, selecting ‘Copy Link Location’ and then setting up a link in the normal way.
Here’s to the next 10,000 comments.
Useful links:
Dr David Whitehouse’s article can be found here with 1289 comments.
Mark Lynas’ attempted refutation can be found here with 1715 comments.
The original Continuation of the New Statesman Whitehouse/Lynas blogs thread is here with 10,000 comments.
http://channels.isp.netscape.com/whatsnew/package.jsp?name=fte/globalwarming/globalwarming&floc=wn-nx
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/05/hansens-1988-projections/
AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH: Chrysler recovered via sales of gas-guzzling trucks, SUVs…
http://detnews.com/article/20110524/MIVIEW/105240374/Payne–SUVs-saved-Chrysler
Chrysler and the White House will celebrate the Detroit icon’s $5.9 billion repayment of government loans Tuesday in a ceremony that will be hailed by both sides for the same reason: The government bailout had become a liability for both entities.
In fact, government-free Chrysler is hardly off the debt hook, but is simply refinancing its debt with private rather than public debt-holders. For its part, the U.S. government will still have a 6.6 percent equity stake in Chrysler – but by removing itself as the company’s loan shark, the White House can boast of the unpopular bailout’s success in returning taxpayer loans 6 years ahead of schedule. That’s an important sound-bite in an election year.
But there is one inconvenient truth you won’t hear at the Sterling Heights, Mich. ceremony: Chrysler wouldn’t be here had it not defied its green White House masters. Chrysler’s return to profitability is a direct result of the fabulous success of its SUVs.
The White House hand-picked Fiat to shepherd Chrysler out of bankruptcy in June, 2009 because of Barack Obama’s obsession with remaking Detroit’s automakers in the image of their European peers. Convinced that Americans craved small cars to fight the warming scourge, the president demanded Fiat bring its best-selling 500 Eurobox to the States as part of the acquisition deal. Obama was convinced that Fiat could reform the immoral, gas-swigging, SUV-dependent Chrysler.
The exact opposite occurred.
Two years later, the little 500 is about to go on sale in dealer “boutiques” – but it is the resurgence of America’s appetite for trucks that has brought Chrysler back from the dead. Chrysler Group reported sales were up 17 percent to 1.1 million vehicles in 2010 on the strength of its wildly popular, redesigned Jeep Grand Cherokee and Dodge Durango SUVs. For CEO Marchionne, the SUVs success in the U.S. market has been a revelation and he is planning to expand the SUV lineup into Europe with Alfa Romeo and Maserati-badged trucks. Marchionne is no starry-eyed green – he has realized that trucks like the Cherokee typically rake in twice the per-vehicle profit of cars (thus the beleaguered company’s speedy repayment of U.S. loans).
Chrysler’s truck sales – largely ignored by Obama’s green media parrots – has also been good to UAW workers as Chrysler’s Detroit assembly plant is now at full, three-shift capacity.
But there is one more inconvenient truth: Chrysler has been here before.
After it repaid its 1980s loans under the legendary hand of Lee Iacocca, Chrysler was unable to diversify into smaller vehicles.Today, as the truck boom fades before the specter of $4-a-gallon gas, Chrysler is still heavily dependent on truck sales.
Chrysler is back. But is it just 1980s déjà vu all over again?
PeterM
You posted a link to “scary predictions” on global warming that (supposedly) “did come true”.
Let’s do a reality check on that article (Score: Correct:False:Tie)
Duh! It has been warming (in fits and spurts) since the modern record started in 1850, with or without added CO2. There is no statistically robust correlation between the observed warming and CO2. Score: 0:1:0
This is an unsubstantiated claim, which cannot even be measured. Score: 0:2:0
.
False. The sea level has been rising since the modern tide gauge records started in the mid 19th centuty, long before significant human CO2 emissions. Score: 0:3:0
False. Most of the sea ice melts every summer and refreezes every winter. 2007 was a year of unusually high end-summer retreat, but sea ice extent has recovered partially since then The net end-summer sea ice extent receded just as “rapidly” in the 1920s and 1930s as today; Antarctic sea ice is growing instead of receding. Score: 0:4:0
False. Studies have shown no increase in either intensity or frequency of hurricanes as compared to earlier periods. Score 0:5:0
False. Species have been “going extinct” at about the same rate, with or without “climate change”. Score 0:6:0
That’s what everyone thought, until the recent floods (which are also being blamed on human-induced climate change, of course). But Australia has had prolonged periods of drought long before human CO2 emissions. Score: 0:7:0
This canard has been shot down by Dr. Paul Reiter. It is an unsubstantiated claim. Malaria increased when DDT was banned but other tropical diseases have not increased. Score: 0:8:0
False. Crops are increasing. Some food shortages have resulted from foolish corn-to-ethanol projects.
The ocean remains distinctly alkaline although measurements of ocean pH are sparse and not conclusive. Natural chemical and biological factors act as a buffer; it is likely, however, that there has been a miniscule decrease in ocean pH resulting from CO2 absorption. Let’s call this one a “correct”. Score: 1:8:0
So Peter, you see that the doomsayer crystal ball was pretty lousy in making “scary predictions”. It turns out it was simply “scaremongering”.
Max
My article has just gone up on Climate etc on ‘The futility of carbon reduction.’
http://judithcurry.com/2011/05/26/the-futility-of-carbon-reduction/#more-3330
Comments welcome
Tonyb
TonyB
Excellent article (gave you my comments on Climate etc.).
BTW, your article started an interesting exchange of views on that site.
Max
tonyb I will have a look at it over the weekend Climate etc is blocked at my work
Max
Thanks fir your exellent input. I look forward to seeing input from PeterM and comments from Peter Geany
Tonyb
Nobel Laureate Denounces Freedom of Information on Behalf of Global Warming Hoax
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/may/25/freedom-information-laws-harass-scientists
Brute
Paul Nurse’s bleating about the “poor harassed climate scientists” having to divulge their (taxpayer funded) research work to FoI requests by those who funded the work brings tears to my eyes.
This guy should stay out of the politics of climate science. It only makes a brilliant medical scientist look like a silly fool.
Max
Global Warming Causes Breathtaking Waterfalls In Yosemite
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/record-snow-makes-spectacular-yosemite-waterfalls/
This is cross posted from the ‘No leaders thread’ to retain releance.
—– —– ——
PeterM
Churchill??!!
The question I ask is based on Physics not economics. You have already shown you have no expertise in the latter but claim to have some in the former. Here it is again; by all means post your answer on the other thread to retain relevance.
Question: Temperatures are expected to rise by 3 degree Centigrade because of actions we have already taken. If the world collectively closed down their carbon economies what temperature reduction could be achieved?
a) By 2100
b) By 2200
—– ——
Peter, if you are unable to make the calculations yourself you must know the answer in order to be able to so stridently assert that the roof is falling and we must do something immediately.
Could you therefore provide a link to 4 or 5 studies. Thank you
tonyb
World Bank to suggest CO2 levy on jet, shipping fuel
http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFLDE75407H20110605?sp=true
Activist calls for forcibly tattooing ‘climate change’ deniers…
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/the-dangers-of-boneheaded-beliefs-20110602-1fijg.html
Here ya go Pete……a fine example of an outspoken advocate of Socialism (for everyone except himself)……..I wonder how much CO2 is generated by BONO’s concert tours?
Just think how many polar bears could be saved with the tax money that he has avoided paying………how many poor irishmen could be fed and healed with the money he has “stolen” from the UK social services scam……….err, uhh……….”system”.
‘Saint Bono’ the anti-poverty campaigner facing huge Glastonbury protest – for avoiding tax
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1394422/Saint-Bono-facing-huge-Glastonbury-protest–avoiding-tax.html
By the way, “Bono” is an alias………..his real name is Paul Hewson…………
Brute #4113 That’s quite an article.
First he suggests tattooing us on our arms, then says maybe that’s “a bit Nazi-creepy”, so he suggests lashing us to a pole and watching us slowly drown, then appears to change his mind again, saying: “OK, maybe the desire to see the painful, thrashing death of one’s opponents is not ideal. But, my God, these people are frustrating.”
Then he criticises both left and right, and suggests “getting the politics out of the climate-change debate.”
Richard Glover is an authentic fascist. Not the kind who gasses his opponents, of course. Just the kind who makes jokes about it, paving the way for those who turn his words into deeds. If only someone would say so, in an Australian newspaper. A good libel action could do wonders to clarify things.
Brute #4113, geoff #4116
Mere words sometimes fail me when you read what this nutter has written. Do you know he would be the first to be down protesting about free speech if we removed his rights to say what he thinks. Don’t these people ever see the irony in what they are saying.
One thing is for sure, they must be getting desperate if the paper sees it necessary to print such rubbish.
Did you all see that Australia had a large dip in output recently. They are blaming it on the floods and fires, but it will be interesting to see if they bounce back given that everywhere else is slipping further into the mire.
Millions of (UK) households face record high energy bills
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/8562207/Millions-of-households-face-record-high-energy-bills.html
Australia poised to allow camel cull
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/6e633ac8-9126-11e0-9668-00144feab49a.html#axzz1OdxOD8JX
Brute
The UK power bill hike sounds like the ENRON scam in California back in the 1990s (before ENRON imploded).
I’m afraid I’ll have to ask TonyB: “where are the guys that used to run a world-wide empire?”
Somewhere along the line, British politicians have gotten the idea that their job is to do “what is best for the whole planet” (based on the input from a bunch of fuzzy-brained professors and green activists) rather than “what is nest for the British citizen and taxpayer”.
Is a voter revolt required to jolt these guys back into reality?
Max
Max
“Where are the guys that used to run a world-wide empire” ? I suppose the simple answer is that they are dead and long gone.
Your implication is that Empires are desirable. Part of a Golden age, That it would be better if countries like India, Keyna, South Africa etc weren’t independent. Empires aren’t democratic. They can only be maintained through physical violence and of course it usually takes further viloence to drive out Imperialism.
Ask Brute about the US War of Independence.
Max,
A UK voter revolt?
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/
Maybe. But probably not one you’d approve of.
Max 4120
Actually I think that the British are just continuing their long standing mission to do what they think is best for the planet with their idea that our sacrifices will be for the common good. See ‘Tragedy of the commons’ quote by David Mackay which started off my original ‘futility of carbon reduction’ article
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons
The British Empire had a number of purposes (including self interest) but amongst them was the belief that it would spread civilisation, the rule of law and Christian values
http://209.128.81.248/view/311d1-OWExO/Empire_and_Democracy_flash_ppt_presentation
I wish we were more like the French and looked after our own intests more and minded our own business-yet another 20% increase in fuel prices announced today.
Tony
Peter,
Will China now be the focus of your ire? Will you travel to Beijing to stand with placards in Tiananmen Square protesting the “evil” “gluttonous” Chinese for killing Polar Bears and Delta Smelts?
China overtakes USA as top energy consumer…
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Report-China-overtakes-US-as-apf-1370742434.html?x=0
Greetings,
I see you are still at it, but in an exciting EUREKA moment, I thought I’d let you mostly rationalists know that I’ve semi-solved what seemed to be an insurmountable mystery that you might recall I thought was far more absorbing than debating stuff with Peter Martin. (he aka under a fantastically clever anagram as tempterrain).
The problem was that if I heated a drink in a cup in my microwave, most of the time afterwards, the cup handle was facing away upon opening the door.
WELL, I’ve come-up with a brilliant engineering solution, which may help to solve the underlying problem, given some more grace to work more on that. If I insert the cup holding the body with the handle away from me, when I open the door, the handle predominantly points towards me.
Was denken sie?