I don’t get my science from either Tim or Clive, so I’m not too concerned about their credentials.

Do you consider Richard Lindzen to be a pseudoscientist? He has numerous papers and missives discribing the dishonesty of the warmers. He’s a fully fledged climate scientist too by the way with excellent credentials seeing he’s a professor of climate science at MIT.

Compare that with the credentials on the side of the warmers and the most hysterical screamers. Tim (self) Flatttery started off his “science” career with a degree in English Lit at one of our most famous places of higher learning- Latrobe uni. Later on Ken went on and became some sort of bone collector.

Do you know what Clive’s credentials are?

In no particularly here are some points:

* Science isn’t in the business of proving anything. Anytime a scientist says that they have proved something (and there aren’t talking about a mathematical proof) give them a rap on the knuckles and tell them that science is all about finding a hypothesis to explain something then testing that hypothesis.

* I didn’t impugn you “saying in the 1990s that the anthropogenic hypothesis of global warming had not been validated”, rather I impugn you for saying “[t]he best data and eminent scientific opinion find no real evidence of global warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions”. While it’s good to see that you appear to be backing down from your original articles with much more luke warm statements, your original statement was false. When you wrote the article, the eminent scientific opinion was widely available, and wasn’t anything close to how you described it. If you want to demonstrate me wrong, then find a conclusion from eminent scientific opinion which demonstrates it. If you want some help, here is the press release for the Reconciling Observations of Global Temperature Change report. Sinclair has already linked to a series of PNAS papers – not that they support your early statement.

* It is ironic that you state “No predictions have been made on the basis of the various anthropogenic models that have been validated by subsequent observations”. Your article which I brought up dealt with the discrepancies between the modeled atmospheric temperatures and the measured temperatures. Subsequently, the observations were found to be wrong, and that the models gave the correct answer. This is pretty much a textbook example of a successful prediction.

* On a meta point – global warming is pretty much an example of a successful prediction. When the chemistry legend Svante Arrhenius developed his theory on climate change (approx. one hundred years ago) he predicted that the earth would warm. Rather than use a graph of global temperatures (there were none available at the time) he had a good understanding of how light and matter interact. Subsequently, the world has warmed significantly.

* You have misread the IPCC. They don’t say that there is a 90% chance that CO2 contributes to global temperatures, but rather that there is a greater than 90% chance that humans have a net positive forcing. To argue that CO2 doesn’t contribute to global temperatures is move into serious pseudoscience land (to do this you will have to argue either that the earth doesn’t emit infrared radiation or that CO2 doesn’t absorb it.).

Ken Miles has a peculiar view of scientific method, the difference between correlation and causation, validation by prediction, and the civilities of discourse between adults. He impugns me for saying in the 1990s that the anthropogenic hypothesis of global warming had not been validated. That was true then and it is still true now. No predictions have been made on the basis of the various anthropogenic models that have been validated by subsequent observations. In other words (and to repeat), ‘there is no real evidence’ of anthropogenic causation. That was true then and is true today. That there is some ambiguous evidence of correlation between carbon dioxide emissions and temperature trends nobody denies. It is conceivable to some that CO2 emissions might make an addition to global temperature, but this has not been demonstrated. The IPCC ‘consensus’ can do no better than confront us with 90 per cent probability, to which no explanation as to its meaning is attached, about the anthropogenic hypothesis. This is a very long way indeed from anything approaching validation.

At this moment, there is a growing body of evidence that suggests other causes of the temperature fluctuations that have been occurring for thousands of years. We have a long way to go before understanding what is happening. Either Miles should agree that the anthropogenic hypothesis has not been proved or show us the proof. If he cannot show the proof, then he must agree that we are dealing, at the very least, with serious scientific lacunae and major uncertainty. In the face of such uncertainty, I would avoid irretrievable and damaging decisions and search for more information, of which there is no shortage.

John, if you want to know my opinion on linking ALS with CIS, then just ask - rather than assume. I think that Scorcher piece was simply an attempt at guilt by association (and a pretty poor association at that). My view is that the CIS past stuff was poor (but mitigating against that it was always a very minor part of their work) and the current work (ie. nothing) is much better.

On the creationist bit, I think you’re being over the top. Why automatically assume that any and every centre-right argument is off the same song-sheet. The last time I met a creationist was in high school, and I’m certain they didn’t support free markets.

I’ll try to track down the paper Barry is refering to.

However, your papers don’t even come close to providing support for Maley’s statement [t]he best data and eminent scientific opinion find no real evidence of global warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions. Both papers are fully consistent with the scientific consensus, then and now.

The first paper concludes with Abrupt changes have been especially large when atmospheric carbon-dioxide concentration,
insolation, and other important climatic variables were changing rapidly, with possible implications for general behavior of the climate system. - which if anything, is more supportative for an alarmist view on the effects of CO2 on climate.

The first paper, also should not be read without reading the authors other paper on the implications which blames these large temperature swings on orbital variations which are then amplified by ice-albedo, sea-level, and greenhouse-gas feedbacks and wind changes.

The second paper which you cite, simple tries to estimate the climate sensitivity (a measure of the effect of CO2 on global temperatures) and gets a result consistent with other efforts.

So none of these papers provide any support for the claim [t]he best data and eminent scientific opinion find no real evidence of global warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions.

I don’t think that my analogy was unfair to CIS. They published unsupported garbage - not at all dissimilar to creationists who also publish unsupported garbage. Their current lack of articles on global warming puts them in a much better position intellectually than when they were publishing this rot.