As I try to be a "glass half full" type of person, generally speaking, I find myself somewhat encouraged to read about the shocking pollution in China last week (and, perhaps, the incredible smoke problem stemming from Indonesia that blights neighbouring countries too) as giving reason for at least those countries to get serious about not burning carbon for reasons other than mere temperature rises and climate change. But then again, maybe I am being too optimistic (see The Economist's short take on the Chinese air pollution problem.)
I see that Lomborg has been The Australian's go-to boy for commentary on how the Paris meeting was all for nought. I see that Senator for Guns, Soccer Fans (but not Bicycle Helmets) Leyonhjelm tweet-cites him, which is a bit odd, given that Lomborg actually advocates a $100 billion to be spent on clean energy research. I thought small government types didn't trust governments to back winners.
By the way, Lomborg's website seems to contain even more selfies than Tim Wilson's twitter account, if that's possible. Wilson: "Oh look, here I am, in one of the crucial historical and cultural centres of the world, so let's take up half of this shot with my beaming face!":
And what the heck is he doing there at a meeting with the Palestinians and Bronwyn Bishop and Christopher Pyne?? See his twitter account, if his visage doesn't give you hives.
Update: John Quiggin's cautious optimism seems about right, too.
1 comment:
Ref Paris - despite the euro-bureaucrats and their best intentions, Scientists across the world now accept that the Earth has had extremes of every kind of weather for 4.5 billion years or even more and any cause of warming could melt ice, raise sea-levels, shift jet streams, change cloud cover and shift evaporation rates. Volcanoes are largely to blame of course as Prof. Sir Ian Plimer has demonstrated and Prof Bob Carter AO would still be demonstrating if he hadn’t been cruelly crucified on the altar of political correctness.
Do we know warming is due to coal fired power stations or did I just dream that? We only “know” because some climate modelers say so — and the models deliberately ignore lunar effects, solar magnetic effects, birdsong patterns, and millions of observations taken from planes in every part of the planet so the ABC can blame your SUV and air-conditioner for it.
This is the modus operandi of the ancient witchdoctor - “I can stop the storms — send us your daughter”. Any time the thought police at ABC Centrale want to get a list of real questions to ask climate modelers, they only have to email someone independent like Prof. Jo Nova or out of left field, say Larry Pickering.
They know full well that there are hundreds of ways to define a record or trend, and climate skeptics have thought of most of them so there is plenty of potential for cherry picking. The records and trends that fit the approved “Bob Carter meme” get promoted on blogs, forums and across the country thanks to the funding of independent science bodies like the Heartland Institute.
Any inconvenient data is kept carefully out of view which is what scientists do anyway. There is no trend in global cyclone energy, no trends in Australia or NZ. I don’t know why anyone said there was. And there have always been heatwaves and storms almost everywhere in the world at any time. Nothing to see here.
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