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Originally Posted by HOZ
Thanks Lanny for confirming what I thought all along about you.
I'll type it one more time and see if you understand. Saying they are conservative or funded by big (whatever) doesn't make them wrong. You have to PROVE their DATA is incorrect. Kind of like.....what Doctors did to the tobacco companies.
Thats said.....here is an article written last year by Nigel Calder that makes the point very clearly.
When politicians and journalists declare that the science of global warming is settled, they show a regrettable ignorance about how science works. We were treated to another dose of it recently when the experts of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued the Summary for Policymakers that puts the political spin on an unfinished scientific dossier on climate change due for publication in a few months’ time. They declared that most of the rise in temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to man-made greenhouse gases.
The small print explains “very likely” as meaning that the experts who made the judgment felt 90% sure about it. Older readers may recall a press conference at Harwell in 1958 when Sir John Cockcroft, Britain’s top nuclear physicist, said he was 90% certain that his lads had achieved controlled nuclear fusion. It turned out that he was wrong. More positively, a 10% uncertainty in any theory is a wide open breach for any latterday Galileo or Einstein to storm through with a better idea. That is how science really works. |
That is how science really works? No, science works through the observation and collection of measurable imperical data to prove/disprove a theory. By following a documented methodolgy these findings should not only be repeatable, but consistent, through independent trial. That is how science works. Most journals will not accept papers written without the repetition and independent verification through the peer review process. This peer review process has been around since the time of Plato and Socrates. This is the basis for concensus and scientific foundation. That is how science works.
I really do like the article, but it is also very flawed in its own right. It uses the comments of one scientist on one subject, that being cold fusion, to completely discount the process and work of thousands of other scientists. The study done by the scientist who had his work rejected by journal after journal stuck with the process and obviously kept refining his findings. You don't just peddle your findings from one journal to the next until someone publishes them. That is not how publication works. Too bad the author of the article failed to mention that.
Here is another point that the author misses, and is the most pressing point that is lost on most people. The science community has come together, and scientists from all different specialities, have agreed upon what they think the source of climate change and global warming is. Each of them has their own field of study and expertise, but they have agreed on the source of this problem. There is concensus amongst thousands of scientists, scientific organizations and countries. Are they 100% certain? No, because science is never 100% certain of anything, which is the strength of science in the first place. Those who make claims counter to the concensus theory have been lone voices. They have their own research specialities and their own theories. There is no concensus amongst these voices other than they
think that CO2 is not the problem. Are they 100% certain? No. Do they present a unified theory as a disconscenting concesus? No. They continue to argue amongst themselves what they think the cause is. The only thing they agree on is that CO2 is not the problem (they think).
Again, I will put this into terms that you can understand. There is concensus that the NHL is the best hockey league in the world. The vast majority of hockey experts agree that the NHL is without a doubt the best league out there, regardless of their afiliation with a team and what they think about the other clubs. They will say that top to bottom, each club in the NHL are the best teams in the world and this leads to the NHL being the only league for those who wish to play the highest calibre of hockey. This is concensus. Conversely, there are some Russians who claim otherwise, the RSL is the best. There are some Swedes who claim the best is the SEL. There are some who even say the best hockey league in the world is the CHL. The only thing they can agree upon is their belief that the NHL is not the best. Beyond that, they are at complete odds with each other. There is no concensus. There is no unified theory. It's all noise. They have their theories, but they are on the fringe because there is no unified theory.
Now what would happen if ESPN picked up one of these knuckleheads and started promoting it as the best league in the world, or even that the NHL was second rate? The unkowledgeable people out there might begin to believe that and discount the NHL. This is exactly what is happening right now in the climate change debate. There are elements whose sole intent and purpose is to obfuscate and confuse the issue. It does not matter that there is no unified theory to counter the CO2 theory, ANY theory will do, as long as it adds another layer of complexity and extends the argument. That is the flaw in the argument against the IPCC and why it does not hold water. Until they can present a unified theory there is no serious counter to the CO2 theory. That's the end game. Live with it.