Unscientific AGW
It is over. The case for anthropogenic (or man-made) global warming has been busted for systematically not following any scientific method. According to the Financial Post:
A cross examination of global warming science conducted by the University of Pennsylvania’s Institute for Law and Economics has concluded that virtually every claim advanced by global warming proponents fails to stand up to scrutiny.
The cross-examination, carried out by Jason Scott Johnston, Professor and Director of the Program on Law, Environment and Economy at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, found that “on virtually every major issue in climate change science, the [reports of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] and other summarizing work by leading climate establishment scientists have adopted various rhetorical strategies that seem to systematically conceal or minimize what appear to be fundamental scientific uncertainties or even disagreements.”
Professor Johnson, who expressed surprise that the case for global warming was so weak, systematically examined the claims made in IPCC publications and other similar work by leading climate establishment scientists and compared them with what is found in the peer-edited climate science literature. He found that the climate establishment does not follow the scientific method. Instead, it “seems overall to comprise an effort to marshal evidence in favor of a predetermined policy preference.”
The full report is found here.
June 13th, 2010 at 12:44 am
The article makes clear that “leading climate establishment scientists” are wrong in their conclusions - which they still stand by. How can this be - except when reason is abandoned in favor of emotion? Unless all these leading climate establishment scientists all make the same honest mistake this should not be possible. This area of science is charged wiht exploring nature, and scientists based on observations and findings may come to an incorrect conclusion, but when faced with a better explanation, only avoidance of reason could make them stand by their incorrect conclusions. Is this a phenomenon limited to AGW scientists?
June 17th, 2010 at 12:07 pm
I don’t think the phenomenon is limited to AGW scientists. It’s happening to other scientists in other areas of science. Why, here is an example: a prediction of human extinction within a hundred years from a microbiologist no less. The scary thing is, all these gloomy predictions are no longer reported seriously.
If we are not to take the words of scientists seriously, what is the relevance for their being reported? One answer I can think of is that mysticism is replacing objectivity in the sciences. We are still told to trust the scientists, but we are let in on the “secret” that what they are saying aren’t objective; nevertheless, their words are reported with the wish that readers ought likewise to replace their own old-fashioned standard of objectivity in order to get along in the new age scientific revelations.