11 July 2007

Scientific community take matters into their own hands.

I spent far too much time today trying to get hold of the original source, but failed miserably. But I still want to highlight this story, and hopefully come back with some real data or at least knowledgable commentary when I get my hands on the RS publication.

The BBC did an article on the release of a study which should apparently finally put the nail in the coffin of the sunspot theory trumpeted by "The Great Global Warming Swindle" swindle (grrrrrrr....). I like the study author's comment:
"All the graphs they showed stopped in about 1980, and I knew why, because things diverged after that, ...you can't just ignore bits of data that you don't like"

The story's covered by the BBC and the Guardian. Nice to see that the scientific community won't put up with the media willfully abusing them. It's one thing to give the other side of the story, quite another to make stuff up when the other side of the story is vanishingly small. Basic premise of the show - bash the naughty, apparently money-grabbing climatologists. And of course all those poor defenceless oil companies, with no money to research their defence. People complain that there's not enough evidence that global warming is happening, so money gets put into research to look for it. But apparently now that they're getting lots of evidence, all that (minuscule amount, comparatively) money is going to their heads and their integrity must now be questioned.

Several major scientific organisations have pointed out that the program adjusted data, misrepresented some of those interviewed, presented antiquated and discredited data as new, and even told outright lies (eg volcanos produce 100 times less CO2 than human activities, not more, as claimed). And unfortunately, the story panders to the audience's desire to ignore the problem.

So anyway, this was supposed to be a quick post, I wasn't planning to bash the GGWS! It just came out cos it annoyed me SO MUCH!! Anyone who has no idea what I'm talking about (ie anyone in NZ, I guess) can get a copy of the show from me, if you're interested.

2 comments:

Ruth said...

I think you should consider renaming your blog 'Political Blog' or 'Plob'.

A said...

It certainly seems to be heading in that direction at the moment huh?! It's my forum to tell stories and shout about stuff that annoys me, and seemingly I currently have far fewer stories than things to shout about!

And I'm just about to embark on the book Taking Liberties (cos I don't imagine we'll get the movie down here) so you should probably brace yourselves for continued onslaught. Maybe I'll take some more kitten photos to balance it out a bit though!

LuvYa x