Common sense Left on the cutting room floor

 This letter left on the floor by The Oz editor.... 

As a society we tolerate a certain number of deaths from a wide range of causes to trade off for other benefits. Motor vehicle accidents being a good example. We could bring MVA deaths to near zero by implementing 40 kmh speed limits and vehicle tracking. But we tolerate 1000 deaths per annum for the convenience and benefits of speed. Covid should not be any different. At a time when most of the vulnerable are vaccinated and the risk of people dying from the virus are substantially decreased we should be looking at removing ALL restrictions rather than imposing new ones.

The Rock: if you haven't climbed it you haven't visited

Recent dead letter at the SMH:

Dear Editor,

The climb to the top of Uluru affords one a chance to soak in the geology, geomorphology and environment of this remarkable area. Unfortunately pandering to stone age beliefs has threatened the climb for some time and sadly continues to do so, replete with specious comparisons with climbing man made religious structures (Uluru: to climb or not to climb? 7/8/2017). It may surprise many but climbing the bell towers of many christian churches is a very common tourist practise in Europe that usually comes with a small fee. I understand that you can even climb the Bell Tower at St Mary's if you know the right person.

Climbing the rock is an act that commemorates our collective defeat over primitive mysticism and is a tribute to science and modernity. Not climbing on the grounds that the rock is sacred in some way is an act of wilful ignorance, tantamount to turning your back on the age of enlightenment. Dream time tales, along with other religious fantasies, may make for fine bedtime morality lessons, but they have no role in restricting access to our shared natural heritage. If you haven't climbed it, you haven't really visited it.

Back to the 1800s

Letter to The Australian on the cutting room floor...

Dear Editor,
New research (Climate change to cause twice as many severe floods in Australia, 27/1) indicates we can expect  "almost twice as many severe floods this century like the ones that devastated southeast Queensland four years ago". Looking over the Bureau of Meteorology's charts of flood height for the Brisbane River there were 9 major flood events between 1840 and 1940, and just 2 between 1940 and 2014. Based on this it seems the climate of the future will be a thing of the past.

http://www.bom.gov.au/qld/flood/fld_history/brisbane_history.shtml

Confirmation bias preferred at the Sydney Morning Herald

Pity a once great paper has gone to rubbish. Our well crafted letter tossed into the editor's bin in favour of crap.

Professional scientists often request assistance from citizen scientists. However when a group of "amateurs", including retired engineers and scientists find problems with mainstream science, for example with BOM's system of temperature homogenization or errors in palaeoclimate reconstructions made famous by the hockey stick saga, we see their contributions attacked, not by looking at the evidence they present, but by resorting to personal attacks, name calling and appeals to authority (Climate change deniers raise the heat on the Bureau of Meteorology, 10/9).  

It is sad that many professional scientists are unable to work constructively with a veritable army of enthusiastic highly skilled volunteers interested in making substantial contributions to science. It seems these contributions are only appreciated when they confirm the researchers' preferred models. When they show the opposite, the shudders of authority go up and professional heads get buried in the sand. It's time researchers showed more maturity and humility and engaged with an interested public rather than treating them like pariahs.

The climate bookie

A letter in the Oz today but most of it went missing, here's the full text:

With respect to climate science Brian Schmidt claims to have "considerable knowledge of the science at hand" yet in his proposed bet with Maurice Newman he is unwilling to put a figure on the amount of warming he expects in 20 years. He would be aware that the real debate is not about whether it will warm or not, but the amount of warming, and its effect. Based on the IPCC's current report the range for future warming based on estimates of the climate's sensitivity to CO2 is quite broad and implies anything from inconvenience to catastrophe. With his "considerable knowledge" I would have thought Dr Schmidt would have been confident enough in the science to nominate a figure against which Mr Newman could bet rather than take him for a mug punter.

The slow roast

Left on the cutting room floor at the Sydney Morning Herald...

With CO2 about to breach the 400ppm barrier and likely to continue rising over the coming decades (Greenhouse gas levels highest in 3M years, 29/4) I'm sure readers will be heartened to learn that recent estimates of the climate's sensitivity to this greenhouse gas are lower than previously thought (see link below*). Based on current best estimates (1.6 degrees C per doubling) we are likely to experience further warming of about 0.8 degrees C by the end of the century. The lower climate sensitivity goes some way to explain why the IPCC's climate models have failed to forecast the current hiatus in global temperatures since 1998 despite massively increasing CO2 emissions.
This slow roast hardly represents what former PM Rudd called "the greatest moral, economic and environmental challenge of our generation".  It also pulls the rug from under the feet of ardent alarmists like Clive Hamilton who has moved from calls to suspend democracy to save the planet, to supporting civil disobedience against the coal industry (whatever that entails). Ironically, an industry that through its taxes helps fund Hamilton's generous salary.

*See http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00473.1

Lewis N., 2013. An objective Bayesian, improved approach for applying
optimal fingerprint techniques to estimate climate sensitivity.
Journal of Climate 2013 ; e-View
doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00473.1

Activist Sherpa's views preferred over peer reviewed science

From the cutting room floor at The Australian...


Dear Editor,

Chris Roylance (Letters, 29/2) finds some irony in Des Moore's call for an independent inquiry into the science of climate change by citing the claims of a sherpa. While first hand experience and anecdotal evidence of decreasing snowfall at the top of the world are worth considering, recent satellite data has revealed  "the world's greatest snowcapped peaks lost no ice at all over the past 10 years (Highest peaks have cut no ice in past 10 years, 10/2/12). Claims that Mt Everest is becoming more treacherous to climb are also little difficult to believe when this newspaper reported just 2 years ago that "An estimated 200 people reached the summit on Sunday, the busiest day, when 13-year-old American Jordan Romero became the youngest person ever to climb Everest, tackling the mountain from the quieter north side." (Climate change ups Everest danger, 26/5/2010). Interesting the same sherpa Chris Roylance relies on to rebuke Des Moore, featured in that story too, making the same claims about missing ice after making a record 20th ascent of the world's highest peak; a record your report yesterday indicates he has since broken (Mount Everest perilous as snows vanish, 28/2). Yes the ironies are there for all to see. But that believers in a climate catastrophe now rely on the anecdotal claims of an activist sherpa over the evidence offered by peer reviewed science is the greatest irony of all. 

Cherry Picking the News

Cherry Picking the weather: anyone can do it:

The IPCC Special Report on Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation. (Presentation Slideshow, p.8).

The Little Skeptic

Links to newspaper articles all from the first decade of the 20th century:

Agriculture: http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/63863482

Energy: http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/12281781

Water: http://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/search/results/1900-01-01/1909-12-31?contenttype=article&basicsearch=drought africa&anysearch=drought africa&frontpage=false&sortorder=score

Public Health: http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/24841602

Tourism: http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/69918661

Transportation: http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/56724650

A warped view

This letter left on the cutting room floor at The Age...

Dear Editor,

If Clive Hamilton and others on the loony left are so concerned about Gina Rinehart influencing editorial direction at Fairfax (Mining in a new vein, 2/2), perhaps they should dig deep into their own pockets, put their combined money where their mouth is, and get Clive a seat on the board. However, given that no one on the loony left has any entrepreneurial nous, relying as they do on government handouts of one sort or another, perhaps Clive can just organise a suspension of democracy, ban Gina from Fairfax and in the process stop anyone else from thinking anything that conflicts with Hamilton's own warped world view.

Snippets from Climategate 2.0

Some snippets with commentary from the most recent batch of Climategate emails.

1. Email exchange between Phil Jones and Journalist. Jones answers in italics.

One of your speciality is paleoclimatology. It is necessary to study the dinosaur age to be able to predict the near future or which is the most outstanding period for studying? 

 No! The only recent period that is relevant for the future is the last 2000 years. For earlier periods back to the dinosaurs, the boundary conditions were different. The amount of day hours at different latitudes changes enough prior to 2000 years ago. Back with the dinosaurs the continents were in different positions.

http://di2.nu/foia/foia2011/mail/2740.txt

Seems James E. Hansen and Makiko Sato would disagree!

Paleoclimate Implications for Human-Made Climate Change

Planting the seeds of innovation in the Bureaucracies of today is a sure way to sprout the weeds of the tomorrow.

This letter left on the cutting room floor at the Australian....

Dear Editor,
Bjorn Lomborg suggests spending a $100 billion a year on research into making renewables cost competitive with fossil fuels (Carbon tax a costly feel-good gesture that won't reduce emissions. 17/11). While I am supportive of the concept, and it makes much more sense than the government's economy destroying carbon tax; I can't help but be concerned that the offer of a large, long lived, cash cow and the prospect of permanent research jobs would only serve to create a bureaucracy that would stifle creativity and delay the great leap forward. Just look at the way climate science has hopelessly stumbled in recent years in explaining the travesty of the world's missing warming for instance, despite a healthy investment of tax payers dollars. So, rather than pump $100 billion into a bloated system every year, year in - year out, and risk a drawn out process of invention, why not offer a one off cash prize of $100 billion to the successful individual or consortium who delivers the breakthrough? Planting the seeds of innovation in the Bureaucracies of today is a sure way to sprout the weeds of the tomorrow.

Sherwood's Forest

This Letter missed the cut at The Oz, in reply to an Op Ed piece by Steven Sherwood

Dear Editor,

That Steven Sherwood is unable to condense 50 years of investigation, paid for by billions of dollars of public research money (that may have been better spent elsewhere), into a succinct argument in favour of catastrophic man made warming is one of the clearest admissions of failure I have seen to date from a working climate scientist (Why experts refuse to debate climate science 28/10). Surprisingly Sherwood wants to debate the science in a court room, but he should know that debate in science is not like debate in the legal system as unlike a barrister, a scientist with integrity would give all the information, not just the information that leads to a judgment in one direction or another. A scientist with integrity does not pick cherries!


In the face of such inherent uncertainty, and apparent deep confusion about the manner in which science should be debated, the policy response favoured by the current government and the case for urgent, dramatic action being promulgated by activist scientists, politicians and our under qualified climate commissioners, is looking decidedly premature and lacking in solid foundation. In the long run I have faith that the scientific method, in the absence of political interference, will provide a definitive answer that will provide scientists convincing evidence about the future behaviour of the climate system, on which sound public policy might be developed and enacted. However until then, rather than risk a misdiagnosis and subsequent improper treatment of the problem, a prudent response is required that does not kill the patient. Such a response might involve taking measures to mitigate against current known weather extremes, and enacting policy to remove nonsensical political barriers to competing base load electricity generation such as thorium based nuclear reactors.

The Prince of Precaution

The current print run of The Prince of Precaution has sold out. You can still view it on You Tube.

More copies once orders start to mount up!

find truth in the trends

Thus, although poor station quality might affect absolute temperature, it does not appear to affect trends, and for global warming estimates, the trend is what is important.

Prof. Richard Muller (Testimony at the U.S. House of Representatives Hearing on Climate Change: Examining the Processes Used to Create Science and Policy 31/3/2011)

Some interesting trends above, which one best represents temperature in the vicinity of Melbourne?

Seems reasonable to ask the question

From the cutting room floor at the Sydney Morning Herald...

Dear Editor,
Daniel Bray (Climate change is real. Let's deal with it, 3/3) asks the question: Given the long-standing scientific consensus, why is climate change an unreasoning issue? Perhaps the fact that the observed warming trend (0.1 degrees Celsius per decade) is well below IPCC projections that range up to 0.6 degrees per decade has something to do with it? As current trends clearly falsify the doomsday projections of catastrophic warming derived from the climate models, it is not at all unreasonable to ask what all the fuss is about.

stop the floods, drive an SUV

The following letter left on the cutting room floor at the Sydney Morning Herald:

Dear Editor,

Penny Sackett blames the current floods on global warming (Nature raw in tooth and claw, 15/1). That may be the case, for based on BOM records the Brisbane River experienced a major flood 8 times between 1841 and 1900, and only 2 major floods in the 111 years since, including the current one. It seems one of the consequences of global warming is actually a reduction in the frequency of major flood events! A return to a natural cycle of 8 major floods per century would be devastating, so in order to further reduce flood frequency perhaps the Australian Government could provide every Australian with a gas guzzling SUV and hydrocarbon credits and commission a few more coal fired power plants. As Penny Sackett says "We owe that to those who are feeling the effects of nature's force this summer."

Mug Punt

The following letter left on the cutting room floor at the Sydney Morning Herald:

Dear Editor,

Like a mug punter Barry Jones wants us to take a huge gamble on climate change “action” without having read the form or seen the horses in the mounting yard (Doing nothing on climate is a fool's wager, 8/12). Barry says human suffering will be averted if we take action, but a link between climate disasters and CO₂ has failed to emerge^[1]. He claims little will be lost if the “problem” abates for other reasons, failing to see how those wasted billions could have been more wisely spent. He mistakes prudent “inaction” for stupidity at a time when the worst case scenario is but a chimera in the digital fantasy of falsified climate models^[2]. Lastly, he suggests that if there is no disaster it will be through luck, rather than astute judgement to side-step the mistaken missives of a politicized science.

At this stage a wait and see approach on climate still makes more sense than Barry’s bet on a well flogged horse on its way to the knackery.

[1] Eric Neumayer and Fabian Barthel, Normalizing economic loss from natural disasters: A global analysis, Global Environmental Change, In Press, Corrected Proof, Available online 18 November 2010, ISSN 0959-3780, DOI: 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2010.10.004.

2 A comparison of local and aggregated climate model outputs with observed data Anagnostopoulos, G. G. , Koutsoyiannis, D. , Christofides, A. , Efstratiadis, A. and Mamassis, N. ‘A comparison of local and aggregated climate model outputs with observed data’,Hydrological Sciences Journal, 55:7, 1094 – 1110

Butterfly emergence study- a case of Cargo Cult Science?

A recent journal article titled "Early emergence in a butterfly causally linked to anthropogenic warming" published online by Biology Letters claimed to have linked a change in butterfly emergence with temperature changes caused by increased greenhouse gas emissions. A comment on the article now posted by Biology Letters (HERE) shows the methodology and results are unfounded, the study could not be repeated. We wonder if the media will spend as much energy reporting on this damaging critique as it spent enthusiastically promoting the findings of the original paper.

In his famous Caltech speech "Cargo Cult Science" the late Richard Fynman stated:

"We've learned from experience that the truth will out. Other experimenters will repeat your experiment and find out whether you were wrong or right. Nature's phenomena will agree or they'll disagree with your theory. And, although you may gain some temporary fame and excitement, you will not gain a good reputation as a scientist if you haven't tried to be very careful in this kind of work. And it's this type of integrity, this kind of care not to fool yourself, that is missing to a large extent in much of the research in Cargo Cult Science."

With the truth buried deeply in the servers of Biology Letters it appears the butterfly emergence study joins others that have all the hallmarks of the Cargo Cult that Feynman so eloquently described.

Ignore the evidence at our peril

Unpublished letter to the Sydney Morning Herald, sent 10 May 2010.

If Penny Wong, Kurt Lambeck and David Karoly want evidence (Climate scientists cross with Abbott for taking Christ's name in vain, 10/5) to suggest it was hotter 2000 years ago, they can find just one example, of many, in a recent article titled "Holocene thinning of the Greenland ice sheet" published in Nature in 2009. The article by Bo Vinther of the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen and colleagues uses oxygen Isotope data to reconstruct temperatures over Greenland through the Holocene. Not only does the Vinther data confirm the presence of the rather "toasty" Holocene Climate Optimum, it also reveals numerous warm pulses when temperatures were also higher than present. These include the Minoan Warm Period (1450–1300 BC), the Roman Warm Period (250–0 BC), discussed with students by Tony Abbott, and the Medieval Warm Period (800–1100AD) that the IPCC attempted to whitewash from history with its infamous hockey stick graph.

In developing policy to deal with future climate change Penny Wong should note that the long term temperature trend in the Vinther data is downwards.

Do they have any journos there?

Unpublished letter to the Sydney Morning Herald

British climategate scientist Dr Phil Jones has revealed in an interview with the BBC that the world has not warmed since 1995; debate over Medieval Warm Period is not settled; the rates of warming from 1860-1880, 1910-1940 and 1975-1998 were statistically identical meaning the current rate of warming is not unprecedented; and the world has been cooling since January 2002 at a rate of -0.12C per decade. Will this make it past the SMH's climate alarmist news filters, or will SMH readers be forced to turn to Rupert Murdoch to find out about it? God knows hell will freeze over before our Auntie says anything.