Over at Brenda's, commenter John Cross asks a delightfully civil question of Brenda's regular readers, who are -- the lot of them -- as insufferably retarded as she is:
As someone interested in the science, I keep asking what science does this change. I can find nothing about the radiation physics or CO2 concentrations in the e-mails.
Thanks,
John
Unsurprisingly, no one rises to the intellectual challenge so, a few hours later, John tries again:
Bec: If the science has been questioned, please point to the specific e-mails that discuss radiation physics in regards to CO2.
Thanks,
John
at which point, commenter "Blame Crash" has had quite enough of this smarmy, high-falutin', academic book larnin':
And tell us John, would any answer, or any truth, result in anything except a repeat of your amateur diversionary comment? I think not.
which we can all safely assume means that BC is a moron and has no idea what the answer is. But all this suggests a simple challenge.
If Canada's intellectually-crippled dingbats, yahoos and whackjobs seriously think that the recently hacked e-mails represent some sort of "smoking gun" with respect to the fraud of climate change, then I propose that they post what represents, in all of those e-mails, what they consider to be the smokingest gun of all.
To no one's surprise, these scientifically illiterate yahoos have been creaming themselves over the thousands and thousands of lines of hacked e-mail, without actually pointing to any specific passage that proves their point. So here's their chance.
Let's have them take their time, peruse the e-mails in question and, out of all of that, select the single line/passage/paragraph/excerpt that they think represents an absolutely devastating refutation of climate change. Since they all seem so giddy with victory, surely it won't be hard to produce a single piece of evidence to bolster their spittle-flecked screeching. That's fair, isn't it? But there are going to be a few conditions.
First, I'm after one example. I'm not interested in the "shotgun" approach, during which you fling about pointers at countless pieces of text, hoping to inundate the poor reader with sheer quantity. If your case is as strong as you claim, then it should be easy for you to find what you think is the absolutely best piece of evidence there is.
Second, you will not be allowed to annotate or interpret your example. What you provide should be capable of standing on its own, without any help from you. The text you quote should be clear and unambiguous. You will not be allowed to reinterpret, redefine, mangle or sodomize the English language in order to have it mean what you want it to mean. In short, you will not be allowed to pull a "Patrick Ross."
And, finally, once you've taken all the time you want to select your favourite smoking gun, and you publish it, and we here in Not-Crazy-Ville demonstrate that it is utter shash, you will accept your defeat gracefully, and not run off shrieking, "Oh, yeah ... well there's this other example that's even better." No. You can have as much time as you want to make your choice, but once you've made it, you don't get to start moving goalposts and being a sore loser.
So ... howzabout? Hunter? Dodo? Kate? All of you have been creaming yourselves over these e-mails as if you actually understood the science (and we all know that that's pure bollocks). So, let's see it. Take your time. And choose carefully. And when you're done, drop your pick in the comments section, at which point my regular commenters will be happy to go to town on it.
And now ... we wait.
10 comments:
You know, the real problem is that this is a political win because they got the press to believe there was some smoking gun and that was the first headline everyone saw. You can be sure that it will be often repeated, as the big lies are, and I suspect there is little the facts can do to change the outcome in places that do not have sober second thought.
Words are open to interpretation and as such cannot be challenged very well. It is like arguing climate change science with an economist. Sure, they kinda use statistics and stuff but it is more about words than anything else. Very slippery.
And tell us John, would any answer, or any truth, result in anything except a repeat of your amateur diversionary comment? I think not.
It's not the imbecility, but the bilious conceit.
No wonder I call them all cunts and cocksuckers. Those words were invented for people like this.
Is it possible they do all their cunting and cocksucking for free?!
They're not THAT stupid!
CC: It was your post that made me aware of the Brenda's post so thanks (I think).
I love your idea. I am probably going to have a post up at Dawg's addressing what I used to consider the only possible issue in the e-mails (the avoidance of the FOI request) but I will link back here and will keep linking back here.
Can we place bets on how many submissions you get that meet your criteria? I want zero!!
Regards,
John
This is the drama, in microcosm: 260 comments (and counting) with about five worth reading. The rest are simply well-rehearsed regurgitations of wingnut nonsense, featuring every known Canadian online wingnut, troll and sock-puppet, proceeding through the usual wingnut styles: from excessive linking to wingnut sources to familiar Dunning-Kruger-esque bilious conceit and hauteur to (my favourite), complete silence in the face of challenges exposing the weaknesses of wingnut assertions.
Whatever the truth might be, they are completely uninterested in it.
Yup. Twenty-plus years of science, all apparently nullified by a couple of lines of email.
Their desperation to cling to a false viewpoint in the face of the evidence that actually, y'know, exists is worse than pathetic, it's actively hostile to sense.
Of course, the most laughable part of "punter's" thread is that it is about supposed fabrication of research and selective reporting. Meanwhile the thread itself is filled with fabrications, selectively reported.
Here is a smoking gun of just one suppressed comment:
Global Warming, allegedly caused by (man made) CO2 emissions, was determined to be settled by these guys, period.
It remains "settled", though being science, there will always be more information to consider. Actual counter evidence would make it not "settled", not the assertions of deniers complicit in a criminal hacking.
For example, the warming stopped in 1998 canard. It didn't stop, though a large El Nino that year puts 1998 way above the trend. The trend continues to rise. Removing the 1998 El Nino based additional warming, so the curve would more clearly show steady warming, is the "trick" referred to in the emails.
If their has been NO WARMING and the science doctored, CO2, is now an unproven cause of anything, let alone a non-existent climate change.
There continues to be warming. The science is not "doctored".
It has all simply been debunked.
No, it hasn't. The theory of a great conspiracy should be debunked however, by the fact that these emails show ZERO evidence of a conspiracy or fraud.
Bravo, CC. Those emails are simply scientists giving rigorous scrutiny of each other's work. There is no smoking gun, at least none that I could determine from what conservative sites have posted (including a Canada Free Press article/essay by retired geography prof Tim Ball). All the wingnuts have is the revelation (to them, it would seem) that scientists pick over the methodology of others' work and sometimes disagree on how numbers are used and interpreted. Maybe a little more than that, I suppose, but not much more.
Oh, and sometimes scientists get cranky with each other. And some scientists are a bit kooky.
I think that about covers it.
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