Everything used in climate consensus are models that may show what will happen. These models are likely to show what will happen if carbon emissions aren't controlled since third world countries want to progress the same way first world countries did before we knew what could happen.

Now whether will will have the hockey stick global warming is uncertain, but what is know is glaciers are melting at the poles, Alaska, Glacier National Park, and other places with historical records. This accelerates the process and all that water is slowly raising the sea level.

Anything is better than this (from Elizabeth Warren):

"We believe in science, and that means that we have a responsibility to protect this Earth."

Whether or not anthropogenic climate change is real, science is not a belief.

'We believe scientists.'

Better, jackass?

OP,

Do you have a script that posts this every so often?

"Better, jackass?"

Actually, yes, it's clearer. It's a consensus of "90 and 98 percent of climate scientists", not part of a belief system.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-we-should-choose-science-over-beliefs/?page=1

There is a consensus. Climate change and global warming are undeniable. This past winter in the United States was lauded as one of the worst in memory, but if you just erase the last 25 years of data from the record, then it falls at just a little below average.

Aww, this is cute.

"but if you just erase the last 25 years of data from the record, then it falls at just a little below average"

That's a mindbender... it seems deliberately crafted to be taken out of context and used to undermine your point. Couldn't you have phrased that as "would be considered only a little below average in the period ending in 1989"?

Maybe I'm an old man and I'm missing the irony here. Is that thing you did considered... "COOL"?

tendmote - I just put it in to point out that the last 25 years have been significantly above average......to the point where they're creating a new normal

While I believe that you mean well, fulhamish, to instigate inquiry along these lines is certainly trollish.

Many of our forum readers are young and impressionable and so it's important for them to understand that climate change deniers should be comfortably classified along with holocaust deniers and the people who deny that Obama is a US Citizen.

tendmote,

There's a troubling trend recently to redefine the word "believe" to mean "believe without any evidence." It doesn't mean that. If you think that Maxwell's equations describe the behavior of the electromagnetic field, then you believe [in] Maxwell's equations -- and very rationally, too. Belief does not mean there is or isn't evidence. It just means you accept something as true (possibly without reason, possibly with reason).

There are a lot of articles appearing of late (on various sides of issues) trying to distinguish "belief" from accepting science and the like, and it's troubling, because it's very ignorant of epistemology and will only serve to confuse issues in the public's mind.

@Al Swearengen,

If you're really concerned about the education of the young in forming correct beliefs, I propose that every time you urge them to accept a belief based on your classification of its negators as wingnuts, you also provide a link to, you know, actual evidence and argumentation for the point of view you are promoting.

Otherewise, you're just promoting the forming of beliefs based on in-group status, not reason.

There is a difference between belief in a hypothesis that has been tested and proven versus one that is fitted to past data, but hasn't yet made a confirmed prediction of a future event.

Technical analysis of stock market charts tries to model future stock moves by looking at patterns compared to past charts. It isn't a proven method otherwise technical analysts would be always right in predicting future moves. Quantitative analysts use computer programs to model patterns on past data without regard to what the companies do or make.

This is the same type of extrapolation that some climatologists make for global warming. No need to explain why it's going to happen, just look at the charts.

tendmote:
Oh, really? Jeez, when I checked Merriam-Webster, I thought Elizabeth Warren must have been referring to definitions 3 a, 3 b or perhaps 1. I never imagined she was referring to the only "belief system" on the list of definitions, namely definition 5, otherwise known as Christian Science!
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/science

Yeah, points taken. Still, some of it's supporters do present it as a kind of orthodox "correct belief", although I probably shouldn't object every time the word "belief" is used.

I plead guilty to "unfocused beef posted in forum", but I still have some problems with how *the way* dissenters are hounded as idiots.

@ abgemacht
‘’OP,

Do you have a script that posts this every so often?’’

Wow! Nasty old fulhamish actually bringing up a topic more than once on webdiplomacy, that would never do would it? Single him out for opprobrium, he has got it coming. Why don’t you stick it where the sun doesn’t shine? ;-)

Seriously though the point of my posting that link was not to engage in another likely over-passionate debate on the anthropocentric global warming (AGW) issue, particularly not with you. It was merely to point out that there are reasonable, albeit as yet minority, alternative viewpoints on the issues of both the existence and extent of AGW. The website I posted reports good debates on these issues. This makes rather a pleasant change from the usual very much-agenda driven sites commonly given as a reference here in the past e.g., http://wattsupwiththat.com/ and, from the other side, http://www.skepticalscience.com/.

I know that you and I have discussed in the past what I view as the ever more apparent failure of climate computer models to predict future patterns. You have more direct experience of modelling than I and, perhaps as a consequence, defend the modellers against attack. I respect your position on this, however, I disagree pointing to the gross failures of prediction. We have not reached a consensus on this and, on a much larger scale, I believe that there is not a consensus on both the existence and extent of AGW.

Unfortunately, I rather doubt that you actually followed the link I gave. Hence, to use smeck’s line of argument, you are in danger not just in having a belief in AGW, but a faith in that presented paradigm, which brooks no other point of view.

@Al Swearengen
‘’While I believe that you mean well, fulhamish, to instigate inquiry along these lines is certainly trollish.

Many of our forum readers are young and impressionable and so it's important for them to understand that climate change deniers should be comfortably classified along with holocaust deniers and the people who deny that Obama is a US Citizen.’’

Al thank you for your response, but I am afraid that I couldn’t disagree more. If I were a teacher of a 14, 15, 16….year old and they came to me with a well-reasoned article (rather than, for example, some extract from the popular press) which challenged the accepted view of any scientific matter, I would embrace and encourage that exciting development of critical thought. The teacher might well have a very good budding scientist on their hands. I suspect that, if we are lucky, we can all remember teachers such as that.

Hmm... I had originally interpreted as sarcastic:

"climate change deniers should be comfortably classified along with holocaust deniers and the people who deny that Obama is a US Citizen"

But I guess it is an example of the "orthodoxy" I'm worried about.

One reason this sort of thing bothers me is because doubting one scientific consensus or another is often how science progresses. Although the doubters are *usually* wrong, pronouncements of anathema against dissenters is taking things to far.

I 100% agree with what the climate-change consensus recommends (on national security grounds as well, we should be efficient with our limited resources), but the way it's being put across bugs me.

Tendmote, I am sure that you are aware, but T.Kuhn is very good on this behaviour. And if you want a perfect example of the ''faith'' displayed by those who proclaim their consensus on this matter look no further that those climategate emails.

I fully agree with you, by the way, on renewable energy and the need to conserve/secure our necassarily finite resources.

op, are you arguing that man-made climate change isn't happening, or that there isn't a consensus on it?

because one of these is ridiculous, and one of these is just plain wrong.

To add some color to the discussion, there's also this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_drop_experiment#Millikan.27s_experiment_as_an_example_of_psychological_effects_in_scientific_methodology

In 1909 there was a math mistake that caused the originally accepted charge of the electron to be incorrect. When the experiment was repeated by others, their results continued to cluster around this incorrect value, only slowly moving toward the true value, because they accepted evidence that supported the accepted value and discarded evidence that didn't.

"When they got a number that was too high above Millikan's, they thought something must be wrong—and they would look for and find a reason why something might be wrong. When they got a number close to Millikan's value they didn't look so hard."

Also in the original Milikan's oil drop experiment data, values were excluded from the data that indicated a fractional charge.

I can't remember the name, but in solid state physics for years a wrong theory produced the correct results because the error was canceled out in the calculations.

How much does the fossil fuel industry pay Fulhamish to post this drivel? Is that why he won't reveal what he does for a living?

I agree we should engage this type of OP in exactly the same manner of respectful and considerate dialogue that it deserves. Therefore, allow me to begin by saying:

Fulhamish, you are an idiot and I would advise you to eternally shut your stupid pie-hole, except for the fact that with krellin gone, you are providing valuable comic relief.