One thing you can be certain of in the realm of the corporo-media: if their economic interests can find a useful idiot (never mind he's a Nobel-winning physicist) they will exploit and use him for their agnotology on climate science. (Recall again, agnotology, defined by Stanford Univ. historian of science Robert Proctor, refers to the trend of skeptic science sown for political or economic ends - e.g. in imparting ignorance and faux skepticism, to undermine a scientific consensus which can have dispositive economic repercussions).
The latest person to fit the bill is Nobel Winner Ivar Giaever, who the Wall Street Journal's op ed yesterday ('High School Physics') fairly gushed over as the latest "dissenter" to break from the anthropogenic global warming consensus. To try and ratchet up gravitas for Giaever, the WSJ noted he was an American Physical Society fellow - an "honor bestowed on only one half of one percent" - and that of course also discloses the APS is perhaps the premier professional physics society in the world.
But Giaever resigned the APS in "protest over the group's insistence that evidence of man made global warming is incontrovertible"
Never mind that, 99% of the Society's 30,000 odd members agree that it is, and in particular that critical fraction who happen to be specialists in the field of climate and atmospheric physics - which alas, Mr. Giaever is not. (Giaever won his Nobel in 1973 for work on quantum tunneling with Brian Josephson of "Josephson Junction" fame).
What is sad, apart from this formerly great physicist speaking out on a specialty for which he isn't qualified to offer any serious opinions (any more than Harvard's Prof. Daniel Shrag - former Director of the Laboratory for Geochemical Oceanography - would on quantum tunneling) is how he's merely the most recent in a sad line of physicists or chemists who've become doddering fools in their elder years. Maybe what drives them is a pathetic need to be heard in some small forum, though most people have long since forgotten them or their contributions. Recent examples also include Edward Teller, 'Father of the H-Bomb', who also extrapolated his opinions to climatology where they don't belong (a skeptic, of course), as well as Linus Pauling, Nobel -winning chemist who then went off half-cocked into promotions of "megadose" Vitamin C - wasting decades of his life in that aimless pursuit, and who can forget the great Freeman Dyson -who also fell prey to this skeptic trap, hook, line and sinker, despite that fact that he's never published a climate science paper in a refereed journal in his life.
What this shows, I believe, is also that as a venerable scientist ages, his opinions and views are to be less and less trusted unless he remains in contact with his profession, and particularly provided he reads widely in the physics areas for which he seeks to offer his opinions. Perhaps the best heads up ever offered was by Giaever himself, in his own words: "I am Norwegian, should I really worry about a little bit of warming? I am unfortunately becoming an old man" Yes, and maybe that's your problem!
In the case of Giaever, it's really sad to see the sort of codswallop he's spieled off in the wake of his APS resignation, such as:
"The claim (how can you measure the average temperature of the whole earth for a whole year?) is that the temperature has changed from ~288.0 to ~288.8 degree Kelvin in about 150 years, which (if true) means to me is that the temperature has been amazingly stable, and both human health and happiness have definitely improved in this 'warming' period."
But evidently this mighty Nobel physics scholar hasn't been reading the many recent papers in EOS Transactions of the American Geophysical Society, which show just how radically that "small difference" in temperature has altered the Earth's Arctic ice thickness suggesting major changes for the heating balance. (E.g. Vol. 92, No. 33, 8-16-11, 'Rising Sea Level May Cause Decline of Fringing Coral Reefs'; 'Record Summer Melt in Greenland', (see also attached image showing the cause due to imbalance in incoming solar radiation trapped v. re-reflection), and Vol. 92, No. 18, 5-3-11, 'Carbon Sequestration and Its Role in the Global Carbon Cycle', p. 156).
The last paper is particularly crucial in grasping the role of the accelerated uptake of CO2 (and its relation to the Keeling Curve, Fig. 2) in driving anthropogenic forcing. The most recent data disclose the forcing is even having adverse effects in the oceans, resulting in a 32% higher acidity since the dawn of the Industrial Age because of increased 'spillover' absorption of CO2, resulting in the formation of carbonic acid (H2CO3).
My point? Unless one grasps these issues, his opinions aren't worth a warm ounce of doggie lickspittle, I don't give a damn how many Nobel Prizes the guy has, or medals, or Presidential awards. He's talking bare, unadorned trash. If he can't define the Keeling curve or relate it to CO2 and the anthropogenic forcing process, he doesn't know diddly or squat and has no business pontificating on the theory of anthropogenic global warming. Ditto, if he can't parse or explain the role of albedo and ice reflection (in Arctic regions) in terms of manifesting sea level rise. You don't get to spout off on any area merely because you have some special prize in ONE area! (Not unless you read and research the work!)
But what do we find? All these so called academic renegades simply spouting their anti-man-made warming bullshit as if their past laurels and prizes provide them a license to be taken seriously. They do not. Even Giaever's last remark in passing is totally daft, as he lamely asserts:
The latest person to fit the bill is Nobel Winner Ivar Giaever, who the Wall Street Journal's op ed yesterday ('High School Physics') fairly gushed over as the latest "dissenter" to break from the anthropogenic global warming consensus. To try and ratchet up gravitas for Giaever, the WSJ noted he was an American Physical Society fellow - an "honor bestowed on only one half of one percent" - and that of course also discloses the APS is perhaps the premier professional physics society in the world.
But Giaever resigned the APS in "protest over the group's insistence that evidence of man made global warming is incontrovertible"
Never mind that, 99% of the Society's 30,000 odd members agree that it is, and in particular that critical fraction who happen to be specialists in the field of climate and atmospheric physics - which alas, Mr. Giaever is not. (Giaever won his Nobel in 1973 for work on quantum tunneling with Brian Josephson of "Josephson Junction" fame).
What is sad, apart from this formerly great physicist speaking out on a specialty for which he isn't qualified to offer any serious opinions (any more than Harvard's Prof. Daniel Shrag - former Director of the Laboratory for Geochemical Oceanography - would on quantum tunneling) is how he's merely the most recent in a sad line of physicists or chemists who've become doddering fools in their elder years. Maybe what drives them is a pathetic need to be heard in some small forum, though most people have long since forgotten them or their contributions. Recent examples also include Edward Teller, 'Father of the H-Bomb', who also extrapolated his opinions to climatology where they don't belong (a skeptic, of course), as well as Linus Pauling, Nobel -winning chemist who then went off half-cocked into promotions of "megadose" Vitamin C - wasting decades of his life in that aimless pursuit, and who can forget the great Freeman Dyson -who also fell prey to this skeptic trap, hook, line and sinker, despite that fact that he's never published a climate science paper in a refereed journal in his life.
What this shows, I believe, is also that as a venerable scientist ages, his opinions and views are to be less and less trusted unless he remains in contact with his profession, and particularly provided he reads widely in the physics areas for which he seeks to offer his opinions. Perhaps the best heads up ever offered was by Giaever himself, in his own words: "I am Norwegian, should I really worry about a little bit of warming? I am unfortunately becoming an old man" Yes, and maybe that's your problem!
In the case of Giaever, it's really sad to see the sort of codswallop he's spieled off in the wake of his APS resignation, such as:
"The claim (how can you measure the average temperature of the whole earth for a whole year?) is that the temperature has changed from ~288.0 to ~288.8 degree Kelvin in about 150 years, which (if true) means to me is that the temperature has been amazingly stable, and both human health and happiness have definitely improved in this 'warming' period."
But evidently this mighty Nobel physics scholar hasn't been reading the many recent papers in EOS Transactions of the American Geophysical Society, which show just how radically that "small difference" in temperature has altered the Earth's Arctic ice thickness suggesting major changes for the heating balance. (E.g. Vol. 92, No. 33, 8-16-11, 'Rising Sea Level May Cause Decline of Fringing Coral Reefs'; 'Record Summer Melt in Greenland', (see also attached image showing the cause due to imbalance in incoming solar radiation trapped v. re-reflection), and Vol. 92, No. 18, 5-3-11, 'Carbon Sequestration and Its Role in the Global Carbon Cycle', p. 156).
The last paper is particularly crucial in grasping the role of the accelerated uptake of CO2 (and its relation to the Keeling Curve, Fig. 2) in driving anthropogenic forcing. The most recent data disclose the forcing is even having adverse effects in the oceans, resulting in a 32% higher acidity since the dawn of the Industrial Age because of increased 'spillover' absorption of CO2, resulting in the formation of carbonic acid (H2CO3).
My point? Unless one grasps these issues, his opinions aren't worth a warm ounce of doggie lickspittle, I don't give a damn how many Nobel Prizes the guy has, or medals, or Presidential awards. He's talking bare, unadorned trash. If he can't define the Keeling curve or relate it to CO2 and the anthropogenic forcing process, he doesn't know diddly or squat and has no business pontificating on the theory of anthropogenic global warming. Ditto, if he can't parse or explain the role of albedo and ice reflection (in Arctic regions) in terms of manifesting sea level rise. You don't get to spout off on any area merely because you have some special prize in ONE area! (Not unless you read and research the work!)
But what do we find? All these so called academic renegades simply spouting their anti-man-made warming bullshit as if their past laurels and prizes provide them a license to be taken seriously. They do not. Even Giaever's last remark in passing is totally daft, as he lamely asserts:
"In the APS, it is ok to discuss whether the mass of the proton changes over time and how a multi-universe behaves, but the evidence of global warming is incontrovertible"
Mixing up two distinct domains of research, one in which hard data has been brought to bear (changing proton mass) and the other woefully speculative (multiverse). But in any case, no one is disputing the "right to discuss" anything as a member of the APS. Where the line must be drawn is where scientists with some measure of gravitas in the public eye offer disparaging opinions on a field for which they lack any qualifications, and thereby delay needed action to prevent the catastrophic changes in climate we know are coming. (This past summer's record breaking heat wave is merely a mild foretaste!)
They also provide cover to the whole Denier Brigade for which the main exponents include the reactionary financial press, and assorted underling and lackeys - specifically economic charlatans who've no other function in this world than to demand their dubious theories take precedence over human survival. Once more, the Journal's explanation that:
"Our point is that not all these men (naming several others with Giaever, including Norman Borlaug and Robert B. Loughlin) agree on climate change, much less mankind's contribution to it"
Is amiss. It isn't that these scientists don't agree on climate change, but rather that these non-specialists (mainly) don't agree with the majority, which means we can take their opinions as having as much credibility as mine regarding genetic splicing techniques to form hybridomas. Once more, in their analysis of the extent of scientific consensus on global warming (Eos Transactions, Vol. 90, No. 3, p. 22) , P. T. Doran and M. Kendall-Zimmerman found that (p. 24)
“the debate on the authenticity of global warming and the role played by human activity is largely non-existent among those who understand the nuances and scientific basis of long-term climate processes.”
In their analytic survey for which 3146 climate and Earth scientists responded, a full 96.2% of specialists concurred temperatures have steadily risen and there is no evidence for cooling. Meanwhile, 97.4% concur there is a definite role of humans in global climate change.
The authors conclude (p. 24) :
“The challenge appears to be how to effectively communicate this fact (non-existent debate among real climate specialists) to policy makers and a public that continues to mistakenly perceive debate exists among scientists”
It would appear we also need to find a way to communicate this fact to a clueless but annoying gaggle of "skeptic" scientists who are not members of the climate science specialty, but who feel entitled to spout off about global warming merely because they possess a Nobel Prize, or have a few extra letters behind their names!
They also provide cover to the whole Denier Brigade for which the main exponents include the reactionary financial press, and assorted underling and lackeys - specifically economic charlatans who've no other function in this world than to demand their dubious theories take precedence over human survival. Once more, the Journal's explanation that:
"Our point is that not all these men (naming several others with Giaever, including Norman Borlaug and Robert B. Loughlin) agree on climate change, much less mankind's contribution to it"
Is amiss. It isn't that these scientists don't agree on climate change, but rather that these non-specialists (mainly) don't agree with the majority, which means we can take their opinions as having as much credibility as mine regarding genetic splicing techniques to form hybridomas. Once more, in their analysis of the extent of scientific consensus on global warming (Eos Transactions, Vol. 90, No. 3, p. 22) , P. T. Doran and M. Kendall-Zimmerman found that (p. 24)
“the debate on the authenticity of global warming and the role played by human activity is largely non-existent among those who understand the nuances and scientific basis of long-term climate processes.”
In their analytic survey for which 3146 climate and Earth scientists responded, a full 96.2% of specialists concurred temperatures have steadily risen and there is no evidence for cooling. Meanwhile, 97.4% concur there is a definite role of humans in global climate change.
The authors conclude (p. 24) :
“The challenge appears to be how to effectively communicate this fact (non-existent debate among real climate specialists) to policy makers and a public that continues to mistakenly perceive debate exists among scientists”
It would appear we also need to find a way to communicate this fact to a clueless but annoying gaggle of "skeptic" scientists who are not members of the climate science specialty, but who feel entitled to spout off about global warming merely because they possess a Nobel Prize, or have a few extra letters behind their names!
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