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Could there be a shallower intellect deployed in the field of public commentary than that regularly, and apparently without a hint of embarrassment, flaunted by Professor Peter van Onselen? I doubt it. Have a look at this weekend’s offering in The Australian. The columnist takes issue with the sane position regarding CO2 emission reductions: as we are responsible for only 1.3 per cent of global emissions, anything we do will be pointless:
Opponents of action on climate change have one simple argument they fall back on time and time again: what’s the point of Australia doing more to reduce its emissions when they account for less than 2 per cent of global emissions?
I’ve heard this trotted out in print, on television and on radio. And of course it gets endlessly echoed on social media, too. It really is the only argument for not doing more that opponents of climate change action have at their collective disposal. Other than denying the existence of the phenomenon in the first place.
I will return to the words I have underlined later. First, for a laugh, let us look at van Onselen’s logic:
If the rest of the world isn’t doing enough, why should we? It’s the argument of the sedentary couch potato. It genuinely baffles me anyone with the privilege of a public platform could use such flawed logic. Let’s test what life would be like if that approach were taken across the board.
There would be little point in individuals giving money to charity. Why donate $100 when that amount of money is no more than a tiny fraction of the millions received by an organisation? Much less than 2 per cent, in fact.
Why vote? One vote is so insignificant in a nation of millions. I’m sure such thinking contributed to, for example, plenty of anti-Trump Americans not bothering to vote at the 2016 presidential election. That didn’t have an impact.
The logic for inaction simply because as a nation our contribution is fractional really is weak.
What baffles me is why an organ as frequently sensible as The Australian would place column inches at the disposal of such flawed logic. A couple of points: people give to charity what they can afford in the belief that every little bit helps. They do not give to the extent that they can no longer pay their own bills. Now, back to the simple fact that our admissions in global terms are negligible to the point of irrelevance, which PvO dismisses thus
It really is the only argument for not doing more that opponents of climate change action have at their collective disposal. Other than denying the existence of the phenomenon in the first place.
Most people who deploy the ‘what’s the point’ argument do so because they do believe that catastrophic man-made warming is a scam or, at best, wildly overstated. It is rational scepticism that underpins their position, with the ‘what’s the point’ argument flowing from that and the fact that the rest of the world is largely doing nothing. Two of the three largest emitters — China and India — are massively increasing their emissions. There are, in fact, some on the side of the rational who do accept the theory of anthropogenic global warming — Bjorn Lomborg most notably — but believe there are better and more helpful ways to spend the money. In his parroting of warmist talking points Van Onselen totally ignores these views.
The voting analogy is even dumber. It costs nothing to vote.
Next we are treated to an old chestnut:
Given that Australia has one of the highest per capita emissions rates internationally only underlines the importance of the need for action to bring emissions down. Even if larger countries emit more. Even if developing nations use more dirty energy than we do.
Why does Australia’s high per capita rate of emissions underline “the importance of the need for action”? Our per capita rate is driven by our large land mass, small population and relative state of development. India, China and the Third World are working assiduously to get their own per capita rates i.e. standard of living, to our level. Once again, if you don’t accept the ‘science’, why accept this argument?
Now to the bushfires:
In the context of Australia’s bushfires and drought, I’ve heard the same commentators who wheel out the defence of inaction also mock the notion that climate change has a role to play. They refer to Australia’s history of droughts and fires. They point out the fires have been started by arsonists and lightning strikes.
You will note that PvO conveniently neglects to mention the real villain in this melodrama – accumulated fuel loads. We then get a discourse on listening to the experts regarding longer and more severe droughts, longer and earlier bushfire seasons, for all of which there are legitimate counter-arguments, such as the fact acknowledged by the IPCC that, globally, the land area affected by bushfires has been decreasing. Indeed, when it comes to recounting Australia’s fire history, PvO’s favoured sources are often just plain wrong.
Now we get the argumentum ad verecundium:
It’s populism gone mad. You wouldn’t challenge your doctor who uses their expertise to cut out your cancer. Or question the pharmacologist who has calibrated the medicine you rely on to treat a serious illness. Certainly not when there is an overwhelming consensus in their fields about the issue at hand, as there is among scientists on climate change.
Last year I had my appendix removed. Six months later I was rushed to hospital with a burst appendix, which must not have been entirely removed. Some months ago, a young boy died because his mother was told, repeatedly, that his stomach pains ware gastric problems. Burst appendix again. So don’t tell me about the infallibility of doctors. Yes, I understand PvO is referring to the science, not its imperfect practitioners. But modern medicine is a considerably more advanced and rigorous discipline than ‘climate science’, as Climategate so spectacularly revealed. Noble cause corruption and rent-seeking pervade this bastard field of endeavour.
Finally, PvO can’t resist a swipe at Scott Morrison. He concedes the Prime Minister was within his rights to take a holiday but calls out his ‘hypocrisy’ in criticizing former Victorian Police Commissioner Christine Nixon for her alleged dereliction of duty during the Black Saturday fires:
Anthony Albanese chose not to criticise the Prime Minister for the timing of his holiday, which is more understanding than Morrison showed then Victorian Police Commissioner Christine Nixon back in 2010 when she merely went out to dinner during the Black Saturday bushfires.
It’s not quite the same situation, PvO. Ms Nixon didn’t just go out to dinner. She had a hair appointment in the morning, a meeting with her biographer in the afternoon and then dined at a gastro pub in the evening. A rather relaxed day, it seems to me. Asked during the royal commission that followed why her phone records show she neither received nor made any calls during the course of that three-hour meal, Ms Nixon denied turning off her phone; we must accept her at her word. But unlike the PM, she was directly in command of Victoria’s emergency response. She had a gazetted role in decision-making and overseeing the decisions of her subordinates. As bushfires are a state responsibility, Morrison had no official role whatsoever. As he admitted on Sunday morning (Dec 22) after returning from Hawaii, he now regrets leaving Australia. “Australians are fair-minded and understand that when you make a promise to your kids you try and keep it,” he said. “But as prime minister, you have other responsibilities, and I accept that and I accept the criticism.”
I know The Australian strives to achieve balance, but is PvO the most cogent voice the Left has to offer?
>”Why does Australia’s high per capita rate of emissions underline “the importance of the need for action”? ”
Just a reiteration of the now-standard guilt trip … selfish sinners blah blah.
Oncealot is vanity personified.
And no doubt he does his level best to indoctrinate his poor students at his university. They should ask for their money back.
I’m inclined to think the ‘too small to matter’ argument is the worst argument against destroying civilisation in a futile attempt to stop the climate changing. But that is because I think there are so many better arguments.
What is it with Professors? We have Flannery, a Professor of biology who still cannot work out that carbon dioxide is not a poison but is actually essential for carbon-based life forms,. We have the much acclaimed Professor Pascoe, who sees farmers and foresters everywhere he looks, but can’t even work out a family tree. But Van Onselen is something special. A Professor of Politics who, as far as I’m aware, has failed to predict a single election outcome since being elevated – and still has no idea and no apparent interest in understanding why. A Professor who cannot learn from his failures sounds like the ideal person to employ at the very pinnacle of the education system in any elite university – apparently. People wonder why our education system is going backwards when our elite universities employ those who can’t even get their own specialities right, and can’t learn from their mistakes. They then reward with degrees, those people who can best parrot the short-comings of their lecturers. These are the graduates who then go on to schools to teach a new round of students on how to parrot their teachers’ misunderstandings. As a Professor, Van Onselen has never had his opinions challenged – and it shows in his work.
Ever thought that this particular newspaper prints this crap to goad otherwise sane people into a response? Maybe van Onselen’s remuneration is in inverse proportion to the number of comments agreeing with his position. I used to subscribe to the newspaper myself but stopped primarily because of this guy and a rather ugly woman who used to write about Tony Abbott a lot….. Vote with your wallets and maybe these people will disappear….
PVO is what used to be referred disparagingly an over-educated idiot. Not sure if the over-educated bit applies though in his case. These academics with their useless credentials, luxuriating in cozy sinecures, are amongst our most stupid citizens.
To extend Prof. van Onselen’s medical expert analogy a little, why would I seek the advice of an expert in gastroenterology for a sore foot? Therefore, why would I listen to the advice of an expert in political science (for did not the great man forecast with uncanny accuracy the result of the last election?) on a complex physico-geological issue with hundreds of variables?
To be fair, just because you are an expert in one field doesn’t mean you can’t be right in another. However, the article in question was such a litany of shockers, errors, misunderstandings and full scale pretzel logic, that it defied belief. I wrote several comments on the column, the main one rejecting the entire premise of the article, a secondary one querying why every leftist article parrots the line that “Australia is doing nothing” whereas it is an undeniable fact that we ARE doing something, albeit ineffectual. If you can’t get that right, how can anything else you write be trusted?
“Professor, it may interest you to know that the US National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) has been tracking the number and total acreage burnt of US (Australian data are not nearly so comprehensive over a long period like this) fires since 1926 (link here https://www.nifc.gov/fireInfo/fireInfo_stats_totalFires.html ). The number of fires as well as the total acreage burnt were far higher prior to 1955, peaking (surprise) in the 1930s at FIVE TIMES current values. Fires reached a low in the 70s and 80s, which, coincidentally, is when activists begin their comparisons. This study can be added to a recent NASA (yes, Professor, NASA) report showing a global DECREASE in total area burnt by wildfires of 25% over the last 20y. Australia’s bad bushfire season this year is a local, not a global, issue. Perhaps you could examine these studies and report back next year.”
What astonishes me continually is the high degree of self-worth the far-righteous left attaches to itself. Time after time, the left releases articles that purport to slam-dunk an issue in their favour with unassailable evidence and logic, yet unfailingly reveal an infantile outlook with no command of the issue or its background whatsoever. From climate science, transitioning the economy from fossil fuels to better alternatives, immigration, racial politics, and many more, leftist arguments prove over and over that the phrase “leftist intellectual” is an oxymoron. My theory is that, once they finally do understand an issue, they slap their forehead, shake their head in wonder at their former ignorance, and move to the right.
If Australia produces ~1.5% of the whole Earth’s annual increment of greenhouse gases, then common standards of justice (the pub test) would cause most to conclude that this makes Australia liable for ~1.5% of the GLOBAL solution.
John Howard led the charge in dismissing the ~1.5% of GHG emission as so trivial as to be not worth bothering about, and he has numerous followers in that position. But is Australia is responsible for ~1.5% of the GLOBAL solution, that is not trivial at all.
The scientific consensus does not support the denialist position. But just as people are prone to go from doctor to doctor until they find one who tells them what they want to hear, so great emphasis is given by climate denialists to non-mainstream mavericks like Judith Curry and the ‘Climategate’ beat-up in preference to the scientific mainstream, which includes 198 scientific organisations world-wide, including the CSIRO, the Royal Society and the AAAS.
People tend to listen to those who tell them what they want to hear.
In fairness, Ian MacD, I would have to say, in my humble opinion, the sentiments contained in your ultimate sentence are glaringly applicable to you in all your posts, including this one.
Global warming theory is fundamentally flawed for two reasons:-
[1] CO2 is a really weak warmer
it took 13% CO2 to only just manage to melt snowball Earth
so global warmers use fudge factors with no scientific basis
[2] Earth solved its climate problems 3 billion years ago when it invented RUBISCO
RUBISCO turned 99.9995% of all the CO2 on Earth into all the oxygen and sugar on Earth
Venus, without RUBISCO, still has 200,000 times as much CO2 as Earth and runs @ 400 Celsius
RUBISCO is tuned to 0.5% CO2
This critical kinetic parameter is its Michaelis constant where it runs @ half maximum speed.
Inteligent humans [Americans, Chinese and Indians] are working on getting CO2 up to normal = 0.5%.
This is twelve times the present starvation level of 0.04%.
Only dictatorial fools are trying to make poor people get CO2 down
Anyone who really wants to lower CO2 should stop preaching and join the Amish.
Peter Sandery,
I simply go by mainstream science. It is possible for the mainstream to be wrong, and for one or more lone luminaries to be right (eg Lavoisier; the classic and textbook example..) If that happens, the maverick leads the whole scientific community into a new paradigm.
But I cannot see that happening in this case. RUBISCO or no RUBISCO.
(Sorry, TBL.)
I have set out solid mainstream science. I have done postdoctoral work in enzyme kinetics, as well as protein sequencing and structure. I supervised a number of PhDs, all externally examined. I trained at the jet school in Dallas Texas and ran my own airline for 25 years; I have a deep practical understanding of atmospheric physics. I invite any “climate scientist” whatsoever to critique my simple summary of planetary climate set out above. It is possible that I am in error. But I am a biologist who did actually get lucky, and fluke the Scientific Breakthrough of the Year for 1996.
Dr Lynch–you might enjoy: https://edberry.com/
“Most people who deploy the ‘what’s the point’ argument do so because they do believe that catastrophic man-made warming is a scam or, at best, wildly overstated.”
Indeed. Consider, for example, this recent paper from the climate modeller community:The scientific challenge of understanding and estimating climate change. Tim Palmera and Bjorn Stevensb. October 21, 2019
“……for many key applications that require regional climate model output or for assessing large-scale changes from small-scale processes, we believe that the current generation of models is not fit for purpose .”
“By downplaying the potential significance that model inadequacies have on our ability to provide reliable estimates of climate change, including of course in terms of extremes of weather and climate, we leave policy makers (and indeed, the public in general) ignorant of the extraordinary challenge it is to provide a sharper and more physically well-grounded picture of climate change, essentially depriving them of the choice to do something about it.
What is needed is the urgency of the space race aimed, not at the Moon or Mars, but rather toward harnessing the promise of exascale supercomputing to reliably simulate Earth’s regional climate (and associated extremes) globally.”
Which means, presumably, that despite decades of modelling and billions spent already, there remain significant “modelling inadequacies”.
All they want for Christmas is a few “exascale supercomputers”.
One doesn’t donate (reduce emissions) to a charity to which those who should be donating (the big emitters) do not donate and in fact rob the charity (increase emissions)!
The problem of ‘global warming’ is a volumetric one not a per capita index one. Commonsense tells me that China, which produces 30 times the amount of CO2 Australia does, affects warming significantly more than Australia does.
Common sense, and 80 years experience, tells me that bulls*** baffles brains. I was raised on a western NSW farm, trained as an air traffic controller (with some basic met training) and lived and worked for years in places as climatically diverse (love that word!) as coastal Victoria, temperate and tropical Australia, Papua New Guinea and South East Asia. Thus, I have considerable experience in weather-sensitive activity in a wide range of climates.
The bottom line for me is that, outside very debatable, if not entirely suspect, self-interested “scientific” activity, nothing has changed to any noticeable extent in at least the last 70 years of my life.
TBL:
Can you cite independent scientific support for that claim of yours?
IMD: I give it to you gratis for your PhD project. You can be the new Michaelis/Lavoisier.
IainC:
You will need to gather some empirical evidence to support this theory (eg. Mr Mark Latham), and deal with what I consider to be a larger body of empirical evidence contra the theory (eg. Mr Paul Keating).
TBL:
So can I assume that your comment above: “Global warming theory is fundamentally flawed for two reasons… ” (etc) has come straight off the top of your own head, and has no independent scientific support..?
Yes, or no?
IAN PLIMER The Australian NOVEMBER 22, 2019
As soon as the words carbon footprint, emissions, pollution,
and decarbonisation, climate emergency, extreme weather, unprecedented and extinction are used, I know I am being conned by ignorant activists, populist scaremongering, vote-chasing politicians and rent seekers.”
“It has never been shown that human emissions of carbon dioxide drive global warming.
Climate models have been around 30 years. They have all failed. Balloon and satellite
measurements show a disconnect from climate model predictions. If they have failed
across the past 30 years when we can compare models with measurements, there is
little chance that the climate projections across the next 50 years will be more
successful. Modellers assume carbon dioxide drives climate change. It does not. The
role of the sun and clouds was not considered important by modellers. They are the
major drivers for the climate on our planet.”
The oldest wisdom in life is this: FOLLOW THE MONEY !!!
As soon as everybody is convinced that man-made global warming is an emergency, politicians can introduce more taxes. Nobody would disagree. Look no further than smoking: to this day no study has ever shown that smoking kills and yet everybody believes it does. However, it’s not based in fact. Scott Morrison is one of the worse offenders: he increased tobacco taxes like no other when he was treasurer. His argument? He wanted to save lives. The truth is that the Australian Government collects $15b in tobacco taxes this year alone. Without it, there would be a budget deficit. The lesson must be: always be critical of anyone including scientists and doctors.
The trollster says he goes by mainstream science, yet dismisses temperature data. Plainly silly.
He constantly uses the “consensus” line but fails persistently to define it with any precision. He constantly uses variations of “denier” but fails persistently to define this with any honesty. Plainly and deliberately dishonest.
Any scientist of repute who points out the voluminous holes in the AGW *hypothesis* he labels a maverick by simple assertion, sans evidence. Plainly scientifically illiterate.
He asserts that Australian emissions (presumably he means CO2, but perhaps not) are significant, yet ignores the Chief Scientist’s evidentiary comment that they are not. Plainly pompous.
He persistently maintains the “World’s Scientific Organisations” mantra without acknowledging that all of these statements are made by activists within the various Executives – that is, deliberately without polling the membership – so the views of the memberships are not known. Plainly obtuse.
Oncealot or the trollster ? Oh dear …
Neither of them will provide anything but mean-faced rhetoric.
Ianl, this is the distinguishing trait, and the almost invariably successful tactic, of the radical left: incessant obfuscation. Absolutely irrefutable evidence of the existence and precise cause and effects of “climate change” née “global warming” and their illegitimate offspring “climate emergency”, etc, etc, ad nauseam could be published tomorrow. However, unless it is given the nihil obstat of the IPCC it will be a dead letter. However, nothing other than predictions of impending disaster will ever receive the IPCC’s endorsement because, like its parent, the UN, and all its siblings, it is totally corrupt and beyond reform, and they have too much to lose.
Whatever evidence is found to negate the current myth, the left will continue to spout its nonsense, and all the gravy train passengers and their beneficiaries will go on and on incessantly until normal people tire of the fight and surrender.
IanMac is a classic example of the type. He will never quit, so we should take en passant’s advice and ignore him.
Alistair–Flannery is a zoologist. Carbon dioxide in many, many times atmospheric quantities is poisonous to animal life (but even the warmists don’t talk about us getting to that point). He just doesn’t need to know that it’s necessary to the plants on which the animals, directly or indirectly, feed.
DT
http://joannenova.com.au/2019/08/prof-andy-pitman-admits-droughts-are-not-worse-and-not-linked-to-climate-change/
Just to head the whining off at the pass. I haven’t personally seen the ABC’s reaction to this (pointless watching), but I’ve read of it and can believe the absolute horror for them of having to report that drought is not caused by AGW. Yeek and begorrah …
For the most part, I’ve followed my own advice and ignored the trollster. Occasionally though, his egregious dishonesty needs lacerating.
Ianl (or whatever your real name is, and wherever you are skulking):
“The trollster [by which I assume you refer to me] says he goes by mainstream science, yet dismisses temperature data. Plainly silly.”
And a merry Christmas to you, too.
My long-since-declared assumption has been simple: as long as there is ice at both poles, on the Himalayas and other high mountain ranges, thermometry will yield nothing reliable. Temperatures will appear to be stable, and AGW denialists like yourself will take comfort and claim victory (in between heaping abuse on all who care to argue against them) and go on contradicting the mainstream science and the AGW hypothesis to their hearts’ content.
There is only to my knowledge one reliable indicator of global warming, and that is sea-level rise, which satellite altimetry, using the geographic centre of the Earth as its reference point, puts at 3.3 ± 0.4 mm/yr (CSIRO). http://sealevel.colorado.edu/
Others are:
CU: 3.3 ± 0.4 mm/yr
AVISO: 3.3 ± 0.6 mm/yr
CSIRO: 3.3 ± 0.4 mm/yr
NASA GSFC: 3.2 ± 0.4 mm/yr
NOAA: 3.2 ± 0.4 mm/yr (w/ GIA)
Sea-level rise is due to Antarctic, Greenland and alpine ice melt, thermal expansion of sea-water, or both.
“He persistently maintains the ‘World’s Scientific Organisations’ mantra without acknowledging that all of these statements are made by activists within the various Executives – that is, deliberately without polling the membership – so the views of the memberships are not known.”
As I have pointed out before, this is the mother of all conspiracy theories, and all it would take would be for one of the ‘activists’ responsible to blow the whistle on the whole alleged ‘scam’ to bring it all crashing down. Said renegade ‘activist’ would be able to dine out on this great and heroic act for the rest of his/her days, and be in line for awards and gongs galore; perhaps even a Nobel. Not only that, but take a bath whenever he/she chose in French champagne.
Yet not one of them has done so. ‘Climategate’ was a pathetic beat-up and the main opposition to the AGW hypothesis comes from various identities in the mining industry, beside whose mining fortunes the ‘research grants’ to climatologists (who overwhelmingly support AGW) and about which they so often howl are not even loose change.
TBL: “Global warming theory is fundamentally flawed for two reasons:-
[1] CO2 is a really weak warmer… [etc]
… Inteligent humans [sic]… are working on getting CO2 up to normal = 0.5%.
This is twelve times the present starvation level of 0.04%.”
I hate to have to be the one who points this out to you, but on your own terms, this sort of thing is a sentence of doom for humanity.
From Wikipedia (and a host of other sources should you prefer):
“[CO2] concentration has increased by more than 45% since the start of the Industrial Revolution, from 280 ppm during the 10,000 years up to the mid-18th century to 415 ppm as of May 2019. The present concentration is the highest for 14 million years. ”
In other words ‘normal’ is 280 ppm, and as atmospheric CO2 concentration is the limiting factor on plant growth, that atmospheric CO2 will simply get drawn down by vegetation to that level, no matter how earnestly people try to push it up. This may result in a more forested etc world, or in seaweed-infested oceans, or something else entirely. The atmosphere-biosphere-cryosphere-hydrosphere-lithosphere assemblage is the most complex system we know about in the entire Universe, and as such, highly if not totally unpredictable.
In other words, we are running an uncontrolled experiment on the only planet we have, and the fossil-carbon interests in position to call political shots are whistling in the dark. Your theory that Venus is hot, not because of CO2 absorption of radiant solar heat, but because of what amounts to gravitational collapse, actually revives the pre-Einsteinian theory of what makes the Sun shine, and properly belongs in The Museum of Antique Theories.
All the same, Merry Christmas.
Trollster – the pompous one
>”Your theory that Venus is hot, not because of CO2 absorption of radiant solar heat, but because of what amounts to gravitational collapse, actually revives the pre-Einsteinian theory of what makes the Sun shine, and properly belongs in The Museum of Antique Theories.” [your quote]
Just another of your ignorant straw men. I’ve not put that idiocy up (I could not, it’s just too silly) – that’s all yours. Such silly egregious stuff you pretend to know.
There are many climate indices. Minor and unthreatening sea level rise is one, with about an inch (30mm will do) per decade since reliable enough measurements began in the mid-1800’s. Not AGW, just natural climate change.
The southern “polar” ice (your inaccurate term) covers a continent larger than Australia with a mean thickness of over 1km and reaching over 4km depth for much of its’ area. Temperature range is -60C in winter to -20C in summer. Tell us how that will melt 4km of ice … don’t be shy.
Ho hum … the remainder of trollster’s splutter is even sillier.
You’re more tolerant than I am. I read only just past the gratuitous “couch potato” insult to the charity donation nonsense and didn’t waste any more time. A better analogy would be: who in their right mind would give a donation to an organisation, knowing that none of it would go to the intended beneficiaries? Translated to the climate scenario, this goes: why would Australia make any economic donation to the AGW charity when a few large foreign powers make it worthless? For someone so vocal and egotistical about his command of logic, VO is remarkably bereft of it.
Great article. I think PVO is probably a Marxist and obviously has an axe to grind. As one of the token lefties at The Australian I grudgingly concede that his contribution is important for balance, but even more important in that writers like PVO are there to throw up these hairy chestnuts for discussion, even when the exposed as the emperor has no clothes.
Allan
Too many people continue to blame atmospheric carbon dioxide for global temperature changes. There is much evidence to question this belief. Until and unless the scientific adherents to this belief can refute or explain away the evidence and arguments presented in my paper on the subject, at: https://www.scribd.com/document/383385011/, then the “consensus” view continues to be merely an echo chamber of like-minded academics.