Stereotyping is easy. One can predict people’s worldviews and policy positions based on their social and political identities. That generally holds true for people’s views about climate change and climate and energy policy—among the hottest issues in the world today.Yet some people prioritize the pursuit of truth over how they wish things were. Two in particular have been bold in the face of mass “group think” on climate change and renewable technology. Besides voicing their opinions, they have … [Read more...]
Some Tricks Climate Alarmists Play
When empirical data show so clearly that computer climate models grossly exaggerate the warming effect of carbon dioxide, how do climate alarmists maintain public alarm?Tricks.Among the more famous was “Mike’s Nature trick.” University of East Anglia climate scientist Phil Jones wrote that he had used “Mike’s Nature trick” of “adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie [sic] from 1981 onwards) amd [sic] for Keith's to hide the decline" [emphasis added].The result hid a … [Read more...]
Can Government Agencies Protect Us from Lying Scientists and Sycophantic Media?
Newspapers, politicians and pressure groups have been moving smoothly for decades from one forecast apocalypse to another (nuclear power, acid rain, the ozone layer, mad cow disease, nanotechnology, genetically modified crops, the millennium bug…) without waiting to be proved right or wrong.So wrote Matt Ridley at the start of "Lying with science: a guide to myth debunking," in The Spectator back in March.Well, not quite the start. He actually began with a famous quote from H.L. Mencken:The … [Read more...]
Wind and Solar Energy—Never Meant to Work?
What would you think if someone told you that one of the most important early champions of wind power touted it precisely because he thought it couldn't work for advanced, industrialized societies?"Aww, can't be true"?Well, it can be, and it is.In "The Question Concerning Technology" (1954), Martin Heidegger---one of the twentieth century's most influential philosophers, argued that "modern technology ... puts to nature the unreasonable demand that it supply energy which can be extracted and … [Read more...]
How the Wind Industry Gains by Losing
So you want to make a profit by selling what you produce. What do you do? Sell it for more than it costs you.But that's so old fashioned!Nowadays, you just get into the wind industry. You find state or local policymakers eager to virtue signal by supporting your renewable-, zero-carbon energy tech. And you get them to sign a contract that guarantees you get positive payment for your product even when its market price is negative.Rate- and taxpayers in Georgetown, TX, a small town outside the … [Read more...]
Does CO2 Control Temperature, or Vice Versa?
A Cornwall Alliance follower on Facebook wrote,I remember hearing someone reputable say once that the known historical record actually shows increases in CO2 after periods of warming, rather than before them. I believe might have been referencing ice core records among others. I found him persuasive, and if this is true, it seems it would be an important hurdle for climate change alarmists to get over. Agree/disagree, insight?Climatologist Dr. David Legates, a Cornwall Alliance Senior Fellow, … [Read more...]
If Global Warming Won’t Kill Us, Will Ocean Acidification?
As the stretch of years with no statistically significant global warming lengthens, environmentalists scratch their heads and ask, "Well, if we can't scare people with global warming, what can we use?"And one of their stock answers has become, "Ocean acidification!"Acid, you know? Nasty stuff! That's what very bad people throw in the faces of good people they don't like. It disfigures them for life. How terrible!Except, no. Really strong acids can do that. Battery acid, for instance. But blue … [Read more...]
Who Really Cares about the Environment?
A dozen years ago Arthur Brooks, now President of the American Enterprise Institute, shook the "Look at how much I care! I support government action for the poor!" crowd with his book Who Really Cares: America's Charity Divide--Who Gives, Who Doesn't, and Why It Matters.What he revealed, from painstaking statistical research, is that political liberals, who justify all kinds of government entitlement programs by saying that anyone who really cares about the poor should embrace them, give hardly … [Read more...]
Why Does Global Warming Happen at the Poles though Few People Live There?
Some people wonder, "Why is global warming happening down/up there at the poles if it is because of man? There aren't too many of people living there to cause any problem."Good, common-sense question. But there’s actually a solid answer to it that suits both alarmists and skeptics about anthropogenic global warming.Local anthropogenic warming, usually called “urban heat island effect” (UHI), is the localized warming stemming from increased absorption of incoming solar energy by blacktop, … [Read more...]
The World’s Gone Mad
I have little but respect and admiration for Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swede who has launched a worldwide movement of students on strike from school to protest anthropogenic climate change. I think she's mistaken, and I'm inclined to agree with British climate scientist Piers Corbyn that she's being manipulated, but she seems sincere in her beliefs, and she's acting on them. Lots of adults could take that lesson from her.But, despite her having been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, … [Read more...]
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