So maybe it's the Sun who is killing the Ice Caps?

[Bing o]

AshVX220 said:

Bing o said:

Far better to focus on adapting to changes in climate - what would you do if we had a supervolcano event in Yellowstone - hope a volcano tax will make the blizzards dissappear?

Your username is spot on!!
We have adapted for millenia to changes in climate, we'll continue to adapt as the climate changes in future.

Or die out as his millions of other species over the earth's history

Far better to concentrate on making sure that we have enough irrigation/flood defences and air conditioning/heating than some plant gas whimsy.

[Bing o]

Balmoral Green said:

The whole concept of 'fighting' climate change is very much a King Canute attitude, the only thing we can really do is move up the beach.

Ironic when you consider that this was the real motivation for his actions (and very prophetic):

"So spoke King Canute the Great, the legend says, seated on his throne on the seashore, waves lapping round his feet. Canute had learned that his flattering courtiers claimed he was "So great, he could command the tides of the sea to go back". Now Canute was not only a religious man, but also a clever politician. He knew his limitations - even if his courtiers did not - so he had his throne carried to the seashore and sat on it as the tide came in, commanding the waves to advance no further. When they didn't, he had made his point that, though the deeds of kings might appear 'great' in the minds of men, they were as nothing in the face of God's power."

[Parrot of Doom]

ludo said:

Parrot of Doom said:

ludo, questioning the quality of a source isn't in any way an ad hominem attack; it's an essential part of the argument.

No, go look up the definition of an ad-hominem. It means an attack on the source of an argument in place of an attack on the content of an argument.

Really. So when someone says that a blog is hardly likely to be the most reliable of sources, you'd consider that ad-hominem? Most people would actually agree that blogs are quite unreliable sources.

ludo said:

Parrot of Doom said:

If you wish to defend such sources, you could start by asking the following questions of it:

What makes the site a reliable, third-party published source with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy?

The fact that it can back up the arguments made with references to the peer-reviewed scientific litterature.

...and presumably it doesn't cherry-pick whatever papers it references? Who controls this? Who actually sits there, and stops the writers from biassing their arguments?

It isn't......the very person who writes those arguments, is it? I wonder.

Ludo said:

Parrot of Doom said:

Is it peer-reviewed? Published by anyone? Are its authors generally considered trustworthy, or authoritative?

Irrelevant. What being a skeptic should be about is to question all arguments, regardless of their source and accept them or not based on the strength of the argument. Unless you do so, you are merely following your own biases, which may not be justified.

Right, so peer-review and publication are irrelevant factors when deciding upon the reliability of a source.

Oh.

Ludo said:

Parrot of Doom said:

Who scrutinises its content, and checks the facts?

The readers, if they are sceptics.

You shouldn't even treat peer-reviewed journal papers as being gospel truth, there are plenty of papers published that are wrong to some degree. Occasionally even utter nonsense gets through peer review (rather like the dinosaurs are only half as big as we thought they were that was discussed here earlier this year).

But most people will only read a few comments. They won't read comment number 64 which manages to refute the premise the writer made.

A blog is about as reliable as a random Google search.

[TheStig44]

The Sun is really big, we are really small. Effectively we are the Sun's bh.

[odyssey2200]

TheStig44 said:

The Sun is really big, we are really small. Effectively we are the Sun's bh.

hope Earth doesn't drop the soap.

[Balmoral Green]

Bing o said:

Ironic

Whether one takes the King Canute thing in it's full context, as you've posted, or at the more basic face value. It's pretty much the same either way as far as Climate Change is concerned.

[odyssey2200]

HTH

[FunkyGibbon]

ludo said:

Parrot of Doom said:

ludo, questioning the quality of a source isn't in any way an ad hominem attack; it's an essential part of the argument.

No, go look up the definition of an ad-hominem. It means an attack on the source of an argument in place of an attack on the content of an argument.

Almost

wiki said:

An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: "argument to the person" or "argument against the person") is an argument which links the validity of a premise to an irrelevant characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise.

The ad hominem argument is not a fallacy despite there being fallacious instances of the argument.

In reality, ad hominem is unrelated to sarcasm or personal abuse. Argumentum ad hominem is the logical fallacy of attempting to undermine a speaker's argument by attacking the speaker instead of addressing the argument. The mere presence of a personal attack does not indicate ad hominem: the attack must be used for the purpose of undermining the argument, or otherwise the logical fallacy isn't there. It is not a logical fallacy to attack someone; the fallacy comes from assuming that a personal attack is also necessarily an attack on that person's arguments

Gratuitous verbal abuse or "name-calling" itself is not an argumentum ad hominem or a logical fallacy.

The fallacy only occurs if personal attacks are employed in the stead of an argument to devalue an argument by attacking the speaker, not personal insults in the middle of an otherwise sound argument or insults that stand alone.

see the citations therein for links to the source material - wouldn't want to get ad-homed would I

[ludo]

FunkyGibbon said:

ludo said:

Parrot of Doom said:

ludo, questioning the quality of a source isn't in any way an ad hominem attack; it's an essential part of the argument.

No, go look up the definition of an ad-hominem. It means an attack on the source of an argument in place of an attack on the content of an argument.

Almost

wiki said:

An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: "argument to the person" or "argument against the person") is an argument which links the validity of a premise to an irrelevant characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise.

The ad hominem argument is not a fallacy despite there being fallacious instances of the argument.

In reality, ad hominem is unrelated to sarcasm or personal abuse. Argumentum ad hominem is the logical fallacy of attempting to undermine a speaker's argument by attacking the speaker instead of addressing the argument. The mere presence of a personal attack does not indicate ad hominem: the attack must be used for the purpose of undermining the argument, or otherwise the logical fallacy isn't there. It is not a logical fallacy to attack someone; the fallacy comes from assuming that a personal attack is also necessarily an attack on that person's arguments

Gratuitous verbal abuse or "name-calling" itself is not an argumentum ad hominem or a logical fallacy.

The fallacy only occurs if personal attacks are employed in the stead of an argument to devalue an argument by attacking the speaker, not personal insults in the middle of an otherwise sound argument or insults that stand alone.

see the citations therein for links to the source material - wouldn't want to get ad-homed would I

it seems like a lot of posters appear to think that an ad-hom is just an insult, it isn't, that is just the ad-hom fallacy fallacy

Edited by ludo on Wednesday 18th November 18:38

[ludo]

Guam said:

ludo said:

FunkyGibbon said:

ludo said:

Parrot of Doom said:

ludo, questioning the quality of a source isn't in any way an ad hominem attack; it's an essential part of the argument.

No, go look up the definition of an ad-hominem. It means an attack on the source of an argument in place of an attack on the content of an argument.

Almost

wiki said:

An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: "argument to the person" or "argument against the person") is an argument which links the validity of a premise to an irrelevant characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise.

The ad hominem argument is not a fallacy despite there being fallacious instances of the argument.

In reality, ad hominem is unrelated to sarcasm or personal abuse. Argumentum ad hominem is the logical fallacy of attempting to undermine a speaker's argument by attacking the speaker instead of addressing the argument. The mere presence of a personal attack does not indicate ad hominem: the attack must be used for the purpose of undermining the argument, or otherwise the logical fallacy isn't there. It is not a logical fallacy to attack someone; the fallacy comes from assuming that a personal attack is also necessarily an attack on that person's arguments

Gratuitous verbal abuse or "name-calling" itself is not an argumentum ad hominem or a logical fallacy.

The fallacy only occurs if personal attacks are employed in the stead of an argument to devalue an argument by attacking the speaker, not personal insults in the middle of an otherwise sound argument or insults that stand alone.

see the citations therein for links to the source material - wouldn't want to get ad-homed would I

it seems like a lot of posters appear to think that an ad-hom is just an insult, it isn't, that is just the ad-hom fallacy fallacy

Edited by ludo on Wednesday 18th November 18:38

OH so weak, you must be working too hard Ludo not up to your usual reposte

perhaps because it wasn't a reposte? Still I've learned a trick, apparently I can use any rhetorical device I like as long as I put a " " at the end!

Edited by ludo on Wednesday 18th November 18:46

[groucho]

odyssey2200 said:

Wheels falling off the MMCC machine?

About bloody time too.

When it is proven that man is not the cause of climate change, can I have my tax back?

Of course the Gov't will do everything they can to suppress and hide the information that proves that they raped us for so long.

They will never admit to it.

[turbobloke]

Guam said:

give you 6/10 for that one Ludo

that bird on the pop show said:

Oill give im foive

Edited by turbobloke on Wednesday 18th November 18:50

[turbobloke]

There was a latin spell too so this should be close enough as long as I remember to add

illic est haud humanus signum in orbis terrarum notitia

[turbobloke]

Guam said:

turbobloke said:

There was a latin spell too so this should be close enough as long as I remember to add

illic est haud humanus signum in orbis terrarum notitia

I Like that

Good job my Latin teacher isn't around to read it though

Talking of no human signal, here's another that doesn't exist. Topical too, with drowning doggo still drowining in the TV propaganda.

No Greenhouse Gas Signal in Normalized European Flood Losses 1970-2006

Prof Pielke Jr reports that J. I. Barredo of the European Commission published an interesting paper earlier this year titled, gNormalized Flood Losses in Europe: 1970-2006 (PDF) in the open access journal 'Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences' of the EGU. Excerpts:

Following the conceptual approach of previous studies, we normalised flood losses by considering the effects of changes in population, wealth, and inflation at the country level. Furthermore, we removed inter-country price differences by adjusting the losses for purchasing power parities (PPP). We assessed normalised flood losses in 31 European countries. These include the member states of the European Union, Norway, Switzerland, Croatia, and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

Results show no detectable sign of human-induced climate change in normalised flood losses in Europe. The observed increase in the original flood losses is mostly driven by societal factors.

My emphasis.

[deeps]

Bing o said:

Mondeohdear said:

Or, hopefully, we'll all be living in exactly the same way we are now and having a good laugh about the old days when we believed that anything we did made a difference.

Oh good, let's ban process. No human has ever lived for 70 years in exactly the same climatic conditions.

Spot on Bing o, I was only thinking the other day about how short the human life span is, and if it was say 2000 years instead, we would have first hand experience of the warm period around 1000 years ago and then the freezing period around 400 years ago, and many other ups and downs.

Very old geezer said:

"Ahh but young man, I remember back when I was a mere 1150, the summer months were scorching for years on end, we had to take shelter from the daytime sun in our stone huts, good job the local wine was plentiful. Even the winter months were warm and no snow fell for decades on end. It was glorious. But the King had been informed that the warming could cause catastrophic flooding of our land, and forthwith sent messengers to all village leaders country wide, informing us that an extra coin a month would be put on horse tax, and demanding we ride our horses 5 miles less a week to prevent any further warming. Some folk thought it was madness, and pleaded with the King that the sun was responsible for the warmth, but they were deemed treasonous and beheaded. So we all paid up, and sure enough after many decades of paying the extra horse tax the warm period subsided - the job was done. The King was pleased and built a new palace in celebration, but stated the tax must remain of course to prevent such future warming".

As it is, I'm not even old enough to remember the early 70's propaganda preaching of the oncoming ice age (I was just a kid) but I've watched some old BBC News clips of it.

Edited by deeps on Wednesday 18th November 22:51

[G_T]

Guam stop wriggling round the issue. The simple fact of the matter is that, like most of the more uninformed posters, the majority basis of your arguement seems to be an implied bias and therefore irrelevance of the source material. Are you denying this? Do you agree the majority of scientists are unbiased?

In terms of examples, I need not even go outside this thread. You made a mocking statement for me using peer-reviewed references because they were also included in a "blog".

Guam said:

Quite so and definitely not from Blogs

So if you were not trying to discredit them (or me) by doing so please tell me your intention and I'll quite happily concede I was wrong. If it was a "joke" then fair enough but in the context of the arguement there was no way of me knowing and it still doesn't detract from the fact that a lot of your opposition to MMGW is based on your refuting of the sources.

Also no matter what you keep saying about my supposed bias, I am still undecided on this whole issue. The simple fact is my thread was based on was my surprise at the volume of evidence supporting MMGW. Evidence which I was not aware of and have yet to scrutinise (mostly because so far I currently lack the understanding to do so). I'm honestly not arrogant enough to claim I understand all the science after 3 days reading. If I appear any other way it is only because I am curious to see the defence of a point.

What I do however find disturbing is the "true-believers" are very obviously present on both sides of the arguement and are very quick to jump in whenever they believe a "proMMGW" has been proven wrong.

[G_T]

Guam said:

G_T said:

Guam stop wriggling round the issue. The simple fact of the matter is that, like most of the more uninformed posters, the majority basis of your arguement seems to be an implied bias and therefore irrelevance of the source material. Are you denying this? Do you agree the majority of scientists are unbiased?

In terms of examples, I need not even go outside this thread. You made a mocking statement for me using peer-reviewed references because they were also included in a "blog".

Guam said:

Quite so and definitely not from Blogs

So if you were not trying to discredit them (or me) by doing so please tell me your intention and I'll quite happily concede I was wrong. If it was a "joke" then fair enough but in the context of the arguement there was no way of me knowing and it still doesn't detract from the fact that a lot of your opposition to MMGW is based on your refuting of the sources.

Also no matter what you keep saying about my supposed bias, I am still undecided on this whole issue. The simple fact is my thread was based on was my surprise at the volume of evidence supporting MMGW. Evidence which I was not aware of and have yet to scrutinise (mostly because so far I currently lack the understanding to do so). I'm honestly not arrogant enough to claim I understand all the science after 3 days reading. If I appear any other way it is only because I am curious to see the defence of a point.

What I do however find disturbing is the "true-believers" are very obviously present on both sides of the arguement and are very quick to jump in whenever they believe a "proMMGW" has been proven wrong.

What a complete load of twaddle I made a one line post (as you did) which you for some unknown reason took exception to, this is as clear an example of trolling for effect one is ever likely to see, I am not wriggling around any issue, the point I made is wholly reasonable and as Ludo would say the crux of your arguement (following Wiki definitions) is indeed a Straw man.

Points have been raised and addressed if you have anything different to add or a point I havent covered off in the post above then feel free, I suspect however you will not let this drop, having reviewed the other contentious topics you have posted on other threads and your approach on those.

I have not attacked any "scientists" (in either camp) so you will not find a specific example of me doing so (once again you are argueing from a position of utter invention) I have attatcked illogical and wrong arguements (In MY opinion) which I am as entitled to do as is anyone else.

However I really must stop feeding the troll now as I have work to do

Cheers

Guam you talk some crap mate. The "crux" of my arguement? What arguement? I'm only in defence of common sense and logic. I've explicitly pointed out that fact at least 8 times now.

There are literally dozens of ad-hominem arguements in the other thread and I'm only up to page 30. I would take the time to copy and paste them over but it's pointless doing so when you don't even read what I say.

As usual you've dodged my questions and are now toeing the line of "you haven't understood me" or has the defence become "I meant that as a joke"?

In either case I agree continuing it further is pointless.

[FunkyGibbon]

G_T said:

There are literally dozens of ad-hominem arguements in the other thread

Are you actually sure of that

[G_T]

Oh the hilarity.

[Guybrush]

nonegreen said:

Mondeohdear said:

Guybrush said:

I'd disagree with one thing in the article, it's not a "small group of mavericks", it's a large body of scientists.

No it's not. The majority of climate scientists are pro, the small group of mavericks ( I love that term, it makes them sound sexy and rebellious instead of just wrong ) are agin.

A lot of the climate scientists are civil servants with non science degrees. Or even no degree, which these days makes you pretty thick. Bear in mind a lot of earth science graduates work for oil companies and their views are therefore seen as biased. It would be nice to see a proper breakdown but the politcoes just keep banging out the same stuff about the majority of climate scientists. I bet if we broke that down into scientists and sciuntistsright!!! who have been to collige. We might see a hard core of a handful of scientists and lot of manipulative civil service grades writing the IPCC exec summaries.

This site showing the scientists involved might be useful: http://www.petitionproject.org/ or this: http://www.oism.org/pproject/