{"id":3470,"date":"2009-11-29T15:33:37","date_gmt":"2009-11-29T23:33:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/secularright.org\/wordpress\/?p=3470"},"modified":"2009-11-29T15:34:55","modified_gmt":"2009-11-29T23:34:55","slug":"the-church-of-climate-change-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/the-church-of-climate-change-3\/","title":{"rendered":"The Church of Climate Change? (3)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here\u2019s <\/a>a fairly even-handed summary of the Warmergate scandal from the London Times. <\/em>These sections are particularly relevant to the idea that a belief in AGW has mutated, for some<\/em>, into a quasi-religious faith:<\/p>\n

\u2026There is unease even among researchers who strongly support the idea that humans are changing the climate. Roger Pielke, professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder, said: \u201cOver the last decade there has been a very political battle between the climate sceptics and activist scientists. \u201cIt seems to me that the scientists have lost touch with what they were up to. They saw themselves as in a battle with the sceptics rather than advancing scientific knowledge.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ah yes, the quest for heretics.<\/p>\n

And then there\u2019s this:<\/p>\n

There could, however, be another reason why the unit rejected requests to see its data. This weekend it emerged that the unit has thrown away much of the data. Tucked away on its website is this statement: \u201cData storage availability in the 1980s meant that we were not able to keep the multiple sources for some sites … We, therefore, do not hold the original raw data but only the value-added (ie, quality controlled and homogenised) data.\u201d If true, it is extraordinary. It means that the data on which a large part of the world\u2019s understanding of climate change is based can never be revisited or checked. Pielke said: \u201cCan this be serious? It is now impossible to create a new temperature index from scratch. [The unit] is basically saying, \u2018Trust us\u2019.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ah yes, faith.<\/p>\n

And then…<\/p>\n

Where does this leave the climate debate? While the overwhelming belief of scientists is that the world is getting warmer and that humanity is responsible, sceptical voices are increasing. Lord Lawson, the Tory former chancellor, announced last week the creation of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, a think tank, to \u201cbring reason, integrity and balance to a debate that has become seriously unbalanced, irrationally alarmist, and all too often depressingly intolerant\u201d. Lawson said: \u201cClimate change is not being properly debated because all the political parties are on the same side, and there is an intolerance towards anybody who wants to debate it. It has turned climate change from being a political issue into a secular religion.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A secular religion, indeed.<\/p>\n

That said, I\u2019d make the obvious–but necessary–point that the fact, extent and causation of climate change ought to be a matter of science<\/em>, not politics. What to do about it is where the politics come in\u2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here\u2019s a fairly even-handed summary of the Warmergate scandal from the London Times. These sections are particularly relevant to the idea that a belief in AGW has mutated, for some, into a quasi-religious faith: \u2026There is unease even among researchers … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":64,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[15,21,13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3470"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/64"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3470"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3470\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3472,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3470\/revisions\/3472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}