Last June, the state-reliant BBC reported that human-caused climate change had made U.S. and Mexico heatwaves “35 times more likely”. Nothing out of the ordinary here in mainstream media with everyone from climate comedy turn ‘Jim’ Dale to UN chief Antonio ‘Boiling’ Guterres making these types of bizarre attributions. But for those who closely follow climate science and the assessments of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), “such headlines can be difficult to make sense of”, observes the distinguished science writer Roger Pielke. In a hard-hitting attack on the pseudo-scientific industry of weather attribution, he states: “neither the IPCC nor the underlying scientific literature comes anywhere close to making such strong and certain claims of attribution”.
Pielke argues that the extreme position of attributing individual bad weather events is “roughly aligned” with the far Left. “Climate science is not, or at least should not serve as a proxy for political tribes,” he cautions. But of course it is. The Net Zero fantasy is a collectivist national and supra-national agenda that increasingly relies on demonising bad weather. With global temperatures rising at most only 0.1°C a decade, laughter can only be general and side-splitting when IPCC boss Jim Skea claims that British summers will be 6°C hotter in less than 50 years. Two extended temperature pauses since 2000 have not helped the cause of global boiling. In addition there are increasing doubts about the reliability of temperature recordings by many meteorological organisations that seem unable to properly account for massive urban heat corruptions.
The big problem for ‘far Left’ climate extremists is that event attribution is a form, in Pielke’s words, of “tactical science”. Such science serves legal and political ends and is not always subject to peer review. As the BBC and other media outlets can attest, the work is “generally promoted via press release”. It has been developed in response to the failure of the IPCC to detect and attribute most types of extreme weather including drought, flooding, storms and wildfires to human involvement, notes Pielke. Worse, the IPCC can find little sign of human involvement going forward to 2100.
Scientists cannot answer directly whether particular events are caused by climate change since extremes occur naturally. Meanwhile the IPCC is somewhat dismissive about weather attribution, or as Pielke terms it, “weather attribution alchemy”. It notes: “The usefulness or applicability of available extreme event attribution methods for assessing climate-related risks remains subject to debate.” The IPCC is a biased body full of climate alarmists, but its inability to attribute single events to humans is obviously highly irritating and somewhat inconvenient for activists and their media counterparts.
Dr. Friederike Otto runs World Weather Attribution (WWA) out of Imperial College London and is a frequent presence on the BBC. WWA is behind many of the immediate attributions of bad weather to human causes and its motives are clear. As Dr. Otto has noted: “Unlike every other branch of climate science or science in general, event attribution was actually originally suggested with the courts in mind.” Otto is clear that the main function of such studies, part-funded by Net Zero-supporting billionaires and heavily pushed by aligned mainstream media, is to support lawsuits against fossil fuel companies. She explains this strategy in detail in the interview, ‘From Extreme Event Attribution to Climate Litigation‘.
The inability of the IPCC to attribute bad weather to humans has been viewed by climate advocates as “politically problematic”, continues Pielke. He notes the work of climate activists Elizabeth Lloyd and Naomi Oreskes who are worried that the lack of attribution “conveys the impression that we just do not know, which feeds into uncertainty, doubt or incompleteness, and the general tendency of humans to discount threats that are not imminent”.
Perish the thought that there should be uncertainty, doubt or incompleteness in the settled world of climate science. It is of course different from all other branches of science in that all its opinions are right and consequently there is no need for the unhelpful process of constant inquiry and experiment. It need hardly be added that no doubt exists at the BBC, where former Radio 4 Today Editor Sarah Sands wrote the foreword to a WWA guide for journalists. Recalling when the late Nigel Lawson suggested there had been no increase in extreme weather, Sands noted: “I wish we had this guide for journalists to help us mount a more effective challenge to his claim.” These days, Sands enthused, attribution studies have given us “significant insight into the horsemen of the climate apocalypse”.
For her part, Otto is keen to crack down on the heretics. She was at the forefront of the recent notorious retraction of a paper in a Springer Nature journal that stated there was no evidence that the climate was breaking down. Written by four Italian scientists and led by Professor Gianluca Alimonti, they argued that a climate emergency was not supported by the data. Otto, who had previously worked in the Oxford School of Geography for 10 years, claimed the scientists were not writing in good faith. “If the journal cares about science they should withdraw it loudly and publicly saying it should never have been published,” she demanded.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
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I did hear this little bit of propaganda broadcast by BBC World Service around 05:00 today. Hats off to those who worked their way round the system, but then, why support it? Taking one’s trade away from it would seem wise to some.
The BBC would really be happier in a much more totalitarian regime, it loves nothing better than beating down the oppressed plebs whom it despises so much.
This censorship has really gone full Orwellian
Privatising the BBC is not enough. It needs to be split into tiny pieces or destroyed completely. It’s irretrievably captured by political campaigners.
This makes it eerily similar to the completely private mass media organizations in the USA, to the entirely private Big Tech companies (also in the USA) and to the reprivatized British banks. The neoliberal slogan Privatize! Privatize! Privatize! is not a solution to anything. It just leads to plundering of public assets by ‘private’ plundering entrepreneurs. One could even argue that the complete failure of neoliberalism led us into the current mess as it caused a resurgence of the people who believe the state ought to control everything down to how its citizens must dress in public and when and for which reasons they’re allowed to leave their homes and have contact with other people.
BTW, that’s the reason why I’m entirely unimpressed by this Canadian with the impossible hat. Weren’t it for the complete failure of him and his chaps to end the cycle of boom and bust, someone like Trudeau would never have stood a chance to become an influential politician. That the supposed cure ended up being even worse then the disease doesn’t mean we want the disease back.
Good point. Trust busting of mega media organisations is essential.
Time and time again I read these stories and can’t help but see the BBC, the Twatter blob, the pRedditors etc as petulant, effeminate, spoiled little children. They scream and shout when anything doesn’t go their way, boast about their censorship of others yet cry when anyone counters their stories with facts. I am not drawn to violence, but I really would enjoy seeing these people taking their lumps.
Bit of a rant.
Well deserved 👏👏
I genuinely do not understand the people jumping on the ‘mis-/disinformation’ bandwagon. I don’t mean the politicians and ‘$cientists’ who have much to hide, I mean the dimwits who just follow suit and assume everyone not following the narrative must be trying to spread disinformation.
Is every death within a certain time frame directly related to the vaxx? No, probably not, and I say this as someone who genuinely believes the covid vaxxes are poison and responsible for a significant number of serious injuries and deaths. That doesn’t mean I am incapable of understanding that in some cases something else was the cause.
But it would never occur to me to have the breathtaking audacity to tell someone who is suffering either personally or following the death of a loved one, that they are lying or making things up. How utterly heartless and shameless. I would want to help them find out the truth.
And if they really want to deal with ‘disinformation’, do not silence people, show us the proof! Yesterday there was a parliamentary committee meeting in NL, with MPs and the head of the public health authority. One MP (truly a thorn in the arse of the cabinet :-)) asked the very sensible question that as there appeared to be a connection between the vaxx and the months-long elevated/excess deaths, would it therefore not be a good idea to pause the stabbing campaign to start on Monday 19 September until there was further clarity?
How can that be a problem? There is long-term elevated/excess mortality, the health authority claims not to know what it is due to, thus the vaxx cannot be excluded, why does the infamous ‘abundance of caution’ not apply now, particularly as NL will, contrary to Denmark, be stabbing people 12 and over. The chairwoman of the meeting told the MP he could ask that question 2 weeks from now (after stabbing has begun and harm may already have been done) and told the public health official he didn’t have to answer. The whole job of our MPs is precisely to ask such questions, the whole job of the public health authorities is to provide an answer, not collude with the government to obfuscate. There was a time the BBC knew that and would have reported accordingly, now they simply join the collusion against the people.
Exactly how I feel! I cannot comprehend how people don’t even want to follow this up, it’s like some black hole that they don’t want to look into. Is it because they’re worried about what they’ll find? Are they worried about discovering how they’ve messed up? Complete cognitive dissonance.
Well, governments and public health authorities and pharma companies don’t want to follow it up because they know and have known for some time – naturally they want to keep this covered up until the end of time.
I supposed a lot of people who were vaxxed don’t want to know because the prospect is frightening, I should think doubly so for parents.
But journalists (real ones), scientists (real ones) and health care professionals (real ones) should absolutely want to figure out what is going on. The reputation of governments and public health authorities will not recover until this is dealt with properly and health care workers who genuinely care about the health of their patients must want to get to the bottom of this, no matter where it leads. This needs to be fixed, we have seen that they will simply roll out the same slip-shod ‘testing’ and ‘trials’ to other products going forward.
The truth is capable of standing by itself. It doesn’t need protecting.
If you are still paying your license fee, you are funding state propaganda. If you are still paying your license fee, you are funding the maiming and death of children. If you are still paying your license fee, you are part of the problem.
Good to see the downvotes – proof we have either a) people on here that don’t really understand what’s going on b) foxes in the henhouse. Either way, you people don’t belong here.
Does this mean that a news organisation that spreads disinformation by falsely claiming that illegal immigrants are refugees can also be banned?
Excellent point.
Surely the BBC is acting ultra views.
I presume you meant ultra vires, but having said that ultra views fits quite well also.
I admit I am impressed with the BBC’s tenacity in sticking to its lies. You know what it’s like when you have told a real whoppa (e.g. covid jabs are safe and effective) and then find you’ve boxed yourself into a corner. Then you have two options: (1) face a humiliating climb down by admitting the truth, or (2) pull out all the stops to maintain the lie. The BBC went for the latter option. They are going to end up with so much egg on their face.
If you still pay the licence fee but don’t like the BBC then ask yourself how long you are prepared to continue funding a state propaganda machine that has so much contempt for you it will urge you to take a deadly injection while demanding money from you for the privilege of letting them brainwash you about how good it is.
Just had a letter of apology from TV Licencing, because they continued to harrass me even after an enforcement officer visited me and was happy I didn’t need a licence, I’ve told them that’s not enough and I want compensation for the needless harrassment. I’ll give em 3 weeks then issue a small claim.
I’d like to know how that goes. I don’t own a TV, haven’t watched any TV at home since about 1995, have also entirely stopped watching new movies and don’t ever plan to change this. But that’s not an option with the BBC, it’s not even possible to tell them about such unthinkable heresy as it’s not part of the set of possible answers and freestyle answers can’t be given. Hence, whenever they bother me again, I (again) have to make the wrong claim that I’m only watching prerecorded movies. And that’s something which really annoys me because what I’d really want to tell them is Your whole industry doesn’t produce anything of value to me and now go pester somebody else!
Nice. It appears we have people in our midst that say all the right things, but don’t actually even have the courage to stop funding state propaganda that is warping minds and killing children. Like RW said, it’d be interesting to know how it goes for you. I stopped paying these criminals a few of years ago – one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.
All my regular TV non payment letters over the last twelve years go straight in the bin and If the TV licensing rep calls (once in five years) asking if I am the householder, I politely say no, close the door and that’s it.
That’s not really good enough. It should be possible to tell these people honestly that their services aren’t being called for and also why.
Eppur si muove, indeed…
We don’t have mandated BBC telescreens yet, but unless we resist, it is only a matter of time. A certain massive event is about to be televised, with everyone “expected” to watch it. This has not been explicitly stated, but the implication is very much there, just like the expectation to clap for the NHS, with villification for dissenters: make the most of the option not to have it broadcast into your home. However, this time I don’t suggest posting a picture of your switched-off TV on social media (I did this for Covid briefings), lest you get cancelled.
In Australia we have similar issues with the ABC.
Their modus operandi is censorship of all opposing views.
Many Australians, including most extended family and “friends”, plug their brains in to the ABC for all their news and current affairs.
None have heard of the WEF, farmers and trucker’s protests, and are oblivious to the fact that the “vaccines” are anything other than “safe and effective”.
The ABC is funded from general revenue, no no way to prevent my taxes supporting it.
Great piece, Will.
But what makes you think that BBC & Facebook aren’t fully aware of the reality of vaccine damage – but rejoice in it?
I fully recommend cancelling your stealth license as I did 3 years ago. Now I thoroughly advise Sceptic readers to watch GBNews, where Toby Young is a regular contributor.
That’s the spirit!
I note that Eddie Butler, BBC rugby commentator par excellence, has died suddenly in his sleep while on a charity expedition in Peru. Was he ‘fully vaxxed’, I wonder?
How proud the BBC must be to be the 21st Century flag bearer for Joseph Goebbels:
“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State”
I loathe the BBC. Stopped watching it during the Brexit shenanigans. Tempted to stop paying the license fee and see what happens.
If anyone on here still has a TV licence, have a strong word with yourselves, phone their customer services, ask them if this call is being recorded, give them both barrels in the face and cancel it. It’s good therapy.