Increasing numbers of commentators are starting to call peak Net Zero and this process is being helped by the crumbling of the decades-long suffocating stranglehold exerted on ‘settled’ climate science by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The latest body-blow to its credibility has come from last year’s joint winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics, Dr John Clauser. He has warned the Nobel Foundation not to model a proposed new body to police ‘misinformation’ on the IPCC, adding: “In my opinion the IPCC is one of the worst sources of dangerous misinformation.” It would seem unhelpful that at a time when Clauser voiced his criticism, the UN’s Secretary General headed for a public stage and upgraded global warming to “global boiling”.
Of course, by ramping up the fear to ‘boiling’ point, the unhinged Antonio Guterres has fallen into the ‘worse than Hitler’ trap. Where can you go after you call someone a Nazi, or tell a world audience that the Earth is bubbling beneath its feet?
Details have recently been made public about the short speech Clauser gave to young scientists in South Korea. He implored them to follow the scientific method based on good observations and experiments. Good observations always overrule purely speculative theory, he told them. Referring to climate science, he noted the current world was “literally awash, saturated, with pseudoscience, with bad science, with scientific misinformation and disinformation”.
Referring often to climate science, he told his audience that if they are doing good science they must beware since it may take them on paths that lead them into “political incorrect” areas. “If you’re a good scientist, you will follow them… I can confidently say that there is no real climate crisis and that climate change does not cause extreme events,” he said.
Easier said than done of course since most scientists are funded in one form or another by governments. In the area of climate, politicians require scientific backing for their collectivist plans to re-order society around Net Zero. Huge amounts of public money are flowing into untested, unproductive new technologies, few of which would be viable in a free capital market. Green subsidy hunters are making serious fortunes with little risk involved. The climate narrative is absurd, says MIT Emeritus Professor Richard Lindzen, but trillions of dollars says it is not absurd.
There are a number of fault lines that run through the IPCC science narrative. It maintains that all changes in the climate since 1900 are caused by humans burning fossil fuel. This is plainly odd since it asks us to ignore almost all natural variation, having accepted that natural causes were responsible for climate change in the past. It also suggests that the current period in the Earth’s history is the hottest for 125,000 years, ignoring copious evidence that temperatures were much higher in the Holocene Thermal Maximum about 9,700 – 5,700 years ago. The IPCC would have us believe that higher levels of carbon dioxide cause the temperature to inevitably rise, despite observational evidence throughout the paleo record that contradicts that simple hypothesis. After 50 years of trying, not a single credible paper has yet been published providing conclusive proof for the anthropogenic global warming boiling hypothesis.
Earlier this year, a group of scientists operating through the Clintel Foundation examined the latest work of the IPCC. The authors were damning about its most recent report, finding it emphasised worst-case scenarios, rewrote climate history and had a huge bias against good news. Its standout revelation was that 42% of the IPCC’s claims were based on climate models fed with the implausible assumption that global temperatures would rise by around 5°C in less than 80 years. Deep in the main body of its work, even the IPCC admits this is of “low likelihood”. Even worse, Clintel noted, was that about half the extreme climate model forecasts found across the entire body of scientific literature are based on this 5°C boost. It is a fair bet that almost 100% of the clickbait scare stories that dominate mainstream media are taken from these sources.
The former IPCC author and economics professor Roger Pielke Jr. thinks that the continuing reliance on these implausible assumptions by the IPCC is “one of the most significant failures of scientific integrity in the 21st Century”.
The tide could well be turning as the voices of previously cancelled giants of science are heard. In the UK, there is increasing media interest in the retrospective uplifts to temperature datasets enabling previous inconvenient pauses to be removed, and ‘records’ to be declared at regular intervals. Not before time, the Met Office’s habit of declaring heat highs amidst the jet exhaust at British airports is becoming something of a national joke.
One of those science giants, atmospheric scientist Richard Lindzen, recently told a U.S. government body that climate science “is awash with manipulated data, which provides no reliable scientific evidence”. In his view, the IPCC only issues “government-dictated findings”, noting that the important, and much quoted, “Summary for Policymakers” must be approved for publication by all governments. He further noted that, “misrepresentation, exaggeration, cherry-picking or outright lying pretty much covers all the so-called global warming caused by fossil fuel and CO2”.
Dr Clauser signed off his inspiring talk to young scientists in South Korea by telling them to observe nature directly so they could determine real truth. “Use the information gained from carefully performed experiments and research to stop the spread of scientific misinformation, disinformation,” he said.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
Stop Press: The new head of the IPCC, Professor Jim Skea, recognises that constantly pumping out apocalyptic predictions which don’t come true is damaging the credibility of the IPCC. In a series of press interviews following his appointment, he warned doom-mongering was doing more harm than good. “If you constantly communicate the message that we are all doomed to extinction, then that paralyses people and prevents them from taking the necessary steps to get a grip on climate change,” he told one newspaper. The Telegraph has more.
Stop Press 2: Janan Ganesh, the FT columnist, thinks the Conservative victory in the Uxbridge by-election is the beginning of the end of the pro-Net Zero consensus: “It was always paper-thin. In 2019, when Britain committed to net zero greenhouse gas emissions by the middle of the century, inflation was 2 per cent. A decade had passed since the previous recession. Had politicians been frank about the cost of the green transition, voters might have felt prosperous enough to pay it. Now? Not a chance.” Not paywalled and worth reading in full.
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I would strongly advise John Gray to stick to his day job – philosophising, because it is clear from the above that he has done absolutely zero research on net zero.
“Remember, most climate scientists agree that once human-induced climate change is in the works, it goes on for decades or even centuries.”
Can you provide any proof of “human induced climate change?”
No. Well STFU!
Why is DS printing utter garbage such as this?
Not only DS, why is Uherd giving him a voice?
“ He thought that climate change would consist of sudden jumps and it could transform things quite quickly, in a couple of decades. We might be in the middle of it. That’s my view – I’m not a climate sceptic.”
’Sudden jumps’: according to the geological data ‘sudden’ is tens of thousands or millions of years.
There is a serious possibility that we’re now in the early stages of runaway climate change.
Really..? The only thing that is ‘running away’ is the hysterical reaction of people who have followed the hyperbole, but have forgotten to ask critical questions or think for themselves.
And your comments earlier today under New Round-up, and those of JeremyP99 with the graphs are equally valid here.
Mr Gray is a Bernard Looney…..
The great game was, in fact, simple paranoia; Russia then, as now, a paper tiger.
China seems likely, particularly economically, to follow the well trodden path of so many socialist fascist states, something to which Britain itself should pay heed….tin eared though its political apparatchiks currently appear…..
As long as people like John Gray, “political philosopher,” stipulate that emissions are causing a runaway climate crisis it doesn’t really matter what else he has to say. He’s giving the “CO2 will kill us all” loonies all the ammunition they need to destroy the west and kill billions world-wide with their insane Net Zero bollox.
Sad to say that at this time Exhibit A of the CO2 Will Kill Us All Loonies includes most Western governments.
Perhaps he can explain how CO2 at levels of 150ppm drove the climate out of Ice Ages, then at levels of 4 000pppm, 6 000ppm and above, managed to drive the climate out of tropical ages back into Ice Ages.
Until any of these idiots can explain that, I’m not interested in their ramblings.
“Worth reading in full.”
I don’t think so.
“There is a serious possibility that we’re now in the early stages of runaway climate change.”
Evidence please? There is nothing to indicate a ‘runaway climate change’, nothing. What does a runaway climate change look like and Michael Bay type films are not evidence? There is plenty of evidence that the inter-glacial that we are currently in will end sometime in the next 500 years, and end it will. If we have somehow, and inadvertently, manged to stop the next glacial expansion then we will have dodged a massive bullet, except the forces that dictate the glacial cycles have not stopped, so I don’t see how..
The Earth having two ice caps is rare in its history. Having even one is unusual. We are therefore in an unusually cold period of Earth’s history.
I have to be honest, if this is ‘progress’ then it’s not very progressive. This is hilarious. Can you imagine what Khant would do if this were black cabs in London?
https://twitter.com/KanekoaTheGreat/status/1705651803168366638
Texan Gold there Mogs.
Well if there is a climate emergency, it is not shown in the heat waves in the USA. Debunked by Steve Koonin and John Christy. Chapter 5 of Unsettled S Koonin -explains the trick to explain the scary looking graph in the Climate Science Special report from 2017.
The fact that Gray mentions James Lovelock in a positive way instantly tells you anything he says is going to be garbage. Lovelock was bonkers and only appeals to the Charles “I talk to plants” type of environmentalist. He one of the first people to claim that by some point this century the Arctic would be the only part of the Earth that would still be habitable. Why any media site is giving Gray any kind of a platform is beyond me.
Yes but Lovelock as he got older realised he was wrong and admitted so. He should at least be credited for that, because the current lot of eco socialist government funded data adjusters simply double down on their propaganda masquerading as science with no intention of ever admitting they are way off the mark.
I gave up reading Lovelock’s books/statements a long time ago. Did he say that there isn’t going to be runaway climate change, or did he just say he was wrong about how quickly it would happen?
“Charles “I talk to plants””. Always a good thing to talk to plants as you’re giving them CO2 (plant food) from your breath. Mind you in Charlie boy’s case there’s an awful amount of hot air.
JugEars has always been several sandwiches short of a picnic …. we’d be far better served with his sister at the helm.
As long as you don’t think the plants are talking back, or understand what you say.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66906201
Armed forces, suitably armed, to replace police who have handed in arms permits following the arrest of the officer after Chris Kaba killed.
It is difficult to know where to start with this jumble of mainly nonsense. The first thing I see is references to James Lovelock, but infact Lovelock actually said that he was WRONG about climate change. He said he thought he knew what was going to occur 30 years ago and even wrote books about it, but “it just hasn’t happened”. Gray then redeems himself a bit by criticising Net Zero and the lack of the technology required for it. But he quickly dives into more nonsense again by saying “There is a serious possibility that we are now in the early stages of runaway climate change”——–This is an evidence free statement. Then he doubles down on the nonsense with the following “Remember, most climate scientists agree that once human induced climate change is in the works it goes on for decades or even centuries. You can’t stop it” ———I have always liked the Daily Sceptic for the fact that we can all have a point of view. So my point of view on this article is that the author has jumped into a subject he knows little about. He has written a jumble of fictions with a few facts sprinkled on top.
I missed the facts.
Incidentally the nonsense was from John Gray – Richard was simply reporting what he said.
He did say Net Zero was nonsense. He did say we entered it before the technology for it was available and he did say that many of the raw materials for batteries etc were produced by China. So a few facts in amongst the evidence free nonsense.
How can you possibly describe this as excellent? It is utter rubbish. Gray accepts that humans are causing climate change and they might not be able to stop it. It talks about uncertainty about the climate initially but effectively he is saying the science if fixed and we are causing climate change. It is utter nonsense as many physicists point out and they are being slowly silenced because of it. Unherd is becoming a promoter of nonsense.
“John Gray questions the effectiveness of current climate policies, suggesting they were implemented prematurely and lacked the necessary technology and materials.”
The policies were designed by idiots to solve a non-existent problem, by replacing working existing technology with unworkable and non-existing technology based on the conceit that Mankind, not physics, controls the Universe and that a global coalition of vested interests can control the Earth’s hugely energetic heat budget by legislation, taxation, initiatives, fraud, grift, lies, wishing and Pagan Mother Earth worship.
“Remember, most climate scientists agree ….”. Oh pleeeease, not that old 97% of scientists agree rubbish? Yes, 97% of a small number of so-called scientists who are already sold on man-made warming.
100% of “climate scientists” agree that they like the funding.
Grey still seems to accept that they are required.