Auspundits

The Church & Environmentalism

Here's a (paraphrased) quote from a book I'm reading:

The embattled Church, which had, in common with almost everyone else at the time, embraced Environmentalism, felt itself unable to allow any serious challenge to the IPCC although there were the beginnings of rumblings (particularly among blogging parishioners) that the Bible itself did not always support IPCC.

Replace "Environmentalism" with "Aristotelianism", "IPCC" with "Aristotle" and replace "blogging parishioners" with "the Jesuits".

This quote comes from Dr. John Lennox's book God's Undertaker: Has science buried God?. This commentary is made with regards to the Galileo affair where the Church apparently persecuted Galileo for his theological heterodoxy. In fact, Galileo's crime was upsetting secular Aristotelian by upending the a priori Aristotelian scientific method with a more open minded evidence-based approach. It was in fact the Church's adoption of Aristotelian scientific methods that got him into a spot of bother. Not theology. So says history.

And once again, the Church adopts a philosophical worldview masquerading as science (no debate wanted, reason rejected and what should be public information is privatised). And once again, it is running off with abandon, condemning objectors to the fiery pits of hell if not the stake. The Church has failed to learn from its past mistakes. And as a result is doomed to repeat its failures. Rather than strengthen the Church's social appeal, it will, ultimately, bring upon itself another long period of isolation and animosity.

Environmental Disaster

Bad Language Warning.

Penn and Teller - Bullsh*t! - Environmental Hysteria

On Cardinal Pell

As the current leader of the Australian Catholic church and a highly respected member of the inner echelons of the Vatican, it is encouraging to see Cardinal Pell take intelligent, well-thought and faith-informed positions on two of the key issues of our time: global warming and Islamism.

One of those issues is a real threat and is largely ignored. The other is a pseudo-threat and has generated millions of by-lines and scores of documentaries. The former is of course, the Islamist threat. The latter is the purported cataclysmic threat of global warming.

Pell, in contradistinction to many of his fellow clergymen, nails it right on both of these issues.

Reduce Pollution, Increase Global Warming

According to new research published in the Geophysical Research Letters by thirteen climate scientists, the global dimming effect is empirically justified. As a result, a much larger part of the warming in the 20th century can be attributed to the effect of aerosols and significantly less to human activity.

Indeed the forcing effect of aerosols (predominantly sulfates) was one variable that was not solved by the IPCC's AR3 (2001) but fudged in AR4 (2007).

This paper's conclusions upend the IPCC's assessment of the impact of aerosols on global warming. In AR4, the IPCC deemed the aerosol effect to be approximately -1 W/m2, namely, having a net cooling effect. This paper estimates the aerosol effect to be approximately +1 W/m2. Namely, having a net warming effect. That is, more aerosols equals higher temperatures.

Could more pollution be good for global warming? Perhaps. But then again, after having suffered through a really cold Sydney winter's day yesterday, I prefer warmer than cooler thank you. And so do the world's poor: they can grow more food to feed themselves.

Chalk up another one for AGW sceptics. We have been on a winning streak recently.

Anyone Watching Insiders?

Rudd blunders his way through his first interview on Insiders for some time. Bad bad performance. Does anyone else think that Rudd is looking haggard and flustered?

Chris Uhlmann shines a bright light on the Gaia Worship. My goodness. I couldn't believe my ears. I can't wait for the transcript of this to be released. Here's the relevant quote (my transcription):

What strikes me most strongly about this debate is its theological nature. And that's essentially: that we have sinned against the environment; that we are now being punished; and that the only way we can escape that punishment is to wear a hair shirt for the rest of our lives. And hope that in the next life, and our children's lives and our children's children's lives, that things will get better. Now I am willing to sign up on that caravan. But there are many lunatics attached at the end of it. I do not believe every proposition that's being put. When the weather department can tell me what the weather's going to be like next Friday with any certainty and Treasury can get within a million dollars of the [Federal Government budget] surplus is going to be next year, I'll believe an economic model that marries those two things and casts them out a hundred years. I'll make one prediction: whatever number Garnaut [Australia's Nicholas Stern] puts on 2100, will be at least a trillion dollars either way wrong.

Andrew Bolt will be impressed. Has alternative transcription.

Update 6/7/08 11:30AM AEST: Bolt is impressed. Also, here's a prognostication on my part: Uhlmann's clip is going to be an internet sensation. Political blogs across the world are going to carry this one prominently.

And some context for our non-Australian readers: Uhlmann is a senior political editor for the ABC, Australia's government-owned media organisation. The ABC is a notorious leftist hangout. This was broadcast on the ABC's flagship political TV show. He was a seminarian. He knows religion when he sees it. I wonder how long Uhlmann is going to keep his job with the likes of "100-metres" Robyn Williams almost surely drafting up a huffy email to the ABC Managing Director.

Update 6/7/08 4:00PM AEST: Video is up and on right side of page link. Will have YouTube up shortly.

Update 6/7/08 4:15PM AEST: Uploaded this to YouTube with the help of reader, Tapir. As of time of update, YouTube is still processing this file. The still should be up in the next half hour or so. If you press play, the video will load. Relevant bit starts at about the 3 minute mark.

Energy & Environmental Politics

I have long argued that were leftist governments (including our very own Kevin '07 - notwithstanding its aversion to the label) paying more than just lip service to environmentalism, they would act aggressively to implement a carbon tax. Yet, they have not. Dithering has been their hallmark. Consider Britain. Or Australia. That's because, when the average bloke on the street has to put his money on the line, he smells a snake oil salesman. Increasing the price of energy is not a winner it seems.

So what explains the public's discomfort or reluctance, in the face of a 600% increase in crude oil prices over the last decade and a war against jihadists funded by oil sheikhs, to support development of oil fields in their own nations?

Mars & Earth Climate Change - Cartoon Version

Courtesy of Junk Science:

For sobering perspective on reality, read on here. Also NASA desgin a satellite to help us understand our star better.

Recent Climate Change News

News and brief summary:

• Serious questions being raised about the integrity of NASA's GISS data set. Is global warming a data manipulation phenomenon? H/T: Tapir
• And more fiddling of climate change models.
• The Sun has a "dead face". Is this causing the collapse in global temperatures?
• Australia's Federal Environment Minister wants churches to pray at Gaia's altar. And churches appear happy to acquiesce his demands.

Freeman Dyson Spills Ink

This brilliant theoretical physicist writes two book reviews for the NY Review of Books. Topic? Global Warming. In particular policy prescriptions & the scientific climate. Bottom line of several pages of review?

1. Assuming AGW is true, a global carbon tax (determined by some sort of optimisation routine) increasing over time is most efficient economic mechanism. Call this the "optimal policy".
2. Policy prescription: "Avoid the ambitious proposals. Develop the science and technology for a low-cost backstop (cheap solar, "carbon-eating trees" &c - my addition). Negotiate an international treaty coming as close as possible to the optimal policy, in case the low-cost backstop fails. Avoid an international treaty making the Kyoto Protocol policy permanent."
3. Policy prescriptions proposed by Stern and Gore are "disastrously expensive".

Some context: Dyson is a proponent of AGW. And a lefty. And despite both of these deep seated convictions he remains more dispassionate and insightful than most (including myself).

Brilliant discussion and analysis. Read the whole thing.

Hysteria Pays Dividends

Al Gore has just raked in another $US700m from institutional investors, including the Victoria Super Fund. The monies raised will be dished out in lots of approx $US30m to "renewable energy; energy efficiency technologies; energy from biofuels and biomass; and the carbon trading markets." Supposedly, Gore has also taken a "sizeable stake" in the fund and is thus contributing to the humanitarian crisis caused by grains being used to drive cars rather feed people. But Gore has a Nobel Peace Prize. So there!

David Blood, who manages the fund said that:

The fact we were able to raise $683m was extraordinary...A fear expressed by some is that the first thing to go in a downturn is the nice-to-have sort of investment. Some people put green investments in that category, but we think that is nonsense. This is not nice-to-have – it is fundamental finance...because the transition from a high-carbon to a low-carbon economy is a ginormous step that is going to happen quickly

I guess when you create an existential panic using Styrofoam you can trump panicked markets and create your own words. Why not?

Update 30/4/08 6:00PM AEST: If this trend continues, then we will all be having to wear two jumpers in winter. And there will be some unhappy super fund members in Victoria. So much for global warming.