Brutal Assessment (read up ye climate mongers!)

[blatzer]

Harold Lewis is Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Here is his letter of resignation to Curtis G. Callan Jr, Princeton University, President of the American Physical Society.
Dear Curt:
When I first joined the American Physical Society sixty-seven years ago it was much smaller, much gentler, and as yet uncorrupted by the money flood (a threat against which Dwight Eisenhower warned a half-century ago). Indeed, the choice of physics as a profession was then a guarantor of a life of poverty and abstinence—it was World War II that changed all that. The prospect of worldly gain drove few physicists. How different it is now. The giants no longer walk the earth, and the money flood has become the raison d’être of much physics research, the vital sustenance of much more, and it provides the support for untold numbers of professional jobs. For reasons that will soon become clear my former pride at being an APS Fellow all these years has been turned into shame, and I am forced, with no pleasure at all, to offer you my resignation from the Society.
It is of course, the global warming scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist. Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.) I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.
So what has the APS, as an organization, done in the face of this challenge? It has accepted the corruption as the norm, and gone along with it. For example:
1. About a year ago a few of us sent an e-mail on the subject to a fraction of the membership. APS ignored the issues, but the then President immediately launched a hostile investigation of where we got the e-mail addresses. In its better days, APS used to encourage discussion of important issues, and indeed the Constitution cites that as its principal purpose. No more. Everything that has been done in the last year has been designed to silence debate
2. The appallingly tendentious APS statement on Climate Change was apparently written in a hurry by a few people over lunch, and is certainly not representative of the talents of APS members as I have long known them. So a few of us petitioned the Council to reconsider it. One of the outstanding marks of (in)distinction in the Statement was the poison word incontrovertible, which describes few items in physics, certainly not this one. In response APS appointed a secret committee that never met, never troubled to speak to any skeptics, yet endorsed the Statement in its entirety. (They did admit that the tone was a bit strong, but amazingly kept the poison word incontrovertible to describe the evidence, a position supported by no one.) In the end, the Council kept the original statement, word for word, but approved a far longer “explanatory” screed, admitting that there were uncertainties, but brushing them aside to give blanket approval to the original. The original Statement, which still stands as the APS position, also contains what I consider pompous and asinine advice to all world governments, as if the APS were master of the universe. It is not, and I am embarrassed that our leaders seem to think it is. This is not fun and games, these are serious matters involving vast fractions of our national substance, and the reputation of the Society as a scientific society is at stake.
3. In the interim the ClimateGate scandal broke into the news, and the machinations of the principal alarmists were revealed to the world. It was a fraud on a scale I have never seen, and I lack the words to describe its enormity. Effect on the APS position: none. None at all. This is not science; other forces are at work.
4. So a few of us tried to bring science into the act (that is, after all, the alleged and historic purpose of APS), and collected the necessary 200+ signatures to bring to the Council a proposal for a Topical Group on Climate Science, thinking that open discussion of the scientific issues, in the best tradition of physics, would be beneficial to all, and also a contribution to the nation. I might note that it was not easy to collect the signatures, since you denied us the use of the APS membership list. We conformed in every way with the requirements of the APS Constitution, and described in great detail what we had in mind—simply to bring the subject into the open.<
5. To our amazement, Constitution be damned, you declined to accept our petition, but instead used your own control of the mailing list to run a poll on the members’ interest in a TG on Climate and the Environment. You did ask the members if they would sign a petition to form a TG on your yet-to-be-defined subject, but provided no petition, and got lots of affirmative responses. (If you had asked about sex you would have gotten more expressions of interest.) There was of course no such petition or proposal, and you have now dropped the Environment part, so the whole matter is moot. (Any lawyer will tell you that you cannot collect signatures on a vague petition, and then fill in whatever you like.) The entire purpose of this exercise was to avoid your constitutional responsibility to take our petition to the Council.
6. As of now you have formed still another secret and stacked committee to organize your own TG, simply ignoring our lawful petition.
APS management has gamed the problem from the beginning, to suppress serious conversation about the merits of the climate change claims. Do you wonder that I have lost confidence in the organization?
I do feel the need to add one note, and this is conjecture, since it is always risky to discuss other people’s motives. This scheming at APS HQ is so bizarre that there cannot be a simple explanation for it. Some have held that the physicists of today are not as smart as they used to be, but I don’t think that is an issue. I think it is the money, exactly what Eisenhower warned about a half-century ago. There are indeed trillions of dollars involved, to say nothing of the fame and glory (and frequent trips to exotic islands) that go with being a member of the club. Your own Physics Department (of which you are chairman) would lose millions a year if the global warming bubble burst. When Penn State absolved Mike Mann of wrongdoing, and the University of East Anglia did the same for Phil Jones, they cannot have been unaware of the financial penalty for doing otherwise. As the old saying goes, you don’t have to be a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing. Since I am no philosopher, I’m not going to explore at just which point enlightened self-interest crosses the line into corruption, but a careful reading of the ClimateGate releases makes it clear that this is not an academic question.
I want no part of it, so please accept my resignation. APS no longer represents me, but I hope we are still friends.
Hal
Harold Lewis is Emeritus Professor of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, former Chairman; Former member Defense Science Board, chmn of Technology panel; Chairman DSB study on Nuclear Winter; Former member Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards; Former member, President’s Nuclear Safety Oversight Committee; Chairman APS study on Nuclear Reactor Safety
Chairman Risk Assessment Review Group; Co-founder and former Chairman of JASON; Former member USAF Scientific Advisory Board; Served in US Navy in WW II; books: Technological Risk (about, surprise, technological risk) and Why Flip a Coin (about decision making)

[JLT]

Harold Lewis is Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Here is his letter of resignation to Curtis G. Callan Jr, Princeton University, President of the American Physical Society.

The fellow obviously has issues with the APS, but it's difficult to determine how much of it questions the science itself, and how much relates his feeling that the APS has done him wrong. I'd be interested in hearing the APS's side of the story.

As for the "trillions of dollars" that are driving what he calls the ClimateGate scam, we should be reminded of the trillions of dollars spent on the other side, by energy companies, in an effort to dismiss the phenomenon completely.

Regarding the "ClimateGate" reference, there's another side of that story, too:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/12/0 ... 71223.html

I, for one, am glad that there is a controversy regarding the data and their interpretation. That's science at its best. But when the consensus of opinion is moving to the conclusion that human-influenced global warming is a real possibility, and that its effects are potentially catastrophic, then you have to pay attention to it. As near as I can figure, the global warming people have better data on their side, but I'll leave it to the scientists to determine that.

That said, I agree that if the APS really did treat Dr. Lewis as shabbily has he described, they did science a great disservice. But good science will survive that.

[ruckman101]

APS Comments on Harold Lewis’ Resignation of his Society Membership

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a recent letter to the American Physical Society (APS) President Curtis A. Callan, chair of the Princeton University Physics Department, Harold Lewis, emeritus physics professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, announced that he was resigning his APS membership.

In response to numerous accusations in the letter, APS issues the following statement:

There is no truth to Dr. Lewis’ assertion that APS policy statements are driven by financial gain. To the contrary, as a membership organization of more than 48,000 physicists, APS adheres to rigorous ethical standards in developing its statements. The Society is open to review of its statements if members petition the APS Council – the Society’s democratically elected governing body – to do so.

Dr. Lewis’ specific charge that APS as an organization is benefitting financially from climate change funding is equally false. Neither the operating officers nor the elected leaders of the Society have a monetary stake in such funding. Moreover, relatively few APS members conduct climate change research, and therefore the vast majority of the Society’s members derive no personal benefit from such research support.

On the matter of global climate change, APS notes that virtually all reputable scientists agree with the following observations:

* Carbon dioxide is increasing in the atmosphere due to human activity;
* Carbon dioxide is an excellent infrared absorber, and therefore, its increasing presence in the atmosphere contributes to global warming; and
* The dwell time of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is hundreds of years.

On these matters, APS judges the science to be quite clear. However, APS continues to recognize that climate models are far from adequate, and the extent of global warming and climatic disruptions produced by sustained increases in atmospheric carbon loading remain uncertain. In light of the significant settled aspects of the science, APS totally rejects Dr. Lewis’ claim that global warming is a “scam” and a “pseudoscientific fraud.”

Additionally, APS notes that it has taken extraordinary steps to solicit opinions from its membership on climate change. After receiving significant commentary from APS members, the Society’s Panel on Public Affairs finalized an addendum to the APS climate change statement reaffirming the significance of the issue. The APS Council overwhelmingly endorsed the reaffirmation.

Lastly, in response to widespread interest expressed by its members, the APS is in the process of organizing a Topical Group to feature forefront research and to encourage exchange of information on the physics of climate.


neal

[Amskeptic]

Very nice back and forth references here. Hyperbole can damage the credibility of the hyperbolic.
Colin

[MeyerII]

Nice post Neal. I've never heard the argument summed up so nicely as it was in those three bullet points.

[Bleyseng]

I pretty have stopped reading the hyperbolic crap from the FoxNewsies as you can't reason with em nor disagree with em as they are right.

Still in my meager 58 yrs on the planet its alot hotter now...course I remember when you couldn't see the sun an hour before sunset in Seattle due to the smog. People with breathing problems couldn't go out during the bad days... That was a big issue back then too- as who was gonna pay for all these smog emissions stuff on our cars, not me!!! Its a 'merican right to pollute and governments role.
40 yrs later and thank god the government stepped in to curb emissions!

Now its time for the Government to step in and curb/eliminate CO2 emissions even if it hurts.

[Amskeptic]

I pretty have stopped reading the hyperbolic crap from the FoxNewsies

thank god the government stepped in to curb emissions!

Now its time for the Government to step in and curb/eliminate CO2 emissions even if it hurts.

The ranting against "The Government" is not only childish, but disingenuous. The BP oil spill illuminated that.
Colin

[glasseye]

http://www.truth-out.org/glenn-beck-bri ... ate-change

Read the URL. It describes the article.

[ruckman101]

http://www.truth-out.org/glenn-beck-bri ... ate-change

Read the URL. It describes the article.

Lots of hands washing the other.



neal

[Amskeptic]

And so, the subject-to-hysterical-stampeding flock was led astray once more from the sunny pasture on the hill to the rocky glen of the grey-haired white wolves . . . .
Colin

[glasseye]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/18/opini ... ml?_r=1&hp

From today's NYT. Of ALL Republicans up for election, only one isn't a climate change denier.

Feeling lonely, blatzer?

[blatzer]

seen any english snow storms lately
i know, it's colder now because it's really hotter and they're leading me right up to the edge, oh well
'don't stop beleevin'

[ruckman101]

It's all about trends.


neal

[Velokid1]

It's all about trends.


neal

Trends aren't convincing for people with such narrow vision that they are unable to recognize or appreciate patterns. All they see is the patch of ground where their foot is going to fall next. And if there isn't a pile of shit right there for them to step in, well then there must not be any piles of shit anywhere in the world at all.

[MeyerII]

It's all about trends.


neal

Trends aren't convincing for people with such narrow vision that they are unable to recognize or appreciate patterns. All they see is the patch of ground where their foot is going to fall next.

Word. And then they post about it.