Global warming... again.

[tzor]

I don't deny science. I deny leaping to conclusions; especially when I know the ulterior motivations of the people making the "leaps of faith."

[BigBallinStalin]

"_______ denier" is an interesting piece of rhetoric to "win" your argument.

[tzor]

Record Antarctica Ice Contradicts Global Warming Trend

As climatologists worry about the effects of global warming, Antarctica has quietly set a new record for the greatest sea ice extent ever measured at either pole, according to various sources.

[PLAYER57832]

Record Antarctica Ice Contradicts Global Warming Trend

As climatologists worry about the effects of global warming, Antarctica has quietly set a new record for the greatest sea ice extent ever measured at either pole, according to various sources.

Without any citations, its impossible to say if the data they are referring to was even cited correctly. However, offhand, the idea that universal and complete melting was ever predicted is just wrong.

There was some data along these lines presented in the global warming thread I suggested you read. Teh bottom line is that the Antartic ice expands and grows. Its not a refutation of global warming theories, at all. It just shows that too many people are too lazy to bother with the science, but feel free to criticize its conclusions none-the-less.

[BigBallinStalin]

I found this amusing:

FAREED ZAKARIA, HOST: Your funding, some of your funding came from the Koch brothers who are famously anti-global warming, or believe that it isn’t happening. How did that play out? Did, were they disappointed by the results of your research or have they asked for their money back?

Zakaria must have thought he had asked his guest the perfect loaded question. As it turned out, he was shooting blanks:

RICHARD MULLER, UC BERKELEY: [Laughs] I actually find it amusing how many people think they know what the Koch brothers are thinking. It’s a caricature of these people who I did speak with them, and they made it clear to me from the very beginning that they recognize that there were serious issues raised about prior estimates of global warming: everything from urban heat islands to data selection bias to other things. And they knew that I wanted to look into that, and our team would do a good unbiased job, and all they were asking for was scientific objectivity. So, I was very pleased with their fundings. I really sense they wanted to have this problem solved, and they never gave me any suggestion, any hint of a suggestion about which side they were hoping we’d come out on.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-shepp ... r-have-the


Remember all that vehement bitching and rhetoric leveled against the Koch Brothers on climate change?

What does the above response by Richard Muller signify?

[PLAYER57832]

What does the above response by Richard Muller signify?

That you enjoy trolling?

[Neoteny]

That people like mixing politics and science?

[Dukasaur]

I found this amusing:

FAREED ZAKARIA, HOST: Your funding, some of your funding came from the Koch brothers who are famously anti-global warming, or believe that it isn’t happening. How did that play out? Did, were they disappointed by the results of your research or have they asked for their money back?

Zakaria must have thought he had asked his guest the perfect loaded question. As it turned out, he was shooting blanks:

RICHARD MULLER, UC BERKELEY: [Laughs] I actually find it amusing how many people think they know what the Koch brothers are thinking. It’s a caricature of these people who I did speak with them, and they made it clear to me from the very beginning that they recognize that there were serious issues raised about prior estimates of global warming: everything from urban heat islands to data selection bias to other things. And they knew that I wanted to look into that, and our team would do a good unbiased job, and all they were asking for was scientific objectivity. So, I was very pleased with their fundings. I really sense they wanted to have this problem solved, and they never gave me any suggestion, any hint of a suggestion about which side they were hoping we’d come out on.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-shepp ... r-have-the


Remember all that vehement bitching and rhetoric leveled against the Koch Brothers on climate change?

What does the above response by Richard Muller signify?

I'm not sure what you're getting at, but he seemed to me to have no particular axe to grind. Of course I could be naive; he might be grinding a secret axe with great sophistication and misdirection, but Occam's razor suggests the former.

[BigBallinStalin]

I found this amusing:

FAREED ZAKARIA, HOST: Your funding, some of your funding came from the Koch brothers who are famously anti-global warming, or believe that it isn’t happening. How did that play out? Did, were they disappointed by the results of your research or have they asked for their money back?

Zakaria must have thought he had asked his guest the perfect loaded question. As it turned out, he was shooting blanks:

RICHARD MULLER, UC BERKELEY: [Laughs] I actually find it amusing how many people think they know what the Koch brothers are thinking. It’s a caricature of these people who I did speak with them, and they made it clear to me from the very beginning that they recognize that there were serious issues raised about prior estimates of global warming: everything from urban heat islands to data selection bias to other things. And they knew that I wanted to look into that, and our team would do a good unbiased job, and all they were asking for was scientific objectivity. So, I was very pleased with their fundings. I really sense they wanted to have this problem solved, and they never gave me any suggestion, any hint of a suggestion about which side they were hoping we’d come out on.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-shepp ... r-have-the


Remember all that vehement bitching and rhetoric leveled against the Koch Brothers on climate change?

What does the above response by Richard Muller signify?

I'm not sure what you're getting at, but he seemed to me to have no particular axe to grind. Of course I could be naive; he might be grinding a secret axe with great sophistication and misdirection, but Occam's razor suggests the former.

I bring this up because of a few things.

(0) Player doesn't know what she's talking about (re: 1st post of this page)

(1) People/MS media bitch about Koch Brothers This and Koch Brothers That, but given that the account by the Koch Brothers-funded scientist, the image construed of Koch Industries Inc (KII) was false. Yet, people believed it to be true.

(2) Regarding climate change, people held preconceived views and held their opinions as fact. When a large consensus was made (argumentum populum, or whatever the appeal to the majority fallacy is), this merely reinforced their views, and they did not wish for such views to be criticized, nor do they wish to be open to revision (Symmetry is a good example of this in the TSA thread). When Koch Industries Inc. funded research to tease out the problems of the general consensus on climate change, and revealed some issues (e.g. hot islands in cities may have been one), many laypersons simply reacted with stupidity--or vehemently rejected such criticism because it would cast doubt on the 'consensus', which conveniently reinforced their own opinions.

(3) IN conclusion, I guess all I'm saying is that some people are stupid, even when science is mixed in. People advocate for Policy A and fit facts into their conclusion at their convenience. The global cooling to global warming to climate change shifts in thought were amusing.

[Neoteny]

So, like, I heard about Koch for the first time two days ago. What's the deal with them? I'm guessing we're not talking about Robert Koch?

EDIT: Nevermind. I googled it; another large company putting short term gains over long-term solutions.

[BigBallinStalin]

So, like, I heard about Koch for the first time two days ago. What's the deal with them? I'm guessing we're not talking about Robert Koch?

EDIT: Nevermind. I googled it; another large company putting short term gains over long-term solutions.

Ah, and so it begins.

How do you know?

[Neoteny]

So, it comes to this...

The funding of Muller's work alone indicates this, since, as reported here, Muller's work was essentially a replication of work that was done in the field previously. I have a certain degree of respect for Muller having the intestinal fortitude to make a list of issues he had (even if they were already addressed), test them (even if they were already tested), and come to a conclusion opposite his original position (this is actually a big deal). Why it needed to be his own research is beyond me, but it would be unfair to say that's uncommon in science.

Anyhow, as it relates to Misters Koch, while Muller has the excuse of professional egocentrism, the brothers do not. Though I obviously don't know their innermost personal motivations, and I can't find a recent statement by them or the company as to further research (my Google results were a mess of Greenpeace hategasm and climate realist back-patting), the fact that they are funding studies/whatever that are attempting to call into question not just nitpicky bits, but the very foundation of a well documented phenomenon leads me to believe that their goals might have some sort of basis that relates maybe in some possible form or fashion to their bottom line perhaps. A good way to convince me otherwise would be to give an example of some of their other esoteric basic science forays. Perhaps crustacean metabolism on treadmills or something? The additional information that at least one of the brothers possesses so-called "wackaloon" political/economic views may also be coloring my perspective. As it stands, though, a large company that has interest in minimizing regulation which is also oriented toward sowing doubt against an obvious scientific theory which has ramifications on short term regulation and also long term "oh noes polar bears" forces me to my conclusion above.

[BigBallinStalin]

So, it comes to this...

The funding of Muller's work alone indicates this, since, as reported here, Muller's work was essentially a replication of work that was done in the field previously. I have a certain degree of respect for Muller having the intestinal fortitude to make a list of issues he had (even if they were already addressed), test them (even if they were already tested), and come to a conclusion opposite his original position (this is actually a big deal). Why it needed to be his own research is beyond me, but it would be unfair to say that's uncommon in science.

Anyhow, as it relates to Misters Koch, while Muller has the excuse of professional egocentrism, the brothers do not. Though I obviously don't know their innermost personal motivations, and I can't find a recent statement by them or the company as to further research (my Google results were a mess of Greenpeace hategasm and climate realist back-patting), the fact that they are funding studies/whatever that are attempting to call into question not just nitpicky bits, but the very foundation of a well documented phenomenon leads me to believe that their goals might have some sort of basis that relates maybe in some possible form or fashion to their bottom line perhaps. A good way to convince me otherwise would be to give an example of some of their other esoteric basic science forays. Perhaps crustacean metabolism on treadmills or something? The additional information that at least one of the brothers possesses so-called "wackaloon" political/economic views may also be coloring my perspective. As it stands, though, a large company that has interest in minimizing regulation which is also oriented toward sowing doubt against an obvious scientific theory which has ramifications on short term regulation and also long term "oh noes polar bears" forces me to my conclusion above.

As always, Neoteny, I appreciate your insights.

Well, Koch Industries, Inc. does own one of the largest paper producers. If blunt environmental regulation is implemented but is stupid (costly unintended consequences) and fails to achieve optimal goals, then it may result in unemployment and decreased revenue for KII (as well as other businesses). So, it is necessary for KII to conduct this kind of research.


A dual-sword with regulation and lobbying is that businesses which would be greatly affected by regulation have to invest heavily in influencing regulation. There's a gray area in this spectrum: On one extreme is merely informing regulators and coordinating with them to show that if they wish to achieve X, then they must do Y and not Z because a, b, c, and d. On the other extreme side is collusion which splits the pie for the benefactors of the lobbying company and for the regulators--but yields poor results for taxpayers/everyone else.

In between these extremes is that gray area, and after reading their Science of Success (a book on KII's business model and general intentions and goals) and discussing with several affiliates and employers of Koch Industries Inc about this book and how they run their business, I'm of the opinion that KII lies more toward the informing regulators side of the spectrum.


My main concern about environmental policy is that the general voting public is uninformed yet well-intended, so they'll support policies of terrible unintended consequences--alongside other public policies which affect producers and consumers' ability to reevaluate their production, consumption, and savings in accordance to expected problems. Within this, I see an increasingly hostile yet ignorant view (e.g. OWS and most environmentalists on the left) in regard to markets and its capacity to deal with environmental concerns better than the most solutions driven by public policies. Of course, this view of 'others' will change once I get out of such an economically ignorant place, but that's another story.

[Symmetry]

Environmental and safety record

From 1999 to 2003, Koch Industries was assessed "more than $400 million in fines, penalties and judgments."[25] Another source points out that Koch has had only "eight instances of alleged misconduct ... over the span of 63 years" despite being a giant multinational, and that this compares favorably to the fines, penalties and judgments accrued by the similarly large General Electric corporation.[46]
In May 2001, Koch Industries paid $25 million to the federal government to settle a federal lawsuit that found the company had improperly taken more oil than it had paid for from federal and Indian land.[47]

Legal activity

In 2008, Koch Industries discovered that the French affiliate Koch-Glitsch had violated bribery laws allegedly securing contracts in Algeria, Egypt, India, Morocco, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia after an investigation by Ethics Compliance officer, Egorova-Farines.[25] After Koch Industries' investigative team looked into her findings, the four employees involved were terminated. A Bloomberg article states that Egorova-Farines reported her findings immediately, and even after Koch’s investigators substantiated the findings, her “superiors removed her from the inquiry in August 2008 and fired her in June 2009, calling her incompetent.”[25] Koch Industries’ general counsel, Mark Holden, gave a different account of the events to Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post.[48] Holden stated that Egorova-Farines failed to promptly share the findings, choosing instead to give the information to a manager at Koch-Glitsch who was later fired for bribery. Rubin writes that, according to Holden, “Egorova-Farines was not fired but instead ran into performance problems, left the company to go on leave and never returned.” Egorova-Farines sued Koch-Glitsch for wrongful termination in France. Rubin writes that she lost and “was ordered to pay costs for bringing a frivolous case.”[48]

In May 2011, a Utah judge dismissed a Koch Industries lawsuit alleging that Youth For Climate Truth, in releasing a fake Koch Industries press release, had infringed on Koch Industries' trademark.[49]

[BigBallinStalin]

Environmental and safety record

From 1999 to 2003, Koch Industries was assessed "more than $400 million in fines, penalties and judgments."[25] Another source points out that Koch has had only "eight instances of alleged misconduct ... over the span of 63 years" despite being a giant multinational, and that this compares favorably to the fines, penalties and judgments accrued by the similarly large General Electric corporation.[46]
In May 2001, Koch Industries paid $25 million to the federal government to settle a federal lawsuit that found the company had improperly taken more oil than it had paid for from federal and Indian land.[47]

That's impressive.

[Neoteny]

As always, Neoteny, I appreciate your insights.

Well, Koch Industries, Inc. does own one of the largest paper producers. If blunt environmental regulation is implemented but is stupid (costly unintended consequences) and fails to achieve optimal goals, then it may result in unemployment and decreased revenue for KII (as well as other businesses). So, it is necessary for KII to conduct this kind of research.

Unless I'm misreading you, I have to fully disagree with that conclusion. I sincerely hope Koch is putting money into research regarding effective regulation that is business friendly which addresses climate change concerns. I wouldn't know where to look for evidence of such funding, particularly after trying to wade through those Google results earlier. Indeed, it would be bad business, in my opinion, to not want to have some sort of plan to put forward that merges business and environmental interests, particularly when one considers current trends in public opinion (it's only a matter of time before climate change is popularly accepted). Preparation seems like good business to me. Muller's research does not (to date) fit that mold. They started out redoing (somewhat publically) all the basic science. Perhaps this is just phase one of some multi part master research project which aims to eventually touch on business models and regulatory reform. But I'll be goddamned if this doesn't look like the standardized obfuscate and misdirect that is the forte of every antiscience effort I've ever seen. In short, I hope they are dedicating resources toward responsible environmental action that bolsters or at least maintains economic interests, but it really looks like they are just trying to prove something in climate science.

A dual-sword with regulation and lobbying is that businesses which would be greatly affected by regulation have to invest heavily in influencing regulation. There's a gray area in this spectrum: On one extreme is merely informing regulators and coordinating with them to show that if they wish to achieve X, then they must do Y and not Z because a, b, c, and d. On the other extreme side is collusion which splits the pie for the benefactors of the lobbying company and for the regulators--but yields poor results for taxpayers/everyone else.

In between these extremes is that gray area, and after reading their Science of Success (a book on KII's business model and general intentions and goals) and discussing with several affiliates and employers of Koch Industries Inc about this book and how they run their business, I'm of the opinion that KII lies more toward the informing regulators side of the spectrum.

I don't have any issue with this reading of their lobbying values. I have no reason to find your research on this matter faulty. But it doesn't change the fact that their focus seems to be more on the side of the veracity of global warming theory, and less on effective ways to use the science provided to maintain a strong economy and environment. I'm not certain that the two are mutually exclusive yet, so I don't know why KII might be. Are you aware of any research they support in some fashion that does account for AGW?

My main concern about environmental policy is that the general voting public is uninformed yet well-intended, so they'll support policies of terrible unintended consequences--alongside other public policies which affect producers and consumers' ability to reevaluate their production, consumption, and savings in accordance to expected problems. Within this, I see an increasingly hostile yet ignorant view (e.g. OWS and most environmentalists on the left) in regard to markets and its capacity to deal with environmental concerns better than the most solutions driven by public policies. Of course, this view of 'others' will change once I get out of such an economically ignorant place, but that's another story.

Well, that puts us in an awkward situation, doesn't it? We have a public uninformed in both science and economics, whatever that might entail, and companies apparently expressing an interest in actively muddying up one side of the equation (as uninformed as the general public, or actively working against scientific progress?). As a scientist, how should this make me feel about market solutions when it comes to a) creating an informed population, and b) working toward environmental and economic harmony?

[PLAYER57832]

I found this amusing:

FAREED ZAKARIA, HOST: Your funding, some of your funding came from the Koch brothers who are famously anti-global warming, or believe that it isn’t happening. How did that play out? Did, were they disappointed by the results of your research or have they asked for their money back?

Zakaria must have thought he had asked his guest the perfect loaded question. As it turned out, he was shooting blanks:

RICHARD MULLER, UC BERKELEY: [Laughs] I actually find it amusing how many people think they know what the Koch brothers are thinking. It’s a caricature of these people who I did speak with them, and they made it clear to me from the very beginning that they recognize that there were serious issues raised about prior estimates of global warming: everything from urban heat islands to data selection bias to other things. And they knew that I wanted to look into that, and our team would do a good unbiased job, and all they were asking for was scientific objectivity. So, I was very pleased with their fundings. I really sense they wanted to have this problem solved, and they never gave me any suggestion, any hint of a suggestion about which side they were hoping we’d come out on.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-shepp ... r-have-the


Remember all that vehement bitching and rhetoric leveled against the Koch Brothers on climate change?

What does the above response by Richard Muller signify?

I'm not sure what you're getting at, but he seemed to me to have no particular axe to grind. Of course I could be naive; he might be grinding a secret axe with great sophistication and misdirection, but Occam's razor suggests the former.

I bring this up because of a few things.

(0) Player doesn't know what she's talking about (re: 1st post of this page)

(1) People/MS media bitch about Koch Brothers This and Koch Brothers That, but given that the account by the Koch Brothers-funded scientist, the image construed of Koch Industries Inc (KII) was false. Yet, people believed it to be true.

(2) Regarding climate change, people held preconceived views and held their opinions as fact. When a large consensus was made (argumentum populum, or whatever the appeal to the majority fallacy is), this merely reinforced their views, and they did not wish for such views to be criticized, nor do they wish to be open to revision (Symmetry is a good example of this in the TSA thread). When Koch Industries Inc. funded research to tease out the problems of the general consensus on climate change, and revealed some issues (e.g. hot islands in cities may have been one), many laypersons simply reacted with stupidity--or vehemently rejected such criticism because it would cast doubt on the 'consensus', which conveniently reinforced their own opinions.

(3) IN conclusion, I guess all I'm saying is that some people are stupid, even when science is mixed in. People advocate for Policy A and fit facts into their conclusion at their convenience. The global cooling to global warming to climate change shifts in thought were amusing.

Actually, what you really show, (regardless of what you intended) is that science and money are blurred. It does take money to do research. BUT the part you miss is that real science, as opposed to media or political hype is based upon substantiation of fact.

In the case of Global warming, the facts are clear. The climate IS changing... and finding out who is funding what research does not change that except that when you look into the fudning for the few outliers.. those that dispute that the climate is changing or caused by humans you find people heavily vested in the current energy climate. .. that, or you are looking at very early results that have long since disproven.

[BigBallinStalin]

You sound as if you're very familiar with the research produced by KII. Please, player, share with us exactly what their position is and has been.

[Symmetry]

You sound as if you're very familiar with the research produced by KII. Please, player, share with us exactly what their position is and has been.

Environmental and safety record

From 1999 to 2003, Koch Industries was assessed "more than $400 million in fines, penalties and judgments."[25] Another source points out that Koch has had only "eight instances of alleged misconduct ... over the span of 63 years" despite being a giant multinational, and that this compares favorably to the fines, penalties and judgments accrued by the similarly large General Electric corporation.[46]
In May 2001, Koch Industries paid $25 million to the federal government to settle a federal lawsuit that found the company had improperly taken more oil than it had paid for from federal and Indian land.[47]

Legal activity

In 2008, Koch Industries discovered that the French affiliate Koch-Glitsch had violated bribery laws allegedly securing contracts in Algeria, Egypt, India, Morocco, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia after an investigation by Ethics Compliance officer, Egorova-Farines.[25] After Koch Industries' investigative team looked into her findings, the four employees involved were terminated. A Bloomberg article states that Egorova-Farines reported her findings immediately, and even after Koch’s investigators substantiated the findings, her “superiors removed her from the inquiry in August 2008 and fired her in June 2009, calling her incompetent.”[25] Koch Industries’ general counsel, Mark Holden, gave a different account of the events to Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post.[48] Holden stated that Egorova-Farines failed to promptly share the findings, choosing instead to give the information to a manager at Koch-Glitsch who was later fired for bribery. Rubin writes that, according to Holden, “Egorova-Farines was not fired but instead ran into performance problems, left the company to go on leave and never returned.” Egorova-Farines sued Koch-Glitsch for wrongful termination in France. Rubin writes that she lost and “was ordered to pay costs for bringing a frivolous case.”[48]

In May 2011, a Utah judge dismissed a Koch Industries lawsuit alleging that Youth For Climate Truth, in releasing a fake Koch Industries press release, had infringed on Koch Industries' trademark.[49]

[BigBallinStalin]

You sound as if you're very familiar with the research produced by KII. Please, player, share with us exactly what their position is and has been.

Environmental and safety record

From 1999 to 2003, Koch Industries was assessed "more than $400 million in fines, penalties and judgments."[25] Another source points out that Koch has had only "eight instances of alleged misconduct ... over the span of 63 years" despite being a giant multinational, and that this compares favorably to the fines, penalties and judgments accrued by the similarly large General Electric corporation.[46]
In May 2001, Koch Industries paid $25 million to the federal government to settle a federal lawsuit that found the company had improperly taken more oil than it had paid for from federal and Indian land.[47]

Legal activity

In 2008, Koch Industries discovered that the French affiliate Koch-Glitsch had violated bribery laws allegedly securing contracts in Algeria, Egypt, India, Morocco, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia after an investigation by Ethics Compliance officer, Egorova-Farines.[25] After Koch Industries' investigative team looked into her findings, the four employees involved were terminated. A Bloomberg article states that Egorova-Farines reported her findings immediately, and even after Koch’s investigators substantiated the findings, her “superiors removed her from the inquiry in August 2008 and fired her in June 2009, calling her incompetent.”[25] Koch Industries’ general counsel, Mark Holden, gave a different account of the events to Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post.[48] Holden stated that Egorova-Farines failed to promptly share the findings, choosing instead to give the information to a manager at Koch-Glitsch who was later fired for bribery. Rubin writes that, according to Holden, “Egorova-Farines was not fired but instead ran into performance problems, left the company to go on leave and never returned.” Egorova-Farines sued Koch-Glitsch for wrongful termination in France. Rubin writes that she lost and “was ordered to pay costs for bringing a frivolous case.”[48]

In May 2011, a Utah judge dismissed a Koch Industries lawsuit alleging that Youth For Climate Truth, in releasing a fake Koch Industries press release, had infringed on Koch Industries' trademark.[49]

Oh, I see, "environmental/safety record = environmental research."

You can sit at the kids' table, Sym.

[Nobunaga]

More mud in the eye for the climate panic zealots.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blumer ... orms-uk-me

[oVo]

More mud in the eye for the climate panic zealots.

I don't think the Arctic Sea remains frozen as in the past
and Himalayan & Andes Glaciers continue to recede.

show: i blame miley

[Metsfanmax]

More mud in the eye for the climate panic zealots.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blumer ... orms-uk-me

Climate scientists predicted that the Arctic sea ice minimum would likely be larger this year than last year. The reason why? The sea ice minimum in 2012 was so low that the 2013 minimum was likely to be larger due to pure statistical noise. Year-to-year variations are much less important than long-term trends, which is something you really need to keep in mind when reading any piece which suggests that a single comparison between two years is enough to disprove or prove the reality of global warming.

[Lootifer]

More mud in the eye for the climate panic zealots.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blumer ... orms-uk-me

Isnt inter year variations something that is typically used relentlessly against those in support of global warming by those who are believe it to be a myth?

Not taking a side, just sayin' you need to play with a stright bat.

[oVo]

Global warming or not... this Planet and it's Oceans are in a warming trend in the present tense. The global sea temps are up nearly 2º which may not seem like much, but is substantial. People can debate the cause all they want, but the planet's temperature is on the rise. Natural cycle or boosted by human activities may be moot, since the heat seems to be on the rise.

There was a time when the Bering Sea could be crossed by vehicle or on foot in the Winter months, but not lately.