Saigon
Gold Member
What surprises me everyday here about the climate change discussions is the sometimes staggeringly poor argumentation presented by sceptics.
There are credible scientific questions still to be answered by scientists on this topic - and yet those questions are rarely raised here. Instead we the same paint-by-numbers cliches from posters who show little sign of even believing the arguments themselves.
Here are the five I hope posters will begin to move on from:
1) Scientists produce the reports government demand of them; scientists fake research to advance their careers.
Rebuttal: In a left-wing society this might make sense, and it probably has happened on occassion - but it ignores the fact that there are right-wing governments in power in many major western economic right now. When conservative governments ask their own experts for info on climate change, we can be fairly sure they are getting decent information. And yet, in country after country, we see conservative governments and their scientific advisors confirm AGW.
2) Research is faked, manipulated etc
Rebuttal: I can remember 2 or 3 cases of fraud in the medical sector in Finland during the past 10 years or so, e.g. a doctor with fake credentials. This does not mean medicine is bogus. What it does mean is that in any field there will be come crooks. Climate science seems to be clean by comparison with most other fields, with very, very few acusations made against research these days.
3) The climate is always changing, these are natural cycles.
Rebuttal: Climate changes only when it is made to change. There are no natural cycles. If the earth is cooling for several hundred years and then begins to warm, it does so because something triggered a cooling phase, and then something else triggered a warming phase. Check any chart of temperatures, and you won't see a smooth, even cycle. What you see are wild peaks and troughs, generally following specific events of triggers.
4) It's all about redistribution of wealth, socialist conspiracy
Rebuttal: In a world where more western countries are rightwing than left, this is the silliest theory of all. If anyone can explain why hard-core right-wing politicians in Germany, the UK, Canada or Australia would support a left-wing conspiracy, they need to explain it to their therapist.
5 Scientists are only in it for the money
Rebuttal: No one spends 10 years at university because they think they can make millions in teaching or research. There is more money to be made in a dozen other fields. People study physics or biology because the field interests them. It makes no sense at all to suggest that literally thousands of scientists all over the world would start faking research because they thought they would get more funding for doing so. On the contrary, oil poured billions into research denying climate change, before finaly conceding defeat. If scientists were only interested in money, there would be more seeking out the big dollars to be made in denial. The scientists that I have met have been sane, moderate types who never mentioned politics and didn't seem terribly interested in it. I'd have thought more voted for moderate conservatives than the extreme left.
There are credible scientific questions still to be answered by scientists on this topic - and yet those questions are rarely raised here. Instead we the same paint-by-numbers cliches from posters who show little sign of even believing the arguments themselves.
Here are the five I hope posters will begin to move on from:
1) Scientists produce the reports government demand of them; scientists fake research to advance their careers.
Rebuttal: In a left-wing society this might make sense, and it probably has happened on occassion - but it ignores the fact that there are right-wing governments in power in many major western economic right now. When conservative governments ask their own experts for info on climate change, we can be fairly sure they are getting decent information. And yet, in country after country, we see conservative governments and their scientific advisors confirm AGW.
2) Research is faked, manipulated etc
Rebuttal: I can remember 2 or 3 cases of fraud in the medical sector in Finland during the past 10 years or so, e.g. a doctor with fake credentials. This does not mean medicine is bogus. What it does mean is that in any field there will be come crooks. Climate science seems to be clean by comparison with most other fields, with very, very few acusations made against research these days.
3) The climate is always changing, these are natural cycles.
Rebuttal: Climate changes only when it is made to change. There are no natural cycles. If the earth is cooling for several hundred years and then begins to warm, it does so because something triggered a cooling phase, and then something else triggered a warming phase. Check any chart of temperatures, and you won't see a smooth, even cycle. What you see are wild peaks and troughs, generally following specific events of triggers.
4) It's all about redistribution of wealth, socialist conspiracy
Rebuttal: In a world where more western countries are rightwing than left, this is the silliest theory of all. If anyone can explain why hard-core right-wing politicians in Germany, the UK, Canada or Australia would support a left-wing conspiracy, they need to explain it to their therapist.
5 Scientists are only in it for the money
Rebuttal: No one spends 10 years at university because they think they can make millions in teaching or research. There is more money to be made in a dozen other fields. People study physics or biology because the field interests them. It makes no sense at all to suggest that literally thousands of scientists all over the world would start faking research because they thought they would get more funding for doing so. On the contrary, oil poured billions into research denying climate change, before finaly conceding defeat. If scientists were only interested in money, there would be more seeking out the big dollars to be made in denial. The scientists that I have met have been sane, moderate types who never mentioned politics and didn't seem terribly interested in it. I'd have thought more voted for moderate conservatives than the extreme left.
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