Science under fire from 'merchants of doubt'

Yep, just look in the ""public relations"" depts or providers of said "service" to see where these strategies are hatched, they are some of the scummiest people on earth without a doubt!

I think the public has the right to question the climate models on which all of this hysteria is being based. Especially since it is the Internationalists, people for expanded government control over people and people, companies and nations that stand to make a fortune who are promoting the theory of manmade global warming. Anyone in the hard sciences know that computer models need correlation to the real world to be accurate. Some of the data has been "tweaked" to make the models work for global warming.

Rather than blame "greedy corporations" for the dissent against the warming crusade, why not prove the accuracy of your warming models by showing how man has radically changed the climate in the past? How about showing how man was responsible for the Little Ice Age from 1600-1860? It is much easier to prove your model using past data than it is to verify it predicts the future. We are skeptical because the soft sciences are only good at observation, not prediction. Prove your model works on past events before ripping the world apart with your profitable doomsday cultism.

Goddamn pesky dissenters, always demanding facts.

What a nerve they have, to demand un-biased truth; and to oppose the punitive doling out of freedom-sapping taxes, edicts, restrictions, and fines put on unproven-to-be-harmful human behavior.

I guess the scientific method, of publishing your theories and letting other scientists have at them to prove or disprove them is unacceptable to these state sponsored, policy driven, pseudo scientific hacks.

A large segment of conservatives believe that all in the world think and act as they do: on the make for the buck, wearing the guise for whatever entity underwrites them at the time, with no interests but themselves and no ability to conceive of others any different. Any time logic intrudes on whatever fantasy is paying their bills, they reflexively dismiss it as thieving fraud - as if there were some group of "people for expanded government control over people" - precisely because that is how they would act if they could profit. And they toss strawmen at will to avoid logical discussion at any cost - like suggesting the existence of climate change periods in the past, say, some "Little Ice Age" here or there, excludes the possibility that the one of the present is man-made.

These people cannot be reasoned with. They are Pavlovian dogs who will only change when their master changes its arbitrary signal - and certainly the possibility exists their master may find in a certain case that science supports his agenda, in which case this bunch will be back on the science wagon - ot as rationally capable humans, but simply because that is where they have been commanded.

Good little doggies. Get your bone and leave the thinking to others.

So we shouldn't question anything and just blindly accept what we're told? Sounds exactly like a religion to me.

Who wrote this commentary anyways?

Aren't editorials supposed to have names of the authors instead of just © 2012 AFP

Well, you can't do without doubt. And you cannot silence the minority. Well, you can, but the result would be poor science.

I think the main point is this: "These naysayers—some of whom are paid by interest groups" That is an obvious conflict of interest right there. You cannot expect good results from anyone caught between people giving them money and favors on one side, and scientific honesty and integrity on the other.

Any scientist with such a conflict of interest, past or present, should not be given any creedence beyond submitting research for review. We need legal measures to keep them controlling scientific debates for the sake of profit. In fact, it might be a good idea to set up groups of scientists which instantly bar anyone with a conflict of interest pertaining to that specific group. In other words, a group of environmental scientists would have no members employed by companies using smokestacks. That way, we know where the conflict of interest does and does not lie.

I think the public has the right to question the climate models on which all of this hysteria is being based.

I absolutely agree. After years of having "global warming" shoved down our throats, the UEA emails were leaked and we learned that the vast majority of research underpinning GW was a sheer fraud. How much money was made by people who invested in these "green technologies" that benefited from the GW mass hysteria?

Some people think the world is flat and that oil reserves will provide infinite resources.

@Hôjô Sôun: Did you read all those e-mails, or just the cherry picked parts. Here I will show you how cherry picking works. To quote you:

After years of having "global warming"

See that? You believe we have had years of global warming!

Its a child's game played by so many of the global warming disbelievers. Its part of the reason I don't have any faith in them anymore. As a skeptical person myself, they have done a great job in making me think that global warming is real. I just have not decided if its natural or man-made yet, or a significant combination of both.

But if listening to dysfunctional argumentation is any proof, GW is real.

The world is dynamic and not a stagnant rock. nature knows what it is doing in most respects. It does make mistakes though. Humans.

They publish it in The Wall Street Journal, which is not a scientific journal.”

That's what happens when the leading "scientists" in the man made global warming interest group conspire to blacklist other scientists that do not follow the party line by attempting to publish dissenting articles in the so-called "scientific journals". It should raise red flags for everyone whenever scientists seek to avoid subjecting their own theories to scrutiny.

It should raise red flags for everyone whenever scientists seek to avoid subjecting their own theories to scrutiny.

Scrutiny is one thing. A plan to sabotage from the start is another. And its not always easy to tell the difference. That is part of what the article is about. Scientists are rightly concerned about saboteurs these days. Its not like the honest doubting Thomases are doing anything to stop them, is it?

In this climate, I too would guard my research from pundits and interest groups and try to make sure serious scientists scrutinize it first.

The world is dynamic and not a stagnant rock. nature knows what it is doing in most respects. It does make mistakes though. Humans. Quote: JapanGal.

The reason why the US authorities does not show an interest in Global warming? it knows that this condition is not due to anything man made. The warming is comming from the core of the earth and have nothing to do with polution at all, that is why they do not pay any attention to the global warming group. What this warning is about, is the earth is evolving at an enormous pace. Ready of not humans evolve or else.

"Science" is under fire ! Another crisis! Lemme guess: the solution involves taking even more of your money and buying votes.

That's what happens when the leading "scientists" in the man made global warming interest group conspire to blacklist other scientists that do not follow the party line by attempting to publish dissenting articles in the so-called "scientific journals".

This is made-up nonsense.

It should raise red flags for everyone whenever scientists seek to avoid subjecting their own theories to scrutiny.

This is true. But I suspect you also know fully well how silly and dishonest it is of you to insinuate that this has happened.

Boy a few heads buried in sand on this thread for sure!

Folks in the past iceages creeped up & fades over 1000s of YEARS, the climate change happening now is happening at speeds off the charts to what nature has done in the past, this really shudnt be to hard to figure out.

All you have to do is look at what the mature economies have done the last 100yrs & now that China, India, Brazil etc are coming on strong it SHUD be pretty easy to see that man is having a profound affect on the planet, we burn fuel like there is no tomorrow(and there may not be if we cant restrain ourselves!).

Man is ravaging the land & oceans at a scary scary pace of late, to think oh gee this likley wouldnt have any affect on something like the weather or ocean levels is incredibly naive