DamnSaxon

I'd be interested to know how you can claim that, AT. Do you not remember the news from last September - news report here and elsewhere - that there are now no reliable records of global surface temperature, because the CRU have "lost" (or, perhaps more accurately, destroyed) all the original data. Oh, for sure, they now allow you to download "the data" from the Met Office site, but even there they tell you that this is not original data but "adjusted" data. They can't even tell you which data have been "adjusted", still less how (although, after "Climategate", we all know how). Don't trust me. Look on the Met Office site. "Adjusted" data is corrupt data. It is "data" which shows exactly whatever the people who "adjusted" it want it to show. There is now no reliable data. Accordingly, and I speak as someone who is appalled beyond belief that a group of self-styled "scientists" can deliberately destroy 160 years' work by real scientists, I feel perfectly justified in saying that there is now no credible data on which to base any of the catastrophists' scary fairy stories. In fact, there is no climate data on which to base any statement about climate now. The clique at UEA should be banned from ever again working in a scientific field after perpetrating that crime against knowledge. And please don't give me a link to "realclimate.org". They are just a shouty shouty catastrophist propaganda site run by a media company, and certainly not a place where anyone will find unbiased information. Nor Monbiot, who has lost all of what credibility he ever had. Remember his doom-laden piece in the Guardian (Dec 14th) - headline "This is bigger than climate change. It is a battle to redefine humanity." Precisely, George, precisely. And why should humanity allow itself to be "redefined" on account of a fairy story based on, remember, NO DATA?

Check those changing rooms before using them, ladies ...

Come to that, what exactly is it that's owed? Most currencies seem to have decoupled from the gold standard, and all you ever see is bits of paper "promising to pay" and digits in computers, all floating about in "value" according to the whims of the people who help themselves to most of it anyway. We're supposed to have confidence in that?

I'm with EM, basically. Just Say No! I loved the comment from a guy from (I think it was) Ladbroke's when the national lottery started up. He said the odds were about the odds Ladbroke's would give you on Elvis Presley landing a UFO on the Loch ness monster. Now, I'd put a quid on that if I thought it might make it happen ...

Think positive. It could have been all 31,000-odd from the Petition Project ...

Agree. When words like that turn up in a politician's speech, they mean nothing at all. Thinking about it, that applies to pretty much all words from politicians, bar very few. I suspect most people in most countries (including me) would describe the ordinary "grunt" soldier as pretty brave, though, mostly because they're the ones who actually lay their lives on the line - but they still do it, even as they joke about the complete incompetence of the entire chain of command above them. We still have a sort of Platonic ideal of bravery in our minds. The fact that most of the lines they lay their lives on aren't worth a thing is down to the depravity of politicians, of course, but that's another issue.

At the risk of attracting the fire, as someone who actually aspires to the derided status of incomin' soothmoother, one or two thoughts: - I joined Shetlink (and have that aspiration) just because I have found the relatively few Shetlanders I have known in real life to be a pretty good lot. Mostly, Shetlink has confirmed that impression, happily. - For obvious genetic reasons, I'll never be a Shetlander. But even if I never get as far as becoming an incomer, I hope I might count myself a "Friend of Shetland" or some such status. You've got perhaps the last bit of real local identity left in the UK (if Shetland really is UK, which rather proves the point) - surely better to educate newcomers in the proper Shetland way of doing things to try to preserve it rather than trying to hold back, or drive off, the flood. - Re proper locally identifiable ways of doing things, I think that's the weak point in the "multicultural society" model generally. Ten minutes down the road from here, I can stand in a street where you seldom hear a word of English, and where there's no presence of local figures of authority (the local bobby, park-keepers etc) to say to people "Hey, you don't do things like that here!". Result, you end up with your local culture getting swamped by alien ways. Probably most non-locals anywhere are only there for the money, but a few of us would actually prefer to learn how to fit into a culture they have chosen to move into and would go along with local ways gladly if "corrected". - OK, when people get really annoyed about anything, the fur can fly, and the internet probably doesn't help in that you can sit at home and in the heat of the moment post stuff you might well think twice about saying in real life - or could at least soften a bit by buying the offended party a drink and trying to explain your anger. Stuff on forums does have a sort of horrible permanence which a hasty word doesn't, and thank Heaven for Shetlink's mods who generally seem to keep the place in pretty decent order. Kudos, folks. - Which doesn't mean that we shouldn't think first ourselves, of course. Disagreement with another poster is one thing, but slagging them off really isn't going to persuade anyone. - Oh, and noting mention of the Council ... I promise you, Shetlanders are not the only ones who, er, "have differences with" Council decisions ... ... absolutely not ... ... no, sorry, just thinking the word "Council" gets my blood pressure up to dangerous levels ... perhaps the kindest thing to all is not mention them and hope they'll go away. Or, become a great satirist and perhaps achieve more by getting them mocked mercilessly until they learn some sense. - As for those original kids - well, there's nobody to say to them "Hey, you don't do things like that here!", either, nobody instilling what used to be ordinary respect for others. That's a major problem in itself, of course, and again, not only for Shetland. Anyhow, this alien sends best wishes for a grand long weekend's New Year celebrations and a prosperous and enjoyable 2010 to all Shetlanders, Shetlinkers, and any fellow aliens who happen to pass this way. I shall not resign from Shetlink even if insulted, and propose to drop in and annoy you for at least another year, unless the fates have other plans.

Congratulations, piggywiggy - a Christmas you'll always remember! I wish you every happiness.

Yes, a merry Christmas to one and all, let's look forward to a happy 2010.

1. We are cooling, and have been for about a decade. 2. I'd still be more interested to know how a tiny increase in a minor "greenhouse gas" on one planet affects the other planets around us ... and ... If I seemed to suggest that we don't know what the Sun is doing, I apologise. What I was trying to point out is that we don't know what the Sun can do. Remember only a few years ago when a big flare turned off the power across half of North America? - it is very big and very powerful, and it can take us completely by surprise because we don't know what it is capable of. Re "the warmest decade since records began" and suchlike claims, dare I point out that our instrumental records go back about 150 years, and that we know there was a "little Ice Age" about 250 years ago? I should sincerely hope that the planet is warming back up after that. It's gradually moving back towards its normal temperature. Given that the Romans were growing vines when they were over here, this sounds more of a desirable thing than an undesirable one. Move along please, nothing to see here. And please let us agree that the science is not settled. If there is going to be a "consensus" at all, consider: (The pro-AGW camp:) "I think the only thing that counts is numbers. The media is going to say "1000 scientists signed" or "1500 signed". No one is going to check if it is 600 with PhDs versus 2000 without. They will mention the prominent ones, but that is a different story. Conclusion -- Forget the screening, forget asking them about their last publication (most will ignore you.) Get those names!" (J. Alcamo, in 0876437553.txt, 1997) I believe they claim two or three thousand "top scientists" (for which, read: "yea-sayers"), although you only ever seem to hear two or three dozen of them. (We Stupid, Left-Behind Sceptics:) (see http://www.petitionproject.org/) "Signatories are approved for inclusion in the Petition Project list if they have obtained formal educational degrees at the level of Bachelor of Science or higher in appropriate scientific fields. The petition has been circulated only in the United States. The current list of petition signers includes 9,029 PhD; 7,157 MS; 2,586 MD and DVM; and 12,714 BS or equivalent academic degrees. Most of the MD and DVM signers also have underlying degrees in basic science. All of the listed signers have formal educations in fields of specialization that suitably qualify them to evaluate the research data related to the petition statement. Many of the signers currently work in climatological, meteorological, atmospheric, environmental, geophysical, astronomical, and biological fields directly involved in the climate change controversy." (Emphasis mine) And, after that screening, the project gained 31000-odd signatures - in the US alone - before being ignored by the politicians. That is absolutely not a "consensus that manmade global warming is happening". That is, if we are going to talk "consensus" at all, a consensus that it's not, and, specifically, among the group of people who ought to have the best ideas about what's happening. One thing nobody ever seems to mention, but which really unsettles me. As any student of thermodynamics (which pans out at most science and engineering students) learns in the first year, ALL the energy we use ultimately ends up as waste heat lost to the environment. Since the Industrial Revolution, we have put an awful lot of Joules of energy in the form of heat directly into the environment. Why is nobody pointing out that putting colossal quantities of "waste" heat - effectively, almost all of the energy we've used since we discovered how to - into the environment is by definition going to increase its temperature? It's a much more plausible cause of heating than the CO2 effect, and no mechanism of any kind is needed to explain it. If we could build nuclear (or "Zero Point", or whatever) energy plants without generating any CO2 at all, all that "waste" energy would still be heating us up as we used it. There's your manmade heating. And since nobody used my comment about the Mayan calendar to cast doubts on my sanity (thanks!), consider one rather unsettling thought: They only had to know about one Solar System cycle which we haven't discovered yet to predict calamity in 2012. Can we be certain they didn't, given that we do know that the ancient astronomers were pretty hot? Just a thought. Sorry if it makes anyone else lose sleep.

^^ Well, yes, actually - went straight over to Wikileaks when I saw the mention on the Graun site, then found they had their own link to a scribd copy when I went back. But my "1% science, 99% politics" comment was about the whole process, not just this junket. Along with tens of thousands of scientists (and let us not forget them), I don't accept the "science" being presented there, which I believe to be drawing unjustifiably extreme conclusions from dubious arguments based on a science which is still in its infancy (not to mention software which (a) faithfully produces a "hockey stick" graph from a file of random numbers and ( is in any case a linear mathematical model trying to predict a chaotic system). AT, when your side of this (definitely *not* settled!) argument can explain how human GG generation on Earth can also cause the warming on other planets in the Solar System which has been noticed over a period of some 10 or more years, I may be persuaded, though the argument will have to be pretty good. 'Til then, I'll stick with broadly agreeing with Piers Corbyn, a man who is more accurate about next week's weather than the Met Office is about tomorrow's - it's the Sun and Moon which control Earth's climate. I wish I had your certainty, but frankly I believe that if we stopped producing CO2 today and hoovered all "human" CO2 out of the atmosphere, it wouldn't make any noticeable difference to GW. It's the Sun doing odd things to all the planets, being in what seems to be an "interesting" state at the mo with an unusually protracted period of sunspot minimum - today's figures from Space Weather are: 2009 total: 259 days (76%) Since 2004: 770 days Typical Solar Min: 485 days That's your (well, my) main suspect - almost 60% over the normal quiet period and we're still waiting for a convincing upswing in spot count. We don't know what it's doing, and we don't even have proper data on exactly what energy, in what forms, it throws at us, still less enough to predict manmade apocalypse by disregarding it. (And I absolutely refuse to be drawn on whether it's all teeing up for the End of Life as We Know It in 2012, fascinating and wonderful as those internet predictions are ... )

Thanks for that, AT, you're probably right. Not least because you're only 2" short of twice my screen size ...

Definitely the whisky. When you think of the responsibility of keeping the site legal, the hassle from irate users, the knowledge of the system, the rate of pay ... AND they'll be sitting there keeping us moderate on Christmas day! Keep it up, mods, very well done. http://ganjataz.com/01smileys/images/smileys/SuperKewl.gif

^^ You're probably right, Auld Rasmie You can pick up a book by one of the old Roman authors, and find them writing things like, "I don't know why I ever moved to this city. The streets are knee-deep in rubbish, you can't find a quiet place to hear yourself think, the children show no respect to their elders ..." and you think "Hang on, this was two thousand years ago!" Edit - Forgot me closing quotes.

Not really a great problem, but there isn't a thread called "Shetlink Strange Phenomena", so ... Just been over to the GW thread, and noticed (again) that the page renders overwide in my browser (FF). That is, on the current page (39), and on p37 ... but p38 in the middle renders normal width and doesn't require me to keep shuttling left and right. Anyone else getting this?

Well, not halfway through yet and they're not disappointing. Plenty of apocalyptic quotes, as expected, and ooops! How unexpected! that the Grauniad, hardly sceptical on this issue, leaks the "Danish text" and reveals that ... the conclusions have already been written by the main beneficiaries thereof! 1% science, 99% politics.

Yes, they were better, IMHO as someone who was a young adult then - this isn't a problem unique to Shetland, of course. While I wouldn't want to go back to the unthinking deference which was still around to some extent in the 70s, I do miss the way that people generally treated one another with more respect.

Apparently no problems here (outside Shetland) either. Straight in, access all areas as normal.

Wow. What is this?

A passing fancy ... then everyone disappears: That's haiku for you. Main reason for post: nobody's mentioned those beautiful haiku "error messages", allegedly (of course) Japanese in origin. Meditate on these: Yesterday it worked. Today it is not working. Windows is like that. First snow, then silence. This thousand-dollar screen dies So beautifully. You step in the stream, But the water has moved on. This page is not here. A crash reduces Your expensive computer To a simple stone. Stay the patient course. Of little worth is your ire. The network is down. Serious error. All shortcuts have disappeared. Screen. Mind. Both are blank. Chaos reigns within. Reflect, repent, and reboot. Order shall return. Three things are certain: Death, taxes, and lost data. Guess which has occurred.

Making Trouble for Yourself 101: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/12/04/cell_phone_pic_arrest/

This "certain Eastern European lady" - d'you suppose she's related to the one who keeps sending me those nice emails and photos of (allegedly) herself?

^^^ Presumably also a lot of bull sh*t in the advertising.

Yep, here we go, all aboard for two weeks of nonsense on stilits. And I, cynical old sod that I am, await the show with interest. Predicted net effect of outcome on thermal properties of planet Earth, approx. 0.000000% max. Sorry it's another longish post, I've not been able to get on for a few weeks so I've been bottling it all up. We are, of course, all dooomed - we always have been, nothing we humans like better than stuff to scare ourselves silly - and, by God, for the next fortnight we're all going to be told in very loud voices about how we're racing towards climatic catastrophe and why we're all individually to blame, miserable sinners that we are. The mathematical models can't lie, after all, can they? Errrrrrrr ... you mean they might just be "botch after botch after botch"? ... And, of course, after all the blather, our noble, statesmanlike leaders will agree on "decisive measures" to "address the problem", undoubtedly by imposing whole new tiers of parasitic economic superstructure, which will (this is, after all, politics) hurt everyone except the real offenders against the world's ecology ... the giant agribusinesses who are tirelessly working to replace the human food supply with their paid-for, patented monocultures, the slash-and-burners who feel that replacing millions of acres of rainforest with millions of acres of farting cows is a cool idea, all of them. No, they'll be wheeling and dealing their "carbon credits" and laughing even louder all the way to the bank. And the bank will certainly be laughing. We used to think it was a joke when we said "they'd tax the air you breathe, if they could" ... and now they are. The real loser in the long run from the fiascoid state this has degenerated into is science. In a time when universities have been closing science departments because potential students think science is too hard, we're exposed to acres of coverage of how "world leading" scientists have been tweaking and diddling with figures, fiddling with peer review, repelling FOI requests, how original data have "been destroyed" ... yes, kiddies, these scientists are just like anyone else, they make it up as they go along, no reason to think that what they say is "really" any truer than anybody else. Oh. except those silly, "out-of-date" deniers, of course, who've "been left behind by the debate", the "consensus" is that they're pants. No. As AT has observed above, science is about facts. You define and study your problem. You think about it, make a mark 1 theory to explain what happens, and test against reality. If stuff happens (or doesn't happen) in the real world which is incompatible with your theory, then your theory is wrong. So you modify the theory to mark 2 and try again, and again, until you end up with a theory which hasn't broken down yet. Most importantly, you publish everything - the actual measurements, how they were taken, the formulae you used, the assumptions you made, everything you think might have had an influence. That way anyone and everyone can question every aspect of your work, until the eventual theory has some authority and disproofs become - temporarily - beyond our knowledge. The CRU haven't helped their own case in all this by apparently using data which they "couldn't" release because it was "someone else's intellectual property" - if people can't see what you're doing and check your workings, why should they believe a word of your conclusions? I'm an interested, scientifically literate onlooker, and I see a lot more output from mathematical models than deliberation about actual data, which is much, much harder to find. Well, the Met Office has now said that it will release the original data itself. It will be interesting to see the extent to which the political miasma of the last couple of weeks results in these figures being doubted; after all, the Met Office are well-known supporters of the AGW hypothesis, so "of course" these figures will show it. Even if the released figures are simon pure, they are now infused with that residual doubt, and in science that shouldn't happen. Not that it will make any difference to anything, of course, because international action is being decided now, long before anyone can do anything with the data. Yes, science is the loser. In a world where uni science departments are closing, and where so many people seem to think that the truth is something determined by consensus on Wikipedia, I find that far more terrifying than anything climatic change can offer. If we throw away our rationality, we are certainly doomed. Still, on with the show! Humanity, not to mention the "face" of leading politicians worldwide, must be saved!

And another article here about "Climate Fools Day" - there're a few claims here which I hadn't heard about.