Rogers writes "I looked at their dataset and — as we might expect — RCP8.5 features prominently in many of the papers receiving the most media attention in 2020".
Can Roger or someone else can provide specific examples of the mainstream climate press basing their apocalyptic articles specifically on RCP8.5? I suspect they do, but when I try to explain to people why they should be skeptical about such climate predictions, it would be helpful if I could point out that these articles are based on scenarios that even the IPCC scientists find highly unlikely.
To be clear, “RCP8.5” usually doesn’t appear in those news articles, only in the scientific papers they cite. Some news articles will contain “high emissions scenario” or “business as usual”, which usually mean RCP8.5.
If you want specific examples, I recommend you either start with Roger’s recent testimony to Congress (he wrote a post about it) or his Twitter feed. He will often tweet a link to a news article and write a single word “RCP8.5.”
If you have trouble finding examples lmk and I’ll be happy to dig up a few.
Thanks for the links. They certainly illustrate the atmosphere of "crisis" created by so many climate articles in the mainstream press. My question was about how one counters such articles by pointing out they are based on highly unlikely scenarios. That is what I find difficult, particularly since the articles reference seemingly legitimate scientific articles. The Bloomberg article links to a study in "Nature" which states "we project an ice-free Arctic in September under all scenarios considered."
I would like to dig into the same question again. In the article it says:
"I looked at their dataset and — as we might expect — RCP8.5 features prominently in many of the papers receiving the most media attention in 2020, including 4 of the top 5 most covered papers."
In order to be able to make my own argument more substantive, I am specifically looking for such studies.
Our local paper, the Boston Globe, regularly refers to climate change issues as "the climate apocalypse". As one layperson talking to another, it's difficult for me to explain, "well, the Globe is basing that highly unlikely claim on RCP8.5" since most people have never even heard of "RCP8.5"
A quote on the website of "Just Stop Oil" says "What we do over the next three or four years I believe is going to determine the future of humanity". Really!! And this quote is from the former Chief Science Advisor to the UK government, 2021. What's he basing that Incredible statement on, RCP8.5?
No wonder young people are depressed. A German climate group calls itself "The Last Generation". I know trying to counter these claims frustrates Roger who is an expert. For us non-experts, it seems impossible
Recently our local Toronto-area development newsletter Novae Res Urbis issued a correction to an earlier story that had led off saying southern Ontario rain intensities were increasing. The editor was quite supportive when I raised the issue of data in our Engineering Climate Datasets showing nothing of the sort. Its nice when folks are open minded and listen and make correction. These are the data trends I cited by the way: https://www.cityfloodmap.com/2023/05/southern-ontario-extreme-rainfall.html ... the original article author had offered nothing to back up the original statement that intensities were increasing which is typical (i.e., just cut and paste the narrative).
Another successful avenue I have found for corrections is working with Canada's advertising standards agency. While you can say whatever opinion you want in a newspaper, advertising must meet a higher standard to not mislead consumers. Again, after sharing information on actual extreme rain trends many large insurance companies have updated earlier inaccurate statements in their advertising. This effort took years. The result? Insurance companies no longer report that an arbitrary 1 standard deviation shift in a normal bell curve is the actual frequency shift data for extreme rainfall in Canada. Yes, for years leading news organizations across the country, and even the chief economist of a large bank, repeated that a 40 year storm had already become a 6 year storm in Canada - but this was all made up, a 1 std dev shift in bell curve shift!!!, and no data was never used or checked. The details on this "weather story" are here: https://www.cityfloodmap.com/2015/07/storm-intensity-not-increasing-old.html
It takes a lot of effort and patience to share data and to try and not be a 'pointed headed' engineer / scientist when communicating and helping journalists. Often one is just dismissed as wearing a tin foil hat though :) To get ahead of stories, instead of just following up, U of T's Dr. Bryan Karney and I prepared a report for CBC ombudsmen with data sources to share with editors/journalists and consider to improve the accuracy or balance in reporting. I hope this is helping.
As Steve Martin said, some people have a way with words and others ... ummm...'not have way'. Thanks Roger to you and your way with words, making these topics more digestible. Its a model for us all to follow and help the journalists out there up their game :)
Wish I could share your optimism but the CBC is simply awful, all emergency 24/7.
I applaud you getting them to correct a couple things but while you were doing that they did 1000 more alarmist pieces.
I cannot turn on the radio or TV without hearing “catastrophic wild fires are increasing” even though the data doesn’t show it and many including Roger have shown that to be so.
They simply don’t care. It’s not that they are inaccurate, they have an agenda and a narrative. Facts are to be avoided.
They aren’t news organizations anymore, they are all paid shills.
Thanks Pat. I am a glass half full guy, even it is less than half :) The CBC corrections are truly few and far between and so I wade in where I can when the ombudsmen can have an easier time reviewing - there are many complaints (constructive criticism) that go nowhere too though. CBC is one-sided and I have to rely on other media to share info on wild fires and heat waves, etc like Financial Post: https://financialpost.com/opinion/learn-the-science-before-you-follow-it-fact-checking-justin-trudeau-on-climate-change
If you want to obtain funding or keep your job you have to toe the line. Roger hits the nail on the head, only the "good" reports and articles are going to get published. Sad but true!
I've been a reporter covering climate since before Hansen's Senate bombshell. I have always tried to play straight. The quality of reporting has worsened over the years and current reporting has no nuance or skepticism. It's cheerleading. I suspect most of the reporters and editors have no idea about RCP8.5 or that there is any uncertainty in the science.
Kennedy, what happened to skepticism? I've noticed foreign correspondents now tasked with explaining wildfires at the big Coastal media outlets.. is it simply that there isn't funding for expert reporters in different areas? Or are people hired as climate reporters now and so if all you have is a hammer.. everything looks like a nail? I find it puzzling.
There has been a deep rooted intellectual trend that characterizes information and language as primarily tools for powerful groups to oppress others. It's basically marxism applied beyond economics
As a result those who are influenced by this underlying belief discount the value of logically and fairly weighing differing viewpoints, assuming one viewpoint is correct and serves the true interest of average people while the other viewpoint is corrupted and simply an application of force through the avenue of language and debate in order to advance an 'evil' agenda
I recommend Cynical Theories by James Lindsay and Helen Pluckrose. They seem to understand the phenomenon just about perfectly while also being very capable of explaining it clearly
So, given that WG1 clearly defines that there is no climate emergency or existential threat, how do these media outlets plan to defend their own personal ‘Exxon Knew’ moment when, for example, a group of tax payers starts a class action citing grossly wasted tax dollars? Surely responsible journalism requires that they can defend the stance they have taken by illustrating the balance of evidence?
I estimate climate policy to have a comparable cost to a world war, and with currently popular policy trends, without much countervailing benefit to speak of
One response is to poke holes in the catastrophism balloon, another to advocate best policies, such as a carbon tax with the revenue redistributed back rather than lobbyist and "sounds good" influenced political decisions like banning combustion vehicles in short order
But how do you calculate a carbon tax if you don’t have a reliable figure for ECS, ignore realistic SSP emissions projections and use a ridiculously low discount figure when you are calculating the ‘cost’ of climate change. Until you are confident you have some degree of certainty in these variables then any carbon tax is purely fanciful. For example, if you use a discount of around 7% for future cash flows (which isn’t unrealistic) then the cost of carbon emissions is essentially zero. Depending on which camp you sit within, this could be good news...
Those are big issues but they also exist with other policies. What discount rate and ECS justifies banning ICE vehicles by 2035? A carbon tax couldn't do that because it's volcanically not cost effective
If the tax is revenue neutral and avoids heating, farming etc then it will be a better deal than something of the same cost that subsidizes whatever politicians come up with
Journalism like this only confirms the belief of those who deny there is anything to worry about regarding climate change. To be honest, I can't blame them. They may not be scientists or even well versed on the topic. But they can smell bullshit when they see it. I think a natural reaction to bad faith actors is to take a completely opposite point of view.
I'm not sure I'd call climate journalism "green." It pretends to be, but in general it has a very shallow, physics-only view of the climate. The truly green aspects of climate, such of the role of land use, very few climate journalists are even aware of.
I'm curious what you mean in more detail. How is the climate narrative getting the physics wrong? Are you talking about the physics of land/atmosphere interactions? Thanks.
I mean, basic physics. In the beginning with discussion of the concept of AGW, it was proclaimed that the high latitudes and arctic would warm faster, and so it has. Success right?
The atmosphere and oceans are essentially a heat pump? It take heat in at the equator/mid-latitudes, move it to the poles where it escapes into space.
"Weather" is created by the temperature differential between the those points so if the poles warm faster than the equator the differential decreases and therefore extreme weather should decrease.
And so it has come to pass, as Roger points out on here with the data regarding hurricanes, tornados etc, extreme weather is decreasing or at minimum flat. Wildfires are not increasing.
Now all of that could be a case of correlation and have nothing to do with each other. But it fits what the theory supposedly was.
But the alarmist "scientists" and "media" just cannot get out of their own way, everything must be bad and therefor they have to trumpet ever weather event as climate change, instead of stating that the observed data actually seems to be tracking the original theory. But no, it must be screaming hair on fire 24/7.
I have been following this for a couple decades which is WHY i'm a skeptic/realist. I used to believe but i got over it. For 20 years i have read that the science is settled, and yet every day it changes and somehow still remains settled and just never you mind what we said was settled last week.
Grifters
Anyway, i think its all irretrievably broken and should be burned to the ground, start from scratch.
Its all corrupt, root and branch.
Look at what happened to Roger, and that is by no means done as he is attacked as a denier daily even though he recites the catechism regularly.
He simply points out the data doesn't match the narrative, same sin Koonin and other are guilty of.
You want to fix it? First step, anyone who uses the term "denier" is removed from public debate, no exceptions, as those people are only trying to prevent debate. To the gulag.
Thanks for getting back. Interesting point. It's a side of the picture I'm not too familiar with, but have spoken with other scientists involved with land use, who get marginalized because their results run up against the computer models. You might find this piece interesting in terms of how climate science was administratively organized to leave land use issues out of the picture. https://www.resilience.org/stories/2022-09-07/putting-the-land-back-in-climate/
I like your term "Administratively organized" but i have no idea why you are being so nice about.
They systematically eliminated anything that doesn't support the narrative, that CO2 dun it. Its all narrative control.
So we who read know that the climate has been warming steadily for over 200 years, thats just how it is.
The radiative physics of AGW says that CO2 had to be to a certain level to make a change well that didn;'t occur until the last 25% of that time frame.
And yet its axiomatic that people have cause any warming since 1950 even though they cannot explain the first 150 year nor can they explain why its no longer a factor.
How can you determine if something is a factor when you don't know what it is.
Anyway.
John Robson kills it every week on his blog, love his stuff, laugh away.
My issue is that climate science operates like a cult. Roger is an example, as a Canadian my main thoughts are regarding what happened to Susan Crockford. Like Roger she didn't question the theory or the science behind it, she simply pointed out that despite predictions the polar bears were doing fine, not facing extinction, increasing in numbers in counterpoint to the predictions from "the science".
And her career was destroyed because she questioned the narrative.
I cannot take "climate science" seriously and i will laugh at them every week along with John Robson as mockery is the best response. The soviets knew if everyone is laughing at you, you are done.
You don't comment on the role that the Arabella network of left-leaning dark money plays in the shift in media bias, but I wish you would. It appears that Arabella has now reached or outstripped the dark money vehicles of the right.
So Mark Jacobson, a Stanford Prof, says it's really easy to go all renewable.. which we here on the ground know not to be the case, just based on siting concerns. The problem is that either reporters are not skeptical, don't want to appear to be skeptical in front of others, or don't know enough about the real world to be skeptical. I sat in on this one and Jacobson sounds compelling.. but so did snake oil salespeople.
This is no different than what Taibbi and Shellenberger are reporting regarding censorship in general. Lots of “foundations” and NGOs supposedly set up by caring individuals but in reality funded by govt and or agenda billionaires to pump out fake studies to help shape the narrative and define the allowable terms of debate.
I'm pretty sure that when you write that you do not share the authors' views (that climate "journalists" have become climate ADVOCATES) it's a typo, because you go on to explain how right they are.
And BTW, I do wish that you had the luxury of bouncing your newsletters off a good editor or proofreader pre-pub,
"The authors hold a position that I do not — that the main purpose of media coverage of climate is to motivate people to act on climate, whatever that means."
Josef Goebbels (arguably the father of modern media-based propaganda) is sadly smiling at the state of journalism on this subject. A recent example: RJP at the recent senate hearings making the same plea for ethical scientific work and reporting and the misuse of the extreeme scenarios to guide policy.
How did the UK Guardian report his words: "RJP supported the notion of a climate crisis...."(I parphrase)".
It will take many years yet of human ability to master the "imminent tipping points" and adapt, before the general public understand they have been "had" or nakedly manipulated.
What I've noticed is that land change and land use are never mentioned as climate drivers, even though scientists like your father have been pointing out for years just how important land use is to the climates we live in and experience. It is a consistent omission with profound consequences.
Roger, thanks for this article, as this is only confirming to the 20% of the population who are sceptics, what is a root cause of biased reporting, which includes advocacy, lack of facts and all advocate, opinion.
This is not only true in the field of alarmist climate change, but also covers pretty well all "NEWS" covered by MSM newspapers and main stream broadcasting outlets that nowadays has an to has an agenda, has to be activist driven, has to follow a propaganda narrative, and has to follow the dictum of "if it bleeds its leads."
It is so good to have outlets like Substack which facilitates the airing of the 20% skeptical views, which until recently were unable to see the light of day.
It goes without saying that this expose by the likes of yourself, is critical to the fight against the The Industrial Censorship Complex which is well under weigh from those sources that would have us all believe that for the human race to reach Utopia, demands a global government, which will eliminate the ills that plague all societies, that all poverty can be eliminated, and the world will will consist only of altruistic societies, can live in harmony and we can all sit around the camp fire humming kumbaya.
No surprises here to quote Dylan, “you don’t need a weatherman to tell which way the wind blows”.
I have a friend in England that told me to stop sending your blog. He just refuses to believe any other scenario then the one that is sensationalized in the media.
I have a number British friends that are Poisoned to their core by the British media. I provide Paul Homewood and the UK Conservative Woman (stop that, i can identify as i please!) as the antidote but i am condemned for sending these. I dare not send any US based links as they are entirely frowned upon.
We're not all like that.... but a lot are. The reporting here in England is tiresomely biased but I think a few cracks are emerging. It will take along time but £ and physics will win in the end.
I was in Europe a couple weeks ago and I ended up watching Skynews a couple nights. I thought the CBC was bad but Skyness blew them out of the water in the climate/insane stakes.
I am sick and tired of hearing how extreme weather events have increased significantly over the last few decades. I hear this all the time...and I recently listened to a congressional hearing on the energy transition where several representatives of both parties were saying extreme weather events have increased sharply. Is anyone informed anymore? I feel like the climate agenda is essentially cultural totalitarianism.
Problem is, publications like The Economist and New York Times won't even publish comments pointing to errors in their climate reporting. Joe Biden says climate change is real, "You can see it with your own eyes, feel it in your bones," and nobody responds - BS!
Rogers writes "I looked at their dataset and — as we might expect — RCP8.5 features prominently in many of the papers receiving the most media attention in 2020".
Can Roger or someone else can provide specific examples of the mainstream climate press basing their apocalyptic articles specifically on RCP8.5? I suspect they do, but when I try to explain to people why they should be skeptical about such climate predictions, it would be helpful if I could point out that these articles are based on scenarios that even the IPCC scientists find highly unlikely.
To be clear, “RCP8.5” usually doesn’t appear in those news articles, only in the scientific papers they cite. Some news articles will contain “high emissions scenario” or “business as usual”, which usually mean RCP8.5.
If you want specific examples, I recommend you either start with Roger’s recent testimony to Congress (he wrote a post about it) or his Twitter feed. He will often tweet a link to a news article and write a single word “RCP8.5.”
If you have trouble finding examples lmk and I’ll be happy to dig up a few.
Here are three very recent examples
I literally see these every day
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-06-20/rapidly-melting-glaciers-on-world-s-highest-mountains-risk-a-quarter-of-humanity
https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/4057045-catch-22-scientific-communication-failures-linked-to-faster-rising-seas/
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/28/climate/mountains-extreme-rain-less-snow.html
Thanks for the links. They certainly illustrate the atmosphere of "crisis" created by so many climate articles in the mainstream press. My question was about how one counters such articles by pointing out they are based on highly unlikely scenarios. That is what I find difficult, particularly since the articles reference seemingly legitimate scientific articles. The Bloomberg article links to a study in "Nature" which states "we project an ice-free Arctic in September under all scenarios considered."
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-38511-8#:~:text=we%20project%20an%20ice%2Dfree%20Arctic%20in%20September%20under%20all%20scenarios%20considered.
I would like to dig into the same question again. In the article it says:
"I looked at their dataset and — as we might expect — RCP8.5 features prominently in many of the papers receiving the most media attention in 2020, including 4 of the top 5 most covered papers."
In order to be able to make my own argument more substantive, I am specifically looking for such studies.
Can Roger (or others) help (with links)?
Sure, just so I understand, do you want papers that utilize RCP8.5? Or papers critiquing that use? Thanks!
Our local paper, the Boston Globe, regularly refers to climate change issues as "the climate apocalypse". As one layperson talking to another, it's difficult for me to explain, "well, the Globe is basing that highly unlikely claim on RCP8.5" since most people have never even heard of "RCP8.5"
A quote on the website of "Just Stop Oil" says "What we do over the next three or four years I believe is going to determine the future of humanity". Really!! And this quote is from the former Chief Science Advisor to the UK government, 2021. What's he basing that Incredible statement on, RCP8.5?
No wonder young people are depressed. A German climate group calls itself "The Last Generation". I know trying to counter these claims frustrates Roger who is an expert. For us non-experts, it seems impossible
Papers that utilize RCP 8.5. Thx a lot!
http://m4.emails.telegraph.co.uk/nl/jsp/m.jsp?c=%40nd81CmNevoUsKUCqx9zLwGXsavHR8lVGqHu6EjwNNkoGgXd%2BbCk9KvfTcRm7VDcuIET1ne88hYr1N8FOJRvRZA%3D%3D&WT.mc_id=e_DM168758&WT.tsrc=email&etype=Edi_EIn_New&utmsource=email&utm_medium=Edi_EIn_New20230627&utm_campaign=DM168758
Perhaps a better standard of climate journalism from an economic perspective noting its political effects. It requires subscription for full access.
Fortunately I've been successful at getting some Canadian Broadcasting Corporation stories corrected on the topic of extreme rainfall trends and damages (https://www.cityfloodmap.com/2019/09/assessing-damage-cbc-ombudsman-finds.html, https://www.cityfloodmap.com/2020/11/radio-canada-ombudsman-finds-standards.html, https://www.cityfloodmap.com/2019/01/). Bravo to the CBC ombudsmen for helping to improve accuracy in journalism (and adhere to their own policies). Most recently the offending article was deleted as the ombudsman suggested it was so bad it was not salvageable (see description/ruling). Sadly, some journalists seem to start with a conclusion and work back to fill in the story - facts be damned!
Recently our local Toronto-area development newsletter Novae Res Urbis issued a correction to an earlier story that had led off saying southern Ontario rain intensities were increasing. The editor was quite supportive when I raised the issue of data in our Engineering Climate Datasets showing nothing of the sort. Its nice when folks are open minded and listen and make correction. These are the data trends I cited by the way: https://www.cityfloodmap.com/2023/05/southern-ontario-extreme-rainfall.html ... the original article author had offered nothing to back up the original statement that intensities were increasing which is typical (i.e., just cut and paste the narrative).
Another successful avenue I have found for corrections is working with Canada's advertising standards agency. While you can say whatever opinion you want in a newspaper, advertising must meet a higher standard to not mislead consumers. Again, after sharing information on actual extreme rain trends many large insurance companies have updated earlier inaccurate statements in their advertising. This effort took years. The result? Insurance companies no longer report that an arbitrary 1 standard deviation shift in a normal bell curve is the actual frequency shift data for extreme rainfall in Canada. Yes, for years leading news organizations across the country, and even the chief economist of a large bank, repeated that a 40 year storm had already become a 6 year storm in Canada - but this was all made up, a 1 std dev shift in bell curve shift!!!, and no data was never used or checked. The details on this "weather story" are here: https://www.cityfloodmap.com/2015/07/storm-intensity-not-increasing-old.html
It takes a lot of effort and patience to share data and to try and not be a 'pointed headed' engineer / scientist when communicating and helping journalists. Often one is just dismissed as wearing a tin foil hat though :) To get ahead of stories, instead of just following up, U of T's Dr. Bryan Karney and I prepared a report for CBC ombudsmen with data sources to share with editors/journalists and consider to improve the accuracy or balance in reporting. I hope this is helping.
As Steve Martin said, some people have a way with words and others ... ummm...'not have way'. Thanks Roger to you and your way with words, making these topics more digestible. Its a model for us all to follow and help the journalists out there up their game :)
Wish I could share your optimism but the CBC is simply awful, all emergency 24/7.
I applaud you getting them to correct a couple things but while you were doing that they did 1000 more alarmist pieces.
I cannot turn on the radio or TV without hearing “catastrophic wild fires are increasing” even though the data doesn’t show it and many including Roger have shown that to be so.
They simply don’t care. It’s not that they are inaccurate, they have an agenda and a narrative. Facts are to be avoided.
They aren’t news organizations anymore, they are all paid shills.
Thanks Pat. I am a glass half full guy, even it is less than half :) The CBC corrections are truly few and far between and so I wade in where I can when the ombudsmen can have an easier time reviewing - there are many complaints (constructive criticism) that go nowhere too though. CBC is one-sided and I have to rely on other media to share info on wild fires and heat waves, etc like Financial Post: https://financialpost.com/opinion/learn-the-science-before-you-follow-it-fact-checking-justin-trudeau-on-climate-change
If you want to obtain funding or keep your job you have to toe the line. Roger hits the nail on the head, only the "good" reports and articles are going to get published. Sad but true!
I've been a reporter covering climate since before Hansen's Senate bombshell. I have always tried to play straight. The quality of reporting has worsened over the years and current reporting has no nuance or skepticism. It's cheerleading. I suspect most of the reporters and editors have no idea about RCP8.5 or that there is any uncertainty in the science.
Kennedy, what happened to skepticism? I've noticed foreign correspondents now tasked with explaining wildfires at the big Coastal media outlets.. is it simply that there isn't funding for expert reporters in different areas? Or are people hired as climate reporters now and so if all you have is a hammer.. everything looks like a nail? I find it puzzling.
There has been a deep rooted intellectual trend that characterizes information and language as primarily tools for powerful groups to oppress others. It's basically marxism applied beyond economics
As a result those who are influenced by this underlying belief discount the value of logically and fairly weighing differing viewpoints, assuming one viewpoint is correct and serves the true interest of average people while the other viewpoint is corrupted and simply an application of force through the avenue of language and debate in order to advance an 'evil' agenda
I'd be interested in books or posts that talk about that.. I'm embroiled in an Orwellian obfuscation in the form of a regulation right now. Thanks!
I recommend Cynical Theories by James Lindsay and Helen Pluckrose. They seem to understand the phenomenon just about perfectly while also being very capable of explaining it clearly
So, given that WG1 clearly defines that there is no climate emergency or existential threat, how do these media outlets plan to defend their own personal ‘Exxon Knew’ moment when, for example, a group of tax payers starts a class action citing grossly wasted tax dollars? Surely responsible journalism requires that they can defend the stance they have taken by illustrating the balance of evidence?
I estimate climate policy to have a comparable cost to a world war, and with currently popular policy trends, without much countervailing benefit to speak of
One response is to poke holes in the catastrophism balloon, another to advocate best policies, such as a carbon tax with the revenue redistributed back rather than lobbyist and "sounds good" influenced political decisions like banning combustion vehicles in short order
But how do you calculate a carbon tax if you don’t have a reliable figure for ECS, ignore realistic SSP emissions projections and use a ridiculously low discount figure when you are calculating the ‘cost’ of climate change. Until you are confident you have some degree of certainty in these variables then any carbon tax is purely fanciful. For example, if you use a discount of around 7% for future cash flows (which isn’t unrealistic) then the cost of carbon emissions is essentially zero. Depending on which camp you sit within, this could be good news...
Those are big issues but they also exist with other policies. What discount rate and ECS justifies banning ICE vehicles by 2035? A carbon tax couldn't do that because it's volcanically not cost effective
If the tax is revenue neutral and avoids heating, farming etc then it will be a better deal than something of the same cost that subsidizes whatever politicians come up with
Journalism like this only confirms the belief of those who deny there is anything to worry about regarding climate change. To be honest, I can't blame them. They may not be scientists or even well versed on the topic. But they can smell bullshit when they see it. I think a natural reaction to bad faith actors is to take a completely opposite point of view.
Green journalism is the new yellow journalism.
I'm not sure I'd call climate journalism "green." It pretends to be, but in general it has a very shallow, physics-only view of the climate. The truly green aspects of climate, such of the role of land use, very few climate journalists are even aware of.
And gets all the physics wrong.
I'm curious what you mean in more detail. How is the climate narrative getting the physics wrong? Are you talking about the physics of land/atmosphere interactions? Thanks.
I mean, basic physics. In the beginning with discussion of the concept of AGW, it was proclaimed that the high latitudes and arctic would warm faster, and so it has. Success right?
The atmosphere and oceans are essentially a heat pump? It take heat in at the equator/mid-latitudes, move it to the poles where it escapes into space.
"Weather" is created by the temperature differential between the those points so if the poles warm faster than the equator the differential decreases and therefore extreme weather should decrease.
And so it has come to pass, as Roger points out on here with the data regarding hurricanes, tornados etc, extreme weather is decreasing or at minimum flat. Wildfires are not increasing.
Now all of that could be a case of correlation and have nothing to do with each other. But it fits what the theory supposedly was.
But the alarmist "scientists" and "media" just cannot get out of their own way, everything must be bad and therefor they have to trumpet ever weather event as climate change, instead of stating that the observed data actually seems to be tracking the original theory. But no, it must be screaming hair on fire 24/7.
I have been following this for a couple decades which is WHY i'm a skeptic/realist. I used to believe but i got over it. For 20 years i have read that the science is settled, and yet every day it changes and somehow still remains settled and just never you mind what we said was settled last week.
Grifters
Anyway, i think its all irretrievably broken and should be burned to the ground, start from scratch.
Its all corrupt, root and branch.
Look at what happened to Roger, and that is by no means done as he is attacked as a denier daily even though he recites the catechism regularly.
He simply points out the data doesn't match the narrative, same sin Koonin and other are guilty of.
You want to fix it? First step, anyone who uses the term "denier" is removed from public debate, no exceptions, as those people are only trying to prevent debate. To the gulag.
Thats a beginning.
Thanks for getting back. Interesting point. It's a side of the picture I'm not too familiar with, but have spoken with other scientists involved with land use, who get marginalized because their results run up against the computer models. You might find this piece interesting in terms of how climate science was administratively organized to leave land use issues out of the picture. https://www.resilience.org/stories/2022-09-07/putting-the-land-back-in-climate/
Further
I like your term "Administratively organized" but i have no idea why you are being so nice about.
They systematically eliminated anything that doesn't support the narrative, that CO2 dun it. Its all narrative control.
So we who read know that the climate has been warming steadily for over 200 years, thats just how it is.
The radiative physics of AGW says that CO2 had to be to a certain level to make a change well that didn;'t occur until the last 25% of that time frame.
And yet its axiomatic that people have cause any warming since 1950 even though they cannot explain the first 150 year nor can they explain why its no longer a factor.
How can you determine if something is a factor when you don't know what it is.
Anyway.
John Robson kills it every week on his blog, love his stuff, laugh away.
I promise it hurts someone somewhere
https://climatediscussionnexus.com/blog/
Interesting.
My issue is that climate science operates like a cult. Roger is an example, as a Canadian my main thoughts are regarding what happened to Susan Crockford. Like Roger she didn't question the theory or the science behind it, she simply pointed out that despite predictions the polar bears were doing fine, not facing extinction, increasing in numbers in counterpoint to the predictions from "the science".
And her career was destroyed because she questioned the narrative.
I cannot take "climate science" seriously and i will laugh at them every week along with John Robson as mockery is the best response. The soviets knew if everyone is laughing at you, you are done.
I laugh every day
You don't comment on the role that the Arabella network of left-leaning dark money plays in the shift in media bias, but I wish you would. It appears that Arabella has now reached or outstripped the dark money vehicles of the right.
I'd love to learn more. Clearly a lot of "journalism" in climate is sponsored.
Check out Robert Bryce’s post on Substack, “Let Them Eat Solar Panels” for more on Arabella.
Here's an example. I belong to the Society of Environmental Journalists. We will frequently get a notice for a webinar on a topic funded by some kind of foundation. Check out this one for example. https://www.samuellawrencefoundation.org/event-details-registration/first-friday-series-march-2023
So Mark Jacobson, a Stanford Prof, says it's really easy to go all renewable.. which we here on the ground know not to be the case, just based on siting concerns. The problem is that either reporters are not skeptical, don't want to appear to be skeptical in front of others, or don't know enough about the real world to be skeptical. I sat in on this one and Jacobson sounds compelling.. but so did snake oil salespeople.
This is no different than what Taibbi and Shellenberger are reporting regarding censorship in general. Lots of “foundations” and NGOs supposedly set up by caring individuals but in reality funded by govt and or agenda billionaires to pump out fake studies to help shape the narrative and define the allowable terms of debate.
I'm pretty sure that when you write that you do not share the authors' views (that climate "journalists" have become climate ADVOCATES) it's a typo, because you go on to explain how right they are.
And BTW, I do wish that you had the luxury of bouncing your newsletters off a good editor or proofreader pre-pub,
"The authors hold a position that I do not — that the main purpose of media coverage of climate is to motivate people to act on climate, whatever that means."
Indeed, we could each use a good editor!
I guess you intend "the main purpose" to mean the PROPER purpose, and I took it to mean the actual intention.
Yes, "main" as in "primary"
Josef Goebbels (arguably the father of modern media-based propaganda) is sadly smiling at the state of journalism on this subject. A recent example: RJP at the recent senate hearings making the same plea for ethical scientific work and reporting and the misuse of the extreeme scenarios to guide policy.
How did the UK Guardian report his words: "RJP supported the notion of a climate crisis...."(I parphrase)".
It will take many years yet of human ability to master the "imminent tipping points" and adapt, before the general public understand they have been "had" or nakedly manipulated.
What I've noticed is that land change and land use are never mentioned as climate drivers, even though scientists like your father have been pointing out for years just how important land use is to the climates we live in and experience. It is a consistent omission with profound consequences.
Roger, thanks for this article, as this is only confirming to the 20% of the population who are sceptics, what is a root cause of biased reporting, which includes advocacy, lack of facts and all advocate, opinion.
This is not only true in the field of alarmist climate change, but also covers pretty well all "NEWS" covered by MSM newspapers and main stream broadcasting outlets that nowadays has an to has an agenda, has to be activist driven, has to follow a propaganda narrative, and has to follow the dictum of "if it bleeds its leads."
It is so good to have outlets like Substack which facilitates the airing of the 20% skeptical views, which until recently were unable to see the light of day.
It goes without saying that this expose by the likes of yourself, is critical to the fight against the The Industrial Censorship Complex which is well under weigh from those sources that would have us all believe that for the human race to reach Utopia, demands a global government, which will eliminate the ills that plague all societies, that all poverty can be eliminated, and the world will will consist only of altruistic societies, can live in harmony and we can all sit around the camp fire humming kumbaya.
No surprises here to quote Dylan, “you don’t need a weatherman to tell which way the wind blows”.
I have a friend in England that told me to stop sending your blog. He just refuses to believe any other scenario then the one that is sensationalized in the media.
I have a number British friends that are Poisoned to their core by the British media. I provide Paul Homewood and the UK Conservative Woman (stop that, i can identify as i please!) as the antidote but i am condemned for sending these. I dare not send any US based links as they are entirely frowned upon.
We're not all like that.... but a lot are. The reporting here in England is tiresomely biased but I think a few cracks are emerging. It will take along time but £ and physics will win in the end.
I was in Europe a couple weeks ago and I ended up watching Skynews a couple nights. I thought the CBC was bad but Skyness blew them out of the water in the climate/insane stakes.
I am sick and tired of hearing how extreme weather events have increased significantly over the last few decades. I hear this all the time...and I recently listened to a congressional hearing on the energy transition where several representatives of both parties were saying extreme weather events have increased sharply. Is anyone informed anymore? I feel like the climate agenda is essentially cultural totalitarianism.
Problem is, publications like The Economist and New York Times won't even publish comments pointing to errors in their climate reporting. Joe Biden says climate change is real, "You can see it with your own eyes, feel it in your bones," and nobody responds - BS!