Still waiting for MF to explain his conspiracy theory belief that the vast majority of climate scientists are lying for political reasons.
The wait is over. We will explore the alleged "conspiracy theory" in detail.
First, some context. I never accused climate scientists of "lying." The discussion was about the IPCC, and the IPCC's claim that it had "95% certainty" that global warming is man-made.
Basketcase said the following about the 95% certainty: "There are two possibilities here. Either the scientific evidence is strong enough that it is the accepted view or there is a massive conspiracy in the scientific community."
Here is the exchange that followed (posts 443 and 471):
You missed the obvious possibility: That the IPCC is driven by a political agenda, rather than a scientific one.
So then you vote conspiracy theory then. Not surprised.
Apparently, basketcase believes my assertion that "the IPCC is driven by a political agenda" is a "conspiracy theory."
Really? Let's assess that.
We'll start with the idea that the IPCC's reports are influenced by politics. Where does that suggestion come from? The IPCC, actually:
Review is an essential part of the IPCC process to ensure objective and complete assessment of the current information. In the course of the multi-stage review process - first by experts and then by governments and experts - both expert reviewers and governments are invited to comment on the accuracy and completeness of the scientific, technical and socio-economic content and the overall balance of the drafts.
http://www.ipcc.ch/organization/organization_procedures.shtml#.Uxz5Oc69bAI
Scientists involved in the IPCC process have confirmed that there is a political agenda.
On June 25, 1996, Ben Santer -- the lead author on Chapter 8 of the IPCC's 1995 report -- said in a letter to the Wall Street Journal that the chapter had been reviewed by "governments, individual scientists, and non-governmental organizations.":
http://www.ucar.edu/communications/quarterly/summer96/insert.html
Feb. 23, 2005 -- In an email to fellow IPCC researchers, Hans von Storch -- a leading climate scientist in Germany -- says the IPCC's decision to declare that Michael Mann's hockey-stick graph was "true," was "stupid, politically motivated" (
https://sites.google.com/site/globalwarmingquestions/climategate-2). On Dec. 22, 2009, von Storch writes an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal that says scientists working for the IPCC have become politicized, "with scientists acting as politicians and politicians posturing as scientists":
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052748704238104574601443947078538
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-- 2007 -- The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to Al Gore and the IPCC, for "their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and
to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change" (emphasis added by me).
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2007/
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And then there's the broader interpretation in the media and the public. According to basketcase, I'm a "conspiracy theorist" whose views are outside of mainstream opinion. Apparently, most people who follow the IPCC's activities have determined that the IPCC is the definitive authority on the science of global warming, dedicated solely to the dissemination of empirical information. According to basketcase, anyone who thinks there is any kind of "agenda" is clearly on the fringes.
Is that so?
Here is a broad selection of articles (in no particular order) that appeared in the Toronto media related to the IPCC's most recent report. All of these articles cast doubts on the IPCC's reports, often accusing the IPCC of having a political/activist agenda.
http://opinion.financialpost.com/2013/10/08/climate-forecast-alls-well-despite-what-the-ipcc-says/
http://opinion.financialpost.com/2013/09/30/ipcc-climate-global-warming/
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/glob...r-problem/article14491748/#dashboard/follows/
http://www.torontosun.com/2013/09/16/climate-change-hoax
http://www.torontosun.com/2013/09/27/climate-change-what-climate-change
http://www.torontosun.com/2013/09/26/time-to-end-the-climate-of-fear
http://www.torontosun.com/2013/09/27/world-needs-pause-from-ipcc-politics
http://www.torontosun.com/2013/11/01/condescending-bbc-cools-on-global-warming
http://opinion.financialpost.com/20...ide-is-rising-on-climate-models-and-policies/
http://opinion.financialpost.com/2013/09/26/9000-nobel-pretenders/
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com...oure-right-in-the-end-if-no-one-believes-you/
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com...plays-high-priest-to-climate-change-religion/
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Some select quotes:
-- Lorrie Goldstein (Toronto Sun): "The IPCC today is primarily a political and advocacy organization. It has too many scientists who think of themselves as politicians, entitled to tell everyone else how to live. It is populated and stalked by green activists, who have an ideological agenda that is anti-growth and anti-western."
http://www.torontosun.com/2013/09/26/time-to-end-the-climate-of-fear
-- Margaret Wente (Globe and Mail): "Global warming’s credibility problem is not the deniers’ and the skeptics’ fault. It’s the fault of activist scientists, Al Gore, and the IPCC. They’ve cried wolf too much. They’ve vastly overstated what the science “says,” and treated anybody who is the least bit doubtful as the enemy."
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/glob...r-problem/article14491748/#dashboard/follows/
-- Matt Gurney (National Post): "(A)larmism, once proven to be bogus, destroys credibility just as effectively as it sells papers and motivates politicians. I would not invest my money with someone who got the stock market as wrong as the IPCC has gotten Earth’s climate wrong since 2007."
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com...oure-right-in-the-end-if-no-one-believes-you/
-- Judith Curry (National Post): "The problem and solution were vastly oversimplified back in 1990 by the UNFCCC/IPCC, where they framed both the problem and the solution as irreducibly global. This framing was locked in by a self-reinforcing consensus-seeking approach to the science and a “speaking consensus to power” approach for decision making that pointed to only one possible course of policy action – radical emissions reductions."
http://opinion.financialpost.com/2013/09/30/ipcc-climate-global-warming/
-- Charles Krauthammer (National Post, via the Washington Post): "(T)hose scientists who pretend to know exactly what this will cause in 20, 30 or 50 years are white-coated propagandists."
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com...plays-high-priest-to-climate-change-religion/
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To sum up:
The political influence in the IPCC process (from governments and NGOs, such as environmental organizations) is a confirmed fact, according to the IPCC.
It has also been confirmed by a lead author and a researcher who accused the IPCC, in an email, of a "stupid, politically motivated" decision (and by a number of others involved in the process that I couldn't be bothered to cite).
The Nobel Institute awarded the IPCC with a Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for its activist agenda.
And the political/activist agenda has been described in various articles throughout the media (and I was only citing publications in Toronto). Some commentators have concluded that the IPCC is mostly driven by a political/activist agenda.
You can choose to disagree, if you like.
But a "conspiracy theory?" Absolute hogwash.