Back in the Day

It's Time to Fish or Cut Bait

Back in the day--like two years ago--when climate "scientists" gathered to prognosticate and pronounce jeremiads upon the human race, newspapers would print garish headlines on front pages, magnifying the impact of these egg headed folk. It sold papers, after all. And on the nightly TV news we would be entertained by grave news readers solemnly re-iterating the spectral harbingers of climate doom.

How things have changed. The same old crew has gathered at Cancun in Mexico. True to form the confabulations have produced even worse prognostications. "We have lost time. There is more carbon dioxide out there now. If we are to avert the end of the human race we have to act. The lateness of the hour requires even more drastic measures, etc. etc." But not a peep. No garish headlines. No tremulous news readers. No-one is listening any more.

Mind you, the fact that right on cue the northern hemisphere is shivering under blizzards that have come much earlier than normal does not help. But it is apparent that during the intervening months since the debacle at Copenhagen and the embarrassment of leaked e-mails from the CRU showing that when it comes to the climate cabal the protagonists do not deserve the appellation "scientist" the true believers have retreated into their Platonic caves only to dream darker dreams then ever.

Who will spare us these mad ravings from unbalanced "scientists"? It is clear from a report in The Telegraph that the fictional image of the mad scientist is now a reality.

Cancun climate change summit: scientists call for rationing in developed world

Global warming is now such a serious threat to mankind that climate change experts are calling for Second World War-style rationing in rich countries to bring down carbon emissions.

'The Second World War and the concept of rationing is something we need to seriously consider if we are to address the scale of the problem we face'

By Louise Gray, Environment Correspondent  29 Nov 2010

 

In a series of papers published by the Royal Society, physicists and chemists from some of world’s most respected scientific institutions, including Oxford University and the Met Office, agreed that current plans to tackle global warming are not enough.

Unless emissions are reduced dramatically in the next ten years the world is set to see temperatures rise by more than 4C (7.2F) by as early as the 2060s, causing floods, droughts and mass migration.

As the world meets in Cancun, Mexico for the latest round of United Nations talks on climate change, the influential academics called for much tougher measures to cut carbon emissions.

In one paper Professor Kevin Anderson, Director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, said the only way to reduce global emissions enough, while allowing the poor nations to continue to grow, is to halt economic growth in the rich world over the next twenty years. 

Of course we now all know these "experts" are reasoning in a viciously circular pattern.  Their speculative assumptions have been fed into their computer models, which in turn make projections into the far off future, which "show" that things will be bad all around as a result of supposed  increasing concentrations of carbon.  This in turn leads them to devise the most extreme remedies, since their models are "telling" them, driven by their input assumptions that things are going to be bad.

But clearly folk like Professor Anderson have lost touch with reality.  We all know that one of the reasons the public has lost its lurid fascination with such doomsday predictions is the current economic recession.  The public has got back to the basics of life. Environmentalism is only sustainable if folk are so well off they have the luxury of devoting time and money to it.  To be crass, environmentalism does not put bread on the table.  But now the egghead professor is trying to persuade folk that his cause requires the imposition of a far, far worse recession.  Soviet style planning and rationing.  Clearly this man has lot touch with reality.
 

This would mean a drastic change in lifestyles for many people in countries like Britain as everyone will have to buy less ‘carbon intensive’ goods and services such as long haul flights and fuel hungry cars.Prof Anderson admitted it “would not be easy” to persuade people to reduce their consumption of goods.  He said politicians should consider a rationing system similar to the one introduced during the last “time of crisis” in the 1930s and 40s.

This could mean a limit on electricity so people are forced to turn the heating down, turn off the lights and replace old electrical goods like huge fridges with more efficient models. Food that has travelled from abroad may be limited and goods that require a lot of energy to manufacture.
“The Second World War and the concept of rationing is something we need to seriously consider if we are to address the scale of the problem we face,” he said.. . ..

Second World War rationing.  Right.  These guys have spent too long in Plato's cave.  They need a decent dose of empirical reality.  Now is the time to shame the fools who have done damage to us all in their stupid attempts to ward off global warming. 

Let's start with Professor Gluckman, science advisor to our easily-lead Prime Minister.  Since Gluckman has assured the Prime Minister and the nation that the "science" of global warming is settled, we suggest someone should ask him publicly whether he believes this settled science requires that New Zealand enter a regime of World War Two rationing, and will he be so advising our credulous Prime Minister.  If the answers are in the negative, he then needs to be asked whether he holds to the view that the eminent "scientists" at Cancun are operating in the realm  of "settled science".  He can't have it both ways.  After all, if you are a scientist you have to follow the science, right? Or, not?

It's time either to fish or cut bait, Professor Gluckman.