“So long as the tools a paradigm supplies continue to prove capable of solving the problems it defines, science moves fastest and penetrates most deeply through confident employment of the tools. The reason is clear. As in manufacture so in science – retooling is an extravagance to be reserved for the occasion that demands it. The significance of crises is the indication they provide that an occasion for the retooling has arrived.” Thomas Kuhn
Blog
Costly Climate Model Just a Big Boy’s Toy
THE only difference between some men and many boys is the price of their toys. This observation has much relevance to decisions made over recent years at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, BOM.
A toy is a game, a gadget, a gizmo that may have no real practical value. But of course it is fun to play with.
They have a lot of fun at the BOM playing with General Circulation Models. These models, run on supercomputers, are essentially about attempting to forecast future and past climate including cyclones, droughts and ice sheets crashing into the Southern Ocean. The super computers are worth tens of millions of dollars and there are over 130, mostly big boys, playing with them from 9am until 5pm Monday to Friday at the BOM in Melbourne.
It all happens at considerable expense to the Australian taxpayer and I say they do little more than play, because the output from their favorite model generates mostly nonsense at least when it comes to that most important of all climate variable for Australians – rainfall.
The BOM has directed most of its research efforts over recent decades towards modeling climate systems as part of a global effort that began back in the 1950s when a small team of American scientists set out to model the atmosphere as an array of thousands of numbers. [Read more…] about Costly Climate Model Just a Big Boy’s Toy
At Last a Politician Mentions Climate Fraud: Queensland Senator Ian MacDonald
I’VE been unimpressed with new Prime Minister Tony Abbott and the nature of the Coalition’s election victory. During the recent election then Shadow Minister, now Minister for the Environment, Greg Hunt, repeatedly stated that “We agree… on the science of climate change, we agree on the targets to reduce emissions and we agree on using markets as the best mechanism.”
There has been no one prepared to publically put the alternative perspective on climate change, to speak up and explain that of course the climate has always changed, but there is no evidence to suggest we currently have a climate catastrophe or that a carbon tax will have any effect on the climate. Until yesterday. While I wouldn’t consider Ian MacDonald’s speech to the Australian Senate particularly well written, it is inspiring in so much as at last we have an Australian politician speaking plainly in parliament about the nonsense that is climate change and the carbon tax… 
[Read more…] about At Last a Politician Mentions Climate Fraud: Queensland Senator Ian MacDonald
Scientists Warn What?
Help. Received the following media release from the University of Queensland today. Can’t find “the research” amongst the conclusions, platitudes and dogma…
Scientists warn: Climate change inaction betrays the young
4 December 2013
Most of the Earth’s remaining fossil fuels must be left in the ground to avoid disastrous consequences for today’s young people and for future generations, according to research published today.
The research is co-authored by 18 scientists from around the world, including University of Queensland Global Change Institute Director Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg. [Read more…] about Scientists Warn What?
Retraction of GM-Maize Rat Study Findings
Dear ABCA Subscribers,
The journal Food and Chemical Toxicology today announced the retraction of the article Long term toxicity of a Roundup herbicide and a Roundup-tolerant genetically modified maize by Séralini et al first published online in September 2012.
Shortly after the article was originally published, the journal received many letters to the editor expressing concerns about the validity of the findings, the proper use of animals and even allegations of fraud.
The study alleged that biotech corn and herbicides caused tumours and organ damage, and led to premature death in laboratory rats.
Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ), in agreement with food safety regulators globally, rejected the conclusions of the study, finding “On the basis of the many scientific deficiencies identified in the study, FSANZ does not accept the conclusions made by the authors and has therefore found no justification to reconsider the safety of NK603 corn.”
The journal Food and Chemical Toxicology’s retraction today states:
“The Editor-in-Chief found no evidence of fraud or intentional misrepresentation of the data. However, there is a legitimate cause for concern regarding both the number of animals in each study group and the particular strain selected. The low number of animals had been identified as a cause for concern during the initial review process, but the peer-review decision ultimately weighed that the work still had merit despite this limitation. A more in-depth look at the raw data revealed that no definitive conclusions can be reached with this small sample size regarding the role of either NK603 or glyphosate in regards to overall mortality or tumor incidence. Given the known high incidence of tumors in the Sprague-Dawley rat, normal variability cannot be excluded as the cause of the higher mortality and incidence observed in the treated groups.”
The journal’s letter to Séralini requesting he withdraw his article can be downloaded here. The responses of a number of Australian and international scientists given when the study was first published can be found here.
ABCA will be disseminating this information in the coming weeks and months to ensure that Australians are informed of the erroneous nature of the conclusions drawn from this study. We would encourage subscribers to do the same.
Jessica Lee
Chair, Public Affairs Working Group
Agricultural Biotechnology Council of Australia
Same Information: Different Opinion. Part 2, The Tragic versus Utopian Vision of Climate Science
WE know that General Circulation Models underpin the theory of anthropomorphic global warming, rely on supercomputers, are expense to run and mostly output nonsense [1].
Earlier this year I sat in a seminar as a UK climate scientist acknowledged all the limitations of General Circulation Models, but then went on to claim that they had to be the future of weather forecasting because they were grand and incorporated all that was grand about science and that one day they would be better at predicting the weather and the climate.
The Professor suggested that statistical models, including artificial neural networks, were just pattern analysis. He stated that even if statistical models could forecast rainfall in Australia, for example, better than the best General Circulation Models, these statistical models were so limited and so ordinary that this is not where science should be investing.
This professor perhaps sees grandeur, where I see waste and hubris. [Read more…] about Same Information: Different Opinion. Part 2, The Tragic versus Utopian Vision of Climate Science
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD has worked in industry and government. She is currently researching a novel technique for long-range weather forecasting funded by the B. Macfie Family Foundation.