Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Global Warming 'Skeptic' Never Really Was - Media's portrayal of scientist wrong
Capitol Confidential ^ | 8/4/2012 | Tom Gantert

Posted on 08/07/2012 1:19:16 PM PDT by MichCapCon

The mainstream media is celebrating a physicist who allegedly did a U-turn on his global warming views and now says humans are the cause.

Except Richard Muller had already said in 2008 that man was a cause of global warming.

Nonetheless, the San Francisco Chronicle, for example, reported July 31: “The hot issue of global warming got hotter Monday when a UC Berkeley physicist, once a loud skeptic of human-caused climate change, agreed not only that the Earth is heating up, but also that people are the cause of it all.”

Never mind that in an interview almost four years ago with the environmental magazine Grist, Muller said man was a cause of global warming.

Grist: What should a President McCain or Obama know about global warming?

Muller: The bottom line is that there is a consensus — the [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] — and the president needs to know what the IPCC says. Second, they say that most of the warming of the last 50 years is probably due to humans. You need to know that this is from carbon dioxide, and you need to understand which technologies can reduce this and which can’t. Roughly 1 degree Fahrenheit of global warming has taken place; we’re responsible for one quarter of it. If we cut back so we don’t cause any more, global warming will be delayed by three years and keep on going up. And now the developing world is producing most of the carbon dioxide.

Even Muller appears to have forgotten what he said in 2008.

In his July 28 New York Times op-ed, Muller says he came to this conclusion in 2011. “Last year, following an intensive research effort involving a dozen scientists, I concluded that global warming was real and that the prior estimates of the rate of warming were correct. I’m now going a step further: Humans are almost entirely the cause.”

Muller didn’t respond to a question in an email about the discrepancy concerning when he came to believe in human-induced global warming, but responded to another question about his credentials.

Muller co-founded Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST), which released a study this month. Muller is not a climatologist. Many who support global warming have attacked the credentials of critics who were not climatologists. For example, in 2009, Bill Chameides, the dean of Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment, wrote an op-ed for The Huffington Post saying those who doubted global warming were “non-experts” because they were not climatologists.

Chameides wrote: “Have you noticed that a new kind of scientific expert has been born? It is the non-climate scientist ‘climate scientist,’ better known in the trade as the NCSCS. ... What is a[n] NCSCS? It is someone who is not a climate scientist but is nevertheless happy to speak authoritatively about the alleged scientific errors being made by the real climate scientists. A dead ringer for a[n] NCSCS is one who begins with words to the effect of: ‘I am not a climatologist, but. ...’ ”

Chameides didn’t respond to an email asking how Muller’s testimony should be viewed since Muller is not a climatologist.

Muller defended his credentials when asked about not being a climatologist: “I don't know what the definition is. It is unfortunate that this field seems to emphasize credentials rather than science.” Muller also forwarded citations of his published works on climate that “have appeared in some of the most prestigious peer-reviewed journals.”

John Christy, a climatologist and a professor at The University of Alabama-Huntsville, said Muller has been on record in the past “promoting human-induced global warming.”

“I sat next to Muller at a (U.S.) House hearing last year,” Christy said in an email. “Nothing he said gave me the feeling he was a ‘skeptic.’ I also find his result that greenhouse emissions, to him, are the only thing that can cause slow warming in global temperature when such changes have occurred down through the centuries, i.e. before the BEST record begins. Climate variations have been around long before the mere 250 years of the BEST dataset.”


TOPICS: Science
KEYWORDS: globalwarming; hotaircult; mediaconspiracy; mediawingofthednc; partisanmediashills

1 posted on 08/07/2012 1:19:24 PM PDT by MichCapCon
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Springman; Sioux-san; 70th Division; JPG; PGalt; DuncanWaring
Global warming skeptic who changed sides never was a skeptic.

If anyone wants to be added to the Michigan Cap Con ping list, let me know.
2 posted on 08/07/2012 1:23:55 PM PDT by cripplecreek (What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: cripplecreek

The desperation of the socialist left knows no bounds. Much like the collaspe of the obama regime since his fraudulent election the AGW political scam by the socialist democrats has collasped since the emails revealed they doctored the evidence. Many socialist diehards still cling to the fraud hoping they can reverse it’s political dissent. The Chronicle has been pushing the BS on this from the beginning. Yet not one assertion by these frauds has been proven correct, NOT ONE.


3 posted on 08/07/2012 1:35:44 PM PDT by spawn44 (moo)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: spawn44

Sounds to me like Richard Muller wasn’t vocal enough in his belief in stupidity so the media labeled him a skeptic. Now that he does speak they portray it as being no different than if Billy Graham had converted to satanism.

The reality is that Muller is a straw man personified.


4 posted on 08/07/2012 1:50:20 PM PDT by cripplecreek (What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: MichCapCon

For cheaper gas, vote Romney, and let the weather take care of the climate.


5 posted on 08/07/2012 3:31:08 PM PDT by pallis
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: MichCapCon
Getting fairly obvious that big government types can never ever be trusted. We should have learned that lesson when they killed millions last century.

Personally refuse to ever work with any of them ever again. And in the long run, that is not my loss.

6 posted on 08/07/2012 3:35:51 PM PDT by justa-hairyape
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: spawn44
Yet not one assertion by these frauds has been proven correct, NOT ONE.

Debating a leftist is like debating jello. And in the long run, not worth the effort. The truth is already out there. Here is the truth of the carbon dioxide myth. From a former government employee. Perhaps one of the last honest ones.

The lynching of carbon dioxide

7 posted on 08/07/2012 3:46:58 PM PDT by justa-hairyape
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: MichCapCon
I really respect Richard Muller, and his candid approach to physics and science. His book, Physics for Presidents, and accompanying workbook, are straightforward and "non-partisan."
In fact, I will have to re-read it, as I remember that he does discuss, however briefly, the difference between "science" and hysteria.

That he is reported to be unaware that the IPCC sumaries are political rather than science, and that several scientists of world stature resigned from the IPCC because of its political activism at the expense of science, baffles me.

8 posted on 08/07/2012 8:25:51 PM PDT by publius911 (Formerly Publius 6961, formerly jennsdad)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: MichCapCon
I really respect Richard Muller, and his candid approach to physics and science. His book, Physics for Presidents, and accompanying workbook, are straightforward and "non-partisan."
In fact, I will have to re-read it, as I remember that he does discuss, however briefly, the difference between "science" and hysteria.

That he is reported to be unaware that the IPCC sumaries are political rather than science, and that several scientists of world stature resigned from the IPCC because of its political activism at the expense of actual science, baffles me.

9 posted on 08/07/2012 9:04:30 PM PDT by publius911 (Formerly Publius 6961, formerly jennsdad)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson