What Catastrophe?

The Weekly Standard ^ | January 7, 2014 | Ethan Epstein

[Biggirl]

When you first meet Richard Lindzen, the Alfred P. Sloan professor of meteorology at MIT, senior fellow at the Cato Institute, leading climate “skeptic,” and all-around scourge of James Hansen, Bill McKibben, Al Gore, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and sundry other climate “alarmists,” as Lindzen calls them, you may find yourself a bit surprised. If you know Lindzen only from the way his opponents characterize him—variously, a liar, a lunatic, a charlatan, a denier, a shyster, a crazy person, corrupt—you might expect a spittle-flecked, wild-eyed loon. But in person, Lindzen cuts a rather different figure. With his gray beard, thick glasses, gentle laugh, and disarmingly soft voice, he comes across as nothing short of grandfatherly.

[jimmyray]

Tag for further reading

[ClearCase_guy]

The GOP ought to assemble a list:

We were right about Obamacare -- it is a disaster, isn't it?
We were right about Global Warming -- it has been getting colder, hasn't it?
We were right about the Stimulus -- the economy has been stagnant for 8 years, right?

Why vote Democrat? They don't know what they're doing.

[TADSLOS]

Why vote Democrat? They don't know what they're doing.

That would only work if the GOP actually knew what it was doing and what it stood for, instead of statism.

[WayneS]

If Lindzen is right about this and global warming is nothing to worry about, why do so many climate scientists, many with résumés just as impressive as his, preach imminent doom? He says it mostly comes down to the money—to the incentive structure of academic research funded by government grants. Almost all funding for climate research comes from the government, which, he says, makes scientists essentially vassals of the state. And generating fear, Lindzen contends, is now the best way to ensure that policymakers keep the spigot open.

That's the crux of the issue, right there.

[ClearCase_guy]

I do agree with that. I no longer consider myself a Republican. I am a Conservative.

That being said, the Tea Party might want to personalize this stuff --

Sarah Palin said there would be Death Panels. Everyone laughed. But look -- the rationing has begun; death panels are here.
Ted Cruz said Obamacare should be delayed. Everyone laughed. But look -- even the Democrats want it delayed now.

Maybe the Tea Party knows better than anyone else what's going on ...

[TADSLOS]

I agree. The Tea Party has plenty of examples to draw from.

[KarlInOhio]

He says it mostly comes down to the money—to the incentive structure of academic research funded by government grants. Almost all funding for climate research comes from the government, which, he says, makes scientists essentially vassals of the state. And generating fear, Lindzen contends, is now the best way to ensure that policymakers keep the spigot open.

From President Eisenhower's farewell address.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers. The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present -- and is gravely to be regarded.

Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.

Eisenhower hit dead center with that warning.

[WayneS]

Yes he did.

[Jim Robinson]

ObamaCare is a disaster for America.

ObamaNomics is a disaster for America.

Obama’s unemployment numbers is a disaster for America.

Obama is a disaster for America.

The GloBULL Warming freaks getting stuck in the ice is a disaster for the Marxists/communists pushing gloBULLism.

[LucianOfSamasota]

Consensus is antithetical to discovery.

[colorado tanker]

Democrats all remember what Ike said about a military industrial complex, but gosh, they just don’t seem to remember your quote.

[Brown Deer]

Richard Lindzen was originally a Democrat for most of his life, but became a Republican as a result of his position in the climate change debate.

Lindzen attended the Bronx High School of Science (winning Regents’ and National Merit Scholarships,) Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Harvard University. From Harvard, he received an A.B. in Physics in 1960, followed by an S.M. in Applied Mathematics in 1961 and then a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics in 1964. His doctoral thesis, entitled Radiative and photochemical processes in strato- and mesospheric dynamics, concerned the interactions of ozone photochemistry, radiative transfer and dynamics in the middle atmosphere.

Lindzen is a recipient of the American Meteorological Society’s Meisinger and Charney Awards, American Geophysical Union’s Macelwane Medal, and the Leo Prize from the Wallin Foundation in Goteborg, Sweden. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), and the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters, and was named Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences, the American Geophysical Union, and the American Meteorological Society. He is a corresponding member of the NAS Committee on Human Rights, and a member of the United States National Research Council Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate. He was a consultant to the Global Modeling and Simulation Group at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, and a Distinguished Visiting Scientist at California Institute of Technology’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Lindzen is an ISI highly cited researcher, and his biography has been included in American Men and Women of Science.

[Brown Deer]

http://www-eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/CV.pdf

[Brown Deer]

Richard Lindzen, Ph.D. Lecture Deconstructs Global Warming Hysteria

What we see is that the very foundation of the issue of global warming is wrong.

So where do we go from here?

It is hard to tell, given that to note this constitutes an "insult to the educated class and the entire East and West Coasts."

[CedarDave]

An important article. Linzen is likely the most important climate scientist in the US and with his credentials adds much weight to push back the CAGW* alarmists.

(*catastrophic, anthropogenic global warming)

Added keywords globalwarming, climatechange, globalwarminghoax