kim, if one posits these extremes on some straight line, the centre seems furthest from each
And so that's not a bad place to be 'stuck' imho

Some of the more malevolent and unpleasant characters and their actions as archived in this thread cry out for some kind of explanation. Here is one: they may be examples of sub-clinical psychopaths. See: http://jonjayray.com/psycho.html
and http://www.truthjustice.net/politics/liberalism-and-low-self-esteem/

Drivel then, drivel now. King of Drivel. Yet he had the ear of government when it came to science! Quite shocking. Quite alarming. Truly such people have been the main threat of catastrophe. Mind you, almost everything is more scary than rising carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Does Sir David King Still Believe The Drivel He Spouted in 2004?

For chapter and verse, see: https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2017/04/19/does-sir-david-king-still-believe-the-drivel-he-spouted-in-2004/

More evidence of the corruption of climate science: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/04/25/former-obama-official-bureaucrats-manipulate-climate-stats-to-influence-policy/

The title says it all. Careful selection of data. Careful downplaying of whatever is unhelpful to 'the cause'. Careful headlines in careful press releases chosen for the hoped-for impact on public opinion. Tawdry is as tawdry does - one suspects this headline could be truthfully replicated with minor adjustments for organisations in many other other countries.

Not only is it hard to find any morally or intellectually admirable folk in the CO2 Scaremongering camp leaders, their followers and supporters can be down at the low end of any scale that could measure them. Here are two posts from today which illustrate this:

1. https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/05/01/the-ignorance-intolerance-and-violence-of-the-climate-crusaders/

2. https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2017/05/01/prof-tom-anderson-shows-his-ignorance/

We are not being led by the brightest and the best to fight the good fight against 'global warming/climate change', nor are their followers in either category. Some pretty dreadful and/or incompetent people are leading and being led in this fatuous crusade.

John J Ray on his Greenie Watch blog, spells out why the corruption of science in and around climate could be with us for some time yet. This is an introduction he gave to a paper about the sorry state of medical research:

Splashy ideas get the money -- even if they are wrong

The article below is about medical research but similar results are found in other disciplines -- such as psychology. But global warming is probably the most spectacular example of what the article discusses -- that scientists are most likely to get funded if they have an exciting idea to present -- but almost all such ideas are eventually found to be wrong. And saving the planet is a REALLY big idea that yields a golden shower of research grants onto anybody who promotes Warmism. The data is already in which shows that Warmism is BS but until most scientists come out and say it is BS it will still hold sway. But for most scientists concerned, Warmism is their bread and butter so we are going to wait a long time for them to own up

Source: http://antigreen.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/splashy-ideas-get-money-even-if-they.html#links

Nasty people have been very fond of malaria over the past 50 years or so. It helped soothe their overpopulation nightmares when their attacks on DDT led to a massive increase in deaths due to malaria. More on that phase here: https://junkscience.com/1999/07/100-things-you-should-know-about-ddt/#content

Now the new wave of eco-nasties are riding the CO2 Scare bandwagon, ably supported by the IPCC. They like malaria now as another means to spread their Scare. But, as before, they do that for political, social-engineering, and fantasy reasons rather than science-based ones. See Paul Homewood's reminder of this here: https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2017/05/08/paul-reiters-damning-assessment-of-the-ipcc/

He mentions the BBC doing its bit to push this lever for the Scare: '...as Earth warms northern countries will become more susceptible to outbreaks of "southern" diseases like malaria, cholera and dengue fever, as these pathogens thrive at warmer temperatures.' In response, Homewood writes:

Prof Paul Reiter, one of the world’s leading experts in malaria, completely debunked this whole scare story in 2005, in a written submission to the Parliamentary Select Committee on Economic Affairs.

It is an old story, but many won’t be aware of it. It is worth revisiting it, since it revealed just how corrupt and thoroughly bankrupt the science surrounding climate change in general, and the IPCC in particular, had become.

Here is the final paragraph of Reiter's submission:

41. The natural history of mosquito-borne diseases is complex, and the interplay of climate, ecology, mosquito biology, and many other factors defies simplistic analysis. The recent resurgence of many of these diseases is a major cause for concern, but it is facile to attribute this resurgence to climate change, or to use models based on temperature to "predict" future prevalence. In my opinion, the IPCC has done a disservice to society by relying on "experts" who have little or no knowledge of the subject, and allowing them to make authoritative pronouncements that are not based on sound science. In truth, the principal determinants of transmission of malaria and many other mosquito-borne diseases are politics, economics and human activities. A creative and organized application of resources is urgently required to control these diseases, regardless of future climate change.

31 March 2005

One of the bottom-feeders at the CO2 Alarm trough is David King:

Let us be very clear. It is an extremely serious affair to provide false evidence to Parliament. Since King was employed by the Government as their representative, this is doubly true.

He should be forced to return to the Committee, apologise and retract his untrue statement.

https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2017/05/16/sir-david-king-lied-to-parliamentary-committee/

This is a neat summary of the situation created by the disgraceful campaigning for climate alarmism::

'You look at all this, how social scientists, political analysts, philosophers etc. have spread their tentacles into the field of climate change ‘science’, welcomed into the burgeoning self-satisfying, self interest Club by ‘scientists’ sitting at the sharp end who supposedly are justifying, with solid, scientific research, the ringing of the alarm bells re. the End of the Civilisation, and you realise what a monstrous betrayal of logic, reason, common sense, self-reliance, independent thought and natural justice it has all become. Yes, in place of all these admirable qualities which have characterised the Renaissance and the Industrial revolution which followed, we now have in place in academia a huge self-aggrandising, self-affirming, Club of ridiculously generously funded intellectual pygmies and group-think dead heads who arrogantly presume to lead us through the Valley of the Evil Anthropocene and out the other side into the fossil fuel free sunlit uplands of a Brave New World. God help us.'

By Jaime Jessop, in this comment at CliScep: https://cliscep.com/2017/11/15/oxford-university-press-on-climate-conspiracy-theories/#comment-18355

The moral and intellectual corruption of the London Royal Society by climate alarm campaigners is illustrated anew by their latest report on climate. The folks at CliScep have their number: https://cliscep.com/2017/11/29/climate-updates-from-the-royal-society-aka-the-alarmists-inventive-inventory-of-more-bad-news/

For a summary of RS standards in this area being already low two years ago, see: https://www.thegwpf.org/royal-society-misrepresents-climate-science/

And five years, ago, Andrew's essay on this sorry tale: Nullius in Verba: The Royal Society and Climate Change

Hiding this decline is not an option. The decline is being documented, and what a sorry spectacle of a rotten Royal Society it makes.

There have been so many instances of the turpitude of the climate alarm extremists over recent decades that we have barely scratched their surface with the ones noted in this Discussion. But here is a very good summary of some of the core evils of this extremism:
Hypothesis: Radical Greens are the Great Killers of Our Age

'The number of deaths and shattered lives caused by radical-green activism since ~1970 rivals the death tolls of the great killers of the 20th Century – Stalin, Hitler and Mao – they advocate similar extreme-left totalitarian policies and are indifferent to the resulting environmental damage and human suffering.' Allan MacRae, 2019

Attenborough beclowns himself by collaborating with irresponsible hot-headed alarmists in the BBC documentary 'Climate Change: The Facts.' The trashiness of this 'work' is a good fit to the BBC's general coverage of climate variation, and it should come as a jolt to any true-believers in the Climate Alarm Faith who retain even a scrap of independence of mind: is this really the best they can do?

Paul Homewood has done some Fisking:
'One of the features of the programme is the insertion of personalised, emotional film sequences – bats dying from heat in Australia, father and son escaping from wildfire in California, and the Isle de Jean Charles.
They are clearly designed to bring home to people the real effects of climate change, and make them feel guilty. At one point, the interviewee even says “we have got to do something”.
Unfortunately, the facts don’t agree. Maybe the programme would better have been called “Climate Change – The Myths”'

Part 1
Part 2

James Delingpole writes with his customary understated flair:
'Even by the BBC’s abysmal standards, this programme was a disgrace: an insult to the intelligence, a betrayal of the Reithian principles on which the BBC was founded, and a shameless piece of propaganda on behalf of the watermelons who would destroy our civilisation.
As for Sir David Attenborough, it’s time this whispery voiced, gorilla hugging, walrus scaring Malthusian was recognised for what he is: not as a national treasure but as a national embarrassment long, long past his sell-by date.'

More Green Lies

They had the resources of the BBC. They had their pick of climate alarm campaigners. They had a great opportunity to make the case for climate alarm. They did their best, but the material they had to work with was poor, threadbare stuff. They produced a disgraceful piece of shameless propaganda. That seems about right for them. There is, after all, no good case to be made for their precious panic.

More evidence that those sounding the climate alarm have not much in the way of science to support them, and that they know it: An All Too Rare Climate Debate

'The official resolution for the debate was Resolved: There is little or no rigorous evidence that rising concentrations of carbon dioxide are causing dangerous global warming and threatening life on the planet. The debaters were Craig Idso for the affirmative, and Jeffrey Bennett for the negative. '

and, later:

'The debate was in Oxford style format, and at both the beginning and end the audience members voted as to their views of the resolution. Before the debate, the audience was 22% for the affirmative, and 29% for the negative. After the debate, it went to 42% for the affirmative and 41% for the negative. Idso was declared the winner, based on moving the needle 20% in his direction, versus Bennett moving the audience only 12% in his direction.'

See the link for details of how Idso deployed science, and Bennett deployed hyperbole and emotion.

You might suppose a scientist invited to provide testimony at a Congressional Hearing would welcome the opportunity to lay out arguments, evidence, and supporting links to the scientific literature. You would be surprised if their testimony was largely based on their assertion of authority and largely linked to articles in the popular media. Be surprised no more. Here is a report on Mann's recent testimony in the USA: Judith Curry shares her experience in a recent Hearing