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Lindzen on the Decline and Politicization of Climate Science

Jack Hays

Jack Hays

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A great generation of scientists has largely passed away, to be replaced by careerists of lesser light.


Lindzen: On the ‘Death of Skepticism’ Concerning Climate Hysteria

Guest essay by Richard S. Lindzen, Professor Emeritus of Atmospheric Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Bill Nye looks forward to the death of skeptics in this Huffington Post essay. There is a sound basis for his wish. While the politicized climate issue dates back to the 60’s, things really took off after the Clinton-Gore administration…
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. . . . While the politicized climate issue dates back to the 60’s, things really took off after the Clinton-Gore administration assumed power and funding for climate increased by about a factor of 15. This was far more than a small backwater and very difficult field could absorb, and led to a vast increase in the number of scientists who claimed their work was related to climate in order to cash in on the windfall. Moreover, the institutional structure for support of alarm was already in place with the United Nations creation of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) and UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) – both exclusively concerned with only human impacts on climate. Added to this were the wild enthusiasm of the well-funded green advocacy movement, and the motherhood nature of environmentalism.
It is, therefore, informative to look at who the skeptics (not of climate change, but of climate catastrophism and the need for specific action) were when this explosion of support began. Here is a very brief set of examples (for those who have died, the year of death is listed): . . . .

These were hardly fringe scientists (as opposed to Nye who is no scientist at all). On the contrary, they were leading figures whose deep interest in climate long pre-dated the Global Warming Hysteria and the subsequent explosion of support for those endorsing alarm. So, Bill Nye is right. The newcomers are younger, and with death of many of the previous generation, they have come to dominate the field – to the great detriment of the science, itself. Those, among the older generation, who are still alive, are the subject of constant public abuse and libel, leading several of them like Bengtsson and Tennekes to withdraw from the field. Singer went so far as to sue for libel, winning his case and obtaining a public retraction from Justin Lancaster (http://media.hoover.org/sites/default/files/documents/0817939326_283.pdf ).
In addition, there are many outstanding scientists who have bothered to actually examine this issue, and have come to the obvious conclusion that there is much less to the story of gloom and doom than is popularly asserted. Many started as supporters of alarm but came to change their minds. Here are a few of them: . . .

When, today, one hears of overwhelming support for alarmism and for the control of Carbon Dioxide as the unique and precise solution to a largely unknown and uncertain set of phenomena, we should all realize the individuals promoting such narratives have not studied the underlying science, have decided to cash in on the windfall, are politically and economically motivated, fear expulsion from the ranks of the politically correct, and/or are intent on befuddling the public. In brief, we are in the midst of a very unhealthy situation for both this issue and science in general.


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Jack Hays said:
A great generation of scientists has largely passed away, to be replaced by careerists of lesser light.


Lindzen: On the ‘Death of Skepticism’ Concerning Climate Hysteria



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Ah, hey Jack still plugging away there I see. Let me just discredit this guy for you...

In a biographical note at the foot of a column published in Newsweek in 2007, Lindzen wrote that "his research has always been funded exclusively by the U.S. government. He receives no funding from any energy companies." (Emphasis added).[6] However, analysis of Peabody Energy court documents showed that the fossil fuel company backed Lindzen,[2] proving that Lindzen was lying.

Ross Gelbspan, journalist and author, wrote a 1995 article in Harper's Magazine which was critical of Lindzen and other global warming skeptics. In the article, Gelbspan reports Lindzen charged "oil and coal interests $2,500 a day for his consulting services; [and] his 1991 trip to testify before a Senate committee was paid for by Western Fuels and a speech he wrote, entitled 'Global Warming: the Origin and Nature of Alleged Scientific Consensus,' was underwritten by OPEC."[7]
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In a 2001 profile in Newsweek, journalist Fred Guterl wrote that Lindzen "clearly relishes the role of naysayer. He'll even expound on how weakly lung cancer is linked to cigarette smoking."[13] James Hansen recalls meeting Lindzen whilst testifying before the Vice President's Climate Task Force: "I considered asking Lindzen if he still believed there was no connection between smoking and lung cancer. He had been a witness for tobacco companies decades earlier, questioning the reliability of statistical connections between smoking and health problems. But I decided that would be too confrontational. When I met him at a later conference, I did ask that question, and was surprised by his response: He began rattling off all the problems with the data relating smoking to health problems, which was closely analogous to his views of climate data." [14]
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Lindzen was a member of the Science, Health, and Economic Advisory Council of the Annapolis Center[1], a Maryland-based think tank which had been funded by corporations including ExxonMobil[20], but does not appear to have filed a tax return with the IRS since 2007. [1]
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Richard S. Lindzen - SourceWatch

And here's an article of his former colleagues denouncing him.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2...mate-change/86K8ur31YIUbMO4SAI7U2N/story.html

And I found countless links to many of his papers and hypothesis being debunked by credible scientists.

anyhoo, take care Jack, hope you find that one credible source someday...
 
ThoughtEx. said:
Ah, hey Jack still plugging away there I see. Let me just discredit this guy for you...







Richard S. Lindzen - SourceWatch

And here's an article of his former colleagues denouncing him.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2...mate-change/86K8ur31YIUbMO4SAI7U2N/story.html

And I found countless links to many of his papers and hypothesis being debunked by credible scientists.

anyhoo, take care Jack, hope you find that one credible source someday...
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Just the usual unfounded smears by the consensus enforcement squad. You're actually making his point.
 
Jack Hays said:
Just the usual unfounded smears by the consensus enforcement squad. You're actually making his point.
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Oh come on Jack, he's financially tied to companies and groups that have a vested interest in denying climate change. Funny how that's always the case isn't it?
 
ThoughtEx. said:
Oh come on Jack, he's financially tied to companies and groups that have a vested interest in denying climate change. Funny how that's always the case isn't it?
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I'm simply not going to dignify that sort of smear with a response.
 
ThoughtEx. said:
Oh come on Jack, he's financially tied to companies and groups that have a vested interest in denying climate change. Funny how that's always the case isn't it?
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Are you saying Michael Mann has not benefited by promoting catastrophic climate findings for the Government?
 
The attempt to smear Lindzen just validates his thesis.

MIT Scientist Dr. Richard Lindzen: Believing UN pacts can save the planet ‘are returning us to the Middle Ages’ | Climate Depot

Payments that you have allegedly received from the coal company Peabody is sometimes being used against you.
Lindzen: Sure, they wanted an expert analysis needed in the court. Everyone gets paid for this work. More importantly, this money is so modest that it is negligible relatively to the funds flowing to the official climatology. Since 1988, the latter has been tens of billions of dollars, an amount so large that the climate science has basically been unable to absorb it so far. The field is relatively small and the tens of billions are going almost exclusively to support a pre-determined paradigm. Don’t believe the talk about thousands of climatologists who agree with the conclusions of the U.N. international panel. Have you attended a college? Have you ever met someone who studied climatology in your student environment? No? Almost no one has met a climate student. Sure, the U.N. is already importing people from Zimbabwe and Tanzania, but those aren’t real climatologists. But when you continuously increase the research funds, and on top of that, you develop the research on the impacts of the so-called climate change, you may study e.g. cockroaches and still be incorporated to the industry of climatology once you publish studies about the cockroaches’ prospects in the globally warming world. If 90% of the research funding for the climate were slashed, the discipline would actually benefit.
 
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longview said:
Are you saying Michael Mann has not benefited by promoting catastrophic climate findings for the Government?
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Are you saying the Government has a financial interest in convincing everyone climate change is real? Because, it really, really seems like the opposite to me.

Not only is Lindzen a shill for big oil, he was a shill for tobacco, another common thing it seems. Big Oil using scientists that Tobacco used in the exact same way. That's not suspicious at all.

Hey and then there is that whole thing where his former colleagues at MIT called bull**** on him...

"As [Lindzen's] colleagues at MIT in the Program in Atmospheres, Oceans and Climate, all of whom are actively involved in understanding climate, we write to make it clear that this is not a view shared by us, or by the overwhelming majority of other scientists who have devoted their professional lives to careful study of climate science," said the March 2 letter, signed by 22 current and retired MIT professors.

The MIT staff addressed specific inaccuracies in Lindzen's letter, including his assertion that "carbon dioxide is not a pollutant."

"The risks to the Earth system associated with increasing levels of carbon dioxide are almost universally agreed by climate scientists to be real ones," they wrote. "These include, but are not limited to, sea level rise, ocean acidification, and increases in extreme flooding and droughts, all with serious consequences for mankind."
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https://insideclimatenews.org/news/...l-scientists-richard-lindzen-mit-donald-trump

And now, he's with the Cato Institute. Which was founded by the Koch brothers. Those guys aren't manipulative lying ideologues, nope, not them. Dude gets a paycheck from literally the most corrupt men in America. So forgive me, for not buying a thing he is, or ever will be, selling.
 
ThoughtEx. said:
Are you saying the Government has a financial interest in convincing everyone climate change is real? Because, it really, really seems like the opposite to me.

Not only is Lindzen a shill for big oil, he was a shill for tobacco, another common thing it seems. Big Oil using scientists that Tobacco used in the exact same way. That's not suspicious at all.

Hey and then there is that whole thing where his former colleagues at MIT called bull**** on him...



https://insideclimatenews.org/news/...l-scientists-richard-lindzen-mit-donald-trump

And now, he's with the Cato Institute. Which was founded by the Koch brothers. Those guys aren't manipulative lying ideologues, nope, not them. Dude gets a paycheck from literally the most corrupt men in America. So forgive me, for not buying a thing he is, or ever will be, selling.
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Did you happen to notice that the letter from MIT was not a technical argument?
At some point Lindzen's Scientific abilities were enough for the IPCC to choose him as a researcher (TAR).
The rift came when the IPCC made alterations to the reports, after the actual scientist had finished their editing.
Lindzen's comments are fairly well documented in his testimony before the US Senate.
http://eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/Testimony/Senate2001.pdf
The benefit to the Government in getting CO2 declared a regulated pollutant is nearly unlimited,
each of us after all is a CO2 source.
 
longview said:
Did you happen to notice that the letter from MIT was not a technical argument?
At some point Lindzen's Scientific abilities were enough for the IPCC to choose him as a researcher (TAR).
The rift came when the IPCC made alterations to the reports, after the actual scientist had finished their editing.
Lindzen's comments are fairly well documented in his testimony before the US Senate.
http://eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/Testimony/Senate2001.pdf
The benefit to the Government in getting CO2 declared a regulated pollutant is nearly unlimited,
each of us after all is a CO2 source.
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why would they send a technical argument to Trump? Might as well send it to my 6 year old, they would be able to understand it just as well. They sent it, because Lindzen is using his former position as MIT to lend credibility to his bogus arguments. Which use cartoons...

I'm not interested in the statements of a paid for shill for Koch and big oil.
 
ThoughtEx. said:
why would they send a technical argument to Trump? Might as well send it to my 6 year old, they would be able to understand it just as well. They sent it, because Lindzen is using his former position as MIT to lend credibility to his bogus arguments. Which use cartoons...

I'm not interested in the statements of a paid for shill for Koch and big oil.
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If you have read Lindzen's paper on the atmospheric Iris the idea is not without merit, and fills in some of the gaps in
modeled approaches.
They may disagree with him politically, but they do not seem to be challenging his position from a scientific standpoint.
 
longview said:
If you have read Lindzen's paper on the atmospheric Iris the idea is not without merit, and fills in some of the gaps in
modeled approaches.
They may disagree with him politically, but they do not seem to be challenging his position from a scientific standpoint.
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Yeah, I did one quick google search and found plenty of legite scientists challenging his position. So...
 
ThoughtEx. said:
Yeah, I did one quick google search and found plenty of legite scientists challenging his position. So...
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Then it should be easy for you to cite one pointing out what errors they found in Lindzen's work.
 
longview said:
Then it should be easy for you to cite one pointing out what errors they found in Lindzen's work.
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yeah, it would be super easy. But it would also be pointless, for one, no matter what I say or do none of you are going change your position. That's why I focus mostly on discrediting your sources, which I did here through his financial ties. If I put up a counter source filled with technical jargon no one here, including me, fully understands. You'll just ignore it. If I point out you're source is compromised, that's easy for all to understand.

Getting into technical arguments with climate deniers is an exercise in futility. Much like arguments with birthers and flat-earthers. It's much more effective to demonstrate their sources are flawed. Plus, if you cared at all about accuracy, I wouldn't have to link it. You would have already independently researched lindzen, and considered the many, many scientists who are skeptical of his hypothesis before accepting his as the most relevant.
 
ThoughtEx. said:
yeah, it would be super easy. But it would also be pointless, for one, no matter what I say or do none of you are going change your position. That's why I focus mostly on discrediting your sources, which I did here through his financial ties. If I put up a counter source filled with technical jargon no one here, including me, fully understands. You'll just ignore it. If I point out you're source is compromised, that's easy for all to understand.

Getting into technical arguments with climate deniers is an exercise in futility. Much like arguments with birthers and flat-earthers. It's much more effective to demonstrate their sources are flawed. Plus, if you cared at all about accuracy, I wouldn't have to link it. You would have already independently researched lindzen, and considered the many, many scientists who are skeptical of his hypothesis before accepting his as the most relevant.
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It is not my fault that the data does not support the idea of catastrophic climate change!
That you attempt to discredit any scientist who does not toe the IPCC line, speaks to your adherence to your dogma.
Scientist may be skeptical of Lindzen hypothesis, but are unable to refute it.
I think Lindzen ECS range is low, but only because the actual data is coming in higher.
I think an ECS somewhere between Lewis-Curry and Otto is more accurate, roughly 1.8C.
 
Jack Hays said:
Not much of an argument. The Cato Institute is a respected think tank.
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No, it was a respected think tank under Ed Crane, who was forced out by the Koch brothers in 2012. The top was then reorganized into 12 directors a good many appointed by the Koch brothers. And funny thing right after this, is when the Cato institute hired Lindzen and became decidedly more partisan. Imagine that...
 
longview said:
It is not my fault that the data does not support the idea of catastrophic climate change!
That you attempt to discredit any scientist who does not toe the IPCC line, speaks to your adherence to your dogma.
Scientist may be skeptical of Lindzen hypothesis, but are unable to refute it.
I think Lindzen ECS range is low, but only because the actual data is coming in higher.
I think an ECS somewhere between Lewis-Curry and Otto is more accurate, roughly 1.8C.
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One, it's not that I attempt to discredit any scientist who does not toe the IPCC line. It's that every scientist and source Jack throws up has ties to Oil money. Do you not check the sources people present to you, do you not try and determine their credibility? Or do you just go along with anyone that confirms what you already think. And if they were not tied to big oil money, they wouldn't be discredited. But here's the thing, you can't find a climate scientist who is a skeptic that has no ties financially to big oil. You can find an astro physicist that thinks its all because of solar radiation. He's the only source Jack has ever thrown up I couldn't tie to oil. The only one. And he's so far into left field, even the deniers have no idea what he's talking about.

And two, they are more than skeptical of Lindzen's hypothesis. I couldn't find one, not one of his colleagues that have any respect for him at all.

And three, I have no interest in arguing against a source's data after I've discredited the source. That's why I look at a their credibility first.
 
ThoughtEx. said:
No, it was a respected think tank under Ed Crane, who was forced out by the Koch brothers in 2012. The top was then reorganized into 12 directors a good many appointed by the Koch brothers. And funny thing right after this, is when the Cato institute hired Lindzen and became decidedly more partisan. Imagine that...
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Sorry but your Koch boogeyman nonsense doesn't work on adults.
 
ThoughtEx. said:
One, it's not that I attempt to discredit any scientist who does not toe the IPCC line. It's that every scientist and source Jack throws up has ties to Oil money. Do you not check the sources people present to you, do you not try and determine their credibility? Or do you just go along with anyone that confirms what you already think. And if they were not tied to big oil money, they wouldn't be discredited. But here's the thing, you can't find a climate scientist who is a skeptic that has no ties financially to big oil. You can find an astro physicist that thinks its all because of solar radiation. He's the only source Jack has ever thrown up I couldn't tie to oil. The only one. And he's so far into left field, even the deniers have no idea what he's talking about.

And two, they are more than skeptical of Lindzen's hypothesis. I couldn't find one, not one of his colleagues that have any respect for him at all.

And three, I have no interest in arguing against a source's data after I've discredited the source. That's why I look at a their credibility first.
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Your claim is a lie. Henrik Svensmark, Nir Shaviv, Jan Veizer, just to start.

And connections to the oil industry are not disqualifying in any case.
 
Jack Hays said:
Sorry but your Koch boogeyman nonsense doesn't work on adults.
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Wow Jack, that's not like you. You really hurt my feelings there bud, :(

No, but seriously. The Koch's are horrible people, and they've done serious damage to the country over the years.
 
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