You can help fight the denier attacks on Michael Mann by buying his book, reading it, and then reviewing it at Amazon.com.
The most vindicated climate scientist in America, Michael Mann, has published an excellent new book, The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars. How much do the climate science disinformers want to discourage you from reading it? I’ve reported that the deniers immediately launched an attack on the book and on the positive reviews on Amazon.com.
Now Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal has decided that rather than just ignoring the book, they would have it ‘reviewed’ by their leading anti-science and anti-scientist editorial page writer, Anne Jolis.
I say “anti-science” because, as recently as Septmber, Jolis wrote an entire ‘opinion’ piece on “The Other Climate Theory: Al Gore won’t hear it, but heavenly bodies might be driving long-term weather trends.” Yes, she was pushing the long-debunked “cosmic ray” theory of climate change based on a CERN paper — months after its lead author explained that the paper “actually says nothing about a possible cosmic-ray effect on clouds and climate, but it’s a very important first step.” Multiple peer-reviewed papers make clear that cosmic rays aren’t driving significant climatic change.
I say “anti-scientist” because, as forest science expert Simon Lewis wrote here in a 2010 debunking of another one of Jolis’s masterpieces of misinformation:
I asked Peter Cox what he thought about the WSJ article. He was surprised that he was featured in a climate science bashing editorial. While his quotes were correctly transcribed Prof. Cox was not told that the article was about attacking climate science. The same journalist tried the same sleight-of-hand with me over a potential Amazongate article. So memo to scientists. If Anne Jolis of the WSJ contacts you, watch out, or you could find yourself being tricked into starring in an article about scientists not being open and honest.
It’s safe to say that if you ask Jolis to write review of a book on climate science, you know what you’re going to get. And, indeed, the review reveals that Jolis remains a one-trick pony.
Here she is with what I suppose she considers a devastating example of hypocrisy but which is an unintentional revelation of her own biases:
Yet for all his caviling about “smear campaigns,” “conspiracy theorists” and “character assassination,” Mr. Mann is happy to employ similar tactics against his opponents. Patrick Michaels, former president of the American Association of State Climatologists and a past program chair of the American Meteorological Society’s Committee on Applied Climatology, is introduced as “a prominent climate change contrarian at the University of Virginia primarily known for his advocacy for the fossil fuel industry.” (Nowhere does Mr. Mann explain why a scientist might be more easily corrupted by a check from, say, a coal company than by one from a politically controlled institution.)
Seriously.
To be clear, there is no equation between Mann and Michaels. Michaels makes crap up on climate for a living and deserves to be called on it. As Skeptical Science has detailed, Patrick Michaels is a “Serial Deleter of Inconvenient Data.“
As they show in 3 different instance, “Michaels has deleted the data which contradict his constant arguments that the planet will warm less than most climate scientists expect, and thus that global warming is nothing to worry about.” NASA’s James Hansen said Michaels’ distortion of his work was “treading close to scientific fraud.“ You can find many more debunkings of Michaels online and here.
Jolis may think it needs explanation why fossil fuel funding would call into question a scientist’s repeated attempts to spreads pro-pollution disinformation, but it’s rather obvious to everyone else.
In contradistinction to the discredited and endlessly debunked Pat Michaels, Michael Mann is one the most vindicated climate scientist in America. The final independent vindication noted,that his work “from the beginning of his career, has been recognized as outstanding” and it “clearly places Dr. Mann among the most respected scientists in his field.”
Mann’s “Hockey Stick” work has also been utterly and repeatedly vindicated:
- The Hockey Stick was affirmed in a major review by the uber-prestigious National Academy of Scientists (in media-speak, the highest scientific “court” in the land) — seeNAS Report and here. The news story in the journal Nature (subs. req’d) on the NAS panel was headlined: “Academy affirms hockey-stick graph“!
- The Hockey Stick has been replicated and strengthened by numerous independent studies (see “Two more independent studies back the Hockey Stick: Recent global warming is unprecedented in magnitude and speed and cause“). My favorite is from Science — see Human-caused Arctic warming overtakes 2,000 years of natural cooling, “seminal” study finds (the source of the figure below).
What’s most laughable about this review is the final sentence:
Mr. Mann closes “The Hockey Stick” with a passionate call for more scientists to join him “on the front lines of the climate wars.” “Scientific truth alone,” Mr. Mann writes, “is not enough to carry the day in the court of public opinion.” It would be “irresponsible,” he says, “for us to silently stand by while industry-funded climate change deniers succeed in confusing and distracting the public and dissuading our policy makers from taking appropriate actions.” These are unfortunate conclusions for a scientist-turned-climate-warrior whose greatest weakness has always been a low estimation of the public intellect.
Obviously she hasn’t read most of the book. Mann’s book, arguably his entire life’s work, assumes a high public intellect, one that can understand science and objectively make wise decisions. Heck, he even explains, at length, principal component analysis (PCA) — better than I’ve seen elsewhere.
It is the anti-science and anti-scientist misinformers at Murdoch’s empire, including the Wall Street Journal, who assume their readers are so dumb as to not even be able to use Google to figure out who is on the side of science and who is on the side of ignorance.
Jolis’s review has the unintentionally ironic headline, “The Climate Kamikaze.” Kamikazes, of course, were suicide bombers. But Mann is no kamikaze: In fact, he has devoted his life to its informing the public about how to avoid humanity’s self-destruction, which requires action now to avert catastrophe.
It is Jolis and her employer who future generation will label kamikazes. As one Australian scientist put it, “The Murdoch Media Empire Has Cost Humanity Perhaps One or Two Decades in Battle Against Climate Change.”
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Mann’s publishers did him a dis-service with that cover.
Mann’s book is excellent, and readable for a layman, too. There are all kinds of interesting technical and historical details.
Amazon was instantly besieged by readers from Watts’ blog, talking about what a terrible book it was. Problem is, none of them had actually read it. Even if they got a Kindle copy, their reviews appeared the day after Watts’ bugle calls. WUWT readers are not capable of reading any book in one day.
Some of us tried to alert Amazon about this, but it was tough getting through all of their barriers, so we were left with review comments. If anyone here knows an executive at Amazon, they need to communicate this problem to him.
While we’re talking about newspapers misleading and confusing the public, put your head vise on. Over at the Washington Post, Glenn Kessler’s Pinocchios are angry that Obama doesn’t include “undiscovered” oil in his facts. Also, they’re mad that the “tantalizing” quantities of U.S. tar are unaccounted (no mention of how that would affect worldwide comparison). Furthermore, they take umbrage at his comparing reserves to consumption, which doesn’t sound terribly bad to me. Any thoughts?
Yes his explanation of PCA is simply the best I have seen. I almost understood it, I now have an idea of what it means.
Right now on Amazon there are 106 customer reviews. They break down as follows:
5-star….68
4-Star…..9
3-Star…..1
2-star…..3
1-Star….25
In addition there is a series of endorsements from Bill McKibben, Paul Ehrlich, Chris Mooney, James Lovelock, Sherwood Boehlert, Henry Waxman, and Bill Nye.
It’s not a call for complacency, but right now I think visitors to this Amazon page will get the right idea.
That second paragraph from Jolis reminds me of a series of articles I’d love to see here about the fallacious reasoning that’s often employed by denialists, confusionists and the ignorati.
We often show how their claims are wrong, their tactics shameful, and we often demonstrate how their sources are uncredible. But as another way to try to sway that slice of the population that might just still be convinced otherwise, it would sure be neat to show just how specious the reasoning can be from some characters. (CP does this routinely of course, but it would interesting to highlight/focus on it). That way, even if people are agnostic on sources and claims to facts, they might at least see how one side is the clear winner in the abuse of logic race.
I’m thinking of common fallacies one sees in introductory philosophy classes like:
> Ad hominem: Climate change isn’t happening because Al Gore is stupid.
> Appeal to complexity: Because the author doesn’t understand the climate, it is not understandable.
> Two wrongs make a right: It’s okay to lie routinely, because the other side has lied in the past too.
> Etc.
But some of the more subtle forms or examples of fallacious reasoning would be good to untangle as well.
I like the 3 examples. Got some more?
I was able to hear Michael Mann today discussing his book on the Kojo Nnamdi show today on that most excellent PBS station, WAMU.
It’s a show with call-in’s and emails and he handled them all very well. He keeps his cool and presents clear, understandable answers.
Unfortunately it’s not a PBS-wide show (to my knowledge). Kojo is a great host.
I put up a review at amazon.com shortly after I got my signed copy of Dr. Mann’s book. In the review, I focused on the scientific incompetence of the deniers attacking Dr. Mann. Linky here: http://www.amazon.com/review/R144UZ0BPXWVDY/ref=cm_cr_pr_perm?ie=UTF8&ASIN=023115254X&nodeID=&tag=&linkCode=
The review is entitled “Attack of the C-Students”. I’ll admit that it is pretty long-winded, but with my focus on denier incompetence, I could easily have written my own entire book!
And as for the deniers who have posted and promoted negative reviews at amazon.com, here is a strong indication of how loony they are: The 1-star review currently rated as “Most Helpful” at amazon.com turns out to have been written by a 911-truther!
Linkies here:
http://www.amazon.com/Hockey-Stick-Climate-Wars-Dispatches/product-reviews/023115254X/ref=cm_cr_pr_hist_1?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&filterBy=addOneStar
http://www.amazon.com/review/R2Z9NJVEA0L1D1/ref=cm_cr_rev_detmd_pl?ie=UTF8&cdForum=FxULZQNJUEUJD9&cdMsgNo=28&cdPage=3&asin=B0072N4U6S&store=digital-text&cdSort=oldest&cdThread=Tx31HE8JDCITSF3&cdMsgID=Mx3SCQLA1LOPZAN#Mx3SCQLA1LOPZAN
Dr. Mann was on Science Friday on March 2nd and it was a great interview. I think you can access the podcast through NPR’s archives
I myself bought and read the book in total and found it most useful in the science and politics and smear campaign waged by the special interests. I can not believe that even today the deniers still cite the “Hockey Stick” and stolen emails as proof of fraud. It is as if their tunnel vision is on purpose and other than lies and misinformation the denial position has no place to stand on.
Time is so short, Dr. James Hansen claims if we wait for ten years to beign reduction of greenhouse gas emissions it will be practically too late to avert a crisis.
My copy was at the Post Office today. I’ll leave a review after I read it. Sorry Tony : Horse, Cart. Repeat again : Horse, Cart. Got it now?
I pity American reporters and others who must work in environments where science can always be slammed by resident deniers. At the Australian Broadcasting Commission there is no need to be looking over your shoulder all the time. The official policy is to cover the issue in direct proportion to the number of serious scientists who work on evidence. This “balance of truth” has given us a free hand to expose the lies where and when we find them. Speaking personally, I have free rein to fact-check Monckton ever time he opens his mouth. It is not hard – you take what he says, consult an authority and publish. If we have a denier on staff I don’t know about them. That is the way it needs to be in all news organisations that want to be taken seriously.
When it comes to reporting the consensus, I am proud to say we are the gold standard.