Skeptical Science on Vahrenholt’s Interview in Spiegel
Craig seems to have fallen in with the anti-global-warming tinfoil-hat crowd, which is kind of disappointing; I’d always thought he was smarter than that. I guess it’s an indication that as long as you’re willing to consume garbage as input, your output will suffer accordingly.
Craig describes Fritz Vahrenholt as “a significant German warmist-turned-skeptic”; later Craig comments that “a warmist representative who has seen an advance copy of the book, says a ‘number’ of the issues brought up have been ‘refuted’.”
Digression: This term “warmist” bugs me. The implication is that there’s an unreasoning element advancing a nefarious global warming conspiracy. I’ll accept that there’s room for legitimate debate in terms of the policy response to global warming, and I think it’s likely that the actually-criminal tactics of the conspirators on the anti-science side (and, admittedly, the success of those tactics in influencing the public debate) have induced a bunker mentality and more rigid positions from those arguing for warming-aware policies. But to characterize those who accept reality on climate science as “warmists” is to engage in a false equivalence. Setting policy responses to one side, there’s an objective reality in terms of the underlying facts of the matter as determined by science, and the denialism worthy of an “ist” suffix is almost entirely on the anti-warming side. Also, putting “number” and “refuted” in scare quotes is misleading; there are indeed a number of obvious problems with Vahrenholt’s arguments, and those arguments have indeed been refuted.
Anyway, in response to hype that the Spiegel item apparently has been getting recently from the anti-warming conspiracists, Skeptical Science pointed to a previous debunking they did: Fritz Vahrenholt – Duped on Climate Change.
Let’s begin with the book’s authors. Who are they, what expertise do they have, and what possible motive might they have to distort the science?
German electric utility executive Fritz Vahrenholt is co-author (along with geologist Sebastian Lüning) of a book expressing “skepticism” regarding the human contribution to global warming, which predictably has been trumpeted by the usual climate denial enablers. Why should we particularly care what Vahrenholt thinks about climate science? That is something of a mystery – he has a PhD in chemistry and has worked in the energy sector for Shell Oil and wind turbine maker RePower. Vahrenholt and Lüning both currently work for RWE Innogy, Germany’s second-largest energy company (Vahrenholt as a manager, Lüning as a scientist in its oil and gas division).
Vahrenholt admits he has no expertise in climate science, but apparently his status as “Germany’s Top Environmentalist” (a title which Vahrenholt appears to have been awarded just recently by anti-climate think tanks and denialists) and his climate “skepticism” are sufficient for some people to take his climate claims seriously.
Sigh. The credentials of the authors suggest what we’re in for: a Gish gallop of misleading claims about what climate science says from people whose livelihoods depend on getting the science wrong. SkS does the dirty work of going through Vahrenholt’s claims from the interview, knocking them down one by one:
- Vahrenholt claim: WARNING: BULLSHIT: “The long version of the IPCC report does mention natural causes of climate change, like the sun and oscillating ocean currents. But they no longer appear in the summary for politicians. They were simply edited out.” In fact, as SkS points out, there are many prominent mentions of natural causes of climate change in the report’s summary for politicians. They quote five passages and reprint two prominent figures as examples.
- Vahrenholt claim: WARNING: BULLSHIT: “It hasn’t gotten any warmer on this planet in almost 14 years, despite continued increases in CO2 emissions. Established climate science has to come up with an answer to that.” Except that it has gotten warmer, though on short time scales that warming is hidden in land-based measurements by the noisy oscillations resulting from land-ocean heat exchange. “And of course,” continues SkS, “there’s the fact that the odd timeframe choice of 14 years conveniently begins at the peak of the strongest El Niño in a century (a.k.a. cherrypicking of short-term data).” See the “down the up escalator” graphic I ran recently, or any of numerous “hockey stick” graphs produced using various methods by various independent research teams over the last few decades, demonstrating that recent warming is an anomaly unrivaled in the past 800,000 years.
The SkS piece goes on to point out Vahrenholt misstatements on solar radiation, galactic cosmic rays, and research on cloud formation at CERN. In each case, SkS gives links to supporting information on the actual science that refutes Vahrenholt’s claims.
I find it hard to escape the conclusion that Vahrenholt is a hack, someone willing to blatantly distort and mislead as part of a disinformation campaign aimed at confusing the public about the facts uncovered by scientists.
February 14th, 2012 at 11:19 am
So let’s see, Dana 1981 (Dana Nuccitelli) has a bachelors degree in astrophysics and a masters in physics, he is a self described climate expert even though “he has been researching climate as a hobby since 2006″. John Cook is, among other things a cartoonist. Just thought you should know.
February 14th, 2012 at 11:44 am
Vahrenholt’s lack of relevant science credentials and history of employment by the fossil fuel industry are relevant because he is trying to offer himself as an authoritative source on climate change, claiming that his personal doubts are grounds for others to question the science. Craig also implied that Vahrenholt was in some sense a credible source, or at least one worthy of attention, when he (Craig) referred to him as a “significant warmist turned skeptic.”
The people who run Skeptical Science, on the other hand, are not offering their personal views and personal credentials as the basis for questioning Vahrenholt’s claims. Instead, they are referencing specific flaws in his claims, backing up their criticisms with reference to relevant scientific sources. It is only by following up on the claims and counter-claims, seeing whose sources actually are credible and actually are consistent with the views of climate scientists, that you can meaningfully weigh the competing opinions.
Vahrenholt says, in essence, “I, personally, doubt the science, therefore the science should not be trusted.” The writers at Skeptical Science say, in essence, “Vahrenholt’s claims are contradicted by these specific studies by these specific climate scientists, therefore the claims should not be trusted.” The first argument rests on the authority of the person making it. The second argument rests on the authority of the referenced sources, and the credentials of the person making it are largely irrelevant.
I would expect you to overlook that distinction, given your history of statements in the comments here. So you at least get points for being consistent (albeit consistently wrong).
February 14th, 2012 at 12:26 pm
I wonder if shcb is capable of understanding or acknowledging the distinction?
_______________
“Gish gallup” is a great term. Thanks for that.
February 14th, 2012 at 1:17 pm
BREAKING NEWS (from 1950)
A “top scientist” at Imperial Tobacco with no specialization in respitory illness announes that smoking is completely harmless.
February 14th, 2012 at 1:29 pm
But using your standards the guys at Skeptics aren’t any more qualified to read a paper and make a judgment call as to who is more right or wrong than I am. They are just a couple guys that know how to read the English language and then write what they think someone said about something they haven’t been to college to study, same as me. They certainly are less qualified than Grey or Spencer, they at least have the schoolin. And by the way Nuccitelli is employed by the environmental industry so he should be disqualified by your standards.
February 14th, 2012 at 1:54 pm
Here’s a cartoon about Cook that is starting to apply to you
http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?99x3p0o5dkzckmx
February 14th, 2012 at 2:09 pm
No need to wonder, shcb appears incapable of making the distinction.
shcb, before spewing nonesense again, would you try a little harder to understand JBC’s explanation? Please pay special attention to his second last paragraph, and extra special attention to the last two sentences in that paragraph. Because if you continue to fail to understand that then you are about as qualified to discuss things here as a table leg.
February 14th, 2012 at 2:28 pm
har har har! That cartoon finally convinced me that climate change is hooey!
case closed, move along folks, nuthin to see here
knarly, you can lead a horse (or in this case a special needs mule) to water, but you can’t make it drink. jbc’s second paragraph sums it all up in a package that will be entertaining to read wwnj’s reply.
If there were a stampede of climate scientists saying ‘we got it all wrong! nbd! things are fine! nuthin to see here folks!’ then I would probably change my mind. But I haven’t seen anything like that stampede. If anything the BEST assessment (and others) seems to reinforce the likelihood of ACC being frighteningly real.
February 14th, 2012 at 4:16 pm
Oh I understand everything JBC says, I just don’t agree. I think it is you that doesn’t understand what I am saying. The guys at Skeptics aren’t qualified to make the determination of whether “these specific climate scientists” are qualified based on JBC’s own criteria; they aren’t climate scientists themselves, and at least one of them (the one that wrote this specific article) is paid by the environmental industry, an industry that has its best interest at the top of its priorities as much as the gas and oil industry.
My point is that the guys at skeptics have every right and are perfectly qualified (to the degree they are qualified) to make whatever assertion they want, and the skeptical scientists (and others) do as well. The problem with that for you guys is it means the science isn’t done. For the science to be complete you have to somehow invalidate not only the opinions of those that oppose you have to invalidate the actual person.
Just for context, that cartoon has nothing to do with global warming, the guys at Skeptics didn’t like people abbreviating Skeptical Science as SS, they thought it was too close to Nazi connotations, but the guys at SkS as they prefer were more than happy to call us deniers as in holocaust deniers, just as nasty. Hence they were backing themselves into a corner.
February 14th, 2012 at 4:18 pm
As jcb noted, my credentials are completely irrelevant (John Cook’s even moreso, since he didn’t contribute to the post). For the record, I have never claimed to be a climate expert, contrary to shcb’s assertions on my behalf.
The facts are what they are. For example, Vahrenholt said the IPCC deleted all mention of natural climate effects from the Summary for Policymakers. I pulled about a half dozen quotes (there were more) and 2 graphics from that document which explicitly discussed natural contributions to climate change.
Frankly Bozo the Clown could have easily proved Vahrenholt was wrong on that point. The fact that he made such an easily disproven argument should make anyone hesitant to believe a word he says (most of his other arguments were no better). My being an environmental scientist (whose work has absolutely nothing to do with climate change) is utterly irrelevant, and the various attempts to somehow discredit me rather than actually look at the facts are rather disappointing.
Some good comments (i.e. jbc’s), but others are clearly just trying to look for an excuse to deny reality.
February 14th, 2012 at 4:20 pm
shcb – I believe the saying goes “you’re entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts.” The facts are what they are, completely independent of my qualifications. I suggest you expend more effort looking at the facts and less effort trying to discredit those who try to expose you to those facts.
February 14th, 2012 at 4:48 pm
shcb,
To the contrary: your comment clearly indicates you do not agree because you do not understand it.
February 14th, 2012 at 8:20 pm
Well, I guess you have a bunch of groupies that got your picture then Dana
http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/bio.php?u=25
“The facts are what they are, completely independent of my qualifications.”
That has been my point for the last several weeks, this go around alone. But this group seems to think you have to meet some pretty tough standards to have an opinion, you obviously miss on all of them, as do I, but for some reason you are given a pass.
February 14th, 2012 at 8:46 pm
shcb – why can’t you seem to understand that facts are not opinions? It’s not a difficult concept. Vahrenholt made demonstrably false claims. All I did was demonstrate they were false, which was not hard to do.
Not sure what you mean by groupies. Shaping Tomorrow’s World has published some climate solutions articles of mine, and asked for my bio and photo. Again, not the least bit relevant to the topic at hand.
February 15th, 2012 at 4:54 am
We’re on different wavelengths, I haven’t read your critique of Vahrenholt and I haven’t read much of what Vahrenholt said, at least nothing I can remember right now. It doesn’t matter, you are in the surreal world of Lies.com now, what someone says is not important, what is important is what credentials they have, who pays them etc. To make it even more goofy those standards only are important if you are on the “wrong” side of the issue especially if it pertains to manmade global warming.
If you were on the opposite side of the argument and Vahrenholt was lock step in time with JBC and I had said there is this site called Skeptical Science, one of the guys is really sharp, he is an environmental scientist and has a masters in physics, I would have gotten skewered. He doesn’t have a PHD, an environmental scientist isn’t the same as a climatologist, he is paid by big oil (I know you’re not but you’re on the other side now). Oh! How do you know he is an environmental scientist, just because a web site calls him that doesn’t mean he is what is an environmental scientist anyway? You get the idea.
The list would go on and on, and it obviously doesn’t apply if you are on the “right” side of the argument. I agree with you fully, what someone says, the quality of their work, whether they are right or wrong should be more important than who they are. Who they are, their qualifications etc are important to know so you can apply the correct filter, but that filter shouldn’t be black and white and shouldn’t be dependent on which side of the argument you come down on. But you’re not in Kansas anymore, you’re in Lies.com. Sorry you got drug into this.
February 15th, 2012 at 9:47 am
Never mind shcb, he has special needs: facts that don’t fit his opinion need to be explained away as the result of a big conspiracy, or as he describes it above, they are a result of a surreal world that parallels his own.
That’s one reason he’s known as a wrong wing nut job (wwnj for short.) The other is because his statements here are virtually always wrong and he is incapable of recognizing that fact.
February 15th, 2012 at 11:31 am
Really? Look what just happened to poor Craig, he disclaimed the hell out of one simple comment and he is instantly not smart. It is a very sharp slope from there to me. I don’t only disagree, I’m stupid (Craig is there now) I’m so far down the path that I probably have some mental disorder, I’m uggly and covered in warts as far as this crew is concerned, all for having an opinion. Craig is only one or two anti AGW posts away from a standing appointment with liquid nitrogen to keep his warts at bay.
February 15th, 2012 at 11:59 am
I think the wingnutoverse isn’t a parallel universe, rather it is orthogonal (at right(wing) angles) to reality
poor poor Craig
won’t anyone think of the misinformed?
the malinformed? the easily bamboozled?
I’ve asked Craig some direct questions, but he can’t actually seem to muster any, well, facts. I’d love to hear his explanation (with links if possible) for the observed warming and climate change.
The only post that refers to anyone being “stupid” is your own wwnj.
If you bothered to put down the right wing polarizing filter, take off the bullshit colored glasses, you might see that the SkS posts aren’t stating the poster’s opinions: they are a series of easily obtainable actual links and examples of facts that plainly disprove Mr Vahrenholt’s opinions. Facts is facts. Up is up. 2+2=4. We’ve been over and over this in kind and gentle language many times, to absolutely no avail. There is no amount of proof that can sway a zealot from their belief. So what is left? Ignore? Fine. Mock? Funny.
I’m curious what Mr Vahrenholt’s response would be to the SkS postings.
February 15th, 2012 at 1:46 pm
Maybe, “Doh!”
?
February 15th, 2012 at 2:01 pm
I think I’ve pretty clearly stated (for those who cared to understand it, rather than reflexively categorize it into some broad “your either for us or against us” checkbox) my views on this climate issue. The article on Vahrenholt’s book seemed interesting on its face due to his supposed position as a prominent, long-time German industrialist in the Green Energy industry. And also because it is my impression that the story is to be part of an additional set of articles about emerging skeptic views on climate change. I’m not sure if my tinfoil hat has been fitted properly for me, since I clearly noted that a warmist-supporting book reviewer casted doubts about the findings, and that the interviewer of the article did a good job challenging Vahrenholt’s views, rather than throwing softball questions at him, and that I didn’t know whether any of the claims would be proven accurate. Oh well, I guess its easier to put people with some questions in the “loon” category and call it a day.
As far as the warmist tag goes, the warmist-skeptic designation seems a bit nicer than the alarmist-denier version.
February 15th, 2012 at 2:03 pm
or maybe, “Hurf Durf!”
or maybe, “Lorry!”
?
February 15th, 2012 at 2:05 pm
Craig’s right, he never committed himself to any view, as he’s happy to just obfuscate by tossing poorly vetted dissenters into the discussion.
February 15th, 2012 at 2:06 pm
or, rather than “obfuscate” it might’ve been more accurate to say “add to the Gish gallop”
February 15th, 2012 at 2:26 pm
Craig, no one has called you a “loon” (other than [wait for it...] yourself)
same w wwnj, no one called him stupid (other than wwnj)
your original comment wasn’t quite so even-handed
tho this comment appears to be what you are referring to?
http://www.lies.com/wp/2012/02/08/gleick-on-cherrypicked-climate-trends/#comment-288981
note that you haven’t responded to my questions (in the post directly below yours) in any thread (not that you are required to, of course)
February 15th, 2012 at 2:31 pm
yeah I forgot to say how much I enjoyed learning the term “gish gallop”
a flood of bullshit is still just a big ol pile of manure
February 15th, 2012 at 4:49 pm
For what it’s worth, my comment about Craig’s intelligence in the original item (“I’d always thought he was smarter than that”) stems from my disappointment at seeing him treat Vahrenholt’s obvious denialism as worthy of attention. Is the “epistemic closure” problem on the right with climate change so bad that even someone as intelligent as Craig is willing to view someone like Vahrenholt as being worthy of attention? A longterm energy-industry employee and non-climate-scientist making attacks not just on the policy implications of the climate science consensus, but on the underlying scientific facts themselves?
shcb, for his part, has made it clear that he doesn’t actually understand what critical thinking is, and isn’t inclined to learn or apply it to his own views. So while he’s occasionally kind of frustrating (given his propensity for loudly and repeatedly claiming he does understand and apply critical thinking), it’s not hard for me to account for his example. He’s just a particularly clear case of the Dunning-Kruger effect.
But Craig isn’t in the same category. He’s always impressed me as smart, by which I mean he’s both good about subjecting his sources to critical scrutiny, and honest enough to treat as B.S. even the B.S. produced by his own side (to the extent he’s on a side). So if something as obvious (to me) as the fact that Vahrenholt is spewing B.S. is not obvious to him, it means one of two things must be true:
1) Craig is not as smart as I gave him credit for (where I’m using “smart” in the specific, idiosyncratic sense described above), or
2) The facts of the situation are not as obvious as I think they are (which I can only attribute to a greater-than-I-realized penetration of the ideological relativism that has people on the right bamboozled into believing they can wish away inconvenient facts about climate science).
That’s depressing either way, but the first explanation is maybe a little less depressing than the second, at least for me, which is probably why I went there first.
And yes, feel free to chime in with explanation #3, which is that the facts I’m alluding to aren’t as obvious as I think they are not because of the inroads that Fox News and a steady diet of rightwing bloggy denialism have made in your critical thinking apparatus, but simply because I’m wrong, and there actually is a significant scientific controversy over whether global warming is real, human-caused, and problematic. But when you do that, know that unless you make a very compelling case, I’m likely to view your response as being better explained by the two phenomena already listed.
February 20th, 2012 at 2:33 pm
[...] Dana's Fritz Vahrenholt – Duped on Climate Change was re-posted on PlanetSave and Lies.com. [...]
February 23rd, 2012 at 1:30 pm
Enkidu, I have no idea what the latest set of gotcha questions are that you need me to answer. If you’re referring to that climate snark scale, I’m not sure what value there would be in categorizing myself in such a way. It would be like asking Knarly to rate himself on a measurement titled “Where do you fit on the 9/11 kook scale?”
There doesn’t seem to be an option for “climate change happens in some mix of natural and human influence, but who can scientifically assert that X trillions of dollars invested will result in X temp moderation, thus resulting in X tangible positive effect.”