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John Kerry: If he truly thinks climate-change realists are flat-Earthers then he lack the intelligence to understand the science.

(Alex Wong/Getty Images)



In a column earlier in the week, I noted that the New York Times devoted the front page of its Sunday February 9 Week in Review section to a skiing writer who asked the profoundly silly question "Is this the end of snow?" based on a few bad experiences he had in the hills.

There was a snowstorm that evening, followed by another three snowstorms over the next 10 days. The climate alarmists have an answer for that: "Weather isn't climate."

They're right on that. So why do they continue to use individual instances of warm weather to "prove" climate change while ignoring instances of cold weather?

Because the climate-change movement is a religion, that's why. I like to call it "climate scientology."

Climate change is an interesting topic when considered by scientists, but those participating in that debate must think long and hard about such concepts as radiative forcing. This is an extremely complex problem of cloud formation (Here's some fun reading on it) without which the mere presence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would have little impact.

Instead, the climate scientologists base their belief on faith, a faith in an alleged "consensus" they lack the initiative and/or the intelligence to understand.

The Washington Post recently provided proof of that. Check this column headlined "How to convince your friends to believe in climate change. It's not as hard as you think."

Note what's going on here: The writer is encouraging someone clearly not capable of engaging in a scientific discussion to do so, but on the basis of faith, not facts.

The writer quotes another writer to this effect:

“Speak openly of your personal ownership of your convictions. Say, ‘This is what’s important to me, and this is why.’ Don’t get caught up in the scientific discussion. You’re not a scientist, and evidence doesn’t persuade people who reject climate change. What carries power is your personal conviction as a friend, colleague or neighbor.”

This is a formula for religious conversion. The writer goes on to prove that by citing yet another prophet in the Church of Climate Change:

"We aren’t really a society of believers and deniers on climate change; our opinions exist on a spectrum. Maybe you’re 90 percent sure that climate change is real, while your neighbor sets the probability at just 20 percent."

How can a person who is not able to engage in scientific debate be 90 percent certain of a scientific prediction? Similarly, how could another have only 20 percent certainty?

In science, the validity of a study is based on what are known as "confidence intervals." You can find a good explanation of those here. These give a measure of how likely it is that a study's results are due to chance.

But what meaning is there in some layman having a 20 percent belief in climate change? What could that possibly spring from?

This brings to mind not any quote from a science publication but instead a quote from the Bible: “Now accept the one who is weak in faith, but not for the purpose of passing judgment on his opinions," said Paul to the Romans when he was advising them on how to convert non-believers to the faith.

That is followed by this silliness:

"Even if there’s only a 20 percent chance of rising sea levels, intensifying storm systems and crop failure, we ought to take steps to mitigate the risk. After all, your house probably won’t burn down or flood, but you still have homeowners insurance."

Does this writer seriously believe that if a layman believes there is a 20 percent risk of all those things then that means that risk is real? Evidently so.

But quite obviously if the risk can vary between 20 and 90 percent, then there can be no assurance that there is any measurable risk. Yet the reader is urged to prevail upon others to take action against a threat that neither can comprehend.

But here's my favorite:

"Next, talk about nuclear power.... Even if you’re personally opposed to nuclear power, this is a handy way to open climate-change rejectionists to the idea of managing the risks."

It's okay to deceive people to bring them to faith. So what if you don't really advocate nuclear power? Push it anyway.

Of course, if the people at the Post were really paying attention to the origins of the climate-change movement, they'd realize it had its roots in an effort by British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher to make a political argument for nuclear power.

It's certainly true that nuclear is the sole means of producing adequate amounts of electricity in the absence of fossil fuels. But the great majority of climate-change alarmists oppose nuclear power. That makes no sense, but then religious views are not required to make sense.

Like fanatic followers of any religion, these guys will use any method possible to spread the faith. Note this New York Times article urging people to take advantage of a summer hot spell to push climate alarmism:

So much for the "weather isn't climate" argument. And note that the author is not a scientist but a professor of sociology, a pseudo-science if there ever was one.

But what about that supposed "consensus" among climatologists that the planet will warm up significantly because of carbon dioxide emissions. It's nonsense for two reasons.

One is that carbon dioxide by itself could produce only a minor increase in temperature. That's why those computer models need to employ various Rube Goldberg-like atmospheric reactions that would amplify that small effect, such as entirely highly speculative theories about cloud creation. Note that a primary driver could be cosmic rays, not greenhouse gases.

The other problem with the alleged consensus comes from all those efforts by the faithful to lump non-believers in with flat-earthers and evolution deniers.

The flat-Earth charge is just stupid and shows the level to which these people will sink. As for the comparison to evolution, how do they explain Freeman Dyson's debunking of climate-change alarmism. Dyson, the Princeton physicist who may be the world's smarter scientist, wrote an entire book on the human genome.

Does Secretary of State John Kerry seriously believe he knows enough about this to tar a guy like Dyson with that flat-Earther label? That's just stupid.

The difference between a consensus on genetics and a consensus on climate should be obvious: The study of genetics focuses on observable events in the past. That man evolved from other mammals millions of years ago can be proven by comparing the DNA of a human and a chimp, for example.

Such an observation is about the past. But the climate alarmists claim to know what will happen in the future. There can't be a legitimate consensus on what cannot be known. It's entirely possible a new Ice Age will begin next week.



Would that shake the faith of the faithful? Not at all.

They'd just blame it on global warming.