By Patrick J. Michaels on 2.21.06 @ 12:08AM
No one is censoring NASA's global warmer -- and his penchant for distorting the truth for dramatic effect.
NASA's Jim Hansen has gained a lot of attention for asserting
that the Bush administration is suppressing his ideas on climate
change. Most recently in the February 8 New York Times,
Hansen accused his employer of destroying our democracy by
censoring climate science, saying, "the foundation of
democracy...is an honestly informed public."
But wait. Hansen has himself advocated the use of exaggeration
and propaganda as political tools in the debate over global
warming. In the March 2004 issue of Scientific American,
Hansen wrote, "Emphasis on extreme scenarios may have been
appropriate at one time, when the public and decision-makers were
relatively unaware of the global warming issue....Now, however, the
need is for demonstrably objective climate forcing
scenarios..."
In other words, Hansen thought the public should be subjected to
nightmare scenarios regardless of the scientific likelihood of
catastrophe, simply in order to gain people's attention. And
further, that the lurid pictures that have been painted aren't
objective after all.
So now he says the time has come to tell the truth, and he is
being censored.
Why should we believe him now? What evidence can he give us that
his opinions and statements about climate change are suddenly true,
when he admits to having misrepresented the facts in the past? Was
the public being "honestly informed" then?
Hansen is far from alone in exaggerating climate change for his
own political agenda. In 1989, at the same time Hansen was
"emphasizing extreme scenarios," Dr. Stephen Schneider, now at
Stanford University, opined in Discover magazine that "we
have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic
statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have."
Hardly a recipe for encouraging an "honestly informed" public.
The irony is that, in recent years, Hansen's positions on global
warming have come increasingly in line with those of the
administration he claims is censoring him. In a 2003 article in
Natural Science, he laid bare the faulty reasoning behind
the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
reports, which have become famous for predicting massive climate
change over the course of the next half century.
He wrote that "we predict additional warming in the next 50
years of 3/4°C +/- 1/4°C, a warming rate of 0.15°C +/-
0.05°C per decade." This at the absolute low end of projections
made by the IPCC and is precisely the value that has been argued by
global warming "skeptics" ("moderates" would be a more accurate
term) like myself, for over a decade now.
Hansen essentially argued that the extreme IPCC scenarios are
exaggerations without firm grounding in reality, and that we are in
all likelihood on an emissions pathway that lies near the low end
of the IPCC projections. He was spot on about that.
But obviously, this conclusion doesn't sit well with the throngs
of scientists and environmental organizations that have made it
their business to scare the bejesus out of us in an effort to
advance their own agendas and livelihoods. And, soon after his 2003
paper was published, very little was heard from Mr. Hansen.
But, as soon as he says anything alarmist, his face time
returns. And if, while banging the tocsin, the administration is a
bit skeptical, he portrays himself as a martyr. So, while Hansen is
certainly free to continue to draw attention to himself and to his
personal opinions about climate change and how they are being
suppressed, we can draw attention to another salient point.
That is, it doesn't seem entirely unreasonable to think that
some folks, based upon Hansen's own words, may want to try to make
sure that the public is truly being "honestly informed."
topics:
Business, Environment, Global Warming, United Nations
