Abbott’s climate change policy is “bullshit”

Australian politicians are great. Malcolm Turnbull (the ex-leader of the opposition government who was recently ousted from his position) has called the new leader, Tony Abbott’s climate change policy “bullshit“. Tell us what you really think, Malcom? But it’s a fair point – this is Tony Abbot that yesterday declared:

“Notwithstanding the dramatic increases in man-made CO2 emissions over the last decade, the world’s warming has stopped,”

The world’s warming has stopped? Really? Wait, we’ve heard this one before. So has Tamino, who apparently is also sick of hearing that “the last decade of global temperature contradicts what was expected by mainstream climate scientists”. To illustrate this nicely, Tamino plotted the NASA GISS data from 1975-2000:

giss1

His solid red line is a linear regression, and the dashed lines 2 standard error (i.e. most data is expected to fall within these lines). So what happened after 2000? Were all the predictions wrong? Did we really see global cooling?

giss2

To quote Tamino:

Gosh. What actually happened is exactly what was expected. Exactly. By mainstream climate scientists. You know, those folks who keep telling us that human activity is warming the planet and that it’s dangerous.

We’re only 10 years into the 21st century, but so far, global temperature has done exactly what was expected by mainstream climate scientists. Exactly. You know — those folks who keep telling us that human activity is warming the planet, and that it’s very dangerous.

This is undeniable. Unless of course you’re in denial.

Yet people continue to deny it. They tell you it’s all a hoax, and to support that idea they repeatedly claim that the last decade of temperature data contradicts global warming.

Note to Tony Abbott: quit talking bullshit, stop peddling opinion as fact, and start being held accountable for every word you say as a politician.

11 thoughts on “Abbott’s climate change policy is “bullshit”

  1. It’s deeply disappointing that someone with real aspirations to become this nation’s leader can so recklessly and wilfully dismiss the abundance of real scientific information that’s on the table. Not that I find Labor policy able to inspire me to think we’ll seriously face this challenge; Carbon Capture and Storage is the favoured technology of choice at both National and State levels i.e. the coal fires will keep on burning. NSW Agriculture and Energy Minister (I think – hard to keep track of who’s what lately in NSW politics) Tony Burke made it quite clear at the Press Club the other day that coal is the future energy source of choice for NSW.

  2. Even if the World is warming. Prove that it will be bad for humans or for the living things on earth. Plants and animals like it hot and it is a fact that increases in temperatures benefits the planet ecosystem. Plants will require less water and will grow faster and stronger with the increase in Co2, thus creating a lessening need for cutting down forests for land in which to grow food and biofuel. Any true environmentalist should recognize what is best for the environment. Unfortunately, most are blinded by the political aspirations of their enviro-leaders. Environmentalism is now big business, and unfortunately, it is stuck on an unproven (yes, don’t deny it, UNPROVEN) theory. Someone out here in bloggerville, mass media, Someone, ANYONE! please prove how a warming world with more Co2 will be detrimental. Yes put money into research for alternate energy sources, but don’t do it before you stop the flow of carbon energy. If we do that, there will be no money in the kitty to protect our forests and oceans and no money for research.

  3. There is a mountain of scientific evidence to show that a warming planet will wreak havoc on ecosystems. It’s not a simple as saying “plants and animals like it hot”… this is a pretty considerable generalisation. It’s not difficult to search the internet for the impacts of CO2 – try Wikipedia for a start (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_global_warming#Ecosystems).

    In a true sense, scientific theories cannot be proven (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_evidence for more on this). Having said that, the weight of evidence supporting anthropogenic global warming is overwhelming.

  4. Ben,

    Yes, Plants and animals like it hot is a generalization. Good for you to notice my point. There are more plants and animals living in the hotter regions of earth than there are in the colder regions of earth. I checked out the Wikipedia links. The link was about Global Warming not Co2 as you mentioned in your comment. Co2 is not the only cause of climate change. The wiki link failed to touch on the possible great things that could result from a warming world. It was a little pessimistic in my opinion. The overwhelming “evidence” that you mention is from computer climate models known to not be able to predict future climate very well. Observational evidence does not match the models to date. The reason being is that the chaotic relationships of the earth’s climate as a whole is not yet understood enough.

    There are many articles that show the effects of Co2 on plant growth. It is amazing how much faster they grow and how they require less water to grow.

  5. Ben,

    “The wiki link failed to touch on the possible great things that could result from a warming world. It was a little pessimistic in my opinion.”

    You are welcome to your opinion, but I strongly doubt that ‘great things’ will result from climate change – almost all the available science points to the contrary.

    Observational evidence does not match the models to date.

    Really? Where do you get this idea from?

  6. J.Roff,

    Observational evidence does not match the models to date:

    “If outgoing radiation from the atmosphere is reduced to less than the incoming radiation from the Sun, heat energy will accumulate in the climate system causing rising temperatures. The models assume CO2 emissions will cause water vapour, the strongest greenhouse gas, to increase in the upper atmosphere, trapping the radiation. They also assume clouds will trap more radiation. But satellite and weather balloon data shows just the opposite of the climate model predictions.”

    http://www.friendsofscience.org/index.php?id=222

    No one can say with certainty if the world warms whether there will be more bad than good or vice-versa. a 50/50 chance at best. We will have to agree to disagree on this point.

    Merry Christmas from Duane in Canada.

  7. Hi Duane,

    Friends of Science are an astroturf organisation who willfully distort the facts on climate change to fit their own political paid agenda.

    The Douglass et al paper you linked to is a bit of an embarrassment in scientific circles – See what realclimate have to say about it here.

    No one can say with certainty if the world warms whether there will be more bad than good or vice-versa. a 50/50 chance at best. We will have to agree to disagree on this point.

    It would depend on what your definition of ‘bad’ and ‘good’ is. For example, we know that increased temperature and warmer oceans will greatly impact the world’s coral reefs through coral bleaching and ocean acidification. Surely this isn’t ‘good’? And as for a 50/50 chance, surely 87.42% of statistics like these are made up on the spot?

    Merry Christmas from here in Australia.

  8. J.Roff,

    Sorry I’m not familiar with the Douglas paper. I meant to put the following link in:

    http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/Lindzen-Choi-CLIM.FEEDBACK.2009.pdf

    The Argo system has been deployed in 2003 and since that time they have not recorded any warming in the oceans.

    Friends of Science -politically paid agenda? Paid by big oil you assume? If questioning the agenda is: petitioning for a fair debate so that governments are held accountable, then SIGN ME UP. However, the amount of people getting rich off of this theory is sickeningly large. If anything, we have to be cautious in the alarmist views. All scientists and governments are not angels who all tell the truth. Greed and money does corrupt.

    I wish you well in your studies. And I hope that your beautiful reefs are not comprimised by increased Co2.

  9. Sorry, I missed your response. The Lindzen & Choi paper you linked to has also been critiqued by Real Climate (read more here).

    As for government accountability, sure, I agree with you strongly. I just don’t think this whole “people getting rich off of this theory is sickeningly large” holds any truth.

  10. just blows my mind how fast the educated can buy in to all this propaganada keep the massess in fear and control THE MASSES IM 47 yrs old and it seems no one questions anything GOD HELP THIS GREAT COUNTRY

  11. So now that arch-warmist Jones (who has been caught with his trousers down – sorry falsifying the data) has said there has been no statistically significant warming for the last 15 years, and that that all the IPCC models have a 2.5 multiplier (not proven to actually work) for the effects of CO2 on global warming, just who do you think is going to believe this stuff. Dream on. Don’t bother with the next scare of “Oceans going acidic, shock – horror” that one is dead in the water…. Get real, the AGW scare is gone forever. Climategate, glaciergate, amazongate, yawn, it goes it just goes on and on……

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