The Myth of the Copenhagen Conspiracy

By Nick Gier, Unfiltered 12-18-09

THE MYTH OF THE COPENHAGEN CLIMATE CONSPIRACY

By Nick Gier, Professor Emeritus, University of Idaho

In the first of his two alarmist, hyperbolic, and scatological columns on the “Copenhagen Conspiracy” (Nov. 28 & Dec. 12), Idaho State Journal columnist Richard Larsen calls on the authority of the Lord Christopher Monckton, a journalist and adviser to former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

Larsen must be referring to Monckton’s October 14 speech to the Minnesota Free Market Institute in which he declared that man-made global warming is a hoax.

In this address Monckton revealed the Copenhagen Conspiracy, which predicts that in Copenhagen Obama and other world leaders will set up a Communist world government under the guise of flawed climate studies.

Earlier in the year scientists from RealClimate.org studied some of Monckton’s graphs, and they decided that the Third Viscount of Brenchley misrepresented data from the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and manipulated other evidence to conclude that there has been substantial cooling since 2002.

The World Meteorological Institute, that left-wing organization that feeds lies to your weather reporter every evening, just released a report indicating that the first years of the 21st Century (except for 1998) were the warmest on record.

After pointing all of the errors and deceptions in one of Monckton’s graphs on CO2 emissions, NASA’s Gavin Schmidt asks “How can this be described except as fake?” Larsen’s failure to check out Monckton’s credibility seriously undermines his own.

Larsen joins other global warming deniers in capitalizing on illegally obtained e-mails from the Climate Research Unit at East Anglia University. At least seven experts in science ethics have read the e-mails and they have concluded that, while there was intemperate language about climate skeptics, there was neither fabrication nor manipulation of data.

A very recent study done by two University of Washington scientists, posted on RealClimate.org, compared the CRU weather data against independent variables and demonstrated that there was no cheating on their part. An Italian scientist did a check using a different method and also vindicated the embattled researchers.

Much hay has been made of East Anglia researcher Phil Jones’ use of a “trick” in one of his papers, but in this context it simply means an ingenious way of presenting data.

One e-mail indicated that two papers by climate skeptics might be withheld from the 2007 IPCC report, but in the end both papers were included and discussed.

Larsen calls on the authority of three other climate skeptics. The first one is Tim Ball, who lied that he was the first Ph.D. in climatology in Canada. Ball has had no peer-reviewed papers in the field for 13 years, and the Calgary Herald states that he is a “paid promoter of the oil and gas industry rather than a practicing scientist.”

Larsen’s second reference is Patrick Michaels, a fellow at the free market CATO Institute, about whom climate scientist Tom Wigley states: “Michaels’ statements on the subject of computer models are a catalogue of misrepresentations and misinterpretation. Many of the supposedly factual statements made in his testimony are either inaccurate or are seriously misleading.”

Larsen’s third witness is John Theon, who has not done any science for thirty years, and therefore has no expertise to comment on sophisticated computer climate modeling.

As a former NASA official, Theon falsely claims to have been James Hansen’s boss, and he is the source of Larsen’s libelous claim that Hansen, one of the nation’s top climate scientists, manipulated data.

With regard to Lord Monckton’s visions of Communist world government, legal experts say that this is completely unfounded and paranoid.

On this issue the Truth-O-Meter at Pultizer-winning, fact-checking Politifact.com points to “Britches on Fire” for Monckton’s McCarthy-like pronouncements.

In Copenhagen Monckton confronted young protesters and called them “Hitler Youth.” Even when one of the students identified himself as Jewish and said that his grandparents died in the Holocaust, Monckton continued to insult the protesters.

This certainly is not a proper way for a British peer to conduct himself. His lordship behaves far worse in public than the East Anglia researchers did in private e-mails.

When Richard Larsen calls climate scientists’ independently validated work “execrable man-made concoctions,” one could also say that this is certainly not good form for an award-winning columnist.

Nick Gier taught philosophy at the University of Idaho for 31 years. Read or listen to all of his columns at www.NickGier.com

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