When climatologists such as John Coleman debunk AGW, the believers contest that he is not the right kind of scientist to dispute the “science”.  He is after all “just a weatherman”.

Al Gore is certainly no scientist and has less credentials than John Coleman on the subject.  Yet he is considered an authority on the subject by the believers. The “science” is debatable; the “certainty” is disturbing. Gore has consistently refused to debate the issue. “The debate is over” is certainly not the language of science. Nor is treating skeptics like heretics.

Climate Gate has shown that even “scientists” can be biased by the influence of money.  For every “scientist” that supports AGW there is a “scientist” debunking it.

The greater fallacies in the AGW argument are fallacies of logic, not science.  The idea of certainty in such a hugely uncertain and massive realm just defies common sense.

Science welcomes skepticism, religions generally do not.

George Will writes on Climate Gate in the Washington Post; The Climate -change travesty

Excerpt:

Barack Obama, understanding the histrionics required in climate-change debates, promises that U.S. emissions in 2050 will be 83 percent below 2005 levels. If so, 2050 emissions will equal those in 1910, when there were 92 million Americans. But there will be 420 million Americans in 2050, so Obama’s promise means that per capita emissions then will be about what they were in 1875. That. Will. Not. Happen.

Were their science as unassailable as they insist it is, and were the consensus as broad as they say it is, and were they as brave as they claim to be, they would not be “goaded” into intellectual corruption. Nor would they meretriciously bandy the word “deniers” to disparage skepticism that shocks communicants in the faith-based global warming community.

It is hard not to gloat and feel some sense of relief at the release of the climate-gate e-mails.

The most bothersome aspect of the global warming mongers was the certainty.  I have no scientific back ground, but the idea that any group of scientists can pretend to know with any degree of certainty the cause and future of global temperatures just always seemed ridiculous.

Just as Wall Street caused a financial fiasco by refusing to recognize the unknown unknowns in the global financial market, climate scientists have refused to recognize their limits and have arrogantly claimed to know the unknowable.

Yet there were many scientists out there who for years have raised questions about the claims of global warming. Their professionalism was brought into question because they were not the politically recognized source. Using the word ‘denier’ to describe the skeptics made them seem like wingnuts akin to a holocaust ‘denier’.

The use of religious language to characterize the debate diminished any scientific credibility. It became clear that the science became secondary, the promoters of the theory wanted to believe it. It gave them a sense of comfort, a way to expunge their guilt.  Even the demonization of the skeptics seemed religious.

We spoke of using this problem to unite mankind in a common goal. This is not the language of science. Like a religion belief may be very resistant to any facts. The release of these e-mails is a critical tipping point in the debate and now the believers of global warming theory will be on the defensive.

We refused to believe that scientists could be corrupted by money. When money is thrown at one side of the debate we should expect information to lean toward that side, but we should question its credibility.

And yet again we see a compliant media more willing to confirm their own beliefs than to ask intelligent questions.

It is our nature to accept lies that give us comfort and certainty.  That is why the truth is so difficult for many to accept, much less work to uncover.  We owe a debt of gratitude to those who leaked the e-mails.

I would even nominate them for a Nobel Prize.

Much has been written about the Climate-Gate, but Mark Steyn applies his clarifying wit to it in this article “Cooking the Books on Climate.” Read the whole article here.

Excerpt:

“The trouble with outsourcing your marbles to the peer-reviewed set is that, if you take away one single thing from the leaked documents, it’s that the global warm-mongers have wholly corrupted the “peer-review” process. When it comes to promoting the impending ecopalypse, the Climate Research Unit is the nerve-center of the operation. The “science” of the CRU dominates the “science” behind the United Nations IPCC, which dominates the “science” behind the Congressional cap-and-trade boondoggle, the upcoming Copenhagen shakindownen of the developed world, and the now-routine phenomenon of leaders of advanced, prosperous societies talking like gibbering madmen escaped from the padded cell, whether it’s President Barack Obama promising to end the rise of the oceans or the Prince of Wales saying we only have 96 months left to save the planet.”

HKO comment- credentialism does not overcome the emotional and psychological impediments to the truth. Over dependence on professional peers is just another form of elitism.  “skepticism is the price knowledge pays for truth.” When skeptics are demonized the truth suffers. Who peer reviews the peers.