Global warming is like gravity; it works, whether you understand it, and believe in it, or not.

I thought a “lolly” was a very good analogy. If I give you a 60 g lolly on a warm day, Can you calculate, on the basis of physics and engineering, just how long you have to eat it , before it falls to the ground? No! The best you can do is make an estimate based on a history of lolly dropping. Nor, can you calculate rates for ice sheets sliding into the briny. Except that with ice sheets, we do not have a history of ice sheet sliding (under current conditions of climate forcing) with which to make an estimate. Thus, the ice sheets could move with a rapidity as disconcerting as the rapidity of a lolly falling into the dirt. The driving force is the same – gravity.

You are correct in suggesting that there exist ideas which become fashionable for a time, and then less so, and so forth. Some of these ideas originate in ‘great’ (or perhaps we might say ‘deep’) thinking/thinkers.

I suspect that you also have a valid point in suggesting that some of these fashionable ideas are, ultimately, of less substance than they at first appeared, and their demise is thus unlamented and, to some extent, inevitable.

You also have a point when you say that some people are willing to accept the truth of an assertion simply because it is repeated frequently. Isn’t this something like what Marketing people do?

Groupthink is an interesting concept, as is collective consensus. Likewise, contrariness for its own sake is a well-known phenomenon.

But you are stretching the limit of good manners somewhat by implying that I have been brainwashed/deluded/fooled into swallowing some line or other; this is simply insulting my intelligence and placing your own as superior by inference. If you wish to demonstrate a superior intellect, I am impressed by reason and sense; try that.

The ‘cult’ thing is just the familiar old subversion-by-implication nonsense and isn’t really worth comment.

What does the ‘Manhattan declaration’ say? Why does it matter: what is the source of its supposed significance?

Why do you mention the temperature over the past ten years? Are you cognisant of the context of climatological observation and analysis? And, while we’re on the subject, how do those ten years rank over the past century? Any of them in the ‘below average’ area? Any of them outside the top fifteen warmest years on record?

You are also correct that there are a lot of people who peddle the same old same old on the internet. The blogs you refer to are all busted flushes these days; nobody is really listening to these fools any more.

You are at least plausibly wrong in asserting that nothing you could say would influence my opinions or understanding. I change my mind all the time. Sometimes, reason has something to do with it. Give me a good reason to believe that those 81,000-odd papers are misguided. Give me a good reason to believe that the hard work I put in to understanding the many thousands of pages of text and data, science and so forth, was ultimately futile, as I clearly missed some critical point, in common with all those scientists whose work I read, and therefore came to the evidently false conclusion that it is reasonable to assert that AGW is happening.

P.S. I suspect you are wrong about the Milloys and McIntyre being more competent than you. There is little evidence to supoport this belief, either. Rely on your own intelligence and reasoning skills and tell me where I have gone wrong…

Regards,

http://www.climate-skeptic.com/

http://www.climateaudit.org/

http://www.junkscience.com/

http://gustofhotair.blogspot.com/

There are more on the net than you can shake a stick at but these fellas should do nicely for now.

P.S. I do actually enjoy reading your blog.

You also appear to imagine that, if many people find something credible, then they must therefore be credulous. But these are not the people whose credibility is in question. To imagine that an idea which is popularly understood to be true is false by virtue of its popularity is peculiar; perhaps even an example of lazy thinking.

And then there’s the Godwinism. Gracious.

It doesn’t make any difference whether my, or your own, opinion is unique or universal. What matters is whether it is right.

Do you wish to provide evidence that AGW is ‘wrong’?

Do you wish to propose the statement that the evidence in support of the conclusion that AGW has, is, and will continue to happen, is insufficient?

Do you wish, then, to suggest an explanation for the apparent changes taking place in the world, the environment and the atmosphere, which explains at least a proportion of them satisfactorily?

Please feel free to dispute, but please also try to use reason rather than sloppy rhetoric.

Regards,

QED

But the only reason you would want to do so is if you wished to convince yourself and or others that AGW is still worth disputing. And whatever you did, would count for little in relation to the weight and complexity of evidence from a number of disciplines which in and of themselves, and collectively, point to one inescapable conclusion (albeit one which is a complex and interesting one).

The lolly is irrelevant. It’s the capacity for self-delusion which pertains.
Regards,