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22 September 2008
On Global Warming “Skeptics”
There are still some of them around, and many of the leading climate change “skeptics” reputations are doubtful to say the least.
Here is a good list of well-known skeptics such as Bjorn Lomborg and Richard Lindzen:
Entry Filed under: Climate Change, Climate Chaos, Climate skeptic, Global Warming. .
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Ed Gulachenski | 22 September 2008 at 9:50 pm
You write: “There are still some of them around, and many of the leading climate change “skeptics” reputations are doubtful to say the least” and you mention specifically Professor Richard Lindzen.
And the main concern is that Lindzen once received $2500 per day from Exon Mobil. His funding today is only from the government.
But as Jeff Jacoby wrote in the Boston Globe—“ if scientists who take a non hysterical approach to global warming are going to be scrutinized for ulterior motives, shouldn’t we be just as suspicious about the alarmists? There is no shortage of incentives, after all, for those who paint global warming as a deadly and growing peril.
To begin with, staggering sums of money are channeled to researchers who emphasize the human role in global warming. The greater the sense of anthropogenic crisis, the greater the flow of research grants to address it. And it isn’t only government that ladles out the dollars. Last year, Virgin Atlantic Airways founder Richard Branson pledged $3 billion to fight global warming; more recently he offered $25 million for the first person who devises a way to annually remove a billion tons of CO2 from the atmosphere. In 2002, ExxonMobil announced a $100 million grant to establish a Global Climate and Energy Project at Stanford University for research into “the potential long-term risk of climate change.” Are experts who raise alarms about global warming being unduly influenced by such funding?
What about the lucrative and prestigious prizes global-warming alarmists have received? NASA’s James Hansen, a prominent global-warming Cassandra, won a $250,000 Heinz Award in 2001. Last month he was a co-winner of the Dan David Prize and its $1 million purse. Other awards have gone to other prophets of doom. And the potential rewards don’t stop there. For those who toe the politically correct line on global warming, there have been big book contracts, hefty speaking fees, worshipful magazine profiles, softball TV interviews. Should any of that call their objectivity into question?.”
Our global-warming debate is contentious enough as it is. The last thing we need is to be disparaging the integrity of every scientist who takes a strong stand either way. Tempting though it may be to think otherwise, not every true believer is a scoundrel — and not every heretic is a shill.