Fire and Ice

[southsider2k5]

http://www.businessandmedia.org/specialrep.../fireandice.asp

 

It was five years before the turn of the century and major media were warning of disastrous climate change. Page six of The New York Times was headlined with the serious concerns of “geologists.” Only the president at the time wasn’t Bill Clinton; it was Grover Cleveland. And the Times wasn’t warning about global warming – it was telling readers the looming dangers of a new ice age.

 

The year was 1895, and it was just one of four different time periods in the last 100 years when major print media predicted an impending climate crisis. Each prediction carried its own elements of doom, saying Canada could be “wiped out” or lower crop yields would mean “billions will die.”

 

Just as the weather has changed over time, so has the reporting – blowing hot or cold with short-term changes in temperature.

 

Following the ice age threats from the late 1800s, fears of an imminent and icy catastrophe were compounded in the 1920s by Arctic explorer Donald MacMillan and an obsession with the news of his polar expedition. As the Times put it on Feb. 24, 1895, “Geologists Think the World May Be Frozen Up Again.”

 

Those concerns lasted well into the late 1920s. But when the earth’s surface warmed less than half a degree, newspapers and magazines responded with stories about the new threat. Once again the Times was out in front, cautioning “the earth is steadily growing warmer.”

 

After a while, that second phase of climate cautions began to fade. By 1954, Fortune magazine was warming to another cooling trend and ran an article titled “Climate – the Heat May Be Off.” As the United States and the old Soviet Union faced off, the media joined them with reports of a more dangerous Cold War of Man vs. Nature.

 

The New York Times ran warming stories into the late 1950s, but it too came around to the new fears. Just three decades ago, in 1975, the paper reported: “A Major Cooling Widely Considered to Be Inevitable.”

 

That trend, too, cooled off and was replaced by the current era of reporting on the dangers of global warming. Just six years later, on Aug. 22, 1981, the Times quoted seven government atmospheric scientists who predicted global warming of an “almost unprecedented magnitude.”

 

In all, the print news media have warned of four separate climate changes in slightly more than 100 years – global cooling, warming, cooling again, and, perhaps not so finally, warming. Some current warming stories combine the concepts and claim the next ice age will be triggered by rising temperatures – the theme of the 2004 movie “The Day After Tomorrow.”

 

Recent global warming reports have continued that trend, morphing into a hybrid of both theories. News media that once touted the threat of “global warming” have moved on to the more flexible term “climate change.” As the Times described it, climate change can mean any major shift, making the earth cooler or warmer. In a March 30, 2006, piece on ExxonMobil’s approach to the environment, a reporter argued the firm’s chairman “has gone out of his way to soften Exxon’s public stance on climate change.”

 

The effect of the idea of “climate change” means that any major climate event can be blamed on global warming, supposedly driven by mankind.

 

Spring 2006 has been swamped with climate change hype in every type of media – books, newspapers, magazines, online, TV and even movies.

 

One-time presidential candidate Al Gore, a patron saint of the environmental movement, is releasing “An Inconvenient Truth” in book and movie form, warning, “Our ability to live is what is at stake.”

 

Despite all the historical shifting from one position to another, many in the media no longer welcome opposing views on the climate. CBS reporter Scott Pelley went so far as to compare climate change skeptics with Holocaust deniers.

 

“If I do an interview with [Holocaust survivor] Elie Wiesel,” Pelley asked, “am I required as a journalist to find a Holocaust denier?” he said in an interview on March 23 with CBS News’s PublicEye blog.

 

He added that the whole idea of impartial journalism just didn’t work for climate stories. “There becomes a point in journalism where striving for balance becomes irresponsible,” he said.

 

Pelley’s comments ignored an essential point: that 30 years ago, the media were certain about the prospect of a new ice age. And that is only the most recent example of how much journalists have changed their minds on this essential debate.

 

Some in the media would probably argue that they merely report what scientists tell them, but that would be only half true.

 

Journalists decide not only what they cover; they also decide whether to include opposing viewpoints. That’s a balance lacking in the current “debate.”

 

This isn’t a question of science. It’s a question of whether Americans can trust what the media tell them about science.

 

Much more at link...

[Jenksismyhero]

http://www.businessandmedia.org/specialrep.../fireandice.asp

Much more at link...

 

Blasphemy!

 

The Goracle tells us that the end is near. The Goracle is not the media.

 

We are all doomed.

[Balta1701]

Max Planck was once told by a professor that he shouldn't go into Physics as a discipline, because "in this field, almost everything is already discovered, and all that remains is to fill a few holes."

 

Because science never, ever, ever learns new things with time, therefore, you should throw away your computer, because it is actually run by evil magic and you can never trust that it's not going to sprout arms and come after you.

[FlaSoxxJim]

you should throw away your computer, because it is actually run by evil magic and you can never trust that it's not going to sprout arms and come after you.

 

This is true though.

 

[kapkomet]

NEVER EVER question "global warming" science. EVER. It's just WRONG!

 

It seriously amazes me how strongly this one issue is defended here more then every other one.

 

[Jenksismyhero]

Max Planck was once told by a professor that he shouldn't go into Physics as a discipline, because "in this field, almost everything is already discovered, and all that remains is to fill a few holes."

 

Because science never, ever, ever learns new things with time, therefore, you should throw away your computer, because it is actually run by evil magic and you can never trust that it's not going to sprout arms and come after you.

 

 

I don't understand why this guys point has to be taken to this extreme, especially when his context isn't "We all know God rules all and science is crap so don't believe anything you hear about global warming," but instead it's about journalists and how they cover stories.

 

You can trust in science AND question it. You can believe the Goracle if you wish and still follow these:

 

 

Three of the guidelines from the Society of Professional Journalists are especially appropriate:

 

“Support the open exchange of views, even views they find repugnant.”

 

 

“Give voice to the voiceless; official and unofficial sources of information can be equally valid.”

 

 

“Distinguish between advocacy and news reporting. Analysis and commentary should be labeled and not misrepresent fact or context.”

 

That last bullet point could apply to almost any major news outlet in the United States. They could all learn something and take into account the historical context of media coverage of climate change.

 

[Balta1701]

I don't understand why this guys point has to be taken to this extreme, especially when his context isn't "We all know God rules all and science is crap so don't believe anything you hear about global warming," but instead it's about journalists and how they cover stories.

 

You can trust in science AND question it. You can believe the Goracle if you wish and still follow these:

Yes, you can question the science. But this is not how you question the science. You don't question the science by just asserting that because science has been wrong before in one particular case you don't like, the science must be wrong again. That's why I use those sort of lines about throwing away your computer; because the logic is exactly the same. If you don't trust the science in one case which you don't like for political reasons on the grounds that science has been wrong in the past, then by the same logic, you should trust nothing that science has ever given you because it could be proven wrong. You should not trust quantum mechanics because physicists once didn't believe in it, you shouldn't trust medicine because some cures have been wrong before, and you shouldn't trust chemistry because it hasn't yet figured out how to turn lead into gold. That is the exact same logic you're trying to apply here, and it is simply faulty.

 

If you want to question anthropogenic climate change, the way to do that is simple. Show me the data, good solid data, which undermines the theory. Show me where we have evidence that atmospheric CO2 has not tracked and driven climate change in the past, show me a theory which explains some mechanism whereby increasing CO2 in the atmosphere will not increase themperatures, or give me some other sort of important data.

[mr_genius]

you should trust nothing that science has ever given you because it could be proven wrong. You should not trust quantum mechanics because physicists once didn't believe in it

 

Of course theories have been proven wrong in the past, that fact alone does not discredit science. An abstract estimation of what is possible can be reached on many principles. As you mentioned quantum mechanics, Werner Heisenberg questioned what level science can actually understand most anything. This is not a reason to abandon science, as extremely close approximations are often the key to advances.

Edited July 23, 2007 by mr_genius

[mr_genius]

You can trust in science AND question it. You can believe the Goracle if you wish and still follow these:

 

Three of the guidelines from the Society of Professional Journalists are especially appropriate:

 

“Support the open exchange of views, even views they find repugnant.”

 

“Give voice to the voiceless; official and unofficial sources of information can be equally valid.”

 

“Distinguish between advocacy and news reporting. Analysis and commentary should be labeled and not misrepresent fact or context.”

 

That last bullet point could apply to almost any major news outlet in the United States. They could all learn something and take into account the historical context of media coverage of climate change.

 

Great post. The scientific "witch hunt" that is being leveled on scientists who think natural causes also affect global warming is out of hand.

[Jenksismyhero]

Yes, you can question the science. But this is not how you question the science. You don't question the science by just asserting that because science has been wrong before in one particular case you don't like, the science must be wrong again. That's why I use those sort of lines about throwing away your computer; because the logic is exactly the same. If you don't trust the science in one case which you don't like for political reasons on the grounds that science has been wrong in the past, then by the same logic, you should trust nothing that science has ever given you because it could be proven wrong. You should not trust quantum mechanics because physicists once didn't believe in it, you shouldn't trust medicine because some cures have been wrong before, and you shouldn't trust chemistry because it hasn't yet figured out how to turn lead into gold. That is the exact same logic you're trying to apply here, and it is simply faulty.

 

If you want to question anthropogenic climate change, the way to do that is simple. Show me the data, good solid data, which undermines the theory. Show me where we have evidence that atmospheric CO2 has not tracked and driven climate change in the past, show me a theory which explains some mechanism whereby increasing CO2 in the atmosphere will not increase themperatures, or give me some other sort of important data.

 

My point wasn't towards questioning science. There's a difference between scientific reporting and journalistic reporting. Scientific reporting doesn't hit the public daily and bombard the citizenry with hyped up bullsh*t. That's what I get out of this guys article; that global catastrophe is a popular story and in the last century alone we've been told the end is near four times.

 

Take all the science studies and throw them together and at this point we still don't know the extent of the human element and what will happen because of it. Yet if you read every story about global warming, you're not told this, you're not given theories, you're mainly given three answers: humans did it, humans can fix it, and if they don't the world will end.

[kapkomet]

My point wasn't towards questioning science. There's a difference between scientific reporting and journalistic reporting. Scientific reporting doesn't hit the public daily and bombard the citizenry with hyped up bullsh*t. That's what I get out of this guys article; that global catastrophe is a popular story and in the last century alone we've been told the end is near four times.

 

Take all the science studies and throw them together and at this point we still don't know the extent of the human element and what will happen because of it. Yet if you read every story about global warming, you're not told this, you're not given theories, you're mainly given three answers: humans did it, humans can fix it, and if they don't the world will end.

^^^^^^.