August 24, 2007
Category: Fumento • LancetIraq
I really don't know where to begin with this anti-Lancet piece by Michael Fumento. Should I start with the way Fumento describes Kane's paper as "so complex" that it "may cause your head to explode" while being utterly certain that Kane has demolished the Lancet study? Or with his assertion that I've been ignoring criticism of the Lancet study? Or with the way he quote mines me? Or that after again and again arguing that Lancet was wrong because they included Falluja when they should have left it out, he is embracing Kane's argument that they were wrong because they excluded Falluja? Or with a picture of a rake?
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 01:57 PM • 14 Comments
August 23, 2007
Category: Global Warming • The War on Science
Last month the Australian mounted an over-the-top defence of one of their pundits after blogs criticised him for spinning as favourable to the government an opinion poll that showed the opposition way ahead and no change in its lead. So how do you think they reacted to Media Watch's criticism?
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 01:51 PM • 8 Comments
August 22, 2007
Category: meta
Here are the top 5 lists of the top Australian blogs:
Ranking of the lists was done by a completely objective criterion -- how highly they ranked Deltoid.
Posted by Tim Lambert at 11:47 AM • 0 Comments
August 21, 2007
Category: The War on Science
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote how the Australian had misrepresented Rajenda Pachauri (IPCC head), falsely claiming that he supported the Australian government's policy of delay. Media Watch has the latest developments. Pachauri wrote to the Australian:
I am writing to convey my deep disappointment at the news report in your newspaper of August 9 with the headline, "Climate expert backs Canberra". Nothing that I said in my telephone interview with Mr Matthew Warren implied or even remotely conveyed that I supported or opposed the Australian Government's policies on climate change.
I am surprised that a very general opinion that I expressed without reference to any country was twisted around to create the impression that I supported the current government's stance on climate change. That was a total distortion of my comments. I would not put myself in the position of passing judgement on the policies of any sovereign government. The public and voters of Australia will do so in the coming months, as indeed they must.
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 02:04 PM • 38 Comments
August 20, 2007
Category: DDT
The Washington Post reports:
Long-lasting, insecticide-treated mosquito nets should be distributed free, rapidly and widely in malaria-endemic areas, World Health Organization officials said here Thursday, setting new guidelines for fighting the mosquito-borne disease around the globe.
For years, a policy debate has raged not so much over the effectiveness of mosquito nets in preventing the disease, but over how best to distribute them. ...
Thursday's announcement "ends the debate" over which method is best, said Arata Kochi, director of WHO's global malaria program. "No longer should the safety and well-being of your family be based upon whether you are rich or poor," Kochi said in a statement. "When insecticide treated mosquito nets are easily available for every person, young or old, malaria is reduced." ...
The WHO announcement was paired with what Kochi called "impressive" findings by Kenyan health authorities that widespread, free distribution of mosquito nets can effectively save children's lives.
After several years of using a combination of free distribution and sales, the Kenyan government last year conducted a massive, almost military-style campaign to distribute without charge 3.4 million insecticide-treated mosquito nets over three days in 46 malaria-endemic districts across the country.
Among a monitored group of 3,500 children in four of those districts, the number sleeping under the nets increased nearly tenfold from 2004 to 2006, WHO said, citing Kenyan government figures. The result was 44 percent fewer deaths than among children not sleeping under nets.
In light of this and other new evidence, the WHO seems to have reversed the policy it adopted last year of indoor residual spraying (IRS) in high-transmission areas. They now say:
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 03:40 PM • 3 Comments
August 19, 2007
Category: Global Warming
Four of the six government members on a committee examining geosequestration put out a dissent denying the existence of anthropogenic global warming. I was going to write a post on what they got wrong, but I realised that since they rely on Bob Carter so much, I'd already done it. John Quiggin comments on the affair:
But now that the disinformation machine has been created, it's proving impossible to shut it down. Too many commentators have locked themselves into entrenched positions, from which no dignified retreat is possible. The problem has been reinforced by developments in the media, where rightwing talk radio and blogs have formed a closed circle of tribal loyalty, in which hostility to science is taken for granted. Spurious talking points are picked up and amplified by these groups, eventually finding their way into the opinion columns of writers like Andrew Bolt and Miranda Devine, and then into the opinions of conservatives in general.
See also Guy Pearse and Trevor Cook.
The disinformation machine is still desperately trying to hype the correction to NASA temperatures. Yesterday both Sydney newspapers had articles (Tim Blair in the Terror, and Michael Duffy in the SMH). They both seem to be reading from the same script, because they both confused US temperatures for global temperatures. In the US, 1934 and 1998 are in a virtual tie, and the correction didn't change this. Globally, 1998 was much warmer than 1934, and the correction didn't change this. Penguin Unearthed corrects Duffy, but it also works for Blair. James Hansen comments on the anti-NASA campaign:
What we have here is a case of dogged contrarians who present results in ways intended to deceive the public into believing that the changes have greater significance than reality. They aim to make a mountain out of a mole hill. I believe that these people are not stupid, instead they seek to create a brouhaha and muddy the waters in the climate change story. They seem to know exactly what they are doing and believe they can get away with it, because the public does not have the time, inclination, and training to discern what is a significant change with regard to the global warming issue
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 02:25 PM • 27 Comments
August 18, 2007
Category: DDT
Members of the "we hate Rachel Carson" club have been touting a new study on indoor residual spraying as showing that DDT remains effective against malaria even when the mosquitoes are resistant. For examples, see Angela Logomasini and Ron Bailey. The study found that DDT-resistant mosquitoes were still repelled from huts sprayed with DDT so that occupants would be protected from 73% of mosquitoes. But it also found that there was 92% protection with dieldrin, which mosquitoes were not resistant to. In other words, an insecticide that killed the mosquitoes worked better, as you might expect.
So while the study suggests that DDT might be more effective than tests on how effectively it kills mosquitoes suggests, it does not seem a good idea to continue to use it where the mosquitoes are resistant -- a switch to a more effective insecticide would seem wise. The experience in Sri Lanka where DDT resistance led to a malaria epidemic despite DDT spraying also points to the wisdom of switching.
One additional point -- the study found that DDT acted as a spatial repellent, with mosquitoes repelled without coming into contact with the DDT sprayed on the walls. Presumably this was because there were particles of DDT in the air in the hut. Since this would rely on DDT continually escaping from the walls, it is not clear how long this effect would last for. I would have liked to have seen them test for this one and three months after spraying.
Bug girl has some more thoughts on the study, as does John Quiggin.
Posted by Tim Lambert at 03:14 PM • 8 Comments
August 17, 2007
Category: Global Warming • stupidity
If I summarized Glenn Reynold's response to my post on his hyping of a small correction to GISS data, you would not believe me, so I'm quoting the whole thing:
Lamberted! But no Instalanche.
Later: In an update: "Matthew Yglesias links to Tim Lambert, obviously deeming him a reputable source. Hey, this is about politics; not accuracy." Yglesias has been off his game lately.
More: Brad Plumer has been fooled, too.
Yes, Reynolds is enough of an egomaniac to think that I wrote my post because I was hoping to get an Instalanche. In fact, I wrote it to correct his hype. The change meant that 1998 and 1934 went from being in a statistical tie to being in a statistical tie, and no-one had ever reported that NASA had 1998 as the warmest in the US. The JF Beck post he links to doesn't dispute that, instead Beck repeatedly calls me a liar. But apparently that's enough for Reynolds -- he seems to genuinely believe that Matthew Yglesias and Brad Plumer are discredited just because they linked to my post. But hey, at least he linked to them. Do you think that in Reynold's imagination Plumer was at first elated to get OMG! an Instalanche, but then Oh No! shattered to find that Reynolds had refuted his post?
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 03:09 PM • 28 Comments
August 16, 2007
Category: Global Warming • funny
Nexus 6 has a new cartoon making fun of global warming denialists.
Posted by Tim Lambert at 02:51 PM • 13 Comments
Category: DDT
DDT hoax spreader Walter E Williams has a new anti-environmentalist column where he writes:
In one long-term study, volunteers ate 32 ounces of DDT for a year and a half, and 16 years later, they suffered no increased risk of adverse health effects.
You know, two pounds of DDT is a lot of DDT. It's a bit worrying that Williams felt it plausible that volunteers would chow down on 2 pounds of DDT every day for a year and a half.
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 10:35 AM • 24 Comments
August 13, 2007
Category: Global Warming
In comments to my post on a review of Guy Pearse's High and Dry, JC pointed to a dispute between Andrew Norton and Pearse on whether the CIS had promoted denial and delay on greenhouse gasses. Pearse makes his case here (scroll to 25 July 2007), while Norton responds here. Now I think it is a bit much for Pearse to tag the CIS with Jennifer Marohasy's opinions on global warming when all they did was publish her article on another topic. But it is also a bit much for Norton to argue that the opinions of Roger Bate have nothing to do with the CIS when the CIS list him as one of their Research Staff with expertise in climate change.
Norton wrote:
But given the CIS cannot control any of these people, how can it be responsible for what they say?
The CIS can certainly control what appears in its publications and on its website, so I searched their site for published articles that took a position on the science or the policy related to global warming. The articles I found appeared in CIS publications Executive Highlights, Policy Magazine or Economic Freedom Watch. Without exception, the position was either denial ("its not happening!") or delay ("we shouldn't do anything!"), just as Pearse said. Here's the list, along with quotes from each piece so you can get the flavour:
Bjorn Lomberg 2006:
The really inconvenient truth is that combating climate change through the Kyoto Protocol has a social value of less than a dollar for each dollar spent.
Nicholas Kerr 2004:
That it has not signed up to such agreements as the Kyoto Protocol is less a sign of US selfishness and more one of a lack of evidence surrounding the science and economics on which protocol is founded.
Helen Hughes 2003:
The highly tendentious nature of measuring 'warming' and its tenuous relation to current, or even medium-term development is ignored.
Wolfgang Kasper 2003:
Green lobbies and litigation lawyers announced in October that they
would sue environmental regulators and carbon energy producers for
weather damages -- because the links between Greenhouse emissions,
global warming and weather damage is increasingly proven. Given the
recent flare-ups in sunspot activity and given the well-known
correlation between solar activity and variations in global
temperatures (Graph 4), EFW suggests that the litigators make the Sun
a co-defendant.
Graph 4 is similar to the one that had to be corrected here
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 03:13 PM • 111 Comments
August 12, 2007
Category: Global Warming
Because of the corrections to the GISS data 1998 and 1934 went from being in a virtual tie, to being in a virtual tie.. This, of course, has not stopped global warming denialists from endlessly hyping it as a big change.
For example, Glenn Reynolds:
Ace wonders why nobody's talking about the NASA climate data revision.
Because the change is trivial. Duh.
UPDATE: Well, here's a bit of notice.
The link goes to James Taranto, who gets his facts wrong, confusing the US temperature with the global temperature. Reynolds doesn't notice.
ANOTHER UPDATE: More here: "Will the mainstream media report the corrected story with as much gusto as they initially reported the claim that 1998 was the warmest on record? Doubtful. But they should. Good public policy can not be made on bad data."
In the linked post, Bill Hobbs originally claimed:
NASA's much-ballyhooed data showing that 1998 was the warmest year on record for the Earth was, uh, wrong.
Which was, uh, wrong. He "corrected" it to write:
NASA's much-ballyhooed data showing that 1998 was the warmest year on record for the USA was, uh, wrong.
Which is, uh, also wrong. How about we look at how the 1998 numbers were reported:
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 02:02 PM • 142 Comments
August 11, 2007
Category: Global Warming
Guy Pearse's book, High and Dry has been reviewed by Tim Flannery:
The Prime Minister and several of his key ministers, Pearse asserts, have been captured by a group of industries and their lobbyists, known as the greenhouse mafia. They have infiltrated deep into the bureaucracy and they continue to make sure the Prime Minister and his ministers hear nothing by way of advice but what they want them to hear. There is consequently, Pearse says, no debate whatsoever in cabinet on climate change. The Prime Minister simply elucidates his policy and the party follows.
Pearse describes the think tanks, industries, bureaucrats and individuals that provide advice to the Prime Minister on climate change and the media outlets that propagate the resulting party line. In the inner circle is a group that Pearse (following Clive Hamilton) calls the Prime Minister's XI. Hugh Morgan is characterised as team captain, while Queensland Premier Peter Beattie is included, and so (as 12th man) is Chris Mitchell, editor-in-chief at The Australian.
Posted by Tim Lambert at 11:36 AM • 23 Comments
August 10, 2007
Category: Global Warming
Steve McIntyre found an error in the GISS temperature data for the US. The GISTEMP page says:
USHCN station records up to 1999 were replaced by a version of USHCN data with further corrections after an adjustment computed by comparing the common 1990-1999 period of the two data sets. (We wish to thank Stephen McIntyre for bringing to our attention that such an adjustment is necessary to prevent creating an artificial jump in year 2000.)
How much difference did the adjustment make to the US temperature series? Well, it changed this:
to this:
Not much difference. The right hand end of the red curve has moved down a little bit, but this decade is still the warmest ever recorded in the US. The change to the global temperature series is imperceptible.
Of course, if you're Steve McIntyre, you want to make this seem like a big deal. So what do you do?
Read on »
Posted by Tim Lambert at 02:33 PM • 249 Comments
Category:
Ok guys, how about you move the off-topic discussion here,. please.
Posted by Tim Lambert at 01:08 PM • 56 Comments
Category: DDT
Ed Darrell is working is way through the inaccuracies in junkscience.com's "100 things you should know about DDT". He's up to the claim that DDT prevented 500 million deaths:
First, the mathematics are simply impossible: At about 1 million deaths per year, if we assume DDT could have prevented all of the deaths (which is not so), and had we assumed usage started in 1939 instead of 1946 (a spot of 7 years and 7 million deaths), we would have 69 million deaths prevented by 2008. As best I can determine, the 500 million death figure is a misreading from an early WHO report that noted about 500 million people are annually exposed to malaria, I'm guessing a bit at that conclusion -- that's the nicest way to attribute it to simple error and not malicious lie. It was 500 million exposures to malaria, not 500 million deaths. It's unfortunate that this erroneous figure found its way into a publication of the NAS -- I suppose it's the proof that anyone can err. ...
But the actual publication from the National Academy of Sciences suggests other issues that JunkScience.com would rather you not know about.
Importantly and specifically, the National Academy of Sciences is calling for broad research 1.) to avoid the problems that DDT presented (problems which Junk Science denies exist), and 2.) to combat the continuing evolution of the insect pests (evolution which Junk Science also denies), and 3.) to provide insecticides that hit specific targets to avoid the collateral damage of harming helpful insects, other animals and especially predators of the harmful insects (more problems that Junk Science pretends do not exist).
Darrell also takes the time debunk yet another repetition of the evil environmentalists banned DDT hoax, this time from Jay Ambrose. Who shows up in comments claiming to have a "long list of documented facts", but fails to deliver.
Posted by Tim Lambert at 12:53 PM • 9 Comments
Tim Lambert (deltoidblog AT gmail.com) is a computer scientist at the University of New South Wales.
