Tweet
climate science mathematics
In Climate Science, to observe something, you have to create it. Now this sounds scarily close to bullshit. But if it is bullshit, then at least it's bullshit with equations.
Where A= a quantity and B= a quantity and C=a quantity and BS =Bullshit
Here is the formula that defines bullshit:
A+B+C = D
A+B+C+BS=BS
and BS is not equal to D
The significance of this formula is that even when you solve the variables A. B and C once you add BS to it your answer is also BS. Simply adding the bullshit factor completely destroys your ability to solve the equation that would otherwise be represented by the value D.
The most telling moment came in an interview between Nurse and a computer-modelling scientist from NASA, presented as a general climate expert although he is only a specialist in ice studies.
Asked to quantify the relative contributions of CO2 to the atmosphere by human and natural causes, his seemingly devastating reply was that 7 Gigatons (billion tons) are emitted each year by human activity while only 1 Gigaton comes from natural sources such as the oceans.
Another came after Nurse had defended his old university’s part in the Climategate emails. Inevitably he claimed that various reports had cleared the scientists involved of any wrongdoing, without mentioning that every one of the inquiries had carefully avoided the scientific questions at the heart of the row. (Yet another superficial parliamentary report last week, despite the heroic efforts of Labour MP Graham Stringer, was rendered meaningless by the same central evasion.)