A brief on the canard that Warmists are more credible because they have out-published skeptics

Warmist Greg Laden offers this graphic to marginalize confidence in climate skeptics:



[The author of the graphic can't even spell "consensus".  The URL for the graphic names it as "global warming concensus".  Warmists are not the best of minds -- JR]

Without quibbling about precise numbers, why has comparatively little research been published by skeptics?

1. No government funding. With few exceptions (Spencer and Christy come to mind), the federal government (the overwhelmingly largest funder of climate research) doesn’t fund skeptics. But it has funded warmism to the tune of tens of billions of dollars since at least the Clinton administration. Without money and access to expensive data and instruments, original climate research is nearly impossible.

2. Journal bias. Many (most? virtually all?) relevant journals refuse to publish skeptics — even letters to the editor. Indeed the publishers of these journals (like the NAS, AAAS and Nature publishing) are highly partisan when it comes to climate research.

3. Warmist-enforced journal bias. As discussed here, journals are policed by warmists such as Michael Mann to make sure that skeptics aren’t published. Those that dare to publish skeptics are targeted and punished.

4.Being a skeptic is a career damaging. If you want to end your career as a climate researcher, announce your skepticism. This is most likely the case because of #1. If the only significant funder of climate research favors warmism, then that’s what you do (or at least your institution will, with or without you). Consider how Penn State was willing to degrade itself to keep its cash cow (Michael Mann).

Why doesn’t it matter that skeptics have published many fewer papers?

Just like you don’t need to be Steven Spielberg to figure out whether a movie is any good, you don’t need to be a professional climate researcher to figure out that, say, the hockey stick is hokey. As long as science is not a black box (which is what Mann’s hokey stick was until McIntyre and McKitrick began their work), it can be evaluated.

SOURCE

From what I can see, ALL academic fields are clubs of the like-minded that adamantly reject anything that might seriously question the accepted ideas.  To do otherwise would damage too many childish egos -- JR

Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).