What do you think about John Christy after his congressional testimony?

Question

Although he's a "skeptic", John Christy had been a pretty low-key one. He rarely signs on to "skeptic" letters or petitions, he doesn't write media articles (unlike Lindzen), he doesn't have a blog (unlike Spencer), etc. He had seemed to me like a pretty honest guy - wrong, but honest.

But on Tuesday he appeared before a US Congressional committee to give testimony about climate science and whether it supports Republicans' efforts to revoke the EPA's authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. Christy's testimony was a litany of long-debunked "skeptic" myths. He even went as far as to claim that the tropical troposphere 'hot spot' is a signature of the greenhouse effect, when any climate scientist should know it's a result of *any* warming of the Earth's surface. More details here:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/christy-testimony.html

What do you think about John Christy after this congressional testimony?

Answer 1

Christy is in too deep as a skeptic to back down now. That his position is intellectually untenable is irrelevant, but someone has to take over for Lindzen as the lone skeptic with credentials. Christy's problem is that there aren't any credible arguments left for him to use, and he doesn't have the best track record in terms of scientific integrity to begin with, even when it comes to a processing his own data (note 1). Therefore there is no way this testimony is going to help his reputation as a scientist (in the UEA e-mails, there was an exchange where someone (maybe Santer, or Jones, I forget) referred to him as irrational and impossible to engage in constructive dialog). It is funny that skeptics here hold him up as a paragon of scientific truth when everything he has been associated with has been screwed up or shown to be wrong.



So, his testimony didn't change my opinion nor was it much of a surprise. We will see a long line of the same skeptics making claims we've heard before. There are no new skeptic objections, but as the effects of a warming planet are demonstrated and felt, the skeptics will recycle them with evermore firmer conviction. It is *not* happening. It is *not* happening.



Edit: Lindzen is a smoker and not particularly fit, based on his pictures. He's not going to be around that much longer. Same for Singer, Gray, etc.

Answer 2

Without knowing what Dr. Christy said about water vapor, it's hard to know if the deniers could do better. It sounds like Christy conceded a lot of key points. My experience with expert witnesses is that they are extremely unpredictable. You go over their testimony with them several times before trial, and yet when they get on the stand, everything they say is qualified and caveated to the point it all boils down to about nothing. You can go through the transcript line by line, and what they said in lines 1 to 15 is taken back or qualified into a nullity in lines 130 to 145, and what they said in lines 45 to 60 is caveated into nihil in lines 235 to 250. When you're done with the analysis every part of the transcript cancels out some other part and the net residue and remainder is a big fat bowl of zero. They do take up a lot of Court time though, and they enjoy being on the stand, and they like to put a lot of biographical detail into how they got to be so smart and expert. For that reason, panels of scientists are a better source of good science than are Courts. Most judges are science ninnies. So even if they do their very best, it's a little like brain surgery with a wooden spoon. Heisenberg talked about the idea that the event is changed by the process of observing it. So if we put the electron on the witness stand and ask it how it became such a fast electron, it gives and unreliable answer --- well it's the same with expert witnesses.

Answer 3

I dunno. I'm sure he's a nice guy, and all. It's just this sort of thing is bound to happen whenever politics gets involved in science.



Here's how it always seems to play: Some committee wants to hear the pros and cons about whether, say, the theory of gravity is reliable enough to justify spending billions of tax dollars to reinforce highway bridges.



Since it's "only a theory," the politicians feel obliged to call in one mainstream scientist, and one... well, you know. This other guy will point out every flaw in the established theory, not because he's a jerk, but because that's the job the politicians brought him to do. So you'll get N minutes of floor time on the established science of gravity, and an equal N minutes of floor time on the uncertainty of the mass of the universe, the failure to find the mediating particle, the failure to find dark energy, etc.



Finally, the issue will go to a vote, and about half the committee will vote to reinforce the bridges to prevent collapse, and half the committee will vote to use the billions for a tax cut and let dark energy keep the bridges propped up. I guess the moral of the story is that the committee member who casts the tie-breaking vote is determined by OUR votes every other November, so please do remember to vote. :)

Answer 4

Starting out with specific "extreme" events was a great diversion because it is a red herring. He implies that AGW and climate scientists have made specific claims (that they of course have never made) while maintaining his own deniability in making any such assertion.



His interpretation of the Reanalysis Project is just a joke.



>>In other words, there appears to be no supporting evidence over this period that human factors have influenced the major circulation patterns which drive the larger-scale extreme events. Again we point to natural, unforced variability as the dominant feature of events that have transpired in the past 140 years.<<



He has removed the "G" from AGW and redefined it as "AWTMCP" (Anthropogenic Warming of Three Major Circulation Patterns).



And every time he references "new" studies or evidence, he is referring to one of his own references (60% of which he was either author or coauthor).



And in a great example of denier sloppiness, on page 15 he cites "McKitrick et al 2010", even though McKitrick does not appear in his list of References. Given the fact that his report contains only 15 references and 21 call-outs - not to mention that this was for an appearance before a congressional committee - you would think that he would have been more careful. On the other hand, maybe he was just following the Denier tradition of cutting-and-pasting without thinking or letting someone else actually do the work instead of doing it yourself.



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Eric --



To quote Dana: "is English your second language?" And the same , apparently, applies to the lecturer.



First, "hide the decline" is not a "mathematical trick". In fact, there is no math involved. Mann removed the tree-ring data (leaving the actual recorded temperature intact) because of a divergence issue that has been discussed in the scientific literature for over 10 years.



The speaker leaves that out and presents only the tree-ring data with the holier-than-thou claim that is the way HE would have done it. Well, it had been done. Not only did Mr. Science fail to mention that part, but he also failed to mention that Mann's hockey stick paper was not a paper about tree-rings.



The only "trick" being played here is on the audience of that video. It is, absolutely, intellectually dishonest - and it is done intentionally.



It is a cheap, fallacious argument from authority with the speaker using himself (and his position as a physicist) as the authority to convince people he is right. It's disgusting. If you want to see a real example of a scientist behaving unethically - just watch the video again.



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edit -



On second thought, this is what I think.



The only reason that the whole thing is not a joke is because the penalty for being stupid has real-world consequences. The committee members (from both parties) are incapable of having an informed opinion on global warming or anything requiring scientific understanding above the high school level, and Christy’s testimony was that of a political advocate and not as a scientist presenting scientific findings and evidence.



It is just one more step down the road of politics co-opting science. Millions of people already seem unable to tell the difference between scientific understanding and political opinion, and circus stunts like this congressional hearing only further blurs that distinction.



When scientific truth is defined by popular opinion, the result is the Dark Ages. The reason the scientific and industrial revolutions occurred in 19th century instead of the 9th century is because science was controlled by (and, therefore, defined by) the prevailing social/political/religious beliefs of the time. If the Renaissance has not occurred there would still be whacked-off heads rolling down European streets and life expectancy would probably only be half of what it is today.



And that is the penalty for having an uninformed and intellectually lazy public.

Answer 5

Unfortunately, it was a waste of time, money and energy. These "hearings" are not for information, they are just a show, the politicians have already made up their minds concerning most of the topics he covered, Repub's have the majority in the lower house, so there will likely be less money spent on this issue, in my opinion they are just looking for some validation for the position they have already taken. Christy is just another academic espousing his own views before Congress, it is a miracle that the Congres gets anything done with proceeding like this. Like I said, it was a waste.

Answer 6

One would think that Dr. Christy would know better than to use debunked arguments in his testimony before Congress. At the very least, he should have done his homework and checked whether his "expert" opinions were consistent with current data. Denialists love to call for such climatologists as James Hansen and Michael Mann to be charged with fraud. Would these denialists hold John Christy, Roy Spencer, Richard Lindzen, Fred Singer and Tim Ball to the same standards?



Perhaps the producer of the Movie, "The Great Global Warming Swindle," should also be charged with fraud,

http://kingsgreenpad.ca/?p=1527

Answer 7

I think that he was pandering. He was probably trotting out the debunked "skeptic" myths because that what they (the witch-hunters) wanted to hear... In fact, I wouldn't be too surprised to find out that he was provided "assistance" with his testimony and that's why it was a bit out-of-touch. It seems to me that he could have made much better arguments for skepticism than those points.



_

Answer 8

You wrote " Christy's testimony was a litany of long-debunked "skeptic" myths". Yes Dana, we all know what the perverted alarmist tactic. It is a common alarmist tactic to claim that the existence of a refutation makes something "wrong".



But if you want to have an honest discussion of Christy's testimony try to link a discussion to something other than the dishonest skeptical science web site. The fact that skeptical science tries to justify the dishonest "hide the decline" shows their agenda, and how dishonest they are. No Berkeley scientist would try to defend or even publish a paper that contained "Mike's Nature trick", accept for one. (One has to be a regular on this site and watch the video to get the last sentence).



http://anhonestclimatedebate.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/hide-the-decline-explained/

Answer 9

I'd like to hold back my judgment here until this Tamino graphic gets published in a peer-reviewed journal and allows for the adjustment method to be analyzed: http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/adj1yr.jpg



Edit: Sorry Dana, if you wanted a critique of that skepticalscience.com piece you should have just asked for that. Here you go for my five minute coffee table analysis:



Russian heat wave natural causes: http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2011/20110309_russianheatwave.html



Snowstorms natural causes: http://www.climatewatch.noaa.gov/2010/articles/forensic-meteorology-solves-the-mystery-of-record-snows/all/1/



Australia floods natural causes: http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/NASA_Satellites_Capture_A_Stronger_La_Nina_999.html



So you just go ahead writing about extreme weather being caused by global warming. Keep using the word "may" and you should be fine.

Answer 10

Well dana1981 you said it best.



By his testimony, Christy did no service to his country.

Answer 11

Brilliant! John Christy is brilliant! Global warming is a non-falsifiable hypothesis, and climate change is a weak leg on which to stand to justify crippling the world in energy production. Carbon dioxide is vital, and its effect is only proportional to its volume (very small indeed). Global warming believers are funny.

Answer 12

I think you need to refresh yourself on what Christy was referring to. As you usual, you are misinformed.



From page 14 Christy's report in your link

<<>



<<
global upper atmosphere is also depicted in models to warm at a rate faster than the surface. Again, we did not find this to be true in observations>>



I think Christy's testimony is devastating to alarmists causes but it will no doubt be ignored as are all inconvenient facts. I do have to give you credit for at least linking to his report. I hate it when all we get are filtered interpretations of what others say.

Answer 13

I propose an official National Landmark Rogues Gallery. It could have more than one location. One spot might be in Glacier National Park with photos of the receding glacier (Grinnell?) position taken as each new lying "traitor" (Paul Krugman's word) is added to the gallery, and posted alongside. A second location might be a sandbar in the New Orleans delta. with each successively added traitor being given a slightly higher water level mark on a "submerged but not forgotten wall of shame."



Edit: I see from Wikipedia that Christy has a PhD in atmospheric sciences from U-Illinois, and was a co-author of the 3rd IPCC report. In other words, I was unfamiliar with his work and position (and I have still to look at your link) but clearly, he is a credentialled scientist who could have HAD a claim to being a skeptic rather than a denier. This reminds me of the most famous Holocaust denier, David Irving, who was widely recognized as a skilled and convincing (if quite unconventional) historian of World War II early in his career, but later moved to the "dark side" with anti-Semitic rants, etc., his scholarship then went downhill as well, and he ended up being essentially blasted as a fraud in a huge court case in front of the world press (he tried to sue another scholar for libel and lost, big time).