Walport Shows His Ignorance
By Paul Homewood
h/t Bishop Hill
Mark Walport, the government’s chief scientist and expert in immunology, has been submitting evidence to the Energy & Climate Change Select Committee. Asked about Matt Ridley’s view, (backed up by Richard Tol’s analysis), that global warming would bring net benefits over the next 40-50 years, he replied:
I understand the point [Ridley] is trying to make but I think he’s completely wrong unfortunately. While there might be trivial benefits in some parts of the world for some of the time the long term direction for all of us is a negative direction. And frankly I think he is…he described himself as a "rational optimist". I’m not sure about the rational bit.
He has obviously forgotten what proper scientists were saying during the 1970’s, after three decades of cooling.
Scientists like Walter Orr Roberts, atmospheric physicist and first director of NCAR, the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado.
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Magazines/Bulletin/Bull165/16505796265.pdf
Walport may be an excellent immunologist, but what the hell makes him think he knows better than the likes of Roberts, Lamb, Flohn or Bryson?
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
The price of grain doubling or tripling in two years, 1972 to 1974, had more to do with monetary policy than weather. We had aggressive world-wide inflation at that time and it effected the price of all commodities. The Peruvian Anchovy catch failed probably because of an El Nino. (and the author does say, it might not be climate change) Not only do we have an example here of cold-climate change prognostication, but also an example of over-hyped climate change.
It was the Russians …………
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_grain_robbery
http://marketswiki.com/mwiki/Russian_wheat_deal
There is also a fruit fly expert who has been converted to an expert climate know it all.
One guess only.
Hardly an expert. Suzuki hasn’t done a lick of research since he escaped from grad school into broadcasting. Lo, these many decades ago …
To be honest they did not say they were to be rational or scientific – after all this is the Energy & Climate Change Select Committee they are giving opinion too.
You can’t expect too much from those reduced to mere government fuctionaries.
Do you think Ridley or Walport really know anything about the probable effects of climate change on the world economy in 40 years time?
Do you know how those projections of the effects of climate change were made? Did they involve models by any chance? Do you think economic models have a solid reputation for their predictive power?
And what sort of prediction can the models make? Do they know how climate change will effect weather patterns over the next 40 years? If I offered you a GCM that made some predictions for levels of drought, storms, rainfall, etc would you believe those predictions? Why believe these economic models?
I am glad you accept Walport does not know what he is talking about then.
The idea that warmer is all bad, and colder all good is simply naive nonsense. There will of course be a balancing of both, and as you say we can only crudely estimate it.
BTW – Matt Ridley has now emailed Walport, asking him why he is wrong. We’ll have to see what he has to say.
“I am glad you accept Walport does not know what he is talking about then.”
So do you accept that Ridley knows equally little?
As usual you are getting away from the topic, so let’s recap:
1) Walport says that the work of 14 separate studies is “completely wrong”, without providing any reasons why, or evidence of his own .(NOTE – this is not Ridley’s work, which you seem to wrongly assume, or even Tol’s, who has simply pulled them together).
2) Now of course they MAY be wrong, but surely a Chief Scientist has a duty to say why they are. Instead he simply namecalls.
3) Instead Walport maintains that the long term direction (of warming) for all of us is a negative direction, without providing his own evidence.
4) Meanwhile, climate scientists in the 1970’s established that a cooling world had very real drawbacks. This was based on actual events, not theoretical models.
Ridley himself points out
“There are many likely effects of climate change: positive and negative, economic and ecological, humanitarian and financial. And if you aggregate them all, the overall effect is positive today — and likely to stay positive until around 2080”.
This seems quite a reasonable and practical position to take, especially given the events of the 1970’s.It’s a pity Walport does not have the same open mind.
This is deja vu in more ways than one!!
I was taking A level sciences in the early 1970s and well remember a ‘new ice age’ being widely predicted in publications such as New Scientist and The Ecologist.
As to government chief scientists exceeding their expertise, cast your minds back to 2001 when a certain surface chemist, aided and abetted by an ornithologist, decided that they knew better than all the vets in the kingdom. Their interference resulted in probably the largest animal health debacle the world has ever seen. The saddest part is that, despite factual analysis to the contrary, they still believe that they saved the day.
Reblogged this on CraigM350.