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Search for Craig Idso

Comments matching the search Craig Idso:

How big is the “carbon fertilization effect”?

Bob Loblaw at 11:11 AM on 14 July, 2023

Philippe @ 29:

Yes, SB Idso would be that Sherwood Idso. He has been getting things wrong about CO2 and climate change for something like 40 years, since his early claims that surface temperature was not sensitive to CO2 concentration. He made those claims on the basis of "natural" experiments comparing surface temperature variation to surface changes in incoming IR radiation.

His mistake there was to not recognize that the important IR changes are the ones for outgoing IR radiation at the top of the troposphere (earth energy balance), not the surface ones (surface energy balance). It's such a shame, as he was a very good microclimatologist in his early years. He moved big time into the CO2 is fertilizer realm many years ago.

He's listed at Desmog:

Sherwood B Idso

and has turned his denial into a family business, including his sons.

Craig Idso

Keith Idso

Desmog also has a page on the family business:

https://www.desmog.com/center-study-carbon-dioxide-and-global-change/

I am not at all surprised that Dave Burton would find them a useful source of "information".

Just how ‘Sapiens’ in the world of high CO2 concentrations?

Cedders at 00:54 AM on 7 December, 2018

Craig Idso and others of that ilk have been commenting on a study by Rodeheffer et al (2018), who fail to replicate the effect on the same measure of cognitive ability. However, they are using a different population, and I think shorter exposure. Maybe submariners have become habituated to high carbon dioxide levels, or maybe the sample size is too small. The lack of reported effect on comfort might suggest some acclimatisation.

Allen et al (2015) (free full text) is strongly supportive of the cognitive effect. There's also a new review by Kenichi Azuma et al (2018): 'Effects on cognitive performance begin at 1000 ppm during short-term exposure', but other physiological variables at 500ppm.

Our brains and circulatory systems did indeed evolve in a high-O₂, lower CO₂ world, so this seems plausible, but needs more research. When contrarians ask about the direct human health effects, it is usually a distraction from what is healthy for the climate and biosphere.

Rodeheffer CD, Chabal S, Clarke JM, Fothergill DM. Acute exposure to low-to-moderate carbon dioxide levels and submariner decision making. Aerosp Med Hum Perform. 2018; 89(6):520–525

Why the Republican Party's climate policy obstruction is indefensible

Tom Curtis at 12:07 PM on 7 July, 2017

supak @14, nigelj @20, Wallace may be an obscure engineer, but D'Aleo is a meteorologist, and Idso is a climatologist. Both, however, are well known deniers, and Idso has earned a reputation for, for want of a better word, dishonesty when it comes to climate science. Idso does not appear to have any peer reviewed climate research since the early 2000s, but has been very productive of misleading denier "reports".

I have not gone right through the report but evidence in the early sections suggests this is just another in that sequence. In particular, they show a graph of various versions of the GISS temperature trends (Figure IV-1), the differences between which they attribute to "adjustments". The graph plots versions for 1980, 1987, 2007, 2010 and 2015. Wallace et al, however, feel no need to inform readers that the number of meteorological stations used increased from 1000 to 2200 between 1981 the 1980 (actually 1981) and 1987 versions, or that it increased to 7200 for the 1999 version. Nor do they feel any need to inform their readers that prior to 1995, no Sea Surface Temperature data was used, so that the data was for meteorological stations only. The very substantial changes in the temperature series between "1980" and 1987, and between 1987 and 2007 are probably influenced by these large increases in available data. Attributing the effect to "adjustments" without taking into account the change in available data is straightforwardly dishonest IMO.

Hardly any better is the "proof" that the "adjustments" eliminate a large "cyclical" component by comparison of global temperature data to US and North Atlantic temperature data. What is not noted is that the current versions of temperature data, even with all the adjustments, retain that large "cyclical" element in those areas. This can be seen clearly here, for example. (I should note that adjustments have increased the trend of the temperature data for the contiguous US, but has not eliminated the "cyclical" pattern. As a further note, I put "cyclical" in inverted commas because it is unclear to what extent the pattern is due to cyclical patterns in the climate, and to what extent it is due to changes in the aerosol forcing over time.)

Just who are these 300 'scientists' telling Trump to burn the climate?

Nick Palmer at 00:31 AM on 2 March, 2017

I thought I'd see how many of the usual suspects were in it. Interestingly, I didn't find Christy or Peiser in there...

ABDUSSAMATOV, Habibullo Ismailovich
ANDERSON, Charles R
BALL, Tim
BARTLETT, David
BASTARDI, Joseph
BELL, Larry S
BOEHMER-CHRISTIANSEN, Sonja A
BRIGGS William M.
D'ALEO, Joseph S.
DOUGLASS JR.
DYSON, Freeman
EASTERBROOK, Donald J.
EVANS, David M. W.
HAPPER, William
HUMLUM, Ole
IDSO, Craig
LEGATES, David R.
LINDZEN, Richard
MANUEL, Oliver K.
MISKOLCZI, Ferenc Mark
MOCKTON, Christopher
MOORE, Patrick
MORNER, Nils-Axel
MOTL, Lubos
SCHMITT, Harrison H.
SINGER, Fred S.
SOON, Willie
SPENCER, Roy W.
WHITEHEAD, David

How we discovered the 97% scientific consensus on man-made global warming

Tom Curtis at 13:23 PM on 4 February, 2015

Stranger @20, searching The Consensus Project database, I find just two papers with Willi Soon as a coauthor. The first, on polar bears, was rated neutral because it does not include any discussion in the abstract germain to the attribution of recent global warming. The abstract of the second reads as follows:

"The authors investigate how the global monsoon (GM) precipitation responds to the external and anthropogenic forcing in the last millennium by analyzing a pair of control and forced millennium simulations with the ECHAM and the global Hamburg Ocean Primitive Equation (ECHO-G) coupled ocean–atmosphere model. The forced run, which includes the solar, volcanic, and greenhouse gas forcing, captures the major modes of precipitation climatology comparably well when contrasted with those captured by the NCEP reanalysis. The strength of the modeled GM precipitation in the forced run exhibits a significant quasi-bicentennial oscillation. Over the past 1000 yr, the simulated GM precipitation was weak during the Little Ice Age (1450–1850) with the three weakest periods occurring around 1460, 1685, and 1800, which fell in, respectively, the Spörer Minimum, Maunder Minimum, and Dalton Minimum periods of solar activity. Conversely, strong GM was simulated during the model Medieval Warm Period (ca. 1030–1240). Before the industrial period, the natural variations in the total amount of effective solar radiative forcing reinforce the thermal contrasts both between the ocean and continent and between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres resulting in the millennium-scale variation and the quasi-bicentennial oscillation in the GM index. The prominent upward trend in the GM precipitation occurring in the last century and the notable strengthening of the global monsoon in the last 30 yr (1961–90) appear unprecedented and are due possibly in part to the increase of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, though the authors’ simulations of the effects from recent warming may be overestimated without considering the negative feedbacks from aerosols. The simulated change of GM in the last 30 yr has a spatial pattern that differs from that during the Medieval Warm Period, suggesting that global warming that arises from the increases of greenhouse gases and the input solar forcing may have different effects on the characteristics of GM precipitation. It is further noted that GM strength has good relational coherence with the temperature difference between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, and that on centennial time scales the GM strength responds more directly"

The first thing you will notice is that it says nothing to dismiss the attribution of at least 50% of recent global warming to anthropogenic factors. On the contrary, it several times mentions CO2 forcing (an anthropogenic factor) as a relevant forcing, and as a cause of recent warming. Specifically, it is stated:

"The simulated change of GM in the last 30 yr has a spatial pattern that differs from that during the Medieval Warm Period, suggesting that global warming that arises from the increases of greenhouse gases and the input solar forcing may have different effects on the characteristics of GM precipitation"

Given reasonable background information about the relative strengths of anthropogenic and solar forcing, that represents an implicit endorsement that >50% of recent warming was anthropogenic. However, we don't need to dig that far in. The paper uses climate models which are known, given historical forcings, to show humans as responsible >50% of recent warming. Absent an explicit disclaimer indicating that the authors are not using standard historical forcings, that again respresents an implicit endorsement. The paper was in fact rated as Explicitly endorsing but not quantifying, ie, a 2, and that is arguably a mistake. (I would rate it as 3, implicitly endorsing.) It is, however, a mistake that makes zero difference to the headline result of Cook et al.

Now it is possible that Soon and his coauthors did clearly indicate the use of radically a-historical forcings in the depths of the paper. The raters did not get to see the depths of the paper, however. They rated on the abstract and therefore a rating justified by the abstract, though contradicted within the paper merely shows that abstracts often poorly communicate the contents of papers, not that the raters made a mistake. Further, raters clearly rated abstracts, not authors. If Willi Soon is really saying that he (rather than an abstract of one of his papers) was rated as endorsing the consensus, then he either completely misunderstands the study he is criticizing (nothing new there) or completely misrepresents it.

Turning to Craig Idso, he also has to papers rated, one of which was rated as neutral. The second, which was rated as implicitly endorsing the consensus, had the following abstract:

"Since the early 1960s, the declining phase of the atmosphere’s seasonal CO2 cycle has advanced by approximately 7 days in northern temperate latitudes, possibly as a result of increasing temperatures that may be advancing the time of occurrence of what may be called ‘climatological spring.’ However, just as several different phenomena are thought to have been responsible for the concomitant increase in the amplitude of the atmosphere’s seasonal CO2 oscillation, so too may other factors have played a role in bringing about the increasingly earlier spring drawdown of CO2 that has resulted in the advancement of the declining phase of the air’s CO2 cycle. One of these factors may be the ongoing rise in the CO2 content of the air itself; for the aerial fertilization effect of this phenomenon may be significantly enhancing the growth of each new season’s initial flush of vegetation, which would tend to stimulate the early drawdown of atmospheric CO2 and thereby advance the time of occurrence of what could be called ‘biological spring.’ Working with sour orange (Citrus aurantium L.) trees that have been growing out-of-doors in open-top chambers for over 10 years in air of either 400 or 700 ppm CO2, this hypothesis was investigated by periodically measuring the lengths, dry weights and leaf chlorophyll concentrations of new branches that emerged from the trees at the start of the 1998 growing season. The data demonstrate that the hypothesis is viable, and that it might possibly account for 2 of the 7 days by which the spring drawdown of the air’s CO2 concentration has advanced over the past few decades."

Cutting to the chase, the authors are suggesting an alternative explanation to the fact that spring is coming earlier than it did in the past. The standard explanation is that it is warmer earlier. Craig Idso's alternative explanation in terms of the CO2 fertilization effect is found to be a viable hypothesis, that "... might possibly account for 2 of the 7 days by which the spring drawdown of the air’s CO2 concentration has advanced over the past few decades." The might, possibly indicates not only uncertainty, but the upper range of the potential effect. That is, it might account for 28.6% of the botanical effect of an early spring (and zero of the effect on animals). That leaves around 70% still attributable to the traditional explanation, ie, the increased warmth.

To my mind, that is not enough to rate the paper as implicitly endorsing the consensus; though only because the consensus is implicitly defined as relating to attribution on which the abstract says nothing. Therefore this is a case of an abstract that was rated (3), but should have been rated, IMO, (4).

Note again that the ratings are not rating authors, and not rating papers. However, Cook et al did include a rating of papers by the authors. Comparison between it and the abstract ratings showed that by far the most common "error" was rating papers that endorsed the consensus as not endorsing the consensus. Again, if Craig Idso understood Cook et al, he would know that to be the case. He would know that pointing out one or two potential errors without pointing to the overall error statistics as shown be comparison of the abstract and author self ratings is a blatant cherry pick. Indeed, that is probably why he claims the error, but does not draw attention to the results of the author self ratings.

How we discovered the 97% scientific consensus on man-made global warming

KR at 13:01 PM on 4 February, 2015

Stranger: If you look at the rated abstracts, and search on "Soon" and "Idso", you will see that of the sampled abstracts Soon's (2 abstracts) were rated 3 (implicit endorsement) and 4 (neutral) respectively, while Craig Idso's abstracts (I found 2) also were rated 3 and 4.

This was a sampling protocol - not an exhaustive search of every paper published - but of the particular Soon and Idso fish/papers in the net the rankings were neutral or higher in endorsement of AGW.

How we discovered the 97% scientific consensus on man-made global warming

Stranger at 11:21 AM on 4 February, 2015

I’ve been having an exchange over the Cook et al paper and would like some information concerning Willie Soon and also Craig D. Idso’s claim that they were mischaracterized in the survey as being neutral instead of showing that they were in opposition. I’ve looked for a response to the claim but I’ve been unable to find it. Can someone steer me to an explanation?

There is no consensus

MA Rodger at 19:49 PM on 8 January, 2015

The Forbes story amhartley asked about @650 is rather strong in its assertions. It asserts that Cook et al (2013) involves "egregious misconduct" and was "a deliberate misrepresentation designed to intimidate the public." These claims are backed up by a mis-description of the Cook et al method and the comments of some well-known scientists - Richard Tol, Craig Idso, Nicola Scafetta and Dr. Nir Shaviv, this last one being a not-so-well-known climate change denier compared with the other three.

Brandis confuses right to be heard with right to be taken seriously

Composer99 at 22:47 PM on 7 May, 2014

Warren, you state:

we know "about 0.75c per century" is not [alarming].

To paraphrase Dikran, whether some phenomenon is alarming or not is a question of the observer's attitude towards the phenomenon. After all, melting ice, changing weather patterns, and rapid ocean acidification don't have emotions.

You can be as alarmed or not, as you wish. What you can't do, if you want to be taken seriously (at least around here), is argue your case on the basis of misleading evidence (e.g. the material from Joanne Nova and Craig Idso), cherry picking (e.g. "ice-free Arctic in 2013" when the correct estimate is 2016 ± 3 years), and outright false claims (e.g. your comments about the "Hockey Stick", which others have noted has been substantiated over and over in the literature). If you persist in doing so you aren't likely to get any more polite reception than you are now.

Personally speaking, if you don't find an unprecedented temperature change, in geological terms, alarming (or at least potentially alarming), that's your lookout. Frankly it seems that you don't have the slightest grasp just how rapid and significant a 0.7-0.8°C change in global mean temperature over a single century is.

Regarding your (again, apparently reflexive) dismissal of 9+ metre sea level rise: the simple fact of the matter is that 9+ metre sea level rise would become inevitable, given sufficient unabated warming. It would take a few centuries to happen (even worst case scenarios for 2100 call for no more than 2 metres of sea level rise IIRC), but it would be inevitable (because, surprise surprise, ice tends to melt as temperatures rise, and there is a lot of ice locked up in the Greenland & Antarctic land ice sheets).

Brandis confuses right to be heard with right to be taken seriously

Glenn Tamblyn at 18:34 PM on 7 May, 2014

Warren. Your first link (GISP) tells us about Greenland. The MWP (if there was such a thing) doesn't appear to have been global in nature. Certainly not if it was 500 years apart in different parts of the planet. Whereas warming today is global. And by not showing the instrumental record for Greenland in conjunction with the ice core data that removes the context wrt current temperature changes.Picture what that graph looks like if, at the far right the line climbs to current temps in Greenland. That would put it up at around the 'minoan' level, a much larger change than any of the other spikes given that we should be in a long term downward trend as the curved trend line on the graph suggests. Incomplete information can be very misleading Warren.

Your second link was about evidence for differing proportions of different plant types in the Great Plains in the transition out of the last Glacial involving lots of factors. And if you read Nordt et al they show graphs from studies by others that differ significantlyfrom their work. So what was the point of the second link.

And what excatly is Craig Idso's manipulation of the graph from Otto et al telling you about the reliability of your sources?

And your links were all to the same source - Jo Nova. And she sourced 2 of them from Craig Idso. And Idso manipulated both the images he supplied.

You need to find better sources of information Warren.

Brandis confuses right to be heard with right to be taken seriously

Glenn Tamblyn at 17:54 PM on 7 May, 2014

Warren

Regarding your 2nd link, this is a small excerpt from a paper Nordt et al here. Quite a technical paper about variations in the proportion of C3 & C4 plant in the US Great Plains over the last 12 kyr+

Here is the conclusion from the paper:

"Conclusions

The delta 13C and delta %C4 from organic carbon of buried soils within the mixed and shortgrass prairie of the North American Great Plains permits a regional analysis of C4 grassland dynamics for the past 12ka. The delta 13C data compiled from a literature review of buried soils reveal that C4warm season grasses were present throughout the Great Plains study area during the past 12ka, but that there were appreciable fluctuations with 0.6 and 1.8ka periodicities. The crossover latitude of equal relative production of C4 and C3 plants appears to have been several degrees to the south of the modern location of 46 deg N prior to 6.7ka, with a shift to near the modern position after 6.7ka.

Relative C4 production did not increase monotonically in response to orbitally forced insolation between 12 ad 6.7ka, apparently because of a negative feedback from the presence of the LIS, glacial lakes in the northern plains, and cool glacial meltwater pulses into the Gulf of Mexico and North Atlantic. Thereafter, fluctuations in solar irradiance provided a more direct influence on delta %C4 as outflow of warm subtropical air from the Gulf of Mexico became established, interrupted periodically by warm, dry westerly flow contributing to episodes of drought. Here, increased delta %C4 occurred during intervals of elevated solar irradiance and with shifts in the ITCZ into the northwest Gulf of Mexico in the absence of ice-rafting events in the North Atlantic.

The coherency in our buried soil record with pollen spectra, marine cores, and ice cores, demonstrate the reliability of C4 plant dynamics not only as a proxy for grassland evolution but for climate as well. More work is needed to better understand grass dynamics in the early Holocene in response to conflicting reports of whether conditions were warmer or cooler than present. The paradox in the middle and late Holocene is that positive delta %C4 anomalies correspond with periods of dune activation. More work is needed to understand why during drought conditions C4 plants flourished. No doubt, C4 plants were responding positively to elevated temperatures as they should, but either these grasses thrive during drought or were growing between drought events during periods of landscape stability.

Hopefully our work will spawn further investigations into grassland dynamics of the past, provide additional parameters for climate and biome modeling, and create a better understand C and N dynamics in a region that is poorly understood"

So what exactly is the relevance and more importantly significance of your 2nd link?

Then there is this graph from Nordt et al. Seemingly one of the graphs that your graph was based on.

Whereas your looks like this:

Sort of a bit different isn't it when you leave half the data off. Because the Nordt paper was looking at some quite complex local climatic issues as the Laurentide Ice sheet melted and so on. Again not exactly global.

So who produced this truncated graph that could o easily mislead people? Well lets quote Jo Nova "Thanks to the Craig Idso at CO2Science for compiling so many of these on his site.". Interesting concept don't you think. Truncating graphs and cherry-picking is 'compiling'?

As to your third graph and some more from Craig Idso, try reading this. Note particularly the section labelled CO2 Non-Science on how CO2Science misrepresents Oppo el al (2009).

Here is your graph as shown in Otto et al (b)

Notice the '1997-2007 mean annual SST' line that Craig Idso at CO2Science 'compiled' away in your version and replaced with another line that is not on the original, is not identified, and might suggest well sumfink or uver.

Finally Warren. If you wish to discuss science here with people that's great. But please make them your opinions or the published science itself. Not a blogger said that another blogger said that ... well you get the picture.

Just doing a copy and paste from an old Jo Nova blog doesn't really count as making your own argument does it? Its sort of insulting to everyone here.

Lessons from Past Climate Predictions: J.S. Sawyer in 1972

Rob Honeycutt at 01:57 AM on 27 March, 2014

adrian smits @5... Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe you must be referring to this web page here. The full quote that you post is also found there.

What you would find if you pushed just a little further are a few interesting elements to this story. First, the graph presented on that page do not come from the paper that is being quoted. The paper doesn't specifically compare N. Sweden temperature to N. Hemisphere temps. They've pulled a trick on you by adjusting the two Y-axis scales to fit the message they want to deliver to you. Note the left axis applies to Korallgrotten series of oxygen isotope readings and the left side applies to NH temperature.

The graph originates from this website called CO2 Science, which is funded by the the fossil fuel industry and run by Dr Craig Idso. The CO2 Science site has gone through and reinterpreted peer reviewed research, added their own made up graphs, that generally do not agree with the actual findings of the actual research. And if you don't believe me, just pick one paper on their site, email the lead author and ask them if they agree with CO2 Science's interpretation. I've done this and in each case the scientists do not agree with the re-interpretations of their research.

The actual paper this is derived from is: Sundqvist et al 2010. Stable isotopes in a stalagmite from NW Sweden document environmental changes over the past 4000 years.

This research is limited to speliotherm data for Northern Sweden.

How we discovered the 97% scientific consensus on man-made global warming

barry at 16:25 PM on 23 November, 2013

Question:

Of the scientists that were surveyed to rate their own papers, did you include Alan Carlin, Craig D. Idso, Nicola Scafetta, Nils-Axel Morner, Nir J. Shaviv, Richard S.J. Tol, and Wei-Hock "Willie" Soon?

I ask because Anthony Watts, referring to a PopTech article regarding those scientists' comments on the paper, says that they were not contacted. But the scientists themselves say nothing about that.

Do you have a list of the scientists you attempted to contact, perhaps in supplementary material?

Any leads appreciated.

Barry.

US school infiltration attempt by Heartland’s IPCC Parody

MA Rodger at 20:50 PM on 31 October, 2013

Re climate feedbacks @9 & 10.

The NIPCC analysis of cloud feedbacks would indeed be laughable if they actually were talking of feedbacks. Actually it is far worse than that.

The finding I quoted @4 is based within their Chapter 2 Forcings & Feedbacks , a 98 page treatment by Craig Idso & Tim Ball with contributions from Tom Segalstad. These gentlemen then must be the NIPCC experts on forcings & feedbacks. The quote @4 appears in Section 2.4 Clouds but it is very obvious from reading section 2.4.1 that these "experts" do not know the difference between "forcing" and "feedback" which is a trifle embarrasing, even for Numpy Idiots Professing Climatological Credentials.

I think I will enjoy reading the rest of Chapter 2. I will learn why, for instance, these numpties source their paleoclimate reconstruction from an archaeologist and not from the original climatologist (Alley 2004) or perhaps a more recent piece of work.

CO2 effect is saturated

Rob Honeycutt at 14:58 PM on 18 June, 2013

Craig Idso is paid over $11k/month. (Just wanted to source the claim above.)

We're heading into an ice age

Kevin at 02:48 AM on 16 February, 2013

Here is a source for wine in UK CfA Press Release
Release No.: 03-10
For Release: March 31, 2003 20th Century Climate Not So Hot

Cambridge, MA - A review of more than 200 climate studies led by researchers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics has determined that the 20th century is neither the warmest century nor the century with the most extreme weather of the past 1000 years. The review also confirmed that the Medieval Warm Period of 800 to 1300 A.D. and the Little Ice Age of 1300 to 1900 A.D. were worldwide phenomena not limited to the European and North American continents. While 20th century temperatures are much higher than in the Little Ice Age period, many parts of the world show the medieval warmth to be greater than that of the 20th century.

Smithsonian astronomers Willie Soon and Sallie Baliunas, with co-authors Craig Idso and Sherwood Idso (Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change) and David Legates (Center for Climatic Research, University of Delaware), compiled and examined results from more than 240 research papers published by thousands of researchers over the past four decades. Their report, covering a multitude of geophysical and biological climate indicators, provides a detailed look at climate changes that occurred in different regions around the world over the last 1000 years.

"Many true research advances in reconstructing ancient climates have occurred over the past two decades," Soon says, "so we felt it was time to pull together a large sample of recent studies from the last 5-10 years and look for patterns of variability and change. In fact, clear patterns did emerge showing that regions worldwide experienced the highs of the Medieval Warm Period and lows of the Little Ice Age, and that 20th century temperatures are generally cooler than during the medieval warmth."

Soon and his colleagues concluded that the 20th century is neither the warmest century over the last 1000 years, nor is it the most extreme. Their findings about the pattern of historical climate variations will help make computer climate models simulate both natural and man-made changes more accurately, and lead to better climate forecasts especially on local and regional levels. This is especially true in simulations on timescales ranging from several decades to a century.

For more information, contact:

David Aguilar, Director of Public Affairs
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Phone: 617-495-7462 Fax: 617-495-7468
daguilar@cfa.harvard.edu

Christine Lafon
Public Affairs Specialist
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Phone: 617-495-7463, Fax: 617-495-7016
clafon@cfa.harvard.edu

2012 SkS Weekly Digest #10

DSL at 02:59 AM on 14 March, 2012

Actually, Trent1492, that's a link to an analysis from a couple of paid misinformers: Craig Idso and Keith Sherwood. Perhaps you could provide your own analysis of the Eldrett et al. 2007 article that I'm betting Idso and Sherwood grossly misread.

DenialGate - Infographic Illustrating the Heartland Denial Funding Machine

Tom Curtis at 22:04 PM on 19 February, 2012

Michael of Brisbane @28, there are several crucial differences between the money received by climate scientists and that received from the Heartland Institute.

The first, and most crucial is that money paid to scientists is paid based on the quality of their research, not on the basis of the conclusion reached. So called climate skeptics will dispute that, but there is no question that it is formally correct; and no question also that some well known so called skeptics continue in the university sector in publicly paid positions with no financial penalty despite rejecting the consensus on climate change for over a decade. (Spencer and Christy come to mind, but there are others).

In contrast, payment from the Heartland Institute is definitely conditional on the recipients hold particular opinions. I do not know if that is a formal requirement, but how long do you think Craig Idso would continue receiving his $139,000 a year if he started publicly arguing that the evidence supported the IPCC consensus, and that the IPCC AR4 was a sound document, with few and inconsequential errors?

Because payment form the Heartland Institute is conditional on opinions held, it represents a conflict of interest for any scientist investigating climate change, and any person speaking out on the topic. This does not mean that those receiving payments are wrong (although we know they are wrong on other grounds), but because it is a conflict of interest it should have been publicly declared by those people long before now. Not declaring a known conflict of interest is an ethical breach.

Second, contrary to your supposition, many of the activities of scientists are unpaid, including any participation in the IPCC, and of course in internet forums. While Anthony Watt can build his site with 44-88 k donations from the Heartland Institute, John Cook (for example) must do so with his own money, and that from a few small donations from friends. I understand that RealClimate does receive free web hosting, but that is the limit of funding. As they say:

"The contributors to this site do so in a personal capacity during their spare time and their posts do not represent the views of the organizations for which they work, nor the agencies which fund them. The contributors are solely responsible for the content of the site and receive no remuneration for their contributions.

RealClimate is not affiliated with any environmental organisations. Although our domain is hosted by Science Communications Network (and previously Environmental Media Services), and our initial press release was organised for us by Fenton Communications, neither organization was in any way involved in the initial planning for RealClimate, and have never had any editorial or other control over content. Neither Fenton nor SCN nor EMS has ever paid any contributor to RealClimate.org any money for any purpose at any time. Neither do they pay us expenses, buy our lunch or contract us to do research. This information has always been made clear to anyone who asked."

(My emphasis)

I am sure there are climate scientists who would love to be paid $119,000 a year to work full time in science communication as Craig Idso is paid to work full time on pseudo-science communication, but the money is not forthcoming for that purpose.

Further, unlike payments from the Heartland Institute, payments to scientists are largely used up in research costs and administrative costs for universities (which always take a large chunk). Not having been employed as a scientist, I cannot speak from experience, but my understanding is that scientists typically get paid significantly less than Craig Idso is being paid, and for positions which are very demanding in terms of time and stress. This is not a significant factor for most of the anti-scientists paid by the Heartland Institute. Most of their "research" consists of cherry picking librarianship, with their research costs being restricted to the costs of journal subscriptions (where they do not already have such subscriptions through university affiliation.

Finally, assuming that the Heartland Institute payments are the limits of payments to the various scientists received for their opinions held. There are many conservative "think tanks" which attack AGW, and most of the scientists involved are affiliated with more than one of them. The assumption that they only receive money form one of the poorest and smallest of those organizations is unwarranted.

Denialgate - Internal Heartland Documents Expose Climate Denial Funding Network

Glenn Tamblyn at 14:46 PM on 15 February, 2012

I just tried posting a couple of comments over at WUWT, wondering what theur response might be to DenialGate. Instead of the usual awaiting moderation message nothing appeared at all. So I thought something had gone wrong and resubmitted the comments. And got a 'you have already posted that comment' reply. So they have them but they aren't coming up. Very queer. I wonder if they have gone into lock-down.

Anyway, these were the comments I posted to no avail - maybe Anthony might get around to responding when he is a little less busy:

===============================================================
Since you don't have a post up yet about Denialgate, I will comment here and you can then transfer comments across when WUWT does comment.

One important comment that struck me from Heartlands little treasure trove was this this juicy little gem:

“Development of our “Global Warming Curriculum for K-12 Classrooms” project.

Principals and teachers are heavily biased toward the alarmist perspective. To counter this we are considering launching an effort to develop alternative materials for K-12 classrooms. We are pursuing a proposal from Dr. David Wojick to produce a global warming curriculum for K-12 schools. Dr. Wojick is a consultant with the Office of Scientific and Technical Information at the U.S. Department of Energy in the area of information and communication science. His effort will focus on providing curriculum that shows that the topic of climate change is controversial and uncertain- TWO KEY POINTS THAT ARE EFFECTIVE AT DISSUADING TEACHERS FROM TEACHING SCIENCE (my emphasis).We tentatively plan to pay Dr. Wojick $100,000 for 20 modules in 2012, with funding pledged by the Anonymous Donor.

Cant have teachers teaching now can we.
And pay a lot of attention to the ‘Anonymous Donor’ We will no doubt hear more about them, whoever they are. And generous to a fault:

2006 – $1,559,703
2007 – $3,277,000
2008 – $4,610,000
2009 – $2,170,590
2010 – $1,664,150
2011 – $979,000

Nearly 15 Million ponied up so far to fund the denial machine in just one ‘dont think tank’. Wouldn’t we love to see similar accounts from all the other dont think tanks.

In the best of American traditions. You can always get what you want if you are willing to pay enough for it. And so the dumbing down of America continues….
===============================================================
Anthony, when will the new Temperature website be up and running? I'm sure Heartland and their Anonymous Donor would like to know their $88K is being well spent.

And nearly $400K for the NIPCC Report. A bit pricy don't you think when the scientists who work on the IPCC report do it Pro Bono.

Still $144K for Craig Idso, $60K for Fred Singer, even $20K for Bob Carter down in Australia. One only needs a few nice gigs like that and you have yourself a 'nice little earner' as they say.
=============================================================

Denialgate - Internal Heartland Documents Expose Climate Denial Funding Network

dana1981 at 11:29 AM on 15 February, 2012

Stunner #1 - Craig Idso makes a six figure salary from Heartland. Stunning in the large sum of money, and the fact that he's really not that prominent. I don't think Heartland is getting their money's worth on that one!

Monckton at odds with the very scientists he cites

Svatli at 20:22 PM on 14 July, 2011

John:
Thanks for the good work of debunking Christopher Monckton, a necessary job.

I would also like to refer to a good debunking of the CO2Science medieval project by Hoskibui here on SkS, Medieval project gone wrong. Dr. Craig Idso's website doesn't seem to check the sources either and his website is filled with flaw work and misrepresentations.

Medieval project gone wrong

Same Ordinary Fool at 06:52 AM on 30 April, 2011

Soon & Baliunas(2003) used these deceptions, and one more. They compared MWP temperatures to the average temperature for the 20th century, rather than recent temperatures.

Craig Idso and Sherwood Idso (of the CO2 Science website) were co-authors when Soon and Baliunas published (three months later) a longer version of this paper in E&E.

See Wikipedia: Soon and Baliunas controversy

Hockey Stick Own Goal

MichaelM at 09:20 AM on 23 February, 2011

"In their Prudent Path document, Craig and Sherwood Idso argue ..."

Hockey Stick Own Goal

DSL at 09:20 AM on 23 February, 2011

Paul, search for Craig Idso.

Medieval Warm Period was warmer

stefaan at 07:27 AM on 14 December, 2010

Besides, its probably a bit off topic, but you have a look at this co2science organisation :
chairman : craig d. Idso
president : sherwood b. Idso
vice-president : Keith e Idso
a nice family business :)

Skeptical Logic Can't Save Greenland Ice - for that you need to stop climate change

Berényi Péter at 01:05 AM on 16 October, 2010

Posted by gpwayne on Friday, 15 October, 2010 at 14:59 PM
Climate change skeptics like Marc Morano employ gross exaggeration to dismiss or diminish the potential disruption that climate change is likely to bring about. In the Inhofe EWP press blog, Morano made much of this statement [...]

That blogpost is more than three years old, dated 9:39 AM ET, July 30, 2007.

Latest Scientific Studies Refute Fears of Greenland Melt
Posted By Marc Morano

What he says is not entirely unsupported. For the sake of fairness you could at least dig up references from that post or peer reviewed literature backing them.

Annals of Glaciology
Volume 46, Number 1, October 2007 , pp. 209-214(6)
DOI: 10.3189/172756407782871558
20th-century glacier fluctuations on Disko Island (Qeqertarsuaq), Greenland
Jacob C. YDE & N. Tvis KNUDSEN
GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS
VOL. 33, L11707, 5 PP., 2006
doi:10.1029/2006GL026510
Greenland warming of 1920–1930 and 1995–2005
Petr Chylek, M. K. Dubey & G. Lesins
Science 11 November 2005:
Vol. 310. no. 5750, pp. 1013 - 1016
DOI: 10.1126/science.1115356
Recent Ice-Sheet Growth in the Interior of Greenland
Ola M. Johannessen, Kirill Khvorostovsky, Martin W. Miles & Leonid P. Bobylev
JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH
VOL. 111, D11105, 2006
doi:10.1029/2005JD006810
Extending Greenland temperature records into the late eighteenth century
B. M. Vinther, K. K. Andersen, P. D. Jones, K. R. Briffa & J. Cappelen
Science 16 March 2007:
Vol. 315. no. 5818, pp. 1559 - 1561
DOI: 10.1126/science.1138478
Rapid Changes in Ice Discharge from Greenland Outlet Glaciers
Ian M. Howat, Ian Joughin & Ted A. Scambos
Science 6 July 2007:
Vol. 317. no. 5834, pp. 111 - 114
DOI: 10.1126/science.1141758
Ancient Biomolecules from Deep Ice Cores Reveal a Forested Southern Greenland
Eske Willerslev, Enrico Cappellini, Wouter Boomsma, Rasmus Nielsen, Martin B. Hebsgaard, Tina B. Brand, Michael Hofreiter, Michael Bunce, Hendrik N. Poinar, Dorthe Dahl-Jensen, Sigfus Johnsen, Jørgen Peder Steffensen, Ole Bennike, Jean-Luc Schwenninger, Roger Nathan, Simon Armitage, Cees-Jan de Hoog, Vasily Alfimov, Marcus Christl, Juerg Beer, Raimund Muscheler, Joel Barker, Martin Sharp, Kirsty E. H. Penkman, James Haile, Pierre Taberlet, M. Thomas P. Gilbert, Antonella Casoli, Elisa Campani & Matthew J. Collins
IPCC Fourth Assessment Report
Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report
3.2.1 21st century global changes
Table 3.1. Projected global average surface warming and sea level rise at the end of the 21st century.
The Holocene 12,1 (2002) pp. 49–58
DOI: 10.1191/0959683602hl519rp
A mid-Holocene shift in Arctic sea-ice variability on the East Greenland Shelf
Anne E. Jennings, Karen Luise Knudsen, Morten Hald, Carsten Vigen Hansen & John T. Andrews
GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS
VOL. 32, L17605, 4 PP., 2005
doi:10.1029/2005GL023740
One more step toward a warmer Arctic
Igor V. Polyakov, Agnieszka Beszczynska, Eddy C. Carmack, Igor A. Dmitrenko, Eberhard Fahrbach, Ivan E. Frolov, Rüdiger Gerdes, Edmond Hansen, Jürgen Holfort, Vladimir V. Ivanov, Mark A. Johnson, Michael Karcher, Frank Kauker, James Morison, Kjell A. Orvik, Ursula Schauer, Harper L. Simmons, Øystein Skagseth, Vladimir T. Sokolov, Michael Steele, Leonid A. Timokhov, David Walsh & John E. Walsh
GLOBAL WARMING
Notes on Climate Change
Syun-Ichi Akasofu
Earth and Planetary Science Letters
Volume 207, Issues 1-4, 28 February 2003, Pages 13-22
doi:10.1016/S0012-821X(02)01155-X
Modern spectral climate patterns in rhythmically deposited argillites of the Gowganda Formation (Early Proterozoic), southern Ontario, Canada
Gary B. Hughes, Robert Giegengack & Haralambos N. Kritikos
Global and Planetary Change
Volume 40, Issues 1-2, January 2004, Pages 177-182
Global Climate Changes during the Late Quaternary
doi:10.1016/S0921-8181(03)00108-5
New perspectives for the future of the Maldives
Nils-Axel Mörner & Michael Tooley
CLIMATE RESEARCH
Vol. 23: 89–110, 2003
Proxy climatic and environmental changes of the past 1000 years
Willie Soon & Sallie Baliunas
Energy & Environment
doi: 10.1.1.124.3216
Reconstructing climatic and environmental changes of the past 1000 years: a reappraisal (2003)
Willie Soon, Sallie Baliunas, Craig Idso, Sherwood Idso & David R. Legates
Science 11 August 2006:
Vol. 313. no. 5788, pp. 827 - 831
DOI: 10.1126/science.1128243
Insignificant Change in Antarctic Snowfall Since the International Geophysical Year
Andrew J. Monaghan, David H. Bromwich, Ryan L. Fogt, Sheng-Hung Wang, Paul A. Mayewski, Daniel A. Dixon, Alexey Ekaykin, Massimo Frezzotti, Ian Goodwin, Elisabeth Isaksson, Susan D. Kaspari, Vin I. Morgan, Hans Oerter, Tas D. Van Ommen, Cornelius J. Van der Veen & Jiahong Wen

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