Sunday, March 15, 2009

It gains something in translation

Our correspondent in Japan writes

Steve Bloom and Hank Roberts pointed me towards this article in The Register, which has been splashed all over the septic end of the bogusphere (I think I'll adopt that typo). I'm relieved to find that it's all a fuss about nothing. The "report" is simply the collation of one of these popular-but-pointless sceptic-vs-scientist debates, and has no official status. The various documents surrounding it are here on the JSER front page (only in Japanese), just below the headline "Global warming: What is the scientific truth?". The pdf labelled 本文 is the main report. The articles immediately under that are various documents by two of the contributors, Kiminori Itoh (伊藤) and my colleague Seita Emori (江守), who was the only climate scientist involved in the event and who tried to present the scientific case but was obviously rather outnumbered. Those documents have some pictures in so may be partially readable, even to non-Japanese readers. You may notice a citation or two for yours truly.
and then goes on to say some amusing things about some of the participants, like gone emeritus, over-promoted, etc. But dear bunnies it is hard to contain stuff like this when you have such papers as the Australian

THREE senior Japanese scientists separately engaged in climate-change research have strongly questioned the validity of the man-made global-warming model that underpins the drive by the UN and most developed-nation governments to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

"I believe the anthropogenic (man-made) effect for climate change is still only one of the hypotheses to explain the variability of climate," Kanya Kusano told The Weekend Australian.

It could take 10 to 20 years more research to prove or disprove the theory of anthropogenic climate change, said Dr Kusano, a research group leader with the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science's Earth Simulator project.

"Before anyone noticed, this hypothesis has been substituted for truth," writes Shunichi Akasofu, founding director of the University of Alaska's International Arctic Research Centre.

and the Marc Morano telegraph service to promote such things

Alert: '90 per cent of the participants do not believe the UN IPCC report' -
Japanese scientists challenge warming claims: (Australian Sun)
Morano, Marc (EPW) [Marc_Morano@epw.senate.gov
Sent: Friday, March 13, 2009 10:12 AM
Marc, of course, is Darryl Inhofe's soon to be ex-climate troll, but Inhofe, is pretty good by himself at making trouble as can be seen in this report from the El Paso Times

The inspector general for the Commerce Department is trying to force a prominent environmental group to reveal who leaked the Bush administration's plans to weaken the Endangered Species Act just weeks before President Barack Obama took office.

The investigation was triggered by Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma, senior Republican on the Committee on Environment and Public Works. The case suggests that, under at least certain circumstances, the government will continue to pursue and identify federal employees who disclose sensitive documents about controversial U.S. policies—a common practice under the Bush administration.

which is all over the environmental blogs, with some not very nice things being said about Zinser, let alone Inhofe. Will someone remind Eli why he has to be a nice bunny?

Comments?

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Why does Eli have to be a nice bunny?

Reminds me of a quotation attributed to British WWII general Montgomery...


David B. Benson

bi -- International Journal of Inactivism said...

They still can't let the Japanese report go?

Anyway, the Australian's coverage is actually saner than the Register's. Of course, it's still not very sane, since it doesn't report on what Emori actually says.

"Dr Maruyama said many scientists were doubtful about man-made climate-change theory, but did not want to risk their funding from the government or bad publicity from the mass media, which he said was leading society in the wrong direction."

Conspiracy theories written in Japanese! I like that, I do. :)

Aaron said...

Going back to the Battle of Britain, "Daddy Rabbit" was the slang title for leaders of Air Fighter Squadrons that would take any mission.

Georg said...

Eli
could you please contact me by mail. I need some infos about Gerlich/Tscheuschner since this paper, believe it or not, passed a peer review and one might think of a formal reply.
Georg
georg.hoffmann@lsce.ipsl.fr

amoeba said...

This video clip gives guidance on how the Rabbet should behave toward the enemies of science:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCI18qAoKq4

All metaphorical of course!

Apologies if this has been posted before!

Anonymous said...

Sumimasen ga, Maruyama-san bakayaro des'. Ditto Itoh-san.