We took every easily-available green world publication with a list of members and tried to find the geographical focus of discontent. The main identifiable centre was western and southern Germany, though it was fairly diffuse and we were hestitant to draw conclusions. (California scored a bit of focus, but they were on the rebound from the 60s when LSD was nice). Some heavy funding was coming from some unexpected Foundations and Benefactors who shall remain nameless because I have forgotten who they were but remembered that I was surprised at why they were spending.

With hesitation, I felt that the discontent was a product of savage recent war. We also discussed whether the materials of war were targeted. Think about the strength of anti-uranium after the 2 Japanese bombs. Think about lead poising, lead being used in bullets. Anti-whaling, as the whales were shot by harpoon guns. About oil crises, fuel for warplanes, napalm. A whole splinter group campaigned against anything with chlorine in it, like DDT and dioxin – what gas was used in the trenches? Then came the anti-synthetic chemical phase which has led to the current PC organic farming fad, as though war chemically contaminates everything pure and natural. One further spin-off is anti immunisation, since it is not “natural” and people were terminated by lethal injection. Fluoridation of drinking water was equated by some to gas chambers mandated by compulsory State action. But heck, it’s just a theory and it lacks proof. (And modelling).

It is possible that these extreme reactions against mainstream society were not created by choice. Who knows the true trauma of the after-effects of war? Does the human genome start to change in response to savage consequences of war? Is the anti-science stance an evolutionary product, carried in the genes and growing stronger generationally?

Publishers of magazines are forever doing market reasearch so they can appeal to a public that thrives on fads. Sci-Am was taken over by a group from this (postulated) region of discontent if #21 above is correct and began writing incredibly green papers. It might have started this course before then. We oldies know that incredibly green policy equates with incredibly bad science. Can anyone volunteer a top quality scientific article that espoused green ideals (and offers its source code and reviewers’ comments)?

“Hagiography” opened this thread. I’m more alarmed by autohagiography (as in autobiography versus biography). Sometimes I feel that articles about people have descriptions of the authors written by the authors. Sometimes I feel that authors are the peers who review their own papers.

One way to clear the air is to openly disclose your name and experience, like I have done on CA. I have not had a single word of abuse since I explained who I was and where I came from. Maybe it could be good to have a section of CA where readers can look up readable c.v. material for frequent writers. I would not be surprised to find some very high quality people disclosing their interests. That is one reason why I can note that as I write, CA has become number two for the moment in Weblog popularity stakes.

Nobody denies that the European viniculture 800 years ago extended to East Prussia and southern Norway, requiring an average temperature 1.5 C higher than today; this presumably sustained for 100 years minimum. Mann would presumably argue a similarly sustained cooling elsewhere to compensate. If local random variation can produce a warming of this degree over an area the size of europe over 100 or probably 200 years how much variation can we expect over a 30 year period? 2 C. Maybe even 3 C. Over a 10 year period maybe even 5 C.

Perhaps Mann can show where these extreme”natural” variations have occurred in the last 150 years. We have good temperature data from the mid 19th century onwards and don’t have to rely on proxies!

Given the hysteria that ensued during summer 2006 when average temperatures over parts of NW Europe were 2-3 C above average I think we can safely assume this doesn’t happen too often. Or maybe it happens all the time. Maybe Quebec warmed and aquired a New England climate while New England cooled and became like Quebec.

They are claiming not that these things did not happen, but rather that the happened locally only, rather than globally. Mann 2006, states many times that the MWP and LIA were European phenomena. He references several coral studies which show the reverse of the MWP and LIA. Mann, of course, defines these as “global,” not “local.”

When there are a high number of land falling tropical cyclones along the Gulf Coast, that becomes “global,” rather than “local.”

The Mann Group (named on his Penn State web site) seems to define “global” and “local” based not on the locations. but rather on the story that they are trying to support.

There’s only one obvious answer to these questions and it is common to all of them – it was warmer
then than now.

Do the alarmists claim that these things didn’t happen? That the evidence was somehow faked? Or
do they have an alternative theory as to why and how they happened?

Even if they managed to clean up all the technical holes in their models – like the inability to pick
up the present warming – don’t they still have to answer this question?

To me it’s like arguing that Washington didn’t in fact cross the Delaware with his troops, without
explaining precisely how he ended up on the other side…