Timothy Ball, a Canadian climatologist scientist, doesn’t believe in human-induced global warming. This puts him in the vast minority of scientists, but in the company of novelist Michael Crichton.
That’s fine. Even creationists are entitled to their opinions. But here’s why I mention Ball: He wrote an essay/editorial for the Canada Free Press entitled “Global Warming: The Cold, Hard Facts?” with a subhed of “Global Warming is not due to human contribution of Carbon Dioxide.”
The editorial is 1395 words long, but it boils down very simply:
1. I have a Ph.D and consider myself a climatologist.
2. I don’t believe that global warming is due to human contribution of carbon dioxide.
3. I don’t accept any of the evidence that contradicts this belief.
4. People don’t like my point of view.
Period. That’s it.
Here’s a suggestion: If you’re going to put forth an opinion notCorrected 2007-10-30 shared by the majority of the world’s climatologists, you really need to put forth some evidence supporting your view. Simply saying that few people listen to you…
…despite the fact that I was the first Canadian Ph.D. in Climatology and I have an extensive background in climatology, especially the reconstruction of past climates and the impact of climate change on human history and the human condition.
And…
“Few listen, even though I have a Ph.D, (Doctor of Science) from the University of London, England and was a climatology professor at the University of Winnipeg.”
In fact, Ball isn’t a climatologist; his Ph.D is in geography, according to Tim Lambert. And although he claims to be “the first Canadian Ph.D. in Climatology,” Lambert points out that when Ball received his Ph.D, “Canada already had PhDs in climatology,” and proceeds to list several.
And Ball apparently hasn’t published much if anything on climatology. “During much of the 28 years cited,” Lambert writes, “he was a junior Lecturer who rarely published, and then spent 8 years as a geography professor. His work does not show any evidence of research regarding climate and atmosphere and the few papers he has published concern other matters.”
Further, Ball once stated that “CFC’s were never a problem…. it’s only because the sun is changing,” he was an “adviser” to an oil-industry-funded group called “Friends of Science,” and he once write an editorial called “Warmer is better” about how global warming could be good for Canada.
Just so we know who we’re dealing with.
Hall essentially accuses the thousands of scientists who do believe that humans are at least partly responsible for global warming of having no evidence to support this — despite the hundreds of papers and studies on the subject. I.e., Simply closing your eyes and saying, “I don’t see that evidence!!!” doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
Further, Ball offers none of his own. He cites no papers rebutting the majority view, and in fact doesn’t substantiate his argument in any way, other than to imply that, “I’m a climatologist, so I know what I’m talking about.” The entire editorial is, really, just a long whine.
Oh, Ball brings up global cooling. In the 1970s, he says, there was the opinion that we could be entering a new ice age. See? Ball says, We used to think it was cooling, but now we think it’s warming! Neither must be true.
First of all, while the idea of global cooling had some traction in the popular media, as William Michael Connolley,a climate modeler for the British Antarctic Survey points out, there were few researched scientific papers promoting the idea.
Further, Ball ignores the fact that recent studies have been more thorough and widespread, and that we have better technology at our disposal to monitor and study temperature change.
Following his logic, in fact, would lead one to ignore any scientific opinion if scientists once held the opposite. “We once thought the sun revolved around the Earth, now we say it’s the other way around. We can’t be sure either way!”
A perfect example of how thin Ball’s editorial comes in his last paragraph:
I was greatly influenced several years ago by Aaron Wildavsky’s book “Yes, but is it true?” The author taught political science at a New York University and realized how science was being influenced by and apparently misused by politics. He gave his graduate students an assignment to pursue the science behind a policy generated by a highly publicised environmental concern. To his and their surprise they found there was little scientific evidence, consensus and justification for the policy.
For a scientist, he’s awfully vague. At “a New York university”? (Sounds like a letter to Penthouse — “I’m a student at a small Midwestern college…”) His students studied “a policy generated by a highly publicised environmental concern”? What policy? What concern?
For a scientist to refuse (or be unable) to cite specifics like that certainly doesn’t make me want to put a lot of stock in his argument. Except, of course, that Ball doesn’t have an argument, just a position.
The Fray
Leland says:
I don’t believe in it either, but I’m not a climatologist. However I do believe in the cyclic nature of the climates of the earth which is caused by everything from variations in the sun to periodic shifts in the jet stream for what ever reason.
We had a mini ice age around the 1300s if I remember right. In the 1960s these very same learned scientists were claiming the green house gases were going to lead to another ice age for some reason or another. I forget the logic but remember the cover of Popular Science or Popular Mechanics with an artist rendering of Manhattan buried in ice.
A couple decades from now it’ll be some other “sky is falling” doom and gloom prediction.
Rather then sweating the global warming thing and all the other small stuff, we should be worried about collision with a fair sized asteroid or comet. The fact is that life on the planet will be significantly changed or wiped out by a collision event long before humans can change the climate.
Anonymous says:
I have been questioning the idea that humans are responsible for global warming. On the surface it makes sense, so I decided to research scientists that dispute the idea.
Can you investigate Dr. Richard Lindzen, he has been researching and writing about climate since 1965. He also has been published over 220 times.
Dean Patterson says:
I am not impressed with credentials or number of publications. However I do expect some data to support conclusions. I rec’d Ball’s article in an e-mail and won’t pass it on.
I don’t believe that opposition to the global warming crowd is conducive to maintaining a position in a university or media and most scientists don’t have the guts to say what they really believe. So I am in somewhat of a quandry. I think it was Berkeley who said “Truth is the cry of all but the game of the few.”
I have been thinking of late about lack of a general climate model for the earth. Oil deposits in the arctic and tropical animals frozen in the ice of Siberia. Is there a good source for intelligent speculation on the big picture?
Dean
Colette says:
Not being a scientist and choosing to review primary sources first (actual scientific journals such as those found in PNAS, I do not have a decided opinion on global warming. Also, being old enough (45), to remember, the 70s global cooling, ice age, naturally I am skeptical. All this having been said, what do you make of Dr. Lindzen’s position?
“There are many indications that carbon dioxide does not play a significant role in global warming. Richard Lindzen, Ph.D., professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one of the 11 scientists who prepared a 2001 National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report on climate change, estimates that a doubling of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would produce a temperature increase of only one degree Celsius.3 In fact, clouds and water vapor appear to be far more important factors related to global temperature. According to Dr. Lindzen and NASA scientists, clouds and water vapor may play a significant role in regulating the Earth’s temperature to keep it more constant.4″
Mike says:
Don’t bother with unsubstantiated claims, read the science.
http://www.realclimate.org
Yes, at that site you can find ACTUAL data and statistical analysis (i.e.-math) and the contributors (actual climate scientists) will answer your questions. I know it’s a lot easier to get your information from blogs, or to listen to a guy say “believe me…climate changes all the time, I read about it somewhere”, but…..
Mic says:
See Statement of Claim, letter of interest at back, and Statements of Defense.
http://www.desmogblog.com/tim-ball-vs-dan-johnson-lawsuit-documents
gnomic says:
There is always room for skepticisms, but when every major scientific body says something is happening, you’d better have something more than some crackpot claiming that everyone else is wrong – and he’d better have evidence, not a small slice of data like “it got cold today, so global warming isn’t real.” Scientists do have an agenda – its to find out and tell the Truth. there is no global warming conspiracy, no matter how much Big Oil and Fox Noise and Rush Limburger say so.
And the “negative economic impact” isn’t as bad as the naysayer claim, but the worse-case scenereo for global warming is far worse. Remember the Apollo program – many said it would cost too much, that going to the moon wasn’t worth it. Its led to science and technology and techniques (like project management) that have contributed to the US economy far more than any other investment since.
Tam says:
Further info on Dr. Timothy Ball
http://www.americasnewssource.com/images/cover0207l.jpg
- seems he is a Doctor in Philosphy with studies/thesis in Climatology.Does that makes his a scientist?
I too question the debate of global warming 7 man’s influence, but we tread in a very dangerous area here. The real question to ask is if you chose not to believe in GW as a reason to do nothing about it,stick your head in the sand and absolve us from any responsibilty or action. What then if it is true…and then it is too late to do anything about it?
CommonSense says:
Whether or not people are causing global warming, shouldn’t we be more concerned with immediate deaths than future ones? The trillions of dollars the world wastes on global warming concerns could be used to feed every hungry person on the planet. Next time you feel like donating to a global warming cause or voting for increased use of tax dollars for carbon control, stop eating for a day and think about what it would be like to die that way. Then think about the FACT that there is enough money in the free world to feed all the starving of the world but we choose to spend it on stuff that makes us feel smart and important instead. Another African child starved to death or died of AIDS while you were reading this.
gnomic says:
Feed a kid; kid lives today. Don’t fix global warming; we all die ni the next century. Tough choice. As callous as it sounds, I’m not convinced that feeding these kids really doess anything but prolong a miserable existance so they die slightly older. What’s the long term solution to the poverty, war, disease, oppression and so forth? Those of us attacking global warming are looking for a sustainable solution to the problem, not just shutting down a power plant which in the scheme of things isn’t a solution.
Yeah, I’m sorry that kids are dying. Like so much else, its horrible. But feeding them without solving the larger problems isn’t so much a solution as it is prolonged cruelity.
Dan says:
So far, Ball’s science has not been discussed. Let’s look at his one (1) scientific article on climate change and greenhouse gas, etc., and see the genius in it.
It happens to be a book review, but nonetheless, he makes a conclusion about CO2.
(1) Ball, T. 1994. Book Review, Agricultural Dimensions of Global Climate Change, Edited by Harry M. Kaiser and Thomas E. Drennen. Canadian Journal of Agricultural Economics 42 (2): 212-214.
”…For example, carbon dioxide from anthropogenic sources increased the most from 1940 to 1980 while global temperature decreased. Atmospheric carbon dioxide readings plummeted at Mauna Loa in the last two years. “
- Tim Ball, University of Winnipeg
That is a very clear statement.
Proof of Ball’s statement that the increase of CO2 was greatest from 1940 to 1980.
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/wp-images/maunaloa1.JPG
Proof of Ball’s statement that CO2 increased the most from 1940 to 1980, and that CO2 plummeted during 1992-93:
http://eesc.columbia.edu/courses/ees/slides/climate/Moana.Loa.CO2.gif
Look carefully and see the sharp drop after 1992: Mauna Loa, Hawaii
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/images/maunaloa.jpg
(2) Ball, T. 2004. On the real danger for Canada, global cooling
2004-11-15 (52). Frontier Centre for Public Policy website article.
http://www.fcpp.org/main/publication_detail.php?PubID=864
Tim Ball: “Yes, it warmed from 1680 up to 1940, but since 1940 it’s been cooling down. The evidence for warming is because of distorted records. The satellite data, for example, shows cooling.”
Proof of Ball’s statement that the earth is cooling:
Global temperature
http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/archive/2486/24861402.jpg
Another angle:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png
Proof of Ball’s statement that the satellite data shows cooling:
http://www.globalwarmingart.com/images/7/7e/Satellite_Temperatures.png
Well, I’m impressed.
Stan says:
Sorry to burst your bubble, but what you claim as “evidence” that global warming – or climate change if you prefer- is caused by man is not evidence. There is an hypothesis which is supported by computer models, but there is still – despite billions of dollars of research trying to prove it – no evidence that climate change is caused by man. The reliablity of the models has always been questionable – due to the fact that there are so many unknowns about climate change – but a recent study has recently demonstrated that they are, in fact, wrong. According the climate change models it is not possible for their to be significant glacial or sheet ice in Greenland if the temperature is 5-8C higher than the current temperature and CO2 much higher than it is now. Yet this recent study I referred to has evidence – real evidence – that there was in fact a time when temperatures were considerably higher and CO2 much higher than today and yet, contrary to these models, Greenland did in fact have significant glacial and sheet ice.
What does that matter? Well it proves two things. First of all, it proves that the projected sea rise ain’t gonna happen. More importantly it demonstrates that the models are useless. Your belief in anthropogenic global warming is founded on a theory suported by a methodology which has just been demonstrated to be unreliable. Are you likely to change your minds? I doubt it.
(Source – Eldrett et al, Nature, March 2007)
Also, Dan -I suggest you go back and check those graphs. Look closely and you’ll notice that they do in fact support Ball’s comments – the drop in 1992 and the more sgnificant rise of CO2 occuring at a time when temperature fell. Please pay attention to scales as they play a vitally important part in reading graph data. Check out the last site you link to and you’ll notice that another graph showing surface temperature does in fact show a possible cooling trend developing in recent years. Even the graph you show suggests there has been, at least, a levelling out since 2000 – but because the trend line is drawn from 1975 this is distorted. As you know – temperatures dropped between 1940 and 1975 so there is bound to be an increase. The preceding two graphs demonstrate this – but end, conveniently, at 2000. Draw the line on the last graph from 2000 and it is less clear cut and tends to support Ball’s assertions. Draw it from 1998 and it proves his point.
D says:
Nice try, pretending that any data or graph or even an overextrapolation in existence would support these silly claims published by Ball. So I guess this means that the deniers admit that Ball has zero evidence and zero science. Wrong. They don’t read it. Watch as they continue to either bluster over Ball’s great science, or resort to this:
http://westernstandard.blogs.com/shotgun/2007/03/global_warming_.html#comment-63739026
If the deniers blame all of those accepting global warming for the unknown rude comments received by Ball (boo hoo, reported worldwide), then by the same lack of logic they must take group credit for this vile attack.
Sean says:
This is very sloppy. You should proof-read.
For example:
“If you’re going to put forth an opinion shared by the majority of the world’s climatologists”
should be “NOT shared”.
Dan says:
Ha ha. In that case,
“shared by the majority of the world’s climatologists”
should be
“shared by essentially all of the world’s climatologists with any actual experience”
Andrew says:
You’re right, Sean — I left out the word “not.” Thanks for pointing that out. I don’t know if I’d consider one missing word “sloppy,” but I appreciate the catch.
Reviews says:
Bogus, a letter coerced from a clerk, 20 years after the fact:
http://www.americasnewssource.com/images/cover0207l.jpg
Original:
Hypography Science Forums - Co2 Acquittal says:
[...] is going to say what you want to hear. It’s a good idea to check their data before cowering to it. Andrew Kantor’s Place:* Timothy Ball: Opinion without evidence Remember, we cannot see everything even when it is there right in front of us. "We [...]
pranxter says:
Please, define the expression “a vast minority”? Slip of the tounge there, I guess? :-)
Andrew says:
No slip. A tongue-in-cheek description of a group that only makes up a tiny percentage of the whole.
Reviewer says:
Lambert “writes”, Lambert “points out”, etc.?
Check your sources.
>>>In fact, Ball isn’t a climatologist; his Ph.D is in geography, according to Tim Lambert. And although he claims to be “the first Canadian Ph.D. in Climatology,” Lambert points out that when Ball received his Ph.D, “Canada already had PhDs in climatology,” and proceeds to list several.
And Ball apparently hasn’t published much if anything on climatology. “During much of the 28 years cited,” Lambert writes, “he was a junior Lecturer who rarely published, and then spent 8 years as a geography professor. His work does not show any evidence of research regarding climate and atmosphere and the few papers he has published concern other matters.”
Rev2 says:
Revised version after lawsuit (according to public documents filed in court):
“Few listen, even though I have a Ph.D, (Doctor of Science) from the University of London, England and was a climatology professor at the University of Winnipeg.”
Original, which was modified after lawsuit:
“Few listen, even though I have a Ph.D, (Doctor of Science) from the University of London, England and that for 32 years I was a Professor of Climatology at the University of Winnipeg.”
http://www.orato.com/e-buzz/2006/05/28/global-warming-cold-hard-facts
While googling sources we goodled “early canadian phds climatology” and got these class notes:
http://people.uleth.ca/~dan.johnson/first_phds_in_climatology_in_canada.htm
gnomic says:
Fox noise also agrees with this nitwit. (funny only becuase its tragicly stupid!)
http://www.newshounds.us/2007/01/08/brian_kilmeade_has_new_explanation_of_global_warming.php
Why waste time talking about stupid people? Point, laugh, and move on.