Wednesday, May 23, 2012

SkepticalScience.com compared to WUWT.com

I know some claim SkepticalScience.com is no different from WUWT.  

I have been told: 
"it's just a different perspective:
you choose to believe SkepticalScience.com 
and I choose to believe WUWT.”

But, is it as simple as that?  How do we decide on the respective veracity of each?



 I can only speak for myself, but when I look for information on the internet it is because I want to learn stuff.  As for Anthropogenic Global Warming, I've been learning about it and paying attention to new findings since my high school science classes in the early seventies.  So I expect something serious and I can see through many phony arguments simply because I have been learning about it for decades... {besides, most "skeptics" arguments tend to be rather repetitive}.

What I like about SkepticalScience.com is that I am constantly engaged by their informed explanations. It's a place I can go to sink my teeth into real information and to work on learning something relevant about various aspects of our planet's global heat engine.

And I'm constantly impressed with new findings that answer old questions and often open entirely new perspectives and questions, also I’ve had some misperceptions of my own corrected, which is a good thing to do.  I trust them, because SkS refers to actual studies and provides links to them for more detailed information, so it is easy to investigate a little deeper.

Why people can attack such an approach is beyond me.  
{Funny though, for all the carping going on, no one presents actual reasons for their personal rejection of SkS reported information.}


Add to that, SkepticalScience.com's impressive discussions following each post.  They are interesting as heck, with skeptics showing up regularly to challenge the authors of said posts.  Given that SkS has a strict code of conduct, their dialogue remains on point, with information and arguments being passed back and forth, it is an intelligent informed discussion like we see too rarely these days. 



Again, Why people can attack such an approach is beyond me?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Then we have WUWT, the self-proclaimed "world's most viewed site on global warming and climate change", these folks present a totally different approach to incoming climate information. .  

WUWT is demonstrably about political advocacy, not about teaching climate science details.  That's a huge difference!


And this observation is based on reviewing many posts over there.  It's all raw emotions and anger over there, like being in a cat fight. It's a rare post at WUWT.com that tries to describe and consider some particular aspect of our global heat engine.

Rather than actually examining science, most of their posts revolve around attacking people, or organizations, or their ever present scientific conspiracy canard.  

Most recently NASA was getting hammered based on a letter by a bunch of politically active non-climate scientists, who happened to have been NASA employees.  SO WHAT, I read their letter, more hand waving and name calling, but have the NASA Forty-Niners presented any actually scientific arguments or evidence? NO.  And it's so typical of what I find over at WUWT, and throughout that "echo-chamber."

As for learning anything from WUWT discussion forum, it is pretty slim pick'ns beyond self-congratulatory proclamations of Global Warming finally being dead, or unsupported charges and name calling of the most incredible {and obviously uninformed} variety.   


Here’s a sample off the most recent {at the time of this writing} post... pretty much the same as any other day:
“The money wasted world wide on this Climate farce must be truly astounding...”
~ ~ ~
“The warmists are far past listening to anything approaching reason or common sense. They cannot be persuaded or convinced of the folly of their actions in any way; they can only be defeated. And even after they’re defeated, they’ll whine about it for the rest of their lives.
The scientific battle is over. The political one is just beginning...”
 ~ ~ ~
"Do they really think that we cannot keep ahead of a 1 m sea level rise in 100 years? 1 centimeter a year is nothing..."
~ ~ ~
"There is an experiment that proves that the Greenhouse gas effect does not exist. This experiment which has been peer reviewed by Ph.D physicists . Ph.D. Chemical engineers and others..."
~ ~ ~
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Lacking at WUWT are comments discussing Climate dynamics with explanations or reasoned lists of complaints, findings, or conclusions.  Sure, sure a lot about graphs, and statistics, but this global warming is about much more that obsessing over subjective statistical minutiae.  It's about understanding basic real physics and recognizing the full scope of the Earth Observation information available these days.  Which is the sort of thing the folks at SkS do so well.

Instead at WUWT you'll hear the echo "it's too complex to understand."
Why should anyone be impressed by that defeatist attitude?  

Besides, it's nonsense!  If doctors can make sense of the human body, climatologists can make sense of Earth's processes!

What happened to our natural curiosity and wanting understand how the world around us functions ???

~ ~ ~ 

Where does Mr. AW, actually try to teach folks anything, other than opposing any admission that something has gone very wrong and demanding we do nothing until 99% proof is forthcoming {something he knows damned well is impossible}?

 
Why trust Anthony Watts or his WUWT given it's well documented list of peddled misrepresentations of the science and promoting outrageous liar of the first order.  In particular, I'm offended by Anthony's championing of Sir Lord Monckton a supreme political performer, but manipulator of evidence, adulterer of others graphs/data, hate-monger, world-government conspiracist and documented liar {dozens of times} over.  But people like his political story and that's OK by Anthony.  Well that sort of double standard is not OK by me.  That's why I don't trust Mr. Watts.





BUT WE NEED TEACHERS NOT SCHEISTERS!

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