While the BBC get all excited about cool new British cloning, and fresh monkey business, they apparently haven’t noticed a whacking blow to their greatest environmental news fetish- news that the Antarctic is putting on weight. (via A Tangled Web)
Oddly no-one ever seems to learn that when it comes to a lot of the investigations we perform in science today our knowledge is in its infancy. At least one guy the BBC interviewed seemed to get it:
‘”A large, striking monkey in a country of considerable wildlife research over the last century has been hidden right under our noses,”‘
Makes you wonder what else has been hidden from them that’s right under their noses. Especially those scientific minds that bring us the Beeb in all its glory.
Update (Sat)– In response to Natalie’s interest, expressed in the comments, here are a few links gleaned from a commenter at the aforementioned ATW- post here– that highlight the fact that the BBC really have bought into a political agenda with their relentless enviro-spin. All over the web I’ve found people quoting the BBC as a source for global warming warnings- including in the post I’ve just linked from ATW. I hope these three links– posted in order of technicality, with the most technical first- illustrate that the Beeb has sidelined debate in favour of left-tinged crusading politics, as usual. From the second of the three sources linked, this quote impressed me a lot, and it was good to read-
‘the predication of government, and United Nations’, policy for energy growth on the unsustainable myth of ‘global warming’ is a serious threat to us all, but especially to the 1.6 billion people in the less-developed world who have no access to any modern form of energy. The twin curses of water poverty and energy poverty remain the real scandals. By contrast, the political imposition on the rest of the world of our Northern, self-indulgent ecochondria about ‘global warming’ could prove to be a neo-colonialism too far.’
OT
Check out Melanie Phillips’ blog for a scathing critique of the usual anti-Israel bias at the BBC. This time it’s the Today programme which goes under her scalpel.
http://www.melaniephillips.com/diary/archives/001215.html
OT, FYI – you may want to be aware that the big disclaimer at the top of the comments box carries no legal wieght. Google for “godfrey libel” (not actually in the quotes).
The news you will not see today on the BBC is just happening under your nose, in London. Scary scenes of tiny group of ‘peaceful’ Muslims demonstrating next to US embassy
go to http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?PHPSESSID=f5ddc322f94884288e94236eb3c52c51
and scroll down for the pictures, see also the recommended site, great pictures
Yes, just seen this on the BBC’s lamentable LDN local news programme. The reporters were taking every care to point out that most of the demonstrators were moderate – such as the MCB’s Iqbal ‘There is no such thing as an Islamic terrorist’ Sacranie – even as the crowd were chanting “Bomb America”. Whilst reported that the MCB felt there should be a full inquiry into the alleged Koran incident nobody felt able to explain why there was quite this amount of fuss over a book.
During the Vietnam War, Young American and British protestors were in the same place, saying similar things. I guess thats the price we pay for an open society, we should not fear protest but must ensure that the reporting of it is accurate.
To Alex,
bomb America, kill the Jews, we’ll dominate the world have no relation to the war, or the Koran story, it is only an excuse.
The beeb seems to be in a tiz over The Sun publishing photographs of Saddam- its a breach of his human rights you know! Dont you just love the ‘have your say-providing you agree with us’ page
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/4567687.stm
Rachel,
I agree and there exists nobody who Loves America more than me. All I`m saying is that we must not fear these idiots and thier idiotic ranting. We are so far ahead of them as to render them comical.
Off Topic:
I thought this page might be of interest to many here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/4566079.stm
I found this paragraph amusing:
“Basic idea – we have our usual Have Your Say debates but we can allow many more comments to be published in a clearly flagged “unmoderated” part of the site if we wish. Readers can go through a simple registration process to become a trusted chum of ours, then they can read the comments and recommend them if they wish. Then the best gradually come to the top of the pool.
You too can be a trusted chum of the BBC.
.
Hate to be so crude as to return to the topic at hand – but do you have an assessment in layman’s terms of what this means? The article itself spoke of it as an expected, if paradoxical, consequence of global warming. To some extent I smell an unfalsifiable hypothesis in that, but phenomena can be paradoxical.
I have not really followed the whole global warming debate. I’d laugh my head off if it turned out not to be true, but the universe has so far not always arranged itself for my amusement.
“You too can be a trusted chum of the BBC.”
There’s a whiff of fear in this one, I think. The BBC has finally figured out that there are blogs out here that it can’t control, so it offers “unmoderated” content of its own.
It makes this chump wonder why moderation was necessary in the first place. CNN has, or had, unmoderated debates that were screened only for outright profanity and obscenity.
There were some ugly people on CNN – the SF/IRA mob for one – but at least it was open and honest, and casual readers could see for themselves who were the nut cases and who were the voices of sanity.
Chums? I haven’t heard that word (outside of a 1930s edition of Nancy Drew) in decades.
Do Brits still commonly use that word, or is this a quaint Beeb thing only?
Perhaps it’s a typo — they really meant “chump.”
Chums? I haven’t heard that word…in decades.
You never saw Jaws?
jon livesy.
i agree. the BBC is realising at last that the blogsites , which it previously ridiculed as amateur etc, are undoing the years of brainwashing as more and more people seek them out for insights.
I was sickened by the recent BBC on line piece on Galloway’s “conquest” of the US senate committee.
It was pure socialist workers party copy and surely an indication of what is yet to come.
As Americans and Europeans are starting to turn off BBC news, surely the only market for the BBC will be as a a competitor of Al jazeera’s in the Middle east.
Good point, Natalie. Never made me laugh either.
My analysis- and I hesitate to call it that really- is that when they say that it falls within global warming prediction models to find this kind of ice thickening, we should be very curious to find out which analyses and within what parameters such thickening of ice on such a scale fits.
What I am really interested in is how this might play to complexify that oh-so-simplified meme about the global warming hypothesis that has a purely political motivation. I’d like to puncture that balloon, personally- not to rubbish science but to rescue it.
My view is that the checks and balances in such a vast climactic system as that which the earth operates will take a lot of understanding- and this phenomenon might be a step towards demonstrating that.
O/T
Why are the BBC not headlining the Pro Democracy Protests in Cuba?
Nothing on the news homepage, or world, you have to go Americas to find a story refering to the poor bastards seeking libery as “disidents”, What a real malevolent and anti democratic heap of crap the BBC has become.
Alex – the BBC isn’t Fox News, therefore it refers to people who are dissidents as “dissidents” rather than “bold crusaders against the Commie menace”. You appear to be claiming that the Beeb is insufficiently biased…
‘Alex – the BBC isn’t Fox News, therefore it refers to people who are dissidents as “dissidents” rather than “bold crusaders against the Commie menace”. ‘
Er, Fox News also refers to them as dissidents:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,157225,00.html
O/T I note that the story about the London Eye possibly having to close because the Labour peer who runs the South Bank centre wats a 1500% increase in the rent has been “edited”. You will note there is now no reference to the Labour peer….(Clive Hollick) yet there was a mention yesterday…..
NuLabour – even worse than Old Tories for corruption and making money off the backs of the people….and the Beeb stay silent.
OT
A story in the Evening Standard on 12 May reported that the BBC is spending £650 million of our money to refurbish Brodcasting House. Yes £650 – not 65 million. The project is already well over budget and late. It may not end until 2011.
Meanwhile the BBC is about to let a 10-year contract worth some £900 million for managing all its UK properties.
Shades of the Scottish Parliament scandal in Scotland. Isn’t it amazing how easy it is to waste Other People’s Money ?
Sky puts itself on an estate out in the fringes of West London, near Heathrow. The BBC prefers to stay in central London, at enormous expense. Why ?
john b
you raise an interesting point, should the BBC come down on the side of the type of liberty and democracy from which it was created and is maintained?
Given that the beeb has the power to bring events to our attention or to bury or ignore them we must consider its long term record which has been rather kind to Castro and the whole Che movement.
Is it bias to champion the cause of freedom in favor of other types of political system? It is after all the “British Broadcasting Corporation” which might lead people to expect a certain “British” take on things. Which may include a robust defence of Democracy as opposed to more Authoritarian systems (although given its love of all things EU, I no longer believe that personally).
As for the use of the word “dissident”, it is not inaccurate but perhaps lazy, are they not “pro democracy” or “anti Castro” protestors, the benefit often seems to be given to the beebs favoured groups.
My point is this, the Cubans are pro American and Anti-Castro and in BeebLand, that `aint good.
Natalie:-
“I have not really followed the whole global warming debate. I’d laugh my head off if it turned out not to be true…”
If you would like to be moderately entertained while laughing your head off at a forensic debunking of the whole basis of envirofascism, invest in a copy of Michael Crichton’s ‘State of Fear’. It doesn’t really work as the airport novel it purports to be, but as a demolition of the partiality and bad science underpinning the whole nonsense, it has few peers.
BTW, does anyone know what to do if one does not want to pay the Biased BBC fees?
Biased BBC blog is charging fees now? 😉
.
Sorry, I meant how do I avoid paying the licence fee?
I know Rachel, just teasing.
Obviously the law abiding way is to cease watching television. If you wish to keep watching television but not pay the licence, then you must accept that you are engaging in criminal behaviour. And to protect Biased BBC blog from any possible liability, I’m not going to incite or explain law breaking on its pages.
Head on over to:
http://www.tvlicensing.biz
and have a good nose around. There’s plenty of info and support on hand.
.
OT
The Telegraph http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/05/22/nyob22.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/05/22/ixportaltop.html brings us this expose of our porcine Home Secretary delivery of a record attempting 6 porkies in 100 seconds. The recording of the interview can be found here http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/listenagain/ram/today4_clarke_20050517.ram and to save you too having to endure the entire 10m 20s of tedious waffle I can reveal that the offending segment begins at 4m 45s. As usual the Today program provides a perfect platform for the Government’s ongoing campaign of disinformation. Catch it quick before the Stealth Editor magics it away.
In posting the above, it occurs to me in retrospect that I may have been a trifle unfair to Charles Clarke as he was likely only limbering-up for the forthcoming Euro-referendum debate. His performance has however done much to secure his credentials as contender for the Prime Minister’s job after the departure of Tony Blair.
John B.: “OT, FYI – you may want to be aware that the big disclaimer at the top of the comments box carries no legal wieght. Google for “godfrey libel” (not actually in the quotes)”
Not quite John B. – in the Godfrey case, Demon Internet were shown to be liable because they had not acted in response to a complaint from Godfrey.
In the case of Biased BBC, commenters are reminded that they are (as they always have been) liable for whatever they say here, and that, whilst Biased BBC may also be held legally accountable, each commenter will have indemnified us against such action – therefore should someone pursue Biased BBC legally then B-BBC will have the right to recover any costs B-BBC incur from the commenter who has indemnified B-BBC against that possibility.
In other words, whilst both parties (the commenter and, potentially, Biased BBC) may be liable under law, the commenter, by clicking on ‘Publish’, will have assumed responsibility for any liabilities B-BBC incur as a result of their comment.
Biased BBC will of course, where necessary, and to the best of our ability, act to prevent such incidents occuring in the first place – which is where Demon were found to be wrong because they did nothing about Godfrey’s complaint.
There are all sorts of legal grey areas here of course – which it might be interesting, in an academic sense, to resolve – but, in the interests of a quiet life, I think we’d better not try to find out the hard way.
Gary – Susan, of this parish, rechristened Have Your Say “[Don’t] Have Your Say” a while back. She now shortens it to DHYS.
Sorry to go off topic, but I just caught parts of “dateline’ on BBC world and it is absolutely appalling. A panel of like minded people (among others reps from the “independant” and “al Quds”) busy agreeing with each other that the US is totally at fault for alienating the world with its boorish manners. You know, same old tired nonsense. “Dateline” is so bad it’s almost a joke (almost but not quite – too serious a matter).
deepdiver
and now the Beeb Website comes up with the “Laura Bush heckled in Jerusalem” story http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4570993.stm quoting a “Muslim protester”: “How dare you come in here, and why are you hassling our Muslims?”
I wonder if the Beeb paid these hecklers. Remember Howard?
Dateline is the epitome of BBC bias. I’ve never seen a balanced panel on it and I mean ever.
Shold not Michael Grade or someone not sit down and watch a whole stream of Dateline programmes, say several months worth, and keep a log of the actual panels and their political leanings, their views eg on Iraq, on Britain and Europe, Britain and the US etc. Not the odd programme – the whole damn string of programmes, week in/week out.
And then tell us, the licence payers, what the aggregate score is. How many panel members on each side of the argument.
And then try to explain his way out of that one.
How dare the BBC deny that there is blatant bias ?
I hope the beeb’s not relying the the UN’s hockeystick methodology to prove GW.
Seriously flawed, it is.
this site’s lost its ‘must view’ rating it used to have with me.
the moderators post once in a blue moon and not much work is going into the few they do post. bah! humbug!
Sometimes Dateline has Sir Bernhard Ingham on, he strips back all the appauling lefty orthodoxies and calls a spade by its given name. He`s Broadcast Viagra for that flaccid and effete load of impotent old bollocks masquerading as Political Debate.
The wonderful thing about this life is that ten thousand puffed up Liberals can be deflated by a single acerbic shard of rapier clarity from the likes of Sir Bernhard.
Gavin Essler, dont make me laugh……….
Alex –
Perhaps it’s a matter of taste. I think they have INgham on because (a) he sounds old fashioned and (b) he’s not too bright. All that ineffectual huffing and puffing is jsut what the liberal lefties like from a conservative commentator. Tehy wouldn’t like say an Andrew Neill or similar.
Back OT, Daily Ablution Fisks the lefty eco luddites…….
Rain Forest Disappearing, Eco-Luddites to Blame
http://dailyablution.blogs.com/the_daily_ablution/2005/05/rain_forest_dis.html
It’s good to see the naysayers on climate change coming out to play. The BBC’s agenda on climate change is matched by the facts. The climate is changing. The scientists that actually study climate change are in consensus as to the how and why global warming is taking place.
Opposition to the prevailing view exists, but it is widely discredited by the vast majority of scientists specialising in the area.
If you think climate change is a “green issue” or part of some nefarious “green agenda”, you might as well proclaim the earth is flat.
From May 19th’s Daily Telegraph, responding to an article which questioned how and why climate change predictions were made.
“The best science
Sir – The article by Neil Collins disputing the scientific evidence that increasing emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are the major cause of climate change (Opinion, May 16) contained a number of errors.
It was misleading for him to suggest that the scientific consensus about climate change is based on some sort of dictatorial political process. There is agreement between climate scientists because the weight of evidence points to the same conclusion, as your science editor has made clear on many occasions. The Royal Society endorses the consensus because it represents the best science.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the world’s most authoritative source of information on the effects of rising greenhouse gas levels, achieved consensus among about 2,000 of the world’s leading climate scientists in its last assessment in 2001 by quantifying the uncertainties about the likely causes and potential impacts. It is true that there are still a few people who reject the verdict of the IPCC, and present, like Neil Collins’s article, a distorted alternative view of the science.
The paper from the journal Advances in Space Research that was cited in your article does not argue that “cosmic ray intensity and variations in solar activity have been driving recent climate change”. It provides estimates of the small contribution that these factors have made to the overall rise in global average temperatures, which is largely due to rising greenhouse gas levels.
Nor is it true that sea level is not rising. As the IPCC pointed out, average sea level around the world increased at a rate of 0.1 to 0.2 centimetres per year during the 20th century. Local sea levels have varied because of other factors, such as the slow readjustment of continents to the removal of ice sheets after the last Ice Age.
Given the evidence that rising greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere are causing climate change, the Kyoto Protocol targets for small but significant reductions in emissions are not based on “bad science”. They are a crucial first step towards the substantial cuts that will be required if we are to prevent the worst potential effects of climate change.
Finally, the assertion that the scientific community is in agreement on climate change to protect their livelihoods is risible. Almost as risible as a professional contrarian using a national newspaper to present a wholly misleading picture of the science of climate change.
Sir David Wallace, Vice-President, The Royal Society, London SW1″
Re: the global warming debate, as with any scientific theory there are dissenting views (‘intelligent design’ anyone?) however scientific consensus concludes that this phenomenon does exist.
Whilst one might conclude that on a cost/benefit analysis our best response should be a resounding “sh*t happens”, but I would suggest that a major obstruction to an objective analysis is political ideologists desperately trying to label rigorous scientific research as sinister socialist/capitalist plots.
Surely better to attempt to do more work on quantifying the economic costs of climate change in order to contrast with the costs of implementing Kyoto and the like. The market approach (carbon credits and the like) is by far the best way to approach this, the head in the sand, blame it on ‘anti-Americanism’ approach rivalling the ‘lets all live in tents and eat nettles’ approach as the worst.
Cockney
That has to be about the silliest post you’ve ever delivered here.
1. For the millionth time, most people do NOT argue that global warming isn’t happening. Sane individuals who have followed this realise that the evidence for man-made global warming is sketchy at best. The lobby pushing the man-made warming theory have not offered one piece of evidence to back their claims which cannot be rebutted. Those who promote the theory that it is no man-made have offered plenty.
2. Your cost/benefit analysis has been carried out by the environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg. His conclusion is that implementing Kyoto will cost at least (IIRC) £300billion in today’s money by the end of the century and will slow down warming by six years. It’s not worth it.
3. Nice attempt to head off the argument at the pass but you’re not getting away with it. Kyoto IS an attempt by the Tranzi crowd to bring down western economic activity, just as they hope to deny us our military via the UN.
3. The science underpinning Kyoto and the IPCC has been widely trashed and there is in no way a scientific concensus on global warming. In fact very many dissent from the ‘accepted’ theory. The fact that you regard this as ‘rigorous scientific research’ vs conspiracy theorists reveals that you actually know very little about the debate, the facts and the politics.
1) That’s a largeish majority of the scientific community dismissed as insane then. Glad to hear that you know better.
2) Good to hear that somebody’s done some work on this, however where hundreds of billions are at stake I’d like more than one bloke’s analysis on which to take decisions.
3) B*llocks.
3(again?)) There’s little consensus on the specifics but draw a scatter graph of the views of experts and you’ll find the largest cluster around the ‘better do something about this sharpish’ point of view. Your refusal to at least acknowledge this suggests that you spend more time skulking around niche websites seeking morsels to reinforce your ideologically driven point of view that considering a representative cross section of the information on offer.
“Sane individuals who have followed this realise that the evidence for man-made global warming is sketchy at best.”
This precisely *not* the consensus of opinion among climatologists, as the Royal Society clearly states:
“There is an international scientific consensus that increasing levels of man-made greenhouse gases are leading to global climate change”
The scientists that believe climate change is not being driven by man-made activities are a distinct minority. Are you seriously questioning the sanity of the majority of UK and international climatologists?
“re you seriously questioning the sanity of the majority of UK and international climatologists?”
Are they funded by taxation, or by donation?
I think most Climate change scientists know which side their bread is buttered when thye scream “I have a nightmare”.
When is the ice age coming that was previously predicted?
Was Malthus correct?
“Are they funded by taxation, or by donation?”
Unless you have proof that over 2000 scientists, the IPCC and the Royal Society members are pushing the idea of man-made climate change for personal gain, I can’t see how the question is relevant.
Nonetheless, I’ll refer you to the Royal Society’s answer:
Finally, the assertion that the scientific community is in agreement on climate change to protect their livelihoods is risible.
“When is the ice age coming that was previously predicted?”
What was the prediction? Perhaps you can find a primary source and enlighten us?
Anon
And as we see here
http://www.staff.livjm.ac.uk/spsbpeis/Scienceletter.htm
the Royal Society is wrong to make that claim. Its’ claim arose from flawed research which was exposed by Dr Benny Peiser of John Moores University.
Read the exchange of letters, if you can be bothered. You’ll see that the ‘consensus’ is a myth, that the Royal Society and others are guilty of pushing the party line on climate change and that when they have been shown to be wrong they do not acknowledge it.
I’ve read it. Perhaps you might want to read Tim Lambert’s detailed criticism of the faulty methodology surrounding Peiser and Bray’s survey (it is self-selected), and the associated comment thread.
http://cgi.cse.unsw.edu.au/~lambert/cgi-bin/blog/science/bray.html
and the follow up
http://cgi.cse.unsw.edu.au/~lambert/cgi-bin/blog/science/bray2.html
Lambert deals comprehensively with the two specific points of Bray’s arguments.
“As far as I can tell, Peiser changed the categories that Oreskes used. She said that there were no papers that explicitly disagreed with the consensus view. Peiser responds with a claim that “there were 34 abstracts reject or question the view that human activities are the main driving force of ‘the observed warming over the last 50 years'”.
It’s perfectly possible for both statements to be true, with none of the 34 rejecting the consensus but just raising questions.”
Indeed, the abstracts raise such a point, and there is also evidence that Peiser misrepresents the abstracts he cites.
Lambert’s analysis of the survey:
“The 2003 survey was conducted as an on-line survey. The existence of the survey was posted in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, the Climlist server. [..]
However, the information about the survey was reposted (mail list membership required to read link) to the climatesceptics mail list by Timo Hämeranta on Sep 20 2003
[..]
Since the survey was anonymous, there is no way to ensure that only climate scientists participated and no way to prevent people from submitting the survey multiple times. Furthermore, the survey was distributed on the climatesceptics list which has over 200 members, almost all of them strongly skeptical about global warming. Since the total number of participants was just 557, this could serious skew the results.”
You must undestand that one of the major aims of the so-called ‘Enviromentalist’ movement is to drastically reduce the standard of living in the developed world and maintain the undeveloped world’s quaint and picturesque poverty. Global Warming is admirably suited to further both these aims hence the fanatical and reality defying support for Kyoto et-al.
It’ll all be solved by advanced technology, which will leave today’s global warming fanatics/Luddites looking as wrong and stupid as the Malthusians.