Scientist or politician? You decide.
CSIRO is no longer a respected, independent scientific advisory body, but a politicised mouthpiece for the Labor government and their efforts to “tackle climate change”:
The head of Australia’s leading science body says a carbon price should be a key part of the nation’s overall climate action.
CSIRO chief Dr Megan Clark will today join 600 of Australia’s top climate change scientists [environmental activists – Ed] at a meeting in Cairns to update the latest observations.
Dr Clark says global warming is one of the most challenging issues facing humanity and needs careful consideration.
“It’s an urgent issue, but it is also a very complex one and one that will affect us, not just in this country, in all aspects of society, but probably one of the most challenging issues we have ever faced as humanity.
“It does need careful consideration and it does need debate. [As long as the debate comes down in favour of a carbon price, right? – Ed]
“We need to debate the issue, come to grips with the issue, and it’s an important part of us coming to grips with it and stepping forward.”
Dr Clark has welcomed the pro- and anti-carbon tax rallies, saying she is not concerned the science may be overlooked as the political battle focused on the carbon tax.
“Clearly we need a price on carbon and a policy response [do we? Please explain – Ed], but we also need sustainable technologies that will take us into a low-carbon future and also our change in behaviour,” she said. (source)
When even the WA Nationals are considering backing a carbon price (see here), there really is little hope that sanity will prevail.
Australian Climate Madness 
The Scientific Method implies that scientists becoming political immediately declassifies them as scientists, as universal laws are immutable from opinion or election.
I have a dream of one day such scientific bodies returning to science. I don’t hold out much hope for it happening in my lifetime.
As Carl Sagan said: “Science is more than a body of knowledge; it’s a way of thinking, a way of skeptically interrogating the universe with a fine understanding of human fallibility. If we are not able to ask skeptical questions, to interrogate those who tell us that something is true, to be skeptical of those in authority, then we are up for grabs by the next charlatan …. who comes ambling along.”
Symphony of Science – A Wave of Reason
It looks like an ice age is the only thing that can save us from this madness. Sad situation for a modern society to have come to…
Follow the money, Simon…
http://www.climatechange.gov.au/about/grants.aspx
– Australian Climate Change Science Program ($7,748,400)
– Australian Climate Change Science Program ($5,536,300)
– Australian Centre for Climate Change Adaptation Program ($35,200)
– Australian Centre for Climate Change Adaptation Program ($660,000)
– Australian Centre for Climate Change Adaptation Program ($770,000)
– South Eastern Australia Climate Initiative (SEACI) ($990,000)
– CSIRO – Doctor John Church ($17,442.70)
– National Climate Change Adaptation Program ($550,000)
– Australian Centre for Climate Change Adaptation Program ($319,000)
– Greenhouse Action in Regional Australia ($1,018,225)
– Australian Centre for Climate Change Adaptation Program ($361,878)
– Climate Change Adaptation Centre Program ($850,000)
Bought and paid for, Simon!
Think Climate! Think Gravy Train!
A low-carbon future???
I thought we were talking about carbon dioxide?
Presumably the Good Doctor is referring to our transcendence from carbon based life forms to a higher (Gaian) spiritual plane where we will no longer be bound by the shackles of physical bodies and thus able to grasp that Utopian “change in behaviour”…
Oh and don’t you love how she’s:- “saying she is not concerned the science may be overlooked as the political battle focused on the carbon tax.”
I’m not surprised this “scientist” is “not concerned the science may be overlooked” when she so blatantly overlooks the unscientific and misleading inference of her language.
Australia has 600 top climate change scientists???? WOW,
There is going to be some serious warming in Au…
Could I please have their names & addresses.
We need separation of Science and Economics just as importantly as separation of Church and State.
I wouldn’t worry too much about Tony Crooks. He knows the next election hinges on Carbon tax and will be booted out if he supports it.
This is just a bit of ‘we are not the same as the National party’ product differentiation. When push comes to shove he won’t support it, but he will try and eke some goodies from Gillard as a possible way of wedging the Greens or other independents.
Have a look at the CV for Ms Megan Clark…..
http://www.csiro.au/people/Megan.Clark.html#3
OMG – she used to be a director for Rothchilds between 2001 & 2003. Perhaps this explains why she supports a carbon tax…or am I being too cynical here?
Or are you being too cynical?
Not as cynical as I Bruce.
Check Simon McKeons CV.
Just what is it with the CSIRO and their love affair with ex bankers?
http://www.australianclimatemadness.com/2010/06/new-csiro-boss-has-no-scientific-pedigree/
I guess there is not much point having a scientist in charge of a pseudo-scientific organisation which the CSIRO has become. Responsible for that nauseating graph of sea level rise in The Australian.
Regarding the following…
“CSIRO chief Dr Megan Clark will today join 600 of Australia’s top climate change scientists [environmental activists – Ed] at a meeting in Cairns to update the latest observations.
Dr Clark says global warming is one of the most challenging issues facing humanity and needs careful consideration.”
What latest observations are these ‘scientists’ referring to?
I question this because they keep talking ‘IPCC pseudo-science’ at a time when the IPCC’s model-based predictions or scenarios have been debunked by real-world observational data.
For example, the temperature rise over the last century has been wiped out in the last couple of years and is still going down. People just have to look at Dr Roy Spencer’s latest chart:
So what does Dr Megan Clark say about that?
I can’t understand how the Dr. Megan Clark’s of this world just blatantly ignore the real science that is put forward on almost a daily basis.
Surely the time is nigh, that they need to stop and think about their own cred. and reputation, before they pedal the debunked theories of the IPCC!