Is it plausible that scientists are faking global warming?

There is no surer way for a scientist to ruin his career than by faking science. Other scientists expose him, and he's gone.

In one famous case a researcher's own graduate students doubted the work. They met, and decided that, if they shared their suspicions, it would likely cause great damage to their own careers. They did it anyway.

And they were right. They lost the value of all the work they'd done, and had to start over. Most left science instead.

The history of science is loaded with cases where someone tried this, and got caught. To think that hundreds of climatologists would do this is pretty strange.

Note that no "skeptical" scientists accuse their peers of faking anything. They just have another theory. The "it's a fake argument" ONLY comes from political sources.

2008-04-03T07:09:43Z

Note that, once the data was in, _scientists_ didn't think the Earth was flat or that the Sun revolved around it.

2000 years ago Eratosthenes measured the diameter of the Earth. Once that data was in, there was a scientific consensus that the Earth was round. Only ignorant "skeptics" who denied scientific fact said it was flat.

Once Galileo demonstrated the phases of Venus, there was a scientific consensus the Earth revolved around the Sun. Only ignorant "skeptics" who denied scientific fact persecuted Galileo.

The analogies to global warming are obvious.

2008-04-03T07:17:33Z

Clarification - mostly man made global warming

2008-04-03T08:33:10Z

Galileo and Eratosthenes did not "stand alone". Based on their data the scientific community joined them rapidly. It was ignorant "skeptics" (much like the ones today) who denied scientific fact, who stood apart from them.

2008-04-03T08:55:01Z

Re: the data. Is it any more plausible that scientists aren't aware of the uncertainties about the data they use?

The fact is that, even using the range of data possible because of uncertainty, you still get the same answer. Mostly man made.

It's a powerful reason for the massive agreement among scientists. This isn't a close call, it's overwhelming, even considering the uncertainty in the data.

Dana19812008-04-03T09:25:44Z

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Not only is it not plausible, it's simply not possible.

I mean, consider what it would take to perpetrate such a hoax. Scientists have been warning of AGW since the 1960s.

http://www.usatoday.com/weather/climate/globalwarming/2008-02-20-global-cooling_N.htm

So basically you're talking about millions of scientists perpetrating a massive hoax for 4 decades, falsifying data with not one single credible person revealing the 'truth'. Even the skeptical scientists don't claim it's all a fraud or hoax. That's really all you need to know in order to conclude that it's not a hoax. Credible skeptics like Lindzen might disagree with the theory or its projections, but they don't argue that it's all a fraud.

Even if you ignore the absurd amount of collusion that such an immense hoax would require, and the fact that scientific frauds on far, far smaller scales have been revealed almost immediately, consider the fame that a scientist would get for disproving the hoax. If global warming were really due to the Sun, and all scientists have been saying it's not, and another scientist proved that this was the case - you're talking infamy, Nobel Prizes, etc. etc. Any scientist would love to disprove AGW if it were wrong.

To be blunt, people who think AGW is all just a massive fraud or hoax are just nutty conspiracy theorists like the guys who think there are aliens at Area 51 and the moon landing was faked. They've divorced themselves from reality, and so there's simply no reasoning with them.

Larry2008-04-03T07:37:55Z

I think they don't fully understand the causes of climate change and they go with what they do know. They know that greenhouse gases reflect some of the heat back down to the surface of the planet and that man has increased greenhouse gases and the global temperature is 1ºC warmer. I believe the computer models give CO2 too much credit though and that has been observed many times through the revised IPCC predictions that exaggerate the expected future warming.

If you look at the geological record, you will find that CO2 has little effect on temperature and that it is just a minor feedback. If CO2 had as much influence as the IPCC computer models give it, the world would have overheated a long time ago.

Look at the latest IPCC report and search for the words: uncertainty, uncertainties and assumption

I think it is reasonable to assume that the science is in its' infancy and that there are many unknowns at present.

Edit:
The data is far from being all in.

Barbi2015-03-27T21:42:25Z

Well they told us in the 1970's that we were entering a 10,000 year ice age so I guess we have some time before we need to worry about it, huh> Look for your self you wern''t away=re then it was the hot media topic of the time.

gundaniumarmy2008-04-03T06:46:22Z

The idea that most of the scientists today would knowingly fake data to "prove" global warming is slightly absurd. They may all have mistaken or misinterpreted data, but the idea that they knowingly and purposefully manipulated the data doesn't make sense. Someone somewhere would leak that and make millions off of the book deal.

It is possible for scientists to simply not have enough data or to have interpreted the data incorrectly. It wasn't that long ago that scientists thought that the Earth was flat and that the sun revolved around the Earth.

Ben O2008-04-03T07:18:28Z

I disagree that faking science is bad for your career - people can get away with a lot if they are politically well connected.
Micheal Mann found a hockey stick that wasn't in his raw data, prehaps intentionally or perhaps by a programming error on his part. Finding this hockey stick seems to have done more good than harm to his career and his peers have rushed to his defence claiming that despite any shortcomings in his scientific technique, he got the right answer (apparently by pure luck).

The other problem with climate science is that the processes are not transparant. Case in point are the numbers that the IPCC use for equivalent radiative forcings for various factors. The 500 pages or so of each IPCC report does not include a detailed explanation of where these numbers come from.

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