Global Warming: Man or Myth?

OR

Forbes Magazine Uses Architect for Climate Science Advice

Sound too ridiculous to be true? 

Well, one of these storylines IS true!

The stars tell me you should invest in real estate because housing prices will triple in the next year. Do not believe the experts that state otherwise.

The scientists are wrong, the military is wrong, health officials are wrong, and the insurance industry is wrong. Relax, climate change is nothing to worry about.

No, Forbes to my knowledge does not use astrologers for financial advising.

Yes, Forbes has an architect very badly advising its readers about climate science.  That person is Larry Bell.

In several recent posts Larry Bell has engaged in:

1. Smearing the reputations of climate scientists.
2. Making false statements about the current state of climate science.
3. Cherry-picking data to misdirect his readers away from the mountains of evidence that humans are causing the globe to warm.

What qualifications does Bell have that impressed Forbes so much that he is now advising on science?  Take a look at his credentials.  Apparently all one needs to be a science advisor at Forbes Magazine is an MFA in Industrial Design.

In his most recent post (02/09/11) he maligns several top climate scientists including, among others, Ben Santer and Michael Mann. 

Bell, although never a part of the IPCC process, states “The Chapter 8 lead author, Ben Santor (sic), had excised denials of any scientific evidence of man-made warming, replacing them with statements asserting the opposite”  These claims have no basis in fact and are, in my opinion, grounds for a lawsuit.  Here is the real story from Dr. Santer:

Close Encounters of the Absurd Kind

Of course, this link has been available at Realclimate for almost a year so Bell obviously does no research.  He did not even spell Santer correctly!

In a typical amateur move, Bell also takes a shot at Michael Mann’s “hockey stick” temperature reconstruction.  Bell writes: “The chart has been thoroughly debunked thanks to careful analysis by two Canadian researchers who uncovered a variety of serious problems. Included are exclusion of natural climate change evidence of the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age, calculation errors, data used twice, and a computer program that produced a hockey stick out of whatever data was fed into it.” 

Dr. Mann’s work has been verified by many other international scientists.  The hockey stick-shape temperature plot that shows modern climate considerably warmer than past climate has been shown by many scientists using different methodologies (PCA, CPS, EIV, isotopic analysis, & direct T measurements).

Bell’s lack of scientific understanding has been thoroughly detailed at Realclimate with the post Forbes’ rich list of nonsense and in a subsequent letter that Forbes management promised to publish and never did. 

 As written in that letter:

No financial executive planning for future risk based on the latest science would ever dismiss the entire body of science because of a few cherry-picked studies. This is precisely what Bell is asking Forbes readers to do. This disingenuous practice is a disservice to Forbes readers who require objective and factual information to carry out responsible risk assessments and to inform their economic and policy decisions, all of which are affected by a rapidly changing climate.

Forbes is undermining its credibility by having someone so clearly unqualified speak about science. Bell is not a climate scientist. He holds an MFA in industrial design. There are many sources of credible authoritative information on climate change and Forbes should make use of them instead of relying on a person who is demonstrably uninformed about the science.