ON ABC radio 702 Sydney this morning, host Adam Spencer engaged in what you might describe as a relatively lively chat with climate change denier Lord Christopher Monckton.
Spencer challenged Lord Monckton on his qualifications, questioned his links to mining squillionnaire Gina Rinehart, pressed him on his misrepresentations of the science and asked him to clarify whether he is, or is not, a member of the House of Lords.
Lord Monckton wasn’t too pleased and told Spencer to “shut up” which, obligingly for some listeners but not to Monckton, Spencer ignored.
There’s much to chew over in the interview, but one of Lord Monckton’s claims jumped out like an environmentalist at a mining conference. His claim to be a Nobel Laureate.
Spencer: Are you a Nobel Laureate as is claimed on many websites?
Monckton: I don’t know what websites… there is no website that I control that says any such thing.
Really? No website that you control? This, from Lord Monckton’s biography on the Science and Public Policy Institute‘s website, where Lord Monckton is Chief Policy Advisor.
His contribution to the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report in 2007 – the correction of a table inserted by IPCC bureaucrats that had overstated tenfold the observed contribution of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets to sea-level rise – earned him the status of Nobel Peace Laureate. His Nobel prize pin, made of gold recovered from a physics experiment, was presented to him by the Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Rochester, New York, USA.
And just in case you think I’m making this up, a screen grab from the same page.
I should just point out that there’s nothing too revelatory about this incident. Journalist Hugh Riminton pointed this out when Lord Monckton was last in Australia, in February 2010.
What an excellent piece of pwnage by Adam Spencer. He is one smart cookie that spencer. Slightly different from the gimme interviews he gets from the right wing media. Another hilarious bit of pwnage is the high court preventing Moncktons block of the BBC airing a show on his denialism.
http://www.carbonbrief.org/blog/2011/01/monckton-loses-fight-against-bbc
Tee he hee. That documentary is going to be a sweet sweet thing & hopefully shown in prime time t.v on repeat for days.
Will it be as sweet as seeing the clip of Graham getting pwned at the Brisbane Institute debate? Tee hee hee.
Oksanna, or Monckton being humiliated on his own turf by Tim Lambert.
Let’s reminisce for a moment.
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010/02/moncktons_mcluhan_moment.php
Monckton traveled the world with his killer piece of evidence “Do Satellites Detect Trends in Surface Solar Radiation?” , by “Pinker”…
Now ,not only did Monckton think he had the killer bit of evidence, but regarding Pinker….he said he “knew him”.
Tim Lambert showed that not only did Monckton not “know” Pinker, as Pinker was a “her” & not a him, but Lambert produced a voice recording from professor Pinker saying that Monckton misrepresented her work & didn’t know what he was talking about.
Oh….the tears, the thigh slapping…no more…ahaha!
Deniers & liars for hire, they are a funny bunch.
Graham, why are you such a hateful person? I have never seen you debate anyone on the science involved (which you seem to have zero knoweldge of), all you seem to do is throwe insults at those who do not agree with the group think position. As far as the Nobel prize is concerned, Monckton was mocking the IPCC.
btw, saw your Brisbane effort, I would not be too exposed if I were you, that performace was truly awful and not one that an itelligent seeker of the truth journo would undertake.
“Graham, why are you such a hateful person?”
I don’t see any hate there. He is shining the spotlight on a verified fraud that’s all. A fraud that is allowed to peddle his wares to the gullible.
Monckton Myths – a one-stop-shop for Monckton misinformation: http://www.skepticalscience.com/news.php?n=544
One wonders why Spencer doesn’t use such aggressive interrogation of the likes of Flannery [who is not a climatologist either and has an economic interest in a renewable energy company] or Garnaut, who isn’t even a scientist. Mind you, it is the ABC so one would not expect political fairness and balance to raise its ugly head.
Anyway, on to the debate itself at the NPC. Anyone who watched couldn’t help but conclude it was Monckton First, daylight Second.
A poll conducted by Roy Morgan shows I’m not Robinson Crusoe there.
http://www.roymorgan.com/news/press-releases/2011/1393/
Not only did he win convincingly, he persuaded a significant 9% to his view that alarmism is exaggerated.
I know I won’t persuade any “rusted on” types here, but the results speak for themselves. Amazing how people’s minds can be opened when they listen to both sides instead of just the sound of one hand clapping!
If you’re not happy with Roy Morgan, try Newspoll or Nielsen. While acolytes here exhibit a barely disguised arrogance and disdain for contrary views, subjects of polling are increasingly making it clear the tax is as popular as anthrax and the issue of AGW is a beatup. Get used to it, guys and girls. This is one bird that won’t fly!
Finally, the fact Monckton wiped the floor with Professor Denniss would have pleased our esteemed blogger too, given the humiliation of last year’s effort in Brisbane. Reason wins out over ideology an dfaith, every time.