Global Warming, Again

Last time, I mused on the similarity between global warmingism and the sale of indulgences.

Science Daily has an article attempting to support the idea using an appeal to numbers.

"Two questions were key: have mean global temperatures risen compared to pre-1800s levels, and has human activity been a significant factor in changing mean global temperatures.

About 90 percent of the scientists agreed with the first question and 82 percent the second."

Agreement does not equal truth. There is also some nice ad hominem:

"Petroleum geologists and meteorologists were among the biggest doubters, with only 47 and 64 percent respectively believing in human involvement."

"The petroleum geologist response is not too surprising, but the meteorologists' is very interesting," he said. "Most members of the public think meteorologists know climate, but most of them actually study very short-term phenomenon."

Of course, climatologists are smarter than us, so we need to bow down (our economies) to them:

"They're [climatologists are] the ones who study and publish on climate science. So I guess the take-home message is, the more you know about the field of climate science, the more you're likely to believe in global warming and humankind's contribution to it."

Of course, there is no self selection here. How many people who doubt climate change are going to remain in a field dominated by climate change group think? How many people are jumping on the band wagon of easy funding and publishing? 'Cause that never happens...