http://home4.inet.tele.dk/jensguld/JyllandsPesten.htm

Don’t have the kneejerk reaction that “Scandinavians are socialists” or anything like that

Iceland fell for the entire market fundamentalism cult paradigm, believing it was rational, scientific economics:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/iris-lee/libertarian-experiment-in_b_172961.html

Just as in Argentina and Chile, what happened was the resources of the average person were melted down, the safety net was cut up into snippets, and a handful of elites made a killing. What they killed in this case was the whole economy of a whole country.

This is not a surprise. Believe me, Denmark has its rabid reactionaries just like the US, that’s exactly how the con govt. got in a while back. In fact, Jyllands Posten the paper that got in the controversy over the Islam-bashing cartoons was openly pro-Hitler in WW II, and its owner bought the top progressive paper

Hey Mikkel – how’s your red-baiting, environmentalist scapegoating, rich elite master-pleasing market fundamentalism working out for Iceland? And why didn’t you move there? I can assure you they understand Danish very well.

What part of that Lomborg’s “contributions” have been completely rejected by Denmark’s scientists has not gotten through the mail yet?

Also, again – quantity is not quality.

Hils Danmark!

“I can say with certainty that Lomborg is misrepresenting our findings… Lomborg claims that our “bottom line is that benefits from global warming right now outweigh the costs” and that “[g]lobal warming will continue to be a net benefit until about 2070.” This is a deliberate distortion of our conclusions… ”

Full column here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/aug/22/climatechange.carbonemissions

“I can say with certainty that Lomborg is misrepresenting our findings… Lomborg claims that our “bottom line is that benefits from global warming right now outweigh the costs” and that “[g]lobal warming will continue to be a net benefit until about 2070.” This is a deliberate distortion of our conclusions… ”

Full column here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/aug/22/climatechange.carbonemissions

Thanks, especially for willingness to do Danish->English.

My problem is this: I’m quite familiar with the tactics of creating delay and confusion, starting especially with the cigarette wars in the US, which are well-documented in on-line databases.

Every cigarette company says it’s all for health, see for example R J Reynolds, which says among others:

“Minors should never use tobacco products and adults who do not use or have quit using tobacco products should not start.”

Is that clear? R. J. Reynolds is against minors’ smoking. That’s what they say…
Do you think we can find much of their PR or public comments that say “Our business depends on getting kids addicted, which is why we invented TwistaLime.” I doubt it, although it’s true.

Do you understand the “I don’t disagree with X, but there are all these problems” style of argument, designed to cast doubt or cause confusion?

I’m looking at the UK edition of Cool It!
IPCC references are on pages:
11, yes, but…
25-6, Kyoto
68, IPCC hockeystick flawed
73, glaciers (Lomborg is deadly wrong)
76, shows IPCC graph
77, misrepresents IPCC on sealevel rise meaning
87- casts doubt on scenarios
125-6, IPCC OK

So, actually, he often tried to shwo the IPCC is wrong on the science, but he usually doesn’t come out and say so, but uses “IPCC says … but…” and then cherry-picks or obfuscates.

For context, you might want to study the progression of arguments:

a) there’s no global warming
b) well, there might be, but not human-caused
c) well, it might be a little human-caused, not much
d) but actually, it’s good for us
e) or it would cost too much to do anything about
f) and it’s too late, so we should just adapt

and the bottom line, the whole time, is always:
“And no CO2 restrictions”.

Entering this game a bit late, Lomborg skipped to d), e) and f) without going through a), b), and c), except to frequently cast doubt on the IPCC. he certainly believes McIntyre, although if he can’t be bothered to use linear regressions, it seems fair to question his statistical expertise…

By the way, do you ever talk to IPCC authors? If not, you might want to try that some time. Nobody should accept it as gospel, just the best guess we’ve got from very good people.

The problem I have is that someone *says* “Yes I accept that the Earth is warming” but then *does* everything possible in the details to cast doubt on it, and to prevent doing anything about it, I tend to believe the latter.

Anyway, I’ll look forward to any more info, especially as your local knowledge is rare. But, I would especially be interested in a clearer answer to why someone who represented himself as a statistician could say what he did…

With regard to Lomborg being a denialist and the use of short term statistics I will also return with a more thorough comment. He is being quoted out of context is my simple conclusion at first. As for your question;
“Would you agree he is saying global warming either isn’t real, or has stopped ”
I think the best answer is given by Lomborg himself. In every book he accepts global warming science and never denounces IPCC or the science it is based on. More recently and simply put.
“I point this out not to challenge the reality of global warming or the fact that it’s caused in large part by humans…”
” It’s wrong to deny the obvious: The Earth is warming, and we’re causing it.”
Both from an article in the Washington Post.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/05/AR2007100501676.html

Lomborg is no scientist and does not claim to be. He is concerned with the misuse of science politically and by some ‘environmentalists’.

I will return with more later on Fog and the interview with Connnie Hedegaard.

Lastly, I agree completely with you on your comments on statistics and how these can be willfully mispresented (alternatively stupidly misread).
I also agree completely that denialist using any statistics routed in 1998 until now (or any other short period) does not deserve serious attention. I am not a denier, however I am very sceptical about some of the meassures we utilize.