Wednesday
Jun192013
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Here come de heap big warmy
Jun 19, 2013 Climate: MetOffice Telegraph blogger Sean Thomas was at the Met Office meeting and was able to get the low-down on what was said. I think we should be worried.
First, I asked Stephen Belcher, the head of the Met Office Hadley Centre, whether the recent extended winter was related to global warming. Shaking his famous “ghost stick”, and fingering his trademark necklace of sharks’ teeth and mammoth bones, the loin-clothed Belcher blew smoke into a conch, and replied,
“Here come de heap big warmy. Bigtime warmy warmy. Is big big hot. Plenty big warm burny hot. Hot! Hot hot! But now not hot. Not hot now. De hot come go, come go. Now Is Coldy Coldy. Is ice. Hot den cold. Frreeeezy ice til hot again. Den de rain. It faaaalllll. Make pasty.”
Reader Comments (47)
A very perceptive journalist. Wish we had more like him!
As folks used to say, castigat ridendo mores.
I'd have more faith in witch doctors than Met "Doctors".
@ John
The amusing thing is that Mr. Thomas has not really misrepresented Professor Belcher's views.
Nomine facta accordant, in a way.
That should be enough to get him packed off to diversity training school. It did bring back memories of my father talking about white-man's powerful ju-ju used to make it rain. First two men in long white coats walked to the middle of a field. Then they placed six sticks in the ground with four short sticks resting on top. When they were joined by thirteen more men, all wearing white, they would say Play! and it would start to rain.
Thanks Bish for pointing out the cargo cult humor.
Loved the bit at the end about Dr. David Viner too.
If you listen carefully, you can hear my uproarious laughter across the pond.
One message comes thru loud and clear, "we need more money!" and it was ever thus, the never ending cycle of British weather advocacy, politicians tell them [Met Office et al] how it will be and hey presto, as if by magic - a scientific paper[s] is produced!
More bewilderment of confusions is all we get and of course it will be better next year/some time in the near future - when Exeter gets another super computer or, three.
//
Unprecedentedly, I had direct access to the meteorologists concerned, as I was in Exeter in spirit form, and I managed to speak to the principal actors.
//
The Met's 30million pound computer is not powerful enough and has failed to predict the weather correctly. A 100million pound one may just do the weather-predicting trick, or not.
I'm going to be vain and claim I got there first with this ( which resulted in me being denounced for "racism" by a dour glaswegian climate-botherer) -
There's something splendidly Edwardian about us sending our climate emissaries out to spread the word to the primitive peoples of the world...... I can see it now.....
Richie "Jungle" Betts of the M.O. stands in a clearing in the rain forest, the ostrich plumes on his hat wilting in the sticky heat....."I come in the big silver bird to bring you greetings from the Great White Queen across the ocean"......... the chiefs and their warriors listen cautiously and their weathermen sitting at their feet, with their chicken entrails & magic bones spread around, nod approvingly.
"I know your weathermen have told you that the gods are angry and they have tried their best to appease them with their best spells and magic without success - but I have news from the weathermen of The Great White Queen of spells a thousand times more powerful than yours. The Queen has taken much gold from her subjects to build a machine which makes spells we call teraflops. Just one teraflop is more powerful magic than the sacrifice of a thousand fine white goats and with a few more teraflops the weather gods will be happy again"...
A murmur rises from one corner of the clearing and, as an old jungle hand, Richie knows instinctively that something's not quite right - he gives a quizzical look to young Hannah the pretty but inexperienced local D.O. "It's OK Ritch, I've spoken to the chiefs and their weathermen before you came, everything's fine - there are just a few old tribal elders being a bit difficult"...
Ritch feels the hairs stand up on the back of his neck, but he carries on - he's done a lot of these gigs and they've always turned out alright...... "Chiefs, elders and people of this land - without more teraflops the weathermen of The Great White Queen know that the gods will soon flood your valleys and burn your crops and your children will starve. My assistant will now pass among you with pieces of paper we call contracts - if you make your marks on the paper to promise to send gold to the weathermen of The Great White Queen they will buy more teraflops and the gods will be appeased".
Suddenly the murmuring from the old men in the corner starts to spread around the clearing and the volume rises, some of the villagers and even a few of the young warriors start talking to the elders and Ritchie notices their spears are beginning to be pointed towards young Hannah and himself. With no time to lose, he grabs her her arm crying "It's turning nasty we've got to get out of here".....
......... as Ritchie guns the F.O. Land Rover out of the clearing he hears the spears clattering on the roof and realises they've only just made it in time "I don't understand Hannah, it's always worked in the past, what's gone wrong - who were those old guys?"........... "I don't understand either - the chief told me himself they were just a bunch of drooling old loonies that nobody listens too - I think he called them deniers"
Apr 9, 2012 at 12:43 PM | Registered CommenterFoxgoose
One of the comments to the blog has an excellent summary of the current state of climate research:
"Climate him big buggerup"
This is the only way to address warmists. Total ridicule.
Climate scientists have suggested that energy from the greenhouse effect recently changed from heating the atmosphere to heating the oceans.
It's as if when Galileo dropped the balls from the leaning tower of Pisa, they arrived on the ground simultaneously for the first time. Millions of people around the world thought 'funny, they didn't do that yesterday, the heavy one landed first'.
Hot or not, time for a sharp exit?
http://tinyurl.com/hot-hot-hot-not-exit
"Mumbo-Jumbo, Lord of the Quango..."
Yes, making fun of the warmists is a good idea and fun too. But we must not forget the horror they have wrought. Biofuel nonsense has starved many in the developing world. Windmills have created energy poverty in the UK and other places. How would you like to be the African mother who can't feed her child because of some greenies desire to be PC? How would you like to be the pensioner unable to both feed and keep themselves warm because of some fatcat's profiteering in wind farm industrial sites? Yes these so called people should be a figure of fun, but they should also be reviled for the evil they are.
"A 100million pound one may just do the weather-predicting trick"
Or, in Piers Corbyn's case, a £500 one...
I read Sean Thomas' blog and need somebody in the know to confirm if this is what was said or he is just making fun of the "climate scientists" involved. I just cannot believe that this is what was said.
Is this actually defamation of character if the blog is untrue?
Jeen. E. Us.
Or salvia corrugata lathyrus vernus, as I often quip to my colleagues.
John Peter,
"I just cannot believe that this is what was said.
Is this actually defamation of character if the blog is untrue?"
!
"I just cannot believe that this is what was said."
It's not defamation if you make fun of someone who tells you that warming and cold are caused by warming,
I recognise this chap as a longstanding and frequent commenter at the 'Political Betting' blog, where he used to go by 'SeanT' (link on the right-hand side of this blog). I didn't know he had a Telegraph blog but then I haven't read PB in a few years.
World Bank: "Time to stop arguing about climate change". Enough to make you weep.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/06/19/uk-worldbank-climate-idUKBRE95I0BN20130619
John Peter: He wasn't there - see my edited quote above @ 12:57pm
Pasty or pastey, that is the question.
James Evans - your language is getting a bit flowery!
For both the Met Office and CRU I am proposing a new regime of 'Payment by Results' for all funding including wages.
Both agencies to be tasked to make forecasts and all payment will directly depend on the accuracy of the results. Forecasts will contain no passive language, error ranges to be strictly limited.
Met Office forecast will run up to 3 months into the future, CRU funding will depend on the accuracy of all forecasts and reports from the last 15 years to the present and weighted to reflect the publicity they enjoyed.
I believe such minor changes would improve all future forecasting in both accuracy and focus.
So soggy summers are "extreme" and "unusual" for the British Isles?
Like this has never happened before?
The arrogance of these rent-seekers never ceases to astound.
Excellent article - sufficiently cutting and so well deserved!
I think we have here an excellent pastiche of the Met Office position on climate, and it could be printed on or just after the title page of every one of their briefing and sales documents. Here it is again since we are now a few screens away from the start:
I think this would reduce the risk of the Met Office doing more harm to this country by helping users get their climate forecasts into a sensible perspective. Basically, prudent and anxious people should plan for as wide a range of climate conditions as we have seen over the past few hundred years in their area - as wide, that is, as they can afford. If they are really rich, they could add a little extra spread just to be on the safe side. Cold, being more of a threat than warmth, should probably be their main pre-occupation, but it is far to early to be spending very much on anything other than looking to live in a well-insulated house, installing multi-fuel stoves to back up gas and oil supplies, and looking to have excellent internet and other communication and transport links within easy reach.
Shaking his famous “ghost stick”, and fingering his trademark necklace of sharks’ teeth and mammoth bones, the loin-clothed Belcher blew smoke into a conch, and replied, Here come de heap big warmy. Bigtime warmy warmy ...
What worries me most is that I cannot work out where factual reporting stops and the sarcasm starts.
Josh ?
Laugh-out-loud funny. Wonderful!
It brings to mind the episode of Asterix where a (bogus) soothsayer arrives in the middle of a thunderstorm, and receives great acclaim when he successfully forecasts that the sun will come out afterwards. This seals his credentials and he dines out on it until he is finally called upon to forecast something more difficult...
Loved it! Very funny.
Perfect for a slot on Have I Got News for You this week doncha think!
Oh...
More ridicule like this please.
jamesp, I read that Asterix book again just last week, and I also thought of climatologists...
There is more:
Satire gold.
Thanks. If laughter is the best medicine, I shall certainly see out the rest of the year!
When articles in the MSM start to parody and ridicule the warmists you have to know the end is near. Brilliant and long waited for, articles like this will do more than any number of scientific forums, debates, data discussions and parliamentary committees to demolish the church of global warming. I'm not diminishing the former list and huge effort of those behind the aformentioned efforts, they were absolutley essential, nor am I diminishing Joshes stalwart work. The published article for me is a breath of fresh air in a fetid room.
I think of astrologer Thrasyllus whenever I hear of climate scientists, their models and predictions.
"Excellent. I knew it. My calculations prove it. The chart doesn't lie."
See here and here for the relevant bits.
Actually, if we could have the next climatologists' conference in Rhodes and throw into the sea all those who failed in their predictions, we might turn that particular field into something better than astrology.
Pith hat futures are looking volatile.
LOL:
19 June: Bloomberg: Alessandro Vitelli: EU Carbon Market Needs Immediate Changes, Policy Exchange Says
An independent advisory institution could be established to review the system every two to three years and recommend changes to the market, Newey said.
The specific circumstances in which the market could be adjusted would include “when macroeconomic conditions change significantly from what they were when the cap was set, if the climate science changes, or if there is progress on an international climate deal that would require the EU to take on more ambition, or less,” Newey said.
Policy Exchange was founded by Michael Gove, Francis Maude and Nicholas Boles, who are all now ministers in the U.K.’s coalition government…
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-18/eu-carbon-market-needs-immediate-changes-policy-exchange-says.html
That’s just damn funny. :)
The thing is (he says, threatening to analyse comedy which you should never do) is that this is one of those skits that works outside the rather more select, sardonic, snarky world of climate blog comedy.
I see from twitter even the likes of Leo Hickman seem a bit exasperated by the MET’s claims of media distortion. Once you see that then you realise this joke isn't just a one sided snark (even if it was intended that way) but has hit a wider funny bone :)
Pith hat futures are looking volatile.
Jun 20, 2013 at 4:59 AM | Registered Commenterjohanna
That is because too many people are taking the pith, Johanna.
The bit that is still cracking me up is the detail about the "ghost stick"....for some reason it makes me think of another type of stick that brought climate psyence into similar disregard.
OK. I really should add this cos it's been bothering me for some time.
Dear Foxgoose,
Mate, unless a wog who goes by the name sHx tells you you are a racist, you are definitely not a racist. Rest assured and be comfortable for your past 'misdeeds'.
I am very sensitive to racist remarks, and the reputation of the BH community in that regard has so far been impeccable, regardless of whatever a Glaswegian tells you. Take my word for it, not some Scottish peasant's.
It is pretty racist though.
It is pretty racist though.
I take it you are some Scottish peasant. ;-)
Brilliant, Foxgoose...
I like these touches:
"Startled by this sobering analysis.."
"It’s a pretty stark analysis, and not without merit."
Captures the tone and spirit of so much of the media's vacuous commentary on The Big Myth.