Customer Reviews

The Lomborg Deception: Setting the Record Straight About Global Warming

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4 star:		(1)
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2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is a failed attempt to rubbish Bjorn Lomborg, author of The Skeptical Environmentalist and Cool it!

In Chapter One Friel proves, unsurprisingly, that Lomborg is not part of the `consensus that projected unprecedented warming with potentially catastrophic consequences if green house emissions were not significantly reduced'.

Chapter Two looks at the numbers of polar bears. Lomborg claimed that their numbers have risen, from 5,000 in the 1960s to 25,000 today. Friel cites a 2001 report by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature Polar Bear Specialist Group that there are between 21,500 and 25,000. Then he berates Lomborg for writing of a `stable' bear population when the report said `stationary'.

Al Gore said, "polar bears have been drowning in significant numbers." Friel seems to think that the Center for Biological Diversity's 2008 report proves this true when it wrote, "polar bears are at risk of drowning in large numbers" and "polar bear drowning events are expected". But that is not the same as saying that they are currently `drowning in significant numbers'.

Friel often misreads Lomborg. For example, Lomborg wrote, "Some of the largest colonies contain more than twenty thousand pairs [of Emperor penguins] each, several of which may be increasing." Friel writes, "penguin colonies in one of the areas (and not `several', as Lomborg wrote) `may be increasing'". But Lomborg's `several' referred to colonies not to areas.

Lomborg cites the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's 2007 estimate that sea levels will rise about a foot by 2100: Friel calls Lomborg's statement `narrowly accurate' and `not wholly inaccurate'. Yet Friel then tries to justify Gore's 20-feet rise estimate as `a not entirely hypothetical possibility'. Again, Friel quotes reports saying that sea levels could rise by five feet by 2100, without assessing how likely this is.

Friel quotes a 2002 conference of the American Geophysical Union, "The melting of Greenland glaciers and Arctic Ocean sea ice this past summer reached levels not seen in decades." He can't see that this wrecks the case for `unprecedented warming'. (If these levels were seen decades ago, they are not unprecedented.) Nor can they be a `record', yet The New York Times headlined the conference, `Arctic Ice is Melting at Record Levels, Scientists Say' (8 December 2002). This is the kind of exaggeration that Lomborg criticises.

Other examples include a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences which concluded that climate change is `largely irreversible' for the next 1000 years, and James Hansen writing, "If the present overshoot of this target CO2 [of 350 ppm] is not brief, there is a possibility of seeding irreversible catastrophic effects."

Again, the Worldwatch Institute said that we will have to end `the emission of carbon dioxide by 2050 to avoid catastrophic disruption to the world's climate'. The Independent's Michael McCarthy reported, "Lord Stern said new research done in the past two or three years had made it clear there were `severe risks' if global temperature rose by the predicted 4C to 7C by 2100. Agriculture would be destroyed and life would be impossible over much of the planet, the former World Bank chief economist said."

But the IPCC said in 2007, "Globally, the potential for food production is projected to increase with increases in local average temperature over a range of 1 to 30C, but above this it is projected to decrease." Yet Friel concludes, "It is also fair to say that Lomborg's prognosis that `we will be able to feed the world ever better' because of global warming was not supported by either Lomborg's own sources or the 2007 IPCC assessment of the issue."

The IPCC also said in 2007, "Abrupt climate changes, such as the collapse of the West Antarctica Ice Sheet, the rapid loss of the Greenland Ice Sheet or large-scale changes of ocean circulation systems, are not considered likely to occur in the 21st century, based on currently available model results."

The book is well written and contains much relevant criticism of Lomborg. Although some points of criticism could be regarded as small details, they do illustrate that Lomborg's treatment of his sources is not reliable, and the book also deals with many points of great importance. The book once more stresses that one should not take Lomborg's postulates at face value, and one should not be impressed by the technical matter-of-fact appearance of Lomborg's books. Out of his thousands of notes and references, many do not say what he postulates that they say. Friel's book serves as a much needed immunization against believing Lomborg on his word.

On my have web site I have posted relevant links, e.g. to Lomborgs defence against the book and Friel's reply. I also have an independent evaluation of the conflict between the two, and a lengthy review of Friel's book.

[...]

I had a problem with Lomberg's books, I don't know where his numbers come from or how he calculated. There are holes but if it was simplification or deception, I couldn't tell. So I was looking forward to Finn clarifying the detail.

Sadly, I was massively disappointed with "The Lonberg deception" . Finn loves the word "balance" and that is exactly what this book is. "Balance" is simply a journalist deception technique claiming that all bias and non bias are the same thing. By taking two options one never has to deal with pesky reality. Finn book seem to be about defending his switch to balance instead critiquing Longberg. Finn describes his supporters with the most elaborate grandiose title possible while detractors are discounted. The merits of the ideas are always avoided. He calls Lindzen a controversial meteorologist that studied at MIT where Ian Stirling is part of the Royal Society of Canada and a scientist. This wouldn't matter if Finn arguments all revolted around who has a better degree.

An example of this book is the Kyoto treaty, Lomberg describes it as wildly expensive with no intention of working claiming that there will not be the money for anything else. He claims doing something designed to fail is a bad idea. Finn tries disproving by saying that Kyoto is step one and it was designed to fail the benefits would be in step two, claiming just because it won't work isn't a reason not to try. No question of Lombergs financial numbers, no question of the economic theory, no questions that Kyoto won't fail.

Finn is preaching to the choir nothing more. He adds nothing if you are trying to learn more about the issue or the ideas behind it.

The above one-starred review is misleading and false. The author of this book, Friel, traces Lomborg's mis-appropriations, diversions, non-sequitirs, and bald-faced lies through a myriad of references, not just IPCC reports.

These sources include:
ACIA Reports (Arctic Climate Impact Assessment)
British Antarctic Survey
Center for Biological Diversity
WHO
FAO
Earth Policy Institute
The Ebi Report
UNESCO
Foreign Affairs (Journal)
Global Environmental Outlook Report
Hadley Center Reports
IFPRI
IUCN
New Scientist
New York Times
US News and World Report
NASA ESSDS
NASA Goddard Institute
Science
Scientific American

plus dozens more. A well-researched book on a very poorly-researched one. But Friel makes very clear that Lomborg is much more than simply ill-informed. His selective and actively-misleading use of references was meant solely to deceive. Shame on Cambridge UP for publishing that garbage, even if it was their social sciences review division.

Anyone who ever thought that Lomborg had anything useful to contribute to the debate about the state of the planet must read this book!

Its author provides a detailed page-by-page account of how Lomborg studiously overlooks all the key facts that do not fit his preconceptions, falsifies what the peer-review literature states, and fabricates material to his ends. No wonder the Danish Committee of Scientific Misconduct called him "dishonest." This is the book to show how Lomorg did it. Yes, it's an account of a sordid few years, but in detailing how Lomborg and his ilk produce this nonsense, there is no better guide. As a journalist who specializes in investigations -- and not a scientist with an axe to grind -- Howard Friel is the very best person to write this debunking.

Definately a very good book to read, even as some of the criticisms of Lomborg's work does seem to be at times trivial, it in the whole makes a very important and clear refutal of many of Lomborg's main arguments and severely criticizes his scientific integrity in terms of arguements made concerning the expected impacts of climate change. The book focuses more on the environmental rather than the economic arguments Lomborg makes however, and would have been better to also address more of these issues.

The author, Howard Friel, should not be seen as an individual who approaches this subject with no bias, no political framework which might, might color his approach. With a quick Google search, I see that Mr. Friel was a research assistant to Edward Herman, who colloborated with Noam Chomsky - heard of him? These are people with very strong opinions. I'm not saying this makes Mr. Friel defacto wrong about his positions, of course not, just that be wary if you think he's a neutral source. And if I'm wrong, then I shouldn't have trusted [...]! This is an interesting debate, though, and I wish there was a Tim Russert - type author who would take it on.