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The Great Global Warming Blunder: How Mother Nature Fooled the World's Top Climate Scientists (Encounter Broadsides) Hardcover – Illustrated, April 13, 2010
| Roy W Spencer (Author) Find all the books, read about the author, and more. See search results for this author |
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In fact, Spencer presents astonishing new evidence that recent warming is not the fault of humans, but the result of chaotic, internal natural cycles that have been causing periods of warming and cooling for millennia. More carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is not necessarily to be feared; The Great Global Warming Blunder explains that burning of fossil fuels may actually be beneficial for life on Earth.
As group-think behavior and misguided global warming policy proposals threaten the lives of millions of the world’s poorest, most vulnerable citizens, The Great Global Warming Blunder is a scintillating exposé and much-needed call for debate.
- Print length176 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherEncounter Books
- Publication dateApril 13, 2010
- Dimensions6.5 x 1 x 9.5 inches
- ISBN-109781594033735
- ISBN-13978-1594033735
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Product details
- ASIN : 1594033730
- Publisher : Encounter Books (April 13, 2010)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 176 pages
- ISBN-10 : 9781594033735
- ISBN-13 : 978-1594033735
- Item Weight : 16 ounces
- Dimensions : 6.5 x 1 x 9.5 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #262,670 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #159 in Environmental Policy
- #303 in Climatology
- #740 in Environmental Science (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author

Roy W. Spencer is a Principal Research Scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. He was formerly a Senior Scientist for Climate Studies at NASA. He is co-developer of the original satellite method for precise monitoring of global temperatures from Earth-orbiting satellites. He has provided congressional testimony several times on the subject of global warming and authored the 2008 New York Times bestseller, Climate Confusion.
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Dr. Spencer has taken a very scientific and complicated subject and put it into easy to read and understand layman’s terms. His premise is that Carbon Dioxide (CO2) regulations are expensive, drive up the cost of energy and consumer goods, and hurt the poor the most, so governments, ours in particular, darn sure better have an ironclad case that it’s absolutely necessary before the begin placing burdensome and costly regulations on producers of CO2 emissions. And if they don’t have an ironclad case, reinforced by rigorous and extensive research into other potential causes of global warming, and a thorough independent scientific peer review of the work that IPCC scientists have done to support the hypothesis that CO2 is the cause of global warming, then they need to wait until they do before taking any action. And they don't have an ironclad case, or an independent review.
Dr. Spencer’s premise also is that climate scientists have been so diligently focusing on and examining each individual tree, they have entirely missed the forest. His contention is that Occam’s Razors should apply and that the simplest explanation is likely the correct explanation.
Dr. Spencer believes that climate scientists at IPCC have confused forcing and feedback (cause and effect) and got it backwards. This has created problems with all their computer models in that they neglect half the mechanisms that cause climate change, and the result is a more sensitive climate system than is actually the case. He believes that a less complex and more elegant climate modeling, looking at the big picture, is a better approach to understand how the climate works. “An elegant model is only as elaborate as it needs to be to capture the essence of a particular source of complexity, but no more elaborate.” Dr. Spencer’s uses observations and satellite data to support his hypothesis rather than theoretical calculations, massive computer models, and powerful computers.
Dr. Spencer’s theory is that the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) can itself potentially explain most of what is popularly called global warming, and can explain the warming during the 1940s followed by cooling until the 1970s (a time when there was a rapid increase in CO2 and other greenhouses gas emissions) and then resumed warming through the 1990. IPCC scientists and their models can’t explain the period of cooling and have made some interesting attempts to erase this cooling from history.
Nine years of our best NASA satellite data combined with Dr. Spencer’s simple climate model (run on a home computer) reveal that the PDO causes cloud changes that might be sufficient to explain most of the major variations in global average temperature since 1900, including 75% of the warming trend. Dr. Spencer believes that the PDO is the source of 75% of global warming trend during the twentieth century, and the rest can be attributed to the addition of CO2 and other anthropogenic (manmade) forcings in addition to the climate influences of the Artic Oscillation, Atlantic Mid-decadal Oscillation and Pacific Decadal Oscillation, which are similar to the PDO but not included in Dr. Spencer’s simple climate model, as well as El Nino and La Nina, also not included.
Dr. Spencer’s says, “I’m convinced that this global warming hysteria is a crises created by the left for the advancement and financial benefit of the left on a global scale.” Dr. Spencer believes, “that there is a conspiracy among some politicians and some of the IPCC leaders to get international agreements to regulate greenhouse gas emissions no matter what the science says. Whether their motivations are financial or political, or they are looking for meaning in their lives, these folks seem to be wishing that humanity is in grave danger from manmade global warming. In short, the issue of global warming involves scientists and politicians who have a vested interest in the consensus being correct. How can the IPCC leadership be so sure that global warming is manmade when they have never even investigated possible natural sources of global warming?” He points out that millions of dollars have been spent on proving climate change is manmade, but virtually nothing has been spent on seeking alternate explanations. IPCC leaders decided climate change was manmade and proceeded to set up the science to prove it.
Dr. Spencer says, “One might expect that the US government would have put serious funding toward research into possible natural explanations for global warming before setting about to make hugely expensive and massively disruptive policy changes. But very little money has ever been awarded by the government for that purpose. Most of the funding for global warming research has gone toward building on the assumption of anthropogenic climate change with increasingly complex computer models.” For politicians its controlling energy production which increases their control over tax dollars which in turn increases their power and provides opportunities to increase their personal wealth.
Dr. Spencer has another interesting twist on the increasing CO2 hysteria. He says, “so what.” He says, “carbon dioxide is necessary for life on earth. Photosynthesis by plants and phytoplankton in the ocean would be impossible without CO2; and without photosynthesis, animals and humans would be done too.” Dr. Spencer says that an increase in CO2 may be good for the planet and he goes on to discuss it, as well as the possible benefits of increased global temperatures. Dr. Spenser states. “During most of geographic history there was much more CO2 in the atmosphere than there is today. Life on land and in the ocean flourished, just as it does in greenhouses where the CO2 content of the air is pumped to three times the atmospheric concentrations.” Increased CO2 levels could increase plant and phytoplankton growth, producing more oxygen and consuming more CO2.
Regarding the mainstream news media, Dr. Spencer thinks they are promoting and exacerbating a non-problem and says, “The usual news outlets (read liberal mainstream media) have taken on a role of censors, (where have you heard that before?), refusing to report any new science that does not accord with their worldview. When it comes to global warming, they have made sure that only certain kinds of scientific results are reported to you, the citizen.” “The public has been misled by politicians and news reporters who have selectively filtered the science and economics related to climate change and energy use.” I find this interesting, because wherever you find corrupt politicians you seem to find the corrupt liberal media close behind, defending and promoting them. My words, not Dr. Spencer’s.
I was trained as an engineer but don’t by any stretch of the imagination consider myself a scientist, yet I could easily understand the concepts described in this book. I don’t trust governments, including our own, the liberal mainstream media, or any politicians. As far as I’m concerned all politicians, Republican, Democrat and whatever else is out there, are corrupt until proven otherwise, so this book didn’t surprise me with regard to the politics of this issue.
Dr. Spencer has guts and is putting his professional reputation and future at risk by bucking the establishment and fighting for what he believes in. He’s a man with a cause and is to be admired.
Believers in the religion of climate change and catastrophic global warming, and skeptics alike should read this book, if for nothing else a better understanding of how out planet’s weather systems work and a history lesson on climate changes have occurred naturally in the past.
This book was first published in 2010, and the second edition was published in 2012. The author's central thesis, in his own words, is "that natural cloud variations cause temperature variations, which give the illusion that the climate system is very sensitive to humanity's greenhouse gas emissions." [Preface, Kindle Locations 86-87]. It's at least arguable that this book has played a role in influencing the popular discussion of anthropogenic global warming versus natural climate change. Therefore, the author's ideas are worth consideration.
CONVINCING POINTS. Spencer's book makes some convincing points about the physical processes, data, and calculations related to climate change. Not all of these ideas are original, but they are adequately presented. 1) Climate changes have occurred over the whole of Earth's history through natural processes, that is, over long timescales and without mankind's influence. 2) The most detailed data available for climate study covers the period since modern monitoring methods and satellites have been deployed, a period of 50-100 years. Data at earlier times is less direct and less complete. Even the best modern data cannot measure all aspects of the processes involved in climate change. 3) The most widely used climate modeling employs very large, complex computer models. These computer simulation models are still "models"; they fall short of including all the physical processes involved in determining the climate, and they represent but do not duplicate even those processes that are included in the computer program. The treatment of the behavior and effects of clouds is uncertain in current models. In general, large computer models are not infallible. The models must be constrained by careful comparisons with good, relevant data. 4) In analyzing satellite data, it is inadequate (and can be misleading) to perform a single-variable linear fit to data from a non-linear, complex phenomena such as the amount of cloud cover. Although this is obvious, Spencer spends a great deal of effort making this point and succeeds. 5) The natural processes involved in climate change are not well understood and should receive greater research funding and effort than has been the case. 6) Predicting the future of something as complicated as the climate is difficult and prone to error.
However, as you can tell by my overall rating, I found this book seriously deficient. Here, I will discuss some areas where the book fails, in my opinion.
CONSPIRACY THEORIST. Spencer embeds his scientific insights within a suffocating blanket comprising his conspiracy theory. Climate scientists, journal editors, the IPCC, the media, and politicians are all conspiring, for various reasons against poor Dr. Spencer. Lest you think I am exaggerating, here are a few excerpts expressing his allegations. The IPCC is probably Spencer's primary nemesis, but everybody gets some notice:
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"Our most recent paper supporting the theme of this book was peer-reviewed and accepted by top experts in our field, and published in the journal Remote Sensing in 2011. Astonishingly, as a result of that paper being published, the chief editor of Remote Sensing was forced to resign after apparent pressure by an influential "gatekeeper" for the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)-even though our paper was never retracted by the journal." [Preface, Kindle Locations 94-97].
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"The Keepers of All Climate Knowledge have erected a nearly impenetrable barrier to any new science that does not support the current paradigm of anthropogenic global warming, as defined and guided by those controlling the IPCC process. Published research that should be causing the climate modeling community to sit up and listen is instead being ignored. Groupthink has taken over." [Ch. 5, Intro, Kindle Locations 1363-1365].
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"The House of Representatives has already passed cap-and-trade legislation to regulate carbon dioxide emissions by businesses. The EPA may regulate CO2 production now that the Supreme Court has told them to consider it a 'pollutant.'" [Ch. 5, Intro, Kindle Locations 1367-1369].
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"I do believe that there is a conspiracy among some politicians and some of the IPCC leaders to get international agreements to regulate greenhouse gas emissions no matter what the science says." [Ch. 5, Sec. 1, Kindle Locations 1387-1389].
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Spencer goes completely off the rails in speculating that a clever (hypothetical) whistleblower might meet a sad (and nefarious?) end:
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"The story ends with a small obituary in the local newspaper for the prominent, Nobel Peace Prize-sharing scientist who died in a freak accident while filling his hybrid with gas." [Ch. 8, Sec. 3, Kindle Locations 2451-2452].
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By this time, Spencer has lost all credibility with me on the subject of how the world (in and beyond physics) works. It was hard to plow through all this muck in the book.
VALID, IMPORTANT SCIENCE? Now, I will put aside the muck and discuss Spencer's main scientific ideas and defense of them.
Spencer goes to considerable length to demonstrate point (4) above, regarding the analysis of satellite data. I am easily convinced on this subject. One glance at Figure 14 is enough to convince me that the data cannot be used to extract a single, linear characterization of the processes involved. However, in case you are too inexpert to understand this point, the author goes on to demonstrate it using a simple model.
Spencer calls his model a "simple climate model". However, I think the "climate" connection is very tenuous. I would characterize it as a simple, ad hoc, non-linear model constructed to show that extracting a physical parameter from the output of a nonlinear process or model can be misleading. His demonstration of this point is technically correct and convincing, if you follow the details.
However, in his next step, he tries to use his simple model to tie together satellite observations and the index for the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). Here he commits the very blunder he accuses other climate scientists of making: circular reasoning. His simple model contains four parameters; Spencer treats these as arbitrary, curve-fitting parameters. He uses a computer to explore the parameter space covered by his model and selects the solutions he "likes". Let Spencer describe his error in his own words:
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"It took only a few minutes to run the 100,000 different combinations of knob settings. Out of all these model simulations, I saved the ones that came close to the observed temperature variations between 1900 and 2000. Then, I averaged all of those thousands of temperature simulations together, which produced the curve labeled 'PDO' in Fig. 25." [Ch. 6, Sec. 3, Kindle Locations 2058-2061].
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In short, he chooses, then averages, the results that fit the data and, low and behold, he obtains a (not-very-good) fit to the data. This is just a lot of hand-waving, considering that the observations in Fig. 25 are nearly a straight line, aside from short-time scale fluctuations (which he does not address).
There are other parts of Spencer's technical arguments that I consider questionable. However, the assessment above is sufficient, I think, to discredit the author's science.
MY BOTTOM LINE. "Blunder" is a book that mixes a few interesting thoughts into a mish-mash comprised of paranoia and weak, sloppy (or just plain bad) science. Spencer's book does not convince me of either the conspiracy or the so-called scientific blunder of the IPCC (and most of the rest of the world's "foolish" scientists). Balancing the limited positive content against the extensive negative, I find the balance strongly tipped to the negative. Readers, beware (or skip it).
Top reviews from other countries
This book describes his research, analysis and experiments to identify if climate change could have a natural cause in addition to any anthropogenic causes. His results lead to two conclusions brought about though climate researchers not separating cause and effect.
Firstly the climate is relatively insensitive to greenhouse gas emissions because clouds form in response to warming, thereby reflecting more sunlight back to space and reducing the warming. This is called negative feedback, which the IPCC acknowledge but refuse to include in the output from their climate models. Instead the IPCC erroneously predict a strongly positive feedback resulting in high sensitivity causing increased warming or even catastrophic climate change.
Secondly, Spencer details new satellite evidence showing that the global warming observed over the last 100 years may be due to the Pacific Decadal Oscillation causing natural cloud changes – direct evidence that the Earth is capable of causing its own climate change through chaos in the climate system. Spencer demonstrates how the IPCC refuses to even consider the possibility that most global warming might be caused by natural events because it has the preconceived agenda of anthropogenic causes.
This book is simple science, and very easy for any layman to understand. It should be compulsory reading for everyone – especially school children striking over climate change. Every school library should have copies of this book!
I would like to see Al Gore, IPCC, UN, and all politicians/public servants locked into a big stadium and listen to real scientists!










