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Meltdown: The Predictable Distortion of Global Warming by Scientists, Politicians, and the Media Kindle Edition

4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 66 ratings

An eminently readable and often humorous critique, Meltdown documents hundreds of exaggerations from scientists, politicians and the media, and ties them together with the common thread of rational self-interest.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This spirited critique challenges the conventional doom saying about global warming. Climatologist Michaels acknowledges that the earth is warming because of anthropogenic emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, but he insists that the warming will probably be modest and that nature and humanity will easily adjust to it. Writing in a lucid, engaging style supported by a mountain of data, he debunks such recent scare stories as melting ice caps and glaciers, intensifying storms and droughts, species die-offs and a Day After Tomorrow–style ice age. He argues that researchers and reporters mistakenly ascribe normal fluctuations in local weather to global warming and commonly ignore the facts (reports that the Pacific island nation of Tuvalu is being submerged by rising sea levels, for example, ignored research demonstrating that sea levels in that region have actually been falling). Michaels, who is a fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute, sometimes allows his own agenda to intrude. Advocates of the precautionary principle will note that he fails to demonstrate his claim that "there is no known, feasible policy that can stop or even slow these climate changes." And while he chalks up global warming alarmism to an unholy alliance of climatologists hungry for grants and media sensationalism, his remedy for biased science is not better science but a "wider source of bias" in the form of more funding of climatology by the fossil fuel industry. He also calls for the abolition of academic tenure—a crushing blow against an independent professorate that libertarians and their allies in the world of academia view as the intellectual wellspring of the regulatory state. Nonetheless, Michaels’s challenge to global warming orthodoxy should invigorate the debate over climate change.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From the Inside Flap

"This powerful, lucid, fluent book is a triumph of science over superstition. Pat Michaels, a gifted climatologist, tells the straight truth about the hysteria and ignorance surrounding climate change and how the scientific establishment has been led astray."
James K. Glassman, Resident Fellow, American Enterprise Institute

"Pat Michaels has written another fascinating and useful book. . . . I urge everyone, regardless of the extent of his science background, to read Meltdown. But be prepared to change your way of thinking. Just let go of your preconceived ideas, strap yourself in, and enjoy the ride!"
George H. Taylor, Past President, American Association of State Climatologists

"Patrick Michaels fully exploits his incomparable wit and credentialed expertise to dismantle the claim that catastrophic climate change is upon us. Using dozens of examples, this working-stiff climatologist exposes the exaggerations and outright falsehoods promoted by a media industry hungry for if it bleeds, it leads stories."
John R. Christy, Director, Earth System Science Center at the University of Alabama at Huntsville

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B001D71DNW
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Cato Institute (October 1, 2004)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ October 1, 2004
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 5561 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Not enabled
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 208 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 66 ratings

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Patrick J. Michaels
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4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5
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66 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Reviewed in the United States on July 8, 2007
This book deals with many of the common myths regarding global warming using facts instead of personal attacks in order to deal with the many issues and constituencies who have a stake in the global warming debate. Michaels shows that far from there being a "consensus" about global warming, there is a vast group of special interests who distort facts, ignore real scientific research, and create "facts" out of fiction.
Michaels gives many examples of supposedly scientific conclusions about global warming are really a closed loop of closed minds who exclude any evidence that questions the reasons behind global climate changes.

Are there holes in the Arctic sea ice in the summer.? Yes, but they have always shrunk and expanded over millions of years. Is the Antarctic getting warmer or colder? Yes and no, depending on which part of this vast area you are measuring. Are CO2 levels increasing? Yes, but they are no where close to historical levels reached many times in the past. Polar bears on the verge of extinction? Not when the truth is that there are more of them now than at any other time in history (and eating those cute little fur seals in record numbers, no less.)
The list of currently held myths are dealt with in a very objective fashion, backed up by real research, and showing the earth to be a very complicated system, which is not very well understood. Michaels does a great job of showing that many of the things we think we understand about climate change are really not what you read in the newspapers.

If you are looking for a book that deals with the many arguments used in the global climate change debate in a fair and objective way, this is the best of the lot. But of course Michaels is attacked because he does not rely on tax money for a living, unlike the hundreds of thousands of politicians, bureaucrats, media people and their ilk who flood the world with hysterical stories about the end of the world due to global warming when the evidence is quite to the contrary.

The irony of course is that many who see a great conspiracy in those who question the reasons behind climate change somehow blame "big oil" for asking questions about a supposedly finished debate. They obviously have failed to notice, as Michaels has, that most advertising by "big oil" today is to embrace the agenda of the Gores of the world so that they can make even more money trading "carbon credits" which do nothing to reduce air pollution, and not have to spend a dime for oil exploration.
21 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States on October 6, 2005
This book is an exquisite dissection of the global warming hype, using real facts, scientific principles, long-term data and long-term trends.

Yes, NATURAL global warming and NATURAL global cooling has existed throughout the history of the earth. Michaels does an oustanding job of showing long-term data trends (pre-massive industrialization in the post- WOrld War II period, pre-petroleum age, and even from before the industrial revolution in some instances) that indicate climate changes are cyclic, or in some locations, cooling, and in some locations, warming. He analyzes each of the global warming arguments with factual analyses and scientific principles in a sobering manner. His data cast doubts on so-called climate model projections and the so-called overwhelming effect of anthrogenic influences. In short, the sky is NOT falling.

Michaels also is to be commended for showing how flawed governmental policies have driven global warming science, and the associated conflict of interest invoving funding and publication. He exposes serious flaws in the so-called journal peer-review system that are obvious to relevant scientists.

Frankly, his funding sources from ExxonMobil and his "neo-con" leanings have NOTHING to do with the outcomes described in his book. What he does is expose the flawed science in global warming studies using scientific prrinciples that are independent of financial sources for his research and his perceived political leanings.

This is an excellent book with realism that policy makers must be required to read before caving in to the policies and hype of nihilism and defeatism advocated by the global warming crowd.
37 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States on March 26, 2019
It s the other side of the story about the planet we live on. It tells the tale of why money is driving the global change scare today. This is the first of several books by this author. Having read it 15 years after printing I look forward to reading the remaining to see how consistent the position may be and when or if it changes.
3 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States on March 17, 2008
This is an impressive, well-researched book. Meltdown is an excellent counterpoint to all the Chicken Little books on global warming. Warning: this is not an easy read, as there are many graphs and charts throughout the books. Michaels shows that while the planet is warming, we are not headed to the end of civilization. I also recommend, as a calm, rational alternative, Bjorn Lomborg's more recent book, Cool It. I especially like the last chapter, as it strongly criticizes the peer-review process that has corrupted science.
7 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States on July 17, 2019
Global warming is real, beginning another cycle now, as has been going on for over 8 hundred thousand years. Before man, before cars or coal or oil. Mother Nature is NOT man made.
3 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States on May 12, 2013
I really enjoyed how this book made me question everything that I thought I knew about global climate change. It was a very interesting take on the entire debate. I can definitely see things from Michaels' point of view, and the book also raises some questions about the peer review process.
Reviewed in the United States on November 13, 2013
I gave read ~8 books trying to discover the truth or falsehood of global warming. In a discussion with a climate change believer, I ask if they are willing to read a book on the subject. Patrick Michael has made several converts,but he cheats, he uses knowledge and facts!
7 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States on December 12, 2012
I buy copies of these for a friend of mine, a Ph.D. who uses them in his lectures on global warming.
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Top reviews from other countries

Nick Dougan
5.0 out of 5 stars A society that can no longer rely on the wisdom of science can only be governed by irrationality and fear
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 3, 2008
So concludes Professor Michaels at the end of this book of 246 pages (excluding references), of which only 15 are given over to his hypothesis, and just five to his recommendations as to what to do about it. The first 219 pages are devoted to exposing the scientific imprecision, and the political and media exaggeration based on that imprecision, on which his hypothesis is based. If I have any complaint, it is that these proportions are out of balance, and that it is rather longer than it needed to be.

Michaels' hypothesis is in fact the restatement, updating and specific application (to global warming theory) of an earlier one - that of Thomas Kuhn, who published "The structure of scientific revolutions" back in 1962. Kuhn defined a paradigm as a body of knowledge that defined the problems and methods of research for succeeding generations of practitioners. The problem, Kuhn and Michaels argue, is that paradigms become self-referential: they solve the problems defined by their creators as being most acute, presumably ignoring other issues, they bring together people of a like mind, and once a scientist has begun to subscribe to a particular paradigm he or she will probably do so for the rest of his or her life. The concept of a scientific paradigm is worsened, Michaels argues, by the effect of the state funding of science (since WW2).

Michaels, who is a climatologist and "environmental" scientist, argues that man-made global warming, and that it is out of control, has, since the 1980s, become the prevailing paradigm (or as the IPCC calls it, the "consensus") and in so doing has made it more and more difficult for those who believe differently. The first 219 pages, needless to say, pick holes in the flawed science of those scientists who are working to demonstrate the validity of the paradigm and the exaggerations of politicians and publications that support it. He does so in a humorous and, to my mind, credible way, although whether you will agree will depend rather on what your own paradigm is! Chapters focus on icecaps, hurricanes, droughts and floods, disease. He is highly critical of lapses in what ought to be basic peer-review in major scientific journals.

Michaels has three recommendations; while these are written in the American context, they probably hold true in the UK and Europe as well:

1. To break the government monopoly of the funding of science - and so to eliminate the problem of such funding being devoted exclusively in support of one paradigm or another.
2. To change the peer-review structure, by requiring that reviewers' names, and a synopsis of their views, are stated on published papers.
3. To abolish academic tenure - i.e. the security of employment that academics may receive after a few years

This book is published by the Cato Institute - a libertarian organisation based in the US. Michaels is himself, in all probability - a libertarian - i.e. he believes in making markets as free as possible, and in reducing the role of governments as far as possible. Not everyone will find that a comfortable concept, irrespective of their understanding of global warming, but I would have thought that everyone could agree to his second proposal - "peer-review" is a much hallowed phrase of the AGW lobby!

Is Prof Michaels a global warming "denier" as such? This is the paradigm that he supports:

"The earth's surface temperature is influenced by human activity, and changes that are being measured today are largely consequences of that activity. We know, to a very small range of error, the amount of future climate change for the foreseeable future, and it is a modest value to which humans have adapted and will continue to adapt. There is no known, feasible policy that can stop or even slow these changes in a fashion that could be scientifically measured."

My reading of the rest of the book is that he thinks that human activity may, at worst, be having a small effect on the climate, but that it is not large. I do recommend that you read this book. I shall have to turn my attention to Thomas Kuhn!
21 people found this helpful
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Just Jo
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent - But Now Updated and Rewritten
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 30, 2009
Meltdown is an excellent introduction to the climate change debate. But since early 2009, Michaels' new book 'Climate of Extremes' has come out which is basically a substantial rewrite and update of Meltdown. Both are worth reading, but if you just want the one - go for C of E, because it is up to date.
7 people found this helpful
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Bobski
5.0 out of 5 stars Global Warming: How and Why the Myth has burgeoned.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 17, 2017
Lucid. Factual. Compelling. Very explanatory. Intelligent non-gullible people should all read it. Gullible ones should as well, but the likelihood is lower because it illuminates their illogicality.
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