I've been lying doggo on the recent counter-flurry of climate articles that balance, sort of, a preceding flurry of climate hysteria. Tim Haab makes it too funny to avoid.

Scientists: Global warming is a problem

Me: No it isn't

Scientists: Yes it is

Me: No it isn't

Scientists: Yes it is

Me: OK, maybe it is

Scientist: No it isn't

Tim likens it to a Daffy and Bugs exchange but I hear Monty Python. Philip rounds up a commentary and provides links to relevant material including this bracing brain cleansing by Scott Burgess.

. . . it's worth asking just what engendered the myth of consensus. Paleoclimatologist Bob Carter, in an separate Sunday Telegraph article - one which incidentally points out that there's been exactly zero global temperature rise since 1998 - offers a possible explanation:

"There are other reasons, too, why the public hears so little in detail from those scientists who approach climate change issues rationally, the so-called climate sceptics. Most are to do with intimidation against speaking out, which operates intensely on several parallel fronts.

"First, most government scientists are gagged from making public comment on contentious issues, their employing organisations instead making use of public relations experts to craft carefully tailored, frisbee-science press releases. Second, scientists are under intense pressure to conform with the prevailing paradigm of climate alarmism if they wish to receive funding for their research. Third, members of the Establishment have spoken declamatory words on the issue, and the kingdom's subjects are expected to listen."

. . . Incidentally, it's amusing and instructive to consider the response of a representative of Friends of the Earth to Prof. Carter's talk of "the climate scare-mongering campaign" of which FoE is such a prominent and energetic exponent. Quoted in the Daily Mail (apparently not online), the unnamed spokesperson reminds us that:

"The ice sheets are melting at unprecedented rates, there are unprecedented levels of flooding around the world and droughts in South-East England."

In so saying, the FoE campaigner unwittingly undermines the very simulations upon which the alarmists base their arguments. In fact, the water shortages in this country are blamed on insufficient winter rains - but precisely the opposite is predicted by the warming models.

I wonder if there will in fact be some open and honest discussion? It seems unlikely since the amounts of money and power at stake are so large. Too many politicians have married themselves to hysteria, and too many scientists are on the dole, for an epidemic of intellectual honesty to break out. The pathetic antics of activists - "creating overwhelming demand for action" - may seem relevant but they aren't. They are noisy but not influential, much like the Looney Tunes Tim hears in the discussion.