| Hurricane Ian may have spared many neighborhoods, but the climate-change propaganda surrounding it has the potential to do enormous damage. Michael Shellenberger, author of Apocalypse Never, just released an excellent thread on it: Over the last week, the mainstream news media claimed that hurricanes are becoming more frequent and intense, but they’re not, as the data clearly show. What’s more, it’s clear that the media are engaging in deliberate misinformation. These aren’t innocent mistakes. [A recent] article in the Financial Times [claims] that “hurricane frequency is on the rise,” based on NOAA data. But NOAA says, “After adjusting for a likely under-count of hurricanes in the pre-satellite era there is essentially no long-term trend in hurricane counts.” In fact, NOAA writes, “The evidence for an upward trend is even weaker if we look at U.S. landfalling hurricanes, which even show a slight negative trend beginning from 1900 or from the late 1800s.” In other words, the graphic the Financial Times chose to show of apparently rising hurricane frequency is, in reality, a graphic showing improved hurricane detection thanks to satellites. What are the chances that Financial Times reporter Aime Williams didn’t know this? I would guess close to zero. It’s possible that Williams was careless but I doubt it. I would bet good money that she read NOAA’s web site, which clearly warns that “there is essentially no long-term trend in hurricane counts,” and chose to ignore it in order to sensationalize. What about intensity? Same story. Writes NOAA, “After adjusting for changes in observing capabilities (limited ship observations) in the pre-satellite era, there is no significant long-term trend (since the 1880s) in the proportion of hurricanes that become major hurricanes.” Bottom line? “We conclude that the data do not provide compelling evidence for a substantial greenhouse warming-induced century-scale increase in frequency of tropical storms, hurricanes, or major hurricanes, or in the proportion of hurricanes that become major hurricanes.” Against the best available science, the news media unleashed a hurricane of misinformation using the exact same manipulation of data as Aime Williams. The quantity of pseudoscience and journalistic irresponsibility is breathtaking. For example: |
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| Again Shellenberger: And now it’s clear that activist scientists at the UN are working with Google to control the information available on climate change. This is dark, chilling stuff. (Here Shellenberger is referring to a recent news item in which the UN Secretary for Global Communications says they “own the science” on “climate change,” and that thanks to their partnership with Google, dissident voices are being pushed down in search results.) To the extent the cost of hurricanes is rising it’s due entirely to greater wealth in harm’s way. Consider how much more developed Miami Beach is today compared to a century ago. Once you adjust for rising wealth, there is no trend of rising costs. Is it possible that hurricane intensity will rise in the future? Yes. NOAA predicts a 5% increase in hurricane intensity. But it also predicts a 25% decline in hurricane frequency. I have not seen a single mainstream news media outlet mention any of this. This is not complicated. The information is not hidden away somewhere. NOAA even boldfaces its key conclusion. Journalists know this. They’ve been covering this for decades. It’s clear that they are actively trying to mislead the public. We all remember a time when “climate change” talk was an annoyance but had few real-world consequences. Now it’s everywhere, and the real-world consequences are frankly deadly, especially for the developing world. The stuff about the truth being suppressed in search results is especially disturbing and people must wake up to this disturbing reality of the press embellishing and lying at every opportunity to serve their god the underlying almighty dollar. |
fox files 
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