Peter Heller: Vahrenholt’s Book Shows How Far The “Climate Creationists” Have Meandered From Science

When it comes to reviews of Fritz Vahrenholt’s and Sebastian Lüning’s controversial best-selling Die kalte Sonne book, now sweeping across Germany, Dr. Peter Heller, think tank member and contributor at the German Science Skeptical blog, has published what up to now has been one of the most thoughtful and insightful essays – a welcome change from all the shallow and emotional reviews we’ve seen from the knee-jerk warmists.

One of Heller’s main points is that anyone claiming climate can be predicted and is now solely “created” by man is as scientific as the theory of finger-snap-and-behold creationism. The following is an excerpt translated from Heller’s essay (emphasis added).

Vahrenholt and Lüning do not assume the role of scientists, but that of science journalists. The demand to present the book’s assertions in an appropriate form using the appropriate tool (such as publication in a suitable journal) for scientific internal debate just proves once again the totalitarian demand of the climate creationists. Not only are they blind with respect to the already acquired findings that contradict their world view, but they are also no longer able to distinguish between a scientific activity, and the reporting of that activity.

Vahrenholt und Lüning led me to the term “climate creationist“. In the same way their book helps to put energy policy back on the track of rationality, it could also promote the return of reason in climate debate. In my view their main message is: We do not know what the future has in store for us. […] Somehow this simple knowledge has become lost in our society over the past decades.

Vahrenholt und Lüning deserve credit for thrusting the indefiniteness of our climatic future back into the public consciousness. They show us how natural factors could counter an anthropogenic warming.

Whoever refuses to permit such thoughts is acting unscientifically and against the pursuit of truth. And whoever opts to ignore these ideas, or even fights to create an environment that does not allow them to be even expressed, is also guilty of the same – just as someone who through religious fundamentalism is convinced of the creation of the world by a Creator, an Intelligent Designer. The theory of evolution describes the principles to which the development of life on Earth are subject. It neither provides a basis for the existence of mankind itself, nor for any other specific life form, nor does it provide any prognosis for the future. In fact it only tells us that random coincidences mutually interact. It’s completely open as what comes out as a product.

Where the conventional creationist sees a (supernatural) creator and designer behind the living environment, the climate creationist views man as the sole creator of the (future) climate. Die kalte Sonne holds up a mirror and shows us how they have meandered far away from science.

Particularly very important to observe is what Vahrenholt and Lüning only mention between the lines. Namely the question of to what extent does a possible warming of the lower layers of the atmosphere have whatsoever on man. Here the climate creationists see a huge danger and thus completely ignore possible adaptation strategies by human societies – completely in contradiction to the experiences of the last thousands of years.”

Neglecting strategies for adaptation is one way of creating your own eventual premature downfall. Unfortunately we are dealing with climate fundamentalists, zealots, and not scientists.

Anyone who knows the German language is urged to read Heller’s essay at Science Skeptical.

 

18 responses to “Peter Heller: Vahrenholt’s Book Shows How Far The “Climate Creationists” Have Meandered From Science”

  1. Ingvar Engelbrecht

    Oh!
    I would love to see his essay translated into English and I would translate it to Swedish!!

  2. Ingvar Engelbrecht

    Its an important sentence you make:
    >Neglecting strategies for adaptation is one way of creating your own eventual premature downfall.

    Its not only stupid to believe that we can fight climate change.
    To quote a Swedish scientist, “Håkan Sjögren”. “There is no such thing as a defeatable climate change”
    The way they try to do it is by making energy expensive, limited and irregular when in reality the only way that we can adapt to climate change is to have aboundant, reliable and reasonably priced energy.
    Now, how stupid is that?
    Unbelievably stupid I would say.
    Or they have the Malthusian view. To many people. Kill them.

  3. Ulrich Elkmann

    Please, folks, don’t let these “anti-alarmists” fool you. Get the actual real truth from state radio broadcaster Deutschlandfunk (March 6, 14:31), “Die Kosten des Klimawandels/The Cost of Climate Change” (according to them, the official UN version):
    “Der Klimawandel zeigt immer deutlicher sein Gesicht – in Form von Erdbeben, Tsunamis und Überschwemmungen” (“Climate change shows its face ever more clearly – in the form of earthquakes, tsunamis and floods.”)
    http://www.dradio.de/aktuell/1694947/

    [Remember – someone wrote that sentence, someone else vetted it; is there ANY kind of knowledge about the world you have to have these days before you are allowed to spout state-sanctioned propaganda?]

    1. DirkH

      Reminds me of “Deutschlandwelle Kultur”.

      There are quite a few bizarre hideouts for communists in Germany, and public radio is one of them.
      This is their hard hard left UN-arse-kissing CAGW propaganda page.
      http://www.dw.de/dw/0,,30654,00.html

      1. DirkH

        “Deutschlandwelle Kultur” seems to be only a sub-channel of Deutsche Welle, their websites are meshed together… anyhow. This one is their GLOWING report about Current TV from 2009. In German; doesn’t seem to be available in English.

        http://www.dw.de/dw/article/0,,3924103,00.html

        Just like nobody watches Current TV, nobody listens to Deutsche Welle or their culture communist group Deutschlandwelle Kultur, but we all have to pay the wages of these people.

  4. Ingvar Engelbrecht

    Ulrich!

    Get real. “actual real truth”. “Official UN version”. Here is a piece from the upcoming IPCC report:

    Climate change may be due to natural internal processes or external forcings, or to persistent anthropogenic changes in the composition of the atmosphere or in land use

    and

    ”Projected changes in climate extremes under different emissions scenarios generally do not strongly diverge in the coming two to three decades, but these signals are relatively small compared to natural climate variability over this time frame. Even the sign of projected changes in some climate extremes over this time frame is uncertain”

    Fom the horses mouth!

    There is no such thing is a defeatable climate change!!

    1. Ulrich Elkmann

      Ingvar, if you check the DR report (via Babelfish or some such), you’ll see that they are in no way quoting the IPCC; it’s just the usual Appeal To Autority: “The IPCC says – must be gospel truth”. The making of AR5 will be an interesting thing to watch: they cannot backtrack to a sober assessment that fits current trends and science without making AR1-4 look like blatant farragos of lies; and they cannot repeat the alarmism without making the IPCC – and by implication the UN – look like a bunch of fools or worse. The search for “neutral expressions” might even tax their powers of obfuscation.

      1. Mindert Eiting

        I like this one from Donna, showing Pachauries back-ground. Especially, I like the photograph on which Pauchauri and Al Gore receive their Nobel prizes, which will be adopted in the Great Book of historical comedies.

        http://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2012/03/02/explosive-pachauri-profile-in-australian-magazine/

        1. DirkH

          The UN was looking for a crook and got what they wanted.

  5. Harry Dale Huffman

    As a hard physical scientist, dedicated to dispassionately determining the truth, I categorically REJECT Heller’s thesis. To argue against the dogma of man-made global warming by raising the dogma of undirected evolution–a theory that does not refute but simply refuses to acknowledge clear design, in the widespread phenomenon of so-called “co-evolution” (which is the very antithesis of evolution theory’s “survival of the fittest”, in the supposed fundamental “competition between species”)–is simply childish, schoolyard posturing before the current “in” crowd in science. It is also not surprising, because the climate debates just follow the earlier evolution/creation and “intelligent design” debates, as the latest in a continuing series of scandals in modern science, that has overrun its ability to prove what it theorizes–because it has for too long been running on unproven, and in fact wrongheaded, dogma in its basic assumptions. As the one scientist who found the definitive facts against the incompetent AGW consensus, which fundamentally correct climate science, I am here to tell the world that the real war in science is for simple competence, across all the modern physical sciences, and against the increasing tendency for scientists to argue dogmatically and blindly for their ideological prejudices (as Darwin did). A new/old paradigm (from millennia before the beginning of known history) awaits, on the other side of the current posturing, on both sides of every vain public debate over science’s too-long-nurtured dogmas.

    1. Aussie

      Harry, I fear that you have missed Heller’s point regarding what he terms “climate creationists”. As a non-scientist (economics graduates are not scientists), and as a Christian I saw his point and thought it was a good one.

      Creationists are totally fundamentalist in their approach. They believe that what is written in a book, that has been translated into English from another language is something that cannot be questioned. They see it as both a science text-book (which it is not) and an historical text-book (which is more appropriate but still not entirely correct). They also dogmatically believe in the young earth. As a Christian I reject their version of Christianity and the way that they use the Bible.

      Now compare the behaviour of the Creationists (not Intelligent Design people) with that of the Armageddon style of the warmies….. there is indeed a similarity in their approach. Both insist upon their dogma being the only true dogma.

      I think that is what Heller is getting at… and yes he has a very good point…….

  6. Ingvar Engelbrecht

    Harry,
    Could you put your statement and position in one or two sentences?

  7. Peter Heller

    First: Whoever wants to translate my text into any foreign language and publicize it on other websites is invited to do so. Due to a lack of time and a lack of talent in other languages I cannot do this by myself.

    Second: Based on the experience made with my “Fukushima”-essay (which has been translated by Pierre and posted on Watts up) I expect harsh reactions especially by american readers, climate sceptic or not. There is a substantial group of believers in “Intelligent Design” especially in the USA.

    Therefore, Mr. Huffmann, I am not surprised.

    Would you describe yourself as a believer in “Intelligent Design”? This is what I read in your statement.

    If you really think of co-evolution as an argument against Darwin, if you really think of evolution as a theory about “competition between species”, then you haven’t understand Darwin.

    The theory of evolution describes, how different physiological characteristics can evolve in one specific species over time, if different members of the species experience different environments.

    1. Mindert Eiting

      Peter, the answer can be found on Harry’s website.

      1. Peter Heller

        Thanks Mindert, now I have seen it.

    2. DirkH

      Hi Peter, I’m German; I’m a proponent of Darwin’s theory, and I’m watching all the back and forth in Germany and the US. Liked the article but found the creationist reference unnecessary and distracting. You are, BTW, right in that Vahrenholt is muddying the waters by saying “If the public finds itself cheated by the CO2AGW scientists they might turn against renewable energy”. Yes we will, at least a part of the population, what’s the big deal. There’s also a million-strong anti-nuclear movement, so what? It does not matter whether we tear down the wind turbines; the technology cannot be un-invented and if someone somewhere finds it useful he may build himself one… At the moment I see wind turbines in Germany as subsidy moving machines; the energy they produce is frankly totally irrelevant (except for posing a real danger to the stability of the grid).

      1. Mindert Eiting

        Hi Peter and Dirk. I am Dutch and want to propose the theory that the world was created five seconds ago, including the bones of dynosaurs, wind-mills, us and all our memories. The theory easily explains why the surface temperature record is as it is.

        1. DirkH

          Mindert, you can have your fun with the creationists; but it has no bearing on the CO2AGW question; that’s what I wanted to say. Why drag that question in? For years, warmists have insisted that anyone questioning the CO2AGW consensus would be equivalent to a denier of gravity. It was a stupid argument, but using the same argument the other way round is equally uncalled for.

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