Articles tagged as: Cherry picking definition

Wall Street Journal op-ed by Steven Koonin publishes misleading claims about how climate change influences Greenland ice melt

in Wall Street Journal, by Steve Koonin

Human-caused climate change is already accelerating Greenland’s melting and is predicted to continue to accelerate it in the future. In addition to Greenland, most glaciers around the planet are also melting at an accelerating pace. This melt, in addition to the expansion of the ocean as it warms, contributes to elevate sea level at an accelerating rate, threatening coastal cities around the globe.

— 24 Fév 2022


Misleading Wall Street Journal opinion piece makes the unsubstantiated claim that the U.S. will have herd immunity by April 2021

in Wall Street Journal, by Marty Makary

« The article’s claim that the U.S. is near herd immunity rests on two numbers: 1) the detection of infections by testing (claimed to be 10 – 25 percent) and 2) the infection fatality rate (claimed to be 0.23 percent). Using the same number of deaths as the author indicates that 0.15%/0.6% = 25% of the U.S. population has been infected, rather than two-thirds as the author claims. Thus, the author’s argument that 55 – 66 percent of the U.S. population has already been infected and has immunity is not supported by available data. »

— 26 Fév 2021


Breitbart article makes numerous false claims about the impacts of climate change, based on Global Warming Policy Foundation post

in Breitbart, by James Delingpole, Dr. Indur Goklany

« The article’s scientific credibility is very low. The author cherry-picks data, makes broad generalizations and characterizations based on incomplete or flimsy reasoning, and repeatedly misinterprets technological and economic progress in justifying false claims and misinformation minimizing global warming impacts. »

— 12 Fév 2021


Article by Michael Shellenberger mixes accurate and inaccurate claims in support of a misleading and overly simplistic argumentation about climate change

in Forbes, by Michael Shellenberger

« Shellenberger’s article promoting his new book “Apocalypse Never” includes a mix of accurate, misleading, and patently false statements. While it is useful to push back against claims that climate change will lead to the end of the world or human extinction, to do so by inaccurately downplaying real climate risks is deeply problematic and counterproductive. »

— 06 Juil 2020


Article in The Guardian misleads readers about sensitivity of climate models by narrowly focusing on single study

in The Guardian, by Jonathan Watts

« The article correctly reports that the most recent versions of some climate models estimate more warming for a given increase in CO2 concentrations. It is also correct in highlighting that how clouds are represented in these models is the likely reason for these higher estimates. However, it does not report all the science available on this topic and its claims are thus misleading. »

— 18 Juin 2020


Telegraph article on climate change mixes accurate and unsupported, inaccurate claims, misleads with false balance

in The Telegraph, by Sarah Knapton

« This article is a prime example of false equivalence, putting fringe figures side by side with mainstream scientific findings while failing to distinguish between their respective credibility. It is rife with numerous factual errors and misrepresentations. Anyone unfortunate enough to read it will understand less of the science – as actually appears in peer-reviewed publications and conferences – not more. »

— 18 Oct 2019


Letter signed by « 500 scientists » relies on inaccurate claims about climate science

in clintel.nl, by Guus Berkhou, Reynald du Berger, Terry Dunleavy, Viv Forbes, Jeffrey Fos, Morten Jodal, Rob Lemeire, Richard Lindzen, Ingemar Nordin, Jim O'Brien, Alberto Prestininzi, Benoit Rittaud, Fritz Vahrenholt, Christopher Monckton

« The scientific content is completely inaccurate, undocumented, and fails to bring proof for its claims. The ending of the Little Ice Age in 1850 has no logical link with the fact that the Earth is warming now. Most past climate variations have been slower or less intense as the present one, and if they were as fast or severe they brought about mass extinctions in the biosphere. No explanation or proof is brought on the implausibility or inaccuracy of climate models (whose accuracy or uncertainty is precisely quantified and makes their use better than just random guesses). »

— 04 Oct 2019


Washington Examiner op-ed cherry-picks data and misleads readers about climate models

in The Washington Examiner, by Patrick Michaels, Caleb Stewart Rossiter

« This article focuses only on specific lines of evidence that climate models disagree with observations. In doing so, the authors ignore research that helps to reconcile differences between models and observations. The authors do not consider alternate datasets and time periods in which models and observations agree. Models are one tool for understanding climate change; their overall credibility does not hinge on one variable, in one domain, over a specific time period, with respect to a set of imperfect observations. »

— 31 Août 2019


Financial Post commentary jumps to unsupported conclusions in claiming “climate change isn’t causing extreme weather”

in Financial Post, by Ross McKitrick

« This article is misleading since it confuses changes in climate change impacts with changes in climate and weather extremes and it subjectively selects examples that support its message.
There is clear scientific evidence that many weather and climate extreme events increase in intensity and frequency due to anthropogenic climate change. Munich Re, for example, publishes data on global major extreme events in its annual reports. »

— 13 Juin 2019


Article claiming vaccines cause autoimmunity and autism due to fetal DNA contaminants found unsupported and implausible

in Vaccine Impact, by Theresa Deisher

« While the letter provides some concerns about the fetal cell-derived DNA contamination in vaccines, it does not provide any actual evidence to support the claims made. The whole hypothesis of the author (which is misleadingly presented as fact) is based on the author’s own measurements of fetal cell-derived DNA, which has serious methodological problems that could be easily prevented by RNase treatment »

— 09 Juin 2019