Twila Moon
Wall Street Journal article repeats multiple incorrect and misleading claims made in Steven Koonin’s new book ’Unsettled’
Scientists who reviewed the article found that it builds on a collection of misleading and false claims. For instance, Koonin states that “Greenland’s ice sheet isn’t shrinking any more rapidly today than it was eighty years ago”. Contrary to the claim, scientific studies using airborne and satellite altimetry observations show considerable thinning has occurred along the margin of the Greenland ice sheet since 2003.
A third of Antarctic ice shelf risks collapse at 4°C above pre-industrial levels, as accurately described in CNN article
Claim:
"A third of Antarctic ice shelf risks collapse as our planet warms"
Video interview of Ian Plimer at Sky News falsely claims that a new study announces an incoming ice age, partly based on an incorrect Daily Mail headline
“This video is chock full of false and misleading information, and presented in a way to make the correct scientific information seem like a farce. For example, the direct link between human emissions of carbon dioxide and global warming is very well established. The physics and chemistry of this link has been understood for well over 100 years, and science continues to affirm it.”
Article by CNN exaggerates study’s implications for future Greenland ice loss with “point of no return” claim
The article in CNN discusses findings from a study published August, 2020 that analyzes trends of ice discharge from the…
Ian Plimer op-ed in The Australian again presents long list of false claims about climate
“This article is a mixture of misdirection, misleading claims, and outright falsehoods. The author attempts to paint a picture of current climate change as simply a continuation of natural changes that have occurred in the past. But this neglects the clear evidence that climate change over the last two centuries has been shown to be largely man-made, that it is much more rapid that anything we have seen in the last two thousand years if not longer, and that it is occurring in the context of a globe with more than 7 billion human inhabitants.”
Letter signed by "500 scientists" relies on inaccurate claims about climate science
“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).”
Blaze article badly misrepresents study of Greenland's Jakobshavn Glacier
Claim:
[O]ne of the previously fastest shrinking glaciers in the world is growing again, calling into question the narrative that rapid climate change [...] poses a significant threat to the existence of the human race
Popular “Friends of Science” video promoted by Youtube presents long list of climate myths
“The video presents a litany of the usual climate denier talking points, none of which hold any water. It is full of outright false claims and does not even shy away from presenting a fake TIME magazine cover that supposedly warned of an ice age. “Friends of Science” is an advocacy group “largely funded by the fossil fuel industry””
The Australian publishes "deeply ill-informed" opinion on climate by Ian Plimer
“This article is an amalgamation of logical fallacies, misleading talking points, and downright factually incorrect statements regarding the physics of the climate system. Every talking point in this article has been debunked many times over and it is astonishing that this was published.”
President Trump’s claim of growing ice does not reflect reality
Claim:
The ice caps were going to melt. They were going to be gone by now, but now they're setting records
New York Times effectively informs readers about large Larsen C iceberg calving event
“The article handles a complex topic well. It would be easy to be alarmist with this subject matter, and while its lede edges that way, the main content of the article is very balanced. It also presents a lot of interesting information in a compelling manner.”
Conservative Tribune post falsely claims cancelled Arctic research cruise is evidence against climate change
“Repeating a version of a debunked argument against climate change science, this biased and misleading political article states that the cancellation of an Arctic research cruise due to increased sea ice at one time and in one region proves climate scientists don’t know anything about climate change over 100 years, which is patently false.”
Grist article on an “Ice Apocalypse” mostly accurate, but doesn’t make the likelihood of that apocalypse clear enough to readers
“The article has a bias, emphasizing the high end scenarios of ice sheet behavior, avoiding scrutiny of model assumptions. The concept of marine ice cliff instability and how unusual it is as a mechanism today on the vast coastline of Antarctica or Greenland is ignored.”
Some extreme weather events are clearly becoming more common, in contrast to Lord Lawson's claim
Claim:
The IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which is sort of the voice of the consensus, concedes that there has been no increase in extreme weather events.
Lord Lawson falsely claims that global temperatures have declined over last decade
Claim:
according, again, to the official figures—during this past 10 years, if anything, mean global temperature, average world temperature, has slightly declined
Analysis of "The big melt: Global sea ice at record low"
The five scientists who reviewed the article concluded that it is accurate. It properly conveys the core facts about global sea ice extent and the attribution of continuing sea ice loss to human-induced warming of the climate—primarily in the Arctic, as the low sea ice extent around Antarctica this year has not yet been clearly connected to climate change.
Analysis of "Greenland's huge annual ice loss is even worse than thought"
“I find the headline accurate and supported by the article. The article explains the novelty and impact of the research accurately for the general readership and in particular the context provided from the scientists works really well in this regard.”
Analysis of "Environmental records shattered as climate change 'plays out before us'"
The article summarizes the main findings of the “2015 state of the climate” report published by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Overall it accurately reports the main findings that many global indicators of the Earth’s climate, notably the global surface temperature, have set new records in 2015 under the joint influence of ongoing human-induced climate change and a strong El Niño event.
Analysis of "What science can tell us about the links between global warming and massive heat waves"
“This is a well-written article that provides a good overall discussion around the connection between climate change and the ongoing US heat wave. In the absence of a specific event attribution study the role of climate change in this event can’t be quantified, but Chris Mooney provides an insightful overview of the role of climate change in heat events generally.”
Analysis of "…in many ways global warming will be a good thing"
“This article presents a highly biased view of global warming, only presenting the “positive” aspects of it. As the author is criticizing media doing the opposite (always showing the bad side of climate change) it is a shame the author didn’t present a balanced view here.”
Analysis of "Your Complete Guide to the Climate Debate"
“This article peddles the usual false statements masquerading as opinion that we have been seeing for years, and would not be published by a reputable publisher. Most of the scientific statements in the article are false or misleading.”
Analysis of “Updated NASA Data: Global Warming Not Causing Any Polar Ice Retreat”
“This article discusses land and sea ice interchangebly and appears to confuse the two. This is a fundamental error, equivalent in other fields to confusing house and senate, or an artery and vein.”