Alt-Right Pro-Trump ex-scientist Judith Curry sez climate science is a hoax

If you've visited Judith Curry's blog in the last few months you'll have noticed she has fully completed her switch to climate science denial. Most of her articles are from guests who reject science. She hasn't written much herself lately, but her latest article (archived here) confirms that she is now a hard core climate science denier.

What Judith has declared is her support for the alt-right anti-semitic populist Hitler wannabe, for the sexual predator and woman-despising President-elect, Donald Trump. She has also declared, again, her position as a climate science denier. Judith was arguing that Donald Trump was correct when he said that climate science is a hoax. She wrote a definition of the word "hoax" and then wrote this:

With these definitions in mind, here are two examples that qualify as hoaxes that I have previously written about:

1. The UNFCCC definition of ‘climate change’ arguably qualifies as a hoax: climate change is a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods. [link]. This perversion of the definition of ‘climate change’ was designed to mislead people into thinking that all climate change is caused by humans.
2. The propaganda from the UNFCCC that misleads people into thinking that the planned emissions reductions will have any discernible impact (that emerges from natural variability) on the 21st century climate [link], even if you believe the climate models.

So in terms of climate hoaxes, perhaps it is NOT Donald Trump’s whose pants are on fire.

Judith's UNFCCC conspiracy theory

Seriously. I mean a person can criticise the UNFCCC for its original narrow definition of climate change.  However one has to be a nong, or assume one's readers are stupid, to pretend that the words "in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods" wasn't about natural climate change, and was "intended to mislead people". And  there's no excuse for Judith launching into one of her favourite conspiracy theories -  that all the 160 plus signatory nations of the UNFCCC (at the time) were perpetrating a hoax. What Judith also failed to point out was that the IPCC itself, in its subsequent reports, broadened the definition to:

Climate change Climate change refers to a change in the state of the climate that can be identified (e.g., by using statistical tests) by changes in the mean and/or the variability of its properties, and that persists for an extended period, typically decades or longer. Climate change may be due to natural internal processes or external forcings such as modulations of the solar cycles, volcanic eruptions and persistent anthropogenic changes in the composition of the atmosphere or in land use. Note that the Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), in its Article 1, defines climate change as: ‘a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods’. The UNFCCC thus makes a distinction between climate change attributable to human activities altering the atmospheric composition, and climate variability attributable to natural causes. See also Climate change commitment, Detection and Attribution. 

Judith Curry claims the CO2 greenhouse effect is "misleading" and "propaganda"

Even worse, if you can imagine this from an ex-scientist, is that Judith believes, or is pretending to believe, that CO2 is not the major greenhouse gas that influences climatic change. She effectively claimed that emissions reductions won't have "any discernible impact" on climate. I mean this is something that has been solid in science since the middle of the 1800s, and Judith "believes" it's a misleading piece of propaganda from practically every country in the entire world. All 196 State Parties to the UNFCCC plus one regional economic integration organization.

Think about it. So far human activity has caused an increase in atmospheric CO2 of more than 40%. So far the average global surface temperature has risen above pre-industrial by more than one degree Celsius, even without allowing for this year's extraordinarily high temperatures:

Figure 1 | Global mean surface temperature anomaly for the 12 months to September each year. The base period is 1951-1980. Data source: GISS NASA

And that's instantaneous. There is more in the pipeline. How do Judith and Donald think we can hope to contain this incessant temperature rise and associated change in climates without cutting CO2 emissions?

Judith might blame climate scientists and bloggers for pushing her into the arms of the anti-democratic Trump and his disturbing (and disturbed) fans. That would be an abdication of personal responsibility. Surely something repugnant to an individualist in the USA, even one who's gone round the bend.

Donald Trump is not just a huge danger to the USA, he is a huge danger to the world. Not just in regard to climate and the environment, but in terms of global stability and progress. The difference between Trump and Hitler was that Hitler was a fan of science and technology, although he abused it. Donald Trump and the anti-knowledge / anti-everything and everyone crowd are more comparable to those that brought down Rome way back when.