Malcolm Roberts' 15 minutes of international fame

Sou

Malcolm Roberts got his 15 minutes (actually it was more like 30 minutes) trying to persuade Professor Brian Cox that climate change is a hoax dreamt up by bankers who want to take over the world, or something. Even deniers at WUWT didn't think he won the day. Except for Eric Worrall. Many of them judged his performance by how the audience reacted, and they didn't think he persuaded them.

The thing that was different this time was that the media scorned him - all around the world.

Some people thought that Brian Cox could have done better. I'm not in that camp. IMO he pitched it right. My favourite was the look of amazed disbelief on Brian Cox's face when Malcolm Roberts tried to claim that NASA faked the temperature data. "NASA?" he asked, almost choking trying to hold back his laughter. "The same NASA that sent men to the moon?" (And then he asked if Malcolm believed that there really was a manned space journey to the moon.)

JohnCook

The telling moment in the exchange was when Roberts requested empirical evidence, Cox presented evidence and Roberts responded that the evidence was corrupted by NASA. That short exchange told the audience everything they needed to know about climate science denial - no evidence will convince them because incoming facts ricochet off their tin-foil hats.

Humma_Kavula

And Robert's based his "corrupted by NASA" claim on the claims made by Steve Goddard, a blogger who uses a fake name and who tells deniers like Roberts whatever they want to hear.

Phil51

Put me in the camp that believes Cox could have done better. He did well but I thought a little extra effort would have bought out more of the strange beliefs Roberts holds. Cox successfully planted the seed in peoples mind with the NASA remark but Roberts deflected it reasonably well I thought.
Hopefully there will be other opportunities because the situation is dire.  In eighteen months One Nation preferences may put a conservative govt back in power in Qld, with them holding the balance of power. In that case kiss the reef goodbye. 

tadaaa

imo he should have hammered Roberts on the conspiracy theory aspect - forget the science, forget the confusing details over "forcings" "feedbacks", "correlation" etc
it was not a science show after all - the graphs were enough for that message to get across
he should have gone after him on the conspiracy angle - how far does it go, NASA obviously, they have form after all

WMO, MET offices of Japan, UK & Australia - it must do as all the data broadly agrees

and have managed to convinced all the major science academies/organisations, fool those idiots who run the global insurance and global risks markets, the worlds research universities (apart form the Liberty Creationist University - so beloved Ted Cruz)

force Roberts to look more like the tool he is

dcpetterson

Is there a link to the video of this wonderful event, or must I use my own Google-foo?

DavidR

Initially I thought Prof. Cox could have been more explicit in his approach.  With hindsight, Cox isn't a climate specialist and we shouldn't expect him to be.  I'm now inclined to agree with the view that his broad-brush approach was more fitting for this type of televised debate.   The more technical it gets, the more the general audience tends to blank out.

Cox's obviously sincere incredulity re Roberts' position was most effective in this case, I think.

tadaaa

john

It is dismal indeed that this person is now a senator.
His gambit being that even the US military must be in on this whole "joke".
To say the man needs help is perhaps understatement.
His web site runs the usual about this all being a terrible hidden secret or gaud enough.

john

Perhaps to have a look at RealClimate to see how this was viewed.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2016/08/australian-silliness-and-july-temperature-records/

dcpetterson

Thank you Tadaaa!

BaerbelW

Several people had uploaded video-questions to ABC QandA for Brian Cox and Malcom Roberts. Unfortunately, none of them were shown during the show. I think that they should at least have shown Glenn Tamblyn's video which is just a wee bit on the sarcastic side of things.



Please note that Glenn is a contributor at Skeptical Science.

john

I agree Baebel and when some could not watch it I mentioned get the free program irfanview which has been copied by the type of graphic program you have to pay for i may add, my comment went in the bin.
His video has to put a smile on your face.

dcpetterson

I watched the video of Q and A. Awesome.

Okay. I have to say this. I'm a guy, and I'm totally straight. Brian Cox is a superstar, and I think I'm in love.

metzomagic

I think Cox did very well, considering the limited time constraints imposed by the live debate format. You simply don't have time to thoroughly debunk each of Roberts' tired old denialist talking points before he Gish Gallops on the the next one. But the audience will respond better to clever, short, and memorable rebuttals like: "I brought the graph!".

Ceist

I would have loved for Cox to say "Steve Goddard"?  You know Steve Goddard isn't a real person don't you? He's just some crank using a fake name who just pretends he's a climate scientist and runs a ridiculous conspiracy blog. I have to laugh at the silly fake graphs he posts. Some really gullible people really believe he's some kind of expert because of the fake name he uses. Is that what you believe Malcolm? That he's an expert?

tadaaa

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, citing Goddard IS extraordinary, just not in the way Roberts intended

Phil51

Roberts made his first speech in the senate yesterday; nothing too conspiratorial, just the usual denialist talking points
http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/chamber/hansards/7bf9040b-3855-4d2d-840b-2e051635f1c8/toc_pdf/Senate_2016_09_13_4435.pdf;fileType=application/pdf#search="chamber/hansards/7bf9040b-3855-4d2d-840b-2e051635f1c8/0000"

Contrail Chook

If anyone hasn't seen the Q&A episode before and wants to know where the popcorn starts, it's at about 11 minutes in.

By around 25 minutes Cox is trying to explain climate predictions to Roberts, and looking much like he's trying to explain quantum chromodynamics to a cane toad.