[SlackDad]

Originally Posted by punky

Wow, in one post you have managed to libel thousands of research scientists that might for all you know actually agree with you.

This issue is addressed in State Of Fear. If research money comes from oil companies, then the scientist is automatically corrupt regardless of his reputation or what he actually researches/reports. However, if a scientist is funded from a leftist, pro global-warming agenda based organisation, then automatically you're above reproach, and the sun shines out of your backside.

As for using State of Fear as a basis for argument, a reviewer on Amazon sums it up:

Originally Posted by The Oysterman

I enjoyed this book as it should be read....a fictious novel. Thinking of this book as a factual piece of work citing debunking references to climate change, means that you also believe that after you fall down a crevasse in Antarctica, you can climb out and be rescued by a meteorite survey robot...yeah right.

Any book that tries to marry real world science with heroic characters should not be taken as the gospel truth. What the book should do is make you think, then go off and do a little research yourself. Having done this you may find that Mr Crichton is using aspects of science to perpetuate his own views on climate change,(humans are not responsible)and are not altogether backed-up by other science nor the scientists which he cites. He is using the very same techniques to convince, that the characters in the book use to debunk. He could be seen to be pervading the state of fear, and judging by some of the reviews I have read here he has succeeded. It was probably the graphs, stick one in a book and it becomes true. Note the hurricane graph pg 505, hurricanes per decade except for the last line which covers only 4 years but this gives the impression of declining strikes......

---------- Post added at 17:35 ---------- Previous post was at 17:31 ----------

Originally Posted by injuneer

Yes, hasn't it been proven through ice core analysis that the rate of change has increased dramatically since the industrial revolution?

I personally don't know but it certainly sounds plausible.