Faith-based climatology

Lubos Motl provides some links and reaction to what was supposed to be The Great Climate Debate last month here.

Evidently because of local phone problems, realist Tim Ball couldn't participate. This left us with a rare opportunity to hear, straight from the horse's "mouth", how an alarmist scientist (Andrew Dessler) justifies his position (you can currently listen or download an MP3 here).

Boiling down Dessler's non-answers to many specific questions, the answer emerged--Dessler believes mostly because he has faith in other "experts" who believe.

He doesn't seem to have much faith in models; he evidently doesn't think recent warming is particularly unusual; and he seems to admit that the IPCC's "90% confidence" figure was pulled from the air rather than calculated.

His reasoning seems to be that until he's convinced that recent warming is caused by the sun or other natural factors, the null hypothesis (it's caused by CO2) must stand.

If Dessler was surrounded by scientists that believed the sun was the major driver of current warmth, I highly doubt that Dessler would look at our current evidence and disagree with them.
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Not long ago, I think many people viewed the IPCC like some all-knowing Wizard of Oz. That Summary for Policymakers was scientific Truth itself, representing a complete consensus of 2,500 scientists that unchecked human carbon dioxide emissions would result in catastrophe.

We couldn't ever actually look behind that curtain, but if we did, we'd be assured of seeing 2,500 climate experts back there, all wearing horn-rimmed glasses, standing by counters with bunsen burners and beakers, and probably flanked by an enormous wall of complicated-looking blinking lights. All have independently checked the evidence, and most importantly, all are in agreement.

It's becoming more and more clear that the reality is stunningly different. There's actually a vast amount of disagreement back there, and it's looking like a very large percentage of the "consensus" folks, like Dessler and this guy, mostly believe because they have faith that someone else has done the thinking.