Is Pope Benedict a closet climate sceptic, after all?

It is interesting to note that Pope Benedict, in his carefully prepared address to the ambassador, did not say a word about climate change, which was a priority item in the new ambassador´s speech. Maybe the Pope is not that convinced about human induced climate change, after all?

Monckton on Paul Nurse’s “anti-science” | Watts Up With That?

IF YOU respect science you will probably be disturbed by the following opinions.

On climate: true science may be found in “the consensus opinions of experts” [1], we can “say with assurance that human activities cause weather changes” [1], recent variations are not “natural, cyclical environmental trends” [1], the manmade CO2’s contribution to the annual carbon cycle is not the 3% imagined by the UN’s climate panel, the IPCC, but 86% [2], “anthropogenic climate change is already affecting every aspect of our lives” [3],

On freedom of information requests asking publicly-funded scientists for their data: the requests are “a tool to intimidate some scientists” [4].

On a sceptical interviewer: the force of Sir Paul’s replies had left him “tongue-tied” and had compelled him to stop the cameras on several occasions, when the interviewer had in fact told Sir Paul he suffered from hypoglycaemia and needed to take regular breaks to maintain his glucose intake [5].

On US politics: voters should not choose Republicans [1].

You would probably be even more disturbed to be told that these are the opinions expressed not by some climate scientist or politician but by Sir Paul Nurse, the geneticist who heads the world’s oldest taxpayer-funded lobby-group, the grandly-named and lavishly-grant-aided Royal Society.

Ben Jervey | "Doubt" Video On Fossil Fuel Industry's Tobacco PR Tactics To Undermine Science

It's called "Doubt," and it's about how the fossil fuel industry took the tobacco industry's playbook (didn't just borrow a play, but really the whole playbook) to confuse the public on the science of climate change. Not by disproving the facts [which facts, specifically?] — because that's impossible — but just by creating enough doubt to make a busy public dismiss it.