So a few months ago we pointed and laughed at Jairam Ramesh and this one scientist who said that global warming is false and that the Himalayan glaciers will melt by 2035.
Turns out, they were half right:
Leaders of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change apologized yesterday for making a "poorly substantiated" claim that Himalayan glaciers could disappear by 2035.
The finding was included in the group's 2007 report in an error-riddled paragraph that also misstates the total land area covered by Himalayan glaciers. Scientists who identified the mistakes say the IPCC report relied on news accounts that appear to misquote a scientific paper that estimated the glaciers could disappear by 2350, not 2035.
Oops!
Hey, IPCC, aren't you guys scientists? So shouldn't you have OVERCHECKED for errors? Shouldn't you have higher standards than a student in fifth grade who even has typos in his project report which he completely copied from Wikipedia?
And yes, I WAS WRONG to believe the IPCC when they said that their "report was peer reviewed by scientists from various countries" and that they used data provided by ISRO.
So, to quote my favourite sign outside my neighbourhood grocery shop, "PLEASE BRING EXACT CHANGE. SORRY FOR THE INCONVEIENCE. THANK YOU FOR COOPERATION."
However, the point remains that even though the IPCC was wrong, even Jairam Ramesh and his crank scientist were wrong to deny global warming. Global warming is not a myth. It is something which is quite evident and in front of us. We see it when it rains unseasonly or the thick fog which envelops our cities every morning, we feel it when we have a heat wave and cold wave in the same year. It's real. The climate is changing and not in a good way.
Yes, I screwed up by believing those fact fudgers.
The pointing and laughing may now commence.
Regular programming will resume shortly.
Climate Science Panel Apologizes for Himalayan Error [NYT]
India's environment minister will not believe any stupid scientific fact about global warming [Me]
