I have at least twice posted the findings from the Meteorologists Bulletin Survey of opinions on AGW. Here is yet another survey: I just post the abstract and title. You can go to the entire paper if interested. It is available free as a PDF file from Environ. Res. Lett.
Environ. Res. Lett. 8 (2013) 024024 (7pp)
doi:10.1088/1748-9326/8/2/024024
Title:
Quantifying the consensus on
anthropogenic global warming in the
scientific literature
(Sorry I omitted the long list of authors. formatting to cumbersome to handle)
Received 18 January 2013Accepted for publication 22 April 2013
Published 15 May 2013Online at stacks.iop.org/ERL/8/024024
Abstract
We analyze the evolution of the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming (AGW) in the peer-reviewed
scientific literature, examining 11 944 climate abstracts from 1991–2011 matching the topics ‘global climate
change’ or ‘global warming’. We find that 66.4% of abstracts expressed no position on AGW, 32.6% endorsed
AGW, 0.7% rejected AGW and 0.3% were uncertain about the cause of global warming. Among abstracts expressing
a position on AGW, 97.1% endorsed the consensus position that humans are causing global warming. In a second
phase of this study, we invited authors to rate their own papers. Compared to abstract ratings, a smaller percentage of
self-rated papers expressed no position on AGW (35.5%). Among self-rated papers expressing a position on AGW,
97.2% endorsed the consensus. For both abstract ratings and authors’ self-ratings, the percentage of endorsements
among papers expressing a position on AGW marginally increased over time. Our analysis indicates that
the number of papers rejecting the consensus on AGW is a vanishingly small proportion of the published research
The main point I would call to your attention to is that the bulk of papers ~ two-thirds take no position with regard to global warming. It is only a minority of papers, ~one-third, that endorse AGW or question, or reject it outright. The later two categories being nearly insignificant within this one-third of papers. Those papers endorsing AGW, which may be accurately said to be equivalent to accepting the Hansen Hypothesis as correct, are divided in their estimates, if they give any, of how significant they believe AGW is.
It is from this minority of papers that the 97 % figure, so often seen, comes from. Overall, among these 11,944 climate abstracts published between 1991 and 2011 approximately one-third accepted the Hansen hypothesis as contributing to warming and a large majority, two- thirds, took no position. Among those two thirds, a surprising number of papers reported findings that are inconsistent with the Hansen Hypothesis or invalidate the assumption inherent to the models on which the verity of the Hansen hypothesis depends. There is a reason why researchers who find results inconsistent with Hansen's Hypothesis prevaricate. They don't want to find themselves on the wrong side of politics which could negatively affect their funding, or so they believe. They prefer to error on the side of caution. Can you blame them?
Sadly the science has become inextricably intertwined with emotions, politics, and money interests. On the one hand we are now in the realm of religion among an unsuspecting lay public, and on the other hand our course is being dictated wounded egos, commercial concerns and the quest for profits. The science has hardly any chance in such an atmosphere. But in the end of course, mother nature will prevail, she always does.