A couple of sensibly written pieces to show how vapid and shallow Bolt et al are in their understanding.
Sydney Morning Herald piece looks at how global warming can increase the likelihood of disasters here.
Piece by former CSIRO atmospheric research head Graeme Pearson on global warming, Hadley Cell and drying Australia here.
Showing posts with label natural disasters. Show all posts
Showing posts with label natural disasters. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Floods, false prophets and the love of God - radio appearance
Having blogged about the recent QLD floods and comments by Pastor Danny here, I am speaking tonight on radio about it with youth worker and all round good guy Dave Fagg of Urban Seed, Praxis Victoria and Seeds Bendigo.
The program is Radio Godbotherers and the stream is found at phoenixfm.org.
The program is Radio Godbotherers and the stream is found at phoenixfm.org.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
false prophets and natural disasters
Catch the Fire ministries recently blogged about the QLD floods here. Pastor Daniel is not controversy shy, and featured in a case some years back where he was accused of villifying muslims. He is pro-Israel and this recent blog suggests there is a link between Kevin Rudd's comments on Israel and the QLD floods. He suggests a past pattern of such events in the USA. His view is wrong on so many levels. Here's a brief discussion on a few.
The state of Israel
How does God relate to Israel today? One thing to keep in mind that equating the modern nation state of Israel with the Jewish people as a whole is a mistake, for it means that any criticism of the state of Israel or Zionism is interpreted automatically as anti-Semitism. One can support the existence of the state of Israel in principle, not be anti-Semitic and still critique what the nation does (by which I mean its policies and actions of its military, etc). After all, this is what the prophets did.
The Jewish people are an ongoing concern to God. A close reading of the book of Romans shows that for Paul, God can hardly be righteous is he is not true to his promises to Israel, starting with his promises to Abraham (Rm 4). He has been faithful to his covenant promises through his Messiah Jesus, and it is Gentiles (most of us) who have been included into this covenant, renewed in the Messiah. Israel too will be saved as part of one family. One cannot marginalise Rm 9-11 and its discussion of God's (and Paul's) love of Israel.
However, a close reading of Galatians will show that ethnic divisions have ended (3:27) and that the Law itself has had its day since it was designed to divide Jew from Gentile - no circumcision, no food laws so that we are identified by our faith (justified - 3:23-25). There is roomm for Jews in God's plan but not for Jewish exceptionalism. This is not to deny them a right to a national or protecting of its citizens, but neither are they free from criticism.
God has used disasters, but how do we know now?
In saying that this tragedy is a result of human sin, it is hardly a theological innovation. The biblical flood tells the story of the judgement of sin by flood. A 3 year drought occurs in Israel due to the people turning to the pagan god Baal (1 Kings 17-18), and Deuteronomy contains curses for breaking the covenant that have a weather component. Yet we know from the book of Job or Jesus' comment on the man born blind (John 9) or those killed by the tower of Siloam (Luke 13) that there is not always a direct connection between sin and disaster. So how does Pastor Danny know? Given the weakness of his theology of Israel I'd say he has no idea.
Our theology has to include 'natural disasters'
We simply have to live with the fact that there are some things that happen that are 'part of nature', or more accurately, part of the way creation is allowed to work, at least for now. La Nina/El Nino is part of a natural oscillation in ocean temperatures and wind patterns that can produce droughts and flooding rains. A nice article by climatologist Neville Nicholls is found here. The flora and fauna have evolved to deal with this variation. It does of course affect human society massively, but it is part of the way things work.
We are not told that the drought that occured during Joseph's time was due to sin, simply that it was going to happen and Joseph should help Egypt prepare so that his family might take refuge. The bible acknowledges that it rains on the righteous and unrighteous and that rain is sent in its seasons. This event is 'natural' in this sense. We need to take care when attributing it to climate change since 1974 was a similar event, thought certainly such events are more probably in a warmer and wetter atmosphere, even if on average QLD will receive less rainfall as climate projections suggest.
Instead of blaming Rudd for mildly chastising Israel over its misstreatment of Palestinians, Pastor Danny should be praying for those affected and encouraging his flock to do the same and dig deep for those in need. Didn't Christ come because God loved the world?
In claiming that this disaster is an act of judgement, Pastor Danny is making God out to be an unloving, immoral monster. He is slandering God and his people. Such is the act one might say of a false prophet, for he falsely interprets an event, and because he is misrepresenting Christ who loved humanity enough to die to reconcile us to God, that he is an anti-Christ!
The state of Israel
How does God relate to Israel today? One thing to keep in mind that equating the modern nation state of Israel with the Jewish people as a whole is a mistake, for it means that any criticism of the state of Israel or Zionism is interpreted automatically as anti-Semitism. One can support the existence of the state of Israel in principle, not be anti-Semitic and still critique what the nation does (by which I mean its policies and actions of its military, etc). After all, this is what the prophets did.
The Jewish people are an ongoing concern to God. A close reading of the book of Romans shows that for Paul, God can hardly be righteous is he is not true to his promises to Israel, starting with his promises to Abraham (Rm 4). He has been faithful to his covenant promises through his Messiah Jesus, and it is Gentiles (most of us) who have been included into this covenant, renewed in the Messiah. Israel too will be saved as part of one family. One cannot marginalise Rm 9-11 and its discussion of God's (and Paul's) love of Israel.
However, a close reading of Galatians will show that ethnic divisions have ended (3:27) and that the Law itself has had its day since it was designed to divide Jew from Gentile - no circumcision, no food laws so that we are identified by our faith (justified - 3:23-25). There is roomm for Jews in God's plan but not for Jewish exceptionalism. This is not to deny them a right to a national or protecting of its citizens, but neither are they free from criticism.
God has used disasters, but how do we know now?
In saying that this tragedy is a result of human sin, it is hardly a theological innovation. The biblical flood tells the story of the judgement of sin by flood. A 3 year drought occurs in Israel due to the people turning to the pagan god Baal (1 Kings 17-18), and Deuteronomy contains curses for breaking the covenant that have a weather component. Yet we know from the book of Job or Jesus' comment on the man born blind (John 9) or those killed by the tower of Siloam (Luke 13) that there is not always a direct connection between sin and disaster. So how does Pastor Danny know? Given the weakness of his theology of Israel I'd say he has no idea.
Our theology has to include 'natural disasters'
We simply have to live with the fact that there are some things that happen that are 'part of nature', or more accurately, part of the way creation is allowed to work, at least for now. La Nina/El Nino is part of a natural oscillation in ocean temperatures and wind patterns that can produce droughts and flooding rains. A nice article by climatologist Neville Nicholls is found here. The flora and fauna have evolved to deal with this variation. It does of course affect human society massively, but it is part of the way things work.
We are not told that the drought that occured during Joseph's time was due to sin, simply that it was going to happen and Joseph should help Egypt prepare so that his family might take refuge. The bible acknowledges that it rains on the righteous and unrighteous and that rain is sent in its seasons. This event is 'natural' in this sense. We need to take care when attributing it to climate change since 1974 was a similar event, thought certainly such events are more probably in a warmer and wetter atmosphere, even if on average QLD will receive less rainfall as climate projections suggest.
Instead of blaming Rudd for mildly chastising Israel over its misstreatment of Palestinians, Pastor Danny should be praying for those affected and encouraging his flock to do the same and dig deep for those in need. Didn't Christ come because God loved the world?
In claiming that this disaster is an act of judgement, Pastor Danny is making God out to be an unloving, immoral monster. He is slandering God and his people. Such is the act one might say of a false prophet, for he falsely interprets an event, and because he is misrepresenting Christ who loved humanity enough to die to reconcile us to God, that he is an anti-Christ!
Bolt just doesn't get it.
Sadly Queensland is suffering a flood the like of which we haven't seen since 1974, and lives have been lost, to say nothing of property. Sadly, conservative commentator Andrew Bolt has used this as a pretext to bash global warming science yet again in his blog here.
He states "What I cannot understand is this: how was the possibility of such a danger not forseen, when climate experts and the Government claim they can predict the climate 100 years from now? How did this week’s rain come as such a surprise, when we now spend billions more on computer models predicting the future?"
I can't at this time comment on how well the situation was forecast since I haven't looked closely at the evolution, but a few comments are worth making.
Firstly, it is worth understanding that sometimes situations develop rapidly due to the right ingredients being there, and sometimes the information is not available to the models to simulate this rapid development. Oftentimes the human forecaster adds enormous value. Secondly, given that such an event is an extreme one, picking the precise values of rainfall can be beyond the models, however they can point to the fact that an event will be extreme.
Thirdly, there are comparisons with this event and the one in 1974 which was also a result of a La Nina year. A rearrangement of the ocean temperatures and wind patterns in the Pacific can result in floods during La Nina years and drought during El Nino years. Given this, we need to exercise caution in ascribing this event to global warming. Certainly under global warming there is more moisture contained in the atmosphere and hence an increased chance of more severe rainfall events (think the recent monsoon in Pakistan). This natural variability will continue, so while Bolt is right to point out that global warming scenarios have QLD receiving less rainfall on average, this does not mean that events like this are no longer possible.
Finally, the comparison of (sometimes) poor weather forecasts and climate projections is a false one. In the case of the former, a lack of evidence can lead to large errors in the forecast (think of chaos theory). This is known as an initial value problem as the initial measurements are key. The forecast problem is one of predicting accurately certain weather elements like wind speed and direction, rainfall amount at a point (in models averaged over a grid box) or maximum temperature. For climate projections, we are more interested in the mean conditions averaged over a larger grid box than a forecast model (due to computing and time constraints) and time, and not in precise values like the temperature at Melbourne on Feb 2, 2100. This kind of accuracy is impossible due to chaos. However, mean climate states and values like global mean temperatures or regional mean temperatures are possible. This is because the kind of forcings like solar output or greenhouse gases together with the state of the physical earth are more important than the effect of the state of the atmosphere now on the future climate.
It is a shame Bolt can't resist using a tragedy to highlight his willful ignorance of what should be plain to all. We can't say global warming has caused this event, though it may be consistent with it. All we should do is pray, lend a hand and a few dollars, showing the love of Christ to those in need.
He states "What I cannot understand is this: how was the possibility of such a danger not forseen, when climate experts and the Government claim they can predict the climate 100 years from now? How did this week’s rain come as such a surprise, when we now spend billions more on computer models predicting the future?"
I can't at this time comment on how well the situation was forecast since I haven't looked closely at the evolution, but a few comments are worth making.
Firstly, it is worth understanding that sometimes situations develop rapidly due to the right ingredients being there, and sometimes the information is not available to the models to simulate this rapid development. Oftentimes the human forecaster adds enormous value. Secondly, given that such an event is an extreme one, picking the precise values of rainfall can be beyond the models, however they can point to the fact that an event will be extreme.
Thirdly, there are comparisons with this event and the one in 1974 which was also a result of a La Nina year. A rearrangement of the ocean temperatures and wind patterns in the Pacific can result in floods during La Nina years and drought during El Nino years. Given this, we need to exercise caution in ascribing this event to global warming. Certainly under global warming there is more moisture contained in the atmosphere and hence an increased chance of more severe rainfall events (think the recent monsoon in Pakistan). This natural variability will continue, so while Bolt is right to point out that global warming scenarios have QLD receiving less rainfall on average, this does not mean that events like this are no longer possible.
Finally, the comparison of (sometimes) poor weather forecasts and climate projections is a false one. In the case of the former, a lack of evidence can lead to large errors in the forecast (think of chaos theory). This is known as an initial value problem as the initial measurements are key. The forecast problem is one of predicting accurately certain weather elements like wind speed and direction, rainfall amount at a point (in models averaged over a grid box) or maximum temperature. For climate projections, we are more interested in the mean conditions averaged over a larger grid box than a forecast model (due to computing and time constraints) and time, and not in precise values like the temperature at Melbourne on Feb 2, 2100. This kind of accuracy is impossible due to chaos. However, mean climate states and values like global mean temperatures or regional mean temperatures are possible. This is because the kind of forcings like solar output or greenhouse gases together with the state of the physical earth are more important than the effect of the state of the atmosphere now on the future climate.
It is a shame Bolt can't resist using a tragedy to highlight his willful ignorance of what should be plain to all. We can't say global warming has caused this event, though it may be consistent with it. All we should do is pray, lend a hand and a few dollars, showing the love of Christ to those in need.
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