Real talk, there hasn’t been a more loaded Q&A panel since Pauline Hanson overloaded at the news of Sam Dastyari’s technically-Muslim upbringing in Iran. That is to say tonight’s edition, featuring One Nation’s climate-skeptic senator elect Malcolm Roberts and particle physicist Professor Brian Cox was the most fiesty showing in weeks. Weeks!
ICYMI, Roberts appeared on Insiders and pleaded for host Barrie Cassidy to show him empirical evidence linking human interference to the planet’s rising temperature. What followed was a veritable avalanche of evidence hurled his way, and his co-panellists tonight, including current Science Minister Greg Hunt, were happy to continue that trend.
That’s all well and good, and you may think to yourself that there’d be no better place to entertain opposing views than on the ABC’s weekly hackle-raiser, but Roberts wasn’t having the evidence. At all.
If we can understand the show as public policy by way of gladiatorial bloodsport, Roberts raised his shield to all attacks. He said there had been a clearly observable pause in global warming, and all other evidence was fallacious.
Let’s continue the combat metaphor: Cox then yanked Roberts’ shield away and bonked him right over the head with it.
The scientist produced the very same graphs Roberts was badmouthing, which show a correlation between carbon dioxide emissions and global temperatures, and attempted to point out every way in which the senator elect has misread the data.
We’ve had a pause in warming & NASA corrupted data, says Malcolm Roberts. @ProfBrianCox examines the graphs #QandA https://t.co/HTNk4Bzrk1
— ABC Q&A (@QandA) August 15, 2016
What followed were some pretty audacious attempts to pin data manipulation on NASA, and a feeble belief that Cox’s consensus argument merited some kind of disqualification on rhetorical grounds.
Of course, that’s basically like complaining to the gladiator pit referee that your opponent is stomping you in the gonads – no, it may not be a technically flawless move, but you’re still getting stomped in the gonads.
And, when even the Liberal Party’s man is choosing to accept humanity’s influence on climate change, it may just be worth considering the idea that the scientists behind these stats aren’t part of some shady cabal.
We’ve never seen a nerdier takedown on television, but now Roberts has been locked in for a three year Senate term, we can probably expect a few more in the following months.
Source and photo: Q&A / Twitter.
