Climate skeptics go quiet when challenged

There’s a great article over at the BBC, about what happens when you give the climate change denialists a chance to present their side of the argument. You get

The sum total of evidence obtained through this open invitation, then, is one first-hand claim of bias in scientific journals, not backed up by documentary evidence; and three second-hand claims, two well-known and one that the scientist in question does not consider evidence of anti-skeptic feeling.

While I’m not surprised that these people complete failed to back up their claims of systemic bias in the scientific community, I don’t share Mark’s view that the whole exercise was a waste of time. Sure, we knew they wouldn’t come up with the goods, but it’s worth doing the legwork to prove that to the public at large, especially if you can get that result published on a hugely popular site like the BBC.

Also, if someone goes through these motions every once in a while, then it gives the denialists less scope to claim they’re being oppressed. Of course they won’t stop; they’ll just claim that this a piece of establishment propaganda, but for every article like this that is published, the public at large will be less inclined to give those claims credence.