“James Hansen, for instance, who headed NASA’s Goddard Institute for three decades before taking a post at Columbia University, is one of the best known “climatologists” in the world — despite his long and embarrassing record of bad forecasting spanning decades.
In 1988, Hansen was asked by journalist and author Rob Reiss how the “greenhouse effect” would affect the neighborhood outside his window within 20 years (by 2008). “The West Side Highway [which runs along the Hudson River] will be under water,” Hansen claimed. “And there will be tape across the windows across the street because of high winds. And the same birds won’t be there. The trees in the median strip will change.... There will be more police cars … [since] you know what happens to crime when the heat goes up.” In 1986, Hansen also predicted in congressional testimony that the Earth would be some two degrees warmer within 20 years. In recent years, after the anticipated warming failed to materialize, alarmists have cooled on predicting such a dramatic jump in temperature over such a short period of time.”
“James Hansen is a political activists”
I won’t deny it, but he is still considered a “distinguished scientist” as well, which is basically my point. The fact that scientists accept such men as him into their community, appoint them to lofty positions and laud them with accolades dilutes the reputation of all “distinguished scientists”.