[RyanZAG]

From a cursory glance into the grants and money devoted to climate science research from the UN and others, nearly all of it directly relates to climate change. There is a market for general studies into planetary climate, but they're minuscule compared to the amount of funding provided by the fear of climate change.

To deny the financial link here is purposeful blindness, in my opinion. If all of the studies showed that no climate change was occurring, and all of the studies were funded by oil companies, you'd no doubt be agreeing with me. Actually the studies that are funded by oil companies do show far less climate change, while those funded by the UN show the most. Coincidence? Not a chance.

> I don't agree with the down vote applied to your post. However, the rhetorical device of claiming an opponent has ulterior motives is frowned upon on HN.

Fair enough, but I literally got down voted 5 seconds after pressing submit. I've never seen that before, and I have a feeling I was downvoted by someone without even having my post read fully. It was more of a personal anecdote to myself that there's more here than meets the eye.

[linkregister]

What resources do you use to look into the funding sources and scope of climate science studies?

I've seen quite a few articles here on HN based off of NOAA and NASA studies regarding other interesting climate topics, such as variation in jet streams and ocean currents, changes in rainfall (especially California), and the development of storms. That's just my haphazard exposure, certainly not a definitive answer.

Are climate scientists so specialized that they can't pivot to another discipline within meteorology?

Do climate scientists even stay within the field more than other academics? I was under the impression that the vast majority of post-docs and PhD candidates perform laboratory work for a few years, fail to get tenure, and then work in private industry in a tangentially related field for much better compensation. Post-docs and PhD candidates are also notoriously underpaid. Wouldn't tenure follow from a groundbreaking study that disproved mainstream scientific belief, instead of boringly replicating existing findings?

Of course there is an economic link to everything. You still haven't established the link in a meaningful fashion. "I'm just asking questions" isn't good enough to present a convincing argument.

[RyanZAG]

Unfortunately, the numbers we need here are all confidential. Here's the list of UN grants though: http://www.unccd.int/en/programmes/Capacity-building/CBW/mar...

Here's a decent article on the economic effects on climate science research: http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/got-science/2015/got-scie... - This is in the opposite direction, but it shows how easily money is a factor. The fact still remains that there are unknown and undisclosed links to research that is paid to give a specific result.

As for climate scientists, yes they are fairly specialized. A PHD is always going to be specialized. And even more so, nearly all work for climate scientists is in research or in explaining climate change: https://www.indeed.com/q-Climate-Scientist-jobs.html

> Wouldn't tenure follow from a groundbreaking study that disproved mainstream scientific belief, instead of boringly replicating existing findings?

Not if even trying to research it would get you immediately fired. Stating you don't believe climate change exists inside a climate science department will almost instantly guarantee you will be axed. You're definitely not going to get funding to study it.

> Of course there is an economic link to everything. You still haven't established the link in a meaningful fashion. "I'm just asking questions" isn't good enough to present a convincing argument.

That we agree that there is an economic link, and that an economic link will influence outcomes, is literally all I'm saying.