In a recent article
https://cliscep.com/2026/09/04/climate-history-a-load-of-old-scallops/

I mentioned – ever so ironically – that “..the science [of climate], unlike the history, is settled.” I should have added that the fact that it’s settled is the clearest possible proof that it’s not science, particularly when the thing that is being claimed to be “settled” is not just our present state of knowledge about the climate, but the predictions of the change in climate over the coming decades and centuries.

But in any case, the settled nature of climate science is irrelevant to the question of upcoming climate doom, because the basis of our knowledge of climate change (as opposed to our knowledge of the workings of the climate in general) is the way that the climate has changed in the past. In other words, the study of climate change is a historical study, not a scientific one, though science may of course contribute, just as it does to archaeology and other branches of history.

No doubt scientific data such as the width of century-old tree rings on a mountain top in Colorado may possibly provide useful information, just like the “cost-effective laboratory visible-near infrared/shortwave infrared spectroscopy data” and the prehistoric Papuan porcine dental records Professor Frankopan is so excited about. It doesn’t, of course, because it is entirely fake, but that’s another matter.

A friend is opening a jazz club near where I live in the ancient town of Elne, originally St Helen’s, a fortified oppidum founded in late Roman times by the Emperor Constantine and named after his mother Helena, who was sanctified for her discovery of the True Cross. (Further evidence that it was originally called St Helen’s is the fact that they play 13-a-side rugby there too.)

It’s called the Club Illiberis, after the name of the Gallo-Roman town mentioned by multiple early Roman & Greek authors, and thought to be on the site of the present town of Elne.
I had to look it up, and Wiki wasn’t much help. There’s the Illiberian Plain, which is being advertised by the local tourist office as a fascinating historical and environmental site, though unfortunately it exists on no known map.

[Rendering the region invisible to tourists is a particular talent of the local tourism agencies. The local wine is “Côte de Roussillon,” although the Roussillon region was abolished ten years ago by the central government as part of their policy of giving power to the regions. The Tour de France was welcomed here with a banner in English proclaiming “Welcome to North Catalonia” – again, a name that exists only in the imagination of the region’s advertising agency. And the local tourist office, instead of announcing the name of the town, accompanied by the words “Tourist Office,” proclaims simply “La French Catalane,” which means nothing at all.

To add to the impression that I’m living in Nowheresville, there’s even an erotic novel from the year 1900 set on an imaginary peninsula off the coast, which, if it existed, would be visible from where I’m sitting. It’s “the Adventures of King Pausole,” and its appeal is based on the fact that everyone in the imaginary kingdom is nude, which allows the author to say something saucy in every sentence without ever overstepping the bounds of propriety. It’s the novel that Benny Hill would have written if he’d been an effete Belgian érotomane instead of an ordinary bloke from Hampshire, like me.]

Where was I?

My internet search for Illiberis led to an article by a local historian, one J. Margail, which suggests that Illiberis, whose existence is attested in dozens of Greek & Latin sources, wasn’t at Elne at all, but a few kilometres away, which is interesting, because it would suggest the existence of an important undiscovered Roman site. He cites evidence archaeological, geographical, geological, and climatical, as well as ancient authors and three separate Roman travel guides which give the mileage between different sites all along the Mediterranean coast. He also cites Napoleon on the route across the Pyrenees taken by Hannibal. Napoleon’s theory is apparently rejected by all the experts, since he never wrote it up in a peer-reviewed article, and what did he know about historical army manoeuvres anyway?

The author, writing in 1933, supports his thesis by citing the doubts about the identity of Hisarlik with the site of Homer’s Troy. If we can’t even be certain of the identity of the site so thoroughly excavated by Schliemann and Dörpfeld, how can we trust the assertion that Illiberis was at Elne, given the total lack of archaeological evidence?

Which led me back to Wikipedia to ascertain the state of play on Hisarlik/Troy. As a full-time sceptic, I’m naturally attracted to any theory that casts doubt on the opinion of experts. I’ve a book “Where Troy Once Stood,” which places Troy in the Fens, with Ilios, father of Priam and founder of Troy/Ilium, buried under Ely Cathedral. Ulysses’ Isle of the Laestrigonians was Cuba, while Lesbos is the Isle of Wight. Suddenly it all makes sense.

Wikipedia has no article on Hisarlik, but instead sends you directly to the article on Troy, much as Wiki disappeared the article on “Climate Scepticism” soon after the birth of this site, and now sends you directly to “Climate Denial.” Wiki in French has a separate article on “le Site Archéologique de Troie” which does at least acknowledge that there was once a debate on the question, though it adds that since the discoveries of Korfmann in 1988, scholars are unanimous in identifying Hisarlik with Troy, and it gives as a reference an article in a popular history magazine which doesn’t even mention the subject, but describes how Schliemann’s treasure turned up in Moscow.

The article on Illiberis links me to this sceptical article on Troy/Hisarlik from 1930:
https://www.persee.fr/doc/bude_0004-5527_1930_num_26_1_6695
The author, after reviewing the many reasons why Hisarlik cannot be the site of the siege of Troy, ends by noting:

The problem of Troy’s location remains unresolved, and it is necessary to revisit it from first principles, stripping away the incoherent hypotheses that have served only to obscure it over the past half-century. We must also deliberately abandon the method followed thus far. From a scientific standpoint, it is flawed to posit—prior to any demonstration— as Schliemann and Dörpfeld have done, that a pre-selected site is the Ilium of Homer, and then to arbitrarily distort any contradictory evidence in an attempt to align it with that initial assertion. The alternative approach is undoubtedly slower, yet far more reliable—and, in any case, the only one that is prudent, logical, and rigorous: it consists of approaching the problem without preconceived notions, patiently gathering all relevant evidence, and subsequently drawing a measured conclusion from that body of information, if possible.

..which is about as good a summary of the scientific method as you could wish for – from a historian. The history wasn’t settled in the time of Herodotus two and half millennia ago, and it still isn’t. How very different from climate science, which was born fully armed from the head of James Hansen in 1986 and has never looked back – except to change the historical temperature data from time to time.

Here’s a modern sceptical article from another non-expert:
https://medium.com/@seltzer_57387/where-was-troy-certainly-not-hisarlik-by-richard-seltzer-528f8f06e4bd