The idea that the entire case on global warming comes from a single data set that no one made a copy of is absurd on the face of it. Even if one were to willfully believe that the rest of the article is true, something which I am dubious about, it doesn't mean much in the greater scheme of climate science. One can always find a sloppy scientist. That's why scientists practice things like peer review and replication. The conclusion that global warming is real has been replicated across any number of studies. People opposed to the idea that global warming is real will point to any discrepancy, bit of sloppy science, or dispute on any detail as evidence that it must -all- be wrong. But it's a fallacious and misleading argument. A bit of sloppy science is nothing more than one bit of sloppy science. A slight dispute over details is nothing more than a slight dispute over details. The core of the position that global warming is real and caused by humans has overwhelming evidence behind it. One sloppy scientist doesn't change that fact.
Steve Mcintyre is an interesting guy. His hobby is to check the data, statistics, and models published in climate science articles. As far as I know his work is quality, at least several of his corrections have found their way into mainstream climate records. The fact that he has been involved in so many tooth-and-nail fights to obtain the data he seeks, often being flatly denied, ought to concern anyone who cares about the veracity of the claims of climate scientists and activists, as well as anyone with a vested interest in a political system that looks poised to spend trillions of dollars on climate policy over the next decade.
You can check out his blog here: http://www.climateaudit.org/. But be warned, it's not political at all. If you don't have a head for data series and regression models, you'll be put to sleep.
The amount of bad scientific practices and obfuscation that this one man has uncovered is staggering (scientists cherry-picking data for a paper and then refusing to provide the whole data set seems a common complaint). However, as good citizens we must believe that the thousands of papers he has not gotten around to checking are perfectly valid. To do otherwise is to be painted with the label of "heretic".
In the end, it is the poor treatment of the scientific process by scientists and activists, as well as the religion-like enforcement of agreement, that causes me to hold onto my green skepticism. I'm not sure that climate change won't Kill Us All, but I am not convinced by those that do think so.
edit: One final cause of my green skepticism is the fact that so many highly-publicized predictions made by environmentalists in the past, many of whom held PHDs, have been wrong. But more importantly, they have always been wrong in one direction, the direction of overstating the environmental damage done by human activity. The environmentalists of the 1960s foresaw a world that would undergo multiple environmental holocausts by the 1980s, which of course never came to pass.
While the quality of past predictions has no direct bearing on the quality of current predictions, indeed one might even assume that modern predictions are of higher quality given more advanced methods and greater funding, it does make me skeptical of any would-be green Nostradamus, at least until one establishes a good track record of predicting the future.
"But more importantly, they have always been wrong in one direction, the direction of overstating the environmental damage done by human activity."
In most cases where the predictions have been wrong, they were only wrong because a law has was passed to fix the problem, as in the case of DDT, acid rain, rivers catching on fire, etc.
In just about every case where we haven't passed a law the predictions have come true... fishery deplition, rain forest destruction, mercury and pcbs in fish, etc.
So how do you weigh your decision? Are you waiting for unassailable evidence? What is your best guess at the cost of regulation needed to fix the problem you are not unconvinced exists? How does that cost change over time as we do nothing? Or do you care about any of that?
This isn't (just) an internet flame war. The goal isn't (or shouldn't be) to "win" by poking holes in the oppositions argument. It should be to make the best/safest decision possible given the evidence at hand.
But that's the point: there has to be a decision made. By advocating inaction, you are expressly taking the side of the denialists, even though you claim not to agree with them, technically.
> But that's the point: THERE HAS TO BE A DECISION MADE.
No, not really. That's an argument that's often heard from the confirmalists(1), injecting it into the discussion as a premise. It's not the language of people who are confident truth is on their side.
The action-now argument assumes that no significant technological advances will be made. If e.g. desalination on a massive scale becomes viable, most of the drought-problem can be solved. If the nuclear power waste problem can be solved (e.g. by raising the efficiency), we can slash a huge percentage of current emissions with little to no downside. If artificial photosynthesis becomes viable, we can even wash out already emitted CO2.
Deciding against globally orchestrated emissions programs -- which will have very real costs in terms of economic growth, which fuels increases in living standards, especially in countries where it isn't so high -- isn't denying climate changes. It's arguing that we're already hard at work slashing our dependencies on fossil fuels, and that we probably know a lot more in 20 years than we do today.
If I'm wrong, and we don't take the decision, then we're much better equipped, both technologically and financially, to handle the situation in 20 years than we are today. If I'm right, and we do it, then we're severely limiting the ability of the worlds poorest regions in increasing their own well-being. 400 mio. Chinese entering the middle class, and accepting that a western standard of living (car, air condition, heating, hot baths, flying on vacation) is going to be denied to them because of changes in the climate lying decades ahead? Not gonna happen, no matter what Hu Jintao said at the UN.
(1) It's a stupid word, but so is deniers and denialists.
Deciding against globally orchestrated emissions programs -- which will have very real costs in terms of economic growth, which fuels increases in living standards, especially in countries where it isn't so high -- isn't denying climate changes
I cannot help observing that skepticism of environmental problems correlates strongly with economic certitude. Those argue most passionately that we have insufficient data about the climate are so totally confident in the predictions of economic ruin that they don't even bother to explain their reasoning.
Why this spurious equation of energy efficiency with a halt to economic development? The goal of the green movement is to increase the ratio of productivity to waste, particularly external waste (ie that affecting the commons). Your argument implies that economic development in poor countries must follow the same path that of the west during the industrial revolution, and that fossil fuels are the only coin that buys future prosperity.
If I'm wrong, and we don't take the decision, then we're much better equipped, both technologically and financially, to handle the situation in 20 years than we are today.
I've been following (but not crusading for) environmental issues for 20 years, longer if I include youthful awareness - for example, my uncle used to be an agricultural inspector who'd tackle farmers dumping manure into rivers. We have greatly enhanced our technology over the last 20 years, so why can we not put that expertise to work now, instead of waiting for some future panacea?
As for being in better future financial shape, you assume an inevitable upward trend, a future in which we will all be richer and have more disposable income, so we can afford to kick the can down the road. Only a few short years ago the bull market was hailed as a great economic success, this time it was different, the mistakes of the past would never be repeated, etc. The fact is that we are just as likely to experience a recession or other financial bust in the future as we are experiencing now. When the market is going up people procrastinate on distant necessities in favor of short-term profit. When the market is down such investments are called too risky. To believe that some future market will be so awash in capital as to render environmental improvement a trivial overhead is to subscribe to a form of socioeconomic teleology, not so different from belief in a technological singularity which will obviate all current problems as we become beings of pure energy or suchlike.
The goal of the green movement is to increase the ratio of productivity to waste, particularly external waste (ie that affecting the commons).
You can only have one objective function.
Promoting development means increasing the ratio of economic output to people. The green movement wants to increase the ratio of productivity to waste.
In the (highly likely, considering how large the solution space is) event that the solution to both these problems is not the same, following the prescriptions of the green movement will mean sacrificing some development.
Wasted labor seems to me to fall under that goal (not that I am offering a a fully burnished economic theory here). If your need is illumination, say, a lantern or even a candle is considerably less wasteful than a fire, both in terms of externalities and the effort required to operate it - obtaining oil or a candle that lasts a week, vs armfuls of wood that last for one night which cost time and effort to gather and which are not easily portable once set on fire.
> ... totally confident in the predictions of economic ruin that they don't even bother to explain their reasoning.
I don't predict economic ruin -- I predict slower economic growth. It's not the same.
What I do think, is that there's a huge moral dilemma when we in the western world who're enjoying the fruits of economic growth are now ready to push much poorer parts of the world into slowing their growth, and thus slowing their ascent to the prosperity we're all but taking for granted.
> Why this spurious equation of energy efficiency with a halt to economic development?
Energy efficiency is going to advance itself, since efficiency equals money saved. But the kind of energy efficiency sought under the banner of saving the planet has nothing to do with efficiency, and everything to do with forcing us into using less energy at whatever the cost.
> Your argument implies that economic development in poor countries must follow the same path that of the west during the industrial revolution
Burning fossil fuels is by far the cheapest and easiest way to generate mechanical and electrical energy on demand. Especially when bootstrapping an infrastructure, it's also the most efficient. Gasoline, diesel and oil are simply the only readily available sources of energy that's immediately and cheaply transportable and storable. There is no reason to believe that rural Africa is going to go anywhere without burning a lot of fossils. China and India are sufficiently densely populated and able in terms of infrastructure that they can probably fuel much of their growth electrically -- but barring a breakthrough in nuclear power, there's only so much of it that's going to be generated without fossil-burning.
However: That might change, come economic development.
Taxing (in whatever way, directly or indirectly) carbon emissions -- and that's really the only political proposal that's on the table will curtail economic growth: It will make it harder for the "little man" in China, India, Africa and Russia who can create economic growth by driving his car to the next town, or who can increase yield from his field by using a tractor, or mechanised irrigation pumps, or who tries to run a factory. To hundreds of millions of people there is simply no way of doing these things available, that doesn't involve burning fossils.
Since rich countries for this reason will be expected to lead the way, it will also mean that the inventor of something that might change this dynamic, would have a harder time raising the necessary capital. The richer an economic is, the more money it can afford to throw into universities, research and startups.
> I've been following (but not crusading for) environmental issues for 20 years
Good. Then I'm sure you'll agree it would have been disastrous if humankind had sat down in 1989 and decided to implement a world-wide scheme that would essentially dampen economic growth and development.
> We have greatly enhanced our technology over the last 20 years, so why can we not put that expertise to work now, instead of waiting for some future panacea?
Because we still don't have a solution that doesn't involve dragging down the world economy. Our solution today is to try to stop doing the things that emit carbon, but as long as those things are also to a large extend the things that create wealth, it has some extremely bad side effects. Wind turbines are fine for up to about 15% of the electrical supply in the developed world. Solar is promising where and when the sun shines. Water plants are fine where are water for them (not many places left, if any). Nuclear is nice, except for the waste and the extremely high requirements for safety (making them slow and expensive to construct and operate).
We are getting there, and we have several outs. Electrical cars and hydrogen infrastructure would allow a much higher share of wind and solar in the mix. 3rd gen. biodiesel might help. Efficient scrubbers would allow us to stop caring about coal, oil and gas plants. But we are not there yet.
> As for being in better future financial shape, you assume an inevitable upward trend (...) Only a few short years ago the bull market was hailed as a great economic success
Energy creates wealth, because it makes the same person more efficient. That's the essence of the industrial revolution: harnessing energy in machines, suddenly one person can create much more. Since then, machines and how we operate them has developed massively in favour of efficiency -- from the steam hammer to Tim Ferris operating business on an iPhone lying on a beach.
And we need to look at the economy at a much grander scale than 10 years. Economies expand and contracts, but over a longer time, it invariably expands. When there is talk of global climate change, a scale of 100 years is more appropriate.
> To believe that some future market will be so awash in capital as to render environmental improvement a trivial overhead is to subscribe to a form of socioeconomic teleology
I'm not claiming that. I'm claiming that it's going to be richer than this one, and not least, more developed than this one. About 120 years ago we worried about the wether the supply of whale oil could meet the demand -- in other words, it seemed unlikely that in the future, the market would be awash (pardon the pun) in whale oil. Then we refined mineral oil, and that was that. Nobody knows what the future holds. The officials going to Copenhagen (which reminds me, I need to find a place out of the city to park my car for those weeks) think they know what the future holds. I claim that they can't and that history speaks against what they are trying to do.
I don't want to endlessly grow the thread so I won't respond with an essay, but: [green causes] have everything to do with forcing us into using less energy at whatever the cost is where we disagree. The environmental goal is to reduce externalities which damage the environment and result in costly future problems. Energy efficiency is one strategy in pursuit of that goal. In short, I feel you are discounting the future cost of pollution management.
it would have been disastrous if humankind had sat down in 1989 and decided to implement a world-wide scheme that would essentially dampen economic growth and development
You say you don't predict economic ruin, but you suggest that more attention to environmental considerations in 1989 would have been 'disastrous' - hmm. Conversely, it would have been advantageous if we had sat down in 1989 and committed more resources to renewable energy sources instead of dismissing their utility. For example, British engineers had developed promising wave-power technology in the 80s which now enjoys a renaissance, but when North Sea oil was discovered investment in that technology was halted. It would have been better to exploit North Sea oil and funnel some of that windfall back to R&D. Some background on this particular case: http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article1018.html
I really don't want to get into politics or point-scoring, but I basically believe you are naively discounting the utility of environmental stability.
First, let me apologize for the essay. I didn't mean to write that long when I set out.
I don't discount the utility of environmental stability. But I have a hard time convincing myself that politicians and bureaucrats are in any position to impact environmental stability in a significant positive way.
If only this was a Pigovian tax on carbon emissions being suggested, I'd probably go along -- especially if sweetened with some development subsidies for the countries hit harder by this. But it's not. It's a bid to get people to stop using the single source of energy that has brought about the largest expansion of prosperity ever seen.
> You say you don't predict economic ruin, but you suggest that more attention to environmental considerations in 1989 would have been 'disastrous'
Well, I did contradict myself slightly there. It was said with reference to the boom in prosperity enjoyed by eastern Europe after the collapse of the Soviet Union -- one that was largely fuelled by cheap and readily available gas. Form them not to have experienced that, while not spelling economic ruin, would have been very unfortunate.
Is it not essentially a Pigovian tax? I assumed (perhaps naively) that that is exactly what it is. What aspects of it make you think differently?
> It's a bid to get people to stop using the single source of energy that has brought about the largest expansion of prosperity ever seen
Maybe, but the intention behind it is irrelevant isn't it? If the benefits outweigh the costs then we should do it. If not, not.
Just because some (or most) of the green movement wants to reduce fossil fuel consumption for agrarian-socialist reasons doesn't automatically make reducing fossil fuel consumption a bad idea, does it?
That's a false dichotomy. There are not only "believers" and "non-believers" in any issue. It should always be the goal of all parties in the discussion to work from the best possible data/predictions.
Besides your argument is circular. The urgency you express with "THERE HAS TO BE A DECISION MADE" assumes that the data/predictions are correct.
I think you missed my point. It's not a dichotomy at all, it's a spectrum. There is some (incomplete) evidence, and some choices of action available, and some (uncertain) costs to be borne because of those choices.
Your point seems to be that we should do nothing, because we don't know that the "data/predictions are correct".
That's not a middle ground, it's a choice. You are making an AFFIRMATIVE decision that the costs (amortized over probabilities) of regulation are greater than those of inaction. I don't think you realize this. You think you're just delaying a decision, but because the cost models aren't constant, you're actually making one. And obviously I think you're making it based on some very flawed logic.
It's only a decision in the sense that each day I "decide" not to go to medical school, and so sacrifice some future earning potential. Inaction may have consequences, but that doesn't make it a decision. And by inaction I mean maintaining the status quo not literally doing nothing.
Inaction is always our default position: innocent until proven guilty. Your argument is tantamount to "consider the cost (amortized over the probability that he actually did it -- which we can't actually know) of letting this murderer go free!"
"It's only a decision in the sense that each day I "decide" not to go to medical school"
Well, it is a decision in that sense. That's a real sense in which a decision can be made. At each point in time we choose to do one thing from among the infinite possibilities available to us. And in making the decision to do that one thing, we are making the decision not to do any of the other things, even if not consciously.
I don't know where you're coming from with the "inaction is always our default position" thing. What do you mean when do you say "default"? Do you mean that we should (oof, I hate to bring "should" into this) sometimes maintain the status quo even if doing so doesn't have the highest expected outcome for us? Do you mean that we should sometimes maintain the default even if the expected outcome of doing so is dramatically lower than doing something? (I'm gonna go ahead and assume that this isn't what you believe, but if it is, our argument has to end here, because the only response that I've got is, "Well, that's really stupid.")
Because I would argue that that's the situation that we're in with global warming. I actually agree with you that the scientific establishment should be treated with substantial skepticism. But I also think that global warming is probably happening, and through applications of logic I've decided that reacting to a fictional global warming is SO SO much better than not reacting to a real global warming that we'd be insane to choose inaction as long as there's still some non-infinitesimal probability that global warming's happening.
You seem to think that you have an ace in the hole with your argument that our society supports an "innocent until proven guilty" approach. In fact, I am both a believer in the "expected value" approach to choosing a course of action and an ardent defender of innocent-until-proven-guilty. This is because the downside of convicting an innocent person is dramatically larger than the downside of letting a guilty man free -- not only because locking up an innocent guy for 40 years is much worse than letting some embezzler get away with it, but because every time our legal system sends an innocent person to jail the public loses some faith in it, and faith in the legal system is one of the most fundamental elements of a stable and happy society.
Okay, I think I'm done. I'm pretty damn sleep deprived at the moment, though, so if I missed anything please point it out and I'll address it later.
I do see your point that in some sense we make infinite many implicit decisions all the time, but I think the word really refers specifically to the intentional act of creating a position. Though that's a semantic argument and not really important because my main point in the above comments was that this is not a now or never issue. Inaction today isn't a commitment of any kind, because the same options will be available tomorrow.
Do you mean that we should (oof, I hate to bring "should" into this) sometimes maintain the status quo even if doing so doesn't have the highest expected outcome for us?
No, certainly not. I mean that we should maintain the status quo until we can reasonably estimate those expected outcomes and their costs/benefits (ask questions first, shoot later). This article is arguing that we don't yet have those reasonable estimates.
I think the "innocent until proven guilty" approach is and expected value approach. Public loss of faith in the system is a huge cost (probably much bigger than letting the average criminal go free). So I think there's an implicit cost/benefit analysis there.
There are also costs associated with (at least some of) the proposed global warming solutions. I'm thinking specifically of cap and trade, a system with far reaching economic consequences we can't fully understand until it's actually implemented. So before we implement it, we'd better know with some degree of certainty that the current situation is bad enough to warrant a potentially dangerous economic experiment. On the other hand, I think investment in alternative energy is a relatively low cost decision (sort of a "what the hell, it can't hurt").
Your first point is semantic. I grant it, but I don't see that it changes anything. You still oppose carbon regulation, which is the issue at hand.
Your second is just a bizarre analogy. Yes, that's exactly what my argument is saying. But analogizing a decision of real world regulation (where we should be able to make a rational decision) to criminal justice (where we get tied up with the moral issues of unjust punishment, or "soft on crime" tolerance) is just weird. Are you trying to argue that "unjustly" regulating carbon is a violation of someone's basic human rights? Again, weird.
In fact I do not, and you've placed me into one of the two mutually exclusive categories I accused you of creating earlier.
I'm only arguing that relevant data/predictions should be reasonably vetted (this article makes some pretty strong claims against that point). And second, that whatever policies we enact should be supported by rational gathering of evidence, not just fabricated urgency.
You are making the mistake assuming that the level of understanding of our climate for scientists is a limited as your own. If that was the case then certainly there would be good cause to delay action until further knowledge was gained. However it turns out that many brilliant people all around the world have been devoting their professional lives to understanding this. The data/predictions have been 'vetted', evidence has been 'rationally gathered' the urgency is based on fact and has been not fabricated.
Unless you are prepared to devote a large portion of your life to studying climate there is no chance you (or I) will develop anything like a sufficient understanding of the models to have a meaningful opinion their accuracy. All we can do is choose who to believe on the topic. We are all 'blindly following' other people's opinion on the matter.
The reasonable default position is to believe the people who are spending the most time and effort looking into the issues - the 'experts'. For whatever reasons you are choosing not to believe them but instead following a group that has devoted far less time and effort in research.
Granting more power through regulation just because you think "something" needs to be done about something you haven't proven to exist. That doesn't seem like a bad idea at all, does it? "Don't just do something, stand there."
That's the absolutist argument. You want "proof" before you will do anything at all. Read up the thread, it's exactly what I'm arguing against -- that logic just plain doesn't work. If you're not looking at risks and costs, you're not looking seriously at the problem.
I want proof that there is a good possibility of a problem happening before I do something about it. You would really venture into throwing around labels and debating against that stance? Regulation is bad if it's not needed, that doesn't make me and absolutist. That means I've evaluated the potential of a problem and the proposed 'fix', and I think it does more harm than good. I don't write code unless it solves a clear problem, why should I treat regulation any differently?
There's Scientific correctness, and then there's risk. The likelihood is that the science is correct, so the risk is high.
Look at it this way, play Russian roulette - you can't prove that you're going to shoot yourself in the head, but that doesn't make it safe. Nope, corrective action should be taken against the risk.
The science should continue. Until there's a good body of scientific evidence that what we're doing is safe (and at the current rate, that's very unlikely), there will still be the need for change.
> The science should continue. Until there's a good body of scientific evidence that what we're doing is safe (and at the current rate, that's very unlikely), there will still be the need for change.
The question is not "change or not?", the question is "what change?"
When the "reduce carbon" folks start seriously pushing nuclear, as in breaking ground for a nuke/month in the US, I'll believe that they think that AGW is a serious problem. As long as they act like it's just a club for political ends and feel-good moralism....
I'd rather see move money going into the solar/wind/electric ecosystem, but yep, the greens need to get over their primal fear of nuclear as part of the solution, and the mainstream politicians need to rearrange the funding priories.
It's not just nukes, it's a bunch of things that folks who were actually serious would do that they're not doing. Either they're ignorant or they're not serious, and either way ....
You don't have to rearrange govt funding priorities to get nukes built. You merely have to significantly fix the approval process.
The same is true of the wind farm that Ted Kennedy blocked to protect his view.
You don't have to rearrange govt funding priorities to get nukes built.
True. But it would help everyone else if western governments being so nice to the (massive, rich) oil industry. The best non-oil technologies would benefit the most, like they should in a competitive market.
When global warming proponents spell out the actual danger, usually things don't get bad for a hundred+ years. Seems like we have time to make carefully informed decisions.
But that's kind of the point, regardless of what you think about global warming you should be wary of "you're either with us or against us" type arguments.
And for the record I don't know much about global warming, it seems at least plausible, and I certainly don't reject it. I'm just wary of the kind of argument from urgency that's become so popular lately in American politics (and I'm sure it's been an effective political tool since the beginning of time).
I agree about being wary of overly simplistic ideologues. However, conflating climate change science with such ideologues is itself an over simplification. I'd look into the actual science and see if urgency may be a valid stance before spending time arguing against a call urgency.
By advocating inaction, you are expressly taking the side of the denialists, even though you claim not to agree with them, technically
One thing that the world really needs to do is move beyond labels like "denialist". I'm sick of depiction that the only possible positions we can possibly take are "No way, global warming is absolutely a complete myth" and "zomg we're all going to die!"
The truth doesn't always sit somewhere between the two extremes on every controversial debate, but I'm pretty sure this is one of those cases where it does. One can think that anthropogenic global warming is probably a nonzero problem without buying into every extreme-level prediction or supporting every suggested policy prescription.
I don't believe I asked you to buy into "every" prediction or support "every" prescription.
But it's a fair point: which regulation choices do you support? My experience is that the seemingly-moderate "science is incomplete" skeptics, when pressed, generally argue for no action at all. That would put them much farther on the "denialist" (I don't know what other label to use, and you didn't offer a suggestion) end of the spectrum, no?
See, this is a straw man argument. No one, and I mean no responsible person in government has argued for no action at all in my lifetime. We've had environmental regulations since people were afraid of Global Cooling. This has always been a question of degree not one of "action vs. non-action"
question of degree not one of "action vs. non-action"
Not just of degree but of kind. Assuming anthropogenic global warming really _is_ a problem of nonzero severity, there's a vast array of actions that can be taken on a governmental level. These include:
carbon taxes
build more nuclear power plants
more funding for alternative energy research
cap and trade
giant mirrors in orbit to reflect sunlight
more funding for clean coal research
kill half the population
ban electricity
build artificial trees for carbon sequestration
and so forth. They all have risks and rewards, costs and payoffs. We should not be entirely surprised that our elected leaders tend to prefer the ones (carbon taxes, cap and trade) which involve our elected leaders getting more money and more power.
Should I infer that you are in favor of one or more of those courses? My guess from your tone is that you oppose all of them. So how is it not correct to characterize your advocacy as being for "inaction?".
If you really want to know, then I'd say funding alternative energy research, clean coal research, and probably building more nuclear plants are a good idea. Giant mirrors are worth consideration, just in case -- remember, we're talking about risk minimization here. We shouldn't launch them just yet, but we should figure out how to make them just in case the planet ever does get sufficiently warm to cause serious problems (in which case it won't matter whether it's anthropogenic or heliogenic anyway).
Carbon taxes might be an alright idea provided that they're offset by cuts to other taxes. Cap and trade seems to me like a much worse idea for various reasons (potential for corruption, weird economic distortion, potential of very high long-term economic costs, doesn't actually do all that much anyway).
The remaining solutions (kill half the population and ban electricity) aren't much good either.
> By advocating inaction, you are expressly taking the side of the denialists, even though you claim not to agree with them, technically.
So what? If a particular response is "correct", why does it matter who else advocates said response? Why does it even matter what their reasons are?
Surely you're not arguing that we should do dumb things because ugly people say otherwise....
BTW - you've got things backwards. It isn't "go along with us because we're good people", it's "we're good people because we do good things". If you're pushing bad science....
I don't think any intelligent reasonable person objects to the fact that the global temperature is rising. As for Human activity being the cause that is far from settled.
Don't get me wrong I'm all for reducing emissions and generally doing anything we can to reduce our impact as much as is possible because it's just good sense. But stating that the industrial age caused the rise when we really have so little understanding of how all this works rankles me just a bit. I especially object to the attempts to assign blame as a scare tactic for political gain. Especially when there are equally valid reasons to reduce emissions and lessen our impact local air quality and increased efficiency in manufacturing being just a few of the reasons.
The plain fact is that while there "might" be a correlation with Human activity that does not imply a cause and effect relationship out of hand. I don't think we really have enough data or understanding yet to make an assumption regarding the cause.
[Edit: I had a misplaced sentence which totally made that read wrong. Just fixed it]
Except for the fact that global temperature is falling, not rising - dependent on how (and where) you measure it.
That's part of the problem. We don't know enough about how this highly complex climate system works to measure it consistently. Given the variation between the hottest and coldest places on earth are somewhere around 100 degrees celsius I have real problems with the term global warming as a whole. It's a series of interconnected problems with interconnected knock-on effects.
While it's a reasonable view to hold that temps have been falling since 1998, it's hard to point out a source (on either side) that hasn't been called into question. Just google on "global temperature since 1998" and similar, and you'll see lots of partisan debate and screaming about it on the front page. Unfortunately, everyone on both sides seems to cherrypick data to avoid letting facts get in the way of Truth, and it's very hard to know who, if anyone, has an unbiased desire to present data.
With all due respect, you haven't answered the question. You've made a factual statement: "global temperature is falling." It should be trivial to back that statement up with evidence. You refuse to do so, and in doing so reframe your original point to the substantially weaker statement "temps have been falling since 1998." That latter assertion is indeed trivial to support: here[1] is a data set that supports that second assertion. You will note the central point that the narrowly-framed question can be true while the broad implication can be false.
If you are going to stand by the statement "global temperature is falling" I would again ask for a citation.
If you cannot or will not back up your assertion with evidence, please do not couch them in the terminology of fact. "JFGI" is not a citation.
You've made a factual statement: "global temperature is falling."
That's so easily checkable that I'm not sure why you'd assert it. You can just reread the post you just replied to. I did not say that. I have not edited that post.
The closest I came was that it was reasonable to believe that global temperature fell after 1998, and suggested that since I know of no source of data which isn't disputed by one side or the other, it's pointless for me to track down data to support a claim I haven't made.
If you are going to stand by the statement "global temperature is falling" I would again ask for a citation.
I have no plans to stand by someone else's statement. Thanks, anyway.
I did support my actual claim that it was reasonable for a third party to believe that global temperature is falling, by pointing out that google's first page of results provides many examples of vociferous arguing both ways. I really have no idea what global temperature is doing, apart from the obvious fact that it's not increasing or decreasing so quickly as to be unmistakable, since lots of mistaking is going on, one way or the other.
"JFGI" is not a citation.
On the assumption that you're unable or unwilling to copy/paste or type "global temperature since 1998" into Google yourself to see this first page of results, here's a handy link http://www.google.com/search?q=global+temperature+since+1998 . Sheesh.
> Given the variation between the hottest and coldest places on earth are somewhere around 100 degrees celsius I have real problems with the term global warming as a whole.
As do many climate scientists. I've heard the term "Global Weirding" thrown around before. The term is a better descriptor because what we humans actually experience isn't hotter weather, but highly unusual climate occurrences: storms, record temperature fluctuations, etc.
You echo my thoughts on the issue. But what really bothers me is the logical outgrowth of that logic.
What I mean is, as you said, most agree the planet is getting warmer. That's the actual problem here. But Global Warming advocates are so convinced of their absolute infallibility that they're suggesting a solution based on a cause they can't prove.
So my question is "What if they're wrong?" If the Global Warming movement really believes this trend will lead to the end of life as we know it shouldn't they be considering all options? Shouldn't someone be talking about ways to live if their climate predictions are correct and we aren't the cause?
The fact that they completely ignore that side of the issue tells me their pushing an agenda not trying to solve the actual problem.
Indeed, Any solution that assumes the wrong cause may cause just as much harm as it does good. For all we really know the trend could suddenly halt or accelerate despite our attempts to "control" it. When political goals drive the debate then true discourse gets drowned out and progress may either stop or continue in the wrong direction.
The sad thing is that absurd arguments work. All that's needed for denialism to win is doubt. Just one goof, or bad actor, or wrong result can be spun like this into a "collapse" of the case it is making.
The fact that this is an argument of risk, where the argument for carbon legislation needs to be weighed not against the certainty of the science but on the best-guess risks of inaction is completely lost on the public and the media.
> Patrick J. Michaels is a senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute and author of Climate of Extremes: Global Warming Science They Don’t Want You to Know.
Yeah, figures. Want a grindstone for that axe?
Edit:
Quote from Wikipedia[1] about the author:
"Climate scientist Tom Wigley, [21] a lead author of parts of the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, is quoted in Ross Gelbspan's book The Heat is On[22]: "Michaels' statements on [the subject of computer models] are a catalog of misrepresentation and misinterpretation… Many of the supposedly factual statements made in Michaels' testimony are either inaccurate or are seriously misleading."[23]
Peter Gleick, a conservation analyst and president of the Oakland-based Pacific Institute, said: "Pat Michaels is not one of the nation's leading researchers on climate change. On the contrary, he is one of a very small minority of nay-sayers who continue to dispute the facts and science about climate change in the face of compelling, overwhelming, and growing evidence."[24]"
Yeah, I'll take a pass on taking this article at face value.
You don't trust him, because he agrees with the view he expresses in that article?
This is easy to settle. He says the data don't exist. You apparently say the smart default is to assume that they do. So find the data, and that's the end of it. Right?
Your edit is pretty hilarious: he can't be right, because he's part of Cato and has published stuff arguing against climate change! Look, somebody at the Pacific Institute ("Research for People and the Planet") has published something saying so!
You might be right, but your argument is basically "Galileo is wrong, because he's a heretic. The Pope even said so. Is Galileo a Pope? I. Thought. Not."
The article comes across spectacularly lazy which bodes ill for the veracity of its contents.
Just look @ how our "researcher" (ahem) "researches" the only known-to-him example of raw data being given out:
- supposedly "Peter Webster" has (a subset of) the "raw data"
- no other "researchers" aside from the data originators have the "raw data" (at least insofar as is known to Michaels as revealed in this article)
- supposedly Michaels is interested in obtaining the "raw data"
Is there any evidence in the article that, you know, Michaels tried calling Webster up and asking for the "raw data"? The kind of thing you'd do if you were, you know, seriously interested in getting your hands on this data?
Not really:
- there's no explicit mention of (attempting to) get in touch with Webster
- there's a half-hearted attempt to strew fear and doubt based on the fact that Webster's findings (about hurricane and warming correlation) are apparently at variance with what others have found, but it's half-hearted b/c:
-- it doesn't examine whether the different findings are due to methodological differences or due to "raw data" differences (only the latter of which implicates the "raw data" as perhaps suspect)
-- as per usual it's not like Michaels tried calling Webster and being like: "do you think your results are different b/c the data has been mangled?"
So just with respect to Michael's actions with Webster there's a rather transparent pattern of some mix of incuriousness or laziness.
Which (quite apart from any think-tank connections) is why he ought to come across as not all that credible: he's lazy or incompetent or both.
I mean really: say you were to read an article wherein the author:
- is supposedly searching for some holy grail
- identifies a source that has it
- makes no mention of trying to get it from that source
...would that not raise a red flag as to the author's sincerity and/or general competence? Would you be more or less likely to take his other claims at face value after seeing that?
Eh, no. I don't trust him because he's written anti-climate change before and doesn't give any sources for his claim that the data is basically fraudulent.
Seems to me he's just searching for arguments to discard the scientific consensus and not trying to further the debate at all.
The claim is the data is missing. This is not the same. The presumption that it did exist is the reasonable conclusion, however, for it to be scientifically useful, people need to be able examine the data from the beginning. Correction techniques are routine applied to data across a wide variety of sciences, but are themselves something legitimately subject to scientific examination due to their intrinsic danger.
For all you know, the corrected data underestimates warming due to use of bad correction methods! How would you prove this, though? The data is missing.
Here's a very important point: This isn't about global warming or the skepticism thereof. This is a story about scientific malfeasance. Going to town defending people who can't produce their data, in accordance with the basic scientific principle of reproducibility, is an enormous flashing warning sign that you are deciding positions based on politics and not science. The scientific principle is clear: The data should be readily available for others to examine, full stop. That examiners may challenge it is a feature of the scientific process, not a bug!
There's really no room for debate on this, unless you are willing to admit up front that science is not a relevant consideration to your position, in which case, yeah, sure, go nuts defending the guys who won't produce their data. But you should be aware you've left science behind.
Am I personally a skeptic? Yes. But this isn't why, nor do I consider this evidence of my position. It is just plain scientific malfeasance of the kind that can pop up anywhere; since it's hardly the only piece of evidence in any direction, it's not really a story about this one piece of evidence. But it's critical to root this stuff out, call it out, and address it head on, for the same reasons it's important to call out the corruption of any other process. You can't tolerate this stuff, or it gets worse. I would by the first to criticize anyone who published one of the (many) scientific publications that bolster my personal beliefs if they refused to share data with "critics". This is basic science.
You have hit upon a key distinction, unfortunately the author is intentionally muddling these two issues of 1)scientific data is missing or being withheld and 2) global warming or the skepticism thereof.
"the data needed to verify the gloom-and-doom warming forecasts have disappeared"
"If there are no data, there’s no science."
There are plenty of mundane explainations for why scientists aren't providing data to people like Warwick Hughes. Perhaps Jones thought Hughes was a crank. Perhaps assembling the data was a lot of work and Jones didn't feel like going through all that work for someone he thought was just trying to raise trouble. Perhaps there were legal issues to providing the data publicly (as the article notes) that hadn't been resolved yet.
Of course Jones was wrong, all scientists should make every effort to provide data to anyone and everyone who wants it, even people they think are 'cranks'. In fact, Jones' reluctance to provide data to climate skeptics only fuels the fire of skepticism. But for the author to argue that this single act casts any serious doubt on the science of global warming is giving this incident far more importance than it deserves.
"Seems to me he's just searching for arguments to discard the scientific consensus and not trying to further the debate at all."
A frightening, ignorant statement. If this subject wasn't so political then "searching for arguments to discard the scientific debate" would be considered exciting, interesting and daring, not "shut the fuck up, we figured it out already".
Hasn't science been wrong about everything at one time or another? for luminiferous aether, for eugenics, against evolution, against continental plate drift, etc
I'm surprised and a little bothered by the responses here, especially yours.
Assuming that the subject here was, say, evolution, would you respond the same? Would you be saying, "Well, we should consider it exciting, interesting, and daring when someone says that there's not actually any factual basis for evolution"?
The other commenters are correct in their critique of this. Michaels isn't offering evidence contrary to most scientists' understanding of climatology. That would be exciting, daring, and interesting. Merely attempting to discredit climate research by saying that they're missing data that they once had is ... well, it's thin at the least, and it doesn't further the debate at all.
The whole "science has been wrong before" angle has been answered very well by lots of scientists. The answer basically boils down to, "Yes, but it's usually wrong in a continuous cycle of refinement, not wrong in a 180-degree direction kind of way".
It is extremely wasteful to have to keep answering the same questions over and over in scientific contexts, especially when those are brought by people who aren't familiar with the field, and especially when their questions basically amount to, "You haven't answered all my questions the way I wanted you to, and you might be wrong."
If you -- or Michaels -- wants some credence in the scientific community, then you have to do some actual research, you have to have some actual data, and you have to get it peer-reviewed.
This brings up the interesting question of "how is this different from denying evolution"? The relevant question is, I think: if the theory turns out to be wrong, how hard is it to explain the data?
If the theory of evolution turns out to be wrong, there's a huge stack of data which we're going to have a very hard time explaining sensibly, including DNA evidence, observations of short-term evolution in certain living things, and the entire goddamn fossil record. Apart from "God put it all there deliberately to test us" there's no way to come up with an alternative explanation.
If the hypothesis that human CO2 emissions have a significant effect on the climate turns out to be wrong, then... well, the only actual data we need to come up with an alternative explanation for is a hundred-year modest overall warming trend (for which we can all easily think up a few alternative explanations). Everything else is just theoretical predictions.
"The whole "science has been wrong before" angle has been answered very well by lots of scientists. The answer basically boils down to, "Yes, but it's usually wrong in a continuous cycle of refinement, not wrong in a 180-degree direction kind of way"."
Well I'm talking about scientific revolutions, which are 180's
"If you -- or Michaels -- wants some credence in the scientific community, then you have to do some actual research, you have to have some actual data, and you have to get it peer-reviewed."
This happens all the time, but you don't hear about it, because they are against the scientific consensus.
Also, funding is 1000 times higher for pro-warming than against. If you want funding to study the blue-footed-boobie get in line, but if you want to study the effects of global warming on the blue-footed-boobie they throw money at you.
> > "If you -- or Michaels -- wants some credence in the scientific community, then you have to do some actual research, you have to have some actual data, and you have to get it peer-reviewed."
> This happens all the time, but you don't hear about it, because they are against the scientific consensus
Supporting evidence please? Please give some examples that "happen all the time" but "we haven't heard about".
Frankly, you sound like a conspiracy nutter. Please provide some counter-examples to support your case.
I'm not going to play that game. If I gave you a list of papers to counter man made global warming, you'd say "they are sponsored by big oil" or "those scientists are shunned by the scientific community".
How about this, I think the burden of evidence should be for proving man made global warming. Has it been done? No, it hasn't, despite all the "consensus" noise. Buried under all the "concensus" you'll simply find computer models. Computer models that don't even agree with each other, of impossibly complicated systems.
That wasn't the most fortunate way to put it, but I thought the part about furthering the debate would have clarified the previous part. I'll try again:
"Seems to me he's just searching for sticks to hit people with, instead of doing new research and redoing others research to confirm or reject previous conclusions."
Yes, being sceptical is valuable. But not when it's just scepticism. Do some research. Test your hypotheses. Test theirs. Test them again. Test them differently. All of that helps further the debate. It gives us better facts, more facts, a more complete picture of the real world. It helps, it's good.
But saying "you missed a spot" is useless. The science may not be perfect, but then science rarely is perfect anyway. At the end of the day we're looking for the facts, not the perfect experiment.
Want better science? Make it. Forward a new hypothesis. Test it. Let other people test it. And over time we, humanity, will figure out which theory supports the facts better.
That's science. Some 1000-word op-ed article without any citations is not.
No, please stop cherry-picking my statements. I made a sentence consisting of two parts. Leaving out a key part is dishonest.
What I said was:
> Eh, no. I don't trust him because he's written anti-climate change before and doesn't give any sources for his claim that the data is basically fraudulent.
He's clearly a sceptic and that's his right. But I'll give you several points to consider:
a) The author has written a book (several even) where he disagrees with the international consensus about climate change. I'd wager a bet that they aren't all about how the data is missing. So either he's out looking for ways to disprove the theories (which is good) and finding a lot or he's just searching for stuff to hit people with, instead of trying to do serious science. I'm inclined to believe the latter, since the former would mean that a few hundred climatologists from around the world are blatantly ignoring clear evidence and the latter would only mean someone with political motives (or being stupid, corrupt or something like it, or any combination of said things).
b) He has written extensively about how climate change isn't true, but is only now trying to review the data of people that have found climate change to be happening. That's odd.
c) Yes, it makes a difference if he has written anti-climate change before. If he had written pro-climate change before and is now coming to the conclusion that the data can't be checked, his claims are a lot easier to believe because political motives can be ruled out.
It's the same when a climate change sceptic would review the data and find that it supports the conclusions. That would mean that it convinced a sceptic. That's a higher bar to pass than convincing a tree-hugger.
d) The title of the mentioned book is "Climate of Extremes: Global Warming Science They Don't Want You to Know". "They don't want you to know"? He's apparently implying that there's a conspiracy to make people believe climate change exists. That does not give me a whole lot of confidence in his intellect or intentions.
All that makes me distrust the author. Which is fine, I don't need to trust the author to believe facts he reports, as long as there are sources. But he didn't supply any.
So I'm left with an article written by somebody I cannot trust to be intellectually honest about the climate debate and that doesn't contain sources. The only conclusion I can come to is that I cannot trust the "facts" reported in it.
> You can verify the person if you want, but not by comparing his opinions to yours.
Which isn't what I did. At no point have I given my opinion. My opinion has not changed between my two posts, nor has my point. The last post was an elaboration of the first. If you find no issue with the second, then there is none with the first (other than too brief, apparently).
I do not trust the author of an anti-climate change article because he has a pre-existing opinion against climate change AND doesn't cite any sources. If either would have been the opposite, I would have had a different opinion, because then there would be no motive to fudge the truth. Both parts of the statement are important and relevant.
I think the problem is that others are telling him that doubting the scientific consensus is how science, academia, and the world should be. Quite contrary, science has improved and expanded beyond what it was 100 years ago simply because everyone doubts and challenges the norm.
Now, I've never seen scientific data to prove that climate change is real (besides it being hotter in Florida in my opinion). I'm not a scientist and I don't actively search for such data.
I think the article's correct but it's mistake is in ascribing motive to the lost dataset. The bottom line is that Global Warming traces its origins back to a study done on a dataset that is now incomplete. But the fact that there's only one dataset isn't exactly a conspiracy.
When talking about Global Warming we're talking about measuring a really small number over a really, really big surface area. That's a far bigger job than most people think. All the equipment has to be calibrated exactly, in sync, and distributed across the globe.
And as I said the numbers are relatively small. Global Warming asserts a 1.33 degree increase in temperature over the last Century. To put that in perspective the difference between standing on asphalt during a sunny day or standing on concrete during a sunny day is about 3 degrees (because the concrete reflects where as the asphalt absorbs)
So it's not some big conspiracy. There's probably only one set of equipment in the world capable of measuring what needs to be measured which is why there's only one dataset available. How parts of it got lost is anyone's guess but I can't imagine in was done with malicious intent or that the study based on that dataset was purposely inaccurate (or at least I don't want to imagine that)
mistake is in ascribing motive to the lost dataset
Indeed. When you get down to it, the core of many political skeptics' arguments is: evil liberal scientists can't get real jobs so they cooked up 'climate change' to get endless government funding from honest taxpayers like you and me.
Those political organs arguing most vociferously against action on climate change oppose any kind of public funding for science that isn't obviously defense-related.
There's plenty of evidence, other than temperature measurements: permafrost, glaciers, and polar ice melting; extended growing seasons; changes in bird migration.
Not really true. That indicates weather changes in certain areas but doesn't measure global weather changes which is what's called for when trying to assess the validity of man-made Global Warming.
Isolated weather changes like the ones you cite happen all the time on our planet.
Many articles are peer reviewed without actually looking at the data or recreating all the results.
The whole idea is that a paper should be reproducible so that people can come along later and reproduce it. If they fail to do that then that is what letters are for. Every paper that has been peer reviewed isn’t faultless.
IANAClimatologist. This[1] chart is not subject to the "missing data" problem; as cited by wikipedia it is composed from freely available data. In addition by including satellite data that is free of an entire class of measurement artifacts it substantially limits the plausible error alleged by the article. The best interpretation of the article is that it is an astonishingly narrow picture of a small slice of an enormous field.
Isn't satellite data subject to a different class of measurement artifacts? Since it is measuring reflection at potentially different layers of the atmosphere, some high, some low?
The noise is different but the signals are strikingly similar. That's a strong point in favor of the model IMO, but as I said this is a complex, subtle field in which I'm not an expert. Imagine how badly the popular media gets computer stories and think that we're making at least as bad a hash out of this whole field.
No, you're reading it the way that piece of FUD is intended to be read.
There's lots of other evidence that the author carefully avoids mentioning. If you're in Europe, go see some glaciers in the Alps while you still can - they won't exist for much longer.
I saw "lots of evidence" in lots of places, then I saw "there is some evidence" in some places, but I don't recall it going further than that.
This is sad, because it makes the whole subject a matter of belief. Even worse, anyone having a bit dissident opinion is likely to be treated as nay-sayer, heretic and the enemy of the Earth. I don't see that as scientific way to tackle the problem.
London used to be overrun with vineyards a couple of hundred years ago. Since then it's dramatically cooled. Things change all the time. Chill out, they sky's not falling.
As always, it has been an intellectual feast to read through the comments on both sides of this debate. I would just like to throw this out there to see what YC thinks. Is this possibly an explanation to the warming we are seeing?
Mars Warming Points to Solar, not Human, Causes for Global Warming
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/02/070228-mars-...
Also, I'm curious if anybody knows what other alternative theories are out there?
The skepticism in the article about Abdussamatov's conclusions says to me that he has a long way to go before he can really show "solar, not human" cause. It's an alright article.
"The shrinkage of the Martian South Polar Cap is almost certainly a regional climate change, and is not any indication of global warming trends in the Martian atmosphere. Colaprete et al in Nature 2005 (subscription required) showed, using the Mars GCM, that the south polar climate is unstable due to the peculiar topography near the pole, and the current configuration is on the instability border; we therefore expect to see rapid changes in ice cover as the regional climate transits between the unstable states."
A conservative think tank shill serving vested interests by spreading FUD about climate change. How quaint.
All over the world, glaciers are receding rapidly, the arctic ice cap is disappearing during summer - changes that are very, very measurable and visible to anyone who cares to look. Satellite measuring does not reach back that far, but shows clear, undeniable upwards trends.
And this guy says measures taken to combat this should be reconsidered because one particular set of historical data may have been cooked?
I guess he didn't get the memo that denying the existence of global warning has become untenable and the methods of choice are now denying that humans caused it, or claiming that reducing CO2 emission is less cost-effective than protecting against the symptoms.
Cato is a (classic) liberal or libertarian think tank, not a conservative think tank.
Furthermore, arguments against global warming are normally 1) there is a warming trend, but we cannot assert it is anthropomorphic, 2) there is evidence of a warming trend, but due to poorly chosen temperature locations (e.g. cities), it may be overstated, or 3) there is no evidence of CO2 related global warming.
Saying glaciers are receding does not refute any of these hypotheses. I agree with randallsquared: people who do not buy global warming hook-line-and-sinker are likened to holocaust deniers.
Bias notice: I fall into an odd category on the debate. I don't know whether global warming is anthropomorphic, and I don't really care. I believe there are benefits to "clean"(er) energy sources that will lead them to dominate, regardless of environmental views or policy.
I believe there are benefits to "clean"(er) energy
sources that will lead them to dominate, regardless of
environmental views or policy.
Ha!
It's important that big decisions are made on the basis of cost-benefit comparisons that use reason and real data. First-world foreign policy is directed towards pushing all of the world towards carbon reduction. This includes nations who have very poor people where cost of energy differences at the margins affect your ability to keep your family warm and fed. Carbon reduction puts barriers in front of the people of all nations, and should be justified by real reasons and not thumb in the air judgements.
You misunderstand -- or i did not make clear -- what I meant. I believe for economic reasons, "clean" sources of energy will dominate less "clean" sources of energy -without- policy intervention. I am saying that I believe technologically we are approaching economically viable cleaner sources. I am against carbon taxes, trading, etc, partially for the reason you mentioned but mostly because I think they are unnecessary.
Receding glaciers refute the hypothesis that "there is no global warming" - which is what this article is intended to make people believe (successfully so, look at ars' comment). It states no hypothesis of its own, questions the veracity of one set of data, asserts that this data is the only basis for global warming and concludes that all policy concerning global warming is therefore flawed.
Receding glaciers refute the hypothesis that "there is no global warming"
This statement isn't as obvious at you make it seem. A large part of the controversy is what constitutes Global Warming, as opposed to regional. Oddly, by making the statement that receding glaciers are incontrovertible evidence of global warming, you are challenging the current consensus.
Much of the question about Climate Change is whether the current climate change is 'unprecedented', and therefore more likely to be correlated with human activity. The current consensus says that the Medieval Warming Period, a period where all parties agree that there was glacial retreat, was only a regional event.
Differentiating global warming from regional warming is very difficult, and is focus of this piece. Anecdotal evidence about retreating glaciers doesn't help to clear it up --- what's needed are global datasets as referred to in the article. I believe this is actually why McIntyre started researching the datasets in the first place: he was wondering why the graphs of global warming had 'erased' the MWP.
(And while the piece is certainly biased, I wouldn't call it FUD. Etymologically, this makes no sense. If anything, rather than spreading Fear, it's encouraging complacency in the face of what might be a true catastrophe. CUD maybe?)
How is it that people who want to see and check data on a subject of concern have been tarred with the brush of holocaust deniers? I'm starting to assume that anyone using the word "deny" or "denier" in the context of a question of science is trying to shut down research in favor of politics.
The thing is: he's not saying "this particular piece of research seems questionable" - he's saying "because this particular piece of research seems questionable, measures based on it and lots of other, better sources should be reconsidered".
It is in fact quite similar in style to holocaust deniers (you brought that up, not I): look through the other side's data carefully, find the weakest parts and make a big show of proving those false and conclude that therefore it must all be lies. (And yes, the holocaust deniers often go one step further and just make stuff up)
In real science, you try to disprove the other side's strongest arguments, not their weakest ones.
Actually, from what I remember, holocaust deniers tend to make up stuff out of whole cloth, both for their arguments and against (for easier demolishing, see). Maybe they look at actual evidence now, but I haven't paid attention in years.
In any case, I really have no idea whether the data in question was critical to the argument that climate is warming faster than it was earlier (since pretty much everyone accepts that significant global warming has been going on since at least the 1700s; the arguments are in the causes and details), but I just object to the hammering of the "deny", "denial", "denier" refrain.
In this case, the fact is that they have arrived at questioning the availability and integrity of one dataset (which is not the entire basis for theories of climate change) only after years of empty rhetorical or scientifically absurdist arguments.
It's like being told that 'true scientists are open to new information, you are too close-minded' by an astrology advocate. Astrology buffs love using this argument, for the same reason they love the poster of Einstein with his tongue sticking out and the caption 'imagination is more important than knowledge'. That does not mean they like science.
More seriously, it seems clear that a well-informed layman might have any of the following opinions:
global warming is both happening and is greatly exacerbated by human production of carbon dioxide,
global warming is (or was until very recently) happening but is not greatly affected (so far) by human production of carbon dioxide, or
global warming is happening (or was until very recently) but it's unclear to what degree humans have exacerbated it.
Some opinions which do not appear to be well-informed are:
global warming is happening and humans caused it all,
global warming hasn't happened in historical times,
global warming has already produced temperatures which are higher than any in history, or
global warming is unstoppable unless we act this month, year, or decade.
Neither of those are exhaustive lists, of course. Part of the problem here is that this discussion has become so politicized that facts that don't fit the positive assertions of the various factions are simply ignored or assumed to be unproven (or even fabricated). Additionally, everyone pushing for a viewpoint seems to have something to gain from their preferred viewpoint, from skeptical geologists funded by oil companies to academics who want grants to study climate from the government under the approved legislation-supporting view. Faced with this, what are we to make of these choices?
The Cato Institute is not participating in the worthy, rigorous, hard-nosed scrutiny that underpins any real science. They are a PR firm disguised as a think tank. They exist to serve the interests of the energy industry.
They are called deniers, and derided alongside Holocaust deniers, because their actions are base and foul. They, and others like them, will cause millions of deaths from environmental upheaval in the 21st Century. Millions of deaths that could have been avoided had we worked together and put aside our political differences.
Climate skeptics are the ones to laud for their bravery in the face of scientific consensus. They are the ones that evaluate every result, every harebrained theory, every scientific paper on climate change, and shoot it down in flames if it doesn't add up right. They are invaluable.
However, unlike the deniers, they accept results that go against what they previously believed. They are quite willing to change their minds if they see good evidence to do so, like any intelligent human adult.
Deniers, though, have no reasons beyond self-interest or madness. They simply deny everything, based on lies, speculation, half-truths, false appeals to common sense, and any more underhanded methods. They don't care, or they delude themselves that they don't care (which is worse) about the fact that if we don't fix the world in time, millions of people (at least) will die early.
The holocaust deniers merely insult the memory of the victims of the worst crimes in modern history.
Climate change deniers will cause millions of early deaths. They are WORSE.
This post is completely ad hominem. It's also easily shown wrong by a quick perusal of Cato's web site. The statement "They exist to serve the interests of the energy industry" is obviously false, because they clearly publish about all sorts of regulation, foreign policy, etc. One couldn't even say they're Conservative shills (not that this post did), because they also seem to favor gay rights and decriminalization of marijuana.
But none of this says anything, one way or the other, about the veracity of the OP, or the utility of its thesis.
I don't want to see environmental catastrophe any more than you do so why haven't you convinced me?
Because as ever I'm offered a litany of highly questionable statements supposedly adding up to something so obvious that only an idiot could fail to recognize it but when as here, I (proxy 'I' at least) ask to look at the data, I get Dr. Phil Jones from the UK Met Office saying
"We have 25 years or so invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it?"
As a doctoral student impressed by Karl Popper's views on science I thought the idea was indeed to try to discover any flaws in theories and the data supposedly supporting them with the goal of making genuine progress in understanding the world.
And of course trillions of dollars are linked to the veracity of that and analogous data. This is indeed a scandal.
I find absolutely no reason to believe any set of arm-waved statistics. And estimates of global growth decades into the future, from industry groups that can barely predict the fluctuations of their own business from one year to the next are at least as dubious as the most questionable of direct evidence for and against anthropogenic climate change.
One way or the other, yes. Either trillions in avoidable costs due to rising seas, high power bills due to air conditioning, rebuilding infrastructure wiped by superstorms, etc, or trillions in avoidable costs due to legislating carbon scrubbing and energy rationing.
The stakes are very high. We'll see how it shakes out.
Anyone interested in global warming should read Solomon's "The Deniers: The World Renowned Scientists Who Stood Up Against Global Warming Hysteria, Political Persecution, and Fraud - And those who are too fearful to do so", http://www.amazon.com/Deniers-Renowned-Scientists-Political-... .
Most interestingly, most of the scientists the author interviewed still believe in global warming; they just believe their own research was twisted or misinterpreted to support it, all the rest they still believe. Because of the media barrage supporting global warming, that is all most people, even scientists who do not actually look for disconfirming claims and evidence, ever see.
Also, Moore's "Climate of Fear" (published by Cato), http://www.amazon.com/Climate-Fear-Shouldnt-Global-Warming/d... , points out that the effects even proponents claim have been getting down graded, to the point where the actually expected global warming is likely to be more beneficial than not.
This article brings up an issue I often face when looking at articles from sites like this. How do I know the slant of a news site I don't often read? I don't have a problem with a little bias, (in fact, bias is nearly impossible to eliminate imho) but I'd like to know how to approach the article in the first place. It is easier with sites like npr, cnn, foxnews, but it takes a little bit of googling to find out about many others.
I look at the form of the argument presented. If it employs rhetorical fallacies, or lacks qualifiers to broad statements, or shies away from more than the most cursory contextual explanations, then it's probably bullshit.
Or in programming terms, watch out for undeclared variables, errors in scope, and abuse of the GOTO statement.
To me the article displayed a typical revisionism trait: picking one small aspect, proving it wrong and thereby claiming to disprove the whole theory. It is like the creationists who think finding some obscure bone somewhere that falls outside of the predictions of some obscure application of evolution theory somehow disproves evolution theory.
While I can imagine a lot of things, I very much doubt that the whole climate debate rests on one unobtainable data set.
