GW Skeptics vs Scientific Concensus

[Henning]

On this subject an open letter from 255 members of the US National Academy of Sciences, including 11 Nobel laureates, was published in Science Magazine:

Climate Change and the Integrity of Science

We are deeply disturbed by the recent escalation of political assaults on scientists in general and on climate scientists in particular. All citizens should understand some basic scientific facts. There is always some uncertainty associated with scientific conclusions; science never absolutely proves anything. When someone says that society should wait until scientists are absolutely certain before taking any action, it is the same as saying society should never take action. For a problem as potentially catastrophic as climate change, taking no action poses a dangerous risk for our planet.

Scientific conclusions derive from an understanding of basic laws supported by laboratory experiments, observations of nature, and mathematical and computer modeling. Like all human beings, scientists make mistakes, but the scientific process is designed to find and correct them. This process is inherently adversarial—scientists build reputations and gain recognition not only for supporting conventional wisdom, but even more so for demonstrating that the scientific consensus is wrong and that there is a better explanation. That’s what Galileo, Pasteur, Darwin, and Einstein did. But when some conclusions have been thoroughly and deeply tested, questioned, and examined, they gain the status of “well-established theories” and are often spoken of as “facts.”

For instance, there is compelling scientific evidence that our planet is about 4.5 billion years old (the theory of the origin of Earth), that our universe was born from a single event about 14 billion years ago (the Big Bang theory), and that today’s organisms evolved from ones living in the past (the theory of evolution). Even as these are overwhelmingly accepted by the scientific community, fame still awaits anyone who could show these theories to be wrong. Climate change now falls into this category: There is compelling, comprehensive, and consistent objective evidence that humans are changing the climate in ways that threaten our societies and the ecosystems on which we depend.

Many recent assaults on climate science and, more disturbingly, on climate scientists by climate change deniers are typically driven by special interests or dogma, not by an honest effort to provide an alternative theory that credibly satisfies the evidence. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and other scientific assessments of climate change, which involve thousands of scientists producing massive and comprehensive reports, have, quite expectedly and normally, made some mistakes. When errors are pointed out, they are corrected. But there is nothing remotely identified in the recent events that changes the fundamental conclusions about climate change:

(i) The planet is warming due to increased concentrations of heat-trapping gases in our atmosphere. A snowy winter in Washington does not alter this fact.

(ii) Most of the increase in the concentration of these gases over the last century is due to human activities, especially the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation.

(iii) Natural causes always play a role in changing Earth’s climate, but are now being overwhelmed by human-induced changes.

(iv) Warming the planet will cause many other climatic patterns to change at speeds unprecedented in modern times, including increasing rates of sea-level rise and alterations in the hydrologic cycle. Rising concentrations of carbon dioxide are making the oceans more acidic.

(v) The combination of these complex climate changes threatens coastal communities and cities, our food and water supplies, marine and freshwater ecosystems, forests, high mountain environments, and far more.

To be continued in next post.

[Henning]

Continued from previous post:

Much more can be, and has been, said by the world’s scientific societies, national academies, and individuals, but these conclusions should be enough to indicate why scientists are concerned about what future generations will face from business-as-usual practices. We urge our policy-makers and the public to move forward immediately to address the causes of climate change, including the un restrained burning of fossil fuels.

We also call for an end to McCarthy-like threats of criminal prosecution against our colleagues based on innuendo and guilt by association, the harassment of scientists by politicians seeking distractions to avoid taking action, and the outright lies being spread about them. Society has two choices: We can ignore the science and hide our heads in the sand and hope we are lucky, or we can act in the public interest to reduce the threat of global climate change quickly and substantively. The good news is that smart and effective actions are possible. But delay must not be an option.

P. H. Gleick,* R. M. Adams, R. M. Amasino, E. Anders, D. J. Anderson, W. W. Anderson, L. E. Anselin, M. K. Arroyo, B. Asfaw, F. J. Ayala, A. Bax, A. J. Bebbington, G. Bell, M. V. L. Bennett, J. L. Bennetzen, M. R. Berenbaum, O. B. Berlin, P. J. Bjorkman, E. Blackburn, J. E. Blamont, M. R. Botchan, J. S. Boyer, E. A. Boyle, D. Branton, S. P. Briggs, W. R. Briggs, W. J. Brill, R. J. Britten, W. S. Broecker, J. H. Brown, P. O. Brown, A. T. Brunger, J. Cairns, Jr., D. E. Canfield, S. R. Carpenter, J. C. Carrington, A. R. Cashmore, J. C. Castilla, A. Cazenave, F. S. Chapin, III, A. J. Ciechanover, D. E. Clapham, W. C. Clark, R. N. Clayton, M. D. Coe, E. M. Conwell, E. B. Cowling, R. M Cowling, C. S. Cox, R. B. Croteau, D. M. Crothers, P. J. Crutzen, G. C. Daily, G. B. Dalrymple, J. L. Dangl, S. A. Darst, D. R. Davies, M. B. Davis, P. V. de Camilli, C. Dean, R. S. Defries, J. Deisenhofer, D. P. Delmer, E. F. Delong, D. J. Derosier, T. O. Diener, R. Dirzo, J. E. Dixon, M. J. Donoghue, R. F. Doolittle, T. Dunne, P. R. Ehrlich, S. N. Eisenstadt, T. Eisner, K. A. Emanuel, S. W. Englander, W. G. Ernst, P. G. Falkowski, G. Feher, J. A. Ferejohn, A. Fersht, E. H. Fischer, R. Fischer, K. V. Flannery, J. Frank, P. A. Frey, I. Fridovich, C. Frieden, D. J. Futuyma, W. R. Gardner, C. J. R. Garrett, W. Gilbert, R. B. Goldberg, W. H. Goodenough, C. S. Goodman, M. Goodman, P. Greengard, S. Hake, G. Hammel, S. Hanson, S. C. Harrison, S. R. Hart, D. L. Hartl, R. Haselkorn, K. Hawkes, J. M. Hayes, B. Hille, T. Hökfelt, J. S. House, M. Hout, D. M. Hunten, I. A. Izquierdo, A. T. Jagendorf, D. H. Janzen, R. Jeanloz, C. S. Jencks, W. A. Jury, H. R. Kaback, T. Kailath, P. Kay, S. A. Kay, D. Kennedy, A. Kerr, R. C. Kessler, G. S. Khush, S. W. Kieffer, P. V. Kirch, K. Kirk, M. G. Kivelson, J. P. Klinman, A. Klug, L. Knopoff, H. Kornberg, J. E. Kutzbach, J. C. Lagarias, K. Lambeck, A. Landy, C. H. Langmuir, B. A. Larkins, X. T. Le Pichon, R. E. Lenski, E. B. Leopold, S. A. Levin, M. Levitt, G. E. Likens, J. Lippincott-Schwartz, L. Lorand, C. O. Lovejoy, M. Lynch, A. L. Mabogunje, T. F. Malone, S. Manabe, J. Marcus, D. S. Massey, J. C. McWilliams, E. Medina, H. J. Melosh, D. J. Meltzer, C. D. Michener, E. L. Miles, H. A. Mooney, P. B. Moore, F. M. M. Morel, E. S. Mosley-Thompson, B. Moss, W. H. Munk, N. Myers, G. B. Nair, J. Nathans, E. W. Nester, R. A. Nicoll, R. P. Novick, J. F. O’Connell, P. E. Olsen, N. D. Opdyke, G. F. Oster, E. Ostrom, N. R. Pace, R. T. Paine, R. D. Palmiter, J. Pedlosky, G. A. Petsko, G. H. Pettengill, S. G. Philander, D. R. Piperno, T. D. Pollard, P. B. Price, Jr., P. A. Reichard, B. F. Reskin, R. E. Ricklefs, R. L. Rivest, J. D. Roberts, A. K. Romney, M. G. Rossmann, D. W. Russell, W. J. Rutter, J. A. Sabloff, R. Z. Sagdeev, M. D. Sahlins, A. Salmond, J. R. Sanes, R. Schekman, J. Schellnhuber, D. W. Schindler, J. Schmitt, S. H. Schneider, V. L. Schramm, R. R. Sederoff, C. J. Shatz, F. Sherman, R. L. Sidman, K. Sieh, E. L. Simons, B. H. Singer, M. F. Singer, B. Skyrms, N. H. Sleep, B. D. Smith, S. H. Snyder, R. R. Sokal, C. S. Spencer, T. A. Steitz, K. B. Strier, T. C. Südhof, S. S. Taylor, J. Terborgh, D. H. Thomas, L. G. Thompson, R. T. TJian, M. G. Turner, S. Uyeda, J. W. Valentine, J. S. Valentine, J. L. van Etten, K. E. van Holde, M. Vaughan, S. Verba, P. H. von Hippel, D. B. Wake, A. Walker, J. E. Walker, E. B. Watson, P. J. Watson, D. Weigel, S. R. Wessler, M. J. West-Eberhard, T. D. White, W. J. Wilson, R. V. Wolfenden, J. A. Wood, G. M. Woodwell, H. E. Wright, Jr., C. Wu, C. Wunsch, M. L. Zoback

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: petergleick@pacinst.org

Notes

* 1. The signatories are all members of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences but are not speaking on its behalf.
* 2. Signatory affiliations are available as supporting material at http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/328/5979/689/DC1.

[Breakable]

A very clear explanation how is GW evidence gathered, analyzed and interpreted starts in 2 minutes, by energy secretary Dr. Steven Chu

[Phil’s Dad]

AaronB wrote: But that’s just me.

…and me. :coolsmile:

[Brian H]

Henning;
The “argument from Authority” you quote is readily and easily counterbalanced by a much larger pool of equally or better-qualified scientists who reject most of the core arguments, partly because the modelling is so crude compared to the minimum required to deal with multivariate non-linear systems like climate.

As for the precautionary principle, it should be rejected on its face, because no real numbers are involved. Except for the very real risk of economic collapse and death by starvation of hundreds of millions entailed by the “solutions” proposed. The cost of mitigation of hypothetical warming effects would be a small fraction of the costs of attempting to choke off CO2 production.

My fervent hope, of course, is that FF will render the entire issue moot. And send the climastrologers to the Unemployment office.

[Breakable]

Brian H wrote: Henning;
The “argument from Authority” you quote is readily and easily counterbalanced by a much larger pool of equally or better-qualified scientists who reject most of the core arguments, partly because the modelling is so crude compared to the minimum required to deal with multivariate non-linear systems like climate. …

Such pool does not exist or at least they are not climatologists.
Maybe they are physicists or literature professors?
I would rather see you go the other route, that “Consensus does not actually mean anything”.

[Brian H]

Breakable wrote:

Henning;
The “argument from Authority” you quote is readily and easily counterbalanced by a much larger pool of equally or better-qualified scientists who reject most of the core arguments, partly because the modelling is so crude compared to the minimum required to deal with multivariate non-linear systems like climate. …

Such pool does not exist or at least they are not climatologists.
Maybe they are physicists or literature professors?
I would rather see you go the other route, that “Consensus does not actually mean anything”.
Neither the “Consensus” nor “climatology” exist. There is no such degree; those claiming/inventing the title are dabbling in physics, mathematics, oceanography, hydrology, computer modelling, forecasting, and meteorology without qualifications in any of them. Those who do have such qualifications are contemptuous of their amateurish abuse of those specialties.

[Aeronaut]

Sour grapes have little or no market value. The consensus and climatology exist because other groups have been more successful at getting publicity than we have. Of the 2 general groups of sales people, these people are the ones who can sell intangible “products”- ideas. The guy selling Hype Perions is a very good example, since, like us, he has no proven hardware or regulatory certifications in hand to sell with.

2 facts about internet marketing to consider are that the majority of “purchases” begin with offline marketing (TV, radio, and print ads), and 97% of the clicks go to the top search engine result. Without belaboring SEO’s inherent slant toward government-funded science (.edu and .gov sites with thousands of pages available for link juice funneling), we don’t advance the Cause by debating what can’t be proven.

[Breakable]

Brian H wrote:
Neither the “Consensus” nor “climatology” exist. There is no such degree; those claiming/inventing the title are dabbling in physics, mathematics, oceanography, hydrology, computer modelling, forecasting, and meteorology without qualifications in any of them. Those who do have such qualifications are contemptuous of their amateurish abuse of those specialties.

It seems to me the scientists have good qualifications of similar disciplines:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatologist
Just to check the top three in alphabet:
Dr Myles Allen graduated in Physics and Philosophy in 1987
Richard B. Alley (born 1957) is an American geologist and Evan Pugh Professor of Geoscience
Svante August Arrhenius (19 February 1859 – 2 October 1927) was a Swedish scientist, originally a physicist, but often referred to as a chemist, and one of the founders of the science of physical chemistry

Yes they have qualifications of neighboring disciplines because the original discipline did not exists at the time. Do you expect a climatologist to hold a PHD in ALL of the disciplines you mentioned? Btw Physics (nature philosophy) was once not a discipline either and some time ago Programmers were called Theoretical Physicists, but that did not stop them from doing science. We have only a few centuries of solid science in core disciplines and decades in secondaries. Give it some time and we will have Climatology PHD’s.

I would agree with you that when they working on a different discipline makes your skills less sharp in the original one, but that does not mean that any of scientists that do not currently work on the topic understand it more than a specialist spending his life work on it. Yes you could expect a mathematician to know if a physicist is right or wrong, because he understands more fundamentals, but I bet they don’t, otherwise there would be no need for other fields – we could train only mathematicians. This analogy should hold true for Physics and any other field that Climatology is base on.

Yes I heard about the criticism of Climate research by other disciplines (physicists or hydrologists) and usually the press responds to it with headlines “OMG WTF THERE IS NO CLIMATE CHANGE” where the original message was “OMG WTF A SMALL MISTAKE SOMEWHERE IN A METHOD OR CALCULATION”.

[Brian H]

The point is that the CRU Team etc. aggressively exclude input from those qualified in the various genuine sciences. Their mathematical hand-waving, e.g., uses PR to substitute for acknowledging the impossibility of producing the kinds of projections they claim.

We are conducting an on-going study to examine earlier forecasts of manmade disasters such as the global cooling movement in the 1970s, and the environmental movement’s campaign to ban DDT. We have been actively seeking such analogous situations, especially from the people responsible for promulgating alarming forecasts of manmade global warming, to see if there have been any widely accepted forecasts of manmade disasters that proved to be accurate or where the forecasted disaster was successfully prevented by government actions.

In all, we have identified 72 analogous situations, and we judge 26 of them to be relevant. Based on an analysis of these 26 similar alarms with known outcomes, we found that none were based on forecasts derived from scientific forecasting procedures, and all were false alarms. Government actions were sought in 96% of the cases and, in the 92% of cases where government action was taken, the actions caused harm in 87%. (“Effects and outcomes of the global warming alarm: A forecasting project using the structured analogies method”).

The forecasting procedures used by global warming alarmists were not validated for the situation. To address this oversight, we conducted an ex ante forecasting simulation of the IPCC forecasts (from the organization’s 1992 report) of a .03°C per year increase in global average temperature.

We used the period from 1850 through 2007, a period of industrialization and exponential growth in human emissions of carbon dioxide. In a head-to-head competition involving 10,750 forecasts, the forecast errors from the IPCC model were more than 7 times larger than the errors from a model more appropriate to the situation, the aforementioned naïve extrapolation. More importantly, the errors were 12.6 times larger for the long-term (91 to 100-year forecast horizons).

Those who were responsible for making the forecasts had no training or experience in the proper use of scientific forecasting methods. Furthermore, we were unable to find any indication that they made an effort to look for evidence from scientific research on forecasting. It is perhaps not surprising then that their implementation of their forecasting method was inappropriate.

The purpose of scientific forecasting is to reduce uncertainty in order to facilitate wise decisions. The so-called “precautionary principle” claims that uncertainty is a reason to make dramatic changes. It has the effect of marginalizing rational scientific study. Rejection of the rational scientific approach to decision making was mocked in George Orwell’s 1984, in one of the three slogans displayed on the Ministry of Truth building, “Ignorance is strength.” (Our essay “Uncertainty, the precautionary principle, and climate change” describes the anti-scientific nature of the “precautionary principle.”)

In the case of global climate change over policy-relevant time scales, there is little uncertainty. Proper scientific forecasts provide extremely accurate forecasts. Climate varies, but our validation study showed that simply extrapolating last year’s global mean temperature resulted in a mean absolute error of only 0.24°C for fifty-year ahead forecasts. It is difficult to imagine how policy makers would benefit if this error were reduced further, even to 0.0°C.

[Phil’s Dad]

The so-called “precautionary principle” claims that uncertainty is a reason to make dramatic changes. It has the effect of marginalizing rational scientific study.

Therein lies the heart of the problem. The last twenty or more years of heavily funded research seems to have bought us no greater certainty over the future. For every peer-reviewed and published argument there is a counter argument from scientists every bit as well qualified. Sadly there is an increasingly high risk that blind obedience to the precautionary principle could be the most destructive course we take. Scientists (and politicians alike) need the humility to recognise their own limitations and the confidence to acknowledge that humanity does not thrive on restrictions.

[Brian H]

Phil’s Dad wrote:

The so-called “precautionary principle” claims that uncertainty is a reason to make dramatic changes. It has the effect of marginalizing rational scientific study.

Therein lies the heart of the problem. The last twenty or more years of heavily funded research seems to have bought us no greater certainty over the future. For every peer-reviewed and published argument there is a counter argument from scientists every bit as well qualified. Sadly there is an increasingly high risk that blind obedience to the precautionary principle could be the most destructive course we take. Scientists (and politicians alike) need the humility to recognise their own limitations and the confidence to acknowledge that humanity does not thrive on restrictions.

And when thousands of gigabucks are in the offing from a suitably panicked public and complicit governments, the odds of sane science occurring drops by orders of magnitude.

[Breakable]

I am not trying to discredit it yet, but from the beginning it smells biased:
Compare the author introduction
Taken from article:

J. Scott Armstrong (Ph.D., MIT, 1968), a Professor at the Wharton School of Management, University of Pennsylvania, is the author of Long-range Forecasting, the creator of forecastingprinciples.com, and editor of Principles of Forecasting (Kluwer 2001),

Taken from Wikipedia:

J. Scott Armstrong (born March 26, 1937), Ph.D., is an author, forecasting and marketing expert,[1][2] [3] and a professor of Marketing at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

[Breakable]

Regarding the precautionary principle I think corporations would love to throw it away. The alternative Ignorance principle sounds much cheaper. Actually all regulation costs money so it would be nice to abolish it and let the free market resolve all the issues – the strong will survive and the weak will perish.
I like how the free market resolves the quality issues, now to buy a can opener that can open one or more cans you need to find a good brand. Even then there is a limit how much can you use it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_obsolescence
Do like to remember as well when a bicycle used to last 20 years? Even when you actually use it…

[Breakable]

Brian H wrote: The point is that the CRU Team etc. aggressively exclude input from those qualified in the various genuine sciences. Their mathematical hand-waving, e.g., uses PR to substitute for acknowledging the impossibility of producing the kinds of projections they claim.

Interesting paper with zero substance. Author(s) claims he has discovered (absolutely true) principles of forecasting which everyone must adhere to, but he does not provide any proof of. Why does he not use those principles to make some money in forex, stock market, horse race or football betting? Or do they only predict where you can not make any predictions?

Much more substance you can find here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Circulation_Model#Accuracy_of_models_that_predict_global_warming

[Author]

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