Interesting word choice by Peter Gleick:
In a remarkable bit of irony, the art chosen by editors (not by the authors of the letter) at Science to accompany the letter was a picture of a polar bear on an ice flow. To the embarrassment of the journal, this photo is “photoshopped” — combining polar bear, ice flow, clouds, and other elements into a perfectly lovely, albeit made-up piece of art. Oops. The journal, of course, when they realized their mistake, agreed to swap out the photo and post a sheepish correction.
Irony: When publishing a strongly worded letter written to complain that scientists are being accused behaviors not specifically mentioned in the letter, (but which include colluding among themselves to mislead the less scientifically literate members of public about about the certainty of climate change through various acts that include publishing deceptive scientific images “to hide the decline”), include a misleading emotionally charged photo that required effort, creativity and expensive software to create and which might mislead the less scientifically literature members of the public about the level of certainty of climate change, and the current living conditions of polar bears.
I guess that does fit the definition of irony.
But I think we might suggest other words:
“In a remarkable display of incompetence ..,”
“In a remarkable attempt at playing hard-ball politics ..,”
“In a remarkable resort to propaganda ..,”
None of those are quite right.
To convey just the right blend of incompetence, attempt at politics and use of propaganda, I need a word that means “inability to understand what sorts of communication constitute propaganda.”
Reading Gleik’s (not by the authors of the letter), I can’t help wondering: Why didn’t the editors at Science consult the author’s letters about the artwork? Aren’t the editors of science aware of past kerfuffles related to use of ginned up images of polar bears used to tear at the hearts of readers and which backfired? Do the editors of science live in bubble isolated from members of the public who get their news from newspapers and television?
Oh well. I expect the future will continue present us with more photo-shopped images intended to “inform” those who don’t actually read but only gaze at pictures of the “true” facts of climate change. After all, everyone knows the best way to communicate the truth is using deceptive images.
Hat tip: Roger Pielke.
Must share this article:
(Desperately) Looking for Arctic warming
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/22740
lol
“Oh, by the way, there really are polar bears on ice floes”. So a real photograph would have told us what exactly about “climate change”?
Dr. Gliek’s letter is a fantastic peek into the way the climate alarmist “machine” works — and I call it a machine, because it truly operates like one: (1) Ignore any evidence of bias, editorial spin, selectivity or substantive methodological flaws to which “denialists” have drawn attention; (2) Instead create a straw-man universal proposition “denialists say all climate science is flawed”, preferably expressed with a heavy sight and eye-roll then (3) dismiss the straw man without ever addressing the issue at hand–that the climate science community has a real problem detaching itself from politicized spin and manipulation and as a result, public confidence in their substantive work has been understandably diminished.
That a scientific publication felt compelled to insert a polar picture was an act of political allegiance that illustrates the problem. That Dr. Glieck rushed to the barricades in the HuffPo to miss that point as loudly and completely as possible is also symptomatic.
I find it funny that I mentioned the other ironic aspects of this whole polar-bear story too.
http://nigguraths.wordpress.com/2010/05/07/integrity-science-gleick/
Re: your comment at Roger Pielke’s blog. the letter does refer to the McCarthy-like attacks on climate science near the end – I guess that’s as far as they would go.
The whole letter seems to be a hurried job – which is *probably* what resulted in the lapse of quality control at Science.
George–
I wrote this at Roger’s:
When I read the recent “Just do what we tell you ’cause we’re smarter than you!” letter from the NAS member scientists, I was reminded of Richard Feynman’s resignation from the NAS on the grounds that it was an elitist organization with no reason for existence other than fulfilling an overwhelming need for self congratulations… and choosing who next should be honored by invitation to join the club.
.
Not much has changed. Feynman really was brilliant.
Shub
I consider this vague. Is the uninformed reader supposed to fill in the blanks? How are readers supposed to know if the scientists mean Cucinelli (who really is pestering)? Inhofe (who seems to be doing toothless grandstanding)? Or critics who complain the scientists collectively discussed and figured out ways to present images that would mis-inform the public about the uncertainties about paleo-reconstructions? Or are the “McCarthy-like attacks”, merely people suggesting that scientists like Jones would have been wiser to not expend huge amounts of time giving people who requested information the run-around ( both when information was requested under FOI and prior to the existence of the FOI act.) Or are the all the same thing?
Who knows? Since this whole ‘communication’ is done holding the public away with the 100 foot pole equivalent of publication at Science– rather than a blog with comments, or any sort of open meeting with reporters or bloggers, the writers can delude themselves that they have presented some sort of meaningful defense against… what? Exactly?
A word that means “inability to understand what sorts of communication constitute propaganda.â€
I can suggest two: stupidity and naivete. The later is more generous, but I think the former is more accurate.
I’m not clear on what is being objected to: is it that a photomontage was used or that an emotionally charged image was used?
If the answer is “both,” would there be similar objection to an actual photo of a polar bear on an ice flow, or of a photomontage of something different, something without emotional resonance?
lucia, do you really think that those reading SCIENCE are easily misguided by a photo?
Gleick is 100% right. the episode demonstrates the weakness of the “sceptic” argument.
Paul —
I actually think the letter itself was quite lame and the polar bear image is the iceing on the cake. But as for your question, both.
I think the editors of Science have developed a culture of thinking fake-but-accurate (in their mind) is ok. Their choice of this image is an example of the sort of thing that happens when people who think that way get control of a publication. This is a very unscientific attitude.
That fact that the fake-but-accurate (according to Gleick) image appears in the journal, particularly alongside a letter that purports “educate” the public about science is very unsettling. The fact that Gleick seems to think running the images was not-so-bad and doesn’t seem to criticize Science for the choice of an anti-scientific image to post next to the letter is unsettling.
So, in this regard,the “fake” aspect of the photo-montage that bothered me.
The fact that, on top of it all, the image is emotion laden, makes it worse.
Of course, the emotion laden aspect of the letter parallels some of the content of the letter with its vague allusions to a scary episode in history named for Senator Joe McCarthy.
If Gleick and his co-authors do want to discuss a witch hunt, they should be specific and not tap dance around the specific accusations and acts. By naming it, readers can gauge precisely what is happening, whether it has reached the level of McCarthyism and discuss what they think about the various specific events. (The VA AG ought to cut it out. With luck, VA voters will drum him out of office. Inhofe is Inhofe. Doesn’t look like he’s going to actually get enough senators together to achive a true McCarthy-like period. So.. with regard to the US Senate, intoning McCarthy is inflating the “assaults” way out of proportion. )
I suspect the 255 authors prefer to tap dance around the precise nature of most of the assaults (to use their word) because they know that many, many of the criticisms they lump under assaults and want to put under the umbrella of McCarthyism represent valid concerns on the part of the those members of the public who they prefer to label as ‘the climate denial “machine”‘.
I think the authors likely know that frank discussion of any accusations would result in a letter that would disperse any of the dark clouds hanging over any climate scientists’s head. So, they penned a letter with sweeping terms like ‘the denial “machine’, and label concerns expressed in even the mildest terms “McCarthyism”.
Since the letter is emotion laden, it’s hardly surprising the editors of Science, at least some of whom may not be scientists themselves– saw fit to decorate the article with a totally non-scientific ginned up image. But maybe the scientists who wrote that letter ought to have been the ones to slap their heads, and complain to Science’s use of a propaganda photo before their critics did it for them?
SteveF beat me to naivete, but how about gauche/gaucheness, or hubris?
Anomie?
Re: sod (May 10 11:08),
I think that some regular readers of SCIENCE are easily misguided by a photo. I suspect Gleick himself falls in this category. Other regular readers can be misguided by a fake-but-true photo, but with greater difficulty.
But anyway, why do you ask that question? Do you think that primary target of the letter was for-pay-subscriber to SCIENCE? Climate scientists? Physicists? Or was the target audience the media? (Science or non-science alike?) Or high-school teachers? Or the broader public?
I strongly suspect that letter was written with the intention of being picked up by the broader media and dissemination to the general, non-SCIENCE subscriber public. I strongly suspect the editors of Science chose to publish it for that reason, and picked an emotionally evocative fake-but-true image to entice journalists to run the story as an emotion laden appeal.
Of course, you may have other theories, and those may be as good as mine. But my quatloos are on my theory.
Regarding Inhofe: I guess it’s mathematically possible that Inhofe comes out of the next election as somebody with teeth. Not at all likely, but possible.
Quoting the article,
Lucia thinks this would be better if the VA AG were referred to by name? Sure, it could have been given as a very visible example. Beyond that, would you like a list of quotes from politicians, commentators, bloggers and blog commenters calling for criminal prosecution of climate scientists for.. um, something? I’m sure somebody could put something together, if you think such things have not been said or written.
Why not go with this ?
http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/02_1/polarbrsDM010207_468x762.jpg
Paul Daniel Ash (Comment#42340),
“I’m not clear on what is being objected to: is it that a photomontage was used or that an emotionally charged image was used?”
What I object to is the idiotic desire to use an “emotionally charged image” at all. What does a phony photo of a polar bear on floating ice have to do with the substance of the original letter or the editorial position of SCIENCE? If climate scientists believe they are being unfairly targeted for political reasons, then they should address that issue with substantive comments. If they think that “denialists” (their word choice) are duplicitous then they should address that issue with substantive comments. But phony stranded polar bears? It’s like a bad joke.
.
If SCIENCE wants to effectively address public doubt about climate science, then they should call the bad behavior of some climate scientists inappropriate and unprofessional, then start complaining about everybody else. Or just be quiet.
I don’t think I’d even noticed the picture until I read this here.
Re: carrot eater (May 10 11:50),
Sure. But so far, he doesn’t have the chops. That doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be criticized, but if the 255 authors of the letters want him criticized, they’d be wiser to criticize him directly. This involves naming him.
Yes. I think they should of named him. I’m sure someone could if they wished. I’m quite sure the 255 authors of that letter didn’t wish to do so in that letter, they would either
a) have a very small list of things they could defend against, and would have to admit that most of the people they want to call “‘the climate denial “machine” ‘ have already criticized Cucinnelli and often Inhofe.
or
b) know that the ensuing discussion would reveal that many of the critics and criticisms are valid
and in either case journalists would repeat the substance of the charges and the evidence that had been advanced.
In event (a), readers with more than two brain cells might rationally conclude that there is no such thing as a “climate denial machine” and in the event of (b) those same readers would conclude that the dark cloud looming over climate science is very likely the result of some sort of mis-behavior of climate scientists, in the event of (c), the 255 would really, really prefer the public not understand the precise nature of various accusations or hear the previously intoned lame defenses. The public did not side with the scientists the on the last go around, and they will probably continue to find the defenses lame– even if scientists were “cleared”, in some sense.
Since the authors don’t wish to achieve these goals, they wrote that vague, emotionally laden letter that names no one, is utterly unspecific about the accusations, spits out some talking points they would like journalists to transmit, and the editors of Science, recognizing the nature of the letter, decorated it with an emotionally laden fake-but-(maybe)true photo-shopped image of a polar bear.
Carrot–
You wouldn’t notice the photo because SCIENCE yanked the photo after it was criticized.
RB–
Why didn’t Science use that image?
Maybe they didn’t use that image doesn’t show the bears separated from other ice or land by over a hundred miles of water. The names of the photographers of that image are available, and maybe, if contacted, they would admit that floe is close enough to other floes to permit the polar bears to fish and swim to their hearts desire. Heck as far as the image goes, that ice floe might be so big, the polar bears could trot over a few feet and find a nice long flat surface to sleep on. Maybe their just swam over from some near by flow because they smelled baby seal.
Maybe the editors of Science resorted to the ginned up image because finding a not-fake honest image of polar bears actually stranded on a floe is difficult and time consuming. Has anyone asked them? Did they answer?
Lucia,
I think your reference to “the editors of Science” probably overstates the decision level – I imagine it was a sub-editor who needed a photo to balance the print on the page and got something out of the files.
Lucia,
This photo seems to have been yanked from the NYT . The problem is that if they commissioned a photographer to do this, he would indeed try to achieve emotional and artistic appeal .
NickStokes
I was quoting Gleick who wrote this:
You may be correct. It may be that the editors at Science leaves these details to sub-editors.
RB–
Thanks for the larger picture. I think the more complete image, along with Ann Althouse’s comments, shows why the editors of science were wise not to use that picture.
I wonder if Gleick will be moved to prove the ending claim of his article correct by finding a photo of a polar bear stranded on an isolated ice floe? Might be more difficult than he thinks. . .
Lucia,
I’ll repost what I said.
“Beyond that, would you like a list of quotes from politicians, commentators, bloggers and blog commenters calling for criminal prosecution of climate scientists for.. um, something? ”
Are you pretending this hasn’t happened? Or are you pretending it’s the fault of scientists that people have called for criminal prosecution for… who knows what? Have you already forgotten the whole feeding frenzy in the wake of the email release, and how irrelevant it all was to the science (as the letter points out)?
You’re going to pyschoanalyse the choice of a picture from a stock-photo website, and take these guys to task for how they communicate; meanwhile it’s pulling teeth to get you to criticise the WUWT crowd/d’Aleo for incompetence, full-blown quackery and baseless calls of fraud and misconduct? Oh, but we can never ever say anything about how those guys misinform the public.
Carry on, then.
Looks like it’s the fourth picture that comes up when you search for ‘polar bear’ at istockphoto. We’re really going to psychoanalyse whoever it was who went to a stock photography page, and just grabbed something?
It’s there now. I have no idea if it was there when I first read the thing.
Carrot–
I’m not pretending anything.
I’m saying that if a group of 255 authors want to criticize behavior, they should describe it, attach names and explain why that behavior is bad.
They shouldn’t go around suggesting the existence of unidentifiable groups like “the climate denial machine”, and write prose that suggest every single person who criticizes them falls in that group or that the fact that person “A” makes ridiculous criticism means that any and all criticism by anyone else must be “muddy[ing] the waters”
What do you think the letter points out? Where does the letter mention the email release? I can’t find “email”, or “CRU” in this. The closest thing I find is a reference to “recent events”.
This is an exercise in defending by hoping readers have forgotten many of the specific accusation and the evidence supporting them.
It seems to me the authors judiciously avoid any specific mention of the release of emails — possibly because they hope readers will have forgotten what triggered all this and refresh their memories by re-reading specific discussion describing more precise accusations of unscientific behavior on the part of climate scientist.
So no, I have not forgotten the public reaction to the contents of the climate scientists emails and I can well understand why the 255 authors prefer to avoid mentioning what “recent events” might be.
As for who I criticize: I think when a highly respected journal like science makes choices that would mislead the public, that is news.
Carrot–
You’re right. I guess I read they agreed to yank it and assumed they had.
So what if you didn’t register it’s presence? Or mind it? Can’t the effect be subliminal?
Carrot–
Is SCIENCE magazine that slip-shod? Do they have no fact checkers? Does nothing get reviewed? Does no one on the publication staff know enough about the current state of the climate, technology to guess that photo was photoshopped? Is their entire publication department so unaware of the history of weird alarmist photos that turned out to be… well… ginned up, to be unaware that running a ginned up photo-shopped image would be, at a minimum, unwise? What made someone think the letter needed any picture at all? Why not just run a picture of Gleick? Or Michael Mann’s face photo shopped onto a cartoon body so the readers could really put the article in context?
Poor dear darlings. They are probably just hapless drones buffetted about by the power of istockphoto. That picture on the web probably just jumped out and practically attached itself to the article.
Here’s the third image. If the editors just graph photos making no judgments, I wonder why they didn’t use it?
“http://www.istockphoto.com/file_thumbview_approve/11185856/2/istockphoto_11185856-children-in-line-to-visit-santa-room-for-your-message.jpg”
“…and baseless calls of fraud and misconduct”
having no base; without foundation; groundless
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/baseless
Not ‘baseless’, CE. Mistaken? Erroneous? or whatever other word you’d prefer to use… but not ‘baseless’. People who claim fraud and misconduct in climate science can certainly tell you why they think that. Just ask me. I’ll be happy to elaborate. 😉
Andrew
Re lucia (May 10 11:23) they penned a letter with sweeping terms like ‘the denial “machine’, and label concerns expressed in even the mildest terms “McCarthyismâ€.
No they didn’t.
The word “machine” appears nowhere in the open letter. And the “McCarthy” reference is quite specific:
It’s clearly a reference to the Cuccinelli investigations, and certainly not to “concerns expressed in even the mildest terms.”
I don’t think you make a very strong case by misrepresenting what the letter says.
… and if you are looking for one of the better and truly humorous (or at least a bit sad) use of irony, it is worth observing that the same folks whom are positing the “climate denial machine”, can in the next breath scoff at the skeptics believing a “climate conspiracy” because “after all we are only in it for the gold” and in the breath after that imagine vast conspiracy funded by big oil.
I find that in general that the selective fact filters used by some to justify their worldview tend to provide the best irony. The polar bears are actually pretty weak irony compared to the invokation of the “climate denial machine”. The only thing that could be better is if he actually managed to work his own conspiracy theories into the same article in which he condescendingly strawmans his opponents’ arguments as conspiracy theories. That would be a work of art.
Paul–
Sorry, you’re right. My mistake. It was Gleick, the first author of the letter, who later said:
He wrote that here.
You are correct he didn’t use that term in his letter in science– my mistake. In the Science letter, he uses the passive voice and those assaults are occurring by someone or some group that remains entirely unnamed.
I’m afraid I clicked over to the letter from Gleiks article about the letter, and forgot he did the passive voice trick in his Science letter.
If you think not naming anyone and referring to nothing specific is clear reference to the Cuccinelli investigations, your defintion of “clear” is called “dog whistle” by others. See dog whistle politics.
Lucia, you were searching for a better word; how about “oblivious”?
That word, in turn, reminded me of Toronto instituting a $125 fine for idling a car more than one minute, while China burned 24% more coal for electricity generation in the first quarter compared to last year.
Here’s a quote from Randy Olson:
Re: lucia (Comment#42366)
The photo you now have on display is the real thing – credited to a National Geo photographer. See Science’s note .
I’d call that a clear reference to criminal prosecution based on innuendo and guilt by association, not “concerns expressed in even the mildest terms.†Your presentation was misleading… and in the context of your critique here, one might call that ironic.
It might have been clearer if they’d called out Cuccinelli by name, or perhaps they meant to reference not just Cuccinelli’s CID but Inhofe’s threats as well.
If you really think that passage was “coded language that appears to mean one thing to the general population but has a different or more specific meaning for a targeted subgroup of the audience” (from your link), I’d appreciate some further explanation of that. I’m afraid you’re veering a little close to mind-reading for my comfort, but perhaps I’m missing something.
If I was a signatory to that letter I would be on the phone with Science giving them a piece of my mind and demanding a public apology. Science has inadverntantly? turned this letter into a laughingstock.
Interesting dynamic here as pointed out my our hostess with the mostest…
-Defensive letter published with 255 esteemed signatories
-Science publishes fake polar bear picture next to the letter impinging upon the credibility of said letter
-The picture become a bigger story that the letter.
-The public never learns what a feckless piece of misdirection the letter is because ensuing hullabaloo over the picture.
Yes, I’m shocked and amazed that somebody at the journal went to a stock photo webpage, and took a picture without doing a full investigation as to its provenance.
That said, whoever it was whose job it is to go look for illustrations, I’m betting that person will from now on make sure the original source of the picture is known.
So now there’s a real picture up there, with a proper credit.
File photos actually are a source of amusement sometimes. It isn’t that unusual to see a newspaper article with a file photo that doesn’t really match the article in some way.
You want me to take that seriously? Was that really worth the time it took to type in?
Somebody wanted a picture of a polar bear, so that person passed over the picture of whatever the heck that is.
Lucia
Nothing in the letter says that. Given that you take (certain) people to task for how they communicate, and what is vague or explicit or strawman, you might do well to not misrepresent the letter yourself.
I think most any reader would understand that to refer to the climategate thing, as well as perhaps the assorted IPCC report gates, such as they were.
I’d say those who perpetrate the charges are the ones hoping that. Merely repeating that the scientists are all corrupt would eventually make it seem like a proven point, even though the substance is lacking. As it always was.
The rest of your points are just overly contrived. If they wanted you to forget that the controversies ever happened, they wouldn’t have written this, as it is in response to the political response to those events.
Woe is us. Somebody carelessly took a file photo that wasn’t a photo (since replaced by an actual photo), and the public is now misled. Yes, that is the major source of misunderstanding among the public. Not a critical peep about the bloggers who are actually spreading crankery and unfounded claims of fraud.
Should Science be held to a higher standard than WUWT? Absolutely. But if you’re going to hold WUWT to no standard at all, then be upfront about it, as that says something important about WUWT.
when a highly respected journal like science makes choices that would mislead the public
Wait, was it misleading or “fake but accurate?” Is the public being misled that polar bears are drowning due to receding ice, or that a particular forlorn polar bear was photographed on a flat floe on a calm sea under a blue sky?
carrot eater (Comment#42379) May 10th, 2010 at 2:12 pm
“Somebody wanted a picture of a polar bear, so that person passed over the picture of whatever the heck that is.”
Maybe I’m slow to catch on, but aren’t photo’s and stories of ‘drowning polar bears’ exactly what is wrong with the climate debate.
We don’t have accurate historical counts of polar bear populations, we don’t have accurate current counts of polar bear populations. We can’t conclusively state one way or the other whether the polar bear population is declining or rising, but if polar bear populations are declining, something that there is no hard evidence to support, it is being cause by human CO2 emissions rather then a lack of seals to snack on or maybe they’ve just decided to ‘Become European’ and stop making Baby Polar Bears.
Re: Paul Daniel Ash (Comment#42382)
We further suggest that drowning-related deaths of polar bears may increase in the future if the observed trend of regression of pack ice and/or longer open water periods continues.
Wildlife photographer Moose Peterson had a picture about this in a link I posted above.
lucia (Comment#42372) May 10th, 2010 at 1:16 pm
But haven’t you just made a deliberate misrepresentation of the situation for propaganda purposes? Aren’t you outraged? I know I am, and all AGW believers.
See, it’s easy for me to play that game too.
harrywr2, I agree with you to some extent, but not entirely. I don’t know much about WGII sort of stuff like this, but I’m under the impression that we don’t have a very accurate read on historical polar bear populations – you are right on that. That said, I get the idea that in certain regions and groups, recent population decline is pretty well documented. Seems like there’s a balance between decreased hunting of polar bears, and stress due to habitat loss/trouble getting food.
If the latter concerns really are well founded, then I guess a picture of a polar bear would be appropriate.
Re: Paul Daniel Ash (May 10 14:48),
It was misleading. Someone at Science who picked the image, or Gleick himself may think the unstated message conveyed wordlessly by the image was accurate, but that seems dubious.
Lucia,
You complain of vague allusions and the letter writers not being specific, but the letter is positively encyclopedic compared to this business of dog whistles and “unstated messages conveyed wordlessly.”
Your argument, as I understand it, is that the letter is not what it purports to be, but you don’t offer any evidence of that other than your subjective interpretation.
Re: carrot eater (May 10 14:32),
I didn’t say the letter says anything. The problem with the letter is that much of it says nothing specific. Everything is alluded to indirectly, and so merely gives an impression. That’s what I think the letter does, and I don’t think observing this is misrepresenting the letter.
Oh? Would most infer they are discussing the climategate thing? As opposed to the Cuccinelli thing? Paul at least seems to think the letter quite clearly refers to that. Or maybe readers are supposed to recognize transitions for various different recent unnamed recent events?
Why should readers have to guess what’s communicated by dogwhistle?
Sure, you’d say that. But if you statement reflected reality, why don’t those charged should counter by explaining what they have been charged with, who charged them and explaining what really happened? Specifically, why don’t the Gleick 255 coauthors use vague language like non-specific assaults committed by some un-namable entities?
Sure they would. Because they think they can get media coverage announcing a letter by 255 scientists, the lead author will be interviewed, and the story has gotten old enough that journalists won’t discuss the more nuanced arguments nor talk to the critics of the scientists.
But then Science blundered and posted the faked image reminding readers that much of the initial controversy included discussions of a deception used to hide the level of uncertainty in hockeystick reconstructions.
CE: “If… then I guess a picture of a polar bear would be appropriate.”
Andrew: “If… then I guess claims of fraud or misconduct are appropriate.”
Andrew
I did the search on polar bears, and the forth photo I get is number 4095333, similar but only one bear on the ice. The notes show the purpose of the photo is not neutral. I assume the correct photo would also, but I can not find it to confirm this. All the other polar bears look happy bears.
Re: carrot eater (May 10 14:12),
Why did someone want a picture of a polar bear? Did the picture have anything to do with the contents of the letter? No. For some reason someone at Science, chose to decorate the letter with an utterly irrelevant picture of a forlorn lonely polar bear stranded on a isolated ice floe so far from land or other ice floe so far from land or other ice that one would imagine it was doomed to die.
Carrot
I am a bit shocked. You don’t see this sort of weird mix of info-taiment in most peer review journals. Why does Science do it? Do authors page charges cover the costs of editors time to find these silly irreleant decorations to their science-news-lite?
Would most infer they are discussing the climategate thing? As opposed to the Cuccinelli thing? Paul at least seems to think the letter quite clearly refers to that.
Lucia, at the risk of sounding uncivil, I’m beginning to feel that you either have horrible reading comprehension today or you’re being intentionally obtuse. I was referring to the section about the “McCarthy-like threats.” I can’t imagine how I could have been clearer about what I was referring to: I quoted the text from the letter. The part that talks about “recent events” is three paragraphs before that:
It’s not the best writing, to be sure (“remotely identified?”), but I can’t imagine how you could read “the recent events” in that context and not get that it refers to the IPCC controversies.
One could interpret the non-specificity as dogwhistling, or one could interpret it as a particular academic style of writing where naming names isn’t done. Either way, it’s an attempt at mind-reading, and by its very nature can’t ever be proved or disproved.
Paul–
Did I argue the letter is not what it purports to be? I don’t think so. I think it purports to be a letter written by numerous scientists, and I’ve never suggested it is not a letter written by numerous scientists.
What does you think the letter purports to be?
Or course I am providing my evaluation of the letter. Others can read it and provide theirs. It’s online. Science even moved it to the public side of their pay wall.
Paul
How am I supposed to know the McCarthy-like threats which happened recently aren’t also the recent events?
So, why climategate? That is the cru letters? Why not Amazongate? Or the problems with the sections Pielke has been complaining about. And why isn’t Cucinnelli motivated by revelations about the IPCC controversies?
So, are you now admitting it’s not specific, but suggesting that’s merely academic style? Or are you still insisting it’s actually specific and clear?
If the former, I will simply say that this is not an academic paper. Appearing in Science doesn’t make it an academic paper. Moreover, if it was an academic paper, Science’s decision to decorate it with an irrelevant polar bear image is simply bizzare.
Even if the letter is vague because some think academic style requires that, it’s still fair for me to point out it’s vague and non-specific. The final effect was to create a letter whose message is a dog-whistle and which, any ‘rebuttal’ could be waved by away by suggesting those criticizing the letter did not understand what specific actions the scientists thing need to be halted.
I have no idea what all the complaints are about here. Giant yawn from me, sorry.
Uh, unless someone wants to talk about the actual science, which shows that Polar Bears are going to have lots of problems in a warming world? No? Carry on.
“Why not Amazongate?”
Ah, the fake-but-fakegate.
Did I argue the letter is not what it purports to be? I don’t think so. I think it purports to be a letter written by numerous scientists, and I’ve never suggested it is not a letter written by numerous scientists.
I score that response +1 willful obtuseness.
The letter purports to be a defense of the integrity of climate science. (In support of that assertion, I offer the title: “Climate Change and the Integrity of Science.”)
You, on the other hand, have asserted that it is “a carefully worded piece of propaganda” that “convey[s] a vague — and essentially false –impression about the “assaults†on climate scientists” and is “an exercise in defending by hoping readers have forgotten many of the specific accusation and the evidence supporting them.”
In defense of this assertion you offer nothing but a subjective interpretation. I mean if that’s all ya got it’s fine, but even you’d have to admit doesn’t make for a very compelling argument.
By the way, for those who are sure “the recent events” are about climategate here is a quote from Tobis
http://theenergycollective.com/TheEnergyCollective/64970
.
So, is the letter referring to climategate? Or does it say nothing about climategate? Or do the words mean whatever the reader wants them to mean?
Spencer uses photoshopped iceberg. Oh, the irony.
http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/iceberg.asp
How am I supposed to know the McCarthy-like threats which happened recently aren’t also the recent events?
+2 willful obtuseness. In what sense would the threats make sense in the context of this statement: “But there is nothing remotely identified in the recent events that changes the fundamental conclusions about climate change?” If you are really going to assert that this sentence can be interpreted as “there is nothing remotely identified in [Cuccinelli’s CID] that changes the fundamental conclusions about climate change” then I’m gonna have to conclude that you’re yanking my chain. That’s ridiculous.
So, why climategate? That is the cru letters? Why not Amazongate?
I have absolutely no idea what this string of words is supposed to mean.
So, are you now admitting it’s not specific, but suggesting that’s merely academic style?
I score that response +1 “reading comprehension FAIL.” Kindly.
What I said – in words written in the English language – was that trying to divine whether the writers were or were not being intentionally deceptive would be “an attempt at mind-reading, that by its very nature can’t ever be proved or disproved.”
Paul
Ok. Fair enough.
You, on the other hand, have asserted that it is “a carefully worded piece of propaganda†that “convey[s] a vague — and essentially false –impression about the “assaults†on climate scientists†and is “an exercise in defending by hoping readers have forgotten many of the specific accusation and the evidence supporting them.â€
Yes. Why do you think an attempt to defend climate science (which they tells us the letter is) can’t also be a carefully worded piece of propaganda? I say their attempt to present a defense relies on their hope that the readers have forgotten the specific accusations?
Are you being willfully obtuse?
Of course I am describing my interpretation of their letter. And you are responding by providing no interpretation, suggesting the utterly vague statements are clear, and the retreating to saying my interpretation is just an interpretation.
But here’s how communication normally works: Some tries to communicate something by word, writing, sign language, smoke puffs or dog whistle. Someone else tries to interpret what they actually said.
I am reading what the letter says and telling you what I think it actually says, and also what it seems to communicate while still saying nothing.
I think you raise several important questions in this thread. Someone has to do the lateral thinking for the global warming debate. It is always about asking the right questions.
I was wondering as well as to how Revkin knew that Science made a ‘mistake’ in putting that picture. But at the end of his post, he does mention that he contacted the editor in question who replied back by email.
There are several questions arising from the blatant, out-in-the-open fakery committed by Science. Gleick has used this opportunity to pontificate, not once but twice – about ‘deniers’ on the Huffington post. Maurizio notes on his blog that Gleick has a book on bottled water just out – the cynic in me has to reluctantly take note of this.
Paul–
Where did I accuse the writers of being intentionally deceptive? I’ve accused them of being vague, spinning a story and writing propaganda. Propaganda need not involve deception. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda
I’m pretty sure the goal of that letter was to change attitudes of a target audience. Resorting to vagueness is using facts selectively. It doesn’t necessarily involve deception.
Maybe I’m mind reading– but why do you think 255 authors wrote that letter? Why do you think Science ran it? It’s not a scholarly article.
Where did I accuse the writers of being intentionally deceptive?
In comment# 42334 at 10:40 am, where you say: “they have mastered the art of conveying a vague — and essentially false –impression about the “assaults†on climate scientists”
Lucia
Let’s look in a previous issue, in the letters section. Apr 30, 2010; there’s a letter about eating insects. Complete with a picture of a big pile of some colourful bugs.
So Science likes to spruce up the letters sections with some nice pictures. How offensive. Let’s all be outraged.
I disagree with Tobis, in that the recent political grandstanding and threats of prosecution are inspired by climategate. I don’t see how he can separate them, as it seems he does there.
But nowhere in that letter does it say or suggest that:
That’s just you projecting, in a weirdly defensive way.
It’s not a scholarly article.
No. It’s a Letter. Every issue has them.
Paul Daniel Ash:
Essentially and intentionally mean the same thing in your dictionary?
Or are you just dishonest yourself?
Carrick,
Care to explain how you can “master an art” unintentionally?
Carrot Eater:
“Weirdly defensive” actually describes you pretty well. If you get your dander up because somebody questioned a passage in the AGW creed, watch out! Expect an endless back and forth going nowhere because you yourself are either unwilling or unable to do any of the leg work to test anybody else’s assertions.
carrot eater (Comment#42386) May 10th, 2010 at 3:12 pm
“That said, I get the idea that in certain regions and groups, recent population decline is pretty well documented.”
From an NGO group
http://www.polarbearsinternational.org/research/pbi-supported-research/polar-bear-population-studies
“A new U.S.-Russia management treaty now allows scientists on both sides to cross borders. Research on the U.S. side resumed in 2008 after 15 years with no data.”
So for some areas of the arctic we have no data between 1993 and 2008. Pretty hard to establish a trend line.
Paul Daniel Ash:
As I read it, the statement ““they have mastered the art of conveying a vague — and essentially false –impression about the “assaults†on climate scientists†conveys two parts, one is the authors of this screed are conveying a vague (and hence difficult to undermine) impression of assaults on climate science. The second part is clearly a stated opinion by Lucia, interjected into the sentence using hyphens, that this impression they are trying to convey is “essentially false”.
I have no problem recognizing the boundary between her description about what they were doing and what her opinion about that was. Why are you having so much trouble?
Carrick
Endless back and forth? I’ve had two here; one was with Lucia’s model-observation comparison where I convinced her to do some test of her own test, so that actually didn’t end up endless. Though I forget how it turned ultimately out. No, I wouldn’t have done that work myself; I wasn’t interested in taking the time to reproduce her math. If I recall, you didn’t even think my test was worth doing; Lucia felt otherwise. The other endless back and forth is Amac’s obsession with Tiljander, and I still can’t quite figure out what his complaint actually is, but that’s already polluted another thread, so we’ll leave it there.
I will get my dander up when I see sheer incompetence or misrepresentation, though, and there is a lot of that out there.
harrywr2 (Comment#42416) May 10th, 2010 at 5:57 pm
I think the level and history of observation varies from region to region, population to population. In fact, if you read your link, it gives you a feel for that. Very poor data in some regions/populations, better in others.
Boris:
I’ll bite.
Remember how it is thought that polar bears differentiated from the brown bear to start with? If you go through their natural history, they have shown an enormous capacity to adapt to changing climates.
In any case, and more the to point,if the economic cost of maintaining their current wild habitat is say 50 trillion dollars, what is the chance that people would actually be willing to pay that price? I’d think the AGW activist crowd needs a better argument than a nice little man-eating bear.
Paul
But who says I don’t think they think they are deceiving, and I don’t think they intend to decieve. I think they believe they are conveying a true story. So, there is no intent to deceive.
What I think is a group of people have developed a very sloppy practice of not naming, not specifying accusations and writing rebuttals based on this practice. After much practice, they have mastered this art, and now convey essentially false impressions of the truth. This is not an accusation that they intend to deceive, but merely that their formula of communication results in misleading propaganda. They believe it themselves– but it is never the less misleading.
Carrot–
If they are going to do this sort of thing, and wish to remain reputable, they should budget sufficient resources to ensure check to be sure the images don’t convey a false scientific message. If you aren’t shocked that they decided to turn the magazine into science info-tainment, don’t be. But I think it’s a bit of an odd mix to include snappy images and then not budget to make sure they aren’t wrong.
I don’t doubt you disagree. But I think this makes my point that the article does not explicitly call out what recent events they refer too and different readers can come to entirely different conclusions.
Oh? There has been a systematic practice of being vague. Who are they criticizing? What are they defending climate science against?
Yes, Paul. But you are defending the vaguness based on the notion that it is an academic style. This isn’t even an academic topic. The non-naming and lack of specificity of the charges is inappropriate in a defense. What are the defending against?
Frankly, I don’t know why scientists write letters. I don’t know if anybody cares, and I doubt any policy or opinion is affected by their writing letters. There are always 50 Nobelists writing letters about this and that – Iraq war, arms control etc – I just don’t understand why.
Carrot Eater:
There was nothing wrong with Lucia’s analysis. I’m not sure what the real problem was. It certainly wasn’t incompetence or misrepresentation. The only “beef” I had was I would have used a more realistic noise model.
Here’s a weird switch. We go from talking about whether there might be adverse impacts on polar bears, to speaking as if that’s the only adverse impact to speak of? Come, now.
As it is, no matter what adverse impact you’d try to illustrate, you’d be accused of being alarmist or appealing to emotion or somesuch.
Lucia
The letter isn’t a rebuttal of anything. It’s expressing dismay at political attacks on scientists (which you really want listed out, but they didn’t, and yet we both know that the “threats of criminal prosecution” have occurred – Virginia [though I think that’s civil], Inhofe, Monckton), it’s giving a little primer on the process of science in general, and it’s laying out some fundamental conclusions they feel can be drawn at this time.
“it’s laying out some fundamental conclusions they feel can be drawn at this time”
Just like people can lay out some fundamental conclusions they feel can be drawn at this time that climate science contains fraud and misconduct.
Andrew
Carrick:
I’m not saying Lucia’s thing was incompetent, but I did want to see if it was a meaningful test. And running individual model runs through it was as fun a way of doing it as any, I thought.
It ultimately turned out in favor of my position. However, the test was weak because there was very little data.
Yeah. The problem was that if you run the binomial theorem or a couple of other tests, the range of results that are consistent with my method working is fairly large. The results fell in there. But it would be better to have more “model data”. I did some stuff I am going to put in a paper, but I want to defer that particular ones until if and when the model mean rejects since 1990, 1980, 2000 and 2001 with all data.
There is another one in the bin.
No? How do they defend against the unnamed accusations– and the threats of prosecution are accusations– without rebutting? And what of the accusations in climategate? You think they alluded to that. Are the defending the accusations surrounding that without rebutting them? If so, this is one pitiful “defense”.
But you are defending the vaguness based on the notion that it is an academic style.
No. For the third time, what I said was trying to determine if it was intentional vagueness or just a style thing would be mind-reading. You have asserted – again and again – that “there has been a systematic practice of being vague.” I’m saying that coming to that conclusion without evidence, based on your own subjective reaction, is thin.
There’s an editorial available too – Science editors focus on the main problem and recognize that the state of climate science is currently inadequate.
In turn, it is time to focus on the main problem: The IPCC reports have underestimated the pace of climate change while overestimating societies’ abilities to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
Oh heck, I’ll jump in…
For all you non-history majors, Senator Joe was more right than wrong in his depiction of Communist infiltrators in the US.
?
They are simply expressing dismay that people are making political attacks, particularly in threatening prosecution.
It isn’t meant as a defense against those attacks; it’s saying that such threats are themselves inappropriate, then laying out a general idea of how science proceeds.
When you decided the VA AG was being inappropriate, did you make a list of all the climategate accusations first, and rebut them one by one?
David
The practice is well established in discussion ofclimate. The practice of not naming people, not describing other’s arguments when “rebutting” their points was established by Hansen in his various email postings and practiced regularly at RC. Hansen has even explained it saying something like he doesn’t mention jesters.
If you don’t believe it, fine. It’s been observed regularly enough. Maybe if you read a little, you’ll notice the pattern. Or maybe you just don’t notice it– as you initially appeared to think the 255 author letter is clear in places where it names no one, fails to describe what actions constitute assaults or what sorts of charges their letter supposedly defends against.
On reflection, it also occurred to me that your claim that academic writing is traditionally vague about naming people when defending or rebutting is absolute bunk. Academic practice not only encourages naming precisely who advances arguments or has acted in ways one criticizes by by citing specific sources. It is simply not the case that Academics are in the habit or trimming off the name of who committed something they call an assault, the precise nature of the assault, when it happened or leaving off details.
This amazing level of vagueness cannot be explained by normal academic practice. It violates that norm. So, I don’t think it takes much mind reading to suggest that violation of academic norms in an overtly political document penned by 255 academics was intentional. As you appear to have conceded the vagueness in at least this instance, maybe you can suggest some other reasons for the vagueness.
Carrot–
It’s not a defense? Well, maybe you and Paul Daniel Ash should put your heads together on and decide if it’s defense or not. He says this:
I guess the lack of clarity goes deeper than even I imagined.
Back to Carrot.
You mean in way down comments here at my blog? Or do you mean I would have done so had I been lead author of a formal article I composed along with 255 other academics and published in Science? Which I knew would result in press coverage and discussion at places like the NYT?
I comments here at my blog, the subject of the VA AG’s actions came up somewhere after comment 100 on the thread discussing Judy Curry. When I expressed my opinion, I did not write a formal list or rebuttal and I think that is entirely appropriate to the informal nature of comments.
I think many people expect a higher standard of argument applies to formal articles that have been authored by a team of 255 academics, submitted to SCIENCE and published in that venue. But if you think that it’s reasonable to expect letters by teams of academics published in SCIENCE to fall below the standard expected of the 200th comment in a long comment thread at a blog, that may say something not particularly wonderful about SCIENCE or the 255 academics.
Paul,
Ok, so i am going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you are very new to this argument and not just assuming the oft seen studied ignorance. Let’s review some history of this argument shall we:
When the criticisms of Mann’s work initially arose with some very specific to the point issues. Specifically, there were issues with Mann’s choice of statistical methods, clear issues with several of his proxies including the bristlecones and Tijlander (which were used upside down). To make matters worse, it appeared that standard statistical confidence tests were deliberately withheld when they demonstrated points that Mann et al did not want made. Add on top of all of this “Mike’s Nature trick†in which the late period data which diverged from the actual temperature record was “treated with the actual temperature record†to make a graph more politically palatable.
All of these are specific directed complaints. It is now a matter of record. Due to the wonder of the internet, you can find them yourself on this site and many others including Climate Audit and the Air Vent. For the past several years (prior to the whole Climategate fiasco), you can find many instances of direct and specific questions being ask about pretty much all of the above points. If you want details, you don’t have to dig very deep. When these questions are put to the mainline AGW tribe, they begin to resemble Neo dodging bullets. Yes or no questions are reframed or spun into something political because they just don’t want to answer the question.
I am sure AMac is lurking around here somewhere if you want a real history of something like upside down Tijlander which demonstrated that a bunch of B list climate scientists couldn’t tell up from down with a road map firmly in hand. Hell, with input from Jean S and AMac my 13 year old can verify this these days. What organic brain damage prevents a climate PhD from answering the question directly ?
In the case of the question “Did Mann use the Tijlander proxy in a configuration opposite of that reported in the paper ?†there is a single simple and intellectually honest answer “Yesâ€. Maybe you should look at the gyrations required (after more than a year of time) to actually answer that. In the process, we have seen no end of sophism and spin, misrepresentation of statistical authorities, censorship of direct and specific questions on mainline AGW sites and many techniques that seem closer to Chomsky than Feynman.
Let’s make the additional point that I tend to trust Lucia because she does address specific points and will actually answer them objectively instead of spinning like a top. Maybe I would actually have some faith in the believers if they would actually address the questions I ask instead of answering the questions they want to answer. Zeke and scienceofdoom are a great start, but the damage done by realclimate and the apologist clique is immense and I think the depth that these guys have poisoned the well is just not comprehended by the true believers.
Do I think that Cucinelli’s pogrom is a good idea ? Absolutely not. Politics and science don’t mix well. Here is a direct and specific question for you however. If we don’t want political figures intervening in the sciences, what do you suggest we do when political groups are arguing for major changes to society and the scientific groups don’t seem to be policing their own and are behaving in a fashion best described as political ?
1.
One of the tenets of the Consensus AGW position seems to be that there’s such a thing as Science, and such a thing as Anti-Science, and not much in between.
The letter says
I concur with all four of these characterizations, as they are written.
The next paragraph continues
We see the dichotomy: in this corner is Science, represented by the AGW Consensus position and its adherents. In that corner is a dishonest coven of climate change deniers, driven by special interests and dogma.
At least to my ears, that’s a strange way of thinking about scientific criticism. In the 1970s, biology’s Central Dogma was (DNA -> RNA -> protein). Were those who demonstrated the dogma’s inadequacy “anti-biology”?
How about the substitution of plate tectonics for isostasy as the prime explanation of changing landforms? Was that bruising fight won by “anti-geology” forces?
There are disagreements within the ranks of the AGW Consensus. The NAS letter notes that “Like all human beings, scientists make mistakes, but the scientific process is… inherently adversarial.”
2.
However: be wary of straying too far from accepted wisdom. Yes, you might become famous for showing that the scientific consensus is wrong and that there is a better explanation. More likely, you’ll become a climate change denier, engaged in assaulting climate change science and scientists.
I guess you could call this the Bad-Faith Theory of Dissent from the AGW Consensus.
Of course, such a framework has its challenges.
* How much evidence of skepticism towards AGW dogma is needed to know the motives of the doubter?
* Is the shift from pro-science to anti-science gradual, or is it more akin to a phase transition?
* Can we empanel an NAS subcommittee to mark the boundary between permissible and forbidden questions?
3.
While open-minded debate will always be an integral part of the scientific process, it is time for those outside the AGW Consensus to agree with the well-established theories that have succeeded in reconstructing the climate of the past, explaining the climate of the present, and modeling the climate of the future.
Once the clamor of unregulated criticism is muted, I foresee an era of ever-smaller confidence intervals and ever-more-precise forecasts.
With AGW Consensus scientists free to guide policymakers, this will be the best of all possible worlds.
Interesting. The article in Science suggests we need to take climate scientists more seriously. They are really good, hard working guys and we should just trust them… so they use a faked polar bear shot???
Bad form indeed.
Re: Artifex (May 10 22:37),
“which were used upside down”
In the case of the question “Did Mann use the Tijlander proxy in a configuration opposite of that reported in the paper ?†there is a single simple and intellectually honest answer “Yesâ€
You’re just parroting McI’s schoolyard chants here. MM did not use them upside down. There is no reason to think that he used them other than as reported in the paper. As I’ve been contending to AMac, he calibrated to temperature in the normal way. No evidence has been produced to the contrary.
The Tiljander objection is that physically XRD should go in the opposite way with temperature to that observed during the calibration period. That’s a substantial objection. There are known reasons why the lake bed may have been disturbed, which might cause the expected relation to break down. If so, that makes it a faulty proxy, but doesn’t mean that it can be used some other way. You have to use it as the calibration says, or leave it out.
Lucia
This is getting ridiculous. You can read the letter. This isn’t that hard.
It is not a specific rebuttal of the various accusations (themselves often ill-defined) that came up through climategate. It does however give a statement of how science works in general. You can read that as defending the integrity of science, in a general way.
Oh, bother. Some things can go without spelling out every single time, Lucia. Witch-hunts are simply inappropriate; politicians calling for blood in order to satisfy some part of their base is inappropriate. If you really think the letter writers should have quoted Inhofe and the VA AG, and dissected them at length, and somehow rebutted in detail the claims that aren’t even spelled out by the VA AG, go ahead and think that.
I think it’s perfectly reasonable for this group to make a short and general statement, saying that threats of criminal prosecution are just disturbing and inappropriate.
AMac (Comment#42441) May 10th, 2010 at 11:01 pm
There’s plenty of room in between; just a lot of the loudest mouths don’t occupy it. Actually, I wouldn’t prefer to paint the spectrum like that; if you’re actually doing good work, then you’re within Science too.
I know it’s popular around here to pretend the crazies don’t exist, but they do, and they seem to be numerous.
Not if what you say actually makes any sense, and is backed up by observation.
There’s no evidence that past climate changes were as abrupt as the one that is occurring now. In addition, those earlier climate changes occurred without the added pressures of human encroachment on their ecosystem.
I don’t know if people will “pay the price,” but it seems reasonable that they should be made aware of the cost of doing nothing as well. You know, instead of making things up the way Lomborg did.
carot eater:
“Some things can go without spelling out every single time, Lucia.”
Is that so? I wonder why skeptics are not extended the same courtesy when it comes to the various aspects of scientific corruption regarding Climategate.
Your defence of Gleick not mentioning Cuccinell and Inhofe is invalid – the facts seem to paint a different picture.
Gleick’s letter was refused publication at the Washington Post, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/10/scientists-unite-against-climate-skeptics/
Even in the blog post above, Gleick is not directly quoted about Inhofe and Cuccinelli.
Please note that Gleick is pushing the ‘climate change = harmful for human health’ angle. It is the next ‘in-thing’.
More likely, you’ll become a climate change denier, engaged in assaulting climate change science and scientists.
“Not if what you say actually makes any sense, and is backed up by observation.”
CE,
From years of experience reading climate blogs, I can attest this is definately not the case. Without exception that I can recall, every Warmer has either been hostile to criticism from the get go, or they have eventually become hostile when their talking points fail.
Andrew
“There’s no evidence that past climate changes were as abrupt as the one that is occurring now”
Bull shit.
as bugs asked before, When can we expect the Spencer irony post, lucia?
.
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010/05/roy_spencers_great_photoshop_b.php
.
you do understand, that he has 1000 times more to say about his cover photo, than those scientists about what photo an editor places among the letter pages?!?
Artifex, if you can explain to me how your long screed was in any way responsive to what I wrote, I’d appreciate it.
I’m not really sure why it seems people have been misreading my comments this whole thread. I write professionally, so I have a fair degree of confidence that I can express myself in my native tongue, but perhaps I haven’t done a very good job here.
It’s been an interesting discussion, if an occasionally somewhat frustrating one.
Sod, you idiot.
Dr. Spencer’s book cover is art, as referenced inside:
COVER ART by Ralph. A Clevenger/CORBIS
Re: carrot eater #42448 (May 11 05:49),
The antecedent to “that” isn’t clear. I think you mean to say that you wouldn’t envision the range of views as restricted to a choice of either “Science/pro-AGW-Consensus” or “Anti-Science/anti-AGW-Consensus.”
If I’m reading you correctly, then I agree.
I quoted from the letter in Comment #42441 to show why I think the academicians see the situation in stark terms.
When a writer chooses to insult adversaries with the pejorative terms “denier” or “denialist,” I take it to mean that she does not view them as holding legitimate views in the scientific arena. If you’re proposing that the letter’s signers agree with the sentiment that there’s “plenty of room” within science for investigators who dissent from the Consensus: can you supply a passage in support of that perspective?
What is the letter writer’s view on how the climate-change scientific establishment should handle criticism that is scientific in nature, but that involves dissent from the prevailing Consensus? It seems to me that silence on this point is a signal that she finds the issue to be unimportant or irrelevant.
Assume, much?
Lots of people hold views that are unsupportable with respect to science-based thinking and knowledge. For example, an answer other than “yes” to Steven Mosher’s question, “Do you accept the validity of Radiative Transfer Equations?” (link) marks a person as being very unlikely to demonstrate insight on matters concerning climate change.
As far as “Watts Up With That”: I don’t read it. Low S/N; too many posts are contributed by ignorant or misinformed people. Somebody on the Internet is WRONG!
Hal (Comment#42456) May 11th, 2010 at 7:32 am
Sod, you idiot.
Dr. Spencer’s book cover is art, as referenced inside:
COVER ART by Ralph. A Clevenger/CORBIS
.
this will be funny, can you explain to me, what your definition of “art” is?
.
and why that definition wont capture the picture of the bear above?
.
and why cover art is different from photo art in letter sections?
Even if the letter is vague because some think academic style requires that, it’s still fair for me to point out it’s vague and non-specific. The final effect was to create a letter whose message is a dog-whistle and which, any ‘rebuttal’ could be waved by away by suggesting those criticizing the letter did not understand what specific actions the scientists thing need to be halted.
.
Lucia , an interesting thing in relation with your post .
I have a friend (physics professor at a university in Paris) and he also works on modelisation of the dynamics of public opinion .
Without going into detail , he simulates interactions among individuals in groups of variable size and determines the dynamics of the propagation of an opinion A and non A in a given population .
As he is also an AGW skeptic like most physicists I know , he sent me a draft of a paper that he is going to publish soon .
In this paper he took a particular structure of the population , e.g it contains the Ayatollahs .
The Ayatollahs are people who per definition do not change their opinion regardless how they interact and regardless with whom they interact .
.
The interesting result of his paper is that the propagation of an opinion A is very strongly influenced by the initial proportion of the Ayatollahs of A .
But even more interesting is that he found that if you want to fight an opinion non A , then it is much more efficient to increase even slightly the proportion of the A Ayatollahs than to massively try to convince the floaters .
Translated to f.ex politics , if one means it really seriously with anti communism then 5 McCarthy are much more efficient in turning the public opinion than 500 relativising philosophers writing letters and giving speeches all over the place .
Since I read his draft , I see massive evidence of his findings around me .
.
Of course he wrote me in the e-mail that his work was just a computer model of an extremely complex system and that one shouldn’t believe too hard that a model is the real thing … 🙂
This is quite the rewrite of history. First off, trying to boil a complex science down to “yes or no” questions is just a rhetorical game anyway. Or, more precisely, it is a lawyers game. I’m very sorry that statistical and physical descriptions of details of the climate system come into play when discussing these topics, but that’s the nature of the beast.
So when AMAc and others ask “Did Mann use Tiljander upside down, yes or no?” no one who is serious will answer yes or no. As Nick notes, there IS no “upside down” wrt to Tiljander. The question is much better posed in this way: “Did the orientation of Tiljander proxies in Mann’s paper run counter to a known physical relationship between a variable and temperature?” Gosh, that doesn’t have the rhetorical punch, does it? Also, it requires a bit more proof: where is the cite for how X-ray desnity, for example, relates to temperature in lake varves? Who does Tiljander cite for this relationship?
Similarly, no one wants to really discuss the divergence problem, they just want to put the word “trick” in scare quotes and send off irate letters to the administration of Penn State demanding a full investigation, perhaps even attaching the latest “misleading” polar bear photo as evidence of malfeasance.
As for reframing or spinning to the political, that is exactly what the denialists always do, which is why they pick these minutiae (UPSIDE DOWN POLAR BEARS OMG!) to discuss rather than issues that actually might have an impact on the science.
Carrot–
I agree this is getting ridiculous.
You can read that as defending the integrity of science, in a general way. Defending against what? Is this like telling women to wear burqua’s is defending the virtue of womanhood in a general way?
Sure. But in comments, the specific incident we are discussing was clear: The Cucinelli issue. In the letter in science even which incident is not clear.
It was a dog-whistle.
Shub
That would explain why it reads like a mediocre letter-to-the editor composed by a committee.
I suspect if the “faked to exaggerate current hazards of polar bear habitat” photo would hot have been inserted by a publication with fact checkers like the Wall Street Journal. They don’t insert any artsy stuff to decorate their letters to the editor.
It would be interesting to learn why the editors at those journal refused to publish. Maybe their view was that either a) the apple pie bullet statements are not news and b) the surrounding stuff is too vague? Who knows?
But, given the standard of letters I read in those papers, I imagine the thinking was that if the scientists want to complain about Cucinnelli and Inhofe, they should be specific to ensure that WSJ, NYT and WaPo readers have a clue what the letter writers intend to say about those specific issues. It the want to say something about climategate, they should say something about climategate.
If they want to publish a vague letter, why not have each of the 255 authors pony up $100 – $1000 and buy a full page advertisement? I’m sure these guys periodically donate to causes they support– why not this one?
Boris (Comment#42449),
“I don’t know if people will “pay the price,†but it seems reasonable that they should be made aware of the cost of doing nothing as well.”
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With your phrase “the cost of doing nothing”, you have raised a (perhaps the) key issue. What cost? How much do polar bears get paid for looking nice and eating seals (and sometimes people!)? What do they produce? How much do they pay in taxes? What is their economic contribution? Whatever cost you are talking about, it has nothing to do with money. I am thinking that seals, even though they have no income, would be most happy to pay the “cost” of declining polar bear populations.
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The key issue is values, and most debates about “climate change” need to be viewed that way. The letter from NAS members (and the associated phony bear image) conveys a set of moral values. Sexed-up (and far fetched) claims of future doom for humanity from GHG emissions convey a set of moral values. Politically motivated attacks on climate scientists who produce those sexed-up claims of doom convey a set of moral values.
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So fair enough, make people aware of the “cost” of doing nothing WRT the polar bears. Provide people with as much accurate information as possible. Will they accept the “cost” of declining polar bear populations by doing nothing? I don’t know, but I think history suggests they will.
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But suppose in this case people were willing to make substantial personal sacrifices to save polar bears. The logical next question is will people make the sacrifices needed to return vast stretches of farm land to forest? Return the flow of the Colorado river to it’s natural state (and who cares if the desert South West has any water)? How about merry old England returned to the state it was in 3,000 years back? Or simply forcing the human population downward by a factor of 2 or 10 (or 100!) to reduce the “ecological burden” (I just love that phrase) of humanity? Not doing these things incurs enormous continuing “costs” if the same standard is applied as you suggest be applied to polar bears. If some believe, and I think many do, that Earth in a “natural state” (not influenced by human activities) is morally “good”, while Earth altered by humanity is morally “bad”, but environmental issues are not clearly framed as moral questions, then endless disagreements await.
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The proper public response to GHG driven warming, even with perfect information about it’s consequences in hand, is a moral question, and like all moral questions, is not subject to a scientific resolution. What I think has been missing in the debate, and what is sorely needed, is a clear separation of the factual (scientific) and moral arguments on both sides.
Re: carrot eater (May 11 05:49),
I don’t think anyone here claims crazies don’t exist. Crazies do exist.
Re: Boris #42461 (May 11 07:38),
I grow tired of this.
The use of the Tiljander proxies in Mann08 was a topic in the recent Curry/Kloor thread. Surely Boris (and carrot eater) and I had explained our respective (irrecconciled) positions there, by the 223rd mention of the term (I counted). Readers wanting further insight can clink on the link and use Control-F.
Boris, if you want to organize your thoughts and write up a guest post here, the offer remains open.
Sod–
The answer is: Context and tradition.
By tradition, people expect the covers of books be decorated with items that are artistic representations of something. There is little danger of expecting them to believe that the cover-art is literally correct and they expect cartoons, artistic renditions and photo-shopped exaggerations on covers. In contrast, by tradition, the photos run along with newspapers, magazines and peer-reviewed articles are not-faked. Ginned up concocted pictures are considered blunders when run inside articles at the the NewYork Times; they can be ok in some ads which may even run obviously not realistic cartoons. Heck, newspapers even caricatures and cartoons. Readers know these are not “real” so no one complains.
If you do not believe this, an we view examples of cover art:
If you visit Amazon.com, you will almost certainly see that the overwhelming majority of cover art is not factual representation of anything. It’s the tradition. People expect this.
In contrast, flip through articles inside most peer reviewed journals, serious newspapers or honest to goodness news magazines and examine the photographic images that are bound to those articles. If you check, you will discover most are not photo-shopped to exaggerate the story in the image. Those that are photo-shopped will indicate that they have been photo-shopped. It is the tradition for images specifically linked to articles in serious news magazines, peer reviewed journals and fact checked news papers to be not-faked. When they are faked, and this is discovered, it’s news.
Now, for an intermediate example: look at the cover of news magazines. Those may contain photo-shopped images, cartoons or other artistic elements.
So, the difference is the Science fake image violates a norm established by tradition and the cover photo-art Spencer’s book follows the norm.
One may complain about the norms and wish to changes them, but these are the norms people come to expect. Science’s faked-to-exaggerate-a message polar bear where readers expect truth is not excused by the existence of faked-to-exaggerate a message cover art on books where people expect artistic renditions.
Sod:
Easy enough. One piece of “art” conveys a propagandistic message, the second does not.
Are you really unaware of the litany of incorrect information and flat out falsehoods that have appeared in the editorial pages of the WSJ wrt climate science in the past few years? You think the Wall Street Journal fact checks the editorials? Oh, boy.
And yet, people donate money to causes that promise to protect the polar bears. Many (and I would even say most) people derive happiness from nature and its preservation. In fact, claims that the polar bear pictures are an “emotional” argument implies that there is emotional value in preserving the polar bear. Otherwise people wouldn’t care at all.
I agree with you that all costs should be weighed–and that’s all I really want. Spell out the costs and let people decide. The denialists are not honest about the costs. They’d rather claim that the polar bears will be fine despite the evidence that points to the contrary. That’s a far bigger problem than some photoshopped picture in a science journal.
1) The invocation of McCarthy in the 255-man letter was sophomoric, inapposite and hackneyed.
It is not clear to me that the McCarthy bit refers to Inhofe or Cuccinelli-Mann per se because a McCarthyite persecution necessarily involves a much broader conspiracy. I infer that the actual intent was to lump all criticism of AGW science into the same category of dismissible organized right-wing malice.
2) The 255-writer letter operates in a kind of vaccuum. Substantive issues about the comparative role of different climate factors (see, e.g., Pielke Sr.) are dismissed with a cursory claim that human influences “overwhelm” all else. The breezy assurance that all mistakes have been fixed, the pompous conceit that only the other side has any political or ideological motives and the restatement of a Hansenesque disaster litany indicate that (a) these guys really don’t get why there are concerns about what they do and (b) they don’t seem to realize that there is actually a line between science and policy advocacy, a failed distinction which is at the root of the problem.
3) The premise of Paul Daniel Ash’s rather tiresome attack on lucia for her alleged lack of clarity and accuracy appears to be his belief that the letter writers (255 and Gleick) were clear in their intent. I believe they were clear but not in the manner he seems to think. I think the unambiguous intent was (a) to deny, dismiss or recast the issue/accusation of politically-driven bad behavior on the part of key members of the core climate science community rather than address the matter substantively; (b) to demonize all AGW critics and (c) publicly reaffirm their own political allegiance.
4) Lastly, the “McCarthyite” charge is especially irksome given the militant, at times nasty groupthink evident in the climategate emails. The treatment of Bjorn Lomborg for the heresy of believing that AGW is a fact but that mitigation is a more sensible solution than centralized economic controls is a pretty good indication of who the McCarthyites are. The notion that AGW extremists are vulnerable and hunted in academia while evil denialists presumably have some kind of protected status is asinine. Until these guys sound more like Judith Curry than Michael Mann when discussing the nature of the disagreements, their pleas for sympathy will not register with me.
Boris–
I think the WSJ verifies the letters to the editor are written by the people who write them. I suspect the WSJ sends the equivalent of a galley proof to permit letter writers to check whether things they did not say were inserted when WSJ typeset the letter. This is “fact checking” of letters to the editors: That is to say, they check that it is a fact that letter writer A wrote that letter or opinion piece.
I also think the WSJ would check the provenance of a photo they pick out themselves and insert. They would not “decorate” a letter to the editor with their own choice of photo without passing that by the letter writer. To insert such a thing without permitting any review by the letter writer would tend to mis-represent the image as having been thought appropriate by the letter writer. ( As it happens, the WSJ avoids all of this by not inserting stray irrelevant photos in letter to letter to the editor. Letters to the editor contain content written by the letter writer without the addition of extra information inserted by the WSJ.)
Could you be specific? Do you mean they published letter to the editor that were written by people other than the named author? Or that, as is typical for papers, they do run opinion pieces and letters to the editor, that these opinion pieces express opinions you do not like, and which, being opinions, are not facts? Or that the correctly report what is in, say the CRU emails, but you don’t like their opinions as expressed on the opinions pages? Or do you mean something else?
Paul Daniel Ash:
More evidence that it’s not “clearly” a reference to anyone in particular. You say:
Revkin says,
Is it one? The other? both? Someone else?
Dog whistle….
George Tobin,
“they don’t seem to realize that there is actually a line between science and policy advocacy, a failed distinction which is at the root of the problem.”
Yup, that is what neither the letter writers, “main stream” climate scientists, nor their media attack dogs are willing to address. Their willfully obtuse approach of deflecting legitimate complaints about political influence on climate science with references to McCarthyism, instead of addressing the substance of those complaints, just comes off as arrogant, and so ticks a lot of people off (including me). They need to accept that it is politics cloaking itself in science that causes most of the problems.
Boris,
“I agree with you that all costs should be weighed–and that’s all I really want. Spell out the costs and let people decide.”
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It is a miracle of near Biblical proportion; we agree on this.
The answer is: Context and tradition.
By tradition, people expect the covers of books be decorated with items that are artistic representations of something. There is little danger of expecting them to believe that the cover-art is literally correct and they expect cartoons, artistic renditions and photo-shopped exaggerations on covers. In contrast, by tradition, the photos run along with newspapers, magazines and peer-reviewed articles are not-faked. Ginned up concocted pictures are considered blunders when run inside articles at the the NewYork Times; they can be ok in some ads which may even run obviously not realistic cartoons. Heck, newspapers even caricatures and cartoons. Readers know these are not “real†so no one complains.
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sorry lucia, but you can t be real about this. you simply can not be really tyring to tell us, that the same picture on the cover of science, with a reference to the letter, wouldn t have produced the same “sceptic outrage. (actually more)
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you have maneuvered yourself in a pretty bizarre position. which Paul spotted really early on.
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————————————–
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none of the covers you posted above is similar to either one of the two pictures (iceberg or bear). and basically every picture in a magazin these days will have seen some rework.
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the icebear was not an attempt to mislead people. it was an addition with very little relevance. the focus on it, and the silence over Spencer’s use of the very similar thing is telling a lot about sceptics.
1) The invocation of McCarthy in the 255-man letter was sophomoric, inapposite and hackneyed.
It is not clear to me that the McCarthy bit refers to Inhofe or Cuccinelli-Mann per se because a McCarthyite persecution necessarily involves a much broader conspiracy. I infer that the actual intent was to lump all criticism of AGW science into the same category of dismissible organized right-wing malice.
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that claim is complete bogus. so did climate scientists invoke McCarthy all the time? or did this start pretty recently?
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2) The 255-writer letter operates in a kind of vaccuum. Substantive issues about the comparative role of different climate factors (see, e.g., Pielke Sr.) are dismissed with a cursory claim that human influences “overwhelm†all else.
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so they didn t write a seperate paragraph over a single scientists objections? how could they?!?
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hint: Pielke is not the centrer of the universe. one can write a piece on AGW, without bringing him up!
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The breezy assurance that all mistakes have been fixed,
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why not name all the errors that have not been fixed? this again was a really obvious reference to recent errors found, and i didn t see an attempt to not correct obvious errors. enlighten us!
the pompous conceit that only the other side has any political or ideological motives
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as obvious as Inhofe? Monckton? CEI and the Heartland Institute? well, you will have to do a serious search among these SCIENTISTS, for a similar display of obviously “political or ideological motives “. go along!
sod
Nonsense. I can certainly be real about this. I can even continue in the same vane. Why do you think the obviously not-real foot print on Mann’s cover wasn’t criticized? Or why “earth doesn’t fit into an inner tube earth” picture on Romm’s cover wasn’t criticized? Or why the “fake iceberg” on the cover of Archer’s book was not criticized.
The reason those weren’t criticized is the same reason Spencer’s “fake iceberg” cover deserves no criticism. Whether the cover shows a fake iceberg or a foot print large enough to stomp on industrial scale smoke stacks, artistic renderings are the tradition, not exception, for cover art on books.
Accident or not, it was a serious blunder. The misleading emotionally charged photo was included in a context where readers expect non-fictional information. Where this not so, Science would not have replaced the photo.
The silence over Spencer’s use of iceberg art on a cover where one traditionally expects art tells us the same thing that silence over Archer’s use of iceberg cover art tells us and Mann’s use of a footprint the size of smokestacks tells us. It tells us people expect cover art to be non-factual. Or do you think it means skeptics gave Mann a pass on this because they love him so?
People also expect books marketed as fiction to be fiction and books marketed as fact to be fact. Few people upset when a book they expect to be fiction turns out to be… omg… fiction!
If you were unaware of these traditions involving book cover art before the Science-fake-ice-bear kerfuffle broke, you need to get out a bit more.
sod,
Check in with your pharmacy. I am certain you are ready for a refill of something to do with mood control.
The letter was claptrap because it is claptrap. From the picture to the contents to the many non-climate scientists signing it, to the insult it makes to scientists who do disagree with the concept of a global climate catastrophe. It is junk. Picking on one part of the claptrap and arguing that the rest is OK by comparison is a non-starter.
Reasonable people react negatively to the letter for the same reason you reflexively defend it: It is obvious claptrap.
After reading Randy Olson’s excellent analysis of this issue, I shall refer to this as “The Booger Letter” from now on.
TerryMN–
I think it should be “The 255 Booger Letter”
Nonsense. I can certainly be real about this.
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so then, be brave and write it down:
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“i, lucia, and most other sceptics would not have criticized the same picture, if it had been posted on the cover. with the headline of the letter as text. “
Why do you think the obviously not-real foot print on Mann’s cover wasn’t criticized? Or why “earth doesn’t fit into an inner tube earth†picture on Romm’s cover wasn’t criticized? Or why the “fake iceberg†on the cover of Archer’s book was not criticized.
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those pictures are completely different, because none of them is semi-realistic.
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Accident or not, it was a serious blunder. The misleading emotionally charged photo was included in a context where readers expect non-fictional information. Where this not so, Science would not have replaced the photo.
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too many holes in that story. the scientists have nothing to do with that picture. any honest debate would focus, on what they have to say.
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the idea that the picture was placed to mislead is at best a wild guess. if it was just a blunder by graphic guy in the letters department, people shouldn t discuss it for over one minute.
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the ideas that the SCIENCE readers are easy prey for such an “emotionally charged” picture, is plain out stupid. the idea that the real target were other people, is obvious nonsense. without the controversy, nobody else would have seen it.
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People also expect books marketed as fiction to be fiction and books marketed as fact to be fact. Few people upset when a book they expect to be fiction turns out to be… omg… fiction!
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while i completely agree with your assessment of the Spencer book, i can tell you that it is not supposed to be fiction!
From the picture to the contents to the many non-climate scientists signing it, to the insult it makes to scientists who do disagree with the concept of a global climate catastrophe.
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so how many climate scientists are in the group? only they have a right to sign? because nobody else understands the basic concepts of the rising temperature?
the other highly respected scientists can not assessment recent attacks on climate scientists?
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there is no assault on scientists who disagree”. this is the phrase on that topic:
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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.
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two clauses restricting the phrase: many, and a limitation to a certain group, that Pielke for example doesn t belong to. i can t shake the feeling, that the majority of you have not read the letter! stop staring at that photo.
“Or do you mean something else?”
I mean the false and misleading things that are printed in the letters. You are up in arms about a photoshopped polar bear and then you point to the WSJ as some bastion of journalistic integrity? I don’t get it. If they published a misleading photo you’d be all over them, but they publish a misleading letter–well, that’s not what you are talking about? You arguments are not self-consistent. I mean, I don’t see that you are concerned about things published in the WSJ “which might mislead the less scientifically literature members of the public about the level of certainty of climate change,” you know, like basically every letter published there by Lindzen and Michaels and others.
Well, well. So the pretend internet climate scientists are sometimes also pretend Internet psychologists too. Perfect.
A big part of the problem as seen from within the AGW Consensus community: There are people motivated by special interests and dogma who are Anti-Science, reject all concerns about AGW, and seek to obstruct the necessary, urgent policies that have been proposed by climate scientists and their allies. Denialists pose grave threats to climate science, and to the world as a whole. How can they be contained and marginalized?
A big part of the problem as seen by a lukewarmer: Climate science is a young field tackling very difficult problems. A history of conflict and a tradition of activism have led to a narrow Consensus position with attributes of groupthink. Further, climate scientists often overestimate their abilities to model the phenomena they study. How can climate science return to a normal scientific footing?
With different perspectives and different priorities, it’s no wonder there’s so much talking-past, and so little discussing-with.
There should be no place in this discussion for ad hominem remarks of this sort.
There is a third leg to the situation as identified by Amac:
This (AGW) if true is a “tragedy of commons” issue. The free market does not have solutions to such issues. Liberals naturally gravitate to the solutions involving bigger government (and higher taxes) and conservatives naturally oppose it. Therefore, the path of least resistance is that this devolves into the other pre-existing fronts of “identity politics.”
In the end, this is possibly about how we deal with an inflection point in a transition from high energy density sources to lower energy density sources and the accompanying implications for economic growth .
With different perspectives and different priorities, it’s no wonder there’s so much talking-past, and so little discussing-with.
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i appreciate your effort to take a look at both sides, from a somewhat neutral position.
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my problem with the two options you posted is a simple one: those 255 scientists are the middle ground. they are not extremists, nor are they part of a lobby group. and lukewarmers will simply not be able to match their expertise.
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There should be no place in this discussion for ad hominem remarks of this sort.
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i greatly appreciate your reply to this one as well. this happens rarely!
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but i have to point out, that the comment was not ad-hom, but simply an insult.
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a pretty good example of an ad-hom like argument is: those scientists posted a faked photo next to their letter, that for the science in the letter is rubbish…
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Hi Lucia. Sorry to hear about the puss, same age as mine.
I am also sorry and sadened to see that the RC trolls have found you. Yours’ used to be a civil and intellectually driven blog. Bugs bunny does at least forward some intelligent and cogent arguments but the rest … doh!
Boris,
“They’d rather claim that the polar bears will be fine despite the evidence that points to the contrary.”
Haven’t polar bears been around for c. 250,000 years? As a species they might be a bit more resilient, therefore, than you think.
Sod–
I already wrote what I meant. When a fictional image that contradicts literal truth is posted in a context where people expect to find “true/factual” images, people are liable to be mislead about the truth. When a fictional image that contradicts literal truth is posted in a context where people expect the images are artistic renderings that don’t represent the truth, people aren’t liable to be mislead about the truth.
I am curious though, so I have to ask you this: What specifically concerns you about Spencer’s cover art? Are you worried that people who haven’t noticed that 99% of cover art on books consists of unrealistic artistic renderings, might get the wrong impression about the specific gravity of ice?
Re: RB (May 11 13:19),
Pielke Jr. seems to me to think and write constructively on the intersection of AGW science and public policy, which certainly includes “tragedy of the commons” issues. Yet judging from blog posts and comments, he is among the more reviled figures, among passionate AGW Consensus boosters.
Nice link to “peak coal.” Hubbert’s legacy, perhaps.
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Re: sod (May 11 13:34),
> lukewarmers will simply not be able to match their expertise.
I wish the letter writer had given more thought to the matter of expertise, rather than (it seems to me) assuming that “we have it and they don’t.”
An image that should stick is Richard Feynman at the Challenger explosion inquiry, on stage, dipping the shuttle’s O-ring into ice water and bending it…
Closer to home, read GISS administrator Reto Ruedy’s enthusiastic thanks to the Clear Climate Code people, for their work.
It seems likely to me that some areas within climate science would face severe criticism from qualified experts in relevant disciplines. Others wouldn’t. And then there’s the issue of folks who think they’re experts, but aren’t.
But these sorts of questions aren’t all together novel. It seems to me that a set of factors have combined to make the climate science establishment handle them in a particularly poor fashion. The tone-deaf quality of the NAS letter on this point likely adds to the chilly reception it’ll receive beyond the walls of Fortress Climate.
sod:
I do not regard the viewpoint they endorsed as being “middle of the road” with respect to the data, which is what matters. Not coincidentally, I view my own position as as closely centered on the data as I can make it. I’m sure they feel the same way, but there are issues they endorse that I believe are not defensible based on the science.
AMac,
“There should be no place in this discussion for ad hominem remarks of this sort.”
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Agreed…except for maybe sod.
Boris,
“The Cost of doing nothing”.
A 2008 CBO study concluded that for nuclear power to be cost competitive with coal, coal would have to sell for $85/ton which would require a $45/ton tax on carbon.
The year is now 2010. Central Appalachian coal costs almost $70/ton at mine mouth plus delivery fees.
The price of coal on global markets is now over $100/ton plus delivery fees.
Unless one lives within a 2,000 mile radius of the Gillette, Wyoming coal field, there is no longer a question as to the long term viability of burning coal. The laws of economics have already answered the question.
All the global catastrophe assumptions assumed coal would remain cheaper then alternatives. That fundamental projection turned out to be wrong.
Since the projections for the price of coal were wrong, the ‘business as usual emissions scenarios’ are wrong as well.
Business as usual is that we adopt the cheapest method for producing a product in the absence of regulatory interference.
Irony like in coppery, tinny, bronzy?
Anywayz, after all the pig wrestling by the usual suspects in this thread one might wonder why the hell Science is using a photoshopped picture? Out of habit? And what has a polar bear to do with Global Warming? I thought this was already “debunked” (using a favorite alarmist word) centuries ago?
Sod–
I already wrote what I meant.
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i knew that you would not post that nonsense. sorry lucia, but your position is contradicting itself. whether on the cover of a book or on the letter page, simply doesn t make a difference. on the cover of the SCIENCE magazin, the polar bear picture would have drawn one hell of a attack by “sceptics”.
this is in contradiction to your claim above.
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When a fictional image that contradicts literal truth is posted in a context where people expect to find “true/factual†images, people are liable to be mislead about the truth
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the picture doesn t contradict any truth.there exist very similar, real pictures. and the situation is obviously happening.
the only point is, that this picture was produced by photoshop.
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When a fictional image that contradicts literal truth is posted in a context where people expect the images are artistic renderings that don’t represent the truth, people aren’t liable to be mislead about the truth.
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you simply keep ignoring the fundamental difference between the
polar bear and iceberg picture, and the artistic stuff you posted above.
you need to find examples on science books, that are semi-realistic. and you should have checked the science letter page, for photoshopped pictures in the past.
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and i still don t see any science readers being “mislead” by that picture.
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what are they mislead about? that the arctic sea ice is shrinking? that polar bears mare endangered by this? that the photo is a real one?
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I am curious though, so I have to ask you this: What specifically concerns you about Spencer’s cover art? Are you worried that people who haven’t noticed that 99% of cover art on books consists of unrealistic artistic renderings, might get the wrong impression about the specific gravity of ice?
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i am mostly concerned with dishonesty among a group of people, who label themselves “sceptics”. but are 100% uncritical towards the errors of their own side.
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from a look at the amazon list of books on “science climate”, i assume that your 99% number is another obvious error.
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http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=science+climate&x=0&y=0
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i would actually say, that the number of “unrealistic artistic renderings”, that look realistic enough and are wrong enough to mislead, are a minority. the Spencer one is an obvious example.
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i think Paul tried to figure out, whether the problem is about using a faked picture, or with what it shows being unrealistic, or being an emotional trigger.
you will have serious problems to explain criteria, which will make the bear picture more problematic than the iceberg.
Sod-
My position is not contradicting itself. My position is that the context matters and so whether an photo shopped image appears on a book cover or in the “facts” part of a publication does matter. You disagreeing with me does not constitute me contradicting myself.
By showing miles of ice free ocean around the stranded bear, the fake-bear photo makes it appear that lone polar bears are stranded frequently enough on the ice to permit photographers the opportunity to take photos. It also suggest that particular polar bear was in serious peril because it was stranded on a very small isolated floe that one might fear will vanish quite soon.
This suggests that poor polar bears are suffering and dying as a result of being stranded on tiny isolated ice floes far from land or any other ice.
Note that in the updated photo you do not see miles of stranded ice. Even if the bears are on an ice floe (where bears do hang out) the photo does not convey the impression that the bear in in peril of his life owing to the melting ice.
So, you can’t think of any error that photo communicates, but you think I should dream one up and complain?
Are you suggesting the correct number should have been 100%? Absolutely none of the images on the covers at the link you provided look like realistic photos. All looked photoshopped to alter reality, are cartoon like or consist of abstract sketches with lettering over them. But I suspect if you looked further you could find some. My 99% is a guess.
Once again: Are you concerned someone who doesn’t look at the books at Amazon and notice that cover art almost never shows anything remotely realistic might be mislead about the specific gravity of ice?
Oh? I think you are just stubbornly refusing to register that I think context matters. Cover art on books is traditionally not realistic, and not intended to communicate anything realistic. News articles, and journal articles are intended to communicate something factual. Images included in news articles are intended to communicate something factual.
I recognize that you are free to disagree. But if you actually don’t understand what I am saying of believe it is a contradiction, you are simply obtuse. Add some iodine to your diet.
The letter gets an F. teacher comments below: I’ll just do the open and the close and let the student try again. Weak opening, poor conclusion.
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.
1. Strawman. What is needed here is a quote by anybody, anybody taken seriously, that CERTAINTY is needed for action. We routinely fisk the dopes who make these claims. routinely.
you are arguing against a foe who doesn’t exist. Simply,
if your goal is to change minds, you first need to understand the minds you seek to change. Its rare to find a person who argues that we need certainty. Its far more common to find a person who says we have too much uncertainty. They dont require certainty because they know that science doesnt offer that. But they fear that you are overselling the knowledge you have. Sceptics sell doubt. their product is doubt. It is only natural that you would try to position against this product. But you have a hard time doing that, since science is contingent. So you invent an opponent that doesnt exists. you INVENT a person who believes you need CERTAINTY to act, so you can sell action under uncertainty.
2. Escalation of political assualts. Be specific. WHO WHAT WHERE WHEN. It there an escalation? Over what time period? And why are the polictians MORE involved now. Science didn’t correct itself. did it? provide evidence.
conclusion:
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.
1. When using the McCarthy analogy it is important to get your analogy facts in order. For example, which scientists are being threatened with criminal procesecution based on
A. innuendo
B. guilt by association.
This would be a great paragraph with an example or two. Especially on the guilt by association. Without those examples you risk the danger of looking foolish and unscientific, basically getting the facts wrong. Since sceptics wrongly accused you of fraud, it would be unwise to lose the high ground by making sloppy counter charges.
“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”
Try not to end with a false dilemma. There are more than two choices. Your thinking readers will notice these false choices and offer up a third. We can for example take measured actions on a local level. Putting the choice as one between NO ACTION and QUICK SUBSTANTIVE ACTION, essentially argues that you have a certainty that a middle way would not work. A certainty that is not supported by the science. Putting choices as black and white, exposes you to the charge that you try to have it both ways: you try to argue that science is both uncertain but only offers us two certain choices.
So, I’ll give you an F on the draft. please rewrite this and pay attention to some of the lessons we have gone over. Examples will make your piece come alive. Pick a good enemy. It worked for apple against IBM. Pick a real opponent, strawmen are easy to beat and impress no one. attcking them makes you look weak and stupid at best and like a liar at worst. beware of analogies. the Mccarthy one can backfire ( you leave an opening for somebody discussing mike Mann’s mail where he wanted to keep files on journal editors. Also, be VERY careful about the guilt by association charge. Somebody will mention how Phil Jones showed the FOIA officer the climate audit site. remember, he did that to show them what kind of people “they were” That led to CRU doing some nasty things WRT HOlland. please avoid accusing skeptics of doing things that Jones did. It allows the skeptics to flip the script
I think sod is concerned that if people start looking at polar bear images offered by the scientific community, and deciding they have little or no scientific value, they may start looking at squiggly lines offered by the scientific community …and deciding they have little or no scientific value. 😉
Hence, the Some Other Person Does It, So Why Can’t We? Anti-Argument.
Andrew
To put my criticism of the letter into short form>
the scientists argue both for the uncertainty of science and the certainty of there being only two choices for policy.
the question which unravels ( deconstructs in the derridean fashion) their argument is this:
Are you certain there are only two choices. Or
Which is more certain? that science is uncertain or that there are only two choices?
And when they answer that they are more certain that science is uncertain, then its clear that their call to quick action is less certain than the science. And that one can question the call to quick action and not be anti science.
1. When using the McCarthy analogy it is important to get your analogy facts in order. For example, which scientists are being threatened with criminal procesecution based on
A. innuendo
B. guilt by association.
.
sorry Steven, but you must be joking. you wrote a climateGATE book. why not start working on your own analogies first?
sod:
Drunk blogging?
This didn’t make any sense.
Carrick (Comment#42514) May 11th, 2010 at 4:17 pm
He was comparing the CRU letters being stolen to Watergate.
Irony, indeed.
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2826189.htm
Attacks on science don’t matter, do they? Using a stock photo for a letter is far more important.
Mosher,
I think there is room to argue that “the science is uncertain” but “certain enough to discuss mitigation.”
You’re right, though, this debate is rife with contradictions 🙂
sod and bugs,
.
Perhaps if you read over this thread again you will note a couple of things:
.
1. Smart, educated, and thoughtful people, who all agree that GHG’s are warming Earth, object to the phony image of a polar bear on a small piece of floating ice.
.
2. Those same people object to both the spirit and the content of the letter from the NAS scientists. They say that the letter is vague, condescending, and fails to address some important issues that have diminished the credibility of climate science.
.
3. You become apoplectic and attack everyone in sight.
.
Can you not see that you are attacking your natural allies? Can you not consider (even in supposition) that the letter and the phony photo were ill considered? Can you not consider (even in supposition) that the loss of public confidence in climate science may be related to inappropriate behavior by certain well known climate scientists?
.
I am honestly puzzled; you and Real Climate continue to move in lockstep down a path that is not working. Why? What exactly do you think you accomplish using these tactics?
bugs.
i would hazard that the Watergate analogy ( which I didnt like so much ) had more similarities than a Mccarthy Analogy.
But you see, those guys called out the aspect of the analogy that THEY wanted to foreground ( metaphors are always about foregrounding) Sometime you call out the foreground usually, its better to leave the foreground vague. That way people can fill in the forground to their tastes.
For example just with watergate. what about the incident are the same.. Start with that. Then note the differences. Any student should be able to do this, just as a mental exercise. Think of it like an SAT test. you can do it.
people in power. bunker mentality. everyone on the outside is an enemy. the enemy list. the small crime. ( briffa in ch06)
the effort to cover up causing more trouble. secret communications being exposed. the interview with british tv. the thoughts of suicide. the defenses used by the accused.
Now do the McCarthy one. But problem.. they called out the exact frame of reference.. Guilt by association. That’s a problem
cause now the analogy lives or dies on that. That’s just basic rhetoric Bugs.
Also, you missed the crutape analogy. That is a QUALIFIER to the climategate trope.
You see as I frame “GATES” gates are about coruption of those in power. Now, how does “crutape” MODIFY or exemplify a GATE.
what was the screwtape letters about? how does that map to the thesis of the book.
And What happened in the end of the book.
I assumed a literate audience. the book was not meant for you
Re: SteveF (May 11 17:24),
apoplectic? Drunk? Needing mood control ? Iodine? Lacking literacy?
A lot of diagnosis going on here!
Re: SteveF (May 11 17:24),
Bugs and sod are paid goons for the parent outfit of RC.
I suspect that they are one guy.
The purpose is to confuse issues in blogland for neutrals that stray in.
It’s not an effective game anymore, but the warmista machine keeps on plugging.
Nick Stokes:
Not to mention people with no sense of humor!
>.>
Stephen Mosher:
I don’t think much of either analogy. The emails most likely weren’t “stolen” (even if there was impropriety with their release, it’s just the wrong word, for those of us who get bothered with the wrong word choice).
And if you mentioned McCarthy, you end up with the apologists showing up trying to explain how McCarthy was “right”, usually channelling Ann Coulter.
Neither ends up being productive.
In the mean time, Tim Lambert’s latest headline is Camille Paglia is an idiot.
Talk about constructive approaches to dialog.
Nick Stokes (Comment#42521),
“A lot of diagnosis going on here!”
.
No, just simple observation.
“ap*o*plec*tic; most ap*o*plec*tic informal : very angry and excited”
.
I think that definition pretty well matches my observations. Not a lot of thoughtful analysis involved in their responses so far, just anger and excitement.
Re: Carrick (May 11 18:28),
The theme of this thread is Irony 🙂
Nick Stokes,
“The theme of this thread is Irony”
Indeed. it is ironic that hysterical CAGW supporters take every possible opportunity to attack people who they should be aligned with. And more than a little sad.
Carrick (Comment#42525),
“Tim Lambert’s latest headline is Camille Paglia is an idiot.”
Perhaps Lambert becomes confused when he looks in the mirror while thinking about who is an idiot.
Paul Daniel Ash.
“The word “machine†appears nowhere in the open letter. And the “McCarthy†reference is quite specific:
We also call for an end to McCarthy-like threats of criminal prosecution against our colleagues based on innuendo and guilt by association”
Please post some references where McCarthy threatened individuals. Where did McCarthy invesitgate, blackball, call infront of a committee… any INDIVIDUAL!!!
I am really tired of hearing about all the horrendous things the a Senator McCarthy alledgedy did. Try actually researching the Congressional records and news reports of the time.
You might find that Ronald Reagan, as President of the Screen Actors Guid, led them in BLACKBALLING Communists or alledged Communists in Hollywood. Was McCarthy a member of the Screen Actors Guild?? You might find that the HOUSE Committee on Unamerican Affairs (or something like that) did a good job of a number of the things that McCarthy, a SENATOR is ACCUSED of doing including investigating individuals and calling them before their committee.
You will find that McCarthy called for the Gubmint and Military to investigat itself to get rid of its Communist members. you would find that the Democrats investigated McCarthy and badgered him into releasing ONE name during his testimony. The individual DID have a sevure military position and WAS a communist agent.
So, carry on with the smears of a man who was attempting to get our Gubmint to clean its house. He was demonised and pilloried by the Dems and the press and ruined. Oh yeah, isn’t that what he was accused of doing to others??
Funny how the Dems always accuse others of exactly what they are doing!!
So please, give us some references where McCarthy attacked any specific persons with innuendo and guilt by association and threats of prosecution. When the only person ever exposed on his secret list was actually a communist agent…
Hal (Comment#42522),
“Bugs and sod are paid goons for the parent outfit of RC.”
.
I assume you can provide information that explicitly confirms this.
kuhnkat:
Isn’t this just a bit OT?
Carrick,
I do not think that there are many avenues for constructive dialogue, and this thread has confirmed that for me. Those on one side of the debate have one particular reaction to this letter; those on the other have a different one – and I include myself in this. This to me is symptomatic of where we are. I cannot see a methodology to move past this disease, personally.
Re: Carrick (May 11 19:03),
Yes, OT and also untrue. To take just one example, the Senate Tydings committee:
“Eventually McCarthy moved on from his original list of unnamed individuals and used the hearings to make charges against ten others for whom he had names: Dorothy Kenyon, Esther and Stephen Brunauer, Haldore Hanson, Gustavo Duran, Owen Lattimore, Harlow Shapley, Frederick Schuman, John S. Service and Philip Jessup. “
State Department employees.
If Mann used polar bear population as a proxie for global temperature, would he use the series right-side up or up-side down, or does the sign not matter? Just curious.
SteveF (Comment#42529) May 11th, 2010 at 6:51 pm
So you respond with irony. Attacking the scientists for writing a document, that was published in Science, using a stock photo that they would not have known was going to be used, that turns out to be a typical stock photo, it’s been photoshopped to look good.
The photo is all the Lucia thinks is important, but, as I linked to from the ABC, climate scientists are being attacked and threatened all around the globe. That’s not nearly so important. If I point this out, I’m being unreasonable.
Nick Stokes:
Well I agree with you, but that’s the sort of discussion I hope we can agree to avoid here. In any case, the “raw data” is available for anybody to read and make their own conclusions. Most of this is available on the web. There’s no reason to rely on other people to think for you or do your research for you, in a case like this.
David Gould:
I’m not sure those of us on “the other side” to each have the same reaction. I’d hope the same would be true for you AGW types.
While I happen to think there are substantive errors in their letter, the photo itself isn’t even a blip on my conscious. That’s just a publicity snafu, something we ham-handed scientists are prone to do.
In my opinion, if you’re going to write a highly visible letter like this, you make it as neutral as possible, not resort immediately to attack mode. While this letter went over well with the True Believersâ„¢, its effect varied from person to person among the rest of us, but it’s impact was generally negative.
Carrick,
Reading the thread, it seems that those on one side had one reaction and those on the other had a different reaction. Reading this thread was very depressing for me because of that. And, yes, there were exceptions. But few and far between. There is no hope for fruitful dialogue, imo.
And I used to believe that there could be. No longer.
By the way: I have just realised that people could misinterpret what I am saying. I am *not* saying that there are not reasonable people on the other side. What I am saying is that it appears to me as if there are very definite polarised camps and not much inbetween. Further, the way these polarised camps view things is so different that their interpretations of things tend towards the differences rather than any similiarities, however small.
And I am finding more and more that I, despite my wish for discussion and dialogue and rational argument and so forth, do not know what to say or, if I do, how to say it to someone on ‘the other side’. And I read what many those on the other side write, and find it to be incomprehensible and my reaction to what I do understand about it entirely negative – a reason why I am limiting my comments (I have written quite a few of them, and then deleted them as they would not have constructively contributed; I seem to no longer know *how* to constructively contribute; there appears to be no way ‘in’. Very depressing.)
David Gould, if you mean by different reaction that I “didn’t find it compelling” you are correct. Beyond that I think you’re being a bit overly dramatic.
Many of us agree on substantive issues. Much more so in fact than we do on approach for how we discuss it. As I pointed out, the various among us have had different reactions to the photo. I think Lucia’s point regarding a “fake but true” photo becoming the picture banner for a letter from 250 AGW scientists is well stated. It’s ironic regardless of how it got there. I admit it made me chuckle (that’s the limit of my reaction to that).
Then there’s a certain irony about a letter bitterly complaining about being attacked at the same time demonizing anybody who is critical of them.
How we learn from all of this that reconciliation is hopeless is beyond me, unless you expect me to swallow every word said by Peter Gleick as if it were etched in stone. In that sense reconciliation is impossible. Neither I nor any like me will ever accept anything anybody tells us as truth without lifting a skeptical eye at their claims.
Carrick,
I do not ‘expect’ anything. The issue of this letter is not a significant one in any respect. However, the reactions to it are, as I have said, symptomatic of the distance between two groups.
As to overly dramatic, perhaps. But I am serious when I say that I personally can see no way in. And this is disturbing and depressing for me. That may simply be my issue, of course. But the evidence suggests that many, many others are running into the same problems.
Indeed, the letter itself is evidence that those on each side do not know how to talk to one another, with one side interpreting certain criticisms as attacks beyond the pale and the other side rejecting that position and rejecting the language of the letter.
Trouble at mill.
Trouble at the mill???
Would that be “on’t cross beams gone owt askew on treadle?”
Let’s hope not.
If so, it supports my point about the difficulties in communication. 😉
It’s hardly unique for people–for groups of people–to arrive at a standoff like this. Answers are unlikely to come from any of the ‘camps’ continuing to proceed as before, for the obvious reasons.
Of course, “answers” implies dissatisfaction with the current state of affairs, and a desire for change. A lot of people are eager for change, in this regard. Yet: I suspect that the status quo is preferable for a number of players, for a variety of reasons. Some practical, some banal, some intricate and unacknowledged.
I imagine that a good clinical psychologist would be able to make more sense out of this, than would most of us.
Of the participants who might have insight into the situation, the list is short. Names that come to mind are Pielke Jr.,, Randy Olson, and Judy Curry. Though, if people are hankering for a good fight… they’ll fight. Maybe that’s just the way it has to play out, for now.
I’ll leave it at that.
I think this blog just went haywire…
It was good for a while there; when Zeke was posting…
But this stuff? Jeepers…
It’s interesting that the screeching from both camps has risen to new crescendo’s lately… Wonder why.
And Steven Mosher caps it off with this post at 42152
[To put my criticism of the letter into short form>
the scientists argue both for the uncertainty of science and the certainty of there being only two choices for policy.
the question which unravels ( deconstructs in the derridean fashion) their argument is this:
Are you certain there are only two choices. Or
Which is more certain? that science is uncertain or that there are only two choices?
And when they answer that they are more certain that science is uncertain, then its clear that their call to quick action is less certain than the science. And that one can question the call to quick action and not be anti science.]
What an amzing piece of Postmodernism. It’s astoundingly manufactured. And is chock full of tasy false dichotomies.
They said there were two choices in front of us.
“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. ”
So the choices are; act, or don’t act. As far as I can see that’s the choice confronting us. If you can think of a third option Steven, would be really interesting to hear what it is.
If we act, we can then move on to discussing how to act. And here we will see an infinite number of choices.
So to answer your (ridiculous) question:
Which is more certain, that science is uncertain or that there are only two choices? (I edited it for clarity).
Neither, as both are completely true. Science is uncertain, and there are two choices (to act, or to not act).
Then we move onto this little piece of amazing logic.
[And when they answer that they are more certain that science is uncertain, then its clear that their call to quick action is less certain than the science. ]
No, the second premis just doesn’t follow from the first. In fact it makes no sense at all.
Just because there is uncertainty in science doesn’t mean we know too little to do things, or know to little to know that something mus be done. You may prey on the term ‘uncertainty’ and try and focus on that to try and make it sound like it’s all a ‘uncertain’, but this is simply a useless statement. For a start you haven’t defined how ‘uncertain’ you need to be about something before you fail to act (or do whatever third or more alternative there is other than acting or not acting as you implied earlier). And really does ‘uncertainty’ really always imply inaction? You certainly haven’t shown why being ‘uncertain’ means you must not act.
Steven
We all get you like your Postmodernist theorists (btw who is you fave? Lyotard? Baudrillard?) but in science we tend to be Modernist. So using Postmodern-style arguments generally won’t work.
AMac,
I have to say that it is unique in my experience. I have engaged in many internet and in person discussions with people with vastly different worldviews than my own, let along opinions on one issue; indeed, these were often people with worldviews inherently *hostile* to mine. There were always ways in. Not so here, at least for me.
And imo it is not a question of it being ‘a standoff’. I, a very intelligent individual, *do not understand what is being said by the other side*. I do not mean by this that I do not understand the words or the sentence construction; I mean that I do not understand the thinking behind what is being said. I try to put myself in their shoes *and I fail*. This, for me, is very unusual. Me disagreeing with a person is normal, as I have unique views. But me failing to understand the basis for the disagreement is not normal. Maybe my mind is going. I hope so.
Welcome to the new “cold war”
.
Both sides are convinced that the other side is out to “destroy the world”. Not much room for compromise that I can see.
.
I know I feel that compromising on the issue of AGW will condem by kids to a VERY bleak future of…….
.
Fill in the blanks as needed depending on which side of the question you are on…..this statement works for both sides.
Ed Forbes,
I am not even talking about compromise – I generally do not see discussions on the internet as a way of quickly and easily altering opinion. What it has been about for me on other controversial issues is the humanising of the other side: coming to an understanding of where they are coming from, even if you completely and utterly disagree with everything that they say and believe.
It is the way that discussions and reactions in these debates go that seriously troubles me. Reasonable people disagree on many things. But there seems to be something else at play here, either in my own head or in reality. And the fact that communication seems so difficult not just for me but for major players on both sides suggests to me that the problem is a real one and not simply one of my own warped brain.
Re: David Gould (May 12 00:12),
David,
I take a more detached position. There’s always a bit of a triumphal dance after a gotcha, but it goes away, and people resume talking about the things that can be discussed.
Re: Carrick (May 11 21:08),
Indeed, it should be avoided. I won’t do it again. BTW, I should have addressed the response to KK – sorry about that.
“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 optionâ€
.
No choice or room for compromise in this statement.
.
Anyone who disagrees with the notion that we must act NOW “must” be intentionally out to destroy the world as this group seems to think.
.
Hard to have cool and rational discussion when the fate of the world is at stake.
.
Very few people who take the time to follow these sites are uncertain which side of the AGW fence they are on. As such, people talk past each other constantly. Makes for pretty dull shouting matches many times.
Ed Forbes
Why does there need to be room for compromise?
“Anyone who disagrees with the notion that we must act NOW “must†be intentionally out to destroy the world as this group seems to think.”
That statement is hyperbole. No one claims AGW will ‘destroy the world’.
We are agreed, though, that hyperbole makes it impossible to have a rational discussion.
Nick Stokes,
I cannot really comment on the gotchas without significantly reducing any constructive value I might add.
scientists may well be being threatened around the globe, which is bad. This does not of course detract from the very bad behaviour such scientists have indulged in.
This merely a sloppy example of the typical hyperbole used by the press and hardly discouraged by those same badly behaving individuals.
Nathan (Comment#42561)
May 12th, 2010 at 12:59 am
“We are agreed, though, that hyperbole makes it impossible to have a rational discussion.”
Unfortunately hyperbole seems to rule at times. The letter that generated this thread is mostly all hyperbole and false choices.
If this letter is to be considered to be written the best and the brightest, science is in trouble.
Lucia slams the writers, and quite rightly, for a very sloppy piece of work. One should be able to acknowledge that even though one may agree with the overall tone and conclusions of the letter, the letter itself was very poorly written for what one should expect in a major scientific publication.
Unfortunately, defending the indefensible has become the norm it seems.
Ouch…1am and I am up early…off to bed with me.
The topic was not about the letter, but about a stock photo someone grabbed to put next to a letter that some other people wrote. That’s what annoys me. There was no attempt at substance from the start. Does the response surprise anyone?
Ed Forbes
“Lucia slams the writers, and quite rightly, for a very sloppy piece of work. One should be able to acknowledge that even though one may agree with the overall tone and conclusions of the letter, the letter itself was very poorly written for what one should expect in a major scientific publication. ”
Seriously, who cares? That’s just a statement of her opinion about a letter. Her writing is even worse. It’s inflammatory and it is completely unclear who she is targetting. Is it the authors? The editors? The journal? It’s just a rant. We know she doesn’t like people publishing in scientific journals and what not. She gets all funny about it. Probably why she never bothered to publish any responses herself. So I assume in the end it’s targetting the journal. Heck we know Science is a terrible journal and should be dismissed… Now THAT’s irony.
This whole thread is a sloppy piece of writing.
Like what you wrote:
“Anyone who disagrees with the notion that we must act NOW “must†be intentionally out to destroy the world as this group seems to think.”
Sloppy writing, because it’s rubbish.
Ed
“the letter itself was very poorly written for what one should expect in a major scientific publication. ”
So here’s a challenge for you. point out in what ways the letter is ‘poorly written’.
Rather than just asserting it, demonstrate it.
From the wording, I wonder if Lucia originally thought that Science did the photosphopping itself. That would have made the initial outrage a bit more proportionate.
The whole thing reminds me of the victim being blamed for the crime. “It was badly worded, y’r honour”.
Re: bugs (May 11 20:55), 42540″>bugs (May 11 20:55),
I also criticized the letter itself, as have many. I don’t know why you (and for that matter Gleick) want to think this collapses into only discussing the polar-bear.
bugs
No. It was photoshopped to mis-represent conditions in polar bear habitat. Also, Science– the magazine– is the one criticized for running the picture, inserting it where it doesn’t belong, and not adopting practices that permit the scientists to check whether the image is appropriate before running with it. (I guess SCIENCE, has adopted the unusual practice of not sending proofs to authors.)
The scientists do share some blame because none of them seemed to catch the blunder when the article appeared and none sent letters of protest to Science.
Gleick is criticized for telling people the fake-image doesn’t matter. It does matter. When he learned of SCIENCE’s mistake, he should have said “OMG! Let me contact them and tell them to yank the picture.” But he didn’t. He tells people it’s ok to run deceptive pictures.
Re: Nathan (May 12 02:52),
Evidently, you care enough to discuss my statements of my opinions. Whether my writing is poor or good, that letter by 255 authors has received very little favorable press. Other than bloggers who think it’s bad, and Revkin’s article, it’s practically invisible. Copy editors might like it, but it’s a symptom of pretty ineffective composition.
Carrot
Of course I didn’t think that. The sentence describes the photo, not who downloaded it. The notes at Istockphoto say
“(This images is a photoshop design. Polarbear, ice floe, ocean and sky are real, they were just not together in the way they are now) ”
see http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-4095333-the-last-polar-bear.php
Anyone who dowloaded the photo should have read the caption and been aware that it was photo shopped by someone. Anyone who works in publishing should know that this is done using software, takes time and can result in images that are fake.
Thank you, Dennis, for illustrating what I’ve been saying for a long time. The reason McIntyre says Mann used Tiljander “upside down” is that it creates a nice little narrative. Never mind that the series was never calibrated or validated before Mann did it. Never mind the impact on results. Now we have something to ridicule Mann about, something that even Rush Limbaugh listeners can grasp: Mann used something upside down and is stupid!
The fault lies with phony skeptics who gin up a phony controversy. The “hide the decline” is a great example. If it is so bad, then why do people like Fred Singer and others have to lie about it and make it about current temperatures? Why are the hard core skeptics not satisfied with “hide the decline” as it is? Because it refers to an obscure graph no one had ever seen and it “hid” things that were widely known in the literature. So “skeptics” have to exaggerate it.
Then you realize that these same skeptics have been exaggerating things for years. That’s all they do because that’s about all they have.
But we can’t criticize the phony skeptics (except for the occasional Monckton post that goes on here). If Lucia and Steve were actually allies to people who accept the consensus view on climate science then they’d spend a bit more time on these completely fabricated controversies and maybe a little less time on a frickin’ polar bear picture.They occupy a unique rhetorical space. They claim to believe the consensus, but 95% of their criticisms are aimed at mainstream scientists while they embrace skeptical scientists (and even outright denialists like Anthony Watts) and look the other way when those skeptics make mistakes even worse than those they criticize. This makes me quite suspicious of their true motives, despite their claims to the contrary.
In the end it’s about the truth and if you are giggling at “Hide the Decline” videos, I doubt very much that you are interested in truth.
Lucia,
This is just getting silly. Yes, whoever inserted the image should have been more careful, and not used that image. But you’re pretty much just flailing around, otherwise – making comparisons to the WSJ, on the grounds that they don’t put pictures all over the place – so what? The WSJ is known for being minimalist with regards to illustrations. So what if Science wants the letters page to be a little colorful? Is that really so offensive?
This is just getting weird. First, you don’t know if this happened or not. Second, I wouldn’t expect it to. Maybe to you, the first thought would be to go to the source webpage, click on it, and see what the provenance of the picture was. I wouldn’t have done that, and I don’t blame any of the authors for not doing that.
As to what they would have seen ahead of time: keep in mind it’s a letter to the editor, not a paper. The procedures would be rather different.
Written on the letters page:
In this case, there maybe was some communication beforehand, as it’s a little unusual with so many authors.
I’ll take your word for it. But it would have made your response make a lot more sense, if that’s what you were thinking – I’d be outraged too if Science themselves did the photoshopping. But no, I just can’t summon up any outrage over an oversight by whoever went and got the image – graphics intern, editor, whoever. So if Gleick or whoever thinks your reaction with regards to the photo is disproportionate and a distraction, I wholly agree.
There are a whole lot of people who need a refresher course on what McCarthy actually did. I’m not surprised that the academics used an expression in their letter which is inaccurate — that’s par for the climate science course. McCarthy never filed a criminal prosecution. And, his claim that there were a large number of communist spies in the federal govt was accurate. He was a miserable grandstanding SOB just like the vast majority of politicians. And he slandered people. Not as many as Obama has, but he did.
The more important aspect of the publication of this letter and the handling of the pushback is that it gives us another glimpse of the incompetence which infuses so much of what we get from climate scientists. This really is the gang that couldn’t shoot straight.
Re: Boris #42574 (May 12 05:53),
Boris,
Organize your thoughts!
Take me up on the guest-post offer!
Or pitch it to Lucia!
Or blog it and send over the link!
For me, not this thread. ‘K?
“So what if Science wants the letters page to be a little colorful? Is that really so offensive?”
And if Climate Science wants it’s squiggly lines to be a little more artsy, who’s to complain? What’s a little ‘trick’ between The Genius Artist and the Common Worker?
The Elite Scientist surely should get some slack here. After all, isn’t it understood that scientists are our betters by simply being themselves? 😉
Andrew
Lucia
Then read this
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2826189.htm
Tell me, what matters more?
“So what if Science wants the letters page to be a little colorful? Is that really so offensive? ”
Not offensive indeed, just not scientific, which is strange for a magazine called “Science”.
Then again it nicely fits in the “one-cannot-exaggerate-enough-to-save-the-world-in-case-we-are-right” motto the alarmists have.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NC7bE9jopXE
Re: carrot eater #42576 (May 12 06:20),
In a recent blog comment (at Pielke Jr.?), Gleick states that he and the other lead authors got a “galley proof” from the Science editor as a Word document, not as a PDF file. So they got to check the text, but not the layout or any accompanying artwork.
At Pielke’s, “omniclimate” at #40 makes a similar point to Randy Olson’s, as to why “fake but accurate” has such legs.
Olson and Lucia and others are pointing that out. OK, fine, I’d rather folllow George Tobin’s early comment #42329 and talk about the letter itself. You started down that path too (#42448), but didn’t respond to #42457. Instead, you went back to the photo in #43570 & #42576.
Look, read WUWT and Deltoid. I doubt many people can enjoy both (I can hardly stand either). They’re the same in this regard: a major theme is to catch the other side making an unforced error, and then mock them for it. When our side is alleged to supposedly have done something similar: silence. Or serial defenses and explanations. Tu quoque is a favorite.
Go to a baseball game. Same thing. People are tribal.
People whose priors lead them to see the leading AGW Consensus boosters in a critical light are gonna …
People who already identify with their position are gonna…
People who come at it from a media/communication background are gonna…
The photo’s a symbol that people with a different perspective aren’t going to interpret the same way that I do. I get that. Not much more to say about it.
As far as I’m concerned, the letter’s problems are in the text.
Give me a break. If you had picked up last week’s issue, I bet you would have not raised an objection on paging through and seeing some color.
Oh no, it isn’t scientific because the letters to the editor section has some illustrations in it. This is really the level of knee-jerk response we’ve come to?
Science is a general interest sort of journal. Relatively short research articles, along with other sorts of features – letters, news, opinions, book reviews, etc. Nobody confuses a letter to the editor for a research article.
AMac
Good for you. But our host and others are making strange comments, such as saying it’s inappropriate for there to be illustrations in the first place. I find this weird and reactionary.
Hoi Polloi (Comment#42582) May 12th, 2010 at 6:47 am
Sorry to have to tell you this people, but a lot of that Hubble stuff? Enhanced.
http://hubblesite.org/gallery/behind_the_pictures/meaning_of_color/eagle.php
“But our host and others are making strange comments, such as saying it’s inappropriate for there to be illustrations in the first place”
Illustrations are appropriate for children’s books, and fantasy/sci-fi stories, advertisements, and situations where reality cannot be captured in a more scientific way. Ahem. Like an actual photo.
Andrew
Carrot
You wrote snide question insinuating ignorance about the origin of that image. I answered, indicating I was not ignorant of the origin, which indicated in the caption of the image on the page where editors of SCIENCE would have downloaded the image. I noted that they should have read it and been more careful.
You agree they should have been aware of this, but evidently you don’t like my answer. Possibly, you are disappointed to learn that I, like anyone who read the caption or the image– was aware it was photoshopped.
Now, possibly feeling a bit grumpy, you tell me things are getting silly. Yes. Silly things are going on.
Sorry you don’t like the conversation. Someone above linked to a NYT blog article that mentioned that the letter had been submitted to the WSJ, WAPO and the NYT, all of whom turned down the opportunity to run it. In response to that observation, I noted that if Gleick had gotten it positioned at the WSJ, at least the WSJ would not have made the blunder SCIENCE did. Maybe “so what”– but why does this observation irk you so? Conversations happen at blogs. The practices at the WSJ and SCIENCE differ in a way that ensures that this sort of blunder does not happen at SCIENCE.
Am I not allowed to observe the difference in practices after reading a NYT blog entry that indictes the letter was submitted, but not run by the WJS, WAPO and the NYT?
Now, lest you decree this response to your “so what” either a) silly or b) so what, let me explain how conversations work: Others picked up the discussion of the WSJ and now you are also discussing the difference between WSJ practices and SCIENCE practices. Even if you think the fact that they have different practices is a big “so what?”, your re-introducing the subject is giving the discussion of the relative standards of the WSJ and SCIENCE more play in comments.
It’s true that the practices at SCIENCE looks deficient relative to those at at the WSJ in this regard, but as you say, “so what?” People are free to observe this in comments– particularly if you re-introduce the subject.
Now you have vaulted into truly silly territory. No one has criticized Science for wishing to be “colorful”. Science blundered by inserting a photo-shopped picture that gave a false impression of the current effect of climate change on polar bear habitat. The fake-images would have been just as bad if they’d converted it to grey-scale to eliminate the color.
Oh? Well, I wrote “seemed”– I don’t know if none sent any. But I know Gleick wrote he only sent a protest on Saturday; the article was posted Friday. So, at least one of the 255–Gleick shares blame for not looking at the pdf, noticing the obvious fake and alerting SCIENCE promptly. I know when he alerted Science because I wrote what he said. (Feel free to poll the other 255 or Science to find out if the other’s did write. Then’ we’ll know if it just “seemed” they didn’t write of if none wrote on Friday.)
It may well be that you or I would have acted just as deficiently as Gleick and his coauthors. However, in my opinion, if you or I had corralled 255 authors to write this, shopped it around to 3 journals and finally placed it in Science, and then not reviewed the article when it was presented to the public, we would assume some blame for not noticing a problem with the article. Possibly, knowing our own deficiencies, we would not blame Gleick for his blame Gleick. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t share blame with Science.
And why should I not point out that Gleick shares the blame when he he appear to lay all the blame on SCIENCE? In comments at Pielke’s PG (who, I believe is Gleick) wrote:
Yes. It was stupid of SCIENCE to miss the fact. Stupid.
Well, given how much trouble Gleick went to get his propaganda piece published, it was stupid of him not to look at the article on Friday when it was published, notice a photo he did not provide was inserted, look at it, realize it was obviously faked not check the provinance, and not write SCIENCE on Friday. It was stupid of PG not to make the fake public– so as to prevent others from noticing and mocking the insertion before he had time to indicate that he disapporved of it.
As lead author on the PR effort involving the efforts of 255 scientists, Gleicks oversight remains stupid even if you or I would have acted equally stupidly.
So, yes. Maybe I don’t know that none of the 255 wrote SCIENCE promptly, but I sure as shootin’ know Gleick did not. So, even if he wants to blame behavior even he calls stupid on SCIENCE, I say he shares it.
Yes; the procedure is different. And it is stupid of SCIENCE — the magazine– to adopt a practice of running letters, inserting material not proficed by the letter writers and then not sending the final material out to review. I don’t know why you object to my pointing out that SCIENCE magazines practices are part of the problem.
It is also stupid of Gleick to submit the 255 author Public-Relations/Propaganda letter to that sort of journal and not take pains to make sure that magazine won’t decorate it with fake-photo-shopped images that later embarrass him. If this letter was important to Gleick, he should have checked the policies and either a) restricted submission to magazines that would not insert information he could not control or b) communicated by phone or email to request the magazine not run any fake-images along side his letter.
Not to bring up the Wall Street Journal again since that’s a bit “so what” — but what I previously said is that if Gleisk’s letter had gotten accepted by the WSJ then SCIENCE’s slip-shod practice vis-a-vis letters would not have caused him an embarrassment. (But, of course, so what?)
Outraged? I laughing at Gleick’s use of the term ironic and you think that’s outrage? I’ve been laughing my head off at the goofballs at SCIENCE and Gleicks idiotic response, and you think I’m outraged?! Heh.
People pointing out that stupid things happened, that they shouldn’t have happened, that they actually matter is not always “outrage”.
The outrage seems to be on the part of people like Gleick who think the blunder is not to be spoken of, who seem upset the content of their unflavored, unsweetened, mushy icecream of a letter is not being discussed, and who appear to believe the PR effort was a failure because of the polar bear images. I suspect the letter would have been a failure anyway– because it had all the character of unflavored, unsweetened, mushy icecream.
I don’t think Gleick has commented on my reaction.
It would be difficult to believe his post complaining about the reaction was aimed at me because I wrote my post after Gleick foamed at the mouth over the fact that people were discussing SCIENCE’s fake polar bear image.
If Gleick hadn’t posted his silly defensive post, I wouldn’t have posted mine. If people like you, nathan, bugs, Daniel etc. weren’t wearing your finger tips out typing comments to suggesting that SCIENCE’s blunder wasnt all that stupic, or that Gleick’s is right to complain that people noticed and commented on the insertion of faked photo images into SCIENCE, or they can’t laugh when at his defensive reaction to people criticizing this blunder, then the comment thread would be pretty short.
It’s pretty silly on your part to think you can repeatedly jump in to defend your view and then decree others of being “silly” when their responses show that your view doesn’t make any sense. It’s equally silly of you to think that their posting responses to your points represents “outrage”.
I’m not outraged that you are defending the ridiculous blunder on the part of SCIENCE, Gleick and the 255. When you or others post something I think is wrong, and I happen to read it, I respond. It appear when I post something you think is wrong, you respond. I don’t assume you are outraged by what I wrote. Should I assume so? (If you are outraged, well hey. Everyone is entitled to their emotions.
Carrot–
I didn’t say this.
Lucia
What’s wrong with the text?
This is an amazingly low-brow discussion. Of all the things to get all upset about… It’s just weird.
i’ll do my part to try and lift it. Noting that there are no problems with the actual words (as in no spelling mistakes or mistakes in sentence structure etc.) all that is left is the actual message. We have seen a lot of assertions here that the letter is ‘poorly written’ but not much actual demonstration of how it is ‘poorly written’.
But before we can decide if the message has been delivered well or if it is poorly written, we need to ascertain who the audience is.
So, who is the audience in this case?
Lucia
“It’s true that the practices at SCIENCE looks deficient relative to those at at the WSJ in this regard, but as you say, “so what?†”
What a thoroughly ridiculous thing to say. No it isn’t true. You are just making stuff up as usual.
“Yes. It was stupid of SCIENCE to miss the fact. Stupid.”
That’s hilarious! Suddely SCIENCE is stupid…
“I’m not outraged that you are defending the ridiculous blunder on the part of SCIENCE”
And they made a ridiculous blunder!!!! OMG!!!!
Wow, SCIENCE, so stupid, with their ridiculous blunder… OH NO!!! They have no credibility anymore!
It’s the hyperbole that is lunacy here Lucia. It’s really funny!
There’s no need for anyone here to defend SCIENCE, and I don’t think any of us are. I think we’re just pointing out that this is a particularly stupid post.
Nathan,
Do you have a reading comprehension problem? I and other criticized the letter for the content not the copy-editing.
If you have forgotten the criticisms, please save us all time, scroll up, find them and read them. Then, if you disagree or can defend the article, do so.
I’m not going to re-type what’s I find deficient in the content merely because you wont’ scroll up.
Wrong. Some writing is ineffective for all audiences.
stan (Comment#42577) May 12th, 2010 at 6:31 am
And Andrew_KY
Hear hear!
All that matters is the data.
They manipulated that too! (Besides manipulating photos, people, other scientists and professionals, peer review, paleo knowledge and the historical record, the media, Congress etc etc… all that manipulation to fit this ideology and belief.)
Ladies and gentlemen I give you Junk Science!
The article I posted up thread called the climate models “Sim City” and “Farmville”. That cracked me up. Spot on.
““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. —
How about stop all this nonsense? No way are humans going to stop the climate on this planet from changing.
Let that sink in a minute.
And another thing: if you are all so sure it’s human C02 emissions causing “climate change” (IT WAS CALLED GLOBAL WARMING)…
STFU already and fight for billions of dollars spent to “further our understanding” go to PRIVATE companies developing alternative energy instead of funding these idiot clown climate scientists again and politician’s who have a pet project to further regulate us (punish us) to death.
Nathan, “what’s wrong with the text?”
Read the many comments at Pielke jr, under the threads
Peter Gleick Fires Back
#6 8 30 31 32 33 34 39
Revkin, Gleick and Olson on the Gang Who Couldn’t Shoot Straight
#35 38
“Science is a general interest sort of journal.”
I see, that’s why the 255 alumni choose “Science” to publish their “j’acuse”. Makes it kind of “general sort of letter”, right? It very well fits the picture, thanks for the confirmation.
.
bugs (Comment#42586):
Erm…the relevance?
Andrew_KY (Comment#42587) May 12th, 2010 at 7:22 am
They apologized and came up with an actual photo of polar bears on an iceberg.
Has Watts apologized for his accusation that there is a conspiracy to manipulate the global temperature record?
Meanwhile Lucia
you ignore
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2826189.htm
Re: Nathan #42590 (May 12 07:31),
A number of people have weighed in on this. Why not link their comments and respond.
Er.
I missed your answer.
“They apologized and came up with an actual photo of polar bears on an iceberg.”
.
They apologized, even after you and the other usual suspects told us that there was nothing wrong using that pic? Typical case of a PE?
Pic of a polar bear on an iceberg, nobody can go wrong here, butttt are there still icebergs in the Arctic? More photoshopping?
Oh for crying out loud. Now you’re criticising Gleick for noticing the error and writing in on Saturday instead of Friday? Seriously?
And no, I don’t think the error was obvious; at a glance I didn’t make anything at all of the picture. One would have to think to go find the paper on the original website, and no, I don’t think it’s stupid of all 255 to not do so immediately, or even ever. I do think it’s stupid that somebody at Science ran the picture without seeing where it actually came from. That is the limit of the stupidity.
As for the WSJ: going back up, OK, it seems that your complaint is not so much running illustrations, so much as running illustrations without consulting the authors of a letter. Fine.
I didn’t mean to say Gleick was referring to your reaction in particular, but I am saying that you are reacting in the exact same way – disproportionately about the picture. Yes, I agree you’ve criticised the text for being vague, as well, once you got into the comments.
Lucia the only thing I see above is that you complain that you don’t know who the ‘attackers’ are… And that you wish it had been more specific.
Well, great. That’s terrific. If you can’t understand what they mean, that’s sad for you.
When I read it, I thought of the Va AG. When I read it I thought it was an appeal to engage with them in the literature and not in the courts. When I read it I thought they were saying that the science is fine, despite the reports of errors in the IPCC.
Worked fine for me.
To be honest, I think you just want to be confused by what they mean. I think you want to be angry about this and the reason you don’t understand it is because you don’t want to. You have always disagreed with having to engage with scientists in the literature, so of course you would find it irritating when they demand that the debate be engaged in the literature.
Tell me, you say that the media haven’t received this very well… Why is the media the determiner of the success of writing? Some pretty shocking writing is deemed ‘successful’ by the media.
“Wrong. Some writing is ineffective for all audiences.”
What? You seem to be suggesting that this writing has been unsuccessful for all audiences, which is obviously a stupid thing to say. The fact that people have taken the time to say that they think it’s ok means that it has been successful for some.
“They apologized and came up with an actual photo of polar bears on an iceberg.”
bugs,
I forgive them, then, for their error, and am glad to hear they have attempted to correct it.
“Has Watts apologized for his accusation that there is a conspiracy to manipulate the global temperature record?”
I don’t know that he owes an apology for that because it’s obvious that the the global temperature record has been manipulated.
Andrew
Re: Nathan (May 12 07:38),
When I used the word “stupid”, I was agreeing with Peter Gleick– the author of the 255-letter. He is the one who first characterized SCIENCE as stupid, as you can read in the text he wrote which I quoted.
I don’t think the use of the word “stupid” was hyperbole when Gleick used it– that’s why I agree. It would be hyperbole to suggest their stupicity means they have no credibility. That’s why I wouldn’t suggest such a thing, and likely why Gleick did not either.
It sure seems like a lot of people are suggesting there was very little to blame in SCIENCE’s stupid decision to insert a fake-polar bear image into the letter to the editor. This is coming in response to people (including the lead author of the 255-letter) saying what they did was stupid. You appear to be pretty torqued that I would echo Peter Gleick’s characterization of their behavior as stupid. If that’s not defending SCIENCE magazine, I don’t know what constitutes a defense.
Nathan
What an AMAZING piece of misreading
THEM:
“They said there were two choices in front of us.
“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. â€
YOU:
So the choices are; act, or don’t act. As far as I can see that’s the choice confronting us. If you can think of a third option Steven, would be really interesting to hear what it is.
ME: They put two choices:
1 bury your head in the sand: no action
2. Quick substantive action.
You notice how you cut off the parts I focused on in my long post on this. where I mentioned the third option.
Seriously if you cant see the problem I cant help you.
Hint: the science of the climate is more certain than the science about WHAT TO DO.
Its getting warmer. the science is clear
Man is the cause. the science is clear.
The science is in: cap and trade works?
Not so clear.
PUSHING people to act, when the COURSE of action is unclear, seems a bit alarmist to me. Surely when know we MUST ACT, but what? which way, how much?
THATS how the argument unravels DOPE.
Ok, from Pielke’s site
I got nothing. No one commeneted on what was wrong with the letter this is the best I got:
“Did the authors resort to lack of specificity hoping this one incident will occur to readers who will then forget the other valid criticism that have arisen post climategate? Why did they fail to mention the variety of sins or commission and ommission climate scientists are actually accused of? Did the numerous scientists authoring the letter invoke confidence in the big bang and evolution to mislead uninformed readers about the actual sorts accusations people are levying against climate scientists? Or to make it seem — without ever precisely claiming– that every single finding is science is as well established as evolution? Or discuss the episode in the vaguest of terms to permit something that sounds like a defense while avoiding saying anything that indisputably inaccurate.”
Which is a pretty bizarre rant. All about lack of specificity. And then a bunch of rhetorical questions.
What it looks like is you’re not actually reading the letter, but rather trying to re-interpret it because you feel it is an attack.
Mosher!
So what’s the third option??? You still didn’t answer. Here’s what you said in your long post
“Try not to end with a false dilemma. There are more than two choices. Your thinking readers will notice these false choices and offer up a third. We can for example take measured actions on a local level. Putting the choice as one between NO ACTION and QUICK SUBSTANTIVE ACTION, essentially argues that you have a certainty that a middle way would not work. A certainty that is not supported by the science. Putting choices as black and white, exposes you to the charge that you try to have it both ways: you try to argue that science is both uncertain but only offers us two certain choices.”
see, no third choice… What’s the third choice?
The ‘quick and decisve action’ didn’t actually say what it was. Perhaps if you actually just read the text… There was no mention of cap and trade…
Could be anything at all…
BUT there is one thing that the action must do, and that is reduce the amount of CO2 in the air.
“Its getting warmer. the science is clear
Man is the cause. the science is clear.
The science is in: cap and trade works?
Not so clear.
PUSHING people to act, when the COURSE of action is unclear, seems a bit alarmist to me. Surely when know we MUST ACT, but what? which way, how much?
THATS how the argument unravels DOPE.”
You argument falls at the end, DOPE, because we know what the course of action must be; Reduce CO2. That’s what we need to do. That’s the action… Reduce CO2. So let’s fix a target, say 350ppm, and get to work.
How you do that, is the question, but I certainly don’t see you trying to answer that… And when people try and answer or offer solutions all you do is criticise. You are simply a noise maker, trying to prevent action, any action.
Carrot–
Criticizing? I said what Gleick did was just a stupid as what Science did– which Gleick called stupid. Is that criticizing? Or is it just observing and characteristic the behavior accurately?
Anyway, before I continue, I may have a mistake. Even though “The Benshi” and others dates the letter to Friday, the letter may have been made available to the press- by Thursday. Andy Revkin wrote about it on Thursday May 6 (See May 6, 2010, 4:01 pm Scientists Lash at ‘McCarthy-Like Threats’
By ANDREW C. REVKIN http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/06/scientists-lash-at-mccarthy-like-threats/
) So, the length of time between availability of the pdf and Gleick’s letter was a bit longer than I indicated.
But whether published on Friday or Thursday, I think it was stupid of Gleick for waiting that long. He alerted Science about the fake image image. He, evidently knowing he hadn’t seen the final pdf, knowing Science might insert things, took no actions until after the blunder had been noticed by others. We don’t know why he took no action. Maybe he — the lead author– didn’t bother to look at the pdf, thought there was nothing “stupid” about Science inserting the image (until after the firestorm).
Whatever the reasons for his inaction, if it was stupid of science to insert the image, it was just as stupid of Gleick not to catch the problem on Friday and alert Science. So, my response to his passing the buck of all blameworthy actions to Science is that he shares the blame.
Is there some law that the only response to Gleick passing the blame is to say, “Oh, well, then! This blunder is only fault of some stupid sub-editor at SCIENCE?”
Oh? But even if it’s not obvious, I think to avoid doing something stupid the lead author of a letter to SCIENCE should:
1)Look at the final version as soon as he possibly can.
2) Notice insertions — like the photo.
3) Check the provenance of the photo and
4) If there is a problem that will embarrass him or subvert the message of his letter, write Science and alert them.
Presumably, Gleick was not hit by a bus on Friday and should have been able to do this. He did not. His not doing so was just as “stupid” (to use his word) Science’s decision to insert material into letters to the editor without requesting review by the authors. (Yes. I know you told me this is just following Science’s own stated policy. That means their policy is stupid.)
Yes. In the article, I begin by criticizing Gleick for his idiotic response to the criticism about the polar bear image. I also marvel at the practices at SCIENCE, wondering
It appears after many comments, you now write
So, maybe you now “get” that my complaint is about SCIENCE inserting stuff and not checking with authors.
This practice, by SCIENCE is stupid.
An act with no import on the science was stupid. As I said already, they acted and fixed it. Watts still stands behind a lunatic conspiracy theory, no fixing there.
Hubble is regularly photoshopped, I love it.
Scientists are being threatened for just doing their work. Still no response to that.
Any here (including David Gould) who have concluded there is no possibility of meaningful action based on consensus ought to read: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/27939/1/HartwellPaper_English_version.pdf. The authors lay out a reasoned case for actions that will have significant and nearly immediate benefits, while avoiding the more intractable political disagreements so clearly evident in this thread.
.
Those who hold extreme views on either side will likely reject these proposals as either totally inadequate (on the flaming green left), or a total waste of money (on the soot covered right). But those with extreme political views are unlikely to ever support a compromise, no matter it’s structure… that is the nature of extremists. While one or more of the proposed actions will be coolly received by most everyone else, on balance, most people could probably support the proposed actions if taken as a whole. I believe that people who do not hold extreme views (which to me just means they have a measure of respect for the views of people they disagree with) actually represent a substantial majority of the public. I therefore believe political consensus on at least some actions to address “climate change” remains possible.
.
The proposals outlined in the paper are substantive, reasonably inexpensive, should be effective, and most importantly, all lie within in the range of actions that are politically possible.
.
H/T to George Tobin for pointing out this paper.
Lucia: This comment is off topic, sorry.
bugs–
Yes, but you left details out: After the blunder was caught by others, Science and the authors of the 255-letter were laughed at by many in the blogosphere, the lead author (Gleick) made a fool of himself defending the image and suggesting that people prove some conspiracy theory of his one, Science replaced the image.
As for your closing volley: We’ve discussed scientists being sent email nasty-grams before.
It’s a practice now, is it? If it is, I agree, it’s stupid. They should only put in decorations that the author approves of. If it’s not practice, it’s a once off that should’t happen again. Now that thats out the way, how about http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2826189.htm , because that seems to be far more relevant.
Bugs
Carrot posted SCIENCE’s stated policy. Keep up.
I think the “nasty-grams:” are far more relevant. Science, is being attacked, and for petty and ignorant reasons. Those attacks warrant attention from the police, and they aren’t just abstract threats, they are made against individuals.
Re: Nathan (May 12 08:12),
Pick a “what was wrong the the letter” topic from among Pielke comment #s: 6, 10, 30, 31, 32, 33, and 39.
Discuss.
And that amounts to what?
bugs
I don’t know. Maybe, Gleick getting indigestion, whining in public and lowering the credibility of scientists in the eyes of the public?
Bugs
You linked to an article from February and discuss emailed nastigrams. We discussed that issue in February. If you feel the need to check on the status of any police investigations that arose after those receiving the email reported them to the relevant authorities, you are welcome to investigate further, and learn if there have been any developments.
Feel free to report back.
Re: David Gould #42556 way upthread (May 12 00:12),
This could be a precedent that combatants in the AGW War could learn from: Bible Study. More specifically, how people have tried to manage disputes in the study of Palestine, ~ AD 1 to AD 200: Roman conquest, Jewish society at the time, Jesus the person and the Christ, the original texts of the Gospels and Apocrypha, what got written in Aramaic and Greek, what was selected for the New Testament.
The topic has a lot of features in common with climate change science. Such as:
Many of the controversies are historical. Original sources are scant and of uncertain reliability (Josephus / paleoclimate proxies).
There are irreconcilable religous (ideological) perspectives among present-day participants. In studying the questions, different people are looking for different things.
Taking the long view–recent decades–there has been a great deal of progress in many areas (textual analysis, “Q” / instrumental record). Some efforts have been ecumenical, some secular.
Science is about describing and understanding the world. It feeds into public policy, but it cannot prescribe public policy (Pielke Jr.’s point). So, in terms of defining the notion of “progress” and then advancing, in an emotional, polarized, bitter environment, full of difficult personalities, ideological fractures, with matters of career, reputation, and funding at stake:
What can climate science learn from study of the Bible?
(I’m throwing that out as a general response to David Gould’s remarks — this ain’t an area of expertise for me, by a long shot.)
Lucia:
I’ve had work that appeared in articles in major newspapers, and I can guarantee that we scrutinized everything, including the graphics that were being included (I found a few problems with the graphics, as I recall, which were fixed). And this was a case where we had essentially ZERO editorial control, and the editor was simply trying to do “due diligence” to ensure that the article accurately portrayed the science.
For a highly visible opinion piece like this, there is no excuse for the sloppy, lack of quality control that was done by Gleick AND the science editor responsible for this piece. There is no excuse for Gleick not asking for the PDF, there is no excuse for why he didn’t receive it without having to ask.
That doesn’t even touch the problems with the body of the letter that Lucia has mentioned, which is a pervasive vagueness through out that e.g., for some suggests a conflation of doubt on AGW with creationism for example.
I think the problem with the defense of this letter by some is that their waving away of its problems would apply more appropriately to a blog post and less to a highly visible public comment like this.
Letters like this are a place where you can’t afford blunders, no matter how mundane. And it’s also a place where you can’t afford to throw away an opportunity to sell a position by the over use of vague strawman-like statements.
Boris (Comment#42575),
.
Wow, you seem pretty upset. You suggest that anybody who critiques climate scientists, either for the quality of their work or because they appear to have a political agenda, has to be a closet denialist. A very strange conclusion. Really.
.
I am quite certain that GHG’s have contributed to warming of the Earth’s surface, and support both prudent action now, and continued research to better quantify expected future warming, so that additional action can be taken if needed. I also think that Climate scientists are way too political, and they ‘demand’ specific public actions which are both politically motivated and wholly outside of “climate science”. Does that make me a “denialist”?
If you look you will find that both Lucia and SteveM (who you single out) have clearly stated that they agree GHG’s warm the Earth. Lucia has even stated that she wants action to reduce GHG emissions/global warming. Does the fact that she criticizes climate scientists then automatically make her a “denialist”?
.
It seems to me that you will only accept political purity. This is never going to happen.
“Reasonable people disagree on many things. But there seems to be something else at play here, either in my own head or in reality.”
The problem is here is that David has already disclosed there is nothing objectively true for my side and his to agree on. He told me once awhile ago, that there is no absolute truth. He is on the side that is setting up disagreement, in deciding to maintain this worldview. If we can’t decide together that we can even agree there are absolutes we both can recognize, then the cosmos is unorderable and everything (literally) is subject to personal filters.
Andrew
AMac,
“What can climate science learn from study of the Bible?”
I hope not too much. I sure don’t want a majority declaring the minority heretics and burning them at the stake. I believe there are lots of better approaches to resolving the AGW conundrum.
Re: SteveF (May 12 10:00),
Well, I was thinking more along the lines of this “Nova” episode than an auto-da-fe!
6. Letter claims climate change is as sound as Big Bang, Evolution.
Commenter has a point. The letter should make clear that things like radiative transfer and etc are on that level, but not specific predictions. However, this is sort of covered when the letter mentions uncertainties, so this is a big Meh for me.
10. Letter claims that science cannot convince deniers.
That’s why they are called deniers. Phony outrage here.
30. Glieck is calling people communists and Nazis.
Have no idea what this person is talking about. Definitely not in the letter.
31. Wants the letter to be specific. I don’t see the value in calling out individuals in a letter like this. You just let people play the role of victim, a role they relish.
32. PaulM’s comment simply argues that there is no evidence for climate change and such. Not really a comment on the letter at all. Further he has completely swallowed denialist claims about Amazongate, for instance.
33. Eric provides another yawner. Any letter stating scientific conclusions about AGW would get him riled up.
39. Doesn’t like the word “denier.” I don’t have a problem with calling people who deny basic scientific facts “denier,” though I prefer “denialists.” If you don’t deny basic scientific facts (RTE, etc.) then I guess you aren’t a denier. But don’t pretend they don’t exist (cough Marc Morano).
Mosh has a point about straw men. I agree that very few people say “We should wait until the scientists are absolutely certain.” Then again, people do say “wee need more certainty” again and again and again–and they will likely keep on saying it indefinitely. This is a minor error on the letter writers’ part.
And I don’t get the false dilemma either. Is Mosh suggesting that slow, insubstantial action is a third way? I guess it is. So I’ll give you that. But does anybody actually agitate for action that will be mildly economically disruptive and mostly ineffectual in decarbonizing the energy supply?
I cannot take you seriously on this. You’re just saying stuff to say stuff, to string this out.
You’re saying that given the 255 authors might know that Science sometimes puts in some artwork or photos to accompany letters, it is stupid of them all to not immediately go to the online version the split second it’s available, to see what picture might have been placed there, and then further click around to see where the photo might have come from, just in the off-chance case there was something fishy with it. And if other people notice this faster than the authors do (on a time scale of one day)(probably because they’d seen that picture before, and recognised it?), that makes the authors stupid? Really? This is just unreasonable, and is monday-morning-quarterbacking in an weird way.
It isn’t stupid that Science puts illustrations there. It IS stupid that they put a photoshopped one there without realising it, when looking at the source information would have told them as much.
You can well say that it’d be better if Science consulted with the authors of any given letter, how they might illustrate that page. Particularly since it isn’t obvious to the reader who is responsible for picking the illustrations. (If it was obviously an editorial decision, then it wouldn’t really matter). That’s a reasonable suggestion, though I wonder if it’d ever gotten to be much of an issue before. But what do I know; maybe the pile of bugs from last week is controversial as well in the bug-eating world, for whatever reason.
But to fault the authors for not noticing it as soon as it was published online? Blaming people for complaining two days later, as if that’s so late? That just doesn’t make sense; you’re just blaming for the sake of blaming, apparently out of some sort of bitterness.
Carrick
You’re making up norms that don’t or didn’t exist, and then insisting they be followed retroactively. If I write a letter to the newspaper, I don’t get to see any proofs or anything, nor do I expect to. That apparently is how letters to the editor work in this journal as well, for the most part. In this case, the lead author did get to see something, but not everything. Has this ever been an issue before? Hindsight is 20/20.
As for your experience.. I don’t know much about newspapers, but it seems to me that even the journalist writing the article rarely gets to pick the headline, and sometimes not the accompanying art. And if you’re quoted as a source, you’ve no guarantee you won’t be quoted out of context until the article appears. I’m happy you had a good experience, but don’t extrapolate.
“If you look you will find that both Lucia and SteveM (who you single out) have clearly stated that they agree GHG’s warm the Earth. Lucia has even stated that she wants action to reduce GHG emissions/global warming. Does the fact that she criticizes climate scientists then automatically make her a “denialistâ€?”
Obviously not. But both Lucia and Steve are quick to criticize the minute missteps of climate scientists while ignoring huge missteps from the other side. Steve even allies with Anthony Watts, who is nothing but a political activist wrt global warming. By watching their behavior, it’s clear they ally themselves with the skeptic side for one reason or another and this makes me suspicious, as it should to anyone who is paying attention. The fact that they then turn around and say “I believe in AGW” only makes me MORE suspicious, not less. To her credit, at least Lucia has posted a few times about Monckton and some others. Steve–not so much. Did he ever audit Loehe? I thought that would be in his wheelhouse.
So basically I’m a hard core cynic. Ambrose Bierce is one of my heroes if it makes things clearer.
“9. Doesn’t like the word “denier.†I don’t have a problem with calling people who deny basic scientific facts “denier,†though I prefer “denialists.†If you don’t deny basic scientific facts (RTE, etc.) then I guess you aren’t a denier. But don’t pretend they don’t exist (cough Marc Morano).
This RTE business is such a crock and all it is a new talking point. (pushed as the new “proof” that C02 is THE ultimate only climate driver) Sure RTE works out but so does Gravity. But saying RTE is the thing that drives the climate over everything is like saying gravity is going to make everything stay on the ground, no one can fly or like saying every ball is going to roll down a hill no matter what- when there are all kinds of things and conditions on this planet that could STOP a ball from rolling down a hill and let people or animals fly -no matter what you say. Like a pool of WATER on that hill that ball encounters, or a big ass rock. Yes, How about all that water on this planet and all those rocks? 8″ of new snow in Denver today. 1,000s of PPMS higher CO2 in the past and it still got cold.
There’s plenty of meteorologists that say “climate scientists” have no clue at all.
BTW I think that label DENIER is used by cowards who can’t defend their practices or their data and used by the low level thinkers who support them,
Re: Boris (May 12 10:17),
Thanks, Boris, for responding as to the letter’s substance.
#6. You got his point about the letter writers’ hyperbole in elevating the stature of the AGW Consensus, though he and I see it as more important than you do.
#10. You missed his point, which was about arrogance and tolerance.
#30. You missed his point, which was about civility. “Denier” echoes “Holocaust denier,” which is an insult. (If you were unaware of that, now you know.)
#31. You disagree with the commenter, fair enough. But a fair question for the letter signers is: Since the dichotomy presented by the letter is between “Scientists” (= adherents to a narrow AGW Consensus) and “climate change deniers” — what about Patrick Michaels, Richard Lindzen, Bjorn Lomborg, Stephen McIntyre, John Christy, and Roy Spencer? Are they best characterized as “deniers”? Is the Best Practice to marginalize all of them, e.g. keep them all out of the peer-reviewed literature?
#32. You missed his point, which was that most criticisms of the AGW Consensus position are based on the science (he offered specifics).
#33. You missed his substantive complaints, which were that the signers compare compare the stature of AGW Consensus scientists to Einstein and Galileo; that Consensus scientists state working hypotheses as “fundamental conclusions”; that the letter writers demonize their “McCarthy-ite denier opposition” [sic].
39. You missed my main point, about the letter writers demonstrating their lack of trustworthiness, even as they demand greater trust from the public. You get that the moniker “denier†is offensive, but will continue using it anyway. “If you don’t deny basic scientific facts (RTE, etc.) then I guess you aren’t a denier.” Thanks for the gracious praise. “But don’t pretend they don’t exist”… which you follow with “Mosh has a point about straw men.” Yes, he does!
Re: liza (May 12 10:46),
No.
The website scienceofdoom discusses these issues.
Let’s face it. This is the part of the letter that people are really upset about:
Imagine if people actually find out that every scientific body on the planet supports AGW. Opponents have done a good job making it look like only crazy corrupt Dr. Mann and Al Gore believe this crap. Complaints about polar bear pictures and McCarthy references only distract from the weight of scientific evidence and do nothing to undermine it.
Radiative transfer is a new talking point? It’s been at the very heart of the matter for decades, if not over a century.
Let’s face it, Boris. You’re wrong. At least in my case, I’m not upset, and only parts of these statements I think was deceptive is in (i) and (iii). The planet is not warming only due to increases in GHGs, at least that’s not what the models say. Natural causes are not being “overwhelmed”, otherwise we wouldn’t have ended up with a decade with no warming.
As usual, everything for you is “either”/”or”. AGW isn’t a single statement, or even just these five. One might accept general premises of the AGW story, without agreeing with all of the particulars.
And as usual, you exhibit your special brand of extreme tribalism:
“either you are with us or get off the ship”.
Liza
Nobody says this, except for sceptics looking for a strawman. Like yourself, here.
Radiative transfer in a radiative-convective model will help you describe lots of things – solar effects, CO2, CH4, volcanoes. Not just CO2.
Re: Boris (May 12 10:56),
I’m not upset about that part. I agree with those apple-pie statements. People say that all the time; many have been repeating it for months.
The 255-authors surrounded bullet points saying things I’ve said myself with a bunch of puffery referring rather vaguely to recent events and non-specific actions on the part of unnamed individuals. The letter writers evidently want those unnamed individuals to stop doing whatever it is they are doing. (Some readers seem to think who the individuals are and what they are doing is clear, but they don’t all agree with each other. There are some top theories, but still, more than one.)
I’m not even upset about that part of the letter.
I’m just saying it was a poorly written, ineffective, mushy-unflavored-icecream come quality item. I’m not surprised to learn the NYT, WAPO and the WSJ declined to publish it, and I’m not surprised to discover people aren’t discussing the contents other than to criticize it for it’s lack of substance.
Gleick evidently thinks the reason the discussion is focusing on the embarrassment of the fake-polar bear shot is some sort of coup by the climate denial machine. I think the reason is that the fake-ploar bear fiasco is the only interesting thing about the letter. Otherwise… yawn.
Where does the letter say that?
Then again, for that matter, what natural forcing has had a substantial positive value over the last 30-40 years? Or are you appealing to mysterious unforced changes?
I doubt this is true in general.
What about them? Did that commenter expect every scientists to be labeled in the letter? I mean, it’s an interesting question, but hardly material for such a letter.
But they obviously don’t:
G, P, D and E proved a scientific consensus wrong. The Consensus scientists obviously didn’t prove the consensus wrong.
As for your 39, you say:
I saw no such message in the letter. Can you find the passage that states anything about an “ill-defined but narrow consensus.” This is your definition, not theirs.
Carrot Eater:
What it says is “The planet is warming due to increased concentrations of heat-trapping gases in our atmosphere.”
It doesn’t say “only”, though that would be meaning a causal reader might take away. Hence my choice of the word “deceptive”.
There’s these things called “atmospheric ocean oscillations”. They have amplitudes typically of a few tenths of a °C. The net increase/decrease in atmospheric temperature from these is larger than the driving predicted from CO2 increases (to this point). They are in no danger of “being overwhelmed”. (iii) isn’t just deceptive, it’s wrong.
I mean seriously, Carrot. You think that the lack of warming in between 2000 and 2009 is explained by an “overwhelming of natural forcing by CO2”? LOL.
Steve F. Responds to the question “What can climate science learn from study of the Bible?†with:
“I hope not too much. I sure don’t want a majority declaring the minority heretics and burning them at the stake.”
Not significant to the overall discussion here, but this is a response based on ignorance of the contents of the Bible. In spite of the long history of majority religions claiming to be Christian burning heretics at the stake, here is, in fact, no recommendation or example in the Bible that I am aware of for burning heretics at the stake. In fact, in the New Testament, which is what most Christians base their faith on, there isn’t any recommendation at all for killing unbelievers or heretics in any way. The strongest punishment I can find suggested is to refuse to eat dinner with them.
Carrick
Depends on the time scale, and the magnitude of the sum of the forcings. Five years, yes. High amplitude, high frequency ocean dynamics win there. 10 years, maybe. 30-40-50 years, no. If you have a forcing that’s strong enough, it will absolutely overwhelm such oscillations over the long run. Heck, if the forcing is really strong (Pinatubo), it’ll overshadow them in the short run as well. When you start appealing to ocean oscillations for sustained trends of appreciable magnitude over 30+ years, you need to flesh it out a bit – you need oscillations that are high amplitude and low frequency – where is the heat coming from. You can’t just say, ‘magic!’, it’s the PDO! when the ocean heat content also went up over the time period in question.
Is it unusual to see a letter published in “Science” accompanied by a photo in this manner?
“carrot eater (Comment#42633) May 12th, 2010 at 11:01 am
Radiative transfer is a new talking point? It’s been at the very heart of the matter for decades, if not over a century.
Nobody says this, except for sceptics looking for a strawman. Like yourself, here. Radiative transfer in a radiative-convective model will help you describe lots of things – solar effects, CO2, CH4, volcanoes. Not just CO2.”
Right, then why did you guys need to to manipulate all that tree ring data and upside down sediment cores, surface stations, hide the decline and MWP to show “it has never been warmer” when RT was all you needed to show it will be warm and will get warm.
That’s what I mean Amac.
And I dont believe the modern temperature record is okay or is accurate and we can clearly and reasonably think they fudged the raw data at the CRU. They are still arguing and worrying over a questionable fraction of one degree where I come from (and I am not alone!)
Adam Gallon: Is putting a picture there unusual for Science?
No.
Last week, a picture of bugs, for an article about eating bugs.
Before that, some fish and a coral reef. Picture source: author of letter.
Before that, some dogs in a cage, for an article about finding animals for research. Picture source: some NGO.
I can’t tell if the authors were consulted ahead of time on any of these, though it’s likely for the coral reef one, since the photo is sourced to the letter-writer.
deputyheadmistress (Comment#42640),
“Not significant to the overall discussion here, but this is a response based on ignorance of the contents of the Bible. ”
Please, you know nothing of what you speak. I had a quite adequate Christian training prior to rejecting all religion as utter nonsense, and I am very familiar with the bible and it’s content.
.
You miss the point of my comment. How people who believe that the bible contains absolute truth have acted over the centuries toward people who disagree with them is what needs to be avoided. Any belief system that proclaims itself absolutely right carries the potential to do absolutely horrible things. I do hope you see this danger… it has nothing in particular to do with the contents of the bible, it has to do with what “true believers” of any stripe are capable of.
“rejecting all religion as utter nonsense”
SteveF
Bad move, IMHO.
Andrew
SteveF (Comment#42656)
deputyheadmistress (Comment#42640)
On Biblical scholarship — this is so totally not what I meant to say.
Rather, I was thinking of tweed-jacket-wearing humanities professors, JRR Tolkein or Indiana Jones, maybe. Arguing the scholarship.
Let’s drop this line, maybe…
AMac,
“Let’s drop this line, maybe…”
Agree 100%. It will not be productive.
Carrot Eater:
Yes! This is exactly correct.
It’s the snag that skeptics run into when trying to say “what about 2000-09”. And it’s why there is an issue with interpretation of GCM output, if the GCM does not produce accurate fluctuations on those time scales (it means you have to use a long enough duration to fit to, so that errors in reproducing this short-period fluctuation doesn’t matter).
Part of what makes climate difficult to wrap your head around is the complexity of the problem:
The various atmospheric ocean oscillations not only affect mean surface temperature, in general they affect global albedo too (shift the same pattern of clouds north or south and the solar SWR albedo associated with them changes, even if area of the clouds is conserved). So even if you are tracking heat energy of the total system, you can still have net decreases in total heat energy associated with a given phase of an atmospheric ocean oscillation.
I like James Hansen’s description of CO2 as a “loading of dice” of the fluctuations in the atmosphere/ocean system. Increasing CO2 not only increases the GHG effect (in electrical engineering this would be described as an offset bias), it also affects the total amplification of the system, meaning that the amplitudes of the various oscillations show grow in response to the increase in atmospheric CO2 content.
It does mean climate will become more variable and that does mean you can still have periods of net heat energy loss from the system even with an increase in the CO2 forcings.
IMO, it doesn’t mean that CO2 forcings will ever necessarily “overwhelm” other climate forcings to the point where you get a nice visual tracking of CO2 concentration and global mean temperature.
Re: Boris (May 12 10:17),
I think being vague on who you are talking about has many serious shortcomings. These includes:
1) People you are not accusing don’t know you don’t mean them. You alienate them.
2) Some readers know you don’t mean them, but think you might be smearing someone they think is not worthy of smearing. You alienate these readers.
3) Some readers have no idea who you might be referring too and think you are just suffering from paranoid delusions about some non-existent group.
4) Some readers suspect who they think you mean, but know that the fact you did not name them means those people are robbed of the opportunity to present their side.
5) Some readers observe the habit of being vague and think you are an unfair weasel. That alienates them.
Relative to this, the fact that people you did accuse might complain you accused them seems like a pretty lame reason not to name names.
Re: Carrick (May 12 13:37),
Why? The paleoclimate evidence that I’ve seen is that warmer is less rather than more variable. If the relative humidity stays nearly constant, then the total heat capacity (sensible plus latent) of the atmosphere goes up. Higher heat capacity means a longer time constant, damping rather than enhancing short term fluctuations. Polar amplification means a smaller temperature difference between the equator and the poles, so the pressure gradient force, the driving force for a lot of global circulation, is smaller rather than larger.
Carrick,
Let’s see here.
Yes, ocean dynamics can change cloud patterns, which then change the radiation balance.
You’re losing me here. There’s all sorts of work on whether warming will affect ENSO and the like (and how so), but I didn’t think we can definitively say that the amplitudes of ENSO and other variations will be greater.
I don’t think anybody says that, except for strawmen-raisers. The point is that human-related forcings will be/are apparent as a long-term secular trend superimposed on the high frequency unforced variability, which will always be present. Or, you can just smooth the temperature series.
Alternately, people mean that human-related forcings outweigh natural forcings.
It isn’t obvious to me how much the total thermal energy of the system changes with ENSO, as opposed to it being redistributed around the system. This goes back to the clouds, among other things. This is something I’ve been meaning to brush up on in the literature.
Carrick,
“It does mean climate will become more variable”
Seems like a lot of speculation here. Can you provide references that support this, or at least offer clear explanation why you think it is so?
Ha. Three different people all objected to the same idea there (me, dewitt, stevef)
Hey, Wait! The pic is a PERFECT representation of the science… fake photoshopped bull shit!
Steve F “How people who believe that the bible contains absolute truth have acted over the centuries toward people who disagree with them is what needs to be avoided.”
Actually, I agreed with you about that.
What I objected to was your implication that this ‘sport’ was found in the pages of the Bible itself, and I do know exactly of what I speak. You implied that burning heretics at the stake was a practice advocated in the Bible, and it’s not. That’s all I am saying. This doesn’t need to be a theological discussion at all.
Does Book A. recommend burning heretics at the stake?
In this case, nope, the book in question does not- what its purported followers might have done notwithstanding- and that’s not a matter of opinion.
Am I too literal at times? Yes. I like precision.
deputyheadmistress (Comment#42676),
“You implied that burning heretics at the stake was a practice advocated in the Bible, and it’s not. …. Am I too literal at times? Yes.”
.
Well we completely agree on that. Nobody who did not just drop down from Mars would suggest the Bible, or the Koran, or The Communist Manifesto advocate atrocities. Yet…
DeWitt Payne:
Depends on the time scales of course. Beyond that for paleoclimate all things are not equal: as your continents drift, ocean circulation patterns change too.
The (equatorial) Hadley cell doesn’t depend on the polar temperature. If anything, its amplitude gets bigger.
Third, regional scale feedbacks most definitely increase. How much depends on how much the water vapor feedback contributes in addition to radiative forcing.
Carrot Eater:
You’re right, but that’s only because the GCMs are still unreliable for this. The expectation in the community is that it will become larger, but we can’t say “definitively”. I was giving you my view on how I thought it would go, which all things being equally, implies growth in short-period oscillation oscillation amplitudes.
That’s at the same level of proof as saying an increase in CO2 means an increase in temperature. It could turn out to not work out that way, but it would require a “conspiracy by nature.”
Those were almost
their exact words:
You can parse them so they aren’t wrong, but as phrased it’s clearly erroneous.
That is the picture that I always have assumed.
I’d like to know the answer to that too. I’m not sure it’s known.
SteveF:
The argument is pretty simple.
The amplitude of the ocean-atmospheric couplings depends on the amplification of solar radiation from CO2 and water vapor. Increase the CO2 (and throw in a water vapor feedback effect) and you’d expect the amplitude to depend on the level of CO2 forcings.
By more “variable” though, I only mean in the sense that it is “measurable and a significant effect.”
Whether it’s relevant for policy makers is an entirely separate issue.
lucia, you are in great company. Anthony has weighted in on WuWt.
.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/05/12/new-bear-species-discovered-ursus-bogus/
.
another well thought out critisism of the piece by 255 NAS scientists!
.
and he is basing it on Tim Blair:
.
http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/timblair/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/ursus_bogus/
.
“sceptics” are a little easy to predict, these days. zero substance.
Carrot Eater:
BRING IT ON!
😉
Nathan (Comment#42561)
May 12th, 2010 at 12:59 am
“That statement is hyperbole. No one claims AGW will ‘destroy the world’.”
.
LoL…I knew I only had to wait a few hours for a new post. Its to easy looking back for older ones.
.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/7710229/Climate-change-could-make-half-the-world-uninhabitable.html
.
“Under realistic scenarios out to 2300, we may be faced with temperature increases of 12 degrees or even more,” he said. “If this happens, our current worries about sea level rise, occasional heatwaves and bushfires, biodiversity loss and agricultural difficulties will pale into insignificance beside a major threat – as much as half the currently inhabited globe may simply become too hot for people to live there.”
Here’s a reference on the effect of increase in CO2 affecting ENSO frequency and strength.
Timmermann, A., M. Latif, A. Bacher, J. Oberhuber, and E. Roeckner, 1999: Increased El Nino frequency in a climate model forced by future greenhouse warming. Nature, 398, 694-696.
link.
So Lucia and Anthony are throwing out the same red meat.
Timmermann has his publications listed here. There may be others besides the one I dug up that are relevant too. It would be worth the time for anybody who is interested in that to read through Timmermann’s work on this.
DeWitt, another thing that occurred to me was that the polar amplification mostly refers to land temperature.
There isn’t much of an effect in ocean temperature trends.
If anything there is a weakening of the driving…. global ocean circulation forcings from pole-equatorial temperature difference is increasing slightly over time.
Hm…that’s not a result I anticipated. >.>
? I’d phrase it the exact same way. The exact same way. Meaning that human-forcings are dominating over natural forcings. It’s implicit that unforced cycles will continue to exist in the meanwhile; I’m surprised you’d read this in any other way.
I assume the answer (or at least an answer) is in Trenberth’s papers somewhere.
Also, even if the picture isn’t apparent in real life, you can know what the models do in this regard. With the caveats that the models don’t have this nailed yet, of course.
SteveF,
I think that there are policies that the majority can agree on. That is not my issue here.
What I am finding is that I cannot see behind the curtain. I feel that perhaps I am experiencing what a psychopath experiences: I see an event and I see reactions to that event but I cannot make the connection between the two.
As to the point raised by Andrew_KY about me not believing in absolute truth, this has never been a problem for me before in discussing controversial things. Indeed, my time on the internet in these kinds of discussions has mainly been with Christians of various types, and I have always managed to come to an understanding of their positions and the reasons behind them. I am unclear why it would be a particular problem in the case of AGW.
AMac,
There may indeed be many things that those in this discussion can learn from religious debates. However, for me personally religious debates seem orders of magnitude easier than this one.
Carrot Eater:
They didn’t say “forcings.” Again what they say was:
“Natural causes” isn’t just forcings nor are “human-induced changes”. I just don’t see how one could read it in that narrow way. That’s my opinion.
Carrick,
“The amplitude of the ocean-atmospheric couplings depends on the amplification of solar radiation from CO2 and water vapor. ”
In light of the recent claims of Lindzen & Choi (the updated version of the 2009 paper submitted), Spencer (paper awaiting publication), Trendberths “missing heat” paper, and lack of significant ocean heat accumulation in the last 5+ years, I’m not convinced the net amplification by water vapor is significant. I think what you say about increasing short term variability remains speculative.
“As to the point raised by Andrew_KY about me not believing in absolute truth, this has never been a problem for me before in discussing controversial things.”
Not to nitpick, you David, but not believing in absolute truth leaves you the ‘out’ of dismissing truths you don’t like. You can always then say “that’s not my truth, therefore I can discard it.”
Some people think it’s better to learn what the absolute truths are (about themselves and the world around them)and hold on to them, and that is a better long-term philosophy, than believing or not believing in things based on subjective and temporary personal preferences, fads, and/or short-term gratifications.
Andrew
Andrew_KY,
Except that I have never used that response. I am not a post-modernist – I find post-modernism to be very silly indeed.
My thinking on absolute truth is in some ways similar to Kant’s. There is indeed a way that the universe in fact *is*. But all we can every reach are approximations of this truth. This is in fact the basis of science. I think that finding out what the objective truth is is impossible – or at least I have never encountered a methodology which enables one to determine objective truth.
Deductive logic relies on premises, which either have to be proved using deductive logic on other premises or the premises have to be declared true without proving them.
Inductive logic relies on failing to detect a counterexample, which does not prove that there are no counterexamples.
So neither method enables the determining of objective truth.
David Gould,
“What I am finding is that I cannot see behind the curtain. ”
.
I admit I’m not completely sure about what you mean.
However, the reactions I see seem not at all surprising, and quite easy to understand. The undercurrent everywhere in debates on GHG is based mainly on political inclination.
.
People on the left see drastic public action as a good, just, and proper response to GHG warming, in part because it opens vast new opportunities for making sure people live the “right” way, and more importantly, it opens new ways to make life more “just” (AKA taxing the rich). People on the right see drastic public action as questionable, and certain to be both stupid and inefficient in implementation. They are openly hostile to government telling people what the “right” way to live is, and most of all, see it all as an effort by the left to redistribute wealth (AKA taxing the rich); which they consider nothing more than legalized theft.
.
People on the left see government as a force of good, so think it should be expanded to cope with every problem, while people of the right see government, at best, as a necessary evil, and think it should be limited to address as few problems as possible.
.
Read over the comments in this thread, and try to guess the political inclinations of the different people; I think their political inclinations are pretty obvious in most cases.
“I think that finding out what the objective truth is is impossible – or at least I have never encountered a methodology which enables one to determine objective truth.”
Well, it seems to me that for you to get along, you have to functionally accept some things as objective truths. What are these things and what method do you use to discern them?
Andrew
Carrick
That can be your opinion, but it’s quite a strained reading. I really wouldn’t expect anybody to read that statement as meaning that high frequency climate noise won’t be observed anymore. Apparently you do, but that’s frankly just weird.
Carrot Eater:
What I find weird is that you would assume a letter written for general consumption would have some secret, not spelled out nuance associated with it. Weirdly defensive indeed.
Andrew_KY,
Of course. I provisionally or functionally, as you put it, accept many things as true – millions of things, I suppose, if they were all broken down and laid out. Inductive logic is the main method, but deductive logic based on premises supported by inductive logic is a large part also. I would imagine that cultural/social/familial indoctrination/education plays a major part also.
I understand the limitations of logic and accept that anything that I currently believe to be true might not be. I have had three major paradigm shifts in my life thus far, and I was as strong in my provisional acceptance of the truth of my previous ones as I am in my provisional acceptance of my current one.
Given that there is no methodology that enables us to determine what the objective truth is, it seems a pretty pointless notion from my perspective. Provisional truth is the best that we have to work with, and that seems good enough in any case.
I know a lot of people who might be called to be on the left, but I don’t know anybody who thinks anything like that.
Most of them just want a price on carbon, and let market forces take care of it from there.
SteveF:
Well we disagree on that that. I don’t give much weight to Lindzen and Choi though, so that could explain part of it. And how exactly does Trenberth’s “missing heat” undermine the notion of water vapor feedback?
I did provide a paper that included climate modeling supporting my comment, so it’s really not very speculative.
Some RC comments are relevant here.
SteveF,
Oh, I understand the politics. That is one of the main issues that I have here: that reading this thread you can pick out who is one what side of the debate based on their reaction to this letter. But to me that makes no sense whatsoever. What I am saying is that the event – the letter – has no relation whatsover to the reactions. The reactions are, in fact, *completely independent* of the letter. This is my issue; this is where I am failing to grasp what it is that people mean.
Carrick,
No, you’re straining to read it in a way that just doesn’t make any sense. You are willfully taking a straight-forward, unconfusing and simple statement, and torturing it. How anybody could read that statement and think it means that year-year variability won’t exist anymore is beyond me. We’re talking about climate, not noise.
“I have had three major paradigm shifts in my life thus far, and I was as strong in my provisional acceptance of the truth of my previous ones as I am in my provisional acceptance of my current one”
David,
Forgive my curiosity, but what were the major provisional truths you discarded, and which ones did you accept as replacements and why? Because I think if you have a pattern of discarding and accepting new ‘truths’, then maybe you just have an issue seeing the difference between what are facts/truths and what are beliefs. This, I think, probably is a skill that you can improve.
Andrew
Andrew_KY,
The three major paradigm shifts were:
1.) Christian to atheist.
2.) Believer in free will to a non-believer in same; and
3.) Believer in the self to a non-believer in same.
In some ways, they were part of the same shift. But each change occurred at different times – I have written them in the order in which they occurred.
It should be pointed out that prior to the change I was a Christian for around 12 years – from the age of 18 to the age of 30, and have now been an atheist for 9 years, so it is not as though I have made a habit of shifting (although I was what might be classified as a rebellious teen atheist).
I accept, by the way, that my views are … unusual. 😉 I would estimate that fewer than one in a thousand people share my positions on these three issues.
David,
I see that your shifts were philosophical/religious in nature, and the motivations for them are from changes of belief. We all confront these kinds of issues.
I have to run. Thanks for the dialogue. Perhaps we can continue the discussion later on. 😉
Andrew
Carrot Eater,
“Most of them just want a price on carbon, and let market forces take care of it from there.”
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Does anyone really say that? What does “a price on carbon” mean? Does it mean cap and trade? Cap and trade doesn’t put a price on carbon, it mostly takes money from some people and gives it to others, with the government taking a fat slice. Does it mean a straight carbon tax (X dollars per ton)? Well, that sounds a little better, until you see that the only way to significantly reduce fossil fuel consumption is to drastically raise the cost; the Europeans are way ahead of the USA on this… look at their fuel consumption and look at their fuel prices. That gives you some idea of the tax level needed to make a significant reduction…. about 100%-150% of the non-taxed value starts to make a significant difference in consumption. Now were will all that money go? Oh, government. And will government then reduce everyone’s income taxes because of that huge carbon tax? Don’t count on it. Sure, politically favored people will get “tax relief”, politically unfavored people (AKA the rich) will get skinned alive. Total government expenditures as a fraction of GDP will grow drastically, and people will be ever more dependent on government… since government has more of their money!
Andrew_KY,
Happy to – although lucia might not like it, depending on where we go with it … 🙂
The ENSO and the PDO are not noise, they are climate, and they all have multiyear periods. They are not “year-to-year” variability. I have no idea where you got the notion we were discussing that.
These are plain as English words:
ENSO is a natural cause. 10 years of a person’s life is long enough to count it climate. They said “human-induced changes”. Perhaps you are correct that they mean “forcings”.
But if so, you’ve simply confirmed my opinion that it is a poorly written article. There is no chance in 1000000 that the average reader would have instinctively said “let’s integrate over 50 years to avoid short term climate when we make this comparison.”
You are right it is a straightforward statement. Had they meant to say “forcings”, my guess is they probably would have said “forcings” instead of “changes”. There’s no way to make the two words mean the same thing.
The best I can give them is it is badly worded. You have some bizarre need to carry Gleick’s underwear, so I’ll leave you the chance to do so one more time… this argument over the meaning of “is” is getting wearisome.
That’s how capitalism works, money passes from one party to the other. I don’t know how the government gets a big slice of it?
Yes, Cap and trade means a fatter government with the guy at the bottom usually providing the meat and potatoes… and desert… and the bar tab
SteveF (Comment#42722) May 12th, 2010 at 8:21 pm
Yes. I think it’s a fairly common position. Put in a carbon price, and let the market take things where ever they may go from there.
That’s one way of implementing it. I like it because the market sets the price; I prefer that to having the government arbitrarily set the price. On the downside, a market-set price is also less predictable or more volatile.
Weird statement. It very much does. The market price of an emissions permit is your price on carbon.
Eh? It puts certain businesses (and their customers, if they’re captive) at a disadvantage. But that’s the point.
Depends on how it’s done. If the allowances are auctioned off in the beginning, then the government gets a windfall up front. (if they’re simply given away, then the receiving businesses receive a windfall). I prefer an auction; again, allow the market to efficiently allocate resources.
But yes, that means revenue for the government up-front; I’d partially rebate that, partially pay down the debt.
It can, and many prefer that. I don’t, as I don’t think the government knows how to decide what X should be.
I don’t know about drastic, but it’ll have to be something – to further encourage conservation and efficient use, as well as alternatives. The conventional wisdom is $20-$30 per ton; as I said before, I tend to prefer having the market set that price.
As it happens, if oil gets a bit more expensive on its own anyway, that’ll do to some extent.
Well, when oil went from $30 to $50, nobody really cared. When it hit $100, then behaviours finally budged. Then the recession hit, and it became hard to separate the effects. Can you extract a demand curve from that data? Probably not, because it takes time for people to switch cars, install insulation, etc. Where am I going with this? I’d like to see a more careful attempt at finding the demand curve.
That would be the idea.
You can say that, but I’d wait to see the details of any legislation on that matter. If your complaint is with the details of how the rebates or income tax reductions are structured, then that’s your complaint – not with the overall general idea.
Only if the idea isn’t made revenue neutral. If you’d be OK with the idea if it were revenue neutral and didn’t change the current relative tax burdens (rich, middle, poor), then you should say so. It would help define what you would support, as opposed to just saying no from the start.
Carrick
With climate traditionally defined over timescales of 30 years, ENSO is very much noise. The PDO is physically ill-defined to begin with. Year-to-year, interannual, whatever you want to call it, they aren’t things that you’d expect to give you sustained trends over 30 years, of any appreciable magnitude.
If they’d specified ‘forcings’, then people would be accusing them of using jargon. As we’ve seen, the Lizas of the world don’t know what ‘forcing’ means, and become hostile when you use the word for some reason.
And I don’t agree that they need to say forcings there. I wouldn’t have. The statement is perfectly fine the way it was; protest as you will. The human-related causes are strong enough to be discerned as long term trends. Meaning, it is visible over both natural forcings and unforced variations.
I think a great many people in 1,000,000 have a feel for climate being a long-term thing. The exceptions are perhaps the unfortunate readers of WUWT, where ‘climate is not weather’ is a joke, not a lesson to remember.
And no, I have no allegiance to Gleick. I’m just not going to stand for weird readings of plain statements. But if you must know, I personally think this passage is incorrect:
Well, clearly, taking cautious half-measures is a third option, and realistically, the most likely choice. Though it hardly makes for a strong concluding paragraph.
Carrot Eater:
Well the IPCC says:
The “old school” 30-year period is a good one if you want to separate trends from periodic oscillations, but that’s the only reason for that original choice. But it is not true to say this is a firm number. The definition of “weather” these days is the value for the classic meteorological variables for periods less than two weeks. Climate is any period longer than that.
Next try typing ENSO+climate in a google window and you’ll get over 4,000,000 hits, many of them apropos to the treatment of ENSO as part of climate.
If climatologists think ENSO is part of climate, that’s good enough for me. For many climatologists, ENSO is not noise. (Weather is noise.)
They could have used your paragraph that I liked. That was a much better way of saying it. I doubt anybody would have complained about forcings. Anyway, it’s pretty much a strawman argument in any case, unless you can land an example where a reasonable reader has actually complained about the use of the word “forcings.”
Nah, IMO, you’re just being argumentative. The plain statement just isn’t saying what you’re trying to make it say, at least in the context of a document written for the general public: context matters for interpretation, a principle of critical reading. I think we’ll go back and forth on this all night with no resolution, so I promise to shut up on this already.
I agree with the problems of the final paragraph. It shows symptoms of western thinking, namely it is a “bipolar representation”, where the solution set has gotten pigeon-holed into just two possible values. There are an infinite range of solutions available, and it may well turn out that the solutions some people think are mandated to solve the problem aren’t even solutions at all!
MikeC (Comment#42727) May 12th, 2010 at 9:26 pm
The government is out of the loop. What it means is that ‘high carbon’ energy costs more to buy than ‘low carbon’ energy.
It’s a part of the climate, but it’s a cycle.
bugs (Comment#42742)
It’s a part of the climate, but it’s a cycle.
Why and How?
carrot eater (Comment#42729),
OK. Step by step:
” Put in a carbon price, and let the market take things where ever they may go from there.”
There already are prices on fossil fuels, and at least in some places, the price of fuel is a reflection of the market. To justify any artificial shortage (cap and trade), you must assume that government is capable of setting a reasonable emissions goal. I most certainly do not. The experience in Europe with cap and trade seems to me ample evidence that cap and trade is subject to continuous political manipulation, and does not reduce emissions in any meaningful way.
.
” Cap and trade doesn’t put a price on carbon,
Weird statement. It very much does. The market price of an emissions permit is your price on carbon.
it mostly takes money from some people and gives it to others,
Eh? It puts certain businesses (and their customers, if they’re captive) at a disadvantage. But that’s the point.”
Weird responses. Since every cap and trade scheme is controlled by politics, “the market” doesn’t have a lot to do with the real price of a permit, except for the politically disfavored. Politicians will grant permits to favored industries and constituencies. It is a huge political can of worms.. see the European results. It is far worse than a flat tax on carbon emissions; a complex, expensive, and ineffective plan that fairly well invites political malfeasance.
.
” Does it mean a straight carbon tax (X dollars per ton)?
It can, and many prefer that. I don’t, as I don’t think the government knows how to decide what X should be.”
We agree on this, at least if the objective is to reduce fossil fuel consumption. If the objective is to raise money, then X is pretty easy to choose.
.
“Well, when oil went from $30 to $50, nobody really cared. When it hit $100, then behaviours finally budged. Then the recession hit, and it became hard to separate the effects. Can you extract a demand curve from that data? Probably not, because it takes time for people to switch cars, install insulation, etc. Where am I going with this? I’d like to see a more careful attempt at finding the demand curve.”
Well, it is true that an exact demand curve does not exist for the USA, but there is a long history of heavy taxes on petroleum in Europe, and their per-capita consumption of petroleum is about half that of the USA. This represents a reasonable estimate of the long term impact of much higher prices, but it would take many years for USA consumption to fully respond to much higher prices. As you note, much of USA consumption is built into the physical infrastructure: housing designs, residences outside of cities, roadway based industrial logistics, few passenger train systems outside of cities, etc. These things would take multiple decades to react to higher prices. Put $30 per ton on carbon emissions, and it would yield little reduction in consumption, even long term, because the added cost would never justify investment in lower energy use infrastructure. A $200 – $300 per ton flat tax would theoretically reduce consumption, especially in the long term, but before that could happen the system may compensate for it: the politicians who passed the tax might be out of work (note what recently happened in France). The reason cap and trade is so adored by politicians and a flat tax so hated is that cap and trade allows politicians to minimize risk of loss of office, since they can favor their constituency and place the burden on people who would not vote for them in any case. Cap and trade is the ideal system for politicians.
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” If you’d be OK with the idea if it were revenue neutral and didn’t change the current relative tax burdens (rich, middle, poor), then you should say so. It would help define what you would support, as opposed to just saying no from the start.”
I have been around to too long to trust politicians on this one. Once a huge amount of new tax money is available, there is no telling where it will end up. I am basically opposed to any scheme that tempts government to determine economic outcomes. I would support a very low flat tax ($10 – $20 per ton) to fund research on energy efficiency and low carbon alternatives, if the tax was a) of specified (short) duration with automatic expiration, and b) all proceeds directed to energy R&D use. But I do not suggest that this low tax would have any significant effect on consumption.
Which is exactly the point here.
Context. When talking about long term secular trends, ENSO is noise. If you’re studying ENSO in particular, then it’s your signal.
The point is to say that the human impact on climate is apparent as a warming trend, not to give a dissertation on signal/noise. The statement says the former just fine.
You could unpack any of the broad statements like this. You could just as well criticise them for saying that greenhouse gas concentrations are increasing, without mentioning there’s a seasonal cycle in the CO2 concentration. (though probably few laymen are aware of that cycle). But there’s no doubt to any reader that they’re talking about the long term trend.
http://deepclimate.org/2010/05/11/how-to-be-a-climate-auditor-part-1-pretty%C2%A0pictures/
Well, well. It seems that DC has found another “fake” image, but this time instead of supposedly implying some “emotional” argument, the fake image actually relates to one of the arguments made–i. e. that the IPCC “artfully” hid the Briffa reconstruction behind the others. Maybe the Daily Mail, Steve Mc and the Hide the Decline video makers need to hire the WSJ’s fact checkers. 🙂
Oh, and my internet must be broken because I can’t seem to find the correction to this fake image. I’m certain it would have been published within a day or so. Any help?
SteveF
You take ETS as an example to learn from. You don’t have to do exactly what ETS did. If you want a positive example, then look at the very successful cap/trade program on SOx. The concept works; we’ve seen it work.
All the bad things you say about cap/trade in concept are undermined by the fact it’s worked like a charm before, for SOx.
Only if you hand the permits out, instead of auctioning them out. I clearly stated that auctioning them out is the best way.
Yes, these things take time, though movement can happen more quickly than you think. And some efficiency gains can come pretty quickly. The energy intensity of the economy has been doing down, after all.
Your idea on how high the carbon price has to be seems to be an outlier high. For electricity generation, you can do rough estimates (4 cents/kWh vs 8 cents/kWh, etc). The downside is that the capital for existing coal plants has already been paid off, so replacing an existing coal plant isn’t so simple as that. But to the extent that new capacity will be needed, you can include capital costs for all.
For transport, alternatives are a little less obvious, until/unless we start importing sugar-based ethanol or figure out cellulosic. But even using traditional fuels, you can get efficiency gains and conservation, and we already see this, brought on by high oil prices and recession.
.
I’m not asking you to trust. I’m simply saying, if the proposal were X, would you be OK with X? I’m not asking what you’d say if the politicians took X, messed it up, and made it Y instead.
My guess is that whatever comes out of Congress will be too low to move the market, so it will pretty much just be that – a funding mechanism for research and subsidies. Research is great, but subsidies, we have to be careful. Subsidies embody pretty much everything you’ve been speaking out against – the government picking winners, picking political favorites.
In the short term, I’m OK with that – for example I support the government subsidising the heck out of a handful of new nuclear plants, so that we can get a sense of what challenges remain in building the new generation ones. But subsidies have a habit of sticking around past their usefulness, and the nuclear people will probably take some of theirs for granted.
Carrot eater,
.
$200 per ton for carbon is almost exactly $0.08 per KW hour additional cost fora coal fired plant. I think my estimate of $200 – $300 per ton to significantly impact consumption is in no way an outlier. Such prices of course make nuclear much more economically attractive than coal, but the permitting system (yes, government again) makes it impossible to build a nuclear plant in less than 15 years… if ever. So changing from coal would still be a very slow process, even at $200 – $300 per ton tax.
.
” I’m not asking what you’d say if the politicians took X, messed it up, and made it Y instead.”
But that is what they almost certainly will do! I could ask: Would you support the Devil if his program said XYZ? Maybe you would, but I would not; government programs are always subject to politically driven change.
.
“a funding mechanism for research and subsidies”
Who said anything about subsidies? I would never support subsidies… they are subject to all the same (political) moral hazards as cap and trade.
Carrot Eater,
I just realized that our exchange shows political differences clearly: You believe government does mostly good things, while I think it mostly just screws things up.
How on earth can you possibly get that from the above? I am clearly saying I want government out of it as far as possible – don’t let the government decide who gets the permits, don’t let the government decide what the carbon price should be. These are functions for the market, not the government.
What’s confusing you is that I’m asking you to judge a policy as it’s drawn up on the chalkboard here, not what it would look like after the Senate was done with it. Just to see where we can start with. Because I can make the exact same complaints about your idea: that the Senate would not actually make a flat tax and fund research with it, but end up giving exemptions to some favored industries, put a higher tax on less favored industries, and use the revenue to do random other things.
You see?
So if you get to present a clean-slate idea, and ask it to be judged as is before political realities muck it up, then so do I. But don’t confuse that for me thinking the government does mostly good things.
Carrot Eater:
And my point being here.. this is a letter aimed at a lay audience. Context matters. They aren’t going to grok the difference between climate that they have experienced for 10 years of their lives and a 30 year minimum period to disambiguate CO2 forcings from other shorter-period ones.
Context certainly matters, especially in cases like this.
Beyond that, there are some issues with your assumptions. ENSO amplitude can influence long term temperature trends. Let’s take a simple from of a feedback model as an example:
G(t) = 1/(1-f(t))
where G is the net climate amplification and f(t) is the feedback from atmospheric fluctuations with the long term average <f(t)> = 0.
If you look at the long term average of G:
<G> = <1/(1-f(t))>
and expand 1/(1-f(t)) in f(t) small, there’s a contribution from <f(t)^2> to G(t) for example.
So ENSO isn’t necessarily “noise” even wrt temperature trends.
This sort of bias exists anytime you look at averages where the fluctuating quantity appears in the denominator. (Measuring the velocity of the turbulent flow in a wind tunnel is a classic example where this shows up.)
For pete’s sake. They’re telling the lay audience that there has been a warming trend, and man has a lot to do with it. I really don’t see how anybody would take it any other way, except maybe you. Just because you want a longer discourse on unforced variability doesn’t mean it makes any sense to parse the statement with that fixation in mind.
Pete’s not here, and what they wrote, from a lay perspective or a technical level, is deceptive at best, or wrong at worst.
What happens from 2000-10 in terms of climate is important to many people, and many on both sides have wondered what that implies about global warming.
It should be obvious to everybody you’re being hyperpartisan here or in your words “weirdly defensive”. What Gleick wrote was dumb, too bad you’re not intellectually honest enough to admit it.
BS. From any point of view, it is clear what they meant, and it is just fine. Just because you want to torture it to death, to say something it doesn’t, doesn’t make your reading reasonable.
If, in one sentence, I wanted to say that warming is apparent and that human factors are the dominant reasons for that warming, I’d say something like what the letter said. In that one sentence, I wouldn’t bother discussing ENSO. Maybe you want that sentence to be stretched into a paragraph that discusses the nuances of trend magnitudes and ever-present variability, but that simply isn’t necessary every single time you want to simply say that the human effect is apparent as a warming trend.
Why the heck are you obsessed with that particular time span? Why do you think the statement was referring to that time span? You’re just making things up. Look, I get it. You really really really want to always explicitly talk about unforced variability in the same breath that we talk about long term trends. But not everybody has that fixation.
It should be obvious that I know how to read. What this all says about you, I don’t know.
Re: David Gould (May 12 20:31),
You are right. I think it’s best of you and Andrew_KY don’t delve into theology on this thread. Maybe someday, I can start a no holds barred religion thread. It could get ugly.
lucia (Comment#42827),
“it could get ugly.”
Only if we non-religious folk choose to participate. Otherwise the majority will burn the minority at the stake, and it will end quickly! 😉
Re: Boris (May 13 07:49),
Thanks for the link to the criticism of McIntyre’s “hide the decline” criticism. This is sure to lead to some, er, interesting exchanges. Backing out the vitriol, it ought to be possible to make some sense of this. Deepclimate has established credibility with his criticisms of the Wegman report, in my opinion.
“it could get ugly.â€
Nah. I bet if there were a Native American, Hindu, Muslim, or Buddhist poster you’d be real nice to them even if they didn’t buy into the AGW religion too. (I happen to know people like this personally, I live in California!)
(You guys are something else!)
“it could get ugly.â€
So could conversations about climate science.
Did I mention I’ve experienced that Warmers almost always display hostility to people with other beliefs? Not just about AGW, but about things like religion and philosophy.
That could be the reason.
Andrew
Re: discussion of religion. Count me out. I’m the one who raised the subject in this thread (slaps own wrist). That part of this conversation went nowhere.
X% chance that a mixed religion/AGW discussion will prove enlightening.
Y% chance that commenters will take offense and harden prior viewpoints.
Y >> X.
Re: Boris #42760, AMac #42848
Boris, on your link to Deepclimate’s criticsim of McIntyre.
McIntyre offers a brief rebuttal of DC here.
AMac,
That isn’t a rebuttal. That’s McI admitting that one of his weak arguments was indeed weak – a petty argument about the colors and the order of data series in the spaghetti graph. When you start reading malintent into stuff like that, it’s getting a little kooky over there.
Reading that post on DC was painful, because of how dumb the point was. But McI raised the point in the first place.
I imagine part 2 of the post will be about McI’s interpreting some emails as alleging that Briffa was being pressured by others to make his graph look a certain way.
edit: on closer look, McI is only conceding the ordering part, not the color choices.
Sigh.