At Collide-a-Scape, Keith Kloor highlighted a proposal by Francis, “A self-proclaimed left/liberal/Democrat”, intended as an olive branch for Republicans. I’d like to engage that proposal by suggesting a counter proposal.
Francis’s proposal relates to inflamed rhetoric, and the concrete part of the proposal appears to be:
Can we both agree to back off a little?
We’ll continue to try to make the case that the global society does need to decarbonize, and we’ll accept that your disagreement doesn’t make you evil. In return, can you agree at least to listen in good faith and accept that our beliefs about the importance of global warming doesn’t make us evil?
As a first suggestion in a negotiation process, this proposal seems ok. However, to be useful any agreement should, presumably, have something in it for all parties subject to the agreement. As written, the parties would seem to include Activist Warmers– including Francis, and “nonActivist Warmers and nonWarmers”. (I call Francis’s party Activist Warmers because they believe in warming and advocate an action– deCarbonization. I assume he is trying to get agreement from all people outside his group.) If we were knocking out a treaty, I would find this one rather lop-sided in favor of the proposer’s (i.e. Francis’s) side.
Let’s examine the provision as stated explicitly. If agreed to,
- What are Warmers explicitly required to do?
a) Accept that ‘nonActivist Warmers and nonWarmers’ disagreeing with Activist Warmers does not make ‘nonActivist Warmers and nonWarmers’ evil. - What are “nonActivist Warmers and nonWarmers” explicitly required to do:
a) Listen in good faith to Activist Warmers and
b) Accept that party Warmers’s continued advocacy for their position does not make Activist Warmers evil. - What are Warmers explicitly permitted to do?
a) Continue advocating their position to party nonActivist warmers and nonWarmers (and note that the other group to is required to listen in good faith.) - What are nonWarmers/nonActivists Warmers explicitly permitted to do?
a) The agreement does not specifically grant them permission to do anything.
So: Activist Warmers only need have to drop their unreasoanble position that people who disagree with them are evil. They don’t need to “listen in good faith” to people with whom they disagree. If we want to pick nits, technically, Activist Warmers don’t get to think “nonActivist Warmers and nonWarmers” advocacy doesn’t make them evil. They merely need to stop thinking nonActivist Warmer/nonWarmerns disagreement — possibly only silent disagreement– doesn’t make them evil.
Meanwhile, nonActivist warmers are required not just to listen, but to listen “in good faith” to vocal advocacy of positions with which they disagree and not think the vocal advocacy makes Warmer’s evil.
Unbalanced– but a good start
Since no one has agreed to the proposal yet, I propose we edit the agreement to equalize both the burdens and boons: Let’s start from the last sentence of the first paragraph. I prose we edit to read as follows:
Can we both agree to back off a little?
Activist Warmers will continue to try to make the case that the global society does need to decarbonize, and they will accept that disagreement with their arguments doesn’t make others evil.
Non Activist Warmers will continue to try to make the case that even the world is warming, the problem can be solved by other means than decarbonization. They will accept that disagreement with their arguments doesn’t make others evil.
Non warmers will continue to try to make the case that there warming is not happening and there is no problem to be solved. They will accept that disagreement with their arguments doesn’t make others evil.
All three groups agree to listen in good faith to the other groups, not poke fun at them, and accept that their beliefs about the global warming and the necessity for action (or lack there of) doesn’t make others evil. All three groups will make a good faith attempt to avoid even the appearance of accusing other parties to this agreement of being evil and will refrain from
- using the word evil during public or private discussions of climate change or decarbonization
- using metaphors involved groups or entities considered evil during discussions of climate cahnge,
- running images alluding to evil along side blog posts touching in anyway on climate change or
- representing their own “side” of the climate debate as examples of good and the “other side” as examples of evil when writing supposedly philosophical treatises on the general nature of evil.
Of course, this version of the proposal is only a start. I’m sure it can be improved; I’d love to read your suggestions. (In honor of the topic, please be civil and do avoid suggesting anyone is evil.)
With some luck, we can find an agency to fund negotiations to take place in a location with a better climate than Chicago in Winter. If the facilities in Cancun are available, I’m sure Keith, Francis, other individuals to be specified and I would love to conduct negotiations there.
Brooklyn (where I live) is the new Manhattan, so I’ll be happy to moderate negotiations here (but let’s do it in the summer). 🙂
Seriously, I’m looking forward to reading suggestions on this thread.
We should probably stipulate that energy companies merely wish to make a profit and are quite capable of shifting their capital to accommodate changing market needs and desires. The motivations of Windmill Manufacturers and Coal Companies is identical. They both hope to profit by selling energy.
No, I totally disagree with this post. I am offended at the notion of decarbonizing the economy. I want to carbonize the atmosphere more. My phd is not in climate science so I will take the Princeton physicist William Happer’s belief that humans would be better off at 2,000ppm.
Keith–
My nephew lives in Brooklyn. Is Brooklyn in April nice?
Shoosh–
Which part of the agreement do you object to: Being required to listen in good faith to ideas advanced by others? Or not accusing those who disagree with you of being evil?
The agreement does not suggest you are required to agree or support the notion of decarbonizing. Just listen in good faith and not accuse those who advocate that path of being evil.
Both sides agreeing to be honest would be a better start.
Andrew
Andrew says:
I think that’s the part of whole point of Lucia’s post. You might consider them wrong, you might not understand the mental process by which they arrived at their conclusion, but it is probably a pretty good bet that they actually believe what they are saying.
Calling someone dishonest is not a very useful exercise. On the other hand, pointing out where their arguments fail to map to reality is often a very useful exercise.
Artifex,
Well, lucia’s post was a bit wordy for my tastes. I like to be more succinct. 😉
Andrew
ROFL This cracks me up. The AGW advocates couldn’t debate civily for years while they had the upper hand… but then came Climategate and now no one believes them… so they decide this is the time to add civility to their debate. No Way. Besides, what would happen to my favorite blog where climate talk gets hot!
Andrew_KY (Comment#65521)
January 12th, 2011 at 12:46 pm
“Artifex,
Well, lucia’s post was a bit wordy for my tastes. I like to be more succinct”
.
Come on Andrew… let’s have a good old fashioned Irish bar brawl… I gotcher back…
“Come on Andrew… let’s have a good old fashioned Irish bar brawl… I gotcher back…”
MikeC,
Let’s put all the Jameson in a safe place before we get started. 😉
Andrew
Agreed with Artifex, accusations of dishonesty have been commonplace all around. Maybe it’s less harmful to think someone a liar than an evil threat to society, but the two often go hand in hand.
I allow for the possibility that people may be dishonest, that they may lie, but this seems to be quite rare. Better to assume everyone is honest, though some may be deluded, inconsistent, or out of touch with reality. Still, focus on the arguments not the person.
What I object to is that either side is evil. I don’t think the global warmers are evil, just really dumb. Harrywr2 said it best, a coal company and a windmill company both seek to profit off energy. I don’t care what they do as long as they don’t try to tax greenhouse gasses, raise gasoline prices or subsidize industry like they do ethanol. I’ve seen the assertion that the U.S. government subsidizes our oil, I think this is either false or a bad quarter truth because it is fact that the government taxes the oil companies at a rate of 40% and it may be higher now.
Come on Andrew… we’ll get a bucket of KFC
“I allow for the possibility that people may be dishonest, that they may lie”
Zajko,
Quite. That’s why we should agree to be honest before we get started.
Andrew
Shoosh
This is just expressing your position– which the agreement above would permit you to express. The agreement — if entered into by others– is that the warmers would be required to listen in good faith to your position and argument in favor of your position without calling you evil. Assuming you are hoping your words will be listened to by some you might wish to be convinced, their agreeing to listen to you would be “what’s in this for shoosh”.
Likewise, you would be required to listen to their position and not call them evil. If they are hoping for you to listen to them that would, presumably be, what’s in it for them.
Since you already don’t call the evil, not calling them evil should be easy for you.
So, what I’m asking you is: Do you object to agreeing to listen to their position (in good faith) and not call them evil— provided they are required to listen in good faith to your views and not call you evil?
I’m not trying to discover what your position is. I’m trying to discover whether you would enter into the sort of agreement to listen to each other and not call each other evil.
Andrew_KY–
I don’t think what I wrote translates into “be honest”. Some of those who call their political opponents evil are honestly expressing their opinion of their political opponents.
I want people to understand that the fact that person disagrees with you doesn’t make that person evil.
“Andrew_KY–
I don’t think what I wrote translates into “be honestâ€. Some of those who call their political opponents evil are honestly expressing their opinion of their political opponents.
I want people to understand that the fact that person disagrees with you doesn’t make that person evil.”
If what you wrote doesn’t contain “be honest” then we definately need to make sure “be honest” is included.
Yes, and a person who disagrees with you doesn’t make that person evil. It’s what the person wants to do to you when you disagree that might might be evil.
Andrew
but Lucia… that’s the way it already is
MikeC–
What’s the way it already is?
Andrew_KY
Fair enough. We can make a note to expand the agreement to somehow include an agreement that all parties must be honest. That said, I think you will need to explain more specifically what “be honest” means.
For example: If the other side thinks you are an idiot, is it dishonest for them to withhold that information? I would prefer we permit people to withhold certain types of personal opinions without deeming that dishonest. However making up false facts should not be permitted.
Since you are the one interested in extending the agreement to include some notion of “be honest”, I challenge you to draft a clause, and word it in a way that requirement binds all parties equally.
Sure. The agreement as it stands permits you to believe and even say someone is evil if they propose to boil you in oil because you disagree with them. In fact, you can consider them evil for wanting to boil you in oil irrespective of their reason for wanting to boil you in oil.
Oh. I should add that you are even permitted to think someone is evil because they would chuckle when watching their political adversary or ex-spouse choke on a chicken bone. The agreement doesn’t require you to never, ever, ever see or diagnose evil. You just agree not to jump to the conclusion that someone is evil because they disagree with your position.
Listening in good faith is called peer review, a process circumvented by those advocating APG.
They can’t play by existing rules, why expect them to play by new ones. The problem with the science to date has been that it has not been honest or fair making it in fact not science.
Simply require honest science on both sides.
“I should add that you are even permitted to think someone is evil because they would chuckle when watching their political adversary or ex-spouse choke on a chicken bone.”
Absolutely! So let’s get a bucket of KFC and have a debate!
… or if that’s evil… how about we do some voodoo and sacrifice the chicken?
What about those of us that believe that warming is/has taking/en place, but don’t attribute it to CO2 in the atmosphere?
Or those who believe most of the CO2 warming theory, but not that it will be catastrophic (ie: the LukeWarmers) ?
This is not to be nit-picky — but allowing only three ‘parties’ in this agreement is way too narrow.
Why can’t we just be like real adults and allow other people to have divergent opinions (without having to assign good/evil labels to them for their opinions)?
I think that how individuals present their views and counter the views of others matters more, as far as judging them, than what ‘party’ they belong to. Respectful polite advocates of all types deserve at least a preliminary hearing, others can accept or dismiss their views as they chose, and after a time, scroll past their posts if they are considered boring or nonsensical. Disrespectful impolite strident snarling advocates should be given a chance to straighten up, ignored if they won’t, until they are barred from normal discourse for refusing to play nice.
Dudley
Listening in good faith is not called peer review.
But, I’m going to have to ask you to clarify what you mean. Are you complaining that peer review has not been carried out in good faith? Or are you suggesting that restricting discussion to papers that survive peer review is ‘listening in good faith”? Or what?
Francis’ proposal strikes me as well-intentioned but pointless.
Let us not agree to be civil. Let us be civil.
There, done!
In other words, if you wish civility in a discussion, then lead by example. Some ill-defined agreement that applies to no one but those already participating in a civil discussion is pointless. Expecting some ill-defined agreement to apply beyond the confines of an already civil forum is beyond pointless. Promoting such ill-defined agreement knowing that it does not and cannot apply beyond the confines of said civil forum constitutes grand-standing, in my humble opinion.
We already have guidance for civility anyhow. It is commonly referred to as The Golden Rule. There’s even a Wikipedia page on it.
You can’t push discourse in the direction of civility from below. You can try to pull it up. That means applying the standard first to yourself, not those who disagree with you.
(edited last sentence for clarity)
Kip Hansen
Sure. I already expanded from 2 parties to 3. Maybe someone could draft language to broaden that further.
I think that’s the goal. If your question is why do we need an agreement, I think the answer is that we observe that some people aren’t acting like real adults.
One difficulty is that some disrespectful, impolite, strident snarling people do not and will not recognize that their behavior is disrespectful, impolite, strident or snarling. If others don’t come right out and say that calling people ‘evil’ merely because they disagree with you, expecting them to sit through your lectures while never listening to them or calling them names is inappropriate. The other difficulty is some of the impolite, strident, snarling advocates are listened to: Joe Romm gets tons of traffic. Yet another difficulty: How do you bar people from discourse? And how do you make sure that those barred from discourse are done for proper reasons?
In principle, getting an agreement that we don’t go around calling people “evil” merely for disagreeing with our positions on climate change would be a concrete start.
… but they do not call them evil because they disagree… they call them evil because in their mind the disagreement is based on greed because they are being bought off by an oil company.
On the other side is the opinion that their adversary wants environmental reforms in order to break down the free market system and institute socialist policies.
Thank you for your comment! It has been added to the moderation queue and will be published here if approved by the webmaster.
changing policies, are we?
I HAVE THE ANSWER.
Realclimate must agree to stop censoring comments. It is petty and wimpy. Also, I submit that real climate should allow me to moderate comments.
And Mr. Keith Kloor, how about we start by recognizing some important facts. Firstly, your side vastly outfunds the skeptical scientists and your side has lied and tried to make it look like oil companies were creating doubt. Second, global warming began and has always been a political movement because Al Gore fired William Happer. If you encourage “FREE MARKET” solutions to decarbonize the atmosphere, even though I think it will be bad, you can go ahead and do it and I won’t say anything. Please just don’t ask me to pay higher taxes. If you do not agree with all of my facts then you can shut your face and get out.
MikeC,
Dont feel too bad, dude. I’ve been moderated b4 and Lucia has deleted a couple of my best comments, dang it all! 😉
Andrew
MikeC– For the past few days, the spam filter has been moderating for mysterious reasons. Every single one of Keith Kloors comments has been moderated this week. Many of Carrick’s have. So have yours, Andrew’s and a few other people’s.
Andrew_KY– Yes. You were moderated during your endless post nothing bot rhetorical questions phase. That’s not what’s happening now.
Shoosh–
Keith is frequently criticized by people who I think you would characterize as “his side”. He also criticizes them frequently.
I don’t think much of RC’s moderating policy, but it’s their blog. It’s silly to suggest they should allow you to moderate comments.
One more thing. The Hadley Centre will bestow an honorary climate science degree to Rush Limbaugh for excellent climate predictions and ozone hole predictions.
Lucia,
I recognize this is not on topic, but:
“You were moderated during your endless post nothing bot rhetorical questions phase. That’s not what’s happening now.
“
Did the endless phase end? 😉
You must set the ground rules before you start negotiating points of contention. That, of course, requires negotiation, but it’s about conduct, not content.
And giving dignity to all sides is fundamental. So is good faith, which means that people are free to be assertive so long as they recognize they might unintentionally be offensive and are willing to “back off” until the impasse has been worked through.
Starting without these basics, Lucia, and you are very unlikely to come to any sort of settlement.
A Code of Conduct for Effective Rational Discussion that was linked on Judith Curry’s blog seems relevant here. The first principle is that everyone has to admit at the start that they might be wrong. If you’re not prepared to change your mind, then you’re not discussing in good faith, at best you’re debating and trying to score points. At worst, you’re being a troll.
DeWitt-
Thanks. Judy’s code for conduct is excellent.
I think that listening in good faith can only be done by people who are willing to admit that a) they might be wrong, b) there might be something worthwhile they are unware of and c) the people who disagree with you on many things may be aware of worthwhile information and at least be right about something relevant to the topic.
Gary–
Agreed. The point of the agreement is to set ground rules for precisely the reason you provide.
After negotiating away claims of dishonesty, can we address my pet peeve next ?
I absolutely hate arguing with some sanctimonious jerk about the beliefs held in “my” head. I somehow doubt that they can read my mind better than I can. The conversation generally runs something like this:
Me: I think A about situation B
SJ: You think that because you believe C
Me: No, I don’t believe C, I think A for some other reason.
SJ: No, you think A therefore you must believe C
At this point, I generally decide the SJ is suffering from a severe brain deficit and wander off. This is not to say that people can’t guess what I am thinking. They often guess correctly, but if I say you are wrong, I know best — end of argument
Maybe it has something to do with the belief systems of the participants in this debate, but it is just as widespread as claims of dishonesty and any bit as annoying. While the following opening statements can be true, they generally raise red flags in my book:
Republicans don’t support cap and trade because …..
Liberals true motives are ….
or the tried and true
You don’t doubt the study for the reasons you give, you doubt the study because …
They are sometimes anomalous, but usually mark the speaker as a bit dim.
If we get the grant to discuss this, I am available for a conference in Fiji.
Ok, I can sympathize with both groups backing off and listening in good faith to the other side, but where I draw the line is Mr. Kloor claiming “Brooklyn … is the new Manhattan”. That, sir, is a bridge (well, three bridges) too far. There are some outrageous and irresponsible claims that just cannot be considered legitimate opinion. As a died-in-the-wool upper-east-sider (a.k.a. genuine Manhattanite), I say Keith is in a serious state of delusion. Denial, even.
Well… Artifex… that’s only your pet peeve because …. 🙂
Yes, everyone has experienced this. Not only are the guessers sometimes wrong, but often, so what? If, for example, you think airline seats should be roomier because you are 6’4″ and think the current leg room is too cramped, but I, at 5’4″ believe there is no health impact to being cramped at least for shorter flights, I might hold my opinion that we should let the airlines decide on leg room based on market demand and you might want to insist that regulators should require airlines to provide more room.
Our positions might happen to align with our convenience (I want cheaper seats; you want more widely available roomier seats.) But do we “only” hold our views because of our heights? Can’t we still sit down and figure out whether the issue is comfort, health, economics etc?
Well, I can see this is going pretty well. Two of my personal favs:
Dr. Shoosh: Please just don’t ask me to pay higher taxes. If you do not agree with all of my facts then you can shut your face and get out.
Artifex: “I absolutely hate arguing with some sanctimonious jerk about the beliefs held in ‘my’ head.”
Folks, this is not about you. It’s about listening to someone else who disagrees with you. Without telling them to shut their face or calling them a jerk.
Keith–
To some extent, in Artiflex’s example, the “SJ” person is not really listening in good faith– is he? He’s insisting that he gets to decide what Artiflex thinks he gets to decide what Artiflex’s argument is.
It’s a sort of example of the way in which people don’t listen.
Of course, Artifex then thinks he’s a jerk. To some extent, in the hypothetical Artifex thinks SJ is a jerk because SJ doesn’t listen.
(Given the choice of initials, I can’t help think Artifex is arguing with a member of the Society of Jesus. I bet I’m guessing wrong though.)
Oh, if Artifex is arguing with ‘an’ SJ, I may have to break out the joke about the Dominican and the Franciscan.
The problem isn’t that I don’t listen to people like Shoosh. The problem is that when I do, he says things like “My phd is not in climate science so I will take the Princeton physicist William Happer’s belief that humans would be better off at 2,000ppm.”
So because Shoosh isn’t a PhD in climate science, he relies on the opinion of someone else who also isn’t a PhD in climate science (Wikipedia describes Dr. Happer as “a physicist who has specialised in the study of optics and spectroscopy”). How can anyone be expected to refrain from poking fun at that?
Lucia
Garbled mess. Sorry.
The peer review has been less then steller skewing what we have heard/read/been allowd to see concerning global warming. It has not been a fair conversation from the get go.
lucia,
If there is a formal agreement, what are the penalties for breaching it?
If this is simply a way of expressing what we would like to see in the debate and the kinds of people we want to discuss the issues with, don’t we all apply our own judgement and impose our own penalties? (by talking with the kinds of people we want to talk to, for example?)
Regarding respect, I have a lot of trouble being respectful of certain beliefs and am not certain that being respectful of beliefs is something that is useful. This can be interpreted as being disrespectful of the people who hold those beliefs. (And, to be fair, sometimes I am sure that I cross the line in that regard). Some people think that certain beliefs inherently deserve respect, even if they do not agree with them. How does a group of people with vastly different beliefs on all sorts of issues come to agreement on who is being disrespectful to whom? Tricky issues to formalise in an agreement. Don’t we all just wing these kinds of things?
Jon-
It’s possible to refrain from poking fun.
The more difficult thing is to promise to continue to listen. After all, there is only so much time in each person’s day, and eventually, lots of people decide it’s better to spend time listening to someone else.
So, it might very well be fair to suggest the agreement needs to be altered to say you are willing to listen in good faith up to some definable point. After that, you get to mingle and listen to other people.
I would like to point out though that the fact that everyone has to budget their time means the original proposed agreement was very imbalanced. Francis’s wording burdened the non-Warmers, nonActivist Warmers with the obligation to spend their time listening in good faith while Warmers promised to continued to advocate the need to decarbonize. As the agreement stood, the Warmers were not required to listen to counter arguments.
So, how much listening in good faith are ‘we’ going to require of those with whom we disagree? Are ‘we’ willing to listen to others just as attentively as we want them to listen to “us”?
Lucia,
Your proposal implies that if there is warming, it is a problem that needs to be solved by decarbonization or by other means. Is there space for people who either accept warming but do not see it as a problem or accept warming but do not see it as a problem that can be remedied by any means. (Shoosh seems to be in the first category perhaps.) At any rate the diversity of opinions is grater than that assumed in the post.
A non-climate scientist’s two cents.
Dr. Shooshmon, phd. (Comment#65509)
January 12th, 2011 at 11:24 am
“No, I totally disagree with this post. I am offended at the notion of decarbonizing the economy. I want to carbonize the atmosphere more. My phd is not in climate science so I will take the Princeton physicist William Happer’s belief that humans would be better off at 2,000ppm.”
Shoosh-
Since you brought up your PhD, and in the interest of full disclosure, would you be willing to tell us what field your degree is in?
lucia,
How is listening in good faith defined? For example, if I carefully read a blogpost at WUWT, check a few things, and then dismiss it as nonsense/irrelevent/plain wrong, I believe that I have listened in good faith. But nobody else can actually detect me doing that. Further, I could quite easily *fake* that. It seems to me that we have to assume that the people we are talking with are listening in good faith until it is demonstrated otherwise. And then we can talk to someone else.
But why do we need a formal agreement for this? Isn’t this something that we all do in any case – only talk to the people we think are worth talking to?
I guess I am having trouble seeing what the aim of the formal agreement is.
David–
So do I– especially at home. Or when talking to my sister.
Yes. And frankly, it’s these believes where I often cross the line and have a difficult time respecting the belief. But I do avoid calling people evil for holding (or not holding ) them, and if I get involved in a conversation, I listen to them. Then, I expect them to listen to me.
BTW: The 7th Day Adventists regularly come to my door. I invite them in and chat. Then… later.. at block parties, I talk to the other atheist down the street who talks to them too. 🙂
Whatever the aim, I want funding to go to CanCun. Or Brooklyn in April. Whichever is fine. 🙂
Actually, I think talking about what we could possibly agree to is useful. For example, I think it’s worth pointing out that Frances– likely unintentionally– ask for more from others than his own group. I doubt it even occurred to him he was doing that.
Also, in conversation, we can see that asking people to listen in good faith can be asking a lot. Most people budget their time and will listen up to a point. After that, who ever is speaking needs to earn the attention they seek. What’s required to earn it is up to the person granting the boon– that is the listener.
On the other hand: Not accusing or insinuating people are evil should be pretty do able. Also, refraining from making fun of people in public should be pretty easy and do able.
Denny-
I don’t think so.
We can add those. I expanded from two groups to three. But as I noted previously, we can add groups. It makes the write up longer. But of course it’s no good unless some people would be willing to agree to the ground rules of how to behave.
lucia,
What would the penalties be for breaching the agreement, who would enforce them and are they any different from the penalties that we individually all apply to those we no longer want to discuss things with?
lucia,
What about people who do not believe in free will? I want a special rule. 😉
I do not think that you need to write rules for groups. Just write rules for people – for example:
1.) Be polite.
2.) Assmue the best about those with whom you are discussing.
3.) Do your best to be fair.
There do not have to be special rules for people with different beliefs/assumptions/conclusions.
David–
I agree with you in principle. The problem is that in practice, especially in political or climate discourse, we have seen many people will divide people into “them” and “us”. Those people will hold themselves and “their” group to one set of standards, and they will hold those in the “other” group to a different set of standards.
Then, everyone starts complaining the other group is worse.
We see this with the recent shootings in AZ. We see this in climate. That’s why Francis’ original agreement was between two groups and not just a pledge which any individual can (and likely should) internalize without regard to what “others” are doing.
If you look at how I changed Francis’s agreement, I think what I did was to change the agreement so the rules were the same for everyone. It’s explicitly written for groups– but every group is required to listen to others and not call them evil. Every group should have the same expectation to be listened to and not be called evil. Discussing three groups does make the agreement wordier, and may mask the principle that everyone is bound by rules that ought to apply to people. But I think this may also assure that each group understands that they and those in their group are agreeing that the specifically will listen and not call people evil.
That DeWitt Payne, who I respect as a commenter (e.g. #65555), referenced A Code of Conduct for Effective Rational Discussion was enough to get me to read it.
To tempt others, here are its 13 tenets.
1. The Fallibility Principle
2. The Truth-Seeking Principle
3. The Clarity Principle
4. The Burden of Proof Principle
5. The Principle of Charity
6. The Relevance Principle
7. The Acceptability Principle
8. The Sufficiency Principle
9. The Rebuttal Principle
10. The Resolution Principle
11. The Suspension of Judgement Principle
12. The Reconsideration Principle
13. Fleck’s Addendum
Interestingly, blogger John Fleck is currently exchanging Tweets with Razib Khan. Khan’s approach is in marked contrast to Lucia’s — he’s quick to ban commenters who he feels are obtuse or disingenuous. Because of (or despite) this, he consistently hosts productive, high S/N discussions at his blogs, on a variety of topics with quite an assortment of people.
lucia,
If the agreement has special sets of rules written for each group, then each group is being held to a different set of standards … unless there is no functional difference in those sets of rules, in which case there is only need for one set.
For example:
“Hold your own side to the same standards of conduct as you hold everyone else.”
David–
But people would get around this by insisting that if their side was evil, they would say so. Then, they happily go around calling the other side evil. Feel free to substitute whatever noun or adjective you like– stupid, idiotic, hypocritical etc. Similarly, they will say that they would be willing to listen if the other side didn’t just always say nonsense– so applying the “same” standards requires “their” group to listen to “my” group but not the other way around.
Sometimes, greater specificity about the standard is required to get people to understand that good behavior means they don’t get to call other people “evil” for merely disagreeing with them nor insist that others must listen while they get to flap their gums expressing their views endlessly.
lucia,
You are reading the rule in isolation. When the other rules include be polite, be fair and make positive assumptions about those on the other side, then that would tend to discount calling the other side evil without good reason. (As you have said, you are permitted to call the other side evil if they are in fact evil by some criteria – not that ‘evil’ is a useful tag in any case).
You can get still be specific by providing a non-exhaustive list of – for example – words, phrases and analogies that are not allowed to be used.
Writing the same set of rules out a number of times seems to me to be a waste of effort and, as we have already seen, leads to people feeling that they have been excluded.
Start with general principles. Then move to specific examples of those principles. (that is how I would approach it, at any rate).
And regarding people ‘getting round the rules’, you can overcome that by having a rule that states, ‘Cynical attempts to get around the rules are a breach of the rules.’
David–
Out of curiosity, when you were in grade school, did the school teacher ever have to deal with the boys and girls deciding to treat each other badly as a group? Do the teacher ever turn to one group and say,
“Boys, do you promise to stop shooting spitballs at the girls?” and then turn to the girls and say, “Girls, in return, do you promise to stop sprinkling cayenne pepper in the boy’s jock straps?”
The teacher might preface this with a lecture that your own side should hold itself to the same standard of conduct as you expect of the “other” side. But if she doesn’t actually get agreement on the details, neither side ever really admits that they need to stop what they are doing. They just complain the other side needs to stop– and they invoke your principle of “same standards”.
It’s stupid. And you may think, “but that’s kids”. Empirical evidence suggests it’s not just kids. It’s just the adult equivalent of cayenne pepper and spitballs are different.
lucia,
I am studying to be a teacher, so the question is more relevant than you might think.
In my classroom, I would have a list of general principles that everyone should follow. With those specific instances, I would then be saying something like, ‘Boys, shooting spitballs at the girls is against class rule 1.’ And then I would explain which rule the girls were breaking, which would likely be the same one.
I am still wondering, though, what the purpose of the rules are. Are these rules that you are going to employ on your blog? (I think you are looking more broadly than that, but I do not know how that would operate in practice).
Lucia,
Certainly it’s possible to refrain from poking fun. It seems we disagree as to whether it’s desirable. I think mockery of ridiculous, crazy, illogical and hypocritical statements is a valuable way of pointing out that they have those properties and I would be sorry to see it declared off limits. Would the world be better if Jon Stewart was a straight news anchor?
David–
I think we are discussing what sorts of specific things people might be willing to agree to. The discussion started at Keith’s.
Obviously, we aren’t going to get a signed treaty– even though I’d love to go to Cancun to knock one out.
Based on discussion at the thread, I see that Shoosh’s doesn’t seem willing to agree to listen to anyone but wants RC to be ordered to stop censoring comments. Andrew wants to change the subject to honesty. MikeC wants to derail the conversation by proposing a bar brawl. Lots of people want to discuss optimum behavior in the abstract (i.e. the golden rule.)
The reason I want to discuss the rule about evil and listening as it applies to each group is that, to some extent to get good behavior, we do have to eventually get to specifics. Notice in your example, you do turn to the boys and emphasize the rule applies to them. Then you turn to the girls and emphasize it applies to them. You don’t just say “No one gets to shoot spitballs at anyone” even if that single declaration might take half as much time.
Also, you don’t just invoke an abstract “be good” rule similar to the golden rule hoping that statement and obvious (to you ) logic takes care of the problem.
Invoking the golden rule in grade school sometimes just results in a few kids observing they don’t mind people shooting them with spitballs, so that means they can shoot spit balls at other people. And this is perfectly true because at least some kids would rather get hit by spitballs than read the boring story assigned by the teacher.
lucia,
I still think that you start with general principles. Then children learn what things fall under specific principles. Adults, hopefully, already know more about which things fall under specific principles. If they do not, then they can have them explained. If you want to list examples, then you can do so (and I would in a classroom – indeed, it might be the case that the general principles are actually built up from specific examples, as I would get the class to write their own set of rules.)
All rules are subjective and the spirit of any set of rules can be wriggled out of by a determined wriggler – unless you make it so specific as to be useless: ‘David Gould will not use the word ‘evil’ on any day, with day defined to include night, and use defined as spoken or written or mouthed or pointed to or linked to or used in an anagram or …”
But if you insist on specific rules rather than generalities, I will not object. I will sign up. It is an interesting intellectual exercise. But it is not much more than that, is it?
Jon
If someone is as good as Jon Stewart, they can get away with it. 🙂
The other thing is Jon Stewart works a lot harder at being funny than most involved in the climate debate. He actually has fact checkers and to some extent makes sure that the joke doesn’t only work because he didn’t listen or understand what was said.
Of course those who think they are as funny as Jon Stewart are not going to agree to not poke fun. I’d suggest that in most cases bloggers or commenters who operate by poking fun at those they think are ridiculous fail to convince anyone on “the other side” or even “in the middle” to buy what they are selling. It’s ineffective.
re spit balls, if one of the general principles includes ‘disturbing others from their work’ then even if two students agree to shoot spitballs at one another, if they were disturbing me they would still be breaching the rules. And the golden rule would cover that also.
You also certainly need to explain to anyone why their specific action breaches a general rule.
They tremble in fear
Shocked at all their awful thoughts.
Three foolish monkeys.
==============
As DeWitt noted:
“The first principle is that everyone has to admit at the start that they might be wrong. If you’re not prepared to change your mind, then you’re not discussing in good faith, at best you’re debating and trying to score points. At worst, you’re being a troll.”
.
I believe that this principle, if actually a requirement for participation, would eliminate the vast majority of people at this blog, as well as most people at other blogs dealing with climate change. There is too much willingness to believe that anyone who disagrees with you is an idiot, evil, or morally corrupt… and maybe all three at once. There is an awful tendency of many to refute a reasoned technical analysis with a) appeals to authority (mostly ‘warmers’), b) political views (mostly ‘non-warmers’, but also some ‘warmers’), and c) uninformed personal opinion that is clearly in conflict with the most basic of scientific principles (left, right, and center). To say nothing of the gratuitous insults and personal attacks.
.
A corollary principle is that everyone should enter a discussion willing to learn. Once again, this seems rarely the case. I am not sure I see any easy way around this conundrum.
Sure. We can see who is unwilling to agree to be governed by these rules and we can read their reasons why. We may also observe whether those people complain that others violate them.
We aren’t a real government, so to a large extent, that’s the exercise.
Lucia,
“We aren’t a real government, so to a large extent, that’s the exercise.”
.
Here at least, you are the ultimate authority/government (dare I say, ‘Queen’?). You may not choose to exercise that authority, but you do have it.
I actually think it is interesting to see those who require specific rules for their particular group … or for other groups. 😉
Lucia, “MikeC wants to derail the conversation by proposing a bar brawl.”
My oh my… when MikeC makes an absurd comment to express his opinion of how absurd the idea being discussed is… kinda like the chicken bone thing where a silly and humorous example was being made, and rather than having a discussion, some one tried to make it into a serious character flaw… which tells me that person is not worth the time of day or any respect…
so I’m gonna go grab some chicken and have a chuckle about how absurd this whole idea of regulating the debate is… where does it stop, Orwell’s pigs?
Lucia,
My SJ reference is indeed to Santimonious Jerk and not Society of Jesus. Amusingly (from my admitted small amount of exposure), I honestly can’t see one of them insisting on such a basic logic error. I generally don’t share their world view, but their grasp of argument and logic seems to be pretty formidable. The ones I have met have been pretty nice folks.
To extend upon your airline metaphor, I have no problem discussing my need for regulation and leg room vs your need less regulation and leg room. What gets my goat is when you claim that my need for leg room is indicative of my generally expansionist nature and really my need for more leg room is indicative of my chauvinistic need to control your leg room. It at this point I figure out that the discussion is not going anywhere useful. There are few things I know almost by definition. One of which is my own opinions. This is however better discussed in Fiji.
One additional question here. I don’t do well with argument by assertion. If we are coming to a “grand understanding”, what is going to be the accepted approach for dealing with thought patterns we just don’t get ? Yes, I get the listening part but the speaker simultaneously believes A and ~A sometimes my skepticism is going to shine through pretty strongly. So what “is” considered polite here.
Artifex
Sure. But if some one does that, are you willing to
a) not call them evil.
b) not mock them and
c) listen in good faith (for at least a while).
Presumably, the “listen” requirement needs to be clarified to say that you don’t need to keep listening forever. You also get to point out there error. If it some point, it’s obviously impossible to convince them that A and ~A cannot be simultaneously true, any reasonable agreement requires you to be able to exit the conversation.
(Similarly, at parties, the pretty girls (or cute guys) get to wave at their pretend friend across the room, listen to the old windbags who want to monopolize them for a short them, then look up and say, “Oh! I need to go talk to my friend over there!” Clearly, all situations involving people require some acceptable way to exit.
Artifex,
“So what “is†considered polite here.”
I’m not sure what is most polite, but one way or another you have to stop talking with them when you realize that you are wasting your time. Sometimes that realization comes pretty quickly, other times, not so quickly. One sure-fire indication that you are wasting time is when someone will not reconsider or backtrack on even the most absurd comment; a second is a preference to insult or taunt rather than reply calmly. When you see these behaviors, it is almost always is futile to continue the conversation. Fortunately, the number of these individuals is relatively small at most blogs.
Re: SteveF (Jan 12 18:33),
Precisely. In fact learning is why I started participating at climate related blogs in the first place. Posting is like taking an essay test. You don’t know if you really understand something until you can put it in writing and have other presumably knowledgeable people take shots at it. But there seem to be very few blogs where the signal to noise ratio is high enough. If there are too many comments in a thread, yours will probably get lost, especially if there’s a lot of ‘me too’ comments.
There also seems to be a version of Gresham’s Law that applies to the blogosphere. Bad comments drive out good.
DeWitt,
“There also seems to be a version of Gresham’s Law that applies to the blogosphere. Bad comments drive out good.”
That is good; I never thought of it that way, but there is some truth to it.
After I made a couple of guest posts at WUWT, I realized that my efforts mainly incited attacks from people with with little basic technical understanding, and even less desire to acquire that understanding. Instead of thoughtful questions/comments I got mostly insults, accusations of being both a “typical catastrophic warmer”, AND accusations of being “a climate change den**r”. No amount of discussion convinced even a single one of them that they might be mistaken… about anything. A frustrating experience; and not one I want to repeat.
I wouldn’t refer to SteveF as a CAGW’r or a denier… but based on his posts on the GISS thread, he certainly doesn’t seem to know what he’s talking about
This is all pointless. The points that are laid out in this topic fall under the following:
1. using the word evil during public or private discussions of climate change or decarbonization
2. using metaphors involved groups or entities considered evil during discussions of climate change,
3. running images alluding to evil along side blog posts touching in anyway on climate change or
4. representing their own “side†of the climate debate as examples of good and the “other side†as examples of evil when writing supposedly philosophical treatises on the general nature of evil.
Any and all that use such naturally lose credibility. I believe that SimonH’s perception is correct on Collide-a-scape that any “points” attempted using any of the above techniques are “cheap” and petty.
The root of all contention is the refusal to acknowledge JeffN (on CAS):
I have argued the same and the response is always the same
“Eh, I don’t really like that option…”. It is infuriating, to say the least.
I find the olive branch is pointless and trite. JeffId said it best:
“a second is a preference to insult or taunt rather than reply calmly”
.
Confirmed, yet again.
Over at WUWT, the commenters are now trying to out-surpass each other with their descriptions of Trenberth as ‘evil’, ‘worthless piece of junk’, etc. Anthony Watts has helpfully pointed to Trenbeth’s e-mail address. Does anyone think this was done in the hope that more moderate language would be used?
Re: SteveF (Jan 13 07:26),
I became interested in the Tiljander data sets a year-plus ago, because on first exposure it seemed obvious that they were wrongly used in a major pro-AGW-Conensus paper, Mann et al (PNAS, 2008). To my surprise, almost all of the pro-Consensus scientists and blog warriors who have opined on the subject have defended (or excused) such use. This continues to the present, as seen in the artful turns of phrase in the Annals of Applied Statistics (2011) submission by Schmidt, Mann, and Rutherford (PDF).
There are complex and subtle aspects to the Tiljander saga, but they don’t in any way negate or disprove the Cliff Notes version of Mann08’s mistakes. And yet, to my knowledge, only one pro-Establishment advocate of any prominence has stated, “yeah, the Tiljander datasets were mistakenly used in Mann08” (that was DeepClimate, far down a long comment thread at his site).
People can believe what they want and make the arguments that they want, respectfully or with scorn, as they please. What I see in Tiljander is perhaps similar to what SteveF is relating about WUWT: the unwillingness or inability of committed climate partisans to make an Admission Against Interest.
In my opinion, this speaks to a shortcoming of intellect or of character. In these circumstances, the “Code of Conduct for Rational Debate” (DeWitt Payne’s #65555) becomes another handy stick, nothing more.
Sorry to put it so bluntly, and Lord knows we all have our defects, myself certainly included. Hopefully I am being harsh without being patronizing.
DeWitt noted in #65555,
At some point — for a varied set of reasons — this principle got lost by most of Establishment Climate Science, and its champions, and its detractors.
I would be happier if the story of these obscure lakebed varved sediments was a one-off anomaly, with nothing to teach about the broad subject of the science of AGW and its application to public policy. But, reading SteveF, I do not think this is the case.
SteveF– You could guest post here. I don’t want to volunteer for other bloggers, but JeffId, SteveMc and a few others seems to permit guest posting from time to time; if you prefer that blog, you might ask them. Chances are you can ask any blogger. They might say no, but many solo bloggers are solo mostly due to history.
… he wouldn’t be able to handle the criticism
Lucia,
I did a guest post (one in a series of three) about a week ago at Jeff’s blog
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2011/01/02/light-scattering-by-the-earth%E2%80%99s-atmosphere-aerosols-and-clouds-part-one-%E2%80%93-basic-concepts/
The second part will be done in a couple of days. Most comments on the first post were reasonable. A very different environment from WUWT.
AMac,
“the unwillingness or inability of committed climate partisans to make an Admission Against Interest.”
.
Yup, that is the real issue. They have have either forgotten or never learned of Oliver Cromwell’s plea: “I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken.”
Louise (Comment#65693)
“Does anyone think this was done in the hope that more moderate language would be used?”
I don’t know. Here is an email I sent this morning:
Subject: Your AMS Talk
Dr. Trenberth,
I read with interest the text of your talk titled “Climategate Thoughts”. It is certainly reasonable and prudent to point out that many people you classify as ‘deniers’ do not present reasoned technical arguments. But I think you would be well served to not paint with too broad a brush.
There are many thoughtful, well trained, and experienced scientists and engineers who look at the climate data and do not agree with the conclusions drawn by the majority of climate scientists. When you call these technically trained people “deniers” you just antagonize them, and will for certain only stiffen their resolve to confront climate scientists in public discourse and in publications. It is simply unwise and unproductive to insult competent technical people by calling them ‘deniers’. That label suggests that you believe they are incapable of understanding complex systems and evaluating noisy and difficult data, when many, if not most, make a living doing just those things.
Were climate science not so important for formulating public policy, most of these people would, of course, not even think about climate science. But the reality is that climate science is and will continue to be relevant, and so of interest to capable technical people who work outside of the field. Antagonizing them is not going to advance climate science, and I believe doing so will only do climate science harm.
Lastly, the cartoons at the end of your talk are wholly inappropriate, unless it is your intent to insult some fraction of the people in your audience I suggest you need to think about the kind of content that makes a good presentation; insults are never suitable.
Regards,
Stephen Fitzpatrick
Stuart, Florida
I do not expect a reply, but I hope he takes a minute to read it. Would you not consider this message moderate?
Louise (Comment#65693) January 13th, 2011 at 8:49 am
“Over at WUWT, the commenters are now trying to out-surpass each other with their descriptions of Trenberth as ‘evil’, ‘worthless piece of junk’, etc. ”
So? Everyone should read that Trendberth’s piece. He shows this whole conversation here is moot and hopeless. IMHO
No body on this planet knows anything for sure. Period.
A little of “we don’t know” would do climate science some good along with some understanding of the vastness time.
Response To Lucia’s Challenge:
hon·es·ty noun \ˈä-nəs-tē\
plural hon·es·ties
Definition of HONESTY
1 obsolete : chastity
2a : fairness and straightforwardness of conduct b : adherence to the facts :
(Lets ignore the obsolete def. It will never fly with everyone anyway, 😉 )
In a scientific context “fairness and straightforwardness of conduct” means admission, acknowledgement and adjustment based on all the relevant evidence or lack thereof. Perpetual bare assertion is frowned upon. If a person doesn’t KNOW something, they should make others aware, rather than pretending they offer facts when they are actually offering beliefs.
Andrew
SteveF (Comment#65704) January 13th, 2011 at 11:03 am
I know you aren’t talking to me. But that was a good letter. (You know that already)
For instance,
Our resident Global Warming Salesman would insure that everyone he has a discussion with would understand that the GISS Squiggly Line is not “the earths temperature.” It’s an analysis of a collection of numbers.
If his assertion is that it has some real relation to the world, he’s going to have to explain all the relevant details of how he came to his conclusion. This is science, remember, dot your i’s and cross your t’s please. Data, methods, code, presumptions, metadata, verification… all of it.
Andrew
Setting up rules for others to follow might be proper (and work) for an organization that can select its members and expel them, but to propose a set of rules for engaging in individual speech and communication would appear to me, at first glance, to be symbolical at best and silly at worst.
When people use emotional terms I use that to judge the content of their messages and whether I should take it seriously or dismiss it out of hand. I think that thinking people can judge for themselves what is proper discussion and the worth of the contents.
On the other hand, if I owned a blog I think I would be a lot less tolerant of rantings even if occasionally it cut off a discussion that others might want to continue. If reducing silly and waste-of-time rhetoric does not require a major effort by the blog owner, I would think that what they chose to delete would be a way of leading by example.
SteveF–Ok. I read that. I forgot where that had appeared, and thought it might be at WUWT.
Kenneth Fritsch (Comment#65711),
I think simply deleting a comment that is beyond the pale wastes a great teaching tool: explaining clearly what blog rules were broken, and then blocking all comments from that person for a specified period (1 hour? 2 hours? a day?) would probably eliminate most non-constructive comments. But I think it would be way too much work for most individual bloggers to do that.
Lucia,
The guest posts at WUWT were about 2 years ago (if I remember right).
SteveF
The difficulty is that it seems to suck CPU. Although… maybe it was letting TCO see his comments while hiding them from others that sucked CPU especially if attempted while caching. (A more informed WP/php programmer might be able to figure out how to make the process not suck CPU, but I don’t want to devote the time).
I could probably write a script to moderate a specific commenter, and then run a chron job every now and then to release them if they have aged sufficiently. That wouldn’t be very difficult. If TCO’s response is indicative, that after a fair amount of obnoxious negotiations, commenter leaves (which outcome was perfectly acceptable unto me, the all powerful moderator. )
Moderation policies are difficult.
Lucia,
“Moderation policies are difficult.”
For sure. Too time consuming. Better if those who want a constructive exchange just not engage those who want mostly to exchange political rants and personal insults. At least the rants and insults retain their comic value even if they illicit no replies. 😉
Re: SteveF (Comment#65704) January 13th, 2011 at 11:03 am
Steve,
I’m not sure “moderate” in either a political or personal sense is the issue. I do question whether your letter will have a useful effect. What you have done is challenge Trenberth on several of his positions which may be “non-negotiable” (“core beliefs”?).
“Thoughtful, well trained… scientists [not agreeing] with the conclusions drawn by the majority of climate scientists” — I’m not sure this is a logical possibility in certain world views. In fact, they probably do not qualify as “competent technical people” so indeed he may believe they are incapable of understanding “___ ”
Given that the scientists and engineers are not (blah blah) then why worry about antagonizing them?
The climate science is advancing quite nicely without the rest of the world, how could it possibly be “harmed” by antagonizing incompetent, thoughtless and untrained ___?
And finally you end up telling him what you think is inappropriate, to which he could very likely reply (at least in his mind) “appropriateness went out the window when some schmuck hacked into for-team’s-eyes-only emails, blah blah blah.” That and “We’re here trying to save the world, not some poor ignorant fools’ feelings.”
Okay maybe I’m just being cynical here, but I just thought I’d throw it out. 😉
William Happer is an expert on the greenhouse effect. I believe the radiative physics are the most important part of understanding global warming. I actually believe physicists are the most qualified to comment about global warming. The warmers refuse to discuss free market solutions so what is the point of Mr. Kloor’s proposal? We know what the government solution is to EVERYTHING. Raise awareness, raise taxes. Lucia herself won’t admit that global warming was born as a political movement. Nobody besides Liza seems to care that when Hansen testified to congress in 1988, that they turned of the AC and opened the windows to make the room hotter. The University of Virginia has spent half a million dollars to protect Michael Fann, when they could simply produce the documents for 8,000 bucks. I think what we have here is a classic case of, “that’s what you get”. They have sat here and cried wolf for over 20 years about global warming and the ozone hole and have nothing to show for it. I think it is obvious the majority of the public does not believe in global or thinks it is irrelevant, based on the November elections. Many of the new members do not care about global warming. I applaud Marc Morano for his efforts and I hope he keeps the pressure on the global warmers. Mr. Kloor, please know that I am not directing all of this at you. I haven’t seen any of your comments on the matter but I firmly believe that the warmers have a lot more to concede than people like myself. Sure, I’ll concede that I might be wrong about the warming effect of co2, it could be greater. However, so what. There’s no evidence to suggest that by raising the planets GAT 4 or 5 degrees will do something bad to humans. Now, a question for the heavy hitters like Dewitt Payne, historic GAT is 22 degrees Celsius, or a little higher. What is our current GAT? If a warming of 4-5 degrees does not raise us past the historical average, this is once again a joke. We’re talking about below average levels for co2 and temperature across the board and it is absurd.
oliver,
“Okay maybe I’m just being cynical here, but I just thought I’d throw it out.”
Cynical indeed. I hope Trenberth does not hold all the beliefs that you suggest. If he does, then he is for sure not the right person to be making the presentation, since it will only hurt progress toward the objectives he professes. Insulting a large fraction of the public never helps reaching political goals. He may also not be the right person to be in the position he holds, since if what you suggest is accurate, then he is not capable of rational analysis.
Re: Dr. Shooshmon, phd. (Jan 13 13:03),
What historical average? Homo Sapiens first emerged about 200,000 years ago and reached full behavioral modernity about 50,000 years ago. The GMST averaged over either of those periods is a lot lower than the current temperature. OTOH, agriculture and the beginning of civilization as we know it is more recent, about 10,000 years old. That puts it into the current Holocene interglacial where the average temperature has been quite close to the the current value, maybe a little higher about 5,000 years ago. The average for the last 500,000,000 years is not relevant to human civilization.
The questions then are: How fast is the temperature changing? How much will it change? What are the likely consequences? Is mitigation even possible (and I mean politically as well as technically)? Will any given mitigation scheme actually work? How much would mitigation cost compared to adaptation (that’s not just money, but externalities like the cost of consigning the majority of the planet’s population to grinding poverty forever). Given finite resources, what percentage should be assigned to dealing with climate change?
We sort of have a handle on the first two questions. At least we can put some sort of bounds on the range. For all the rest but the last, if the IPCC Working Group II and III reports are any indication, it’s all hand waving at best. Asking the last question got Bjorn Lomborg denounced as a heretic.
Another good op-ed in today’s WSJ by Daniel Heninger:
Why the Left Lost It
He goes on to discuss a 1964 piece by Richard Hofstadter: “The Paranoid Style in American Politics.”
You can’t have a rational discussion with someone who thinks you’re crazy.
DeWitt Payne,
“You can’t have a rational discussion with someone who thinks you’re crazy.”
Which is why it is so very important to vote these people out of office. 😉
Re: SteveF (Comment#65704)
That’s a very nice letter, I think. I would disagree with your assessment of Trenberth’s cartoons, though. The first one, yes, it’s stupid, pointless, and offensive. But the second one I find cute and touching in an idealistic way. You might accuse it of being completely disconnected with the real world, by implicitly assuming that there is no price to be paid for getting all those wonderful things on the screen. But I would blame the real world for that, rather than the author of the cartoon. 🙂
Re: DeWitt Payne (Comment#65758) January 13th, 2011 at 2:51 pm
DeWitt, thanks for the link to the Hofstadter piece by the way.
DeWitt noted in #65555,
The IPCC does exactly that. It says it is not 100% certain. It also says the supporting evidence is such that they are very sure they aren’t wrong.
Well the proposal is amusing .
OK let’s try to get Girolamo Savonarole and Boticelli together , talk and ABSOLUTELY avoid the word evil .
It might even work provided that after the end of the discussion Boticelli is burned .
Because , come on ! , EVERYBODY knows that Boticelli paintings are pure evil even without having to spell it out loud .
Re: bugs (Jan 14 02:34),
If you’re going to quote someone, you should attribute correctly. I did indeed write the first sentence you quoted. However the second sentence was from AMac in this comment where he quoted me (correctly).
All three groups will make a good faith attempt to avoid even the appearance of accusing other parties to this agreement of being evil and will refrain from
1. using the word evil during public or private discussions of climate change or decarbonization
Um, but if there are actually bad actors, doesn’t this let them off the hook? I mean, I can avoid specific words, but the concept of ethics is important to well-meaning parties on all sides.
Why not just change the Francis position to explicitly give parallel rights (as stated in F’s #3) to other groups?
Thus:
# What are Warmers explicitly permitted to do?
– Continue advocating their position to party nonActivist warmers and nonWarmers (and note that the other group[s are] required to listen in good faith.)
# What are nonWarmers explicitly permitted to do?
– Continue advocating their position to party nonActivist warmers and party Warmers (and note that the other group[s are] required to listen in good faith.)
# What are nonActvistWarmers explicitly permitted to do?
– Continue advocating their position to party nonWarmers and party Warmers (and note that the other group[s are] required to listen in good faith.)
But also note
# What are Warmers explicitly required to do?
– Accept that ‘nonActivist Warmers and nonWarmers’ disagreeing with Activist Warmers does not NECESSARILY make ‘nonActivist Warmers and nonWarmers’ evil.
– Listen in good faith to the other parties
# What are “nonActivist Warmers and nonWarmers†explicitly required to do:
– Listen in good faith to Activist Warmers and
– Accept that party Warmers’s continued advocacy for their position does not NECESSARILY make Activist Warmers evil.
I think that we can’t really disentangle the current situation without regard to whether one side or the other or both has been misleading and/or misled.
Re: Michael Tobis (Jan 14 10:09),
There are no sides. There is a continuum, probably multidimensional. The fact that you don’t recognize this is a large part of your communication problem.
DeWitt, I was agreeing to Francis’ model for the purpose of argument. I agree that there are multiple dimensions. The blame here doesn’t accrue to me.
I also think there are multiple identifiable camps. I have made this point myself and can clearly identify at least ten of them.
Why this tendency to jump on the mainstream climate science supporter even when that person is trying to be agreeable? This tendency on the skeptic sites is fascinating.
You claim to have identified 10 different camps but your writing is much more simplified–those who agree with you in Group 1 and ‘deniers’ in Group 2.
MT
Out of curiosity, why do you frequently describe “sides”– as in the quote Dewitte provided? Do you really expect people you talk to to remember that once, long ago, you wrote a post in which you mused about 10 groups remind themselves that when you say “sides” you don’t mean “sides”?
Are you were “jumped” on during your ‘efforts at Curry’s’? Or something else?
I’m going to guess that the answer to the first question is yes. I read — your first comment on the thread. I don’t see anyone “jumping” on you. I read < a href="http://judithcurry.com/2011/01/08/politics-of-climate-expertise/#comment-29207">your second. I don’t see anyone “jumping” on you.
Can you point to examples so I can understand who you think is being jumped on and where?
Interesting post. I like the rules. But when we come to this:
“a) not call them evil.
b) not mock them and
c) listen in good faith (for at least a while).”
. . . I have a few questions. First, is evil real? If it is real, then we cannot promise not to identify it when we perceive it. That would not be truthful. Second, is mockery ever an appropriate response to something, or is it always bad and destructive? I tend to think that there are things that warrant mockery. Finally, when we are listening in good faith (a good idea) do we have any protection from the same bad ideas being reiterated over and over as a kind of a holding action?