Recently, I became aware of the oddly titled Uncertainty is Not Your Friend by Stephan Lewandowsky posted at Planet3.0org back in June. I vaguely recalled reading this and thinking it a rather strange mixture of mangled text, graphics and math. Ben Pile commented on the paper blog post. But at the time I didn’t consider the pastiche of misinformation mixed with some not-necessarily wrong observations was worth commenting on. Today I’ll comment on a few items so as to clarify which statements in that specific article appear totally false, which are worded so strangely as to be impossible to parse and note things that happen to be true.
I will start by saying this: Of course it’s true that uncertainty is “not your friend”. I will add that “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush” and “Better the devil you know.”.
I’ll also say that generally speaking, when one accounts for uncertainty of anything we might call X, it is often the case that the cost of our best estimate of X will be lower than our best estimate of the cost of X. This appear to be the case that for climate change. (If we use the mean or expected value to represent our “best estimate” of anything, the previous statement can be expressed using mathematical symbols. If $latex E[X] $ is the expected or mean value of $latex X $ and $latex C(T) $ is the cost associated with a temperature rise of $latex T $ , then often $latex C(E[T]) < E( C[T]) $. I don't know if the property $latex C(E[T]) < E( C[T]) $ means uncertainty is "our friend". I would suggest uncertainty would not be our friend if $latex C(E[T]) > E( C[T]) $ either. I’ll defer discussing costs for now.
I want to focus on certain specific verbiage in Lewandowsky’s first post which seems to focus on the probability that temperature would change more or less than “anticipated”. Specifically, in his first of three posts he writes things like
So uncertainty doesn’t just mean that things could be worse than anticipated—in the case of climate, chances are that things will be worse rather than better than anticipated.
Uncertainty in climate evolution means things are likely to be worse, rather than better, than anticipated.
In paper 1, he the “thing” he focuses on is the change in temperature. But I had to scratch my head for a while because the following question popped into my head: “Does that depend on what is ‘anticipated’?”
I continued reading and hoped the examples might reveal which properties of the uncertain temperature defined the changes that are “anticipated”. Based on the example, it seemed that — possibly- the value that assumed to be ‘anticipated’ (by someone) is the mean value of the temperature change. At least, it seem to clarify his points, Lewandowsky used probability distributions for climate sensitivity that all shared the same mean temperature. To wit:
To make my point, I ensured that the mean of the four distributions is identical (around 3, with a tiny amount of deviation introduced by the simulation). However, the standard deviations (spread) of the distributions differ considerably, from .49 in the top left to 2.6 in the bottom right. The spread of each distribution characterizes the extent of uncertainty surrounding the mean estimate of 3 degrees.
Reading this, it seems whatever Lewandowsky means, he is comparing probabilities computed when we assume a) similar functional forms for the probability distribution function, b) identical mean values for the change in temperature and c) an increase in variance about the mean.
So, I thought I’d just plow through the math, making changes where I thought suitable. I noticed Lewandowsky drew heavily from “Roe, G. H. & Baker, M. B. (2007).” (RB) but substituted his own probability density function for theirs which is based on a normal distribution for the “climate feedback parameter” $latex f $. I thought I’d follow RB more closely, but introduced a tweek motivated by problems that arise in their probability distribution function as their dimensionless climate feedback parameter approaches $latex f $ approaches or exceeds 1. (Some of these problems were identified by Zaliapin, I. & Ghil, M. 2010). For the purposes of the discussion here I think it is sufficient to resolve the problem by simply noting that empirical evidence suggests $latex f<1 $. To reflect this known requirement, I replaced the normal distribution for $latex 1-f $ used by RB with an Inverse Gaussian Distribution with mean freed back $latex \overline{f}= E[f] $ and standard deviation $latex \sigma_f $ Then, to create my examples, I used the numerical values of $latex \overline{f}= E[f] = 0.62 $ and $latex \sigma_f =0.13 $. These values originate from a “suite of GCM simulations” and correspond to trace “A” in RB2007 figure 3. The resulting probability density function for the temperature rise shares the skewness of those in RB and the log-normal distribution used by Lewandowsky
However, if we are to use the “method of eyeball” to compare features like the mode, mean, median, it is more convenient to examine the cumulative distribution plot. Below, I show the cumulative distribution for the parameter values I picked:
Notice that I’ve highlighted the “mean value” in red. On the right hand side, I’ve indicated the temperatures that bound 90% of the range we might anticipate. So, based on this distribution, we might say that that we anticipate that the temperature will likely fall between 1.93 C ad 5.76 C. The expected value is 3.53C. We think there is a 5% chance the temperature will fall below 1.93 C and a 5% chance it will fall above 5.76 C.
What if the uncertainty was higher?
Now, suppose that someone suggests that we should explore what happens to our probability estimates if we:
- Use the same functional form for the probability distribution function
- Hold the expected value of temperature constant (as Lewandowsky did) but
- Increase the uncertainty. That is: double the standard deviation about the expected value.
When we do that we obtain the following cumulative distribution function:
Recall that in the previous it was decided that the “anticipated” temperature range was (1.93C to 5.76 C); there was a 5% chance chance temperature would fall below this range and a 95% chance they would fall above this range. Examining the new distribution
- The probability that temperature will fall outside the (1.93C to 5.76 C) range is now estimated to be 31% which is larger than 10%. This outcome is not surprising: uncertainty is defined this way.
- The probability the temperature will fall below the anticipated lower bounds has increased to 19.1%.
- The probability the temperature will fall above the anticipated upper bound is 12.1%.
- 19.1% > 12.1% so the probability that temperature will fall below the range currently anticipated will rise more than the probability it will rise above the range currently anticipated.
Based on this, I would suggested that based on what people might understand by the words “anticipated” and “likely” (meaning more probable) and the model for probability distribution I described, the following claim appears to be backwards:
Uncertainty in climate evolution means things are likely to be worse, rather than better, than anticipated.
The figure above shows that assuming that if, as we gain understanding, the mean value of the predicted temperature rise remains constant but our uncertainty in our ability to predict temperature increases, then we will find the probability that temperature will fall below the current estimated lower bounds increase more than the probability that temperatures will exceed the current estimated upper bounds.
For those who might think finding the increasing uncertainty means that the probability of lower temperature rises rises more rapidly than the probability of higher temperatures means “uncertainty is our friend”: That’s not the case. Uncertainty is uncertainty. It’s really never a “friend”. We can better understand why uncertainty is not a friendly thing when we turn to discussing costs. At that time we can discuss whether its unfriendly nature means what Lewandowsky thinks it means.
References
“Roe, G. H. & Baker, M. B. (2007). Why Is Climate Sensitivity So Unpredictable?Science, 318, 629-632.”
Zaliapin, I. & Ghil, M. (2010). Another look at climate sensitivity. Nonlinear Processes in Geophysics, 17, 113-122
mmm…James Annan would say you have that ass backwards – the link is on Ben Pile’s post or an Annan’s site – the posts are so few that you should be able to find it relatively easily (esp if you search for Pile). Mind you, I think that on this point James Anna has it ass backwards…but who is to say? Maybe a climate scinetist might make a verifiable prediction.
but…thinking about it…Annan’s post is all about having a model of costs if everything climatic spirals out of control, whereas you are making no assumptions about things spiralling out of control.
Will they, won’t they
Will they, won’t they
Won’t they join the dance?
(Carroll)
“Uncertainty is not your friend” is my phrasing too, and I’ve been saying roughly the same thing for some time.
I am confident that Lucia is correct in her criticism of the phrasing “So uncertainty doesn’t just mean that things could be worse than anticipated—in the case of climate, chances are that things will be worse rather than better than anticipated.” This is incorrect and indeed hard for me to ascribe a meaning to.
Lucia is also, in my view, certainly correct in conceding the key point, which is that “I’ll also say that generally speaking, when one accounts for uncertainty of anything we might call X, it is often the case that the cost of our best estimate of X will be lower than our best estimate of the cost of X. This appear to be the case that for climate change.” That is a point I have been trying to get people to understand for a very long time. That is what I mean by “uncertainty is not your friend”. Many, perhaps most, of the critiques of climate science go from a dismissal of the maturity of climate science to an insouciance about climate change. But this does not follow.
Rather, however you weigh the maturity of climate science beyond what was well established by planetary scientists and physicists by 1950, the less the you estimate that science has advanced, the greater your cause for concern, and even of alarm, about CO2 accumulation.
This economics cost study might be of interest as you go forward.
The time-dependence of the climate response functions comes to play when you consider economic costs.
Short summary, and as best I can do from my reading, please chip in to revise and extend: The comment about costs being higher with higher uncertainty depends upon a static economy. When you consider that models that are on the high side have longer response times to achieve equilibrium sensitivity and you consider that economies are growing during this period, the economic costs are “devaluated” by the effects of economic growth over that longer period of time.
diogenes
I’ve read Annan’s post. The only thing I object to in James’s post is his making it appear that the only point made in Lewandowsky’s opii is this:
That observation would be:
$latex C(E[T]) < E( C[T]) $
That statement appears to be correct for damage functions typical of climate. Had that statement been Lewandowsky's point no one would have criticized him. But he made numerous other claims, and I think it's fair to criticize those other claims. It remains fair to do so even if a statistician wishes to pretend the other claims are not present in Lewandowsky's post or possibly pretend those other claims don't matter.
My current post isn't discussing the one not totally wrote point in Lewandowsky's article which James fished out and defended– ignoring all the other claims. My current post is limited to things Lewandowsky said in his first post and that has nothing whatsoever to do with cost. So, James’s defense of the claim about cost is utterly irrelevant and there is no need for me to link it.
MT,
Lots of people already know this. Their disagreements with you relate to what other conclusions we think this drives or does not drive.
Uncertainty is rarely anyones “friend”. And if you want, in a few posts on, I can do this and show an extreme climate case where the less than sign changes to a greater than sign and you still will probably say: But look! That case would mean have to be very worried to. (Actually, in the extreme example I can concoct where the sign in C(E[T]) > E[C(T))] , I would agree that acting would be absolutely urgent. But note that < switched to a >.)
MT,
Maybe. Or not. There is no objective metric quantifying how alarmed one should be.
And what one should chose to do requires economic analysis. I’ll do one. Zeke will laugh….
SL has devolved to the point where pointing out his foibles and failings is like pointing out that homeless guy talking to himself loudly as he stumbled down the street is probably a kook.
To repeat my post over at Ben Pile’s blog,
Lewandowsky: Uncertainty is nobody’s friend.
Bookie: Wanna bet?
Alex
I think you managed to capture the idea Ben wished to convey with this:
For the bettor uncertainty is not their ‘friend’. (They find the enjoyment of betting worth the cost nonetheless.)
For the bookie, uncertainty is their friend.
We could discuss various aspects of the bookie metaphor. Perhaps we will.
lucia
Indeed. Actually one could argue that, as a species, uncertainty is our friend, because the key competitive advantage we have is our adaptability.
Alex–
I wouldn’t want to push that. We may be able to modify our environment or change our behavior such that we are still well adapted while remaining in the same location even though climate has changed. But I suspect cockroaches can shift their habitat faster than we can adapt.
The fact is we depend on other species– even if one only counts food like corn, wheat, hogs etc. So there is a limit to how much and how quickly we can adapt.
lucia
Yes, while I wrote “one could argue” it was more in the role of devil’s advocate. I think you have captured a more realistic attitude with your title for this post.
Uncertainty is certainly the climate modellers friend, since if they make the uncertainties large enough, they can claim that the model was correct, no matter what the outcome.
It would be very nice if the plot in Figure 1 included the Tmax and Tmin from which the line shape was calculated.
Ray hits nail on head. The extremist climate kooks, like SL, rely on broadly worded prophecies of doom so they can always claim to be the enlightened ones, no matter the outcome.
Religious extremist preachers rely on this technique over the centuries to keep their flocks fearful and willing to put up lots of money.
Promoters of climate doom are doing this now.
The only uncertainty the SL’s of the world hate is the sort that leaves less social and financial capital under their control.
“Uncertainty is not your friend”.
This is a very odd way of looking at things for any scientist. How boring it would be if every experiment gave exactly the preconceived answer; if the next step in each branch of science was obvious beyond debate; if the unification of relativity and quanta stared everyone in the face; if..
Well, you get the point.
Good scientists welcome surprises. I’m sure the folks at CERN would love something really wierd to show up.
It’s therefore typical that climate scientists and their incompetent cheerleaders in BS fields hate uncertainty and will try to naysay any surprises from real,actual field research which cast doubt on their models.
As usual the strawman of the “argument from uncertainty” is put forward to be burned in effigy. But I’m mixing my metaphors again.
I for one don’t think the estimates are “uncertain” and therefore allow for a remote possibility that there isn’t a problem-a remote possibility to then be seized upon as effectively true. Rather I think the estimates are just wrong and that there are very good reasons to suppose this is the case.
BTW “immaturity” and “frozen in place for thirty plus years by stupidity” is not the same thing. In the latter case the problem isn’t that your answers are stubbornly fuzzy (well, not necessarily in the former case either) the problem is that you’re just perpetuating things that were wrong to begin with. Nor is “immaturity” equivalent to “uncertainty.” Immaturity of a field implies a slew of problems the very least of which is inability to give usefully constrained answers.
Lucia,
A minor point, but when you wrote:-
“The probability the temperature will fall above the anticipated lower bound is 12.1%.”
I think you meant above the “anticipated UPPER bound”.
P
Doc–
I never set a Tmin or Tmax. But Tmin is 0 and Tmax is infinity.
I set f_bar and sigma for the feedback parameter in RB’s paper, and thats 0 < f <1
Thanks Paul_K– fixed!
This seems to me to be an important point which might have been worth highlighting at the top of the post, though I guess you’re under no obligation to summarize for newbies.
if everything were perfectly symmetrical (I admit that’s a bit vague) then this wouldn’t be true:
It’s deferred because it needs it’s own post.
First, “everything” is not symmetrical.
If the damage function is a function of sensitivity only and it is convex (e.g. cost ~ Tn with 1 < n), and the probability density function for T is symmetric, what I write is true except in one special case where equality holds. (That’s a case of perfect symmetry and I would need to draw a graph.)
But also, the reason I mention that it’s possible to switch signs from < to > is that the probability density function for T is not symmetric.
James write this:
And that math is sufficient to show E[C(T)] > C(E[T]) provided that the pdf for T is symmetric about T. But it must be remembered that to get the cost you would integrate ( p(T) C (T) dT) not C(T)dT. (James argument always works if p(T+t)= p(T-t). )
With at least some heavily skewed pdfs of T– including the one I show above– it is possible to show hypothetical examples were E[C(T)] < C(E[T]) and others where one gets E[C(T)] > C(E[T]).
But I don’t think either condition makes uncertainty “our friend”. It is not the existence of < or > that makes uncertainty a friend or foe.
Except when the thing we are certain of is absolute doom, certainty is generally better than uncertainty.
“I wouldn’t want to push that. We may be able to modify our environment or change our behavior such that we are still well adapted while remaining in the same location even though climate has changed. But I suspect cockroaches can shift their habitat faster than we can adapt.
The fact is we depend on other species– even if one only counts food like corn, wheat, hogs etc. So there is a limit to how much and how quickly we can adapt.”
Exactly so, that is a key insight.
“So there is a limit to how much and how quickly we can adapt.”
Who thought we could go from burning none of the corn crop in cars to 40% in such a short time? And how quickly it turned out to be a really, really stupid idea.
Bruce… I was going to take my camera and show one of the Australian’s the drought ravaged fields near my house. But it started raining just as we were discussing it. (The field near my house is soy, not corn. So, it’s not fair. And I’m in No. Ill, not So. Ill. so doubly not fair. But I think for perspective, it can be worth showing that some parts of the world aren’t all that dry even when in drought. Much of Australia is a desert so reading about drought might conjure up different visions to them. )
I seem to remember someone saying the mid west was in a “wet drought” 🙂
Hey, we have had “wet drought” in the UK too.
In March, the UKMO forecast that April-May-June would be drier than average, with April being the driest month, hedged by lots of statistical probability estimates.
The probability that the period would fall into the wettest of their 5 categories, was given as 10-15%.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/p/i/A3-layout-precip-AMJ.pdf
In fact, it turned out to be the wettest A-M-J on record (since 1910), with April and June being the wettest on record for those individual months.
“which made the fairly straightforward point that the expected cost of climate change is greater as a result of uncertainty about its magnitude (eg, the canonical example of climate sensitivity), and thus those who argue that uncertainty is a justification for inaction are precisely backwards in their thinking.”
These statements from Annan and Lewandowsky is why they should either stick to their fields or at least acknowledge the assumption made in their arguments. They need to recognize that action on mitigation of even higher levels of AGW is not a slam dunk for obtaining a net improvement. These oversimplifications and assumptions of the supposed adverse effects of AGW and the supposed lack of man’s ability to adapt to AGW, and even knowing what scenario is reasonable for GHG emissions are what is wrong with these advocacy appeals for immediate action on AGW that are seemingly presented as if in some higher order logical context when in fact their argument and logic can only be understood if we do the assuming that those who make these statements do.
If one believes that there is a “limit on how much and how quickly we can adapt” one must also believe that there is a limit to how much and how quickly we can innovate energy sources-and therefore one must believe, preferably be up front about it, that it is necessary for the standard of living of much of the world to significantly decrease in order to stave off too much change.
However, there are very clear differences here. Progress in “innovation” has been slowing for years, and not for lack of government “investment.” On the other hand people’s adaptive capacity seems to be increasing faster than ever. So I think anyone should be able to see why “we won’t adapt fast enough” or “we’ll reach an adaptive limit” is utter nonsense, and anyone should be able to see that the magical government innovation machine “solutions” are nonsense too.
Hmmm.. what I wrote about being able to change the sign on E[C(T)] < C(E[T]) may not be true for this particular pdf with concave C(T). I know it can change for some pdfs (I could easily show this.) I thought I’d gotten some sign swithche on some choices of parabolic cost functions. But those may have been with the bogus pdf you get if you assume RB’s feed back parameter is normally distributed (which violates our understanding of the range for their ‘f’ values.)
Lucia,
I was almost going to agree with everything you said in 103006. Maybe I still do. This whole thing seems to be befuddled with verbiage, but I am going to try to clarify what I understand.
What you did in the post, was demonstrate how increasing the variance of a fat tailed distribution, while holding the mean constant, results in an asymmetrical change of values outside of a previous range of absolute probabilities.
What Lewandowsky appears to have done, if you ignore all the confusing gibberish and just look at the graphs, is shown how the right tail changes while ignoring anything that happens with the left tail. Precautionary principle, as Ben Pile noted.
For the cost exercise, the whole thing depends on 1) assuming a concave cost function C(T) and the various shapes that the PDF of T can take….
Lucia,
From Roe & Baker, Figure 1.
Their x axis shows the Gaussian PDF of f with mean 0.65 and SD 0.13. f > 1 is unphysical as they note, which I take to be the same as the empirical evidence in your post. Your use of the inverse Gaussian for 1-f limits f to values less than 1 (1-f > 0) but I am not able to replicate it, I guess not being able to equate the SD to the shape factor in the inverse Gaussian??
“one must also believe that there is a limit to how much and how quickly we can innovate energy sources”
In the last 5 years the biggest innovation in energy sources has occurred – fracking+horizontal drilling. Yet many warmists are also conspiracy theorists about shale gas. The web is full of warmists who will clam that shale gas is dirtier than coal.
IMHO, about 90% of active warmists believe in a massive consiracy theory that shale gas will destroy life on this planet as we know it (only a slight exaggeration).
Most warmists I encounter are clinically insane conspiracy mongers when the topic is shale gas.
Bill C–
Do you mean you can’t create an inverse Gaussian?
You could use the inverse gaussian in R. But for obscure reasons, having to do with wanting to plot and use “integrate” etc, I just coded:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverse_Gaussian_distribution
This has two parameter, mu and sigma.
inverseGausian_dInorm<- function(x,mu=1,sigma=1){ lambda=mu^3/sigma^2 small=10^-16 x=max(x,small); sqrt(lambda/(2*pi*x^3))* exp(-lambda*(x-mu )^2/ (2*mu^2*x) ) } That lets me pass a mean and a standard deviation. To get the pdf for the feed back I did: probabilityDensity_feedback <- function( f, f_bar=0, sigma_f= 1 , moment=0){ # try inverse gaussian.( See if coded) # truncated distribution causes all sorts of problems because it hasn't decayed to 0 at f=1. h_f=(f^moment)*inverseGausian_dInorm(1-f, mu=1-f_bar,sigma=sigma_f) return (h_f) } So R is doing the algebraic substutions. Seems to work.
Of course on the limit. But it’s possible to believe the rate of increase of the standard of living of the world to slow rather than reverse. It’s also possible for some to think that standard of living dropping is ok. Heck, based on what some seem to say, they think we’ll all be better off if the standard of living were to drop and we were all to lead “simpler” lives. But the fact is: people living in sod huts like in the Little House in the Prairie books wanted to make their lives less “simple”. Especially if that involved not having to dig wells or haul water every day.
According to Watts, Lewadowsky is having a meeting with the ethics committee of his school, which may reduce the uncertainty about his future quite a bit.
Inquiring minds and all that.
hunter–
I know Lewandowsky was going to meet with the IRB. That’s a sort of ethics oriented thing. Is it a different group…. (Better to see what Anthony says and may check Lewandowsky’s blog…)
Lucia.
A-ha! Eyes glazing over from trying a new statistical function, I missed the bit on the right of the wikipedia page that said “Var = mu^3/lambda”. I can replicate your graph (to eyeball satisfaction, anyway).
Andrew_FL:
Only if you define “investment” to mean market intervention.
Federal funding of basic research has been slowing, since the end of the cold war.
But what’s your source for “progress in innovation slowing?
Yep. And it’s a nice function for this purpose.
After all: The PDF of f (and likewise of T for doubed CO2) are expressions of belief. I think it’s fair to say that no one who understands what ‘f’ means and thinks we can use a linear ‘f’ thinks the probability that 1< f is anything other than 0.
I don’t quite understand why RB didn’t use an inverse gaussian in the first place. For the most part, they are making a qualitative argument and I don’t think substituting the inverse Gaussian would have affected their results. (And if it does… well… that’s actually sort of a problem for their paper.)
Hi Lucia,
I just found this post on Stephan Lewandowsky’s site under his most recent post.
excerpt:
I am pleased to report that I received advice from executives of the University of Western Australia earlier today, that no legal or privacy issues or matters of research ethics prevent publication of the names of those bloggers.
So here they are:
Dr Roger Pielke Jr (he replied to the initial contact)
Mr Marc Morano (of Climatedepot; he replied to the initial contact)
Dr Roy Spencer (no reply)
Mr Robert Ferguson (of the Science and Public Policy Institute, no reply)
It will be noted that all 4 have publically stated during the last few days/weeks that they were not contacted.
http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/lewandowskyGof4.html
Lucia,
“Heck, based on what some seem to say, they think we’ll all be better off if the standard of living were to drop and we were all to lead “simpler†lives.”
Heck, I think there is no ‘seem’ about it. Folks like Michael Tobis say straight out that humanity has to be much poorer in material and energy in order for humanity to survive in the long run. It’s just Club of Rome neo-malthusian rubbish, rehashed, regurgitated, and re-published for the mindless masses who either can’t or won’t accept the reality of the vast improvement in the human condition over the last 100+ years. I think this is as close to the fundamental disagreement on global warming as we are likely to find: some people simply ‘think/feel’ it is immoral for humanity to become materially better off. Economic evidence (which is overwhelmingly opposite the neo-malthusian expectations) is irrelevant to the discussion, because it is fundamentally a moral/pseudo-religious argument, not a factual argument.
SteveF,
I’m not sure these mindless masses exist. What does exist, perhaps, are lots of people who are able to be convinced that our luck is about to run out, or that we are or have already been at the high point, etc. etc. Even the most hard core who seem to take the line that we’re worse off NOW, seem to mostly revert to the promise of future apocalypse when challenged.
I tend to blame the experts, rather than the masses.
The question of uncertainty, to have meaning with regards to policy on AGW is better framed by those, who advocate for immediate and strong government intervention, as a question of the uncertainty involved in predicting an event horizon, if you will, that would occur so quickly in time so as a catastrophe for mankind could not be prevented no matter how urgent the reaction or intensity of that reaction. The question then becomes one of our ability to estimate probabilities for the occurrence of such a catastrophic event produced by AGW and under what conditions and what would be required to avoid or mitigate it.
Doubtless the stronger advocates for immediate and strong government intervention in attempts to mitigate predicted adverse effects of AGW are very much aware that talk of a consensus where a range of future global temperatures are predicted means little, in and by itself, without attaching consequences to those predictions and further predicting catastrophic events (but not so catastrophic and imminent that we are behind reversal by immediate reactions) that require immediate action to avoid disastrous consequence. The most likely scenario (for a disastrous effect not for it to occur) that I think is currently put forth for a rapidly developing disaster would be the undercutting and slippage of the Antarctic and/or Greenland ice into the oceans and thus inundating populations located near the oceans.
I know these notions are very much in play with advocates when large changes in proxies for temperatures are frequently noted as occurring rapidly. While these topics are sometimes associated with alarmists I do think that these issues are more relevant to what we should be doing, if anything, about AGW, and what we might predict are its effects and timing of those effects, than getting excited about a pdf for some measure of AGW. Maybe we get stuck on pdfs of predicted warming because we feel we know more about it than we do any looming AGW related disasters.
Re: SteveF (Comment #103052)
UCSD’s Tom Murphy accepts the importance of energy for the improvement in human well-being over the last couple of centuries, yet speaks favorably of the Club of Rome’s “Limits to Growth.”
This post is relevant in this context too.
Carrick (Comment #103039)-“Only if you define “investment†to mean market intervention.”
Um, yeah, hence the scare quotes. But I’m curious what form of government “investment” does not constitute an intervention. Given that it is a redirection of capital from it’s natural course I would say none.
“But what’s your source for “progress in innovation slowing?”
Aside from the fact that I’m rather confident that government intervention can’t repeal the law of diminishing returns and that it hasn’t ceased to apply by magic? Well, a pretty good example would be the price of solar panels, which is down significantly since the 70’s but has really budged in ten years or more. I’m pretty sure that this is the case for vehicle mileage since I believe I’ve seen it somewhere before analyzed-improved in the last thirty years, hardly budged in ten. But given that it is pretty much a given that the increase in the efficiency of something would slow with time, it would make more sense for you to provide the evidence that progress in improving alternative energy technology/energy use efficiency is proceeding apace, as fast as ever or faster. If you want to argue for research socialism, you should be the one to provide evidence that it at least has results.
RB (Comment #103067)
It appears to me that lurking behind all these pronouncements are suggestions that would only apply to a strictly controlled command economy and then almost as though the actions suggested would become self- fulfilling. I think much of this approach comes from those who fail completely to see the innovations that come from an unfettered free market of not only goods and services but ideas as well.
Command economies are always adverse to changing course even when their planning fails.
Kenneth,
I’m not sure that it implies a strictly command controlled economy but “buckling down now” is a political non-starter in any case. It is possible that issues get averted due to far-sighted government initiatives – for alternative energy development, for example.
Andrew_FL:
I’ve seen numbers which suggest the opposite, such as here . This goes longer and is better viewed on the log scale. Where are you getting your information from?
Andrew_FL, I assume you mean the following:
Because the other phrasing doesn’t make much sense.
Actually prices have follow through the floor in the last three-four years. In 2010, the cost of panels was over $4/watt (I can pull up some old POs if you really question this–and yes this was in quantity). Now they are running at about $2/watt, with the only reason they aren’t dipping further is because of US government interference with the market.
Funny that.
Andrew_FL:
Then it is a meaningless thing for us to discuss. You’ve defined the words so you can’t ever be wrong.
Pointless.
BTW, a link appears to be broken in (Comment #103067) . I meant to refer to this post .
“I’m not sure that it implies a strictly command controlled economy but “buckling down now†is a political non-starter in any case. It is possible that issues get averted due to far-sighted government initiatives – for alternative energy development, for example.
Ah, yes far-sighted like the anecdotal Solyndra example and the more general and global problems of unfunded liabilities for the largest of all world-wide government initiatives: old age pensions and health care. I suppose a more controlled government run/directed economy could merely command a “fix” for AGW and the officials could tell its constituents that it was the plan come hell or high water and those recipients of government collected (and already spent) revenues for the pensions and health care to go pound sand. Given their current control, the governments and politicians must be a bit more nuanced.
Spain’s recent experiences with alternative energy is a bit more than anecdotal and apparently suffered from Frederich Hayek’s “fatal conceit” of government planners.
RB (Comment #103130)-A log scale being necessary would prove my point that progress has slowed.
Carrick (Comment #103132)-I’m looking at a chart in a text book. And a drop of two dollars is in fact an order of magnitude less than the decreases that happened in the seventies and eighties. Slowed. I shouldn’t have implied stopped, but relatively speaking 2 dollars is nothing.
Carrick (Comment #103133)-Um, no, I’m using the correct definition of words. I’m not wrong because what I am saying is true by definition. You’re the one who wants to consider some government intervention to not be government intervention so you can be a little against capitalism without having to be totally against it. This kind of muddled thinking is really frustrating, because it requires an inconsistent application of logic.
Andrew, how would you like to view y=0.93^x ?
It’s true by your definition Andrew. You’ve defined the terms so your “accepted” meaning is the only one that makes sense. I’m sure you can find economists who will agree with your pet definitions, others who won’t.
In a rule by consent government, it is a lot messier chain of command than “the government takes your money and spends it.”
As to what “I want”, unless you can read minds, you should abscond from telling me what I think.
Andrew:
It’s a factor of 2 in two years.
Go through your textbook and see if you can find a 30% reduction in cost in one year, other than the period right before Obama broke free trade on solar panels.
Carrick (Comment #103212)-“It’s true by your definition Andrew. You’ve defined the terms so your “accepted†meaning is the only one that makes sense. I’m sure you can find economists who will agree with your pet definitions, others who won’t.”
Um, no, again I’m using the actual definitions. When the government does something to alter the natural movement of capital, it is intervening. There is no way around it. That you can get some “economist” to say it is not isn’t suprising considering you can get “economists” that say that natural disasters stimulate the economy. They say it because they are daft and wrong.
“As to what “I wantâ€, unless you can read minds, you should abscond from telling me what I think.”
Given how vigorously you argue that the government must fund research, because the market is “shortsighted” one ought to be forgiven for thinking that is what you want. You believe that what would happen in the absence of the government intervening is that no money would go to “twinkle in the eye” research. I take it now that you do not presume that money should go where the market wouldn’t, by your own logic, put it? Or was my mistake presuming that I had seen you arguing for a free economy in most other areas, save this?
I warn you that if you do succeed in convincing me I am wrong I will go where you are not, as far as I can tell, prepared to take the logic of government funded research, and become a full fledged devotee of Karl Marx. I am not capable of selectively applying logic.
Andrew_Fl,
The reality Andrew is that people (even staunch libertarians) often accept that government should sometimes intervene in economic matters. There are regulations against certain activities (dumping waste on public land, for example) which are clearly interfering with economic activity, but which are judged by most to be in the public interest. Ditto for usage fees on public property, all kinds of environment regulations, funding of basic research, usury laws, preventing loan sharks from breaking late payers’ legs, and much more. You can (and regularly do) rail against many of these, and of course, it is clear that many regulations and interferences may well be senseless, especially if considered in economic cost/benefit terms.
But that does not mean voters do not have a legitimate right to make policy choices which are contrary to your personal views/priorities/analysis. You are welcome to carry on about these policy choices (and history suggests that you will continue do so!), but I think you would be well served to consider a more practical and less ‘hard line’ approach. All things in moderation my friend.
As I have at least once before noted, my personal experience is that businesses (in general) operate on too short a time horizon to be willing to make investments in important research that is risky and long term. Imagining a perfect capitalist world where people make perfectly rational choices about what research is worth funding over long time periods begs reality: People have fixed life spans. People have fixed assets available to invest. A likely payout date becomes ever more difficult to define as the time considered increases. Most people make investments which will generate financial benefits in a relatively short time (whether those people are individual investors or company managers) using only the amount of capital they are willing to risk. Super-long term investments are often not funded, even if a perfectly rational analysis of costs and benefits would justify the investment. The danger with government funding of basic research is that what is funded will produce only rubbish, and that is indeed often the case. Public funding of basic research needs to be limited in scope and subject to regular critical review to eliminate the worst of it. But that does not mean no publicly funded research can be justified as being in the public interest.
The pictorial representation of solar power costs and their decline is best captured by the chart offered by Emmanuel Sachs of MIT, thoughtfully displayed to us by my dear friend Joe Romm here: http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2011/12/11/387108/solar-power-much-cheaper-than-most-realize-study/
thomaswfuller2,
Unfortunately, the reality is that like much at Joe’s blog, the reality falls short of the hype. Those studies look only at the energy produced (and forced onto the grid by law!) rather than the true cost. Without economically practical storage of energy for use when the sun does not shine, solar cells will NEVER be an alternative to fossil fuels. Can economically viable storage be developed? Maybe, but we sure seem a long way from there today. The cost of solar panels does not tells us much about the practicality of solar energy as a substitute for fossil fuels.
I get emails in my inbox every day offering me solar modules for between $0.60 and $0.70 / watt DC, if I buy in bulk. If I want enough for just a residential roof install I can pay as little as $0.97/Watt DC. That’s just hard cost, no subsidies or tax credits.
Solar power is not intended to be a substitute at this point in time, absent mass storage. It is intended (and is serving perfectly well) as a supplement to the existing mix of electricity generating fuel sources.
thomasfuller2
a similar regime exists in the UK where people who put solar panels on their roof get both a grant and also a subsidised price for the electricity those panels generate. Whether or not the house is a net-user of electricity. William Connolley uses the scheme for his advantaqge. He thinks it is great to scam the rest of the UK in this way. In the UK, a kwh costs about 12 pence. Connolley receives about 70 pence for generation of this electricity…and if he is not generating electricity he still gets about 30 pence for having solar panels on his roof.
Tomasfuller2,
“I get emails in my inbox every day offering me solar modules for between $0.60 and $0.70 / watt DC, if I buy in bulk. If I want enough for just a residential roof install I can pay as little as $0.97/Watt DC. That’s just hard cost, no subsidies or tax credits.”
I was not suggesting otherwise. But please keep some things in mind:
1) installing those panels, along with a suitable DC/AC converter system will likely more than double the total panel cost, assuming no batteries.
2) unless forced by law to accept your back-feed at retail (or higher!) rates, the local power company will pay you a demand-based wholesale cost of power, which is way below the retail price, and may be well below the average wholesale price.
3) Justifying the investment in panels absent legally forced back-feed to the grid and after considering both total installed costs and how much the sun actually shines, will be impossible most everywhere.
Storage is the key technical hurdle. Installed cost (including storage) is still WAY too high to be practical; this could change in the future, but investment today is impossible to justify.
Solar modules do indeed comprise less than half the cost. But I have no objections here in California to receiving monetary benefits for doing so, as voters passed an initiative supporting it.
There are more signals in a market than price.
Steve, I think you need to familiarize yourself with how payback works. First there is a limited amount of energy you can sell back at that rate, secondly there’s a limited number of customers who qualify for higher rates. Third, whether it is cost effective depends on a lot of factors, but as a blanket statement what you said about it being “impossible to justify” is simply wrong.
You also obviously own a much bigger house than most of us. A decent sized solar controller (e.g., 10 kW) goes for about $1500 these days. My peak wattage is way lower than that.
The real issue, which I completely agree with SteveF on, is energy storage. We’re still in the 19th century on battery technology. At this point, most of your costs will be sunk into energy storage, and if you live in a marxist part of the country, paying somebody else to install your solar system for you.
[In all cases, I recommend that the solar controller, if you’re wiring it to the grid, be professionally installed. Unless you like yourself extra crisp.]