Kevin Vranes has a phud in Physical Ocean- ography and Cli- matology. He now studies sci- ence policy and politics at the With thirteen thousand people at a confab of geophysicists and geophysicists-in-training, a few thousand of whom work on something related to the climate system, you expect to hear about climate change. In perhaps a short decade, climate change has rapidly surpassed seismology as the primary membrane between the public and the geophysics research world. Climate is now what most makes the American Geophysical Union relevant to non-members; climate is now what essentially drives the meeting despite the presence of dozens of other specialties represented.
As a physical oceanographer (which by definition also means "climatologist")- become-enviro policy guy, though, I wasn't so much interested in the details of climate science at this year's AGU. What I was (and am) interested in is seeing the conference as a whole. My interest in AGU has strayed from the hardrock science, moving into something more to do with feelings and hunches. That's right, feelings. Hunches. Intuition. The squishy, soft underbelly of the human mind; the part we want to ignore in pursuing geophysical data analysis. What I want to know is attitude. More than the state of the science, I now want to know about the state of the scientists.
I will grant that talking to the people I did at AGU represents a small fraction of all the attendees. I will grant that there is no way to know whether my averaging of attitudes in the climsci world, as sensed by talking with a few people over a few days, scales up to represent the true feelings of the collective. But I will tell you what I found, and what I felt, and whether you think it might represent the current attitude of climsci world is up to you.
To sum the state of climsci world in one word, as I see it right now, it is this: tension.
What I am starting to hear is internal backlash. Sure, science is messy and always full of tension between holders of competing positions, opinions and analyses. That has always been the nature of science, and of course extends to climate science. Tensions come out at meetings, on listservs, on letters pages, and in the press. But these tensions normally surround a particular paper, or a particular question. While much more broadly-based tensions have existed for years on the state of understanding on global warming, they haven't really been tensions internal to the climsci community, but tensions between the climsci community and interested outsiders.
What I am sensing now is something much broader and more diffuse, something that has less to do with particular components of the science in the field and is much more about how the field is composing itself.
What I see is something that I am having a hard time labeling, but that I might call either a "hangover" or a "sophomore slump" or "buyers remorse." None fit perfectly, but perhaps the combination does. I speak for (my interpretation) of the collective: {We tried for years - decades - to get them to listen to us about climate change. To do that we had to ramp up our rhetoric. We had to figure out ways to tone down our natural skepticism (we are scientists, after all) in order to put on a united face. We knew it would mean pushing the science harder than it should be. We knew it would mean allowing the boundary-pushers on the "it's happening" side free reign while stifling the boundary-pushers on the other side. But knowing the science, we knew the stakes to humanity were high and that the opposition to the truth would be fierce, so we knew we had to dig in. But now they are listening. Now they do believe us. Now they say they're ready to take action. And now we're wondering if we didn't create a monster. We're wondering if they realize how uncertain our projections of future climate are. We wonder if we've oversold the science. We're wondering what happened to our community, that individuals caveat even the most minor questionings of barely-proven climate change evidence, lest they be tagged as "skeptics." We're wondering if we've let our alarm at the problem trickle to the public sphere, missing all the caveats in translation that we have internalized. And we're wondering if we've let some of our scientists take the science too far, promise too much knowledge, and promote more certainty in ourselves than is warranted.}
I came to this place in a few ways. One was a colleague describing a caveat he put into his poster abstract out of fear --- yes, fear! (He strongly called into question widely-quoted data supporting a decline in snowpack and advance in spring peak runoff in the northern Rockies.) Another was multiple colleagues giving me independent but similar blistering accounts of the GCMs they work on (upcoming post on this). Yet another was listening to competing ideas presented by Torn (GC22A-02) and Knutti (-04) in this session. It was in these and other events and conversations that a theme arose that pervaded my meeting.
None of this is to say that the risk of climate change is being questioned or downplayed by our community; it's not. It is to say that I think some people feel that we've created a monster by limiting the ability of people in our community to question results that say "climate change is right here!" It is to say that a number of climsci people I heard from are not comfortable enough with the science to want our community to push to outsiders an idea that we have fully or even adequately bounded the risk. I heard from a few people a sentiment that we need to stop making assumptions and decisions for decision-makers; that we need to give decision-makers only the unvarnished truth with realistic bounds on our uncertainty, and trust that the decision-makers will know what to do with it. These feelings came of frustration that many of us are downplaying uncertainties for fear of not being listened to.
I don't play in the weeds of climate change anymore, I play in the weeds of how the science gets to policy makers and how the nature of policy-making gets back to the scientists. My own feeling of self-responsibility in this field is to be that translator in any small way I can; to hear what each sides thinks and needs and to play go-between. (I am certainly not the only one, but there aren't many of us, either.) It is for that reason that what I heard concerns me greatly, because I see negative implications for the credibility of the climsci world.
In upcoming posts I will give concrete examples of events and discussions from which I draw these conclusions. For now I leave the concerned climsci community with the thoughts of one former Congressional science fellow who is now back in research science (with some additions of my own): dealing with uncertainty is exactly what Congresspeople do, and they do it a lot better than we do. For scientists, uncertainty is an abstract concept, something that feeds into an academic study, a place where the stakes are low and time-scale is long-term. For politicians and unelected decision-makers, uncertainty is life-or-death, yet decisions must still be made. Politicians constantly make decisions amid levels of uncertainty that would stifle the publication of any academic climate change paper. We need to realize that, give the politicians their due, and get the hell out of their way. Give them the science and the uncertainties and let them make the decisions. Overplaying our hand is a dangerous gambit, and may spell big trouble for us in the future.
I realize that many of you will disagree with the notion that we are overplaying our hand, or are not giving full voice to our uncertainties. I'm not sure the answer to this question myself. But I write all this because I sense a sea change in attitudes amongst climsci people that I know as good scientists without agendas. These are solid scientists, and some told me in no uncertain terms that we are not giving full voice to uncertainties; others implied as much. Therein lies the tension. Where we go from here is anybody's guess, but I tend to agree with the Oracle in the second Matrix movie: we already know the answer to that question, our task is to understand why we are going to do what we are going to do.
Comments
# 1 | Dave S. | December 20, 2006 2:02 PM
I would say that whether or not climate scientists are giving full due to the uncertainties, its still good to be aware of the issue and of the risks inherent whichever way you go. Thanks.
# 2 | Brian S. | December 20, 2006 3:10 PM
So are you referring to tension between an Annan-type position and a Lovelock position, or between Annan and Lindzen position?
I think it's also critical to distinguish between uncertainty over whether/extent of current AGW and uncertainty over future AGW. From a policy perspective, whether our current modest warming is partially anthropogenic is a totally unimportant question. I don't really care if experts disagree about the present but generally agree that significant future AGW is going to happen.
# 3 | bigTom | December 20, 2006 3:34 PM
For all the concern that things might be oversold, we still have a large fraction of deniers -and they seem to be running national policy. The legalistic fallback position in the face of uncertainty -if it can't be absolutely proven that (AGW) is going to be severe, lets not spend any resources on it is still very strong.
I don't see our politicians dealing with uncertainties very well. Look at Iraq, where only the rosy scenario was planned for. Most of them are lawyers by profession, and they deal in logical certainties.
# 4 | PhysioProf | December 20, 2006 4:10 PM
That is a really interesting post, with relevance beyond just the relation between climate science and public policy, but to all sciences and public policy. For example, in biomedical science--where I do my thing--we need to point out to policymakers the importance of basic science to the ultimate discovery of cures, or else we don't get funding for basic science. But if we oversell--double the NIH budget and we will "cure cancer" in ten years (I am exaggerating for effect)--then we get shot down when these oversold prospects do not occur.
So, I agree completely with you that our job as scientists is to educate policymakers and the public about (1) what we do is important, (2) nothing we conclude is certain, (3) the degree of certainty that we have concerning particular conclusions. In other words, "honesty is the best policy" for scientists, and let policymakers do what they are good at.
# 5 | kevin v | December 20, 2006 4:24 PM
Brian, thanks. There's a little of both, but definite emphasis on the future prediction side. It's obvious to everybody that the future is known only within some envelope of uncertainty, and that that envelope is larger than is being discussed. More to come on this when I write the post coming out of some extensive (and shocking to me) conversations with GCM modelers. In terms of past/present, the example I mentioned about northern Rockies spring peak runoff is illustrative. The frustration was that a result that purports to show sizable evidence of climate change (coming out of Phil Mote's group at UW-Seattle) was shoddy in the data used and analysis done, yet people are afraid to take it on since it shows evidence of anthro influence on climate.
# 6 | John Fleck | December 20, 2006 4:53 PM
One of the difficulties here, I believe, is that the non-sciency public, schooled on textbooks and the notion of science as a fixed body of knowledge, is fundamentally unfamiliar with the contingency of science's shifting sands: "But last week they told me coffee was *good* for me!"
It makes the conversation, as it happens in the public arena, as opposed to the scientific one, difficult.
# 7 | Steve Bloom | December 20, 2006 5:02 PM
Kevin, I hate to call you naive with regard to how politicians operate, but I'm afraid I have to. I'll have time for a more extensive comment this weekend, but for now I would commend to you the example of New Orleans as a cautionary tale of how well politicians deal with uncertainty.
Another example, one you and I have discussed before, is how well politicians around here (SF Bay Area) deal with approving development in earthquake zones. In this latter instance, even where the uncertainty is purely of timing rather than scope and the range of possible policy responses is far more constrained, I think we would have to call the policy response half-assed at best.
A further question that comes up for me is the extent to which the average Congressperson or staffer is prepared to understand scientific uncertainy with regard to climate change. The short answer is not very. I'm sure the people associated with the science committees are a different story, but there aren't very many of them. Regarding politicians in general, IMHO you're confusing an ability to handle uncertainty with the ability to balance political interests. This latter is typically clothed in other language since it's not good for politicians to be seen as overly political.
Is it possible that the ability of climate scientists to get the substantive attention of politicians is directly linked a perception by politicians of a growing ability by the scientists to influence public opinion? I would have to say yes, and that if the scientists back off they will tend to lose their clout.
# 8 | Steve Bloom | December 20, 2006 5:26 PM
Also, maybe I'm being dense, but I don't see the conflict between Knutti and Torn. Recall that sensitivity calculations don't include carbon feedbacks.
# 9 | kevin v | December 20, 2006 6:47 PM
Steve -- that's ok, I don't mind being called naive. This, like many things, I leave for the readers to judge.
Starting with your last PP: you may be right, but are we talking scientists in general or only climate scientists? If the former, I don't see that scientists have more influence on public opinion now than ever before; in fact, I think they have less. Climate scientists maybe, only because they were starting from zero.
On the other points: you and bigTom of course can find plenty of examples to bolster the view that politicians make bad decisions under uncertainty (New Orleans, I would say, is not a good example of this, though -- I would call that simple incompetence on both ends). Do you have an array of examples beside Iraq and NO? My feeling is that if we step back and look at America over the past, say, five decades, we'd have to say that considering our overall health as a country and economy despite uncertainties along the way (dealing with the USSR, how to steer the economy with imperfect information, whether dealing with clean air/clean water issues was wise, etc.), we've done well.
On the staffer and politician-understanding issues, I think you're missing the forest for the trees. All you need to know is that these are smart people who are in their positions because they are abnormally good at processing loads of disparate data (sometimes complicated data) and acting on their conclusions. They don't need to be any more astute at reading science or understanding the background processes on scientific uncertainty than your average BA homeowner. To give an example, good friends of mine live in the Oakland Hills within sight of the Hayward Fault. I gave them their probabilities: 67% chance of a 6.5Mw or greater in the next 30 years (if I recall right). They told me it was enough info to base a decision on buying or not buying shaking insurance. That's all the decision-makers need and that's all I'm saying.
And to further your BA/quake example, whether the response has been half-assed depends on your perspective. DM's must both lead and follow....they can't get too far beyond what their constituencies want. What aspect of the situation in particular are you thinking about? If you're talking about dealing with the 1-5 day timescale in meeting the needs of the stranded, you're probably right.
Finally, on Knutti and Torn -- you had to be there, but what they presented was in the meat orthogonal to one another. I hope to post specifically on this soon (it may have to wait 'till after the new year, though).
# 10 | Steve Hemphill | December 20, 2006 11:17 PM
Re #3, My question is: How much money is spent on climate research in the US, and how much is spent on climate research in the EU? I really don't know, but I think the answer could be important.
FYI I cross posted a response to this over on Prometheus.
Thanks
Steve Hemphill
(of the CO2 is the base of the food chain, which might count, tribe ;-)
# 11 | James Annan | December 21, 2006 6:46 AM
Tension
Is this the "controversial" article you were talking about, or is that still to come?
:-)
I think it's been clear to quite a few of us for some time that there has been a certain about of overselling of climate change. I'm glad to hear that the argument is gaining momentum though.
# 12 | kevin v | December 21, 2006 2:12 PM
James, just wait 'till I post the GCM article.... 8-)
Unfortunately I'm going to have to continue to not name names, but it'll probably still ruffle some feathers...
# 13 | Louise | December 21, 2006 3:02 PM
Hi Kevin: Speak of the devil, there was a 3.7 quake on the Hayward Fault Wednesday night! In Hawaii we just blame it on Madame Pele. Your presentation and post are great, and will be quoted by multiple blogs.
# 14 | anonymous | December 21, 2006 4:18 PM
[NB: I know the commenter; it's a person engaged in climsci work with a bevy of NSF funding and respected pubs. This was emailed to me and I post here with permission.]
I think you got it right. As you know there is little reason for skepticism regarding anthropogenic warming. But, there is a bandwagon among earth scientists to find the 'impacts' of said warming. In a cynical way, I dare say it takes a lesser scientist to find a few 'impacts' than it does to uncover the underlying process driving the climate system. And hence the race is on to document the impacts of global warming. This makes scientists feel important -- they are working on global warming after all, a big and important issue. And if you are bold enough to doubt a proposed impact, you may be labeled an ignorant skeptic of anthropogenic warming, perhaps science itself.
# 15 | Mencius | December 21, 2006 9:59 PM
Respected and successful scientists who are too afraid to write under their own names. Wow. What a world.
Would anyone care, perhaps, for a small history lesson?
Once upon a time there was a little country called France. They had a revolution, and something very interesting happened.
At first the place was run by old stick-in-the-mud dinosaurs who didn't believe in anything new. But the country needed change. Reform. So all the reformers got together in a tennis court, and swore an oath. It was all very exciting. And some quite reasonable and moderate people got put in charge.
But there was a funny thing. It didn't stay reasonable. The revolution had its own momentum. You could always be outflanked from the left. In the end, a lot of people ended up a little shorter.
The same sort of a thing happened in Russia. You had your Mensheviks and your Bolsheviks. Your Mensheviks were nice reasonable socialist types. Your Bolsheviks were utterly crackers. But guess who won? Funny thing, that.
So - congratulations on having convinced the entire world that there is no doubt about AGW. Congratulations on having cashed the check on the hockey stick. Congratulations on the fact that everyone with a brain believes that Edward Wegman doesn't know anything about statistics.
Congratulations, in other words, on your revolution. I hope you'll enjoy it.
# 16 | Steve Bloom | December 22, 2006 1:04 AM
But Wegman has admitted to being a global warming alarmist. Go figure.
# 17 | Andrew Alden | December 22, 2006 7:11 PM
Re #14, That rings true in my experience watching science: once the paradigm is stipulated, there's a lot of publishable research to do on the secondary questions, what Kuhn called problem-solving. This happened in paleontology after the land-bridges paradigm, in tectonics after the plate paradigm and after the mantle-plumes paradigm, in geomorphology after the peneplain paradigm, and as pointed out in climatology after the global-warming paradigm. Some of the paradigms are short-lived. The key is to do research that is worthwhile even without the paradigm, but funders and supervisors and editors discourage that in favor of the paradigm.
# 18 | garhane | December 24, 2006 4:26 AM
I HAVE encountered something like this in the practical matter of bringing polluters to trial in the civil courts, over 4 decades of practice, and I still do not fully understand it. Scientists, and I am mainly familiar with biologists, and employees of government, will provide environmentalists with quite a bit of good information, hints on where to get good data, and make a lot of statements about their science and the state of the eco system they study. You review this with them in fine detail, work up affidavits, go over factual material many times, and prep them for trial. Then they get on the stand and talk like they never heard of what they have been telling you, they collapse into uncertainty and wind up good witnesses for the other side. It does not seem to matter how careful you may be in reviewing evidence or in framing questions, they will find a way to kill the environmental arguement. IN fact they are often eager, or seem eager to do it.
There are many familiar comments one can make on this relating to the quality of the scientist, or the lawyer, but when it happens as a pattern it needs to be understood. The best I have come up with is that the scientist does not want to be seen as part of the team, especially a team of laymen that has prosecuted the case. They wish to be seen apart, and the easiest way to do that is to show on the stand that they are not eager to rush forward with an environmental case. I would wish to find a more attractive conclusion, but I have not to date. There are techniques lawyers have to deal with such witnesses, but it is not a satisfactory relation to have with the scientist. Unhappily, it is often also necessary to tell the proposed witness to stop farting around and take responsibility for what he has expressed in academic writing or research material, and speak to what he can say for sure or admit he cannot say anything before a lot of money and effort is spent getting him to the stand, only to see him show an astonishing reversal of all he has said before.
# 19 | Andrew Dessler | December 26, 2006 12:50 PM
fyi, I blogged on this post here. let me know if you have any thoughts on my thoughts. so recursive!
# 20 | Ric Locke | December 27, 2006 8:59 AM
We see once again what has happened repeatedly in the history of science: When the established, respected, tenured scientists in any field declare that the main question is closed, and start sneering at the trudging nonentities whose job it is to cross the "t"s and dot the "i"s, it is a very good time to begin a career in that field if you're tough-minded enough to continue in the face of the Consensus.
Phlogiston, anyone?
Regards,
Ric
# 21 | moptop | December 27, 2006 9:14 AM
Let me see if I understand garthane. Democracy doesn't work. Common people can't be trusted with straight facts. Only true believers really understnand the situation, so overplaying the facts and labeling anybody who applies common skepticism as a denialist outcast are justified tacticts.
Just wondering if I got that right. Al Gore's speech was all about manipulating emotion or presening science. I see that you take it to heart.
# 22 | Eli Rabett | December 27, 2006 10:15 AM
Let me see here, first there was no consensus on climate change, then a scientific consensus by its nature is unimportant, and now, congrats, you have found a guilty consensus. All this in a couple of years, nay months. And just a few days before the AR4 is released. How convenient.
# 23 | andy.s | December 27, 2006 3:41 PM
You worry too much, Kevin. The political momentum for "doing something" has been built, and any politician who opposes it will get steamrollered.
The state of the debate "feels" to me something like the state of the nuclear power debate in the late 70's. The proponents of nuclear power had lots of arguments left in their quivers, but people just stopped listening to them. Worse, people started making fun of them. This will start happening to the climate change skeptics within two years.
My guess is that, if your doubts about CC prove valid, it won't be known for twenty years, by which time the environmentalists will all be yammering about something else and it won't even be noticed.
# 24 | guthrie | December 27, 2006 3:50 PM
It is also extremely important here to actually make some concrete statements about precisely how much you think it has been oversold. Its all very well saying "Well, some studies are crap and you know, we're not all going to die in 2100 of heat stroke", but thats not enough. Theres an iceberg of unstated context here, starting with whether you think the warming by 2100 or doubling of CO2 or whatever is going to be 1.5 degrees or 4.5 degrees.
Rather than going down a no names no packdrill kind of confessional format
(Tonight ladies and gentlement, in the darkened corner wearing a hood, we have an annonymous climatologist from central USA, he's going to explain how the studies he took part in overemphasised the effects of AGW on rainfall. His voice has been disguised.)
can we have more outlines of uncertainty. I appreciate that much of the science behind this is not settled in teh same way as quantum physics is settled, (ie 23 decimal places and all that) but in order to avoid an extremely messy brouhaha with people on all sides and none misquoting things, you are going to have to delineate your own uncertainties.
# 25 | agres | December 27, 2006 11:10 PM
Oversold? Not a chance. All the careful, reputable scientists have gone overboard to avoid being "alarmist." Being labeled alarmist would be detrimental to their careers.
The community climate models have big error bars. Our reputable scientists have not shouted the full impacts of the size of those error bars to the press, leaving the press to discover the details of the models for themselves - why not? After all, much of the model documentation is on line, and such documentation was not written in Greek. ("C" perhaps, Fortran maybe, plain English unlikely)
However, we know the models do not handle land based ice, but we do not know what other important elements of climate, the models do not handle very well - hence the big error bars. To quote the SoD, ". . . There are things that we know that we do not know, and; There are things we do not know that we do not know!")
One interesting point is the projected date of a sea ice free arctic. The early models said, a couple of hundred years, then better models said 100 years, and now the best models say 50 years. Do I trust those models, whose managers go out of their way to not be alarmist? Or, do I trust some weatherman in the Canadian Navy with an old meter stick that says 15 years?
I had a chemistry professor that always had a tough environmental question on every exam. I just know that if he were still teaching he would pass out a page of data on the Arctic ocean, and ask, "When will the Arctic sea ice melt?" He wanted to see diagrams and calculus. He wanted to see estimates of heat transfer. He wanted to see proposed convection currents. Now, I have had more than 20 minutes to think about this, and my answer comes back at much less than the Canadian's Navy's answer of 15 years. (I do not have a career at an intitution, so I can be alarmist. )
So what? The next question is what happens when the Arctic is ice free? How long would the ice on Greenland last under the influence of warm, moist winds? How long would the engineered infrastructure of Europe last if their Arctic breezes, instead of being cold and dry were warm and wet? Europe could get BIG rain! All of the sea ice would not have to melt, in order for Europe to have some real floods. We do not have to wait for Greenland to melt in order to have the infrastructure of civilization wash away. Our engineered infrastructure was designed for one climate, and we now have another climate. Expect infrastructure to fail.
No, all you reputable scientists with careers at endowed universities and federally funded institutions have not oversold anything, in fact, you have not even told the full truth about both ends of the error bars.
# 26 | Steve Hemphill | December 28, 2006 1:39 AM
agres -
You forget that in terms of models, the future forecast is not better than the weakest link. Climate Change has not been oversold. It has not been undersold. It is, in terms of reality (and that's what counts, is it not?) simply not understood.
How is convection handled? Not well. How is CO2 sink to additional cold water surface, as in the Arctic ocean, handled? I suspect it is dismissed. How about increased albedo from precipitation from that increased moistness in the Arctic air?
Then again, the failure mode of the Arctic ice may be structural failure and flushing.
Sorry, but we really just have no clue.
# 27 | Eli Rabett | December 28, 2006 8:25 AM
If you have a single strong driver (something that moves a system in one direction) to first order everything else is a random walk. Right now that is the situation with climate. Yes, I can find things that move the system in one direction, and I can also find things that move it in the other. I can find things the models do well, and other where they do not so well, but they capture the big picture on a lot more things than global climate. Concentrating on the residuals and ignoring the driver is to enter the world of cranks.
# 28 | Steve Hemphill | December 28, 2006 11:16 AM
Good point, except everything eils is not necessarily a "random walk". Just because we have a qualitative list of pluses and minuses doesn't mean their quantities add up to zero. However, we don't even know what that "single strong driver," is. If it was CO2, CO2 concentration changes would lead temperature changes in reality (models are not reality). It doesn't. Temperature changes lead CO2 concentration changes.
# 29 | Andrew Dessler | December 28, 2006 2:09 PM
For those lurkers who might actually believe Steve H., his point has been debunked in dozens of places on the web. It is, in fact, one of the great myths in the AGW debate. Check out these sites for the correct way to think about this issue: http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2006/11/20/21248/499
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2006/12/22/231145/76
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=13
# 30 | ed | December 28, 2006 4:03 PM
Hmmmm.
1. Please re-read #17, replace "paradigm" with "wild ass guess". Thank you.
2. To promote the climate science you pushed the politics, now the cart's before the horse and the politics is pushing the science. Congrats! Now the rest of us get to deal with the fact that scientists really don't know anything at all.
3. Am I alone in mentioning that we're still at the tail end of the last major Ice Age? Would it be impolite for me to mention that perhaps, just perhaps, the planet's temperature is rising *to* it's normal level rather than *from*?
4. Dare I mention that we could be in the midst of a interim between little ice ages? That the warming we're seeing is entirely transient, offering the illusion of being humanity driven but is instead driven entirely by outside forces? That we might be seeing warming over the next few decades only to be hammered with another little ice age that'll cause even greate devastation than any nonsensical warming?
I dare!
5. And I suppose I should point out that having the earth warm up is entirely better than having the bloody thing cool down. For one thing it's rather difficult to grow cereal crops under 5 feet of snow. So frankly I'm far less impressed with people screaming about global warming, which doesn't seem to have many downsides, than global cooling, which would be an utter disaster.
I await more nonsensical drivel from the climate science forces at play. But you'd better be covering your collective ass. If the global temperatures start to plummet, your reputations can careers will follow.
# 31 | stewart | December 29, 2006 8:42 AM
Mencius (#15) was concerned about unfettered politization resulting from the lack of checks and balances. Examining the past 6 years, I'd agree there is every right to be concerned. When the government has been run by those devoted to maintaining their power rather than providing good government, and who beleive will is more important than reality, nasty things happen, whether to other nations, political prisoners, international agreements, or those who are constrained by reality rather than belief (such as scientists).
Kevin, I think that reality triumphs over belief faster in science than anywhere else. Think of n-rays, cold fusion, and all the wonder cures for cancer that have been succesfully demonstrated not to be true.
As for being oversold, I don't buy it. And I'd love to hear that Rocky Mountain glaciers and snowpack won't decrease, but all the eveidence I'm aware of is that glaciers are shrinking, snowpack is decreasing every year, and stream flows have markedly declined, at least on the eastern slopes. Couple that with increased evaporation and decreased winter snow cover, and the plains and prairies are becoming hard-hit.
# 32 | outeast | January 4, 2007 10:45 AM
KevinV:
I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on Garhane's anecdotal contribution (post 18 and 19). If I understand correctly, he seems to be implying that there is a possibility that the new (or renewed?) tentativeness you report having been hearing may be at least in part a cognitive issue rather than a rational response - a special sort of response to priming that is peculiar to scientists, perhaps. This sounds an interesting (and feasible) hypothesis to me, and I'd like to hear if you think it worth taking into account. Thanks!
# 33 | kevin v | January 4, 2007 5:31 PM
outeast:
I read garhane's comment with amusement when he/she posted it and I felt while reading it that I could picture the scene perfectly and fit dozens of scientists I know within that frame. I'm not sure that's really what's going on here, but it may be similar. A lot of this has to do with how scientists are trained. In my experience, you don't pass orals in your PhD program without saying "I don't know" and "I'm not sure" over and over again. Your committee wants to test your knowledge, but also test your attitude. If your attitude is to stretch what you know and what you can prove, it is considered a mortal sin. What they want is for you to say what you know and what you can back up and what you can surmise from the data, until you've reached a point, and then stop and say, "I'm not sure." This culture of conservatism is imbued from day 1 as you watch your senior scientist colleagues grill seminar speakers, as you take classes, and as you discuss research with your advisor.
Perhaps that partially explains what's going on. As a group, we scientists are drilled to be conservative. Now that we're seeing some people of our community (those who make the media) stretch things a bit, our natural conservatism is kicking in?
# 34 | kevin v | January 5, 2007 11:31 AM
Thanks SteveB -- I just got tired of having the trollish comments muck up this thread, so I deleted the whole string from old #32 on, including my own. Since yours didn't refer to an existing comment any longer I also removed it, but you were absolutely right.
# 35 | outeast | January 11, 2007 5:09 AM
Thanks for the response, Kevin.
# 36 | Twill00 | January 23, 2007 4:21 PM
Reminds me of the Seinfeld line "Not that there's anything wrong with that." Any time that a character said anything regarding first gays (then later about almost anything), the characters had to use those words as a ritual disclaimer.
Now you have the ritual disclaimer that, to point out clear flaws in junk science, the person pointing out the flaws must disclaim membership in the skeptics, at risk of his career! Since when did "skeptic" become a bad word in any real science?
Oh, yes - since "global climate change" (name a decade the world's climate did not change) became the holy grail of world environmentalists.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
# 37 | David Tufte | January 26, 2007 1:02 PM
May I suggest "winner's curse" rather than "buyer's remorse"? The latter is about regret, while the former is about misjudgements.
It isn't perfect for your case either, but winner's curse is the name given in economics to the idea that when you buy something, you need to recognize that every other person who could've bought the good at that price and passed thought it was a bad deal.
In this case, perhaps the overall position of global warming is correct, but many scientists are starting to feel that they've bought into one too many aspects of it than they should have.
# 38 | Aaron Treacher | January 26, 2007 11:29 PM
So in the following:
To do that we had to ramp up our rhetoric. We had to figure out ways to tone down our natural skepticism (we are scientists, after all) in order to put on a united face. We knew it would mean pushing the science harder than it should be. We knew it would mean allowing the boundary-pushers on the "it's happening" side free reign while stifling the boundary-pushers on the other side.
Are you not thus suggesting scientific misconduct?
# 39 | Hank Roberts | April 17, 2007 6:06 AM
This now seems like foreshadowing of the 'framing' idea.
Combined with the notes about how poor the academic pay is --- perhaps industry will accept scientists who recant their prior statements and are willing to give a little to get a little?